by Eddie Patin
Chapter 8
"Goddamn it, Gliath!" Riley shouted, sprinting toward the invisible portal along the slope of the hill. He pushed his enhanced reflexes to avoid slipping in the slush and snow. His hellhound-hide duster jacket flew behind him like a whipping cloak. "Don’t let him get away!"
The soldier dropped Gliath’s gear bag into Jason’s backyard so that he could move faster, then turned against the slope as he rushed down from the house to the area where the rift opened, sliding on the sides of his boots.
But he knew that it was too late.
Gliath’s sleek, black 'primal form' (as he called it) dashed along the edges of the scrub oak like a dark ghost, his natural leopard shape much smaller than his taller 'warrior form'. Riley’s friend usually wore his primal form when they relaxed together in between missions or when the Krulax was scouting—situations where stealth would be more important than his ability to kick ass. He knew that Gliath preferred the leopard form. It was his first form, after all.
The big, black leopard slowed to a graceful stop in the snow near the curled-up body of the giant spider, which lay on its fat, furry belly among a pool of its own ichor.
Riley leapt down to the bottom of the hill as he approached the scene where Jason had fought the arachnid, immediately scanning for any electrical disturbances from the rift with his eyes, but there was nothing. Though the creature's long legs were curled up tight against its body in death, the soldier still detected faint life signs with his enhanced senses. He cocked his head and scratched his beard, staring at the spot where he saw the rift close up. Riley had been near the back of the house when he heard the shots, but before he could run to the edge of the snow-filled yard to see what was going on, he heard the tell-tale fluttering sounds and the snaps of the rift opening and closing. He'd heard Jason Leaper 934 crying out in protest.
When the soldier had made it to the edge of the yard, Jason 934 was gone.
"Fruk," Riley muttered, playing with his beard and staring at the empty space that he knew had some sort of tie to the ninth dimension at an angle that he couldn’t perceive.
Too small, he heard Jason 113’s voice say in his mind. Folded into a single Planck frame—even too small for your eyes, Riley...
Riley felt a stab of sadness remembering his friend’s words.
He couldn’t see it, but it was there: a rift that had been there for a long time—at least according to Jason 113's account. Permanent rifts like these were so strange. How did it get here? Riley wondered. Had it always been here, connected to universe 934? Or was it torn open at some point by some weird and incomprehensible ninth-dimensional being passing through? Was it created casually by something like a god who stopped to relax here for a while, maybe creating a civilization here before passing off once again into the infinite quantum foam?
Or was it something far simpler? Shet—for all Riley knew, Jason 113 might have opened it himself at some point. The place—the Wilderlands?—was full of infinity crystals, right? Maybe the place was a useful universe that Jason had set up as some sort of mine or a contingency of some kind. That guy was always working on other projects and backup plans when the Reality Rifters were between missions.
Gliath strode up beside Riley, his wide feline paws crunching through the snow. The panther paused to sniff at the spider’s wicked, bristly body, then he pushed his heavy, black skull against Riley’s thigh. The soldier reached down to pet his slick-furred friend.
"I reckon I’ll get started with the OCS," Riley said. He couldn’t believe that they screwed this up. He screwed it up—it was Riley’s fault. They should have just talked to Jason 934 like their boss had told them to. "I dropped your gear bag up there in the backyard. You should shift down again to blend in with this place. It looks like a pretty peaceful, boring world—Jason 934 travels with little regard for bandits or beasts—but it’s possible that his spider battle’s weapon-fire might attract some sort of attention."
Gliath made a low, purring sound, pushing his face against Riley’s hand. The leopardwere’s long, black tail swished a few times back and forth, and then, after one last look at the dead spider, the panther went bounding up the hill toward the bag.
"Shet—I’d better get up to the house too for that matter," Riley added to himself.
Pulling out Jason 113’s OCS, Riley turned on the complicated device and attempted to read the area. He pointed its scanning laser at the spot where he thought the portal was, but couldn’t pick up anything. Then, he pointed the scanner at the dead spider and took a reading. Jason 113 said that he'd tuned the informational set point to this universe, so any data that the OCS would express from now on would be in relation to the data of universe 934. If whatever Riley scanned didn't have a direct match to this universe, the OCS would do its best to cross-check against the planet’s historical and contemporary lore.
