"We're not gonna make it." "I can't believe you'd say anything that sounds like that." "I thought we'd be on the ground with plenty of time to spare." "You mean the vortex will open up in the airplane?" "It's gonna have to, or we're gonna miss the slide." "Is there enough room?" "What about the stability of the craft?" "What will it do to the stability of the crew?" "I don't know!" "Man, why'd we get pulled into a civil war, anyway?" "If Southern California wants to secede, let them go!" "Red Cross refugee relief is supposed to be neutral." "Yeah, well, tell that to the rebel bird shooters on the ground!" "We've been hit!" "Losing number one engine." "Prepare to bail out!" "I'll get the chutes." "Remmy!" "Remmy!" "Oh, no, the chutes." "Those chutes were cooked!" "Take care of him." "Quinn!" "Oh, Quinn, don't bail on me now." "Quinn." "Colin, you get Quinn." "Come on, hurry up!" "We've got one chance!" "Remmy, get up!" "Come on!" "Whoa!" "Remmy." "Quinn!" "His pulse is weak." "He might not make it." "What if you found a portal to a parallel universe?" "What if you could slide into a thousand different worlds where it's the same year and you're the same person, but everything else is different?" "And what if you can't find your way home?" "I'll stay here with them." "You go into town for help." "What do I do?" "What if this is one of those strange worlds?" "Colin, every world is a strange world." "Just be careful and scope things out, and come back with help, okay?" "Your brother's life depends on it." "We've only got three days, so get a move on." "Could it be?" "Is this my home world?" "Hey, hey, stop!" "Can you give me a ride into town?" "I'm lost." "How'd you get lost?" "Two friends and I were looking for some property." "I suppose the map was wrong." "Where are your friends now?" "Down the road, a mile or so." "They sent me for help." "Help?" "For what?" "My friend, he fell down, injured his head." "All right." "Climb on." "Thanks." "So, is this the way to El Segundo?" "Granada Hills." "You sure you're not the one who hit his head?" "No, my head's good." "Thanks." "Benjamin." "Many thanks." "Good morning, sir." "Any neonatologist to five west." "Any neonatologist to five west." "Well, if you have insurance we've got a lot of rooms." "Excuse me." "Otherwise, I can't help you." "Please." "Are you a doctor?" "Yes." "Hold on a second." "I need your help." "You look okay to me." "It's not for me." "It's my friends, two of them." "It was a terrible accident." "Look, as you can see, we have no shortage of customers here." "If your friends are hurt, bring them in, and we'll eventually see them." "Would you help us, please?" "It's my brother." "I'm afraid he'll die unless you send help." "All right, all right." "Come on, let's go, Lisa." "Thank you." "Let's see what we've got." "Okay." "Mild shock." "Start a compression." "Get him to number five." "Okay, get him to ICU, stat." "Call the neuros." "Excuse me, people, out of the way." "Clear, clear!" "Let's go!" "More controversy today from the independent folks who live in Santa Monica." "This morning, California President, Charlton Heston, stuck out his political neck, when he said that the citizens there do not have to carry firearms if they do not want to." "In a speech to the Santa Cruz Bazooka Club, the President said..." "Hi." "I'm afraid I have some good news and some bad news." "The good news is Mr. Brown suffered only a mild concussion, some bruises, but he should be okay." "Your brother's in more serious condition." "There was some hemorrhaging in the skull." "If we can't stop it, or relieve the pressure..." "We'll do the very best that we can." "Am I in heaven?" "No, you are in Van Nuys." "You were in an accident." "You were out for a while, but you're going to be just fine." "You're my doctor?" "For the time being." "My name is Grace, Grace Venable." "Well, Dr. Venable," "I'm sure you'll take good care of me." "Mmm-hmm." "Oh." "Hey, guys." "Take it easy." "Guess I'm still a little dizzy." "What hit us?" "A wagon." "It came out of nowhere." "Wagon?" "Yeah, but we were in a plane." "You're mixed up, Remmy." "We haven't been in a plane since the war." "He's a little mixed up." "Quinn is in very serious condition, Rem." "He's in ICU and we have to go to New York in three days." "You got that?" "And if Quinn isn't better by then, we may have to leave him." "It should be no problem for you to make your trip on time." "We'd like to keep him under observation tonight." "But I think he'll be out of here in the morning." "Good." "We're in the usual place." "See you in the morning?" "Quinn?" "I don't know if you can hear me, but if you can," "just know that we're here." "We're not gonna leave without you." "It's going to be okay." "It's going to be all right." "The war's been over for three years." "California seceded from the union to become a neutral independent nation." "International banks are everywhere." "Secret number accounts." "That sort of thing." "You told me the