by Jason Ayres
“Who are you?” she demanded in a strong Liverpool accent. “What are you doing in here?”
Josh looked up at the nurse, caught flat-footed by her sudden arrival and needing to come up with an answer quickly. She was pretty and blonde, and looked to be around her mid-thirties. Clutching at straws, he looked to her chest for a name tag, clocking not only that her name was Amy, but also that she had been blessed with extremely ample breasts. Unfortunately his eyes lingered on her chest just a little too long.
“I’m Doctor Gardner,” he bluffed, putting on the sort of cut-glass accent favoured by English actors playing upper-crust roles in stage shows and American films. Attempting to pour on the charm, he added, “I’m a specialist, visiting from Harley Street. I’m delighted to meet you, Amy.”
“Don’t give me that,” she replied, “and stop staring at my tits. None of the doctors in this hospital or anywhere else wear white coats anymore. What they do wear is ID, so where’s yours?”
“Ah yes, one of the chaps down on security printed it up for me this morning,” he ventured. “I must pop down and pick it up at some point.”
It was quite clear from the look on her face that she didn’t believe a word of it. Conscious of the time, he glanced across at the clock again. It was 2.58am. He just needed to stall this woman for a couple of minutes.
Deciding to try a different tack, and reverting to his normal voice, he said, “Look, I’ll come clean, I’m not a doctor, I’m a scientist attached to the university carrying out some research here. I just need a couple of minutes, that’s all. Then I’ll be out of your hair.”
“I’m sorry, that’s not good enough,” replied Amy. “People don’t go around hospitals in the middle of the night wearing dubious disguises unless they’re up to no good.”
“What can I get up to in here?” protested Josh, gesturing towards the body on the bed. “It’s not as if I’ve come to bump him off, is it? It’s a bit late for that: the Grim Reaper’s already been and gone.”
“I’m calling security,” replied Amy, moving towards a telephone attached to the wall.
“No, don’t do that,” he protested, and began to move towards her.
Sensing a threat, she backed away and hit a large red button on the wall close to the door. It began to flash, but there was no sound.
Josh hadn’t expected this. “Since when have hospitals had panic buttons?” It wasn’t something he had ever been aware of.
“Since last year when a patient assaulted a nurse in this very ward,” replied Amy. “Do you have any idea how much abuse we get from the drunks that get hauled in here every weekend? Now you’ve got less than two minutes until security arrive from downstairs to escort you from the premises – and that won’t be pleasant. They don’t take too kindly to women being threatened and can get quite heavy-handed. If I were you, I would scarper, now, while you still can.”
She had well and truly got the measure of him. Perhaps he should simply abandon this attempt. There was nothing to stop him shifting back in time a day or two and sideways into a similar universe. He could then try again ensuring that the annoying Amy with her irritating Scouse accent was well out of the way this time.
He decided against doing a runner as she suggested. He didn’t relish the thought of running down unfamiliar corridors being pursued by aggressive security guards. It would be far easier to get out of there right now.
“Fine,” he said, “but I’ll be back and you won’t even know about it.”
Pressing a couple of buttons on the tachyometer, he set it to take him back forty-eight hours, pointed it towards the window on the far side of the room, and activated it.
“What are you doing?” she asked, unable to see anything. The tachyometer didn’t produce a glowing whirlpool-style vortex such as you would see in a science-fiction movie, just an invisible portal through which Josh was about to step.
“Nothing for you to worry about,” he said as he prepared to step into the bubble. But before he could do so, something unexpected happened.
On the other side of the room, not far from the window, another Josh, seemingly the same age as him appeared, also holding out a tachyometer in front of him. He was aiming his device into exactly the same place Josh was.
Josh had never even considered the possible effects of creating two time bubbles in the same space before, but he couldn’t imagine that it was going to have a positive outcome.
“No!” he shouted, but the other Josh seemed oblivious to his presence and was already pressing the button.
The moment he did, things got decidedly weird. Suddenly he was facing what looked like an infinite regression of Joshes, stretching backwards in all directions from the point where the streams from the two tachyometers had merged. It was a similar effect to one he had once seen when attempting to negotiate a mirror maze at a theme park. The mirrors, all facing each other, had created a myriad of kaleidoscopic images retreating into infinity from all directions.
“What’s happening?!” he heard Amy scream. His eyes were filled with multiple images of her, himself and the dead body on the bed. There were thousands of them all spinning around him like trailing images on a computer screen.
He felt sick, dizzy and about to pass out. Just before he did there was some sort of explosion and he fell backwards towards the wall, as all the competing images in front of his eyes seemed to rush together to a single point. After that he remembered nothing.
Chapter Nine
December 2024
Slowly Josh began to regain consciousness, feeling disorientated and confused. Momentarily, he could remember nothing. Where was he? What had happened?
Opening his eyes, he tried to sit up. Despite feeling extremely groggy it didn’t take more than a second or two to realise that he was in a hospital.
He was in a small ward of four beds, all occupied. Two of them had curtains drawn around them, but opposite he could see a man with a bandage over his right eye. He was a young man, mid-twenties and a tough-looking customer. His uncovered arms were muscular and covered in tattoos. With his one functioning eye, he was looking directly back at Josh with an unfriendly expression on his face.
