by Sarah Dreher
That wasn’t good enough. Not good enough at…
Gwen leaned over to the window and looked down. “We’re here, folks.”
Walt Disney World lay below them, glistening in the sun. There were the turrets of Cinderella’s Castle, and Spaceship Earth, and the monorail, and the Contemporary, and...
Something was wrong.
Stoner rummaged through her memory and retrieved it. It had been dark when they’d left. The deep of night. And even if they had moved through Real Time, it would only be dawn now. Not high noon. And that wasn’t all. Everything below them was too bright, too colorful, too vivid. Like… like a cartoon.
Of course it looks like a cartoon. This is Walt Disney World. And it could be daytime. You don’t really know how long you’ve been gone. And those certainly look like real people scampering about down there. Don’t they?
“Where would you like to land?” Gwen asked. “I’m open to suggestions.”
“We should probably get as close as possible to Mexico,” Aunt Hermione said. “That’s our nearest landmark. Can you handle it?”
“No problem,” Gwen said. “I haven’t watched all those reruns of Star Trek for nothing. I can certainly land a shuttle.” She touched a flashing box on the computer console. The vehicle seemed to slow, and slid toward the ground.
“This is quite a ride,” Marylou said. “Every kid in the park is going to be whining to go on it. By the way, we didn’t find out where we drop off the car.”
“There’s a button here marked ‘Return.’ It probably sends it back to where it came from.”
“Back to the barn on its own, just as horses used to do, before the automobile,” Aunt Hermione mused. “Comforting to think progress has come such a long way.”
The ground was moving toward them at a steady clip. A fast, steady clip. Spaceship Earth loomed in front of them, a wall of aluminum panels reflecting sky and trees and water.
We’re going to crash, Stoner thought wildly. “Gwen, turn!”
Gwen held up her hands. “With what? This thing doesn’t have a steering wheel.”
Any second now… “The stick.”
“No stick, either. I knew there was something I should have asked Elaine.”
If she reached out the window, she could touch the side of the Ball, and they were still coming closer. Stoner pushed Marylou’s and Callie Rose’s heads down, and leaned forward to protect her aunt. “Cover your head!”
The shuttle veered, tilting sideways, its belly only inches from the wall. It turned a barrel roll and skirted the equator, reversed directions, shot over the top, and soared into the sky.
“Dern show off,” Gwen said, peeking from between her fingers.
Stoner sat back in her seat. “Are you sure you can’t control it?”
“Apparently I can order it to land, which I did, after which the computer’s superior and obviously more playful intelligence takes over.”
They were still climbing, up into the sky. The light grew brighter, whiter. Wisps of cloud and mist flew past the windows. She could feel herself grow lighter, lighter until she was floating. She grabbed for a seat belt and strapped herself down. Remember what Marylou said. None of this is real.
The sky turned black. The shuttle broke the earth’s gravity and soared into space. Stars and galaxies and novas rushed toward them. They soared through the Milky Way like a bird flying through a comet’s tail. Through her window she could see a space station, rotating slowly and silently in the darkness.
It’s the ride again, she realized. The Horizons ride. There’s the time-lapse movie of the growing crystals and...
Oh, God, here comes The City!
The shuttle changed direction, tilted downward, and rocketed toward the ground. It was dusk again, and they were headed for New York. The sky darkened and lights came on. Came on and came at them. The shuttle soared over roof tops, streaked between buildings. Spun itself at the walls of skyscrapers, to rise at the last minute like a daredevil Phoenix. The Chrysler building streaked past. She could see people inside the upper floors, looking up, startled as they hurtled overhead. She felt her heart pounding. It’s just a ride, just a ride, just a ride...
Someone was screaming.
She realized it was all of them.
Then, with a bumping and banging and shifting of gears, the shuttle slowed. The console lit up.
“What’ll it be?” Gwen asked. “We can land on the desert or under the sea, or in the space station...” She stopped and looked again. “Or inside EPCOT.” She punched the screen with one finger. “EPCOT it is.”
