Temporal Fractures

Jason Finch was a simple, average, run of the mill middle class man. He lived his life exactly like everyone told him to. Went to school, passed with decent scores, went to college, got a degree, got a job in a bank, kept the job for a long time, got married, had kids, went to the bar every Friday and drank no more than 3 beers. His life was as boring as it could be.

And like every other middle class man in his late 30's he had a midlife crisis. He lost his job at the bank thanks to his credit stealing boss, got divorced and his kids didn't want to see him. All in the span of two years. So, Jason was fed up with his life. He'd done everything according to what everyone said and still, everything went wrong. His future was looking pretty bleak. He then decided to put a portion of his savings into investments that should bring him some money for his kids and left the country to travel the
world.

His travels took him all over the world multiple times. He met interesting and repulsive people. He got mugged a few times. He slept in monasteries, temples and sometimes under bridges. He was living his life on his own terms and he was loving it. On his third trip to Vienna, he met a British scientist in a back alley pub. They got talking as they were the only English speaking people in the pub. 3 beers, 4 shots of tequila and half a bottle of vodka later, they were spilling their life stories as if their lives depended on it.

The Englishman's name was Dr. Albert Walter Thomas. He was deported out of Great Britain, USA and Venezuela for his experiments.

"So you did everything right, and your boss screwed you over, but at least paid you for it before firing you. Your wife left you for someone else. Your kids like him better because you're never around. And-" before Albert could go on, Jason interrupted him,
"Why Venezuela? I get US and Britain. But why Venezuela?" Jason asked.
Albert started cackling like a maniac. "I actually was kicked out of Venezuela because of an experiment gone wrong. A mosquito. A single, tiny, pesky, little mosquito got into the wrong place at the wrong time and BOOM." His sudden exclamation almost sent Jason off of his chair.

"The explosion released a stink nobody could remove" Albert added and cackled almost falling off himself.

"So what did you do in US and England that got you kicked out?" Jason slurred out.

"Studied the effects of temporal displacement on organic matter" Albert said pompously. He then promptly broke down laughing.

Jason didn't understand a word. And his face mirrored his confusion. So Albert explained in simpler terms," I tried to make a time machine but the animals inside it went splat everytime"

Seeing Jason's expression of disgust, he broke down laughing again.

Seeing one of them green around the gills, the bartender called for a cab to get the two drunks out of his pub before they spray painted the floor with the contents of their stomachs. Albert offered Jason a place to crash for the night.

Jason agreed and eventually, after thoroughly irritating the poor cab driver with slurred directions, they reached Albert's lab.

The lab was a scientist's dream. A huge shelf lined a wall with bottles of liquids of every color imaginable. There was a door near the shelf that led to a room where all sorts of animals were kept in their cages. Unfortunately, Jason was in no state to appreciate the size and elegance of the lab as he had just vacated the contents of his stomach on the poor Doctor's shoes. They barely made it to the couches and promptly passed out.

The next morning, after thoroughly cursing each other in hushed whispers, they closed the curtains as much as they could. They took all day to get rid of their hangovers. Eventually, they started talking about Albert's research about time travel. Albert was celebrating the fact that he had finally cracked time travel and had built a machine for it. He could send any living creature forward in time and anywhere in space. But not backwards. Soon, Jason's enthusiasm about the topic prompted a demonstration in the middle of the night.

They sent a frog forward in time and space by an hour.  They kept the frog in a huge chamber, powered it up till it was humming loud enough for them to feel it in their bones. When the noise built to a crescendo, there was an audible crack that sounded like a gunshot.  When the opened the chamber, the frog was gone.

A tense hour later, both of them anxiously looked at the piece of wood where the frog was supposed to appear. A bright flash suddenly blinded them.  When they stopped seeing spots, both of them were awestruck at the sight in front of them. The frog was intact and whole and hadn't croaked. Until it actually did.

Both of them spent a long time screaming, yelling, and jumping around like 4 year olds on a sugar high. When they finally got slightly sober, they got talking again. They talked about the next step and what they could do with this. Their excitement started climbing and their ideas grew more fanciful by the minute.

Suddenly the idea of human trials was floated, encouraged and promoted. They talked for a long time about the possible implications and what they could do in the future. Jason then volunteered for the first ever human to time travel. He finally had a chance to become somebody important. He could carve his name in human history. He would become somebody whose name was remembered by everyone.

