by Joe Mahoney
“Barnabus,” a woman’s voice said.
“Barnabus,” the voice said again, and I snapped out of a brief but absorbing fantasy involving the very woman talking to me and a candlelight dinner accompanied by a carafe or two of Valpolicella. Looking up from the button I was fumbling with, I found myself staring into her green eyes, and blushed.
Sarah didn’t help matters any by leaning forward and kissing me on the cheek. “You’re doing the right thing, Barnabus.”
I finished getting ready in a daze.
Rainer appeared at the front of the room, a single hand raised in a bid to get everyone’s attention. He didn’t have to say a word. Within seconds the loudest sound I could hear was my own breathing. He nodded in my direction. “For those of you who haven’t been introduced, this is Barnabus Wildebear.”
Murmured greetings filled the room.
Self-consciousness descended. I managed a nod at those closest to me. Before I knew it we were shaking hands and everyone was patting me on the back, saying things like, “Sorry about your nephew, man,” “Don’t you worry ‘bout a thing,” and “We’ll get ’im back.”
I almost believed they meant it.
Rainer coughed politely into one of his hands. “Soon I will ask Mr. Wildebear to take control of the gate. When it is clear that Mr. Wildebear has assumed complete control we will enter one at a time after Mr. Wildebear. Sebastian.”
Sebastian spoke both from my wrist and from the air around us. “The anchor has been disabled. As expected, the gate appears stable, which should remain the case until Mr. Wildebear assumes control. You may proceed at any time.”
I glanced at the gate with apprehension. It oscillated rapidly between a bright orange and a deep, featureless black. As ever, no sound made its way from beyond the gate to Ridley’s room. Just the same, the sheer intensity of the colours pulsating within the gate’s confines placed the impression of a low, throbbing hum deep into my hippocampus.
Rainer nodded. “It’s up to you now, Mr. Wildebear.”
I did my best to ignore everyone’s gaze on me. I picked up Humphrey’s bag and angled myself so I was facing the gate. What did they expect me to do? I hadn’t a clue. I considered saying, “Abracadabra.”
Sarah appeared at my side. “Say it,” she whispered in my ear.
Say what? Abracadabra? Had she read my mind? A frisson of excitement coursed up and down my spine as the answer struck me like a thunderbolt. I looked at Sarah in amazement.
I knew exactly what to do.
I faced the gate again and braced myself.
“Iugurtha,” I said, the word emerging from my lips as little more than a whisper.
Nothing.
Nothing happened. Literally. All conversation and sound ceased at once. Utter silence. Around me everyone stood stock-still, frozen in place. Only I moved, shifting my head just enough to glance around. I caught a glimpse of a clock on a nearby console. It too was frozen, its digital readout stuck at 9:00:31.
And then everything happened.
Before me, the gate collapsed, folding in on itself. It fell to the floor without a sound. Once more a book, it seemed to throb where it lay, though I am certain it did not move an iota. Inside my brain it was as if someone had pulled back a velvet curtain, revealing a treasure trove of information. I felt an affinity for the book, felt in tune with it. I could open up its pages and by so doing tell it where I wanted to go. I could trust that it would take me there. It was as though I had suddenly grown a third eye, and out of the corner of that eye I glimpsed things I was certain would take my breath away if only I could see past the habitable places of the known universe to the strange dimensions beyond. For the eye had crept open only a tiny bit. To see more I would have to actually open the book, and journey to where it took me.
“Sebastian,” I said.
He didn’t answer. Not only that, I didn’t hear myself say his name. In fact, I could hear nothing at all. Sebastian could well be speaking and I wouldn’t even know it. Had this third eye cost me my hearing? Curiously, the thought did not alarm me. I marvelled at my self-possession, though I knew perfectly well whence it came.
The gate.
I pondered it there on the floor before me: a book, handsomely bound, about twice the size of an ordinary hardcover. No author credit, no publishing information. Only a title in a fancy font: Iugurtha. The whole package looked like something a monk might have created back in the twelfth century. Now that it was no longer anchored I could pick it up, flip through its pages, and choose whichever destination I desired. There was only one destination that mattered, of course: wherever Iugurtha had taken Ridley.
If I wanted to, I could go through the book alone, leaving Rainer and the others behind. Did I dare? Partially crippled, dependent on crutches? I had no experience in this sort of thing. The sensible thing would be to take someone with me, someone more knowledgeable than I. Someone who could assist me physically if need be. But who?
Anyone I didn’t already know I dismissed outright. The new faces Rainer had just introduced me to all looked competent enough, but they were unknown quantities. I could not trust them.
Rainer himself I didn’t trust one bit, despite what Sebastian had said about him. The man was too cunning, too wily. Anything could happen if I took him with me.
Giorgio—he might be informative, but if Sebastian functioned on the other side the scientist would be redundant.
Schmitz. I didn’t like him and he didn’t like me. Too dangerous.
My gaze settled on Sarah. Sarah… yes. It could work. She knew as much as anyone about where we were going. Young and strong, she could assist me physically if it came to that.
