Inheritance cycle still doesn't belong to me, no matter how good this ends up being. And yes, this chapter is longer than the first one.

Report 02: The New World and the second inciting incident.

The first thing I remember after I lost the weird feelings about meaningless time and eternity, was that my mind was in shambles, it was like every thought took over a minute to ooze its way through my head and make itself known, all the while my head felt like it was going to burst from the inside out, like said thoughts had gained the size of slugs as well as their speed. I couldn't even massage my temples or groan in displeasure because my body wouldn't respond to my commands… and I feel like I shouldn't go into any more details.

I swear if I have to go through the multiverse again I'm opting for losing my pinky finger to do it, It'll probably be less painful and the added benefits of having much more control over where I end up, plus the added ability to pull stuff from another universe on a whim would be... extremely preferable to what I was going through then.

Note: It has occurred to me that if other people have read these reports before you then they may have challenged you to have a drinking game to take a sip every time I reference something from our world. A trope, a piece of media or anything like that.

My advice to you is DON'T!.

Anyway, after that nasty case of experiencing a 'And I must scream' scenario the atrocious pain and paralyzation started to subside and I started to regain control of myself, and with my still somewhat sluggish mind I began the slow process of figuring where I was.

The first thing I noticed was the feeling that I was lying on a mattress that was more firm than the one I had at home, but I could get used to it if I had to. Next, I slowly opened my eyes only to see a white blur all around, then after a few painfully long minutes my vision started to clear up and I saw that there was a grayish ceiling above me, then my depth perception returned and I realized it was in arm's reach.

With something resembling strength returning to my body I was able to turn my head to my left side to see a wall just as close to me as the ceiling. For a split second, I was in a panic thinking I was trapped in a small metal box, but then I turned to my right and I saw a bigger room... well the term room might be a bit generous, it was more like a narrow hallway.

But I still breathed a sigh of relief, so I'm just in a compartment I thought to myself. Next, I focused on the other side I saw that there were three empty sleeping compartments built into the wall, seeing how the leftmost one looked like it was leveled with me I made a guess that there were two more compartments behind my head for a total of six.

While I was still curious about the rest of my surroundings, for example, I heard a slight hissing sound from a distance, like a pressurized helmet being taken on or off in the movies and video games, but I was tired, just completely burned out like I just completed the whole Portland bridge pedal with a bag of potatoes on my back. So I decided to get as comfortable as I could to get some sleep, somehow managing to take off my gloves and hoodie in that time, it still felt exceptionally odd be resting while wearing jeans but I wasn't willing to do anything about that. But before I could sleep there some nagging thoughts in my head keeping me from doing that.

But what if something is going wrong right around the corner! The more vigilant side of myself thought to myself.

Then there isn't much I can do about it now… not when I'm barely conscious. I can't fight off or run from a predator for example, so I'm better off not making any sudden moves and playing dead. I wasn't entirely sure about the playing part but you get the idea.

But what if this place has a nuclear reactor that's about to go critical unless you find a computer terminal and fix it.

There would probably be some sort of alarm going off at that were the case-

You're just making up excuses to be lazy like you usually do!

I paused for a moment, and then after half a second of silence, I formulated my response in the most respectful, elegant and with the biggest and most obscure words that I could conceive of.

Shut up and let me sleep.

That apparently did it and I was free to rest while waiting for myself to fall unconscious I began to think back on the events that brought me here, the dog barking at the normal-looking commercial truck, the chaos that followed [which again, I would later find out my memory about it would change every time I thought about it.] And the consequences that would likely come of it for those I left behind.

I hope the dog found his way home… and that the family isn't tearing itself apart with worry and grief. I thought solemnly to myself as I started to drift to sleep.

But before I could get that much-needed rest an utterly horrid beeping sound assaulted my ears that sounded like it was coming from right behind my head causing my lingering headache to crawl its way back to prominence. Then an automated voice that sounded suspiciously like the female A.I. from Doom 2016 made an announcement.

"Dimensional phasing completed, please confirm crew status."

At first, I tried to ignore it, hands pushing against my ears in a desire for silence, but between the continuous pinging, repeating voice, and the cautious voice in my head eventually overcoming my inner sloth.

