Reality Check

Cabin Fever

Hideaway (by Grace Vanderwaal)

"The day is gonna come when there's no time left to waste. But we'll never grow up, I say we hide away . . ."

___

The Scouts' jail was unlike any other prison that Kara had heard of or been to. While there had only been a few jail cells in the hallway she and Kiel had been in, there were many more cells than she realized. And all of them were empty.

It was weird, though. Why so many empty cells? She guessed that since everyone here must be brainwashed, there was no use for so many, anyway. The jail was still much smaller than the TSA's had been; Kara didn't think there were more than a hundred cells here.

Is this where they kept kids who weren't so easily brainwashed, when they first got to the summer camp? Or — the more likely story — had this prison just been here before the summer camp was built? She wasn't sure. She figured that the only people who'd recently been here were her, Charm, Owen, and Kiel. And Gwen, Bethany, and Orion, if they'd been here, too.

As Kara crept down a hallway, a shiver went down her spine. It was strange to be back inside a jail. A few weeks ago, it was crazy to remember that she would've purposely stayed in one, just to prevent the end of the world from happening. Things had changed so much since then, and Kara herself, was pretty sure she'd changed.

Locking herself into prison was past Kara's solution, to stop a prophecy from happening. But now that she wasn't in her own world, it was a little easier to stop blaming herself. Destruction usually followed Kara wherever she went, but here, it seemed she really wasn't to blame. But still, seeing the pure possibility caused a heavy weight to sink into her shoulders, so familiar that it stuck to her like a gum underneath her shoe. 

It was familiar, because Kara had seen it before. Past times when she'd traveled to the future, all that was there was this white nothingness, which stretched on for miles and miles. No people, no buildings, not even a sign of life. And she'd blamed herself, because who else could've wrecked the future so badly that the entire world disappeared?

Only her. Kara Dox, the paradox girl.

Until, through Owen, she'd learned about Nobody. Through she still had a difficult time believing that none of this was her fault, she could easily place the blame on him. She just couldn't imagine wanting to destroy the world. Kara had been so careful in her efforts to save it, yet here was Nobody, a man who literally had no cares whatsoever about destroying the worlds.

The time agents, the Countess, Dolores — everyone — should've been blaming Nobody the whole time, instead. But they hadn't known about him. No one had. They'd just known about Kara, the girl predicted to destroy the future. And while that certainly had been true, maybe Kara had been wrong about some things. Sure, she'd destroyed the world in every timeline. But in this chapter of her life, it was Nobody wrecking the future, instead.

Maybe it'd always been that way, but Kara had just never realized it. Kara and her future selves had only known themselves to be the culprits, not anyone else. Knowing that Nobody had caused this took some pressure off her shoulders, though not that much.

Despite knowing about Nobody, Kara still had her doubts. Living through her worst fear — remembering the look of terror on everyone's faces, on Owen's face — kept the doubt creeping in, that this could always be her fault. To think that this time could be different was shocking. Being immune to paradoxes meant her fate could never be changed, so naturally, Kara wasn't having the easiest time accepting the idea that none of this was her fault.