The Forever Gate Ultimate Edition

by Isaac Hooke

  Ari bit her lip. "We'll always have the Inside. We can live anywhere we want, in there."

  Tanner looked at her and smiled. "I suppose we can." He returned his attention to the window and the space beyond, and his features darkened. "I worry that they'll come back someday."

  "Who?" Ari said. "The attackers?"

  "Yes."

  "I hope not," Ari told him. "But if they do, we won't have Hoodwink to protect us."

  "No." Tanner rested a hand on her lower back. "But I'll protect you."

  "No one can protect us," Ari said.

  Tanner smiled. "I can." He gave her a quick kiss on the lips.

  Much as she enjoyed the kiss, she extricated herself from him, feeling slightly embarrassed. She was never a big fan of public displays of affection, especially not in front of the Children. Fortunately no one paid them any heed, or at least pretended not to, absorbed as they were in the private worlds of their augmented reality displays.

  A few moments later a chime erupted from the door speaker.

  Stanson glanced at her. "The retrieval team is here. They have him. He survived."

  "Let him in," Ari said.

  The doors opened and the two members of retrieval led in a wide-eyed individual wrapped in a towel.

  As Ari had guessed, he was young, no more than nineteen or twenty. His features were gaunt, with a thin, straggly beard that reached to his Adam's apple. The unkempt hair on his head touched his shoulders, and his fingernails were only an inch long. His hair and nails should have been longer for his age, of course, but the umbilicals in the pods released a chemical amalgamate that stunted the growth of both.

  Underneath the towel she could see the outline of a full body exoskeleton—it allowed him to walk on his weakened legs and lift his atrophied hands. Ari had worn a similar exoskeleton when she first emerged, though hers had only been lower body. The Children had found that the reborn gained muscle tone faster when a full-body suit was employed, with the strength-enhancements subtly dialed back each hour of movement.

  The reborn youth started when he saw Ari and Tanner, and he took a step back.

  The retrieval team members grabbed his arms on either side and held him in place.

  "The gols!" the youth said, struggling against his captors. They had obviously set the strength of his suit relatively low, because he couldn't break free.

  "So you remember us," Ari said. "Good. Though we look like gols, we're fully human, trust me. You'll notice we don't have numbers on our chests anymore. And we're a bit skinnier than before."

  The youth's eyes darted to her chest but quickly returned to her face.

  "What do you want? What have you done to me?"

  Ari smiled. "We want to give you your life back. And we've set you free."

  His expression crumpled in confusion.

  "What's your name?" Ari said.

  He didn't answer.

  "I'm Ari," she said. "And this is Tanner."

  Tanner inclined his head.

  Still the youth didn't respond.

  "If you won't give us a name, I'll invent one for you. What should we call him, Tanner? Pretzel, maybe?"

  He regarded them uncertainly, and then said, quietly: "I'm Zachariah."

  "What's that?" Ari said.

  "I'm Zachariah." Louder. "Or Zak, for short."

  "Zak," Ari said. "It's a good name. You'll learn the answers to all your questions in the coming days. Someone will be assigned to help you through the relearning process. For the moment, all you need to understand is that the world you were living in was a simulation. It wasn't real."

  "But this..." Zak looked around. "This can't be the real world? What is this place?"

  "As I said, everything will be revealed to you in good time."

  His captors had released him, and Zak used the opportunity to break away from them and dash to the window. "What is that?"

  The retrieval personnel caught up with him but Ari waved them back. She joined him by the window, taking care not to get too close.

  "Are we in a spaceship of some kind?" Zak asked. "Like in the stories?"

  "We are," Ari said. "We crashed, many years ago. We're stranded on a moon called Ganymede. That's Jupiter, up there. A planet far away from Earth."

  He gazed at the Jovian ball. "It's beautiful." He abruptly looked at her. "What happened to my sister?"

  "The woman with you?" Ari said.

  He nodded quickly.

