Purchase indGame in paperback, e-book, or audiobook

Laboratory 311, home of the Waller-Lobue Particle Accelerator.

It was the perfect day for a high school field trip. The sun was shining, birds were singing, and the staff was… well, dead. All of them. Dead.

“Welcome to Laboratory 311”, the tour guide had said, but when she went to check on the screams coming from the particle accelerator viewing chamber, she never came back.

To the best of our teacher’s understanding, some sort of accident caused the emergency protocols to kick in. That meant a complete lock-down and containment of any breach. Now I’m trapped in the complex with the other students and our teacher, Mr. Panacharian, waiting for a rescue team.

~

“Kids, please stay together,” Mr. Pan said gruffly. Pan was a big man. He wasn’t fat, but he wasn’t muscle-bound either. He was powerful looking, with huge hands and an overly expressive unibrow that looked like two caterpillars practicing the Kama Sutra on his forehead. Picture a Greco-Roman wrestler, but shorter. Probably just a higher concentration of Neanderthal DNA. I mean, give the man a cigar and mutton chops, and he would have been the perfect guy to play a comic book accurate Wolverine.

“Mr. Pan, I have to go to the restroom,” Becky Anderson whined. “Really bad.”

Pan’s shoulders drooped, and he sighed like a man whose job it was to tell the world that humanity was on the brink of extinction. “Becky, we’re supposed to remain in this room until someone comes to let us out. I don’t think anyone will hold an accident against you. To be honest, I have to go too.”

Brad Wilson, team quarterback, snickered. “Don’t be too sure of that. I’m sure there’ll be plenty of judging.”

Pan swiveled his head on the tree stump serving as his neck and glared at Brad. “Don’t be a dick, Brad,” he said, clearly unafraid of potential repercussions. “You’ve been doing the pee-pee dance for the last twenty minutes.”

The rest of the class, including Becky, laughed as Brad’s face flushed a deep, warm crimson.

It took a moment to register amidst the laughter, but a hush rolled through the room as we all recognized the sound of what could best be described as a guttural, primal roar. The roar echoed through the room like a train passing through an underground terminal, and Becky began to cry. I put my arm around her, hoping to provide a little comfort, but I wasn’t feeling all that comfortable myself.

A series of shrieks and screams rang out in the halls, followed by a high-pitched squeal that sounded like the mating call of a cyborg dolphin. Becky, voice shaking like a Yahtzee cup, whispered, “Brad just peed himself.”

~

We stood in the closest thing to silence we could muster. I mean, there were whimpers, whispers, and outright crying, and of course Mr. Pan was busy hushing all of the above, but it wasn’t as bad as the pandemonium going on in the hall and particle accelerator chamber.

Suddenly, the door from the adjoining viewing room flew open and a tall Japanese man wearing a lab coat and yellow safety glasses stumbled through. He quickly closed the door behind him and cursed when he remembered there wasn’t a lock on our side. He turned to look at us, seeming surprised for a moment, and then wheezed, “The field trip! Thank God. Are you all accounted for?” He looked to Mr. Pan for an answer, his eyes desperate.

“Everyone’s here, except Jodi, our tour guide,” Mr. Pan replied. He looked just as shaken as the man standing in front of us. His name tag identified him as Fuun Shishido – Senior Controls Engineer. “Can you tell us what’s happening here?”

Fuun shook his head. “Classified,” he muttered.

Mr. Pan wasn’t a fan of the engineer’s answer. In one solid move, he hefted him against the unlocked door by the front of his lab coat. “I have more than a dozen kids here whose parents won’t give a good god-damn about your classified crap! What in the hell is going on out there!?”

Fuun looked at us through cockeyed safety glasses. As if finally seeing us for what we were – a bunch of clueless kids who just wanted to go home – he sighed and relented. “Let go of my jacket, please.”

It was a request, not a demand, and Mr. Pan obliged.

