Chapter - DreamCast

Cosmic Soup

The tiny speck adjusted slowly to her unfamiliar surroundings. It would take several minutes before she knew where she was or why she was there. Right now, she stared dumbly, eyes watering from the painfully bright sun, not even aware she was a speck.

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Massive cliffs of impossible red towered over her, blocking out half the sky. Heart racing pumping adrenaline through her exhausted system. Memory blank, her mind void of all context. Thousands of threads that connected her to a specific time, place, and people had all been severed. Terrified and standing lost and alone, the floating marionette shut her eyes to this unknown world.

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The loud, mechanical grind of a buzzsaw startled her back from whatever netherworld she’d been visiting. The traveler once again opened her green eyes. Majestic, snow-capped peaks framed the distance. Before her, the valley was filled with strange formations of red boulders and small hills. Fantastically foreign. Could this be Mars?

Awareness came slowly. The nausea, however, was immediate and intense. A thin mist of sweat broke out on her hairline and upper lip. Making fists of her clammy hands, she was going to black out. Blinking hard once, she focused on the point of a red mesa, taking long, slow breaths of the fresh air.

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She had no idea where she was or why she was here. Maybe the nausea was caused by severe disorientation… or the other way around? There were no footprints to indicate which direction she’d come from. The fine dirt around her was all windblown and her white tennis shoes stood in pristine contrast with the remarkable dirt.

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The only thing familiar was her queasy stomach. An intense need to vomit combined with hunger pangs. A primal need to feed and a compelling desire to purge her stomach. She’d felt this before. It was the worst part.

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The worst part of what?

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Swaying uneasily on her feet, she tried to come to terms with her situation; to find her place in time. Tether herself one string at a time. Breathe. Sweat. Focus on the red cliff. Another wave of nausea passed like dark thunderclouds roiling through her bowels.

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Her eyes tracked for the source of the repeating buzzsaw. She found it. A pair of motorcycles were leaving a thin trail of dust through the sagebrush of the foothills on the far side of the valley, at least a mile away. There were no other sounds or signs of life. She had the bizarre sensation she was on a grand movie set. Everything seemed fantastically normal, but almost too perfect - idyllic and staged. Disconnected from anything real.

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A thin voice broke the silence. “I think it’s this way.” Bent over, spitting in a clump of desert grass a short distance away, her companion’s face was drained of all color. The skinny frame of a teenage boy about her age pulled in long drags of air. She recognized his face, but no name came with it.

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Her companion moved away, and she followed, adding her footprints to his in the fine paprika powder. A whisper of recognition bubbled up through thoughts of heavy molasses. They had done this before.

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Walking helped settle her stomach. Awareness returned a bit at a time, slowly filling in some details, leaving others obscured in a heavy fog. She still didn’t know where they were, or why. But after a half mile or so, she remembered her friend’s name. Connecting some of the loose threads brought some peace. Recalling details of the current global conditions did just the opposite. She remembered holding the newspaper, LeMonde. Its French headlines screamed of the war in Bolivia and the fall of Shanghai.

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She felt guilty, as if she’d done something to cause it. Then she remembered why and immediately blocked it from her mind. The memory re-energized the rolling waves in her gut. She pushed through it, gagging against reflexes as she trudged through the alien landscape.

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Soon, they stopped at a dirt road and her companion rummaged through his backpack. “You’ll want this,” he said, and handed her a heavy, black-knit beanie. Past his shoulder, across the road was a very full campground. Trailers, motorcycles and at least a hundred people packed the open space of packed dirt.

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She froze, eyes wide, then glanced back the direction they came. “We can’t. They’ll see us.”

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“Yeah… sorry. We don’t have a choice.” He hesitated before adding, “Unless you want to go to one of the alternate locations.”

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Another connection formed and she remembered why they were in this remote part of Utah. They’d scouted several other sites but there was no way they could travel again this soon. Instead, she stuffed her long hair into the hat and pulled it low to cover some of her face. It wasn’t much of a disguise.

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She looked up, expecting to see him wearing his familiar cowboy hat. Caught off guard, a surprised laugh escaped as she saw his pale, skinny face topped with a bright orange hunting cap several sizes too big. It looked like a giant, neon orange was eating his head. And the thought of him hunting a living creature sent her into a fit of much-needed laughter.

