Step 1: Get an incurable disease (Prologue)

"AAAAAAHHHH," the woman in bed screams. She curls up in a semi-fetal position, clutching her hand and drawing it in to her stomach.

People in white lab coats pour in through the door to surround her, each with an inked date or two somewhere visible on their body. One has a date from a couple of years ago on their forehead. Another has a number a decade in the future on their cheek partially covered with makeup.

All have concerned looks on their faces. The eldest, a man, asks, "What is it?" The woman on the bed doesn't respond.

Another reaches forward, revealing part of her date as her sleeve slides up, "Where's the pain?"

Eyes still closed not looking at the crowd around her, she rolls onto her back as lifts the back of her hand to them like a wounded dog offering its paw.

A collective gasp echoes among the various visitors. Several looking to others for confirmation or comfort. One murmurs, "The date was for today."

Another answers back in the same hushed tones, "I've never seen this before."

After a moment of silence, the woman in bed opens her eyes. The rest of the room follows suit and looks to the oldest man in their midst. He clears his throat and the crowd parts as he steps toward her. Clearly uncomfortable, he clears his throat again. "Miss Greer. It seems. It seems that we'll need to do more tests." He looks apologetic.

She turns her hand so that she can see the back of it. Like usual, it has three sets of two digit numbers, but instead of a date with a month, day, and year, she has colons. She has hours, minutes, and seconds left.

"I'm sorry, but at first glance it seems you are getting worse."

Step 2: Travel to an Alternate Universe

"Huh." He pauses as his eyes dart back and forth, analysing the various lines and symbols displayed in the mono-lens that is his sunglasses. In front of that is a wall of wires and hardware, but mostly criss-crossing wires of all sorts of colors. Some of the colored bands, as seen through the green tint of his eye screen, have an arrow showing direction of flow. Others have lightning bolts, showing power, or random strings of letters, showing data.

The most concerning of all, however, are the little, animated bug icons that are chomping into the streams of data. "Well, that would explain the errors." He lifts his right hand covered with a glove to his face. Each fingertip has a pad that he assigns a program to with his eyes through his glass's interface.

Finger by finger, he adds more complexity to his hand waving at the cords. Some of the viruses leave after a pass or two, but the final ones need a full five finger intricate wave gesture. At last, the final bug disappears.

"Okay," he says slapping his gloved hand with the ungloved one. "That's done. Now to get paid." Standing from a kneeling position he takes one last look at the network of wires and finds that everything is all clear and functioning property.

Turning toward the door of the small room, that only houses this equipment, he stops and looks down. He pulls a glove out of his left pocket. It looks much like the one he is already wearing. It's vibrating. He checks his interface again. "What's this? I've never seen this before."

He interacts with it. "I can't delete it." He tries something else. "Wear the left glove?" He shrugs. "Well, Bobby, if it makes the error go away..." He puts on the glove.

It begins to glow. After the light becomes too bright to look at, a beam fires out and disappears at the door. Not that it hit the frame, rather it hit the air where the door would normally be and stops there. Then the glove goes back to normal. Checking the interface in his glasses again, the annoying icon is gone.

Beyond the door, everything looks like it should. Bobby spots something he didn't see before. On the wall in the hall there is a large crack. Curious, he walks towards it. Taking a curving path, he spots more oddities. The crack points toward another open doorway where the frame is broken. As he crosses the threshold from the perspective of the small room, Bobby disappears and a painted hall with workers pass by, paying attention to their phones and not to the empty room with the network tower.

"What?" All around him the signs of decay increase. No longer is he surrounded by well lit, carpeted, modern building he was in. Now, hunks of walls are missing. Light comes through those same holes in walls. Looking around, Bobby wonders how this how this thing is holding together, when he's not wondering what happened to his job site.

He doesn't get to wonder too long as everything around him begins to sway. "Oh crap. Earthquake." He calls upon his memory of his path getting to the server and traces it backward. This proves tricky as swinging lights and old wall decorations fall all around him. A hunk of ceiling crashes through the floor leaving a hole in its wake, right in front of Bobby.

