**EPISODE ONE:**
"THE SCIENTIST, THE JUNGLE, AND THE WORST POSSIBLE LANDING"**
---
1. THE INVENTION THAT SHOULD NOT HAVE WORKED
Dr. Milo Finch was absolutely, undeniably certain of one thing:
Time travel was a terrible idea.
This belief did not stop him from inventing it.
The laboratory beneath Finch Applied Sciences looked exactly like the kind of place where a catastrophic accident would later be described in a congressional hearing. Wires snaked across the floor like anxious spaghetti. Monitors flickered with equations that no longer remembered what numbers meant. Coffee cups formed geological layers on every surface, charting Milo's decline from "brilliant young scientist" to "man who argued with a microwave at three in the morning."
At the center of the chaos stood the machine.
Officially, it was called the Finch Temporal Displacement Engine.
Unofficially, Milo had named it "The DeLorean But Worse."
It was a ring of humming metal, large enough to walk through, glowing with a nervous blue light that suggested it was one bad decision away from becoming a crater. Symbols scrolled across its surface... some mathematical, some temporal, some possibly just there to intimidate reality.
Milo stared at it, rubbing his eyes.
"This," he said aloud, "is either going to change the course of human history… or turn me into an interesting smear."
The machine beeped.
Milo sighed.
"Don't encourage me."
He checked his wrist-mounted control unit... sleek, compact, and duct-taped in three places. The screen read:
TEMPORAL TARGET: Unverified
Unstable
Probably Fine
Milo nodded.
"Good enough."
He hesitated, fingers hovering over the activation switch.
Every sci-fi movie he had ever seen played in his head at once.
Don't mess with time.
You'll create paradoxes.
You'll erase your parents.
You'll accidentally invent a new Hitler.
Milo swallowed.
"I'll just go back a little," he muttered. "Observe. No touching. In and out."
The universe, which had been listening patiently, prepared to laugh.
Milo pressed the switch.
The Finch Temporal Displacement Engine screamed.
Not metaphorically. Literally. Milo had not anticipated that time itself would sound like a blender full of haunted cats.
Light exploded outward. Gravity inverted, reconsidered, then gave up entirely. Milo felt his stomach attempt to file for divorce from the rest of his organs.
"Oh come on!" he shouted as the floor vanished beneath him. "I calibrated you!"
Time folded.
Reality twisted.
And Dr. Milo Finch was violently ejected from the present.
---
2. IMPACT IS A RELATIVE TERM
Milo landed face-first.
There was no graceful way to phrase it. He did not stumble, roll, or heroically tumble to his feet. He slammed into the ground like a sack of science thrown from a moving truck.
Mud filled his mouth.
Warm mud.
Living mud.
Milo groaned and pushed himself upright, spitting and gagging.
"Note to self," he coughed. "Time travel tastes awful."
He wiped his glasses, smearing them further, and finally looked around.
The lab was gone.
So was the city. The ceiling. Electricity. Civilization.
Instead, towering trees rose in every direction, their trunks thicker than buildings, their leaves forming a living roof that blocked out most of the sky. Vines hung like ropes. The air was thick, wet, and alive with sound... chirps, growls, rustling leaves, distant roars.
Milo froze.
"Oh no," he whispered.
He checked his wrist console. The screen flickered, cracked but functional.
TEMPORAL COORDINATES:
Year:????
Era: Pre-Industrial (Probably)
Location: Tropical Biome
Status: Catastrophic Success
Milo laughed weakly.
"I did it," he said. "I traveled through time."
A pause.
"I also appear to have traveled directly into a nature documentary."
Something moved in the bushes.
Milo's heart leapt into his throat.
Okay, he thought. Statistically, it's probably just a monkey.
The bushes exploded outward.
It was not a monkey.
It was a man.
Or rather, a man-shaped missile.
He dropped from the trees like gravity owed him money, landing in a crouch that suggested several broken laws of physics and at least one gym membership Milo had never used.
The man was tall. Broad-shouldered. Bare-chested. Muscles layered over muscles like an anatomy textbook edited by a fantasy artist. His skin bore scars... old ones, earned ones. His hair was long and wild. His eyes were sharp, intelligent, and very aware of Milo.
The man stared at him.
Milo stared back.
Neither spoke.
The jungle held its breath.