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Hand on hip, he waited a minute before asking, “Are you through?”

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Controlling her laughter to a few spasmodic wheezes, she answered with a smile, “Let’s go shoot us some coons, Bubba,” and the laughter began again.

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“Very funny.” He turned and headed down the street, saying over his shoulder, “The scout trip said this campground was completely empty a few weeks ago.”

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“Maybe it wasn’t huntin’ season,” she said.

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“Anyway, the car with our stuff should be at the far end of the parking lot. It’s supposed to be in the last stall and should have an Oriole’s baseball cap on the dashboard.”

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They’d crossed about half of the campground when they passed a mammoth RV. A small crowd had gathered their lawn chairs around. Some sat, many others stood watching a flat-screen TV that had been set up outside under the extended awning of the caravan porch. A wooly mammoth wearing motocross pads was burning hot dogs on a rusted, round charcoal grill. A brood of similarly clad mini-mammoths circled with open buns on paper plates. The smell triggered her stomach. It wasn’t hard to guess what was capturing everyone’s attention. They were too engrossed in the latest news flash to notice the passersby. But the two teens kept their heads low and looked away, trying to make themselves invisible anyway.

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Neither, however, could resist glancing at the screen as they passed. The broadcast switched from a news anchor sitting behind a studio desk to an unsteady shot taken from a hand-held camera. It clearly showed the trailing refugee without her black knit hat. It was a long shot of her holding a newspaper, standing in front of the Eiffel Tower. A caption at the bottom highlighted “90 minutes ago.” Then the screen split, showing another image of both travelers, this time standing at the iconic Taj Mahal. The caption now read, “30 minutes ago.”

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Her first thought was, Great! It’s not enough for them to show a picture of us exactly as we’re walking by. Why not show two pictures? That was closely followed by her second thought of, My hair looks awful. Her hands automatically stuffed a few more strands of wispy hair back under the black cap as the screen showed a map displaying “4,198 miles”. Back in the studio, the news anchor talked about the suggested speed of travel between the two points when she mumbled, “It doesn’t work like that.” After a few seconds of walking with their heads down, the boy muttered, “It kind of does.”

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They discontinued the conversation. It wasn’t hard for either of them to predict what would happen if they were spotted. It would be exactly what they were trying to avoid by coming to this “deserted” campsite in the first place.

Eventually, they reached the end of the parking lot. There were fewer people here, but they still moved fast and kept their heads low. They walked past the last car before finally crossing the road to a sun-faded, maroon Oldsmobile several decades old. A behemoth with far too many miles to be reliable. She thought, this is our escape vehicle? at the same time she noticed the boy’s shoulders slump.

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She walked around the front of the beast, avoiding detection from a few kids maybe a year or two older than them, college freshmen, perhaps. They were playing frisbee, trying to bounce the disc off the gravel-packed road base to skip-pass to the next person. The girl stopped in front of the car, confused. There was no baseball cap on the dashboard. It was void of anything but a layer of red dust. Glancing at the next vehicle over, a broad smile crossed her face and her eyes lit up as she saw a black baseball cap with a comically goofy grin of a cartoon bird in orange and black staring at her from the dash.

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“Hey,” she whispered to her companion, motioning him over to the front of the car. He also kept his back to the frisbee crowd as he joined her. Then she watched as his face repeated her previous confused reaction to the empty dashboard of the ancient Oldsmobile before she pointed at the next vehicle and said, “How about that one?”

His eyes doubled in size and his mouth dropped open, “Whoa.”

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“Too bad you don’t have your driver’s license yet.” She walked around to the driver’s side door as an errant frisbee smacked into the front oversized grill of the all-black Humvee and fell to the ground between them.

“A little help?” came an intruding voice.

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The two fugitives froze in their tracks. Trying to avoid detection, they both reached for the frisbee at the same time. His hand got to the frisbee first but stopped short, so she started to pick it up just as he finally found relief from his nausea. He puked. It splashed the Humvee, her arm, and the frisbee. The smell of acidic bile reached her nose, almost pushing her over the edge.

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“Sorry,” came the boy’s whispered reply. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

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“It’s okay,” she gagged, “just get in the truck.”

