Mercury Shrugs

by Robert Kroese

  “Then it’s settled,” said Red Mercury. “Balderhaz has to go through the portal to the Gray timeline to shut down the portal there.”

  “Whoohoo!” cried Balderhaz. “I can’t wait to get a look at the oscillation matrix on that baby!”

  “We don’t have time for you to satisfy your intellectual curiosity, Balderhaz,” said Blue Mercury. “We just need you to set the thing to self-destruct and come back here so we can open the portal to Heaven. Can you do that?”

  “Hmph,” Balderhaz grumbled. “You people come across a marvel of interplanar engineering and your first thought is to blow it up. I have half a mind just to stay in the Gray timeline.”

  “I’ll go with him,” said Blue Mercury.

  Burton frowned. “Can we trust him?”

  “He gets like this sometimes,” said Red Mercury. “He just needs adult supervision.” He turned to Blue Mercury. “Are you sure you want to do this? I can go.”

  “I’ve got it,” said Blue Mercury without looking at his counterpart. “Come on, Balderhaz, let’s go.”

  Balderhaz nodded. He took a step toward the portal and disappeared.

  Blue Mercury stepped up behind him, then paused to turn and look at Red Mercury. “In case I don’t make it back,” he said, “tell Christine… well, you know. Don’t fuck it up.”

  Red Mercury nodded as Blue Mercury took another step and vanished.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Somewhere deep inside the Machine, Lucifopolis, Gray Timeline; Luciprex IX, MMMMMMMXXVI

  Blue Mercury thought he was prepared for the transition to the Gray timeline, but he wasn’t. If anything, the air of oppressiveness was worse than he remembered.

  If you’ve never been to another plane, it’s hard to explain how it’s possible to just feel when something is off. It’s not the air, or the light, or the smells, or the scenery, although the perceptions of all those things are affected as well—it’s the energy of the place. There are those on the Mundane plane—mediums and ghost hunters and the like—who claim to be able to sense “bad energy,” and like most unverifiable assertions, those claims are mostly nonsense. Living things do, however, have an innate ability to sense and respond to interplanar energy, although this relationship is almost entirely on a subconscious level. Most people are no more aware of the interplanar energy that flows around them than a fish is aware of water. If you take a fish out of water, though, it will quickly deduce that something is very wrong.

  Something was very wrong on the Gray timeline.

  Blue Mercury and Balderhaz found themselves in a concrete building that resembled a parking garage, lit by strings of dim incandescent bulbs hanging from wiring that looked like it dated from the 1930s. The bulbs barely augmented the gray light filtering in through a series of grimy windows that lined the wall to their left. Through the windows they could make out a dingy gray-brown sky hanging over a desolate brown-gray plain. Several fires burned on the horizon, emitting plumes of black smoke that added to the haze. To their right, massive rusted steel pipes and other conduits of indeterminate composition or purpose ran from floor to ceiling and wall-to-wall. A deep rumbling sound could be heard somewhere beneath them, occasionally punctuated by the screech of metal or the chugging of some machine. The air was dank and smelled like burning garbage and mildew.

  “I think I’ve changed my mind about staying here,” said Balderhaz.

  “I hear you,” said Mercury. “Let’s blow this thing and go home.”

  “Where is the… oh.” Balderhaz turned to find something resembling a steamer trunk on its side behind him. A dinner plate sized dish was mounted on top of it, casting the ellipse-shaped portal on the ground. Other than the fact that it seemed to be made of wood, brass and other low-tech materials rather than stainless steel and plastic, and that its display was an ancient-looking monochrome monitor, it looked almost identical to the portal generator Balderhaz had built.

  “Cool,” said Blue Mercury. “It’s like the steampunk version of our portal generator.”

  Balderhaz nodded, regarding the device. “I have to admit,” he said, “Lucifer has style.” He traced a conduit from the base of the portal generator to a manifold on the floor from which protruded a great many other pipes and wires. “That’s the connection to the interplanar energy capacitor,” said Balderhaz. “You see how they’ve modulated the ambient flow with an array of superconductive coils? Somewhere they must have a hell of a condenser to get the temperature down to a level that would permit—”

  “Yeah, super-impressive,” said Blue Mercury. “Can you blow it up or not?”

