Мир Скользящих

What if Arturo survived the events of Exodus!

Chapter 1: Restless

Being shot hurts.

Waking up from dying hurts even more so.

My memory was blurry. I felt like I had a hangover, and I could not think straight. I started to remember how I was dying of a terminal illness, and a 'mystic' had supposedly cured me of my ills. He didn't. He managed to stop the pain for a while, but not by much. It still lingered inside me. And then I remember taking a bullet that would have killed Quinn hadn't I jumped in front of it. After that, exertion and delirium and the pain from the wound took over, and then I just saw blackness.

I woke up in a white room. I was barely able to tell that I was awake. I felt like I was just waking up from some long overdue sleep, and any sense of feeling I had was weakly making itself known. I could not see anything, something I have experienced before and bitterly loathed. I barely smell the sterility of the place. At least my senses were returning, although I could not feel my own body. I could smell the disinfectant in the air. I concluded that I was in a hospital of some kind. My body started to pick itself up; I could feel the coolness in the air. This was a bad thing, because then I suddenly wanted to scream, the pain in my heart and my brain kicked in with a vengeance, but I couldn't. My body would not let me. Then my hearing started to return.

"He's awake."

"Finally. He must sleep like a bear."

"Remember who he is."

I tried to turn my head, but the paralysis hadn't left me yet. I felt a small prick in my forearm.

"I am not dead." I managed to slur the words out. It sounds ludicrous, but it was all I could say.

And the reply I got before I passed out was "Far from it."

I woke up again, but this time it did not feel as bad as before. In fact, it felt good. I was instantly awake, nothing trying to make me want to stay in bed for another hour or so. Then my instincts took over. My hand flew to my heart. I prodded there for a few seconds, not wanting, or daring to want to look there. And finally I did.

No bullet wound. Not even a scar.

Then my brain registered the fact that I was wearing a hospital gown. Strange how it might sound, it felt tailor-made.

I took a good look around. Human built hospital, very advanced from what I could tell. A hard bed that doctors seem to have great pleasure inflicting on their patients. No IV's around. One door. I would be leaving that for now. No obvious security cameras. There would still be some around however. Being shunted across parallel dimensions for three years had left me paranoid in my old age. And a mirror…

I walked up to it. And examined myself in detail. Still the wrinkles. The beard that I had not had a chance to properly maintain for what seemed like years. My hair had been cleaned thoroughly. I was worthy of presenting myself to the Queen of England, obviously without the hospital gown however. I thought I might even look a few years younger than I was. No scar tissue, no evidence at all that I had been shot. Incredible. I felt invigorated. That was the word. Now to find the others…

Maybe they had found a way of sliding us all off before the window, and I had just passed out from shock. That sounded like the most logical solution. I walked up to the door, and peered through the tiny window.

No one there.

I looked around again, to see if any of my belongings, or even a spare set of clothes were nearby. No such luck. I tried the doorknob. Unlocked. As unwilling as I would normally be to walking around a public building in just my nightwear, the nurses obviously were unaware I was awake. So I opened the door.

The corridor I stepped into was immaculate. A sunny yellow colour had been painted everywhere along the wall. Everything was neat and tidy, ordered. No doctors or nurses were rushing about saving lives. Then I heard a very familiar voice.

"Ah, you're finally awake."

Belonging to myself…

I was standing in front of my double. This one was wearing doctor's robes, over a fine suit and his hair was cut short, like mine from before. Other than that… Well, he was my double.

"Max Arturo, I presume?" He thrust his hand in front of me, which I gracefully accepted.

"Yes. And you are?"

"Maxwell Arturo." Ah. Slightly different birth-name.

"Actually, It is Maxamillian Arturo."

"Mother chose the name?"

"I really do not know."

"Ah well, at least there is a slight difference between us. And I take it you have a great many questions to ask me."

"I would like to start with if I could get some proper clothes actually…"Chapter 2: A Few Truths

My host had obviously second-guessed me, as he led me into a nearby guestroom. It was spartious enough, about the size of a typical hotel room, and had the usual creature comforts. He indicated to me a small buzzer, and told me he would wait to explain things if I wanted to. An hour would have sufficed me however, and he said he'd get some food made up in advance while I readied myself. A brief inspection revealed a cabinet full of clothes, ranging from business suits to more casual attire. A shower was in order first though, and then I put on a rather expensive Armani. It felt good. Another look around revealed my belongings in a desk drawer. At least the ones that I had taken with me before I got taken in Quinn's little jaunt around the universe. My watch was there. My wedding-ring was there (which I quickly placed in it's rightful position), and so was a photograph.

Wade had insisted that we had a group photograph taken on a paradise world. The same one where I had the joy of being her slave for a week. All four of us. I stared at the photograph for a long time, and remembered how these three people had become a family to me. I wondered where they were. Probably running away from Kromaggs or averting another apocalypse to the universe. I decided not to dwell on the fact, and walked outside.

Maxwell was waiting for me, and casually looked me over.

'Good fit?'

'I have to ask. Who is your tailor?'

We chuckled at the joke, and he led me to his office. The door had a number of honorifics underneath his name; a quick glance revealed that he was an expert on the human anatomy and a superb doctor, but the office itself was possibly even more impressive. An ocean view was in front of me, washing onto a beautiful beech. I could see a few people working on computers, or just relaxing in the sun. My host poured himself a drink as I admired the view, and was busy getting another glass for myself.

'It's a beautiful view'.

'One of the privileges of being the head of this department. Whiskey? Temporally manipulated to 800 years.'

'8000 years old whiskey? I'd need to see the barrel.'

I graciously took the whiskey and a seat, and Maxwell turned on the computer that was sitting on his desk. While it warmed itself up, I had a brief look around the office. A simple desk with paperwork, no photographs. A drinks cabinet with a variety of beverages. It appeared that Maxwell was also the welcoming committee, and the fact that he was my double was coincidence. A bizarre one at that, but a coincidence none the same.

Maxwell tapped into the computer while I took a sip of the whiskey, and turned around the monitor so that we could both see it. The image changed from that God-accursed Windows to a video-clip.

'That is me, isn't it?"

I tapped at the body on the screen.

"Yes."

"And those?"

I pointed at two black machines that were milling around the area. They were some sort of robots, more advanced than any I had ever seen. They looked as if they belonged in a science-fiction show.

