Time Travel-Part 4

She led them through another long corridor and into a room, not as big as Tom’s dad’s, but still bigger than any room Tom had ever been too. When the woman left, Tom and Annie started talking.

“I don’t trust your dad at all,” Annie said.

“I really don’t know who to believe. It makes sense for my dad to do what he did. But I still don’t know why he needs us,” Tom said.

“Don’t you get it. He is using you as bait. My dad wants you back with him because it was part of the deal,” Just then, they heard a commotion outside the building. They looked out their window, which was facing the main entrance. It was hard too see who was causing the commotion, since they were surprisingly very high up and many people were crowded around the person, but Tom caught a small glimpse that he couldn’t believe.

“It’s your dad Annie. He came here,” Tom said. Annie looked to Tom in disbelief.

“We have to go get him! We have to save him,” Annie said. Tom nodded in agreement. “But how do we get to him. These hallways are too confusing to navigate,” Tom said.

“We have to try at least!” Annie said. She bolted through the doors. Tom ran to catch up with her. When they got out into the hallway they were already lost.

“I remember us coming from that way,” Tom said, pointing to the right. They came across many more intersection points and after the third one, Tom was just guessing on where to go. On about their seventh intersection, they bumped into someone unexpected. When they were turning to another hallway, Annie crashed into Tom’s dad. He seemed very mad about something, probably the fact that Annie’s dad had shown up.

“Hello, Tom and Annie. I see you’re going on a walk,” Tom’s dad said.

“Umm, yeah. Just going for a walk,” Tom chucked nervously. Just when they were about to continue their search for Annie’s dad, Tom’s dad said something. “Tom, I just want you to know that I sent you back in time to here because I thought that you were finally old enough to learn the truth,” With that, he left them to themselves again. After a few more turns, they found a door slightly ajar.

“Maybe that’s the exit!” Annie said excitedly. The opened the door and walked in, only to see that it was just a room, and not a door leading to the outside. When Tom was walking back out of the room, he hit a board. He cried out in pain, but just as he did, all the lights in the room turned on, and a secret door opened.

“What was that” Annie asked.

“I have no idea. But it could be important,” Tom replied. Annie and Tom cautiously walked into the secret door, only to find a huge rectangle with a lock on it.

“Should we try the lock to see what's inside?” Annie asked.

“How could we guess the lock correctly?” Tom said.

“It is your dad that designed this place. Maybe he said the password before,” Annie said. Tom thought about his past. When had his dad say number over and over again? Then he remembered something. He remembered that his dad was trying to teach him the alphabet when he was younger, but his dad kept on repeating the same letters over and over again, that weren’t even in alphabetical order. It had started with an A...He couldn’t remember the rest. Annie saw that Tom was struggling to remember the code, so she gave a tip. “Maybe you could remember it better if you said it out loud,” Annie said.

“OK, I’ll try it. A, uh, E, I, Q,” Tom said. “It should be AEIQ,” Tom approached the lock on the rectangle. Him palms were sweating as he entered the letters, hoping that he could open it on his first try. The A was entered, then the E, and I, and at the end, the Q. Right when he pressed enter, a long buzzing sound appeared, and to Tom and Annie’s disbelief, the metal rectangle fell open, revealing what was inside.

“What is that,” Annie said, astonished. It was a metal frame, but Tom could tell that being a metal frame wasn’t it’s only purpose. It had many complicated buttons on it, and a huge lever. Tom slowly walked  toward the rectangular device, and saw that the huge lever meant turning the device on. He hesitated for a few moments, but then he decided that he would pull the lever. A loud sound rang Annie and Tom’s ears, and instead of a blank rectangle, the frame was now swirling masses of purple air.

“Could that be the time machine?”