  "We didn't know she was your sister," Ari said slowly, feeling a pang of regret. "We left her in the simulation. She's unharmed."

  "I want to see her," Zak said.

  Ari frowned. "It's best if you never again contact those you once knew on the Inside. Especially during the relearning period. It makes letting go easier."

  "But—"

  Ari lifted a hand. "Listen to me. I have to ask you something. And it's important. Where did you get the Lightning Rings?"

  As she spoke, she kept an eye on the Children who were present to see if anyone reacted, but they all seemed oblivious, consumed by whatever it was they were doing in their aReals. That didn't necessarily mean it wasn't one of them, especially considering that half of them were unconscious and operating on the Inside.

  "A hooded man gave them to me," Zak said.

  "Did you see his face?" Ari pressed. "Did he give a name?"

  "No face. No name. He told me only that he was fighting for a free Inside. He gave me the patterns of the town watch, which helped me avoid the guard patrols these past couple of months."

  Ari glanced at Tanner. "Have Stanson get in touch with Briar. Find out if any of the rings are missing from the stores in the Black Den." Briar was the current leader of the Black Den, which sheltered the Users. He was also Ari's Uncle, at least in the world of the Inside.

  She returned her attention to Zak. Ordinarily she would have let the rebirth officer take over at that point, but she decided she wanted to introduce the youth to his relearning specialist herself. She had the perfect choice in mind. "Zak, come with me. There's someone I would like you to meet."

  3

  The man who called himself Amoch scaled the rock outcropping. The staff he held neither abetted nor hindered the ascent. In moments he reached the top and stood before the murmuring crowd that had gathered on the outskirts of Dhenn, the underground cave city. He wore a black robe, with the hood lowered so that his face was concealed in shadow. Electrical energy pulsed occasionally along his bare hands, close to the skin.

  He ran his gaze across the gathering. Torches lined the stone walls, illuminating farmers, merchants, tradesmen. The middle class, with a healthy serving of the poor. There were even a few rich men near the back, watching from their painted carriages. Amoch smirked when he saw them. They only thought they were rich.

  He lifted the gnarled bone staff, striking the bronze ferrule at the bottom against the stone three times.

  The crowd grew silent.

  Amoch reached for the vitra that lay inside the amulet he wore at his throat.

  "People of Dhenn!" Amoch said, his words magnified by the jewelry so that his voice boomed. "I am Amoch. And I have come here to set you free. I was once like you, a man who scraped a meager living by trading goods between cities. I had a wife and two sons. Though I didn't have much, I was happy. My family could eat.

  "It unraveled, all of it, when I was accused of a crime I did not commit, and sentenced to hard labor in the rock pits of the city of Crag. Every day I worked in those foul pits, my body covered in white dust from the rock, blood oozing from my mouth and nose from the irritation the abrasive powder caused my inner cavities. I worked sixteen hour shifts. My body shriveled from the malnutrition. My lungs deteriorated from the dust. I coughed blood often.

  "One day my body couldn't take it anymore and I collapsed. As I lay there, dying, something happened to the world around me. Time seemed to alter. The workers with me began moving in slow motion. The taskmaster's voice warped, becoming deep, prolonged. He flicke
d his whip at me but I caught it easily. I went to him, drew the sword from his scabbard, and I plunged it through his heart. I cut the shackles from my feet and freed the other workers.

  "But time continued to slow around me, so that when I returned home to my wife, the entire world had stopped. I sat down at the table and waited for time to return. It did not. I spent six months living like that in isolation, waiting for the rest of the world to catch up. But no one ever moved. It was unbearable, watching my wife and kids frozen like that, and being unable to say a word to them, or interact with them in any way or with anyone else in the world. You can't imagine what it was like.

  "I decided to starve myself to death. I drank no water, ate no food. My body grew weaker and weaker, but I didn't die. Finally, two months later, as madness sank in, I attempted to scale the Forever Gate that sealed our city. I made it only a short distance before I plunged to my death.

