Sunset Hill: Chapter One.

Tara sat on the hill watching the sun go down. The view was perfect; evening sky with that perfect orange tinge.

It was breathtakingly beautiful.

She loved Sunset Hill. It was aptly named for its view of show-stopping sunsets, and perfect for watching the world go by below.

She heard the usual gurgle of a river and the whispers in the trees that surrounded her. She observed the sky and smiled.

Tara had always appreciated this view. It was just perfect. She decided to look to the valley below, hoping to see the three children she usually saw dancing there, and catch a glimpse of the traffic below her. The world from here was usually a cheerful but busy one, but tonight, something did not seem right.

She couldn't put her finger on it.

She looked around her. The sky was still amazing, and the trees were still whispering, but still the scene below seemed unusually quiet. She decided to get out her binoculars, something she didn't usually do while sitting on this hill; they spoiled her day by making everything look smaller.

She only observed the view for five minutes before quickly pulling them away from her eyes in shock.

The river had gone, and the once lush, green grass was dead. There were no children or traffic, and the roads had disappeared. She looked to the sky as if searching for clarification, but strangely, that changed too; it was darker than usual, and the once beautiful orange sky had turned completely black. There were no stars, no moon, and no sunset to be seen.

She felt a chill run down the back of her spine.

"How could this be happening to me?" She asked herself.

"Why is this happening at all?" She asked again.

She slapped her cheek to confirm that she was awake. She was hoping it was all a dream, until she looked to her side and saw a dead horse by her side.

Tara let out a scream of horror that nobody could hear but herself. Her once-perfect view had turned into a horror scene from a movie. She questioned whether it had always been perfect, or maybe she had missed something? This was her spot; she came here every night, but she had never seen anything like this before.

She was unable to see anything now; the sky had turned completely black, though it wasn't late. It had only just turned six in the evening. She pulled out her torch and switched it on, observing her surroundings once more. There was nothing now; no houses, fields, people, water, trees or animals.

Sweating, she started to panic and cry. She was alone in this world. She had nobody to support her, that was if she even was still in her world, because her haven now felt more like hell.

The earth below her smelled like it was burning, and she felt herself sinking like a volcano, though she couldn't stop it. She fought hard to pull herself up, but gravity pulled her back down. She relaxed her body. She felt that if she fought back, she'd be able to make it to the top. She fought back stress, tears, panic and anxiety in an attempt to hold herself together; every time she fell back down, she tried to relax a little more.

She finally felt some solid ground beneath her feet, but the ground that surrounded her was cracked and lumpy. If she tried to move from the spot she was standing in, her feet would boil and burn.

Tara felt exhausted. She had been fighting this depression for too long. She was confused, and she felt unsafe for the first time in a place that had always given her some peace from the darkness inside her.

She had no idea what was happening to her until she woke in her bed and realised that she had been dreaming. She lay there all morning, frozen and distressed by her nightmare.

Sunset Hill was a real place, and she often went there to escape her thoughts. She couldn't bear the idea of something horrible happening there.

Then it struck her. Something was wrong at Sunset Hill.

Tara had to force herself to investigate Sunset Hill. She had never had dreams this bad before, and Sunset Hill was a beautiful place with plenty of nature, trees and the greenest grass one could ever find.

It was just perfect!

The weather was beautiful, and she knew there would be plenty of birds singing their beautiful songs. She looked forward to hearing the river gushing and seeing the black horses again.

She couldn't cope with the thought of anybody destroying the beauty of this place. To her, it was magical. The scenery lifted her when she felt low or angry, and it helped her to connect with her inner peace.

She packed some water and headed to the hill.

Tara knew she had gone to bed last night, but if she was dreaming, the things she saw and felt were too fresh in her mind for it not to be real.

She found Sunset Hill and observed it from the bottom before heading to observe the top. The Hill seemed perfectly normal compared to what it was last night. She noticed the grass had overgrown at the bottom, but the roads were still as busy as ever with traffic, and the horses were there. She headed to the river. To her relief, it was still gurgling in its usual way, but two things were missing.

Where were the children and the horses?

She frowned, unable to understand it. The children played here every day, and the horses were always grazing on this hill.

She decided to search around the hill for them, smiling at the sky, which had turned into a beautiful golden glow, reassuring her that everything was going to be fine. She walked to the back of the hill to find one of the children flat on her stomach, crying, and a horse that was running wild.

"Are you alright?" Tara asked.

"I fell off my horse, and now I can't move my leg," the boy told her.

Tara observed the leg. The boy had a huge gash from where he had fallen down that hill.

"Did you fall off your horse while coming down the hill?" Tara asked.

