CHAPTER
Ten
I wake to a churning feeling deep inside the pit of my stomach. After a night of tossing and turning I can’t say that I’m exactly ready to face the day, but I roll out of bed anyway. My head throbs with the immense pains that follow an overused brain.
I rock back and forth cradling my head in efforts to numb the pain. I scan the room to find that I am the only one left in the sleeping room. I glance over at Cynthia’s bed to find its covers neatly pulled over and tucked in.
Valde’s bed is left the way it was last night. Pillow hanging off the edge of the bed, covers crumpled up in a pile. He must not have returned after his hospital visit. Images from the night before pass through my mind and I can’t get Valde’s screams out of my mind.
I look at the clock hanging on the wall by the door and see that if I hurry I can still make it for the end of breakfast. I slip on some clothes for the day and leave the sleeping room looking back one last time to see Valde’s bed unchanged. He really didn’t return last night.
The dining hall is half empty by the time I get there and I see Tristis and Cynthia sitting together in the back. I grab some food and head over to them. I sit down next to Cynthia and she turns to greet me. She hugs me in a mournful, sad way.
“Any word on Valde?” I ask.
“They say he’ll be back later on today.” Tristis answers, fiddling with a gadget in his hands.
“That’s good news.” I comment hoping that it truly is good news. Tristis takes the gadget he was fiddling with and puts it away in his bag and it reminds me of what today is. It’s the day of the burial.
Cynthia must see me eying Tristis’ bag, “Are you ready for the burial today?” I try to think of the last place I had my burial bag. I either left it under my bed or in Dr. Finley’s room.
“Yeah, I think so.” I respond while trying to pinpoint its location in my head. “This is it huh? The real deal. Today we get to see the Ascension room in action.” We’ve been waiting the whole time to see the room serve its purpose.
I remember when Richard took me inside the ascension room for the first time. It was right after I agreed to join the society. It’s weird looking back on that moment now. How different I was. Young, naive even.
“Well well well, if it isn’t Mr. Briggs,” Percy’s voice hits my ears and my stomach starts to flip.
Here we go.
“So I heard about your little,’outing’ last night,” Percy slides into the seat next to me, folds his arms and continues, “It’s a shame really. Valde was a good kid.”
“Is. Valde is a good kid you mean. He’s coming back.” Tristis fires at Percy.
“Well aren’t you a smart one. Dr. Tristis Grant is it?” His comment is bitterly riddled with sarcasm.
“What do you want Percy?” I ask hoping that he would just get to the point and leave us alone.
“Point is,” He continues before peeling his glaring eyes off of Tristis, “You’re mine. From here on out, you do everything through me. You want to sleep, you ask me. You want to eat, you ask me. You want to blow your nose—,”
“We ask you.” Tristis mouths cutting off Percy mid-sentence.
‘You think you’re real smart, don’t you?” Percy stands out of his seat where his height is exaggerated all the more as we are all still sitting. “Let’s find out how—,”
“Percy stop, we get it. You’re in charge. Now please just leave Tristis alone. It’s been a long night for us all.” Cynthia interjects and it seems to have worked on cooling Percy down a bit.
He begins to back away from the table casually as if it was one-hundred percent his idea to do so.
“I’ll be watching you. All of you very closely from here on. No more stunts, or there will be hell to pay. Got it?” Percy spins around after his last words without waiting for an answer to his question and walks away.
“Sometimes I just want to ring his neck, you know?” Tristis says ringing with his hands an imaginary neck.
“I wouldn’t worry too much about him, he’s mostly talk. Most of the Primacies are.” Cynthia says.
My mind switches gears and I am reminded again of the burial.
“Hey guys I’ll meet you at the ascension room for the burial later on. I’ve got something I’ve got to do before.” I tell them as I stuff the rest of my muffin into my mouth.
“Is everything ok Alex? Do you want us to come with you?” Cynthia’s voice is sincere.
Through a mouthful of muffin I answer, “No, I’m fine. I’ve got it under control. I’ll catch up with you guys later on.” My talking with a mouth full of muffin routine seemed to deter her concern as she smiles at me.
