The Time of Change

The Curious Case of the Ralph Family

Something glints in the dirt on the ground, catching my attention. I look down and see the sleek black screen of a smartphone lying half-buried in dead leaves. I bend down and pick it up, then hold it out to the Doctor. His eyebrows pull together and rise at the same time as I click the button on top of the phone, the screen lighting up. The picture for the Swipe to unlock screen is a photograph of a light blue flower just beginning to bloom. It's an azalea, if I'm correct.

I glance at the Doctor again, almost asking for permission to open it. He straightens himself off the tree and walks over, standing behind me to look over my shoulder at it. I feel his cool breath on my ear and resist the urge to shiver. I slide my thumb across the smooth glass screen, and immediately after, up pops an image in the Photo Gallery of a statue with sharp, pointed teeth and menacing eyes. If I didn't know any better, I'd say the statue was meant to resemble an angel, but it appears so hateful. It startles me so badly that I jump and drop the phone. Luckily the Doctor catches it before it hits the ground. His face is drawn, pensive. This look tells me that he recognizes the thing in the picture, even if it only looks like a statue to me. I watch as his eyes roam over the photograph hungrily.

"I don't understand," he mumbles to himself. "Nobody's ever taken a photo of one of these before."

"What is it?" I chance. "Is it another... y'know, out-of-the-ordinary-but-unnoticeable-and-super-dangerous thing?"

That brings a half-smile to his lips. "Precisely," he says. Almost instantly he sobers again. "And to answer your first question, it's called a Weeping Angel. They're probably one of the most dangerous beings you'll ever face because they don't attack. You never know that they're there, ever. You never see them; they are invisible to the eye, hidden in plain sight. They can only move when no one is looking at them, when they're unseen by any other living organism. You can't capture them, not by any traditional means, at least, and they can't be stopped by a usual method. Angels are practically impossible to kill, and they don't attack—not traditionally anyway. You mustn't let them touch you," he adds, his monologue taking a sharp turn toward desperation, and I feel goosebumps rise to attention on my arms. "Never let them get close enough to touch you. As long as you're looking at them, they can't move. Even if you're up against more than one, look at them each in turn. And don't blink. Don't even blink. Blink, and you're dead."

A chill sweeps over me. "What do you mean they don't attack traditionally?"

"The touch," he reiterates. "When a Weeping Angel touches you, it displaces you in time. Within a fraction of a nanosecond, it analyzes everything about you: all your fears, hopes, dreams, nightmares, strengths and weaknesses. And it uses that information against you. It chooses a specific time and place to send you with its touch, one where it knows you won't survive. It isn't a merciful, quick death. It's a slow, painful process, and your loved ones almost never find out what actually happened."

Every nerve in my body begins to awaken, ready for action. I feel a tiny feather of fear in my chest, but I stifle it. Pressing the Home button on the cellphone, I notice that the home screen consists of clusters of neatly-organized apps and folders. They appear to be in alphabetical order. The photograph behind them is a shot of a night sky saturated with stars.

A thought occurs to me. I hold down the Home button, and a thick beep greets me. "Take me home," I tell the AI assistant. The Doctor peers at me, totally confused, but I just smile at him. A computerized female voice responds, "Getting directions to home." A second later, the map appears with a route to a house five minutes from where we stand.

"Nice," he quips.

"Sometimes humans are clever."

The chuckling Doctor follows me on foot as I listen to the phone's directions. It leads us to the opposite edge of the forest, back into the light. Though the temperature is still rather cold, I sigh with a sort of relief. I didn't realize until now how uneasy the surrounding trees had made me. As we approach the subdivision, named Starfield Place, I'm met with a scene of perfectly picturesque suburban bliss. Adults tend to gardens and mow lawns as far as the eye can see. Cookie-cutter brick houses line the road in an identical fashion. There are children playing in the front yards up and down the street, which is branded Heaven Road by a street sign. The more cynical part of me finds that extremely serendipitous.