STORY FILE // SPOILER-CONTROLLED
THE STORY
Four Churchill University students build a machine meant to move through time by only one hour. One violent collision changes the experiment—and sends people from present-day South Central Los Angeles into a past none of them were prepared to face.
PRESENT DAY • DIEGO’S GARAGE • SOUTH CENTRAL
CHAPTER 01
THE
EXPERIMENT
ONE MACHINE. ONE HOUR. ONE MISTAKE AWAY FROM HISTORY.
Diego, Izzy, Malik and Chloe have spent a week inside their university garage building something that should not exist:
a machine designed to send them exactly one hour into the past. The theory is ready. The machine is nearly ready.
None of them knows that before the night is over, their experiment will reach much farther than sixty minutes.
DIEGOIZZYMALIKCHLOE
THE COUNTDOWN HASN'T STARTED YET — BUT HISTORY IS ALREADY ON ITS WAY TO THEIR DOOR.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
PRESENT DAY
TEMPORAL BREACH
1800s
CHAPTER 01 // PRESENT DAY
THE EXPERIMENT
Diego, Izzy, Malik, and Chloe spend a week inside their garage laboratory finishing an experimental time-displacement machine. The objective sounds simple: go back exactly one hour.
CHURCHILL UNIVERSITY // GARAGE LAB
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CHAPTER 02 // SOUTH CENTRAL
THE TRUCE
Across the city, rival street groups gather at a park under a fragile truce. Crips and Bloods gather under their existing truce at one park, while the Mexican gangs gather separately at another park around the corner.
ONE PARK // DIFFERENT CODES
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CHAPTER 03 // THE SPARK
THE CHASE
An altercation involving Maria and Star spills beyond the gathering. Cars tear through South Central, turning a neighborhood dispute into a pursuit headed toward the Diego’s garage.
THE NIGHT CHANGES COURSE
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CHAPTER 04 // TEMPORAL BREACH
THE COLLISION
The chase crashes directly into the experiment. Metal, electricity, smoke, and the machine's unstable field collide. What was built to travel one hour tears open something far larger.
TIMELINE STATUS // UNSTABLE
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CHAPTER 05 // 1800s LOUISIANA
THE OTHER SIDE
When the dust clears, the streets are gone. Cars and crews awaken among cotton fields in Louisiana, surrounded by a world whose laws—and dangers—are brutally different from their own.
LOCATION // WHITNEY PLANTATION REGION
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CHAPTER 06 // A MAN NAMED COFFEY
THE HUMAN COST
They encounter Coffey, an enslaved man whose strength, family, and fight for survival force the newcomers to confront history face-to-face rather than as something written in a book.
COFFEY // ELIZA // MOSES // NAOMI
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CHAPTER 07 // FIRST CONFRONTATION
THE LINE IS DRAWN
Overseer Samuel Briggs and armed riders discover that these strangers do not understand the rules of his world—and refuse to obey them. Survival quickly becomes resistance.
THE PAST PUSHES BACK
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CHAPTER 08 // THE MISSION CHANGES
THE FIGHT TO GET HOME
Back in the present, the students search for a way to repair what the machine has done. In the past, getting home is no longer the only mission. The people pulled through time must decide what they are willing to change before the window closes.
HISTORY IS NOT FINISHED
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ADDITIONAL STORY EVENTS // CLASSIFIED IN THE VAULT TO PROTECT THE FILM
PRESENT DAY • SOUTH CENTRAL LOS ANGELES
CHAPTER 02
THE
TRUCE
CRIPS AND BLOODS ARE TRUCING. THE MEXICAN GANGS ARE AT A DIFFERENT PARK AROUND THE CORNER.
At one South Central park, the Crips and Bloods are already observing a fragile truce and gathering together to keep the peace.
Around the corner, the Mexican gangs are at a separate park. They are not part of the Crip-Blood truce, and there is no Black-and-Mexican gang alliance yet.
That larger truce does not happen until the crews are displaced into the 1600s and are forced to meet on different terms.
CRIPSBLOODSMEXICAN GANGSLOWRIDERSPARK DAY
TWO PARKS. TWO SEPARATE GATHERINGS. THE BLACK AND MEXICAN CREWS HAVE NOT UNITED YET.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
PRESENT DAY • SOUTH CENTRAL LOS ANGELES
CHAPTER 03
THE
SPARK
THE PARK IS PEACEFUL. THE TROUBLE STARTS SOMEWHERE ELSE.
With food and drinks running low at both parks, members from each gathering independently head to the same liquor store. Inside, the tension is immediate but controlled—hard stares, no conflict.
At the soda section, Star and Maria accidentally bump into each other. Words are exchanged. Before either side can settle it, gunfire suddenly erupts from bystanders nearby.
