OUT NOW: Night of the Unexpected!

Jim and Sam are friends. One rainy night, the two men are riding on a bus on their way to a party...

SCI-FI HORROR OR WHEREVER IT TAKES US!

In February to March 2026, thirty-six of the Harvey Duckman and Robinson House Writers signed up for a Round Robin Challenge to take it in turns to write an instalment each, and with just the overall brief (as above), the last three sentences from the previous writer and 48-hours in which to submit their part, our awesome writers came up with this fantastic story.

Many thanks to everyone who has contributed!

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NIGHT OF THE UNEXPECTED

A SCI-FI HORROR STORY

Chapter 1 by Phil Sculthorpe

Jim looked at his friend in amazement. “You’re not going to eat that chocolate bar, are you?”

“Why not?” asked Sam.

“Because you found it on the floor.”

Sam raised his eyes heavenwards. His friend was too fussy by far.

“I didn’t find it on the floor, I found it on the bus seat. I saw it just before I sat on it.”

“But you don’t know how long it’s been there.”

“Well, it can’t have been long, can it? Otherwise somebody else would have picked it up by now. It’ll be fine. Do you want half?”

“No way,” said Jim, “you’ve no idea if there’s anything wrong with it.”

“The wrapper’s intact,” insisted Sam, “it’s not been opened; it’s okay.” However, once he’d torn the paper off, he gave the bar a good sniff, to make sure.

“What does it smell of?”

“Duh! chocolate,” said Sam, with exaggerated scorn, before swallowing it in two bites. “Very tasty,” he added.

Neither said anything for half a minute. They were both wondering whether it had been worth coming out on such a rainy night to head for a party they had only heard about through a friend, and to which they weren’t specifically invited.

“How many more stops?” asked Jim.

“Not sure,” said Sam, looking out the window, “I can’t work out where we are.”

They had been on the bus around fifteen minutes, so Jim reckoned somewhere close to Bradley Park.

“What are those flashing lights in the sky?” Sam suddenly said. “Red, green, blue…”

Jim, on the aisle seat, couldn’t see anything out of the rain-streaked window. Certainly not flashing lights. An awful thought occurred to him. “You don’t think there was something in that chocolate? You don’t think somebody injected something into it for a joke? Sam, are you alright, you’ve gone very pale.”

“Those flashing lights,” Sam answered him, “they’re a flying saucer. Look.”

“Bloody hell,” Jim shouted, falling into a panic, “I knew that chocolate bar would be dodgy. I’ll have to get the driver to stop the bus. We need to get you to a hospital.”

“Look!” commanded Sam, and he pulled his friend closer to the window.

All Jim could do was utter, “Oh my God,” with genuine awe.

He had been right about them being near Bradley Park. They were driving past it. And right in the middle of Bradley Park a gigantic flying saucer was landing. Shaped like something from a 1950’s sci-fi film, red, green, and blue lights flashed around its circumference.

Jim pulled back, aware his friend had begun to breathe horribly stertorously. Sam’s eyes were glazing over. He looked to be in a trance. When Sam spoke, there was a strange echo to his voice, as if he was talking through a cheap microphone.

“They put the chocolate bar there.”

It was as if Sam was speaking to himself, trying to work out what was happening to him. “They somehow placed it on the seat for me to find. They knew I would eat it. There must have been alien technology, or a celestial mind drug, or something like that, in the bar. Whatever it was, it allows the crew of the flying saucer to communicate with me. I can hear them in my head… they’re speaking directly to me, right now.”

Jim had hardly the breath to get his words out. In a hoarse whisper, he asked his friend, “What are they saying?”

Chapter 2 by Adam Stone

Sam closed his eyes, concentrating hard. He was acutely aware of his body. Hands clasped, palms damp. A cruel tightness across the back of his neck, and the fluttering feeling in the chest that comes with a swift kick of adrenaline. He focused his attention beyond the discomfort, trying to tune in to the voices. Were there two, or three? It was hard to tell. They were all speaking at once, and then suddenly they coalesced and together gave him a clear message.

“We can’t go to the party,” Sam gasped.

Jim stared at him, dumbfounded. He wanted to ask: Why in hell not? But something in Sam’s face told him that wasn’t the right thing to say. His friend was dead serious and Jim wasn’t sure which was more worrisome… that Sam was hearing voices in his head, or that he believed what they were telling him.

“Look…” Jim spoke gently, maintaining eye contact in a way that he hoped conveyed sympathy. “We’ve come a long way already. But it’s just a party. There will be others. When we get to our stop, we can just stay on the bus if you want. Or catch one going the other way.”

Sam shook his head. “By then it will be too late.”

Too late for what? “I’m not sure I am tracking…” Jim said.

“We have to get off at the next stop. And then we’re going to have to get some guns. Or something. Any kind of weapons we can get our hands on. Probably some supplies, too. Water, food, whatever medical stuff we can find.”

Medical stuff? Jim leaned back in his seat and thought about how long he’d known Sam, how much he even knew about him, really. The obvious thing to do was to get as far away from this guy as possible, as soon as it was practical to do so. If the voices in Sam’s head were telling him to gather an arsenal – for what, exactly? – Jim wanted to be in another county before whatever-that-was started hitting the fan.

Chapter 3 by Irene Lewis

Jim’s thoughts were instantly ejected from his mind with a bolt of pain as his body suddenly lurched forward and his chest hit the metal rail of the seat in front. Why had the driver slammed the bus to a dead stop? Jim would soon realise that the obvious and practical thing to do would have been to never have got on that bus with Sam in the first place. Foresight was a wonderful thing but hindsight was even better. It seemed that the ‘whatever-that-was’ thought he’d had only a few seconds earlier had come into the here and now. Unfortunately for Jim, in the here and now, it was too late to escape anywhere.

Suddenly the doors of the now stationary bus ripped open wide. Jim, on high alert, screamed to Sam. “What the hell is happening?” Yet somehow he was unsurprised to see that his friend was weirdly calm. “Sam? Shit! You know about this! What’s going on?”

Sam’s eyes widened as he turned to meet Jim’s. He placed a finger to Jim’s lips and whispered, “Shhh, it’s started. It’s going to be okay, Jim. We’re in this together, mate.” Then he mouthed slowly and clearly, “Trust me.”

It was quick and quiet. No questions. No introductions. No shouted demands from the two huge, combat-clad, heavily armed men who were heading directly for them both. The rain was torrential now as Jim was pushed roughly from the bus onto the shiny wet road. In this position, Jim couldn’t avoid noticing the reflecting hot red and silver white lights shining from the military blockade that had forced the bus to a stop. Jim was scared and knew better than to protest and fight against it. But why was he the one on the unforgiving, cold hard ground being handcuffed and Sam wasn’t? Where was his friend?

Where was Sam?

Jim began to feel the fear and panic rise. Should he prepare himself for a deadly bullet in the back of his head right now, this second and for no reason? No? Thank God! There was only momentary relief as Jim was catapulted onto his feet. Relief turned to disbelief. Disbelief and a numbing realisation. The bus, the party, everything before this point had all been an elaborate set up. A set up that unbelievably Sam was a part of, deliberately luring him into it. Jim was beyond raging. All he could do right then was chance that his so-called friend was within earshot. Jim had just enough time to yell abuse and numerous expletives before he was forcibly gagged. He felt better after that even though he knew it was unlikely Sam would have heard.

As the soldiers dragged him toward the back of one of the blockade trucks, Jim just caught a glimpse of Sam climbing into a mysterious unmarked car with an even more mysterious, smartly dressed female. Why would the military and government be interested in the imaginary voices Sam claimed to hear, warning him to gather an arsenal? Jim was seething; he swore if he ever saw him again he’d smash the git’s head in, then he remembered the words Sam had mouthed, ‘Trust me’…

Chapter 4 by Mary F Carr

Well, that was all well and good but he was the one being roughed up and thrown in a lorry while Sammy boy got the flash car and the even flasher woman. Trust the man hearing the voices…? Jim didn’t think so! He guessed he was on his own now.

The back of the lorry was dark – even darker when the doors clanged shut. He groped for a seat and someone swore and kicked him.

“Hey,” he protested.

“Leave it out, Richmond. He’s a ‘catched’… not one of them.”

“So, tell him to keep his hands to himself then,” Richmond rumbled.

A match flared, lighting up a scarred face, now puffing on a fat cigar. She had close cropped hair and a gold tooth. The air of capability about her was not reassuring. She jabbed the cigar at Richmond.

“Help him up then, it’s going to be a long journey.”

Richmond growled but reached out a large paw and grabbed him up by the scruff of his neck and dumped him on the bench seat that ran the length of the lorry. As Jim’s eyes adjusted to the dark, he saw there was a third man in the corner huddled in a blanket.

“That’s Simeon, he got ‘catched’ yesterday. I’m Quinn – I’m in charge back here. What’s yer name?”

“Jim.” His voice went high as the lorry hit a pot hole and he fell against the unmoveable object that was Richmond. “Do you know where we’re going?”

“One of the holding camps.”

“But I haven’t done anything,” he whined.

Quinn gave him a withering look.

“Seriously, I was just trying to get to a party with my friend Sam. Then he went a bit mad.”

“Mad?”

“Sam was hearing little voices in his head telling him to build an arsenal,” Jim said, “then this woman took him off in a flash car and I got thrown in this truck.”

Quinn, who was obviously the leader of these rebels, gold tooth glinting in the light of her cigar, whistled and shook her head, saying ominously, “He’s tapped in to the prophets… your friend’s been press ganged by the government.”

“The government?” Jim gasped and felt the panic rising as the woman muttered, “Hopefully – or he really is in trouble.”

Chapter 5 by J.R. Whitbourn

“What? Surely not?” said Jim.

Flows of cigar smoke turned and tumbled in turbulent flows till, with a single decisive exhale, Quinn blew both them and Jim away. “There’s worse things out there than the government, Jim. Much worse.”

“How? Who?” was all Jim could muster in reply.