Kromaggs destroy every world they take." "What happened here?" "Apparently this was a supply raid." "They plundered all the natural resources." "Coal, oil, precious metals." "Most of Europe and Asia is just a vast wasteland." "I saw a picture of Montana in the hospital." "It looks like a huge pit mine." "So, no oil, no gas-powered cars." "That explains the horses." "But why does everyone have a gun?" "Self-protection." "The border is under siege." "Refugees from the war." "Technically, all citizens are members of the militia." "So, you show me your gun and I'll show you mine." "I left it in the room." "Didn't figure on a fire fight over margaritas." "Forgive the intrusion." "Hackett, Ralph." "Beckett, Maggie." "Mallory, Colin." "Hi." "You just passing through?" "Actually, yes." "A couple of our friends are in the hospital, so when they get better, we'll be heading on." "I'm sorry to hear it." "Both about the hospital and you moving on." "Are your friends in serious condition?" "Not really." "Well, one is." "My brother." "He could die." "Well, I'm just passing through myself, but I know quite a few doctors in the area." "It's kind of my line of work." "Referrals, that sort of thing." "So if there is anything that I can do..." "Thank you." "I'm in 715." "Appreciate it." "Say, I have nothing on this evening, and the two of you look a little the worse for wear." "Why don't I treat you for dinner?" "Take your mind off your friends." "Thank you." "Not tonight." "As you say, worse for the wear." "We're just gonna turn in." "Another time, perhaps." "Maybe." "I live in hope." "Cardio tech, four northwest." "Cardio tech, four northwest." "Good morning." "Good morning, Doc." "You're looking better." "Well, a good night's sleep, and I'm a new man." "Well, this is looking better today, too." "All your vitals are back to normal." "You know, a lot of doctoring is pretty simple really." "You make sure the patient is breathing, has a pulse." "Two of what he's supposed to have two of." "Ten of what he's supposed to have 10 of." "Hmm." "You have nice hands." "Thank you." "You must have a pretty hard head." "Those who know me best all say so." "I think we can get rid of this." "How does that feel?" "Mmm, a little stiff." "I think you can check out whenever you want." "Thanks." "So how's Quinn this morning?" "No improvement." "Oh, he'll make it." "If anything, his head is harder than mine." "Tell me again about the accident." "Well, I don't remember much." "You know, it's just that some of Quinn's injuries are just not consistent with what you and your friends told me." "Really?" "Mmm-hmm." "All I remember is a wagon going out of control, wooden boxes flying everywhere." "Was there a fire?" "I don't remember." "You talked of being in a plane." "Yeah, well, like Maggie said," "I'm a bit mixed up, thinking about the war." "Hmm." "You fought the Kromaggs?" "Yeah." "Yeah, I did." "Good." "And it looks like you survived it pretty well, too." "Well, there were times when I didn't think I would." "It changed my life." "Yes, it changed a lot of lives." "Excuse me." "Hello." "Hey, Maggie." "Yeah, yeah, come on up." "Doc says I'm free to go." "Doc, I was thinking." "Why don't you call me Grace?" "Grace, yeah." "Yeah, that's what I was thinking." "How about dinner tonight, you and me?" "That's very nice of you." "But like I said before," "I've got a lot of patients." "Yeah, but you also said that you would fit me in." "I'm gonna be leaving in a couple of days." "I have plans." "It's just that I feel that I owe you." "Plans can change." "My hotel room?" "My apartment." "I can cook." "Well, you don't have to." "Restaurants are a bad risk ever since the war." "You can cook?" "You better get dressed." "Why do women always tell me that?" "What are we gonna do?" "You know what Quinn would say." "He'd say, "We do the usual." ""We pull off a miracle. "" "And just a couple of days before the slide." "Doctor said it could be weeks, if he makes it at all." "Can we take him with us?" "He's hooked up to all that life-support equipment." "We can't take it with us, and without it, he dies." "Dies." "You know, the professor died, we lost Wade, we've seen a lot of other good people go under." "And I almost lost Quinn a couple of times, but he always seemed to make it." "And if he dies, what happens to us?" "Do we keep sliding?" "Do we stay here?" "Well, I don't care much for staying in an armed and dangerous world." "Do we keep trying to find my home world?" "Okay, enough." "We're going to make sure he doesn't die." "We're going to get him better help." "From what I'm able to pick up, the country's whole medical establishment is overloaded." "You got refugees crossing the border." "You got rich people flying in, buying their way in." "Colin and I met a man in the bar." "He said he was in the medical referral business." "He asked us to dinner." "Well, maybe he can help us find a better hospital or better doctors." "Look, I'm having dinner tonight with Grace, and..." "Dr. Venable." "I'll