MaLu uses time travel shitfuckery. It's very effective. People are silent in reaction. There are no reviews. MaLu is sad. MaLu puts more angst in story. ;) (Is the review button broken again? I see the amount of clicks, so I will ask for reviews even though I dislike doing it).
Thanks to Aimofdestiny for the beta.
Carefully, Sarah opened the B&B's front door and spotted Claudia in the hall, talking to a taller man. The caretaker met the time traveler's gaze. Sarah pointed at her Tesla and mouthed 'danger'. In reaction, the redheads eyes widened and she went on speaking with the tall guy in the hall, apparently desperately trying to look casual.
"What does he look like?" Sarah hissed at Paul.
Oh, I don't know. He has aged a lot, I've only found one picture of him where he's already around 50. I would say he has been brunet, short, maybe he had acne. He must have been 24 back then. The writer could almost hear her brother shrug.
She concluded that the person Claudia was talking to couldn't be Kurt Parker, because he was blonde and tall.
Now, Sarah forced herself to stay calm. She was no detective or investigator. Only a writer. What would Susan, her protagonist detective, do in a case like this? Well, she would probably be reasonable as always and not walk straight with a gun to the suspect, but maybe flash her badge to ask him some questions.
So the time traveler lowered her Tesla and reached for Steve's badge - ATF, not Secret Service - instead. She heard a noise upstairs and again looked at Claudia. While still talking to the tall delivery guy, the caretaker showed her two fingers. Then she secretly pointed at the man right in front of herself so he couldn't see it and then only raised her thumb.
Sarah nodded. There was only one more person in the B&B. And considering that Claudia was looking up at the ceiling rather often while talking, Sarah concluded that he must be upstairs.
So the girl took the stairs and already heard a person working in one of the rooms, probably Myka's (Sarah wasn't sure. Her parents hadn't lived in the B&B during her lifetime, after all).
In the room, Sarah met a short, brunet and young man who seemed to struggle to arrange the mattress with all the shelves and the bed in the room.
"Kurt Parker?" Sarah carefully asked. The man froze, let go of the mattress and turned around.
"Yes?" He gave back, looking sheepishly over his glasses. But still, he had some kind of grin in his face. He was clearly... high.
A few minutes later, the suspect sat at the B&B's dinner table, looking awkwardly at his hands while Sarah gave him a thorough look. He also looked very nervous, but the writer couldn't find anything about him that caused her to worry. She just had the feeling that she knew his face. Claudia was standing right behind her. The tall guy she had been talking with was one of the McKenzie brothers. He had said he would wait for them in the living room.
"Well, Kurt." Sarah said in a serious tone of voice. "I do know you have a smaller stone. Something that maybe makes you happy or something like that. Something that makes you feel good. And well, there's something about it. You cannot keep it. It's dangerous."
Good talk to a confused suspect. Paul commented on her speech. I'd have said the same.
"I don't have anything like this." Kurt replied, avoiding her eyes. Sarah was good in reading body language so she didn't even need Steve's skill find out that he wasn't telling the truth.
"Kurt." The time traveller sighed. "I really don't want to frisk you." She smiled as she spotted a necklace around his neck. "Maybe you could just... show me your necklace instead."
He winced and closed his eyes for a brief moment. "I want to talk to my lawyer."
Claudia took a step into his direction. "Listen, kid. We aren't here to arrest you or anything. There's something about that stone that can get really dangerous for you. We only want to help you. And then you're free to go wherever you want."
"That's it?" Kurt looked warily at her, narrowing his eyes.
"Yes, that's it, Kurt." The caretaker assured him and smiled carefully.
"Okay." The man replied and took off his necklace. Sarah raised an eyebrow. That was it? Everything? One and a half day of time travel for this? Kurt reached out his hand with the necklace for her. The time traveller just stared at him, confused. Why was this so easy? There was something wrong! Something had to complicate these things.
"Steve, I think you should take the artifact, since you're...You know..." Claudia shrugged.
