The ringed table, as I mentioned, was some thirty feet in diameter; the tabletop was about four feet wide; this left a circular, open space in the middle of more than twenty feet. In this open space were a couple stools and a small table that seem to have been left there for no reason.
“What do you hope to accomplish, Ms. Megaton?” Rex asked. “As I explained, these devices are only useful to communicate to an exactly paired device in another reality. Without another Transdimensional Transceiver on the other end, you have nothing; you can’t get something from nothing, ex nihilo …”
“It’s Ms. Megaton Man,” I corrected him as I plugged the machine in. “And I happen to know where there is and identical transceiver to this one in another reality. Let’s fire this thing up and see if I can make contact with home.”
“I remember those things,” said Glenn. “Rex and Winnie used to toy with them all the time; they were playing with them across the room from one another when Willard disappeared. I always wondered if there was a connection.”
“They’re not playthings,” said Rex resentfully. “And they had nothing to do with that goofball’s disappearance. They’re only capable of communication, not the actual transportation of objects back and forth to other dimensions. Although, with sufficient energy, solid matter could be converted to waves, and …”
I happened to know that both Rex and Winifred Wertz, the inventors of these primitive devices, had further refined their technologies in my timeline, resulting both in the Time Turntable and the Dimensional Doorway, respectively, devices that could indeed transport objects as well as people from one reality to another.
Rex mused about how he might have elaborated on his forty-year old experiment had he not abandoned it as juvenilia while the vacuum tubes inside the transceiver warmed up. Meanwhile, I examined the knobs that ran along the side. I counted five of them, each numbered one trough ten But there was no indication of what they did.
“What do these do?” I asked him. “Show me how they work.”
Shaken from his revery, Rex explained that one was intended to adjust what he termed “chronometry,” or time: past, present, or future. Another he called “situation,” I supposed meaning geographical location. The other three had to be used in tandem to triangulate and pinpoint an exact dimension among the vast and infinite Multimensions.
The tiny, circular cathode ray screen on one end of the device flickered on; it projected a black and white image of snow.
“Heh,” snorted Delbart.
Rex glared at him. “Who exactly do you want to contact again, my dear?” he asked me.
I had to think about this for a moment. If contacted the Troy+Thems now, I wouldn’t have left my own reality yet; that would be too confusing.
“How would I contact suburban Detroit in my home reality, about five weeks into the future?” I asked.
Rex set the first two controls. “That should take care of the time and space,” he said. “Although you might pick up Milwaukee three weeks ago. But the other three are pure guesswork.”
The screen now showed random images that looked like randomly-switching television broadcasts. Sound crackled through the tiny speaker.
“At least you’re picking up something,” said Brenda encouragingly.
Avie wanted to get a better view of the transceiver to see what we were talking about. She set her guitar case on the ringed table while she crawled underneath. When she arose, she was inside the perimeter; this enabled her at least to see the transceiver from the opposite end.
“What’s this opening on the back?” she asked, crouching down to examine it. “It looks like a quarter-inch jack. What’s it for?”
“An override control,” explained Rex. “We planned to develop a more refined tuner later on; we never got around to it.”
“Like a foot pedal for a guitar,” said Avie.
I was having no luck fixing a picture on the tiny screen; the vertical hold kept rolling up and down and changing channels.
“It’s no use,” I said. “If there was someone on the other end who knew the same exact frequency ahead of time, maybe we could read them. But these controls are just too primitive.”
“I have an idea,” said Avie.
She opened her guitar case and strapped on a used 1967 Telecaster, which in those days could be had dirt cheap. Next, she pulled out a twenty-foot cable, plugging one end into the guitar and the other into the back of the transceiver. Finally, she clipped a capo across the neck of the guitar to shorten the length of the strings, and fetched a tortoise-shell pick from her case which she put between her teeth.
“Are you going to play the ‘Star Spangled Banner,’ Jimmy?” I asked.
“No, stupid,” she said, moving a stool to the center of the space. “This won’t make much sound at all without an amp. But I can use the length of the strings as a more precise tuning mechanism than those clumsy knobs. And I have six strings with twenty-four frets each—that’s four thousand seventeen possible chords—which beats your lousy three knobs.”
Rex considered this for a moment. “That’s just crazy enough and stupid enough an idea to work,” he said. “Try a D-flat diminished over F-sharp augmented, flat seven, sus four,” he instructed.
Rex’s scientific colleagues looked at him incredulously.
“What? I’m a polymath,” he said. “I’ve been known to tickle the ivories in a jazz combo from time to time.”
