Forbidden Fusion

by killalao

explicit multiversal adventure with lots of cute girls.

34. Traveling the nexus

-Chapter 34-

We woke to a morning that was much like any other, except we were on our bed on the floor of the bus and not at home. We didn't wake up with the sunrise, cause there wasn't one, outside it was still foggy with the strange grayish-green light. We just woke up when we felt like we couldn't sleep anymore. Then we stayed in bed and I held her for a little bit while she cried about Charley as she was worried to the point that her dreams were troubling her. I was just happy I didn't end up on the floor again. After she calmed down we talked quietly for a little while before we finally decided to get dressed and head outside to see what was going on.

One of the first things I saw after stepping out of the bus was the fireman using a small steam driven pump, which had been stashed in the van all this time to siphon water from the tankcar to Jack's tender, it was running on excess steam from Jack's boiler. It had one small cylinder and a huge flywheel that was a bulky cast-iron thing about 15 inches in diameter. The entire assembly was screwed to a small wooden cart with small steel wheels for "convienience", if something that was basically 250lbs of cast iron could be convienient. They used a ramp to get it out of the van, and it took up alot of space despite being able to pump water only slighty faster than a garden hose. Henry and Claire were in the coach where they had apparently spent the night, or, more correctly, whatever time of day this world was always in. This world had no sun, no stars, just an endless grey void and a railway of all things. Once Jack was ready to go, a wooden sign, assembled from some fire wood we cut yesterday and nails and paint from the supply car, was put up close to the tracks to indicate the world the track led to, and also to serve as a warning to other trains that the rails were barely useable. Then they packed the bulky steam pump back into the van, and then we returned to the "main" line and kept heading the same direction we had been going in for most of yesterday.

"Hey Cj? " Phoebe asked shortly after we returned to our seats in the coach. "How long is this going to go on?"

"I don't know." I replied.

"What if we're driving passed worlds here that have a portal that will take us home?" She asked.

"What are the chances of that? "I asked in return.

"I don't know." She replied.

"They'll run out of fuel eventually." I said. "Then they'll either have to turn back or come with us."

"Also, make sure you get pictures of this place, this is pretty interesting."

"Ok. "She replied as she pulled her phone out of her purse to take a picture of the endless forrest of mysterious obsidian trees out the window.

"Hows the battery holding out?" I asked.

"45 percent." She replied.

"We're going to have to find a way to charge it soon." I said.

"Yep." She agreed as she aimed her phone at the window she snapped a picture, then she pointed her phone at me.

"Smile." She said, playfully.

"Really Pheebles?" I asked.

"Mhm, smile." She cutely said again.

I briefly posed for a picture to appease my beloved, as the train traveled on.

"We need to let our Cyndaquil out so we can ask him what he thinks of being named Mr. Cinders." Phoebe said after tucking her phone away in her purse.

"Yeah we probably should shouldn't we?" I replied as she fished his pokeball out of her purse.

"Mhm." She said as I heard the pokeball expand and open to release our little jointly owned pokemon.

"Cyndaquil." He chirped.

"Hello little guy, I think we finally thought of a name for you." Phoebe said to it un a playful manner as she picked him up off the floor.

"Quiiiiiiiillll? " It seemed to ask out of curiousity.

"Well, what about Mr. Cinders?" Phoebe suggested.

"Quil." He replied.

"That's just ok?" Phoebe asked. "Well ok then I guess that's your name now."

As the minutes passed by the coach began to become more and more occupied with our smaller pokemon. Mr. Cinders began to play nicely with Henry's Totodile and Claire's Chikorita, they were darting around the coach like children. While Cap'n' Magnum. Hellblade, Blossom, Cloudella, Polli, and Cubey were a bit less hyperactive. Blossom, Cloudela, and Polli were charged with watching over the starters, in case they tried to do something dangerous, like open either of the end doors on the coach. While the others just enjoyed some R and R.

Unfortunately we couldn't let out our other pokemon as they were just too big.

A few hours passed and then we met another train, both trains came to a stop. The crews got out and spoke to eachother. From there it was determined that the other train was closer to a switch, so it went in reverse , so they could back into the nearest siding and allow us to pass. I got a good look of the train when we passed them. This train appeared to be just a lone, non-sentient, 1970s Alco Century diesel of unknown nationality, as alco diesels had been exported all over the world, and it's paint scheme was not one I was familiar with. I could see the crew through their cab windows as we passed, and they looked terribly confused, both at our sentient steam locomotive, which would have been a strange sight even without a face, and of where they were. They looked at us like we were on some kind of ghost train. Which, if they had just arrived here, and we were the first train they had come across, wouldn't be too much of a stretch for them to think that, especialy considering the coach was full of pokemon that they could clearly see through the windows. They ended up turning around and following us, apparently trying to get back to where they came from. They followed us for maybe another hour before they apparently found the switch they came out of and quickly headed back to their own world. We knew their world would be inhabited, and it might even be a decent place to get supplies, but going there could also cause extreme delays if their world wasn't aware of the magic railroad, and who really knows what would happen, they might try to lock us in some government blacksight never to be seen again.

Later on we came to a stop at a switch that apparently led to the crew's homeworld. Which led to a railway that was somewhere in france during or by now even shortly after WW2. They stopped the train here to erect a sign to designate it as such, and that was it for that stop.

We came across another train a few hours later, this time when we stopped, we all left the coach to stretch our legs for a little bit, after we made our way to the front we could see that this second train was a set of subway cars of all things. This was when we discovered the railroad had even further anomalous properties. Subways usually require an electrified third rail in order to operate. One wasn't present here, but this train was still moving. Just like with the lone alco diesel, both trains came to a stop, and the crews spoke to eachother. Except instead of the driver, some agents came out of the front car and were speaking to the crew from our train by the rear door of the front carriage. Surprisingly it wasn't an ordinary subway, full of confused commuters but a secret project by the U.S government, of some other world, to explore the magic railroad in a similiar manner to what we were supposed to be doing, it was full of secret agents and high-tech equipment.

"What a strange looking engine, stranger than the last." Jack quietly thought as he came face to face with the flat faceless front face of a faceless subway car.

The man behind the control stand was just as confused. "What the heck? It has a face." He thought. "Is it alive?" He wondered as he saw Jack's eyes move. They couldn't speak to eachother through the subway's glass windscreen.

"It's Robert." Phoebe said.

"Huh?" I said, confused and trying to remember who Robert was.

"It's Robert, talking to the crew." Phoebe replied.

"What the heck how did he?" I asked when I finally remembered who he was. "It's gotta be an alternate version of him Pheebles."

Robert was our old boss the head of the Federal Bureau of Pokemon Management, who we quit working for a few years ago, because, well he was kind of a dick, and our goals were kind of different, he wanted to turn back time to undo the disaster which would mean that Phoebe and I would never have met, so we quit working for him and started working for James at Devon Co shortly afterwards. While it was a morally grey thing at the time, since then the two worlds comming together had turned out for the best. The disaster was terrible, but society was rebuilding quickly and given a few years things would be almost normal again. Sometime after that, the portal machines appeared, under circumstances that nobody really understands. The F.B.P.M itself collapsed as well convieniently losing their headquarters shortly after we quit.

"Whatever happened to him anyway? I forgot." I said.

"I forgot too." She replied.

"Did he die? I don't remember, that was so long ago." I continued.

"I don't remember either." Phoebe said.

"Should we say something to the crew?" I asked.

"I don't know. Maybe this Robert isn't a bad Robert." She replied.

"Yeah, maybe." I half-heartedly agreed while Jack's crew spoke to him and another unknown man in the distance. About a minute later they started to come towards us. So Phoebe teleported us to the other side of the train.

"Why'd you do that?" I asked.

"Cause what if he recognizes us?" She replied.

"Pheebles, if they're from a world where the disaster hasn't happened yet, or just plain didn't happen, he shouldn't even know who we are." I argued as the crew introduced Robert and the other agent to Jack.

"Ok fine." Phoebe said as she took my hand and teleported us back to the other side. "But let's hide." We retreated into the fog just a few feet away from the track, to watch the four men and the locomotive converse.

"What's going on?" Claire asked as she and Henry approached us from the side, we weren't really hiding that well, more just keeping our distance. We didn't want to go too far into the forrest or we could lose sight of the rails and be lost for good.

"Not much." I replied. "Just another train."

"That's a government owned train." Henry blurted out.

"How do you know? "I asked.

"It's painted black, and look at the guys the crew is talking to, those fancy suits they're wearing." He replied.

"How do you know they're not just businessmen? I mean, it is a subway." I argued. "Lots of people take the subway."

"Their sunglasses, their ties, they're the exact same, it's not just a suit, it's a uniform." He replied.

"I dunno man." I replied, knowing he was right if Robert was one of them.

"You know they can see us from here right? " Henry asked.

"Yeah, I know, but Phoebe wanted to hide in a place where, we really can't hide." I replied.

"Ok." Henry replied.

"I kind of forgot we couldn't go into the forrest." Phoebe commented.

"Why are you trying to hide if they are just businessmen?" Henry asked.

"Because Cj is afraid of them." Phoebe lied.

"I am not, it was your idea to hide from them in the first place." I denied.

"Look the truth is we used to work for an alternate version of that guy years ago." I said as I pointed to Robert, who, along with his friend, seemed to be too amazed by Jack's sentience to notice, maybe our hiding spot was working for now, afterall.

"Oh ok." Henry replied.

"Basically he was a dick and it didn't end well." I added.

"He was not a weiner Cj, he was just . . . . ok maybe he was." Phoebe tried to argue for him, but gave up halfway through.

" He sent us on separate missions to opposite parts of the country, he was extremely arrogant, he cryogenically froze me after I was mortally wounded by a weaville and neglected to tell Phoebe that I was still alive which almost led to her suicide." I elaborated. "Oh and also, his grand scheme, had it succeeded, would of made it so that we would have never met, but all it really did was create a glitchy abomination."

"What's a weaville?" Claire asked.

"It's a dark and ice type pokemon, very fast, very scary claws." Phoebe replied.

"Ok so he is a dick then." Henry agreed.

"Or atleast that version of him was." I replied. "This version might not even know who we are."

"Then why were you hiding?" Henry asked.

