by R E McLean
Alex turned to Lacey. Her skin was glowing with sweat and adrenaline. She looked ten years older than the girl Alex had seen disappear from Fisherman’s Wharf.
“That true?” she asked. “He your friend?”
Lacey shook her head.
“Thought not.” Alex turned back to the boy. “Please. Put the gun down. I’m not going to hurt you.”
The boy let out a strangled sound. He waved the gun from side to side, pointing it first at Alex, then at Lacey. Lacey clung to Alex’s arm, her nails gripping through the fabric of Alex’s jacket.
The boy was whispering again, his lips quivering. He was scared. Scared people could do stupid things.
Alex stepped away from the shed. She reached out her hand and beckoned.
“Now come on. Hand it over and everything will be fine. You don’t want to shoot us and you know it.”
Alex glanced back at the shed. She felt her stomach dip.
Then she remembered Dr Pierce, the professor who’d preceded her in this job. Mike had been at her funeral, before they’d met. Before she’d been recruited to the MIU. What had happened to her? Had she died like this?
She closed her eyes. She wasn’t trained for this. Her job was the physics. To spot the anomalies, identify people who’d slipped from one world to the next. She wasn’t a cop. She was Scottish, for Christ’s sake. The only guns they had at home were for shooting cardboard rabbits at the fair.
She heard movement behind her and turned.
“Stop!” cried the boy.
She held up a hand and carried on turning, not quite able to believe what she was seeing.
“I said stop!”
A crack ricocheted between the empty buildings. Alex yelled something unintelligible. Lacey let go of her arm and started running.
The shed door was open. Mike had recovered, and walked out.
He’d been shot again.
But this time it was no ordinary shooting.
21
Eggplant
Lacey heard laughter behind her. She stopped running.
“Oh, wow. Mike, you should see yourself.”
She turned to see the ginger woman standing alone, pointing at the ground.
Pip was in the same spot, pointing his gun at the woman, staring at the same patch on the ground.
“Stay there. Don’t hop off,” said the woman. She approached Pip, her hand outstretched. “I suggest you give that to me before you do any more damage.”
Pip dropped the gun.
“What did I— Why is he—?”
The woman picked up the gun. She shoved it in her pocket.
“Something to do with all the other weird stuff going on in this world. You can open rifts. That shed’s like my cat’s cardboard box. And your stupid quantum gun has just turned my partner into a rabbit.”
“A what?” said Lacey.
The woman turned to her. “Don’t worry, he’ll be fine. I’ll put him back in that shed and he’ll be back to normal in two ticks. Failing that, I’ll have to shoot him again. Although he may turn into a mouse, or a pumpkin.”
She drew the gun from her pocket and inspected it.
“Is it the gun that did this, or something else?” She looked at Pip. “Tell me.”
Lacey approached them slowly, wanting to see the rabbit.
Sure enough, on the ground next to the woman’s foot, was a small brown bunny rabbit. It had a sleek coat and its nose was twitching.
“Aww.” Lacey picked it up.
“I’d watch out if I were you. Mike’s a grumpy so-and-so.”
Lacey stroked the rabbit, feeling its ears pull over its back. It was soft, and warm. She felt tears come to her eyes.
“Can you take me home now? Ouch!”
She dropped the rabbit. It twisted as it fell to the floor, landing on its feet. It hopped toward the shed.
“Little sucker bit me!” she cried, sucking her finger.
“I did warn you.” The woman scooped the rabbit up and shoved it into the front of her jacket, which she buttoned up. “Stay there, if you know what’s good for you. And keep those fangs to yourself.”
“Stop it!” cried Pip. “You’re being dumb. Quantum sheds, rabbit men. Wha’s going on?”
He waved his hand in the air and started to wriggle his fingers.
“Oh no,” said Lacey. “He’s doing it again.”
The woman looked from Lacey to Pip and back again. “Doing what?”
“He does this thing with his arm. It’s what you saw him do at Fisherman’s Wharf. It’s what he pulled me through.”
“No!” Pip cried. “Leave me alone! Give me Lacey! Just want a friend.”
“Sorry, kid,” said the woman. “But where I come from, we don’t make friends by snatching people through portals between dimensions. It’s not polite.”
He screamed at her and raised his other arm. He was twirling them around each other now, his teeth gritted.
A flash of light flew into the sky above his head, illuminating them all. The rabbit was peering out of the woman’s jacket, staring up at Pip’s hands.
“Not a portal!” he cried. “Lot worse!”
Lacey turned to the woman. “If he does it again, maybe we can escape through it.”
“Sounds like a plan. Did it look like this last time?”
“No. It was in front of him. It started out as a patch of light.”
“Shimmering?”
“Yes.”
“Smell of PVA glue?”
Lacey wrinkled her nose. “Er. Yeah. I guess so. I didn’t really think about it.”
The woman nodded. “That’s a portal alright. A link between dimensions.” She turned to Lacey. “Cool, huh?”
“Not if it means we’re stuck here.”
“Nope. Not stuck anymore. All we need to do is annoy him and we can go through it.”
“He closed it last time before I had a chance.”
