Heir of G.O'D. Revelations Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  The Ordinance: Book of the Devastation (14:11-12)

  Mid Kaspersky, 2045

  -01-

  Wednesday, Halley 24th, 2043

  -02-

  -03-

  -04-

  Saturday, December 27th, 2025

  Rebirth Day, 2043

  -06-

  -07-

  One Year Later

  Thursday, Halley 18th, 2044

  -08-

  -09-

  -10-

  -11-

  Friday, Halley 19th, 2044

  -12-

  -13-

  -14-

  Saturday, Halley 20th, 2044

  -15-

  -16-

  -17-

  -18-

  Sunday, Halley 21st, 2044

  -19-

  -20-

  -21-

  Monday, Halley 22nd, 2044

  -22-

  -23-

  -24-

  -25-

  Tuesday, Halley 23rd, 2044

  -26-

  -27-

  -28-

  Wednesday, Halley 24th, 2044

  -29-

  Thursday, Halley 25th, 2044

  -30-

  Thank You!

  Releases Coming Soon

  Life After?

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Gary O’Drae’s Fracking Blog

  Sol Calendar of 2022

  Regions and World collectives

  Glossary and Terms

  Heir of G.O’D. Revelations (1) by Harper Maze

  The Heir of G.O’D.

  Revelations (Book 1)

  By: Harper Maze

  www.harpermaze.com

  Copyright © 2020 Harper Maze

  Dedication

  To everyone who does not believe in

  global warming, the dangers

  and effects of fracking,

  or the realities of

  climate

  change

  Open your eyes!

  The Ordinance: Book of the Devastation (14:11-12)

  The lands rumbled and shook and were rent apart. As the earth broke, and clouds of death filled the sky and rivers of molten rock flooded the land, people fled.

  He looked upon the Devastation and wept. “How have we not learned?”

  The Ordinance: Book of the Devastation (14:11-12)

  Mid Kaspersky, 2045

  BAKTUN (properly bʼakʼtun) is 20 katun cycles of the ancient

  Maya Long Count Calendar, containing 144,000 days

  The Baktun occurring on 21st December 2012 was regarded as the end of the 5,126-year-long Maya Long Count Calendar which began over three millennia BCE.

  Baktun in Sol means the end of all.

  -01-

  Blackness. All-encompassing smothering darkness. Not the black of deep space where pinpricks of light from stars and distant galaxies are visible, but pure darkness, like wearing a blindfold in an unlit cave buried in the Earth’s crust.

  I never told you, but that’s what being blind is like.

  Imagine being unable to see furniture, doorways, or even the walls. A world where windows are superfluous, and ornaments and furnishings are hazards rather than mere decoration. Close your eyes and imagine dreams devoid of images and a life where getting dressed requires both meticulous preparation and a set routine, and where venturing outside is a minor expedition.

  That’s what my life would still be like if I wasn’t one of the lucky ones.

  Looking back, it’s hard to remember existing inside my container, my eight feet by twenty home for a decade or more. A compact space where everything had its place; from the bed area and tiny bathroom at the rear, to the kitchenette in the middle and the Sol harness-rig at the front. A single item out of place, or an object like my precious fridge moved the tiniest distance to the side, would result in another bruise to my battered body. My container was my sanctuary and my refuge, and how I coped realworld.

  Converted from a shipping container, the metal box provided protection from outside, my tiny castle in a broken world. Safe from the moving electric carts and delivery drones that I couldn’t see, walled off from drugged Mex-heads and Sol-addicts who would mug me for my haptics, my ID or my Sol account. Not to mention the myriad of other dangers that Denver would regale me of daily, including the latest blind person Sol-Corp had captured. Outside that stank of refuse and human waste and stale air, where the Earth still struggled to repair itself after we, humans, ripped our planet apart. The container kept me safe, detached from everything, and everyone, and allowed me to be alone with Sol.