“Thank you,” Fuun said, offering a slight bow. “I’m sorry. You see, everything is classified, even the number of sugars I take in my coffee. Chalk it up to habit.” The man looked around the room. Seeing nothing but terror, he continued. He must have thought Mr. Pan was a priest, because he spilled the beans on everything except how many sugars he’d taken in his coffee that morning. “A strange black stone, unlike anything we’d ever seen. A power source beyond comprehension. We used it to power the accelerator. It worked well the first time. It opened the multiverse like a beautiful patchwork. We could see everything, everywhere. But the second time, the investors got greedy. They wanted to do more than just see. They wanted to explore. But it was an accident. An accident ripped a hole in the complex fabric of spacetime, and it appears the multiverse is now collapsing into a single nexus. That nexus is our lab. It’s contained for the moment, but the strain of the entire multiverse pressing against the tear is just too much for even spacetime to hold. The rip is expanding. Soon it will exceed the confines of this facility, and there will be no place to hide.”

“Unless someone closes it,” I said matter-of-factly. I was trying to impress Becky, who’d clamped onto my arm like a human vice; a very pretty, incredibly nice smelling human vice. But it was still a valid statement, right?

Everyone in the room looked at me like I’d just professed my virginity or something.

“Seriously? Are you going to tell me you can’t close it,” I asked.

“He’s got a point,” Brad said, no longer trying to hide the drying stain on the front of his Levis.

I hadn’t really expected validation from anyone, especially Brad.

Fuun sighed and pursed his lips. “I’m only a controls engineer. I’m not allowed to operate the systems necessary to-”

“Doesn’t matter if you should do it.” The new voice was Jamal Stone, a generally quiet self-described science nerd, who probably understood what was happening better than anyone on the field trip, including Mr. Pan. “The question is, can you?”

Fuun looked really nervous. He was obviously a rules guy. But we were teenagers. We broke rules for breakfast.

Jamal continued. “Look, I’ve been taking particle physics classes through MIT’s online program since junior high. If you need an assistant, I’ve got your back. But you’ve got to be straight with us, alright bro?”

Fuun nodded. “Yes. It is worth a try. I think dodging any sort of liability went out the window when the rip appeared, and as far as I can tell, I’m the only employee left alive. I’ll try, and I’ll take whatever help I can get.”

Becky was looking at Jamal with a newfound level of admiration. We all were. I’d had a crush on Becky since the fourth grade, but unless her last name was Higgs-Boson, Jamal wouldn’t have even known she was alive.

I stepped forward once more. “Are there any weapons around here? Like a security station or anything? Someone has to keep everyone else safe while you guys figure this thing out.”

Fuun nodded. “Yes, but I wouldn’t bother with the security station. They’ve only got tasers and batons. There’s another chamber, not far from here, with tactical exploration gear, just in case we were successful.”

Mr. Pan shook his head ruefully. “Looks like you were successful.”

I nodded. “Jamal, you help Mr. Susudio. Whoever wants to come with me, I’m going for the tactical gear.”

Becky squeezed my arm, Jamal all but forgotten. “I’m coming with you.”

Brad stepped forward bravely. “I’m with you too, nerd.” His facade of bravado was as thin as our survival odds.

“Not so fast, kids.” Mr. Pan put up his hands. “I’m responsible for all of you, so-”

“No disrespect, Mr. Pan,” I said, “but things are only getting worse out there, and time is not on our side. You can’t stop us all. If you want to protect us, come with us and gear up.”

Several kids agreed out loud. While the screaming outside had ceased, the alarms continued to blare at a, well, alarming level.

Mr. Pan looked flustered, but he couldn’t argue, not about that, not considering what we all knew. He finally nodded and looked at Shishido. “Ok, some of us will get the tactical gear. The rest will assist you and Jamal.” He glanced around the room at my classmates. “Or stay out of the way.”

A few of the students who were neither scientifically inclined, nor particularly excited about carrying a firearm, nodded sheepishly.

Mr. Pan looked satisfied. “So, Mr. Shishido, tell me. Where is this munitions depot?”

~

A few minutes later, eight of us, including Mr. Pan, Brad, Becky, and I, escaped the locked room using Mr. Shishido’s keycard. He had limited access inside the facility, meaning the keycard wasn’t going to open any exits leading to the outside world, but he assured us he had access to the munitions room. It turns out our humble Mr. Shishido was more important than he made himself out to be. Our unwitting savior had overseen the development of most of the systems that controlled everyday life at Waller-Lobue, including security. His card allowed him to go anywhere his expertise might be needed. Apparently, he was needed just about everywhere.

Shishido, Jamal, and the other five kids remained in the waiting area, as there were unimaginab