The honking of geese (a notebook)

1.
I can safely say the first thing I noticed about Tonje were her calves. Up on tip-toe, her body hidden somewhere inside a refrigerated grocery-store cooler, her long firm calves were all I could see. Nice. Definitely nice.

I pushed my cart closer, idly curious what might be built on top of those shapely struts. I didn't get off the Facility grounds often, so a grocery run like this was a rare opportunity to see some new faces. Or butts. I'm not picky. We don't get a lot of turn over at my work. That happens when you have to have top-secret clearance and dual PhDs before the recruiters will even look at you.

The view continued to improve, with trim thighs disappearing into a short sky-blue skirt that was draped over a nicely rounded backside. I'd come far enough around the open glass door to see she was struggling to pull a sack of frozen peach wedges off the top-most shelf in the case. She wasn't going to succeed unless she climbed halfway into the freezer. She had elfin stature to go with the elfin features.

While I might have subconsciously been hoping for an opportunity to make the woman's acquaintance, it was reflexive chivalry that got the better of me that time. "Can I help?"

I hadn't meant to startle her, and I'm not sure that's what actually happened. Instead of jerking back out of the case she... settled, her hips dropping into an easy crouch. The back of my brain screamed "PANTHER!" for a moment, a premonition of being devoured whole gripping my body.

The flicker of primal awareness was quickly forgotten as bright blue eyes turned to examine me. "Sure! Two bags if you don't mind." She backed out of the cold-case with a dancer's lithe grace.

"That's a lot of peaches." I tried to keep the conversation going as I slid into the doorway she had been occupying and grabbed the bags for her. I felt her eyes measuring me up from behind. I'm an ok specimen, I like to think. I didn't hear her gagging or anything.

"I like peaches." She answered, seemingly open to further dialogue. As if reaching around for something to add, she went on, "I make a mean peach-strawberry smoothie."

I finally got a look at the front of her as I loaded the two bags into her cart. Cute. Very. Her cream-colored top pulled enticingly over her pert and petite bosom. Medium-gold hair in a bob just long enough to cover her neck. She had several small side-braids that put me in mind of a Viking shieldmaiden. "Looks like you already took care of the strawberries," I noted, a little disappointed I wouldn't have another opportunity to fetch for her…

"Always start with the low hanging fruit." she quipped, ending with a smile that had me grinning in return.

"Or the ones on the lower shelves anyway," I added. She laughed.

My quick glance in her cart showed a collection of treats. Prepackaged microwavable foreign food, some cupcakes... A lot of flavors, but no real staples or basics. Someone who either didn't like to cook or didn't have to, most likely. Not all that different from my own cart: We have a very good cafeteria on the compound and runs like this were just to stock my personal fridge in the dorms.

I snickered a little. There was enough sugar in her cart that she must keep to a pretty vigorous exercise regimen to still be so slender. I gestured to the two different containers of ice cream. "Lot of calories." and then mentally kicked myself. Smooth, Darren... Not.

I thought I was done, but she just laughed. "I keep busy. A lot of short walks on long nights."

I froze. That... Those... Those were words you just did not throw casually into conversation unless you were part of the Project. It couldn't be coincidence! Was she a spy? A kidnapper? I wasn't at the top of Technical, but I was still well versed in the T-sec Transformation equations that made the Project possible. My own contributions to stabilizing the injection process were... Shit. I began to look around in a panic.

She must have seen the horror on my face, because she immediately made soothing gestures with both her hands. "Whoa, boss. Different departments, same company. My bad... I thought you recognized me."

My panic began to segue into embarrassment. Was she really part of the Project and I just didn't recognize her? I considered. Yeah. I suppose it was possible she was a Strider and I'd overlooked her in their formations. You just sort of expect Striders to be... taller? And dudes. Storming other planets being sort of the ultimate he-man macho fantasy.

It wasn't quite a jocks-and-nerds thing, but there was a sharp line separating those halves of the organization. Hard to avoid some dour looks when my forgetting to carry the two meant someone's brother-in-arms died screaming. I'd heard they call us 'the witches' sometimes. It wasn't a term of endearment.

Not that we had a lot of women over in Technical either. Still, with a smile like hers, you wouldn't think was possible to have missed it. Aside from being a little short, she pushed enough of my buttons to claim a solid '8'. Then again, the field teams trained in camouflage fatigues that weren't nearly as flattering as what she had on now. But more than the sleek silhouette, it was those eyes - they sparkled with awareness and poise. Instantly mesmerizing for me.

Or it could still be a trap. Bait, chosen specifically to put me at ease.

I'm not ashamed to say I was nearly paralyzed by indecision. I must have looked ridiculous.

Well, if one of us had "first contact scenario resolutions" on their resume it clearly wasn't me. Sensitive to my still looming freak-out, the maybe-Strider/maybe-spy gently backed away, her basket in tow, making it all look quite casual for the store cameras. "Thanks again. Look me up. Tonya. They'll know who you mean, down on the Track." And then to my surprise, seemingly forgiving all my spy thriller paranoia, she licked her lips and added, "I'll make you a smoothie. They're good."

