Dials

[WP] You stumble into an abandoned warehouse and find a room completely covered in dials marked with years. Each dial is labeled with a different species. You find the dial that's labeled "Human" with the dial turned to 122 years, the longest anyone has ever lived. You decide to tamper with it.

I took a sip from my canteen and wiped the sweat from my brow. I leaned back against the motorcycle, and glanced to my left. Joe was already seated on the ground enjoying his sandwich while Juan yelled to a passing car.

“¡Oye, ayudanos por favor!”

The car whizzed by, and Juan swore and threw his hands in the air in frustration. He paced to us, then back to the road, and back to us again; all the while muttering a flurry of incomprehensible Spanish curses.

“Did you see that? I barely believe it. Those fuckers have no empathy. None at all. I swear if they were out here I’d let them die in the heat.”

“It’s fine Juan.” I laughed. “I’m sure there’ll be another car sometime soon.”

“Yeah, just get something to eat.” Joe added, with a mouth full of turkey.

Still muttering under his breath, Juan plopped to the ground and grabbed a sandwich from the cooler. I did the same. We both ate in silence, while Joe nosily slurped up his few remains.

“So… Do you… think we should…” Joe paused between each lick of his fingers. He finished, and stopped for a second before regathering his thoughts. “Do you think we should check out the area? I mean we wanted a tour of the rainforest, looks like we got one.” He made a lazy helicopter-like motion with his hand vaguely towards our surroundings.

Joe was right in a way. Everything around here was vibrant. The canopy was thick, yet the sun’s intensity still burned right through it. Trees of all kind were littered with snaking vines, and the air was filled with the calls of birds and the chirps of insects.

“Alright then, let’s make the most of this. Who wants to stay behind to watch the bike and flag down any cars?” I said.

Juan touched his noise, and Joe scoffed. “Alright you two, I’ll do it. I didn’t even want to come on this vacation anyways, you know I’d rather just stay at home and play some videogames or something anyways.”

“Alright Joe, whatever you say.” I retorted.

Even though Juan and I may have had to drag Joe down to South America at first, I could tell he was enjoying our trip by now; whether he’d admit it or not.

“Don’t go too far you too.”

“Yeah, right.” Juan waved a dismissive hand at Joe as he stepped into the underbrush, and I followed closely behind with a shrug.

We had been walking for less than five minutes when Juan and I stumbled upon an old stone structure.

“Looks like one of them Aztec or Mayan temples or something, huh?” Juan noted.

“Well I don’t know; it could be Incan.” I taunted.

“Jesus Dan, I don’t know the difference.”

“I think all of those different empires existed in different places, and maybe different times too?”

“Hell if I know. Let’s just check this bad boy out.”

“Do you think this is like, a real undiscovered shrine or something?”

“Yeah right, like we’re the first to walk 10 minutes into this jungle and find this temple, which just happens to be right off the road.”

“I mean, we could be.”

“Plus look at this thing. It’s brand new. If this was a real temple, wouldn’t it be like in ruins or something. Probably just an old tourist trap that shut down.”

Juan pushed forward through a veil of vines and was engulfed by the darkness of the temple’s cold stone walls. The sun shone bright, but there were no cracks in its foundation and the darkness was absolute.

I followed, and let out a small laugh as I saw the words: Beware, what is right is not fair etched into a rock. I guess Juan was right. Must’ve been some old tourist trap; I doubt the Aztecs spoke English.

I put my hand to the wall of the tunnel and inched forward into the darkness. I just hoped there weren’t any Columbian spiders or vipers waiting for my fingers accidental caress.

“Hey Juan.” I yelled, and the sound echoed throughout what must’ve been a massive chamber. It sounded much larger than I’d expected.

“What Danny?” His voice reverberated off the walls and seemed to be coming from everywhere at once. “Guess you were right about this place being a tourist trap, the entrance had some modern writing on it.”

“Yeah I saw that. It was some warning about being fair or some shit.”

“Yeah I know Juan; I can read genius.”

Juan snorted just ahead of me. “Since when can you read Spanish?”

“Uh… It was English jackass.”

“No, I’m pretty sure it was Spanish.”

“Are you pranking me right now?”

“Wait man, who cares what the entrance thing said; you gotta see this. Holy crap.”

