“Good idea,” said Dr. Scopes. The two farmers nodded as well.
“I’ll be back soon.” Dr. Khatri set off across the fields, just as dawn was beginning to peek over the horizon.
49
STATION LIMINUS
The Klapprothi child appeared in Duna’s sleeping chambers unannounced.
Duna bolted upright in their cumulo-bunk. “Virri?” they said groggily. They reached for their lynk and checked the time. “It’s so early. What’s going on? Is everything okay?” They sat up and rubbed their tired eyes. They had been up late, worrying over the possibility that a member of the MAC might have tried to incinerate the Earthlings. Why would a council member, or members, want the cadets dead?
Virri crossed the room and placed a small, round pearl in Duna’s palm. She curled their fingers around it tightly, hoping to convey the importance of it, the need for it to be kept safe.
“What is it?” Duna asked, inspecting the pearl carefully, holding it up to the light. It was warm to the touch. Its surface swirled as it hummed with energy.
Virri touched a finger to her heart, then her lips, then she touched the sensory port on the side of her head.
Duna had never seen a Klapprothi pearl in real life, but they remembered from their history books that they were known to contain great multitudes of information. Entire epics could be compressed and layered within the lustrous spheres. For centuries, the people of Klapproth used pearls as storytelling devices, as a way to pass on information from one generation to the next, to communicate across space and time, to capture memories in the form of gems and preserve them. In the days before her dimension’s interdiction, Queen Eryna had often attended MAC meetings with an impressive strand looped around her neck. She had said wearing the necklace was like carrying the history of her people with her at all times.
Duna looked down at the object in their palm. Pearl-making was believed to be a lost art form, replaced by newer, sleeker technology like lynks, hyperdrives, and gamma-radios. But here was a real pearl, right in the palm of their hand.
“Is this … a message of some sort?” Duna asked. “Something I need to listen to?” They tapped their ear to show what they meant.
Virri nodded excitedly. The Earthling’s music had successfully activated Dim14’s triskaidecagon, allowing Virri to send a sonic message back to Klapproth. In return, Queen Eryna had transmitted a single granular note, which crystallized deep within Virri’s chest. She had spent the past several hours crafting the pearl, unraveling the message encoded within the grain of sand, and building upon it, wrapping it in layers of mucus, which hardened into a durable, beautiful shell. Virri looked at Duna earnestly. She did not have Tessa to help make her understood, but she tried to convey to them the seriousness of her request.
Duna nodded solemnly. They clutched the pearl. The humming grew more intense, but whatever story was contained within it wasn’t audible to their frilled Mertanyan ears. They would need to find something to amplify or decode the message.
Duna looked at Virri. “Thank you for trusting me with this. I will see what can be done.”
50
EARTH
Just as Dr. Khatri pulled into the Gwen Research Center parking lot, his phone rang.
“Mayor Hawthorne! I’m so glad you called. There’s been an encouraging development …”
“Yes,” she said breathlessly. “I have something exciting to tell you as well. We received a message from Tessa.”
Dr. Khatri stopped in his tracks. “Tessa? I thought it was Zoey?”
“Long story. They’re identical twins and they switched places for the day. The important thing is that we’ve established a line of communication.”
“ Really? How?” Dr. Khatri’s voice hitched in his throat.
“After an unfortunate hacking incident during my last campaign, I gave my girls eChron watches that operate over a secure network. Somehow, Zoey is able to send and receive texts between Earth and this other dimension. There seems to be a delay between messages, but at least we’re getting through. And you’ll be glad to know that the kids are all safe.”
“Oh, thank goodness.” He blinked away tears. “Tell Dev I love him. Tell him this …” Dr. Khatri proceeded to dictate an entire text message, and then quickly explained his discovery of the portal at the dairy farm. “Valerie, why don’t you and your daughter meet me at the MegaAg field? I am gathering some materials from NASA now, but then I’m heading right back to the field. We can work on a new plan together and keep in touch with the kids through Zoey’s watch.”
