Day 2
I decided not to reveal my ability to control Tomar’s body while he was asleep just yet. It would most definitely freak him out, but more importantly, I still didn’t know what exactly I was dealing with here. If these two suddenly decided to act against me, this could be my ace in the hole. After all, I was still an uninvited guest, and it appeared that my mere existence caused Tomar pain. If it were me, I’d try to get such a voice out of my head by any means necessary. They needed me for now, but who knows how long that would last.
When we finally arrived at the water source I was immediately slack-jawed.
‘Hey, wait! What is this?’
“The water source. This is where you get water.”
Do you think I’m stupid? I can see that!
‘I mean the Omega script! Those are the sigils you were talking about?’
An Omega script. Just like the ones from my own world. I immediately understood about a fourth of the program, but unfortunately Omega relies heavily on pre-defined functions, variables, and systems. While I could read the program, I couldn’t say what every part of the script did just yet. I would have to study it.
Tomar called Omega “scripture sigils”, a term that was apparently used by the temple. Some kind of religious group. He basically knew nothing about the script itself. He couldn’t read it, he didn’t know what it does, and as far as he knew, nobody else knew anything either. To him, it was decorative scribbling.
‘Decorative, huh? Hahaha.’
My mission was clear. Learn more about Omega, the water sources, the temple, and anything else that might help me get out of here in one piece. But theorizing without a rubber duck to bounce ideas off of is boring... I thought. In lack of a ducky, Tomar would have to do.
Our first tests weren’t promising. No matter what we tried to apply Omega to, nothing happened. I was missing something, and I started tuning out anything Tomar was doing, to concentrate on the water source script that I had memorized. I took it apart “sigil” by “sigil” in my mind, tried to glean their meaning, how they related, and how they affected the flow of the program.
It was difficult to keep up the concentration when “your” body constantly moved around on its own, however. Looking here, touching there, talking to people, hearing, smelling, while you were trying to think. I was regularly interrupted.
“But if it were possible, we could have our own water source in the backyard,” I heard Phiona say with half a mind.
Flexible water sources would indeed be a revolution to this world, that didn’t seem to have running water of any kind. All she was considering at the moment was having a cube that gave water in her backyard, but there was so much more you could potentially do.
‘Or the kitchen. And the toilet,’ I added before tuning them out again.
Night 2
Tomorrow we would apparently go to the Job Agency. That would take some time, so I decided to sneak out to the water source in the middle of the night to do some more research.
They had a curfew here, but as long as you avoided the few patrols, it wasn’t too difficult to move around. And by the second night I had a decent amount of control over Tomar’s body.
I arrived at the water source and looked it over. There was nothing on it but the script, above that hole the water came out of. I took a blue stone that I had “borrowed” from a bowl in the kitchen, placed it on the cube, and took a close look at the hole. Based on the script, that hole wasn’t exactly defined as the output for the water. I guessed it had just been placed there to let the people know where the water would come from, and my suspicion was confirmed when I noticed that the water appeared out of nothing in the middle of the hole. It didn’t really come out of the cube. This is basically magic... I thought. Omega was a fitting choice for this application.
I walked around the cube and looked at every part of it. I kicked it, licked it, hid from a guard, and walked around some more. It looked like some kind of black quartz. And it tasted like quartz too. Assuming it was, I was missing something else.
Using a knife I had brought I scratched away part of a sigil without damaging its form too much. I tested the water source to make sure it was still operational and then examined the paint I had scraped off the cube, but it looked and smelled ordinary to me. That’s not it either then? I didn’t know what I was missing, but I turned around and walked back to Tomar’s home for the moment, deep in thought.
Day 3
Tomar wanted to talk to me about our situation that morning, but I cut him off, saying I was working on it. I was sure Omega would be the key to solving this whole thing. They used “magic” to get water, and they used what sounded like a magical ritual to receive Callings. Or rather, based on the description and what happened to me, the ritual probably merged other people’s memories and abilities into the citizen’s bodies and minds. Tomar’s ritual had simply gone wrong somehow and I entered his mind without any merging.
I would study Omega and figure out how it and the rituals worked. And then I would hopefully be able to reverse the process. Though I would make sure that Tomar and his mother would be safe somehow. For now he needed me as his Calling, to get and hold a job. I was sure we’d find a way around that though. I was starting to warm up to them, and Tomar’s reaction to hearing that I would be one hundred and twenty in his world was hilarious.
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Night 3
The next night I was standing in front of the water source once again. What’s so special about you? I thought. I hopped on top of the cube and sat at its edge, letting my feet dangle in the air. Then I leaned back and laid down on top of the water source. As I was looking at the stars in the sky, suddenly, there was some kind of pulse from inside the cube. Initially, I thought I had imagined it, but after a while there was another. I put my ear to the cube and kept listening. One beat every two minutes. Is this thing alive?
