by J. D. Hale
It took what seemed like forever, but eventually we were to the front.
“Are you four a group?” An irritated man asked, holding a clipboard.
“I suppose.” Rowan shrugged, trying to be nonchalant.
“Fantastic.” He said sarcastically, “The current tour will end about…”
The doors behind him swung open, and a group of chattering tourists walked out.
“…right now.” The man with the clipboard said.
A pleasant looking tour guide came out with the crowd and greeted us excitedly.
“Right this way, please!” She said, ushering us through the doors.
We followed her, and I nodded to Iesleen. She and I had both brought weapons, and we had a plan.
The tour guide showed us to a large, tall, car-like vehicle. It had a great green hull with two benches, perfectly sized for the four of us and the driver. She helped Iesleen and I in and waited as Rowan and Ross jumped up. She clambered into the driver’s seat and put it into gear, prepping to drive away. The moment the car started, the doors behind us air-locked, keeping everyone on the outside out and functionally keeping us in.
“Welcome to the Institute tunnels!” She said into a microphone, which projected through speakers on the side of the benches, “This is the one place in the universe where millions of technological advances and tools are kept for safe keeping. Whenever the Intergalactic Police technicians come up with new weapons or security devices, they make copies and keep the original down here. They make copies of everything except, of course, our most coveted treasure: the Xeron. As I’m sure you know, the Xeron is the most amazing device the police have ever come up with. It can crack codes, translate while speaking, and even read minds.” She stressed, “But, the most popular criminals in the galaxy – Kairee and Rowan Dunham, along with two accomplices from the distant planet, Earth – are threatening to steal it. So-”
Rowan cut her off, “What are you doing to keep them out? I mean…everyone knows how absolutely brilliant the Dunham twins are.”
I smirked, but then quickly wiped it away.
“Well, you can be assured that our previous security was more than enough to keep them out. They’re only sixteen, right? Anyways, we’ve installed several new measures, including ‘The Beast.’” She said cryptically.
“And what, exactly, is this ‘Beast?’” I cut in, utterly curios. This so called monster has been mentioned to me on numerous occasions, and has been speculated from everything to a massive bird or an invisible monster to the even more ridiculous guesses like dragons or unicorns. It was impossible to know – not even the Prime Minister herself knew. I suspect that only one person in the entire universe knew, and he was recently murdered.
“Actually, the big guys upstairs won’t tell us subordinates about their most valuable method of protection. Mystery is one of those things that scares off little Kairee.” The guide smiled.
“I can assure you, she’s an adequate opponent.” I replied, almost maliciously.
“Oh? And how would you know?” She countered.
I pulled out my contacts and smiled, “Because you just met her.”
Iesleen jumped up when I did and took over the controls of the car. I grabbed the sword from my bag and expanded it. The hilt of the obsidian sword made contact with the guard’s collarbone, and she cried out in pain. Pushing her off the car, I jabbed the back of her neck, and she passed out.
Iesleen turned off the car and pulled her contacts out, as did Rowan and Ross.
“Ready?” I asked, my voice suddenly loud as it echoed off the walls.
Each member of our little group nodded, and I locked eyes with them.
I got my first real look around the tunnels. It was all reddish, dried clay packed in strange formations. The ground under our feet was the same material of the walls, but smoothed over from the car driving over it hundreds of times a day. It was a good guess that, as we went farther down, the ground would get bumpier and harder to walk on.
We began walking in silence for about ten minutes through the dimly lit cavern, passing breathtaking rock formations and pieces of glowing technology, until we reached the end of the straight. Ross shot out his arms, stopping the rest of us.
“What is it?” Rowan asked curiously.
“Trip wires.” Ross replied.
And he was right. All around our feet, only one or two steps ahead, were hundreds of tiny, web like pieces silken wire.
I walked parallel to the line to the side of the wall and got onto my knees. Sure enough, they led to little gold ring drilled into the stone.
