DOUBLE VISION

 

 I have a plot for a Sci Fi story. This is the first chapter. Let me know if I am way off beam.

I have no idea what made me look up from an interesting article in THE TIMES. Maybe it was the flash of a bright red umbrella as a woman rushed past the coffee shop window I was sitting at. Like all the other pedestrians, she battled against a blustery wind that blew a light rain in all directions; rain that made a light staccato sizzling sound each time it peppered the window in uneven waves.
My eyes followed the woman along the road until she was almost out of sight. She’d stopped and stood on the curb waiting to cross the road with a small crowd around her. It was then I noticed it. At first I thought it a piece of brown paper or maybe someone’s discarded burger box sitting on top o...f a trash bin. I tried to focus but rivulets of rain running down the window blurred my view. I thought nothing of my strange observation and returned to reading THE TIMES.
Half an hour later I crossed the precinct in front of the tower block I worked in. The rain turned to a mist as the wind abated into a breeze. There were several trees in the precinct and my attention drew to one, under which two dogs leashed to a bench were looking up, barking. Then I saw it again. I slowed, despite the weather, and approached cautiously although I have no idea why; maybe sixth sense. As I walked closer, I made out a square shape, brown in color, nestling in the crook of two branches high in the tree. It wasn’t paper or cardboard and seemed not to have any distinctive shape to it, for as I stood directly underneath the tree it changed into a cylindrical shape and grew in size, some two feet long and a foot wide. It was then I realized it was opaque. I could see leaves through it.
Amazed at this odd conundrum, I looked around for one of my colleagues, hoping they would confirm my mental state was sane by seeing as I did. The dogs were totally engrossed in the object and would not let up barking.
“For goodness sake, you two, stop scaring the pigeons.” The voice behind startled me. A young woman stepped forward to untie the leash.
“I think they were barking at that object up there,” I said, pointing up into the branches.
She looked up. “There’s nothing there, sir. Pigeons don’t normally fly off when barked at as long as they are up in the tree or on a ledge. That’s why these two naughty boys were barking so much.”
I waited until the woman left and looked back up the tree. There it was. I didn’t feel ill and I told myself I didn’t drink. Surely someone would see what I could see? I took another look and froze with fear. What happened next started a whole chain of frightening events that have shaped my miserable existence ever since.