Time Is Broken Read online

  Samuel Clark

  122 Enderby Road

  Scunthorpe

  North Lincolnshire

  DN17 2JS

  United Kingdom

  [email protected]

  07594770767

  word count – 3600

  Time Is Broken

  by

  Samuel Clark

  The glass on the face of Jan Jansson's watch was cracked and broken, he peered at the hands with his tired watery eyes. It was definitely morning that much was obvious, the air was clean and fresh, apart from the stench of rotting food and rubbish drifting across from the nearby industrial bins. He scratched at his beard and his hair, the layer of dried sweat and dirt was getting ever thicker and his clothes were like rags hanging off his skinny frame. He tapped the glass watch face hoping the hands would magically begin ticking over again. The watch had stopped at eleven minutes past eleven. At the very least he would know the exact time twice a day. He looked up at the sky, maybe he could tell the time by the height of the sun? The morning light was dim, the sounds of the city were not in full swing yet. He needed to get to the station at just after six a.m., just after they opened the gates, then, buy a single ticket and seek out his begging pitch. If he didn't get there in time he would lose it. It was at the foot of the stairs at the junction between the northbound line and the southbound line. The perfect spot. Just enough time for the passengers descending the stairs to see him at the bottom, and if they were feeling particularly generous that morning, enough time to reach in their pockets and toss the loose change into his empty violin case. There was also the added bonus of passengers pausing at the foot of the stairs to check their destination on the underground map he would sit under.

  He rolled up the white foam mat and tied up his pillow with string, wrapping it tightly, reducing it just enough so he could stuff it into his backpack. He sat for a moment underneath the black metal fire escape he had taken shelter under. A still moment, shaking his drowsy thoughts clear. His bones felt creaky. He examined the watch again, the spider web cracks bled white, distorting his view of the watch face, he examined it at numerous angles still hoping it would magically work, as if by his own will. He should've just bought a cheap digital watch, but then there was the problem of battery life. Everything breaks down in the end, he thought solemnly. He held the watch to his ear and heard a faint- tick, tick, tick. The mechanism inside the watch was working, but it wasn't transferring itself to the hands. The watch face again, the second hand began to tick, it ticked up to the hour mark, then stopped, then ticked backwards. He furrowed his brow, confused. Maybe he could get enough money together by the end of the day to get it fixed. He remembered buying the watch before everything inexplicably fell apart. He had rewarded himself, he'd just been offered a job, a very lucrative job.

  He glanced sideways in fear as a gust of wind blew stray newspaper pages across the alley, the noise was followed by footsteps, bounding, purposeful and rhythmical, almost in time with the faint tick, tick, tick.

  “You got the time,” his cracked voice asked. “Any spare change?” The man walked straight by, like a shadow, ignoring him as if he didn't exist. “Hey!” he called after the man as he reached an anonymous door, the staff only entrance.

  “Hey. I know you, don't I?”

  The shadow man keyed in a code. “Time is broken,” the shadow man said into the intercom . A loud buzz and the door opened. The man stepped inside, never looking back, still ignoring him as if he didn't exist.

  “Hey, your name. Your name is--”

  * * *

  The name on his driver's license is false. If you were to call the police he would be detained only long enough for another agent to authorize his release. He doesn't exist as a citizen, nor does anyone he works with.