The other woman looked at her, surprised. "Alright." She replied, still pondering what she was missing. Carefully surveying every step she was doing, Sarah put on gloves and reached out her hand for the necklace. She opened her hand, so that Kurt could drop the artifact in it. Euphoria was an orange gem, Sarah tilted her head while watching it fall into her hand, followed by the necklace. She still had a strange feeling. She knew that guy, she really did.
The stone landed in her hand, its necklace still connected to Kurt's hand. For the part of a second, Sarah stirred. She wasn't sure if she had actually seen that small spark making its way from the stone up to the necklace. Had it been static energy?
Confused, she looked into Kurt's eyes, which had widened. He grinned like he was getting high again. There was something utterly creepy about his smile. Something disgusting. The way he now looked at her. Quickly, the writer pulled out a static bag and dropped the artifact into it. More sparks, all three people had to duck and cover and then the artifact was neutralised. Kurt looked at Sarah, the glisten of his eyes that had made him look high had disappeared. Now he looked a little unsettled, maybe he was struggling with his addiction.
The time traveller placed the artifact on the table.
"That's it, Paul?" She asked loudly.
I don't know. You seem to have snagged the artifact. Congratulations! Her brother replied happily.
No, that couldn't be it. Why were her parents frozen in stone? Why had she lost the artifact again after this had happened? Why did she have the feeling to know Kurt?
Sarah looked at him again. The guy was young,... she pondered this. Maybe... maybe she had to try to imagine what he would look like older. What...
Her eyes widened. She quickly took a few steps back, breathing anxiously.
"Paul, can you maybe get access to Kurt Parker's bank account?" She asked, her voice shaking.
What do you mean? Her brother asked confusedly. He started typing.
"Can you?" She demanded to know emphatically.
I'm already in. He replied in his monotonous, but still confused tone of voice.
Claudia raised an eyebrow, approaching the time traveller. "What's going on?"
"Did he buy a bus ticket to Univille in the last days?" Sarah closed her eyes.
What are you implying?
"Did he?!" The writer now asked louder.
Yes. Paul replied. Oh, hell!
Sarah cursed and spun around to look at Claudia.
"My family is frozen in stone, they all were in the Warehouse at once. Why? They don't tend to be all there so easily. Somebody must have lured them there. Somebody who knows about the Warehouse. Who is good at finding information." She explained to the caretaker. "Paul, there is another thing!" She suddenly said, because it had come to her mind. "You said he is a techy! Tell me, Paul. You said you haven't had time to check if the device for the time machine drop is actually working properly. And it didn't. Where did you get that device from?"
I was in Sioux Fall the evening before yesterday and got it from a guy I met on the internet. I worked on it with him. Paul replied. Stayed all night, came home in the morning. Been late. You got mad at me.
"Don't you think it's actually quite a coincidence that somebody suddenly has this device for you in 2044 exactly the day before I travel back in time to 2014?"
Paul was silent. He seemed to think.
"Somebody wants me to be here. To exactly find this artifact right now. Somebody wants that I am here, that I find the Euphoria artifact and meet Kurt Parker."
Kurt Parker? Now that I think properly about it, it's telling me something as well. She suddenly heard Julia's voice in her head. Wait, isn't that the guy who sent you creepy fanmail?
"I'm a writer." Sarah whispered surprisedly. "Three years ago, my book became successful. Three years ago, Kurt Parker's company moved to New York. Where I live. Somebody looked for me until they found me. I'm a successful writer. They had to find me to make sure that I'm here today, meeting Kurt." She looked up at Claudia. "It's a trap."
"Sarah Bering-Wells!" Claudia looked amusedly at her. "Well, at first: Wonderful Star Wars reference! But... don't you think you're overreacting a little bit? I mean, you're obviously your mothers' daughter, I get that now, the deduction skills are definitely working a little bit too-"
"I don't know, Claudia." Sarah shot a glimpse at Kurt Parker, who had carefully reached out a hand for the artifact bag. His hands was closing around it while he watched them warily. "All I know is that you just told the suspect my name."