Milo raised a hand and waved.
"Hi," he said. "I'm very lost."
The man sniffed the air.
Milo felt deeply judged.
"You are strange," the man said.
Milo's brain short-circuited.
"…You speak English."
"Yes," the man replied. "You speak loudly."
"That's fair. People tell me that."
The man stood, towering over Milo.
"I am Tarzan," he said. "Lord of the Jungle."
Silence.
Milo blinked.
Once.
Twice.
Then his brain exploded.
"Tarzan," he repeated faintly. "As in... Tarzan?"
Tarzan frowned.
"There is no other."
Milo sat down hard in the mud.
"Nope," he said. "Absolutely not. This is not happening. I did not invent time travel just to crash into a fictional character."
Tarzan tilted his head.
"You are injured in the mind," he observed.
"Buddy," Milo said, laughing hysterically, "you have no idea."
---
3. ACADEMIC PANIC IN A LOINCLOTH CONTEXT
Milo scrambled backward, slipping in mud.
"Okay," he said rapidly, pointing at Tarzan. "You're not real. You're literature. Public domain literature, but still."
Tarzan crossed his arms.
"You wear dead animal skin," Tarzan said. "You carry glowing magic. Yet I am not real?"
"That's… a strong counterpoint."
Tarzan circled Milo, eyes narrowing at the wrist console.
"That thing hums," Tarzan said. "It angers the jungle."
"Oh yeah," Milo said. "It does that."
A distant roar echoed.
Tarzan's posture shifted instantly... alert, predatory.
"Hunters," he said.
Milo's stomach dropped.
"Hunters?" he repeated. "With… guns?"
"Yes."
"That's bad," Milo said.
"Yes."
"That's very historically inaccurate," Milo added.
Tarzan looked at him.
"You brought them."
Milo raised both hands.
"Indirectly! Through time destabilization! It's a whole thing!"
A gunshot rang out.
Milo screamed.
Tarzan moved.
He grabbed Milo by the collar and threw him behind a fallen log just as a bullet shattered bark where Milo's head had been.
"Stay down," Tarzan ordered.
"I am extremely good at that!"
Tarzan leapt into the trees.
Milo peeked over the log and saw figures moving through the jungle... men in boots, carrying rifles, cutting through foliage with mechanical efficiency.
Wrong.
Everything about them was wrong.
Their weapons were too modern.
Their movements too trained.
This was not history.
This was invasion.
Tarzan struck from above, a blur of muscle and fury. He disarmed one hunter mid-leap, snapping the rifle like a toy. Another fired wildly before Tarzan kicked the weapon away and dropped him unconscious with terrifying precision.
Milo watched, stunned.
"This is like Batman," he whispered, "if Batman hated pants."
The jungle joined the fight.
Apes crashed down from the canopy. Elephants charged. Birds swarmed in shrieking clouds.
The hunters fled.
Silence returned.
Tarzan landed beside Milo.
"You are dangerous," Tarzan said calmly.
Milo nodded.
"I've been told."
---
4. CAMPFIRE CONFESSIONS AND COMIC BOOKS
That night, Tarzan led Milo to a hidden camp... elevated platforms woven into trees, firelight flickering against ancient bark.
Milo sat by the fire, wrapped in a borrowed pelt, shivering.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to bring… whatever this is."
Tarzan studied him.
"You fell from the sky," Tarzan said. "You smell of storms and fear. The jungle knows you are not a liar."
Milo swallowed.
He explained everything.
Time travel. The future. Cities. Satellites. Superheroes. Comic books. The concept of irony.
Tarzan listened intently.
"So," Tarzan said slowly, "you are a man who breaks time."
"Yes."
"And stories say I am a story."
"Yes."
Tarzan considered this.
"Stories have power," he said. "They shape men."
Milo smiled weakly.
"Trust me," he said. "You're a bestseller."
Tarzan nodded, satisfied.
The wrist console beeped.
Milo froze.
TEMPORAL ANOMALY DETECTED
His blood ran cold.
"That's… not good."
Tarzan stood, spear in hand.
"What comes?"
Milo looked out at the jungle.
"I don't know," he said. "But it followed me."
Somewhere in the darkness, something answered.
Time itself had been disturbed.
And it was not done yet.
