Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-1671931-20150312192911

A while go, after watching the film Absentia (fun film, good quality for a kickstarter by the way), I got the idea for the following pasta. The story is finished (maybe some subtle chances, based on your opinions) but I wanted your opinion on certain aspects of the story: I'm a bit uncertain about the ending, about the climax/explanation itself I'm pretty content but after that, the ending and some exposition by the narrator. Also I'm doubtful about the title, the working title was No Trespassing but I was also thinking at The Underpass as title (both titles are motives in the story). If you would come across any mistake (grammar or otherwise, althought normally, I should have corrected all of them after proofreading...) or have any suggestions, please let me know The story itself is 8 and half pages, just so you know. Also, one more thing, the change in font of the last alinea isn't intentional and is due to the fact that this was written in Word.

The Underpass

'''Authors Note: '''

No Trespassing, two very simple words that everyone understands, even those who don't speak English. It has become an universal warning for danger, for something foreboding. It also has become an invitation to uncover something secret... Rarely the warning gives us a reason why we can't trespass and rarely we bother to ask the question. Why do we follow these orders, if we don't know why these orders are in place. Why do we follow them blindly? Easy! We are simply taught to obey the order, no matter what. We are taught to never question its authority. We obey the order and stay clueless. Clueless of what dangers or what secrets may lay behind the barrier. Are you never curious what's on the other side? Well, let us say, some secrets are better left to be secrets...

Hello, my name is Lucy Kinsley, 15 years old. My story started in July of 2013. A boring summer as most of my friends were on vacation or summer camp while I was stuck in the small township of Monty's Creek, England... Population 5130. Mostly farmers or city folk, trying to escape the stressful existences they lived in the big world, the exciting world. The grass is always greener on the other side, isn't it? The problem with small townships is, there is nothing to do, and when your friends are out of town that counts double. With nothing else to do, (you can only check your Facebook so many times), I did little errands for people in the village, mostly old people with walking difficulties. Now, the thing with old people is, one doesn't simply bring them their purchases and leave. The prime example of this was without a doubt Geraldine Lamb. And normally, that doesn't bother me, it is not like I had something else to do and they are so happy when they can talk to someone. To finally have a visitor that isn't there to measure their heart pressure or proscribe medication. But that Friday was different.

Friday the 12th, I'll never forget that day. With family coming over from out of town, I had a curfew. My mother expected, or in more truthful wordings, demanded me to be home at 6 PM. And my mother wasn't someone you would want to disappoint. Having a curfew is one thing but explaining that to someone like Miss Lamb was a different story.

'Come on, dear. Stay, have another biscuit... Or more tea. I'm sure your mother will understand.'

I was sure that my mother would flay me, but I kept that for myself, instead I try to escape Miss Lamb's attempts to force feed me biscuits. Miss Lamb was even worse than my mother as she didn't seem to understand the word 'No' and when I finally managed to leave, I had only ten minutes to get home. This was where the misery actually started. The problem was, the shortest way was through the underpass which was closed, for longer than I can remember. A big sign with No Trespassing written on it, discouraging anyone from using it, forcing people to go around it and lengthen their journey with a mile. If I took the detour, I never would make it in time and  I would have to face my mother's wrath. When I arrived at the underpass, the sign was there, threatening and foreboding but as I saw a clear light on the other side of the tunnel. That sight did me wonder what would be worse, facing the wrath of my mother or facing the consequences of going through the underpass. I chose the latter and after making sure that there was no one who would have seen me and stopped me, I crawled under the sign, with my bike in hand. If the underpass was really so dangerous that nobody ever should go there, they would have used something more efficient to keep people way, won't they. They would have closed the underpass properly, wall up its entrances or so. Back then, nothing seemed out of the ordinary, I drove through the underpass with no problem, the road was decent enough and nowhere saw I signs that the tunnel would collapse any time soon, no visible cracks, no erosion, not even the growth of mould... There was a bit of graffiti but which abandon construction didn't suffer from such mild vandalism (although being abandon was for some 'so called artists' not even a criteria anymore). The only thing that struck me as odd, was a red line in the middle of the tunnel. A red line of an inch thick, marking the floor, the walls and the ceiling. It didn't look like graffiti, it was too simple, not extravagant enough. I didn't know why but the sight had something unsettling and I tried to escape the underpass as fast as I could, so fast I almost collided with the sign on the other side of the underpass. But thanks to the shortcut, I got home in time and I didn't had to spent the rest of the vacation with house arrest.

