Yggdrasil Forest

First-----Previous

Epilogue: Detour

The door opens into a world of flames. Were they—had they gone back? No. Here is different. It was raining here, but no storm could keep the fire at bay.

This was a house once, by the looks of it, it held a family, now it is a skeleton of cinders and toppled bricks populated only by the deathly wail of a child.

Where? Where is that coming from? Still, in their formalwear, the two scurry through a downpour equal parts water and ash. Colin finds the door first. Tries to kick it in to no avail. He pulls a Tool from his pocket. What was happening?  The reading are gibberish, his psionic scan a mess.

Alex joins him and sees the door. She takes Colin’s hand, and he takes hers. They ram into the door with all their strength.

The crib. A child is in the crib. It is coughing and crying, and it is in pain. The two interlopers scramble to get the child to safety.

Now they stand two blocks away as a stranger’s home continues to burn, and a stranger’s child rest swaddled in Colin's arms.

“Well, I’ll say it.” Colin breaks the silence  “This is not where we were meant to be headed” the child whines in agreement.

“Where are its parents?” Alex half-whispers “Did you see any—” Her question is cut short by Colin’s negatory nod “Forget the parents, where are WE?”

“Coordinates unknown.” Colin says as he looks to the sky. A few stars can be see through the clouds. “Earth. I think. Or some other planet that formed in the same orbit. The architecture looks…”

Alex looks around at the buildings that were not on fire, at streets not only empty of firefighters, but of anything. “ Later half of the 20th former half of the 21st by our world’s standards.”

They trek through the rain. Familiar as some aspects are, this is an alien world, and their guide book is busy doing its best impression of a drunk e.e cummings to tell them where they were. A hospital, they need a hospital or a shelter or some place this child would be safe.

The infant whimpers, but does not cry, as Colin cradled it close. “It’s going to be ok” Colin whispers.

The sky made up for how little water fell from the child’s face. The had entered downtown. Colored light of lively buildings fill their view, yet the streets are largely empty.

That one! It has a green Circle emblazoned on it from every angle, inside the circle a strange symbol, it seems half translated, as though Alex and Colin’s minds had received the meaning without the word.

It means Medicine. Safety. It meant Help is Here. Is it their joy of finding such a place or were the signs that bright? For a moment they think it too convenient. But this does appear to be the center of the city, a hospital ought to be around here, oughtn’t it?

The building was definitely a hospital, the smell unmistakable, they entered, and the petrichor of the streets gave way to the chemical sterility of a medical facility. Colin cradled the child closely as they approached the desk.

A young woman looks up at them. “Can I help you?”

“Unclear.” Alex answers.

Colin gestures to the child. “We found this baby.”

“Found?” the woman raises an eyebrow.

“Uh, yes. In a housefire about a mile that way.” Alex gestures back the way they came. “No parents, they either left the child behind or… y’know.”

“I understand. We can keep an eye on them, in the morning we’ll look into the fire and try to identify the parents.”

The traveler's breath a sigh of relief. Colin hands over the child. The woman gazed into the infant’s eyes then looked back up “Sorry I didn’t catch you…” The waiting room was empty. ‘…names”

Odd, even if they had rushed out the second she looked down, they should be visible out the glass door.

~~~

The Planet Kiwin in the Eld System of Universe 108.phi/Dragonfruit. 3434 was almost entirely ocean. The only land was a five-kilometer wide ring of soft golden beach wrapped around the entirety of the planet. Pristine. Untouched. Uninhabited.

And yet, approximately halfway between the poles, there was a worn wooden door frame resting on the sand.

The door opened, spat out two humans and disappeared as abruptly as it arrived.

Colin brushed himself off, Alex breathed a sigh of relief. “Kiwin. Lovely choice”

“Aye. I like chaos as much as the next interdimensional traveler, but I think we deserve a break.”

“Good plan, yeah.”

“We did okay. I think.”

“With the library or with the baby?”

“Both I hope. Any signs of what that last world was?”

Colin glanced through the quantum guidebook. “None. Some sort of paracausal eddy warping our doorway.  Care to check?”

Alex took the guidebook “Weird.”

“Incredibly so, never heard of such a thing.” Colin nodded.

“No one left to consult.” Alex unconsciously brushed the scar under her eye.

“No.”

There was a sad pause. They really were alone. Together.

“Have you got the sleeping bags?” Colin asked

“Yeah. Good plan. The second sun is setting.”

One tent, two cots, and a small sand castle later, it was time to welcome sleep. Colin was quick to dream.  Alex was left to wonder, staring at the stars.

Infinite worlds, even all the lights in the sky but a leaf on an impossibly tall tree in an impossibly vast forest. Never get used to it. She’d met someone who’d gotten used to it once. What an utterly dreadful person they were. She needn’t worry of course. After all, She and Colin were an infinite feedback loop of reckless childlike wonder. Slowly, long after the sand castle had washed away, she too faded into sleep. Alone on an alien world with her best friend. End

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First-----Previous----- Next

Chapter Six: Freedom

Another Door, and Finally the travelers and the would-be terrorist reached the lowermost depths of the Library. The room they had found themselves in was small, brightly lit and contained a flying saucer.

“What is that?" Titus was hesitant to enter.

"In all probability, that god of yours" Colin was far more eager rushing up to the alien ship.

Alex not far behind pressed a hand to the ships smooth grey surface "Kandosian?"

"That's my guess. Explains the psychic distress signal. and how Alexander was able to conquer the solar system."

"Only question is, if this ship has been stuck here since 48 BC, why would Titus' be the first to hear the call?"

"Or at least the first to talk about it" Alex pointed out "actually for all we know there’s a whole asylum full of people who claim they hear gods telling them to blow up national landmarks."

They looked to Titus.

"No, not that I know of. ” he paused for a moment. He was about to say he was as confused as they were, but that would, of course, be a lie. The worldbound felon's grasp of the situation was still approximately as acute as the center ring in the Towers of Hanoi is of its own puzzle. The Wanderers, on the other hand, were simply trying to fill in the last few words of a crossword puzzle with the clues scattered about the rest of the newspaper.

“Step away from the subject.” The voice sounded as though it had tried to plaster calm over a wall of quivering rage. The three turned to face it.

“I am Captain Hadelock of the Third Alexandria Reliquary Guard, and I command you to step away.” He was flanked by several guards which the intruders recognized from the level above.

“Pleased to meet you, Captain” Colin did indeed take a step away from the craft toward the guards. “I really do appreciate the diligence with which you guard this place.”

Hadelock sneered “I anticipate that is sarcasm.”

“No, no” Colin held out his hands to show he was unarmed. “Really. We apologize for any trouble.”

Alex leaned in to add “I do hope that sword is undamaged?” One of the guards opened his mouth to assure her the sword was fine, but aborted when he saw Hadelock’s gaze.

“Look we’ll even pay for the damages,” Colin said “All these other artifacts and texts? They’re either yours or at least preservation of the people you’ve conquered nothing we can do about that; It’s your world.” He tried to make a subtle gesture to Alex as if to say ‘on my signal, get to the ship’ “but this? This ship doesn't belong in Alexandria.”

Hadelock seemed to have taken the patriotic bait “Doesn’t belong in Alexandria?! There is now where that is not Alexandria!”

“ You know I was telling Titus earlier: People believed that about our home, eventually, some people got to thinking that wasn't right, people have the right to be there own people, places have the right to be there own place.”

As Colin kept Hadelock and the guards rapt with his parent blasphemy, Alex dragged Titus the last few paces to the Ship and passed through the wall.

“This place,  it’s a bit of a paradox. It holds so much of so many cultures, but it’s all here kept as a novelty. “At least it was kept. Apologies I suppose it's rude to be waxing philosophical while you're pointing a dozen deadly weapons at me.”

‘Me?’ Thought Hadelock. Dammit. It was just him, where had the others gone??

Inside the ship, Titus wondered the same thing “at this point I figure it’s pointless to ask, but how did we—”

“Pass through that wall?” Alex wasn’t looking at him but was already working at a green, slimy control console. “Kandosians aren’t big on doors. They just phase shift walls, and that wall was waiting for your psionic signature.”

“I knew it was pointless to ask.” Looking around, Titus once again traded one bafflement for another.

What was this place? The floor and walls were all…uncomfortably moist, translucent tubes ran around the edges of the ceiling carrying various colors of liquid.

“All the complicated stuff is in here. That’s why your engineers could only manage reverse engineering the impulse thrusters.” Alex had rearranged several bone like knobs on the control panel. “Which means the pilot should be safe and in stasis. I just have to get this online, and we can send it home.”

