“Who said that?” demanded Raven, spinning around—and finding himself face-to-face with a huge purple-maned lion.
“Who do you think?” growled the lion.
“The damned thing was going to attack me.”
“Of course he was. It’s his nature.”
“Well, my nature is to defend myself,” said Raven.
“And mine is to kill and eat anything weaker than myself.”
Think, Eddie, Lisa’s voice seemed to say.
“Then it’s a good thing I’m stronger than you,” said Raven.
The lion swallowed hard. “You are?”
“Want a demonstration?” said Raven. “I can’t promise you’ll live through it, but that’s hardly my problem.”
Suddenly the lion began shrinking until it was the size of a housecat. “You wouldn’t hurt a little guy like me, would you?” he whined.
“Not if he gets out of my sight, and is quick about it,” replied Raven.
The cat raced off between two hideously misshapen buildings.
Is that the best the world’s got to offer? thought Raven. Cowardly cats and dinosaurs?
No, Eddie, answered Lisa. I wish it were, but you’re on the very outskirts. Believe me, you’re going to need all your courage and skills before you’re through.
I can’t tell you how encouraging that is, thought Raven wryly. Are you in this venue too?
No, not yet, she replied. Maybe not ever. It all depends.
On what?
On you, of course.
And suddenly he sensed that they were no longer in contact.
He decided that until he found a reliable form of transportation he’d better hunt up what they would call in spy novels and movies a safe house, a place where he could relax, consider his next move, and replenish his mental and physical energy.
He looked up and down the street and ruled out all one-story buildings. Sooner or later there had to be another dinosaur or something similar, but with a temper, and a creature like that could tear such a dwelling apart with almost no effort.
By the same token, he didn’t want anything too high. The way this world worked—or, rather, didn’t work—he could climb to the fifth or tenth or thirtieth floor, only to find that the stairs or elevator had vanished once he got there . . . or worse still, while he was getting there.
He began walking, passing one unacceptable building after another. After two blocks the street swerved and spent about fifty yards winding around the base of a mountain that, as far as Raven could tell, had no geologic reason for being there. As he began walking down the street, which became a twisty path through the mountain, he passed a small cave on his left.
He stopped, faced it, and called, “Anyone there?”
“Damned right there is!” growled a very strange-sounding voice, and a moment later a creature that had clearly never existed on Earth emerged and confronted him.
The being was perhaps seven feet tall, and at least that wide. Its flesh looked like it was formed of rock. It seemed to have one leg when it stood still, but when it stepped forward the one leg split into two, then rejoined when it stood still again.
“Friend or enemy?” asked Raven.
“Yes,” was the reply.
“You got a name?”
“Of course I have a name,” answered the creature. “Everyone has a name.”
“What is it?” asked Raven.
The creature frowned. “Damn!” it growled. “I hate questions like that.”
“Why don’t I just call you Stranger?” suggested Raven. “After all, you’re stranger than just about everything else I’ve encountered here.”
“Stranger . . . Stranger . . .” muttered the creature. Suddenly it shot him a toothy grin. “I like it!”
“Okay, Stranger,” said Raven. “How do I get out of here?”
“Which way did you come in?”
Raven shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Well, that does make it harder.” Stranger frowned. “I suppose we could walk to the horizon and see if we fall off.”
“Off a world, with gravity and the like?” said Raven, frowning.
“Do you know for a fact this is a world?” demanded Stranger. “Maybe it’s just a mildly flat piece of cosmic debris.”
“No, it’s a world,” said Raven. “It’s got gravity, and some kind of almost comprehensible ecosystem.”
“Okay, it’s a world. Why do you want to get off it?”
“It’s not my world.”
“It’s not mine either,” replied Stranger. “But I find lots to eat, and so far hardly anything has attacked me, and I like the gravity, and I can breathe what passes for the air, and—”
Raven shook his head. “I want my world.”
“Well then, we might as well go looking for it,” said Stranger. “Round, was it?”
“Pretty much so.”
“Blue?”
“The oceans, yeah.”
“The oceans, not the continents?” asked Stranger.
“Right.”
The creature shook its head in wonderment. “Very odd world.” He paused. “Got air?”
“Couldn’t breathe if it didn’t,” said Raven.
“You’d be surprised what people can breathe when they have to,” said Stranger.
Raven grimaced. “Yeah, I have a horrible feeling that I would be.”
“Okay,” said Stranger. “Let’s get started.”
“Which way?”
Stranger frowned. “Beats the hell out of me.” He looked around, then pointed off to his left. “I’ve never been that way before. Been most other directions, and I’m still here.”
“Let’s go,” said Raven, walking off.
Stranger joined him, and they walked across a rough, rocky landscape for close to a mile.
“Be careful,” warned Raven. “It’s so dark I can’t see the ground, and that means I can’t see any bumps or holes or even small carnivores.”