  “I’m not sure I could keep this place from blowing up if I tried,” said Balderhaz, studying the mass of pipes. “The way this thing is designed… it’s a one shot deal. This facility has got to be the size of a small city, and the whole thing is a giant death trap. There are a hundred different things that could cause this thing to blow sky high.”

  “We just need one,” said Blue Mercury. “Whatever’s the quickest.”

  Balderhaz nodded. “If I reverse the polarity on the compressor override, the flux nebulizer should overheat, causing a chain reaction that’ll wipe this place off the map. No more portals from Gray timeline.”

  “Do it,” said Mercury.

  As he spoke, a door opened in the far wall, and a man burst through, holding a dark brown bottle that appeared to be half-empty. He was wearing the same sort of dingy, ill-fitting clothing Gray Mercury had been wearing, but on his head was a conical paper hat. He seemed completely oblivious to the presence of Blue Mercury and Balderhaz. He stumbled into the room, a young woman, similarly dressed, right behind him.

  “Wooooooo!” yelled the man. “We did it! He’s really gone!”

  “We’re free!” cried the woman. “The Machine worked! I only wish Granny were alive to see it.”

  The man nodded, suddenly somber. “Many people have died in the service of the Machine. But now it is done, and Lucifer is gone. We can honor the memory of our ancestors by living our—hey! Who are you?” The man had finally noticed the two visitors.

  “Hey there,” said Blue Mercury. “Don’t mind us. We’re just going to, um, blow up your life’s work.”

  The two looked at each other and shrugged. “Okay,” said the man.

  “You don’t mind?” asked Blue Mercury.

  “I never thought I would live this long,” said the woman, who couldn’t be over thirty.

  “None of us expected to see this day,” said the man. “And frankly, I think we all expected Lucifer to rig this place to blow up before he left. I guess he got distracted. We’re a little overwhelmed by the thought of actually having a life after the Machine.”

  “Well, you won’t if you don’t get out of here. How long till the place blows, Balderhaz?”

  “Fifteen minutes, give or take.”

  “Is there anyone else in this building?” Blue Mercury asked.

  “Just a few other technicians,” said the man. “Lucifer fired most of the workers when construction was finished. He only kept us around to finish programming the Machine.”

  “Get everyone out,” said Blue Mercury. “You’ve got less than fifteen minutes.”

  “How many minutes are in a lucifon?” asked the woman.

  “Uhhh…” said Blue Mercury. “How many lucifons are in a day?”

  “86,423,” said the man.

  “Okay,” said Blue Mercury. “That means…” He thought for a few seconds, doing the math in his head. “…you should probably just get everybody out of the building as fast as you can.”

  “Lucifer that,” said the man. “Come on, Lucifressa. Let’s get out of here!”

  “Last one out the building is a Mercury!” yelled the woman.

  The two ran out the door, giggling.

  “I fucking hate this place,” said Mercury. “Are you done yet?”

  “Almost,” said Balderhaz. “Just have to shut down the portal generator—”

  Blue Mercur
y frowned. “Is that safe? What if we get stranded here?”

  Balderhaz shrugged. “Should be no problem to reactivate it,” he said. “I have the coordinates.”

  “I know, but…”

  “You said to pick the fastest way to blow it up,” said Balderhaz. “This is it. I just have to shut it down for a second, reverse the polarity on the compressor override, and then flip it back on.”

  “Fine,” said Blue Mercury. “Do it. This place is creeping me out.”

  Balderhaz tapped a few keys and the portal winked out. He walked a few feet away, turned a valve 180 degrees, and then walked back to the keyboard. He tapped another series of commands and the portal reappeared. “See?” he said. “Easy.”

  “Let’s go,” said Blue Mercury. “If I never come here again, it’ll be too soon.”

  Blue Mercury stepped on the portal and was gone.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  The rubble of the BOX, just outside Elko, Nevada; April 29, 2017

  Something was wrong.

  Not wrong on the same level as the Gray timeline, but wrong nevertheless: the building was missing. More accurately, it seemed to be reduced to a large number of piles of smoking rubble. Blue Mercury looked around to see small fires burning in several places.