“I really don’t understand how trip wires work.” Iesleen said, confused. She walked over and crouched down next to me
“These little gold rings are rigged so that, when they get pulled out of the wall, a trap sets off. So, if I do this,” I said, and pulled out on of the rings, “A trap sets off.”
The moment I stopped talking, bright orange, molten lava trickled down from the rocks.
“Back up, Row!” I said, as he tried to get a closer look at the wires.
The lava splashed onto the rock and melted holes through it.
I sighed, “The classiness of these traps astounds me.”
Ross chuckled, “The Intergalactic Police Force really knows how to do things.”
I stood up when the lava stopped flowing and jumped took a big step over the remaining wires.
Ross, of course, messed up everything. His foot landed right on a trip wire.
I continued walking forward, waiting to see some sort of slope to go down to the next level.
And then, I was falling through a pitch black hole in the ground. Wind whipped past me. I felt the clip get ripped out of my hair as I tried to get control of my body. A blood-curdling scream escaped my lips as I fell down, down, for two seconds. It was a long fall, maybe fifty or sixty feet, and I tried to gain control of my body.
When I didn’t expect it, my feet made crushing impact with the ground. I let myself fall forward, increasing deceleration so that I wouldn’t crush every bone in my body. Still, I shattered my left ankle.
Around me was nothing but black in every direction. My breath was heavy and raspy, surrounding my body. I’d heard my bag thud down next to me, and I blindly felt around for it. When my hand reached the plastic textured bag, I unzipped it and tried to feel for the blue gel.
I healed my ankle, and then heard Rowan’s panicked voice.
“Kairee!” His deep voice echoed down to me until it sounded soft, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah!” I yelled back, my voice shockingly loud, “Jump down! Carefully!”
“Alright!” He shouted down, and I heard the whir of him, Ross, and Iesleen jumping down one after another. Each landed with a painful-sounding thud, and I heard several cracks of bone.
“It’s so dark.” Iesleen whispered through the blackness.
“Who’s hurt?” I commanded, turning to where I’d heard Iesleen’s voice.
“I am.” Ross groaned. He’d landed near Iesleen. I shakily began waling towards them. There was a little rock that I had, of course, missed and tripped over. I fell forward and landed, scraping my knees. Feeling in front of me until my hand hit Ross’s knee, I sliced my hand on the rocky ground.
“Someone get out a flashlight!” I shouted, my hand searing.
A bright light pierced the darkness. Rowan was holding it and pointing the light towards Ross. Rowan and Iesleen were unscathed, but Ross had landed on his knee, and it was shattered. Blood was pumping into the red stone ground, and he looked as if he would pass out at any moment.
I spread the white, bone healing cream onto his knee, and then the blue gel. When he was fully healed, we stood. I dug into my bag and pulled out the long, black flashlight and clicked it on.
“Oh my god.” Iesleen whispered, looking at the ceiling. We all jerked our heads up, and I let out a gasp.
All around – on the floor and the ceiling fifty feet above us – were numbers
. Normal, English numbers, all in different orders, with blank tiles at irregular intervals sat all around us. I immediately realized they represented letters. I shared this observation with the other three, and they agreed. I shined the flashlight down the hall to a giant, metal door. There was a little panel next to the door, with writing that was too small to see from here.
And the challenge begins.
“We’ve got to look at that little panel by the door to know how to get to the next level.” I said, and Rowan nodded.
“Let’s go.”
We jogged down to the door. It was a great chrome door, with hundred of locks that would unlatch when someone typed the pass code onto a touch-screen keyboard. The sign next to it was chalky white rock with black as night words scrawled across it. Rowan shined his light on it, and I began reading the sign aloud.
“‘The way through is to crack the code. Find the words and you may go. This will be another clue/ to find the next challenge that awaits you.’” I quoted.
“So…we have to make words out of all those letters?” Ross gaped.
