The year is 2048. Flying cars, hoverboards, interstellar travel, and time travel have all been made possible. Mankind has truly reached its technological peak. But the Earth is slowly dying. Glaciers melted, oceans rose, volcanoes erupted, and a looming World War 3 was just around the corner. There will be more death and destruction. Earth WILL die.

Karan was sleeping when suddenly a call woke him up. A call which he would answer and he would never be the same again.

The next day, the funeral took place. Karan’s best friend for 23 years, Roy, had died in a brutal car crash whilst driving in the middle of the night. The previous day for Karan was spent in existential doubt and a lot of breaking down. But he didn’t shed a single tear on the day of the funeral. He came to a realization that Roy would’ve wanted him to be strong. And it’s what he would’ve wanted too if the roles were switched.

Back home from the funeral where he gave a beautiful eulogy describing his friendship with Roy, Karan started mulling over all that had transpired in the past couple of days. He spent the next few weeks in mostly solitude. He skipped work a lot. He stopped socializing.

One day, whilst reading the newspaper, Karan read about the new bill being passed about the usage of time machines and how it was affecting the space-time continuum. The Government wanted all time machines to be destroyed as it was the sole and primary reason for the World War 3 which was drawing nearer and nearer day by day. Karan realized he had a chance to bring back the one thing that had kept him from going insane for so many years. His brother was in the military. Surely meeting him could help him get his hands on a time machine.

The next day, Karan set out to the biggest military base in the country where his brother, Arjun, lived. He knew his brother wouldn’t approve of this dangerous mission that he has decided to set out on. So he asked his brother for a tour instead. Whilst on the tour Arjun showed him the new advanced weapons that had been developed recently and showed him around the barracks, garage and artillery, all this whilst describing everything in a rather monotone voice. Arjun then took him to a lab where there were secret equipments present. He told Karan that he wasn’t supposed to be showing him around this area but as it was still quite early, so it might not cause him any trouble. He showed him nano nuclear weapons, superhuman pills and much more advanced technology which had been hidden from the public eye for a long time. He then took him to another room and said, “The time machines are kept here. Fascinating, eh?”. Karan entered the room and saw a much smaller version of spacecraft reminiscent of the ones in Star Trek with their nuclear cores and long nacelles for warping through time. He was in awe of the design and realized his jaw was wide open. His brother laughed and led him on to the next part of the tour.

The next night, while sleeping besides his brother in the barracks, he got up and slowly reached out for his ID card and sneaked out to where the time machines were. He opened the doors using his brother’s ID, and entered the room for a second time in 2 days. He got into the time machine and closed the door behind him. He entered the cockpit and saw a plethora of buttons and didn’t know what to do. He strapped himself in, and pressed on the biggest button in the room whilst crossing his fingers. Everything lit up and the engines started. Karan then saw the time dial to which he set up the date of death of Roy. And then Karan pressed on the accelerator and everything turned to black.

While passed out, Karan saw glimpses of millions of shades of colors around him. The scintillating colors were all intertwined into each other as the time machine passed through space and time, breaking all the laws of reality. He passed out again.

The next time Karan woke up, he was somewhere which was not as colorful as the place he had been moments earlier. It was his bedroom. The time machine was nowhere to be seen. He quickly got up and searched his entire apartment but couldn’t find the time machine. He had a searing pain in his head. He opened the medical box to take an aspirin and checked his phone to see that Roy’s car would crash in about 30 mins. He knew what he had to do.

He got in his car and revved up to the place where Roy would die. As he was nearing the place where the crash had taken place, he got a call from his aunt. As he reached for the phone, his eyes went away from the road causing the car to deviate a little to the right. An approaching car grazed Karan’s car and went and crashed into the divider and flipped as Karan stepped on the brakes.

Karan immediately got out of his car and went towards the crash area and looked into the window to see the window covered in blood. He immediately opened the door and pulled out the man from inside to see that his face had been so badly damaged that you couldn’t even recognize who it was just by merely looking at it. The man had an ID strapped around his neck. Karan lifted it up and looked at it. His heart dropped. On it, a very familiar photo had been stuck and written below it, in bold letters, was the name “ROY”