E-Catalyst

By John O'Riley

When fifteen-year-old Jeremy Marshall goes on a family vacation to watch a rare astronomical event, he and his sister get a lot more than they bargained for. As particles from a nearby comet rain down into Earth’s atmosphere, an electrical discharge vaporizes millions of people worldwide including his parents. As survivors grieve for their loved ones they lost in this horrible event, a biological contagion begins to mutate plants, insects, animals and even people.

Jeremy’s sister has a theory that all of those people who disappeared weren’t killed; instead, she believes they’ve been transported to an alternate reality. When Jeremy, his sister and two of his friends develop extrasensory abilities, they are recruited by the FBI who believe their new power may be the key to saving the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dreamy Worlds Publications
• Release date: May 20, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370610198

John O'Riley

John O'Riley has been writing as far back as he can remember. He is an award winning fiction writer and the author of the Grumpy Old Wizards series, The Winters Family Psi Chronicles series, and the Wizards of Seattle series. His movie feature screenplay, Cursed, is an Honorable Mention Winner for the 2012 Screenplay Festival. His most recent accomplishments include the screenplays New Earth, Pinky Swear, and Mutant Wizards in the 2014 Filmmakers International Screenplay Awards which made it to Quarter-Finalist status. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Spanish and French and worked in and managed a variety of bookstores including Borders. He currently resides in Washington state and has a parakeet companion named Amy who sings like a canary to help encourage and inspire him. He loves reading fantasy, science fiction, and humorous fiction. Some of his favorite authors include Kim Harrison, Jim Butcher, S.J. Viehl, Kat Richardson, J.K. Rowling, Angie Sage, Jayne Krentz, and Dima Zales.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Bursell’s Comet was an astronomer’s dream come true and one of the most exciting events I had ever witnessed in my entire life. Not that I have much experience under my belt at only fifteen years of age, but I have yet to meet anyone who wasn’t awed by the sight of the immense comet with a coma that was 8 times larger than the moon, cutting a blazing swath of silver in its wake. Over the last several weeks, I spent many nights watching its approach. Several days ago, it finally reached its closest point to the planet at approximately 1,207,400 miles and would remain visible to the naked eye for several more months. Debris from the comet had already begun to rain down on our atmosphere several days ago, offering a spectacular lightshow of shooting stars predicted to last for five more evenings with the greatest accumulation of the debris impacting our atmosphere tonight.

Dad was heavily invested in Bursell’s Comet and had developed a somewhat obnoxious habit of lecturing my sister and me about comets, meteors, and asteroids. At first, it was fun to learn that shooting stars were really space debris, meteors and meteorites entering our planet’s atmosphere. Or that comets are comprised of three main parts—a nucleus, which is the solid inner mass, the coma, which is the large gaseous part that surrounds the nucleus, and of course the tail. Eventually these informational talks became a bit tiresome to me, especially as Dad tends to repeat himself many times. My sister, Patricia, appears to hang on every word he says. I have a hard time believing that she doesn’t find the lectures to be at least somewhat tedious when she seems to have a photographic memory. She rarely studies for any classes and yet she effortlessly glides through Hill Crest High School with straight A’s while taking courses at our local community college in Bothell, Washington as she works towards her associates degree in science. As if this isn’t enough to keep her busy, she’s earned a second-degree black belt in Jujutsu and practices Yoga in her spare time. My theory is that she has photographic memory and I sometimes tease her about it. In spite of her obvious intellect, she manages to rub elbows with the popular crowd but she only hangs out on a regular basis with her best friend, Natalie.

I’m proud of my older sister and I’m only the teensiest bit jealous of her even though she’s the embodiment of perfection. With her long, silky, black hair, blue eyes the shade of sapphires and strikingly gorgeous features, she turns virtually every male head at school but she has no interest in dating. She shares the same passion in life as our parents, a driving curiosity to understand the dynamic nature of our universe. I do share their interest and curiosity to a degree, but schoolwork and reading extensively on the subject bores me to tears. I would certainly never aspire to become a particle physicist like Dad or a bio-engineer like Mom. If I could somehow turn gaming or inventing worthless, inane gadgets that no one in their right mind would want to own into a career, I’d be all set. I sometimes wonder if I was secretly adopted and my parents haven’t yet told me. I have brown hair and green eyes the shade of evergreen trees like Mom but that is where our similarities end. My face is long and narrow with a sharp cleft in my chin and overall plain features that make it easy to blend into a crowd. I’m taller than most at almost six feet, which is the only reason that anyone would ever notice me and the only reason I’m not plagued by bullies. My shoulders are as narrow as my hips, landing me a scrawny and awkward appearance and the unflattering nickname Skeletor by some of my peers.

