Tales from the Universe
Moral Dilemma: When we willingly pay to feel danger without consequence, how much responsibility belongs to us when the danger turns out to be real?
Every autumn, the city of Vey held the Festival of Safe Peril.
The name was part of the joke.
Nothing at the festival was safe.
There were sword swallowers.
Fire walkers.
Blindfolded knife throwers.
A tower from which visitors could leap while tied to an elastic rope imported from somewhere nobody could locate on a map.
There was even a tent containing a bear.
The bear was old.
Mostly it slept.
A sign outside read:
SURVIVE THE BEAR — TWO COPPER
Nobody had ever failed to survive the bear.
That was the point.
The festival sold danger after removing most of the dying.
People loved it.
This year, a new attraction appeared.
It occupied a black tent at the far end of the grounds.
There was no barker.
No music.
No painted sign depicting screaming people.
Only a wooden board.
THE ROOM
Beneath that:
ENTER ALONE.
And beneath that:
YOU MAY LEAVE AT ANY TIME.
Admission was one silver.
Which was outrageous.
Naturally, the line stretched across the festival.
Kessa joined it.
Her brother Davin groaned.
“One silver to enter a room?”
“Apparently.”
“What happens inside?”
“Nobody will say.”
“That means nothing happens.”
“Then don’t come.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
Kessa smiled.
“You’re afraid.”
Davin looked offended.
“Of a room?”
“Apparently.”
He joined the line.
People emerged from the black tent one at a time.
Their reactions varied.
Some laughed.
Some looked disappointed.
One man immediately bought another ticket.
A woman came out crying.
Her friends surrounded her.
“What happened?”
She shook her head.
“Nothing.”
This made everyone considerably more interested.
When Kessa reached the front, an attendant held out his hand.
“One silver.”
She paid.
“What are the rules?”
“There is one.”
The attendant pointed at the sign.
YOU MAY LEAVE AT ANY TIME.
“How?”
“You’ll know.”
Kessa entered.
The room was empty.
Stone floor.
Stone walls.
A chair.
A door opposite the entrance.
The door behind her closed.
Kessa waited.
Nothing happened.
She laughed.
“One silver.”
Then someone knocked on the opposite door.
Kessa stopped smiling.
Another knock.
“Hello?”
Silence.
She approached.
The door had no handle.
A third knock.
Then a child’s voice.
“Please.”
Kessa froze.
“Please let me out.”
She looked around.
“This isn’t funny.”
The child knocked again.
“Please.”
Kessa touched the door.
It was cold.
“Are you part of the attraction?”
The child began crying.
Kessa stepped backward.
A brass lever protruded from the wall beside her.
Above it were the words:
EXIT
She stared at it.
The child screamed.
Kessa pulled the lever.
The wall opened.
Sunlight poured in.
An attendant smiled.
“Thank you for visiting.”
Kessa stepped outside.
Her heart was pounding.
Davin ran over.
“What happened?”
She looked at the tent.
“Nothing.”
Davin entered next.
He returned six minutes later.
His face was pale.
“What did you get?” Kessa asked.
“Get?”
“In the room.”
Davin shook his head.
“Nothing.”
“You’re lying.”
“So are you.”
They stared at one another.
Neither spoke about it again.
For several hours.
Near sunset, they found the crying woman who had exited before Kessa.
She was sitting alone beside a fountain.
Kessa approached.
“Did you hear a child?”
The woman looked up sharply.
“No.”
“What happened to you?”
The woman hesitated.
“There was a man.”
“What man?”
“My husband.”
Kessa glanced at Davin.
“Was your husband working at the festival?”
“He’s been dead nine years.”
Nobody spoke.
Davin sat beside her.
“What did he say?”
“He asked why I hadn’t come home.”
They began asking others.
A soldier had been ordered to execute a prisoner.
A merchant watched his warehouse burn while a door offered him escape.
A young man found himself standing over a wounded stranger while someone outside the room called for help.
One woman experienced nothing at all.
“I sat there ten minutes,” she complained.
“Completely empty.”
She wanted her silver back.
There appeared to be no common experience.
Except one.
Everyone could leave.
Whenever they wanted.
Kessa returned to the tent.
The attendant recognized her.
“One silver.”
“I have a question.”
“One silver.”
She slapped the coin into his palm.
“What is inside?”
“The Room.”
“What is the Room?”
“The attraction.”
“Is the child real?”
