Without our abilities, we were pretty much screwed, trapped in a mystery which we had to unravel, one way or another, if we wanted to get out of here and complete this mission. The Soul Crusher had quickly established himself as a calculated lunatic, and this was the worst kind of foe.
“There’s a minor advantage here for you,” he said after a while. “I thought you should know. In here, time passes at a slightly slower rate. Mind you, that doesn’t mean you have weeks at your disposal! But it’s not just minutes, either.”
We’d spent the last twenty minutes checking the room from top to bottom, worried that if we pressed the wrong lever, it might trigger something unfortunate. The Soul Crusher had yet to explain what these things did. I’d asked, multiple times, but he’d been quiet until now.
“What’s the time difference?” Lumi asked.
“If I’m not mistaken… I don’t know!” The Soul Crusher laughed.
“You’ve yet to give us the rules for this room,” I said, ignoring the string of curse words leaving Raphael’s and Herakles’s mouths—and Eva wasn’t far behind them. “How do we get out?”
The Soul Crusher paused. “I thought that was obvious. I find myself once again doubting Death’s decision to send you over here. Press the right lever, and you’re out! Duh.”
“I hate him so much right now,” Eira murmured.
We looked at each other, until I exhaled sharply and motioned around me. “Might as well pick one and get started, I guess?”
With four walls covered in levers, it was difficult to actually pick one. We were all on edge, aggravated by the knowledge that all hell was about to break loose outside, once the Hermessi got here. I needed us all focused and calm, but our circumstances weren’t helping. No one responded well to being locked up in a room at the bottom of the ocean by a psychopathic Reaper.
Herakles muttered something under his breath as he walked over to the nearest lever and pulled it.
“Herakles, no, wait—” Riza stopped herself at the sound of a hiss.
“Don’t pull that yet? Is that what you were going to say?” Raphael replied, equally irritated by Herakles’s reaction.
“We had to start somewhere!” Herakles defended his decision.
“It shouldn’t have been that one,” I said, looking up. Though barely noticeable, I could see the air shimmering softly in a corner of the ceiling as the hissing persisted. The air smelled funny. I tasted sweetness on the tip of my tongue.
Amelia was the first to cover her mouth and nose with both hands. “Guys, it’s gas. It’s a toxic gas.”
“Oh, for…” Herakles’s voice trailed off, his breath cut short as his eyes bulged. He started choking, coughing and wheezing. Riza was instantly by his side, but the gas hit her too.
Everything happened too fast. I didn’t even have time to react. I felt something swell and expand in my throat, making it impossible to breathe. I dropped to my knees, poison spreading through me like liquid heat.
Someone said something—maybe Lumi, I wasn’t sure. Hands fumbled with a backpack, and I could hear the clicking of straps and rustling of waterproof fabric. Glass clinked.
“Oh, God…” Varga croaked, collapsing.
“Healing… Healing potion,” Nethissis managed, reaching out to Lumi.
I followed her desperate gaze, but my body gave out. I ended up flat on the floor, my face soft against the cold stone. Lumi wobbled as she made her way toward me. She handed Nethissis a few vials. I could see them being passed around. At least I understood now why the Soul Crusher had taken away the pulverizer stuff and the breathing devices, but not the healing potions. The jerk wanted us to live through as much of this as possible.
Herakles was unresponsive, but Riza, despite her condition, managed to push the potion down his throat, lifting his chin and forcing him to swallow. Everything went white. My blood burned. My bones ached as though a claw hammer had come down on them, over and over.
Was this it? It couldn’t be. Death had made me immortal. I’d wake up eventually. But the others? What about them?
“Amelia… Raphael…” I heard myself whisper.
“Take this,” someone said. Maybe Lumi. The voice was distorted. The white before my eyes became black, and darkness seeped into my being, threatening to take me away. How quickly this nightmare had unfolded. How swift its delivery.
I felt the rounded edge of a glass vial pressed against my lips. A cool liquid slipped down my tongue. I tasted berries and something slightly acidic, a little tangy. It was something I’d had before.
“Come on, Tae.”
