Momentum Shift-1 by Lynceus Dr. Ronick was a genus. And probably insane. But like a moth drawn to a flame, I couldn't seem to escape his madness! If only things were different, I thought. In another world, another life, I could love someone like him. Little did I realize that I was about to get everything I had wished for...and a whole lot more!

---

I never set out to become a physicist. Mom was a registered nurse, and Dad, well, Dad was a cartoonist. Actually, he preferred to call himself a humorist; and it's true, he did have a weekly column in the paper that was really funny.

It was hard to take his work seriously, but Dad had a way of making me smile, even when I didn't want to. I miss him so much. He had met Mom late in life, and while they both loved each other dearly, it wasn't easy to have a wife twenty years younger than you are.

Or a teenaged daughter when you're pushing sixty.

But he did the best he could, and I wouldn't trade him as a father for anything. The heart attack was sudden; he'd always seemed so full of life, so young for his age. But then he was gone. Mom threw herself into her work, and me? I shut everyone out of my life.

I decided to become a nurse like Mom. If she'd been there when he had his coronary, maybe Dad would still be alive? It sounds silly, but I wanted to know how to help people. To help pay for school, I took a job at the community college library, helping to organize their old books.

So imagine my surprise when I came across a book called Who are you calling Mad? I'm laughing here!. And it had my father's name on the dust jacket!

I had to read the insert to be sure, and there he was, a lot younger than I remembered him. Dad had written a book?

His style was unmistakeable, every few lines I'd chuckle, laugh, or cry. He'd written about some of the great scientific minds of the 20th century, interspersing fact with humorous anecdotes and observations. "Science," he said, "has long been thought to be the realm of boring, absent-minded geniuses with their heads in the clouds. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Science is a heck of a lot of fun, and I'm going to prove it to you!"

I wondered why I'd never heard of this book before. I asked Mom, and she just shook her head. "He put so much work into that thing. Science was his first love, you know. Which is how we met, he'd gone back to school to try and earn a physics degree. But then you came along, and...oh did we argue about it. I didn't want to cost him his dream. But you know your father. He said 'I may love Science, but being funny pays the bills'."

"But the book?"

Mom sighed. "Just didn't sell. The critics liked it, a lot of really smart people asked to have it autographed, but...well, it's a competitive market. He gave away all his copies, and never talked about writing again."

"Mom...if I wanted to become a scientist, would you be disappointed?" Don't ask me where that came from!

She kissed my cheek. "You could never disappoint me, Linda."

-

That's me, by the way. Linda St. Joan. 24 years old, with a Masters in Physics. I guess I should tell you a little about myself. Let's see. I'm 5' 5", and I have my scale sufficiently intimidated enough that it claims I'm 128 lbs.. I have short black hair, because long hair always gets in my way. I guess I'm pretty, although I've never had men (or women, for that matter) fall all over themselves to get to know me better. I have a slight overbite, despite wearing braces for years, and I'm nearly blind in my right eye, thanks to a freak softball accident (I used to be a real tomboy when I was younger. Chalk it up to being a Daddy's girl).

I'm told my eyes are my best feature; they're hazel, which is weird since neither of my parents had hazel eyes. I'm not adopted, although Dad and I used to joke about it (which annoyed my mother; apparently she'd had a long, difficult labor with me).

I have a bad habit of breaking my nails, so I keep them short, and I never wear heels if I don't have to. Actually, tennis shoes are sort of a trademark with me. And my socks never match, something I picked up from Dad.

As far as my personal life goes, I don't really have much of one. Even when I finally came out of my shell, most people are put off by me. Curse of being a smart girl, I guess. Either I'm too brainy or I'm too silly.

It didn't help much when I finally came to terms with the fact that I was a lesbian. I don't take the lead in a relationship well, but I find aggressive girls to be too pushy. Plus, I culd never live with someone; I'm too attached to my personal space.

So while I have friends, you guessed it, I'm a lonely person. I don't even have cats! Not that I don't love cats, but I'm allergic to cat dander; it wreaks havoc with my sinuses. So there you have it, Linda, the weird scientist girl.

