by Ethan Bibile
Quinn Fenton and the Time and Space Protection Agency
By Ethan Bibile
Copywrite © 2018 Ethan Bibile
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters, locations and events portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
To Mum and Dad
Who read this one first
PROLOGUE
“Time is a fragile thing, wouldn’t you agree?”
His long black coat swept against the floor as he walked forward, studying the fob watch that sat in his hand. Opposite him stood a man with short brown hair, watching him rather blankly.
“It is, sir,” The man agreed, observing the man who continued to stroll around, continuing to study the fob watch.
“Right answer Slavian,” The man said. “It’s almost as if, in the very beginning, when the universe was made, time was made specifically to be a weakness to everything,” He looked up at Slavian. A psychopathic grin spread across his face.
“I pity those who didn’t think of it themselves,” He continued. “Stupid, really. It’s like the answer to power is staring right at you in the face. I’m sure it’s about time that someone got it right, hey?” The man said, grinning. He spread out his arms, seeking praise for his pun.
“Rather amusing, sir,” Slavian said, hands behind his completely straightened back.
The two stood in a dark circular room. To one side of the room, there was a door. The walls were lined with dark patterns and apart from the two men who stood inside, the room was completely empty.
The man continued pacing before he stopped and turned to look at Slavian.
“What news do you have on the new forming agency?” He asked his servant suddenly, staring at him coldly.
“They are recruiting members. But so far, they are no threat to us,” Slavian replied. “Once we’ve placed the Watches throughout time, they will begin to send out groups to track them down and destroy them.”
“It’s funny how they try,” The man said, sighing to himself and grinning. “They don’t know that they’ll never win, do they? Despite all their efforts, despite trying so hard, they will never, ever win,” The man stopped pacing, before laughing. Slavian simply watched his master with a blank expression as he doubled over, his shoulder-length black hair obscuring his face from view. Eventually, he stood up, sighing to himself.
“It is rather amusing, sir,” Slavian replied, yet his face showed no sign of any amusement. He might have been a talking brick wall.
“Oh, come off it Slavian,” The man said, walking up to his servant. “You’re so serious,” He said before standing up completely straight and changing his expression to a blank one. “Look at me, I’m Slavian, I’m so serious,” He said, mocking one of his own workers. Slavian, however, didn’t seem to care in the slightest.
“You know, I think I need to fix these,” The man said. He tapped a strip of metal that was attached to Slavian’s neck. “Too serious,” The man shook his head, before stepping away from his servant. He turned and strode to a black door and opened it, finding himself looking into a circular tube which housed a ladder. The man looked up the tube and shouted out.
“How far away are we?” He called up, waiting for a response.
“We’re arriving as we speak, sir,” Came a voice from above. “Give us a few minutes to land, sir. We will inform you when we reach the surface of the planet.”
The man stepped away from the tunnel and shut the door, smirking to himself as he did. He pulled the fob watch out of his pocket, before throwing it up in the air and catching it again.
“So close!” He said, very clearly excited. “After years of hard work finally, we’re right here and no one, no one, will stop me!” He laughed a demonic laugh, which echoed around the circular room, bounding from one wall to the other. Slavian still stood rooted to the spot hands behind his back.
“Come off it,” The man said sighing and dropping his hands. “Loosen up.”
Minutes passed by as the two waited. Slavian with little interest. The man with jittery excitement. Eventually, the door to the tube opened and a man was standing on one of the rungs of the ladder. He was similar to Slavian in the way he dressed, and he too had the silver, metal, blinking strip upon his neck.
“Sir,” The man said with a blank expression on his face. “We have arrived upon the surface of the planet.”
“Oooh, exciting!” The man said, jumping up and down. He shoved the watch into his pocket before rapidly clapping his hands together. “C’mon, get moving!”
The driver of the spaceship they were on climbed down the ladder, the man following him immediately, Slavian coming in last. The ladder eventually ended, and they found themselves in a room nearly identical to the one the man and Slavian had been in previously. There was a slight difference in that it was a little smaller and upon one wall there was a ramp door that had been pulled up and become part of the wall.
“Slavian,” The man said, nodding to his servant as he stood himself in front of the ramp, his eyes glinting with excitement. Slavian went over to the wall where there was a keypad attached. He typed in code rather quickly and the ramp began to descend.
A soft wind blew in through the widening cracks, these openings also granting them a view of the dark sky outside. The man’s lips pulled up at the edges, forming a smirk as the ramp connected with the ground.
The outside world was a grim wasteland. Thunder rumbled, connecting with their eardrums, lightning crackling above. The ground was rocky, cracks everywhere which had smoke billowing from their depths. No animals or plants lay over the wasteland. A burning smell met their noses, yet they couldn’t see any fire or lava.
The man strode down the ramp, stopping as his black boots connected with the rocky terrain.
