Vrin: Ten Mortal Gods (15 page)

Expecting a counter attack I held onto a thread rising up into the sky. I was finding that the more threads I controlled the more difficult it was to concentrate. And I began to realize if I continued on like this I would most certainly lose. He was far more experienced and for all I knew he was merely playing with me, like a cat with a mouse. It was time for a retreat.

I pulled away and the men followed as I flew over the battlefield to the outpost of our patriots. Hovering above I saw the camp was surrounded by a huge stone wall with a narrow doorway facing the battle. Troops traveled in and out. Some were carrying wounded. Others carried equipment. All looked filthy and tired. A muddy road stretched out to meet the battleground where demons and men fought viciously. Only a few humans were on the side of darkness, Rath’s children most likely. I reached my mind out into the web and felt for Armadon’s presence. “
We must
pull back.”

“
I agree. But will the enemy allow it?”

“
We won’t know until we try.”
I amplified my voice down into the carnage. “PULL BACK! PULL BACK!”

Shuffling backwards on shaky legs the soldiers began a slow retreat. Gradually the enemy desisted and the two sides moved away from each other, licking their wounds as they went.

I flew down inside the stone wall. Corel was standing at the entrance keeping an eye out for changes. Armadon was already healing broken soldiers as quickly as he could. The flood of wounded was tremendous so I moved in beside him. “May I assist?” I asked the hulking man.

“Please.” His deep voice resonated.

I was not happy to note, that I was still intimidated by him.

We worked for over an hour, mending and saving as many as we could. The method was more like sculpture than surgery. First I exerted my will to relieve their pain then I went to work. If there was a cut I pulled the pieces together. If there was a break I fused the bone. Burn victims were easily relieved of their hideously burnt flesh. And excess blood was turned to air. There was no mess, no terror. When we were done many had died, but a far greater number had been saved.

Armadon and I went to meet with Corel at the mouth of the outpost.

“Nice armor,” said Corel, looking me up and down.

I looked down at the steel bands and circular patterns. It
was
kind of fashionable. “Thank you.” I smiled. “I made it myself.”

It was nice to see her grin, but her eyes were worried. “We’re thankful you arrived when you did. I’m glad you didn’t do what I suggested.”

“What happened anyway?” I asked.

She looked away. “We infiltrated the castle and retrieved the information but it was not what we expected. --Rath is in league with Kric’ tu.”

“That’s not the half of it,” she said with grave concern. Her eyes met mine and burned into my soul. “He is
using
Gaza to destroy Vrin.”

A TWISTED KNOT

001001011001110

“Alganah stepped forward and spoke the words written in the ancient text of the Marathil. The sky grew dark as coal and the stones of The Circle of Ghosts began to glow. A screech emanated from within The Circle, so loud it brought the gathered people to their knees. With desperate fingers they dug at their ears. Their eyes began to bleed. The haunted stones hummed an awful accompaniment in time with the screeching wail.

“Alganah continued to speak the words of the Drahdoos. ‘Te nerith oon, Tus danor bal!’ His words were swallowed into the chaos forming in the center of The Circle. He spread his arms wide and his body began to shake. ‘I trade my life for yours!’ he screamed. Two ghostly hands pushed forth from the violent maelstrom and clutched him in their delicate grasp. With devastating force they pulled him in. The ground shook as chaos sucked up into the sky and clouds pushed away in all directions.

“When the dust cleared a man lay in the center of The Circle, naked in the rays of the sun. He had come. The prophecy had been fulfilled.”

Corel reached out and turned to the next page in the thick musty book. I continued to read.

“For days we sat outside the sacred place. The dark one did not move. Men and women prayed and cried. Others went mad and leaped into The Circle in desperation. Their bodies blew apart in pieces so tiny they seemed to vanish in the air. Holy men preached and the people fasted. On the fifth day he began to stir. Rising from the ashes of his birthplace he walked in his nakedness to the edge of The Circle and stared out at the multitude. He spoke. 'I am the maker of chaos, the keeper of darkness. Why have I been summoned?'

“The dark one hissed, stepped backward, and lifted his arms. His body contorted into a hideous gesture. ‘I WILL NOT GO BACK!’ A tremendous flash blinded those who looked on. The ground trembled. And all that remained was silence, and pain.”

I leaned back in my chair and looked at Corel over the dusty tattered book. Armadon paced by the door of the dimly lit tent. "The people unleashed a demon from chaos," I stated with disbelief.

I got to my feet, my fingers moving across the surface of the book. “It’s time I shared something with you.” I chose my words carefully. “I, ah-- know the nature of this place."

"Let me finish," I said sharply.
Wow!
He was on my side and he still made me nervous. I left a wary eye on him. "Are you familiar with REM sleep?"