  I sit here now, aware of the truth and the decision that I must make, and I can’t help but question it all. Have I made my choice already? What if I’m wrong?

  Simon’s voice, richly baritone, but thick with rasping pain as blood seeped from the bullet wounds in his chest, echoes in my mind. ‘Ana, you know what you need to do.’

  Everything rests on me now.

  I hope you can forgive me for my choice. I couldn’t see another way.

  Don’t hate me.

  Ana

  Wednesday, Halley 24th, 2043

  Remembrance Day - The Year Before Baktun

  After the passing of The Creator, his disciples discovered his Testament and determined to perform his wishes. The Church of G.O’D. was founded on his Testament and his wishes and recorded in The Ordinance for all to read.

  The Ordinance: The Founding

  -02-

  The sinking sun lends the cloud-streaked sky a fiery glow. The moody sea to my left, as I hurry south away from my hunter, shimmers in undulating reds and oranges. An echoing recoil of a sniper rifle sounds from my right. The shooter is hiding up somewhere in the Princess Juliana International Airport, built on Maho Beach, Saint Martin. I leap over the traffic barrier and hunker behind a pointless sign for cover. Pointless because it’s got a picture of a plane on it, and a warning that standing here can be deadly thanks to the jet blasts from arriving aircraft. Only, the world hasn’t seen a real plane in almost two decades, and me never. How could I?

  My heart threatens to explode from my chest, thumping against my ribs like a nostalgic Disney rabbit. “Where the frack are they?”

  “Holed up in the control tower,” says Denver, my spotter, his monotone voice droning through my tinny earpiece.

  The display chimes to confirm seventeen people left, and a little over twelve minutes to survive. Thanks to my thirty-two kills I’m ranked third. Not winning, but if I add the promised sponsor prizes to my savings, I should have enough for…

  A bullet cuts through the sign above my head, peeling back a hole like an exploded orange. “Concentrate!” orders Denver.

  I can only finish third if I don’t get shot in the next few minutes. Swinging my rifle around, I nestle in the swaying grass and shoulder my Heckler & Koch G28, searching through the scope. The shooter’s taken refuge in the perfect structure, making it nigh-on impossible for me to spot them. The glass tower rises several floors tall, each with a myriad of windows.

  Frack, I think to myself. I hate being exposed in the open like this.

  Precious seconds drift away as I scan each window with meticulous care for the minutest sign of movement. Single-minded focus almost costs me, and I fail to notice a looming shadow as someone rises from the beach behind me. The sniper fires again from somewhere on the top floor, hitting the sneak in the head and blasting his helmet to pieces.

  I don’t need any encouragement or instruction from Denver to know I need to move my butt; his orders are nothing more than a distracting babble. I scramble to my feet, clamber
over the barrier and sprint across the road to the beach. The drop is enough to take me out of view from the sniper but leaves me exposed to assailants who may lurk at either end. The trouble with this exclusive annual time-limit Bounty Hunter is that the sponsors invite the top five hundred ranked fighters, and only the top five remaining at the end get prizes.

  As I roll towards the sea another bullet drives into the sand, burying itself in the body imprint I left behind. The vultures are closing in, and my rank is making me a target. I dislike countback scoring with a passion.

  My heartbeat no longer sounds like a drum but threatens to explode through my rib cage like a stomach-bursting alien. Praying that the metal sheet strapped to my back—looted from one of my first victims—protects my retreat as I sprint south along the sand. The building, a decorated tropical bar, at the southern tip of the beach offers a glimpse of sanctuary.

  I swerve to avoid the hail of bullets as I scamper through the sand, then clamber up to the building, and flop inside the nearest door. Air fills my lungs as I pant, more from nerves and adrenaline than effort.

  “Aren’t you listening?” Denver’s voice burns with anger and frustration, again. Anyone would think that me making the podium was going to change his life. “On countback you’re sixth now.”

  “Fracking countbacks.”

  Desperate for liquid, I grab my water tin and moisten my lips before swishing the ice cool water around in my mouth.

