What Happened?

I was rushed to the medical room for a checkup, my body still trembling from the intense experience. The nurse asked me a few routine questions, but I could barely focus on her words. My head was throbbing, and my thoughts were spinning in circles.
They had called my parents, but only my father was available. He was on his way, though it would take some time for him to arrive. All I could do now was wait.
As I lay back on the bed, I couldn’t help but replay the events in my mind. Had I really called someone from the past? The idea seemed absurd, yet everything pointed to that conclusion. The number, the conversation, the strange distortion I’d experienced afterward—it all lined up, even though I could barely believe it myself.
But if I had, what did it mean? What kind of consequences could come from that single call? Could I have set off a butterfly effect spanning over a thousand years? My mind raced, but I had no answers.
I reached for my phone, hoping to look over the call history and find some kind of proof. But as my hand brushed against my pocket, I felt a sudden, intense heat. It was like a flash of fire searing into my leg.
“What the—” I hissed, pulling my hand away. My phone. It was burning up.
I quickly reached into my pocket, ignoring the pain, and yanked the phone out. It was scorching hot, almost unbearable to hold. I tossed it onto the nearby table, watching as it landed with a soft thud. Even from where I was sitting, I could see the heat radiating off it.
The skin on my leg where the phone had been felt raw, like it had been burned. I rubbed at it, wincing from the sting. The phone lay there, silent but dangerously hot, almost as if it had absorbed too much energy and was now suffering the consequences.
“Great,” I muttered, staring at it from a distance. “Now what?”
I couldn’t touch the phone again until it cooled down. But something about the way it had overheated gave me chills. What if the call had triggered some kind of overload? What if I had unknowingly pushed my phone beyond its limits by connecting it to that strange moment in time?
The possibilities spiraled in my mind, growing more and more unsettling.
I leaned back, trying to calm my racing thoughts, but it was difficult. My body felt weak, and my head still pounded with the weight of it all. It was like a flood of information, memories, and sensations had surged into me, overwhelming my senses.
Did the call somehow rewrite my life? That ridiculous thought kept haunting me. Everything seemed so surreal now, as if reality itself had been altered in some way. I needed answers, but the more I thought about it, the more impossible it all seemed.
A nurse came in shortly after, noticing the burn on my leg from the overheated phone. She worked quickly, treating the injury with practiced precision. The cool sensation of the ointment was a welcome relief, but it didn’t do much to ease the mess swirling in my head.
Then, my father stepped in, his eyes immediately scanning me with concern. “You okay, son?” he asked, his voice steady but edged with worry.
“I am… not,” I admitted, my voice low. I felt sick—mentally, physically, everything just felt wrong. “I’m feeling very miserable.”
My father, usually calm and collected, furrowed his brow. "What happened?"
I looked around the room. There was no way I could explain this here, with the school’s sterile white walls and the occasional hum of medical equipment around us. This needed to be a private conversation, away from prying ears and curious eyes.
“Let’s have this conversation somewhere more private,” I suggested, my voice quieter now. My father, always quick to catch on, gave a small nod in agreement. Without another word, we left the medical room.
As we walked toward the car, I felt the weight of the situation pressing down on me harder. My father opened the passenger door for me, and once I settled inside, he got in and started the engine. The gentle hum of the car filled the silence as he drove us out of the school grounds. It wasn’t until we were far enough away, the city skyline looming in the distance, that he finally spoke.
“So, are you finally going to tell me what’s going on?” my father asked, his eyes fixed on the road ahead as we sped along the highway.
I hesitated, knowing how crazy this all sounded. “I don’t really have enough proof to support this, and it’s going to be hard to believe hearing it for the first time,” I said, pausing before continuing. “But... I think I’ve contacted the past.”
“You did?” My father’s voice held a mix of curiosity and excitement.
“Not confirmed yet. I need to do more tests.”
He chuckled softly. “We can become very popular and rich with this discovery.”
Of course, that was his first thought. Always about the money and fame. “No, we can’t,” I said firmly. “Right now, we’re in a dangerous era, with the war between humans and AI. If they figure out we’ve unlocked something like this, they’ll come after us harder.”
