A Collection Of Beginnings

Five:The Mysteries Of The Diaz Tribe

I sat in the lab, eagerly awaiting what was sure to be the most exciting time of my life. I looked around as I waited, noticing all the things I hadn't noticed before. The lab was like most labs, white walls and tiled floors with a few desks placed around the room. One desk belonged to my professor, Erik Payne, and was covered in all kinds of strange odds and ends. I wasn't sure what the other desks were for, though. But that didn't matter to me because the part that interested me was in the center of the room. The mystical looking pool that we were going to use later. It was smaller than I thought it'd be, with a radius of only three or four feet. I didn't know exactly what we'd be using it for, but I knew it was going to be awesome. Doctor Payne had asked me and another student to assist him since we were "the top of the class". I'm not sure I'm ahead of the scientific geniuses I go to school with, but I'm happy that Payne thinks I am.

"You know, the expression is the early bird catches the worm, not the bird who never sleeps catches the worm," said a girl who had just entered. "I'm Miranda, by the way, I'm the other student helping Dr. Payne. I don't think I've ever introduced myself." Miranda looked at me expectantly. She had her black hair pulled into a ponytail and her dark eyes searched my face for a sign of acknowledgment at her remarks.

"Andrew Herrera," I replied. "And I do sleep, I just like to be the first one to the lab."

"Hopefully he'll be here soon, I'm beginning to worry he'll be late. It's nearly ten!" She looked out the window and then turned back to me, her dark face illuminated by the car lights flashing in the window behind her. "

"That must be him!" I exclaimed. We both grinned as Doctor Payne pulled up and entered the lab.

"Great, let's get started!" he said as soon as he came in and saw us standing there.

"But Professor," said Miranda, "you haven't even told us what we're doing. We do have some questions, you know."

He simply smiled at her and started typing in a long sequence on the computer. "There'll be time for explanations later, we have to get this set up before she gets here."

"Who is she?" I asked.

"I have absolutely no idea," he said. "Now, Barnes, start inputting the sequences from that book into the laptop over there. Herrera, you start connecting the cables on the left to the V34. That's the machine in the middle."

"Yes, sir," Miranda said as she hurried over to do her job. Following her lead, I headed to the center of the room to connect the cables. There were about four cables which all seemed to end in the pool. After I had connected all the cables and Miranda finished the sequences, we sat back and waited for whatever was going to happen. Then it happened. The water began to glow a brilliant blue and something black bobbed to the surface.

"Quickly!" Yelled Dr. Payne. "Help her out!" Confused, I looked to the pool and nearly screamed as I saw a woman appear. She wore a wetsuit and helmet, but as soon as she got her head out of the water she took her helmet off. Shaking out her shoulder length brown hair, she allowed herself to be pulled out of the pool by Dr.Payne and Miranda.

"Greetings," she said to Dr.Payne. "I presume you are Dr. Erik Payne?"

"I am," he replied. "Listen, Eleanor, it's late here...we'll have to get moving soon. Have you decided where you're going to stay?"

"Well, I'll need a job, I-"

"Could someone please explain what is going on?" Miranda interrupted. I silently thanked her, I wanted to know as well but I was too shocked to speak.

"I'm Eleanor Diaz," said the woman. "I come from a different universe. Erik has created a sort of passageway and I was the first to test it. You see, there is much war and poverty in my homeworld." She glanced around the lab and smiled. "Not that different from your world, from what I've heard. Anyway, we want to come to your world and now we can."

"Um..." Miranda seemed at a lost for words. Welcome to the club, I thought.

"Ms. Diaz will need to create a life for herself before the rest of her family comes through...she'll have time though, the machine takes six months to charge."

"What do your people want with our world?" I asked, finally finding my voice.

"Just to settle and escape the terror. But not for too long, we're trying to find access to an empty universe to build a new civilization. Unfortunately, finding the parts will be...tricky." Eleanor looked at me and Miranda before continuing. "That's where you two come in. I need a team to work with me...will you consider?"

"What's to keep us from telling everyone about this?" I asked.

"They wouldn't believe us," sighed Miranda.

"And I have blackmail on you both," said Dr. Payne with a terrifying giggle. Miranda and I looked at each other with similarly horrified expressions. "I'm not saying you need to help, you just can't tell anyone about this without permission from me. But, do you want to help?"

"Why should we?" Miranda asked angrily.

"Well, you'd be helping out innocent people, improving scientific technology, working closely with Dr.Payne and I, and...yeah, that's all I got."

Without thinking, I nodded. I knew it was stupid and that things were probably going to get worse from there, but I still did it. I agreed to help Eleanor Diaz, and that was my first mistake.