I know I should have been more excited about our family weekend getaway in Lake Tapps but I was missing out on Zombie Supreme Madness 3, which had just become available for purchase this very day. I knew for a fact that my best friend, Raiden Koizumi, was going to practice and perfect his skills with the new game for every waking moment of the weekend even though he promised he would hold off until after school on Monday so we could play together. He would cream me in every match of Zombie Supreme Madness and there was nothing I could do about it because I was stuck camping. My family and I had packed and loaded Dad’s black RAV4 right after Patricia and I had come home from school so that we could arrive at our cabin well before nightfall. My parents always rented the same cabin when we stayed in Lake Tapps so I knew exactly what to expect. I knew the closest trails, the best way to get to the lake, and the areas that provided the best possible reception for taking advantage of the free Wi-Fi.

Dad pulled his black SUV onto a long, well-kept, winding road that cut through an upper class neighborhood and led to a row of ten cabins. Our cabin was the second to last and they all overlooked Lake Tapps, boasting a picturesque view of the expansive water nestled in a lush forest of evergreens.

Thousands of tons of debris enter the earth’s atmosphere every year. My father spoke in a somewhat droning tone that he often adopted when he lectured my sister and me on something that he thought would interest us and was usually related to his field of expertise. Most of it burns up before it can reach land and it’s rare for people to see but meteorites strike our planet about five to ten times a year. We usually don’t hear about it because they usually don’t cause much damage and they usually strike in an uninhabited area. Tonight, we’re going to witness a truly historic event that you will tell your children and grandchildren about for years to come.

Tonight, they’re expecting hundreds of meteorites worldwide, I said, getting caught up in the excitement. It will be the most that have ever landed all at once in recorded history.

That’s right, Jeremy, he acknowledged and snapped out of lecture mode. The unusual electromagnetic properties of the comet are fascinating and completely unique. I hope our company manages to get its hands on one of those meteorites. Maybe I’ll get the chance to find one of them on my own.

That’s entirely possible, my sister said. Meteorites have already been found.

You will go nowhere near those things. Mom’s face tightened with anger. There’s a high probability that they’re dangerous due to radiation. If you happen to see one, you report it to the local authorities so they can call in a team to safely dispose of it. You’ve seen the warnings on the news. I can’t believe you would seriously consider exposing yourself to this danger.

A thick tension descended over us. Ever since Mom was assigned a new project at Quantum Paradigm, Inc. she’d become a tightly wound bundle of nerves. We never knew when she would suddenly blow up over a trivial remark or occurrence. It had been this way for about two weeks. Mom and Dad usually worked on high security projects for the government at Quantum Paradigm, Inc. but since their work paralleled, they were usually allowed to discuss it with each other; however, in this particular instance, Mom couldn’t say a word about whatever she was doing and Dad was completely out of the loop. They had even argued over it several times when they thought I was out of earshot. One thing I’ve read and noticed about human behavior is that when people try to hide something, their words and actions actually draw attention to it rather than away from it. Mom definitely became edgy when we broached any topic related to the meteorites, which made me suspect her research was somehow related to meteorites. I couldn’t make sense of that because she was a bio-engineer. I would think Dad would be a more logical choice for studying the unusual properties of space rocks.

We’re here! Dad exclaimed with forced exuberance. He often chose to ignore Mom’s outbursts and pretend they hadn’t happened.

Mom forced a strained smile. This is going to be a night to remember.

The tension began to diminish as we brought our luggage into our cabin and began unpacking. One of our family traditions for any type of road trip or vacation away from home was ordering pizza on the first night. Dad always placed the call and purchased far more food than we needed. We gathered in the living room, which was furnished with a couple of long couches, a couple of rickety coffee tables, and several wooden armchairs. The wooden floors and walls were bare and unpainted but clean, lending a rustic feel to the spacious room.

What kind of pizza would you like, sweetheart? he asked Mom.

I’m in the mood for some Hawaiian supreme.

Excellent choice. Dad’s smile was more relaxed and genuine now. He turned to me with an expectant look. What about you, Jeremy?

I’ll have the meat lover’s special. I didn’t even hesitate. I rarely deviated from my choice and Dad often had the exact same thing.

What will you have, Patricia? he asked.

I think I’d like some Hawaiian supreme.