“Where there’s prophets, there’s an end time,” was all she added. Her concentration instead was focused on looking out of the windows. Where the hot dry heat of the cigar spilled over the fogged up window, the condensation had burnt-off leaving a view out into the night. Out into a coming storm.

Jim thought back to his original plans for the evening. The party felt so far away now, and so long ago. The view out of the window was as dark as his mood.

“Just don’t ask me why too,” she added, “because we’ve got things we need to do. Starting with working out if we can trust you. I’ve got a quiz for you. You’ll need to get it one hundred percent right to work with us. Sounds tricky, right? Well, it’s not, because there’s only one question. Can we trust you?”

Jim took a moment to think. Was that the question? Quinn was stroking the barrel of her gun pointedly and with it pointed right at him. Truth be told, Jim knew it made her point for her.

“Glad you’re taking care to think it through, no resits allowed. Or possible,” added Quinn.

“You can trust me,” replied Jim with what he hoped was some measure of calm.

“Right answer, so let’s go get your friend Sam back… if he’s been talking to the prophets about weapons then we need to talk to him. Doomsday is on its way, Jim, and it’s not waiting about for us or the government,” said Quinn as she pivoted out of the truck seat and out into the night.

Chapter 6 by H Wible

Quinn had already gone barrelling down the road, leaving Jim in the truck. He hopped out, shut the door behind him, and hurried to catch up with the woman.

“We’re getting him now?” Jim asked, unsure of her decision.

“Weren’t you paying attention?” she asked. Still, she stomped down the road, her head held high.

“I was, but shouldn’t we come up with a plan?”

“We don’t have time for a plan! Get it together.”

And so, Jim listened. He knew there was no hiding from the inevitable. His head hung low, and he followed the rhythmic thump of Quinn’s steps. The whole world rested on their shoulders, but he cared more about the fate of his friend.

Jim and Quinn walked the length of the road in silence. Once the house came into view, Quinn stopped. She gave Jim a look so serious that it made his stomach drop.

“Let me do the talking,” she said.

“Are you sure?”

Quinn nodded. She turned around, headed up the stairs with her fists clenched at her sides. Jim lingered behind her, unsure of what to expect. Her knuckles rapped against the hard oak door. No lights were on, and not a sound escaped from the confines of the home. The door creaked open. Darkness stared back at them. Quinn took a small step back, causing Jim to do the same. The hair on Jim’s neck stood straight up, and a cold sweat covered the length of his body. He swallowed the spit that accumulated in his mouth and fought the immediate urge to run.

“…Sam?”

That wasn’t Sam, no… it couldn’t have been.

“What are you seeing?” Quinn whispered.

“That’s Sam.” Jim pointed ahead.

“No… No, that’s… Jim, I don’t see anything,” Quinn responded.

She was wrong. How could Quinn be so wrong? Sam was right there, standing in front of them. Jim tried to step toward his friend, but Quinn told him that he was seeing things: that his mind was playing tricks on him.

“The prophets are toying with us – it’s like they want the world to end.”

Chapter 7 by Louise Ewing

Cassandra looked at the three of them standing there in front of her.

Sam grinned and she grinned back and gave him a wave. If it hadn’t been for that she’d have been right narked by the delay in her schedule. She was on her way to a hot date and didn’t want to be late. Having never been on any kind of date before, never mind a high temperature one, and she was curious about what all the fuss was about.

She couldn’t see into her own future, that wasn’t how it worked, so she had no idea and was a bit anxious. Truth be told she couldn’t see into the future at all, but she would never let the family know that obviously. Coming, as she did, from a long line of prophets, that would be a very bad thing – lots of shrieking and crying, rending of clothes and flapping of wings – that much she could certainly predict, but she wouldn’t tell them, so it wouldn’t happen. That’s one of the things about prophecies; they depend on all the ifs and whens and the fickle nature of humankind.

She had many happy memories about Sam. She had known him since they were kids. He lived in the same road, and he used to come round and help her with her giant rabbit Brian. He wasn’t allowed pets after the thing with the ferrets at the county show, which was a shame really, no one could have predicted it would happen, but it did, so having the chance to spend time with a rabbit was nice for him and nice for her as it meant having a friend who wasn’t one of her many relatives.

Cassandra and Sam stayed friends, even after it happened and shouldn’t have been possible, but then, they were both impossible and unusual people, destined to do impossible, unusual things, anyone could see that.

Sam’s eyes were looking very bright and sparkly, nice. Jim and Quinn were looking at him very strangely, like they’d seen a ghost or something. Cassandra didn’t know the other two, but she knew their names because they were both wearing lanyards and she had unfeasibly good eyesight.

Chapter 8 by Tim O Tee

The lanyards carried the wording ‘Space Agency Observer’. What Jim and Quinn ‘observed’ turned their worlds upside down. Jim saw his lifelong friend Sam’s bright sparkly eyes deepen and gleam. Each eyeball projected a full reflection of every star in the known universe. The two observers visually froze, waves of electric terror crackling between them. Cassandra’s x-ray eyes instantly assessed the scene and, with predatorial speed, she leapt at Sam.

Showing the assured grace and training of a seasoned master, Sam side-stepped Cassandra’s lunge. He knew what they must do next. Grabbing both Jim and Quinn firmly by the shoulder, Sam prepared for departure. With gentle yet firm reassurance, Sam intoned, “We must leave Cassandra’s thrall right now.”

A sense-defying silence descended and the two reflected ‘universes’ seemed to merge. Sam, Jim and Quinn slid sideways through the space-time continuum and reappeared at a party in a New York Upper East Side apartment several hours earlier.

Chapter 9 by Ken Braithwaite

Recovering their poise, they entered again into the party spirit among the great and good of New York society including diplomatic big wigs and the Vice President, his wife and entourage.

The eminent society hostess came quickly over to the three time-travellers, unaware of their alarming experience.

“Darlings, where have you been hiding? We have such wonderful news for you all. The President of the United States is making a very private visit to Utah and the Aspens ski runs and some of us are invited.”

Cassandra’s overpowering presence and her mystic powers of forecasting impending doom rested heavily on the shoulders of the three.

Sam replied how honoured they would all be if the invitation included them, and the hostess, whose name escaped them, quickly disappeared to enquire if they were included in this exciting visit.

Jim and Quinn stared closely at Sam and asked the alarming question, “Cassandra’s ominous prediction of a world-shattering event is now firmly placed in our lap as a responsibility to mankind to intervene. Yet we are ill prepared to advise or comment as we are merely well known time-travellers.”

“We all three,” Quinn said to Sam and Jim, keeping her voice quiet, “are aware that – in our time, or dimension – the Aspen Ski Slopes have been closed for many months after the failure of a supporting pillar and the death of twenty skiers, and it is well known that the owners of Park City in Utah are supporters of the President, and this trip, although off the record, is intended to show his support for the enterprise after such a disaster.”

“After our meeting with Cassandra,” Jim said with alarm, “should we go, if invited, or suggest we are aware of a possible incident that is going to happen?”

At that moment, the hostess returned. “The President is expecting you to join him.”

Chapter 10 by David Dumouriez

Sam looked at Jim. “You know what? I can’t be stuffed. I literally can’t be stuffed.”

Jim smiled, the tension suddenly leaving his face and making him look years younger. “Sam, you took the words right out of my mouth. Aspen? Utah? A President? I just want to go to a bloody party!”

“I know, right.” He looked at Quinn. “With respect, we’ve humoured you as much as we’re able. More, even. And the same goes for that other whack-job, Cassandra.”

Quinn was open-mouthed, caught perhaps between an exclamation and an imprecation. Sam took his chance.

“Madam, I bid you good-day.” He nodded, and the pair of them did an about-turn and walked away.

“How did we ever …?” Jim murmured.

“I don’t know,” Sam replied. “It’s just indicative of the kind of luck we’re having these days.”

“We need to re-focus. Re-establish our priorities.”

Sam couldn’t disagree. “What was all that bunk about dimensions anyway?”

“I have no idea. The only dimensions I’m interested in belong to Madriana,” Jim said with a wink, “if you know what I mean.”

Sam made it clear that he did indeed know. “And me, I’m looking forward to getting my hands on some of Dr Murdoch’s award-winning lizard wine.”

“The only question that remains, to my mind at least, is this: where the fudge cake are we?”

“Good question, Jim. Good question. Well… the last place I remember was… was… oh, I don’t know!”

The night was getting darker, and now there was even a hint of rain in the air. Jim looked at his grimy Casio.

“Party must be well under way by now …”

Sam made a desperate attempt to establish their bearings, complete with a mumbled commentary.

“So if we… yes, just follow this path… then go along the track here… we come to a road.”

And they did come to a road. Not a well-made or well-lit one, but a road. “And then…”

“Which way?”

“Which way? Well, by my calculations… that way.” And Sam pointed confidently into the distance. “Or it could be that way.”

“In other words…”

“In other words, I haven’t a clue.”

“Well, wherever we are, I guess we’re nowhere near where we should be.”

Sam nodded, seemingly impressed.

“Therefore,” Jim went on, “I propose that we stand on opposite sides of the road and flag down any vehicle that comes along. Then, we’ll know which way to go. And even better, get a lift.”

“Perfect!”

So they did as Jim suggested.

And nothing happened.

No one came.

Well, something did.

It was shaped like an angular S, made of a mesh-like material, and hovered above the ground.

Stopping between Jim and Sam, it appeared to scan their faces, before exclaiming in a form of uninflected English, “I have discovered humanity!”

Soon, others of its type came floating out of the bushes.

Chapter 11 by Beryl Robinson

A door opened as a voice shouted, “Over here, quick.”

Turning their heads, Jim and Sam stood as though rooted to the spot.

Looking around, Jim said, “The voice is coming from over there. Come on, run, Sam, run.”

As the door slammed behind them, they could hear the drone-like androids crashing against it emitting the most awful scream.

