I woke up and opened my eyes. I couldn't see much because the room was so bright. Looking around everything was white so I blinked a few times to try to help my eyes adjust. Music was coming from the next room. I tried to sit up, it took a while as bones creaked and muscles ached... How long had I been asleep? I tossed off the white bed covers and swung my legs around and onto the white floor. I looked down and saw I was wearing dark blue striped pyjamas - they weren't my pyjamas. As my eyes began to focus a little better I could see the white walls and the white lights on the ceiling and nothing much else in the room. Was I in hospital? There was a door, slightly ajar, that was letting in the music so I tried to get up and make my way out. Only small movements were possible and balance was a bit of a problem but I managed to inch my way towards the doorway.
As I pushed the door open and gingerly stepped through to the next room I struggled to take in a completely different setting. It was a large lounge room with furniture from what looked like the nineteen fifties. There were many people who, as I entered, all looked around and smiled at me. Some were wearing suits like this was a business meeting while others were wearing summer clothes like this was a barbecue. All were eating party food and holding drinks. There was a jukebox in the corner of the room that was playing the music I heard - Roxy Music I think it was, something from the eighties. Sitting on one of the quaint little lounges was... Daniel Riciardo? Dressed in his racing suit and holding a silver tray filled with chocolate chip cookies. Beside him was sitting Selena Gomez? Dressed in a long white gown. As they saw me they both stood at exactly the same time and walked over to me.
"Hi Dave, I am your synthetic Selena."
"And I am your synthetic Daniel. Would you like a cookie?"
Then both said in unison "We are here to help you in your transition."
"Is this..." my voice was rough and I could force out little more than a whisper, "a party?"
"This is your transition Dave." Daniel responds in a rather formal computerized manner. "This room is a setting that we hoped you would be familiar with. It has been set up to look familiar to someone from the late twentieth and early twenty first century."
"Yes it does...why?"
Selena took my arm "Come and sit with us and we will explain everything. We have a lot to tell you. You have been asleep for quite a while and need help in your transition."
"Transition to what?" Then I saw a door leading outside. I broke away from her grip and shuffled as quickly as my aching body would allow. I got to the door.
"No Dave, don't look out the door until we explain. Somebody stop him."
But it was too late. I opened the door and........
Saturday, July 4, 2015
Tuesday, January 6, 2015
I've Discovered... I'm Worried.
I'm worried.
I haven't heard from my friend for 4 days now and I think he may be in big trouble.
His name is Allan, he has been working at the University of Technology in Sydney for the last five years, at least that is what he told me. I tried to call him there yesterday and they told me that he has not been there for nearly 2 years. Apparently he was asked to leave because he was more interested in working on his own projects than what he was employed to do at the University. In those 2 years he has hardly been seen anywhere outside of the small garage that he calls home. I would see him every month or so and we would get together and discuss music and movies and life in general. So it appears that I am the person who would know him best, and I didn't even know he was unemployed for the last 2 years.
He lived in one of the southern suburbs of Sydney in a converted garage in the back yard of a house owned by a sweet little old lady called Mrs Osborn. It was just one big room with a bed up one end, a kitchen in the middle and his workbench and equipement down the other end. It always used to smell of solder, like he had soldered so many electrical connections that the smell of molten metal and plastic had just oozed into every corner of the garage. There was no built in bathroom so he would have to use the one attached to the rear of Mrs Osborn's house and, as well as paying Mrs Osborn very little rent, each week he could leave what little laundrey he had on her back step and she would wash all his clothes for him. Quite a sweet arrangement I thought and just as well if he had been unemployed for 2 years. He did have a lot of savings though from his university salary and the fact that he never went out. When ever I would come to Sydney to visit it would take me hours to convince him to come and see a movie or a band. That is where I first met Allan, nearly 10 years ago. He was this nerdy looking guy sitting behind the mixing desk doing the sound for "The Late Train", a great little bluesey rock band I used to follow. We struck up a conversation about sound mixing and blues music and our friendship developed from there. We have been friends ever since, even when I moved out of Sydney, keeping in constant contact.
Until now that is. He said that he would meet me the day after our testing of the time
machine/recorder thingy. Then I could not reach him by phone. Then I find out he does not work anymore where he said he worked. So I went back to his garage today after dropping him back there the other night after our first test. He was not there so I went to the house and asked Mrs Osborn if she knew where he was. As soon as I asked she started crying and shaking and stumbled back into her front room into the nearest chair.
"Oh dear David, I don't know, I don't know. They took him, they were so loud, and angry and not nice people."
"Who?" I asked, "What happened?"
"I heard Allan come home late the other night," that must have been the night of the test, "and an hour or two later these men came bursting in and ran through the house looking for him. I thought they were police but they talked like Americans. They found him in the garage and dragged him out to their car. They told me they had to take him away because he was making drugs in the garage. He isn't into drugs, is he?"
"He is an electronics nerd," I replied, "He's never had anything to do with drugs."
