9:5
Oof.
Ben fell back and rubbed his wrist, eyeballing the giant mirrored ball standing stark against the verdant forest he’d been wandering for who knew how many meros after he stepped off the path in pursuit of Patti. One mikro it was trees, trees, trees, and, oh yeah, trees. Then bam, in the path, a giant mirrored ball.
Like he was resisting that?
Right.
Not just because it was shiny, though it was very shiny, but because it wasn’t trees, trees, trees, and more trees and there was no way that didn’t mean something.
Don’t get him wrong he knew enough that if a house made of gingerbread, frosting, and candy suddenly appeared in his path he was walking the other way. Quick. But there were no stories, specifically, that cemented that a curious person shouldn’t explore a giant mirrored ball that suddenly appeared in their path.
Some people, with a heightened sense of caution, might have walked away. But people like that never got nothing by doing that except empty pockets and sad lives of complacent mediocrity. Caution was overrated. You didn’t learn nothing if you tried nothing and so far the trying hadn’t killed Ben. What were the chances today would be his unlucky day?
Slim.
Probably slim.
Definitely, definitely slim.
Totally slim.
He rubbed his upper lip with his finger as he sauntered towards the ball, stopping far enough back that it hopefully wouldn’t swell and bitch-slap him again but close enough he could assess the thing.
On closer inspection he determined it was in fact not mirrored but was instead closer to a giant soap bubble with that iridescent shimmer soap bubbles had. And the iridescence shifted across the surface as he examined the bubble. For several mikros he let his mind play with the rhythm of the shifts, considering the possibility of patterns, looking to see if there was a dimple or crack disturbing the flow.
Gaze focused on the surface he slowly made a circuit of the bubble, feet making no noise on the fallen pine needles dusting the ground. At the end of a full circuit he stopped, considered the surface again, then took two steps forward and pinged the surface with his index finger.
The surface dented in very slightly then the entire bubble expanded outwards, a pulse of energy cascading out and picking Ben off his feet, flinging him to slam back first into a not-so-nearby pine tree. He barely managed to curve his spine at the last mikro, dispersing the majority of the force so it only rung his bell rather than breaking his spine.
Damn. Okay. So, that didn’t work. Hmmm.
The House put this thing in his path and he figured his ass wasn’t getting out of whatever horror-scape this forest was until he did something with it. He’d come to suspect The House was testing them, throwing challenges in their way to serve whatever purpose it had whether to learn from them, about them, or just to fuck with them to see which way they spun. He could either dig in his heels and flip it the bird, something he didn’t see much benefit in, or he could play along.
In his experience the best gets were in the toughest vaults or protected by the best security. Whatever The House was or this whole thing was it kind of reminded him of a treasure box that unlocked only for the cleverest and the most persistent. And there was no one more clever or more persistent, in his humble opinion, than himself.
So, this ball was here for him to open. Or move. Or something. Just had to figure out the challenge.
Mirror. Reflected images. Reflected light. Ball. Bounced. Rolled. He played the options through his mind, expanding along each path until another option cropped up. If he chased the trail long enough, guaranteed, he’d eventually reach the point where this thing made sense.
Tapping his bottom lip with his index finger he made another circuit of the bubble. Then stopped, stooped, looked at the bottom of it hovering a hair’s breadth from the carpet of pine needles on the forest floor. Tensing his abdominals he lowered himself to his back then scooted under the bubble, stopping with his toes just shy of the lowest curve.
A wise man might have stopped at the point of being popped twice but wise men did not make history or something-something-adventure-and-discovery and you had to crack some eggs to make a pancake or something.
He squinted at the surface a breath away from his nose, then pursed his lips and blew. A burst of energy erupted from the surface, whacking him on the nose hard enough he tasted blood.
After the ringing in his brain stopped Ben scooted out from under the bubble. He rubbed the damp from beneath his nose, frowning as his fingers came away red. Might not want to do that again.
Or did he?
A small smile quirked the corner of his mouth as he took one more circuit around the bubble then without pausing to give the thing warning launched himself up and over to land on the top of it with his arms and legs spread to keep himself balanced there. Vindication mixed with the adrenaline in his system, coursing through his veins like beer bubbles.
