I couldn't pass up the chance to learn more about the government's most secretive agency.
My status as a wraith already opened up a great many doors to me, figuratively speaking. Now I would begin to learn precisely which doors deserved exploration—and, indeed, which doors might remain barred to me.
Next
Now. Nevada. The Mount Vernon Ranch, sixty miles outside Las Vegas.
The present moment returns to you. You are within the compound of the No State Separatists. Your current mission is to find evidence linking the Separatists to the True Freedom Party, a radical political movement.
You have your hand on a door, ready to open it, though you know nothing of what lies beyond.
The atmosphere in the room around you has changed. The Separatists are checking that their automatic weapons are loaded and clipping extra ammunition to their belts. They bark out instructions to one another. Somewhere above, you hear the sound of a helicopter.
And you hear Agent Meeks, his electronically distorted voice in your ear. "Respond, Agent. What's your situation? Respond, please!"
"I'm…I'm here," you mumble. "What's happening?"
"Glad to hear you're okay," says Meeks. "We were out of contact with you for about a minute and a half. Can you update us on the situation inside the compound?"
A minute and a half? You've just relived, with intense clarity, months of your existence. And still, those memories roll forward, distracting you from the present moment. They're less vivid now, but they come unbidden nonetheless.
Your arrival at Las Vegas International on a jet registered to SENTINEL. Traveling in the back of a black van to the vicinity of the No State Separatist compound. Entering the compound and feeling sickened that the Separatists had brought children to this place. Searching this very meeting hall and choosing not to intrude upon the people in the bathroom. Seeing this door and opening yourself to its otherworldly energies. Ignoring Meeks's instruction not to open the door out of sheer, bloody-minded stubbornness.
The door is solid to your touch. You yank at it and, though it is formed from a great block of stone, it pulls open. Beyond, a vast chamber, a cathedral carved from rock. You step through the doorway.
This new room is immense. Sheer, slate-gray walls rise up high above you on every side. Far, far above, an opening that affords you a sliver of the night sky. And then, a flash of lightning—scarlet lightning, as you have seen only a couple of times before.
A ball of bright-glowing mist hangs in the center of this huge room. It shifts, throwing shadows from titanic pillars spaced around the room. In those pools of darkness may lie other doorways, exits from this place. Likewise, the door through which you entered is an opening in one gigantic wall. Beyond, you can still see that meeting hall in the Separatists' compound. It, and they, seem very small just now. You are far away from Nevada.
That ball of mist is the only source of light present—even your own form does not shine here. You raise your hands to your face to examine them.
You are solid, or almost solid, here. You are very nearly as you were before.
And in the center of this cathedral, an enormous circular pit sinks into the floor. You approach its edge. The bright mist hangs directly above it, and yet even this bright light cannot reach its bottom. The pit becomes a deep shaft that descends into utter, utter blackness.
A booming voice, which has no source: Bring forth the Well.
It echoes away into silence. You wait before speaking. "What?