by Crae, Edward
“What the shit?” Dan exclaimed. “Dude!”
Drew just stood there, his mouth open and his head cocked.
“You don’t know me, do you?” Dan continued.
“Look,” Max said. “I think we just ended up on an alternate Earth. Here, the comet actually hit instead of passing by. It leveled everything and there are very few survivors. But there are aliens…”
“Aliens?” Dan repeated.
“The shadow people,” Max said. “The ones that Jake saw.”
Jake’s eyes went wide. “Here but not here.”
“There but not there, technically,” Max corrected. “They were able to look into our dimension, but not come through. What you were seeing was just their astral projections, I guess. That’s what Barty said.”
“Who’s Barty?” Dan asked.
“The smart guy here,” Max said. “The other me. He really was me, just this Earth’s version of me.”
“What are the odds?” Drew said. “Right?”
Dan smiled, seeing that same grin that his own Drew had. It was somewhat heartwarming. He missed the real Drew, and this guy was almost identical. There were a few minor differences in his posture, possibly due to not constantly drinking wine like the Drew he knew. But he could see that they were definitely identical in most other ways.
It’s too bad he never got to meet this Barty fellow.
Nearby, the folks that were running were beginning to return. They came out of the rubble little by little, a few of them gathering around the little girl that was lying in the center of the clearing.
“Is she alright?” Max called out.
A woman who had knelt nodded her head as she helped the girl to her feet. She seemed to be crying, and looked like she had been through the ringer. Dan wasn’t sure what was going on, but somehow he felt that she had something to do with the screaming creature on his world.
“What’s her story?” he asked as they began to join the others. “And how do we get back home.”
“She might be the key,” Max said. “She is the thing that Maynard spoke of in his journals, and that Jake and Toni saw at the house. There were two of them, twins, but Maynard killed one of them. This one’s sister.”
“How…”
“Something about her epilepsy,” Max said. “The presence of the comet’s materials amplifies them to the point where she actually rips a hole in reality.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jake said, shaking his head. “That’s just nuts. How is that even possible?”
Max shrugged. “We didn’t get that far into the conversation.”
Though listening intently, Dan was unable to take his eyes off Drew. It was almost like having his friend back, even though Drew obviously didn’t know who he was. He was glad to see him nonetheless. Jake seemed a bit glad, too. The three of them had been through a lot together despite the short amount of time they had known each other.
“Stellar,” Dan said to himself, grinning.
Drew looked back at him, smiling. “I say that,” he said. “Nutso.”
Nathan snuck around the back corner of the building, looking toward the spot where Jake and Dan had disappeared. The others had gone inside, but he decided to watch the strange scene that unfolded before him. A flash of light, a shrill scream, and a burst of freezing air preceded the disappearance, followed by a strange and deathly silence.
The creatures that had gathered in the area fell silent, as if mesmerized or confused by what had happened. Nathan was too, but he was still curious. The stalker that was across the street was gone, and the shufflers and shamblers had scattered somewhat. He wanted to know why.
He crept onto the blacktop, feeling the air around him grow colder as he approached the very spot where the rift had appeared. That’s what he called it. There was no other word. Something had opened up and swallowed his friends. He saw it all, and he saw the bizarre scene on the rift’s other side.
They weren’t just vaporized, he realized. They were drawn into some weird and scary place. It was some kind of other world. Some apocalyptic mirror image where darkness reigned. It was fascinating to him, and it made him wonder if where they went was even worse than where he was now.
There was a suddenly whipping sound nearby, and Nathan stopped short, spinning toward the sound. There, near what was once the front gate of the hardware store, was the stalker. Its tentacles were gone, and its skin was loose and falling away, but it was still alive. And it was looking at him.
Nathan spun back the other way and sprinted toward the back of the building. He heard the stalker growl and give chase, its claws clicking heavily on the pavement. Nathan ran as fast as he could, already breathless and his heart pounding rapidly. He rounded the corner, but was quickly knocked forward as the stalker’s bulk slammed into his back.