It wasn't until the next day I found out she was on the Project, her name was spelled Tonje, and - as I found out in her quarters - her smoothies were very, very good.

2.
I brushed some sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand, making sure my braids were still tucked out of my face. My other hand stayed on guard.

"Yeah, but have you fucked your pet witch yet?" Grace threw a jab with her fist right behind her verbal jab and it almost connected. "You've only been stringing him along what? Three months?" She'd been more on target with the first barb. I'd taken Professor Rouse -- Darren -- to my bed long ago.

I threw a snap kick at her leading leg. Contact! She'd leaned in too far and hadn't been able to free it up to dodge or even soften the impact. It was her own weight anchoring the limb, multiplying the impact. She'd have a lovely bruise to remind her to keep her form centered. Bitch.

I like to think it's a testament to my better nature that I hadn't kicked her in the knee. It would have knocked her out of rotation for at least six weeks. See? I am nice. Almost as nice as Darren thinks I am.

Grace hissed. She knew she'd lost that exchange, but she also knew she'd nettled me. She'd found a chink in the Little Valkyrie's armor. We circled, barefoot, sweat darkening our form-hugging workout gear, each looking for the next opening.

"Oh, that's right, tiny Tonje's a thinker, not a fighter." Grace drawled, trying to prey on my academic rather than tactical background. "She doesn't fuck like the rest of us grunts." I wish I could say it didn't bother me, but it would always make me an outsider to some of the folks here. 'Teacher’s pet!' 'Nobody likes a smart girl...' Not smart enough for Technical, not dumb enough for the brute squad. The shit-stained fabric of my life.

Grace sneered. "NooOOoo. Tonje makes sweet, sweet love. Little half-nerd." Again, she threw a punch, but a real one this time.

I was already past her outstretched arm, my own paw coiling around her unguarded head. When my fingers spread delicately over her eyes, she couldn't help but jerk away from the sudden soft blindness and I rode the motion all the way down to the mat, twisting her torso back and down until she fell. It's no coincidence I fell on her, knocking the wind out of her. Then in a blur of rotational violence, I had her arm in a horrendous joint lock. The kind you use to break the wings off a chicken carcass before you throw the whole bird in a soup pot.

"Grace? You talk too much." I whispered in her ear and pressed her face to the floor. Then I twisted her shoulder until she howled like a banshee.

She twitched and struggled and flopped on the floor like a dying fish until finally, her thrashing heaved me completely into the air. Because, like gravity, superior body mass is a harsh mistress. Grace rolled to her feet with bloody murder in her eyes. I'm sure mine were about as friendly.

To my surprise - and her credit - Grace gathered herself up, bowed with the absolute minimum of politeness, and stalked off.

People snickered. Striders are a rough and surly lot. Mostly military types - but with privileges. That loosening of the straps that accompanies any special-operations posting. Pecking order is inevitable with Long Nights being so rare. Your place on the rotation is EVERYTHING. I was still seething: I just WON, assholes, you don't get to laugh.

While every squad needed its readers and talkers, it was the fighters who called the shots at Night, and that power gradient defined squad politics. I was the Little Valkyrie, a proven survivor, but I wasn't a fighter, in their eyes.

I was panting. And angry. And stupid. "Anyone else want a piece of this? Come on!"

See? Stupid.

There were twenty or so Striders lounging around the gymnasium. Watching the catfight with practiced disdain. Two of them, big burly males both, started to lean forward. Shit. I just called out an army of professional hard cases. While I could take more of them than most people would admit, I wasn't gonna be able to put down either of those two. Besides, Jim Rakes was a friend. Probably trying to jump in first and save me from myself. Stupid, Tonje. You know better. You are better. Better than this at least.

"Cut me off a slice, Tonje." A powerful baritone voice rang out from the double doors leading out to the rest of the Track, the Strider training complex.

You could actually see the ripple of respectful nods roll through the assembly. Benedict Mace. "The Mace." Six foot-three and the blackest black man I'd ever sat down to eat with. Built like a mythological war god and a legend among Striders. Shot caller for Echo Squad. ...And evidently dropping by the sparing circle to have a fresh slice of yours truly.

I was fucking doomed. He was gonna wad me up into a ball and then shoot hoops with my ass. Woosh! Nothing but net. Literal statement, not a metaphor. Make any joke you like about black boy from the Oakland 'hood, but Mace was as good at basketball as he was with a rifle - which is to say scary.

He marched onto the mat. Nothing slack or leisurely in his movements. Somehow, this beating about to be administered was work instead of play. A task he needed to get done before moving on to other business. I wished there was some way I could just surrender. Save us both the time.


No. Fuck that. The mat deserved better. Hell, Mace deserved better. It might be months before I got another chance to throw down with some of the Project's best again. I'd been busted back to a second-stringer, no squad, only attached to the Track. On par with the rookies who fought and kicked and bit and scratched for a chance to go Walkabout. Hoping to be tapped for a slot on the regular squads. We all hungered for it: to go pro, run with the big dogs. I was maybe even lower than the rookies - I had the stink of death on me.