My first job out of high school was a real lucky break; who says good grades don't pay? I got a job at S.T.A.R. Labs, specifically, the Salt Lake City branch. Mormon country, so I try to keep my Methodist teachings to myself. Not that Mormons are bad people or anything, I just don't believe in some of the things they do, and I'd rather not make an issue of that.

I was assigned to work for Dr. Ronick. Erik B. Ronick, to be precise, the resident 'mad scientist'. What can I say about Erik? Well, he's 42, but in really good shape. He works out daily, keeps an eye on the old cholesterol level, and with his sandy blonde hair, rugged good looks, and tanned body, reminds me of a younger Robert Redford.

Seriously, for his age, he's seriously hot, even I notice, and I'm a lesbian! But the other women tend to keep their distance; I see a lot of casual flirting, but that's about it. One of the other lab techs, Nancy, warned me about him. "He's a good looking guy, Linda, but he's...really weird. Not in a scary way, just...strange."

She could have been describing me. Well, other than the good looking guy part.

When I first met Erik, he was setting up a strange, yet oddly familiar experiment. It involves mostly household items. He didn't notice me come in, instead he was chuckling to himself.

"Ah, Dr. Ronick?"

He looked up at me. "You wouldn't be selling Girl Scout cookies, would you? I love Thin Mints."

I frowned. "Don't I look a little old to be selling cookies?"

He grinned. "That depends. Will saying yes get me a smile or a punch in the nose?"

I couldn't help but smile a little. "I wouldn't punch you, Doctor."

"You have a pretty smile. I'd like to see more of it."

I blushed a little. "Well, I'm going to be your new assistant."

"Then this could be my lucky day. And yours! But first, I need to test you." He gestured to the table. "What am I trying to do?"

"Other than possibly getting yourself electrocuted? It looks like Tesla's magnetic wall experiment."

"You're hired! And yes, yes, I probably will get a jolt. But I think I'm onto something."

I blinked. "Really? Because it doesn't work."

"Until now. I hope. It all has to do with the strength of the magnetic field. This field is very weak." He walked over to the far end of the room, and gestured towards the wall. "This field, not so much."

I gasped. You're probably not a scientist, so I'll spare you the details, but it was likely the most impressive magnetic field generator I'd ever seen. The thing took up a large chunk of the lab, and it surrounded a glass chamber, about 7' tall, on a raised dais.

"What..what is that for?"

"Ever hear of the Philadelphia Experiment?"

"Sure, who hasn't? But...wait..."

"Complete quantum teleportation using nuclear magnetic resonance. That's what I'm working on."

I gaped at him. I really did. "You're serious? Isn't that, I don't know, a little...fringe?"

He laughed. "Who invented the radio?"

I groaned. This was right out of Dad's book. "Who didn't invent the radio, you mean. Or, as Otis Pond said: 'Looks as if Marconi got the jump on you.'"

Erik laughed. "To which Tesla replied: 'Marconi is a good fellow. Let him continue. He is using seventeen of my patents.'"

"Big fan of Tesla, huh?"

"Mm, yes. And sure, he had some far out ideas. Some of which just don't quite work as well as he thought, but you can't blame him. He was basically working in isolation. The few people who could understand his work tended to shun him as a crackpot. Yourself?"

"Well, my Dad was a big fan. I guess I picked up some admiration from him."

"Your father is a scientist?" He stepped closer to me, and I realized, this guy is huge! I mean, he had to be almost a foot taller than I was!

"Ah, no. A humorist. Allen St. Joan."

"No..! Not the man who wrote 'Who are you calling Mad?'"

"The same."

"So you're his daughter...I hear he passed away, my condolences. I know it was a few years back but...well, name your cliche. Absent minded. Mad scientist. That's me."

"It's alright. So you knew him?"

"Oh yes, he even signed my copy of his book. It's rare to find someone who really understands people like myself. Where other people see closed doors, I see untapped possibilities. Even the most ridiculous science can offer insight. For example, I originally built this thing here," he jerked a thumb at his magnetic field generator, "to test out all this bioelectromagnetism nonsense."