talk with her and see if she can do better for us." "All right, Colin." "I think you should go to the library and see what you can find out." "Everything about the war and the way things are now." "You know, medical facilities, research, alternative treatments." "Maybe there's something in Mexico or Canada." "Yeah." "Yeah, okay." "One night in the hospital, and now it's dinner with Grace, huh?" "She likes my hard head." "We've always depended on Quinn to get us out of trouble." "Now it's up to us." "We have to come through for him." "Right." "Yes, we'll make it, one way or another." "MI5 is letting us borrow one of their planes out of Vancouver." "It'll be at Agua Dulce airport tomorrow morning." "Leaves us with a very narrow window to complete our investigation." "I'll be pressing my new friends for the final piece of evidence, and then at long last, we can make our move." "I know we're supposed to bring the subject back for trial." "But this has been a hard target mission from the very beginning." "It takes what it takes." "You didn't have to go to all this trouble." "It's no trouble." "Yeah, this is gonna be nice." "But you know what?" "We could've gone to a restaurant." "I told you, ever since the war, you're asking for ptomaine." "Ah." "Mmm-hmm." "For example..." "Thank you." "There's a perfectly horrible little JapaneselMexican deli just down the block." "JapaneselMexican?" "Yes." "It's called Miguel-San." "They sell sea urchin tacos, tempura with green salsa." "Oh, and this impossible little thing called a Tokyo Roll with crab, avocado, cucumber, in a flour tortilla." "Tempura taco." "This way." "Hey." "Hi." "Unless you'd rather sit at the fajita bar." "Oh, no, this is fine." "Thank you." "You like it hot?" "You better like it hot with this one." "That's for you and you." "So, sake or tequila?" "Or something soft?" "Something soft." "All right." "Me, too." "Thank you." "Agave tea for two, please." "Thank you." "A lot of these cross-cultural places have sprung up since the war." "Well, it's fascinating." "So what did you do during the war?" "Oh, I tried to stay clear of it, to tell you the truth." "I don't even have a gun." "My business is investments, really." "International arbitrage, currency speculation, that line of country." "I thought you were in medical referrals." "Yeah, well, that's part of it." "Hospitals are a very good investment in times of war." "I was hoping you might have some ideas about how I could get better help for my friend." "I mean, that hospital seems so overloaded." "Yeah, most of them are." "But like I said before, I have some good connections up north." "Private clinics, very best doctors." "I'd really appreciate it." "They're very expensive, I'm afraid." "I'd do whatever it takes." "He must be a very good friend." "The best." "All right, so, tell me your war story." "I take it you weren't neutral." "Oh, I don't understand how anybody could be neutral with the Kromaggs." "You were in the service then?" "Yes." "After California seceded," "I stayed with the Marine Corps and flew fighters off a carrier." "UN Expeditionary Force." "Yeah." "North Baltic push." "I had a little taste of that." "Uh-huh." "I had some friends involved." "Special operatives, undercover, sabotage, partisan fighting, that..." "That line of country." "Quite, yeah." "All right." "Death to the Maggs." "And to those who give them comfort." "Straight out of heaven" "You are an angel" "Better to me than life itself" "And into my mind" "You came" "Giving me hope" "Sweeping the cobwebs of sadness away from my door" "Shut steel" "Closed by the pain of a broken heart" "I went to heaven and stole an angel" "So I could have you" "For myself" "Straight out of heaven" "You are an angel" "Better to me than life itself" "That was great." "Yeah." "It's not finished." "I'm still working on it." "I mean, you haven't made any records, been on television..." "I know I must've seen you on something." "No, I doubt it." "I had a group once, though." "We were pretty good." "Then we broke up, and I went solo, and that wasn't so good." "I guess you could say I got a little sidetracked." "The war sidetracked a lot of us." "Tell me what happened to you." "Like fighting monsters with pop guns." "I mean, the Manta ships..." "I saw high-explosive, anti-tank shells just bounce right off those things." "And I was taken in a raid not too far from here." "I heard terrible things about those camps." "Yeah, I don't like to think about it." "You know, I feel like I have known you for a very long time." "What, you're tired of me already?" "Hmm." "I've got the referrals you need in my Filofax." "Won't be a moment." "Okay." "Why don't you pour us some brandy?" "Sure." "Since the war, it's tough to get good cognac, but I have my sources." "British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, signed a non-aggression pact with the Kromagg Dynasty." "In return for rights to the North Sea oil fields, the Kromaggs agreed not to invade Great