Disclaimer: Same as previous.

Announcement: Real World, the three-part novel on which this is a spin-off from, has been completed; the link to it is in my bio. So if you want to know how everything started out and how the characters first met each other, go read. (If you get bored from lack of plot, fast forward to Part 1 Chapter 13.) And please review! It will be very greatly appreciated. :)

Wayfarers of the Space-Time Continuum: Chapter Six
No Need to Get Hung About

The shadows cast by the ruined buildings lay strangely on the ground. Put together, each seemed to contradict each other with regards to the position of the light source that did the shadow-casting.

The travellers did not follow any visible path, simply walking where it was possible to walk, stepping around the larger piles of rubble that dotted the landscape. Ted hung at the rear, his attention often captured by some thing or other, while the other three took it arbitrarily in turns to take the lead.

The forest of the Nexus did not intrude here. Up above, the undulating blues and blacks that formed the sky were clearly visible, as were the Nexan constellations that shone down from it.

Down below, the only sounds in the architectural graveyard were the footsteps of the four travellers and the occasional snatch of the one-sided conversation between Ted and his newfound insectoid friend.

"…and I don't think brains taste good, so you really shouldn't eat them…"

Andy's only reply was an unintelligible whirr.

"And try to stay away from Neo," Ted continued nonetheless. "I don't think he likes you very much." He hesitated. "I don't think he likes me very much either," he added as an afterthought.

Near the front, Marty cast a worried look to his left, thinking he'd seen something move. It turned out to be a dead-looking shrub swaying drunkenly in the Nexan breeze.

"I wonder what this looked like in the past," Marty said. "Looks like it was a fairly big city."

"The real question is, where did all this stone come from?" Frank asked in reply. "Is there a quarry nearby, or did the builders just steal materials from other universes?" He turned around to look behind him. "Hey, Ted – don't get left behind," he called out.

He'd be faster if he wasn't gossiping to his bug about me, Neo thought darkly. A thought struck him, and he paused in his steps. He looked back. Ted was too far away from him, beyond hearing distance. Neo frowned slightly, then shook his head and continued walking.

Marty wondered where exactly they were going.

Frank wondered where exactly they were going.

Neo wondered where exactly they were going.

"Hic," burped the dead-looking shrub swaying drunkenly in the Nexan breeze.

Ted carefully placed Andy into his pocket for safekeeping, then ran up to join others.

They walked on until they reached the western edge of the ruined city of Reltis. Large iron gates loomed up in front of them, bent outwards and to the sides as though pressed down by some huge unseen force, pointing out onto the wide path beyond that went on a bit before curving into the forest and out of sight.

The sky was turning light in the Nexus' particular brand of daybreak. There was no sun; bright streaks of warm colour just stretched their way across the sky, the trees casting surreal haphazard gold-lined shadows on the ground.

The four travellers went on through the gate and onto the path. They didn't really know where they were going; no one had any particular destination in mind, and at present were mainly taking in the sights – namely trees, trees, and more trees.

But these weren't ordinary trees, as Frank discovered when he passed by one of them, curious. The trunks of these trees passed straight down into the ground without widening and with no sign of roots; secondly, each tree trunk was not a perfect cylinder but flattened on one side, the latter a lighter side of brown than the rest of the trunk.

Frank reached out a hand to touch one, and his fingers went right through. He paused, staring at his hand inside the trunk, then cautiously pulled it out. It looked the same. He put his hand in again, followed by his arm, and reached out as far as he could; but it failed to emerge on the other side of the tree trunk.

"Whoa," Ted said in awestruck wonder.

"Other worlds," Frank murmured, pulling his arm out of the tree trunk. "The trees… the trees are the other worlds… portals of some sort…"

"Are they safe?" Marty asked.

Neo stuck a finger through the portal, wiggled it around, pulled it back out and looked at it. His finger looked fingery and nothing weird seemed to have happened to it.

Ted wondered just what the other three were waiting for. When you discover a portal to another universe, anyone knows that the only sensible thing to do is to go through it.

"Why don't we go in?" he suggested.

The others' only reply was to stare philosophically at the tree-portal.