“Absolutely,” she said. “We’ll be there soon.”
51
STATION LIMINUS
The cadets awoke as simulated sunlight broke through the clouds in their rooms. Someone knocked insistently on the door to their suite. Tessa stumbled out of bed and opened the door, expecting to see Duna. Instead, Shro loomed large, his sinewy jaw pulled into a grin.
“Good morning,” he said, swooping past Tessa and entering the suite uninvited. He held a black box tied with a delicate white ribbon. “I brought breakfast. Pastries fresh from the commissary.” He placed the box on the dining table and looked around. He spotted the broken radio. “What do we have here? An arts and crafts project?”
“Oh, it’s nothing. Just a tuner for our instruments,” Maeve lied, shifting into performance mode, brushing aside the charred electronics.
The other cadets slowly shuffled out of their cloud bunks, sleepy-eyed, still wearing their matching pajamas.
Shro eyed them warily. “You’d better hurry and get dressed. The entire council is assembling as we speak.”
“I thought we’d only be performing for you and Ignatia, and maybe a few lab technicians?” Dev said.
Shro snorted. “On the contrary. Every delegate in the Multiverse Allied Council is keen to witness your musical abilities.” His gray eyes grew cool. “They want to see what all the fuss is about.”
“Good. We can’t wait. We love a challenge,” said Lewis, puffing up his chest. He felt confident after their practice session last night and their teamwork building the radio. Which hadn’t actually worked, but still, it was the effort and collaboration that counted, right? Plus, it eventually led to something good.
Shro nodded. “Very well. A Station guide will arrive in forty-five minutes to escort you to the auditory lab. Make haste. The council’s time is precious and its members do not like to be kept waiting.”
“We’ll be ready,” said Maeve, opening the door, eager for Shro to leave.
He strode across the room, his curved back rippling beneath his leather jacket. He glanced back at the box of pastries. “Do be sure to eat something. You’ll need energy for your big performance. It would be such a shame if it didn’t go well.”
As soon as he left, the kids showered and dressed as fast as they could. Tessa pulled on a copper-and-ivory tunic and a pair of matching leggings that she found hanging in her room’s closet. She laced up stylish yet sensible boots, happy to see that they fit perfectly. She did a little twirl in front of her mirror and caught a glimpse of her watch on the bedside table. She slipped it on and tightened the strap. A moment later, it vibrated.
“A message came through the eChron!” she shouted.
The others gathered around, wearing variations of the Station-issued copper-and-ivory attire. They peered at the watch’s glassy face, eager for news from home.
“There’s definitely a delay between sending and receiving info,” Dev said, looking at the time stamps. “But that’s better than nothing.” He was elated and relieved that they could communicate with Earth using the watch.
A chain of texts flooded the smartwatch’s screen:
Geez. It’s about time you texted me back!
I thought you were totally ghosting me. Jerk.
Anyway, I’m glad you’re okay.
Say hi to my friends. I’m glad they’re okay, too.
I showed Mom and Dad your message.
Mom burst into tears.
Then she finally confessed that
you’re not doing a sleep study after all.
Surprise, surprise—NOT!
…
Uh-oh.
Bad news: Mom has lost her dang mind!
Seriously.
She said you were stuck in some other dimension!
Yeah, okaaaaay, Mayor Cray-Cray.
LOLOLOL
…
Um, wait, what?
Your other messages are just
downloading now …
…
Hold up—
YOU’RE ACTUALLY IN ANOTHER
DIMENSION?!?!?!?
WITHOUT ME?!?!?!
OMG. The FOMO struggle is real
*crying face emoji*
If you’re not already dead, I’m going to kill you.
JK. Sort of.
…
So, YAY. No one is actually crazy and no one is actually dead (yet).
Big news: Mom talked to Dev’s dad.
He’s all excited that you guys are alive and able to send messages to me.
