The doorway was so bright and as I stepped through that I had to cover my eyes, as I crossed whatever threshold was holding the two places together I was momentarily disoriented, as I opened my eyes I was surprised to see my poster filled ceiling above me. I felt my covers begin to shift and when I glanced at them a strange lump was moving beneath them, needless to say I flew off my bed.

After a couple more seconds Pix's head popped out from under the covers. “Okay dude, why am I in your bed? And by the way you need to wash these things, they smell worse than some homeless people I know.” She said matter of factly while looking around the room. “You really are a nerd, you know most guys your age have posters of half naked ladies but you have buff guys in armor. I thought it was weird that you didn't even try to pick me up, now I know why.”

this girls attitude was finally getting on my nerves, “are you always this rude to people or is just me?” She looked at him, her expression remaining neutral.

“I thought it was part of my charm, are you always this easily upset or is it just me?” She said casually while getting out of my bed.

I sighed, “Do you need to use my phone to call a cab or something?” I said turning over to look at her.

“Well that all depends on where we are.” Said Pix, exploring the room.

“Summerset Pennsylvania, it's about 3 hours west of Harrisburg.” I said.

Pix turned around so fast that she almost fell down, “Pennsylvania!? Freaking Pennsylvania! I was in New York an hour ago!”

I sat up, “That is pretty far, you would have to have ridden a fighter jet to get here that fast, but I guess that's magic for you.” I said shrugging , getting up and opening the door to the rest of the apartment. I went to the kitchen and grabbed two cans of pop, “I'm still confused though, you're a fairy right? Are there fairies everywhere or just in New York? And are there other races? Like orcs and vampires and stuff?” I said while offering her one of the cans.

“Wow you are new to the Labyrinth huh?” Pix said as she popped the tab and took a drink.

“Whats the Labyrinth? Is that where all you guys live or something? Like the Greek myth? Whoa are there minotaurs!? I freaking love minotaurs.” I said excitedly.

“So many questions, I'll try to answer them in order.” Pix said as she set her drink down, “No fairies aren't just in New York, although the art and music has drawn a huge following there which has amassed a pretty big colony” she said.

Pix continued answering the questions, “Yes there are other races, the main ones are fairies, vampires, therianthropes, sorcerers and witches. Orcs and Minotaurs do exist along with a slew of others that exist in pop culture today, oh and spirits if you count them but that debate has been going on forever. Anyway, yes they do exist but their number is exceedingly low and they are a sort of endangered species, we're normally referred to as “Supernaturals” but everyone just says “Supes” for short.” as she talked she counted her fingers as if to keep track of the questions. “The answer to your final question is both yes and no, the Labyrinth is not a place but it is where we live. It's the new age term used for the magical underworld. Now is the history lesson over? Because no offense to this lovely little town of yours but I would really like to get back home as soon as possible.” she said taking another drink.

“You can fly when you turn into that little ball thing right? Why don’t you just fly back?” I asked.

“Yes I can fly but that's like asking me to run back, yes I would get there in a day or two but I would probably die from exhaustion first, and I would really like not to die.” Pix answered.

“Well I don't have the money to get you a plane ticket or anything.” I said apologetically. As we sat there somberly I got an idea, “but I think I might know someone who can help, and I'm sure he can afford a plane ticket.”

Five hours later Pix and I were standing outside the Origin entertainment building in Harrisburg, we walked into the lobby and up to the lone receptionist, she was sitting behind a towering desk that came up to my chest.

“Hello, and welcome to Origin entertainment! How can I help you today?” said the perky lady.

“Hello, my name is Cole Richardson. I called earlier about seeing Mr. Adams” I replied to the receptionist.

“Oh yes Mr. Richardson! The R&D department has been phoning up here every hour asking if you were here yet, you must be pretty important.” She said smiling with a face full of glowing white teeth. “There's a map over there” she pointed with her finger, “Find R&D and just follow the arrows on the ground, you and your girlfriend have a good day!”

