ratcatchers | Introduction to a Dingo

"Crikey, Maddie, they sent something back!"

She grimaced at his phrasing, cursing the day they took that course at the Irwin Centre. She continued to write on her PDA Notepad, her letters instantly translated into text.

"So what's it say, Link?" she replied wearily without looking up. The letter landed on the pad in front of her, followed by the squeak of protest from her dorm-room bunk.

"I 'aven't opened it yet, Maddie, I'm too wired. You do it."

She sighed an looked at the D'Ange Institute letterhead, addressed to one Dingo Roth care of the University of Adelaide. She opened it with a penknife and extracted the off-white sheet.

"Hmmm..... 'ave the pleasure of offering you full funding...."

"Yes!" came the scream from behind her, the bed screaming once more as he bounced on it.

"Careful! I don't want to have to explain why that got broken again."

"They're going to fund my work! No more dicking around with mice!" He grabbed the paper from her. "... in line with our current interest in the effects of T-field energy on genetic mutation.... choice of location.... Maddie, this is it! It's even signed by the top cheese herself." A furry hand shoved the paper back in front of her. "See, right 'ere!"

"Yes, right under the line that says Sincerely and above her name, just where everyone else signs it." She turned to look at him and failed to keep the smile from her face. It was hard to be cynical in the face of such blind optimism. "So where're they going to send you?"

"Here," he dropped his own PDA Notepad onto the desk and tapped the screen a few times. "Remember that paper I did on T-field pockets for Gingham's class? I was also looking for isolated places with T-filed spikes."

She looked at the world map on the screen, sparsely criss-crossed with red lines. "And you found... three? No four, there's one over there."

"Yep, but of those places, I wanted a small island with an indigenous mammalian population, and proximity to some form of civilization."

"Why?"

"Because I don't plan on being stuck in the middle of nowhere without some chance of having fun. Of those places, the best fit was this place over 'ere in the East Atlantic."

"Pico Island" she read as she tapped the spot. Details of the island, drawn from the Internet, expanded onto the screen. "But, isn't that a volcano?"

"Been dormant for a hundred years. Besides, there's a small D'Ange Institute research facility there. It's perfect! and a short hop to Europe."

"Where you can be butchered in a hundred creative ways by the arse-headed fey that live there," she reminded him. "Hello! Teifling? Doesn't mean much here in the civilized world but those morons are still living in the Dark Ages."

"I tape me ears back and I'll blend right in." He grinned broadly, eternally hopeful as always. Some days she just wanted to slap some sense into him. A smile and letting insults roll off like water doesn't always make things right. She had learned her own lessons among the human population in New Zealand, who were ready to test whether witches like her burned or floated. Academia made a great place for freaks like them to hide, especially in a country like Australia that welcomes them with open arms.

"Promise me you'll keep a low profile. Those people are nutters up over there."

"Don't worry, Maddie," he said as he leaned back on the dorm room bed. "I've got it all worked out. The place is out-of-the way, but has all these nature walkabouts and stuff. Full wireless coverage in all the cities, the outback's only a short drive away, and all big storms are in the West Atlantic so no typhoons like we'd get here. Besides, when am I going to get another all-expenses paid trip to the other side of the world? Two years of data collection. I'll be in and out in no time. I promise, it'll be a piece of cake!"

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The wind continue to howl as Dingo stared out through the cracked window.

"You will come away from there or place smell of hairy dog," came the voice from behind him. He turned toward the sound. The man, grizzled and wearing a Greek fisherman's hat, was smoking a cigar and playing some one-man card game.

"I thought you didn't get typhoons here?"

"Hurricane," came the response in a heavy Portuguese accent. "We call them hurricane here. Have not seen one here since little boy. Come, supper get cold." He indicated the plate at on the table beside him.

Dingo turned back to the storm and winced as he activated his magic sight, his eyes glowing bright momentarily to match the fading throb of the headache that accompanied many of his "spells". He looked out on the storm, not expecting to see anything different, but board from spending all day trapped in the lab with Dr. Kelopolis. He may be the world's expert on T-field mutations, but his choice of cigars left much to be desired. He was just about to return to the table when a drift of smoke caught his eye.

"Doctor, do hurricanes have magic fields?"

"No, why?" Doctor Kelopolis strode to the door and looked out with his own mage sight. Almost hidden among the easterly winds, magically glowing clouds drifted by moving west. "Look like T-field interacting with storm surge. Not seen that since,..." He trailed off and moved quickly to the workstation, followed by Dingo. He brought up a map of the compound and tapped small red symbols, each expanding into a squiggly graph. He drew his finger over part of one and it expanded to show a squiggly line moving upward.

"T-field increasing, has been for... since before storm began. Was small, so not see before. Not big, but keep going and will be. Soon." He sat back and stroked his beard. "What cause?"

The silence descended on them suddenly.

"Eye of storm. More to come," spoke the Doctor, engrossed in the moving lines on the screen. A shriek of metal broke his concentration. He turned to see Dingo pulling open the door.

"I need to check on the pens before this starts again. The kids are scared silly out there."

Outside, the place was a disaster area. Pens were overturned despite being tied down. Trees uprooted, one across the back of their hummer. Above, the sky cleared partially, but the island was ringed by an angry circle of cloud.

"How long you think we've got?" asked Dingo.

"Ten, fifteen minute. Hard say, but not much time. I check sensors." He strode off to one of the metal poles and examined the top while Dingo dropped into communion with the rabbits that remained in the damaged pen, his eyes glowing briefly as the link was established. Suddenly, he turned back to the Doctor.

"They're terrified, but it's not the storm. Something's.... coming? Big. From there....." He looked to the volcano, his jaw dropped. The sky was curling inward on itself, like a ball dropped onto a rubber sheet, but the sheet was the sky and it was bending upward, away from the top of the volcano. He stood, staggered, and stood again. Doctor Kelopolis looked at him, puzzled, then turned to the mountain and dropped the cover of the sensor.

"Mary, mãe do deus!" the Doctor whispered. A faint roar could be heard as the clouds billowed forward from all directions. Lightning crackled and broke where the clouds met the hole in the sky. Winds howled around the island's periphery, but only a strong breeze reached them. The blackness within the hole expanded and a form began to descend.

"A wormhole," spoke Dingo quietly. "That's what it is, a conduit to another world." The Doctor exclaimed in pain, drawing Dingo's attention. Kelopolis was rubbing his eyes, blinking rapidly.

"Do not look in mage sight. Like atom bomb in eyes."

They both turned back to watch the unfolding spectacle in normal sight. What appeared to be a mountain was descending through the conduit; then another. Shortly, a third became visible at the edge of the blackness.

"Aliens. They've found a way to tame a wormhole," muttered Dingo as he moved to stand beside the Doctor. Suddenly a brilliant light lit up the mountaintop, a rolling cloud of fire billowing outward into a cloud of smoke. The storm clouds roared as the drove forward once again, this time shrinking the black eye to a fraction of its former size. All around them, the winds picked up suddenly. Rain descended on them in torrents, blurring their vision. One of the flying mountains, passed over them, blotting out the sun momentarily. They ducked reflexively, but when the looked up into the sheets of rain once again, none of the ships could be seen. Only the eye remained, a black spot surrounded by an angry, rotating ring of clouds.

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And 27 years later, the eye remained, imprisoned by the storm.