"So. You ready?" Elly glanced at me.

"Sure." I whispered. I was the Transport Specialist, and therefore the best person to go charge in first. I was the one who figured out how the criminal escaped. The thinking went that if I was wounded or killed by the criminal, then I wasn't needed to figure out where they went because the criminal was still there.

"On three?" Elly whispered back. We glanced at each other.

"Three." we said at the same time and I kicked the door down and ran into the apartment, as my eyes scanned the room for any danger. No lifeforms were anywhere to be seen. "It's clear." I called. Charmella, Rednax, and Lee walked in and looked around.

"Not much here." Lee said as her eyes glanced around the one-room apartment. She was right. There was an old brown and yellow couch with scratched wooden armrests against the right wall, a bare lightbulb hanging from the ceiling, and a wooden table against the left wall. The carpet was a wall_to_wall woven rubber mat, with the occasional hunk torn out of it. No windows. I walked over to the table and examined its contents. A shoe box filled with compact disks and a large stack of blank white paper. As Lee checked the couch for clues and Red tapped the walls for hollow sections, Elly joined me at the table.

"What do you think?" I asked her.

She smirked at me, "Why have cds where there's no stereo?"

I smiled. "Exactly." I tried pulling one of the cds out. It wouldn't budge. I pushed and the cd sank into the box. I let go and the cd floated back up to be at the same level as the others in the box. Then I noticed the liquid in the bottom of the box. It was dark and thick like gooey tar. It was a transporter all right.

For those of you who aren't Transporter Specialists, I suggest that you never go near one. If you happen to get sucked into one and you don't have the key, then you will be trapped in the limbo of the transporter forever. But there's always a key. The key could be anything from sterling silver to Martian cigarettes to tree leaves to dragon ears to fake diamonds to ogre fingernails. And it's different for every transporter, so I usually carry small samples of things that might be keys with me at all times. Even with as much knowledge as I have about transporters, the hardest thing is to figure out what the key is. Usually, though, the criminals have a stash of the stuff hidden around. That's why Lee and Red were checking the couch and the walls for the hidden stash of the key.

"Nothing." Red said.

"Nothing." Lee echoed. Well there goes that idea.

I looked at Elly. "I don't suppose it's the paper."

"Nah." she replied, "It couldn't be that obvious." She thought for a moment. "We should check anyway. Just in case." I agreed. You can rarely be too careful. I took a page of the paper and slid it between the cds. The moment the paper touched the tar, the tar started pulling the paper in. I let go and the paper shot straight into the tar.

"It's not paper." I said. If the paper had been the key, then the goo would have slowly sucked the paper in, wary to see if anything was holding onto the other end. Once it realized that nothing was still holding on to the paper, then it would have sucked it in quickly, often emitting a greedy "slurp". I studied the table, but no pieces of wood had been taken out. I studied the couch, but it was completely intact as well. That left only one thing in the room.

"The carpet." Elly said. Sure enough, there had been hunks cut out of the woven rubber mat/carpet, which fit the description of a stash of the key. Elly drew her knife and quickly cut another hunk out of the carpet and handed it to me. I pushed the cds until there was a gap between two of them (amazingly you could push them sideways and down, but they wouldn't come out of the box) and slid the rubber in. The goo slowly sucked the rubber in, wary to see if anything was holding onto the other end. Then it realized that nothing was still holding on to the rubber, and it sucked it in quickly while emitting a greedy "slurp".

"It's definitely the key." I replied. "Now we have to get rid of it." We all started cutting large chunks out of the carpet and putting them in the tar. Since the tar didn't suck it in very quickly, the rubber got a bit backed up. Elly tried poking the rubber into the tar to get it moving faster, and the tar spurted up and splashed onto her finger. The tar immediently started pulling her in, and by the time she let out a frightened, "Ayesha!", her arm had sunk in to the elbow. I looked up when she cried out my name, and immediently understood the problem.