“What are you looking at?” said the man aggressively. As he spoke, even at this distance of several feet, Josh got a whiff of alcohol.
It must be a weekend night, thought Josh, averting his gaze and looking towards the door where a nurse had just come in. It wasn’t Amy, but a shorter, older Hispanic woman.
Of course, he thought. Amy! Seeing the nurse had triggered a flow of memories, flooding into his brain. What had happened to the pretty Scouse nurse who had caught him loitering where he had no right to be?
His thoughts were more than a little scrambled. He was going to have to try and piece them back together but it would have to wait. The nurse who had just entered the room was making a beeline straight for him.
“Ah, you’re awake then,” she said, with just a hint of a Spanish accent. Her name was Carmen, according to her badge, which Josh allowed himself a swift peek at. Mindful of Amy’s accusations of leering, he quickly looked away again and answered her question.
“It seems so,” said Josh. “What’s wrong with me?”
He didn’t have any wires or machines attached to him, which was a relief, so hopefully she wasn’t going to give him any bad news.
“As far as we can tell, nothing,” said the nurse, thankfully. “I’m guessing yet another case of festive overindulgence. We’ve had no shortage of them in here over the past couple of weeks. Every night’s a Friday night at this time of year.”
“Oi, nurse,” growled the aggressive man in the bed opposite. “What does a bloke have to do to get some fucking breakfast around here?”
Josh was disgusted by the man’s rudeness. How dare he swear at a nurse like that? No wonder they had installed panic buttons. He thought about saying something, but Carmen beat him to it. She was clearly used to dealing with this sort of thing. That didn’t make it rig
ht, though.
“Absolutely nothing if you speak to me like that,” she responded firmly. “Perhaps if you hadn’t got drunk and provoked someone into wrapping a bottle around your head last night, you’d be at home getting your own breakfast.”
The man remained silent, seemingly respectful of Carmen now she had stood up to him. Satisfied that she had shut him up for now, she turned her attention back to Josh. “So what’s your story, then? Drunk and passed out? Is that how you ended up here?”
“I wasn’t drunk last night,” protested Josh.
“I should hope not, at your age,” replied the Spanish woman. “That fellow over there’s young and impulsive, but a man of your years should know better. So, if you weren’t drunk, would you care to enlighten us on how you ended up unconscious on the floor of a private patient’s room on the oncology ward?”
“I’m not sure I can,” he said. “My memory’s a bit hazy.”
“Well, you had better think of something, as security will want to ask you some questions before you leave.”
“Sleepwalking,” proclaimed Josh, seizing on the first thought that came into his head. “I’ve suffered from it all my life. I must have fallen asleep and wandered into his room.”
“Where were you sleepwalking from, exactly?” she asked. “You’re not a patient at this hospital as far as we can tell, so are you telling me you made it here all the way from your house? And also, how do you know it was a man?”
“I didn’t come from home. I was here because my wife’s having a baby,” he bluffed. “She’s been in labour for over twenty hours. I think I must have nodded off in the waiting area.”
“Aren’t you a little old to be a father?” asked Carmen, clearly sceptical of this suggestion.
“No, I’m only in my early fifties,” said Josh. “Lots of men have children at this age. My wife’s much younger than me. I met her after my divorce and we tied the knot a couple of years ago. Still got it!” he added, unable to resist slipping into his ostentatious persona.
“Traded in the first wife for a younger model, no doubt,” said Carmen. “What is it with you middle-aged men and having to prove your virility?”
“I didn’t realise that part of your nursing duties included issuing moral judgements,” replied Josh. “My wife’s having a long labour and I dozed off and wandered into the wrong room. It’s as simple as that.”
“You certainly did – the full length of the hospital and three floors,” replied Carmen. “Well, I am sure we can clear this all up. I’ll just check with the maternity ward, shall I? What’s your wife’s name?”
“Emma,” he said, again saying the first name that came into his head.
“Emma Gardner,” said Carmen. “I’ll just go and find out how she’s doing. She must be worried about you, disappearing like that when she’s about to give birth.”
It was clear from Carmen’s demeanour that she didn’t believe a word of it. The nurses in this hospital were clearly no fools, judging by the two he had met so far. Just as she turned to go, he was struck by the significance of what she had said.
“Wait,” he said. “How do you know my surname?”
“It’s standard practice,” she said. “We have to identify every patient that comes in, and looking at personal effects is the easiest way.”
“You looked in my wallet?” he asked, fearful of what she may have discovered. “That’s private.”
“Yes, I did,” she replied. “And rather interesting it was, too, Mr Gardner, if that is indeed your real name. You know, if you are going to create a fake driving licence, you should at least make sure it has a realistic date of birth on it. You must be vain in the extreme if you think you are going to pass for twenty-three years old.”
“Yeah, that was a mistake by the DVLA,” he said, hoping that they were still called that in this time period. “I keep meaning to send it off for them to correct it.”