"Scout-Bots. We send them into parallel dimensions before we risk sending anybody else. Just in case the world is uninhabitable. They were there to investigate the radiation that was building up in the surrounding atmosphere. That's when they found you."

I couldn't believe I was watching this. It was morbid, seeing my own body like that.

"You knew about the pulsar?"

"One of the people in the Cosmology department detected it from our hyperspace-rigs."

"Hyperspace-rig?"

"I'll explain in a second. See that Bot?" He pointed at the one closest to me. It brought out what could only be a tentacle, and shot out a hypodermic needle, that it proceeded to stab into my heart.

"That was, unsettling." I downed the whiskey, and Maxwell poured me a refill.

"Unfortunately necessary as well. Direct nano-bot feeding was needed. You would have been completely brain-dead had we arrived later." Maxwell turned off the computer. "I don't believe you would want to see field surgery."

I was listening to his words, and then I caught what he had fully said. "How, dead was I?"

"Two minutes."

"I was actually dead?"

"Yes. By luck, that droid was also fitted with our new medical technology. Given enough time, our nano-tech robots can repair practically any damage to the human body. But with you we had a problem."

"And that was?"

He stared at me for a moment. "You were suffering from a terminal bout of brain cancer. You didn't know?"

And of course that mystic had cured my cancer by performing 'surgery' in my gut! Heal myself? Preposterous.

"I knew of it, but I had reason to think that I may have been cured of it."

"Well, you were not. That complicated matters. You are cured of cancer, you are alive…"

"And have no scaring."

"Exactly. But there was a little side-effect."

"And that was?"

Maxwell pinched the bridge of his nose. "We had to keep you in cryogenic suspension for the duration. At the time, our nano-tech was effective, but slow. We had to cure the immediate problem, and then freeze you to stop anything else happening. So, we cured the wound and revived you. But the cancer was at this point in operable. Open surgery would have caused more damage. So again, we used the nanites to destroy the cancer from the inside. But we had to keep you frozen for quite some time."

I paused for a few seconds. If I had been sipping on the whiskey, I would have done a spit-take. Yes, I believe that's what it is called.

"How long?"

"About four years. It's now the 2nd of March, 2001."

Deep breath. VERY deep breath. Do NOT loose control. This man is responsible for saving your life. DO NOT EXPLODE AT HIM!

"So, no millennial apocalypse's at all?"

"Not really, no."

"Very good. Is there any more whiskey?"

Authors Notes

Okay, this took longer than I planned to write, and it is pretty short. But I've been developing this idea for a little while, and I've got some rather nasty ideas that means I can drag out the plot for a while, and make up quite a few chapters. What can I say, I loved Sliders when I actually got the chance to watch it. After some checking, I realised that I've only seen 16 episodes. Thank you BBC for TOTALLY SCREWING UP THE SHEDULE! INCOMPETENT YAHOOS! AAARGH! WANT SLIDERS BOXED SETS! DON'T JUST WANT PILOT AND A FEW EPISODES! WANT THEM ALL!

Sorry about the little rant. About doing this Sliders fic…

I wanted to focus on Arturo for a change. Hey, he's one of my favourite characters in ANY program, and in most of the fan-fics I've read, he is criminally under-used. Sliders is foremost about CHARACTER INTERACTION, and so, since this is what I like the most, I decided to write about this. Also, I never saw the Exodus episode. From what I've heard, I'm dreading it (and not just about killing Arturo off), and even though there are plenty of fics out there that have Arturo back in it, they tend to use the common dues-ex's.
Exodus never happened. Continues from Exodus. Has characters I've never seen, so can't reference anything. That Post Tramatic Slide Syndrome Arturo double thing (never saw the episode, but sounds like fun. Sorry, I'm not buying the theory though, since I can't believe that the others wouldn't notice the difference.) It's another double, who just happens to want to slide about the universe aimlessly.

Fair enough, it's a valid, plausable way to bring 'him' back, but when it is done, it is just a case of…

Quinn: Professor!

Arturo: Mr Mallory!

Quinn: You're meant to be dead!

Arturo: You took my double with you in that PTSS episode that everybody likes and uses as a reference to bring me back into their fan-fiction stories. Blistering idiot.

Quinn: Okay. Wanna get lost in the universe again?

Arturo: Okay dokey.

Right… Sorry, I'm being a pedantic goit but I wanted to do something different. Also, some people will probably ask me why I'm setting it modern day.

Little teaser thing.

Everything from the show happened. This is a continuation of the show.

Next time, Arturo learns more about the applied physics of controlled sliding. So I have to come up with a plausable science, as well as set up how to explain sliding, and stuff like coordinates. Coordinates for a reference which is infinate… Give me a few months.

Hopefully too much later.

Give me feedback. Remember, feedback helps make me improve. So if you enjoyed this story, or even if you didn't, let me know.Maxwell poured me another shot, and I let myself digest the information I had been given

Maxwell poured me another shot, and I let myself digest the information I had been given. I had been 'technically dead' for at least five years, and had supposedly been rescued by people yet unknown who possessed technology far greater than my home dimension. Maxwell was patiently staring at me while I downed the shot, and then he poured me another one.

"No questions so far?"

"Oh, quite a few. I'm just unsure where to start, that's all."

Maxwell poured himself some more whiskey and took a sip. Then I came up with a good question.

"You mentioned I was alone. No-body else was around, no?"

"No. You were the only person left. We found some quantum signatures, to suggest that there had been some sliding occurring recently, but nothing major. Just as well really. The pulsar that was going to hit the planet was far more potent than it should have been."

"How so?"

"It destroyed the entire planet."

If I hadn't been drinking the whisky just then, I would have done a spit-take. And yes, I'm not too old not to know what one is.

"A pulsar destroyed an entire planet?"

"Yes. There is a nice little asteroid belt now in that dimension where Earth used to be."

"A pulsar destroyed an entire planet?"

"Yes. The cosmology division is still trying to figure that one out. If there was some divine force that wished to wipe the human race of the face of the planet, then they have a mighty sense of over-kill."

"Any idea of any survivors?"

"No way to do a trace. The radiation is too great now. We could barely discover that there had been sliding in the area. You had companions I take it?"

I nodded my head, and Maxwell silently took that in.

"Most sliders are survivors. You survived. I am sure that they must have as well."

