Oh, no... that cannot be.
The said truth of reality by her truly struck me like a whirlwind.
She was right, there had been nothing to ensure that I was the same Kairi and as this memory got compressed, let’s just say like a file from a computer, as a ZIP file, it would have its quality reduced... but wait, what was the relation between this and her Rifter?
"Oh, so you didn’t get it."
The f*ck you mean by not getting it?! You explained the nothingburger of sh*t!
This whole time here she never explained anything about her f*cking rifter.
"Selene, I got to be honest. I really want to punch you right now."
"Do it." Her eyes were serious. Those cold sleepy eyes gaze at me.
"No, I’m not going to."
"Why not?"
"Let’s just say it’s my way to shake my frustration off." I shrugged.
"So, you were kidding. Fair enough."
Never mind, let me retract my words. I said that because I meant it.
She is the kind of person who would hide something crucial that should’ve been told while the whole world was on-fire or the earth was having an earthquake.
That’s Selene in a nutshell.
"Should I explain it to you like a five-years- old too, hm?"
"No need. I’m an adult, a grown woman."
"Alright, sure. Let me start with something specific then."
"Do you know what a void is?"
"Well, it’s the space in a vacuum territory, no?"
"Correct. And how does it work, my dear Kairi?"
Not her starting to overuse that calling.
"Well, space is space. An empty room that can be filled with molecules."
"False. Kairi, use your mind for a bit."
I already did what the... never mind.
Apparently, we both are too thick-headed to continue this. I would rather forget that we have ever met before at this point.
"Don’t say something that is forbidden to say."
"Alright, my bad. Anyway, go on."
"Void is not exactly nothing, but something that negates space."
"The negation of space then implies a negative form of space, a counter-measure that works as the anti gravity. Also why it is formless but has a lot of particles contained in it."
"And what you consider as nothingness is just the illusion of space being empty when what actually happens is that the space you usually are familiar with is negated by time."
Okay, this is a bit too much for me...
"If that’s so, how does time negate space then?"
"Simple. Space and time are interconnected with each other. If negative time represents a positive space then positive space represents a negative time."
"Hold on, it’s not that simple."
Negative time indeed has been discovered, but considered to be a hypothetical framework.
"Why?"
"Because... if you do that, how would you break the void with your rifter then?"
"Yet another easy question." She said, her tone condescending.
"First of all, let’s consider space as water with much lesser density and is not mass-dependent. Water’s volume is highly dependent on its mass, but not for the space’s volume. Which means any mass can break the water, from making a ripple to creating a hole by isolating the mass. And then, to understand the way it works, instead of explaining..."
"Let me show you the way it works."
Her hand weaved then her finger pointed at the top of her rifter.
I imagined myself watching a video titled "Quantum Physics with Selene" while—
Wait, is that radioactive?
A spark of light... no, something much more distorted and unstable.
Wait no, impossible...
Distorted imagery of light... the so-called Tachyon.
Her hand made a gunning gesture, shooting the distorted light into barely breaking her own stasis, leaving a tiny hole. I hated to admit it, but that was genius. Incredible.
"Oh, you science people called it Tachyon? I would call it the ultra-high concentrated emission of light instead."
I nodded upon hearing her haughtiness when saying that.
Next, another magical thing happened.
The said Tachyon got cancelled from breaking her stasis, condensed as if its time froze.
"Uh, may I touch it?"
"Sure."
I approached the frozen ’light’, my hand touching it, and it feels...
Light. No puns intended. It’s like touching a mist if not cloud that keeps sparkling.
Selene looked at me, half-smiling witnessing my curiosity getting into me, as her hand covered her mouth.
"Do you want to know how it happens?"
I nodded immediately while distorting the said ’light’ with my fingers.
"Space is the field of gaps meaning that each particle cannot make a contact with another. And what you think as touching, or even kissing, is not exactly a direct contact but distorting the level-surface of the said object."
"And every single object has its domain and boundary, meaning that the interference of boundary leads to the interaction between one object’s domain with another."
"So, you’re saying I never touch it. Just... distort its element’s property."
I stared at my fingers. The afterglow of the "light"—or whatever dimension-breaking nonsense Selene called it—still pulsed softly against my skin.
