by Vicky Savage
“This here’s a Sig Sauer P226 with a laser sight.” She points out the various features of the pistol, and then holds it out for me.
“How’s that feel? You like that weight? Is the grip okay?” she asks.
“Yeah, it seems fine.” Like I have something to compare it to.
She hooks up a target to the pulley and pushes a button sending it gliding to the back of the lane. “Okay, let’s see how she works. Use your laser sight, and you can’t miss.”
She’s wrong. I line up the laser just where I want it, but when I press the trigger, the gun kicks, my hand jumps, and I miss by a mile.
“Here, grip it with both hands like this.” Eloise takes the gun and demonstrates.
I plant my feet firmly, hold the pistol with both hands, line up my laser sight, and bam! I miss again. On my third try, I just nick the edge of the target paper.
“Hmm, that trigger feeling a little chunky to you?” she asks.
“Maybe a little.”
“Let’s try these others.”
We spend the next thirty minutes testing and comparing the three pistols. They each have attractive features, but the Kimber just feels better in my hand. The trigger action is smooth, and I actually hit the target six times. Although none of them is a great shot, I find myself enjoying learning a new skill.
“I think we found a winner,” Eloise says. “Remove the clip and make sure the chamber’s empty like I showed you. You can lock it up in its case and take it home with you, if you like.”
“Really?”
“Yes. “Some paperwork needs to be filled out, but we’ll take care of that tomorrow. “Congratulations, Jaden. You got yourself a fine new weapon.”
THIRTY-FIVE
Spontaneous Shifting is next on my schedule, and I have only five minutes to make it on time. It’s probably not appropriate to take my gun with me, so I quickly shift back to my apartment. The closet seems the best place to stow the gun case, and I shove it to the back of the empty top shelf. Then I hurry downstairs to Dr. McDonald’s laboratory.
“Whoa, there she is, Supernova Girl,” Dr. McDonald says when I scuttle through the door.
“Sorry I’m late,” I say, harried and not at all amused by the cutesy nickname.
“Not to worry SG, we’re going to have a great time today.”
SG? Is she serious?
“All right, Luci,” I say, figuring two can play that game, “what’re we going to do first?”
“Hey, you called me Luci.” She laughs. “My dad used to call me Luci. I like it.”
Crap.
“First off, I thought we’d have a little scavenger hunt. I made up a list of locations for you to shift to and things for you to bring back.”
She hands me the list. “So, currently where are you able to spontaneously shift?”
“Where?” I shrug. “Nowhere.”
“You mean nowhere, as in not anywhere?”
“That would be correct.”
Squinting at me, she taps a finger against her temple. “Hmm. This is going to be a challenge, SG, and I love a challenge. Let’s chuck the list for the moment and start easy.” She takes the list from me and tosses it on her desk.
“Easy is good,” I say.
She puts her hands on my shoulders and positions me facing the front of the room. “Okay, see that whiteboard on the wall behind the desk?”
“Yep.”
“Your first shift will be from right here to over there.”
She runs through the basics of spontaneous shifting for me. “Picture a specific place in your mind—in this case, that space in front of the whiteboard. Conjure up the feel of the place and combine that with the crazy streaming stars feeling of shifting, and poof! That’s how it happens.”
I already knew that, but my first go-round last year didn’t work out so well. “I’ll do my best, Luci, but last time I tried this, I ended up in a previously undiscovered jungle world being drooled all over by some unidentified species of carnivore. Are you ready to find me if something goes wrong?”
“You betcha.” She flips open her bracelet. “You’re on locator. If you don’t land where you’re supposed to, I’m hot on your trail. Now concentrate.”
I hold the picture of the whiteboard firmly in my mind. Closing my eyes, I allow the feeling of shifting to flood through me. Zzzt.
When I open my eyes, I’m standing unsteadily on top of the desk in front of the whiteboard.
“Woohoo. That was great!” Luci bounds across the room and offers me a hand down. “You’re a natural at this, SG. I think we’re ready to try some things on the scavenger list.”
She reads over the first few items and scratches her head. “You want to try your apartment first or the main kitchen?”
“Probably my apartment. I know it better than the kitchen.”
“Okay, shift to your apartment and bring back a shoe from your closet.”
“A shoe?”
She spreads her arms wide. “Whatever. Anything from your apartment will do.”
I’m still not sure about this, but I’m willing to try. “Okay, here goes.” I close my eyes and envision my bedroom. I summon up the comfortable feeling of lying on my bed and combine that with the streaming stars rush. Zzzt!
Incredibly, I land on my bed. Yippee! I bounce up and down for a few seconds, feeling proud of myself. Then I hop onto the rug and fish a shoe out of my closet.
