1.

Sometimes, inexplicably ... connections are made and bonds are created, such is the nature of the universe. They connections can last a moment, or they can last a lifetime. They can be as near as being between two people who pass on a street or as far as two people who live half a world away. Who knows how or why these things happen? It is just part of Human nature; it has always been and will continue to always be.

With present technology being what it is, the world has become a much smaller place to live. We can be a world away and still be right next to someone with a simple phone call, or an on-screen text chat or even with a video connection. We could catch a flight from one location to another and can sometimes appear to be in two places at once. The world is forever shrinking so why can't we actually be in two places at once?

Trevor lived alone ever since the amicable split he had with his former business partner Abraham Matthews. Their connection had gone so far that they had even bought a house together such became the nature of all that was. It had worked better for the business that the two shared a residence and it was a business they had done well with, both men profiting strongly from it.

They had chosen a good time to call it a day too. The decision to close up shop came at a time when business for them was still on a high while others around them were being forced to close with the recession climate of the time. Business would likely have taken a turn for the worse and a welcome would have been outstayed if the decision had been delayed by any significant amount of time.

Having bought the deeds to that house and having taken time off before heading into another business venture, Trevor now was able to spend time concentrating on his real passion, which was and is writing. Trevor loved to write and had been writing short stories since he was a child. A time had come to explore an avenue or two and see where it might take him.

Anything to do with the strange or the weird and wonderful was what he loved to write about, as well as stories about death and the afterlife. A fascination of what might exist after death had been with him for as long as he could remember. Stories of relationships between young boys and their pet dogs and the likes, as pleasant as they may be, held no interest for him. There had to be an edge to each and every story.

Over the years, a lot of what Trevor had written had been lost. He had written many stories in spare copy books during free time in school from many years ago, copy books that were now long gone. Others were on notepads or notebooks, whatever he had handy, many of these were also long gone. Technology of the time, the late eighties when he first started writing, was not what it had become by the time of his decision to make a go of things.

Trevor however still had many stories he had written in his possession so with laptops and computers in general being commonplace in the home by 2011, he decided to begin typing these up along with other stories he could still remember having written. They would be typed onto his laptop then backed up to prevent any future loss.

In one way it was a good thing that he lost so much of his previous writings as for when he would type up what he could remember, new thoughts and ideas for old stories came along too. With plenty of ideas for new stories as well, it would take some time to get through all that he had either on paper or in his head.

Never really being all too confident with what he wrote, Trevor went online to compare what he wrote with whatever short stories he could come across possibly by others in a similar position to him to get a feel for his own progress and he did feel that in a way his writing could at least stand alongside some of what he read.

He joined an online writing community where he was more than surprised with the positive feedback he began to receive. It was through this community that Trevor would get to know fellow short story writer, Shannon. Now Shannon lived half a world away from Trevor and there was an eleven-hour gap between their two time zones with Shannon living in the future ... according to Trevor anyway ... but this wouldn't really hinder the many online conversations they would have.

After a few weeks of connecting with one another, it had felt to both Trevor and Shannon that they had known each other for a very long time. Trevor had begun an online blog to co-exist with his fiction writing and suggested to Shannon that maybe she should begin one of her own. She clicked onto his blog and for the first time she got to see what Trevor looked like.

Surprisingly enough, it had been something which had yet to come up in their conversations and since Shannon now knew what Trevor looked like, she offered to send a photo of herself to him. This is not a dating service they are on, and neither are considering such a thing, especially with the distance between they, still, there is curiosity.

Trevor was amazed by her beauty; he already knew Shannon was a beautiful person on the inside, and now it proved to be the case on the outside. He could have easily thought that this photo was not actually her, given the nature of the internet, but Trevor had no reason to doubt her, if anything Trevor felt it in his gut, this photo was Shannon, no doubt about it.

It was the very next messenger chat where the connection between the two really took off. It was late evening Trevor's time when he arrived home from work and only a couple of hours before mid-day Shannon's time and she had a bit of time to kill away from her work. Indeed, and officially, Trevor is not currently working so to speak but there are still one or two things still hanging around from the business he and Abraham had, and they needed to be dealt with.