---
5. END OF EPISODE ONE
Milo stared at the fire, realization sinking in.
He wasn't just stuck in the past.
He was standing at the beginning of something very wrong.
Tarzan watched the jungle.
"Tomorrow," Tarzan said, "we hunt."
Milo swallowed.
"Tomorrow," he said, "I explain paradoxes."
The jungle rustled.
The future trembled.
TO BE CONTINUED...
---
**EPISODE TWO**
**"THE JUNGLE REMEMBERS, AND TIME BLEEDS"**
---
**1. THE MORNING AFTER THE FUTURE BROKE**
Morning in the jungle did not arrive politely.
It did not ease in with soft light or gentle birdsong. It *erupted*. Sound slammed into Milo Finch's skull like a marching band made entirely of screaming parrots, arguing monkeys, and insects that had personally decided his ears were a hostile environment.
Milo groaned and rolled onto his side, immediately regretting both actions.
His body ached in places he hadn't known possessed opinions. His mouth tasted like ash, moss, and regret. His glasses were crooked. One lens was cracked.
"Fantastic," he muttered. "I survive time travel, land in fiction, and lose depth perception."
He pushed himself upright and nearly fell off the platform.
The camp sat high in the trees, woven into branches with a casual architectural confidence that suggested Tarzan had invented OSHA purely to ignore it. Platforms connected by rope bridges swayed gently in the breeze. Below them, the jungle stretched endlessly... green, breathing, alive.
Too alive.
Milo checked his wrist console.
The screen flickered. Lines of text scrolled rapidly.
**TEMPORAL STABILITY: 63%**
**ANOMALY PROXIMITY: INCREASING**
**WARNING: LOCAL REALITY DESYNCHRONIZATION DETECTED**
Milo swallowed.
"That's… lower than I like my reality percentages."
A shadow moved silently behind him.
"You sleep like wounded animal," Tarzan said.
Milo yelped, flailed, and nearly went over the edge before Tarzan caught him by the collar with effortless strength.
"Please stop doing that," Milo gasped. "I'm fragile. Emotionally and physically."
Tarzan released him and crouched nearby, eyes scanning the jungle below.
"The night was wrong," Tarzan said. "The jungle did not rest."
Milo frowned. "That's not normal?"
"The jungle always rests," Tarzan replied. "Even when it dreams of violence."
That… was not comforting.
Milo followed Tarzan's gaze. Below, the forest canopy rippled strangely, like heat haze over asphalt. Leaves shimmered. Shadows stretched where they shouldn't.
"Okay," Milo said slowly. "So I didn't just break time. I offended it personally."
Tarzan looked at him. "Explain."
Milo took a breath. "Time isn't just a line. It's… more like a river. You dam it, divert it, poke it with a stick... "
"The river drowns villages," Tarzan finished.
"Yes," Milo said. "Exactly that but metaphysical."
Tarzan nodded. "Then the river is angry."
A distant *thump* echoed through the jungle.
Then another.
Then something that sounded suspiciously like metal striking stone.
Milo's stomach tightened. "That's not… elephants."
"No," Tarzan agreed. "That is not the jungle."
---
**2. FOOTPRINTS THAT SHOULD NOT EXIST**
They descended carefully, Tarzan moving like gravity was merely a suggestion, Milo clinging to ropes like a man who deeply regretted skipping upper body workouts.
On the forest floor, the air felt heavier.
Hotter.
Charged.
Milo's wrist console began emitting a low, anxious hum.
"Stop that," Milo whispered at it. "We're already stressed."
They reached a clearing.
The ground was torn apart.
Deep tracks gouged the soil... parallel lines, evenly spaced, mechanical. Broken branches lay crushed beneath immense weight. Trees bore scorch marks.
Milo knelt, running trembling fingers over one of the impressions.
"…Tank treads."
Tarzan stared at him.
"Yes," Milo said weakly. "Actual tank treads. As in 'World War, not invented yet, very much not jungle-approved.'"
Tarzan crouched, touching the scorched bark.
"Fire without flame," he said. "Metal beasts."
Milo's console beeped sharply.
**TEMPORAL SIGNATURE IDENTIFIED**
**SOURCE: NON-NATIVE / MULTI-ERA TECHNOLOGY**
"Oh no," Milo whispered.
Tarzan straightened. "You know this enemy."
