The Dimension Wanderer *HIATUS*

Chapter Eleven ~gunpoint~

Finding Hazen was no easy task. Kellan and Sierra barely knew anything about the German ginger, other than that he was German and ginger. They had compiled a list at Kellan's  suggestion of what they did know, and the list was depressingly lacking. It was not, however, entirely fruitless, as Kellan learned that the way Sierra tucked her hair behind her ear may have been quite flattering on her, but the incessant, thoughtful smacking of her lips was decidedly not. How this information would help them find Hazen was a puzzle that Kellan could not solve.

The first item on the list was "red hair," of course. The second was a bit lengthy: "says he's from Germany, has accent, but doesn't speak(or very much look) German." The third was "tall." Sierra had at first said "taller than you," but Kellan had weakly demanded against placing that on the list. She had bitten her tongue, explaining that she didn't mean it to sound so offensive, only that Hazen was simply bigger, meaning broader, and maybe more muscular. She smiled a genuine sympathetic smile at him, saying it was alright, that it wasn't his fault, while Kellan, cheeks red and blustering profoundly, protested that he was in fact tall, and then, realizing just how ineffective his words were, set his jaw, capturing the rest of his argument in his throat with one last indignant glare at the ground. Sierra was unwittingly holding a gun to the (slim) chest of Kellan's masculinity and shooting it. Repeatedly. And after all, Kellan's dignity was firmly planted in his masculinity; without the other, neither could survive.

To spare what remained of Kellan's pride, Sierra suggested they continue the list, to which Kellan readily, though grumpily agreed. The fourth item on the list was "supposedly a creature." They really needed a better name.  The creatures weren't monsters or aliens. They had souls and morals and thoughts independent from animal instinct. Maybe Sierra could invent a better title. 

The fifth item was "inexperienced with most modern technology."  Hazen hadn't known what a phone was, or even a radio.  If it wasn't for his easy English speech and modern clothes, Kellan might have guessed that Hazen's world was stuck in the Middle Ages. Yet Kellan suspected that there was another reason for this: the "mindweb."  That was the final item of the list, the mysterious and pestering question of the mindweb.  Kellan was baffled as to how a mindweb actually worked. Having attempted to apply science to the concept several times, utilizing the instrument of a stick in the dirt and modeling the brain and nervous system with various rocks, leaves, and flower petals, Kellan had found no loophole or technicality that could permit the existence of mindwebs.  If they were the next evolutionary step of mankind, they were the most advanced step he had ever seen.  Besides, he had to doubt the theory of evolution now that he knew that the Garden of Eden was really fact and not fiction.  If  it was.

Nevertheless, Hazen possessed a mindweb- an alternative method of communication rendering phones and radios and other such devices unnecessary. It could directly link minds together- forget about your pathetic "Help! I can't get up!" buttons. Well, actually they weren't pathetic, they were a very useful invention that Kellan still was not able to convince his grandmother to purchase, but the point was that mindwebs eliminated the need for them.  In a world where communication could be accomplished with a thought, of course no one had invented a smart phone.  Why trouble to type something when you could think it instead with the same result?

Apparently, the mindwebs were natural.  "We're all born with one," Hazen had said. All Kellan needed to make the most important scientific discovery of the modern era was his dad's lab, one person with a mindweb, and a few weeks.  Just to think how much information a single blood sample could provide made Kellan's skin crawl in excitement. Maybe if he begged Hazen hard enough...  However, they had lost Hazen. The only person with a mindweb that they knew.

It was just Kellan's luck.

Oh boy.

No, they hadn't.