Arctic, the ignorant researcher:
At last, we had found it. At last, we had found the remains of a lost and extinct civilization. I could hardly believe my eyes. We had discovered a shard of porcelain within these massive layers of frozen water. I picked up the shard and examined it, searching for specific details. On this shard, I recognized something I identified as a rune or symbol, depicted as a labyrinth. The paths of this labyrinth appeared to be studded with sharp objects, likely arrows. But before I could analyze this shard further, it was taken from my hand and placed in an airtight bag. My blood began to boil with rage and greed. I hid my feelings behind a calm facade as I began to speak.
"Celeris, what are you going to do with this shard now?"
I didn't notice the change in my voice.
"Albert, this will end just like last time. We're not doing this. Do you understand?"
I was silent for a moment, then spoke.
"Let's go back to the station, Celeris."
When we arrived at the station, we began to examine this ancient artifact. We couldn't decipher any information, only that these arrows formed a pattern. Now it was time to lay my body to rest.
That night, a wave of negativity washed over me. I dreamed of leaving the sleeping pod, escaping the gaze of the surveillance cameras, and making my way to the display case containing the shard. I opened it using my key card and reached out to take the airtight bag. Inside was the shard with the red notches and black arrows.
Before my hand could remove the bag from the display case, it was caught by a security device, so I had to wait until the scientists arrived to see that I had triggered the alarm. Moreover, I was growing increasingly anxious as I realized I was no longer in a dream but was about to be punished.
I grew more anxious by the second and let go of the bag, whereupon I desperately tried to wrench my hand free from the restraint. In doing so, I began to bleed heavily. I was stuck. My hand was bleeding profusely.
Now the team of researchers reached me, while I was becoming incredibly angry.
"Albert…," said one of them, someone I got along with well.
"Albert, you know what's going to happen now, don't you?" asked another voice, concerned yet indifferent at the same time.
I felt a brief pang of sadness, but then rage overwhelmed me.
"Celeris, it's all Celeris' fault. If only he'd left it to me!" I screamed like a madman.
"Enough," Celeris ordered, whereupon I quieted down. But not because of him, no, no. My wound was still bleeding, which was draining me of vast amounts of energy.
"I warned you. And now everyone in the council has found out this time. Well done."
He made sure I understood that, though his sarcasm was getting on my nerves by the end. "What do you mean, Celeris?" asked a beautiful and incompetent researcher. Why is she even here? She's smart, but she doesn't feel like getting anything done. A mystery.
"Well, an incident like this has already happened in the past. Do you remember when a shard like this one, only made of stone and purple, went missing? Albert had taken it and hidden it. But since the research showed that this stone shard didn't have the same properties as the other fragments we'd found here, it didn't matter that it was stolen," Celeris said calmly, even though he'd promised me he wouldn't tell anyone.
I was very exhausted, which is why I couldn't show any emotion. But if I could, I would be furious right now.
Celeris spoke to me about what would now affect me. But it literally fell on deaf ears. I lost consciousness.
Celeris:
I knew this would happen sooner or later. After all, Albert was a greedy and selfish man. I don't know what drove him to commit such acts, but who could possibly know?
The ward's doctors admitted Albert and treated him so that he survived. After all, he had lost about one to two liters of blood. Now it is time to interrogate him. I can already imagine the outcome of this interrogation.
Albert:
I don't know how long I had been unconscious or any other useful details. I woke up in a room I knew all too well. The seats were arranged in a circle, while in the center stood a single chair, on which I was sitting.
Several top-ranking researchers, including Celeris, the traitor, entered the room.
"I suppose I'm about to be interrogated," I whispered in a dry, almost sickly voice.
"Lower your voice, Albert," said the Chief Researcher calmly—too calmly.
No 'Doctor'? I wondered, since this man always addressed people by their titles. I already knew what to expect, having studied our station's regulations thoroughly. But I didn't realize that at that moment.
"From now on, you will no longer be a researcher. We don't need a thief here," said the chief researcher, still too calmly.
I remained silent; after all, a single word might make my situation worse. Chief researcher Noctus was silent too.
"So you will now have to leave this station." He spoke stiffly and sternly, to which I could not reply. I nodded.
"These shards will remain here, and this as well, do you understand?" After Noctus said this, my blood boiled with rage, but somehow I managed to hide that emotion. I barely managed to nod.
"Good luck surviving, thief," said Noctus, which confused me slightly.
