At this point in his life, Derrick had jumped across universes more times than he could count. Still, the sudden appearance of sheep dotting the lush green countryside made his brain do some sort of mental spasm. For a long moment, he just stared. He eventually realized that Elaine was trying to pedal the tricycle. She glanced over at him with raised eyebrows.

  “Care to help?” she asked, smiling slightly. Derrick laughed, which felt nice. Especially considering they’d managed to escape from some sort of multiversal stalker. He started pedaling from his seat, and the strange cycle began to cruise down the road. It wasn’t long before Derrick recognized the area. He’d seen it on the screens while at The Switchboard.

  “It worked!” he exclaimed. “We’re on the road towards Eli’s house!” Elaine, surprisingly, let out a whoop of excitement and then laughed. Derrick thought they must make quite a sight, riding a strange tandem tricycle down the country road while shouting and laughing. Fortunately, there were only sheep to notice.

  That is, until they made the turn onto the unpaved drive that led to Eli’s actual house. That was when they remembered that the reason the others left his home in the first place was to avoid the IPF. In front of them were multiple large vehicles, and up ahead they could see that there were still a handful of IPF agents milling around. They quickly veered off the road, and rode the trike up to an old shed that appeared to be seconds from collapsing.

  “Do you think they saw us?” Elaine asked, peeking cautiously around the flimsy wall. Derrick slowly peered out around her, doing his best not to think about how close they were. Initially, it had seemed like there was a large IPF presence at the house. But now, with a more prolonged look, Derrick thought it looked like the agents were finishing up. Indeed, as they watched, a couple of male IPF agents climbed into one of the large vehicles, made a giant u-turn on the grass, and roared up the road. It happened fast enough that Derrick and Elaine barely had time to try and hide behind the shed.

  “I think they’re moving out,” Derrick whispered to Elaine. “Maybe we can get in the house once they leave?” Elaine looked worried, but she nodded her approval. So they leaned back against the shed wall, carefully choosing the spot that seemed least likely to cave in, and waited.

  Eventually, Derrick opened his eyes with a start. The sun was sinking behind the fields and he realized they’d fallen asleep. Elaine’s head was leaning against his arm, and she was sleeping with her mouth open. Derrick considered not moving, but he had to know if the IPF had left. He slowly twisted to peer around the edge of the shed. Sure enough, there were no vehicles in sight, though he could see warning signs that the agency had left up around the property. He felt Elaine shift next to him.

  “Did they leave?” she asked, somewhat groggy. He nodded at her.

  “Looks like it. Fortunately, they missed us while we were sleeping. Shall we?” He stood up, then reached down and helped Elaine to her feet. Deciding to approach on foot, they stashed the tricycle and then warily walked up the drive. Derrick realized he was almost tiptoeing, and forced himself to stop. He tried to reassure himself that the IPF wouldn’t booby trap the house of someone they were looking for.

  They reached the front door without incident. Elaine twisted the knob, and the door opened easily. She looked over at Derrick, and he shrugged, so she pushed it open fully and stepped inside. There were no lights on, so Derrick stepped over and flipped the switch in the entryway. Nothing jumped out at them, so they proceeded down the hallway to the kitchen. Everything was surprisingly picked up, besides a few dishes that the others had obviously left out in their hurry to leave.

  “I don’t think there’s going to be anything here,” Elaine said, turning to Derrick. “Anything that would’ve helped us was probably picked up by the IPF.” Derrick was afraid she was probably right. Unfortunately, they didn’t have anything else to go on. Cassia could’ve jumped anywhere. When you lost someone in the multiverse, it was extremely difficult to find them.

  A shout from Elaine, who had moved into the dining area, snapped him out of his depressing thoughts. He raced into the other room and found her staring at a device with a small screen on the dining room table. As Derrick reached the table, the device flickered and then the screen lit up, filled with the indigo face of Detective Tek K’Nani.

  “You are not Eli,” she stated flatly, though the musical quality of her voice was still evident. She frowned at them.