Looking at the woman, girl, they couldn’t really ascertain her age as the building was in gloom, window blinds closed to keep the daylight and the S-shaped mechanical monsters out. Her hair was tied back in a long ponytail with streaks of bright pink running through it. Her uniform sort of gave the game away… she worked here. Other than that, she was sort of non-descript, Jim thought, and that wasn’t a slur. If either of them had seen her at the party they would have ignored her. She wore glasses and looked over the top of them like a librarian, though that again was unkind to librarians.

The woman felt the same, looking at Sam and Jim. She thought they were a bit spaced out, as though they had taken something but it could be shock, fear or all three.

Once their eyes became accustomed to the light, they realised they were in one of those American diners, which were once fashionable, with formica tables and banquette seating. There were still plates and drinks sitting on tables as though people had just left the place, meal unfinished.

“I thought I was the only person left,” the woman said. “The name’s Rose, and you are?” She held out her hand.

“Is that blood,” Sam asked, not taking the proffered hand.

“Yes, but I don’t know where it came from.”

“I’m Sam, he’s Jim,” Sam replied. “What’s going on and where have you come from? What are those things out there?

“So many questions, which I can’t answer,” Rose responded, finally relieved to have someone to talk to. “I’m not sure how long I’ve been hiding out here, maybe a day or so. I work here and was just closing up when one of those minions tried to attack me. I managed to trap it in the door.”

Rose walked over to the table furthest away from the door and windows. Rather like a magician, she whipped a table cloth off and there was one of those S-shaped things sat there.

Jim went to turn. “We need a bit more light.”

“No, don’t touch the switch,” Rose screamed at Jim, “they can contact us through the strip lighting; you’ll need to turn your phones off as they can use them as well. I was going to try and take it apart to see what it was, but it’s not that simple. The S-shape seems to be moulded, no screws to get into the motor, and I don’t know if it’s dead.”

Chapter 12 by Bill Griffiths

“Listen up,” said Jim, “I have a plan

If we talk in rhyme they won’t understand,

While they’re trying to figure it out

It will give us time, to take account.”

He’s flipped his lid, thought Rose

The pressure’s getting to him, I suppose.

But I’ll go along with his request

There may be method, in this madness

The tension rose, as they tried to address

The situation, in rhyming couplets

When what they needed, was a flame cutter

To slice through that S-shaped cover

The silence was broken! No one noticed

They’d all been so intensely focused

The motor, thought dead, kicked in

And was purring away, gently within

Had it started of its own accord?

Or, had they triggered it from outdoors?

The only way to make sure

Was to go and open the door.

They looked at each other. Jim said to Rose, “That was unexpected. I think we can talk normally again. Do we stay, or go out and face the consequences?”

Chapter 13 by R. Bruce Connelly

“Is THAT what they’re called?” asked Rose, shuddering.

“Is that what WHAT are called?”

“Those THINGS out there. ‘Consequences’?”

“Rose, I…”

“Get down!” Rose cried, dropping to the floor.

Jim followed suit.

“I can’t,” she cried. “I just can’t.”

“Can’t what?”

“Face them!”

“Okay, Rose, I think you misunderstood what I meant,” Jim said. He tried to rise but Rose pulled him back down.

“Don’t let them see you!” Rose was close to edge of hysteria.

“Careful, Rose,” Jim said. “You’re going to crush that plant.”

“Who cares about a plant when THIS is going on?”

“Well, whoever owns that hysteria is going to care,” Jim muttered.

“Take a peek. See if they are still out there,” she said.

“What in particular am I…”

“Peek!” she ordered.

Oh, yeah, she was well over the verge.

“But be careful!” she whispered.

“I can’t really peek out there unless you let go of me,” Jim said, starting to get annoyed.

“I can’t,” she sobbed. “I can’t be alone right now.”

“Okay. Then… come with?”

“Okay,” she said, with a little hiccup in her voice.

Jim slowly moved off the floor. Rose was not helping. He got to the lower edge of the window.

“Don’t let them SEE you,” urged Rose, clutching at his lapels.

“The…?”

“The Consequences.”

“Right. Okay. Easy now. You can stay below the glass. I’ll peek.” Jim raised his eyes to the window and peeked.

“SEE anything?” she hissed.

“I see you are drawing blood with your nails,” Jim said, wincing. “Can you let my skin go?”

“Sorry,” she said, with more attitude than the situation deserved.

“I don’t…”

“There’s one!” shrieked Rose and threw herself to the floor once more, dragging Jim along with her.

“What?” cried Jim, “Where?”

“By the tree!” Rose balled herself up and crawled under the chair. Maybe that was a good thing.

Jim took ahold of her hand, which had already torn the lapel by several inches and applied pressure to her fingers. “You… need… to take a calmative!” he said, with gritted teeth. “Let go of me!”

He pushed Rose’s hand away and said, “Go hide under the seats. I’ll go out there.”

“And face the Consequences?!?”

“Yes,” Jim hissed, “and afterwards we can all go out to the House of Pancakes.”

Chapter 14 by A.D. Watts

Rose groped her way to the back of the bus and tucked herself down, before bobbing up again, and whispering, half-jokingly, ‘You will come back for me, won’t you?’

Jim whispered back, ‘Yes, soon as I can.’ Then he stumbled to the front. Even though his eyes must be adjusted to the dark by now, he could barely see where he was going. The only light came from a few streetlights on the edge of the car park, and a dim glow from a hut some fifty yards away. Opening the bus door took a long time. There were switches on the driver’s dashboard but none of them did anything. In the end, he found a lever at the top of the door, pulled it, and managed to swing the thing open by main force.

Everything had gone wrong tonight, he thought ruefully. Rose was Sam’s girlfriend. He’d always liked her, and there’d always been a bit of flirting, but that was all. At the party, though, they’d both had too much to drink. Sam had been engrossed in political discussion with a bearded anarchist and Rose had looked bored, so Jim had suggested to her they sneak off to the House of Pancakes on the bus. He’d said, ‘We’ll catch the Number Nineteen; it stops right outside. We’ll get a couple of pancakes to take out; the maple syrup and chantilly ones are delicious. Bring them back on the next bus and Sam probably won’t even notice we’ve gone. And if he does, well, serve him right.’

The bus had been warm. Her head had lolled onto his shoulder, which felt nice. His eyes had closed for a moment – and he’d woken hours later, sitting in the cold and dark with Rose’s head still resting on his shoulder only now it wasn’t nice. It was very bad news. How were they going to get out of this one? Would Sam believe his explanation? If not, would Sam ever forgive him? And anyway, where the hell were they?

Rose came up with a plan. They mustn’t be seen together, not at two am. People would gossip. But if he could find a phone and call her a taxi, she would head straight back to the party. Jim would then call another taxi and follow about half an hour later. It would be okay; Wendy’s parties always went on till at least four or five am. Once back in the house, they would act the complete innocent, which, Jim thought regretfully, they actually were. Then Jim would suggest to Sam that the three of them head off to the House of Pancakes. Party-goers liked the place because it stayed open all night on Saturdays and through to breakfast on Sundays. Anyway, it was a plan.

He stepped down and walked to the hut. It was very quiet. No one was around. Apart from their bus, the car park was deserted.

Jim pulled the door open and stepped into an empty, bare office: a metal lamp shining on a wooden desk, a metal chair, no phone. Outside, he heard an engine start up. He ran out to see the bus drive out of the car park, heading into the darkness with Rose aboard.

Chapter 15 by G. Murray

The rain lashed his face, soaked through his shirt. Why had he ever got on that bus?

He turned back towards the office. At least he had somewhere dry to think.

He stopped. Someone was standing in the doorway, their outline backlit by the lamp on the wooden desk.

“Hi!” said Jim, hurrying forwards. “I didn’t see you before… have you got a phone I could use, please?”

“Come in.” The voice was dry, hollow.

“Is this your office space?” Jim could see her now. Large build, short haired. Jacket. School principal maybe.

 She stepped back to let him in. She did not reply.

The door clicked shut behind him. He swung round. “I won’t take up your time; I’ll just make a quick call if that okay then I’ll wait outside. I don’t mind the rain at all, it’s fine…” He stopped. He was gabbling. Why didn’t she say anything?

“Sit down, Jim,” she said.

How did she know his name? “Do you know Rose?”

No reply.

“It’s okay, thanks, I’ll just stand; it won’t take a minute, thanks.”

“Sit. Down. Jim. “

A wave of icy water rose up, washed through him. He felt his legs dissolving.

“Actually, I’ve just remembered where I left my phone, so I’ll get off now.” His hand was on the door handle. He tried it. Tried again.

It wasn’t opening.

“Sit down, Jim. You wanted to go to the party. This is the party game.”

She pointed to the chair.

“I didn’t want to go! It was Sam’s idea! I don’t even like parties – or party games!” Boys don’t cry. Blinking back rogue tears, Jim stumbled to the chair. A sheet of plain paper and a pen had appeared on the desk. His hair dripped onto the paper.

 “I have three questions,” she said. “You have exactly one minute to answer each question. You only need to answer one question correctly then you may either leave or use my phone.”

“What if I don’t answer any correctly?” He’d forgotten how to breathe. He looked up, saw the shards glinting in her eyes.

“Question One. Maths. How many potatoes are in a bucketful if the pig eats three and the goat puts nine back?”

A harsh laugh burst from Jim’s chest. “What? That’s not maths! That’s just stupid!”

“Just answer the question the best you can, Jim. Forty seconds remaining.”

Jim picked up the pen, sweat glistening on his palms.

“Question Two. Advanced Maths. What is the sum of the parts of the universe divided by its diameter?”

Jim shook his head once. “Is this someone’s idea of a sick joke?”

He looked up. No reply.

“Question Three. English. What is the rule concerning apostrophes after full stops in sonnet form?”

A hot flare of anger ripped through him; he scraped his chair back and marched up to her.

“Right, let me out – NOW – I’m not playing your stupid party game!”

The flash from her eyes threw Jim back into the chair.

Chapter 16 by Robert N. Crathorne

“You’d best do as she says, mate. She’s not best chuffed, and I don’t think she’s wired up right.”