"I know the *type*," Milo said. "This isn't random. This is organized. Someone is using time travel. Or... " He swallowed. "Something."
Tarzan's eyes narrowed. "Hunters return."
"No," Milo said. "Hunters adapt."
A shrill cry pierced the air.
An ape... one of Tarzan's people... burst into the clearing, chest heaving, eyes wide with terror.
"Tarzan!" the ape cried, using the complex, fluid sign-language-like gestures of the jungle. "Metal men! They take trees! They take earth!"
Tarzan's jaw tightened.
"Where?"
The ape pointed east.
Milo felt cold.
"That's bad," he said. "That's very, very bad."
---
**3. THE FIRST FRACTURE**
They moved quickly.
Too quickly for Milo's liking, honestly.
Tarzan bounded through the jungle like a guided missile. Milo stumbled behind, branches slapping his face, shoes sinking into mud that seemed personally offended by his presence.
They reached a ridge overlooking a wide valley.
Milo stopped dead.
Below them, the jungle was being *harvested*.
Not chopped. Not burned.
*Extracted.*
Towering machines... angular, brutal, wrong... moved through the trees on articulated legs. Mechanical arms tore trees from the ground, roots and all, feeding them into grinding chambers that pulsed with blue light.
Men in armored suits moved among them... sleek, black, unmistakably *future* tech. Their helmets reflected the jungle like predators' eyes.
And hovering above it all...
A structure.
A spire of metal and glass, half-phased into existence, flickering between solid and transparent like a ghost trying to remember how to be real.
Milo's breath hitched.
"Oh god," he whispered. "They're anchoring."
Tarzan looked at him. "Explain."
"They're stabilizing a temporal insertion point," Milo said, horror rising in his voice. "They're making this time *stick* to theirs."
The console screamed.
**REALITY BREACH: STAGE ONE**
**WARNING: FICTIONAL ENTITIES GAINING ONTOLOGICAL MASS**
Milo froze.
"…That's new."
Tarzan turned slowly. "Say that again."
Milo laughed hysterically. "Apparently, by being here, by interfering, by being acknowledged... *you* are becoming more real."
Tarzan stared at the machines below.
"I was always real."
"Yes," Milo said. "But now the universe is starting to agree with you."
A gunshot cracked the air.
The bullet slammed into the tree inches from Milo's head.
Tarzan moved instantly, dragging Milo back as more shots tore through leaves.
"They see us!" Milo shouted.
"No," Tarzan said grimly. "They were waiting."
---
**4. MEN FROM A TOMORROW THAT SHOULD NOT EXIST**
The soldiers emerged from the treeline with chilling precision.
Six of them.
Armor matte-black, segmented, humming softly. Their weapons were compact, elegant, horrifyingly advanced.
One raised a hand.
"Dr. Milo Finch," a voice amplified and distorted called out. "You are requested to surrender."
Milo peeked from behind the tree.
"…Requested?"
"Compliance is statistically recommended," the voice replied.
Tarzan growled low in his throat.
Milo stood up slowly, hands raised. "Okay, okay. Let's not escalate."
Tarzan grabbed him. "Do not trust metal men."
"Normally I wouldn't," Milo whispered, "but these ones know my name."
The lead soldier stepped forward.
"We have been tracking your temporal signature for some time," the soldier said. "Your arrival accelerated projected timelines by thirty-seven years."
Milo's blood ran cold.
"You're from…?"
"A future that *should* exist," the soldier replied. "If anomalies like you did not interfere."
Tarzan stepped forward.
"You hurt jungle," Tarzan said.
"Collateral," the soldier replied flatly.
Tarzan moved.
What followed was chaos.
Tarzan launched himself forward with a roar that shook leaves from trees. He struck the first soldier with enough force to dent the armor, sending the man flying.
The others opened fire.
Energy bolts scorched the air.
Milo dove for cover, screaming something unintelligible about peer review and ethical oversight.
Tarzan moved like a force of nature... leaping, striking, disarming. But the weapons adapted. Shields flickered on. Blades of hard light extended from rifles.
One bolt grazed Tarzan's shoulder.
He staggered.
Milo saw red.
"No," Milo snapped, raising his wrist console. "No, no, no."
He slammed a sequence of commands.
The console screamed.
Time *hiccupped*.
