Chapters 7 and 8

Chapter Seven:

The Plot Finally Gets to Advance Quite a Bit, but Not as Much as You’d Think

There were few things that lifted Linae’s spirits more than a slice of leftover pizza for lunch.  Hot or cold, plain or with toppings (especially ham and onion, and occasionally a chili cheese pizza could be good, too), it was by far her favorite lunch.  No matter that she had eaten it for dinner the previous night with Brooke, she was still looking forward to lunch time purely for the two slices in a plastic container waiting for her in the break room refrigerator.  So it was curious that she didn’t take off for the break room at the soonest opportunity.  Or not so curious, considering that she half-fell asleep while trying to make the words on her computer screen make some kind of sense.  By the time she picked herself up enough to actually go and eat lunch, Lynne and Benedict had already made it to the break room, as well as two other agents that were talking to Lynne.

“Did he say how long it would take?” One of them asked, poking at the remnants of her lunch, which was too eaten to be distinguishable any more.

“A couple of days, probably,” Lynne replied with a shrug.

“Hey, Lin,” the other agent, the only one facing the door, said with a little wave when Linae came in.  “Did Lynne tell you yet?”

“Tell me what?” Linae asked.  If she hadn’t been so intent on getting her pizza from the fridge, she probably would have sounded more accusatory.

“About the guy who cracked the code, that’s what!” the other agent replied.

Lynne turned in her seat to face Linae.  “Mary Ellen brought someone over from Halix, and he was able to get the data from Benedict’s language to make a sound wave plate.”

“That’s good, then,” Linae said, joining them at the table.  She briefly remembered what she heard in the restroom.  “You should thank Mary Ellen for helping you out.”

“That’s just what I said!” the first agent, whose name was also Mary, said.  “M.E. can be such a pain about getting credit for something.”  

“Oh, I know!” the other agent, called Sheila by the others, agreed.  “If you don’t give her some kind of acknowledgement, she’ll snub you for weeks.”

Lynne didn‘t generally see this as a bad thing, but she knew it was better to keep a good relationship with people at work.  “I’ll send her a message when I get back to my office.”

“I was thinking something more along the lines of a cookie bouquet,” Sheila said.

“Don’t do that,” Mary said, waving a hand in disgust.  “If you do, everyone,” she shot a pointed look at Sheila, “Will get to it before she does.  Probably.”

“I take it that happened to you?” Linae said, having finished enough of her first slice of pizza to feel up to joining the conversation.

“Not really, no,” Mary said, “I just think it was a little suspect for someone to suggest something edible.”

“I wasn’t suggesting that so that I could raid her office, if that’s what you think,” Sheila said, visibly offended, “Although I did think that she’d ‘share the wealth’ if she got one.”

“See, I knew you weren’t being altruistic!” Mary said, pointing an accusing finger at her friend.  “Honestly, Sheila, that’s your problem, you’re always so self serving!”

“It’s not like Mary Ellen would share, anyway,” Linae pointed out, although neither girl really heard her.  They had started in on what sounded like an old fight.  

“I’m done here,” Lynne said, pushing her chair away from the table.  Benedict did the same, having finished before Linae even showed up.  

“See you later, I guess,” Linae said, then looked at the squabbling agents and hastily crammed the remains of her second slice of pizza into her mouth, chewed it up, and left as well.

Lynne was still standing outside the door waiting.  “I wanted to talk to you about the patch,” she said to Linae.  

“Go ahead,” Linae said, and they started walking back to her office.

“Well, I was thinking, if this thing is really ready in a day or two, you’ll need to clear out your schedule to get Benedict home.”

“Whoa, whoa, wait,” Linae said, stopping in her tracks. “Whoever said I was going to do that?”

“I had just assumed you would.” Lynne said, also stopping.  

“Why should I do it when almost every other agent here is leaping at the chance to get involved with this situation?”

“But in the end, it is your client’s problem, isn’t it?”

Linae had almost forgotten that part of the situation.  She made a mental note to call Mr. Elwood and set up the payment for services, payment she would only get if she actually did the deed herself.  She sighed.  “You’re right.  It is my client and my responsibility, no matter what help I get.”  Then a thought occurred to her.  “But of course you’ll be coming, won’t you?”

