Time unknown

“What will you see when you're dead?”

A chain of words crosses onto my mind as I glare powerlessly towards a charades of gray and white on the raging and storming skies. This view is the first thing I see after who knows what happened to me and for who knows how long I've been passed out. That chain of words is also the first thing I thought. I don't know why, might be just my survival instinct telling me if I am alive.

But still, what will I see when I die? My mind is too weak to do the simulation right now. The question remains unanswered, but seeing how I am not staring to infiniteness and/or nothingness must be a definite message that I am, indeed, alive. I can only blink while my whole body is felt like being dragged up and down without ever touching a solid surface. I am not falling, it's something else.

Also my whole body feels wet, my whole body is wrapped with damp thick fabric. Raindrops falling onto my face and bounce off, while my damp clothes absorbs them. With this feeling dragged up and down, I am beginning to realise that I am currently drifting on storming ocean with raging skies on top of me, alone.

My hearing slowly begin to activate, the only noise I can hear is the sound of how the heavensend raindrops failed trying to pierce the salty heap of water of the Earth. It's not music, but the voice is actually sounds beautiful for me. Sometimes I admire how the ocean gives mercy for me. Despite the raging storm and the rise and fall of tides, the ocean never even for once rolls me inside its mighty waves.

I could have been drowned at any moment, but it would seem the sea has its own plan. Theoretically speaking, my body's mass is not enough to press against the intensity of ocean's salty waters; that is why I am not sinking. But still, I can't help to think if there is anything else working here.

To be honest, I don't think I will survive this situation. Being alone in such vast place, even if I to squeeze my voice out, I am not sure that someone would hear my desperate scream.

“...”

I tried it, even if I try to force a sound from myself, nothing comes out. The hopelessness of the situation, the cold within the damp cloth which wraps my frail skin, the soothing sway of ocean calming from a storm's lullaby, and the chiaroscuro the skies play as the rolling clouds which hides its true heaven fades to clear skies have somnolent effect which my weak body unable to resist. Slowly but sure, my eyes got into a losing battle against sleepiness.

“...”

“Someone is floating out here!”

“...”

“Help him!”

“...”

“Ready?! Hoist!”

“...”

“Is he alive?!”

“Is he breathing?!”

“How did he ended up here?!”

“...”

“His heartbeat is too weak!”

“...”

[...]

“...”

“We have done what we can, the rest is up on his own...”

“...”

Perhaps it was just a dream, I thought I heard some noise entering my peripheral sense of hearing during my dreamless rest. Despite the deep sleep I was in, I'm begin to regain my function. But it was not yet enough to awake me, instead my mind began to dream. Not a wild dream where I experience something I've never had during a pitiful moments of inability we call ‘reality.’ But a dream which feels so real it trapped me inside and give hard time differing which is real and which is not.

The lids of my eyes began to raise, both of my eyeballs recognise a wooden desk right in front of me. Meanwhile my own self is sitting on a chair with my hands resting on its arms. As I slowly raise my head, I can feel a small knockback from my motion. My body feel like rotating a bit, just then I realise that I am sitting on some kind of rotating chair.

“You awake?”

A sound had alarmed me, for a second I frantically turn around to see where did it came from. But instead of finding it, I realise another bizarre fact; the place I am in is literally nowhere. The chair, the desk, and me are placed in a vast room where the floor is black bottomless while the ceiling is topless grey and the walls, if there is any, is borderless shades of gradient between black and grey.

“Please don’t panic, remember that I've promised not to hurt you.”

Abruptly I stood from the chair where I sit, again looking where that voice came from. I've tried to scan every angle available in this place, from my back around to my back again, but still nothing, I am alone in this place.

“Please Mr <...>, sit, and I'll explain everything.”

I turn myself around abruptly, this time because I am definitely sure that that voice is coming from my back. Both of my eyes dilate as I find a black silhouette of a man standing behind the desk. His whole figure is shrouded in darkness, making me unable to see any feature of his body. But from his silhouette, the only thing I can notice is that he is about 170 centimetres tall and is wearing a doctor coat.

[Wait, what did he just called me?]