He hadn’t actually thought ahead to what he was going to do once he lit on the thing, it was more the challenge driving him, but that wasn’t much of a thing anyhow as he managed to remain splayed on the surface for oh, half-a-mikro before a force shoved against all his splayed limbs and his torso and other parts and flung him straight into the air hard enough he got some serious hang-time in which he lifted his arms and muttered “whee” in a droll tone.
It kinda transformed into a “Woof!” as an additional force slammed from the bubble and caught him somewhere in the region of his side and sent him spinning off at an angle with his waist torqued to the point of pain and his leg flung out.
His view rapidly shifted. Trees. Sky. Ground rushing up at him. Or him rushing down at it. It was all kind of a spinning mess and the sudden appearance of black at the edges of his vision sure as shit didn’t help.
He threw out his hands and braced for impact, letting out another “woof” as his downward plunge halted short of the ground, something solid and yet squishy giving beneath him. He found himself draped over nothing, his hands scrabbling at the air and his nose almost brushing the pine needle carpet on the ground.
“The fuck?”
Twisting at the waist he flung himself backwards. His foot made contact with nothing. Nothing gave out a “oof” and then he was being lifted by nothing and flung backwards to slam into another tree. This time he didn’t have the chance to curve to shift the force of the hit. As his head smashed into the trunk he thought, “Well, this is going to suck.”
And then he thought nothing else as darkness rushed in on his vision while his head spun and puke rose up his throat threatening to blast outwards. He gritted his teeth, keeping it in, even as his vision went completely dark. The last thing he saw was the mirrored surface of the ball, light winking off it in a pattern his muddled brain failed to understand.
*
The ink on Abe’s arm pulsed against the confines of their skin, surging forward and slightly to the left. Tapping the hand Dan clamped to their left shoulder they let the ink guide them further into the all-encompassing darkness.
They had no idea how long they’d floated, tugged this way and that by their ink. Since their ink had gone insane, joined the darkness off the path, and yanked them out of one reality and into another that was nothing but darkness and seeping chill. The only variation in the cold was Dan’s warm hand on their shoulder and they grasped it like the lifeline it was.
Thank All That Was they’d been able to lash out with their ink and yank Dan to them when they’d surged from the path. Not that they were happy to have caused anyone else to be lost in this nothingness, but it was good to not be alone.
They cast their eyes down for no other reason than they had to do something with them or they’d end up straining for a hint of contrast in the darkness to confirm it was the world that was dark, that the ink hadn’t flowed over their eyes, stealing their light as was the eventual fate of every Magicker with their ability.
First it was the eyes that went, the ink stealing their vision. Then it was their ears, absorbing sound in the black fist of the ink, or sometimes it was their nostrils, the ink shooting up their nose and obliterating all sense of smell. Then the mouth, taking away the sense of taste and the ability to speak.
Some theorized the process occurred in a similar manner to sap sealing off wounds on a tree. Unlike sap the ink didn’t fossilize but the end result was the same. Eventually Abe would be trapped in their own body by the ink, suspended as effectively as a fly in amber.
It was not a pleasant fate and they tried really hard not to dwell on it. Usually they just shifted their thoughts to other things but being dropped into the darkness made it hard. Made it really hard. Because no matter how they strained their eyes there was no contrast and, really, were they actually sure the process of their eventual petrification hadn’t started?
They’d been so good! Why was the Magick punishing them?
No. No, that wasn’t it. That wasn’t. This was just the stuff of creation. That, that made as much sense as them being trapped in a hardening coffin of ink.
Abe took a slow, long, calming breath. Then another. Then another as their thoughts continued to run in dizzying circles while singing “neener neener neener” and blowing a juicy raspberry. Then another, drawing in and holding the breath this time as they willed calm.
There’d been no warning and there was warning. Their vision narrowing along the edges, ringing in the ears, numb spots on the tongue. They’d had none of that. This was just some effect of The House. They were fine. This was not their personal darkness. No. Dan’s hand on their shoulder meant they were not alone and this wasn’t their Magick consuming them.
Abe took a hard breath in through their nostrils, held it, willed calm, then released it and squeezed Dan’s hand again. Patti is out there, they reminded themselves. And Sass. And Ben. We are not alone in the dark. We just need to find them. This is temporary. This will pass. They just needed to place faith in their ink’s ability to find the others.
