by Jake Bible
There were startled, yet controlled, responses from the other operators and in seconds Cosio and Morgan were in their drivers’ seats, the speed rollers turned and moving toward the glow.
“Mike? You awake?” Ivy called.
There was a hiss of static as Ivy pushed the comms signal long range. The shredhawks were up in the darkness somewhere and the comms relays were set back along their path. Comms should work.
“Mike?” Ivy called again.
A snort and a growl. “Huzz…? Whaz it?”
“Wake up,” Ivy said. “I need you to send a couple of the shredhawks ahead of us to check something out. Is their vid transmitting?”
“Vid? Transmitting?” Mike asked, his voice groggy. “Transmitting what?”
“Wake up!” Ivy yelled.
“Christ, dude!” Mike yelled back. “Break my eardrum, why don’t you…”
“Shredhawks. I need two to go north of our position,” Ivy said slowly. “Can you make that happen or not?”
“Give me a second, dude…” Mike yawned. “Shredhawks… Go north… Your position…”
“You’re not falling back asleep, are you?” Ivy asked.
“Huh? No. Just getting my brain active,” Mike replied. “I was having the weirdest dream.”
“Mike…”
“Right, dude. Sorry. Shredhawks.”
A beep on the dashboard got Ivy’s attention. She glanced away from the glow and studied the vid that appeared on a screen set into the dashboard.
“Is that the best resolution?” Ivy asked.
“Shit, Ivy, you’re lucky to have that,” Mike said. “I’m pushing systems as it is to send a signal simultaneously to you and back here.”
“Who’d you wake up?” Ivy asked.
“No one. Why, should I?” Mike responded. “I don’t have a reason to wake them up.”
“Yet.”
“Yeah, yet,” Mike agreed. “Let me see if I can dial in…the signal… Well, huh…”
“That looks like flowing lava,” Ivy said.
Cosio glanced at the image. “We would have driven right past it in the morning. Good thing you can’t sleep for shit, boss.”
“Good thing,” Ivy said. “Mike? Is that a shimmer too?”
“Could be,” Mike replied. “I can’t tell for sure. You’ll know when you get closer.”
The image shifted to show the POV of the second shredhawk. That one was closer in and up higher. A shimmer was just barely visible.
“Bubble,” Mike said. “For sure a bubble.”
“This must be where Lewis’ team disappeared,” Ivy said. “Mike? Circle the bubble and shoot me dimensions. I don’t want us driving inside the damn thing. We could end up anywhere if that thing Turns with us in it.”
“Already on it, dude,” Mike said. “I have the shredhawks splitting the circumference. They’ll meet in the middle and give me numbers soon.”
Ivy waited silently, but far from patiently. Her fingers tapped the butt of her rifle.
The speed rollers grew closer and closer to the glow, but Mike hadn’t responded with dimensions of the bubble yet.
“Stop,” Ivy said after a few more seconds. “Right here. Stop.”
“You see something?” Cosio asked.
“No,” Ivy said. “That’s the problem.”
Ivy opened her door and got out, her rifle at the ready.
“Mike?” Ivy called. No response. “Mike? You there?”
Still no response.
Ivy walked away from the speed roller, her eyes studying the ground and the much closer glow.
“I got ya covered,” DeLuca called from up top the speed roller.
“Thanks,” Ivy said.
She kept walking, getting a few meters away from the speed rollers before making a chopping motion in the air above her head.
“Cut the headlights,” she ordered.
Both rollers’ lights went out.
Instead of facing the glow, which from the smell was certainly lava like the shredhawks showed, Ivy turned and walked back the way they came. She grew frustrated with each step, but then saw what she’d feared. Ivy turned and sprinted back to the speed roller.
“Go! Back! Back! We’re inside the bubble!” Ivy yelled as she slammed the door closed and strapped in.
Cosio didn’t argue or ask a single question. She whipped the wheel to the left and gunned the motor, sending the vehicle into a tight spin. The follow roller was right on their tail the entire way.