He leaps forward. Time freezes for a moment in air before he feet touch the other side. He turns a corner and passes some elevators. Up ahead rubble is all over the place and blocking the sides leading to a wall. Crap. A dead end.

Crash! Crash! Crash! Bobby doesn't look back as bigger and bigger things fall behind him. He slows to a jog, looking ahead. He is about to stop when he spots one long crack that starts at a bottom on one side and goes up and over and back down the other side.

He mumbles to himself, "I guess this is my only shot." He picks up speed, charging the wall. The shaking slows allowing him steadier steps. Air whips up giving him a tail wind.

Right before he reaches the dead end, he jumps and throws his shoulder into the painted surface.

It seems futile as he slides down the wall. He backs up to try again. Crack. Crack. Rubbing his shoulder, the breeze becomes a wind. The noise becomes louder. Crack. Crack! It sounds like the whole building is coming down.

He charges again. Adrenaline fuels him. CRACK! crack.crackcrack. Bobby crashes at full speed. Nothing moves. More of the building falls blocking his path back and trapping him where he is. I'm going to die here. He slumps against the wall.

creeeeeeAAAAAKKKKKKK! The wall he's leaning against groans and gives way, dropping him on the red grass-like plants outside. The rest of the building collapses away from him and with the wind caused by the collapse, it throws debris over and beyond him.

Someone near Bobby calls out in pain, "Ow!"

Behind him another voice, filled with concern, answers, "Are you alright?"

The voices break Bobby out of his thoughts and stare at what remains of the building he had worked in. Or had worked in. he adds as he stands and turns to look at the people talking.

His visor activates putting a double circle around the piece of metal jutting out of the thigh of the one lying on the ground. A big bug icon is to the upper right of the injury near the kneeling companion. Another icon, this one a band-aid, hovers over the body on the ground.

An app in his mono-lens flashes with a new exclamation point in the corner. That's odd. How did my toolkit get an update? With a look and a double blink, it opens. Among the display are tools he hasn't seen before. He looks at one of his virus busting programs and the selection dims. He brings up his right hand and circles appear around his fingertips. Better safe than sorry. He places the program on one of his fingers and the selection comes back. Most of my programs are gone. What the heck are these?

He hovers over one that looks like a first aid cross hoping to get information on it. Instead, the selection dims and the finger circles return. He drops it on another finger doubting that it'll tell him more but wishing it would. It doesn't. The display gets bright again. His eye falls on a scalpel icon. He looks to the side quick. Heh. No need for something so drastic.

His attention returns to the wounded person, and the reality of his situation sinks in. The fox ears popping out of short, brown, feathered hair crowning pain filled pink eyes of the wounded fox-woman-thing. And looking down on her is floppy ear, spotted skin dog-man-thing. I am not on Earth. Or at least not my Earth. I've got to find a way out of here.

Panicked, Bobby starts moving, looking, searching. Seeing movement out of the corner of their eye, the kneeling person looks up and gapes. "Did? Did you just come out of that crumbling building?" Bobby nods. "You survived that? You should go to the hospital."

"Uh. Sure," he answers not really comprehending. His visor vibrates. He focuses on it again. The circles around the punctured skin flash. Without thinking he reaches toward her with his right hand. Like a zombie, he pulls out the metal.

She cries out, and he comes out of his trance. The shrapnel is in his hand, germ free. Blood is trickling out of her wound, but strangely enough, the opening seems smaller. Still not all there, working on almost automatic pilot, Bobby swipes his first aid finger over her in a straight line. It closes a little more.

His brain kicks in. I'm healing her. This time, he zigzags over the laceration, like sewing it shut, and it seals it completely.

Tiredness from running around the collapsing building, weariness from slamming his body against the wall, and finally the fatigue of healing this thing-person washes over him and he sways on his feet.

A padded hand grasps his arm and steadies him. "Mister," the dog-man says with as much concern as he had for the fox-woman, "you really should go to the hospital." He nods absent-minded.