~~~

Outside Colin had finished his distraction and waited for  Hadelock’s response

“You’re all insane. What even you believe, where ever you think you are from, I will not let you bring harm to the library.” Hadelock turned to the guard “I’m tired of this. Just kill him.”

Colin sprinted for the Kandosian ship and into the control room “Have you got the defenses up yet?”

Alex turned from the panel “Defenses?”

“Yes! Defenses! Now that Titus is in here, the lock is down. It’s not long before they realized they can come in” Colin scrambled to another panel, reach up and turned a knob on one of the tubes.

Titus looked between the two and tried to piece together the words he understood. “If I were to leave the ship would it lock again?”

Colin took a moment to think. “Yes, I think so but—”

“And, there is no god?” Titus prodded

Alex shook her head. “Not necessarily, there’s probably one or to lucking about in this universe. But no, not under the library at least, so no trying to blow up any more nexuses of culture and knowledge.”

“Nexi” Colin corrected.

“Nexuses” Alex repeated.

Titus nodded his head. “ Then I’m going to turn myself in. I have no more excuses for my actions. This thing may not be a god, but please, save it for me.” He turned and exited the ship.

Colin and Alex looked at each other. Alex spoke first: “I’ll go check on the pilot, you reposer the navigation and set course for Kando Prime.”

Colin nodded and began his task.

Titus, too, was completing his task. He stepped out of the ship to find the guards had so thoughtfully moved in to corner him. “I surrender.” He kneeled, head down and wrists out ready for execution or death.

“Surrender?” Hadelock said “What of your compatriots?”

“I don’t know. Frankly, I don’t understand anything. Do you know I was going to blow up the library?”

Hadelock flinched at that.

Titus continued. “They stopped me, those two. Surely that evens out their trespassing. But for me? Even saving this thing cant even out my deserting, theft, and attempted terrorism.”

Hadelock blinked “Saving? Saving what?”

~~~

Alex entered the center room. What appeared to be a vat of Yellow slime extended a sensory tendril to see the first being it had encountered in millennia.

“It’s alright. Your safe now.” Alex said

The Kandosian bubbled in a way  that psionic translation rendered as “what happened?”

“Long story” Alex laughed. “Short version, you crashed, and a more than a thousand years later a very stupid, surprisingly selfless man picked up your distress signal and was willing to do far too much to save you. He thought you were a god.”

The Kandosian burbled with amusement at the notion of it’s prescribed divinity.

“He was going to let a lot of people die in an attempt to free you.”

The Kandosian ceased it’s burbling.

“We stopped him though. And now he’s giving himself up so you can get away, back home.”

~~~

The Ship lurched in a hyperdimensional direction, gone.

“What the Hell was that, what have you done?!” Hadelock had dropped any facade of calmness, he oozed lividity.

Titus laughed until a steel-toed boot reminded him of his predicament. "I don’t know. Tonight I've discovered I know very little." Another kick to his ribs, a laser spear pointed at his nose "You won’t find them, that I’m sure of. But my name is Titus Welborn. I am responsible for the theft of Athena class explosives from the Westmost police office, the assault of two Alexandrian officers and--" he smiled "The mastermind of this infiltration, I recruited those strangers via underground markets. It's me you want."

A few moments later, Titus was relieved to feel the cold steel around his wrists. Whatever fate awaited him in government custody, he had fulfilled his goal. The god under the library was free.

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First-----Previous------Next

Chapter Five: Breach

Vitrus Perphen, Captain of the Library guard turned the know to his superior's office. Sweat made this action difficult. Such an emergency had never happened before. Now it had, under his watch. It took several tries, but he eventually found himself inferno Chief Tomas Hadelock. Hadelock was an unreasonably narrow man, his figure almost as pointed and sharp as his gaze.

“Sir.” Vitrus saluted. “We’ve had a major breach.”

Hadelock tapped his pen twice, took a breath, and looked at the guard. “What do you mean by ‘major’? Is it a few rats? Because by my reckoning, any breach by humans is catastrophic.”

“Sir.” Vitrus repeated “We’ve had a catastrophic breach. Three individuals”

          “Three?!” Hadelock stood from his desk. “What level?”

“Just level one, sir.”

Hadelock paced over to a cutaway map of the library. A blue light flickered on revealing the lower levels in invisible ink. “How long ago was this?”

“Only a minute—“

Before he could say ‘sir’ Vitrus’s com sprang to life “Captain! The intruders have been detected on level six.”

Hadelock gifted Vitrus a look of infinite disappointment, wrapped in bitter expectance. “How?”

The comm buzzed. “Don’t know sir. We ran them into a dead end and then—“

“Then what?” Hadelock growled

“Well, sir... they ran through a door....” The guard on the comm said.

“You said it was a Dead. End.”

“It was, sir.”

“So what you’re telling me,” Hadelock said through gritted teeth “is that the intruders ran through a door that doesn’t exist and found themselves all the way down one  level above where we contain alpha subject?”

The comm remained silent. Vitrus remained silent.

“Get down there!” Hadelock looked as though he was about to throw his entire desk at Vitrus.

Vitrus stuttered “Sir, no-one has the authorization to be down there.”