  “Where is he?” she asked, though it sounded more like a demand. Derrick looked at Elaine, who simply stared back at him with wide eyes. He leaned forward.

  “We’re not sure, Detective,” he answered. “We’re looking for him, or Cassia, ourselves.” The detective frowned again. There was a beeping noise from her end, and she glanced to her left, then cursed under her breath.

  “Look, I’ll ignore the fact that you apparently bypassed all the IPF warnings to avoid entering the house,” she said, her voice growing more firm. “Simply because you are now tangled up in something that is much bigger than you know.” The beeping noise repeated itself. The detective paused, then set her jaw and somehow seemed to loom even larger on the screen.

  “You need to get out of there. Let me find Cassia and Eli. It would be best for both of you to remove yourselves from this situation. Get out now and I can keep the IPF from coming after you.” There was silence for a moment, and Tek raised an eyebrow.

  “Um, I suppose we might be able to do that, Detective,” Derrick managed, looking at Elaine to see her nod. Tek stared at him through the screen for a moment, then gave a curt nod.

  “Good,” she said. “And if you meet anyone named Aventus, run as fast as you can in the other direction.” Elaine let out a strangled squeak, and the detective narrowed her eyes and leaned back in towards the camera.

  “I take it you have already met him?” she asked, and Derrick nodded in affirmation. Tek sighed and leaned back.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “Well, consider yourselves lucky to still be alive,” she said. “Where is he now?”

  Derrick opened his mouth to answer, but was cut off by the a small thump from the entryway. He recognized it from when they had entered earlier. It was the sound of the front door bumping against the small bench that Eli had placed near the door.

  “Detective,” he said, trying desperately to keep the tremble out of his voice. “I think he’s in this house.”

  Aventus crept along the entry hallway towards the kitchen. He’d heard voices in the house immediately upon entering, and as he ventured further in, he scowled. It was the same two who had eluded him before! How had they known that this was his next destination? He paused for a moment to reconsider his evaluation of the male and female. Initially, he’d thought them to be ordinary humans, accidentally caught up in the larger schemes of those more powerful than they. And yet, they had successfully slipped through his fingers twice, and were now potentially anticipating his next moves. Perhaps there was more to them than it first appeared. He resolved to only kill one, and continued his stealthy advance to the next room. The kitchen was empty, but he quickly determined they were in the dining area that was just off to the right.

  “...will be very loud, so get as far away after you toss it as possible.” Aventus thought he recognized that voice, but couldn’t place a name to it. He paused for a moment to evaluate his options, now that there was a third person in the mix, apparently standing closest to him. In the end, he decided to go with surprise and a hostage. He drew a long knife from a sheath on his belt and stepped into the dining area, ready to grab the owner of the third voice and put the knife to their throat. Immediately, he realized his mistake. The third person was just a voice, coming from a device that the man was currently holding. He saw the woman’s mouth open in a shout, and then the man was hurling the device towards him.

  His subconscious put the clues together, and Aventus launched himself backwards into the kitchen, twisting and covering his ears with both hands. He hit the ground hard, and then everything blew up.

  Derrick and Elaine sprinted with everything they had towards the shed that hid their tricycle jumper. The back of Derrick’s mind laughed maniacally at how they found themselves running for their lives towards a tricycle for the second time in less than twenty four hours, but the rest of his brain was simply focused on putting one foot in front of the other. That wasn’t true, he realized. A good portion of his brain was paying attention to Elaine and making sure she didn’t fall behind.

  As they slid around the shed to the jumper, they heard an impossibly loud roar of rage. Aventus had lived through the explosion, after all. Detective K’Nani had indicated that he probably would, but after seeing, and hearing, the explosion, Derrick was shocked someone could’ve lived through that. As it was, he was certain both him and Elaine would have bruises from being flung to the ground by the force of the blast.

