Rift 35
Kate snuggled up next to her husband and wished for sleep but her mind just wouldn't shutdown and let her get any. "You awake, babe?" She needed to talk with him if she was going to get any sleep.
"Hmm." Rick hummed back to her. He had no idea how he was supposed to get any sleep after today. He had been involved in a real Indian fight, one right out of the history books. His baby girl was here and his wife was pregnant. How was he supposed to get any sleep now? Not to mention they had an entire dining room just downstairs filled with real robots.
"Tell me what you think. Do you believe them?" Kate asked him.
He started smiling. "Our restaurant is filled with robots, my daughter's down there, and we're in 1876. General Custer is going to be wiped out soon. Are you sure you want to know what I think?" Rick teased knowing that she already knew what he was thinking.
"Besides that… Not that I'm not glad that Alexis is here. It's just…how did she and the others get here?" They'd kept telling them that it was very complicated.
"Do you know how we got here?" he asked her yet again. Yes, they'd discussed this before and had come up with nothing. They barely remembered being tortured in 2011, New York City. Not middle of nowhere Montana.
Kate pinched him for his answer. "OUCH! Spousal abuse," Rick complained but he was smiling while he said it. "2327 and 1999 and us all in 1876. Are we supposed to stop something? Save Custer maybe? Change the past?" Rick loved thinking of the possibilities like this.
"Where are your little green men or CIA experiment?" Kate ribbed him since he had left two of his most favorite reasons out.
"I knew I would convert you and you'd see things my way." He was all set to hug her closer and kiss her till she punched him for it. She had definitely not been converted.
"FINE! Tell me what you're thinking," he challenged since his theories were being shot down as usual.
"I don't know…yet. But I will. What do we do tomorrow? We killed a lot of Indians and those that we didn't kill were run off. They'll be back." They'd lost and would want revenge, she was sure of it.
"And I want to know how they did that. Where did they get weapons like those?" She'd seen them even if they hadn't explained them.
"Yeah, they were cool!" Rick had something new to drool over and it earned him yet another punch.
"Focus, babe. We have Indians that are trying to kill us and unless you haven't noticed, I'm pregnant." Kate knew they needed a new plan, she just didn't know what that plan was.
"Oh, I noticed, trust me I noticed." He laid his hand on her baby bump. Kate was guessing she was just entering her second trimester.
"We need a hospital." She really wanted a nice modern hospital to have her child in.
"Women in 1876 had babies all the time. You'll be fine." Rick tried to allay her fears yet again.
"And women in 1876 died in childbirth a lot, too," she reminded him – again. Rick and his cursed memory of knowledge hadn't helped her in the least.
The common reason for the mother to die was puerperal fever (or childbed fever) which was caused by unhygienic medical staff and medical equipment by which the mother's genital tract is infected during childbirth.
"Then they take us back to where they came from in 2327 or do you prefer 1999?" The second he'd said it, he regretted it. He knew what that year meant to Kate. "Sorry, you know what I meant."
She sighed and cuddled a little closer. "I know. Do you really think I haven't thought about having them take us back to 1999 so I can save my mom?" The second she'd heard that the other Kate was from 1999, she began thinking.
"Have you noticed that the other you and Jim aren't with your mother and haven't said a word about her?" Rick hoped that didn't mean what he thought. Wouldn't the others especially his Alexis have said something about it?
He heard a very quiet, "I noticed," from his wife. His heart sank knowing her hope had just taken another hit.
Rick shifted so that he could look right at her. "I know you think there isn't another person besides you and your dad that want her to be alive. But I do, too, love. We can ask them in the morning, unless you want to ask them now?" He was willing to get up and go ask them right now if she wanted.
Kate reached out and placed her palm against his cheek. That was one of the things that she loved most about him. He had the biggest heart when it came to family. She already knew he was the greatest father and would be again for their children.
She leaned in and kissed him. "No, it can wait." She wanted to know but didn't want the bad news she knew was coming.
He reached out, pulled her in close and got her settled in her favorite position and his. "We'll talk tomorrow. Now sleep, okay? We may have another busy day tomorrow and my pregnant wife needs her rest." He kissed her.
Kate turned her head so that her face was buried in his body. "I love you." She meant it with all of her heart.
"I love you, too. Now go to sleep, please. You need your rest and so does the baby. I'll feed you and the others in the morning." He kissed her again and closed his eyes.
{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}
This Rick and Kate weren't the only ones having trouble sleeping. "That was creepy, babe." Kate did her best to whisper to her husband since there were others around them.
Rick simply smiled. "Which part? The fact that we fought Indians in 1876 or the fact that our older doppelgängers are sleeping upstairs?" He found both of them a little creepy. He was from 2327 after all. No one even thought about cowboys and Indians anymore.