His left hand gets warm. He peels the glove off and stuffs it into his pocket. A smaller padded hand clutches his other arm as Bobby's new friends lead him to somewhere. Probably the hospital, he reasons.

Without realizing it, he begins to scratch his left hand. Bobby notices it a moment later when he tries to scratch his hand and the skin just below his neck. It feels like his skin is on fire.

Feeling their companion's movement, the two escorts look at Bobby. They gasp. One points at his hand, the other his neck. The fox-girl takes her hand off his arm to cover her mouth.

"You've got two tattoos," gasps the dog-man.

The fox-woman echoes his amazement talking over her hand, "both of them are today."

Fire becomes unbearable. His eyes roll back as he screams out in pain, "AAAAAAHHHHHHHHH--"

Step 3: Almost Die

"HHHHHHHHHHH!" A pair of nurses burst into the room. The kindly one has gray skin and large sail-like ears. Next to her, looking nervous, is a young lady with an elongated neck and colored splotches scattered all over her visible body.

Looking around the room, they try to find their patient, but the room seems empty. After executing a thorough search of the room, they end up looking at covered bump on the bed. "Miss Greer, are you okay," asks the giraffe-teen as she pulls back the cover to reveal a cat-girl curled up into a ball with ears turned backwards.

Together, the nurses manuever the patient back into a sitting position. This is made more challenging because Miss Greer flinches every time the elephant-nurse touches her right hand.

Once settled, the kind nurse asks, "Where does it hurt?" She reaches toward the bed revealing the year on her arm as the sleeve slides up.

Miss Greer points to the back of her right hand. The giraffe-nurse's hand springs to her mouth as her eyes go wide and she gets even more jittery. Her head whips to look at the elephant nurse who is better at hiding her surprise.

Expecting that to be the end, both don't expect what's next. Miss Greer tugs at the neck of her hospital gown and points to a spot above her right breast. One nurse almost passes out. With a hand, the elephantine nurse steadies her and gives her something to focus on, "Go get the doctor. Quick."

Frightened, the nervous assistant races away and clobbers her head on the door frame. She backs up, ducks, and rushes out.

While she's gone, the remaining nurse soothes her patient and checks her vitals. "How are you doing?"

"I'm. I'm doing better," she says just above a whisper, "Thank you." The two continue their business until the patient breaks the silence again, "When do you think I'll be better? I'd really like to ..." Seeing the nurse look back and forth, she stops.

"I hate to be the one to tell you," she checks the room again to be sure no one is near. She closes the door to be extra sure, "but it seems that the doctor isn't going to tell you." Hearing the grim tone in the nurse’s voice and the sad smile on her face, Miss Greer braces for the bad news. "You are terminal. We don't have any way to cure you. And the marks on your right hand say that the disease is accelerating."

Startled, the patient fires back, "How long do I have?"

"Your hand just changed to say a few hours. The tests confirm it."

Miss Greer's head drops as she looks into her lap and just as quickly it whips back up, "What's the other pain?" She points the same spot as before without pulling down her gown.

"Well, it's--" The door slams open and a man is a long white coat and the giraffe nurse from before enter.

He takes charge, "What's the situation?"

The elephant woman changes and lifts up the patient's right hand, "Her tattoo has changed again."

"That's no surprise," he says as he steps forward to get a better look, "I suspect any tests we administer will reflect the change." Turning toward the nurse, he asks, "So, why have you called me?"

She pulls down the patient's gown and shows the spot indicated before. "She now has a second tattoo."

Silence fills the room. The giraffe girl nearly passes out again. The other two ponder this new development. At last, the doctor speaks up, "So, what? She has a soul mate date now."

The not silent nurse makes a karate chop gesture at the patient’s covered writing, "Yes, but the date is today."

He turns to smile and face Miss Greer but his words are directed at the nurse, "So? That's good news. She's going to meet her soul mate today."

