﻿<strong>Lucas Denziger<br/>Time: Day 278, afternon<br/>Location: Omnicast Labs, Altex<br/>Tagged: Simone</strong><br/><br/>"Power levels are stable...Heisenberg readings are within acceptable parameters...atmospheric conditions are optimal...oh, and your grilled cheese is ready," said a feminine, inhumanly smooth voice from behind Lucas' shoulder. Lucas turned from his desk and nodded at Simone, the lab's primary robotic semi-autonomous droid assistant. "Fantastic. Just enough time for lunch, and then hopefully I'll be on my way back to Earth! Not that I won't miss this world, of course; I mean we have had some pretty amazing adventures since I crashed into this reality, right?"<br/><br/>"Sure," Simone replied in her dreamy monotone.<br/><br/>"Traveling to the center of the planet to reboot that giant ultrasonic space moth repeller, thwarting the Gumball Gorillas' scheme to steal the world's supply of artificial fruit-flavored candy, winning the interplanetary dance competition and taking home the grand prize of a moldy shirt<em>and</em>a free soda, not to mention stopping the tournament committee from blowing up the solar system," Lucas said, absently ticking off the antics and situations he'd found himself in since landing in Altex (his own private name for this alternate reality) so many months ago.<br/><br/>"Sure," Simone said again as Lucas continued.<br/><br/>"Visiting the lost undersea civilization of Nwordannogruoy and rescuing their kidnapped princess from the Spongeous Rebel Alliance, even if she did turn out to be a transvestite with a rather unpleasant personality, and of course, who could forget that stint we did prison when we were accidentally rounded up with that puppet theater group suspected of inciting sedition? And then we ended up saving the prison warden from an assassination attempt and earning our pardons --"<br/><br/>"Sure," Simone interrupted, causing Lucas to turn and look at her sharply.<br/><br/>"Simone, are you stuck in another neurostimulus hueristic feedback loop aga-"<br/><br/>"Sure," the droid said again.<br/><br/>The young engineer sighed and turned back to his worktable, thankful he soon wouldn't have to worry about neurotic droids anymore, and finished gathering the tools and devices he'd picked up during his stay in Altex. Most of the items were less than functional, but Lucas knew if he could get them working properly they'd make him a bloody fortune when he returned to Earth -- er, not to mention save countless lives and save the environment and, who knows, maybe save the whales, stuff like that. Sure.<br/><br/>Stifling a yawn, Lucas rose from his chair and grabbed the cheap durasteel teacup from the desk corner, intent on making one last round of the lab to ensure the settings and power levels of the interdimensional rift generator were accurate; it would be a lousy way to go to have the device send him all the way back to his reality, only to wind up on Jupiter or some such. At least Simone had been correct in her earlier report, he thought as he sipped the hot tea. All readings indicated the generator was charging properly. After months of working with some of the greatest minds he could find in Altex (when not in the middle of one of his seemingly endless misadventures, of course), The day had finally arrived. Another five minutes, and Lucas Denziger, Dimensional Traveler Extraordinare, would finally be going home. He could barely contain his excitement.<br/><br/>Of course, that barely cotainable excitement transformed into completely uncontained horror when Lucas' boot caught on one of the thick power cable bundles that snaked across the lab floor, and sent the engineer sprawling headlong toward the generator's main control panel. The teacup splattered its contents across the protoplastic casing, dripping down onto the circuits and microboards and causing an uncontrolled chain reaction as the generator's capacitors began to fire erratically.<br/><br/>"No! NO! We've got cross-spectrum contamination, the power cells are destabilizing! The generator can't handle this kind of strain, Simone! Initiate emergency shut down protocols immediately! We can't let--" Lucas shouted in panic, his voice's pitch rising with his desperation as the contact coils began to glow. An unnatural wind with no obvious source whipped through the lab, scattering papers and sending several small objects hurling through the air as Lucas hurried to input the shut-down commands to the generator's secondary systems. But it was too late; the power cells, unstable though they'd become, still had enough juice to run the machine, and it wasn't stopping now. Lucas could only watch in horror as a vortex just like the one that had brought him to Altex formed before him, as powerful and irresistible as a black hole.