Coran had always followed what her father asked of her. Her mothers all adored her for being the only daughter born to the three of them. This morning was the first time in her twelve years of life she opposed their wishes.
Women were becoming scarce. Most dying during childbirth. The ones who survived their firstborn were rare, and given status among the tribe. She dreaded the day she became a woman and would be forced to choose a husband.
The scouts had come back to camp and said the hey had found metal, smooth, unbent, flat metal. She had never seen it, and wanted to watch it being harvested. Because she was about to become a woman, and because of it, the tribe had been sheltering her the past few months. She managed to convince her father to allow her to join the harvesters. Her last adventure before choosing her husband. They neared the spot the scouts had found, the ground became strangely firm, especially figuring the rain the last few days.
The men around her stayed a few feet away from her, just in case she fell. In her tribe, the first man she touched after her 12th black day would be her husband. No man wanted to gain the wrath of an accidental wife, so they kept their distance.
The two men with the thick metal bars walked up to the flat metal that barely had any rust on it. A small round shape was located to the left of the door. Coran walked over to it and looked at it. A voice rang through the woods, all around the team she came with.
"Iris scan complete, human female confirmed. Survival possible. Opening door to stairwell." As the voice stopped, the pice of metal the men were about to try and pry away swung inwards, revealing more metal than she had seen in her entire life, but what was more is that none of it showed any sign of rust, or decay.
The men around her were astonished, and it showed on their faces. This is something even they had never seen. Coran was now very happy she had convinced her father to let her come. She approached the opening, and the men backed away as she did. There were metal flats that kept descending, this must be what the voice called a stairwell.
As she stepped on the first piece of metal, she felt a cool breeze from below, it was quite refreshing to feel on a summer day. "I'm going down, two of you follow in case there is a man, the rest of you stand guard. Don't harvest until I come back."
The men quickly chose two to walk behind her, and the rest stayed at the open hole. The three descended for nearly an hour before Coran saw another of the strange circles, she looked at this one a little closer and again the voice rang out.
"Human female confirmed. Time elapsed since last entry is six hundred fourty-three years, twelve days. Christian Solar Calendar month: July. The his is the Fourth day of the month. Happy Independence Day. Time lapsed since connection to the surface lost: six hundred fourty-one years, Three months. Air quality exceeds minimum standards, no viruses detected. Beginning Waking procedures."
"I only understood half of that. What about you two?" She asked he companions.
"Miss Coran, I can only say That we have found something that is a year older than black day, whatever is here, is very valuable. Almost nothing remains from that time, and what does is owned by the larger tribes."
In other words this whole place is an artifact that has an unknown value to her tribe. The young girl walked through the door and found a strange sight, four moving pictures, with strings comming from them, all attached to a huge cylinder as large as the trees in the forest, but it was clear. And there was a man inside of it.
Coran took a step back and let the two men stand in front of her. The cylinder rotated down. The sound of water falling accompanied the dropping fluid levels of the cylinder, which she now recognized as a tank. The clear portion of the tank slid into the wall behind the tank. After a few minutes the voice that came from everywhere spoke again.
"Waking process complete. Facility will be destroyed in 12 hours. Deleting memory banks and backups. Subject zero revived. Subject zero requires a guardian. Human female, please state your name."
"Coran of Springfield." She replied, before her mind understood what she had heard.
"Coran of Springfield is now Subject Zero's guardian. No record remains of subject's name. Please state the name you wish to give him."
With a short thought, she recalled the name she had always wanted to call a child of hers. "His name is Jesse."
"The name Jesse of Springfield has been recorded. Name is Hebrew in origin, with the meaning Gift of G_d. A good name for this one. Laminate plate complete. Jesse is no longer in the care of this facility. He will wake in 10 hours."
A door opened in the base of the tank where Jesse lay, a strange material slid out and Coran grabbed it. Looking down at it she realized that it was some form of proof of guardianship.
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"We need to get out of here, grab him and lets go. The other tribes might attack us if they find this place. And I for one do not wish to be outside of the walls if that happens." One man began to argue as she spoke again, "the voice said this place is going to be destroyed. Either it know something we don't, and a tribe is about to invade, or it will destroy itself, pre-black day artifacts are known to do that, and either way I don't want to be here to find out. Whatever we need to learn, we will find out from him later." She said pointing to Jesse.
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My head hurt. Something told me I needed to open my eyes. They slowly opened, and around me stood several men, a few barely old enough to be called that, but obviously men none the less. I didn't recognize anyone around me. Had I been kidnapped?
"Who are you? Where are my parents?" I asked, betraying my panic. A young girl stepped forward and handed me a Laminate.
"Where we found you gave me this, what is it?" The tone in her voice told me she knew what it was, but was skeptical.
I rested my thumb on the small square at the base of the Laminate to turn it on. A few seconds in the sun is all these needed to function. As the holograms danced above the page, I noticed this was a contract. And so I started with a simple question.
"Can I get some food? I feel like I haven't eaten in years." I exaggerated. Everyone in this room paled, and two girls in the back ran out the door. "First this is a Laminate, they are only used for legal purposes and are really difficult to fake. Also, they can only be activated by the people who are directly named in the document. So this means, I am either Jesse of Springfield, or I am Coran of Springfield." I paused for a moment, trying to recall my own name and I couldn't. As if it wasn't there before. I continued to read the different holograms to determine what was going on. The girls who left to get me food came back with a tray of vegetables, all looking to be home grown in soil that was lacking nutrients, why did I know that?
Both girls set their hands on my forearms, I'm guessing to comfort me, and the men gasped at the behavior. I'm guessing their religion prohibits this, but none of the men made a move to stop them. They walked back to the door and stood where they had before, only now they wore triumphant smiles in addition to their well made animal leather dresses. The girl in front of me seemed angry all of a sudden and did the same thing as the other two, and laid the palm of her hand on my forearm. As she did that, the Laminate in my hand changed. One of the six holigram's title changed from Certification of Guardianship to Certification of Binding Marriage. And now there were two more names added. Gina and Cassie, both also with the 'of Springfield' after their names.
I sat up straight in panic, my mind went fuzzy and started to get dark as I realized that this Laminate just showd the active user got married. And the active user was me.
I pointed to the two girls on the wall, and simply said "Cassie and Gina right?" Their triumphant smiles turned to confusion. "So which am I? Coran or Jesse?" I looked back to the girl who handed me the Laminate that now stated I was in a Binding Marriage, meaning no possibility of a divorce or annulment.
"You are Jesse." She said, then leaned her head to the side slightly, "how did you know their names?" She said pointing at the other two.
Since she was already my wife I grabbed her hand and placed her thumb on the activation square in the opposite corner, so she could see what I was seeing. She tried to pull her hand back as the holograms materialized for her, but I held her hand there. I watched her eyes flick between the six holograms, and once she calmed down I pulled my hand off here and pointed to the one that stated we were married; then pointed at the line that named the spouses.
"Is this magic?" She asked.
"No. But for some reason this is blood bound. Meaning it will automatically show changes that occur to me. These are rare but not unheard of." I explained
"Um, Jesse, that isn't entirely true." One of the men shuffled forward as he spoke. "We found you in a room that has been sealed since black day. These don't exist. They may have at one time, but that was a long time ago, but even you are older than Black day, and three months ago, was the six hundred fourty-first black day." He looked down, and then back up, "the voice in the room we found you said today was Independence Day, what is that?"
I looked to all the faces around me, including my three new wives who barely looked to be in their early teen years, and saw that all of them were telling me the truth. The dizziness that had been threatening to claim me finally did.