Doomsday Hunter 2, page 3
part #2 of Doomsday Hunter Series
“You’re not wrong,” the doctor agreed. “That’s why you’ll have to wrap it up in something that is organic.”
“Uhhhh… ” I trailed off. “If you’re suggesting I stick it up my anal cavity, I’m not gonna do that.”
“Why would you need to stick it in your ass?” Natalie looked at me sideways. “Also, why did your mind jump right to that?”
“They do it in prison shows all the time.” I shrugged.
“You won’t have to do that,” Karla chuckled. “In fact, we really don’t suggest you do.”
“Hunter,” Dr. Nash mused, “you are already fully equipped with the means to smuggle the AI out of Dimension Fifty-Seven.”
I wasn’t following.
“What do you mean?” I questioned. “Won’t we need to transfer it to an external hard drive?”
The face on the screen shook his head with amusement.
“Not an external hard drive… ” He grinned. “An internal one. I don’t have hands, or I’d give you another hint. Karla, dear? Will you help me out?”
Karla turned to Natalie and me and then pointed at her right temple.
The chip inside my head.
“I thought that was just for interdimensional travel?”
“We had thought of this exact predicament before,” Dr. Nash explained, “so we built the chip with six terabytes worth of storage space, just in case we ever needed to smuggle information out of a dimension.”
“Once you find Dr. Merrick’s AI, I can walk you through the process of transferring the data,” Karla offered.
“And where, exactly, are we gonna find this thing?” Natalie sighed.
“We’re going to drop you off in the city of Utopolis,” Dr. Nash tried to quell the Scavenger’s fears. “It is where Deltacorp’s headquarters are located, and I am certain that’s where you’ll find Dr. Merrick’s AI.”
“And the Wayfarer?” I spoke up. “Do you know where we’ll find her?”
“You’re in luck, Hunter.” Dr. Nash whistled as binary code ran across his image. “According to my algorithms, she is an employee at Deltacorp. I do not have a name or a description, but that will at least narrow your search down to a singular building. If you trust in the chip, you should be able to locate her in no time at all.”
“Convenient,” I noted.
“There is one more thing I want to talk to you about,” Karla interjected, “before you two leave. In the meantime, you two can go change into your Wayfarer outfits.”
The brunette woman dashed out of the room, and Natalie and I were left alone with the super-smart AI.
“Wayfarer outfits?” Natalie questioned. “What’s wrong with the outfit I’m wearing right now?”
“It’s not organic,” I reminded her as I walked over to the cabinet on the right side of the room. “Sure, some of the fabric will hold up when we make the jump, but all of the buttons on your jacket and the buttons on your pants and all those studs? They’ll be lost to space and time.”
I pulled open the doors to reveal a heap of laundry, folded up neatly. They were all the same thing, only in different sizes.
A plain white cotton shirt, complete with a set of black pants that were a combination made of the same material, fashioned to look like a cross between sweatpants and hiking pants.
They weren’t the most stylish things to wear, but it definitely beat being naked.
“Are-Are we supposed to change right here?” Natalie gasped as I handed her the outfit.
“Don’t worry, Natalie,” Dr. Nash chuckled. “I’m an artificial intelligence. I have no desires of the flesh, nor do I have any sense of romance, sexuality, or passion. The two of you could quite literally make love in front of me, and my demeanor wouldn’t change one bit.”
“Yeaaaaahhh.” I awkwardly motioned to the door to the side of the dresser. “I still think we’re gonna go in there and change.”
“Suit yourself,” the face on the screen mused, “I was just informing you that there was no concern to me.”
Natalie and I stepped into the side room, where we then promptly began to disrobe.
I stripped myself down to nothing but my boxer briefs, though I was sure Natalie wanted me to go further.
“So close,” she purred. “Too bad we don’t have a few extra minutes.”
