Disclaimer: I don't own any of the fandoms featured in this fic. The Nexus universe is the creation of my brother and I, as well as everything in it.
(I think it's amusing that out of all the people who added this to their favourites, none reviewed...)
WAYFARERS OF THE SPACE-TIME CONTINUUM - Chapter Five
"So where are we going now?" Ted asked.
"Where d'you want to go?" Frank asked in reply, instinctively checking the road for traffic and then realising it was pointless.
"Home would be good," Marty mused.
"Yeah," Ted agreed.
"I meant besides that," Frank said. "I doubt we'll be getting home any time soon, if ever."
"Where's the nearest town?" Neo asked.
Marty turned on the pathfinder and fiddled around with the buttons. "Fesham," he finally replied. "But that's the one Tom told us about, back the way we came. The next closest is Reskan…" He pressed one of the buttons, and an arrow appeared on screen pointing in the direction of the town. "It's that way," he said, pointing.
"How far?" Neo asked.
"Ah… it says 377 nems."
"What the #$&! is a nem?"
"It could be short for nemesis," Ted suggested.
Marty interrupted Neo's reply to that suggestion by a quick use of the handy calculator function. "It's about a hundred and forty miles," he said.
"They could just say so," Frank commented. "It's a better option than using some weird unit of distance that just conjures up strange mental images of having to get past three hundred and seventy seven nemesises."
"So we're going there?" Marty asked.
"I say no," Frank said. "What're we going to do when we get there? This whole place is the same; it doesn't matter which part of it you're in. We might as well ditch the pathfinder and go wherever we feel like going." He gave a short laugh. "After all, we've got eternity to be here. Eternity is a long time. Let's just walk and see where we end up."
The trees in the wood were placed surprisingly far apart, giving the travellers ample space to walk. Golden black trunks rose up around them into the bright radiance of the sky; on the ground, twigs cracked beneath their shoes with each step on the leaf-carpeted floor. All was quiet. They appeared the only living things around, apart from the trees, and even the trees didn't look particularly alive.
It was only after several minutes of walking that Neo realised just what was so weird about the trees: their roots were not visible above the ground. The trunks simply went clearly through, not even widening as they descended but rather remaining the same width as the middle of the trunk.
No one talked much. The four of them just wandered aimlessly through the trees in a roughly western direction. There weren't in actuality any real north, south, east or west in the Nexus: those had been decided arbitrarily, and beacons placed at various points to orientate the pathfinders' compasses.
After about twenty minutes, they came to a break in the trees. Up ahead, the remains of a stone wall cut through the wood, and beyond that lay old broken down stone buildings, stretching for some way into the distance.
"Whoa," Ted said.
Neo gave him an 'I-was-going-to-say-that' look.
"Wonder what place this is," Frank said.
Marty dug a pathfinder out of his bag and did a quick location search. "The ruins of Reltis," he replied. "Apparently it was some city or something…" A sudden thought struck him, and he took out The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Nexus. Flipping through the pages, he soon found the relevant entry. "Here," he said, and read it out.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Nexus has this to say about Reltis:
"Reltis was the first major city in the Nexus, founded and populated by a humanoid race of beings known as the Mastragaths. The city flourished and grew for three hundred standard years, before the Mastragaths all vanished mysteriously one day. Rumour goes that this was caused by a focussing of the thirteen o'clock wind from Babel, a tower constructed by The I, who didn't like Mastragaths very much."
There was a short silence after Marty finished reading this.
"That's it?" Frank asked.
"Yeah."
"What's The I?" Neo asked.
"Ah…" Marty flipped the pages, and found the entry. "'The I was supposedly the first human ever to enter the Nexus, though time being what it is here, that claim is therefore subjective. Not much else is known about The I, except that he liked to sing and his name was Elvis.'"
A long silence greeted Marty.
Frank shook his head slowly. "This is the weirdest place ever," he muttered. He got out his water bottle and took a gulp of water from it, then wiped his mouth on the back of his hand.
They got into Reltis through one of several gaps in the broken down wall, stepping out onto the cracked paved road on the other side. Heading on straight, they wandered through several rows of stone ruins.
"Elvis," Neo uttered incredulously to himself somewhere along the way for no particular reason.
Ted's gaze was drawn to a small bright splotch of faded red on one of the exterior building walls. Things that are simultaneously bright and faded are, to say the least, pretty unusual, and Ted wandered over to get a better look.
"Whoa. Check this out, dudes!" he exclaimed several seconds later.
Marty wandered over. The Nexus is meant for wandering. "What's that?"
"Words, I think."
"What's it say?"
Ted squinted to make out the marvellously bright faded lettering. "You ain't nuthin' but a hound dog," he read.
"You gotta be kidding," Frank muttered. He went over to the wall and stared closely at the words.
"You ain't nuthin' but a hound dog," he was forced to admit. "This is the weirdest place ever," he repeated.
They moved on, heading nowhere. At one point, Neo thought he heard something – several somethings – but he couldn't pinpoint its source and decided it was probably just the trees. Nonetheless, he kept taking short glances behind him; just in case.
