Hacking the Sun - The Re-Remake

Prologue 2/2

"See Forever." Darkness in the elevator. After a long ascent in a dimly lit box, hundreds of years fell before Mik'ael's eyes. A winding screen depicted the relatively brief history of this part of the city. Something about the towers' disappearance on-screen had made him nervous, lament almost.

Afterward, he entered a queue alongside the same group of people who accompanied his elevator ride. Together, they crossed shadows and light that painted the room a dark blue, flanked by bright tapestries of New York City, that lit every step on the path towards See Forever Theater.

Being nervous wasn't going to help him or anyone else. He knew that. It's the right thing, he mentally repeated over and over again. Then the blackness came undone, the walls rising, rising on all sides, to let the sun beam through every window. Despite all his years, he could barely recount anything so mesmerizing. New York City's morning glory reigned nowhere more apparent than it did high inside One World Trade Center.

A stream of emotions struck with the sunlight. Its careening morning melody gravitated him towards the windows as he stared across the Hudson. He had to calm his breathing.

Everyone else dispersed throughout the room, taking pictures, tapping tablets, and posing by the grand view. Contrarily, he simply stared and loaded everything he saw into memory. How to proceed from here, however, that question thumped his heart.

Rebounding from his long inhale of the city, he looked down, away from everything but the floor. After a long and sorrowful sigh, he eventually returned his gaze. The lack of clouds in the sky made it seem rather empty.

"I wonder how events would have transpired..."

Finally, he removed his glasses and beheld New York's Jewel through unadulterated vision, through bright yellow Irises. He removed his headphones, his beanie, and let his long, tapered ears hear without muffles. A figment of his likeness reflected off the window, a pale complexion that was unlike any human.

Near the apex of the One World Trade Center, Mik'ael treated himself to one last peer beyond the screen, his final overlook of New York City below noon. Brief recollections of a starry sky accompanied visions, recollections unhindered by sun and light pollution. It was a nuanced place without a horizon, a limitless space. He contemplated the northernmost pole to the southernmost; he debated his lot in life and on the planet before peering toward the future. So, his eyes rose to the sky, slave to the anticipation of a presence already weighing on his shoulders. Then he checked his watch, which flashed a red light and jargon text. Reluctant as he felt, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled a plastic firearm.

The trigger ejected a transparent substance onto the window panes. As the liquid made contact, it dematerialized everything it touched: the glass quickly melted and oozed its way down to the floor.

A middle-aged woman noticed a thin veil of smoke rise from where Mik'ael was standing, then noted the strange device in his hand. From knee-jerk terror, she screamed, "Someone, stop him!" and immediately called the room's attention.

Every tourist darted with delayed horror. People jerked away, while the woman yelped in tears, embracing the old man next to her as tower security sprinted forward.

Two suit-and-tie guards stopped in front of Mik'ael, their pistols pointed down. "Sir!" one of them called. He grew nervous at the culprit's alien facial features. Since staring achieved nothing, the other guard proceeded.

"Sir, I'm going to need you to back away from the window, put down your weapon, and get on your knees with your hands up."

"It's not a weapon," Mik'ael replied. "Just a tool."

Everybody watched, rattled as a gaping hole formed on the screen window. The glass touched the floor as a viscous material, emanating smoke beside the stranger's feet. It blew over them with the rushing wind that entered the room and chilled their sanguine faces. Inevitably, panic levels increased.

At this point, both security guards were pointing their Glock barrels directly at Mik'ael's head. "Sir, this is your last warning!" A warning slightly muffled by the high-altitude wind.

Nothing changed. Mik'ael stepped outside the window cavity when the foremost guard fired his weapon. The loud bang made everyone jump; hands over their ears, their instinctive duck came with screams.

But when the ringing stopped, only the wind remained, and people opened their eyes to the sight of Mik'ael by the window completely unharmed and comporting a casual look. The guards were smacked by awe as he continued outside and set his feet on thin air.

He floated upright against the New York City backdrop, turned from the frightened group of people and, again, observed the magnificent city sprawl in its entirety. Floating further back before the grand length of One World Trade Center, he rotated three-sixty degrees. The view buried his thoughts, throwing a grin on his face while the wind massaged his scalp. The plan never involved being enraptured; he simply succumbed.

He was no less inspired than the witnesses, who took pictures from behind the new hole in the window. Beaming, they eventually noticed his boots and the strange wave emitted underneath. Assuming this wasn't a magic trick, something from the boots kept him airborne.

As mesmerized as Mik'ael was, in his levitational musing, a tick and blue light from his smartwatch brought him back to the real world. Dismay caught him, his thoughts silent as he stared at the strange letters onscreen. When his conscience found its voice, he remembered what he had to do.

Solemn, sober, and prepared, he upturned to the sea of sky. The boots carried him farther, up to the spire, slowly toward the peak.

Dauntingly elevated, Mik'ael had a vantage of the world's curve. At the stakes of the great skyscraper's beacon, he grabbed onto the metal and stared down the enormous length of steel, while his legs remained free to swoon in the air.

Helicopter rotors echoed in the wind, nearing, loudening. More choppers began a circuitous patrol nearby. A new noise then took his ears, not of the wind or helicopters. Jet engines. Military aircraft soared in New York City's airspace, looming at eye level as their wings deftly navigated the horizon.

On the peak of New York City's tallest skyscraper, he waited. Several jets populated the sky now, environing him with the screech of burning fuel. That's when they came.

The first one eclipsed the sun, a behemoth of a craft whose mass literally engulfed Brooklyn in shadow. Panic, wonder, fear—all solicitations of the unknown came with their arrival.

The sky darkened, a second ship arriving just above Mik'ael. It was a solid, opaque mass looming adversely to the god rays in its descent. Mik'ael watched them consume the sun.

As he removed his watch, he stared down the overhead behemoth. Fist to the sky, his bitterness suddenly prevailed when a grand and resonant bell expelled from the ship. A chaotic dance of wind, turbines, and echoes then fondled him, mid-air, never once removing his relentless gaze from the dark mass.

"I have what you wanted!"

Smothered by the sounds of a frightened city devolving into Pandemonium, Mik'ael stared at the ship as if awaiting a response. Rage accompanied his sun-colored eyes.

"I have what you wanted! Show me what your word means, Xynocephles, and do as you promised!"