His death had come unexpectedly. There wasn’t a vestige of her husband’s voice left in the house, though she listened for it in the creak of the stairs and the hush between kettle whistles. #bravewrite

The ball field was gone now, the land sold to a developer. The park now lay beneath poured concrete and manicured lawns, each townhome a forgetting. And yet, on certain evenings there was the haunting sound of children long displaced still wanting to play one more game. #vssmagic

Agnes waited in the corridor, toe tapping involuntarily, as the temporal historians debated whether 1348 was “too plaguey” for a second drop. Fifteen years ago Kivrin had went against protocol and rescued her from the plague. She was reluctant to go back to where all her family had died #2WordPrompt

The loom was supposed to be a harmless artifact, but the way it shimmered suggested it had opinions and possibly a grudge. Rumpelstiltskin had once owned it, but a zealous undergrad had taken it back on his jump. Now the loom could only produce tapestries not gold and it was resentful. #vss365

“Ah the trouble with young phd students in the program”, Dean Willis thought. “You can give a historian a time machine, but you can’t make her follow protocol, especially when there’s a Regency ball involved.” #bravewrite

She moved through the garden with a sense of reverence, as if each rosebush could relate a story if only she listened long enough. There were tales there alright. If only she had the ears to hear them. #2WordPrompt

In the garden, beneath the garish sun, they danced a wordless waltz, their feet brushing the dew-slick grass. He held her like a man who had lost things, and she leaned into him like a woman who had found something again. Neither spoke. There was no need. #vssmagic

He ran amongst the crowd as fast as he could. Still he felt it’s presence and he had the nagging feeling he had been targeted. He turned and watched the bull veer at the last moment, dust rising, the horn missing by inches. #vss365

The tower loomed over the college quad like a disapproving don, and I couldn’t help but feel it was judging my thesis proposal for going to St Patrick’s Day in New York City 1946 as harshly as Dr. Willis had. #bravewrite

When the draft notice came for him, against family wishes he left the Catskills and fled to the Maritimes. He felt the pound of the sea in his chest long before he heard it, as if the Atlantic had taken up residence in his ribs, reminding him that exile is not just a place but a rhythm. #vssmagic

The cow, inexplicably dappled like a Holbein painting, stared at me with the same blank expression I’d seen on Head Engineer’s face when I told him I’d misplaced the temporal stabilizer. It just chewed its cud as if a man from 200 years in the future had not just appeared in front of him. #vss365

I break out in a cold sweat until I can sweat no more. My breasts shrivel and disappear. My hair falls out and scales take its place. My arms and legs get so small. I sprout a tale and have no center of gravity. I am crawling like a reptile for I am one and my dog smells so delicious. #HorrorPrompt

Agnes told the undergrads not to touch anything, but of course one of them tried to pet the dragon. Now her mission was down one historian and up one very smug lizard. Merlin watched all this in wonder; a millennium later and people still had not developed common sense. #bravewrite

Pádraig and Aislinn strolled along the beach. The boy waited for the proper words, but the sentence never formed, and the moment passed. Aislinn left leaving him with the sound of the wind and the surf. He took a slug from his flask, but any words it would give home were too late. #2WordPrompt

In the mirror, Agnes’ eyes glinted with crescent moons, as though the stars had chosen her for something ancient. Her last jump she had spent time with the Druids. Now it seemed a spirit had returned for her. She was fae now and the spirit was reclaiming her as one of their own. #vssmagic

The coffee was bitter and hot enough to sear his tongue. He liked it like that. When he started drinking it at twelve years old his father said coffee like that would put hair on his chest. It did, but his effeminate nature could not be burned away. #vss365

The posting had been to observe the signing of the Magna Carta, but the original plan went awry thanks to a scheduling error. Agnes ended up at a 1970s disco in thirteenth century period piece clothing. Luckily it was Hollywood and no one noticed. #2WordPrompt re

She had the kind of skin that remembered every summer. It was freckled, but there were no prominent wrinkles. It was if nature had let the young girl in her run free. #vssmagic

In the chapel, he offered a heartfelt prayer not for salvation which he thought was assured, but for the scent of her to remain on her pillowcase, her smile to stay in his heart, and the memory of her voice to linger a little longer in his ears. #vss365

She eschewed going to the dentist for her overbite. This was in part because few orthodontists were open at night, but also that would give away that she was a vampire as if the protruding fang did not do so already. #bravewrite

The object had no label, no note, but the staff passed it between them like something sacred or cursed. it was hard to tell which until they suddenly began to sprout donkey ears. Too late they realized the object was from Pleasure Island. #2WordPrompt

She poured the wine and spoke, her voice low and even, like the hum of a train slipping through dusk. He watched the lead clouds roll in over the hills beyond the vineyard, slow and certain, the way bad news travels. The storm was gathering he was sure, but neither of them mentioned it. #vssmagic

She wore a wonky hat tilted just so, the kind of tilt that suggested both mischief and meticulous calculation. It was a pale green cloche, slightly crushed on one side. Beneath its brim, her blue eyes sparkled with the weary amusement of someone who had found herself at yet another party. #vss365

The current in the Thames was too strong. Meanwhile, the undergrads began to wander, a logistical nightmare. I had no leeway left in the itinerary. I tried to express my concerns until I was purple, but had no idea how to explain the three men in the boat to say nothing of the dog. #inkmine

Agnes was meant to observe colonial trade routes, but the equator had other plans; namely, a monsoon, frizzy hair that was impossible to deal with, and a very persistent Portuguese sailor who thought she was his long-lost paramour from Ireland. #bravewrite