“Hm?” Lynne cocked her head, “Why would I come?”

“Why would you come?  Why wouldn’t you come?” Linae was almost amazed at her sudden stroke of genius, if at the same time dismayed that Lynne hadn’t been planning on coming anyway.  “You’ve been so involved with this, and Benedict certainly has taken a shine to you.”  She looked down at the blue creature currently holding Lynne’s hand and glaring at both of them impatiently.  “I mean, he probably wouldn’t feel right going home without saying goodbye to you, and wouldn’t you feel better knowing that he got to the right home?  The home that is his world that he doesn’t even know the name of?”  She was starting to lose her thread, and Lynne was looking less than convinced, so she took a deep breath before continuing on.  “And don’t you want to know, just a little, what that world actually looks like?”

“I’ve already read the description Benedict gave us,” Lynne pointed out.

“Yes, but that’s just what he said,” Linae said, “How can mere description compare to seeing the real thing with your own eyes.”

“You could take a camera and get some pics for me,” Lynne pointed out.  But Linae could tell she was starting to turn to her toward her way of thinking.

“I could,” she said, “But then, I’ve never been all that good at taking pictures.  I’d probably leave something out.  And of course, if I went by myself, I’d just go and come back again.”

“You’d leave without finding out the world’s name?” Lynne asked.  Linae secretly smiled.  She hadn’t thought of that as a consequence of her words, but it was certainly a fitting one.

“Once I’ve been there, I can go anytime, and I can take anyone I like,” she said with a slight shrug, “So why should I stick around by myself?”

“You have a point,” Lynne said.  “Anyway, what I was really going to say…”

“Yes?” Linae said, unable to read her expression.

“I don’t remember what I was going to say.”

“Oh.  Well, if it comes to you later, be sure to send me a message.  Oh, and don’t forget to thank Mary Ellen.”

“Right, I’ll do that.”  And with that, the two women went back to their respective offices.

The rest of the day passed without incident.  Lynne dealt with all the messages Linae forwarded to her, although she forwarded back the ones that didn’t deal with Benedict directly.  She also sent Mary Ellen a nice iCard to thank her for introducing her to Grayson.  Linae met with two clients, answered the messages Linae forwarded back to her, and decided to stay in that evening (although Brooke did come over, and they ordered another pizza and rented a movie).  Benedict, meanwhile, spent the night wondering why everything in life had to be so hard.

Lynne was only slightly surprised when she found a message from Grayson Mason in her inbox when she got into work first thing that morning.  From the message, he seemed to be very pleased with himself.

“I have done it!” he wrote, “In just one night I have made a prototype wave plate for a headset.  I will be coming today to give it to you.  Please let me know what would be a good time to drop by.”

Lynne was pleased that it was finished so quickly, but couldn’t help but feel that it was a tad too convenient.  But then, the sound wave plate technology had been around since she was a child, so there had been plenty of time to refine the process of creating new ones.  And as Grayson said himself, what he was bringing was only a prototype.  Another part of her was thinking about what Linae had said yesterday.  She’d thought about it all through the previous night as well.  And the more she thought about it, the more she thought that she would go.  As long as she was free when Linae went, there wasn’t any reason why she shouldn’t go.  She had mostly been thinking that should wouldn’t go because she didn’t want to go alone.  And when she thought about that, she realized that there wasn’t any reason why Linae would want to go alone, either.  No wonder Linae had worked so hard to convince her to go along.  Thinking about it now, she really couldn’t blame her.  This was why, when she wrote back to Grayson, she asked him to bring an extra wave plate for an earpiece, if at all possible.

“For you, anything is possible,” Grayson had wanted to write back when he read her message, but he felt that might not be the best thing to say at the moment.  Open-ended remarks had a tendency to come back to bite him, like when he promised his cousin Mary Ellen that he would do anything to score some tickets to the big game.  But then, the favor she had called him for had certainly had a pleasant bonus for him, so perhaps it wasn’t a bite, exactly.

Chapter Eight:

The Unknown World Becomes Known to Linae, Lynne, and Grayson, too

“So, then,” Linae said as she placed the wave plates into the slots on her headset, “These work?”

