by M. D. Cooper
“And she told you what happened on PetSil with Maverick?”
Amanda smiled and nodded as the group continued to walk away from the CPS station. “Me, and the others that were there.”
“…Others?” Cheeky asked, her voice a little squeaky.
“Not such a secret after all,” Jessica cut in, raising her eyebrows at her friend.
“Sorry, I’m making it sound like Tanis is telling everyone about this, um…event…but there’s more to it than that. I swear the only people who know about it, in this universe at least, are standing right here—apart from Tanis herself and the guy whose foot you sucked,” Amanda winked.
Cheeky raised an eyebrow and then laughed. “Don’t knock it till you try it. Besides, the distraction worked.”
“I bet it did,” Amanda answered. “And between you and me, I’ve sucked on a few toes myself. One of the hazards of a long life…You tend to try new things.”
A beat passed, and after a flicker of a signal between herself and Jessica, Cheeky shot the woman a look that was playful but also suggested that she didn’t have much room to talk.
Amanda checked on the progress of the part of her mind she’d set to breaking through the encryption. It was close, but they had some serious security going. With a quick boost of Essentia and a working of Magic, Amanda enhanced that part of her mind, making it faster and more computer-like. She wanted to find out what these ladies were talking about. She’d have it in a moment.
She turned to the two gleaming, metallic figures who were walking with them. They smiled back at her.
“Hi, I’m Amanda,” she said in greeting.
“Iris,” the chrome clone of Jessica said.
“And I’m Jinx,” the silver and blue one answered.
“Lovely to meet you. Look, I’m sorry for the secrecy,” Amanda said, addressing them all. “But once I talk with Tanis, and she confirms who I am, this should all be a lot easier.”
“That’s fine, you’ll be speaking to her soon, we just need to get to our ship,” Jessica answered as she led them to a maglev station.
They waited in silence for a few minutes until a train arrived, and they boarded.
“Did I interrupt a night out?” Amanda asked as the train took off. She pointed to the dresses that Jessica and Iris were wearing.
“It was already interrupted,” Iris answered, her tone sour.
“Not that there was a lot to interrupt,” Cheeky added. “The LoS didn’t pick this station as their capital because of its hoppin’ third-shift.”
“The night wasn’t that much of a disaster.” Jessica directed a tolerant smile at Cheeky. “Besides, you looked like you were getting on well with that guard.”
“You’re right,” she answered, and then turned to Amanda. “Thanks for getting arrested,” she said brightly.
“My pleasure,” Amanda answered. “So why was it already interrupted?”
“We foiled a break-in,” Jinx explained. “It was fun.”
“A break in?” Amanda echoed.
“Before we go any further in this conversation,” Jessica interrupted, “I think we need to have our chat with Tanis. No offense,” she said to Amanda.
“None taken. I understand completely.”
She could relate to Jessica’s reticence in telling her too much; they really didn’t know who she was or what her motives were. She decided to sit back and enjoy the rest of the journey, which included some more walking, as well as a lift ride.
Having spent time away from Earth in her home universe, and in the galactic community of the Magi, she’d seen some impressive sights, but there was something about being in a totally different universe that added a new sense of wonder to everything.
As they walked down a passage, she took in the people around her, admiring their clothing and body modifications, as well as the advanced technology on show. She was pleased to see that she didn’t stand out too much in her fitted outfit and boots.
Eventually, after they turned onto a broad concourse with windows looking into space on their left side, Jessica turned to her.
“We’re here now, Sabrina is just up ahead,” she said. “You can see her out there.” She pointed.
Amanda turned and looked out the windows to see a huge ship docked at the station. It was blue and silver with long, sweeping lines, and Amanda guessed it was maybe two hundred meters long. It looked quite majestic against the twinkling light of the stars beyond.
She nodded in approval. “Impressive ship.”
“I’m sure she’ll appreciate the sentiment,” Jessica laughed.