If they knew nothing else, they knew the ink wanted to survive. That had been established pretty much from the first time a word jumped from the world and onto their skin. The ink needed to survive and it would protect Abe as its chosen vessel. Until it didn’t.
No. Not thinking about that. Faith. That’s what Abe needed right now. Just because they couldn’t see the way didn’t mean the ink couldn’t.
Nodding, Abe stared blindly forward in the direction of their ink’s pull. They remained loose, letting the ink pull their floating body and Dan’s forward, only to tense as they came to an abrupt stop as something came flying out of the dark and slammed into their chest. Their breath left them in a huff that was instantly eaten by the dark. Panic sending a jolt of adrenaline through their limbs they scrambled to retain their grasp on Dan’s hand even as they jolted to the right under the force of the hit.
Their ink surged forward, starting at their shoulder and cascading down to their wrist before whipping out in the direction of the hit. It wrapped around the aggressive force, feeding back input to Abe defining something humanoid, around 5’9” or 5’10 with a head in the normal place and the standard four limbs. Abe wasn’t sure exactly how the ink read so well or communicated its read to them and in quiet moments they’d often contemplate the nature of their connection to the words that lived under their skin but this wasn’t a quiet moment and there was no more time to contemplate, only to react.
They directed their will through the ink, flinging the thing that had hit them out into the darkness with their right hand while clamping their left hand hard on Dan’s fingers. The ink slid against the dark like unfurling satin, slightly heavy, slightly liquid, its substance feeling lighter than it did when moving through air. There was a subtle resistance to its movement like the darkness had viscosity.
Heart hammering in their chest they opened their eyes super wide and searched the darkness, like somehow the widening would allow in light that had eluded them up to now and provide a visual. Of course, it didn’t. Squeezing Dan’s hand fast they lunged to the left, opposite the direction they’d flung the intruder. All directions were the same they supposed but ‘away’ seemed a safe bet.
That thought had barely flitted through their mind when something splooshed against their right cheek. Yeah, splooshed. It hit their face like a water balloon and burst.
A water balloon full of hot water. Or maybe magma. When it burst something sharp like embers flicked their skin and a hard flare of light stunned their right eye, a wash of blistering heat blasted their cheek, and a clear note drilled into their right ear. The sudden noise after countless meros of enveloping silence sent a shard of pain directly into their brain or maybe that was the blast of light.
Abe smashed their hand against their eye only to flinch back when it hit the scorched skin of their cheek. What the What The?
“Go!”
The sound after a sea of black silence confused Abe’s mind. They whipped their head around several times, trying to pinpoint the origin. Before they could Dan twisted their shoulders like the steering yolk of a mining trolley, driving them in the direction the sploosh originated.
Abe’s right eye danced with phantom lights and their left remained dilated making the world feel off-kilter. They lilted to the right and then the left, flinging their hands out to retain their balance as they wiggled in the direction Dan pushed.
A ball of light bobbed in the darkness. Abe was pretty sure that was what Dan was aiming them for. Like, yeah, were they a bullet sponge? A burning ball of ouch sponge?
They wriggled their shoulders in Dan’s grasp and mumble-hollered (What? It’s a thing), “Those things burn!”
Or they tried to mumble-holler but the darkness ate the words. Of course, it did. Ugh.
They snapped their shoulders, instinct overcoming sense. They knew that they couldn’t lose contact with Dan but the guy was shoving them towards exploding balls of ouch. Luckily said balls of ouch were moving pretty slowly and Abe was able to dodge the next one coming for their face. While they managed to dodge it from the sudden “Damn!” that burst against their ear sounded like Dan didn’t. Oops.
An unfiltered “ha!” burst from their lips and they caught half a snort from Dan. Probably the dark ate the other half.
Seemed like the bursts of light when the balls popped dispersed the effect of the darkness, letting them hear and see for a short time. Abe weighed the merits of communication against the merit of not taking a splashing burn as the next ball bobbed towards them out of the darkness. At the very last mikro they dodged again and the ball drifted behind them. Dan must have dodged it too as no sound came from behind Abe and Dan continued to shove them forward.