  I need another kill.

  I’m in a beachside hotel lit by the failing sun with under four minutes left to rescue my event, four minutes to win the life-changing voucher prize on offer. I race through the building, ignoring my cautious inner voice, my fearful conscience born to worry. In the courtyard I find a wooden grid screwed to the wall, like a vine-entangled ladder. I unfasten the metal plate and let it clatter to the ground, before climbing to the roof. With the sniper hunting me, I keep low beneath the apex and out of sight of the distant tower across the airfield. Along the beach everything is still. I swing my G28 around, lay prone and scan for movement along the shore.

  “Anything?” I ask into my microphone.

  “Quiet! I’m concentrating.”

  I wish Denver would stop being Denver, just for a minute. He’s all I’ve got though. As the sun drops further on the horizon, the gloom increases and the clock ticks relentlessly towards the final claxon, to herald another failure. I catch the slightest, briefest, of movements in the shadows of a beach chair. No time to think, I point my rifle and fire. The victim slumps as my bullet blasts through their shoulder. Not a killing blow, but the second takes them in the chest.

  “Fifth.”

  “Frack.” I still need one more kill – the prize for fifth isn’t enough, and the item listing will be over soon. A bullet smashes the roof tiles above me. I slide a little lower and slither right, ignoring the warning that flashes inside my visor. Another shot, and more smashed tiles rain down.

  “Hurry. Thirty-eight seconds.”

  A year of effort, collecting points, a month or more of saving, and I have under a minute to rescue everything. My prize is slipping away like water through a sieve. I try to peek over the apex, but another shot booms and more tiles explode, a large fragment bouncing off my helmet. Whoever it is, has a spotter like me (and likely a less grumpy and demanding one than Denver).

  “Twenty seconds.”

  Like a blaze of acknowledgement from G.O’D. himself, the sun flashes one last flare in the sky, soaking the command tower in a wall of red light. Praying that no one will notice, I press a hidden button on the undercarriage of my rifle that extinguishes all reflection on the windows. It’s against the rules, and I’ll get banned, again, if I get caught. But I’ve got to podium; the prize is life-changing for me. Using the hack more than once almost guarantees detection, a single shot is almost as risky. I cross everything that my hack goes unnoticed in the chaotic conclusion of the final seconds. The time for finesse disappeared with the fading light. Hoping the sun’s flare has blinded the sniper, I search through the scope for a silhouette, or a flicker of movement. I think I spot something three windows from the left, on the uppermost storey. It must be them.

  “Five, four, three…”

  I shoot.

  -03-

  “Holy frack, you did it!” Denver whoops and thumps his booted feet on my container’s padded floor, the sudden outburst making my heart skip a few uncomfortable beats too many.

  The image of the beach on Saint Martin in the Caribbean fades out, replaced by the Arena dome cluster-zone. Most of the other competitors have drifted away already, but a few remain browsing the virtual shops run by the Event’s three sponsors that are offering extra discounts to entice those of us who competed. A presentation platform sits amongst a gaudy bank of advertising screens, streaming Sol housing and asteroids from 3arth R3al 3state, haptics by Haptical Illusions and salvaged equipment from NARaS (the only realworld sponsor). The promised NARaS vouchers are the entire reason for my determination to podium this year.

  B3t3arth who design, construct and host the Arenas, dominate the stage, but it’s not the gambling firm that’s making me feel anxious. Lining the stage on either side, as always, are Sol-Corp – the massive corporation that runs Sol itself and manages everything that happens in-Sim. Yesterday, more rumours started circulating through my Darknet groups – apparently Sol-Corp found another blind person, the nineteenth they’ve captured this year, and nobody knows why. My fear of detection heightens with each moment that I spend this close to the swarm of yellow and black uniformed Sol-Corp security wasps. I’m almost tempted to leave now and abandon my prizes.

  Almost.

