I picked the door on the left. I don't know why. We weren't under the school, and so I couldn't be sure it would lead to Yesterday like that door did. But still, an instinct took over. Maybe if it took me back in time, I could change things. Fix things.

But no, we weren't under the school. Whatever Alexei had built here with these new doors, it was not a carbon copy of the original ones. It was something new. And I was aware of that the moment I passed through the yellow light and landed on the other side.

The first thing I became aware of was a large, warm hand holding my own. And a raindrop falling on my head.

And that could only mean one thing.

I had become my other self. That was the only way I could have immediately landed in a situation rather than walking through a door. The forces of balance that govern the doors had plopped me into my other body, as no two versions of the same person can exist at once—that is, unless one of them is a baby or somehow has a very different molecular structure.

So I was an adult. That meant it was either an alternative present, or else a version of the future.

I took deep breath and looked to see whose hand I was holding. Relief flooded through me as I saw that it was Kieren. He looked older, maybe thirty. Very similar to how he had looked in that photo in Adam's childhood bedroom—a tight, military haircut, chiseled jaw, freshly shaved. His eyes were squinting towards the ground, and he didn't seem to notice or care that a raindrop had just landed on his forehead.

I followed his line of sight to the ground, where a freshly-dug grave smelled of churned earth and cut grass. We were in the middle of an enormous cemetery. All around us, uniform rows of graves stretched for what seemed an eternity, little American flags, crosses, crescent moons, and Stars of David emerging from their tombstones.

My head whipped around at the crowd of mourners surrounding us, and my heart lodged in my throat when I didn't see my brother anywhere.

But then suddenly a baby cried, and I spun to see Piper standing behind me. She was a bit older now, too, and rocking an infant in her arms, gently patting its back and whispering into its little ear. The baby was swaddled in layers of warm blue blankets, shielding it from the chill of the day. And a moment later, my brother stepped up from within the crowd and put his arm around her. One of his strong hands landed gently on hers, covering the baby's back.

Robbie looked up and offered me a warm smile, though the sadness never left his eyes. I smiled back, relief overwhelming me that he was here.

I turned back to the grave, squeezing Kieren's hand tighter. He squeezed mine back, then pulled me into his side and rubbed my arm. And for just a moment, I felt as safe there as the baby swaddled in Piper's arms behind me.

But that's when I looked up and saw him, standing on the other side of the abyss of the grave.

Jonah Martel was staring right at me, his tired eyes a less vibrant shade of green than Adam's. And they were puffy, lined with red, like he had cried out every tear inside of him until there was nothing left. And I realized then that he wasn't really looking at me; his eyes were just drifting into the space before him, exhausted and unable to focus.

Nearby, a man who could have been Adam's clone, if it weren't for the brown eyes and the slightly stockier build, twisted his mouth into a sideways slant. He stared at the hole in the ground like a kid staring down a bully, knowing he didn't stand a chance in defeating it.

Caleb Martel.

My body began to shake before I allowed myself to accept what was happening.

An older man with a long gray beard approached the head of the grave, his body armored in a thick black coat. He raised a book before him and began to half speak/half sing some words I didn't recognize.

Caleb and Jonah mouthed the words along with him, as did several other members of the mourning party—about a dozen people total. I realized the words must have been in Hebrew. The man in the black coat was a rabbi.

And he was saying a prayer for Adam.

The shaking that had begun in my spinal column worked its way up my back and towards my face. My lip started trembling and a fresh wave of tears seized my eyes. This couldn't be right.

He couldn't be gone. Adam couldn't be dead.

And yet, this wasn't the future I had seen in Elaheh's dome. In that future, Kieren and Adam both died. In this one...

This was one of my options, I suddenly realized.

Every door would lead to an option.

And he was going to make me choose one of them.

I gave Kieren's arm a gentle pat and began to back away from him.

"You okay?" he asked softly.

"Yes," I said. "Be right back."

As I passed Piper and Robbie, I couldn't help but sneak a glance at the baby in her arms—my niece or nephew, though the blue blanket and the little blue beanie on his head told me it was the latter. It was so like Piper to have a color-coded baby. The whole nursery was probably painted in soothing shades of eggshell blue.

A gust of breath filled my lungs when I saw his little face, so perfectly at peace in her arms. He was a shade lighter than my brother, with a wide little nose and a perfect mouth that opened into a tiny little O. And though he was so small, there was something about the shape of his brow, the curve of his cheeks, that was so completely Robbie.

And the way my brother stood by Piper's side, his head ever-so-slightly tilted in the direction of his son, made my heart burst with so much joy I almost forgot where I was.

I almost forgot that Robbie was here, at Adam's funeral, to comfort me.

I could stay here, I thought to myself. I could let this be true. Let Robbie have this future. Let Kieren take my hand again.