"It all looked like one of those violent movies with the men and the shouting and the guns... they had guns, David, I thought they were going to shoot poor Allan."
"Guns? This is serious, what did Allan do?"
"Nothing he could do, they were too strong for him. They kept yelling at him and pointing their guns at him and dragged him away. I called out his name and he yelled something back at me."
"What did he say?"
"It was strange, all the shouting and guns and commotion and it sounded like he said your name."
"My name?"
"He yelled out to me and said to tell David not to give up the guitar, at least that is what it sounded like."
So you can see why I'm worried. I don't know what to do
I haven't heard from my friend for 4 days now and I think he may be in big trouble.
His name is Allan, he has been working at the University of Technology in Sydney for the last five years, at least that is what he told me. I tried to call him there yesterday and they told me that he has not been there for nearly 2 years. Apparently he was asked to leave because he was more interested in working on his own projects than what he was employed to do at the University. In those 2 years he has hardly been seen anywhere outside of the small garage that he calls home. I would see him every month or so and we would get together and discuss music and movies and life in general. So it appears that I am the person who would know him best, and I didn't even know he was unemployed for the last 2 years.
He lived in one of the southern suburbs of Sydney in a converted garage in the back yard of a house owned by a sweet little old lady called Mrs Osborn. It was just one big room with a bed up one end, a kitchen in the middle and his workbench and equipement down the other end. It always used to smell of solder, like he had soldered so many electrical connections that the smell of molten metal and plastic had just oozed into every corner of the garage. There was no built in bathroom so he would have to use the one attached to the rear of Mrs Osborn's house and, as well as paying Mrs Osborn very little rent, each week he could leave what little laundrey he had on her back step and she would wash all his clothes for him. Quite a sweet arrangement I thought and just as well if he had been unemployed for 2 years. He did have a lot of savings though from his university salary and the fact that he never went out. When ever I would come to Sydney to visit it would take me hours to convince him to come and see a movie or a band. That is where I first met Allan, nearly 10 years ago. He was this nerdy looking guy sitting behind the mixing desk doing the sound for "The Late Train", a great little bluesey rock band I used to follow. We struck up a conversation about sound mixing and blues music and our friendship developed from there. We have been friends ever since, even when I moved out of Sydney, keeping in constant contact.
Until now that is. He said that he would meet me the day after our testing of the time
machine/recorder thingy. Then I could not reach him by phone. Then I find out he does not work anymore where he said he worked. So I went back to his garage today after dropping him back there the other night after our first test. He was not there so I went to the house and asked Mrs Osborn if she knew where he was. As soon as I asked she started crying and shaking and stumbled back into her front room into the nearest chair.
"Oh dear David, I don't know, I don't know. They took him, they were so loud, and angry and not nice people."
"Who?" I asked, "What happened?"
"I heard Allan come home late the other night," that must have been the night of the test, "and an hour or two later these men came bursting in and ran through the house looking for him. I thought they were police but they talked like Americans. They found him in the garage and dragged him out to their car. They told me they had to take him away because he was making drugs in the garage. He isn't into drugs, is he?"
"He is an electronics nerd," I replied, "He's never had anything to do with drugs."
"It all looked like one of those violent movies with the men and the shouting and the guns... they had guns, David, I thought they were going to shoot poor Allan."
"Guns? This is serious, what did Allan do?"
"Nothing he could do, they were too strong for him. They kept yelling at him and pointing their guns at him and dragged him away. I called out his name and he yelled something back at me."
"What did he say?"
"It was strange, all the shouting and guns and commotion and it sounded like he said your name."
"My name?"
"He yelled out to me and said to tell David not to give up the guitar, at least that is what it sounded like."
So you can see why I'm worried. I don't know what to do
Saturday, January 3, 2015
I've Discovered Time Travel
When I say that I've discovered time travel I mean a friend of mine has discovered time travel. Well, not exactly time travel, more a way to observe the past - a way to be present in the past.
A friend of mine (I can't say who) from a university (I can't say which one) has been developing a machine. He and I are the only ones on the planet that know about it. None of his peers wanted to be involved in the machine's developement so he has built it all himself and asked me to help him test it out. Not being of the scientific persuasion myself I can't really explain the inner workings of this machine but I can tell you that it allows you to travel back in time - or should I say it shows you what is happening on that very spot at a time of your choosing. It's a machine about the size and shape of an old Fender Twin electric guitar amplifier plugged in to a normal petrol powered electric generator. Across the top of the front, where the controls for the amplifier would be, are an array of tiny parabolic mirrors with a small dot in the middle. Apart from the power lead there is a connection to a laptop from which the machine is controlled. This friend of mine told me it all works by picking up vibrations. He told me that all solid things vibrate. They are vibrating all the time whether we can feel it or not and everything that vibrates is affecting and being affected by everything else vibrating and this vibration is going on as time goes on. What the machine does is scan the area around it, measuring all these miniscule vibrations and the laser things that do the measuring also project back out what they are recording. I don't really understand all that it does so it would be easier for me to just tell you about the test we did.