Looking at her now, frozen in place, she was more beautiful than ever. The light caressing her face and hair—I yearned to take her hand, touch her briefly. But that would be wrong, so I just looked at her instead, and after a few seconds that didn’t feel right either, so I turned away, my heart sinking. Because I couldn’t trust her any more than I could trust any of them. I wanted her to come with me, but not for the right reasons.
I moved, for the first time since taking control of the gate. It felt odd moving, as though I were wading through a sea of invisible molasses. When my foot touched down the floor erupted violently in slow motion, sending shards of wood everywhere. I ducked and covered my face with my hands. The debris was moving slowly but I could not avoid it all. Apart from a few scratches, I did not suffer seriously but the floor looked as though someone had taken a sledgehammer to it.
Somehow I was utilizing the gate’s power to speed myself up, impossible to say just how fast, but obviously much faster than usual. When my foot hit the floor it did so incredibly rapidly. I strove feebly for an explanation. Could that one step have possessed enough kinetic energy to shatter the floor?
It would be nice to have the house in one piece when this was all over. I would have to be more careful. I realized now that if I had taken Sarah’s hand I could have seriously injured her, shattering her hand if not killing her outright. I could not take anyone with me even if I wanted to—not without injuring them grievously.
Experimenting, I placed one of my crutches on the floor as gently as possible. It achieved exactly the same effect. It didn’t matter how careful I was. I could not move slowly enough to make a difference. When all was said and done this was going to cost me a fortune in repairs. With no choice in the matter I moved in a carefully considered path, damaging the floor immeasurably on the way.
On the way I reached down and picked up the book, half expecting it to shatter, but it was fine. Surveying Rainer and his people I detected the faintest trace of movement from Schmitz. Although in real time he was probably moving exceptionally quickly, to me it was barely discernible.
Flipping through the book’s pages, I located roughly where Iugurtha had taken Ridley. I could see now that it wasn’t
random how the gate’s destinations had been changing since Rainer had anchored it open. It was merely shifting through a set series of what I supposed could be called bookmarks, presumably set by Iugurtha.
I threw the book in the air. It turned back into the gate.
I stepped through.
VIII
Short Trek
My nose led the way. This is not unusual if one is facing forward, of course. What is striking is the degree to which it led the way. Like Ridley, I am saddled with the famed Wildebear proboscis, so I am accustomed to my nose beating a path before me by a good inch or so. But to have it precede me by several miles was something of a novelty.
As I moved forward through the gate, my body became incredibly distended. My leg shot forward several hundred feet, retracting only as the rest of me caught up. The fingers clutching Humphrey’s bag saw fit to precede me by a mile or two. My hands, arms, torso, crutches, neck, and head all followed suit—it was spookily reminiscent of Fletcher’s horrible attempt to negotiate the gate, yet it did not frighten me. I was in control. As the various parts of my body caught up with one another they merged like a deck of cards briefly fanned between the hands of a magician and consolidated again.
And then I was through, intact as near as I could tell. Because my crutches weren’t properly placed I promptly fell over. Except it wasn’t just the crutches that had made me fall over. I could feel an oppressive force upon me and quickly deduced that the gravity here was slightly stronger than on Earth.
I hauled myself back up and sniffed the air—it smelled like chlorine. All around me was forest as far as the eye could see, bloated trunks extending several hundred meters into the air. A vast array of branches sprouted from each tree, creating a massive network of mauve fronds that obscured much of the green sky. The topmost branches swayed vigorously in a wind that barely touched me at ground level. Sparse vegetation grew about my feet, shades of violet mostly, with a hint of white here and there.
I knelt down and felt the soil. Spongy to the touch, it dyed the tips of my fingers a faint black that didn’t want to come off afterward. Iugurtha’s book lay face down on the forest floor. I hobbled over to pick it up, afraid it had been stained, but it didn’t have a mark on it.
I leafed through the book, curious to see if I could get closer to Ridley and Humphrey, but I didn’t know the exact location of either of them and there were too many destinations even on this single planet to choose from. Each page represented many thousands of locations, the images shifting constantly, no two the same. I glimpsed many other worlds, fascinating lands of great natural beauty, cities with architecture that could only have been crafted by alien minds. I was sorely tempted to step through the book to visit one or two of them, just for a few minutes, but I resisted—a few minutes could mean the difference between life and death for Ridley and Humphrey.
Resigning myself to a lengthy hike, I stuffed the book in my knapsack and set out in a more or less arbitrary direction. Soon I began to wonder about the make-up of the atmosphere in this place. A tendril of fear snaked its way through my body.
“Sebastian,” I said into the device on my wrist. “Sebastian!”
He didn’t answer. Oh God, did he not work here? Was I all alone in this alien place?
“Yes, Mr. Wildebear?” he answered finally.
“You’re working!”
“Yes,” he said. “I’m not in communication with the rest of me back home, but I —”
“Can I breathe the air here?”
“You’d be flopping around like a dying fish if you couldn’t.”
“Yes, but will I keep on breathing?”
“That’s up to you, I suppose.”
“What if there’s carbon monoxide? I could wind up unconscious before I even know what’s happening.”
“Look, the air probably smells different, but it’s okay to breathe.”