“I don’t think that’s even a real chord,” said Avie. “But here goes …”
She sat on the stool in the middle of the open space and tried different placements of the capo on the neck of the guitar and different combinations of fingerings. In between strumming, she held the pick between her lips and adjusted the tuning of the individual strings.
To describe the possibility of making contact with anything, let alone the exact Counterpart device in Troy, Michigan in my home reality at a precise moment five or six weeks into the future as unlikely would be an understatement. In all the myriad realities in the Multimensions, and in all of time and space, the odds had to be trillions upon trillions to one. But as Mama always told us girls, it was better to be lucky than to be good.
“Wait, you’re getting something, Avie,” I said. “It’s a stable picture, at least.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” said Seymour. “We don’t have time to play with forty-year-old wireless crystal sets.”
“I agree,” said Agnes, hugging the chiffon wrap around her shoulders. “We have too much to discuss in the wake of this upset election. Besides, I’ve been up all night, and yet to go to bed.”
“Hush,” I said, surprised at my own directness. “This is important.”
“Well,” sniffed Agnes.
Everyone held their breath as Avie strummed another silent chord; this time, blurry images appeared on the screen. They seemed to be human in shape; presumably, people were passing in front of another Transdimensional Transceiver in another reality but weren’t paying any attention to it.
“Hey!” I shouted to the transceiver. “Hello! Anybody there?”
One elongated figure passed by the camera, stopped, and did a double-take. A familiar face came into focus; it was stuck on a head that jutted toward the camera lens on a distended neck.
“Clarissa, is that you, child?”
It was the face of Jasper Johnson, Rubber Brother.
“Girl, we’ve been looking all over for you,” said Jasper. “Michele told us what had happened …”
“What on earth is that?” asked Delbart Goodman. “A man with an elastic body? Good Lord! It looks terrifically painful.”
“Some kind of trick photography,” opined Orson. “Anamorphic lenses, no doubt.”
“He’s one of my colleague Megaheroes,” I said. “We have plenty of them in my reality.” To the transceiver, I said, “Jasper, I’m all right. How’s everybody back in Troy?”
“Oh, we’re not in Troy,” said Jasper. “I took this transceiver back with me to New York.”
“Detroit, New York,” said Rex. “At least I got the right Eastern time zone.”
“It’s better to be lucky than good,” said Grandma Seedy.
“We’re fine,” Jasper continued. “But we were awfully worried about you, Ms. Megaton Man. Didn’t you get any of my messages?”
“Messages?” I asked. “How would I have gotten any messages from you?”
“On your visor, of course,” said Jasper. “Remember? I explained to you how Tempy and I tied into the network. The signal should cross dimensions, too.”
“My visor!” I cried.
My Ms. Megaton Man visor, I recalled, operated on a futuristic technology developed by Winnie Wertz, do doubt a refinement of the Transdimensional Transceiver circuitry itself.
I said, “Why didn’t I think of that?” Then I remembered I had set my visor, along with my buttons and cape—which were all solar powered—on Avie’s bedroom windowsill to recharge. “Oh, shit, I left them back in Detroit.”
Momentarily, a feline face appeared on the transceiver’s screen. “Is that Ms. Megaton Man I hear swearing?” asked Kozmik Kat. “What’d she do to her hair?”
“A talking cat!” said Seymour, incredulous. “This is madness.”
“Animation,” said Orson. “Rex, you’ve tuned in a Saturday morning cartoon.”
“Michele’s been trying to reach you, too, through the Astral Aether,” said Jasper. “But you haven’t been responsive.”
“That would explain that erotic, Egypt-themed dream I had while snoozing in the van,” I said. “Tell Michele I’m sorry; next time I’ll know what to expect. I’ve been somewhat preoccupied, getting used to this Civilian Reality. For one thing, Bad Guy’s been elected President of the United States …”
“Bad Guy? That’s terrible,” said Jasper. “He’s a tough customer. You wouldn’t know, because he’s before your time. But he sure gave Megaton Man fits. We’ve got to send a rescue party immediately, Clarissa, and get you the hell out of there.”
The Phantom Jungle Girl stuck her head into the frame. “Who are you talking to, Rubber Brother? Oh, Clarissa! Thank goodness. Bing, look who Jasper found.”
Yarn Man stuck his head into the frame. “Golly! That crazy gizmo really works!”
“Where’d you find her?” asked Fanny. “What reality is she in?”
“That’s a good question,” said Jasper. “Clarissa, what reality are you in?”