She led her forward before turning left into the docking bay and moving toward the airlock. As they approached, a large man with muscles over his muscles ambled forward, his attention on Jessica.
“If I never see another chicken again, it will be too soon,” he groaned.
“Don’t be such a sourpuss, you were cooing over them too. You even named two of them,” teased a voice coming from speakers beside the airlock.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said and leant down to give Jessica a kiss. “Good night out?”
“Eventful,” Jessica replied.
“I see we have more visitors,” he said, looking at Amanda.
She raised her hand in a quick wave. “Hi,” she said, and then offered it to him in greeting. “Amanda, lovely to meet you.”
He took it, his hand swallowing hers as he gave it a firm shake. “Trevor,” he answered.
“Amanda here was picked up by the CPS, says she knows Tanis and wants to speak with her,” Jessica explained.
Trevor let go of Amanda’s hand, and the smile dropped from his face. “And you took her at her word?”
“There was toe-sucking involved,” Jessica answered him.
“What?”
“Look, I told you.” Cheeky glowered at Jessica, hands on her hips. “I was the distraction. Tanis told me to do it.”
Trevor opened his mouth to speak, shut it again, went to say something for a second time, and then paused once more before looking back at Jessica.
“What?” he repeated.
“Amanda here claims to know Tanis, and Tanis apparently told her a story that she and Cheeky had kept quiet about.”
“And it involved toe-sucking?”
“More like half a foot,” Amanda corrected.
“I’m so confused…and yet, not surprised,” Trevor replied.
“I need to hear this story,” the voice from the ship added.
“Tanis swore me to secrecy, but if she’s telling strangers…” Cheeky paused for a moment, weighing her options. “What the hell, I’ll share the whole story at dinner…or breakfast, whatever meal is next.”
“And on that note. Hello, Amanda, I’m Sabrina,” the female voice from the ship said.
Amanda’s Aetheric sight penetrated the materials around her. She could see the energy within the ship and the presence of a sentient mind embedded deep within it.
“Lovely to make your acquaintance,” Amanda said with a smile.
“You too!” Sabrina replied. “You’re quite curious.”
Amanda smirked at the ship’s comments. “Thanks, I think.”
“Right, let’s get this over with,” Jessica said. “Follow me.”
As she led Amanda into the ship, Cheeky, Iris and Jinx followed, while Trevor went back to whatever work he’d been doing… Something about chickens, Amanda wasn’t sure what though.
They didn’t go far into the vessel before Jessica turned right and led them into a good-sized room. They’d entered through the only door, and the small pile of metal crates stacked in the corner suggested it was a cargo hold of some kind. Amanda turned to find Jessica with her arms crossed, looking confrontational again.
Amanda smiled. She didn’t blame them. They didn’t know her from Eve, and she seemed to have knowledge of events that few seemed to. They were right to be suspicious of her.
“Sabs, contact Tanis, and route the
QC through to this hold.”
“Sure thing, messaging her now.”
Everyone stood silently, looking at Amanda while they waited. She could see they were tense and ready for anything, but they really had nothing to fear from her.
Not that she would be able to convince them of that through words alone. No, for that she really needed Tanis.
It appeared that Jessica and the others on this ship were under her command; if Tanis remembered her and their meeting at BOB’s Bar, then everything should fall into place. That was a big ‘if’, though…. The strange effect of the energies at the bar that had loosened their tongues and gotten them to talk about things they normally wouldn’t had also had something of a fogging effect on the mind.
Still, Tanis was her one chance to get these people on her side so she could look into this station a little more. If what Void had told her was true, she should be in the vicinity of whoever it was that had crossed into this universe from her own, and it was up to her to find them and stop whatever it was they were doing.
A moment later, Sabrina’s voice sounded from the speakers in the room. “OK, I’ll transcribe anything you say. The QC network is text-only.”
Amanda raised an eyebrow. “Is it? How will I know it’s Tanis?”
