Project Devilgama

Four

"Hello, Mhaz." A voice emerged behind.

Mhaz opened his eyes. He found himself standing straight, which made it hard for him to wrap his head around waking up in this position. And people in suits of teal and white stood around him. Their ages aren't bound to any standards.

"Hannev?" Mhaz said, turning his head. "Where am I?"

He looked up at his surrounding as he walked. He was on a large boulder of sandstone on the ledge of a low hill. A plane of dry grassland stretched below him. And a patch of woods near his eye's corner. A flowing stream of a river. The bright sun hovers above, but he didn't feel unbearable heat – it's rather easy. The occasional breeze of wind blew him a clement feel of mild coldness.

The others gazed around. Some were kneeling in shock, and some were standing in petrify, brutally amazed by the fresh sight of nature. It felt different. Otherworldly. It's not supposed to be the same world he used to live in. Hannev had not given any word since the 'wake-up' and slowly stridden towards Mhaz.

The two stood against the wind. His gaze swept around in company to Mhaz's, across the vastness. "I have never been there before." He murmured.

"Hey, Hannev!" A person called out. "What have you done? What the hell is De... De, what? I can't remember anything."

Hannev smirked beside Mhaz then sillily chuckled. But Mhaz's sight was still in focus on the scenery unbothered - deep in his mind, he was still thinking about this unknown place. Thinking. He knew that he had lost a major part of his memories, thoughts, and ideas, and felt that his effort would be pointless. But the basic building blocks for knowledge, he could still have a grasp on them somehow. He was thankful that human intelligence is still working inside his brain. And he still remember names.

"You have one task to complete, ladies and gentlemen." Hannev intones. "Take a walk around. That's the only thing."

He walked to Mhaz. He closed the gap, his gestures giving slight clues of secret. Then slowly, he pulled out from a crevice in his suit a tablet. The tablet Mhaz had seen before he went into his new room but didn't remember. But still, Mhaz's attention isn't stolen yet. "If we're not wrong, then we are now at-"

A series of hard footsteps sounded behind the two and got closer, putting Hannev's beginning of showcase to a sudden halt. The thumps of soles become faster, progressively. "You have to pay for everything you've done, demon!" A scoff erupted from him.

Hannev turned to the walking late teenage boy behind which seemed to be convoluted in anger. The boy didn't stop his strides, and seen inside his hand is a piece of rock. "Whatever you're hiding from us, will be finally brought to light! Come here!" He elevated his hand and pointed toward the tablet. And, suddenly, he sprang to a dash.

"Subject 19-M1, you're terminated," Hannev spoke in an even tone despite Mhaz being concerned about how bad that last word sounded. But he didn't have time to process everything until Hannev abruptly started tapping the tablet several times.

Terminated?

Something strange happened to the boy in the last touch on the screen. He was suddenly engulfed in countless particles that seemed to radiate, and they wound up in a twisting shape. Rays of light blue shone around the place where it stood. They swirl and dance, quickly. In the end, his body dissipated into the thin sublimate. He was lost in the flash of the light. Everybody witnessed the whole brief moment end in the de-existence of the man.

The rock that the man held a moment before was dropped to the ground. Mhaz had the urge to approach it. It was somehow more concerning than the disappearance of a man, to Mhaz. Chatters of dumbfounded voices came from the people as he slowly walked, and then, he heard another indecipherable voice of fury rising from the crowd. Mhaz knew that people were having the intention to attack Hannev – and that man will, once more. The tablet is in danger.

"You two are the ones responsible for this." That man said in a high tone. He broke out of the commotion, running towards the rock. In a split second, Mhaz realized where the man is going after. He wanted to fasten his pace, wishing to outspeed in a sprint.

But that man had reached the rock right at the moment Mhaz initiated the quicker move. "Now what are you going to do?" He said in sinister, throwing the rock up in the air and catching it again as it falls. "Go back to hell where you belong."

"Wait, there's something about the rock," Mhaz responded, trying to calm him down as he moved back a step. He didn't want another person to be pulverized into nothingness by whatever it is. He thought that this strange trip wasn't supposed to start crappy. And the man stood still but cynically. He looked at the rock in his grasp for a while, and silence fell upon all of them. Mhaz can hear the wind whistling, the leaves rustling, and people watching as if Mhaz and he were about to wage a fight, which is the last thing he wished to happen.

Then, breaking out of the moment of quietness, the man said, "You're right. Because I can change the whole scenario with this magical stone of the ancient world."

He began charging down towards Mhaz, failing to learn of what had occurred just a moment ago. And Mhaz didn't move a muscle, while the rock-holding man began to drop the distance down between the two. He surely believes his mind about what is about to happen in the next few seconds.

"Subject 19-R1, you're terminated," Hannev said from behind.

--

The same rapid process of elimination happened to the outraged man. And Hannev stood still. His emotion remains flat, even.

"Mhaz, go take a look." He ordered, "Just in case there's something that sparks your fresh curiosity out of your mind."

Mhaz comes up in a couple of strides toward the rock. He knelt, and his hand started probing it. Across the grooves, around the edge. He could feel that a work of dextrous hand had imprinted a distinct signature on its shape.

"Is there any sort of bush craftsman here? Or something like a stranded man?" Mhaz asked.

He picked the rock off the dusty ground and spun it around with his hands. The rock was roughly shaped like an adze head upon closer inspection. It was far from perfect. However, the cleavages and the breakages reflect its creation's age and the level of its makers' minds. It boggled Mhaz for a while.

"We are back to the times when we were young. Stranded, threatened, and banished in nature with nothing but brain." Hannev said, his voice mumbled at the end. And his eyes turned fractals. "Before we built homes on our neighbor world, fleet the globe in transporters, made fusion cores, rewriting the codes of the lifeforms, and Devilgama, that was one of the most advanced things we could possess."

Mhaz peeked at the dispersed crowd behind him. The confusion remained a blanket over their thoughts. And he was aware that his mind had forgotten half of what Hannev had said briefly. "When are we, then?" Mhaz asked.

Hannev cleared his throat, inhaled deeply, and said, "About a million years ago, Mhaz."