He looked me over, appraising me with cold killer's eyes. "You need a minute?" It wasn't kindness or mockery. It was just a question. No subtext at all.

My pride said "hell no" but I'd managed to get my bare foot on its neck and press down by then. Instead I put up one finger and dashed for my bag, getting a bottle of water and a towel. He took off his shoes as I sucked down one quick sip, checking my hair was still tied back. A brusque pat down with the towel to get the sweat out of my eyes and I was as ready as I'd ever be.

We bowed. It was formal, precise, and perfect. It filled me with pride. Mace was taking this seriously. He didn't have to.

I came out fighting. My only hope was to startle him. Shock him with my ferocity. Make him flinch.

He didn't.

Instead, he took me to school. The man countered every shift, shook every grab, canceled every strike I launched. It was masterful and somewhere outside my own ego there was the pure delight of seeing a master at work. I'd had years of Aikido, but the Track catered to more of an MMA crowd. It was a crucible where players from all kinds of backgrounds mingled. I'd seen moves in that ring -- good moves -- that there were no names for.

He was just too goddamn BIG. Skill can balance the scales against weight or reach or even strength, but when you have all those things and skill? Doomed.

It was maybe the longest three minutes of my life, and I will go to my grave beaming, telling and retelling the story of how I caught The Mace with a sweet elbow to the ribs. Just once. Right there I finally had his respect, because only seconds later he took my legs away from me and planted me like a tree. When the world stopped spinning, he was on my chest like an avalanche.

I looked up and could not repress the grin. "What kind of jerk hits a little girl?" I laughed even though he'd destroyed me. "If I had your size, your strength, that would've been REAL fun."

He loomed over me like a storm cloud, he white teeth a flash of lightning against his dark face. "If I had your snow-white skin, I'd have ranked out of field ops a decade ago. Tell me another sad story."

He rose and the pressure lifted off my chest like a 747 taking off. I didn't decline the hand up he offered.

I was just shy of wheezing, sweat rolling down my body. I'd thrown everything I had at him. My honest best.

He looked about the same as when he walked in. Show off.

He also wasn't leaving. Odd.

"Anything else, Mace?"

"Yes. Dane is out on bereavement leave. His sister passed last night. That means Echo is short a pair of boots on our next Long Night. You want the slot?"

Right then I resolved to stop giving Darren shit about his "deer in the headlights" moments anytime the world catches him off guard. Because I'm pretty sure that's what I looked like. Deer. Headlights.

Mace waited another beat, then shrugged and started to turn away.

"Yes. Yes, absolutely!" I tried hard not to squeal like a schoolgirl. Pretty sure I failed. Real smooth. Darren would have laughed. With me, not at me.

"Good. Walk with me." He stated flatly, retrieving his shoes.

I slipped on my flats in a rush, not even stopping for my bag.

He stalked through the halls, a measured stride that made zero concessions to my half-trot trying to keep up. Everywhere we went the other Striders' body language offered up rough-hewn respect. I followed him out of the building and out onto the actual running track that gave the Track its name. He didn't pause, and soon we were in the woods that bordered the compound.

In other circumstances, I might have been terrified. Alone in the woods with a massive black man who had just proven he could absolutely dominate me despite martial arts training that had stretched across the whole of my adult life. I didn't even have my phone.

Finally, he sat down on a big rock beneath a tree and looked at me, still nearly eye to eye with me standing.

He looked so at ease. So comfortable. Regal even, perched on that rough stone. I realized this was his office. Not behind a desk. A real fighter.

"Tell me about October."

There it was. No getting around it.

"You've read the report," I answered dully. He was a squad captain. Of course he knew everything in my record before he'd even considered pulling me in.

"I have. Now tell me."

"Six of us walked in. Three of us walked out." Every Long Night was a freefall into the dark... But some landings were rougher than others. Bad judgment. A junior captain. Shit luck. I told the tale and pulled no punches. My captain had gotten it wrong, the natives were restless, and at the end of the day I had been the one who had to make the call: we all came back as honored dead or some of us lived to Walk another day. I chose survival, for some. I also chose who would die. Thrown to the wolves. I still see them in my nightmares. Even the dipshit captain.

"The Little Valkyrie. Chooser of the Dead." Mace mused when I'd finished. I hadn't gotten the nickname because I was blonde. Ok, that might have contributed. I’d gotten it for killing three of my brothers to save myself.

I nodded, more exhausted from dredging up those bad memories than even the struggle on the mat had left me. 'Soulsick', Darren calls it. Best name I've ever heard for it. I get soulsick, sometimes. Then he makes me soup and he... he's just... Darren. Then I'm not as sick anymore.

Mace rubbed his ribs, acknowledging a hit likely no one else in the gym had even seen. "Good."

"Good?" I echoed. Honestly, I didn't know what to make of his response.

"Tell you a secret. Little above your pay grade, but I think you've earned it. I've been on some bad Walks too. Only I came back alone. Sole survivor. Nothing I could have done different or better would have made one damn bit of difference. Striders die."

I nodded. Ugly truth. Hard truth.

