Juncture 2.2

I slowly opened my eyes. There was a bright white light directly over my face, forcing me to squint. Slow, throbbing pains pervaded my entire body, especially my left arm and my head. The sensation sent a wave of nausea through me, and I gagged loudly, turning my head to the side.

Nothing came out, and the nausea passed. I breathed heavily through my mouth, trying to block out the pain. I faced up again, my eyes closed, still breathing.

A light clinking sound came from the right. I turned my head, gritting my teeth, and cracked open one eye. There was a small glass – filled about halfway and with several pieces of ice floating on the surface – being held next to me. A straw stuck out of the top, and I finagled it into my mouth.

Dear god.

That first sip of cold water was quite possibly the best sensation I had ever experienced. I felt the chill travel down my throat as I swallowed, and felt it diffuse throughout my body. It was beautiful.

“Slow down,” I heard a voice say. I stopped sucking through the straw, and held it in my mouth, looking up at the person holding the glass. He was a thin man, wearing a tan plaid shirt. He was wearing glasses, and he had an unobtrusive, combed-over haircut. He looked to be in his mid-to-late twenties.

I continued drinking, slower this time. I tried to recall where I was. I was in class, then I was outside. Then I was back in class? Everything was shaky and blurry, like an old-timey movie. So I didn’t know where I was, and I didn’t know what was happening. I knew something important had happened, and it was just out of my grasp.

I popped the straw out of my mouth with my tongue, and asked, “Where am I?”

The man sighed, and pulled away the cup, putting it on a tray to his right.

“You’re at OST Headquarters. I’m unable to inform you of where that is currently, I’m unable to inform you of how long you will be here for, and I’m unable to inform you of why I can’t tell you either of those things. All classified. Also, I regret to inform you that your left arm has been broken in three places, and you have a concussion.”

He said all of this in a monotone, as if he had memorized a list of bullet points and was mentally checking them off one by one. By the look of him, I wouldn’t put that past him.

“Concussion?” I asked, grimacing as another wracking wave of pain and nausea hit me, “Do you have any painkillers?”

He grunted, reached back to his right, and passed me a dixie cup with several small red pills in it. I grabbed them with one hand, poured them into my mouth, and swallowed them dry.

“OK, so why am I here, and who are you?” I asked the man.

I heard a door shut quietly somewhere behind the man. A deeper voice from far away spoke, “He is Hans. I’m Major General Siegfried, the Head of Recruitment here at OST.” The voice continued talking as it got closer and closer: “You were trapped inside a time loop, and I was told to retrieve you. Unfortunately, due to lack of time, I had to force you out of the way of a vehicle. I am sorry for the pain.”

Funnily enough, the pain meds were already working. I wasn’t feeling the throb as much anymore. His words did shake something loose inside my head, though, and I remembered the past thirteen days. My eyes widened as I absorbed the information.

Oh shit. Time loop?

It fit, with all the information I had previously. Unless I was just going deeper and deeper into my own brain as a symptom of oncoming insanity, this made the most sense. I accepted it.

“OK, time loop. What caused it?”

Siegfried frowned, furrows deepening on his forehead.

“Well actually, we believe that you caused it. Within each instance, when you died, the world reverted back to how it was nearly exactly seven hours beforehand.”

“Cool,” I said, “Superpowers.”

Siegfried looked thrown off-guard for a moment before he responded.

“ …Yes, kind of, I guess. It’s more of an inherent trait or ability, or –“

“Superpowers,” I repeated, trying out the word, seeing how it felt in my mouth.

…

A resigned look came upon his face, and I continued, “So what’s the OST?”

“The OST, or Organization for Temporal Stability, is a group that attempts to find and counter anomalies in space-time whenever or wherever they appear. If the cause of the anomaly is a person, we offer to help them with their situation, and attempt to recruit them into the organization.” The words sounded like a speech, but Siegfried managed to inject the words with emotion, a stark contrast to the other guy, Hans.

“So,” I asked, irritated, “You guys are time cops?” The big man laughed, deep and hearty.

“Well, I guess you could call us that. Often-times it’s less crime that we clean up, more often its accidents, or even mistakes.”

“So why am I here?” I asked. Hans was quick to answer, even before the Major General could open his mouth.

“We’re recruiting you.”

Why?

I didn’t ask out loud. I knew they had told me something earlier, but I couldn’t remember what it was. Something about a time loop, something caused it. Was it me? I did know that I didn’t really know either of these men. I didn’t fully trust them.

It was probably the concussion, I was getting angrier and angrier as he spoke. I latched on to the one thing that could logically explain my anger - they had kidnapped me. In retrospect, I could almost consider their abduction a good thing, but in the moment - I was tired, I was angry, I was in pain, and I was confused. None of those combined to make a thoughtful and pragmatic Marc.

“You’re recruiting me? Isn’t that normally more of an interview thing than a kidnapping thing?” I asked rhetorically.

“Yes, well. You were trapped in a very significant type of loop. If I hadn’t gotten to you when I did, the loop would have continued, and you would continue to be stuck in that instance.”

“No I’m not gonna join your fucking club man! You kidnapped me! Why should I trust you?!”

Sadness pervaded the Major General’s eyes. He shook his head slowly, and started walking toward the door. Hans got up and followed him. Right before he left, the Major General turned back toward me and said quietly:

“Think on it a while.”