Dr. Glass was the chief bioengineer and surgeon. She was a tall woman with big hands.

They swallowed up my own grasp when we shook. I wondered how she had the dexterity to install delicate pieces of machinery with such big sausage fingers.

“You’ve had a couple days to think about the options I laid out,” she said. “Tell me where you’re leaning. And remember, it’s better to install lots of things at once, rather than one at a time. Fewer incisions in the skin, and less total recovery time. And my understanding is that you’ve only got two months of recovery to work with.”

I set the manual of human biomodifications on the table. I’d pored over the pages in the time since I’d first been introduced to her three days ago.

“I want the works,” I said. “Everything that could be useful dealing with a radish demon, but nothing that requires long-term maintenance.”

Dr. Glass smiled a gleeful Frankenstein grin.

“I like your gusto, Dr. Parsons. You seem less hesitant than when we first met.”

“Well, I’ve spent the last three days pacing around this hospital wishing I could be back with my family. I’ve decided that the best way to ensure their safety is to use all the tools I’ve been given.”

“I have to agree with you there.”

Dr. Glass jotted down some notes.

“Alrighty then. Let’s see. I’ll give you a micro-communicator in your ear canal, infrared and hyperoptic lenses, cardiac mesh, muscular reinforcements, a generation six body shield, thrombotic nanoparticles, an oxygen injector, a renal toxin filter, a reservoir of hyperhemoglobin. The works.”

I nodded with grim resolution.

“Good. When can we do it?”

“I just need a day to size and initiate the devices. We’ll operate tomorrow morning, and you can expect about ten days of recovery time.”

That was a little sooner than I expected, but that wasn’t a reason to back down. The faster I got this gear installed, the faster I’d be recovered and ready to get back to Jack and Violet.

Dr. Glass pulled out a measuring tape and began noting the length of my arms and legs.

“Your upgrades have all been paid for,” she said absentmindedly. “By Lannon.”

I raised my eyebrows.

“He has the money for that?”

“He won’t rub it in your face, but he’s kind of a big deal. He’s essentially the general of our makeshift military.”

“And he came to my Earth all alone? Without any of his soldiers?”

“Catching Revella has been a bit of driving force of his since he joined MEAD. There’s no way he would’ve given that mission to anyone else.”

I could understand that.

Dr. Glass recorded the vertical and horizontal diameters of my eyeballs like an architect taking measurements from a blueprint.

“I’m grateful for what you’re doing,” she told me. “Your Earth will be a great addition to the connected multiverse and a great start to our revolution.”

“Oh.”

I cleared my throat.

“Revolution, huh? I mean, I’m sure my Earth will be grateful for an invitation to join the multiverse, but really the biggest priority right now is creating an access point and stopping the radish demon.”

“Right,” Dr. Glass murmured. “But I can’t imagine them declining that invitation. Not when the multiverse has so much to offer. It’ll make the Republic furious.”

I sighed.

“Right. As long as the demon’s gone, I guess joining the multiverse can’t be a bad thing.”

“Not when we have technology like this to offer.”

Dr. Glass picked up the booklet of biomodifications and fanned through the pages, the gust of wind brushed my hair with ghostly fingers.

“People on your Earth are going to live longer and better,” she said. “And that’ll be evidence enough to put pressure on the Republic.”

She tucked the booklet under one arm and shook my hand with her big meatloaf grip.

“I’ll see you in the operating room tomorrow.”

…

The operating room resembled the disinfectant chamber that had awaited us at the end of the bridge to the widow’s nest. White walls with little devices in the ceiling wafting a thin mist of antimicrobial fog into the air overhead.

I was wearing a gown made of synthetic fiber. It felt about as comfortable as wearing a potato sack and as was just as flattering to my figure.

A small IV line was placed in my left arm – the only thing that resembled medical care from my home reality.

A clock ticked on the wall to my left. Fortunately, the connected multiverse kept time in a similar manner as my home Earth. Someone over the last four days had explained that our language and numerical systems were so similar because my Earth was a reality that ran immediately parallel to many of the Earths in the connected multiverse – that is, it branched off more recently than some of the universes where humans still ran around beating each other with sticks or the ones where they never evolved at all.

I was sure the logic was more complicated than that, but the MEAD soldiers who’d been supervising me had politely explained everything like I had the intelligence of a five-year-old.

The clock overhead kept ticking like a bomb. I waited for Dr. Glass to enter and for the operation to begin.