It didn’t burn. It didn’t buzz.
But my nerves weren’t convinced. My hand felt wrong.
Lighter. Heavier. Displaced.
"Exactly. What you would consider as a contact is the way object interacts with each other. The atoms of your fingertip did drive back the surface field of condensed photons."
So, I’m gaslighting myself into thinking I touched something when it’s not the case...
I gave her a smug look with a faint smile, accepting my defeat.
Wait, hold on. I know these stuff are fascinating and all but...
Aren’t we going to save Helena or what?
I was being complacent enough, not realizing her explanation once again served as a distraction against the current objective due to an inquisitive mind I possessed.
"Now, do you understand how difficult it is to control this sh*t, Kairi? So please, for once more, think before you speak."
Oh no, she even started to cuss. I really dislike this character development of her.
I noticed her vocabulary did blend with mine, so I could see it being the case.
"Yeah, sorry. Thought it was actually easy for you."
"I will always forgive you anytime you ever make a mistake. Please keep doing more."
At least, don’t show your masochistic side...
I clenched my fists, pressing them into my thighs to steady my breathing.
The more Selene talked, the less I felt like I understood—and that, more than anything, pissed me off. She had this way of talking like she was the only one who saw the whole picture, like I was some child fumbling with puzzles I didn’t have the pieces to.
"Okay, okay," I muttered, trying to keep my voice steady.
"So, this ’Void Rifter’ thing is... what? A cheat code for manipulating space and time?"
Selene’s lips twitched into a smirk, her eyes sharp, watching me carefully as if she were waiting for me to catch up.
"It’s not a cheat code, Kairi. It’s a tool. A paradoxical one."
"A paradox?" My voice rose slightly, but I quickly stifled it, unwilling to show how much her words were getting under my skin. "You really think we’re going to sit here talking about paradoxes? Because, I gotta tell you, I hate paradoxes. They just—"
She raised a hand, cutting me off mid-sentence. Her fingers hovered in the air as if weaving invisible threads, and then she snapped her fingers with finality.
"Forget the paradox for now. We have talked about it before. No need to hate it."
I didn’t reply right away. Her confidence, as frustrating as it was, made her words ring with an unsettling truth. I was out of my depth, no matter how much I hated to admit it. But that didn’t change the fact that we had bigger issues at hand.
"So, what are you saying?"
I asked, forcing my voice to stay even, to hide the growing frustration.
Selene’s expression softened, but only just. "You need to understand how it works. The way light bends reality. The way space and time aren’t as straightforward as you think."
I frowned, struggling to keep up. "Okay, so what’s the difference then?"
She let out a soft sigh. "You’ve touched it already. The way light doesn’t behave normally. The way everything feels... wrong."
She gestured to the pulsating energy above us, the shifting mass of condensed light hanging in the air like some foreign object that didn’t belong in this reality.
"That’s not just light. It’s the residual echo that’s been reduced—frozen in time."
"Your fingers are distorting the boundary between you and it. Your mind is just trying to make sense of it."
I stared at my hand, still hovering over the shifting light, and felt a wave of disbelief hit me. I couldn’t shake the strange sensation that the world around me wasn’t as solid as it should be. Like reality itself was a little... off.
"So what does that mean?" I asked quietly, half to myself. "What do we do with all of this?"
Selene’s eyes darkened, her voice dropping an octave. "What we do is nothing simple. If it were simple, you wouldn’t be standing here right now. You wouldn’t need to be asking questions." She let the words sink in, her gaze holding mine. "But what we can do... is manipulate it. Use it to change things. To alter what’s already been done."
I froze, my heart suddenly skipping a beat.
"Change things? You mean... change the past?"
"Nope, not changing the past."
"But your fate and Helene’s future by bending the space-time continuum."
A shiver ran through me. I could feel the weight of her words settling like a stone in my chest. This wasn’t just about saving Helena anymore, but much bigger—something that could unravel everything.
"So what now?" I asked, my voice steady despite the rising fear in my gut.
"How do we fix this?"
The air around us shifted again. This time, I wasn’t sure I was ready for what came next.