Season 1: Episode 1 – The Porta Segreta
This series contains mature themes and is intended for adult listeners.
>Begin Porta Cor imprint.<
I do not know where I am.
A day ago, I entered the council hall in Teithia because the city was in turmoil. I knew collapse was simply a matter of time. I sent orders for citizens to evacuate, but I knew that, like a captain, I must perish with my ship.
One minute, I was running through the hallways of the council building, and it felt like the city of Teithia crumbled around me. There was thick dust in the air, and every breath tasted like stone and old blood. In an instant, I felt the heat of an intense fire moving toward me. The fire…she must have done what I asked.
Then suddenly everything went black, and I woke up here in this cell. I don’t ever see my captors, but they do slide food and water into me. I don’t even see light most of the time. I know I need to record every event that led to this, so those left behind can understand where we went wrong.
It began over 200 years ago with an off-world stranger in bright orange and a doorway that never should have been opened.
This is how it began: before the fires, before the betrayals, before I lost everything I loved.
I walked through the hallways of the central council chamber late that day, running from one committee meeting to another.
Mallaidh, the eldest living Tylwyth Teg on Anturia and the head of the council, nodded at me as she approached me. “Bryn Tal, we have a request from an off-worlder for an audience. I saw the dockets were clear this afternoon, so I granted permission. I’m sending out a message to get everyone gathered now.”
I tilted my head slightly, puzzled. “We’re giving an audience to an off-worlder? Isn’t that a little abnormal?”
Her lips tightened from a friendly smile to almost a condescending one, “Bryn, we cannot close ourselves off from the universe forever. Let’s be open-minded and hear what he has to say.”
I shrugged. She was right; I should at least hear what he was here to say. “Where’s he from?”
“Ricerca,” she said as she started to walk off from me down the hallway. “I’ll see you in a bit.”
I felt my face scrunch up distastefully as I thought to myself, ‘Ricerca? The planet of sentient beings that invented artificial intelligence to think for them, so they no longer had to think. Their people spent their days in idle indulgence, letting their machines think for them. The only activity they pursued was trying to infect other worlds with their promises to free up time so all people of all planets could become stupid and do nothing all day.’
Again, I shrugged, and I went to get a drink vial before heading to the council chamber. I hadn’t eaten anything since the morning, and I was starving by this point in the day.
While I was in the break room, I ran into my friend Oswalt, one of the few males in the council. He was essentially our communicator and secretary of sorts. “Oswalt, how are you today?” I asked him.
He looked up from his deep thought at his table, “Bryn, hello! I’m well. Did you hear about the off-worlder being here in Teithia?”
I nodded as I reached into the creation alcove and grabbed a vial. “I heard just now from Mallaidh.” Suddenly, Mallaidh’s broadcast message arrived in all of our minds at once. We both paused our conversation to listen.
“Council Chambers now for emergency audience.”
I rolled my eyes before I could stop myself. Emergency? Since when was a meeting with an off-worlder considered an emergency? I heard Oswalt chuckle, and I realized he had been watching me. I chugged down the drink quickly and then helped Oswalt clear away his things from the table.
“Well, shall we go together?” I asked him.
We stepped together into the vast chamber, its polished stone walls, marble floors, and a cathedral ceiling arching high above us.
Mallaidh was sitting in the chair to the right of the podium on the dais, and I moved to the one to the left. Oswalt sat next to me.
I nodded to her before I sat down, and then the rest of the chairs around us and the floor filled with various council members, mostly female, from all over the planet of Anturia.
Once everyone was seated, a bizarre being in a bright orange outfit, an exceptionally tall hat, and yellow boots stepped onto the dais. He stood before the podium, giving a low, ridiculous bow to the council. Was he mocking us? I remained stoic in appearance since the rest of the council could see me.
“I am Adamo Fisico from Ricerca!” He announced as he rose from the bow. He didn’t bother to move behind the podium. “I came here today to introduce you to the incredible technology that will enhance your world beyond your imagination. It is called the Porta Segreta. It is a doorway that connects your world to your twin planet in another dimension.
Your twin planet is called Earth, and it has some fantastic opportunities for you all as it is rich in minerals, life, and promises to help you rid yourselves of shortages of all those things here on Anturia.”
