Multiverse mashup omnibu.., p.57
Multiverse Mashup Omnibus, page 57
“Ulurk!” Ronell shouted. “Down here!”
Ulurk had already spotted us. Some of the Martians took aim at him, but his steed deftly dodged the beams. He shouted something guttural and the jungle around us exploded with movement. Dozens of Ulurk’s people burst from the greenery. Some were on foot, but many rode saddled raptors – deinonychus, according to the Professor. The dinosaurs were ten feet from nose to tail, and at their riders’ commands vigorously tore into the Martian troops.
“Now!” Adventure shouted. “While they’re distracted!”
We broke for the clearing, shooting down any Martians who crossed our path. One of the tribesmen ran past us, chasing a disarmed Martian towards the doorway, but I grabbed his arm and stopped him.
“No!” I said. His language didn’t have a word for ‘explosion,’ so I made do. “A big fire is coming! The metal house will be destroyed! Keep back!”
He nodded and shouted at his comrades, who kept to the far side of the clearing.
I yelled at the Martian he had been chasing, “Hey, Marvin! I wouldn’t go in there if I were you!”
The Martian stopped short of the doorway, but I didn’t wait to see if he turned around. The other Martians, seeing the humans running in the opposite direction, got wise that something was up, and scattered into the jungle.
We reached the edge of the clearing and dropped, covering our heads, just as a series of powerful explosions went off inside the building, one after another in quick succession. Heat and flames burst through the doorway, searing the ground in front of it. A chunk of the door flew over our heads.
The dinosaurs freaked the hell out and bolted, taking their riders with them. The rest of us stood and watched as, slowly at first, then with greater speed, the towering drill toppled sideways. With a terrible shriek of twisting metal, the bottom of the drill tore free of the earth, demolishing the circular wall of the surrounding building. Chunks of metal and dirt flew up into the air. The earth shook as the drill hit the ground, crushing a good stretch of the plant life on the far side of the jungle.
We did it. The machine was destroyed. The drill bore had snapped near the bottom, and the surrounding structure was nothing but crushed wreckage.
Professor Adventure grinned from ear to ear. He smacked Ronell heartily on the back. Ronell managed not to wince.
“Well done, boy, well done!” the Professor said. “That’s put paid to their evil plan, no doubt about it.”
“Father,” Trish said. “We’re not out of the woods yet.”
She was right. Our reinforcements had dwindled in number, and the Martians were returning to the clearing.
“Oh,” Ronell said, “I do believe your knock-out gas is wearing off, Professor.”
Earlier, we had dragged about ten unconscious Martians out of the building before setting the charges. The Professor had wanted to leave them to a fiery doom, but I had insisted. A Martian lifted his head and blinked his bulbous eyes a few times in confusion. Trish gave him a quick zap from her rifle and his head dropped into the dirt once again.
“We’ll handle them,” Adventure said. “You do what you need to do, Jed.”
“You sure?”
He nodded. “Ulurk’s people will be back once they’ve calmed their mounts. They’ll help us clean up. Go on. You’re right, they’ll just rebuild if you don’t stop them.”
I didn’t like leaving my friends on their own, but I had to trust them. There was still one very important task left before my mission was complete. I got to my feet, waved my hands in the air, and whistled. A shadow fell over me and wind from the beating of powerful wings blew through my short black hair.
As the pterosaur swooped past me, a strong hand grabbed my wrist and pulled. I found myself hoisted up behind Ulurk, onto the back of his reptilian mount.
“Adventure thought you ran out on us,” I said.
Ulurk grunted in disgust. “No run. Get help.”
“Thanks, buddy. You saved our lives. Is she ready?”
“Ready. We go now.”
He kicked his heels and the pterosaur picked up speed. I threw my arms around Ulurk’s waist as we flew past the shattered drill, over the Martian’s base camp, and towards a much larger clearing than the one we had just left.
“There it is,” I said. “Looks like Fleckspin kept his word.”
