TIME

A man with severe paranoia wages a war against his greatest enemy: time itself.

The words scrawled at the top of the page glare at me, vivid black against harsh white.

 

Rule 1: The clock is the enemy.

I have known this rule for as long as I can remember. I’d see people trying to beat the clock, rushing around. It was a never-ending war, and we were facing a relentless opponent.

I was 18 when I became immune to the most crippling weakness in our war. I became immune to sleep. We spend a third of our lifetime asleep. I had now gained back that third of my life. Now I had 8 extra hours of the day, and nothing to do with them. I’d lie awake, staring at my hated enemy, that damned alarm clock. It had once tormented me with relentless beeping, but now it held no power over me. I’d do the things everyone else was too tired to do. Early morning jobs, midnight runs. I became accustomed to seeing the sun both rise and set.

But I felt the clock faces staring at me. It was then, with shock, that I realised that clocks were not the only mercenaries of time. The sun too, told the fall of day and night. The one I had gazed upon, was in fact one with the enemy.

Traitorous b***h.

I boarded up the windows of my apartment so that I would not have to see time in the form of day or night. I sat in the dark, the monotonous ticking of the clocks echoing in my fragile mind.  I ended up smashing that b*****d alarm clock.

This was a war, there were going to be casualties.

For a while, I had thought I had won. Then I blinked. I found myself counting. 1…2….blink….1….2…blink.

 I heard a scream of anguish and realised it had come from my own mouth. My very own eyes had betrayed me. I looked down at my hands, and at my face in the mirror, now lined and pale.

 Time was a sly enemy. It seemed that it could show itself in more than just obvious ways. My face in the mirror showed what lack of sunlight for so long had done to me.

The mirror fell to the floor in silver shards, the grains of glass beneath my feet glittering in the light of the bare bulb.

I wrapped my hand up in a bandage and tried to ignore the searing anger coursing through me before squeezing my eyes shut.

No more blinking, no more seeing.

No more seeing the bloodied smashed mirror, the peeling paint, the dried blood. 

 I sat there, unmoving in the darkness I had created. The only sounds accompanying me were my heart beat and my own breath. Then I realised.

The ragged rising of my chest, the beat of my heart in my ears. Every few seconds. Time. My body, told time.

It had betrayed me.

I tore into the kitchen, searching for something to make the beating stop! My hands closed around a smooth metal handle, death was in my hand, my last resort. It shone silver in the light, the edge shining with a threat of pain to come. It would make it all stop.

I took a breath in, my repulsive flesh raising with the action, before slamming the knife hard through my rib cage. The knife tore through the sinew of my diaphragm, my breath now uneven as blood flooded my lungs. The tip of the knife pierced my heart, its beat now irregular. I laughed, at the walls, at the ceiling, at time itself.
“F**k you!”
These were my last words. Not quite as dramatic as I had hoped. It’s funny; I had always been told that when you died, your soul left your body.  

Mine didn’t.

 My soul stayed trapped in my body. There was a stiff, dead smile on my face. My eyes glassy and staring. I watched as someone broke down the door. There was an old woman beside them, apparently they had been complaining about the smell.

 They zipped me up in a body bag; I had always wondered what they looked like from the inside. They lay me on a cold metal slab, knives cutting, blood flowing.
‘A suicide.’ The coroner said.

A suicide? No, I think not, They were wrong. This was a triumph.

They slid me into the darkness, the quiet. A morgue. A timeless place if there ever was one. Now I can stay here, where time cannot touch me. I have won. I am Jack and I am timeless.

Author's Note

My first completed story. Written after a German exam while my mind was still caught in the movie Cashback.

Critique is appreciated, please feel free to point out any grammar mistakes. I'm terrible at grammar and need all the help I can get.

I would really appreciate the opinion of other writers.

In case you were wondering, the last line is a teeny homage to Fight Club. Kind of, if you squint.

I am Jack's hope of receiving a review.

Reviews

[NovaKai]

XD jack was epic

[David W Moore III]

Very compelling, a little off maybe, but then who isn't? :) A battle over time, huh. Funny, I clicked your profile randomly, but I have a story about the battle of time as well - The House. WHOLE different feel to it, but a battle nonetheless. Let me know if you enjoy it.