‘Super. Yeah,’ Abe quipped to themselves. ‘Happy to volunteer as a shield! I make a great shield. Best shield ev-’
‘Oh,’ they stopped themselves mid internal rant. Shield. Derp. They could Totally do that.
They help their left hand out in front of themselves, palm flat, and willed a wave of ink to form a shifting shield in front of them. Directing Ink through their unmarked left arm was harder than with the blackened right but the right was busy dragging them through the dark and it was possible to use their left. Just less ideal. The next ball that came their way they deflected with a sideways twist of their wrist, shuttling the ball off to the left.
A slight resistance met the splayed fingers of their right hand then the darkness transitioned to light. Searing pain seized their head as their pupils contracted in reaction. They clamped their palms to their eyes and gave a sharp shriek.
“Whoa! Where’d you come from?”
Wait. Wait. Shriek? Voice? Hearing? What?
Squinting until only a sliver of light entered their eyes, Abe lowered their hands and peered forward. At first all they saw was a vague shape, dark against the light of the space. Slowly details resolved, revealing Patti’s face about a foot from Abe’s.
Panic unfurled like a butterfly flexing its wings inside Abe as they felt the lack of Dan’s hands on their shoulder. They spun around and were instantly sorry for the speed of the action as the world tilted. Or, wait, no the world seemed to have actually tilted as Patti shuffled her feet as she slid slightly to Abe’s left on an angle.
An angle? Abe blinked their eyes, checking to see if the effect was in their eyes and not the world but, nope, Patti was definitely standing at about a 10-degree tilt. Fully upright only not. Abe shifted their gaze down to Patti’s feet. They were flat on a surface that curved slightly. Abe followed the curve, realizing quickly it was the base of a bubble with a surface of shifting colors like oil on water.
“What?” The question came out unbidden. Like there were probably a hundred better questions but that was the one that popped out.
Patti shrugged. “Dunno?”
Abe raised their hand to their empty shoulder then snapped their head rapidly to look behind them, only relaxing when they saw Dan standing a bit back from them where the bubble started to curve up to the right.
“You’re here.”
Dan nodded. “I’m here.”
“And thank the Singer of Songs for that,” Patti said on a rush. “For a mero I thought Sass and I were alone in this.” She waved a vague hand to encompass the ball around them as well as the darkness beyond that.
Abe bit their lip. “I was afraid it was only Dan and I. Then the bubbles came out of the dark and splattered on us and btdubs that hurt a lot and then we were here.” They paused, caught a breath, looked at the protective bubble they stood in. “Bt… where is here?”
“I don’t…” Patti flicked her finger at the wall. “I’m not sure? It just appeared. I’m pretty sure its an effect of my Magick. I know its kinda bright but it’s better than the darkness.”
Dan nodded. “Agreed. At least it doesn’t burn.” He plied the wall with a single finger. “You said it just appeared?”
“Yeah.” A squeak sounded from the small house hanging off her belt. Patti looked down with a small frown, tilted her head, nodded and then sang a note. Several trilling notes came in reply from the house.
Dan’s head turned hard, jerking his attention from his contemplation of the bubble. “That’s new.”
Patti’s head bobbed. “Yeah.”
“You can understand Sass?”
Patti’s expression shifted inwards then she nodded. “Yeah. You can’t?”
“Interesting.” That settled Dan turned back to look at the bubble, then turned back to Patti. “No. I can’t understand her. Did you before?”
“No.”
Dan ‘hmm’d’ and went back to looking at the surface of the bubble. “Did the bubble occur as soon as you left the path?”
“No. Uhm…” Patti’s mouth curved to the side. “When I spoke bubbles came out of my mouth. And then they smooshed together and got bigger.”
Another ‘hmm’ and a head nod from Dan. “Did Sass make bubbles too?”
“Uh, yes?”
“Hmmm.” Dan nodded like the answer meant something in a way that got Abe going over what they knew about Patti’s Magick. Not much. Not much at all.
“What’s that mean?” Abe asked Dan.
“What?”
“The ‘hmmm’.”
Dan held up a finger and looked to Patti. “Did you start to understand Sass after that?”
Patti’s eyes went wide. “Yes.”
“Hmm.”
“Yeah,” Patti said, “Now I want to know what the ‘hmm’ means too.”
