Chapter Eleven: The Time Guardian
"It's too dangerous," Layla insisted, her voice firm as she paced the back room of the
bookshop. "Performing the Second Level ritual so soon after the First could destabilize
your entire temporal anchoring. You could be pulled back to your original timeline, or
worse—become lost between timelines, trapped in the Void like your grandfather."
It was three days after Majid's unexpected communication with Abdul Karim, and the
debate about accelerating his timeline had grown increasingly heated. Rana sat quietly
at the table, her expression troubled as she watched the argument unfold.
"I don't have a choice," Majid countered, the amber flecks in his eyes seeming to glow
more intensely with his frustration. "The Door Keepers are preparing to move against
me. My grandfather warned me directly."
"And you're certain it was actually your grandfather?" Layla challenged. "Not a temporal
echo, not a manifestation of your own fears or desires?"
"It was him," Majid said with absolute conviction. "He exists in the Void now—not alive in
the conventional sense, but not gone either. And he reached out specifically to warn me
about the Door Keepers' plans."
Layla sighed, running a hand through her silver-streaked hair. "Even if it was truly Abdul
Karim, even if the warning is legitimate, rushing into the Second Level ritual carries
extreme risks. The memory sacrifice isn't just painful—it fundamentally alters who you
are. Without proper preparation, you might lose more than you intend."
"I've been studying my grandfather's journal for months," Majid argued. "I understand
the requirements, the risks. And I've already decided which memory I'll sacrifice."
This caught both women's attention. "You have?" Rana asked, speaking for the first time
since the debate began. "Which one?"
Majid hesitated, then replied, "My memory of why I decided to travel back in time. The
moment on the balcony in Riyadh, the despair that triggered my temporal
displacement."
Layla and Rana exchanged concerned glances. "Majid," Layla said carefully, "that's an
extremely significant memory. It's the foundational moment of your journey as a
Traveler. Sacrificing it could alter your entire motivation, your purpose in this timeline."
"Exactly," Majid replied. "The Door Keepers are monitoring me because they believe I'm
following my grandfather's path, seeking connection with the Observer. But what if my
motivations appeared to change? What if I seemed to abandon that cosmic purpose in
favor of more mundane concerns?"
Understanding dawned in Rana's eyes. "A misdirection. You'd still remember
intellectually that you traveled back in time, but without the emotional connection to
that moment of despair..."
"I would appear to be focused solely on reshaping my personal destiny," Majid
confirmed. "My interest in temporal mechanics would seem academic rather than driven
by a desire to connect with the Observer. The Door Keepers might lower their guard,
giving me time to develop my abilities further."
It was a calculated risk—sacrificing the emotional core of his original motivation while
retaining his intellectual understanding of his purpose. The memory of Zuhair's betrayal,
of Samira's abandonment, of his business failures would remain. His desire for revenge
would persist. But the visceral connection to that moment of utter despair on the
balcony, the emotional catalyst that had triggered his temporal displacement, would be
gone.
"It's still dangerous," Layla insisted, though her tone had softened slightly. "The Second
Level ritual is far more demanding than the First. The physical pain is more intense, the
risk of losing control greater. And without a full year of stabilization after the First Level,
your consciousness might not be sufficiently anchored to withstand the strain."
"I understand the risks," Majid said quietly. "But I also understand the threat. If the Door
Keepers move against me before I've advanced to the Second Level, I won't have the
abilities to defend myself. I'll lose everything—my presence in this timeline, my chance
to reshape my destiny, my opportunity to continue my grandfather's work."
Layla was silent for a long moment, studying Majid with an intensity that seemed to look
beyond his physical form. Finally, she sighed. "Very well. If you're determined to
proceed, I'll help you prepare for the ritual. But we'll need to take additional
precautions, given the accelerated timeline."
Relief washed through Majid. "Thank you. When can we begin?"
"The ritual must be performed during the full moon," Layla replied. "That gives us two
weeks to prepare. We'll need to find a secure location—somewhere the Door Keepers
won't think to monitor. And you'll need to strengthen your temporal focus in the
meantime, to give yourself the best chance of maintaining control during the ritual."
