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Chapter 2

What follows is not the original chapter 2. The next two scenes were written almost a year after the story posted, and were included because at the time I still had delusions of finishing the trilogy.

Quinn is standing on the beach, unaware of how he came to be there, but not surprised. It seems right, somehow. It’s night time; the sand and sea are cast of shadows and muted neons. The air is humid and heavy, as if to spite those who need to breathe it. He feels the weight of the night pressing down on him; the sense that there’s something else he should be doing, if he could only remember what.

Yes, the verb tense shifts. This is the ubiquitous dream sequence, because Wendy is all about dreams and dreaming. Even took a course on the topic once. This is probably the only time I've ever written in present tense, and I think it works out pretty well.

Down the beach, he sees the others clustered in a group, silhouettes against the horizon. They are waiting for him, talking in hushed tones about some grave matter. Their backs are turned to him. He smiles at them fondly; at the friends they are and the family they represent. He will get them home; that much he has promised. Still, he can’t help but wonder if the home they’ll find is the one for which they’ve been searching.

“Thirty seconds,” someone says, their voice drifting above the others.

It’s time to Slide. That’s what this is all about. Quinn frowns and checks his watch, surprised at how close he cut it and positive that he couldn’t have calculated that wrong. A blank watch face stares back at him, the hands absent. One part of his mind registers the absence, another supplies the time. The disparity doesn’t seem at all odd. Why should it?

This idea of time without time is a frequent one in my dreams.

If he doesn’t hurry . . . But they’re so far away; he’s not sure he’ll be able to reach them. If he misses the Slide . . . He can’t worry about that now. There’ll be time later, on the next world, when the next crisis -- there’s always a crisis -- has passed. Always later. Waves lap at his ankles and bare-feet; he feels his feet sink into the coarse sand.

“We thought you were going to Slide without us.” Wade is standing directly in front of Quinn now, her cropped reddish locks ruffling in the breeze. She reaches up and runs a finger down his jawline. “But you came back.”

“Just like he said he would,” Professor Arturo adds. He is standing straight and proud, a smug grinlette on his face. His tailored suit is unmarred, despite the wind and the water. Yet, he too is standing barefoot in the sand.

“He said,” Rembrandt echoes, frowning. But for the flashes of his eyes and teeth, and the occasional movement of his hands, he is invisible against the night, his dark skin a camouflage. He passes a folded piece of paper to the Professor, who tucks it into his vest pocket without a word.

They were, apparently, betting on whether or not Quinn would make the Slide.


Wade playfully slaps Rembrandt’s arm. “Not you, too.”

“Hey, girl,” he says, pulling away in mock defense. He never stops smiling.

“Fifteen seconds.”

“What’s going on?” Quinn asks.

The Sliders turn as a unit to stare at him, their expressions caught between shock and disbelief; the echoes of their bickering quickly drowned by the voice of the ocean.

“It’s time to Slide,” Rembrandt answers first. He glances once at Wade, as if afraid of how much he should say. “We’re going without you.”

Quinn’s thoughts race ahead of his speech; a million questions pile up, waiting to be asked -- but only an inarticulate stammer escapes his lips. He’s right here; the window hasn’t opened yet. His friends would never leave him behind unless they had absolutely no choice. Just as he would never leave any of them behind. How can they talk of something so calmly to his face? “But . . . Why?” he finally manages.

“Because, my dear boy --” Arturo holds out the timer. The numbers flash, counting first up then down. Zero is nowhere in range, and never will be at this rate. Still, Quinn knows the vortex will open soon and his friends will slide without him unless he prevents it. He reaches for the timer and grasps only an empty female hand. With a coy tilt to her head, Maggie smiles at him. “-- you promised.”

Maggie replaces Arturo in the dream because Maggie effectively replaced him on the show, as well.

Quinn knits his eyebrows and stares first at Maggie and then at Rembrandt and Wade, trying to decipher what they are talking about. They return his gaze, their faces neutral. “I promised?” he echoes blankly.

“Who will take your place when you die?” Maggie responds, by way of an answer.

“I will.” A second Quinn steps up on Quinn’s right, their shoulders almost touching.

“No, I will,” another Quinn says, stepping up on the left.

This is foreshadowing for the second two stories.

“Do you really think you can get rid of me that easily?” This from a fourth Quinn, who appears behind the other three Sliders.

