Beep, beep, beep!
"It's got to be here, we're basically on top of it," it was the fourth time Stephen had said that and Nick was getting frustrated.
"Maybe you're reading it wrong, give it here," he grabbed for it but Stephen pulled away too quickly for him. Nick let out an annoyed sound.
Stephen smiled at him, "How about you walk that way and I'll walk this way and we'll come round in a circle and up that way. If we don't find something then we'll make camp, have a romantic little fire and fall asleep under the stars, then try again with fresh eyes tomorrow," the sun was beginning to go down after all.
That lightened the professor's mood a little, "Well in that case I almost hope we don't find anything," he gave Stephen's ass a playful pinch before heading off in the direction he was given.
They each walked in opposite directions for ten minutes, coming round in a circle to meet in what you could barely describe as a clearing, heavily surrounded by trees. As they stepped into the clearing, they both saw the shimmering light of an anomaly.
Beep, beep, beep!
"Found it!" Stephen called out cheekily. He proceeded to check his gadget, "Seems to be a pretty strong signal, won't close for a few days I'd say. And luckily a safe one; it's just present day California...I think..." he read off the readings as they came in on his device. He gave Nick a sly look, "Fancy a quick trip to California?"
"What do you mean that you think it's present day California?" Nick enquired as he joined Stephen on the edge of the clearing.
Stephen frowned and looked back down at the device, "Well, it's flickering between California and nothing, and when I say nothing, I mean that it doesn't exist. So my best bet is California. Come on, let's just go for a couple of hours, it'll be fun. Please!" he gave Nick puppy dog eyes.
Nick shielded his eyes, "No, don't give me that look, we can't just go to California, what if the anomaly closes?"
"Then we catch a plane back? Come on, Nick, how often do we find a safe anomaly that won't screw up any time lines and allow us to holiday a little?" Stephen gave him the face again.
With a sigh Nick gave in; Stephen knew how to get what he wanted, "Alright, a few hours, that's it!" the next thing Nick knew Stephen had gripped his hand and was pulling him through the anomaly. For a moment he thought that they hadn't gone through, as the forest they had just arrived in looked almost identical to the one they had just left, just a lot brighter as it was only midday in California.
"OK, I'll admit I didn't expect to come out in a forest, but- Holy shit!" Stephen also didn't expect to see seven identical shimmering portals to other places all hovering in a larger version of the clearing they were just standing in back in England.
"Christ!" Nick was bewildered, "this cannot be good."
As if the universe had heard him, suddenly a tall, thin beast with a pointed jaw and big yellow eyes ran out of one of the anomalies nearest to them and disappeared into the forest.
"What the bloody hell was that?!" Nick exclaimed; he'd never seen a creature like that before. Then there was a great pitch black dog running out of the same anomaly and after the beast, following closely behind was a stag and a man dressed all in black with matching hair, bringing out the paleness of his serious face.
"Oi!" Nick called out after the man who glanced back for a moment, pointed a stick at them then obviously thought better of whatever it was he was about to do and kept running after the others.
"Should we follow them?" Stephen asked, looking just as shocked and confused as Nick.
"I don't know. Maybe we should stay here in case anything or anyone else comes out of one of these," he gestured to the rest of the anomalies.
Both Stephen and Nick jolted and turned their heads sharply as the sound of car tyres screeching to a holt echoed through the forest. A short, painful yelp followed immediately.
"It came from the same direction that lot went," Stephen stated, silently asking Nick to make a decision about what they should do.
Before a decision could be made, however, two more people stepped out of a different anomaly.
"I'm telling you Tony, we should do more tests before even thinking about stepping through this thing, we don't know what could be waiting on the other-oh…"
The man that must have been Tony was gripping a hand as he stepped through the glimmering light. That hand was attached to another man wearing glasses with curly black hair, he was the one speaking as they came through, though he cut off the end of his sentence seeing where they were and realising they weren't the only ones there.
The four men stared at each other for a moment, unsure of what to do or say.
"Uh, hello," the man with the glasses said rather timidly.
"Well, hello indeed," Nick greeted back, "where are you guys from then?" straight to business.
Tony took the lead on the question, "You don't know who we are?"
"Should we?" Stephen replied.
"You've heard of Iron Man, right?" Tony seemed taken aback.
"Is that some sort of weight lifting champion?" Nick asked.
Tony's stood in astonished silence, meanwhile his companion decided it was time to actually figure out what was going on here.
"Let's start again. Hi, I'm Bruce, this is Tony," he gestured to Tony, who was still caught in a state of shock, "we are from New York in America, we are scientists investigating this portal type thing, and Tony here had the brilliant idea that we should just go through it, and here we are. Your turn…"
"Okay well, I'm Stephen, this is Nick, and we are from London, England. It's our job to investigate these 'portals', we call them anomalies, they crop up all the time and we often have to go through them. We have designed special equipment to detect, locate and read anomalies. It may also intrigue you to know that we are now in California," Stephen explained.
"Yes, I believe California would be correct. This is the first 'anomaly' we've ever encountered, we couldn't really get much from it except for the energy readings and co-ordinates for the east of America," Bruce informed them.
"I'm starting to think I have an explanation for your 'nothing' reading earlier, Stephen," everyone looked at Nick, "we may be living in the same year as them, but our universes are not the same. There is no way that America has never seen an anomaly before, we've been dealing with them for a few years now. And Tony, you expected us to know who you are, yet we have no clue. Also just before you two came through, another band of four ran out of their own anomaly and took off through the trees, we heard a car brake suddenly not too far from here and were about to head off to investigate when you both showed up."
Both Tony and Bruce had looks of awe on their faces, they spun in a circle slowly, taking in the fact that they were surrounded by seven anomalies.
Bruce came back to his senses first, "This is all very exciting and I certainly want to know more, but we should probably go help those people who came through before us, especially if they've been in an accident."
Everyone immediately agreed and they quickly set off in the direction Nick and Stephen heard the noise from.