Rise of the Weird Ones

“This locket has the power to return someone to the past. Use it to end this chaos.”

Those were the last words that my mentor said to me before she was taken by the Weird Ones. They echoed in my mind as I looked down at the heart shaped locket in my hand. The locket itself was made of pure silver and had three tiny sapphires in a triangle near the middle. My mentor warned me that the locket had a finite number of uses. As I stared down at the locket in my palm, I wondered if the sapphires had anything to do with amount of tries. After all, it would make sense. Three sapphires to represent each chance you had of starting over. Until I know differently, that is what I will assume it means.

I do not know how many days have passed by since the start of this new world. I lost track ages ago. I do remember how it started. Researchers gathered in a lab somewhere in the eastern part of the world to create a new medication. It was supposed to be the cure for cancer. Many of the researchers had been there for years trying to find the cure. The person who discovered the cure was a woman by the name of Dr. Eleanor Serrano. At the time, she had only been at the facility for a year and a half. After all these years, someone finally discovered the cure. Media outlets across the globe reported the day and night. For weeks, it was the only thing that was talked about. Dr. Serrano received the Nobel Peace Prize for her discovery and the media declared her a hero.

Cancer patients everywhere eagerly took the medication. The media touted it as a massive win for mankind. No one in the history of mankind had ever created something that wiped out a thing as deadly as cancer. For a few days, every person on the planet relished the idea that cancer would become a thing of the past.

After a few days passed, however, it was clear that something had gone horribly wrong. The cancer patients who took the medication began to exhibit strange behavior. They seemed to go from being on death’s doorstep to perfectly healthy in a matter of days. As though the patients had never been afflicted with cancer at all. It was easy to see why everyone believed that the medication had worked at first, given this outcome. But after three days, the patients displayed more odd behavior. All of a sudden, they were sensitive to light and lashed out at the slightest bit of noise. On top of that, the patients would only eat raw meat.

But not just any raw meat would do. Their favorite type of meat was human flesh. They loved to chase down their prey and tear them to bits with their teeth. The Weird Ones, as they are now dubbed by us survivors, are fierce hunters. The only way to avoid them is to outrun them. Whatever was in the medicine heightened all of their senses. Anyone who is unlucky enough to cross their path becomes one of them or is eaten by them. There are no other options.

Which is why I need to find a way to stop all of this. I need to go back in time and prevent this from happening. I turned the locket over and over in my hand. The locket felt cool to the touch. The silver of the locket gleamed in the afternoon sunlight and the sapphires sparkled. My mentor was the one who created the locket with my help. Though, to be honest, I really did not do much more than hand her the tools and offer input when necessary. She was the real genius. I was just her protege.

I shook my head from side to side, my copper bangs shifting out of my eyes as I did. I needed to focus. If the Weird Ones came back this way to search for me, I would be a goner. This was no time to get lost in thought. If my mentor saw me right now, she would chide me for wasting time.

The corners of my mouth lifted into a smile as I pictured my mentor's scowl. One thing that she hated was wasting time. That was her biggest pet peeve. If she were here right now, she would scold me for slacking off. Most likely, this would be followed by a head slap. Just thinking about the head slap caused a sharp pain to course through the back of my head.

Unconsciously, I began rubbing the spot on my head as I contemplated my next move. My mentor did not tell me how the locket was supposed to work and I did not have a way to ask. We were the only two people in existence who knew of the locket. My mentor felt that it was better to keep the project under wraps and I agreed with her. Time travel was not something to mess with lightly. Bad things could happen to those who meddled with time. It was for the best that the locket was not common knowledge.

"I wish you would have explained to me how this actually works," I grumbled to myself. "Now I have to guess and I don't like guessing games "

My mentor knew that I hated guessing games. As wasting time was one of her pet peeves, mine was definitely predicting outcomes. I am not a mind reader. Having to figure things out on my own with no clues was not something I enjoyed. However, I would have to deal with it. My mentor was gone. The Weird Ones had surely disposed of her by now or she was one of them. Either way, I could not rely on her to help me. I had to discover how to use the locket on my own.

I decided to use the process of elimination. Realizing that simply holding the locket did nothing, I ruled out that possibility. A soft chuckle escaped my lips. It was a ridiculous concept but I had to at least try.

Another idea popped into my head as I glanced at the sapphires. I wondered if it worked like the story about the genie in a lamp. Perhaps rubbing the sapphires would make the locket work? My index finger traveled over the smooth stones as the thought crossed my mind. After thirty seconds, I came to the conclusion that this was not the answer. I needed to move on.

I issued a sigh of frustration. How was I supposed to use this locket to travel back in time? The task seemed impossible. If only my mentor could give me some sort of instructions on how to use it. If I didn't know any better, I would swear that my mentor was playing a cruel joke on me, but that was unlike her. She did not like to play pranks. She was far too serious of a person for that. Pranks were a waste of time and I knew how she felt about that.

As I gazed at the locket, I noticed the gap in between the two halves of the heart. As though they were two pieces of a whole. It was at the moment that I realized the answer to my problem. I swore gently under my breath as I cursed my own stupidity. It was right there the whole time. In order to get the locket to work, you had to open it.

Holding the locket in between my fingers, I dug my fingernails into the crevice on the side. As I pried it open, a blinding white light filled the room. Panic started to set in as I realized that the Weird Ones would have certainly noticed the light. As I glanced around, I saw several dark shapes moving my way. I did not need to see their yellow eyes to know that the Weird Ones had found me. I shut my eyes as tightly as I could as I waited. Any second now. I knew something would happen. Hopefully, it was the locket transporting me back in time instead of being torn apart by the Weird Ones.

A boil covered hand reached out for me and I screamed. Just before the hand closed around my ankle, I felt a tug as if I was being dragged by an invisible force towards the locket. Whether it was from pent up anxiety or something else, I started laughing. My laughter rang through the deserted hallway. The last thing I saw was the eyes of the Weird Ones glaring at me as I fell backwards through a bright tunnel.