Late at night, I felt myself unable to get asleep. I just couldn't stop wonder why the underpass was closed in the first place. I had seen nothing that would justify such a decision. Even stranger was the fact that I never had questioned that decision before. For as long as I could remember, the underpass has been closed and yet I had no idea why. Maybe it is human nature to just follow instructions without knowing why. We just learned that it was forbidden, that is was unsafe. But for some odd reason that answer wasn't enough for me. I had to know why. If the underpass was under lockdown, there had to be reason and I was planning on uncovering that reason. Not only would it satisfy my curiosity, it would also give me something to do, something else than listening to Lamb's stories about her father war antics. Don't get me wrong, the first time around these stories are interesting but after you have the same story, over and over again... Well, I can tell you this, the novelty quickly wears off.

My research started in the library. I could try to google it but people who ever tried to find something so specific on Google will agree with me, this way was by far the easiest of the two. I searched in books, I read old newspapers, with some interesting but incoherent results.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">The underpass was build in 1970, and was already closed in 1980 after two bodies were found in the tunnel. I couldn't find much details on their story however, only that they were in their mid' 20s, were gone missing a few weeks prior and they were robbed. The underpass was closed for 'further investigations' but I couldn't find any reports that they ever opened the underpass again. But in later years, some people had disappeared near the underpass, mostly drug addicts for as far as I could recover... So other than a grim history, there was no actual reason to close the underpass. Or was there something I had neglect to notice when I drove through it. My thought process was both easy to understand as stupid in hindsight: I believed that I might neglected to see certain details when I drove through it. I was in a hurry, my first time through. There was only way to be certain, to trespass once more. Armed with only a flashlight, I returned to the place and ignored for a second time the sign that tried to discourage me from entering. With the flashlight I scanned the ceiling and the walls, no visible cracks, little erosion maybe, but nothing that really looked like something to worry about. I looked at the graffiti on the walls, in the hope that they might tell me stories about this place that my information from the library neglected me to tell. Most of it were profanity, others just boastful but one writing in particular caught my attention: 'Go Away...' I looked around and noticed a second writing, a few meters farther. Written with the same handwriting: 'Leave'. At that point I actually considered that advice but as I looked around, nothing to see, I felt brave and ignored the warning. But closer to the unsettling red line, I found the most disturbing message of all. It was clearly written by the same author of the previous two warnings, but this wasn't a warning...

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">'It lurks in the dark... Look behind you...'

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">For a brief moment I could only watch at the writing on the wall, too shocked to move. With a heart that was pounding so fast that it hurt, I slowly turned around and aimed the flashlight at the wall behind me. While breathing heavily, I read a new message at the opposing wall: 'Boo!'

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">Relieved but also a bit humiliated, I shook my head and decided that I should stop following instructions, written on walls. Once my heart rate dropped to acceptable levels, I continued my investigation, by checking the red line. It was an perfect line, no spots on either side and the paint didn't look like regular paint used by graffiti artists, more like the paint used for road marking. It could explain why it was spotless but it still begged the question, why? Why would anyone bother to paint a red line in an abandon tunnel, covering the floor, walls and ceiling. What purpose did it serve, if at all? It could be some sort of joke by the people who made the tunnel, or some sort of silent protest. Still, that red line stroke me as odd. Beyond the red line, I saw more graffiti, less than in the first part of the tunnel but with the same messages, the same old jokes and the same boasting that I could only attribute to lowlifes with too much times at their hands (if the graffiti was decent, I could said it was art but you would find more fine art in an elementary school than in this abandon tunnel.)

