29
So they built birds into this thing. A real sight to behold. A flock of white tailed doves flew a hundred twenty five floors above ground in a tiny room and soared just now into the edge of the stratosphere. The very edge of Blizzard's Gate, and its babel of aery feats. Faraji was so tired. Too many hours without blinking. On and on as he flew his mind battled with itself, do not check the clock, do not fall asleep, absorb the view and do not forget it. He spat a little and watched it fall carelessly into the mountain range below him. Unlikely weather in the real world was only dark clear skies here; the ferocious snows from the afternoon and evening were gone with his flight graduation.
Parabolic curving of the earth and multiple moons. He had a vague idea of where he was going. An elder's advice, the thought made him nervous. Elders in this world might only mean middle-aged social pariah in the real. The words: "East until you see, you will see it. The darkest thing in the dawn."
They all told you, trust them, whoever they really are. After all, you're flying right now. One hundred miles east of here by sunrise, just enjoy the stars. Don't fall asleep.
Mirroring the world outside, the unreal sun slide over the edge of the horizon earlier than he expected. The whole of space lit up in its glow, making him shield himself from its brightness, first with his hand, then adjusting the settings of his visuals. He peered down, clear on what he should see. The darkest thing in the dawn. It has a cliché ring to it, but then, this universe is built on clichés and collected imagination. Whose words were those? Elder Heyman, or Mrs. Moon? Had it been a Raider? Or even Gerimiah? He was so tired he was losing his grasp on his memory.
There it was, a lake maybe. Drifting downward through miles of open air, somehow feeling the rush of its million fingers tickling him, toward the small black speck, to one side of two jutting karst peaks. A little closer, not a lake. A sinkhole. Faraji wondered how deep it ran. Was it a cave system or something other worldly? As he reached ground level, he dove into the blackness, summoning fire so that he could see. He reminded himself, things in this world need only a semblance of reality.
He kept himself calm and free of panic even as his avatar descended into the pitch dark. His senses quickly became absorbed in the darkness. The feeling of moving ever downward was communicated to him in a way that was difficult for him to understand. The feeling was a not quite accurate, yet recognizable, likeness to falling.
Here he was not sure that to expect. The first trial of flight was something the Elders had told him about after his initiation into the guild. In the second trial, this one, he knew he would learn how to cut through cyberspace—burrowing wormholes in the digital fabric, so it was described to him. But he didn't know who or what would teach him this skill.
Every second the black seemed more and more like a prison, more inescapable. He craned his neck up to look at the tiny speck of daylight, the stolen halo of some fallen angel. He was starting to reconsider descending at such a rate. Then suddenly, while he was watching, it disappeared. He brought his avatar to a painful halt, redirecting it furiously back to the exit, but the halo never reappeared. He could see and feel nothing beyond his fingertips. He forced himself to breath evenly.
The second trial had begun.
Or had it? He waited in annoyance for something to happen, anything to emerge from the pitch black prison cell. After five minutes he feigned taking off his facemask. It wriggled freely—he could leave any time he wanted. But he knew he couldn't let himself. After ten minutes, he underwent a similar reaffirmation of purpose, and after twenty, and thirty, and an hours, and two.
Conceptual years of silence passed without a word or whisper. He feared his own mind, half wondering if it would exit of its own accord and ruin the whole night's work. He folded his legs, one under the other and clasped his hands at his laps, finding in himself a yogic resolve to meditate, eye's open in determined resistance against sleep.