by Kris Schnee
"Come on; this is nearly impossible!"
The GMs offered no help. As a "Master Artificer" he could bump that up to 3, but... "How about 'Need To Find Out Why I'm Here'; would that justify spending another point?"
[It doesn't seem relevant enough, and wouldn't get you to 6.]
"No good plan yet," he called out to Eva. "All I've got in here is a supply of cloth. Do they feed you in here?"
"I've only been here for a day."
"Well, tell me if you hear anybody coming, because I'm not very observant."
They fell silent. Then Eva whispered, "Psst."
Miles didn't answer, but now that she'd gotten his attention he heard feet crunching through snow. He hurried to make some more blankets, then cast another spell to get levitation going for a moment, though it cost him 3 mental stress. He couldn't afford any more magic "injuries" right now so he'd have to burn fate points if he took more spell harm. Which meant he'd need to break out without a real weapon or the Melee skill. "I'm claiming this as creating an 'Ambush' advantage," he whispered.
[Success.]
The noise approached. Miles tensed. Then a scaly lizard muzzle peeked down into the room to eye him suspiciously. Miles said, "Have you got any food?"
The lizard hissed and dropped out of view. Keys jingled against the lock. Miles tensed... and the door opened. A white-scaled lizard stood there holding a bowl of mush in one hand and brandishing a footstool in the other. Another, burlier guard stood back with a spear.
Miles cued the battle interface. He couldn't afford to mess this up. "Tie the big guy up!" he said, and flung a set of blankets. His magic glowed around them.
[Skill 3, dice +1. Defense 3.]
"Add Ambush."
[Success with style: enemy is Tied Up**.]
The ropes began to close in, but the enemy got a chance to attack. The spear flew at Miles, grazing his arm for 2 stress and then clattering loudly to the floor. The other kobold's eyes went wide, and it yipped and leaped to one side where the floor sloped down.
Miles cursed as he grabbed the spear. That critter was the one with the keys! He called out, "GMs! Can I spend a point to declare that he dropped the keys?"
[Interesting. Acceptable.]
The keyring fell to the ice just outside... and began to slide down. Miles said, "Not quite what I meant!" and began to stagger after it. He caught himself at the doorframe just before stupidly flinging himself down onto the steep ice. Instead he whipped the blanket off his shoulders and magically flung it to intercept.
[Magic 3, dice +0, difficulty 4.]
"No. Fateweaver for +2." The improvised snare snagged the keys and floated back to him.
Eva called out, "What happened? Are you all right?"
"Yeah. Hold on." Miles looked suspiciously at the struggling lizard and conjured another few blankets to truss the critter up even more thoroughly. He glared down at it and said, "Where are we?"
"Iskandar's lair! You be sorry soon, human!"
He looked up. He was in a deep canyon whose ceiling was partly open to the sky, partly roofed over with stone that looked artificial. "Where's the exit?"
"Never tell!"
Miles picked up the spear. "That's a shame."
[Charm roll: 0 skill, dice +1, circumstance bonus +1. Failure.]
"Sss! Do your worst!"
Miles dragged the yipping lizard into his prison cell and gagged it. He found the right key to lock his new prisoner away, but first paused to search the little guy and steal a leather pouch. It contained some irregular copper coins with a crude dragonscale design. "Have fun in there," he said.
His stomach rumbled. The bowl of gruel had fallen mostly intact. He sniffed skeptically, then wolfed half of the stuff down quickly enough that he didn't have to taste it. Armed with a dirty bowl, a pouch, a stool and as many blankets as he could want, he set out to rescue Eva. "Where are you? Keep talking."
Eva began singing a silly song about space pirates, which made Miles grin despite his shivering setting in again. He wrapped more blankets around his bare feet and maneuvered carefully along the icy, sloping floor, tying a chain of blankets to his cell door to use as a rope. It sounded from the confusing echoes like Eva was just upward from him, but the GMs were making him do Notice and Athletics rolls and he failed the Notice. "Eva, can you see me? If I go up or down from here it'll be hard to maneuver."
"Can't see you. I think you're downhill."
