Chapter 4.

Evening was coming and the movie should be out at any moment. I was still confused about the man; I could swear that it was him; same outfit, same hair, and same secret agent look about him. My power should have stopped him in his tracks. By using it I was able to pause the world around me, but in fact that's not what I did. To do that would be an enormous task requiring a lot of energy. My actual ability helped me to move almost at a rate faster then time itself so that everything around me seemed to be frozen.

When we first discovered this my father and I experimented extensively. I could use the power to stop him with no troubles, even though he also had a sort of chronokinetic power. This made the man even more mysterious, either he knew I was coming and was able to transport himself, or he had immunity to my power that enabled him to move at the same rate I did. Either way it was looking more and more like he was following me or someone else from the gang at Sky High.

I heard familiar voices. Warren, Ethan and Zach exited the movie theater. Apparently, the others were visiting the bathrooms. Ethan looked depressed until he saw me. His face lit up and I wondered how I hadn't noticed his crush before. Warren brought up the rear, passive and expressionless as usual. Apparently I had been the only one completely offended by the movie. Now I would have to explain myself to them and ride home with an infatuated Ethan.

"Some movie," Ethan said his voice lost in the silence, "Where did you go?"

"I didn't want to watch anymore," I answered simply looking up at him from where I sat.

"What are you talking about girl, that movie was awesome," Zach said leaning from one side to the other, his hat perched ridiculously slanted on his head. I wondered if he was just bluffing but Magenta confirmed it to me.

She came out the door silently just in time to hear what Zach had said. With a cunning grin on her face she came up and pinched him on the side of his neck, whispering, I assumed a line from the movie in his ear. The effect was immediate. The tall boy jumped nearly a foot in the air and yelped like a little girl. Everyone started to laugh and the tension was eased for the moment.

Magenta repeated Ethan's question and sat down to me. I was vaguely surprised by her friendliness. "I couldn't stay and watch that, it was disgusting."

"Don't worry about it," Warren said suddenly stepping closer to us, "I forgot that you're better suited to snobby actors spouting love sonnets…maybe next time we can all go to the theater."

I took the jab silently, knowing that I deserved some kind of retribution for the comments I'd flung at him. Still I felt myself liking him less and less as I got to know him. Layla and Will joined us; I noticed they were not holding hands. Will looked green while the redhead just looked extremely put out.

"I went to get a refund for my ticket," Layla said, and for once I agreed with the results of her firm convictions. She crossed and offered the money to Magenta, "It's really your money Magenta."

"Don't worry about it Layla, just keep it. I liked the movie," Magenta said brightly and I didn't doubt it. She was a unique one, that was certain.

Soon everyone was breaking off and getting ready to go home. I joined Ethan and said goodbye to the rest. It was time to brave the ten minute ride home which I knew would seem much longer. I gazed across the parking lot mind whirling not with concerns about the mysterious secret agent or about Warren's comments but about what I'd say to Ethan. I didn't have to wait long. As soon as we parked in his driveway he turned to me words already tumbling from his mouth.

"Lydia, I know we've only…we haven't known each other very long but I've never felt this way about anyone before and…"

I interrupted before he could really embarrass himself, "Ethan," I faltered, completely unsure of what I should be saying, "I really appreciate having you for a friend…and right now I'm really not ready for anything else. Good night," and I darted across the yard to my house hoping that somehow my words were more comforting to him then they sounded in my own ears.

I fumbled with the key and opened the door to the house quickly. My heart was beating out of my chest like I had just escaped death. Silently I reprimanded myself, this was nothing worth getting all flustered about. The house was still empty and it made me angry. I spent the next day as pointlessly as any other making an obvious effort to avoid going outside. I just wished that Monday would come more quickly so I could have something to do.

My father didn't come home on Sunday either and it worried me a bit. At one point he was forced to be gone a week without telling me. Still I didn't use the phone number tattooed on my foot then, somehow I knew he'd come back. This time it felt vaguely different, as if he wouldn't. I tried to reassure myself that it was just fear speaking and busied myself unpacking all the boxes in the house during the day.

That night I collapsed on the bed with no thoughts save those about my dad. While I slept, fitful dreams and echoes of the past kept me awake all night. Near morning I had the most vivid recollection of all. It was almost as if I hadn't been sleeping.

I opened my eyes and he was sitting there at the side of my bed, reading a book I've long since forgotten the title of. He smiled when he saw I'd opened my eyes, but suddenly I knew that something was different. There was an unidentified scent in the air or something resting slightly on the tip of my tongue. Suddenly, I realized what it was, my room was different and instead of the sunny Californian sky outside I saw stormy clouds from the window.

My father almost read my mind and nodded with a smile playing on his lips. "I thought you'd know, but I wasn't sure," he said and seemed pleased that I had noticed this unexplainable phenomenon. "You see honey," he said laying his big hand over my small one, "Every time I help to change something back to the way it should be, some small event changes. This time I had to change an event that in turn changed where we moved last time," he paused wondering if I understood.

