Chapter 1

I don’t remember anything before I awoke from a dreamless sleep. It was one that felt like it had lasted only seconds - or even years - and was very disorienting. As I became more aware of what was around me, I tried to recall where I was and what I had been doing prior to sleeping. As I looked around and my mind came into focus, I came to a chilling realization. All of the memories of my life before I woke up were gone. I strained to try and remember anything, but only glimpses and fragments appeared. It felt like the answers were sitting at the corners of my mind just out of reach.

As the fog in my mind cleared some more, I was able to focus a bit better, and I looked around to take stock of my surroundings. Try as I might to get my eyes to focus, there was no light to help me ascertain the size or location of my surroundings. I could tell, from contact with the floor, that there was ground beneath me and that it was rock of some kind. I was unsettled that I could tell what it was by touching the substance beneath me, but not anything that I had done prior to waking up. It seemed that while the memories of my life were affected, my brain’s ability to identify things was not affected at least.

I felt around my body, noticing that I was clothed and began feeling for anything that could be an injury or if I were bleeding. I was thankful to find no real rips in my clothing, just tender spots on my body where I hit the ground, I suspected. I felt around my face and found some tender spots, possibly from the fall, as well as a large lump on the back of my head. That could have been why I couldn’t remember, but it was too early to tell. I figured my next step would be to check my waist for a pack and pockets for any items or identification. When I was checking my belt, I came across a strange object. As I ran my hands along its surface, I seemed to activate a button, causing light to burst forth and push back the darkness enveloping the immediate area.

I was a little disturbed that I hadn’t recognized the object had been a flashlight, but perhaps it was something relatively new. Looking around, I was only slightly surprised to find that the walls and ceiling of my current accommodations matched the floor: rock. It looked like I was in a cavern of some kind. The cavern was large, at least eight feet high and twice as long, with the width of the room looking to be around seven feet. The ceiling of the cavern was covered in various stalactites, as well as a small hole in the ceiling that showed a hint of stars, but no other real light source. Based on what I could see, it appeared that I had fallen through the roof of the cavern at some point.

It explained why I wasn’t injured very much other than bumps and bruises, as I hadn’t fallen very far. I must have landed on my head when I fell, though, which would explain the memory issues that were plaguing me. I took the flashlight off my belt and used the light to illuminate a section of rock while I emptied my pockets onto the floor in front of me. While I was looking down, I noticed that I seemed to have a vest on, as well, covered in multiple pockets. I decided to empty those as well and when I completed my task, I found I had a number of varied objects on my person. Given what I found, I felt that I was in less danger than I had expected when I woke up.

I had a canteen, compass, three protein bars, my flashlight, four flares and some kind of small, foldable hand axe. Putting all the goods back where I found them, I began to search the cavern for signs of a way out. I first looked at the wall that was closest to the hole I fell from. While it did curve and taper down from the ceiling to the floor, unfortunately there were no hand holds that would allow me to get to it. With that option gone, I had to find some route out of this cavern that would lead to the outside. After an extensive search of the other walls, I found what looked to be a crawl space that seemed just big enough for me to fit through.

Aiming my flashlight inside, it looked to go on for a few feet, but I could see that the path curved a bit blocking the end. It looked like a tight fit, but I was confident I could get through it. The worst-case scenario would be that I somehow get stuck in the tight space, and given there was limited room to move, I would starve to death. The tunnel could also be unstable, and a wrong move could cause it to collapse, killing me in a cave-in. However, it could be fine but there may not be another exit, or it could be blocked off. If that happened to be the case, I could try and crawl back here and attempt to get out of the hole.

I knew I didn’t have time to waste, so I took a deep breath, crouched down, and slid into the opening. I had just enough room to move myself about a half foot at a time, as the tunnel was not wide enough to move my arms around much. As I made my way through the tight space, there were sections that looked tighter than others, and I found myself getting stuck for a few moments. As I neared the turn, I began to get worried that I would find a solid wall, or a mound of rocks blocking my path. As I made the turn, I released my breath seeing that there was an exit, and after a few tense moments I made it to the other side. It took a little bit, as the exit hole was slightly smaller than where I entered, but I was successful extracting myself from the small tunnel.