The reading came back with a lot of data that Riley couldn’t comprehend, but he noted that the creature was classified as:
Theraphosa apophysis, 63% match. Universe 312, the Wilderlands.
Sixty-three percent wasn’t much of a match. There was a lot of room for genetic abnormalities in that missing thirty-seven percent. The Wilderlands was in a totally different multiverse than universe 934 and operated on a slightly different set of fundamental physics. Probably why this spider’s so fruking big, Riley thought.
The thought of traveling through the ninth dimension again to a different multiverse sent a chill up Riley’s spine. After all, that’s how almost all of them got zapped: traveling to a multiverse so different from their compositional compatibility that the very air passing into Jason's Earth of u113 was enough to set off a chain reaction to kill all life and probably destroy the entire world. Shet—the whole universe might have been unmade by now. Or, who knows—maybe if it was just an atmospheric invasion. Perhaps the weird, deadly shet might be contained to the planet’s gravitational pull and Earth 113 was now just a big, colorful crystalline rock floating through space...
But Jason 113 wouldn’t have told them to go to the Wilderlands if he didn’t think it was safe, right?
Well—safe was a relative term. The Reality Rifters were planeswalking monster hunters after all. But dealing with massive and powerful creatures that tried to eat or crush or assimilate the team didn’t bother Riley so much. That’s why they were armed and so badass. But wildly different laws of physics were dangerous beyond measure. There were infinite ways that the human body wouldn’t be able to survive things that Riley couldn’t even imagine—like a world where thoughts became lava in your brain, or sound was gravity, or time was rain and being hit by its drops would spread you into all possible parallel universes across Phase Space simultaneously. There could be a universe where light constantly transformed into solid matter. That’s what happened in that rainbow crystalline Hell of u1240...
But Jason 113 wouldn’t have sent them to find the Wilderlands if stepping foot in there would have turned them inside-out.
That grizzled, reality-rifting adventurer must have had a reason...
He also had to have a reason to send Riley and Gliath to seek out this Jason 934 who—from what Riley had seen so far—appeared to be completely unskilled and weak. The new guy was younger than Jason 113, sure, but fruk—he didn’t know how to rift! What the fruk were they here to do? Babysit this younger Jason Leaper until the soft Earth man from this Level Zero Civilization world could figure out how to use his powers?
Riley thought back to Jason 113's dying face—a mix of sallow, flaky flesh and solid, colorful gemstones with a sapphire eye—and felt a stab of shame.
At least Jason 934 knew about his powers now. Sort of. And the soft Earth man would probably become an unwilling meat-snack for something big and toothy if Riley and Gliath couldn’t catch up to him right away...
The soldier scoffed and cocked his head, noting the three spent brass casings from Jason’s handheld slug gun on the ground, highlighted in the HUD of his enhanced vision.
The snow crunched lightly behind Riley as Gliath walked up. The leopardwere was in his human form again—what he called his 'pretender form'—back in his harness and armor. The Krulax wore an outer layer of low-quality Earth clothes that the two of them had stolen from a nearby house.
"What have you learned, Ranaja?" Gliath asked evenly.
Riley looked back at the OCS. "The spider is from universe 312—that’s the Wilderlands, I reckon." Now that he knew what universe to look for, Riley scanned the area of the portal again, plugging in the code that Jason 113 had assigned to the universe when cataloging it. He found the rift. The OCS filled the readout and Riley tried to interpret the data as best he could. "Let’s see—looks like the atmosphere is a lot richer in oxygen ... with increased nitrogen pressure. Let me see if I recognize any of the wildlife..."
He scanned through to fauna readings.
Microraptor zhaoianus, 91% match.
Edmontosaurus annectens, 96% match.
Monoclonius crassus, 98% match.
Einiosaurus procurvicornis, 93% match.
Daspletosaurus torosus, 98% match.
Teratophoneus curriei, 93% match.
