Parallels: The Shift

 

“Clarissa, hurry, it's an emergency!” called out John from the other room.

I left my desk and rushed over to find the lights flickering and the machine running wild.

“Oh, no, we need to leave!”

I reached for the alarm on the wall as John rushed towards the door, but we were instantly covered in a blinding light.

I woke up with a headache, and a ringing in my ears. The world around me appeared as a haze; only smoke and faint glimmers surrounded me. I stood up as my vision returned and found John a few feet away from me. He was still unconscious.

“John! John, are you alright?” I asked as I knelt next to him and raised his head.

John wasn’t waking up, so I checked his pulse: I felt nothing. I tried performing CPR, but it was too late. I had lost him. Many of my colleagues laid lifeless around me. However, all hope was not lost; a couple of them were still alive.

“Alice! Clement! I’m so glad you both are okay!”

“Clarissa, what in the world happened?” Clement asked.

“The machine grew unstable. It blew up before I could hit the alarm.”

“What? How did that happen?” Alice asked.

“I don’t know. I was going through my files when John called out to me.”

“Is he…”

“He didn’t make it.”

As we walked ahead, we noticed something strange: although there was rubble strewn around us, there was nearly not enough. What was even more perplexing was that most of the facility, itself, seemed to have vanished without a trace.

“Clarissa, you don’t think we were…”

“No, no way. The machine was not ready for something of that magnitude yet.”

“I know, but it did malfunction.”

What Alice said was unnerving. I hoped we were still in the same town, or at least the same state—but reality proved me wrong. Wherever we were, it was near desolate. There was barely anything but fields and trees around us; only a single road lay a few feet away. I felt even more uneasy than I was before, and I could see the same feeling begin to grow on Alice and Clement’s faces as well.

“I think it’s safe to say the teleportation device works,” Clement said.

We tried checking where we were on our phones, but none of them were turning on. We figured the explosion had disrupted the circuitry. We had no choice but to see where the road ahead took us. After an hour on our feet, we came across a small town. There was a small cafe across the street, so we decided to have something to eat. Clement had to pay because Alice and I didn’t have our purses with us.

While we were having our meal, I noticed someone familiar at a table further ahead, behind Clement. I leaned to a side to get a better look: it was Darrell, my husband.

“Darrell!” I yelled, rushing towards him.

“Excuse me, but do I know you?” he asked.

“Very funny, Darell, but this is no time for jokes.”

“Who’s joking? I don’t know who you are!”

“What? I’m your wife!”

“Wife? I’m not married. Also, I’m gay.”

“Darrell, this isn’t funny!”

“I don’t know what drugs you’re on, but I’ve had enough of this.”

He stormed out of the cafe as I stood there, stupefied. Alice and Clement walked up to me; they were as shocked as I was.

“Clarissa, the situation looks graver than we thought,” Alice said.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t think we’ve just teleported to another state; this is most likely a parallel universe.”

To be continued...