© Saffron "Castella Merianne" 2010-2011 All rights reserved. When reading this, you accept to never re-use, steal or claim for your own anything that is posted within this topic. Remember, I have IP addresses!!
Hey! So I've finally decided to post a part of one of my stories here! So I'm only going to post the Prologue, but if I get good feedback, I'll post what I have of the first chapter here too.
Tell me what you think!
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Prologue
It was half past three in the afternoon.
Holding the day's edition of the “Timeless” newspaper in both hands, Jeremy Hopes was staring directly above the frail papers at the clock on the wall in front of him.
It was a very peculiar clock in comparison to the digital and holographic clocks that were to be seen nowadays, with a white circle bordered with a black frame.
The numbers contouring the inside of the frame were ones that hadn't been used in over four decades, made of I's, V's and X's.
Jeremy frowned as he tried to remember what they were called.
“ Ro ... rome ... ro – roman numerals?”
His eyes fell back onto his newspaper as a young woman with curled brown hair who had been standing beneath the clock shot him a dirty look.
“ N.Y SKY STATION SHUTS DOWN” read the front of the newspaper in bold black letters. Ignoring the first article, Jeremy skimmed a few paragraphs, but most of the articles appeared to be of the same nature as the first.
Sighing, Jeremy stood up from the scratched metal bench, and rolled the newspaper so he could slide it inside the pocket of his faded brown jacket.
He then looked up toward the clock again, which did nothing more than disappoint him as he saw that it was only two minutes later than the last time he had looked.
Jeremy shook his head, and made his way toward a set of two doors beside a wide flight of stairs, opening the one with a stick man printed on the front.
He found himself standing in a long, graffiti covered white tiled room, with grey cubicles to one side, and opposite them once-white urinals now an eerie yellow colour.
In between the two sets of facilities, adverse to the door, were sinks the same colour as the urinals.
Seeing the urinals, Jeremy quickly turned to his right and shut himself in a cubicle.
A few minutes passed until the flushing sound of the toilet could be heard, quickly followed by a clicking sound of the door unlocking, when Jeremy walked out of the cubicle.
He trudged toward the lowly-placed sinks, and turned the cold water tap. As he rinsed his hands under the icy water, a tall and lanky teenage boy walked out of the cubicle beside the one he had just left.
Jeremy watched the boy from the mirror as he too walked over to the sink to wash his hands.
He was an odd looking boy of maybe sixteen or seventeen, with pale skin and small oval shaped face.
His hair was black and cropped around his head, and a long sideswept fringe cut across his face.
Jeremy jumped as he found the boy staring back at him silently – his hair fell into his large, coal black eyes.
A little intimidated by the intensity with which the boy was staring at him, he turned away from the mirror, feeling a little awkward.
“ Could I use the soap?” the boy asked with a husky voice.
Jeremy frowned, confused, when he looked down to see the only full soap dispenser was on the edge of the sink he had been using.
He took a step back so the boy could lean across and push the pump down with his wrist, retrieving a pea-sized dollop of pink goo in his palm.
No longer staring at the teenage boy who was rinsing the soap off his hands, Jeremy was concentrating on the distinct whiff of flowers he had smelt when the boy had reached over to use the soap.
Was he ... wearing perfume?
Shaking his head, he could see the boy leave the room, wiping his wet hands on the front of his black shirt.
Jeremy turned off the tap and snatched a paper towel from the holder on the wall, and nearly immediately threw it in the trash.
Walking back out of the W.C, he looked at the clock once more.
Twenty-one minutes to four.
Nodding to himself, he marched over to the wide flight of stairs near the toilet doors, and held the railings as he walked down to the subway.
As he looked around him, he couldn't help but be amazed that such an old fashioned place still existed.
Nearly all the Interchange stations such as this one had been disintegrated in 2046, and had all been replaced by Tubes. Apart from the only other Interchange connected to this one.
Jeremy sighed, remembering what life had been like in the early 2000's, when he was a little boy.
Jeremy Hopes was born on March 3rd, 2004. Since that day it had been nearly sixty-seven years ... one of thoughts that crossed Jeremy's mind at that moment was :
“ Eh ... I'm getting old.”
He stopped as he reached platform 8, where Veronica was due to arrive at quarter to four.
Several long moments passed until Jeremy noticed the tall teenage boy he had seen in the lavatory a few minutes earlier standing beside him.
The boy turned his head, his eyebrows raised and his lips narrowed as he saw Jeremy staring at him.
There was a little less than a metre between the two of them as they both stood, their hands in their pockets.
“ Waiting or leaving?”
Jeremy was surprised by the husky voice of the boy as he tried to make conversation.
“ ... waiting.”
“ Me too. Family?” the boy asked again, now staring at his feet.
“ Yeah – my granddaughter. What about you ?”
“ My brother.”
“ Right ...” Jeremy nodded and turned to face the rail road tracks.
At that moment, the train the two of them were waiting for arrived, and Jeremy sighed with relief as he saw the curly mob of red hair of his sixteen year old granddaughter jump up from her seat.
The boy beside him waited patiently on the spot, whilst several of the passengers disembarked the train and left the platform and Jeremy welcomed his granddaughter with a hug.
The boy then smiled as he saw a messy black-haired man disembark the train in turn, a backpack strapped over his shoulders.
He had a rather skinny physique, and was short in height, with a hint of a stubble and thick-rimmed black glasses.
“ Eli!” called the boy, grinning as the man walked towards him and hugged him tightly.
“ Alex! Come here, you!”
Eli ruffled his young sibling's hair, who scowled at him.
“ I told you to stop doing that already ...” Alex mumbled, combing his fingers through his hair.
“ Whatever – so are Mum and Dad home?” asked Eli, scratching the back of his head.
“ No – they've been commissioned to do something ... somewhere ...”
“ They didn't tell you where they were going, did they?”
“ No. But they knew you were coming, so it's fine. Shall we go?”
“ Yes – we shall do exactly that.”
Alex laughed silently as his brother made his way off the platform.
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Soo ... how is it? The rough draft was pretty bad, but I re-wrote it a couple of times and it ended up like this.
Subject: Castella's Writing 
Sat Jan 15, 2011 8:38 pm
If you have any guesses of what his secret is, mail me! I want to see if it's obvious or not.
