Chapter Sixteen

At first I was blinded by the bright lights of this new dimension, when I realized that the blazing ball of fire that was the Sun here almost blinded me instantly. My right foot felt like it had been dunked in ice, and then pulled out of it. I looked down and realized why. I was on the shore of a beach, and the tide was slowly coming in and out as the small waves of the turqoise ocean fell one by one onto the shore of the thin strip of sand that was this beach. I took a few steps forward, and turned off to the side to see the gigantic city that was above me.
“Holy crap,” I muttered under my breath.
The buildings here were quite a site, if I could see them. The tops of them were no where to be seen as they climbed as high as into the clouds. I didn’t know how tall they could possibly be, and I didn’t know how it could have been possibly that there could be buildings this tall without toppling over.
“How do they stay up like that?” I asked.
“Well, they had to build them high, you see,” he said.
“Why is that?”
“Because this is a tiny island,” he explained. “And if this many people are going t live and work and socialize on an insland this tiny, then they can’t very well go out into the sea, now can they? No, instead of going outwards into the sea, they decided it would be smarter of them to move upward into the sky. Sometimes the human race is quite smart. Then again, other times they can be quite stupid. But we’ll just marvel at their genius and architectual beauty for now, shall we?”
“You are absolutely insane,” I said. “So people built upwards? I guess that’s pretty cool. Are we going to check out some of the buildings? Oh, and am I in this dimension, and am I still alive, along with my family?”
“Honestly, I have no idea,” Luke said. “I haven’t been here in a very long time. A VERY long time. In fact, the last time I was here, the buildings were all as tall as normal sky scrapers. Now, if you could see how tall they are now, you will know that that hasn’t been for a very, very, very long time.”
I Looked back up and the ponit where the buildings met with the clouds and gape din awe at how magnificent it really was. I really wanted to go up into one of the top floors and look down at the clouds. But I was a bit afraid that the sun would be more prominent there, and that it would try to burn my eye balls into a crisp, so I figured staying on the ground for as long as possible was a good plan.
“So, where to?” I asked. “Not up in the buildings, right? Wait, didn’t you say we were going to find out some information here?”
“Yes. Like I said, I try to avoid this dimension. It’s because there’s something shifty here, something I don’t like, and something that just seems to annoy me when I get here.”
“Like what?”
“Well, it could just be the water,” he said. “But I really hav eno idea. For all I know our little dimension hopping friend could be here, making a mess of things. Or maybe there is a whole new villain we must face, and that we need to come up with some new strategy to do all of this stuff. Or maybe… yeah, most likely it’s just the water. I’m not a fan of the sea, exactly. Much prefer the city. So, shall we go into the city?”
I followed him into the city. It was quite easy to get into considering how small the beach really was. We decided to go up into one of the smaller buildings, which, incidentally, was about three times the height of the Empire State Building in my home dimension located in New York, New York in America. I thought that that was absolutely absurd, and just had to see it for myself, and I ran to the building and pushed the highest button on the elevator. Luke had to literally sprint in after me to make sure that the elevator didn’t close before he got in. With a building this high, it takes a long time for the elevators to come back down. I figured it would’ve been faster to try to climb up the stairs and catch it somewhere in the middle.
And so the tall buildings slowly became normal sized and right now this doesn't even make any sense because I was just so awe struck and oh my god wow cock fuck amazing shit mother fucking ass fuck yeah it was so amazing. The elevator was made of glass, you see, so as Luke and I rode upwards, I was able to gaze down upon all the buildings and people that were down below us. It was like riding in an airplane, except a whole lot slower, and not really going anywhere but up. But you know how like when you're in an airplaine or something and you jsut want to wave down to the people below you but you know they can't see you but you would think it would be really cool if one of them waved back up at you but they just look like tiny ants, so there is no possible way that they could see you because they are so far down below you and then not just the people start to look like ants, but so do the cars, and the roads start look like the little lines that you draw in the dirt with a twig or something and the little ants are just movin galong that line and you want to dump water on them or something and watch them squirm but then you remember that you're in an airplane and that those are not ants or anything those are cars and people, so you can't actually dump water on them and watch them squirm because that would be very horrible indead if you had enough water to drown a bunch of people... well, yeah, that's basically how I felt at the moment going up in that elevator.
as we continued upward, I thought how long this was actually going to take. it would have been so much more tiring if we had gone up the stairs, but when i thought aout it, it probably would have been faster.
we reached around floor 145, and as that happened, the elevator door opened again.
a very attractive man walked in and raised on eyebrow at me. "Well, hello there," he said. "I haven't seen you in a while, Caitlin. Who is this that you're with?"
My eyes widened. Okay, so there was another Caitlin in this dimension. Shit, was I going to run into her here in this building? Why did we have to choose this building of all places to come and go to the top floor."
"Um. This? Oh, this is no one," I answered. Luke jabbed his elbow into my arm. "Ow! Fine! This... this is my friend Luke. Lucas. I don't really know anymore."
"Luke Lucas, huh?" the man said. He grabbed Luke's hand. "Nice to meet you Mr. Lucas. Say, Caitlin, if this is your friend, I suppose we're not having dinner tonight?"
Luke scoffed. "What? Dinner? I um... no, of course... wait, you think me and Luke?" I started laughing. "No. I would never. Of course not. Wait, what just happened?"
"Okay, good," the man said. "Because I thought that because you called in and said you were sick, that the only reason for that was not only because you didn't want to work today, but because you were avoiding me or something, and trying to sneak out of dinner with me. And go off with Mr. Lucas here. You see, because that's what I thought. I'm sorry if I come off a little paranoid."
"Sick!" I exclaimed. "I'm sick!" I said to Luke. "That's why I'm not at work today! Haha. Good. Because if I were at work today, then--"
"What on earth are you talking about?" the man asked. "You... aren't sick because you're here. And because you're here... you're at work."
"Oh! Right. Of course."
"So dinner tonight at eight?"
"Um."
"Perfect! I'll see you there."
We were at around floor 200 now, and he decided to get off. "I'll see you tonight!"
"Yeah... see you!"
The elevator door closed again.
"Wow, that was incredibly weird!" I said. "I'm dating such a hot guy?"
"He isn't that hot," Luke said a little two quickly.
'Are you kidding me? I mean, I hope that I'm sleeping with that guy, because then after we go out for 'dinner' tonight, maybe we could."
"Oh, look! We're at the top floor," Luke said as the elevator door opened.
"Okay, then. Whatever you say, Mister Lucas!"