I head back to the sleeping room to look under my bed for my pack. I rummage through the contents under my bunk without any luck of finding my bag. I stand and start heading towards the door when it flies open and I am greeted by a couple of familiar faces. Valde and Hilt enter the room. Valde is on crutches and Hilt is helping him walk.
Seeing Valde fills me with mixed emotions. On the one hand I’m glad to see him, alive. On the other hand I feel terribly responsible for what happened and find it hard to look him in the eye.
He is quiet as he enters the room and I’m hoping it’s because he is waiting for Hilt to leave the room before talking.
Hilt walks him to his bunk as he gives me a sideways glance. The look of a silent man can often say more than any words, and Hilt seems to be saying a whole lot about me right now. I look away fearing I may turn into stone with Hilts death stare. I let me eyes dart around the room for a while until Hilt leaves, allowing me to relax again.
I walk over to Valde who is unpacking the contents of his bag onto his bed. Mostly clothing. (They must have packed it for him for the hospital visit not knowing how long he would have to stay).
“Hey man. How you feeling?” I ask nervously waiting to hear his response.
He continues to unpack the bag and put it away. He lets out a sigh as he pauses, “I’ve felt better.” He resumes his unpacking without even looking up at me.
“I’m really sorry about what happened. I can’t tell you how bad I feel. Honestly man, I’m really sorry.” Saying sorry doesn’t quite express how I feel right now, but it helps a little.
Valde finishes his unpacking and lies down on his bed. He pulls out a book and starts reading it.
“How’s the leg? Is it broken? You know Tris…”
“You know I’m really not in the mood to talk to anyone,” His eyes momentarily lock onto mine, “especially you.”
The words dig into me like a knife. My heart is ripped out of my chest as I am horrified with the sight of one of my best friends like this. I’m speechless as I search for the words to say.
“Ok… I understand.” I say trying to seem like I really do. “I’ll see you at the burial later then?’
“Can’t go. They say I’m a liability now.” His words are flat and without emotion.
I know this is all because of me and I can’t help but feel completely helpless. I decide that what he needs is some time alone so I leave him and the room repeating over and over in my head, “I’m so sorry…” though he can’t read my thoughts and has no idea that I’m thinking it, it helps me cope with the guilt.
I make my way to Dr. Finley’s room knowing that the burial is getting closer and closer and if I don’t find my bag I could be seriously screwed. Just another reason for Percy to be all over me.
I open the door to find Dr. Finley in his usual spot, standing over something he is working on. I wonder if he ever leaves this room other than to eat and sleep. He doesn’t hear me as I enter the room.
I can see right away my bag right next to him opened with my things sprawled out all over the table. I move a little closer to him before he senses my presence behind him. He turns to me and a smile spreads across his face.
What’s my bag doing out on the table?
“Just the man I wanted to see.” He says indicating with his free hand for me to come over. “I’ve got your burial bag. I hope you don’t mind, I made a few tweaks to your choices. Don’t worry about what they are, you’ll find out sooner or later.” His smile forms into a grin on the side of his face.
He then begins to shove the devices back into my bag followed by the one he was working on when I entered. It was the localizer watch I picked out for my pack. It supposedly can pinpoint my exact location in time and space, no matter what timeline or period in time I’m in. I don’t really know what that means exactly yet, but I’m sure it’ll come in handy eventually.
He hands me my bag with all my gadgets inside.
I wonder what he did to them? And why won’t he tell me?
“You nervous for the burial today?” he asks me patting my shoulder.
“I don’t know. I haven’t really had time to think about it.” It’s true with all the weird things happening lately and what happened to Valde last night my mind has been too preoccupied to even think about today. “Should I be nervous?”
“No you have nothing to be nervous about. It’s actually quite exhilarating.”
“So you’ve gone through the ascension room before?”
“Yeah. It was a long time ago. Around the time I first started working with Richard.” His eyes glaze over as he is obviously reminiscing about the old days. “Truly fascinating it is. You know, how it works and all. Just shy of a mystery really.”
His comment solicits a question, “How does it work? The ascension room.”
His face lights up with excitement, as if telling me about how the ascension room works was like opening a present that has been wrapped, dangling in front of him for a long, long time. His excitement fills me with the same enthusiasm and for a moment I forget about the stress bearing down on me.