At the far end of the clearing a small group of Martians stood sentry over a slightly larger group, all of whom were lying on the ground, stunned into unconsciousness. Fleckspin was the leader of a band of rebels who opposed the Martian government’s martial policies and wanted peace. They had agreed to take out a squad of guards while we disposed of the drill.
Just beyond the Martians was the whole reason I was in this universe. The aliens had arrived through a naturally occurring fissure in space-time connecting the two worlds. It began a foot above the ground and extended about twenty feet up. A Martian saucer, slightly smaller than the rupture, was hovering on end inside it, preventing it from closing naturally. I needed to knock the saucer clear to seal the rupture and prevent the aliens from bringing in reinforcements.
“I drop you,” Ulurk said.
“Uh, what? You’re not coming with me?”
He laughed. It sounded like a donkey braying. “She easy to ride, Jed! She for children!”
“How big are your children?”
Ulurk didn’t answer. He tipped his pterosaur sideways and I slid off, landing right on the back of the Tyrannosaurus rex waiting below. I slid down the scaled spine but grabbed the crude leather saddle and stopped. I pulled myself into position and grabbed the reins.
The monstrous beast turned its head to look at its new rider. Its hot steamy breath washed over me.
“Um. Giddy up?”
I shook as it turned in place, trying to twist far enough around to get a better look at me. It sniffed the air a few times. Its tongue darted out and in again.
I shook the reins. Nothing. I kicked my heels lightly against its sides.
It took off so quickly I almost fell, but once I got my equilibrium it was kind of fun. It was a surprisingly smooth ride and I gave a whoop of excitement, wishing I had a cowboy hat to wave. Then I saw we were heading the wrong way, straight for the thick jungle, and my excitement turned to panic.
“Turn, turn!”
I yanked on the right rein and the thunder lizard veered in that direction. I was almost thrown again, but I dug my heels in to stay seated. This prompted the beast to run even faster. We had overcompensated so I tugged a little on the left rein and it straightened out.
We crossed the large clearing in no time. Martians scattered out of our path as we barreled toward the rift. The dinosaur slowed slightly, seeing us headed straight for a solid object slightly taller than it was.
“Sorry about this, Rexie. Hyah!”
I kicked my heels again, hard.
The tyrannosaur picked up speed. It ran directly into the flat face of the Martian saucer.
The dinosaur roared in pain from the head-butt it had just delivered and stopped short. I flew up and over its head, past its snout. The reins fell from my hands and I crashed into the saucer an instant after my mount did. I dropped twelve feet to the hard dirt.
“Ow.”
I’m pretty sure the T-rex laughed at me. My spanner can’t translate animal sounds but I’m reasonably certain the snuffling I heard meant, “Serves you right.”
Above me, the saucer teetered as its antigravity field tried to hold it in position. I threw my arms up over my face as if that would protect me from being crushed by several tons of metal. The ship wobbled back and forth, but then fell away from me, backwards onto the surface of Mars, on the far side of the fissure.
The rift itself was invisible, but its presence was obvious by the red landscape and dark night sky on the other side. With the saucer clear, the panoramic view began to collapse.
The peacenik Martians quickly tossed their unconscious brethren through the gap, then one by one jumped through themselves. I sat up just in time to see the last one turn back and wave his tentacles at me.
“Farewell, friend Jed!” Fleckspin said. “Long live the revolution! Peace on Mars!”
The fissure closed and the Martians were gone. I collapsed back into the dirt, rolled onto my side and let out a good long moan. Every part of my body hurt.
The Tyrannosaurus rex leaned down, stuck its snout in my face and took a big sniff. It pushed me with its nose, rolling me onto my back.
“I’m not dead,” I said. “Please don’t eat me.”
It snuffed and walked away. Ulurk’s pterosaur landed and the bulky tribal leader jumped down.
“Jed!” he said. “You hurt Graata’s head!”
“Tell Graata I’m very sorry.” I got to my feet, wincing.
Ulurk tilted his head. “Jed hurt?”
“I’ll be fine once I get home. Hey, here comes the whole gang.”