"Is it?"

He blinked at me. "Is it what?"

"Nonsense."

"Ah...not entirely. Some of their claims actually hold up water, but only with very intense magnetic fields. Which can cause as much harm as good. It's too bad though. Imagine it, a magnetic field strong enough to force new cells to grow, strengthen and even rejuvenate the body. A magnetic field so powerful, it can rebuild you from the ground up!"

He shrugged. "But some ideas are simply too far ahead of their time."

Little did he know what the future would bring.

-

"Do you know what a quantum moment is, Linda?"

This was a few months later. We'd been having a lot of fun, zapping things in the lab. And gotten closer. I can honestly say that Erik was one of my best friends. If only things were different. If only I could accept the love of a man. If only he wasn't so much older than I was! No matter how I felt, I couldn't subject a child to what I went through, when Dad died.

Sure, death is inevitable, but marrying a guy 16 years my senior was asking for it. Not that I could..it's weird. I could see myself falling in love with someone like Erik. But I knew I could never be fully happy with a man. I was well and truly fucked up, no doubt about it.

"Uh, not really."

He grinned. "It's one of those moments in life when you feel, really feel, that something big, something important is going on. You don't know what it is, but you pause for a few seconds, suspended in time, realizing, yes, it's happening. It's really happening!"

He paused, as if trying to bring some cohesion to his thoughts. He did this a lot, so I didn't interrupt. "It's like when I met you. I didn't even know you, but I knew, the minute I saw you, that you were going to be important to me. A quantum moment is when you feel moved, emotionally. It's a normal event, a normal situation, but to you, it's otherworldly, and you respond in an extraordinary way."

I wasn't sure what he was talking about, but I felt a blush spread from my cheeks. I was important to him? Did he...love me?

"It's a paradigm shift. A moment of enlightenment. When you get a brief glimpse at the big picture, and it's glorious. I think I've got it."

He practically dashed to the computer (which was, by necessity, level A TEMPEST-hardened; that is to say, an EMP pulse from 3' away wouldn't do jack to the machine) and began typing in code at dizzying speed. "I never would have realized it without someone to bounce ideas off of. You, very specifically."

He sighed. "If I was younger, I'd probably try to kiss you."

"Erik..."

He turned. "I know, Linda. I know that I remind you of your father. And I know that you're a lesbian. That doesn't matter to me. I appreciate you for who you are, and that's enough."

"You...you knew?"

"Not at first. But I do have a 190 I.Q., I eventually figure out these things."

I shook my head. "I'm not a genius like you are, Erik. If you've figured this thing out, it wasn't because of me."

"Genius has very little to do with intelligence. Einstein was no smarter than you are, yet he gave us equations that, to this day, are a fundamental part of science. You know, I met Lex Luthor once. Absolutely brilliant, yet he, much like Edison, hires others to do the real work. All that it has ever taken, to grasp the stars, is to have inspiration and ambition."

He looked at me wistfully. "I had the ambition. But you were my inspiration." He typed in a keystroke, and the mighty EM generator roared into life, even as the lab was sealed. "Oh..sorry, I guess I should have asked if you wanted to run in terror first."

I laughed. "No. I want to see this."

"There's a good chance we'll just be subtracting the old intrinsic field again."

"I better get out the popcorn, that's always a good show."

"Indeed!" He opened the glass chamber and put in our test target, a 'black box' in a titanium steel alloy shell, stamped with the words 'IF FOUND, RETURN TO S.T.A.R. LABS' on it's face.

We put on our goggles and stepped back as he fired the pulse. And...nothing happened.

I sighed. "It's the #4 capacitor again, I'll get it."

He stopped me. "No no, it's my turn, remember?" He walked over, opened a panel, and tapped the component with his fist. It's a minor short that we hadn't been able to find, but good old percussion maintenance seemed to work just fine.

"There, good enough for the Russians, good enough for me."

And then all hell broke loose. Had he forgotten to interrupt the field generator? Was there a fault in the software? Was his program bugged?