“The room works to concentrate energies and amplify them in a way that we can control it, manipulate it even more than usual. It’s a bit of science mixed with a dose of pure magic. You see the fabric of space and time is much like a real piece of cloth fabric in that it can have tears in it. These tears can be targeted and manipulated to work in our favor. These tears in space and time, when uncontrolled, are unpredictable and very dangerous.” He chuckles a little before saying, “You know the Bermuda triangle?”
“Sure. Is that another one of those tears?”
“Yes that is a great example of a tear in the fabric that is uncontrolled. Entering into a tear without a firm, controlling hand on it is very reckless.”
“So what, is there a tear in the fabric of space and time here?”
“Yes indeed Alex. Right off the coast here there is. Luckily for us we have been able to harness its power and control its extraordinary capability. We use the ascension room to do that.”
“So is time travel possible without it? You know, the ascension room.”
“Of course it is, but without the added help of the ascension room or a steadfast grasp of gravitokinesis it could reasonably become a shot in the dark. There are only a select few gravity manipulators that I’ve ever met that can control it to the degree of time jumping without the ascension room or something like it.” a smile shows up on his face again taken away to a reminiscent time in Dr. Finley’s life.
“Is Hilt one of the few that you know of?”
“Yes, but Hilt’s understanding and grasp of Gravitokinesis has yet to evolve into a less rudimentary understanding. He still is leagues behind the best I’ve seen.”
“So it is possible then? People can do it?”
His face turns to an inquisitive shape and I see him pondering my curiosity. “Yes Alex it is possible. Easy? Not so much.”
The crackling sound of the loudspeaker fills the room as Richards booming voice comes blaring through. He informs us that we are to report to the control room for our burial. Dr. Finley gives me an embracing squeeze and wishes me luck. Cautions me to be safe multiple times and I leave the room. One minute I feel like he’s hiding something from me, the next it’s like he’s my best friend. I can’t quite pin him down.
I move down the hallway towards the control room where I first met Dr. Finley about a month ago. I sling my bag over my shoulder as I run into Cynthia and Tristis who both seem very relieved to have found me.
“Have you seen Valde yet?” Tristis asks with a concerned look in his face. “He wouldn’t say much to us.”
I look at Cynthia who is visibly distraught and lingering very close to Tristis. “Yeah, just a few minutes ago. He wasn’t in the mood to talk to me either.” I leave out any details as to not draw any more concern out of Cynthia.
“Man, Percy is taking his job of watching over us a little too seriously.” Tristis says motioning for us to look behind us with the nod of his head.
I see the head of Percy peeking up over the rest of the group as he is scanning the room, undoubtedly for us. He spots us and immediately begins to push his way through the crowd towards us.
“He was following us like a hawk after breakfast, when we were finally able to shake him. That didn’t last for long.” Cynthia says.
Before we can continue our conversation any longer the crowd of students and Percy come our way and we all usher into the control room together. The room is different with all the tables and chairs pushed to the side walls creating a large space in the middle for a group to stand. Richard and Hilt stand in front of the door leading out to the ascension room. Hilt holding a military style stance, of course, and Richard stand hands in his pockets as he smiles at us while we are entering.
“Gather round everyone. Come close.” Richard says to the group. We all move in close as to hear what he has to say next.
“Today is a very important day indeed.” His eyes move around the room as he makes eye contact with everyone. “Today is your first taste of what life will be like from here on out. It is your first taste of being out in the field. We will be using the ascension room to travel back in time to bury our emergency packs. These are very important and I hope you all have given much thought to the items you have packed.” Richard centers in on Derek, a young boy with dark black hair, as he says the last part.
Everyone in the room laughs at that and Derek grows noticeably red. I event think Hilt laughed a little.
“From here on out you will be listening to Mr. Hilt’s every word. If he says it, you do it. No questions asked, just do it. Any questions?” Richard and Hilt scan the room as they wait, daring someone, anyone to ask a question. I’m sure we all have them, but no one asks anything. Richard sees that as a sign that we are ready, “Ok, let’s begin. As you are all placed in the room you will be instructed to focus your energies so that the room may magnify it. Everyone now, please make your way to the ascension room.”
