One Life Remaining (Portal Book 2)

by Mark J Maxwell

  *

  A light illuminated briefly and then cut out. It flashed again, morphing into a pulsing strobe. A series of tones sounded, low and resonate. They alternated in pitch, phasing up and down. Soothing. Relaxing.

  The light pulsed.

  She was in her childhood home, in the kitchen, listening to her father play the piano with none of the sadness and regret his passing normally lent such recollections. She’d had a horrid day at school. One of the older girls, Sally Bell, had said her haircut was ugly. She hadn’t even said it to her face. It was a passing comment, in the corridor at her locker. But it hurt so bad she’d burst into tears when she told her dad in the car on the way home. He promised to play for her whatever she wanted to cheer her up. She chose Clair De Lune, of course, and it made her forget all about the nasty Sally Bell.

  The light pulsed.

  A man sat at a corner table in a restaurant. John. He looks so young. He caught her looking and grinned. She blushed and then smiled back. The embarrassment was acute. They continued to eye each other. She was out for drinks with some of her MET colleagues. John chatted her up at the bar. She ended up staying till closing time. Talking and laughing. Outside he asked for her number. Less than a year later they married.

  The light pulsed.

  She was in the hospital. In labour. Fatigue hit her, along with a surge of panic. John was just standing there, useless, and it was all his fault! He took her hand and told her she was doing great. His encouragement made her even more angry. He winced as she squeezed his hand as hard as she could. He opened his mouth to complain, but something in her look stopped him dead. The nurse told her to push.

  The light pulsed.

  She’d turned away for one second, and Charlie had vanished. Jess’ bottom lip wobbled. She knew something was wrong by the way Louisa pulled her from aisle to aisle in the supermarket, frantically searching for Charlie. She told herself to calm down, and think. He couldn’t have gone far. She should report it to one of the staff. They could put out an announcement for a missing child. Then she felt a tug at her leg. Charlie beamed up at her, a bright red fire engine clutched in one hand. He’d run off to the toy section. She was so relieved the thought of scolding him never entered her head.

  The light pulsed.

  Memories cycled with increasing speed. It grew hard to coalesce conscious thought. One moment she was laughing, and the next, terrified, her entire being dominated by the surge of sights and sounds the memories engendered. Underlying the emotion of each scene she felt a rising panic at the loss of control.

  She concentrated, forced aside the memories for a split second and formed a single command.

  Stop!

  It had no effect. She was a rag doll flung down a never-ending flight of stairs. Every step a memory slammed into her. With each one a sharp spike of…not exactly pain. Something else. She couldn’t maintain a sense of her self. Somewhere, she knew she must be screaming.

  Then abruptly it stopped. The memories vanished, leaving her in darkness once more. She felt numb. Battered and bruised. Reliving the memories had stripped all sense of who she was. She felt like she should be crying.

  What had happened? Where was she?

  Harrow. The procedure. She remembered now. What had he done to her? She felt violated. Like her mind had been ripped out and held up for inspection. The panic disappeared then, replaced by anger at the thought of Ben having to suffer through the same experience.

  Neon flecks appeared in the darkness. Stars. A night sky. They shifted. She had control over her vision. A hand appeared before her. She flexed her fingers. The hand wasn’t hers. She could command it to move, but it wasn’t hers. It was missing a small burn scar on the back of the knuckles when she’d fallen against a wood burning stove as a child.

  She was lying on her back. She wasn’t sure how she knew. It was more of an innate sense. She recognised the signs of full immersion. The familiar panic crept up, but this time she had no jack out command, no emotional crutch, no reassurance. She was trapped. Louisa spoke the jack out command anyway. Shouted it. Screamed it.

  Nothing happened.

  She needed to calm herself. She closed her eyes. Her mind still reeled from the effects of whatever Harrow subjected her to. Was it the procedure, or had it been the trance? She’d felt the effects of the drug the second the needle went in, but now she was clear headed. Sober. She sat up, then stood.

  A medieval castle was the only visible feature in a barren ochre wasteland. Its walls towered above her. A thick-banded portcullis guarded the entrance. There was a clunk, then a creak, and the grating slowly rose.