“Are you sure?” Cosio exclaimed as the speed roller bounced up and down. Cosio was pushing the vehicle to its limits. “I didn’t see us go through a shimmer.”
“I think these bubbles are different,” Ivy said. “They aren’t like the ones we’re used to.”
“No shit,” Cosio said.
“Mike! Do you read me?” Ivy shouted into the comms. Something flashed above the speed roller then slammed into the windshield. “Fuck!”
“That’s a shredhawk!” Cosio shouted. “What the fuck?”
“The tech is glitching,” Ivy said. “It doesn’t matter what Mike does, inside these new bubbles, tech goes wrong fast.”
The speed rollers raced across the landscape, hell-bent to get back outside the bubble before it turned. Ivy gripped the dashboard with both hands and leaned forward, peering into the darkness for some sign of the bubble’s shimmer. Or better yet, a sign they’d returned to their side of the bubble.
Neither of those signs came.
“This isn’t right,” Cosio said after another twenty minutes of driving. “We should be out by now, but look at that grass? It’s the wrong kind.”
“I know,” Ivy said. “Stop the roller.”
Cosio slowed the vehicle then came to a stop.
Ivy got out once more and put her rifle to her shoulder. She looked through the scope and turned in a slow circle. Zero sign of a shimmer. Zero sign of anything familiar. Zero sign of the Flipside she was used to. This was a new Flipside.
“What’s the call, boss?” Cosio shouted from the roller’s cab.
“Turn ‘em off,” Ivy ordered. “Let’s not tax the motors until we have a better handle on our situation.”
“You mean in case they short out and we end up stranded here like Lewis and her team,” Cosio said.
Cosio shut off the motor. The roller behind them did as well.
In a minute, all operators were crouching in a circle, a halogen lamp illuminating the patch of dirt Ivy was drawing in.
“We came from here,” she said and drew a short line. “We drove this far according to the odometer.” Another line. “Stopped here.” Third line. “Turned and came back to here.”
A fourth line. One that stretched well past the first line.
“How?” DeLuca asked. “I didn’t feel a Turn. You feel Turns.”
“I’ll bet Mike saw a seismic spike right before he lost contact with us and the shredhawks,” Ivy said.
To emphasize the point, a second shredhawk tumbled from the sky, leaving two still above, circling the speed rollers as programmed. Ivy sighed.
“We should call them in,” she said.
“On it,” Blumhouse replied and hurried to one of the speed rollers. He leaned inside and tapped at a screen. In seconds, the two remaining shredhawks had landed next to the lead roller. “Where you want ‘em, boss?”
“Put them in the follow roller’s hold,” Ivy said. “We’ll probably need them at some point.”
“If they stay working,” Morgan said.
“Same with the speed rollers,” DeLuca said.
“Right now, the motors are inert components without currents to fry,” Cosio said. “We keep the motors off and they should hold.”
“That’s exactly what we do,” Ivy said. “We only fire them up when we know we can get out of here.”
“What now, boss?” Blumhouse asked as he returned to the group.
“We set up camp,” Ivy said. “This is now our FOB. We have enough supplies to last fo
r weeks. Two stay here at all times while three are on recon.”
“We’re gonna hoof it? Out there?” Morgan asked, pointing at the lava glow.
“Yes,” Ivy said. “It’s a boots-on-the-ground mission now. Simple grid search starting once the sun is up. We log everything and keep moving until we find Lewis and her team.”
“What if they aren’t in this bubble?” DeLuca asked. “What if we’re in a different bubble?”
“We’ll find out eventually,” Ivy said. “I’m setting two goals: find Lewis’ team and getting our asses out of here and back to Flipside. If the latter happens first, then we ditch the former and go. Bloom didn’t want to send good operators after bad. Let’s not make him right on this, people.”
“We’d never hear the end of it,” Cosio said with a laugh.
“No, we wouldn’t,” Ivy agreed and stood up. “You know how to set a camp. Get to it, people.”
Seven
“He won’t leave,” Tressa said, nodding at the door to the command hut. “He’s going to go crazy if he doesn’t get some sleep.”