Maxwell then spent some time trying to distract me from thinking about the others. The Consortium, the group that he was a member of, was a 'think-tank', a group of experts in many different fields. However, to differentiate themselves from a research team such as NASA, the Consortium took in all fields of experts, from across many dimensions, and used their resources to collaborate and expand on their own knowledge. He told me how he himself had been rescued from a world where mutated diseases were rampant due to meddling in genetic engineering and biological warfare, and his collaboration with a nano-technology expert had resulted in an eventual end to disease on his world. He mentioned a little more about the group, but I was too preoccupied with the welfare of my companions to focus clearly. After the induction, I came up with another question.

"What exactly, if you don't mind me asking, did you do to me?" I was unsure if it was a question I could ask Maxwell, due to any scientific ethics that he had to honour, or for myself; I had seen some of the 'field surgery' that had been performed on me, and that brief image I saw of myself being operated on was morbid and gruesome enough, but he was eager to 'spill the beans' as it was.

"In fact, the technology is my pet project. To put it simply, the reason you are alive is that your body's regenerative and immune system has been, augmented." He stumbled a little with his wording there, as he tried to tactfully put any discomfort that I may have had at bay. "Due to the seriousness of your cancer, and a few other injuries that you had somehow sustained, it was imperative that we try to 'patch you up' as well as we could, as well as simultaneously restarting your body as well."

He had another sip as he continued. "You had suffered a lot of damage that would have eventually have killed you, but the immediate threat was the bullet. Removing that was the task of the exploration robots. One of which had been installed with a medical kit, some healing drugs, and our new nanotechnology. I took over the nano-tech research when our other expert decided to leave us, and had been tinkering with it for a while. So I had managed to develop a technology that would effectively allow someone to get up and do whatever he or she were doing at the time. A child who fell off his bicycle and damaged, or even hurt his knee, could be up riding his bicycle within an hour or so of the treatment."

"An hour!" I felt at that I had to butt into the conversation. "That is incredible!"

"The wonders of technology. Anyway, when we discovered you, you had already been dead for a few seconds. We managed to revive you to a point so that you would not suffer brain-death, and then put you into cryogenic suspension for a few years while the nano-technology does it's work. Unfortunately, the technology was only designed to work with one problem at a time, so as you had so many different ailments, one part of yourself was treated. That is why it took so long."

"Five years however. And you say you can completely heal a broken limb in an hour?" I felt like I was a student again.

"Cancers are usually treated over a long course of treatment. We also had to effectively reconstruct your heart as well, due to the trauma it had suffered. There is also your age, your health. There are so many factors which all added up. Still, I do have to ask you something."

"Yes?"

"How do you feel?"

"I feel like I'm a teenager again. A teenage Olympic athlete."

"Another little side-effect. You will fell good, a lot healthier than you have felt. I do not believe you will have any problems with arthritis, or cholesterol, or any of the joyous signs of aging for many years now. You are possibly stronger and have more stamina than you had before as well. Tests will have to be done of course, but it is distinct possibility."

The marvel of being alive again hit me. It was true, I felt young again. Healthier than I had been in years. I would not have been surprised if I had managed to out-drink any rugby player in England with how my body now felt. Still, there was the niggling feeling in the back of my head that something was not quite right.

"I should be honest with you, we still have many tests to perform. We have to keep the nano-technology inside you, otherwise there is always the risk of the cancer you have developing all over again, and I would warn over trying to drink rugby players underneath the table."

I was sure he could somehow sense my mind shout "DAMN!" at that.

"And you are also our first patient. Obviously, we wish to ask you some questions, but that can wait. Are you hungry?"

"As long as I don't have to eat hospital food."

The next week was full of questions, just as Maxwell had promised. I also met some of the other staff. Some I recognised, or at least their doubles, most I did not know. I had the joy of recounting my sliding experiences to a psychologist, who seemed mostly interested in certain worlds than I would have thought healthy, but I decided to play along. After all, I was being the gracious guest here, and I did owe these people my life. It worried me however, why I was chosen to have this revolutionary treatment. The coincidence of research into the pulsar that had destroyed the last Earth I was on was at least a plausible excuse, but it did not explain why any of the countless other worlds dead were not used for the research. I decided to dismiss any thoughts into that however, and counted myself lucky to be alive.

It was a Monday when I next met Maxwell over a game of chess. It was something we occasionally did; it was a worthwhile escape from research, and we were both good enough to give each other a challenge, or at least drag the game out longer than it should have.

"I've noted you have been exploring."

That was true. The library that they had was gigantic, and most of the space was used to hold the computers that stored the information they had. Nothing was closed. Books were divided into either author, topic, or world of origin.

"The library is marvellous here." This was a casual talk. I took one of his pawns and moved it too the side.

"You like it here then?" He took one of my knights in retaliation, and looked to be wining the forth game as well as all the others we had played.

"It is a scientists dream. No problem with research grants. Unlimited resources. Anybody would give their right arm to work here."

"Would you consider staying?"

It was something that had crossed my mind. The problem however was that their cosmology and physics bodies were already bustling at the seems. Another Maxamillian Arturo in physics would not seem out of place there, but I did not believe I work alongside five of my own doubles for the rest of my life. I put the fear of God into most of my students; I had no doubt that six or seven of us together would drive each of us insane. And sliding had reawakened an adventurous spirit in me that I had not felt in years. But where else could I go?

"It's not as if I could go anywhere else." I tried to appear as nonchalant as possible.

"We could get you home."

That made me drop my queen as I had started to move it to check his king.

I had wondered why the only part of the library I couldn't access was their sliding research. This was probably why. Try to temp me to stay with them, or bait me with something else.

"What's the catch? There's always one. I want to know what it is."

"No catch. Ideally, we would want you to stay, but the knowledge we have been given by you is wonderful. We have proof that the nano-technology works. And we have a log of over a hundred worlds. But I am not the expert on sliding. You should talk to her to get the information you need." The intercourse was carried over a few moves on both sides. Mutual defences and attacks. I had never met the sliding researcher at the complex; she apparently had been constantly 'held up' for some reason or another, but the possibility of being able to go home was too good to give up. I still had a life there, or at least I could salvage it, so I was anxious to return.

"When could we go?"

Maxwell gulped down the rest of his coffee and checked my king. "Why not right now?"