"No." I commanded Red and Lee, who were about to try and pull her out. I quickly cut a hunk of the mat and pressed it into the palm of Elly's free hand and curved her fingers around it. "Hold onto this and go towards the light!" I shouted to Elly and let go of her. She was quickly sucked into the tar shoebox and once the tar had covered her feet, the cds popped back up.

"What did you do that for? We could have pulled her out!" Lee snarled at me. I looked at her.

"Wrong. The transport already had a firm hold on her arm. You two would have either been sucked in yourselves, or you would have pulled her arm off. Once a transport has something, the only way to make it let go is with it's key." I explained.

"So where is she going to come out?" Red asked.

I shrugged. "I don't know." I knew Charmella and I knew that she could handle anything a transport could throw at her, so I wasn't worried.

"YOU DON'T KNOW?!?!" Lee exploded at me.

"Not a clue." I replied. "But she knows that we're here and I'm know that she'll make it back soon."

Lee glared at me. "I'm going after her. She may need help wherever she is."

I shrugged again. "Suit yourself." I cut another large hunk out of the carpet and gave it to her. "Just hold onto this and follow the light."

She took the rubber and gripped it firmly, then turned to the shoebox and stuck her free hand into the tar. It clasped her hand and started pulling. Lee let out a startled, "whoa," before being sucked into the goo.

I calmly finished cutting up the carpeting and, after saving nine sections of the mat, deposited the rest of the rubber carpet into the tar.

"It's been five minutes." Rednax said, checking his watch for the nth time.

"Relax." I told him. "Both Lee and Elly are experienced. They'll be back."

Red shook his head. "I have a feeling that there's something about this transport. Is there any way that I can go in and find out if they've made it out yet?"

I thought for a moment. "Yeah." I replied, "But are you sure you want to risk going in?"

Red closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Yes."

"Okay then." I said, and fished out eight of the sections of rubber and laid them into his hand one by one. "One, is for being let out once you're in; two, is to be able to see the other inhabitants of the transporter; three, is to be seen by the inhabitants of the transporter; four, is to be able to talk to the inhabitants; five, is to be able to hear the inhabitants; six, is to be able to understand the inhabitants; seven, is to remember what you say to the inhabitants; and eight, is to remember what they say to you. Make sure to ask them where Elly and Lee are, and what the rule is for this transporter. You got all that?"

"Yeah. So this transporter considers rubber valuable?"

"Yep." I replied, "and they charge astronomical prices to see their transporter limbo. All transporters do. Of course some transporters are more unreasonable than others. Try collecting eight dragon ears. Or eight Martian cigarettes for that matter. It's illegal to be in possession of more than three at a time."

"I get the idea." Red said.

"Ready?" I said. "On three?" We glanced and nodded at each other.

"Three." we chorused and he went in and soon he too was gone. I sat down on the couch and waited.

Sualoi walked into the apartment. "Hey Lo." I greeted him. He nodded back.

"You won't believe the time I had trying to park." he grumbled. "I highly dislike apartment buildings." Lo is a good man to have on the team. He's a good driver and his pessimism has gotten us out of some pretty tight scrapes. He looked around the room. "Where are the others?" he asks me. "The Boss has already given us the address of the next place to check out."

I nodded towards the shoebox. "They're in there."

Lo looked at me, "They stuck in there or did you find the key?"

"They each have the key." I replied. "I'm just waiting for them to get back."

Lo nodded, his long blond curls bouncing. I could tell that he wasn't worried. Lo and Lee are bro/sis, and they both inherited their backbone and that long blond hair. He knew that Lee could handle herself, just as I knew my sister, Elly, could handle herself.

"So are we just going to sit around moping, or are we going to clean up the place?" he asked me.

"What do you want to clean up?" I said, looking around the room. The couch could stay, and the lightbulb. The carpet was gone. That just left the table, the stack of paper, and the transporter, but we wouldn't get rid of the transporter until the whole team was back. "The table?"