"As far as I'm concerned, you're two up on me. You didn't lose three, you saved three. You're in." He glanced at his watch. "Long Sunset's in 70 hours. You know the chalk times. See you at the briefings."

With that he got up and strode back towards the Track without a backward glance.

Deer. Headlights. Darren. Forgiveness. Maybe even redemption.

These eyes would see the light of other days once more.

My exhaustion was banished by joy; I took off to find Darren at a full sprint.
3.
-bleep-bloop!-

Like any geek, I was eager to get door locks that could be voice-activated. It would be wonderfully Babylon 5-esque if I could just announce "come." from my couch and not get up. As advanced as the Chasm Project is in some ways, we still have to open our own doors, at least in the living quarters.

Even as I was turning the doorknob, I imagined Tonje chiding me for not checking who it was first. In my head I'd protest "but we're on a secure base." She'd give me that look that says I'm cute, but wrong. Essentially a replay of several actual conversations we'd had. I'm not safety conscious enough, I admit it. But she's maybe a little hyper-aware. Good skill for ...out there. Little taxing back here in the rear echelon as it were.

The door flew inwards and suddenly I was engulfed up to my chin in squealing Tonje, the smell of her hair filling my world. I think my ribs creaked a little in her powerful hug. She must have been extra excited - she wasn't scolding me for my overly trusting door-opening habits.

"I'm in!" she cried out. Several times, in fact.

"That's great!" Her enthusiasm really is infectious. "In what?" I finally asked as she all but carried me back to the couch. I'd put on a few pounds of muscle and lost an equal amount of flab since we'd started dating, but being able to pick up or at least drag guys like me was an actual job requirement for her.

"The next Walk! Mace brought me in with Echo Squad."

"I... oh."

"'Oh'?" She eyed me sharply. Released from her embrace at last, I slumped into the couch.

"Sorry. That is great. I just worry."

"It's what I do, Darren. it's why I'm-"

Oh shit. I had about a second to deflect this before she got completely furious. "I mean it, Tawn. I am happy for you but I am also worried. For you. I imagine how dangerous it is... but you know it’s dangerous." She slid into the couch next to me. "So let me be a little frightened for both of us. Then you can go out and explore universes without being afraid at all. Deal?"

"That sounds like a good deal." She said quietly, then hugged me around the middle again. Her head lifted from my shoulder and she looked into my eyes. "Besides, I've got you watching out for me. Doing the math."

"Your very own witch."

"Ug." her face turned sour. "You heard that?"

"It's Chasm. 'The walls have ears and the floor has teeth.' I pay a lot more attention to the Striders now. Since you found me. Since us." I smiled, faintly regretting having brought the nickname up.

"You know I don't feel that way about Technical." She half-pleaded. "Or you."

"I know. I don't blame them, either. What we do IS magic. Besides, Striders weren't the ones to start calling the injection port 'the Cauldron'. That got started on my side of the fence. Because some of us like being thought of as wizards and witches." I twisted my face into a mock sneer and wiggled my fingers "I'll get you yet, my pretties!" I stage-cackled.

She thumped me on the chest. "Quit it you, I'm being serious."

I have to say, I love her touch. Even when she's frustrated with me. She cares. Deeply.

I let the witch's mask expression fall off my face. "Actually, Piers is doing the injection modeling for Echo. I'm crunching the next cycle."

She grumbled a little, deep in her chest. Like a grumpy bear.

"...But obviously I can go over his work. Piers won't mind some peer review." He would mind, but he'd still let me if I pressed. Identifying viable apertures into parallel realities was fussy business, still more art than science. There are some concerns about 'observer effect' that scare the shit out of us over in Technical. That the numbers... move... depending on who is looking at them.

Maybe it was better if I checked the math.

"Good. I'd like that. I'd feel safer knowing you were keeping watch."

I hugged her closer, my faux pass seemingly forgiven. "I'll do that. Promise."

After that we sat together watching TV, snuggling, and not talking much. Basking in each other's simple presence. Once in a while, I'd feel her shiver in delight, thinking about her new assignment, I'm sure. Sometimes just holding hands is incredibly intimate.

Finally, my stomach rumbled.

"Food?" I asked. Supergirl reruns were fun, but nature calls.

"I could cook?" Tonje offered.

"I was thinking ‘get some take-out from the cantina’."

"Ouch." She smirked. "You're never going to forgive me for burning that omelet, are you?"

"What? No... I just thought we could get some food and get back to watching movies. I didn't want to spend time in the kitchen either." She's not the greatest cook, but I'd never stand in the way of her trying to improve.

She laughed. "In my defense, you were distracting me." Her hand slid between my thighs. "Like... This..." 

Ooo. Now that was playing dirty. "Uuufff. Yes. That is... rather distracting."

I squirmed and she rolled over to straddle me on the couch. She always liked to be on top. "How about you go fetch food, and I'll make dessert?"

"I like this plan." I nodded vigorously.

"So... what do you want for dessert?"

"Mmm. Are we asking Questions now?" I smiled. You could hear the capital Q. It was a game that had broken the ice between us many times. If you ask one, you have to answer one. A bit like truth or dare. Honest answers required.

