The Gatespace Trilogy, Omnibus Edition

by Alan Seeger

  Now he had to figure out what to do next.

  ~~~~~

  Stephanie Padgett, a 21-year-old senior from Corvallis, Oregon, had gotten out of her afternoon literature class just a few minutes early and hurried to her dorm room to change and get ready for a night out with her friends.

  The five of them — Stephanie, her roommate Veronica Elms, Caroline Bondi, whom everyone referred to as “Blondie Bondi” or “Caroline Bombshell,” Patricia Owens, and Denise Hampton, were practically inseparable. They had met on the first day of classes back in 1997, wandering around after the new student orientation as incoming freshmen, or what were referred to as “Baby Bears” at Berkeley.

  Veronica was from arid Palm Desert, California, and found Stephanie’s descriptions of the cool, moist breezes of Oregon fascinating, while Caroline, Patty and Denise had grown up together in a suburb of Fort Worth called North Richland Hills and had the Texas twang to prove it. All five girls lived on the same floor of one of the women’s residence halls, which made it easy for them to study together, get advice from each other, and bitch and moan to each other about classes, guys, or whatever.

  Almost without exception, though, on a Friday night they were ready to blow off a little steam and have fun together. Sometimes the five of them would go to the movies; other times they’d round up a group of guys and go out dancing, often in San Francisco or San Jose. Most often, however, the quintet would wind up down at the favorite watering hole of many Berkeley students, the Bear’s Lair, to listen to music, drink cold beer, and see what the night had in store for them.

  This was one of those kinds of nights.

  CHAPTER 37

  Terry was bleary-eyed but couldn’t stand the thought of leaving his station. What if Rick shows back up? He was certain that it would happen at any moment. By 4 AM, he was nodding off, finding himself close to simply putting his head down on the desk and falling asleep.

  To avoid this happening, he got a pen and paper and started making notes on situations that he thought might have been reports of a spontaneous Gate or wormhole appearance in the historical record. Off the top of his head, he listed the mysterious disappearance of Flight 19 off the coast of Florida in December of 1945 and the story of a group of Roman soldiers — the Legio IX Hispana or Ninth Spanish Legion — that disappeared without a trace in ancient Britain.

  A little additional research revealed many more such stories, including amazing tales such as one that he read about an Englishman who made a wager with some friends that he could run non-stop from their little village all the way to Coventry, a distance of some sixteen miles. His friends figured it was easy money and took the bet.

  As he began to run steadily toward Coventry, his friends climbed into a horse and buggy to follow. After a few miles, ahead on the road, the friends saw him seem to trip over something and fall, but rather than landing on the road, he disappeared before their very eyes. Despite a thorough search by his friends as well as the police, he was never seen again.

  Another such story that Terry found was said to have occurred in November of 1878. It had to do with a sixteen-year-old boy who went out to the well on his family’s farm in Quincy, Illinois to fetch a bucket of water. When he didn’t come back within a reasonable time, his family became concerned. Had he slipped in the snow and injured himself, or even fallen into the well? They went outside to check on him, but all they found were his single set of footprints in the snow, leading halfway to the well and then abruptly stopping. No sign of struggle; no other tracks, as from an attacker or predator. Where, then, had he disappeared to? No one was ever able to answer that question, and as with the Coventry runner, the boy was never seen again.

  There were a great many more tales such as this, dating back literally thousands of years. Terry’s father had long told him, “Every mysterious legend has its taproots in the truth.” He gave this some thought and decided it likely meant that, in addition to lending some credence to stories such as sightings of the Sasquatch, the Loch Ness monster, UFOs and the Jersey Devil, it seemed that spontaneously generated Gates may have been appearing at random places on Earth for centuries; and if this had been happening on Earth, then undoubtedly it occurred everywhere, like little glitches or burps in the very fabric of space-time.

  At 6:15 AM, Randall walked in to the lab to see how Terry was doing, and discovered him slouched in his chair, sound asleep. He smiled grimly. He couldn’t fault him; Terry had been hard at work trying to figure out a way to locate Rick for nearly 24 hours,

  He sat down in the next chair from Terry and stared at the green swirl of the Gate, turning in the air like a huge green chrysanthemum.

  CHAPTER 38

  Rick’s heart raced when he saw the younger version of Stefanie walk into the pub, accompanied by her group of friends. They greeted several of the other customers, a couple of the waitresses and the bartender familiarly; it was clear that they were regulars here.

  He restrained himself from greeting Stef as the group of girls settled at a table not far from where he sat. It’d be kind of hard to explain how he knew who she was.

  Instead, he sat at his small table and finished his second beer. He still felt sharp and clear-headed, so he decided to risk a third Bud. When he saw that the waitresses were busy handling the influx of customers, he decided to go to the bar to get it; that would also give him an excuse to pass by the girls’ table, maybe make some sort of eye contact with Stef, and perhaps gauge her openness to conversing with him. He might even be able to get her out on the small dance floor.

