Triangle | -2009-

I looked at the void, at my brother’s frozen face, at the date on the pillars cycling backward—1996, 1983, 1971. The triangle wasn’t a mystery. It was a machine. And it had been running for a very, very long time.

It was Leo’s signal. The one he’d sent six months ago. The one that got me here. Triangle -2009-

Sanger’s voice crackled, thin and terrified. “It’s not a door. It’s a… a filing system. Every triangle leads to another year. Another loop. We’re stuck.” I looked at the void, at my brother’s

The sub scraped against the center of the triangle. The pillars began to hum, the numbers glowing a deep, arterial red. 2… 0… 0… 9. The water boiled without heat. The sky—if you could call the crushing dark above a sky—began to bleed through. And it had been running for a very, very long time

The last thing I saw before the void swallowed everything was the postcard, drifting past the window. The beach was still perfect. The water still turquoise.

When the noise stopped, the sonar was dead. The lights flickered on to reveal… nothing. No seafloor. No pillars. Just an endless, milky void. And floating ten meters from the sub’s window, perfectly preserved, was Leo.