Mark, known as G in online streamer circles, snapped awake, immediately sensing that something was terribly wrong. Once cradled in the soothing embrace of his full-immersion Virtual Reality bed, he now lay upon unwelcoming metal, the absence of the familiar gel padding unsettling. The air was thick with the acrid tang of burnt ozone, shrouded in impenetrable darkness that pressed upon him with malevolent intent. Instinct surged, urging escape, fueled by the fear of utter darkness and his resolve teetering on the edge of collapse.
Frantically, he touched the cylindrical glass cover framed by rough iron fittings. He tried to lift the capsule's lid, but it refused to budge. The once-glowing lights were now extinguished, leaving him in total darkness. G fumbled to remove his VR headset and discovered it had been reduced to a tangled mess of copper wires, stripped of its insulating plastic. Blinking twice, he hoped to activate the AI embedded in his steampunk goggles but received no response. Panic surged through him—something had gone horribly wrong.
A flicker of light danced across the capsule's glass, and G caught a glimpse of a shadowy figure above him. A tanned man in a musketeer's hat adorned with a red plume peered through the glass. Dark, curly locks framed his face, cascading over his ears and shoulders. He wore a deep autumn-red outfit, white frills peeking out from the open renaissance-period jacket and the ends of his sleeves.
Where was his dog Crewton? G remembered seeing his dog with a savage growl, canine teeth uncovered, and ears pressed close backward as the little dog grabbed Ryan's pant leg and went crazy. Ryan had stumbled backward, and both man and dog had fallen into the strange alien prop across the room. The lights went out as the prop closed with a swoosh, and chaos ensued.
Now, who was this unknown man dressed like a Renaissance-era fop? The man tapped on the glass cover. He spoke, with a deep voice and a heavy French accent, "Pardon, are you the one that broke the world?" the stranger asked, sounding a bit muffled through the glass. His dark, curly locks framed his face, cascading over his ears and shoulders in a manner reminiscent of a Parisian boulevardier.
G shook his head, feeling his short hair catch in the copper wires, "No, I didn't break anything. Where is Ryan? Do you see my dog? " Panicking, G tried to lift the capsule door with his legs.
The man watched him for a few moments, "I think this latch is holding it closed. " He rapped on the side of the capsule with the straight metal handle of a cane. "You know you've really caused the universe some pain. Were you working with the human enacting Tychon's ritual? You don't happen to know where he went, do you?"
G looked closer at the man when he heard the word ritual. That was what had happened. He and twenty-four others were supposed to be doing a private closed beta test of Planarverse Online so they could stream it next month when the MMO goes into open beta; it was a marketing event. It was Ryan, the chief engineer, who had performed the ritual. The man was a crazy asshole, he kept talking about how he was going to save all the wild animals on Earth, and all he had to do was sacrifice twenty-five strong souls to some entity called Tychon. G's head hurt; so much had happened so fast. This was supposed to be a fun game. Where is his dog? Crewton had disappeared with Ryan in the alien egg-looking thing, which G had been told was a prop; it obviously was more than a prop. It looked like a large silver egg with four VR capsules standing up on the inside. There was some sort of sliding door on the side G was able to see into before all of this happened. Now it was dark all around him except where the man stood.
"No, I didn't do the ritual. It was Ryan. Have you seen my dog, Crewton? He's small, black and white, with short legs," asked G with a note of panic in his voice.
The man looked at G, then peered off into the darkness. The mysterious man spoke with a deep, resonant voice that carried a distinct French accent as if his words were silk carried on a soft breeze. "I'm afraid I haven't seen your dog. Do you happen to know how many people were in the ritual? How many survived? If you could tell me, I'd be happy to let you out of there to search for your dog. "
G tried to remember what Ryan had said. The crazy engineer, who had originally been really nice and kind, had turned into a maniac. He had pushed buttons on a console hooked to that alien prop thing where Crewton had disappeared. He had laughed as each of the other players had burned alive.
G looked at the man, "How many buttons are pushed on that console over there? By the four tubes near the wall? "
G watched as the man moved over towards the console. Everything in the room had suddenly appeared in a greenish tint. He wasn't sure why that was; he tapped his goggles. The embedded AI Tocai wasn't responding, and the light inside wasn't flashing; the whole device had stopped working.
The man looked like he was counting the holes where the buttons had been in the panel. Then he waved his hand over the console, and the buttons appeared out of nothing, then they lit up. What was he doing?
The man looked for a few more seconds, then the lights went out, and the buttons disappeared, leaving the cutout holes in the metal panel. What was he doing, and how was he doing that?
"Where there only twenty-five? " asked the man.
"Yes, " said G, now suspicious of the man's motives.