OK, so we did this test at night. It had to be dark so that the projection part worked. We drove to an old steel bridge just outside town that has been bypassed by the highway so there would be no traffic. We carried the machine, generator and laptop to one end of the old roadway across the bridge. He got me to set up the machine facing on to the bridge and then he said to just walk out on to the bridge in front of the machine and walk back. We plugged it all in and turned on the power. He quickly tapped a few things into the laptop and, with a flash of red light the machine started. Shining out from all those mirrors on the front was an intense red light, kind of like the laser light shows from old rock concerts. It coloured the whole top of the bridge in red. The steel beams along the side of the bridge, the roadway, everything red. It was measuring and detecting as well as projecting.
"Are you ready?" he asked.
"I'm impressed with the light show as it is."
"Well," he paused for effect, "you ain't seen nothin' yet!"
He started pressing the back arrow on the laptop's keyboard but I saw nothing at first. After many more taps I saw a slight movement in the redness near the machine. More taps and the movement became a sort of red reproduction frame by frame in reverse of my walk out in front of the machine from a few minutes earlier. We both let out a "Whoa!" The machine was detecting the vibrations from the structures around it, including the air in between, picking the particular vibrations from a few minutes before and projecting them back onto those very structures.
He then started typing a few things into the laptop so he didn't have to keep pressing the back arrow. After a while we started seeing a fast motion replay in reverse of the happenings on the bridge from earlier in the day. People walking across the bridge, an old man and his grandson fishing over the side. More laptop typing and the scenes began to pass by faster and we just watched. After a while the view of the bridge changed a little, changing shape slightly. Then we saw workers on the bridge, fixing parts, then we started seeing vehicles passing over the bridge. There had not been cars or trucks over the bridge for thirty years. More vehicles blurred through the red scene.
"Can you stop it? Pause it I mean." I asked in the excitement.
"I think so."
More typing and then the scene paused like on an old black and white (red and white) video. We could see three cars and a truck on the bridge. The cars were seventies models or earlier and the truck looked like it was from the fifties. More typing and they started moving forward at normal speed. Cars and trucks moving along the bridge like we were there sitting in the middle of traffic forty years ago.
"This is amazing" I said.
"I have never gone further back than a couple of minutes before the gen....."
As he said the words the generator stopped. The red light disappeared and we were back to a normal dark unused bridge.
But we were exstatic. Think of what could be done. He could recreate historical events. Depending on available structures we could witness a small part from anywhere in history. The D-day landing, the grassy knole in Dallas, Woodstock. Crimes could be solved by just taking this machine to the scene of the crime. Arguments could be proved. The world as we knew it has now changed.
A friend of mine (I can't say who) from a university (I can't say which one) has been developing a machine. He and I are the only ones on the planet that know about it. None of his peers wanted to be involved in the machine's developement so he has built it all himself and asked me to help him test it out. Not being of the scientific persuasion myself I can't really explain the inner workings of this machine but I can tell you that it allows you to travel back in time - or should I say it shows you what is happening on that very spot at a time of your choosing. It's a machine about the size and shape of an old Fender Twin electric guitar amplifier plugged in to a normal petrol powered electric generator. Across the top of the front, where the controls for the amplifier would be, are an array of tiny parabolic mirrors with a small dot in the middle. Apart from the power lead there is a connection to a laptop from which the machine is controlled. This friend of mine told me it all works by picking up vibrations. He told me that all solid things vibrate. They are vibrating all the time whether we can feel it or not and everything that vibrates is affecting and being affected by everything else vibrating and this vibration is going on as time goes on. What the machine does is scan the area around it, measuring all these miniscule vibrations and the laser things that do the measuring also project back out what they are recording. I don't really understand all that it does so it would be easier for me to just tell you about the test we did.
OK, so we did this test at night. It had to be dark so that the projection part worked. We drove to an old steel bridge just outside town that has been bypassed by the highway so there would be no traffic. We carried the machine, generator and laptop to one end of the old roadway across the bridge. He got me to set up the machine facing on to the bridge and then he said to just walk out on to the bridge in front of the machine and walk back. We plugged it all in and turned on the power. He quickly tapped a few things into the laptop and, with a flash of red light the machine started. Shining out from all those mirrors on the front was an intense red light, kind of like the laser light shows from old rock concerts. It coloured the whole top of the bridge in red. The steel beams along the side of the bridge, the roadway, everything red. It was measuring and detecting as well as projecting.
"Are you ready?" he asked.
"I'm impressed with the light show as it is."
"Well," he paused for effect, "you ain't seen nothin' yet!"
He started pressing the back arrow on the laptop's keyboard but I saw nothing at first. After many more taps I saw a slight movement in the redness near the machine. More taps and the movement became a sort of red reproduction frame by frame in reverse of my walk out in front of the machine from a few minutes earlier. We both let out a "Whoa!" The machine was detecting the vibrations from the structures around it, including the air in between, picking the particular vibrations from a few minutes before and projecting them back onto those very structures.