"Ouch!" Rick complained after Kate poked him. He looked down at her.
"Our doubles, of course. All these timelines I get, but how many of us are there?" Kate complained, not realizing just how many of everyone there actually were.
"I'm not Lex, thank god, but if I was, I would point out just how many timelines that are out there," he reminded her.
"Yeah, yeah, timelines. I get all that–" Kate started only to have Rick interrupt her.
"Do you? Do you really? Every timeline means that there is – or possibly isn't – one of each of us. Maybe it was Rick that died during birth. Maybe instead of killing your mother you were captured, tortured, and then killed to keep your mother silent. The list is literally endless, Kate. Finding another us no matter what age, isn't that hard to believe. Though it is still a bit creepy." Even for him, thinking about it and actually living it were two very different things.
She was silent as she thought about it. She kind of did wish it was she who was dead. At least then she wouldn't have this pain that was never going to go away. However, if she was dead she wouldn't ever feel like she felt now. She loved Rick and Alexis and knew that they loved her back.
"You think the other me also lost her mom?" she asked, not sure what she wanted the answer to be. "Never mind." She suddenly remembered why the other her had been killed in the first place.
"So how did they get here if they are both dead?" The real question she was unwilling to ask was, Did that mean they were dead, too?
"Maybe the real question is why do they remember their prior life and know that they were killed?" That part made less sense to him than any other. "I mean, who remembers dying?"
"As if we know anyone who doesn't?" Kate retorted.
"So we ask them in the morning. Now get some–" Except Rick was interrupted.
"MOMMY, DADDY!" a little voice suddenly cried out.
Hearing that, both Kate and Rick scrambled to get up and were with Alexis instantly. Only to find Lex and Jim joining them.
Rick was holding her close as Kate was rubbing her back while Jim and Lex wanted to do the same when Rick and Kate came bursting into the dining room. Both of them were carrying weapons which were quickly hidden behind their backs.
"We heard…" Kate was just starting to figure out what got them down here in such a hurry.
Rick, though, was faster than Kate. "May I? I know something about nightmares and the ones little girls can have," Rick said, looking at his younger self and younger Kate.
{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}O{}
They had given Rick some space by retreating into the kitchen where Kate made coffee for everyone.
"I don't suppose you have any vanilla," Kate asked Kate as she handed out cup after cup.
Kate snorted. "I'd kill for some vanilla." Then she thought about it. "Actually I'd kill for a washer and dryer, too. Oh, and a doctor who actually knew something, anything." She wasn't going to admit it, but she was worried about giving birth in 1876.
"Sorry, no." Kate gratefully took the coffee.
Lex suddenly had an idea. A brilliantly wild and crazy idea. "Actually we might be able to do something about all those things and others."
Kate sipped her black coffee and tried not to make a face at the disgusting taste. She thought that by now she'd be used to the taste, but no. "I'm all ears."
"Okay… Try to keep up, it's a bit complicated," Lex warned. "It involves how we got here. After I used an object and ended up in Missy's body to talk to you and Dad."
"Yes, how did you do that? Missy blew up suddenly during our meeting and almost had a heart attack at finding herself in the church instead of in the school." Their meeting had been delayed while they tried to calm Missy down.
"That… I used a magical device that my stepmother brought from her world," Lex started to explain but was getting off track.
"Magic?" Kate didn't believe it and overlooked the other words for now. Words like stepmother and her world.
Lex waved her hand. "Not important. You're here and I'm here so I don't need to use it anymore. I do have an idea… Hear me out first. We could all enter the stairs again and go down this time until we find the door that my stepmother used." Lex thought it was brilliant and dangerous all at the same time.
"I'm sorry, stairs? What stairs?" Kate was already lost.
"Oh, you're going to love this," Kate deadpanned. She took a sip of her coffee and made a face. "What's in this stuff? It tastes like–"
Kate finished the sentence for her. "Like a monkey peed in battery acid." She started smiling since for once Rick was right. She also knew she shouldn't be drinking this crap and poured hers into the sink and set the cup into the sink.
Kate followed Kate's example and poured hers into the sink and left the cup there.
"Stairs… We know of a set of stairs that goes on forever. It's filled with doors built into the side wall. Each door is at a landing though not all landings have doors. Each door leads to another location. These locations are limitless," Lex began.
"We found doors that led into water, one led into a wall of fire… Oh, and one led into a world that was radioactive. That was fun," Kate told Kate and rolled her eyes after the last one since that door was anything but fun.
Seeing the blank and disbelieving look on Kate's face, Lex said, "I know it's hard to believe, however, we can show you and not just talk about it. And if we don't like that door we can try another."
