Why are all these so useless? Gin wondered to himself. He went through electronic record after electronic record but none of them helped one bit. Millennia upon millennia of human history and this is all mankind could come up with? What bullshit! Not that he’d ever say that out loud of course. He would never swear obviously.

‘Looks like I have to do that again…’ Gin rocked in his chair, wondering if the risk was worth it. ‘Oh well.’

He got up, tidied the notes from his desk and opened the lock to the study room. The nanobots on the door turned from an opaque silver to a see-through pane. He opened it then turned left, deeper into the library.

From the outset, the place looked small. Very small for a traditional library. Sure, there were loads of rooms for people to sit down and study in private, however, the shelves themselves contained nothing but a set of tablets (one of which Gin held in his hands). They supposedly each contained all the knowledge of his small world. Yet, he knew how bollocks that statement was as he stared at a see-through door he couldn’t unlock. Through it, he could see a vast collection of books of various sizes and quality.

‘Yo, Steph, mind opening the physical books sections up?’ Gin peeked at the middle-aged woman who sat at the reception desk.

She looked up, took off her glasses and put down the physical book she was reading herself. A scratch of her blonde hair later, she leant down and pressed something from under her desk. ‘Go ahead.’

Gin smiled then waltzed forwards until he thumped against the door itself, tumbling backwards and clutching his head in agony. ‘You bitch!’

‘Now, now. Mind your language,’ the librarian smirked at his misery.

‘I only learnt from the best,’ Gin managed to retort back.

‘Cheeky cunt.’

‘Just let me in. There’s no harm in letting me learn a little.’

‘Nope! I’d probably get fired if I did that. Only your dad and his team are allowed in as the village researchers. No one else. Not even my niece is allowed in and she has more of a claim to do so than you do.’

Gin just shrugged. ‘Oh well. I have no reason for being here then. The problem with that is I’m the only one who accompanies you in this library these days anyway. How would poor Stephanie live her job with no one to occupy her?’

Steph rolled her eyes. ‘Attacking my singleness again, huh?’

‘I never mentioned that buuuuut,’ Gin got himself up and smirked at the lady, ‘while we’re at it, I don’t mind putting a word in for Wo if you do this favour for me.’

‘Bribery, eh? You really have the balls to try that with me?’ But her tone changed ever so slightly as she said one last sentence. ‘Who’d want to be with that oblivious bastard anyway?’

Hook, line and sinker.

‘No, you got it all wrong,’ Gin corrected and walked up to her desk. ‘I’m doing this as a gift. Whether you want to give me the gift I want in return is up to you.’

‘Urk. Fine, I’ll open it for you,’ Steph gave a shake of her head.

‘Heh. Thanks a lot,’ Gin went back to the room that tantalised him. However, this time, he stretched out his arm. Lo and behold, the invisible door still blocked him from doing so. ‘Hey! It’s still closed.’

‘Of course!’ Steph scoffed. ‘You really think I was going to let you in just like that?’

‘Well…yeah. Thought we had a deal.’

‘This is why I’m the adult and you’re still the angsty teen. I got responsibilities and you don’t so stop trying to sound older than you really are,’ Steph’s words felt like daggers to Gin. ‘Now, go and play with the other kids outside as you should be.’

Why are all the grown-ups like this? Gin wondered. It wasn’t like he could control his age. With dropped shoulders and a defeated resolve, he let out an exasperated, ‘Fine.’

‘I’m still taking your “gift” though,’ she added.

‘Of course you would,’ Gin muttered his breath as he made his way back to the study room.

As he did so, he made sure to lock the door and pull out the book he managed to swipe from Steph’s desk while she wasn’t looking. He flipped it over to see the cover: The Secret to Immortality by B. East. But before he started reading it, he pulled out an INS.

After inserting his finger into the first chamber, the machine extended in size and shone a small light. It made a small shutter sound every time Gin flipped the pages. He knew the time limit placed on him until –

Gin heard a knock on the door.

‘Yeah, I got your book. Give me five minutes and I’ll give it back,’ he yelled back.

‘Gin, it’s me,’ a different feminine voice called out. One that he equally didn’t want to hear.

‘I know what you want, Samantha. I’m not coming!’

‘Aww, but we need our leader. You know we can’t play without you there.’

