Stanford knocked on Colonel Hardaker’s door. It was time for a status report. He couldn’t put it off any longer. A gruff “Enter” prompted Stanford to move inside. Colonel Hardaker turned off a monitor, placing the remote on his desk. He looked dog tired and stared at Stanford expectantly, waving at the chair in front of him before folding his hands on the desk.

“I don’t think they are aliens.” Stanford blurted as he sat down.

Colonel Hardaker’s eyes narrowed. “Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought you were analyzing technological devices, not our guests.”

Stanford nodded. “We’ve discovered several interesting facts which I’ll relate, but, well, I’m working on a theory. One that seems to explain all the inconsistencies. It’s going to sound . . . strange though.”

“Stranger than little green men from outer space?” Hardaker responded, leaning back in his chair. “Okay. Well, if you think that you have an answer that the analysts in Washington didn’t consider, I’d like to hear it.”

“So, you know what a wormhole is?” Stanford asked rhetorically before continuing, waving his hands as he spoke. “It’s a connection between two different points of space-time. Instead of travelling between them in a linear fashion, a connection between these two points allows you to step from one to the other without crossing the space in between.”

“I’m not hearing anything new, Doctor Ellis.” The Colonel expressed impatiently.

“Well, to put it simply, there’s a possibility that these connections. The start and end if you will, are a shift not between locations but between different timelines.”

The Colonel placed his stogie in the corner of his mouth before it began its habitual orbit. “I thought we’d already talked about time travel-“

“No, not time travel. In this case, time would be a constant, as would space. You’d arrive at the same time and in the same place you left from. What you’d do is travel from one timeline, to a different timeline.”

Stanford shifted in his chair, trying to lay it out for the Colonel as plainly as he could. “We’re talking about an alternate version of reality, where things are…different. That’s why you’ve got a second Daniel Adder. Why the visitors have some equipment we recognize, but other things are strange.”

The Colonel took out his stogie to purse his lips for a moment before reaching out and picking up a phone. As he dialed a number, he simply grunted at Stanford. “I know when something is beyond me, but you sound like you’re on to something. Hang on.”

A few minutes later, Hardaker connected Stanford to some expert in Washington. After relating his theory in far more depth, he hung up the phone and looked across the desk. The stogie was back in Hardaker’s mouth and he ran a hand through his steel grey hair. “Alright Doctor Ellis, good work, but what else?” he asked.

“Well, sir, I’d like to speak to them. I know they’re only here for a while. You have to be thinking about moving them to a more secure location. Dr. Wright and Dr. Brown can bring you up to speed on our device discoveries,” he asked.

“But, confirmation of an alternate reality will only happen by asking the right questions. I’m not sure if your people would do that. This also means that these visitors aren’t aliens. Hell, there may even be Americans among them.” Stanford waited, itching with expectation as the Colonel considered his request.

For a long moment, the Colonel just looked at him before picking up the phone again. “I’ll get you clearance and have someone brief you.”

Date:  4th of February 2017

Location: 28°14’22.07"N 80°36’27.06"W

Time: 2.30am

“Right now they’ve only seen a doctor and nurse. We think if anyone in a military uniform shows up, they’ll stop thinking of themselves as patients and start thinking of themselves as prisoners.  But that realization can’t be far off. So if it happens, roll with it. They’ve slept a lot. Dr. Gillette says they are almost completely healed.” The man speaking to Stanford didn’t look like military intelligence. He was nondescript, average, which Stanford guessed was the very reason he was chosen for his current assignment.

The man tapped  a finger on photos of each of the five visitors in turn as the briefing continued. “The Asian male model identified himself as ‘China’. He speaks with a London accent. Seems like a confident man, and he’s getting restless now that he’s been fed. They all act like they are starving and have put away a lot of food so it doesn’t seem faked.”

The man briefing Stanford tapped another photo. “The African American female. ‘Sarge’. Whether it’s a nickname or a rank is unconfirmed. Snake and China often defer to her automatically, though they haven’t said why. Cool customer. Stays quiet and watches a lot. Says she has amnesia like the others, but might be faking that. We’re watching her closely.”

More tapping. “The cheeky Australian male is ‘Snake’. Seems intelligent, but a wise cracker. He’s been co-operative answering questions, but his patience is running out. I’d say he’s damned curious and likely suspicious.”

“The other two are still unconscious, but this one,” the briefer indicated the short haired Caucasian woman, “talks in her sleep. American accent. New York. She should wake up fairly soon. She’s stirring more.”

The man glanced at the rows of monitors showing the inside of the next room. Turns out Stanford had practically been on top of the visitors the whole time. The lab and the secure ward shared a wall. They were even the same size, expansive to hold all the equipment and hospital beds.

