"... Help me stop the Beast?" Cole shook his head, turning around. "I already have a plan. You're wasting my time."

Roman's eyebrows furled. Of course this wouldn't be that easy.

"Your current plan won't work." Roman said, quietly walking to Cole. "The RFI will kill the Beast, yes, but you will die in the process, and kill anybody capable of defeating the threat that will take over the world."

Cole paused. His head partially back towards Roman. "What are you talking about?"

Roman stepped forward. Time to prove his worth. "I am from the future, Cole. After the Beast is defeated, the conduit gene is destroyed, eradicated from the world… But it resurfaces. Conduits begin being held in maximum security prisons, until a man named Delsin Rowe shows up."

Cole turned around fully, now interested.

"Delsin had a very unique power, Cole. He could touch any conduit, and take their power for his own usage."

Cole's eyes widened. "Wait, you mean-?"

Roman nodded. "After defeating the head of the prisons, Delsin had begun absorbing the powers of every conduit he could get his hands on. He became unstoppable.

"Eventually, he began hearing of Kessler, the man who travelled back in time. He, of course, desired this power, but you had eradicated his body nearly three decades before he had ever even considered time travel. But, by then, security footage of that day began circulating. Everyone knew the true identity of Kessler.

"By then, a team of people began rebelling against Delsin, although quietly. This was their chance. They had retrieved your body from the bottom of the ocean, and began sorting through your available abilities. They found the genes that would eventually given you time travel. They could only give it to somebody who didn't had an inactive conduit gene; I was the only one who fit the bill.

"They had equipped me with my glove-" he lifted his glove "-which would allow me to harness these powers, and give Delsin no chance to take them from me. We trained. I honed my powers. Delsin found us. I ran back in time, to here: Where I knew I needed to find you. To stop the Beast and make sure you live through doing it."

Cole became intensely quiet, thinking through the story in his head again. His eyes narrowed at Roman. "How are you going to stop the RFI from killing us all?"

Roman let out a relieved sigh. This was the easy part. "Technology progressed a lot in 30 years." He began, pushing a small part on the bottom of his glove. That part popped out, showing a compartment, made for carrying small things. Out of it, he pulled a flash drive. "I have the blueprints here. All we have to do is rewire a couple parts of the RFI, and give it the Beast's genetic code. Your friend Kuo should be able to provide that.

Roman held out the flash drive for Cole to take. Cole took it, putting it in his backpacks pocket.

"Thanks, Roman. But I have to ask-"

"The plague is coded in, too, Cole. It'll only kill the inactive conduit genes within the people infected. We're smarter than to accidentally kill off half the population."

"... Alright. Thanks." Cole said, throwing a lightning tether away, pulling himself up onto a nearby rooftop.

Roman watched him go, before sitting down in his little alleyway. Hopefully, hopefully, this all worked.