“Thanks, Sam. Very observant.” He rubbed his jaw gingerly. “She’s definitely not from round here, and that was some bloody punch.”

“Punch? She never touched you, mate. Did it with just a glance. Super power, that’s what I reckon.”

“Super power? Don’t talk b…”

“Shush. She’s watching you again. Might have radar hearing as well. Here she comes.”

The woman seemed to glide across the floor as she approached. There was something about her that made his skin creep, and he shrank back, suspecting Sam was right. Whatever, it was no time for heroics.

‘Well. Mr Jimmy, I hope you’re going to behave from now on.’ Her voice was sibilant as her beautiful face loomed large in his vision. However, it was the totally black shiny eyeballs, and the hot fetid breath, which suggested it was a bad idea to steal a placatory kiss. “Are you going to comply, or should I ask Hector to help adjust your thinking?”

Hector? Who the bloody hell’s Hector? “Sorry. Just a rush of blood, love. Got a bit over excited there.”

She turned slightly to Jim’s right.

“And you. Mr Sam, are you going to behave?”

Her dazzling smile was full of menace, and Sam also shrank back.

“You’ll get no bother from me, Mrs. And can I just say, I love your outfit. Harvey Nichols, mebbe?”

She shook her head condescendingly, then slowly moved away.

“Harvey Nichols, you daft bugger. What a stupid thing to say.”

“It worked, didn’t it? Anyway, we need to find her weak spot. What I’d give for some kryptonite, or mebbe a cloak of invisibility.”

“That’s just fantasy, Sam. In War of the Worlds the aliens all got done by catching cold.”

“I don’t think we’ve got long enough to wait for ’em to catch cold, she’s pointing at you again.”

Indeed, she was pointing; the long green finger nail seemed to be boring right into the gap between his eyes. Sam felt himself rising to his feet regardless of the overwhelming desire to stay put. The finger crooked, and like an automaton he began to advance.

Chapter 17 by Alexandrina Brant-Graham

Like a cloak suffocating his sight, the world darkened until all that was left was the pockmarked, scabby face of the witch and that ugly, beckoning finger. The cabin, all its charred walls and dripping pelts and the still-faint scent of camphor, faded into a state of existence far more dreamlike, a grey hue of calm.

In a way, peace had found Sam…

No. He squeezed his eyes closed, forced his shoulders to roll back in their sockets. Anything. Any movement that belonged to him and not to her. He wrenched an arm back, seeking the desire that he’d had moments before the calm, cursed as pain popped through his shoulder, and reached for something – anything – that he could fling in her direction.

He’d once heard, in a bedtime story surely or in a melody his Mama had sung in a singular glimpse into her own childhood, that a witch’s power was not in her physicality or her trinkets, but in the depth of her sight. It was something about the eye.

Honestly, Sam didn’t get it, but the phrase kept repeating on him like some late night pint.

Except, the witch didn’t have the patience for Sam’s wisdom. She wailed – and it filled him. The noise was so hideous that, if he’d had the control over his own limbs, he would’ve flung himself to the floor and blocked his ears with the palms of his hands.

“This time,” she bellowed, “you must be mine!”

Her face twisted into a snarl… or, more exactly, a deeper cut of a snarl that parted those jet lips.

The finger crooked once more. If anything, its ugly off-green colour deepened like day-old vomit. The soles of Sam’s trainers scraped against the floorboards. One by one. Forward, again and again, towards the witch. He spluttered. God, his shoulder killed. He couldn’t reach for the table, couldn’t bring himself to stretch beyond the pain. Oh, god, she was going to use him to destroy the world, wasn’t she…?

The window to his right exploded in a shower of splinters.

Sam yelled and dived to the floor. Hey, he was in control again! He gasped, rolling onto his good side and eyeballing though the window detritus…

“For god’s sake, buddy!” Jim said, crouching to haul his mate to his feet. “Didn’t I say exactly not to get in the witch’s path?”

“Hey, it’s not my fault!”

Beside him, Jim raised an eyebrow.

A cliché, really.

Well, Sam wouldn’t let himself be reduced to being the cliché anymore. He had work to do and, more than ever, he had an idea how to defeat her.

Nursing his right shoulder with his other hand, Sam gestured at the witch. “Go for the eyes!”

“Not this time.” She released another bone-breaking wail, shattering through Sam’s consciousness with a spell of steel, forcing him once again into the trance. “See how you like making mincemeat of your dear friend!”

Chapter 18 by John Holmes

The thought of mincemeat was a difficult thing to swallow, especially being a vegetarian. His mind jumped to a loaded plate of delicious vegan protein bars. As his mouth began to water, he gradually became aware that the ‘bone-breaking wail’ had changed. No longer was it shattering steel or casting spells – it had become melodic, almost calming like the sound of monks’ monotonous chanting escaping through the walls of Thai temples.

But this was no Asian sacred song being practised by thousands: this was a chant that no one on earth had ever heard before. It was a message: a coded call for help.

Only one set of ears was able to interpret this message.

Sitting in an old yet comfy high-back chair, Casio Seiko carefully placed his book on the coffee table. He liked most of H.G. Wells’ novels, but he found the plot of ‘The Time Machine’ a load of nonsense. Why would you need a machine? Travelling forward in time just happened, day by day. And as for going back, well, that was as easy as ABC or CBA.

Casio Seiko was just about to push himself off the chair and make a nice cup of Earl Grey when he heard it – the hum he hadn’t witnessed for more than two thousand years. ‘The Chant’.

Ignoring his thirst, Casio Seiko got straight to work. He started to sing. Slowly and quietly at first, then in perfect harmony with the voice coming from Earth. Sinatra and Bono could not have performed together better.

Suddenly, just like his namesakes, Casio Seiko stopped! This wasn’t a wind-up, this wasn’t the lies of TikTok – this was a real call for help.

Casio Seiko’s time had finally arrived – he was being called to do the thing he had wanted to do all his life – ‘I can turn back time’. He sang his new lyrics, which sounded uncannily like Cher’s…

…Jim and Sam were standing in the rain waiting for the bus to take them to Rachel’s fiftieth birthday party.

“Here it is. Again!” announced Sam, pulling his bus pass out of his overcoat pocket – the very same pocket that held his ‘Quantum Resurrection Card’.

After the last time they caught this very same bus – at this very same time – on this very same day, Sam would not make the same mistake: this time he was ready.

Chapter 19 by Steven C. Davis

“What did that driver say about wet frogs and red badgers?” asked Jim.

The bus was, unsurprisingly, crowded. And unpleasantly moist, bordering on sticky. The bus heaters were on and the windows fogged up, the world outside the bus rushing past without a care, abandoning itself to whatever happened.

“No,” said Sam, returning the ‘Quantum Resurrection Card’ to his pocket. “He said wet dogs. But who’d be walking their dogs in this weather?”

“It was the butterfly, wasn’t it?” Jim asked.

Sam stared blankly ahead for the moment. Jim’s hearing aid, which he’d never noticed before, seemed to be flickering with a pale blueish, silvery light.

“You know,” Jim continued, “that butterfly that flaps its wings and causes thunderstorms half way around the world.”

“And it wasn’t a dead badger,” a gruff voice spoke from the seat behind them. “I’m a badger and my name’s Dead.”

Sam turned his head slowly.

There was, in fact, a man sitting behind them. Well, mostly a man. He did appear to have the head and snout of a badger.

“You’re…” He hesitated. “A badger?”

“Yes.” The man-badger nodded his snout. “I was named Dead. Don’t ask me why, because I’m not.”

Sam stared blankly. Any moment now there’d be a bowl of petunias turning into a whale or a dolphin. Or was it an aardvark?

The bus seemed to be accelerating. The streets were rain-washed, the night was full on and the bus hadn’t stopped for the last five minutes, Sam was sure.

He began patting his pockets. “Where did I put Rachel’s card?”

Jim frowned. “Who’s Rachel?”

The electronic earpiece, or hearing aid, or whatever it actually was, was flashing erratically.

Am I dreaming… Sam wondered… will I wake up in bed and none of this will have happened?

He grabbed the pole and pulled himself to his feet, muttering, “We should have got to Rachel’s by now.”

“Hold tight… and mind the wet dogs and dead badgers!” the bus driver called out cheerily as the bus accelerated into a skid.

Chapter 20 by David Wilson

The next few minutes seemed to be frozen in time. As the bus careered around the corner, it ploughed through a deceptively deep puddle filled with mud and gravel. The grin on the driver’s face froze then transmogrified into a shocked grimace as the dilapidated vehicle slid in slow motion into a wide ditch that was rapidly turning into a minor torrent in the rain. As they came to a sudden standstill at an ungainly tilt, Sam lost his grip on the pole and slid to the front of the bus in an ungainly heap with a pair of expired badgers and a gawky greyhound wearing a rather surprised expression.

“What now?” yelled Jim, who had managed to maintain his seat, albeit with his head in the footwell and his feet dancing a jig in the air.

“Last stop!” called the bus driver with a dazed expression. “You’ll have to walk from here.”

Once they had sorted out which way was up and which way was down, Jim and Sam stepped off the bus and sank into the knee-high water in the ditch. They scrambled out and found themselves on the edge of an unkempt wood that stretched ahead of them on either side of the road. The pair scrambled out of the muddy gully and began the miserable trudge down the road, plothered in muck and soaked to the gunnels. As they turned to look back at their erstwhile transport, they realised that they had gained a companion; the greyhound had decided that he liked this inept pair, especially Sam, who now smelled slightly of putrefying badger.

“I reckon the path to Alison’s house must be about two miles down this road,” muttered Sam, wiping a steady stream of rain out of his eyes. Of the three of them, only the greyhound seemed pleased at the prospect of a walk in the steadily diminishing light along the pot-holed, tree-lined track.

Chapter 21 by Davia Sacks

As they proceeded down the road, Sam’s mind flashed back to the bedtime story his grandfather used to tell him. It always scared the bejesus out of him and gave him night terrors, which, for some reason, the old coot found delightfully amusing.

