Max stared at the yellow smiley face on the wall screen with a timer above its head showing 00:33:35. The doorless room was completely white with a simple cozy brown chair and table in the middle with a small potted plant in the corner. There was a pale blue-colored holographic screen right in front of me like a VRMMORPG. “Your choice Mr. Callahan?” the emoji repeated again.
And he thought to himself, ’I still can’t believe this is happening’
3 hours earlier
“Maximus Callahan, Come down this instant!”
Full name. Damnn, It’s not gonna be pretty. Full name always meant Trouble. What happened though? He didn’t remember doing anything full-name-worthy in a while. Did Mom figure out that he snuck out? Nah, if that happened it would have been days ago, not today.
He paused his game and stood up. “Coming”
Oh well, today is actually a good day for her to find out. He took out a paper from his bag before approaching the stairs.
Mom was fuming with her hands on her waist while Octavia stood to the side, her eyes downcast and hands interlocked in front. As he descended Mom turned to him while Octavia started giving him ‘the’ look. So it wasn’t them but Mom was in a bad mood, which is why something small was going up in flames.
“I gave the two of you one job, go to the grocery store, complete the list, and come back, ‘before’ I return, How hard is that? How far is the store, huh? On top of that, you guys haven’t even cleaned up the dishes!” Not wanting to let the situation escalate he immediately started in a placating tone, “Sorry Ma, I had plans to meet with friends later, so I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone, Don’t stress so much, it’s not good for your health. Octavia will do the dishes now.” Seeing her expression falter a bit he immediately thrust out the paper. “ Besides today is a good day, look I got an A in a quiz.”
She took it and started examining it instinctively. He wasn’t a genius by any measure but he was pretty good in academics. “This does not change what I said, you should listen to me,” she said, but her voice had lost the fire. Octavia slowly smiled behind her and mouthed “Thank you’ It had been her turn for the chores and he just used a valuable chip to prevent getting grounded for her.
Sure enough, a few minutes later Mom was humming a tune in the kitchen saying she was gonna make something nice for the evening. Max put on a jacket to go out and picked up his bag. As he was leaving for the ‘Study Group’ he noticed his Mom keeping the sheet on the cupboard below his Dad’s photo. It had become her ritual of sorts. Whenever he or Octavia did something nice she kept their achievements there. It had been 5 years since his death, but her love hadn’t faded a bit.
Max stood there watching for a while as she went back to her work. He then sighed and examined himself in the mirror before leaving one last time. An 18-year-old dark-haired and fair-skinned boy with the lithe figure of a reader stared back at him. An errant thought about how he looked struck him. He had an above-average look but was not anything to brag about. He had been planning on starting gym with his friend K for a while now. And this time he swore that he won’t stop like all the last times. After all, nobody knew when an emergency would rear its head. And as if proving him right it struck soon enough. He had set out with a simple plan of returning home in 3 hours never guessing that the next time he came back to this house would be 3 years later.
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An hours later Max found himself in a vacant under-construction building which would definitely look haunted at night. It had been this way for years with bricks strewn around and half-built pillars jutting out since the construction company owner had run off to Australia. And now this aspiring residential complex served another glorious purpose, It was a hangout spot for him and his friends.
A sweet melodious laughter rang out as Lenora showed K some video of a cat in a mana suit hunting a mouse. “Guys you gotta see this,” he exclaimed. “Shut up I can’t hear the dialogue!” Miles replied without taking his eyes off the anime he was watching on his phone. “Reels are bad for the brain, you guys should stop that.” Thea slowly said while reading. She was going through a Digital Detox phase. She was a lean 5’8 girl with black hair and eerily blue eyes. She had just above-average looks but was extremely smart.
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“Max, you’re here, give me your phone its volume is better!” Miles complained. He was a 5’10 slightly handsome kid who was what you call the legendary ambivert, a mixture of Otaku and baseball player. As Max handed him the phone K shoved Lenora’s phone into his face, “You tell ‘em, Max.” The reel wasn't really good but K secretly liked Lenora so even if it had been a video of a man murdering and eating babies he would probably still have found it funny.
“Yeah, it’s cool.” he said with enough fake Enthusiasm to be acceptable to K while telling the rest ‘Not Really’ K was a 5’8 Indian guy with a name so long and difficult to pronounce that it had been long since abandoned by anyone he knew. The best way to describe him was that he lived at the gym. Imagine the bulkiest Gym guy you’ve seen and you’ve got his physique right.