He then started typing a few things into the laptop so he didn't have to keep pressing the back arrow. After a while we started seeing a fast motion replay in reverse of the happenings on the bridge from earlier in the day. People walking across the bridge, an old man and his grandson fishing over the side. More laptop typing and the scenes began to pass by faster and we just watched. After a while the view of the bridge changed a little, changing shape slightly. Then we saw workers on the bridge, fixing parts, then we started seeing vehicles passing over the bridge. There had not been cars or trucks over the bridge for thirty years. More vehicles blurred through the red scene.
"Can you stop it? Pause it I mean." I asked in the excitement.
"I think so."
More typing and then the scene paused like on an old black and white (red and white) video. We could see three cars and a truck on the bridge. The cars were seventies models or earlier and the truck looked like it was from the fifties. More typing and they started moving forward at normal speed. Cars and trucks moving along the bridge like we were there sitting in the middle of traffic forty years ago.
"This is amazing" I said.
"I have never gone further back than a couple of minutes before the gen....."
As he said the words the generator stopped. The red light disappeared and we were back to a normal dark unused bridge.
But we were exstatic. Think of what could be done. He could recreate historical events. Depending on available structures we could witness a small part from anywhere in history. The D-day landing, the grassy knole in Dallas, Woodstock. Crimes could be solved by just taking this machine to the scene of the crime. Arguments could be proved. The world as we knew it has now changed.
Friday, May 30, 2014
Youtubers stole my daughter
I was walking down George Street in Sydney when I got the message that Youtubers had stolen my daughter. I knew where they were gathering. I knew where she had gone to meet them. So I headed for Lunar Park.
It was a bit of a walk and then a wait for a Harbour Ferry from Circular Quay so it took almost an hour to get there. As I walked beneath the gaping mouth at the entrance I could see the gathering. It was a group of about 50 or 60 all joined together forming a circle - all holding cameras up and out and pointing back in towards themselves, naturally. All manor of social media had warned them all of my approach, so they were ready and waiting for me. They had all gathered in this giant circle with the guilty ones protected in the middle. I found out that it was Troye and Zoe.
I yelled their names as I approached the group and all the cameras turned in unison to face me. Since they were all concentrating on their cameras I could easily push to the centre of the group and I caught a glimpse of the guilty two who also continued to film. As I came face to face with Troye and Zoe the group suddenly parted and they both turned and tried to make a sudden, quick getaway on Segways. But they were not quick enough and I managed to grab the handle bar of Zoe's Segway. She wobbled and swayed and almost lost her balance and dropped her camera as she tried to regain control as she got away. I picked up her camera, which continued to record, held it up in front of me and pursued the Segway riding kidnappers. I chased them all around Lunar Park, filming as I went. You can probably find the footage on Youtube - footage from the camera I held and the hundreds of others who continued to film the events. It would be spectacular footage as well as they abandoned their Segways and I chased them into Koney Island - up steps, down slides, over moving sidewalks and through the rolling barrels. I lost them as they rushed out a side door and a group of onlooking Youtubers stopped me from following.
In exhaustion and frustration I collapsed to the floor. The kidnappers had escaped, their youtubing collaborators had halted my pursuit and stood before me motionless, filming my distress. Was everyone with a digital camera so evil, cruel and heartless? Then as everything fell silent I heard in the distance "Daddy...Daddy!!" It was coming from the Ferris Wheel. It was my daughter. I jumped up and pushed through the crowd and ran to the Ferris Wheel. My daughter was in one of the carriages screaming "Make them stop!" Troye and Zoe had jumped in another carriage after forcing the Ferris Wheel into overdrive. It was rotating faster and faster. I stood beside the Ferris Wheel - My daughter comes by screaming - the 2 Youtubers come by laughing maniacally. I had to end it all.
I turned to the crowd of Youtubers behind me who were all holding up their cameras filming the ever accelerating Ferris Wheel. I pushed them all back snatching as many of the cameras as I could. I ran to the Ferris Wheel and as my daughter's carriage almost reached the bottom I threw all the cameras into the gears turning the Ferris Wheel. In a flash of smoke and a shower of sparks the crushing cameras ground the gears to a halt - just as my daughter's carriage reached the bottom. I reached in and grabbed her out of the carriage and we both ran to get out of the fun park as quick as we could. As we ran beneath the smiling face at the entrance we turned to see the Ferris Wheel and all the cameras, that were working, were pointed towards the carriage at the top of the motionless Ferris Wheel where Troye and Zoe were screaming "Get us down......"
It was a bit of a walk and then a wait for a Harbour Ferry from Circular Quay so it took almost an hour to get there. As I walked beneath the gaping mouth at the entrance I could see the gathering. It was a group of about 50 or 60 all joined together forming a circle - all holding cameras up and out and pointing back in towards themselves, naturally. All manor of social media had warned them all of my approach, so they were ready and waiting for me. They had all gathered in this giant circle with the guilty ones protected in the middle. I found out that it was Troye and Zoe.
