Dreams of a Red Horizon

9 - Hosea

"Who's there," an invisible figure from behind the wall croaked out as I approached.

"None of your business, now open the gate," I called back with the same amount of annoyance that I felt about the old man insisting we meet on this particular VR server. I was tired from working almost non-stop for the last 16 hours, and was in no mood to play games with a sentry who took his job too seriously.

A loud thump came from the tall wooden door cut into the stone wall that surrounded the village. The door opened slowly and a balding head popped out from behind it. "State your name and business, stranger."

I sighed. The old man hadn't said anything about how to get through the gate to the village, only where to meet him and when. "I have a meeting with somebody inside," I said. "Now please let me through."

"A meeting with who?"

"Why does it matter?" I asked.

"Well, I've never seen you before, so I don't trust you. How do I know you're not with Control?"

"If I was with Control how would I get in here? You guys don't hand out the room password, which changes every day by the way, to just anybody. And why would I walk around and make my presence known? Wouldn't I just track the incoming connections and record what was being said until I caught everybody?"

The balding man furrowed his brow and looked puzzled. "I guess I never thought of that," he said. "But still, I don't know you. And unless..."

"Joel, old man, are you harassing people again?" an amused deep voice called from inside the gate.

The balding man craned his neck around and addressed the voice I couldn't see. "Harassing? No, I was just trying to make sure that..."

"You know that the council has already talked to you about this. You can't keep people from entering the village. Even if you don't recognize them," the mystery voice continued. "Now open the gate."

The old man muttered a few things under his breath about elders and respect as he begrudgingly complied. The door swung open and I spotted the man that must have been the mystery voice facing us. He had braided hair, a dark complexion, and wore a light cotton shirt and cargo pants over a well built body.

He walked out to me, saying, "You must be Joseph. I'm Isaac. A mutual friend asked me to come get you and bring you to him."

I nodded. He must be talking about the old man.

Isaac gestured towards the central part of the village and waited for me to proceed. I did, with him following closely and the balding man Isaac had called Joel closing the gate behind us. We wordlessly walked up a slope of long stairs past stone and rock and wood huts and buildings that circled around the village. In the windows of many of them white sheets blew and flapped in the wind. To the east, a tall mountain jutted from the landscape like the face of an ancient king watching over his valley. The houses of the village in the same direction climbed a hill that led to the mountain, as if they were cut into the mountain's slope.

"You know, we've actually kind of met before," Isaac said, breaking the silence between us.

"Where?"

"At the Cofa bar."

I nodded. "So you're the one they sent to keep track of me."

"Yup."

"And you're also the one who almost got me detained by Control. I hope you're not keeping track of me anymore."

Isaac laughed again. "No, not anymore. Not that I could anyways, after what happened. A grey-market contact that was supplying us with weapons got careless and burned me. Nothing I could do. Anyways I had to spend three days disconnected until my Sensee unit could be replaced with a clean one. And I still have to stay inside until the heat burns down. You got it easy, man."