by N. I. Snow
Her black hair was a mess of tangles and her pale face was smeared with dirt. She squinted her gray eyes to see the group of older kids ahead of her. A light green jacket fluttered against her small torso as she waved her arms. Her blue jeans stuck against her fast moving legs. But, despite her running full steam ahead, being only seven years old, she was trailing far behind..
One of the boys in the group looked back at her and rolled his green eyes, “Oh man, I thought we lost her.” The boy was about twelve years old and was toughly built for his age. When he spotted the little girl, he hurried his group of friends faster.
“Dude, Jonah, your sister is way annoying,” said another boy to his right.
“Shut up. I think she's adorable,” said a blonde-haired girl.
“Try living with her,” replied the redheaded Jonah, “Come on. We can lose her in the pyramids.”
The group hurried into a transport station and ran to one of the telepads at the left corner of the highroofed building. Jonah entered the coordinates for the pyramids of Egypt and his group disappeared in a flash of blue light. Huffing as she arrived at the telepad, the little girl did the same and when she reappeared, she stood in the empty stone halls of the great pyramid.
“Jonah!” she cried out.
“Go home, Emma,” came Jonah's voice out of sight in front of her.
“But you said we could go to the Amusement Park Dome today. Jonah, you promised,” Emma pouted.
There were snickers from the other kids as Jonah replied, “I said I would think about it.”
Emma pouted even more and walked towards her brother's voice despite him telling her to leave. Curiosity soon replaced her melancholy as she looked at all the different hieroglyphs. Long ago archaeologists had discovered everything there was to know about the ancient ruins. Tourists no longer were inspired by them and the once proud architectures had become nothing more than playgrounds for children. No more secrets remained to be squeezed from them, until now.
As Emma was examining the hieroglyphs, she noticed a group that didn't fit with the others, “Jonah, I found something.”
“Big deal,” came Jonah's voice.
“Really, come look.”
Jonah grumbled, “It better be a forgotten mummy.”
Leaving his friends, Jonah walked up to Emma as she pointed at the glyphs, “Look.”
Jonah did, “They're hieroglyphs, so what?”
“But these are different,” Emma protested.
Jonah looked closer at the markings, “Hey, you're right,” he squinted. “I can't read these.”
Emma looked at the lines again, “I can.”
“What? No, you can't. Mr. Albert teaches fourth graders how to read ancient stuff and you're not a fourth grader yet.”
“I can too read these,” she followed each letter with a tiny finger, “Only the ch-chosen m-may en...ent...”
“Enter?” asked Jonah.
“Enter!” yelled Emma.
Suddenly a section of the wall slid inward with a loud, grinding noise. The opening revealed a dusty and cobwebbed hallway. Jonah was surprised that his friends did not come running with curiosity about the noise. They had probably left the pyramid without him.
Emma backed away from the new doorway and Jonah saw fright in her eyes as he stepped forward.
“Come on, scaredy-cat,” goaded Jonah.
“I don't want to. It's dark and scary,” replied Emma.
Jonah clicked a button on the band he wore on his right wrist illuminating a two-meter radius of the hallway with a soft blue light, “Look there's nothing to be afraid of.”
“O-okay,” said Emma nervously.
They walked together through the dark and musty hallway. Cobwebs stuck to their hair and jackets as dust rose from their shoes making them sneeze. How long had this place been shut up? Was it possible that the archaeologists missed this all together? Anxious to be the first to discover something new, Jonah hurried forward with Emma again desperately trying to keep up. The more they kept going, however, the longer the hallway seemed. Soon Jonah had to slow down and carry a tired Emma on his back. Just as his knees were about to give out the hallway opened out to a giant room with seemingly no roof to be found in the darkness above.
Jonah put Emma down to inspect the walls for signs of more hieroglyphs, while Emma peered curiously around the room, which was bare of any decorations save for a single pillar standing in the center. Jonah looked at the pillar.
“Wow! I bet we're right in the center of the pyramid,” yelled Jonah.