Day 4
Tomar was slowly starting to understand Omega. Since I hadn’t been “merged” properly, I figured my knowledge might now be seeping into him over time. I also decided to reveal the cube’s presumed heart. It was more fun to theorize together, and maybe he would have ideas I couldn’t think of, being an inhabitant of this world.
The one thing I really wanted to test, trees, was sadly out of reach. But while we were at the market, I saw a stand with vegetables and had Tomar buy a tomato. It might not have been the whole plant, but I had heard somewhere that they stay alive for a while after getting picked.
“You paid how much for a tomato!?!?”
Unfortunately, the tomato test was unsuccessful, and all we got from it was a lecture about money and prices of common goods. Sorry, mom— er, Phiona...
Night 4
I wanted to at least see a tree. If they weren’t what I was expecting, maybe it would be pointless to even try to get to them. This world was similar enough to my own, but who knows.
Making my way from Tomar’s home down to the south wall, I had to avoid more guards than I usually had to, when going to the water source at night. They were more active the closer you got to the wall.
Eventually I managed to get there, but I didn’t find a way to get up onto it that wasn’t guarded. Suddenly there was a noise that startled me, and I noticed a guard on top of the wall looking in my direction and then running towards a tower. I assumed he had seen me, so I ran back home as fast as I could. I heard the guards move around outside after I was back in bed, but it seemed like we were in the clear.
Day 5
A little girl by the name of Riala was accompanying us on our way to the water source. Apparently Tomar was helping her and her sister from time to time. I wasn’t much of a fan of children, but she was kind of sweet. What perplexed me was when Tomar suddenly told her about our experiments. That’s not knowledge you should share so freely, I thought.
It appeared that this had been a slipup on this part somehow. Given his more careful nature, that had been unexpected. However, if I had to say, I wouldn’t exactly call myself careful. A little secretive, maybe, but when it came to programming, I would quickly jump into any discussion about it. This new side of Tomar could very well have been another side-effect of the ongoing merge. With his confusion stemming from the opposing instincts he was fighting against. He apparently knows this girl well, he trusts her reasonably enough, why not share? It was certainly something I might’ve done.
Before he fell asleep that night, Tomar mumbled that he had some idea. Since I didn’t have any other concrete plans for the moment, I waited for him to wake up again.
Day 6
For the first time, we used Omega successfully. All we got were a few drops of water, but it was all the confirmation I needed. Our theory was sound. Tomar had brought us to this garden and its weird, large plants all on his own. It had been a good idea to include him in my process.
Unfortunately, his newfound enthusiasm was nowhere to be seen when I suggested modifying the water source for further tests, now that we knew that the script was working and doing what we thought.
‘I’m certain it will be fine!’
“No.”
He wouldn’t budge. We talked about trees again, and there was a remote chance that we might be able to see some during our job, but it was just that. A remote chance. I wanted certainty, and I wanted it now.
Surprisingly, Phiona had a solution for us. She suggested that we use a different water source, one with much less importance placed on it. Even more surprisingly, Tomar agreed. We were back to theoryzing, and for the second night in a row, I didn’t go out at night. Instead, I was waiting patiently for the morning to come.
Day 7
Phiona was dead, lying in Tomar’s arms. He wasn’t crying, he wasn’t moving, he was just sitting there, holding her.
When the beast had killed Phiona, Tomar was on the verge of blindly running towards her, but somehow I managed to get his attention. On my instruction, he jumped to the side, in the direction of the water source, just as the beast was launching at him as well. In those precious few seconds, where the beast was confused and looking around, I gave Tomar new parameters for the script, which he quickly put in place. Just as the beast turned around to attack us again, an incredibly fast and thin stream of water shot out of the cube and into the beast. It was still moving, but it was in pain and appeared unable to stand up.
It was a lucky shot. The beast had been just in the right spot, we had just the right script queued up, and there were minimal modifications to make. A second less, or a stroke more, and we would’ve died as well.
Since the beast had ceased its attack, Tomar finally crawled over to his mother and took her into his arms. Minutes later, the guards arrived and dealt the finishing blow to the beast. Tomar was entirely unresponsive to any attempt at communication. Both from the guards and from me.
He had me really concerned when, hours later, he got up to get the suit he had ordered, which he would’ve needed two days later, on his first day at work... but it didn’t come to that.
Day 14
After Zara and Riala had brought Tomar back home with them, they took care of him for almost a week, until one morning he finally reacted again. It was as if he had been asleep the entire time. In fact, he had been so out of it, that I was controlling his body at times. Finally being able to talk to him again came as a relief. He was still mourning, but in time he would get better. And then we would also be able to resume our experiments.
Day 16
Tomar revealed that he had no intention of doing any tests or experiments anymore. He was deeply scarred, I knew that, but I still snapped at him. My own situation hadn’t changed. Not only was I stuck in his mind, I believed Omega to be the solution to that problem. Not to mention that our experiments were also the only thing I had here. Was this supposed to be my future? Helping a boy do his homework? That doesn’t work for me. Sorry, Tomar.