The first thing Saki did when she arrived home was take a long, hot soak in her bathtub. It didn't matter how tired she felt, she could never start relaxing at home until she had a hot bath.
She began to fill the tub with water, making sure the temperature was turned all the way up, then added some lavender-scented bubble bath salts.
While waiting for the tub to fill, she slowly peeled off her clothes and loaded them into the washing machine. She took a quick shower to wash away the dirt stuck to her body before proceeding to soak in the tub.
The bathroom was covered with steam, providing the illusion that one is in a spa or a hot spring. Saki submerged her body into the foamy hot water, sighing as she felt her exhaustion melt away. The bubbles covered the surface of the water and clung to her skin, sending a relaxing lavender aroma when they burst.
She soaked in the tub until the tips of her fingers began to wrinkle, before getting up and changing into her pajamas. She emerged from the bathroom with a towel over her head which she gently used to dab the water out of her pink hair.
It was still early in the evening so she decided to do some work before heading to bed. But as she was turning to head towards the study, her stomach began to rumble.
"Let's make dinner first, then," she said to herself.
She headed to the kitchen and heated some water in the electric kettle, then grabbed a big bowl of spicy instant noodles from the pantry.
Hunter had invited her for dinner earlier, which she politely declined. She wanted -- no, needed -- to come home. She needed her sanctuary -- a place where she could be herself. Of course, she couldn't really tell him that, so she told him she had some work she needed to do back home.
He conceded and drove her to her apartment.
She poached an egg in a pan of hot water while she waited for her noodles to become ready. Having spent a lot of days eating only instant noodles during college and sometimes when they go on an expedition and cooking was limited, she had the timing down to pat, so much so that by the time the egg was poached to her liking (with a runny yolk), the noodles were ready too.
The smell of spices filled her nose as she uncovered the hot bowl of noodles and dropped the egg into it. She happily inhaled the steam that rose from the bowl and sighed contentedly. Nothing beats a big bowl of hot spicy noodles with poached egg, not even the fanciest hotel meals. She sat on a small chair in front of the small table next to the kitchen island counter and ate.
Her thoughts lingered to the conversation she and Hunter had on the plane.
"There are things that you may not believe in, but it doesn't necessarily mean they don't exist," Hunter began.
"Our ancestors were aware of this, as I am sure you have seen through the numerous records they have left behind."
She did not want to listen. A big part of her wanted to remain anchored in a reality she can see and touch. Archaeology was her way to explain the mysteries she saw all around her. What Hunter was trying to make her believe was something her pragmatic nature actively denied.
Still, pragmatism tells her that what she witnessed earlier can be explained by normal means. It's just that her knowledge was lacking to make sense of it yet. She decided to open her mind and soak in the information. Sorting out could come later.
"I may or may not believe it, but that is beside the point. You have to prove that you respect me enough to not bullshit me or think that I cannot see through it," she interrupted which made Hunter look at her hard.
"Alright… that goes without saying. I hope you don't also look down on me and think of me as someone who wastes his time speaking nonsense," he countered.
This simple conversation has turned into a sparring of words. She welcomed it. If it becomes multi-layered, Hunter will have more trouble feeding her cow dung.
"Our family has also engaged in archeology much like you do. That is something you might appreciate. All these things I am telling you are going to be based on something that still exists materially in our world."
"You speak as if there are more worlds…" she mused but tried hard not to sound unconvinced.
"We are getting ahead of ourselves. Yes, we will come to that but first, I want you to know some things beforehand."
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
Hunter stayed quiet for a time, like he was trying so hard to formulate his thoughts.
"This is a family secret that may or not change the way you see us… but that is neither here nor there. All I am asking is that you keep an open mind. Don't attach meanings where there is none."
"I will be the judge of that…" she quickly responded.
Hunter decided that it had gone past circumspection. His face took on a very serious look.
"Our family found a scroll a long time ago. It took us a very long time as well to decipher what it meant but eventually, we did. It told of a catastrophe that literally cracked the world. At first, we did not understand. I was told that my ancestors even threw away the first scroll. Yes, there were others…" he paused and signaled for Hamarr to come.
He asked for two cups of coffee.
"My head is beginning to hurt and yours would be, I believe, in just a while," he winced.
"I am still handling it well enough," she said with a straight face.