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">For the coming week, I kept using the underpass, it was more convenient than the detour and it strangely felt good driving through the tunnel, a feeling of freedom, ecstasy, maybe even rebellious towards to authority who placed the signs. And surprise, surprise... nothing happened. But 9 days after I actually started using the underpass, it started to reveal its true secrets to me. And never before was I so scared. Running some errands for Miss Lamb, I returned from the supermarket with her bags filled with groceries and once again I used the underpass. And once again, I had to listen to the story how Derrick Lamb fought in Battle of Passchendaele, how he heroically dealt with the Germans and  how he barely managed to survive in the trenches. Lucky for me, the story was cut short this time when somebody called at the door. It was her daughter, Catherine (her surname escapes me for the moment). After the usual pleasantries, I was off the hook and ready to go home, a bit to the disappointment of Grannie Lamb but hey, we can't all get what we want. When I looked at my watch, I saw only an hour had passed, that had to be some kind of record. Maybe I could spend some time at the lake. But my joyful thoughts were roughly disturbed when I was halted by Caroline Winters, a friend of my mother. The moment she saw me, she ran at me and hugged me for no apparent reason. Not really knowing what was going on, I remained silent and waited till she explained her sudden need to hug me. To my surprise, she was crying. With tears in her eyes she looked at me and said sobbing: 'I'm so sorry about your mother... When I heard it...'

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">'My mother?'

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">I had no idea what I heard and with a shock I started asking myself the question: what had happened since I had left the house that morning...

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">'She was so young... Way too young to go... And I'm sure that the other driver was drunk, I'm sure of it...'

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">As the horror of her words invaded my mind, like toxic gas, I was unable to react, I was unable to speak. The idea of  my mother having an accident and died... My world fell apart and without thinking I jumped on my bike and drove home as fast as I could, while fighting against the tears. I didn't care what impression I might have made on people that day. It was all of lesser importance when compared to the horrible news that Winter's brought me. It felt so unreal, it felt impossible. I chased through the underpass without paying any attention to it. When I arrived at the house, I saw her car on the entranceway. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, nothing that pointed at a crash. The trunk was open, revealing that she just returned from the store with groceries. What was going on? I stormed inside, trying to find her. And there she was. In the kitchen, greeting me and asking me if I could take the rest of the groceries out of the car. But I couldn't react, paralyzed by her presence, could only look at her, trying to comprehend what just happened. Winters told me that my mother had an accident. She told me she had died... Was this a sick joke or something? My mother immediately saw that there was something wrong. She always could tell if I had problems. She asked me if something was wrong, something I denied too quickly. I'm sure she didn't believe me but she did let it rest. Only when I tried to go my room, she reminded me of her previous request of taking the bags out of the car. I was completely forgotten that she asked me that question and such forgetfulness doesn't really help if you are trying to act natural. I smiled vaguely, apologized and did what was asked of me. <span style="font-family:'TimesNewRoman',serif;font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;">