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In a voice much cheerier than she felt, she shouted to the strangers, “I got it.” Then she banged the frisbee against the fender, dispelling chunks of vomit before throwing it back, sending it well over their heads and into the sagebrush beyond.

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“Sorry,” she called out, quickly turning away. She moved to the driver’s side door and climbed inside. A quick glance showed that one of the boys wasn’t running after his frisbee. Instead, he was staring after her.

“Shit. I think he saw me.”

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Her companion said nothing and they both closed the doors behind them with a double thud, thud.

“Where are the keys?” she asked.

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She reached under her seat while he checked the glove box.

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The older boy walked towards them, head cocked slightly to one side. His friends called him back, but he waved them off.

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Inside the vehicle, the travelers frantically checked under seats, center console, visors, side door compartments. She turned to look in the back seat and noticed the rear cargo area was well stocked with supplies. Neither of them uncovered keys.

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A knock at the window made them both jump. “Hello?” called the unwanted voice.

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Panicked and desperate, she ducked her head, pretending to look under her seat. Then, the deep growl of the Humvee rumbled to life. She peeked up to see her companion’s finger on an after-market “push-to-start” ignition in the center console. Apparently, the keys were close enough to start the vehicle. She hoped they were at least somewhere inside. Now all she had to do was get the hell out of here.

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The other boys were now walking up directly behind the Humvee, joining their friend and blocking their escape. She looked forward noticing the parking lot’s perimeter had been outlined by stripped tree trunks about eight inches in diameter. She considered her options when the first boy’s entire face appeared directly in front of her. He was leaning way over the hood and had a full of the vehicle through the front windshield.

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This time he definitely saw her. Saw both of them. “It’s her! It’s them!” he shouted as she put the vehicle in low and with a huge jerk of the steering wheel and bounce in the seat, drove forward over the fallen perimeter log and onto the dirt road.

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“It’s them! It’s the kids from the news!” the voice screamed behind them as she pressed the accelerator.

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“Are you okay?” she asked her companion.

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“He saw us.”

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“He thinks he saw us. Nobody’s going to believe him,” she said, trying to convince herself as much as her companion. When she got no reply, she continued. “Would you believe him? I mean, Paris, Sydney, Moab, Utah?”

They’d traveled several miles in silence and were approaching a stop sign at the junction of an actual paved road. She stopped to check traffic and said, “They’re more likely to think he’s crazy than to believe the two of us are suddenly camping during the middle of a huge crisis.”

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The silence both confirmed and questioned the validity of her argument. Then, a glance in the rear-view mirror showed a tail of dirt from a caravan of trailing vehicles. Their pursuers, many of them, were quickly closing the gap when she pulled onto the pavement and stomped the gas.

It was almost pitch black before they parked the Humvee. It had been a half hour since they passed the last humans, a family loading four-wheelers on a trailer at the fork by Courthouse spring. From there they followed a dirt-bike trail over, around, and through the rock formations near Uranium arch. They turned at a marker reading “Wipe Out Hill” and the trail eventually came to a dead end at the base of a massive cliff. They set up camp by the light of the Humvee’s headlights. Five minutes later, they were heating some canned stew over a roaring campfire.

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She’d been formulating a plan for hours. They’d spend the night sleeping inside the locked Humvee. She wasn’t worried about how they were going to get out of here. She’d recovered enough energy and her nausea was finally under control. Surprisingly, the canned stew actually helped. If there were any signs of trouble tomorrow, they could just get out the same way they got here. Within a few minutes they could be anywhere on the planet. But even if they could go someplace else, there was no guarantee their next place would be any more remote, or any safer than where they were right now.

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She still had only a vague idea of how the travel actually worked and she was pretty sure it could be done wrong. Unsure about what those consequences may be, she had a feeling it could be disastrous.

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They had enough supplies for a week and no plans for any public appearances any time soon, on or off camera. Tomorrow during daylight may be different, but tonight they were alone and they both needed food and rest.

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The campfire crackled and spit, throwing yellow and orange tongues heavenward, illuminating the cleared area around it. Basic chemistry, physics, and biology on display as energy stored in the dried pine was finally released back to the atmosphere as heat and light.