“Right! Miles just look at it once!” K continued, but Miles cut him off “Shut the hell up It's the premiere of the final season!” “Just leave it K, let him drool over his waifu in peace.” Lenora took her phone back. She was a rich girl with a mysterious family. You couldn’t tell what it was about her but despite her short petite stature of 5’1, something screamed ‘Danger! Don’t Dig Deep!’
All laughed as Max took out a chess set and Thea closed her book. The Sports day was approaching and they were both in the same house. Miles just glared at everyone but chose to prioritize anime over retaliation. Thea began setting up the pieces. They were a weird group but they had been together for a while now so somehow it worked.
Thea set her side but held back a rook from his. “C’mon, if you keep doing this I’ll forget how to play with a left rook when the matches start!” Max exclaimed while Thea just shrugged and changed the rook with a knight. “You’re better, it's not fun otherwise.” He had simply followed Thea into chess club 3 years ago and had managed to beat everyone in a few months much to Thea’s chagrin who was the previous top. Sadly her academic mastery did not extend to chess. They were in the middle of their second match when the music started. As the crescendo rose and drowned the world in its glory, they looked at each other with befuddled expressions when someone asked, “Does anyone else hear that?”
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Slowly the music started fading when suddenly there was a bright flash and a sharp pain in Max’s head. When he opened his eyes a countdown was there on a floating blue screen. An announcement started in the sky.
Basic Mana Requirement met. Incubation Complete. Starting Baby Protocol. Denizens of the new world are advised to remain stationary and prepare for Descent. ETA 0 hours 4 minutes 59 seconds.
Everyone stopped and looked at each other with curious confused and surprised eyes. “Do you guys see that?” K tried to touch the screen that must have appeared before him. “Yeah…” Thea whispered doubtfully. It was right in front of them but it was hard to reconcile its existence with sanity. Suddenly Lenora exclaimed “Shit!” while everyone looked at her inquisitively a loud crash sounded from outside. “What was that?” Miles asked and everyone started to look towards the window. “Let’s check it out.” Lenora started to move first. Max wasn’t sure if anyone else noticed but he remembered Lenora’s eyes to be one of realization instead of shock at finding a weird screen in front of you but the group had started moving.
They looked out to see a few cars crashed into each other while distant sounds of panic and crashes were heard. A guy was calling for help while a few passersby were crowding around him. A few were helping while most looked around lost. However, it was a little hard to see without the streetlights on. Max observed a girl trying to switch on her phone, most probably to record but couldn’t turn it on. A few seconds later he realized that a lot of people were doing the same. Odd, he thought, when he looked up to see the city draped in Darkness. “Woah, what the hell?” Miles said as K exhaled a few seconds later “Loopy!”
They were just watching the people below freak out and panic when In the distance Max spotted a plane. “Hey look!” All 5 of them followed his hand. In the distance, a plane’s silhouette was growing in size. As the minutes passed it became apparent that it was falling toward them but they all stood frozen like statues not being able to match the reality they knew to the one they faced. “Run!” Suddenly Lenora screamed “Run you idiots run! Take cover!”
As if just waking up they looked around and seeing her run towards the stairs started following. Unsure at first but then with certainty as they processed everything. Max had just cleared the building when he looked to his right at the plane. They were a little off and the plane was headed one building over, which did nothing to lessen their horror as it crashed into it spewing fire and rubble all around. They ran blindly while their luck held as the rocks falling around them didn’t crush them but barely missed. As he passed the car crash he looked at the clock 00:00:59.
He ran past the accident car with a few people standing around looking behind him at the crashing building. They all ran till they were winded and stopped around 50 meters farther near Lenora who had also stopped and was looking back. Max looked back to see Thea slowly catch up as he felt heartburn and gasped for air. The destruction happening was as mesmerizing as it was horrifying. An immovable giant of steel and concrete had been reduced to half a burning heap in seconds and was slowly tilting to fall over. His brain had just registered the screams when the clock hit 00:00:00.
For a few seconds, nothing happened and he looked around to see if something had changed when another bright white light flashed and he found himself sitting on the chair inside the white room. Congratulations Seedling! Welcome to the system’s baby protocol.