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">Later that night, I couldn't put the idea of Caroline Winters, crying over the death of mother, out of my head. It looked convincing to me and Winters never struck me as an great actress. But what was going on? It was something that kept me bothering... Why was she convinced that her mother had died. But also the rest of the story didn't end up. How did Winters knew about an accident involving her mother before I did. Also the way she phrased it, was bizarre to say the least, like she was under the impression that I was aware of what happened to my mother. She didn't seem to question my presence at Lamb's house for a second, while my mother supposedly died that day, while every normal person would be expecting that I was mourning the loss at home, with my family. It was all some bizarre. Little did I know that this would only be the beginning.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">But the next day, my mother asked me a question that blew all my other concerns out of the water. She asked me where I had been the last week. Surprised by this odd question, I told her that for the past week, I had been running errands for Geraldine Lamb. My claims were immediately dubbed as lies and followed by a demand for the truth. According to her, Lamb hadn't see me in 8 days, having called my mother, wondering if I was ill or something. I was stunned, I couldn't comprehend what had happened. First, her friend told me that she died and now Geraldine was telling her that she hadn't seen me in days, not since... Not since I had used the underpass for the first time... Could there be a connection between these two events? It had be. It was the only explanation. Her next question came even more as a shock when she asked me if  I was using drugs behind her back. I denied said claim, of course but I'm not sure she believed me. She warned me that if this behaviour would continue, with me disappearing, I would be grounded. But I could care less for that moment, I had to find out what was happening to me. I had to find out if there was any connection between the underpass and my apparent disappearances.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">Instead of taking the practical approach of actual experimenting, I started with doing some research first, looking if there were any similar cases. If I could find other people who had similar experiences, who went missing for days without they could account for them or even realized that they had been gone missing. My first searches remained fruitless and the need to return to the underpass, and try some theories, grew by the day. I don't know why I had those feelings, those needs, but the idea that all the answers I craved, could be found in the underpass and only in the underpass. It was a feeling that I knew I had to suppress, that acting on these feelings without knowing what I was dealing with, would be ill-advised and a stupid thing to do. After a good week of searching and speculating on explanations, I discovered a site that appeared to be able to provide me with answers. It introduced me to the concept of Timeline Synchronisation, a theory that claimed that it was possible for people to end up in a different timeline. With the help of a portal, in most cases a tunnel or cave, one can enter a different timeline, replacing their counterpart on the other side. Only timelines where the person haves a counterpart and where the counterpart is near the portal are accessible. Because of this specific criteria in most cases, this tunnel or cave will act as a regular tunnel or cave. If another timeline is in fact reachable, the person will likely not be aware that they have infiltrated a different timeline, due to the similarities in the timelines. In many cases, these 'travellers' only become aware of their visits to other timelines, when certain taken action remain unnoticed or unaccredited, when they are reported missing for a few hours or days or finally, because of subtle differences between timelines, stemming from prior the traveller's arrival. Under the article, there was a list of documented cases that were contributed to this phenomenon.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">Although the story was bizarre, bordering on impossible actually, it was till now the only explanation I could find. It was the only story who came close to representing my actual situation, although vaguely. But I felt that there was only one way that I could be certain: I put up an experiment that would ensure me of the possibility of the existence and accessibility of these alternative timelines. It took me a few days to put up this list, as I had to be sure that what I tried, the results would be clear. If there was even the slightest ambiguity about the results, they would useless to me. They had to be irrefutable

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">These are my notes of the experiment

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">This was the first experiment that I performed (later more would follow but this was easily my most important and influential), and had as goal to prove the existence of alternate timelines and the possibility to access them. The experiment was actually quite easy, I had to create a unusual object and place it in my desk. I chose to made a little doll of wood and twigs from the forest, a skill I had learn from my maternal grandfather. The reason why I had to use a new doll was easy: since it would be made for the purpose of the experiment, it would be only found in my timeline. I had no reason to assume that in another timeline someone was making the same experiment, or so that I only would encounter any such timeline. I placed it in a drawer of my desk to make it even more unlikely any of my counterparts would do the same. It would also diminish the change that my parent would meddle with things. They didn't had the habit of coming in my room, if I wasn't there but I rather didn't take my chances. Especially since my mother has started to suspect me from doing drugs. As a final percussion, I decided to only try my luck on days I knew they wouldn't be home, when they were at work or so. The other days I would keep my regular routine of doing errands for people, while evading the underpass. Now I had an idea what might lay behind that red ring, I thought it would be better to not use the tunnel when I wasn't performing any experiment. I had no need for it to complicate things. Once the doll was in place, I would start the experiment. If I used the underpass and returned home using the detour, there were two possible outcomes:

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">1) The Object was still there and nothing meaningful had happened (unless I could find other contradictions with my timeline. )