I never found out. All I know is, the EM field manifested. All the metal objects near me rattled ominously, and my glasses simply flew off my face! I watched in horror, spellbound, as the space around the central dais warped, and I could see a disc appear in mid-air, at the center of the EM field. A literal warp in space. I saw a bright sky, an ocean, and a sandy white beach.

The disc expanded, becoming a sphere. Erik tried to run, but he was pulled in, as if it was gravity and he was a leaf on the wind.

"Linda..I...love..."

And then there was a flash of light. I dived to the floor, and hit my head. Hard.

When I came to, there was no sign of Erik Ronick. His intrinsic field had been rather permanently subtracted.

-

When security unsealed the lab, I was still crying. Director Vance could have been a bitch; we had violated safety protocols. But instead, she sent me home and told me to take some time off.

But how could I? Two nights later, I was back in the lab, trying to figure out what had gone wrong. I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer, so I lay my head down.

A loud bang woke me up instantly. I heard a female voice. "Ow!"

"Who's there?!" I stood up, reaching for the only weapon I had available; a flashlight.

"An interesting question. I'm not sure how to reply to it, really."

I walked closer. There, leaning against the side of the EM generator, was a girl! She was a tiny thing, and at first, I thought she might be a child, but then she turned, and I could see she was definitely a teenager. I also saw something else disturbing.

"Your leg!"

"Huh?" She looked. Where her left leg below the knee should be, was nothing but a faint cloud of Cherenkov radiation. "Oh, that. Yeah, I've had bits and pieces of me vanishing off and on for awhile now. At least it's not my head again, that's really damn disturbing."

I blinked at her. I guess she was probably sixteen, with long honey-blonde hair. Very attractive, with flawless skin and a really nice figure. She was also very tiny, as I said.

"It will come back?"

"Oh yeah. Here it comes now." Sure enough, the blue radiation reformed into a perfect leg. "Can you help me up?"

I took her hand and helped her to her feet. My God, she really was a tiny thing! Her head only came up to my chest!

"Woah. You're a tall one!"

"Huh? No dear, I'm only 5' 5"."

"Oh. Wow. Talk about mass displacement. Hey, um, before I start losing pieces again, you think you would mind bolstering my intrinsic field with yon Dragon over here?" She gestured to the EM field generator.

"What? No, I need to call security. How did you get in here anyways? And why are you naked?!"

She sighed. "Please don't do that. I don't want to be poked and prodded until I have the chance to figure this out. As to how I got here, duh, I teleported! And um, about being naked...well, I guess massive EM fields aren't so kind to clothes."

"Give me one good reason why..."

Just then, she fell to the floor. Not because she slipped or anything. No, it was because her entire body below the waist simply vanished, to be replaced by a cloud of blue radioactive particles!

"Oh...ow...that hurt."

"My God! Are you ok!?"

"Well, yes and no. I mean, I'm half the person I used to be! Heh...in more ways than one." She giggled. "No, it doesn't hurt, I'm still there, just...not very solid. Could you please help me, Linda?"

That part of me that wanted to be a nurse came to the fore, and I picked her up and dragged her to the glass chamber. Her legs returned, and she was able to half-crawl, half-walk inside it.

"I don't know what settings to use!"

She frowned. "Uh...setting 19. No wait! 16! Yeah, that's it."

Frantic, I logged in and changed the field settings. "It needs a password!"

"It's SaintJoan."

I typed it in. "There, that...wait."

I looked to the girl, my eyes wide.

The field started up and she looked at me sheepishly. "Uh, hi again. It's me, Erik."

-

I didn't faint. But I do distinctly recall sitting on the floor when the machine powered down and the girl let herself out. She walked up and crouched next to me. "Linda? Linda? Please be okay!"

I blinked. "You can't be Erik."

"I'm inclined to believe you. Erik is a tall old guy. I'm anything but! However, I know stuff only he would know. Like who you are. Or the six passwords that could let me shut this place down forever. So...that does beg some questions, doesn't it?"

