His small paws skittered against the dark obsidian floor. He was nothing more than a blur as he began to pick up speed, zigzagging his way through the desolate and empty corridors that carried the sound of his frantic escape.

He could have moved faster but he knew that he had to exercise caution, he was still a guest here in this time. These things needed to be taken carefully, lest it risk an alteration.

He was in a serious situation now. He had overshot his destination by a couple hundred years…at least. He was supposed to be in a lush garden somewhere off the coast of France, this was definitely not that.

The question is what the hell happened in those couple hundred years? The France he had been concentrated on was early eighteen hundreds, this had to be twenty third century at least…. His pursuers were at least that advanced.

A searing blue light slammed into the wall just above his head and in front of him, it had singed the top of his fur.

The smell of his fur burning was Timefoxes least favorite smell in the world, but at least they had missed mostly. He would have been a mess of destroyed organs and time energy if he had taken a direct hit.

He turned to look as he picked up speed, even though he knew that he shouldn’t. When was it a good idea to check in on the progress of murder bots that were chasing you through endless hallways that seemed to never change?

There was three of them, they must have been between ten to twelve feet tall, although they moved with a speed that suggested they were much smaller. That was only the beginning of the nightmare that was these things.

Their eyes were glowing a bright blue that reminded him of fire too hot to touch, they moved wildly in their sockets as he felt them calculating his every move.

The infernal mechanical creations were a polished black metal that insuated that they were well maintained. In their hands they held large metal rods the same color as them. They slammed their rods into the wall every few seconds, sparks flying as the sound shattered the concentration that Timefox needed to get out of this place.

It was a trick, a simple yet effective one. They knew that the constant interruption of concentration would stop Timefox from making a jump. He needed a clear mind for at least a few seconds, but they were taking that from him. These creations were absolutely relentless and had been trained excellently in countermeasures.

Timefox needed just a single solitary moment to think. To focus on another time and place. They knew that though, it was almost as if they had known he would be here.

That’s crazy though… Unless.

They had interfered with his jump, it was the only possible explanation. They had found a way to drag him out of the vortex and into this trip. His jumps weren’t as secure as he had hoped that they were.

Timefox turned a corner barely slowing down. This place was a maze and he was never going to get out unless he got the five seconds that he needed. He needed to come up with a plan and fast.

Another slam of one of those blasted metal rods.

He couldn’t formulate a single goddamn thought, much less another time and place. He needed the silence that these damn things had been trained to take away. You never truly notice the value of peace and quiet until a murder bot takes it from you.

Another blast of light, this one bright orange. It hit the walls and immediately spread like wildfire, it burned as if it was alive.

Cursed fire.

But the bright glow had given him a chance to see, it had illuminated the small outline of a wooden door, he had seen it for a fraction of a second. It was the first sign of an exit that he had seen since he landed on this jump. It didn’t make sense that it was there, but that did not matter. It was a way out, that was all that he needed to know.

Just one problem….

He would have to turn around. Not like that mattered in the next few seconds. The walls began to close and in front of him he watched as a wall shot up from the floor and slammed into the ceiling, blocking further progress forward.

Nowhere to run now, and he sensed that no matter how much he ran, this place would keep on going. He flinched as another blast of fire hit to the left of him and began to spread. He was going to have to run right at them.

He turned to face them.

The two bots on the left and right slammed their rods against the walls with increasing amounts of force. They thought that they had him cornered… But why? Surely they had seen the door?

The abomination in the middle began to slam his weapon against the floor as well, none of them in any kind of rhythm. It was a violent spectacle of spark and sound that did its job well. He was never going to be able to make the jump with that level of noise.

Timefox saw the robot on the left slam his weapon harder than the others, he would be the first to try and corner him. This would be his only chance.

He got his back legs ready and loosened his muscles, then he ran hard, he feigned as if he would go low, but at the very last moment he leapt at the wall, going high. It was a gamble that paid off. They had expected him to stay low.

Timefox slid against the floor behind them and made a mad dash for the door, he only had a few seconds. His eyes watered, the flames were so hot that the moisture dried before it could even fall from his face.

