Anomaly Flats (5 page)

Chapter 7

“Anomaly Flats is…well, it’s an anomaly,” the scientist said, clearing a family of test tubes from an overturned milk crate and gesturing for Mallory to have a seat. “Or a series of anomalies, to be exact. Let me ask you; how did you arrive here?”

“I drove,” Mallory said dryly.

“Yes, of course, I understand that. But what I mean is, how did you
find
Anomaly Flats?”

“I followed the road.”

“And how did you find that road?”

“What, are you serious? I saw a road, I turned onto it. How does
anyone
find a road?”

“Hmm…very interesting.” Lewis pulled out a notebook and pen from one of the crates and began scribbling some notes. “Why did you turn onto that particular road?”

Mallory exhaled with exasperation. “I don’t know! I saw a sign, I turned.”

Lewis’ eyes grew large. “You saw a sign?” he asked. “What kind of sign?”

“A road sign.”

“Yes, but what
sort
of road sign?”

“Look,” Mallory yelled over the sound of the raining metal, “what the hell does it matter what sort of road sign? I was on the road, I saw a sign for Anomaly Flats, I turned, and here I am—and absolutely adoring every second of it,” she said sharply.

“Hmm…” Lewis clicked his pen a few times as he let his hidden thoughts tumble about in his brain. “And how do you feel now that you’re here?”

“Goddamn irritated!” Mallory cried.

Lewis nodded. “Subject shows signs of emotional distress,” he mumbled as he wrote. Mallory swiped at him and knocked both the book and the pen from his hands. “Hey!”

“I’m about to give you all
sorts
of emotional distress…I will
drown
you in it. Why are you asking me all these questions?”

“Because you’re the only other outsider I’ve been able to study!” he said excitedly. “Er, meet. I meant meet. You’re the only other outsider I’ve been able to meet.”

“With your social skills, that’s an incredible surprise,” Mallory snorted.

The scientist shook his head. “It’s not like that. I mean you’re
literally
the only other outsider I’ve met. I’m curious about the town’s effects on you. You see, Anomaly Flats is a sort of nexus of oddities. One of those oddities is that most people can’t find it. Even if they look.”

“And lucky me, I just stumbled across it,” she said.

“Yes, exactly my point. The chances of that are so slim as to border on impossible. The town seems to use its geographical secrecy as a sort of defense mechanism.”

Mallory rubbed her forehead. The beginnings of a headache were throbbing to life somewhere in there. “I thought you were just going to answer my questions,” she sighed.

“I’m trying to,” the scientist insisted. “It’s all part of it. Don’t you see? A town that camouflages itself is, in my experience,
highly
irregular…and it’s one of the least irregular things about Anomaly Flats. I’ve been working out the ‘whys’ of its unique properties for some time now, and I’ve only cracked the surface. At first, I thought the strange things that happened here had to do with the area’s peculiar magnetic properties. The magnetic fields in this area are…extraordinary.”

“I’ve heard,” Mallory sighed over the sound of raining metal. She shrugged out of her backpack and shoved it beneath her knees. “My alternator paid the price.”

“Yes, exactly!” Lewis cried. “Not just your alternator, but
every
computer! I don’t have to tell you how difficult it’s been to carry out experiments without the help of a computer,” he said with a little chuckle.

“Does this truck have an alternator?” Mallory asked, looking around the Winnebago. It was a complete scientific mess, but it looked to be fairly new.

Lewis smiled shrewdly. “It does. I constructed a superconductor casing of iron oxyarsenide for the RV’s computer systems. It blocks out nearly 98% of all magnetism,” he said proudly. “That was my Year Three project.”

“Year Three? How long have you been here?”

“Let’s see,” Lewis said, tapping his chin thoughtfully. “I guess it’s been…geez…over twelve years now.” He seemed genuinely surprised by this. “Time does fly,” he said, shaking his head. “Here more so than most places.”

“You’ve been studying this place for twelve years, and you don’t know why the Director of Tourism vomits flies?” Mallory said, raising an eyebrow. “That’s one strike for scientific progress.”