The man nodded and walked back over to G's VR capsule. He waved his hand, and an image of the room G had seen earlier that day appeared on a screen, displaying two rows of VR capsules identical to the one G was in. The image floated mid-air without a monitor, adding an eerie quality to the scene.
As G watched, each of the VR capsules lit up with a fiery intensity. The second one belonged to Tina, a blonde woman he had known and considered a friend. She had streamed games with him before. G witnessed the flame burst through her capsule, causing her to scream and reach out before falling backward into the flames. The other capsules also erupted into flames, and G could hear the screams and cries of those inside. He felt like he was suffocating but couldn't look away from the horrific scene.
The strange man in the sixteenth-century outfit dismissed the image with another wave of his hand and showed an image of the room where G's capsule was located. Ryan, the man responsible for the fiery deaths, was cackling as he pushed buttons on an alien artifact prop. G could see the energy emanating from it, and Ryan's face was twisted with madness.
"It's a small sacrifice to save the animals of this planet," Ryan said. "The power I will gain will make me strong, and I will force the leaders of this world to stop hunting and eating any animals. I will save this planet if I have to kill every last human to do it!"
G was filled with shock and anger. Ryan had lied about the artifact and killed over twenty-four people, including some of G's friends. Tears welled up in his eyes as he tried to get out of his capsule and screamed for Ryan to stop. Then, his pet dog Crewton burst out of a seam on his carrier and attacked Ryan. G realized he should have listened to Crewton's dislike of Ryan from the beginning. The dog had never acted that way before, and G's disregard for his pet's behavior had led to disastrous consequences.
G watched as Crewton and Ryan stumbled into the tube, and it closed. The image went dark, and strange, colored flashes appeared before the scene returned to the room with the tube, now empty. The man waved his hand, and the image disappeared. He looked up at the ceiling, and G thought he saw the man shine blue for a moment before the light faded.
Still reeling from what he had just witnessed, G was overcome with anger and pounded on the glass top of his capsule, trying to break free. The man watched him for a few moments before speaking.
G stopped paying attention in shock when he saw Crewton disappear for the second time. That damned Ryan, if he still lived, G would find him, and Ryan would pay for what he did. The anger that flooded him at seeing it all again was overwhelming, and he started hammering on the glass top of his capsule, trying to open it.
That foppish man watched G for a few moments, "I see, well thank you for being honest with me. If you will calm yourself for a few moments, I believe we can come to an arrangement, and you will be able to leave the capsule there. "
G slowed his pounding. A thousand curse words rolled through his mind, but he held back, concerned this man could easily just walk away, leaving him here to die alone in the dark, trapped.
G bit back an impulse to yell and paused. Then he tried to speak with a calm he didn't feel, "What kind of arrangement? "
"Allow me to introduce myself. I am Doctor Ben Reamus. Once, long ago, this room was my lab," the man said, pointing to the alien artifact with his ornate wooden cane. "That object landed on Earth many tens of thousands of years ago, and the US military took ownership of it after a gold miner discovered it in the early 1900s. I was the researcher they hired to study it, and I made several breakthroughs before leaving after the war ended."
G listened intently, still intrigued despite his anger and confusion. He realized that the man might be his only hope for getting out of the capsule and finding Ryan. He took a deep breath and asked, "Which war?"
"World War II, of course," the man replied confidently.
G was skeptical. "That's impossible. You would have to be over a hundred years old, and you don't look a day past fifty," he pointed out.
The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Doctor Reamus nodded. "I assure you, it is possible. Time runs differently here in the Planarverse than on Earth. Did this Ryan fellow tell you about any notes or other things found in those tubes?" he asked.
G thought for a moment before answering. "I don't know. Ryan didn't tell me much. He just wanted to see Crewton, my dog. A lot of people like watching him on my stream," he said, feeling a bit embarrassed.
Doctor Reamus nodded again. "I see. Well, let me explain something to you. I, too, was pulled into the Planarverse, like you. I left a warning behind on Earth, a very specific one: 'bury the thing and never go near it again.' That 'thing' was the alien artifact you saw earlier," he explained as he pointed at the large silvery egg with the four tubes inside.
G thought for a few moments about how he had been signed up to be one of those marketing influencers to help convince people to buy the new online Planarverse MMO. Some of his friends had also gotten a chance too. G wasn't the most popular streamer by far of his friends, and he was pretty sure this Ryan guy wanted to see Crewton. A lot of people enjoyed watching the dog's antics on his stream.
"It's Ryan Tenebris. He was the Chief Technology Officer and head design engineer on the new fully immersive virtual reality Planarverse game. He said they had rented this lab below Area 51, " said G. He wanted to see how Doctor Reamus responded. If he was from the 40s and was in here, there was no way he would know what most of that explanation meant.
