POLARIS: BOOK I, Ch. 1 -- Welcome to Polaris
Magic, weapons, and seduction in a multiverse
I have been to Polaris.
It was one of those freak accidents, where universes meet at a coincidental time to change your fate. I should have crashed on a desert road in Texas, when my old-school Jeep Sahara went into a gully in one of those freak west Texas thunderstorms, but one of the lightning bolts not only seemed to split the sky, but to split the fabric of reality as well. I was too busy with the Jeep, fighting to control it in a spin, to fully realize what was happening, but the landscape changed from a hard clay road and scrub brush and cactus under a driving rain to a murky street, the kind where the trash piled at the base of a building may be last month's garbage or the home of a local bum, where the rats and the winos both dine out of the buffet on the curb in mildewed cardboard boxes, and where the night mist can curl so thickly that a wi11-o-the-wisp can substitute itself for your evening companion if you're not careful. The Jeep only stopped because it met something sturdier than itself, namely the side wall of an alley, about twenty feet from the end of that and a bit more from the main street itself. If it had been a different night in Polaris, and another dimensional gate had been open in that wall, who knows where I might have stopped, passing from dimension to dimension and never knowing what I missed in this city that was the cynosure of universes. But the other gate was closed that night ...
All I knew at that moment was that I wanted to feel solid ground under my feet again, and I wrenched on the door handle and kicked at the door of the Jeep until I was able to push it open enough to slide out, dropping to the ground, not surprised to feel mud beneath my knees and hands, crawling a few feet away before stopping to catch my breath. I kept my head down, instinctively avoiding the rain that I didn't notice was no longer there, so I didn't see the dark silhouette standing at the edge of the building near the main road, nor the smaller furtive figures that started to crawl closer out of the swimming night.
* * *
It bad been a long day for you, gun-for-hire transporting the Bastet, an art statue carved out of black diamond, to its new owner's dimension. You were hired as the real courier, while most of Polaris's armed escort & delivery services spent the day serving as fronts, not only because it seemed unbelievable that anyone would trust you with such a valuable object, but because you in fact had the best chance of getting it done. Disappointingly, while several armored cars were subjected to hold-ups that day, you crossed the city without even being stopped by one of the robotic LEOs. (Isn't it terrible when enough money can buy off the cops?) So here you were, not a single fight under your belt for the whole day, wending your way back into The Nadir to see what business was going on in Salter's, your most-frequented watering hole.
Seeing the Jeep appear out of a wall and crash into another didn't surprise you, just another instance of those local dimensional gates acting up again. Mild curiosity, enough to make you look without planning to get involved, stopped you when the door opened and the driver slid out. You lit a cigar stub and watched as the local gutter rats, human and otherwise, moved in to investigate. It wasn't your normal policy to bother them, after all, they had to make a living too. You were about to move on when the first prowler reached for the driver's prone figure ...
... and fell back screaming and writhing in agony, lit from within by what looked like flame in his very bones. The rest of the pack paused, looking for the source of the magic, but seeing no one other than their victim (missing your shadow in the dark), they closed their circle again and sent a delegate forward. This one got close enough to push at the driver's shoulder with a splintered stake, prompting the form to push up in protest as another set of rags was set ablaze from within.
Action on the streets - things were looking up for the evening! The expectation of a fight that you had felt all day and not released pulled you toward the fray. If the driver was going to put up a fight, then why not help? You waded in, grinning around your cigar, using the sole of your boot and your scabbarded saber to clear a path, flinging mangy bodies aside to land in piles of rot. Between your forceful blows and the strange incendiary effects, soon the street was clear of all but yourself, the wreck of the Jeep, a few smoking corpses, and the driver.
You reached forward tentatively, not wanting to get burned yourself. Before you touched, you murmured "It's ok, I'm a friend." As your hand made contact with the denim-covered shoulder, the head came up. Auburn hair with shades of brown and gold fell around the pale face of a woman. Her green eyes were slightly unfocused, and she was breathing hard through slightly parted lips. As she looked up toward you, you offered her a hand, and saying "It's ok" again. She made an automatic gesture of cleaning hers on her blue jeans before taking yours and coming off of her knees to her feet. She paused for a minute, trying to catch her breath, then put a hand on your arm, and you felt the chill of it through your leather sleeve. As you looked down, you saw her start to slide and you found yourself catching her in your arms.