Lewis waved off that little insult. “There is so much of Anomaly Flats to explore—so much to
analyze
and
discover
—that Marcy’s esophageal aberrations haven’t been high on the list. But they
are
on the list,” he assured her. He rifled through a pile of notebooks on the floor of the RV behind the passenger seat and came up with a spiral-bound journal with a holographic lizard on the cover. Mallory remembered having something like it when she was in grade school, almost three decades ago. Lewis flipped the book open to a marked page and held it out for her. “See?”

The page showed a long list of items, written in four columns. About a fifth of the items—including
magnetic properties, sharp snow, hypno-stars,
and
mutant cornfields
—were crossed off. Others—
Clone Lake, volcanic activity, drones,
and
aisle 8
among them—were not. There were similar lists on several pages, each with four full columns.
Marcy’s flies
was among the items on the third page, and it was not yet crossed off.

“I’ll get to it eventually,” he promised. “What were we…oh! Magnetic fields! I thought those were to blame for the strangeness at first, but they’re just a
symptom
, not the
sickness
. The root cause of Anomaly’s anomalies seems to be something more…dimensional.”

Mallory’s brow furrowed. “Dimensional?” She wasn’t much for science-fiction.

Lewis glanced at her uneasily. “The things I’m about to tell you…they’re not for everyone’s ears.”

She snorted. “What, you think I’m gonna grab a beer with the Lord of the Flies in there and gossip away all your secrets?”

Lewis nodded. “Good point. I just…this is sensitive information. I’d like it to remain between us. Can you promise that you won’t tell anyone else?”

Mallory shrugged. “Sure.”

This seemed to satisfy the scientist, at least a little. He nodded again, and began. “Anomaly Flats seems to be some sort of…well, I guess you’d call it a dimensional way station. Like a complex highway interchange—except the highways are other times and places. To be honest,” he said, lowering his voice as if he were afraid of being overheard, even over the clattering nickel rain that fell outside. “I’m not entirely sure that we’re actually in Missouri anymore at all.”

“Someone had better tell Google Maps.”

Lewis looked confused. “What’s a Google map?”

The quaintness of Anomaly Flats was really starting to grate on Mallory’s nerves. “It’s just a map…thing.”

“But you see, that’s exactly what I’m saying! Anomaly Flats isn’t
on
any maps. Not one! Not one that I’ve found, anyway.”

Mallory shrugged. “So? This is Missouri. It’s like fifty thousand square miles of write-off. We’re lucky they even put St. Louis on maps.”

“It’s more like seventy thousand square miles,” Lewis said. “But that’s not—listen, do you know, I’ve been here for over a decade, and not a single other outsider has so much as set foot inside these city limits. Not a single passerby, not a single visitor, not a single tourist.”

“Well, hey, it’s not exactly Branson.”

Lewis shook his head. “I’m serious. Do you understand the enormity of that? I mean, no one else has driven through. No one else has taken the wrong road. No one in town has family from out of town who comes to visit. No postal workers, no deliverymen, no county service trucks…nothing. I was the
only
person to arrive in Anomaly Flats for over twelve years. And now, suddenly, you.” He thought for a moment., “It’s almost as if you don’t access Anomaly Flats; Anomaly Flats accesses you.”

Mallory had to admit, it was strange. But “strange” seemed to be the norm for this place. “Well, how did
you
get here?” she asked.

Lewis smiled at the memory. “I received a letter. It told of a wonderful, extraordinary, scientifically baffling place where a curious mind could spend his entire life seeking out answers to improbable questions and never even scratch the surface. And it came with a map.”

“But you just said it isn’t on any maps.”

“Not on any regular maps, no,” he said, grinning shrewdly. “But it’s on this one.” He reached into the pocket of his lab coat and produced a folded sheet of paper, yellowed with age and lightly frayed around the edges. He handed it to Mallory. “See for yourself.”

She unfolded the paper gingerly. On one side was a handwritten letter; on the other, a crude, hand-drawn map with directions to Anomaly Flats. The map showed the town surrounded by a body of water. In the estimation of whoever had drawn this, Anomaly Flats was an island. “I’m no cartographer, but this seems inaccurate,” she said.

“Twelve years ago, when I arrived, this place
was
an island. In the center of a massive body of water that had no business being in the Midwest. Isn’t that strange?”