“I’m giving you authorization” Hadelock hissed “ I don’t trust the automated security. It’s denser than you are.”

~~~

Titus did several double takes. “There wasn’t a…there wasn’t a--”

Alex Smiled. “Door? No. Takes a lot more psionic energy then routing an existing one, but then how are you supposed to get to and from worlds that haven’t invented doors, eh?”

Colin looked as though he’d had three dozen too many drinks and doubled over. “add on to that whatever the psionic mess of a signal you gave me. You’ve certainly had someone else in there. ”

Alex moved to Titus and pulled out a small torch. She moved it from one eye to the other. “We got a bit sidetracked earlier by if does seem something about you has left you open to some kind of psionic signal…”

Again, Titus’s check-up was interrupted by the buzz of lightspears.

Surrounded. They were surrounded, and this time there were far fewer means of egress. A wall of crackling red spears closed in on them.

“Halt!”

“As opposed to what? Running face first into your spears?” Alex said.

The guard paused and considered this. “Matter of procedure, don’t matter you’re surrounded.”

“You’re right about one thing”  Alex grinned.

“What’s that?”

“It doesn't matter that we’re surrounded” Colin smiled. He feinted to the left, a guard followed.

Alex swept the legs and had the guards balance been even the slightest bit worse, they would have toppled like a ring of dominos. As it stood, they managed to remain standing. Mostly. One tripped just enough to let The interlopers out of the circle.

There, No longer surrounded,

Alex hated the idea of disgracing such an artifact, but in her heart, she knew she hated the idea of getting stabbed with a laser staff while Colin was in danger even more. She grabbed a longsword, took a stance, and engaged.

Damascus steel stood up surprisingly well against laser spears. Alex parried, nameless guard number three stabbed. Alex jumped, used guard three’s spear as a springboard leaping higher and dropkicking nameless guard number two. She grabbed Colin by the collar and Titus by the ear and threw them into a side room.

The guards delayed, Alex locked herself in the room with Colin and Titus.

“We’re safe in here, for now, they won’t disgrace the artifacts with their presence.”

“Well I take it we’re disgracing them, sorry for that. We’ll get out of here soon.”

“Are you going to open another door?” Titus asked

“Not until we’ve saved Colin.”

“Are you kidding me? I see it now! I see you bleed! You aren't some kind of heavenly messengers. Look at him, he’s already dead! ”

“Not while I'm around.”

“Well that’s a very heroic way of thinking but--”

“No, He and I share a mutual null casuality. we literally cannot die if the other is around to save us” Alex lifted her dress to reveal a pair of jeans.

Titus imagined those trousers would be uncomfortable under that dress. But then so would the massive First Aid kit she had now pulled from her pockets, so really what did he know?

“Hold this” Alex handed Titus the half a meter wide box she had pulled from her pocket and began to dress Colin’s wound.

“Interesting, you’d think those spears would cauterize.”

Titus looked up from the alien medical supplies. “They’re specifically designed not to.” Happy that his military knowledge might be pertinent.

“Impressive. Pass me one of those blue packets?”

Titus looked in the box and found some small blue rectangles that appeared to be filled with some kind of gel. He tried reading the label but the language was as alien as his current situation. He handed the mystery pack over.

“Lovely thanks” Alex ripped a corner of the packet and spread the slightly bioluminescent contents along the edge of Colin’s wound.

“So he’s going to be ok?”

“Okay as he’s ever been” Alex didn’t bother looking up from her stitching to answer “ There.” Alex stood and took the medical kit back from Titus. “Now we wait.”

Colin sat up. “Wait for what?” he groaned.

“How are you feeling?” Alex gestured for Colin to take it slow.

“Like I was stabbed with a laser spear.”

“we’re safe in here, but we need a door” Alex had stored the first aid kit back in he trouser pocket and smoothed the dress over it.

“Well, I might be able to help with—“ Colin staggered over in pain. Titus caught him.

“You’re still weak. I can handle it but not while I was panicking about you bleeding out.”

Titus raised an eyebrow “That was panic?”

Colin smirked, “Should see her when she’s angry.”

“I’d rather not.”

A level above, Captain Hadelock stormed down the hallway, his boots crushing the remains of a saber’s empty, shattered case.

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First-----Previous-----Next Interlude: Reprisal

Being the Finalized Account of the Events of

November 1991, London, England,

Earth 42.13/ Apple Sigma-3

A Door opened within Ms. Grot’s office and Lucille stepped through. Outside she could hear herself approaching the orphanage. Her previous two temporal iterations now overlapped ensuring she children would not be locked away. She searched the desk and drawers, it had to be here somewhere.

Ah, there it was. In the bottom drawer, a mass of psychic webbing, dense enough to be seen with the naked eye.

She glanced at her watch, it was time. She grabbed the psychic mass and waited for the Mite to detect the threat. This was the rubicon, she had impacted her own immediate past.

“[What she said the second time round]” she could just hear the Mite say a past Lucile, or possibly a future one, though she hoped no more iterations were necessary.

Ms. Grot entered the office and looked at Lucille “Here twice, that’s very dangerous for your lot isn’t it? Overloading your timeline?”

Thrice

“You have no idea. More dangerous than anything and it is not afraid of it. so imagine how not afraid of a Devrosian Mite I am.”

“Oh, really?” Ms. Grot had already begun to shed her human disguise. limbs segmented and chitenized, her torso split into thorax and spiky abdomen, eyes inverted and extended branching in the grotesque sensory membrane, hands twelve of them now, grew into scythe-like pincers

“Yes,” Lucille said “really. you would dare attack me while I’m holding your core.” She feigned a squeeze of the physic mass.

Be cool, it needs to work this time.

“And you wouldn’t destroy that so long as children are in my web.”

“Then we are at an impasse.”

“I don’t see how” the Mite chittered closer “You’re here to save those children. you’d sooner die than fail to save those children, and you will.”

Sooner. Yes. I know.

“Will what? Save the children” Lucielle cocked her head

“What? No! Die!” The Mite seemed taken aback by the human's nonchalance.

Lucille sidestepped with impossible speed.

“I will die yes. But not sooner than those children are free.”

Play it up. Own the room. Keep her guessing.

The mite rotate it’s head “Well then perhaps I will eliminate that option” It hurried back to the door if it could not let the children terror marinate any longer, she would sooner feast that lose her mean altogether, she slipped through the door and—

Found herself in her office. “ On my door?” it spat. “ That takes some doing.”

“Like you said, I’m going to die. Might as well make it splashy.”

Go ahead, channel those three hundred seasons of Doctor Who.

“Who are you?” the mite narrowed a dozen eyes and a myriad of other sensory organs at the human, or at least apparent human

“Oh well, now you’re just asking for a big speech aren't you? What does it matter who I am? I’m the woman who’s going to save those children, I’m the woman who’s going to stop you.”

Okay bit generic. It’s fine. It’s fine just keep it going.

The mite took the monologue as an attempt to try the door again, perhaps Lucille was too distracted too—

No, back in her office.

“I’m also a woman who is good at multitasking.”Lucille checked her watch. “Well, actually I suppose that about does it.”

Oh, close enough.

The Mite, by now accepting she would never be privy to whatever plan Lucille had figured that she might as well take another shot at impaling the woman on her pincers.

Lucille simply raised the hand holding the Mite’s psychic core, momentum ensured that the mite had no say in matters as it stabbed its own life source.

“Nooooo” The psychic mass crumpled, the mite’s screams worsened and then, along with the building, began to fade.  “ You wouldn’t! you haven’t!”

Lucille paced over to the window. “I have. Really you knew there was at least one other me here, out there, with the children. You also knew they hate you, fear you. How hard do think it was to lead an escape.

The mite was too unstable to respond with more that a hiss and gurgle.

Lucille made a dash through the window. From the outside, the orphanage looked like a burning photograph, warping and flaking away.

There, another identical woman. The woman who hadn’t stalled for eight minutes. Lucille walked towards her from the rapidly disappearing building.

“Well then,” The prior iteration of Lucille asked her “How did it go?”

“As well as one can hope,”  Lucille said. “Best close the split, eh?” She offered her hand to her doppelgänger. The other reciprocated.

And then, there had only been one Lucille the entire time. Disparate event chains merged, and the fail state of a child left to burn was pruned from the tree of probabilities.

The temporally reconciliated Lucille doubled over in pain.

“Are you okay?” Colin was the only one to ask aloud, but all the rescued children’s body language echoed the question.