The story was about two friends who were on their way to a party when, among other carking goings-on, they’d lost their transportation. And they’d also been befriended by a greyhound.

Jim assured Sam that the similarities were just a fluke, and the greyhound was merely enamoured with Sam’s eau d’ putrefying badger. Nevertheless, Sam’s grandfather’s tale continued to nag at him.

By now, night had fallen and there was a sudden rustling in the bushes, followed by an ominous shadow darting across their path.

“What was that!” Jim shouted.

“It’s just the rain hitting the branches of the trees,” Sam said. “And anyway, Zippy will protect us.”

“Zippy?” Jim asked.

“That’s what I’m naming him,” Sam stated, nodding toward the greyhound. “I like that name better than…”

Suddenly, he was interrupted by Jim screaming.

“It got me!”

Sam backed away and ‘Zippy’ zipped behind Sam.

“Did your grandfather’s story mention anything about a skunk?” Jim wailed.

“As a matter of fact..” Sam began.

“Cripes! Alison will never let us in now,” Jim whined.

But Sam couldn’t concern himself with Alison’s likely reaction to Jim’s stench, not to mention his own; he was too distracted by what he was remembering about his grandfather’s story, i.e. the real meaning of the badger and the skunk, the true identity of the greyhound, and what Alison’s party was really all about.

Had his grandfather been some sort of seer and was his story actually a harbinger of Sam and Jim’s fate? Or was everything merely a coincidence, and the story nothing more than the ramblings of an old man who had been brought back from the dead way too many times?

Chapter 22 by Louise Kerr

Ramblings or not, this was really happening. Everything his grandfather had told him was becoming reality and this night was getting stranger and stranger. The stench clung to them as they trudged forward, determined to find Alison. They could head back to the party and try and find more clues as to what was happening, but an invisible wall shimmered in the air. This was starting to feel like a real-life role-playing game. All they needed now was for a sign to materialise in the air and tell them where to go.

Oh, would you look at that…

“What the heck?” Jim groaned, fetching a can of beer out of his carrier bag and knocking it back.

Sam cautiously approached a floating sign hovering in the air decorated with an illegible script.

“Useful,” he muttered.

As though the sign heard him it morphed itself into an arrow, pointing to the left of where they were. To a deep, dark forest.

“Okay… come on, Jim. Let’s see if the next chapter in the story matches my grandfather’s prophecy.”

“Didn’t anyone tell you not to go into the forest?”

“This isn’t Little Red Riding Hood. Stop being a baby.”

Into the forest they ventured, hoping their stinking bodies would deter any would-be predators. Sam switched his mobile phone torch on as they treaded through muddy undergrowth. This was not the night they had planned. A party had been exactly what they needed to destress from the week.

“Hoo, hoo.”

They stopped alerted by the sound.

“Who’s there?”

“Tis I. The Owl of Ordinance.”

“We don’t have time for this,” Jim said, grabbing Sam and pulling him away.

“No, hoo, don’t go. You’ll never find her if you go.”

Sam and Jim stopped.

“I’m too sober for this shit,” Jim muttered, upending the rest of his can. “You want one?”

“I think I better,” Sam said, taking the aforementioned can and pulling the tab.

“Brave travellers,” the Owl began, “your smell is most pungent… you have passed the badger-skunk and now search for Alison, host of parties; she is kept in the dungeon of the Great Greyhound whose identity you must uncover to avoid your grisly fates…”

Chapter 23 by Liz Tuckwell

They stared at the Owl.

“How the fuck are we supposed to do that?” asked Jim.

The Owl began to cough and brought up several small pellets.

“Inside these are mouse bones. Throw these onto the floor and the pattern shown will give you the clue to the identity of the Great Greyhound.”

“You’re kidding, right? Mouse bones!” shouted Sam.

The Owl shook its head and pointed his talons of its right foot at the pellets. “Take it or leave it,” it said then tucked its head in between its feathers and refused to speak anymore.

Sam made as if to throw the can at the bird, but Jim stopped him.

“Might as well have a go.”

Sam put down the can, reluctantly picked up a few pellets and gingerly unwrapped them. Jim did the same. They looked at each other and threw the bones onto the dirty floor.

For a minute, nothing happened, then the bones began to glow white. They glowed brighter and brighter until the two men could hardly bear to look at them. Then the bones began to move and formed two words. EASTER HOTEL.

“Easter Hotel?” Jim asked incredulously. “Have you ever heard of it?”

Sam frowned. Memories stirred. His grandad telling him stories when he was a kid.

“Yes,” he said. “It was a hotel where it was always Easter. Always daffodils on the tables, and Easter eggs, and staff in bunny costumes. But it closed down years ago.”

His grandad had told him darker tales too. Of dog races in vast subterranean areas where ‘Easter Bunnies’ were chased by spectral greyhounds.

“Is it nearby?” asked Jim.

“A few miles out of town.”

“Let’s get going.”

They were puffing by the time they’d tramped to the hotel. Taking a taxi was too risky argued Sam, and Jim had reluctantly concurred.

The hotel was dark as they approached. They walked on to the entrance porch and Sam experimentally pushed at the imposing front door. It swung open. They stepped cautiously inside and the door slammed shut behind them. The lights came on and they saw transparent guests and human-sized bunnies walking about the place. They turned to go but the front door wouldn’t budge, no matter how hard they tried.

“Guess we’ll have to find Alison,” said Jim.

Chapter 24 by Fred Johnson

“Good luck with that,” said a blue-furred bunny, sidling up to Jim.

“Yes, a bit unpredictable is our Alison,” said another bunny, pink this time, beside Sam. It smiled, its impressive incisors glinting in the light from the glitter ball overhead.

Sam and Jim took a proper look around. They seemed to be in a night club. There were tables with seats for four scattered across the main floor. Along one side of the room was a bar with a black granite top and, at the back, a mirrored wall lined with shelves of bottles in every colour and shape you could imagine and some you couldn’t. Music was being piped in – a relaxing jazzy blues.

The bunnies were mainly seated at the tables while the ethereal forms of the transparent guests formed groups of three or four at the bar. Almost everyone had a glass, either fluted containing muti-coloured layers of iridescent liquid, or balloons with a pool of something dark that gave off a drifting rack of mist. They scented the air as if lightning had just rolled through.

“I’m Bunny 12,” the blue bunny said, “and this is Bunny 18. Why don’t you have a drink with us? Maybe a little snack?” They clicked their teeth together making a rapid rat-a-tat and a rainbow sparkle of reflected light.

“Er, well, that’s very nice of you,” said Jim, “but we really need to find Alison. She brought us here, but we need to go and the door is locked.”

Bunny 12 took Jim’s arm. “It only opens from the outside. Once you’re in, you’re in.”

“Yes,” Bunny 18 said, “it’s one of those places where you can check out but you can never leave.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,” Sam said, peering around the room. “Alison must be here somewhere.’

Bunny 18 crossed her arms. “Well,” she said, “last I saw she was with a C-Thru. I don’t know what she sees in them, they’re truly boring. Must have been ants, I think, before they changed.”

‘Changed?” Sam said, in a worried voice.

“Yes,” Bunny 12 said, “if you have something they really want here, they can arrange for a genome edit to anything you want.”

“And you chose to be man-sized rabbits?” Jim said, trying to keep the incredulity from his voice.

“Well, it seemed a good idea at the time,” Bunny 12 said, a little huffily.

“What did you change from?” said Sam.

“Butterflies, can’t you tell from our easy-going nature?”

Sam and Jim could find nothing to say to that.

“There was a small hitch in our transition that you might be able to help us with. In return, we could show you a way out.”

“What hitch? And how do we help? said Sam and Jim as one.

Bunny 12 sighed. “We all transitioned as lady bunnies, which means things aren’t as much fun as they might be.”

“Oh, and we can help how?” Jim said, warily.

“Viktor, the bartender, is in charge of transitions,” Bunny 12 said. “Take a close look.”

At first, all they noticed was a tall youngish man with dark hair and thick eyebrows that met in the middle of his forehead. Then he leant forward to pass a drink across the bar and smiled as he did so. The fangs were unmistakeable.

“A small contribution from each of you,” Bunny 12 said. “Enough to fill a flute glass will mean Viktor will tweak our genomes to make us male bunnies – bucks. That should liven things up here.”

“But don’t we end up dead, or undead, or something not very nice,” Jim said, still staring at Viktor.

“No, no, no,” Bunny 18 said, with another toothy smile, “you’ll be fine as long as he doesn’t drain you.”

“Oh, that’s all right then,” Sam said with a gulp.

“We’ve no choice,” Jim said, “cos we can’t stay here forever… we have to chance it.”

He took a deep breath and leaned over the bar. Viktor drew back his lips so that his fangs shone in the shifting light and as he stretched towards Jim’s neck, the whites of his eyes turned red.

Chapter 25 by Adam McLean

“Get a room,” came a voice from the dark of the dance floor. What followed was a roar of laughter. Viktor rolled his eyes, his lips firmly pressed against Jim’s pasty neck, his eyes glowing red, and his tongue now coated in cheap aftershave. A few moments passed… then a few more…

“Is this going to be much longer?” Jim asked, eyeing up the others at the bar. He was trying to seem as suave as he could be with another man leeching off his neck.

“Jus… anova… minnit… or sew.” Viktor mumbled through intense sucking, his words slurring as he drained Jim like a Capri Sun. After an uncomfortably long time, he finally gulped and went to pull back. He couldn’t. “Hey, jus do meh a faveh, schwivel to ya leff a lil.” His teeth were stuck, rooted firmly in Jim’s neck. The two were squabbling, arching over the bar and trying not to draw attention.

“Look, I can’t understand what you’re saying. This is ridiculous, just pull out. Come on, don’t mess around.” They started an odd tug-of-war, shuffling along the bar and across partygoers.

Viktor kept mumbling, taking his time to pronounce each word as best he could. “I’m twying, I jus need you to schwivul a lil to the leff.”

