Act I: Cyris

"I was 16 when it first happened. Freaked me out honestly, being on my birthday and all.

"’Okay sweetie, I need you to clean the living room and the deck,’ my mom says and checks her watch, ’your party starts in four hours.’ 

I sighed. 

’Listen, I’m going to the store to pick up the cake and I’ll be back at before 11:30.’

 ’Fine. I should have everything done by then.’

’Thanks hun.’ she says and kisses me on my forehead. 

’Mom, I’m 16.’ 

’And you’re still my baby.’ she says as she leaves the house. And so I cleaned the house, set the table up and the balloons and such, whatever. I... I had fun, I’m pretty sure. ...I had to have had fun. It was a great day of having the family together, I’m sure."

"Hold on... why don’t you remember what happened on your birthday?" Bree asked. 

Chris paused. 

"... Its story time. No interrupting." 

"Whew... forgive me for trespassing." 

Chris took in a deep breath. 

"I went to bed on a high that night. All excited about being a new me, whatever that means. And I decided to sleep in the next morning, or at least tried to.

"’Honey, its 10 o’clock! We need to get ready!’ my mom said, shaking me awake. 

’... what? Get ready for what...?’ 

’Your birthday, Chris. Its the 25th!’ 

I sat up in bed and squinted at her. 

’No it’s not, it’s Saturday.’ 

She sighed. 

’Come on Chris, you can’t skip your birthday.’ she says and leaves the room. I was confused. I was more than confused. So I got dressed and went downstairs. The balloons from last night were gone. I looked it the fridge and there was no leftover cake. Everything was like the party never happened. 

’Alright sweetie, I need you to clean the living room and the deck,’ my mom says and checks her watch, ’your party starts in four hours.’ 

I stood silent, perplexed. 

’I’m gonna go to the store to pick up the cake and I’ll be back before 11:30.’ 

’Uh... O...kay...?’ ’

Thanks hun.’ she says and kisses me on my forehead. I just stared. Before my mom left the house she asked, 

’... Are you okay?’

’Um... yea. ...I think so...’ 

’Alright. I’ll see you at 11:30.’ She closes the door behind her and I looked around the house, bewildered. I checked my phone and it said ’July 25th’ on the lockscreen. I was so confused, trying to figure out whether yesterday was just a dream or if today was an elaborate joke. The latter seemed to make more sense, and I spent my whole birthday just completely out of it. It wasn’t until that night in bed that I really thought about it. 

’Oh my god... I have to relive my birthday until the end of time!’ Of course I was wrong. It only took me a week to realise I was living every day twice. Tried telling my parents, they thought I was just spouting nonsense. My doctor suggested that I get more sleep. But I couldn’t. Everything happened twice. Or at least it almost did."

"How would everything ’almost’ happen twice...?" Wade asked. Chris paused like he didn’t like what he was about to say. He takes a deep breath.

"... One day me and my best friend, Damien, were having a sleepover. And at some point, he decides to tell me one of his largest insecurities. He has had a serious phobia of kiwis since he was 7. Strange, I know. But on the repeat day, he doesn’t mention it. He says absolutely nothing about any insecurity."

"Did that mess anything up? I thought the two worlds didn’t need to be the same." Bree asks. 

"Well things like that happened a lot. I would hear very similar sentences from people on each day and every once in a while something doesn’t get repeated. So it didn’t so much as mess anything up as I messed things up.

"Weeks later we’re at a party and I see him pour a cup of strawberry kiwi juice. 

’Dude wait.’ I say and stop him. 

’What?’ he asks. 

’That’s strawberry kiwi.’ I say, motioning towards the glass. Damien gave me a confused and concerned look. 

’...What does that matter?’ 

I cocked my head and was like, 

’You have a phobia, remember?’ 

And immediately after I said it, I realised my mistake. He hadn’t told me about it in the repeat world. Damien could see that I had put my foot in my mouth and said, 

’You went through my journal?’ 