‘You’ll just put me in goal like always,’ Gin rolled his eyes, all too familiar with her tricks. ‘I’m busy anyway.’

‘Busy with what? All you do is hole yourself in your room both at home and at this library. Why can’t you be more like your brother?’

Gin gritted his teeth. ‘He’s the reason I hole myself up.’

Samantha stayed quiet for a few seconds before letting out a single “tsk.” She moved away, her steps growing quieter as time went on. Now Gin could continue recording the contents of the books. Peace and quiet! However, that didn’t last long when footsteps returned followed by another knock on the door.

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‘For the last time, I’ll be out in five minutes!’

But the knocking continued.

Gin tried to ignore it, flipping through the pages one by one, glancing over the pictures of a small boy in a lab coat in the middle of it. Who was he? Who knows? Though he had a feeling he would find out soon enough.

But the knocking stopped.

‘Thank god for that,’ he sighed.

But then scratching started.

‘Uhhh…Samantha? Are you up to your weird tricks again?’ Gin couldn’t ignore the noises this time.

No response.

‘Is this some sick prank by your Steph?’

No response.

Gin pulled away from his desk and took light steps towards the door. The scratching grew in both loudness and frequency. It communicated to him like some sort of morse he couldn’t decipher. A part of him told him not to open the door but the other side screamed to run. What on earth was causing it?

With hands outstretched, shaking at every second, he grabbed hold of the handle. With his heart racing and breathing erratic, he gave a gentle tug. With his head throbbing in agony, his mind collapsed as the door wouldn’t budge.

‘Oh, I forgot I locked it,’ Gin’s body sank at the realisation.

The door burst open.

Hundreds, no thousands of white worms squirmed through, enveloping Gin in a body-crushing blob of disgust.

Gin couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. The moment he opened his mouth to scream, several worms wriggled down his throat. They festered within every pore on his skin. They squirmed through every nook and cranny of his body. His mind went blank, not from the shock but from the worms he knew were going for his brain.

However, in the last moments of his consciousness, he could feel another entity on his body. Instead of the slimy noodles he felt elsewhere, this being had four, skinned feet.

A mouse perhaps?

***

‘Didn’t expect that,’ Gin stared at the ceiling in his bedroom.

‘If I may, didn’t expect what?’

Gin got up. He swivelled on his bed with slumped shoulders and faced the xernim user who sat at his desk.

‘Oh, hello again,’ Gin felt calm to his surprise. ‘You always seem to appear at the weirdest times. Or maybe it’s the most convenient ones.’

Artemis cackled her unnerving cackle. ‘I came in to have a nice conversation with your daughters. It was only a matter of time till you awoke from your slumber, paidi.’

‘I see,’ he paused for a moment. He didn’t grimace, flinch, or react at all. He knew he should (after all, this strange woman with her strange language admitted to entering his room without permission and waited for him to wake up). And yet, he didn’t. Why?

‘I’m presuming you saw some sort of rodent in your dream,’ the mage carried on as if she said nothing odd herself.

‘How did you – tsk,’ Gin rubbed the bridge of his nose, composed himself then continued, ‘Are you the reason I was dreaming again?’

‘Again? My dear, you dream every night according to them. And while I realise most people aren’t the most pleasant out of bed, I do not approve of this accusatory tone,’ her wooden mouth opened to reveal the toothless grin of hers.

‘Apologies. Did…did my xernim tell you what I dream about then?’ he corrected his approach. So, even she gets annoyed by some things.

‘Not at all.’

‘Then how did you –’

‘Sheer deduction. You see, to my kind, we only perceive dreams as mere chemical reactions that happen during sleep. We can’t tell what they contain but they’re quite the manipulative function of the brain. I believe our little conversation would have influenced you in some capacity. What baffles me, however, is that this is a dream you remember of your own accord without your daughter’s influence since you got them. Or so I’m told.’

“Or so I’m told”? Gin mulled over that last sentence. Can Xernims lie? But he left that question for another time. Instead, he hopped out of bed and began making it. ‘I honestly don’t know what’s doing what at this point.’

‘Oh?’

‘I don’t know if me talking now is because of your truth-invoking abilities. I don’t know if my dreams are because of me or my Xernims. I don’t even know If I really am the real me now that I think about it,’ Gin clutched the final corner of his blanket, unwilling to fold it for the final time. ‘I sort of created a bland persona so that I could forget my past and move on as a new slate. And I succeeded!’

