The following days, Elara and Kael experimented cautiously, stitching fragments of memories from volunteers and observing the results. At first, everything was controlled. Volunteers reported visions of lives they never lived—minor, fascinating experiences.
But soon, cracks began to appear. One morning, Kael noticed the lab window reflected a different skyline. "Elara… that street outside—the one with the clock tower—isn't there anymore," he whispered.
Elara frowned at the Telestitch. "The threads… they're… leaking."
The anomalies grew more pronounced. Objects moved on their own, people remembered things that never happened, and reality itself began to flicker in subtle ways. One evening, while reviewing the data, Kael vanished for a full ten seconds before reappearing. "I… I was somewhere else," he stammered. "It felt real."
Despite the danger, Elara felt compelled to push further. She stitched herself directly into an alternate timeline of Nova Haven. The city she entered was familiar yet alien, as if reality had a mirrored version with subtle distortions: gravity pulled slightly differently, colors shimmered unnaturally, and time ticked at a peculiar pace.
Here, she understood the true cost of the Telestitch: it was unraveling the delicate balance of the universe, thread by thread.