“I guess you’re right,” my father muttered, disappointment creeping into his voice.
“And aren’t we rich enough already?” I added, a bit frustrated.
“Well, we could still be more,” he replied, without a hint of irony.
I sighed, turning to look out the window. “I don’t know if I’m supposed to be happy with that answer.”
“Huh?” His voice sharpened, slightly annoyed.
“Nothing, you’ll just get more angry and punish me,” I muttered under my breath.
Despite his intelligence, my father always seemed to make the most selfish choices. He looked out for himself first, and only after his own survival did he consider anyone else. I wanted to be angry, but I couldn’t muster the energy. He was who he was, and deep down, I had accepted that.
After a while, we finally arrived home.
As soon as we arrived back home, I bolted straight for the house lab. My mind was still clouded with a headache, but that didn’t matter right now. I needed to figure this out first.
I grabbed my phone and connected it to a machine, setting everything up. First, I hooked it to the particle accelerator, then added some machines designed to absorb any excess energy in case things got too heated. Both machines were up and running. I typed the number back into the system and hit "call."
But instead of a connection, the screen flashed a message: 'No Caller ID Found…' Frustration bubbled up inside me. Why wasn’t it working? Could it be because the call was from a thousand years ago? Maybe the machines draining the energy were interfering with the signal.
I removed the energy-absorbing devices and restarted the particle accelerator. Just as I was about to type the number back in, I heard a familiar voice behind me.
“Rui, you know you can’t just use the machines without our permission,” my mother said, standing at the entrance of the lab with her arms crossed.
I froze for a moment, then quickly turned to face her. “Oh, yeah, I’m sorry. But I think I’ve discovered something new,” I said, still typing the number into the system.
Without a word, my mom slipped on her lab coat and safety glasses, walking over to me with a focused expression. She handed me a pair of safety glasses, and I put them on without hesitation.
“Thanks,” I muttered, my hands shaky as I continued the process.
The phone was calling again. It took longer this time, the machine humming softly as it worked. I held my breath, waiting for something—anything—but then, a new message appeared: 'No connection found.'
This time, there was a caller ID, but the connection just wasn’t strong enough. It was close, but not enough to pull through.
Before I could reach for the phone to disconnect it, my mother stopped me. “Wait,” she said, handing me a pair of insulated gloves. “You should be more careful, Rui.”
“Yeah, sorry, and thanks,” I replied, slipping on the gloves. I carefully disconnected the phone from the machines and placed it down on a nearby counter where it wouldn’t be in the way.
“You’re excited, forgot about every safety rule, and the phone is playing a major part in this experiment,” my mother said, her tone a mixture of concern and intrigue. “Have you figured out time travel?”
“I think so,” I replied, trying to steady my thoughts. “Me and my friend were testing some things out by sending random messages to an unknown number, but then he grabbed my phone and called the number instead. The person on the other end… they sounded like they were from the year 2025. But I didn’t have solid proof, until this experiment.”
“I see… Anything else unusual?” she asked, clearly trying to gather more details.
“Yeah,” I said, recalling the unsettling moment. “After I hung up the call, everything around me started to warp, like a virus was spreading through reality. Colors, sounds, sensations—it all felt wrong. But then it snapped back to normal. My theory is that it is a 1000-year butterfly effect taking hold.”
“If that’s true, then you should be in bed,” she said with a sigh. “The butterfly effect is no joke, and if you’re feeling nauseous, you shouldn’t push yourself.”
“Yeah, I know. It’s catching up to me,” I admitted, feeling the exhaustion and nausea really hit. “Good night.”
“Good night,” she replied softly, watching me as I headed toward my bedroom. “I’m going to do some research on this phone tonight. Maybe tomorrow, we’ll have more answers.”
“Okay,” I said, too tired to think much more about it. I slipped into bed, my mind still racing with everything that had happened. But sleep quickly took over, and I drifted off, hoping that tomorrow would bring some clarity.

To be continued…