He just said only three lines and obviously he just called my name, I remember everything he just said, but no matter how I rewind everything he just said in my mind, I cannot hear the version where he called my name.

“I understand that you are willing to participate in our program—”

“What did you just called me?!”

I barged and walk around the desk to reach him, but when I slash my hands to his collar about to grab his figure, my hands just go through his figure, as if I was trying to catch a ghost. His figure also disappears when my fingers touched his silhouette, making me frantically looking around for him. But despite his figure gone, his voice can still be heard continuing his sentence from my back.

“...and I thank you for your consent. Believe me when I say that you will do great deeds if you succeed.”

As I turn myself around, I find the logic of this place had been bent. The desk I walked around should have been at least four steps away from me, but instead I find it standing directly in front of me. Terrified as I am, I take a step aback. But the back of my thigh bumps against a something hard and makes me lose my balance. I brace my bottom to land on anything solid, but instead, my fall breaks mid-way on something else; the rotating chair.

This literally dropped my jaw, I began to hyperventilate, not just through my nose, but also through my mouth. Soon I know that I have to calm myself, start with stopping to breathe through my mouth and close my lips. The sudden change on my breathing pattern forces me to swallow some of my saliva, which ironically almost makes me choked. But it actually helped, I have calmed a little.

But still I haven't yet to understand what is happening here, even I began to doubt if I am really still alive. Since honestly, this ‘room,’ this chair, the desk, the sensation of grabbing a ghost I felt when I was about to grab that figure, the feeling of almost got choked by my own spittle, and the sensation I felt when I fell to this chair, all of those are too damn real just for a dream.

“From this moment on, you'll be living in this facility. You will get everything you want, but we expect you to always be prepared any time we need you.”

Despite I have several question about what he just said, like what did he called me, what he meant with ‘program,’ or who is he, I had given up on asking. The only thing I want right now is to get out from this place.

“Every once and then, I will monitor your condition personally. There is no actual schedule for that, I will do it sporadically—”

“Shut up! Just get me out of here!”

I scream as loud as I can, but he does not react. Even I realise that my loud voice isn't even echoing, as if this ‘room’ I'm in is boundless, literally infinity.

“...and that's all you need for now, someone will show you your quarter. If you ever need anything, just let us know.”

I can't hold my impatience anymore, not if I am going to be confined in this room forever. I want to scream, loud enough my lungs should break. I stand from the chair where I sit and slams both of my hands onto the wooden desk in front of me.

“You deaf fuck! All I want is to get—”

Just in an instant, I can feel something, I can differ what is real and what is not. The feel is just like when someone kidnapped me, put a blindfold over my eyes, takes me on a plane, open my blindfold, and then throws me out from that plane.

“—OUT!!!”

I wake up from my sleep whilst still continuing what I did last in my dream; screaming on top of my lungs. My voice was so loud, that is the only thing I can hear until ten seconds later. That kind of sudden shift in my conscience make me slightly confused, but only for a brief moment before I can adapt to my new surroundings.

Immediately after I stopped screaming, my senses begin to kick in. First thing I do is to apprehend what happened, I need to know where I am. Currently, I am sitting on a bed in a white room where there is only one bed, which I am on, one desk with a chair, a mirror, a jacket hanging next to it, and a medical kit cabinet.

After a few seconds, I can feel my head is dizzy. I realise that this room is a part of a ship. Not too long after that, I began to hear rushed footsteps from outside this room. This room does not have any door, only a rectangle hole in the wall with a doorframe covered by a cloth as its curtain.

As the footsteps outside gets more and more intense, my instinct began to react. I scan the room for weapon to defend myself since I don't exactly know where I am right now. But I can see nothing useful I can use.

*FLUSH*

A sudden fabric voice being flapped forces me to shift my focus, from looking for weapon towards the archway which covered in cloth. There stands two sturdy looking man who fix their eyes on me for a moment.

“HE'S AWAK—”

The second man shouts, despite being able to let off some scream, I managed to silence him by throwing a pillow to his face. To my surprise, my throw was strong enough to knock him back off the doorway. The other man immediately runs towards me whilst looking violent. I can read his movement, he is trying to pin me onto the bed where I am sitting.

