Wow, guys. Thank you for your support. I got quite a few hits and more reviews than I had hoped for. Keep them coming! This chapter is a set up. The next are going to be even more exciting. It's worth mentioning that this chapter is about the average length of what I'll post.

Also, if ever anything is in italics, it is a memory. If ever anything is bolded it is from the Notebook.

1. Do not interact with the past Simon. He needs to become you, not be told who to be.

-First Simon

Simon arrived in the past at the date the notebook said was the best time to appear. It was about three or four weeks before the first sighting of Superhoodie that he could remember any of them talking about. He wished now that he had asked Alisha to tell him exactly what he had done but Simon remembered how much he had hated hearing about himself. This was going to be so confusing he thought, setting his backpack down in the ruined loft.

The instructions for legally obtaining the loft were in the notebook, as well as cell phone numbers for a realty agent and a bank that would give him a loan. Everything was meticulously prepared and planned out and Simon was satisfied that his past selves had done their job properly.

He started simple. He cleaned the apartment, replaced the lights and fixed the plumbing. That was the first week.

After he had finished the work around the loft he steeled himself he went out to find Seth. It wasn't hard, he had managed to time his arrival perfectly, just as Seth was pulling the plastic off his desk. It was easy enough to trade money for the ability to be invulnerable to other powers, and ignored it when Seth asked who he was, turning and walking out the door at a brisk pace, jumping over a stairway railing and hiding behind a column when Seth ran after him.

He had three powers now. Foresight – he had seen Seth running after him, the ability to go back in time and now invulnerability to other powers. He supposed that maybe the latter should have countered the others but the accidental insight into the immediate future proved otherwise. Looking through the notebook it mentioned that this wasn't the case for the third Simon, who had to trade Seth for the Invulnerability power since the relationship between Seth and Kelly not as cordial as it had been in this – the fourth Simon's - timeline. This was interesting, and for the first time Simon began to hope again.

He had an advantage that his other selves didn't have.

Next Simon ordered furniture online, tables to line the walls, countdown clocks, a shower screen, a rack for his clothes, a bed frame and mattress. He had managed to get a credit card in his uncles name and ordered a few vanity items he had remembered. Towels, a Polaroid camera, linens, weights, a punching bag, and the materials he needed to build the P.O. box.

The jewelry box contained everything he could possibly need. Diagrams of the box and locket, and a suggestion that he make at least two lockets so he could open the box whenever he wanted to, even outlines of where all the furniture had been set up. It bothered him a bit that numerous other versions of himself had come back and fixed this place up in exactly the same way, so he decided to paint the walls. He chose a light green, and painted the far wall a yellow, Alisha's favorite color.

He smiled after he had finished. Something was already different.

It was as simple as changing the paint, that was enough to convince Simon that as long as he could do one thing different, change one thing, what was to stop him changing everything else?

All he had done so far was the busywork. The easy set up. He had started to follow the group, but just barely, snapping Polaroid's whenever he got the chance. It wasn't too hard, the most difficult part had been when he began to take pictures of Alisha. Simon would have much rather run up to her, pulled her close, and never let her go, breathe into her hair, hold her, but. . . that would be later. That would be the worst part, he knew, trying to stop himself from telling Alisha how much he loved her.

He sat down on the bed frame that surrounded the queen mattress – painted an off white – and looked around. He had already set up the clocks, timed them properly, and put up the few pictures that had been in the jewelry box as well as the three dozen or so he had managed to take. There was one picture that stood out. The beat up photograph of him and Alisha smiling in front of the Las Vegas sign.

Simon smiled and tried again not to cry. She was alive. She was here, he was here, they may not be together but for the moment, she was safe. He kept repeating that and looked at the ceiling of the loft, taking deep breaths.

Alisha was safe, and right now that was all that mattered.

What if he did something wrong? Simon looked at the notebook and opened it. He had to wait until he needed to save Nathan from the Virtue zombies before he did anything else. He had about a week left, as far as he could tell. He might as well spend that time studying and preparing.

There was a tab sticking out of the notebook, like one he would use in his textbook. It was labeled simply 'ICE' and Simon knew that it meant In Case of Emergency.

If something goes wrong, The first Simon had written, you can go back in time to change it. Just remember that you do not replace the past you, you merely appear alongside of them. If you cannot stay out of the way and fix whatever has been done incorrectly without interfering so much that the past you does not go back again, there will exist a reality with two – or possibly three – of yourself.

That paragraph alone made Simons head hurt. But it didn't help him. There was a line after another few paragraphs that had been bolded and underlined.

If you need to, you can go back in time and kill yourself.

Simon closed the book almost immediately after that sentence and stood up, walking over to the sink on the other side of the loft. He stared at the steel bowl, his heart racing. He thought he was going to be sick. Could he really though?

He looked at his reflection and clenched his fists around the sides of the sink, clenching his jaw. Could he even do it? He'd never killed someone like that, in cold blood. He supposed it wasn't without a reason, it would be to save Alisha. He knew that he would sacrifice himself to save her in an instant, but did that really mean he had to literally do it?

Simon went back to the notebook and opened to the ICE tab. It continued after the bolded print, explaining the experiment the second Simon went through to prove his assertion.

I bought a mouse from a pet shop. I put it in its cage and then left for an hour. I went to the bar, had a drink, and then came back into the loft. I put the mouse in a small shoebox and went outside, going back in time a half hour. I went back in the loft, and (the Simon holding the notebook could see where the second Simon's hand had trembled a bit) broke the neck of the mouse in the cage and replaced it with the mouse from the future I had brought with me.

The future mouse showed no sign of trauma, and continued as normal. I hid in the loft until the past Simon showed up from the bar I had been at, put the future mouse in the shoebox and left.

I am looking at the dead mouse, and I can definitely say that if I need to, I can kill myself with no negative consequences other than I now have a body to get rid of.

R&R, thanks everyone!