Finally, the doors of the operating room swung open, but it wasn’t the meaty palm of Dr. Glass. Instead, spindly fingers with garlic bulb knuckles thrust the doors aside.

My mother entered.

I let out an involuntary groan and sagged into the bed.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Laura!” she exclaimed.

“What are you doing here?”

“It’s their policy to let family visit before surgery. Laura, you’re getting surgery? Why?”

They should’ve asked me first about that policy. I could’ve told them that, barring Dr. Glass accidently dropping her scalpel blade-first into my heart, a visit from my mother was the worst thing that could’ve happened to me in the operating room.

“I’m getting a few biomodifications installed. It’s very safe, and it’ll help me lead the rescue team that’s going to catch Michael.”

“Right now? They’re saying there’s a sandstorm moving this way. It sounds dangerous, and it’ll hit soon. Do you think that’s the best idea?”

“Dr. Glass knows what she’s doing.”

She looked flustered.

“You were just going to go let these strangers operate on you without telling me? I know you’ve been avoiding me since we’ve arrived. Why?”

I shrugged.

“I don’t mean this in a rude way, but why is this different from back home? If I told you I wasn’t going to see you in Glemridge, why would I see you here?”

Okay, maybe I did mean it in a rude way.

She bit something back, holding it behind her lips like a sour candy.

“We almost died,” she said. “We’re trapped on a desert planet in an alternate reality. Doesn’t that make our little squabbles feel a bit insignificant.”

I exhaled sharply.

“Maybe, Mom. Maybe. But I’m a little busy right now. I’m trying to do things that will help people back home,” I said. “You can keep sitting around here, but billions of people could die if I don’t help.”

She pouted

“Do you think I enjoy sitting in this hospital ward all day? Nobody asked me if I wanted to help.”

“Well, do you?”

She faltered.

“Is there anything I can do?”

I ran a hand through my hair, trying to comb my headache away like it was a knot in the strands.

“I don’t know. Why don’t you ask Lannon if you can do anything? He’s in the surgical recovery ward.”

She looked me up and down with a probiscis gaze, confusion etching her features.

“You and Lannon? Are you…”

“Jesus Christ, Mom! I’m married.”

She raised her hands and took a step back.

“Okay. Sorry. I just wondered.”

“Go be helpful or go back to sitting around, just do it somewhere else. Please?”

Her face fell like a puppy realizing it had urinated all over the carpet.

“I hope the surgery goes well.”

“Me, too.”

She raised a hand in parting and exited the operating room. Dr. Glass slipped through the doors before they closed. I wondered if she’d overheard our conversation. Her face betrayed nothing.

A tall doctor followed her in. He began manipulating the machine connected to the IV in my arm.

“Ready?” Dr. Glass asked me.

“Let’s get it over with.”

She pulled a mask over her face with a satisfying snap.

“That’s what I like to hear.”

She gestured to the other doctor.

“Anesthesia, please.”

He nodded, and the next thing I knew, I was lying in a different bed in a different room. There was a window to my left and a man in a bed to my right. Lannon. He was covered in bandages and healing foam, but mostly free of the wires and tubes that had been keeping him alive when we’d arrived.

I felt a weight on my ankle.

I looked down. It was Dr. Glass’s hand. She was sitting at my bedside.

“Surgery was a success,” she said. “You’ll feel a bit foggy and weak from the pain meds for the next couple days, but you’ll be up and walking soon. My advice is to take it slow. We did a lot of work, and you’re going to be itching to test it out. Don’t try to do too much at once, okay?”

“Okay.”

She patted my leg like she was slapping a thick sirloin onto the chopping block. It didn’t hurt, thanks to the medications, but I heard the thunk of her palm against the sheets.

Dr. Glass left, and Lannon looked over at me.

“Welcome to the recovery ward.”

“You look better, but you still look like shit.”

He grinned.

“So do you.”

I glanced down. Similar webs of bandages and globs of foam were plastered down my arms, legs, and chest.

Lannon sensed my momentary alarm.

“Don’t worry. You’ll be up and out of here before I am.”

“Well, you better catch up, then,” I teased. “I need you to get me home.”

Lannon squirmed up in his bed, adjusting the position of his shoulders against the pillow.

“Don’t worry. I’m resting as hard as I can.”

We spent the next several days in the recovery ward. A screen overhead played recorded movies – some of the greatest hits from across the connected multiverse. Lannon tried to pick ones from dialects of English I could understand. Maybe it was the fog of the pain medications, or maybe it was my Earth five hundred ninety-six beta taste in cinema, but they were somewhat confusing and hard to follow.

