John always felt that slipping tasted like purple.  Try as he might, it was the only description he could think of.  It wasn’t grapes or figs or plums or any of the other foods associated with the color purple.  He couldn’t put his finger on it but knew deep down that slipping tasted purple.

 Today there was a bit of iron in the taste too.

John opened his eyes.  He always reflexively closed them during a slip.  He wasn’t sure what it looked like when he slipped or if he’d go blind or anything but for some reason or another his eyes would slam shut right as he slipped.

“What the hell happened to you?” Lenny yelled from his desk a few meters from the slip-gate.

“I think I failed the mission,” John replied.

 Lenny stared at John in disbelief.

“Oh, you mean the blood?”  John gave himself a quick once over.  He was essentially covered head to toe in blood and possibly some entrails.  That explained the iron taste.

“Yes, the blood!” 

Lenny reached into a drawer in his desk and pulled out a towel which he promptly tossed in John’s direction.  The towel hit John square in the chest and dropped to the floor.  Lenny honestly wondered if John even noticed.

“Well it’s not my blood,” John said.  He rubbed a finger along his coat and licked it.  “Yep, not mine.”  He picked up the towel and began haphazardly wiping the blood off.

“How would you know by tasting it?” Lenny started to ask but thought better of it.  John, like most slip-divers, was a bit on the weird side.  It took a special sort of mind to be able to keep sane while slipping in between parallel worlds.

“So, what happened this time?” Lenny asked instead.

“There was a chase, some gunshots, an explosion, and finally, a bus.  I think it was in that order too.”  John took one last wipe and nonchalantly tossed his blood covered towel back at Lenny.  Lenny dodged the gore covered linen, hearing the damp splat as it hit the floor behind him.

“Should I go back in now?” John asked.  He hadn’t moved from the slip pad since he arrived back in his own universe a few minutes ago.  He scooped some more viscera out of his hair and tossed it at the floor.  With the same hand he reached in his mouth and tried to pick something out of his teeth.

Lenny was trying desperately not to retch at the sight.  He swiveled in his chair and looked away, taking deep breaths.  A quick look at the floor revealed a trail of blood and innards behind the crimson-soaked towel.  He felt the vomit rushing up his esophagus and fought hard to keep it from flying out of his mouth.  He swallowed hard and turned his chair back to John.

“John,” Lenny said and then cleared his throat.

“Sup?”  John was digging in one of his ears and staring at the ceiling.

“Maybe you should clean up first,” Lenny suggested.

“Didn’t I just do that?” John answered honestly.

“No, if anything you just made it worse and made a mess out of the slip room.  Like maybe go take a shower.”  Lenny wondered if a shower would be enough to actually get all of the blood off of John.

“Sure thing, Len.  You’re the boss.”  John pointed at Lenny with not one, but two finger guns and began walking out of the large chamber.  Every step made a squishy, wet sound that John was either oblivious or apathetic towards.  He whistled the entire time as he left the room, leaving a trail of bloody footprints.

Lenny slumped back in his office chair as the automatic doors closed behind John.  He exhaled deeply before picking the phone off his desk and calling maintenance to clean up the mess.  He jotted down a note to dock John’s pay for the cleaning bill.

John strolled back into the slip chamber about an hour and a half later.  He whistled that same unfamiliar tune as he casually strolled back up to the slip-pad.  He couldn’t remember where he learned the tune but it was stuck in his head.  He wondered if maybe he learned it from himself during one of his slips.  Or herself.  Or possibly a cat version of John.  The fun thing about slipping universes is that every option is equally as likely.  John shrugged and put his hands on the rails of the slip-pad.  He didn’t think about these things too much which was probably what made him an appealing agent for slipping.

“Alright John, you ready?”  Lenny asked.

John didn’t answer, instead putting on a pair of sunglasses and throwing a very enthusiastic thumbs up in Lenny’s general direction.

“What’s with the sunglasses?”  Lenny made the mistake of asking.

“Don’t want to hurt my eyes when I slip,” John replied honestly.  “I think it might be bright when I slip but I’m not sure since I’ve never actually looked.  Or I may have once.  The other me that is; I don’t know what other John is up to, but I’d say it’s possible he looked once and that’s why I think its bright to slip.”

