Artifact (14 page)

“It looks like a pennant, or a chemical trail.” He said, “Or a cloud.”

“I was thinking it looked like two arms.” I pointed at what may have been the start of an ulna – and the shape seemed to be on both objects, right above where thumbs ought to be.

“So this place isn’t real.” He said, “I get that. But I don’t get why I don’t have a face.”

“Well, you said it yourself – everything in here is incomplete.” I shrugged. “So are you.”

“What are you missing?”

“My memory…”

He shook his head, “I’m just as lost as you are in that department. I don’t remember anything before the accident – and what I do remember is incoherent. So am I more incomplete than you? Why? Why have you been flitting through universes, and I’ve been stuck in here?”

“I wish I knew…”

“If we are the same person, assuming that what is happening has a point, then why the differences? If everything in here is incomplete, again I have to ask which parts you are missing.”

“First off, I’m not entirely sure we are the same person,” I said.

“Fair enough. But whose dream is this then – mine or yours?”

“What if it’s both of ours?”

The other me shook his head and rubbed the back of his neck.

“I’ve seen a separate vision of myself before–”

“While you were bleeding to death by the bed, I know you told me–”

“Yes. But that projection of me either couldn’t or wouldn’t acknowledge that I was there. You have
.
We’re talking
.
We’re putting together a puzzle with each other, for god’s sake.”

“What gave you the idea to head to the labs?”

“The week we spent in Arizona, remember?”

He thought about it and nodded.

“The only constants – the only real consistency within each dream is that there was an accident, we were there, Alice was there, and it involved some sort of artifact from Mars. I just thought that if I could do anything, I might as well try to put all the dreams into one place, and see what happens. I chose the lab for two reasons. One, because it was a place where I remember being able to figure things out and find answers. Two, because the artifact is there…”

“You’re using the people and places that you recognize as landmarks, and mapping your way back to the lab.”

“Exactly.”

“So it’s symbolic,” he said simply. “And so is the fact that I’m missing a face. It’s a metaphor or an allegory for something.”

“I don’t know. But it would make sense, wouldn’t it?”

He nodded.

“Whose dream we are in is irrelevant,” I continued. “What’s important is that we have realized
that none of this makes sense on real terms.” I waved around, taking in the endlessness of the cave. “Where on Earth could this have existed? How much sense does it make that you don’t have a face?”

He leaned forward, and hesitated.

“Go ahead.”

“Well,” he said. “If this is all a dreamlike hallucination or a coma, why must there be an artifact at all?”

I shrugged. “I think that what we do in this place is crucial to whether or not we wake up. I believe that every weirdass thing I’ve survived so far is strictly symbolic of our fight to stay alive somewhere in the real world.”

We sat in silence for some time, letting the possibility sink in deep and take root.

“You don’t think we woke up after the accident,” he said finally.

“Nope.”

“And you think that opening the artifact in this place will cause us to wake up in the real world.”

I nodded. We finished an additional ring toward the center of the puzzle and started picking through the dwindling pile of pieces again.

“There is one thing…” I said slowly.

He tilted his head toward me.

“The whole reason I’m here, in this
dream.”

“You were dropped down that shaft.”

“Yeah. And the people who dropped me said that this wasn’t
as much of a dream as I would think. They also said not to let the zombies touch me.”

“Well,” he said. “That sort of changes things. How much can you trust advice from something that may or may not be a hallucination?”

“Well,” I shrugged. “If each projection is a separate part of who we are, then why would we lie to ourselves?”

“Good point.”

“If I disappear in the next few minutes, remember,” I said. “If those zombie things get in here, don’t
let them touch you. You run, understand?”

He nodded.

“I think that if one of those things bites us, we’re dead. As in, real dead. As in, we’re never waking up. Understand?”

He nodded again.

We worked without talking for some time, and I became increasingly anxious that I hadn’t shifted realities yet. This was the longest I remained in one place for so long.

