Chapter 4: Opal City

-- Earth time: 2095--

Where was I?

Yes, my first trip to my Island. If I wasn’t nuts before I got here, I was by the time I left.

My arrival...

-- Earth time: 1100--

I coughed and then vomited again.

I dry retched several times and finally sat up as the dizzy sensation abated. I looked around me and found that I was sitting inside a Ring. I knew that it wasn’t the same Ring as the room was also different.

This room had curved walls and had a high domed ceiling that was covered in crystals. They were a lot dimmer than the ones in the other cavern had been. The pattern on the dais was also different.

I spat one last time, trying to rid the taste of vomit from my mouth. Belatedly, I wondered what sort of trouble I had now found for myself. I decided that my life was getting seriously weird.

I started when a male voice said, “Foolish girl, you shouldn’t travel while you are pregnant. Then again, that portal hasn’t been updated in some time, so it didn’t know any better. I was issued an update from the other Portal Books, as I was created. Do you wish me to place lecterns and coordinate books at the other portals in this world?”

“Wouldn’t that tell other people that something has changed?” I asked as if it was perfectly normal to be speaking to a lectern with a glowing book on it.

“Well, yes. Although not many of the portals here work. Most of them must need reseeding, or they are blocked from me for some reason. Some sort of calamity has had happened in this world.”

“From the information that I have downloaded, it was once a great civilisation as shielded cities appear to be on all five main continents. However, I can’t seem to contact the cities or most of the portals that should be here.”

The voice from the book then informed me, “This city had lost its controller. I suggest you find out what has happened to her as it may be wise to reinstate the shields as soon as possible.”

“How the hell do I do that?” I asked crankily. My tummy still felt queasy, I felt disorientated, and I wanted to lie down. Then what the voice had first said penetrated my brain. What the fuck? I was still pregnant! “Wait, wait, do you know how far along I am in my pregnancy?”

“Yes, from your timeline it would be about twelve days. However, you can’t travel in the Portals again until you give birth,” the book told me firmly.

“What? I’m stuck her for nine months?” I blurted out. Fuck me, I was apparently stuck on some other dump of a world, where books talked to you but most of the other stuff, didn’t work anymore. The fact I was on another world, really hadn’t hit me yet. I guess I was in some form of shock and just going with the flow until my brain caught up what was happing.

“In your concept of time, yes. On this world that is registered in my data as being called Amity, the days are measured differently. I’ve been able to access a redundant backup system in one of the old sections of a Keltrian spacecraft that is within this city.”

“The comparisons indicate that a day here is approximately twenty-three of your Earth hours long. They assign each day ten hours and each hour a hundred minutes. They have allotted ten days to a week and four weeks to a month and ten months to a solar year.”

“It has been approximately two thousand years since an event that was called the War of the Wizards. Apparently, it decimated the people on this planet and set them back to the dark ages as far as technology goes. My information states that the section of craft that landed here on Topaz Island arrived about ten years after the War.”

“This bit of news may cheer you up. Apparently, two wizards came here to help the people from one of the other three sections of the craft that landed further West on the continent they called Federation.”

“They had some sort of a plague on the ship. It apparently was made worse when it got into the local population. They believe it bonded with a local variation and made people even sicker. The wizards tried to quell the new outbreak. However, they had both been affected by radiation that leaked from the downed spacecraft, and they both died from its effects some years later.”

“And that is supposed to cheer me up?” I said sarcastically.

“Sorry, no, not that bit obviously. The bit that should cheer you is that the wizards apparently anchored their wizard’s boxes here. You are wearing a magical item so it may be possible that you can claim a wizard’s box or if they have them at least a mage’s box.”

“A wizard’s box will speed up your pregnancy by about two of your months. A mages box may only speed it up half that, but you will at least have good health while you are pregnant and you should be better able fix the City if you have one of them in your position.”

My head was spinning. Wizards? Magical items? Wizard’s boxes? What the fucking hell was the Book on about? “Who the fuck, are you?” I asked in frustration and confusion.

“Oh! Sorry, we get a bit vague when we don’t have people using us regularly. I’m a Coordinate’s Book you may call me Vaughn. My job is to record where this planet is, any portals in this solar system and the general layout of this solar system. Some of the ancient Keltrian satellites in this system are still working.”

