Series: Chronos Imperium
Episode 1: Anomaly
FADE IN:
EXT. AETHELGARD - DAY (2342 A.D.)
Sunlight, pure and soft, filters through the canopy of a bio-luminescent forest. The trees, with bark like polished silver and leaves of emerald green, tower over crystalline rivers that flow with a gentle hum.
In the distance, the city of Aethelgard rises.
Its towers are not of steel and concrete, but of living, self-repairing coral and woven carbon, spiraling elegantly towards a sky unblemished by pollution. There is a profound, palpable peace here, a world humming in perfect harmony.
This is the world built by the Oracle.
INT. ORACLE CHAMBER - DAY
PRINCESS KAELEN (22), dressed in simple, elegant robes of white and silver, stands barefoot on a floor of cool, glowing light. Her hair is long and dark, and her eyes, a startling shade of violet, are focused on the air in front of her. She is a member of the Royal Family, the hereditary Stewards of the Oracle.
The chamber is vast and circular. The walls are a seamless, pearlescent surface that swirls with galaxies of data-streams of light representing global weather patterns, resource distribution, and the collective emotional state of humanity.
At the center of the room floats a sphere of pure, white light. This is the heart of the Oracle, the benevolent machine intelligence that has guided humanity for two centuries, eradicating war, famine, and disease.
Kaelen holds a small, smooth obsidian device in her palm-a Wayfinder. With a gesture, she pulls a thread of data from the Oracle. A holographic projection shimmers into existence before her: a meticulously detailed simulation of 20th-century Earth.
It's her private obsession. While the other Stewards focus on the present, Kaelen is a temporal historian, fascinated by the chaotic, violent, beautifully imperfect era that came before. She watches as tiny, pixelated cars clog the streets of a city labeled "New York, 1996."
Her older brother, LYREN (30), enters. He is the epitome of a Steward-calm, composed, and utterly devoted to the Oracle's logic.
> The past again, little sister? Why do you insist on gazing into the abyss? There is nothing but noise and pain there.
> It's not noise, Lyren. It's... music. A
symphony of beautiful, glorious chaos. It's the era that made us possible. We have a duty to understand it.
> We have a duty to the present. The Oracle requires our attention for the atmospheric moisture redistribution over the Sahara.
Real-world concerns.
Kaelen sighs, but her eyes sparkle with defiance. She respects her brother, but she doesn't understand his lack of curiosity.
> The Oracle can handle the weather. It's the deep history logs that are... behaving strangely.
> The Oracle does not behave "strangely." It is perfect. Its logic is absolute.
He places a hand on her shoulder, his tone softening.
> Come. Join the Council. Leave the ghosts to their graves.
Lyren exits. Kaelen watches him go, then turns back to her simulation. She runs a deep diagnostic, a complex query into the foundational data of their timeline. She wants to see the roots of their utopia, the precise moment history bent towards their perfect present.
The Oracle chamber hums. The data streams on the walls begin to flicker.
Suddenly, an alarm blares-a sound no one has heard in a century. It's a discordant, ugly shriek. The white light of the Oracle's core wavers, turning a sickly yellow.
> (whispering)
> What is this?
On her holographic display, the simulation of 1996 violently distorts. A crimson spike, a line of corrupted data, erupts from that point in time and shoots forward, tearing through the 21st, 22nd, and 23rd centuries.
The data streams on the walls turn red.
Projections flash in the air:
TIMELINE INTEGRITY: 94%
TIMELINE INTEGRITY: 87%
TIMELINE INTEGRITY: 75%
Lyren and the other members of the Royal Council rush back in, their faces masks of
Lyren and the other members of the Royal Council rush back in, their faces masks of disbelief and horror.
> It's not me! It's an anomaly. Something in the past... it's rewriting us.
She frantically works the Wayfinder, her fingers flying across its surface. She isolates the source of the corruption. A face appears in the hologram. A man's face-gaunt, with eyes that burn with a cold, terrifying intelligence. It is a face she knows from the history archives.
> Malakor.
> Impossible. He was exiled. Stripped of his neural interface. He has no access to the Oracle.
> He doesn't need it. He's not attacking the Oracle. He's attacking history itself. He's gone back.
The Oracle's light flickers violently. The projection of their future-the serene, peaceful 24th century-is replaced by a nightmare. Cities of black iron under a blood-red sky. Masses of humanity marching in perfect, soulless synchronicity. A world not of peace, but of absolute, tyrannical control.
At the center of it all, a single, monolithic throne.
TIMELINE INTEGRITY: 42%
An elderly Steward, CHANCELLOR ELARA,
:
> A temporal paradox... He will unmake reality. We must do nothing. To interfere now could shatter what little remains.
5G
> Do nothing? He is erasing us! We are becoming a ghost story, a future that never was!
> She is right. We cannot allow this. Oracle, what is the protocol?
The light of the Oracle dims to a faint pulse.
A single, synthesized word echoes in the chamber.
> ...FAILURE...
The Stewards look at each other in terror.
The Oracle, their god, has just admitted defeat.But Kaelen's eyes are blazing. The fear is gone, replaced by a fierce, burning resolve.
She clutches her Wayfinder.
> No. Not yet.
She turns and runs from the chamber, ignoring Lyren's shouts.
INT. TEMPORAL LABORATORY -CONTINUOUS
Kaelen sprints into her private lab, a smaller, more cluttered version of the main chamber. She slams a command into a console. A ring of chrome and crystal lowers from the ceiling. This is the Temporal Displacement Unit-a forbidden piece of technology, deemed too dangerous to ever use.
Lyren bursts in behind her.
> Kaelen, stop! You don't know what you're doing! You will be torn apart!
> Our world is already being torn apart! The Oracle can't stop him. The Council is afraid to. That leaves me.
She steps onto the platform, her Wayfinder held tight to her chest. She syncs its temporal coordinates to the origin point of Malakor's anomaly: New York City, 1996.
> You are a Steward of the present, not a soldier of the past! This is not your fight!
Kaelen looks at her brother, her violet eyes filled with a sad, profound certainty.
> He is trying to conquer the world. I am a Princess of that world. That makes it myfight.
She initiates the sequence. The ring begins to spin, emitting a blinding white light and a deafening roar. The air cracks with energy. Lyren shields his eyes.
Through the storm, he sees his sister, not as a historian, not as a Steward, but as a warrior. A queen.
> (shouting over the noise)
> Tell them I went to go change the future!
With a final, shattering boom, the light implodes.
And Kaelen is gone.
Lyren stands alone in the silent, flickering laboratory. The TIMELINE INTEGRITY warning on a nearby screen freezes at 38%. He has just watched his sister leap into a
with nothing but a piece of dying technology and a desperate hope.
FADE TO BLACK.
END OF EPISODE 1