My heart skipped a beat as all the blood in my body ran to my nether regions. If we weren’t in the presence of our bosses, I would have ripped Natalie’s clothes off right there and made love to her against the wall.
Unfortunately, we were on the clock.
“It’s a damn shame,” I chuckled, and then I pulled the cotton pants up over my legs.
Natalie simply winked as she removed her snowsuit from her body. Underneath, she was wearing nothing but a pair of pink panties with a small heart on the front. Her perky breasts were completely exposed, though she quickly slid the white shirt on as a cover.
Even then, her pert nipples stood erect through the fabric.
I stared down at Natalie’s exposed navel and thought about the baby in her womb… She was my mate, forever tied to me as a Wayfarer and the mother of my child. Natalie’s stomach wasn’t quite showing yet, but her boobs did seem a bit bigger.
That was going to definitely cause some distractions during this mission.
Both of us finished getting dressed, and then we made our way back out to the main room. Karla was back, too, with a stack of what looked like money in her hands.
“This is for you,” Miss Nash noted as she handed us the greenbacks. “It’s four-thousand dollars. That should be enough to get you through for a few days, right?”
My jaw dropped down to the floor, and all I could do was stand there and stare at Karla in awe.
That was way more than enough, especially if we were only going to be in Dimension Fifty-Seven for a few days.
Man, is this what rich people think everyday life was like?
“Y-Yes!” I exclaimed as I snatched up the bills. “That’s more than enough.”
“I’m still not sure if it will be sufficient, Karla,” Dr. Nash sighed. “This may be a dimension that’s similar to our own, but we’re not sure what sort of currency is employed by its people. For all we know, physical currency could be completely eradicated in the time period we’re sending them to.”
“Doubtful.” Miss Nash put her hands on her hips and looked up at her father. “You and I both know a completely virtual currency system is a disaster waiting to happen. Even if that’s not exactly the right money, it should be close enough to work. How often do retail people actually check the bills you hand them closely? They see a ‘twenty’ and just assume it’s the right bill.”
“I suppose that may be the case,” Dr. Nash grumbled. “Though I still wish you had--”
“More data to back it up,” Karla scoffed with a wave of her hand. “Yeah, yeah. I know the drill, Father.”
“Just as sassy as when she was a teenager.” The face rolled his eyes. “Back to the matter at hand… The money is made out of organic material, so it can come along with you. Use it to buy anything else you need for your mission once you get there.”
“Hotels… weapons… food…” Karla explained. “You’re probably going to want to find new clothes once you get there, too. I don’t know what kind of fashion they have in this new dimension, but I can assure you it’s not what you’re wearing right now.”
“Noted.” I smiled and shook my head.
“So, we get to this dimension,” Natalie began her verbal mission checklist, “then we get our supplies, find Deltacorp, find the Wayfarer, and then put a copy of Dr. Merrick’s AI into Hunter’s head.”
“Precisely!” Dr. Nash grinned. “I told you this woman was a natural, didn’t I, Karla?”
“You did,” the brunette chuckled. “Now, shall we send our Wayfarers off on their next adventure?”
Natalie could hardly contain her excitement as she ran over to the IFDR, halted with a firm, spread-eagle stance, and waited.
Too bad the teleporter was on the other side.
“Over here, antsy,” I joked as I walked over to the spot where we needed to be.
A soft blush spread across Natalie’s cheeks, but she simply shook it off and then walked over to my side, underneath the satellite dish-looking devices.
I wrapped my arms around Natalie’s slender body, pulled her in tightly, and then looked up at the face on the screen.
“Ready, Hunter?” he asked.
“We’re ready,” I confirmed. “Send us to Dimension Fifty-Seven, Dr. Nash.”
“Good luck, Wayfarers,” Dr. Nash said in parting.
A bright light erupted from IFDR over our heads and then shot its beams down onto our position. Natalie and I were engulfed in their bright glow as we held each other, and then a tiny bit of electricity jolted through my body as the world turned white.
