Hexad: The Ward (6 page)

"Sure, that would be great." Amanda walked over to the apple tree, trying to avoid staring at the grass where she had wanted to dig earlier. She felt calm, like what they'd just done hadn't happened, except, of course, it had. Hadn't it?

She whistled tunelessly as she tried to vibe the squirrel she could see poking its head out from the conifer hedge. It stared right back at her as if telling her to hurry as he wanted a snack.

With the feeders collected, she walked across the lawn to the shed that was nestled back into an awkward corner of their garden, and after opening the door, cursing again because she hadn't oiled the bolt as Dale would never get around to it, until finally she slid it free. She scooped the mixed seed into the feeders.

A little mouse darted out and snatched up a few fallen grains before making a run for it back into a corner, the private domain of spiders and nasty creepy-crawlies.

Now I'm feeding the mice too!

Amanda manhandled the bolt closed and almost knocked over the freshly filled feeders balanced on the step, but caught them just in time. She smiled as the resident robin took the opportunity to get in first and landed on the step, pecking seed before flying off in a flurry of red.

That robin is more cheeky than Dale.

After the feeders were hung, Amanda walked down the slight slope of the rear garden and slumped into one of the new garden chairs they'd picked up for a steal at a store that was closing down. She watched as the blue tits and the sparrows fought for supremacy, the sparrows coming out victorious — they always seemed to appear together, easily crowding out the blue tits that usually came in ones or twos.

The day was still warm and it couldn't be later than early afternoon, maybe she should use her watch again? She'd taken it off at the beginning of the summer as she always did so she didn't get a strap line from her sunbathing, but maybe she should start wearing it if they were going to be time traveling all over the place.

She caught herself and shook her head at the madness. What was she thinking? Who said anything about any more jumps? They'd done what was asked of them, hadn't they? Why did she take it for granted that they'd be doing it again?

Of course, because they still had jumps left on the Hexad. How many? Amanda added up the jumps. They'd done three so had three left. What could they do? Where could they go? Should they do something to help people? Jump and stop wars? Could she see her parents again?

Now she was upset. It was silly, to think about them in that way. They were gone; her present life was all down to them — they'd left enough money to help her and Dale buy their first home, no mortgage. It was a great home, a great life. A large wraparound garden on three sides, working from home, getting up when they wanted. Just them, together. But could she? Could she jump back and keep her parents alive? What kind of repercussions would it have?

"Hey, you okay, Amanda?" asked Dale, looking worried as he put the coffee mugs down on the already damaged wooden table. Amanda had caught him using it to rest a piece of wood he was sawing, and boy was he in trouble when she told him off then realized that he'd cut through the plank and the table too. Muppet!

"I'm okay, thanks for the coffee. Just thinking about Mum and Dad is all, because of the Hexad."

"Oh, I'm sorry, honey, I know you miss them. I've been thinking about it too. We have three jumps, shouldn't we do something or do you think it will be a big no-no? Maybe we'd affect the future if we jump into the past and go see people, or try to kill the inventor of the gun?"

"Where'd that come from?"

"What?"

"The inventor of the gun? I'd never thought of that. Who did invent it?"
That was a good idea, wasn't it? Although I've never even hit anyone, let alone killed someone.

Dale shrugged. "I have no idea." He slurped his coffee and scowled at the apple tree as tiny fruits fell onto the lawn, disturbed by the squirrel as it crept along the branches as if it thought they couldn't see him.

Thud.

Dale and Amanda jumped up and stared at each other, not knowing what to expect but knowing it would be something awful, something to do with Hexads. Maybe someone was after them? Tellan said there were a lot of people from various universes after them, but weren't they supposed to be gone or closed off or something? Who knew? By rights, surely the futures they had just visited shouldn't exist, otherwise...
Don't think about it.

Amanda looked around. Dale was already staring at what had caused the noise as it hit the ground.

"It's a pigeon," said Dale, looking around cautiously then stepping closer.

"Careful!" warned Amanda.

"Of what, time traveling pigeons? Haha."

"Dale, be careful."

Dale walked up to the bird, then squatted to inspect it. "It's got no head, and all its insides are gone. Weird."

Amanda moved beside him. She gripped his shoulder, getting a handful of his curly, dark hair as well. She peered at the bird. It really was a headless pigeon. Amanda took a step back and peered up at the roof of the bungalow — there was no sign it had been up there, but then what would a headless pigeon be doing on the roof?

"Let's just go inside, I've had enough surprises for one day," said Dale, pushing the bird away from the kitchen door.

"I'll get the coffee." Amanda quickly grabbed the mugs and they walked into the cool interior of the kitchen.

It felt normal, which made it feel weird. Amanda could have convinced herself everything was okay if it wasn't for the Hexad on the table, the 3 flashing, casting a faint blue light on the ceiling that needed a new coat of paint.

"I think I need a lie down."

"Me too," agreed Dale.

They went into the living room and slumped down on the sofa.

The coffee, forgotten, slowly grew cold in the kitchen.

Stupid Ideas

Present Day

"That's the last one I go to. Ever," moaned Amanda. She dumped her coat and bag on the kitchen counter then ran her hands through her hair. The fine drizzle had flattened it like she'd just got out of the shower, and she felt miserable, defeated, and worried about the human race if she was honest.

"Me too. What is wrong with these people? Well, at least we tried," said Dale, clearly trying to be the optimistic one. "Now we know we aren't going to get answers from any of these damn conventions. It's just made up of weirdos and crackpots. None of them have got a clue what they're talking about, have they?"

"Absolutely no idea. If they knew what we know I wonder what they'd say?"

"They'd probably smile to our face and nod, but call us nutters behind our back, like we do to them."

"Except the difference is we really have done it, haven't we? Tell me it wasn't all a dream, Dale, tell me we jumped."

