He managed a weak grin. "Like shit, but I guess you figured I'd say that."
She smiled. "You had me worried there for a while. I didn't think you were going to pull through."
"Yet you stayed with me."
"Hey, you're my best ticket out of here," she teased.
"What about Raven and Anton? They got separated from us in the storm."
Her blue eyes clouded for a moment. "They came through to here, but they aren't with us."
"What do you mean?"
"They got captured. They're being held prisoner."
Harrison struggled to get out of bed. "We have to help them!"
"Easy, there." Gillian jumped out of the chair and pushed him back down into the bed. He noticed then that she was wearing different clothes, and the gown she wore was much more revealing, at least when she was bent over him like that. She was in even better shape than he'd imagined – not that he was in any condition to do anything about it.
"You aren't in any condition to be saving anyone," she said, mirroring his thoughts.
Harrison sighed. "What happened? And how long have we been here, wherever we are?"
"You hit that tree head-first. I thought you were dead for sure. You have a bad concussion, maybe a skull fracture. Hard to say. They don't have x-rays or MRIs here. You've been unconscious, delirious, for five days. As to the last question..." She paused and looked around the room. "I don't know exactly where we are, but it's closer to the Earths we both know. The people here speak English, although the accent is strange and thick. The technology level is roughly Colonial American, I think. A local farmer took us in after the storm. We've been guests in his house ever since."
Great. He'd been delirious. He wondered what he had babbled about. "You said Raven and Anton had been taken captive?"
"There's another group of people here. I think they are from a different Realm, a different universe, than this one, but I'm not sure. The people here don't like to talk about it, but it seems that about a year ago, these strangely dressed people showed up with powerful weapons and took over. I know they have Raven and Anton because they announced it two days ago. It's illegal to harbor strangers, and they executed the family who had been helping them."
"The whole family?"
"Even the baby."
"What the hell? Are we safe here?"
Gillian nodded. "I think so. The invaders are universally hated, and the public execution only made them hated more. There is a strong undercurrent of revolution around here, but the invaders' weapons are too powerful compared to the local muzzle-loaders. They also deal very harshly with uprisings. Jonas, the patriarch of the family here, said the invaders wiped out a whole village last month because a man tried to stop some soldiers from raping his daughter. Conditions are terrible here. I'm sorry; I didn't mean to bring us to such an awful place."
"You couldn't have known," said Harrison. "What about my gear?"
"I've still got my rifle, but I couldn't find yours. Since you dropped it when we were still in the storm, it could be Realms away. Your other stuff, the pistols and the explosives, are under the floorboards in the shed out back. I hid all evidence of non-local technology, just in case."
"Good thinking. Was the device I had on my arm still intact?"
She nodded. "It seemed to be. I didn't mess with it, though."
He caught her hand. "You could have used it to escape."
"I've been alone too long, Michael. I've seen too many awful things. I just want to get back to my Earth, or at least close to my Earth. I'm tired of being lost and cold and hungry. I'm tired of people trying to kill me, or worse, every place I go." She shrugged. "You offered to help me when you didn't have to. It's time I repaid the favor."
Harrison settled back into the pillows and sipped the water she held for him. He thought about what he could do to rescue Raven and Anton. Nothing came to mind.
Chapter Forty-One
Gillian woke him just as the sun was coming up. A rooster crowed in the yard outside. Harrison had been dreaming about gigantic war machines blasting his home. He'd been a child in the dream. It was very disturbing.
"Wha–? Why did you wake me? Is everything okay?"
"Everything is fine," she said. "I heard the family stirring. They'll expect us down for breakfast, now that you're doing better."
"Better is relative," Harrison answered, stretching. "How much time do we have?"
"Probably half an hour. Why?" she asked with a smirk.
"I thought we could get to know each other a little better."
"My, you are feeling better."
Sadly, he wasn't feeling that much better. "So you went to Georgia Tech?" he asked.
"It's kind of a long story."
"Apparently I'm not going anywhere for a while. You have a captive audience."
She laughed. "I got my bachelor's degree in geology in the spring of 'twenty-one, and was working on my master's."
"Wait a second," Harrison said. "'Twenty-one?"
"Two thousand twenty-one," Gillian replied. "You're from an Earth that's earlier than that, right?"
"Yeah," Harrison said. He wasn't sure how different universes could be so similar and yet so different. The Earth that had invaded his home was very close to his own, but these others... Some of the worlds, like the one where he found Raven, seemed drastically different. He thought about his dream. Maybe that was really happening someplace. He shuddered at the thought.
"Anyway, I was on a field course in the Bahamas, mapping geomagnetic anomalies, when this nasty tropical storm blew in out of nowhere. I was up in a tower when it hit, and the wind was so fierce that I didn't dare try to climb down. Then the funnel cloud dropped. I jumped from the tower to try to escape. I was caught by the storm. I woke up the next day in the middle of a desert. The people there were..." She paused and looked away. "It was bad, and bad things happened. Use your imagination if you must, but I won't talk about it."
Harrison squeezed her hand. "When did you first discover you could control the storms?"