Lo had already seized the paper and was feeding it into the tar, a couple sheets at a time. That was done in moments, and we tipped the table onto it's side and each tore a leg off. I fed mine in first, pushing some of the cds down until the tar touched the end of the wooden table leg and started pulling it in. Lo watched it. "No matter how many times I see a transporter do that, I still can't believe it."

The tar pulled the rest of the leg in and closed around it. A moment after the leg disappeared under the goo, the cds popped back up. Lo stuck the second wooden leg in, and it went down easily. We continued tearing apart the table until it was gone. I checked my watch.

"It's been ten minutes since Lee and Elly went in." I remarked.

Lo nodded. "They should have been back by now."

Just then I happened to look in the corner of the apartment by the couch, and I noticed something happening in the air. A reddish halo of light appeared, and a golden one appeared next to it. Within moments Elly and Lee had materialized.

"That was weird." Lee said, plopping down onto the couch.

"Yeah." Elly agreed, sitting down also.

"You guys took ten minutes." I chided them.

Elly shook her head, "We got lost."

I frowned. "How do you get lost going towards the light?"

Lee smirked, "There was a mirror."

I stared at her for a moment, and then we broke out laughing. "A mirror? Oh that's rich." We stopped laughing after a moment, and I checked my watch, "Rednax should be back in the next five minutes. More if he gets tricked by the mirror." I was curious about this mirror. "I think I'll go in myself and check out the mirror."

Nobody argued, so I pulled out the last rubber section and headed towards the box. Elly and Lee were asleep on the couch, so I glanced at Lo.

"Good luck." he said.

"Thanks." My gaze lingered on his deep blue eyes, before I turned towards the box. I stuck my hand in to the tar, and was pulled in.

I have never gotten used to these kinds of transports. The thickness of the goo enveloped me and it makes me feel like a blind fish swimming through tar. I kept thinking that the tar would choke me, but I could breath easily. Through my closed eyes I sensed a large light source on my left, and up in front of me seemed to be a current going towards the light. I moved towards it and felt myself being swept towards the light.

"Hey kiddo. I was just thinking about you." he said.

"Really?" I asked absently. I was trying to figure out why I was here and not where Elly and Lee had materialized.

"Truly. I was just wishing you were here so you could change the ceiling lightbulb for me." The woman who had lived in the apartment before dad had hated men, and had designed the ceiling light to be changed only by a woman. I changed it for him, and he invited me to dinner.

"I really have to get back to work. I was supposed to be materializing there, and not here." He nodded, and lent me use of his transporter. I like my dad's transporter especially, because it never makes a mistake. As long as you know where you want to go, it'll take you there. It's in the shape of a book, with large swirls and lines and designs on different pages. I found a design I liked, and ate two of my dad's sugar cookies. Like I said before, all transporters have a key. To work my dad's, you must have a fresh burst of sugar in your body. One cookie would do, but I ate two because they are very good cookies. I laid the open book on the table, and peered closely at the blue/green swirl, thinking intently about the apartment. After a moment, the blue_green design blurred and a tiny picture formed in the center of the design. I leaned closer, blue-green filling up my vision, and recognized the picture as the apartment, with Elly and Lee on the couch, Rednax sitting on the floor and Sualoi standing by the transporter. I leaned closer, and I felt myself materializing in the apartment.

"I figured out what the transport does." Red said now that I was there. "It takes you to where you're needed the most." Ah, I exclaimed to myself, That's why it took me to my dad's.

"So, how do we safely get rid of this?" Lee asked me. I walked over to the box. I took the lid off the bottom of the box and fit it on top Then I pressed the lid down enough that the inside of the lid touched the tar. The box seemed to consume itself, getting smaller and smaller until it was gone.

"Ready to go?" I said, looking at the others. They nodded and we walked out of the apartment and Lo drove us to the next assignment.

~end~