“Wait a minute shes not my--” I started to say but was interrupted.

“Yes we will try to have a good one, you too.” Pix replied, pushing me to the sign, “Let's just go with it, I usually get thrown out of places like this.”

“But I’m sure as soon as I tell them whats going on they'll let you stay so there's no need to lie.” I said as I pried her hand away from my arm.

“What am I not pretty enough to be your girlfriend? Jeez just as I was starting to think you were an okay guy.” she talked as if she was upset but she couldn't hide the smile on her face.

“That's not it, you're really pretty it's just that—” she interrupted me again, I was really getting tired of that.

“Awe you think I'm pretty? I take everything back.” she said and then punched me on the arm. They reached the big map, it looked like the ones that you see in malls complete with a “you are here” sticker.

The place was huge, I had never been in an office building before but I didn't think they were all this big. Pix and I followed the yellow arrow on the ground to some elevators, stepped in and pressed the button for the bottom level.

“So this Ted guy is the one that gave you the app?” Pix asked as she watched the floor numbers go down.

“Yeah, he came in my work yesterday upset and talking on the phone to someone.” Was it really only yesterday? I asked myself, the events of last night seemed so long ago, “Then he hung up and bought a water, he started asking me a bunch of questions out of the blue and when he found out I play one of the games that Origin makes he gave me the app. At the time I should have been a lot more suspicious, but the holy grail of video games had just fallen into my lap.” I explained.

“Did you hear anything of what he was talking about?” she asked.

I had to think for a second when she asked that, “Yeah a little bit, he definitely said something about losing a test subject and then he started threatening whoever was on the other end of the phone, telling them that if they didn't find another one that it was their head.”

“Well he sounds like a peach.” Pix said sarcastically, the elevator continued falling for what seemed like ages before it eventually stopped. This place was definitely a lot bigger than regular office buildings. “Looks like this is us.”

The doors opened to a long poorly lit hallway, at the end were two large metal doors with some type of artwork on them and standing next to them I could only assume was a lost gorilla that happened to find a security uniform. Although I was reluctant I followed Pix down the hallway. As we approached the gorilla he put his hand on his side arm and held his hand out.

“this is a restricted area, you don't have access badges so I'm going to ask you to leave.” he spoke like he had gurgled gravel that morning.

“What's with the attitude dude? We're supposed to be here, and who do you think you're threatening me with that little toy of yours” Pix's hands started to glow and I had to keep her from walking up to the big guy.

“Oh, we must have gotten off on the wrong floor. We're looking for the R&D department I'm sorry we'll leave, come on Pix” I said as I tried in vain to turn her around.

“This is the R&D department, what is your business here?” the guard asked with his hand still on the pistol.

I turned back towards the guard, “My name is Cole Richardson, I was supposed to meet someone here.” and with that the gorilla finally relaxed, he lowered his hand and spoke more casually.

“I'm sorry Mr. Richardson, I was expecting someone more..I don't know just more, and I was unaware that you would be bringing company.” he gestured towards Pix. “It's not every day that you see a fairy and human together, and when they are things usually get pretty weird.” the guard turned and swiped my key card in the door and it opened without a sound. “Just walk straight and there will be someone to help you, have a good day Mr. Richardson.”

The area past the huge doorway was vastly different than what I was expecting, I imagined that the R&D department would just be a bunch of young people fresh out of college playing ping pong and brainstorming ideas about future video games. Instead it looked like something crossed between where NASA made satellites and Dr. Frankenstein's laboratory.

Pix and I walked the expanse of technology without a hitch, when we reached the top of a set of stairs the sound of a large explosion could be heard and the ground shook violently.

Pix grabbed onto me to keep balanced, “What in Grismodal's ballsack was that?!” Pix said with extreme femininity.

As if he timed it a red skinned young man dressed in a lab coat and sporting a Mohawk stumbled out of a side door rapidly filling with smoke, coughing and staring at the ceiling he spoke aloud, “Huh that's funny, the sprinklers usually turn on by now.”

