I'm Nine Again 14 Prologue: 18/01/2008

It's been exactly five years since Alice, and I started living within the bunker. Known factions are as follows.

The New World Order:

Their goal seems to be using their knowledge of the future to leverage themselves into positions of power within the governments of the world and ultimately, take over the whole world.
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The Preservationists:

Their goal is to protect the events of the original timeline as best as they can. So far, they're not exactly winning the war of the future, although they can be helpful. Dangerous, but helpful.

Freedoms Front:

Their goal is the dissemination of future technology into the past. Well, our current present anyway. They are probably the real saviors of the world. We had smartphones in wide circulation by 2005. It also means that those big tech companies aren't as valuable as they were in the original timeline, but Alice and I have adjusted our investments to compensate for that.

The Guild:

We've been in contact with 'The Guild' a few times. They don't seem to care who they align themselves with. Their main goal is money. If a company is going to fail, then they make sure that company fails spectacularly and short their stocks to make a profit. On the other note, if a company is going to succeed and grow, then the Guild supports them as much as they can so the value of that company will skyrocket, and they profit off that.

Chance:

Their goals are similar to what our goals were originally. They aim to change the world and stop all of the bad events that happened in the original timeline. Although that seems like the n.o.ble cause, Grey has given us a task more dire.

Originally, Scarlet had told us that she estimated between 80 to 120 time travelers. She was dead wrong. The people who have traveled to the past number in the thousands. That number grows larger every day. We can keep track of how many people are coming into this timeline because of a machine that Grey had left us within the bunker. It could detect whenever there was a divergence in the timeline. Every new divergence would mean that a new time traveler has arrived. Some days it never chimes. Other days it would chime maybe once. Other days it would chime four or five times. There were constantly more people streaming back into this timeline.

The only undiscernible thing was whether they were traveling from the original timeline or the first divergence. We call this timeline.

The Second Divergence.

Still, the world is on track for a global recession in the markets which means that our investments are about to skyrocket. The bankers regardless of all of the changes in the world are still lending ridiculous amounts of money to people who can't afford to pay it back. More so now with all of these new tech companies sprouting out from ideas they get from the Freedom Front. Our first task that Grey set us will be completed by the end of the year. We will become incredibly, stupidly wealthy.

Money, however, is not the be-all and end-all. Money is not going to fix the problems that we are going to face. As for the second task Grey set us. More so that he set me. My time manipulation powers are growing and every day I'm seeing tangible differences in what I'm able to do. It was months before I was able to do anything. It started out with tennis b.a.l.l.s, and then bullets. It took being shot in the leg six times before I was finally able to stop a bullet in the middle of the air. It took thousands of times with the tennis ball to be able to stop it.

I call that ability: Stop Motion. I can stop the motion of moving objects or to be more specific, I can stop the time surrounding that object.

The next ability would have to be 'Rewind' I have the ability to rewind time. Not by much, and it doesn't diverge the timeline. I've only ever rewound time by 1.42 seconds. That's my limit, my average when practicing though is about 830 milliseconds. I've yet to find a practical use for this skill yet. The rewind is too short to do anything meaningful.

The next ability is something I call, 'Ageing' I can speed up time around and object. I've been practicing on flowers. I can plant a seed and focus my energy and in the s.p.a.ce of five minutes, that seed will sprout, grow, flower and then wither away. This works well with objects that corrode over time like a metal lock. I can break a padlock with my powers in under a minute. I've never tested it out on a living being, not that I would ever want to.

My last ability is 'Slow Motion' and it's exactly how it sounds. I'm able to slow the motion of time. My mind can still think with accurate speed but my body and those around me all slow down to a snail's pace while I'm using this ability. It's not known to the people around me when I use time slow. They are unaware of the slow pa.s.sage of time.

There are probably more powers that I'm yet to discover, but with time and training, I'm sure to be able to find more ways that I can manipulate time.

I hope that no one ever has to hear this audio, but Alice and I are about to embark on the next stage of our journey and it's sure to be perilous. If you are hearing this, then I've failed in my task to save the world and the Second Divergence is lost. My only hope is that this audio record makes its way to the Third Divergence for Sean 3.0 to try and fix things on that end.

I'll continue updating this audio log so that if Sean 3.0 does end up having to take over, he won't be going in blind. Not like I am right now.

Also, if Sean 3.0 is hearing this then I've got a secret between you and me. It took me years to figure this out but if you get this then you'll have an advantage from day 1. Alice really likes cats. I'm taking teddy bear cats, cats on mugs, cat-shaped clocks, a cat charm on a necklace.... Just keep that in mind, she really likes cats. I'll keep up the good fight on my end.

Sean 2.0 Out

[Audio Log End]

* * * * * *

Alice walked into the room with her long blond hair tied up in a bun, sweat dripping down her face and staining her cotton white singlet, breathing heavily with a red completion.

"You're not slacking off now Sean, are you?" she said panting. She walked up to the kitchen and pulled a soda out of the fridge before returning to the lounge area and kicking back on the couch, spreading her body our wide as she took in big breaths.

"If I'm in the gym beating my sprint times then you should be in the training room taking bullets to the face," she said.

"I'm not taking a bullet to the face!" I said.

"You can just reverse it," she said still panting.

"I don't care if there is the possibility that I can reverse it," I said, "I'm still not taking a bullet to the face just to test that theory out!"

"By the way," Alice said, "You have a ma.s.sive pimple on the side of your face."

"Screw off!" I said picking at the pimple.

"No, I'm being serious, that thing is huge!" she said, "It's like your growing a potato under your cheekbone!"

"Only pimples in here we need to worry about are the ones on your chest!" I said biting back.

She picked up an empty can from the table next to her and threw it at me. I snapped my head to look at the can as it flew through the air. Then it slowed. The can, moving at top speed was now moving slowly through the air as it was arcing over the table from her throw. I could see Alice as her angry expression from throwing the can was slowly turning into a sly smile in expectation for the can to hit my face. Then, the can stopped. Just before it got to me, in the middle of the air, the can stopped and time returned to its normal state as Alice looked in awe at the floating cola can, suspended in the middle of the air. I raised my hand and slapped it out of the way and it toppled to the ground.

"Take a bullet to the face!" she said once more.

"I'm not taking a bullet to the face!" I said again.

[Divergence Detected]

We both looked over to the computer screen in the far corner of the room that displayed the message with a sound.

"How long now?" Alice asked.

"Five days," I said, "It should be about five days before we meet our first teammate."

"I want to meet them now!" Alice said with a childish pout.

"She isn't even in this divergent yet," I said, "We've got to be patient. More importantly," I said picking up a towel and throwing it towards Alice, "We need to train. Our first a.s.signment is going to be our hardest."

Alice took the towel and started wiping the sweat off her face and arms before throwing the towel back at me. I pushed it to the side as it came to me.

"You scared?" she asked standing up and taking a big sip from her can of cola.

"Scared of going fight insurgents in the Middle East?" I asked, "Yeah, I'm f.u.c.king s.h.i.+t scared."