When I got out of the hole, I stood up and I used my light to get my bearings in this new area and was shocked at what I saw. The cavern was enormous, easily three or four times the size of the one that I had just woken in. There was no light source in the cavern, save for the flashlight in my hand, meaning that there was no opening anywhere. The ceiling was solid from wall to wall, covered in many stalactites of various sizes. In the center of this vast cavern, was what looked to be a massive angular piece of obsidian jutting out of the rocky floor. There was almost no reflection from my flashlight along its matte black surface, with only a slight hue of discoloration signaling that the flashlight was hitting it. I had never seen anything like it before, but with my memory loss it was hard to tell if I really had.

While I was fascinated by the large object in the center of the vast room, I needed to find a way out of here. I began to search the walls of the room for a way out, looking at every possible spot where another small tunnel could hide and found nothing other than the tunnel I had used to get in here. I looked around for water somewhere that might be entering into here from some small crevice, but each wall was bone dry, as were the stalactites. I guess I was here during a dry season because I could remember how the stalactites were formed. I then began searching the floor and walls for some mushrooms or some sort of edible plant, but there was nothing to be found.

I started to become frantic, as I began to realize that the food and water, I had on my person wouldn’t last me very long, even if I were to ration it out. Feeling defeated, I made my way to the center of the room and sat down next to the large black rock. As I sat there, with my back against it, I began contemplating my fate. I had some food, but I didn’t know how long it would last me and I had a bit of water but probably only a few mouthfuls. Even if it were completely full, I had no means to replenish either of them. I could not remember how long I could go without food and water, but I didn’t think it would be very long. It also seemed a very sad, lonely, and painful way to live out my last days.

I laughed at the irony that I would not have to worry about missing anyone or anything, due to my current memory loss. I sighed and rested my head against the large obsidian rock and contemplated what options I had left. I could return to the room and try to climb up the one wall, in hopes of getting to the opening that I had fallen through. The worst that could happen would be I would break my neck and that was a less painful way to die, I figured. That or I would break my neck, paralyze myself and then slowly die that way. Both images sent shivers down my spine, and I wracked my brain trying to come up with a better solution. Perhaps I could simply call out and hope someone was passing the hole and could rescue me or at least get help.

I was lost in my thoughts when the surface I was resting on disappeared and I found myself falling backwards into the newly formed opening. After a brief tumble, I got up and found I was no longer in the cavern, but inside of something mechanical. Once I stood up, I turned and realized, with some trepidation, that I was not able to leave the new place I now found myself in. The opening that I came through was now closed, and, despite searching and banging on the wall, I found that the doorway had disappeared. I knew it would not open again. It looked just the same inside it as it had from the other side, like obsidian, but the walls on either side of where I stood did not look to be rock at all. I seemed to have rolled down a small set of stairs and now found myself in a small hallway. The walls of the tunnel were mostly scarce, coloured with a pale white colour to it. There were support beams every few feet and there were controls on my left, but despite my attempts they didn’t respond to my touch.

Down the hall, on the left, there was what looked to be a glass cabinet. I pulled my flashlight off my belt and looked to find that there were masks of some kind stored inside. Resigned that I could not leave whatever this was, I turned and made my way down the small hallway. There was a hatch on the end opposite to where I entered, and I was surprised as it released with a loud hiss when I approached it, moving to the side to allow me to continue on. I hesitantly moved forward through the now opened doorway, keeping a watchful eye for anything dangerous that could potentially pop out at me. The only light was coming from my flashlight as I entered the new area. Once I was a few steps into the new location, the door closed behind me with a hiss and I began to wonder just what the hell was going on. A light hum started to fill the room and, in a few moments, lights along the ceiling began to come on.