"You have a special gift, I have it also. Both of us are able to remember what happened before these changes take place. We can sense when someone has done something to change the past and in turn the future. If you didn't have that gift you wouldn't know that we had ever lived in California, you'd think we'd always been here in Washington."

I nodded, comprehension slowly seeping into my twelve-year old brain.

"Now that I know you have this gift, I can help you. Whenever this happens, I'll be here," he pointed to the chair beneath him, "To explain everything. If I'm not here," his voice grew suddenly serious, "Then you'll know something's gone wrong…and whatever you do, don't tell anyone about what's changed…even me. If I don't come to your bed but I'm in the house," his voice grew soft, "It'll be him."

At the time, I didn't quite understand everything my father told me. Later I would learn exactly what his words meant. He'd tell me more, give me advice on what to do if the worst should happen and he didn't come home. We worked out scenarios with my pausing ability to configure plans to keep me safe. He was always worried about my safety and rarely about his own. So now I know exactly how to tell when something's gone wrong.

Like that morning, I woke up and the wall across from me was painted yellow, instead of the light steel-blue it was before. The bookshelf was moved to a different wall and the room itself was different. Glancing out at the street, I could tell that it wasn't the same one, and Ethan most definitely did not live beside us anymore. I reached to my neck as I began breathing faster and faster. There on my neck was a strange piece of jewelry. This had to be a part of the dream. I was still asleep.

I opened my eyes again and waves of panic took over then and I stayed buried in the foreign white comforter. Hopefully, my father would come down the hall in a moment and wake me up, telling me he had been late from a mission. That was it, he had just forgotten to come sit next to the bed…he was late.

But he was never late; there was no excuse that would change what had happened. My father, my real father was gone and if I found someone like him in the house it would be Secondhand posing as Chrono. I took a few deep breaths, trying to calm myself, fingers toying with the necklace. My father's words came into my head.

"The first thing to do is make sure you know that he's an imposter. Wallace has bad vision and will be wearing contacts. Check the bathroom for wash and a contact case. If you find it you'll know…if he has his own bathroom wait until he's gone and then check it. There will be other signs, so be as aware as possible."

I was suddenly glad that my father had cared enough to tell me about these things, even if it scared me to death. Heart pounding, and all other problems forgotten, I got up from the bed and looked around. The room was clean, and many of my belongings were still there. The backpack on the floor was the same. A couple of new textbooks were in it, and the familiar ones looked more beat-up than usual.

I tried to give myself a pep talk. First I needed to act confident; if my "father" was a fake then he would sense discomfort. He would remember the past like me, but he'd expect me not to remember. I still had to go to school…maybe I could ditch, wait till he left the house and then search the bathrooms. "What then," I muttered aloud. I had no idea of how to save my father yet. The only thing to do was to walk out the bedroom door and discover what this alternate dimension was like. The things that changed might give me an idea as to what had happened.

The door creaked open and I stepped out into the hallway. The house was quite a bit larger than the one we had owned before. The floors were wood and led swiftly to a large living room, where a man sat reading a newspaper. He looked like my father, graying hair that had been a dark brown, but I knew better than to assume he was. He looked up, blue eyes shining and smiled. My father always smiled without teeth but this man was showing his pearly whites without a thought. I realized I must be staring.

"Morning," I said without a thought, my heart beating out of my chest.

"Good morning sweetie," he said and then turned back to his newspaper, "You better hurry or you'll be late for school."

"Course, school," I stood looking completely confused.

"Principal Powers won't be happy to see you in detention again if you are late to class."

I smiled inwardly, "Yup, I better get going," and turned back the way I had come. I threw on an outfit and then searched the closed doors next to mine for a bathroom. Apparently I still went to Sky High, though for one reason or another I had been getting detentions. I was almost sure the man in the living room was Walter Stevens and not Harold Stevens, my father. When I looked under the sink and found a bottle of contact solution I was even more confident.

I took a few deep breaths and gathered up my books from my room. There was a purse on the floor and I took that also, noting that there was a license and car keys in it. The necklace I had been toying with was a simple black leather choker with a round metal charm, in the middle an hourglass shape was punched out. I touched it with something bordering on familiarity. My father had told me some memories or feelings of the changed past might come to me even though I had not actually lived through it.

I tried to be discreet as I left the house but had no such luck, "Honey, don't forget to fill up the gas tank when you come home from school, it was pretty low when I brought it home this morning."

"K, dad...Where's the yellow pages? I need it for a school project," I was amazed at how easily the lies slipped from my mouth. If I was going to drive to school I'd need to know where it was. It was obvious to me that if I could drive a car there then it was located in a different place.

"It's on the kitchen counter I think."

AN: Thank you to all my reviewers, hopefully you all received my responses. To my anonymous reviewers: belle, blueglass25 and theriz, thank you so much for leaving a review, it's encouraging to hear from everyone.

To the numerous people who have asked, yes it is a Warren/OC but first and foremost it's an action/adventure story. You'll understand soon enough what I have in store, but be forewarned that their relationship is not going to be my first priority while writing. If this makes you want to quit reading, be my guest, but I'd ask that you give the story a chance. I take my time when developing a plot so there aren't going to be any instant answers.