The elevator moves further down until we come to another door. Unlike the first door, this one is as smooth and shiny as the wall. I would not have noticed it if it did not have the doorframe around its opening. Naomi jumps from the jet over to the door some fifteen feet. She places her hand on a console that scans her hand. The steel door opens swiftly and she hastily rushes me inside. The lights are off but the smell of stale blood, oil and gasoline permeate the air.

She flicks on the light and I see we are in a three-story steel mansion. The floor beneath us leads to what looks like a medical ward and the floor above is some sort of supercomputer. Along the walkway that leads to the upper level lies several doors that probably lead to quarters for the scientists. Large pillars stretch from the bottom level to the top. The entire structure is in the shape of a sphere. It would have taken a lifetime to build.

“Don’t worry about the smell. You’ll get used to it,” she says as I cover my nose.

“Your grandfather had a lot of free time if he got a bunch of scientists to build this in secret.”

“He did not build it. He did not build anything from the elevator to the supercomputer in the upper floor. Everything was already here and perfectly preserved for about four millennia, but the computers were wiped clean and there was no trace of whoever used this structure before us except the smell. Whoever built this made it possible to enter by scanning our hand on the console outside the door but only twenty people could be entered into the system.

“It’s over four thousand years old? Impossible the technology is on par with modern day,” I say.

“It is twenty years more advanced than anything we have. Everything here is downgraded from normal Black Technology as if designed to accommodate us. If that’s not strange enough this Black Technology can be used by anyone Aidoshian or not as if it was made for us to implant the Vortex inside you,” she says as she walks up from the doorway. “Come along. We are going to the medical ward for surgery.”

“Surgery,” I question. “What surgery the nanites have almost completely healed me.”

“Not for your injury,” Naomi says. “For the Vortex to be implanted inside of you.” She places her hand on the center my chest. “Right here.”

She leads me down a long walkway that circles downward to the medical ward. The strange machines look more like torture devices than medical equipment. The smell of blood is more prominent down here, so much so that it’s sickening. In the center of the room is a patient’s chair but by the time I get to it I have broken out in a chilling sweat. I can’t help but follow Naomi. I’m a little reluctant but I sit in the metal seat. There is an inscription on an incision knife on the table next to me that catches my attention. “May he find my soul not be tainted with evil.” It’s the same as how Aidoshians start prayers, but why would the Aidoshian share so much with this ancient race and have no written accounts of meeting or interacting?

“You did it again,” Naomi says. “I thought you said you did not know that language.”

“Maybe it’s the nanites or something,” I say.

“The nanites aren’t capable of embedding memory of anything especially something as complex as another language. They rebuild damaged organs, bones, skin.” She stops for a minute then continues. “The only logical explanation is someone has experimented on you before and given you knowledge of this language for some reason. We’ll hopefully get some answers when you’re implanted with Vortex.”

“How is that the only logical explanation,” I ask. “I think I would remember being someone’s science experiment.”

“Not if you were too young to,” she states

She straps me down into the chair so tight I can’t move. Then she takes out a silver necklace hiding underneath her cherry red shirt in between her breasts. The Vortex is tied on the necklet to look like one of the designs on the chain. Once she finishes untangling the Vortex, she walks out of my sight but only for a moment before returning with a clear glass orb.

“Elvion,” she says in a concerned voice, “there is no pain killer for what you are about to go through. It has been reported from many Black Technology Scientists as the worst pain the world has to offer,” she says as she sticks a rolled up towel in my mouth. “This is to keep you from swallowing your tongue or biting it off.”

She drops the Vortex on the glass ball and the Vortex sinks into the orb until it reaches the center. Once there the Vortex begins to root like one would expect a seed to. Naomi squeezes the orb to form a jagged point that becomes the shape of a knife nearly a foot long.

“We will know for sure if you are the one who will ride the Rift if you live through this,” she says as she stabs the knife into the center of my chest splitting my ribcage in two, slicing through any organs in its path stopping as it enters my spinal cord. Immediately pain surges throughout my entire being. I can feel the Vortex expanding inside me intertwining itself rapidly becoming one with me.

The pain vanishes as abruptly as it starts before it becomes too unbearable. Symbols, mathematic equations and element names rush through my head so fast I can’t process them. This information overload is silenced by a great deep voice that sounds as familiar as my own heart beat yet I have never heard this voice before.

“Iva’ni haiya ganai ya en, kai wa’qua,” it says in Latianeus but for some reason I can understand. You will tame this beast and become its master! “Iva’ni sao toi celestin en, fle c’aiot Loiki Anie,” the voice says. You will soar the sky and ride the chariot of our God King.

When the voices end and the symbols vanishes the first thing I see is Naomi’s smiling face. My body feels numb but not so much I can’t move.

“You are the one just as was predicted.” She wipes tears of joy from her face. “I was skeptical, Grandpa, but that Oracle was right all along,” she says out of respect to her grandfather.

“That wasn’t too bad,” I say reassuringly.

“Wasn’t too bad? You were out for five days and nearly flat-lined twice,” she says as she unstraps me from the chair. “The nanites must have slowed the integration process. Ironically it was also the only thing that kept you alive. I have never seen such a brutal integration.”

“What now? Do we go get the Rift?” I ask.

“I’d love to but no. The Rift comes after the Black Seed has a complete sync. Phase one was successful though.”

“Phase one,” I say. “Out of how many?”

“Black Seeds have three phases—the first organ integration, the second nerve sync and the last bone integration. Bone integration is the most painful but can take weeks before it commences. Until then, your bones will stay as fragile as a normal humans. For now, let’s go.”

“Go where?” I ask as I sit up.

“To the town outside of the volcano,” Naomi replies.

“What volcano?” I ask alarmed.

“This is Mount Pe’hēb, a dormant volcano that erupted thousands of years ago with such force it blew itself apart leaving this crater. The volcano’s eruption is believed to be the cause of the Heo’s fault line that encircles the planet. They say if this volcano erupts again, the world will split in two.”

“Is it safe,” I ask.

“Nope,” she responds emphatically while trying to hide a smile.

“That’s not funny,” I say as I stand up on my feet. “You know that’s not funny!”