𝐖𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄 ━ five hargreeves

13│OUT OF THE FRYING PAN, INTO THE FIRE

▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅

❛ ᴡᴀsᴛᴇʟᴀɴᴅs ᴏғ ᴛɪᴍᴇ​​​​​​​​​​. ❜ ° . ༄
- ͙۪۪˚   ▎❛ 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐄𝐍 ❜   ▎˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
»»————- ꒰ᴏᴜᴛ ᴏғ ᴛʜᴇ
ғʀʏɪɴɢ ᴘᴀɴ, ɪɴᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ ғɪʀᴇ ꒱


❝ I NEED YOU TO PROMISE
ME SOMETHING ❞

▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅

2029

The monotonous landscape of crumbled buildings and scattered rubble had faded into darkness as night fell, covering the landscape in a blackness so thick it was impossible to see your hand in front of your face. There were still no stars or moon in the sky most nights so the only light available was the fading fire.

The only use for the flame had been for warmth for there was little in the way of food and less in the way of water. Five had long since grown used to the sharp pangs of hunger that came with being stuck ten years into the apocalypse; while the earth was recovering, it wasn't nearly fast enough for two humans that needed daily nourishment. He knew Dolores felt them too, though they both tried their best not to complain for that would do little to make them feel better. Instead, the brunette had suggested that instead of food at once-daily mealtimes, they feed their minds. This consisted of debates on a series of topics that they both knew enough about to have an hour— or longer— discussion.

Today's subject had been the existence of multiverses which, to his surprise, they both agreed upon. His opinion, of course, came with the math to theoretically prove it. Dolores' was based on pure belief so their different perspectives had provided an interesting conversation— or so he'd thought: the brunette was now asleep with her head in his lap. (A part of the reason for her lack of interest could be that the repetitive motion of his fingers combing through her hair had lulled her into unconsciousness.)

Now he sat alone in the growing darkness, the faint remaining embers of the flame providing barely enough light for him to see the outline of Dolores' face. He wasn't sure how long ago she'd fallen asleep— time was nearly irrelevant in a post-apocalyptic world— but her breathing was deep and even, the sound audible enough in the otherwise silent night. As she slept, he thought.

He often thought about a great many things and his mind was never fully able to rest, even in sleep. On this particular night his mind took him to his life in the Academy, his father's voice a constant timbre over all the memories he had of the place. None of them were particularly pleasant but he found that he often took them out to examine them when time was allowed to think that what the outcome might've been if he had done something differently. There were a thousand different possibilities, of course, hence the multiverse.

He then went forward in time to the present, now, when he was alone except for the only other person in the world and what, exactly, the statistics were that led to to cause this to happen. There was potentially a one in a billion chances that Dolores was the person he ended up with. Somehow, that made his time here seem less. . . unbearable. He didn't know how she did it but in the span of ten years she'd become the most important person to him. Another, more pleasant, permanent fixture in his existence.

Every equation had a constant. Without them, nothing could be solved. Five often preferred to think of his life as an equation and in that equation, one variable had to remain the same or else it would stop functioning. Until he was fifteen, his father had taken that place. Now, it was Dolores.

He wasn't quite sure how it happened that she had come to replace his father but she had. He knew constants weren't supposed to change but sometimes the original formula was improved upon due to another variable being added in to replace the old, so that was how he explained it. He had long since known she had become the one person he couldn't live without, though putting it in the context of numbers was a more noticeable realization that made him consider a tangent of the equation: her safety.