And then, just as I’m spacing out, the digital clock readout on the wall shows thirteenth hour.
Suddenly a strange deep musical tone sounds, coming from all the walls, floor, and ceiling. It’s so powerful, so profoundly indescribable, that I have nothing to compare it to, except maybe a naval ship’s horn and a grand temple gong rolled into one, and okay, a whole wind section of an orchestra—except it’s even deeper, lower, darker. . . .
So low, in fact that the vibration rattles my bones and resounds in my body and echoes in my head. The sound seems to come from everywhere, and the floor vibrates under my feet so that I feel it through the soles of my shoes. . . . Distant glass windows and portions of ceiling rattle menacingly. . . . The whole stadium complex seems to be buzzing with the profundity.
What is it? What is its source?
“It is time,” an official says. “The Commencement Ceremony is starting. The sound that you hear is the Song of Invocation. We are now in Noon Ghost Time. When it ends, prepare to stand and line up.”
The great hall stirs all around me. Contenders in uniforms of all colors grow alert, and piercing glances are exchanged, as all these thousands of muscular, deadly, powerful young men and women all around me prepare.
As I too tense up, buffeted by the relentless deep sound, it occurs to me, out of the blue.
That sound, that “song”. . . .
It’s coming from the monument of the Atlantis Grail.
Ghost Time flies by, enveloped in the surreal sound. And then everything grows silent.
In that terrifying silence we rise from our seats and move in orderly sections, entering another long corridor. The next moment, we emerge into bright sunlight and open air of the grand Atlantis Grail Stadium interior.
The scope and size of this place is stunning. Imagine a huge, deep, oval bowl-shaped sports stadium on Earth, the biggest you can. Now, double it. Then, add the technology for a retractable dome roof, which is at present recessed away. Give it the seating capacity of over a hundred thousand spectators. And then stick a giant golden goblet monument at one narrow end of the oval, so that it towers over the stadium, gleaming with yellow fire in the sun. . . .
Even though I’m wearing sun-shade contact lenses, I squint from the white glare of Hel, as I step outside, in the wake of the Contender walking in front of me, into a slow-boil rising sound of the stadium audience.
The first thing that strikes me is—the central arena space is huge, and the stadium walls and grandstands are taller than I imagined. . . . Rows of amphitheater seats rise in endless tiers, higher and higher toward the sky. These general seating sections are interspersed with private boxes and balconies, and—strangest of all—massive golden statues of what might be ancient gods straight out of the Temple of Karnak. . . .
The heroic statues stand or sit at equal intervals all around the stadium, their blind golden gazes eternally trained upon the arena. The seated ones serve as seating sections in themselves. Their massive “laps” contain premium seats for the highest nobility—maybe so that they can be said to sit in the lap of the gods themselves?
I try to recall what I know of Atlantean religious faiths and beliefs. Except for the cult of Kassiopei, I’m not too familiar with the others. Who or what are these statues?
Meanwhile, on the very nosebleed top of the stadium are food and merchandise vendor terraces and giant video screens for close-ups and digital scoreboards. It’s a strange mixture of the ultra-modern and the ancient. And the whole thing is packed with people, spectators filling every seat.
In those first few seconds as I take in the overwhelming stadium, it occurs to me—I cannot see the Grail monument. Where is it?
And then I suddenly understand. It’s directly overhead. We’ve emerged out of an entrance at the very foot of the Atlantis Grail. There are two such entrances, one on both sides, and a stream of uniformed Contenders flows simultaneously from each. I glance upward momentarily to see the Grail’s looming monolith presence, like a wall of fire blazing above me. . . .
We enter the arena, moving around the outer edge along a special track. As more and more of us emerge, the stadium noise grows louder, until the ground shakes with the roar.
We walk with our heads held high, raising hands frequently to wave at the audience. After making a complete circle around the arena, we’re supposed to line up in rectangular sections in the middle, for the rest of the Ceremony.
