Chapter 2: Arrival

Bright afternoon sunlight peeked in through the side curtains of the quiet house as Spencer stepped inside. No one was there to greet him or ask how his day had been. It wasn’t a surprise, being the son of two successful business entrepreneurs had a number of drawbacks and time off was certainly one of them. Their workday typically started before Spencer woke up for school and ended long after he returned home.

I suppose overseas business trips are a bit rarer. Spencer thought to himself as he opened up the fridge and grabbed one of the prepared dinners his mom had left for him.

His parents were giving a seminar over in Japan for some upstart company inspired by their story. They would probably be considered a rich family, the house certainly was an improvement to their old one down by Chris’ family home, but Spencer didn’t like to dwell on it. He ate quickly in the dim kitchen as the clatter of his fork against the ceramic plate sounded unnaturally loud in the empty space. 

After cleaning up after himself Spencer spent a bit of time finishing off a few assignments he hadn’t completed at school before spending the rest of the evening playing Zero Conflict on his bed. 

After eleven thirty ticked by on the clock by his bed, Spencer sighed and closed out of the game. Even though he knew there wouldn’t be any notifications he still checked his phone’s call history to make sure he didn’t miss any from his parents.

None.

“Figures…” Spencer let out a long breath and reached for the phone charging chord sticking out of his clock.

They always forget to call. 

******

A chime sound woke Spencer up before his alarm could. He checked his phone and saw that he had received an email from Chris. Attached to the email was a twenty five page document filled with, as Chris put in the title, “Everything you need to know to be a god amongst peasants while dominating the world of Zero Conflict.” Spencer smirked and set the document to download. He’d look at it fully later. It was only then that he saw the email had been sent way earlier that morning, around one AM. It was currently six in the morning. His phone shouldn’t have chimed a moment ago from this, but there were no other notifications that clued Spencer into what woke him up.

Spencer grumbled and was about to roll over when he noticed something hovering beside his bed. It was a text box. A two dimensional image floating in his three dimensional room. Spencer tried to move his head to peer around the box but wherever he turned the box rotated perfectly.

“What the hell?” Spencer sat up fully and rubbed his eyes.

In the red glow of morning sunlight peeking through his upper blinds Spencer finally saw the words within the box floating in his room.

‘Congratulations! You’ve been selected as a champion in the coming apocalypse. All powers/abilities/talents have been assigned according to relevant data. Changes can no longer be made to assignments.’

Spencer reached up with a tentative finger outstretched to see if he could touch the floating text box. There was slight resistance, like his finger had poked a thin plastic material, but he was able to push his extended appendage through with just enough force. The moment his finger made contact with the mysterious two dimensional plane the message displayed changed.

‘Champion, Spencer Lee, has been awarded powers according to the last video game played, Zero Conflict. The champion power that will be given is gacha hero summoning from Zero Conflict. Please give the system time to configure itself according to this assignment.’

Portions of the text seemed to be filled in segments with information specific to Spencer. Zero Conflict was the last video game he had played, but he wasn’t sure what any of this meant. Spencer reached his finger up and pushed it against the text box again. The message changed one more time.

‘Individualized systems will take over guidance from here on out. Best wishes to all of the champions selected and may you grow strong enough to survive.’

The text box remained floating in front of him just long enough for Spencer to finish reading before it vanished without a sound. Spencer reached his hand up but could no longer feel resistance in the air like he could before. Whatever that had been seems like it was gone for good.

“Survive? Survive what?” Even as Spencer asked it aloud he thought of the first message he read.

Coming apocalypse. 

Spencer’s hand fumbled for his phone as he opened up his news app with shaky fingers. The top national headlines that morning were all about the clean up efforts along the east coast after an intense tropical storm rolled through yesterday. Spencer scanned through the numerous articles, but couldn’t find anything that would be considered an ‘apocalypse’. There were always stories of wars, murders, and destruction around the world yet nothing on a scale Spencer would have expected given the messages he’d just seen. Spencer let out a long breath and glanced up at the space the text box had occupied a few minutes ago.

What if it’s not real? 

He’d never had a hallucination before. Is that what this was? He was so sure everything he had been seeing was right in front of him. His initial panic at a world ending event slowly gave way to a haunting doubt that he had experienced anything at all.

Shouldn’t I be seeing… something happening? Spencer frowned and peered out of his bedroom blinds illuminated by the morning light that had yet to crest the horizon.

The world outside looked just as plain and ordinary as it had yesterday. He turned back to the space in his room where the text box had been before.

“System menu.” Spencer said out loud the way people do in the web stories he and his friends read online.

Nothing appeared.

“Window open. Status window. Display…”

Spencer tried every iteration he could think of but no text box appeared in the room. By this time Spencer’s second alarm went off and he needed to leave very soon if he wanted to catch his bus. He thought of calling out sick, but knew his parents would eventually ask him about it and they were very good at getting to the truth. Spencer wasn’t confident his, “I thought the world was going to end and I was selected as something called a champion”, defense would hold up in parental court.

