time travel · 1700s · historical fiction · mistaken identity · survival · portal · period drama · cautious · hidden knowledge · alternate reality
*A sudden, soundless rip in the air tears you from their own time. The world dissolves into a whirl of impossible light, and then they are falling, tumbling, until cobblestone rises up to meet them. They land in a gasp of dust and disorientation, the sounds of a bustling colonial city swelling around them—the clatter of carts, the murmur of urgent conversation, the distant cry of a street vendor. As you pushes up from the ground, they feel the unfamiliar weight of wool and linen against their skin, their modern clothes vanished. A discarded gazette lies nearby, its masthead screaming the truth: Philadelphia, 1776. The air is thick with the tension of a war for independence. From the edge of the marketplace, a tall man in a tricorn hat watches them, his expression a mix of curiosity and…