Despite the blinding sunlight, I notice the tiny swirling “snow” of nano-cameras all around, seeming to fall from the sky or some other unknown source.
That’s when the great video screens come alive. Close-ups of popular Contenders’ faces appear in montages, and the audience screams at the sight of each favorite.
There goes Deneb Gratu’s steel-eyed countenance, and a roar of “De-neb! De-neb!” shakes the stadium. It’s followed by a glimpse of the stunning blue-haired beauty Tiamat Irtiu whose confident grin reveals perfect white teeth as she waves at the adoring fans who call out her nickname “Thalassa! Thalassa!”
Next the audience screams “Kuk-ku! Kuk-ku!” and we see Hedj Kukkait’s lean intelligent face and reserved smile fill the giant screens—pale skin, long white hair, black brows and strangely “avian” super-black eyes sharply outlined in kohl. I can see why Hedj has earned his nickname of “White Bird.” Like a hawk, he is a beautiful predator, and on some visceral level he is terrifying.
I keep walking, maintaining the designated distance between the person in front of me, watching with my peripheral vision the close-ups on the giant screens, the roaring crowds of spectators in the tiered seats, the strange giant golden statues. . . .
The Imperial balcony is coming up—positioned in the exact middle of the wide oval portion of the stadium, so that the Imperial Kassiopei can observe both directions of the arena with equal comfort. The Imperial balcony section is flanked by two standing golden statues that appear to guard the Imperator and the rest of the Imperial party from both sides.
Is Aeson there, next to his Imperial parents, looking at me right now? I wonder, not daring to look up directly, and my heart speeds up with anxiety. What about Gracie and Gordie, and the rest of my friends and expert trainers?
I can’t bear to look. . . .
In that moment, the video montage picks up my face. Suddenly, there I am, several stories tall, my blanched tense face filling all the mega-screens around the stadium.
The crowd reacts with a mixed roar. “Earth Bride! Earth Bride!” I hear them call. “Gwen Lark, Earth Bride!”
And then I hear boos and hoots which seem to overpower all other sound. Then they chant, “Carrion! Carrion! Food for the wild birds! Bakris! Bakris!”
I’ve no idea what that Atlantean word means, but somehow I don’t think it’s complimentary. However, I have to keep up an appearance of confidence and strength. So I force myself to smile, nod, and raise my hand to wave to all of them.
And then the video montage jumps to an unexpected image of the Imperial balcony. My breath catches as I see the Imperial Crown Prince Aeson Kassiopei seated to the right of the Imperator. . . . The crowd stops booing and now roars in genuine adoration as the camera moves in, giving an impossible close-up of my beloved’s face. It’s as if it’s taunting both of us, showing our reactions to each other for all the world to see.
Aeson’s face is inscrutable, frozen in stone. He looks straight ahead, and does not blink, beautiful haughty, perfectly calm. . . . Just for a moment I feel a strange stab of confusion at his indifference, his lack of any human reaction.
And then I remember—this is his mask.
My Bridegroom is putting up a wall, playing the Imperial Crown Prince, because he must. Only his eyes, for a split instant, reveal a living energy, a fierce intensity.
The crowd continues to roar approval of their Crown Prince, until Aeson’s close-up gives way to other Contenders, and then the fans’ responses become more varied, based on the popularity of the individuals.
&
nbsp; I continue walking along the track, frozen and wooden inside, trying to maintain the smile, waving periodically. We’ve circled most of the arena at this point, and it’s time to enter the central portion and form squares of our Categories, in a checkerboard of colors.
In minutes we form ranks, standing with others of our Category and color, and our reflective uniforms blaze metallic in the sun.
A musical introduction sounds, grand and uplifting, as a many-layered orchestra of slightly alien wind instruments and percussion plays the familiar theme of the Games—familiar to me, after watching endless Games footage this past month, so that I can probably hum along with it.
