I Am... Ashanti

Present Day: 2013

"Run sweetie. Run as fast as you can!" my mother yelled good-naturedly at me.

A high pitched giggle flew out of my mouth as my assailant caught up to me and we tumbled to the ground.

"That's not even fair." I exclaimed, breathing heavily, my friend Abu, a bright eyed boy smiled toothily at me and stuck out his tongue. I was care free and happy, it was a time of great joy and freedom. A better time in my life.

"Ashanti! Are you even listening to me?" I was snapped out of my reverie, and found myself face to face with a pair of large bespectacled orbs.

"What is it Hershel?" I asked.

"We have news on him." Hershel told me as he took his spectacles off and started to wipe them with a dirty rag. "We may finally understand why he wants you so much. This, technology as they call it turns out to be extremely useful in finding out details. Far more so than those god forsaken newspapers."

I simply nodded, as I took his findings and quickly scanned through them before crunching it into a ball.

"Hershel this is even less information than we last collected." I said to him rather despondently. He blinked those seemingly large eyes at me slowly, he quite resembled an owl when he did so, I thought to myself, as I watched him scratch at his snow white head of hair.

"I suppose you're right." he replied, stroking his moustache. "Not to worry my dear. We will find something, your mother didn't simply pass in vain"

All I could manage was to nod as once again the pain that accompanied my mothers memory caused a constriction around my heart. I fingered the gold locket that lay around my neck, the one she had slipped into the pocket of my dress that fateful night.

"I'm off to the library Hershel. Perhaps I will find more luck in acquiring information there." I told him, as I shrugged on a jacket and walked out into the busy London streets.

The London of today was different from that, that I'd spent my childhood in. The streets were now full of what they called cars, automobiles had just started being produced in larger quantities when I'd left my London, back then, it was the elite that owned a vehicle, nowadays it was a norm.

"No wonder the air seems to weigh down heavily on my chest. There's smoke everywhere." I think to myself as I pulled the jacket in around my shoulders. "At least they treat us as equals now." A family walked by me, with two children,the mother was black, as they called it, and the father was Caucasian. They looked so comfortable together.

"Thank God indeed" I thought as I pushed the heavy oak wood door open. That aspect still remained the same, it was nice to have an iota of familiarity to link me to my own time.

"Hello Ashanti." The elderly woman sitting at the front desk said to me. She was the only friend I had made, Hershel had told me to avoid doing so at all costs. Nobody could be trusted here. We didn't know what had happened when we got here, whether or not anyone had been sent after us being if they'd found a way to manipulate the fabric of time.

"Don't get attached to anyone. Nobody can be trusted" Hershel told me when we got here. And I'd abided until I has met Ms Margaret, she seemed to be of no harm. Just a sweet old lady.

"Hello Ms Margaret. It's quite lovely outside isn't it?" I asked in effort to fit in, it only seemed as though small talk had gotten worse over the century as well as the millennia.

"Oh dearie, there's no need to speak so formally with me."

"Of course, my mistake once again. I apologize profusely." I said nodding at her. Ms Margaret simply shook her head and let out a chuckle.

"Oh you. Do go on with your reading, although I don't understand why you'd waste your time in this old dump. You could easily be a model." She said, giving me a roguish wink, I found myself laughing. She looked positively ridiculous doing that. With her tiny poof of grey hair, beady brown eyes that seemed to hold so much mischief in them and puckered lips.

Of course, I scoffed at the implication of me as a model.The modeling they did now, with their skimpy clothing and everyone seemed to be walking stick figures, I would never fit into that, I was tall, incredibly so at 5"9, but I had a large bust and wider hips than would be acceptable. My face however, matched their quota, the high cheekbones, the large eyes with thick eyelashes, thick eyebrows, and large bow shaped lips.

It adhered to their standards but in the 1890s a larger woman, was considered most beautiful, as well as healthy. And thus, the models catered to that criteria, the well off. They would be pleasantly surprised by how people looked nowadays I thought to myself.

I nodded towards her before sitting at a computer and starting my research.

This was simply the beginning of picking up all the pieces. Even with all our previous research, we hadn't began to scratch the surface. Until now.

It seemed like they were coming together, and perhaps I'd now be able to answer the questions that plagued me each night.

Why did my mother have to send me away?

Why did she have to sacrifice her life like that?

What did her murderers want from me?

And how would I be able to exact me revenge on them.