The Pages of Time

by Damian Knight

  Eventually he gave up on sleep and climbed out of bed. The heating hadn’t switched on yet and the house was freezing. He pulled his dressing gown on over his pyjamas and, in almost total darkness, crept out onto the landing and down to the kitchen.

  The digital clock on the oven said it was 04:23. He made toast with chocolate spread and ate leaning against the kitchen worktop, looking out over the blackness of the garden. The clear night sky was dotted with faint starlight in the places where it was able to fight past the glow of the city, and he could just make out the outline of the tree next to the fence.

  After finishing, Sam left his plate and knife in the sink, fetched his duvet from upstairs and, wrapping it around his shoulders, curled up on the sofa in the living room. Once again his life seemed to be spiralling out of control, and this time his problems were far worse than the prospect of moving to another country. The previous evening he had seen a side of Dr McHayden that both frightened and repelled him, a ruthless streak that would stop at nothing to get what she wanted. Whatever her true plans were, it was clear that Sam’s own wishes melted into insignificance. He was nothing but a cog in McHayden’s machine, and if he didn’t do what she wanted then it was obvious she wouldn’t think twice about discarding him.

  At some point he must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he knew the living room was filled with light. He jumped from the sofa and yanked back the curtains, afraid that he’d overslept and was late again, but there was no sign of McHayden’s car in the road. The smell of bacon drifted through from the kitchen. He followed it and found his grandmother standing over the stove with a frying pan.

  ‘Good morning, pet,’ she said. ‘What were you doing in the front room? I came in earlier, but you looked so peaceful that I didn’t want to wake you.’

  ‘I couldn’t sleep so I came down in the night,’ Sam said. ‘What’s the time?’

  ‘Twenty to nine. Grandpa has another hospital appointment, so I’m making bacon butties before we leave. Fancy one?’

  ‘No time,’ he said, wishing she’d woken him.

  Sam hurried upstairs, picked up his phone from the bedside table and called Eva at Doug’s flat. He had tried several times the previous evening, but there was no answer and he remembered her saying that they were going out for dinner. This time, however, the line was engaged, so he jumped in the shower, pulled on some clean clothes and tried again, only to find that the line was still busy.

  With no time to keep trying, Sam went back downstairs to see McHayden’s sleek Mercedes already waiting outside, so he stuffed his phone into his pocket, grabbed his coat and yelled goodbye as he stepped out of the door.

  It was colder than any other day so far that year and large, feathery snowflakes floated down from the sky. He crossed the road feeling strangely calm, as though whatever lay in store for him couldn’t be any worse than waiting for it. Dr McHayden was sitting with a leather bound notebook on her lap. She barely glanced up as Sam climbed in next to her.

  ‘About yesterday―’ he began.

  McHayden raised her hand, palm towards him. ‘I have work to do, and I’d rather not have to endure any more excuses, thank you very much.’

  The heating system hummed as they drove, wafting warm air around the car. Still tired from lack of sleep, Sam stifled a yawn and stared out through the window. The snow began to fall more heavily as they left the city, and the roads soon became clogged with cars driving well below the speed limit.

  By the time they reached the Tempus Research Facility a thin layer of snow carpeted the ground and lined the branches of the pine trees surrounding them. Sam followed McHayden and Steele to the entrance, their shoes leaving muddy prints on the previously perfect blanket of white.

  As always, Arnold was sitting behind his desk, reading a book. He looked up and gave a toothy smile as Sam stamped his feet on the mat. ‘Looks like we might have a white Christmas after all,’ he said, pushing his cap back on his head. ‘Looking forward to Christmas, Sam?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Sam said, although he hadn’t really thought about it until then. It suddenly dawned on him that this would be the first Christmas without his mum and dad.

  Arnold must have sensed Sam’s discomfort, because he stopped smiling. ‘Well, I suppose you’re getting a bit old for that sort of thing. How old are you anyway? Seventeen, right?’

  ‘Almost,’ Sam said.