"Because we don't trust him." Phoebe replied.

"Well we're gonna go introduce ourselves." Henry said.

"Ok, just be careful, we got your back" I replied as they walked away.

"Yeah, be careful." Phoebe added.

They walked away from us and towards the other group that was gathered around Jack, while Phoebe suddenly teleported the both of us back to the back side door of the coach.

"Pheebles!" I exclaimed out of annoyance.

"If we stayed there they would've noticed us." She defended.

"They probably already saw us anyway Pheebles, we weren't hiding that well." I replied as Henry peaked around the side of the train looking for us.

When he spotted us, he motioned for us to come closer, around the front of Jack.

So I started to go, then Phoebe gently grabbed my hand.

"Wait." She said.

"Pheebles, come on, if something happens we can teleport away again." I calmly replied.

And so she reluctantly trailed behind me, still holding my hand while we walked towads the others.

Inevitably, we made it over to the group of what was now 6 people, and one sentient locomotive, 7 people if you count the driver of the subway who was watching us.

"Here they are." Henry said as we came around the side of Jack.

"Hi." Phoebe said, nervously.

"So this is your entire group then?" Robert asked, making it clear he didn't recognize us.

"Right." The engineer agreed.

"Ok well, now that everyone is here allow me to explain." Robert began. "We're on a mission from the United States Government to explore this Phenomenon. From what your crew has told us so far you're here for the same reasons."

"More or less." I replied.

"Actually, I for one am more interested in seeing if this track ends at somepoint." Our fireman replied.

"From what we've explored so far it doesn't." Robert said. "This fog never seems to lift either."

"Yeah we've noticed that." The engineer said. "Have you seen anywhere we could stock up on supplies?"

"I think um, what was it, fives tracks down from here, there's an abandoned steel mill, there should be plenty of coal there for you to use.

"Thank you sir." Jack happily replied.

"Now what have you seen for supplies?" Robert asked.

"Just a forrest a bit away from here, it's good for a campfire, we marked the tracks with a sign, the rails are bad, so just park your train of the main line. " The engineer replied.

"Well, that's a shame, I was hoping you'd have more info. " Robert said. "What about your home world?"

"It's not electrified, the second you go through the portal you'll probably lose all power." I replied.

"Well, we haven't needed to do that so far. We're not even sure how we're getting power we just are, there's no third rail and no current whatsoever running through the tracks. Anyway, we've seen a few trains out here, but yours is definitely the most intelligent. And most of their crews were just as confused as we were when our world first discovered this place, you're the first we've seen aside from ours that seems to know what they're doing. So since we have similiar goals, we can give you a copy of our notes if you want, they'll tell you the gist of what the next few worlds contain."

"That's sound delightful. " The Engineer agreed.

"Allright then go copy our notes." Robert said to his unknown partner, who then ran around the front of the subway and entered the train through the side door.

"So you're british correct?" Robert asked.

"Right." the engineer agreed.

"And judging by your train your from the 1940s, or maybe the 50's?" Robert asked.

"Right."

"And they had smartphones in your world, in the 1950's?"

"Smartphones?" The engineer asked out of confusion.

Phoebe just happened to be looking at her phone at that point.

"Pheebles." I exclaimed out of annoyance.

"So you're from different worlds?" Robert asked.

"Yep." Henry confirmed.

"How did that happen? " Robert asked.

"It's a long story." I defended.

"Well time doesn't exist here so." Robert said. "Go on."

Anyway, about 30 minutes of going over the events of the last few chapters.

"Well that's quite a story." Robert said. "Not sure if I can remember all that, but you said you knew me from your own world?"

"Yeah, you were our boss for a time." I replied, annoyed at Phoebe for blurting that out earlier, during the 30 minutes of review we just skipped over. "But then we started working for someone else, and now, we technically work for Sir Topham Hatt, until we can get back home."

"Well then, we got your notes, we just passed a switch a little while ago, which one of my men should have reached by now, so we'll back in, and let you pass. Then we'll both be on our way."

At that point his partner handed us a few pages of notes, held together by a brad where most people would've used a staple.

After that Robert and his partner returned to their train, while we took a moment to look through the notes.

They were busy it seemed, as they had given us information on the next thirty worlds! We took a bit to decide if any of these worlds were worth visiting, as communicating with the crew while the train was moving was kind of a pain in the butt for Phoebe. We decided to visit the steel mill to top up with coal. We hadn't gotten into our reserves yet, but any little bit would help. Fresh water was also important, both for Jack and as something to drink. So we decided to visit another world as well, that might have some. This gave Robert's train plenty of time to get into the siding. Once we decided where we were going to go, Claire, Henry, Phoebe, and I headed back to the coach, while the crew climbed into Jack's cab. A few moments later Phoebe and I we were back in our little passenger compartment.

"See Pheebles, there was nothing to worry about, he was even quite helpful." I said, once we were comfortable.

"Yeah, yeah, Cj, I was wrong." She admitted.

"I'm really surprised you didn't just use your powers to figure out sooner." I said.

"That didn't help us the first time." Phoebe replied. "Besides, I don't even want to know what's in that man's mind, you know who he works for."

"The government?" I asked as the train lurched forward.

"No, the CIA." She corrected.

"Oh, ok." I replied.

"Like mk ultra, the bay of pigs, and all that crazy stuff." She continued.

"I didn't know you were a conspiracy nut." I replied.

"I'm not, but still CJ." She insisted.

"Where did you learn all this from?" I asked as I move from the seat across from her to the seat beside her.

"Will, from the store." She answered.

"And how did that come up?" I asked.

"I overheard him talking to someone else about it." She replied.

"Oh, ok. We haven't been to the store in awhile, that must have been a long time ago." I said.

"It was." She confirmed. "I don't even know why I remember it."

"Yeah, I know how that feels." I replied as I put my arm around her and pulled her close.

"Maybe I remember it because I thought it was kind of scary at the time." She said once she was comfortably snuggled up beside me.

"Eh, maybe." I replied.

"Man this is a boring ride, I never thought train rides could be boring but, we've been here so long." I said.

"It's better than walking through a desert for an entire day." She replied.

"Yeah, I guess it is." I replied, remembering that terrible day, which wasn't too long ago.

"The busty blonde's big bouncy bags of bliss bounced out of her beige blouse beautifully." I said.

"What?" She asked, which is probably what anyone would say after hearing that out of nowhere. I was trying to be funny and the line suddenly just came to me.

"It's a game, you gotta say something sexy but also it has to sound as silly as possible." I replied. "You wanna play? Might help pass the time. I said."

"The big boobied brunette bounced her big booty balistically on her boyfriend's big bubbly balls." She replied.

"Bubbly? "I asked.

"I don't know." She replied.

"How about Big booty ballistics?" I replied. "Best company name ever!"

"BOOBIE BALLLLSSS!" She said as I burst into laughter.

"What is going on in there?" A heavilly muffled Henry called out from another compartment.

"Ok no more this is too weird." She said as we almost died laughing.

"What comes out of a booby ball?" I asked, barely able to contain myself.

"Ew I don't know, don't ask." She replied.

"Are there like cannibalistic booby ball babies?" I asked.

"What no, that's weird, Cj stop!" She insisted. "Do not entertain that idea anymore."

"Oh allright." I replied. "Even thought you're the one that said it in the first place, crazy girl."

"It was funny." She defended. "But then you took it too far."

"Ehh, yeah, maybe I did." I replied.

" The old . . . . . fat . . . . grandma." Phoebe began.

"Pheebles, no!." I interupted her before she put an image in my mind that I didn't want to see.

"Watched." She continued.

"What?" I asked, as she turned my disgust into curiousity with just one more word.

"As the pumpkin boobed blonde blowed her boyfriend's big blimpy dick." She finished.

"Blimpy?" I asked as I wondered if that was even a word.

"Yeah blimpy, like swolen, like your weiner when any part of me gets within an inch of it." She said.

"Hehe, funny." I replied with some sarcasm.

"Ok let's put them together."

" Ok, so, The pumpkin boobed busty blonde's big bouncy bags of bliss bounced out of her beige blouse beautifully as she blowed her boyfriend's big bubbly balls." Phoebe began.

"As the big boobied brunette bombshell bounced her booty on his big blimpy boner." I added, with difficulty trying to keep my composure.

"Well Pheebles, we did it, we made the world's most alliterative porno!" I exclaimed as we laughed.

"I guess we did didn't we?" she agreed.

"Now what? "I asked.

"Um I don't know, maybe we can have sex?" She asked.

"Uh, baby girl, can we just take a break for a bit? I know this ride sucks but."

"It's ok Cj, we're having fun anyway." She said. "The other kind of fun."

"They're basically the same as long as it's with you." I said as I kissed her on the cheek.

"Awe, Cj." She sighed. "You're so sweet."

"And you are too, when you're not crazy."

"How about now we come up with the weirdest sentence? "I asked.

"Space grandmas." She began.

"Pheebles, no grandmas." I repeated.

-meanwhile-

The bubblemen made it to the nexus, and were now traveling down the side of the tracks with their jeeps, and the flatbed lagging behind, they could move pretty quickly as long as they were careful to avoid the strange trees and were slow over the occasional track that branched off the mainline.

The flatbed just kept falling behind however, and eventually they were separated, those in the jeeps just assumed the old truck would catch up eventually.

That said, we had quite a head start, and they had no way of knowing we were even on the mainline still. It was by luck that they were even heading the same direction. Inevitably, they would come across Robert's subway about a day later, fortunately for them, as the pair of stolen jeeps they had left were running low on water, and the Aec low on petrol.

Just like we had, both parties paused for a moment to speak to one another. One of the few times the bubblemen weren't immediately hostile. And for good reason.

"CIA Head of Research Smith." Volkheim announced. "You're supposed to be dead. " In his world, Robert was killed by Silverwind along with most of the world's population.

"And you're supposed to be in a black sight locked up never to be seen again." Robert replied, recognizing Volkheim's voice but not his face, which was obscured by his helmet. In Robert's home world, Volkheim had been arrested sometime in the 90s for conducting inhumane experiments, completely out of the eye of the public. As Silverwind never happened in his home world, the bubblemen, and even the suit technology, never existed. Though Volkheim was still a researcher.