“Welcome my friends!” He cried, stretching his arms out. His shoulder length hair lightly blew around his face, yet the wind not strong enough to move his coat. Slavian and the pilot of the ship walked down the ramp and stood behind their master, looking at the planet before them too. The three were not alone, however. Their spaceship was not the only one on the planet’s surface. About half a dozen ships stood behind them that were identical to theirs. “We march forward! For a new universe!” He cried out, setting forth.
“Bring out the Watches,” Slavian instructed, an earpiece in his ear, before he and the pilot walked forward too.
Slowly, the other cargo doors on the other spaceships descended and figures emerged from each of them. Men and women alike, with similar expressions and attire to Slavian and the pilot. Silver, shiny robots emerged too with glowing red eyes. The men and women led the robots forward, which were carrying boxes between two of them, which were filled with fob watches.
The large group marched forward through the desolate wasteland, the man at the front holding his watch in his hand as he marched, a sadistic smirk on his face. Smoke billowed up around them as they marched, stepping over cracks, lighting exploding in the sky overhead.
The flat ground began to slowly ascend, creating a slope. Pretty soon the rising ground was quite clearly perceived as a mountain.
They made their way to the very top of the mountain, which had become very steep at the peak They managed to climb their way over to the very top of the peak, which wasn’t very thick. Instead of the mountain forming a point
at the top, a large crater lay in front of the army. The man made his way to a rocky ledge that stuck out over the crater and looked down.
Below them was a pitch-black pit. It wasn’t pitch black because it went on forever and into the heart of the planet, it was pitch black because it was simply nothing. Nothing dirtied it, nothing touched it. It was pure darkness.
The only thing that could even be slightly similar was a black hole. Yet a black hole pulled things in, a black hole had a terrifying gravitational pull. This pit of nothingness below was silent and still, not pulling anyone or anything towards it.
“Ah,” The man sighed out. It didn’t seem possible, but his crazed smirk got bigger, making him look even more deranged and evil. “Evanesces. The one place in the universe where my dream can come true,” He sighed, staring down into the pit, before turning around. His small army stood behind him, robots carrying boxes, everyone else simply staring at him.
“Slavian,” He said, strolling up to his servant and putting his hands upon his shoulders. “It’s here, right here where everything will truly begin!” He let out a crazed laugh, which Slavian didn’t share, simply staring at his lunatic of a master.
The man stopped laughing rather suddenly, taking his hands off Slavian’s shoulders. He made his way back out to the edge of the ledge and stared into the darkness.
“Throw them in,” He commanded.
The robots walked forward to the edges of the crater and tipped each box upside down over the darkness. The watches fell out of their containers, plummeting towards the black. They vanished as they fell through it.
The robots emptied box after box after box, hundreds upon hundreds of the Watches tumbling down into the black pit of nothingness.
The man stood on the edge, an insane gleam in his eye and a lunatic’s smile on his face as he watched the Watches falling into the pit below. He pulled out his own Watch yet didn’t throw it in.
“And this, universe,” He whispered. “Is where you fall,” He let out a laugh before he flipped open the lid of the fob watch.
NESPRITIA
Despite having never set an alarm in his entire life, Quinn Fenton was woken up rather abruptly by one.
The noise was incredibly irritating, piercing his brain like a knife. Quinn sat up, thoroughly annoyed at being woken up so early on a day of the weekend. He rubbed his eyes, trying to open them as they continued to try to force themselves closed.
Quinn reached across to his bedside table, his vision slightly blurred as his eyes were still adjusting to the darkness of the room. He reached over to the holographic clock on his bedside table, trying to find the holographic projector. His hand hit the bedside table repetitively as he tried to find the button to turn the annoying alarm off. However, as he fumbled around, he just knocked the clock behind the bedside table and out of his reach. Unfortunately, the alarm continued.
Quinn sat up in his bed, now fully awake and no chance of falling back asleep. He yawned loudly, running a hand through his hair before attempting to get rid of the sleep that occupied his eyes. He swung his feet over the side of the bed, his feet connecting with the cold, hard wooden floor, sending shivers up his spine as he stood up. He put his arm in between his bed and the bedside table, slithering it down until he found the screaming alarm clock. He grabbed it and pushed a button that turned the alarm off, then put the holographic projector back onto his bedside table right next to a couple of books and his headset, the time telling him it was seven thirty in the morning.
Quinn looked around his room in the darkness, squinting as he tried to adjust his eyes to the lighting of the room.
He made out his bed, with its white frame, crumpled sheets and pillows. He knew he should probably put in some effort and at least attempt to make his bed, but he very rarely bothered to do that.
Of course, next to his bed was his bedside table that had some of the things he used most on it. Towards the wall on one side of the room was his desk which had his computer and crystal clear see-through monitor set up on it, his hovering desk chair sitting idly in front of it.
Quinn picked up his headset and put it on. It consisted of a metal circle that was adjustable and fitted around a person’s head. From the headband a metal strip pointed towards the ground, a piece of glass attached which went in front of Quinn’s eyes. He reached up to the side of the headset and pressed a button to turn it on.
