As was usually, Sean had become extremely caught up in his current project and didn't notice when someone knocked on the door. Nor did he notice when they opened and walked in. In fact, it took him several seconds to realize someone was calling his name.
"Sean? Sean?? SEAN!! Hello??" The voice belonged to a mildly attractive girl in a blue and white sailor fuku holding a small bento box. She stood at the edge of the doorway, somewhat afraid (and perhaps rightfully...) to enter the workshop proper.
Finally recognizing her presence, Sean set down the tools he was working with and walked over to the small cleared area in front of the door, the only cleared space in the entire structure. "Eri, you're going to be late again."
"That's okay, I knew you'd probably forgotten to eat again, so I made this before I left. Here." She handed him the lunch, and smiled.
Sean took it, cursing to himself. [Damn the laws of anime... how many times do I have to go through this?] Inside his head, another voice echoed his own.
[Oh, come on now. you knew this would happen when you picked the "reclusive genius" identity in this world. It always does; you know that....]
[Shut the hell up!!] he screamed in his mind. [I'm not so pathetic that I'd try and take advantage of some schoolgirl!]
[You said it, not me....] the voice chuckled as it trailed off.
"Sean? You okay?" Eri's voice pulled him back to reality.
"...Sure Eri. Just thinking about something."
"Like what? Like me?" she asked innocently.
The universe chose that moment to interrupt the conversation by having Sean become insubstantial. The bento he had been holding dropped to the floor, spilling open all over the ground. Eri immediately got a worried look on her face, glancing between Sean and the spilled lunch.
"Sean... are you okay? What's happening?"
"The same thing that always does, sooner or later." Sean's body and clothing were fading in and out, becoming fuzzy and insubstantial, as though he were a badly received television signal. "I'm going to be leaving here very soon, and I won't be back, probably ever. As soon as I'm gone, get out of the lab, go back to school, and forget I was here the past year."
"But-" she started, moving forward to grab him in an attempt to stop what was happening.
"Don't. I can't say what will happen if you try, or where I'm going, but wherever it is, it probably won't be at all pleasant. Now go."
The last thing Sean saw of that world was Eri running out the door, not quite crying, as she headed for school. Of course, from his point of view, it was the world that was becoming fuzzy to him rather than the other way around. Once he had faded completely from reality, he allowed himself a sigh. [Sometimes, I really hate this happening. And sometimes I love it. Most of the time, it's both.]
The voice chose that moment to come back to him. [Nothing like the sight of a girl running off heartbroken to cheer a man up, eh? How about we try kicking puppies in the next world? I hear that's fun. Or maybe beat up some nuns, or rob a nursing home...?]
[You always do pick the most annoying times to show, you know? Sometimes I really wish you could actually be *useful*....]
The voice gave the mental equivalent of a shrug. [What do you want from me? I'm *evil*. I'm not supposed to be helpful. And besides, I'm just a copy of you; I'm only holding up a mirror and show how bad you really are.]
[I am *not* evil.]
[Whatever you say.... Oh, look, we get to stop talking to ourselves and try our hand at screwing up the real world again. Toodles....]
The Sean was, in fact, fading back into the "real" world, and a fairly nice one, from the looks of it. As reality blurred in and out of focus, Sean could make out a large, wooded landscape, with rolling hills, blue skies, the whole deal.
[Oh, goody. A non-tech world. Just what I needed. Oh well, I probably needed to get some fresh air for a while anyways....] As the scenery slowly faded into focus, Sean could hear an odd, high-pitched keening noise, though no source was evident in the area. He glanced around several times. [If that's you doing that in there, it's really not all that funny or annoying.]
But there was no response from his dark half as the noise continued to escalate, becoming loud enough to grate on his nerves. Then there was a sudden mental flash, a burst of raw information, as though someone had opened up his skull and poured knowledge into it without bothering to sew things up afterward. Sean collapsed to his knees in pain as the scenery began wavering again, fading back into nothingness.
[What the-] It had *never* done this before. At times, he had only remained in a world for a week or two before being pulled away, but he had never been pulled into a world without fully manifesting in a previous one. And it had never *hurt*, either. All he could do was hope the transfer was as quick as possible as he clutched at his head and gritted his teeth.
