Chapter 3

The chaos and noise in the room faded away slowly; it didn’t settle all at once, but gradually. The urgency in the room has softened. Voices are no longer sharp but in low murmurs now. 

The chaotic movements in the room are now more settled and more controlled. The machines are now steady. The chaotic sounds are now sounding smoother than they were before.

Elera slowly regains consciousness; she feels much calmer than the first time she woke up. Her breathing was smoother; it was not harsh like before. The pain she felt before was gone. The tightness she felt in her chest also loosened. She feels so light, maybe even too light. 

Elera still feels the heaviness in her body. Strangely, she doesn’t feel suffocated by it. Elera feels like her body belongs to someone else. It's like she has lost control over her body. 

Her eyelids flutter as she tries to open them; they open effortlessly this time around. As she opened her eyes, the light burned a little, but it wasn’t as harsh or blinding as before. Elera tries to adjust her eyes to the light. The blurriness begins to fade, and her vision gradually becomes clearer. 

The room she was in became more visible to her. The room was very white, the walls looked so smooth, and there were no visible joints in them at all. There were no imperfections in the room. The lights in the room seem to be coming from everyone in the room.

It is a brightly lit room. Elera can’t help but explore the room. She sees machines she has never seen before. They were tall with metallic structures. They all had transparent panels that glowed faintly. “Wow…. this is amazing…” 

Elera couldn't help but think to herself. The shapes and designs are like nothing she has ever seen before. She saw thin cables that extended in pristine lines. Elera tries to remember if she has seen any of these designs before, but nothing comes to mind. 

Faint hums filled the entire room; they didn’t sound loud. It felt as if the room itself was alive. All this confuses Elera the more. She feels very strange about all this. Elera frowned as her thoughts became clearer. 

Elera tries to study one of the machines beside her, but the information and data it was processing was moving too fast for her to process the information. The design was just too different. They looked like advanced machines. 

Elera’s chest tightened a little bit; her breathing is still steady. Elera knows technology; she was surrounded by it. She has studied technology and even helped build it. But this is something she has never encountered. 

Elera can’t help but feel uneasy. Elera moves her gaze around the room again. She moved slowly again to take in more information.  

Elera noticed a curved surface that covered part of her body; it looked transparent, and it was very invisible too. Then, light in the room reflected on it, and she was able to see what it was a little.

It looked like a chamber, Elera felt she couldn’t really tell. “I don’t remember being placed in a chamber like this.” Elera tries to search through her memory, but everything feels so blank. 

“Why can’t I remember, like some part of my memory has been wiped clean”...

Unconsciously, she moves her fingers against the surface, though the movement was small, Elera couldn’t help but be happy. “I’m gaining control again.”

“Let me try to move my head.d” Elera put so much effort into it, it worked… “Yes, finally..” Elera sees another part of the room she is in. The room is a large room, and everything just stretches out beyond what she can see. 

Everything is arranged in order. She looked fascinated with everything she saw. Then a screen caught her eye; it was a large, vertical-looking screen. It was embedded in the wall of the room. 

It was on, and there were words displayed on it. Different information was shown and moved. The data was too long; she couldn’t process it at all. 

On the screen, something caught Elera’s eye. It was a date. Elera tries to focus her eyes very well on the screen to see the date properly. Her eyes kept getting blurry as she tried to refocus them. 

Elera closes her eye and opens it again. The date she saw shocks her. “This is not right. What am I seeing right now?” The numbers Elera saw settled in her subconscious. 

A gap escapes from her mouth. Her mind tried to fight what she was seeing. Elera stares straight at the screen, not blinking her eyes, as if the information will disappear. The date remains the same. It didn’t change at all. 

There was no correction to it at all.  It stayed exactly the way it was. Elera begins to feel uneasy, her pulse rising, little by little. 

Elera’s thoughts were all over the place. Just trying to make sense of what was happening. Elera was trying to find an explanation for what she saw on display. 

“It has to be a system glitch, yes.. It had been. Because there is no way what I’m seeing is right.” 

Elera curled her fingers to stabilize herself, her eyes still glued to the screen. “If this is true th, that means it is 25 years later, it's been 25 years ahead of anything I could remember.” Elera couldn't help but panic as she thought to herself. 

Her chest tightened a little, her breathing dragged a bit. The realization is sinking in. It felt heavy and suffocating for her to process or to ignore. The entire room felt colder than it should have been. 

The room felt bigger, but the screen remained the same. They were not changing at all. 

TIME PERIOD: 25 YEARS.