This drew a quick grin from Dan which he quickly smoothed beneath his fingers. “It means ‘hmm’.”
Patti glowered and gave a small growl. “Right.” Then she chuckled. “Of course it does.”
“I have a theo-“ Dan cut off abruptly as the bubble bulged inwards and slammed into his back, sending him stumbling forward. Abe planted their hand in the middle of Dan’s chest, stopping him before he could slam into them or Patti.
Patti lunged forward and punched the surface, letting out a sharp low note which was echoed by Sass. The bulge reversed and the bubble visibly expanded outwards across its entire surface. It snapped back to a firm sphere but it appeared to have…
Abe took three large steps forward and then back to roughly the center. Yep. Definitely. The space inside was bigger, allowing for more distance between Abe, Dan, and Patti.
“Huh.” Dan raised his brows, scanned the space with his gaze, then focused back on Patti. “I think we can determine this bubble is a construct of your Magick.”
Sass chirped. After nodding to the mouse, Patti looked at Dan, brows raised. “D’uh.”
“Uh,” Abe looked around the circumference of the sphere, reading the swirling patterns in the surface, then looked at Patti. “Does it grow each time you hit it?”
Patti gave the bubble’s surface a narrow-eyed look. “Yep. Not a lot but yeah, it grows each time.”
“Do you feel tired after you hit it?” Dan asked. “Drained?”
“Noooo.” Patti drew out the answer.
“Do you feel energized?”
Patti took a mikro longer to answer this time. “I don’t think so?”
Dan scrubbed his finger over his chin and eyed the wall.
“Does it only expand if you hit it? And do you need to make that sound when you do so?”
“I…” Patti frowned, “haven’t really thought about it. Maybe?”
“Hmm.”
Another tremor, another wall bulge. Before Patti could react to it a narrow tendril of darkness darted through the apex of the bulge. The end bulged and then unfurled, presenting fingerlike projections that grasped the air. Abe instinctively fell back a step to leave more air and light between themselves and the fingers. Wide-eyed they turned to give Patti a questioning look. Patti’s eyes were equally as wide and she gave an expansive shrug. Okay, so this was new.
The tendril bent at a roughly 90-degree angle and the finger projections wiggled along the bubble’s wall. A resounding “no” played in Abe’s head and then a cascade of ink flowed from their hand and whacked the fingers. Dan yanked a book out of his tac vest and slammed its edge against the place the tendril entered the bubble. The tendril flew out straight, the fingers flailing with the force of the hit, then receded, making a subtle slurp sound as it hit the spine of the book and then disappeared.
Patti jumped forward, both palms out, and did some kind of warble sound while making circles with her hand like she was smoothing out the surface. Dan yanked his book back and then stared intently at the flawless surface of the bubble.
Patti beamed and then Sass leaned out of the little house, paws out, and did a little shimmy with its upper body that made the paws dance. Mouth open it stared up at Patti with a look of mouse-y joy. Patti pointed a finger towards the mouse and Sass reached up to smack its paw against the pad.
Another bump shoved in on the bubble and another tendril jabbed through the thinned surface. Before it could unfurl fingers Dan batted it with his book and Patti, in combination with Sass, holler sang at it. It retreated on its own this time and Patti smoothed the bubble back to perfect.
Abe eyed the expanded bubble. “So, it’s great to be out of the dark but anyone else wondering if we should try to figure a way out of here before whatever that is out there gets in?”
“We are fish in a barrel this way.” Dan pressed his hand against the surface of the bubble and pushed out. The surface moved with his hand, forming a bulge out similar to the ones formed by the tendrils before they broke through. When he pulled his hand back the surface snapped back into place.
Planting his feet, he stretched his arms up, gaze on his extended fingertips. Patti skirted closer to Abe when he brought his arms down towards his sides. Dan bent his knees a few times then rose up on his toes before coming down on his heels with some force. Swiveling his head to assess the distance between his fingers, Dan nodded then lowered his hands fully to his side.
He stepped over next to Patti and pressed his palms against the surface of the bubble, then looked over his shoulder at Abe. “Help me with this?”
Abe shrugged then moved to stand next to him in a similar position. “What now?”
“I’m wondering if we can move it, like a hamster ball.”
Patti snorted a laugh, then stepped to Dan’s other side and pressed her hands against the bubble too. “That’s a picture.”
