by Terry Schott
Thousands of years had passed inside the Game. It was time to reset the server.
***
Michelle crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair. “They will begin the reset protocol soon?”
Trew nodded. When Danielle had completed her final play, the majority of her team — Trew’s team before that — had retained positions of importance in Trew’s organization.
Michelle remained a crucial part of the day-to-day operations concerning the Game. “Let’s see if Sylvia was able to deactivate the function.”
“They are going to be confused.” Danielle sipped her drink and watched the Timeless sit around the fire on the main monitor.
“We will get word to them as soon as we can.” Trew looked towards the screen. “They have been at this Game much longer than we have. After thousands of years, this will be just another hiccup. They might even enjoy the break in routine.”
They watched the Timeless enter a small, round chamber approximately ten feet in diameter with a rough-cut wall that arched into a domed ceiling.
One of the newer executives looked at Trew. “What’s that in the centre?”
“The Artifact,” Trew said. On the view screen, a sphere two feet in diameter floated above the ground. It appeared to be both solid and liquid; silver, gold, black, crimson, and white swirled like smoke beneath the globe’s surface. It pulsed, the outer surface changing shape from round, to jagged, to bumpy before returning to round.
“It’s beautiful,” Danielle whispered.
“It looks familiar,” Lilith, Danielle’s previous sponsor, said. “What do you know about it?”
Trew shook his head as he continued to watch the Timeless move around the Artifact. “Only that it is an extremely powerful item and the Timeless use it to reset the Game every ten Tygon years.”
“Does it do anything else?” a new team member asked.
“Not that I know of.” Trew leaned forward to get a better look at it on the screen. “Sylvia didn’t say much about it. I will ask next time I speak with her.”
“They stand around the globe and place their hands on it?”
“One hand each. The globe does the rest. They’re in place. Let’s hope that they don’t take too long to figure out what is happening.”
***
Fourth time standing in this chamber. Carl maintained his outward stillness even though the tight space of the room made his skin crawl. Five thousand years between trips isn’t long enough between return visits to this coffin.
Raphael took a deep breath and nodded. “See you in a few centuries, then.” When the reset was complete, they would be flung far apart from each other, scattered to different corners of the world.
Raphael placed his hand on the globe. It began to hum as the silver pooled together and moved to rest under his palm.
Shane touched the globe and the blackness gathered into a round ball and moved to his palm like a greedy fish looking for food.
The humming became louder as each Timeless put their hand on the Artifact. As each stepped forward, the gold flowed to Gabriel’s palm, crimson to Carl’s, and white to Angelica’s.
Sound washed over them in a melody that was both beautiful and discomforting. The volume built to a crescendo and Angelica opened her mouth, laughing as she waited for the energy to release and blast them all halfway across the planet. With a grin and shake of her long blonde hair, she prepared herself for the concussion that was about to strike . . . and then frowned as the sound stopped and the room was bathed in darkness and heavy silence.
“Umm.” Carl’s voice rumbled from the blackness. “Is anyone here, or is this a new hallucination for me?”
“We’re all here.” Gabriel said the words as if they were part of a formal ritual.
There was a faint snapping sound and a small ball of light appeared above Angelica’s palm to illuminate the chamber. A moment later, the colours reappeared inside the globe, lighting the room as they resumed their slow swirling. “What now?” She wiggled her fingers and her light faded away like smoke.
Shane’s expression conveyed his confusion. “Did the reset occur?”
“I have no clue.” Gabriel scanned the chamber. “But I don’t think we should touch the Artifact again.”
“I agree.” Carl walked towards the steps. “Let’s find out if we accomplished anything.”
“We don’t even know if the door will open.” Raphael followed Carl.
“Oh, it’s gonna open.”
Angelica chuckled. “Okay, let’s get outside and see what’s up.”
“Agreed.” Gabriel began walking toward the exit.
They made their way to the top of the stairs and the doorway shimmered into existence as Carl’s foot touched the top step. They stood outside and gazed at the city in the distance. The city was brightly lit.
“That answers our question,” Shane said. “If electric power exists then the reset did not occur.”
“We need to make contact with Tygon.” Angelica ran a hand through her hair. “Trew will know what is going on.”
The Timeless nodded in unison. “Let’s get out of here.” Raphael floated into the air.
“We stay together until we figure out what’s going on?” Angelica looped her arm through Carl’s.
“Yes.” Gabriel nodded. “Let’s head to my last residence.”
They rose into the air and left the pyramid behind them.
4
“I agree with you.”
Thirteen looked up from his plate of food at the woman standing across from him. He smiled and pointed at an empty seat. “I didn’t say anything.”
Melissa sat with the fluid grace of a professional soldier and glanced around the mess. “Sure you did.” She took a bite of food and chewed as she watched Thirteen. “Your body language gave it away, same as everyone else.”
He shook his head. “What?”
Melissa swallowed her food. “No one wants to be here.”