The shuttle gave a little shudder, turned, and shot off into the darkness of space.
Headed for home, Stoner hoped. Shortcut. Past Andromeda, Deneb, Antares. Just a shortcut. A secret shortcut. The fastest way home, really. Everything is relative, just ask Einstein, just ask...
Her mind trembled on the brink of hysteria.
A large structure appeared, outlined by tiny lights, suspended in the black, rotating slowly on its axis. They drew nearer. The structure resolved itself into a space station, the lights into windows.
“Uh-oh,” Stoner said. “You must have pushed the wrong button.”
“I didn’t.” Gwen gritted her teeth. “This bloody thing has a mind of its own.” She pounded on the console. “A deranged mind, at that.”
“There are no deranged computers,” Aunt Hermione said placidly. “Only deranged computer operators.”
Gwen glared at her. “I think you’re enjoying yourself.”
“Of course I am,” the older woman said. “This is an adventure. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”
“You believe in reincarnation,” Gwen muttered. “There’s never anything to be afraid of if you believe in reincarnation.”
“I suppose that’s true.” Aunt Hermione frowned thoughtfully. “I never looked at it that way.”
Stoner glanced over at Marylou. She seemed to be doing all right. True, she and Callie Rose were holding hands in a kind of desperate way, but at least she wasn’t whimpering. “You okay?” Stoner asked.
“Fine,” said Marylou. “None of this is real.”
“I think it is,” Stoner said.
“It is not! My reality says this is not real, and what my reality says is real for me.”
Stoner decided not to pursue that line of argument. Besides, they had nearly reached the space station, and were slowly circling. A door in the side of the structure slid open, and they slipped inside.
“Welcome to Brava Centauri,” came a booming voice from a public address system. “All passengers for the express shuttle to Jupiter and the outer planets please follow the yellow arrows to launch port C. Those going on to Venus, Mars, and the neighboring moons please follow the red arrows to Space bus terminal B. Those remaining on Brava Centauri follow the blue arrows straight ahead to the main terminal.”
They all looked at each other. “Now what?” Gwen asked.
“I think,” Stoner suggested, “We should go to the terminal and see what we can do about getting back to Earth.”
“Good answer,” Marylou shouted in her best imitation of a contestant on “Family Feud.”
They started forward. The blue doorways led to a long gray, sterile hall, with mysterious, unmarked, locked doors on either side. Just like the airline terminals back home. And, if they were indeed in space, the locals seemed to have solved the zero-gravity problem. Stoner dropped behind to talk to Gwen and Aunt Hermione.
“How are you doing?” she asked Gwen, regarding her closely.
Gwen smiled, but her smile was grim. “A little better. I seem to have gotten a second wind.”
“You look awfully pale.”
“Of course I’m pale,” Gwen said testily. “I’m in spirit.”
“A bite to eat might be a good idea,” Aunt Hermione suggested.
“Yeah.” Stoner looked around. There didn’t seem to be anything like a restaurant on this space station. And she had the feeling they weren
’t getting any closer to the terminal...
All of a sudden, the word “terminal” took on a different meaning. Terminal, as in final, the end, ultimate...
Just a word game, but something told her she was right. That wherever this hallway led, going to the end of it wasn’t a good idea. Not a good idea at all.
“Aunt Hermione,” she said, “do you sense something wrong?”
Her aunt closed her eyes for a second. “Yes. Ahead of us.”
“Me, too.” She reached forward and tugged at Marylou’s shirt. “Listen, we think there’s a problem up ahead. So let’s keep our eyes open for a side door or something.”
“Whatever you say,” said Marylou breezily. “Problems are your reality, after all.”
She moved more carefully, testing every door they passed. All locked. The end of the hallway was easily visible now, with corridors leading to the right and left. A blue arrow pointed right to “Main Terminal.”
So they should go right.
If they could believe the sign.
Well, they were out of side doors. Not that she’d trust them, anyway. If one did open, they’d probably find an empty room with a table and a bottle with a label that said “Drink me.”