“They’re only a prototype,” Grayson explained, again, “But they should properly translate the language.”

“All right then, say something,” Linae said to Benedict.  She was lucky that her headset had finally gotten back in from the shop that morning.

“Not this again,” Benedict grumbled.  “Did you guys have enough of this yesterday?  I sure did.”

“Heh,” Linae arched an eyebrow, “So it does work.”

“Well, I’d like you to test it a little more than that,” Grayson admitted.

“Do I really want to know what kind of secrets lurk in the inner workings of Benedict’s mind?” Linae asked Lynne.  “How’s your earpiece translation doing, by the by?”

“Probably not, and it seems to be working all right,” Lynne said, answering both of her questions in turn.

“Feh on you both,” Benedict said, but he wasn’t really mad.  A little offended, certainly, but for the most part, he was just glad to be, in theory, going home.

“Okay, if everyone’s ready, let‘s get a move on,” Linae said, eager to be getting on with it.  Not only was Lynne coming, which was good in a manner of speaking, but Grayson had decided to come along as well, which was potentially good.  But seeing as she had just met him that morning, she really couldn’t be sure of his usefulness on this trip.  Still, if this trip went as planned, everything would go back to normal.  She could ignore Lynne as usual, and the agency would have a new world to take customers to.  A win-win situation if ever she saw one.

“Ready,” Grayson said, taking Lynne’s hand.

“Ready,” said Benedict, taking Lynne’s other hand.

“Don’t know about these two, but I’m ready,” Lynne said, holding up her two taken hands.  

Linae rolled her eyes at the terrible joke, and took Benedict’s free hand.  “All right, just like we practiced.  Everyone get ready to step on my mark.  Ready, steady, GO!”

And then, there they were, the four of them, standing in the middle of a bustling village full of creatures of a similar vein as Benedict.  Just as Benedict had described, the buildings were mostly beige, and the whole place had a rather underwhelming look to it.

“I’m guessing this is the right place,” Linae said dryly.  

“I’d guess that,” Grayson and Lynne said at the same time.  Benedict, however, had taken off like a shot, and was now out of sight.

“Well, that’s gratitude for you,” Linae said when she noticed he was no longer there.  “That’s done, then, we can go back.”  But Lynne and Grayson were talking amongst themselves, and didn’t hear her say this.

“Should we go after him?” Grayson asked.

“I don’t know which way he went,” Lynne said, feeling a bit ill at ease.  The presence of three very strange strangers had not gone unnoticed by the populace of the village, although no one had stopped to talk to them.  But the stares of the passing villagers, that was something else entirely.

Linae didn’t seem to notice the staring, though.  She had realized that they were probably not going home without getting some acknowledgement that this was indeed the right place for Benedict, and so decided to move things along.  “I felt a whoosh, and the whoosh went that way,” she said, pointing randomly toward a small hut.  Sure enough, Benedict was going inside it.

“Oh, good, we didn’t lose him,” Lynne said, and started heading toward the hut herself, with Grayson and Linae following behind her.  They arrived just as the door of the hut opened, and they were in time to witness a heartfelt reunion scene between Benedict and two creatures who looked almost exactly like him; one of them the same pale blue, but the other a pink so pale it was almost white: his parents.

“Mom, Dad!”

“Benedict, we were so worried!” His mother hugged him tightly.  Then she looked at him disparagingly.  “What are you wearing?”  He was still wearing the poncho Rachel had given him, but before he could explain, his father took him aside.

“What in the world happened to you?” His father asked.  “The entire village combed the countryside for two whole days looking for you and your friends.”

“Friends?” Linae wondered, but pushed the thought out of her mind.

“You’ll never believe it, Dad, I went to a different world!”

“You’re right, I don’t believe it.  Where did you really go?”

“No, I really did go to another world, and I couldn’t understand anyone, and they trapped me somehow, but then I got to a place where I could understand one person, but she couldn’t understand me, and-”

“That’s enough,” his mother stopped him, “It’s all right, honey, we won’t be mad, but you need to tell us what really happened.”

