Lost In The Edit

Lost In The Edit

By Bonnie Gerstenlauer

The rain was a persistent drummer, beating a rhythm on the grimy asphalt of the alley. It was a rhythm Jack Malone knew well. It was the rhythm of secrets, of late-night deals gone wrong, of a city that never washed clean, no matter how hard the heavens wept. The neon sign from "The Blue Dahlia" bar flickered, casting a sickly pink glow on the wet brickwork and the unfortunate stiff lying at his feet. Classic case. A dame, a deal, a .38 caliber goodbye. Jack knelt, the brim of his fedora dripping, and was about to check the man’s pockets when the world went sideways.

It wasn’t a sound. It was a feeling. The air shimmered, tasting suddenly of ozone and… sugar plums? The grimy brick wall to his left dissolved into a cascade of shimmering, rainbow-hued light. From the impossible portal stepped a young woman.

She wasn't a dame. Dames were all sharp angles and sharper attitudes. This woman was a symphony of soft curves and pastel silk. Her gown, a confection of sky-blue and silver, seemed to repel the city's grime. A tiara of sparkling diamonds sat atop a cascade of golden curls, and her eyes were those of a marc who had never seen a back-alley deal. They were full of a bewildering, doe-like innocence. A small, blue bird with a disturbingly cheerful expression chirped on her shoulder.

"Oh, my!" she gasped, her voice like wind chimes. She curtsied, a gesture so out of place in this gutter that Jack almost laughed. "Pardon me, good sir, but this doesn't look like the Whispering Woods at all! Have you seen a talking white rabbit by any chance? He's dreadfully late for the Royal Ball."

Jack stared, his mind struggling to categorize her. She didn't fit. She was a splash of vibrant, impossible color in his monochrome world. "The only talking rabbits in this town are the ones you see after three shots of cheap whiskey, lady. And you're in the wrong part of the story for a ball."

The blue bird chirped again, a series of melodic notes.

"Pip says you seem very sad," the princess—she had to be a princess—translated earnestly. "Is it because of that poor man sleeping on the ground?"

Before Jack could formulate a response to the sheer absurdity of the situation, the world twisted again. The opposite wall of the alley didn't dissolve; it *glitched*. Bricks pixelated and reformed into a jagged hole of rusted, corrugated metal. A low hum vibrated through the ground, and a figure scrambled through the opening, landing in a low crouch.

This one was the polar opposite of the princess. She was dressed in patched-up tactical gear, her face smeared with grease and dirt. A pair of night-vision goggles were pushed up on her forehead, revealing short, jagged-cut black hair and eyes that were hard, cynical, and constantly scanning for threats. She held a strange-looking weapon, a contraption of scavenged parts and raw power.

"Sector 7 is compromised," she hissed, more to herself than to them. She clocked Jack, then the princess, her eyes narrowing. "Who are you? Resistance? Corp-Sec? And what are you wearing?" she barked at Elara. "You'll be spotted by a Scrapper-drone a klick away in that getup."

Princess Elara just blinked. "A 'klick'? Is that a type of cricket?"

The new arrival, Kira, looked at Jack. "Control this civilian. What's the sit-rep? Where's the extraction point?"

Jack pushed himself to his feet, pinching the bridge of his nose. The dead body was still on the pavement, completely ignored. The rain was still falling. But his case, his city, his entire genre had just been invaded. He was stuck in an alley with a fairy-tale princess and a soldier from a world of scrap metal and surveillance drones.

"There is no sit-rep," Jack said, his voice a low growl. "There's a stiff, a princess looking for a rabbit, me and you, soldier. I'm a detective, and I've got a headache the size of City Hall."

Suddenly, the alley floor beneath them changed. The asphalt softened and swirled, the grey giving way to a vibrant, emerald green. Grass sprouted between the cracks. The dead body, the focus of Jack's entire night, dissolved into a shower of sparkling dust that floated up and faded away.

The three of them stood in stunned silence on a patch of impossible meadow, trapped between a flickering neon sign and a wall of rusted metal, under a sky that couldn't decide if it wanted to be a gloomy, starless night or a brilliant, sunlit blue.

"Right," Jack Malone muttered, pulling the collar of his trench coat tighter. "New case. Find the author of this story... and give him a piece of my mind."

A small rabbit hopped past them, mumbling to himself. Jack watched, his eyes narrowing, as the rabbit produced a gold pocket watch. "I'm late," the creature complained in crisp, precise English, then bounded straight through the flickering wall of metal, vanishing completely.