"Dimensional phasing completed, please confirm crew status."

Shit, I grumbled in utter contempt for all sounds, physical afflictions, and whoever or whatever was responsible for me ending up here in the first place. Then with all the speed and grace that would make a drunk zombie feel amazing about itself, I finally got up to investigate the beeping noise.

"Dimensional phasing completed, please confirm crew status."

"GRRAAAAAA!" I hoarsely shouted as my shambling led me to a terminal that was located on the wall pretty much within two arms reach of where I was resting, but in my current state, it felt like I just ran so much that my legs were going to collapse under my own weight if I took another step. I did my best to ignore the pain and proceed to learn what all the fuss was about.

There was a big flashing message on the wall terminal saying [swipe here for confirmation] in a bar that had arrows pointing thought the right of it, and seeing how I couldn't find any mouse or keyboard I concluded that I was dealing with a touchscreen, so I swiped right on the bar and immediately the beeping stopped and I also found myself looking at the main menu.

Compartment 1: Status: In Use.

Compartment 2: Status: No Occupant.

Compartment 3: Status: No Occupant.

Compartment 4: Status: No Occupant.

Compartment 5: Status: No Occupant.

Compartment 6: Status: No Occupant.

Aerial drones ready for deployment.

Exploration drones ready for deployment.

Sentry drones ready for deployment.

First landing protocols: Initiated.

Ok… I thought to myself in an uncertain voice, I couldn't remember how long I just stood there not doing or thinking about anything, and I never ever bothered to check how long I took. But I eventually noticed that the word 'Initiated' was highlighted like none of the other words, so I pressed my finger on it and I saw the screen changed to a scene of a dark pine needle forest lit only by the stars and an orange moon in from the dark and clear sky with the words Exp Drone 1 in the bottom left corner of the screen. So I'm currently looking through the eyes of a drone, and... wait a minute, doesn't the moon only become orange in the fall? I thought to myself in confusion until I remembered the announcer's… um, announcement.

'Dimensional phasing completed' after I really paid attention to that line I came to the conclusion that would have been obvious if I wasn't having to think with a real foggy mind.

So I traveled to some alternate dimension where it's now autumn instead of winter… ok...

At the time I had really hoped I had lost my ability to feel surprised to the journey to wherever I was, but it would later seem that I was just overwhelmed by the number of questions I had.

Then, on the screen, I saw the words Autopilot Resumed and the image started to move as the drone began to sweep the area around it in what looked like a complete 360-degree turn, allowing me to see what I would come to call the pod. On the outside, it looked just like it had when I first saw it, just a large, green, rectangular, inconspicuous cargo container that you would never think about again if you even looked at it in the first place. Except for the fact that it was in the middle of the forest and the area right around it was burned and still giving off the occasional wisp of smoke, and at the now closed door there were now tracks that led to the bottom of the camera, right were the drone now resided and recorded everything it saw.

Huh… so this thing is like the Tardis, a time/dimension traveling machine designed to hide in plain sight?... alright… who made this thing, was it created by some hyper-advanced civilization or did some team of scientists on Earth figure out how to breach the veil between realities?... and how hard IS it to have interdimensional travel anyway? I decided to check if there were any logs that could tell me about this thing's origins, maybe a pre-recorded message for the crew, or… um… something else I guess.

But after a few minutes of searching the pod's databanks, I found nothing, except for what was looking to be a complete copy of all humanity's knowledge. Centuries of scientific knowledge, millennia of history and culture from across the world apparently copied right from the moment that the pod left for wherever it would end up.

...Wow... that's just, wow. After I managed to process that fact I started to wonder what it meant to the origin of this thing. So this pod made by someone from Earth? It wouldn't be likely for it to have been made by someone else or there would be more information on it. But why would you download a copy of the internet? Was this meant to be some sort of ark? It didn't nearly have enough room for people for that. Is it some sort of exploration vessel? That did seem like a better explanation for what I've seen so far, but that just brings up more questions, was it a new creation being moved to some testing facility? Or were devices like it being used for a while now like in Stargate? It was definitely designed to be transported in plain sight by looking like a commercial truck, so… goddammit. I felt the pain I felt earlier creeping back into my head as I started thinking too hard, so I sat down on the floor while I waited for the pain to go away, after about a minute of silence both inside my head and around me the reemerging headache vanished and I dared to think one more thought about my particular situation and the thing that brought me here.

