He had never been in that room before, he had never seen that specific reactor, although he knew one was doomed to fail. But he was aware of the yellow crystal shard, it was just a fragment of the larger crystal that fell to earth. The rest of the crystal was being studied by the government, it would later be used in its entirety as the fuel source for the final version of the generator.
Arthur was only aware of the crystal because it was featured in a government campaign and the laboratory's own press release several years in the future, but it would be kept as a closely guarded secret for the next couple decades.
"Too many strange things have happened." Arthur mumbled to himself. "But, I already knew something bad was happening with the reactor."
His rational side was trying to fight against his crazy theories. But it seemed like he had started stretching to explain some of the strange phenomenon, the only one that was impossible to explain was the fact that he was sent back in time.
"I have to go check." He finally came up with his answer. "There's a high chance it's just a coincidence but on the off chance that it isn't..."
If it wasn't a coincidence, and if this did happen, then what were the other visions. One was like the event that happened in his timeline, but that last one was confusing. What was the beam of light, and why did the sky turn purple?
"If that wasn't a dream... No-- a nightmare. Then what the hell was with the future versions of me." Arthur blurted out, "Why would I not save Anna, and what was with the other one, I don't even like beer."
He continued going back and forth in his mind, and his hands started to prune as he continued wasting water.
Eventually he started feeling better, and the stench escaped him. He finished showering before getting ready to visit the lab, and only now did he realise that his hand seemed to have healed.
Before he left, a strange thought crept into his mind, he decided to text Quinn, who fortunately was still awake this late at night.
"Hey, do you plan on getting a dog soon?" Arthur felt like an idiot the second he clicked send, but he couldn't take it back now.
A few minutes passed before he received a message back. Quinn sounded confused. "Huh? You know my mum won't let me get a pet. Why, what's up?"
Arthur didn't really know what to say now, so he just tried awkwardly changing the topic before letting Quinn get back to his game.
"What a stupid question to ask." Arthur shook his head as he grabbed his phone, keys and wallet.
He left the house, locking up behind him before making his way towards the laboratory back door.
When he entered the lab, it seemed eerily quiet. He made his way over to the special elevator, but it seemed to not be operational, so he was forced to take the stairs.
"That's weird, something is definitely wrong." Arthur mumbled to himself as he climbed the stairs up to the first floor. He made his way over to his father's office, but he couldn't help but notice that everyone he passed was running around while trying not to make too much noise. They seemed so busy that Arthur barely got a greeting.
As he approached his father's office, he could hear his father yelling through the door. "...What the hell do you mean you can't agree to our request."
"The department secretary can't give you that clearance." He heard an unfamiliar voice responding to his father, although his voice sounded like he was on the verge of crying. A common fate for those who ended up on the wrong side of his father.
"Don't you give me that crap. Your stupid design just put three of my best in the ICU, has dealt millions of dollars in property damage and wounded my son." His father shouted, it sounded like he was getting progressively angrier as he continued his rant. "So alongside any compensation we're owed, I expect to see a damn letter on my desk saying we've got free reign over the project by tomorrow morning."
When Arthur heard his father say "three of my best", his mind immediately brought back up the dream he had. It was getting harder to deny that it wasn't a coincidence.
"But he can't--" The other person tried to explain himself, but he was cut off by Arthur's father.
"I don't care. If he doesn't I'll shove his stupid space rock so far up his--" As his father began screaming, Arthur heard glass shatter. It seems his father had throw something again. The glass shattering was so loud he almost missed the rest of his father's threats.
"You government types are so god damn useless. Why do you even have a science and industry department if everyone on it is incompetent." His father threw insults at the man. "Stop wasting money and just redo our damn contract, or I'll start a damn press release right now."
"You can't do tha--" The other person tried to speak once more, but was cut off once again.
"Just watch me!" His father threatened, "Get the hell out of my office, and don't come back without a contract!"
The door swung open, and a pale scrawny man wearing a suit quickly left the room, he didn't seem happy.
"Useless government officials." He could hear his father's mumbles now that the door was wide open. "I should bill them for the window too."
Arthur walked into the room. His father had his back turned to him, he was busy inspecting the damaged window, and looking to see if any glass hit someone on the floor below.
"Do you think it was wise to threaten the government?" Arthur asked with a concerned voice.
"Arthur?" His father's tone quickly softened as he turned around. "What are you doing awake?"
"I couldn't sleep." He said, "I went to bed with a fever, woke up covered in sweat and nauseous, I was hoping to see if Doctor Hudson could prescribe me something to help... But it doesn't seem like the right time. What happened here?"
His father stared at him, he had a troubled expression on his face. Arthur's father wasn't fond of lying, especially to his children.
Although he didn't consider omission a dishonesty. Which would also probably be his justification if pressed on the issue of the Watts family.
"The government's reactor overloaded." His father told him the truth, "The discharge hit a couple of the engineers that couldn't escape in time, before it self destructed."
This lined up with the dream Arthur had. He was now almost certain that he had another one of those strange future vision phenomenons, but that only troubled him further when he remembered the other two scenes.
While the two talked for a little while, Arthur found out that the accident happened a few hours ago, which lined up with the dream once again.
There was a knock on the door as a woman wearing hospital scrubs poked her head through the doorway.
"What is it?" Arthur's father asked.
"Sir, two of the patients are conscious." The nurse said, "Doctor Hudson is checking up on them now, but he says it isn't extremely serious."
Arthur, his father and the nurse all made their way up to the second floor. Unfortunately they had to use the staircase, which Arthur found out was because of the surge caused by the reactor, as he suspected. Fortunately they used a separate power source for the medical bay, so other experiments never posed any risks to the patients or equipment.
The three cut through the medical research sector and made their way into the medical bay. They were led over to the sector that focused on intensive care, which was also near the surgery rooms, one of which seemed to have a lot of activity.
There were quite a few medical staff around, but Arthur immediately noticed Anna and Doctor Hudson walking out from one of the patient rooms.
The nurse that led them there quickly disappeared into another room, leaving Arthur and his father to approach the other two on their own.
"Doctor Hudson." Arthur's father spoke loudly, causing everyone's attention to focus on him.
Doctor Hudson walked over to him, and Anna followed. She had a surprised expression when she saw Arthur beside their father.
"Art, what are you doing here?" Anna asked as she approached Arthur, "You should be asleep."
Anna looked incredibly tired, but she still had the energy to worry about her little brother.
Arthur could feel his heart beating faster as he saw his sister walk towards him, he remembered the sight of his sister's body laying there in the neighbours yard, but he had to force himself not to suddenly start crying.
"Hey buddy, you okay?" Anna reached over and placed her hand on his forehead. "You don't look so good. Oh, you're burning up."
"Yeah, I came to get medicine. But..." Arthur felt his throat tighten up. He already went through this emotional turmoil once before, why did it have to start again.
He noticed Doctor Hudson and his father start walking into one of the patients rooms. Arthur decided that he had to know for absolute certain.
"I wanted to talk with Doctor Hudson." He said softly before quickly making his way into the same room, Anna followed along saying that it wasn't something he should see.
"How bad is it?" Arthur heard his father's voice as he turned the corner.
As Arthur peered into the room, he saw a familiar looking man laying in the hospital bed. It was definitely one of the engineers in his dream, this erased all doubt in Arthur's mind.