“Schwivul? What the hell is schwivul? Why should I schwivul? I didn’t move, you schwivul.”

They kept tugging, eventually reaching the end of the bar where Viktor could exit. Now they stood, connected, flashing lights glowing over them as Bronski Beat pounded from every speaker, and a sea of glowsticks lit up.

“Rerax, wood ya, a’v goh an ass up ma seeve,” Viktor spat.

Jim looked puzzled. “You’ve got an ass up your sleeve? How’s that supposed to help?”

“NO!” he yelled. “AN ASS UP MA SEEVE.” The two stood, their brains working overtime.

“Ohhh, an ace up your sleeve!” Jim felt like he’d just solved an intense riddle.

“Ye,” Viktor replied. He took a step back, tugging Jim’s neck painfully, then he stretched out both arms and shook them like a hyperactive chicken. Before they could argue anymore, black feathers began to rain down. It was quick, but Victor had spawned two long black wings, crooked and slick.

“When were you going to tell me, you could… wait, are they wings? You can grow wings?” Jim shouted, feeling his feet slowly lift from the ground. “Okay, can you remind me how floating helps in any way?”

“Shhh, I need sience to concenrade!”

“Science? Is that to get the ass from your sleeve?” Jim laughed, noticing they were floating higher and higher from the ground.

Viktor let out a long groan as he kept flapping his arms, both of them approaching the ceiling. His teeth were still stuck deep in Jim’s neck, holding him in his mouth like a cat carrying their litter, as he announced, “Now… ime oo geh Sam and esscape!”

Jim looked confused, “Ass cape?”

Chapter 26 by Nimue Brown

Sam knew he should be focusing on the escape issue, but it wasn’t easy. He kept getting the terrible urge to have a flashback instead. Perhaps this whole episode would make sense if he could unravel the relationship between his current situation and some unresolved issue from his past. It was a literary reflex and something he had fought to overcome during that time in his late teens when he had been detoxing from serious poetry abuse. Now he realised that Jim’s presence had been the only thing keeping him grounded. Without Jim, he wanted to float off in flights of metaphorical fancy, just like he had seen Jim float away in Viktor’s grasp. Perhaps Viktor symbolised the innate uncertainty of the human condition.

Still, his attack of post-modern story trauma disorder made him want to flash back to that formative experience of being put in a barrel. That had been Aunt Millicent’s doing, as punishment for his not wanting to read any more of T.S. Eliot’s more serious poetry. He had only been eight at the time and he wasn’t ready to move on from the cat poems, no matter what she demanded.

Hadn’t Viktor carried Jim as though he was a kitten? It did make a certain kind of sense, with the cat poems somehow foreshadowing the loss of Jim. Only Jim could pull him out of such mental spasms as these and get him safely back into something a bit like reality.

He had to escape, but this scenario was probably just a metaphor for the imprisonment of his soul. He must overcome these inner demons, break the fourth wall and escape from the tyranny of his own inner narrative.

“Jim wouldn’t talk about himself in third person,” Sam said aloud. “Jim would punch something and move on. If I can break the fourth wall, I can get out of here, I just have to smack it hard enough, that’s all.”

Chapter 27 by Adrian Lee

How on earth can I find myself locked in here, whilst outside it’s full of people having a great time, drinking, dancing and listening to loud music. And that loud music means nobody can hear my shouts and knocks.

There is no weak spot nor is there a tool that makes enough noise or has enough power to knock a wall down.

My best solution is the door.

Sam realised his anxiety was rising quickly and that meant his blood pressure would be too. And he took medication for that already.

He felt claustrophobic, breathing was forced, and he was beginning to sweat.

“Sit down, Sam. Take some deep breaths, meditate for ten minutes.”

Talking in the third person also helped him focus as though there was a mentor with him. He sat on the floor and shut his eyes and tried to ignore the music and meditate for just a short while.

As his temperature dropped, his blood pressure lowered and his breathing eased. He thought, ‘Eureka, I have a plan. Let’s just hope for Sam’s sake my phone works in here.’

Battery charge was fine as was the 4G signal strength.

He opened Maps to locate exactly where he was, and searched for pizza delivery.

Finding a local firm, he ordered the cheapest pizza on the menu, and asked for it to be delivered to the property where he was.

In the Special Notes, he added: The pizza is for Sam who is locked in the room opposite the fountain on the first floor… there is a party going on… can the delivery guy make sure it gets to Sam.

He was pleased with the last line as he had visions of a small pizza arriving and being devoured by party goers and him remaining stuck.

As paranoia took over, Sam ordered a second pizza from a second delivery firm with the exact same instructions… now he just had to wait twenty minutes.

Chapter 28 by Allison Kotzigova

As it happened, the two pizza delivery drivers arrived at the exact same time at the exact same place. Due to unforeseen circumstances, by them at least, they imploded into one another, tearing a rift into the space/time of the party.

Sam was sucked out of the locked room into a red dimension. Pizza cheese dripped from his beard, he stuck his tongue out a bit to get a taste of the melted cheese, mourning for the two pizzas lost to the universe.

“Well, hopefully someone out there gets them at least,” he muttered as he took some tentative steps into a new world.

Jim had been thrown onto a fire-escape by the blast. He lay on his back, catching his breath and saw a pizza box headed directly for his head. He caught it before impact.

Screams echoed from the sidewalk below as party-goers ran amuk, trying to avoid the rather alarming hole in space/time that appeared to be growing by the second.

Jim sat up rubbing his head and opened the pizza box.

“Smashed,” he sighed with regret. Nevertheless, he grabbed a mangled slice, chewing thoughtfully while watching the chaos unfold below him.

He finished the slice, stepped onto the railing and jumped into the dimensional rift.

“Saaaaaaam,” Jim yelled, wind rushing past his ears as he plummeted into the red dimension. With a pop, the rift sealed itself over his head and he was gone.

The two pizza delivery guys re-appeared, dazed

“Watch where you’re going!” the one said.

“YOU bumped into ME,” said the other delivery guy.

They started to argue.

Confused party-goers milled the street. Shoving commenced between the delivery guys. The crowd, already bewildered, quickly joined in to what turned into a noisy and profanity-laden block-long brawl.

Meanwhile, the red fluid-like atmosphere of the new dimension swallowed the two friends. Sam and Jim swam through a star-filled expanse, as glowing blue orbs bounced along and then formed a line, seeming to indicate a path through the luminous red world.

Chapter 29 by Shadow Liptrot

It was no longer a flat line cutting through the horizon, but a jagged incline that was climbing it. Sam and Jim looked at one another to ensure they were of one mind. The orbs had formed themselves into a staircase, and what else was there to do when you found yourself at the bottom of a staircase but climb it?

They sang like sirens in a sea as red as blood. Every vibration caused by the travellers’ curious feet rippled through what looked like stones, but must have been, in fact, living organisms ransoming their comfort to some greater cause. They were the watery blue shade of veins, or of blue eyes looking up at them, judging their worth as they walked.

The crowds of that other world were long forgotten, their anonymous faces ripped out of Sam and Jim’s brains as they turned towards this new adventure.

‘Other’ world?

It felt so tempting to give in to what this red world wanted, to surrender the past and say there had never been any world but it. There was a pulse to the world, so quiet you could hardly hear it, and yet that made it all the deadlier. Subconscious. Hungry. The world had a sky that was shades of red upon pink; pulsating orbs of inky red hung lazily in the atmosphere and their visions of the four points of the horizon was blocked by walls of flesh. Was this a land? Or were they in the belly of a beast?

They were at the top of the staircase now and they could see flesh, but their minds would not allow them to put a name to the form. All they knew was that it was alive, and trying to communicate with them. It was conversing in code, exciting images in their heads: memories. Whatever was the single word that that memory made them think or feel in an instant, that was the word of the creatures’ sentence. Hieroglyphics. It made them wonder… had everything they had ever done or experienced been geared towards this one conversation? Clues, like jigsaw pieces, scattered throughout their lives?

It was something visceral, jagged and unhinged. Something alien, but it had got under their skin. Into their blood. It was sewing together isolated parts of their psyche to convince them it had been with them all their lives. It was part of them now.

The message from the flesh was translated: ‘The forest is in danger… Man, the bringer of electric thunder, is out to destroy the world – which is a witch.’

The curse of their heritage was a poison in their blood; they were the earth now, and they were as diseased. To find their antidote, they must first save the Earth.

Chapter 30 by Amanda Brown

However, before decisions could be made, a giant playing card depicting a wheel materialised and sucked everything in. After completing ten rotations, it spat out two people, just a ‘nanomoment’ before the story first started. Located in just their mentalities, Sam and Jim found themselves hovering in a bus, where their inactive physical bodies were slumped. They sensed a large pink figure, reminiscent of a candyfloss, shimmering up the aisle towards them.

‘Excuse me,’ Sam thought politely, but the candyfloss just vibrated momentarily then floated on by, intimating to them, “An advisor will be with you shortly.”

They both shivered in the cool breeze that followed in its wake. Another vibration entered the energy field emanating, “Sorry not to have met you when you arrived.” A blue flame flickered warmly in front of them. “You must feel so disorientated,” it added sympathetically.

“Well yes I do, a bit, thank you for asking,” Sam replied.

“What are you doing?” Jim asked sarcastically. “It’s a flame! Not a person!” Turning to the flame, he demanded “What’s happened? Why are we here?”

“What a good question,” the flame confirmed. “In basic terms, the bus burst a tyre because a spider went outside its remit and spun a larger web.” Blankness formed in their minds. “It caught the butterfly, you see, so we’ve had to manifest a humming bird to eat the spider before it span. Just hope it eats the damn thing in time, otherwise repercussions in the astral realm could be quite severe, with appalling consequences in the physical,” it added knowingly.

“Pardon?” Sam enquired.

“Well, that’s the reason for the delay you see. Butterflies’ damaged wings can’t flap, so the Source had to play the Change Card. Hence everybody ‘back on the bus’, in the causal realm.”