The Focal Point Five days before the beginning of the tournament
Reality is often spoken of as being "torn open" by people traveling between dimensions; this is entirely possible, but quite wasteful in terms of mystic energy. A much simpler solution is to find someplace where reality is weakened, either by someone using the "rip through" method or simply through a spot that is unusually weak, and step through there. This does, of course, limit your arrival point, but when entering a new universe knowing where you'll be arriving is mostly impossible, so this isn't usually a problem. So when it comes to dimension-hopping, a more often than not an experienced traveler will appear in the same place that others have, if only for convenience.
The point of this whole explanation is that Charnel shouldn't have been the least bit surprised when Sean appeared right behind him. Unfortunately, Charnel's experience with the dynamics of dimension warping was fairly limited, so when there was a hiss, followed by an explosion and a yell, he was *quite* surprised. He slowly turned around to see a man in a black coat standing from the wreckage of what had until recently been a section of the stadium wall.
"Owww.... damn. I hate it when I land in something...." he said, rubbing his head as he stood.
"Oh, no, not *another* dimension warper," muttered the tech. "For once I wish that one of the contestants would let us bring them here...."
"Contestants?" Sean perked up at this.
The tech looked at him oddly. "Aren't you here for the tournament?"
In Sean's mind, a dim memory came back to him. Something from just before everything had went wrong.... "The Grand Merchandisable Clash of Authors?" he asked.
"So then you *are* here for it. I suppose I should tell you the rules, then. One: No leaving the mountains, except as part of the fights. Two: We don't use money here, so forget about making any as part of this. You might get some from merchandising in other universes, but around here...." He shrugged. "Three: No taking anything back with you, especially the technology. Four: If you don't want to fight, you can be a ref, or something else. Five: Matches are every other day to let you heal, with the aid of our local medical facilities, of course. They're top of the line, so injuries shouldn't be a problem. If you can't follow the rules, you're out of the tournament and the dimension."
"...You're pretty well rehearsed at that," said Sean, turning his attention from the duplicators and telerings back to the man. "I've got a few questions, though."
"Huh? Well, okay, what are they?"
"Well, first off, does the whole 'no leaving the mountains' thing only count leaving by choice? I didn't exactly intend to come here, and while I don't intend to leave, I really don't have any control over it."
"Uh, I suppose that wouldn't count, but I'll have to talk to someone about t." *that* was a first, thought Charnel. An accidental dimension traveler, of all things. "What else did you want to know?"
"Well, what's the prize? And who am I fighting? I'm not going to go into this blind...."
"Oh, I'm sure you're a match for any of the other contestants or you wouldn't have gotten the message. And the prize is whatever you want."
[My, how... stereotypical.] Thought Sean.
"Oh, and you'll need a partner. All of the fights are between teams."
Sean went cross at this. "Damn. You wouldn't happen to have anyone on hand, would you? I'm not from these parts, so I don't know anyone here...."
The tech chuckled. "No one is from these parts. But if you need a partner, you can inquire over there-" he pointed to a set of large, circular rings set in platforms "-and they should be able to find someone for you." When he looked back, Sean had already walked off towards the rings. Charnel went back to what he was doing after making sure that someone would take care of the broken wall. "Dimension travelers have got to be the most arrogant bunch of jerks in all reality...."
"...So if you'll just pick one of the rings, we can send you there and you can find your partner."
Sean looked over at the tech. "Any idea who's in any of these...?"
He shook his head. "No, sir. You should come out pretty close to whoever it is that was interested, though. Not more than a kilometer or so."
[...Close enough. Now, lessee here....] Sean stepped over to examine the portals individually; the first one was something out of a Lovecraftian nightmare- a huge cavern filled the view, with hundreds of scaled, ichor-dripping beasts hanging from the walls, ceiling, and crawling along the floor. Adding to the sheer alienness of the scene was the fact that the creatures within seemed to be at least partly mechanical, with pseudo-organic bits of machinery protruding from their sides. Sean shivered once, remembering, and stepped on.