I yelled their names as I approached the group and all the cameras turned in unison to face me. Since they were all concentrating on their cameras I could easily push to the centre of the group and I caught a glimpse of the guilty two who also continued to film. As I came face to face with Troye and Zoe the group suddenly parted and they both turned and tried to make a sudden, quick getaway on Segways. But they were not quick enough and I managed to grab the handle bar of Zoe's Segway. She wobbled and swayed and almost lost her balance and dropped her camera as she tried to regain control as she got away. I picked up her camera, which continued to record, held it up in front of me and pursued the Segway riding kidnappers. I chased them all around Lunar Park, filming as I went. You can probably find the footage on Youtube - footage from the camera I held and the hundreds of others who continued to film the events. It would be spectacular footage as well as they abandoned their Segways and I chased them into Koney Island - up steps, down slides, over moving sidewalks and through the rolling barrels. I lost them as they rushed out a side door and a group of onlooking Youtubers stopped me from following.
In exhaustion and frustration I collapsed to the floor. The kidnappers had escaped, their youtubing collaborators had halted my pursuit and stood before me motionless, filming my distress. Was everyone with a digital camera so evil, cruel and heartless? Then as everything fell silent I heard in the distance "Daddy...Daddy!!" It was coming from the Ferris Wheel. It was my daughter. I jumped up and pushed through the crowd and ran to the Ferris Wheel. My daughter was in one of the carriages screaming "Make them stop!" Troye and Zoe had jumped in another carriage after forcing the Ferris Wheel into overdrive. It was rotating faster and faster. I stood beside the Ferris Wheel - My daughter comes by screaming - the 2 Youtubers come by laughing maniacally. I had to end it all.
I turned to the crowd of Youtubers behind me who were all holding up their cameras filming the ever accelerating Ferris Wheel. I pushed them all back snatching as many of the cameras as I could. I ran to the Ferris Wheel and as my daughter's carriage almost reached the bottom I threw all the cameras into the gears turning the Ferris Wheel. In a flash of smoke and a shower of sparks the crushing cameras ground the gears to a halt - just as my daughter's carriage reached the bottom. I reached in and grabbed her out of the carriage and we both ran to get out of the fun park as quick as we could. As we ran beneath the smiling face at the entrance we turned to see the Ferris Wheel and all the cameras, that were working, were pointed towards the carriage at the top of the motionless Ferris Wheel where Troye and Zoe were screaming "Get us down......"
Friday, November 15, 2013
It's Not Dingos
Aargh. I hate being woken by bright sunshine on my face. Oohh. My back. Where the hell am I? I see through one half opened eye that I am on the porch. Didn't even make it inside to bed. Where have I been? What did I get up to last night? I'm trying to move but I feel like my body has been stretched out then pummled into a ball. Like water skiing through mud then pounced on by the local Rugby team, and here I am trying to force myself into movement... I don't even have any clothes on, just wrapped in the dog's blanket that was on the porch.
I'm trying to get up but can only make it to all fours. Aching all over and a pain in my gut like a bowling ball - wrapped in barbed wire... and the taste in my mouth. What did I eat last night? It tastes of rotting meat, off fish and stale milk - with hot chillies. Oohh, I just threw up in my mouth. I have to get to the bathroom. I'll just crawl.
Vomiting helps a little. Now to throw some clothes on. I can just about walk now. What's that noise? Sounds like a car coming up the driveway. Geez, I moved out of town to get away from people and I really don't feel like entertaining visitors this morning. It's a cop car. What the hell...?
The cops have been here twice before. About a month ago, and then a month before that. Both times they were investigating wild dogs, or something attacking stock on the neighboring properties. I wasn't well those times either but this time I feel so much worse. As the thought of wild animal attacks occurs I have a sudden flash in my mind of distressed horses, loud growling and blood all over the place. I want to throw up again.
I meet the cops on the front porch - lucky they didn't arrive before I woke up. "Hi guys. Don't tell me something's been eating livestock again."
"Hi Dan. Afraid so, but it's a bit worse this time. Something got into your neighbor's and mauled two of their cows and a horse."
I had another quick flash of dead animals, growling and blood. I had to catch myself so I didn't vomit on the cops.
"You OK Dan?"
"I'm not feeling the best this morning. Sorry." I tried to gather myself together. "Sounds like the same as last time, didn't they think it was dingos or something?"
"It was a bloody big dingo if it was. It gets worse too. What ever it was knocked the back door down, got in and attacked Susan and her little one year old."
The pain kicked in my gut and I had another flash of growling and screaming and blood.
"There wasn't much left of them. Was horrible."
As he spoke I could hear their screams in my mind, I could see them cowering on the floor, I could see the pieces of them that were left lying in pools of blood. I couldn't keep it in any longer, my gut convulsed and I threw up right where the cops stood.
What was I remembering? Could it be? Was I the animal responsible?
No.
It can't be.
It's impossible.