Blank responses again.

“Oh dear, have you never read Ephesians 6 vs 12?” the flame said to Jim and Sam, adding, “anyway, no matter…” It giggled. “You’ve got cause control, just for a moment, so what do you want to do, save the Earth or start the story again… your choice, witch?” it punned, and tremoring the astral realm below with its giggling, caused the San Andreas fault to quake…

Chapter 31 by Janet Jackson

Save the Earth or start again. The weight of this decision sat heavily on their shoulders. The fault quaked again, sending a vibration around the cosmos that caused the friends to lose their balance.

“Start again from where?” Jim questioned, regaining his centre of gravity. “From where humans started to mess things up or back to the dawn of time?”

“Your choice,” the flame replied.

“We don’t know for sure how it all began,” Sam murmured.

“With a word,” the flame sighed, becoming impatient with their lack of awareness of the Bible. “And that’s all I need from you. A yes or a no.”

Sam and Jim looked at each other uneasy. Could they really wipe out the Earth and have it start all over again? Would the human race make the same mistakes or learn their lessons? Would they live in peace and cooperation not war and competition. The flame, becoming more intolerant then gave them two hours to make up their minds.

Inside their small space craft, Sam and Joe weighed up the pros and cons of the Earth’s destruction while watching the birth of a newly formed star.

“Surely if we had a creator, they would see the mess we’ve made,” Sam mumbled. “And take away our free will.”

“What about the Big Bang Theory?” Jim whispered, not sure if the flame was still listening. “There may be no heavenly realms. The flame might be the evil that it is actually warning us about, hell bent on annihilation, using us as scapegoats for the world’s end.”

The pair had faced many dangers to themselves during the journey, but the existence of the human race was now placed in their hands. Sam, who had never been much of a churchgoer, sat, eyes closed, asking God, the universe, all that is, anyone or anything, that had the capacity to hear him, to send a sign that would help determine what was best. The fault quaked again, sending Jim spinning from where he sat. His head hit a metal storage box. He was out cold. This wasn’t the sort of sign that Sam had in mind, especially since the two hours given by the flame were almost up.

After what seemed like an eternity, Jim opened his eyes.

“We can’t destroy the universe…” Jim cried out while rubbing the bump that was forming on his head, “…we can’t make this kind of decision. I saw it while I was unconscious – it’s all going to work out – there’s no other evil but humankind and they will come to their senses.”

With these words, the flame extinguished itself; Jim and Sam’s craft went into darkness, lit only by the stars outside.

Chapter 32 by Meg Basterfield

Meanwhile on Earth, the leaders of all the nations on the planet were holding a conference. Artificial Intelligence had been hailed as the saviour of the world, that it would free mankind of all the onerous tasks. It would revolutionise medicine, food production, entertainment, and could produce clones of selected specimens of the human race. There was nothing left for the humans on Earth to do. The Earth’s riches had been plundered by overpopulation, leading to wars both on the ground and in technology.

The human species had been decimated, with brother fighting brother for a means to survive. The different tribes turned on each other, using intelligent machines to eliminate great swathes of the population on the various continents. Plagues were synthesised by people using AI to wipe out further levels of the population, the ones that survived being used as guinea pigs for the AI to experiment on.

Heated discussions were being held at the underground conference of surviving world leaders as to what could be done to save the human race. There was a commotion outside the conference room, the doors burst open and the young children of the delegates flowed into the room, challenging their parents and saying, “Your policies over the decades have brought us to the brink of extinction; this is what we want you to do about it…”

In their small space craft, Sam and Jim found themselves circling a brightly-lit planet Earth; on their second orbit all the lights had gone out.

Chapter 33 by Will Nett

JIM

Maybe I was being selfish but my main concern as we circled what was left of Earth was having to explain the disaster of the Bumbershoot Plan to the Committee. This could all have been avoided if we’d pulled it off. Or if Sam wasn’t so incompetent. It had been done before, of course. There’s nothing new under the sun. Or the rain, in this case. CCTV complicates things so we needed to pick our spot. But I knew Doctor Brigthon’s habits. I’d expect her to be more careful, knowing the extent of her involvement. Which was the reason we were hired in the first place. It was Sam’s first proper job. He’s keen but inexperienced. Game as a badger, though. I thought if I could temper his excitement, he’d make a useful hitman. That’s on me. I didn’t know what he was like under pressure, when things go wrong. That’s when you find out someone’s character, especially in this racket.

I thought back to the day when it happened, or rather didn’t happen at least in the way it was supposed to. When my phone rang. I’d forbidden him to send any text messages or communications but a text arrived, saying simply, ‘JOB OFF DINT WORK NOT GOOD’ followed by a sad face emoji. Classic Millennial behaviour. He rang me – uncharacteristic Millennial behaviour – and I knew it was bad news.

I answered but didn’t say anything as was customary, but I didn’t need to because he was already talking.

“It’s fucked. It’s FUCKED.” He sounded panicked, breathing heavily between sentences. Gasping.

I stayed silent. My first instinct was to start backing away from whatever had gone wrong.

“It was the wind,” he explained, “it just came out of nowhere. She was sitting there, reading a book. Like you said she would be. I was just walking past, like you said. No one around. And then… and then…”

I could only hope nobody was listening in – if this one-way diatribe could be called a conversation – but by now I was sure they would be. So I kept quiet. I didn’t even tell him to shut up. I should have hung up but I wanted to know what happened.

More frantic gulps. “I went to do it… and… it wouldn’t work, and then it just fucking opened. The gamp just fucking OPENED. Like… WHAT… THE… FUCK? Right when the wind blew and it just fucking went. Blowing up into the trees and then off along the riverbank below. But it was too far gone, so… I ran. I panicked. And she knew. She knows, doesn’t she?”

I suppressed my anger. She did know, yes. When you’re a marked man or woman, you got a sort of feeling for when someone’s about to run you through with a poisonous Robinson, especially when you’d survived multiple defenestration attempts and a car bomb or two.

Now we had several problems: a live woman who should be dead… a boss who’d want to know how on earth we’d fucked this one up… but most importantly of all, a Penguin stick loaded with ricin twirling prettily down one of the York’s busiest tourist thoroughfares, if York was even still there when we got back from orbit, that was. It was red and white with a silver handle… distinct. Maybe someone had handed it in to lost property.

Chapter 34 by Keith Errington

As they returned from orbit, Jim and Sam debated what they should do about their problems.

“You know, we could do nothing at all,” Sam suggested.

“What? Are you joking?”

“No, not at all. Sometimes the best answer to complex problems is to wait and see how they play out.”

“That’s just…”

Jim’s phone rang. There was a quiet conversation.

“Who was that?” asked Sam.

“That was our boss’ secretary. Apparently, boss has just had a massive heart attack and passed away.”

“Good Lord. Well, they did love their doughnuts,” said Sam. “See, doing nothing is a solution.”

“It still leaves us with a mess.”

Sam’s phone beeped; a text. “Strike two for doing nothing,” he said.

“What do you mean?” asked Jim.

“Well, what’s her name, you know, the one who should be dead, she’s just gone off and joined a nunnery. Changed her name and taken a vow of silence and everything.”

“Wow. I’m impressed. Let’s do nothing… even more.”

Sometime later, they were sitting at a café. Sam with his usual cappuccino, and Jim trying macchiato for a change. On a big plate in front of them were four huge scones.

“Well, it’s been quite an adventure,” started Sam, “Since we got on that bus…”

“Yes,” agreed Jim, “It seems like years, doesn’t it?”

“All the ridiculous things that have happened to us. I mean, it’s all kind of hard to believe, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Indeed. It’s hard to make any sense of it,” said Jim, shaking his head.

“Hmm. I mean, there was that thing with those cross-dressing Vikings…”

“Oh yes! And that Greek goddess who gave you six extra arms…”

Sam chuckled. “Well, that came in ‘handy’!”

Jim groaned.

“And what about that bit where the talking unicorn sang to the Dalai Lama?”

“Bonkers.”

“Bonkers,” agreed Sam.

“The time travelling bit was tricky. You meeting your grandmother and…”

“Hey! I said I didn’t want to talk about that, okay?” Sam protested.

“Sorry.”

“What about that time you spent six weeks living as a squid?” asked Sam.

“That never happened, right?” Jim looked worried.

Sam laughed. “No, but it could have done. No madder than some of the things we have been through.”

They sat then for a while, contemplating life’s twists and turns, the little moments in time that define a person.

“Sam…”

“Yes, Jim?”

“I’ve been thinking. How would you feel if I changed my name to Gerald?”

Sam appeared to consider this for a moment, then shook his head. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Sorry.”

At that moment, the barista tuned the café’s radio to a news station.

“Reports just in. A container of deadly ricin has been isolated and made safe in York, following its accidental discovery by a deadly toxins specialist visiting York’s Viking Museum.”

“Well, that’s our current problems sorted then…” Jim said with a sigh. “What do we do now?”

“Let’s take a walk in the park, I could do with some fresh air and nature.”

Jim and Sam walked together then sat down by a pond and fed the ducks with crumbs from their leftover scones, whilst pondering what they should do next.

Chapter 35 by Jane E. D. Allen

The buttery sun shone on the backs of their heads, but there was a cold chill to the light breeze signalling the beginning of autumn, and if Sam looked closely at the old oak on the other side of the pond, he could see the cinnamon and paprika tips of the leaves as they began to turn towards a bare winter.

They sat in companiable silence for a short time, watching the drakes fighting for the scone crumbs with their wings flapping in angry machismo, and listened to their noisy squawking. Drakes are very territorial.

“So…” began Sam, raising his voice slightly over the ruckus and knowing he would need to be the one to break the silence, “what do you think our next steps should be?”

“Well, we could keep calm and carry on as if nothing has happened, like everyone else seems to do,” Jim said, “or we could bite the bullet and let the cat out of the bag.” Jim was as good at balancing opposing clichés that didn’t commit him to actually taking any kind of action, as he was for stating the obvious. Great at sitting on fences, Jim was.