The second portal was far more normal, apparently leading into s perfectly normal men's washroom. [A bit ordinary, but perhaps workable if there's no other alternative.] He thought. The third portal led into a steel corridor, and people occasionally walked by it dressed in various unusual clothes. After a quick pause to consider, he moved on to the last. The view led to a small, dismal picture of a city, filled with broken-down buildings and rubbish filled streets.
[So, it comes down to: Terrors of the Underworld, Averagetown U.S.A., Goofy Jumpsuits 'R Us, or Welcome to Dystopia, huh? "First bowl was too hot, the second too cold. Third bowl was just right, why check the fourth?"] He turned to the technician, still standing there beside him. "Okay, I've decided."
"Huh? Okay, fine. Which one do you want?"
"Heh. I'll take what's behind door number three...."
The very same moment An altogether different part of space and time
A large fist slammed against the simulated wood surface of a metal desk, echoing throughout the otherwise silent room; followed by a throaty, animalistic growl. It was decidedly dark, in the captain's quarters; only the glowing green light of a holographic screen illuminated a shaggy mop of blond hair as the captain's head traveled to the flat, hard surface of his desk.
After moments of inactivity, a hand, seemingly acting of it's own volition began to pat around the side of the desk, searching for something in the dark. A drawer handle... a handgun... the lip of an open bottle. And like many pirate captains before him, David felt with little coaxing that he, indeed, was in need of a drink to calm his nerves, which were at the respective ends of their tiny, microscopic ropes.
A nearly unintelligible mumble escaped his lips as he forced his body to pull itself back up from the tabletop to a more comfortable upright position. The screen, illuminating the room flickered at David mockingly, prompting him to furrow his brows in frustration. Lifting the bottle to his dry lips, he took a mighty quaff, and mulled things over in his head. The same self-animated hand set the bottle upon the tabletop, bisecting the holographic screen. As the thermo-luminescent image cast itself through the curved surface of the bottle, a ripple, like disturbed waters caused the previously difficult to understand lines of code to sway and oscillate, appearing even less intelligible than before.
"I said lights, Dottie." Sighed the disgruntled captain. In response, the room began to illuminate itself; slowly... A dim red light at first, then slowly adding blue and so on, comfortably altering the light levels within to make everything visible. What a mess. Disarray barely began to describe the state the room was in. Clothes were strewn about; various paper manuals and tablets, even the odd ammo clip lay about the floor with no particular method to its madness. And in the center of said chaotic array sat the illustrious captain of the pirate ship, Androphonos, David "Tytan" Fayram. He stared at the shifting patterns of star charts that littered the ceiling and sighed. It was one of those days.
Hauling his feet atop the desk, he tapped the button, deskside, to turn off the monitor he had been staring at for hours that he dared not count previous.
"Dottie. C'mere for a minute." He spoke loudly enough for the walls themselves to hear; and no doubt, they heard, as no more than a second passed before a tall, thin young lady materialized before him, standing next to his desk. Her thermo-luminescent form floated to the ground, followed by a rush of warm air over Dave's face.
"What's up?" The well-dressed lady chimed in, cheerfully.
Dave looked over at her holographic form, picking up his bottle and taking another drink from it before beginning. "Where are Danny and Luke?"
D.O.T.T.I.E. shook her head, running a scan of the ship's floors. "Not on ship at the moment. They went to get lunch; they tried to invite you along, but you had your "Do not disturb" flag on. Would you like me to find them?
Waving a dismissive hand, Dave muttered, "No, don't bother. Do you know where they were planning to go?"
Dottie shrugged. "Nope."
Dave sighed. "They don't let the captain know when they're going; they don't even tell the computer." He rolled his blue-gray eyes, and took another drink from his bottle, as the entity before him waited patiently. "I'm hungry."
Dottie nodded understandingly and smiled. "You could go to the galley, but seeing as Luke is the ship's cook, and he's not around, you're not likely to find much in there that's ready to eat."