Now for the hard part—getting back. I try to visualize Dr. McDonald’s office, but I can’t get a good feel for it. My mind keeps drifting back to the whiteboard from earlier. When in doubt, go with what you know, right? I concentrate deeply on the whiteboard, and Zzzt, I land back on top of Luci’s desk, and triumphantly hold up my shoe.
“Got it.”
“Bravo!” She applauds. “Want to try the kitchen now?”
“Why not?” I climb down from the desk feeling much more confident. Spontaneous Shifting is going to be a breeze.
“This time, shift to the kitchen and bring back some cookies” she says. “I’m getting kind of hungry. I like chocolate chip, but bring back whatever you like.”
I laugh. Luci’s a strange bird, but I’m kind of warming up to her. “All right. Give me a minute.”
I shake out my arms and waggle my head back and forth to loosen up. Then I close my eyes and envision the kitchen. At first, my mind resists zeroing in on a specific spot, but I force myself to concentrate on the counter near the pantry. The flying through dimensions feeling fills me up and Zzzt.
“Ouch!” I bang my knee hard as I land in a confined, pitch-black space. A wave of claustrophobic panic washes over me. I don’t have the slightest idea where I am. I frantically clutch for my TPD, but a door in front of me suddenly swings open, and light floods into the small space. I’m standing in the damn broom closet.
“Oops. We got a little off course on that one,” Luci says, offering me her hand once again.
I clamber out of the closet with a vacuum cleaner hose wrapped around my leg. My shin and kneecap are pretty banged up, and a lovely purple bruise has begun to blossom.
“Oooh golly. That looks nasty.” She untangles the hose and shoves it back in the closet. “You’d better ice that right away.”
“Ya think?” I say, annoyed with the whole scavenger hunt game. “Just take me back to your office so I can get my shoe, please. It’s almost time for my next class.”
“No problem.” She transports us back to her office in a flash. “We’ll try something a bit different tomorrow. Maybe we’ll work outdoors.”
I limp out of her office and take the elevator to my apartment. Tossing my shoe on the rug, I open the freezer and scoop out some ice. My schedule says I’m supposed to be in “Classroom 3” on the first floor at twelve-twenty for the Study of Alternate Earths. That gives me ten minutes.
I rig up a make-shift ice pack and prop my leg on the couch for several minutes. Asher says it’s considered bad form to shift locations while inside the Chate
au, but I don’t have time to wait for the elevator, and the stairs are out of the question. I chuck the ice in the sink, grab my electronic notebook, and use my bracelet to shift downstairs to the hallway where the classrooms are located.
When I open the door to Classroom 3, I receive two surprises. First, Ralston’s roommate, Gil, is the instructor, and second, twenty or so people are already seated in the amphitheater classroom—most of whom I’ve never seen before.
“Miss Beckett, welcome. I wondered if you’d be joining us today,” Gil says.
All heads turn to me. “I apologize if I’m late. I had a slight accident in my last class.” I rub my swollen knee for emphasis.
“It’s quite all right, please take a seat.”
I slide into the nearest empty spot.
“This is your text-book.” He places a small memory card on the desktop in front of me. “Do you have your tablet?”
“Yes, right here.”
“Wonderful. Let’s begin again.”
I sneak a glance at the guy sitting next to me. His memory card is plugged into the side of his tablet, so I find the slot for my card and plug it in. The glass lights up like a screen, and the table of contents appears. A virtual keyboard sits at the bottom of the page for taking notes.
“As I was saying, we are aware of the existence of precisely one thousand seven hundred and sixty-two Archetypal Earths, or AEs,” Gil says. “These earths share similar histories and are substantially the same in geography, technology, and political structure. You may study those earths at your leisure. In this class, we will concern ourselves primarily with the Outlier Earths, or OEs. They are by far the most interesting. While all earths began as Archetypal Earths, the outliers have, for one reason or another, deviated from the norm in one or more significant ways.”
Gil spends the next hour going over the fundamentals of what constitutes an Archetypal Earth and pointing out instances of earths that don’t fit the mold.
“Any AE can quickly become an outlier with the occurrence of a catastrophic event,” he says. “Recently inhabitants of Earth 47CF, up until now an Archetypal Earth, embarked upon a major war—World War III. Though we do not know the final outcome as yet, the war will undoubtedly cause that earth to deviate politically and historically from the AEs, thus moving it into the OE category.”
I type in notes, not really sure yet what’s important and what’s not.
“As another example,” he says. “Ms. Beckett, our newest Transcender, is originally from Earth 7Y12, an AE. In her initial shift she found herself on Earth H87D, an OE. This earth had become an outlier, due in part to a natural disaster in the form of a catastrophic asteroid collision, and also due to the outside introduction of advanced technology in the form of enormous domes containing entire ecosystems.”
Everyone turns to stare at me again, and I shrink a little in my seat. “She now finds herself a resident of Arumel City on Earth A1W5, also an OE, due to the existence of our eighth continent and our advanced social systems and technology.”