Jim added his voice. "She's telling the truth, Katie. We found a lot of what they had to say very hard to believe. But once you live it, once you walk those stairs and see what we've seen, you'll believe, too."
"Yeah, like a World War II Japanese fighter plane attacking us. Or having the Merrimack from the Civil War attack us," Kate related. "Oh, and that modern Russian warship, don't want to forget about that one." She started shaking her head and huffed out a soft laugh.
"Not to mention being in a taxi at Coney Island one minute and sinking in an ocean the next," Jim went on to say since they had lived it, getting his Kate to nod her head.
"We've lost you haven't we?" Lex knew it was complex and hard to follow and Kate knew nothing about any of this. "I have a question for you. How did you get here and why do you know where you were from before coming here?" Lex really wanted an answer to that one.
Kate was used to switching topics quickly since Rick did it all the time. Still she had to get her feet under her first. "I… I remember being in an alley and there was pain, so much pain. Then there was someone… Next thing I knew I was walking into this town. I have no idea how I got here.
"A couple of bullies with guns had come into town and started taking what they wanted, threatening everyone. They'd already killed the one person that stood up to them. I don't know why but I felt I had to put a stop to it. At first they just laughed at me. They knew how to draw a gun fast but couldn't shoot straight. Both of them missed me. I did not miss them.
"The townspeople begged me to stay and over time convinced me to be Sheriff. Then one day, Rick suddenly walked into town. We spent hours talking." Kate lowered her head. "Something up until that time we had done very little of." She knew she wasn't wholly responsible for that, but she was a part of it.
"We found a place to stay, saved our money, bought this building and renovated it by turning it into a restaurant. We're still trying to make a second floor apartment for ourselves. Then Rick asked me to marry him." Kate wiped at the tears that had started.
"Now I'm pregnant, learned that Indians were attacking other small towns, figured we were next and you showed up just as the Indians did.
"As to why we remember?" Kate shrugged her shoulders at that one.
"Actually a lot of this is Rick. He pushed me to accept being Sheriff, pushed to get us to buy the building and what to do with it." Pushed for them to be together, asked her to marry him, convinced her to stay and fight. She really had no idea where she'd be right now without him. And she didn't want to.
Lex had a theory but decided to keep that to herself for now. "We can get you two out of here. If you're willing to go."
"Kate?" They heard a new voice and all heads turned to find Rick standing in the doorway holding a sleeping Alexis in his arms. To him it felt like old times.
Kate couldn't believe that her husband had managed to sneak up on her. She knew just what he was asking of her, though.
"What about the town? I'm still Sheriff," Kate pointed out. At that moment Rick stepped up to her still holding Alexis.
"And what about wanting a doctor? You're pregnant. Women in this time have a greater chance of something going wrong. I'm not losing you, Kate. Not after all we've been through to get here. I want our happy ending. But we have to fight for it. We have to make the right choices. Talk to me. …I love you." He didn't want her reverting back to her old ways. He liked this Kate.
She lifted her hand to cup his face and he watched her face soften. "I love you, too. So much."
Kate turned her head to look at the others. "Where does this door of yours take us?" They had gotten here somehow and said they could prove it.
"Manhattan, New York City, January 19, 1999," Lex said.
Kate thought about it. "Twelve years into the past. I'm still in Stanford. We just buried…" She stopped talking and looked at her dad and the other Kate.
"We were at Coney Island after leaving our home filled with people." Kate still remembered that day. Like there was any possibility that she would forget it.
"Yeah, the second day from hell," Kate agreed which had the other Kate looking at her. They both knew what the first day from hell was. The day they found out their mother was dead.
Jim was ahead of both of them for a change. "But Katie and I are from that date. That's the date your device picked us up and moved us. Won't we be there, or are we already gone?" He knew there was a problem but was confused about the implications.
Lex was shaking her head. "Different timeline." To her the answer to that was obvious, just not so much to the others.
Jim took it and tried to understand, but still saw a problem. "Say we're gone. We come back but now there are two Kates and two Ricks."
She shook her head again. "Different timeline. Yes, if both of you stay there could be some complications. The two of you share the same fingerprints, have the same DNA, have the same parent or parents. However, I've gotten pretty good at hacking over the years." Lex was pretty sure she could do anything she wanted in 1999.
Kate turned to ask Lex for clarification. "Wait, say that again. The part about parents."
"Different timeline. It's possible that your mother isn't dead, even if it is January 19, 1999. It's equally possible that Jim's dead. Maybe he's the one that was involved and not your mother, or any combination thereof. Or Rick's dead or I am or any number of other possibilities or people." Lex could see a countless number of possibilities.
"We would know the future. Know what stocks to buy and what ones not to. We could be rich. Know who's going to win the World Series." Rick was on a roll. Right up to the point that his pregnant wife hit his arm and glared at him.