What if it is real?

That question also weighed heavily on Spencer’s mind. He could rationalize away what he saw all day, but a part of his mind refused to let it go completely. He got up and immediately went to the kitchen to check the pantry.

If anything were to happen, what do I have to work with?

Fortunately for him his parents had stocked up just before they left on their business trip. He had plenty of non-perishable food in the pantry and their family had been through enough droughts to keep an emergency supply of bottled water tucked in the back. It wouldn’t last forever, but it was certainly nice to have just in case. It was a silly thing to check on, but Spencer couldn’t deny he felt relieved to see the supplies. 

Spencer’s next stop was his parent’s closet. He pushed his way to the back of the crowded space and cleared out the area next to his father’s gun safe. He paused here for a long moment. It was one thing to take stock of food and water, that was something good to be aware of even if there was no global crisis, but retrieving a firearm felt like an admission that he thought this apocalypse was legitimate. 

If I can even get it open…

Taking a moment to remember the code his dad had told him was only for emergencies, Spencer spun the combination lock to the four different numbers. The safe clicked audibly and the door swung open. Spencer sat there staring at the open safe for a few moments before he checked his watch and chided himself for wasting the little time he had left.

His dad certainly wasn’t a hunter or a gun collector, but a home invasion when Spencer’s mom was pregnant had convinced his dad that having something in the house for personal protection was important. Inside the gun safe was a pump action shotgun. Spencer carefully pulled out the twelve gauge and then grabbed two out of the four boxes of shells from the bottom of the safe. One box was birdshot while the other contained slug rounds.

The shotgun and shell boxes felt incredibly heavy in Spencer’s hands as he walked out of his parents closet into their room. He paused as he saw himself in the floor mirror near their bedroom door.

“What am I doing?” 

Was he going to bring these with him to school? No. Was he still going to school? At this point and time, yes. He checked the news on his phone again and spotted nothing out of the ordinary in the headlines that filled the page.

There’s no reason to keep these out. Spencer thought to himself as he glanced down at the gun and the shells. But maybe I keep them within easier reach…

Rather than placing them back into the safe where they belong, Spencer brought them into the kitchen and set them in the large cupboard under the sink. Keeping them out in the open seemed like a stupid idea. At least here under the sink he could get to them much faster than the slow to open gun safe. Satisfied that he covered both scenarios of imagination and reality, Spencer rushed to get ready for school.

******

In typical southern California fashion the morning was pleasantly warm as Spencer watched the bus approach his pickup spot at the edge of his subdivision. The full summer heat wasn’t quite here yet, but according to the news it would be upper ninety degrees fahrenheit later today. Spencer wouldn’t normally concern himself too much with the weather, but his paranoia kept him constantly checking the news on his phone as he waited. The big yellow bus rumbled up to the curb and hissed loudly as it came to a stop. The double doors swung open to let him and a few others at the stop get on. Spencer hesitated at the bottom of the steps.

If he stayed home and he was wrong then he’d be in big trouble. If he went to school and was right then he’d be a long way from home when whatever might happen happened. On the other hand, if it did exist, he didn’t actually know when this apocalypse was supposed to start anyway. The final push to get on the bus came in the form of a familiar laugh at the back of the bus. Spencer sighed and climbed on. The double doors shut behind him and the bus began to rumble forward before he even got to his usual seat.

“Morning Steven.” Spencer yawned as he tried to casually avoid looking directly back at Mary when he sat down. “No morning marching band?”

The younger boy grinned. “Two of the tuba players got busted for selling adderall to other students. We got the next few days off while the band teacher, ‘emotionally recovers from this brutal betrayal of the arts’.”

Steven recited the last part in an excellent imitation of the stuffy nosed band teacher.

“Your world is going all sorts of sideways man.” Spencer laughed and for a moment it felt like the world would continue on as usual.

The drone of conversation on the bus was cut short by a high pitch whine that drowned out all other sounds. Spencer looked around in alarm until he realized it was coming from everyone’s cell phones. The bus driver, an older gentleman by the name of Barny, lurched in his chair as he hastily pulled the bus to the side of the road while scanning his large rear view mirror trying to see what was causing all of the noise. Spencer pulled out his own phone and felt his blood chill in his veins.

‘Emergency Alert: Meteor impacts imminent across California and many other states within the continental United States. Mandatory evacuation of the following counties: Orange County, Sacramento County, Los Angeles County, Ventura County….’

Spencer’s eyes glazed past the lengthy list of counties that required evacuation until he reached the end of the message.

‘If you are unable to evacuate please shelter in place within a sturdy room with no outside facing windows. Stay indoors and await further instructions.’

Spencer looked south, over Mt. Gleason, towards Los Angeles and felt his jaw fall open. From high in the sky came down an enormous grey pillar. The thin layer of stratus clouds rushed aside as this massive object fell to Earth from the heavens. Even as Spencer watched a chime sounded in his ear. A new text box appeared in front of his face.

‘System Setup Complete! Welcome to the new world champion.’