The nurse huffs a little, "Yeah, but when? At the rate her death date is changing, he'll meet her on the way to the funeral." They lapse into silence while she waits for the doctor to respond, and he waits for her to finish.

"Well, if that's all," he condescends, "I have important matters to address." With nothing else to say, he heads out of the room.

Turning to the patient, the nurse sees surprise written all over her face, "I have a second date?"

"Yes, dear, and that date is today," she answers smiling and nodding. Her face turns sad, "The doctor is correct, though. Just because the date is today doesn't mean that you'll be alive to see them." She pats Miss Greer's arm. "But don't you worry. I'm going to do everything in my power to get your soul mate here to meet you."

Turning to the silent nurse, she orders, "We need to start local and spread out. Quick, check the hospital records to see if we have anyone admitted who has today's date as a tattoo. Stat!" She stops the moving nurse headed for the door, "Wait. If the list is long, start with the singles and failing that, everyone else. Go."

The nervous giraffe bonks her head again as she focuses on her orders instead of the door. Miss Greer lifts her right hand to her face, and despite seeing the answer, she asks the remaining nurse, "How long do I have?"

"Not long, I'm afraid."

Step 4: Save a Stranger

Creek. Creeek. Bobby hears the single sound like a tiny ship rolling on the waves. Crreeeeeeekkk ... CRASH! He sits up startled. Eyes frantic he looks around the room. It's white and sterile as far as he can see, which isn’t that far. A curtain blocks most of his view.

It's odd, but part of the curtain is bent toward him.

He finds himself on a neat, thin, white mattress raised in the air or sitting on something. He's not sure. Patting himself, he finds the pain, from before, is gone. His curiosity gets the better of him. He looks down at his left hand and unlike ever before there is writing on his hand. Bobby tries to understand what is written there, but it makes no sense what it says.

Feeling fine, he flips his legs off the bed, and it slides away from the wall dropping him on the floor. I guess this thing was made for someone more agile than me. He looks up at the frame holding the mattress above the floor and there is nothing under it. Also, down by the foot of the bed there is an anchor switch that's set to off.

Other than the stinging of his hands that caught him, he feels fine and stands. Sliding the curtain, he steps back in surprise. There's a body lying on the floor with a knife sticking out of their chest. The woman standing over the body looks around frantic.

She looks right at Bobby but doesn't see him. Frightened himself, he says not a word so as not to gain her attention. She turns on heel and runs out the door that Bobby only just notices. Right as she leaves, a man looks in on the door from the other side of the room.

The body seems to sink into the floor as the face looking in from the right side of the room grows until it fills half the room. Then the face dissolves and a massive oval table covered with all sorts of food and candles surrounded by a dozen chairs half of them filled with people appears. Servants, some robotic, enter and swirl.

Bobby sees this as his chance to get out of this madness. He darts out the open door and down the hallway. Right after he leaves, the giraffe nurse scurries in and the images filling the room blink away. "Hey! I was watching that," calls an old man nearby, "I like watching my afternoon show with the sound off."

She turns on him, focused, after checking the recently departed bed, "Where is the patient that was here?"

"I 'unno. He left," he answers.

"I don't have time to search for him. I still have a half a dozen patients to check." She leaves and turns the opposite way as Bobby.

The old man calls after her, "Hey! Turn my show back on. I need to see what happens to Casey now that she thinks her boyfriend is dead even though he was only practising a death scene for a play..." He doesn't get a response. "Grumble, grumble. I guess I gotta do it myself."

Meanwhile, Bobby is wandering the hall of doors. Nothing looks right. There's got to be a way out of this crazy place. Here? He looks into a doorway and his visor lights up, another exclamation point.

"New app?" He steps into the room as a spotted cheetah intern blurs past pushing a hovering gurney with a patient on it. A clutch of doctors surround the moving party. In the room, checking his interface and the patient, a circle surrounds her striped throat displaying a different bug. Over in his tool box, he finds a tweezers icon that wasn't there before.