Ted looked at them, realised that future conversation would be pointless, shrugged, and walked into the portal.

Frank blinked. "…Ted?" he asked. "Hey! Don't…"

The portal closed behind the teen, leaving Frank hanging in mid-sentence.

There was a moment's silence.

"…Is he dead?" Marty asked.

There was another moment's silence.

"Why hasn't he come back out yet?" Marty asked.

"He probably found something totally excellent in there," Neo said, and walked into the portal.

Frank and Marty looked at each other.

"You first," Marty said.

xxxx

Marty went in last. The sounds of the Nexan wood were suddenly cut off as he entered the portal, and the woodland scene replaced with a large, bare stone room. Marty felt his feet leave the soft forest floor and step onto hard stone. When he was fully through the portal, he looked back, and saw just the other side of the room. He stuck a hand in the direction he'd just come from. It slipped through the portal and made him look as if all his fingers had mysteriously vanished. He returned his hand to his side, comforted by the fact that there at least appeared to be a way out.

Thin window slats positioned near the high ceiling allowed long shafts of light to shine through into the chamber-like room, where they fell coldly onto the floor. At one end of the room lay an open archway; three others gaped into the walls on the other side, each giving hem a glimpse of similar-looking corridors and stairs.

Ted looked, for some reason, jubilantly happy. He took Andy out of his pocket and let the kitch take in the sights – namely stone, stone, and more stone.

"Now what?" Frank asked, his voice echoing around the high walls.

Ted smiled. He liked echoes.

"Doesn't look like there's much here," Frank continued.

Ted had gone through the archway and was gazing in wonder at the next room. "Check this out, dudes!" he shouted happily.

"What?" Marty asked.

They moved towards the archway until they reached where Ted was standing. This room was made completely out of stone; the longest of its walls sloped downwards from the ceiling and was of a transparent material. And through this window…

They were high up; very high. Well, not very high; they were considerably lower than the heights commercial airlines usually fly at. But they were still pretty high, enough for a cloud to float nonchalantly past them.

Neo instinctively took a step back. He didn't like heights, his love of flying notwithstanding, and this place was making him dizzy. He didn't mind heights when he was flying about. But he minded them quite a bit when he had no control over gravity, as was the case here.

From the long window they could see out to what appeared to be short buildings clustered together far below, but this only took up a small portion of the land they could see. The rest of it was covered in neat rows of green all the way to the horizon. A building or two dotted the fields at intervals, but other than that, the fields met no interruption.

They had yet to know this, but those were strawberry fields. All over, all around, strawberry fields forever.

A wooden shaft was cut into the stone wall adjacent to the windows, going down as far as they could see. In the shaft sat a wooden lift, and Ted was about to step into it when Frank stopped him

"I don't think you should go down there," he said.

Ted's face fell. "Why not, dude?"

"We don't know what's out there," Neo said, glad of any reason to get out of this place.

"But-"

A loud shout from behind made the four of them jump. They turned, only to find a small army of strangely pale humanoid creatures blocking one of the two exits to the room.

They looked angry. And from the way one of them was pointing at the travellers, the latter were probably what they were angry at.

"I have a bad feeling about this," Frank murmured.

The leader of the army barked a question in a tongue none of them could understand. When an answer failed to come, he gave a command and the group started advancing into the room.

"Go back to the portal," Frank said quietly. "We'd better make a run for it. On three. One… two… RUN!"

They dashed wildly through the other exit and back to the portal room, but their pursuers were both smarter and faster than ganras. Marty made it out of the portal safely, but before the others could follow, they found themselves pinned down by strong hands; for Ted, only to get roughly yanked back to his feet and his hand forced open - where Andy sat for all to see.

The locals went into a manic frenzy at the sight of the kitch. The leader started hollering at Ted, making frantic gestures between Andy, the general area of his brain, and his mouth, as Ted looked on in blank incomprehension.

The leader swept Andy off onto the ground and squashed him dead with a forceful stomp of his foot.

Ted's mouth fell open in horrified comprehension.