"We did, honey, we sure did. I'm half tempted to do it again just to prove to ourselves that we are the normal ones." Dale took off his coat and shook it before realizing he was getting the kitchen wet. He picked up Amanda's and put them both out on hooks in the small utility room that led off the kitchen to the side garden. After taking off his shoes he came back into the kitchen. "Ugh, my socks are getting all wet. And what's this!?" Dale bent down and picked something up off the floor.

"What is it?" Amanda slipped off her Converse and danced around the wet patches on the floor, then put them out next to Dale's. She sidled up beside him — he was still peering at whatever it was he'd found.

"Looks like sausage. What's going on here? Why does this keep happening? Think we've got mice?" Dale dropped it into the bin, the lid scraping against bare brick wall as he opened the lid too wide as usual.

Amanda kept quiet, even though she was itching to tell him to be careful. "Maybe we time travel and come back and steal our own sausages?" Dale stared at her. "What? You never know. Anyway, I'm past caring. I'm shattered. No more conventions, they just depress me."

"Agreed."

Amanda got two glasses out of the cupboard and poured them both a much needed glass of wine. They took them into the living room and sank gratefully into the soft sofa.

It was now months since their time travel experiences, and much as they were glad to be able to go about their normal lives, the events of the past hung over them, as if waiting to warp reality once more. But nothing happened, life just carried on as normal. They did their work, they looked after the garden. Dale mowed the lawns if the rain stopped long enough and they had a fry-up every Saturday. It was maddening. Life went on as before but it wasn't relaxing — they both kept expecting something to happen, something epic, something crazy, but life remained static.

Neither of them had dug up the garden, much as they wanted to, as they agreed no good could come of it, the same as no good could come from using the remaining jumps they had. Instead, they had delved into books on anything even remotely related to time travel, trying to understand the theories, the concepts, anything that could help untangle the strangeness they had got caught up in. None of it helped.

There were as many theories as there were people interested in time travel itself, each of them varying wildly when it came to what would happen if you jumped — whether you could only jump to the past, if you could change the future or not, to speculation on parallel universes, if you created new universes just by jumping, or even saying you would jump — as the future had to be there for you to jump into if you said you might do it, right? There were downright bizarre theories concerning the creation of new versions of yourself each time you jumped, creating multiple timelines in not only your own universe but doing the same in newly born ones too.

Some of it made sense, to a degree, but most of it was simply the ravings of people that should take up other hobbies.

When they moved on to going to conferences, large and small, and even little get-togethers for those interested in such things, well, it just got silly.

This was their last event, and it wasn't one of the better ones.

It had comprised little more than a hired room in a very low-grade hotel, a dodgy looking buffet and a few speakers so full of their own pomp and importance it was laughable. The whole thing was designed to sell some ridiculous device that the main speaker promised would allow them to change the future, in the future, which was quite a clever marketing gimmick, Amanda had to admit. There wouldn't be any returns because it didn't work as it wasn't supposed to work until at least fifteen years in the future, which the speaker promised was when time travel was actually invented.

When they eventually got home they were shattered. They'd driven for hours to get there, and the drive home took even longer — the motorway was closed and they had to take a detour through endless small towns and villages before they finally arrived, the car running on fumes, the fuel gauge showing empty for miles, leaving them panicking about being stuck in the middle of nowhere.

"Well, it's over now. We learned nothing, as usual."

"Maybe we should use the Hexad, jump to when these things were invented, see who did it, how they did it?" said Dale, downing his wine, getting up to pour another.

"I almost agree with you, almost." Amanda finished her drink and handed the glass to Dale on his way out into the kitchen.

They'd discussed it over and over, the debate going on for so long that eventually they both got bored of themselves talking about it. They should wait, was the final conclusion. Wait until it seemed like the right time, and hopefully there never would be one.

It was a terrible responsibility, knowing you had such power, but what overrode everything else was not wanting to get caught up in anything that could risk their life together — they had seen firsthand how terrible the consequences could be for unleashing Hexads into an unsuspecting world. The deaths of countless people, actual versions of herself, not to mention the trillions of people brought into existence then vanishing as realities opened and closed their infinite doors.

It didn't seem real, the numbers nothing more than abstract, but as far as they could tell it was what had happened, and neither of them wanted that kind of responsibility.

"Here you go," said Dale, handing Amanda her glass.

"Thanks."

They sat in silence, a nice end to what had been a long, bad day.

Soon enough, the wine was drunk and Amanda woke Dale up from where he'd fallen asleep on the sofa.

They went to bed.

Tomorrow was just going to be another day.

Caught You!

Present Day

"Dale! What are you doing?"

"Bugger, thought you were going to have a lie-in?" said Dale, looking guilty, trying to hide the trowel behind his back.

"Are you seriously trying to pretend you aren't digging up the lawn? Look at you, you're soaking wet, all muddy, and there's a hole right in front of you."

"Um, would you believe me if I told you he made me do it?" Dale pointed at the robin watching Dale digging, swooping in now and then to nab a worm that tried to make its escape.

"Oh, the robin made you do it, did it? Hold a gun to your head and said, 'Dig mister, or the sparrows get it'? Please, spare me. I thought we agreed?" Amanda tried to look without showing interest, but she was kidding herself — she hated to admit it but she was curious too.

"I know we agreed but it's just been bugging me for months. I had to look. But I'll stop, you're right, this is silly." Dale got up and brushed ineffectively at his filthy jeans. He hadn't even put his waterproofs on and the December rain had soaked right through to his skin. Amanda was always amazed at the fact that however cold it got he never seemed to feel it, wearing little more than a t-shirt whatever the weather.

"Um, hang on," said Amanda, zipping up her own waterproof, pulling the hood over her head to try to stop her hair getting soaked.