Gadget blinked open his eyes. Gradually, the world came into focus around him. Not Fantazmagoria. Earth. His apartment. He was lying in his bed; his head was on his pillow, and Mystikite and Zoë were both staring down at him, with looks of concern etched on each of their faces. And what was that steady beep-beep-beep? Was that . . . was that a heart monitor? The one Zoë had “borrowed” from the hospital a few months ago? Had they . . . had they hooked him up to it? And these things stuck on his face . . . were those . . . electrodes? Oh yeah. His homebrewed electroencephalograph. Mystikite must’ve . . . Wait. He also still had the Dr. Manhatten Helmet on his head. They hadn’t removed it. That’s right. He had told them. Told them . . . what? Oh yeah. That it was dangerous to disengage it if he was ever using it and something went wrong. So what the hell had happened? He remembered trying the Transilience Beam settings, on the Ray Gun, and then . . . Had he passed out? Gone into cardiac arrest or something? He heard the heart monitor speed up, the beeps going by faster and faster as his anxiety mounted. He sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. The heart monitor slowed down a little. He did it again. And again. And again. Gradually, the beeping slowed.
“Uggghhh,” he groaned. “Could somebody turn that thing off? It’s giving me a freaking headache.”
“Dude,” said Mystikite as he looked down at him, seeming to relax all at once, “thank the freaking gods. You're awake. And functional. Didn't think you were gonna make it there for a second. Welcome back to the land of the living!”
“Uh, yeah,” he said, and sat up, propping himself up on his elbows. His head felt swimmy. Take it slow, he told himself. What the hell just happened? I was in Fantazmagoria . . . just a second ago. I wasn’t me though. I was Gadgorak. I was . . . Shit, now I’m confused.
“Oh Gadget,” said Zoë, breathing a sigh of relief, “oh Gadget thank God you’re awake and okay.” She bent down and hugged him. He sat up all the way and hugged her back. As always, she smelled wondrous. Gadget didn’t care if the perfume was cheap; it was still delightful. If they hadn’t been best friends since forever, and if he and Mystikite hadn’t been best friends since forever, then maybe . . .
He cut the thought off mid-sentence. No way. To even think that thought was taboo. Verboten.
“So where’d you go, dude?” asked Mystikite. “You had to have been tripping-out majorly in your dream state. Your brainwave readings were . . . off-the-charts weird.”
“Yeah, I, uh . . .” he began. “I was . . .”
“‘Was it a dream where you see yourself standing in sort of sun-god robes on a pyramid with a thousand naked women screaming and throwing little pickles at you?’” quoted Mystikite.
“Uh, no,” said Gadget.
“Huh. Why am I the only one who has that dream?”
How could he put this? How could he make them understand? Maybe if he just told it like it was. He sucked in a breath and commenced jabbering: “I was in another world. I don’t know how else to put it. And I don’t know how to really describe it, either. Postapocalyptic? Science-fantasy? Both? I dunno. I wasn’t exactly myself, either. I was Gadgorak Prime. And he thinks he’s me but yet he isn’t me, but is me when he’s here, in this world, being me. And when I’m there, I’m not me, but him, in that world. I know, it’s weird. But. Anyway. When I was there, and was him, I built a Proton Pack out of the guts of a fusion-powered clockwork horse and used it to fight off these Wraiths at the entrance to Castle Grayskull. The base of which looked at lot like our old high-school. I was on a quest to find this mythic Crystal Sword named Dràchynthýr. So I could help this Sorceress, the Lady Amalphia Gadget Discordia, fight this Dragon named Schyzarchon, in the Northlands of Cerebria. That’s as far as I got before I woke up. I think if I got knocked out again, I would go back, and pick up where I left off. I’m not exactly clear on how time works in that world, though, so I can’t be a hundred percent sure.”
Mystikite and Zoë exchanged a worrried glance and just looked at him for a moment or so.
“What?” he said at last, a little frustrated with them.
“You sure you’re alright, dude?” said Mystikite. “You hit that wall pretty hard . . .”
“I’m fine,” he said, and began plucking the electrodes off his face, head, and chest. “You guys need to quit worrying about me so much. I swear, it’s like having a pair of nanny droids, sometimes.”
“We’re just looking out for you,” said Zoë. “Someone has to.”
“I can look out for myself,” he said. “Anyway. How long was I out?”
“A couple of hours,” said Zoë.
“Oh. When did you get home?”
“Just a little while ago,” she said. “I was out with Dizzy all morning. She offered me a job, same as you guys. Tell me, are you two taking her up on her offer?”
“Pretty much,” said Mystikite, nodding. “We decided it was better to stick close to her. She’s one hell of a wildcard.”
“Yeah, I was thinking the same thing,” said Zoë. “And the secret she’s keeping. Dear God. If people knew . . .”