Alamosaurus sanjuanensis, 95% match.
Triceratops horridus, 99% match.
Dromaeosaurus albertensis, 95% match.
Dakotaraptor steini, 97% match.
Stygimoloch spinifer, 91% match.
Saurornitholestes langstoni, 98% match.
Atrociraptor marshalli, 95% match.
Homo sapiens, 93% match. Lore: Lizardman, 57% match. Goblin, 24% match.
Albertosaurus sarcophagus, 97% match.
Pachyrhinosaurus canadensis, 89% match.
Styracosaurus albertensis, 91% match.
Parasaurolophus walkeri, 97% match.
Tyrannosaurus rex, 98% match.
Pachycephalosaurus wyomingensis, 99% match.
Crocodylus acutus, 97% match.
Ornithomimus velox, 98% match.
Unknown. Lore: Wyvern, 93% match. Dragon, 65% match.
Ankylosaurus magniventris, 97% match.
Rolling his shoulders to loosen up, Riley crouched down and skimmed the list. It went on and on for as long as he cared to look. He also found the giant spider again on there, as well as other creatures with the same Genus names—more arachnids and spider-like creatures that he didn’t know and didn’t want to know. There were plenty more unknowns as well. And these were just the lifeforms in the area of the permanent rift...
"Looks like a lot of dinosaurs," he said to Gliath. "And some other weird stuff. This human-lizardman-goblin thing is interesting. And this unknown ... its closest classification through the lore data of u934's Earth is a fantasy creature: a wyvern. Or a dragon. More wyvern than dragon. Let’s hope it’s not a fruking dragon..."
Gliath nodded then turned his attention to the giant spider, staring at the dead creature with stony eyes and a wooden face; his irises the same yellowish-green as his panther-like forms.
Riley stood, passing some fingers through his short, dark beard. Slinging the OCS around his shoulder again, he took a few long and easy steps to where Jason’s empty brass landed in the snow then bent down to nimbly pluck one up.
He stared at the casing, turning it over to see the spent primer. He smelled the residual burnt powder.
"Nine millimeter," he read from the back side. The soldier smirked. "It looks like on this world, they still use slug guns—primitive projectiles fired by propellant. That’s unfortunate. We should really have Gauss rifles or something with more penetration power for dealing with—"
Riley was interrupted when the giant spider suddenly skittered to life, spinning on its long legs. Its beady eyes were lively, and its fangs flexed as it let out a loud, sputtering hiss. As the beast moved its mouth, it squeezed murky bug blood out from the holes in its face, oozing over its weird mouth...
Gliath and Riley both sprang back away from the creature immediately, and as the leopardwere in human form crouched to prepare for grappling, Riley instantly produced his Zeeker X47 blaster from its drop-holster on his right leg. Faster than any man of Earth 934 could track, he had the muzzle of the laser pistol aimed at the creature’s face, and with the targeting assistance of his cybernetic eyes, Riley fired once. The cooling fins hissed and there was a quiet snap as the burning red laser cut through the air. The triple-pulse beam hit the arachnid full in the face, immediately burning through the exoskeleton and frying its brain.
The spider dropped again, its face burning and charred, a terrible smell filling the air as the hair and bristles of its head melted and sizzled from the heat left after the shot.
"Gross," Riley said, standing casually again. "Fruking spiders. I hate fruking spiders."
He returned his blaster to its holster and picked up the rest of Jason 934’s spent shell casings from the snow.
"What were you saying, Ranaja?" Gliath asked, resuming his easy stance.
"Oh, um ... we don’t have any ... ah ... the only guns we have after bailing on u113's base is my blaster. I reckon we’re gonna need to find some Earth weapons to take with us. Fruking dinosaurs. That’s okay. This is gonna be cool..."
Gliath nodded.
There was suddenly a faint sound in the air like a whistle—some sort of electronic whine—undulating up and down in pitch.
"Do you hear that, Ranaja?" Gliath asked.
"Yeah," Riley replied, cocking his head and looking back up the slope in the direction of the town. "That might be those authority figures. Maybe they’re like the police from my world. Go ahead and drag that dead spider into the bushes out of sight and we’ll go into the house, okay?"