Britain." "The Prime Minister and the Kromagg Foreign Minister, Kamvax, celebrated the agreement at an embassy party." "Well, must be in the other room." "Can't be too careful who you give information to these days." "Even about something as innocuous as medical services." "Plenty of Thatchers around." "After the North Sea oil giveaway, humans who collaborated with the Kromagg invaders were called Thatchers." "After the war, many Thatchers went into hiding in the nation of California." "Listen, I haven't told you the whole truth about myself." "My friends and I, we're not just passing through." "We've got this device." "Now, I'm not sure if I understand it." "The guy who does, the one who invented it, he's in a coma in your hospital." "Maggie, Colin and I, we're not going to New York in two days." "We're going to another world." "You mean to tell me you're sliders?" "Of course." "Of course." "Kromaggs have sliding technology." "You know all about it." "I know a little bit about it." "But I had no idea till now that humans had actually ever done it." "Sometimes I wish we hadn't." "I mean, some of the worlds we go to, they're a lot like home." "Sometimes they're completely different." "Sometimes they look the same until you look closely and you find that one little thing, something that you never thought to be important at all, can change everything." "Like meeting someone special?" "Yeah." "Yeah." "We've been sliding from one world to the next." "The Kromaggs, they destroyed my world." "We're trying to find my friends' home world." "At least that's what I think we're trying to do." "There's so many worlds, I've kind of lost track of what we're doing or why." "It's hard to imagine." "You know something, Grace, I'm not a scientist." "That's Quinn's department." "But I have been paying attention." "No matter what world we go to, heaven's always the same." "Big Dipper, Orion, North Star." "And nature, it's always working the same way." "It's got gravity, light and motion." "Two and two always turn out to be four." "I've thought about it a lot." "What do you think it means?" "I think it means that the same God is in all these worlds." "You know, I must say that it hasn't been easy for me of late." "You know?" "I don't know why I continue to slide, but one thing I must say is that I've made up my mind about something, and you helped me to do that." "What?" "My friend Quinn, he's always been there for me, and I want to be there for him." "So when the time comes for the next slide, if he's not well enough to go," "I'm gonna stay here with him." "I helped you decide that?" "How?" "By being here, too." "The Kromaggs made use of human doctors when their own medical service could not handle some of the native microbes." "Dr. Helen Donovan was a notorious Thatcher doctor at the Magg Evacuation Center in Belgium." "British Special Service has inserted teams into California to seek out and arrest fugitive Thatchers." "Sorry." "Name and address of a neurosurgeon in San Rafael and an advanced research clinic in Palo Alto." "Been doing some very interesting work with..." "Why are there pictures of me in that desk?" "Why did you look in that desk?" "Certain things about you just didn't add up." "So I decided to do a little snooping." "Well, for what it's worth, those pictures aren't of you and your friends." "You just happen to be in them." "I'm with British Special Service Branch." "Okay." "But you also have a Danish passport, and a German one and God knows what else is in there." "Well, this one's real." "I'm telling you the truth." "And I'm asking you for your help." "The woman in this picture, Dr. Venable, was a collaborator during the Kromagg War." "Oh, my God." "Maybe I can go with you." "What?" "On your next slide." "Maybe instead of staying here," "I can go with you to another world." "Well, why would you want to do that?" "I mean, most of the time it's no fun." "I mean, it's a day here, a week there." "No place to call home, no friends that you could keep." "I mean, it's endless." "It's that way for me here." "I mean, there's gotta be a better world someplace." "A place that we can live the rest of our lives in peace." "Well, I can't leave Quinn." "There may be a way he can go." "You shared your secrets with me." "Secrets of where you came from, where you go." "Well, I'm going to tell you something I have never told another living soul." "It was a method I learned during the war." "It's a mental imaging process, a healing process." "Now, I've never used it on humans before, but I think it could help your friend." "Well, then you have to do it." "And then you can come with us." "I've been tracking this woman for the past two years, and she's been very clever." "She covered her tracks pretty well." "And with expert help, forged a new identity here and wiped out all traces of her past." "What did she do?" "She gave aid and comfort to a terrible enemy." "You don't have to tell me about the Kromaggs." "But they must have forced her." "They