<br/><br/>Lucas attempted to fight through the wind, reaching back to grab onto one of the desks, Simone, anything that could keep him from being sucked through to who-knew-what on the other side, but to no avail. The rift's pull was simply too strong, and Lucas was quickly dragged kicking and screaming into the portal's gaping maw. Moments later, the generator's power cells finally failed, and the vortex collapsed back into normal space-time.<br/><br/>"Sure," Simone said to the empty lab, as papers drifted and equipment tumbled back to the floor.<br/><br/><br/><strong><span class="bbc_u">The Void</span></strong><br/><br/><em>'Ohh, great. <span class="bbc_u">This</span> place again. Floating aimlessly in nonspace, waiting endlessly through nontime, and hoping I get deposited in a reasonably life-accomodating reality before my mind snaps under its own weight due to stimulus deprivation. Just like Disneyworld,'</em>Lucas thought as he drifted in the void between dimensions. The last time he'd been trapped in the void, he'd nearly gone insane after what had felt like eons in solitude with only his own thoughts for company. There was no light, no sound, no sensation of any kind; there wasn't even any oxygen, although Lucas seemed to have no trouble breathing. Actually, the last time Lucas had been here, he'd discovered he didn't even need to breathe; his body had just kept right on doing it out of habit, and it didn't seem to give a damn that there was nothing for his lungs to work with. Hunger and thirst were similar non-issues. That was life in the void, Lucas figured. Everything was<em>non</em>.<br/><br/>Lucas stretched out, crossed his ankles and laced his fingers behind his head, and settled in to wait. At least it was comfortable, he had to admit. There was nothing quite like the feeling of total, utter weightlessness to make one relax, and Lucas closed his eyes as he adjusted to the sense of constant freefall. Only one thing to do, now...<br/><br/><em>'Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream,<br/>   merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,<br/>      life is but a dream,<br/><br/>'Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream,<br/>   merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,<br/>      life is but a dream,<br/><br/>'Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream...'</em><br/><br/><br/><strong>Lucas Denziger<br/>Time: Day 2, mid-morning<br/>Location: Hillsbrow Village, Merc, Fantasia<br/>Tagged: Whoever's Around</strong><br/><br/>The rift opened, with doubtlessly sadistic glee, several dozen feet in the air over a small, rustic-looking town. Lucas had long since lost track of which chorus he was on, having given up counting after attempting to sing in the round by himself, and he barely had time to notice the portal's recurrence before being jerked back into existence. The crackling, roaring vortex thundered and burned brightly in the morning light like the gateway to hell, and spat Lucas out into the uncaring sky before vanishing into the aether. For Lucas' part, the young engineer managed to remain hanging in the air for nearly a full second, thanks to the effects of the vortex delaying the return of his mass to his body.<br/><br/>He managed to fit several thoughts into that second.<br/><br/><em>'Oh good, a town!'<br/>'A very <span class="bbc_u">primitive looking</span> town...'<br/>'Aw, man, I didn't get my grilled cheese!'<br/>'Hmm, windy out here.'<br/>'Things seem to be getting bigger...'<br/>'Oh, <strong>dammit</strong>!'</em><br/><br/>This last came at approximately the instant said mass began to return to said body, leading said body to plummet to the ground. Fortunately Lucas didn't reacquire his full mass at once, or the fall almost certainly would have killed him; instead, the young man struck the earth with less than half the force he would have under more normalized conditions. Which still hurt like a son of a bitch. Heavily stunned and severely disoriented, Lucas gazed blearily upward into the morning sun as curious townspeople gathered around him.<br/><br/>"Well...back to the lab again, yo," he managed to croak, before he passed out.