Epilogue 3.02

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---Em---


     When we were kids, Olivia and I once tried to build a teleportation device. The only materials we had on hand were some twigs, a couple of pinecones, and a whole lot of mud, but we weren't about to let that get in our way. Olivia had that twinkle in her left eye that she gets whenever she's really into something. She told me the first thing she was going to do once the machine was finished was teleport to the moon. I wanted to teleport to the cookie factory.

     We'd been at it for about half an hour when Colby showed up. He wasn't as enthusiastic about our latest project—he took issue with the fact that neither of us would be able to program the device. And if we couldn't program it, there was no telling where we'd wind up each time we used it. We could teleport to the cookie factory, sure. But we could also teleport right into the pit of a volcano.

     Ripping through to new worlds is a lot like using a teleportation device without being able to program it. Question is, is this place a cookie factory or a volcano pit? Well, it's definitely not a cookie factory.

     Of all the worlds we've ripped to so far, this one's hands-down the most foreign. Purple clouds drift far above our heads. Skinny trees with leopard spots sprout upside-down from the clouds, their crooked branches reaching downwards. My shoes sink into gelatin-like puddles of burgundy ooze that are clustered along the rugged terrain. I step into an ankle-deep puddle, the resistance slowing me down. My foot sinks, like in quicksand. When I pull it out, the ooze slithers off neatly and settles back into the puddle without leaving a drop behind—I bet you could swim in a lake of this stuff without getting wet.

     Comma passes through one of the cloud forest's many arches—tendrils of blue and red clay that interlock in a double-helix formation, protruding from the ground and forming arch-shaped pillars. A couple of furry boulders rest on the other side of the pillar; Comma keeps at a distance, doing her best to tread carefully, at least until she steps in a puddle as deep as her knee and falls flat on her face.

     I stifle a chuckle, passing through the arch. Comma glares at me; I help her back to her feet. We both stare ahead of us. Nothing but arches, boulders, and puddles. The clusters of cloud trees get denser the further we tread, their branches interlocking and preventing most of the sun's light from reaching the terrain below.

     Comma sighs. "We should turn back."

     "Tired already?" My stomach grumbles. "We haven't found any food yet."

     "And we're not gonna."

     "The last time we had this argument, you were the one in favour of persevering." I'd wanted to wait out the oncoming storm. I learned an important lesson that day: never tell Comma what to do.

     "The last time we had this argument, you were right to want to turn back. We wouldn't have met Topher and the others if we hadn't." Comma glances back over her shoulder. "Come on. It's getting dark—the others will be worried."

     "And I was hoping to spend some more quality time with you."

     Comma sticks out her tongue at me.

     "Hey, what's that?" I hear a buzzing noise. Shivers run down my spine as I'm reminded of the swarm of flying cockroaches that nearly ate me alive this one time. I pivot around to see where the noise is coming from.

     A flying creature the size of a water bottle flops down onto one of the furry rocks. The creature has the body of a naked rodent with oily scales all over its skin, like a fish. A set of dragonfly wings flutter against its back. With the elongated snout of a seahorse, it nibbles on little fungus flakes growing along a crack in the boulder.

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