After the man finished coughing the rest of his lung out of his chest he noticed the two of us standing there and approached smiling ear to ear, the gleaming white of his teeth was a perfect contrast to the black ash covering his face. I walked up to Pix and me and stuck his fist out to me for a bump, to which I reluctantly obliged to, “What's up my dude's? My name's Randal McGrouder, but my friends call me Roundout, I'm the lead fantasy interaction developer here. You're Cole right? I'm supposed to take you to Mr. big dog Adams, oh cool you brought a friend.” he looked Pix up and down then stuck his fist out to her, “definitely some kind of Fae, woodland tribe?” Pix bumped the fist. “Close, I'm actually plains tribe.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Roundout nodded my head in agreement, “awesome that means were like long lost fourth cousins or something, I'm half Wendigo on my mother's side.” The dude's office is at the other end of the sub-level, on our way there I'll give you the grand tour.” he gestured to the back of the huge room.

Roundout walked backwards as he started his speech, “everything you see past this point is strictly need to know, if you try using any recording devices our security systems will notice and automatically launch a targeted E.M.P and fry said recording devices so if you want to keep your phone working then I would keep it in your pants.”

“Our first stop on today's tour will be here at the Tech lab, this is were we develop the beautiful technology that keeps us at the forefront of the modern world's development. Origin is just one company managed by a group of incredibly powerful people and here in this lab we make more than just video games, here we make everything ranging from government satellites to cpu's in smart phones.” said Roundout as he led them through a brightly lit room full of odd pieces of metal.

I stopped to pick up and look at an expensive piece of circuitry, “why am I being told all this? I'm just a tester for one of your apps.” Roundout took the piece out of I's hand and set it back on the table, “Oh my dude, you are way more than that. Do you know how hard it is to find someone who can pass the first test and who doesn't have anyone to miss him if he doesn't? Plus you kind of screwed the pooch last night opening that app early which means the more you know the better you can do to make up for that, anyway we'll get to that.”

I must have looked upset about that comment because Roundout put his hand on my shoulder as if to comfort me, “sorry man, that must have sounded rude. My bad I'm not that great with socialization, besides you should be glad. Normally someone in your shoes would either be dead or locked up in one of our containment cells. After what you did yesterday I'm seriously surprised why they're letting me take you to Mr. Adams instead of a being escorted by guards with your hands cuffed.”

I was confused by that comment, “what exactly did I do?”

Roundout started walking again, “you started the app before midnight man, that messed with a whole mess of stuff here. They're still cleaning up the blood from some of the sorcerer's that were performing the ritual, but this is the boring stuff our next stop is where the magic happens.” he used his fingers to make quotation marks when he said “magic”.

The strange man kept the informative tour moving along as the three of them walked for another 10 minutes, until they reached yet another set of doors, although this one had more security than the original doors with Mr. Gorilla. “Why is there more security here than there is at the entrance? If you're trying to keep people from getting in you've put the guards in the wrong spot” I said.

Their guide turned around before approaching the door. “Well you just answered your own question bruh, we're not trying to keep people out here, we're trying to keep things in.” Roundout smiled brightly at my own comment. “also I think that my dude Drinkle is more than enough to keep out the occasional fan-boy that tries to break into a video game company, were-dudes are tough like that yanno?” My jaw almost hit the floor, “no way, I knew no regular person could have that much hair.”

Pix and I had to stand and wait in front of the door while the 4 armed guards inspected every inch of us with strange looking devices, even Roundout got searched momentarily, after what seemed like an eternity we made their way through the reinforced double doors and into another mundane looking space, as we walked a couple feet within a shiver ran up my spine and I started to sweat even though the air was chilly. “Gross, what's this feeling I'm getting right now, It's like I'm watching a horror movie.”

Round spoke over my shoulder as I kept walking, “that would be your natural fight or flight response dude, it's the same thing a gazelle feels when a lion is hiding in the grass. Although once we reach our destination you might wish it was just a lion.” I imagined I could suffocate on the amount of silence that followed us as we continued their walk.