’No, I didn’t!’ 

’Then how do you know?’ he questions. 

’You­ you told me!’ I explained, knowing that the excuse wouldn’t work. 

’I’ve never told anyone that! I can’t believe you Chris!’ 

’Damien, you go­’ 

’No, you crossed the line.’ Damien said and stormed off. Damien held a grudge. He never spoke to me again. He didn’t even look at me..."

"That’s pretty harsh..." Bree says. 

"Yea... it was." 

"And he really never talked to you again? Not ever?" 

"No. He no longer considered me a friend. But I soon learned. I couldn’t let a mistake like that happen again.

"I cleaned up my act and lived every single day exactly the same. I made the same mistakes, said the same things and kept track of the little differences between the worlds. It did me well..."

Chris scoffed and shook his head. 

"What is it?" Bree asked. 

"It almost did me well.

"I was in the wrong place at the wrong time one day. Strolling down the street I saw a body in an alley. I went to investigate and found that the man was dead. Bleeded out. I frantically tried to wipe the blood off my hand to call the police, but I wasn’t quick enough. The police was there, and I was covered in the victim’s blood. And that was a bad situation to be in."

"But you didn’t kill him." Wade says. 

"Yea, but I found him." 

"So you had to find him again..." Bree says. 

"Yea. Though I’m not sure what I did wrong because I replicated the day exactly." 

"Did wrong?" Bree asks, "What do you mean?" 

"The court case that followed.

"There I stood in the middle of a trial, in front of a jury that looked down on me. And my lawyer did well to defend me. I couldn’t be placed at the scene of the crime when the victim died. And on the repeat day something was different. I got different looks from the judge, the jury, and the witnesses. It was like none of them believed me. And in the end, they didn’t. Long story short I was doing 10 years."

"Bëma, Chris." 

"What?" 

"You had to do 10 years?" 

"No, what did you just say?" 

"... bëma?" 

"Yes." 

"Is that not English?" 

"No that’s not English!" 

Bree looks at Wade. 

"A lot of the humans don’t know much about their native tongue." he says. 

"Oh."

Chris looks at Bree and Wade. 

"Don’t talk like I’m not right here!" 

"Continue your story! How did you end up in cryosleep?" 

"Right. So I couldn’t bear to live half my life in a cell.

"One day a guy visited my cell during lunch. I spent most of my time laying in bed so he asked, 

’Why are you always sleeping?’ 

I sighed. ’Because I don’t want to be here.’ 

’Sleeping doesn’t change that.’ 

I closed my eyes. ’Maybe not.’ 

The man leaned against the wall. 

’If only you could live in another reality.’ he says. 

I lifted my head and looked at him. 

’So you do.’ the man says. 

’I do what?’ 

’You live in another reality.’ 

I sat up in my bed. ’Says who?’ 

’A normal person would look at me like I belong in an asylum, but you seemed perfectly fine with that idea. There’s a way out for people like you, ya know.’ 

’"A way out"?’ 

’Cryosleep, kid. Let’s you sleep for as long as you want. You interested?’ 

I thought about it for a second. 

’... Yea.’ 

The guy ended up sneaking me through the prison to its basement where he had a cryosleep capsule hidden in a room. 

’How long do you wanna be in there?’ he asked. 

I almost said 10 years but... I thought maybe I could make the better choice for myself. 

’Indefinitely.’ 

The man smiled and laughed. 

’Good answer, Cyrus.’ 

’It’s Chris.’ 

’Uh huh.’ 

He put me under, and everything returned to normal. Normal normal. That is, UNTIL YOU GUYS WOKE ME UP."

"Whoa whoa whoa chill out man, we didn’t know about all this." Bree says. 

"What exactly did you know?" Chris questions. 

"I knew that most all of the humans were killed in the invasion and that the prophecy said Cyrus would live to stop the King. Our King." 