The room looked to be roughly nine feet long by eight feet wide and the lights lined the edges of the ceiling where it met with the walls. The walls themselves had different devices and monitors mounted to them that were slowly coming to life as they were once again being fed power.

The monitors were displaying a language that was unknown to me. It was hard to see where the controls were as there were no keys or touch pads. There were pieces of glass or crystal jutting out of some of them with strange markings on them. There were such input devices in front of two monitors on the left side of the room. There were flat surfaces under the monitors where what looked like a keyless interface terminal would most likely be. The input areas were dark with no activity, other than what was showing on the displays, but I could not make out what they were for. Even the displays seemed to tell me nothing about what this thing was and that was mostly due to there being only symbols on the screen.

There was a single workstation like the ones that were on the various walls to my right, opposite a large table. The table in the center seemed like one that you would find in any house save for a low glow illuminating from its center. The odd part was that instead of chairs, there seemed to be devices that looked more like tubes surrounding it. They matched what I saw in front of what I could only suspect were workstations placed around the room. I made my way to the tube that was closest to me and noticed a pungent odor coming from it. I walked around until I saw glass and when I looked inside, I found out right away where the smell was coming from. The glass on the tube was damaged and the crack had caused the remains inside to perish. There was no telling how long the remains had been there, and I couldn’t tell what I was looking at inside. I went around the room and checked the tubes at the various workstations around the room and they all suffered the same fate as the one I had just looked at. The tubes surrounding the table were damaged, but there were no remains in any of them. I looked around the room and saw the only other door was on the far side of the room. With few options left for me, I headed over to the door and was surprised that it opened when I got near it.

I warily peeked past the open doorway, to find a hallway illuminated before me. Like the room I had been in, the hallway was gently lit by lights embedded in the ceiling. I looked around it and, including the doorway I was peaking through, there were five doors in total. The four other doors in the hallway had more of that strange language written on them, and, upon closer inspection, I noticed the writing was engraved into the doors.

I stepped through the doorway, leaving the room I had just been in and decided to try the door that was immediately to my left. Once I was in the hallway, the door behind me closed with a hiss and I wondered what would happen next. I turned and approached the door I had come through, hoping that it would open when I drew near, but this time it wouldn’t move. I decided to go with my initial idea and turned to go to the door on my left, but it didn’t respond to anything I did. Resigned that it would not work, I tried the door nearest to it, but it had as much success as the others had been. I cycled through the next door with the same result, but when I approached the last door, it opened with a hiss.

I felt as though someone, or something, was directing me, and it was becoming obvious I was getting little choice in the matter.

Stepping through the opened doorway, I made my way into the room that had been opened to me. As I entered the new room, lights flickered on with a light hum, revealing another room filled with more tubes and displays. As I moved deeper into the room, I looked around as the various workstations began to power up. There were four tubes in this room, two on the wall to my right, one in the middle, near the doorway, and one directly opposite from the doorway. The smell of decayed remains was pungent in the air, and I felt my stomach begin to churn. I took a few deep breaths, steeling my nerves, as I looked into the tube nearest to me and saw desiccated remains. Just like the others I had seen, there was little to tell what had been inside, due to the ravages of time. I began to wonder just how long this thing had been here, and who, or what, it was that I had found in all these tubes.

As I continued around the room, the same was true for the two that were found along the right side of the room. I was surprised when I reached the last pod, which was on the opposite side of the room and found it functional. While I should have been shocked that one was undamaged, I was even more surprised at what I found inside. All of a sudden, a loud warning sound filled the room and a language I never heard before began to blare from unseen speakers. I looked around frantically, trying to see if there were anyone else in the room, but I couldn’t see anyone, nor where that sound was coming from. I couldn’t figure out what I might have done to cause the alarm to sound and frantically made my way towards the open door. Just before I arrived at the doorway, it closed with a hiss and wouldn’t open no matter what I tried.