He adds it to his glove and swipes his hand over her face. A tiny circle comes out of her mouth. Moving his hand and the circle, by proxy, closer, a cylinder slides onto screen and opens up. It reminds him of Biology class and a petri dish. He combines the two and the cylinder closes and slides off one side.

Almost as soon as it leaves, a new tool appears in the tool box. He checks it and finds a tool that looks like the bug her just captured. Huh. I wonder... Swapping the new bug tool for the old, he swipes the air in over her throat. They disappear. Cool. "I guess I'd better continue my search for a way out of here."

He steps out when he hears a soft voice behind him, "Wait." Bobby turns back to the hippopotamus person on the bed. "Thank you," she croaks out.

Bobby continues down whatever hall he is in, with his visor causing him to stop at every door. He gains a whole new set of tools in the process and leaves everyone healed in his wake.

Reaching the corner, the green tinted interface directs him right into a room instead of left into the next corridor. Inside, he sees another patient lying on a bed. Her belly has circles on it. Bobby checks his tool box. He doesn't seem to have this tool yet. Might as well add it to the arsenal. The bug on this one is huge.

He tries to grab it with tweezers, but it doesn't work. First aid doesn't work either. Not only that, but the bug grows after each attempt. The animal woman groans on the bed, but he pays her no mind. His brain is racing to solve this puzzle. Maybe my virus busters.

Noticing the ever-growing antagonist, he chooses his weapons carefully filling all five fingers. He chops and weaves his fingers in a dance above her body. It works for a moment. The beast shrinks, a little. Then its visage evolves and changes. Her belly distends causing her to look pregnant as the disease grows again.

She groans and cries out a little. Nearby, the nurse notices what's going on, "Hey! What are you doing to my patient?"

Bobby waves her away as he tries to think his way through this. Nothing's working. What other tools do I have? He checks his tool box a second time, then a third. At last, his eyes fall on the scalpel. A thought, a dangerous thought, enters his mind. I don't even know if this will work.

Trying to decide what to do, he looks to the disease and then to her and back to the bug. "Do it," she whispers. Startled, he looks to her again. Weak and tired, she gives him the faintest of nods.

The nurse butts in again grabbing Bobby's arm, "What are you going to do? Nothing we've tried--"

She is cut off by the quiet words of the prone woman, "I trust him."

Looking to the interloper, the nurse begins again to ask him something but goes silent as the flesh on the cat girl's belly splits as if being cut with a knife. His finger draws a line in the air parallel to the one being cut on her skin.

New options appear on his visor. He doesn't have time to analyze them. He grabs something that he thinks will work and adds it to the glove. Using the new tool, he scoops at her stomach.

Her belly bulges even more before something breaks free. It is a black, snarling, moving mass that tries to fall off the invisible hands holding it. No longer having warm sustenance and life blood, it shrivels in the air. With a heave, Bobby tosses it to the side where it splatters on the floor and splits into little black pieces before dissolving completely.

In quick order the wound and the circle are gone. "There you go. All healed up." He turns to go. "Now to find a way out of this place."

The nurse stammers as she looks down at the floor, "Wha? Wha? What just happened?"

Bobby takes another step toward the door ignoring the commotion in the room. A weak, "Wait," halts him in his tracks. He turns back to see the cat girl sitting up. Rubbing her belly, she continues, "Take me with you. Please."

The nurse's face gets more surprised, "Miss Greer, you can't go out. We don't even know if you are healed yet."

With weak movements, she flips over and slides off the bed, tail high in the air lifting through the back of the hospital gown. When she is almost down, her ears flip back and she groans into the mattress. Her right hand releases its hold and she crumples onto the floor.

Alarmed, the nurse rushes around the bed with Bobby right behind, "See? I told you that you aren't read--" The nurse gasps and covers her mouth, "Your hand."

Bobby looks at the mentioned appendage and sees ink marks on it, "What about her hand?"

"It has a date again," mutters the nurse.

He compares the marks on his hand against the marks on hers. They are the same. Then he remembers the words of the people before he passed out, "That's today's date."