I already knew that the country of Arumel is the counterpart of the United States on this earth, and that Arumel City is its capital and roughly equivalent to New York City. But this is the first I’ve heard that this earth has eight continents. Guess I have a lot of independent study to do.
After class, I apologize once more to Gil for being late and ask him about the other students.
“This class is open to the public,” he says. “Most of the local colleges give credit toward graduation for completion of the course. Many of the students are more interested in seeing Transcenders in their natural habitat, rather than in the material itself. Prepare yourself to be approached by some curiosity seekers.”
“Thanks for the warning,” I say. “The thing is, I feel a bit behind everyone else because I don’t know much about this earth or the history of Arumel. Can you recommend a book or something that will help me catch up?”
“I have some wonderful materials for you. Very rudimentary. I’ll bring them to class tomorrow.”
“That’d be great. See you then.”
Cartography is just down the hall in Classroom 7, a smaller more intimate space. Ten students are in attendance, eight of whom are Transcenders. The class consists mainly of learning to read 3D maps. The professor says that later in the year we’ll learn to construct them ourselves. I’m told I need to master both of these skills before heading up an exploration of my own.
After class, I collect my things and hurry back to my apartment. Asher’s due in two minutes. I drop my school stuff on the dining table and shimmy out of my shorts on the way to my bedroom, leaving them in a heap on the floor. I yank a long lavender dress off its hanger and barely have time to pull it on over my head before Asher knocks at my door.
“Coming,” I call as I shuffle my feet into sandals and grab my purse. I hope every day won’t be as rushed as this one.
“Are you limping?” Asher asks when I join him in the hall.
“A little mishap in Spontaneous Shifting,” I say. “Had a little run-in with a vacuum cleaner. It’s not bad, really.” I slide the strap of my embroidered bag over my shoulder.
“You still up for this today?” he asks.
“Yeees! I need this. It’s been an intense day.”
We take a community car downtown. It’s still unnerving to ride in a car that drives itself, even though Asher explained on my first visit that the entire traffic system is satellite controlled by quantum computers. He claims there hasn’t been an auto accident in years, but sometimes it feels like being on a carnival ride without tracks. Despite my apprehension, traffic flows smoothly all around us, and we move through the town at a decent clip.
The cityscape of downtown Arumel is awe-inspiring. Towering, futuristic buildings of glass and steel dominate the skyline. Each glittering structure is nestled in its own lush little park, creating the impression that the skyscrapers were conjured from the ground up by architect fairies. The streets and sidewalks are spotless and impeccably maintained. Asher tells me the locals call it the Emerald City, because of the glittering edifices and all the greenery.
We stop for lunch at a small sidewalk café. Our table occupies a shady corner under a cherry red umbrella. It’s the perfect spot for people watching. Most Arumelans appear similar to people in my hometown, although they generally dress in flowy apparel like long dresses or loose pants and tunics. The younger people tend to experiment with more interesting, trendy designs. Uniforms are not an uncommon sight in town—some military, some law enforcement, and some community workers like sidewalk sweepers. Also, people in certain professions, like lawyers and judges, wear long robes in a variety of colors around town.
We order our meal from a touch screen menu built into the table. After only a few minutes, our pine nut and arugula salads, warm pistachio rolls, and tall glasses of iced raspberry tea are delivered to our table by a pretty, young woman. I notice she looks like the twin of the woman delivering food to the next table, and their sister appears to be totaling the tab for a table on the other side.
“Are they automatons?” I whisper to Ash when she leaves.
“Yeah, robots do a lot of service work in the upper-end restaurants and hotels,” he says, matter-of-factly. “So what style of décor do you have in mind for your place?”
I take a moment to process the idea of a fleet of automaton restaurant workers, before I answer him.
“Uh, I don’t really know,” I say. “Something colorful and pretty, maybe funky and a little unexpected. Does that sound stupid?”
“No. But it encompasses a lot. Do you have a favorite artist?”
“I guess I’m partial to the Italian renaissance painters like Botticelli. But I also kind of like Andy Warhol.”
He grins. “I guess that’s something to go on.”
While we enjoy our crunchy salads, I fill Ash in on my first day of classes.
“Eloise taught me fire-arms, too,” he says. “She’s amazing. You�
�ll get used to Dr. McDonald after a while. She’s harmless and scary-smart. As far as Gil’s class goes, if people ask you for autographs, or want to take photos with you, feel free to say no. They’ve been told that’s not appropriate during class time.”
“Okay, good to know.”
As the pretty automaton server brings the bill to our table, I catch sight of a company of soldiers in white armor and helmets carrying long mean-looking rifles, marching straight for us on the sidewalk. For an anxious second, I’m sure IUGA has sent them for me. I grasp Asher’s arm ready to bolt if necessary.
“Who are those guys?” I hiss. “Have you seen them before?”
