Waking up from what seemed like a long slumber, Riley Matthews stirred away, yawning and stretching before relaxing against the bedsheets of the foreign bed she was in. Blinking up at the ceiling, she used her touch to sense that she wasn't in her own bed, concluding that she still remained twenty years in the future.
She sat up, taking a deep breath and she looked around the bedroom she remembered slipping into the night before. She threw off the covers, wiggling her toes before placing them down on the soft carpet of the bedroom. Her legs took her out of the bedroom and down the hallway and the stairs until she had reached the kitchen.
The sight that awaited her caused her to pause. Her future self was all dressed up professionally in a white blouse and jet black pencil skirt, high heels and her hair up in a low ponytail. By her side was future Farkle wearing a black business suit, the jacket off and hugging the shoulders of the chair he was sitting in so he had the sleeves to the white dress shirt rolled up to his elbow. Nova sat across from them in her regular seat, still dressed in her pajamas black plaid pajama pants and a black shirt which read "Stand back. I'm going to try SCIENCE."
Confirmed; she was still twenty years ahead of her time, her future self was married to future Farkle and they had a teenage daughter.
Okay.
"You're up early!" Her counterpart said as she turned her head to the sound of the footsteps that had came down the stairs. The young Riley turned to the clock to see it was almost six in the morning.
"I-I didn't know," Riley stuttered, shuffling her feet against the hardwood of the floor.
"It's no problem. Would you like breakfast? We have cereal in that cabinet there and there's some leftover bacon and some french toast you could warm up. I believe there is still some batter out for waffles too," Mrs. Minkus said as she wiped the corner of her mouth with her napkin.
"Uh, I'll just have some cereal, but thank you," Riley said, taking a bowl and selecting her favorite cereal which happened to be one of the options. After pouring herself a bowl, she took a seat next to Nova and started to eat.
"I hope you don't mind staying here for the day while Nova goes to school and we go to work. It'll just be you and your friends, but I'm sure with so much to do in our home, you'll find something to do," Mr. Minkus said before taking a bite from his french toast stick.
Riley looked up to the man and spoke up after swallowing her spoonful of cereal. "It'll be fine."
"Also, there will be a man coming over later to finish fixing the hole in our laboratory," Riley Minkus informed the teen out of time.
"It's my Uncle Lucas!" Nova nodded with a grin.
Riley froze mid-chewing, blinking several times. "Uncle Lucas?"
"Lucas Friar if you need the full name for when he comes over," future Farkle stated as he finished off his breakfast.
"I don't know why he needs to come over when I'm at school. I haven't seen him in like forever!" Nova exclaimed, adding an angry have do at the end.
"You saw him earlier this week, don't over exaggerate," Nova's mother chuckled. "Besides, he needs to come over early for the floor to be patched up and dried by the time we come back from work."
"You guys aren't going to coop yourselves in the lab all Saturday, right?" Nova asked, sounding worried for some reason.
"Just depends on how much we get done today," her mother answered truthfully before getting up from the table, putting her plate on the conveyer belt, her husband doing the same.
"We'll be back for lunch. Maybe we can take you and your friends out to eat or something," Mr. Minkus said to the young Riley who blushed slightly for being acknowledged by the man she would be married to.
"T-Thank you, Mr. M-inkus," she cleared her throat, hating herself for stuttering.
The mother and father kissed their daughter's cheek who returned the gesture to them. They said their goodbyes before the mother reminded her daughter that her punishment of cafeteria duty at school would start today. The information made the 14-year-old student groan, letting the chuckles of her mother and father be heard before they left for the day.
"Why are you up so early?" Nova asked Riley who looked at her and shrugged.
"I don't know. I just couldn't sleep anymore. What about you? What's your excuse?" Riley reversed the question back to her.
"This was the only time to eat breakfast with my parents," Nova answered, before taking a spoonful of her cereal and eating it.
"Do you normally eat breakfast with them?" Riley asked, interested to know.
"On weekdays, there's at least one time during the day I can actually be with them, breakfast or dinner. They're always busy with work and I'm busy with school, we try to be together as much as possible but breakfast time or dinner is all we have to come together and really interact as a family. They're going out tonight for some stupid banquet so breakfast was the only choice for today..."
"Does it upset you? That you don't hang out with them as much as you want?" Riley asked with a frown.
"Only a little bit, but they always make it up for me with the weekend. Usually I join them in the lab and help them with experiments, but I'm grounded..." Nova huffed as she stirred the milk left in her bowl with her spoon. "Which is why you're going to be my hawk."
"Your hawk?" Riley asked bewildered.
"Yes! Make sure Uncle Lucas closes that stupid hole today so when I come back to school I can go in and finish that stupid experiment I never got to finish!"
"I don't know, Nova. You're grounded, you should respect the punishment you got and just stay away."
"Ugh! You sound like my mother!" She groaned. Riley tensed, blush creeping up her neck.
"Please Reed! You're the only one I can trust!" Nova said taking Riley's hands and giving her a pleading look.
"O-kay...?" Riley said questionably before Nova squealed and hugged her tightly.
"Thank you! If you need anything, just tell me!" Nova offered.
"Actually, do you have a computer I could borrow?" Riley asked.
"That's a stupid question to ask."
"You sure like the word 'Stupid'."
