“People want to matter, Mr. Hunter.”
“And that’s why all these people are here? To matter?”
“Among other reasons.” She stopped at the front doors and stepped back. Isn’t it obvious?
“May I take your coat?” a woman in formal attire asked.
Hunter stripped off his black overcoat without breaking eye contact with Dova.
“Your cap?” the woman asked.
“No. Thank you.” Rude or not, he was keeping it. His past was advertised on his forehead, something that rarely mattered to him. But here, it seemed prudent to keep it secret.
“Have you eaten?” Dova asked.
“You tell me.”
She laughed. “Breakfast was a lucky guess, Mr. Hunter.”
“And the hotel?”
“I called around, yes. I suggest for future anonymity you use a different name when checking in.”
“Is that all I have to do to remain hidden, change my name?”
“Perhaps.”
She pushed the doors open to enter a ballroom. The floor reflected a massive chandelier. White-clothed tables were stationed in the corners with displays of seafood, salads and desserts.
A woman from the staff whispered in Dova’s ear. Hunter caught the syllables of another language. “If you will excuse me, Mr. Hunter, I will only be a moment. Please enjoy the food and surroundings.”
She was ushered to a doorway on the left.
People gathered in small groups, drinks in hand or small plates. Hunter stood like an introvert shoved on stage for the very first time. Various works of art were displayed on the walls, sculpture on the tables. A large piece was centered beneath the chandelier, a larger than life depiction of Zeus holding a lightning bolt. The Greek god, the ruler of the skies, the father of gods and men.
He moved around the room, stopping at paintings, feigning interest as he looked at faces, memorizing details. He paused at the doorway Dova had gone through, a metal railing spiraling down a stairwell.
A painting grabbed his attention.
It was to the left of the door. A similar one was on the other side. He wasn’t interested in the arts, certainly not abstract, but there was something different about this one. Slashes and drips of vivid colors camouflaged a pattern of lines.
Hunter reflexively felt for his coat pocket.
The pattern was the same as the one on the back of the postcards. There was no address, no tagline hidden in the seemingly random spatter of paint. Long lines of yellow were among the dashes, like a chalk line of paint had been snapped across the canvas, a fractured element breaking up space.
Or hinting at it.
“Fan of the abstract?” Dova was at his side.
“Who lives here?”
“The business.”
“The business that has no name?”
“Is a rose not a rose?”
Dova cracked the seal on a bottle of water. She did it slowly, let him hear it, let him know it was new. She took a sip and put it in his hand.
“Let me show you something.”
Bifold glass doors were open along the back. A breeze gently fluttered the tablecloths. It smelled of earth and water. Dova took his arm and led him to an expansive balcony. The glass railing did not hinder the view to an endless body of water, the horizon sharp and flexing beneath of darkened sky. It couldn’t be the ocean, but there was nothing to say otherwise.
“I love it out here.” She closed her eyes, inhaling. “Much better than the city.”
“Why did you bring me here?”
She paused for several seconds, gazing at the stars in the water before turning her dark eyes on him. “It is how a relationship begins.”
“I’m the government.”
“Why do you continue reminding me?”
“Because this is unusual.”
“We have nothing to hide, Mr. Hunter. Everything is for you to see.”
He chuckled. “You want me to see, is that it?”
“What do you see, Mr. Hunter?”
He looked around. Men polluted the air with cigars. Women laughed. An elderly woman was leaning on the railing, drinking in the view. Three stories below, there was a pool. Palm trees rustled in a rogue breeze. Palm trees don’t grow here.
Dova dug through a tiny purse to find a thin cigarette. She cupped her hands to light it. The smell of cloves streamed from pursed lips.
“When the mood strikes, I smoke.” She took another drag. “Have you experienced that, Mr. Hunter? When the mood cannot be denied. You must have it. Like an itch that must be scratched.”
He felt like a child who had wet his pants, attempting to hide behind his hands. That was not a lucky guess. There were parts of Hunter’s life that he kept hidden, even from himself; memories he locked away to forget. Parts that itched from time to time, that wanted to be remembered. That needed scratched.
A bell rang.
The patrons on the balcony extinguished their cigars and began walking inside the ballroom, forming a line that led to a spiral staircase on each side of the room. The elderly woman remained on the balcony.
“You’re ready for this, Mr. Hunter.” Dova ground the cigarette beneath her heel. She said it as if they’d been waiting for him, that the time was right. That all of this was for him, despite the crowd.
He lingered outside, unsure whether to follow or not. He was being played, the moves laid out for him. Only traps were at the end of those paths. But he wanted to know; curiosity had sunk its hooks. And all these people couldn’t be in on it.
He checked his phone. Still no signal. The agency wouldn’t know where he was. But there would be clues if something happened.
He was the last one on the balcony. Hunter found Dova at the back of the line, her hand open and inviting, slipping her fingers between his.
THEY DESCENDED AT LEAST three stories, a cacophony of footsteps that measured the plunge to a cool, damp room. A hint of something pungent, slightly spoiled. He expected to see iron bars around the corner, the elaborate joke finally up.