"I can cook." He frowned. "Hell, I can probably cook better than he can." He shifted in his seat uncomfortably, getting into an upright position. His hand found the edge of the desk, and he pushed his hovering chair away from his old spot, floating across the floor. "Pah. For ship's cook, he suggests we eat out an awful lot."
Dottie shrugged yet again; a well-practiced motion. "I don't eat, it doesn't bother me."
Dave scratched his thin goatee and sighed, defeated. "I'm going to go look for them, Dottie. Hold down the fort, "'Kay?"
Dottie nodded, and faded away again, a faint announcement over the com, letting him know that the ship was now armed against intruders.
Dave pushed himself, in his hovering chair away from the desk, and planted his feet firmly on the ground. Almost mechanically, he rose from his chair, and began plodding doorward.
In space... Nobody can hear you scream... The twinkling thousands of stars reflected off of the chromatic hull of the Androphonos. Like a living being, its surface shifted now and again; causing the lights to shimmer ethereally over a huge, silver Jolly Roger. Docked at one of the uncountable numbers of interspatial quick-stops, it looked almost out of place... Technically speaking, it always looked out of place, much as most experimental warships tend to; but coupled with the fact that all of the rest of the ships docked that particular day were no more than a quarter it's size, the Androphonos seemed to be about as inconspicuous as a punk rocker at the opera. It's crew were, however, much more common looking.
So to speak.
"In space... Nobody listens to you when you order lunch." Muttered a young-looking gentleman who consequentially happened to have most of the ranks on said pirate ship. He propped his chin up upon an open palm, long blue hair hanging loosely about his face and neck. He listlessly eyed the various serving drones as they hovered between every table but his. His companion was, amazingly enough, no less laissez faire about the ordeal. Perpetually carrying a cup of coffee, the ship's engineer sat opposite the young officer, glasses catching the decidedly scant light of the restaurant and casting an eerie glow about his face. Nearly as long blonde hair fell down about his face in a similar manner, though his posture was without doubt better. Though that says very little.
Danny adjusted his glasses atop his nose, taking another sip of coffee, and looked about the room; such as it was. Full of nobody important, just as it should be. Nobody seemed to recognize him or his companion, which was just fine in his mind. "Why don't you just shout to one of the waiters if you want something?"
Luke reached up and dragged a particularly large lock of cobalt-colored hair out from in front of his equally blue eyes and sighed. "That'd be rude."
Danny smirked evilly... He tended to do things evilly, as a side note, it was his modus operandi, all things considered; even at the time of smiling. "If you don't, they won't come and help you."
The younger of the two just shook his head, and allowed the forelock to fall back to its preferred position, and glanced off toward the server drones again. "It's not nice to be rude, Danny. I don't want to bother anyone, and all of these people were here before us."
Danny frowned (evilly, it bears to note), and shrugged. "You can go back to the ship and cook..."
Luke shot Danny a 'look'. "I *could* cook. But there's nothing *to* cook."
"What about all of the vegetables and things we picked up on Altarea Gamma?"
"Decorations. You can't actually *eat* Altarean food." Luke sighed. "I mean, you can eat it theoretically, but it's like trying to cook an Altarean theorist. Even their food is difficult to reason with."
Danny nodded, seemingly appeased by the comparison, and returned to his coffee. Finishing the last quarter of his cup, he set down on the table... Loudly.
Immediately, a service drone hummed over to the table, having heard the loud noise, mid-flight producing a carafe of java from within its stomach cavity with which to refill the emptied cup. It beeped and buzzed a bit as it did, presumably the robotic equivalent of whistling.
"Excuse me..." Luke hopefully chimed in.
The robot did nothing.
"Um, I'd like to order now..."
Again, no response elicited.
"Hey..."
Having finished filling the cup, the robot turned and began on its way.
Luke sighed, and leaned on his palm again, looking to Danny hopefully. "I can't be rude; you do it."
Danny chuckled to himself, and turned toward the robot's back.
Rarely from between two lips comes a noise so blood-curdlingly loud it can startle a robot with basically no intelligence. An art perfected after no shortage of practice, Danny shrieked at the robot. A noise worthy of a banshee's applause, it was as annoying as it was painful to hear. That same shriek was supposedly the same noise that exploded the grim reaper's head on Alvo, Danny's home... well... moon, making his people effectively immortal until meeting some fate other than old age.