Lenny sat there with his mouth agape, in awe at the jumble of nonsense that spewed from John’s mouth.  He shook his head and rolled his eyes at the lunatic on the pad, struggling to regain his professional demeanor.

“Anyways,” Lenny began, “you know the target, so we don’t need to go over that again.  I’m going to tune the slip for a 1.15; it should give you a little more leeway than the last slip.”

John nodded and pulled out a piece of gum.  He put it in his mouth and began chewing.

“It helps with the purple taste,” he stated as he pointed to his mouth, chewing and grinning like an idiot.

Lenny shook his head and began to tune the slip machine.  He adjusted the reality scale to a 1.15.  The reality scale was a measurement of how close to our reality the one they were slipping to was.  A 1.0 was for all intents and purposes identical to their own and took the least amount of energy to travel to.

The tenths spot determined universal changes from their own reality.  The higher the value, the more differences between their own universe and the next.  The normal setting was a .1.  This setting pretty much guaranteed that the only major difference was that the target was going to die if nothing was done in the target’s dimension.  The company operated this way in order to keep a balance in the multiverse to the best of their ability.  After all, there are infinite universes where the target is alive and infinite where the target is dead at any given time.  Pull the target from a universe where it is supposed to be alive could result in an untold number of different universes never coming into existence.  Pull the target from a world where they were moments away from their demise and it meant limited damage to the multiverse.  Or at least they assumed that was the case.  No one knew for sure either way but better safe than sorry was the company’s view on the whole thing.

The number in the hundredths spot determined how situationally different the adjacent universe would be.  It was a localized change to the situation the target would be in at the point before it ceased living.  A lower value for less changes, a higher value for drastic situational changes.  Considering that last run on a 1.1 included an explosion, gunfights, and an errant bus, Lenny decided the extra deviation would be worth the extra cost.  After all, the more differences between your world and the next, the more energy needed to slip between the two.

“Any questions John?” Lenny asked as he finished tuning the slip.

John let out a loud “Woooo!” and gave two thumbs up to Lenny.

“Goddam moron,” Lenny whispered under his breath.  He began the countdown.

“Slipping in 3… 2… 1…”  Lenny counted off.

John closed his eyes and vanished from their reality.  A few moments later he was standing on the pad again.

“Ah crap,” John said. “I closed my eyes again.  I wanted to see if it was bright or not.  Definitely still tastes purple though.”

Lenny jumped from his chair at the sight of John.  John looked as if he had been abandoned on an island somewhere for the past six months.  His hair was shaggy and he had a full beard.  One of the lenses was gone from his sunglasses and the remaining one had deep crack in it.  His suit was in tatters and one of his shoes was completely missing.  Lenny was also pretty sure he could smell John from his desk.

“What the hell happened this time!” Lenny yelled, partly concerned for John’s safety and partly in anger over another failed mission.

“What?”  John asked, as oblivious as ever.

Lenny gave an exaggerated motion towards John’s attire.

“Oh, this?” John looked himself up and down.  “I’ve been abandoned on an island somewhere for the past six months.  Funny story actually…”

“I don’t want to know,” Lenny said honestly before John could explain.  “Just go clean up and we’ll give it another shot.”

“Sure thing, boss man,” John said before strutting off the pad, whistling the same tune that he may have learned from himself in a different universe.  Or not, he wasn’t sure.

John stood on the pad, once again ready to slip.  This time he was wearing a full track suit instead of his usual business casual attire.  His face was dotted with bits of tissue paper where he had nicked himself while shaving his castaway beard off.  He didn’t bother with the sunglasses this time.

“Alright John, we’re doing a 2.1 this time,” Lenny said as tuning the slip-drive.

“Yes!  Superpowers!” John ran down from the slip pad to Lenny’s desk and held his hand above the desk, expectantly waiting for a high five.  After a few moments of waiting fruitlessly, he high fived himself with his other hand and hurried back to the pad, albeit slightly dejected.

Changes in the absolute number on the scale meant changes in the laws that govern their universe.  Typically, the company used a 2.0 to give slip agents an edge in the new universe.  For example, this 2.1 that John was going to could have lower gravity than our own universe.  This meant that John would be stronger and faster than the residents of that world.  The company only allowed universal changes as a last resort as the energy to travel from this world to one that different was unfathomable.  The more energy you use, the higher the operating cost.  They were already over budget for this mission but the only thing worse than a negative balance was bad consumer reviews.

