We found a time capsule dated 1975, but the items inside were from 2025.

It was buried beneath an aspen grove deep in the Alberta woods. The ground pulsed before we even saw it—like the forest was breathing beneath our feet. We met there, strangers until that moment. But our eyes locked, and something ancient stirred.

“I’ve seen you before,” she said softly.

“In dreams,” I replied.

The capsule was old, rusted at the seams. But the moment our hands touched it—our skin grazing like sparks—it creaked open with a sigh. Inside: a smooth device humming low, a shimmering crystal pendant, and a single note.

"To our future selves—remember who you are."

We stared at the note, at the objects that shouldn’t exist. The handwriting looked like mine. It also looked like hers.

She picked up the pendant, and a vision crashed into both of us at once. We staggered, fell to our knees. The forest blurred around us.

We saw temples and cities—now ruins. Moons we’d walked on. Suns we’d died under. Four of us, always four. Two more souls walked beside us through every life. Sometimes brothers, sometimes sisters. Always bonded. Guardians.

The dreamscape that haunted us all our lives was real. It was a memory—a home beyond time. Gaia, the living consciousness of Earth, had chosen us in an age long forgotten. She breathed her first wave of awareness into the void, the electromagnetic pulse that stirred time into motion. She made us from the elements: earth, air, fire, water.

We were her first children. Gods, by understanding. Deities, by duty. But we had failed her.

The old world’s imbalance was of our own making. We craved too much, guided too little. When our temples fell, we fractured into lifetimes. Reincarnated endlessly. Gaia gave us time. She gave us dreams. Hints. Each life a lesson. Each death a door.

The device projected a map—flickering with forgotten languages, glyphs drawn from all sciences: alchemy, chemistry, sacred geometry, physics, mantras, and mudras. All encoded in one design. A master key. It pointed to a place that only the four of us could enter: the Akashic Library.

The Library wasn’t physical. It lived in the plane between memory and creation. In meditation, we were guided there. Four lights merged into one at the entrance. We saw the others.

One stood barefoot in desert sands—her hair kissed by wind and flame. The other emerged from ocean mist—his eyes carrying the tide. They, too, had found their capsules. All of us connected across continents by a pull older than civilization.

We entered.

In the Library, knowledge flowed like rivers through air. Gaia was there—not in form, but as presence. In warmth, in rhythm. She revealed the truth to each of us privately. Why there was suffering. Why memory fades. Why even gods must be humbled.

She showed us humanity as her cells. Each soul, a piece of her body. Each act of love, her heartbeat. But now her pulse was weak. Humanity had grown cold, chasing illusions built by the old gods. Us. Our past selves.

And she gave us a choice.

We could remember—take back our divinity, our burden, and our vow. We could live with the weight of all lives. Or we could forget again. Be human. Be free.

She turned to me and whispered without sound, “Some will choose to forget. Some must choose to stay.”

We stood in silence, all four reunited. She turned to me. “If we forget again… will we find each other?”

I nodded, a tear slipping down my cheek. “We always do.”

The Library faded. We awoke back in the forest.

She leaned into me, heart pounding against mine. “Do you remember?”

“Yes,” I said. “This time, I do.”

Birds sang in a higher pitch than before. The wind carried whispers—language without words. The trees felt alive with intention. The others, though distant, had chosen too. The glyph etched itself onto our minds. We knew what came next.

But love was part of the plan. Always was. Gaia said it was the greatest energy she’d ever known. It builds universes. It softens destruction. It revives memory. And now, it tethered us—her and I—across all timelines.

We lived a life after that. Not perfect. But whole. And eventually, the time came. Gaia called us again.

We returned the capsule to the Earth. Sealed it beneath the same grove, beneath the same roots. We left a new note.

"To our future selves—remember love."

We passed into new forms. Some say they see us in dreams. Some say gods walk the earth disguised as warriors, thinkers, scientists, poets, farmers, mothers, and musicians. That maybe not all chose to forget. That maybe one of us stayed behind with full memory.

Gaia breathes through us still. We are all her children. Some awaken sooner than others.

But we always awaken

Lindsay

@Lindzieloo

Uk

Lindsay has not written a story.