Diary Entry 001 — Date: Last Known 21-6-2098
Today marks the beginning of an incredible new chapter in my life — one I never imagined even in my wildest dreams.
As I sit here, staring at the shattered remains of the world I once knew, I can't help but marvel at how life — and time — have led me to this moment of complete absurdity.
It all started on what seemed like an ordinary day.
I was going about my usual tasks, checking the space accelerator's systems.
I never realized that one simple event would shatter the rules of time and space, hurling me into a reality that defies logic.
My name is Harris Blake, and I'm writing this diary to document the journey ahead.
Discovering time travel has opened up a world of possibilities — and dangers.
I am committed to exploring it, uncovering its secrets... and maybe, if fate allows, changing history for the better.
As I begin this journey, I am both excited and terrified.
The road ahead is unknown.
It could be wondrous...
It could be deadly.
I must find a way to survive these "time slips" — and bring my small research team safely home.
This diary will be my record — of experiences, of thoughts, of discoveries.
If I ever lose my way... if confusion or fear overwhelms me...
I hope these words will remind me why I chose this path.
So here we go — into the unknown — with nothing but our wits, our courage, and the ticking clock to guide us.
Yours in time,
Harris Blake
Julian lowered the diary after reading the first entry, staring at the faded handwriting.
He didn't know what to think.
It had already been insane — surviving a plane crash, washing up on a deserted island, being dragged through a dimensional gate into a whole new world.
But this? Time travel? Time slips?
He leaned back against the wall, mind racing.
He remembered the morning of the crash — the brief moment before everything went wrong.
The strange lurch in his gut, the static buzz in his ears, the way the plane seemed to flicker for a split second.
At the time, he'd been too wrapped up in his own problems — his ex, his future — to pay attention.
But now...
What if that was the moment it happened?
What if they fell into a Time Slip without even realizing it?
Heart hammering, Julian flipped through more pages of the diary, desperate for answers.
The next few entries were... less exciting.
Harris detailed the miserable days after the Slip — trapped on a deserted island with twenty-four other lab workers and scientists, none of them prepared for survival.
"FIND FOOD FIRST" was underlined and scrawled across multiple pages.
Julian skimmed through the drama — arguments over leadership, near-starvation, a poisoning incident that almost killed one of their group.
They had barely scraped by.
It wasn't until days later, Harris wrote, that a second Time Slip opened — swallowing half the group and sending them elsewhere.
Harris and eleven others landed on a new island — larger, colder, and filled not with dinosaurs, but with beasts from a different time.
Wolves, giant elk, mammoths.
Creatures from Earth's ancient past, long extinct — yet thriving here.
Even the plants were prehistoric.
Harris described fruits and vegetables he'd never seen before — rougher, wilder ancestors of modern crops.
Foods that tasted familiar and alien all at once.
Julian sat back, clutching the small diary.
Multiple Time Slips. Different eras. Islands that don't belong anywhere.
Whatever had happened to Harris...
Whatever was happening to them...
It was bigger — and stranger — than anything he could have imagined.
The next section of the diary detailed how Harris and the survivors began building what they called an Enclave — a small, fortified settlement where they could try to survive the random chaos of the Time Slips.
They found other lost people from time to time, gathered scraps of technology, and slowly — painfully — began rebuilding civilization from the ground up.
Julian paused, flipping to the end of the diary out of sheer curiosity.
His heart almost stopped.
"Year 2126."
He sat bolt upright.
The first entry had been dated 2098. That meant Harris had been stuck here for twenty-eight years — and who knew how long beyond that, considering the diary's last entry wasn't necessarily the end of the story.
Swallowing hard, Julian flipped back to where he'd left off.
The next entries spoke of hope — of finding a woman from Harris's own time who had arrived by accident, aboard a ship carrying advanced machines.
With her technology — and their ingenuity — they were able to create devices to help stabilize the Slips and defend their enclaves.
Julian smiled faintly, reading about Harris and the woman, Elizabeth.
Together, they built something that almost resembled a home.
And then... the words hit harder.
"Today, I have lost Elizabeth. She was transported through a Time Slip gate we created to escape from a Rex. Where she was warped to... I have no idea. But I will find her."
Julian's chest tightened.
Elizabeth. Gone.
A few entries earlier, Harris had mentioned a three-year-old daughter waiting for them back in the Enclave.
Did he ever find her? Did she ever see her mother again?
Julian flipped through page after page, searching for her name — but Elizabeth wasn't mentioned again.
Only passing references to the growing Enclaves, new island discoveries, new dangers.
"Hope they reunited at least..." Julian whispered, even as a sick feeling coiled in his gut.
He returned to the technical sections, learning more about the "Rex" — the creature that had forced Elizabeth to flee.
A monster mutated by the chaotic energy of the Time Slips.
An apex predator, drawn to human scent, adapting to every environment it encountered.
Smart. Fast. Lethal.
Julian shivered.
Worse still was the truth about the Time Slips themselves.
They were unpredictable.
Random.
Violent.
And they only ever connected to isolated islands — each one small, dangerous, and strangely frozen in different ancient climates.
None bigger than a few kilometers across.
Worst of all: Time Slips could happen at any moment.
Gatekeepers — people trained to use the experimental equipment Harris's team had developed — were the only ones who could bring survivors back once a Slip dragged them into a new place.
Without a gatekeeper...
You were lost.
Forever.
Julian closed the diary slowly, the weight of everything he'd just read pressing down hard on his chest.
They weren't just stranded.
They were standing on unstable ground, surrounded by invisible traps, living on borrowed time.
And Emma Blake — Harris's daughter — might be one of the only reasons they were still alive.
For now.
Julian closed the diary and set it carefully beside his bed, trying to reorganize his spinning thoughts.
Around him, the others were equally absorbed in their own books — journals and diaries that chronicled the harsh lives of earlier survivors.
Stories not of victory, but of struggle, loss, and stubborn and at times bloody survival.
Charlie wore the most dramatic expressions, his face twisting from horror to disbelief as he flipped through pages.
Michael, usually stone-faced, sat stiffly, brows drawn together in a tight line.
Even Geo, who rarely stayed serious shrug, he had gone strangely quiet — wiping at his eyes once when he thought no one was looking.
Julian sighed, flopping back onto his thin mattress, staring up at the cold, featureless ceiling.
What happens to us now? Tomorrow? The day after?
They weren't just stranded on some remote island anymore.
They weren't even on the Earth they knew.
The memory of the date at the start of the journal burned in his mind — 2098.
And the final date Harris had written, before the entries stopped — 2126.
Julian squeezed his eyes shut.
When their plane had crashed, it was still 2025.
Somewhere along the way — in the split-second turbulence, the flicker in the sky, the mechanical failure that had made no sense — they had fallen out of time.
And now they were stuck in a future they couldn't even begin to understand.
A broken world patched together from scraps of lost ages, where time itself had shattered into wild, chaotic pieces.
No home.
No rescue coming.
Only the ticking clock... and whatever scraps of hope they could find.
Julian exhaled slowly, feeling the weight of it settle over him like a second blanket.
Tomorrow would come.
Whether they were ready or not.