I woke up with the strangest pain in the back of my neck. As I was rubbing it I pulled myself up off the floor. Then I thought, the floor? I blinked and looked around and all I saw was a whole bunch of me’s starring right back at me. I jumped from where I lay and found my feet beneath me even though I staggered a bit. Oh jeeze I really hate that feeling when you get up to fast and the world just swims around you. Uhhh…
I blinked and the fuzziness left, except now the room was filled with other Me’s; everywhere I turned there was another one of myself starring back. What? I walked up to one of them and as I got close I saw that it was a mirror. Just a whole bunch of mirrors, ok. I breathed a sigh. I placed my hand on the mirror and my reflection did the same. I smiled at me. Then mirror me smiled back of course.
Everything is just fine, just fine. But something was off. I could tell just in my eyes’ reflection that I knew something was off. Like you know whens it’s going to rain, you just know. No questions asked its just fact.
“Hey Dad! What’s with the mirrors?” I yelled. I smiled to myself again wondering about what he could possibly be doing. “DAD!” I yelled again.
I turned around and walked out a blue door, “Dad?” I said barely an audible whisper. I stepped out into my room. Everything was, as it was. My pictures, my closet, my bed… but the window? Where was my window? I believe I have a concussion or something. I walked past all my stuff, still rubbing my neck. I still couldn’t figure out why it was hurting so badly. Why did something seem off to me? “Hey DAD!” I yelled.
I walked up to my bedroom window, which I discovered were hiding behind these hideous yellow curtains and just nearly had a heart attack. (Not because of the hideous yellow curtains.) But because instead of endless cornfields out my window, I saw a city and I don’t live in a f------ city. As I stood there gaping out at the city street. It wasn’t really like how I thought a city street would look. Of course, I wouldn’t really know, but still, first off, all the cars looked old. And all the people were acting strange, milling about, almost as if they were bored and pacing back and forth.
That’s when my bedroom door swung open and a boy appeared. I screamed.
“Wow… ya’ll ok newbie?” he asked me.
“What…?” I said standing there quiet possibly looking like a suffocating fish.
“Mighty fine?” he asked, grinning and smiling that’s when I really got a good look at him. He was wearing these overalls and a tattered shirt. He looked like he just stepped out of the dark ages for all I know. All I know really, is that something very, very strange is happening and my neck still hurts. “The names, Jonathan Colley,” he said, smiling still.
“You’s a Newbie of course, but ya’ll get it all soon.” He smiled then grabbed my hand. “Come on better give ya the layout.” He pointed to me, “What’s your name?” I looked at him then glanced back into my room as we stepped out onto the city’s street. “Name, girl?” Jonathan nudged me.
“Oh… yes, right, Lucy Emmett.” I said. Then I screamed and cowered behind Jonathan. He just laughed at me as I watched a f------ T Rex walk down the street, stepping over cars and horse carts as if they weren’t even there.
I nearly dropped dead from my shock Jonathan pulled me onto my unsteady feet and we climbed (Jonathan pulled me) into a horse-drawn carriage in front of us. I starred out the window at the dinosaur. Then turned to Jonathan. I guess since he just laughed and clapped me on the shoulder my pale white face only read, what the f***?
“I tell ’ya Newbie Lucy ya’ll get it soon enough.” He pounded on the wall and the carriage began to roll. I simply stared as the city drifted off until suddenly Jonathan grabbed me and pulled me to the ground. Just as spears rained into the carriage, I screamed again. I glanced up and saw about five of six Neanderthals were standing on the side of the road shaking clubs and spears and yelling at us.
Jonathan grinned tightly, “Them cave men don’t like Newbies. Don’t take kindly to them yeah…don’t take it personal, girl” he pulled me closer to him on the seat as he broke off the spear points penetrating the side of the carriage. He chucked them out the window as if he had done this a million times.
“Wha…” I mumbled as I grabbed my shirt trying to hold my heart together because it was racing at a thousand miles an hour. “What… is… going on?” I choked, finally finding my words. They seemed to have been hiding somewhere deep, deep inside of me alongside my sanity. (Sadly that hasn’t decided to come back yet.)