"Alright. Sure. Question: What is... your favorite dessert?"

My eyes went vacant, thinking hard. Like solving a complex curve. My witch's trance. Finally: "Cherry cobbler. Hot from the oven with French vanilla ice cream melting on it."

"Oh... that does sound good. Easier than a cake or something, too."

"Yup. Grandma used to make big trays of the stuff for family gatherings. Better in a bowl than on paper plates though. Less messy."

"You are just so grown up now." She giggled, then mimed whipping something off my face and licking her finger, obviously envisioning me as a kid with cherry-filling goop all over the place. "So, do you have the ingredients?"

"I do, actually. I just usually don't get off my butt and make it."

"Excellent. Then you grab dinner, and I'll make some cobbler."

"Yu-umm! I'll grab my shoes. But first, my turn... Question: What is... your favorite Disney princess."

"Oh my god. You are going to hell, Darren." She's even cuter when she's aghast, I realized, treasuring the rare opportunity to spin her up without getting punched for it.

"Good, That's where the interesting people end up, and I'm lousy with cold weather. Now 'fess up."

She grumbled at me. "I hate you. A little. That's just so..."

"Girly? Come on. I bared the cherries of my soul. Spill it."

"Kida. From Atlantis." She crossed her arms over her chest, unwilling to give any more.

"Hmm. I'm not sure that even counts. I don't think she sings."

Ok, that got me punched. I probably even deserved it.

"Come on, Tawn. I included vanilla ice cream and Grandma. You've gotta give some details."

Tonje's face squinched up before the dam finally broke and it all came out in a flood. "She's just so tall, and strong, and a warrior - she's like three thousand years old and doesn't look a day over eighteen and she flies, in one scene kinda, and..."

I caught her in the pause as she finally had to inhale. "And she gets the nerd in the end, too. The resemblance is uncanny."

"You!!" She burst out laughing and flopped onto my chest. "My witch. MINE. ...Now go get us some food. Something spicy."

I pulled her close, the difference in our height making it simplest to kiss her on the forehead. "I love you. I'll be back soon." I didn't mean to sound so solemn, but the reason she'd come over was still there in the room, inescapable.

She hugged me tight again, so much stronger than me. "I love you too. ... and I promise I'll come back. I'll always come back."

4.
“Trace harmonics are favorable. Technical is optimistic: this injection is 'go'. So be as safe as the job allows.” The screen curling around the podium went dark and room lights came up on Professor Rousse. “That concludes the final briefing for Chasm Insertion 91-strike-A. Echo Squad, you have twenty minutes personal time before final assembly at the Cauldron.”

I flashed him a smile, then rolled my eyes. He grinned and shrugged. It's something of a running joke between us. Funny how streamlined briefings become when your intel is pretty much, “As usual, we know nothing.”

The witches –excuse me, Technical– do their digital voodoo and then the Striders get handed a window. A little patch of fuzzy logic where we can use ten billion dollars of custom hardware to push stuff from our world “into nearby parallel worlds”. Neat, huh?

That said, I have no idea what ‘nearby’ means in that sentence. I have more experience than most and when we get there all I can say is “looks like we aren’t in Kansas anymore, Toto.” It’s a joke I think all the squads share. Except maybe Alpha. They’re kind of ‘serious dogs’ over there. They have that ‘we’re #1’ image to uphold.

People began to shuffle out. There's always a ton more people at last call than just the Squad that's up. Chasm Group management. Reps from other squads. Guests of the Project. Darren managed not to wink, but he did slip in a fond glance to me as he left the podium. This was my fourth Long Night with Echo. Third with Darren as our lead Witch. Plus, I know he had a hand in that first Long Night too, even if it was Piers at the podium for the "Be safe. We know nothing" speech. We’ve had a couple real winners, come home with the phat loots. Viable technology and even some hot media that Chasm could barter for funding. Appease the secret overlords.

Pay my outrageous salary.

That hot streak had decisively shut people up at the Track about me and Darren. Even just three in a row with no fatalities was noteworthy. We Striders are a superstitious lot and nobody wants to jinx a good thing. In fact, I think Grace is trying to find her own ‘pet witch’ to get a more benevolent eye crunching Delta’s numbers. Guess I'm a trend-setter now.

Twenty minutes to zone out. Personal time: you pray, you meditate, you listen to music. Whatever it takes to get your shit together before lining up for your quantum-assisted suicide pact. Then final assembly: the six members of Echo Squad would gather up on this big platform in the center of what looks suspiciously like a high-tech Stonehenge and they… I dunno? Turn it on? Step three: magic occurs, the Cauldron bubbles and anything on the platform gets pushed into another world. ‘Injected’ is the technical term.

Anyway, depending on how well they lined everything up and tuned the antennas and whatnot, you get around 72 hours before everything that was on the platform gets pushed back out of the other world and we all get sent home.

You …or your body at least, always comes back. But as honored dead or heroes? Yes, I have a strong preference every time the universe asks me that question.