The restaurant went silent. Luke clasped his hands over his ears, and all eyes were upon Danny, who smugly took another sip of his coffee. The robot unsteadily floated back to the table, beeping and buzzing a question to Luke.
"Yes, thank you. And next time he'll do something worse, like throw all of the napkins on the floor... I've seen him do it before."
The robot spoke back to him, in a series of blips and whirring noises.
Luke smiled. "No harm done, I just wanted to order a sandwich."
The robot nodded, nervously and turned toward Danny.
"Granroot bread and a cup of Altarean Death Java." He waved the robot away, and turned back to the table.
Several seconds earlier In a nearby corridor
Taking a quick glance around to insure that no one was in the immediate area, Sean stepped out of the portal and into the corridor of the space station. Fortunately, he had emerged from it at the intersection of two pathways, so no one took any notice of him as he quickly turned and started walking away.
[Okay, so I'm somewhere near whoever it is that they invited. Of course, this thing is probably three-dimensionally constructed, so there's an awful lot of space to search. So the best plan would be to find all likely hangouts for a powerful combatant- training halls, weapons stores, and so forth- and check them.] A sudden rumbling in his stomach, caused by the familiar scent of traveler's food from a nearby restaurant, derailed his line of thought. It had been a *long* time since he had eaten. [Eh... might as well grab something first, then. After that, I search out look for likely places to find him- or her. Hmmm... Of course, it might be just as easy to simply wander around and look for unusual-] His thinking was derailed again, this time by a wave of piercing sound that nearly brought him to his knees in the instant it continued for.
[-Occurrences....] he finished in his mind. [I'll lay bets that that's my partner in there. Even through the bulkhead, that still hurt like *hell*.] A small crowd had gathered at the entrance to the restaurant, but Sean pushed his way through them into the shop proper, desire for food forgotten. Inside, virtually everyone was throwing semi-covert glances towards a pair of men sitting towards the back, once apparently uncaring and the other somewhat embarrassed. [Bingo. Now, how do I tell for sure? Hmmm, maybe he got the message from the organizer, too...?] He walked towards the table where the two men were sitting.
"Excuse me...." Luke and Danny looked up at the young man who was standing in front of their table.
The two gents sitting at the table looked up from their promptly received food. Luke made as if to speak, but a mouthful of sandwich reduced the previously articulate young man to a muffled Neanderthal. Danny, however set down his cup, and looked up at their guest. "Yes? What can we do for you?"
"I was passing by outside looking for something- well, to be exact, someone- when I heard a noise. In fact, I think the someone I'm looking for is you. You wouldn't have happened to-" He was cut off as a largish man in rumpled clothes pushed by him.
Dave huffed down onto the chair next to Danny uninvited, as if he had not a minute earlier gone off to the bathroom. Wordlessly he shot Danny a quick, disapproving look, then the same one to Luke, who mirthfully chewed away, then he leaned back in the booth chair and said. "So you decided it was time for lunch without me?" He looked at Sean appraisingly for a moment, then nodded. "Hi." Then turned his attentions back to the two previously seated.
Sean glared back at the newcomer, obviously annoyed at the disturbance. "As I was SAYING, I'm looking for a partner in a tournament, and I think you're him. Until I was *interrupted*, anyways." he finished, glaring at the captain again. "So anyways- what do you say?"
The three seated at the table paused for a moment, blinking and staring at each other, then turned to take a good look at the man standing next to them. Luke forced the sandwich down his throat, and piped in, somewhat confusedly; "Do we know you?"
Sean forced down a grin. "I should hope not- I'm not from around here. And by "not from around here," I mean that there's a decent chance my molecules aren't even composed of the same stuff as yours. I'm... well, a professional wanderer and full-time bum, currently terminally bored and entered into a multi-universal fighting tournament called the Grand Merchandisable Clash of Authors. Name's Sean." He held out his hand to shake with whoever might take it.