The Krulax nodded. Gliath bent forward and seized the definitely-dead big arachnid by its nearest legs and hauled it into the scrub oak with ease.
Looking back at the invisible point in space-time where the permanent rift waited unseen, Riley felt bad for a moment. He still buzzed with the loss of Jason 113 and the others. He and Gliath were still together at least. He really cared for Goran and Artemis—especially Artemis—but losing Jason 113 felt like losing a big brother ... or a father.
Now this new Jason Leaper—this soft, inexperienced Jason who couldn’t rift—was stuck in a world that would try to eat him, and it was Riley’s fault. He never should have fruking played a game with it. He should have just talked to the new guy like Jason 113 told him to. After all, Jasons were Jasons, right? Jason 113 knew Jason 934’s heart ... probably.
Riley sighed. He should have listened.
Now they had to hurry. The soldier didn’t even want to think about the guilt he would carry if this young Jason was killed because of him. And yeah, they could always try to find another Jason Leaper, but shet—killing a Jason because of a stupid blunder would stick with Riley forever.
Besides, who knows how long they’d be stuck looking for another Jason Leaper? The omniverse was a big place, and the Market would be a lousy place to bum around for a while again. It was cold there—cold all the time. Planeswalking without the help of a Jason Leaper would suck.
Riley pocketed the spent casings then started up the hill.
Looking over the outside of the house, walking casually around it through the snow, Riley smirked when he saw a tiny white cat with a brown splotch on its face emerge from some sort of ... miniature, floppy door in an exterior wall. When the little creature saw Riley, it bounded away into the snow around to the front of the house. The diminutive white cat was dramatically smaller than Gliath in his leopard form, but the door it emerged from looked like it might not be too tight a fit for a panther...
Chapter 9
The dragon shrieked like a reptilian eagle as Jason plunged into the thick underbrush and wet, green bushes to the south side of the yawning cave's mouth. The call of the monster was a lot like how Jason imagined a dragon would sound like, but it was too damned close—right behind him and above him! The fierce screech scraped roughly through Jason’s bones and teeth like knives on a chalkboard.
Jason cried out with a panicked sound and tripped into the nearest bush, thrusting out his hands and cane in front of him. Big, fat leaves and scratchy fern fronds streaked dew across his face. The scent of weeds and pungent flowers flooded his nostrils and the back of his throat, and the man clenched his eyes shut as he fell, hoping that he could keep plant matter from getting in there. Jason hit the dirt, swallowed up by the man-high plants at the edge of the cave, feeling his hands land in the cool, soft earth at the base of the bushes and ferns.
The dragon’s coming! he thought and immediately spun around, pulling his legs close in to his body as quickly as he could, trying to get out of sight.
Jason froze, feeling leaves and fronds and water droplets tickle his face. His wrist hurt where he landed with his cane still in his grip. His bad knee was screaming—throbbing from the sudden explosion of movement. He waited, hoping that he was quick enough to escape the beast’s notice. His imagination ran wild with terror as he visualized a big, reptilian head bristling with horns suddenly bursting through the broad, green leaves and chomping down over one of his legs, dragging him out into the open like a thrashing doll...
Something tickled Jason’s left hand as he sat holding still in the foliage, and he looked down.
A huge millipede ran across the top of his hand, tickling his skin with hundreds of tiny legs. It was as big around as a stick of salami, dark brown, and covered in chitinous plating. The bazillion little black legs were like soft toothpicks that moved like lightning, their points just barely brushing his skin...
"Guh!" Jason exclaimed to himself, pulling his hand out from under the creature. Revulsion washed over him, immediately followed by a flush of fear.
With a gasp, he clamped his hands over his mouth and looked out to where the dragon flexed and moved around just out of sight. He heard the creaky flapping of the monster’s huge wings. Rocks and pebbles scattered under the bursts of air as the beast landed, or perhaps hovered nearby. Far too close to Jason, on the other side of the foliage, were the beast's huffing breaths and the sounds of its claws and other body parts scraping against the stone...