I’m oversimplifying when I say “as usual, we know nothing.” Technical has actually come a long way. They hardly ever squirt us into other Earths where it’s hard vacuum at the surface or Venus-like heat and pressure (both readily recognizable by the crispy-crunchy corpses that come back at Dawn). They used to try sending drones through first. Sounds reasonable, right? Then they discovered you can only get one crack at a Long Night – no sending drones in, then sending people in after you knew it was safe. It’s go-or-no-go. All or nothing. So, Striders go. Because so far, they still need people like me to exploit what we’re finding out there: Parallel worlds. Alternate Earths. Other Histories.

So, when Darren says the ‘harmonics are favorable’, that’s witch-talk for they’re pretty sure we’re gonna be able to breathe. I don’t know about you, but I’m partial to breathing.

That’s actually where the second big breakthrough came in for Striders. It only took a couple fatalities to work out why people were coming back with no oxygen anywhere in their bloodstream and instantly suffocating on the Cauldron pad. When Dawn comes, you get pulled back to the Cauldron. But ONLY you come back. Just the atoms and molecules that went over in the first place. We all carry a compressed air charge now – just enough to get you properly oxygenated before popping back to our world. Same thing with food – you end up coming home looking like molecular Swiss-cheese if you don’t stick to the rations we bring with us. Classic learn-by-dying. Turns out the old folktales are true: it's better to fast for a few days than eat faerie-food while you're Underhill.

Darren says injection is strictly an exchange of information between worlds. All the matter remains discrete. Out of tune with each other in some way, I guess. There's a unique signature for every timeline. At least, that's how Darren's tried to explain it to me. Which seems like a big plus to me: that really limits the contamination we might bring back. If we piss off one of the more advanced cultures we're burgling, they can't just slip one of their out-of-tune nukes into our pants and send it home with us. That's not paranoia, that's tactics.

Tick-tock. Personal time. Me? I listen to music before my Walks. Sometimes I even dance. I should probably meditate, clear the mind for the rigors of the task ahead. But if I ever do Walk into a runaway greenhouse hell-hole, or get smeared across the side of a mountain, I don’t want my last minutes to have been serene. I want to go out living.

Mace eats. Chows down like it’s his last meal, every time. I tried that, but I just end up throwing up once we get there. Sometimes it’s good knowing there’s someone simply better at all this than you are. Gives you hope you can get better too.

The others have their own rituals. Marcos prays. I would not have taken him for a Muslim, but there you are. I’m not sure what the other three do. It is personal time after all. Some people see their families. I always think about using that time to see Darren, share a few words. Hold hands. But then it feels like that’d just unsettle both of us. Make it too real.

Besides, he’s got his hands full babying the Cauldron, right down to the wire. "Fussy" becomes an incredibly scary word when he says it. As in "the Cauldron's fussy sometimes." I’d rather he be fully focused on riding that horse instead of trying to be brave for me.

And just like that twenty minutes is gone. Here we go again: another Long Sunset, and the start of my eighth Long Night. The Cauldron is an outdoors site, heavily shrouded in sails and awnings to obscure aerial and satellite photography. The bosses would have rather put the whole deal underground, but that had a nasty habit of destroying early probes – there’s not usually a matching cave or complex on the other side. Getting injected into solid rock pretty much defines ‘Messy’. Yes, we’re one of those spots Google Earth doesn’t show, courtesy of some mutual back-scratching with the NSA. If you were to look online, all you’d see is trees.

Which is amazing when you consider we’re just one ridgeline east of Berkley. The Cauldron practically has line of sight on San Francisco. Yup, just roll down the hill and over a bridge and you're in one of the biggest cities in the world. That works out too for the Striders – we don’t have a lot of time to find the natives and take pictures of their stuff. The City by the Bay seems to exist in one form or another in many, many alternate histories. A major shipping hub, the privilege of its geography. The underlying continent doesn’t seem to change much as you step across worlds. Maybe that’s what they mean by “nearby parallels”? Hmm. Might have to ask that when I get back.

I started the climb up on our mound of gear, heading for my tent. It’d be cool if things were more like that TV show with the stargate – bold soldiers marching into a wall of silvery light. Not nearly as dramatic when you’re huddling in a heavy-duty reinforced pup-tent while the big machines spin up. Rough landings are rough -- man-killing hail or a little West Coast hurricane waiting to greet you. Sometimes all you can do is hunker down and wait for Dawn. Then shake it off and Walk another day. Which is what made Echo’s hot streak so exciting for everyone. Word is we’re being bumped up in the rotation. Slotting us in as often as possible. Priority, baby! (you know, after Alpha's dance card is full, but still.)

Nope, instead of a cinematic conqueror's march up the ramp to a big shiny portal, real Striders go tucked into a heap of gear that would make any troop of Boy Scouts think they’d died and gone to Scout Heaven. “Ready for anything.” We’ve got some gold and silver coins, a few trade-goods, like whiskey. Even some porn because: men, duh. But not much that’s super high-tech other than our radios and adventure-cameras. My personal favorite are the bikes. Hardcore mountain bikes with detachable electric motors. Whoever figured out to start packing those in was a genius. It gives us a ton more range.

