Incubus Inc. 3

by Randi Darren

  Staring into the Void, Sam couldn’t argue her point.

  “Indeed. Well, time to begin,” he said, then levered himself up off the ground. There was no reason to dilly dally any longer. He’d like to get the whole thing over with, if he could manage it.

  “You’ll be able to come back out, right? When I sent you there before, it was entirely based off of what I’ve heard,” Erv said, following him toward the portal. “I’ve never actually been in the Void myself.”

  “Honestly, neither had I until you sent me there,” Sam said with a chuckle. “It was exactly what you would expect, I suppose. Utter weightlessness. Inability to breathe. Extremely cold.

  “Without an open portal and an Essence draw, I imagine it would be a very quick death to anyone who tried it. Which means there is only a small set of people who would have a shot at surviving.

  “Certainly not mortals of any sort, with no Essence to pull on. Actually, anyone without Essence to pull on at all. If you don’t have a steady stream of it, I could easily see how one would perish in the Void.”

  “Is that how Luke did it, then?” Erv asked, peering into the portal. “He had so much Essence that he could do as he wished inside.”

  “Would make sense. Especially, if he really were a special type of Demon,” agreed Sam. “All that death, destruction, and doom, likely fed him quite a bit.

  “Ah… well… time to go in. Here I go. I’ll leave a tether with you just in case. I didn’t figure you’d mind holding my leash?” Sam said with a grin, holding out a loop of Essence to Erv.

  Clicking her tongue, Erv took the Essence in hand and looked at him seriously.

  “You and I both know I’m already quite firmly in your grasp and that my own leash is nice and tight around my neck,” Erv capitulated. “Willingly so, as well.”

  “Mm. Maybe I want the lovely Water Elemental to hold my leash a bit? It’s nice to have those who just love me like Irma and Jes,” said Sam, then he stepped through the portal and straight into the Void.

  Once more, Sam instantly felt the chilling cold of the Void slide over his skin. That infinite coldness that left no room for life or warmth at all. Not so much as a flicker of heat or light existed here.

  The only things Sam could feel or see all came from the portal through which he’d come.

  Looking round, Sam realized this was somewhat futile. Without any light to see by, or reflect off of, he wouldn’t see much of the Void regardless.

  “Sam? Are you okay?” Erv asked, causing Sam to look back that way.

  He could see her perfectly on the other side. The fact that he could hear her did at least reveal that whatever was in the Void could conduct sound.

  And if there’s no sound in the Void, anything I put out would be echoed back if it hit something.

  I could use Essence in much the same way, could I not?

  In fact, I bet that’s exactly what Luke probably did with all that Essence he had at his command.

  Nodding his head at Erv with a smile, he held up his hand in the universal “one second” gesture, with one finger held upward.

  He wasn’t sure he could speak in whatever gas filled in the Void, but he wouldn’t bet on it. If he needed to speak, he was going to save the air he had in his lungs for that.

  Erv nodded her head in acknowledgement of his gesture, and smiled back at him.

  Closing his eyes, Sam did his best to not pay attention to the absolute freezing cold that was seeping into him. To block everything out.

  With a sudden push on his Essence, Sam sent out an expanding spell of Essence in the shape of a sphere. Traveling outward and constantly expanding until it struck something or ran out of Essence. A “sonar pulse” very similar to a submarine, Sam imagined.

  Floating there in the Void, Sam suddenly wanted to be a lot closer to the portal. The cold was actually starting to bother him. His teeth were even starting to chatter.

  Listening, waiting, he felt the sphere continue to move outward. Drawing more Essence from his tanks with every second. Yet it found nothing.

  There was nothing to be found.

  I’ll need to cut it off. This isn’t working.

  Cutting the spell free from his Essence, Sam let it finish itself off. It would run out of Essence all on its own.

  Okay, that didn’t work. What’s next? Light? Actual sound? What’s more likely—

  The sphere hit something and disintegrated to nothing.

  But not before giving Sam a direction to move towards.

  Sam opened his eyes and found Erv watching him.

  “Moving, hold the leash,” Sam said with the only lungful of air he had.

  Taking in a breath of whatever it was around him, he felt his lungs start to burn painfully. Opening his mouth, he tried to talk again, and found nothing came out.

  Can’t talk in the Void, right. Now… let’s go see what we found.

  Pushing out Essence behind himself like a jet nozzle, Sam began moving toward where his spell had made contact. Moving quickly, he flew through the Void, leaving behind the portal back to Hell.

  The portal was the only source of light and warmth in the Void, as far as he could tell.

  Faster than he expected, Sam collided with whatever it was the spell had come into contact with.

  Face first.

  Bouncing off it, Sam let out a lung-burning groan and reached up to touch his face. He couldn’t feel anything out of place, but there was no telling. He felt like he hadn’t been moving that fast, but he’d reached the location faster than he anticipated.

  Putting his hands against whatever it was, he began to feel around blindly. It felt incredibly smooth and without blemish. There wasn’t anything for him to get his fingers into.

  This is stupid.

  Holding his left hand up, Sam created light from nothing but Essence.