"Ironically, it's my favorite word!" Nova grinned and sat up straight, taking Riley's hand, leaving their cereal bowls at the table as she took Riley to her room where she presented a blank desk and the wall in front of it to the teen. Riley looked at Nova, not getting it. Nova rolled her head before she pressed a blue button and the center of the desk flipped around to a keyboard and mouse while a piece of the wall opened up to reveal the screen.
"Cool!" Riley smiled. "And I can use it?"
"Yeah, sure! I won't mind!"
Riley embraced the other teen, chanting "thank you". Nova chuckled at the happy teen.
"Okay, now if you don't mind, it's almost 6:30 so I can sleep for another half hour before I need to head off to school."
Riley nodded and left the other girl to be left alone, along with herself. She went back to the kitchen, taking her bowl and Nova's and putting them on the conveyer belt.
It was still early in the day so she decided to return back to her bedroom. With fainted footsteps, she jogged up the stairs and entered her temporary bedroom. The sound of another door's squeaky hinges caused Riley to turn her head to catch Farkle's form in between the door and the side wall. She smiled gently at him and hid her face before she could catch his returned smile.
He watched her as she closed the door behind her, him letting out a heavy sigh before shaking his head and closing the door again.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Farkle and Riley Minkus had gone to work and Nova had gone to high school, leaving the Minkus residence to be occupied to four unsupervised teens who were simply up to no good.
"Riley, what are you doing? You can't just search up his name and have him pop up on your screen," Maya huffed as her best friend was on a mission to find and locate Dr. Marbles.
"Don't underestimate the future, Maya! They surely have trackers imprinted on everyone by this time!" Riley stated seriously, her eyes not looking off of the computer screen.
Maya whimpered at her best friend's words. Why was knowing her so hard?
"You actually believe this guy is still alive?" Lucas stated as a possibility.
"It's only been twenty years, Lucas. He wasn't that old," Riley sighed. "I'm almost positive he's still alive. I just wish I knew more about him to search up the right things."
"I don't know why you're in such a rush to find him, Riley? We just got here! Lucas is right, this guy is probably long gone from some freak science accident or something. We might as well be stuck here!"
"He wouldn't do that to us!" Riley snapped at her friend. "What happened to trusting him, Maya? Those were your words; you trusted him, and if you do, then I believe that he's out there and knows exactly how to get us back to our time. What about our parents? They're probably worried about us right now!"
"If we're even gone..." Farkle said more to himself as he thought about Riley's words. "Search up Dr. Marbles science convention of 2015," Farkle stated standing up. Riley looked over at him. "Most conventions have a whole list of the participants online so on-goers know what to expect."
"Oh my gosh! The unicorn! I totally forgot about it!" Riley gasped up at her friends.
"Move over, Riles," Maya said as she pushed her friend the chair and started to do the work for her.
Farkle took her by the arm and helped her up, both timidly smiling before she took a step apart, keeping their distance. Farkle's smile faltered at her action, noting her behavior towards him.
"That's weird. There's no record of a Dr. Marbles participating at the 2015 convention," Maya said, confusion laced in her voice.
"That can't be right," Farkle frowned as he leaned over and took control of the keyboard. He placed a search for any Mr. Marbles in the city of New York City. Luckily, several popped up.
"Write these down," Farkle instructed Maya to do. She gave him a stern look, not liking how he demanded for her to do the action.
He softened slightly, giving her a encouraging smile, "please?"
She hummed before taking a pen and a sheet of printer paper and writing down the names, numbers, and addresses.
There was loud distinct pounding coming from the front door of the penthouse apartment. The teenagers froze, all looking at one another.
"Do you think that's the other Farkle and Riley?" Lucas asked, trying not to assume the worse.
"They would have used the padlock; they wouldn't need to knock," Maya reasoned.
"Maybe they're being nice?" Lucas pushed on, only to get a head shake from the blonde.
"Who could that possibly be? Is someone supposed to come over?" Maya said, rubbing her hand up her arm as she stepped closer to friends.
Farkle gasped. "What if it's another version of us from a different time coming to take us away and brainwash us?!"
Maya rolled her eyes at her guy friend, standing up from her seat. "I'm not going to let that happen! Man, you're just as bad as Riley about all of this. No wonder you two end up together..." She muttered the last part, still audible for the others. Farkle and Riley caught each other's eyes and blushed, looking away after not even two seconds.
The knocking got louder.
"What are we going to do?" Maya questioned.
"This seems like a nightmare I once had where Uncle Sam had came out of his poster, yelling 'I WANT YOU' before taking us all to fight in the war." Farkle visually looked frightened as he stepped closer to hide behind Maya who was just done with him.
"What war?" Lucas asked.
"THE WAR!" Farkle answered back loudly.
Riley looked at her friends and over to Lucas whose eyebrows were furrowed and looking around to his friends. With a gasp of realization, she knew who was knocking at the front door of the home. She dashed out quickly, hearing the yells and calls from her friends behind her, their footsteps following.
"Riley no!" They yelled in unison but it was too late.
She opened the door, a smile creeping onto her face as she spotted the handsome, tall male figure standing in front of her.
"Lucas!"
Cliffhanger? I don't know, I hope you like this! This almost seemed like a filler to me but we'll get more of the main story soon!
Vote and/or leave a comment on what you think might happen! :)
I will say one thing, lots of foreshadow in this chapter. How many do you think you can pick out?