"One enlightened ancestor took to research seriously and only because they witnessed an anomaly that coincided with what the first scroll said. It confirmed that what it said was not total gibberish. They did what any self-respecting thinker would do. They decided to investigate and look for the place where the world was cracked according to the scroll."
He paused as he took one coffee and motioned for her to take the other one. She did and he resumed.
"Are you curious as to where that place could be?" he smiled at her.
"No," she said but her rapt expression betrayed her and she laughed. "Alright, where?" She caved.
"Nowhere. They did not find it…" he anticipated her expression and quickly stopped her from commenting. "...BUT they found something else. A second scroll in an impossible place and circumstance. A place that is not supposed to exist. Pompeii."
He sipped his coffee as he peered on her. She knows he is waiting for a comment so she threw an obvious one.
"But Pompeii still exists. Sure, it was buried when Vesuvius decided to unleash his wrath on them but it has been uncovered and declared a UNESCO site. So you found another scroll on an ancient ruin. What is impossible about that? Unless they found it before the calamity and even then, nothing is remarkable about that."
"The scroll was dated as both older and younger than Pompeii. Intrigued? The scroll itself is decidedly ancient and it was found in an area that would have been directly under the lava flow and the ash clouds yet it wasn't damaged at all. It predates the city by hundreds of years but the weathering did not match the timeline. Like it is new."
Hunter leaned closer.
"You know your archeology. THAT, alone would be hard to swallow but its content described another event that happened long after Vesuvius erupted. We traced it to another volcanic catastrophe in the South East Asian region. It only happened in 1991."
Saki blinked. She knows THAT event very well. Her team has one who was actually there when it happened.
"It led my whole family to a merry chase across the globe, Saki. It would just as easily have ruined us but by some fortune, we found ourselves benefitting from our knowledge gained from the scrolls. Most of their contents are still a mystery to us but it told us two things: 1, these scrolls almost always describe calamities, and 2, they involve two mysterious entities, these events, if we want to call them that."
Saki raised her eyebrows but remained quiet.
"I hope by now you would have an idea about where my story might lead," Hunter ventured.
Saki looked out the window before answering.
"I might have an opinion or two but you still haven't answered the biggest questions in my mind so I'm gonna have to tell you to go on," she smiled sweetly but her eyes told him another story.
"I wanna hear what you deduced, first," Hunter urged.
"You want to know if I am a complete airhead, is that it?" she shot back hotly.
"Yes.... I want to be able to know you better and I want to see if I can have conversations in the future that would not involve a lot of eye-rolling and empty giggles!" He never raised his voice but Saki heard him screaming in her head just the same.
"...and NO, I didn't do it because I look down on you. Quite the opposite. I genuinely am curious as to what theories you have formed so far."
"Fine. These scrolls of yours described entities, places and events that are considered anomalous, so to speak. That suggests a break from conventional logic. Therefore they border on what we consider as paranormal phenomena. You used the words places and circumstance in that context and that would suggest that these places are neither here in the present where conventional thought applies. That obviously speaks of dimensional crossing. That was what the first scroll described. A literal tear in the fabric of reality." She looked at him challengingly.
His open mouth told her he is no longer up for a fight.
"Bravo…" he acknowledged.
Saki mimicked a little curtsy even in her seat.
"Yes, we found dimensional tears, if that is what they are called. The scrolls described how to find them and we figured out a way to briefly go into these pocket dimensions."
"You raided these pockets...you pirates!" she teased.
"Not quite. Call us artifact collectors and retrievers if you will," he said, visibly irked by the suggestion.
"That answers how you have amassed a fortune that is unmatched by your taxable income. I just thought you were just a tax crook." She was pleased by Hunter's obvious discomfort.
"That still didn't answer why you have this very unusual interest in my family," Saki dropped her bomb.
"At first, our interest was just THAT but I found that there is more here than meets the eye. That is why I am confiding in you. There is a lot that I don't know yet and with your help, maybe we can find more answers."
"That is the partial answer…" Saki left it hanging.
"We found bigger doorways, Saki. Bigger than what we have raided so far. My interest in those are way beyond just amassing fortunes. We could be at the cusp of the biggest breakthrough this world has ever seen."
"Getting there, Mr. Pirate… but nothing in your answer even remotely convinced me how I or my family figured in this story of yours."
"To cut it short… I want you to be our partner in going into these doorways."
"Why us?"
"Because you have… the key."