What the hell was happening in the dark corners of the world I left behind? Asking a question that I felt wouldn't be getting an answer to any time soon.

My musings stopped when the still annoying if no longer intolerable beeping noise returned originating from the computer screen, I sighed in resignation and pushed myself up to inspect the screen and see what the rover was fussing about, and what I saw would change my life forever, and would more immediately completely recontextualized this entire adventure.

Without anyone giving it any commands the drone resumed its surveying of the immediate area, it started not by circling and recording the pod for what I guessed was for the purpose of seeing if the structure had sustained damage from wherever/whatever it had traveled through to get to were it, and by extension I, was now. But thankfully there wasn't any damage, although even if there was I don't think that would be what I would be at all that interested in for the moment, and it wasn't what the drone sent an alert about either.

Apparently, the drone was going about its pre-programmed route when it came across… it, after using a few onboard instruments to analyze its quarry it sent me the following messages.

Anomaly detected. No hazardous signatures detected. Object deemed safe for transportation and study. Permission to retrieve? Yes/No

Usually, I would've at least given myself the chance to rest before I bought any anomalies on board even if they were 'deemed safe for transportation and study'. But seeing what the anomaly in question looked like I knew that if I left it outside I would be up all night wondering if it was what I thought it was and what it was if it wasn't what I thought. Pretty counterproductive to getting much-needed sleep, so I suspended that particular cautionary voice in my heard and after a minute of inwards debate, I pushed the yes button and witnessed the robot pick up the 'anomaly'.

Affirmative. Returning to deliver the anomaly.

Before we go any further in the report let me tell you something about myself, back home I was well noted for having a good memory for certain kinds of things, for example, when I was… I dunno 7, 8? My family watched Stargate SG1 together a tradition that we discontinued after we watched the end of season 10 and the Ark of Truth, afterward nobody watched the series again for a little over a decade. Then one day, when a random episode aired on some random channel my parents were watching they were surprised when I was casually able to say exactly what some of the lines the characters were going to say next, apparently, they like most people would have (and did) forget almost everything about that episode after over a decade.

Just in case anyone was wondering the episode in question was the one where Mini Carter (The ability to remember names wasn't included among those certain kinds of things.) and the tiny living lights showed up and they kept saying they were on a moon, NOT a planet, and it was the lines involving exposition to Mini Carter, exposition about the tiny living lights, and the fact that they were on a moon NOT a planet were the ones I remembered most clearly. It was this particular kind of memory that let me remember the 'anomaly' despite the fact that it had been years since I read those books, so I was fairly confident that I knew what it was, but at the same time I didn't feel like saying or even thinking it out loud what I thought it was at the time because… well…I didn't want to sound like an idiot to myself if it turned out I was wrong.

Anyway, after the drone picked up the 'anomaly' it started to move to one end of the rectangular cube that made up the pod that I resided in, The drone is bringing it here! I thought to myself as my heart began beating at a frantic pace despite the fact that the message had stated that the thing was safe, Also, how exactly is it going to get it in here? And how did the drone get out of the pod in the first... place...?

A mild smacking sound came from my forehead as I internally berated myself for not realizing all the wonderfully important questions I should've sought answers to as I learned I was inside of a metal box and concluded then I was in another universe, so I could leave in a hurry in case something went wrong! Goddamit I'm lost without the slightest clue how to get back or how to make sure I am found by who and/or what I want to be found by as opposed to say, an army of eldritch abominations that could be lurking in the veil between realities and might be able to show up at any time! All the while I had no idea if there were any mundane dangers nearby and or coming, AND I DIDN'T THINK ABOUT FINDING THE EXIT!

God I felt like such a moron at that moment, until I remembered that I was in no state to get out with any form of hast due to my barely functional mind and body, and I had so many other things worth thinking about by the time I had gotten over those deficiencies that I could reasonably believe most people would have made the same mistake.