Before he could reach me, I jumps at him and lands my right foot to his left shoulder, I use my the direction of my fall and my weight to tumble his whole body off his standing. My weight is not heavy enough to actually pin him to the floor, but I still have enough force to knock him back with a kick using my right foot which still on his left shoulder.

His back clashes against the wall and the medicine cabinet, some of its content pouring from it to the floor. Some of the medicines in the glass bottles scatters all over the floor upon their container shatter as it hit the floor. Meanwhile some of the other plastic bottles withstood the fall and some other pours out after the fall broke open its lids.

Among the cluttering pills, I notice that a pair of small scissors also fell out from inside the medicine cabinet. Looking at my opponent is still trying to recover from my previous attack, I seize the chance to pick the scissors and hold them tight in my right hand.

Right after I have the scissors in my hand, the man thrust his right shoulder at me while his left hand is grabbing my right wrist. The force of his attack pushed me backwards, strong enough to strike my back against the bed. He have my upper body pinned against the bed and his grip to my wrist is tight enough to force me let my grip on the scissors go, even my free left hand is not strong enough to claw on his face to force myself free.

Suddenly I realise that my legs are still free. Not took me long to begin pulling my legs upward to his abdomen and push him with all my might. He steps aback trying to regain balance, the pills on the floor doesn't make it easy apparently. In the end, he tripped and falls to the floor with the back of his head struck against the wall.

He groans in pain, I'm guessing the fall must have make his head dizzy, the sound of his head knocks against the wall is loud enough to distract me for a few seconds until I realise that outside the corridors are stampeding noise of footsteps approaching. Immediately I shift my eyes to the scissors on my right, I turn around and grab them with my left hand since my right hand is still hurt.

From the corner of my eyes, I noticed four men are standing by the doorway, looking at me in wonder after they looks at the man I knocked down lying against the wall. I tighten my grip to the scissors in my left hand while sorting my breath, my left foot hovering slowly onto the floor, trying to grasp a solid surface while my right leg is still sitting on the bed along with the rest of my body, preparing to charge towards them.

“Come on! Just hold him!”

Suddenly, a voice commands from outside, the voice had all of us distracted, but it also give me the chance to attack first. I thrust myself forward whilst holding the scissors and runs towards them, there are only small chance that I can win against four people, but taking advantage of their distraction, I might be able to take one of them as my hostage.

It will only take me three steps until I reach the one who stands foremost, but my first step is enough to alert all of them. The man who stands in the front managed to avoid my first attack with the scissors, but he doesn't do anything afterwards. Instead one other man proceeds to hold my left wrist and another man tackle my chest. Both of them push me backwards towards the bed.

After two of them have pinned me, the other two joins them, making it harder for me to break free. The man who is holding my left wrist bit my hand, making me screams in pain and forces me to open my grip. I don't know what he does next with the scissors, I can't see him. I keep expecting the worst, but four of them just keep restrain my movement without doing anything that would damage me fatally.

Among the chaos, I notice someone else has entered the room, he walks hastily towards me trying to face me without having his men to let their restraint of off me. Honestly, I think that he is their leader, someone who is responsible for my condition right now.

Using all the power left within my body, I raise my body trying to stand. To my surprise, I am strong enough to resist against them. Despite barely, I finally able to face him, there stand a man wearing green sweater, slowly taking steps aback holding his distance with me. The four men pull me with all their might, one pulling my left arm, one pulling my right hand, and two locking my neck, but their effort rendered useless. I am stronger alone then them four.

“It's okay, don't panic...”

The other man in front of me slowly approaches, he lifts his right hand towards my forehead. After then I can feel a damp sensation on my moustache area, some liquid drops from my nostrils into the grinding teeth inside my opened mouth, from there I can tell an indistinct taste of salt.

“Calm down! You're bleeding!” the man ordered loudly. Even without his orders, slowly my strength disappears, I'm beginning to feel weak, not even strong enough to stand. Also slowly, the grips of the four men are loosing. But without their grasp, I can't even stand on my own.

As I lose my balance, the man in front of me catches me. His slightly taller figure than me makes me have to look above so I can look him in the eyes.