The reluctant nurse changes her tune, "You guys need to get out of here." A look passes between him and Miss Greer. They are confused. "Both of your death dates are today. Get out of here and spend as much time together as possible before the end comes." She steps aside to let Bobby get closer to the cat girl.

Like a gentleman, he offers his hand, and she takes it. He pulls her up onto her feet where she sways and leans into Bobby. "Don't you get it," the nurse asks. The frown on her face signals that they are taking too long and must not understand it, "You are going to die. At any time. Go. Run. Get out of here."

With gentle push from behind, Bobby and Miss Greer head for the door, his arms wrapped around her to hold her steady. After they disappear into the hall, the elephantine nurse looks against the floor where the black goop splattered and then to the now empty bed, "What did I just witness?"

Moments later, the giraffe nurse rushes in, "I couldn't find anyone who matched the description. One left, others were unavailable. The rest were married and --"

The one nurse pats the other on the arm, "That's okay."

"What about expanding the search to include the city," asks the nervous one, fidgeting.

She steps to the side allowing full view of the empty bed, "They found each other."

Step 5: Run for your Life

"What's that green thing over your eyes?" Bobby looks down to see his charge looking up at him. Her steps are still a little wobby, but she seems to be getting stronger.

"This," he asks pointing at his face. She nods. "This is my Visual Interface for Scanning, Observing, and Removing or V. I. S. O. R. for short." Her face shows confusion. "Just call it a visor."

"Okay," she replies and then adds after a moment, "That visor is cool." A few more steps later and she breaks out of the shy, timid girl, "Let's get you out of here. I know the way." She sways a little as she starts and gains her sea legs quick. Barely turning her head, she calls back to Bobby, "Let's go!"

With that, she takes off at a sprint. He quickens his pace as well.

Where he had been just been, a scalpel lodges itself in a wall. Nearby, in a room, a male says, "How did I let go of that thing? I've never been this clumsy before..."

They round a corner and enter a larger hall that opens up. Pointing to the outer wall and the holes in it, "There's the level tubes. They'll take us down." She stops in front of one and gestures, "Use this one." He jumps in and the air rushing up at him slows his descent. When she enters, he goes down faster but not much.

Just about the time they reach another opening, the moving air stops. With nothing to hold them up, they start falling. Oh crap. What do I do? Thinking quick, he kicks out. His rubber soles catch the sides of the tube and slow him down. Bobby reaches for her, but is already on top of it by wrapping her arms around his head.

It takes some doing, but between the two of them they lower themselves to the next opening by alternating legs. "What a fluke thing," she says, "I've never had a level tube go down on me before." She pauses for a moment and smiles at him, "Of course, if one had gone down on me before, I would have been dead."

As they catch their breath after the climb, Bobby speaks up, "So, according to that nurse up there, we are supposed to get to know each other. What's your name?"

"Willow."

"Bobby," he says offering his hand. She grabs it and pulls him into a hug.

"Nice to meet you, Bobby." Their greeting is short lived as the building begins to shake. "Quick! To the Escalleras. This way." Willow leads to an opening in the wall and stops short. Metal panels have fallen just inside, blocking the entrance. On the floor under the blockage, Bobby spots a few stairs.

"Crap," she says spinning away and throwing her hands in the air, "All the exits are blocked. I guess we need to go down the tube to get out of here." She takes a step toward the level tube.

"Wait," Bobby says placing a hand on her shoulder. "Maybe we should wait out this earthquake."

"No. You don't understand. We need to get out of here. If we don't leave, this building will collapse and kill us." Startled, his mind springs into action.

Bobby scans the room around them. Now that he thinks about it, this place looks a little similar to a hospital in his world. There's the desk and chairs, that hover in the air. Medical supplies, equipment, even those floating beds, he'd learned about first hand.

Click. His eyes dart to the bed. Click. Over to the crutches. Click. "Wait." Willow slows her second step.

Looking over her shoulder but not stopping, "What." It's more of a statement than a question.

