"I don't know what it means," I sighed as I slowly shook my head. "I don't like the timing though? The fact that it started blinking as soon as I finished updating Terri's inventory feels like more than a coincidence."

  Gwen looked like she was about to comment but I spoke up again first.

  "Maybe it's not specifically about Terri or her inventory," I crified, "But the bottom line is it started blinking after I finished the updates to all four of them. That LED didn't come on after any of the changes to the three of us. It didn't come on when we dealt with Ed either. But now at one in the morning it's blinking, right after we helped a handful of trans friends?"

  The elf girl nodded slowly, "It could be reted."

  "What about the documentation?" Chelsea asked. "You haven't seen anything in the manuals about the LEDs?"

  I shook my head, "Nothing yet. I've read a couple of the guides, but they only talk about the specific applications. Not the hardware. I've only read a few chapters of the giant 'handbook' but so far that hasn't even mentioned the ptop."

  "Do you want to look at that again now?" Gwen asked.

  "Yeah," I sighed again, then stifled another yawn.

  I ended up ying on the bed with the ptop, while my companions cuddled me on either side. I opened up the e-reader and loaded the handbook, then jumped to the index. Unfortunately there wasn't anything in there about status LEDs. There was a single reference to the word 'ptop', but that wasn't helpful either.

  It was in a chapter that seemed to be discussing SysAdmin tools in a very broad general sense, and all it had to say was that the tools should fit in with the Realm. The word ptop appeared in a list of examples based on the technical advancement of a given realm.

  Like papyrus scrolls or lead tablets at the lowest level, then parchment scrolls or hand-made books ter. Printed books came ter still, and finally electronic devices including ptops and tablet computers would be appropriate if a realm had that technology. Beyond that came roll-up or folding screens, then holographic tech, and finally neural impnts. Or if a realm had magic then the tools could be magic-based, like wands or amulets or things like that.

  "This isn't helpful at all," I sighed. "It's just generic stuff, the handbook doesn't cover anything specific."

  Chelsea cuddled up a little closer as she suggested, "Maybe you should leave it till morning then? It's te and we all have csses tomorrow."

  "I feel like this might be important," I frowned. "Why don't you two get some sleep? I'll go sit at my desk, and I'll keep quiet so I don't bother you."

  After a second or two Chels nodded, "Ok Lisa. Don't stay up all night though."

  "Wake us if you find something," Gwen added.

  I nodded, then gave them both a kiss before I extricated myself from their arms. Then as I moved back to my desk with the ptop the two of them shifted closer so they could cuddle with each other. I set the ptop into its docking station and got comfortable in my gaming chair, then found myself staring at it again as I tried to figure out what I was missing. I knew I had to be overlooking something.

  After a minute or two I had another look at that curriculum file. I'd already read the three editor guides it recommended, and part of the handbook. Then I noticed the st thing it mentioned, about that connections app. It was written almost like an afterthought, saying the connections thing 'might come in handy' rather than outright telling me to look at it. I didn't have any other ideas though, so I went back to the e-reader and opened the document in question.

  "Oh shit," I whispered to myself as soon as I read the first paragraph. "It's not a web browser, it's a messaging app!"

  I remembered Frank said he knew Annie had something on the ptop that could do emails or messaging, he even suggested I might find some instructions for me in there. Or maybe I could use it to get in touch with her. Either way it seemed like my best bet to finally find some answers, so I quit the reader and unched the Connections app instead.

  Like everything else in the work directory the first thing it did was ask me to authenticate with a fingerprint. Then as soon as I'd done that I got another alert. This one read, "You have 1 pending chat session. Accept? Y/N"

  My eyes widened and I gulped, but went ahead and tapped the Y key.

  The screen immediately went bnk, and that LED suddenly stopped blinking. For a second or two it seemed like nothing was happening, then the yellow LED flickered briefly and two words appeared in the top left corner of the screen.

  "Hello Lisa."

  "Oh shit," I mumbled to myself as my heart rate jumped.

  I continued staring at that for another second or two, then finally reached out and typed a reply. I already had a pretty good guess who I was chatting with, but I figured I should still ask just to be sure. "Who is this?"

  The yellow LED flickered again when I hit the enter key, and it did it a third time as a new line appeared beneath my own.

  "You can call me Annie."

  By that point I knew the yellow LED was obviously reted to communications. Blinking meant incoming traffic, and it flickered when data was sent or received. So at least that was one mystery solved. I had about a hundred other questions, but before I could start typing another line appeared on the screen. And that one was quickly followed by a couple more.

  "I know you have a lot of questions, and I'll try and answer the top ones right now."

  "Then I have some crucial information for you."

  "So I need you to pay attention."

  I frowned at the screen but typed a short reply, "Ok?"

  There was a pause before a lot more text appeared, and it seemed like Annie already knew the main questions I wanted to ask her.

  "I chose you because you reminded me of myself when I was your age. And yes, this is more or less how I got the job before you. My original Realm was simir to your world, but a little further along in terms of technology. Yes, you can travel between Realms. And you have to make your first move now."

  As soon as I saw all that I had even more questions, especially about the very st part. It seemed ominous, and maybe a little scary.

  "What do you mean?" I typed out. "Are you saying I have to travel to another world? And why do I need to do it now?"

  Then I added, "I'm not going anywhere without Gwyneth and Chelsea."

  Annie's response appeared a second ter, "I know Lisa, and don't worry. I wouldn't dream of trying to separate you from your girlfriends, of course they can accompany you."

  I found myself staring at one word for a couple seconds. Girlfriends. I'd been subconsciously avoiding that, like I was almost afraid of it. Afraid of making the assumption, afraid of getting it wrong and alienating either Gwen or Chels. I thought of them as friends, partners, companions, even lovers, but I'd been dancing around the 'G' word. So it was maybe a little jarring to have a complete stranger drop it so casually like that.