Neither group knows where the first shots came from, and each believes the other side fired. The misunderstanding turns the store confrontation into chaos.
MARIASTARLIQUOR STORETENSION RISING
ONE ARGUMENT BECOMES THE SPARK THAT PULLS EVERYONE INTO THE SAME NIGHT.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
PRESENT DAY • LOS ANGELES
CHAPTER 04
THE
CHASE
THE TRUCE IS BEHIND THEM. NOW EVERY SECOND MATTERS.
Shots are now being exchanged between both parties as the chase tears through South Central.
Police units and helicopters join the pursuit. Both groups are suddenly running from law enforcement as well as from each other.
Trying to escape the cops, the lowriders race toward Diego’s neighborhood and crash into his garage.
HIGH-SPEED PURSUITLOWRIDERSCHURCHILL UNIVERSITYTHE GARAGE
METAL COLLIDES WITH THE MACHINE. THE STREET STORY AND THE EXPERIMENT BECOME ONE.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
PRESENT DAY • DIEGO’S GARAGE • SOUTH CENTRAL
CHAPTER 05
THE
BREACH
THE MACHINE WAS BUILT FOR ONE HOUR. THE IMPACT SENDS IT SOMEWHERE ELSE.
The crash sends a violent vibration through Diego’s garage.
That vibration reaches the time machine and triggers it accidentally. Power surges through the equipment before anyone can stop it, and the garage is swallowed by a temporal event.
No one deliberately activates the machine. The impact itself causes the breach, pulling everyone caught inside out of the present and into the past.
GARAGE IMPACTPOWER SURGEWHITE FLASHTIMELINE FAILURE
THE MACHINE DOESN'T SEND THEM BACK ONE HOUR. IT TEARS OPEN HISTORY.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
THE PAST • UNKNOWN LOCATION
CHAPTER 06
THE COTTON
FIELDS
THE CITY IS GONE. SOMETHING OUT THERE HAS NOTICED THEM.
The crash should have been the end. Instead, everything goes silent.
Dust. Wreckage. An unfamiliar landscape.
As everyone struggles to understand where they are, something appears in the distance—something that makes no sense.
And then it notices them.
THE UNKNOWNTHE STRANGERNO WAY BACK
WHATEVER HAPPENED INSIDE DIEGO’S GARAGE CHANGED EVERYTHING.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
THE PAST • UNKNOWN LOCATION
CHAPTER 07
COFFEY
THE STRANGER FROM THE FIELDS MAY KNOW MORE THAN THEY DO.
The stranger from the fields is no longer just a figure in the distance.
As the crews come face-to-face with him, the impossible begins to feel dangerously real. His fear, his exhaustion, and the world around him make one thing impossible to ignore:
This is not a dream.
But learning where they are only raises a harder question—what are they supposed to do now?
THE STRANGERTHE PASTTHE QUESTION
THE QUESTION IS NO LONGER WHERE THEY ARE. IT’S WHAT THEY DO NEXT.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
PRESENT DAY • DIEGO’S GARAGE • SOUTH CENTRAL
CHAPTER 08
NO WAY
HOME
THE PRESENT HAS QUESTIONS OF ITS OWN.
The world around them is becoming harder to dismiss—and more dangerous by the minute.
What first felt impossible now has consequences. Every unfamiliar face, every distant sound, and every decision carries weight.
Getting home still matters. But first, they have to survive long enough to understand what they have stepped into.
DIEGOIZZYMALIKCHLOEMACHINE DESTROYEDMISSING PERSONS
WHAT HAPPENED IN DIEGO’S GARAGE DIDN’T END WHEN THEY DISAPPEARED.
CLOSE CHAPTER −
PAST • WHITNEY PLANTATION • LOUISIANA
CHAPTER 09
BREAK THE
CHAINS
SURVIVAL IS BECOMING SOMETHING MORE.
What began as survival is becoming something harder to ignore.
The people from Los Angeles are being forced to look at the world around them—and at themselves—differently.
Old rivalries no longer feel as important as the danger closing in. Whatever comes next will require a decision none of them expected to face.
SURVIVALPRESSURETHE DECISION
THEIR NEXT DECISION COULD CHANGE EVERYTHING.
PAST • SUNDOWN PLANTATION • LOUISIANA
CHAPTER 10
SUNDOWN
ONE NAME KEEPS SURFACING: SUNDOWN.
Somewhere beyond the danger lies another possibility.
A name begins to carry weight: Sundown.
Whether it represents refuge, another threat, or something else entirely is not yet clear. For now, the road ahead is uncertain—and every step deeper into this world makes the way home feel farther away.
SUNDOWNTHE ROAD AHEADUNKNOWN CONSEQUENCES
REFUGE, THREAT, OR SOMETHING ELSE—THEY DON’T KNOW YET.
REWRITTEN • THE STORY CONTINUES