"Dude… you killed Andy…"

On the ground, Frank struggled to get hold of the converter around his neck as quietly as possible. It had fallen to his side, barely within his reach. His fingers grabbed at the string and made their way down to the converter. He set the controls: 'IN 100Y'.

With one swift motion, Frank slapped the converter against his captor's arm and pressed the big button. Almost instantly, the hand shrank away in size and a scream filled the air as Frank's captor found himself a hundred years younger.

Neo made use of the distraction and broke free of his captors, treating them to a brief display of his kung fu mad skillz before grabbing Ted and leaping out of the portal with Frank.

They landed in a pile back in the woods of the Nexus. Marty was nearby; relief coursed through his face as he saw them and realised that there was no longer any need for him to go back in after them.

Panting slightly, Neo got himself into a sitting position on the grass. "Good thinking back there," he said to Frank.

"Thanks."

"I guess this means no more new universes, huh?" Marty asked, dropping down to sit with them.

"And no more pets," Neo said, turning his gaze to Ted. The teen was too busy being depressed over Andy's death to notice.

"Marty?" Frank asked.

"Yeah?"

"Where are we?"

Marty took out the pathfinder and pressed several buttons. "Nowhere in particular," he concluded. "Nearest city is Reltis, which we just left."

"Any other tourist attractions nearby? Apart from parallel universes, I mean."

"There's a small village called Brey several nems from here," Marty answered.

"Great," Frank muttered. "More nemesises." He pulled out his water bottle and took a swig, then leant against the non-portal side of the tree and shut his eyes.

Ted plucked mournfully at the grass. He missed Andy. He hadn't even got to say a proper goodbye. He wondered what happened to little bugs when they died. Did they go to little bug heaven, or did they just-

"AHHH!"

The other three looked up at Neo's yell, only to find him seven years old and surrounded by four teenage newcomers wielding converters and advancing rapidly towards them.

Frank swore and scrambled to his feet, bolting head-first into the tree-portal they had just escaped, as a hand swiped at his disappearing foot and missed.

He emerged sprawling on the stone floor, the room now thankfully empty. He cast an anxious look in the direction of the portal, but the air was still. He got up nonetheless and made his way into the next room; there was no knowing if they would come in after him.

A couple of minutes later, he heard his name called in an urgent whisper.

Frank peeked cautiously round the corner and saw Marty in the next room, his face slightly ashen.

"They're gone," Marty said quietly, not wanting to alert the locals.

Back in the Nexus, Neo was feeling most supremely annoyed - partly at being half Ted's age, and partly because he was having trouble keeping his clothes from falling off. He gritted his teeth, muttering silent curses in his head as he rolled up his sleeves using hands too small for his liking.

Frank watched him in concealed amusement for a while, then extracted fifteen minutes of his own time into a disc and chucked the converter-cum-disc at Neo.

"Fifteen years," he said. "You owe me for this."

Neo gave up on his sleeves and picked up the converter. "Thanks," he said quietly.

"Don't mention it," Frank said, leaning back against his tree. "I just don't like the idea of having to look after three kids."

Marty was flipping through The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Nexus, and he paused on a page near the book's beginning. "I guess we should have read this first," he said. "'If you intend to travel in the woods, it is advisable to maintain a physical age of eighteen or less so as to present yourself as a less likely target of time thievery. The Ilmayen woods are especially dangerous, as they are home to a large number of Nexan gangs."

He flipped the book shut. "And that's where we are," he added. "Right smack in the middle of the Ilmayen woods, according to that." He gestured at the pathfinder.

"Just our luck, huh?"

Neo got up off the ground. "Let's make a move," he said.

"Where?"

Neo hesitated, decided that Frank made a good point, and sat back down.

"Here's our situation now," Frank said. "We've got enough food for one meal. The water should last a while longer. Money is time, and we've got a total of… uh… not very much."

"Seventy-three years," Marty said helpfully, flashing the pathfinder in calculator mode.

"Thanks. How much did they take from Neo?"

"Thirty years," Neo said. "They thanked me for them as they ran off."

"Where's Ted?" Marty asked suddenly.

And for the first time since the attack, they realised that the youngest member of their group was not with them.

To be continued.

...Go read Real World. ;)