Fractured Time Chapter V.
The Tearing of the Fabric 🔞
🔞| Explicit sexual content | Mature audiences only
Let them follow the tracks.
Mason didn't think. The decision had been made. Elena placed the energy cell into the prototype, while he grabbed the scanner and stepped into the damp, humid air, behind the wreck. Adrian's biological signature on the screen was a faint, broken streak, pulling eastward, into the thick of ferns and giant magnolias. The other signature – the smooth, cold imprint of the Time Warden – filled the air as a constant, threatening background hum. It wasn't following. It was there. Everywhere.
"It's close," Elena whispered, stepping beside him. "The Warden… it's not moving. It just is. As if it's waiting for the damage – Adrian – to stop on its own."
"Then we have to hurry," Mason said, and clambering over a large, fallen fern trunk, he moved on in the direction of the signal.
Adrian hadn't left a clear path. But there were signs. A broken branch, not yet dry. A deeper footprint in the soft ground. And a spot where the moss was scuffed, as if someone had fallen or sat down to rest. Here they found the first stone marker. Not a pile. Three smaller stones, stacked on a flat rock. A triangle. The first one. I knew you'd come.
Mason's heart clenched. He knelt, touched the stones. They were still cool from the moisture. He hadn't left them long ago. The touch of the stones triggered a clear, sharp image.
The sun was setting over the Pacific, drawing a golden stripe on the water. On the rocky terrace, everyone was applauding, but Mason only saw Adrian. His husband was smiling, and that smile was like the sun that had just set – it flooded everything with warmth. The titanium ring was cold on his finger at first, then warmed as Adrian slid it into place. There were no grand words, just a simple vow. But when Adrian looked into his eyes and said, "In every equation, you are the one fixed, beautiful point," Mason knew this was more than poetry. This was physics. This was truth. Then they kissed each other, and the applause, the roar of the sea, everything blurred. Only the touch of their lips remained, soft and promising, and the smell of salt in the air. Adrian's tears wet his face, but his smile was radiant. "Our timeline," Mason whispered in his ear. "From now on, only this one."
The memory was so vivid, it was as if Adrian were standing beside him. Then the heat of the Eocene jungle slapped back. Mason stood up and moved on, the three stones in his pocket.
The second marker was at a shallow stream. On the bank, carved into the wet sand: a circle, a line. Our pattern. Next to it, a larger, dark stain in the sand that the water hadn't yet washed away. Fresh blood. Mason touched it with his finger. It was still warm. He had stopped here. It hurt here.
The wedding night wasn't on the terrace, but in their own bedroom, where the city lights and the sea's salt scent filtered in through the open window. The flowers were still there, but their fragrance was overwritten by the warm, familiar scent of Adrian's skin. They were both drunk on happiness and champagne. Adrian slowly, deliberately undid the buttons of Mason's shirt, pausing at each one to follow the trail of his fingers with his mouth on Mason's skin. Mason held back a sigh as Adrian's hands slid down to his pants, and the sound of the zipper broke the silence.
"I don't want to rush this," Adrian whispered, but his voice was hoarse with desire. "But God, how I've waited for this."
Mason didn't answer with words. He took Adrian's hand and guided it to his own pants, where the hardness was already obvious. "Don't wait."
After that, it wasn't slow. The clothes fell to the floor. Mason pushed Adrian onto his bed, into the sheets, and pressed his body against his. The touch of their skin was electric. Adrian's legs parted to receive him, his hands gripping Mason's back. Mason pressed his lips to Adrian's neck as his fingers prepared him. Every movement was familiar, yet brand new. This was the first time they made love as husbands. When Mason finally pushed inside, a shared, deep gasp broke from them. There was no more patience, only an ancient, urgent rhythm. The bed thumped against the wall, and Adrian's voice, crying out Mason's name, mingled with the roar of the sea. With each of Mason's thrusts, he felt them rooting deeper into each other. When they reached their peak, there was no distinction between them. One body, one soul, one future. Later, tangled, sweaty, Adrian rested his head on Mason's chest. "Nothing will change this," he murmured. "Nothing. Ever."
The blood in the sand was cold now. Mason stood up and moved on, but the memory of the wedding night, the heat of their bodies, the density of the promises, still burned on his skin, in contrast to the cold mist of the jungle. Adrian was out there, bleeding, but once they had awakened to such life in each other's arms.
They moved on. The air grew colder. The jungle noises faded, replaced by a deep, vibrating silence. The Time Warden's signal on the scanner didn't change. It just was there. Like a constant pressure on the eardrums.
The third marker was in a natural rock crevice. Adrian had hidden here. On the ground, an empty water pouch wrapper. A torn handkerchief. And on the rock wall, scratches. Numbers. Coordinates. 55.002. -12.774. Altitude: 340. Location coordinates. Adrian had tried to mark his position on the map of his present.
But there was something else here. At the entrance to the hiding place, in the wet clay, a footprint. Not human. Not animal either. It was as if space itself had curved and pressed into the ground: a perfect, oval indentation with smooth edges. No toes, no claws. Just an imprint preserving the distortion of reality.
Fresh. Very fresh.
"It's been here," Elena whispered. "The Warden. It doesn't walk. It appears. Space itself bends beneath it."
The free portion of Fractured Time ends here.
Mason traveled millions of years into the past to save his husband, Adrian, who is being pursued by a mysterious Time Warden. Bloody trails, ancient jungles, and a desperate love that bent time itself.
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