"What about the memory sacrifice?" Rana asked. "How does that actually work?"
"The ritual creates a temporal vortex centered on the Traveler," Layla explained. "As it
reaches its peak, the Traveler must consciously identify and release the chosen memory.
The vortex extracts it—not just suppressing it, but removing it entirely from the
Traveler's consciousness. What remains is only an intellectual awareness that the event
occurred, without any emotional or sensory connection to it."
The clinical description sent a chill through Majid. To lose the emotional core of his
journey's beginning—the despair, the hopelessness, the desperate wish for a second
chance—would be like losing a part of himself. Yet he had chosen this sacrifice carefully,
believing it would serve both as protection against the Door Keepers and as a suitable
offering for the Second Level ritual.
"There's something else you should know," Layla added, her expression grave. "The
Second Level doesn't just enhance your existing abilities—it grants new ones.
Specifically, limited physical temporal manipulation."
"What does that mean exactly?" Majid asked.
"It means you'll be able to affect the temporal flow of physical objects, not just your own
perception. Accelerate the decay of materials, reverse minor physical damage, even
briefly stop local time in a small area." Layla's eyes held a warning. "These abilities are
far more visible to those with temporal sensitivity than your current ones. Using them
will immediately alert any Door Keepers in the vicinity."
"So they're emergency measures," Majid concluded. "To be used only when absolutely
necessary."
"Exactly. And there's one more thing—a change you should be prepared for." Layla
hesitated, then continued. "Each level of anchoring leaves its mark on the physical form.
The First Level changed your eyes. The Second will affect your hands. They'll develop a
subtle luminescence visible in darkness or dim light—a glow that follows the pattern of
your veins and arteries."
Another physical change, another visible sign of his transformation from ordinary
human to Traveler. Majid wondered briefly how many such changes he would undergo if
he continued to the Fifth Level, how different his physical form might become. But that
was a concern for the future. For now, his focus needed to be on successfully completing
the Second Level ritual and protecting himself from the Door Keepers' imminent action
against him.
The next two weeks passed in a blur of intense preparation. Majid divided his time
between his normal routine—school, family interactions, careful management of his
relationship with Zuhair—and secret meetings with Layla and Rana to prepare for the
ritual.
The preparations were more complex than those for the First Level. Layla taught him
specialized breathing techniques to maintain consciousness during the intense pain of
the ritual. Rana helped him practice identifying and isolating the specific memory he
intended to sacrifice, ensuring he could separate it cleanly from connected memories
that he wished to retain.
They selected an abandoned industrial site on the outskirts of Dammam for the ritual—a
location far from Majid's usual haunts and unlikely to be monitored by the Door Keepers.
Layla spent several days preparing the site, establishing protective measures that would
help conceal the temporal signature of the ritual from distant observation.
Throughout this period, Majid remained acutely aware of being watched. Twice more he
spotted individuals following him—different faces but the same careful distance, the
same alertness to his movements. Each time, he used his First Level abilities to lose
them, accelerating his local temporal flow to move faster than normal perception could
track. But each use of these abilities further depleted his anchoring, the stability of his
presence in this timeline gradually eroding.
The night of the full moon arrived, clear and cold, the sky a vast expanse of stars above
the abandoned industrial site. Majid had told his parents he was staying overnight at a
friend's house to work on a school project, ensuring they wouldn't discover his absence
until morning.
The ritual space Layla had prepared was more elaborate than the one for the First Level
—concentric circles of symbols drawn in a mixture of ash and crushed bone, with seven
black candles placed at precise intervals around the perimeter. In the center lay a silver
bowl containing the vial of prepared ritual blood from his grandfather's safeguard,
alongside the ceremonial knife with its handle of dark wood inscribed with temporal
symbols.
"Are you certain about this?" Rana asked one final time as Majid prepared to enter the
ritual space. "Once begun, the ritual cannot be stopped without severe consequences."
"I'm certain," Majid replied, his voice steady despite the apprehension coiling in his
stomach. He had come too far to turn back now, had committed himself to this path with
full awareness of its risks and potential rewards.