Great. Dad pulled out his cell phone, stood up and began pacing back and forth as he placed the order. I stood up and crossed over to the window, opening the blinds so I could peer outside. It was still daylight but Bursell’s Comet was clearly visible along with many shooting stars. I had grown accustomed to seeing the comet during the day but watching the meteorites burning across the clear, blue sky added a new level of excitement to this event. My sister took up a position beside me at the window while Dad and Mom gazed out another window at the far side of the room. Dad finished his conversation and pocketed the phone. An enormous white flash obscured the sky, and an instant later, a crash like thunder shook the cabin. Waves of white luminescence undulated all around us, distorting my view as if gazing through water. My sister and I stood within one layer of waves but three more waves stood between us and our parents.

I froze in place, shocked by this strange phenomenon. It only lasted for several seconds. The waves of bright, white light flared brighter and vanished as suddenly as they had appeared, taking my parents with them. I gaped at the empty spot by the window where Mom and Dad had just been standing, stunned and unable to comprehend what I had just witnessed. Patricia was the first to react. She walked very slowly over to that window and tentatively reached out with one of her arms. I gathered my wits and came up beside her, a growing sense of panic and terror taking root inside me. I was still in a state of shock, unable to hold on to a single thought as I stared straight ahead at the window, waiting for my parents to somehow reappear. I could hear shouts and screams off in the distance, snapping me out of my stupor. Reality set in. My parents had been killed by some kind of destructive phenomenon. My thoughts spun in a frantic circle around my head as grief slammed into me. My sister and I stared at each other and I could see sadness, shock and terror set in her face. The frantic shouting in the neighborhood continued and I gradually became aware of it.

I need some air, my sister whispered in despair and spun on her heel to flee the cabin. She threw the door open and sprinted outside. I stared numbly at her as she ran to the nearest trail and vanished from sight.

Patricia, wait! I shouted and dashed after her. I wasn’t nearly as fast as her and when I reached the dirt path, I wasn’t sure in which direction she had gone. I only hesitated for a couple of seconds before taking the route that was most common for her. Grief and adrenaline tore through me as I pumped my legs, struggling to run as quickly as possible. It only took a couple of moments for my legs to grow weary and for my lungs to burn. I was only able to keep up this pace for a short time before I was forced to slow down to a sluggish walk so I could catch my breath. I couldn’t believe my sister had taken off like that after what had just happened to our parents. My vision blurred as my eyes burned with unshed tears. I swallowed a lump in my throat as I realized how foolish I had been to try to catch up with Patricia. I was seriously out of shape while she could probably run a marathon. I stumbled off the dirt path to lean against a tall, thick evergreen. I squeezed my eyes shut and allowed myself to slide against the tree until I was sitting on the ground, overcome with a horrible sense of loss and fear.

I heard a small hissing followed by a series of patters on the ground nearby. I opened my eyes and turned to gaze in the direction of the sound. The shrubbery, ferns, and grass slowly wilted in front of me, revealing about a dozen small meteorites scattered on the ground. They were sharp-edged and ranged in size from about an inch in diameter to four inches in diameter and had formed small depressions in the ground where they had struck. Thin tendrils of smoke wafted off of them. Even though I was about ten feet away from them, my mind spiraled into panic mode as I remembered how anxious Mom had sounded every time she had mentioned the dangers of meteorites that came from Bursell’s Comet. I scrambled away from the radioactive rocks and then climbed awkwardly to my feet. The plants that had wilted formed a spherical pattern approximately thirty feet in diameter and included the spot where I had been sitting.

My gaze lifted up the tall evergreen I had been leaning against. It looked stable and showed no signs of collapsing. I stared at the small space rocks in fascination as I remembered Dad quietly telling me with remarkable assuredness that there was hardly any chance they would be radioactive. He had always relayed this information when Mom was safely out of earshot and had only challenged her once on the matter, which had led to a very heated and uncomfortable debate. Which one of my parents was right about this? One thing was certain; I wasn’t going to stick around long enough to find out. I made my way back to our rental cabin, my thoughts becoming dark as I remembered my parents who had passed away right in front of my eyes. If I had been standing just a few feet closer to them at the time, I probably would have met the same fate, and just then, I wished I had.

Wailing sirens off in the distance reached my ears. I was suddenly seized by the urge to know what was happening and went to my room to get my portable solar radio. I halted in front of the dresser when I saw the radio perched on top of it, but I saw something very strange that took me aback. An exact replica of my radio was lying facedown on the floor at my feet and right beside the dresser there were two wheeled suitcases instead of just the one that I had taken on this trip. I only owned one suitcase and one radio, and yet now there were two of them. I reached out to touch the fallen radio with the tips of my fingers. When nothing strange occurred, I picked it up and set it down beside the one perched on my dresser. I gazed at them both with a critical eye to look for any differences no matter how subtle. After a moment, I accepted the fact that they were identical. They were both black with red trim and my name was printed on a small, white sticker on the back. My sister had a smaller solar radio that was shaped differently and had a large flashlight on one end so I knew neither of these was hers.

