It Begins Anew

                            By:

                         Fox Cutter

12/25/95:

The loneliest time in the world is just before 4:00am on
Christmas day. It seems even the dead have better things to
do than walk around looking like zombies.

Mine was the only light in the house. I was up because I was
unable to sleep, which is normal for me, though I do need to
get back into the habit of sleeping at 1:00 am or so, as I'm
heading back to school on the 3rd.

So I sat, working at my computer, mIRC running in the
background, not a soul on except the bot. In the back ground
of my room played the new Meat Loaf tape "Welcome to The
Neighborhood".

It was one of my presents (we opened them about nineish, as
I would still be asleep when Mom and Tom left about one). I
got a few things, but they're not really important.

I was just sitting there, trying to wrap my mind around
graphics, and having very little luck, when there was a
flash out of the corner of my eye.

I looked back over my shoulder, over at the corner behind my
door. Nothing was there.

Looking back at my computer I hooked my index finger on my
collar, and rubbed the band with my thumb. I wasn't sure if
I had seen anything at all, and just assumed it was a glare
off my glasses.

A few minutes later I saw another flicker of color. I
turned, expecting... no, HOPING, that nothing was there.
Sadly, I was wrong.

In the corner of my room, right behind the door, was a hole
of swirling light. It was only a few inches wide, and glowed
faintly.

"Shit," I said as I watched the hole grow, the colors slowly
mixing into a stable bluish color. The hole stopped growing
when it was 7 feet tall, and 4 feet wide. It hovered a few
inches above the floor.

I stood from my chair, and moved towards it. "What the hell
is a portal doing here." I muttered to myself.

The portal flashed a bit, and the color started to darken, I
knew that, unless the portal had one HELL of a good
controller behind it, it was about to implosively pull me
in. "Not again." I muttered

Then as quickly as it started, the color change stopped. The
center of the hole rippled, and a small greenish ball popped
out. The second the ball hit the ground the portal closed in
on itself with a violent flash.

I grabbed a pen, and poked at the ball; nothing happened.
The surface of the ball was irregular, and had cracks in it.
I stuck the tip of my pen in one, and pulled down some.

A bit of the green stuff pulled away, to show some lines in
red. I blinked, then blinked again. The red was clearly
writing of some kind, though I wasn't sure what.

I picked up the ball and unfolded it. It turned out to be a
wadded up paper. I was aghast, "Who would use so much energy
to send a piece of junk through!"

The I had a bit of an idea. I laid the paper down, smoothed
it out a bit, and scribbled, "Keep your rejects in your own
universe! --Fox Cutter" and balled it back up.

I then closed my eyes and reached out. The location of the
portal was still hot, meaning I could easily open a portal
back to where the first one came from.

"Sloppy." I muttered, flipping a switch in my mind. When I
opened my eyes a small portal had formed where the other had
been.

I picked up the paper, and tossed it through, hopefully
giving whoever was on the other side a good shock. I then
closed the portal, covering my path, keeping the location
untraceable for the next two days.

After that was done, I lay down on my bed. "Well, that's
going to get me a visit by a Council member, but it was
worth it."

Laid out on my bed, I fell asleep, still dressed, with the
lights still on. It had been a good day.

-----

This story is (c) 1999 by Fox Cutter, hardcopy reprints
limited to one a person, all other rights reserved. This
story may not be distributed for a fee except by permission
of the author, and this copyright notice may not be removed.