The Bureau of Time
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Authors: Brett Michael Orr
Tags: #Time travel, #parallel universe, #parallel worlds, #nuclear winter, #genetic mutation, #super powers, #dystopian world
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Copyright © 2015 Brett Michael Orr
ISBN: 978-1-925442-78-6 (eBook)
EPUB Edition
Published by Vivid Publishing
P.O. Box 948, Fremantle Western Australia 6959
eBook conversion and distribution by Fontaine Publishing Group, Australia
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.
Subjects include: Time travel, parallel universe, parallel worlds, nuclear winter, genetic mutation, super powers, dystopian world.
Chase your dreams, follow your heart, and know that nothing is ever impossible.
THE PURSUER
It was the middle of summer, and it was snowing outside.
Cassandra Wright leaned against the windowsill, a frigid wind stirring the curtains and sending goose bumps running along her arms. Clouds gathered overhead, so dark they were almost black, plunging the world into a nighttime that was four hours too early for the time of year. The streetlamp on the opposite side of the road flickered uncertainly, catching falling snowflakes and casting speckled shadows on the sidewalk. Far beyond the clouds, the sky was still a blue ribbon wrapped around the horizon.
From the second-story window, Cassie watched young children play in the street, shouting and laughing as they hurled snowballs at each other. Parents looked on warily, mixed expressions of concern and wonderment on their faces. A group of older teenagers from her high school were whooping as they raced bobsleds down the road.
A strong gust of wind sent snowflakes curling through the open window, landing on her skin and melting instantly. Inside the house, it was still summertime – a balmy July evening. Icy fingers crawled up Cassie’s spine, but the chill had nothing to do with the wind tugging at her red hair, soaking wet and hanging forward over her shoulders.
Pennsylvania wasn’t far enough.
Snow in the middle of summer, an uncomfortable headache at the base of her neck, the crawling feeling of being watched from afar. Snow drifted through the air, mixed with something darker – flakes of gray ash.
The assassins had found her again.
Cassie gripped the windowsill, her knuckles turning white. Her eyes darted all over the street, lingering on the lengthening shadows, expecting to see one of
them
there, one of the dark figures that had been stalking her for the past two years.
Visual hallucinations
. That was what the psychiatrists had called it. They blamed her parents’ divorce, the stress of moving between states and being pulled in and out of different schools.
Cassie knew better. She wasn’t schizophrenic, she wasn’t
stressed;
she was being actively hunted by nameless
things
, and nobody believed her.
She looked around her room, a tight knot of fear forming in her stomach. Her eyes passed over the hot-pink wallpaper and the single bed with its obnoxiously bright cover. Her family home hadn’t changed in the eight years she had been away.
After her parents’ divorce, she had moved with her newly independent mother to New York City. She had been ripped away from the quiet city of Hermitage and plunged into the swarming metropolis of New York. The busiest city in the world left a bitter taste in her mouth and sinister faces in her nightmares.
Cassie was sixteen now, living back with her father in Hermitage, Pennsylvania. Her bedroom was only a painful reminder of happier times now lost – times when monsters had been imaginary, when her father’s smile or a stuffed toy could protect her from whatever lurked beneath her bed.
Her fiery hair flicked behind her as she crossed the room. Her shoulders were freezing, her hair damp from the shower. She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. Perhaps there was a logical, rational explanation for the bizarre weather. She pinched the bridge of her nose, the gleeful shouts of young children entering through the open window. How could people be having
fun
out there?
She turned around to shut the frost-covered window and let out a horrified shout.
She stumbled backward into her bed, her blood turned to ice. The image was frozen in her mind like a photograph: a tall man with a mannequin-like face standing on the opposite side of the road, dressed in a black jumpsuit, a vicious grin splitting his otherwise featureless face.
Adrenaline coursed through her body. Her hands trembled and her breaths came short and sharp. That was the closest one of the assassins had ever come to her. She
knew
they were assassins, somehow. She had never spoken to one of the creatures, never found out what they actually
were,
but she knew they wanted to kill her. It was a feeling deep inside her gut, an unshakeable instinct to run, to keep running and never look back.
Cassie took a tentative step toward the window.
The street was empty.
