Just Your Average Time Traveller

Too complex for a definition.

Cassia was mumbling the whole way there.

The midday sun was impaled by wispy clouds that promised torrents of water in just over an hour. I was starting to be thankful for any moisture in this country, with its spiny giants for trees and the relentless glare of the big golden orb floating in an expanse of blue above.

Why am I so poetic when I'm annoyed? The thought seized my brain as Cassia reached her hand forward to knock on the door of Cassandra's abode and the door, as expected, opened before she had the chance, an expectant Cassandra standing before us.

"Hello, Sam," she smiled uneasily. "Please, come in. Both of you." She only just noticed Cassia.

Cassia protested. "Actually, I have to go and-"

"Yes, I know," Cassandra interrupted. "I was being polite."

The girl sighed in resignation. "Of course. Of course you know..." she muttered as she turned and walked back the way we had come with a delicate frown on her sun-bronzed face.

My heavy footsteps thudded along the wooden floor and into the dim room, comparatively heavier than the old woman's. To my surprise, we didn't just settle for sitting down at the long table in the middle of the room, now with something that looked ominously like a Hot Wheels car on it, but squeezed inbetween two bookshelves that didn't quite touch and opened a miniscule door that I had to bend over to enter. The smell of drying fish assaulted me as we stepped onto a narrow paved path that had been slipped between the building and a grey wall, turning into a small, dry, grey stone courtyard enclosed by low brick walls that looked upon a bleak menagerie of houses, huts and low buildings. It looked suspiciously like Cassandra's house had been driven away from the others. It was apart from the main huddle of homes.

There were potted plants placed randomly on the courtyard floor, some tipped over with loose maroon soil spilling out of the glazed clay pots. The floor was hot, even through my thick, day old sandals and the smell of fish came from a cloth-covered table displaying an astonishing range of mackerel, cod and other smaller varieties of seafood. Hugging the back of the house was a simple wooden bench with no back and runes driven somewhat forcefully into the seat. Finally, Cassandra faced me.

"Sorry for dragging you here with no explanation." she said. 

I mumbled something like 'don't worry' while she sat on the bench and gestured for me to sit next to her. I complied and immediately noticed how she smelt like petrol.

"This...is very difficult for me to say," she began, "and I need you to listen carefully before you react. Will you?"

I flet myself nod.

"Good. Let's start off with the least problematic news, shall we? I had a vision."

"Right." Shocker.

"I saw you and Cassia. It was unclear, fuzzy, not completely definite. My visions tend to be fuzzy. That means that whatever the future holds, it can be changed now if you try." She shifted. "Inhaling the air was like...breathing shards of metal, the taste of smoke so potent it could tranquilise an-"

"Hold on, you know what the air tastes like? In a vision?"

"I just said it tasted of smoke, Samuel Derry. What do you think?"

I flushed red. "Sorry, never mind. Carry on."

"You stood beside a large container of waste, and the day was dark, dark as twilight. I saw what you saw for a moment: buildings covered in glass, lifted from the flooded ground by metal supports the height of eighty-five men. Large, hulking creatures of man sloshing through the  stagnant water that reached your knees, trying to pile you up with the rest of the unwanted rubbish poking out from the waves...and you were fine and Cassia..."