  I suck in a deep breath. The prizes are why I compete, and this year there’s something I’m desperate enough to stay for. Wary of the security detail, I scan the corporate frackhats and spot one of my in-Sim friends; Arm@g3dd0n, the B3t3arth Arena announcer, is currently interviewing the event winner, DiscipleShuzo.

  Shuzo, bane of my Arena-competition life, and primary fighter of the Church of G.O’D. is accepting his ninth consecutive Bounty Hunter Invitational trophy, and the associated gold byte-ball prizes, with his inimitable customary indifference. I ignore the lot of them and focus on taking my remaining loot prizes, one each from the last two victims. DiscipleJanus, another COGOD fanatic, black-screened amongst the deckchairs on the beach, while D0m1n3M0rti$, a guy I often encounter in Arenas, was my tower victim. I’m not surprised he was in the tower; D0m1n3M0rti$ is a frequent Blazer, hiding for most of an event before killing a few key targets for countbacks at the end. I take the most valuable item from each player and swipe the windows closed. Although I’ve never met D0m1n3M0rti$, or any of the others in person, he’s legendary for a sixth finger on his left hand, something he claims he has realworld too.

  “… and in second place, with that thrilling finale worthy of any movie is G@n@le0.”

  G@n@le0, the name that floats above my avatar inside Sol, is pronounced Gan-ah-lay-oh. It uses the alphanumericabet of 2023, merging my realworld name Ana with my all-time favourite historical figure, Galileo Galilei.

  In complete contrast to my green-brown patched combat trousers, deep green vest the colour of pine needles and thick combat boots, Arm@g3dd0n is resplendent in a crimson dinner jacket with black lapels and a pristine white shirt. His restless fingers twiddle the iconic blood-red bowtie fastened at his collar. He looks ancient, like sixty or something, with wrinkles creasing his avatar’s pale skin and perfectly Brylcreemed swept back white hair, reminding me of an eccentric English gentleman.

  “Tell me, my dear, and ignore the millions of viewers watching you, what was going through your mind in those final seconds? A minute left and you were in sixth, not even in the prizes. Yet, here you are on the podium again.”

  For me, the worst part of Events is being forced to speak at the end. Arm@g3dd0n’s okay, but the rest...

  What if they realise?

  Bile bubbles up inside me like a mudp
ot. I hate having to be so near to the reality-detached corporate frackers, living in their ivory towers (as Denver calls them), whilst the rest of us struggle to scrape enough $uns for food and water. $uns, pronounced suns, is the in-Sim currency that everyone uses for everything, Sol or realworld. If it wasn’t for my skill in the Arenas, and my unique visor that compensates in-Sim for my disability, I’d still be poor and living in the slums, or worse. I’ve got to play along though, or I don’t get my rewards.

  “Frustration. Desperation. Fear of failure.” My voice sounds thin in my ears, the strain from trying to be civil to the frackhats evident in my tone, despite my efforts to mask it. I want to add: ‘Fear of not being able to afford food. Again’, but I don’t want to give them the satisfaction. Arm@g3dd0n likes me, I think. I make him, and the betting company he represents, a serious chunk of money. $uns are everything.

  “True, my dear.” I bristle at his tone. Arm@g3dd0n is a friend, albeit an in-Sim one, but I’m certain he wouldn’t call Shuzo ‘dear’ or use such familiarity. “Tell me, G@n@le0, the final open Bounty Hunter of the year is tomorrow. Shuzo’s unbeaten in any Bounty Hunter event now for over two years, since you yourself beat him back in Hawkin, 2041. Why should our delightful investors back you tomorrow?”

  By investors he means gamblers, most of whom profit from betting on the desperate competitors in the Arenas and other events, who are just trying to win enough $uns to survive. My last gasp rise in the charts likely cost many gamblers a fair packet, but then it probably made a bunch of others a decent profit. Either way, Arm@g3dd0n and B3t3arth will have made thousands, if not millions. “He’ll lose eventually,” I say with a shrug.