It’s all "minimum footprint". Eco-friendly for all the most selfish reasons. This is asymmetrical exploration and exploitation: we’re supposed to bring back more than we share, even by accident. Because one of these days we’re gonna pop out of the Cauldron sitting on somebody else’s Cauldron, and who knows what they might inject back into our world? There's actually a whole chapter in the guide book for that scenario. DO NOT piss off anybody who looks like they have this tech too.

Paranoid? Yes. Too paranoid? Not even.

I saw Darren circling on one of the catwalks. He was listening to the big pylons powering up. Keeping watch for me. I waved. He waved back and gave me a huge thumbs up. It was going to be our first anniversary in a couple of weeks. We’d been trying to set ground rules for buying presents. Not overdo it. But I still wanted it to be special. He... He'd changed my life.

The whine rose and the light took on the weird crystalline sheen it always did right before injection. I zipped up my shelter. Here it comes! I wished I could bring him back something. Just a little taste of the wonders out there. We filmed everything of course, but I wished there was something tangible I could share with him…

Why? Why did I have to go and jinx it like that?

Tonje breathed deeply and steadily, centering herself for what was about to begin.

She stood at one edge of “the playground”, an urban warfare training area on the edge of the Strider campus. It has a slightly post-apocalyptic air, the walls were scored by gunfire while several burnt-out husks of cars decorated the simulated main street. She looked across that long strip of rough asphalt at Mace. Something instinctively twisted in the transparent field covering her face, magnifying the object of her attention. The lab techs said it was only equivalent to about 3x power binoculars, making it pretty weak for real optics, but still incredibly handy. The field would flex the other way for close objects, like a living magnifying glass. It might seem like a footnote compared to the other abilities her field granted her, but she’d quickly grown used to seeing everything around her with exceptional clarity be it near or far.

“Ok, we have some special observers today, so we’re upping the difficulty a little bit.” Mace’s voice boomed out through a series of concert speakers installed around the combat arena, keyed to a simple tactical headset he was wearing. “So, Tonje, try not to get naked.”

“It was just that one time!” She shouted back, needing no amplifiers to make herself heard. Her increased muscular power extended to her diaphragm, allowing her to bellow most impressively. She blushed slightly at the reminder that she needed to pay a small amount of attention to extend her field enough to protect her clothes. Otherwise, it would ‘snap back’ to skin tight.

Both of them were in their “tactical-practical’ outfits they defaulted to on Long Walks. But Mace was going sleeveless, showing off his embarrassingly deliciously muscled arms and he had added a chest harness loaded with what appeared to be a variety of grenades. Hers was modified only to cover her now extravagantly sensual measurements, doing a fair job of masking the super-models-would-kill-for body underneath. But she did nothing to hide the breathtakingly classic features of her girlish face. That would give their unseen observers something to drool over, she mused.

Mace ignored her response, all business for the phantom audience. “You will have two minutes to make me tap out. Keep your guard up at all times. I will not be playing nice today.” She could see his warm and ever so slightly bloodthirsty smile from two and a half blocks away. “Oh, and if you kill me or break any of my bones, the extraction has failed.”

“Awwwww…” She pouted dramatically. “You take all the fun out of it.”

He flashed her a quick look to make sure she knew he was serious on that last part. She nodded slightly, realizing he was also warning her just how rough he was about to get.

“Annnnnd… Go!”

Tonje launched herself into a hard sprint down the street, charging straight at Mace. Again her increased strength translated into Olympic levels of speed as her long legs pounded the ground, propelling her forward. Instead of seeking cover, Mace shouldered his rifle and waited. She’d covered almost two-thirds of the distance to her prey when her head snapped sideways and she missed a step. Flashes of light filled her vision as her field flared. She skidded to a stop, bouncing off one of the wrecked cars, adding a new dent like it had been hit by a young woman-sized truck. Mace has shot her square in the face! Then he’d poured the rest of the clip into the vicinity of her skull without pause or mercy. Tonje shook her head, dazed by the impacts and by the sparkling light of her armor reacting, a distraction he’d most deliberately provoked.

This was far from the first time she’d been shot, of course. Testing her abilities had moved up to that level quickly. But nothing she’d ever been shot with before had felt so… meaty… when it had hit her.

She looked down to see strange disks of dull metal all around her boots. They looked like little cow patties, random glops of soft metal. She realized Mace had chosen some sort of unjacketed ammunition specifically for maximum momentum transfer, knowing he couldn’t pierce her armor. He wasn’t playing nice at all! Tonje clenched her fist so tightly the field around her hand began to glow white, fading only as it reached her mid-forearm. “Class is in session, old man.” She whispered, acknowledging that rushing straight at him had been a rookie move.

Aaaaaand when she looked up at him again, he was gone, vanished into one of the side streets and probably about to hide until her time ran out.

“Shit!” she grunted. Picking herself off and then trotting the last thirty yards to where Mace had been standing. She took a deep breath through her nose, finding the scent not of him, but of the hot gun he’d just fired at her. It seemed a little stronger to the north side of the street, so she started searching that direction, kicking in a locked door without even breaking stride, knowing he certainly would have the keys to every building in the Playground.