I must’ve swallowed it. It went down, reaching my stomach and spreading out in ripples of sharp pain. My muscles jerked. I couldn’t control any of this. The blackness took over. It prevailed. My inner light went out.
Snap. And it was over.
Riza
My eyes popped open. I sucked in a desperate breath, suddenly remembering how I’d fallen, in the first place. Relief washed over me as I realized that I was still alive. How or why, I wasn’t sure, until I noticed the aftertaste in my mouth. The healing potion.
Lumi.
“Herakles!” I cried out.
Someone stirred beside me. Above, the ceiling stared back at me with its cold light beams. There were levers on all the walls. Oh, no… I didn’t dream it. It was real. The Soul Crusher’s insane puzzle was real, and we were stuck in it.
I managed to push myself up into a sitting position, to find Herakles by my side. He’d been the one I’d felt, seconds earlier. He was alive, his chest moving slowly with each breath. A white, powdery substance lingered over his lips. I wiped it off with my sleeve. The memory of him choking and literally foaming at the mouth made me shudder.
He’d pulled a random lever, and it had released some type of gas. It was extremely toxic. It probably would’ve killed us, had it not been for Lumi’s quick thinking. Lumi…
I looked around in a panic. They were all here, each of them still breathing and gradually coming to. I said nothing for about a minute. Herakles opened his eyes and smiled upon seeing me. Somehow, at some point in this journey of ours, we’d gotten so close to each other that it had become increasingly difficult for us to be apart. I didn’t mind it one bit, since my thundering heart had already declared my feelings for him… but I worried. I worried so much now, in this room, in this crazy place.
What if we never got out of here? Snap out of it! We only tried one lever. Hundreds more still left. That was true, but what other traps waited behind them? What else would the Soul Crusher throw at us before we found the right lever? Poison? Blades shooting out from the walls? Some evil sudden-death type challenge that would kill more than half our crew before we made it out?
“Are you okay?” he asked me.
We helped each other up. “Yeah. The potion worked quickly.”
“Thank the stars.”
“No, thank Lumi,” Raphael replied, pulling himself together. Amelia checked his vitals with loving concern, and he gave her a soft smile. “Look at you, nursing me.”
“Hey, if I can’t take care of my first boyfriend, I’m friggin’ useless,” she said jokingly.
“First boyfriend? How many were you planning on having?” he shot back, and they both laughed lightly.
I smiled, almost reflexively, pleased to see their moods still up after what had just happened. Lumi groaned as she got up, rubbing the back of her neck. Nethissis took out a cloth and soaked it in volcanic lake water, using it to wipe Lumi’s mouth, then hers.
“That was a nasty little gas,” Nethissis said. “It was quick and vicious. I’ve never experienced something like that before.”
“I know. My insides were literally burning,” Eva grumbled, as Varga helped her up.
Taeral shot up almost instantly, blinking rapidly as he looked around. We all sympathized with the sigh he let out as soon as he saw that we were all okay. Eira hugged him tight, whispering something in his ear. He seemed surprised by her gesture,
but he welcomed it, giving her a warm smile.
“I’m glad you’re okay, too,” he said slowly, and glanced at us. “You’re all good, right?”
“Yeah, magic lady over here saved our asses,” Raphael replied. He gave Herakles a hard nudge. “You need to stay away from the levers from now on. You’re bad luck.”
“Hey, man, I stand by my actions. Someone had to pull one of the damn things!” Herakles shot back.
I squeezed his shoulder briefly. “It’s okay. We’ll be more careful next time.”
“It’s not okay. Don’t enable him. He will never learn, otherwise,” Raphael retorted, still pretty angry with Herakles. I understood where he was coming from, but his reaction was just too much for this situation, and it could easily lead to unwanted and unproductive friction. The last thing we needed in this place was tension or conflict.
“I mean, there’s a reason why Riza warned you,” Varga muttered. He, too, was cross with Herakles. Taeral didn’t seem too happy about it, either, and I didn’t know what to do to defuse this.
“The odds were that the same would’ve happened if any one of us had pressed one of the levers,” Eva interjected before Herakles could reply. “Let’s just take it as a lesson and maybe find a way to better screen the levers before we press them.”
