LOGINShare
Chapter 54: Failure
Last Updated:
2024-10-29 19:42:56With a shaking but hopeful hand, Emmet handed over the purple container he had chosen to store the nanobots in. A dark, gleaming shade of purple slightly lighter than plum and deeper with bluer undertones, looking as if it could be the gem of a necklace.
Jasper's hands also shook, when he received it. He turned it over, examining it from all sides, thumbing the clasp that would open and reveal the interior capsule which needed a code to release a tiny needle sized hole to the nanobots.
Startling slightly as Jasper shoved the device into the waist band of trousers, Emmet startled. It would make more sense to simply not be carrying the nanobots in case they went to the future, as the device could be recognised and exploited. It really was the best place to hide it, between them, but it was still surprising.
The same analytical expressions washed over Jasper's face, his eyes and nose scrunching up slightly and then replaced
Related chapters
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 55: Not Enough
It wasn't enough. It couldn't be enough anymore.The first time that the agent had been knocked out by a blow to the head, it wasn't enough. He was awake in minutes and with enough fortitude to try to strangle Jasper. He wouldn't be going down now. It wasn't enough.Emmet needed to make sure that the agent would not hurt Jasper again. He needed to make sure that no more hands, lunging out of the shadows to wrap around the throats of the innocent and choke them to death, would be able to hurt Jasper. He needed to do this. He needed to.Hitting the agent on the head was not enough to knock him out. It wasn't enough. It wasn't enough anymore.Emmet reached out to one of the agent's left shoulder, bearing the hand that had dared to move itself against Jasper. The arm that had dared to hurt Jasper, threaten to extinguish his life. He needed to make sure that it would never hurt anybody ever again.
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 56: No Lasers
Emmet desperately reached out to Jasper, his arms outstretched, grasping at his sleeves, his fingers lightly brushing against his gown, before leaving that white material behind.But Jasper wasn't looking at Emmet.He looked down into his hands, tears falling into them, dripping off of them into his lap and the time machine. He was stuck in his mind, completely unaware of the world around him. He couldn't see Emmet. He wasn't seeing Emmet.He wasn't seeing Emmet reaching out to him. He wasn't seeing Emmet who was so close to him. He wasn't seeing him. Jasper wasn't looking at him.He was looking at his time machine.He was looking at the big, red button on it.His fingers were moving towards it. He wasn't looking at Emmet.His hand pressed down on it. He wasn't looking up. He wasn't looking at Emmet. He wasn't looking at his outstretched
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 57: On my Own
Emmet looked over to the agent that he so detested, almost hearing his mocking voice, grating on his nerves. If he was awake right now, he would surely be making fun of Emmet for going back on his promises to Jasper, and for getting his heart broken for some guy who had probably considered their relationship to be some couple week long fling.Even when he was unconscious, he managed to make Emmet angry.He was glad that the agent had now shut up and couldn't do any harm, but hated the fact that the bastard was now his responsibility to bear. He hated the fact that agent was such a bastard, but he needed to get him some kind of medical attention if he didn't want to be charged with manslaughter or murder.Fuck!He now had to go back to trying to salvage his life.He knew that he would be first arrested, and probably be placed in some sort of isolation while a thorough investigatio
The Boy who Circled Time September Chapter 58: A Bowed Back
Emmet almost crumbled down into a broken heap onto the floor, as soon as he stood up, onto his one, good leg. He leaned heavily down on the crutch, his muscles in his arm and leg straining and struggling, with blood rushing straight into his head as soon as he fully stood up, the unconscious agent tied to his back, completely alone in the cupboard.He wondered whether he could hop towards the door, but decided against it, knowing that his back probably couldn't take the strain, with all the additional weight, tied onto it, and his leg could probably collapse under him.He awkwardly shuffled towards the walking stick and dragging his body along to it. It felt awkward and too uncomfortable and cumbersome, twisting his ankle round left and right, almost always on the verge of hopping anyway.He forced himself to keep doing the same movement, again and again, until he reached the door.He stopped himself and closed his eyes, breathing in and out at a co
The Boy who Circled Time September Chapter 59: Stealing the Time Machine
His office was fucking empty.His fucking office was fucking empty.Either this was some top tier power move designed to make Emmet believe that he was perfectly safe until they were sure that they could liberate the agent's body from Emmet, before summarily killing him, and, maybe or, arresting him.It was far more likely that headquarters could simply hack into his computer and access all the documents remotely, but that still didn't mean that they needed to go into his office and retrieve the physical copies of documents.Or maybe, while Emmet was trapped in the cupboard, they already fucking had, and happened to leave the rest of his office spotless and untouched.If that was true, then maybe they really were playing head games with his boiling, pain induced delirious mind.He wanted to leave this all behind. He wanted to leave and go somewhere where he never would ever have to think again.Nothing had been moved noticeably. The c