I hugged her. "Oh God, I thought you were dead...you jerk! You jerk! How could you do that?! How could you die on me!"

"Linda...I'm sorry."

I looked down at her. "And then you died telling me you love me?!"

She blushed. "I...it seemed like a good idea at the time. If I die again, maybe I should go out on a joke?"

I took off my labcoat and put it around her shoulders. It's damn cold in the lab, and for good reason! Needless to say, it hung on her like a tent.

"Thanks, it was a bit chilly in here."

"How..why are you a girl?"

"Honestly? I have no idea. It felt like I was in the wormhole forever, falling towards that damn beach. The whole time, my body kept phasing in and out of existence. By the time I landed on the beach, my body parts were coming back...different. I have no idea where I was, the stars were totally wrong."

"So how did you get back?"

"To be honest? I have no idea. I couldn't explore very much. Every few minutes I'd lose a foot or something else kind of vital. And yes, I did lose my head, or at least parts of it. You have no idea how weird that was. I could still think like it was there, but...yeah."

"And you eventually turned into this girl?"

She nodded. "I just hope that in some alternate universe, there isn't a pretty girl who got stuck turning into me. That wouldn't be very pleasant."

I hugged her again.

"Hey..oh hell, I really had you upset, didn't I? I'm so sorry, Linda."

"Are you stable now?"

"I think so. I feel stable, at least."

"You seem to be...well, taking this pretty calmly."

"I know! I think that's odd too. Maybe it's just the novelty of it all. I mean, I should be dead. And I mean, really dead! Instead, I'm alive. And young again. And a girl. Uh...I know this sounds vain, but...am I pretty?"

I went through my purse and found my compact. I didn't use it much, but it's handy to have one around. "Here."

She looked at herself. "Oh...oh wow. I'm...hot!"

I giggled. "Yes, you are. I'm jealous."

"I can't stay here."

I nodded. "I know. You'll have to come to my place while we figure this out. Those passwords, they involve shutting down security checkpoints?"

"What passwords?"

"The six passwords that can shut this place down?"

"Oh...those passwords. Yes."

"Good."

-

In the end, I was able to smuggle her out of the building without being observed, and incidentally, destroying a lot of data. Not on the other projects, but on ours, and all the security logs, files, and camera feeds. If anyone asked, well, I was on leave, remember?

By the time I got back to my apartment, Erik...Erika? Whoever she was, she was sleeping softly. She looked a lot younger when she was asleep. I'm told most people do, but I was struck by it.

I carried her in, she didn't weigh much at all, and put her in my bed. I should have slept on the couch, but I needed to touch her. To know she was real, and that this wasn't a dream. So I put my arms around her and held her while we slept.

She cuddled up next to me, and I let exhaustion take me.

-

I awoke to the smell of cooked bacon. Sitting up, I realized I was alone in bed. Putting on a gown, I walked out into the kitchen, only to find Erik, dressed in one of my shirts (which served her quite well as a nightshirt, I might add) cooking breakfast.

I noted with a smirk that she was standing on my footstool. What can I say, reaching the top shelf isn't as easy at it sounds!

"Breakfast?"

"Morning, Linda. I already ate, and I was working on seconds when I thought you might be hungry too."

"Seconds? Where would you put them, are you hollow inside?"

"I don't think so, but I'm ravenous!"

I got myself some juice and sat down, just staring at her until a thought came to me. "You must be a metahuman."

"You think so too?" She hopped off the footstool and slid an omelette and bacon onto my plate. "I figured it was the most likely scenario for my survival. Somehow, rather than teleport things, what we were actually doing was punching little holes in reality. Accessing pocket universes. And I got sucked into one."

"That doesn't explain your transformation though."

"I'm willing to bet normal people wouldn't survive having body parts dematerialize on them. Plus, the magnetic forces in the wormhole must be immense. Enough to kill a human, easily. So I mutated to survive."

"...magnetic force strong enough to rebuild someone from the ground up..." I remembered his words.

"Yep! I'm going to have to do some serious research, but I do recall a Japanese scientist making some comments about how one's environment interacts with the awakening of the metagene."

