Zane held the letter in his hands, stunned. He could feel his heart rate rising and his hands began to shake, all while a massive grin began to form across his face. $10,000,000. He couldn't believe it, so much money just for a book? He wondered how this person could afford it when he read the name: "M. Millian." Zane's eyes widened as he looked up to Ms. Wen, who stood there, hands clasped in front of her mouth, unable to hide the big, goofy smile on her face.
"Do you have any idea who this is?" Zane asked, expectantly. Ms. Wen just shook her head, confused. "This is Mateo Millian, CEO of Millian Dollar Industries!" Zane proclaimed.
Millian was a tech entrepreneur who had nearly single handedly been responsible for some of the greatest technological advancements in recent history. Notably, he was a primary outside contractor for the US Military, supplying drones capable of fulfilling solo missions in a far more successful way than any drones previously. On top of that, he was the tech supplier for most major brands, providing delivery drones for most retail businesses, stocking and sorting robots for wholesalers, and even online software, one of which Zane was very familiar with, as it was the same program that he used to create the library database. Last summer, Zane had given himself a goal to sort and document all the library's books in a way that anyone could see both what was in stock, as well as what they had in general. Luckily, almost everything was recorded, just on paper, not digitally. Zane had spent far too long in the dark and cold basement, looking through the library's physical records to digitize them for the library website. At that moment, Zane had realized it was likely due to his creation of the database that Millian had found out that they even had the book.
"Do you have any idea what I'll be able to do with $10,000,000?" Ms. Wen asked Zane. Zane just shook his head. "Good, because neither do I!" Ms. Wen said, throwing her head back in laughter.
"You know, I won't know what to do with all that money," Ms. Wen said, suddenly serious, "all I know is that I want you to share in it."
Zane began to protest, he didn't deserve this, right? It wasn't his book, not his library, it was just a job. Ms. Wen put up her hand, cutting off his attempt at protest.
"I know that this kind young man only found out we had this book due to your hard work making the database," Ms. Wen, hand still up, "so I figured it would only be fair to compensate you in some way." Zane tried to speak up in protest again but Ms. Wen kept on talking. "I know you are only here in Creekbend due to your brother, and that you had to give up your dream school to be here, so I wanted to cover your four-year college tuition at MWU." Ms. Wen said, hands on her shoulders, defiantly.
Zane just stood there, stunned. Zane had told Ms. Wen about the fact that he lost the ability to go to his dream school, Mount Washington University, due to the fact that his brother had gotten recruited almost two years ago for lacrosse, causing his whole family to move across the country to achieve not only his brother's dream, but his parent's. His parents always wanted a star athlete son and had raised them both to fit that role. Zane's younger brother had achieved their parents' dream through his excellence in lacrosse, while Zane had never liked any sport he participated in. It wasn't that he was bad at the sports he had played, it was that they took over his life. His parents had a "You do well or you're a disappointment" mentality that infected Zane's enjoyment of sports. When winning is the expectation, loss was crushing, and winning didn't even feel good. Over time, Zane had slowly stopped trying before dropping out of sports entirely, to the incredible disappointment of his parents. To appease their potential retaliation, Zane had taken up fencing, as it was the one sport he had enjoyed, as he went into it with a healthy mindset, and since his parents hardly cared about it, he was able to have fun. After a while, Zane had found enjoyment in both reading and writing, a way to escape reality, both in an expression of creativity and indulgence. After a while, he had found a University in his sophomore year of high school that he thought fit him perfectly. MWU was a writer's dream, hosting many talented and famous authors as professors and guest speakers. Zane had even achieved a partial full scholarship to attend the university when he graduated. It wasn't until the end of his sophomore year when his brother had gotten big news. If he attended Creekbend High for all four years of high school, he would be granted a full ride scholarship to the greatest lacrosse university to play on the team, all they would have to do is move across the country to do so, far away from MWU. Zane's parents were unwilling to either stay and allow Zane to attend his dream school, or allow him to fly cross country to attend, as they "didn't have the money." Zane knew they did, but he didn't fight back. Maybe that's why he always stood up to Keith, as he knew that this was the place to do it, as doing so at home would serve no purpose. But now, now with the support of Ms. Wen, he could realize his dream again. Tears began to well up in Zane's eyes as he realized this. Ms. Wen, seeing Zane's sudden change in demeanor, from outright protest to intense gratitude, she scooped him up in a hug.
"You know my parents won't let me go." Zane said softly.
"Oh, I think I can convince them." Ms. Wen said, pushing Zane away, a smile on her face.
They just sat there, absorbing what was just revealed. Zane could truly live the life he wanted; he could finally be free! A smile spread across his face, almost too excited to wait.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
"Where's the book? Do you have it ready?" Zane said, nearly bouncing off the walls with excitement.
Ms. Wen placed her hands on her hips and looked at Zane. "It's in the sub-basement, you know those stairs are too dangerous for me to climb!" Ms. Wen said.