Three more pterosaurs flew into the clearing and landed. Professor Adventure, Trish and Ronell jumped down from behind their tribesmen chauffeurs and hurried over to join us.
“You did it!” Adventure said. “Well done, Jed!”
“There are still Martians here, Professor. There won’t be any reinforcements, but the ones left behind might still cause you some trouble.”
“We’ll get back to the surface and warn the Army. Will you be joining us?”
I raised my left wrist. “I’ve got my own transport, thanks.”
He grinned. “I’d love to see how that little gizmo works, but I’d better get our digging machine prepped for departure.” He extended his hand. “It’s been a pleasure, Jed.”
I shook his hand. “The pleasure’s been all mine, Professor Adventure.”
He nodded curtly to Ulurk, then beckoned to the other members of his party. “Come along, you two.”
“We’ll be a moment, Father,” Trish said. “You don’t need us for prep. We’ll say goodbye and catch up.”
He nodded and took off across the clearing. Trish and Ronell watched him carefully, waiting until he was out of sight.
Trish threw her arms around me and kissed me. I grabbed her back and pulled her tight against me. I thought about the other encounters we had snuck in over the past few days, when her father wasn’t looking, and regretted that we wouldn’t have time for more.
She broke away. “I won’t see you again?”
“Probably not.”
She laughed and punched my shoulder. “Good riddance. I just about used you up. I’m ready for someone new.”
We turned towards our friends, our arms around each other’s waists. “They don’t seem to feel the same,” I said.
Ulurk and Ronell were locked in a passionate embrace of their own. The Neanderthal was dipping the young geologist, and Ronell’s hands dug into Ulurk’s muscular, hairy back.
Trish and I waited politely until the two men finished. When Ulurk finally placed Ronell gently back on his feet, he said, simply, “Ronell stay.”
Ronell blushed and turned to Trish. “Make up some excuse for me to your father, would you? I don’t think he’d understand.”
“I’m sure he wouldn’t,” she said, and winked. “Don’t worry, I’ll tell him you’re staying to get to know the locals a little better.”
I embraced Ronell and Ulurk in turn. I gave Trish a final kiss, then inhaled deeply. Dinosaur breath aside, the air was incredibly pure in this enclosed tropical world. I’d miss it.
With a mental command to the spanner on my wrist, I vanished.
Two
The artificial sunlight shining down on me from the roof of Recreation Area Sixteen was warm against my bare chest, a pleasant contrast with the cool water covering my feet. The fake rays would never tan me, but my pale-ass white skin never tanned anyway. I closed my eyes and let one hand drop into the pool, then took a sip of my cocktail and sighed. My inflatable chair bobbed gently.
“Ooooohhhh, yeah.”
I had been back at the Crossroads for less than day, but the bumps and bruises from my adventure in the hollow Earth had already faded. The healing atmosphere of the Crossroads was better than any hospital, but what I really needed was a little rest. I had been on three back-to-back missions, and even if nothing brought me greater joy than patrolling the multiverse helping those in need, enough was enough. Everybody needs a break sometimes.
I floated to an empty section of the huge pool, putting some distance between me and the other Crossroads personnel seeking some R&R. I put my drink – something fruity with vodka – in the chair’s cup holder and folded my arms behind my head. The sounds of distant chatter faded to white noise as I started to doze.
“Hey, Jed!”
Water splashed on my face as a teenage boy burst up right next to my chair. I put my hand over my drink to keep the pool water out.
“Hey, Kud,” I said, wiping my face. “I was wondering when you’d get here.”
A grimace fell across his deep brown, chubby face. “I was in school.”
“Aren’t you, technically, always in school?”
“Fish jokes. Hah hah. Very funny.”
Kud was a merman. He hadn’t always been a merman. He had died and been reincarnated as half-fish on one of my prior missions. A whole bunch of other merfolk had been stranded in his universe, and I had taken the whole lot, Kud included, back to the Crossroads with me until my people could find the world they had originally come from. The whereabouts of their universe remained a stubborn mystery, so they had been living here as refugees ever since.