He removed his shirt and shoes, as he had for the First Level ritual, and stepped into the
innermost circle. The chalk lines seemed to absorb the moonlight, creating a pattern of
perfect darkness against the concrete floor. The pendant at his throat grew warm,
responding to the temporal energies beginning to gather around the ritual space.
Layla took up her position at the eastern point of the circle, while Rana stood at the
west. They began the chant—the same unfamiliar language Majid had heard during the
First Level ritual, but with a different cadence, a more complex rhythm that seemed to
resonate with the beating of his heart.
As the chant intensified, the chalk lines began to glow with a deep blue light, pulsing in
synchronization with the words. Majid knelt in the center of the innermost circle,
focusing on his breathing, on the visualization techniques Layla had taught him—
imagining his consciousness as a distinct entity from his physical form, preparing to
identify and release the memory he had chosen to sacrifice.
The pain began gradually this time, unlike the sudden onset of the First Level ritual. It
started as a warmth in his hands, spreading up his arms and throughout his body,
increasing in intensity until it felt as if his blood had been replaced with liquid fire. Majid
gasped but maintained his focus, his consciousness hovering above the pain, observing
but not consumed by it.
The blue light of the ritual circle intensified, and Majid felt a pulling sensation at the
center of his being—the temporal vortex forming, preparing to extract his chosen
memory. This was the critical moment, the point where he needed to consciously
identify and release the memory of that night on the balcony in Riyadh, the despair that
had triggered his temporal displacement.
He focused on the memory, isolating it from connected experiences—separating it from
his recollections of Zuhair's betrayal, of Samira's abandonment, of his business failures.
Those memories he would keep, maintaining his motivation for revenge. But the
moment of utter hopelessness, the contemplation of suicide, the desperate wish for a
second chance—that he would surrender to the ritual.
The vortex pulled harder, and Majid felt the memory beginning to unravel, threads of
emotion and sensory experience being drawn out of his consciousness. It was a strange
sensation—not painful exactly, but profoundly disorienting, as if a fundamental part of
his identity was being extracted.
He could see the memory now, floating before his mind's eye—himself on that balcony,
looking down at the city below, the glass of whiskey in his hand, the emptiness in his
heart. The image began to fade, the emotional connection to it dissolving as the vortex
pulled it away.
Then something unexpected happened. As the memory of the balcony faded, another
image took its place—his grandfather, Abdul Karim, performing a ritual in the cellar
beneath his house. This wasn't part of Majid's personal experience; it was something he
had glimpsed during his temporal perception of the safeguard. Yet it was being drawn
into the vortex alongside his chosen memory, as if the two were connected in ways he
hadn't anticipated.
Majid tried to separate them, to retain the vision of his grandfather while surrendering
only his own memory of the balcony. But the vortex pulled at both, the connection
between them too strong to break.
In that moment of struggle, the ritual pattern flared with blinding intensity, the blue light
shifting to a brilliant white. Majid felt a tearing sensation, as if something was being
ripped from his consciousness by force rather than surrendered willingly. The pain
peaked, transcending physical sensation to become something more fundamental—a
cosmic agony that seemed to exist at the level of his very being.
Then, abruptly, it was over. The light faded from the ritual pattern, the candles guttered
and went out, and Majid found himself still kneeling in the center of the circle, gasping
for breath, his body drenched in sweat.
But something was different. His hands were glowing faintly in the darkness, a subtle
luminescence following the pattern of veins and arteries beneath his skin—the mark of
the Second Level, just as Layla had described. And in his mind, where the memory of the
balcony had been, there was now a strange emptiness—a space where he knew
intellectually that something important had happened, but could access no emotional
or sensory details of the event.
"It is done," Layla said, her voice hoarse from the extended chanting. "The Second Level
anchoring is complete."
Rana moved to help Majid to his feet, supporting him as his legs trembled with
exhaustion. "How do you feel?" she asked, concern evident in her voice.
"Different," Majid replied, studying the subtle glow of his hands with fascination. "More...
solid somehow. More firmly connected to this timeline." It was true—the fraying
sensation he had been experiencing, the gradual erosion of his anchoring, had been
replaced by a new stability, a more secure connection to his current reality.
