Warped Space - Chapter 1
By Misty Steppes

Welcome to my first story! Be warned, this may receive a rewrite at some point, but I'm not going to do much good staring at it so I might as well let it out into the wild. Enjoy, and I'd love to hear comments or criticism down below.

I’ll never forget that night. Not because of the bitter chill of the winter solstice night, nor because of the runny nose that constantly reminded me of my persistent cold, no - all that paled in comparison with the events of that night. To be fair, what I saw is no longer the most surprising moment of my life, as you’ll soon see as I recount my adventures, but it was certainly the first of many.

“Goddammit Aaron, can’t you just leave it a few weeks? I had to reschedule my flight out to make this test. I know you haven’t got any plans, but I’d like to spend some time with my family before we get on with attempting to further humanity.”
I didn’t even bother looking up from my monitor as my coworker’s complaints echoed through our metal-paneled lab. The screen in front of me laid out thousands of individual variables related to our project, and I was carefully editing each one individually and observing the changes they created in one another.
“This is the last one James, and once again I apologize for keeping you. I could have done this myself.”
My voice was rather monotone as I spoke, far more focused on my work than his protests.

“As if I’d let you blow everything up on your own. You remember the last time you forgot a decimal point before a test? That’s why we had professionals ground everything properly. I’m not letting you screw up again if I can help it.”
“I’m well aware, James...”

I stood up with a sigh, sparing one last glance towards the monitor as I saved my changes and clicked it off.
“The changes are saved, turn off your workstation so we can run the test without risk of interference.”
James rolled his eyes as I spoke, but shut down his own workstation nonetheless.
“I’m honestly not sure what you’re expecting here. Quantum anomalies have been proven to exist, but they’re not known to be controllable in any meaningful way. Countless panels of scientists agree that they’re just harmless blips in the fabric of space-time.”

“Well one good, repeatable experiment can prove countless panels wrong, James. That’s what science is all about, and it’s what my thesis will be about regardless of our success. The professor eats this shit up, and you know it. Now get to the booth, I’ll clear the chamber and prepare the sub-chambers.”
“Yes, oh captain my captain.” With a snarky half-salute, James leaned over and opened the door to the main testing area, the dimly lit operating booth serving as the barrier between our work space and the actual test chamber. I had no expectations for this experiment, much like our last 273, but it wouldn’t do to leave a new theory untested for the several weeks of winter break that would follow - as James had said, he was not convinced as to my ability to conduct experiments on my own.

To be fair, he had a point, though it wouldn’t much matter as we soon found out.

With a hard pull of the metal door set in the wall just past the one James had opened, I entered the chamber, met immediately by the sight of my work over the last few months: two identical domes, inside which stood identical pedestals. The insides of the domes were lined with a metal apparatus of my own design, the function of which would take thousands of words to explain in even the simplest (accurate) terms.

Put simply, though not entirely accurately, I was trying to teleport significant amounts of matter.

The 20th and early 21st centuries would argue that this was impossible, as per Einstein’s famous work; but drastic advances in our understanding of quantum mechanics revealed “anomalies” of a sort in the fabric of the space-time continuum, ones that we have slowly attempted to quantify and document. Or, in my case, control.

“Alright, set the test object, I cleared the chambers last night. Get ready for a whole lot of nothing.”
James’ voice came through the speaker system set up in the chamber - he had apparently already closed the door while I was surveying our work. I walked over to the far side of the room, passing between the two domes, where on a small table
sat hundreds of metal ball bearings, split into two piles: used and unused in our experiments. It seems pretty pointless since our experiments had done exactly nothing observable, but if they were doing something we couldn’t see, anything at all, any future iterations of the experiment would be affected.

Plucking a single ball bearing from the unused stack using a nearby pair of tongs, I carefully moved it over to one of the domes, the one which I knew to be our “send” dome, as I had so aptly named it (the other was the “receive” dome, of course). A small hatch on the side of the dome opened with a light press, and I reached in with the tongs and the ball bearing. The ball bearing rolled around slightly as I released it, but the concave shape of the pedestal kept it from falling. I quickly shut the door and returned the tongs to their original location, before looking over towards James.
“The test subject is set.”
I moved between the domes to observe the ball, crouching down slightly to get a straight-on view. The nature of quantum anomalies meant that the object wouldn’t be traveling through physical space even if it did somehow work, so I was in no danger of being run through with a metal ball.
“Alright. Now recording.
“Test #274, Date and Time December 21 2035, 11:27 PM. Modification List compared to Test #273: Extensive, thanks to a calculation error that would have skewed any data collected from Test #273.
“Variable entries appear correct. Structural integrity normal. Powering up system in Three.
“Two.
“One.”

Each dome began to hum as the metal contraptions vibrated at a high frequency, just as they had done in experiments before.
“Effects on structure consistent with previous experiments… no sign of change in the test subject.”
I squinted at the metal ball… nope. Nothing.
“Alright James, cut the power. We’re done for the night. Enjoy your flight home.”
His face lit up in the booth, and he pressed the intercom button once again.
“Finally~ Test results inconclusive. Cutting power to system in Three.
“Two.
“HOLY SHIT! AARON!”
I had looked up to speak to him, but my head now snapped back to the dome at his reaction.

That was the moment.

The marble was no longer visible - instead, the inside of the dome was shrouded in a blue mist of sorts, entirely obscured. I looked behind me at the “receive” dome, and saw the exact same thing.
“Absolutely stunning…” I muttered.
“Should I still cut power? We can’t see anything with this mist.”
“Go ahead. Should be replicable regardless.”
I waved to him to go ahead, and I assume he pushed the button to turn off the structures, but the words that came next told me I was in serious danger.
“I… can’t cut the power. It isn’t working. I’m going to run for the dead switch in the basement, you need to get out of there though. Who knows what’ll happen, this is unknown ground.”
I was inclined to agree, so I promptly abandoned my place between the domes and bolted towards the main door.

But perhaps that was the real moment I remember even more keenly, because clearly my escape was not meant to be.

Before I could move an inch, the domes shattered with the high-pitched crack of breaking glass, the metal structures exploding outwards in the same impact. The two spheres of mist shot towards one another - and directly towards me, since I was right between them.
I can’t really describe the feeling of the impact. It was simultaneously freezing cold and burning hot, yet also a tingly sensation like when you hit your funny bone or your leg falls asleep.

All of that at once.

And then nothing.