The attendant looked at her.
“What child?”
“The child behind the door.”
“I don’t know.”
“You work here.”
“Yes.”
“Who built it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who owns it?”
“I don’t know.”
Kessa stared at him.
“You don’t know anything?”
“I know admission is one silver.”
“That doesn’t bother you?”
He considered this.
“Not especially.”
“Why?”
“People enjoy it.”
“Some don’t.”
“Then they leave.”
Kessa found the festival master.
He was supervising fireworks.
“The Room?”
He grinned.
“Wonderful, isn’t it?”
“Who runs it?”
“A traveling company.”
“Which company?”
The festival master waved vaguely.
“Foreign.”
“From where?”
“Far away.”
“Did you inspect it?”
“Of course.”
“What happens inside?”
“Nothing happened when I entered.”
Kessa stared.
“Nothing?”
“Empty room.”
“You approved an attraction you don’t understand?”
The festival master laughed.
“My dear, have you seen the tower people jump from?”
“That has ropes.”
“Usually.”
That night, Davin woke Kessa.
“I want to go back.”
She sat up.
“Why?”
“I need to know.”
“Know what?”
He didn’t answer.
Kessa understood.
Whatever Davin had seen, he had left before something happened.
Now he wanted the ending.
They returned to the festival.
The grounds were closed.
The black tent remained.
No attendant stood outside.
Davin lifted the flap.
Kessa grabbed him.
“This is stupid.”
“Yes.”
“Then don’t.”
He looked at her.
“What if it matters?”
“What if it doesn’t?”
“I don’t know.”
“That is exactly the problem.”
Davin pulled away.
“I have to see.”
He entered.
Ten minutes passed.
Then twenty.
Kessa began shouting his name.
No answer.
She entered the tent.
There was no room.
Only grass.
The black canvas walls surrounded an empty patch of ground.
No stone.
No chair.
No opposite door.
No Davin.
Kessa screamed.
Festival guards arrived.
They searched until sunrise.
Nothing.
The festival master closed the attraction.
That was difficult because nobody could find whoever owned it.
The tent was dismantled.
Beneath it they found grass.
No foundations.
No trapdoor.
No tunnels.
Davin remained missing.
The city investigated.
The attendant was found two days later drinking in another town.
He knew nothing.
“I answered an advertisement.”
“Who paid you?”
“A man.”
“What man?”
“I don’t know.”
“What were you told?”
“Take one silver. Point at the sign.”
“Did you know people were seeing things?”
“I heard.”
“And you continued?”
The attendant looked uncomfortable.
“They could leave.”
For years, Kessa hated that sentence.
They could leave.
It appeared everywhere once she knew to listen for it.
The bridge was dangerous, but travelers could turn around.
The medicine was experimental, but patients had agreed.
The contest was brutal, but everyone volunteered.
The factory was unsafe, but nobody was forced to work there.
The duel was legal.
The contract was signed.
The warning was posted.
The door was unlocked.
As though the existence of an exit answered every other question.
Nine years later, Kessa was traveling through a city hundreds of miles from Vey.
There was a festival.
She almost didn’t attend.
Then she saw a line.
At the far end of the grounds stood a black tent.
A wooden sign read:
THE ROOM
Her blood went cold.
She pushed through the crowd.
An attendant stopped her.
“One silver.”
Kessa grabbed his shirt.
“Who owns this?”
The attendant panicked.
“I don’t know.”
“Who’s inside?”
“One person at a time.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know!”
Kessa released him.
People in line complained.
She looked at them.
“You shouldn’t go in there.”
A young man laughed.
“Why?”
“Someone disappeared.”
“When?”
“Nine years ago.”
The line became interested rather than frightened.
“Really?”
Kessa stared at them.
She realized she was advertising it.
She stepped aside.
One by one, people paid.
They had been warned.
They entered anyway.
Kessa could not decide whether that made what happened next their responsibility.
Then someone emerged.
An older man.
Thin.
Confused.
He looked around at the unfamiliar city.
Then he saw Kessa.
“Kess?”
She couldn’t breathe.
Davin looked exactly nine years older.
He walked toward her.
She grabbed him.
For a long time neither spoke.
Finally Kessa whispered:
“What happened?”
Davin looked back at the black tent.
“I stayed.”
“For nine years?”
He shook his head.
“For about an hour.”
Kessa held him tighter.
Behind them, the attendant continued collecting silver.
The line had become twice as long.