  He risked peeking around the shed. Elaine grabbed his arm as he did, and he felt a surge of adrenaline. He would get her out of her safely if it cost him his life. Even as he thought it, he wondered what was happening to him. Did he even know this woman? Elaine made a small gasping noise, and Derrick yanked his focus back to the now burning house. A tall figure stepped out of the flames, then surveyed the now dark fields that surrounded the house. After a moment, Aventus gestured, and a large ship shimmered into view on the front lawn. He sat back against the shed.

  “I think he’s going to leave,” he whispered to Elaine. She looked relieved.

  “What do we do then?” she whispered back, and Derrick shrugged.

  “I guess we do what the detective said,” he answered. “We lay low somewhere. I don’t know how we can help, even if we want to.” Elaine seemed about to respond, but then she stared upwards in horror. Derrick turned to follow her gaze, though he knew what he would find.

  “Hello humans,” Aventus said in his growly voice, looming over them as they cowered against the shed. “You’ve made things difficult. I commend you on your efforts, but it ends now.” He drew his long knife in an impossibly fast move, and Derrick knew they would both die here in Eli Thorn’s field. Aventus raised the knife, and Derrick set himself to charge the man. Perhaps it would buy Elaine enough time to use the jumper.

  Suddenly, Aventus screamed. It was a terrible, guttural scream that seemed inhuman. In fact, Derrick thought it probably was inhuman. Aventus whirled around, trying to reach over his shoulder and Derrick saw some sort of animal attached to the man’s back. It looked like it had its teeth in Aventus’ neck. The man stumbled around trying to get the animal off. As he stepped slightly away from them, the light from the moon illuminated him.

  “Tango!” Elaine shouted. Aventus finally dislodge the pangolin, who fell to the ground in a tight ball, then unrolled and ran through Aventus’ legs. Snarling, the man took a swipe at Tango with the knife, but the hasty attempt glanced off the pangolin’s scales. Tango immediately turn and snapped at the inside of Aventus’ thigh. The man screamed again and contorted his body, knocking the pangolin to the ground.

  Derrick felt a yank on his arm and turned to see Elaine sitting on the tricycle.

  “Let’s go!” she hissed, and Derrick scrambled to jump into the second seat. She reached for the bicycle bell to jump, but Derrick grabbed her hand.

  “Wait!” he said. “It’s obvious Aventus can follow us wherever we jump. Let’s try and outrun him.” He started pedalling as he spoke. Behind them, Aventus was still dealing with Tango, who had continued his unexpected attack. Derrick and Elaine fled into the darkness. Derrick risked a glance back, and saw the tall man fling the pangolin from his shoulder once more, then sprint towards his ship.

  “Elaine, wait!” he called, stopping his pedaling. The tricycle ground to a halt, and they watched as Aventus stepped into his ship. A moment later, the ship shimmered and then disappeared. They waited for a couple more long minutes, but neither the man nor the ship reappeared.

  “He jumped,” Derrick said, hardly daring to believe it. Elaine slumped back in her seat in relief, but then movement in the darkness made them both alert.

  Slowly, Tango limped into view. His scales were bent or cracked all along his body, and he was heavily favoring his front left paw. There was a large gash near his right eye that had hit an unarmored part of his face.

  “Oh, Tango!” Elaine cried, jumping out and scooping up the animal. “You saved us!” Tango licked her face in a very dog-like way, and Derrick wondered for the umpteenth time about how strange of an animal it was. She looked over at Derrick as she sat back down with the pangolin on her lap.

  “Let’s go,” she said, starting to pedal. Derrick quickly joined her.

  “Where?” he replied. “I don’t think either of us has a home world to jump to.” Elaine smiled.

  “Just jump by feel, then,” she said. “We’ll get where we need to go.” Derrick thought that was probably untrue, but he kept his opinions to himself as he looked at how happy Elaine seemed to be. So, instead, he reached out and turned the bell. The ripping sensation happened immediately and their setting shifted. For a brief moment, he caught a glimpse of a bloodied Mel, and then they crashed directly into Aventus.