The Mausoleum

Choice 1

You awake suddenly. You lie prone on the cold ground. The integrity of your environment-suit’s seal seems sound. Your breath fogs the inside of your visor…or possibly it’s your mind that is foggy from whatever put you in an unconscious state. Gathering your bearings, you glance at the heads-up display in the top-left corner of your visor: oxygen is running low (17%), but you have nothing to worry about yet.

You slowly get to your feet and take in your surroundings. You don’t recognize the place. You stand in a stone chamber, cylindrical in shape, with columns at even intervals around the room. Light shines down from high above. You cannot tell if the central area of the room has a ceiling or not, the walls go so high. Beyond the columns, the ceiling is much lower, masking off the overhead light and making it difficult to see much farther into the space. You can make out a stone slab, what might be a table, beyond the columns; something rectangular rests on top of it. You also see a closed door, well-lit, beyond the columns on the opposite side of the room. Oddly, while the walls, floor, columns, and ceiling are made of stone, the door seems to be metal from what you can tell.

Choice 2

You approach the stone table, passing by the columns into the room’s dark corners. For a couple of seconds you lose track of the table in the darkness, but your eyes quickly adjust. You glance at your oxygen supply (16%). Upon closer examination the stone table is what it appears to be: a table. While there is no seating around it, you do see a stone tablet resting atop the table.

Choice 3

You pick up the stone tablet. It’s much lighter than you expect. While the script is in a language you do not recognize, you are somehow able to comprehend its meaning. The tablet reads:

“Now that you have read these words, they cannot be unread. Follow these instructions thusly,

- Light a candle on the pathway to my casket’s room

- Purge local data

- Don’t follow the voices

- Insert tablet into my casket’s base”

You secure the tablet on your utility belt. (Oxygen’s at 12% now...draining faster than it should).

Choice 4

You approach the metal door. It seems so out of place in the austere room. Accent lighting affixes the oblong frame, casting the door in a pale, yellow glow. An access panel, waist-high next to the door, is open, revealing a pair of buttons: one extruded outward and illuminated green, the other pressed in flush to the panel and not lit up.

(Your oxygen counter reads 8% now. Something is wrong!)

Choice 5

You ignore the oxygen counter for now, adrenaline focusing your urge to escape the room.

You press the green button.

A pronounced hisssss pushes paths past the door’s peripheries. Slowly, the door slides up, revealing a dark passage. You step forward into darkness. Before long, it becomes impossible to see. You stretch your hand out to touch the wall and stay grounded to your surroundings. You remember your visor has a low-light setting. You could turn it on to see where you’re going, but that might affect your suit’s power consumption — and your oxygen. Your oxygen counter reads 7%.

Choice 6

The urge to enable your visor’s low-light setting is strong, but you take a moment to compose yourself and resist. You continue on in the dark. Comfort rises as your gloved fingertips sense scraping vibrations as you keep your hand affixed to the wall.

You continue for a timespan that is difficult to conceive. Darkness remains your only companion. Your oxygen counter reads 5%.

Suddenly, your foot snags on something outstretched across the path and you fall forward into blackness. Crack! Ouch, that hurt. You roll over on your back, taking a moment to collect yourself.

hisssssssssssssss

Oh no. A slender sliver branches down and across your visor: the sound of air escaping sends you into a state of near panic.

Choice 7

Your hands fumble over and rifle through the pouches on your utility belt. Your panic prevents you from making sense of what you’re touching.

4%

You feel small objects tumble out of the belt, scattering across the cold, stone floor. Your heart drums against your entire body.

3%

You stop. You lie back and look up at the darkness, no ceiling in sight. You close your eyes and take a deep…purifying…restorative — breath.

2%

Composed, you flip up a pouch, third from the center to the left, and reach inside. You pull out a roll of tape designed to patch suit damage.

You place the tape over the crack. This hissing sound of your oxygen escaping stops. You check the oxygen counter: holding at 2%.

Choice 8

You rush down the dark passage, leaving whatever it was you tripped over behind. You try your best to keep your eyes off the oxygen counter in your visor, but the darkness ahead (combined with the dread of not wanting the number to go down) makes this difficult.

But wait! Ahead, you see a faint light. You move toward it, and light expands within your field of view. You emerge from the passage, briefly blinded by the shift from total darkness to any light at all. Once your eyes adjust you begin to take in your surroundings.