“What's happening? Where am I? What—”

Weakly I query a barrage of question, as I am unsure how long I can maintain my consciousness. I just wish he'd at least answer one of my questions.

“Relax, I know you have so many questions.”

“Just answer— Wait... who... am I...?”

“Rest...” his voice is keeps fading away as I lose my awareness, “we will talk later.”

“...”

“...”

Again, I fall to a dreamless rest, but I am still too uneasy to have this rest. The next thing I know, I am back in that room; a room with only one chair and one desk. I raise my hands onto the desk, once and twice I tried to clap them. The sensation and the sound they produce, they feel so real. Yet I am sure that this place is not real at all.

“What is this place?”

Another question, as if there is not enough matter to confuse me at the moment. The solitude of this place gives me peace to reflect on myself, I try to answer the entire questions myself, but I don't have the facts I need to build solid truth.

“What happened to me?” that is the first question, “what is the reason that made me ended up here?”

The last thing, and ironically also the first thing I can remember is waking up staring at stormy skies while floating on the ocean.

“But what happened to me that I ended up there? Fuck! I can't remember anything!”

I cup the top of my head with both of my hands and furiously scratch it. I hate myself for knowing absolutely nothing.

“Who am I?” I ask myself. “What did I do to deserve all this?!”

“Good day, Mr. <...>.”

“What?”

It's happening again, I am not alone here. Someone or something is communicating with me. Not just that, he also called my name but I still unable to hear my own name.

“Who's there?!”

I look around, at least waiting for another voice. Just let me believe that I am not insane.

“Who's there?”

Another voice, but I don't like this. I know exactly that voice, that harsh voice of mine.

Did my voice echoed? That voice is definitely mine, my voice talking to the other voice. I have no recollection of it anywhere, yet I feel like I know what I will have to say. Am I the one control this room? Or instead, this room controls me?

“I'm the one in charge of this project.”

Suddenly another black silhouette of man appeared from my right. He walks around me to the other side of the desk until I can see his full figure. He is completely different from the one I meet in my previous visit to this room. This one is slightly taller, at least 180 centimetres, he is also wearing a suit and his hair is neatly combed aback.

“Then you must be Doctor Einhorn...”

“Then you must be Doctor Einhorn.”

I correctly guessed what ethereal my voice had to say. Finally I realise that this is not something that is happening to me, but is something that had happened to me, this room is a place from my memories. But no matter how hard I try, I can't remember anything about this Doctor Einhorn, what did he called me, nor what happened in this room.

The silhouette approaches me who is sitting on the chair and offers me a handshake, doubtfully I raise my hand to answer his gesture. And to my surprise, I can feel a solid texture of a hand as I shake his hand. The sensation is definite, meat, flesh and muscle. His grip is firm, yet so gentle, like handshaking with a living stone statue, just far more alive.

“How are your progresses?”

“I'm still struggling with the basics, what do you expect me to accomplish?”

When he speaks, I already know the respond. But in the same side, I also feel like I've never been here before. It feels like re-experiencing a past you never knew about. Despite being the one who is experiencing this, I can only watch like a bystander.

“I believe my subordinate had briefed you.”

“Yes, but not in details.”

“Okay, what do you want to know?”

“Can you start from the very beginning?”

“Well, I'm not sure how...”

He ponders for a moment, might be thinking about what he should say next.

“...do you like this world?”

“Excuse me?”

“How the world is governed by the olds and frails who manipulate the young and toughs to protect what they have and to get what they don't have nor deserve?”

“...”

For a moment, my voice went silent, even if I had experienced this, I don't know what would I respond to that kind of question.

“I'm not sure, but I don't think I'd like it.”

“You should be. In my early days, I've had killed one to many human souls before I understand their value, not to me, but to who cared about them.”

“You were a soldier?”

“Yeah, my past is something that I can't replace with good deeds.”

“...”

“I never liked it, and I don't want anyone else to feel the same.”

“That's why you choose to do something about it?]

“Yeah, and you are the key for that.”

“What do you mean?”

“You know time travel, right?”

“Yeah, what does that have something to do with me?”

“Two years ago, I witnessed an important event which is probably the most influential event of my life.”

“What event?”