She let out a shaky sigh of relief, but the uneasy feeling in her stomach remained. Every time one of those monsters appeared, it was preluded by inexplicable weather. At first, she had thought nothing of it – a heatwave in winter, snow in summer, a bizarre rainstorm in Central Park; the weather events only lasted for a few minutes then disappeared without a trace. It would make the news, but the media remained blissfully unaware of the creatures, and no matter how many times Cassie had tried to tell her parents, her teachers, even the police, nobody believed her. She couldn’t even prove the monsters existed, let alone that they wanted to kill her.
There was a loud bang from downstairs and she jumped.
“Dad?” she asked, her voice trembling. She checked the time on her phone.
4:58pm
. It was too early for him to be home yet. But she called out anyway, hoping she was wrong. “Dad, are you down there?”
No answer. Her heart was pounding, threatening to burst out of her chest. The headache at the base of her neck changed, becoming sharp, a needle stabbing through her skull. Then she felt something
else.
It was an inexplicable, tangible energy that ignored the limitations of the physical world. Tendrils of power snaked through the air, wrapping around her body and humming through her bones. The source of the power was downstairs, moving slowly through the kitchen, a bright beacon flaring in Cassie’s mind.
The assassin had entered her home.
Panic seized control of her mind, every rational thought pushed away, replaced with a single command:
escape.
She threw the window up and scrambled through, dropping onto the porch roof. The snow was cold beneath her bare feet, and her jeans and t-shirt did little to protect against the cold wind, but there wasn’t time to dress properly.
She gauged the distance to the ground, aiming for the carefully manicured grass. She jumped, her body jarring with the impact of landing.
It was completely dark beneath the storm cell, the clouds hanging overhead oppressively. Away over the city and the rolling countryside of Pennsylvania the sun was still shining, the day long and warm – but the light seemed hopelessly far away, taunting her with its safety.
There was a sudden, much sharper spike in her mind, and she felt the assassin change direction abruptly. She stumbled away from the house, the grass slick beneath her.
She made it to the mailbox before the front door opened, revealing her pursuer.
All the scary movies in the world could not compare with the horror of the faceless assassin. It was still distinctly human, and that was what made it all the more terrifying. The creature’s head was pale and featureless, completely bald. An abnormally wide mouth split the monster’s face in half, raised to one side in a silent, beastly snarl. A hexagonal metal disc – no larger than her palm – was bolted into its temple, glowing bright red around the edges.
The assassin wore a black jumpsuit; a crimson sash encircled its left bicep. It advanced, and in its right hand, the monster held a steel knife, the blade wickedly curved, the handle shaped like an hourglass.
Cassie’s paralysis broke and she turned on-heel, racing toward the far end of the street. She was alone now, but still she screamed for help, her voice breaking into a choked cry. Her bare feet hammered into the ground, and twice she almost slipped on the sidewalk, the snow already melting into a dirty slush. She threw a quick glance over her shoulder and saw the assassin following. Her heart leaped into her throat and she redoubled her speed, her legs aching with the effort.
Cassie had never been particularly fit – she was skinny, underweight, and not particularly gifted at any sports. Her lungs were burning by the time she reached the cul-de-sac at the far end of her street, and she desperately wanted to stop for a moment, to rest and get her breath back.
I can’t stop,
she thought, a hollow pit of fear consuming her.
That thing is going to kill me
.
A fierce desire to live burned through her veins, driving her forward. She headed for the narrow alley that backed onto the small woods behind her suburb.
The football stadium of her high school was visible through the cluster of pines.
There has to be somebody at the school, somebody who can help.
She held onto that feeble hope as though it were a mighty shield that could protect her, a tiny flame against a raging storm.
Cassie squeezed down the lane between two houses, muddy water splashing up over the lower half of her jeans. She rushed into the woods, thin branches reaching out and scratching her, slowing her as she fought through the trees. Rivulets of blood ran down her arms, the rough ground cutting her bare feet. Loose pine needles matted in her wet hair and as she burst out of the woods, she realized it was no longer snowing.
The storm clouds were still following her, swallowing up the sky, robbing the world of its protective light. The light could save her, because the monsters always lurked in the shadows, always appeared in alleys, in crowded malls, in reflections from store windows…
The football stadium loomed overhead, the bleachers appearing oddly menacing against the dark skies. Cassie ducked under the seats and bent over, gasping for breath, her eyes darting over the grassy field and the woods. She pulled her hair behind her neck, her hands trembling.
She reached into her back pocket, fumbling for her phone – but it was missing. Where had she lost it? Somewhere in the street, or in the woods? She swore under her breath, a sense of loss gripping her as her vital lifeline to the world was suddenly severed.