‘Do you have amnesia?’ the wood on Artemis’ helmet moved as if she raised an eyebrow.

‘No. I remember what happened but my mind doesn’t think about it that much to the point where the key points are there but it all feels meshed together in a blurry vision of my past. Even now, even though I’m talking about it and know what happened, my mind isn’t thinking about what has happened in my past. Just like a dream.’

‘How ironic. But before I let you continue this monologue of yours,’ Artemis spoke, waking Gin out of the trance he found himself in, ‘may I ask what you make of dreams in general? Do they have meaning or is it you, as humans, that give meaning to the nonsense?’

‘Oh, er,’ Gin stopped talking for a moment. He realised how much he said that he wouldn’t have under normal circumstances. Yet, the alluring nature of Artemis ushered him to carry on with his drivel. ‘A bit of both maybe? They’re sort of your inner consciousness, aren’t they? And then it’s down to us to make sense of it all. Whether they’re the same meaning is up for debate.’

All of a sudden, the Xernim user leapt up from her chair, knocking it over with such ferocity that Gin jumped a little. The menacing grin grew further until the fake, wooden teeth reached her ears.

‘Ha! My dear, that is exactly what Gargarensis, would say: “both meaning in dreams and us trying to find meaning in them.” Like a fascinating piece of mage meat that looks too delicious to be consumed. Oh, how I envy your ability.’

‘Heh, if my actual dream is to go by, I was a bit of a jerk when I was younger. So, maybe it’s a good thing that my memory of the past is all a bit hazy,’ Gin scratched his head and gave out a weak chuckle. Why didn’t the analogy creep him out as much as it should? ‘Still, sometimes I wonder if I really am who the others put their trusts and hopes in. What if one day the old me resurfaces and no one recognises what I once was?’

‘Oh, but you must be aware of how easily manipulative they are,’ she pointed a finger that grew in size until it stopped a metre away from Gin. ‘Tell me, would you have dreamt of mice if I never mentioned them? Or of your past, if you weren’t so fervently trying to forget it? If I told you about the existence of a giant sea monster named Karen the Kraken, would that pop up in the future?’

‘I…’ Gin backed off and sat on his bed. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Very well,’ the makeshift finger dropped off, eroding away in an instant back to its normal size. ‘I shall be leaving it at then. I’m sated for today, to say the least. Though as parting words, I will say to take your time to reflect. What you are as of now is merely a reflection and genuine development from what you once were. To witness such a fresh being is truly a marvel even if you think you’re merely a blank slate. Believe me, I can tell when one is faking it all. Anywho, as a reward, shall we end this on a puzzle?’

‘A puzzle?’

‘Yes, let’s call it the “curious case of the mouse”! To sum up today’s dialogue. What does this mean? That is what I want you to find out the next time we converse.’

‘Um, sure,’ Gin crumpled his face up. I knew she was weird but that’s too random...

‘Splendid!’

At that, Artemis walked up to the southern wall of the room. She placed her hand on it, closed her eyes and appeared to whisper something under her breath. The room obeyed. The wood of both wall and Xernim began growing. They grew and grew until the woman became enveloped into a single entity like a bloated stomach.

The “stomach” soon reduced in size, however. Any remaining splinters and wooden remnants rotted away, as all remaining evidence of the strange woman disappeared from sight. The wall itself flattened again, turning into your everyday, ordinary wall.

Did that just happen? Gin blinked several times. He felt speechless. Both from his dream and what Artemis said let alone that final riddle. He knew he wasn’t in the right state of mind for a while now but he didn’t want to deal with any of it straight away.

So, in a desperate attempt to keep his sanity in check, he slapped himself awake before making his way to his desk to see what the week had in store for him. Something to distract me. Let’s see, in week 3, we have learning ship nomenclature, first aid training, learning signals…dammit it’s all so monotonous, he cursed his schedule.

However, at the very bottom of the page, he found a note.

“NEED TO REGISTER RUNNING SPEED AND LONGEVITY SOMETIME THIS WEEK”

Gin mulled over the prospect of a potential marathon. He nodded, shook his head then nodded once more.

‘It’s decided. Running it is,’ as he grabbed a new shirt and headed out.