A Glitch in Time

By Yathansh Sharma

Alex was not like any other average human. He had a great thirst for knowledge, which led him to create a time machine in the future. His future self, believing that he has wasted his life came back to give him the schematics for the time machine. Little did Alex know that his life got screwed in every possible way. Upon finding the time machine, Damian, an old comrade of Alex, goes back in time to kill a girl, Hope, who Alex loved, and it is up to Alex now to save her and prevent the timeline from getting any worse than it already is.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Yathansh Sharma
• Release date: Jan 2, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463319086

Yathansh Sharma

Stories are our gateway into the unknown. And as long as I have remembered I have kept wandering into the unknown. To be able to think something new is a special gift that authors have, and to share it with the rest of the world is our characteristic. I invite you for a journey into my unknown, so that I may share what I have discovered, and perhaps someday you will be returning me the favor.

Book preview

A Glitch in Time

Published by Yathansh Sharma at Smashwords

Copyright 2020 Yathansh Sharma

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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Chapter 1 - Introduction

Have you ever tried to make someone understand that you are not different, that you are just like them? I have, always. Trust me, things are a lot easier when you are trying to make them believe that you are different. People lack the wisdom to understand that what is different is not bad, and that they must not fear or despise it, rather embrace it. For what is different is also ‘Progress’. Most of the time.

I have, like I said, always been different. And people have not appreciated that fact. How am I different? Nothing much, I just seemed to have too much knowledge about everything. And it’s like they say, excess of everything is not very healthy. In time I adopted to the life of solitude, until it happened. The Purge, the massacre, nuclear warfare, call it whatever you want. But it was devastating and took out most of the entire human race. All because one person cannot keep it together.

For an entire year people lived underground in special shelters that various governments had constructed in preparation for such an event, if it happens. Our main target was to avoid the radiation, and even when we found a way to come out and breath the fresh air, due to our radiation dampening equipment that we created, we realized that the nightmare is not over. We still cannot find a way to stop the psycho. She kept on fighting as if she was taking out a decade old grudge on the world. We are at war, her military vs our resistance. Although we are winning, but we have lost a lot of good people, family, friends. We are tired and willing to stop at any cost. We want to bring those lives back. But we cannot. For what is done must stay in the past and should only remain part of our memories. Still I always knew that if anyone finds a way to bring back anything they will try it no matter what the cost. And that is why I had to come back 10 Years into the past, because someone did find a way.

The day is, 15th April 2020. Ten years from now we will be fighting the war for our freedom and most of what we have achieved till today, will be lost in the future. In another year or so I will create the time machine with the notes that I will get from another future me from an alternate timeline. This could get very confusing and therefore for now, let’s just get back to the basics, and give you a brief introduction.

I am, Alex Richardson and I am the person who invented ‘Time Travel’, in the future. One day when I was living my life, thinking about that very simple question, ‘Why am I different?’, I saw someone staring at my house. I went out and there was an old man who seemed weak and also counting his final days. His face cut was round, just like mine, had white colored hair, a lot of wrinkles and he was using a cane to help him walk. He was wearing a black color suit and a pair of goggles.

Hello Alex he said as I walked towards him.

I am sorry do I know you?

Yes, in fact, no one knows me the way you do. Although there are a lot of things in my life that you have yet to experience. In time.

I am sorry, What?

It’s fine, come let’s go in there. I haven’t seen my house in years. He said pointing towards my house.

Are you my far away relative? Because I am pretty sure that if you are not then I need to call 911 as you are forcefully entering my property.

Obviously, you should. The last time you failed to report something like this you lost your parents he replied.

Who the hell are you? I said while becoming a bit more aggressive.

Now! Now! no need to get hostile. I come in good faith. I won’t be able to explain this to you unless you come with me inside. Besides, I am just an old man, what can I possibly do? he said that while giving me a smile. Somehow, I didn’t feel that this smile was intended to be a threat and so I decided to comply with his request, while I was still alert if something were to happen.

Come on now, be quick he said opening the door to my house, and I started walking towards him. Once inside he quickly sat on the couch and asked Tell me, what makes you different?

Who said that I am different? I am like everyone else

Exactly! Your persistence to achieve something even if you know that it is not true. It is that very belief in things that make the impossible, possible.

Enough with your riddles. Tell me, who you are?

I will but first… he said pulling out a mobile phone from his pocket, take this and move the slider one click only.

Why? And what kind of phone is this? It does not even have a camera, or a speaker, or fingerprint sensor, or basically anything that a phone has, except for a touch screen.

I cannot answer any question unless you do as I ask, so please move the slider from the left of the screen to the right, only one click.

I looked at the screen and it had current date and time displayed in a holographic texture, 30th sept 2020 7:31. The next thing that I noticed was the mode selection which had two options, rewind and leap, out which rewind was selected. Going down, there was the unit selection, which displayed minutes and at last a slider like the unlock slider for any iPhone. This is what I was supposed to move. I kept the index finger of my left hand on the slider and moved the slider which changed the time to one-minute back.

Now click on the date, he said, and I did as he asked. All of a sudden everything around me turned white and I was outside again with the old man walking towards my house opening the door saying Come on now, be quick.

Chapter 2 –Time Machine

For a moment there I froze in shock and confusion. I didn’t understand what just happened. Did this man hypnotize me? Was I suddenly pushed into some AR or VR? Am I dreaming? Or did that man actually hand me over a Time Machine? I did not notice enough things to understand all of this the first time. So this time I looked around and had a clear picture of everything. There was a white civic parked just across the street till now and just left in front of me. My neighbor came back after walking his dog and waved at me. I waved him back in response. His dog, like always pissed at the small bush right outside his house. Since it was early morning so the newspaper man was throwing newspapers around to the houses where people still haven’t heard about the internet. I believed that this was enough. I quickly went inside the house to find the old man sitting on the couch just like the last time.

You need some water? I asked.

Yes, of course, please. He replied.

I handed him a glass of water while counting the seconds on my watch. I am supposed to