Page 74 of The Wind Dancer
Thin black tentacles burst out of the ceiling, their wet shiny surface glimmering as they rushed down. They wrapped around my arms, dug into my neck, and pierced me all the way to the spine.
It felt like someone was plucking my nerves like the strings of a guqin.
“Repeating analysis...”
The tentacles twitched, and then...
My blood turned green in my veins. It glowed and pulsed, burning my retinas from within.
“Error. Error. Error.”
The Sanctuary’s voice split into dozens of whispers, screams, and groans, as if the spirits of the dead were stuck in it.
The walls shook. Black liquid came out of the cracks, thick as tar.
“Anomaly. The leading element is missing.”
The tentacles tightened their grip and dug deeper.
I tried to scream but my voice wasn’t coming out.
Then, a whisper came from my mouth. It was someone else’s voice and it spoke in a language I didn’t know.
“The Tablets... Open the Tablets...”
The image in front of me exploded into a kaleidoscope of visions.
A bridge going nowhere hung over a void. Millions were crossing it, their faces blown away by the wind, their arms reaching up, but they would never rise higher than they were allowed. Below, in the void, something huge and greedy stirred, its disembodied mouths whispering prayers that should not be answered.
A skinless man standing in the middle of a withered garden. He watered the earth with his own blood. White trees grew from it, but the fruit they bore were scrolls with names that no one could read. The wind plucked them, and every time a name was carried away, a scream could be heard from over the horizon — someone’s last breath.
A tomb made of shimmering metal lay deep underground. The walls were breathing, covered with thousands of mosaics which were moving. They showed the past, the present, and the future, and each image led to a single resolution. To an altar, where a man leans over, embracing his own shadow, which consumes him from inside.
The visions exploded for the last time, showering me with yet more fragments of other people’s destinies. They stuck under my skin, trembling, whispering. I tried to breathe, but I couldn’t.
A voice spoke inside me.
“Hold on. I’M HERE!”
“Connecting to archives. Searching for matches...”
The Sanctuary was afraid.
I could feel it.
The walls trembled, and the lights went out, leaving only the crimson glow of the emergency symbols.
“A match has been found.”
The voice had changed. It became... alive?
“The genetic key has been found!”
There was silence. And then came a deafening sound. It wasn’t an alarm, but a scream. The Sanctuary screamed, as if it were being torn apart from the inside.
The symbols flared and then went out one by one, like dying stars.
The tentacles jerked back, hovering, as if terrified.