“Well, I think we have to do something about all of this; we can’t ignore the consequences of what has happened, what we have just been through, the things we have done, albeit in a good cause,” said Sam, a little irritably. “Someone has to act responsibly and it looks like it might have to be us.”

Jim sighed, slowly letting out a long breath. “I suppose you’re right,” he agreed. “You usually are, and even if you’re wrong, you would never admit it, but it’s true we’re both part of this thing and have to take the consequences. It’s just that if I’m being honest, I’m something of a coward and don’t enjoy being in the spotlight. This is going to create a mountain of fuss, lots of attention and questions I don’t want to answer. I’m not sure I’m ready, willing and able.” He threw the last of the crumbs in the general direction of the nearest duck.

“Me neither,” replied Sam, arising and beckoning Jim to get to his feet, “but we might as well get on with it.” He smiled at Jim ironically, saying, “Onwards and upwards – come on – at least we can face this together.”

And as they walked resignedly towards the park gateway, they separately and silently admired the beautifully ornate nineteenth century ironwork as they passed beneath it.

Chapter 36 by Reino Tarihmen

The hissing of a bus door closing gave them cause to momentarily pause in the gateway and turn, gazing towards the bus from which they had been so unceremoniously ejected. They watched with mixed emotions as the weary, battle-scarred, public service chariot that had carried them thus far, agonisingly pulled away from the bus stop, amidst an unwholesome cacophony of grinding gears and metal-on-metal screeching, as it painfully crawled away into the perpetual fog of Portsmouth North End.

Once the red glow of tail lights had finally disappeared, they turned back to the gate.

“Funny thing,” Sam observed to his friend, “you walk past an ornate, nineteenth century, ironwork park gate almost every day of your life, and not once do you notice it’s a Hell Portal.”

“Now that is definitely one of life’s more unusual quirks,” Jim smiled.

Passing through the gate, they were only briefly aware of the transition from their mundane plane of existence to the ethereal one. A beautifully peaceful moment as if stepping through a veil of cheesecloth.

Which lasted all of three seconds.

Ear splitting sound crashed all around them. Blinding light seared their eyes like staring at the sun. A wave of unbearable heat washed over them as they were crushed and buffeted by unrelenting forces on every side. The air, violently forced from their lungs, was replaced with a foul and overpowering stench of…

“Ace?” said Sam?

“What?”

“Ace. Body spray. It’s the new range.”

Jim was significantly behind Sam in coming to terms with their new surroundings but was shocked to quickly discover that “Hell” was not exactly as he had been expecting.

The source of the ear-splitting sound turned out to be very loud rock music blasting from the night club outside which they currently appeared to be standing, equally the origin of the blinding light, timed to the bass rhythm.

A crowd of screaming, sweating and, Jim noted, somewhat scantily clad, people surged around them towards its doors, propelling the two friends forward.

Jim noticed the crowd was being filtered into lanes, thinking how remarkably well organised Hell seemed compared to what little he knew of the place, although the two, eight foot tall, cloven-hooved bouncers, aligned pretty well. The fact they were also wearing tuxedos did little however to help with his current mental equilibrium.

Reaching the front of the queue at last, another large, ram-horned, snake-scaled individual was holding a clip board.

“Names?” the demon enquired, in a remarkably clipped English accent.

“Errr… Jim and Sam…”

The demon looked down at his list, reading it carefully. “There’s no Jimunsam on my list.”

“Errr… no… it’s Jim and Sam… we’re friends of Susan.”

“No Jim on here. Or a Sam for that matter. Not on my list, you don’t get in to the party, and I don’t care who you’re friends of, now scram before I have a pit beast devour your soul.”

A feminine voice, oozing with carnality causing the demon to blanch visibly, in fact literally turn white with fear, cut in from behind with, “It’s okay, Azazukimhael, they’re friends of mine, they won’t be on the list, VIPs you understand, now be a good demon and let the boys through.”

Sam piped up, “Hey Suze, great to see you… and nice tail by the way… that succubus thing is really working out for you, huh?”

Chapter 37 by Phil Sculthorpe

 Blanching – if possible – even more visibly, the demon stood to one side. Suze ushered Jim and Sam through the door. Once inside, she smacked Sam’s ear.

“Don’t ever mention my tail again. It was a stupid mistake, okay? I’m having it surgically removed next week. Now, I have a little business to attend to, so why don’t you boys grab a drink and I’ll see you a little later on the dance floor? Oh, and take notice: the staff in here don’t stand for any nonsense. Especially don’t give any backchat to the waitresses. They’re just like me: they think nothing of smacking the ear of a rude customer.”

Blowing a backwards kiss, Suze flounced off. Or, at least, attempted to, the tail made a fully-fledged flounce difficult.

“I could actually do with a drink,” said Jim.

“And a quiet sit down for five minutes until the buzzing stops in my head,” added Sam. “That Suze has one hard slap. There are some private booths at the back. You grab the seats; I’ll go over to the bar and order.”

The three-legged waitresses who brought their drinks over a few minutes later had on a pair of two red shoes plus a totally random green one.

“What’s the matter,” she demanded, noticing Sam staring intently at her feet, “never seen a girl wearing different colour shoes before? If you’re so smart, tell me a shop that sells matching footwear for people with three feet.”

And before he could reply, she banged the glasses down so hard that half their contents slopped out. After which she gave Sam’s other ear a hard whack, then turned on two of her three heels and stalked away.

“I think she might fancy me,” observed Sam.

Jim wasn’t paying any attention. He was lost in his own thoughts.

“What’s up with you?” Sam demanded.

“I’m honestly not sure I can take much more of this.”

“What do you mean? I’m the one who keeps getting his ears whacked.”

“I’m not joking,” Jim insisted. “It’s all getting too much. I can’t believe all the awful events that have happened to us since we got on that bus and first saw the flying saucer. What else have we got to face? Right now, I’d give anything to be able to turn back time and for this mullarkey not to continue.”

He paused, noticing his friend’s odd expression.

“Sam, why are you looking at me like that?’

“It’s what you just said,” his friend replied, in an slightly embarrassed tone. “It made me remember this.”

Saying which, he took from his pocket a small square black plastic box, featureless except for a large button on one surface.

Jim had thought, on this crazy roller-coaster adventure, there was surely nothing now that could surprise him. But he was wrong.

“Is that what I think it is?” he said, quietly. “Is that a D.E.M?”

“Yes,” answered Sam. “You’re right: it is a Deus-ex-Machina box.”

Jim needed a moment to take that in. “Are we talking,” he eventually continued, “a genuine D.E.M. box? Technology given that name because of how its action mimics the effect of the Deus-ex-Machina plot device routinely employed in Greek Tragedy? Where a god – or some other highly contrived mechanism – suddenly and abruptly resolves a seemingly hopeless predicament?”

“Yes.”

“Well, you might have mentioned it before,” Jim concluded, coldly. “You might just have mentioned – somewhere along the line – that in your pocket you had a box which, if its button were pressed, would alter the space-time continuum in our favour, returning you and me to our normal lives. To a point before any of these awful things happened. You might just have mentioned that.”

Sam tried to look apologetic.

“How long have you had one?” Jim demanded.

“It got delivered just before I left the house to meet you at the bus stop. I was rushing, so I shoved it in my pocket and then, well, events rather took over, didn’t they? I forgot all about it. Until now.”

“Where did you get the money for a D.E.M? They cost an absolute ruddy fortune.”

“It isn’t one of the miniature quantum computer-based models. No way I could afford one of them. And, anyway, not everything that’s happened has been awful, has it?”

Jim decided not to debate that. Instead, he asked, “So, Sam, from where did you get a cheap non-miniature quantum computer Deus-ex-machina box?’

‘Online. From that Chinese company.”

“You don’t mean Temu, surely?”

“Cheaper than Temu,” admitted Sam. “This one was only a fiver. Look, don’t be so sceptical. You never know, it might work.”

“You had me really hopeful for a second,” Jim sighed. “It cost a fiver! I bet for that price it didn’t even come with a battery. And, funnily enough,” he added, sarcastically, “I don’t happen to have a pack of spare batteries on me.”

“Well, that’s where you’re wrong,” Sam told him, vehemently, “in fact, it came with a battery already installed. It’s ready to go.”

“Then for godsake,” cried Jim, “press the button! Or give it to me and I’ll press it. And keep your fingers crossed it’s not a dud.”

“If we’re going to do it,” said Sam, holding the little black box out towards his friend, “we should do it together.”

Jim nodded, recognising the peace-offering. Not without trepidation, he put his thumb over Sam’s thumb and, with a sudden bravado, together, the friends pressed the button as hard as they could.

Nothing happened.

“Maybe it takes a second to warm up?” Sam said.

At which point, the little black box became instantly red hot, made a horrible buzzing sound, issued an enormous electric spark, and gave both Sam and Jim a vicious electric shock.

Instinctively, they threw it to the ground.

Where it melted into a small puddle of black plastic.

“So,” Jim summarised, grimly, “as well as everything else, I’ve now got a badly burned thumb to contend with. Crikey, I wish you’d never come up with the idea of us going to gate crash Billy Gently’s party.”

“I don’t even like Billy Gently,” Sam said. “I just thought gate crashing his party would be better than a boring night staying in. I feel totally fed up now.”

There was a mutual disheartened silence for a few seconds.

Then Jim realised miserableness would get them nowhere. He forced himself to be positive. “Come on, we’ve survived so far. It’s no good moping. Let’s go and find that waitress. If she really does fancy you, maybe she’ll help us out.”

“She might have a sister she could introduce to you,” ventured Sam.

“That would be something wouldn’t it: this great adventure culminating in us each meeting the love of our life – and, in both cases, it being a woman with fifteen toes.”

“A bit different from the girls back home, eh?”

“Yes,” agreed Jim, “and certainly not what I expected when we boarded that bus.”

Keep a look out for the call to join the next Round Robin which will be launching soon!
xx