The Other Dimension: Part Two

by twilight_lover

Arrick, Gelert Genius, as his owner always called him, woke up slowly. He felt groggy and knew something had happened.

He got up shakily. All he remembered was running in some forest… he struggled to remember. SweetheartZeeZee was in front of him, and he said that he would stay back and protect her from behind. Vaguely at first, what had transpired from first entering the shimmering oval, which must have been a dimension door, until he had been shot in the neck with a tranquilizer bullet came back to him with crystal clear clarity.

Lights turned on with a great "cunck". Arrick looked around himself. He was in a room that had a great balcony quite high above his head. The walls were metal, held together by screws and nuts and bolts.

"Well!"

Arrick felt shook to his very core by the vibrations that voice sent in him. He wryly remembered the way his owner imitated witches' voices when reading to him. This sounded much worse.

He looked up at the balcony. A very ugly woman who seemed terribly familiar to him was grinning down at him.

"Sloth?" he asked, startled. His jaw dropped. A woman Dr. Sloth???

"I," the woman thundered in loud tones. "AM MADAME SLOTH!" She grinned down at him again, her teeth black and disgusting to look at. "What have you got to say for yourself, hmmm?"

Arrick's thoughts raced for something to say. "You're ugly," he blurted. Then he nearly slapped himself on the head. Well, that was a fine thing to say, he berated himself.

Madame Sloth didn't get angry or anything. She merely threw her head back and cackled. "Put him in the cage for the specials!" she commanded a Grundo next to her. "He'll be my favourite NeoPet from now on."

A door on Arrick's left that he hadn't seen previously opened. Two VirtuPets, ugly and mutated came stomping from behind the door with a rod in each their hands. At the end of the rods were nooses, designed to trap Lupes and Gelerts. Arrick looked about in dismay, seeing no other escape route.

Or was there? Arrick gauged the distance it would take to run from one side of the room to the other. He backed against a wall and waited for the two VirtuPets to approach. Then, he leapt over their heads and ran for the door, still opened.

Feeling a rush of exhilaration, he ran out of the prison room and down a winding corridor until he came to complete stop at two doors. Arrick looked at one door, then the other. He rushed at one of them, he didn't care which one and followed yet another narrow passage. It grew darker and darker, but it didn't faze him as he had Night Vision. He found yet another door and burst through it.

He stepped into a large chamber where great trucks moved in and out. "Must be my lucky day," he mused quickly as he ran for the great opening where another truck was driving through.

He saw at the last moment the thin green film that filled the doorway. He hit it and was electrocuted. His body flew backwards into some cargo bales. He simply couldn't believe. No one had ever gotten the better of Arrick Gelert Genius! Angry, he tried to get up, but failed. His legs wouldn't respond.

Growling and snapping at the VirtuPets that came to take him away, he tried to snap at them savagely, but he couldn't. So he decided to let those ugly brutes take him where they would.

They dragged him through doorways, elevators, stairways and finally reached a great chamber. There was a cage hanging over a great pot of acid. In the cage were two NeoPets, unmutated, unchanged, not much different from the NeoPets at home.

He was roughly thrown in.

"Ah. A new one."

The voice was old, yet clear, sounding matter-of-fact. Arrick tried to get up to see who it was with him in the cage.

"Don't get up just yet," another voice advised, soft and gentle. "It happens once in a while. Give it a few minutes before the feeling goes away entirely."

"Now, what did I tell you, Lottie. That Madame just can't get enough of us smart ones. I just wish I read less books sometimes, and then maybe I wouldn't be here, like specimens for a science experiment," the first voice said.

Arrick listened to the voices talk for a while, then he got up.

A red Lupe leant against the bars of the cage, golden eyes staring directly at him. On the other side, a green Gelert smiled at him. "Welcome to the club, sonny," the Lupe said.

** **

Over the next few days, SweetheartZeeZee became more and more comfortable with the motley group of 'changelings'. They all had been through the process of becoming mutants, like the VirtuPets of home, but by some mistake they had all gone through, the complications left them with untouched minds, but all had been disfigured horribly.

"Sometimes, one of us just goes stark crazy. It's the mutation workin' on all o' us. It be eatin' up our minds, but most of us go on. Y'see, we got permeeshen t'enter Sloth's grounds cos we're mutants, but she don't know we still got them minds working," Zeb once told her.

Most of all, she worried about Arrick. Where was he? How was he? SweetheartZeeZee fretted that he would be mutated. Ms. Twilight would be utterly crushed were she to hear that her first pet had been mutated into a monster. Ms. Twilight dearly loved Arrick.

