Chapter Three
Skip
----------------------------------------
The cool air was refreshing and Adam was starting to regain his faculties. After a few deep breaths, he searched his chest pocket and pulled out his Arkfield Pro, casting clear light into the shed. After the brief moment his eyes took to adjust to the pitch black shed, Adam’s blood went cold at what he saw. Simon was standing in front of, to the best of his knowledge, a portal. An honest to God portal, complete with a liquid looking glass moving in the limited light.
Simon held out his hand and something glimmered around his hand. In an instant, a staff materialized out of thin air. It looked like a simple walking stick that was adorned with a cool blue gem attached at its gnarled top. With a light tap against the ground, a small plume of light floated off into the air. Simon turned around as the light slowly increased visibility around them. Adam had seen enough to come to a conclusion, “So,” he whispered. Simon was patient and waited for Adam to complete his thought process. Adam gestured for the staff and Simon handed it to him.
Adam looked over the staff, examining it for any type of mechanical or electrical workings. There were no buttons, wires or switches to activate the next generation light. He tried tapping it on the ground just as he saw Simon doing it to try and get something to happen. When nothing happened, Adam took a step towards the portal and raised the staff at it. “Please don’t poke dimensional portals with sticks.” Simon said as he placed his hand in the path of Adams prod. “So this is real?” Adam asked in amazement. Simon nodded and took the large but slender stick away from him.
Striking the staff a second time on the ground emitted another cloud of light that joined the first, fully lighting up their surroundings. Adam caught Simon murmuring something before he hit the ground. He decided to take stock. It was just as it appeared from the outside, roughly a twelve by twelve metal shed adorned with nothing but a portal arch that was placed dead center of the room. He took a few steps forward, examining the arch closer. It looked like it was made of simple stacked stones with a keystone at the top. The markings of the keystone were unfamiliar to Adam.
By the time Adam regained from his previous exhaustion he had made up his mind. “So I am a curious fella by nature. My only real concerns here are if this thing is one way and am I going to die a horrible and painful death on the other side of this portal.” Simon looked at Adam in confusion, “Those are your concerns?” Adam nodded and Simon continued, “In my experience, when something defies all nature and science people have their reservations. Mostly disbelief and denial. Why are you accepting this at first glance?”
Adam kept his eyes on the waves that made up the center of the portal and shrugged, “Well, several things. One, the debilitating force surrounding this place is supernatural and obviously a defense mechanism. Second, it looks like a portal. Third, I’ve played enough games and seen enough sci-fi movies to only have two reservations about dimensional displacement. Am I going to die and is this a one way portal? So,” Adam turned to Simon, realizing he was now dressed like a wizard. He tilted his head, “Uh… So before we get into your new digs, can you answer my questions?”
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Simon whispered something else under his breath and struck the ground for a third time. This didn’t produce the same plume of light as the first two. This one produced a large wooden chest that had some metal banding around it. “No and no,” Simon said as he opened it up. Adam was able to keep himself from asking more questions, hopeful they would be answered in due time.
Simon produced three things out of the magically conjured chest. “If you are going through I strongly recommend putting these on. I usually wait to see if the people going through here are going to stick around. You seem like the real McCoy. The first thing is this slotted suite. Strip down and put this on. Then I’ll give you the other two things.” Adam grabbed the weird looking Avengers time traveling suite with small slots that looked like orbs would go into them. He looked from the suite to Simon and around the shed, “Pro tip, you have to say ‘no homo’ if you want a guy to strip in the same room as you. It's just the nice thing to do. Otherwise you made a brother feel like you want to buttle scuttle him.”
Adam waited patiently, standing there with the suit in his hand staring at Simon. After a few long moments Simon sighed, “No homo, can you strip down and put on the suit?” Adam smiled and gave his wizard looking customer a thumbs up and walked around to the other side of the portal. He got changed and made his way back around. “This is pretty dope. And it’s surprisingly comfy. Also, go figure. The first customer to ever tell me to get naked is a big black dude. My wife is going to laugh her head off at this.” He pondered for a moment, “You know I have a feeling this is going to be a rollercoaster of a conversation with her. Anyways, what's next?”
Simon handed over what looked like a wrist computer and a monocle computer that clipped to the ear. “I feel like these are lawsuits waiting to happen,” Adam said as he put them on. “You should know that most of the stuff you see in games and anime are based off of this gear. This gear was designed to amplify your natural abilities, give you a heads up display, interact with it and it allows for non ritual Zenith absorption.” Adam tightened down the strap on the wrist computer and had a beaming smile, “This is so cool. Can this thing tell me what your power level is?” Adam tried to find a button on the side of the monocle with no success.
“Technically yes,” Simon said. “One thing at a time though. There is still so much to explain.” “Skip,” Adam interrupted and laughed at Simon’s expression of confusion. “Skip? What do you mean?” Adam placed a hand on Simon’s shoulder, “There is plenty of time for the tutorial later. I am in the middle of the woods during work and about to venture off to an unknown dimension. All the while my wife will be wondering if I’m still alive if I’m not back before midnight. Let’s just skip the boring stuff and get to it.”
Simon took a step back and started moving his staff rapidly and pointing towards Adam’s feet, “As you wish.” Adam looked down and a golden scrawl appeared under him on the ground. It turned into a circle with a pattern, all of the markings were not known to Adam. Simon finished and turned the blue crystal towards the center of the circle and jutted out the staff. A dim blue flame shot out and struck the circle and enveloped Adam in light. It drowned out all sound and he was completely wrecked with pain. After a few seconds the light that encased Adam was gone, along with the fancy circle on the ground.
Adam was crumpled up on the ground, naked as the day was long. “I reckon I skipped a little too much.” Adam said and Simon tossed over a pair of loose pants and a tunic shirt out of his chest over to Adam. He groaned when the new clothes hit him and he rolled over. “Oh,” Simon said with a smile, “I’m sorry. No homo. Put those on.”
Through the pain, Adam laughed. He had to wipe away the involuntary tears to see which end was the front of the clothes. “I think we are going to get along just fine.” He rolled over and placed the simple pants and tunic on as instructed. “I feel like a generic villager. What is the deal with these? And how on earth did I end up naked? Where is the other stuff I was wearing?” Adam asked as he got to his feet. “Skip.” Was the last thing Adam heard before Simon spun the staff around and blasted him with force straight off of his feet and right through the portal.