“I’m fine. Time is just…catching up with me.”

“Because there were two of you?” Alex asked “but… now there's only one.”

“You remember?” Lucille asked

“Hard to forget,” Colin said

From the looks on the other children’s faces, they found forgetting far easier. “You two never cease to amaze. Time-proofed memory.  Yes, there were two of me, in fact, I was here three times in my life, but ‘here’ only exists once.”

She took a closer look at Alex’s face. Underneath her left eye was a scar. A scar from a burn. A scar from a burn she never had.

“I don’t understand.” Alex said.

Lucille furrowed her brow. She wasn’t sure she understood either. “It takes some explaining I suppose. Child services will be here any moment to take you all back home, somewhere safer than an alien web. But..”

“But what?” Colin asked.

“Well, times still settling, readjusting. If, say… two very gifted children were to time travel away from the situation, the police might not notice, and those children might be free to apprentice under a traveler of space, time and beyond?”

“What? Us?” Colin gestured to himself and Alex.

“Like I said, Time’s catching up with me. There are rules for crossing your own timeline, and I broke them. I’d like to pass on what I know before my time runs out.”

Sirens in the distance. Alex turned to Colin “Sounds better than another orphanage to me.”

“Yeah.” Colin nodded “Are you…adopting us?”

“Not legally, no. I’d be a terrible parent. But I’ve been told I’m a brilliant teacher and good friend.”

She held out her hand, the other resting on the knob of a wooden door that had not been there a moment ago. “Shall we take a walk?”

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First-----Previous----Next Chapter Four: Beneath the Library 

Behind the door was a disappointingly plain, corrugated steel staircase. The madman accompanying Colin and Alex seemed ready to sprint down the thing on all fours like a rabid animal, but Alex gripped him by the collar.

“I can work with doors.” she said “Guards and lasers and such require quite a bit more work. Take it slow.”

Titus seemed as though he wanted to protest, but instead only nodded. The three began their careful descent.

A theory was forming in Colin’s mind. “Titus,” he asked “Can you tell us about…how the god has called to you?”

“Oh,” Titus grinned “with a divine voice across the ether and into my mind. It…it tingles with purpose and power. That same power you exude.”

Alex, seeing that this stairwell went on quite a bit longer, decided to press further. “ why do you think the god chose you?”

“I don’t know! I don’t know how others cannot hear it! I see no cause for it to choose me, I am but a mere and disgraced guard!”

“Anything unusual about your diet? Any chronic health issues?” Alex continued.

“I know I am not mad,” Titus said as he stepped off the stairs onto the first basement level. “I saw the finest psychiatrist on Second Alexandria.”

“ On Second Alexandria?” Colin titled his head “But this is third…Did you say ‘on’”

“Yes. everyone knows the best medical research is being done on Second Alexandria.”

One question answered, several raised.

Colin vocalized his realization “Third Alexandria is the planet.”

“Third Alexandria from the sun. Fecking hell.” Alex shook her head.

“The plot thickens,” Colin said.

“That’s not a plot. It’s an increasingly messy load of information” Alex sniped as she stepped off the stairs and onto the basement floor.

The stacks. Books as far as the eye could see. They may as well have traveled to another world, some realm of E-space where only books could exist.

“Depends on what angle you look at it from.” Colin rushed over to a section of what appeared to be much more recent books.

“Deeper, we have to go deeper,” Titus muttered as he paced about the literary labyrinth.

“Yes, yes we will just give us a minute.” Alex had picked up a much older tome and gently opened it. “You were going to destroy all this, you realize that?”

Titus made a noise somewhere between grumbling and sighing “It’s all be digitized anyway.”

“It’s the principle of the thing.” Colin had set the recent book down and headed for an impossibly old scroll, he pulled gloves from his pocket and carefully applied them before doubly carefully unrolling the scroll. “Regardless… How well do you know history, Titus?”

“Not well.” Titus shook his head “ I was raised to be a guard, history wasn’t really part of the curriculum.”

“Then you wouldn’t happen to know when Alexandria spread beyond this planet” Colin didn’t look up from the scroll but tapped a specific section in thought as though waiting for Titus to complete the circuit.

“Everywhere has always been Alexandria,” Titus said, parroting a lifetime of lessons.

“Even if the people there don’t know it yet, right”? Alex said “Yeah where we come from thought the same of itself for a long time. These days the people who believe it are considered assholes.” She too had moved on to another book.

“I’ll rephrase the question” Colin was still concentrating on the same part of the same scroll “When did people first set foot on another planet?”

“Oh, at least a thousand years” Titus had begun looking around frantic and eager to make his way deeper, closer to the imprisoned god. “Why are you asking me this? Where are you from if not the heavens?”

Colin ignored the question and sidled up to Alex “this isn’t right, their history is the same up to the…not burning part. They shouldn’t have been able to make the technological leaps.”

“I’m thinking the same thing, but I can’t find anything to suggest Titus is wrong about the timeframe either.”

“I have a theory.”

“which is?”

The two were so lost in speculation that Titus was able to take them by surprise. He grabbed their collars and pulled “Guards. Now. We have to go deeper! We have to escape!” Titus needn’t use so many words. The moment they concentration broke, they heard it. Footsteps. The crackle of light spears.

“Which way?” Colin asked.

“Uhh…” Titus looked around and whimpered in ignorance. The glow of the light spears flooded the stairs way. A guard appeared. Then two more—

It was Alex’s turn to grab the collar, and she ran with it. Down one aisle. Out of sight, around another. stairs? An elevator? Titus insisted on deeper. Surely there was something.

Too many guards. They flooded the stacked.

“What do we do?!” Titus’s cry alerted their pursuers.  Both wanderers shot him a look.

One more corridor. Short. They run. They check one door: a broom closet. They check another: little more than a wash basin.

“We’re out of doors!” Titus seemed about to collapse.

“Oh, never say that” Alex smiled. She looked at Colin “Can you do it? Now?”

Colin nodded yes “Titus you say you want to go deeper? Think deeper think of the door down there. yes good, that’s it, now run!”

“But it’s a dead end!” The guards were so close now.

“Not anymore.” Colin pulled the psychic location from Titus, and the door at the end of the hall swung open.

Six dozen guards stared at an empty wall.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First----Previous----Next

Chapter Three: Redux

Time doesn’t care how many times you visit a moment any more than the sky care how many times a bird flies through the same space. Were the bird to collide with itself only it would get hurt, the sky wouldn’t even notice.

Worry not of paradoxes. Worry for your health. People much smarter than Colin, Alex or Lucille, had calculated one can cross their own timeline once every one hundred and thirty-two years without major consequences.

“This soon?!” Alex shouted, “We just left home, if we cross now—“

“We could go back further! evacuate everyone, set up holograms without our past selves knowing they could already be safe.” Colin grasped at possibilities.

“That would be a brilliant plan if we had time, but we don’t. By the time we’d set all that up we’d have created so many ripples we’d end up impacting out own timelines anyway!”  Possibilities were in short supply standing in this wreckage

“I know! But you can’t possibly think it would be better to let this have happened.”  Colin said, gesturing to the Library’s present state.

“I don’t but… if we do this now…” Alex knew the answer. She’d known the whole time.

Colin quoted an old friend. “‘Treat every adventure like it’s your last, make every adventure worth it if is’”

“But this is our first! There has to be another way.”

“Alex, we’re standing in the burning wreckage of Alexandria, we don’t have time to go back further and solve why someone would have done this we have to go back, we say him, we know who and where and—“

“I know. “

“We’ll do it. But we need a door.”

They looked around. There was no getting to a door without passing through fire and crumbling wreckage.

“Can you make one?”

“A psionically generated door? Under these conditions? No. No, I don’t think I can.” Colin pursed his lips, sighed, and pointed west. “ If we head that way I think we can make it to the front entrance, maybe enough structure is left to hijack it.”

“Okay” Alex nodded “Just stay low and go quick. I left the fire extinguisher in my jacket pocket.” She said, hiking up the side of her dress to check her jean pockets.

Colin raised an eyebrow “you were wearing that underneath?”

“Well I’m not going anywhere without any pockets, that’s for sure. Now come on.”

They headed out into the flames.