"Yes, I know this already, the system that controls all of this, " he gestured towards the walls and floor before directing his gaze back to G. "This Planarverse, as you've dubbed it, has informed me that it has already located Ryan. After conducting a vast number of calculations, it revealed to me moments ago what I can offer you. It seems you were brought here as a participant in a ritual that, for the time being, has been placed on hold. Ryan has acquired some power but cannot complete the ritual without finding another potent soul. Regrettably, not just any soul will suffice; he now requires yours to finalize it. I suspect he will return for you if I simply release you. We must also address the issue of Earth's fate.
You see, when Ryan connected this advanced technology, some of which was derived from the alien artifact over there, he initiated an event designed to safeguard an emerging species from self-destruction—specifically, their heightened likelihood of causing their own extinction. This is why each habitable planet orbiting a sun harbors one of these alien artifacts. If a species becomes advanced enough, it will inevitably activate the artifact. However, in Earth's case, this occurrence is premature.
By utilizing this ritual and adhering to the instructions provided by a powerful devil named Tychon, Ryan Tenebris has caused the event to transpire much sooner than intended. In essence, Earth has been cheated. If Ryan completes the ritual, there's a strong possibility that devils and demons of every kind will invade, subsequently devouring every human on the planet. They might spare the animals, which aligns with Tychon's intention of remaining within the boundaries of his bargain. By adhering to the letter of his promise, he would still gain control of Earth."
Dr. Reamus paused for a moment, allowing G to process the information he had just shared.
G was struggling to understand the information, demons? Planarverse was real? "Did whatever you called it, this system, did it find my dog? "
Doctor Reamus smiled, putting both hands on his cane which he held in front of himself against the floor. The man clearly didn't need a cane. "Yes," He looked around again, "I currently have time stopped or at least slowed. I can't keep it this way for much longer, so I'll need to be brief. The Planarverse is complex, dangerous, and very real. If you die here, you will be dead. It also runs on rules, many, many rules. One of those rules, which is very important to it, is free will. Choice is the basis of everything."
Doctor Reamus continued, "So because of these rules, I can't just stop the ritual that will destroy Earth. Nor can I just summon forces to destroy it for me. It's the same thing. But you can choose to do this. I think you have already chosen to do this, which is why I'm not quite breaking the rules, just bending them a bit. Ryan has been here for almost two months; time moved differently here than on Earth."
He paused for a moment before adding, "Also, the system that is the Planarverse is curious about this game system you brought here. It wants to know how this interface and approach to life will work. It needs details. It has some choices to make in the future, and it is looking for options, it is looking for," he paused here, searching for the word, "updates."
G couldn't believe what he was hearing. "No, screw that, you fix it. Put it back, put me back, this isn't what I signed up for, did you see those others burned to death!" shouted G. He wasn't a fool. This was a no-win situation for him, and he wasn't some crazy guy's lackey. He had already been an unpaid intern in New York, and this sounded much worse with an offer of death as a side helping.
Doctor Reamus tried to reassure him. "Don't be so hasty; there are some other things I'll give you to help you along. The intended game systems from your version of Planarverse have been reinstated for you with some alterations to make them all work. They are not based on technology, at least as you know it. You will have the starting options from the intended game, and you will need to make your choices. I will also ---" he stopped speaking as G heard barking and growling in the distance. It was muffled, but it was definitely Crewton.
"Let me out of here, I hear him!!" shouted G in panic, "Fine, I agree, let me out!!!!"
Doctor Reamus sighed resignedly, nodded, then tapped the capsule with his cane. As soon as the capsule unlocked, a flood of blue square windows appeared in G's vision. He heard barking and whining in the distance and felt a surge of urgency to save Crewton. G tried to click on the 'x' in the corner of the weird boxes blocking his view, but they wouldn't disappear. A visual keyboard popped up under the name slot. G tried to make sense of the windows and the game system, but the panic from hearing Crewton in pain was overwhelming.
He took a deep breath and attempted to focus on the windows in front of him. He quickly filled in the name slot, G, and clicked 'ok' and 'enter' multiple times until the windows vanished. With the immediate task completed, G leaped out of the capsule and ran down the hallway towards the barking. He tripped for a moment as a small wave of dizziness hit him, but it quickly cleared, and G resumed running after the sound of barking.
The green-lit corridor seemed strange, but G believed it was due to his goggles. As he continued to run, he stubbed his toe hard and noticed his boots were in shreds. He didn't care and took off at a run again, following the sound of Crewton's barking.
