image [https://cdn.midjourney.com/95791cf4-09f2-4786-9c81-39f5713d78dc/0_1.png]
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After waiting for the mercenary to disappear in the distance, Peter pulled out the surveillance drone and raised it straight up, five hundred feet high. The quadcopter rotated around, showing him the landscape.
Eastward, Redroar was cutting a trail in the grass, beelining toward a village, looking like a mixed medieval-far-west type. Northwest was his group, about a mile away. He dared not to make the drone go there to check on Regina for fear of being discovered, but the silhouettes were engrossed in picking flowers, so he supposed all was OK.
In every other direction, the grass sea continued unabated, with a line of blue mountains toward the North. But to the West and South, a shimmering coating covered everything.
"Wanna check?"
Recalling the drone, Peter used his movement skills twice, but for longer distances than before, until he arrived at the border of the fog. From close, the grass behind the haze looked different. Distorted.
"What now?"
"Sure, because now you have redundancy. If I die, Kostel takes over."
Peter refrained from replying. The drone was the safest bet, but the image disappeared as soon as it entered the haze. Strangely, they could still hear it buzzing.
Looking around, Peter found a bush and broke a twig from it, using it to poke an ant nest. A few critters climbed on the wood, and he plunged the tip into the rare fog for a few seconds. The ants looked well and undisturbed by the trip, and he put them back in their home. Then he tried with his hand and felt nothing. Slowly leaning forward, he inserted the tip of his nose and inhaled a bit of fog. Again nothing. In the end, he crossed himself and took a step forward.
"Oh my God!"
The haze was a mirage. In front of them, the grass rarefied, leaving place to a sand bar, on which the drone sat, the rotors still moving from inertia. Thirty feet farther, the ground plunged at a steep angle for about six hundred feet, then flattened, transforming into an endless landscape of dunes, going forever forward and to the left and right. A wrecked sailship displayed its masts in the middle of the incline.
"No kidding, Sherlock. But who builds a town in the sea?" Peter pointed at a line of large but ruined buildings. Some were intact, and colored a deep blue, with horses, bulls, and people over the base layer of paint.
"We explore?"
The distance was not very big, so Peter opted for running. Going down the dunes felt a bit like skiing, a floating surreal sensation, and a nice one. He reached the wreck in one minute, but there was nothing there, no trunks with treasures or even a cannon, so he continued toward the city. Nothing there as well, only the paintings. Men and women with wavy hair, some patterns. The men's silhouettes were red, the women's white.
"This is Minoan!" Peter exclaimed.
"Yeah…"
Looking up and realizing how steep the incline was, Peter sighed. "Pff… going up that sand will be hard…"
"Oh… forgot about it…>
The day was probably shorter on that planet, as three moons had appeared, their color a pale white. All were smaller than Earth's moon.
When they exited the haze, something that was not there before appeared in front of their eyes: a makeshift beach bar with a few tables. The bar had a sign above: We take dollars. An elderly man sat behind the counter, and a customer on a stool. Jack.
"Hey, Petey!" Jack waved. "Pour a whiskey for my friend,> he said to the bartender. "Make it a double-double."
The fuck?
Peter had his helmet and biker gear on. How the hell did Jack know his real identity?
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There was no choice but to roll with the wind. "I'll have a lemonade instead," Peter said before the bartender poured the alcohol into a chipped glass.
"Sure." The bartender put the whiskey back, opened a fridge, and extracted a jug. Approaching the counter, Peter sat on a stool, took out his helmet, and sipped from the drink. It was perfect. Cold, and tasty. He groaned in satisfaction.
"Found anything in the depths?" Jack slapped Peter's shoulder.
The latter tried to contain his befuddlement and shook his head. "Only ruins…"
Jack nodded. "We should ignore the curfew and come at night when the real stuff comes up," he whispered, lowering his head toward Peter.
"I dunno, man… I dunno…"
"Think about it… He's paying," Jack said to the elderly man, getting down from the stool. In beach slippers, he looked shorter than normal. "Remember, this conversation didn't happen. If we meet in public, you don't look my way. And…" he leaned even more, almost touching Peter's ear with his lips, "treat her right, or else."
The fuck! Peter repeated, looking after the leaving Jack. Did we get transported to the future?
"It will be ten bucks for the beer and lemonade."
Dazed by the strangeness of the situation, Peter extracted a hundred-dollar bill and forwarded it to the bartender. "Hahaha… you think I'm blind?" the older man laughed.
"Sorry?"
"Kid, you don't want Old Jimmy to get mad at you. Pay with real money or blow me."
"Sorry… Do you take gold?" The bartender nodded, and Peter offered him a five-dollar Indian gold coin.
"I can't give change for so much," the bartender waved his hands. "I'll break it for you if you want."
