The party was dashing helter-skelter down the hallways, each member focusing on keeping up with the Tenshis in front of them. She knew where they were going, and that was enough for them.
“We are almost there,” one Tenshi promised in a low voice. “If we take this door on our right…”
Without warning, the door slammed open, splintering in the process, as a familiar armoured player crashed through it in a roll.
“Nor?!” Isaac exclaimed.
“Back the way you came!” Nor barked, tumbling to her feet as the rest of Peppermint Eyeglass followed her through the doorway. “We’ve got a real baddie inbound!”
“No, you go back the way you came!” Isaac shot back. “The big boss in right on our tail!”
“Look guys, the exit is just ahead!” Marie pushed her way through to the ruined door. “We’ll just have to fight whoever’s chasing them, okay?”
She turned and came face to face with Cassius’s flesh golem.
A horrific amalgamation of dead and dying Cutpurses, it oozed like a slug across the floor in some places, crawled on countless arms in others, and in parts it even stood on twisted legs. Splitting open into a dozen orifices of jagged teeth and splintered bone, it moaned loudly, as gnarled arms reached out of it’s mouths like serpent-tongues towards Marie, seeking her flesh.
“Merde.” Marie slammed the ineffectual door on the abomination and scuttled back towards Peppermint Eyeglass.
“So, like, our one chance of escape it literally on the other side of that… thing.” Isaac gestured at the clammy hands groping their way through the slowly-opening door. “Anybody got any bright ideas?”
“Well… in that case, I do have one idea.” Kage raised her hand.
*******
Cassius Marlowe gingerly followed in the wake of his gibbering monstrosity, wincing as he accidentally set foot in the pus-like trail it left behind. Pulling up his menu, he triple-checked the map, before nodding in satisfaction.
“Well, ladies and gentlemen,” he announced loudly. “I’ve checked the map, and it says here you’re trapped like rats. Now, do you want to risk it all on a final charge, or would you rather me hunt you down systematically, in an orderly and precise manner? Personally, I rather recommend the latter.”
He paused, carefully sanitizing his hands while he waited for a response. However, all he received was silence.
“Well, that’s that then. I suppose we’re going with option “B”.” He raised his staff. “Sic ‘em, you wretched monstrosity!”
“œgh,” it spluttered in response, oozing through the door on an array of limbs.
But the players were nowhere in sight.
Cassius considered this. According to his colleague’s nose, the two parties would have surely met up by now. Thusly, they would be well aware that they were caught in a veritable pincer movement, with no way forwards or backwards. There were no other exits, so trapped like rats, their most reasonable course of action should have been to charge him, hoping in vain that at least a couple of them would make it past his voodoo horrors. And yet, they had elected to retreat instead. Most inexplicable.
The sudden sound of a heavy impact stirred Cassius out of his musings. In the direction the sound had come from lay a small storage room, the door of which was off its hinges with a heavy crack running through it. Had someone decided to stay behind in there while he chased the others? Some vain attempt at an ambush to buy them time, or maybe a desperate escape? Cassius raised his staff to his shoulder, pointing the rifle-barrel end towards the open doorway as he strafed the corner. Whoever it was, they’d soon regret trifling with a Marlowe…
A flicker caught his eye. A shadow stretched across the fallen door, cast from further within. Cassius grinned, intoning a skill. “REFLECTION SHOT!” he muttered, angling his rifle so that the ricochet would catch the player right in the head…
Suddenly, the shadow snapped upwards, carrying the door along with it! Caught by surprise, Cassius pulled the trigger, as the enchanted bullet hit the door head on… and snapped right back, catching Cassius in the chest.
“Bugger…!” he groaned, toppling to the ground as blood dyed his shirtfront. “Don’t you know how hard it is to wash bloodstains out of fabric?” He clenched his staff, recalling his flesh golem. “Monstrosity, make them pay!” He groaned, staggering to his feet. “And make it messy.”
*******
“Okay, quick! Everyone through the rune!” Cataliszt gestured, slamming a hand on the glowing chalk pattern etched on the floor. “That guy’s gonna be on us in seconds!”
“Kids first.” Marie scooched Riley and Walter over onto the rune.
“Thanks for saving us.” Walter beamed up at the party.
“We owe ya guys one, call us anytime ya need somethin’ and we’ll be there!” Riley clapped an arm over Walter’s shoulder. “See ya.”
Then the two shimmered and vanished.
“You guys next,” Nor smacked Marie on the back.
“Not yet.” Marie turned to Kage. “Hey, can you put me back on the other side of the wall?”
Loud exclamations of protest rose from everyone.
“You got a death wish?” Kage raised an eyebrow.
“I can’t just leave Charles down there.” Marie set her jaw. “Send me back, or I’ll kick my way through that hole Nor opened for us.” She gestured at the fist-sized hole in the back wall.