Noctus whispered briefly to Celeris, the traitor, and left the room. Everyone except Celeris followed suit.
"Get up, thief," Celeris said in a disappointed tone that somehow hurt me.
I stood up and pushed that hurt feeling out of my heart, so that I could feel my anger boiling.
"I warned you," Celeris whispered sadly to me.
I spoke in my own voice, still sounding sickly and hoarse. "Let's get this over with."
I fell silent as quickly as I had spoken. We both fell silent. Celeris nodded and gave me protective clothing against the cold. He led me to the exit after also giving me a loaf of bread.
Out of habit, I held out my hand for our customary handshake. Celeris did the same, and we clasped hands while he whispered sadly, "Goodbye, my old friend."
Once again, I felt pain in my heart and merely nodded. I turned toward the exit, toward the snowy wasteland, and walked out into the vastness of the Arctic.
After a few kilometers, it had grown light. Half-frozen, I noticed that it was getting warmer. But this warmth was not natural. The temperature, as I noted on my thermometer, reached zero degrees Celsius, something I had never experienced in the middle of the Arctic.
I kept an eye on the thermometer to follow the heat, which, surprisingly, pointed north toward the center of the Arctic instead of south. I was confused and forgot my earlier phases of anger and grief. So my inner researcher took over, and I headed north.
I noticed ponds and lakes along the way, while the temperature reached five degrees. The farther I went, the more water I saw and the warmer it got. After a while, I had to take off my warm coat and tie it around my waist.
After walking some more, I realized once again that I had just left my life as an explorer behind. I became angry and spoke to myself. "You'll see. I'm going to make a discovery you can't ignore, and then I'll be the greatest explorer. All the success will be mine."
In my frenzy, I didn't notice that I had stumbled upon frozen ground. It was frozen, even though I was walking around in a T-shirt. I didn't notice this oddity and kept walking.
After a while, I came to my senses and took in my surroundings. It looked like a crater. I was extremely confused, as this environment contradicted the physical laws of nature in every way. The frozen ground was smoking but wasn't thawing. Thus, the environment was warm, at 20 degrees Celsius, yet it wasn't melting. Furthermore, there were ice pillars scattered throughout this crater, which also weren't melting.
Now I looked up, and I was speechless even in my thoughts. After all, what I saw was hyper-unrealistic, yet it existed. It was, so to speak, raindrops raining upward. This rain simply began somewhere in the air, sometimes lower down, sometimes higher up. But never from the ground. Moreover, these drops disappeared as quickly as they appeared.
My head literally began to spin at this discovery. Driven by curiosity, I pressed on.
As I descended into the crater, I noticed that there was something inside every ice column. Whether shards, like the ones I knew, or spheres in various dark colors—the kind artists might call "sad."
Every glance revealed a new discovery, so much so that my head threatened to explode.
I noticed that the further I went, the more physically impossible scenarios occurred. Among other things, islands of rock or earth floated in the air, even if they were quite small.
In addition, a light emanated from the ice pillars—or rather, from the objects inside them—and grew stronger with each pillar along the path to the center. After a while, I realized that these lights pointed toward the center, just as flowers turn toward the sun.
So I directed my curious gaze toward the center.
Suddenly, I was drawn to the center as if by a magnet. The center was surrounded by a bright, neon-green light. Furthermore, five ice pillars were arranged in a pentagon shape at the center.
The entire center was filled with this upward-flowing rain, which seemed to fall into the infinite expanse of the sky.
I reached the pentagon and began to grin wildly as I stood between two giant ice pillars. My eyes adjusted to the blinding light, and once again I began to talk to myself.
"How beautiful… what a treasure—no, no… My treasure… my find. My discovery!" In my delusion, I didn't notice how my voice sounded older.
"You belong to me!" I shouted, as I began to cough and wondered what was happening to me.
I looked into an ice column and saw my reflection, with my altered face. My hair had turned gray and grown long, as had my clean-shaven chin, on which a very long full beard had grown.
With every passing moment, more wrinkles appeared on my face, and I asked myself again why.
I looked at myself and noticed that from the center of my body, the solar plexus, an orange light—no, an orange strand of energy—was flowing toward the center, the neon-green light.
Having no other choice, I walked on toward the center and stretched my wrinkled, aged hand toward the light.
Before I could grasp what was happening, it sucked the last of my energy out of me, leaving me only to notice that everything—including my skin and my surroundings—was melting. Everything was engulfed by the neon-green light.