Worlds Apart (Volume 5) (Story Thieves, Band 5) - Hardcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

James Riley lives in Virginia. He is the New York Times bestselling author of the Half Upon a Time, Story Thieves, Revenge of Magic, and Once Upon Another Time series.

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Worlds Apart

CHAPTER 1

Owen sat patiently while the doctor rummaged through some files in a folder. Eventually the doctor pulled out a picture of a dog—a spotted dalmatian—and showed it to him. “Now close your eyes and try to picture this dog in your head,” he instructed Owen.

Owen nodded. But once his eyes closed, he frowned, realizing he couldn’t bring an image of the dog into his mind. It was like there was a complete blank. He could remember words describing the dog, like “dalmatian,” “spotted,” “tail,” and “paws,” but for whatever reason, he couldn’t build an image using those words. He opened his eyes again, a bit confused, and stared harder at the photo. This shouldn’t be that difficult. He could see it clearly, right there in front of him. This wasn’t complicated.

Owen shut his eyes again, knowing he could do this . . . and came up blank.

“I can’t picture it,” he said, wondering why he didn’t feel more frustrated.

“The technical term for what’s happening to you is aphantasia,” the doctor said. “You’ve lost the ability to visualize anything in your head. Basically, your imagination doesn’t exist anymore. But don’t let it worry you. I can’t imagine it’ll affect your life too much.”

“That’s odd,” Owen’s mother said, raising one eyebrow. “He’s always had an active imagination. But ever since he disappeared for a few days and then turned up in London, he’s been acting different.”

“It’s not just him,” the doctor said. “I’ve seen it in people all over town, from kids to adults to the elderly. It happened to me, even.” He showed Owen’s mother the picture. “Most likely you, too.”

As his mom went through the same test, Owen stared off into space, feeling strangely calm. Losing his imagination seemed like it should worry him. But it didn’t really feel that bad, like the doctor said. So he couldn’t picture a dog in his head. It wasn’t like that came up too often. And really, what was he using his imagination for anyway? Wasting time in school? Making up things that didn’t exist? Nothing important, in other words.

“I can’t picture it either, you’re right,” his mother said, opening her eyes. “So is there a cure?”

“Cure?” the doctor said, blinking in confusion. “Of course not. This is just how things are now. I can’t imagine us ever coming up with a fix.”

“Well, as long as it’s healthy and normal,” his mother said, smiling at the doctor. “If Owen’s okay, we should be going. My shift starts soon at the library.”

The doctor wrinkled his nose. “Does anyone even come in anymore?”

“No, but we’re bringing in more nonfiction,” his mother said. “That’s all anyone’s been checking out lately anyway.”

On the way to the library, Owen went over the assignments he would have turned in that day in school. Everything seemed correct to him, but he went over them a second time, just to be sure. Math was a subject to be taken very seriously, according to adults, and he trusted their judgment.

They arrived at the library a few minutes after Owen started his math assignment over, so he sadly placed his papers in the textbook, marking his spot. “Why don’t you get your London punishment out of the way first?” his mother said. “That way you can enjoy your schoolwork as a reward.”

That seemed logical. After Owen had spent a few days away from home, first in Jupiter City and then trapped with Kara Dox in a time prison, his mother had gone a bit insane, contacting every police station and hospital within four states. But as soon as Owen called her from London, she immediately calmed down and arranged for him to fly back.

He hadn’t expected that, honestly, but now knowing that she had no imagination helped explain things: She literally couldn’t imagine him ever returning while he was missing, so had completely lost it. But now that he was back, she couldn’t picture him leaving again, so his punishment was more about the principle.

She did ask where he’d been, though, and he obviously told the truth: He’d been helping Bethany, who was half-fictional, find her missing father in a superhero comic, only to be thrown into a Pick the Plot book by a fictional man named Nobody, who had then separated the fictional and nonfictional worlds and sent Owen and Bethany back to the nonfictional world through the last open portal between their worlds, the one that led to Neverland. And since that portal connected to London, that’s where they emerged.

She seemed a bit confused by some of the explanation, but couldn’t imagine any other way he could have gotten to London, so accepted his story. Logic dictated that he should be punished for his actions, so in spite of not being able to picture him ever repeating his crimes, she and Bethany’s mother had agreed on a punishment: Bethany and Owen would help Owen’s mother in her library every night for a year.

That didn’t seem that bad to Owen, since that’s what he did most nights anyway. And now he had an excuse to hang out with Bethany every evening, doing homework or quizzing each other on facts they could memorize. All in all, it was a pretty pleasant punishment.

What wasn’t pleasant, though, was having to deal with the books at the library. As his mother had said, almost no one came in anymore, so Owen and Bethany ended up spending most of their time clearing fiction books off the shelves to make room for more nonfiction.

Not that Owen could blame them: Though he’d once spent most of his time reading, now whenever Owen tried to read his old favorite books, he couldn’t picture the stories in his head. Without an imagination, he was just reading words, not seeing any characters or situations.

But like the doctor had said, was that really a bad thing? Now he had so much more time for the nonfictional world, and for performing tasks that he was given to the best of his abilities. What better way to get ahead in life than that? Owen couldn’t imagine anything.

And making room for nonfictional books in the library was easy enough. Spike, his fictional cat, sat in the empty spaces in the bookshelves, periodically jumping up to a higher one just to get a better look. Every so often Spike would meow, and Owen would pet him, which always made him miss his fictional friends for some reason, and he’d wonder what they were doing and where they were now. Were they fighting back against Nobody still? Or had they given up, since things weren’t really that bad with the worlds separated?

Weirdly, he only seemed to think about them while petting Spike. That made sense, though, since Spike was fictional himself, and logically he’d remind Owen of other fictionals.

“Hey,” said a voice from behind him as Owen scratched Spike’s head. He turned around to find Bethany standing there with a worried look on her face as all thoughts of his fictional friends seemed to drain from his mind. “Are you okay? I felt so bad that you missed school today!”

“I’m fine,” Owen said,...