It was as they were passing what looked like the remains of an old tower that Marty first noticed that the sky had changed. By right it should only have been about late morning, yet the sky above seemed to disagree. It was a definite evening blue, and getting darker.
"What's up with the sky?" Marty asked.
"Time moves strangely in the Nexus," Frank mused, eyes to the sky and back to the tower as he quoted Tom. "Night and day when it pleases…"
A low growl sounded from behind Frank, and he jumped in shock, turning unsteadily to face several dog-like creatures that crawled out of the tower's opening. He yelled and tripped over a rock.
The dog-like creatures opened their mouths to bare huge undog-like green fangs, moving slowly but deliberately towards the four in a hungry sort of way.
Frank stumbled to his feet, half-tripped over an old, partly buried pair of blue suede shoes, and stumbled to his feet again. He took several steps backwards, not daring to take his eyes from the newcomers.
Neo swore as another group of them appeared from the other side. Together, the two groups came closer, trying to cut off any way of escape.
"What I say 'go', run that way." Neo said, pointing.
"Maybe they're friendly," Ted suggested.
"GO!"
Three of them dashed towards the increasingly narrow gap, as the momentarily stunned predators watched them go. A second passed, then Neo executed an admirable U-turn, ran back, grabbed Ted's arm and yanked the teen along just as the creatures decided it might be a good idea to give chase.
Ted winced as he lost his footing for the sixth time but was dragged along nonetheless. "Slow down, dude, you're going too fast…"
"Do you want to get eaten?" Neo hollered at him, then went even faster. They soon caught up with Frank and Marty.
The creatures rounded the corner and pounded after them. One stopped along the way to investigate a curious piece of stone shaped exactly like Jabba the Hutt. It tried to eat it and choked to death. Another then ate its late comrade and met a similar fate when it reached the stone.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Nexus has this to say about ganras:
"Ganras are medium-sized, furry creatures which look like a cross between a dog, an anasaurus, and something the cat dragged in. Once kept as guard animals in the Mastragath city of Reltis, ganras survived when their owners disappeared, and they have since taken up residence among the ruins.
"Ganras are armed with low intelligence and long green fangs. The former is of not much use, but the latter can be used to poison their prey. However, this is not so much poison of the kind that can kill one, but more of the kind that affects one's mind and makes one think one is a gin and tonic. The ganras would then spend some time being amused by their prey's alcoholic identity crisis before eating it.
"Ganras are extremely hardy creatures and can spend up to twenty-five standard years without food. By a strange but useful coincidence, that is also the amount of time it takes before some idiot wanders into the ruins of Reltis, thus satisfying the ganras' consumption needs."
The remaining ganras continued in their pursuit, gaining on the travellers.
Marty's life started flashing before his eyes. He had just got past the Universal Studios opening credits when from slightly in front of him, Frank yelled and disappeared beneath the ground. Marty had little time to think about this before momentum carried him forward and he became the one doing the yelling. Seconds later, the other two joined them.
For a moment there was nothing but sand and soil and dust and very small rocks and yelling and not so small rocks and falling, then with several thumps they landed on a smooth floor in pitch black darkness.
From far overhead came the happy yelp of one ganra relaying the message that one of their party had apparently died someway back and could therefore be eaten. Then came the sound of all of them running to investigate the news.
There was silence.
"Is everyone here?" Neo asked.
"Yeah."
"Yeah."
"Yeah."
Ted fumbled in the dark for his pocket torch and turned it on. The orange light showed the four of them on the ground, both them and the ground covered with sand and dust and very small rocks.
"Where on earth are we?" Frank asked rhetorically.
Neo turned somewhat furiously to Ted. "About just now," he started, "why the #$&! did you just stand there for?" he demanded. "You nearly got us all killed!"
Ted shrugged. "Maybe those things didn't want to eat us," he said. "Maybe they were just lonely, or…"
Neo took off his bag and dumped it on the floor. "Give me the flashlight."
Ted handed it over, and Neo placed it a safe distance away. Then he grabbed the teen's shoulders and shoved him forcefully to the ground. Ted yelled as his head hit the floor. He kicked out, his foot connected with Neo, and the latter responded with a well-placed fist that narrowly missed Ted's jugular vein.
Neo gritted his teeth. "The next time I say run, you're going to run, you understand me? Because if you don't, I'm not going back for you again, and you'll be eaten and torn to bits and digested and no one will care."
"I would," Frank said.
"Shut up."
"Cheery fellow, isn't he?" Frank commented to Marty. "Let go of him, Neo. You won't accomplish anything by killing him."
"Wanna bet?"
Frank raised an eyebrow.
Neo released his hold on the teen and gave him back his torch. Cautiously, Ted took it, on guard for another attack, but Neo appeared to have lost interest in beating him up.
One by one, they got to their feet and looked around. They were at the end of a long corridor that went on for a while before turning left. Strange markings marked the wall in the way markings tend to do, interspersed here and there with strange drawings. What looked like torches of the non-electric kind were situated at intervals on the walls.