We filled in enough of the puzzle that we could clearly see I was right – there were two arms reaching toward each other. The part of the puzzle we completed ended at the wrists on either side.

“I know what this is,” he said softly.

So did I. There was enough of the puzzle filled in at that point that it didn’t matter if we finished it or not. It was pretty clear what the image was.

The other me rose from his chair and put his hands on his hips, mirroring exactly the posture I take when I’m thinking very seriously about something–

– Suddenly, there tolled somewhere the loudest and largest bell that I ever heard, and we both had to cover our ears. There was a loud clanging followed by the sound of massive plates of metal grinding together.

We looked across the graveyard of artifacts, and on the far side of the cave, what must have been at least twenty miles away, we saw one of the giant braziers dip onto one side. Molten oil the volume of a small lake poured over the sagging end of the brazier, in what looked like a waterfall of flame. It was breathtaking. Building–sized segments of chain on one side of the brazier finally broke and it majestically swung downward, spilling the entirety of its contents onto a mountain of antiques and buildings. A moment later, a gust of hot air blew us back a bit, and we could see things exploding as the lake of burning oil began to spread. The sound was horrendous.

“Are you familiar with the scientific precept of Occam’s Razor?”

“Of course,” I said quietly, unable to tear my gaze away from the spreading ocean of flame. “It’s bullshit most of the time, though. You know that right?”

He nodded and what may have been a smirk creased round where his mouth should have been. “There’s never a simple answer for anything, is there?”

“I – I don’t know…”

“This,” he said breathlessly as sweat started beading on his pate. “I have no idea what it means.”

The oil started to funnel through the pathways connecting piles and piles of antiques, monuments, buildings and vehicles – as it moved through the cracked landscape like lava, everything the molten river touched ignited and burst into flames. Plumes of black smoke began to fill the cave. The heat was beginning to rise rapidly.

“We have to find a way out of here,” I said, scanning the granite staircases for an opening in the cave wall. The smoke didn’t seem to go anywhere, and simply congealed at the dome’s apex, albeit miles above the building that looked like the Burj Khalifa .

“I agree.” He turned toward the mezzanine. “We have to climb, though.”

He was right. This was a cave. Rule of thumb when you’re trapped inside of a building is to hit the lowest point where the oxygen is, stay below the smoke and crawl your way out. This place changes the rules. All of the oxygen was going to get siphoned away from the lowest points first like a chimney, until the fire eventually consumed everything. If there was a way out, it was up. Our only hope was to find a way out before we choked to death on the toxic black clouds of smoke. A second later, the roaring fires took a huge gulp of air, and we were momentarily pulled toward the edge of the entresol.

Just as we turned to start climbing the stairs, another brazier broke free from its mooring and poured its lake of oil onto the acres of devices below. I quickly ran to the desk and started frantically scooping the jigsaw puzzle back into its box so that we could take it with us.

When I finished scraping the last bit, the world started to finally halo out. I was going. I ran back toward the other me and handed him the puzzle.

“What’s this for?” he asked.

“I don’t know – take it with you.”

“You’re not coming?”

“It’s happening again.”

He took the box and stood awkwardly, trying and failing to find something to say. Something passed between us that was quiet and beyond words. There was a sense that we were each permanently separating from an integral part of who we were.

“Find a way out,” I said finally. “And if you can get to the surface, remember what we talked about.”

We were shouting now, trying to make ourselves understood over the rising din of the fire quickly approaching our position. It was getting increasingly difficult to understand what he was saying without a face to sync with the words.

“Wait,” he yelled. “What does this
mean?” He asked, holding up the puzzle box.

“Occam’s Razor,” I shouted. “I think we’re supposed to shake hands!”

He shrugged and grasped my good hand. As the world started to rip apart, I began to see a pair of eyes coalesce onto his face – as well as a nose and a pair of lips. He reached up and touched his face, which was smiling.

“Occam’s Razor!” He shouted back. He let go of my hand and turned toward the next staircase – without another word, he tucked the puzzle under his arm and started sprinting.