  ‘Thought so. My boy, Ross, is about your age. He used to love Christmas when he was little, but now—’

  McHayden cleared her throat. ‘That’s enough of the chit-chat, thank you Arnold. We’re on a tight schedule after yesterday’s setback.’

  ‘Oh, right you are, boss,’ he said, and reached for the button under his desk.

  McHayden stepped into the recessed lift before the vending machine had even finished sliding back and immediately pressed her hand to the black plate on the wall. Sam just about managed to scurry in behind Steele before the doors closed and they began to descend.

  They stepped out into a flurry of activity. There was several times the number of people as on any previous occasion. A row of computer terminals had been set up along one of the worktops that ran down the centre of the lab, most of which were in use.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Sam asked, but McHayden was already striding away down the aisle that led to the back of the long room.

  He hurried after, eager not to get left behind. There were four metal cages on another worktop by the far wall which Sam didn’t remember seeing before. Each was about four feet high and wide, and six feet deep. The first two were empty but the last two contained monkeys, both with their heads bandaged. One lay curled and motionless near the back of its cage, but the other, a chimpanzee, sat close to the front, watching Sam with sad, almost human eyes. It jumped up as they passed, slammed its small black hands against the bars and, baring its yellow teeth, let out a high-pitched shriek.

  Sam realised that these poor creatures must have been what McHayden was referring to when she’d told him about surgery to recreate his injury in animals, and he shuddered to think about what he had become a part of.

  McHayden marched straight to the small room that usually housed the random chance generator. When Sam entered after, he found that the furniture had been changed, the computer screen and joysticks replaced by a wooden table and a pair of foldout plastic chairs. Malcolm Fairview was sitting on one. There were dark circles beneath his eyes and his eczema appeared far worse than two days before, the red flakes now spreading across his forehead and nose.

  ‘Sam, good to see you,’ he said, standing. ‘We were expecting you yesterday. Is everything okay?’

  ‘Malcolm, let’s not get into that now,’ McHayden said. ‘Come on, chop-chop, lots of catching up to do.’ With that she turned and left, slamming the door on her way out.

  Fairview stared after, a bemused look on his face, then shook his head and opened the metal cabinet in the corner of the room. He removed a bottle from the shelves and poured a glass of water from a jug on the table. ‘Sorry,’ he said, handing Sam the glass along with a small, sticky pill, ‘haven’t got round to sugar coating them yet. As you’ve probably noticed, things have been rather busy here lately.’

  Sam held his nose and washed the pill down with a gulp of water. ‘So, what’s happening?’ he asked. ‘I’m guessing we’re done with the random chance generator.’

  ‘Your assumption is correct. Today we’ll be attempting something a little different. I want you to travel into the past over a longer period of time. A day or two, to be exact.’

  ‘All right,’ Sam said and took another gulp of water, which didn’t quite get rid of the taste.

  ‘During the last day or so we’ve been observing you going about your day-to-day activities.’

  Sam spluttered, sending water shooting out of his nose and dribbling down his chin. ‘You’ve been spying on me?’

  ‘Spying is such a strong word. I’m sorry if it seems like an invasion of your pri
vacy, Sam, but it’s quite necessary for the purposes of this experiment. Believe me when I say I’m not so interested in your personal life that I’d have you watched, no matter what Dr McHayden may think.’ He scratched his neck, showering his lab coat with flakes of dead skin. ‘The purpose of observing you was to plant a series of subliminal clues – little things you’d see but would probably never notice. I’ve drawn up a list of times, places and tasks. Once the Tetradyamide takes effect, you need to travel back to the specified time, find the relevant information and then report back to me, okay?’

  ‘Is that all? I thought you’d ask me to do something difficult this time.’

  Fairview chuckled. ‘Just relax. I’ll be back in a few minutes and we can begin.’

