Time Maze

A Finished Journey?

"Cool. I always wanted to visit this place," Marcus said, looking around as if they were taking a guided tour, not fighting for their freedom.

"Are we safe, or should we worry about external interference?" Sybil asked, ignoring Marcus's childish comments.

"We should be okay. As far as I can tell, this is one of those years where Stonehenge was mostly left alone. Still, it can't hurt to keep an eye out as our carelessness was why George Villiers discovered this place that one time. He almost ended up time traveling. We were lucky we stopped him in time," Beor said absentmindedly.

It was like it was just another typical story in the endless line of equally common ones.

"George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham?" Tyson asked, his mind still interested in the history of it all even though it was the same history that could be their ultimate demise. "Is that why he dug a hole in the ground at the center of Stonehenge? He wasn't looking for buried treasure but for whatever your Maze's power source is?"

"Dude, how do you know that random stuff?" Marcus asked, barely remembering any events and their dates. "Why would you want to remember all those trivial things?"

"I was reading up on Stonehenge, and that was just one of those fun facts that stick with you," Tyson answered dismissively, waiting to hear Beor's answer.

"Yes, we had to hit him with the Time Eraser, and we made up the whole story about the buried treasure, fed it back to him," Beor said, sounding somewhat too proud of himself.

"And he bought it just like that?" Sybil asked, reconsidering if Beor was as harmless as she had thought.

"People choose to believe things that make more sense to them. For that period, buried treasure made a lot more sense than the heart of time traveling," Beor said, looking around carefully, trying to remember where the Perception Manipulator was.

"So, what, you just used one of the most important and well-known historic sites for your games?" Tyson asked, feeling as if it was a blemish on the face of history as he knew it.

"No, not really," Beor said, putting his hand on a barely perceptible curve in the nearby stone. "We created it."

As he said that, his hand fell through an invisible hole, and soon enough, they could see Stonehenge for what it was. A modern-looking hub of activity similar to the one they had just left behind, only more impressive.

The stones were transformed into smooth white surfaces while in the center of it all, a small column rose with a strange-looking ball of energy at the top. It was the most fascinating sight they had ever seen, and everyone, except for Beor, stood there staring unable to take their eyes away from it. Their knowledge of history, everything they thought they knew was rewritten before their eyes.

"That is. So. Cool." Marcus said, trying to touch one of the blank spaces.

"Don't touch anything," Beor warned. "There might be some unpleasant defense mechanisms still active."

Marcus quickly pulled his hand back, but it still hovered in the air as if the need to touch it to make sure it was real overruled his fear of being hurt. Even stunned as Tyson was, he hurried to put Marcus's hand down and pull him away from the stones.

"The whole history of Stonehenge is a lie?" Tyson asked, sounding offended by the notion.

In a way, he was, because Stonehenge had always been one of his favorite historical sights. He had spent hours trying to figure out how it was made. Attempting to understand how there were parts that seemed to have been taken from far away and how it seemed as if people had been building it for more than a thousand years. Now he just felt cheated.

"Well, not the whole history, but its ancient history is something we were messing with. All those contradicting stories on how it got there, how it was created and why, were made up by us," Beor said, shrugging his shoulders as if it was of no consequence to him. "We had to mask our true activity, and misinformation is always the best way. People are more likely to accept a legend than to embrace the truth."

Tyson wasn't satisfied with the answer, but there was nothing he could do about it. After all, he couldn't change the future, could he? Still, it was then that he realized that knowledge wasn't always a good thing and wished more than ever that he had a way of distancing himself from the events the way Marcus seemed to.

"Alright, what do you need us to do?" Tyson said, putting everything else aside except for their great escape.

"You see this bright line of power going from the center to that stone?" Beor asked, pointing at the line that reminded Tyson of an artery of the heart of time travel. "We need to check which ones are off, and then I'll do my best to reconnect them."

Everyone was put to work, and soon enough, they had an idea of what needed to be done, as at least half of the lines were cut off, disconnected in a rather crude way.

"Now, I need to use this core to weave out a few strands of Sunstrium, and we should be able to implant it in the gaps they created to stop the flow of energy," Beor said thoughtfully.

"But what if the gap is too big?" Sybil asked, trying to keep up with all the future tech that made little or no sense to her.

"That's not a problem. Sunstrium is a new material we discovered that has the replication ability. It should fill up the gaps no matter what," Beor said, slowly extracting the strange stringy matter that seemed alive as it twirled and writhed around in his hands.

"That's so beautiful," Sybil said, mesmerized by the energy source that was unlike anything they had ever seen.

"It's the most common energy source in our time. I don't know how it is extracted or how it works. But as far as I understand it, it comes from the sun itself," Beor said as they all watched in wonder as it repatched itself. It ended by creating bright lines towards the stones like rays of sunshine burning brightly before their feet.

"Wow!" Marcus exclaimed. "Who cares how it works when it's so cool!"

And work it did. The whole place was buzzing with energy. It was like electricity was building up to something far more wonderful than they could ever imagine. The grand revelation of their way home.

"What happens now?" Sybil asked, ready to leave years of struggles and pain behind.

"Now we wait for the exit to reassert itself, and then we go home," Beor said as if it was as simple as that.

However, after all the trials and tribulations, Tyson couldn't believe that now when they were one step away from victory, things would go as well as they hoped. There was just something anti-climactic about it all.

"What? Where are we? These are not the tunnels?" An unfamiliar, utterly confused voice stated.

That was when they noticed many people appearing, the Mazers popping up all around them, appearing as suddenly as the first one. All of them were equally confused and terrified of the change in what they expected from the Maze.

"It's them! Kill them," a familiar voice said as two guns were raised in their general direction.

Yes, things were not as easy as Beor presented them, and Tyson hated that he was right, once again. There wouldn't be a peaceful little send-off, but they had to go out with a bang. Maybe even a literal one.