The lift of Dan’s brows was its own comment.
“So? How do we get this rolling?” Patti asked.
Dan leaned forward, pressing his weight into his palms, then leaned back again. The bubble wobbled but didn’t move. “I think lean back then throw our weight forward.”
“Sure.” Patti shrugged then leaned back. “On two?”
Abe nodded. “Two.”
“One.” Patti said
“Two,” from Dan as he threw his weight forward. Patti and Abe did as well. The bubble rolled forward, hard, and all three of them went along with it, smacking their faces, then chests, and legs into the surface. Their legs went back up the curve of the bubble while their heads were at the base. Abe’s vision swam as their eyes tried to adjust to the sudden up-close view of the swirling colors on the surface of the bubble.
“Oof!” Patti grunted.
“Squee!” Sass, well, squeed.
Dan gave a deep exhalation as his face came into hard contact with the bubble’s surface.
Abe turned their head to the side to look at Dan. “So, that could have gone better.”
“You think?” Patti asked from their other side. “So, uh, how do we get up?”
Abe tried wiggling their hips. All that did was tip the weight of their legs off the bubble so their heels smacked into their butt. “Ow!”
“Hmm.” Dan did an abbreviated push up, lifting his upper body and arching his back hard in a move Abe was sure yoga had a name for even though they didn’t know it. Then he did something with his toes as he walked his hands forward. This had the effect of moving his head up the curve of the bubble.
Considering that a success Abe lifted their own upper body up and dug their toes into the surface of the bubble. As it had to the push the surface gave under their toes, providing some traction as they baby stepped their way forward while doing an abbreviated crawl up the bubble. Next to them Patti was doing similarly.
They were maybe halfway to upright when the bubble shifted under them rolling forward and smashing their faces into the surface again. Dan turned his head, pressing his cheek to the bubble’s surface and looking at Patti.
“This is awkward.”
Patti dug her forehead into the bubble and huffed a laugh. “Again with the great observational skills.”
Next to her on the other side Abe snorted then shifted to accommodate the sting in their nose where it pressed into bubble. “Ow. Hurty. Dan?”
“Yes?”
“Do you have a degree in Engineering?”
“No.”
“Kinesiology?”
Dan cocked a brow then said, “No.”
“Advanced hamster ball design?”
This time Dan snorted. “No.”
“KK, just checking.”
Abe very carefully shifted to their side and then using their abdominals drew their knees into their chest. Their body rocked a bit with the shift of weight but the roughly ball shape they’d formed equalized the force of their movement so mostly they just wobbled without actively having any part of their body go flying.
“Okay,” they muttered to themselves, “Okay, this is good. This will work. Positive thoughts create positive results.”
They very gingerly rolled until they were hunched over their knees with their lower legs pressed to the bubble. Pressing their hands down on the surface they pushed up to a kneel. From there they very carefully shifted their weight and pushed up to a stand. They wobbled very slightly on their feet before finding their balance. Once they were satisfied with their stance they turned and looked at Patti still flat on her belly with her cheek pressed to the bubble.
“Think you can do that?”
Patti eyed them, her gaze tracking like she was following the moves in her head. “Mayyyybe?”
“I think you should go next as you are the next lightest. Dan’s weight will probably anchor the ball and keep it from rolling and once you are up we can help him get to his feet.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Patti turned her face, pressing her forehead to the surface of the bubble. “Okay. No time like the present.”
Abe’s gaze went to the little house attached to Patti’s belt which miraculously had survived their roll around the bubble and had landed door facing up.
As Patti started to flex her legs in preparation for moving, Abe called out. “Wait.”
Patti stopped, turned her head and looked up at Abe. “What?”
“Sass.”
“Oh!” Patti’s eyes went guiltily to Sass’s house. “Yeah. Damn. Smart kid.”
“Not a kid.” Abe rolled their eyes then realized that yeah that kind of might be construed as a kid thing. Whatevs.
They held their hand out for Sass’s house. Patti unhooked it and gently nudged it to the side with her fingers.
Abe willed the ink down their arm in a narrow tendril that, come to think of it, looked a lot like the tendril that had jabbed through the bubble. Well, that was a thought for future Abe to contemplate. Time for action now.