I couldn't be the cause of all that death. The cows... the horses... Sue... that poor sweet precious little kid.
No.
Not me.
The cops took a step back from the vomit. "Geez Dan."
We all looked down at the putrid pile on the porch. And all at once we noticed something in the mess. It was unbelievably gruesome, but amidst the bile, blood and undigested remnants was what looked like a small child's finger. More flashbacks, more vomit. I can't take this. I lunge for the cop's gun. He grabs it first so I grab his hand with the gun and pull it up to my chin.
"Do it. Shoot me. Kill me. Stop me. It was me. I'm a killer. That poor baby. That poor woman. Don't let me do it again, kill me!"
Bang.
I'm trying to get up but can only make it to all fours. Aching all over and a pain in my gut like a bowling ball - wrapped in barbed wire... and the taste in my mouth. What did I eat last night? It tastes of rotting meat, off fish and stale milk - with hot chillies. Oohh, I just threw up in my mouth. I have to get to the bathroom. I'll just crawl.
Vomiting helps a little. Now to throw some clothes on. I can just about walk now. What's that noise? Sounds like a car coming up the driveway. Geez, I moved out of town to get away from people and I really don't feel like entertaining visitors this morning. It's a cop car. What the hell...?
The cops have been here twice before. About a month ago, and then a month before that. Both times they were investigating wild dogs, or something attacking stock on the neighboring properties. I wasn't well those times either but this time I feel so much worse. As the thought of wild animal attacks occurs I have a sudden flash in my mind of distressed horses, loud growling and blood all over the place. I want to throw up again.
I meet the cops on the front porch - lucky they didn't arrive before I woke up. "Hi guys. Don't tell me something's been eating livestock again."
"Hi Dan. Afraid so, but it's a bit worse this time. Something got into your neighbor's and mauled two of their cows and a horse."
I had another quick flash of dead animals, growling and blood. I had to catch myself so I didn't vomit on the cops.
"You OK Dan?"
"I'm not feeling the best this morning. Sorry." I tried to gather myself together. "Sounds like the same as last time, didn't they think it was dingos or something?"
"It was a bloody big dingo if it was. It gets worse too. What ever it was knocked the back door down, got in and attacked Susan and her little one year old."
The pain kicked in my gut and I had another flash of growling and screaming and blood.
"There wasn't much left of them. Was horrible."
As he spoke I could hear their screams in my mind, I could see them cowering on the floor, I could see the pieces of them that were left lying in pools of blood. I couldn't keep it in any longer, my gut convulsed and I threw up right where the cops stood.
What was I remembering? Could it be? Was I the animal responsible?
No.
It can't be.
It's impossible.
I couldn't be the cause of all that death. The cows... the horses... Sue... that poor sweet precious little kid.
No.
Not me.
The cops took a step back from the vomit. "Geez Dan."
We all looked down at the putrid pile on the porch. And all at once we noticed something in the mess. It was unbelievably gruesome, but amidst the bile, blood and undigested remnants was what looked like a small child's finger. More flashbacks, more vomit. I can't take this. I lunge for the cop's gun. He grabs it first so I grab his hand with the gun and pull it up to my chin.
"Do it. Shoot me. Kill me. Stop me. It was me. I'm a killer. That poor baby. That poor woman. Don't let me do it again, kill me!"
Bang.
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
A Timeline in the Steet
I was in an old hotel. All marble and sandstone. There were so many doors along the front of the building. Enormous doors that were so heavy and hard to open. When you could get them open they opened directly out on to the street, but the street was like a giant high speed conveyor belt. As you stepped out on to the street you expected to get whooshed along with the fast moving motion of the street, but instead you immediately end up on the opposite side of the street, on the sidewalk which ran along the side of an ocean wall with a very calm ocean behind it.
Once across the street all hell was breaking loose. Planes were coming in to land across the ocean to an airport that I presumed was on the other side of the city. But none of them made it. Every plane that came in low over the ocean edge, over the city, crashed into one of the many skyscrapers that lined the city's edge. They would hit towards the top of the building then fall down to the street. The crowds on the street all started to move away from the crashed planes to a park away from the buildings. I saw the occasional familiar face in the moving crowd. There seemed to be an unusual amount of famous actors in the crowd. Ben Kingsley bumped into me in the confusion and I asked him what all the actors were doing? He quickly, urgently yelled that Ron Howard was making a movie with a large ensemble cast and then he was gone. I couldn't handle all the drama so I tried to get back to the hotel.
I managed to get back into the same door that I had exited earlier but the foyer looked different to how it was when I left. I saw some of the faces about to leave the hotel that I had just seen on the other side of the street. I saw Ben Kingsley again so I walked up to him to see if he could shed light onto what was going on. He didn't remember me even though it was only moments earlier we had been speaking. He told me that he was told that the street out front was a "timeline" and you never knew at what stage you would enter it or leave it. I thanked him for the information and let him know that Ron Howard was in the crowd across the street making a movie with a large ensemble cast. He thanked me and left the hotel through one of the many large doors.