The ground came up fast, knocking the wind out of him. Nathan grunted with pain, quickly rolling onto his feet to escape. The stalker’s claws ripped at the air, slicing his shoulder as he spun away. The pain was excruciating, and the sting that followed grew rapidly as the creature’s venom—or whatever it was—began coursing through his veins.
“Goddamn it!” he hissed, stumbling toward the metal sliding door.
He collapsed against it, struggling to push it open. As he lost his breath and fell against it, he realized the creature was no longer chasing him. He stopped, looking around for any sign of his pursuer. There was nothing. The stalker had given up—he hoped.
“Jesus Christ,” he whispered, clutching his shoulder.
There was a single puncture wound that he could see. It was deep, puffy, and growing redder and redder by the second. Whatever the creature had done to him, he knew it wasn’t good. The wound would get infected, at least. By what, he couldn’t guess. Maybe some antibiotics would help.
He quickly covered it up, slipping between the door and the siding. The store was quiet. Everyone else was up front, watching through the windows or hiding in safety. He wondered if they even knew he had gone outside again. Whatever the case, he couldn’t let them know he was hurt.
They would throw him out if they did.
“I can’t believe they just disappeared,” Cliff said, shaking his head. “Like out of thin air?”
“They were there, then they weren’t,” Toni replied. “Like mother fuckin’ magic.”
Royce let out a skeptical hiss. “Girl you out yo’ damn mind.”
“Shut up, OG Dipshit,” Toni said. “You can drop the whole ghetto thing. You’re about as ghetto as Grace.”
Grace chuckled as Royce’s face reddened. He wasn’t angry, but a little embarrassed.
“Look,” Toni continued. “I don’t know what’s going on, but I saw what I saw, and then I didn’t. They went out to investigate, there was a flash of light, and then they were gone.”
“Okay, okay,” Cliff said, nodding as he sat down next to Grace. “We’ll figure this out.”
“Excuse me,” Jeff said then. “I don’t know what’s happening either, but we should all be thinking about getting out of here.”
“Not without Dan and Jake,” Toby said. “No way.”
Jeff shrugged. “I feel ya, little brother,” he said. “But me and Frankie have to get back eventually, and we’d like you all to come with us. You seem like a tough bunch of assholes, and we could really use you.”
Cliff sighed, turning to Grace. “You got any ideas, baby?”
Grace shook her head.
“Is she a scientist?” Jeff asked.
“A biologist,” she replied. “Not a quantum physicist.”
“Quantum physics,” Royce said with a smile. “Something to do with quantum physics, definitely.”
“What do you know about it?” Toni asked, skeptically.
“I watched them science shows,” Royce said. “All the ones about parallel dimensions and dark matter and all that.”
“So then, Einstein,” Toni began with a grin. “What’s your theory?”
“Somethi
ng happened to rip a hole in our dimension,” Royce said. “A hole that closed up right away, but not before swapping some shit from one universe to another.”
Toni stared at him for a moment, completely flabbergasted. “Swapping some shit, huh? Well, what got left behind here?”
Royce shrugged. “Don’t know. Don’t even know if that’s what happened. Maybe they just got vaporized and the mother fuckers are dead in a little pile of dust out in the parking lot.”
“That’s a pretty good theory, actually,” Jeff said. “Your friend Max disappeared before. You said he was after some kind of monster?”
Toni nodded.
“The monster has something to do with it, then.”
“You guys ever see the shadow people?” Toni asked.
Jeff shook his head. “Not that I remember. What about you Frankie?”
There was no answer. It was then that Toni noticed Frankie was gone. Nathan was also gone. Where the hell did they go? She looked at Cliff then, drawing her pistol from her belt.
“We gotta find them before they disappear, too,” she said.
“Frankie!” Jeff called out, walking toward the back. “Frankie, you back there?”