Immediately, you notice a giant tree towering upward, reaching toward what you assume is the ceiling (though the room is so tall you cannot see where it ends, similar to the room where you first regained consciousness). Your eyes follow the thick trunk downward, but before you can register what lies beneath your eyes dart to your oxygen counter: it has just dropped to 1%.

Choice 9

As you confirm manual overrides within your suit system to unseal and remove your helmet, a rhyme rises to the surface of your memory:

Beyond the sky where dreams are made

lays a hallowed scene in which you’ll rest.

Here’s a place where time is dead

and change can never offer a protest.

You remove your helmet. You take a deep breath — and then breathe out. Floral fragrance fills your nostrils, and you can almost imagine a lazy breeze brushing across your face. Why did that poem come to mind just now?

Panic subsides. Your thoughts begin to settle and drift back to the tablet you found in the first room. You pull it out of your pouch and read it again:

“Now that you have read these words, they cannot be unread. Follow these instructions thusly,

- Light a candle on the pathway to my casket’s room

- Purge local data

- Don’t follow the voices

- Insert tablet into my casket’s base”

Choice 10

Your focus shifts to the giant tree. You take another big breath…and then exhale. There is an earthy smell to the air, and you wonder if it has something to do with this tree. But that's not where your attention remains.

Your eyes trace down the trunk and find the tree’s roots embracing a rectangular, stone block. You approach it.

The stone block is much larger than you first thought (almost twice the size of an average human). Upon closer inspection you notice that the stone block is in two pieces: a thin (relatively) slab on top, and the rest of the block beneath it. It appears at though it’s some kind of container…or sarcophagus.

Choice 11

You further examine the stone block. It’s definitely some kind of container, and you’re afraid to admit to yourself that it’s also most definitely some kind of coffin or sarcophagus.

You take a moment to try and remember how the hell you got here, or why you would have traveled to such a place. Your memory remains a haze.

There are symbols, writing perhaps, carved with craftsman-like precision on the top slab — you do not recognize any of the symbols. You kneel in front of the casket and find an rectangular opening where it appears something could be inserted.

As you lean in to examine the opening more closely, you feel a subtle pinprick at the back of your mind, manifesting as a whisper: there is a door behind the tree.

Choice 12

You ignore the whispering sensation for now and return focus to the rectangular slot in the stone casket’s base. You pull the stone tablet you found in the room where you first awoke and turn it over in your gloved hands — looks like a perfect fit.

You bend down and insert the tablet into the rectangular slot, and immediately jolt back in surprise as the casket’s top slab begins to open. Stone grinds against stone as the top slab disappears into the roots of the tree.

You stand, but before you can do or think anything, someone says:

“It’s about time.”

Choice 13

You lean forward, with bated trepidation, and peer into the stone casket. Inside lies a body — a skeleton to be more precise. Scraps of cloth are draped across sections of the rib cage, and what appear to be a steel saber and flintlock pistol have been laid atop the body. A leather boot adorns the right foot (the other is bootless). Your eyes continue to search the container; you are confused by the casket’s contents, but you begin to feel more comfortable.

Suddenly, you notice a strange high-tech device held in the skeleton’s left hand.

You turn around to see if you have possibly missed something. You see nothing. You hear nothing.

Your attention returns to the casket’s contents. You still have no idea where the voice came from. You think about reaching for the device, but then the whispering sensation returns — except this time it is not a single whisper, but many.

Don’t worry about the body, one says.

Look for a door behind the tree, says the same whisper from before.

You will die in this place…fitting, says another.

Turn back, hisses a final.

Choice 14

You do your best to ignore the whispers, and reach your hand into the stone casket. The device in the skeleton’s hand beckons to you.

Slowly… slowly…

You examine the device further as you reach. It can be best described as a glass slab, although there are details around its edges you have a hard time discerning. It seems all-at-once out of place and at home (much like most of the things in this strange place).

You grasp it. And slowly… you pull it from the skeleton’s hands.

The device (which is not an accurate description now that you hold it in your hands) is much as it appeared from a distance — a glass-like material encased between two impossibly-smooth, L-shaped, stone pieces (attached at its bottom-left and top-right corners). Small, golden rods protrude from the stone at weird trajectories. As you turn it back and forth in your hand, the glass produces a kaleidoscopic reflection.

Suddenly, a whisper hisses, put it back!

