Between Seconds: The Hinge

Part two of a chat-written world that bends between moments

This is the second chapter of a story born in Substack chat - line by line, twist by twist, with some brilliant writers lending their imagination. They all deserve the world for this. Check them out!

If you missed part one, you’ll find it here:

And if you’re reading now, remember: the gates only open because of everyone writing together.

Stark’s iridescent wings shone in the light of the station, and she landed on the far side of the vestibule, on the interior side of the station. Gates one, two, three and four stood innocuously enough on the other side of the hall.

She noticed the yellow curls and fine clothing of the little girl, an adorable beret and dark green woolen coat, with navy blue velvet. Perfect little tights and black patent leather Mary Janes.

Was she from this era, another - she seemed supernatural in her presence and wisdom.

While in one moment the scene in the station seemed perfectly normal, in the next it was deafening with the tic tic tic and the dong dong donging sound of a symphony of different clocks striking on the island all at once.

The little girl pointing at the face of the clock, its face turning into shimmering, silver waves, reflecting distorted images back towards the station. It was bizarre.

Stark’s gears, springs, bells and whistles rattled in her chest as she shuddered from the eerie chill watching the little girl point at the future, or was it the past?

As the woman disappeared behind the shimmering clock face into Gate 4, Stark was stunned. She had to know what was happening, and so she too, took flight and circled far above the crowd, and gained speed as she dove through the shimmering veil between Gate 4 and the rest of the known world.

There was a ‘bloop’ sound as Stark flew through the horizon, and onto the other side.

The silence was so extreme from the sound and fury of the station, to the silence of this… place.

She didn’t hear anything at all, but soon found that the woman had tumbled through the horizon and onto the ground, her luggage, purse and books splayed around her in a loose circle.

She didn’t see or hear Stark, she thought she was all alone.

“What the actual FUCK? What is THIS place?”

It was natural to start assembling herself back together, but to go where?

Somehow they’d traveled from a busy station, clamoring with symbols, to a meadow, open wide with green grass and sprinkled with poppies, daisies and wisps of lavender. It couldn’t have been more of an opposite from Gate 4.

Stark flew high above the meadow and the shimmering circle of light behind the disheveled woman.

It didn’t take long, a matter of a few seconds, before Stark saw another gold oval framing another horizon - she could jump again if she dared.

---

The woman sat up, brushing grass from her coat.

After looking around for several moments, she began gathering books and papers into her lap. Her pulse steadied.

This was not the first time she’d fallen through something she wasn’t meant to survive.

But it was the first time she’d landed in another dimension.

Something tickled at the back of her brain, a steadily growing sensation.

She quickly flipped through her notes with quick, trained hands. Passing pages filled with symbols, scrawls, and meticulous notes, she finally found what she sought: a half-forgotten entry circled in red: “Plains layered like glass. Some shimmer, some devour.”

She lifted her head.

A shadow cut briefly across the meadow.

She wasn’t alone.

---

The guard’s thumbs flew over his keypad, the screen glare staining his face.

Subject line: “Final Transmission.”

Attachments queued. Files he had no clearance to even open. He hesitated only a second, thumb quivering as it hovered.

He hit send.

A sound broke through his concentration - sharp, deliberate.

Clip-clop clip-clop clip-clop…

Echoing louder with every beat.

His heart pounded in time, racing the rhythm.

His mouth ran dry, thumbs slipping across his phone screen, leaving a faint trail of sweat.

Just past the right edge of his phone, they came to a stop right in front of him.

Highly polished black shoes. Patent leather.

Their echo lingered even after the steps had stopped, reverberating louder as the moments dragged on.

His Adam’s apple bobbed noticeably as he swallowed hard.

Filled with dread, he raised his head.

And miles away - or maybe only a breath apart - in the meadow, she did the same.

Two strangers, two worlds, both staring into the unknown at precisely the same second.

Neither of them were alone.

And neither of them would ever be the same again.

---

The meadow rippled. Grass bent as though pressed by unseen hands, and the woman’s papers fluttered like startled birds.

Stark circled above, gears clattering softly, until she noticed it: the second golden oval was no longer fixed. It pulsed - shrinking, stretching - as though breathing. And with each breath, the flowers nearest to it withered, blackening into ash. The shimmering doorway was alive.

Back at the checkpoint, the polished shoes shifted slightly, and the guard’s phone screen blinked.

His “Final Transmission” message re-appeared at the top of his inbox - not sent, but received. The subject line bore his own fingerprints, but the attachments had changed. New files: photographs of the meadow, the woman, Stark overhead.

His pulse spiked as he realized he wasn’t just transmitting - he was being fed instructions.

The little girl in velvet and Mary Janes reappeared at the edge of both worlds.

In the meadow, she skipped through daisies untouched by the decay.

In the checkpoint’s sterile light, her reflection lingered in the shine of the patent shoes.

She lifted her hand slowly, palm outward, as if to halt both the guard and the woman. Time itself seemed to hesitate in deference.

And then the twist: the shimmering clock face they had passed through was not a gate at all, but a mirror. Not future, not past - refractions of choices yet to be made.

The guard and the woman were not separated by dimensions, but by decisions.

When one stepped forward, the other would vanish.

Stark’s wings beat faster, sensing the cruel symmetry.

Only one world would remain.

---

The woman clutched her books tighter, her eyes narrowing on the child.

“Who are you? What do you want from me?”

The girl tilted her head, curls bouncing. “Not who. When. I am the hinge.” Her voice carried both the high pitch of youth and the steady cadence of someone far older. She pointed toward the breathing oval. “One of you must walk through. Only one. The other will unravel.”

From the checkpoint, the guard’s voice broke into the meadow like a whisper carried on wind: “Is this… my choice?” His eyes darted across the mirrored shoes, half-expecting them to answer for him.

The girl’s smile was faint, nearly tender. “Your choices have already written themselves. This is the echo. You decide only which side of the echo will hold.”

The woman shook her head. “I won’t kill a stranger for the sake of your… symmetry.”

The girl stepped closer, her patent shoes glinting like fresh obsidian.

“You misunderstand. You aren’t strangers at all.”

She lifted her hand higher, palm burning with silver light, and the woman saw her own reflection ripple across it - aged, hollow-eyed, dressed in the guard’s uniform.

Her breath caught. “No… no, that’s not possible.”

“It is,” said the girl. “Because you are each other. Two halves of an unhinged whole.”

---

Want to see where the hinge swings next?

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