Author's Notes

Sorry this took longer than expected, but stuff has been happening so bleh. The next chapter should be finished by next week.Maxwell and I left his office, and got onto a bullet train that led deep underneath the compound, where all the more dangerous technological research was kept. Soon, we emerged into a long corridor. Maxwell briefly gave me instructions on where to go, and turned back into the car.

"Why are you disappearing?"

Maxwell thoughtfully looked at me. I could notice he was trying to stare into me and try to identify with me beyond the fact that physically we were identical. That we had both shared and lost something.

"I think when you see, you will know why." At that the door closed and the car raced off. I contemplated that for a moment. Maxwell revealed he had only met a double of Mr Mallory once, and no duplicate Ms Welles or Mr Brown, so it couldn't have been any of my companions. I started walking down the corridor, until I reached my destination.

The door was unusual. Unusual for the compound anyway, as it was made of solid oak in contrast to the usual high-tech metal doors that adorned the place. I knocked on the door, and after a shout of "Come in," I opened the door.

After the door, the technology was obviously Consortium. Imbecilely clean and sterile surfaces that carried human comfort with them. Tools that were possibly at least a few years old looking brand new. This room was also a shock in itself, not only due to its vast size, but it's contents.

It was virtually barren for the size of the place..

Along one side, far to my left, was a gigantic silver ring adorned with what looked like quartz, and leading up to it a padded ramp, at once solid and ready to cushion any fall. A generator was hooked up to one end, with a control panel next to it. Looking about I took in the size of the room. It was a least as long as one block, but seemed nearly barren of anything. Up above me I saw what looked like metallic spiders. These same robots I recognised as the machines that had saved me from death, although these one's were all damaged in one capacity or another. Along to the other end was a desk, with a computer and a bundle of papers adorned all over the place that just barely concealed another robot that was being repaired. I could just see someone underneath the pile, and I softly walked up to the pile. Then I realised why Maxwell felt uncomfortable about the place. The women who looked up at me was Katrina Fox, or at least her double. My late wife, and I supposed also Maxwell's. She glanced up at me and smiled.

"I wondered when you would wake up."

I recognised her now. She had been there when I had first revived. And I started to feel the anxiousness of meeting her again. I had met one of her doubles previously, when my double had foolishly left her and I tried to patch things up again. It possibly did not work, but it had in a way allowed me to say goodbye to her, something that I never got the chance to. Saying hello to her again was not so easy.

"I'm a deep sleeper. Or so I'm told. I didn't snore, did I?" I tried the joke to mellow the mood, at least for my sake. But she smiled at that.

"Perfect gentleman. No snoring. So, you are our errant slider then? I would think that you lot would learn by now."

"A Quinn Mallory is to blame, not I."

"You didn't create sliding on your world? Unusual." She somehow grabbed a chair and handed it to me while I made myself comfortable.

"How so?"

"It's mostly doubles of yourself who do the deed. Mallory's are a close second though."

"You do polls?"

"Polls on many different situations. Who the president is, who discovered electricity. It seems as if sliding is just complex chaos mathematics. If we can find a pattern to how different universes diverge, then we can possibly discover how the universe was created as it were."

I digested that nugget of information. I was not sure if it was true or not, but it was a possibly valid point. "So who runs third?"

"You probably never heard of them before. Bennish?"

I nearly had a heart attack at that. "Yes, I have heard of them."

Some light chatting followed. She had obviously guessed that I had known my double, since she was his wife until he had died. Seemingly the more things change, the more they stay the same, even across parallel worlds. It was good to meet her again, even if it wasn't the Katrina I knew. She explained how she was the only remaining slider, after all of the other members of the team had died. Worlds seemingly more dangerous than any of the others I had been on existed, and she had seen a lot of them. Although their understanding of sliding was greater than my own, it was still not an exact science, and there had not been a great call to expand on it. What they had started however was to form a dimensional map of the universe, and one of the worlds that they had previously visited shared a quantum signature with myself. A quantum signature basically is unique to any particular universe, or anybody who originated there, and so by mapping their records and my signature, they had found my Earth Prime. The theory of infinite universes had apparently been made defunct, because otherwise to find one infinite number to match another would have been impossible, as well as removing the question of free will. After all, if every possible choice was reflected on in another dimension, where would we all stand? Our lives would really have no meaning, but I was not about to let that spoil the possibility of my return. But there was the question of whether I wanted to truly go home. The office I would be offered would be to further the Consortium's understanding of sliding, something that they had lacking due to either unscrupulous sliders, deaths of their own teams who were unprepared for what they ended up against, or Kromaggss. They were not a problem here, due to some form of shielding, but still they were a threat. So I had to balance whether I would go home or not. Katrina obviously wanted me to stay. She didn't show any of the awkwardness that I was suffering, and so was trying the hard sell as it were.

"So you have no family. No real job prospects, after being away eight-odd years. What have you got to go back for?"

That made me think. All the others had family. I didn't have a wife anymore; no one I had that level of attachment to. My work had kept me going after her death. So in all honesty I could have easily stayed in any world we had landed on. But I still had wanted to go back. Home is home after all, and I did miss my old life.

Katrina seemed to understand what I meant, although she was obviously disappointed. She didn't leak any suspicions of any ulterior motives in any case. And so she took me for the grand tour.

The gigantic ring was known as a 'Slide-gate', a permanent and stable wormhole creator. A great deal more reliable than any timer, it could be programmed for any of the worlds on their map, or a random one, and could recall anybody with the appropriate tether device. Mr Mallory, if he was still alive, would have never had left this place. And I was welcome to return here whenever I decided to formally retire. So I after a week of farewells, I packed my meagre belongings, took a tether that was secured to my fob watch, and slid.

The journey was longer than usual, but more comfortable than most. And I didn't run the risk of Mr Brown slamming into my back at the end. The sight I saw was more discomforting than any physical pain would have been when I emerged to Earth Prime. San Francisco laid out in front of me. I was standing in what had used to be a park.

It was now a battlefield. Trampled, decaying corpses covered the ground as far as the eye could see. I retched and managed to stumble to a fountain as I empted the contents of my stomach some more.

That had been a mistake. The fountain was filled with long congealed blood, and contained other bodies.

Small bodies. Small enough to be children.