It was another large room, this one subtly lit with dark corners and round tables. It resembled a small nightclub. A circular dais was shrouded by a black curtain. Dova led him to a standing table, a candle flickering on a white tablecloth. She excused herself with a gentle squeeze and left him with his bottle of water.
The crowd was less than fifty people, but how many of them were business associates pretending to buy whatever they were selling?
Despite the air-conditioning, hot flashes were flaring inside him. He slid the cap off his head, bunching it in his hand. Sweat beaded along his forehead. The air felt stagnant. He could hear his own breath.
He checked for a nosebleed.
Dova was not in the room. In fact, fifty people was a small number based on how many were mingling upstairs. Each of them was welcomed by someone when they arrived. Dova was his invitation.
Or recruiter.
Someone had entered the room and made their way between the tables, occasionally stopping to shake hands, kiss a cheek or share a laugh. They seemed to recognize him, a celebrity among them. Maybe this wasn’t their first time, or they’d heard so much about him. His gait was graceful, fluid.
“Welcome, everyone,” he said above the chatter. “Welcome, welcome. We can get started, finally. I know we’re running a little late, but time is relative, yes?”
There was laughter. Hunter wasn’t in on the joke. He knew about time dilation inside the Maze, but they were laughing at something else.
The man climbed onto the dais, his back brushing the curtain. His hair was as white as his teeth, his smile a heat lamp. Hunter could feel it in his stomach, a pleasant sensation that mingled in the heat of claustrophobia.
He clapped his hands. “We’re glad to have you.”
Hunter drained the bottle of water and mopped his forehead. No one else was fidgeting. They wore big smiles while sitting at attention, every word driving dead center, bull’s-eye. Maybe they w
ere all business associates and Hunter was the only real customer in the room, all of this for his benefit, orchestrated to make him feel safe, to lure him deeper into the trap.
All of them watching him.
“Why are you here?” He paced around the dais. Some answered the rhetorical question; his smile never wavered. “You want something better. You know you’re more than who you are, you can feel it. Am I right?”
Agreement murmured throughout the room.
“How many of you dreamed last night?” Three silent steps, hands together. “Where did you go? Did you leave your body? Go to Peter Pan’s Neverland? Did you experience Foreverland?”
Hunter flinched. Dry heat exhaled through his pores. Did he say Foreverland?
“Who are you?” the white-haired man asked. “When you dream, do you become someone else? I speak of a convincing dream, one you feel and smell and hear, a world as real as this.”
Several people nodded along, reminding Hunter of those mega-church gatherings.
“Your body is merely a vehicle, not much different than a car. Your body only carries you to your destination. You care for the body, you feed it and bathe it, give it medicine to keep it working. But you step out of the vehicle when you arrive at your destination. So what are you if not the body?”
There were several answers.
“The mind?” The white-haired man nodded along. “I believe we’re more than that, my friends. We know the world through our five senses.” He counted them off. “Is that all there is? If we are born without sight, how do we know such a thing as seeing even exists?”
The man straightened the curtain behind him. The silence hung as thick as velvet.
“If your body is a vehicle, where is it taking you? I think you have come to the right place with that question, my friends. Each and every one of you has a destination. You are going somewhere, but you don’t know where. You don’t know how.” He took calculated steps around the dais, hands out. A wide smile. “You don’t know why.”
Hunter leaned forward, waiting for the next words. They came out in a whisper but reached them all.
“My friend, you are blind and cannot see.”
The hook was set. They were on the edge of their seats, leaning on the table, against each other. Every word was a turn of the reel, a little closer to shore where the white-haired man waited with a net.
He said friend, not friends.
Hunter sniffed. Sweat seeped into his eyes, smudging details, streaking lights. The white-haired man disappeared on the other side of the curtain. Hunter’s pocket buzzed. He jolted with surprise and reached for his phone. There was a text, even though he still wasn’t getting service.
Who is this?
He ignored it and looked for the white-haired man. The business with no name was about enhancements, about improving the human experience. Making it more. But this was something else. Something more. He should leave before he felt worse. A swamp of perspiration spread between his shoulder blades. It trickled down his back. He needed some air.
Why did they invite me?
“You didn’t come here for money or fame. You have no need for carnal pleasure or simply to dream,” the white-haired man said. “You came to create.”
Hunter’s elbow slipped from the table. An iron tang filled his throat and rang in his head. He wiped his nose. A crimson streak smudged the back of his hand.
“For the first time in your lives, you will know the true purpose of being human. You will truly see.”
Hunter’s past rushed up from the deep, a leviathan sinking teeth into his mind, tearing away the walls that hid his past, the events that left a scar on his forehead, enslaved him to a lifetime of yearning for something else. Something more. His haunted past had branded him with unobtainable desire. The tropical island where he was first introduced to the needle.
“The universe, my friend, is indeed—” the man raised his hands “—endless.”
The black curtain dropped.
