James Axler – Watersleep

Like most of the other redoubts they had visited, this one offered row upon row of gun-metal gray desks holding a vast array of computers. However, this time there was a major difference.

All but a handful of the monitor screens in the con­trol area were dark.

“Comps down. Wonder we got here,” observed Jak Lauren.

“I couldn’t agree with you more,” Ryan said, and entered the large control room under his own power, grateful the tingling sensation in his leg was gone. He glanced up and noticed the strip lights overhead were almost all dark. The ceiling was cracked, as well, and showed an array of damage from where water had seeped in from above.

“If this is the redoubt in Greenglades, this entire complex has been flooded,” Mildred stated, idly run­ning a finger over a dirty comp keyboard. The gritty coating smeared under her touch, revealing the func­tions of the top row of keys. “I’d say most everything was underwater for hours. Maybe even days. And even if some of the hardware is still up, I’d have to question the software.”

Ryan took a deep breath. The air in the comp room was damp and humid, but infinitely more breathable than what passed for oxygen in the mat-trans unit. “This hole smells like Florida, at any rate.”

“So where did the water go?” Dean asked.

“We know from past experience these redoubts are equipped with emergency drains, Dean,” Krysty re­plied. “The redoubt apparently got rid of the water. Unfortunately for your dad, the gateway chamber didn’t.”

“From the looks of this control room, I wouldn’t want to make an attempt at jumping out of this re­doubt. I think we should take pains to completely dis­able the unit. We might not be so lucky on a return visit,” Mildred said.

“In other words, we could end up back here on another go-round with our eyes where our asshole is supposed to be,” Ryan noted with a glimmer of grim humor.

“Right. Or with our atoms scattered to the four winds,” Mildred responded.

For a second, Ryan’s mind went back to the green sea he’d experienced during his dream. Undoubtedly there were worse places to end up than inside one of the mat-trans units, atoms scattered or not.

“Not that we’d be alive long enough to enjoy the sight,” the black woman continued. “Molecular dis­sipation and regeneration isn’t the most pleasant thing to endure when the mat-trans works properly. I’d hate to think about what could go wrong if the receiving unit was malfunctioning. Since we have no control over where we jump, I say let’s take this stop off the tour—permanently.”

“You forgetting the fail-safes, Millie?” J.B. asked, referring to the past theory the group held that if a mat-trans unit was malfunctioning or incapable of re­ceiving, the computers automatically rerouted the in­coming transport to a second location. All of the friends had agreed the nightmares brought on by the jumps were at their worst if this occurred, due to the longer time spent in-phase.

“No. But we don’t have any proof the theory is right, and this dump barely brought us in safe this time,” Mildred said, idly watching the coded mes­sages dance across the dirty and streaked computer monitor screen as Dean stepped up beside her.

“We had a comp back at the school,” the boy said casually, peering over Mildred’s shoulder.

“Learn anything? Programming? Word process­ing?” the woman asked, gratified to hear that Brody had been savvy enough to include basic computer training and usage at his school.

“Not much. On. Off. Diff between a disk drive and a CD-ROM drawer. One of my buds, Rodney, showed me a game or two. Hot pipe!”

Dean reached out and punched the Escape key on one of the working computer keyboards, despite Mil­dred’s telling him such an action was a vain one since the programs were locked out to prevent tampering from unauthorized personnel. All of the group of travelers remembered previous jumps where Mildred had taken the time to prod and examine the redoubt com­puters in a futile attempt to gain some kind of control over their destinations.

“Let’s see, let’s try pushing Control, Alt, Delete,” Dean said, using three fingers to press the keys si­multaneously.