Crossed Over by Sandra McDonald Part 1
Roy DeSoto and Johnny Gage (picture courtesy Tigger - Thanks!)		Galen, Pete Burke and Alan Virdon

 

Roy DeSoto felt muffled. Swaddled. Wrapped in thick, suffocating layers of cotton. He tried to move but couldn't, tried to talk but found his tongue thick and useless.

"I think this one's coming around, Alan," someone said from far away.

Coming around? Had he been unconscious? Why? The darkness and thickness kept answers from him. Maybe he was brain damaged, permanently trapped in an unresponsive body. Fear prompted him to lash out, to put every ounce of strength he could into movement. He thought he felt his right hand twitch.

"Easy," the man's voice said. It had a slight echo to it. Maybe Roy's hearing was off, too. "You're going to be okay," the unseen man continued. "You're safe."

Safe from what? Roy added that question to his list of worries. He tried to remember why he would be unconscious. Being a firefighter/paramedic for Los Angeles County provided more than enough opportunities to be hurt in the line of duty. Just living in earthquake-prone L.A. and driving on the freeways sometimes felt like a crapshoot with danger. If he concentrated very hard, he remembered having breakfast in the sunny kitchen nook at home. His wife Joanne had fixed him grapefruit and pancakes while the kids watched loud cartoons in the family room. He would have gone off to work after that, would have reported to Station 51 in Carson, California, would have gone on the first run of the day with his partner, John Gage -

"Can you hear me?" Cool hands cupped Roy's face. "Hey, are you awake now?"

Roy realized, belatedly, that he'd opened his eyes. To Roy's disappointment, the man above him was not a doctor. At least he wasn't dressed like a doctor. The stranger was about Roy's own age, maybe a couple of years younger. He had dark curly hair and tanned skin. His blue shirt looked worn, dirty and woven out of coarse cotton.

"You're okay," the man said.

Roy's professional opinion differed. He figured he had a concussion at the very least, and who knew what other injuries once he checked himself over. His vision wasn't working too well, because when he tried to focus past the man's face he thought he saw walls of jagged rock.

"Maybe a little something to drink will help," the man said.

Before Roy could protest, the stranger was lifting his head and holding a cup of water to his lips. No, no! Roy shouted in his head. Although well meaning, the gesture was very dangerous. Never give an unconscious or semi-conscious person fluids, not until you were sure he or she could swallow. The water was just as likely to go down his windpipe as his throat. But the stranger either didn't know that or didn't remember it, and warm liquid trickled past Roy's lips into his mouth.

He managed to swallow the first mouthful, and then gagged and turned his head aside. The stranger rolled him onto his side and pounded on his back a little. Roy coughed and sputtered as his gaze fell on John Gage just a few feet away. Johnny looked dead. A blond man knelt beside him, pressing wet cloths against the other paramedic's forehead.

"Johnny," Roy croaked out.

"He's still out cold," the blond said.

The dark-haired man asked, "What happened to you two? Did you run into Urko's soldiers?"

"More importantly," his friend said, with urgency in his voice, "these uniforms - where did you get them? And the tools you were carrying?"

Still coughing, Roy closed his eyes. Their questions made no sense at all, and he just wanted to sink back into the heavy darkness that still occupied half his brain. He figured if he gave into it, the next time he woke it would be in a sunny hospital room at Rampart General. Or back home in bed with Joanne. This was obviously some hallucination induced by head trauma. But he couldn't be absolutely sure of that. And what about Johnny? If this was real, Roy owed it to his friend and partner to check his injuries and render whatever medical assistance he could.

"Hold on, there," the dark-haired man said as Roy struggled to sit up. "Where are you going?"

"Johnny." Roy ignored the fuzziness at the edge of his vision and the vertigo in his head. He felt the stranger grip his shoulders to keep him upright, and appreciated the help. "Paramedic. Let me help."

The blond man stared at Roy intently. "Who taught you that word, 'paramedic?' Was it someone who had these clothes? Did you find them in one of the cities? Were there any more?"

The dark-haired one rose to Roy's defense. "Alan, slow down, okay?"

"Pete, they could know something important - "

"I know, but you can't ask him a million things at once - "

Roy noticed three things. The walls were definitely rock, meaning they were underground or in some cave. And the cave or cellar or whatever was lit by a burning torch - a fire hazard, that - which told him they weren't hooked up to the city power grid. Observation number three was the foul smell of the place - sweaty, moldy, damp, with just a hint of old urine.

Great. Just his and Johnny's luck. Whatever had happened, they'd been rescued by some homeless men living, however improbably, in a cave in Los Angeles.

There aren't any caves in Los Angeles, a little voice whispered in his head, but Roy pushed aside the thought and lurched toward his partner. As long as he kept his neck straight, he could ignore the crick that ran from his shoulder to his left ear. His right leg was all pins-and-needles, but his left knee supported his weight. Johnny's face was covered with dirt and soot, but his pulse was strong and he had no obvious injuries. Roy groped for the tool pouch on his belt but it had been removed.

"I need my penlight," Roy said.

Alan and Pete had been watching him intently. Now they exchanged glances. Alan asked, "What are you going to do with it?"

Roy found it easier to talk now, to string words into sentences that made sense. "I told you, I'm a paramedic. I need to check his pupils."

"I don't think he's kidding, Alan," Pete said. "Your uniform's for real?"

"Of course it's for real," Roy replied, beginning to get impatient.

Alan didn't say a word, but instead got him the tool pouch. Roy checked out the pupillary response in Johnny's right eye. As he checked the left, the younger paramedic groaned.

"Quit that," Johnny protested.

"Johnny, can you hear me?"