I snatched one of the radios and took it to the living room, setting it down on the coffee table and tuning into the first station that came through. There were a couple of scientists having a grave conversation with the host about the terrifying phenomenon that had occurred only a short time ago. As I listened to the radio, it became clear that my parents weren’t the only victims of this terrible occurrence. It was a worldwide phenomenon and many people had perished during the brief event. No one knew precisely what had happened, but the widely accepted theory among the scientists and the government was that there was a series of deadly energy beams that had heated up organic matter, causing instant disintegration to anyone who had the misfortune to be caught in the crosshairs. Even though I had already known my parents were gone, hearing it on the news made me sick to my stomach. My world was falling apart at the seams.

Chapter 2

The front door to the cabin burst open and my eyes flew over to my sister who looked oddly composed under the circumstances. She had her iPod clipped to the right sleeve of her shirt and ear buds secured to her ears. As she walked toward me, her face was a mask of ironclad determination. She removed her ear buds and I glared at her from my position on the couch.

I can’t believe you disappeared on me after our parents were killed, I snapped.

Patricia’s expression didn’t change as she leaned down to turn off my radio. Our parents aren’t dead. People are wrong about what happened.

You have to face the truth. You can’t run away from it forever.

I’m sorry I took off like that. Patricia bent down to give me a brief hug. I needed some time to process what happened.

She pulled back and gazed down at me. She had always been there for me and we had always been close so it had hurt bad when she had abandoned me after our parents were vaporized. I still couldn’t believe they were gone. My throat clenched as another wave of despair washed over me. I could understand why she refused to believe what had happened right in front of her. I was tempted to do the same thing.

If there were tightly focused beams that affected only organic matter and it was hot enough to vaporize their clothing, that would mean any surface they were in contact with would be charred, Patricia said.

I stared at my sister for several seconds before I realized she was presenting her case that our parents were still alive.

Mom and Dad weren’t touching anything so there won’t be any marks left behind, I said.

They were standing on the wood floor. The determined glint in my sister’s eye didn’t waver. She pointed across the room at the floor to emphasize her point. My gaze traveled to the spot where our parents had been standing and I could clearly see an absence of any charring.

That doesn’t prove anything, I said but hope began to stir inside me.

There are some reports that objects disappeared at the same time that people vanished.

I didn’t hear about that.

It seems to be a lot less common than the disappearances of people, and the media is painting the witnesses as unreliable, Patricia said.

I stood up from the couch as more questions bombarded my mind. I remembered the extra suitcase and alarm clock that had mysteriously manifested in my room.

There’s something I should show you. I pulled myself up off the couch and led the way to my room. I didn’t have to say a word. My sister noticed the duplicate objects right away.

I hadn’t heard about this. She spoke in a soft, hushed voice as though sharing a secret with me. She inspected the clock first. After several moments of turning it over and over in her hands, she set it down and opened one of the suitcases. There were several zippered pockets on the sides that she explored as well, discovering a small notebook that I had forgotten about. She flipped through it, revealing journal entries. I had lost interest in keeping a diary after just a couple of weeks so there wasn’t much written inside. She searched the other suitcase and found an identical notebook. She set the two journals on the bed side by side and opened them.

That’s my journal, I protested, uncomfortable with her reading them because I couldn’t remember exactly what I’d jotted down in them. I didn’t want her to read anything embarrassing.

This is important. Patricia wasn’t taking the time to study the entries. Instead, she was flipping through the books at the same time. I’m just checking to see if they’re identical. It took her less than a moment to finish. They are precisely the same.

What do you think this all means? I asked.

It validates my theory that I came up with while jogging. Her sapphire eyes looked introspective as she hesitated. Remember when Dad used to theorize about alternate universes in relation to quantum mechanics?

How can I forget? He used to talk about it all the time.

He stopped talking about it when it became his assignment. At that point, he couldn’t discuss it anymore.

What do you mean? I frowned at her in puzzlement.

I overheard Mom and Dad talking about it a few times, Patricia informed me. He was assigned to find a way to look at and communicate with other universes. It took him a few years, but he finally succeeded in identifying and observing them. He never got the chance to make contact with anyone inhabiting other realities because the government reassigned the contract to another department.

When was this? I was stunned beyond belief and wished I had known about this before. I tried to remember the exact time period when Dad had stopped talking about his wild and crazy alternate reality theories.

It was about five years ago. Dad was really depressed for a while when he lost the assignment.