Choice 15

You are of two minds. You are intensely intrigued by the glass slab, but you are unsure how you should begin your investigation. At first you begin to touch the golden rods, one-by-one, yet you cannot bring yourself to put any pressure on them — you can’t tell if you’re afraid they’ll break, or if there is some deeper anxiety at play.

You then think about raising the slab up so that you can look through it but something, still, gives you pause.

As you rotate the object back and forth, raising then hesitating then lowering, you notice a white reflection in the glass-like material…in what seems to be the shape of a person.

You noticed the reflection mid-motion, as you were lowering the slab, before you could fully register what you saw (if it is indeed what you saw). You hear nothing behind you, but you feel a presence in the room.

The whispers are noticeably silent.

Choice 16

You raise the glass slab to eye level and turn around, looking through it.

“Like I said, it’s about time.” The words hit you before you have time to process what you see. Through the translucent, glass-like material you see a person, glowing dull-white from head-to-toe.

Their clothing is…odd. On first glance, they look like a pirate; there’s no better way to describe it. But as you look more closely, you notice high-tech flourishes — a control pad (likely for some kind of atmospherics) on their jacket’s chest, a utility belt made of space-age plastics, a device of some kind strapped to their left wrist, and what appears to be a rebreathing apparatus (though it is noticeably broken).

“You done staring?” the ghostly figure asks, putting their left arm on their hip.

Choice 17

You ask them if they have been the one whispering to you.

“The whispers have already started?” they ask with concerned tone. “We don’t have much time.”

Not ten minutes ago you about died from oxygen deprivation from a lack of supply in your environmental suit, and now you’re talking to…a what? You think to yourself that this can’t be real.

Briefly, you lower the glass slab and, just as you thought, you can no longer see the ghostly figure. You raise the slab back up to eye-level.

“You don’t look very concerned,” the figure says. “You should be more concerned. You did follow the instructions on that slab, didn’t you?”

Choice 18

You lie to them, telling them that you did indeed follow the instructions on the tablet, even though you did not light a candle (whatever that means) and you did not purge local data.

“Good, good, that’s a relief,” they say. “It doesn’t explain why the voices have started so early for you, but we can work with it.”

You feel a pang of guilt and a flitter of dread. You feel bad misleading…whatever this person is, but you’re unsure of what to say otherwise. Suddenly, indignation rises within you. You still have no idea where you are, why you came here (or were brought here), and what you must do in order to leave. You’re not mad at the ghostly pirate person, but they are the only lightning rod within striking distance.

Choice 19

You take a moment to compose yourself. You stuff your anger down, for now, and decide to focus on the identity of this strange being before you.

You ask them who they are.

“I don’t remember,” they say. Their arm stretches out and points at the skeleton in the stone casket, “I may not remember who I was — or am — but I do know that’s my body in the sarcophagus.”

You ask them how they died.

“Searching for the Secret of Life, what else?”

Cryptic, but you let it go for now.

You ask them when they died.

“A long time ago…I think. It’s been so long I can’t remember if I died yesterday or a thousand years ago. Do you ever have feelings like that? Mixing up time? Or is that a dead thing?”

As they have been talking, a sound has been growing in your ear — like an ocean tide rising and falling. It sounds so…peaceful. As the volume grows, it morphs into words. A whisper tingles up your spine.

It says, give this shade its final death. Destroy the object you pulled from the crypt.

Choice 20

You tell the ghostly figure what the whisper just said to you.

“This is getting really bad,” they say. “If the voices are able to speak to you at will, it means we don’t have much time. More specifically you don’t have much time.”

You track the ghost with the glass slab as they float toward the massive tree.

Without turning, they say, “I can create a connection between you and the tree. It will allow you to breathe anywhere in the Mausoleum.”

You make a note to yourself that this place is called the Mausoleum.

They continue, “With this connection you should be able to survive the passageway behind the tree. Follow that path and you will find what you came here for.”

You yourself are still unsure why you came to this place, but mentions of the “Secret of Life” and the “Mausoleum” are beginning to paint a morbid picture. You don’t see much of a point in resisting, so you nod your head in agreement.

“Hold still,” they say. Seconds pass. “Done.”

You don’t feel any different, but you take them at their word. You secure the glass slab to your utility belt and enter the passageway behind the tree.