"Zeb?" she asked, approaching the blue Zafara. "Can you help me?"

"Yes, Miss Zee?" he asked, nodding politely.

"My companion, Arrick was caught by Madame Sloth. Can you help me?"

"Well," Zeb said, scratching himself. "I'm shore I can, but it can be kinda tricky, you know, gitting out prisoners, and if 'e ain't been turned mutant by now, well…"

"I'm quite sure he won't be turned mutant. He's too smart for that."

Zeb smiled. "Well, then, I've been a-meaning to try out dis little kentrekshen lately. It wuz a little jerky las' time 'round I used it, but we could give it a try dis time."

"What is it?" SweetheartZeeZee asked.

Zeb led her to a small little tent. Something was hidden under a cloth. Zeb pulled the cloth off.

What looked like metal box with no cover and many little buttons on the inside which could fit two Zafaras inside was underneath it. The edges of this box were rounded, making it look rather circular if it weren't for the two headlights.

"Look it that baby, here. She be the best kentrekshen Geren our genius Kacheek ever invented. Y'see, whut you do is," he demonstrated, putting a helmet over his head. "This is attooned to them brainwaves, reading witch deerekshen you wanna go."

"Sounds cool! Can we try it?"

"Sure we can. Hop in."

As soon as the two of them had stepped into the 'hoverkraaft', Zeb manipulated a few buttons and it lifted off the ground.

"See this? It helps us fly. It's got somethin' to do with them little engines and the relative weight between the passengers, the metal and the air about it and-"

"Can you just fly this thing?" SweetheartZeeZee pleaded. "You're beginning to sound like Arrick."

"Sure, Miss Zee. Hangy on, 'cos this is gonna be one hard" - the hovercraft jerked forward - "riiiiiiddddde!!!!"

The little hovercraft zoomed out into the night sky that twinkled with little lights. SweetheartZeeZee screamed, the wind almost knocked out of her. Zeb hooted. The little hovercraft whirled about, too fast for any of them too fall out.

"Ze-ze-ze-eb-eb-eb!!!!" SweetheartZeeZee yelled. "Sto-op-op-op thi-is-is-is th-th-thing n-n-n-now!!"

"C'mon Miss Zee!" Zeb shouted over his shoulder. "Where be your sense o' adventure!"

"EeeeeeEEEeeeeeEEeee!!!" "WhooOOOoooOOppeeEEEEeeEE!!!"

Finally he relented. "Oh, all right, Miss Zee. But you do realize that this takes the fun outta the rahd, right?"

SweetheartZeeZee was too shaken to reply. She stumbled out of the hovercraft and weaved her way around the trees to where her tent was erected. She lay in her little bed, head swirling about, eyes unable to focus on anything.

"Miss Zee?" Zeb asked softly from behind. "Are you aw right?"

"I…think so," SweetheartZeeZee replied. Then she turned and glared at him. "Don't ever do that again! Ever!"

"Aw, Miss Zee, you be taking this too seriously. I mean, how often do you git a rahd like dat?"

SweetheartZeeZee ignored him. She turned again. "Tomorrow, I want to go rescue my friend, okay? And no funny business this time, okay?"

"Okay, Okay, Miss Zee, you got your point across. I'll tell 'em boys to git ready."

She heard him announce the new 'meeshen' they had, which was to rescue Arrick. Zeb sounded quite in high spirits and everyone shouted in agreement. As the rhubarb of the crowd died down, she heard the hushed whispers near her tent.

"Didja hear him? Didja?"

"Yea…he not been like dat zinze Debbie got mooned, and did you see him? He smiled like he hasn't smiled before!"

There were various sounds of agreement.

"I say, it must be that new footpad, Sweetheart-what's-her-name? She isn't quite like Debbie, but it must be her eyes that remind him of sweet Deb, what!"

"Shucks, you ain't telling me-!!" There was a collective gasp.

"Oh, my, it has to be! Zeb smiling, Zeb laughing, Zeb going on a dangfangled dangerous mission…"

"He can't be!"

"It ain't!"

"Ah seruslee don't buhleeve it!"

"Makes nae sense, mon! Why, there's plenty o' sweet-faced girls in camp, why wouldna he take any o' 'em?"

"Have you seen any of dem charm the entire camp de way Mademoiselle ZeeZee does?"

"Then there's no doubt aboot it…"

"Zeb in love! Why, there ain't bin no such grand thing fer so long!"

"Yeah! And t'hear this! Well, sets a real precedent there, don't it?"

SweetheartZeeZee hid her head under a pillow. She wished she was back home, safe and sound in Ms Twilight's apartment, Arrick by her side. Oh, why did everything turn out like this!