  Another block of text appeared on the screen while I was still processing the girlfriend stuff, and it took me a second or two before I was ready to read it.

  "I owe you an apology Lisa," it began, "I should have been a lot more direct and up front with you, rather than pying around and making a game out of it. I knew you'd figure things out quickly, but I didn't expect you to start rewriting strangers' character sheets only four days in. Not your fault, I know you were only trying to help a few trans people. I know you want to help folks, you want to fix your realm so it's a nicer, better pce. I want the same thing, but unfortunately it's not that easy."

  The message went on, "You can't change the world overnight Lisa. It's a slow process, one I've been working on for a long time. You can help me, we can make things better if we work together. That's why I wanted you to have my ptop, I need your help to do this. Unfortunately the situation's changed, you've run out of time there. One of the people you just helped was a canary. As in, the canary in the coal mine? Never mind, the metaphor's not important. What matters is your Realm has initiated a diagnostic routine, and you need to get out before it reaches you."

  My eyes widened and I gulped as I quickly typed, "How long? And what happens if it reaches us?"

  "You need to be out of there before the sun rises at your current location," Annie wrote back.

  I gnced at the time on my phone then muttered a curse. It was almost two o'clock in the morning and this was the middle of June. So we only had about three and a half hours before dawn.

  Meanwhile another chunk of text appeared on the screen, "As for what happens if you're caught, the diagnostics will detect you as an unauthorized SysAdmin and fg you as a security breach. And it'll detect your girlfriends too since you've tagged them as critical to your mission. Once you've been fgged, you and your girlfriends will be purged."

  As soon as I saw that my gut lurched and my mouth went dry. I quickly typed out, "Where do we go? Can we ever come back? And what happens to the people we just helped? Will they be ok?"

  "Don't worry about the others, they'll be fine," Annie wrote back. "You and your girlfriends will be able to return after things have settled down again. I can't say how long that'll take though. In my experience it might be as fast as a few days, but could be as long as a couple months. As for where you can go, there's thousands of possibilities to choose from. I can make a suggestion though, since this is time-critical. So here's what you need to do:"

  She added a few more lines in quick succession.

  "1. Use the status editor on yourself. Find the 'alertness' slider and set it to 100%. Then find the 'sleepiness' slider and set it to 0%. That'll wake you up better than the strongest energy drink you've ever had."

  "2. Speed-read the Expeditions manual. You don't need to read it all, you'll know what the important parts are."

  "3. Use the status editor trick to wake up your girlfriends. Brief them as fast as you can. Then pack whatever you think you'll need, or whatever you want to bring. Remember you can get most mundane stuff when you get there. This ptop is the only thing you Must! Not! Lose! Keep it with you always!"

  "4. Use the Expeditions program to pick a Realm, open a door, and get the hell out of there."

  "If you don't know what Realm to pick, try this ID: 9A2D 81B9 7219 10AE 12E8. All three of you will blend in there. You can always pick another destination ter if you don't like it. The important thing is to get off Earth-742 as fast as you can."

  "I'm sorry to do this to you Lisa," the st line stated. "Like I said, it's my fault for putting you in this position. I'll try and make it up to you someday. For now, you've got 3 hours to get out of there. So start moving!"

  I started to type a reply but a 'Chat Session Ended' alert appeared just then.

  "Fuck!" I swore to myself, then scrambled to note down that Realm ID while it was still on the screen.

  My heart was racing and I had even more questions than I did before. With an actual life and death deadline looming though I didn't have time to be frustrated, there was barely enough time to be scared.

  It felt like adrenaline was already doing a good job of keeping me awake, but I followed Annie's instructions and used the Status Editor to adjust those two sliders. And sure enough she was right. I felt the weariness I'd been ignoring evaporate away, and it almost seemed like the world came into sharper focus.

  I gnced towards the bed where my partners were both asleep, and it crossed my mind to try and save time by waking them now. Except that would just give them more time to panic and possibly distract me, and I needed to find out how to use the other program first. So I stuck to the list and jumped into the documentation to read "Expedite Your Expeditions" as fast as I could.

  Fortunately that was one of the smaller manuals, and like Annie said I didn't need to read the whole thing cover to cover. I quickly got the gist of how it worked, read all the warnings and safety information, then left the rest for ter.

  From there I jumped to the Expeditions app, then typed that Realm ID into the appropriate field. An info screen popped up that provided an overview of where Annie was sending us, and after staring at it for a second or two I nodded to myself. She said we'd all blend in there, and she was right.

  Finally I went back into the status editor once again and used the sliders to wake up both Gwyneth and Chelsea.

  "Hey you two," I stated as they sat up wide awake and completely alert. "We have a serious problem. We have to get dressed, pack some stuff, and get out of here. And we have to do all that in the next two and a quarter hours."

  Gwen frowned, "What's wrong?"

  Chels sounded anxious as she added, "Please tell me it's not my dad! He's not back is he?"

  I was already out of my chair and heading for my walk-in closet. As I grabbed some clothes I responded, "It's not Ed. I'll expin everything ter, right now you two need to move! Up, clothes, pack, now!"

  "But where are we going?" my best friend asked as she climbed out of bed. "What sort of stuff should we pack?"

  I answered from the closet, "Gwen put on your Mage outfit and make sure you've got your staff. Bring any other mage-reted stuff too. Chelsea dress for hiking, pack for camping. Both of you bring a change of clothes, clean socks and underwear, a jacket."

  My heart was pounding again as I took a deep breath then added, "We're going on an adventure..."

  ~ End of Book One ~

  PurpleCatGirl