  “What the hell happened?” Blue Mercury said to Balderhaz, who had just materialized behind him. “It looks like a bomb went off.”

  “Uh-oh,” said Balderhaz. “I think maybe it did.”

  “How long were we gone? Five minutes? Why would the FBI blow up the building?”

  “To stop Lucifer from going back in time,” said Balderhaz.

  “Lucifer’s in custody. Along with all the other demons.”

  “Not on this timeline he’s not,” said Balderhaz. “Look.” He pointed at a tall, lean figure coming toward them in the dim light.

  “No,” said Blue Mercury, watching the tall man approach. “No, no, no.”

  “Hey there,” said the tall man, whose uncannily familiar face was now clearly visible in the flickering light of a nearby fire.

  “No, no, no, no, no,” said Blue Mercury. “No.”

  “What’s gotten into him?” asked the tall man, looking at Balderhaz.

  “You’re the third alternate version of himself he’s met today,” said Balderhaz.

  “I’m losing my mind,” said Blue Mercury. “Nothing makes any fucking sense anymore.”

  “So,” said the tall man. “Is he a future version of me? Am I a future version of him? What’s the deal?”

  Blue Mercury wandered off through the rubble, pounding himself on the forehead with his fist.

  “As far as I can tell,” said Balderhaz, “You’re parallel versions of each other. Let me ask you this: did I flip a quoin recently?”

  “Sure,” said the tall man. “To determine whether I should stop myself from going back in time or not.”

  “And what was the result?”

  “Weren’t you there?”

  “Yes and no,” said Balderhaz. “Humor me.”

  “Tails,” said the tall man. “So I didn’t interfere. I let myself go back in time. Then Special assfucking Agent fuckface Burton decided to bomb the building. He wrecked the portal generator, Lucifer got away, and I barely got this out of there in time.” He held up the shard. “Then you showed up.”

  “Amazing,” said Balderhaz, nodding slowly. “Let me ask you another question. What’s your favorite color, and don’t say red or blue.”

  “Uhhh… green, I guess?”

  “Good,” said Balderhaz. “You’re Green Mercury.”

  “Sweet!” cried Green Mercury. “Like the Hulk! So are you saying that he—” Green Mercury motioned toward Blue Mercury, who was still shuffling aimlessly through the rubble. “—is the heads version of me? The one who did interfere with himself going back in time?”

  Balderhaz shook his head. “No, that would be Red Mercury. He’s back on the Blue timeline.”

  “Why is Red Mercury on the Blue timeline?”

  “Causal anomaly,” said Balderhaz. “Do you have Tiamat’s miracle detector on you?”

  “Sure,” said Green Mercury. He removed the device from his pocket and handed it to Balderhaz. “What do you need it for?”

  “I should be able to use it as a WAWAW device,” said Balderhaz, tapping at the screen.

  “A wow-wow device?” Green Mercury asked.

  “WAWAW,” said Balderhaz. “Where And When Are We? Every place and time on every plane has a unique energy channel signature, like a fingerprint. By looking for minor variations in the energy channels, I should be able to pinpoint exactly where and when we are. Aha! Just as I thought. Wrong timeline.”

  “Wrong for you, you mean.”

  “Yes. It’s right for you, of course. Green Mercury on the Green timeline. We just ended up in the wrong universe.”

  “How did you get here?”

  “We had to go through a portal to the Gray timeline to shut down a portal generator there. I reopened the portal to return to the Blue timeline, but we were in a hurry so I truncated the coordinates to three decimal places. That level of precision should have been more than sufficient, but I forgot about the possibility of interference from a proximate timeline. Foolish error.”

  “You tuned to the wrong channel.”

  “Something like that,” said Balderhaz. “It’s fine, though. Just forget we were ever here. We’ll go back to the Gray timeline, fix the coordinates, and then return to the Blue timeline. Mercury!”

  Blue Mercury turned to look at Balderhaz, half in a daze.

  “Time to go!”

  Blue Mercury nodded and shuffled back toward Balderhaz, rubbing his scalp with his hand.