I tried to see where there was a space away from the bodies, but the nearest I could see was a rough path that would have been formed by what must have been a tank of some kind. Mercifully there were no bodies on the road, and so I walked further into the city.

It would have been a different sight to grasp. Myself, a middle-aged, and I admit, overweight Englishman in an Armani suit walking through a garden of corpses. Mercifully the mess dissipated into the city. Buildings were still intact; only a few had been burned or scorched. Shops had glass smashed into the inside of the building; obviously raiders. I was temped to use the tether to return to the Consortium, but one problem that it had was that there was a window of opportunity to return. Mercifully it was not nearly as bad as a wait of thirty years if I had missed it, but it would take a day or so before I could return. And I wanted to find out what had happened in any case. So I plodded on.

If anything could be figured out from the destruction, it was this. Whoever the invaders were, they were scared by cutting-edge technology and learning. Most bookshops had been burned down. The same with the libraries. I managed to finally get to my old office at the university, to find it ransacked. The same with the lecture halls, the research facilities, everything. I decided to investigate Mr Mallory's home, and noticed that the whole building had been destroyed. The only part that was still vaguely intact was the gate, that squeaked as I turned and walked off. So I decided to try my home.

There had been some fire damage to the kitchen, but other than that, the house seemed fine, and so I unlocked the door and entered. There was a lingering smell of damp, so I surmised that my home survived being razed to the ground by a brief monsoon. I thought if it was worth trying to sit on my favourite chair, and eventually decided to risk it. Still as good as ever. I sat down for a few minutes and pondered. There had been no obvious sign of life. No animals apart from maggots and flies. No way to discover what had triggered whatever had happened. I wondered if I was the only human here. There was still plenty of daylight about, so I decided to secure the house for the night. I would stay, collect any of my belongings, do a little more exploring, and return to the Consortium, if only to ponder my next move somewhere I would feel safe.

It was my own home, just as I remembered it. I collected any valuables that remained, mostly loose money and heirlooms. It was a relief to see that even though none of my notes or books were still there, they hadn't been destroyed on the spot as all the others had been, so there was the possibility of rescuing them, however slight. All of my old photographs had been taken as well, but I ignored that and decided to start my reinforcement in the kitchen. Although the fire had been enough to burn away a gap in the wall, the structure was still secure, so I could barricade it with a wardrobe if I moved it down from the bedroom.

Removing the clothes would help, but originally I needed the help of two strong removal men to help me move it up the stairs. If it came down to it, I would break the back off it and nail it into place. I was surprised however when I found I could move it on my own. I had tried to move it before, and all I got for it was a nasty back strain. I nearly dropped it when I realised I had carried it as far as I had. The stairs were a problem, but I managed to slide it down the stairs and into place. I had been told that the nano-technology cure had 'enhanced' me, and there would be 'side-effects', but nothing like this. I wanted to know exactly what else I could do. Unfortunately, while up the stair, I had failed to hear the intruder enter through the hole I was about to cover, and so I was knocked unconscious with my own frying pan.

Nano-technology or no, my head still throbbed when I woke up. Pain-nullification was not part of my extra features apparently. The pain soon disappeared however, along with the usual disorientation when waking up. I was underground, in some disused basement that had been converted into what looked like a bunk. Not the best kept one, and I rolled off it onto my feet. The door was locked, and had no window on it. I rattled the handle, but only succeeded in ripping it off its hinges. I thought of breaking the door down, but decided against it. I was not entirely sure exactly how strong I was; I doubted that I was superhuman, but I possibly could have done it, hadn't the door opened out from me at that moment. My eyes adjusted to the change of the brightness. It was brighter in the corridor in front of me than the cell was, and standing in front of me was someone covered head to toe in rags and leathers. I could not even tell if the guard was a man or a women. The was that he or she gestured with the makeshift cattle prod however, made me guess his intentions.

I was led down the corridor, along different cordoned off areas. This place possibly was a storeroom at some point. I could see some shelving scattered around the place, plants growing fruit; some makeshift weapons and assorted tools adorned the place. Finally, I was shoved into an office. At least this room kept some semblance of its original purpose, as I could see one desk and two chairs, the one at the far end occupied by someone I could not make out, due to the light being atrocious in this room. The door was locked behind me, and the shadow I could now just see in the other chair turned on the light.

My eyes again blinked as they readjusted to the change of light, and the light got worse as the figure walked closer to me. Standing in front of me was a familiar looking black man in his early forties, with a well-trimmed moustache, who had light glaring off the suit that he wore. It reflected the light around the room; the fabric was some kind of shiny purple material that shone all on its own, and Mr Rembrandt Brown smiled at me. This was not one of his glad-to-be-alive smiles however. He was the Cheshire Cat and I was one cornered mouse.

"Damn. I've not seen you for a long time."Now, imagine this. You have possibly been returned to your home dimension after a seven year sabbatical or so, and during this time you have died and been brought back to life. Now standing in front of me was one of my companions, or at least his double. I was prepared for a great deal of questions, but not the punch that hit me squarely in the jaw. Rembrandt flicked his hand casually, but I knew the blow had caused him some pain. He sighed under his breath and sat down.

"Don't you people ever learn? We are NEVER going to let you back here. But I cannot believe your, wonderful bosses would try to send a plant like this!" He started laughing at his little joke, and I did not know if I was meant to laugh in turn or not. I could not tell if this was the Rembrandt Brown who I knew of, but then I had no real way of knowing otherwise. So, risking further blows to my person I decided to try some conversation.

"Now, at the risk of appearing ignorant, just what are you on about?"

"You should know. You are the plant after all."

"Humour me."

Rembrandt sighed again and prepared to start, but his eyes brightened and I gathered he had had a better idea.

"No. Actually, I want to hear your story first."

So I started my story. From the beginning, when I was verbally ambushed by Quinn's double in my own lecture hall to my death to my resurrection. I tried not to mention too much about the consortium or the 'side-effects' of my treatment, but dropped enough hints to suggest that I had benefactors, and I also mentioned other things that only he would know about, or conversations that we had had without the others being present. He listened thoughtfully to my story, and sighed yet again. He had probably heard plenty of similar stories from these other 'plants' he had encountered.

"So, assuming this is your world as well, and you are the professor that I knew, why are you here?"

"Home is home, is it not? Come on now, I've told you my story, what about your own?"