“I understand where you’re coming from, I really do.” Isaac clapped a hand on her shoulder. “But Charles volunteered to save us all. If we go back, it’ll all be for nothing!”
“I know that, and it ticks me off!” Marie punched the wall. “Especially because… if he hadn’t said anything, I never would’ve volunteered myself. Here I was, looking out for number one, and Charles was already thinking of how to save everyone else!” She turned to Isaac, tears in her eyes. “And then, what do I do, I go and call him sexist! What the hell? I gotta go back and save him, Isaac!”
“But…”
“Even so, I won’t let you go off alone and get yourself killed.” Kage crossed her arms.
Marie looked at her with hopeless eyes.
“Well said, Kage.” Nor clapped her on the back. “That why I’ll go with her.”
“Yeah, exactly. I…” She did a double-take. “Excuse me, what?”
“Peppermint Eyeglass leaves no man behind!” Nor gave a thumbs-up. “You guys hold the fort, we’ll be back in a jiffy!”
“Seriously?”
“What, don’t think we can do it?” Nico⭐ grinned, throwing her back against the door as a legion of hands began beating against it.
“We’ll hold the line until you two get back!” Cataliszt promised, propping a table against the door to hold it.
“Oh, for the love of…” Kage sighed, extending her shadow through the hole in the wall. “Don’t keep us waiting, got it?”
“Thanks.” Marie slipped into Kage’s shadow after Nor, remerging from the shadow on the other side of the wall. “Let’s go, Nor.”
“Right. Which way?”
Marie froze. “Uh, well… let me pull up the map.”
“Up this hallway, then go right at the intersection.”
The two turned to see Tenshi emerging from the pool, holding Twitch.
“Isaac guessed you would require a navigator.”
“Damnit.” Marie chuckled. “He read me like a book. Okay, lead on, Tenshi!”
“Wilco.”
*******
The Chief whistled a merry tune as he chipped away at the rock with his gauntlet, sending pieces the size of footballs flying as he dug away contentedly, flinging the fallen hunks over his shoulder and out of the pit. Ever since he was a boy, physical work had always improved his mood. While the body was working, the mind could shut off. You didn’t have to worry about anything, not the future, not the past. Working anchored you cleanly in the present, the happiest time to be.
Turning, the Chief looked with some satisfaction at the pit he had dug. It was now deeper than his full height, and equally wide. More than sufficient. He looked down and the knight curled up protectively in a corner of the pit, flinching each time a shard of rock angled off BASTION’s shield. He really only had himself to blame. He’d been given two chances, twice as many as anyone else would’ve got. Now, he had to accept the consequences.
Opening his menu, the Chief summoned a silver dagger with a blue pommel stone.
“Know what this is, Charles?” He grinned coldly. “It’s a dagger with a water periapt in it.”
*THUNK!*
The chief drove the dagger into a crack in the pit, right above Charles’ head, causing the Knight to wince.
“What, you thought I’d try to stab you with it?” the Chief taunted. “We both know that wouldn’t work. No, I’ve got something better planned for you.” He gripped the dagger, willing it to activate.
It started as a couples drops, then a trickle. Then, like a broken faucet, water began pouring out of the dagger, filling the pit.
“You’ve got two choices, Charles.” The chief grinned sadistically, as the water began to rise towards Charles’ face. “Drown, or drop BASTION. Really, either’s fine with me, so I’ll leave the choice to you; how do you want to die?”
“Marie?!” Charles gasped.
The Chief raised an eyebrow. “That not a… wait, who?”
Nor’s rocket-fist hit him across the back of the head, knocking him face-first into the wall of the pit.
“Grab my hand, blondie!” Nor yelled, causing Charles to drop BASTION and cling on for dear life, as Nor reeled her rocket-fist back in on its length of steel cable.
“That wasn’t very nice.” The Chief rose to his feet, and glared flatly at the party.
“Run!” Marie yelled, as they beat a hasty retreat.
“You guys actually came to rescue me?” Charles panted after them, tears in his eyes. “Man, you guys are the best!” He sniffed loudly.
“Don’t thank me yet, we still have to escape first,” Marie cautioned him. “And I’ve got a couple things to tell you when we do!”
“Oh, uh, right,” Charles mumbled. “Sorry.”
Damnit, that did not come out the way I meant it! Marie cursed to herself. I sounded like a total B!
Geez, what a total B! Isaac thought to himself, hearing everything through Twitch. “Hey, uh, guys, we have a problem!” his voice sounded particularly unsettling coming out of Twitch’s mouth.
“Let me guess, the Chief?” Marie asked.
“Ooh yeah.”
“Tenshi! Any shortcuts we can take?”
“If there were any, you can be assured we would already be taking them,” she shot back.
“Right, sorry.”