Stanford took a deep breath to steady his nerves. “Okay. I think I’m ready to get in there. So, you want me to drop some jargon, see if I get a reaction, and try to keep them talking?”

The man nodded, handing Stanford the magnetic door key. “Good luck Dr. Ellis. I’ll be watching on the monitors. Just ask your questions, be friendly, and then leave. ”

Stanford thanked the man and made his way down the corridor to the visitors’ room. After passing the guards, he stood for a moment outside the door. He wasn’t an expert at wheedling information out of people, and he didn’t want to appear nervous. Plastering a smile on his features, he adjusted his lab coat and entered.

His timing was perfect. As the visitors glanced his direction and , the heavy door clicked loudly closed, the blonde woman sat bolt upright, holding her head and groaning loudly.

“Ooh my head.” Her hands moved to her eyes and she gave another pain-wracked groan. “Ugh. What kind of landing was that Pilot Adder? Snake, I thought you said you could play anything?”

Stanford’s insincere smile turned into a genuine broad grin. She identified him immediately. She has her memories!  He thought to himself, glancing towards the cameras.

“Err, what?” responded Snake curiously. “You mean me? Sorry, I thought my name was Snake. Do I know you? We’re in some kind of hospital. I thought we had an accident of some kind. What do you mean by landing?” Snake fired the questions at the woman thick and fast, obviously excited about getting some answers.

The woman blinked a few times, looking at Snake in confusion.  “You don’t remember?”  She looked about to say something else when she caught sight of the doctor, the nurse, and Stanford.  Closing her mouth with an audible click, her demeanor visibly stiffened.  Glancing around worriedly, she made eye contact with Sarge.  ”Medical Officer Mack reporting for duty, ma’am. Where are we? Did we hit target?” she asked giving a desultory kind of salute to the black woman identified as Sarge.

Stanford had worked around military personnel for quite some time, however, he had never served.  So, to him the effect came off as almost rude or congenial.  This ‘Mack’ seemed overly familiar with Sarge.  Or perhaps they had worked together for a long time?  Stanford couldn’t tell.

Stanford watched, shifting his feet nervously on the linoleum floor. The obvious military greeting made the her go completely still.

“I can’t answer that . . . Officer Mack. I’m sorry, I don’t remember you. The three of us seem to have suffered some memory loss.” Sarge replied, indicating China and Snake with a wave of her arm.

On the one hand, Stanford noted that the woman motioned to the three of them with an easy, familiar gesture.  On the other, Sarge’s demeanor remained so calm that it looked almost totally natural for an amnesiac. “We appear to be in a hospital. I thought we’d had an accident.”

The strange, pale violet eyes switched to the newcomer, an obvious question present in them. The large woman gave no other indications that she might be lying.  It was just that feeling . . . Stanford felt a small tweak in his guts, as if he’d seen something he knew he should consider further.

Not daring to meet that gaze due to his own trepidation, Stanford stepped across the room towards the newly conscious Mack, nodding at Dr. Gillette in passing. He poured her a drink of water and fumbled the bed controls until the bed moved in the right direction. He smiled again, trying to put Mack at her ease.

“You’re in a place where we can look after you is all. Seems like you were injured quite a bit when you . . . arrived here.”

“Oh yes, that’s very reassuring,” Snake threw back with a kind of dripping sarcasm one normally reserved for despised ex’s and meter-maids.  

Mack rubbed her eyes and then took a careful, slow, and decidedly suspicious look around the room. She took the cup of water from Stanford with a terse nod of thanks and gulped it down as Doctor Gillette came over as well.

“Hello. I’m Doctor Stanford Ellis. This is Doctor Gillette. You can call me Stan if that’s easier. You said you are Medical Officer Mack. Do you feel up to answering a few questions?” Stanford practically burned with the possibility that this woman might give him the answers he sought.

Mack paused and then answered. “Just call me Mack.” She cleared her throat and then continued with a question of her own. “You in charge here, Stan?” she asked.

“Well, no, I’m not in charge. I’m just here to talk to all of you. You don’t know where you are? You mentioned something about ‘hitting target’?” Stanford countered.

Mack looked at him with bloodshot eyes, “I know where we are supposed to be Stan. I’m trying to find out whether we made it or if this is some elaborate R - trick.” She replied, catching herself at the end.

She slipped up then, something starting with R. Stanford took a couple of steps back so he could address all of the visitors. “Ah, the age old question of how do we trust someone new, when we have no experience with them.”

“Trust, Dr. Ellis?” asked China in his cultured sounding accent. “Seems unlikely when you avoid our questions.”

“Fair enough. I’d like you to trust me, so, how about an answer for an answer?” Stan responded. “Mack seems to have her memories. Our conversation may stimulate your own memories. Anything we don’t want to answer we can just say ‘pass’?”