I walked to the edge of the foyer to a small theatre where there was about ten people watching what looked to be a circus performance. There on the stage was a woman in a sequined costume connected to a harness and safety line that hung from above. She was laying on the stage and, from her movements, I presumed she was trying to raise herself above the stage. She kept trying but was not able to get off the floor. The other people watching all turned away dejected like she had been trying for some time and was never going to raise up. As soon as they left she started to rise and even did a few tumbles in the air - but nobody witnessed this except me. So I ran towards the stage shouting "You did it!" She turned around to see me as she hung mid air and looked disappointed that she now had an audience of one. As I walked closer to the stage I recognised the aerial acrobat - it was Suzy Quatro.
Once across the street all hell was breaking loose. Planes were coming in to land across the ocean to an airport that I presumed was on the other side of the city. But none of them made it. Every plane that came in low over the ocean edge, over the city, crashed into one of the many skyscrapers that lined the city's edge. They would hit towards the top of the building then fall down to the street. The crowds on the street all started to move away from the crashed planes to a park away from the buildings. I saw the occasional familiar face in the moving crowd. There seemed to be an unusual amount of famous actors in the crowd. Ben Kingsley bumped into me in the confusion and I asked him what all the actors were doing? He quickly, urgently yelled that Ron Howard was making a movie with a large ensemble cast and then he was gone. I couldn't handle all the drama so I tried to get back to the hotel.
I managed to get back into the same door that I had exited earlier but the foyer looked different to how it was when I left. I saw some of the faces about to leave the hotel that I had just seen on the other side of the street. I saw Ben Kingsley again so I walked up to him to see if he could shed light onto what was going on. He didn't remember me even though it was only moments earlier we had been speaking. He told me that he was told that the street out front was a "timeline" and you never knew at what stage you would enter it or leave it. I thanked him for the information and let him know that Ron Howard was in the crowd across the street making a movie with a large ensemble cast. He thanked me and left the hotel through one of the many large doors.
I walked to the edge of the foyer to a small theatre where there was about ten people watching what looked to be a circus performance. There on the stage was a woman in a sequined costume connected to a harness and safety line that hung from above. She was laying on the stage and, from her movements, I presumed she was trying to raise herself above the stage. She kept trying but was not able to get off the floor. The other people watching all turned away dejected like she had been trying for some time and was never going to raise up. As soon as they left she started to rise and even did a few tumbles in the air - but nobody witnessed this except me. So I ran towards the stage shouting "You did it!" She turned around to see me as she hung mid air and looked disappointed that she now had an audience of one. As I walked closer to the stage I recognised the aerial acrobat - it was Suzy Quatro.
Friday, September 13, 2013
I Met the Doctor (Continued)
A few people had run into the building being renovated across from the record store. We ran in as well. There were a multitude of corners and nooks and crannies and piles of building materials to hide behind. But, by the sound of the crashes, I didn't think anywhere would be very safe. Particularly when everything is made out of wood - if Godzilla is coming...
"It's not Godzilla" he said as everyone found their own place to hide.
I cowered in a corner behind a pile of rubbish that I tried to pull closer and over me to keep from being seen. The crashing was close now. The room suddenly went dark and I looked up to see something was now covering all the windows along one side of the building. It looked like green blue scaly skin, and at one window I saw a gigantic eye peering in to try and find us. More loud crashing moved around each side of the building and all the windows darkened. Then, what sounded like marching, hundreds marching along the boardwalk out side.
One of my fellow cowerers in the same room loudly whispered, "It's sending in the soldiers!"
"Soldiers?" I thought, "What sort of monster sends in soldiers?"
The marching stopped then started in through the front door of our building. Marching from room to room, stopping to look in then moving on to the next room. I heard the marching enter my room. I couldn't just lie there and wait. I picked up a metal bar and a lump of wood from the pile and jumped out from behind my protection, ready to take on anything that was in front of me... and I saw... nothing.
I tiptoed closer to the door, I don't know what made me look down but I did and there, just inside the doorway I could just make out the microscopic figures that were making all the noise. I squinted to try and get a better view as I leaned forward. What looked like a dark stain on the wooden floorboards was a microscopic army of hundreds of medieval Japanese soldiers, dressed in full armour with swords held high. They marched forward, sounding thousands of times larger than they actually were. An old man who had been hiding in the next room caught a glance of them as he rushed past the doorway. He stepped into the room and, without hesitation stamped his boot onto the miniature soldiers as if they were a pesky insect. He lifted his foot to inspect the damage and as he was trying to wipe away the sticky remnants of the microscopic army the man with the bow tie saw and scowled.
"Oh no. You didn't have to do that. What were they going to do? Stab your big toe? Oh that's horrible and completely unnecessary. I bet you're a spider stamper too."
"But they were ..." the old man tried to think of a convincing excuse, "scary."
"I suppose the big green thing at the window is scary too."
"Well... ah... isn't it?" the old man asked.
"I think you'll find," said the bow tie man as if concluding an important lecture, "that it is just a projection!"