The Boy who Circled Time September Chapter 60: One Bullet
The time machine sat in Emmet's lap, as if it had all right to be there, sitting innocuously and innocently, digging into his broken leg with a sharp, jagged edge.The outer casing looked as if it had suffered various burns on it, with dents littered over the who machine, with one corner particularly damaged and caving inwards as if it had been dropped from a massive height.It almost seemed miraculous that the buttons and the interface looked completely undamaged, even if the giant red button that Jasper had used to escape from Emmet looked as if it was on its way to falling off, sticking out at an odd angle, the spring inside clearly needing to be replaced.Emmet scrambled to alleviate the pain that it was causing him and rolled the time machine over, using his chest, to balance the huge, boxy thing, and his one remaining good arm. He looked at the interface and pressed the green button in the corner, to turn the machine on.The screen showed immediatel
The Boy who Circled Time September Chapter 61: I Watched Somebody Die in my Living Room
Emmet ducked down as quickly as he could, as soon as he whispered out his final apology, the bullet just grazing his shoulder as he fell and moved to hit the big, red button on the time machine.All around him, the world shifted and changed. He saw himself disintegrate, molecule by molecule - his body, clothes, and the time machine itself turning into dust - until his vision also dissipated, leaving Emmer unable to see.And soon, he was left unable to think, all his thoughts scattering into oblivion and nothingness.He saw nothing.He felt nothing.He was nothing.For a brief moment, it was as if Emmet didn't even exist. That he was dead.There was nothing.Nothing.Void.Suddenly Emmet found that, once more, he existed.That he was alive.It felt like he had been abruptly been woken up fro
The Boy who Circled Time September Chapter 62: Nobody
The ceiling above Emmet was a light cream colour, almost too different from the greys that he had grown too accustomed too. The walls were also the same light cream, with golden sunlight pouring through white curtains, which danced and waved on the wind.He felt as if he had he had been run over by a train, and couldn't remember anything that had happened to put him in his current state. He couldn't move any of his limbs either, and found himself almost giddy at the idea of it, being tied down to a bed.A different part of him thought that maybe it wasn't the right time or place to be thinking about things like that, and it hurt every single time that he moved one of his arms.Emmet closed his eyes and waited for the world to stop spinning. He didn't want to think about anything right now. He just didn't want to be in pain, but... that would mean thinking about where he was to solve the problem.He opened his eyes again, and looked up at the cream coloure
Latest chapter
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 371: Schematics
“Why’re you sleeping on the floor like that? Come on, get up. You’ll hurt your back doing that,” Doctor Marigold chided, dragging all her bits of heavy machinery around the office space to prepare for her demonstration.Behind her, Lila remained still.“I know that you’re not dead. Come, get up already,” she called out, stepping over a few sheets of paper that she had laid out to grab Lila by the shoulder and heave her up into sitting.The stubborn girl just flopped down again, not opening her eyes.“If you get the fuck up, we can move the flight a week forward so you can stop worrying about it,” Lucy Marigold shouted across the room.Like a rubber band, Lila snapped back up and finally opened her eyes.It had been harder to see the bags below them when they had been closed and Doctor Marigold wondered if she should buy the girl some sleep tablets.“I’m awake,” Li
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 370: EXTRA GRETEL
Yolanda seemed to understand that she needed to back off and stop teasing Gretel, when the other woman's eyes suddenly misted over, and it was if she was no longer a part of this world.She kept the bubbling annoyance within her away from her face, putting on instead a mask of concern as she reached out and poked Gretel's arms, trying to maybe prod her out of her stupor and bring her back from the recesses of her mind.Yolanda had never actually seen somebody collapse inwards to a catatonic state over her own actions.It was interesting to see it all happen and fold out in front of her.She poked Gretel again, touching her in the face lightly to see if that would possibly work to pull the other woman out of her mind and back into the world where she was needed proper.It wouldn't reflect well on her if Gretel didn't wake up within the hour.It didn't feel as
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 369: Thanatos
When she awoke, she was sat ready to eat and was dressed just like her mother, in a pastel blouse and a lungi down to the floor.Lila looked down at herself and jumped when she heard rattling, noticing the ten, or so, bangles on each arm and the lines of mehndi that ran down all the way to the hems of her sleeves, resting halfway between her shoulders and elbows. A pin held her blouse shut at the top and a quick once over of her hair, with one of her hands, revealed that it had been styled in a simple bun and adorned with flowers.“This is weirdly romantic,” Lila commented, staring at the lit candles nestled in the variously sized candelabrums set around the circular room.There was no door, but a giant window which led to a balcony outside. There was no ceiling but the walls reaching upwards, all the way up, until they formed a dome in the same shade of dull brown that coated the floor and the giant, round table in the centre.The only dishes