Luke eagerly reached out to receive the extended hand, to have his wrist halted by Dave's outstretched arm. Dave frowned incredulously. "I haven't heard that one before. Are you a bounty hunter?" He squinted, and an odd reflection appeared on his eyes.
"Bounty hunter? I don't think you could have been farther off from the truth there.... I'm not really *anything*, actually. Other than bored and a bit lost, which don't really count. As for proof... well, I don't suppose there is any, other than coming with me...." Out of the corner of his eyes, Sean glanced at the odd glint in the rumpled man's eyes. Something about that....
Dave frowned. "Well. You don't show up as having any molecular structure at all." The glow subsided. Dave sighed and looked at Danny. As if Sean had ceased to exist, he conferred with his crew. "Well guys, he might just try and kill us all in our sleep. And if he is a bounty hunter, he could try and hijack the Androphonos or something."
Danny shrugged nonchalantly. "Eh."
Luke agreed, smiling. "What were you saying about a tournament?"
Sean smiled grimly. "I don't suppose I look particularly trustworthy. It's the trenchcoat, isn't it? It's always the trenchcoat. Oh well...." He turned to face Luke. "Well, I can't say I know too much about it myself, but it's supposed to be a fight between a bunch of people from various universes, with the standard prize of Anything You Want." He paused to dodge aside from one of the cleaning robots, who had come to pick up the plates from the three's table. He continued. "So anyways, I need a partner, 'cause it's only for teams of two, and they said I could find one here. I'm assuming that one of you was the result of that... disturbance... earlier?"
Luke smirked, suppressing a laugh into his bandaged hand, and Dave sighed, looking down to the table in some semblance of shame. Danny merely looked toward Sean, and shrugged. The unusual reactions garnered by the three were more than enough to tip one off that it more than likely originated from somewhere in their area.
Sean grinned again. "Yeah, I thought as much. Lemme see... sonic attack, high-frequency sound, though not enough to actually kill someone. I suspect you could do it if you tried, though. Lessee...." He closed his eyes for a second, focusing inward, and hummed a quick note. For an almost unnoticeable second, his form flashed black as the nearby plates, glasses, and tableware vibrated noticeably. Sean opened his eyes again. "Yup, that's it. Nice trick. I may have to learn it for later."
Danny looked up at Sean wryly, "I doubt it could actually kill anyone, just hurt their head really badly."
Luke nodded a few times, smiling. "Danny's a *freak*."
Sean raised an eyebrow. "You'd be surprised. You people seem downright *normal* to me. If you guys are finished, could we move out of here? I'm kinda getting tired of dodging the service bots, and sooner or later one of them is going to get me." As if on cue, one of them did indeed run into him, spilling a tray of soups and salads onto the floor and onto Sean. Sean cursed, wiping off his sleeve where interesting vegetarian soup had made its impression. The robot simply beeped in surprise several times and looked around for the invisible obstacle that had impeded it. "See what I mean? Sorry, but I've got to get out of here before narrative casuality ruins this thing any more."
Dave nodded. "Since it seems I'm outvoted on this subject, let's get back to our ship and talk this over. A tournament, you say...?"
Later that day Back at the Focal Point
"And here. And here. And sign here as well. Initial here. And here too, but upside-down and backwards. Then, check here, here, here...." The tech's droning was almost hypnotic as Sean and Caine, the newfound partners, signed page after page of legal documents. Sean had made some half-hearted efforts to read what they were signing at the beginning, but after twenty pages of "The undersigned (heretofore known as "Proxy Writer A") agrees not forthwith to denudate all indemnifications, reactions, perusals, and so forth, except as noted by Appendix C of the..." he gave up.
When they had finally finished, the tech took the pads away and handed them to another tech, which scurried off. He turned back to the assembled group. "Now that the formalities are out of the way, welcome to the Focal Point."
Sean frowned. "We've gotten this speech already."
"Ah. Yes. Well then, if you'll just make yourselves at home over there-" he pointed to a large, apartment-like building. "-Then the tournament will start in five days."
"Actually, I have a question," Caine added, almost as an afterthought.
The tech sighed, exasperated. "What is it?"
"Where do we park our ship?"