Let Adam die.

Now who's playing God? I heard Alexei's taunting voice in my head.

I don't know if it was self-preservation that made me back away from them, getting lost in the crowd of mourners and disappearing in the gray air that surrounded them. Or if it was something else—a belief that maybe door number two would break my heart a little less.

But in any event, I couldn't give up on Adam that quickly. Couldn't sell him out to give everybody else this future.

I pushed the colors away from me, let this reality sift between my fingers and separate like grains of sand. The world blurred, as it always did when leaving a portal where I had merged with my other self.

I was splitting back into my other body.

I was leaving this world behind.

And only when the brick door formed before my eyes and the eerie blue light of the server room beneath the botanic gardens reformed all around me did I dare turn around and face Alexei.

He was waiting for me, his arms crossed before his wide chest and an evil grin on his face.

"Didn't like it, I see," he said through a wall of teeth.

"What are you doing, Alexei? What is this game?"

"It's not a game, Marina." He uncrossed his arms and took a step closer, which made me back up until I was pressed against the frame of the door I had just exited.

"You'll pick one door and you'll stay in it," he continued. "I don't care which one, that's up to you." He looked down at his shoes for a moment, then back up to me with a steely resolve in his eyes.

"Why? Why not just let me have Robbie now?" I asked, ashamed of the crack in my voice. I was letting him see how weak I was. How powerless.

"They're all far enough in the future that it will be too late for you to stop me," he answered. Then he took a deep breath. "Look, I know what you're thinking. Young people don't want to lose their best years. And I'm sorry for that. I really am."

I shook my head. He wasn't sorry for anything.

"But this was the only way. I promised Ana I would never hurt you, and I won't. But I can't let you stop me, either. Your brother is alive in all the doors, just like I said."

I looked back to the doors, and they loomed over me like skyscrapers. If they toppled, they could crush me in an instant.

"Can you live with door number one?" he asked me.

I swallowed hard, but my answer was already escaping my mouth. "No."

Alexei hesitated for a moment, then stepped up next to me and reached into his pocket. "I had a feeling you would say that."

The coin he handed me was a strange color, but flattened just like the first one had been. That's when I looked down and realized it wasn't a penny. It was a foreign coin, one I didn't recognize. The stretched-out writing was in a different alphabet.

I hadn't looked carefully at the first coin he handed me, and so I hadn't noticed if there was anything different about it. But now I understood. The coins themselves were both the key and the token—opening the door and leading me to the place Alexei meant for me to find.

"Go on," he prodded, nodding almost imperceptibly to door number two.

And with no other options, I squared my shoulders, digging deep within myself for whatever reserve of strength or calm I could find.

And I slid the coin into the slot.

*

Adam.

His skin was beneath me, his broad chest moving up and down in a steady rhythm. He was snoring.

We were in a large four-poster bed with gauzy white curtains pulled back on either side of us, providing a view of the crystal-blue sea through an open window. A humid air clung to my skin, and a cacophony of birds sang in the trees that dotted the landscape between us and the sea.

I sat up slowly, careful not to disturb Adam, and I looked around the room.

I knew from the perfect layout of everything around me—the strategically placed throw rugs and Buddha-inspired art on the walls—that it was a hotel or an Airbnb. The place was designed to appeal to a Westerner's idea of what they should hope to find here, when the real thing was probably not as pretty nor as clean.

I grabbed a white terrycloth robe that had been discarded by the bed and wrapped it around myself. It smelled freshly washed, with a hint of starch making it stiff around my middle. My bare feet landed softly on the bamboo floor as I approached the window and looked out at a handful of tourists on the beach. Women in broad straw hats walked within them, offering fresh fruit or hats like theirs to potential customers.

And I recognized a small structure—a hut with a large Buddha in it—from the photos Adam had shown me on his cell phone after he'd come back to America.

We were in Vietnam.

Just like he promised.

A cell phone was resting in a charger on the hutch nearby, and I knew from the home-screen picture of a robot in an apron that it must have been mine. I grabbed it and headed for the bathroom.

My own image in the mirror shocked me a bit. I was a few years older, maybe twenty-three. I only noticed because of my cheekbones, which were a bit more defined, and my waist, which seemed a bit more tapered than it had been—probably a result of whatever healthy food Adam had been preparing for us.

I unlocked my phone with my thumbprint and a texting chain with my brother was already open. A quick scroll up and down it proved that it was nothing unusual. He'd sent me a GIF of a robot Sisyphus rolling a Bitcoin up a hill, and I'd written back: "Good little robot."

A dozen more texts followed of jokes and thoughts, with the occasional BRB, and then another joke sent twenty minutes later.

I put the phone down and stared in the mirror.

What was the catch?

Adam was alive and well, Robbie was fine.

So what was the catch?