Pip stopped spinning his hands. The air above him darkened. “Are you listening? Not a portal. Is destruction!”
“I think it’s a portal,” replied the woman. “Let me explain the physics—”
“No explain. Listen!”
Pip’s eyes were shining. He waved his arms again, twirling them in and out like some sort of dance. The cape on his superhero outfit flew out behind him, catching the wind. Lacey watched, transfixed. She waited for him to pull the anomaly down, to put it between them.
There was a clap of thunder. Lacey and the woman stood back.
“Did that happen last time?” the woman whispered.
“Uh-uh.”
“Oh.”
“What does it mean? Is it bad?”
The rabbit leaped out of the woman’s jacket and ran away into the darkness. The woman grasped at it but she was too slow.
“Mike! Mike, come back!”
She ran after the rabbit, leaving Lacey alone with Pip. Shivers ran across Lacey’s skin. She stared at the growing patch of red and purple light above Pip’s head. This was wrong.
“He’s gone,” said the woman, returning to them. She went to the shed and yanked the door open. She grabbed a rock and propped it open.
She shrugged at Lacey. “You never know, he might have the sense to go back in there.”
Lacey nodded then pointed at Pip.
“Stop it!” the woman cried. “We’ll listen to you! Just stop that.”
The wind had increased now, streaming from the sky above Pip. His shaggy blond hair flickered around his face and his eyes were closed. He looked like he was meditating.
“This isn’t what it was like last time,” said Lacey.
“Thought so,” said the woman. “I don’t know what it is, but it’s not a portal.”
Pip opened his eyes. They were dark, reflecting the red sky. He grinned.
He brought his arms down, slowly. Carefully. The anomaly was ten feet wide now. In its center was a swirling mass of gray and purple clouds, like some kind of interdimensional eggplant stew.
He raised his arm and brought it back down like a whip.
“Run!” the woman cried, and grabbed Lacey’s arm.
22
Castle
Alex ran through the almost-familiar streets, trying to calculate how far they needed to run to get back to the Hall of Justice. She could only hope that the Spinner had dematerialized and that Mike would find them somehow.
Could she go back without him? Her mission was clear: rescue Lacey. But she couldn’t abandon Mike here.
They skidded to a halt at the point where she’d climbed over the mountain of rubble. How long ago had that been—three, maybe four hours?
She stopped running.
It was gone. Where the heap of twisted metal and concrete had been was a giant bouncy castle.
Lacey stopped running. “What’s that doing here?”
“No idea.”
Alex approached it, waiting for it to change back into the pile of rubble. She reached out a hand and prodded it.
It gave, just very slightly.
Lacey was in front of her, clambering onto the bouncy castle. It was taller than the mountain, swaying slightly in the darkness. Alex could just make out turrets, and crenellations.
This world certainly did attention to detail.
“Stop!” she called.
Lacey turned. She was standing on the base, bouncing gently. She looked past Alex, toward Fisherman’s Wharf. Her eyes widened.
Alex span round. “What is it?”
She squinted into the darkness, expecting to see Pip coming at them.
A shape loomed at them, bouncing at the same speed as Lacey.
“You’re kidding me.” Alex clapped a hand to her mouth. She closed her eyes. She opened them again.
Lolloping along Mason Street, twenty feet high and half as wide, was the largest rabbit she had ever seen. Its teeth were the size of her thighs. Its ears were like yacht sails. It held a carrot the size of a tuba in one of its front legs and a glittering egg-shaped object the size of a boulder in the other. It walked on its hind legs.
Was it smiling at her?
“Mike?” she whispered.
The rabbit stopped moving. It looked her up and down. Was it trying to place her, or imagining how nice she’d taste?
“Mike?” she repeated, louder this time.
The rabbit nodded.
She stared at it. Well, he’d found her. That was one thing. But how was she going to return to Silicon City, let alone San Francisco, with a twenty-foot-high rabbit?
“Follow me,” she told him.
The rabbit took two strides toward her, making the broken tarmac shudder beneath her feet. It approached the bouncy castle and eyed it for a moment, then crouched down, wiggled its massive butt a few times, and pounced.
Alex watched it fly over her head and onto the bouncy castle. It landed once, then bounced up as high as the buildings round them. It flew out of sight. It had to be on the other side, with Lacey.
Lacey!
Alex clambered onto the castle. As she reached the top, she felt its pressure dissipate beneath her as if deflating.
She crawled across its surface, sinking into its folds. It was deflating. Had Lacey or Mike pulled the plug?
If she wasn’t careful she’d get caught inside the thing, wrapped up in yellow turrets and arrow slits.
On the other side, the rabbit was watching her. It held out a paw.
She stared at the paw, then up into the rabbit’s eyes. It nodded at her.
She took a deep breath then grabbed the paw. It swung her up and over the rest of the bouncy castle, depositing her on the sidewalk beyond.
She bent over and took a few breaths. The rabbit took a bite from its carrot.
“Is this Mike?” asked Lacey.
“I guess so.”
“Cool.”
Alex eyed Lacey. This wasn’t cool. Not in the slightest. This was about as cool as the middle of a volcano during the hottest July on record.
