The egg-shell encasement becomes transparent. <<if visited() < 2>>I'm given the sensation of floating just above the ground. I can see in every direction. These monitors, they let me know. I can know everything through their affordance.<<endif>>\n\n<<if $kills == 4>>[[Time Travel >>>|End]]<<else>>[[Time Travel!!! >>>|Desert]]<<endif>>

She won't die. For now, I'll have to let it go.

//The Knower//\n\n[[->|Meeting]]

[[Barbed wire the place.|ParkingLot][$barbs = 1]]\n\n[[Go home.|Home]]\n[[Time Travel >>>|Mall]]

//...and then there are those who came to shape the world - \n\nThe Knower\n\nThe Seer\n\nand the Branded One//\n\n - Second Birth:311,039,999,998,988\n\n[[->|Title]]

A moment of hesitation, and she's gone, vanished really.\n\n[[Leave.|Left]]

Nothing is left of this place, now a wasteland. I am alone here... for now.\n\n<<if $hole == 1>>A ditch divides the land in front of me. I will have a height advantage.<<endif>>\n\n<<if $barbs == 1>>Aged barbs cover the area. I will have a mobility advantage.<<endif>>\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Meeting]]

This is where we cross paths. I say something cheesy about fate. She stands there with that sad, detached look in her eyes, just staring at nothing.\n\n"Do you love me as your own?"\n\nShe often tells me she wishes she was never born.\n\n//You're the biggest mistake of my life.//\n\n[[->|Choice]]

Now it's all gone. Fast-forwarded by anything worth remembering.\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Waste]]

My mother's funeral, and //she's// there.\n\n<<if visited() == 1>>[[Say something mean to her.|Funeral]]<<endif>>\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Mall]]

Chamber a bullet. Gun cold against my palm. Her stare at nothing.\n\n[[I get it over with and shoot her.|Dead][$girlAlive = 0]]\n[[I don't want to waste my bullet.|Alive][$girlAlive = 1]]

Second Birth

A planet forms beneath me. The clouds become cold, become moist, become water. For a while I'm submerged. The water descends until Earth rises up as if from a grave.\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Prehistory]]

A ocean of glass surrounds me<<if visited() < 2>>, indefinite, all directions. An atomic aftermath, clearly.<<else>>.<<endif>>\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Universe]]

The world dissolves into molten nothingness. <<if visited() < 2>>Nothing beneath my feet. No sense of direction.\n\nGalaxies come to life and die before my eyes.<<endif>>\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Beginning]]

A mall is here now, hovercars zip all around me. The skyscrapers in the distance close me in.\n\n[[Go shopping for bullets.|Mall][$bullets = 1]]\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Far]]

E. Wexler

I get back in my chair. <<if visited() < 2>>Surrounding me, the many monitors that form the shell of this machine. Closed, they join together into an egg-shaped hull.<<endif>>\n\n[[Set course.|Strapped]]

The atmosphere is so damp, the soil soft. I can dig a big hole out of the soil, no problem.\n\n<<if $hole == 0>>[[Dig the whole place up.|Prehistory][$hole = 1]]<<endif>>\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Skip]]

I go until there are people around. I need to find where it all starts. Where I start.\n\n<<if $hole == 0>>[[>>> Time Travel >>>|ParkingLot]]<<else>>[[Time Travel >>>|Ditch]]<<endif>>

<<if $kills == 0>>Not much noise from the gun. The bullet sledgehammers her through the temple. The sound, to her, is of every stampede, avalanche, TV snow, radio static fast forwarded to a nanosecond and played back in her head. She sees nothing flash before her eyes.<<else if $kills == 4>>Gun jams. She gets away, vanishes really. How could this happen!?<<endif>>\n\n[[Leave.|Left][$kills += 1]]

My mother's home, pregnant.\n\n[[Time Travel >>>|Funeral]]

[[Barbed wire the ditch.|Ditch][$barbs = 1]]\n\n[[Go home.|Home]]\n[[Time Travel >>>|Mall]]