  The truth of what he’d found was revealed to him.

  It was a large, wooden double door. There was no handle on it, nor were there hinges.

  That wasn’t the oddest part about the discovery he’d made. The oddest part was that the door wasn’t attached to anything that Sam could sense.

  It didn’t sit in a wall. Nor was there anything behind it or on the sides that Sam could see, despite moving his hand around to shine light on it from every angle.

  Moving to the other side of the door, he checked it for anything else that could give him a clue of what this was. Except it looked identical to the other side. There was nothing to indicate which side was which.

  Floating in front of the door, Sam had no idea what to do.

  Luke got in, so how did he do it? How would he have tried?

  He was a warrior. A conqueror. He would have just… hit it? Smash it with Essence?

  With a frown on his face and ignoring the burn from breathing whatever the Void was made of, Sam struck out at the door with a solid spike of Essence.

  Nothing happened or changed. It was exactly as it had been.

  The door remained shut.

  Sam had no idea what to do, other than to sit there and try anything he could think of. To think about what Luke would do if he was presented with the same situation.

  Then something Luke said floated back up into Sam’s thoughts.

  What’d he say? That the door wouldn’t open regardless of you knocking at it?

  That’s… that’s what you do at a door, isn’t it? You knock.

  He was trying to give me a hint in the best way he could, is that it? He was prevented from really talking about it, but he could say something ambiguous in a different way to get around that.

  The only real way to make someone not talk about something in a round-about-way, is to make sure they can’t talk at all. And the Hub didn’t do that.

  That couldn’t be the answer to this door, though, could it? It’s almost too stupid to work.

  Then again… I can’t think of anything else.

  Lifting his hand, Sam knocked three times on the door.

&nb
sp; Nothing happened.

  That’s what I thought. It’d be like having one, two, three, four, five as the password to your matched luggage. Now—

  The doors slowly opened in front of Sam. Silently and without resistance, spreading wide and showing him the interior of what looked like an office building.

  Huh.

  Okay then.

  Moving forward, Sam stepped through the doors and into the space beyond.

  He felt the Essence leash behind him become detached the moment he crossed over. A second after that, the doors slammed shut behind him, closing him off from the Void entirely.

  As well as everyone else.

  Thirty-Three - Final Choice -

  Sam wasn’t able to help himself and suddenly started coughing.

  Whatever the Void was made of was expelled from his lungs and didn’t seem to linger, giving Sam the opportunity to suck down several breaths of the best tasting oxygen he’d ever had.

  That could have just been a comparative reality.

  It could have been diesel exhaust and it might have tasted better than the Void had.

  Putting his hands on top of his head, Sam continued to take deep breaths. Enjoying each and every one.

  Admittedly, he technically didn’t have to breathe, but after having done it for so long on the planes, he found it was harder to not breathe anymore. It was a lot like blinking.

  Something he couldn’t ever stop doing, once he’d trained himself to do it.

  Looking around the room he’d entered, Sam found it really did look like an office of sorts. Everything was laid out in neat, tidy sections. There were doors that led elsewhere and even several places to sit and relax.

  Additionally, there was a single computer desk, with a computer sitting on it, along with a monitor, keyboard, and mouse. A modern day office in nearly every regard.

  “Hello?” Sam tried, calling out to the open space.

  If anyone heard him, they didn’t respond.

  All he could hear was what sounded an awful lot like an air conditioner blowing through the vents, and the click and whir of a computer. Exactly what one would expect to hear in an office.

  Slowly, Sam walked over to the desk.

  Looking at it, he found the monitor was incredibly thin. To the point that it looked a bit like a piece of paper. Additionally, there were no cords attached to it that led down to the computer sitting under the desk.

  On top of that, there were no cords that ran from the computer to anywhere else. Everything looked correct, but it lacked the details to actually be correct.

  Sam reached over and moved the mouse with a flick of his fingers.

  The monitor turned on and he was presented with what appeared to be some type of desktop. It was similar to what he personally used at home, but it also wasn’t.

  A horse of a different color, but still a horse?

  Chewing at the inside of his lip, Sam shook his head. What he’d learned from Miles and Eugenia about the world certainly made more sense when you included the Hub. An advanced society that decided to make another society from the ground up.

  How did Abigail say it? One of Clarke’s laws is what she said, I think.

  Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic? I think that was it.

  With a shake of his head, Sam moved away from the computer to the couches and sitting area. Nothing there seemed out of the ordinary in any way. Everything was exactly what one would expect.

  Moving to one of the doors in the back, Sam opened it.

  Inside he saw an endless array of what looked like small computers stacked horizontally. Running off into the distance farther than Sam could actually see.

  Just inside the door was a mummified corpse. The remains of some sort of fabric clung to it. The cool, dry air of the office and the lack of bugs had done the trick.

  “Hm,” Sam said, nudging the rotted out boot that was around one foot. Only the sole remained and it was clearly cobbled, not mass produced. “Luke said he got out and the Log agreed. So… who are you? Are you Ryker, then?”