Miles headed upward, then. He played to his strengths by using Craft and Magic to make a relatively sturdy blanket-rope and lash it to a projecting rock, then ascended carefully. Soon, he spotted another metal door on the same side of the canyon as his. "Is that you in there?" he said.
"I see you! What...?"
"Hang on." Miles climbed to a safe spot and reached the door. He fumbled with the keys, nearly dropped them, and finally got the door open.
Eva Callahan was dirty, exhausted, shivering in her tattered space uniform, and staring at him. "Miles, why did you show up wearing a wedding dress?"
"To ask if you want to get married, obviously."
She laughed. "Sure, if we live through this. Are there more guards coming? Or the dragon?"
"Probably. One of the two that came to me escaped. No time to explain, huh?"
"Not much. Think we can climb out?"
Miles handed her what was left of the food bowl. While she scarfed that down, he looked back out at the white haze uphill. "If we follow the slope it should take us outside. I can make some kinds of climbing gear, but it's going to be dangerous for me unless we rest for a bit." He addressed the air. "Point of order. Does this count as a new scene? Is my stress cleared out?"
"Who are you talking to?" said Eva.
"The GMs. I've got, I think, four fate points left but all my injury slots are full. It'll be easier to summon ropes if I can find enough space to put a humongous tent first."
She stared at him. "Did you hit your head?"
"No. Don't tell me you're not playing by the same rules."
"Rules?" Eva looked into his bewildered face, and grinned. "Just kidding."
"Seriously? We're in danger and you're pranking me?"
"Relax! I think we actually do have a moment; the GMs seem to respect a time-out for rules questions. Those kobolds will stand there tapping their feet until we get answers."
"Kobolds?"
"The lizard guys. They actually predate the original dragon dungeon games."
He was starting to think she was the crazy one here, being so nonchalant about getting captured, but she had a point about the timing. "Well, GMs?"
[Stress cleared; minor consequence can be cleared. New scene begins on cue.] A timer appeared with a minute or so on it.
Miles said, "We're on the clock, then. Short summary: I can create and control cloth, but it's safest to do as few types per scene as possible. Safer yet if I can find a big open space, first. Have you got any Melee skill?" He offered the spear.
Eva nodded and took it. "If this canyon-hallway is too narrow, we probably won't find a better space downhill before we find the dragon. Can we climb up, then? Can you do a better rope?" She looked skeptically at the chained blankets.
"I might have to burn points for Mind defense, but here goes."
"Wait! I don't know exactly what you're doing, but I know you can do it." She took him by the shoulders and hugged him warmly, then said, "That's an Encouraging Hug aspect, right?"
Miles saw, [Noted.]
He summoned a coil of sturdy rope that dropped into place beside him. Eva said, "Nice," and tied a rock to one end to use as a makeshift grappling hook.
"Here, let me," Miles said. He cast another spell to activate levitation and make the rocky end, with difficulty, float up to the next place resembling a usable ledge. He'd have taken 3 mental stress, but the hug downgraded that to 1. "We now have access to as much rope as we need; I can repeat those moves."
Eva looked around, then scurried up the rope. Miles instinctively held out his arms to catch h
er if she fell, but she made it up and held the top end steady for him. "What's your range on the rope trick?"
"Around 10 meters. Can't just lift it to the canyon roof from here." He climbed to her ledge easily, but the way ahead was going to be tougher as the canyon's slope grew steeper. "You know, I'd be less bothered if I were in zero-g."
"Sure; you couldn't fall from there. But the GMs probably aren't going to let us die."
He wasn't eager to tell her that deaths were already happening back at the fort. "Don't test that theory, okay?"
She nodded. "Is this area wide enough?"
Miles tried conjuring his tent. The outline of it was an invalid red until he angled it just the right way. "This should work... uh." As it materialized, he realized that he'd put the entrance on the other side. "We'll need to climb over the roof."
The tent was nearly rock-solid once placed, but it still swayed gently and gave him a terrifying moment of thinking it'd tip over. He and Eva clambered over the broad, sloping top as though trying to break into the circus. They made it to the tent flap, and climbed in.
Miles tested the canvas floor and found it disturbingly flexible, but sturdy enough to hold him. "Welcome to the Stately Pleasure Dome. Please don't bounce around."