Mack shrugged, “Sounds fair Stan, but I’m not the boss either. I shouldn’t be talking to you without Sarge’s permission.”  Mack nodded towards the quiet woman.

“She’s in charge?” Stanford inquired. “Okay, well, I suppose that’s an answer to one of the questions I had, so it’s only fair I answer one of yours. You’re in Florida.”

“So, Ponce de Leon made it here too,” Mack responded cryptically. She started slightly as the door opened and Nurse Simpson entered with a food cart. Dubiously edible smells emanated from plastic covered dishes and filled the room with the scent of what might be pumpkin soup and bread that smelled vaguely of penicillin and floor cleaner.

Stanford heard Mack’s stomach growl in response to the sight, regardless of the unappealing smell. Despite the food they had already eaten and the conflicting sensory input, all the conscious visitors fixated on the meals as Simpson wheeled the cart inside.

“Who?” asked Stanford trying to regain her attention as Nurse Simpson lifted the trays onto overbed tables and moved them into position with a smile for each patient.

“Ponce de Leon was a French explorer in the sixteen hundreds who named the State of Florida. Not a history buff, huh Stan?” Mack quickly jibed before stuffing her mouth with bread and swallowing. “You know, just telling me the State we are in doesn’t help. What country are we in?”

“You’re in The United States of America, planet Earth.” He responded with a serious tone. “Is this where you meant to arrive?”

There was a mixture of unmistakable relief and wry amusement on Mack’s face as the words left Stanford’s mouth. “Sure sounds like we hit our target.”

“Safe to say then, you aren’t from around here. Even though you sound just like my seventh grade geography teacher,” Stan joked.

“You’re right Stan, but appreciate my situation here. I shouldn’t be talking to you without permission. I am going to tell you a couple of things now. Number one, that quip about planet Earth, we’re not aliens,” she gave away with an amused smile.

I thought that alien hypothesis was implausible. But just because she says it, doesn’t make it true. Unfortunately. He could feel the paranoia of his superiors seeping into his thought process.  Pushing it aside, he kept listening.

Mack continued after swallowing. She rapidly demolished the bread roll in an unladylike, but efficient fashion. “We’re as human as you. Just, as you say, not from around here.”

She stopped long enough to ravenously attack the soup, pausing for a breath before swallowing. “Number two. From the looks of this room we’re in a government medical facility, probably military. Jay is going to completely lose her shit when she wakes up and gets a look at this place. You don’t want that to happen.” She nodded somberly towards the still unconscious teenager.

“If you have any Denikerazine, I recommend a fifty milligram IV dosage now to keep her sedated and relaxed when she wakes up,” Mack offered with the confidence of a seasoned medical professional.

“Denikerazine?” Doctor Gillette asked, an eyebrow raised in consternation. “We don’t have . . . I don’t know what that is.” He grew flustered at the turn in conversation, as if Mack was personally challenging his medical opinion.

“Denikerazine? Another name for chlorpromazine.  You have that here, right?”

Gillette wore his apprehension on his sleeve, “We usually call it chlorpromazine. Or Thorazine.” At an acquiescing nod from Mack, the doctor continued, “That’s a sizable dosage for such a small patient. You think she will be violent? We can restrain her.”

Mack shook her head rapidly at the doctor’s suggestion. “God no! Restraints will just make things worse Doctor Gillette. Trust me. Dose her now before she wakes up. I wouldn’t want there to be any . . .  misunderstandings.”

Stanford frowned, curious about Mack’s bizarre yet clearly genuine trepidation. “Better do as she says Doctor Gillette. Until we have a clearer picture about what is happening.” Gillette scowled, obviously reticent to take instructions on how to look after his patients, but nodded his assent and headed for the door.

“I don’t suppose you’d tell me why you’re recommending we sedate a teenage girl?” Stanford asked.

“It’ll just be safer.” Mack replied.

“Oh goody, even more reassurance. What the bloody hell is going on here?” Snake said with pointed heat.

“Cool it Snake.” Sarge said before turning back to Officer Mack, “We’ve lost our memories, although they seem to be coming back slowly. What can you tell us about ourselves?” Sarge asked.  

“Yeah, I’d like to know if I’m a Snake or a Pilot Adder. Adder. Oh, I get it. Snake’s a nickname. Cheesy nickname.” The Australian sounded relieved about finding that out, but impatience still laced his tone.

“Call sign Snake, not a nickname. Look Sarge . . . hmm. I’m really not sure we should be talking at all. Are we prisoners here?” Mack demanded of Stanford.

“That’s not up to me.” He replied. “I know that isn’t particularly  reassuring, but some very important politicians want to know more about all of you. You see, they are cautious about who you are and what you represent. Should they be?”

Mack shook her head before thoughtfully nibbling on another bite of bread, plainly refusing to answer.