I took a couple of practice breaths just to see. “I don’t know. I can’t quite seem to catch my breath.”
“You have a tendency to hyperventilate when you’re under stress. Relax. Breathe from your diaphragm. Make your exhalations longer than your inhalations.”
I did as he suggested and felt better almost instantly. “That’s a relief. I thought for sure there was a problem with the—”
“Interesting,” Sebastian said.
“What?” I glanced around, wondering what had caught Sebastian’s attention, hoping it wasn’t something dangerous.
“Weren’t you supposed to take a team with you through the gate?”
“Change of plans,” I said.
Suddenly I was filled with the desire to put as much distance between Casa Terra and myself as possible. With Humphrey’s bag clutched tightly in my left hand, I propped myself up on the crutches and began hobbling away. Of course, Rainer and his team were but a single step away through the book if I so chose. But the book was closed, and closed it would remain until I found Ridley and Humphrey.
The going was relatively easy—at first. There wasn’t much in the way of undergrowth and the trees were spaced well apart. The leaves possessed a reflective quality that quickly became an issue. My eyes began to water and I had to squint to avoid the glare. I found a pair of sunglasses in one of the knapsack’s pockets. They fit perfectly and eliminated the glare.
The fact that I had been seriously ill recently threatened to become a problem. I began to fear that I might not have the stamina to get very far. It was slow-going on crutches, and hard on my one good leg. Lugging Humphrey’s bag didn’t help. Although not particularly heavy, it swayed constantly and kept bumping into my crutches.
“You don’t know where you’re going,” Sebastian observed.
I skirted a pink mushroom about five meters wide, maybe half a meter high, then waded through a shallow but fast-moving stream of murky water. Everything was a shade too dark with the sunglasses. “I’m going to find Ridley and Humphrey. Obviously.”
On the other side of the stream I took the sunglasses off and squinted at my surroundings. The forest looked pretty much the same whichever way I turned: an explosion of violet leafiness. Just visible through a small gap in the trees ahead of me I could see this planet’s sun. It was too bright to look at directly and appeared closer than the Earth’s; or maybe it was just bigger.
“I recommend you turn right,” Sebastian said.
“Why?” The wind had picked up—I had to pitch my voice higher to make myself heard.
“You’ll find higher ground if you bear right. From there you might find it easier to figure out which way to go.”
I wondered if I should trust him. He was Rainer’s machine, after all. He could be programmed to lead me anywhere—or nowhere at all.
“How do you know this?”
“I know all sorts of things.”
“Like what?”
“I know that we’re standing on the foothills of a mountain. You’ll be able to see for yourself if you follow my directions.”
“Did Iugurtha take Ridley this way? Can you tell?”
Sebastian said something that I couldn’t quite make out over the whistling of the wind. I held him up to my ear. “What?”
His voice blasted from the tiny speaker so loud that it hurt my ear: “YES.”
I jerked my arm away in annoyance. I had little choice but to trust him until he gave me reason not to. Putting the sunglasses back on, I set off in the direction he’d suggested.
My good leg hurt like the dickens. I was forced to stop frequently to rest, although I was worried because the sun was setting and once it became dark I would face a whole new set of problems.
On a break, rummaging in the knapsack for refreshments, I discovered a package of banana chips that proved surprisingly tasty. As I sat munching them, Sebastian said, “You’re alone in a hostile environment with limited resources.”
> “Do you have an off switch?” I asked.
“With no idea where to find what you’re looking for.”
“I take it that’s a ‘no’.”
“On crutches.”
“Your point?”
“Mr. Rainer has technology that could accurately trace the entity’s steps. Resources that could have helped you. Protected you. I find it interesting that you would choose not to avail yourself of such help.”
“I don’t trust Rainer.” Rainer wasn’t all I didn’t trust. A nearby clump of vines appeared to be moving of its own volition.
I put the banana chips away and moved away from the vines. I found myself in a clearing of scarlet grass up to my thigh. On the other side an almost solid wall of purplish leaves blocked my way. It was time to get out the machete, although wielding such a thing on crutches would surely prove a neat trick.
“I don’t know what you all see in this Rainer character, anyway,” I told Sebastian, more to take my mind off my growing fears than because I wished to talk about Rainer. “He’s a bit of a cold fish, if you ask me. I suppose you’re programmed to like him.”
“One must respect one’s chain of command,” Sebastian said. “Especially when one can be unplugged at a moment’s notice.”
It was good to know that Sebastian had a sense of humour. If the journey became too tedious, maybe I would get him to tell a few jokes.
“To tell you the truth, I can’t really say I like any of you,” I said, hacking my way viciously through the vegetation as I balanced precariously on my crutches. Sweat ran in rivulets down my face. I could feel it trickling beneath my arms. “Not after what Sarah did to me.”
“Ah yes, the lovely Miss Sarah Frey,” Sebastian said. “We knew you’d find her quite fetching.”
“You used her to bait me.”
“Of course. This is Casa Terra you’re talking about. Miss Frey would do anything for Mr. Rainer.”
“Because she’s so loyal to Casa Terra.”
“Because she loves him.”