But she had to work with what she had.
“We need to get back to the Hall of Justice.” Alex looked up. “Give us a ride?”
The bunny bent its back to make a slope. She and Lacey clambered up and grabbed its fur. It made a screeching sound and Alex loosened her grip.
They bounded along the street, heading toward the Hall of Justice. It wasn’t far now and they were there in less than a minute.
Still no Spinner, no portal. Nothing.
“What’s that?” said Lacey.
Beyond the Hall was a red glow. It was growing, brightening. Its edges swirled and span.
“This isn’t good,” she said, in the biggest understatement since Albert Einstein said he’d had an idea.
“No.”
“It’s Pip,” said Alex. “The thing he created. It’s growing, and it’s heading this way.”
23
Cube
Lacey stared up at the anomaly. It was advancing toward them, growing. She imagined Pip beneath it, his rage palpable.
This was her fault. This thing was going to swallow them up and they’d all die. She should have stayed, should have done what Pip wanted.
She looked at the building in front of them. It was featureless, with tall broken windows and a blank front torn through in places. How was this place going to get her home?
“I don’t understand,” she said. “Why are we here?”
The woman turned to her, the giant rabbit following her gaze.
“My name’s Alex Strand. I work for an organization called the Multiverse Investigations Unit. We have technology that allows us to jump between worlds. You were snatched by that kid and brought to this world. I’m here to take you back.” She looked up at the rabbit. “Among other things.”
“So who’s he? And why has he turned into a giant version of Bugs Bunny?”
“This is Mike, my partner. I’m not sure why he’s taken this form, but it’s something to do with this world. It’s full of anomalies, odd quantum effects.”
“What effects?”
Alex shook her head. “Let’s just focus on getting you home.”
There was a crack of thunder, the redness swirling above their heads.
“We need to get moving,” said Alex. “It’s gone.”
“What’s gone?”
“Tell you later. Mike, let us up.”
The rabbit lowered itself again and they climbed up its back. Lacey was careful to grip tightly enough not to fall but no more. She wondered what it felt like to be turned into a twenty-foot rabbit, or indeed if this Mike person was aware of what was happening.
They lolloped away from the purple storm. It looked like a bruise now, the kind of bruise that would make you turn away and gag. She wondered where Pip was. Was he moving toward them too, or was he back at Fisherman’s Wharf, casting this thing from a distance?
They reached a park, trees arranged in neat rows along pathways. The rabbit stopped.
“It’s not moving,” said Alex. “I think we’re safe.” She tugged at the rabbit’s fur and he let them slide down.
The trees here were different. Some of them looked like giant sticks of cotton candy, others were huge toffee apples. A clump to their left were regular trees, but with carrots dangling from their branches.
The rabbit hopped over to them and grabbed a carrot. As he pulled, the tree morphed into a giant slug.
“What the—?” cried Lacey.
“It’s getting worse,” said Alex. “The weirdness. Maybe we’re approaching its epicenter.”
They carried on walking, ignoring the disgruntled huffs and sighs of the rabbit as it loped along beside them. They reached the waters of the Bay.
On the other side was what looked like a fireworks show. Lights flew into the sky, exploding to form multicolored shapes reflected in the water.
Alex was walking away from Lacey, toward an object glowing on the ground. Lacey followed, wary.
Alex turned to her, holding a black cube. It was so dark it seemed
to swallow light, but at its edges was a faint pink glow.
“What is it?” asked Lacey.
“It’s a bitbox. And it’s going to get us home.”
24
Unicorn
Alex clutched the bitbox to her. She had to find a way to communicate with Madonna.
Mike approached her, holding out a paw.
She looked up at him, questioning. He beckoned with his paw so she handed it over. He could crush this thing between those paws, or under one thumping foot. She could only hope this thing in front of her was more Mike than rabbit.
He stared at it intently and stroked it. She held her breath.
“What’s he doing?” asked Lacey.
Alex held a finger to her lips.
Mike started shrinking. He went from twenty feet tall, to twelve, to six. At last he was his normal height, but still in rabbit form.
He turned the bitbox over in his hands and brushed its surfaces again. Alex held her breath.
His teeth started receding, his whiskers shrinking. His huge feet shrank down to size elevens. The fur blurred, then disappeared altogether.
His shape stretched, tore at itself, and blurred again. He gasped once, then let out a groan so deep Alex thought he might be giving birth.
“Eww!” said Lacey. “He’s got no clothes on.”
Standing in front of them was Mike, naked as the day he was born.
It was lucky his beard was long enough to drape down in front to him. It trailed along the ground, ending in a wisp of wiry white hair.
He smacked his lips together and picked at his teeth with a nail.
“Yuck,” he said. “I always hated carrots.”
Alex let out a breath, relief flowing through her. “Are you OK?’
His face darkened. “I will be. Not a word of this to anyone, right?”
“Not even Madge?”
“Especially not Madge. So… Let’s use this thing to contact someone back at base.”
“It’s yours, then,” Alex said.
He shook his head. “I lost mine.”
“Then where did it come from?”