"What are you some kind of astronaught now?" Robert asked.

"If only you knew." Volkheim replied.

"It's clear we're not from the same world." Robert replied.

"I believe you are correct." Volkheim agreed. "What was I arrested for? "

"You were testing the effects of Delta wave radiation on prison inmates, in an attempt to give them psychic powers, which resulted in over 40 deaths." Robert replied. "It was a huge PR mess, we had to sweep the entire thing under the table."

"Interesting, yeah that sounds like something I would have done had Silverwind not ended the world before hand." Volkheim replied. "Kind of ran out of test subjects."

"Still a sick bastard aren't ya?" Robert asked. "Is that what the suit's for? Keeping your filthy disease from spreading to others?"

"Actually no, it's quite the opposite." Volkheim replied.

"Oh so you're too good for humanity now?" Robert asked.

"Shut up Bob." Volkheim snapped. "We're here looking for a train, a train containing extra dimensionals."

"Aren't we technically extradimensionals?" Robert asked.

"Not in the sense I'm talking about." Volkheim insisted." I mean a creature that has the power to warp between dimensions, not just by finding some random portal."

"Look we have a sketch see. JEFFRIES GET THE SKETCH!" He commanded his lackey.

"Yes Lord Doctor." Jeffries replied.

"Lord Doctor? " Robert chuckled.

"So are you a lord of doctors or just a lord and a doctor? " Robert realized as Jeffries handed him a peace of paper. "Or maybe you're a docto of lords."

"Nevermind that, it's this girl, we've been tracking her through 3 worlds already." He handed him a sketch that just looked vaguely enough like Phoebe for Robert to recognize her.

"Oh well, you're pretty far behind then, we just passed them about a day ago."

"You know where they are?" Volkheim asked.

" They've probably moved since then." Robert replied. "Anyway why should we help you, you're a crook Volkheim, you were a crook in my world and by the sound of things you're a crook in yours as well."

"Think about how much this discovery could do for your career." Volkheim replied.

"Well, I." Robert thought thoughts of thoughtful nastiness. "Ok I know where they may have stopped, but I don't know if they're still there, that's all I can tell you.

"Go give them a copy of the notes and the lcation of our home portal." Robert said to his partner who once again darted inside the subway. "AND A PEN!" He added after the doors nearly closed.

So the bubblemen recieved the same notes we were given, along with some additional indications of worlds we were likely to stop in, and the location of this Robert's home world. First things first though, they waited for their buddies in the truck to catch up, then they began by seeking out a source of water for their jeeps, They accomplished this in their usual way by going to a populated world and stealing bulk packs of bottled water from the backroom of a convienience store.

Anyway, the rest of the day for us consisted of finding ways to entertain ourselves on the train and visiting the world with the abandoned steel mill. According to the notes we were given the tracks were safe and there was nobody around, so unlike the last stop Jack got to see this world for himself, though there wasn't much there besides the sprawling mill complex, a railyard with some abandoned 1950s style american freight cars, and a few old flatbed trucks that hadn't been started in quite awhile. Their tires were flat, and more than likely their batteries were long dead. It was strange to see such a big, developed place be so devoid of life, without there being much of a reason why. Perhaps this was a deadworld too, like Henry's. All we knew is that it wasn't some type of nuclear fallout zone, as the notes that Robert gave us said this place was completely radiation free. Why they were testing for that was beyond me, but it was all in the notes. The rails hadn't deteriorated as much as the ones in the previous world we spent the night in, but a layer of rust had covered up the once shiny surface, so they had been disused for awhile.

We spent a few hours here so we had some time to look around. While the fireman topped up the coal supply from the steel mill's abandoned stores.

Unlike Henry's world where the massive amounts of skeletons indicated that something had gone wrong, there was little evidence here to suggest anything other than the place had been abandoned, in full working order. A mill that had been abandoned because of a fire or other catastrophic damage for some time wouldn't have several tons of coal and iron ore sitting around would it?" Surely it would have been moved to another, more operational mill? We used the mystery of it's abandonement to occupy us while we were here as we explored the interiors of the buildings. The large crucibles suspended from the ceiling offered little clue as to what had happened here, other than the typical operations of a steel mill. Even in the warehouse there were stacks and stacks of steel sheets and extremely heavy coils that had been basically left to rust, along with an equally big overhead crane to load them all up onto a flatcar, or even a truck.

It was a huge place with several structures including a blast furnace, a large warehouse, and other large buildings that housed machinery to turn raw steel into either coils or flat sheets. I think they're called rolling mills. Along with the various freight cars there was a small diesel shunter, which had also not been used in some time. Somewhere in all the industriality there was an office. I forgot where because it was such a huge place and we only had a few hours to explore, but just like the rest of the mill, it was abandoned, however, here there were filing cabinets full of information, anything from employee medical records, to business transactions, and other things. And this caught our attention because maybe one of these documents contained something useful, like an indicator of what happened. Unfortunately, we couldn't find anything by the time we heard Jack's whistle, which was an indicator for us to get back on the train. Phoebe snapped some pictures, but there really wasn't much that this world had to offer that couldn't be found in another. Once we left the world, a moment was taken to erect another sign before we were on our way once again. We spent a couple days like this, riding the nexus and making occasional stops for supplies. It was also a great time to connect with our smaller pokemon, who were out of there balls more often than not during this time, as the coach was kind of empty with just us four.

We were also amazed at how many mysteriously empty worlds existed. According to the notes, populated ones existed as well, but we tried to avoid them, prefering the empty ones where we wouldn't have to worry about hiding or drawing attention, and also because resources in empty worlds were free for the taking.

Anyway, nothing really happened over the next few days that would make an interesting story, so skipping to a few days later, right when we were about at the end of the worlds described in the notes, the bubblemen caught up with us.

"You know what sucks Pheebles? We went to the island of sodor and we never saw Thomas." I said to my beloved as we were just kind of hanging out in the passenger car.

"Is finding out the Island of Sodor is real not incredible enough? " She asked.

"Yeah, you kind of have a point I guess." I replied.

A weird light shined through the window.

"What the heck?" I said as it caught my attention. "Get down it's the bubblemen!" I yelled as I caught a glimpse of one of their jeeps, the strange light turned out to be their headlights as one was running almost parralel to the window. The noise of the train, along with the passenger car's insulation, kept us from hearing them.

They waited until we crossed over another switch, because they had to slow down to avoid damaging their vehicles, but after they were passed it, they gunned it and tried to make it up to Jack, paying little attention to us. It was then that I realized they also aquired a small suv, a 90s trailblazer looking thing that was lagging behind the other 3 jeeps, likely a replacement for the one that got bent into a banana.

"They're going to try to stop the train." Phoebe said. "We have to stop them."

"I got it babygirl don't worry." I said as I located Cap'n'Magnum's pokeball and ran to the compartment with the broken window, by then the jeeps made it passed the passenger car so they weren't watching us. I sent Magnum out, and he crashed through what was left of the window without injury to begin an attack on the bubblemen. Henry approached the doorway behind me.

"You see the jeeps?" He asked.

"Yeah, already sent Magnum after them." I replied as I retreated into the corridor. Phoebe was just comming out of our compartment to check on me.

"Pheebles, can you take me to the roof? I can't see Magnum from here." I asked my beloved.

"Of course Cj, come here." She replied.

So I went over to her and took her hand and she teleported us to the roof of the carriage a few seconds later. Jt was hard to keep a footing on the roof, and the persistant fog was thick enough that Magnum was little more then a silver blur, looking more ufo-like than ever.

"Still can't see him very well." I said.

"Well then let's move up some more." Phoebe said as she took my hand and prepared to teleport again.

So we hopped over a few freight cars and made it to the coal hopper. where it was a bit easier to stand and Magnum was a bit easier to see. The coal was very messy, but it was about the best place to be as we were close to Jack and could get a decent view of the battle without being directly in the line of fire.

Electric attacks weren't effecting them very well, which likely had something to do with their suits. So Magnum had to resort to using Magnet Bombs, which, were a bit dangerous to use this close to Jack. He knew this and was refraining from attacking, but he was still flying around them and looking for an oppourtunity. One of the jeeps was running parralel with the cab while the Engineer and Fireman were keeping the bubblemen at bay just like they had done at the station. They were trying to hijack Jack. And there wasn't much we could do about it because we couldn't out run them. Then they did the unthinkable, they shot coupling out, separating Jack and crew from the rest of the train. The crew found this out seconds later as the cars began to fall back, and Jack himself realized he wasn't pulling nearly as much weight as he had before. We came up on another switch so the jeeps had to slow down again, faster than the now engineless train was. This gave Magnum and opening to attack, and he took it. A magnet bomb attached itself to the hood of the lead jeep and exploded, popping the hood up and immediately knocking out the engine. The explosion, while causing minimal damage to the engine itself, snapped the fanbelt and caused the entire thing to fail. The second jeep barely avoided the first one which was now blinded by it's own hood. It stopped in order to assist along with the third jeep and the blazer as our train coasted passed and eventually vanished into the fog. The next switch ahead led us off of the main line and into yet another world as Jack led the way and tried to slow us down. This time we ended up in a disused siding of a gigantic railyard around midnight, surrounded by modern autoracks.

We were litterally surrounded by trains, this yard was huge.

This was the third world outside of the ones covered by the notes, so we didn't know what to expect.

Meanwhile:

"Why are you stopping? Keep chasing them!" Volkheim demanded as he slammed the hood down on his disabled jeep.

"Just making sure you're ok." One of his lackeys in the second jeep said.

"Well go, get going, catch up to them." Volkheim commanded.

"We've allready caught up to them, we'll get another chance, and they'll have to stop, their coupler is broke." His lackey insisted.

"Right, you're right." Volkheim replied. "I'm just rattled from that damned explosion."

"Sir what is that flying saucer thing?" His lackey asked.

