“Now our little girl is married, and she will go her way. All we—all we ask is that she visit us again, when she chooses. We want so much to—”
Nona came to an abrupt decision. “Let me tell you more about the Virtual Mode,” she said. “It is a way to cross over to other realities. Other worlds. Darius lives on one; I live on another. Seqiro, the horse, lives on another. Seqiro enables us to talk with each other, because I do not know your language.”
“The horse?” the woman asked blankly.
Hello.
The woman looked at Seqiro. He lifted his head to gaze back at her. He projected acceptance.
“The horse,” she said, realizing it was true.
Nona took her hand. “I will show you the Virtual Mode.” She led the woman through the anchor.
The scene changed. The new scene was similar, but the nearby houses and yards were subtly different.
“This is not our town,” the woman said, looking around.
“It is the adjacent world. Very similar, but different. There are others; the farther we go, the more different they become, until there is no similarity at all. Some have strange animals, or strange machines. Some are dangerous. Some have magic.”
“Magic!”
Nona decided not to confuse the woman with too much. “Some do. The rules change a little with each Mode. Darius has a special kind of magic. He lives in a nice world, and he wants Colene with him.”
“He does seem like a nice young man.”
“He is.” After last night, Nona realized how much of an understatement that was.
“He seems to be upright.”
“He is absolutely upright. Colene could not be with a better man.”
“I am so glad to know that Colene is in good hands.”
Nona led the woman back out through the anchor. The Earth Mode reappeared. “So you see, Colene is making a strange journey, but she is with friends. I think she will be happy with Darius. Certainly she is happy with Seqiro.”
“If we can only see her once in a while, to know she is all right.”
“She surely will visit you again. If she doesn’t, I will.”
Now the woman understood some of the significance of that promise. “Thank you so much, Nona.” Then, dazed, she returned to the house.
The car arrived. Darius and Colene walked to the tent, holding hands. He looked so tall, and she so small, but they were married now. Nona resolved to say and think nothing about what she had seen last night.
“Let’s go,” Colene said briskly. “I’ll say goodbye to my folks.”
Nona abolished the tent. She helped Darius put the harness back on Seqiro, and load their gear. Burgess floated through the anchor, disappearing.
Colene returned. “I promised your mother you would visit again,” Nona said.
“I will.” Colene’s eyes were wet. “I don’t think I ever really knew my folks, until now. They’ve been great.”
They moved on through. They were back traveling the Virtual Mode. It felt good.
TRAVELING this segment of the Virtual Mode was easy, because the paved street remained. Burgess had no trouble keeping the pace; this was ideal terrain for him.
They came into a region of animals. The streets and moving vehicles remained, but now the animals were dominant, with human beings serving them. “Watch out for these,” Colene warned. “They’re telepathic. Like Seqiro. But I don’t think they can reach across Modes. So if we get attacked, we just need to step on across. Quickly.”
Indeed, they saw dogs, cats, bears, and other creatures, of all sizes, moving around in their Modes as if they were the proprietors. They felt the touches of the animals’ minds. Once Nona received an order: Stop. Come to me. Unable to resist, she had stopped, turned, and walked toward the bear. Then she had crossed the boundary, and the bear disappeared, and she was freed from the compulsion.
So it was easy to escape, because of the narrowness of the slices of the worlds. But not pleasant business. Because the bear had viewed her as food.
I will help you resist, the next time, Seqiro’s thought came.
“Thank you. I don’t know how to fight it, when its power bypasses my magic.”
Darius has learned to resist. He has been practicing. He has stood off two creatures so far. Colene is making a similar effort. Perhaps you can learn to resist, too.
“I hope so,” Nona said. “I’ll try to fight the next one. Let me do it, and rescue me only if I am in too much trouble.”
“I’m practicing,” Colene said. “But I can’t resist as well as Darius can, now.”
“Burgess has no trouble,” Darius said. “These creatures can not touch his alien mind.”
“So if we are even in doubt, follow Burgess,” Nona said. The others agreed.
They crossed a boundary—and there was a row of oxen to the side. What comes into existence? an ox demanded.
Just passing through, Seqiro replied.
Nona felt a mind clamp down on her body. She saw Colene freeze just ahead of her. Even Seqiro halted. Several of the creatures were doing it, overwhelming the single horse.
Darius fought to move. He half fell beside Burgess. One hand struggled to a contact point. That was all he could do.
Burgess put his intrunk down to the ground. There were stones and sand there. He sucked them up. He aimed his outtrunk. A rock shot out and struck an ox on the head, between the horns. Then another rock flew, striking another. And a third.
Suddenly Nona’s mind was free. She leaped ahead, across the boundary. Colene was right with her.
In a moment all of them were across except Burgess. Then he too appeared.
There were too many telepaths, Seqiro explained. I could not prevail against several. But they were unable to address Burgess. When he shot stones at them, they concentrated on him, letting us go. But still they could not stop him, without touching his contact points.
“It is good to have you back with us,” Nona told the floater as she touched a contact point. He kept helping them in unexpected ways.
They found a Mode without telepathic animals, where a river crossed to the side, and made camp for the night. It was early evening, but they still needed to catch up from the prior night.
Nona and Colene went down to the river, careful to remain within the boundaries so that they would not accidentally cross over to the Modes on either side. There had been so many kinds of telepathic animals that it wasn’t worth the risk.
“I wonder whether there’s a Mode with telepathic humans,” Nona said musingly. “Obviously humans can do it, because you are learning.”
“I don’t want to see that Mode,” Colene said. “The animals are bad enough.”
“Except for the horses.”
“The horses are bad too, except for Seqiro. He had to leave his Mode, because he wanted to think for himself. They tried to pen him in. We don’t want to stop there.”
“There should be no need to, with Burgess well.”
“I hope so.” They stripped and waded into the water, which was cool but not unbearably so. Seqiro had checked it for minds, and reported nothing inimical or dangerous there.
They scrubbed each other off, then emerged, refreshed. They stood by the bank, letting themselves dry.
“About last night,” Colene said. “Thanks.”
“I don’t mind watching Burgess.”
“For not mentioning my shame.”
Nona could find no answer to that.
They returned to the camp, and the three males went down to wash, while Nona took small parts of their supplies and expanded them into a good-sized meal for all.