"It was in that place, actually. I just wanted to get away. One day a storm came. I had dreamed of it, and was wishing for it to come and smash that place. The people ran in terror; they'd never seen anything like it. I climbed a building and jumped into the storm. I've been traveling ever since."
"How long?"
Gillian shrugged. "Haven't got a clue. I don't have any frame of reference. It's been years, though. I know that. The storms aren't real frequent, maybe only a couple a year in any given Realm."
"What is a Realm, exactly?"
"It's just what I call them. I've met other people who traveled, and they told me about the topography of the universes, how everything fits together, the powers that hold sway over vast areas of it. Anyway, most of them called the different universes Realms, and I just followed along, kept using that name. Easier for me to wrap my head around than universes anyway, especially since they're just alternate Earths."
"Do you know why there seems to be so much difference in the times of the different worlds? Why this world is like Colonial America, and ours were more advanced?"
Gillian shook her head. "I've never been able to discover that."
"What about languages? Isn't it odd that they speak English here?"
"You mean more odd that the idea of traveling through different realities? I don't know. English is common in the Earth Realms, but not so much further out."
"You've been to a lot of different places?"
"Several dozen," she replied. "Like I said, the storms tend to be infrequent, so I spend a lot of time getting to know the locals in each place. Most of them have never heard of other universes."
"Are many of them technologically advanced?"
"Not really. Most seem to be like this. I'm not sure why. I've been to a few that were really advanced, a lot further along that our Earths. I think most worlds don't make it that far."
"What do you mean? They blow themselves up with war or something?"
&n
bsp; "Or something," she said, looking away. "Listen, we don't really know each other all that well, and I don't want you to think I'm crazy."
"This all started for me when I met my misguided and very angry doppelganger from another universe. Sanity is a pretty fluid concept to me right now."
"I think there are some kind of evil forces moving out there, in the Realms. Sometimes I meet someone who just isn't right. They feel off. Places should be doing better than they are, but they seem controlled by a force that causes stagnation." She shrugged. "I don't know what to think about it, to be honest."
"Raven said he thought his JRC was controlled by an evil entity. Something he referred to as It."
"Yeah, like that," Gillian said. "I've encountered those teams that come out of the Doors. They often just destabilize whatever is going on in a Realm. They make life worse for everybody, even if they do claim that they're doing it for the greater good."
"The greater good," Harrison echoed. "What does that even mean?"
Gillian sighed. "I wish I knew." She met his eyes. "I assume you're going to want to free your friends before we move on from here."
"I can't leave them in a place like this. Besides, it seems to me that we should try to repay our hosts, if we can."
"You have something in mind?"
"Well, as soon as I can get out of this bed, I'd like to do a little scouting, see this enemy up close. How advanced are we talking about, when you say advanced weapons?"
"Better than muzzle-loaders, but not up to our level. They have at least one primitive machine gun and bolt action rifles."
"The local resistance will have a stockpile."
"I don't think there is one."
He smiled. "Yes, there is, or the people here are a lot different from other people. They may not have confided in you, maybe because you're a woman." He held up a hand for her to wait when she looked angry. "If this place is like Colonial America in other ways, women won't be very highly regarded."
"You're right," she replied, voice heavy with frustration. "You think they'll open up to you?"
"I think it is worth exploring. I could use the help, if I'm going to free Raven and Anton."
Harrison sat up in bed slowly. He was a little bit dizzy at first, although no worse than he expected. His scalp was tender, but he didn't think his skull was cracked. He'd always had a hard head, and he'd been wearing his helmet.
"You shouldn't be getting up."
"I'm okay." He paused. "I'm going to need some clothes, though."
Gillian smiled. "Will it keep you in bed if I don't give you any?"
"I can think of a few things that would keep me in bed, but no, a lack of clothes isn't one of them."
She blushed and handed him a small stack of garments from the side table.
The material felt much like cotton, but it wasn't. There weren't any shoes.
"Our hosts didn't have any shoes that would fit you. You'll have to go barefoot."
"What happened to my boots?"
"They're in the shed, but they look too anachronistic. They have rubber soles and metal eyelets."
Harrison sighed. "You don't think going around barefoot will raise eyebrows?"
"No, not around here. At least half of the people I've seen are barefoot. This isn't a particularly wealthy Realm, at least not around here."
"Which raises the question of why anyone would choose to invade here in the first place."
"I've wondered that, but no one seems to know. Most just think they must have displeased their gods."
Harrison dressed quickly, ignoring the pain in his wrist. "We'll have to do something about that, won't we?"
Chapter Forty-Two
Their host family was awake and already working around the house when Harrison and Gillian came down the stairs.
They seemed cautiously friendly and happy to see him up and moving. Breakfast was a hurried affair, and light on food, but Harrison couldn't complain. They were feeding and sheltering the two of them in hard times. A couple of fried eggs and buttered toast were quite adequate. He would have loved to have some bacon, though. He really missed bacon. The unbidden memory of the dead, burnt bodies of his enemies came back into his mind, and he thought, Maybe not.
"You think you can work now?" Jonas, the patriarch of the family, asked him suddenly. His accent was thick and strange to Harrison's ears, maybe a little bit like Pennsylvania Dutch. One thing was certain: Harrison would never pass for a local if he opened his mouth.