But there was something else, something unexpected. "I can't remember why I decided
to travel back in time," he said slowly, probing the empty space in his memory. "I know
that I was in Riyadh, that I was an adult, that something happened that triggered my
displacement. But the details, the emotions... they're gone."
"That's the memory sacrifice," Layla confirmed. "As expected."
"But there's more," Majid continued, his brow furrowing. "I've also lost something about
my grandfather—a vision I had of him performing a ritual in his cellar. It was connected
somehow to my memory of the balcony, and the vortex took both."
Layla and Rana exchanged concerned glances. "That's unusual," Layla admitted. "The
ritual should have extracted only the specific memory you chose to sacrifice. If it took
something else as well, there must have been a deeper connection between the two
than we realized."
"Does it matter?" Majid asked, still examining the subtle glow of his hands. "I've
achieved the Second Level. I can feel the new abilities, the enhanced connection to
temporal currents."
"It might matter," Rana said cautiously. "Memory is complex, interconnected. Losing
pieces you didn't intend to sacrifice could have unforeseen consequences for your
understanding of your journey, your purpose."
Majid considered this, probing the empty spaces in his memory. He still remembered
Zuhair's betrayal, still felt the cold determination to reshape his destiny and exact
revenge on those who had wronged him. But the emotional catalyst for his journey—the
despair that had triggered his temporal displacement—was gone, leaving only an
intellectual awareness that something significant had happened on a balcony in Riyadh.
And something about his grandfather's ritual in the cellar was missing too—some detail
or insight that might have been important to his understanding of the safeguard, of
Abdul Karim's journey as a Traveler.
Before he could pursue this line of thought further, a sound from outside the abandoned
building caught their attention—a car engine, then doors slamming, then multiple
footsteps approaching.
"Door Keepers," Layla said grimly, quickly gathering the ritual materials. "They must
have detected the energy signature of the ritual despite our precautions."
"We need to leave," Rana urged, helping Majid put his shirt back on. "There's a back exit
we prepared for this possibility."
But Majid hesitated, a new awareness flowing through him with his Second Level
abilities. He could sense the temporal signatures of the approaching individuals—five of
them, moving with purpose toward the building. And one signature in particular stood
out, familiar somehow.
"Samir Al-Zahrani is with them," he said, certain of this despite never having sensed the
man's temporal signature before. "The Third Guardian."
"All the more reason to leave immediately," Layla insisted, shouldering the backpack
containing the ritual materials. "You're not ready to confront a Guardian, even with your
Second Level abilities."
Majid nodded, recognizing the wisdom in her words. He was exhausted from the ritual,
his new abilities untested, his understanding of them still theoretical rather than
practical. This was not the time for a confrontation with the Door Keepers.
They slipped out through the back exit Layla had prepared, a small door that led to an
alley behind the abandoned industrial site. Rana's car was parked two blocks away,
hidden between derelict warehouses. They moved quickly but quietly, Majid's enhanced
temporal perception allowing him to sense the movements of the Door Keepers inside
the building they had just left.
"They're searching the ritual space," he murmured as they reached Rana's car. "They
know what we did, but not where we've gone."
"That won't last long," Layla said, sliding into the passenger seat as Rana took the
driver's position. "They'll fan out, search the area. We need to be far away before they
organize a proper pursuit."
As Rana drove them away from the industrial site, taking a circuitous route back toward
the city, Majid experimented cautiously with his new abilities. He could sense the flow of
time around physical objects now, could perceive the subtle variations in temporal
current that affected matter itself. And with concentration, he found he could influence
those currents—accelerating or decelerating the local flow of time for specific objects.
He demonstrated this by touching the car's dashboard and slightly accelerating its
temporal flow. The plastic aged visibly, developing small cracks and fading in color over
the course of seconds rather than years.
"Careful," Layla cautioned, noticing what he was doing. "Each use of your abilities,
especially the new ones, creates a temporal signature that can be detected. And you're
still learning to control the extent of the effect."
Majid nodded, releasing his influence on the dashboard. The accelerated aging stopped,
but the damage remai