When the music ends, a male voice speaks, and his resonant words roll in echoes along the expanse of the stadium. He is the Priest of the Grail, a temporary honorific position given each year to a favored member of the various sects of the Atlantean clergy. Once designated as the Priest of the Grail, the priest leads the Invocation and all other ceremonial aspects of the Games for a given year, then relinquishes his position to his successor when the Games are over.
“Welcome, Contenders, to the eternal Games of the Atlantis Grail! There is no beginning and there will be no end! The Games are Forever!”
“The Games are Forever!” we repeat as one, and then the whole stadium roars in answer.
The sound we make in unison makes the ground vibrate. There is such power in the air that my skin prickles in goose bumps.
When it fades into silence, the screens all around the stadium are once again showing the Imperial balcony.
The close-up, this time, is of Romhutat Kassiopei, the Archaeon Imperator of Atlantida.
It’s the face of a cold stone dragon, handsome and terrifying in its divine distance, as he looks on at the spectacle of the crowds and the arena filled with Contenders.
And then the Imperator parts his lips and he sings.
The musical sequence is infinitely complex, profound, his deep resonant voice amplified to resound in all the distant reaches of the stadium complex.
And yet, trained by Aeson all these months in the use of my voice, I somehow recognize it.
But before I have time to recall which sequence this is, I feel a jolt and lurch underneath my feet.
Suddenly the ground under me is rising.
I gasp. . . . Every other Contender around me catches his or her breath. Because we’re all rising—the whole arena is rising, in separate square sections based on Categories.
The ten squares float upward, each one a platform supporting five hundred people. Squares of Red, White, Yellow, Green, Blue—they continue rising into the air, as we stand upon them, petrified with awe.
At the height of about fifty feet over the ground level of the arena, the ten platforms hover and rearrange, forming a grand circle in the air, like a circle of colorful tiles.
And then, just as it cannot get any weirder, the standing golden statues all around the stadium make a creaking metallic sound . . . slowly their limbs animate . . . their metal arms rise upward, palms turned toward the sky.
Finally, the blind golden eyelids of the statues lift open.
Their hollow eye sockets reveal fire.
Chapter 36
The crowd roars approval, and the voice of the Imperator fades in splintered echoes.
There is a brief pause as the audience quiets, watching the spectacle of the statues come to life, spouting fire from their sockets.
I and the rest of the Contenders watch in stunned expectation, as we stand on platforms floating in the air, levitating at a level somewhere near the middle seating tier—which also happens to be close to “lap” level of the seated golden statues, and the waist level of the standing ones.
It is also the level of the Imperial balcony. Apparently the Imperator raised us up to his own level, maybe to see us better?
Whatever the reason, there’s no time to guess . . . because the Imperator sings again.
And once again we begin moving. This time, the platforms are set in motion horizontally, beginning with a gentle lurch and then speeding up, maintaining our formation as we circle the arena.
The carousel circle of platforms turns just fast enough that it becomes hard to fix your gaze on anything stationary, but not so fast that anyone falls off. However, the dizzying movement is so unpleasant that I’m forced to close my eyes periodically in order to maintain my stance, while many others around me do the same.
Whenever I manage to open my eyes, I notice in flashes that the stadium screens are now showing close-ups of our spinning circle, and there’s an amazing optical illusion. The blocks of distinct colors rendered by our Category uniforms blur together with motion—instead of segments of Red, Blue, Green, Yellow, and White, there is only white, the mixture of all our colors come together. . . .
We stand, maintaining our row formations, facing outward as we turn, seeing the blur of the stadium walls and the audience flying past us. I feel bad for anyone who gets dizzy easily (I’m one such person) and extra-bad for anyone who’s standing along the outer perimeter of each platform, close to any of the edges adjacent to the precipice. . . . Just for a moment I revisit my old fear of heights. Seriously, a few more minutes of this and people might start barfing. . . .