Rowan cursed, “There’s no way we can do this. There’s too many letters. Way too many combinations.”
“Not necessarily.” I replied, “See where the blank tiles are?”
He nodded.
“Those are spaces. So, between each set of blanks is one word. We just have to work through it methodically. Ross, you have the best vision, so you should take the ceiling. Iesleen, the left wall. Rowan, the right. I’ve got the floor. My bet is that it goes from the floor, to the left wall, to the ceiling, to the right wall. Maybe there are more instructions in the letters, and it’s not just a password like thing.” I handed out pieces of paper from my notebook with pens.
I got to work where we had fallen from the upper floor, and immediately realized that all I had to do was write out the alphabet with their numerical value, and then decode it.
5-22-5-18-25/6-9-6-20-8.I penned onto a sheet of paper, and then de-coded it.Every fifth.
“Every fifth!” I exclaimed, jumping up.
“What?” Rowan asked from across the room, where he was craning his neck to look at the wall, carefully penning each number.
“It’s not every single word! It’s every fifth word! Only look at every fifth word, and we’ll get it!” I was excited now, “Every fifth word will leave us with about one hundred words – twenty five or so each. Then, it’ll be condensed down into one sentence. Get going!” I instructed to the group.
I stared at the floor, pacing backwards, and quickly jotted down all the words. Ross finished only a moment after me, Iesleen and Rowan after that. We met up by the door, and set down what we had. We ended up with this: The next level will be one where someone important gets left behind, spurred by a fear-facing challenge for the strongest of kinds.
Ross nervously typed the phrase onto the screen, and we all waited hopefully for a few moments.
Then, the second I thought we had failed, a whir sounded inside the door. A series of clicks, bangs, and clangs rang out as every single lock unlatched. The door swung open to reveal massive, glass spiral staircase. We began walking down. My heels clicked against the steps, and Iesleen tripped at least twice in hers, obviously not use to walking five inches taller. With each step, the tunnel got lighter and brighter until we were standing in a bright, reddish tinted level. For some reason, there was a little hut-like building with a padlock on the door, and I saw three chairs inside.
There was another little panel, matching to the one upstairs, on the wall. I read it, terrified of what it could say. I was still exponentially worried about the sixth line of the prophecy – But on might face their final hour – simply because it was so painfully straight-forward. It was either that person dies, or they don’t. We’ll have to find out.
The sign read ‘One must fight a monster, and stay behind, while the other three watch. No helping. Make your decision now.’
“Is this,” Ross gulped, “‘The Beast?’”
“I don’t think so,” I replied, “This just seems like something else to me. It said ‘fear facing,’ which probably means one of us will have to face our biggest fear – classic stuff, in all honesty. It’s got to be one of you two,” I pointed to Ross and Iesleen.
“Because,” Rowan interjected, “the only thing Kairee and I fear is each other.”
“Iesleen,” Ross said quietly to his friend, “it should be you. You’re a good fighter, and I couldn’t fight off a four year old suffering from a terminal illness.”
I smiled, “He’s right, you know. You’re a better fighter than I am, Iesleen, and you can take anything that this crazy place throws at you. Take this, for good luck.” I said, and tossed her the collapsible sword. She expanded it carefully and looked at it.
She looked completely confident, “I can’t really think of anything I’m afraid right now, but I suppose this place knows me better than myself. The only problem is that I’ll have to stay behind. Can you guys really fight whatever the Beast is without me?”
“I’m sure we can manage.” Rowan said. He took a step closer to Iesleen, and looked her in the eyes.
Ross and I awkwardly look at each other.
“Be careful.” Iesleen whispered to my brother, and kissed him. When she pulled away, Rowan looked extremely flustered, but then steeled himself.
“You too.” He told her, and then walked into the shack by the door as if nothing had happened.
I shot Rowan a look, and Ross copied.
“What was that?” Ross asked me so quietly that Row wouldn’t hear.
“I have no idea.” I replied just as softly.
