An Obsidian Sky Read Free

of the Eternis Systems in
commemoration of the conclusion of the Resource Wars. It had always
seemed to me that the war had been appropriately named. It was a
stupid name for a stupid war.
    In reality the
building was far more of a corporate temple than it was a memorial.
Its promotions boasted more office space than any other building in
Bagata. In fact the memorial offered the second most office space
in the whole of the former Democratic Republic of Congo. The city
of course belonged to West in all but name and so it was only
natural that the Eternis System’s owned every square foot of
it.
    Parking the
car and listening to the local terror report I opened the door and
descended into the boiling fume filled landscape of Central
District, Bagata. The terror report had promised a low level of
activity, despite recent increases in violence across the
Waste.
    I was walking
now away from the car park and towards the entrance of the
memorial. Whoever had designed the entrance had seemed to be
desperate to convince its users that it was an entirely natural
composition. There were fountains dancing rainbows about them.
There was a white marble floor with black circular sculptures, the
genesis and intention of which, was unknown to anyone but their
designer. There were broad leafed trees and rows of sculptured
grass gardens separating the sovereignty of the memorial from the
rest of Bataga.
    As I walked
through the opulence I imagined that perhaps in another place,
serving another purpose, the entrance could seem almost heavenly.
The architect had simply chosen the wrong place to put his
sculpture because the surrounding memorial arching its laser
straight angles into the sky caused a sickening sense of
vertigo.
    Standing there
in front of the doors that lead into the structure I caught sight
of my target. He saw me at the very same moment that I saw him. I
drew my breath and marched towards him.
    ‘Mr Sephra,’ I
demanded.
    ‘Mr Engeltine,
so good of you to come. Let’s take a walk.’
    We entered the
building together our paces matching one another. I tried to keep
my awe contained but the Sennaca Memorial was something to behold.
Inside the huge entrance gallery, which rose for hundreds of
unclearly defined floors, were huge crystal overhangs and tall
obsidian obelisks that rose for hundreds of feet and seemed to
split into a thousand fragments. Each fragment appeared suspended
in the air, in the act of falling.
    We crossed an
eternity of gallery and entered an elevator. Chiming with sincerity
the Eternis System’s vocal representative informed us of all the
tourist attractions within the structure. We disembarked at some
bizarrely high number, with my shoulder brushing the door
apologetically, as I struggled to keep pace with Sephra. Traversing
yet more crowded passageways we made it to a room of immense
proportions. Despite its size all that was present in the room was
a huge desk surrounded by chairs. Sephra sat on one side and I the
other.
    ‘What have you
done to me?’ I asked more calmly than I thought possible.
    ‘We have given
you a gift, Mr Engeltine. We have made you see,’ Sephra answered
equally calmly.
    ‘All I see is
light and then darkness. It is beyond all recognition. How exactly
is that a gift?’
    ‘Like all
great gifts Mr Engeltine, you may not always understand its gravity
straight away.’
    ‘So tell me
everything. What have you done to me? I want to know. I want
to understand what all this crazy shit is I’m seeing. I want you to
fix it. I want you to make me understand. You can’t just offer me a
job and turn me insane,’ I cried.
    ‘If it is any
consolation George you’ve got the job.’ Standing briefly he offered
me a cigarette which I took gratefully, snapping off the ignition
stub and inhaling deeply. Sephra did the same. We stared at each
other for a while. Each of us searching the other for a sign,
wholly indescribable and yet wholly ingrained in reality. Sephra
must have found