“Makes no difference,” replied Stranger. “After all, ground is”—there was a sudden surprised gasp—“grouuuund.”
Raven turned to his companion, only to find that he wasn’t there.
“Stranger?” he said.
“Down here!” came the answer from what seemed a quarter mile away.
Raven couldn’t see anything, but examined the ground with the toe of his shoe and found a large hole that hadn’t been there when he walked over it a few seconds ahead of Stranger.
“Are you all right?” he shouted down the hole. “Anything broken?”
“Of course something’s broken!” snapped Stranger. “The ground where I was walking.”
“Nothing broken on your body, though?”
“I don’t think so,” said Stranger. “But I’ve never broken anything before—well, except a tooth—so how would I know?”
Raven peered into the pit, but it was too dark to see his companion.
“How the hell are we going to get you out of there?” he said.
“I don’t know,” answered Stranger. “I suppose you need the longest rope in existence, or one hell of an impressive set or stairs, or—” The voice went still for a moment. “Well, how about that?” it continued in a happier tone.
“What happened?” asked Raven.
“A wall opened, and a dim light went on in an adjacent chamber, and there’s a table with a hell of a spread laid out on it: chimera liver, ogre eyes, and what looks like pickled unicorn horns.” Another brief pause. “You go ahead without me. This was my own fault, so I’ll stay behind and suffer.”
“You sure?”
“Go, goddammit!”
Raven shrugged and turned to once again face the dark, foreboding, not-quite-empty world.
Well, what the hell, I don’t suppose it r
eally matters. Might as well keep going in the same direction.
He headed off, and after another mile the sound of laughter came to his ears.
Some final exam, he thought as he turned and headed toward the sound. The worst things I’ve encountered so far are a nonaggressive dinosaur, a lion, Stranger, and a hole in the ground.
He heard a loud hissing noise off to his left, turned to face it, and found that it was either a very large worm or a very small snake. He ignored it and kept walking.
He’d gone about two hundred yards when he heard a soft, delicate meow. Thinking a small cat or a kitten might make a nice traveling companion, especially if it could see in the dark, he paused and faced the gentle meowing.
“Join me,” he said softly. “I won’t hurt you.”
Another meow, just the slightest bit louder.
“Here, boy—or girl,” he said in gentle tones.
Then came a meow that was literally next to him, and he felt a huge expulsion of foul-smelling breath. He looked up, and found himself facing a feline creature about the size of a bull elephant, with fangs almost as long as his arms.
“Forget I mentioned it,” said Raven, backing away.
The creature approached him.
“Scram,” he said in his softest, least aggressive tone.
The creature reached out a tongue and licked his arm—and the sleeve came away on its tongue. It made a face, spit out the cloth, and emitted an ear-shattering roar.
Raven would have run, but he couldn’t see more than fifty feet in any direction, and besides he was certain there was no way he could outrun a pachyderm-size cat, so he stared at the creature for a minute and then yelled, “Get the hell out of my way!”
It jumped back a few feet, stared at him, and growled, which sounded to Raven not unlike a volcano about to explode.
“Beat it!” screamed Raven, and the creature jumped back again.
Raven reached down, picked up a rock, and hurled it at the creature’s nose as hard as he could.
The creature moved slightly, caught it in its mouth, chewed it with a loud crunching noise, made a sound that Raven couldn’t interpret, turned, and walked away.
Raven stared after it for a long moment, then shrugged, and recommenced walking. After half an hour he saw a very strange structure about half a mile ahead. As he got closer, he saw that it was a single manufactured creation, though unlike any he had ever seen. It was vaguely hexagonal in structure, but there were literally hundreds of departures from that design, and the building materials seemed to change every few feet—and in some cases every few inches.
From where he stood he couldn’t tell if the walls surrounded an empty space a hundred or more yards across, or if the walls contained a totally solid structure. He looked for a light, listened for a sound, remained alert for any sign that the structure was inhabited—and finally he heard the faintest strain of music from a harplike instrument.
He began walking along the building’s wall, certain there must be an entrance somewhere. He didn’t fully trust his eyes, so he reached an arm out and slid it along the wall as he walked—and indeed, after about one hundred yards he came to an indentation. He stopped, couldn’t see it even from two feet away, but used his hands to determine its outline, which was about three feet wide and somewhat higher than he could reach.
I could wander out here forever, he thought, and what would it prove? Where would it get me? I’m trying to get back to my world, and maybe there’s someone in there who can help. Of course, no one’s helped yet, but no one’s misled me or done me any harm, so what the hell.
He felt for a doorknob or handle but couldn’t find one. He was prepared to ram his shoulder against the portal and shove, but when he thought about it, realized that this world had constantly surprised him, and pushed gently against the door—and, of course, almost the second he made contact with it, it vanished.
He stepped through and found himself in what seemed to be a covered, dimly lit courtyard. Parts were lit by flaming torches, parts by laser beams.
“You there!” cried out a deep, stentorian voice. “Halt!”
