Page 28 of Shaped to Be Yours

“Yes, yes,” Zinnia said. “All you need is your badge.”

We returned to the fork of the first corridor and continued straight, which would have been right from the main entrance. While following Zinnia and Beck, I pressed a button on my scanner, and the screen flared to life with a series of various readings that updated with every step. They were each labelled in both English and the pictograph language of the kappas.

It was mostly expected things to scan for, like quarks and photons in relation to the quantum entanglement that made the portals possible. At the very top was for electromagnetic wave activity, which on the way to the portal room was all over the place. We were surrounded by various technology and fluorescent lights. Directly around the portal would be different.

Curiously, at the very bottom of the readout was a segment I assumed was for exotic matter, because all it said was UNKNOWN. That meant they could track that something within the quantum structure was having an impact, but they didn’t know exactly what each component was. Crazy that something worked without anyone fully knowing why. But it wasn’t uncommon. Ask any computer coder. Sometimes technology could be just as much luck as science.

I nearly ran into Zinnia and Beck’s backs as we reached the security door. I still wanted to watch the readings and kept one eye on the scanner as they punched in a code for the door and brought me into the room housing the official portal.

I’d never seen the one in Edgewind. I knew that portal had just as much security, including a guard inside to double check credentials before allowing anyone through. Monsters required a visa to go back and forth, but humans could technically visit the monster realm whenever they wanted–at their own peril.

There wasn’t anyone waiting in line to head there now.

“Um, if you speculate that the official portal is having an effect on the natural one, is there any danger continuing to use it?” I asked.

“Perhaps,” Beck said, “but because it is speculation, our request for temporary closure of the official portal was denied. We need proof, and thus we must study.”

Once the door to the portal room closed behind us, everything about the electromagnetic activity on my scanner stilled to a steady pulse. The room itself was huge. Like some giant hanger for a blimp, but the only thing the room housed was the portal itself, which looked sort of funny, just a normal-sized door in the middle of the room with a metal doorframe. I knew there was so much more to it from the materials in the floor, walls, and ceiling. The flow of electricity and particles beneath our feet and through every part of the surrounding structure, all funneled to that seemingly innocuous doorway.

Only the doorway itself wasn’t empty or black. It looked like a wormhole, in constant, hypnotic flux. It reminded me of pictures of the Milky Way Galaxy, with the shimmering colors of the Northern Lights, like a tiny closet of cosmic wonder.

“Is Ricky a poet?” Zinnia giggled.

Oh shoot. I’d said that last sentenceout loud. “I guess. When I’m inspired enough. It’s just so beautiful.”

“As is our home. Come.”

She and Beck led the way, but when we reached the portal, they stood on either side of it, motioning for me to go first.

I couldn’t resist looking at the scanner again. Now that I was so close to the portal, every reading was still and in perfect balance with each other, including the UNKNOWN matter, as if the chaos of the universe had been forced into order at this one spot.

Just like in the woods—which made a lot more sense now—the hairs on my arms stood on end, and I knew that if I’d unbound my hair right then, it would have looked like I’d touched an electrostatic generator.

I took another sip from my coffee, held tight to the scanner, and stepped on through.

I felt an extra jolt shoot through me and feared my legs might give out, but just when it seemed like too much or that it might become painful, it wasn’t. It all soothed away as I took another step… into an almost identical room. The only way I knew I was somewhere different was because the guard here was another kappa like Zinnia and Beck, not a human like in my realm.

It seemed like he’d been expecting us, and I moved toward him to give Zinnia and Beck room to enter behind me.

“Finish that while here,” he said, nodding at my coffee. “Nothing organic can go back with you.”

“Oh. Understood.” I took another zip. It tasted… better than I remembered. Like the shock I’d received had infused the coffee too. I checked the readings.

Just as stable as on the other side.

Once through, Zinnia and Beck led me through the base. It still didn’t feel like we were somewhere new, other than seeing even more monsters around. Not until we reached the main doors, and they each took one of them to open the way to the monster realm for me like I was being presented to a royal court.

Andholy shit. I felt like I’d just stepped into a video game.

I’d seen pictures while researching kappa culture, but standing before their, well, kingdom, was way more humbling than some sterile white building.

To my left was an entire civilization of people who lived in and out of water, so second-nature to their daily routines that their buildings were constructed around a series of waterways, waterfalls, and pools. If the Magic Kingdom had a waterpark literally created by fairies, maybe it would come close to how magical this place looked. Everything sparkled like crystal with reflections from the water, as people of varying color combinations like Zinnia and Beck walked the skyway streets,looked out of windows in tall towers, swam in the various pools and floated down waterways, and even dove off the top of a central waterfall that ended in a deeper pool in the center of the city.

To my right was just as wondrous, but the rivers and pools gave way to forest. It looked like something from the Feywild of Dungeons and Dragons, so beautiful, but twisted and colorful in a way that made everything look poisonous or possibly capable of causing hallucinations. I clearly saw some DO NOT ENTER signs blocking off that area, but there was a small path into the forest with green signs, saying STAY ON PATH.

And way,wayin the distance were mountains like some land made of ice, as well as an area of darkness I couldn’t see through.

It was beautiful and intimidating and so cool. Two things clanged in my head as I took it all in. One: I really wished Jason was here to see it with me. And two…

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