  As he passed their table, however, Stefanie was deep in conversation with a dark-haired girl — he recognized her as a younger version of his Stef’s old college roommate… what was her name? Vanessa? Veronica? Something like that. He’d met her one night the year before — in 2015, I mean, he thought to himself — when she was in St. Louis on business.

  What he didn’t expect was the very direct way that one of Stef’s other friends, a blonde, curvaceous girl, looked him in the eye and smiled. “Hi there, handsome,” she said. “I’ve never seen you in here before.”

  Caught off guard, Rick found himself stammering a bit. “I, uh… I’m just in town for the night,” he responded.

  The girl, who he remembered from Stefanie’s photos was named Caroline, stood up and grabbed his hand. “Well, then,” she said. “It must just be my lucky night.” She leaned in toward his ear and murmured, “And it might be yours, too.” She led him toward the dance floor as he cast glances back toward Stef, not knowing what to do, but found her still deep in conversation with her roommate.

  A love ballad was playing, and Caroline drew him close. Rick felt the generous curves of her body conforming to his in all the right places. He drew back slightly, unwilling to allow himself to succumb to the feelings she was evoking in him. He smiled and laughed softly.

  “What’s the matter, do I scare you? I would have thought a mature guy like you would be used to younger women coming on to him,” Caroline said, pulling him closer still. “C’mon, don’t be afraid,” she grinned. “I promise I won’t break.”

  Rick looked over Caroline’s shoulder toward Stefanie, uncertain about what he should do, and continued to sway with her as he frantically tried to sort out what he should do next.

  CHAPTER 39

  Stefanie woke up in the bed, having cried herself to sleep in the wee hours of the night. She looked at the clock; it was nearly six in the morning. No sign of Rick. Stef sobbed softly, not knowing what to think of Rick’s sudden disappearance. Did it have to do with his illness? His work? Randall had denied knowing where Rick was, but something in his tone had made Stefanie doubt he was telling her the truth.

  Well, she was going to discover what the truth really was. She got up, pulled on her favorite worn jeans and the very first tee shirt that she’d appropriated from Rick, one that had the Foo Fighters logo on the front and a roster of the cities from their 2010 tour on the back, slipped into a pair of running shoes and
a grey hoodie.

  Grabbing her keys, she was in the Jeep and driving down the road by 6:15.

  CHAPTER 40

  Rick was practically in a daze. He had come here, to 2000 San Francisco, passing through a green swirl that somehow connected his time and place with this one, determined to find Stefanie — the twenty-one year old version of Stefanie — and somehow steer her toward meeting thirty-year-old him, though he had no idea how… and now this… this… complication, this blonde with double D tits, was pressing up against him in a way that suggested that she would very much like him to forget all about Stef and —

  What was he thinking? She didn’t even know the nature of his interest in Stef, didn’t even know he had an interest in Stef.

  To make matters worse, the 2000 version of him was three thousand miles away, in DC. What was he supposed to do, just tell this young Stefanie, “There’s someone you need to meet, but he’s on the other side of the country. Trust me on this one”?

  Ridiculous.

  Preposterous.

  Absolutely essential.

  CHAPTER 41

  It was 6:35 AM. Nearly 24 hours had passed since Rick had apparently used the HOT6 to pass through a wormhole that led back to San Francisco, 2000, to do only God knew what.

  Randall and Terry were sitting next to each other in the laboratory, their workstations cluttered with empty coffee containers and fast food wrappers. Terry was currently reclining as far back as his office chair would allow, precariously balanced with his feet propped up on another chair, quietly dozing, not quite asleep, letting his thoughts orbit around the problem.

  They were taking turns keeping an eye on the Gate, and it was Randall’s watch. They were hoping against hope that Rick would suddenly reappear from out of the green and that he wouldn’t have instigated some chain of events that would seriously fuck the world up.

  Leukemia or not, Randall thought, if and when he ever gets back here, I’m gonna beat his ass and shove a copy of the Three Rules up his nose. Or vice versa.

  He knew the rest of the staff would start showing up in less than half an hour. He only wished he had better news for them.

  A few more minutes ticked by, and he heard, from the direction of the main door, the sound of keys in the lock. That would likely be Elizabeth, coming in early to get the coffee started and so on. Then he heard voices shouting.

  “You’ll have to wait —”

  “Get out of my way!”

  “I’ll check and see if —”

  “I said get the fuck out of my way if you know what’s good for you!”

  Suddenly she was there in the doorway, as Randall had somehow always known that she would eventually be; beautiful and intelligent, auburn-haired and curvaceous, and very, very pissed off indeed.

  He wasn’t attracted to her in that way; she belonged to Rick, and that was as it should be. He just hoped Rick would make it back to her.

  “Stefanie, I’m so glad you’re here. There are a few things you should know…”

  CHAPTER 42

  Elizabeth Ryan was a native of O’Fallon, Illinois, just on the other side of the river from St. Louis. Tall, blonde, and skinny, she had been the star forward of her high school’s girls’ basketball team, and had very nearly convinced the coach of the boys’ team to let her try out for his squad. She was adamant that she wasn’t going to wind up popping out two or three kids by the time she was 25. She had loftier goals than that. However, she wasn’t exactly Mensa material; she was fully aware of that.