For half a second, everything froze.
Leaves hung in midair. Energy bolts stalled like glowing insects trapped in amber. Tarzan hovered mid-leap, muscles locked.
Milo stumbled forward, heart hammering.
"Okay," he panted. "This is incredibly dangerous and very illegal in several dimensions."
He grabbed Tarzan and yanked.
Time snapped back.
Tarzan crashed into the soldiers like a meteor.
The remaining soldiers retreated, activating jump-thrusters and vanishing into the canopy.
Silence fell.
Tarzan landed heavily, breathing hard.
He looked at Milo.
"You bent the river," Tarzan said.
Milo sagged. "I… splashed in it."
---
**5. THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH**
They didn't celebrate.
They *ran*.
Tarzan led them deeper into the jungle, to a place ancient and hidden... a stone ruin swallowed by vines, older than memory.
"This place is safe," Tarzan said. "The jungle listens here."
Milo collapsed against a wall, shaking.
"That was bad," he said. "That was very, very bad."
Tarzan knelt before him. "They wanted you alive."
"Yes," Milo said quietly. "That's worse."
A slow clap echoed from the shadows.
"Well done, Doctor."
Milo froze.
A man stepped into the light.
He wore a tailored coat, pristine despite the jungle. His hair was silver. His eyes sharp and amused. A faint shimmer surrounded him, like heat distortion.
"I must say," the man continued, smiling, "I *love* the dramatic timing."
Milo's breath caught.
"…You."
The man bowed slightly.
"Professor Elias Crowe," he said. "Temporal Architect. And, I suppose, your biggest mistake."
Tarzan tensed. "Another metal man."
Crowe laughed softly. "No, my dear lord of vines. I am something far worse."
Milo whispered, "He's supposed to be dead."
Crowe smiled wider.
"Death," he said, "is a scheduling inconvenience."
The jungle trembled.
Time bled.
And the story shifted into something far more dangerous.
---
**6. THE VILLAIN EXPLAINS (BECAUSE OF COURSE HE DOES)**
Crowe walked casually through the ruin, examining carvings like a museum patron.
"Do you know," he said, "how many stories humanity has told itself?"
Milo glared. "Don't."
"How many myths," Crowe continued, "how many heroes, how many jungles, gods, MONSTERS... fiction, Doctor, *fiction*... that shaped who we became?"
Tarzan watched him silently.
Crowe turned to Tarzan. "You are a template. An idea. A story humanity used to define savagery and nobility."
Tarzan's grip tightened on his spear.
"And now," Crowe said, eyes gleaming, "you are real."
Milo shook his head. "You're destabilizing reality."
"Yes," Crowe agreed cheerfully. "I'm *reorganizing* it."
He stepped closer.
"Why settle for one timeline," Crowe whispered, "when we can curate the best parts of all of them?"
Milo felt sick.
"You're turning fiction into weapons."
Crowe smiled. "Into assets."
He activated something on his wrist.
Far away, machines roared louder.
Crowe looked at Milo.
"You opened the door," he said. "I'm simply walking through it."
Tarzan raised his spear.
Crowe vanished.
Only laughter remained.
---
**7. WHAT COMES NEXT**
Silence.
The jungle breathed.
Milo sank to his knees.
"I've made everything worse," he said.
Tarzan placed a hand on his shoulder.
"The jungle does not blame the storm," Tarzan said. "Only those who ride it."
Milo looked up.
"What do we do?"
Tarzan's eyes burned with resolve.
"We hunt," he said. "Not animals."
Milo swallowed.
"…Paradoxes?"
Tarzan smiled faintly.
"And gods who think they are men."
The console beeped softly.
**PRIMARY ADVERSARY IDENTIFIED**
**MULTI-EPISODE THREAT CONFIRMED**
Milo laughed weakly.
"Well," he said, "at least the universe is being honest now."
The jungle rustled.
Time trembled.
And somewhere, Professor Crowe smiled.
---
**END OF EPISODE TWO**
TO BE CONTINUED...
---
**EPISODE THREE:**
**"WHEN LEGENDS BLEED AND GODS LEARN FEAR"**
---
**1. THE JUNGLE DECIDES**
The jungle did not speak in words.
It spoke in *movement*.