You walk for a short distance in near darkness (you seem to be breathing fine) until a faint light appears ahead. You continue toward it until you reach a juncture with three doorways. Each has a symbol carved into the stone above.

The Left Doorway has the symbol of three horizontal, curving lines, stacked on top of each other (you interpret this as waves).

The Middle Doorway has the symbol of a triangle with a vertical line protruding down from the center of its base (you are unsure what this represents).

The Right Doorway has the symbol of a circle with a horizontal line dividing it into two halves (again you are unsure what this intended to represent).

Choice 21

You turn to the right and step through the doorway with the symbol of a divided circle.

The light from the juncture lights your way, framing your silhouette on the path before you. Though the path is much less spacious than the previous room, the echoes from your footfalls grow louder and louder. A din of echoes overwhelms you, so you stop for a moment and let them settle…settle…

You turn around to view the path you’ve walked, and the light goes out. No longer do you stand in a cramped, stone hallway; instead you stand in a multi-story hotel lobby filled with modern furniture (you are unsure how you know what this style is called, you just know). Chairs, and the occasional sofa, are grouped in conversational circles through the center of the lobby. Light streams in from skylights above, but it doesn’t seem natural (something about a subtle green tinge gives you this thought). You spot a front desk on the far side of the room; you notice a bell on the counter.

You look around and see no sign of a path back.

Choice 22

Your footsteps echo throughout the lobby as you make your way toward the front desk. You reach the desk and slide your hand across the faux-wood surface. When your hand reaches the bell, you ring it.

Ding!

You wait as the shrill sound of the bell dissipates into silence. Nothing is happening. You reach to ring the bell once more, but before you fingers make contact a compartment on the desk’s surface slides open. A computer screen emerges and rotates to face you at a forty-five degree angle. The screen blinks to life. Simple, blocky text rests on a blue background. It reads:

“You ignore the oxygen counter for now, adrenaline focusing your urge to escape the room.

You press the green button.

A pronounced hisssss pushes past the door’s peripheries. Slowly, the door slides up, revealing a dark passage. You step forward into darkness. Before long, it becomes impossible to see. You stretch your hand out to touch the wall and stay grounded to your surroundings. You remember that your visor has a low-light setting. You could turn it on to see where you’re going, but that might affect your suit’s power consumption — and your oxygen. Your oxygen counter reads 7%.

What do you do?

- Enable low-light setting

- Continue on in the dark”

Confusion and anxiety rise within you. Is this describing the events you went through not thirty minutes ago?

Choice 23

You refrain from selecting one of the options on the screen. You are unsure what doing so would lead to, but you don’t want to take a chance on reliving those events — you were not a fan.

Instead, you walk to the other side of the front desk and begin investigating. You check the various shelves and drawers. You find nothing, except a small, black, leather-bound book titled “HOLY BOOK”. You leave it be for now. You pick up the receiver of the rotary phone on the desk and listen for a dial tone — instead you hear an unsettling gargling noise. You quickly set the receiver down.

It’s not until just now that you notice another figure standing in the lobby. You are unsure when they first appeared or where they came from. Looking more closely, their entire body, that of a slender-built man, is covered in a glossy, plastic-like material. Their face…is not a face at all. Where their face should be is a hollowed-out basin.

Fear pinpricks its way up your body.

The figure is currently standing still. They aren't giving off any indication that they are dangerous or intend you harm…but you still feel uneasy.

Choice 24

Slowly...carefully, you inch your way out from behind the desk, keeping your eyes trained on the strange, plastic man standing in the middle of the cavernous lobby. As cautious as you are, you find it difficult to be completely silent.

The smallest footfall produces a disproportionate echo. With each reverberation you notice the plastic man with the concave face twitch and twist toward your location, as if he is pinpointing you through echolocation.

You continue to inch forward until you are out from behind the desk; you feel less panicked now that you are no longer trapped behind it. Across the lobby, you notice an elevator you did not see before.

You continue to inch forward, attempting to create space between you and the plastic man. Your eyes stay trained on him, searching for any sign of impending movement. As you remain focused on the plastic man, however, you fail to notice a small, metal object on the floor — your foot accidentally kicks it, sending it skittering across the polished marble floor. You look down briefly to register that it is a silver pocket watch.

Echo. Echo. Echo.

You freeze and your eyes dart back to the plastic man. He is also frozen, and staring right at you.