“Thanks!” I yelled after him.

He turned once more and took a step back, reaching his hand out to me. I couldn’t hear what he was saying.

“For saving my life!” I yelled.

He stood for a few moments with his eyes locked onto mine, and then his hand slowly dropped to his side. He nodded one last farewell and turned again toward the stairway.

I walked back to the spreading river of fire. It was by far the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

The jigsaw puzzle was of a photo taken inside the Sistine Chapel, in Rome. It was a close up of the ceiling during the exact moment when God missed Adam’s hand.

The fires roared, and a third brazier broke free, pouring its judgment onto the ground. I sat down again, wanting to take in the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, and then–

5.

–The river of flame gave way to utter nothingness. I was blind. Pitch colored darkness consumed me. I floated in starless space without axis toward a horizon of uncertainty that I could neither see nor touch. I instinctively crouched, and my palms felt a smooth polished surface below my feet that extended indefinitely out of reach. I heard a faint pounding, and what I thought was a series of frustrated, hungry moans.

I reached away from my body into the inky, unending blackness, and I finally felt a wall. It was some sort of concrete masonry unit, coated with something that felt a bit waxy. My hands traced the outline of a sixteen by eight inch block of high density rock, and then what felt like mortar joints connecting several more – I realized it was a wall of painted cinder blocks.

I was in a basement somewhere – the pounding and the moans grew louder until a beam of light strafed what I could clearly see was an
L
shaped corridor that broke away fifty feet to the left.

“Are they inside?” Kate asked, pulling Sarah behind her. She quickly tracked her light in front of me. “What’s wrong?”

Now that my vestibular had something to work with, I stood and studied my surroundings. The power was still out, and there didn’t seem to be any floodlights down here. I realized that I was holding onto something metallic and cylindrical.

I switched on the flashlight and watched the small particles of dust swim for a moment, trying to shake the memory of the molten river of oil from that last place. I pointed my light at the wall and found a laminated map of the corridor. I ripped it out of its brackets and angled my light until I could clearly see the layout. There were two doors on the right of the corridor, one labeled
GR and the other ER. There was an emergency exit at the other end, where it branched off with the lower part of the
L
. There was also an additional door on the left, directly across from the GR – and finally the stairway to the ground floor, which was behind us.

“Where is it?” She asked, unzipping her jacket and draping it over Sarah’s shoulders.

“This way.” I shined the light down the corridor and concentrated on my breathing.

We moved slowly, preparing ourselves for what was at the other end of the hallway. As we neared the source of the pounding, we picked up the faint chorus of frustrated moans that was all too familiar. The door marked Generator Room in stark white stencil was to our right, but we moved farther, intent on seeing where the pounding was coming from. We needed to assess whether or not we had time to even deal with the generator.

“If something happens,” Kate said quietly to Sarah. “What do you do?”

“Run to the emergency stairs by the elevator and go to the second floor.” The little girl whispered back, “Tell Alice and Sid that you’re in trouble.”

We moved around the corner and illuminated the empty hallway. The emergency exit at the end of the corridor was oscillating. There must have been countless zombies on the other side, because there was a thick puddle of blood oozing through the weather stripping on the floor. The map showed how the emergency exit opened to a stairway that ascended to a separate hallway on the ground level – this meant that the zombies were inside the building, albeit confined to a single hallway that probably opened to the facility’s exterior somewhere. Depending on how many there were, I imagined the entire stairwell crammed with corpses, the ones closest to the emergency exit pancaked by the hordes pressing down from above.

“Come on,” Kate said.

We walked back to the generator room
and methodically went through the key–ring that Kate apparently policed from a zombified janitor. She said he was so emaciated that he could barely react to our presence – but he was at least aware enough to shadow us with his jaw wherever we moved. I had no memory of this – by that time I was probably walking around the mausoleum miles below the Earth’s surface with my faceless self.