Rembrandt scowled at that. I gathered that he thought me an impostor, and in his position I could not blame him. But it did not explain his heavy-handedness with me from before, or the state of the streets outside. But, eventually he relented.

Rembrandt told me what had happened to the group after my death. He collaborated that the world I had died on was about to be destroyed by a pulsar, and that they had chased after that man Rickman to get the coordinates for here. Somewhere along the line, they had discovered that Quinn was from another dimension entirely, and had met his brother, only to be merged with him into some gestalt entity, while here the Kromaggs had invaded this world and put it to the torch. Wade had been captured by them at some point and taken away. I nearly was sick as I could imagine what they would had done to her, and I could only hope that she had not suffered long. Rembrandt seemed to guess that would have upset me, so he told how he had managed to return here with a virus that was lethal to Kromaggs and had managed to wipe the majority of them out. It was still in the atmosphere, but non-lethal to normal humans, and Rembrandt had been made a national hero. Unfortunately, it appeared that national was the state of play. The Krommaggs had learned a lesson from the Roman's, and had 'poisoned our well' so to speak. The plague needed time to spread, enough time for them to set off an electromagnetic pulse that shorted out the majority of the technology here. Their method however was similar to the Hiroshima blast. Japan, France, Egypt and a number of other countries had been decimated by nuclear warheads, the resulting EMP blasts causing the devastation. With no way to confirm if the reports were true or not, it was fare to speculate that Earth had become a wasteland. It was a shocking revelation that I had just missed World War III.

"So what weapons do you have?"

"Stuff stolen from old army bases. It's not as if the security systems work there any more."

"I saw the devastation outside. What was that?"

"I figured you'd call it 'poisoning the well'. They knew about the plague, they hadn't managed to develop a cure for it though. I don't know the specifics, but it's nasty. So they just started killing people or sending them through to be slaves. Setting their stuff to blow up. They figured if they couldn't have this world, they would make sure we couldn't either."

"The university?"

"Most of the lecturers, scientists, any egg-heads they could get their hand's on were put into concentration camps then killed. Bookshops and libraries were burned down. You and Q-Ball were on wanted posters everywhere. They figured that since they had seen me and Wade, you two wouldn't be far behind and had just gone into hiding. They're scared most of all of anybody who could replicate the technology, so if you were here to build another timer, or somehow wall them out, they'd be out of business soon enough."

"You still do not believe I am the Maxamillian Arturo you knew, do you?"

He then started to laugh. "You want to know what I think? I'm wondering why I didn't have you killed on sight! Professor Arturo, is, dead. I saw him die right in front of me, and it devastated us! I mean, we got lucky so many times before, but with you dead, it brought it home, you know. I figure, you are a double of his that the Krommies sent here to try to get us to open up. Trojan horse. I figured you'd appreciate the humour in that."

This was starting to annoy me. "And why are you starting to talk like I do?"

"Because I don't get much chance to laugh just now. So you're the joke just now! You're dead! You're not the guy I knew!"

I could feel myself getting more angry at this. "All you are is a Krommie puppet! They send you guys here every once in a while, figure to try the sympathy deal. But they're weak. They believe that they get to go home, or they'll be allowed to live. But it's a lie! And I don't believe that you believe that lie any day of the week! But if you do, you are the biggest fool on this or any other world!"

That was enough. Thankfully, I have had enough experience at shouting at people I could not feel my throat get sore at all. "So you think I'm a fool do you? Well, I thought I could go home, meet some old friends and sleep in my own bed for the first time in seven years! But I come home to find out that the race that probably gave the Nazi's pointers had gotten here first! If the Krommags were so interested in wiping you out, why didn't they just send a nuclear bomb, or another plague through here, instead of me, the so-called plant!"

I took a small breath. "You want to know what I was offered? Do you? I could have been the head researcher of sliding at the consortium! It would be any scientist's dream! But I turned it down so that I could go home. And if you do not believe that I am who I say I am, then fine. Fair enough, there really is no way to prove who I am, but I thought you knew me well enough to know I was I. Welcome to Hell Mr Brown. It may be home, but I sure as hell do not want to live here any more!"

He shot me a glare and started his own retort in a soft but cold voice. " I've been here for nearly two years. I got called the messiah nearly when everyone else figured out I had killed those, things." He looked as if he was about to spit the word out. "And this is hell. I'm expected to help rebuild this place. And I can't. We have no scientists or technicians. No books? We have hardly any equipment. You know what they want to do to me, those people who look to me to make their lives better?"

"What?"

"They want to make me president. Can you believe that? The first black president of the United States. That would feel good."

I had managed to calm down by now. "Better than singing?"

He started crying a little at that. Yes, out of only one eye. "Oh yeah! But I can't do it."

I did not want to see him like this. Even if he did not believe me to be me, I knew who he really was, that he was my friend. "You have led these people for two years, yes?" He nodded. "And how is here now compared to two years ago?"

"Better I guess. You figure I've done alright?"

"From what I have seen? To be honest, I've not seen that much. The park was littered with corpses. I was ill in the fountain, and walking to my home did not help, but I believe that you have done well here."

"You're really you, aren't you?"

"Have you known any other Arturo to bellow like that?"

"Well…"

It looked as if he finally believed me. After another tearful outburst he hugged me and started the grand tour. This base was underneath one of the junior high schools of San Francisco. Rembrant had managed to jury-rig a garden so that fresh food was available, since the majority would have spoiled before he had arrived, as well as a fresh water well. He and the others, mostly teenagers or middle-aged people, had converted some other buildings into gardens, as well as workshops and other little communities. There was even a school there. Rembrandt finally took me to a small kitchen and dished out some food for us both. I believed it was mashed potato. I wanted it to be mashed potato, but decided to give it a try.

"Delicious" I managed to lie.

"It gets better once you get used to it." I could tell he could barely stomach it himself. So to put both our minds at ease I decided to ask some questions.

"If the Krommaggs were so eager to destroy any research, why is my house relatively intact?"

"After we disappeared, the FBI was very eager to find out what had happened to us. They figured we were working for a foreign government. The Russians, the Chinese. The feds got paranoid, and decided to raid Q-Balls place first. Course, he built it and all the research was there, they figured out what it was, assumed we all got caught in it by accident and were dead or whatever. They even roped in that Bennish guy in to help."