Leaves twisted without wind. Vines crept where they had not been before. Birds went silent... not fleeing, not resting, but *watching*.
Milo Finch noticed this because his wrist console had stopped screaming.
That, somehow, terrified him more.
He stood at the edge of the ruin, hands shaking, staring at the place where Professor Elias Crowe had vanished like an error message reality refused to log.
Tarzan stood beside him, still as carved stone.
"He will return," Tarzan said.
"Yes," Milo replied quietly. "Villains like him always do. Preferably mid-monologue."
Tarzan tilted his head. "Villain."
"Bad guy," Milo clarified. "Arrogant. Overconfident. Thinks explaining his plan makes him unbeatable."
Tarzan considered this. "Then he is foolish."
"Historically," Milo said, "yes."
A low rumble echoed through the earth.
Not thunder.
*Footsteps.*
Tarzan's posture shifted instantly. "Something large moves."
Milo checked his console.
**ONTOLOGICAL FLUCTUATION DETECTED**
**FICTIONAL MASS INCREASE: SIGNIFICANT**
**SOURCE: UNKNOWN**
"Oh," Milo whispered. "Oh no."
From the jungle emerged *something that should not exist*.
A massive shape pushed through the trees... leather wings scraping bark, claws digging furrows into the earth. Yellow eyes glowed beneath a horned brow.
It exhaled.
Smoke curled from its nostrils.
Milo's knees buckled.
"…That," he said faintly, "is a dragon."
Tarzan stared.
The beast roared.
The sound shook the canopy, rattled bones, and triggered several deeply buried evolutionary instincts in Milo that screamed **YOU ARE FOOD**.
Tarzan did not retreat.
He stepped forward.
"You are not jungle," Tarzan called.
The dragon's eyes focused on him.
"You are *made*," Tarzan continued. "And you do not belong."
The dragon tilted its head.
Then it spoke.
"I was summoned."
Milo's brain audibly snapped.
"…Of course you were."
---
**2. THE COST OF MAKING STORIES REAL**
They ran.
This was not cowardice. This was *strategy*.
The dragon breathed fire.
Trees ignited instantly. The air warped. Milo tripped over roots and screamed apologies to every god he had previously doubted.
Tarzan vaulted upward, swinging into the canopy.
"Milo!" he shouted. "Climb!"
"I am *not* built for this!" Milo yelled back, scrambling desperately.
The dragon surged forward, jaws snapping shut inches from Milo's feet.
Tarzan dropped from above, slamming his spear into the dragon's eye.
The beast howled... an unholy, echoing sound... and thrashed, knocking Tarzan aside like a toy.
Milo screamed. "TARZAN!"
Tarzan rolled, rising slowly.
Blood ran down his arm.
The dragon recoiled, wounded... but not defeated.
Milo's console flared violently.
**WARNING: FICTIONAL ENTITY STABILIZING**
**REALITY ACCEPTANCE: 89%**
"No no no," Milo muttered. "You're becoming permanent."
The dragon laughed.
"Yes," it rumbled. "I *exist*."
It reared back, preparing another blast of fire.
Milo didn't think.
He *acted*.
He slammed his console into override.
Time fractured.
Not stopped.
*Split.*
Reality doubled for half a second... two jungles overlapping, two dragons screaming out of sync.
Milo felt something tear inside his head.
Blood ran from his nose.
The dragon staggered, confused, partially unmade.
Tarzan seized the moment.
He leapt.
The spear plunged deep into the dragon's skull.
The beast collapsed, shaking the ground.
Fire died.
Silence returned.
Milo fell to his knees, gasping.
Tarzan stood over the fallen creature, breathing hard.
The dragon dissolved.
Not into dust.
Into *ink*.
Black, swirling symbols scattered into the air and faded.
Tarzan stared at where it had been.
"Stories die strangely," he said.
Milo wiped his nose, trembling.
"They're not supposed to die at all."
---
**3. BLOOD ON THE MYTH**
Tarzan swayed.
Then fell.
Milo scrambled to him.
"No no no... stay with me... this is not how the narrative goes!"
Tarzan's blood was dark against his skin. Real. Too real.
"You bleed," Milo whispered.
Tarzan smiled faintly. "So do men."
Milo's hands shook as he tried to bandage the wound.