“We’re all on edge here,” I said. “Let’s not lose focus.”
“For what it’s worth, I am sorry this happened. But I just couldn’t stand idly by anymore,” Herakles said. “Time is of the essence, no matter what the Soul Crusher tells us. Whether we get a few extra hours in here or not, as opposed to the outside world, it’s irrelevant unless we do something with them.”
I was terrified without my powers. I barely recognized myself. Words came with great difficulty, and all I could think of was how nice it would’ve been if I could just teleport everyone out of this place—which was the one thing I couldn’t do.
“What do we do, then?” I asked, feeling useless.
Herakles sighed. “Try again?”
“Not you, though,” Raphael shot back with a smirk. “Someone else. We could take turns.”
“We should be careful, still,” Lumi advised us. “There’s a limited amount of healing potions and volcanic lake water left.”
“My vampire blood is still…” Amelia’s voice trailed off. “Oh, no, what if the Soul Crusher took that away, too?”
“Oh, honey. You’re definitely the brightest out of the group to consider that possibility.” The Soul Crusher’s voice boomed through the room. “But even I am not skilled enough to do that. I’d have to strip your DNA to a bare thread, then reassemble it, and that’s just a massive headache. So, how’s everybody doing?”
“Just peachy. When do we get dessert?” Varga replied sarcastically.
The Soul Crusher laughed. “Good, good, keep that humor up, darling. You’ll need it. Anyway, Herakles here is right. Keep trying. I’m watching, so don’t disappoint me, okay?”
“I don’t get it. Amelia can still heal, but I can’t turn into a snake? That’s part of my genetic makeup, too!” Eva said, frowning.
“Now, now… What did I tell you? There isn’t much time. Will you spend it questioning me or getting the heck out of here?” the Soul Crushed replied.
“He’s right,” Taeral interjected. He paced the room several times and stopped in front of another lever, on the wall opposite the one that Herakles had tried first. “We should keep trying. Lumi, Nethissis, can you two handle the dispensing of healing potions, if needed?”
“Sure. I might as well pass the vials around now, so we all have an even quantity, readily available in case we set off some other poisonous trap,” Lumi replied.
“Where’d the gas come from?” Nethissis murmured, studying the ceiling. “There isn’t a single hole for it to come through.”
“It could be hidden. Some kind of retractable opening,” Eva suggested. “I mean, this is old-school Reaper magic, and we don’t even know enough about the present-day Reaper magic. We’re wasting our energy wondering how he’s pulling this stuff off.”
Raphael stilled, his brow furrowed as he glanced over his shoulder. He flexed his muscles briefly with a grunt, and his wings exploded behind him. He shot us all a broad grin. “Couldn’t take these away, it seems.”
“That is so not cool.” Eva sighed.
Taeral gently pressed the lever he’d set his sights on, motioning for us all to be quiet as he listened to the mechanism within the wall. We heard the faint screech of the metal as the lever was twisted. A click followed, and we all froze, eyeing one another with sharp concern.
Minutes passed in heavy silence, until we realized that nothing had happened.
“Okay, this one doesn’t do anything,” Taeral concluded.
“Which is good,” Eira said. “It means not all of them are traps.”
“Great. Some might kill us, some do nothing, and only one is right. Just great.” Herakles scoffed.
Varga chuckled. “Hey man, I’ll take ‘some do nothing’ over ‘all do something horrible’ any day of the week.”
“You next,” Taeral said to him. “We said we’d take turns.”
Varga scowled. “No, Raphael suggested it. We didn’t agree on anything.”
“Seriously?” Eva chided him.
“Fine,” Varga shot back and took a moment to study the wall. “What are the odds that there are two neutral levers right next to each other?”
Silence settled over the room. I certainly didn’t have an answer. I was too busy holding back the panic that kept threatening to cloud my judgment. The last thing I wanted was to be a liability to anyone, but I had trouble shaking off this wretched sensation of utter uselessness that had come over me.