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">2) The Object was gone and I would have my proof.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">My first attempts were futile, time after time, when I got home, I found the doll where I had put it. And I almost gave up on my clearly foolish attempts to recreate an internet fantasy when finally something happened. I came home, went to my room and the doll was nowhere to be found. Excited I opened every drawer, I looked under the bed, I even dared ask the mother of this world's me who just got home. But it seemed that the doll never existed. For a second I thought I was going crazy and that I seeing things and judging how the other mother looked at me, she had similar thoughts. The other mother... That's sounds a little bit too Tim Burton but you get the idea. Anyway, there was but only way to be certain that it wasn't just my mind playing tricks on me, returning to what I believed was 'my world'. After making up some lame excuse of having forgotten something with Lamb, I left the house, hoping that my plan would work. If I failed... I had no idea what I should as explaining my odd behaviour would likely be the least of my problems. I followed the road I used to get here and a few minutes later I looked at the arc that formed the entrance to the tunnel. Signs looked as authoritative as ever but as usual I ignored them. Arriving back home, with the feeling that I was acting idiotic, I ran inside and tried to go to my room to check for the doll. If everything went as I hoped it did, I would find the doll. But before my foot could even touch the first step, my mother called me back. With shoes of lead, I followed the sound of her voice and found her in the living room. She asked me why I didn't greet her when I came home before asking me about my day. Nothing about the wooden doll, or my behaviour when I left the house... Not even the slightest hint that she questioned my hasty departure or even was aware of said events. As the truth was too bizarre to be an explanation she would accept, I told her that I spent my day at the lake, reading a book. And after I could ensure her that I 'only had been reading a book', I was free to go my room. From what it seemed my experiment was successful. When I returned to my room, and opened the second drawer on the left side of the desk, I had my confirmation. In the middle, on the book that my mother now believed I had been reading at the lake, laid the doll. I wasn't going insane, no... The underpass was really a portal to another world and based on the fact that my actions in this parallel worlds didn't echoed back to my world, so my second experiment was finished as well. <span style="font-family:'TimesNewRoman',serif;font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;">

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">If I only had stopped there... But now I knew of the alternate universes, I was eager to learn more about them. And what was the great harm in it? Those that would drastically different from my own wouldn't be accessible, now would they. I mean, for me to be able to enter a different timeline, a version of me had to exist, be alive and present in the village. What was the worst that could happen...

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">While I write this I haven't been home for three days. Three long days... What happened you might ask? While the underpass kept calling me, kept encouraging me to use it, it is now clear to me that time doesn't liked to be meddled with. And with every experiment I did, some serious, some for mere fun I made things worse for myself, but nothing could prepare me for what would happen in my  last experiment. I had visited timelines where events like 9/11, or more recent the Boston Bombings never occurred... It were events that never influenced my life in the first place, not in a drastic way that was, other times, I found myself in worlds with my parents divorced, with miss Lamb having died of a heart attack in 2009 or my mother being pregnant of a baby brother... In all fairness, sometimes I had problems with returning to my own world, not that anything physical or metaphysical stopped me but because some worlds seemed to be better than my own but I knew too much from other worlds and too little about these new worlds... But my last experiment... While I said that I couldn't exist in a drastically different universe, I soon learned that I was dead wrong. The moment I drove out the underpass that day, I knew things weren't as they should be. It was too calm outside. The Nobody was outside as I drove through the streets... The village was desolated, almost looking like a ghost town,  with some houses were even rundown and others utterly destroyed. What had happened to this world. But before I could do the wise decision, namely turn my bike and return to the world where I belonged, I heard airplanes soaring over my head and seconds later, I was called by a man in shelter basement. He urged me to come towards him, seconds later I realized why that wasn't such a bad suggestion as the airplanes started dropping bombs! I barely managed to escape the bombings and found shelter with the man. He was alone and somehow he knew who I was. He condoled me for the loss of my parents and expressed how sorrow he had felt when he heard the news. As you will understand, I wondered what happened, and what unleashed this horror... As he explained me about the war, he seemed to be under the impression that I have amnesia, I decided that I wouldn't ask him about what just happened to my parents, I'm sure that something questions are better left unanswered.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">After several terrorists attacks on big cities across the globe, like a nerve gas attack on the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, bombings on the Kremlin and on UN headquarters in 2009, followed by several assassination of diplomats, distrust grew between the nations. Every nation was pointed fingers at other nations. Fuelled by the collapse of banks and real estate market and economic unrest in both Russia and China, who saw the US vulnerable for the first time in many years, this led to a worldwide conflict that was now called World War III. According to my host, who was named Darren Willems by the way, none of the parties hadn't  dared using nuclear weaponry for now, fearing that when the first nuke would detonate, it would trigger a series of cataclysmic events that would result in the end of human civilization. Nevertheless he had heard reports about the use of both biological and chemical weapons and this by both parties of the conflict. Most of Europe fell a few months back, either under the might of the Sino-Russian Faction, or due to pre-emptive occupations by the Japan-Western Alliance. With England having become symbol of Free Europe, it became prominent for both parties to conquer this bastion or at least control it. For the moment, we are allied with the Japan-Western Alliance but at the price of being under constant threat of attacks launched from European mainland, mainly from Scandinavia. Although no ground troops have been send in yet, air strikes appeared to be a daily occurrence and one couldn't only wonder how long we would be able to withstand the Chinese and the Russians. One could ask how the Sino-Russian Faction ever became so powerful, at first this was a question that plagued my mind too, but once asked, I learned that when you control the remaining oil reserves in the Middle-East, you have a definite advantage over your enemies. When I asked him about Australia, he simply replied by stating that the 'Aussies have closed their borders to all!'