  "Or at least, I thought it was my death. But in fact it turned out to be my salvation. I did die, don't get me wrong. But when I next opened my eyes, I resided in a different world."

  "You have seen the afterlife?" someone shouted.

  Amoch nodded. "I have. And it is... well, nothing like I expected. Nothing any of you will expect. You see, I realized the truth. A hard truth. None of this is real. Your oppressors are illusory, as is all of this. And I will prove it to you."

  Amoch extended his arms and from his hands forks of lightning streamed forth, slamming into the ceiling of the cavern.

  The crowd screamed in horror.

  Amoch smiled in exhilaration.

  Yes. Feel my power, ants!

  "He's a User!" someone said. "Uncollared!"

  Several people near the front started a rampage as they struggled to retreat.

  "Halt!" Amoch commanded.

  All of those who fled froze in mid-step, some in ludicrous poses. Though they may have wanted to move, they could not.

  Amoch ceased the lightning display. "I am not a User. Can a User freeze an entire crowd of people? I think not."

  Small rocks pelted the immobile throng from the ceiling. A large boulder broke away and fell toward the group. No one screamed: they couldn't. However some of those near the back of the crowd who hadn't been frozen gasped.

  Amoch reached for the vitra inside his staff and swiped his arm sideways. The heavy boulder swerved to the side, following the motion of the bone staff, and smashed into the wall beside the throng, where it crumbled harmlessly to the ground.

  "Can a User move a boulder weighing several tons with the wave of a hand? I am no User." Amoch took a step forward. "None of you need to live this way. Do not allow yourselves to die naturally. Take death into your own hands. Come to the other side. I promise when you return, you will have the powers of a gol! Join these others who have chosen to die today."

  He released his hold on the crowd. Some people still fled, though the retreat was more measured. Most stayed, held by curiosity.

  Amoch gestured to the right. Seven white-robed men and women scaled the outcropping to stand at his side. They knelt, opened the upper halves of their robes, and planted swords hilt-first into the rock. They pressed the blades into their diaphragms.

  "There is no one else who wishes to join them in death?"

  Amoch waited, but no one stepped forward.

  "I will," an old man shouted gruffly. "Got nothing to live for, anyway."

  He struggled to make his way up the rock.

  Amoch beckoned towards his assistants, two muscular men who wore only loincloths. The pair helped the man ascend.

  When the man was at his side, Amoch asked him: "What is your name, old man?"

  "I am Sammuel."

  "Sammuel," Amoch said. "When you return, you will be a king at my side." Amoch beckoned toward the rock beside him. "Kneel."

  Sammuel obeyed.

  One of the assistants handed the old man a sword. He positioned it hilt first in the ground like the others.

  There was a disturbance among the crowd. Several town guards were making their way to the front. Amoch had thought he'd disabled them all. He must have missed a few, then.

  "Stop this!" one of the gol guards said as it reached the front. "By the order of the mayor of Dhenn, you are hereby under arrest for disturbing the peace."

  "I think not." Amoch tilted his staff. The guards immediately froze in place. Amoch turned toward the kneeling individuals. "When you hear the ringing of the ferrule thrice upon the rock, fall on your swords." Amoch addressed the crowd: "Watch now, and learn the true meaning of courage."

  Amoch lifted his staff and thrust it down into the rock. He repeated the action. On the third strike, the eight men and women impaled themselves on their swords. The old man went last, but he, too, reluctantly followed through.

  "Finish them," Amoch told one of his assistants.

  The muscular man moved between the bodies that still writhed and chopped off the heads.

  "The guards, too, please," Amoch told his men.

  The assistants moved between the immobilized gols and chopped off their heads.

  "You are all cowards," Amoch addressed the crowd. "All of you. These men and women are adventurers in the true sense of the word. And they will reap the benefits of their courage." He paused, staring at the frightened faces nearest him in the throng. "Nonetheless, I have a gift for all of you as well. For those who want it, anyway. Think of it as a reward for staying, and hearing me out.