“I’ll do what I have to do,” Wade answers. She spins around and punches the fourth Quinn in his chest. The impact drives him to his knees; he claws helplessly at something that protrudes from his chest. As if in slow motion, he finishes collapsing to the beach. He stares at the sky with wide open eyes, his mouth curving into a slow smile. Then he’s gone.

The last two lines are a reference back to the prologue. The rest of the paragraph is setting up the direction of the story.

“Five seconds.”

“You see,” Maggie says, pressing herself close to Quinn and whispering in his ear, “We all have to die sometime.”

She reaches up to touch his face.

****

Now we switch back to past tense for the parts of the story that aren't dreams. The above is the only dream in this story, which is kind of unbalanced.


The light touch of fingernails trailing along his jawline pulled Quinn from sleep. He lay in silence for a long moment, eyes still closed. The touch had been wrong for Wade or Maggie; the caress too gentle. Too . . . something else. Something he was afraid would go away if he looked. The bed creaked as the person sitting beside him shifted and he felt her draw closer, leaning over him. She smelled of the ocean air, of the outdoors; a windblown scent that teased his memory.

Quinn cracked his eyelids enough to see through the haze of lashes, and found himself nose to nose with the girl from the hotel. Her eyes looked silver in the moonlight that filtered through the partially draped bedside window, luminous; the rest of her face cast in shadow.

“Did you miss me?” she inquired. Her breath tickled his face. “I missed you.”

His body twisted beneath her, as if to slip from her grasp and escape. This was very wrong, and he knew it, but he really couldn’t bring himself to care.

“Shhh.” She caressed his jaw again, the touch sending shivers down his spine, then kissed him -- just the barest touching of lips. He toyed with the idea of resisting, and found that the thought alone took too much effort. His hands were already reaching for her, to pull her into a real embrace.

“You came back,” she whispered, punctuating the words with more light kisses across his face. “Just like you promised.”

This is Beth talking to him. Quite possibly she was talking while he was still dreaming, which is why the above sentence appears in both places.

One of the arcs of the series was the idea that Beth is inutterably insane and completely in love with Quinn, inasmuch as she has any idea what love is. That part isn't so unusual. Where it starts to get unusual is that Beth keeps killing Quinn. Over and over, she kills him (by accident, because she loves him so much). But *she* hadn't caught on to the fact that the Quinns she kills aren't actually the same person. They're all the Quinns who are also Sliders, who keep landing on her world. So she assumes that Quinn knows who she is, just as she knows who he is.

Her lips started down his neck; he tilted his head back with a sigh of pleasure.

“Now I’ll keep my promise,” she added.

Her promise is to turn him into a vampire. Which fails in some way every time. But, as long as Quinn keeps coming back, she'll keep trying.

The next kiss stung, like a jellyfish or bee sting. He jerked away out of reflex, his eyes flying open.

He was lying on his back on the bed, alone, the covers tangled around his limbs. Quinn sat up slowly, disoriented. Moonlight shown on an otherwise uninhabited room, lending an illusion of life to the heavy wooden bureau, nightstand and straight-backed chair that comprised the furniture. Forms that a childhood of being afraid of the dark had taught him to ignore. The form he sought wasn’t present: the young woman he could swear had been more than just a dream. The sheets at the edge of the bed were cool to the touch, however, and he could sense nothing to indicate that she’d ever been there.

He raised a hand to his throat and touched the spot where she had bitten. It felt unmarred, if a little tender; his fingers came away clean. Slipping from bed, he poked around the room, touching the furniture, walls and carpet, trying to convince himself that he was awake now but hadn’t been before. Her visit felt so real. It seemed wrong somehow to be having those kind of dreams about a woman he had only just met. Yet the alternative was even more out of character. He argued with himself for awhile before realizing that there wasn’t enough evidence to answer the question one way or the other.

Finally, he checked the window, found it secure, and crawled back into bed. All memory of the dream and the visit slipped from his mind as he fell back to sleep.

Now I'm wondering about this. If all the rooms at all the hotels are booked, why does Quinn seem to have his own room?

****

The segment that follows is original to the story.


"You're safe now."

The voice interrupted Wade's sleep and pulled her reluctantly awake. She opened her eyes. A man dressed in black slacks and a billowing black shirt stood over her. His black hair was slicked back from his long featured face, his eyes hidden behind dark sunglasses.

The description is intended to invoke the idea that this man might be one of the world's vampires. He's not. It's the same one who was reading the newspaper upside down back at the hotel.

