Chapter 72: Not Crazy
That day, that rainy night, it was filled with so many unsettling moments.
Such as...
People waking up in the middle of conversations they hardly remembered. Los Angeles recorded one of the highest road accidents in different areas in the last five years.
An aircraft veered off course and was found hours later.
Even ships were lost on the high seas, leaving captains and small fishermen frustrated.
Animals sensed the slight shift in time and reality felt different to the most observant.
It felt like the whole world had walked through a door and couldn’t remember why.
’’It feels like I am forgetting something...’’
Most people admitted as no one could properly describe what just happened and why they felt a certain way or that a moment of their lives had either been erased, paused, lost or taken away from them. And like most people, they turned to the government and public sectors for answers.
Stylie gasped, waking up from what felt like a terrible dream. But felt so real enough to bring tears running down her cheeks.
Ding!
The girl jumped, finding herself in the exact spot of where that terrible dream began.
At the ground floor of the hospital, sitting on a bench before a large and centralized indoor mini fountain. Berry’s phone had just finished charging and she stared around weirdly, her eyebrow furrowing in confusion as she stared at the rain that kept falling endlessly from the sky.
It grumbled as a tv placed at the center of the busy ground floor of the hospital kept playing and reporting a wave of strange incidents that seemed to happen without anyone being able to explain how they occurred.
Motorists waking up in the middle of brutal and ghastly accidents or pedestrians blinking to find themselves standing in the middle of their rooms not being able to explain why or how they even got there in the first place.
’’Everyone came sharing testimonies online and on the news on how this strange occurrence felt like they had time–jumped or experienced a weird shift from the present moment they last recalled to a similar yet different reality. Some described it as time itself pausing for a few seconds before resuming again leading to so many worldwide confusions and disasters.’’
Stylie gasped, her eyes watering with tears as the news reporter continued on Fox News as the world around her moved on quickly as if nothing had happened.
’’Majority says it was extra terrestrial contact with earth and their memories of the invasion had been wiped.’’
’’Could it have been CERN messing with particles of space and time again?’’
Stylie ignored the News reporter as she stood up with Berry’s phone in her hand knowing it was more than that.
To her, it felt like a dream. A really terrible one she couldn’t help even dismissing as one as she went from walking to running down the pristine hallways of the hospital, bumping into nurses and trays of food and medicine in the process.
She slowed when she reached her destination and gasped at what she saw.
Berry was busy beating Lin to a pulp with her handbag, scolding him just as Stylie remembered. That sight awakened a feeling of multiple goosebumps on her skin as her eyes widened a bit in horror.
Then she snapped out of it and ran towards them, almost falling in the process.
’’Guys! I think...I think something terrible has happened to Boss! We gotta go to the office right now!’’
’’Hmm?’’ Berry paused from beating her hardworking bean who had little to no regard for his health. And for a moment it felt like the entire hospital was still listening to her bizarre words.
Berry stared at her strangely, looking at the old intern from head to toe who looked terrible, anxious and out of place.
Lin only sat straighter on the bed, blinking at his junior dumbly as she said the strangest thing.
’’Boss...?’’
Stylie nodded, wishing they will respond better than they did to her in the dream or...
’’What happened to Bosssss—-ah!’’ Berry didn’t get to finish her sentence when she was dragged away from Lin by their anxious junior out of the general ward and in the direction of the ground floor.
Lin blinked, feeling left out before quickly pulling out his drip and got up chasing after them.
’’W–w–wait for me!’’
☆☆☆
’’B–Boss is in serious danger! We have to help her before it is too late.’’
Berry blinked as she sat stiffly in the passenger’s seat and watched as their old intern drove them through the pouring rain to the office, mumbling strange words that sounded strange and apocalyptic to them.
Berry could say nothing as Lin tried and urged their junior to communicate clearly to them what she meant by Boss was in danger.
What kind of danger was she talking about and how were they supposed to stop or prevent it?
Stylie hoped they wouldn’t be late this time if what she saw and experienced was indeed some kind of dream or vision or foresight of the future.
The rain didn’t make getting to the office on time easier but the little employee was determined to drive through the storm and stop whatever this was from happening.
Even if it was just some nightmare, she still felt like it was something she shouldn’t ignore. It made her heart race, her hands trembling as she grabbed onto the steering wheel of Berry’s car, staring through the foggy windshield as if looking for something as she drove.
’’Hey, Stylie,’’ Lin tried again from the backseat, tapping her shoulder gently as he tried not to sound so frustrated.
She was scaring them with the way she was behaving.
’’Why are we heading towards the office at this hour thinking something bad is going to happen to Boss when Boss is perfectly fine, possibly somewhere enjoying the aftermath of her dinner date with that tech guy?’’