  On the other hand, she wasn’t fond of the idea of commuting to a factory job in Fairview Heights or East St. Louis, either, so she finally signed up with a placement bureau called St. Louis Staffing in early 2011.

  Four days after she’d registered there, her phone rang, and a pleasant voice asked her to come in to a new company’s office in the University City area of St. Louis for an interview for a secretarial position.

  Initially, Randall Orwell had intended to hire a temp girl until he could find a permanent, professional office manager, but after she’d been on the job for four days and was already fielding questions from people in the scientific community and the media like an outfielder catching pop flies, he made her the office manager, and she’d been there ever since.

  Having grown up in suburban, working-class Illinois, Elizabeth had pretty much heard it all and seen more than most when it came to aberrant behavior, so when Stefanie came exploding through the front door early that morning, Elizabeth knew better than to stand in her way.

  CHAPTER 43

  “There’s something I need you to do for me,” Rick told Caroline as they danced.

  Blondie Bombshell had heard that line a time or two before. She stopped swaying and grinned at him lewdly. “Sure. You got a car?”

  “What?” Rick said. “Oh — no, nothing like that. I need for you to give a message to someone.”

  She stared at him uncomprehendingly. “Huh?”

  “I need you to give this note to your friend.” He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, pulled out a plain white envelope, and handed it to her.

  She held it up, read the name written on it in blue ball point ink. Stefanie.

  “For Steph?” She looked disappointed. “Yeah, I can give it to her, I guess… but you spelled her name wrong.”

  Rick glanced at the menu and mentally kicked himself. Her birth name was ‘Stephanie.’ She didn’t start spelling it with an ‘f’ until she was 22.

  “Thank you, Caroline. I really appreciate it.”

  Caroline never considered the fact that she’d never told him her name. She turned and walked toward the table where Stephanie and Vanessa were sitting.

  “Hey, Padgett,” she called, “I got something for ya.” She handed Stephanie the envelope.

  Stephanie looked at the envelope, puzzled. “Who’s it from?”

  “That guy over there.”

  “What guy?”

  Caroline turned to point at Rick. “That guy right —” She stopped short.

  Rick was gone.

  CHAPTER 44

  Stefanie and Randall were sitting at a table in ChroNova’s break room. Randall had poured them both a cup of coffee, explained the HOT6 to her in layman’s terms, and confessed to her that it appeared that Rick had passed through the vortex into the past.

  “But why? Why would he just leave like that — leave me here and…” She paused, thinking for a moment. “When and where does it lead to?”

  Randall stared at her for a moment. “San Francisco, California. In the year 2000.”

  Stefanie looked at him. She looked out of a nearby window for a moment, and he could see the wheels turning in her head. Then she looked back at him.

  “I know where he went.”

  CHAPTER 45

  As soon as Caroline had turned to walk towards Stephanie, Rick had spun around and headed for the door. He hailed a cab, and twenty-two minutes later, late night traffic being fairly light, he climbed out of the taxi in front of the alley where, if everything was stable, he would find the Gate that would take him back to 2016.

  For a moment his heart raced, as he neared the end of the alley and didn’t see the familiar green flicker, but when he turned the final corner, there it was, far dimmer than he seemed to remember.

  He wondered what effect, if any, the note he’d left Stephanie would have on 2016, took a deep breath, and stepped into the vortex.

  CHAPTER 46

  Randall and Stefanie had rushed back to the lab, shouting to all the team members who had arrived that they had a plan. Within moments, a dozen people were gathered in the lab.

  “What are we doing?” Terry asked.

  “I know where he is,” said Stef. “In 2000, I was a senior at Berkeley. He went back to 2000 to find me.”

  Terry looked confused. “But…”

  “I’ll fill you in later,” Randall told him. “Ready any time you are, Stefanie,” he said to her.

  “I’m going now,” sh
e replied from the launch platform where she was already standing, and practically ran into the swirling Gate.

  The team members all sighed with a bit of relief, and began to speculate aloud what would come next.

  None of them guessed correctly.

  Just fourteen seconds after Stefanie Padgett entered the Gate, the team was floored to see Rick Harper come striding out of it...

  Alone.

  CHAPTER 47

  Stefanie Padgett found herself in a dark alley, disoriented and a little confused.

  How did I get here? Where am I? She turned and saw the faintly glowing swirl of the Gate that she had just walked through and had a vague recollection of having arrived from… somewhere else?

  She walked to the street end of the alley and looked around. She recognized San Francisco; she could see a familiar area down the hill that told her she was in the Marina District. She’d been a frequent visitor to the area when she was in school at Berkeley, years ago.

  But how did she get here?

  The last thing she’d remembered, she was in St. Louis… and…

  Strange.

  She couldn’t remember anything that had been going on in her life, for…