Quickly, Sarah reached for her Tesla. She was fast, she was incredibly fast, but Sarah had problems aiming due to her usual body height difference to Steve. When she had figured it out, Kurt had already ducked under the table. The stun gun's flash didn't get him. The time traveller braced herself to fight him while she watched Claudia spinning around from the corner of her eye.
Parker jumped out of his hideout, quickly tackling the caretaker, who landed in the writer's arms. They struggled shortly with each other, Sarah almost fell over. The suspect ran, but instead of going outside, he ran upstairs.
"Why is he doing that?" Sarah asked loudly while trying to get rid of Claudia's body weight.
"Maybe he has actually forgotten something up there! I don't know, Sarah." The caretaker grunted.
Sarah straightened herself up, holding Steve's Tesla clutched tightly while approaching the stairs slowly. Suddenly, Claudia was gone. "Listen, dude." The time traveller heard her voice from upstairs. "I really don't know what you're now up to, but I have a gun and I can teleport and you had better not fight me."
And then, suddenly, the world broke apart in Sarah's mind. Paul had been quiet for some time to give Sarah the opportunity to think properly. But now he whispered:
What kind of aura is this?
There was some sort of rustling noise inside her head and then she heard a small How did you get in...? From Paul, before there was the noise of a firing Tesla. Sarah had heard this particular noise so often, she could tell it was one. Julia screamed, surprised, and then there was the noise of something heavy falling down. A suffocated sob escaped Adelaide's throat. The writer heard everything, but couldn't do anything, because she currently sat completely motionless in the time machine. She was in the past, listening to the future breaking apart.
"Julia! Paul! Adelaide!" She yelled, on the middle of the staircase, paying attention to what was happening inside her head and not to what was happening around her. It had been a trap, everything that had happened this day she was experiencing now, it had already happened. It lead to the current events in the future.
"Dude, that's a knife." Sarah heard Claudia from upstairs. "Better be careful with that." There were suddenly fighting noises from their direction, the caretaker's grunts and yelps while she fought Kurt Parker. And there were still noises inside her head. Something heavy was shoved over the ground.
Sarah. Julia sobbed. He has done something to Paul! Paul's unconscious!
The time traveller only knew of one explanation for that: A Tesla. An intruder in the Warehouse - how had he managed to come inside? People had to get introduced... but Adelaide had introduced Julia this morning. There had always been this problem adjusting this small ceremony. Sarah cursed internally. He had a Tesla. Why did he have a Tesla?
Better be quiet now, silly girl. The girl heard a male, older voice in her head. Or the same will happen to you. And you, lady, don't you dare move!
Still being mesmerised by all the impressions she had to handle, the writer listened to the fighting noises from upstairs and to what was happening in her mind. Her view fell on her own hand, holding the stun gun clutched tightly. Everything that happened today has already happened, she realised again. Why did the intruder of the Warehouse in the future have a Tesla?
"Because I have one." Sarah whispered breathlessly.
There was a new noise from upstairs and suddenly, the time traveler faced Kurt Parker jumping down the stairs, right into her arms. He tackled her and both of them fell down the stairs. Sarah grunted, as she made forceful contact with the ground. She felt her shoulder crack loudly - pain flooding it immediately. Her hand opened automatically in reaction to the pain, letting go off the Tesla. Kurt had fallen onto her, and it seemed Steve's bulk had softened his fall. The man stood up, made a grab for the stun gun that lay on the ground and then ran away.
Sarah was still preoccupied with the agony in her shoulder. She stared up the stairs, trying to tell Steve's body how to breathe properly. Claudia appeared on the highest step of the stairs, holding her forearm. She bled.
"He took the door to the backyard. Are you alright?" The caretaker fretted. Sarah wasn't able to speak through the pain. Instead, her eyes widened.
"Better be following him by teleporting." Claudia nodded and then disappeared.
Sarah lay on the ground. It was quiet now inside her mind. There was only the noise of a chair being pulled back and somebody sitting down.
Hello Sarah Bering-Wells. An older Kurt Parker greeted her inside her head.