Sinking Through Time - Future Past

Chapter 4 - An Enemy Revealed

Graham was pleased to finally be free of the quicksand. It seemed like he'd been lost in space with screaming stars for an eternity.

He was relieved to see that he had arrived before Sidney Pickett. Now was his chance to get rid of the man before anyone knew he was here. Graham wasn't usually a violent man but he knew he now held the power to re-write history and change the outcome for his whole family, both past and present, but only if he could get rid of Sidney before he could become a threat to his plans.

Graham had thought about how to tackle this problem a lot in the last couple of hours and had justified to himself that it didn't matter what happened to Sidney now anyway, as the future would be changed and Sidney probably wouldn't even exist in 2014 once it did. Graham was certain he would still be born, but with Pickett Senior out of the picture, he was pretty sure Sidney wouldn't.

He'd have to make it quick though. Graham thought to himself that he may be about to commit murder but he didn't want the man to suffer more than he had to. After all, it wasn't exactly Sidney who had wronged him; he just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, literally.

The only other problem Graham had to contend with was the Winnie suit helmet. It would protect Sidney from a head injury so Graham knew he'd have to get Sidney to take it off voluntarily before he made his move on him. He knew what he had to do. For now he just had to wait for Sidney to come through the quicksand.

On cue, Sidney's head popped up out of the quicksand. Graham immediately went to Sidney's aid to help him out of the pool.

Sidney was elated at the sights he'd just encountered.

"Oh, what do you know, it's daytime here. Fancy that. Glad to see you, Mr Anderson. I'm happy we both made it through. Wasn't that amazing?" Sidney gushed.

"Please, call me Graham," Graham replied, only just realizing that Pickett was right, that it was daytime and not night like they had expected it to be. He wondered why that was the case?

"Sorry. Graham. Wasn't that amazing? Did you see the singing stars? I've never seen anything like it. I felt like I was in heaven, or what I imagine heaven would be like anyway. Their song was simply angelic," Sidney replied.

"Singing stars? Don't you mean screaming stars? It was the most ear piercing thing I've ever heard. It felt like an eternity," Graham replied, holding out his hands for Sidney to take.

Sidney grasped Graham's outstretched hands and concentrated on climbing out of the quicksand pool. He was puzzled as to why he would see beautiful stars and Graham would have an entirely different experience.

"Surely it wasn't that bad?" he asked Graham, but before Graham had time to answer, Sidney went on in his excitement at making it through the quicksand. "I don't know how Lucy managed without a Winnie suit. Do you?"

Graham shook his head. He thought Sidney was quite rude and felt less guilty about what was about to happen.

"No, I have no idea. She was a very lucky girl, that's for sure," Graham replied, making sure to keep in Sidney's good graces until he had the right opportunity.

"Now, let's get out of these suits. I don't know about you, but I've had enough of mine," Graham continued.

Being a cautious sort of man, Sidney didn't want to take off his helmet until he knew for sure they were where they were supposed to be. If they could travel through time, he wanted to make sure he was in the right time and the right environment before taking a chance with his life and taking off his helmet.

"I don't think that's a good idea. I think we should establish that we are in fact in 1877 and not some other time. We don't know if the air is safe to breathe. Better to be cautious and alive, don't you think?" Sidney asked Graham.