The Fan

The man, apparently named Time, covered his mouth, giggling in an overly high pitched manner. "Oh, Umbra, I've waited so long to meet you."

Umbra staggered back, eyes wide. "How do you know my name?"

He grinned, getting uncomfortably close to him and looping his arm with Umbra's. "Oh my goodness, I'm like your biggest fan ever. Like seriously." Time had a noticeably African accent, which contrasted severely with his gratuitous use of slang.

"I don't know you!" Umbra hissed, pulling away from Time. Umbra instinctively raised his upper lip, revealing pointed teeth in a show of aggression.

Time's swirling eyes gained a faint glow to them and he gave Umbra polite bow. "I guess I should formerly introduce myself." He snapped his fingers, and time seemed to stop.

Shoppers halted mid-step, like they were characters on a television show that had been paused. The color around them seemed to drain, leaving only Umbra and Time in full vivid resolution.

"I said my name was Time, but there's more than that, of course," Time chuckled, adjusting the strap of the suspenders he wore. "I am not simply called Time, I am Time."

Umbra stared in disbelief at the man before him. "You're a...you're the..."

"Überdragon of Time, yes."

Umbra's heart leapt into his throat when he realized just what kind of creature was interacting with. This was no mere man, this was a god.

The Überdragons, as Umbra had been taught, were ultra powerful and elusive beings that embodied universal concepts: Life, Death, Order, Chaos, Time, and Space. They weren't exactly dragons per say, but it was said that the true manifestation of their powers, their inner core, took the form of a dragon made out of energy.

"Impossible," Umbra breathed. "No mortal has seen Time's new avatar...!"

"Yeah..." Time murmured, scratching the back of his head. "Life's been making me keep low and avoid everyone. But the second I learned you, my favorite human ever, were trapped in a time loop, well, I had to break the rules a 'lil bit."

"T-Time loop?!" Umbra cried.

"Let's go get coffee," Time said playfully, snapping his fingers again and resuming the motion around them that had been stopped. "I'll explain everything there." He wrapped his arm around Umbra, casually walking to the nearest coffee shop, Starbucks, and helping Umbra into a chair.

"So whatdoya wanna drink? Hot chocolate, espresso, ice coffee, cappuccino-" Time started, but Umbra interrupted him.

"I don't want anything to drink. I want to know what the crap is going on." Umbra growled, glaring as Time shrugged and ran up to the counter.

Umbra leaned back in the metal chair, sucking in a shuddering breath. The situation that was unfolding around him was surreal. He had always been a victim of chronic bad luck, but this was a new level.

Time soon returned to the table, sitting a steaming cup of hot chocolate in front of Umbra.

"I'm lactose intolerant," Umbra muttered, turning his head to avoid the chocolatey steam of the drink.

"Don't worry! I knew that! So I got some 'em to put some of that weird fake milk in it." Time explained, waving his hand. He sat down in the chair in front of him, rocking back and forth as he stared at Umbra.

"Ah... Well, I'm not very thirsty anyway." Umbra's hand went to his neck, where he tentatively clawed at the severe rash that stuck to his skin.

Time looked like he had just noticed the massive skin infection on Umbra. "Oh! Yeah, like, that stuff on you is the temporal sickness. It'll go away when I get you out of the time loop."

Umbra glanced down at his phone, alarm washing over him when he realized that he only had three more minutes until he would be forced to repeat the same fifteen minutes again.

"Can you, um, hurry this up? I don't have much time." Umbra said in a strained voice, tapping the table impatiently.

Curious, Time peered across the table. "That's how long you have on your loop, right?"
Umbra nodded, slightly unsure.

"Alrightly then. Don't worry, I'll give us all the time in the world." Time, once again, snapped his fingers and paused everything around them. "Get it? Cause I stopped time?" He waited for Umbra's reaction, but the man remained stony faced.

"I probably should get to explaining what's going on, right?" Time said chipperly, pulling the cherry off the top of his whip-cream topped hot chocolate. "Okay, so like, as you know, I'm over time and stuff. The system of time is mostly neat and orderly like, but sometimes there are anomalies."

Umbra squinted. "Define anomalies."

"Well, like, there's these little invisible bubbles of screwed up time- they pop up every once and a while and sometimes people get caught in 'em. They've been happening a lot here lately. You stepped in one of those and got trapped in a time loop."

Umbra quietly processed the information. "So...this is normal? And you can help me?"

Time smiled, enthusiastically bobbing his head. "Yup, totally! Fixing time anomalies is my job- I can't stop them from happening, but I can correct the error and save the effected person when they appear." He took a sip of his drink. "I actually was just in Beijing helping some old dude out. Poor guy's been repeating the same day over and over again."

"Alright, but how do you know me?" Umbra inquired skeptically. "I've never met you before."

Time's eyes lit up. "You see, Umbra, I have a lot of free time since Life won't let me interact with anyone except the other Überdragons. Sooo, I started watching mortals do their daily stuff. I accidentally came across you while searching through various timelines. You were so cool, so I like went back in time and studied your entire existence! I'm like so excited to finally meet you in person!"

Umbra eyelid twitched in alarm, Time's stalkerish tendencies disturbing him.

"Look, Time, I don't know what you're thinking here, taking me out to coffee and such, but I don't really, pardon my French, 'swing that way.' Understand?"

Time slapped the table with his hand, laughing. "Of course I know you're asexual, dude! What kind of self proclaimed biggest fan wouldn't know that?!"

Umbra's jaw went slack. "H-how do you know that?!" He narrowed his eyes into violet slits and leaned forward. "I've only told one soul that factoid about me, and it most certainly wasn't you."

"Are you not listening to me, Umbra? I've seen all of your life up to here. I've even seen the alternate timelines that include you. I watched your conception, Umbra. I know everything you know about you. Heck, I even stuff about yourself that you haven't even figured out yet!"

Umbra stared solemnly down at his hot chocolate, which was slowly turning into room temperature chocolate. Why me? Umbra thought, sighing. Why do I have to be the one that the god of time becomes attached to?

He glanced around, focusing on the sullen colors that speared around them. He had to humor Time, otherwise he wasn't going to escape from this 'time loop' or even from being stopped in time! So, Umbra turned to his most trustworthy problem-solver: lying.

"Oh, that's intriguing... It's very nice that such a powerful, wonderful creature is so fascinated with me. How about you save me from this time loop? This, ah, 'temporal sickness' is rather painful." He touched the scaley skin on his wrists and arms, trying not to grimace at the unnatural feel of the rash.

Time crossed his arms, huffing. "I guess I'm done talking for right now. But I'll be seeing you again. In about forty eight hours, twenties minutes and..." he paused, staring at one of his watches. "...fifty six seconds."

He stood up, walking behind Umbra and touching his shoulder. Suddenly, Umbra felt like a massive weight had been lifted off his back, and he took a deep breath. His skin started to clear, the red, infected flesh healing to its normal dark brown color.

"You're out of the time loop now. Also, I'm just gonna do a little time skip and send you to about lunch time so you can meet up with your friends. You wanna see 'em, right?"

Umbra nodded furiously.

"Alright, coolio." Time lightly tapped the air in front of him, and a portal appeared. "Just step in here and I'll see yah later!"

Time threw his arms around Umbra, squeezing him hard. "Byeee!"

Umbra awkwardly stepped away, giving the god of time one last glance before he walked into the portal.

Today had been a very strange day.

Author's Note- just letting you guys know, I'm not just writing random sequels. I do have a massive plot that stretches across all the planned arcs. So yeah, I kinda know where I'm going with this XD