"I . . . it's one of the interdimensional's beasts, I don't know. Perhaps it is an interdimensional being as well?" He replied as he climbed into the second jeep, while other lackeys tried to climb into the rather cramped blazer, not that it was small, but it wasn't really intended to hold 7 people in very bulky suits. One of them had to squeeze into the back for crying out loud, where there weren't any actual seats, both it and the jeeps were pretty much loaded to capacity. By this point they had abandoned the AEC in favor of the blazer-like suv, it was just too slow. Over the next few weeks, unlike many of the vehicles the bubblemen had stolen, things went well for the AEC, as it was impounded by the police, auctioned off and eventually found its way to a museum, as opposed to being hard at work on a farm just weeks prior. In a world where AEC never existed, people eventually realized it was one of a kind and its value went through the roof.

Anyway, in the railyard world, which is what we were calling it at that point because all we had seen so far was the railyard, we were trying to navigate through the seemingly endless maze of traincars. Climbing under and over them, or just teleporting over them. It was atleast four hours before we reached the edge where there was an extremely large shed. We didn't get to do much more exploring than that though because we were surrounded by black cars resembling Ford LTDs. They looked like the men in black.

"Go back where you came from." The driver of one of the cars said. "Nobody can know about the portal."

"We need to repair one of our couplings." The engineer said.

"We noticed." The man replied. "We have a chain for you, just take it and go."

"Do you guys work for Robert?" I asked.

"Maybe on another world." The man replied. "Just make your repairs and go."

A second man stepped out of the car and opened up the trunk, pulled out the exact parts we needed to repair the coupler, yes it sounds as strange to you as it did to us, but it happened. Anyway, he handed them to the engineer, shut the trunk and then returned to his seat.

"How did you know what we needed?" The engineer asked.

"You're not the first to come here with problems. CJ." The man in the car replied. "That Robert guy you mentioned was just here a few weeks ago."

"We have another problem, we got some people following us, and how the hell did you know my name?" I asked.

"From your counterpart in this world, 100% confirmed DNA match, don't know the rest of you though." The man replied.

"Dna? What?" I asked.

"We've already talked to much, just get your repairs made and get out of here."

"Please sir can you just let us stay long enough to get them off our back, we just lost them about an hour ago, they could get here before we even get back to our train." Phoebe asked.

"Why are they after you?" He asked.

"Honestly we don't know, but they've chased us through several worlds already." I replied.

"Do you think it's space police?" I overheard his partner ask.

"No, space police don't follow people across worlds, atleast I've never heard of it happening." The man replied.

"Ok listen up, we give you permission to move your train into storage shed 39, just get your coupler repaired, keep going forward from where you are, do not exceed twenty miles per hour, the switches will already be set for you, pull up to the end of the track as close as you can. We'll talk to your pursuers when they arrive, but if you turn out to be some kind of extra-dimensional fugitives, we'll have no choice but to ask you to surrender, do not enter or mess with any of the other trains in the shed. You can stay here for up to two days, and that's it, if they don't show up in 2 days, it's not our problem." The man explained.

With that, we returned to our train, thankfully the plume of smoke from Jack's funnel made it easy to find our way back, though it still took awhile. The coupling was quickly repaired and then we went on a short ride to the shed, It was a huge shed and there was quite a collection of strange locomotives. The only one I could recognize was a particular type of czechoslovakia diesel locomotive known as "Goggles" and for good reason. I mean, I called them that even before I knew that they were actually called that. That's how well the name fits. Anyway, many of the others were impossible to identify and seemed to be a mish-mash of european and american features. Some had had a few boxcars or passenger cars hooked behind them. Were they all exploration trains? It was hard to tell, other than they had almost certainly came from the portal. No railroad would normally employ so many different locomotives at once would it?

Out of all of them, Jack was the only sentient one, it seemed that sentient locomotives were quite rare outside the Island of Sodor, as well as Jack and Crew's homeworld. Once the entire train was inside the shed, the doors automatically closed behind us. It went black for a moment as there were no windows and therefore, no natural light, but after a few moments the interior lights came on and illuminated everything again. We got off the train, and another MIB Agent, or atleast that's what they seemed to be, led us through a doorway on the side. While Jack's crew stayed behind to help their locomotive "shut down" for the night.

"You figure out who these guys are yet Pheebles?" I quietly asked, wondering why she hadn't said anything by now.

"That's the thing Cj, they're blocking me somehow." Phoebe quietly replied.

"Anti-psionic implant miss." The agent agent guiding us replied."Can't read my thoughts, can't control my thoughts. You're not the first psychic to come through the portal."

"Can I get one of those?" I asked.

"Cj..." Phoebe nudged my shoulder in objection.

"Sure, if you have a quarter million dollars." The agent joked.

"Well crap." I replied. "Why so pricey?"

"It's a very difficult procedure, and the chips are in short supply. We found a case of them on board one of those other trains back there. That wasn't a good day when it arrived, we were almost over run." The agent replied. "The train was full of violent alien abominations, they came in, parked in the shed and tried to shoot their way out, they were hideous, ugly things with bright red skin, a single large eye for a face and a large mouth where their stomach should have been." The man lost his calm demeanor and seemed to be genuinely disturbed by the events he was describing.

"Wow... we've been pretty lucky with our encounters so far then." I replied. "All we found was an island of friendly trains."

"But these guys you claim are following you?" He asked.

"They were chasing us before we discovered the magic railway." I replied.

"Mhm." Phoebe agreed.

"Anyway, those red-faced cycloptic buffoons almost blew the lid off the entire operation." The man replied.

"How secret is this operation?" Henry asked.

" If you were civilians we'd have to kill you." The man replied. "But you're guests, so you can stay on base for what was it? 2 days is the norm, then you have to get out of here. Regardless of whether your followers are apprehended by then or not."

"And you miss, you can't be out in public." He said to Phoebe.

"Yeah, we usually try to avoid the public anyway, right Pheebles?" I asked.

"Mhm." She agreed.

"The rest of you look human enough, just don't tell anyone about this, because we will find out." The man continued.

"We are human." Claire said.

"Oh, well, that's good, no surprises then." The man replied as he led us into a elevator. I thought we were going outside, but I guess not. "You'd be surprised how many things come through the portal disguising themselves as humans." The man said as he pressed one of the many buttons. The elevator doors closed, and when reopened to a hallway that greatly resembled a hotel, except without any windows.

"Ok you have room 8, dinner is served, at well, 8, and now I have to go back up to get the rest of you, so make yourself at home, and I'll be back in a bit with your friends." The man said in a courteous manner. "On the table in your room you'll find some paperwork, that we need you to fill. It's so we can run a counterpart check, to see if you have any counterparts in our world."

Our "room", was actually more of an apartment, with 2 bedrooms, and strangely enough fairly luxurious, even had a plasma tv with cable.

"This is better than my apartment at home." Claire said after looking around.

"I wasn't expecting a free room, but this is nice." I said.

"Now you two remember we're sharing this couch." Claire joked.

"As long as you remember." Phoebe agreed.

"The train driver guys are going to be in here too aren't they?" Henry asked.

"Yeah, probably." I said. "Unless they get a different room for some reason."

"Actually you know what? Cj and I will sleep in the bus, you can have the room if you want." Phoebe said.

"What you like sleeping on the bus?" I asked.

"I think she likes something else . . . . on the bus." Claire said.

"Oh yeah, like you two weren't fooling around in the brakevan." Phoebe defended. "And no, neither of those are the reason, the driver and firemen haven't had a decent place to sleep for awhile, so we should probably give them a bed too."

"Well Pheebles, in her defense, you do have a tendency to be hornier than the brass section of the London Symphony orchestra." I don't know why, but I have been wanting to say that for awhile.

"What?" She asked, confused, while both Claire and Henry chuckled.

"But you're right, it wouldn't hurt the give them a rest." I continued, satisfied with my brief moment of revenge.

"See you tomorrow." Phoebe said as she headed for the door.

I followed her out of the room and over to the elevator, were we realized there were not any call buttons, just a single stainless-steel button labeled "Request" and a grill for a speaker.

"Ok I guess we're stuck here." I said upon onspecting the button.

"No Cj, I think we just need to make a request." Phoebe said as she went and pressed the button.

"Hello, what is your request?" An agent's voice rang out from the speaker, different from the one that led us down here.

"We want to go back up and sleep on the train." Phoebe said to nothing in particular as there didn't seem to be a visible microphone anywhere, perhaps one was hidden in the speaker grill.

"Ok, well wait till the elevator comes back." The agent said.

A few minutes later the man who had led us downhere returned with the Driver and Fireman, he pointed them to the room, then he brought us back up to the shed.

"Is there problem with ithe room?" He asked out of concern.

"No it's allright, we just . . . . . " I began.

"The crew hasn't had a bed to sleep in for awhile so we thought they would appreciate it more." Phoebe finished for me.

"Oh I see. " The man said with some relief.

"Are the planet's conditions nice enough for you mam?" He asked. "We can get you a room with a high concentration of nitrogen, chlorine, carbon dioxide, hydrogen cyanide, sulphor, or arsenic if you want."

"It's fine. " Phoebe insisted.

"Aren't those last five things highly poisonous?" I asked.

"To most living things yes." The man replied. "Some require a certain percentage of them to survive though, otherwise our oxygen-rich atmosphere will cause them to pass out." He said.

"Now remember, do not board any other train but the one you came in on." The man said. "You are our guests, but do not break our rules or there will be consequences."

"Ok." Both Phoebe and I agreed.

The man bowed, then headed back towards the elevator, the doors closed behind him and he descended to the depths of god knows what.

"What did you say about me and the orchestra?" Phoebe said.

"You still haven't figured it out?" I asked in disbelief.

"No."

"A brass section is full of trumpets and trombones and tubas and what not, they're all types of horns, you are hornier than the brass section."

"Ohhhhh." She said. "So they're like musical instruments, or like tauros horns?"

"They're musical instruments Pheebles." I replied.

"How do you not know this?" I asked, genuinely surprised.

"I don't know, it just never came up." She replied." It's not like we talk about musical instruments every day and those are human instruments, not like the voirrr de garrrs or garrrrrrr de voirs, I saw at royale parties as a ralts."

"Didn't you also learn how to play the piano?" I asked.

"Yeah, but, that was it." She replied. " Those are called garr voirrr garrrrrs."

"oooookaay." I replied.

"And you know I'm horny for you, you silly boy." She said as she wrapped her arms around me. "And I would love it if we could have fun together on the bus in a little bit."

"I love you too baby, but." I began.

