The Cafe was quieter than usual when Elian stepped back into it.
The world around him had resumed its usual pace, but he hadn't. His hands still trembled faintly, not from fear but from awe.
It was difficult to explain what it felt like walking among the ancient Sumerians, witnessing their daily lives, their struggles, their brilliance.
He had seen history, not in a textbook or documentary, but with his own eyes.
Selene sat at the same table near the window, sipping her tea as though she hadn't moved at all. She looked up and met his gaze as he approached. Her expression, unreadable as ever, was softer this time. Perhaps even… guarded.
"You look like someone who's been gone longer than an hour," she said.
Elian slid into the seat across from her. "It felt like days. Maybe longer. But it was real.
All of it. The sounds, the people, the smell of the air… I walked in the first cities. I talked to them."
"Yes," she replied. "Time is not always a constant in the way you think. Where you went was real. What you felt, experienced
it all happened."
He leaned forward. "How is that even possible? How does any of this make sense? I'm not… I'm not anyone special. Why me?"
Selene didn't answer immediately. She studied him with eyes that seemed to measure his soul.
"You were chosen because you listened," she finally said. "Most people look at history as something dead. Cold facts. Events to be memorized. But you… you saw it as something alive. You heard its voice. And more importantly, you cared."
Elian fell silent. The compliment, if that's what it was, stirred something deeper in him. He didn't know what to say.
Selene's gaze darkened slightly. "But you need to understand something before we go further. Time travel isn't just wonder and knowledge. It has cost. There are rules."
He tensed. "Rules?"
"Yes. Not because someone enforced them, but because time, by nature, is fragile.
Memory and reality are entangled more tightly than you think. Change even a small moment, and it could echo forward in ways we can't predict."
"So... no interfering?" he asked.
"You can observe. You can learn. But you must never change the course of events. No matter how tempted you are. No matter how unjust something may seem."
He looked away, jaw tightening. "That's... easier said than done. If I saw someone suffering if I saw someone about to die how could I not help?"
Selene's voice was soft but firm. "Because history has already shaped the world you live in. Change one moment, and you risk unraveling everything that followed.
Even mercy can be dangerous in the wrong moment."
He didn't answer right away. The Sumerian girl he'd spoken to came to mind. The way she had smiled at him. The glimmer of curiosity in her eyes. What if something had happened to her? Would he have had the strength to stay silent?
"Why me?" he asked again. "Why not a historian, or a scholar? Someone more qualified?"
"Because scholars seek facts. You seek meaning," she said. "And meaning is what history truly is. Not a list of dates, but the soul of humanity."
There was a silence between them then. Heavy, not uncomfortable. He realized he was only just beginning to understand the depth of what he'd agreed to. It wasn't a thrill-seeking adventure. It was something sacred. Something dangerous.
"What happens now?" he finally asked.
Selene gave a faint smile. "You decide. You've seen the beginning. Now we move forward to the next breath of civilization. Egypt."
Elian's heart stirred again at the mention of it. Egypt the land of pyramids, pharaohs, and secrets lost to time.
"You'll see things that scholars only dream of," she said, finishing her tea. "But remember, Elian every step you take in the past walks beside shadows. Respect them."
He nodded slowly. The weight of her words lingered.
Outside, dusk had settled over the city, the streetlamps flickering to life.
Selene rose from her seat and turned. "We leave tomorrow. Rest well tonight. Egypt waits."
As she walked away, Elian remained seated for a long while. The thrill of discovery hadn't left him but now it was tempered by something deeper. A quiet, growing sense of responsibility.
He opened his journal and wrote down four words.
History is watching me.