by Rick Scott
Val Helena squints at me curiously. “How do you know?”
“That other girl was from Nasgar too, right?”
“Yeah…”
“Well, weren’t you like the last guys to even beat a world boss from there? Maybe she’s been in here like a really, really long time. Becky has been in here for what? A few days? No way she’s going to be like that when we find her.”
The giantess smiles at me.
“Thanks, Reece,” she says, giving my hand a squeeze. “I really needed to hear something like that. This whole place has been like one big curse. Nothing but misery has come out of any of it. I guess I’m just fearing that the trend isn’t going to change, y’know?”
I look back to Gilly on her back and grimace.
She notices my glance and suddenly looks apologetic. “God, I’m such a knucklehead. I’m sorry, Reece. I forgot what finding Becky means to you too.”
“That’s okay,” I say. “It’ll all work out. We’ve got plenty of time left. And everything that’s happened so far hasn’t been all bad. Think about what happened with the Labyrinth Spirit just now. And even Gilly’s timer. We’re going to get another Hail Mary, Val. I know we will.”
She chuckles and presses a smile, making the tears in the corners of her eyes roll down her cheeks. “You’re awesome you know that. Please don’t ever change. Not even for Braxus.”
I furrow my brow at that one. “Huh?”
“What I said before. About vengeance. Don’t let it harden your beautiful heart, Reece. It’s the best part of you.”
I’m not sure how to feel about that, but I smile at her as she squeezes my hand again.
“Hurry it up, you two!” Aiko shouts from up ahead. “Stop holding hands like idiots and come on! We’re here!”
Aiko’s words make me feel a bit silly and I let go.
Val Helena lets out one of her great big goddess laughs again, something I haven’t heard for ages, and it warms my heart.
She gives me a final nod.
“Let’s finish this,” she says.
* * *
We use one of our few remaining Labyrinth Keys to make the jump to the last platform and run towards the massive silver ball. It looms above me like a skyscraper and I can see now its surface is not really solid. Ripples run across its surface as if it’s made of water, like an enormous ball of mercury.
Maxis stops a couple feet away from where it meets the platform, forming a wall out of the liquid metal. “How do we get inside this thing?”
“Doesn’t look solid,” Aiko says, reaching towards it. “Maybe we can just walk through?”
“Be careful,” Val Helena says as Aiko continues to reach for the shimmering surface.
Her hand touches it and she lets out a curse. At first I think that maybe it shocked her or something, but when she steps back folding her arms and looking ticked off, it becomes clear that it was a curse of frustration and not pain.
“What happened?” I ask.
Aiko shakes her head. “Says I don’t meet the requirements for entry.”
“Let me try,” Maxis says and touches the sphere, but the results turn out the same. “Crap… Don’t tell me we can’t even get into this thing.”
My stomach sinks through the floor. We can’t have come all this way and done all this for nothing. I step forward and touch the rippling mirror surface of the sphere. Despite its appearance it feels very solid to the touch.
Do you wish to use the Warden’s Key? [Y/N]
Excitement floods through me again. “Guys. You need a Warden’s Key to enter!”
“I have one,” Val Helena says. “How many extras do you have, Reece?”
I check my inventory and frown. “Just the one.”
“I’ve only got one left as well,” Rembrandt says.
Maxis lets out an agitated sigh. “I guess we’re two keys short. Me and Aiko.”
Rembrandt looks over his shoulder, back towards the closest island, which is about five tiles away. “Shall we go farm?”
I check Gilly’s timer.
18:23
I’m about to mention the time, but Aiko beats me to the punch.
“It’s too far away,” she says. “We’ll lose way too much time trying to farm up two more keys. We’ve got to go with who we got.”
“Hold on,” Maxis says, pumping his palms in a ‘slowdown’ gesture. “We don’t know what’s in there. It’s best we face it as a team.”
“It’s a risk either way,” Aiko says. “We’d have to get through at least two pulls of angels to get the keys we need. That’s a lot of angels. Even if we killed them as fast as we could, the distance running there and back would leave maybe ten or twenty minutes to find my sister once inside.”
“And what if you need a key to get back out?” Maxis says.
That one sends my gut for another tail spin.
“We need to do something,” Val Helena says, looking exasperated. “Time’s burning for Gilly either way.” She then looks down at me. “You’re still the main tank, Reece. You’ll be fighting whatever we find in there. So what do you think?”
I release a sigh and drop into a crouch as I consider our options. Aiko’s right, it could take close to an hour to get those keys and Gilly doesn’t have that much time. But my brother is making sense too. Our health bars are all in the yellow around halfway. If we get in there and find a boss or something, we could be screwed.
I mull it over some more and finally get a flash of inspiration.
“I have an idea,” I say, standing again. “It’s like what Gilly said that one time, remember? Our goals need not be mutually exclusive.”
Maxis squints his eyes at me. “What?”
“Whoever has keys now can enter and begin looking, right? And whoever is left outside can start farming for more keys. It’ll be slower with just two people, but at least you could be working towards getting inside while we scout ahead.”
“Could work, I suppose,” Val Helena says with a shrug.