“So…” Ross said, obviously ready to say the most clichéd line in the history of every universe, “Should we kiss now?”
He said this louder, so he knew it would bother Rowan.
“Don’t be a doofus.” My brother snapped.
“Maybe some other time.” I smiled flirtatiously at Ross, “Oh!” I exclaimed as the door behind us shut itself, and locked a hundred times over.
“Get ready for the monster.” Rowan chuckled, crossing his arms over his chest.
We watched out a window in the wall.
Iesleen tensed for battle, her eyes darting around nervously. She pulled off her shoes and tossed them to the side, holding the sword out in front of her.
In seconds, huge, black spiders came crawling out of the walls and dropping down from the ceiling. Most of them were only a foot of so long, but one was bigger than Iesleen by four feet. It had eight, bloody red eyes and two sets of snapping fangs, coated in dripping poison. It snarled like a dog when it saw Iesleen, gnashing its foamy fangs angrily.
A look of pure terror filled Iesleen’s eyes, and I heard her whimper. She backed up until she was against the window, and all we could see was her red dress. She put her face to the window, and I saw tears in her eyes.
“Spiders.” She cried, and then whispered, “What do I do?”
A grief-stricken look crossed my brother’s face, “We can’t help you. Just…kill it.”
“Listen, Iesleen.” I told her, cutting off my brother, “You can do this.”
She nodded shakily, and turned to face the advancing spider, her sword at the ready.
She closed her eyes, and it looked like she said a prayer, and then she attacked. She jumped onto the spider’s back, masking her fear with a vicious yell. She smacked the butt of her sword into the spider’s head, crushing it in on itself. The spider bucked, thrashing Iesleen around. She whipped back and forth, grasping to hold onto the writhing spider. It jumped up, folded its eight legs in the air, and crashed down. It was unscathed, but Iesleen was in a crinkled heap on the ground.
An audible snarl escaped my brother’s lips, and I heard the wall next to us groan. The wall was going to fall apart.
“Rowan.” I breathed, holding onto his arms, “Calm down.”
He took a deep breath, but still had a look that would strike fear into the hearts of millio
ns in his eyes.
“You know Iesleen can do this. Her only problem is that she’s so afraid that her fear is preventing her from killing it. All she has to do is overcome her fear – that’s the whole point of this exercise.” I told him, “We both know that the only reason you’re angry is because the person out there is her. If it was Ross or me out there, you’d be fine right now. You know we can’t do anything for her, so cool it.”
Rowan nodded and locked his jaw.
Outside, Iesleen slowly got to her knees. Her eyes were full of vengeance as she stood up to face the spider. I swear the spider was smirking at her, directly in front of the three of us. She ran at it, a piercing war cry filled with rage ripped out of her. Her sword flashed as she charged the spider. In a spectacular show of strength, she cleaved off two of the spider’s back legs with one strike.
The roar the came out of the spider was reminiscent of a prowling lion. It jumped over Iesleen, and she whipped around. It came at her, flinging out its six remaining limbs. She dodged each of them expertly, ducking and weaving through the maze of legs. But, the spider was more cunning than I’d anticipated. It turned around when Iesleen tried to stab her sword through it. It snapped out its poison covered fangs and bit her arm, shredding her skin apart. Iesleen let out a heart-wrenching scream that was killing Rowan.
He groaned and put his head between his hands.
The spider leapt up and Iesleen saw what she had to do. With tiny spider running all over her body, she held up the sword. The spider didn’t see it and continued to thrust downwards, and the sword went straight through its abdomen clear to the other side.
Life left the spider’s eight eyes, and its legs curled up around its body in death.
The door next to me unlocked itself, and I ran out.
“Ross!” I yelled, “Grab my bag!”
I ran to Iesleen. Her arm was ripped open, blood gushing out. Yellowy spider blood was seeping into her dress, and tears steamed down her face. Rowan came up next to me.