Meanwhile and ten minutes ago, a plain man in a plain suit entered the Library. He passed through the security scanner as calmly as one could while smuggling the finishing pieces of a bomb.

Titus Welborn has visited the Library every day for the past week, each time wearing a different disguise and carrying a different component. Now, it was time.

Now, it was time to set this place ablaze, he thought as he made his way to the maintenance closet, where he had hidden the catalyst.

Now, it was time to demolish this prison of knowledge he mused as he prayed the accelerant from it’s hiding place in the Lost and Found.

“Now, it was time to free me...” the voice in his head said as he hid in the crowd too busy to see him placing the final wires beneath his coat.

Now it was time to— get punched in the face, apparently. Titus was dazed and unable to stop the detonator from being snatched away from him by a woman in a slightly singed azure dress

“H—how?” Titus wheezed.

“How? How the hell could you destroy this place you bastard?!”

Titus’s mind swirled “No the plan was foolproof…. This is a test! it has to be a test.”

“Foolproof?! you were standing in the middle of—“ the woman’s partner cut her off

“Test? Who would be testing you?”

Before Titus could answer, two more strangers approached him. Two strangers identical to the two that had foiled his sacrifice.

“Oh no, already?” the slightly less toasted version of the woman asked

“‘Afraid so. Bastard blew up the library.”

“Dammit. well then...” the less burnt duo held out their hands, their doppelgängers returned favor and shook.

And then— well there has only ever been one pair? Right? How could they have— Oh, his head. Only one force had ever made him feel like this. This must be a test!

“You’re toying with me, surely you’re testing me. You must be It’s messengers. The God under the Library”

Both strangers ears perked up at this. “Let’s say we were messengers of your god. What would we be testing?” the man said.

“My resolve, surely my resolve to free you!” Titus smiled.

“Do you think perhaps there is a better way to free your god than blowing their…prison up?” the woman asked.

“I don’t understand.”

The strangers looked at each other, then the woman spoke “Do you know what. I think we’re heading under the library ourselves. Don’t blow anything up and you can come along. Let’s go see this god.”

Titus was shaking with excitement “You will grant me passage past the security?”

The woman followed Titus’ gaze to the far corner of the central hall, a door, reinforced with an unreasonable number of locks. “Yes. Yes, I think we can help with that.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First----Previous----Next

Interlude Two: Revision

Being a Revised Account of the Events of

23 November 1991 London, England

Earth 42.13/Apple Sigma-3

Ms. Grot’s voice came like seething wind. “Now what could you possibly be doing hiding in the hallway like this”

A far kinder voice: “Now, now. Let's not jump to any conclusions, eh?" Standing in the hall is hardly a crime” Not this time. Not this time. Not this time.

The two children spun around. Ms. Grot and Lucille were right behind them.

Ms. Grot’s eyes narrowed as though she were trying to block the other woman from her peripheral vision “Aye, but loitering is a fineable offense...”

The old woman tilted her head as though she had heard a peculiar noise.

Oh, so that’s the plan I had to go with. Shit.

Where the others only heard the uncomfortable silence that preludes the announcement of a punishment. “ I have something I must attend to. Ms…” she snarled.

“Just Lucille”

“Well, ‘Just Lucille,’ why don’t you escort these children back to to the common room?” she looked pained by the prospect of leaving her charges alone with someone who seemed so… well-meaning, but whatever had her attention looked like it might pain her more.

Before Lucille could respond, Ms. Grot had already made a beeline for her office at the end of the hall.

Once the door had shut behind her and Lucile felt certain she was out of earshot, she kneeled down to the children and said “dreadful woman isn’t she?”

The two children, not as certain Ms. Grot wouldn’t hear, simply nodded vigorously.

Lucille tilted her head toward the common room “ Come on, best to keep our distance.”

In the common room, the other children played or read quietly fearful of Ms. Grot’s return and untrusting of the new arrival. Okay, not get them out, get them all out before anything catches fire.

Lucille looked over the twenty or so children, she pressed her tongue to her cheek in thought, then turned to Alex and Colin “Are you two the newest here.”

“I am,” Colin said

Alex shook her head. “Been here two years.”

“And no one’s been adopted at that time?” Lucille’s stance was confident, even stoic, but her face looked as though she was searching the floor for a missing puzzle piece.

“None.” Alex nodded.

Yes. That’s what I thought.

“That must be very disheartening.” Lucille turned to face Alex “Most of these children, they seem…resigned to that. But you two…” That’s why I didn’t see them before. “Optimism. Resilience. Rebellion. Intelligence.  A strong shield.”

“Shield?” Alex asked

Lucille led the two just back out of the common room where they wouldn’t be heard. “Would you two agree if said Ms. Grot was a monster?”

“Absolutely.” Alex barely waited for Lucille to complete the question.

“Seems like.” Colin agreed.

Not only are they here, they can help. Lucille leaned in close and whispered: “She is.”

“She is what?” Colin asked.

“A monster. Literally. Do you two know what a psychic parasite is?”

“I know the two words separately,” Alex said

“Yeah but...put them together and—“ Colin continued the thought.

“I have one more question for you two do you want to save them, the other children.”

the yes was implicit, the “How?” was the only question that needed to be said aloud.

Lucille produced a spyglass from one of her coat pockets and handed it to the children “Look.”

Through the spyglass it was immediately clear the other orphans were surrounded by a mess of glittering strings, wrapping them like flies in a--

“It’s a psychic web.” Lucille explained, “The threads all tie back to Ms. Grot, carrying the residue of agony back to her.”

The two kids passed the glass back and forth. Colin’s brow furrowed. “But.. look at you! You haven’t got nearly as many threads as everyone.”

Alex turned the glass around “Neither have you!”

“Like I said,” Lucille gestured for the spyglass to be handed back to her “ a psychic shield. Hope” Explains why she hates you. Explain why she locked you away.

“What is she?” Colin asked

“A Devrosian Mite.” Lucile said “ Native to the Lowland glens of a world far from here."

“Another planet?” Alex asked

“Further. They hatch and drift until they find a place they can feed. They take a localized form and wait for natives to fall into their web.”

“Now,” she continued “I have a plan to save all of you, but you have to act quick. I need you to get all the kids out of here starting now” She hit a button on her watch.

It was easier with three people in the know. Some children were reluctant, some fearful. The web held them tightly. Here was where Lucille knew why she was going to have went with the plan she did.

Time travel tenses are difficult. Timing is easy. She needed to know how much time. As it turned out, With Colin and Alex’s help, corralling all the children took only eight minutes.

Brilliant I can stall for eight minutes.

She stood outside the orphanage with a total of twenty-four children, all twelve boys, and all twelve girls, all accounted for. Now comes the tricky bit.

The orphanage was warping, fading, disappearing shriveling like a like a burning photograph. The wails of a Devrosian Mite fading with it.

When all else was gone, the air was still, then, from where a window had once been---

There she was. Another Lucille. The woman who had already stalled for eight minutes. She walked towards this Lucille from the rapidly... disappearing building. In contrast to the destruction, she seemed almost serene as she approached the Lucille the children had been accompanying.

She failed, she went back, she succeeded. But for her to have succeeded…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First -----Previous ----- Next

Chapter Two: Convergent Moment

Despite its relatively modest stature, The Library towered above them. An aging wonder. Slowly repairs, expansions, and renovations left the building a Ship of Theseus.

The pair ascended the freshly swept steps to the Library’s entrance.

A guard blocked their path. The man was remarkably well armored, a thick, flexible charcoal armor that still wore it’s Hellenic roots in it’s layering. He held a long, thin rod like a headless spear.

“No entry.” He said.

“Oh, ah, yes, well then if you could—“ Colin stuttered.

The guard took the pair’s less-than-immediate departure as an opportunity to display his weapons ability to produce a sparking red spearhead.

“Oh very nice” Alex nodded “Look, this might seem like an odd question but… why is it closed.”

the guard paused for a moment, looking between the strangers. “Preparation for the Gala tonight.”

“Oh,” Colin eyed the spear “I don’t suppose you believe we were here to help…decorate?”

“I would not believe that. No.”

“I see.” Colin took Alex by the shoulder and motioned to give the guard some distance. They headed down the stairs and back onto the streets of Third Alexandria “Well, then, it seems we’re attending a Gala.”