“Knew what?” said Mystikite. “She didn’t tell us that part yet. What did she tell you?”
“Whoa boy,” said Zoë, rolling her eyes. “You mean she told me, but not you?”
“Looks that way,” said Gadget. “She was cagey with the details. Said we’d find out after we agreed to work for her. Well, we agreed, but she took off before telling us anything. I guess she meant for you to tell us, since she told you right afterward. Told you whatever it is, I mean. The secret.”
“Are you sure you guys are ready to hear this?” said Zoë, quietly.
“Sure,” said Mystikite. “It can’t get any weirder than discovering the world’s first artificial lifeform hiding in the NeuroScape.”
“Say what now?” said Zoë, cocking her head curiously.
“It’s a long story,” said Gadget.
“Well, yes it can,” said Zoë. “It can get a lot weirder.”
“Try me,” said Mystikite. He plopped down in the beanbag chair opposite Gadget’s bed. “Just try me.”
Zoë sucked in a breath and then, rapid fire — just like Jordan, Gadget’s favorite character from Real Genius, apropos of Mystikite's earlier quote — she said: “Dizzy has an actual alien spaceship hidden in the research labs at Mechanology’ Special Projects Divison. She and her father Walter dug it out of the Arctic in 2001. It’s thirty thousand years old, and they’ve managed to pull the engine out of the saucer and decipher some of the navigational computer. They call the engine the ‘Tesseract Reactor.’ It’s what Ravenkroft Evolutior — also known as the alter-ego of Dr. Viktor Arkenvalen — is after. They’ve kept it a secret from everyone — the public, the government, other companies, other countries — for twenty-six years now. And she wants us to help decipher the computer system, the dead alien pilots’ biology, the engine, and the saucer’s other internal systems. And she wants us to help her track down Ravenkroft and defeat him and his technology, which is based on technology Weatherspark Dynamics has managed to reverse engineer from the saucer, like Dizzy’s Repulsivators and force-fields. There. That’s the actual job she’s hired us for. That’s why she wants us.”
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“Holy . . . John . . . Bigbooty,” said Mystikite, and he gave a low whistle. “Wow.”
“Big-boo-tay,” corrected Gadget.
“Whatever,” said Mystikite. “This is big. This is like . . . huge. Ginormous. Bigger than my penis even. And that’s really big. How much do you think the National Enquirer would pay for this story?”
“Probably less than Dizzy is going to pay us if you average it out over five or six years,” said Zoë. “But seriously, how can you boil this down to just money? This is about something, Mystikite. This is about truth. This is about meaning. This is bigger than just us. Bigger than the whole world, even. This dwarfs nations. Why, do you know that the thing in Dizzy’s chestpiece — the thing that powers her Evangeliojaeger — that that little thing could solve the world’s energy crisis, all by itself? It’s just not ready yet, is all. Once she perfects it — ”
“Oh yeah, I’m sure it’ll be ready someday,” said Mystikite. “And it’ll be patented, packaged, shrink-wrapped, and made-for-profit by Mechanology!”
“Guys,” said Gadget, “I’m sure Dizzy wouldn’t do that. She seems a lot more idealistic than that. Doesn’t she?”
“I dunno,” said Zoë. “She seemed pretty cynical with regard to humanity when I talked to her.”
“And let’s not forget,” said Mystikite, “that we saw her freakin’ torture Astrid just to try and get information out of her.”
“Hmm, yeah,” said Gadget. “There is that. Still, you gotta admit: She is pretty hot. I mean, hot as in . . . like, on fire with . . . I mean, she’s really smart. And charming. She doesn’t seem the type to cynically keep a world-changing breakthrough all to herself out of pure profit-motive.”
“Oh great,” said Zoë, laughing. “Just great. One day on the job, and Gadgorak here has a crush on the boss!”
“Shut up!” said Gadget. “I do not!”
“You so do too,” said Mystikite. “I saw the way you looked at her Avatar.”
“I wasn’t . . . I mean, I do not,” said Gadget. “I merely think she’s . . . very likeable.”
“I’ve known you for almost twenty years, dude. You have a thing for superhero chicks. Don’t front with us. We know you too well.”
“Mmm-hmm,” said Zoë, nodding. She smiled at him knowingly.
“Oh just . . . shut up shuttin’ up,” said Gadget. Was he blushing? Goddamn it, he bet he was.
See? said the Beast. Poker is not your game. Especially not where your tender feelings are concerned. You cannot hide them. Not from them . . . and not from me.
Leave me alone. Please?
No.
“So have the weapons arrived yet?” asked Zoë.
“Not yet,” said Mystikite. “Should be arriving any time this morning, though, if they’re coming FedEx. Later on if it’s UPS.”
“Well I hope they come soon,” said Zoë. “We have to leave for con around noon.”