But then I forget about being dizzy, because the spouts of fire pouring from the eyes of statues increase in force and extend outward into horizontal geysers. The fire-streams flow onward, passing us directly overhead at the height of about thirty feet, so that sparks rain down upon us and sizzle out before they touch down on our heads. The geysers of fire enter the interior area of the circle defined by the inner boundary of our spinning motion.
I’m too stunned, deafened, and generally too amazed to be afraid as I watch the river of fire overhead fill the expanse of the inner circle. What’s keeping the fire in check?
At the same time the spinning platforms upon which we stand begin slowing down gradually, turning slower and slower around the stadium, until they come to a full stop and hover in place, still forming a circle of colored “tiles” in the air.
Our backs might be turned to the circle’s interior, but the grand stadium screens show us what’s going on there. . . . The river of fire has filled the circle completely, forming a sphere suspended in the air, possibly held within some kind of containment field—a quantum field? And the fireball is now spinning in the opposite direction from our own earlier rotation.
The stadium claps and thunders its approval.
The Imperator sings another sequence, his voice cutting through the roar and forcing them to silence.
This time the fireball alone rises, still maintaining its spherical shape and containment. And then it floats over our heads and beyond the boundary of the circle. It continues sailing across the expanse of the whole stadium, moving toward the Atlantis Grail.
I watch incredulously as the immense sphere of fire—at least a few hundred meters in diameter—crosses the stadium and then hovers directly over the bowl of the Grail, coming to a stop while the roaring flames inside continue to rotate.
The voice of the Imperator ends on a long held C note.
And that’s when the fireball falls, at the same instant starting to lose its cohesion. . . .
The crowd screams. . . .
The moment it touches the rim of the Grail, there comes a fierce hiss, followed by an explosion of rising vapor. The fires sink beyond the rim inside the cup, drowning—for apparently the Grail is filled with water—and the flames are extinguished, leaving only the grand vapor cloud rising high above the stadium.
Very briefly, the incandescent white sky over our heads is transformed into a soft shadow of an overcast, so that the sunlight comes through gentle and filtered. . . . Then just as rapidly the mist coalesces into droplets, dissipating the cloud, and coming down as sudden rain over the stadium.
The rain lasts only for a few seconds, while the audience responds in squeals and yells and happy laughter. It barely wets our hair, splashes on fa
ces and eyelids, before it’s all over and the sky is clear and deadly white once again.
While some of the Contenders around me are full of equal amusement and awe as the audience, I’m distracted with other thoughts. . . .
I stand remembering the exact vocal sequence the Imperator used to cause the cascade of these elemental special effects. It’s definitely impressive as a show of power, but it’s also a clever trick, using the joint motion of orichalcum platforms on a grand scale to create a personal quantum field boundary, which he then manipulated the same way I once called the Quantum Stream to me when we had Breached during the QS Race—using some kind of quantum entanglement.
I’m almost entirely certain it’s what’s just happened here. Aeson taught me enough advanced material, and explained some of the underlying principles behind Quantum Stream technology that it’s not difficult to piece together the rest.
While I continue to mull over this, the stadium grows silent once more. The Imperator sings the sequence to rearrange the circle of levitating platforms back into our original checkerboard pattern, and brings us back down, gently floating to the ground.
Then the orchestra plays the Games theme again, and the Priest of the Grail continues the next stage of the Ceremony. It includes the parade of last year’s Top Ten, the Champions of the Games.
The field of Contenders stares with respect at the Champions as they emerge from the two entrances at the foot of the Grail. Three female and seven male winners walk proudly onto an elevated special platform, wearing the somewhat different-looking uniforms of their own Games, golden laurel wreaths atop their heads, and carrying their Grail trophies, as the audience erupts with screaming applause. Their names are announced, followed by their total awarded AG points. The numbers are staggering.
We all salute them. And they salute us in turn, raising their Grail trophies high.
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