He said, and I quote:
“Tell Dev-i-doodle that his father loves him to infinity, but not beyond because infinity goes on forever-ever-ever-ever-ever …”
You get the idea.
Tessa looked at Dev. His face was bright red, but for once he wasn’t embarrassed, just grateful. They kept reading.
Anyway, Mom’s all excited because Dev’s dad found a portal.
Not the thing you guys broke (you’re in BIG trouble for that, btw)
There’s another one, out in some field.
Yo? Are you getting my messages, or not?
…
I repeat: Dr. Khatri found a portal!
*happy dance*
He and his coworker think they can use it to bring you home.
But it’s dangerous.
They need to run some tests.
Mom’s taking me with her to check it out.
She says we need to stay in constant contact.
So, text me back!
Hellooooo?
…
FYI Mom called me a “critical link” (in case you were starting to feel like the more special twin)
…
Oh! And tell Isaiah I have his
Journal of Strange Occurrences.
Benni gave it to me. Isaiah left it on the bus.
…
I’ll message you as soon as I know more.
Stay tuned …
52
STATION LIMINUS
“Well, that’s encouraging,” said Lewis, once they’d finished reading the messages. “Now all we need to do is play some sweet tunes, get those councilors boogying, and convince them not to blast us into space.”
“Right. We just have to buy enough time for my dad to stabilize the portal,” Dev said.
“Then we can go home and tell everyone that planet Earth is about to self-destruct. Yippee,” Lewis deadpanned.
“Yeah, I’m not looking forward to that conversation.” Isaiah grimaced. “It’s so … doomy.”
“It’ll be okay. The grown-ups will know what to do,” Dev said. “All we need to worry about now is our music.”
“That should be easy enough,” Maeve said. She turned around. “Wait. Where are our instruments?”
They looked in each room of the suite. “I could have sworn we left them right here before going to sleep …”
They searched high and low, but the instruments were nowhere to be found.
“Aw, man.” Lewis flopped on the couch. “Without our instruments, we are so dead. Like super dead. The deadest.”
“Stop it. We’ll improvise if we have to.” Maeve took a deep breath and put on her best game face.
“Improvise with what?” Dev asked. “We can’t all sing like Zoey, er, I mean Tessa.”
Tessa was busy rummaging through her closet. She was looking for the instruments, and also some accessories to jazz up her outfit.
“Do you think someone stole the instruments?” Dev said.
“Impossible. I made sure to lock the door before we went to bed,” Maeve said, pointing to the deadbolt on the suite’s main entry.
Isaiah’s face flushed. “Uh-oh.”
“What?” Maeve asked, glaring at him.
He swallowed the lump in his throat. “I sort of left the suite last night.”
“You what?”
“I couldn’t sleep. I went for a walk, just to clear my head.”
“Did you lock the door behind you?”
Isaiah shook his head guiltily. “No.”
Maeve’s hands balled into fists, but she kept her voice calm. “Were the instruments here when you got back?”
Isaiah blinked. “I don’t know. I was so tired by then. I fell right asleep.”
“Great. Just great!” She planted her hands on her hips and shook her head.
The wall beside them rattled. Lewis jumped back. The ventilation grate opened and Virri appeared.
“Did you take the instruments?” Tessa asked, running to the child.
Virri grabbed Tessa’s hand and tugged her toward the vent. “I think she wants us to follow her. Maybe she knows where they are!”
“She wants us to crawl in there again?” Isaiah asked, eyeing the narrow metal shaft. He hadn’t exactly enjoyed their underfloor expedition the night before.
“Do you have a better plan?” Maeve asked.
They all looked at one another blankly.
“ Didn’t think so. Let’s go.”
The cadets wove through the winding ductwork on their hands and knees, following Virri in the darkness.
“For the record, I am very claustrophobic. I hope you all recognize the sacrifice I am making for you right now,” Tessa said.
“Much appreciated,” Maeve replied, rolling her eyes.
