Erica poured another one of the multicolored chemicals in the beaker, she had been trying to break through the barriers between universes ever since she had heard about the multi-verse theory, and now it was so close she could smell it. It was funny, she didn't think it would smell like something burning, something burning! She turned around to see one of the beakers shatter over the flame meant to heat up chemicals to high temperatures, for science. The chemicals covered the counter and caught fire, destroying her research notebooks she had worked on for weeks.
"Not again!" she screamed as she grabbed the fire extinguisher she always kept close by and doused the flames in the cool foam. "I'm never going to hear the end of this", she said as she started to clean up the mess.
"You got that right", she heard from behind her.
She didn't bother to turn around when she said, "Shut up and help me clean this, Troy".
Troy laughed as he walked over to her and started to help, they had known each other since they were kids, so he knew what would cheer her up. "You want to go get some sundaes with me and Janet later?" He asked as he was cleaning up what looked like a book, but he couldn't be sure.
She sighed and said "Yeah, but I need to get home soon and try and salvage these notebooks, they were so young!" she exclaimed as she grabbed the notebooks and mock cried.
Troy laughed and said "Okay, I'll text Janet and we'll go right after school." He pulled out his phone and texted with one hand, and cleaned with the other. They got the lab clean a few minutes before a class was starting to file in, they made it look like nothing had happened, well except for a beaker and some books that no one noticed were missing.
They met at their local Dairy Queen, which happens to be where they all met one day, pooling their money to buy a large sundae, and ever since then it had been a tradition to go there at least once a week and talk about things that were happening in their lives. Janet showed up a few minutes after Troy and Erica did.
As soon as she did Troy said "Hey Janet guess what happened today?"
Janet put her hand on her chin and said "Hmmm, does it involve fire?"
Erica said "Very funny, it was a small fire, no harm done" Troy looked at her with squinty eyes, "Well, there were some books and a beaker" Erica said with some red in her cheeks. Troy was still looking at her, so she said "Okay! Uh, and the notebooks you gave me, Janet."
Janet laughed and said, "I figured they would go sooner or later, just not a month after you got them" Just then their sundaes came and they all dug in, idle chatter filled the Dairy Queen as the three friends ate, thinking about their future. They all wanted to travel, not around the world, but in the stars, across the multi-verse. Have grand adventures and be heroes. As a result of these ambitions, they all trained to fight, karate, boxing, and the like. They knew it was crazy, but a part of them wouldn't let it go. So they lived their lives waiting for something, either Erica finding a way, or by some other means.
Erica got home at 6 and immediately started to go through her notebooks and copy what she could onto some fresh notebooks. The task was agonizingly slow, but she had to do it if she didn't want to start over from scratch, she didn't have a computer, so she couldn't copy it into the digital realm. It took her 3 hours to get it done, the resulting notes taking up one notebook, when she originally had four.
She sighed and went to close the notebook, but something caught her eye and she stopped, a variable she hadn't thought of before was right in front of her! How had she not seen this before? She ran to her whiteboard and erased the previous notes, she furiously started to write out a complex equation that her teachers would never figure out in their lifetime. She finally collapsed into a deep sleep at 4 o'clock in the morning, the board covered in different colored numbers and symbols, all pointing to a swirling vortex in the middle.
The next day, Troy was walking to the lab to check on Erica like he did every day. When he got there he could see light coming from the room, he cautiously opened the door to see Erica staring at an intense light coming from one of the beakers. "What is that?" he asked, he couldn't look directly at it because he didn't have any goggles, so he just looked at Erica.
"It's a rip between universes!" She exclaimed excitedly.
He looked at her incredulously, "You did it?!" he said as he ran to the door and locked it.
She didn't look away as she said "Yes, but there's no way of telling where it goes, it could go into the vacuum of space, or right outside this room. We'll never know until I go in and see."
Troy said, "No, if you can't control where it goes, then you can't test it!"
"I know, but it's the only way, I'm going to take it home and test it there. It's now or never, I don't know how long it'll stay open." She said, still not looking away.
He looked at her and said "I know you really want this, but you could die! Or worse, pop up in a government facility where they experiment on you to figure out how you did it!"
She reached over and picked up the beaker, "I'm taking it home anyway, I can't leave it here" she said, and put it in her backpack.
He looked at her backpack and said, "Just promise me you won't use it without making sure you'll survive first"
"Of course" she said, "And if it works and is stable, we can go anywhere we want!" She brought the 'Rip' as she started to call it, home and put it in her closet for safe keeping. Her phone beeped and she pulled it out of her pocket, it was a text from Janet, [You did it! We're going to watch all of the Pirates movies tonight, you should come and we can talk about how you did it] She thought about it, I do like pirates and crazy Johnny Depp, she wrote back that she would be right over and grabbed her jacket. As she was leaving she took another look at the Rip, not now, she thought, I'll do some more calculations and find a better way. She walked outside and closed the door.
(Transition)
Flash jumped from his ship to the other, holding onto a rope that he didn't think would be able to hold him, he hummed the theme from Pirates of the Caribbean as he swung across the water.
"Shoot him!" The captain of the other ship screamed, Flash pulled his stun gun and started shooting wildly at the shipmates, felling a few of them, but mostly missing everything. He continued around and around the mast, bullets whizzing past him, a little too close for his comfort, but he looked cool, he knew that. He let go of the rope and flew towards the captain, with all of his momentum he knocked him out as soon as he landed. He turned around in time to see his team take out the rest of the pirates.
"Good job everybody" he started, "Now take everything, leave nothing, and find that box!" They started searching the ship and he went to the captain's quarters, looking under everything, a compass, some sheets of paper, the box he was looking for, and an ink jar. Welp, must not be here, he thought and walked outside. A few minutes later he sheepishly walked in and grabbed the box.
(Transition)
"And it was that easy", Erica had been explaining how she had made the discovery for the past 30 minutes.
"I have no idea what any of that means, but it sure sounds interesting" Troy said as he yawned for the umpteenth time. "Have you been working on making it stable?" he asked.
She yawned and then said, "No, not yet, I came straight here when I got that text."
Janet looked away from the movie and said, "Yeah, sorry, I really wanted to watch Johnny Depp outsmart everyone that thinks he's a terrible pirate." They laughed, then yawned, then went back to the movie, thinking about what they would do if they were in the movie.
(Transition)
"Faster!" Flash yelled from the top of the crow's nest, "They're gaining on us!" He didn't think they would wake up fast enough to catch up with them, that was his problem most of the time, not thinking would be his downfall one day he knew, but not today. He pulled his jacket open and took inventory, 2 stun grenades, 3 rubber bands, and a few twizzlers. He pulled out a twizzler and ate it, then quickly went back to his jacket. He pulled out the two stun grenades and put them into his stun gun, I really need to learn how to shoot this, he thought as he took aim at the other captain's head.
"For Asgard!" he yelled as he fired the gun twice, one missed and went into the water, but the other went right between the captain's eyes and exploded with electricity, it chained to all of the other pirates and stunned them as well. "Yes!" He yelled, "That was totally worth 14 experience levels!"
He jumped from the crow's nest and used his rockets to land safely. "Well, it's been fun", he said, "But now I have to go, if you ever need anything..." He paused, "... Don't call me because you don't have phones yet".
His temporary crew laughed at him and said they're goodbyes as he picked up his newly acquired box and checked his watch.Fully Charged, it read, "Goodbye everybody." He said, then pressed a button and a white portal opened up, he walked into it, and the portal closed.