And now, being in a moment he had to himself, Trevor knew before he even turned on his laptop that Shannon was online and she basically had only just signed into messenger right before he did. Before he even got around to saying 'hi', Trevor had an unusual question to ask indeed before even thinking of pleasantries or greetings.

An overpowering scent filled his senses as if it had just wafted right passed his nose, it was a very pleasant smell and Trevor liked it a lot. So strange for such a scent to completely take over the living room of his home that he couldn't help wondering as to as where it may be coming from. A thought struck him.

'Are you wearing perfume today?' he asked via screen text.

To say the least, Shannon was very surprised by this question as for the first time in quite a while she was. I am, she replied while also telling him of the fact that it had been some time since she last wore perfume. And he told of what was occurring to him.

Shannon then asked Trevor to describe what he smelled. He described the scent as a musky flowery smell. She continued by asking that if he had to put a name to the flower it most resembled what would that flower be? Trevor honestly didn't know much about flowers and suggested sunflower. What Shannon was wearing was a scent combining white musk with Gardenias. When she told him this, it hit him, he did know what Gardenias smelled like and that was indeed what he could smell.

As strange as it may be, Shannon liked the thought that two had such a connection that it allowed Trevor to smell her perfume. She didn't doubt that this was a possibility no matter how odd it would be to say out loud. And if there was a certain truth, or power in this ... it didn't scare or shock either of them in the slightest.

This all was more amusing than anything else, especially since when Shannon went back about her work, returning to chat whenever she could, Trevor could sense her return by receiving another waft of her perfume before Shannon would even begin to start typing. She also found it funny when due to it being so warm where she is, that turning on a fan also increased the strength of the scent at Trevor's end. How odd indeed.

Their friendship continued over the next couple of months with the two friends sharing their writings with each other with each aiding the other with regards to their confidence levels in their writing and so on until Shannon stopped coming online all together in a way which appeared all to sudden to Trevor.

The most recent of their chats discussed the possibilities of Shannon reuniting with her ex-husband. Shannon had left her husband due to the gambling debts he had amounted and the impact that this had on their lives. After years of living with his ways, Shannon finally had enough, felt the need to call it a day and it had been time for her to move on. Time had moved on. He was back in her life now, with the promise that the days of gambling were long behind him.

With this new acceptance, Shannon had felt like she was back in her late teens again, being brought out for meals and the likes though with this new bridge having come into her life, she still wanted to hold onto her friendship with Trevor. So, it was strange for her to simply stop coming online and without even offering a shard of explanation.

If the husband had placed an ultimatum on the returning relationship, one which forced Shannon to end her friendship with Trevor, then surely she would have let him in on that, if she agreed to it of course, but to simply just seemingly disappear ... well, that didn't sit well.

Time passed some more and Trevor felt uneasy, something was wrong and he knew it. The lack of chat with Shannon was more than her having a busy schedule, more than the possibility of an demanding ultimatum. She wasn't going online at all, there were no instant messages, no email's, no new writing, he couldn't even concentrate on his own writing knowing that something had to be not right with his friend on the other side of the world.

***

Lunch time, the high street is busy, out and about Trevor accidently collides with a lady in his hometown. She drops her mobile phone, and it breaks apart upon impact. He apologizes and goes down on his hunkers, picks up the pieces and puts the phone back together, turning it back on, thankful to see it is in working order. He stands back up returning the phone to its owner apologizing once again.

'It is quite alright and thank you' speaks the lady as their eyes briefly meet before they both move on.

It was only at this point, when the lady had moved away that Trevor realized it. The eyes had a familiarity about them, but it was the scent that did it, the perfume the lady is wearing, white musk and Gardenia's. Those eyes, he knew he recognized them. That woman, it was Shannon that he had just bumped into, but how can that be? She is half the world away, or at least she is supposed to be half the world away. Trevor turned; he couldn't see her, too many people in the way, all of whom are moving towards and past him.

Trevor fought his way through the oncoming traffic of humanity without allowing the time to consider the oddity of it all. He got to the street corner to which he thought Shannon had gone down but as soon as he got to that corner, he suddenly found himself alone. There were no people anywhere within the lines of his vision, no people at all, anywhere. Not ahead of him, not behind him. This is an impossibility for the sheer size of the crowd that only just been present.

