Near Future

• Joshua Nicholls, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2015

"Good morning class, this morning I'd like to introduce our new student Joshua Nicholls, welcome to the class Joshua, would you like to tell us something about yourself?”
“Ummm' I'm from a small island near Australia,” Josh began. “My home is called 'chally'. I've been awarded a diploma in science and I'm currently working on a time machine.” The class roared with laughter and Josh shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. The teacher asked that he take his seat.
Mr Kazan explained the project this week was science. Josh was excited. Mr Kazan explained the task was to create an energy source. Josh knew instantly that he would finish his time machine and use the energy source from this task to power it.
Josh raced home and started as soon as he got to his lab. Most kids have a bedroom but Josh had no time for sleeping and his room had been converted to a lab the minute they moved to town. Josh worked for hours trying many different formulas to complete the time machine task he'd started so long ago and then it hit him. He'd need a large amount of energy to power a machine enough to send someone back through time or to the future. 43.5 hours later Josh had finished his project however, he was going to need to borrow power from all available power lines in his neighbourhood in order to break the time vortex. Josh hurried to school in order to submit his work but when he got there, everything was different. There were robots everywhere and Mr Kazan was nowhere to be seen. Josh asked one of the robots and they explained that Mr Kazan retired 79 years ago. What had happened? Had Josh broken the vortex without even realising and if so, how does he now get back home...?
To be continued.