Instants Instance Wattys2016

Chapter 2

04/05/2163 1pm.

Nestor led Alex through various corridors, all constructed of the lacy material that the first room had been made of.

"That's a bone polymer", explained Nestor, seeing Alex's stares. "This place wasn't built, it was grown."

They continued on into a much larger room, about the size of a football stadium. The dome was lit from within, so that each strut was like a glowing wire. In the centre of the room was a giant holographic display showing the time down to the last millisecond, and a small table. They walked over to the centre of the room, and Alex was able to see that on the table were various pieces of machinery.

"These are your tools. These are what you will use to travel through time." Nestor picked up a headset. "This headset will show you the time you're in, and also give you information on objects you are focussing on. It has a messaging system as well, allowing you to intuitively send yourself a message for the future or the past. For now, I'd suggest you restrict yourself to sending messages to the future, it's far less confusing." He handed the headset to Alex, who put it on. Immediately, a small icon flashed in the corner of his vision, though there was no screen. He glanced over to it and immediately it opened to show a single sentence.

When he says "think fast", go right!

Alex could only conclude that this was a message from the future. Apparently the only-to-the-future rule would be broken at some point, but he had no idea what the message meant.

"And this is the machine that will take you anywhere and any when. We call them Warpers." Nestor handed Alex the machine with something like reverence.

The machine wasn't exactly what Alex had imagined. He'd imagined some sort of vehicle, but the device was obviously designed to be strapped to your chest. A circular window opened onto the device's inner workings, revealing a glowing ring of pure incandescent heat that was somehow contained by a strange distortion in the air around it. Within the ring was a dark tunnel that seemed to extend further back than the device's dimensions should allow. The end of the tunnel was barely visible, but seemed to flicker, as if it was leading to a new place every instant. A set of gloves were lying on top of the device, and when Alex put them on, he realised that they interacted with his Heads-Up Display on his headset, overlaying his hands with a neon orange wireframe in his vision.

Nestor strapped the device to Alex's chest. It was surprisingly light, but seemed to hum, even though when Alex carefully listened there was only dead silence.

"You can use gestures to control the machine to go to a specific time and place," Nestor explained. "There are some inbuilt programs that I will tell you about in the coming days, but first I think it's time for you to see what time travel is like. Come over here."

Alex followed him to an octagon painted on the floor in haphazard orange paint. "Stand in the centre," instructed Nestor.

Nestor swung his arms back and forth breezily. "Right, so now you're going to take a little trip into the future, any questions?"

"Um, yes, how do I work this thing, and what are the chances of it going wrong?" asked Alex nervously.

"Oh, it's perfectly safe going to the future, generally speaking," Nestor reassured him, "It's when you go backwards in time that problems usually arise. You used to have to be careful not to land on top of yourself, or inside a wall, but now there are safeguards to prevent that. As for how you use it, tap your thumb and index finger together to see."

Alex did just that, and a menu popped up in his vision, asking how far forward he wished to go. "How far should I go," he asked Nestor.

"Five minutes or so? Don't keep me waiting too long."

Alex navigated through the menu and selected the time. An orange button pulsed before him, the word LAUNCH emblazoned upon it. Alex hesitated. This was it. He was going to go to the future, and no matter how close to the present, the future always buzzes with possibility.

He clicked the button, and with a flash of blue light, the world disappeared. Darkness bloomed before him, and suddenly he was speeding along a tunnel at impossible speed. Or was it just that the tunnel was shortening before him? The end of the tunnel was a bright pinprick, faint at first, but becoming brighter and larger with every instant. Suddenly he was through the end, and standing on a pentagon of orange paint. He was back, or rather, he realised with a jolt, forward.

Nestor was standing over by the table again, working on something. "Very good. Now you understand what travel in time is like. Now the real training begins. It's time for you to think, and think fast!" He suddenly chucked the object he had been working on straight at Alex. It extended whirling blades as it flew, but Alex was ready, and, remembering the message he had been sent, dodged to the right. The device passed over his shoulder, and he felt the wind of its passage. It circled back round towards Nestor, who caught it effortlessly.

"Impressive! Either you have very good reactions, or you got advance warning from your future self. I'm willing to bet that it was the latter." He wiggled his eyebrows, waiting for an answer. Reluctantly, Alex nodded, feeling as though he had done something wrong.

"Excellent! Now you understand one of the most important rules of using time travel effectively. It's almost always a good idea to cheat!" Nestor grinned into thin air as though reliving a private memory. He suddenly blinked and was firmly back in the present. "So, are you ready to train for the wildest ride ever?"

Alex nodded. "Hell yes!"