by Jason Ayres
“I’ve heard it all before, Josh. It’s pure fantasy. I really think you need to get some sort of help.”
It was interesting that he had apparently brought this up before. Clearly the Josh she had been living with had at least some inkling of what had been going on. He’d had some experience of this sort of thing before, when both Alice and Lauren had been haunted by dreams of bleeding through from their other selves in other universes.
“I don’t need help,” he persisted. “There’s this woman, her name’s Vanessa and she’s going back into time and killing our friends, one by one, and every time she does it, she changes history.”
“If that were true, how come you can see it and I can’t?” asked Lauren.
“I don’t have time to go into all that now, but you’re in terrible danger. Since the last change you and I are now apparently married, which means you’re highly likely to be next.”
“What do you mean, apparently we’re married? We’ve been married for over twenty-five years.”
“In this timeline, maybe, but not mine. Up until a few days ago, I was married to a woman named Alice. Now she’s dead, as are a lot of other people – including Charlie and Kaylee.”
“You know as well as I do, Charlie and Kaylee have been missing, presumed dead, for decades. I’m sorry, Josh, but I think you’re insane. I’m calling the hospital again. I think we need to get you committed.”
“I am not insane, Lauren!” he insisted, aware that the more he protested, the more he sounded as if he was. “You’ve got to believe me. There are now only the two of us left.”
“Seriously, I’ve heard enough,” she said angrily. “I’m going downstairs to do some work. I think you’d better stay up here and get your act together.”
“Just tell me one thing,” he said, as she turned to leave. “It could help. When exactly did Kaylee and Charlie disappear?”
“Oh, shut up, Josh,” she said, leaving the living room and slamming the door behind her.
Clearly, he wasn’t going to get any help from her. Alone in the room, he attempted to gather his thoughts and figure out what the hell he was going to do next. He had no tachyometer with him and he didn’t even know if the tachyometer existed anymore.
If he had been married to Lauren and living in the pub, would the past three decades of time travel research have even happened? He doubted whether he’d have had the time as he would probably have had to spend most of his time attending to her insatiable sexual needs.
He didn’t have long to dwell on these thoughts because before he had even had the chance to begin thinking of some sort of plan, everything around him changed again.
The décor and all the furniture were seriously upgraded this time, changing to luxurious velvet curtains, an expensive-looking glass coffee table and various expensive-looking pieces of Rugby Union memorabilia adorning the walls, as well as a well-stocked trophy cabinet. He had no idea who lived here now but it clearly wasn’t Lauren. It didn’t take a genius to work out that Vanessa had clearly got to her.
She certainly had. Furious at discovering Lauren being married to Josh in the new timeline, Vanessa had gone back to their wedding day and blown Lauren away at the front door of the church, just as she was about to walk down the aisle.
Josh headed for the living room door, needing to get away, not that he had any idea where he was going to go in this timeline that was no longer his own. His intention was to head for the stairs and get out of the pub, but even that was going to prove problematic.
As soon as he came out of the room, he ran into trouble. The layout of the landing had changed completely. The open-plan kitchen opposite had disappeared. In its place was an open door leading into a bedroom, where a young, impossibly attractive woman was admiring herself in an expensive dress in front of a full-length mirror. Unfortunately for Josh, the woman caught sight of his reflection at which point things started to get seriously out of hand.
“Will!” she cried in a rough Essex accent, which suggested that she perhaps wasn’t as posh as she looked. “It’s a burglar!”
He heard the sound of a man leaping off the bed and running towards the bedroom door. Josh had been in scrapes like this before and had no desire to get a beating at the hands of a man under the impression he was breaking into his home. He turned and ran in the direction of where he hoped the stairs would still be.
“Come here, you!” shouted a gruff voice behind him, which Josh vaguely recognised. When Josh looked back, he caught a glimpse of a big, beefy man, exactly the sort of person you didn’t want to come after you. Then he realised who he was.
That explained the rugby memorabilia. The man was William Parker, a local lad who had been one of the stars of the England team in the 2040s. It seemed he was now living in the pub.
As Josh reached the bottom of the stairs, he discovered that it wasn’t even a pub anymore. The whole building had been converted into a luxury pad, presumably by William and his trophy wife.
He headed for where the front door used to be, praying it wasn’t locked. It wasn’t and he managed to scramble out just before William was able to catch up. Fortunately, the rugby star was only in his underwear, bringing an end to the pursuit. It was also fortunate that he was past his playing days, as Josh doubted he would have made it to the door if William had still been in his prime.
“Don’t think you’ve got away with this!” shouted William. “It’ll all be on the CCTV.”
That meant the police would be after him now as well, but that was the least of his worries with Vanessa still on the rampage. He ran up the reassuringly normal street, wondering where on earth he was going to go.
He knew all too well from past experience how quickly universes could diversify after even relatively minor changes. You didn’t have to assassinate Hitler or save Kennedy to drastically alter things. Even the removal of people who might not seem important in any shape or form could send out ripples of change that could swiftly turn into tsunamis.