So they had to take their chances with the choice-point at the end of this runway. That’s what it reminded her of, those experiments back in Psych. 101 where you put a starving rat in a T-maze, and at the end of one arm is a food pellet, while at the end of the other arm is an electric grid. And if you make the wrong choice—zing go the strings of your life.
Now, really, wasn’t she taking all this a little personally? This was, after all, Walt Disney World—or a reasonable facsimile thereof. WDW did not exist to destroy, maim, terrorize, or otherwise harm happy guests.
Except that she sincerely believed they had left WDW behind a long time ago. These places might look like WDW. They might sound like WDW. They might even smell like WDW. But they were definitely not...
They had reached the end. Everyone stopped and stood there, waiting for her to make a decision.
Why me? Why doesn’t someone else make the decisions? Someone like… Marylou.
Oh, sure, that would be really smart, letting Marylou call the shots. Marylou doesn’t even believe it’s real.
Aunt Hermione? But she thinks all of life is one big amusement park, anyway. It doesn’t matter to Aunt Hermione which ride they go on. And, until Stoner had gotten a lot older, or evolved through a few more lifetimes, it was still very important to her which ride they went on.
Callie Rose was young, confused, and couldn’t make up her mind whether to be dead or alive. She doubted that Callie Rose would use the world’s best judgment.
Which leaves Gwen. Gwen’s sensible… except for the time she’d married that man they’d had to kill… but she wasn’t looking very well. In fact, she was looking very not well. Stoner suspected Gwen needed to keep her energy as close to her life processes as possible.
So there we are. Left up to good old Stoner.
She took a deep breath and stepped into the cross bar of the “T”. She glanced quickly to the right. It looked like a normal, everyday airport terminal. Fast food stands, gift store, news stand. Ticket counters. It was tempting. Very tempting. But…
It felt too good to be true, like a trap.
She looked closer. Something strange about it. Something… shimmering. Shimmering as in dissolving. The wall, behind the Delta counter (Delta Airlines? In outer space?), turned porous-looking. Holes appeared. Black holes. And, here and there, stars.
Definitely not in that direction. She took a few steps down the left corridor. There was a closed door at the end. With an identifying sign that read “Greenhouses.”
It gave her an idea. “Aunt Hermione, do you think there might be something in there that would help Gwen? Some kind of healing herb or something?”
Her aunt gazed at the door as if she might find inspiration there. “Possibly, assuming it’s not filled with Martian kelp or some such.”
“You’d recognize herbs, wouldn’t you?”
The older woman sensed what Stoner was thinking, and patted her arm. “I may have had a hard time learning them initially, but I’m fairly sure I know what I’m doing now. At least I know which ones to avoid, so I’m not likely to kill her. And, if I find myself totally unsure, I can channel an ancient herbalist.”
“Right.”
Well, at least the decision was made. Motioning to the others to stay behind her, Stoner forced herself to stride down the hall and open the door. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected. Anything, she supposed, except what she actually found—a real greenhouse. Built like a dome, with glass walls, glass overhead panels, some of them shaded, some open to a pale blue sky beyond. Water trickled from overhead pipes or sprayed in a fine mist from ducts in the floor. Plants grew in tidy rows of what looked like a Styrofoam and sand mixture, which Aunt Hermione said was a popular rooting medium—something like vermiculite. Basically, it was a hydroponic set-up, and managed to support a startling variety of greens, cucurbits, brassicas, and good old tomatoes. Even luffa sponges seemed to be thriving.
“The Land,” Stoner said. She turned to Gwen. “Remember? This is part of the Listen to the Land ride.”
Gwen looked around. “You’re right. That means we should be able to…”
“Find our way out,” Stoner finished for her.
Callie Rose was wandering up and down the rows, her jaw slack with amazement. She saw Stoner watching her, and blushed. “Had a lot of these things back home,” she said. “But these people don’t have bug trouble like we did.” She bent down and plucked a couple of ferny leaves. “Even got dill weed. And rough sage. We always stuffed the Thanksgiving turkey with that.”