They rounded a corner, and found a Tenshi clone waiting for them, pipe-bombs in both hands.
“Keep running,” she cautioned them, lighting the fuses and dashing towards the rapidly-approaching Chief.
An explosion rocked the fort once again, and Isaac could feel the rush of hot air through Twitch. But yet, when the dust cleared, the bandit was still gaining on them!
“Twitch!” Isaac commanded “SNIPE!”
“Shupau!” With a leap, Twitch sprung from Tenshi’s arms onto Nor’s shoulder, quickly drawing her pistol and resting it against the player’s armour. Then, she took the shot.
*Thud*
The bullet hit the Chief right in the forehead.
But he didn’t slow.
Wiping the small trickle of blood away, the bandit raised his gauntlet in defense and kept running.
“Again, Twitch! Again!” Isaac commanded, and his minion opened fire, aiming for any gap she could find. But it was no use.
“That’s about enough of that,” the Chief muttered, cocking his arm back. “IRON BULLET.”
With one powerful motion, the Chief launched his remaining gauntlet like a rocket, blasting it into the shoulder of Nor, and carrying it right on through. Metal screeched, Nor screamed, and Twitch disintegrated, as the projectile carved Nor’s mech open like a can of sardines from neck to hip, taking the entire right arm with it, and revealing the now very scared girl piloting it.
“Oh, so that’s where the pilot sits,” the Chief called out, sending a shiver down Nor’s spine. “Perfect, now I know where to aim,”
“I don’t think we’re gonna make it, guys!” Charles called out, as they rounded the next corner.
“I did warn you, idiots.”
The party nearly bowled Kage over, as she stood up from the hallway. “I figured you’d need a hand, so I left Nico⭐, Tenshi, and the rest to hold the door while I came to help.”
“Thanks, but unless you’ve got a plan…” Nor started.
“Try this.”
One by one, Kage systematically kicked them over, knocking them into the torch-cast shadows of the hallway. However, instead of hitting the stone floor, they once again found themselves sinking into Kage’s shadow, reappearing at the other end of the corridor.
“I can only move you between shadows within my eyesight, but it should help.”
“Atta girl!” Nor beamed.
Behind them, the Chief looked on in helpless rage as the party slipped further and further away from him. Still chasing, he opened his menu.
“Cassius, do you copy?”
“Ten-four and roger-dodger, I read you,” the sarcastic voice came back.
The Chief ignored him. “I’m chasing a couple of kids your way as we speak. You know what you have to do.”
“Naturally. They’ll find all hell waiting for them.”
“See to it.”
*******
“Almost there,” Nor informed the others, as they popped out of another shadow around a corner.
“I would suggest caution,” the Tenshi clone advised. “The attacks upon the door have suddenly ceased, it is entirely possible…” she paused, her face grim. “He found our hole in the wall. This is bad.”
“Almost there!” Kage grit her teeth, as they plunged into another shadow, popping up in a hallway intersection.
And there was the flesh golem.
Marie screamed. Charles screamed. The golem gibbered insanely, fluid leaking from its countless mouths, as a twisted pillar of interlocked arms shot out towards them, corpse-like hands scrabbling for grip.
“Kage! Drop it through its shadow!” Nor yelled, lashing out with her wrench at the tentacle-like arms grabbing at her.
“On it!” Like dirty dishwater draining from a kitchen sink, the golem sunk into its own shadow with a mindless cry of despair, oozing out at the far end of the hallway behind them.
But it refused to let go. With a death-grip on the players, it heaved the party towards the shadow, aiming to pull them in after it.
“SHADOWPLAY!” Kage intoned, as jagged shadows sliced at the sea of arms pulling them in. “Damnit, there’s too many!”
“I’ve got this.” Nor surrendered her mech, clambering out the massive hole in its side, and snagging the helmet as she went. Kicking her armour off into the shadow, she managed to take most of the arms down with it, leaving Kage to slice the remaining few. Then, Kage dismissed the ability, and the shadow was solid again.
“Nor! That thing’s heading this way!” Marie looked in horror down the hallway at the approaching fiend.
“Oh no it’s not.” Nor popped a detonator out of her overalls and turned the key, as her suit exploded into a raging inferno, catching the gibbering horror in its blast, as the creature writhed and moaned helplessly.
“C’mon, let’s get to the teleporter!” Nor slammed the helmet over her head.
“You should’ve run while you had the chance, little rats.” Cassius rounded the corner, a dozen phantasmal hands attending him. “Now, you die.”
“BASTION!” Charles yelled, as the ghostly arms whipped out at them, flinching back as they struck his shield.
“Kage! Get us inside!” Marie yelled.
“Right!”
Still protected by Charles’ BASTION, the haggard adventurers slipped through the shadows, remerging inside the storage room.
“Well damn, we did it!” Charles dropped his shield.