“You speak English,” replied Raven, frowning. “Are we somehow on Earth? I mean, where the hell else would they speak it?”
“Earth?” said the voice, and Raven saw that it came from a mildly human figure with three eyes, a nose on each cheek, an ear where his nose should have been, and a robe that kept changing from primary to pastel colors and back again. A golden dagger resided in a sheath wrapped around its waist. “Where is Earth?”
Raven shrugged. “Beats the hell out of me. I’m trying to find it.”
“Must be an interesting place if you’re typical of it,” said the robed figure. “You’re physically as close to one of the People as anyone who’s yet made his way to the Holy Land here.” Suddenly he frowned. “Why are you here?”
“I’m lost,” answered Raven.
“You do know the penalty for invading the Holy Land?”
“Of course not,” said Raven irritably. “I just got here. Let me leave and we can part friends, a quantity I suspect you do not possess in abundance.”
“It’s a novel thought,” admitted the robed figure. “But once you’re beyond the wall you’re in Inferno, so why do I need a friend there?”
“Have none of you ever been outside the wall?” asked Raven.
“Certainly not.”
“You’ve been misinformed.”
“Blasphemy!” cried the robed figure, and suddenly he was joined by ten more similarly garbed figures.
“If it’s blasphemy, how come I’m standing here, safe and sound, having just walked in from your mistaken notion of Inferno?”
“You know,” said another of the beings, “he is the second one to claim to be from Inferno. Maybe there’s something to it.”
“They could all live there, waiting to overcome us,” said the robed figure. “After all, they are the same race.”
“You have someone else of my race here?” asked Raven.
“I just said so.”
“May I see him? If he knows how to get back to where we came from, the pair of us can take our leave of you and no one will be any the worse for it.”
“I shall have to think upon it,” said the robed figure.
Raven stared at him. “Try not to take too long,” he said. “If I get hungry, I may eat you . . . and if I get restless, I may tear apart your Holy Land.”
He stood absolutely still, studying their faces to see if he’d said it forcefully enough so that a few of them at least believed it.
Finally the leader spoke. “All right,” he said. “Bring the other one.”
Half a dozen of his warriors went off behind a structure, and Raven lost sight of them. They returned a few minutes later, half of them pulling a lovely silk-clad girl by her bonds, the other half prodding her from behind with their spears.
Raven watched the procession until she was close enough for him to make out her features.
“Lisa!” he exclaimed.
“Hello, Eddie,” she answered.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“I told you it was possible that I’d wind up in part of your mission,” said Lisa. She frowned. “I just never guessed it would be this part.”
“You know each other,” stated the leader. It was not a question.
“Yes,” said Raven. “Now release her and we’ll be on our way.”
“Why should I take your word for it?” demanded the leader.
“Because you have nothing to gain by holding her,” replied Raven.
“How do you know?” scoffed the leader.
Raven reached the leader in three quick steps, pulled the creature’s gold-handled dagger out of its sheath, stood behind him, wrapped an arm around him, and held the blade to his throat.
<
br /> “It’s up to you, of course,” said Raven, “but my guess is that what you have to gain by releasing her is your life.”
Half a dozen warriors withdrew their swords and began approaching the pair.
“No!” cried the leader. “Let him go!” The beings who were approaching suddenly stopped. “The creature has a point. I’ll live a lot longer if you all back away and I allow him to escape with the female unmolested.”
The creatures backed away, leaving a path for Raven and Lisa to a nearby wall, which became translucent, then transparent, and finally nonexistent as they approached it.
“How long were you there?” asked Raven when they were outside and the wall had solidified behind them.
Lisa shrugged. “I don’t know. It seems we were just talking in that bar an hour or two ago, but time doesn’t have much meaning in this universe.”
“Are you all right?”
“They didn’t torture or mistreat me, if that’s what you mean,” she replied. “But it feels as if I’ve been in that damned dungeon for weeks.” Suddenly she shrugged. “Hell, for all I know, I have been. Like I say, time is very subjective in this venue.”
“Well, we might as well start looking for a way home,” said Raven. “At least I managed to rescue you and escape from that crazy place. I assume that was my test.”
She shook her head. “No, Eddie.”
“No?”
“It was too easy,” said Lisa. “Just kind of a first step.”
Raven frowned. “You’re sure?”
She nodded her head. “I’m sure.”
“But you’ve never been here before—so how can you know?”
“Because, Eddie,” she said seriously, “you are not the first candidate. In point of fact, you are the fifth since the human race was established—and none of the first four ever returned. They were skilled, resourceful men, as you are. It has to be more difficult.”
“All four are dead?”
She shrugged. “We’ve no idea, though we assume so. All we know for sure is that they’re gone.”
Raven frowned. “Okay, I guess we’re stuck here a little longer.” He reached out and held her hand. “At least we’re together. We might as well find the equivalent of a safe house where we can get a little rest.”
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