“Prisoners?” China inquired, his tone darkening. “Why exactly would we be prisoners, Stan? We haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Well, let me summarize,” Stanford stated while pacing the floor and looking at the visitors. “Some time ago, the five of you arrived in the middle of Patrick Air Force Base in what the witness described as ‘an angry ball of lightning and sound’. You were carrying with you advanced technology that is . . . unfamiliar to us. You are also healing at an unnatural rate. Landing in the middle of a sensitive government installation, you were brought here and given medical attention.”

Stanford tried a rueful smile. “Mysterious strangers popping up in the middle of a military base . . . I’m not sure how you should be treated because we don’t know your motivations for being here. From a military point of view, they think you might represent a threat. Not co-operating," he gave Mack a meaningful look, “is not helping that perception.”

At Stanford’s speech, Sarge maintained her cool composure, despite the bristling and posturing of her companions. Only a small tightening around the mouth gave away her apprehension.

Mack pushed the table and empty bowl away, crossing her arms and looking put upon.

Snake didn’t even bother to hide his annoyance. “Unknown medical advances, unknown technology, unknown motivations by unknown boffins all around.  Strewth, is there anything you do know, Stan?”

“I understand your reticence, Mr. Adder, but the sooner we sort out why you are here, the better. Seems like only Mack here can answer that question. There’s also a theory I’ve got that I’d like confirmed. So, question for a question: what do you think?”

Snake’s face took a turn from sarcastic to agitated at the notion.  He rolled his eyes and threw up his hands. He looked about to answer with a remark likely even more caustic when someone stopped him cold.  

“If that’s the case, I think it’s my turn for a question.” Mack quickly interjected, looking to Sarge for approval.

“Something tells me I should trust you. Go ahead,” the big woman replied.

“Do you know what a world key is?” Mack queried, studying Stanford intently with an appraising eye.

Stanford blinked in confusion before shaking his head. “Sorry. I’ve never heard of a ‘world key’ before. Sounds . . . important.” He debated asking what a world key was and then considered that it may have something to do with his current theory.

“My turn. What do you think of the many universe model?” he served in return.

“Ahh. You’re a smart one, Stanford. You’ve figured it out haven’t you?” Mack fired back with a knowing look in her strangely colored eyes.  Stan noticed that Mack’s eyes, while tinged with the faintest of periwinkle hues, were not nearly as deeply colored as Sarge’s or China’s.

“Figured out what?” blathered Snake, just as China opened his mouth..

All eyes fixated on Mack.

“Since he knows, there is no point keeping it secret and this might help you remember.” Mack paused, looking to the others in the room with a serious expression. “We are from this planet, but, as Stan has rightly surmised, we are from a different version of reality. Our reality and this reality have a singular divergence. At . . . some point . . . in the past, our shared history ceased to exist.”

There it was, the reason for the little inconsistencies, neatly wrapped in a bow and tied off. Mack confirmed Stan’s theory with a single sentence. These travellers were definitive proof that alternate realities not only existed, but could be visited. The implications were staggering, yet the most important question remained. Why were they here? The way she had mentioned a particular ‘point was important. Some pivotal event held the reason, the purpose of their journey.

“You’re trying to figure out if a particular event occurred here, aren’t you?” Stanford asked Mack.

Mack didn’t answer.  Instead, she glanced to one side, unable to completely hide a small smile that turned up the corners of her mouth. She already knows the answer to that. When I didn’t know what a ‘world key’ was.

“Why are you here then? Why did you come to this version of reality?” Stanford pressed.

Mack shook her head in the negative. “Pass.  Besides,  I think it’s my turn for a question,” she declared flatly as the door opened to admit Dr. Gillette returning with a syringe.

Even in such a short amount of time since her waking, Mack danced around certain topics, clearly remembering a good deal more and in full possession of her faculties. Her terse answers were complete and clearly compartmentalized.  It frustrated Stanford to no end.  Before he could say anything else, Sarge flinched, pointing behind Gillette. “What’s that?” she asked, her deep purple eyes straining to recognize something.

The medical doctor turned instinctively. There was nothing obvious there.  A high pitched mechanical whine sounded and before Stanford could react, blood blossomed from Gillette’s forehead and neck. In slow motion, Stan watched the body fall with a sickening thud. His brain took a long moment to process what he’d just seen.  Gillette wasn’t moving, a pool of scarlet spread out from his body in rhythmic pumps across the immaculate pale linoleum.  A disturbance in the air in front of the door caught Stan’s attention.  

The doctor’s  blood had sprayed across something invisible, a plethora of red drops hung in the air like graffiti written in Gillette’s own life across a window.  

“CONTACT!” bellowed Sarge.

Next Chapter: Date:  4th of February 2017Location: 28° 14’ 5.4564’’N 80° 36’ 15.2316’’WTime: 3.01am