Death in Stockdale (part one)

The election was drawing nearer and the good folks of Stockdale had crammed themselves inside the town hall for last of the candidates speeches.

There had been lots of talk about who would turn up to speak. Rumours had spread like peanut butter about how the three main parties had all pulled out over confusions and arguments about the TV rights, but it seemed that nobody had bothered to inform any of them that tonights event would not actually be on the tele.

As a result there was not one single representative from the Cuntservatives, Blabour, or the Miserbale Lemoncrates.

This meant left just two men left to battle it out. Lemiwell Jones and Dr Malevolent.

The latter had won the toss before the night started and was currently finishing off his opening speech as our story enters it’s fifth paragraph.

 “..and is how I – Dr Malevolent will ensure jobs for all with my henchmen scheme, Free anti-aging cream for all over 65’s and a complete ban of people eating dry Weetabix! Thankyou Stockdale. The future is MINE… I mean.. OURS!”

Cheers ran out through the damp hall as the feckless sheep collectively remembered only the bits they wanted to here.

Lemiwell Jones stepped from behind his podium and gave a little nervous cough as he took his place before the microphone. “This is it.” He thought to himself. Followed by “…dry Weetabix? Why didn’t I think of that? Filthy buggers.”

A dry swallow and quick tug at his collar and Lemiwell began his speech.

“Ladies and gentlemen… Friends… Uuurrghh!”

A loud BANG had shot through the ears of all in attendance caused at least one person to faint and another to loosen their bowels.

Everyone looked around a little confused. This wasn’t the kind of speech they were expecting.

Lemiwell Jones fell to the floor in a heavy heap.

One of the floor managers ran up to him and checked his pulse.

“He’s DEAD!”

Gasps echoed around the room and somebody else fainted.

At the back of the room Henry Hut (truth wizard) staggered back in disbelief. “I don’t believe it!” He said.

A strange figure in a grey hooded jacket ran past him and through the door. Henry immediately ran after him knowing that this must be the killer and Henry had to catch the murderer of his friend and mentor.

“STOP!” Henry screamed as he gave chase but the killer had disappeared into the shadows.

Security had gathered around Dr Malevolent and ushered him through the back door and back to his secret HQ at the top of the moors.

“My god!” he wheezed, out of breath. “What the hell was that?”

His number one henchman, Barnabus, said nothing and continued driving at high speed.

The net hour was a blur. Henry had run until he got a stitch (it didn’t take long as, like most conspiracy theorists, exercise only ever got in the way of searching for the truth) and found himself walking aimlessly through the dark and empty streets. He hadn’t even noticed it had started raining.

He soon found himself outside of Mrs Featheringays house for wandering gentleman of which Mr Jones have resided for the past year or so.

He knocked on the door and was greeted lovingly by the lady of the house herself.

“Come in love.” She whispered, putting her arm around the now sodden Henry. “The kettle’s on… I’ll fetch a towel.”

Henry walked into the common room and found the imposing figure of Professor Procto stood motionless, his hands held on his hips. “It’s about time you got here. We have work to do.”

Henry flew into a furious rage. “There must be something you can do Professor!” He pleaded. “Don’t you have some sort of machine that can bring Mr Jones back to life… or …or … a time machine or murderer finder-o-tron or something?!?!”

Henry had never gotten a fix on the Professor. He never understood how a man of SCIENCE could be so dismissive of Henry’s theories and thoughts about aliens and chem-trails and “big pharma”.

The Professor said nothing but ushered Henry up to his part time room on the first floor.

Professor Procto usually slept in his laboratory at the University and only used a room at Mrs Featheringays in order to perform some of his more “experimental” experiments. (it had something to do with the University’s insurance against high explosives and multi-dimensional creatures on the rampage).

“Funny you should mention a time machine Henry. I have at least one in here. I only finished building it last week and not had a chance to use it.” He said plainly.

“?” questioned Henry.

Through the door of the Profs room they both entered and the Professor pulled an old dust sheet off a large shapeless shape in the corner of the room.

“I’m going to send you back in time to find out who killed Lemiwell Jones.”

Sobriety hit Henry in the face like a wet sock.

Questions had to be answered.

“But.. won’t travelling through time cause y’know consequences?” He nervously asked.

Procto Shrugged. “Could do.” He said.

“There are three main possibilities. First of all, by travelling back in time you may cause something to happen that wasn’t going to have already happened in the past (you now future) and this will result in a time split, creating two parallel time at the same point in space/time may cause the universe to implode due to the weight of it’s own impossibility.”

Henry stared blankly as the words washed over him.

“Secondly, there is the grandfather paradox. You may end up doing something that will stop you wanting to travel back in time in your own future (the now/present or then/past depending on your point of view) and the total impossibility of this will cause the universe to implode.”

Henry still stared..

“Thirdly, there is the theory of predestination. You always will be/were going to travel back in time. You won’t/have not been able to stop the killer as it has/will be going to have already happened. Even if I send you back to before the murder, it will already have will be going to have happened. So there is that to consider as well.” He shrugged again.

Henry remembered to breathe.

“It’s why I don’t really bother with Time travel.” Concluded the Professor. “It just gives you a massive headache.”

The prof flicked a switch by the plug socket and the machine turned on with an ominous hum.

He machine itself looked just like a poorly made door frame but with some blue and red wires sticking out of the sides and some very futuristic neon lights flickering up and down the edges.

The Professor frowned. "That's odd. It's looks like somebody has already travelled back in time."

"How can that be?" said Henry. "You said you had only just made the machine."

The Prof tapped on the keyboard of the strange machine and concluded thusly:

"It looks like somebody from OUR future has already gone back in time to before the murder. We are locked out of that time frame."

It was now Henry's turn to frown. "But if they are in the future and have not travelled back in time yet, why can't we travel back there first?"

Procto mused on this logical retort and replied "Even though they are in our future, they actually travelled back into our shared past. This means that they are already there. If they are already there in the past they must have already time travelled in the future. This means that we are unable to travel between those two points."

"eh?" (that was Henry)

"It's quite simple. Time is locked out by the travelling of somebody from the future(point A) into the past (point B) any time between those two points is locked by that journey. Because we exist inside those two points we can only travel back to point B and no further... I suppose this cause a fourth time travel consequence. Extrodinary."

Henry was getting a bit fed up of being confused. "So what do we do then?"

“ Carry on as normal... But remember Henry, whatever happens don't…” and with that, the Professor pushed henry through the time machine ….

And BACK.

Henry awoke to find himself trapped in the past facing a mirror image that was not his own. Fearing that he may be infringing of the copyright of other time travellers opening credits, 

Henry quickly realised he was actually looking at a poster of Albert Einstein.

Grateful of not having to get a lawyer (just yet) Henry looked around the Professors empty room (Henry had travelled in time but not space) and decided to utter his famous catchphrase:

“I don’t believe it…..”

But Henry did not have the time to not believe anything. He had to save Lemiwell Jones from a fate worse than death… well from death anyway.

TBC…..