4338.211 · July 30, 2018 AD
Wine, Rain, and Interdimensional Getaway Cars
Fleeing police through a storm-soaked Tasmanian forest teaches you three things: sprained wrists hurt, shiraz bottles survive falls better than dignity, and getting splashed by passing utes whilst waiting for rescue defines rock bottom. Meanwhile, Beatrix discovers the most audacious use for Portal Keys yet—because when your sister needs extraction, why limit yourself to objects when you can drive entire vehicles between worlds?
Some escapes are dignified. Others involve mud, blood, forest debris, and the stubborn refusal to drop the bottle of shiraz you grabbed on your way out.
Gladys crashes into Myrtle Forest with police lights flashing behind her, nursing a sprained wrist whilst Karl and Sarah's voices echo through the rain. Five hundred metres east, then north off the trail toward the creek. Every step calculated. Every sound amplified. The forest offering sanctuary and labyrinth simultaneously.
By the time she reaches the road, she's bleeding, soaked, and officially a wanted criminal. The shiraz tastes like medicine and defiance. Then a ute drenches her in filthy water, and all she can do is call Beatrix and wait.
Beatrix, meanwhile, is testing theories about what can cross between worlds. Objects, certainly. People, obviously. But vehicles? At the abandoned Old Fenwick Place, she opens a Portal against weathered barn boards and drives a hire car through to Clivilius. Then back. Forward. Back again. The audacity settling in with each crossing.
When Gladys' panicked call comes through—"Please can you come and get me?"—Beatrix doesn't hesitate. She's already behind the wheel of an interdimensional getaway car, and every kilometre between them is closing fast.
