Jeff had scrolled through most of the Chronivac's possible options, and each category seemed to have endless sub-categories and an infinite amount of possible results. By the time he had reached “Function W/O Form”, he was getting somewhat bored of the gimmick. It wasn't like he expected this thing to actually work at all, so from here he just started checking random options.
Once Jeff clicked the “Submit” button, the only options he was sure he had checked were “Function W/O Form” and “Alter Reality” along with some conflicting choices for good measure. He was fairly sure he had picked some “Inanimate” options, too, but for the most part he was just bored and tired by this point. When pressing “Submit” did nothing, he just sighed and went to bed, feeling he had wasted his time.
That night, Jeff was affected by strange dreams of transformation and a world most different from his own...
Jeff was awoken by his retro clock radio, which was tuned into a news station. The anchor was talking about some kind of bizarre accident that had been averted by a team of super heroes. Much of what the anchor said sounded absolutely wild and impossible. Jeff frowned before rolling over and sitting up. After a moment of listening, he decided there was only one way to make sense of what the anchor was saying – check the internet.
When Jeff found a reliable news website, he opened up the broadcast feed and watched the video.
Apparently, a series of freak accidents had caused the local train station to catch on fire, while a landslide took out the tracks and buried the freeway below. However, a group of heroes whose true names were unknown had saved the day.
Jeff marvelled at what he was seeing. Amateur smartphone footage showed a train racing down the tracks. A person who looked like they were either in their late teens or early 20's leapt up towards the railroad. The image shook and blurred as the person holding the smartphone tried to zoom in. Where the person – who was wearing clothes that had a very strange pattern that reminded Jeff of the local express train's livery and who seemed to also be wearing strange metal pipes on their arms and legs – would have landed on the tracks from their impossible jump, there was now a powerful locomotive which was barrelling towards the gaping hole in the tracks up ahead. Instead of a horrible accident, however, the train zoomed right over the hole leaving glowing blue tracks in its wake. The train them seemed to throw its own tracks ahead of itself, tracks which did loop-de-loops and spun off of the railway like roller-coaster tracks and rid them impossibly before spirally off of them. The massive machine did a mid-air backflip as it shrunk back down into a person and landed on the ground. Once the person hit the ground, the glowing blue tracks they left behind started unravelling into nothing. The real local express train came hurtling down the tracks and passed over the gap that had been filled in. As the last carriage cleared it, the seemingly magical tracks all vanished, allowing the train to carry on down the line unimpeded.
Down below, a person in a strange yellow outfit was making scooping motions with their arm, and what looked like a hologram of an excavator was projected over them. As they moved, huge chunks of the debris on the freeway were cleared, allowing cars to pass safely. The earth was being moved faster than any normal crew could manage. A large black 4x4 was standing nearby, and something about it made it seem like it was coordinating these efforts.
The news report then showed a different recording, one from the station. Here a guy wearing red was putting out the fire in a peculiar way. Jeff could tell it was a guy, because he was putting out the fire by shooting a stream of fire retardant foam from somewhere between his legs. He was whooping and hollering while lights flashed on his back like a disco, and he appeared to have a ladder strapped to his back. The foam was quickly quelling the fire, while a rubbery-looking fleshtone crash mat was allowing commuters to jump safely out of the windows of the raised station and for people to leap from the train where it had been forced to stop short of the platform.
Jeff couldn't believe what he was seeing. The people in the news report seemed excited, but Jeff felt like they weren't reacting with enough incredulity considering the impossible things they were witnessing. Jeff had debated whether or not this could all be some kind of movie promo but not even the best modern-day special effects could make these things look so real.
Then Jeff surprised himself – he realised he had a sense of familiarity with these strange people, like he had seen them somewhere before. He thought about it, and then it came to him. In this altered reality, he knew them because...