“Well…” Jessica said, tapping a finger against her chin. “I suppose you can ask her about something that happened at that mysterious bar that no one knows about, except all the people who seem to know about it.”
As the purple woman spoke, a sentence appeared in the air between her and Amanda.
[Jessica. Ship’s nearly ready.]
“That’s a bit abrupt,” Amanda commented.
“We skip words to keep usage low,” Jessica explained, before the holodisplay hovering between them read, [Have guest named Amanda. Knows you from Bob’s Bar?]
“Hi, Tanis. It’s Amanda,” she added. “Amanda-Jane Page. We met at BOB’s Bar about a year ago—a year for me, at least—with Cal and Splurt and the others.”
The words appeared in text form floating in the air, though pared down to just the essentials by Sabrina. [Hi. – Amanda], appeared, below Jessica’s explanation.
Amanda raised a single eyebrow in response.
[Shit. Amanda?] came Tanis’s response. [Seriously?]
“Do you remember it? You told the story of your night out with Cheeky on the PetSil Station, where you encountered Maverick,” Amanda replied as her words were transcribed again. [Yes. I told Cheeky and Maverick story].
[You told the Roswell story.]
“That’s right,” Amanda answered, beaming at Jessica, who had cocked her head and mouthed, ‘Roswell?’
[Had half-wondered if the bar was a dream,] Tanis sent, then added, [You come on your own?]
“I did, yes. I just needed you to confirm to Jessica and her crew that I am who I say I am, and that we have indeed met before.”
[Jessica, Amanda’s legitimate. FYI, multiverse isn’t a theory anymore.]
“Shit,” Jessica muttered, shaking her head. “When were you going to share this?”
[Sometime. Amanda, why are you in Virginis?]
“I’m tracking down other travelers. I suspect they’re on this station and I need to stop them. Where are you?”
[New Canaan, three thousand light years coreward. Damn, would have liked to see you.]
“Me too. Once I’ve finished up here, I might try to make the trip.”
[Looking forward. Jessica, new mission, help Amanda.]
“Already planned on it,” Jessica replied.
[Good.]
“She’s gone,” Sabrina told them.
Amanda smiled at the memory of the blonde woman she’d met at the bar. It was good to hear from her again, even if it was just words and not her voice. She would dearly love to visit Tanis if she could. She knew that three thousand light years would be about a month’s travel on an Aetheric craft—something she was more than capable of conjuring.
I’ll think about it.
Looking over at Jessica and the others, she could see signals being sent between them, as they no doubt discussed what they had just heard. As she peered at those signals, the mind she had assigned to cracking the encryption suddenly made a breakthrough. She was quickly connected to their network and listening to their voices.
~Hi, guys. Just figured out your encryption. Those were some serious defenses you had running there. I had to augment the mind I had assigned to hacking it quite a bit. Impressive.~
“What? How are you on the Link? You don’t have any mods,” Jessica asked.
She winked back at the blonde, who smiled like a schoolgirl at the gesture. Then she frowned at Jessica. “You’re right, I don’t. Okay, so I have a lot to explain, and it’s going to seem crazy, but you need to hear it if you’re going to help me.”
“Fair enough,” Jessica answered, “and if Tanis trusts you, then I do too. Let’s get everyone into the ship’s galley so we can do this in one go, with alcohol and coffee on hand.” She turned and walked out of the cargo hold. As Amanda followed the purple woman through the ship, Cheeky fell into step beside her.
“So, you’re going to be around for a few days?”
Amanda glanced sideways at the pretty blonde, catching Cheeky giving her an appraising look. “Looks that way,” she answered with a smile.
The woman was not being very subtle about her advances, but Amanda didn’t mind. Cheeky was very pretty, reminding Amanda of a Californian blonde bombshell from Earth.
“Good…” Cheeky answered, looking like the cat who got the cream.
Amanda listened as Jessica sent out a call through the ship’s net to the other crew, telling them where to meet.