"Genes don't work that way." I gestured at her with my fork, then ate the bite of omelette. It was really good!

"Sue me, I'm a physicist, not a geneticist!" She put her hands on her hips, then giggled as she turned to make herself more food.

"Still not going crazy over your lost manhood?"

"No, and that's weird. I've never entertained a thought about being a girl in my life. At least, not that I could recall. My opinion on the matter was much like Lazarus Long's."

I chuckled. "You're too old to figure out the new plumbing?"

"Something like that. I haven't read 'Time Enough For Love' in years. But no, really, I feel really enthusiastic for some reason. I mean, I have no idea what I'm going to do with my life now. I have no identity, no place to go."

"You have me." I don't know why I said that.

"Thank you, Linda. But I can't be a burden to you like that."

"Erik...you're not a burden to me."

She sighed and turned off the stove, walking back over to me. "Linda. You're too young to be burdened with a child."

"You're not a child!"

She frowned. "I feel like one! I mean, how else could I possibly screw this up?! I hurt you, I ruined all our work, I forced you to have to deal with my feelings for you...and now, as if I haven't screwed it up badly enough, even if you did find me attractive this way, I'm the one who's too young now!"

I blinked. "I thought you weren't upset."

"Hm. So did I. Well, I'm not crying, that's something."

"Erik. I do find you attractive." Don't do it!, screamed my inner voice. Which I decided to ignore.

"Uh...but..."

"Come here."

She walked over to me and I kissed her. I thought it might be hard, given how young she looked, but it wasn't. It was easy. Great, Linda. Now you're a pedophile. I really hated my inner voice! What was it Heinlein called it? My worse, if wiser, self.

At first she was shocked, but then she warmed up to my kiss, and it wasn't long before we were making out like a couple of horny teenagers. When I kissed her on the neck, however, she froze.

"Oh. Man."

"Erik?"

"Sorry, it's not you. God, it feels good. But, um...reality is setting in. I'm a girl!"

I wanted to laugh, but I knew that would hurt her. She was really fragile right now. "I'm afraid so."

"It's kind of scary."

"Do you want me to stop?"

"Yes! No! Uh...maybe?" She frowned.

I took her hand in mine. "We can take this slow, there's no need to rush."

"Part of me is relieved."

"And the other part?"

She frowned. "The other part is feeling really frustrated right now."

I did laugh then. "A part of me feels the same way."

"We should finish, then."

"Erik...you don't need to..."

"Rhea."

I blinked. "Huh?"

"Call me Rhea. Rhea Jones." She grinned.

"You just thought up a new name like that?"

"Yeah, isn't that cool?" She did a half-spin, and then I found her in my lap. She was deliciously lap sized, and I held her close.

"Yes, it's very cool."

"Ah, but that's not all!" She reached out her hand, and my silverware flew off the table to crash on the floor.

"Er. That wasn't what I had in mind."

I blinked. Again! "What did you do?"

"Well, uh...I seem to have magnetic powers. Kind of."

"You're generating a magnetic field?!"

"Uh...yeah. But it shouldn't hurt you!"

"Of course. Metahuman. Superpowers." I shook my head. "This is going to take some getting used to."

She cuddled in my arms. "I'm sorry."

I kissed her hair. "Don't be. We'll figure this out, somehow."

-

After getting a shower in, I went out and got Rhea some clothing that more or less fit her (she has a better figure than the vast majority of girls her age). I remember the clerk giving me an odd look when she checked my ID, but I didn't think much of it.

We slept together that night, but we didn't do much. Some heavy petting and kissing, I swear! We both had some reservations about our situation.

The next morning, I woke to the smell of french toast. Oh God, Rhea was such a good cook! I padded into the bathroom and turned to face my reflection. And got the shock of my life when a very surprised-looking teenaged girl stared back at me.

"Oh my God...Rhea!?!!"

She practically ran into the room. "What? What's wrong?!"

I looked at her. She looked at me. And a heartbeat later, we both spoke at the same time.

"Oh hell."

---

To be continued!