by Pam Uphoff
Eldon grinned. "I'm twenty-seven already, and I'll be young forever." He turned back around and continued down the street. The big black car turned the corner and matched his pace.
"You are at the most, eighteen. I'd kill for your energy, not to mention my eighteen year old complexion."
He looked at her thoughtfully. "Killing won't get you what you want. How about a million dollars, instead?"
She snorted. "If you could do it, I'd pay."
Eldon fished his two wine bottles out of his bubble. They were the one thing, well, two things, he always had with him. In case he had to bolt. "Gotta wine glass? Drink these, and if you like the result, meet me here in one month with a check for a million dollars." He dodged around a light pole and some newspaper machines, and she held out a wine glass. He poured, grinning as they kept moving. "See you in a month. Bring your friends."
He stowed his wine and watched the car speed away. If she'd drink it, if she was good for the money, if she brought a friend or two . . . could be an easy way to get filthy rich.
***
The kids were back the next day. Armed and dangerous. With sleeping bags. Girlfriends armed with cookware. Or in Shane's case, quite obviously a sister.
"Don't you have to go to school tomorrow?" Eldon looked them over carefully. "I'm going to assume you all know how to use those weapons, despite not noticing that birdie getting hit."
Coltrain scowled. "That's why I've got this." He patted something that Eldon tended to associate with military movies.
"We're college students, we can skip classes if we want to." Shane gazed wistfully at the weapon.
Eldon blinked at Coltrain's nod. He'd figured they were the notorious inner city gangs they talked about in the papers. Although the shop was a bit outside the really rough areas, and not that far from the University and cheap student housing, now that he thought about it.
Eldon shook his head. "Well, don't get lost." He ducked through the Gate and crawled out from under it. Vultures and things that looked like oversized weasels scattered from the remains of the bird. Nothing large in sight, again. He tipped the gate up.
"Have fun scouting around. I'm going to build some sort of building around the gate."
The kids moved off, the women both repulsed by the gory, and slightly stinky remains and partly fascinated by the alien animal.
Eldon ran a quick head count. Seven guys, four gals. Then he scowled at the gate. He just wasn't as good at rock stuff as, well, any witch half his age. But he wasn't helpless. In fits and starts he cleared the ground, found rock about six feet down. He eyed it with disfavor. Molding solid rock would deepen the pit as the walls rose. He kicked a rodent that came to investigate. "What I need is a rock outcrop, so I can bring all the rock down here."
The ground rose to the east, past the woods, so he headed that direction.
He spotted the kids up on a bare hill top, and veered aside to leave them to their little adventure. He spotted a more ragged-looking hill, and found his outcrop. Slice was such a satisfying spell. Such clear results. He trimmed off the weathered limestone, and started cutting two foot thick slabs.
"Are you teleporting them to the Gate?" Shane had walked up behind him again.
"Nah, just scooping them into a bubble. Then I can take them all down to the Gate and pull them out one by one, and fuse them together."
"Can we learn how to do that, or do you have to be born magic?" One of the other dark pack kids edged around and studied the scooped out rock.
"Well, see, it's genetic. My ancestors were engineered to be this way. I suppose I could give you some of the magic genes, but since you didn't grow up with them, I dunno if you can ever learn how to use them." Eldon eyed them thoughtfully. "You're pretty young, I don't suppose it would hurt to try it. I'll make up a potion when I'm done with this." He got back to work, and gradually the kids wandered off. Just as well. Some of them were curvy enough to be interesting, and he really didn't want to find out how Coltrain would react to him stealing his girlfriend. Or Shane his sister, for that matter.
He took the outcrop down to ten feet below ground level, then walked back to the gate. "It would improve the atmosphere if you guys would drag that thing off a couple hundred feet." They'd been so busy poking it, they hadn't heard him coming.
"Wow, you walk pretty quietly." Shane's sister eyed him in a clinical fashion. Definitely too young.
"So do stalking animals. You lot should think about sentries." Eldon turned his bubble around and slid out his first slab. Fused it to the ground. He got a five foot wall and a temporary roof done, pulling the gate down to the bedrock so it was safe, before he quit for the day. The kids followed him, after he promised to give them free access to the gate.
He crawled home and collapsed. He hadn't worked that hard in years. In fact gold mining was slower and easier. Maybe he should go back. After the Superbowl.
In the morning, a search of the potions he'd picked up from Rior and Aunt Susto gave him a good starting point for creating wizard potions. He had the potions for the three power genes, but what about the rest? A hundred and five other engineered genes, and he had no idea which were necessary for magic.
Well. He could start with longevity, and something from Susto that claimed to be "good health". He could reinforce their natural hair, eye and skin colors. Or change them if they wanted. Intelligence. Hmm. He took a sip of that one. Just in case it might work on an adult. Pity I didn't get any when I was a kid. I could be a nice honest wizard today. Probably bored to tears. Married, six brats. Unfortunately it didn't sound too bad.
He pulled out eleven empty bottles, and started mixing.
Heso came along to see his gate. The kids eyed him carefully, then trooped through as Eldon opened a doorway out of his stone room.