Dimension Fifty-Seven, here we come.
Chapter 3
Much like the first time I’d done it, the sensation of interdimensional travel was surprisingly painless. My body went completely numb for a split second before the world began to fade from darkness, back into view.
“Hunter?” Natalie gasped. “I can’t see! What’s going on?”
“It’s alright,” I promised the scared woman in my arms. “It’s just a side effect of the Roosevelt’s teleporter. It should wear off in a second or two here, and then we’ll be--”
“Hey!” a random voice shouted out from the darkness. “Move it, buddy!”
A gust of wind swished past my head as the person rushed by, and then a few more footsteps scuttled by. I felt somebody bump into my shoulder, and as I stumbled to retain my balance, I heard the ramblings of a few more disgruntled citizens. My vision began to fade from pure darkness to an amorphous blur, through which I could see several human-sized figures bustling around our position.
I quickly realized this dimension was a lot more populated than the last one I’d gone to.
“What are all these things?” Natalie gasped. “Mutants?”
“Who you callin’ a mutant, lady?” some man’s voice growled. “You kiss your mother with that mouth?”
“My mother is dead!” the Scavenger protested, and there was a long, awkward silence as I assumed the man dashed off.
Slowly but surely, the blurred edges around the figures disappeared, and I realized where we were.
The two of us were standing at the center of a bustling city square. Hundreds of people dashed past us, with their eyes either fixated down onto their cell phones or staring off into the urban jungle of the city before them.
About fifty feet to our left was a dark black street lined with glossy, geometric cars whose headlights were a perfect circle and whose tires appeared to have no rims whatsoever. Though they were obviously turned on and moving, they made next to no sounds as they rolled slowly down the asphalt.
Electric cars, maybe?
Even the roads and sidewalks themselves were clean and flawless, a perfect utopian construct for this near future world. There wasn’t a single pot hole or chewed-up piece of gum or even spider-web crack in the concrete.
All around us were sprawling skyscrapers with a sleek, sterile aesthetic. Their building materials were either black, white, or chrome, though hints of greenery hung out over the very tops of the structures, and the buildings’ windows were made of highly reflective, one-way glass that showed off the kinetic streetscape that passed before it.
“This is what the future was supposed to look like?” Natalie gasped as she stared in awe around her.
“Maybe.” I shrugged. “This is an alternate dimension, so it’s only one of an infinite number of possible futures. For all we know, the future your dimension was headed toward was steampunk or something like that.”
Was the teleportation process successful? Karla’s voice spoke up in my head.
“Yeah, we’re here,” I explained to the disembodied voice. “There was a bit of temporary blindness, but that’s no different than the last time I did this.”
Thank goodness. Karla whistled. I was a bit worried.
“Was there a reason to be worried?” I asked as a million terrible possibilities flashed before my eyes.
Well, yes, Miss Nash noted nonchalantly. There is cause for concern any time we send a Wayfarer away with the IFDR. This time was particularly worrisome, however, because it’s the first time we’ve ever sent multiple Wayfarers at once.
“Uhhhh, what?” I demanded. “Why didn’ you tell us about this before we made the jump?”
I didn’t want to scare you, Karla mused. Besides, according to my father’s algorithm, the chances of a critical failure were about point eight-one percent. But that is still more than zero…
“Well, I appreciate your concern,” I chuckled as I continued to look around at the world we’d just entered.
One of the first things I noticed, outside of the sleek, futuristic aesthetic of the vehicles, roads, and buildings, was the fact that we stuck out like a sore thumb. Every other person for as far as the eye could see was clad in monochromatic outfits that appeared to be made out of leather, silk, or cire fabric. No matter if it was a dress or a pair of slacks, the clothes of these future dwellers were equally as shiny as the reflective windows on the buildings.
Then there was Natalie and me, in our white and black cotton clothes that looked like they’d come from the bargain bin at Goodwill.