“Really?” she said. “Well, while they are about it, they might want to issue one that’s the right colour and actually looks like a real driving licence.”
Oops, thought Josh. He hadn’t thought about that, but then he hadn’t expected anyone to go rooting about in his wallet. She would be expecting to see one of the old, plastic, pink types that he used to have when he first started driving.
“And just a friendly word of advice,” added Carmen. “I don’t know what sort of life you lead, but you might want to think about how much cash you are carrying around with you. Not everyone finding someone collapsed on the floor might be scrupulous enough not to help themselves to the two grand stuffed in your wallet.”
Josh decided to be agreeable. There was no point arguing with her. “Thanks, Carmen,” he replied. “I’ll bear it in mind.”
“Good,” replied the nurse. “Now you wait there while I go and find out how your wife’s doing, I will be back shortly.”
“What about my breakfast?” shouted out the patched-up drunk from the opposite bed.
“All in good time,” said Carmen politely, but with a resigned air. She had clearly been doing this job a long time.
As soon as she was out of the way, Josh jumped out of bed. Whoever had put him to bed had managed to get his normal clothes off and put him into standard-issue hospital bedclothes. So where were his clothes and the rest of his stuff? Most importantly, where was the tachyometer? The thought of losing that didn’t bear thinking about it.
The mystery of what had occurred in Thomas Scott’s room to cause his current predicament would have to wait. He knew it wouldn’t be long before Carmen returned, freshly armed with the knowledge that there was no Emma Gardner, heavy with child, in the maternity ward.
He needed to get his act together and get out of there as quickly as possible. Once he had retreated to a safe distance he could try and figure out what had happened.
There was a small, white table next to his bed. It had a single drawer and a cupboard door that opened outwards beneath it. He opened the lower door and was relieved to find his shoes and clothes inside. He quickly began to change. Conscious of the aggressive man staring at him, he drew the curtain around the bed before taking off his bottom half.
“What’s the matter, got a small penis?” called out the man mockingly.
Josh ignored him, finished dressing, and then opened the top drawer. The only thing in there was his watch. It was a highly advanced, solar-powered device that was as accurate as the most advanced atomic clock this time period had to offer.
It wasn’t very accurate now, appearing to be completely dead. Could that have been a result of whatever had happened in Scott’s room?
Slipping it onto his wrist in the faint hope it might start working again, he pulled the drawer out to its full extent. It was no good; there was nothing else in there. He had drawn a blank and now he was missing both the tachyometer and his wallet.
A quick search of his backpack, tucked between the table and his bed, also proved fruitless. That scuppered his plan of making a swift exit before Carmen came back. He was going to have to try and appeal to her better nature to get his stuff back. This might prove difficult, and lying about the non-existent Emma Gardner wasn’t going to help.
Perhaps he should change back into his pyjamas, get back into bed, play the dutiful patient, and try and wheedle the whereabouts of his missing items from her. But before he could do so, she reappeared, pulling open the curtain.
“Going somewhere?” she enquired.
“Do you mind?” protested Josh. “I could have been naked then.”
“It’s nothing I haven’t seen before,” said Carmen. “Who do you think got you undressed and into bed earlier? Now where exactly do you think you’re going? I don’t recall saying that you could get dressed.”
“I need to get out of here,” said Josh. “You can see there’s nothing wrong with me, and I know how much you NHS people need the beds. You do still have the NHS in your time, don’t you?”
“Just about,” said Carmen. “And wha
t do you mean, in my time?”
“Never mind,” said Josh, making a mental note that he really must stop dropping anachronistic comments into conversations. “Look, I’m not doing any harm, am I? I haven’t committed any crime, and I’m not ill. I just wandered into the wrong room in the night and passed out.”
“Ah, yes, while you were waiting for your fictional wife to give birth,” replied Carmen sarcastically. “I’ve checked with maternity and, as I suspected, there is no Emma Gardner there.”
“Maybe she already had the baby and went home?” suggested Josh.
“Maybe you should stop trying to pull the wool over my eyes,” said Carmen. “I’m an old hand at this and I know every trick in the book. Now I don’t know what you’re doing here but clearly there’s nothing wrong with you so perhaps you’re right. Maybe you should just leave because I really don’t have the time to play these little games with you any longer.”
“What about my stuff?” asked Josh.
“I’m afraid you are going to have to go and see Barry on security to get that back,” replied Carmen. “But let me warn you now, he’s ex-Army, and he doesn’t suffer fools gladly.”
Josh didn’t like the sound of Barry. Would he be just as insufferably difficult to deal with as everyone else he had met in this hospital?
“Can’t you just get it back for me?” he asked, almost pleadingly.
“I’m afraid I can’t,” replied Carmen. “And I should warn you, they were very interested down there in that wand thing you had with you. Barry was talking about calling in the police, or possibly even the anti-terrorist squad.”
That was the last thing Josh needed. He had better get down there and try and sort it out before things got out of control.
“Where do I find Barry?” he asked.
She gave him the directions he needed, adding at the end, “And one final thing. I don’t ever want to see you around here again, is that clear? Because if I do, I will be certain you are up to no good and will have no hesitation calling the police.”