Stylie sighed out in frustration, running a hand through her blonde hair as she fought the urge of rolling her eyes to the back of her head.
’’Tell me what you mean by Boss is in danger and we are on our way to stop whatever this was!’’
The intern tried not to break down completely as she focused on taking them there quickly to the office. Lin’s constant pressuring wasn’t helping her focus or handle this situation better. It was only making everything worse because she doesn’t know how to make them understand how she felt about this.
Whatever happened, she had to make them believe her before it was too late. She had seen Boss die near the office. She had seen all of them crying, wishing they had arrived sooner. For some reason, it felt as though that entire moment had been erased, and they had all been placed back at the beginning.
To maybe...stop it or was it just a nightmare she was paying too much attention to?
Stylie shook her head, adding more pressure on the pedal.
’’Can you just stop asking me why or where we are going and just focus on getting to the office right on time? Please?’’
Lin stared at her strangely for a moment before turning to Berry who shook her head, telling him not to say anything and let their old intern lead them both to wherever she wants.
☆☆☆
By the time they reached the office, the rain had eased into a drizzle. Only a few distant sounds of thunder echoed as two employees of the Winfield Entertainment industry stood in the cold, almost empty and quiet parking lot of their office.
All the lights of the building had been put out and a dog kept barking at something from a distance.
Lin sighed out deeply at the heavens for the one millionth time that night as he leaned beside his sassy fruit on her car, waiting for Stylie to return from wherever she disappeared to in the building.
The employee, still wearing the patient uniform of the hospital he ran from, clicked his tongue in annoyance, staring sideways at the lonely yet wet parking lot in complete boredom.
’’She probably just had a nightmare or something.’’
Berry turned to him in disbelief, hitting him lightly on the chest when all he did was mock their old intern.
’’Will you stop saying that she is crazy?’’
Lin scoffed in disbelief while shaking his head at what this was about. He stared at his arm still bleeding from pulling out that drip, thinking it was something serious or life-threatening.
’’Well, have you called Boss again?’’ he asked, when Berry wouldn’t stop giving him that disbelieving look.
Berry pulled out her phone again, thinking it was strange Boss was yet to return any of her calls tonight and shook her head. The last message of her promising to visit this night remained unanswered but Berry wasn’t all that worried because the message had been seen this morning.
’’She is probably busy or spending the time with Henry.’’
Lin tried not to laugh at the thought of that dickhead. He was still one hundred and one percent convinced that the bald gorilla wasn’t worth every bit of their gorgeous, hardworking boss. He just knows that the guy was trouble but couldn’t prove it yet.
He just hopes their boss wouldn’t realize how unworthy that gorilla was when it was too late.
’’I’ll rather she spends time with that hot manager guy upstairs or with—’’
’’Grim!’’
Both employees turned to look at each other when they said the same thing, looked away quickly and smiled.
’’Either one of them is fine with me and seems much safer to be with than that creepy, bald gorilla.’’
Berry nodded her head, stopping herself from smiling before saying, ’’You know I just recorded you calling Boss’s boyfriend a bald gorilla and you might just get fired tomorrow.’’
Lin turned to his sassy fruit with a betrayed look but the noise of two people talking and stepping out of the dark building distracted them both.
’’I am telling you and I am not crazy. Just tell me if you’ve seen her today and saw her leave this place safely.’’
The guard that called for 911 sighed before turning over to Berry and Lin to come and get this girl out of his face.
’’For the one hundred and one millionth time, your boss is fine. I saw her come to work this morning and nothing extraordinary has happened since then.’’
Stylie remained unconvinced, looking hellbent angry and somewhat frustrated because everything that happened to her was too real to be dismissed as a mere dream or hallucination.
She was definitely not on sedatives or crazy.
Hell, she rarely even had nightmares like that!
’’B–b–but did you see her walk out of this place by yourself?’’ Stylie pushed further and the guard stared at the blonde eye sore in complete disbelief.
’’You know who else I didn’t spy on leaving this place?’’ he said, this close to screaming out loud.
’’All the fifty-eight people that works and has a place in this building!’’
He wasn’t getting the point!
Stylie wanted to rage back before Berry and Lin decided it was enough. They approached Stylie calmly and Berry’s heart sank at the sight of the tears in her eyes.
’’I am not crazy, please believe me...’’ Stylie cried out and Berry nodded her head before embracing her sweet, innocent junior.
The guard just shook his head angrily, muttering out a few curse words before leaving with his flash light.
As Stylie held on to Berry, she tried again to make sense of what this was about.
And why she was the only one that remembered it all when all of them were clearly in it too.
Or...
Stylie stiffened in Berry’s hold as she stared at the distance in realization.
Could it have been...
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