Hot air scratched through Hunter’s throat, scorching his lungs. He fell into the table and went to the floor. Only the people near him noticed. The rest of the room saw only what was center stage. Hunter caught a glimpse of the upright tank before rolling onto his back. Bubbles streamed up the sides.
A body inside.
He fell onto warm sand and smelled the ocean, went deep into memories that were down but never forgotten. When he hit bottom, the past was waiting.
Foreverland was calling.
17
Hunter
After the Punch
WHERE AM I?
Hunter looked through a glass wall that was slightly curved, a horseshoe-shaped building a few stories below. Beyond that was a large green field, a college campus lined with palm trees with giant white birds.
Foreverland Island.
He was a kid when he woke up with a headache and a scramble pot of memories, memories the old men programmed in him, confused him. Memories he believed, he trusted.
Memories that weren’t his.
Is that what we are, memories? A record of past events, each one a building block forming an inescapable foundation? Blocks cemented beneath us in childhood, blocks that support us, convince us who we are?
Even if the memories aren’t mine.
His memories, the ones before the island, were of a loose childhood. He lived with adoptive parents that disciplined often. Their weapon of choice was an old car antenna that sliced the air before stinging the backs of his legs, a blazing line burning his thighs. His mom slept most of the day. His dad was usually gone.
Hunter ran away when he was young. He didn’t plan it, just left school one day and didn’t go home. It was the next morning they noticed he was gone. It wasn’t long after that he woke up on the island with no memory of how or why.
The old men brought him there and boys like him. They scrambled their thoughts and locked them in cells, made them uncomfortable, and instilled a mad desire to escape their bodies. Eventually, they did. What was left was a young, healthy body with nobody home. The old men in their sick and failing bodies were waiting.
It was the needle that was erasing them. They strapped on a punch and welcomed the needle as it drew them out of their suffering bodies and sent them to a dreamland where every wish came true, a place of make-believe they never wanted to leave, never wanted to return to the agony. Like all the other boys, Hunter embraced the needle, craved its kiss, clung to its escape. Even though it was erasing him, he reached for it when it was offered.
We all did.
He’d survived the island only because the authorities arrived, but it taught him one thing: memories couldn’t be trusted. He kept them at arm’s length, regarding them with suspicion. Who he was—his identity, his core existence—was something more than just memories; he believed, like all sentient beings, he had an essential nature that used memories to form an identity but didn’t require them to exist.
He’d escaped the island, was rescued from the old men before they stole his body, but part of his mind never left.
The island is inside me.
The jungle began to fade. An off-white ceiling replaced the sun and sky. His vision was obscured by a damp cloth over his forehead. He wasn’t looking down on the island. He was lying in a chair and struggled to sit up.
“Shh-shh.” Soft, thin fingers stroked his arm. “Slow down.”
His body was heavy, a mold filled with wet sand. He dropped his head into a pillow. Water was running down the walls to his left and right. The wall in front of him was transparent. It overlooked a great lake. Unlike the island, this glass wall was not curved. The moon hung above the horizon.
“What...” His throat jammed up.
“You’re in the healing room,” Dova said. “Many find it soothing to be here after an overwhelming experience.” She smiled down on him, pupils large.
His front teeth were numb and slightly loose. He ran his tongue over his lower lip. The taste of clean iron and the sting o
f a neat gash were near the tip of his tongue.
“You fell before we could catch you,” she said. “I never should’ve left you alone. Your reaction wasn’t unusual. It just came a little faster than anticipated.”
She dabbed his cheeks.
He pushed onto his elbow despite her resistance. The chair folded to his new position. A full view of the lake was below. She offered a bottle of water.
“You drugged me.” His words were long and slurred, heavy and wet. They put something in the water, uncorked all those memories of Foreverland, things he wanted to forget. But she opened it in front of me. Took a sip.
“I assure you, Mr. Hunter, you were not drugged. Others have had a similar experience. It is why we escort our clientele. It is quite overwhelming when first exposed to the possibilities.”
He shook his head. That wasn’t it. He knew all about tanks and awareness leaping, of the alternate realities they experienced. He’d seen that show a thousand times. It was his head. It had begun to itch. The residual was still in his skull, a creeping worm that inched its way up and down the dormant stent buried beneath the scar, scratching the gray matter in search of a way out, dragging him back to the island.
“There is a certain energy,” she said, her full lips curling, “that fills the room during these moments. You experienced this.”
It was illegal, what they were doing. And they knew it. Recreational tanking was what they were selling. The sales pitch suggested something more than mere entertainment, though. To create.
Create what?
They wanted him to see it, an agent of the federal government. But why? He twisted around. A door was in the back wall.
“You are free to go, Mr. Hunter.” She chuckled. “You need a few moments to recover, get your strength back. Your legs are weak. Another fall like that and you’ll lose a tooth.”
“What you’re doing, you’ll all be arrested if I leave.”
“We are doing nothing illegal.”
“You’re peddling awareness leaping to paying customers for recreational purposes.”
Maze: The Waking of Grey Grimm Page 13