Jyra Read online

  “I don’t understand. This shouldn’t be possible. And what are the dreams?”

  Another stepped forward – a short, pale thing that seemed like it once might have been human long ago but was now too slight and disjointed to be anything closer than a cousin to the Homo sapiens. “As far as we’ve been able to figure out, they’re paths of what could happen to our dimensions if we go wrong. Or maybe they’re visions of something that’s already destroyed a dimension similar to ours. Mine was about a tsunami cataclysm that wiped out over half of our population. If it weren’t for the dreams, I wouldn’t have been able to avoid it.”

  “Dimensions? As in the multi-theory?”

  This time, another spoke. They were covered in hair so thick that it was hard to define any other feature beside that. “I’ve been trying to figure this out since I first discovered it a hundred years ago, when I was a child. As far as I can tell, the multi-theory – our dimension has that as well – is on the right track, but not entirely the accurate picture. Yes, there are an infinite amount of dimensions of different times, different places, different choices, all existing at the same time. The discrepancy is that they’re not stacked on top of each other, but rather that we’re all within each other.”

  “How is that possible?”

  “Surely, you know how every atom is mostly empty space?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “And you understand how even their tiniest parts are constantly vibrating, whether dropping energy levels, or gaining them.”

  “I have a thorough understanding of the basic building blocks of our universe. Please proceed to your point.”

  “Well, my theory is that these dimensions are all able to reside within and around each other because we’re all vibrating at different frequencies. Like stations on a radio. We’re all real, and all valid, but we’re all separated. And those channels that are static? Those are ones that have crumbled to whatever scene the dreams send us.”

  “…But what’s a radio?” Radio waves didn’t make sense in this context, but I couldn’t quite place what he meant. “And who sends the dreams? And why are we able to see them?”

  “That we’re not quite sure of. We’re all quite different. No similar origins. Definitely different physiologies. Whatever is allowing us to see each other and these visions eludes us.”

  I wanted to argue with him more, but that’s when Andi flashed into my mind. Red haired, chubby cheeked, and from a world entirely different from mine. What if…what if that wasn’t an imaginary friend after all? What if she was real?

  Oh, God, she was! Memories came flashing back to me in a rush. Us eating vastly different foods together, on either sides of the invisible partition that separated us. Me comforting her, after her beloved, four-legged pet had passed. Her yelling at my bullies that used to make me hate school. Those were all real. She was real! And I had forgotten her.

  Whatever had happened to Andi? Why had I stopped seeing her?

  And then, the last time I saw her replayed itself in my memory, and I couldn’t help but gasp. Something horrible had happened to my best friend, and I had wiped her from my mind rather than save her.

  “What’s wrong?” the original stranger asked.

  “I think I’ve been seeing other dimensions since I was young. Well, one dimension to be precise. I had a friend, and no one else could see her but me.”

  “That’s impossible. We can only see each other within the dreams.”

  “You are purporting that we are all from different dimensions currently sharing a consciousness across realities and you want to argue at the possibility that some of us might be able to view alternate planes while awake?”

  “Your point is noted.”

  I nodded and continued on. “But she disappeared one day. What could make a person just disappear like that?”

  “Death.” That was the small, slight girl, and someone next to her elbowed her. “Oh! Maybe a head injury? I’m sure they’re fine. Really.”

  Resolve flowed through me. “I think I know what these dreams mean for me. I must find Andi. These dreams began before I lost her.”

  “You think someone from outside your dimension is going to stop whatever Great Choice is approaching your reality? How does that make sense?”

  “I cannot explain it.” Or, rather, I didn’t want to. My hypothesis was incredibly unscientific. But I had this feeling, deep, deep, deep down in my gut that finding her was exactly what I needed to do. Maybe it was born out of guilt. Maybe it was because those feelings of trust and friendship were pulling at me stronger than any gravitational force. “But I will find her, and I will stop whatever these visions are showing.”

  “Good luck to you, my friend. As the Great Choice approaches, the dreams will become clearer. And we’ll be here, should you need advice. Unless, of course, one of us chooses wrong.”

  “Does that happen often?”

  The group was quiet for a moment before the girl spoke. “There were once over a hundred of us. Occasionally, newcomers like yourself would join, but something is pushing our universes to the brink faster than we can be born.”

  “Well, that’s entirely unpleasant.”

  “That’s why we must support each other more than ever. Those of us who have been through one Great Choice will no doubt have to face another. So, sleep and rest well. You will need all the energy you have.”

  The stranger let go of my hand and slowly, the figures began to fade from my view. When the last one was gone, I fell backward into nothingness until I landed in that same landscape of massacred bodies again.

  The dream played out, same as it always did, but this time when I jolted awake, I knew what I had to do.

  So, now I am declaring this to you, my friend. I will dissect this vibrational theory and find a way to identify the different dimensions. I will find Andi and reunite us. And for the sake of every human, sierr, krelach, kodadt, nesr-roona, and moorarie, I will save my reality from the approaching Great Choice.

  Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some theories to form.

  Newly awakened,

  Jyra

  Daans 15th, 4712

  I…

  I have a troubling theory.

  One of the strangers is not who they seem.

  I know. I just met them. They’re supposed to be my friend, my allies in a thick soup of dimensions that were all swirling toward their demise.

  But one of them wasn’t. Or perhaps there was someone who knew of us and wanted to stop us at any cost.

  How do I know this?

  Things have happened, diary.

  Terrible, terrible things.

  I continued working for several days after my great revelation. I knew that if I wanted to eventually have the facilities to be able to conduct the proper experimentation needed to dismantle this multi-universe conundrum, I would have to put in the time and climb up the science ladder.

  So, if that meant grunt work for years, I would do grunt work for years. I was unstoppable.

  In fact, I was doing grunt work when I felt a strange shift. I can’t really explain it, beyond the hair at the back of my neck standing on end, and the urgent feeling that something was wrong.

  I stood, figuring perhaps that I still had vestiges of the collective dream conscious in my mind, and I just needed some fresh air. My new krelach friend asked if – since I was already up – I wanted to get some stim-juice with her as she went on a snack run for the head scientists.

  We both headed out, but we never made it to the door.

  One moment, everything was normal. The next, the entire world rocked, and we were flung out into the hallway, heat singeing our forms.

  It was hard to comprehend what was happening as stimuli after stimuli assaulted my body. I felt myself start to get overwhelmed, but I forced it down to evaluate my surroundings.

  There was fire. Fire everywhere.

  And large chunks of scrap peppered the walls all around me. Struggling to my feet, I tried to
put together what had happened. It was hard to concentrate with the screaming and the sirens wailing.

  Sirens.

  I knew that particular whine. I remembered it from my training videos. There was a breach in the hull. We were compromised. According to protocol, our wing was going to be sealed in five minutes after the initial siren to save the rest of the station.

  We had to get out.

  I reached down for my new friend, and she groaned very unceremoniously. I didn’t have time for empathy, however, and hauled her to her feet.

  “We have to go!”

  She managed to stumble along with me, and we limped along past the sealing hatch. I dropped her to the floor, then turned right back around to head to the lab.

  “Where are you going? Jyra! It’s dangerous! Are you crazy?”

  But I didn’t listen. I forged back down the hall. Toward the flames, toward the smell of chemicals, melting plastic, and blood. It hurt, but I didn’t care. I forced myself into the room, squinting against the smoke.

  “Hello!” I called. Such a silly thing to say. But I had never been taught the appropriate greeting for when one was looking for possible survivors after an explosion.

  An explosion…

  Our lab had exploded.

  But why? We hadn’t been working with anything particularly volatile. It didn’t compute.

  I was pulled from my speculation by a nearby whimper. Kicking over some rubble, I saw a particularly small nesr-roona, badly burned and barely conscious.

  I wasn’t very gentle when I picked them up, but I figured they would appreciate my expediency given the current situation. Once more, I headed out the shattered doorway and down the hall to safety.

  I deposited the intern right next to my first rescue and turned back once more. I hadn’t been keeping track of time, but there had to be at least a couple minutes left. I could save one more person.

  A hand gripped me, halting me in my tracks. I brushed it away, expecting the three furry digits of a krelach, but instead, I felt smooth, human flesh. Turning, I saw brilliant red hair and defiant eyes, matched by a strongly set jaw.

  “Don’t go.” Her voice was low with a bit of a rasp, but that was all I needed to identify her.

  Andi.

  It was Andi!

  She was older, sure, and her childhood chubbiness seemed to have melded into a sort of warrior-like build, but it was my best friend; there was no doubt.

  “You have to stay safe, okay?”

  I nodded, and felt my body start to return behind the hatch, but then another hand gripped me, pulling be back to the lab.

  When I turned, I didn’t see a face. Instead, I saw a swirling mass of blackness. Violence and destruction personified in a humanoid form.

  “You can do it, Gee-Gee! You can save another.”

  Shock beat out my inquisitive nature for once, and I jerked back. Andi wrapped her arms around me protectively, and I felt more at home there than I had in years.

  “What are you?” my once-imaginary friend snapped.

  “What do you mean, what are we?” The form seemed to shift upon itself in its confusion, growing and spreading out until it was looming over us. “You can see through our shell. Interesting. You two must have been born closer to the brink.” Now it practically took up the whole hall, undulating and pulsating with its miasmic, dark aura. “It is no matter. We will not stop. We will grow. Your warnings will not stop us. Your choices will not stop us. We are coming. We’re already in your little group.”

  With that, the sirens kicked up several more octaves. Rather dramatic timing, actually. But the back of my mind that was paying attention to the situation recognized it as the half-minute warning.

  “Come on, Andi. We have to go!”