“I knew you’d make it!” Nico⭐ grinned, bumping fists with Nor and Kage. “Ah, what’s with the helmet, Nor?”
“Someone’s not supposed to know my identity,” Nor shot back testily, flicking her head in the direction of Isaac.
“Ooh, gotcha. Right, well first, let’s get outta… HANDS!” Nico⭐ yelled out a warning, pointing over the party’s shoulders.
Slipping through the hole Nor had punched in the wall, the phantasmal appendages gripped the stone walls of the room, and with unearthly strength, began to tear the hole open.
“Get to the teleporter!” Isaac yelled, as the players scrambled for the chalk rune, one by one planting their palms on the floor and pulling up the teleportation menu.
As his fingers flashed across the destinations, Isaac could see the wall crumble down around them. Then, in the distance, a figure was hurtling towards them, full-tilt.
The Chief!
Isaac tapped his destination, shimmering and fading out as the bandit lunged at him. A steel fist en-route to his face was the last thing Isaac saw.
*******
“No!” Isaac dropped to the grass, trying to dodge the bandit’s fist.
Wait, grass?
Isaac got up. The Chief was nowhere in sight. It was just him, alone at the Resurrection Shrine where he had first spawned. Exhaling deeply, he threw himself against the edge of the fountain and allowed the adrenaline to flow out of him.
It was over. They had won!
“I was certain we were adequately qualified for the mission.”
Without any warning, Tenshi was suddenly sitting beside him, her pale hair tousled in the breeze.
Isaac laughed. “You call that adequately qualified?”
“We survived, did we not?”
“Barely.”
“Oh, this is where you guys were!”
Charles shimmered into being next to them, throwing himself down between Isaac and Tenshi, and elbowing himself some space. “Geez, I freaked out when I was the only one at the Wyndvale teleportation rune, I thought maybe you guys didn’t make it or something. I went and checked every rune in the nearby area before I found you.”
“You went to Wyndvale? Man, that’s the first place the bandits would look!”
“So, sue me.”
The two players shared a long laugh, and just then, Marie teleported in.
“What’d I miss?” She looked warily at the two laughing men.
“Nothing. Took you long enough,” Charles ribbed her.
“Yeah, it’d help if you guys told me where you were headed. Good thing Tenshi told me the coordinates.” She pushed her way into the group, elbowing Tenshi and Charles over.
“Man, haven’t you guys ever heard of sitting on the end?” Isaac complained.
“Sitting on the end is for losers.” Charles laughed, bumping a fist with Marie.
“I see.” Tenshi nodded, as clones fizzled in next to her, lining the entire edge of the fountain until they were all shoulder to shoulder. “Now none of us are on the end.”
“Pffft! Yeah, there’s no beating you, is there?” Marie noogied Tenshi.
“Naturally.”
There was a moment of quiet, as the players sat and contemplated the preceding events. Now that the adrenaline and euphoria of escape had left them, a pensive mood prevailed.
“So?” Charles said finally. “What next?”
It was the very question Isaac had been turning over in his head since he first arrived in this new world of BRYZ. What was next? And more specifically, what was his role in this new world he had created?
“I’m going to fix this,” he declared, finally. Then, he repeated it more firmly, as if to assure himself of it. “I’m going to fix this world.”
The others looked at him.
“But… couldn’t you just wait for that to happen naturally?” Charles objected. “I mean, you said yourself this couldn’t last more than a couple weeks.”
“I know, but I want to speed that along,” Isaac returned. “You saw the same things I saw back there, Charles. You heard about Basilisk. That’s probably just one of dozens, maybe hundreds of other organizations planning on using BRYZ, my BRYZ, the world I spent so much time designing, all for their own ends. I can’t stand that.”
He looked at the others. “I didn’t want any of this. Not perma-death, not my Alveus all mixed up with their BRYZ, not other people using the world I built for my friends for their own ends, none of it. But I can’t just put my head in the sand and pretend I didn’t cause it. That’s why I’m gonna fix this world, even if I have to destroy everything I’ve built to do it. I don’t want anyone else getting hurt because of me.”
There was silence again. Charles and Marie exchanged glances, then a nod. And then, Charles got to his feet, stretching widely.
“Well, I guess we’d better get going then.”
“We?” Isaac raised an eyebrow.
“What, you didn’t think we’d let you do this alone did you?” Marie punched him in the shoulder. “If that’s what you’ve decided, we’re with you all the way, okay?”
Tenshi nodded. “We are still Team Antivirus, after all.”
“That’s right, we are, aren’t we?” Isaac laughed, doing his best to blink back his tears before anyone noticed. “Alright then, our next objective is to go to town and turn in our quest!” He sprang to his feet. “And after that, well…”
“Eh, we’ll figure it out.” Charles threw an arm over his shoulder. “We always do.”
End of Book One of BRYZ
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