He had no idea where everyone had disappeared to. The afternoon sun had gone too; it changed to an early evening dullness in an instant, then went to a nighttime darkness in another instant. Not only was this all happening, but something else had changed. The street Trevor turned onto was not a street that he recognized. He has been down almost every street in his hometown at some time or another, but where he now found himself was most definitely somewhere he had never been before.

Turning around, Trevor could no longer see the street he had just come from. In fact, he could no longer see anything at all that would be familiar to him. It was like stepping from one room into a completely different room except this was something happening outdoors.

Trevor found himself in a wide-open space with very little nearby lighting. A night sky was in full effect, despite it having been lunch time a moment or so ago, so Trevor, not knowing what else to do, cautiously approached the only building that he could see.

The building looked old and grey and appeared to be in pretty bad condition from the outside with paint peeling and wooden frames chipped away. The main door was unlocked so Trevor slowly went inside. He couldn't find any light switches but that probably wouldn't matter. It is very likely that the electricity within this place had been turned off a long time ago. He could hear a sound but wasn't sure where it was coming from.

The further he ventured inside, the louder the curious muffled murmur sounded. Trevor was surprised to hear any sound at all, but he had to find out where this murmur was coming from and what was creating it. Even more surprising, Trevor could smell that scent again. The white musk and Gardenia scented perfume that he could smell from Shannon.

Sure enough, that scent was once more coming from Shannon. Just as Trevor found her, just as he discovered Shannon bound and gagged as if she had been kidnapped only to be held prisoner, or something of the likes and was being held or hidden within this building, ... he was whooshed away ... a sensation within itself that was almost too much to process.

Shannon had been in a crouched position in a particular room within which Trevor had entered. He had been surprised, shocked even, though was ready, willing and able to do something about it but before he could make any further movement to his bound and gagged friend, everything which had surrounded him began to spin making Trevor not only feel dizzy but sick to his stomach too.

When the spinning came to a halt Trevor had indeed been whooshed away. He found himself, all of a sudden, back on the street he had turned on to moments after realizing it had been Shannon that he had bumped into.

He had no idea what had just happened to him. He was at a complete and utter loss to explain it or even understand it. Nothing like this had ever happened before. Maybe in some strange way he was being shown something. Was Shannon in trouble? Did he just somehow travel through not only space but time too? Or just through time zones? What a thought that is.

It was full on dark when he walked into that old grey building, but he was now back on a street in his hometown at lunch time. Of course, there is the time difference between their two actual locations but lunchtime plus eleven hours is well and truly into the night which so happens to explain the nighttime darkness.

It was at this moment back on that lunch time street when Trevor would receive a phone call. It came with no caller ID and the voice at the other end of the call was distorted. The voice told Trevor that Shannon was being held captive and that she would be released unharmed upon payment of a ransom of one hundred and twenty-five thousand US dollars which was to be wired to a specific account yet to be given.

Surely this is a joke, right? With what had happened moments ago, maybe it wasn't. The call came to an abrupt end but not before he was given a time frame of twenty-four hours. Trevor was informed that he would receive another call once the twenty-four hours come to pass, a call in reference to the account where the money should be wired to. All the while during the call warnings came not to get police involved.

From his successful business days Trevor had become financially secure, to the point he could take some time to pursue a potential writing career, so he had the funds and they are available so was this an attack on him rather than on his friend halfway across the world?

Seconds after the distorted call ended, Trevor received a second phone call. This one did come with a caller ID; it had an international number. This voice was undistorted and belonged to a police detective inquiring as to whether Trevor knew of a lady by the name of Shannon. With the previous call weighing heavily on his mind, Trevor thought it best to reply that he didn't. Sure, he had been warned not to get police involved.

The voice continued to inform Trevor that it was of upmost importance that he co-operated. Trevor apologized stating that he couldn't help and he ended the second call. Not sure if what he had just done was the right thing to do, he began to worry. During that second call, Trevor had been put on the spot, and he had to make a quick decision.