Re: Four Leads, John, Dom
John caught the look, but shook his head. "I don't know how much you guys had guessed about Vance's power, but he could sense the rifts when they opened. He didn't get a warning. But, when they opened, he felt it. In the beginning, he'd get these monster migraines when it happened. That's really the only reason I knew about it. I was there that night when ten of them opened at once, when Dom came through." And it seemed so long ago, now, since he'd been that eighteen year old kid running in with a gun when he heard Vance scream. "But, even then he could tell where they opened, how many came through.
"How to pinpoint the exact dimensions we wanted to go to has always been the biggest problem with getting this done. Given enough time, there was no question we could build a machine to do it. But, knowing how to pick and choose dimensions and recognize them? So, about a year ago we talked about the possibility that he could use his power to reach beyond the rift to the dimension people were coming from. It was a back-up plan, since we figured we still had three years or more to figure out another way. But, even though he'd only have a minute at most with each rift, he was able to do it. He could feel the differences between different dimensions.
"When you guys disappeared, he felt it. He could tell exactly where you'd gone missing from. But, more than that, he could sense enough about this world that, we could put together a fairly accurate training program for rainforest and jungle living. Judging by how much this place reminds me of home, he really wasn't far off at all. Given that, when our timetable got sped up, we had to go with the back-up plan. It was the only way this was going to happen in months instead of years. Unfortunately, we didn't count on the fact that whatever the government did with their experiments, it not only created the rifts, but destabilized the entire dimension. For the last month or so, Vance has been...had been sensing what I can probably best describe as swarms of rifts opening. He's had a near permanent migraine for at least the last two or three weeks. He didn't say anything specifically, but my guess is that we ran out of time and that dimension doesn't exist anymore. It's been torn apart by all the rifts. It must have been too much for him to handle at the end. But, the short of it is that the machine works, but we have no way of navigating without him."