~~~

They could have just went through the door, but that would have been impolite; better to just wait and sneak into the gala without an invitation.

Their entrance was a door near the back of the Library’s foyer. The space was full of patrons in quite spectacular garb.

An often underestimated tool for blending in while visiting another reality is that in most cases, the local populace would be willing to believe most anything before accepting the slightly odd individual is from another universe.

There are, however, several circumstances where this is known to fail: Circumstance one: the local sentient population does not include the visitor’s species. Circumstance two: the crowd in which one finds themselves is extremely judgmental.

The sort of people who attend galas tend to be very, very judgmental. For this reason, Colin and Alex had elected to procure local formalwear.

Colin exchanged his coat and impossibly colorful shirt for an incredibly monochrome suit with asymmetrical buttons. Alex would have preferred something similar, but without knowing how lax Third Alexandria was about gender roles, was stuck with a narrow grey and blue dress of modest though flattering cut.

Stairs led up to several balconies where more displays were flanked by refreshment tables. Glass cases holding millennia of artifacts stood as islands in the seas of elites. The party crashers pushed through to get a better look. How much of this pottery and jewelry had destroyed doppelgängers back on their earth? How much was the result of the differences in the two world’s histories?

Alex had already found herself so lost in a displayed manuscript that she barely noticed herself lift a sandwich from a passing plate anymore that the plate’s owner.

Colin had found a collection of paintings which seemed to show the stylistic evolution of some distant region over the span of several hundred years.

Art and culture were on full display, even if that display was behind glass. But it did not take long for Alex and Colin to wonder where the fruits of the Library’s famous research institute were.

In a fair world, they would have pursued this line of inquiry, discovered several fascinating secrets and had a relatively safe adventure. Alex and Colin had not visited a fair world.

Alex saw it first: A man across the room. Like she and Colin, he was out of place, overlooked. He had a bag with him. Small, lumpy. The way he held it, the look on his face…

Colin noticed right as it clicked for Alex. Immediately he felt Alex grab his shoulder.

“Door. Now.” She had run the numbers. They couldn’t reach him in time, Not at this distance and with this crowd. Shouting, trying to get someone else to stop him? No, no reason they’d trust her. No time. no time

There was a restroom door about two meters away, Colin didn’t have time to ask questions, nor did he have to. They reached the door just milliseconds before the explosion.

The door opened into fire.

With no time to plot a course, they had simply skipped forward several minutes. The library was no more. The door they had exited only there in spirit.

This unfair world ablaze. Why? Why? Why would that man have done this?

“We have to stop him.”

“I think it’s a little late for that.”

They had been away from home for less than a day. Surrounded by flames, they knew they could stop it, they could go back but…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Previous Chapter ----- Next Chapter Interlude: Iteration

Being an account of the events of

23 November 1991 London, England

Earth 42.13/Apple-Sigma 3

A little girl woke to the sound of pain. A chorus of thuds and sobs. Downstairs, the boys’ rooms. The girl got out of bed and crept by the others toward the hallway.

She looked both ways, no sign of Ms. Grot, then with remarkable speed and stealth for a seven-year-old, she darted for the stairs, glid down them and swung into the room the sobs were coming from.

“Oi!” she half-yelled.

Two boys had been beating a third, the bullies paused and looked.