Chris sighed. "Well I’m sure I’m ’Cyrus’, but this prophecy sounds way out there." 

"If you’re Cyrus then why can’t you return to your other reality?" Wade asks. 

"See, that’s the weird thing. I’d have to be sleeping the entire other day for me not to wake up there. And yet the last I was doing was driving." 

After a few moments of thinking, Chris froze. 

"...... crap." Bree says. 

She turns around to Wade. 

"Wade, we have to help him." she pleads. 

"What for? That’s not our problem." 

"Even so we got him into this mess ourselves! And think about it: he could help us win this war." 

Wade reluctantly sighed and said, "Fine." "

W­-what if I don’t wake up?" Chris finally utters. 

"Then you’d better get comfortable h-­" 

"Wade’s just joking." Bree interrupts, "You’ll make it back." 

"How?" 

Bree bites her lip.

The guards come rushing down to their cell after hearing cries of distress. They see Bree frantically clinging to the cell bars and Wade choking the life out of Chris in the back of the cell. 

"Let go of the human!" they shout. Tsaida shortly arrives to what was going on. Seeing Chris’ blue face, she opens the cell doors and draws her gun. 

"Drop him Wade!" 

While keeping an arm around Chris’ neck Wade backs up, bends down and rips off the drain cover on the floor of the cell. 

"Don’t take another step!" 

Wade takes another step with Chris and drops down the drain pipe. 

"Crap!" Tsaida says and follows them down the drain. Bree looks around. 

"Do you guys hear that ticking?" she asks the guards. They both quietly listen until they hear rapid beeping and high­tail it out of there. Bree snickers and takes the pocket watch from under the bed’s pillow. 

"What a bunch of tools." she remarks before heading down the drain. It led out immediately into a stream. On the other side was Chris and Wade, holding Tsaida in her own handcuffs. Bree hopped across the stream. 

"Nice work guys. Now all we have to do is lose the guards in the forest since nobody has a clue how to navigate through it." 

"Except for me." Tsaida says. 

"And that’s why you’re with us, Phoebe." Bree says, pulling down her hoodie.

The four traveled through the forest for a good 30 minutes. Chris triumphantly led the way. 

"Chris, you shouldn’t be teaming up with these two." Tsaida says, "Are you really gonna betray one of your own?" 

"Oh please!" Bree butts in, "That has nothing to do with this." 

"Think about it Chris: the only waylins on the planet are the soldiers who exterminated the human race. Heck, they probably killed your parents!" 

"Well... that would mean something..." Chris begins, 

"But my parents are alive and well in the other world so it’s okay." 

Tsaida was silent for a moment. 

"... That is really stupid reasoning." 

"Don’t let her put you down Chris, she’s just making a pathetic attempt to fool you." Bree says. 

"Man, the way you talk about Tsaida, it’s almost like she killed *your* parents." Chris laughs. 

When he looks around and sees everybody with a straight face not making eye contact, he clears his throat and says, "Oh." 

"You dimwits aren’t gonna get away with this." Tsaida taunts. 

"Au contraire, we have this all planned out." Chris boasts. 

"Admittedly," Bree confesses, "I didn’t really plan beyond this point." 

"Yea, we’re just kind of making it up as we go." Wade adds. 

"Listen," Chris says, "plan or not, we have-­" 

"Shh!!" Tsaida hushes everybody and freezes in place. 

"... Do you guys hear that?" Everybody stopped and listened for a moment. 

"Nice try, Tsaida-­" Suddenly, everybody heard growling in the distance. 

"That sounded like a dog." Chris says. 

"It came from the right. Come on." Bree says, taking the lead. The four of them eventually make it to a destroyed neighbourhood. 

"What’s all this...?" Wade asks. 

Tsaida looks around. "I know where we are. This is where the ferals gather." 

"Ferals?" Wade asks. 

"The wild dogs." 

"Wait..." Chris took a few steps forward, seemingly dazed,

"This is my neighbourhood."