"Pweeaaaase." She said as cutely as she possibly could.

"Can you keep it to one a day? " I asked.

"No promises." She replied.

"Well that figures, you broke the last one." I replied.

"Oh come on, we don't have anything better to do, and you love me, and you enjoy it, you just won't allow yourself to enjoy cause you think you don't deserve me." She said.

"That's not why baby girl, it's cause I think you're letting boredom get the best of you, and you're losing control, and well, you're scaring me baby girl." I replied.

"Well can we snuggle at least? I don't want to scare you Cj." She sincerely replied.

"Yeah, I'll snuggle with you, maybe we'll have some fun later, but we got to get back to the bus first." I said.

"Thankyou." She replied. "As long as you'll snuggle with me I know I'll be ok."

"Hehe, I'll always snuggle with you baby." I said as I pulled her into a kiss. "Now come, let's go, if we stand here too long something weird might happen."

"Hehe, like what?" She asked.

"I don't know, maybe one of the trains will become sentient and start playing the trumpet." I replied. "Or maybe it will turn evil and try to kill us."

"Eheh, yeah right." She replied in disbelief.

"Well you never know baby girl." I said as we approached Jack.

"Hello again." Jack said as he saw us approaching him.

"Hey um, Jack whatsup?" I said to the rather jubilant locomotive.

"Not much, driver killed my fire, probably going to fall asleep soon." He replied.

"Allright well, goodnight then." I said.

"Goodnight." He replied.

"Night." Phoebe said.

"He's alot nicer than the h.a.v. " Phoebe said once we were out of earshot.

"That's cause I think he's actually alive, he's not like an ai or something." I said.

"Do you think he was born or built?" Phoebe asked.

"I have no idea." I replied. "Probably a bit of both. At some point he was made from non- sentient parts, and at another point he was "born" and became sentient."

"All I can say is, he's a lot smarter than any computer program, especially one that could be built with 1940s technology." I said.

"So like the 1900s then for me? " Phoebe asked.

"I don't know, the 1940s was when they came up with radar, and microwaves, and radio-controlled things."

"Yep, 1900s, about the time of the johto-kanto civil war." Phoebe replied.

"So it was like your WW2?" I asked.

"Um, kind of." She said. "Except it really was just Johto against Kanto, they were just one region at the time and after the war they split into two."

"Hoen, Sinnoh, Kalos, they kind of just stayed out of it." Phoebe said. "It was the first war where trained pokemon fought alongside humans, as pokeballs were just starting to be mass-produced, airplanes and machineguns were used, and afterwards, the Kanto Elite Four was established and became the first Elite Four in the entire world."

Eventually after hearing seemingly everything Phoebe knew about the Kanto-Johto civil war, which was a lot, very impressive considering she didn't know what a trumpet was five minutes ago, but that was understandable, and I liked being able to teach her on occasion, anyway, back on track, eventually, we made it to the bus where we snuggled for awhile. I know, not the most exciting thing, but there wasn't much else to do and she was being super clingy.

"So what do you think about these men in black guys?" I asked.

"I don't know Cj, they seem a bit nice, but also a bit creepy." She replied. "I can't read their minds and it bothers me."

"Hehe, now you know how I feel." I replied.

"I guess so." She said. "Didn't you say we could have some fun?"

"I said maybe in a little while, you sneaky girl." I replied.

"Maybe instead we could explore the other trains?" She asked.

"Pheebles, they specifically said not to do that." I replied.

"Oh what's the worst they could do Cj?" She asked.

"They are our alies at the moment Phoebe, it'd be wise not to cross them." I replied.

"We have angry bubblemen after us isn't that enough?" I asked. "And hell knows what will happen if we come across the space police again. Look, the bubblemen may be just a bunch of soldiers in spacesuits, but these guys here have serious tech, hell they know how to block your powers. We shouldn't cross them, you know that, it's not a good idea."

Meanwhile, outside the shed and about a half mile down the track by the portal. The MIB-like agents were waiting around for the bubblemen to show up, while a local freight passed by in the distance, completely oblivious to anything that was going on. While the yard was used on a regular basis, with freight trains passing through every so often, sometimes even stopping to pick up or drop off cars, it was surprising how few people knew what was actually going on here, that a portal existed, and that there was a secret underground facility beneath the shed.

Only the MIB and the highest ranking employees of the railway knew. The yard changed staff frequently to keep people from getting suspicious about the many long rows of freightcars around the portal that were never moved, and the shed they were told to never go near. Excuses were frequently made, like the switches were broken, or the cars were waiting to be scrapped, and anybody that tried to venture near it was picked up by security, sworn to secrecy, and escorted off the premises in a similiar manner to area 51, but a much smaller area of course. The Bubblemen caught up about an hour later, after taking some time to backtrack so they could fix their jeep. 3 Jeeps and a blazer like vehicle came through the portal, and were immediately surrounded. The bubblemen were arrested by the mib and taken into the shed, down to a different floor of the complex for questioning.

"What is this all about? "Volkheim asked. "We've done nothing wrong." He said, and well, yeah in this world he hadn't done anything wrong, yet.

"This is standard procedure for new arrivals, just keep moving." The agent replied.

The agent sent Volkheim and his men to separate interogation rooms for questioning. Another agent had the job of questioning them one by one. The interrogation rooms were square rooms with a window on one side facing an interior hallway and a stainless-steel table in the middle. There were several of them in the facility and they all had the same general layout.

-a few minutes later-

"So you're the leader correct?" He asked. "You're name is Doctor Benjamin Volkheim."

"Yes." Volkheim replied. "except it's usually Lord Doctor now."

"What's with the space suit?" The agent asked.

"It's uh self-contained biometrically sustainable environment." Volkheim replied.

"It's a what?" The man asked.

"It protects us from the toxins." Volkheim said.

"What toxins?" The agent asked. "Do they have a name?"

"Project silver wind." Volkheim said.

"What's that? " The agent asked. "Wait a minute, let me check the archives." The agent left Volkheim alone in the room for a moment, as he went to see if Project Silverwind had a counterpart in this world. As it turned out, it did, and he returned with the relevant documentation.

"Project Silverwind, proposed in 1979, cancelled in 1984, Top secret project to establish complete control of the climate, headed by a Doctor Volkheim? Wait a minute. That's you?"

"I didn't lead it, that was Doctor Scarnova." Volkheim corrected.

"Well it says you assumed control when Scarnova had a fatal bus accident." The agent said. "Every story changes between worlds, just a bit."

"The project backfired, billions died." Volkheim muttered under his breath. "Including Scarnova."

"That's probably why it was cancelled in this world." The agent replied.

"Well there's no toxins here so you can remove the suits."

"NO! The shock would be fatal." Volkheim replied. "And we can't be sure there aren't still toxins here."

"Right, well . . . " The interrogator began to say.

"Why are you detaining us? " Volkheim interupted.

"Another group arrived before you and said you were chasing them, we need to know why." The interogator replied.

"Because they're responsible for Silver Wind!" Volkheim falsely declared. "We've been chasing them across dimensions but they keep beating us at every turn, they can travel across dimensions at will and release other interdimensional beings of great power to fight against us. Please, you have to trust us, they're responsible for the deaths of billions of people and animals. And they've used those beasts of theirs to destroy so many others."

"Yeah, well, we can't take your word for it, you know that, and we still have to question your accomplices as well." The agent replied, sensing something was awry. He didn't get near as much out of the other bubblemen. "The Lord Doctor Volkheim will speak for us." or "I don't know, ask the Lord Doctor." or something along the lines of that was all they would say.

"So what do you think?" A senior agent asked the interrogator shortly after he had spoken to the last of Volkheim's lackeys.

"I don't know, the only one that will tell me anything is their leader." He replied.

"Who seems more believable?" The senior agent asked.

"I don't know, I need more time. I'd have to side with the others as things are now though, they aren't wearing crazy suits and most of them are human." The interrogator replied. "Did you see Volkheim's file for this world? He's not exactly a saint."

"Yes, but, though it's uncommon, personality can vary across dimensions, just because ours was a nut doesn't mean he is." The senior agent replied. "And what about the other party?"

"Nothing on the sentient train or its crew, or on the alien girl, but that was pretty obvious. The normal looking guy served with the army while Volkheim was working on Silverwind. It's likely they know eachother. As for the blondie and the metalhead, we have nothing, if they have counterparts here they haven't commited any crimes worth noting. I can't even get names out of any of Volkheim's men, so I can't tell who they are. Also according to the observational paperwork the metalhead and alien girl are married."

"That might mean their worlds are more connected." The senior agent said. "Or they're from the same world."

"Right, it's not all that uncommon." The interrogator agreed.

"Try to get more information out of Volkheim, we need to figure out what we're going to do about these two parties." The senior agent instructed.

"Ok, sounds good." The interrogator replied.

A bit later.

"Hello again Volkheim, are you hungry? Do you need something to eat?" The interrogator asked. As he sat down across from him.

"Hehehehehehehehe." Volkheim responded with a laugh.

"What?" The interogator didn't understand.

"It's been so long since I've eaten anything." Volkheim replied.

"So that's a yes?" The interrogator guessed.

"No you don't understand, this suit, it takes care of that." Volkheim said.

"Really, how?" The interogator asked.

"It's complicated, it's a automatic blood filter and chemical injection system, you take raw meat, and raw plant matter, you stick it in this tube, and then, it converts it into a blood-soluble, nutrient-packed liquid, after filtering out all the, undesirable things."

"So it's like a blender?" The interrogator asked.

"No you fool! It's a little more complicated than that." Volkheim replied. "Alot more, if you just blended that stuff and tried to inject it into your veins it'd probably kill you. In order to inject it, it has to be processed, purified, reduced down to a water soluble liquid state. Not just a coagulated blob of meat and plants."

"Do you want meat stuffed into your tube or not?" The rather annoyed interrogator asked without realizing what he was saying.

"No, it's fine." Volkheim replied. "Won't need more for another 40 hours or so."

"How long have you been in that suit?" The interrogator asked.

"Since Silverwind backfired." Volkheim replied. "More than a few years, I've lost track of time."

"Yeah, well, I can't help you there, time varies across dimensions." The interogator replied. "All I can say is that it is May the 14th, 2033 here."