Their destination happened to be a three floored rotunda with several darkly lit, giant cages with an even larger empty cell in the center. Numerous guards were patrolling the floors and lab coat wearing scientist milled about with various projects.

“Okay I will bite, what is all this?” said I gesturing to the cages with my hands. “I already told you this is where the magic happens, well technically the magic happens on the third floor so that we can access the sky if need be.” The ash-faced man said easily as he picked his ear using my little finger.

Pix spoke before I had the chance, “don't try and be cute you surfer wannabe! Why do you have hundreds of Monstrum locked up in here and why is there blood coating the entire floor?!” she spoke with so much anger and force that a few guards stopped their patrol and aimed their weapons at her.

Roundout raised his hands and spoke calmly, “easy dudes, our friend here is a just a nature lover. She means no harm.” He turned to her and spoke. “The blood is from Jerry, he was a cool guy but he got a little too comfortable with one of the harpy's.

And to answer your first question you can think of this as like a super duper big dog pound, the Monstrum we keep here are only the one's that have caused dangerous situations out in the world, we keep them here to study. We have to have a complete understanding of them so our AI can spawn them in the astral program, which by the way we're calling Limbo, awesome name right? I wish I came up with it”

“Wait, what is a Monstrum?” I asked.

“That is the Latin term for monster, its what most of the people in the labyrinth call the creatures that can't be explained by science, the bristle boar you fought last night was Monstrum.” said Roundout.

“If that's what monster's are like then I'm going to be disappointed, that thing wasn't a monster it was just a big pig.” I said incredulously.

“Don't get full of yourself man, that thing you fought last night was a juvenile it was like 6 months old. If you had went up against a fully grown one you would be like a blood sprinkler right now dude.”

As I finished my sentence a long green tongue came from the cage and lashed out around Roundout's arm and a giant horned frog hopped into view. I flinched back as Pix's hands started to glow, Roundout held his hand up. “It's okay guy's, this Beelzebufo demon has been acting up a lot recently.” He turned to cage and his voice dropped an octave, “LeT gO Of mY aRM BuG BreATH!” the tongue immediately retreated and when Roundout turned back around his eyes were glowing a pale green and there was a stench like rotting flesh in the air.

“Sorry guy's I usually try to keep my mom's blood out of the public view.” Roundout said as he pulled a comb and straightened his Mohawk, I noticed that his fingers were elongated and the nails looked more like claws.

“That was a little scary man, but pretty awesome too.” said Pix with a slight bit of awe. Roundout laughed, “if you thought that was scary you should see my mom when she's mad at me, anyway now that you've seen where we keep the creepy crawlies I think it's finally time to take you to the main attraction.”

We passed more cages holding Monstrum on our way to an elevator which would take them to the third floor and to whatever it was that had made Roundout continuously repeat things like, “oh man dude you're going to love this” and “I just want to tell you but it will ruin the surprise.” Whatever the surprise was I just wished it lived up to all the hype my new friend was building.

The third floor did not have any cages, instead the space was mostly taken up by computer servers. Roundout led us near the back wall furthest from the elevator and towards what vaguely resembled a floating planetarium. As we approached it he held his arm out to stop us, “I'm not a serious guy my dude's, but I cannot be more serious when I say that you can't touch anything once we make it to where we're going, cool?” Pix and I spoke at the same time, “cool.”

What I originally thought was a planetarium turned out to be a bunch of metal spheres just floating around in the air, “I have to tell you Roundout, no matter how cool floating balls are I'm really disappointed. I was expecting a dragon guarding a magic sword or something.” I said unenthusiastically.

A deep voice responded to my statement, “well I'm sorry to disappoint Sir Knight Magister.” Before I could find where the voice came from another one spoke. “If I had a list of creatures I could change myself into I assure you that a dragon would be near the top.”

I slowly turned around in a circle, “okay who's there? And why did you call me that, my name is Cole.”