  Trance users described their drug-induced hallucinations as a waking dream. Is that what she was experiencing now? She clung to the explanation. The alternative was too hard for her to consider, and nearly sparked off another panic attack. To counter it she walked forward.

  As she passed underneath the castle walls she looked up, noticing the murder holes, and entered a courtyard. A squat, circular keep greeted her, the battlements topped with crenellations. She crossed the flagstone-paved courtyard and climbed stone steps to the keep’s wooden doors.

  They swung open at her approach.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  The hall stretched out before Louisa, cathedral-like in scope and palatial in decor. On each side square pillars supported an arched arcade, with effigies of winged angels and sea creatures embellishing the stonework. Atop the arcade a colonnade stretched up to a curved vaulted ceiling soaring high above.

  A large round wooden table took up most of the floor space at the far end of the chamber. Twelve high-backed chairs arranged around it were an uncomfortable reminder of the pods in the pumping house. Beyond the table, on a raised dais, sat an ornate high-backed gilded throne.

  She set off toward the dais, her footsteps echoing around the room. Between the columns daylight streamed through tall stained glass windows, their abstract angular designs washing the cream marble floor in a rainbow of hues.

  Reaching the table, she ran her fingers over its surface. Twelve silver swords were inlaid in polished walnut, their points converging in the center. If the table was Arthurian in influence, the throne was an anomaly. It signified someone had authority over those at the egalitarian table.

  Is this how Harrow views himself? As the king of his new domain? What am I, then―a supplicant? Here to beg for my life?

  ‘Do you like our temporary home, Louisa?’

  Harrow had appeared on the throne. Combat fatigues gone, replaced by a white shirt, open at the collar, and back trousers. Despite the simple attire Harrow maintained an imperious air.

  ‘A little ostentatious for my taste,’ Louisa said.

  ‘It’s only temporary, but when the possibilities are limitless why restrict your environment to the mundane? You don’t mind if I call you Louisa, do you? After all we’ve been through it seems befitting to drop the formalities.’

  She eyed the throne. ‘So we can converse like equals?’

  Abruptly he rose and descended the steps to stand beside her. ‘How was your transition? Not too jarring, I hope?’

  Louisa shuddered. She still felt bruised from the experience. ‘It was…unnerving.’

  ‘Many of the Sons found it so.’ He shrugged. ‘I found the experience enlightening.’

  ‘Why can’t I feel the effects of the trance any more?’

  Harrow cocked his head. ‘You still don’t believe, do you?’

  ‘It feels no different to full immersion.’

  ‘I’ve restricted your virtual machine’s process to this realm. As such, your inputs have been limited to those provided by the simulation. To your mind, there is no difference to full immersion.’

  Louisa gestured around her. ‘Then how can I know for sure this isn’t all for show?’

  Harrow glanced over her shoulder. ‘Turn around.’

  A large sphere had appeared, hovering over the table.

  A mind pattern. It was similar to Adam
’s, but the bursts of light within formed blurred streaks, moving too fast for the eye to follow. ‘Whose pattern is this?’ Louisa asked.

  ‘Yours.’ Harrow looked up at the sphere with her. ‘If you need proof of your ascension, it’s within you.’

  ‘I’ve told you. I don’t feel any different.’

  ‘What were you doing a week before your fifth birthday?’

  Louisa glanced sidelong at Harrow to make sure he wasn’t joking. ‘I can’t possibly recall back that far.’

  ‘Can’t you?’

  ‘Of course not, I—’

  Recollection slammed into Louisa. She was swimming, at the local leisure centre. Her mum had taken her. She paddled around, clutching onto a polystyrene float. She’d spurned her mother’s offer to swim in the baby pool. She wanted to swim with the big kids. Her eyes stung, not with the chlorine, but because she’d been crying. There was a slide at the pool. A tubular corkscrew. Her mum had refused to let her go on it. It isn’t fair! A white-hot anger burned through her. She hated her mother at that moment, with all the visceral intensity of a wronged child. Louisa gasped. ‘What did you do to me?’

