Ghosts in the machine

I think it was a few hours later. It was near dusk; the mosquitoes were out and the birds were settling into their nests. There was no sound pollution to deter them from the trees, and no air pollution to kill them off if they nested. Wind gently rustled the leaves of the magnificent old gums that lined the streets with military precision. I got up from my crude seat of light-bricks, and stared at the rubble. The bricks seemed to be decomposing.

After a period of depressed self-analysis, I’d realised that there was nothing I could do. First I’d told myself that you can’t change the past, and then grasped that, apparently, you could, and it was just that I didn’t know how to. Plus, more birds and cleaner streets was a good thing, right? I’d just go where the arrow told me, and hope for the best.

The Shifter hummed in my pocket, reassuringly. I pulled it out, and stared at the screen.

‘You’d better be on the good side,’ I muttered, and pulled the lever. Turbid, grey light.