In one, a man professed his love to a beetle. Two chairs went shopping together in another. Very abstract stuff. There was one I actually enjoyed, which featured a man dressed like a clown on a Mission Impossible-style adventure. Mostly laser guns and explosions.

A sandstorm hit on the second day after surgery.

The view through the window was dimmed by a nimbus of grit. Particles of sand tapped against the glass constantly like impatient thrumming fingers.

Lannon said these happened all the time across the equatorial continents on the widow’s nest. Part of the reason it was inhospitable – it was dangerous to venture outside without a body shield for days at a time while the storms were passing over.

He assured me that the hospital had enough backup power generators to weather three months’ worth of storms. The current sandstorm only lasted a few days before the sun returned and the solar panels on the rooftops began cooking once more.

I began to experiment with the gear I’d been given.

There was a small microphone installed inside my cheek, which allowed me to verbally communicate instructions to the AI coordinating my new devices. I could receive whispered messages from Lannon through the micro-communicator in my left ear. I could see the heat signatures of MEAD soldiers walking around outside – even in the middle of the night. I used voice commands to turn my body shield on and off. It would crackle to life with a flash of phantasmic sparks before hugging up to my flesh and vanishing from perception.

The dull ache in my arms, legs, and chest began to fade away. When my dressings were changed, I saw long incisions down my limbs and torso held together with surgical glue. Lannon assured me the glue was seeded with dermal stem cells, which would heal over without a scar.

When I tensed and flexed my arms and legs in bed, they felt good. Surprisingly so. Like Dr. Glass had lubricated my joints with oil and wound-up springs inside my tendons. I followed her instructions and fought the urge to step out of bed and try them out.

My chance to test them finally arrived when the hospital was evacuated.

Blaring alarms woke me from a nap in the early hours of the afternoon. A harsh, griping sound that snapped me out of slumber with ear-splitting gusto.

The micro-communicator in my left ear automatically inflated a small airbag to muffle the sound and protect my left eardrum. I clapped a hand over my right, wincing in agony.

“What’s going…”

“Dreadhawk!” Lannon exclaimed, gritting his teeth as he threw the sheets off his legs. “We’ve got to get to the bunker.”

I didn’t know what a dreadhawk was, but I knew enough to be scared if Lannon was. It had been nine days post-surgery. I was feeling mostly comfortable in my new body. Comfortable enough that I didn’t think my wounds would split open like tight pants over a fat ass if I tried running around.

So I moved, swinging out of bed and hurrying toward Lannon.

My steps were unsteady. Every stride forward threatened to hurl me into the ceiling if I didn’t consciously tone down my newfound strength. By the time I’d taken five paces to Lannon’s bed; however, the AI had kicked in, and my steps were coming easily.

I helped him to his feet and offered him my shoulder as we hustled toward the door. He took hobbled steps, leaning heavily on me. He really did have more healing to do.

“We need to go faster,” he murmured. “Carry me.”

“What?”

Lannon was a good four inches taller than me. A vision of me wobbling down the halls with him sitting atop my shoulders flashed through my mind.

“You’re stronger than you realize,” he insisted. “Pick me up.”

And so I did.

The AI helped me keep balanced as I leaned Lannon back onto one arm and scooped the other behind his knees. I shouldn’t have been able to lift him like that, but he was easier to pick up than Violet.

He swung an arm over my shoulder and held on.

“Go!” he urged.

I ran down the hall and to the emergency stairwell. Other staff and soldiers scrambled down with us. At some point, someone took Lannon off my hands. I followed them as we all hurried to the ground level.

We passed the second floor, where my mother was staying. I pushed the door open. It banged against the wall with a steel-on-plaster smack.

My mother was being escorted at a brisk walk toward the stairwell by the soldier who’d been assigned to guard her.

“Come on!” I urged, shouting to be heard over the sirens.

“What’s happening!” she demanded, squeezing past as I held the door to the stairwell open for her and the guard.

“I don’t know. But we have to get to the bunker.”

We followed the flow of MEAD soldiers and medical staff into the lobby and onto the sand outside. The sunbaked ground felt good on my bare feet after the cold hospital floors.

The strain on the inside of my skull deflated once we were free of the hospital alarms. I only had a moment of relative silence to orient myself before a shrill cry reverberated through the air and sent the entire crowd into a panic. Everyone scattered like toddlers in a game of hide and seek.

The dreadhawk appeared.