Emma did not hear him through the voices that had begun to whisper into her mind. Eyes in a trance, she walked towards the pillar unafraid. As she neared it, she noticed a pale light emitting from a pyramid-shaped object set in the center of the pillar. The moment she reached the pillar she stretched her arm out to grab the object but was stopped by her brother.
“Don't touch that. What if it’s booby trapped?”
Emma pulled her hand back, her gray eyes blinking with confusion. At that moment, the whole room lit up with a blinding white light. Voices began whispering from all around them as fog shapes began to form into strange figures only to dissipate and reform repeatedly. The two children whirled around trying to pick out one shape that wouldn't change. Emma backed up behind Jonah and fear once again filled her eyes.
Finally the shapes stopped changing and a single male voice boomed out from one of them, yet none of them appeared to be speaking. “Your caution is well noted, young Jonah Sholtal, but it is unneeded.”
Jonah whirled around trying to figure out which shape spoke. “Who said that?”
Another voice spoke. This one was a female's voice and was more gentle than the last, “You have nothing to fear from us, young one.”
One of the mist figures stepped forward and brushed a gentle hand against Emma's cheek as she stepped out from behind Jonah. When she looked up into its face, she thought she caught the glimpse of sad, slitted reptilian eyes.
A soft voice, this one more frail, like that of an old man, spoke from the figure. “We have been waiting a long time for both of you.”
As the new voice spoke——the object on the pillar began to glow even brighter. “This relic is one of many that we have left scattered throughout the universe. The knowledge that it contains is more valuable than anything in the galaxy.”
The first booming voice spoke again, this time from a different shade, “Should it fall into the wrong hands the entire galaxy would be in danger. More poor creatures would share the same fate as us.”
“Why? What happened?” asked Jonah.
The gentle voice spoke, “Long ago when your race was still young, ours was on the verge of discovering the secret to the Gaia, the Light of the Universe.”
“Our discovery destroyed us,” spoke the older voice.
“What is the Light?” wondered Emma in awe.
“An object that is said to be the life force of the very universe. It could be anywhere and anything,” spoke the deep voice.
“But you found it right? You said your discovery destroyed you. It was the Light, right?” asked Jonah excitedly.
The deep voice continued, “No, just a shard of its power was what killed us. We never found the Light itself, which brings us to you.”
“We left behind this relic as the last record of our discoveries. In its memory are all the details of what we found here. The data recorded inside is not to be seen by just anyone,” the gentle voice added.
“So what does that mean for us?” Jonah questioned, but he feared the answer.
“There are others of our kind who have misinterpreted our will and wish to find the Light and use its power to control the galaxy under their laws. We need both of you to guard this relic with your lives.”
“Us! But we're just kids,” exclaimed Jonah.
“Yes, but you both have strength and courage that you have yet to realize,” said the elderly voice.
“You're crazy!” Jonah spat out
as he grabbed Emma's hand. “Come on, Emma, let's get out of here before these guys get us killed.”
Emma braced herself against Jonah’s force, her gaze captured by the gloomy, golden reptilian eyes. “No, Jonah. We gotta help them. Look how sad they are.”
Jonah shook his head at her, “Listen, Emma, they want us to guard something that caused them to die. What's stopping this Light thing from killing us?”
Emma bit her lip, her gaze still on the sad, golden eyes, “I don't know, but we gotta help them.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s the right thing to do. Remember what Mama keeps telling us—always help someone when they need it.”
Jonah gave in; there was no arguing with a stubborn seven-year- old, “Fine, but don't come crying to me when this Light thing shows up.”
“Then it has been decided,” said the deep voice; and as it spoke, the pyramid shape was lifted up into the air by the misty figure, “You, Jonah, will be the guardian of our most valuable secret.”