I looked at Avie, who could only shrug. “I think A-sharp Phrygian eleventh,” she said. “By the way, I can’t hold my fingers in this position forever.”
“A what?” asked Jasper.
Rex pulled a slide rule out of his pocket. “Let’s see, 440 hertz, half-steps, whole-steps,” he mumbled as he made his calculations. “313427.6856,” he read off, “give or take a decimal point.”
“Who are all these people?” asked Grandma Seedy. “And where are they?”
“They’re in a place called the Quantum Tower,” I said, “in New York City. It’s the headquarters of the reconstituted Megatropolis Quartet, a Megahero team in my reality.”
“Do we have a Megatropolis Quartet in our reality?” she asked.
“Fraid not,” I said. “You probably don’t even have a Quantum Tower.”
“Let me run those numbers on the team’s computers,” said Jasper. “Once we have you pinpointed, we can send a rescue party using the Time Turntable or the Dimensional Doorway, defeat Bad Guy once and for all, and …”
“Ixnay,” I said. “Hold up on that.” I didn’t have time to explain Winnie Wertz’s theory of the Tragic Realization of Temporal-Dimensional Travel—that every trip through time or across dimensions results in the unintentional side effect of creating another alternate reality in which your loved ones never see the traveler again, not to mention the propensity of Megaheroes to generally make matters worse. “I have a hunch I need to do this the natural way—the same way I got here. Let me try to reach out to Michele again …”
Avie’s fingers were growing tired, having to press down on the same frets for so long without relief; the picture began to break up.
“Do it your way, Ms. Megaton Man,” said Jasper. “Just get ahold of you visor; that will provide a more stable, secure connection …”
“Wait!” said Avie. “How’s my sister doing?”
“Clarissa Too? I understand she’s doing fine,” said Jasper, although the sound was becoming garbled. “Dr. Joe … working on … Syrup … restore her powers …”
“What’s that about powers?” asked Avie, concerned. “How’d she lose them?”
Because I hadn’t want to worry Avie unnecessarily, I hadn’t explained to her that when Clarissa Too had hugged Trent Phloog, it had drained Ms. Megaton of her strength and left her as lame as she’d been before she’d ever touched the Cosmic Cue-Ball.
“I’ll explain later, Avie,” I said. “Just don’t let go of the guitar …”
“Clarissa, you told me she was safe,” said Avie. “Sounds like we need to send a rescue party for her!”
Her tired fingers were beginning to slip from the frets.
“Steady, Avie,” I said. “Don’t lose the conection!”
The bloated, bulbous face of Liquid Man popped into view on the transceiver screen. “Who are you talking to, Jasper?” said the Rex in my reality. “The Doomsday Factory? Why are you wasting a transceiver transmission on them, when they’re right across the bay?”
Then Rex must have noticed his colleagues, including Rex Too.
“Good Lord! Is that me?” said both Rexes at the same time.
We were losing the transmission as Avie’s fingers slipped.
“You’re breaking up, Clarissa,” said Jasper. “Locate your visor. Check your messages. Remember, the connection will be more reliable …”
Avie let go of the neck of her Telecaster, rubbing her knuckles and fingertips.
“Sorry,” she said. “I held it as long as I could. Give me a minute to rest; we can try to get it back.”
“Never mind,” I said. The connection was already gone.
“We need to go back to Detroit so I can retrieve my visor, buttons, and cape,” I announced. “I can’t be Ms. Megaton Man without them.”
“That’s impossible,” said Glenn, gravely. “Clarissa, you can’t leave the Doomsday Factory.”
“Nonsense,” I said. “I have to …”
“Why do you think we brought you here?” asked Delbart. “It’s to hide you from the government.”
“They’re right, dear,” said Seedy. “It’s for your own protection. You’re in grave danger.”
“But Bad Guy doesn’t become president until January,” I said. “It’s still early November.”
“I find it endearing, the nickname you’ve come up with for Bartholomew Gamble,” said Hyacinth. “It suits him; I’ve met him on the social circuit. He’s complete and utter riffraff. But the fact remains, my colleagues are correct. Your life is in danger.”
Gene, who was still wielding his submachine gun, “ICHHL intercepted word that the President-Elect wants Ms. Megaton out of the way well before the inauguration,” he said. “Bad Guy’s put out a contract on you, Clarissa. On your life.”
Next: Slaughter on Tenth Avenue
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| A short-haired Clarissa turns her back on Megaton Man, beleaguered by Bad Guy, 2021. |
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