Chapter Two: Brave New World

There were a few drawbacks to open combat, as I had learned in training. For one, you had to reveal yourself in order to successfully pull it off. That made it nearly impossible to be able to sneak away, or flee, as your enemies most likely would track you down, hiding in some broom closet or whatever. Secondly, if you were outgunned in any way, and didn't have the element surprise, you'd be dead within a few minutes. But damn is it satisfying to hear the audible sound of a snapping jaw. I was thinking of this, as a fully armed shadow agent, busted through my door. I don't think, he expected the right hook to the face, as soon as he entered. While he was stunned, I dragged him over to the railing, and gave him a little push. The fall into the cubicle didn't kill him, but the message remained clear… stay down! His ally raised a suppressed M4 carbine to fire at me. As a response, I ran directly at him, but slid at the last second. My momentum took out both of his legs, sending him tumbling to the floor. Brushing the tussle off, I got back on my feet quickly. Before the agent could react, I had already kicked him in the stomach.

"Nice…" I said while I kicked him again

"To…" I punched him in the jugular.

"Meet you…" I picked him up by his shoulders

"Too." I slammed him into the wall, knocking him unconscious.

Without delay, I picked up his weapon. Two more agents were charging up a set of stairs, but were halted with a six round burst of rifle fire. In the back of my mind, I knew I had to get out of the building. It was now that out of the corner of my eye, I spotted the elevator sitting at the back wall of floor seventeen. That was my destination. I took a shortcut, which involved me vaulting over the railing. I landed not on the floor, rather another agent. I simultaneously fired a continuous burst of shots, into his trio of friends and finished of the stunned agent with a kick to the cranium. This floor, to my knowledge seemed to be clear, but just in case, I readied my weapon. I had just passed the last cubicle when my weapon seemed to disappear out of my hand. I looked around wildly, and spotted a shadowy figure standing on the top balcony, holding my weapon.

"Looking for this," a familiar gravelly voice spoke.

Time seemed to slow as I drew my handgun and fired at the balcony. My shots never connected. Instead, Emmet seemed to disappear. His voice spoke up again, not from the balcony, but from right behind me. I whirled around, but caught a punch to the face. As I started to black out, I heard two final words.

"Too slow."

My eyes started to blink open, when I realized I was in the basement of the agency. There was the normal stuff you'd expect to find down there like a boiler and some grainy light fixtures. Then there was the stuff only local to the P.P.S.S. There were some more exotic items dotting the storage tables around the room, like a grapple hook and a box of exploding pens. This was where inventions came to die. I turned my head to the left, catching a glimpse of a door shaped object wired to numerous junction boxes and computer screens. All of these wires connected at a central point, which was a pedestal with a large on and off switch, guarded carefully by Emmet. Out of nowhere, I felt something hit me in the ribs.

"Wakey, Wakey," I heard grunted from one of Emmet's goons

Emmet noticed I was awake, and ordered the guards to stand me up, and keep me at gunpoint.

"Mr. Donnelly! What a surprise. How nice of you to join us this evening."

"Cut the bull shit, Emmet. If you're going to kill me, might as well do it now."

"And make you a martyr and me a target? Don't be silly Oscar. I'm going to put you somewhere no one will find you, and my agents will tidy up."

"What that thing," I gestured with my head towards the teleporter "Damn piece of machinery doesn't even work."
"Really? McCoy, throw the switch."

A man across the room pressed a few buttons and threw the on switch causing a blue tinted portal to open. What I saw at the other end was a deserted highway with fields of dead grass on both sides.

"People will find me you know."

"What? You mean the 10 people that believe you to be alive. Let's run this down shall we. That air headed agent, Jennifer I believe, is currently face down in a ditch in south Ohio. That security team is all dead as well. That robot is reset. Oh, I almost forgot. That Sergei guy's car is rigged to explode. That's pretty much everyone."

"You forgot about the director."

"That old bat? Nobody would believe her anyways. She's quite old at this point, and paired with her drinking habit makes a cocktail of untrustworthiness."

I was pretty shocked from hearing Emmet's words. It was happening again. I got to close to people, and now, they were paying the price. I'm such an idiot. I thought this time would be different. Maybe I was a fool to think that I actually could protect the people I cared about. I snapped out of my state, when I was thrown through the portal. All of my stuff was in a nice neat pile (probably getting ready to be burned judging by the smell of gasoline in the air) I rolled away, as 3 three armed agents loaded their weapons.

"You're not going to kill me," I said in a mix of confusion and shock.

"No. All three of these people's lives have been ruined because of you. They can have your death. I'll take more satisfaction in destroying everything you have achieved."

"On your knees," The agent in the middle ordered.

I complied and faced away from them, looking down the road. I could see in their shadows, that they were raising their weapons. I couldn't accept my fate. Not like this. Almost instantaneously, one after the other slumped to the ground dead. As soon as the last one dropped, I made a dash for the portal. Emmet was firing wildly at me. I knew that in his heart, he knew that I planned to make him pay for his actions. I was closing the gap, but I could see the portal dimming. I sprung through the air, just as the portal closed, hitting hard concrete instead of linoleum floor. Doing a brief scan of the bodies, I could plainly see they were killed by a sniper. Each had a small hole in their helmet. What kind of person had access to armor piercing rounds, this far in the backcountry. Then reality hit me. I was now being hunted. Emmet wasn't going to take too kindly to three of his men being killed. I cursed under my breath and began to punch the air for god knows why.

