The Barsoom Project

Max caught the joke, and his laughter drowned out the rumble of the volcano. “Unless they’re time travelers too!” He turned to Alura, who had been cowering politely through the entire exchange. “Alura, take us to church!”

“This way!”

Behind them the sky glowed. The lava was filling the valley of dinosaurs, and in another few moments it was going to come roaring down the tunnel. The result was likely to use up all of his hit points in one hot second… so to speak.

They ran, or at least moved as quickly as girth and wind would allow. Kevin, a skinny little rabbit with barely enough meat to separate bones from skin, reached the chamber alongside Alura, way ahead of the rest. He was gasping, she wasn’t. Max clamped his mind down on the fatigue, but when he saw the chamber, exhaustion and confusion melted away like snowflakes.

The structure might have been carved from limestone by the passage of water, or it might have been an enormous gas bubble in a mountainous, sludgy wave of primeval lava. Whatever had carved it had done one hell of a job. It was huge, a crystalline cathedral with indirect lighting. (And where did the light come from? Oh, give it up. Phosphorescence, bioluminescence, whatever, it was gorgeous!)

Stalagmites rose from the floor like rows of fairy teeth. Thick spiderwebs festooned the corners, strange, baseball-sized husks dangling from them; but the room still sparkled.

In the center, surrounded by a cone of light, was what Max knew they would find.

Orson clapped his hands delightedly. “That’s it!” A platform with a metal post and a waist-high metal ring large enough for several adults to grasp simultaneously. “It’s an advanced version of Deveroux’s time machine.”

“Another group came back, with their kids-like taking a picnic.”

“Stopped to feed the dinosaurs-”

“Kids got stranded here, grew up with no adults.” They were laughing and hugging now. Even Eviane had abandoned her vow of silence, and was whooping louder than anyone.

“Let’s move!” Max said, checking his watch. He’d set it to count down. It gave him ninety seconds to end the Game.

Kevin and Orson examined the machine. Orson called, “It takes a key! Ev-Eviane?”

The only key still in the Game. Eviane tossed it underhand to Orson, who fitted it into a lock and turned it.

“Fits. It was drownin’ fair, after all.”

“Move it. We’re about to have company, say a million tons of lava.”

Kevin and Orson tinkered with the vehicle, fiddling with the buttons until lights triggered around the metal ring, and the air vibrated until it sang. Max felt the tingle all over his skin, and laughed and stomped delightedly. They were going to make it, they were “All right. Everybody gather around, and get ready.” The room was heating up. The hair on his arms stood up away from the skin as the time machine’s whir grew loud.

All five of them grabbed the ring, felt the electric trill as the power increased. The entire room began to vibrate. Alura released the ring with one hand to grab Max’s shirt, pressing her warm little body against him. Max was terribly glad that Alura, unlike the rest of her family, was a real live unhologram-type person.

The entrance of the cave splashed with lava. For a moment fear filled his stomach, and a shrill whir filled his ears The room whirled, and there was nothing there, nothing at all. When the smoke and lava cleared, they were back in the clean, sterile Time/Life building.

The woman who called herself Eviane wandered out of the Time/Life building into the main thoroughfare. It had been a long time since she had been to Dream Park, although in another sense, Dream Park was with her wherever she went.

The facades of the rides and exhibits rose like a fabulous array of circus balloons. The hologram images rose thirty and forty feet into the air-Polynesian Paradise, DragonWorld, Fokker Biplane (duel the Red Baron!), the Ali Baba ride, the infamous Snuff Show (kill any of two thousand famous historical or contemporary figures!), and the hallucinogenic Little Nemo.

Some of the facades were pure delightful fantasy: the rosy cheeks of Snow White blended naturally with the Alpine splendor of the Ski Chalet. But there were also strong elements of the grotesque. Here was the face of a screaming South American Indian, with ants swarming..

Before her eyes, naked bone appeared.

The Marabunta Challenge. The threat of violence made Eviane’s head spin. She stopped for a moment, leaned against a railing, and squeezed her eyes shut.

No violence. No pain. Just fun. Right? Nobody gets hurt…

It was self-defense. Plot smashed, the Cabal had been rabid for vengeance. The Terichik…

She opened her eyes, and when the film of tears cleared, she remembered to breathe again. The pain in her chest went away. Maybe she shouldn’t be here at all.