“Stay focused John and get the job done.”  Lenny began firing up the slip sequence.

“Let’s do this!”  John said and shadow boxed the air in front of him.

Lenny shook his head in disdain.

“Slipping in 3… 2… 1…”

John held his breath and closed his eyes while raising one hand up with a thumbs up before promptly vanishing.  Moments later he was back.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me.”  Lenny muttered at the sight of John.  He dropped his head to his desk and continued to swear under his breath.

John stood on the pad, clothed in a white latex leotard from neck to foot with a long flowing purple cape.  In the center of the leotard was a cartoon image of a giant thumbs up.

“Lenny, it’s me John!”  AwesomeMan said, revealing his secret identity to his old friend.  “That world was great, I saved so many people!  Do you have any water?  I can’t get the purple taste out of my mouth.”

Lenny opened a drawer without looking and reached in and grabbed a small bottle of water.  He lifted his head and tossed the water at John.  It bounced off the side of John’s head and landed on his cape.

“Thanks chum!”  John said.  He picked up the water and took a sip, washing the purple taste away.

“We are so getting fired,” Lenny muttered to himself.  He waved a hand at John.  “Go get changed and we’ll give this one more try,” Lenny said, defeated.

“You got it boss!” John replied.  He dropped to one knee and pushed off the ground like he was trying to fly, instead barely jumping a few inches.  On landing he tangled himself in his cape and almost fell to the ground.  John quickly straightened himself up and gave a quick look around to see if anyone saw before strutting out of the slip chamber.  He was humming that same tune that he may or may not have learned from himself.

John stood on the pad, wearing jeans, a t-shirt and sandals.  He jammed his pinky finger in his nose and explored for a moment.  After retrieving his finger, he proceeded to flick the nasal contents stuck to the tip aside before wiping his hand on his jeans.

“You disgust me,” Lenny said.

“What?” John asked innocently.

Lenny shook his head and began programing the slip-drive.  He set the computer to a random number and clicked through the numerous warning screens that popped up.

“John, you screw this up again and we are both out of a job,” Lenny explained.  “Get it done.”

“You got it Len!”  John replied enthusiastically.  “What’s the setting this time?” He began to ask, cut off as Lenny hit the button to slip John out of this existence.

Moments later, John was standing on the pad wearing the same suit he had been wearing on the first slip.  In one hand he held a small purple drink and in the other a small pet carrier.

“Wow, that was bright!” John exclaimed.  I should really close my eyes next time I do that.”  He scrunched his face up and blinked a few times.

“Please tell me that is the target.”  Lenny pleaded.

“Think so.”  John motioned his purple drink to Lenny.  “This tastes like purple.  Not grape or fig or plum, but purple.  I wish I could explain it better.”  He took another sip.

“John, I don’t care in the slightest about your drink.  What I do care about is if that is the target or not,” Lenny said as he walked up to the slip pad.  He knelt before the carrier and inside was a small black and white cat with bright yellow eyes.  It looked back at Lenny from inside the carrier and cocked its head slightly at the strange man looking in at it.  He pulled a picture out of his pocket and compared the two.  As far as Lenny could tell the cat in the picture was identical to the one in the crate.

“Good work John, looks like you did it.”  Lenny slapped John on the shoulder and nodded at him in approval. Why don’t you bring the target to the waiting room and then let the front office know to call the client.”

“Sure thing, buddy.”  John strolled out of the room, sipping the small cup of purple drink.  From inside the carrier came a whistling tune that Lenny could swear he had heard before.

“Hey, that’s a great tune cat.”  John said as he left the room.  “Lemme try it out with you.”  The two whistled the now too familiar tune in tandem as the door slid shut behind them. 

Lenny tried not to think about it too much as he tossed the photo in the garbage next to his desk.  The photo landed upside down, exposing some writing on the back side.  Lenny knelt over the garbage and squinted trying to make out the writing.

“Rest in peace John.” Lenny read aloud.  He grabbed the photo and looked it over, then looked at the door that John had just left through, then back at the photo.

“Well that’s a weird coincidence.”  Lenny tossed the photo back in the garbage, grabbed his coat off the chair and went home.