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Chapter 2
When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It
Buffy, Cordelia, Spike and Flynn stepped from the urban world of grit and grime and noise into a massive vault of stainless steel where the only sound was the hum of a wormhole generator.“Please stay clear of the event horizon,” came a familiar voice over a public address system. The words resonated in the empty vault.
With a sound like a giant sliding door being shut, the vortex collapsed in upon itself, folding inward from the superconducting toroidal confinement ring that contained it and contracting to a brilliant silver point before vanishing entirely.
A sequence of lights at the apex of the superconducting ring cycled from red to amber and finally to green. A few seconds passed, and then the silence was shattered by the percussive sounds of massive internal bolts being retracted. Buffy, Cordelia and Spike turned their eyes toward the vault’s titanic circular doorway as it began to swing slowly inward.
As the door swung aside, it revealed a woman flanked by two fully armed soldiers in body armor and helmets. Buffy recognized her.
“Jenny?” she asked, her voice carrying easily in the unnerving quiet of the vault.
“A Jenny, yes,” said Jenny Calendar, her dark eyes as inscrutable as her expression.
“This particular Jenny Calendar is head of our little R and D department here in Pubspace,” said Flynn.
“Pubspace?” asked Cordelia.
Jenny raised an eyebrow and said to Flynn, “They haven’t been briefed?”
“All in good time,” said Flynn.
Jenny sighed. “You really are impossible sometimes, Flynn. Why do you even put the rules in place if you don’t plan on following them?”
“Because without rules, where would be the fun of breaking them?” asked Flynn.
Jenny’s dark eyes flashed with irritation. “Fine. They can wait in the pub until you’re ready to run them through the orientation.”
“Now that sounds more like it,” said Spike.
Miss Calendar raised a handheld communications device to her lips and said, “Hal, realign the generator for the pub coordinates, please. We might as well give this contraption another test while we’ve got it warmed up.”
Buffy heard the telltale sound of the wormhole forming again.
“Well, for what it’s worth, welcome to Pubspace,” said Jenny. She looked directly at Buffy and said, “Buffy, it’s always nice to have another one of you here. Best of luck. You’ll need it.”
“Another one of me?” asked Buffy as Jenny retreated back through the vault’s door.
Flynn grabbed the Slayer by the shoulders and firmly turned her toward the hypnotic incandescence of the wormhole.
“Yes, well, time enough for all that later. Come along. It costs a fortune to run this damn generator and frankly the operational budget for this quarter isn’t looking very promising,” he said.
“But …” began Buffy.
“No buts,” said Flynn as he prodded her toward the wormhole. “Everything will be made clear soon enough. But in the meantime I imagine you could all do with some lunch.”
“Finally, a bugger who speaks my language,” said Spike.
The four travelers disappeared back through the bright maw of the vortex and emerged inside a bar.
“Welcome to Flynn’s Cross-Dimensional Bar and Grill. Known to the locals as simply ‘The Pub’,” announced Flynn.
* * *
“Well, this jolly damn well sucks,” said Sergeant Mick Aston as he tossed another rock against the rusting hulk of the Ford Explorer.
“Cut that shit out, huh, Sarge? You’re giving me a headache and we ain’t got but half a bottle of aspirin left in the medkits,” said Hudson from beneath the hood of a more promising looking automotive specimen. He looked up from his work on the engine and, shading his eyes with one hand, surveyed the desolate landscape through which a heat-hazed asphalt ribbon ran. The highway disappeared into distant mountains that crouched beneath dark and ominous clouds. Nearer to the two men lay the ruins of a city, its steel and glass towers toppled, its inhabitants long gone.
Aston smiled and said, “Just beating you a cadence, what with you being such a notorious slacker and all.”
“Ha bloody … I mean frigging ha. Now you got me sounding like one of you limeys,” grumbled Hudson as he slammed down the hood of the Dodge pickup.
“And a distinct improvement it is over your impoverished colonial vernacular, I might add.”
Hudson glared at the Englishman as he slipped behind the wheel and gave the ignition key a twist. The engine cranked laboriously for at least twenty seconds before it finally caught, expelling a billowing cloud of acrid hydrocarbon emissions from the tailpipe.
“You know, there are any number of fine ladies I wouldn’t have minded sharing this post-apocalyptic rock with, Sarge. So tell me where I went wrong in life that I ended up stuck out here with you for the last six months,” said Hudson.