  "For you see, I am gathering men and women to my side. Men and women who want to fight with me. I am uncollaring worthy individuals across the world. We will live free in this land, and make our own rules, form our own kingdom. There will be no gols to order us around." He raised his arms and shouted. "It is time to break free of your trammels! The gols bitched you when you were fifteen years old. Fifteen years old! Why? Because they knew that the power of lightning flowing through your veins could easily overthrow them! I say to you, from this moment forth, you will be no one's bitch." Except mine.

  He pointed out an individual near the front. "You! Come to the stage."

  The frightened man looked from side to side, and then pointed at himself.

  "Yes you!"

  The man made his way up the outcropping. He stumbled halfway and the assistants helped him.

  When he was at the top, Amoch told him. "And what is your name?"

  The man was dressed in dirty coveralls. He had grime underneath his fingernails. "I'm Hadrian. I'm a potato farmer."

  "Hadrian, the potato farmer, today you are a lightning wielder." Amoch produced a heavy gold key. "Turn around."

  Hadrian reluctantly complied.

  Amoch fit the key neatly into the hole at the back of Hadrian's collar and twisted it. The bronze bitch clicked open and Amoch let it fall to the rock with a heavy clank.

  Hadrian reached up and felt the skin of his bare neck. His eyes widened. He glanced at his fingers and held them to his face.

  "That's right," Amoch said. "Go ahead and try it."

  Hadrian looked out at the crowd, then he raised one hand and unleashed a bolt of lightning over their heads. Hadrian grinned widely, and seemed about ready to jump up and down for joy.

  "You are free," Amoch told him. "Let us fight together to set this world free."

  "I will follow you!" Hadrian said.

  "Good," Amoch said. He beckoned toward the wall behind him, where other followers waited to welcome Hadrian.

  His assistants moved through the crowd below. They handed out similar keys from the wicker baskets they carried.

  "Men are moving through your ranks now. I want you to accept these keys, use them to unlock your collars, and open the bitches of your friends and family members. All I ask in return is that you consider joining the ranks of the army I am building. We are going to free this world and start our own utopia."

  Individuals accepted the keys and began opening their collars. Most of them experimented with lightning immediately, sometimes injuring themselves
and those nearby. A few handed the keys to other people in the crowd and joined Amoch on the rock. Others departed, ostensibly to free their friends and families.

  And so it has begun, Amoch thought. The birth of an army. And a nation.

  Leon watched the scene unfold from the outskirts of the crowd: men and women received keys and then unlocked their collars. Several of the uncollared raced away, gleefully casting lightning about, destroying indiscriminately.

  That wasn't good. Not good at all.

  He was one of the eyes and ears of the Black Faction, a loose conglomeration of thieves and criminals who operated underground throughout the cities of the world. Sure, uncollaring everyone sounded like a good idea, at first. Freedom from the oppression of the gols and all that. But when one paused to think about the ramifications, the worldwide chaos and looting that would result...

  Leon shook his head. That whole uncollaring affair was going to be bad for business. Very bad. It wouldn't do for ordinary people to have these abilities. How were the citizens supposed to be scared and intimidated by the Black Faction if everyone had lightning?

  Yes, it wasn't good at all.

  He would have to return to the Black Den in Severest and report the news at once.

  After he got himself uncollared, of course.

  4

  Ari and Tanner arrived in the Control Room early the next morning. They had taken a sonic shower together in her quarters, and were holding hands up until the moment they arrived at the entry hatch.

  Ari took her place. "So what's the latest news on the Inside today," she asked Stanson, who was part of the first watch.

  "This might be a statistical anomaly," Stanson said. "But we're getting a rise in the number of people dying violently on the Inside and waking up prematurely."

  "How many over the past day?" she asked him.

  "Seventy-two."

  Ari shook her head. "There's no way we can accommodate them all. Send them back under."

  "Twenty-two of them already broke out of their pods," Stanson said. "Retrieval crews have been collecting them all night."