  “Hold on,” said Green Mercury, rubbing his chin. “Maybe there’s a reason you’re here.”

  “Yes,” said Balderhaz. “Imprecise coordinates and proximal timeline interference.”

  “No, I mean… what happened to Lucifer on your timeline? The Blue timeline?”

  Balderhaz shrugged. “Red and Blue Mercurys stopped him from going back in time. The police have him now.”

  “Ah, you see?” said Green Mercury excitedly. “You stopped him on your timeline, but I failed on mine. And since Burton blew up the portal generator, I have no way of going after him. But you have a perfectly good portal generator on your timeline!”

  Balderhaz scowled. “You want us to bring our portal generator to this timeline so you can go back in time and stop your Lucifer?”

  “Exactly!” cried Green Mercury.

  “No,” said Blue Mercury. “No, no, no. We need that portal generator to transport Lucifer and the others to Heaven.”

  “You can have it back,” said Green Mercury. “I just need it for a minute.”

  “I don’t like it,” said Balderhaz. “Once you start borrowing problems from other timelines, there’s no end to it.”

  “Easy for you to say,” said Green Mercury. “You happened to be on the timeline where everything worked out.”

  “Oh yeah,” said Blue Mercury sardonically. “Everything’s fan-fucking-tastic over on Blue timeline.”

  “Don’t be a dick,” said Green Mercury. “Just let me borrow your portal generator for one minute. You know I’d do it for you.”

  Blue Mercury groaned, still rubbing his scalp with his hand. “Balderhaz, how much time do we have on the Gray portal generator’s self-destruct clock?”

  “About ten minutes.”

  “Can you stop it?”

  “Sure,” said Balderhaz. “By blowing up the building.”

  “That would rather defeat the purpose,” said Blue Mercury.

  “You rigged your portal generator to blow up?” asked Green Mercury.

  “Not our portal generator,” said Balderhaz. “The one Gray Lucifer built. We didn’t think we were going to go back there.”

  Blue Mercury sighed. “So,” he said, “the question is: do we have time to return to Gray, reset the Gray portal generator with t
he Blue coordinates, take the portal from Gray to Blue, grab the Blue portal generator, take the portal back to Gray, reset the Gray portal generator coordinates to Green, bring the portal generator here, reset the coordinates to caveman times so Green Mercury can go back and stop Lucifer, drag the Blue portal generator back to Gray, reset the Gray portal generator coordinates to Blue, and take the Blue portal generator back to Blue before Gray blows?”

  “I don’t see why not,” said Balderhaz. “But I still object on philosophical grounds.”

  “You should have objected before you split the universe in two,” said Green Mercury.

  “Fair enough,” said Balderhaz, with a shrug.

  “Why did I ever get involved with this crap?” Blue Mercury said. “I was perfectly happy building Twinkie ziggurats. Okay, if we’re going to do this, let’s do it. Everybody ready?”

  Balderhaz and Green Mercury nodded.

  “Time for some advanced timeline-hopping,” said Blue Mercury. “Balderhaz, you first.”

  Balderhaz took a deep breath, stepped onto the portal and disappeared.

  Blue Mercury turned to Green Mercury. “You’d better hope you don’t screw up our universe as well as yours,” he said.

  “Man, I can see why they call you Blue Mercury,” said Green Mercury. “You’re a real downer.”

  “Just get on the portal.”

  Green Mercury took a step onto the portal and disappeared. Blue Mercury sighed and followed.

  Once they were back on the Gray timeline, Balderhaz shut down the portal and began tapping at keys. After a minute or so, Blue Mercury began to get nervous. “What’s taking so long?” he asked. “If that thing explodes while we’re here, we’re going to be blown apart and be stuck in the worst place ever, and yes, before you ask, I’m including Chuck E. Cheese.”

  “Your chattering isn’t going to help,” said Balderhaz. “This is the most difficult part. Once I get these coordinates entered, the rest is cake. Relatively speaking.”

  Blue Mercury bit his tongue while Balderhaz finished entering the sequence. Once again, the portal appeared on the ground in front of them.

  “Okay,” said Blue Mercury, “Everybody through.”