"All right you lot. I mixed up some customized magic potions for you this morning. It won't change your hair, skin or eye color. If you want to change, tell me and I'll work something up. I don't even know what most of your names are. Here. Shane's sister. Miss Goldenhair. Nosey."
After he'd thumped Nosey, he explained that there was nothing wrong with a big nose, and what was his name? Ice? "Right. Now stop being so sensitive, only girls are sensitive. Here's yours. Coltrain. Pimples. Sorry, what's your name? Right. Jeff."
They all looked scared, and eyed the bottles. Eldon grabbed his bubble and started removing his low ceiling. His next tier of five foot tall slabs completed, he started on a floor. Heso levitated thinner slabs while he fused them to the walls and then to each other. He left a hole for stairs and started the next row of wall. Basement with gate. Three floors. Flat topped roof with stairs, for a lookout post They all bugged him until he put up a half wall with crenellations. And arrow slit windows on all three levels.
Then the kids informed him that there was a river fives miles away, and his location was lousy. He huffed a bit, then drilled a hole down through the sediments . . . six feet to solid limestone . . . but another hundred feet down he found a sandstone full of water and with a spell to induce movement, had running water in what might be his kitchen and privy sometime in the future.
The kids spent a week puking sick from drinking the river water. He never heard what their parents thought about it. He just gave them all keys to the shop so they could come and go at will.
***
"No incense? What kind of magic store doesn't have incense?"
Eldon slowed his steps as he approached the door of the Magic Potions. The high clear voice had sounded female and young.
"We specialize in magic charms and potions." Heso sounded breathless. She must be pretty.
"Well, what books do you have?"
"We don't sell books, that's around the corner, we're just renting the back room."
"I know that. I'm curious about what system of magic you use. Or pretend to use."
"Pretty much straight Comet Fall wizardry for me. Eldon is better at the potions than I am. He's a mage too, and I think he's added a few thing
here and there, some on purpose."
She snorted. "So, you could get rid of my freckles?"
"You don't want to do that! Your freckles are marvelous. I mean, attractive. I mean, why would you want to change yourself?"
Eldon grinned and leaned against the wall to listen. Heso sounds like she's knocked him for a complete loop, with that Texas accent . . . Wait, Heso didn't actually call Julia the Bouncy Castle Girl from Texas, did he! Dammit. I've been kind of enjoying this World. Now the police are going to . . . make it necessary to leave.
"Well, if you’re going to sell potions as if major changes are no more important than a better haircut, you ought to be used to it. Let's see. You can cure acne, baldness, graying? You've got to be kidding. No one will fall for that. I suppose your weight loss potions are no more harmful than any other junk people sell. Improve your eyesight? Heh. What's in your 'general base' up there?"
"Oh, umm, general healing, rejuvenation, libido, fertility, long life, strong immune system, anti cancer. Then we add special stuff. Whatever the customer wants. Most of them figure that's enough right there. Except the bald guys and the fatties."
"And them you charge extra."
"Would you like a sample? Maybe with some power genes? A bit of this and that will really rev up your Spring Rites, or whatever." There was a clinking of glass.
"I really don't think . . . I mean . . . "
Eldon grinned. You mean you and your sister and buddies snuck in and sampled everything, back in Houston? Didn’t I tell Heso about that?
"No, on the house. It's really good wine, by the way. Let's see, add a bit of witch and wizard, that's a nice strong combination. I've been thinking about adding a bit of mage, myself. Umm, a few extras to boost your magical ability . . . "
Eldon thought at him. :: Intelligence, Memory. Add her natural hair and eye colors.::
:: Mine! Go away!::
:: I don't poach. :: Mostly . . .
:: Then stop eavesdropping.::
Eldon wandered away, still grinning, and walked down to an ice cream shop.
"You keep eating like that you're going to get fat. Again."
"I've got a potion for that." He told Shane's sister. "I suppose you lot are off to try and get yourselves killed. Again?"
She sniffed. "Coltrain's killed two more of those bird things. Did you see the humongous thing, a baluchi–something, I looked it up. It's, like, Miocene, fifteen or twenty million years ago. So we're time traveling."
"Nah. It's just a different World, where the time runs much slower than here. My World's even faster. So we had genetic engineering. And time to sort of evolve into it."
"How much time? Relative to here, I mean?"
"About a thousand years."
"That's not enough time for evolution."
"It is if you've got a whole bunch of new genes and a small, isolated breeding population. See, the people that made my ancestors freaked out over the magic stuff, and exiled us to another World. Then they had a nuclear war, maybe three, depends on how you count them, and they lost a lot of tech. They just rediscovered dimensional travel a couple hundred years ago."
"Huh. I wouldn't believe a word of it, if it weren't for the gate. Triple chocolate, please. How come you're not at the shop?"
"Ah, Heso's trying to charm a lady there, and I figured I'd stay away. Not fair to the poor guy, to have to compete with me."
She snickered and traded the lady money for her cone. "Riiight. All this and modesty too. So, why did you make the gate? Why to there?"
"Well, I've never made one before. I was experimenting, and that just happened to be the World it went to. I suppose I'll open another one, sometime. Gotta try and figure out how to steer them, you know?"