“I can have him forcibly removed,” Bloom said as he stood facing Tressa, Olivia, and Dr. Raskov.
“How will that look to the civilians?” Olivia asked. “You send operators in there to drag Mike out and you’ll sew distrust across this base. I’m a civilian, and if I saw that first thing in the morning, I’d be rethinking my place on base.”
“Suggestions?” Bloom asked.
“Dr. Raskov adds sedative to this mug of mud,” Tressa said. “Liv goes in and talks with him. Liv gives Mike the mud and talks until Mike falls asleep. Then Liv and I carry him to his cot.”
“Still not going to look good,” Bloom said and nodded. “But you know Mr. DiCenzo better than I do. Doctor? Do you have a sedative that will work?”
“I do, but the dosage is going to be a guess,” Dr. Raskov said. He faced Olivia. “As soon as he’s out, you come get me. I want to make sure we haven’t accidentally put him into a coma.”
“Yes, let us avoid that,” Bloom said sternly. “As much as Mr. DiCenzo needs his sleep, we need Mr. DiCenzo at his workstation. He cannot be there if he is in a coma.”
“He can, but he’d be useless,” Olivia said then grimaced at the look Bloom gave her. “Sorry.”
“Ready?” Tressa asked, handing Olivia the mug of mud.
“Ready,” Olivia replied as soon as Dr. Raskov sprinkled a powder into the beverage and gave it a stir with his finger.
“He won’t notice,” Dr. Raskov said. “My finger might improve the taste.”
“Nothing is that powerful,” Bloom said. “Not even a healer’s touch.”
“Then he certainly won’t notice the sedative,” Dr. Raskov responded.
“Here goes nothing,” Olivia said and walked into the command hut.
Mike was dead asleep, drool pooling under his cheek and dripping off the edge of the console where his head rested.
“He fell asleep like five seconds ago,” a tech at a different console said. “Started snoring immediately.”
“Five seconds ago?” Olivia asked, staring at the pool of drool. “Damn.”
She ducked her head out the door.
“He’s already out,” she said.
“Then let’s get him to his cot,” Tressa said.
“You are co-head of this base, Ms. Thompson,” Bloom said. “There are other people that can do the carrying for you.”
“Those other people didn’t spend months trapped in this place with Mike,” Tressa said. “We did. We got this, Commander Bloom.”
Bloom set his jaw then nodded, turned, and walked away.
“Find me when he’s awake and coherent,” he called over his shoulder. “I am sure he has plenty to tell us.”
Tressa stepped into the command hut and helped Olivia get Mike up out of his chair and outside. Some of the personnel passing by gave them strange looks, but most averted their eyes, unsure of what they were watching. Both Olivia and Tressa nodded to those that made eye contact and ignored the rest.
It took some doing, since Mike was dead weight on legs, but they managed to get him to his cot in a hut he shared with a couple other techs. Mike had insisted he be housed in the main barracks because he didn’t want to look like an elitist bastard, but after only a few nights, everyone in the barracks voted for him to leave due to the strange hours he kept. They were sick of him waking everyone up at four-thirty in the morning after he finally left the command hut.
“There we go,” Olivia said as she and Tressa eased Mike on top of his cot. “Get his shoes, will ya?”
Tressa took his shoes off then wished she hadn’t.
“Christ. When was the last time he changed his socks?” Tressa asked.
“Or took a shower,” Olivia added. “He’s worse than when we were on our own and living down in the ground.”
“Turned…” Mike muttered in his sleep. “Moved…”
“What’d he say?” Tressa asked, tossing his shoes as far away from her as possible.
“Turned and moved,” Olivia replied. “What does he mean by moved?”
“You don’t think he’s referring to the new bubbles, do you?” Tressa asked.
“Since I know nothing about these new bubbles, no,” Olivia said. “But if you want to fill me in, then maybe I can give you an informed answer.”
“Maybe I should show you,” Tressa said after a moment’s thought. “Bloom won’t like it, but Bloom can deal.”