“That would mean me and Max staying,” Aiko says. “I could tank them, but pulling them, I don’t know? I have a few shuriken on me, but my throwing skill isn’t that high.”
“Let’s make things easy then,” Rembrandt says, and materializes the purple Warden’s Key in his palm. “You take my key, Aiko.”
“What?” Aiko looks back at him, stunned.
“It’s your sister in there. If there’s anyone who should be looking for her first, it’s you.”
Aiko stares at the key. “Rem…I don’t know what to say.”
“Just take it,” Rembrandt says with a grin. “Plus you guys forget that Max and I used to survive out here just the two of us no problem, before we met all of you. We’ve got this. You three get going. Find Becky and bring us back our Gilly, yeah?”
Aiko accepts the key and looks like she’s about to cry. “Thank you, Rem.”
Val Helena pulls my brother into an embrace. “You two be careful with those things. One at a time, okay?”
“And you be careful with whatever you find in there,” Maxis says, hugging her back. “If you run into something you can’t handle, just come right back out.”
“Hey,” I say. “We’ve got two Dodge Tanks, a kick ass half-giant Warrior and hopefully two Celestial Mages about to join us. We should be in great shape to take on anything we find in there.”
Maxis chuckles and gives me a bro hug. “Well I hope you don’t run into anything. Go get your girl.”
* * *
Aiko, Val Helena, and I line up at the edge of the shimmering sphere of mercury. We give each other nods of confirmation and then touch the surface.
Do you wish to use the Warden’s Key? [Y/N]
I hit yes and my hand sinks through the metal. I expect it to feel wet or something, but I feel nothing at all. It’s like the metal surface has turned into an illusion. I step through and once my eyes pass the silvery curtain of the sphere’s edge, I immediately squint.
A radiant light sh
ines from high above and it takes my eyes a few seconds to adjust. When they do, a sprawling clockwork of mechanical devices lie before me, banging and slamming with the rhythmical din of a printing press.
Huge pistons and gears the size of houses lay stacked atop of one another, towering into the air like a mountain of discarded cars. At its pinnacle I see the light source that made me squint. A massive orb floats a few feet above an array of crystal pillars at the very top of the mechanical heap. With the reflective interior of the sphere as backdrop, the place becomes a kaleidoscope of shining metal and brass, silver piston rods moving to and fro and gears that creak and grind. And always with the ever-present banging and slamming that makes my ears ring.
Val Helena and Aiko step through the veil of the sphere next to me and gawk up at our surroundings.
“What is all this?” Aiko says distastefully.
I’m still trying to figure it out myself. How are we supposed to find Becky in all this mess? I look at the mass of contraptions and try to find a path through to the glowing orb at the top. If she’s in here, I’m sure that’s where she has to be.
And then a strange sense of déjà vu hits me, along with a terrible sense of dread.
“I think I know what this place is,” I say and already feel defeated.
“What?” Aiko says.
I’m about to answer, but Val Helena beats me to it.
The half-giant grimaces as she shakes her head.
“It’s a damn jumping quest.”
Chapter 13: Learning
Of all the things that could have been inside this stupid silver ball, it had to be this.
I look at the mass of slamming pistons and gears with weary eyes. “Why the heck couldn’t it have just been a boss or something?”
“We can’t lose hope,” Val Helena says. “We’ve gotten this far. We just need to figure it out.”
“No crap,” Aiko says bitterly, folding her arm. “But how are we going to get through this? I hate these freaking things. And there’s no respawn here.”
That thought sends my stomach quivering.
“You completed one, right?” Val Helena says, looking to me. “Before? In the Shards?”
I shrug. “Yeah, but I died like 50 times doing it.” And then my thoughts sour a bit. “Plus I had Gilly helping me.”
It reminds me to look at her timer.
17:23
“No way all three of us are getting though this thing,” Aiko says.
“All three?” I say. “I’m not sure about even one of us getting through.”
“Maybe she’s not even up there,” Val Helena says, looking toward the orb at the top. “If Becky made it this far, I don’t think she could have made it through this either.”
Val Helena makes a good point. I made it through that jumping quest back in the Shards mostly because I’m a Ninja. But a Celestial Mage? I take a good look at the clockwork again to see if there are any signs of Becky. I strain my eyes at the bright orb at the top and then look to the crystalline pillars below it. Faintly I make out the silhouette of a human figure inside each one and my heart sinks.
Could that be Becky in there? Frozen inside one of those pillars?
Were we already too late?
I almost don’t want to point it out to Aiko and Val Helena, but they need to see it as well.
“Guys, take a closer look at those pillars up there. I think one of them could be Becky.”
They both fall quiet as they look up and then Aiko finally lets out a curse.
“This can’t be happening!” she says, spinning in a circle, frustrated. “We need to get up there now!”
“There has to be an easier way,” Val Helena says. “Maybe there’s a puzzle piece or key we’re missing, just like the platforms.”
Aiko scowls. “Well, I don’t see any angels to kill in here.”