Patrick began to rethink his concentration in Medieval Temporal Studies. This week’s symposium managed to include both a lecture on thirteenth century sanitation and a live demonstration, which was more immersive than strictly necessary. #2WordPrompt

He wasn’t the sort to fall in love easy, but when he did, it was a thunderbolt kind of thing. There was no warning, no shelter, just her laugh and the way she poured herself out to him like the finest coffee. She invigorated him and he soon found he could not do without her. #vssmagic

Even in winter, with the wind slicing like a knife, Dad would take his coffee out to the stoop, claiming the cold kept his thoughts sharp. He never acknowledged winter. He said to do so would make the cold even worse. #vss365

Agnes heard the commotion and looked up. On the parapet were twelve territorial pigeons and one terrified undergrad trying to walk by them without invoking Hitchcock. #2WordPrompt

Agnes’ protest that she was merely observing the past was undermined by the fact that she’d become the lead soprano in a 19th-century opera. Her mission was to record provincial musicians, but a soprano with food poisoning later, and Agnes had found herself warbling through La Sonnambula. #vssmagic

Agnes knew the symposium was doomed when the keynote speaker arrived with a slapdash PowerPoint Presentation and a live chicken that he claimed was the world’s first dinosaur. #vss365

They temporized over the tea, neither wanting to be the first to say what needed saying. She traced the rim of her saucer with one finger, slow and steady, as though the right words might rise from the china. He cleared his throat once, then again, but said nothing. #bravewrite

Agnes had no energy left to pursue the missing tea trolley. She’d spent the morning deciphering the professor’s handwriting, which resembled the migratory patterns of startled geese. Somewhere, a revenant was probably sipping Earl Grey, but that, she decided, was a problem for tomorrow. #2WordPrompt

The symposium on “Revenants and Revisions: Temporal Ethics in the Afterlife” was canceled when the keynote speaker failed to materialize - again. Agnes was beginning to think what Arthur Conan Doyle had told her about the existence of spirits was a bunch of hooey. #vssmagic

The symposium on “Temporal Etiquette and Kooky Consequences” was standing-room only, mostly because someone had accidentally scheduled it in a room without chairs. Agnes was okay with this. It would be easier to leave early. #vss365

He had crossed the equator once, chasing fish and forgetting names. In the southern hemisphere, the stars were wrong, and he missed the ones he knew. He missed the woman too and his world felt upside down without her. #bravewrite

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Patrick had meant to bring back a sample of 19th-century air, not a Victorian tortoise with a barometric sensitivity and a tendency to sulk when the temperature dropped below 60. It was like having a 100 year old first year around. #2WordPrompt

Geraldo was stunned! Al Capone’s vault was empty. All the research had said that the vault would be filled with gold. What he did not know was that Agnes and her time travel team had gotten there first decades before. The Temporal Studies Holiday Party that year was spectacular. #vssmagic

Jake looked over the city with Diane. The skyline shimmered with unmissable promise, but he knew better than to believe in cities after midnight. Jake didn’t have too much faith in them in broad daylight either. He remained a country boy at heart. #vss365

He had a wolfish hunger in his eyes, not for food, but for the kind of secrets that ruin families. Jack knew that his cousin was dangerous; doubly so because he had a smile that could knock your socks off. #bravewrite

The site was meant to a tidy little slice of 1431 France for the benefit of Medieval Studies, but by the time Agnes arrived, there was a number of flaming arrows coming from the French castle aimed at the anachronistic German accordion player serenading “Edelweiss” from atop a hay cart. #2WordPrompt

In the Adirondacks, truth had a way of showing up in the wind: blunt, uninvited, and colder than you’d like. But it had a way of letting you know where you stood and you were grateful for that. #vssmagic

Agnes had planned everything down to the minute, but the arrival of the ration books was delayed by a minor air raid and a major misunderstanding involving the delivery boy, his bicycle, and a goose. #vss365

She wore an old-fashioned brooch shaped like a clock face, the kind with Roman numerals and delicate brass hands frozen forever at 10:10. It caught the light oddly, as if it remembered a different century. I saw the way the brooch shimmered, just slightly out of sync with the rest of her #bravewrite

Agnes landed in a 1920s garden party where the euphoric scent of lilacs mingled with the potent tang of gin. Somewhere, a jazz trio played with mighty enthusiasm and this, along with several gin and tonics brought out colour in her cheeks and a long dormant, latent desire to dance. #inkmine

At his ten year reunion he strolled through campus. He remembered the narrow bed in the dorm and the girl with whom he had spent many nights the last semester before graduation. He had made plans then, but that May she took his future with her as she left her past behind. #2WordPrompt

Madeleine said the fold in the timeline was minor, a mere wrinkle, but Agnes suspected otherwise when she was deposited in a medieval fair in a mime troupe. Normally she could shake off snafus, but here she found herself mute with no exit strategy since she could not call for a retrieval. #vssmagic

The ballroom was adorned with garlands of white roses and the class of people that only money could buy. I looked among the crowd for Fifi. I could not see her. No doubt she was fashionably late as always. I lit a cigarette and bided my time. #vss365

We’d planned for plague, fire, and the occasional inquisitor, but no one had accounted for the snafu that was Lady Godiva’s parade intersecting with a rugby match. The net had occasional temporal anomalies, but this showed the bare naked truth we had not yet perfected time travel. #bravewrite