"Of course I can." Johnny sounded irritated. "I can hear all of you. Quit shouting. I've got a lousy hangover."

"It's not a hangover," Roy said, although for a moment he had his doubts. Was it possible that they'd gone to someone's bachelor party or retirement bash, had a few too many 'Fireman's Specials' at the bar, gotten into some kind of accident on the way home, and then been rescued by two homeless men living in that improbable Los Angeles cave?

No, probably not.

"You're really a paramedic?" Alan asked.

The tone under the question - awed, hopeful, shocked, heartbroken - convinced Roy more than anything that this hallucination was real. The knot of worry in his gut tightened.

"Roy DeSoto, L.A. County. This is my partner, John Gage. Who are you?"

Alan sat back against a wall, looking shell-shocked. Explanations fell to Pete. "I'm Pete Burke. Er, Major Pete Burke. This is Colonel Alan Virdon. We're astronauts. Or we were."

Roy kept his face carefully neutral. "This doesn't look like NASA."

Pete snorted. "It's not. Believe me, it's not. Do you remember how you got here?"

"No," Roy admitted. "Johnny?"

Johnny lifted himself up on his elbows. Lines of puzzlement creased his forehead. "We were on a run. Something blew up, I think. Where's everyone?"

"There's just us," Pete said. "And some nasty surprises just outside this cave."

"Where's the nearest phone?" Roy asked.

Pete snickered as if Roy's question was the funniest thing he'd heard in a long time.

"There's no phone," Alan said quietly. "No phones, radios, TVs, anything. No other firemen or paramedics or astronauts. Somehow you've managed to travel through time, like we did. It's now sometime after the year 3080."

"Okay," Johnny said, in the same tone he used when they were dealing with crazy patients. "It's the future, huh? Who's the president?"

"There's no president," Pete said. "There's no United States."

"Thank you for helping us," Roy said. He clipped his pouch onto his belt. He didn't know how he was going to stand up on his own, he didn't even know if Johnny could walk yet, but he resolved to crawl out with one hand dragging his partner if it came down to it. "We really should be getting back to our station. Our captain's going to be worried about us."

A shuffling noise and a new voice at the far end of the cave cut off whatever Pete or Alan would have said to him. "I'm back!" someone called. "I found some fruit that hasn't gone bad yet. How are they?"

"Shell-shocked," Pete said. "But I think the worst is yet to come, Galen."

"What does 'shell-shocked' mean?"

The newcomer - Galen - shuffled into view. Roy expected the voice to belong to a young man, and it did, except this young man was wearing a Halloween costume. He looked exactly like a monkey. A monkey with neatly groomed hair, wearing a leather tunic and leather boots. He even walked like a monkey, all hunched over, his hairy hands curled loosely around a straw basket.

"That's a great costume," Roy said, dazed.

Galen came closer, so close that Roy could see his nostrils moving in and out. Bright eyes considered the paramedic.

"What's a 'costume?'" he asked, revealing brown animal teeth with little bits of banana stuck between them.

Darkness rushed in and saved Roy from answering.

***

The next time Roy woke, he found Johnny sitting cross-legged by his side. Johnny looked awake, alert and scrubbed clean of dirt. He was cleaning his fingernails with his scissors. Roy couldn't see Pete, Alan or that mon - no. His thoughts veered away sharply from that last clear memory.

"Hey, there," Johnny said, relieved. "How you feeling?"

Roy didn't answer. He tugged on the itchy rectangle of cloth that passed as a blanket.

Johnny stilled him with a press of his hand. "No, leave that on. Did you know you've got a big bump on your head? And a concussion, I'm guessing. Whatever happened, you got the worst of it."

"What did happen?" Roy asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine."

"You don't seem too upset."

"I was pretty upset when you keeled over on top of me," Johnny admitted. "You thirsty or hungry? They've got some water here, and something that kinda tastes like an orange."

"Where are they?" Roy asked.

"They said something about getting more food. I think they didn't want to freak you out any more than you already are."

"I'm not 'freaked out,'" Roy protested. "That guy really looked like a monkey, that's all."

"He really is a monkey, Roy. Well, a chimpanzee. All chimpanzees are apes, but not all apes are chimpanzees, you know?"

Another odd scenario presented itself to Roy's mind. This was all a joke. Some big fat joke perpetrated by their co-worker at Station 51, Chet Kelly. It wasn't funny, but then again, most of Chet's jokes weren't. Johnny was obviously in on the whole thing, otherwise he wouldn't be looking so calm and composed.

Johnny held up his hand. "Before you start looking at me like I'm crazy, do you remember the run we were on when everything went kablooey?"

"No," Roy admitted. "Tell me."

"We were at Mammoth Studios, on the backlot. One of the sets caught fire."

Roy shifted uncomfortably. He didn’t like lying on the ground, but he wasn't too confident about sitting up yet. "So?"

"Remember that show that Chet, Marco and I like to watch on Friday nights? The one based on that Charlton Heston movie?"

Aside from the news and occasional classic movies, Roy didn't watch much television. He preferred books. "No."

"It's a science-fiction show," Johnny persisted. "Filmed at Mammoth. I think somehow we got stuck in it."

"Johnny, I have no idea what you're talking about," Roy said, annoyed at the prospect of yet another of his partner's crazy ideas.

Johnny leaned closer. "Roy, listen to me. I think we're trapped in the TV series 'The Planet of the Apes!'"

Part Two: Is it true? Can our two heroes be trapped in a TV show? And what happens when they cross over into the next "universe" - and meet the Rookies?!

Author's Notes: Grateful thanks to Terry Odell, Cindy Hudson and Susan for their beta-reading. They caught mistakes I'm too ashamed to admit! Any remaining typos or goofs are entirely my own fault.