The Night Bus
The man in the leather jacket sat at the bus stop and stared into space, his hands thrust into his pockets. His face was harsh, tough, his dark eyes darting about as if eternally searching for something just under his nose. Kate hadn't seen him at the bus stop before; it was usually just her, catching the night route 109 home from the office. Brixton to Croydon and back from Croydon to Brixton, five days a week. Every week. Her role was formally classified 'management consultancy and associated logistical services', but she just thought of it as 'the job'; a lone, skulking beast that chewed up her time and energy and spat her out again on a Friday evening, utterly exhausted.
There was a chill breeze in the air, a thick acrid tang of diesel, a distant low roaring and buzzing from the traffic a few miles away on Oxford Circus. Kate watched the high slanting towers of concrete on the indigo horizon, trying to make out the bottle-green dome of the Gherkin, or the slender bulb of the Post Office Tower. She was still peering into the sky when a sharp voice cut through her thoughts. "What year is it?" Kate turned to see the man in the leather jacket sitting on the bench, an almost inanely friendly grin across his face. She edged away, unnerved, but decided to answer out of sympathy anyway. "2004." The man in the leather jacket looked as if his pride had been wounded, a pugilistic frown appearing as he took out a device resembling a mobile phone and shook it roughly, as if trying to free a stuck coin. "Come on, don't give up on me like this…"
"What's the matter?" Kate said. The man in the leather jacket muttered tersely under his breath for a moment, then looked up. "What's wrong with 2004?" Kate asked. "'What's wrong with 2004?'" He repeated, mock-horrified. "Nothing." The man in the leather jacket shrugged casually. "Great year. You've got Facebook and the Olympics and McFly. Something for everyone, really. Just not the one I was aiming for…"
"Okaayy…" Kate said, stepping onto the night bus with a sigh of relief. It was oddly busy, she thought. Lots of businessmen in suits, identically dressed. Pinstripes and umbrellas. Late night in the City, she guessed. Or a stag night, maybe. That was probably it. Probably… The bus was silent as it drove east, save for the drone of the engine, regular and comforting, like the purrs of a sleeping kitten.
It took a moment before she saw the man in the leather jacket sitting beside her, staring out of the window with arms folded bullishly. "Where are you going?" She said, curious now. "You know when you think you've run out of toothpaste? So you squeeze the tube a bit more, keep going, and a great lump of the stuff flies off into the sink?" The stranger spoke quickly, urgently. Kate nodded. "Bit like the time vortex. You think you know how much temporal energy is dispersed throughout the twenty-first century, then-bam!" The man in the leather jacket's voice rose to a crescendo. He had a strong Northern accent- somewhere between Manchester and Sheffield, Kate guessed.
"Massive wave of time energy, whacking huge blip of the stuff somewhere round here. You wouldn't happen to have seen any aliens, would you? Little green men? No?" The man in the leather jacket trailed off, disappointed. At that moment, there was a strange uniform clicking, like a thousand fountain pens in the hands of nervous secretaries, and the businessmen stood in unison. They turned towards Kate and the man in the leather jacket, surrounding them.
The man in the leather jacket looked almost comically surprised, gaping open-mouthed with shock. "No, no, no…" The closest businessman spoke with a low growl. "We are the Maldrak." In a single motion, all the businessmen reached towards their faces. Then they tore off their eyes, ripping the horizontal strip of flesh bridging both pupils and the upper nose away like papier-mache. Beneath there was nothing, a swirling black void. Kate gulped, a sudden surge of nausea rising to the back of her throat.
"Very impressive." The man in the leather jacket beamed, "you should try that trick at parties. I bet it goes down really well with the in-laws at Christmas-" There was a barked order and two of the businessmen wrestled his arms into a painful lock. "Oy, careful with that-" The leader snatched the mobile phone-like device away. "We shall feed on this planet. Its temporal energies shall sustain our life cycle for centuries. This dimension will crumble into dust and its people shall become our slaves." The businessman pointed the small machine at the man in the leather jacket, fumbling with the controls. "And we will begin by using your own time loop instigator against you."
The man in the leather jacket looked concerned. "You're holding it the wrong way round…" The businessman cackled. "You lie!" He flicked a switch, and a bolt of lightning arced backwards from the device. It struck the businessman in the chest at point-blank range, sending violet sparks everywhere. There was a blinding scarlet flash, a deafening bang, and Kate felt very tired…
She woke to find the man in the leather jacket standing a little way off, fiddling with the mobile phone. "What happened?" She said. "Not much." The man shrugged airily. "That lot should have listened, really. The time loop bounced back and trapped them. Now-" he tapped the device with satisfaction- "they're stuck in here. Permanently." This struck Kate as a little mean. "Are you really going to keep them there forever?" She recognised the huddled line of trees nearby, the murky silhouette of the Thames. "We're in Hyde Park!"
"Yep, top marks. As for the Maldrak…forever? Maybe. Can't risk them getting out again. No second chances. Best to be on the safe side." His words were calm, but his gaze had hardened, become distant and cold. "Are you alright?" Kate said. There was a tinge of sadness behind the light bluster, like a gentle gust of air concealing the lurking fury of a hurricane.
"Yeah. I'm fine. Just…"
"What?"
"The world you live in. You think it's all so safe, so predictable. You go to work every morning, come home every night. It'll all change one day, just you see. Anything's possible. I know, because I've been out there. I've seen planets torn apart, their cores reduced to molten flames, their skies burning with magma. You take this all for granted. Don't." The man in the leather jacket gave a brisk smile. "Goodbye." He said, and walked away through the park. After a second Kate realised he was stepping into a tall blue box with 'POLICE' stencilled in glowing letters along the top. She guessed he was going to call the police, get them to clear up the bus or something like that. The man in the leather coat paused in the doorway, gave a silhouetted wave. Kate waved back. Then he ducked through into the box and was gone. Kate shivered in the cold, pulled her coat tight around her and began the long walk home.