With that everyone situates their bags on their bodies as Hilt opens the door we are all eagerly waiting to go through. Dr. Finley comes in the room just as the door begins to close behind us. He shoots me a nervous unsettling look and then disappears behind the door. My stomach quakes with nerves as the uncertainty of what I am about to do starts to concrete itself in my head. I shake out my hands and take a deep breath hoping to lose the nerves before we get into the room.
We move as a group, as one across the bridge connecting the main building to the floating island out in the ocean. When I first saw the ascension room a month ago from the roof I thought it was a light house. It was an easy mistake to make as its shape is distinctly tall and thin.
Hilt proceeds to open the door to the ascension room and we all pile through it. From the outside it seems too small to fit us all in, but inside it is deceptively large and could easily fit five to ten more people in it if we really crammed in. the walls are covered in wires running up and down the entirety of the room. Not an inch of it isn’t covered by a wire or a switch or some sort of technological item.
Hilt moves around us and closes the door we came in through. He flips a few switches to the ‘on’ position as the room begins to sound as if it is winding up. The hums grow louder as Dr. Finley’s voice comes in though a speaker somewhere in the room. “Ok everyone hold on tight now, it may get a bit bumpy in there.” The room instantly fills up with tension. My breathing grows heavy and a slight case of claustrophobia sets in.
“Here we go. Now is the time to start focusing your energies.” Dr. Finley’s last words before the room begins to rumble. What little light that is in the room grows intensely dim. I start to feel my energy being sucked out of my body as I strain to focus. That’s how the room works. It takes our powers and abilities and focuses it into the tear in the ‘fabric’ as Dr. Finley described it.
A girl gasps across the room and nervous mumbling fills the room. The rumbling gets louder and harder, shaking everything in the room. The same strained concentration fills everyone’s face.
Cynthia’s hand slams into mine as she wraps her fingers around my hand. She clenches tighter and tighter as the room we are in grows in immense tension. I can see the fear in her face as she looks to me for some sort of reassurance. I twist my hand around so her hand is now inside mine and I give her hand a squeeze. She gives me a half smile and turns again to face forward, effort straining in her face. I look over to Tristis on the other side of her who gives me a bitter look. I think he likes Cynthia. I think he thinks I like her too.
Do I? Do I have feelings for Cynthia?
Before the question can really sink in, the room grows very strange. As if it’s being stretched like taffy, the room and its contents begin to grow taller and taller. The tops of everything moving towards the steadily growing black abyss forming in the ceiling and we are all lifted off our feet. My pack, which was weighing me down a bit, has released its mass from me and I feel weightless. Everyone on the room is floating upward. Higher and Higher. Objects loosely scattered around the room take flight upward with the rest of us.
Higher and higher my body gets stretched and pulled just like everything else in the room, until my head is engulfed by the darkness and everything loses its color and falls into a state of nothingness. Cynthia is gone, no longer holding my hand. My hand, my body is gone. I try to hold out my hands in front of me but I can’t see them. A sense of vertigo creeps into my head and the strong feeling of spinning grows more and more intense until my stomach feels like it can no longer stand the nauseating ‘motionless’ movement.
My eyes fill with a scorching light and almost as if in reverse the room and its inhabitants come back into view. First lifted and stretched. Then shrinking until we are all normal size and shape again. Cynthia is again holding my hand and breathing heavily as our feet are placed back onto the concrete flooring of the room. The room continues settling as I look to Hilt who stands unmoved from his military stance by the door. He seems entertained by everyone’s reactions.
“We’ve made it. We are here.” Hilt informs the room.
It’s strange. As I look around the room and observe it, nothing has changed. The wires, the switches, everything is the same as before. If I didn’t know any better I’d say it didn’t work. Hilt opens the door as the sun floods the room in with its warm rays. I struggle with the rest of the group to peer outside of the door, fighting for a position near the door so I can see outside of it. The blinding light of the day takes only moments to relinquish.
When my eyes begin focusing I am shocked at what I see. There is no building. No bridge. Just the shoreline.
“Welcome to year 19.” Hilt says smiling back at our blank expressionless stares.