Albert wanted to jump too, but Jason convinced him to stay and record all the data so he could publish it and become famous. All the countries that deported and banned him for experimenting on animals and accidentally blowing them up would shower accolades on him. He would definitely be knighted and given a Nobel.

Soon, after two more days of countless calculations and brainstorming, they were ready to send Jason forward in time by an hour. Jason stepped into the chamber, and felt the vibrations start. His heart was pounding. The vibrations increased in intensity. His teeth started chattering violently.

"I should have thought about a mouth guard like boxers have. Too bad" he thought to himself.

The vibrations soon got so bad that he couldn't form a coherent thought. His chest was hurting. He could see only white. His pupils had dilated so much he couldn't see anything. His arms felt numb. He dropped to his knees. He tried his best to stay awake, but he fainted anyway.

As he gradually woke up, it felt like he had another massive hangover that was many times worse than the last one he had with Albert. His entire body ached. His chest hurt with every breath. Moving his body hurt. His mind was sluggish like he'd just had a huge dose of cocaine and heroin. He spent what felt like an eternity on the cold metal floor of the chamber.

He slowly started realising certain changes. The air felt stale. There was no wind. He slowly started moving around even though it hurt a lot. He dragged himself out of the chamber. He braced himself on the chamber walls and tried to stand up. He almost fell face first many times. Eventually he made his way to the chair near the chamber. He collapsed in it and fell asleep.

The next time he woke up, he felt better. He finally looked around the lab. He wondered why Albert hadn't helped him last night. Or at least what felt like last night. He looked around the lab agape. It was trashed. Okay. That was a generous and frankly kind description.

It was in shambles. Ruins. Totalled. Utterly destroyed. Papers all over the place. Broken glass where the chemical equipment used to be. The kitchen looked scorched. There were papers strewn all over the place. The glass terrariums that once held miniature zoos were broken and empty. He suddenly noticed something. The chamber's walls were severely dented from the outside. It looked like someone had taken a crowbar to the metal chamber. It was so severely dented, Jason could tell that the machine would never work again. Then he saw something that chilled him to the bone.

On the wall behind the chamber, written in blood, was a something that chilled him to the bones. It simply said, " I'M SORRY"

Jason didn't know how long he stared at the wall. What happened? What went wrong? It was just an hour. Was it a prank? If it was, he's going to kill Albert. His mind kept racing. His thoughts kept speeding up till he fainted.

When he woke up again, his head hurt. He stumbled around before reaching the chair. He sat in the chair and started thinking about what to do.

He was hungry and thirsty. He found a few bottles of water and a few cans of soup and beans. He ate them and kept some for later. He tried using his cellphone but that was completely useless. It didn't even switch on. The wall clock was smashed. He looked around the papers to find a date. He pointedly refused to look at the bloody wall. He left on the 2nd of May 2026. He found pages with Albert's notes dated from August, November and a few from April. None had dates or years on them so he couldn't be sure how much time had passed. And Albert's handwriting was worse than any doctor's he'd ever met.

He found a phone charger and plugged it in. When the network connected, he stared at the date. He realised something had gone wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong. The year was 2037. He'd gone into the future by 11 years. His knees gave way. He stared at the phone but couldn't see anything. His stomach felt like it had decided to go skydiving.

He went to the kitchen in a daze. He drank what was left of the water. He then thought about what Albert might have done while he was gone. The destruction now made sense. Jason decided to look around and try to make sense of what had happened. He started cleaning up and sorting the papers. He freaked out while cleaning the section that had clear signs of dropped blood. Surely somewhere, Albert might have made notes like he was supposed to. He made a huge stack and started sorting them. His eyes kept wandering to the trail of blood drops that led out of the lab and up the stairs. Every time he caught his mind wandering there, he'd shudder and get back to his task.

From what he could make of it, Albert thought he had made an error in three possible variables. Jason's fat to muscle ratio, the volume of the black hole 3523 light years away or the approximate mass of dark matter in their solar system. He took all the notes he could find. He took all the books and notebooks he could find and loaded them into a box.

He had set out to make history. He would be damned if he lost out on 11 years for nothing. He went to the nearest ATM and tried his cards. He wasn't surprised they didn't work. He had just about enough cash to make it to a flight to New York. After that, it would be a long trip hitch hiking home.

It took him another month to reach home. Apparently, living in another country for long after the visa expired was frowned upon. He was interrogated my multiple agencies and agents over the period of a month. He stuck to the cover story he'd made about being abducted and imprisoned for 11 years. When he finally made it home, he saw his home somewhat intact.