“Minimal, at best,” Lumi finally said.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he replied and pressed another lever. This one went down with a disturbing clang that echoed through the chamber, but nothing else happened.
I didn’t even realize I’d gripped Herakles’s arm until he cleared his throat, demanding my attention. I’d been too busy sweating bullets and waiting for something terrible to happen. Giving him a faint smile, I pulled my hand back, but he caught and squeezed it gently. “It’s okay,” he whispered.
“Your turn,” Varga said, looking at me.
My knees were weak. “What?”
“Your turn,” he replied, raising an eyebrow. “Come on. Three down, hundreds more to go. Chop-chop.”
I wanted to object, but I worried it would push us all back. I’d just worried about not being a liability, yet my first instinct was to obstruct our mission by not doing my part. Taking deep breaths, I reached out to another lever with a shaky hand.
I could feel their eyes on me. My skin tingled, sweat dripping down my temples. Whatever happens, it happens for a reason, I thought. Maybe the purpose of all this was to test our characters and our wit, more than anything. After all, if I was nothing without my powers, I was nothing overall, and that certainly wasn’t what my parents had taught me over the years.
My fingers touched the cold metal, and I gripped the lever and pulled down on it. I heard the screech, followed by a delicate click. A second later, as I glanced back at the crew, I heard the hiss coming from above.
“Oh, no…” I managed and quickly fumbled through my front pocket for the healing potion vial that Lumi had already slipped in.
We all took a dose and waited, quietly. The hiss finally stopped. Breathing heavily, I waited for some kind of poisoning symptom to work against the potion—it would fail, of course, but there would still have to be some kind of discomfort.
“Even with the potion in us, shouldn’t we feel something?” Taeral asked, slightly confused.
“That’s what I thought,” I said.
We were all baffled. Even Lumi. “This is weird. I’ve taken potions before a poison, and there is always a reaction, albeit not as violent as first ingesting the poison, then the potion.”
Seconds
passed in silence, until Varga burst into laughter. “Poison, then potion. You’re quite the poet, Lumi.”
“Accidental rhyme. It happens,” Lumi replied.
“Take the poison, then the potion. Take the potion, then the poison.” He giggled, unable to stop.
We threw each other confused looks, until Raphael chuckled. “Take the potion, then the poison. Take the poison, then the potion. Wait, no, it was the other way around…”
The two of them doubled over. Moments later, Eva was laughing, as well. Lumi stifled a smile, while Herakles joined Varga and Raphael in their display of… uncontrollable humor. Before I knew it, I was laughing, too.
Suddenly, the whole potion-poison bit became unstoppably hilarious. The greatest bumble we’d ever blurted. It was so funny that we were all on the floor, literally, laughing our hearts out. I couldn’t stop it, for some reason.
Part of me was terrified, yet my body just kept convulsing with laughter.
“Holy crap!” Taeral said, cracking up between hiccups. “It’s some kind of laughing gas. Guys… It’s laughing gas…”
“Oh, good, killing us with humor, then!” Raphael roared.
Lumi was on her back, laughing hysterically as tears streamed down her cheeks. “I’m not sure how it works, but I think it would’ve been… ugh, it would’ve been so… much worse without… without… without the—”
“POTION!” the others screamed in unison, practically falling apart. The greatest word ever.
“You know… You know what the worst part is?” Nethissis chuckled. I stared at her in genuine horror, though I could feel my lips stretched, my chest compressing as another wave of laughter threatened to dismantle me. “We have very little potion left… If we get hit once or twice more… we’ll manage, but after that… damn… Amelia, we’ll be screwed.”
We couldn’t take it anymore. We just couldn’t hold back. Our bodies had become our greatest enemies, and, despite the potions we’d taken, we simply couldn’t control ourselves. We laughed so hard, it became increasingly difficult to breathe.
My air supply was cut off. I tried… I desperately tried to stop, to calm down, to regain my senses. Nothing, absolutely nothing worked. I was helpless. My flesh no longer mine. I looked at Herakles with tears in my eyes, until my consciousness simmered away completely.
A Shade of Vampire 75: A Blade of Thieron Page 12