“The spacecraft also managed to release new satellites for this planet when it entered this system. They too are still working here so I can access all of them to scan the planet and the system. I then link to my brethren and update the information to them. So they can send magical beings like yourself here when they request it.”

“The odd thing is that I can now only connect to the portal you came from. It seems there is a malfunction, as we believe that you are not in the same period in time, as you would understand it is. Your planet, Earth, seems to have a problem with different forms of radiation interference. This seems to be screwing up the operation of the portals on it.”

“The people on your home planet are desperately in need of cleaning up their act. I’m not even sure if I can send you back close to when you left. I will try to keep contact with your planet all the same,” he assured me.

“So in the meantime, I need to find a wizard’s box and fix this city so I can stay safe in it until I have my child?” I clarified with the book as all of this new information swirled around in my head.

“Sounds about right to me. Oh, there is often a second box that has books in it that should help you to learn the spells you need,” he offered.

“Right,” I said sardonically.

Suddenly remembering my bag, I grabbed a bottle of water from it and drank most of it down. I felt better once I had. At least my mouth didn’t taste so bad. I pulled out one of the packets of potato chips I’d tossed in my bag. I then wandered off to find the bloody box that would help me get out of here, as I ate them.

My mind was in complete turmoil at this point. I wasn’t sure if I was happy about still being pregnant or not. At least I knew it was Michael’s child and not Brian’s child. The problem was that if I turned up with a kid, they could lock Michael up and toss the keys away forever.

I decided there and them that I couldn’t go back to Michael and keep fucking up his life. He was better off without me. I was a screwed up mess and if he was going to be in the Media’s eye due to his invention then the sooner he forgot about me, the better.

With any luck, they will think I committed suicide or something and leave him alone in sympathy. I chuckled to myself, as in one way, I had. No one would be able to find me here. I had wanted to be removed my old life and perversely I had gotten what I had wished for. I shrugged as I walk.

I wasn’t really paying a lot of attention to where I was going, as I was deep in reflection of my sorry life. I decided that I was probably better off here, wherever the fuck here was. I’d have to talk to that infuriating book again I was sure. Who the fuck ever heard of a talking book with attitude? Fuck, I was so screwed.

“Out of the frypan and into the fire,” I muttered to the empty hallway.

I wandered the halls for a while.

I ate my chips and decided that my best option was to put the past behind me. When Brian had first started using me, I had created a door in my mind, and as soon as he left my room, I had opened the door and pushed the event into it.

I knew it was a coping mechanism, but it had worked for years, and I had no qualms pushing my memories of Brian and Michael into the room and slamming the door shut. Thinking about them was pointless, I had reasoned with myself.

For the here and now, it was only me that I to worry about, Oh, and the damn baby. I still couldn’t believe I had missed the signs. I could only blame Michael for making me orgasm for him. Having someone do that to me had been mind blowing, and I was greedy for more.

The intoxicating feelings he had invoked in me had overwhelmed me at the time. It seemed that he only had to touch me and I had wanted him so badly it was all I could think about. I had never felt like that with another, and it had been heady while it lasted.

I knew if I had just started to ovulate, it would have only intensified my desires to have him in me. In many ways, I guess it made it easier for me to deny that I had loved him. I was sure that it was only my hormones driving me and he had been the bloke who had been available.

I tried to convince myself that we wouldn’t have lasted anyway. We were too different. I wouldn’t have known how to cope with a big loving family. That concept wasn’t one I had ever experienced, and I had no idea how to deal with.

I had convinced myself that I was better off here and that if I could work out how to run this place, then I should just stay. A part of me knew I was hiding from my problems, but I ruthlessly pushed that thought away.

I blinked and focused, as I realised I had stopped walking. I looked up to find I was standing outside a door. I had no idea why I had stopped here. I looked, but I couldn’t see how the door opened.

“Where the fuck is the bloody handle?” I asked the air. I stepped back and looked above the door, but I couldn’t see a sensor to activate it. ‘Touchpad, ‘ I thought.

I ran my hands down either side of the door frame. I found a tickly spot on the right side and pressed my hand to it. The door opened, and I grinned in delight. I walked into the room, and some form of hidden lighting in the ceiling brightened the room.

I looked back down the hall that I had just walked along. I realised there must be some form of sensors as it was lit back the way I presumed I had come from, but it was still dark about 5m further down the hallway. Satisfied, I turned back to investigate the room.