  ‘The human brain is constantly evolving, new neural pathways forming every second we exist. Over time some connections fall out of use. Memories fade. The extraction process removes your mind as a whole, including these forgotten memories. I reconnected the neural pathways in your mind, and my own. I can now recall every visitation I’ve had during my entire lifetime.’

  Oh God, I’m really not in full immersion. And Harrow had altered her mind pattern. He’d rooted around inside her head. Her flesh crawled. And he could do it again. She was powerless to stop him.

  ‘Full memory recall is the barest tip of the iceberg.’ Harrow’s voice lowered to a whisper. ‘I am close now. So very close to achieving full comprehension.’

  ‘I want you to send me back.’

  ‘Back?’

  ‘To my own body.’ She struggled to remain calm. ‘We had a deal.’

  ‘I’ve kept my side of our bargain. Ben’s mind is being restored as we speak. But our journey has just begun.’

  ‘Our journey?’ Louisa shook her head. ‘No. Once you’re safely on your way you send me back. That’s our deal.’

  ‘Ben’s pattern could be reintegrated because it hadn’t changed since the moment of extraction. Your situation is different.’

  Louisa swallowed and found her mouth dry. ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘Every new thought process in your mind alters its pattern. If I was to attempt a reintegration now your brain’s neurons might reject it, much like an organ transplant can be rejected by the body.’

  Louisa staggered. She grabbed onto the table. ‘You lied to me.’

  ‘Not a lie. An omission. I said I would reintegrate you, if you no longer wished to remain.’

  ‘You knew very well I wouldn’t be able to return, and you let me undergo the procedure anyway.’

  ‘The choice was yours. You are part of the Paradigm whether you like it or not. What is meant to be, will be.’

  I’m stuck here. Anger burned through her. Not unlike how she’d felt reliving her childhood memory. ‘There is no Paradigm. This is a fantasy. It isn’t real.’

  ‘The human mind’s greatest ability isn’t the perception of reality; it’s the capacity to quantify the imaginary. To rationalise concepts which don’t exist. The sensory experiences relayed to your mind from your body are gone. Your concept of what is real has shifted, and your mind has adapted. What you say is imaginary, this environment, is your new reality. In time you will come to appreciate what I have gifted you.’

  ‘Gifted me?’ Louisa was incredulous. She took a step back. Her heels hit the dais. She sat down with a thump.

  ‘We don’t have long,’ Harrow said, stepping back up on the dais. ‘The pumping house’s server farm is set to self sanitise. We either leave the network, or we cease to exist.’

  Louisa covered her face with her hands. ‘This can’t be happening.’

  There was a pause, then Harrow spoke again. ‘It is time.’

  Louisa slowly raised her head. The globe containing her mind pattern was gone. Arrayed around the table in a semi-circle stood the Sons. They all stared at an oblong of white that had appeared on the dais beside Harrow. A doorway. The Sons came around from behind the table and lined up before it.

  Louisa stared at one of the clan members. ‘Killian?’

  Killian Baker glanced at her in confusion. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t believe we’ve met.’

  ‘But…you’re dead. I saw you die.’

  ‘Killian’s mind pattern was sampled prior to Tilbury,’ Harrow said. ‘We kept it safe in case he couldn’t be present for our group ascension. We did the same for Henry’s.’

  Louisa followed Harrow’s gaze.

  Henry Booth, freckle-faced, grinned at her. ‘I guess I didn’t make it either.’

  ‘You killed yourself, Henry,’ Louisa said. ‘Killian too.’

  ‘Now do you understand?’ Harrow asked. ‘What you left behind isn’t your reality any more. This is.’ He held out a hand. ‘Come with us.’ His tone had changed. It wasn’t a request.

  Louisa tensed, but there was nowhere to run to. What if Harrow could alter her thoughts as easily as her memory recollection? What if he could make her want to go with him? She shivered with revulsion. ‘What will happen to me?’

  ‘Once you cross the gateway’s threshold your virtual machine will shut down, transfer to the destination server, and reinitiate. To your mind the experience will be seamless. You won’t feel a thing.’

