Snippet #2817967

Klaus sat silently as the memorial carried on. His mind kept replaying the events of the day, or rather the year for him. He'd spent an entire year developing a method for destroying the Beast, using tech three-hundred years more advanced, and still managed to fail. In fact, it nearly cost him his life! Technically it did, at least life as he knew it. He was now a prisoner of time, unable to move forward to return home, and somehow everywhere he visited in the past was now different. Time was fractured, and he had managed to slide into a different timeline when exactly the timeline splintered was the mystery. Henry and a few others mentioned The Horde, a species of time tunneling roaches, but that wasn't conclusive enough to him that the shared allies they'd met were from the "proper" time or this new offshoot. Did it even matter? He couldn't be sure. He indeed seemed to exist outside the rules of time and very well may never live in this world's future and could be reason enough for why he cannot visit the future. Perhaps his tech had been altered by being here into a less advanced version? He made a mental note to run a diagnostic when he visited The Time Tunnel next.

His attention returned to the memorial as Albert, a hero he remembered seeing briefly during the battle, finished speaking. His voice echoing around the audience. Klaus stood and placed his hands into his pockets. He wasn't going to learn anything sitting around. While he understood the symbolism and psychological need for a memorial, it was simply a stage for those in power to pretend they cared. They truly felt sorrow and could empathize with the thousands of people of Atlas City in mourning. It was all for show. The President would travel back to D.C. and remember no one he talked to, Sec Def would simply think of the weaponry he wanted and use the catastrophe as leverage to add money to the defense budget, and the heroes? Many of these heroes are around for show only. Few fought, and fewer are truly mourning anyone. Many will speak as Albert had, but few will follow through. Klaus doubted everyone employed by George was indeed on board with the suicide mission he'd recruited them for. Many may have seen the opportunity to use the "Get out of Jail Free Card" he'd presented but never really considered the price.

Klaus found himself walking among construction barriers and chain-link fences, heavy machinery parked nearby. Clean up was well underway and in a few months the debris would be gone but the scar across the city would last years. He wondered if a proper memorial would be built here, and thought about what that could look like before turning down a street and into what was just another normal day for the citizens of Atlas City. Their city had been attacked, thousands died, no answers were ever given, yet here they were, traveling to work, school, shopping, life went on, it always does. He looked over his shoulder at the stark contrast to the crumbling ruins of the beachfront where thousands sat to listen to speeches, and then back to the bustling street before him. He sighed and pressed on, his mind clouded with questions that seemed to have no answers or at least answers he wasn't ready to accept.