He heard Crewton bark again farther down the hall, and he started to run and stubbed his toe hard. He looked down, lifting his hurt foot, and realized his boots were gone, well, not gone. They were in shreds, and the sole and uppers were gone. What in the hell? He didn't care, and he took off at a run. He heard Crewton growl and bark again as he came around a corner to find a clutter of broken office furniture, cabinets on broken moving carts, and an open doorway leading into a large room beyond.
G's heart raced as he heard Crewton's frantic barking echoing through the dimly lit corridor. There in front of the open doorway was Crewton, which was great as hope surged into G's chest, but then G saw why the dog was growling and barking. There was a black creature trying to bite the dog, he looked again shocked. It was a giant spider. Not a hairy one with legs that run, this one looked like a black widow. The carapace of the creature was a primordial black that shined even in the green of his vision. It had long black legs and was trying to snap forward at Crewton as the dog jumped back every time it leaped at him. The thing was the size of a basketball and looked scary as hell as it jumped forward again at Crewton, who dodged backward.
G looked around for something to throw at it, and near him in the hallway was the bottom half of an office chair. The plastic wheels and seat were gone, and the only reason he recognized it was the five metal legs, and the crude metal lift piston was still there. He reached for it grabbing the piston shaft as he ran towards the giant spider.
He shouted as he started swinging the impromptu club overhand down at the bone-chilling midnight black horror. The creature turned as he came at it. It reared back on its legs and hissed. The absolute horror the creature inspired in G drove him forward to save his friend.
"Get away from my dog, you shit!" Then he swung the legs of the chair down as the piston extended, and it struck true. A green bar came up over the creature that went instantly to half red. He hit it again as some of its legs broke off, and it tried to scramble away. Bits of metal were breaking off the metal ends of the chair as he swung it down hard, hitting the creature or against the floor. He kept swinging at the creature long after the spider's bar went red and disappeared. He hated spiders, and he especially hated this one.
He stopped when he heard a whimper from Crewton. The dog had lain down and was on its side. Oh damn, he thought as he dropped his now ragged and ick-covered club and went to his knees, picking Crewton up in his arms.
G heard clicking from the open metal door that led into the larger silo chamber to his right. Tapping as if many sharp feet hit the floor. Oh shit, he turned and ran back towards the room with the VR capsule in it. G looked down at Crewton as he ran, he could now see holes in the dog's side, and blood blacker than night was oozing out of the wounds. Shit, he had been bitten. Why wasn't this Doctor Reamus helping him? "Don't die, buddy!" G ran for the entrance to the capsule room when Crewton disappeared from his hands. One moment the dog was firmly grasped, and he wished he could do more; the next, the dog was gone? He stopped and looked down at his now empty hands. He was in shock, then he screamed, "No!!" He dropped to his knees as the echo of his voice boomed down the empty corridor around him.
He heard the tapping of a cane and the footsteps of Doctor Ben Reamus coming closer. G looked up, "Why didn't you help me? " It was a demand, not a question.
Doctor Reamus could see G and the tears forming in his eyes. The older man scratched his cheek a moment, then spoke softly, "You should read your prompts. " Then he sighed, seeing G's anguish. "Think about the spell ability, Summon Companion. " He waited as G looked at him as disbelief spread across his face.
G was about to say something then stopped as his mouth was half open, looking like a fool, "You mean?" he stopped, then he thought about his windows. To the side of his vision were a bunch of little blinking icons that looked like blobs of blue. He thought about spell abilities, specifically thinking Summon Companion.
A message box appeared.
Summon Companion - This is a spell ability. It is a spell you can cast instantly without the necessary vocal components. Summon companion will summon a druid or ranger's companion to his side. A druid's companion can never truly die as long as the caster lives. Unlike a familiar, a companion animal will be removed from the current plane of existence and will only return if summoned. The companion can be dismissed at any time by the caster as long as it is in full health.
G reread it. He stood up and looked at the Doctor, who just nodded and smiled. G said out loud, "Cast Summon Companion," but nothing happened. He said to cast the spell, but again, nothing happened. He imagined himself clicking on the blue spell text, but nothing happened. Then G thought and willed himself to cast the spell Summon Companion.
He felt a pull like he would throw up and pee simultaneously, two exits, no waiting. A blue bar appeared in the upper left of his vision. There was a number there, 100. He saw it go from full straight to empty in a split second, 0 mana. He hit his knees again, this time throwing up. G did this for a few moments, then stopped when he felt a wet nose pushing against the hand he was using to hold himself up. As he bent over, he heard a familiar wheezing whine. He looked over to see Crewton right there, good as new. He tried to smile at the dog, but then he fell backward as the world and his vision started to spin.