2006-8-17 mute_mike
And then everything turned itself right side out again!
I feel like I've just been barfed out of the belly of the whale and tossed back on shore. Like it was all some queasy dream....
Time isn't a constant. At least not between this dimension and the ones we just plowed through. The whole trip didn't seem like more than a couple of days away for me, but for Loopy and Cherry Dairy it was like half a year, and back here on our earth it lasted what, two months?
So there I was in the brig, back in the dimensional pressure ship U-38, when the wall explodes and suddenly there's the grill of a 1972 Pontiac Grand Safari staring me down through the dust and smoke. Cherry hops out and grabs me and starts shoving me into the back seat but I stop him and tell the rest about the stasis tubes and our fellow students, frozen in time and turned into some kind of dream-batteries to power the pressure ship. Everybody kind of looks at me like I'm crazy but Aimee jumps out from behind the wheel and says "Let's go!"
She is so hot.
So the two of us take off through the hole their entry made, out through the dust and down the gangway, through the claxons wailing and red alerts flashing and I've got no idea what we're going to do. But somehow we find our way to the engine room, where the pods begin.
I don't know why we're not spotted as the enemy - there are stress-sailors and dog faced gaurds and filmbots running around in emergency-mode, but for some reason nobody thinks twice about us. I imagine the station wagon and its passengers are getting some attention, though.
Aimee points out a room with its door ajar but covered with WARNING and STAY OUT notices. We slip in, and find a large room with only one thing in it - a huge red button built into the floor. It's the size of a hot tub.
Aimee knew what to do. She ran up to it and jumped on. Seemed like a good idea at the time.
For a moment, things got really weird. Everything was spinning, and there seemed to be a bunch of people at the door all shouting "Nooooo!" in slow motion.
And slowly, the giant red button sank down.
Then, suddenly, things stop spinning. Everything seems back to normal gravity again, except everything's tilted to the left. There's nobody at the door. Aimee and I run out, and find only a few of the pressure ship's crew still milling about, looking for access to any unused escape pods.
It's then I notice the stasis pods have all hatched.
RacerK, RexX, and all the other bully-jock-idiots we came to save are stumbling around, still groggy from being bottled up like that. And a bunch of other kids, who may or may not be idiots, as I don't know them.
And, naturally, my big brother is there too. Hadn't aged a day since he left...which means we're now the same age! Or maybe I'm even a little bit older? Gotta figure that out.
So, I've got my brother hanging on my shoulder, just kind of following the crowd. I see a bright light ahead and everyone's walking into it. We just follow the shuffling crowd along, and before we know it, we find ourselves....
outside! In the parking lot of the U-38 Warehouse, in the industrial park. The U-38 building is now all crooked and off to one side - like the conning tower on a submarine that's been beached. Which is, of course, kind of exactly what it is. And I don't think it will be taking any more trips. But it looks like a piece of modern architecture, sticking out at an odd angle between the Underwear Fellowship Hall and the Uzi factory.
Sergio was there, directing refugees, making calls. Already some busses from school were starting to pull up. I also saw Sergio overseeing the detention of a few dozen crew members from the pressure ship, face down on the ground with those little twisty ties around their wrists.
I didn't stop to talk - I suppose I'll be called in for some kind of debriefing eventually. I just wanted to make sure my brother got checked out by a doctor and into my bed back in my room. He's sleeping now, so I figured I'd write it all down.
Ah! I hear Aimee's horn out in the parking lot. My brother will need to sleep for awhile, so I think I'll log off.
2006-8-27 MJames
To: NETT
From: ****_***ames
****_********__thing going to plan. MM has returned ****|***___. The trap will be set tomorrow.
[next]