"This is my fault," Milo said. "You weren't supposed to... "
"I was never supposed to be *safe*," Tarzan interrupted gently. "Only strong."
Milo swallowed hard.
The jungle shifted again.
Not hostile.
Concerned.
Apes appeared at the edge of the clearing. Elephants rumbled softly. Birds circled overhead.
The jungle had *chosen*.
Tarzan placed a hand on Milo's wrist.
"You fear making things worse," Tarzan said. "But you also make things possible."
Milo laughed weakly. "That's the nicest way anyone's ever called me a walking disaster."
They moved Tarzan to a sheltered grove.
Milo worked frantically, using future medicine on a man who was not supposed to need it.
The console beeped softly.
**TEMPORAL STABILITY: 52%**
That was bad.
Very bad.
---
**4. CROW'S TRUE DESIGN**
Night fell unnaturally fast.
The stars above flickered.
Some constellations were wrong.
Milo stared upward, dread settling deep in his chest.
"He's doing this on purpose," Milo said.
Tarzan, resting, nodded. "Crowe."
"He's not just pulling fiction into reality," Milo continued. "He's letting reality *believe* in it."
Tarzan frowned. "Belief gives strength."
"Yes," Milo said. "That's the problem."
A voice echoed from everywhere at once.
"Very good, Doctor."
Crowe appeared... no shimmer this time. Solid. Smiling.
"You're accelerating," Crowe said. "That fracture you caused? Delicious."
Tarzan tried to rise.
Crowe raised a hand.
Tarzan froze.
Milo felt sick.
"Stop," Milo demanded. "This ends now."
Crowe laughed. "Ends? Oh no. This is the *beginning*."
He gestured.
The jungle peeled back like a curtain.
Beyond it... cities.
Not ancient.
Modern.
Skyscrapers twisted with jungle vines. Mythic creatures perched on rooftops. Soldiers battled beasts in streets that no longer belonged to one era.
"You see," Crowe said, eyes shining, "time doesn't want consistency. It wants *stories*."
Milo whispered, "You're collapsing timelines."
"I'm editing them," Crowe corrected.
Tarzan growled. "You turn jungle into battlefield."
Crowe nodded. "Evolution demands conflict."
He leaned toward Milo.
"You want to fix this?" Crowe whispered. "You'll have to choose which stories deserve to survive."
Crowe vanished.
The vision snapped away.
Silence returned.
Milo stared at the jungle, horror and determination warring inside him.
"I can't undo this alone," Milo said.
Tarzan placed a hand over his heart. "Then do not stand alone."
---
**5. THE ALLIANCE OF IMPOSSIBILITIES**
By dawn, others arrived.
Not summoned.
*Drawn.*
A woman stepped from the trees, clad in armor that shimmered like moonlight, a sword at her side.
"I felt the world scream," she said.
Milo blinked. "…Wonder Woman?"
She raised an eyebrow. "I prefer Diana."
Behind her, a cloaked figure emerged, staff glowing faintly.
"I was hoping retirement would stick," he muttered.
Milo nearly fainted. "Gandalf."
Gandalf sighed. "Yes, yes, I know."
Tarzan looked at Milo.
"Your people are strange."
Milo laughed hysterically, then wiped his eyes.
"Welcome to the consequences."
The jungle watched.
Time trembled.
And for the first time since Milo pressed that Switch...
Hope appeared.
---
**6. WHAT MUST BE DONE**
They gathered at the ruin.
Diana studied Milo. "You broke time."
"Yes," Milo said. "Accidentally."
Gandalf examined the console. "A small device for such great foolishness."
"Hey," Milo said. "I resemble that remark."
Tarzan stood tall despite his wound.
"Crowe hunts stories," Tarzan said. "Then we protect them."
Milo nodded slowly.
"We don't fix time," he said. "We *fight* for it."
The console chimed softly.
**MULTI-TIMELINE ALLIANCE CONFIRMED**
**EVENT HORIZON APPROACHING**
Milo took a breath.
"Okay," he said. "Let's punch a god complex in the face."
The jungle stirred.
Legends gathered.
And time braced itself.
---
**END OF EPISODE THREE**
TO BE CONTINUED...
---
**EPISODE FOUR**
**"THE WAR THAT TIME TRIED TO FORGET"**
---
**1. THE SKY CRACKS OPEN**
The sky was wrong.