I felt the wall come to a corner, and slowly maneuvered it with my arms outstretched. My eyes began to pick up a faint glow, and after two more sharp turns I was standing next to Juan. We were in a massive cavern aglow with blue and green crystals embedded in the walls and ceiling. They let off an eerie light, which washed over thousands of small golden rods sticking out of the ground. And, when I say thousands, I mean it. There were literally more than I could count. As my eyes adjusted further, I could see that this subterranean lair stretched far further than I had initially noticed. It reached far off into the distance, and the golden rods rose from the earth like grass from a plain. They glinted in the pale light, and from our elevated vantage, I had no idea what on earth they could be. “I wonder what this place was before it got shut down.” Juan mused. “It certainly wasn’t on any of our maps, and I hadn’t heard of a theme park around these parts.”

“Do you really think this is an exhibit? It’s just creeping me out. Maybe we should just leave.”

“Oh come on Dan. Let’s just check it out. Don’t you wanna see what those metal rods are? Maybe they have cool facts about the Incas on top.”

Juan carefully climbed to the ground. We were only about ten feet up, and the rocks to our right made pretty good footholds. At least it wouldn’t be too hard to get back up. I decided to go down after him.

Juan, still a few paces ahead of me began to examine one of the metal poles. As I approached my own, I could see no visible imperfections, and there was a small plaque at the top. On top of that plaque I could see what looked like a cylinder, but still couldn’t quite make it out in the dim light.

“It says Polar bear. There’s a dial turned to 24.”

“Polar Bear? What? We’re in the jungle? What’s the meaning of that?” I made it to my own rod, and sure enough it had a name with a dial. “This one says Abacus Beetle, and the dial is at 2.”

“What’s an abacus beetle?”

“Hell if I know.”

“Wait, how’d you read that? This one’s in Spanish.”

“Oh well this one’s in English.”

“Let me see that.”

Juan jogged over to my position and looked at the abacus beetle stand. He furrowed his brow and muttered under his breath.

“It’s… Spanish. How’d you read that? Have you been practicing?” Juan shot me a sideways glance.

“No. I swear it’s English Juan, what’re you talking about. And come on man; even if I was gonna learn Spanish do you really think I’d pick up a word like abacus. So just drop the act.”

“It’s not an Act Dan. This is really in Spanish.” Juan looked at me with wide eyes. “Swear to me it’s in English.”

“I can clearly see it’s in English. So yeah of course. I mean why would…” I suddenly came to the realization that Juan seemed to be having. “So, it’s in Spanish for you?”

Juan just stood with his mouth agape.

“Juan, where are we?”

We both turned and looked around the cavern once again. The luminescent crystals flickered dazzling shades of blue and green, and their watery hues splashed the golden stands playfully.

“Well, let’s find out.” Juan said, as he took hold of the dial on the abacus beetle stand. He twisted the dial all the way around from 0 to 9999 and back. Nothing happened. Juan kicked the stand and walked away searching for another.

“Well of course it’s not gonna do anything. What the fuck is an abacus beetle? Let’s try polar bear. Do you think these are codes for something? Like did we stumble into a government lab? Maybe these are the animals they experiment on.”

I didn’t answer. An uneasiness was building up inside me. “I think we should just go back to the road, Juan. This place doesn’t feel right.” I said his name sharply for emphasis.

“Suit yourself, but tell Joe to come check it out. I’m gonna poke around a bit more.”

I felt bad leaving Juan by himself, but I had to leave. I can’t explain it, but something had me terrified. I put one foot on the rock to climb out. Then the other. Then one hand, and slowly worked myself up. Fear crept through my spine and along the small bones in my arms and legs like a procession of spiders.

“Dan.”

Juan’s crisp call bore into me. With dread, I turned and looked at him.

“Hey Dan, come check this out. This dial says humans. It’s at 123.”

I didn’t want to, but I started climbing back down. I walked over to the dial and reached out to touch it. At first I gently caressed it, then I gave it a slow turn. 123. 122. 121.

I felt something change inside of me. It felt like something was being ripped out of my body. Juan must’ve felt it too, cause he slapped my hand away from the dial.

“It’s. It’s… it can’t be.” Juan muttered. He grabbed the dial and spun it roughly to 1000, then 2000. I felt myself flood with energy. I looked at Juan with wide terrified eyes. “What’re you doing?”

Juan began to laugh. “It’s life expectancy Dan. At least I think it is. Let’s do some good.” Juan continued to spin the dial upwards a strange fire burning in his eyes.

It’s easy to forget how close 9999 is to 0.