have very sophisticated mind-control techniques." "We have information that Dr. Venable, as she calls herself now, was very willing to help them." "She organized hospitals in evacuation centers." "She was known as the personal physician to the Kromagg High Commander in the European theater." "And she may perhaps have been more than that to him." "What do you want me to do?" "If you can help me make positive identification," "I can make an arrest and take her back to Britain to face trial." "I have a plane waiting at Agua Dulce airstrip." "A plane?" "Where did you get the fuel?" "There are limited supplies for government use only." "And bringing in Thatchers is a priority." "In this picture, Dr. Venable is handing something to your friend Rembrandt." "Medicine." "A prescription for pain killers." "Well, there are bound to be fingerprints on the bag or on the bottles inside." "But he's with her right now." "I promise you he won't be hurt." "No." "No?" "If your friend Rembrandt knew what you know now, what would he do?" "Mmm!" "So, tell me about the strangest world you have ever been to." "Well, now, what's your pleasure?" "I've been with dinosaurs, zombies, androids, dragons, wizards." "One particular world we went to, the icecaps had melted, and everyone had a boat." "Another world, I was a famous opera singer." "Really?" "Yeah, but not really me." "You see, on some worlds, there are exact duplicates of ourselves." "And on that particular world, that Rembrandt Brown was a big star." "Although there are some of us who feel that this Rembrandt Brown is a big star." "Oh, you can count me one of them." "So, there are more mes out there on these worlds, huh?" "Mmm-hmm." "You might meet some." "What a frightening thought." "Remmy!" "Oh, my God!" "No, leave me alone!" "Stop it!" "Leave me alone!" "I shouldn't have given them anything." "You did what you thought was right." "When Remmy didn't come back here, I should've known." "Things with them have gone way too far." "And I betrayed him." "If she did what they say she did, she deserves punishment." "Are things really that simple on the world you came from?" "We knew right from wrong." "Maggie!" "Oh, good, you're both here." "They've taken Grace." "Some goons in ski masks." "They just busted in and took her." "But it's easy to get guns on this world." "They don't even ask for ID." "Remmy, stop." "What are you talking about?" "Didn't you hear what I said?" "They took her." "I know they did." "You know?" "I helped them do it." "Why on this Earth would you do that, Maggie?" "Those two men that took her, they were British Special Services." "They were taking her to stand trial." "Trial for what?" "She collaborated with the Kromaggs during the war." "That's a freaking lie." "It's true." "Hackett, the man I had dinner with, he's a British soldier." "And he's been tracking Grace for two years." "Rem, she worked for the Kromaggs." "For the European High Commander." "I told her all about us." "All about us?" "Yeah." "The slide." "The different worlds." "Everything." "She said she wanted to come along." "Now I know why." "Where did they take her?" "You gotta tell me." "We've gotta get to her before it's too late." "Remmy, it's no good." "Don't you see?" "No, there's something that you don't see." "She said that she knows something about some healing technique." "Something she must have picked up from the Kromaggs." "Look, it's the only way to save Quinn's life." "Whoa." "Come on, guys." "Put them down." "We don't need to hurt anybody." "We didn't intend on stopping the arrest, we just wanted to delay it." "She may be able to save our friend's life." "Let's go." "I have nothing else to do here." "Yes, you do." "I don't know what you did in the war." "I don't care about that now." "What I care about is my friend." "Now, last night you said you could help him." "Well, like all great love stories, that was last night." "Look, if they let me do this for you, what are you going to do for me?" "You're a doctor." "A healer." "If you do this, you do it for you, not for me." "You gave us a scare." "Whoa." "Hi, guys." "All right." "I guess I overslept." "Kromagg mind-control healing." "I'd heard of it, but I'd never seen it before." "I never knew they taught it to humans." "Impressed?" "Doesn't change a thing." "I'll give you a minute to say goodbye." "Maintenance to the front desk." "Maintenance to the front desk." "Where's Quinn?" "He's getting dressed." "Is he gonna be okay?" "A little shaky." "But, yeah, he'll be fine." "I don't know how to thank you." "Take me with you." "I know a back way out of the hospital." "Tell me that they tortured you." "Tell me that they killed your family." "Tell me that you had no choice but to help them." "I can't." "I can't." "We've gotta go." "I'll tell the court what she did." "It could help her." "Come on." "So what'd I miss while I was napping?" "Let's get outside." "We've got four minutes till we slide." "It's a long story, and it doesn't have a happy ending."