"2033?" Volkheim asked.

"Right 2033." The interrogator replied. "So you said these people you were chasing were killing others?"

"Yes." Volheim answered.

"Do you know why?" The interrogator asked.

"Why does anybody kill anybody? Power, the thrill, the excitement, the look in their eyes when they realize the eternal darkness that awaits them." Volkheim replied. "How should I know? I saw them kill people and that's all I saw. All I want is for them to face justice!"

"Right well, that's all I have to ask for now, please, if you need anything just press the button by the door." The interrogator said as he excused himself from the room to talk to his superior.

"Look I can't find anything to convict either party, if they commited any crimes they were off of this world, I don't even know why you brought me in." The interrogator said.

"We can't just let them go, if they were chasing the other group." The senior said. "If we can't prove whose right or wrong, why don't we just let the first group go, and then give them a head start? We'll keep Volkheim and crew back for further questioning." She said.

Anyway meanwhile.

" Ohh, Cjai-ay-ay." Phoebe moaned.

"Oh yeah baby, you like that don't you baby girl?" I said as I screwed her upon the bed.

She talked me into it, it was inevitable. We were finished a few minutes later.

"Remember baby, just once per day." I said, about ready to fall asleep.

"I know Cj." She replied. "We'll see if that's true."

"You crazy girl." I replied as I held her close. "What am I going to do with you?"

"I think you know you just won't admit it." She replied.

"Oh really?" I asked.

"Like you can just cut me off." She laughed.

"I can try." I replied.

"But why?" She asked.

"Cause you're addicted baby girl, you just don't realize it." I said. "Your my wife, I need to help you through this."

"Cj?" She asked. "I think you're addicted."

"I am not."

"Yes you are."

"I am not."

"Yes you are."

"You cut that out you naughty girl I know what you're trying to do." I gave her a kiss. "I love you, and I will snuggle with you here until something inevitably interupts us, but we are not having sex again today."

"My loyal husband." She said as she held me tight.

"You know it baby girl." I replied.

"What about tonight?" She asked.

"We'll deal with that when it comes." I replied.

-a few minutes later-

"Hey I have an idea." I said.

"What?" Phoebe asked.

"Well we have to get our clothes back on." I replied."I got some cards over here."

"Ok, you want to play go fish?" She asked, confused, as she retrieved her dress from the floor.

"No, I was thinking strip poker, actually hold that thought, you keep your clothes off." I replied.

"Well what's the point of that then?" Phoebe protested as she dropped her dress to the floor.

"If I win, you have to put your clothes back on and we don't have sex for the rest of the day." I said as I got dressed.

"And if I win we have sex again?" She asked.

"Right." I said.

"But I don't know how to play." She said.

"You don't remember helping me play just a little bit ago?." I asked. " It's the same game, and maybe sometime when we're back home, when the kids are asleep, we can play how it's supposed to be played, how's that sound?"

"I wanna go home." She said in a sincere and forlorn manner.

"Me too baby girl, me too." I agreed as I finished getting dressed and retrieved the deck of cards. Now, onto the game."

"I miss Charley." She said without a change in tone, causing me to be concerned.

"Baby girl calm down, don't get upset now, we're about to have some fun ok just relax." I said, thinking she was just a few seconds away from erupting into tears.

"I'm fine Cj, it's just, I miss them." She said, solemnly, though she was standing there naked so it was a bit hard to take seriously. That said, I wrapped my arms around her all the same.

"Are we going to play?" She said, holding back the tears.

"Allright then, gather up your clothes as sit at the table." I said.

"Well you better prepare to take yours off again. " She said.

"You know Pheebles, it's gonna be pretty obvious to me if you're using your powers. I'm not like those guys at the bar, I know what you're capable of." I said.

"I know Cj, I won't cheat." She said as she gathered up her clothes. "But you'll still lose."

"Yeah right." I said.

"Because you love me, and you want me, and you won't even stop staring at my boobs." She said. "You'll let me win."

"Pheebles, I love you and your giant boobs, which is exactly why I'm going to win." I replied.

"Are you sure you're not in heat by the way, usually they're back to normal size by now." I asked.

"I don't know, you'll just have to tie with me and find out." She replied. "When I win."

"You're just excited aren't you crazy girl?" I said as I shuffled the cards.

"Maybe." She replied as she put her feet right by my crotch.

"Baby girl?"

"Mhm?"

"Keep your limbs to yourself until the game is over." I said.

"Ok ok fine, you're no fun." She replied as she pulled her feet away.

"You know Cj, if it wasn't for my powers I would be starting to think you didn't like me anymore." She said.

"And if you used your powers properly you'd know exactly why I'm doing this." I replied as I dealed out the cards.

"Because you think I need more control, but I honestly can't imagine why." She replied.

"Because I don't want you to learn to rely on it that's why." I said.

"Whatever, I fold." She said after looking at her cards and promptly setting them down.

"Really?" I asked.

"It's colder than I thought it'd be, I want my dress." She said as she slipped it over her head.

"Heheh, ok." I agreed as I gathered up the cards and shuffled them into the deck.

"Now you have to take your shirt off to make things even." She said.

"No, that's not how it works baby girl, you forfeited the first round." I said.

"But I was cold." She argued.

"That doesn't matter." I replied.

"Well that's not very nice Cj." She said, trying to guilt trip me.

"Well you forfeited the first round and now you're trying to make me give you a point for free." I replied. "That's not how it works baby girl."

"Fine, let's go again." She demanded.

I only had time to deal out the cards before there was a knock on the door.

"Seriously?" I asked in vain.

"Pheebles get your clothes on." I said as I walked over to the door.

"Awwwe." She complained, but she scrambled for her clothes none the less. She was slipping on her panties by the time I opened the door.

"Hello?"

I asked as I discovered an agent standing before me.

"I came to inform you that you and your friends will be leaving tomorrow." He said.

"I thought we had two days?" I replied.

"Plans change." The agent replied. "The rest of your group are being informed as we speak."

"But what about the spacemen?" Phoebe asked in the background.

"You'll be given a headstart." The agent replied. "We'll hold them for two days. We can't determine which one of you is in the right, so we've decided to return the issue to it's natural state."

"They'll catch us again by the end of the week." I argued.

"The decision is final and neither me nor you can change it." The agent said.

"Could you give us a bit more of a headstart? Or maybe send them the wrong way?" I asked.

"Maybe, we shall see, that is all I have to say for now." The agent replied, before he quietly and promptly walked away, climbing down from the flatcar and heading towards the side door of the shed.

"Wait a minute, you mean you have technology that can keep your minds from being read, but not technology that can read minds?" I asked.

"We have mind reading technology." The agent replied. "But it's heavilly regulated and we're not allowed to use it unless we have already have proof they've done something wrong, and we don't."

"Well what good is that? "I asked, stepping out of the door to the bus and raising my voice as he was starting to get pretty far from the bus.

"If we catch a serial killer for one murder, we can find out exactly how many people he's killed and find all the bodies, and convict him for all of them." The agent replied as he continued to walk away. "Now return to your lovemaking and get ready to leave tomorrow."

And with that I retreated into the bus.

"You heard him." Phoebe said.

"That doesn't mean we're going too." I replied, quickly dashing her hopes.

"Good thing he didn't come a few minutes earlier huh?" Phoebe said after I closed the bus doors again.

"Yeah." I agreed. "But I think they heard us anyway."

" I guess we're leaving this place earlier than we thought." I said after letting out a sigh.

"That's good." Phoebe said." We need to get moving again."

"Yeah, I guess so." I replied.

"So if we're not going to have fun, should we get back to the game?" She asked.

"You're already dressed baby girl, kind of ruins the point." I said.

"Well wait I can get undressed again." She insisted.

"Ok fine, but keep your dress on, you still forfeited the first round." I replied.

"Fine." She replied as she began to remove her shoes and panties again.

And with that we returned to our rather silly game. I ended up winning, but just barely. Playing cards in the pokemon world were slightly different, we had circles, squares, diamonds, hearts, stars, and triangles as suits and I couldn't remember the value of the face cards (They used pokemon instead of royalty figures, for instance the queen was a vespiquen, because, it's the queen bee pokemon? And the jack, per se was a charizard. Alakazam was the wizard, which was an additional face card somewhere between queen and jack, and the king was represented by lugiah ) so I was kind of able to make things up as I went, Phoebe didn't know either so I kind of got away with it. So it was a 86 card deck with 2 joker represented by primeapes. ( Which in the pokemon world were just considered to be wild cards, so they were associated with a typically crazy pokemon."

"Hehehe, I win, now you have to put your coat on." I said as I started to get dressed.

"Awe..." She replied. "It's too warm in here for that."

"Ok you don't have too, but you lose." I said.

"Ok, fine, I want a rematch." She said.

"That's not how it works baby girl." I replied.

"How about we play go fish or something?" I asked.

"If I win can we have sex?" She asked.

"Why can't we just play the game, and have fun that way?" I asked.

"Ohhhh, we can if you want." she said. "I guess, I wish you'd just take me right now, but no." She said as she continued to try to guilt trip me.

"You lost the game." I said as I shuffled the cards. "You knew what the terms were."

"But you love me." She argued.

"Oh god Pheebles, just stop, seriously? I keep telling you I'm doing this because I love you." I replied. "Stop being such a drama princess."

I wrapped my arms around her.

"I love you baby, just cause we aren't fucking around right now doesn't mean I don't"

"I know Cj." She said after letting out a long, mournful sigh.

"Then settle down, you're never like this at home." I replied as I let her go. "Now do you want to go hang out with our friends or do you want to play go fish or something?"

"I just want to stay here with you." She replied.

"Allright then." I said as I reclaimed my seat at the table. "Come on let's play."

"Can't we snuggle? Please?" She asked.

"Allright if that's what you want fine." I said as I got up from the table.

"And what about our other game? The one with the silly sentences?" She asked.

"I guess we could try to play that too." I replied.

-meanwhile-

Volkheim and his lackeys were given a few rooms for the night, on a separate floor from our group. We both had pretty small groups compared to the occasional trainful of people that wondered through the portal.

"What are we going to do now Lord Doctor? " One of his more loyal lackeys asked.