Nobody saw anything down the aisles. There was no noise, no lights, nothing. Frankie and Nathan would have heard them if they were. Toni followed Jeff and Cliff, with Royce and Toby behind her. She kept her pistol out in front of her, ready to bust a cap in anybody’s ass.
Then a metal swinging door creaked open slowly, causing everyone to freeze in their tracks.
“Guys,” Frankie whispered as he poked his head through. “Be quiet and come look at this. There’s something back here.”
Toni drew her pistol and slowly made her way to the door. Jeff and Royce flanked her on either side and Frankie stepped back a ways to allow everyone to see in. The back room was dark except for a few rays of moonlight that shone through the slightly opened door.
“Damn,” Toni said. “Door’s open a little. Something could have slipped through.”
Something had. Frankie pointed to the upper corner of the room near the door. Plastered to the wall was a cocoon of slime, dripping and pulsating rapidly. The vague shape of a human body was inside, slowly being transformed into something else.
It was Nathan.
“Oh my god,” Toni gasped. “Close the door.”
“But we need to—“
Frankie was cut short by an explosion of goo. A tentacle shot out of the cocoon, wrapping itself around his neck. He dropped his gun and grasped the slimy thing as his face contorted in agony.
“Frankie!” Jeff shouted, pushing Toni out of the way.
She raised her pistol, trying to aim around Frankie’s struggling form. Jeff saw her, pushing Frankie down out of the way. He fell to his knees, leaving Toni a clear shot. She fired several times, striking the fleshy pulp, tearing giant holes in it with her large caliber rounds.
Royce was there beside her, firing round after round of his own. A loud screeching sound erupted from the cocoon, and the tentacle let loose. Jeff pulled Frankie back into the store, dragging him by the shoulders.
“Close the door!” Toni shouted. “Brace it shut!”
“We gotta kill that mother fucker,” Royce said. “It’ll get inside and do more shit.”
“Gotcha!” Toby said then.
The kid had grabbed a propane torch from the shelves and pushed his way through to the door. He pulled the torch’s trigger sending a massive fireball of flaming propane right into the cocoon. The screeching sounded again, and the flesh quivered as it tried to escape the agonizing flames.
“Die fucker!” Toby shouted, spreading the flames as best he could.
The cocoon itself began burning on its own, and Toby lowered the torch and stepped back. Cliff slid a heavy shelf in front of the swinging door as it closed, bracing it with more heavy items that were nearby. Frankie continue to convulse and choke, and Jeff tried his best to get him breathing again.
“The tentacle crushed his windpipe or something!” Jeff shouted. “Come on, Frankie! Breathe man!”
Toni watched in horror as Frankie’s wide eyes slowly went dull as his trembling faded away. Her heart was pounding, afraid of what would happen next.
“We gotta get him outta here,” she said. “He’ll change. I know it.”
“How do we know that?” Jeff hissed. “He’s dead already.”
“I don’t know,” Toni admitted. “We don’t know how any of this works. Shit’s different now than it was. The freaks are changing.”
“She’s right,” Grace said. “That stalker at McDonald’s was transforming right as we watched. It was becoming something else, or something inside it was changing. We can’t be sure of anything anymore. We have to burn him.”
“Fuck…” Jeff cursed. “Goddamn it Frankie!”
“We can’t do it in here,” Cliff said. “We gotta get him outside. I think all the weird shit is gone. The parking lot should be safe.”
Toni nodded, waiting for Jeff to respond. He nodded slowly, standing up to gather his thoughts.
“Alright,” he said. “Let’s do it.”
Chapter Eight
Max looked over all of the equipment that was at Barty’s station. He felt like a king upon a throne, gazing out over a kingdom of electronics; monitors, gauges, keyboards, computer towers and everything else gadgety that he always loved. For some reason he couldn’t fathom, all of it seemed familiar to him.
He couldn’t figure out why, but it felt like he had always sat here. He knew how every little piece of equipment worked, what it was for, what it monitored—everything. It was like everything that Barty knew, he knew. It was the strangest feeling he had ever had.