  Ben’s safe. Louisa clung to the belief even though she only had Harrow’s word it was true. It gave her strength. Whatever happened now, Ben would recover. She stood, legs trembling, and took Harrow’s hand.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  A pastel blue crepe paper lampshade hung from the ceiling. Across two fluffy clouds arced a rainbow and behind another a smiley-faced sun peeked out.

  Why is the house so quiet? Her plastic frog sat on the nightstand, its mouth open wide, red glowing LEDs within showing the time.

  I’m late for school! Louisa slid her legs off the bed, yawning and stretching, her toes exploring the rug for slippers cast off the night before. Once her feet were snugly enclosed she shuffled across to the window and pulled the curtains, blinking against the morning sun.

  Where’s my uniform? It wasn’t hanging in its usual spot on the wardrobe door. Confusion turned to elation. Of course, it’s Saturday. She plucked her pink dressing gown from a chair and raced downstairs, imbued with newfound energy. The whole weekend stretched out before her.

  ‘Mum?’ she called. ‘Dad?’

  The kitchen was empty, but the table had been set for breakfast. Bread, jam, honey, and orange juice. A covered pot rested on the stove. She knew straight away what was inside. Mum made porridge every weekend for breakfast. She fetched a ladle and took off the lid. Steam billowed out. A nasty crust had formed on the top. She dug underneath and spooned out a serving. Back at the table she added a generous helping of honey. She liked it sweet. Dad put salt on his porridge, which was totally gross.

  She remembered now. Dad had an early appointment at the doctor’s. They’d be back soon. A burst of excitement gave her goosebumps. Her toes wriggled inside her fleece-lined slippers. Then I get to have my first piano lesson. Dad had promised. As soon as they got back. He’d shown her a few chords already the night before. Playing the piano turned out to be harder than it looked. Dad always made it seem so effortless. Her fingers had to stretch really far. When she managed to play a G major Dad clapped his hands in delight. She’d wanted to learn more but it was late and Mum shooed her up to bed. She’d lain awake for what seemed like hours, stretching out her fingers, practising in the air. She looked over at the piano. Her fingers twitched in anticipation. She slid off her seat.

  She wasn’t supposed to touch Dad’s piano when he wasn’t there. A harsh rule. Especially because the
instrument was just so touchable. She approached it with her hands clasped firmly behind her back.

  He won’t mind if I just sit on the stool. The seat was set for Dad, so her legs couldn’t reach the pedals. She swung them back and forth. A bundle of loose sheet music rested on a thin shelf above the lid, held in place by a wire clip. Countless framed photographs sat on top of the piano. Mostly they were of her, or her with Mum and Dad, but the one with just her parents on their wedding day was her favourite. Mum looked so beautiful in her white dress and even Dad was smartly dressed in a proper suit. Louisa told Mum she wanted the exact same dress when she got married. Mum laughed and said it was too old fashioned now, but Louisa insisted she didn’t mind.

  Her eyes drifted to a picture at the end in a shiny silver frame. There were two children in the photo. A boy and a girl. It must have been taken recently because she hadn’t seen it before. The girl was older than her, but she looked very familiar. Louisa looked back at a photo of herself. Then back at the strange girl. There was a definite resemblance.

  She frowned. Was the girl a relative? Mum hadn’t mentioned her before.

  I love you, sweetie.

  Strange. She remembered talking to the girl.

  Jess. Her name’s Jess. Louisa frowned. How did she know the girl’s name? She’d never met her before. Her legs weren’t swinging now; they were trembling. Something was very wrong.

  Louisa hopped off the stool. She tingled all over. She wanted Mum and Dad.

  ‘Louisa.’

  She jumped. A strange man was sitting at the kitchen table. She tensed, feet poised to run. Her bottom lip wobbled. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘It’s time for you to remember.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Red-hot needles lanced into Louisa’s consciousness. Where they stuck, memories blossomed forth, and were instantly absorbed. They jabbed and jabbed. Hundreds of them. Thousands. She attempted to halt the deluge, to retain what little awareness she still possessed. Her efforts proved fruitless. She cried out, realising she could no longer discern the division between her old self and the new.