I looked at Corel. She nodded. I glanced over at Armadon. I gathered from his squinting eyes that he was not.

"There are four levels of sleep during the normal human sleep cycle, which takes about three hours. We go from level one to level four and back again, always in REM just before we awake. Think of it as submerging yourself in a pond. Above the surface you are awake but as you go down deeper into the water you go deeper into sleep. The shallowest is level one, which is where REM occurs. REM stands for rapid eye movement. It’s where you dream all those funky things you can barely remember when you wake up. As you go down through levels two and three you go deeper into a restful sleep, the last of which is level four. Level four non-REM sleep is a rejuvenating sleep. Are you following?"

"I'm assuming there's a point," Armadon quipped.

"There is indeed. You see, we are not in level one. We are in a simulated dream state in level four non-REM. As we speak, a computer is being used to stimulate our minds into a low level active state." I walked over to Armadon. "Whenever Armadon does something the computer remembers it and alters my perception of this world to fit Armadon's change. If I were to slide this table the computer would change each of your perceptions as to where this table is." I gestured towards the roof of the tent. "The cognosphere remembers every tiny detail as we are changing things."

I paused. "Apparently the ten of us have all suffered damage to our brains. We are unable to wake up-- because we are all in comas."

"Well obviously it's very possible. I don't know why, or how, but it's the truth as I know it. Why else would we have memories of another place and another life?"

"Can you prove this?" asked Armadon.

"I can let you talk to the scientists yourselves."

Armadon feigned a look out the door of the tent. "Let's assume for a moment that what you say is true. How does it fit in with the events occurring around us?"

"I've thought long and hard about that one but I'm afraid I don't know. What I do know is that these events are real to us. And as the death of Humphrey can attest, if we die in here, there's no coming back. As for the advent of Kric' tu, I don't have the slightest clue. Vrin was created by the scientists and they say we are finishing the work they started. But it would
appear
that life on this planet existed for
centuries
before our arrival. These people have lives and a history.” I paused and thought a moment. “Vrin's history
could
be a series of made up events that have transpired from the intricacies of this environment. Maybe Kric' tu was just a mistake."

"A pretty
big
mistake," said Corel.

"Perhaps supernatural components were added to the program to simulate our own folklore and myth."

Corel stood. Her hands went to her hips and she began to pace. "Kric' tu is instigating events that could
destroy
this planet. Can't those scientists stop him?"

"I don't know. I’d have to ask.“ I paused. “But before doing that I'd like to know more about what happened inside the castle today."

Corel stopped pacing and fielded the question. "As you know our intentions were to find out about the woman and child, who they are and why Gaza is so interested in finding them. But we learned more than we bargained for.” She shook her head in disbelief. “Rath is holding the woman and child in his dungeon. Gaza doesn't know this. And it looks like Kric' tu is calling the shots. We don't know why he doesn't want Gaza to have the woman and child but Rath has been given strict orders to hold them. We can only assume that he
wants
Gaza to go through with his threat."

I let this new information sink in for a moment, then added, "Humphrey said the two may be replicas of Gaza's wife and daughter. They died in his last existence and he has an unnatural preoccupation with them. Kric' tu may be aware of this but what doesn't make sense to me is, why would a character of this world want to destroy its home?"

Armadon interjected. "From what we know Kric' tu is the creator of chaos. It would make sense for him to destroy governments, or cause upheavals. Maybe destroying this world is
not
his main intention."

"Good point," I said. "He could be stirring things up a little to get us to play his game.

“A little?” Corel said. “He's already stirring things up
a lot.
The question is how do we stop him?"

"Supposedly I'm some kind of programmer, at least that's what they told me. I can read it as easily as you can read English."

"I'm not sure. I could take a guess but I might not be right. It's complicated. You see, you are writing portions of the program we aren't able to read yet. We've been working frantically to understand the code but there's so much of it. The system was open-ended and we had no idea how to simulate an internal environment. So we let you come up with one on your own."

"I thought you said
you
created this world."

"I did. We did. Well, we made the framework, but you've changed it and adapted to it. There isn't much left of the original program."

I was puzzled. "Well then, how did you know who
I
was?"

"You're the only programmer in the system so we knew if anyone responded to our message it would have to be you. But we have a complete personality profile on each of you so perhaps if you tell me something about the other two I might be able to figure out who they are.

Corel interjected. "I like to explore, I'm into climbing, and I love nature." Her eyes shone with excitement, like I hadn't seen since her reunion with Kitaya.

Kitaya. My mind drifted to that place which held the memory of her. When I was with her I’d felt less alone-- she had given me peace for a time. I wanted our relationship to go further but time had been so short. There was so much I wanted to tell her. I
missed
her.

"Say no more. There's a pretty good chance you are Major Ben Kendrick, age 36. You have an honorable discharge from the United States Army."