“If it’s going to strain your relationship with Bloom, then don’t worry about it.”
“Flipside strains every relationship.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Come on. We’ll go back to the command hut and I’ll show what is going on.”
They left Mike’s hut and walked back to the command hut. Tressa was surprised to see a couple of the techs standing over a third tech that was collapsed on the floor.
“What happened?” Tressa asked, rushing to the unconscious woman.
“We don’t know,” a tech said. “She was talking about wingers then her words started slurring and she fell out of her chair.”
“I have an idea,” Olivia said, standing by Mike’s console. She held a mug up then turned it over and only a drop of mud fell out. “She drank this.”
“Shit,” Tressa muttered then looked to the techs. “Get her to her cot. She’s going to be asleep for a while.”
“Did you… Did you drug her?” a tech asked, staring at Olivia.
“Not on purpose,” Olivia protested. “It was for Mike.”
Everyone nodded knowingly then picked up the sleeping tech and carried her out of the hut.
“People are gonna wonder what the hell is going on in here,” Tressa said.
She moved to Mike’s console and sat down. A holo came up and Tressa talked Olivia through everything that had been going on. When Tressa was done, Olivia’s face was pale. She found a chair and sat down heavily.
“That’s all we know?” Olivia asked.
“We’re hoping Raff’s team and Ivy’s team will bring back more information,” Tressa said. “We’re also hoping they just make it back.”
“Mike said turned and moved,” Olivia said. “Can you bring up the holo of the seismic activity?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Tressa said with a smile and swiped at the image until the grid with the seismic readings rotated above Mike’s console. “That’s all the data.”
Olivia stood up and leaned in close. She spun the holo every which way then nodded.
“He’s right,” Olivia said. “They’re moving.”
Tressa looked from the holo, to Olivia, then back to the holo.
“How can you tell?” Tressa asked.
“See these readings here?” Olivia said. “And these here? Same exact readings, but in different places and different times. And these here with these here? Same readings, different places and times. What are the odds you have two sets of readings that match exactly in force,
but the only difference is where they came from and what time they occurred?”
“Son of a bitch,” Tressa muttered then glanced at the door to the hut. “And not one of those techs picked up on it.”
“They’re busy with other jobs, Tressa,” Olivia said. “Speaking of which, I need to go open the school. Even in Flipside, parents get bitchy if their morning routine is altered in any way, shape, or form.”
“Good luck,” Tressa said, her eyes locked onto the data, seeing it all in a new light.
“You going to let Bloom know?” Olivia asked.
“Yes.”
“You think he’ll send more operators out?”
“I have no idea what he’ll do.”
“Then good luck to you too.”
“Thanks, Liv.”
***
The sun wasn’t right. The sky wasn’t right. Even the clouds were all wrong as they drifted over the two rollers (one functional, one not), tendrils of condensed moisture reaching out in strings in a way Cash had never seen clouds behave before.
“We got wingers,” Haskins called from his perch on top of the Flipside speed roller. “Three o’clock. I count five and they aren’t small.”
Cash turned and faced the direction Haskins was pointing. He shielded his eyes from the morning sun and squinted into the sky. The man wasn’t kidding, they were big wingers.
“You got them covered?” Cash asked.
“I got them covered,” Haskins said as he steadied his rifle and took aim. He squeezed off two shots, but only one winger fell. The other three broke off and rose high into the air, but kept coming in the direction of the small camp. “Maybe.”
“I’ll get my rifle,” Cash said. “Three wingers are easy enough to pick off.”
“I don’t know, man,” Haskins said, eye to scope. “These guys look like trouble.”
“What the hell does that even mean?” Cash asked.
Cash walked around to the rear of the Flipside speed roller and opened the back hatch. Raff was asleep on one bench while Dr. Xipan was asleep on the other. Cash smacked Raff’s boot.
“Get up. Wingers,” Cash said and grabbed his rifle from a rack on the wall. He ejected the magazine, checked it was full, then snagged a spare before smacking Raff’s boot again. “Wingers.”