Not looking at her, "I need your help."

She cocks her eyebrow and tilts her head, "With?" Curious, she begins to follow him as the shaking gets worse.

He hands her two crutches, "Take these and put them on the corners." She takes them and heads away from him. She pauses, "Corners of?"

Bobby hears her words, but doesn't hear them as he scours cabinets tossing the contents onto the floor. At last, he turns triumphant with a long length of hose.

Seeing her opportunity, she repeats, "Corners?"

He turns toward her and where she is looking. Nothing is there. Oh right. My brain jumped ahead again. Bobby turns around and grabs a floating gurney and shoves it towards her. As an afterthought, he chases after it and hops on.

Willow tries to remain on her feet as he glides over. "So, put these where," she asks as he arrives.

It takes some doing since she doesn't see his vision, but in short order, they put the tips of the crutches together and start wrapping them with the rubber hose. Before the crutches lock together, they hook them on the "front" two corners of the gurney between the handgrips and the underarm part. It looks like a flat cow catcher on a flat train.

While wobbling on his feet, he encourages her onto the platform and finishes surrounding the pointed front. Tying it off, he points his invention down the hall. Lights fall from the ceiling and the walls sway.

Bobby starts to push the device down the swaying passage, but his feet have a hard time getting purchase and picking up momentum. Seeing his plan, Willow bounds off. With one hand holding on and the other tossing him on, she digs in and accelerates. She uses whatever surface is available to her including the walls.

Just before they hit the fluctuating window, she hops back on. CRASH! They burst through the window and arc down toward the ground.

Despite their counter balance, before long the head of their transportation is pointed straight down. Luckily, they don't fall far. When the point of the crutches hits the ground, Snap! Snap! Snap! The rubber hose holding it all together breaks in several spots due to all the pressure placed on it.

Momentum transfers to them, and they fall to the ground. Willow manages to land on her feet. Not for long, however, since the ground is still shaking. The gurney flops from vertical to horizontal.

To be able to do anything other than go prone on the ground, Bobby and Willow scramble back up on their elevated conveyance. Nearby, pieces of the hospital fall down at them. "We should get further away," Willow says, "The building could fall on us any time now."

"Good idea," Bobby says leaning over the edge and scooping up a broken crutch. Like paddling a canoe, he uses what's left to push the ground behind them. Willow grabs the other and paddles on the other side.

rummmbbbllleeerunblerumbleCRASH! The hospital crumples and falls into a heap. A breeze blows them from behind, giving them a bit of a tail wind. They paddle on until they reach a hill which helps them gain speed.

Since they no longer need to do anything , Willow turns to him, "Bobby? Can I try on your visor?"

My V.I.S.O.R.? I paid big bucks for that. "Why?"

She shrugs, "I dunno. I just want to see what it is like to look through them."

Bobby crawls off of the gurney to check if the earthquake is still going. It's not. They are far enough away. With his only excuse taken away, he decides to let her. "Okay, but just for a few minutes." He hands over the green mono-lens and she slips it on. It fits.

With the green tint gone from his eyes, he sees this beautiful world in all of its magnificence for the first time. Flower colors seem a bit brighter. The gray road they are traveling on looks a little fresher and real.

As he looks around, his eyes fall on another collapsed building. Recognition comes. "That's where I came here." He scans the rubble for any arches and finds none. I can't go back. Then another thought hits. I'm stuck here in this place that's trying to kill me.

A tap on his shoulder breaks Bobby out of his spiral into depression. Turning back to look at Willow, a shadow catches his attention, a big shadow. Following the trajectory of the shadow, he looks up to see a giant burning meteor hurtling toward them.

A tap again. This time he turns to look at her, to find that she is not looking at him or the meteor. "What is it, Willow?"

"It says I need the left glove, whatever that means."

Bobby pauses to consider his options. I don't really want to give her the glove. What's next? She takes the right glove and has the whole set that I paid big bucks to get?

Another part of his brain argues back, Why not? She's been helpful so far. And it's only a quick look.