Zane shivered, that basement is where he spent almost a week during the summer logging the books. It's cold and dark, only lit by a few dangling lightbulbs and has no airflow.
"You want me to go get it?" Zane said, hoping she would say no.
"Of course!" Ms. Wen said, throwing her hands up. "You think I want that nice young man to go down into the dark and dangerous basement? That's your job, and it's the least you can do for being late!"
Zane put his hands up in surrender, "Ok, ok, I'll go." Zane said, disappointed.
Zane walked to the entrance to the basement, this part was well lit and where they kept their format library and newspaper record. As he began to descend the staircase, Ms. Wen yelled down after him.
"And don't damage it! It's our ticket to a better life!" Ms. Wen yelled.
Zane just nodded, continuing to descend the stairs, not knowing how right she was.
The staircase to the sub-basement wouldn't look out of place in a dungeon in a medieval castle, with its uneven stone stairs and stone walls. The only thing keeping it from fitting would be the single string of dangling lightbulbs heading down into the basement. Zane just sighed, reminding himself that this was his first step into the life he wanted to live. Descending the stone stairs, the air changes almost immediately. As he gets lower and lower, the air gets colder and staler, like the air has been trapped down here since this place was built. Dust covered almost every surface, including filling the air. Despite spending almost a week down here, it didn't get easier. The air still tugged at his lungs, and he felt like he could taste the rotting books all around him. He pulls up the database to locate where the book was. "Isle 3A 6" it says. Zane walks down isle 3A and it doesn't take long to find what he is looking for. A large, well made, completely intact book lays on the shelf, sandwiched between the same old, fragile books. The book was magnificent, pristine, and it was practically glowing. There is no name on the spine, but Zane has no doubt in his mind that his is the correct book. He carefully takes the book from the shelf, making sure that it doesn't stick to the shelf like some of the old books down here have done before, yet it slides off effortlessly. The light was too dim to see the book in its whole glory, so Zane turns on the flashlight on his phone and places it face up on the table. He goes to blow the dust off the cover off the book before he realizes there is none. Squinting, he blows anyway, nothing, not a single bit of dust is on this book. And the cover, it is magnificent. The book was the side of one of those World Record books, so much bigger than the average book. A well-crafted, immaculately designed cover, lots of flourishes and various flora that he does not recognize surround the title of the book: "Tales of the Aether" in gold font. For the briefest moment, he feels the urge to tell Ms. Wen to not sell the book, that it was worth far more. Zane shook his head, the book was awesome, but not $10,000,000 awesome. That being said, he had to see what was inside the book to see what all the hype was about, and besides, the book is in incredible condition, he doubted he could damage it if he tried. He felt compelled to open the book and see what lay inside, as if the book spoke to a part of his body even he wasn't aware of. Zane pulled open the front cover, revealing the first page. It was full of foreign characters, looking like no language he had ever seen before. As Zane turned the pages, his brow furrowed more and more. The book was entirely filled with these runes.
"What the hell are these?" Zane said, confused. "How old is this book? The cover is in English, but the rest are in..." Zane trailed off as he continued flipping through the book.
His confusion only grew as he continued through the book. As he was flipping, a page caught his eye, different from the others. While each previous page had been set up in a pattern that each other page mirrored, a 9 x 15 grid of these "runes." This page contained the same outside of the runes, but the inner runes were gone, and were replaced with a circle of runes. Instead of black ink like the rest of the runes, these markings were red.
"Blood?" Zane said, reaching to feel the markings.
A spike of pain went through his finger as he touched the markings, like touching a hot iron. Zane pulled his hand away in pain, wide eyed. Sticking his finger in his mouth to soothe the pain, he looked back up at the book. Zane stood there, dumbfounded, not only that this book somehow burned him, but now that the same book was glowing. The circular markings began to glow like hot coals, which made Zane take an instinctive step backwards, but that was as far as he went before he felt his whole body tense up. He sat there, unable to move as he witnessed what was occurring in front of him. The book was vibrating, and Zane could swear he saw the markings in the book begin to spin. The markings lost their details as the glowing red markings created a spinning red halo on the page of this book. The book was no longer just vibrating and was instead violently shaking, as if the book couldn't contain what power lay inside, like a balloon too full of air about to burst.
"What the hell was in that tea?" Was the only thing Zane could think before the red halo left the page of the book and began to expand.
The area inside the halo was rippling, still see-through, but becoming opaque fast. The growing pressure inside of Zane he couldn't place exploded as the halo stopped growing, and the inside of the halo became completely gone, like a whole in the world. Zane was so captured by the scene in front of him, he didn't notice until he was halfway across the room that he was sliding toward the now obvious portal. That snapped Zane out of his body untensed, and he turned around and sprinted for the stairs. He made it two strides before he lost his footing and began being pulled once again towards the floating portal. Zane noticed that he was the only thing down here being pulled in, as he could even see the dust on the floor undisturbed by the red and black vortex hellbent on consuming him and him alone. Zane let out one loud, guttural scream before he was dragged through the portal, and his whole world went black.