  Alone in the small room, Sam drummed his fingers on the tabletop as he waited. After several minutes he felt a surge in his chest like a hit of adrenaline and looked down. His fingers blurred together, each hand a fleshy flipper. He lifted his right hand, wiggled his fingers and the gaps between each regained some definition. When he looked down again the sides of the table had become fuzzy, as if he were watching two overlapping images that were slightly out of sync. He looked back up. The whiteness of the walls was tinged with colour, a faint pinkish orange that hung on the edge of his vision.

  Fairview stepped back in, a clipboard under his arm. ‘Feel anything yet?’

  Sam nodded, the world shimmering around him in a sparkling kaleidoscope of colour. ‘I’m ready.’

  Fairview pulled a sheet of paper from his clipboard and slid it across the table. The action appeared jerky and disjointed; separate instances connected only by the illusion of time. Sam did his best to ignore the sensation, knowing it was only the Tetradyamide, and glanced down at the page. It contained print that swam and swirled. He rubbed his eyes, which brought the words into focus.

  There were three short paragraphs. The first read:

  Friday, 12:15, Fraser Golding College.

  There is a girl behind you in the queue.

  Blonde hair, green dress.

  What colour are her earrings?

  ‘I don’t get it,’ Sam said.

  Fairview removed the chewed end of a biro from his lips, leaving them stained with ink. ‘The day and time are the point I want you to travel back to. Fraser Golding College is the destination and the girl in the green dress is your target. Find out what colour her earrings are and report back to me.’

  ‘But that was just after my interview yesterday. I don’t remember any girl in a green dress.’

  ‘Which means she did her job. She’s a junior operative I instructed to pose as a student at your college as part of a routine surveillance operation. Her orders were to monitor your activities without arousing your suspicion. Naturally she had no idea as to the true purpose of her assignment. Your task is to pass back and observe what you didn’t notice the first time.’

  ‘You mean the colour of her earrings?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Sam closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind. At first this wasn’t easy with Fairview breathing loudly beside him, but Tetradyamide helped to sharpen his concentration to the point of a needle. His mind was an empty space, a blank canvas for thoughts cut off from bodily sensations. Brightly coloured shapes gradually emerged from the darkness, like you’d see when closing your eyes after staring at the sun too long. The shapes danced behind his eyelids, spinning and multiplying. Slowly they fused together, forming larger, multi-coloured shapes until an image revealed itself.

  Sam was looking through the point of view he’d had just before closing his eyes. Fairview was standing beside him, clipboard in hand. But this wasn’t happening in time; it was a frozen moment captured like a snapshot, a thing both temporary and eternal, a single page in the book.

  Sam willed the image to move backwards, a mental sweep of the hand, and it did. One by one images passed, flicking back to earlier pages. He saw Fairview pick up the piece of paper, slide it into his clipboard and walk backwards out of the door.

  The harder Sam concentrated, the faster the images went. He saw himself enter the room with McHayden and Steele; he saw the monkey in the cage; he saw Arnold, the security guard, on the ground floor just before they got in the lift. And then he was back in the car, looking out of the window at snowflakes rising through the air. Soon things began to move so fast that the images became a blur, nothing but flashes of colour shooting by, until suddenly they were replaced by darkness. Sam willed the pages to stop and, just like that, they did.

  He was in his kitchen, a knife dripping with chocolate spread in his hand and a plate of toast on the counter.

  ‘Play,’ he said, and suddenly it wasn’t just an image anymore, he was actually there. A chill prickled his skin. The smell of burned toast hung in the air. A droplet of water fell from the tap and splashed into the sink. He glanced at the clock on the oven. It was 04:25, but as he watched on it rolled over to 04:26.

  Sam laughed and licked chocolate spread from the knife. He was standing in the middle of last night but, incredible as this was, it wasn’t where he wanted to be. There was a task to complete.

  After closing his eyes, he swept the images back once again. Briefly he glimpsed himself on the stairs and then lying in bed. For a while after that darkness was all he saw, but then the splashes of colour returned and Sam realised that he must be passing through the day before. He concentrated on the time on the sheet of paper, 12:15, and as if on cue the images became visible once more as the rate at which the pages flipped back gradually slowed.

