"Location: Richmond, Virginia, September 3rd 2024"

It was a sunny Tuesday morning in Richmond. Kimi was in the castle's attic, having finished patching up a window that had broken ten minutes earlier, and she was now rummaging through random boxes to see what she could find.

"Hey, it's the ball that me and the gang used to play as babies. Maybe the twins will want to play with it after their born." Kimi thought, holding up the famous green, blue, and orange star ball that she and the other Rugrats had used to play with as babies, which now looked worn out after so long.

However, Kimi failed to notice an old soccer ball that was on the ground, until she felt something round under her left foot and her leg sliding out from under her. She crashed into a tower of boxes, sending the contents of said boxes to the floor. Fortunately, there was no damage to her extended belly. She got up and started cleaning up the boxes. However, just as she was putting the contents back in one of the boxes, she noticed a photo on the ground. She picked it up, looked at it, and stared in shock.

"Is that... that can't be possible!" Kimi thought.

In the photo was the Rugrats, except Zack and Jesse, as adults. However, the only thing was that they appeared to be different. Dil looked like he was a hippie, Phil looked ugly, Angelica looked old even though she was young, and Chuckie had a really long beard. And there were a few kids with everyone that she didn't recognize. But the weirdest thing about the photo was that she and Tommy had their arms wrapped around each other in a loving fashion. And like everyone else, she also looked different. In the photo, she was wearing glasses, had pixie-styled hair, and was wearing a pink shirt and yellow pants, instead of a royal Confederate Uniform. However, some things in the photo were still the same. Tommy, Lil, Stu and Didi still looked the same as they did currently, and Angelica and Harold, who was also in the photo, still looked like they were in a relationship.

"This doesn't seem right. I don't recognize those kids, most of the gang look weird, and while I did have a short crush on Tommy during the TP+KP incident back in 2014, I never dated him. Maybe Peter knows what's going on. After all, he is the one that knows the most about time out of the whole gang." Kimi thought.

Kimi made her way downstairs to Peter's office, where he was doing work at his desk.

"Peter, can I talk to you for a second?" Kimi asked.

Peter looked up and smiled at his wife.

"Sure, Kimi. What is it?" Peter asked.

Kimi handed him the photo.

"What is this?" Kimi asked.

Peter looked at the photo, and his eyes widened in shock. He looked back up at Kimi.

"Where did you get this?" Peter asked.

"Upstairs in the attic. I found this and wanted to ask you about it. I don't even remember anything like this happening." Kimi replied. She then gasped and asked "Oh no. It's my fault, isn't it? I accidentally messed something up in the past when we last went time traveling, didn't I?".

"No, don't even think that it! I can say with absolute confidence that you were not, in any way, responsible for how things are different in the photo." Peter replied softly.

"How can you say that?" Kimi asked.

"Because... I was." Peter replied.

Kimi froze in place, staring at her husband.

"What? What do you mean?" Kimi asked.

Peter sighed.

"Sit down. Let me tell you exactly what I did." Peter replied.

Kimi stepped back and sat down in a chair in front of the desk. Peter sat down in the chair behind the desk.

"It all began in 2013, after your, Tommy, Chuckie, Phil, Lil, and Dil's past selves came to the future after they messed with Angelica's karaoke machine back in 2001. I decided to use my Fork-Finder machine to see what the future was like in my original timeline's version of this year. When I got there, I saw that each of you, Angelica, and Susie were different from this timeline. All of you didn't have your jobs like you do here. You were married to Tommy, instead of Lil being married to him, and the other relationships were slightly different. Zack and Jesse never met you guys because they never moved here. Our future kids, Adam, Cassi, and Darin didn't exist. And none of you knew the Disney Characters and the Nickelodeon Characters because I never created the portal key and showed it to everyone in 1994." Peter explained.

Kimi nodded. But then she became worried again.

"Wait a minute. Couldn't what you had done cause a paradox and mess up the time-space continuum, like you talk about whenever we use one of your time machines?" Kimi asked.

Peter nodded.

"Maybe. But I altered the past and survived intact. I have some theories, but I doubt that you want to hear them." Peter replied.

Kimi shook her head.

"Actually, keep talking." Kimi replied.

Peter nodded.

"Okay, I'm sure that you know what a paradox is. It's when you alter the past in such a way as to make the future you came from impossible. It can be described as a loop. When you cancel the cause, you cancel the effect, which often reinstates the cause, which reinstates the effect, which cancels the cause, and so on and so on. Now, the one truly logical explanation that I've discovered for preventing these paradoxes is the memory-replacement theory." Peter explained.

"Memory replacement?" Kimi asked in confusion.

"Think of myself. I retained the memories that I have of the original timeline. The memory-replacement theory states that I kept those memories to ensure that a paradox would not occur. It works like this. I lived through the original timeline, where I was just a normal kid and teenager with my family. But then I went back in time and altered the present by starting the war. When my new self... my slightly younger self... went to 1990, the dimmed memories came to the forefront. They replaced the memories that I had of the timeline that now was." Peter replied. He then shook his head and asked "I'm explaining this badly, aren't I?".

Kimi shook her head and smiled.

"No, I think I understand. Thanks for the explanation." Kimi replied.

Peter smiled.

"Your welcome." Peter said.