Frank walked over to inspect the nearest one. "We could try lighting one of these," he said as he brushed very small rocks out of his hair. "We've got that cigarette lighter thing, after all."
"Firebox," Marty corrected.
"It shouldn't be that hard," Frank continued. "There might be some sort of fuel still left in these things…"
Holding the torch such that its light fell on where Frank was looking, Ted looked to his right and saw a strange small rectangular piece of metal set flat into the wall. One-half of it was raised slightly. Curious, he pressed it.
The wall-torches came on, flooding the place with warm light.
Everyone stared.
"Whoa," Ted said happily, shading his eyes from the sudden brightness, "electric lights!"
The lights in question were not exactly electric, but that is just a minor thing that normal people normally don't care much about. As such, no one questioned Ted's assumption regarding the electricity of the lights.
When his eyes had become accustomed enough to the light to keep reasonably open, Frank started inspecting one of the strange coloured drawings on the wall. It consisted of three panels; the first showed a humanoid figure climbing a tree; the second showed it sitting on a branch and sawing at the connection; the third showed it falling off the tree, still half-sitting on the sawed off branch.
Ted found another switch near the first one and pressed it. Merry piped music filled the place.
They had just entered the largest comic strip gallery in the Nexus.
"Nice," Marty commented.
The end where they had fallen out onto was filled with rubble – sand, stone, sandstone, very small rocks, rather big rocks, and the occasional twig. From up above, small specks of light could be seen from the broken ceiling that hadn't been broken until they'd broken it.
They stood and gazed around for a while until they discovered the futility of that and started walking down the gallery. Its floor was tiled with smooth, large white tiles, each one amazingly spotlessly clean. Each gleamed and shone as the travellers approached, then got covered in dirt and very small rocks as they walked over them.
Passageways opened up here and there, leading to other parts of the gallery. They turned into the next passage, not literally of course, for people generally do not spontaneously transform into architectural structures. At the end of this one the lighting ended, and the corridor went up several steps that turned into darkness. A cool drought was blowing from it.
Ted looked for a light switch, found one, and pressed it.
The lights on the stairs came on. They went up, turned, reached an archway, and stepped outside into the darkness. It was night in the Nexus.
"Sure is dark out here," Frank commented intelligently.
They trooped down the crumbly stone steps, beneath which a nuclear family of little kitches snuggled in a little hole in the steps that had been their home for fifteen years. The children kitches listened peacefully to the parent kitches telling them a bedtime story, when all of a sudden Neo's foot dislodged a piece of stone and it squished the whole family.
Ted thought he heard what sounded like five small creatures cry out suddenly with shrieks of pain, only to be silenced. He gazed uneasily at the general area around Neo's foot, and thought he saw a pale yellow kitch antenna poking out from the stone, twitching feebly.
"Uh, Neo?" he asked.
"What?"
"…Never mind."
Ted waited until the others had moved on a little, then dropped down and scrabbled at the bits of loose stone. There was indeed an antenna poking out, and digging deeper he quickly uncovered a half-dead little kitch lying there, one of its four legs trapped under its father's dead body. The kitch looked like an oversized cartoonish ant, about one inch long, smooth all over, and exceedingly cute. It looked miserably at Ted.
"Hey, little dude… you okay?"
The kitch chirped, then gave a little click of thanks as the teen freed its leg and scooped it up gently.
"Sorry about your family," Ted said, looking at the dead kitches in the hole, "but it looks like Neo totally killed them."
The kitch snuggled into Ted's palm, and he smiled.
From up ahead came Neo's annoyed voice. "Ted, what are you doing?"
Ted got up and hurried ahead to join the rest. He showed them the kitch. "I think you killed his family, dude," he informed Neo.
"What the #$&! is that?" came Neo's reply.
Ted shrugged. "I don't know, but I think it's hurt…"
The kitch made little whirring sounds.
"We're not having some weird bug thing with us," Neo said. "Put it back."
"It's not a weird bug thing. His name is Andy."
Neo closed his eyes in exasperation. "Look…"
"Lay off him, Neo," Frank said. "It's just a weird bug thing."
"It's not a…"
"Fine!" Neo said. "Keep it then. Just don't come crying to me when the thing drills into your skull and eats your brains."
Ted looked doubtfully at Andy.
Andy nuzzled against his thumb in the way only kitches can.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Nexus has this to say about kitches:
"Kitches are small, yellow, four-legged insectoid creatures which first appeared in someone's kitchen in the Severil region. They spread out from there, and can now be found in most human parts of the Nexus. They bear a creepy resemblance to Jiminy Cricket of Disney fame.
"Unlike Jiminy Cricket, however, they eat brains.
"But it may be of some comfort to the reader to know that many kitches have since discovered alternative sources of food, and few kitches, if any, still remember what their ancestors used to feed on."
Some way from the travellers, a ganra bounded across the landscape and crashed into a three o'clock rock.
to be continued...