Evarus Falls

They landed near the edge of the ruins. For buildings that haven’t been maintained in one thousand some years, according to Evarus lore, they held surprisingly well. Less Greek ruins and more old west ghost town crossed with the Buddhist Caves in India. Domed buildings built from stone withstood the fiery onslaught of the Phoenixes, and pottery shards poked through dirt and grass on the street. Recent scorch marks blackened several buildings on the edge of the city.

They entered the main square without encountering anyone, not even creatures. Ten altars of encased ash circled the square. Beneath the ash, a flame flickered at their presence threatening to awake the phoenix loons.

On the old city hall building above a fallen and rusty bell, someone had scrawled a message in faded red paint mimicking blood. “Tell no lies.”

Sadie gulped. She needed no reminder of the curse placed on this place by the phoenixes, and the ruins served plenty of warning on what happens to those who lie in this place. Instant death. In the game version of Evarus, that meant a boot back to Rudi Flats. She doubted the same happened to travelers.

“Can we turn back now?” Edson said. “We checked it out. Nothing’s here. No tear.”

“We’re nowhere near the tear yet. It’s in the caves.” Jiyu pointed to a cliff behind city hall where thirty-foot phoenix loons carved into the rock face stared down at them.

“It’s probably scarred over by now. Let’s choose another one.” Thunder rippled from the yellow cloud, and Edson jumped.

“No,” Sadie said. “We don’t have time. The next viable tear is too far away, and we’re already here.”

“Maybe we should call Vidar for help.” Edson cleared his throat. “Send backups, or something.”

Jiyu’s pulled out her gun in a blink of an eye. “Try it.”

“It was just a suggestion!” Edson pulled out Gus and waved it at her in defense.

“Pft. What are you going to do with a screwdriver?”

He clicked a button and fired a small plasma blast up into the sky. “See, I can use it as a weapon too.”

“Not very Doctor Who of you,” Fawkes said.

“Well, I’m practical,” Edson huffed.

“Guys, calm down.’ Sadie stepped between them. Her mind raced on how to calm the situation without telling a lie when all she wanted to say everything would be fine. “If you want to call Vidar, fine, but do it back at the airship.”

“What! Come on,” Jiyu said. “Vidar will have his guys here within an hour. Maybe sooner.”

“Definitely sooner,” Edson retorted. “There’s a crew not thirty minutes from here.”

“Which is more than enough time for us to have a look at the tear,” said Sadie.

“I’m calling them to protect us,” Edson said. “You’re going to get yourselves killed messing with this. We really should have left this to the more experienced aces. Told them your theory.”

Sadie braced, ready to defend herself on why that would never work, they’d never listen. But hadn’t she just been mad at Vidar for the same thing?

“At least we won’t be cowards,” Jiyu muttered.

Edson looked like he wanted to throttle her. Before Sadie could try to calm him again, Fawkes pulled Edson back from Jiyu. “Do what you need to do, man, but we’re going in.”

“We’ll be quick,” Sadie promised.

Edson backed away keeping one eye on Jiyu. “I’m telling them to be quick.” Before stepping behind a building to leave Jiyus firing range, he sighed. “Seriously, be careful.” Then, he disappeared out of sight.

Jiyu snorted. “We won’t need him anyway. Should have left him back at the Colosseum.”

Maybe they did. None of the rest of them were cautious in the slightest, but she couldn’t dwell on that right now. “Thanks for helping,” she said to Fawkes.

He shrugged it off. “Let’s check out that tear.”

Heat radiated from inside the caves making it hotter in the shades of the cliff than out in the open. Ornate carvings adorned the five cave openings telling stories of the people who used to live here. Actual humanoid people, or as human as you can get in a digital world. The history and carvings seemed far too detailed to be made up entirely by a game company or Ben. Maybe they were real at one point, just like the emus.

But if so, where did they go? No humans existed on the island except players from Earth. If they’re real, they couldn’t just vanish. Could they?

Maybe the Decay had answers for that too.

They pressed onward into the center cave entrance, and the air grew thicker with every step. By the time they reached the first chamber, Sadie struggled to breathe properly.

