His head was pounding and the room was spinning while something felt wrong.
The ceiling was unfamiliar and painted white with a crack running diagonally from corner to corner, while his vision blurred at the edges and his skull throbbed. His mouth was dry and tasted like cheap beer, so when he tried to move his arms they felt heavy in that particular way that came from drinking too much too fast.
He was lying on a bed.
That registered slowly while his brain struggled to process where he was and how he'd gotten here, because the mattress beneath him was soft and the sheets smelled like fabric softener and perfume.
The truck.
The impact and the pain and the blood spreading beneath him on pavement and the text appearing in his vision telling him regression was complete, so his chest tightened while panic started flooding through his system.
Weight pressed down on his hips and his eyes focused properly.
A girl was straddling him while her hands worked on his belt buckle pulling it open, and her shirt was torn at the collar with fabric hanging loose while her hair was messy. His own shirt was gone and his chest was bare while his jeans were still on but unbuttoned.
What the fuck?
His brain struggled to catch up because seconds ago he was dying on pavement and now he was in a bed with someone on top of him, so confusion flooded his system while his body felt heavy and sluggish in ways that didn't make sense.
"Wait—" His voice came out rough and slurred, so he tried to sit up but his coordination was off while she pushed him back down. Her fingers worked at his belt while he tried to process what was happening. "Stop—what are you—"
She wasn't looking at his face while her expression stayed focused and determined, then his eyes caught her features properly—the sharp nose, the blonde hair, the small scar above her left eyebrow—and recognition hit him like a second truck.
Christabel.
The torn shirt.
The door slightly ajar instead of locked.
Her hands pulling at his pants while positioning herself on top of him.
Thirty years of memories flooded back with perfect clarity because he'd lived through the aftermath of this exact moment, so his chest tightened while understanding crashed over him.
This was the party.
This was the room.
This was her.
She was going to scream.
Any second now she'd scream and people would come running so they'd see her torn shirt and his bare chest and his pants half-undone, then she'd cry and say he forced himself on her while everyone believed her.
The setup was perfect and he'd fallen into it exactly like he had in the original timeline, but this time he had knowledge so this time he could change it.
His belt came loose while her hands moved to the button of his jeans.
He filled his lungs with air before screaming.
"HELP! SOMEBODY HELP ME!"
Her hands froze while her eyes went wide with shock, so for two seconds she just stared at him while her brain tried to recalibrate.
Footsteps pounded in the hallway while voices called out.
The door burst open as three people stumbled into the room with drinks in their hands, so their eyes went immediately to the bed.
A girl straddling a guy with torn shirt and his pants undone while him calling for help instead of her.
"Please—" He forced his voice to shake while crossing his arms over his bare chest, then his face twisted into an expression of fear. "Please help me—I said no but she won't stop—"
The girl scrambled off him while her face went from shocked to panicked, so she opened her mouth to speak but nothing came out.
More people appeared in the doorway while phones came out immediately.
"I—this isn't—" Her voice cracked as her hands moved to fix her torn shirt. "He's lying—he—we were just—"
"He called for help." One of the guys in the doorway spoke flatly while his expression stayed hard. "We heard him shouting so we came running. You were on top of him."
"His pants are undone," a girl added. "What the fuck were you doing?"
The room was filling up while at least seven people were crowded around the doorway, so the girl's face had gone pale while her breathing accelerated.
He sat up slowly before grabbing his shirt from where it had been thrown on the floor beside the bed, then his hands shook slightly while he pulled it on. His belt hung loose while his jeans were unbuttoned, yet he made no move to fix either.
"I don't feel good," he said quietly, while his voice carried just enough tremor to sound genuine. "I drank too much so she said she'd help me lie down somewhere quiet, then she locked the door and started taking my clothes off while I kept saying no but she wouldn't listen—"
"You're fucking lying!" The girl's voice went shrill. "He wanted it—he came up here with me—"
"Then why was he screaming for help?" The guy in the doorway crossed his arms. "And why's your shirt torn? You do that to yourself?"
Her mouth opened and closed without sound.
Someone laughed from the back of the crowd.
"Holy shit," another voice said. "She actually tried to—"
"We should call someone," a girl interrupted while already pulling out her phone. "Like campus security or something."
The crowd started murmuring while phones stayed pointed at the scene, so the girl just stood there frozen.
He stood up slowly before fastening his jeans with fingers that had stopped shaking, then he pushed through the crowd toward the door while people stepped aside.
Lucas appeared in the hallway with wide eyes. "Bro, what the fuck just happened?"
"I'll tell you later." His voice stayed quiet. "I need to get out of here."
The party continued downstairs but the music seemed distant, so he walked through the front door and out into the night air without looking back.
The street was quiet and empty while the March air was cold.
He walked twenty feet from the house before his legs gave out, then he sat down hard on the curb while his hands were shaking again from relief.
His breath came out in short gasps while his mind tried to process what had just happened.
Thirty-one years of suffering had just been erased because he'd screamed first so witnesses had seen the truth instead of a lie.
His vision blurred so he pressed his palms against his eyes while his chest heaved.
Text appeared in his peripheral vision—clean white letters against the darkness behind his closed eyelids.
|CRITICAL MISSION: ESCAPE FALSE ACCUSATION|
|STATUS: COMPLETE|
|REGISTERING USER INTO DATABASE...|
A loading bar appeared beneath the text and filled from left to right with smooth progression, and his hands dropped from his eyes while he stared at the glowing interface that hung in the air impossible and real at the same time.
|REGISTRATION COMPLETE|
|REWARD GRANTED|
His breath caught and his chest tightened while confusion flooded his alcohol-fogged brain because what the fuck was happening and what reward and why were glowing words appearing in his vision like he was inside some kind of video game.
"What..." The word came out as a whisper and his voice cracked. "What is this?"