I smiled and then chuckled when I saw the four boxes. I walked up to them. They had no visible handles or latches on them, either. I looked between the two that I felt were the wizard’s boxes, I wasn’t sure why. As I stood there, I got this weird feeling that one of them was calling to me.

I placed my hands on the box, but nothing happened for a minute. “Open, you stupid box,” I said peeved. It probably wasn’t very nice of me, but I’d had a trying day, and I was tired and anxious about my situation. Still, nothing happened, and then I felt that the box was sulking.

Pissed-off, I narrowed my eyes and looked at the box. “Bloody hell, just my luck to get a moody box of tricks,” I said. I giggled as I felt its response was of indignation. I had a strange sensation that whatever it was that lived in the box was male.

I got this image of a cranky old wizard with long silver hair and pointy ears in my head. I sighed. ‘Fucking men, ‘ I thought. Aloud I said, “Please open for me. I need your help. I’m pregnant and don’t come from here. The coordinates book said I need you to help me fix the city and to protect my child.”

I felt a light touch on my mind and made sure all the doors to my bad memories and self-doubts were shut tight. I projected the feelings of being lost, alone and scared, at the mind touching me. I felt it waver and then to my relief, the lid clicked, and the box opened.

“Thank you,” I said gratefully.

I looked in the box realised it had several items of jewellery in it. I plucked out the ring. The band was plain, but it had six different gems mounted on it. One looked like the crystals in the cave and was the central gem. Around it were a tangerine quartz, an aquamarine, a pink sapphire, a rainbow moonstone and a purple agate.

I placed it on my middle finger on my left hand, as that was where it wanted to go. Happy, I then lifted out the chain and medallion that were made of rose gold and looked at it. The medallion was about 4cm at its widest points and was flat with hexagonal sides. A pale yellow square cut gem about 10mm square and about 4mm thick was in the centre and visible from both sides.

Five symbols were etched on one side. At the top was an eye. On one side were a book and a flaming torch. On the other side were what looked like, a mouth blowing out air and a leaf. On the back was an inscription. It read it as saying, ‘I learn to serve.’ The words underneath it said, ‘Psychic Wizard.’

I liked that. I had always believed my mind was my greatest asset. I placed the chain over my head and let the medallion settle between my breasts where it seemed to be contented.

I then lifted out the diadem. It was also done in the rose gold, and the thin, flat strips of metal had been shaped into three sets of eyes. The middle set of eyes had a tangerine quartz gem in one and the crystal in the other. An aquamarine and a pink sapphire were on one side, and the moonstone and agate made up the centres of the eyes on the other.

I placed the diadem on my forehead and felt the being that lived in the items connect to me on some deeper level. It seemed a little disturbed. I found myself asking, “Are you all right?”

I sensed sadness and loss and then it seemed to settle into acceptance as if it knew that I understood what it was to feel loss and pain of a loved one. I found myself sending the being a calming feeling and it seemed more content and happy that it at least had me now and that it wasn’t alone anymore.

I also felt that I wasn’t alone anymore. I was surprised by how good it felt to know that this being would help take care of me, as he was now part of me. He didn’t want to be alone any more than I did. We were kindred souls.

I wished I could talk to it, but while it seemed to understand me, it didn’t seem to be able to communicate with me other than through feelings and the odd picture in my head. I then decided that maybe it was a good thing as only crazy people held conversations with odd personalities in their heads.

I pulled out the device I knew was a wand and found myself pushing it to my left hip. I didn’t have a clue what to do with the wand or the crystal ball. I eyed off the ball and decided, for now, it could stay where it was. The word communication came to me, but I doubted there was anyone to communicate with via the crystal ball.

Out of curiosity, I went and touched the second wizard’s box and was surprised when it opened. I didn’t feel a presence in the box. I touched the diadem, and it felt cold, mine had been warm.

I had the feeling of sadness came to me. I guessed that the bling in the box no longer had a spirit helper attached to it. I also felt that the items needed to be fixed, but I was at a loss as I had no idea how to do it or if I ever could.

Sadly, I closed the lid and opened the two book boxes. Both had about twenty books in them, and at the time, I guessed that I had some serious reading to do. I put one of the book boxes that I believed was mine, on top of the wizard’s box and was surprised by how light they were.