But the meteor! The first part offers, I don't want to die here.

The second part of his mind shakes its head, so to speak, She'll give it back and then you can fix things. Just hold your horses. And before the first part can chime in again, Plus she's kinda cute. There are worse ways to go.

The first tries to argue back, but it's decided. He fishes in his pocket and pulls out the other glove and hands it to her. She slides it on with ease. Willow's covered hand begins to shake. Something about this seems familiar. Bobby tries to remember where he saw this before, but it's not coming to him.

Her glove begins to glow, brighter and brighter. To shield his eyes, he looks away, right at the meteor that is almost on top of them. The air around them is starting to warm up from the heat generated from the heated rock and its friction on the atmosphere. He turns back to see the glove fire a beam of light at an arbor leading to a garden.

"What just happened," Willow asks him.

Then he remembers where he has seen this before. When he first came to this place. "Come on." He takes a step or two and sees she's stunned. Bobby uses his right to grab her still elevated left, and he leads her toward the enclosed garden.

After a few steps, her mind starts rebooting, "Bobby?"

"No time," he answers, "We have to get out of here, or we're going to get smooshed by a meteor." He watches her look up and then sprint with him.

Why did she have to create a portal so far away? Still, they sprint on.

Upon reaching the entrance, she stops, causing him to whip into the arched opening. "Why are we going in here? Why should we die here?" Her head low both from sadness and catching her breath.

"This is the way out of here," Bobby explains with his left hand raised where it was flung.

"You're wrong. This is the way in--" she goes silent as she stares into the opening. After a breath, she continues, "Your hand."

He looks at his hand and sees nothing unusual, "What about it?"

"There's no date." The heat is becoming unbearable.

He nods. "Right. Different place. Come on."

She springs on him pushing both through the portal. They land in a field of flowers and soft ground. No garden around them. No arbors or floating beds. Nothing as far as they can see except flowers. And purple sky with two suns.

They spend another moment lying on the ground, her on top of him. Face to face, she smiles at him and then steals a kiss. Bounding up, she looks down on him, "Let's go." He gets up and joins her. They link again, gloved hand to gloved hand as they take their first steps in this new place, knowing that no matter what happens they will be fine if they stay together. Not that they want to ever part.

Step 6: Enjoy your Date (Epilogue)

"For you, my lucky charm," Willow says taking her cat ears headband off of her head and placing it in Bobby's hair next to his visor. With the headband gone, the only ears she has are the pink antennas atop of her head. Her seven fingered hands cup the nine sided dice with alien symbols on them. She winks at Bobby.

That's the signal. Bobby watches her push the whole pile of silver-y triangular pyramids toward the center of the carpeted table with another pair of arms. While she does this, Bobby loads the fingertips of his upper right hand with various symbols each with a die icon on them.

After shaking them in her hands she lets them fly. As he has done every time, Bobby tracks the dice with his fingers only this time he adjusts each with his V.I.S.O.R. Jackpot! The dice land and fall exactly as he wanted.

More piles of currency are added to her pile. "I'm done," she announces to everyone at the table. Bobby and Willow collect their winnings. They insert the shapes into a machine and a sheet of metal with symbols slides out. After cashing their ticket out, they head to a store.

"I feel like buying something," Willow says scanning the whole place.

"Sounds good," he chuckles, "even though they'll disappear when we leave."

She nods while heading to some clothes that intrigue her. "Yeah, I know." After grabbing one, she turns back to him, "Are you okay if we don't make it back to your home?"

Willow puts it on and pays for it. They leave the store and the building and walk, each in their own thoughts. "You know," Bobby says throwing his share of the winnings to the poor people slumped nearby, "Whenever I'm with you, I'm home."

He hands her the visor. She mimics the action of tossing aside her currency and then puts it on, "Yeah, I can't think of a better person to travel the worlds with."

She fires off a blast. They continue their journey with Willow dragging him into trouble and Bobby solving his way out of it with Willow picking up on the plan and joining in.