“Good morning Quinn,” Came a cool, monotone voice from his headset. Quinn reached out in front of himself and began taping thin air. Despite this, the headset contained a sensor that detected finger movements and applied them to the glass screen, which had lit up and showed him his password options. Quinn unlocked the device and checked to see if he had any messages or missed calls from his friends. Finding no notifications, he turned off the headset and put it back on the bedside table.
Quinn looked over at the large, circular window on one wall, which was covered by his blinds. He crossed the room to a shimmering blue metal plate on the wall, pressed his index finger against it and swiped upwards. The blinds retracted into the roof, causing sunlight to stream through into his room.
Quinn initially covered his eyes, shielding them from the sunlight that seemed to be filled with poison as it cut through the dark.
Once his eyes adjusted to the sun, Quinn stopped squinting and looked out at the world beyond.
Out the window was the planet of Nespritia and the city of Filia. Quinn lived in one of the more quiet and residential areas of the city. In the distance, he could see the beautiful heart of the city, with its gorgeous architecture, its large walkways, odd yet beautifully shaped buildings, the large skyway that was full of flying vehicles, the countless species of aliens, the huge, grand buildings and walkways with multiple levels.
The place where Quinn lived was a little quieter and more ‘normal’.
The houses were still odd shaped, yet not as extreme as in the city. Glass was a popular feature. Wood also was common; these features apparently being brought with people from the planet Earth when they had colonised Nespritia. Vehicles, cars especially, flew past Quinn’s window, not flying as high as the ones in the city, yet still above the ground. The street Quinn lived on was long, and it was very open to the sky. There was some greenery, yet not so much as to obscure things, the grass and plants kept neatly and at a nice length.
Quinn stepped away from the window and moved over to the space of wall next to his bedroom door. Just above his head height was a slim cylinder that was placed horizontally on the wall. Quinn reached up and pressed a small button on the side of it, and a beam shone out and created a full-length mirror, which shimmered in the daylight.
He looked at himself in the mirror, running his hand through his light brown hair messy hair, the face of Quinn Fenton looking back at him. He was about the average height for a teenager of seventeen years old and skinny. He continued blinking, trying to adjust his brown eyes to the time of day, the sun shining against his pure white skin.
Yawning, Quinn reached up and pressed the button on the side of the cylinder which retracted the mirror back into itself. He turned the handle on his bedroom door and opened it, stepping out into the foyer.
He stood on a balcony on the second floor of his house, which overlooked the bottom floor. The balcony was circular and within the middle was a great gaping hole. Doors lined the walls around the balcony, each leading to a different room, a set of descending stairs to Quinn’s right. Above him was a huge glass sunlight, illuminating the entire room, thus making the room only require lights if people stayed up into the night or if it got too dark outside.
Quinn descended the spiral staircase which hugged the white, circular wall, stepping into the foyer of the house, the front door of the house just next to him.
Very aware that his feet were absolutely freezing as he stepped on the tiles, Quinn quickly stepped his way through the house, down and hallway and emerged into the kitchen.
“Morning,” Quinn said, greeting
his mother and sister as he entered the kitchen. The kitchen was very sleek and modern for the year that they were living in. The stove tops were simply black, flat mats on the kitchen top, the kitchen bench and island bench white and smooth. From the roof hung two pots that encased a series of native plants inside of them. Over in one corner was a sturdy, wooden table at which Quinn’s mum and sister sat.
“What are you doing up so early?” Quinn’s mother asked, smiling yet talking in a surprised tone. Quinn bent down to allow her to kiss him on the cheek, as she was considerably shorter than her son.
Quinn had inherited his brown eyes from her, yet the colour of his hair was a result of a combination of his mother’s blonde and his father’s brown hair. Most people said Quinn inherited his mother’s looks with a few of his father’s features thrown into the mix. But if one thing was for certain, despite not even being overly tall, Quinn did not inherit his height from his mother.
“I know, I’m not usually up now,” Quinn responded as he removed two pieces of bread from the bread jar. He put them into the toaster, which had all the functions from heating up bread to toasting it to even adding anything you wanted on it. “Someone set my alarm for seven thirty.”
Quinn turned around as he heard a slight giggle, which was then stifled behind the hands of his six-year-old sister. Quinn looked at her, raising his eyebrows yet smirking, their mother watching the interaction between her children with a smile on her face.
“You set my alarm?” Quinn said, slowly walking around the kitchen island bench, playing with his little sister who was now full on laughing, having abandoned eating her breakfast altogether.
“It was so funny!” She said, laughing. Quinn came from behind and began tickling her stomach, causing her to laugh even harder than she already was.
“Quinn! Stop it!” Natalie Fenton laughed, and her older brother finally stopped tickling her.
“Quinn, your toast,” Their mother said, nodding to the toaster from her seat at the table. Quinn stopped playing with Natalie and ran over to the toaster, quickly pressing a button on the side which popped two overcooked pieces of toast out, both of which were covered in strawberry jam. Quinn put the two pieces onto a white plate and sat down at the table opposite his sister.