As I stepped out, something felt.. Wrong. Like someone was right there behind me.
The portal closed, and the feeling stayed. I heard a gun click, and my eyes widened.
"Hello, Roman."
The voice sounded so.. Familiar?
"Kuo?"
I turned, seeing a 30-year-old Lucy Kuo aiming a gun to my head. But.. That was impossible. How could she of known exactly where I was going to be?
"Seven years is a long time, Roman. And I'm an NSA agent. You do the math."
We were in a back alley of the Native American reservation Delsin lived in. I found several ways that I could get out, but I wanted to see how this was going to end.
"So, you figured out where Delsin Rowe lived, found the deepest, darkest alley, and checked this place for, what, seven years? Seems a bit obsessive, Lucy."
Her eyes narrowed. "Don't call me that."
I rolled my eyes. "Come on, Kuo, I didn't give you any indication of when I'd be here."
"You confirmed it started in 2018."
"So, you just checked here every day for 10 months? Seems a bit farfetched."
"Cole developed Time Powers of his own-"
I groaned. "-And detected Temporal Distortion. Perfect."
She grinned, pulling back on the chamber of the gun. "So, any last words?"
I shrugged. "These aren't my last words."
Her eyes widened in surprise, and she pulled on the trigger. The bullet slowed to a stop, time itself around me, and I plucked the bullet out of thin air. I took a leisured step to the side of the gun, and placed it to the weapon's side.
I let time go back to normal speed, the bullet crashing into the gun and forcing it out of her hand. She gasped and growled, grabbing my throat and chilling me to the bone.
I let a time portal open below her, and she fell in, losing her grip on me as she screamed. I landed back on the ground as she slipped through, before I opened the portal again above me, her falling through and landing on the ground with a loud THUMP.
I sighed, looking to Kuo. "Look, Kuo, you're cool and all, literally, but I gotta do this. It's the only way to make sure the timeline's safe. I don't wanna be forced to kill you."
She looked at me, hatred turning her already Icy gaze even more.. Cold. "And how do I know you wanna 'fix' the timeline?"
"I could've made that bullet tear through your skull."
Kuo just screamed, an ice pillar appearing below me, shooting me into the air. I manipulated the air around me to a time where it was dense enough to stand on. That was only one or two milliseconds near the beginning, but I prolonged those milliseconds so that I could easily stand on what looked like thin air.
Briefly, I saw a Military Truck coming down the road. It was a Curdan Cay holding truck, designed to keep conduits in and everybody else out.
I sped towards it, landing on a nearby rooftop. The vehicle simply kept driving. No one broke out. The world was safe.
I let out a sigh of relief, looking to Kuo. "My work here is done."
She looked at me with her eyes narrowed. "You so sure about that? You never know what could happen."
"I've run this calculation a million times, Kuo. There's no other way for Delsin to get the powers he needs." I rose my hand, opening a portal.
".. Where are you going to go now..?"
I looked to the swirling portal. "I'm going to assemble a team. One that fights threats like Delsin. Strong. United."
".. That seems a little cheesy."
I grinned. "I know."
I stepped through the portal, leaving Kuo there to wonder my next move. When or where I'd show up in the timeline.
Luckily, there's no such thing as one timeline.