"I'll do my best, sir."
Jonas nodded in satisfaction. "Men work in the fields during the day. You'll come with me and my boys today."
Harrison met Gillian's eyes as he stood; she gave him a subtle nod.
Jonas frowned. "You don't have much of a beard. A married man should have a beard." Harrison hadn't shaved in over a week, but what he had couldn't properly be called a beard, especially compared to what the men here sported. Jonas' own facial hair was thick and long.
So he and Gillian were supposed to be married. He glanced at her tightly clothed ass and the gentle swell of her breasts as she worked around the kitchen. He wouldn't mind consummating that later. Not at all. Then he felt slightly guilty. He didn't even know Gillian, not really.
"We haven't been married long."
"I can see that. If you had, you'd have wee ones by now." Jonas handed Harrison a wide-brimmed straw hat. "Wear that hat and keep your mouth shut. If anyone tries to talk to you, pretend to be mute. Otherwise we'll have them soldier knocking on the door."
"Yes, sir."
Harrison had been worried that his pale feet would give him away, but by the time they got to the fields, he was filthy. He wasn't used to walking barefoot, and the occasional rock or twig made him wince, but he'd endured far worse. He wondered what kind of work they'd be doing in the fields. It had been a long time since he'd worked a farm.
"Can you use that hand?" Jonas asked, holding out a shovel.
Harrison shrugged and took the shovel. "I'll do what I have to, sir," he answered quietly. He'd survive. He had to. He knew that after five days, a broken bone was starting to fuse. He'd just have to be careful to not put too much pressure on it. He certainly didn't want to break it again.
The field was full of men and boys. None of them showed any interest in Harrison, which told him that they all knew he wasn't local but didn't want to call attention to it. He followed the others' example and worked down roughly straight rows with the shovel, turning soil. He wondered if they had always done it this way. Had plows had never been invented in this world?
Two soldiers stood watch over the field.
Harrison worked his way as close to them as he dared. They were smaller than the locals, with a swarthiness that suggested French or Italian ancestry – if those distinctions even applied across universes. He was lucky that the locals seemed to share more than just accents with the Pennsylvania Dutch. They were big, pale-skinned people with hair running from blond to black, and Harrison blended in with them well enough.
The soldiers' equipment reminded him of soldiers from World War I. Their uniforms were pale green with light brown leather harness. The rifles appeared to be large-caliber but were indeed bolt-action. He wondered if they needed to be loaded for each shot or if they used stripper clips. That was an important bit of information that would determine their fire rate, but he didn't want to get too close or appear too curious. He suspected that people who were too curious would quickly end up dead here.
If all of the soldiers' equipment was of a similar technology level, he didn't understand how they had managed to invade another universe. How does that work when you haven't even invented electronics? Was there something he was missing?
The farmers worked steadily until after noon, when the women of the village showed up with bread and water. Gillian wasn't with Jonas' wife. Harrison thought that was probably a good thing. She was fairly striking looking. He knew himself well enough to know he'd kill anyone who tried to hurt her, and i
t wasn't time for violence yet.
He thought about that as he chewed the dark bread. There was no doubt that he was going to get involved in what was going on here. He needed information about the enemy. He'd talk to Jonas later and find out if the man knew with whom he should be talking. The invaders didn't look like the type to wait to execute someone. If he wanted to rescue Raven and Anton, he'd have to do it soon.
Harrison watched the farmers while he ate. There was no doubt that they hated their new overlords. They shot discreet looks filled with hatred and loathing at the two guards. He hoped no would do anything stupid. Some of the younger men seemed particularly angry – not that he could blame them. The guards kept up a steady string of jokes, no doubt at their expense, and whistled and cat-called to the women who had brought lunch. Harrison didn't recognize their language. It sounded Slavic.
After lunch, the work was much the same as before. They worked back down the rows, digging them deeper to ready them for planting. The younger boys went along and broke the clods of dirt into smaller pieces. Harrison's left hand was numb, his wrist icy, and burning pain shot to his elbow every time he put any pressure on his hand. He wouldn't be much use the next day if he didn't sneak and take some anti-inflammatories and pain killers.
He hoped he'd have that much time before he had to act, but knew he wouldn't.
Chapter Forty-Three
The air was thick and humid as they were making their way back to the house that evening, and insects buzzed in the trees. It reminded Harrison of summer nights in rural Tennessee, where he'd grown up. There were even lightning bugs blinking out their indecipherable code across the fields. Fortunately mosquitoes didn't seem to be a thing here, though. He'd always hated mosquitoes.
A stocky man waved for Jonas to stop. "Tonight at midnight," he said. "Bring your cousin."
Harrison assumed that meant him.
Jonas nodded. "We'll be there."
The other man walked on without replying. One thing Harrison had noticed about these people: they didn't talk a lot. They spoke when they had something to say, but there had been little conversation in the field as they worked. Harrison wondered if it was because of the ever-watchful presence of the two soldiers, or if they just weren't into gossip. He suspected the latter. They seemed like a very practical people.
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