“We definitely need to find clothes first,” I grumbled to the blonde Scavenger beside me as I motioned to our clothing. “We look like we just escaped from a mental asylum.”
“Speak for yourself,” Natalie shot back with a smirk. “I think I’m totally rocking this look.”
I reached down into my pocket to make sure our money had survived the interdimensional journey and then let out a sigh of relief when my hand touched the paper greenbacks.
Now, where did we find new clothes? If this futuristic society was as close to ours as Dr. Nash claimed it was, then there would probably be some sort of clothing retailer around here somewhere.
Even then, what sort of stuff did we need to buy? I had no idea what the “average Joe” wore in this day and age. For all I knew, all of these people around us in the monochromatic clothing were wealthy elites.
Either way, we needed to move. We were doing no good just standing around.
“Karla?” I asked the voice in my head. “Can you direct us to any clothing stores in the area?”
I’m afraid not, Hunter, Karla sighed. We do not have any maps of this area.
“What do you mean?” I demanded. “You could practically pinpoint my location down to longitude and latitude last time.”
That’s because Dimension Nine-Fifty-One was almost the spitting image of our own dimension, the voice explained, just completely ravaged by a nuclear holocaust. The city of Utopolis is a brand-new construct, somewhere on the western coast of the United States. I could possibly try and find the equivalent location in our dimension, but it’s not going to have the same roadmaps or even the same structures. All we know is this is the city in which Deltacorp is located.
“Well, damn,” I sighed. “I guess we’ll have to do this the old-fashioned way.”
“What’s the problem, my love?” Natalie asked with a frown.
I had hoped my partner and I soul-bonding would mean she could hear Karla, as well. However, that didn’t seem to be the case. Karla communicated with me directly via the chip in my head, and Natalie most certainly didn’t have one of those.
“Karla and Dr. Nash don’t have a map of this place,” I grumbled. “Which means we’re going to have to find Deltacorp on our own.”
“And?” the blonde woman mused. “To me, that just means this mission is going to be ten times more fun!”
“I’m glad you feel that way,” I chuckled. “But I’m worried this mission is going to take longer than anticipated.”
“Not if we do it right.” Natalie winked. “We’re not running for our lives from mindless, bloodthirsty mutants this time, so what’s it matter if it takes a little bit more time? This dimension actually seems kind of interesting.”
I supposed Natalie was right. Even though Doomsday was right around the corner for Dimension Fifty-Seven, it wasn’t like there was any sort of pressing danger that hung over our heads. If Natalie wanted to take a bit of time to explore this utopian society, there was no harm in doing so.
Not to mention, I really wanted to get to know how this place worked. Was it an exact copy of our society, just with updated technology and fashion choices? Or did we need to worry about strange new traditions and social norms?
I mean, hell… Was there like, a special way we needed to greet people? Was our slang different? Would looking at somebody improperly get us hauled away to some sort of high-security futuristic prison?
It was a strange new world, and we needed to proceed with caution.
“I guess you’re right,” I agreed with the blonde Scavenger. “We still need new clothes, though.”
I glanced around at all of the couples who were walking down the street and immediately noticed they were holding hands. So, I snatched up Natalie’s in my own and then began to lead her down the busy street.
We continued on, hand-in-hand, as we took in the sights of the Utopolis. Much like in Dimension One, all of the shop windows had facades that identified the businesses inside, but there was a slight difference.
The reflective glass must have been some sort of smart glass. It looked just like any other window with a decal plastered on its surface. Then, right before our eyes, the decal faded away into nothingness and was replaced by another line of text that looked exactly like a sticker.
When I reached forward and ran my index finger across the words, I felt it had a texture to it.
“Hey!” I heard somebody grumble. “Go touch someone else’s sign, buddy.”
A stout, bald man waddled through the crowd with a rag in one hand and a spray bottle in the other. He bumped Natalie and I out of the way and then hurriedly sprayed down the window with the mystery liquid.