After walking through several corridors and climbing a couple of ladders, they entered a room that was part futuristic ship’s galley and part homely rustic family kitchen, with its scarred wooden table
The room had a good vibe, and she liked it immediately. She smiled at the five people she saw waiting inside as she walked in. She recognized Trevor from earlier, but there were two more men and two more women who gave her some curious looks as she followed Jessica in.
“Okay everyone, get comfortable,” Jessica said, indicating that Amanda should find a place to sit.
She did, feeling watched as she moved around the table.
“So, you spoke with Tanis?” Trevor muttered to her as she passed.
“Yep, I did indeed,” she answered, and slid into her seat, noticing Cheeky very purposely sitting opposite her, with a hungry grin on her face.
“So, what’s going on?” Misha asked the group, glancing at Amanda as he spoke.
“Picking up more waifs and strays?” Usef muttered good-naturedly.
“I’m not a waif,” Jinx commented.
“Right,” Usef replied, his eyes twinkling as he looked from the AI to Amanda. “You’re a stray. She’s a waif.”
Cheeky’s eyes trailed down from Amanda’s face to her chest. “Not that waifish, if you ask me.”
“Cheeky, stop ogling our guest,” one of the other women said, and Amanda recognized Sabrina’s voice.
“Wait, are you the ship’s AI?” Amanda asked.
“Uh huh,” the woman nodded. “This is just a frame I use sometimes.”
“When it’s not being repaired after getting shot up,” Trevor chuckled as he settled onto a stool near the counter.
“Get your head blown off one time,” Sabrina muttered.
“Alright, guys, let’s focus. I want to properly introduce our new friend. This is Amanda, a friend of Tanis’s who needs our help,” Jessica said. “Though I don’t quite follow what with.”
Amanda noticed a more serious mood come over the group at the mention of Tanis’s name. The woman clearly commanded a lot of
respect from them.
“Amanda,” Jessica continued, “before you explain what the hell’s going on, let me introduce you to everyone. You’ve met Cheeky, Iris and Jinx. You’ve also met Trevor,” she said.
The mountain of a man waved and nodded at her from where he stood beside Jessica.
“And of course, Sabrina,” she said, pointing to an AI in a metallic frame. She had fins jutting from her body, like Jinx, but where Jinx had blue highlights, Sabrina’s were red and gold.
“Pleasure to have you aboard,” she said with a smile.
Jessica continued to point people out as she introduced them. “We also have our resident Marine, Usef, ship’s engineer, Amavia, and the cook, Misha.”
Usef touched two fingers to his brow in a salute, while Amavia and Misha nodded silently.
“Lovely to meet you all,” Amanda said. “I’m keen to chat with you, but first, let me tell you a little bit about where I’m from and what I’m doing here. As Jessica said, my name’s Amanda—Amanda-Jane Page. There’s no way to say this without it sounding crazy, so, I’ll just say it. I’m from a different universe.”
“The fuck?” Trevor asked, while Misha simply exclaimed, “What?”
“Universe? Different universe?” Amavia asked.
“Like, triple hot!” Cheeky added. “Does that make you an alien? I’ve always wanted to…uh…meet an alien.”
“You’ve heard of the multiverse theory?” Amanda asked. “Well, what can I say? It’s true. There are other universes out there. Possibly an infinite number. Some are probably almost identical to this one, and others will be so alien, they might be incomprehensible.
“I know that you’re probably thinking that this is crazy talk and impossible—something I would have said not all that long ago. But it was proven to me when an entity that lives between universes pulled me, Tanis, and several other individuals out of our worlds and into a construct that looked something like a saloon. We were unhurt, but coerced into telling stories, which is why Tanis talked about her and Cheeky meeting Maverick on the PetSil Mining platform.” She glanced at Cheeky, who winked at her.
Nearby, Iris made a sucking noise, which got her a frown from Cheeky.