So, did Raven really believe in alternate realities? Honestly, it was still a bit too much to actually believe, but she was starting to think that something weird was going on. By the time Cameron finally got there, she had about convinced herself that it was all a dream. Just about, but not quite there. It didn’t take much for Aaron and Cameron to convince her again, but she wouldn’t let them know. They didn’t deserve to know.
As Cameron entered the room, the first thing he did was hold out the real necklace. Raven grabbed it from him and fixed a glare that was likely to set him on fire if it lasted too long. He just glared back and dared her to keep challenging him. She would have taken the dare and kept glaring until the end, but Aaron deserved just as much, if not more, of her anger. After all, he had been an accomplice, and he was her own brother.
Eventually, someone had to break the awkward and deadly silence. It only made sense that it was Raven, but the millions of tiny thoughts and questions whirring around in her brain made it hard to think, much less ask any questions. Every time she opened her mouth to ask something, her mind could only come up with incoherent mumbling and sounds that resembled a dying dog.
“I guess we should probably explain some of this to you.” Aaron said, breaking the silence.
“Yeah, that might help.”
Cameron looked at Aaron and nodded, authorizing him to speak.
“Okay, so think of this world like a big ball of water; or mud- mud works too. Anyways, this world is a huge ball of mu that keeps rolling in one direction. That one direction is the direction of time. Now, time is often thought of as a supernatural thing, and it is, but it is also a physical object. No one knows exactly what it is or where it came from, but the source of time is often related to the Tree of Life. Of course, this is just a speculation, but it is possible. So, imagine that at the center of the mud ball that we call home is an object that keeps it moving forward. But this object doesn’t work quiet like an engine or a living creature as it moves along; no, it is more like the sun. It burns inside our world and turns and writhes as it bears our heavy weight. It moves forward and carries us with it. This is the TimeSource.”
Cameron had become very serious while Aaron was talking, and sat down. His face suddenly seemed to fit his name and his eyes were hidden in the shadow of his worries. They say that the eyes are the windows to the soul, so how can you speak to a man whose eyes are darkened. They were darkened not by anger, hatred, or pain but by an unmentionable fear that suddenly gripped all in the room. The spell seemed to break when he cut in and finished for Aaron.
“Yes, the TimeSource is what keeps the world running, but we don’t actually know where it is or even what it looks like, although some speculations are circling through the realities.”
“So, how does that work with these alternate realities?”
“Well, that’s not really something that I know the answer to. We think that they are rifts in time that opened with the tearing of the TimeSource. Or perhaps a better way to describe them is as a wave. So, the TimeSource is like the sun, and like the sun it has flares of sorts. These flares are what we travel on when we enter alternate realities. They are connected to our world by the TimeSource, but they are different.”
“Right,” Aaron cut back in, “but we can’t confirm exactly how they work because we’ve only been able to Drop Out a few times.”
“Drop Out, what’s that mean?”
“Well, we had to give it some name. When you walk into a pocket or bubble reality we call it dropping out. It’s not the most creative name, but we feel it fits. Do you remember what it is like when you first step into another reality? Well, I don’t know about you, but every one of us few normal people who have gone dropped out felt like we were suddenly dropped off of the earth right before we entered the other reality. So we say that we are dropping out of our reality and into another- Dropping Out.”
“Okay, I guess that makes sense. I think. Just explain to me what I have to do with all of this.”
“Honestly, we’re not sure. If the flares from the TimeSource are what take you to alternate realities, you have to walk through a locked door to get to the flares. These locked doors can be opened by a key, such as the flower petals or the necklace. Of course, it’s impossible to walk through a locked door without a key, so we have no idea how you do it. Perhaps you had a petal on you and you just didn’t realize it?”
“No way, I would have noticed it. Anyways, I need to think about this some more. Why don’t you go home.”
“No.”
Raven’s head was about to explode from all of her thoughts and questions, so she was not happy when he refused to leave. “Excuse me- that was not a suggestion! Get out of my house!”
“I said, no. The fact is, we aren’t sure if it’s safe for you to go anywhere at the moment, since we don’t even know how you are travelling through realities. It’s better if we stay here to protect you, or at least you could come with us to the lab.”
“I am not a little girl who needs protecting, and I told you to get out of my house. Now!”
Raven couldn’t believe this guy. First he shows up out of nowhere and barges into her house for dinner and tells her a crazy fairytale; now he was refusing to get out of her house. Honestly, she was about to the point of violence; and Raven was not a violent person. In fact, if he said one more word…
“We really need…”
His sentence got cut off really quickly. What could she say, he had said one more word and she really didn’t like him. She didn’t really mean to hurt him, not even close. She was actually aiming more for a slap on the face and then dragging him by his toes out the door and pushing her brother out with him. Instead, she found her fist in his face, and his face through a vase. Superhero powers? Yeah right. More like ninja speed and strength. It probably didn’t help that the force of the blow sent Cameron flying backwards and straight into Aaron, who got knocked over into the table. In less than a second, a slap in the face turned into two knocked out guys and a trip to the hospital. That evening didn’t go as anyone had planned.