  “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

  She unwound her arms from around me to grab my hand, and we bolted to the other side of the hatch as it slowly slid down from the ceiling. I tried not to think of all the lives that were being sealed off on the other side as we dove under the partition.

  When it finally closed, there was silence for a moment. The sirens cut off. The continuous, small explosions were muffled by the hundreds of layers of titanium. The three of us breathed in slowly, and I realized that Andi was no longer there.

  And then a screeching sound ripped through the air so loudly we could feel it in our bones. It didn’t take an immense amount of knowledge to know that the sound was one of the walls buckling and the contents of the lab were being sucked into space.

  According to protocol, there should already be rescue crews outside, ready to pick up bodies as quickly as possible, but why weren’t there any inside? I should have been surrounded by security and med staff at this point.

  It took three more minutes before rescue crews came around the corner, and soon the three of us were devoured by a flurry of activity. As we were put on hover stretchers, I couldn’t help but let my thoughts return to that strange mass that had tried to get me to go back.

  It had wanted me to die.

  I had never encountered something that want me to die.

  Yet, there was no doubt that if I had returned to the lab, I would not have made it back to the door. And if it weren’t for Andi, I might have gone.

  I’m in the medical wing now. It’s been several hours, but I am still shaken. I fear my new path has inscribed a target on my back that I am not yet sure the repercussions of. However, as my mother used to say, you can tell you’re going in the right direction if your enemies are growing stronger.

  I am more determined than ever to find Andi and the secret of these vibrational dimensions. I just hope I survive long enough to do so.

  Because today, ten people did not.

  It is not fair, and I am having difficulty adjusting to the fact that I am alive and they are not. I know the others are struggling as well. I have heard that they were able to save four from space who are now in more critical care, but the rest were lost. I don’t want to forget them. I can’t forget them. I have a responsibility to these souls now.

  I will list them here, not as a memorial, but as a constant reminder of how I cannot give up.

  Please believe in me, diary. Because I fear I will not be enough.

  But I must be.

  Determined but terrified,

  Jyra

  IN MEMORIUM

  Ma’Shalleri Ogat

  Moorarie Research Associate. Always painted her twenty fingernails different colors.

  Hud Gog

  Kodadt Research Technician. Had grey, shaggy fur with beautiful ash dappling.

  Xienna Myvis

  Sierr Intern. Excellent with calculating gravitational influx computations

  Genna De’Angelo

  Human Lead Researcher. Very quiet. I liked her.

  David James

  Human Lead Research. He always joked that he had two human first names.

  K’vrrk

  Nesr-roona Research Assistant. Definitely drank too much coffee and stim-juice.

  Mashar Vimilla

  Krelach Research Engineer. She could pretty much fix anything, and was known for her fun pranks.

  Zak Didg

  Kodadt Research Technician. Didn’t say much. I liked him.

  Mariella Fernandez

  Human Intern. She liked to sing while she measured portions. Distracting, but very pleasant.

  Krivik Mik’v

  Krelach Lead Researcher. One of the most mathematically gifted people I have ever met.

  These are the people that were lost. I will not allow there to be any more.

  Part Three

  Mabden 05, 4715

  It’s happening. The day is finally here.

  After years of proving myself, years of putting in the grunt work as an intern, hundreds of thousands of hours assisting theories I knew would eventually be false, endless computation after computation, and always keeping my eye out for the malevolent, inky darkness that had been revealed to me, I’ve finally been gra
nted my own research branch for my experimentation.

  I cannot tell you how long I have petitioned for this great opportunity. I mean, you know, because I have been documenting it along my entire journey, but you understand the sentiment. I am that much closer to finding Andi, and I can feel the possibilities thrumming through me like the very vibrations of my universe.

  The dreams are getting stronger again, and more often. The Strangers and I are ever watchful of each other, as there is no way to tell if that creature that spoke to me those three years ago was telling the truth or trying to scare me. And although they are certainly not strangers to me any longer, we found we liked the name as a whole of what to call ourselves. After all, we were technically strangers to each other’s universes.

  But anyway, the increasing frequency of the violent vision leads me to believe that the Great Choice will be here in the next few years. If you had told me when I was a child that the fate of the entire fabric of our reality would depend on my scientific accomplishment, well I probably would have believed you. I had a very inflated view of my intellectual prowess when I was younger. Now that I had been chasing a way to dissect alternate dimensions for a couple years with an unknown homicidal force after me, I’m aware that I actually know almost nothing.

  Is it a coincidence that this great event is happening just a few days away from my twenty-third birthday? I think not. I think it’s fate.

  I know, I know. When did I stray so far from the scientific path to begin trusting fate, destiny, and gut feelings? I’m not sure when the transition happened. But I think I might be better for it. As much as I would like the world to follow only logic, predictable patterns, zeros and ones, the truth was that the galaxy around me was a wild haze of emotions, dreams, and unrealized potential. I would have to be a little unorthodox if I wanted to crack it open like an egg.