Transversals

IX. 1 on 1

Maybe ten minutes later we were driving along a back road, away from the hustle and bustle of town. I had been firing questions nonstop, getting answers to maybe 20% of them. Partially frustrated, but settled knowing a little more about "dimension hopping", as they called it. And annoyed that at every traffic stop, some girl in the left turning lane gave Ben a flirtatious wave or wink with her friends giggling furiously. He always played along, and I couldn't sigh or roll my eyes hard enough. He wasn't Dylan O'Brien reincarnated, okay. And a fancy car shouldn't get any sane girl's panties wet.

But he explained, finally. He explained that the whole universe is set up with big spheres of other universes, or different sized "worlds", all packed together like a scoop of caviar. The only portal between them is, undoubtedly, mirrors. Some universes might have hundreds of portals that lead between theirs, or only a few. And all the worlds vary in size.

There's a relative position of each world; you had next-door neighbors, basically. Couldn't go across the street and expect to wind up in the farthest reaches of the universe. Therefore, if the theory would serve correct, the farther you traveled from your dimension, the stranger and more incommensurable they become. Until you wind up in a world of drunk monkeys that eradicated the human population, legend be told from Ben. He said he never traveled that far again.

The number of universes that exist is thousands upon millions, with the slightest changes (like widespread language, or dogs the predominating domesticated pet versus all others by a landslide) to the most drastic (ex: wings, a red sky with black clouds instead of blue). All the portals are random, although there is a high concentration of portals between worlds that hold many similarities, and some are so out there that they might have none. I happened to have a portal to one of the rarer ones in my room: the Winged Dimension.

Big mirrors in public places lead to boring worlds, since there's so many variables the universe must account for. No, the small bathroom mirrors in restaurants and homes is where you could stumble upon something really interesting, he said. I found my curiosity only growing, but remembered the briefly mentioned monitored travel. It puzzled me, but that's where the 80% cut off for answers had been.

"So you guys have names for them all?" I asked as he turned right into a dirt driveway, to the middle of a clearing of woods.

"Not all of them, but the big ones, yes." Ben parked the car and killed the engine, getting out. "The ones with defining features we name."

"Examples?" I questioned, getting out myself.

Ben went to the trunk, unlocking it. "Well, the Winged Dimension, as I've told. Yours is considered Supersize, since it's so big. There's Hell, Accent E, Accent I, Accent A, Heatwave, Fruitsive, Ingenist. Weed World." He peeked around the trunk and addressed me with a childish smile. "Everyone's on weed there. The entire planet."

I laughed lightly and plunged my hands into my jacket pockets as he started rifling around for something in the trunk. "What's Ingenist?"

"It's a technologically advanced world rather close to yours actually," he replied, shoving something or other to the side and making the car move. "But the place is a damn tundra; the only portals you'll probably find are in the arctic. Still, they're the smartest world out of all we've seen. Ingenist comes from the word ingenuity."

"Do they call themselves that?"

"Another time," he mumbled. I knew that meant the end of that train of questions.

I got out my phone and checked for a text from Will maybe, but nothing showed up. Shoving it back in my pocket, I tried to forget about it with more questions. "Why is mine Supersize?"