At which point all noise ceased. What was at the window had disappeared. A group of us circled the outside of the building. I found a small metal version of the monster that appeared at the window. It looked like a wind up mechanical toy. It seemed safe enough so I picked it up and brought it back for the others to see. The man with the bow tie continued his lecture:
"Yes, it is a monster. Yes, it is alien. No, it wasn't going to hurt anyone."
"But the noise, and the size of it." I reminded him.
"Just a projection. That is its natural ability, and its defence mechanism."
"And the miniature Japanese soldiers?"
"Well, they aren't Japanese. Something acquired along the way to help protect our little metal monster projector. I don't think they quite got the scale of things. Still, not a reason to squish them into the floorboards." again he scowled at the old man.
"Can I look after it?" A young boy asked pointing at the little mechanical monster. I passed it to him and he ran off as if it was Christmas morning.
I turned back to the bow tie man, "I know who you are," I said pointing, "You're the..."
"Doctor", my daughter had just returned and completed my sentence for me.
"Maddie," he heartily yelled as she ran up and gave him the biggest hug. "And Bella," who hugged him too. They had told me about this Doctor character who they met while visiting some friends in London. He was a friend of Clara and the kids they befriended on our last visit. I never believed the stories they told me but now it all seemed completely possible.
"So girls, like to go for another ride? All of space and time."
He didn't have to ask twice and they ran off.
Leaving me trying to come to terms with the day's events and the fact that I have time travelling daughters.
"It's not Godzilla" he said as everyone found their own place to hide.
I cowered in a corner behind a pile of rubbish that I tried to pull closer and over me to keep from being seen. The crashing was close now. The room suddenly went dark and I looked up to see something was now covering all the windows along one side of the building. It looked like green blue scaly skin, and at one window I saw a gigantic eye peering in to try and find us. More loud crashing moved around each side of the building and all the windows darkened. Then, what sounded like marching, hundreds marching along the boardwalk out side.
One of my fellow cowerers in the same room loudly whispered, "It's sending in the soldiers!"
"Soldiers?" I thought, "What sort of monster sends in soldiers?"
The marching stopped then started in through the front door of our building. Marching from room to room, stopping to look in then moving on to the next room. I heard the marching enter my room. I couldn't just lie there and wait. I picked up a metal bar and a lump of wood from the pile and jumped out from behind my protection, ready to take on anything that was in front of me... and I saw... nothing.
I tiptoed closer to the door, I don't know what made me look down but I did and there, just inside the doorway I could just make out the microscopic figures that were making all the noise. I squinted to try and get a better view as I leaned forward. What looked like a dark stain on the wooden floorboards was a microscopic army of hundreds of medieval Japanese soldiers, dressed in full armour with swords held high. They marched forward, sounding thousands of times larger than they actually were. An old man who had been hiding in the next room caught a glance of them as he rushed past the doorway. He stepped into the room and, without hesitation stamped his boot onto the miniature soldiers as if they were a pesky insect. He lifted his foot to inspect the damage and as he was trying to wipe away the sticky remnants of the microscopic army the man with the bow tie saw and scowled.
"Oh no. You didn't have to do that. What were they going to do? Stab your big toe? Oh that's horrible and completely unnecessary. I bet you're a spider stamper too."
"But they were ..." the old man tried to think of a convincing excuse, "scary."
"I suppose the big green thing at the window is scary too."
"Well... ah... isn't it?" the old man asked.
"I think you'll find," said the bow tie man as if concluding an important lecture, "that it is just a projection!"
At which point all noise ceased. What was at the window had disappeared. A group of us circled the outside of the building. I found a small metal version of the monster that appeared at the window. It looked like a wind up mechanical toy. It seemed safe enough so I picked it up and brought it back for the others to see. The man with the bow tie continued his lecture:
"Yes, it is a monster. Yes, it is alien. No, it wasn't going to hurt anyone."
"But the noise, and the size of it." I reminded him.
"Just a projection. That is its natural ability, and its defence mechanism."
"And the miniature Japanese soldiers?"
"Well, they aren't Japanese. Something acquired along the way to help protect our little metal monster projector. I don't think they quite got the scale of things. Still, not a reason to squish them into the floorboards." again he scowled at the old man.
"Can I look after it?" A young boy asked pointing at the little mechanical monster. I passed it to him and he ran off as if it was Christmas morning.
I turned back to the bow tie man, "I know who you are," I said pointing, "You're the..."
"Doctor", my daughter had just returned and completed my sentence for me.
"Maddie," he heartily yelled as she ran up and gave him the biggest hug. "And Bella," who hugged him too. They had told me about this Doctor character who they met while visiting some friends in London. He was a friend of Clara and the kids they befriended on our last visit. I never believed the stories they told me but now it all seemed completely possible.
"So girls, like to go for another ride? All of space and time."
He didn't have to ask twice and they ran off.
Leaving me trying to come to terms with the day's events and the fact that I have time travelling daughters.
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