So that’s what was wrong. I thought maybe it was a midlife crisis or something.

I wish I knew everything he had discovered about alternate realities, Patricia said in a contemplative tone. One thing I heard him say was that it looked identical to our own. He couldn’t find any differences. In the other reality he was observing, he was a particle physicist working in the exact same department and with the exact same people. He was looking forward to making contact with them but knew it would take a long time before he could figure out how to do that.

What does this have to do with the deaths of our parents? I asked impatiently. While it was true this would normally be a fascinating conversation, I wanted my sister to stay on point.

Patricia’s expression remained stoic, but her sapphire eyes registered a pang of surprise and disappointment as though I had just said something dense. The meteorites from Bursell’s Comet have extremely strong and unusual electromagnetic properties. Somehow, during the height of the meteor shower, I believe they interfered with the natural process of creating new, alternate universes at a critical stage, which resulted in some people being transported into one of the newly created universes. At the same time, there were some objects from one or more newly created universes that were displaced into our own universe, such as your extra alarm clock and suitcase.

That’s crazy. I wasn’t sure what was more terrifying, the fact that my sister was disturbed enough to believe what she was saying or that our parents were yanked into another reality.

Dad believed that electromagnetic fields were the answer to traveling between alternate realities.

Hundreds of questions spiraled through my mind. I wished I could just wake up and discover that everything that had occurred over the last six hours had been nothing more than a bad dream.

How come you’re the only one in the entire world that figured this out? I asked.

I’m sure there are others who have noticed the same things we have but you have to remember the missing and duplicated objects were less common so people can tell themselves they imagined it. The news isn’t helping either because that’s exactly what they’re saying about people who have made those reports. It’s an absolute certainty that the government must know what has really happened and they are going to cover up the truth until they can find a way to bring all those people back home.

Assuming that you’re right, I said slowly as I struggled with her theory, why would the government hide this?

The world is in a state of emergency and panic. Many of the people who disappeared were driving so we have a gridlock in the streets with abandoned and wrecked cars. It’s believed that between thirty to forty percent of the world has vanished. Martial law has been declared to help give a semblance of order and to curb the looting. If people knew about alternate dimensions, that could throw them into a greater state of panic and make things even worse.

You’re right, I conceded. What if the government never finds a way to get the people back? Or what if they discover how to transport between worlds and it’s so limited they can only take a very small number of people who’ve been taken?

I’m afraid that those are very likely scenarios. It could take years before the government learns how to cross the barrier between dimensions.

That means our parents are as good as dead, I said glumly.

Not necessarily, Patricia argued. I’m sure Dad must have continued to work on this problem on his own at home.

I didn’t think he was allowed to do that.

We have two dads working together in another dimension. I’m sure they’ll try to communicate with us at the cabin very soon and we have to be ready.

Puzzled, I furrowed my brows. What do you mean?

If we get any strange calls on our cell phones, we need to answer. If the radios act funny, we need to pay attention to any hidden messages. Things like that.

It sounded so far-fetched, but at the same time, made a strange kind of sense. I was torn between disappointment and hope. We listened to the radio and waited to hear from our parents with sharp anticipation until well after midnight. It was extremely late when I finally had trouble concentrating and staying awake. I had previously pulled many all-nighters without any problem, but the stress of the day had taken too much of a toll and I fell asleep on the couch.

Chapter 3

I woke up disoriented and lying on my side with news chatter blaring in my ears. Bright light seared my eyes so I immediately closed them. My mind was sluggish and I wanted to go back to sleep, but my body ached. I squinted my eyes and shoved myself into a sitting position on the couch. My gaze rested on the radio and I listened to the news for several moments. The world had recovered from its initial shock. There was lots of speculation over how the economy would suffer and dire warnings to stay indoors as much as possible in case there was another episode similar to the previous night that had resulted in the deaths of approximately one quarter of the population. Everyone was calling it the flash event. What if the mainstream media was right and my sister was wrong? I couldn’t bear the thought that my parents had disintegrated right before my eyes. I suddenly realized there was no sign of my sister. I left the radio on and trudged across the cabin to her room. The door was closed but I could hear her slow and deep breathing, indicating she was fast asleep.

She must have stayed up much later than me. I shivered with cold as I made my way to the kitchen and started a pot of coffee. By the time I had taken a quick shower and changed into a clean pair of jeans and a tee shirt the coffee was ready. I poured myself a large mug of the steaming brew and added plenty of cream. My family often teases me about how heavy-handed I am with cream, and I admit they have a valid point. By the time I finish doctoring up my morning cup of coffee, it is beige and