  He didn't have a name, not any more, not since he took the job eighteen months ago. They had warned him before his decision, made him sign non disclosure agreements and data protection agreements, for a week new documents would arrive in the post, addendums, gag orders, injunctions, terms and conditions, and all this before he'd even agreed to take the job. The job that didn't exist, the five job interviews that never happened, the IQ tests and aptitude tests he didn't take. “If you take this job, you will no longer exist, you will have no country, no nationality, no friends, no acquaintances, there is no job, there is no you.” Officially he had died in a plane crash- British Airways flight- BAW2673, from Nice to London Gatwick. They never referred to him by his name. He was told not to make new friends, cut off all contact with old friends and if possible, not to even speak with any one. He had his groceries delivered and anything else he needed he would have to request in writing, and post to a post office box. This was the toughest part of the job, the loneliness, the isolation. He had found it surprisingly easy to forget his own name, the longer he spent not using it, not seeing it written down in any form, the more it disappeared from his memory. Once he dared to go out for coffee on the south-bank, the B.F.I. Southbank bar, the only person he spoke to was the waiter who served him and even then it was just short monosyllabic sentences and 'thank-yous'. The morning after that he was given a warning, a threat against his life, but written in implied terms and phrases.

  This wasn't a job he could just quit, they told him that from the outset. At first he thought it was M.I.5 or M.I.6. a secret service appointment, or ministry of defence, it wasn't until later, until he'd said 'yes' and had gone through the day to day tasks that he realised this was beyond all that, this, was something else. Even now, he still wasn't sure of the big picture.

  His assignment was three fold- Find a girl called Emilie Du Chatalet, find a mathematician called Thomas Abbt. Manipulate the situation to our advantage.

  An easy task on the face of it, it was just a matter of searching voter registration lists, pulling up tax records, medical records, type in the name and let the computer search the database and he would be done. They would send out field agents to her address and that was it, onto the next assignment. It wasn't until he actually did it that he came to realise the job was infinity more complicated. The phone numbers kept changing, the addresses kept changing. One day, Emilie was located in Paris, he'd put the call out to the field agents only for them to report back- failure to locate target. An old woman was living in the apartment he had specified. The next day she was located in Berlin, another day and she was living in the Swiss Alps, the next week she was living in Venice. He'd put the call out again, and again they would report back- failure to locate target. Just those four words.

  The same went for Thomas Abbt, a mathematician studying at Paris Dauphine University. The next day, he was a Ph.D in physics, lecturing at the same university while researching The Theory Of Everything. He was 23 years of age then 43, then 33, then there was no record of him at all. There had been no trace of Abbt at all in the following months. He was never born, there were no records at the university, nothing. Had he disappeared off the planet? Had he died? Did he even exist? Had they just made him up? Nothing about these two targets remained stable or consistent and he began to think he might be going mad, that none of this was real, that it was brought on by the strict rules surrounding his life outside of the job. He made requests via the P.O. Box address. If he could just get a better handle on the context, he might be able to do the job better, he might find these two people more easily. Just one meeting with- whoever was in charge. He received no reply. He was on his own.

  He'd given up trying to find out why these two people were so important. You can only hit so many brick walls, ask so many questions, make investigations that lead nowhere, before you give up. His tolerance level for dead-ends had peaked and he had resigned himself to the day-to-day tasks of the job. The money was good, the apa
rtment he lived in was luxurious, his living circumstances were greatly improved, and he balanced it against the cost of keeping his mouth shut and living a solitary existence. It couldn't go on forever... could it?, he rationalised.

  He stepped inside the elevator and pushed the button for the 3rd floor, and walked into the dark room, the windows were blacked out and there was only lamp light, monitor light and the flashing green, red and blue of the hard-drives. There were five stations in all, each with four screens. He took a seat at his desk, placing a cup of coffee at the side.

  “Hey!” the employee to the left of him said. “Everything good?”

  “Yeah, all good. You? How's the wife and kids?”

  “They're good.”

  “Good.”

  And that was the extent of the conversation.