The scent of hot gun wafted in the darkened interior, validating what had been largely a lucky guess. Beams of sunlight lit up the dusty air, confirmation he’d come through here only moments prior. She felt the clock ticking as she took the stairs three at a time, smashing through another doorway with her shoulder at the second-floor landing.

She found herself in a corridor with floor-to-ceiling windows facing back out onto Main Street. The sunlight dazzled her momentarily, but she heard Mace shout “hey!” and saw his silhouette only a dozen feet away as he lobbed something at her underhand. Instinctively, she reached out to slap away the grenade he’d tossed at her– only to feel her hand smack something far softer than a grenade. The fragile globe burst into a splash of thick, sloppy white liquid, dowsing her whole torso with… house paint?

“What the hell, Mace?” She sputtered, spitting out a few droplets of paint that had gotten past her pink lips. The opaque fluid hit the ground with a loud splash, sliding off the nearly frictionless surface of her armor.

“I was really hoping that might blind you for a bit…” he looked visibly crestfallen. At least until he bolted down the hallway away from her at his hardest sprint, one hand behind him, emptying a pistol in her general direction as he ran away.

Tonje felt the excitement of the hunt in her pounding veins. She almost had him now! She launched herself down the corridor after him, easily twice as fast as his scrambling retreat, sparkling with the occasional flash of a bullet glancing off her field. She felt a cobweb brush her face–

The next thing she knew she was flying sideways, blown out of the side of the building by the claymore mine she’d triggered. Steel ball bearings driven by a wad of C4 explosive scattered in every direction around her, bouncing off of her invulnerable body like an oversized pachinko machine gone homicidal.

She hit the ground on all fours like a cat, sliding to a halt five feet later as her fingers and toes dug furrows into the asphalt. She glanced up, catching a glimpse of Mace climbing up a second stairwell at the other corner of the building. ‘Fuck chasing him’ she thought, pivoting her hips and coiling her legs. With a surging leap, she launched herself towards the roof. She almost made it too. Instead, she crashed through the glass of the top floor. Without pause she jumped again, smashing through the ceiling to land almost gracefully on the rooftop.

Mace came through the rooftop access door, still checking behind him when she caught him in a one-handed grip by his harness and swung him out over the edge of the rooftop. “That’s at least forty seconds to spare, old man.”

He struggled for a moment, before looking down at the four stories of air under his boots. Then he smiled at her. “So, what’s the theme of today’s lesson?”

“Look then leap?” She smirked, finding it funny that he was stalling. She hadn’t missed the fact that he had yet to concede.

“Nope. The lesson is you’re stronger than a herd of oxen, tougher than any tank …and you still only weigh about one hundred kilos.”

He made a sharp little gesture with his hand. The long, loud crack of an anti-material rifle rang out across the simulated city, arriving a moment after God’s own sledgehammer struck her ribs. Another soft round that pancaked itself on her lean flank. Tonje went teetering off the edge, twisting as she fell to throw Mace back towards the roof, rather than take him with her as she fell. As she fell, she heard a distant voice call out, “Sorry, Tonje!”

Waiting for the inevitable impact of the ground, Tonje cursed herself. Up on the rooftop like that she’d presented a perfect silhouette for Hiro and his sniper rifle. And Mace was just crazy enough to call in the shot even with her dangling him over the side.

But she wasn’t out of time yet.

She barely acknowledged the dull thud as she hit the pavement, gathering herself up to launch herself at the roof on the opposite side of the street. An easy second story jump for her. Then she bounded back across the four lanes, gaining the remaining two stories in altitude. There she quickly spied the set of gloved fingers where Mace was clinging to the edge for dear life. She walked over and knelt at the edge above him.

“Need a hand?”

“I wouldn’t mind.” He chuckled.

“You give?”

“I do.” He said without shame or formality.

She caught one of his wrists in a firm grip and hoisted him up, taking care with her own footing this time. He was right. She was ridiculously strong, but he still weighed more than she did, and physics was an uncompromising bitch on any world.

In a nearby bunker, a huge wall screen displaying a close-up of the two striders’ shared smile of triumph froze.

A man with many stars on his shoulders coughed, then announced. “God, with a dozen of her we could redraw the map of the Middle East.”

“With a dozen like her, we might find the maps of this country getting redrawn. She is unquestionably the project’s greatest discovery, but I trust you now see the need to expand our funding? Until we can solve the redial issue, the world that produced her is forever closed to us.”

The general nodded. “And the failsafe? The insect from the same world as these…superheroes?”

“It’s not a failsafe, general. It’s a doomsday weapon. It murdered an entire civilization far more advanced than ours. If it slips our grasp, humanity dies. We are safeguarding it accordingly.”

Added classic float pose to get the proper lay of the lines.

THis one was more of a happy accident than anything planned.

CAUTION: Wearing this costume for more than several seconds may cause rapid beautification, total invulnerability, supersonic flight, godlike strength, insatiable libido, and a strong tendency towards incomprehensibly powerful orgasms. The manufacturer is not responsible for any overwhelming desire to save the world. If symptoms persist after removal, learn to live with it, it's probably permanent.