“It's a long story, but enough to make me say that I might have found a way to change the whole world.”

“Okay, but what does everything I am doing have something to do with... time travel?”

Without context, I'm unable to understand a single thing they're talking. What does Doctor Einhorn and I have to do with time travel? What happened between us? I'm beginning to see the importance of Doctor Einhorn for me, even enough to make me believe that if I want to know what happened to me, I should search for him.

“To be honest, I can't say anything for the moment since I am not yet sure that I am absolutely right.”

“And, what should be happening if you're wrong?”

“...” he goes silent for a moment, with his hollow face looking at me deeply. It's odd, despite he's only a silhouette, I can feel something inside his faceless gaze, some kind of sympathy, as if I was deeply believed in him. “That choice is yours to decide and to fight for, I can only guide you through the way, the way I'm not sure exist.”

“Doctor Einhorn?”

Suddenly another voice can be heard interrupting, it takes Doctor Einhorn's attention away from me, he turns around and faces my right, looking blankly at nothingness, as if he was talking through his eyes. After a few moment, he nods and turn his face back at me.

“It would seem this concludes our session for today, we will continue this later.”

He proceeds to walk around to my back through my right, I fix my eyes at him, tracing his movements to find him fading away as he reaches the back side of my chair.

I was left here alone, left to do nothing. His conference with ethereal me doesn't help me, it left even more questions for me to answer. I cup my face with both of my hand and rest my elbows on my knees, closing my eyes tightly whilst wishing when I open my eyes, everything would have been just a nightmare.

“Hey, <...>!”

Another ethereal voice can be heard, but the voice is different from any voice I've heard. The voice is so soft, calming, and soothing. It was trying to call my name, but my perception for sound is preventing myself to hear my own name. That voice also felt so familiar, so familiar it forces me to turn around looking for its source.

After turning around more than half a circle to my right, a little far from the chair, I can see a white figure standing and waving its hand at me. Its perpetual motion seems like asking me to approach it. I raise myself from the chair, whilst still clearing my doubt, I slowly approach the white figure in afar.

“Come on!”

Its movement breaks, it stops waving its hand sideward and begins to waving its hand back and forth. Slowly, I begin to notice that the white figure is a girl.

The closer I get, the white figure's shape begin to form a noticeable silhouette, just like Doctor Einhorn's black silhouette figure, just in different colour. Her hip long hair sways according her hand movement, she wears a one piece dress as long as her knees and a wide brimmed straw hat.

“Hurry up!”

When I was about at least fifteen steps away from her, she lowers her hand and begin to run away from me. As she making a distance between me and her, I can hear playful giggles, as if she wants me to catch her.

“Wait!”

She have made an enough distance before I start to chase her. She doesn't run fast, didn't take much effort for me to catch her. But when I touch her figure, her body breaks to hundreds of raven flapping their wings to fly upward and disappear on the air. This surprise made me cover my face by crossing my arms. But oddly, her playful giggling voice don't disappear, I can still hear it from somewhere. I turn my face left and right and backwards to find her again.

“Hey, <...>!”

I can her again, but instead of approaching her, I turn myself and try to ignore her. But wherever I turn, I can still see her in afar in front of my eyes.

“ENOUGH!”

I unleash my rage by shouting on top of my lungs, but by doing so, this place's sky and ground begin to turns upside down. The black ground shifts forwards while the grey skies shift backwards until the black ground ends in the place of the grey skies and the grey skies ends in the former place of the black ground. But in other side, the white figure stopped giggling and calling me.

The sudden paradigm shift of this place's makes me terrified, again, I want to get out. For at least four times, I turned my face backwards looking for the desk and chair or the exit without finding anything, until suddenly I see the same white figure again. But now she is hanging from the black ground ceiling, staring its hollow face at me blankly.

“You're la~te!”

“Huh?”

She touches my forehead using her right index finger, her touch makes me flinch and close both of my eyes. Her touch makes this whole place collapse, the sensation of her touch soon be forgotten by the explosion of gushing wind all around me. I don't know what happened to this place, the next thing I know, I went unconscious. I fall into dreamless slumber, the time revolves, the world rotates, all without me.