The boy nodded.

"You should never ride a horse down that hill, it is a very steep slope. You could have been more seriously hurt," she told him.

The boy explained that the slope was not that steep when he rode his horse there.

"It was only a small hill, but it grew into something bigger! I ride here all of the time, and I've been down that hill before."

Tara didn't know whether to believe him or not.

If he was telling the truth, that could be linked to her dream. She shook her head and told the boy that hills don't grow bigger.

"It did. I know it. I saw it with my own eyes. One minute I was riding my horse to the top, and in the next minute, we were flying down the hill at superspeed for almost two hours!" the boy protested.

Tara thought back to the horrors of last night. She remembered the volcano and how she had to fight to climb out of it. She then remembered depression and how she felt before it. She found it strange to associate her emotions whilst in that dream with the boy's experiences, though it was even stranger that the boy should come out with this at all.

Ouch! My leg," the boy complained.

Tara hated to see a child in pain, so she took out her First Aid kit and proceeded to clean and bandage up the wound.

"Have you been here long?" she asked him, keeping her tone gentle.

The boy looked to be only eight years old, and he looked terrified.

"I don't know. I was racing my horse down the hill with friends when I suddenly fell and all of my friends disappeared," he explained.

"What is your name?" Tara asked.

"Tom," the boy replied.

"Ok, nice to meet you," Tara told him.

"What is happening? Everything is strange here tonight," Tom enquired.

"I don't know yet, but we should get you home. It isn't safe here," Tara told him.

The Hill suddenly spun around at lightning speed, and somehow, they ended up inside Tom's house.

"What the...?" Tom started, but was unable to finish his words.

Tara had no idea what had just happened. Time had somehow jumped, and she didn't understand why.

"How did I get here so fast, and look! My leg has healed," Tom exclaimed.

Tara smiled.

She couldn't explain the events that were unfolding, but Tom's leg had certainly healed.

There was a loud NEIGH outside the window.

Tom rushed to the door. He was startled to see Shamen, his horse, standing outside it. The horse had broken his leg and was unable to move, but he was here, and his leg had fully healed.

Tara thought back to the dead horse.

This can't possibly be that horse, surely.

She checked the coloured spots on the horse's back and checked the name tag.

The horse had black and white spots on his back, just like the horse who had died, and the name tag clearly said, Shamen on it.

"This is not possible!" She thought to herself.

Tom was happy to see his horse alive. He was far too young to understand what was happening around him, and Tara did not have the heart to tell him that she had seen his horse on the ground, not breathing.

She decided that it was best to let him think what he wanted. Explaining these strange events would frighten and confuse him.

She reassured him that he was safe and headed to Sunset Hill, hoping to find some clue as to what was happening there.

Daylight on the hill seemed to have come too soon. Tara checked her watch; 9:30 PM.

It shouldn't be daylight yet; it should be nighttime.

Tara walked around the hill, observing any other changes that may have occurred.

She noticed some people dancing on the hill, but there was something different about them.

They seemed to be dressed in clothes from the past, and they weren't behaving like people from her generation.

She approached a lady dressed in a very long brown dress with brown shoes that turned up at the toes.

"What year is this?" She asked.

"Why, my dear! It's 205 days."

"205 days? I asked for the year?" She questioned, irritated at the rude attitude.

There were flowers on the hill. blue, red, green and yellow daisies amongst gold roses that were shining toward the sky.

Tara felt that it was too surreal.

Something had to be wrong!

A plane roared above her head.

"Duck for cover, or we will be evaporated by blue tanks!" a man called to her and the others.

Silver pellets started firing from the plane.

"LEAVE NOW OR FACE EXTINCTION!" someone called.

Tara had no idea what was happening.

It seemed that they were all caught in some kind of time-warp, though she had never heard of one existing, ever.

Suddenly, the world spun around fast, knocking her unconscious. When she woke up, Tom was calling her name, yet everything had changed.

Tara looked at him, confused.

"Was I dreaming?" she asked him.

"You fell asleep for a long time," Tom explained.

"The world has stopped spinning, but where am I? Where are my family?" he asked, confused.

"I don't know Tom. Something weird is happening here. I don't know why. Will you stay and join my mission to figure this out?" Tara asked.

"What? I'm not old enough to do this!" the boy exclaimed.

"We need to figure this out, Tom. I need you onboard here, so we can make the world right, and get your family back," Tara told him firmly.

"How?" Tom asked.

"I don't know, but we will find out. If this carries on, nothing will be left of our world," Tara told him.

Tom nodded, and they found a cave where they could sleep for the night.

In the morning, their mission to solve the mystery of Sunset Hill would begin.