“Hey, no girls allowed!” One said back.

“No beating other kids allowed either!” She hissed.

“No one will want him anyway, he’s a foreigner,” the other bully said.

“I am not!” the beaten boy said, “ I was born in Leeds!”

“Then why you look so… oriental” one bully snipped.

“Ya can’t say that!” the other gave his friend a rap on the head. “It’s not civil!”

The girl stepped back in “Oh? but hitting him is?”

“Yeah,” both bullies nodded.

“Then you won’t mind this.” the girl punched one bully in the face, then the other. They both wheezed.

The girl turned to the victim. “Right then, get up.” The boy staggered to his feet. “Now, I can hit harder than that. So how bout you don’t pick on uh,

“Colin!”

“Nice to meet you, Colin, I’m Alex. Right, so don’t pick on Colin anymore.”

“Alex?” one bully said, “Ain’t that a boy’s name?”

“Regardless of the name’s gender,” a creaking, ghastly voice spoke from behind the children. “A girl oughtn’t to be in the boy’s dormitories.” Ms. Grot. How had the children not heard her come in?

“Well,” Alex stared down Ms. Grot, knowing full well it was about to be her turn to get hit. “It’s not like you were going to do anything this.” she gestured to the three boys.

Slap. Ms. Grot’s hand left a red mark on Alex’s face.

Another boy sat up on his bed “What was that?”

“Go back to bed.” Ms. Grot’s eyes seemed to flare with frustration. Midnight and at least five children awake? “Oh there will be consequences for this.  All of you.”

Ms. Grot dragged Alex from the room and threw her at the stairs. Alex gave a nasty look back but trudged up the stairs and back to bed.

Morning.

The children of the orphanage had finished their paltry breakfast. Colin slinked off to the library, and Alex followed.

“You’re new, yeah?” Alex said as she sat down next to Colin, already engulfed in a book.

Colin nodded.

“Well, I wish I could say it gets better, but this place is dreadful.”

 “Thank you for last night.”

“ ’s okay. I hate bullies. You’re not a bully are you?”

“No, no never.”

”Good.”

A shadow passed by the library window, a tall one. Alex peered out into the courtyard. “Never seen them before.”

Colin placed his book down and joined Alex at the window. An adult was standing at the front door. A woman with dark skin, short hair, and a long charcoal jacket.

She rapped on the door once, twice.

“Could she be here to adopt?” Colin asked.

Alex shook her head. “Whole time I’ve been here, I’ve never seen any grown-up come to adopt. C’mon let’s eavesdrop”

“Eavesdrop?”

“It means listen secretly.”

“I know what it means but…should we?”

They should, they could, and they did.

Ms. Grot answered the door. “Can I help you?”

The stranger smiled “I believe you can. My name is Lucille, I believe we spoke on the phone. I’m a writer and doing research on London’s Orphanages for my next book.”

“I’m afraid I don’t recall speaking to any such person on the phone.”

“Well, I spoke with someone,” Lucille furrowed her brow. “Is there someone else here?”

“Just me.”

“Just you? With how many children? Oh, that can’t be legal.”

Ms. Grot narrowed her eyes “I mean no one is here right now. My colleague is out shopping for dinner.”

The two women seemed to be in a contest with each other over who could glare at the other the most intensely while maintaining a facade of politeness.

“Well then,” Lucille smiled, “perhaps you could use an extra hand.” She pulled a card from her wallet. “ I am licensed of course.”

“That won’t be necessary, I’m certain my colleague will be back any moment now.”

“Lovely, I’ll wait, and they can confirm I did, in fact, make an appointment.”

Several moments of silence passed.

“Uh, come inside. Be sure to wipe your feet.”

The two children slipped around a corner so as not to be seen as their monstrous caretaker led the strange woman to the foyer.

Something seemed…odd about Lucille. The children couldn’t quite put their fingers on it, nor was it a strong enough feeling that they would think to try. Was it how her coat seemed to every so slightly billow even in the absence of wind? How the light shone off her jewelry at less than ordinary angles?

No matter, whatever implacable otherness the woman extruded, it was overshadowed by the placable otherness of Ms. Grot. More than ever the old woman’s movements evoked a disgust of her surrounding, like just being here was a rotten meal, and now someone had come to her tables and asked her how her meal is. She was grinning and bearing it and saying complaints to the chef, but this woman, this intruder, seemed to have shaken that façade.

“I think Ms. Grot’s scared of her,” Alex whispered once the two women had passed.

“Maybe she’s with the government, maybe Ms. Grot is afraid she’ll see how she’s been treating us and lock her away,” Colin said.

“That’d be too good to be true.” Alex slumped.

“You’re not very optimistic are you.”

“I’d love to be optimistic, but I’ve been here too long. How are you so optimistic, didn’t your parents just die?”

Colin inhaled and looked at his feet. “ It was actually pretty long ago.”

“Then why—“

Ms. Grot’s voice came like seething wind. “Now, what could you possibly be doing hiding in the hallway like this.”

A far kinder voice:“now-now, let’s not jump to any conclusions, eh? standing in the hall is hardly a crime.”

The two children spun around. Ms. Grot and Lucille were right behind them.

Ms. Grot’s eyes narrowed as though she were trying to block the other woman from her peripheral vision. “Aye, but loitering is a fineable offense.”

The old woman grabbed Colin and Alex by an ear each  “I’ll be just a moment.” She told Lucille before leading the children down the stairs to the utility room.

Alex looked around. “Really? locking us in here for being in the hall?”

“No.” Ms. Grot grinned.  “Locking you in here,” she shoved them into a broom cupboard. “ I don’t trust you two stay quiet ‘round strangers. Especially not that one. So you’re going to have a little time out until that interloper is gone.”

The children couldn’t see anything. It was dark, cramped, and damp in their tiny prison within a prison.

Time passed. Then more time passed. They could hear something. Violence and shouting. That woman, Lucille; it sounded as though she was pleading and shouting for the kids to get out. What had happened? Why did they need to get out? How could they get out? What was that unearthly wailing?

Now it was getting warmer. The children were beginning to get a sense of why Lucille was urging them to flee.

“Help!” Colin shouted, but the unearthly wails and the rising sound of crackling flames drowned it out.

“Hello?!” Alex called out. Still, the children voices were nothing to the other noises. She began to kick at the door. She turned to Colin “well come on then, help me.”  Colin gulped and looked at the girl who seemed, bafflingly, to want to be his friend. Well, if the alternative is dying in a fire…

Colin began pounding on the door. Between the two children, the door began to budge. Through the crack, they could see the lock, but it was well above their heads.

“Lift me up, I think I can pick it!” Alex said

“What? From the inside? Besides you’re wearing a dress. It’s not decent,” Colin stammered, switching his gaze back and forth between the lock and Alex.

“Dying in a fire isn’t decent either. Now help me up!” Alex shouted. Colin shrugged and did as he was told. “Wearing a dress”, Alex grumbled. “I swear if I make it out of here I’m never wearing a bloody dress again.” She pulled her hair clip off and bent the clasp with impressive dexterity.