Thirteen felt his face flush. His eyes darted to the corner of the room where a small video camera rotated slowly so that it could monitor everything that occurred. “You shouldn’t say stuff like that.” He barely moved his lips as he spoke. “They will hear you.”
Melissa shrugged. “They know. It’s no secret to Thorn or the General.”
Thirteen frowned. That’s right. She’s one of the General’s Hand. “Do you talk with him often?”
Melissa laughed. “You don’t talk with the General. You listen and then reply when addressed, or else nod and do as you’re told.” She raised her fork to her mouth. “I am in his presence a lot, which enables me to hear many interesting things.”
“You’re sitting with me for a reason. The General wants to put me to use?”
“Yeah. I’m surprised that he’s waited so long to come for you.”
“What does he want?” Thirteen’s tone betrayed that he was nervous. The General had behaved differently since everyone had returned from the Sim — which is what people were calling it, the Return. Still, there was no question that the General was in command; it was obvious when he walked amongst the population or made appearances on the vid screens to address the nation. He was less rigid and cold than before. Instead, the General had become more fatherly, like a parent you would turn to in times of distress, the one who could make everything better when it seemed that all hope was lost.
Which is exactly how everyone seemed to feel since the Return, as if all hope was lost. At first they had been happy just to be alive, but that had soon faded. Now, people missed playing the Sim. The majority of them wanted to go back in rather than face the bleak existence of the reality they found themselves stranded in. No one spoke of this desire, though, because anyone who suggested re-entering the simulation soon disappeared. It was obvious that, for the citizens of this world, life was not a game, and it never would be again.
Melissa pushed her tray to one side. “In the Sim, you played a pivotal role. You were one of the first to break
free and return. To help save the others.”
“You were first, Melissa, I was just one of the advance team after that. There were many with me who did the same.”
“Yes, but you were special too.”
Thirteen shrugged.
“Out here, they still call you Thirteen instead of addressing you by your real name.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“Yeah, it does, and you know it.”
He faced the camera. “I don’t want to be special. Especially not here.” He stabbed the pile of white uneaten mush with his fork, leaving it there as he stood. “I just want to put in my time and make the best of this horrible situation.”
“Until you die?”
“Yeah.” Thirteen’s smile resembled the feral snarl of a caged animal. “Until I die.” He began to walk towards the exit.
“What if I could offer you some excitement?”
Thirteen looked over his shoulder and raised one eyebrow.
“Thorn has found something, and we need volunteers to take a look. Volunteers with scientific knowledge and the ability to accept . . . strange possibilities.”
As if I have a choice. “Okay. I guess the worst that can happen is that I die sooner than later.”
Melissa laughed. She stood and joined him, slapping him on the back. “That’s the spirit, Thirteen! It will either be fun or kill ya. Maybe we can really make you happy and both things will happen at the same time.”
Thirteen couldn’t help but laugh.
5
The helicopter lifted into the air with a roar. Trew and Lilith watched it rise into the sky and fly away, waiting until the sound from the blades faded.
Trew turned the collar of his jacket up to protect his face from the bite of the wind and studied the landscape: jagged rocks strewn across the flat, empty plain. “Five hours in a jet, one hour on a boat, and forty-five minutes in a helicopter. I hope the trip was worth it.”
Lilith smiled beneath the large, fur-lined hood. “I had to bring you. Telling you wouldn’t have been as effective. Besides, we don’t want to risk anyone intercepting a video of what we’re about to see.”
Trew nodded. He had tried to glean some knowledge about where they were going during the flight, but Lilith had refused to say anything.
They walked for ten minutes, slowly moving over the hard, black tundra. They stopped on the top of a long ledge. Trew looked down at an expansive flatland with a large, dark mound in the centre surrounded by tall shale walls. The mound looked like a cave, but Trew couldn’t be sure from this distance. Lilith led the way down the steep, slippery slope. After a half hour of slow walking, they reached the mouth of the structure; it was a cave. As they got close, Trew observed that the doorway was barred by a black metal door with a small panel nestled in an alcove at eye level. The two entered the small recess. The sudden quiet was welcome as they found shelter from the constant onslaught of the biting winds.
Lilith pulled her hood back and shook her hair. “Okay, I’ve been assured that your eye pattern will open the lock.” She motioned to the small panel with the ocular scanner.
“What do you mean ‘you've been assured that my eye pattern will work’? What if it doesn’t work?”
“Don’t worry, it will.” Lilith placed a hand on the back of his head and directed him closer to the screen. “Just hurry and open the door; I’m starting to freeze.”
Trew shook his head and looked into the red light coming from the device. A moment later, the red light turned blue and a heavy thudding sounded from inside the steel door as it unlocked. Trew pushed the door open and, deciding that it would be more gentlemanly to enter an unknown room first rather than let Lilith take the chance, he entered.
The interior of the room was small and round with rough-hewn walls made of black stone. It was stark and empty, except for one item in the centre of the floor. It floated just above the ground.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
“Right?” Lilith closed the door behind her.