A third voice spoke and I turned back towards the spheres and saw that one of them was glowing a bright yellow, “in this world you are Cole Richardson, but in Lyran you are Artorias Gray the leader of the prestigious guild 'Howlpack of Olympus' correct?”

I spoke low, “how did you know that...?”

Roundout spoke then, “Cole my dude let me introduce you to Solomon, he is the first of his kind. An artificial intelligence created through a perfect union of magic and technology, He is the one who will run Limbo when it's up and running. There will be no updates to the program, no patches, no shutting down for maintenance because Solomon evolves to suit the needs of Limbo. There is no set story or future in Limbo each characters personal choices and actions will define the world and once you've made a choice there is no going back. It is in every sense of the word a virtual reality. And in that reality Solomon here is the omniscient god presiding over it all.”

“Well, to be fair I should probably say god's,” Roundout continued. “He is the A.I. That governs it all, but he splits his personality into several different fragments so that there is a specific figure to pair an action to. For example his fragment Marbas is in charge of architecture and civil management and his fragment Agares is in charge of the monsters and animals of the world, all in all there are 8 of these fragments.”

Pix spoke before I could, “well that's all cool and nerdy but why would you need magic for something like a video game?” She did have a point.

“Well in terms of pure technology we're still a couple decades out before we can make a virtual reality as real as the one we make with a combination of the two.” Roundout said plainly.

“I'm still confused as to how any of this works at all.” I said while rubbing my temples.

Roundout smiled, “that's cool my man, you're actually acclimating a lot faster than most people, must be all the games...you nerd.” he punched me lightly in the arm to make his point. “But since we're hopefully going to be working together for awhile I guess I could spill the beans.” he leaned back against one of the server houses and crossed his legs. “Okay so what we're eventually going to do is have a headset that you strap to yourself, which with the help of a hidden magic imprint will send your consciousness to a fabricated astral plane, that would be limbo, which by the time we're finished will largely resemble the world of Lyran, just with an entirely new level of detail and realness. Once there you will have free reign to do as you wish, all the while the headset will use a strong cpu to monitor and store all that happens there while also keeping track of your vital signs, although nothing dangerous should happen. Its mainly just there in case you naturally have a seizure or something, which if that happens it will immediately notify the nearest healthcare location.” He exhaled deeply and stood straight again, “that's the bare bones of it at least, anyway we should go see the big dog now.”

I was blown away with all of what he said, “okay I think I followed most of that, but I do have one question.” Roundout turned around and lifted an eyebrow, “yeah go ahead and shoot my dude.”

I turned back and pointed at Solomon's body, “if there are 8 fragments, then why are there only 7 orbs?”

Roundout walked towards Solomon and counted the orbs with his fingers, he did this 3 times before he said anything. “Okay there should definitely be one more, yo S-man wheres the rest of you?” One of Solomon's orbs lit up a pale blue, “I do not know what you mean Randal I have always been made up of 7 fragments, I did not want to interrupt your explanation earlier but you were quite wrong.”

Roundout seemed to mull this over for a minute, “okay well would you be so kind as to name the seven fragments for me please.” Solomon glowed again, “of course Randal, alphabetically I am comprised of Agares, Amon, Bael, Marbas, Samigina, Valefor and lastly Vassago.” while Solomon spoke Roundout counted the names on his fingers, “...Valefor, Vassago,....” after thinking for a minute he snapped his fingers, “you forgot Barbatos S-man, I don't see how that guy is a huge doucher.”

All of Solomon's orbs blinked various colors before replying in more of a whisper than a voice, “Barbatos.....Barbatos....Barbatos....BARBATOS ISSSSSS DEEEAAADDDDDD” following that all of the lights went shut off, including the ones on Solomon.

“Well that's not ominous at all,” Pix said succinctly.

Roundout spoke loudly, “okay dudes no one panic, the backup generators should come up in 3...2....1...” For a short while nothing happened, then the air was permeated with monstrous howls and human screams. “I guess we can panic now.”