Linae and Lynne were trying to hold back their laughter as they watched, but Grayson, who had pulled out his small laptop computer and was loading the sound wave editor program, couldn’t understand what was being said yet, and was more than a little confused about what the two women found so funny.  Finally, Lynne stepped forward.  “Everything your son told you is true, sir.  He really did go to a different world somehow, but we were able to bring him back home.”

Benedict’s parents just stared at her.  

“See, I told you!” Benedict said, pointing at Lynne and the others.  His parents looked from him to the humans and back again three times before they said anything.  During this, Linae asked Lynne, “Should we do something?”

Lynne shrugged, “I really have no idea what would be appropriate in this situation.”

The program on Grayson‘s computer finally booted, but not soon enough to catch anything.  “So, what’s going on?” Grayson asked, and Linae filled him in.

“Seems Benedict’s parents here don’t believe that he went to another world, but here we are as proof, so yeah.”

At last Benedict’s mother spoke, “P-p-please come in,” she stammered, a bit shaken, “Have something to eat and drink, if you please.”  She motioned to the door.  Benedict ran in, followed more sedately by his father, then Linae and Lynne looked at each other and shrugged.  The three of them went in, followed by Benedict’s mother.

“Please have a seat,” Benedict’s father said, setting out chairs for them.  But since even fully grown adults of Benedict’s species were still much smaller than the three of them, Linae had the distinct feeling of being at a parent/teacher meeting for a kindergarten class.  Not that she knew the feeling personally.  Lynne felt more like she was being forced to play musical chairs in a grade-school classroom, and Grayson opted to continue standing, with Lynne excusing him to their hosts.

“So, you really come from another world?” Benedict’s father asked, while his wife set out some food on a small table in the center of the room between them.  She also poured them all a cup of a sweet-smelling liquid.

“Of course they do,” she chided her husband, “Have you ever seen anything like them in your life?”

“I was just making small talk,” he replied, twirling his own cup nervously.

“That’s fine,” Linae said, “Really, it’s all right.”  She took a sip of the drink in her cup and found it tasted good.  This made her feel bold enough to try the small, round objects on the table.

“We do indeed come from another world,” Lynne told them.  “Our world is called Rearn.  My name is Lynne, by the way, and,” indicating toward Grayson, “he’s Grayson.”

“I’m Linae, and these are delicious,” Linae said, waving what she assumed was a biscuit of some sort.  That’s what it tasted like to her, anyway.

Benedict’s mother smiled.  “Thank you.  I’m Millie, and my husband’s name is Tails.”

“Thank you very much for keeping our son and his friends safe,” Benedict’s father said to them.

“Friends?” Lynne was confused, while Linae just groaned.  Somehow she knew that this would not end with everything back to normal like she wanted.  But Lynne continued, “What friends?  Benedict was the only one we ever saw.”

Benedict fidgeted uncomfortably in his chair.  “You mean they didn’t come back yet?”  But it seemed like he already knew the answer, and had known for a while.

“Please, please, don’t tell me there are others still in our world,” Linae said.  Her mind was already racing to think of ways to shaft looking for these friends onto someone else.

“I don’t think so,” Benedict said, looking even more uncomfortable as he did.  “When I… got there… I was the only one there.  I thought I was the only one that got transported.  I don’t even know how it happened…”

“Spontaneous transportation doesn’t just happen,” Benedict’s father said.

“I’m assuming that it had something to do with the experiment Mr. Elwood was talking about,” Linae said, and briefly explained the circumstances that had lead Benedict to the Tulin-Walker Agency.  Lynne added the occasional detail, especially concerning what they had done to get Benedict back home.

“I see, I see,” his father said, stroking the tip of his snout thoughtfully.  “Be that as it may, something still strikes me as odd about the whole thing.”

“I have to agree with my husband,” Benedict’s mother told them.  Then she turned to her son.  “Just what were you four up to that day?”

“You know… we were just out in the woods,” Benedict said, trying to keep a cool composition.

“Oh, really?” both his mother and father asked at the same time.  Although they didn’t move, it seemed to Lynne that they had gotten uncomfortably close to their son.  “Maybe it’s time you told us what really happened.”