I breathe out heavily as I look at the pounding contraptions. Like Val Helena said, there has to be a way through this. But how? I start scouting around the edge of the sphere, looking for something obvious in the mass of churning gears and pounding piston rods. Val Helena and Aiko follow behind me. After a while, the pile of junk actually starts to take on some semblance of structure and meaning.
And then finally I see it.
A huge steel door stands at the edge of the machines, inviting us to enter.
“There we go, guys,” I say, heading towards it. “The way in! Let’s go!”
We rush forward to the steel door that looks to slide upwards like a guillotine. It’s twice the size of a normal door both in height and width, more like a garage door actually. The banging and slamming gets louder as we approach, so much so that it begins to hurt my ears. We reach the door and next to it I spot a lever. It seems a bit too obvious and I wonder if it could be some kind of trap.
Before I can even vocalize my thoughts, Val Helena rushes forward and pulls on it.
“Val!”
I tense, expecting something to come slamming on top of us, but nothing happens.
Val Helena mutters as she tries the lever again, but it doesn’t move.
“What the heck…?” She then looks back at us. “It says the door can’t be opened from this side.”
At least it wasn’t a trap, I guess. I step forward and try it myself.
[Door cannot be opened from this side.]
“Good thing it’s not asking for a key,” Aiko says sardonically. “Because we ain’t got one.”
I check the timer again.
16:55
That’s more time than I expected to see. I watch the seconds more closely and see about six seconds pass before the digits move. That’s twice as much as before. “I got some good news, guys. We seem to be in another time compression zone. Time’s slowed down for us again.”
“Huh?” Val Helena says. “Are you sure?”
I nod. “That’s another Hail Mary if you ask me.”
“Yeah, I guess,” Aiko says, looking dejected. “But it doesn’t help us much. How do we get through this door?”
I take a step back from it and notice a gap between two steel beams standing vertically next to the doorway. It’s narrow but I could probably squeeze through it. I peer between the beams and trace a pathway that leads through a bunch of hammering equipment, ending at a ladder. The ladder connects to a walkway above, which then leads back to the sealed door in front of us.
“The observation path….” I say as it all begins to click.
“What?” Aiko looks at me.
“When Gilly and I did the jumping quest, there was an observation path that was safe. It overlooked everything.” I point towards the door. “That’s what this leads to. But to unlock that door, someone has to get through the obstacles to open it from the other side.”
“Ah…” Val Helena nods. “Perfect game theory, I guess. But that still means one of us needs to get through there.”
No one says anything but I can feel their eyes burning into me.
Finally, Aiko says, “Maybe there’s another way…”
“Don’t worry. I got this,” I say and my heart begins to race with anxiety. “I’m the only one of us who’s done this before. Plus, I’m a Dodge Tank.”
Aiko looks at the ground sheepishly, perhaps at my mention of Dodge Tank.
I bump into her slender elven frame and grin. “And it has to be me, Aiko. Because I’m the one wearing your gear, remember?”
I give her a wink and the gesture makes her smile.
“Don’t remind me,” she says. “And I still want it back too, so don’t you go messing it up by getting smashed in there. No Reece pancakes, understand?”
That manages to give me a chuckle, despite the life or death subject matter.
“I don’t know, Reece.” Val Helena frowns as she looks down at me. “Do you really think you can do this? Those hammers are moving so fast and just one hit…”
“Hey,” I say again. “I got this.”
My words cause her mouth to close, but I can sti
ll see the worry in her big gray eyes. Aiko too looks like she’s freaking out on the inside, her violet eyes darting back and forth, but she gives me a steady nod of confidence.
They’re both counting on me now. Gilly too.
No way can I let them all down.
“Go wait by the door,” I say. “I’ll see you guys in five minutes.”
* * *
What the heck am I doing?!
After squeezing through the steel girders and moving out of sight of Aiko and Val Helena, I drop the false bravado I’d put on for their sake and the full impact of what I’m about to do hits me in the chest like a torpedo. My heart is racing, my legs shaking so bad I feel like I’m about to fall over.
How am I going to do this??
I stand in front of the first obstacle and fear rises up in my stomach like indigestion. A series of hammers slam down from above, not unlike the first obstacle I faced back in the Shards.
But this time it’s different.
No screw-ups allowed.
And no Gilly to cheer me on or guide me either.
Just the thought of her makes me check that timer again.
16:33
Extra time or not, I need to get moving.
I need to do this.
For her.
If I don’t I’ll lose Gilly forever.
My heart pounds like a bass drum within my ears as I inch forward. If I’m going to do this, I know I need to calm down. I try to think back to when I did this before. The lessons I learned. If anything, the lesson was: “Learn from your mistakes.”
But how do you do that when you can’t make any mistakes?
That makes me think some more.
Actually I can make mistakes—but just one.
One every seven seconds or however long it takes Shadow Copy to come off of Cool-Down. Or one every four seconds if I use the Witch Spider’s Ring. That alone makes this seem less impossible, but at the speed those pistons are moving, a hit every four seconds is way too long a span to just run in there haphazardly. I can afford to make a mistake or two, but I still need to get almost perfect. I need to use those mistakes to learn.