“Yeah,” said Mystikite. “I know. We want to get to the Renaissance Regency as early in the afternoon as we can; grab a parking space in the garage as quickly as possible before it fills to the brim. Man I wish the Harry Potter universe was real. Then we could just travel by broomstick. That shit would rock.”
“Or we could travel via Floo Powder,” said Zoë. “That wouldn’t be too bad, either.”
“You’re assuming the Renaissance Regency Hotel And Convention Center has floos,” said Mystikite. “I don’t think they do.”
“Or if we were in the Star Trek universe,” said Gadget, “we could just travel via Transporter.”
“Whoa no,” said Mystikite, shaking his head. “You’re not gettin’ me into one of those things. No way. You’re not scramblin’ my molecules and then beamin’ ‘em across space and time.”
“Well tell me,” said Gadget, “what, theoretically, is the difference between Floo Powder and the Transporter? Apparating is really the same thing as quantum teleportation, isn’t it?”
“No, one is magic, the other is science,” said Mystikite. “Different paradigms.”
“But the same mechanical principle,” said Gadget.
“No, no, no!” said Mystikite. “Different principles, because they’re different paradigms. You’re looking at it like a technomage looks at it; a technomage is always going to see some sort of scientific principle at work behind the magic. A mage, though, is always going to see magic at work. Like I said, different paradigms.”
“You frustrate me,” said Gadget. “I say they’re the same damn thing.”
“I agree with Gadget,” said Zoë. “You’re talking about the same thing, just from different viewpoints.”
“But see they’re not the same thing at all,” said Mystikite. “See, one is mystical, magical. Floo Powder works by manipulating mystical forces and bending reality according to the will of the mage who’s handling the powder, by telling the universe, ‘take me to Diagon Alley,’ or wherever, and the universe obeys, because Magic. Simple. It’s not teleportation. It’s magic. Teleportation works by taking you apart at the atomic — or subatomic — level, translating you into energy patterns, and then reassembling you someplace else. See the difference?”
“Oh for Pete’s sake,” said Zoë, and rolled her eyes.
“Yeah,” said Gadget, “but how does Floo Powder get the universe to ‘obey?’ How does the universe do what Floo Powder tells it to do? Doesn’t the universe break you down and reassemble you? Or does it pull a Spacing Guild Navigator, pull a Dune on you, and fold space and just ‘pop’ you from one location to the other? There has to be some scientific principle at work, is what I’m saying.”
“No, there doesn’t. Magic ‘just work’s because it’s magic. It’s a wholly different sphere of conceptualization. A different paradigm of thought.”
“I’ve got your ‘different paradigm’ right here,” muttered Zoë.
“Different paradigm of thought, yes,” said Gadget. “But what about reality? Science and Magic are really the same thing, when you break it down. ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’ Arthur C. Clarke. Suck me, bitch.”
“But that goes against the very concept of what Magic is supposed to be!” insisted Mystikite. “One is magic! The other is science! Different — !”
“Oh will you two please shut the fuck up!” shouted Zoë. Gadget immediately shut up. Damn but she could be loud when she wanted to be. She went on, in a quieter tone: “Look, you two. I have almost been eaten by Vampires tonight. I have had heavy truths about the true nature of the cosmos dropped on me. I lost a patient — a kid I was fond of — and had to tell two grieving parents that their ten year old kid didn’t survive. And, I have had to deal with an asshole attending all day. So I am not in the mood to listen to this argument again tonight. Besides, it always ends in a draw anyway, and you guys always end up shaking hands and agreeing to disagree, or whatever. So just shelve it, okay? And besides that, hey, let’s look on some positives for today . . . Number one: Gadget made an incredible breakthrough by connecting his Helm to the NeuroScape and getting his Augmented Reality mode to work; if what you told me is accurate, Mystikite, this opens up a world of possibilities. So congrats, Gadget. And number two — holy shit, guys — we all three got new jobs today! And high paying jobs, too! Working for a really big company! Working for the second-in-command at said company, too! Not to mention . . . we now work on a team that deals with nothing less than the secrets of the fucking universe itself! I’d call that a win, wouldn’t you guys? Well, wouldn’t you?”
“Well, yeah,” said Mystikite. “There’s just one problem.”
“Oh, and what’s that?” said Zoë.
“She’s giving us weapons, Zoë,” said Mystikite.
“Well, what’s wrong with that?” asked Zoë. “That makes me feel safer, knowing what’s out there.”
Mystikite sighed. “Listen. You don’t give somebody a weapon unless you expect them to use it. She’s expecting us to have to fight . . . and if she’s giving us deadly weapons, that means that said fighting is going to be — potentially — deadly. She’s putting target signs on us, Zoë. By working for her, we’re becoming targets of violence.”
Silence for a moment as Zoë thought this over. She apparently hadn’t considered this.
“Well!” said Gadget, clapping his hands together and getting out of bed. “I’m ready for con! How about you guys?”