"Safe," he repeated. His voice was soft, deep and faintly accented: the kind of voice that would make a recitation of the phone book enjoyable listening. Had it not been for the fact that Wade had no idea who he was, she'd have found it quite easy to make such a request.

That would have to wait. She sat up, held a hand to her head to stop the throbbing. She was sitting on a cot in either a small room or a large closet. A bare electric bulb hung overhead; the cot and a large steamer trunk at its foot the only furnishings. There were no windows and the only door was blocked by the man.

Don’t panic, she thought. It’s not what you think.

The back of her neck stung, her head felt foggy. She suspected she’d been drugged. She, Rembrandt and Maggie were heading back into the hotel; there was that fight, and someone grabbed her arm and yanked her down and then . . . an injection? She wasn’t sure. A sharp pain in the back of her neck. Couldn’t keep her eyes open. Two people held her down, but she didn’t fight them. She was too tired. Couldn’t see their faces; they told her to relax. Sounded like a good idea.

“You’ll be safe now,” one of them said. A voice different from the ones repeating those words now.

"Am I a prisoner?" Wade asked, fighting to keep her voice normal, not to let the panic show.

The man straightened, the barest tightening of muscles in his upper body. "Of course not." He smiled, closemouthed, lips stretched almost to non-existence. It wasn't very reassuring. "You're my guest."

It is what you think.

Wade blinked at him, half-expecting him now to reveal in detail his diabolical plan to conquer the world. Did these guys all memorize the same script?

He much have read her expression because he flashed another tight smile. "My apologies. That was not a good choice of words. I'm Dr. David Morgan. You are in my house. You are free to leave any time you want. Although I do recommend waiting until sunrise."

I have no idea why he's a Dr. His first name comes from the lead character of The Lost Boys, as played by Keifer Sutherland. IIRC, his last name comes from the name of kellyfaboo’s dog. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

“You’re the guy from the hotel,” she said. The sunglasses, the unfriendly smile, the upside down newspaper.

“I am,” he answered with a slight lifting of his chin. “Merely doing routine surveillance until you walked in. You surprised me. I do not surprise easily. I did not expect to find someone with your . . . potential.”

She blinked again. He had definitely memorized some creepy horror film script. The accent was probably fake too. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“On the contrary,” he replied. “We can always use someone like you. Especially now.”

For what? she thought, wondering if now was a good time to mention that she wouldn’t qualify as a virgin sacrifice. "Are my friends here, too?" she asked instead.

I like this line about the virgin sacrifice.

"Your . . . friends?"

"I was traveling with three others." She gave a brief description, hitting an awkward moment when she almost included the Professor instead of Maggie. Professor Arturo, who had been the fourth member of the original group of Sliders, and who recently sacrificed his life so she, Quinn and Rembrandt could escape a dying world. That’s when they had met Maggie, and shortly afterwards, decided to take her with them. It hadn’t been an easy transition.

He shook his head and replied, "I'm afraid I'm not very good with faces. I'll find out." With that, he walked out of the room, leaving the door open behind him.

This is another of the intended arcs. Dr. Morgan isn't very good with faces because he's blind. Not only do I play with dreams in my stories a lot, I also play with the notion of insanity. Which means that Dr. Morgan couldn't just be blind, he had to be nuts.

He lost his eyesight to diabetes. Unreleated to that, he's a little precognitive. The insanity comes in because all time is now; he doesn't know the difference between past and future. As far as he's concerned, what will happen (as he Sees) has already happened. This leads to a lot of confusion, especially on his part.

Wade made no effort to follow him or to try to escape. There was too much she didn't know, like if any of the other Sliders needed rescuing. Besides, David didn't seem all that bad, if one could get past the affections. A little formal and dark; the sort who hadn't yet realised that he was too old to do Gothic. He wasn’t the kind of person she’d want to meet in a dark alley, or a well lit one. Or a hallway. She might run into him again as she tried to leave. She wasn’t at all confident that she could leave unmolested, and now was not the time to put it to the test. Her head still pounded; she doubted she could stand up for more than a few seconds at a time.

And what was with his outfit? Black was definitely not his colour. He seemed to have a thing for dark colors and dim lighting. It strained her eyes to focus in any one direction for too long. The door to the room she occupied opened into a larger room that looked to be a study. It too was stark. Mahogany bookcases lined every wall, each packed solid with thick books. A matching desk and black leather chair occupied a place on the far wall. Everything looked very utilitarian; no knick-knacks or other decorative items. Not even a carpet or chandelier. Nor could she see any windows in that room either, or any other exit.