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 368: Sleep
“So, is she finally asleep?” Emmet asked the boy stood behind the counter. He was exceedingly slim for someone surrounded by sugar all day and Emmet could make out the outlines of his spindly elbows through his shirt. His face held a no nonsense, blunt, and almost bored expression. “Yeah, she is. She’s been knocked out on the sofa since I sent her back there,” Kai answered the long haired man in front of him, his hair pulled back by a ribbon matching his eyes before being pulled over his shoulder once more. He looked vain. “Oh good. Don’t tell her that I was involved,” the man asked, putting both his palms up to face Kai. “I’m telling her that you’re a fucking weirdo for that,” was the scowled answer. “No. Seriously, don’t tell her. She doesn’t like me and I don’t like her. She’s known my partner for longer that I’ve known him. She doesn’t trust me with him. Why’re you making that face?” Emmet tried to justify himself before giving up
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 367: Tired
“Are you sure that you’re getting enough sleep?” Kai asked Lila, watching her sway on her feet and clutching the front counter.“Yes,” she gasped, dropping her head into her hands, elbows on the table.“Go and lie down on the sofa. Go to sleep for a bit. I’ll wake you up when I have to leave for college,” Kai instructed her, tapping her on the shoulders and shepherding her towards the office.“… fine,” she conceded, letting Kai move her along towards the back.“You know that this just proves my point,” Kai pointed out, pushing her through the boundary of the door and closing it behind her.“Fine,” she whispered back to him, talking into the silence of the office.She let herself fall over the sofa, draping her upper body over the arm rest and letting her head be cushioned by the pillows. Shuffling a bit over to put her body entirely on the sofa, Lila f
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 366: Punching Bag
“One! Two! Three! Four! Five!Now again!One! Two! Three! Four! Five!Now keep on going!”Lila landed each punch, timing her breaths to the count as she moved her fists, dodging underneath the swing that came towards her head, before blocking the second hit that came to her and moving along with the force of the fist that hit her arm.The swinging punching bag forced distance between Lila and Tweedle Dum, and she stepped back to where she was stood before, within the path of the moving bad, to put more distance between him and her.“One! Two! Three! Four! Five!One! Two! Three! Four! Five!”Lila punched the bag once more, landing all of her hits.“Okay, time for a break,” Tweedle Dum announced, grabbing the punching bag and pulling it back to him as Lila moved away from the centre of the room, sitting down on one of the rickety plastic chairs at the side of the room.She took of
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 365: Much Older Nephew
“Bitch! Why’d you run off and abandon me like that!?” Lila shouted from behind the counter when Kai finally walked back into the store.She was waving her hands about and wore an apron covered in flour as the single customer in the store, an old man precariously balancing on his cane, slept whilst leaning on the radiator.“I thought that you wanted some bonding time with your family so I left you to do that it private!” Kai answered her, tiptoeing past their unconscious patron, in a combination of whispering and shouting.“They’re hardly my family and you left us in the middle of a public café!” Lila cried, not modulating her voice at all.In the background, the old man began to snore.“But you still talk to them a lot like you do to me, so I let you, and besides, I got about fifty more pages of Good Omens done in Waterstones,” Kai appealed, finally at the counter and opening up the
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 364 EXTRA GRETEL
Gretel and Silver had their fun as he continued to teach her how the interface worked and how he had managed to figure out that the system was an older model from the lack of integration between the screen and the touch pad, and explaining how easily it would potentially be to do so once the technology, as displayed in this device, had been demonstrated and established to work in a functional product."We were working on something like this as well, back in the workshops back home for the company that I was in the research and development department for. We were trying to get our motion sensors to be as small as possible for more commercial and personal use of technology that we could sell to the public and those who couldn't afford the contact computers.We had no idea on how their tech worked, because of trade and company secrets and all, but we managed to piece together a few things by looking at the patents and when we bought a few and m
The Boy who Circled Time Chapter 363: Alcohol and Sleep
“Alright, the shop’s free. Why are you actually here?” Lila questioned, crossing her arms and staring down at the tablecloth of Jasper and Emmet’s table.“I’ve got lesson now. I’ll be back in a few hours,” the teenage boy behind Lila announced, picking up a bag that had been hidden behind the counter the entire time and rushing outside.Lila continued to stand there, waiting for a reply.Jasper couldn’t help but notice that she wasn’t meeting either his or Emmet’s eyes.“Are you planning to leave us?” he asked her back.Lila’s fingers dug into the creases of her shirt,” I’m going to be leaving for a trip soon, and I’ll be back as soon as I can. Kai’ll be running the shop and will be looking after things, broadly. He lives here now and I scheduled my leave for when his school term ends so he can take care of things.”“On thi
