Time Trials by M. A. Rothman & D. J. Butler

Author:M. A. Rothman & D. J. Butler [Rothman, M. A. & Butler, D. J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, LitRPG (Literary Role-Playing Game), Science Fiction, Time Travel, Fantasy, Action & Adventure
ISBN: 9781982192488
Google: Pbg3zwEACAAJ
Publisher: Baen
Published: 2023-03-07T05:00:00+00:00

The world had gained strange new colors for Kareem. He didn’t have names for them, but they seemed vaguely reddish. He had noticed this since the moment when the company had found itself on Jebel Mudawwar, but it really manifested itself in the darkness. At night, the strange colors somehow made it so that Kareem could see the ground at his feet, and objects in the dark that should have been invisible to him—plants were one shade, animals another. And the colors of some objects, especially, for instance, stone, and the earth, changed color over the course of a night.

Here again in the cave, he found the strange new colors meant that he could see the cave walls and floor even after Marty was forced to stop. He saw the bats as bright reddish clumps, firmly gripped to the ceiling of the cave. Kareem kept walking. He heard Marty calling after him, but he was too excited at the strangeness and newness of what he was doing to stop.

Perhaps the foreign archaeologists felt like this, when they stumbled upon the tombs and treasures of Egypt’s kings. And what mysterious treasures might Kareem find in this cave shaped like the ancient pharaonic cross? He envisioned gold coffins and heaps of jewels.

Or heaps of data for Dr. Cohen.

Thinking of Dr. Cohen, Kareem turned back. His heart leaped with delight at the fact that he could see his own footprints, painted in the strange colors behind him. But they were fading slowly, and he worried they might not last long enough for him to find his way back. From the corner of the room, he collected a heap of pebbles. He filled his pockets with them and also his hands.

“Don’t worry!” he called back. “I’m only looking!”

“Whatever you do, don’t light any torches or make any sparks. I smell oil in here.” Marty’s voice was distant, with an urgent tone. Luckily, Kareem could see just fine. He hadn’t thought of using his firestarter.

He left a slow, steady trail of pebbles. He found that, if he looked closely, he could see old footprints on the floor. They weren’t noticeable for their color, so they must not be recent, but he could see dimpled sand that showed which passages had been walked in and which had not.

The air grew thicker the farther he went. It smelled like his cousin Ahmed’s garage, which stank from the decades of oil stains on the floor, as well as from the sweat of the men tugging and hammering at the automobiles inside.

He followed the dimpled sand past large galleries, tall chimneys, thunderingly deep pits, and narrow cracks. The colors shifted the deeper he went, but he could always see.

And then, abruptly, the chamber ended. A smooth wall confronted him, with a mottled appearance. At the base of the wall rested a rectangular stone box, something like a crude sarcophagus. Elsewhere in the room lay blankets and other piles of bedding.

Kareem examined the wall. When he looked closely, he realized that the mottled shapes looked like hieroglyphs, only he couldn’t make out the details.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.