Up ahead, Virri slowed, pausing to feel for sound vibrations that would hopefully lead them in the right direction. She turned left, then doubled back.
“We’re supposed to perform for the council in half an hour, and we’re wandering around aimlessly,” Isaiah said.
“I’m sure Virri knows where she’s going,” Tessa said, hoping it was true.
A strange smell wafted through the ducts.
“Come on, Wynner!” Maeve groaned, pinching her nose. “Rude, rude, rude!”
“Seriously, dude,” Dev said, waving his hand in front of his face. “We are in close quarters here!”
“What? It wasn’t me!”
“Sure it wasn’t.” Maeve coughed. The stench was becoming more pungent by the minute.
“Hey, whoever smelt it dealt it,” Lewis rebuked.
“Um, actually … I think she dealt it.” Tessa stopped and gazed down through a large ceiling grate.
Below, the mighty colossadon roared, standing atop a gigantic pile of dung.
Virri trembled, her glacial blue eyes wide. She tucked herself into her shell.
“Why did Virri lead us directly above the Menagerie?” Dev whispered, peering through the open louvers at the beast below.
According to Duna, the colossadon was one of the Menagerie’s most impressive specimens. Weighing several thousand pounds, it looked like a mix between a T. rex, a saber-tooth tiger, and a great white landshark. Its jaw flashed with thousands of razor-sharp teeth; its yellow eyes glowed. Its claws—prized by big-game hunters and traders—slashed through the enclosure’s leafy underbrush like machetes. Duna had told them that colossadons were the ultimate apex predators. This particular one had allegedly eaten all the other colossadons in its home range on Jelingor, making it exceedingly rare and undeniably terrifying. Ignatia had convinced the council to keep this specimen in captivity at the Station to study it and protect it from poachers who would otherwise kill it for its valuable claws.
“Let’s keep moving. Fluffy here doesn’t seem to like our company,” Lewis said, inching forward.
The colossadon’s nostrils flared a
nd its pupils dilated. It circled and charged the triple-thick transparent plastene wall of its enclosure. The kids flattened themselves on the bottom of the metal duct to keep from tumbling around and falling through the grate.
“Why does she keep ramming that wall?” Dev asked, watching the creature’s strange behavior.
“Maybe she’s trying to shake us out from the ceiling so she can eat us?”
“Not helpful, Isaiah,” Maeve hissed.
The colossadon rammed the wall again, howling a mournful, bone-chattering call.
Virri crept toward another enclosure, with Tessa and the others following behind. Maeve looked down. “Wait a minute. Is that … a cow?”
“Looks like it,” Dev said, leaning over to get a better view. “Duna said a black-and-white quadruped stumbled through a Gate recently. Maybe this is the same creature?”
Maeve squinted. “Wait. Do you see that? Look!” She pointed to a tag attached to the cow’s ear. It was hard to see from up so high, but she could make out the letters MM. “Oh. My. Gosh.”
“What?” the others asked.
“That cow is from Miss Mary’s Dairy. The farm next to our old place.” Maeve’s chest tightened. She shut her eyes, holding back tears. The fact that a single cow could potentially reduce her to a blubbering mess was disconcerting. Especially when there were more important things on the line.
“You okay?” Tessa asked, touching Maeve on the arm.
“Yeah, it’s just … that cow brings back memories, that’s all. I haven’t really been missing home that much since we got here, but I miss that version of home.”
The cow mooed.
“I miss our farm. I miss that life.” Maeve sighed. “You know, Gramps and I used to help Ray and Mary during calving season at the dairy. I might have even helped bring that ol’ gal into the world. Isn’t that wild?” she said, looking at her fellow cadets, then down at the cow again. She moved across the duct.
“Maeve? What are you doing?” Dev asked.
“I just want to get a better look.” Truthfully, she wanted to pet the cow, to nuzzle her, to smell her grassy sweetness. But that was crazy.
Mission Multiverse Page 20