  Not wanting to go any farther into the room, and guessing that it wouldn’t do him any good, Sam closed the door. Moving back into the main room, Sam contemplated what to do.

  As far as he could tell, this was indeed the Hub.

  Except there was no indication of what to do to actually “save the world”, so to speak. Not to mention, he had to harden the way into the Hub in the future.

  I’ll have to go back, then open a portal from the Void to Hell, and then defend that spot in particular.

  Then build something that goes from Hell, into the Void, which would protect the doors as well.

  If Skipper got here, that’d be the end of everything, wouldn’t it?

  But… what now? How do I move forward here?

  Having no other answer available to him, Sam decided the straightforward route would work. It got him through the door, after all.

  Sitting down at the computer desk, Sam grabbed hold of the mouse. What he was looking at was indeed a desktop of some sort.

  Reaching forward, he grabbed the keyboard.

  Looking at it, Sam saw that there were more keys on it in some areas and less in others. It was obviously a keyboard made in an entirely different culture and society.

  For whatever reason, though, when he looked at the keys, he saw they were all labeled in Sam’s original language. Something spoken in Hell a great many years ago.

  The language his thoughts were in, despite him speaking modern day English to everyone else.

  Looking at the monitor, Sam read over what was there.

  There were a number of things that seemed a lot like desktop icons, but he wasn’t sure. They were also named in his language as well.

  Grabbing the mouse, Sam flicked the cursor over and opened the file that simply read, “Hub”.

  It seemed like an obvious place to start.

  “Well, hello there!” said a voice through the monitor, as if it had speakers as well as being a display. “So, you found the Hub. Chances are you’re one of three people.

  “If you’re Luke, Lucifer, or Lou, go ahead and click the icon that just popped up on your screen on the right.”

  True to the spoken words, an icon appeared on the far right of the desktop.

  “We’ll just… uh… wait a second to give you some time to click that and—” There was a pause from the voice. Several seconds passed before it resumed. “Uh, that’s enough. Whatever.

  “Now, if you’re not one of those three, then you’re probably Wally, Warner, or Bob. Which means that you, you bad boy, didn’t manage to convert Retribution and you became Vengeance.

  “We’re going to have words, young man. Many words. So many words that I can’t even begin to explain it. You had so many chances and you still threw it all away! Anyway. Here’s your icon.”

  Sam raised his eyebrows at that.

  Retribution? What?

  That… no. He couldn’t be talking about the same person, could he?

  No. No way.

  “Alright. That should be enough time. Now if you’re not any of those six people, that means it’s you, Sameerixis,” said the voice in a slow, tired tone.

  That got Sam’s attention, causing him to sit bolt upright in his chair.

  “You, Sameerixis Fidenis Xilin Fisch Elh Caerwin Aderin Telis, are here to prevent the one you call Skipper from destroying the world,” continued the voice. In using Sam’s true name, he had invoked a pull so strong that Sam felt like his heart was going to stop beating. “Except that’s not the truth. It’s… not real.

  “At least, not in the way you’re thinking about it. Now… just to confirm it’s you, Sammy, go ahead and click that icon that just popped up.”

  A third icon had appeared on the desktop. It was labeled as “Sam” and nothing else.

  Breathing hard, feeling like his skin was on fire, Sam moved the pointer there and quickly double-clicked it. Things were moving fa
r too fast for him right now.

  Nothing immediately happened, but Sam did hear what sounded like the computer’s fans growing louder.

  “Alright. So you made it here after all, Sammy,” said the same voice who’d just been talking a moment ago. “That means eeeeeverything is falling apart. Ha. Literally.

  “The planes have been ruptured, millions upon millions of souls were just lost, the scales aren’t balanced, the Judge no longer sits upon her throne, Runner and myself are gone, Miles has become no better than Seville, and you’re here to fix it all.

  “Well, congratulations. You can do just that. You have the power to fix all of that, minus the Runner and me part, and with almost no effort.

  “It’ll only take a single double-click on your part after you state your instructions on what you want the Hub to do. It’s really quite easy.”

  “Yes, that’s exactly it,” Sam said. He knew it was a recording, but it was hard not to respond.

  “I know, right?” snorted the voice. “But here’s the problem… that’s… exactly it. As you said.

  “This… all that’s happened, even you destroying the planes, this is quite literally the best result I could have hoped for. I can explain myself completely, or I can give you the shortened version.

  “If you want the shortened version, just go ahead and tap the right arrow key. Otherwise, I’ll give you the rundown of what’s happening right now.”

  Glancing down at the keyboard, Sam considered tapping the arrow key. He didn’t feel very patient at the moment. He felt like the entirety of the universe was balanced on a knife’s edge.

  “I know. Believe me, I do,” continued the voice. “I’m sure you feel as if everything is quite literally crumbling down around you. It’s good you feel that way, because it’s true.

  “The very nature of your universe is becoming unraveled. The whole of it is failing. It’s got perhaps another hundred years before it completely implodes on itself. Your personal plane included.

  “Now here’s the part where I ask you to do nothing. To let everything that’s happening continue. Because you’ve got it backwards. Skipper wants to reset the world back to a healthy, stable base.”