"We need to get some air." Volkheim replied as he left the room, headed to the elevator, and got confused for a moment at the absence of the expected buttons, before finally deciding to press the "request" button, while his lackeys trailed behind.

"Hello, what is your request?" An agent's voice rang out from the speaker.

"I would like to go outside." Volkheim replied.

"Copy that, please hold on a moment while I talk to upper management." The agent replied.

A few seconds of silence followed before the agent's voice finally returned.

"That's a negative, we can't allow you to interact with the other group, which currently has members outside." The agent continued after talking with his supervisor.

"That's ridiculous." Volkheim replied. " I want to go outside too."

Another few moments of silence passed as Volkheim staired at the little silver speakerbox with anticipation.

"Ok, but you must have an escort and you cannot leave the facility unless you lose those ridiculous suits." The agent replied. "An escort should be with you in a moment, please step away from the elevator."

Volkheim reluctantly complied with the agent's instructions, and about another minute later the elevator doors opened.

"Follow me please." The agent inside asked.

Volkheim entered the elevator with him and just five of his lackeys, that was all that could fit in one elevator, and yes it did take quite a few trips to get them all down there to begin with.

Anyway, the elevator eventually arrived on the surface level with the hallway that led to the interior of the train shed.

"What about the others?" Volkheim asked as he followed the agent out.

"We can't be here all day ferrying you and your men between here and the lower rooms." The agent replied. "Now follow me, I'll take you outside, but you must not contact the other group, I have been ordered to prevent you from doing so. You are both our guests here and we do not like fighting amongst our guests." He said as he deliberately led them around the shed away from Jack and the rest of our train and around some other, stranger trains that were either extremely hard or impossible to identify if you weren't from the same world that they were. There were some trains in this shed that would look right at home on a railroad on mars in a sci-fi movie.

Anyway, the 6 bubblemen followed the agent out of the shed and into the train yard. Once there they kind of just stood around and hung out, and scoped out the area a little bit. Shockingly they didn't do anything particularly evil, even Volkheim knew the agents here were not to be trifled with, and that was enough to keep him from doing anything too brash, for the moment.

"Is there anything else you can show us that isn't off limits?" Volkheim asked.

"We've arranged for you to meet your counterpart, but that's about it." The agent replied.

"My counterpart?" Volkheim asked.

"Yes your counterpart. " The agent replied. " He should be here in a few hours or so."

"Excellent!" Volkheim exclaimed, thinking that it would be great to have a clone.

"What about the rest of us?" One of Volkheim's lackeys asked.

"Well you see, you might have counterparts here, but they're more difficult to find, because, unlike Volkheim's none have really done anything to stand out." The agent said. "In fact out of both groups here. Volkheim's in the only one we could locate.

"We could find yours given he or she is still alive, but that would take more than three days." The agent said. "We want you out of here in three."

"Or she?" The lackey asked.

"Yeah it happens on occasion, sometimes your counterpart can be a different gender with a different name. They're never exactly the same as you, just very similiar, like a twin." The agent promptly replied.

"Is there anywhere else you can show us? We're vastly interested in this world." Volkheim asked, trying to play nice.

"I'm sure I can arrange for a trip down to the employee lounge." The agent replied. "Excuse me a second while I get permission."

The agent stepped away for a moment to contact his superiors, Volkheim recognized the opportunity to escape, but chose not to act on it. It still wasn't the right time. He knew he had to escape eventually though, he was so close to his target, but yet these agents and their silly operations here stood in the way, by no means could he let us escape again.

So, after the agent recieved permission to show them the lounge, he led them all back to the elevator and down to a different floor, the entiriety of which was the lounge, for the most part it was just a big open room, except for some bathrooms along the right, it was quite an impressive lounge, containing a small theatre with a huge tv, several arcade machines, a pool table, airhockey, pretty much an adult chucky cheese's.

"So this is the lounge, it gets busy in the evenings, not so much right now, but all the arcade games are free, it's kind of fun, we got pacman in the corner, and sometimes we have movie nights on the weekends." The agent said while Volkheim's lackeys went to observe the various machines, they knew what pacman was, but they were blown away by the newer machines and their fanciful 3d graphics, it was alien technology to those from the 80s. Somehow they forgot themselves for a moment and a few started to play the games. One of them even tried to play one of those sit-down racing games, but found it difficult to fit in the machine because of his suit.

Volkheim himself was not as amused, and simply stood by the entrance, observing the room full of games and trying to figure out how to escape so he could attempt to capture us.

"Stop this nonsense at once! We're not here to play games." Volkheim suddenly commanded just as his lackeys were beggining to enjoy themselves.

"But Lord Doctor, have you seen these games, these 21st century graphics are amazing!"

"Oh ease up Lord Doctor, it can't hurt to relax a bit right?" The agent suggested.

"We're here to pursue the extra dimensionals, not take a vacation." Volkheim insisted.

"Right well, we can't let you do that, because we can't tell which one of you is in the right." The agent replied. "So, we're letting them leave tomorrow, then you'll be allowed to pursue them again in a few days."

"You're what? " Volkheim questioned. "They murdered hundreds of people."

"Please understand we don't have enough information to determine who is wrong and who is right, therefore we must remain neutral." The agent said. "All we can do is guarantee that if you follow our rules we will do our best to preserve your safety, because if they try to kill while they're here, I can assure you that we will not take it lightly."

"The beasts they have in their possession are extremely powerful." Volkheim argued "If they decide to attack there is very little you can do about it."

"Well they haven't decided to attack yet and we've seen no sign of such beasts." The agent replied. Aside from that, there's been some pretty strange creatures that have come through here in the past, so we're not too worried.

"You know if you let them go, more people will probably die." Volkheim insisted. "You'll keep us from catching them before they get to the next world."

"That's a risk we're willing to take." The agent replied. "After all this is our world, it is our priority, and we're not going to taint it by convicting a group based purely on the words of another party. Now, I also have permission to show you the cafeteria if you want, that's where your meals will come from for the next few days."

"We don't eat." Volkheim replied.

"Ok, well it's still a pretty cool sight to see, we have specially trained cooks that can make food for a variety of species." The agent said without skipping a beat.

Meanwhile, Phoebe and I got embroiled into a heated argument

"Black holes aren't invisible Pheebles, they're black." I said.

"But they suck up all the light around them." She argued.

"Exactly, if they were invisible they wouldn't react with the light at all they wouldn't suck it up, it wouldn't reflect off them. You'd have no idea that they were there." I replied.

"Then they wouldn't be anything." She argued back.

"The air is a thing, and if it's clean light doen't react with it at all." I argued.

"True." Phoebe replied. "But if they didn't suck up the light they wouldn't be black holes."

"Exactly, they're black." I said.

"No they're invisible Cj, I know they are." She insisted.

"Hey Pheebles?" I asked my beloved as she layed next to me, after mournfully sighing at my lack of progress.

"Mhm?" She sweetly replied.

"Are you hungry? I'm kind of hungry, maybe we should see if we can get some room service or something?" I said.

"Don't we have to be in the room to do that? " She asked.

"I don't know, maybe they can bring it to us out here." I replied.

"Maybe." She said before letting out a sigh. "I am kind of hungry."

"Well ok then, Iet's see what we can do about that." I replied as I clambered out of bed.

I took a moment to get dressed and make myself somewhat presentable before leaving the bus and heading over to the elevator. This one had a request button, as well as the expected up and down buttons, but there was also a slot for a key that was required to use them. Meaning that the request button was still my only option. So I pressed it, and a few seconds later an agent's voice erupted from the speaker box.

"What is your request?" The agent asked.

"We're getting a bit hungry, can we get some food up here?"

"What would you like? We can send someone up with a menu if you need it." The agent replied.

"Yes that would be great." I replied.

"Allright, please back away from the elevator doors, an agent will be there in a minute with a menu."

"So are they going to bring us some food?" Phoebe asked as she came up behind me while I backed away from the doors. Ever since I left the bus I had been wondering if she was going to follow me out.

"They're bringing us a menu, then I guess we can order food, like a restaurant." I answered.

"Ok." She said as she stood beside me.

The elevators opened about a minute later, an agent stepped out and handed us a menu, just like some sort of restaurant, we looked over it for awhile, decided what we wanted, and handed it back to secret agent waiter along with our order. Then he retreated back into the elevator, the doors closed, and we were left waiting once again, atleast there was a smooth concrete floor to sit on, by the time the agent returned with our food Phoebe was practically sitting in my lap while I sat against the wall a few feet in front of the elevator, with my arms around her, because she's my baby girl and I love her even though she had been kind of a handful recently. Sex this, sex that, "When can we have sex?" If it was up to her I swear my balls would be the size of Bbs. Then again, maybe she felt that I was being a pain too with my constant refusals. I was just trying to be reasonable, sex is great, long nights with a significant other are great, but too much in one day and it's just not fun anymore. There comes a point where you just have to take break for awhile.

Regardless of the circumstances, we didn't let it come between us. Once the food came in an assortment of brown paper bags, we took it back to the bus and had a nice little meal together on our little plywood table.

"This isn't bad for cafeteria food." I said as I was impressed with the cheeseburger I was given. "It's almost like McDonald's."

"Mcdonald's?" Phoebe asked.

"Oh yeah, that's right, you've never been to McDonald's, eh, maybe someday they'll come back and we'll be able to go to one." I replied. Not just Mcdonald's but practically every restaurant chain had been defunct since the disaster. Some of the old restaurants took on a new life as an independant diner.

"Hey Pheebles?" I said when we were about finished.

"Mhm?" She asked.

"If you have anything you need to cry about . . . . "

"No, I'm done crying." She interupted.

"Ok." I solemnly replied.

"I'm ok Cj." She insisted.

"Just checking baby girl." I defended.

"What about you? You got anything?" She asked.

"No, hehe, I can't cry, I need to be strong for you." I insisted.

"Not right now." Phoebe argued.

"Well still, I don't feel like crying." I replied.

"Ok." She said. "Just checking."

"So what you wanna do now?" She asked after we had finished off the last of our meal.

"Um, I don't know, why don't we let Mr. Cinders out?" I asked. "And maybe Cloudella and Blossom."

"Maybe." Phoebe replied.