He slammed into the door and yelped as he began to tumble. For some reason he had assumed that it would be a room, yet instead he rolled down a chute, building speed as he fell.

The walls became narrower and for a moment he was worried that he would become trapped. He felt his body rolling into turns and for a moment he felt much more like a ball than a fox imbued with the powers of countless time crystals.

Then just like that it was over.

He let out a yelp of pain as he shot out from an opening and slammed into the wall. There was a sickening crunch as he made contact, he was sure some bones had been broken.
He blinked a few times as he struggled to stand, he was experiencing shellshock as he tried to remember when and where he was. His ears rang and he swore he could hear a sound over the ringing.

The sound of metal striking solid stone.

Timefox took off with a sudden burst of adrenaline, he cursed himself for losing precious seconds. They would be upon him in moments.

He had taken off at what he had hoped would be full speed, but he bacame acutely aware of the sharp pain in his back paw. He had found some of the broken bones. He pushed through the pain as best as he could.

There was a light just off in the distance…. It had to be a way out. He needed to move as quickly as possible, he needed the silence to shift out.

The light grew closer and he hoped silently for a forest or jungle so that he could use the trees as cover, but as he bolted through the doorway he skid to a halt and froze dead in his tracks.

He stood in a room that had no ceiling, at least none that was apparent. The room was massive and seemed to stretch for infinity. The walls around him were the same dark black as the rest of the structure he had been running through.

That was not what stopped Timefox. He had found the source of the light.

In front of him stretched a massive bay window that stretched as tall as he could see. On that window was an image that sent shudders down his spine.

He stared at himself.

The glass was hundreds of feet tall and crafted in painstaking detail. He recognized himself laying underneath a cherry blossom tree, bright pink petals falling all around him.

It was definitely him, there was no mistaking it. When he had been granted the power of time, it left a small streak of white across his fur. Also his eyes, once the color of honey, had shifted to a bright blue. They had got every detail painstakingly accurate.

He looked so comfortable, at peace with everything. He found himself longing for that moment. That’s what good art does, it makes you crave that reality so much more beautiful than the one you occupy. He lost himself in the beauty of the work.

Why had they created this? Was it a shrine? A prophecy of some kind? Were the bots the creators, or were they intruders?

Slam!

Timefox nearly jumped as he remembered the murderbots. He cursed himself as he realized that he had just wasted more than enough time to shift staring at window. He had been an idiot, but no more time to waste.

He bolted forward and ignored the pain in his back paw, the pews passing him by in a blur. The stained glass window was so beautiful, it was honestly a shame what he was about to destroy it.

He put pressure on his rear legs and leapt, he slammed through the glass with a sound much louder than he had anticipated. Shards of shattered glass sliced his flesh and began to fall with him.

Timefox savored the smell of fresh air that hit his nostrils, the scent was nothing short of perfection after the odorless halls he had just escaped from.

He stared up at a sky that was a beautiful pink tinged with orange and blue. He must have been thousands of feet in the air. He could hear the sound of the sea raging underneath him. Wave after wave slammed against rocks that jutted upwards threateningly.

He gazed upon his prison, a massive tower in an endless sea. The exterior was the same as the interior, a dark black so menacing that it seemed to be not even real, as if it was plucked directly from a nightmare.

From the top of the tower Timefox saw a massive beam of light. It shot out a bright blue streak of light that burnt its way through the sky. He noticed it spinning wildly, as if searching for a target.

It would fine none.

Timefox closed his eyes and listened to the sound of the sea slamming into stone. He let go of every feeling as he focused not on where he was, but instead where he was going, when he was going. He knew that this was not the place he meant to be, and not the place he would cease to be.

He felt a peculiar warmth, he knew that the light from the tower must have found his plummeting body, but it did not matter. He had found the few seconds of peace he needed to escape this place.

Timefox felt energy coursing throughout his body, he opened his eyes and watched as the world began to violently spin, his body vibrating with the energy he was using to escape this place. Then with a loud bang and a sudden flash of crackling white and violently blue light, he vanished entirely.

Safe in another time.