“I must follow that rabbit,” the princess said, running after it.

Jack cursed under his breath, then turned to the rebel, whose jaw was clenched tight. "So, do interdimensional soldiers usually cope with magical rabbits on their missions or is this a first for you?"

Before she could answer, a figure strode into view, clad in a tailored white shirt spattered with ink, thumbing through a tattered notebook, a confused expression on his face.

Jack’s hand went to his holster instinctively. The soldier moved forward, training her strange looking weapon on the newcomer, demanding his identification without lowering her aim.

“Whoa! Hold up,” the man said, brow furrowed. "I’m just here looking for my pen? I can’t seem to keep my chapters straight.” Suddenly his gaze shifted away from the two of them. ”What the heck is the deal with that wall?”

“I was about to ask you the same thing,” Jack said.

The man, about to respond, suddenly disappeared into thin air.

The rebel cursed as the notebook fluttered to the ground, landing open on the fresh grass.

Picking it up, she glanced through it. “I can’t make heads or tails out of this gibberish,” she said, shaking her head.

Suddenly the pages rearranged themselves, shifting lines of text into diagrams that glowed faintly. The grass below their feet disappeared and morphed into an unknown metal. There was no longer sky overhead, instead pipes twisted above them, hissing with steam as gears groaned ominously all around them.

“What in the world?”Jack stammered, just as a small blue bird fluttered by.

“Pip, where have you gone to now?” an overly cheerful voice rang out. Footsteps approached as Elara emerged from behind a large brass gear. ”Oh, hello again!” she said, as we stood there staring at her, stunned by her sudden appearance.

“I’m out of here. You two are on your own.” the rebel said, heading toward a door. As she reached for the handle, it spun away, vanishing into the shifting wall behind her. “Crap!” She cursed, running toward another door.

Without warning, a metallic voice boomed overhead, listing the names of unfinished chapters the author had started but never resolved, the words echoing through the chamber as steam clouded everyone's vision.

Robots wearing strange reflective clothing burst into the room, their oddly jointed arms whirring as each one brandished weapons shaped like oversized fountain pens, spraying ink in wild arcs across the trembling metal floor, causing a hissing sound as it hit the hot brass gears.

”I’m really missing that stiff in the alley right now,” Jack yelled, diving towards the giant cog by Elara’s feet as ink rained down from above, splattering the cuff of his pants. “Don’t you have any smarts girl?” he said, grabbing Kira by the arm, dragging her down with him as a jet of ink sliced through the air just inches overhead.

“Have you seen a curious white rabbit?” the princess yelled from across the room, where she was hiding underneath a metallic table, a small blue bird sitting atop.

“Enough with the white rabbit BS! Can’t you see we’re under attack!” the soldier yelled back.

Once again the walls glitched, and cement replaced metal, as the three of them were violently thrust back into Jack’s world. “Thank God,” he said, kissing the ground. The two women stood a few feet away. ”Oh wonderful. The dames are here too.” he said, standing up. He wanted to get as far away from them as he could.

“Pardon me, sir. I appear to be lost,” Princess Elara said, running up to me, grabbing me by the arm. ”Can you help me find my way home?”

“Sorry toots, I’ve got a case to solve. You’re on your own.” Jack said, yanking his arm away from her. He walked down the alley without glancing back.

“That’s right, keep walking. I don’t need anything from you, but you know what, asshole, this pretty little princess here, she sure does. So man up, get back here, and help her!” Kira yelled, aiming her weapon at me.

Jack stopped, letting out a frustrated sigh as thunder rumbled overhead, “Okay, fine. I guess we better figure this out so we don’t keep going in and out of each other’s stories.”

An unnatural green light flashed at the end of the narrow alley. A warped shape emerged from the darkness, shimmering with the hue of sick neon rain. The author stepped forward with pen and paper in hand.

“It’s about time you showed up,” Jack said.

The three of us explained that our worlds kept merging into one another, warping our realities. We told him how we wanted each of our stories to end.

The princess told the author she wanted to catch the white rabbit. Kiara said she wanted to win her epic battle, and I told him I had to solve the mystery of the dead stiff in the alley.

The author listened, smiling, then scribbled a new sentence, his eyes blazing. He tore the page from his notebook just as reality rippled around our feet.

Moments before each of us returned to our stories, we saw the words the author had written at the bottom of the page.

It read;

And they lived happily ever after.

—The End