Aunt Hermione’s face lit up. “Callie, when you lived back in the swamp, did your mother teach you medicinal herbs.”
“You mean the Bible herbs? ’Course. Everybody’s got to know that. We didn’t have no fancy doctors ’n hospitals ’n stuff like that.”
“What did you use for thin blood?”
Callie Rose thought very hard. “Mostly molasses and sulphur. Always had plenty of molasses around. We grew our own cane. But sulphur was hard to get, ’ticularly in bad years when we didn’t have much to barter.”
“In those years, what did you have?”
“Well, I recall times we’d settle on Kayann. And Life Everlasting. That was a good one.”
“Kayann?” Stoner asked.
“Cayenne,” said Aunt Hermione. “Red pepper. But I don’t think I’d recognize Life Everlasting. Callie, do you see any around here?”
Callie Rose trotted off down a row of low plants and came back almost immediately with a bunch of tiny yellow flowers and three pods of bright red dried peppers. She pushed them at Gwen. “Take as much of these as you can,” she ordered. “First one, then the other, and back again. That way you’ll be able to keep more down. Black cohosh is good, too, but it tastes awful and makes you see things.”
“Thank you,” Gwen said, “but I’m having my fill of seeing things.” She nibbled on a flower.
“What does that taste like?” Stoner asked.
“Green. And sort of bitter.”
She looked around. “Has anyone seen Marylou?”
“I think she’s looking for spinach,” Aunt Hermione said.
“I saw something else good down there,” Callie Rose said, and trotted back down the row.
Gwen was very carefully eating a red pepper. It made her eyes water.
Peppers, Stoner thought. Herbs, greens. It wasn’t going to work. They had to get out of here, and get out now. Not that she was really certain where they were that they had to get out of. It looked like The Land, but it didn’t. There was that strange, too-vivid, cartoonish look about it. But even if is really was The Land, they still had to get out, and then to find where they’d left themselves. And after that to get themselves out of there, and...
It looked hopeless.
CHAPTER 13
“I think we’d better get moving,” Stoner said. Gwen did look a bit better, though it was obviously a tenuous better.
The question was, get moving to where? Not back to the terminal, certainly. They knew what lay in that direction. Terminal lay in that direction. Forward would take them—presumably—onto the Land. She tried to remember whether there had been anything terrifying or life-threatening or otherwise unsettling on that ride.
She sensed Gwen at her side, and slipped an arm around her.
Gwen leaned into her. “Stoner,” she said in a low voice, “I don’t think I can do this.”
Fear gripped her. “Do what?”
“What we’re doing. I just want to lie down.”
“You can’t, Gwen.”
“I know, but I want to. I want to so much I don’t really care.”
She turned Gwen to face her. “You have to hang on, Gwen. Please.”
Tears leaked from Gwen’s eyes and slid silently down her face. “I’m really trying, Stoner. I’m just so tired.”
Stoner pulled Gwen’s face down onto her own shoulder so she wouldn’t see her panic. “It’s going to be okay,” she said softly, stroking Gwen’s hair. “We’ll get out of here.”
Gwen shook her head and put her arms around Stoner. She tried to embrace her but she was so weak... “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m really sorry.”
“You have to hang on,” Stoner said desperately. “Please, just a little longer.”
Gwen looked up at her and forced a smile. “That’s… what you said… before.”
“Well, I mean it.” She looked around. “Marylou,” she ordered, “help Gwen. And don’t let her pass out.”
Marylou came forward and slipped an arm around Gwen’s waist. “Pass out on me,” she said to Gwen, “and I’ll never cook anything but Kosher for you for the rest of your life. It’ll be Passover at least once a week. Think about it.”
Gwen managed a weak laugh. “Not Kosher.”
“Kosher.”
Okay, let’s... Stoner counted noses. Callie Rose was missing. “Aunt Hermione, can you find Callie Rose?”