David returned a few moments later, coming into the doorway suddenly enough that she started. She figured that whatever door he used must be on the same wall as the room she was in. "I have been informed,” he said, “that one of your *friends* is Dead. I don’t know about the other two." He didn't seem particularly saddened about either the news or his messenger status; he spoke as though he delivered this kind of news every day.

Not only does he, in fact, deliver this news every day, he is making a distinction between Dead (as in, turned into a vampire) and dead (as in, deceased). Unfortunately for Wade, there is no pronunciation difference between these two words.

Dead? Who was dead?

David was shaking his head. “It’s a shame, really, that your friend had to Die so soon after arriving here.”

“Who?” She finally ordered her thoughts enough to ask.

“The one you were with in the hotel. I told you, I’m not very good with faces.”

“Quinn,” she whispered.

“Yes, I believe that is his name.”

"Did you kill him?" Wade pulled her legs up under her on the cot, pulling into herself. She wanted . . . she didn’t know what she wanted. To be with Rembrandt and Maggie maybe. To be with Rembrandt and the Professor. To have someone console her, offer sympathy and understanding. Not to be stuck in this barren room with a man her father’s age whom she wouldn’t trust farther than she could throw. But she couldn’t leave. Well, she could, but she didn’t know where to go. She didn’t even know where she was. And she didn’t know what to do once she got wherever she’d go.

“Of course not,” he replied. “What do you take me for? Never mind. I forget you’re new to Santa Isabella.” Kneading his hands together, he continued in a softer tone. "That's why we rescued you, because he’s Dead. Wouldn't want you ending up that way."

Santa Isabella. Isabella is the Spanish form of Elizabeth, so this is another reference to Elizabeth Bathory.

Well, no. But dead?

"How did he die," she managed to choke out.

Her question seemed to amuse him; a thin smile flashed across his lips again. Wade wished he’d remove his sunglasses so she could read his eyes. Maybe he was lying. Maybe Quinn wasn’t really dead and this was all an elaborate joke. A very sadistic joke.

“There’s a lot you don’t know about Santa Isabella,” David said, as if that was an appropriate response.

“I’ll read the guide book later,” Wade snapped. “Tell me how he died.”

“You won’t believe it.”

Enough. Wade was off the cot a second later. She slammed David into the wall, hissed in his face, “Try me.” He didn’t react with so much as a muscle twitch; that irritating smile remained on his face.

“Are you quite done?” He gently removed her hands from his shoulders, pushed her away and straightened up. “It was Beth.”

“Beth?” she echoed, not sure if David was providing the name of Quinn’s killer or the means by which it was accomplished. Not that either would have surprised her.

“We need your help,” he continued.

“So you kidnaped me? Did it ever occur to you that you could have *asked*,” she retorted. “Why all of this?” she gestured around the room, but the sweep included the fight and the kidnaping and his inexcusable manner of ‘asking for help’.

“We had to know. Your friends aren’t safe. One of them is already Dead, and the others might be. But you . . . you have potential. We had to get you away from their influence.”

“You panicked,” she said, seeing him in a new light. But there had to be more to it than that. It was too well planned, too smoothly executed. And too intricate. As if they’d been expecting resistance from her and interference from the other Sliders. She absently rubbed the sore spot on the back of her neck, fingers finding what felt like a mosquito bite. They’d somehow known where the Sliders were going to be. Known well in advance what they were going to do.

“She can’t be allowed to destroy any more lives,” David continued. He was beginning to sound desperate, not in tone but in the speed of his words. He was speaking faster now. “Beth is responsible for Quinn’s Death. And she’ll go after the rest of your friends soon if she hasn’t already.”

The silence grew long as Wade tried to make some sense out what David was telling her. Quinn was dead, and Beth had killed him, or distracted him long enough for someone else to kill him. Why? She vocalized that last question.

David met it with more hand kneading. “She preys on the young: attractive youths. Either sex. Some she kills outright. Some . . . you don’t want to know.”

“Which one was Quinn?”

A lengthy silence passed before David replied. “The second.”

Well, there was one way to figure out what was going on. “What do you want me to do?” she asked.


Thus endeth chapter 2.