Eva whistled as she entered. "Nice habitat! So the GMs just handed you this?"
"It was a stunt. Don't know if that counts as earning it, but I got impaled in the process." He felt the bandaged chest wound under his dress and said, "Which reminds me; can you turn aside for a bit?"
He used a third spell to make some rolls of sturdy white wool cloth, quickly cut one up, and fashioned a sort of cloak and kimono for himself so he could tear off the damn dress. "If we get more time I can make something better. Meanwhile, want an outfit like this?"
Eva looked down at her dirty, chilly uniform. "Please."
Now that they were both clad in something remotely appropriate for an ice dungeon, he crafted two sets of woolen foot-wraps too. Eva, meanwhile, had burned wool for a fire, creating a nasty burned-hair smell, and was warming her hands. She glanced up at the roof's vent and said, "The smoke! I didn't think about who'd see it."
"Oh hell, you're right. Put that out." Eva smothered the flame with more wool. Miles continued, "Plan A is to climb up out of here. I can place the tent again wherever there's space, but we'll probably have to make a tough Athletics roll. Then do you have any idea where to go once we're out?"
"Yeah; I can get us to safety from there. Relatively. I've got a 3 in Athletics. You?"
"Just 1. I'll need your help." He fashioned a rope harness for himself, and got the GMs to note it as a [Climbing Harness] advantage. "Is there anything else I can summon for you while I'm in here?" He explained about his magic rules.
"So you got a special rule system, huh? Interesting. For now, how about a parachute each?"
"I could do a big canvas cloth. It wouldn't work well in terms of real physics, but I was able to use one like a glider earlier." He made them each a sturdy canvas thing to grab if they fell.
The GMs didn't chime in again until he and Eva left the tent, carefully, and anchored ropes at both ends to link to the next ledge. [This toughest phase of the climb will be Athletics difficulty 5.]
"5!" said Miles. "Are you trying to get us killed?"
Eva said, "Let me try. Oh wise and patient GMs, are you sure you want to exhaust our resources with a high-difficulty roll?"
[Difficulty 5.]
"Fine, then. I use Notice to look for an easier route or any hazards." She paused, then said to Miles, "Okay, look over there: Good Handholds. Now that I've noticed it, there's one free use of it. Between that and your Climbing Harness you should get a +4, so you just have to not screw up the roll. I have my three fate points to use on both."
"You get three points like me?"
She said, "Yeah; the others don't. We can talk later."
"How about another +2 hug?"
Eva mumbled to the GMs, then reported, "They won't let us cheese this by creating more and more advantages. In fact... company." She glanced down and they saw a squad of lizards -- kobolds -- struggling up the slope far below.
Miles refused to hurry. He started to climb, putting his weight on the knots and hoping his performance would give him a bonus. It was like acting, selling the action. He was near the top when the GMs told him: [Skill 1, dice +1. Using Climbing Harness and Good Handholds?]
"Of course."
He was fine, now, pulling himself onto the ledge. But when Eva followed, she was struggling. Miles lay on his belly and held out his hand. She said, "I've got this. Using two points." She made it, too.
Miles tried not to look down, but the kobolds were now somewhere below and a thrown spear clattered against the rocks he'd just climbed up from. "I think we're out of their range, but we need to move before they try something else." He unmoored the ropes and looked for the exit. There; the ground sloped up relatively gently from here.
[Difficulty 2 Athletics.]
Eva groaned, seeing the message too. "You've got this." She took his hand, and they started up the slope together.
He got a 3 and she must've passed too, because after a brief hike they were outside and hit with a frigid, slicing wind. He nearly toppled backward from the force of it. His arms and legs began to freeze under his makeshift clothes. All around was blinding white. "How far? Which way?"
Eva squinted. "I need a minute."
"Tent?"
"We're probably safe from pursuit for the moment. Sure."
7. Toys
Miles summoned the tent. It flopped onto the canyon surface, a few degrees off-kilter. They dived gratefully into its windproof interior and used a strip of Miles' kimono to start a fire. He said, "Is the dragon going to come after us any moment?"