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">Three days in a world where I don't belong, in a world where every second feels like it will my last and yet drags on like forever. Three days and I haven't see any opportunity to even escape the watchful eyes of my host, let alone this cursed shelter. From what I learned about him and how he lost his family, his wife and his children, it is clear that he isn't planning on losing me too. For him I'm an orphan and probably a perfect surrogate for his lost family members. I don't want to sound as ungrateful bitch, I'm very grateful for the shelter Darren have provided me but I have to leave this damned place. I do not belong here and with every minute I spend here, the likelihood that I will ever be able to return to my world shrinks. What if, during an attack, the underpass is hit and it collapses. I would never see my family again and will be doomed to spend the rest of my life here and based on the current situation that could become a very brief life. If I'm lucky I might be able to escape the attention of my gracious host and return to my world.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">Okay, Darren is asleep, this is my chance to get away, maybe the only chance I ever will have. It is now or never...

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt; line-height:115%;font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif";mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">Author Note: <span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:115%; font-family:"TimesNewRoman","serif";mso-ansi-language:EN-GB"> This was the final diary entry of Lucy Kinsley. Lucy went missing on August 20th, 2013. According to her mother, she left to see a friend who was back in town and wouldn't be late. Her mother never saw her daughter back alive. Four days after the mysterious disappearance, her body was found near the entrance of the abandon Monty Creek Underpass. To everyone's astonishment, her skin was covered with blisters, an autopsy later revealed that her lungs and her windpipe were covered by the same blisters and according to the autopsy she died of a combination of third degrees burns to skin and lung tissue as well as pulmonary oedema. The greatest shock however came when biopsy and toxicological reports were in, claiming that the blisters were caused by sulphur mustard, better known as mustard gas, although it was a far more potent agent than the gas used by the Imperial German Army in World War I. Who or what did this to her, remains for most people a mystery as both the medical report and this diary is the only thing that shed any light on the case and we were ordered to never speak about those aspects of the case. The official explanation was that her body was drenched in some sort of corrosive substance by an unknown attacker. At first, the media was all over the story but they quickly lost interest, especially when no other cases were reported and the death of Lucy Kinsley turned into a cold case and officially remains unsolved.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span style="font-family:'TimesNewRoman',serif;font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;">Now almost two years later, the memories of that cursed day still haunt me, I can't sleep anymore, I can't stay silent anymore... This isn't not only a warning to all, this is also a confession of what we did that day. Of the lie that we created to cover up the truth. And how that was in fact the only thing we did. We give it a cover story, yet did nothing to prevent anyone to repeat her actions. I'm standing at the underpass and I look at the sign: No Trepassing. Why didn't we never walled in the underpass. Why don't we cover things up properly? There hasn't passed a day that I didn't wonder why we never choose a more permanent solution? There hasn't also passed a day that I wasn't curious what I<span style="font-family:'TimesNewRoman',serif;font-size:12pt;line-height:115%;"> might find on the other side of the Underpass... I know I will likely come to regret this... No, I know that I will come to regret this but I guess there is only one way to find out... <ac_metadata title="The Underpass AKA No Trespassing (unreviewed)"> </ac_metadata>