"So you'd never been here until you met me?" asked Tommy as he sat at a table in the Factory with Merton.
Merton shook his head, "I'd never really been anywhere until I met you. My idea of a good night would be being able to watch videos in the lair without Becky interrupting to tell me to keep the noise down. That's still a good night actually, but I like doing this too now." He stood up and waved to someone at the other side of the room. Tommy turned around to see the girl he had met before, Lori. She made her way through the crowds of teenagers and sat down at their table. Tommy got up to get her a drink.
"Is he any better?" asked Lori, concerned.
Merton shook his head, "He's still past Tommy," he explained, "I don't know why, I just wish I could figure out why this is happening."
"I know what you mean, when he went back to normal last time I thought it might be all over but it seems to begetting worse and worse, how long has it been now?"
Merton checked his watch, "Almost six hours since he ran out of class," he said,
Lori frowned, "That's the longest yet, what if it keeps getting longer and longer until we never see our Tommy again?"
"I don't know, I've thought of that." Merton screwed up his forehead in worry, "I don't think it will, but if I'm honest that's just because I hope it won't. We don't know this is the longest yet though, because he was still past Tommy when he walked home from the lair that night. All we know is that he was our Tommy again when we saw him the next day, he could have changed at any time during the night."
"I hate this," whispered Lori, watching Tommy picking his way back to their table with his hands full of drinks, "I just want him back to normal."
Merton nodded, that was all he wanted too. He wanted his Tommy back, the one that would talk to him because he wanted too, not because he had too, the one that didn't care what other people thought of him, but not the one that kissed him, not in public anyway.
Where had that thought come from?
They talked all night, mostly about Tommy and all the things he would do between the time he was from and the present. Merton decided telling him things wouldn't effect the timeline because Tommy wouldn't be able to remember when he got home. He wanted to make his friend feel more at ease, he knew what it was like to have people think of you as a freak, and to think of yourself in the same way, he just wanted Tommy to realise that he wasn't an evil monster.
Tommy didn't seem that convinced. Telling him about everything he had done obviously didn't have the same effect as actually doing it, Tommy just couldn't see past the fangs and fur.
They didn't leave until the Factory was beginning to close, no one felt like going home, Merton to a room full of books that couldn't tell him anything about how to help Tommy, Lori to homework and worry and Tommy to a house full of people that he was keeping a terrifying secret from.
The streets of Pleasentville, like any other streets anywhere in the world, always changed dramatically at night. Even the most calm and happy part of town could become something dark and foreboding. People used to a place tend not to notice it as easily, but to a stranger an unknown town at night is a terrifying place where anything can happen. Mrs Green stopped her car and looked around, pulled the scrap of paper out of her handbag and consulted the directions she had written there earlier as her sister explained over the telephone. She was so excited, she hadn't seen her sister for almost fifteen years, they had lost touch completely and then, suddenly, out of the blue she had called. It looked like she was in the right place, Pleasentville. She shrugged her shoulders as she buttoned up her coat, it didn't look that pleasant to her, anyone could be hiding in those trees. She wished she could have arrived earlier but it had been such a long drive and she had had so much to do.
She locked the door to the car and rested her handbag on her shoulder, keeping the scrap of paper in her hand to be sure she got the right house number. Making sure to look both ways on the deserted road, she stepped out, but felt a hand on her shoulder. She half turned, yelping in surprise at the evil look in the eye of the man she was facing. He was in his late twenties, he had stubble on his face that he hadn't shaved for days and one hand was in the pocket of his jacket, possibly holding a knife or even a gun.
"Give me your bag and your keys." he said in a low voice.
Mrs Green knew what she should do in a situation like this, give the attacker everything he wanted, don't do anything to antagonise him. Do everything he says. She knew what she should do, but knowing what to do and doing it were two very different things.
She screamed
She screamed louder than she had ever screamed in her life, louder than she had ever thought she could scream. Her terror was so absolute that she couldn't even bring herself to make her fingers to drop the bag. She just looked into the eyes of her attacker and screamed.
Suddenly someone else appeared, he moved faster than anyone she had ever seen, before she knew it the attacker was laying on the floor unconscious. Next to her was a boy and a girl, looking concerned.
"Are you all right ma'am?"
She nodded and realised she was shaking uncontrollably. The man lay unmoving on the floor by her feet. "Is he…?"
The boy dressed all in black with black, spiky hair shook his head, "He's just unconscious," he said, "Is there anywhere we can take you?"
She nodded again, "I was going to my sister's, that house there." she pointed to one of the houses across the road with a trembling finger.
"You go with her Merton, call the police, Tommy and I will stay with her and make sure he doesn't get away." said the girl.
Merton helped her across the empty road and Lori turned to Tommy, "You can come out now," she said.
Tommy jumped silently down from one of the trees and landed on the floor next to the would be mugger. "That was pretty cool." He said.
Lori nodded and grinned back at him, "See, now do you get what Merton was saying? You're a good werewolf."
"Yeah, I guess I am." Tommy smiled, maybe his future wasn't so terrible after all.
Merton finished telling Tommy the story of his past self saving the old woman and Tommy smiled, "See, all my selves are heroes." He said. He had suddenly found himself on the outskirts of the park standing with Lori next to an unconscious man. Lori had explained what had happened, and when he got back from making sure the old woman was all right, Merton had given him the same explanation, only embellishing it with dramatic hand movements and sound effects. Tommy couldn't help but smile at his friend's enthusiasm and he was pleased that past Tommy had gone home not hating what he was going to become, but it bothered him that he had lost almost an entire day to his past self and he didn't want it to happen again.
"I don't know whether you'll have to worry about that any more." Merton told him, "You returned and your past self left almost as soon as he realised he didn't have to fear his future, or at least that's how it sounded to me. I don't know for certain of course, but it's possible that he just had to realise that and now he won't come back again." He was making it up, of course, but he made up so many things and nine out of ten times he was right. Plus he was sure he saw a similar plot in a movie once, he just couldn't remember what it was. "Were you feeling uncertain about the future this time last year?" he asked
Tommy stared at Merton trying to decide what to say. He settled on shaking his head and staring at Merton, waiting for him to say something else. "We'll just have to wait and see what happens," Merton told him, "but I'm 99 percent sure he won't be back.
Tommy seemed satisfied by the explanation and he relaxed slightly, but Lori wasn't convinced. "That doesn't make any sense." she decided, "If past Tommy went back to the past not remembering anything, you don't remember travelling to the future about a year ago do you Tommy?" Tommy shook his head, "Then what would be the point in him finding out how great it is to be a werewolf when he's just going to forget it all as soon as he gets home anyway?"
Merton frowned, "No idea," he admitted finally, "but it's as good an explanation as any. If he doesn't come back we'll know that could have been it."
Tommy sighed, "Your explanations are getting flakier and flakier, Merton. One of these days you're going to be wrong." Merton looked away, realising he had been found out and Tommy smiled to himself at the look of embarrassment on the smaller boy's face but trying to force out of his mind the idea that his friend looked cute like that. He felt more and more confused by the way that he was feeling, but that didn't matter. No matter what, he knew that if anything happened to Merton he would never forgive himself. Ever.
Merton cleared his throat and looked back up to meet Tommy's gaze. Tommy looked down, hoping his friend hadn't realised he had been staring. "Hopefully not today though," Merton said, "now all we've got to figure out is what your future self wants, then hopefully we won't hear anything from him for a while either."
"Well that should be easy enough," Tommy told him, "he wants to save your life."