By Vijay Aravindh V
It was seven minutes past eight in the evening. Daniel just had his dinner; the maid had left the mansion and will be returning the next day morning. So now he is all left alone in his sad lonely mansion. He was a day and four hours away from his seventieth birthday. He pushed his wheel-chair to the edge of the bed post. He caught hold of the bed post in one hand and jockeyed another hand from the armrest of the wheel chair and tried to hop on the be. He was almost there, but he couldn’t get hold of anything nearby, he was struggling to get into the bed but was slowly drifting down to the carpet. He tried to catch hold of soft velvet quilt, but he couldn’t. He took a deep breath and limped his semi dormant slight paralyzed left leg and caught the quilt, now he slowly crawled and wriggled up until the hip got stationed on the bed.
He successfully made it today, he felt relieved. He took few deep breaths. He saw the photograph of him and his wife Sara near the night lamp. That photo burst opened a lot of chains of thoughts. The pasts, the future, the presentand all the timelines in between them. The thoughts started chewing him up, He didn’t want that, he need to stay focused.
He gently turned the photo down and switched off the lamp, and went to his shirt pocket and took out his old Ulysse Nardin Tourbillon watch dial without any straps,he caressed it. The room was stark black and dark, but the radiant needles of the dial showcased 8:16, precisely a minute to 8:17pm.He prepped up;his heart was beating loudly. He tried to focus, still 30 seconds were left. He was turning nervous;his room was extremely cold and too calm. The only sound he could hear was his heart beating.10 seconds was left, this period of time is very crucial. The precision is all that matters, there was a slow humming sound outside. He checked the time, three seconds for 8:17. The hummingsound grew too loud, the time was sharp 8:17. It was TIME! suddenly there was a loud glass pane shattering noise down the hall, He could hear a boot noise approaching the stair case, the intruder was directly coming to his room. He had left the door ajar. The shadow of the approaching intruder lurked and slowly grown inside the room. Daniel was abnormally calm, composed and cool. The door bashed open and a dark black figure appeared at the entrance, the figure approached himand took out a gun and pointed at his forehead.
Daniel: “wait…let me switch on the lamp…don’t shoot…no tricks…I am too old for those parlor tricks these days…”
Daniel bent over and switched on the lamp.
Daniel: “take a seat and catch your breath...these time travels can be quite exhaustinngggg…” he noticed the black leather one piece suit and Hox helmet of the intruder… “haaa…classic T&T lab coat shit…the helmet is different though...hope it’s upgraded…
”
The intruder punched Daniel face….and shouted in mechanized voice: “how do you know about the time travel…. then you knew I was coming for you…. but that doesn’t matter… I will end it all by putting a bullet in your head….”
Daniel: “first of all…this is not an ending…you are likea piece of crapwanting to be struck in a shitstorm that is about to blow or…or… you may be the crappy debris of the blown shitstorm… and…and…. how do I know that you are a time traveler??…you just confirmed it… Ha! ...wait…no… I mean not your stupid dumb confession…but your arrival here at 8:17 confirmed it…”
Intruder: “how do you know my time-space coordinates and land sequence time??…why are youtoo calm…I am going to kill you…just going to put a bullet in your head….Oldman… you can be calm…you may think that you have situation under control…nope…you are wrong…I came for you…just to kill you”
Intruder cloaked the gun, Daniel hand gestured to wait and coughed a bit…
Daniel: “why are you whining like a teenager…you piece of shit…” He looked at the intruder, suddenly he grinned “wait…are you a female??...Yes I knew it…ok…ok fine… you seem too perplexed…let me tell you how I know…in exchange you have to quit the idea of killing me…atleast for now…and… sit out with me and listen to what I got to say…”
Intruder: “why would I do that…instead why should I not put a bullet in your head…”
Daniel: “ Is putting bullet in your head…your catchphrase??...ok sorry…sorry… please listen to me….please you have to trust me in the first place…please…ok I will tell you how I found about you..… it’s a classical technique to find if there are any time travelers around us…see…it’s like I will arrange a very secret booze party at a point of time….after the booze party is long over…then I will announce and send a invitation to everyone to come and have a drink with me at the booze party…that’s long over…If anyone would have attended the booze party...then the attendees are time travelers…it’s the same way I sent the space-time co-ordinations and an order to conduct a hit on me…I mean I planned to send it two days later to carry out a hit on me at 20:17 today..”
Intruder was getting more irritated and frustrated every passing second
Intruder: “Whatever crap you are going to feed me…I am going to kill you…”
Daniel: “and put a bullet in head…” laughed mockingly “no you will not…”
Unable to control the anger, the intruder punched Daniel again. Only this time it was way too brutally hard and drew lots blood.
Daniel:“just think…if you kill me tonight how will I order a hit on me day after tomorrow…how will I give you the space-time co-ordinates to reach me here… because now….. what will happen leads to what already taken place… the past traveler can do only what has already been done …”
Intruder: “nope…Old man…sorry you made a silly mistake….if I kill you now…this killing will lead to splitting of the universe into two verses…in one….you will remain dead and in another you will survive to send me the co-ordinates day after tomorrow….”
Daniel: “you know what…you speak lot like my wife…nope… my girlfriend…sorry I mean my ex-wife..nahh…whatever. She was a firm believer in multiple quantum realities….great soul…may her rest in peace, but I don’t really like the multiverse concept…I believe in destiny but I really miss her these days…you kind of remind me of her… ”
Intruder: “I am like no one…I act on my free will and I will think, act and follow what I firmly believe. I have seen it…seen it all…everything… what you do and what you are capable of, that’s why I am going to kill you now”
Hearing this, Daniel closed his eyes, tears rolled down. He took a deep breath and thought of his wife, then he lifted to look at the intruder with teary eyes, smiling face and said…
Daniel: “If killing me is all you want…go ahead…but before that…I have a last death wish…there is a piece of paper under my pillow…it was a note written by my wife…just read it and then kill me”
Intruder: “sure” …. Saying so…the intruder thrusted the gun and pumped all the bullets into Daniel’s head. The life less old man’s body soaked in the pool of blood, the intruder bend down and took out the note written…folded it open and read…
By Vijay Aravindh V