"Sounds sensible, but isn't it going to crowd your shop a bit? Or do they overlap?"
"Naw, they repel each other. I've got to get about a hundred feet away. So I'll practice from the other side."
She looked out the door. "Well, here's everyone. Hope your buddy's lady friend can handle the shock."
The shop was empty, and they all jumped through the gate. By the sound of it, Heso had Julia upstairs. The kids grabbed their packs and guns from the hooks on the basement wall and headed straight off for the river. They were chattering about hunting, a bonfire and tanning hides. He was pleased to see a reasonable number of them looking around. Maybe they'd all survive, despite the nasty predators out there.
He returned to the shop and kicked back to catch the pre-game sports show. He'd close-up the shop and head home before the kickoff.
Chapter Eleven
The Helios think they’ll miss . . .
One World, Paris
12 Ramadan 1404 yp
Director of External Relations Ajki Withione Black Point eyed his small audience. "I'm pleased to report that the listening post we set up with assistance from Disco, has already paid off. One of my agents got a listening device into a conference room where their head scientist told their head of Government—ArcHelaos Nikostratos— they would have a close encounter with the Monster World and then with 'the world with the tribes of hunter-gatherers' and that unfortunately they were probably going to miss 'the high tech world.' We're monitoring constantly."
Ajki had flashed a couple of stills on the screen as he spoke. Nikostratos, so they had a good look at the enemy's leader. The Helaos scientists' graphic representation of their path—superimposed circles, with English labels added. The big circle for the limits of what they considered their possible path, the smaller circles that apparently represented the "can merge with" and "will hit" regions of the worlds ahead. The One World's "hit" zone was completely out of the probable path of Helios. The "can merge" still overlapped a bit.
"Their circle of the limits of what they can merge with is considerably smaller than Q’s cone. So we're pretty safe, and now we know for certain that it is possible to get so close that massive disruptions occur. Earthquakes, volcanic activity and so forth. We gather that they've had numerous hits, without merging, but with their equipment working they can merge even when the other world is more distant. Spontaneous merges . . . we don't know. But these ‘hits’ apparently don’t result in merges."
Ajha cleared his throat. “They did speak, once about how their world had slowed, and the next merge might be their last . . . if they thought it would be a spontaneous merge, that might explain their haste. They might be trying to control the speed of the merge, and thus what they merge with.”
Thoughtful silence for a moment, then Director Ajki flipped over a metal wafer.
“This is Q’s model of the Miniverse tumbling. As you see, it’s coming, umm, in-phase, so-to-speak. There may be solar effects—likewise the other four stars, but those will be at a distance.” Ajki sighed. “Once this is all declassified, half the astrophysicists in the Empire are going to want to see it. Study it.”
He flipped back to Q's first model.
"So, in summary, the Helaos’ scientists' measurements agree with Q's. The close encounter increased the probability that it will hit our world. But by our calculations, Q's efforts during the encounter deflected Helios by a few degrees. So our probability had less of an increase than it would have had without her work.
"We'll be monitoring the Helaos and following their updates as well."
"So, to look at Dr. Quicksilver's steering project . . . Q laid in hundreds of gates to this more distant Paleogene World to divert Helios further from the One and closer to the Dinosaur World. As Helios gets closer to the Dinosaur World she'll add hundreds of gates between Helios and the Dinosaur world. Even if the Helaos decline to merge with it, the close pass should deflect Helios well away from the One World."
Most of the people in the room were his experts, here to give details of their research and reports, if needed. "Questions, sir?"
The rest of the people consisted of the President of the Empire, the Prime Councilor, and the closest advisors of each.
The President was the first to speak.
"I am delighted to hear this. None-the-less, as a hostile dimensionally able civilization, it behooves us to keep a close watch on them. I'm funding the completion and expansion of your current spy post, and authorizing another to pre-stage a large army. In case we need to either destroy or capture their merge centers. We'll work with Disco and . . . hopefully not need the army. But one way or another, when it's over I want their dimensional abilities destroyed. They've killed billions without remorse."
The Prime Councilor nodded. "Six weeks until the Dinosaur encounter, then, just two weeks until the Primitive World encounter. If the Helaos decide to merge with them . . . One help the Natives if Disco can't move them."
Chapter Twelve
How to throw a party
Some Earth, Tunguska Cluster
21 October 2017
Eldon slouched around to the block where he'd poured wine for an old lady a month earlier.
The big black car was parked and waiting for him. The window rolled down. The middle aged lady studied him. And finally handed out a slip of paper. "Half. Because I don't look eighteen. Can you make me look even younger?"
He handed over a card with the magic shop's address on it. "I can. I don't have what I need with me."
She eyed the card, and looked in her mirror. "I still don't believe it. All my friends are envious of my very good face lift. Who are you?"
"Someone who knows that this stuff can never be licensed. Someone who would go to jail if the ingredients were known. If you want your young looks, don't tell the authorities." Eldon stepped away, and the car drove off.
The bank teller had a hard time not choking over the amount of the check.
Eldon opened the door of the magic shop, set out the sign and kicked back to watch a really great gory movie while waiting in vain for customers.