The carriage rolled on and I took a glance out my window again and saw a massive mountain range with deserts, jungles and rivers that flowed into an equally massive ocean. I blinked but it didn’t go away. I pulled the red velvet curtain shut and tried to pretend that the gaping hole in the panel siding wasn’t from a spear.
“Just hold it girl, you got much more to see; not many more humans left though. The humans stay back yonder in the big city.” Jonathon drummed the side of the carriage and it came to a stop. “So tell me Lucy Newbie, when did you get taken?” His eyes lit up “What’s going on back on earth, what year is it?” he asked.
I felt myself stiffen. “Taken? The year?” I looked away as the door opened. I didn’t really want to see what was outside. But a gust of severe artic cold rushed over me. As Jonathan got out, I couldn’t help myself: I took a look around.
“Well… I mean…of course its 2015.” I looked out at the vast whiteness and at Jonathan. “What do you mean, Jonathon, what year is it back on earth?” I asked. I stepped out and fell up to my knees in wet, cold snow, and stopped dead in my tracks as a group of mammoths lumbered by. I think my eyes nearly popped out of my head. I turned to Jonathan who was waving goodbye to the carriage as it rumbled away. Back the way we had come.
“Want to see more dinos? They’re just past the icy’s here habitats.” He nodded like he had already decided for the two of us. “Well, they a took me away back in… 1864.” He turned to look at me and motioned me in the direction of the herd of mammoths. “You coming Lucy Newbie?” he smiled.
Habitat, 1864, cavemen, mammoths, dinosours, back on earth. What was going on?
I rubbed my neck it didn’t hurt because of the frigid air. I figured the dinosaur’s area would be warmer.
“So are you telling me you’re like 500 years old?”
“Ahhh… and so you’re catching on.” He said grinning. “Does it still hurt?” he asked, pointing at the back of his neck. I felt my own neck. No it didn’t really…
“Not anymore…” I said.
“Oh swell then, it’s just so that they can see if you’re trying to break for it.”
Who are they? I thought. “Break for what?”
We had come up to the mammoths now they simply lumbered on not paying any attention to us as though it seemed like for Jonathan like an everyday thing. Jonathan grabbed my hand and we dashed through their large brown hairy legs. Except I stumbled in the heavy snow and fell. If you ever saw me in PE you’d understand.
I screamed as one of the hairy beasts decided to smoosh me with its ugly feet. Suddenly I felt Jonathan’s hands under my armpits and he pulled with all his might. I felt the icy white blanket give way just as the mammoths dropped its foot where I had just been. He yanked me past the last mammoth and together we fell into the heavy snow.
Panting, I stared at the sky. It kind of looked strangely like fish scales, all-shining. Skies don’t shine…
I looked to Jonathan who was lying in the snow beside me.
“Why ya’ll necks hurtin because they…” he pointed at the shimmering sky. “They are always watching to see if we will try to escape back to earth of course.”
I stared at him, my mouth gaping but mute as he pulled himself out of the snow.
“Let’s go Lucy Newbie. Better get to the Jurassic part before we freeze, yeah?”
He helped me once again to my feet and I hugged myself, the freeze was really starting to burn.
“Wait, wwwhhatt is goinnggg ooon?” I asked, my teeth chattering.
He grabbed my hand and started pulling me to a distant expanse of green.
“Why Lucy Newbie ya’lls in a zoo. An earth exhibit and back there,” he motioned back towards the city. “That’s the human habitat… for the most part. And everything else is everything else. Now lets go see those dino’s.”
“I’m in a zoo?”
“Yeah a zoo. On the other side of the Milky Way from earth. Oh now smile now Lucy. Girl, you’re gonna forget all about earth here. Now think of this,” he swiped his hand in a circle, “as a home away from home.”
I nearly fainted but I felt my neck and it didn’t hurt at all as I looked up at the scaled sky where they were apparently watching us.
Home away from home? I fell into step behind Jonathan, still glancing skyward. I thought I don’t belong here… I belong at home… on earth.