The next day made his way to the bank to make it clear it was alive. After being missing for so long, there was no doubt he'd been declared dead. After a few months of visiting many government agencies and banks. He finally had everything sorted out. Meanwhile, he also found out that his old boss had shot himself rather than be imprisoned for fraud. His wife had divorced her second husband. His eldest kid dropped out of college and the other never made it to college. It took him another month to find out what happened to Albert. He'd become a seriously heavy drinker and had committed suicide by jumping in front of a bus. He never left a note. His lab was undisturbed as it was paid for by his still unnamed mysterious benefactor and it was ruled as a suicide.

His investments had either become worth pennies or millions. He was rich. But it felt hollow. He never had to work another day in his life. He threw himself into Albert's work. He started learning Physics, Chemistry and Biology from the very basics. He kept reading and learning till he could recreate what Albert did.

It took him another 3 years of studying day and night to understand what Albert did. It took him 2 more to recreate the machine that worked. He had the original destroyed version smuggled illegally to study it. He kept trying to improve and perfect Albert's work. He even recreated his lab like the one Albert had as a tribute to him.

After understanding what Albert had done, he felt an immense amount of respect and awe at the man that had gone unnoticed and unrecognized for his sheer brilliance all his life. After nearly 6 years after the original jump, the machine was ready. He was ready. He was going to everything in his power to save Albert.
He managed to take the chamber with him in time, and hold all the data he could get his hands on .

He studied history of the decades before his birth, just in case he ended up sometime other than his intended target. When he finally made his jump, he reached the year 1984. He spent the next few months making investments in stocks that would be priceless in 10 years. He set up dummy corporations to monitor and maintain them. He jumped again. This time to 1998 but over shot it to 2013. He felt something this time. The jumping was taking its toll. He felt older. Physically he was fine, but he knew it was taking its toll.

He set up funding for Albert and bought him multiple properties and laboratories around the world and paid for them via the dummy corporations. He jumped again to the day after he was supposed to arrive. But this time the jump hurt more than ever before.

He took a week to recover. When he made it out, he walked to the bar where Albert was supposed to be. He found Albert heavily drunk. Albert looked terrible. He had red eyes, dark circles and smelled like he hadn't had a bath for weeks.

As soon as he saw Albert recognize him, he said, "I'm back. And you're still alive". Albert kept staring at him and suddenly bolted yelling, "I'm sorry" over and over again. Jason was so shocked he stood there staring at the door wondering what happened. He then ran to the lab. When he reached the lab, he heard the sounds of glass being smashed and stuff breaking.

He raced into the lab as fast as he could. He heard the sounds of glass shattering. Just as he pushed the door open, he ducked as one of Albert's pets escaped over his head. Albert had already destroyed most of the lab. He was hitting the chamber repeatedly.

"Stop it Albert!! I'm alive! You don't have to be sorry anymore!" Jason yelled as he tried to make his way towards Albert to help him. But instead, Albert looked at him, his eyes grew wide with fear and he ran towards and straight through the window.

"NOO!" Jason yelled helplessly. But the time he came to the window, he could see Albert limping away in pain. Jason was waiting for the call to connect him to an ambulance when he saw Albert about to cross the block. When the call connected, he started relaying instructions to the people on the other side as he moved quickly to track down Albert. Just as he cut the call he heard the sounds of tires screeching loudly in the distance. He ran like his life depended on it.

When he crossed the corner of the block, he saw the long skid marks behind the bus. He saw all the passengers being off loaded, some holding their heads and a man who's forehead was bleeding. He moved along the bus and saw it was in a pristine condition. Definitely a private tourist bus.

When he got to the front, his heart plummeted like never before. There on the bus, were spots of blood. It looked like somebody was hit severely by the bus. His heart hammering, he looked around. He saw another group of people around something. When he made it there, he looked in horror at the broken body of Albert. A doctor was trying to help him and failing. He immediately got down to his knees to tried to help the poor doctor.

"Hold on Albert. Hold on. Don't give up on me buddy." Jason kept repeating like a broken cassette, not noticing his tears flowing freely.

The only thing Albert could say was, "Not everything needs to be changed". Hearing this, Jason sobbed even loudly and kept begging and pleading him to hold on.

The doctor kept trying to help but he gave up when Albert's heart gave out.

11 years later, Jason would come back to the lab and freaked out by the blood on the wall, completely ignorant of the fact that it was his own.