  Sam was sitting opposite Lewis in the cafeteria at Fraser Golding College. Lewis put an empty fork in his mouth and pulled out half of an uneaten fish finger. Sam saw himself stand, pick up his tray and backtrack past the cash registers, joining a queue where a burley dinner lady sucked chicken curry from his bowl with a ladle and slopped it back into a serving tray.

  The images slowed to a halt.

  This was it.

  Sam blinked and the canteen filled with the racket of voices and the smells of cooked food.

  ‘What’ll it be?’

  ‘Huh?’ Sam said.

  ‘What’ll it be, fish fingers or chicken curry?’ The dinner lady wiped her hands on her greasy apron and placed them on her hips.

  Sam turned to see Lewis by his side. Lewis picked a chip from his plate and stuffed it into his mouth.

  ‘C’mon, sonny,’ the dinner lady said, ‘there’s other people waiting.’

  ‘Never mind.’ Sam took a step back to look down the length of the queue. There was a girl in a pea green dress standing four places behind him. She was petite and very thin, almost like a frightened mouse, and so pale that her veins were visible as faint blue lines under the surface of her skin. Her blonde hair fell loosely to her shoulders, covering her ears. She looked up and caught Sam staring. For a second her eyes stretched wide and then she looked away.

  ‘Mate, are you all right?’ Lewis asked.

  Sam ignored him and walked towards the girl. She immediately turned her back on him and began rummaging in her handbag.

  ‘Excuse me,’ he said.

  The girl did her best to pretend she hadn’t heard.

  Gently, Sam placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘Hello?’

  She flinched as she turned to face him, her eyes angry slits. ‘What is it?’ she hissed. ‘I’m not supposed to talk to you. Leave me alone.’

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to get you in trouble or anything, I just wanted to ask you a question.’

  She glanced from side to side as if wary of being watched. ‘And then you’ll leave me alone?’

  ‘Swear it,’ Sam said and crossed himself like a priest. ‘I only want to see your earrings.’

  ‘My earrings?’ She frowned and pulled her hair back to reveal bare earlobes. ‘But I’m not wearing any today.’

  ‘Thanks, that’s all I needed to know.’ He stepped back and closed his eyes, imagining the word ‘now’. A rush of colour swep
t over him, image after image flooding by.

  Finally the images slowed and he was left with the one he’d first started with: Fairview standing beside him as he sat on a foldout chair in the Tempus Research Facility.

  Sam opened his eyes. ‘It’s done.’

  ‘Already? You were only away a minute or two.’

  ‘That’s all I needed. She wasn’t wearing earrings.’

  Fairview stuck his bottom lip out and made a mark on his clipboard. ‘Well done. After all the speculation I suppose it might take a while to get my head around how this works in practice. So, on to the next task…’

  Sam looked down. The second paragraph on the sheet read:

  Friday, 15:35, The Prince Regent Public House.

  There is a man playing the fruit machine.

  He has a tattoo on his left hand.

  What does it depict?

  He shut his eyes again and cleared his mind. Shapes emerged from the darkness, twisting and expanding until they filled his vision and he was presented with the image of Fairview standing over him, the point of his chewed biro pressed to the clipboard.

  Sam focused on the day and time: Friday, 15:35. On this occasion there was no gradual acceleration; images erupted before him, gushing past like water from a burst pipe. When they finally slowed Sam glimpsed the view of his knees in the mud of Mrs Mason’s flowerbed, vomit spots on his trouser legs. Next he saw himself stopping to lean against a lamp post as he staggered home and then walking with Eva to the tube station, his arm around her shoulder. The last image showed a shot glass in Sam’s right hand and a small mound of salt on the back of his left.

  ‘Play,’ he said again, and the world lurched into motion. An old country and western song sprang up over the sound system. The smell of stale beer filled the room.

  Eva looked up from across the table with a puzzled expression. ‘What did you just say?’