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The pair sat in silence, hypnotized by the dancing flames. Both needed time to think – to gain perspective on all that had happened.

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From the nearby darkness his voice cut the silence, “How do you know who to trust anymore?”

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This thought had been in the front of her mind for several months. Their mutual friend’s obsession with control had cost them all dearly. By contrast, her own naïve approach had almost cost them even more once they’d started meeting with potential investors and global partners. She still didn’t have the answer to his question but shared her latest philosophy anyway.

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“Well, I’m operating on the theory that as long as we align mutual interests, trust is a negligible part of the equation.”

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“Yes, but how do you know who to trust?”

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“I don’t. That’s why it’s so important to work only with people who share common interests.”

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“But that’s not always possible with everyone.”

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“Then we’ll work with them. But don’t trust them.”

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A moment passed. The fire popped and a satellite traced a shiny trail through the night sky. Finally, he said, “That’s an awfully skeptical view on life.”

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“It’s better than death,” she said, avoiding the question.

Silence returned. There was a distinct chill in the air now. The night would be a cold one. For the moment, she believed they were safe. But based off today’s events, she knew it would only be temporary. Their days of being carefree kids in a safe environment were gone long before Eli’s discovery and their first press event. But right now, no one on the planet knew where they were. In fact, given their rushed escape from the campground and the crazy trails they’d followed, they would have a difficult time finding out where they were themselves.

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All at once her spine stiffened and adrenaline flooded her system. Something was wrong. She was terrified but couldn’t identify a compelling reason why. Deep within, she sensed an awful monster, an endless abyss hidden just around the next corner. The light hair on the back of her neck and shoulders were electric. She felt trapped in one of her nightmares – in Dolby sound and high def. A metal taste crept into her mouth. All senses were on full alert and she rode a razer’s edge of raw emotion. She couldn’t understand why. Was this the man on fire? Finally coming to take her? For real? In this desert?

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The panic ebbed away and she watched the flames as she separated fact from fiction. Since their announcement last Monday, the world had erupted in turmoil. Beliefs, traditions, religions, governments, physics all ricocheted against themselves - Creating confusion and tension, sparking conflict, sowing disbelief, all leading to panicked riots. So much stored energy being released, without purpose or understanding. For many leaders, it appeared far more important to act with force than to listen or try to understand.

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The world now spiraled downward in heavy turmoil – greater than any it had ever faced. And it had done so at Internet speed, at the word of a teenager. Right now, officers and advisors around the world packed private conference rooms and security centers beyond capacity. Once fearless leaders sweat in secure bunkers, shrugging off questions they couldn’t begin to comprehend, let alone answer. Many had already made rash decisions that complicated problems that didn’t exist a few hours earlier.

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Back in the ominously quiet slot canyon, minutes passed. Stars twinkled. Silence prevailed beyond the crackling fire. And billions of celestial witnesses watched history unfold on the blue-green planet.

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Picking up their previous conversation, the boy’s voice continued with a slight tremor, “Is it?”

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“Is what, bud?” She was touched by the sincerity of his question. She put her personal fears and global concerns on hold. Now, it was just the two of them sitting around a campfire, untethered from everything but their sacred friendship.

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“Knowing what we know, is paranoid skepticism really better than death?”

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“I don’t know… I mean, we don’t really know exactly what we know, do we? Eli’s video…” Her voice choked and she began again. “Even with the hard evidence you and I experienced. It’s still so vague... and distant. Everything we knew about life on this planet last week has changed. Today we proved it. But I don’t think either of us understands enough to be able to define what death really is.”

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“I guess by that reasoning, we can’t define life either.”

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“I guess we can’t.”

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For the thousandth time since the announcement she asked herself what she and her friends had done? Was their accomplishment a good thing or a bad one? Was the announcement necessary? They had unleashed something into the world that once unleashed, couldn’t be contained. A genie that would never go back into the bottle. Pandora’s box.

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Unlike her nightmares, they hadn’t released a monster with unspeakable powers and never-ending appetite. What they’d released was something far worse. Far more damaging and permanent. Something the world could never be ready for. Something they could never control. Today, they revealed a new truth.

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And the world could never be the same.

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And the world would never forgive them.