"S-sure."
Walking to a small anvil set in the back of the bar, Old Jimmy used a chisel and a hammer to cut it into halves, then divided one of those in two, returning three-quarters of the coin to Peter, along with a couple hundred dollars: a hundred bucks bill, and several smaller cuts. The latter looked normal, but instead of Franklin's familiar face, the hundred bill displayed a mustached man with evil beady eyes. Adolf Hitler, Rex, the text beneath said.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!
Grabbing his helmet, and running away at full speed, Peter plunged back into the haze. He went a hundred yards deep, then returned to the surface. The bar was there.
Fuuuuuuuuck!
Peter used his skill to reach the ruins, ran around, and then Warped up. The bar was still present. He returned to the fog with wobbling steps, collapsing after thirty feet, grabbing his knees in his arms.
"Maybe it's about how much time I spent down here," he mumbled.
"We emerged in a different reality!" Peter screamed.
"I can live with Jack being a Nazi, he was always a jerk. But a nazi Regina? I rather die…" Tears began to flow on his cheek. "I need to get back!"
How do you know?
But what about Jack?
Wiping the tears with the back of his palm, Peter picked up his helmet and followed the instructions. This time, there was no more bar, they exited just near the drone. It was fried, the System informed him, but he stored it in the backpack to get rid of any evidence. He changed into his old clothes and Sneaked his way back into the camp.
The students were having a break, and many were eating. On his way, he picked a bunch of blue flowers for Regina, small ones that grew under moss.
"Hey," he said to her, sitting down.
"Where have you been?" she frowned at him. "I wanted to spend some time together."
"I fell asleep under a bush," he pretended to confess. "Here, I found something for you."
"The elves' periwinkle!" she clapped her hands. "The best, thank you!" she rushed to kiss him on the cheek.
"Regina…" he said, his heart up in his throat.
"Yes?" she furrowed her brow.
"I… relieve you from your promise… I like you. I… don't want to pretend. I want us to date only if it's for real."
"I feel the same," she said, but with a cloud of sadness passing over her face. "We had a lovely first date… well, half of it at least."
"Sorry for sleeping during the movie…"
"You have a talent for sleeping, then doing nice things for me," she raised the flowers, smiling. "I like going out with you… but can you promise to take it slow? I need time…"
Swallowing a lump, Peter nodded. Then, Alchemy yelled at the students to get back to their jobs, and he went to find a bush to sleep under, for real this time. A few hours later, they hiked back to the extraction point, the same location where they arrived. All groups were in position, but there was a big commotion among the students.
Melinda exchanged a few words with the sports teacher, then yelled: "We leave in five. Take your place, follow the markings."
"What happened?" Peter asked a shivering normie. A girl, barely eighteen.
"Botanics died… A couple of hours ago, a big cat came on a buffalo and screamed insults at us. Dumbster yelled back—"
"Who's Dumbster?"
"Him," she pointed to another student, a lanky one, who was crying. "Spirit, on the verge of breaking into the third stage, but dumb. He accepted the duel, but the teacher said she'd fight instead. She threw a Qi-bolt but the cat dodged it and beheaded her in one stroke. There's the body bag," the girl pointed with his chin.
"The cat k-killed a teacher in a second?"
"Then the cat said something like: 'At least I got this one' and went away. Uh…" the teenager began sobbing.
"It's OK…" Peter patted the girl's back. "She gave her life to save another life."
"First jump in ten, nine…" one of the Cultivators doing the teleportation yelled.
Two minutes later, they arrived back at the Campus, in the summer's hot evening. The mood was down.
"My folks are in town, so I'll spend tomorrow with them," Regina said. "But I hope we'll be in the same group on Friday, and I can't wait for the weekend," she added, pecking his lips in a short kiss. He replied in kind then went to his room.
"Oh, hi, Peter. There was a courier for you," the doorman said, giving him an envelope, with nothing written on the outside.
"A courier?"
"Yeah. One of those biker guys. Dark visor helmet and leather all over."
Did you tell the Black Market guys where I live?
"This is… strange," Peter said once in the room.
"I can't take another bad news just now, I'll read it after I take a shower."
Ten minutes later, in boxers and a loose T-shirt, a glass of orange juice in hand, Peter finally read the missive.
Dear Stupid Me,
Yelling aloud, ten meters away from the bar, thinking no one will hear you because you're in the haze? Genius! The bartender couldn't stop laughing. 'He pops out, and in. Back, and in. Cries and spills the beans' he said.
You're lucky he's a friend.
Don't worry about Jack, I'll tell him it was me. We'll speak more on Friday when you'll get back from the trip. Meet me at Garcia, seven sharp. Burn the letter.
Peter from the Second Floor