Reluctantly Jonah reached out and took the relic from the shade. Once the pyramid-shaped object was in his possession, the whole room went dark with light coming only from the alien relic to ward off the smothering shadows away. Jonah placed the palm-sized relic into a pocket of his jacket and then turned his wristband light on again. Grabbing Emma's arm, he then led her back to the hallway toward the teleporter. This time she did not resist. The walk back through the hallway seemed shorter somehow. As they trudged through the near darkness, a voice spoke to each of them individually.
“Jonah, you are too young to realize this yet, but your little sister is the most valuable treasure you have in your life,” the deep voice spoke to Jonah, “If any harm were to threaten her, it would be up to you to protect her.”
A calm female voice spoke to Emma, “When the time comes, little one, do not be afraid and trust in the Seeker.”
When the two exhausted children emerged from the doorway, the large stone wall slid shut behind them. A green glow shone briefly, erasing the cracks, making the door look as though it had never moved. The alien runes dissolved leaving only the Egyptian hieroglyphs. No evidence remained of the ancient alien race save for the relic in Jonah's pocket. Silently he and Emma continued their walk back to the teleporter, and neither of them spoke as Jonah entered the coordinates for the station in Neapolthia.
In the time of Jonah and Emma’s childhood, Earth was one thriving metropolis made up of borough-like areas called cities. The continents had merged into a single network connected with bridges and buildings for even upon the surface of the oceans, humans had been able to build floating communities. From above, Earth looked as though it were covered by a giant spiderweb made from electric lights. The once-thought unbeatable Nature had fallen to man's power, and mankind's lust for expansion had corrupted the entire planet. Only environmental domes built in every city provided food and a margin of nature for humans to escape to when they needed a break.
All the scattered nations had been merged into a whole. The cities were organized into four quadrants, Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Western. Neapolthia took up most of the Western Quadrant, having once been most of the western United States. The Quadrant’s two next largest cities were Komikino, which once had been the island country of Japan and now also encompassed half of China, both Koreas, and a third of Russia, and the third largest, sea-born city, Pacifia. Other smaller cities such as Madino, Hasinoma, and Typhonia filled up the rest of the Western Quadrant.
The Eastern, Southern, and Northern quadrants were marked by similar cities, the most notable being Colonial in the Eastern Quadrant, which had once been most of the eastern half on the United States, the maritime provinces of Canada, Iceland, Greenland, many sea-born cities, and most of Europe. Gambiana was the largest city in the Southern Quadrant and had at one time been Central America, the upper portion of South America, and Africa. Polinia, which had once been the North Pole, became the hub of the Northern Quadrant's industry.
The only nature humans could not overcome was their own. Despite the absence of nationalities, violence continued. Earth's crime rate was high. Fights broke out on a daily basis and a fresh body would turn up on the slab every day. Expansion had only given mankind the chance to murder his neighbor more quickly. Authorities were on their toes day and night to keep some form of peace among their citizens, but it was a futile attempt. Prisons were overflowing with criminals with no end to the lines of people waiting to go in.
With so much mayhem, it was no wonder that the ancient alien race chose two innocent children who had not yet been corrupted by the world to guard their relic.
When Emma and Jonah reappeared in the Neapolthia station, the steel doors to the outside slid open revealing the night-filled streets. They hurried out still maintaining silence. Floating plasma screens lit up the steel streets advertising a new car or a new holoshow. Plasma signs also extended from the sides of buildings announcing stores to passing pedestrians. Glowing green lines edged the steel pedestrian walkways, while light beams from hovercars flashed as they passed from one tall group of buildings to the next. The safety shields of the floating bridges of the upper city glowed faintly in the early evening, yet none of this mattered to Emma and Jonah at the moment. It was more important to them to get home with their secret as quickly as possible.
They walked solemnly past the street vendors, who pestered people with their persistent hawking. Tickets to the Amusement Park Dome, two for the price of one. No? Then a pretty trinket for the little lady, fifty percent off. The two children rushed off; they had a trinket of their own to deal with at the moment. Two blocks down, they turned off the main path for a shortcut home. After four more blocks of constant skyscrapers and lines of hovercars, they reached an elevator terminal that led to the upper levels of the city. The two children entered the terminal and waited impatiently for an open elevator. When one came down, they hurried on ahead of everyone else in hopes of being alone. Jonah quickly commanded the doors to close and selected the bridge that would take them home.