A multi-coloured globe floated before them. It looked identical to the one they had seen the Timeless touch inside the pyramid only hours ago.
“How long have you known about this?”
“I learned about it from Brandon. Shortly before he, well before the old Brandon died.”
“Did you know it was here? Isolated in the far north of the planet?”
“No. I asked Cooper about it, and he made the rest of the arrangements.”
“Who else knows about it?”
“Just the four of us.”
“Is it the same globe?”
“I don’t know.”
“What does it mean?”
Lilith shrugged.
“Should I touch it?” he asked.
“I wouldn’t. If it was movable, Brandon would have done so by now.”
Trew didn’t know what to think. “We should have brought Danni.”
“We can come back.”
After a moment, he nodded. “Yeah, that’s gonna have to happen. I need to think about this.”
Lilith reached for her phone. “I’ll go outside and call the chopper back.”
6
“What in the world is it?” Thirteen moved closer until he was straining against the thick rope that separated him from the object on the other side.
“We aren’t sure what it is.” Melissa’s voice was hushed. “From this world, I mean.”
“What do you mean?”
“Wait until we clear the room.” They were not alone. Three men moved beyond the rope, each wearing a full hazmat suit. One called out numbers at intervals, pausing as the second person wrote the statistics down on a clipboard. The third went back and forth between a desk and makeshift workstation that housed a computer.
Thirteen observed from a distance, wondering what it was he was seeing and where it might have come from.
Ten minutes later, the three technicians completed their work and moved towards the exit. One of them spoke. “Go ahead and cross the rope. Just don’t touch it.”
“Is it dangerous?” Melissa looked over his shoulder and eyed the object.
“It’s not radioactive, but four of us were sent in to take measurements. Mark touched it, and he’s not here anymore.”
Melissa looked at the technician and waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. “What happened to him?”
“He disintegrated. There was a loud whining sound, and then Mark . . . melted into a puddle on the floor.”
“Oh.” Melissa looked at Thirteen with an expression of concern.
“Yeah.” The technician started walking towards the exit. “There was a lot of screaming, so I would guess it must have been painful. Don’t touch it.”
“Okay.” Melissa raised the rope so they could slide under it. They got close but held back a bit to avoid touching the Artifact.
“Have you ever seen anything like this?” Thirteen leaned in for a close look.
“No.” It was a round globe that appeared to be both smooth and rough, both liquid and solid. The colours crimson, silver, gold, black, and white floated in its interior, each colour separate, twisting and turning around each other but never blending.
“It’s beautiful. What makes you think that it’s not from this world?”
“I don’t know why I said that; it must be from here. Where else could it have come from?”
“It could be a meteorite.”
“That’s not a bad guess. Carbon dating puts it at thirty thousand years old. This little chamber that we are standing in is part of a much bigger structure.” She walked to the desk and picked up a sheet of paper. “This is the seismic imaging of the surrounding area. It looks like we are in the top chamber of a huge pyramid-shaped structure.”
Thirteen looked at the paper for a moment and then turned to focus on the artifact once more. “We found this place by mistake?”
“When we got the power up and going, Samson Thorn put together an expedition a
nd came straight to this spot to start digging.”
“Then he knew about it.” Thirteen shook his head.
“Definitely, although I haven’t heard him admit that.”
“Has he been here? To look at the artifact?”
Melissa narrowed her eyes. “Why did you call it that?”
He shrugged. “That’s what you call an ancient piece of unknown . . . glass, or diamond, or whatever it is. Artifact just seems like the correct word.”
“I guess, but that’s what Thorn called it, too. And to answer your first question, no, he hasn’t been inside the chamber since we found it.”
“Why am I here?”
“Well . . .” Melissa’s body language changed, becoming uncomfortable.
“What? Why are you looking at me like that?”
“He was certain that you would see it and know what it was.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Thirteen shook his head. “Why would he think that?”
“I don’t know, but that’s what he told me. He said that you would come here, look at it, and know what it was.”
“Well, I don’t.”
“I told him that might be the case. He gave me instructions on how to proceed if you were unsure.”
“Why does it sound like I’m not going to like this?”
“You’re supposed to touch it. To help trigger your memories.”
“But—” Thirteen frowned. “The technician touched it.”
“And died a horrible death.”
7
Samson Thorn opened his eyes, blinked, then swore under his breath.
“Not a dream.” He shook his head and looked around. On past visits, he had spent dozens of hours wandering the area before finally realizing how to get out of the dense foliage. Thorn grinned and summoned the glow, a golden tingling sensation that enveloped him in a thin film of energy from head to toe, and jumped. He floated into the air until he was hovering a hundred feet above the ground near the tops of the tall trees that made up the jungle in every direction for as far as the eye could see. He scanned the horizon until he saw what he was searching for, a familiar wisp of thin grey smoke trailing lazily into the sky. Thorn leaned forward and flew towards it.