Choice 25

You inch, ever so slowly, toward the silver pocket watch that you inadvertently kicked (where did that thing even come from?). All the while the plastic man with the basin for a face stands staring, utterly motionless.

You risk a glance at the watch every so often to make sure you’re still moving in the right direction, but you dare not move your head. Your eyeballs strain to the edges of your sockets, feeling as though the tendons behind your eyes are about to snap.

At last you reach the watch. For some reason you take note of its beautiful craftsmanship. You look back at the plastic man. He is still motionless and staring, now more in your general direction instead of straight at you, but that gives you little comfort. He looks like a large cat ready to pounce.

Choice 26

Your first impulse is to kick the watch away as a distraction, but you catch yourself before following through.

Instead, you think it a better idea to bend down and pick up the watch. You begin to lean over, but as you do the plastic man twitches and takes a step forward. You freeze.

You almost say, Can you hear me? to the plastic man, but decide against it at the last moment.

There’s no helping it…you’re paralyzed by choice!

Plop — Plop — Plop

The sound of the man’s plastic feet slap against the marble floor. He’s walking straight toward you. You try as hard as you can to muster the will to move, but nothing you think matters. Your body refuses to respond.

In a flash the plastic man is upon you — he covered the distance in what seemed like no time at all. You can’t help but cry out in surprise and dismay as his plastic fingers dig into your arms. An indescribable sound emanates from the basin that is his head and he pulls you closer.

You stare into the slick, white basin and a moment of clarity washes over you. You think you see a reflection...

Choice 27

Your chemical instincts scream at you to break free of the plastic man’s grip, but you are able to push these feelings down and allow yourself to give in.

The moment you give in, your muscles slacken and you begin to relax. Strangely, so too does the plastic man. His grip loosens and his demeanor becomes less threatening.

He holds you closer and you focus in on his basin-head’s reflective surface. You slow your breathing, following the breath as it travels in…and out…and in…and out. The plastic man kneels down, still holding on to you, and bends his head forward. Now you have a straight-on view into the basin.

After a minute more of focus, you start to make out something from the shapes. It’s difficult to discern, but you think it looks like a person with long hair — no, it’s a willow tree on the bank of a lazy river…but wait, now you see the active exhaust port of a space ship.

The forms continue to morph, never settling on one picture for too long. You get the sense the basin is waiting for you to decide on your interpretation.

Choice 28

You see the weeping branches of a willow tree. It’s rooted deep within ground beside a river. You trace roots trailing into the water. You look deeper.

Sitting beneath the tree is a child wearing a space helmet; their face is obscured by the visor’s tint.

Smush. Smush. You feel soft grass underfoot. You look around and suddenly feel fresh breeze on your face. You are here, somehow, on the riverbank with the tree and the child.

Is this some trick of the mind or the plastic man? Or are you truly here in this place? Does it matter? Gods you wish you could remember why you came to The Mausoleum in the first place!

But there’s nothing to be done about that now.

Choice 29

You approach the child sitting beneath the willow tree. They don’t acknowledge you — it’s like you’re a ghost. You stare at the space helmet they’re wearing and marvel at its sophistication; this is no child’s toy.

You reach out to remove the helmet, but stop yourself short. For some reason, this all feels like a dream. The opposite feeling of lucidity floats around you like a mist. You try to wake up. Wake up. Wake! Up!

You close your eyes…and open them again.

The riverbank, the willow tree, and the child are still before you. Things seem solid again.

The child…they somehow seem familiar.

Choice 30

The child stands and faces you. They take off their helmet and throw it to the ground in a tantrum. You stare into their eyes and can’t believe it — the child is you.

“We were supposed to find the Secret of Life here!” the child screams at you. “You promised!”

You kneel in front of the child to comfort them. Their anger turns to sorrow, and tears begin to well in their eyes. “You promised…” they eek out. You wipe away your tears, and a peaceful dread settles on you.

You notice that you begin to feel short of breath. Your vision grows hazy and you lie down in the grass beneath the willow tree. Such a peaceful place.

“I’m sorry, kid,” you say. And then you cease.

...

The Grave-Keeper steps over your corpse in one of the Mausoleum’s many stone halls. They stop, and return to you. They kneel down and say, “Death is nothing to be afraid of, my friend. It comes in many forms and is rarely as final as you think. I’m sorry you didn’t find what you were looking for.”

THE END

A new Choose-Your-Own-Adventure will begin next week…