  He'd given up putting the call out as soon as he located her and decided to wait for a month plus one day. If she disappeared inexplicably during that time, he would start over again. Since there was no advice on how to proceed coming from his superiors, he had to devise his own method, adaptive thinking. He had doubts, maybe a month was too long, maybe he should reduce the time window to a week, maybe two weeks. A period of consistency in Emilie's location was indefinite and he wondered if she might be aware that she was being tracked and watched, as if she knew, precognitively, the fields agents were coming. Stick to the plan, one month plus one day, he assured himself. He pulled up the footage from the C.C.T.V. feed, grainy green-screen, and watched her as she left her apartment building and made her way along the street. He switched camera view points whenever she disappeared out of frame, then waited a few minutes for her to appear in the next. Sometimes she wouldn't appear at all. It was as if she simply disappeared into nothingness and he would start the month plus one day over again. She hadn't vanished in thirty two days and her routine remained consistent. Morning coffee in the café 'Chez Joesphe' on the Promenade de Anglais. Everyday she would have a single pull on an antiquated fruit machine and she would predict, like clockwork the three symbols that came up.

  “Deux cerises et sept,” she would say, then slot the coin in and pull the lever. Sure enough, two cherries and a seven would appear. This happened far too often for it to be a mere coincidence and the bar owner would recoil in shock every time, and then merely shake his head and shrug when Emilie couldn't or wouldn't explain how she did it.

  Then to work, she owned a watch repair shop on a cobbled back street just off the promenade. At first, the voyeurism didn't sit well with him, but as the months progressed he became more and more comfortable with it. He never used the cameras to watch her in an inappropriate manner and as long as he stuck to this caveat, he could live with himself and the invasion of privacy involved.

  He watched as she opened the store and rearranged some of the antique time pieces on display in the window, satisfied that this was stable activity he picked up the phone and gave the field agents the all clear.

  For the rest of the day he typed up his report on Emilie's activities and the reasoning behind his method, all the while anticipating and dreading a call back from the field agents telling him that Emilie could not be found. The call never came and at five p.m. he finished up his days work, which included a plan for locating Thomas Abbt. He had found a small lead, a plane ticket bought under the name Tom Sabbath, an anagram. A one way Air India flight from Paris to Kathmandu that departed a year ago.

  Throwing caution and the earlier warning to the wind he rewarded himself with an expensive bottle of wine, and sat in the open air of the B.F.I. Southbank bar. He watched people pass by, skateboarders, tourists, the young, the old and overheard conversations of the various people that took seats close to his table. He swelled with a feeling of power, he could, in theory discover everything about any one of these people passing by, all he needed was a name, type it into the database and discover every small detail about them, follow their day to day activities using the C.C.T.V. and it didn't matter what country they came from. He sipped the wine with a sense of all-knowing and he imagined himself as an almost god, a quiet god, but a god all the same. He finished the wine and began to feel unbalanced, his head foggy with the effect of alcohol. He fished out his iphone from his pocket with the intention of calling a cab and noticed he had a new message from 'sender unknown' received at '11.11 p.m.'

  Your employment has been terminated.

  He looked at the message blankly for a moment, butterflies fluttered in his stomach, desperate panic rose and he felt nauseous. He paused and breathed, gathering himself from the initial shock. The words made sense but their meaning didn't. Must be a mistake, surely, he thought. This was too abrupt, and without reason, unless the reason was the very fact of him ignoring the previous warning, the very fact that he was sitting here. He glanced around at the passing people and the Thames beyond, was someone watching him, right now, at this very moment?

  His head swam with ill defined conclusions and wine. He would have to sort this out in the morning, it would be okay, an admin error that's all it was. He called a cab and went home, he needed to sleep off the wine and approach the problem with a clear head.

  He dozed off in the taxi and by the time the taxi reached his apartment building it was raining. “Hey, we're here,” the driver called out. He snapped awake from his shallow slumber, leaned forward pulling notes from his pocket and slid them through the glass partition.

  He stepped out of the taxi, he watched in a daze as the black cab drove away into the night, swinging around the corner at the end of the street. The air swelled with potential and he put it down to his foggy mind, enhanced by the wine he had drunk. He shook his head clear and refocused, looking forward to getting home and to bed.