Stranger things bad happened in Polaris, lodestar of oddities. At least you were not being set on fire. With a cynical shrug and a self-deprecating smile, you hoisted the still form and set off down the street. When you neared Salter's, instead of using the front entrance, you took a narrow passage down the side of the building and, pressing a loose stone, entered through your private door to a rear room. This was one of your sanctuaries where you conducted business, laid low, or slept off long nights. Here you set her on a narrow cot, removing her wet denim jacket and soaked boots, wiping off the worst of the remaining wet with an old bar towel. She was still unconscious, so you pulled a blanket over her and headed for the bar, wishing for the best. Some people survive Polaris, and some don't, and you idly wondered which she would be.
* * *
I slowly became aware that I was awake again, still feeling damp and lying on a lumpy mattress in a dark room. The door was cracked, and in the light from that I could see there wasn't much else, just a table and chair. I didn't know where I was, or how I got here. The last thing I really remembered was driving in Texas. But I obviously wasn't locked in, and although the sounds coming from the next room sounded like a bacchanalian fraternity party gone wild combined with a sports bar on Super Bowl Sunday, I figured I'd better see what was out there.
The door opened at one end of the counter in what appeared to be a basement bar room, but I didn't see any Super Bowl, much less any TV. As I paused in the doorway, I saw the bartender look at me and signal to someone in the throng. And then you walked over. You were tall and slender, with a kind of compact tension that seemed to radiate out and force people out of your way without having to touch them. Your sandy hair was trimmed short, and I could see the shadow of a bare day's growth of beard. You wore a dark grey shirt with black pants and black boots. Around your hips was a pistol belt like I used to see at the El Paso Saddleblanket Company, with loops for bullets and a holster with a heavy stainless revolver hanging off of the right side. Slung by a shoulder holster under your left arm was another pistol, an ugly-looking dull black semi-automatic of no distinguishable lineage. Around your throat was tied an old olive scarf, and I could see the edges of a silver chain disappearing under your shirt on your chest. You looked hard, a cross between a gunman and space pirate, I thought, and I braced myself to meet you.
When I looked at your eyes, I found myself being subjected to a perusal similar to what I had just given you. What did you see, I wondered? A young woman (if late twenties was called young here, wherever I was), in a bloused white shirt, kind of like the old pirate shirts without the lace, and faded blue jeans. I had on one of those travel "belly packs" and a black leather belt with brass medallions, and black suede boots cuffed around my ankles. That's what I would have seen. But I realized you saw more -- your eyes were measuring the rise of my breasts under the shirt, and deciding (disappointedly?) that I was wearing a bra. Then they looked at the way the belt fell around my hips, and gauged the way the denim of the jeans caressed my thighs. A quick glance at the boots, then you made your way back up, finally realizing how tall I was when I stood next to you, just barely able to see the top of my head. When you found me staring back, not stepping back, you gave a half-smile and jerked your head for me to follow you.
One table, catty-corner to both the bar and the entrance door, seemed to be your private territory. An oilskin coat was slung over a chair with the silver tip of a scabbard peeking out from beneath. We took the two chairs toward the corner, you to have your face to the door/back to the wall, and I to be able to watch the other occupants of the bar - the nearest comparison I could think of was one of those bar scenes from "Star Wars" or "Star Trek - Deep Space Nine", though this was much seedier than even a Ferenghi bar. The bartender had followed us, and placed another bottle of beer at your elbow, saying "Here y'are, Cap'n" then turned to me and asked "Miss?". I ordered wine, as it seemed safest since I had no idea about the water or anything else here. As I finished yet another overview of the room and ventured to glance toward you, you finally spoke. "You're not from Polaris." A flat statement, not a question, but maybe a bit of amusement underneath?
"No, and I don't think I'm in Kansas anymore either, and I don't think you are Toto or the Wizard."