Mallory looked doubtfully down at the map. “If no mail goes in or out of Anomaly Flats, then who sent you this?”

Lewis smiled hugely. “I did.”

Mallory blinked. “I’m sorry?”

“Look at the signature.” Lewis grabbed the paper and turned it over. It was signed
Lewis T. Burnish, Ph.D
.

Mallory stared up at the scientist, her mouth hanging open. “You sent this to
yourself
? From a place you’d never been?”

“You can see why I was so intrigued.”

“How is that possible?” she asked.

Lewis shrugged. “I have no idea. A dozen years later, and I haven’t even written that letter yet, much less figured out a way to get it to myself in the past. But I’ll come up with something.” He snatched back the letter and waved it triumphantly in the air. “This is proof enough of that.”

“And you haven’t left?”

Lewis laughed out loud. “Leave? Why would I leave? This town is a scientist’s dream! The research I’m doing is completely unparalleled! I’m the first person ever to study inter-dimensional anomalies in a setting this intimate,” he said proudly.

Mallory gripped the milk crate beneath her with both hands, so hard the plastic dug into her skin and made her fingers go numb. “So you’re telling me I drove my Impala into…another dimension?”

Lewis smiled. “Well. Not exactly. Whatever Anomaly Flats is, it
does
seem to be at least
rooted
in Missouri. Most of the soil and water samples are consistent with what you would find in this part of the state. There are just…some additions.”

“That’s absurd. You know that, right?” She shook her head. “That
all
of this is completely absurd?”

“It is, isn’t it?” he said, his voice filled with glee. “But that doesn’t make it any less true.”

“So a dimensional nexus. That’s where we are; that’s what this town is. A place where dimensions mash themselves together.”

“It explains the tentacles, doesn’t it?”

“Does it?” In spite of all she’d seen, Mallory couldn’t quite bring herself to believe it. “Sorry, Poindexter. I don’t buy it.”

Lewis fiddled with the buttons on his lab coat. “You don’t have to buy it,” he said. “It’s empirically true, whether you recognize it or not.”

Mallory closed her eyes and rolled her head around, stretching out her neck. “Look, Lewis—” she began.

“Listen,” he said, cutting her off. “I know it’s difficult to believe. But think about what you’ve experienced since arriving. Have you noticed any time jumps since you arrived?”

Mallory’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean by ‘time jumps’?”

“I mean, does it seem like time has gotten away from you? In a very real and literal sense?”

She squinted suspiciously at the little man. “Time
did
seem to move really fast last night,” she admitted, letting her thoughts trickle out slowly through her lips. “But I just lost track…”

“And your hotel room,” Lewis said, interrupting again. “Did you use the chalk to draw the runes on your door? You did, didn’t you? You must have.”

“I did,” she said, nodding gently. “Why do you say I must have?”

“Because you’re still alive.”

“Oh, come on. You’re saying I’d be dead right now if I hadn’t drawn those stupid circles?”

“Or something worse than dead,” he confirmed. “I bet the runes were smeared when you woke up this morning, right? Like something had spent the entire night trying to wipe them away?”

Mallory noticed her palms had gone clammy. She wiped them on her jeans. “How do you know that?”

“Because this is Anomaly Flats, and that’s the sort of thing that happens here.”

“This is the dumbest dumb thing I’ve ever heard,” she decided. Even so, there was no denying the complete otherworldliness of the town. If it wasn’t a dimensional nexus,
something
was wrong with it, all right. She shook her head in disbelief at what she was about to say. “All right; so
suppose
this is all true…it’s not, but let’s just
suppose
we’re actually in the middle of a time-and-place tornado.
Supposing
that’s true, when my car is fixed and I’m finally able to leave…will I drive back into Missouri?
My
Missouri?”

Lewis thought about that for a bit. “Yes, I think so,” he finally decided. “As long as you take the right dimensional off-ramp.”

“Great,” Mallory groaned. “And how do I find that?”

“In theory, it should be the same road you came in on. If it brought you in, it should take you out.”

“Should?” Mallory asked pointedly.

“Should,” Lewis confirmed.

“And what if it doesn’t?”

Lewis frowned. “Then given the evidence of what exists beyond some of our borders…you’ll probably wish you’d stayed.”