Did he breathe? He said all of that in such a way that it didn’t even sound like he paused to breathe. It sounded so ridiculous.
I looked around me, thinking surely the council would burst out laughing and throw him out at this point. Much to my dismay, their eyes were marked with hunger that felt like a cold hand on the back of my neck. They appeared interested in what he came here to sell us.
I stopped looking out at the council, so I wouldn’t get more disgusted, and dared a glance over toward Mallaidh. She was a no-nonsense sort of leader, and indeed, she would see through this idiot and have him dragged out of here.
My stomach sank when I looked at her and saw her looking at Adamo with the same hungry eyes I found in the audience. She even leaned forward with such intense interest in what Adamo continued to babble about from Earth and its potential for us that I became instantly uneasy as though someone had kicked my legs out from underneath me while I was running.
I wanted to stand up and scream and ask them if they’d all lost their minds, but everyone looked so intense. His words continued, and they were magic glimmering in the air. The council greedily swallowed every one of them.
Less than an hour later, Mallaidh said, “I propose we proceed with the installation on Baliya Island.”
A handful of concerns surfaced, then drowned under the weight of excitement. My own, included.
Another councilor, Murithir, called out, “Seconded.”
Oswalt blinked and then announced, “Let the record show—approved.”
I blinked. We didn’t even discuss it. And just like that, thousands of years of caution and collaboration were erased.
I rose to leave the chamber with everyone else, and Dahlfia appeared at my side, not by chance but by habit. I didn’t have to look at her to know that she was uneasy. “Well, this is interesting,” she said. “And reckless.”
Within days, the arch rose piece by piece, a gleaming curve against the sky, while below it, the old volcanic shelter on Baliya Island was gutted and refitted.
My dread reached an all-time high as doubts wrestled with my mind. But no one spoke up against this thing, so I didn’t either.
Now, we were on a ship heading toward the island, and the Porta Segreta arch could be seen in the distance. As the boat approached the island, all the councilors, including me, gasped at the stunning work of architectural art.
The Porta Segreta was made of titanium, enormous, stretching hundreds of meters from foot to foot, high enough to make us feel like insects. The building beneath it was sunk into the island’s ground and disappeared beneath the water; it was watertight. On its roof sat the arch and a stage, all fitted with chairs and a dais much like our council chamber.
Not a single councilor spoke as we disembarked the ship and made our way from the docks to the stage area with the seating. Dahlfia stood on my right, and Oswalt on my left, and all three of us were looking up with our jaws dropped open in wonder at the scope of the thing.
We took our seats, and the first thing I noticed was the silence on the island. The seabirds had not yet returned after the devastation to the island, and as I looked over my head at the arch above, I wondered if they ever would return now. Would this inhibit them?
Dahlfia elbowed me slightly and nodded toward the stage steps as Adamo Fisico began hopping up them two at a time until he reached the stage in front of where we sat. He had other flamboyantly ridiculous colors today and looked like something that crawled out of a painter’s nightmare.
“Well, at least we are repurposing the island,” Oswalt said to me.
“I guess there’s that,” I whispered barely audibly.
Adamo did another strange, low bow and then motioned above us to the arch as though maybe we didn’t see it ten miles away from the island.
“Welcome to the Porta Segreta!” he announced, more energized than the last time we saw him. “The portal is operated by equipment in the building below, but this stage is where your departing groups will stand while it is activated, and where any groups you bring back will appear. It’s important that, when you begin transporting back and forth, this stage area remains clear. Make note that it can hold approximately 1000 beings our size on it at one time.”
It was quite a large stage, and I felt strange sitting here with our small group of councilors on such a large stage, but it was fitting, I supposed.
“Now, we begin the activation process!” He threw both hands into the air, as if in celebration.
For a moment, the arch looked less like an invention and more like a sacred doorway. I felt my heart race as blinking lights appeared around the feet of the arch, and small beeps filled the silent island. I looked at Dahlfia, then at Oswalt, and then back up to the arch as a bright green light flooded the stage. With a final pulse of green light in between the spaces of the arch, the Porta Segreta awakened.
>End Porta Cor imprint.<