Clockstoppers by Rob Hedden

Author:Rob Hedden
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gallery Books
Published: 2002-12-11T05:00:00+00:00

ELEVEN

The big fly lumbered across the emergency room, its wings barely flapping enough to keep it aloft. It landed on the wall clock, its second hand struggling to tick forward. Doctors and nurses performed their duties in bizarre slow motion, their shouted orders sounding like a tape recorder with the batteries dying.

It all seemed like a bad dream to Zak, who felt like he’d been hit by a truck … or in his case, a large body of water.

Dr. Juarez leaned over him. She was in her forties and had friendly eyes.

“Soooooo … ssstrange … seeems … fine … but… his … vitals … are … doubled….”

Her voice was low and slurred, but seemed to be speeding up.

The watch was still tightly strapped to Zak’s wrist, but it was far from functional. Its face was clouded with condensation and the display was behaving strangely. Tiny arcs of electricity danced and sparked under the crystal as the digital numbers scrolled somewhere between real time and hypertime. The frenetic energy inside the watch continued to build until there was a bright flash. The display went dark.

At the exact same moment, the E.R. and its inhabitants resumed to normal speed.

“Here he comes,” smiled the doctor. “Good morning, Sleeping Beauty.”

Struggling for coherence, Zak hadn’t noticed the tall thin man in the tired brown suit who had been hovering nearby. The man pushed his way past the doctor to Zak’s bedside.

“Where’d you get the van, kid?”

His badge identified him as Detective Freemont, and nobody ever used the word “pleasant” to describe him.

“Not now, Detective,” admonished Dr. Juarez. “Let him breathe.”

“Is he okay?” asked Zak’s mom as she rushed into the room. She and his sister, Kelly, had just arrived at the hospital.

“He’ll be all right. It’s just a mild concussion,” Dr. Juárez reassured. Mrs. Gibbs stroked her son’s forehead as if he was still in kindergarten.

“Hey baby, how you feeling?”

“Uh … I’m fine, I think,” uttered Zak, little more than half awake.

“Good, so you can stand trial,” Kelly piped up, looking for attention.

“What?” he mumbled back.

“Hello?! You stole a van and crashed it!” she said with a certain amount of glee. “Mom, can I have Zak’s room while he’s in jail? Please, please …”

Detective Freemont was losing what little patience he had. He wedged himself between Mrs. Gibbs and the doctor.

“You almost got yourself killed with that little joyriding stunt, son,” he started in.

“I don’t know what got into him,” defended Zak’s mother. “He’s a really good kid, really.”

Zak watched them as if he were detached from his body. He was coherent enough to realize that the gruff cop meant serious business, but trouble with the police was the least of his worries. He was in first-class danger. He had to tell them about the watch, about everything. Zak labored to make the words spinning in his head come out of his mouth.

“No, you don’t understand,” he began shakily. “We were in hypertime … they were after my watch … it’s a molecular accelerator.” Zak reached for the watch and punched several buttons, all to no avail.

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