"They got Bennish to help develop sliding technology? The last time I worked with him he was going to go into the arms business with nuclear weapons!"

"Oh no, they got him in tight. Bennish was a naughty boy. Growing so many drugs in his apartment."

"Why doesn't that surprise me?"

"Anyway, Bennish got off the hook. Then some company found out about it. They got interested in adapting it. Something about how they could fix it so it would work as anti-gravity. Control the vortex so that it lets you out in the same world, but different place. Heck, even use as a sliding machine and dump toxic waste. And since they couldn't get Q-Ball…"

"They got Mr Bennish."

"Yeah. He managed to con Quinn's Mom into getting all the other research. He wanted to get yours too. But then the Krommaggs hit. But to answer your question, your house got bought out by the bank since you were presumed dead. Some other guy got the deed to it and it was changed to be under his name, so when they tried to find out where you lived, they didn't find any records that you were still out. Not even a last point of address. When the resistance found out you were being looked for, they wiped out any record of you and Quinn ever being alive."

"How did you find this out?"

"Bennish got drunk one night and told some of the other guys and word spread around. People figured he led them here by playing about with the timer, so he got jumped later on and dumped outside their headquarters. Bled to death right there with no-one to help him."

"It's sick you know. Course he would have been hunted down next, but maybe if he'd survived I could do what I was gonna do after killing Krommaggs."

"You want to go after Wade, don't you?"

"Yeah. I know it's so likely she's dead, but I have to know. And I want to spread this plague."

"You realise that it would be suicide."

"You really didn't get a good look, did you? I want to make them pay for this."

"But genocide? It makes us worse than they are."

"I don't care. I want to get out of here. If I got stressed out, I would go for a walk. But I do that and I just see what they did here."

"And the people here?"

"They did fine without me before. They had to deal with them before. I don't need to be here. And it's not just Wade I want to find."

"What do you mean?"

"One of the first slave-ships they took through? Our families. Wade's folks. My cousins. Anybody related to us, they took."

"So you want to find them?"

"If you can build a timer then yeah. But I don't want it to be like it was at the start. I need to be able to control it. And you have to teach everyone here how to use one as well. Just in case we need to evacuate. And I mean pulsar-world evacuate."

I felt his plight, but it was not really one I could condone. His very presence could kill them, and as much as I disliked them myself, I did not kill people. I knew Rembrandt knew me well enough that I would help him build a timer, but I would not kill. Then he pulled out his ace in the hole.

"It was weird though. We got a video image of the group that got taken in the first ship. I recognised some of the people, all split into groups. It's a standard procedure before they are split up again. Our families. Some politicians. Small mercy that I guess. But there was this one guy I didn't recognise. He stayed in my head when I saw him, but I really didn't think much of it. Then I got to your place. I figured since they torched Quinn's house, you might have some notes. Couldn't figure it out though so I left them. But I saw a photo on a table." Rembrandt pulled out the picture. It was taken about ten years ago, and I was smiling at the camera. Beside me was a young man in his late twenties also smiling. He was wearing a graduation gown and holding two certificates. Rembrandt gave me the photograph and I tucked it away. "So, who is he?"

That photograph changed my mind about killing Kromaggs. Yes, I would help Rembrandt build another timer. It would be tested, unlike Mr Mallory's, and it would work as it was meant to. If need be, I would be infected by this virus that Rembrandt carried and go myself.

After a long pause I finally looked up at Rembrandt. "He is my son."
Authors notes

Woo, new year and my next chapter. Sorry if it reads odd, but I ended up shattering my elbow just before new year, so trying to type when one of your arms in covered in plaster and you are that pumped full of painkillers is not exactly the best way to proof-read your own work. But hey. I get to be off work. A mate of mine taped the first season of Sliders when it was on cable new-years day so I've been a happy bunny. So watching them made my mind go click. I sorta know where I want to go with this but watching Sliders again has helped me keep sane. You might think being off work for two months is good, but god its boring. Still, got a chance to work on a novel now…

Also, I'd like to thank those who've read my work. Writing this lets me work my brain and keep my sanity, but also knowing that there are people out there who are not just reading my stuff but like it is enough to keep me going. So thanks.

Finally, does anybody know any good places on the net for how parallel universes work and how they are actually mapped out? I might get round to creating a working model 'multi-universe' but any ideas would be appreciated."And you never spoke about him?"

Rembrandt sat there and glared at me.

"What is there to speak about? Now, if you can show me a laboratory, I can get to work." I started to stand up, but he barked at me suddenly, and rather than getting into another shouting match, I seated myself.

"There's all these secrets that you have. We don't really know anything about you, do we?"

"Whose we? Quinn and Wade? If you are right, he is effectively dead, and she is better off likewise!"

"You know what I mean. We don't find out anything about you until we get to some situation that you get uncomfortable about."

"So you know I have a son. So what was the point about you asking me about him?"

"I want to know why you never talked about him. I mean, we suspected you had some kid, but there's no records of you now. All the proof we have is the video and that photo. And, I figure that I deserve to know about him."

"And why would that be?"

"I guess, that if I didn't know for sure that you would come with me to rescue those people, strangers to you, there would be no reason for you to come with me. Oh sure, there's the whole loyalty thing, but it's a bit harsh to ask anybody to help a bunch of complete strangers who could easily be dead by now and forcing you to leave here. Or what of here is actually worth coming back to."

And so I decided to humour him.

"I suppose you remember the double of my late wife?" Rembrandt nodded and grabbed a bottle of water from somewhere. "Well, she did not die, because she and my double did not bother having children. Both considered their careers were to time-demanding for such a thing. My Kristina and myself however had a son, Evan. He was born a few years before Kristina died. The labour however was very difficult on her. It took months for her to recover, so she had to give up on her plans while I worked. She died a few months later." It still was uncomfortable mentally recalling everything, but it was not so bad after so long.

"What happened to Evan?"

"I looked after him as much as I could. I had no relatives who could have looked after him, since they were all dead, but Kristina's parents were all too happy to look after him while I worked. In-laws can be a god-send at times, but it was not fair on them to expect to look after him all the time, especially since they were both getting older and not so able to look after a child. So when I could afford it, he went to boarding school, and I made sure that my holidays coincided with his so I could care for myself."

"So you get on well with him?"