We didn't know it at the time, but the M.I.B like agents were keeping track of our every movement. They were already aware of our pokemon, as Henry and Claire had let their's out to play in the room. However, because of their small size, the agents didn't think they were nearly as much of a threat as Volkheim suggested they'd be. It led them to believe that Volkheim had merely been exagerating. Having seen many other strange creatures pass through, it was nothing really new to them, aside from the pokeball technology that allowed them to be stored and carried around. If they could see inside our pokeballs maybe they would be a bit more concerned, but so far the pokemon we had sent out seemed to be little more than exotic housepets to them.

Down in the room, Henry and Claire were playing with their pokemon while Jack's crew were amazed with the modern flatscreen tv, wireless remote, and all 500 or so channels. They weren't really even watching the tv, they were just seeing what they could do with it, eventually they stumbled upon the options menu and at the moment they were now playing with the color balance, contrast, and brightness options.

The afternoon passed by into the evening without much happening. And we were all asleep before Volkheim and the rest of the bubblemen tried to make a move, after spending most of the afternoon playing videogames in the lounge, Volkheim decided that if they were going to attack, it would be best to do so at night.

"Ok it's getting late I have to take you back to the room now." The supervisory agent said. "I'm sure the others would like to know where you've been."

"Yes the others." Volkheim agreed."What floor are they on again?"

"24 R block." The agent replied.

"Right, well then men, let's go." He said, prompting three of his comrades to restrain the agent.

"What are you doing? You know they can see this right?" The immobilized agent exclaimed."Besides, the elevator doors won't open unless you have the chip."

"Right well, we'll just have to borrow yours." Volkheim said.

"But it's implanted in my wrist." The agent exclaimed.

"No big deal." Volkheim replied as he smashed the glass cover of one of the pinball machines.

He retrieved a suitable shard of glass from the floor and brandished it menacingly while the agent looked on in terror.

-Meanwhile-

Phoebe and I were snuggled up in bed fast asleep. Then the base's alarm system went off and put an end to that.

"What the hell?!" I exclaimed as the alarm woke me up.

"Whahh?" Phoebe said in a state of tiredness and confusion.

"It's an alarm system." I tiredly answered.

"Are we under attack?" She asked.

"No, I don't think we are." I replied. "Maybe something went wrong inside the base?" I said as I layed beside her and tried to cover my ears with the pillow.

"I don't want to get up." Phoebe exclaimed.

"Me neither." I replied. "But we probably should, atleast until we know what's going on."

So we reluctantly got up and got dressed with the alarm blaring outside, becomming more annoying with every passing second. "EeeeeeeeeeeeeeooooooooooooooH,EeeeeeeeeeeeeeoooooooooooH,EeeeeeeeeeoooH."

"Should we hide in here or head out there?" Phoebe asked.

"I think we're better off out there, if it's the bubblemen causing this, they'll know to look for us here." I replied.

"What if it's not the bubblemen?" Phoebe asked.

"We have our pokemon, it shouldn't be an issue." I replied. "And then there's you too."

"I'm too tired." Phoebe replied.

"Ok, well, we still have our pokemon then." I said as I slowly opened the door.

We quietly left the bus, snuck off the flatcar, and snuck quietly around the back of Jack's train, before making our way to the right, carefully hiding behind other trains. We couldn't see anything moving around, just a red emergency light. Phoebe couldn't hear anything, though she had problems hearing the bubblemen anyway, there was still the slightest chance it wasn't them.

Maybe there were other aliens here we didn't know about, or the base was getting attacked by some terrorist cell, for atleast another ten minutes, it wasn't clear what was going on. Until a few bubblemen emerged from the elevator. One of them had their arms covered in blood. I couldn't tell if it was their's or someone else's. I couldn't even tell if Volkheim was with them, I've heard his name, but I had yet to associate a face with it. The only one of us that could identify him was Henry, but he wasn't here right now. I wondered if the alarm woke them up too.

As we hid, the bubblemen went over to our train, passed Jack, and began to search the coach. Somehow Jack was still sleeping despite the alarm. As a locomotive though, I wondered how much he could actually do. Anyway, at this moment the coach would have been completely empty, so the bubblemen wouldn't find anything. All of Henry and Claire's stuff was with them, and all of our stuff was in our bus.

"You think we should fight them before they start digging around inside our bus?" I asked.

"Security should show up any moment now." Phoebe replied." Besides, they're too close to the train, you don't want to damage it."
"I suppose , but."

"Cj." She interupted as she realized something. "We left our pokemon on the bus."

"Oh crap, you're right." I said as I checked my pockets in vain. "We have time, you can go sneak back on and get them while they're exploring the coach, just hurry."

"No I'm not leaving you, " Phoebe refused.

"Well then take me with you, come on we don't have much time." I said.

Before we could do anything several of the large rollup doors of the shed began to open behind us as many MIB agents wielding assault rifles and other weapons began to pile in. They pretty much ignored us and went straight for the bubblemen, as they already knew they were the problem. They quickly surrounded the coach, prompting the offending bubblemen to surrender peacefully, as only one of them was armed.

"See, security showed up." Phoebe said after it was clear the agents had everything under control.

"Yeah, I see." I replied." That was lucky."

"Can we go back to bed now?" Phoebe tiredly asked.

"If you can get us there without being seen." I replied.

"Um . . . let's wait until they're taken away." She said as we secretly watched them slowly walk out of the coach, as per the agent's instructions.

So the bubblemen were handcuffed and taken to the elevator, where it went was anyone's guess. After the elevator doors closed we made our way back to the bus, shortly after, somebody shut the alarm off, and we were finally able to get back to sleep.

Unfortunately. the bubblemen on the coach were not all of the bubblemen that were here, others were still in the rooms below and had no idea any of this even happened. Once again, after being arrested, Volkheim was brought in for interrogation along with his accompanying lackeys. While the rest of the bubblemen were presumed innocent.

"Assault on an agent? " The interrogator asked. "If our own Volkheim wasn't such a crook I'd be blown away."

"I can't let them escape." Volkheim replied. "I told you before, the ones on that living train, they're murderers." He said as he fell back on his old lie.

"The only one here that looks like a murderer to us is you Volkheim. We even have it on tape, you cut an agent's wrist open to extract a microchip to bypass the elevator's security system." The interrogator replied.

"I apologize, but it had to be done, we had to stop them, don't you see?" Volkheim lied.

"You didn't have our permission. That man you cut open, he has a family you know? And now the organization needs to cover his medical expenses as well. You're lucky he'll live, otherwise we'd kill your counterpart here rip you out of that ridiculous suit and throw you in prison in his place." The interrogator continued.

"You were going to let them get away!" Volkheim replied in anger. "I had no choice."

"Likewise." The interrogator replied. "We have no evidence to condemn them, if anything we can condemn you."

"I'm done here mam, I don't think there's anything he can say that we don't have on video." The interrogator said as he turned towards his superior.

" Allright then guard, throw him and the others into the holding cells." The superior ordered the guard who was standing by the door.

"What about the others in the hotel room? The guard asked.

"Leave them be for now, they should be fine, but let the others know not to answer any of their requests until morning." The superior replied.

Eventually, the next morning came, another morning where we couldn't see the sun, as we were inside a building with no windows.

We stayed in bed for awhile and snuggled until our curiousity got the best of us and we felt that we had to get up to see what was going on outside. It wasn't much. Jack's crew were preparing to fire him up for the day, while Henry and Claire had just left the elevator along with one of the mib agents.

"So what's going to happen to the bubblemen now?" I asked the agent, as I didn't get a chance to say anything yesterday.

"That's above my paygrade." The agent replied. "All I know is a few of them are in trouble for violating security protocol."

"Just a few of them?" I asked.

"Not all of them were involved, just about a half dozen or so." The agent replied.

"It would be great if you could imprison them." Phoebe interjected.

"It's not my decision to make." The agent replied.

" What happened last night? " Henry asked, overhearing our conversation.

"You didn't hear the alarms? "I asked in return.

"I heard the alarms, we all did." Henry replied. "But I didn't see why they went off."

"Some bubblemen escaped and went through the coach." Phoebe answered his question.

"Did they take anything?" He asked.

"Was there anything inside?" I asked.

"I'm gonna go check." He replied with a sudden look of concern on his face.

"Ok." I said as he quickly turned around and hurried toward the coach.

I didn't think they left anything on there, but I might have been wrong.

"We'll be ready to go in about an hour." Jack's driver said as he approached our group while Jack himself appeared to be slowly waking up behind him.

"Good, the plan's to have you out of here by this afternoon." The agent replied. "At this rate, we'll be ahead of schedule."

"Can we get breakfast before we go?" Phoebe asked.

"Yes, in fact I already brought the menu in case you wanted something." The agent said as he pulled out a menu out of his suit-jacket.

So we ended up ordering some pancakes, and we had breakfast while everyone else prepared to leave. After Jack was finally awake and ready to go, it still took another hour or so just to navigate the train back to the portal, but around sometime that felt like noon we were back in the nexus making our way down the line. We managed to escape the bubblemen for awhile, but now we would need to find a way to throw them off for good.

We passed a few tracks down the line, thinking the first one away from the mib facility would be too obvious. Our plan for the day was to travel until the crew got tired and then find somewhere to stop for the night, to put as much distance between us and the bubblemen as possible.

Meanwhile, as we were traveling, Volkheim was waking up in his holding cell along with the other bubblemen who were with him.

"What are we going to do now Lord Doctor? Surely the extradimensionals will be leaving soon if they haven't left already."

"Relax, I put a tracker on board that train, if we check every world it should be impossible for us to pass it." Volkheim replied.

"But while we check every world they could get further ahead." Another lackey nervously questioned.

"It's of little consequence, it's only normal for them to want to get as far away from us as possible, and judging by the top speed of that train, and the headstart they have, we can calculate an estimate of where they're likely to stop by the end of the day. We won't be able to make it there before they set off again,but from there we know where we should start looking, and by using our speed advantage the tracking device, and information from trains heading the other direction, we should be able to catch up to them in a few weeks." Volkheim confidently replied.

Tracking devices wouldn't work very well in the nexus, after all there was only two directions we could possibly go. All it would really do is tell them which way we went, as long as we happened to be in the nexus , the signals wouldn't travel through the portals.