He would have to go home, wherever that was. He pulled out his wallet to find his driving licence, but he didn’t seem to have one anymore. Perhaps he hadn’t learned to drive in this timeline; he had left it long enough in his original one.
So now he had no idea where home was, what his job was, or anything at all about what role he now played in this altered world. He decided to go back to Oxford. At least there was the university there, assuming he still had anything to do with it.
On the train heading south he felt a growing sense of despair gnawing at him from inside. He had been in tight spots before, but he had always had friends he could call on, even when trapped in the past. Now there was no one left to turn to. Vanessa had seen to that.
He had other friends, of course, but he didn’t want to risk involving anyone else. With the way Vanessa was carrying on, he’d be as good as signing their death warrants. He had to accept that he was on his own and the odds were stacked against him. Vanessa was holding all the aces.
She had the technology and resources to run rings around him, as she had already amply demonstrated. With each friend she had taken away, his hand had become weaker and he had no idea how he was going to be able to regain control of the situation.
He knew it was likely that he would soon encounter her again, but it was unlikely she was going to give him the opportunity to overpower her and take back the tachyometer. She was way too smart for that.
He would have to find some other way. At least he knew what her motivation was. Could he play along and lull her into a false sense of security, then wait for an opportunity to strike when her guard was down? That was all he had really.
Reasoning with her or attempting to appeal to her better nature probably wasn’t going to get him anywhere. She didn’t have a better nature and trying to reason with someone who was clearly deranged was unlikely to get him anywhere.
He had no idea what to expect when the time came but was pretty sure she hadn’t gone to all this effort just to punish him for spurning her a
dvances. She had made her intentions clear and was surely going to make another play for him soon.
As the train rolled on towards Oxford, he decided to look at his phone to see if he could figure out anything about his life. As he did so, it buzzed as a message came in.
It was from an unknown number and simply read Home followed by an address, followed by the words from a friend.
What was strange was that the address was his old one where he and Alice had lived before her disappearance. Why would that now be his home again? It didn’t make any sense, unless maybe he was getting help from elsewhere. Perhaps another Josh from another universe had come to help him sort things out? If he had, he would be most welcome.
Arriving back at Oxford train station, he disembarked and walked the mile or two to the home he had until recently shared with Alice in the north of the city.
The exterior of the house still looked more or less the same, but he didn’t want a repetition of what had happened earlier with William at the pub, so as a precaution, he walked up to the door and pressed the doorbell.
Behind the frosted glass of the diamond-shaped panels on the front door, he saw the shape of someone approaching. If this was someone else’s house now, then who had directed him here and why?
He had surmised rightly that it wouldn’t be long until he saw Vanessa again, but he hadn’t expected it to be this soon.
She was standing right in front of him.
Chapter Seventeen
May 2058
“Surprise,” she said, chirpily, full of the joys of spring as if absolutely nothing had happened.
“What are you doing here?” he asked. As he did, he realised that it must have been her who had texted him the address.
“Oh, this is my house now,” replied Vanessa. She was wearing a white, traditional summer dress, covered in red and orange flowers, looking like she was dressed for a day at Henley rather than travelling through time murdering people.
“I bought this place some years ago, all ready for this day,” she added. “But don’t worry, I’m happy to share it with you. I think you’ll like it – the décor is so much more tasteful than how it was when Alice lived here. Why don’t you come in and have a look and we’ll have a nice cup of tea? That’s what you English normally do in these situations, isn’t it?”
Josh stood there incredulously. “These situations?” he asked. “You mean where an obsessed stalker has gone back in time, killed her own husband, then my wife and all my friends, before taking over my home? How could anyone in the whole of history ever have found themselves in that situation before?”
“I could make you,” she said, a hint of threat creeping into her voice.
“What would be the point of that?” he asked. “You still don’t get it, do you? I don’t want you. I’ve never wanted you. I wouldn’t want you if you were the last woman on Earth?”
“That could be arranged,” she said, ominously.
He could well believe it, but wasn’t backing down.
“Do your worst,” he said. “But it won’t make any difference. You must be crazy if you thought getting rid of Alice and the others would change that.”
“I had hoped you wouldn’t remember them,” she replied. “I noticed I could see the changes in the timeline, but other people couldn’t and put that down to some sort of protection granted by the tachyometer. But it seems you’re immune, too.”
“Which means I’ll never forget the people you killed or what you did.”
“You know, they don’t have to stay dead. I’ve got the power to restore them with a few simple trips back in time. And you’ve got the power to save them. All you’ve got to do is give me what I want.”
“Oh, I get it,” replied Josh. “I agree to be yours, and you go back and undo all the damage you’ve done, is that what you’re proposing?”
“In a nutshell,” she said. “I’m a past master at blackmail and I’ve got the better of far stronger people than you. Now why don’t we stop arguing like this on the doorstep and go inside where it’s more comfortable?”
“You just don’t get it, do you? Even if I did agree to save the others’ lives, I’d be living a lie. I’d only be pretending to love you and inside I’d detest you. Doesn’t that bother you? And why are you so damned obsessed with me anyway? You’re one of the richest women in the world: you can have whoever you want.”
