Judgment.

The intense knocking wouldn’t stop. At first, I thought it was just some residual throbbing in my head from the walk I took the day before, but then I realized – no, there was somebody knocking at the door of the cabin. I yawned and rolled over. In the bed directly across from me, Soren stared back with the sheet pulled tightly over his head. He ad this “deer in the headlights” look, and his eyes seemed to tell me he was scared. Then I heard the knock again. Someone else got up, and I adjusted the recline of my head to see Luci still asleep and Etand feeling his way toward the door. “Don’t open it, man,” I said under my breath, but he reached for the doorknob anyway. With one eye open, I peeked over to see him reveal our early morning visitor.

It was Sarah, the woman I had first met after coming in from the beach. “Good morning,” she said quietly. “Did you sleep well?”

“Yes, thank you,” replied Etand. “Can I help you?” he continued.

Sarah looked around inside the cabin and saw that I was already up. “Are all of you awake?” she asked.

“Most of us,” I volunteered.

“Good. I apologize for rousing you so early, but if you wouldn’t mind I’d like for you to come with me.”

“Where?” mouthed Soren, and I repeated his query for Sarah.

“Where are we going?”

“You want to get out of here, right?” she responded, “Somewhere more comfortable? I want to help you… all of you.”

Etand scratched his head and turned to the rest of us. “Evan?”

After he called to me, Sarah recognized my name. “Evan. You’re the one I met before, right? Down by the beach?”

I nodded in bewildered agreement. This conversation was only contributing to the bizarre tone of this whole experience, but something told me we could trust her.

She went on. “If you don’t mind then, we really need to go. I promise things will be better for all four of you. You may even find answers to any questions you have, but you must believe what I’m telling you. The longer you stay, the longer you wait.”

Soren kept staring straight at me and shook his head to indicate his disagreement. However, I offered him an optimistic nod of the head in return. “I’m game,” I said.

“Terrific,” Sarah replied, “but what about the rest of you?”

Etand thought for a second before responding. “Yeah, sure. Okay. Give me a minute with Luci, if you would be so kind.”

He went over to Luci’s bed and gently nudged her from her sleep. As soon as she awoke and saw all of the commotion though, she panicked and grabbed hold of Etand.

“Shh… It’s all right,” he reassured her. “We’re going to go with this lady. You’ll be okay.”

After a moment, she calmed down. Sarah seemed to be nice enough, so Luci and Etand got up and went back over to the door. I followed.

“What about you, Soren?” I asked. As soon as he saw that we were up for it, he joined us.

“Well, I think we’re ready,” Sarah told us. “You won’t need anything else.”

We closed the door to the cabin as the daylight began to appear through the trees. One-by-one, we sauntered off the porch and followed Sarah as she led us down the path to the stone slab I had seen previously.

“Are we going to that thing in the ground?” I asked her.

“Oh, you’ve seen it already? Well yes, Evan, you’re all expected there.”

“Expected for what?”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t explain everything yet. You’ll be all right though.”

“Why all of us?” Etand added. “Just out of curiosity, what’s going on that makes us so important to you?”

Sarah stopped and turned to us. “Why you’re here, why the four of you are together – it’s because you belong together. All I can tell you is that only one of you will discover the true purpose of your being here. The other three have been provided to you as companions.”

“May I ask which one of us that is?” questioned Etand.

Sarah smiled and said, “I’m sorry, but I honestly don’t know. We need to hurry though. They’re waiting for us there.”

For the rest of the walk, I kept trying to figure out my own solution to Etand’s question. I also kept trying to figure out who “they” were.

When we got to the stone formation, we were instructed by Sarah to line up parallel to its closest edge. We weren’t terribly near it – probably a few meters away. I briefly glanced behind me to see Sarah whistle.

Out of the forest from the opposite side came three Centaurs. Luci trembled a bit, but the rest of us just stood there and watched them as they watched us. Two of them I’d never seen before, but I recognized the one on the right as the creature I saw during my walk through the forest the previous day. The Centaur in the middle looked to be the leader of his group, and he stepped forward toward us as a leader would.

“I am Bakx,” he spoke with confidence, “Chieftain of the Montedio Coastal Guard. I know who the four of you are, and I’m sure you are all a bit confused as to the situation you’ve found yourselves in. Hopefully, you will shortly be provided with the answers you seek. My companions and I shall now summon the Orcala en Vite for her to rule on your purity of will. By so doing, I implore you, the Belonging, to step forth when she calls upon you.”

He stepped back to join the others, and they let out a screeching yell that reverberated through the trees. Suddenly, the stone slab before us began to shake, and two pieces from opposite corners rose toward us. The others corners immediately followed. Gradually, the middle separated, and the new shape transformed into a cube. I couldn’t turn to see the others, for I was frozen with awe. From the middle of the stone cube, a sphere grew larger and larger until its dimensions nearly matched that of its outer shell. The core of the sphere emitted a bright, radiant light that illuminated everything. This, perhaps more than anything else I’ve witnessed thus far, left me completely stunned and speechless. I could sense myself at its mercy, especially when I felt like it was speaking directly to me.

“Step forward, Evan,” the Orcala commanded, an order I was quick to oblige. “You are distressed, I see. Tell me, do you believe there is a reason fro your being here?”

I thought for a minute before responding. “Well, yes I suppose. There must be a reason; otherwise I would not be here.”

“A wise conclusion,” it told me. “Would you, if you were so inclined, prefer to have the answers to your questions provided to you, or would you rather discover them on your own.”

“Um, if I had the choice, I guess I’d like them given to me.”

“I see. That is precisely why I think you’d do well to discover things on your own. You already know the answers, Evan, but do you know the questions? I can provide answers to questions you cannot ask, but I’m unable to provide the questions to these answers. You already know them, but you need to discover these things for yourself. Momentarily, my assistants will guide you to these questions, and only when you know them will you know the meaning of their answers.”

This cryptic, yet revealing bit of information was followed by a bright flash. Instantly, the Orcala had vanished, and only the stone slab remained – dormant in the ground where we came upon it. Sarah was gone too, but the Centaurs had stayed. I looked over to the others in my group. Luci was on her knees, sobbing and praying. Etand rushed over to help her, and Soren and I joined him.

“That was amazing,” Etand said.

“What?” I asked.

He paused in reflection. “I could see…” he mused. “I could see that thing. I could sense it speaking to me. It was… unfathomable.”

Bakx came over to us and said, “She will be fine. You must hurry though. The Crystalline Gates await your arrival. My Lieutenant, Omiem, will guide you.” He motioned to the one with the mohawk and staff, the one I recognized. Slowly, the four of us joined him as he led us up another steep path.

He said nothing the entire way. We eventually reached a dead end, or so we thought. Omiem parted the ivy that coated the barrier to reveal thousands of small crystals embedded in the walls. When the ivy was removed, the light reflected off of the crystals and the wall spilt down the middle to unveil a neatly landscaped pathway that led to a modern, contemporary-looking building.

Omiem still said not a word, but he motioned for us to pass through the gateway.

“I think he want us to go on,” I pointed out.

Etand was more than eager to go. “Thank you,” he muttered.

Luci was right behind, followed by Soren. I paused to look back at the area from which we came, but Omiem insisted that I go with the others. I obeyed, and once I made it through, the gates closed. We were sealed in yet another strange new place.

“What the hell is going on?” I thought.

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