More warnings were written on the walls in red ink.

Liars are burned.

Do not lie.

Liar. Liar. Liar.

A phoenix loon head carved into the rock hung over the next pathway, and as they approached, its eyes opened and burned a magma red.

“Only the worthy may enter here.” Its eyes shifted between them. “Present the feathers.”

Sadie froze. They didn’t have the feathers from the quest, not all of them at least. She’d screwed around collecting a dozen of them a few months ago, but that was barely a fraction of the total. And back on her avatar.

“Ignore it,” Fawkes whispered. “Remember, we’re not bound by the quest rules of the game.”

Sadie nodded, remembering the jade egg quest.

“DO NOT IGNORE ME,” the phoenix loon head roared.

“What are you going to do?” Jiyu asked. “Pop out of the wall and stop us?” She entered the hall first, strutting forward without any care that she could be burned or maimed by an angry fire chicken.

“THAT IS VERY RUDE. I’LL HAVE YOU KNOW I CAN KICK YOU OUT RIGHT THIS SECOND.”

Sadie braced to be swept out of the caves by a gust of wind, hidden spring, or bats. A few moments passed, and nothing happened. “So…”

“IT NORMALLY WORKS. WHY ISN’T IT WORKING?”

“Let’s keep going before Vidar’s men get here.” Fawkes followed Jiyu, and they continued along.

The phoenix loon head echoed behind them. “I AM NOT GOING TO ASK YOU KINDLY TO LEAVE. DO NOT TAKE A STEP FURTHER. BY FIRE’S WRATH. OH, WHATEVER.”

“What do you think it does if we were regs?” Sadie asked. They passed over a circle of flamethrowers pointed back the way we came. “Well, answers that.”

Faint feathers etched into the cave floor guided them through a series of ill lit tunnels until they arrived in a treasure room painted red with gold decorations. Treasure piled at the back, and a set of red gear trimmed with gold and painted as if covered in feathers hovered in the middle of the room.

A tear crossed the chamber above it. Unlike the scars at the jade egg quest and Ravi’s shop, a white line ran through it letting out a bright blinding light. It was only a sliver, barely the size of the edge of a piece of paper, but Sadie needed to squint if she looked anywhere near it. She stepped closer trying to peer inside.

“Careful,” Fawkes warned.

The tear crackled at her approach, and they all sucked in a breath.

“I’m all for jumping in head first, but Fawkes is right.” Jiyu’s voice wavered. “Maybe we shouldn’t go any closer. We were probably shielded from some of the effects in the Mech suit.”

“I just want to see if I can see in.”

Because if her theory was right, the tears weren’t just a break in cyberspace, but a portal to the Decay. To other parts of cyberspace.

People can’t have just disappeared off the face of the planet, and cyberspace. They went somewhere, and the Decay was the last known somewhere they had. There had to be a way to travel there.

Maybe her dad, and mom, and all the other travelers were there, trapped, with no known way back. All the missing people, the key, all the answers were in the Decay, which meant to an extent this was all a trap like Vidar warned. Ben showed her the Decay to get her to go there for some reason, but she had no other choice. She’d walk straight into a trap to end this.

Guilt fell back over her. If she found the key, she needed to hand it over to Ben to get her family back. But Brink needed it to stop the deterioration event and save Evarus and the people in it. There was no guarantee Ben would do the same.

She’d decide what to do about that later. “You guys step back into the tunnels and keep an eye—"

Before she could finish the phoenix loon head’s voice bellowed behind them. “STOP YOU MISCREANT. ONE HUNDRED YEARS I’VE HAD THIS GIG, AND WHAT DO I GET? ZERO RESPECT. NONSENSE. ENDLESS TOMFOOLERY FOR A CENTURY OF HARD WORK.”

Footsteps pounded down the cave rattling her ears. Edson appeared in view panting and out of breath. “A Glitch!” He bent over hand on his knees trying to catch his breath. “A Glitch is coming!”

“NOT ANOTHER. I GIVE UP,” the phoenix loon head declared.

The cave shook throwing Sadie off balance. The phoenix loon head yelled more, but it was drowned out by a robotic roar.