I suppose I can cut myself a little slack for this instance, still, I should do better in the future. Now that that's out of the way how is that 'anomaly' going to be delivered into the pod? I thought as I pulled my eyes from the screen.

I gave the room my first proper look at the inside of the pod, and it was… pretty dull to be completely honest. The interior was gray along the entirety of the rectangular hall, floor, roof, and walls, the only other things worth mentioning besides that were the six sleeping compartments and the outlines of what to me looked like (and I would soon find out for sure were.) drawers and cabinets that might contain all the supplies that the crew might have needed.

After finishing the overall inspection I focus on the ends of the pod, after seeing both ends had doors but with no discernable characteristics on either one I decided to start with the closest to me and I saw a door that was only several feet away, so I decided to check there first hoping to find the way in and out of the pod and to confirm if I was where I thought I was and if the 'stone' was what I believed it was.

After a small groan l moved away from the screen and the sleeping compartments right behind it and I made my way to the closest door with a diminished but still noticeable shamble from earlier in my movement towards the door, when I finally made it to the door I reached out and gripped the handle and with a slight huff I pulled the door open looking forward to not having to go all the way back to where I started and then more than double the distance to the other side of the pod... and it was a bathroom, it reminded me of the ones on airplanes back home except for the fact it had a shower. Then the computer voice made another announcement.

"The anomaly has been delivered to containment and is waiting for study, please report to containment at the earliest convenience."

Air rushed in through my nose while my right hand's grip tightened on the handle, and my left hand clenched into a rising fist that I could have sworn could've beat Saitama in a punching match. "Goddammit…" I venomously muttered to myself, closing the door with far more control then I felt like committing to it, and I began to move towards the other side of the pod despite my body's protest. I've gotten this far, I thought to myself. I might as well be done with this.

When I made it to the other side I opened the door to find one more door about 10 feet in front of me, judging from the world Airlock right above it this was the last door separating me from the world right outside. On the right side of the room, there were six hazmat suits attached to the wall prepared to protect their wearers from any conventionally hazardous environments the pod arrived in, attached to the left corner just in front of the last door was a modestly sized laboratory grade glove box, you know the glass containers with the rubber gloves built into the thing in for safety manipulating whatever is inside of it while keeping it contained? I'm not talking about a glove dispenser here. (Although there really should be cooler and more distinguishable names for it.)

There were also lockers on the left side of the room not taken up by the glove box, but I didn't learn what was in them until later so they won't matter for the rest of this report, instead, we'll focus on what was in the glove box.

Looking inside saw the 'anomaly' looking just like it had when I was seeing it from the perspective of the drone, but seeing it with my own eyes somehow made it seemed more beautiful and frightening and I found myself needing to make sure it was real, so I opened the metal hatches keeping me from using the rubber gloves and proceeded to pick it up. The roughly foot long oval weighed about 7 to 9 pounds, a noticeable burden but pretty lightweight when you looked at its jewel-like surface and remembered how heavy those things and by extension, it was logically supposed to be.

While the gloves limited my sense of touch I could tell that it was pretty cool for being in the center of what looked like a newly made ground zero no more than two minutes ago, while I felt almost no friction when my fingers streaked across it. The last notable features it possessed were its colors, the fancier part was a spider-web pattern of thin white veins encompassing it, while the rest of the 'stone' was colored a very deep and very dark blue.

Alright, it definitely looks and feels like what I think it is but is there any other way to be sure? I thought as looked for another way to be sure, and I did, just to the left side of the glass was a button that had x-ray written on it, I pulled my hands out of the gloves, closed the hatches to the gloves, took a deep breath, and pushed the button.

When I looked back inside the glove box I saw the form of a western dragon sleeping the fetal position inside. Now while all I really knew for sure was that it was a dragon egg so I could be in a completely different world from that of the inheritance cycle with the only similarity being that One of the dragon eggs looks the same. I still couldn't shake the feeling that that's where I was and not only did I have a dragon egg in my interdimensional traveling pod, but that it was Saphira's egg.

I guess I'm at the point where I'm able to forgive myself for making a mistake like that if it turns out to be one. So… I have Saphira's egg…. So where is Eragon? I thought as I turned off the X-ray and thought of how to get an answer.