As the lift started to move, Jonah let out a deep breath and leaned his back against the glass wall of the car, “What have we gotten ourselves into?”
Emma looked at him, her gray eyes shining with childish innocence, “We had to help them.”
“No, we didn't,” Jonah retorted, glaring back at her. “We could have just turned around and left the pyramid; but, no, you had to open your big mouth like you always do.”
At that moment the doors of the elevator opened and they walked out onto a metal bridge that spanned the northeastern section of the city. As they walked across the bridge and as the rooftops of smaller buildings and the balconies of taller apartment buildings came into view, Jonah took the relic out of his pocket to look at it.
Abruptly he stopped causing Emma to whirl around and look at him with concern, “Jonah?”
Jonah clutched the relic tightly, “Let's toss it.”
“What!” exclaimed Emma.
Jonah looked up at the top of the safety panel, “I could throw it right over the top of that and then we wouldn't have to worry about it anymore. Let someone else find it.”
Jonah held the relic in one hand and raised his arm to throw it, but Emma reached up and stopped him. “Don't Jonah. They would be sad. Remember their eyes,” Emma's own eyes watered, “Please don't make them any sadder. We promised them.”
Jonah hated seeing his little sister cry, but he persisted, “This isn't our problem, Emma. This thing is going to get us killed, either by their race or by that Light thing.”
A tear ran down Emma's cheek. “We gotta try, we just gotta.”
Jonah sighed, giving in to his love for his little sister, and lowered his arm. “Okay, when we get home we'll hide it and never talk about it again.”
“Thank you, Jonah,” Emma said, hugging him tightly.
“Yeah, well sometimes I wish Mom and Dad hadn't…” Jonah stopped himself, hadn't adopted you.
In an attempt to lower the population, families were limited to having one child, but they could adopt a child after their first born. Emma had been adopted as a baby, and Jonah had promised not to tell her until she was at least nine. Jonah looked back into Emma's curious eyes and tucked the relic back into his pocket. “Come on, Emma, let's go home.”
They walked across the bridge for about ten more blocks before coming to a group of apartment buildings. Platforms branched off the main bridge in a left and right formation, and the children took one to a building on the right. They entered the building’s elevator to the upper floors. The elevator stopped on the three hundred and eleventh floor, where the doors opened to a well-decorated hallway. An elegant carpet ran along the floor and blue paint with white clouds covered the walls.
Emma and Jonah walked down the hall and came to a stop in front of a door marked 517 B. As Jonah entered the code to open the door, he braced himself expecting their mom to leap out furious with them for being out after dark. Surprisingly, when they entered the living room, they found that their parents were not home.
“Maybe they're still at work,” suggested Emma hopefully. (The last time they were late coming home they both were grounded for a month.)
“Or, they went out while we were gone and haven't come home yet,” said Jonah. “Let's hide the relic before they get back.”
“There's a cabinet in my wall we can hide it in,” Emma said walking over to a pink door with a holoscreen sign that read, 'Girls “Girls Only.” “Mom and Dad let me put a pass code on it.”
“Why?” asked Jonah as they entered Emma's pink room, which was filled with all sorts of toys. Dolls walked around miniature city play sets, as stuffed animals roamed the room making real animal noises. Even the curtained bed was covered with toys.
Emma stopped in the middle of the room and glared at him while pointing to a charred and beheaded toy lion. “To keep my favorite dollies safe from you.”
Jonah grinned roguishly, “Hey that was only one time and that was because that thing wouldn't let me go in my room.”
Emma balled up her little fists as she walked over to a bare wall. After opening a panel, she entered a code on the hidden number pad. Another panel beside her slid aside to reveal five princess dolls that smiled and waved at her. Moving the dolls to one side, Emma turned to Jonah, “There should be enough room for the relic.”