Aston hefted his backpack behind the passenger seat and said, “So sorry I’m not your Gilligan’s Island fantasy come true, Corporal. But then I don’t suppose your average supermodel would know which government research facility contains the wormhole generator from the Roswell saucer, would she?”
“Yeah, well, I still think this is just a big wild goose chase,” said Hudson.
Aston settled into the passenger seat and closed the door. “If you’ve got a better idea, I’d love to hear it.”
Hudson put the truck in gear and started them on their journey again.
“Nope. Not a one,” said Hudson. “Besides, if it doesn’t work out, we can always swing by Vegas. Never been to Vegas.”
* * *
“We could’ve just walked down there, handed them one of the phase transponders, and had ops bring us all across. We’re just wasting time,” said the dark haired woman as she surveyed the scene from behind the concealment and shade of the low sandstone ridge.
“You know Flynn’s orders. This is a lot bigger than those two. We wait until GHOST gives us the go-ahead,” said her red-headed companion as she peered through the binoculars at the departing truck. She rose and started for the HUMVEE parked nearby.
“Don’t you get tired of being in the second string? An also ran? I sure as hell do,” said the brunette.
“I never thought I was second string,” said the other woman. “Just because most universes got someone named Buffy Summers as a Slayer and mine got me, that doesn’t mean I’m not one of the best there is at what I do. It’s not like we made Flynn’s All-Pro Slaying team because we’re bad at our jobs, you know. Come on. We need to get moving. Hudson’s got a lead foot.”
“Yeah, well, in Pubspace the name Buffy Summers will get you a lot more free drinks than Erin Delacey or Alexandra Harris,” said the brunette as she climbed into the HUMVEE beside Erin the Vampire Slayer.
“You’re a broken record with that inferiority complex shtick of yours sometimes, Xandra,” said Erin. “You, me and Willow kicked a lot of demon ass in our world. We’re no slouches in the mayhem department.”
“You’re not the one who was born a man in ninety-three percent of mapped realities. It’s not very good to the self-esteem to find out that as far as the multiverse is concerned you’re not even the correct sex,” said Xandra.
“There are any number of lewd and lascivious responses to that, but I think I’ll just let it go for the purposes of Slayer/Slayerette amity.”
Xandra scowled and gazed toward the pickup truck. The vehicle raised a billowing cloud of iron-reddened dust that turned the color of molten blood in the angled rays of the afternoon sun.
“They’re going to spot us eventually, you know. I mean, we are the only two other people on this whole planet,” she said.
“We’ve been through this. According to Flynn, we’re slightly out of phase with this reality. They can’t see us,” said Erin, consulting a map and only half listening to her companion.
“Not us maybe,” said Xandra, still watching the miniature tempest of grit and sand created by Hudson’s truck. “But the dust we kick up isn’t invisible.”
Erin looked at her. “You know something? You’re right. I’d better leave more distance on them while we’re out in the desert.”
“Ooh. A three-pointer to the supporting cast. Swish. Nothing but net,” said Xandra as Erin eased the HUMVEE down the slope and back out onto the road.
* * *
“They still there?” asked Aston.
Hudson adjusted his rear view mirror without slowing down. After a moment, a brown plume of dust came into view in the distance. “Uh, huh.”
“Take us for bloody fools, don’t they?”
“Guess so. Still don’t see the vehicle. They must be running slightly out of time phase. Wish I knew how they got that to work. Even Zoot gave up on that, and he’s the smartest guy I ever knew,” said Hudson.
“It doesn’t much concern me,” said Aston. “As long as they keep their distance, they can follow us all the way to Area 51 for all I care.”
“You ain’t just the least bit curious?”
“Of course I’m curious, Corporal. I do have a pulse the last time I checked. That would imply that I retain at least of a modicum of human inquisitiveness.”
“Man, you must’ve been the William F. Buckley of Eton, the way you torture a sentence.”
Aston picked up a Kurt Vonnegut paperback from the seat beside him, began to read, then said, “You may forego the witty Tonight Show dialogue and concentrate upon your driving at your leisure, Mr. Hudson. There is much to be said for the occasional gulf of silence.”
Hudson just smiled broadly and turned his attention back to the shimmering ribbon of cracked and dusty asphalt that stretched in lonely silence toward the shattered city.