  He staggered along the clean white hallway to his apartment door and flinched at the elevator doors sliding closed behind him. He shook the paranoia and addressed himself to his apartment door inserting the key in the lock trying to make as little noise as possible. The key wouldn't work, no matter how hard he tried to twist it in the lock. He paused and checked the number on the matt black apartment door. Number 11. It was his apartment. He was about to try the key again. When footsteps and hushed whispers came from beyond the door. Burglars?, he thought, a rush of panic. Couldn't be, the door was locked and the apartment was three storeys up.

  He jolted backwards almost falling to the floor when the apartment door swung open. “Can I help you?” the voice stern and insistent.

  “I, wait. I live here.” The man peered at him suspiciously, he was in his mid thirties, broad shoulders and a well toned torso, his short blonde hair ruffled as if he'd just climbed out of bed

  “Tony?” A woman's voice came from behind him. “Is everything okay?”

  “Just some drunk,” turning his head back. “He's got the wrong apartment.” Tony stared at him expectant. He looked passed him. The sleek black-on-white décor of his apartment had changed, now it was all wooden tones and pastel colours, wood and brown leathers, flowers, it looked lived in. He pushed past Tony and darted panicked looks all around the living room.

  “Who are you? What are you doing in my house? And where is all my furniture!” he demanded.

  “Look, I don't know who you are or what you're doing here, but if you don't leave this instant you'll be spending the night in jail.” Tony approached him with powerful intimidating steps. He was too confused to notice. By the time he gathered his thoughts and was ready to form a reply he found himself being thrown back into the hallway again. He crashed against the wall and lost his footing. The door slammed shut as he lay on the floor. He picked himself up and banged on the door. There was no reply.

  “But this, this is my apartment,” he whimpered. “I live here.” He looked right along the hallway and saw one of the neighbours at the threshold of her door, peering out curiously and wary. He didn't know her. He'd made a point of not acquainting himself with his neighbours and he didn't even recognise her. “Excuse me.” he said and began to approach. The woman
retreated back inside her apartment and locked the door firmly.

  The screen display on his phone told him it was almost midnight, . Had these people hijacked his entire life? He tried calling the number that had previously sent him the termination message. He stood in utter perplexity as an automated voice told him the number didn't exist. He tried again, punching in the digits carefully, one by one, but again the voice told him the number did not exist. At least he still had some money in numerous bank accounts, all under various different identities. He would have to stay in a hotel for tonight.

  He ventured out into the rain soaked city streets searching for a cash machine, his suit jacket thick with damp. He started with fear at police sirens close by and ducked down a darkened alley.

  Had his whole life been some sort of dream, had the rug had been pulled from underneath it? What the hell was going on? He dismissed the thought and focused on the present. Find a cash machine, find a hotel. That was all that mattered, any other questions could be addressed in the morning.

  He found an A.T.M on the adjoining street, the one he'd always used, buried in the wall between a jewellery store and a 24 hour supermarket. He keyed in the pin code and the screen and waited anxiously. He stared, perplexed when the screen told him- password incorrect. He then proceeded to try the ten pin codes he'd committed to memory for each card and each identity, all of them came up- password incorrect.

  Dismayed he checked his wallet to see how much hard cash he had, twenty pounds and change, not enough. At a loss, and with no friends, no parents, no acquaintances to seek the solace of, he wandered the London streets for hours, through the tumult of Leicester square and Charing Cross, along Northumberland Avenue and over the Waterloo bridge back to the Southbank and the London Eye. The sound of police sirens and traffic, a swirl of artificial light, whites, reds and blues assaulted his senses as he racked his mind for a plausible explanation, he grew ever more tired and ever more weary with thought and the dimming effect of the wine. Overwhelmed by his surroundings, he sought out a quiet back alley and found shelter from the hard falling rain underneath a black metal fire-escape that scaled the building wall. His eyes fell heavy and he checked the time on the watch he'd bought himself eighteen months ago, eleven minutes past eleven and eleven seconds. His watch had stopped working.