“But I want you and you rejected me,” she replied. “That simply wouldn’t do. I’ve told you before, I always get what I want and I’ll do whatever it takes to get it.”
“You’re insane, Vanessa. All that money’s driven you power-crazy to the extent that you think you can control the whole world. Well, you can’t.”
“But that’s just it, I can now, and it’s all thanks to you,” she said. “You’ve given me the power via the tachyometer to control the whole world.”
“But you still can’t control me or make me love you. And if you think killing my friends then offering to bring them back will change my mind, you’re very much mistaken. And if they were alive and here now, I’ve no doubt they would agree with me.”
“Ha, your pathetic little friends, you’re better off without them. Lovey-dovey Charlie and Kaylee? They made me want to vomit with all that childhood sweetheart crap. It was a real pleasure blowing him away in front of her. You should have seen her as I hunted her down afterwards. She was so terrified, I could almost smell her fear.”
“You’re just jealous because you’ve never had love like those two had. They were devoted to each other and that sickens you to the pit of your stomach, doesn’t it?”
“Hardly,” replied Vanessa. “They were just an obstacle in my way that needed removing. As for Alice, that nagging bitch never let you reach your fill potential, always wanting to go on holiday or drag you away from your work to crappy social functions.”
“Do you actually think that slagging her off like this is going to somehow change my mind?” said Josh, incredulously.
“Oh, I’ve not finished yet. What about Perfect Peter and self-righteous Hannah with all her moral bleating? Didn’t stop her coming after me with a gun, did it? You’re better off without friends like that.”
“I beg to differ,” said Josh.
“As for that slapper, Lauren, she’s spent her whole adult life like a little bitch in heat. I’m surprised she didn’t pursue a career as a prostitute: she’d have made almost as much money as I have by now with the number of men that she’s had up her. You don’t need them, Josh – any of them.”
“Oh, but I do,” he said. “Do you know what they’ve given me? I’ll tell you – loyalty, support and friendship – the sort that lasts a lifetime and that doesn’t have to be bought. I imagine these are concepts that are completely alien to you.”
“Everything can be bought,” said Vanessa, smirking, dismissive of what he was saying.
“Not me,” he said. “Now, I don’t care what else you plan to do but I’m never going to agree to being yours. Now this has gone far enough. I want the tachyometer and I want it now. Where is it?”
“Where you’ll never find it,” she responded.
“Perhaps I’ll just come in and look for it,” he suggested, moving forward, hoping to intimidate her, but she blocked his path.
He had never laid a finger on a woman in his life, but after all the people Vanessa had killed the normal rules didn’t apply. She was still holding the door half-open and he tried to push it forward, planning to pin her down if he had to, but before he could advance any further she raised her right arm, showing him the laser weapon she had used to kill the others.
“What’s that?” he asked. “Have you been bringing weapons back from the future? Do you have any idea how dangerous that is?”
“Not at all,” she said. “We developed this at the institute at Canberra. It’s pretty effective. Allow me to demonstrate. Stand back.”
She opened the front door fully as he stepped back and aimed the weapon at an old sto
ne statue of an angel that had been in the front garden for years. She fired, producing the usual fizzing sound as the statue was vaporised in a blaze of bright blue.
“Very impressive,” said Josh, hoping to cover his fear with sarcasm. “But I never liked that statue anyway. It was there when we moved in and I was always telling Alice we should get rid of it.”
“Oh, it’s very effective,” she said. “I’ve used it rather a lot recently, as you can probably imagine. Hannah’s puny handgun was no match for it, that’s for sure. I saw her off with ease. What was it she told you? She was a trained firearms expert? Didn’t do her much good, did it?”
She trained the weapon on him threateningly. “Now get in here!”
“No, I won’t,” he said, defiantly. “I’m out of here.”
He turned his back on her and walked back down the path towards the gate, wondering if he was making a huge mistake and he was about to disappear in a white-hot flash of blue light. He was gambling that she wanted him so much she wouldn’t be able to bring herself to kill him.
“You go, then!” she shouted after him. “And see how far you get. Because if you think what’s happened so far is bad, believe me, you haven’t seen anything yet.”
“Do your worst,” he retorted, resisting the urge to look back. “I’m not changing my mind, and that’s that.”
“We’ll see about that!” she shouted, before slamming the door.
Relief flooded through him that he was still alive, but he knew that he was still in serious trouble. It wasn’t going to end here, that was for sure. It wouldn’t be long before she would try something else, but how could he prepare for it? The truth was, he couldn’t.
In the past, he had always managed to come up with some sort of Plan B when he had got into tricky situations, but he didn’t even have a Plan A this time. He would just have to try and deal with whatever trick she tried to pull next, never give in, and wait for an opportunity, however small, to fight back.
Head down and shoulders slumped, he painted a classic picture of despair as he trudged back towards the city centre without any sense of direction or purpose. Perhaps he should just go into The Eagle and Child and have a couple of pints. The beer might give him some inspiration, and if it didn’t at least it would help him relax.