Milo Finch noticed this first because the stars were arguing.
They slid against one another like misplaced puzzle pieces, constellations overlapping... Orion's belt cutting through unfamiliar symbols, a crescent moon existing simultaneously in three phases. The air shimmered, vibrating with a low, anxious hum that rattled teeth and thoughts alike.
Time was no longer breaking quietly.
It was *screaming*.
Milo stood at the edge of the ruined stone platform, clutching his wrist console with both hands like it might suddenly leap away and ruin something else on its own.
Diana... Wonder Woman... stood beside him, calm as a statue carved from purpose itself.
"This is not merely temporal damage," she said. "This is a war of belief."
Gandalf leaned heavily on his staff, staring at the sky. "Reality is fraying. Stories are being stitched together without consent."
Tarzan emerged from the trees, bandaged but unbowed.
"The jungle fears," he said. "Not predators. *Change*."
Milo swallowed.
"Professor Crowe isn't just collapsing timelines," Milo said. "He's forcing reality to choose what it believes in."
Diana turned to him. "Explain."
"When enough minds accept something as real," Milo said, voice shaking, "the universe starts agreeing. Crowe's making legends undeniable."
A thunderclap split the sky.
But there were no clouds.
Something was *coming through*.
---
**2. THE FIRST WAVE**
They felt it before they saw it.
A pressure.
A presence.
Then the horizon split like torn fabric.
From the fracture poured figures... armored warriors bearing sigils from forgotten empires, monsters ripped straight from nightmares, machines humming with future-tech fury.
Knights clashed with drones.
Minotaurs charged tanks.
Roman legions marched beside cybernetic infantry.
Milo stared, horrified.
"This is a mashup," he whispered. "A catastrophic one."
Crowe's voice echoed across the battlefield.
"Witness!" it boomed. "The purest evolution of humanity... *every story we ever told ourselves, unchained!*"
Tarzan snarled. "Coward hides behind chaos."
Diana raised her sword.
"Then we answer."
She charged.
The ground shook as gods and myths surged forward. Gandalf slammed his staff into the earth, light bursting outward, knocking back a wave of mechanical soldiers.
Milo ducked as an arrow whizzed past his head... followed immediately by a plasma bolt.
"This is not how I wanted peer review to go!" he yelled.
Tarzan leapt into the fray, moving like a living weapon... spear striking, fists breaking armor, jungle creatures rallying behind him.
Apes tore drones from the sky.
Elephants crushed armored vehicles.
The jungle *fought back*.
Milo crouched behind a fallen pillar, frantically typing commands into his console.
**TEMPORAL STABILITY: 41%**
**CRITICAL EVENT CASCADE IMMINENT**
"Okay," Milo muttered. "Think. Think. Think."
Crowe appeared atop a floating platform, arms spread wide.
"You see, Milo," he said, "conflict is the only language reality listens to."
Milo looked up at him.
"You're wrong," Milo shouted. "Stories aren't about power. They're about meaning!"
Crowe smiled. "Prove it."
---
**3. WHEN GODS BLEED**
The impossible happened.
A roar shook the battlefield... not mechanical, not monstrous, but *divine*.
A massive figure emerged from the fracture... golden armor, lightning crackling around him.
A god.
Zeus.
Milo's heart dropped.
"Oh no. Oh *very* no."
Zeus raised his thunderbolt.
"I am called," the god boomed. "And I answer."
Crowe laughed. "Excellent."
Zeus hurled lightning.
The blast obliterated a section of jungle, vaporizing machines and monsters alike.
Diana froze.
"Father," she whispered.
Zeus turned.
Then Crowe stepped forward and *shot him*.
Not with a gun.
With belief.
A device pulsed in Crowe's hand, siphoning something invisible.
Zeus staggered.
Lightning fizzled.
Blood... *golden blood*... ran from his side.
The battlefield went silent.
A god screamed.
Milo felt something snap inside him.
"That's it," Milo said, standing. "That's absolutely it."
Crowe looked down. "Ah. Resolve."
Milo activated his console fully.
"Crowe!" Milo shouted. "You want stories? You forgot the most important part!"
Crowe tilted his head.
"Consequences."
Milo slammed the final command.
(TIME, TARZAN AND TERRIBLE IDEAS will continue with this adventurous episode)