"GOD DAMN IT," echoed through the air

I felt a small prick on my neck, and the lights began to dim.

"Oh you are kidding me right now," I said as I passed out

I woke up a few hours later. The first thing I checked was that my wallet was still here. Don't ask why. It just became a force of habit after all of my times blacking out drunk. Everything remained the same, save that there was now a house key in one of the pockets, and my currency being replaced with some weird looking twenty dollar bills. Instead of Andrew Jackson, there was an image of a buck in a business suit. What reality was I in? Animal Worshiping Cultists? PETA now controlling the government? I had no idea, and I wasn't exactly in the mood to cause my head to explode. My top priority was to find out exactly where I was. With that goal in mind, I picked up my bags, and headed south down the main road.

The first thing that I noticed, was a small scrap yard. I passed under the big metallic sign, advertising the lot. Big Joes Salvage, it read in bold red letters. Luckily, I spotted a semi-damaged Volkswagen beetle in the corner. When I opened the door, and checked the dash, a set of car keys fell on to the patched, cloth seat. Say what you want, but my luck can be pretty uncanny at times. The gas was pretty low, but it was drivable. Plus there was a quickie-mart a few miles up the road. That was my next destination.

A few minutes of driving brought me to the gas station. I chose regular and stood in the open air for a few minutes, filling "my car". These were the kinds of moments I missed. Something so small like buying gasoline, without the fear of being shot felt nice. This was the case in Alaska, but not here (wherever here was). At least the sun was just starting to rise. For some reason, the sun reminded me of some eggs. This spurred me to go into the store to get some food. Interdimensional travel sure does work up an appetite! One thing I learned in the agency about shopping inconspicuously is to not make eye contact with anybody. Shop keepers especially. The back row of the shop was where all the crappy junk food was kept. I eyed some ready to go breakfast sandwiches. However, these were not like the ones I was used to. Sure, they had eggs and cheese, but that's where the similarities ended. One had kale and carrots on it (deffinently avoid). One had tofu (nope). Lastly, there was one plain one at the back of the shelve.

"Thank god," I praised under my breath.

The problem with my method of remaining unnoticed was the fact that I missed a lot of stuff. In fact, I was so absorbed that I did not notice that the man behind the counter wasn't a man at all, rather a dingo in a patched green sweatshirt.

"Welcome to quickie mart. How can I help you," he asked in a southern accent

The voice sounded so close to human, I responded normally. I wasn't even looking in the direction of the cashier (out of the window), which added on to my inability to pay attention to my surroundings and his inability to question what I actually was.

"I'll just have the sandwich." I placed a twenty dollar bill on the counter "keep the change"

I resumed my drive, when a thought hit me. If I was in an alternate reality, my agency could still exist. If I could somehow find a way to contact them, maybe I could get out of this mess. My phone wouldn't work, as I had no service. There was still a glimmer of hope. If I could use someone else's phone, maybe I could finally get out of this mess. It was then, that I noticed a small farm house. That gave me an idea. At the academy, we were taught a multitude of ways to get into contact with the agency. The best one in my opinion, is to pretend that your car is wrecked, find a nearby house, and fake calling a mechanic. I stopped at the nearest house, which appeared to be a farm. Parking my car a little bit up the road (just far enough that someone could see it, but not tell how damaged it was), I walked up to the door. They seemed to be growing carrots, oddly enough. Then again, my location appeared to be in northern California, judging by the landscape, which rationalized the carrot farming. I arrived at the door, standing on a carrot welcome mat. I then politely knocked on the door.

"Hold on a second," a female voice said from inside the house.

I waited for a few seconds, glancing at my Rolex and taking in the environment. I was just starting to get bored, and considered moving on to the next house. As if right on cue, the door handle turned, and the door creaked open.

"Hi mam, I was wondering if I could use your phone. My car is…"

I trailed off when I noticed that the person wasn't human, but a small bunny. When she walked out of the house, on two feet, I nearly jumped a few feet. Then our eyes met.

"Gah, what in the heck are you," she yelled, surprised.

"I was just about to ask you the same thing,"

"What, are you an alien," she asked again. Turning to the house, she yelled, "Stu, you got to see this."

I was getting pretty flustered at this point, so I decided to make my exit. Making a mad dash for my car, I heard some commotion from the house, and some yelling. I didn't care. I just needed to get the heck out of dodge. I practically jumped into my car, and sped off down the road. It took me an hour of driving down a deserted highway to calm down. Still, I was seeing billboards everywhere, advertising products with cringe worthy animal puns. Then something caused me to put on my breaks. I stepped out of my car, and ran up a nearby hill to get a better look. What I was seeing appeared to be a gleaming an advanced city, broken up into what appeared to be districts. In all honesty, it appeared to be quite scenic. Must have been better than New York.

"What the shit," I said confused under my breath.