“This is weird,” he said out loud, looking over at Dan and Jake.
“What’s that, buddy?” Dan asked.
“I feel like I’m Barty himself. It’s like he transferred everything he knew right to me.”
“Everything?”
Max thought about it for a moment. As he went over all the equipment within his vision, he realized that it was more than just knowledge of this little booth. He seemed to be remembering things that happened to Barty.
“Yes,” he said. “I think I’m… absorbing Barty’s memories or something.”
“How is that possible?” Jake asked.
Max shrugged. “How is it possible that we were brought to this dimension?”
“About that,” Dan began. “What is this about a girl named Rose?”
“Ah,” Max said, raising his eyebrows. “That’s the thing. The screaming little girl that Jake and Toni saw was an actual little girl. Her epilepsy, combined with the weird quantum fields caused by the shadow peoples’ equipment causes the two dimensions to overlap. Somehow, she and her sister were able to project their images into our universe. But, I have no idea how we actually came here in physical form. That’s the mystery part of it.”
“Damn,” Jake said. “Fuckin’ weird shit all over. The world’s gone to hell and we’re playing Doctor Fucking Who.”
Max chuckled. “Doctor Who didn’t travel between dimen… never mind. What’s important is Rose. She may be our only chance of getting home.”
“What about the people here?” Dan asked.
“I suppose we could take them back with us,” Max suggested. “That is, if we can create a portal large enough to do it. The problem is, we have to get the fuck out of this bunker before the aliens return.”
“So who is the leader here?” Jake asked.
“A guy named Micah,” Max said. “But I’m not sure he survived the attack.”
“I thought I heard someone yell his name earlier,” Dan said. “As if they were calling out to him or something.”
The door opened behind them, and Drew poked his head in. Dan looked at him briefly, seemingly still confused about the whole thing. Memories began to come back to Max; memories of this Drew.
“What’s up?” Drew asked. “We need to scoot, fellas
.”
“We’re ready, I suppose,” Max said. “Do you have any idea where we’re going?”
Drew shook his head. “Not sure, but if you guys want to get back home we have to find Rose and bring her back here.”
“Wouldn’t she have to have a seizure in order to activate the portal?” Max asked.
Drew shrugged. “I have no clue how it works,” he said. “But if that’s true, I’m sure we’ll have a stellar time convincing her to have a seizure upon demand.”
“We can use a strobe light,” Max said. “Either way, we can’t go far.”
“Dude,” Drew said. “We can’t stay. We’ll have to come back once the fuckers leave. If we’re not here when they bomb the shit out of this place, then they’ll go out and search for us. That’s when we return and get shit going.”
“So you’re willing to help us get back?” Max said.
“Yes, but not for your own sakes. Some of us want to go with you. We can’t live on this Earth anymore. If we do, we’ll die in a nuclear winter. I don’t know how long the darkness is going to last.”
“I noticed one thing,” Jake said. “The moon is a lot bigger here than it is on our Earth.”
Everyone looked at Jake then, and Max had a sudden realization; Jake was right. The moon was bigger here. He hadn’t really acknowledged it before, but it was true. And if the moon was bigger, that could mean only one thing.
“The comet must have knocked it out of orbit,” Max said. “It’s falling toward Earth. It’s going to crash into this planet.”
“Holy fuck,” Drew said. “That’s not good.”
Max slapped his hands onto either side of his face. “Fuck no it’s not good! That would completely destroy the planet! We have to get all of you back home.”
Drew was speechless for a moment, but then pursed his lips and nodded. “I’ll tell Micah,” he said, turning to leave.
Max looked over at Jake and Dan, his heart pounding in terror. They too were wide-eyed and seemed a bit nervous.
“Jesus,” Jake said. “We gotta get the fuck outta here.”
Max nodded. “Let’s go,” he said. “We need to find Rose before the aliens return.”
