Time travel had always been a tricky subject, but there was one thing that always stayed the same. Consequences, and the consequences were usually enough to deter most. Along with the consequences were the repercussions that came after. Punishments, that always seemed far worse than the original crime.

I had been one of those so-called troublemakers, the ones that deserved a crime that felt worse than the sentence of death. Being condemned to spend the rest of one’s living life, in a time that they were never meant for.

The world of 2190 knew that they could never fully ban time-travel, not with how desperately the public wanted it, and how harshly they would protest. The rules were simple though.

1) Never travel back in time, it is far too sensitive, and your actions might prove catastrophic to the future as we know it, only travel forward is permitted, for risk of causing a paradox.
2) Take nothing except for information, certain things were never meant to leave their time.


Seems simple enough, right? Though these rules were not always followed. It was always tempting to go back and right a wrong, to suggest to your other-self which numbers to pick on a lottery ticket. It wasn’t safe though, and it jeopardized the future, or rather, the present.

In all honesty, the laws were only so harsh because breaking them might put the world into grave danger. One might deter an inventor from his invention, by accidentally killing the butterfly or bird that inspired them to do so. Having a three-minute conversation with a seemingly normal passerby, might stop a couple from meeting, and from having the child that would grow up and put the world at peace.

While the protestors would complain that also the opposite could be achieved, that disaster might be prevented. A person could never be quite sure what other miniscule event they could damage, which would destroy the world that we now call home today.

Despite the fact that I’ve been forced to live in some year I don’t even know the name of, I will never regret what I did. How could one regret saving the life of somebody that they loved? I was put into a situation where I knew I could alter the outcome, and despite the fact that I ruined my life, I saved his future.

The future that I used to call home, was not a future that the America of the past could have ever foreseen. Violence and crime run rampant, criminals were the ones in charge of the poor...though most of the time it felt more like we were the prisoners.

The government tried to help, tried to set curfews and to make the laws harsher. They were too late though, the world was already in shambles. The criminals had gone too far now, their crime had been allowed to grow and become a sort of second government, their new kingdom. They were left the poor as their livestock, condemned to our own personal slaughter house.

We were allowed families, and we were still allowed to love...but sometimes we just put the ones that we loved in danger. I had done that, taken the one person that I loved and lead them straight to the slaughter.

His name was Ashe Torres, and he’s alive...well not now, in this time. But I left him to live. Ashe was a boy that I met from the better side of town, he belonged to a family that had enough money to pay-off the criminal slime. Yet I stole him away from that safety, stole him into my land of pain and death.

I can remember the day I met him still, I didn’t even know what he was doing there. Why somebody from a safe haven, would be taking a walk through the slums I call home. I didn’t believe in love at first sight when I met him, I still don’t...but I definitely knew that I wanted to get to know him better. And that’s just what I did.

I got to know that beautiful boy, but in the end I was just delivering him to his death. It had been an extremely sunny and dazzling day when they came, nearly three years after Ashe and I initially met. They were looking for their payment...what I owed them, what my family had owe to them. They never forgot a debt, even when a person had passed away, and my parents debts still weighed me down today. My mother and father had already been taken, I had no brothers or sisters to speak of.

Ashe lived with me at the time...I had told him he could stay in his own safe, gorgeous house. He wouldn’t have any of it though, he wanted to be with me, and his parents didn’t approve of me being there. Why would they approve of a rat from the gutter? They took any money Ashe had to his own name, even penniless he would never belong to this place.

I knew how to deal with them though, knew how to promise and to beg for my life and a few more months. Then I gave them what money I had, my dignity had fallen through the cracks years ago.

Ashe though, he wasn’t used to this. He was used to being allowed to speak his mind, though now he didn’t have the money to do things like that. He stood up for me, and by the end of the conversation his life was draining away, as he lay on the floor.

I cradled that boy in my arms, held him to my chest and sobbed for his life. I whispered to him until the sobs drowned even those sweet words out. I clung tightly to him, and watched as his color and his life bled away onto the wooden floor. It was in that moment that I knew I could change this, and I knew that I would...no matter what it meant for me.

I buried him in the week to come, watching him disappear down into the earth. It was a wonder our cemeteries were not overflowing with the dead by then. My fingers brushed against the pocket- watch at my waist during the entire ceremony, running my fingers over the smooth glass and silver.

The people I lived near mourned for my loss as well, it was hard not to see the beauty in Ashe, not just in his appearance but in the way that he treated people. It was a loss for not only me, it was a loss for our society to see somebody so pure and innocent stolen away.

I’d made up my mind by then, I’d made up my mind when I saw my life shatter when he hit the floor. I’d use the rest of the money that I had to my name...and I’d right the wrong that I had done.

I only needed to go back a few years, three to be exact, and by doing that I’d already broken the law. Once I set that dial back and hit go, I knew it’d only be a matter of time before I was found out. It must alert the authorities when a time machine goes back, usually the perpetrators don’t even finish what they were there to start.

It was simple, my job that is. To keep Ashe from ever falling in love with me, it really wasn’t that hard. I just couldn’t touch my past-self...even I didn’t want to mess up things that badly.

I kept myself hidden as I saw him approaching our dilapidated city. I hid, took the rock closest to my feet and peeked out from the building I stood behind. I tried to aim as best as I could, and when I let that rock fly it hit him square in the shoulder. The look of pain on his face was enough to break my heart, not only that...but the hurt that showed, the fact that somebody would even want to do something like that.

“Where are you, show yourself!” he yelled, sounding timid as he spoke.

I hadn’t expected that, I hadn’t known that I would have to talk to him. That I would have to further hurt the one that I loved so dearly.

“We don’t want you here!” I yelled back, moving to hide behind something else as he approached the alleyway. “Go back to your rich mommy and daddy, we don’t need your pity!” I yelled back. The sound of his footsteps faded as I said this, and I peeked out from behind the dumpster I hid behind.

He looked so shock...so hurt, like he didn’t know what to do. I swear I could even see tears glistening in that beautiful boy’s eyes. I needed to do this though, to protect him from myself. A sigh of relief fled from my lips as soon as he turned heel, and went back towards his own house. I prayed that he wouldn’t return.

It wasn’t long after that I was caught. I kept my mouth shut, knowing that the government would try to right what I had done if I spoke a word of it.

As they dragged me away, I glanced at my hip. The pocket-watch that glistened there slowly started to fade away, and the tears fell freely now. Somewhere in my heart it broke further in that moment, but I knew that he was safe.

That pocket-watch had been a gift, if it had stayed...I would have known that I had failed. But his family heirloom faded away, probably laying on the hip of somebody more well suited for him.

I don’t know where I am now, and I’m not even sure that I want to know.

I will never regret that I saved the boy I loved, who never knew me.