Elsword: Diabolic Esper (One-sided MMDE) + Time Tracer
Time accuses Esper of manipulating the variables.Warnings for violence, blood, and a mentally unstable Esper.

In Esper's barren room decorated with morbid pictures, Time's breaths sound heavy and out-of-place against Esper's own quiet poise. Remembering what he came here to do, Time snatches Esper's arm. "You did something."

"What did I do?" Esper feigns innocence. He looks almost insulted, but the insult on his face melts into a shit-eating grin. Time's brow furrows, and he raises his other arm, ready to sock Esper in the face and send him flying out the window.

"You did something to this timeline." Time repeats, squeezing Esper's bone-thin arm as hard as he can. It must hurt, considering there's nothing to buffer. Esper does not wince, but the shit-eating grin disappears, replaced with disdain and displeasure instead.

Time doesn't miss the shift in his reaction.

"The codes in your Dynamos are different, you adjusted for something- something that shouldn't be there-"

Esper sticks his arm out, and Time catches sight of the purple electricity generated from a dynamo out of the corner of his eyes. Time pulls back, quickly, almost tripping and losing his footing. He pulls up one of his own dynamos, getting ready for defensive position when his vision goes entirely white. A sharp crack from something, and then pain registers in the back of his head.

He also realizes that his own breath comes in ragged bursts, and that something is constricting his windpipe. Esper's face comes into view, his black, hollow eyes staring Time down. Time's eyes follow the length of Esper's arms, until he realizes that Esper's handsare tightly wound against his throat. He's being strangled, and the force from Esper's awakening probably blasted him against the wall on the other side of the room.

His own hands claw against Esper's wrists, "S-stop-Gh-"

Esper doesn't move.

Time tries again, "Let me g–"

Esper's hands tighten against his throat. Time squeezes his eyes shut, still gasping for air. He only manages to peek his eye open long enough to notice the lopsided grin on Esper's face.

He's known Esper to be messed up, so why didn't he account for this possibility? Time bites lip, squirms, but there's no point, Esper's hands are firm and they aren't going anywhere. If Esper is saying something, Time can't hear it. The room is spinning in line with his own thoughts.

Then, Esper lets go rather roughly with disregard. Time slumps to the floor, clutching his chest and heaving for breath. His head hurts. A thousand thoughts race through his head like the breath entering him now. Did his skull crack when Esper sent him flying? That wouldn't be easy to explain to Arc. He doesn't want to feel his head. What if it's actually bleeding? Oh god, he can't even begin to explain the clean up if that was a thing.

But he can breathe, and that's a start to getting better. After a cursory check, nothing else really hurts besides his head, so Time tries to climb to his feet, only to be struck in the stomach by a viciously well-aimed kick. He screams a warbled noise. And then, Esper kicks him again, and Time's head makes contact with the wall, this time, warm liquid pours down his increasingly numbing head.

There is blood in his mouth. His own vision is deteriorating, but he can still spot the six glowing spatio-temporal bodies behind him. He has to buy time until they went away. If Esper actually launched those then he would be- Time doesn't get to complete his thought. Esper interrupts him.

"You should be happy," Esper laughs, hysterical and shaking as he clutches the side of his head, "All of this- It was all me. Pysch, Arc, and even You wouldn't be here if it wasn't for me-"

Esper's launches on a tangent. Time doesn't follow everything, but he follows enough to figure out the new variable, Time manages to choke out, "You adjusted for Mastermind."

The time traveller pauses, freezing for a split second. "I did- I did I did I did-" Esper's words rattle off rapidly like a machine gun, "But he's here, he's here and even though he doesn't love me it's fine he's here and it's okay that the rest of you are here, too. It's all for him."

'No,' Time wants to say, 'It's all for you.'

Esper's his tangent derails further and further. At this point, Esper's not even looking at him anymore. The hovering, purple orbs swirling around Esper are disappearing too, so Time tries to gather his broken bones to try and crawl out. There is no immediate danger from Esper anymore.

Somehow, he manages to make it out the door on wobbly knees. Behind him, Esper slumps into a ball and screams. Then Time's own legs give out, and he collapses on the ground, watching his blood pool around him.

Before he closes his eyes, Time clenches his hands into fists, idly wishing he applied the Seal of Time.