"Reasonably well. I suppose a part of me blames him for Kristina dying, although I have no way of proving that, and I know it isn't his fault. But he is my son, and I would do anything for him."

"Even taking a bullet?"

"And what is that supposed to mean?"

"Did you consider Q-Ball your son?"

"In a way, I suppose I did."

"So that was pure martyrdom on your part, taking that bullet."

I truly did not know what this was, but he was baiting me for something or other. "If you must know, I believed that if either Quinn or myself should die, and I had to choose, on a practical level, for yourself and Wade, Quinn would have had the best chance of getting you back home. In any case, I was not entirely convinced I had been cured. In actual fact I had not. A bullet would be a release from what I would be later suffering."

I decided to throw in a dramatic pause at that moment. "So why ask me these questions?"

"It doesn't really matter. I just wanted to know if you were with me on this. So, you figure you can make a timer?"

"Honestly, I believe I could. If I had a proper research facility and a few months of time to prepare…"

"Quinn had his done in about a month!"

"Yes, he did. He also had the grand unification theory solved for him by a rather obnoxious double who you did not have the pleasure of meeting. And he did not bother to properly research it. Ideally he would have made the blasted thing have it's home coordinates stored somewhere were it would not be corrupted at the slightest opportunity."

"That thing with his double shouting something about the power supply?"

"He probably compared his timer with Quinn's schematics, and figuring them to be identical, warn him not to fiddle with the power gauge. At the time of course we did not have much choice."

"Ice-burg world. I still miss my Cadillac."

"So if I did build a timer, I would need to work out some equations. Since I know some of them, it should not take too long, but the problem is getting equipment. If it really is as bad as you say it is, we have a problem. I suppose we could try outside San Francisco…"

"No go. It's gone all Mad Max out there. What about those people you were with? They would help, wouldn't they?"

"I suppose so. They were eager for me to return, but I suppose they would want something in exchange."

"What about the anti-Krommagg virus? They might go for that."

So it was finalised. Rembrandt told the others to keep a lookout for components for the timer, but everything was broken beyond repair. So he told the others he was sliding again to be on the lookout for technology to rebuild our world. He would not tell them the truth, possibly they might have considered it selfish of him, but they were eager to help when he said he was going for aid.

The way the tether worked was to create a miniature wormhole and broadcast a signal to the Consortium's slide-gate, that would open a wormhole big enough for us to travel through. Although it meant we could not open a wormhole anywhere, it meant that it would be harder for anybody who desired their technology to figure out exactly how wormholes were made, since it removed any possibility of randomness. Scientists can be paranoid of their own research being stolen, and I did not blame them for keeping their secrets to themselves. In any case, if the Krommaggs or other invaders discovered they existed, the damage they could do would be incredible. So it was reasonable to assume that there was some form of booby-trap built into the tether. Another little problem was that I needed to be near the exact point where I slid into before. I did not relish the idea of wandering in an open graveyard again, but since we did not have any other choice, we started to travel there in the early morning.

The sun was only starting to rise when we headed out to the park. Rembrandt pointed out some of the places that had been spared. He mentioned how Quinn and Wade possibly would have been happy that their old parlour of employment was one of the first places to be destroyed. He also started talking about the virus itself when we were ambushed.

It's not really fair to say ambushed. There was only one of them. But one Krommagg was enough. It somehow appeared in front of us, as if it had suddenly teleported from nowhere.

"I thought you said they were all dead!"

Rembrandt started to retort, but he instead dived behind a wall. The Krommagg trained a nasty looking rifle at where he had been and blew a portion of the wall away. I looked about to see some cover for myself, but there was none. Suddenly it stopped trying to shoot Rembrandt at stared at me.

It kept his gun pointing at me, but it did not look as if it was intending on shooting me. Instead it focused on me, and I felt it in my mind. I stood there, not knowing what was happening outside. It was similar to being sedated, but with a sense of fear about. It suddenly stopped, and I shook my head to clear it. The Krommagg was bleeding out of the side of it's head, and a large brick was to its side that had not been there before. Rembrandt grabbed me and started to drag me away while the Krommagg started shooting again.

We kept on running towards the park, not stopping for breath. Although we did not waste any air trying to guess what we had just saw, there were at least a few possibilities. It was definitely a Krommagg, and either it was here from before Rembrandt had returned and was immune to the virus he carried, or it was again immune, but had came here afterwards. Both possibilities were bad.

Rembrandt stopped for a few seconds. He knew a few people who stayed near the park and decided to run off and warn them, while I was to wait for him at the fountain. I finally managed to get there, and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

To alleviate my tension, I started to wander about the fountain. It was still filled with corpses, but I had adjusted to the fact that they were there. And then I saw it.

Maybe it knew what I knew when it was in my mind. Maybe it just got lucky. But it was prowling about the green, looking for something. Possibly us. I put my hand to my pocket and gripped my fob watch, and slid the tether off it. It was then that Rembrandt started running towards me. And the Krommagg saw him.

It started shooting at him but Rembrandt was obviously a veteran of being shot at, and so ducked and dodged the shots. Then it saw me as well. It just missed my leg, possibly I was to remain alive for interrogation. So I jumped back and threw the tether.

It span around it's axis, floating a metre or so above the air, and faded from existence, only to be replaced by the usual blue vortex. I yelled at Rembrandt to follow me in, caring not to be landed on, and jumped.

The wormhole opened up into the Consortium's sliding laboratory. Luckily there were cushioned pads and I comfortably landed, then remembering myself, jumped to one side. Rembrandt came through and picked himself up.

"Hell, best slide ever." I was not looking at him though, but rather the wormhole itself. It was still open. Then a panel to the left of the gate opened on the wall, the quartz on the ring of the gate shot Rembrandt with a stream of energy, and he was dragged onto to the panel.

It was holding onto him as if he was a metal pipe to a magnet. I ran to try to help him, but his body would not budge. He didn't look to be in pain, apart from the initial shock, but he was still afraid. Then the Krommagg appeared.

It had managed to follow Rembrandt through, but landed on it's feet It glared at us, trying to decide who to shoot first. Then the quartz again shot its energy and dragged it to an adjourning panel.

I rushed to the desk, but Kristina was not there. Her voice was coming over a loudspeaker from somewhere

_________________

Самым большим доказательством существования разумной жизни во вселенной является тот факт, что с нами до сих пор никто не попытался связаться.