Suddenly the door to the bathroom creaked open, and Adam was standing there in his boxers watching me with an air of hesitation on his face. "Hey," he said.

"Hey."

He walked into the room slowly, and came to stand behind me as we faced the mirror together. And despite my nervousness that some bomb was about to drop on this reality, I couldn't help but take a moment to just enjoy the sight of us.

He was half a foot taller than me, his strong chin landing on top of my head as his arm came around my middle. And I let myself fall back into him for a moment. Let his strong stomach fill the curve of my spine as I smiled up at his reflection.

"Are we good?" he asked, and I could tell from his tone that he was asking if we were good now, as though maybe we hadn't been the night before.

"Yes," I said, uncertain.

"Can we talk about last night?"

A moment of panic seized me. I had no idea how I was supposed to react to that. I needed a moment to think, so I gently dipped from beneath his arm and headed back out to the bedroom. He followed me, but lingered a few feet away.

"You're still mad?" he asked.

I could only shake my head.

His shoulders slumped, dejected. But he nodded, as though giving himself a little pep talk in his mind. This was something I'd noticed him doing before. It was like he could hear his wrestling coach's voice, drilling him to keep fighting no matter what.

"I didn't mean what I said," he began, keeping his distance from me. "I shouldn't have used those words. It just came out wrong. I know you'll never 'get over' losing Kieren. But what I meant was maybe you could—you and I could—move on. Together."

A shrill note of terror formed somewhere deep inside me, like an echo in a cave. A voice calling out from the darkness.

Was Kieren gone?

I could only shake my head, an aching in my brain taking over my face until I could feel it crumbling. This couldn't be the second option. Why did I have to choose between them?

"Oh, sweetheart," Adam said. He began to cross the room, but stopped before he got to me. Maybe something in my face was telling him to stay away. Or maybe it was something in him. I stared at him, unable to catch my breath.

"Why?" I asked. And the question covered so many of the doubts in my head. Why was Kieren gone? What had happened to him?

Was it my fault?

"You know, I think Kieren did what he did for you. We talked a couple nights before it happened, and he was saying some weird stuff..."

"Like what?"

Adam sighed before he continued. "He was talking about your contract...with Alexei. How he never should have let you sign it. And I told him it wasn't his fault, and he said...damn it."

"He said what? Tell me."

"He said, 'No, it's not my fault. It's yours.' He blamed me for not protecting you."

I shook my head. So that was the reality we were in then—one where I'd signed a contract with Alexei. A contract that I'm sure I'd been coerced into. What must Alexei have held over me to make me do something like that?

"And he was right," Adam said, nodding bitterly towards the floor. "It should have been me who protected you that night, Marina. It should have been me who snuck into the garden to try to take Alexei down, especially after I failed the first time."

"No, Adam, that's not true."

"It is. It should have been me who died that night."

"Stop it! Stop saying that," I said, trying to keep my thoughts straight even as the voice inside my head was screaming. "I don't want to lose either of you. I don't want this!"

He leaned back and studied me for a moment. "You don't want what? To be here with me?"

"That's not what I meant."

"Maybe I shouldn't have brought you, then. But I just...I wanted you to see it. I was hoping this place could bring you some peace, like it did for me." He swallowed hard, his eyes turning into clouded marbles as he stared at the gray clouds rolling in over the suddenly turbulent sea. "I wanted you to see it before it was gone."

My hand reached for my throat, as though to protect it somehow. "Gone?"

He laughed to himself, but there was no joy in it. "You've been through the Tomorrow, door, Marina. You've seen it." He turned and approached the open window, and a gust of wind came in and swept his hair back. "This place will be eaten by the ocean in the next decade. If you want to see it after that, you'll have to buy a ticket to one of Alexei's domes."

A stillness came over me, despite the sudden gale of wind coming into the room. Adam pushed the window closed, and the room grew eerily quiet.

"It's not your fault, Adam," I said, but my voice was so timid I could barely hear myself.

He nodded, unconvinced. After a moment of silence, I started to walk towards him, but he broke away before I got there. "I'm gonna go take a shower, okay?"

I stopped mid-stride, and he didn't look at me as he went into the bathroom and closed the door.

And I took one last look around that large, airy room, mocking us with its pristine beauty and its perfectly chosen furniture. It would be under the sea soon, or barren. A relic, eaten either by the ocean or the dust.

I raised my hands, almost in prayer, and pushed the room away from me.

I pushed and pushed until the colors blurred, until the room became a swirl of white and red and brown, and finally black.

Until I was back in that server room, blue light reflecting onto my arms and making me look like a ghost.

I turned to face Alexei, who just looked bored, chewing on a fingernail and rolling his eyes at the sight of me.

"Door number three it is."

****

If you could paint your own picture of what's in door #3, what would it be?

*painting credit: Irina Laube