"I doubt it. He's only active maybe an hour a day, and we broke out just after he returned to the lair. So there might be a kobold party coming after us, but I expect even that will wait until tomorrow."
Miles relaxed at last, laying down beside the fire. Little of the cold from underneath got through the floor. "I negotiated my way into saying that my food supply is somewhere near where I got imprisoned. Want to go back for it?"
She laughed. "Where we ought to head next is Fort Necessity."
"Hartstown. We can make it there, but that's days away. We'll need to reach one of these kobold villages for supplies."
"Huh? No, the fort is just a day or so to the west, out of the patrols' range, unless they decided to evacuate already."
Miles frowned and sat up. "West? Did I get taken that far out of the way? Or, no, you must be talking about one of the native villages. Captain Thorn and the rest are in a wooden fort south of the hills and the dragon lair."
Eva said, "Then they must have been teleported or something, because I left the crew yesterday, west of here. I think we'd better compare notes."
Before Miles could say much, he saw:
[Your moderate and severe consequence slots have cleared over time, leaving you injury-free. Significant milestone! You gain a skill point, and you may shuffle skills or rename an aspect as per a minor milestone.]
"Yeah, that's great," said Eva, seeming to read the same message. "My top skills right now are Athletics and Melee at 3, followed by Healing and Notice. You?"
"Magic 3, then Craft, Survival and Mind. So you've been doing some adventuring too?"
"Without being handed unique powers for it. I pretty much called it; you didn't put actual combat skills as a high priority, so I knew I had to."
Miles grinned sheepishly. In their shipboard game, Eva had teased him for playing a mostly non-combat character with magic not meant for blasting things. "I'm dependent on spells for offense, but I need another cloth-based sling to make that useful. If I upgrade Magic again, I'll take more spell damage unless I then boost Mind. So maybe I'll upgrade Survival if you haven't got it, or Mind in advance of the next skill upgrade."
"Can you actually make another Magic-based weapo
n soon?"
"Need more time to do a Craft roll and recreate it, but yes."
"Then I suggest upgrading Survival to 3 now. Then your next skill upgrade can go into Magic, and when that happens you can swap Survival 3 and Mind 2, to be 2 and 3. That way, you get the benefit of a safe Magic upgrade later but benefit from Survival first."
Miles upgraded Survival. "You have this planned out, huh?"
"Yeah. I'm boosting Melee so we have a real combat advantage... preferably with something better than a kobold-sized spear."
Miles couldn't let himself get too distracted. He began again to describe his adventure so far to Eva.
Eventually Eva interrupted. "So you were in this fort full of the entire crew, minus me?"
"And minus a few people who were killed or missing. The only name of the dead I heard was Wilhelm the botanist."
"Miles... I spoke with Wilhelm three days ago. Seven people were killed by those ice golems or never made it to us, but not him. And Captain Thorn knows you as a missing crewmember, but he knew I'm alive."
Miles shivered. "Are you saying there are two of him? Two distinct forts, even, with copies of the crew?"
"Except for us two." Eva stood up and paced. "Oh wow. If that's true, this game is... We might be the only ones... Where do you think we are, exactly?"
"I hadn't given it a lot of thought, beyond someplace that the aliens control. The physics here are different and the planet doesn't look like the one we landed on. So the best explanation I've got is that I'm really floating in some alien virtual reality pod while their scientists loom around it, feeding messages to my brain. Best guess I've got at their real appearance is six-limbed starfish."
"Yeah, the VR pod scenario is possible. It'd mean that one or both of the Hart crews we've met aren't real. The alternative is that the aliens solved the uploading problem."
In the 21st century there'd been speculation about "brain uploading", the notion of disassembling the human brain and turning it into software. It would create a form of digital immortality and/or artificial intelligence, along with a host of social and philosophical problems. But the technology just hadn't worked out as more than a sort of gimmicky system to record your ancestors' catchphrases. It didn't meaningfully preserve identity or consciousness. At least, not in a way that could appear on a screen and convince people it was alive. After decades of fruitless effort on that project and true AI, scientists had instead wrung the secrets of warp gate technology from the universe. Miles considered that a good substitute. Humans had gotten infinity instead of eternity.