Colin couldn’t see quite what Alex had done, but after a few tries, the door swung the rest of the way open, the brutalized lock lying on the floor.

The wailing was getting more urgent, more frail. They could now hear Lucille’s “Children? Children?! Alex?! Colin! Please! The others are safe wherever you are, please come out!”

“We’re down here!” Colin shouted as the children made their way to the stairs out of the basement.

The fire was everywhere. Avoiding it was near impossible. The children were already afflicted with several small burns by the time they made it to the steps and up to the main level. Lucille was near, searching for them. Behind her was some sort of dying beast. The source of the wailing.

Lucille ran toward the children. She was so close. She was going to save them.

And then, the rafter fell.

Alex pushed Colin out of the way and into Lucille’s arms. “ALEX!” Colin screamed and kept screaming, more than making up for Lucille’s shocked silence. This can’t be happening she thought as she rushed Colin outside. How had everything gone so wrong? The fire was one thing, but a child—

This can’t be happening. Even if it killed her, Lucille would make sure none of this ever happened.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Next Chapter Chapter One: Departure The Forest, the eternity, the expanse of world trees. Here now is all that ever was, wasn’t, is, and isn’t; all the will and will not be. All of that is a drop in the infinite ocean. That ocean is a single dewdrop on a single leaf of a single tree of probabilities in the eternal Yggdrasil Forest.

A metaphor for a breadth of existence none of us can begin to grasp.

And here: a door, not a metaphor, not an abstraction. A simple door in an unmarked alley somewhere in the City of London. Early twenty-first century. Your world, or very close to it.

Where the door leads is physically unimportant. To the two people standing in front of it, all that matters is that it is a door.

The door ceased to lead to an abandoned delicatessen. It ceased to be a specific door, and for as long as it took these two to pass through, it would be a symbol, a synecdoche for travel from here to there.

Colin, a young man in an aviators jacket, unreasonably large glasses and a more unreasonably colorful button up shirt, turned a small mint-scented tin over in his hand “Care to take a look?” He handed it to his friend, a woman of approximately the same age.

“Of course.” Alex smiled. She probably also winked, but it was impossible to tell with so much hair in the way. She pulled a screwdriver from the pocket of her red track jacket; set the tin on the ground, and popped it open.

A tower of kitbashed tech sprung from the tin reaching more than a meter into the air. Alex leaned in close to the middle “Hmm, circuitry is immaculate as always, but the polarity reversal unit is alarmingly close to the QPM conductors.”

“What?” Colin leaned in to look. Alex took a step counterclockwise around the device to inspect another component. “ I suppose you’re right, though I think it has something to do with the compres—“

“Oh, excuses, excuses!” Alex teased as she adjusted an antenna labeled with several alien symbols. “Everything looks properly screwed in.” She took another step around. Colin followed, triple checking her double checks; Alex tilting her head to quadruple check his.

“Alright then, much better.”

“Lovely” Colin adjusted his glasses. “Where to then?”

“Ooh, what better maiden voyage than spinning the wheel?”

“One random retro classical 3D universe coming up” Colin pocket the tin. “Care to do the honors?”

“Thought you’d never ask.” Alex put her hand on the handle of the door, that was just a door, any door, any door from anyhere to anythere ready to go anywhere.

She opened the door, and they passed through—

They exited a glass door. The pair turned to see a shop. A human shopkeeper seemed utterly unaware that his storefront had been dimensionally hijacked.

The city around them was, for a random universe, remarkably similar to their London, a sizable metropolis. Though this city had considerably more variation in the color of the architecture. Buildings of purple and gold and crimson showed influences of ancient Greek and Mesopotamia. The climate was Earth's, but not England’s.

Alex had been to another version of this city a long time ago, and although she was a million possibilities distant, she still recognized it as an iteration of her namesake.

“Welcome,” Colin said pulling a black and white Quantum Guidebook from his pocket. “to Third Alexandria.”

“All the worlds and we’re on another Earth?” Alex chided.

“It does seem…improbable but I suppose that’s true random for you” Colin said. “Be glad we didn’t come out the same door.”

“Aye, that’d be a sour first outing. So, we’re in an Alexandria, I suppose the first stop should be the Library?” Alex grabbed the Guidebook from Colin and unfolded a map of the city. She oriented herself to the compass and handed the book back “It’s that way.”

“Well look at you, all on top of things.”

“Someone’s got to be, mister misaligned QPM conductors” Alex stuck her tongue out.

Colin smiled, but the window for a return quip passed before he could think of one.

All the while, both travelers took their time to read signs and banners, they appeared to be in a commercial district.

“Why ‘third’?” Alex finally asked

“What?”

“Why ‘third,’ the Library is here. It’s not the third Alexandria Alexander founded. what are First and Second Alexandria.”

Colin pulled the Quantum Guidebook back out and flipped through its citrus-scented pages. “No idea. Doesn't even mention the others.”

“I don't think you’re using that book properly.”

“Here, you try, it’s not like—“ Colin cut off the thought. This was their first outing, no need to dig up old wounds.

Alex had heard the rest of the sentence. She brushed the hair from her eyes and tied it backing one fluid motion. In a second fluid motion, she grabbed the book. She paged through it, bit her lip, kept paging through it.

“Blimey, there's a lot here on one city.”

“Big city I s’pose.”

“Aye,” she tossed the book back to Colin. “How about lunch, then Library.”

“Lunch then Library sounds wonderful.”

“Lovely.”

“But, what about our funds.”

“Uh..” Alex pressed her tongue to the side of her mouth in thought “let me the—

There was a soft thud as Alex bumped into an older woman. “Oh, wow I am so sorry” Alex feigned a smile.

“You’d better be.” The old woman didn't even turn around. Too bad. If she had, she might have seen Alex flipping through the contents of her wallet.

“Impressive. We’ve been in this universe less than an hour, and you've already committed a crime.”

“And what was your idea?”

“That was a compliment just take it.  Speaking of taking…”

“Relax. A master pickpocket takes only what she needs. This should be enough for a meal. going be the menus we’ve passed.”

“Are you actually hungry or did you just want an excuse to show off.”

“Very hungry.”

Soon, They had obtained two gyro-adjacent food items on a pair of paper plates and accompanying drinks. The two found a bench in a nearby park. About half a block of sculptures, benches, paths, and trees,  it was less crowded than the surrounding streets. Only a few other people enjoying a stroll, admiring statues or enjoying their own lunch.

“This is nice.” Colin said between bites “Been forever since we’ve been off-world.” his tone a clear attempt at paving over the reason for this.

“Yeah.” Alex smiled  “Too long. I guess we, uh” She looked down at her drink. Of course, they were both excited. Lifetimes of adventure lay ahead! But…

Nostalgia is inherently painful. Best not to spoil their maiden voyage with it. “Too new experiences.” Alex held up her drink. Colin reciprocated. They finished lunch in rare silence and went the last few blocks to the Library.

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