Kud and the other merpeople lived in one of the Crossroads’ underwater habitats, and Recreation Area Sixteen served as a bridge between there and the habitat for air-breathers like me. I felt a bit responsible for Kud, so I had taken to spending a lot of my off-time there, where I could hang out and catch up with him.
“How’s school going?” I asked. “How’s Trenk as a teacher?”
“He’s tough, but I like him. He helps me outside of class time. I had a lot of work to do, to catch up to the other kids my age. We didn’t get much schooling in my County. They wanted us working as soon as possible.”
“So you’re happy here? No regrets, about leaving your world behind?”
He sighed. “You ask me that all the time, Jed.”
I splashed him a little. “I know. Humor me. The doctors here would be happy to look for a way to change you back to human, if you wanted?”
“This is who I am, Jed. I’m much happier with a tail than I ever was with legs. Why would I go back?”
“Don’t you miss home?”
He tilted his head for a moment, like he was listening to something, then turned and waved at a group of merfolk on the far end of the enormous pool. A red-headed teen boy waved back. This was Skreet, Kud’s boyfriend.
“They’re calling me,” he said.
“I didn’t hear.”
“It was too high-pitched for your ears.”
“My human ears aren’t cool enough for your teen-speak, huh?”
He laughed. “You don’t have to worry about me, Jed. I’ve got a family now. Wherever they are, that’s where I’m supposed to be.”
He dove under the water. His tail arced up into the air, then smacked the surface of the pool, splashing me and almost overturning my chair.
I grabbed my drink and clutched it to my chest. “No! Take me, spare the vodka!”
I leaned one way, then the other, waiting for the water to still. When everything was calm again, I leaned back and took another sip. I closed my eyes and exhaled, enjoying the warmth of the sunlight again. My worries about Kud melted away along with the rest of my tension and I drifted off to sleep.
My stomach lurched as my chair was lifted up from below. It flipped over and I plunged into the pool. Completely unprepared, I swallowed water and thrashed about wildly in shock.
I figured out which way was up and spotted a pair of muscular dark brown legs treading water above me. I glowered, swam upward, and yanked on an ankle, pulling my assailant under.
I surfaced, and an instant later a beautiful black man with buzzed hair and sea-blue eyes surfaced right in front of me. He grinned devilishly.
I coughed out water and wiped my nose with my wrist. “You spilled my drink.”
“Sorry.”
“It was good vodka. I got it in an alternate Russia where they brought peace to their entire solar system based solely on the strength of their potato distillation process.”
“We can’t get drunk here. The healing field won’t let us.”
“It’s the principle of the thing.”
He put his arms around my shoulders. “I’ll make it up to you.”
Lock pulled me in and kissed me. We sank under the water for a moment, then broke apart and surfaced again. I slung one arm around my upturned chair to keep us both buoyant.
“Hey, stranger,” I said.
“Hey.”
Lock was a fellow Field Agent, my best friend, and, as of fairly recently, my boyfriend. Or partner. Or something. We hadn’t figured out a word yet. But if you’re remembering my goodbye kiss with Trish Adventure on my last mission, don’t judge me too harshly. Lock and I had what on my world was called an open relationship, and on his world was just called a relationship. He was from a science-fictiony kind of future universe where monogamy was more the exception than the rule.
“I’ve missed you,” Lock said. “They’ve been running you ragged.”
“My corner of the multiverse has been hopping lately, I guess. I’m ready for some time off with my favorite people.”
“I hope that includes me.”
“I’m still a little peeved about the vodka…”
“I brought us cake from the good commissary.”
“All is forgiven.”
He smiled and pressed his forehead against mine. “You are so easy.”
“You should know.” The spanner on my wrist pulsed. I slapped the water. “Oh, come on!”
Lock groaned. “Another mission?”
I felt all the tension returning to my muscles. Back to work already. I managed a weak smile for Lock’s benefit. “Save me some cake.”