The ink hooked around the belt loop of Sass’s house and spooled back gently until the house was in Abe’s grasp. Once it was Patti turned her head to press her forehead into the bubble again. Then she shifted carefully until she was on her side. After that she followed Abe’s example, pulling her legs towards her chest before rolling back in the direction she’d started so her shins were pressed to the bubble.
She grunted and winced. “Damn. I’ve been skipping too many leg days. Too many being all leg days.”
Drawing a long breath through her nostrils she slowly pushed herself up to kneeling. She paused and took a few more breaths then looked over at Abe. “Can I use my arms?”
“Not sure. Felt like that might shift your weight wrong and maybe tip the ball, even with Dan anchoring it. But you could try?”
“Nah, pretty okay not pitching forward on my face again.” Patti closed her eyes in concentration then slowly pushed herself up to standing, wincing as she got to the halfway point before pushing through. She braced her hands on her hips and rolled her eyes. “Well, that sucked.”
Sass made a long trilling squeak from the house in Abe’s hand, to which Patti nodded and sang back a haunting note to the mouse before reaching towards Abe. “I’ll take Sass now.”
“KK.” Abe handed the mouse over to Patti.
Patti looked at the house, then at her belt, then at her hands. “Better on the belt or in my hand?”
“The belt,” Dan said. “It swings away from your body so if you fall you won’t crush Sass. If it’s in your hand you might fling it or smash it when you brace.”
Patti nodded. “Valid.”
From within the house Sass made a series of squeaks. Patti tilted her head, clearly hearing something Abe did not then shook her head. “No. You shouldn’t. We could crush you.”
She looked up and met Abe’s gaze. “Sass thought they could run along next to us and wouldn’t have to worry about being crushed.” She hooked the house back on her belt then looked down at Dan. “Ready to try to get up?”
“No?”
“Valid.”
“We can move back against the side walls,” Abe offered. “It might offer a little more balance with you in the center with the greatest weight holding it plumb and we can shift a bit side to side if needed.”
“Because the assumption is I’ll fall?”
Patti smirked. “Like a big ass tree. I suspect you’ve been skipping leg day too.”
Abe grinned when Dan said in a dry tone, “I have, in fact, been skipping leg day.”
“Gyms are overrated,” Abe offered.
“And cake is good,” Patti added.
“Cake,” Dan gathered himself to roll and push up, “is good.”
He grunted out the last as he heaved himself to his knees and then pushed up to stand. The ball shifted slightly but remained mostly centered and still.
“Let’s try that,” his words cut off as the wall of the sphere bulged inward. At first the motion was fast but it slowed as the surface resisted the thrust. The surface contorted over the shape of knuckles pressing from the other side, the oil swirl becoming translucent a mikro before the fist burst through the thinned membrane.
Driven by something like instinct Abe thrust their right hand forward, curled their fingers on the air, and pulled. They felt resistance and then the substance of the fist contorted. A dark stream unspooled from it, flowing across the space between it and Abe’s fingers and pooling in their palm. They gave themselves a mikro to goggle then clamped their fingers tight over the darkness in their hand and pulled their elbow back towards themselves. The stream resisted the movement. They clamped their teeth into their lower lip and threw themselves backwards, using their body as a counterweight. The darkness separated from the fist thrust through the wall of the sphere, revealing a dark-skinned arm.
Abe caught a mikro’s look of it before they were flying back, their weight impelling them into the opposite wall of the sphere. Which tipped the sphere into a backwards roll that swept Dan and Patti off their feet and careening into the sphere. Which then tipped it further. If it was smaller it probably would have gone tumbling off into the dark. As it was it did adjust a solid forty-five degrees or so, enough to send Patti’s feet over her head so she landed folded in half with her knee smashing into her nose and startling a yelp from her. Sass’ house flew out at an angle but luckily the loop holding it to Patti’s belt held. Dan’s legs flew up but didn’t buckle quite as much as Patti’s had. Abe being way lighter than either of the others flipped ass over shoulders, doing a reverse somersault that did wicked things to their neck.
Patti groaned and clamped her arms around the back of her legs, pulling her thighs closer to her chest before letting her grip go and gingerly lowering her legs to plant her feet against the bubble’s surface with her knees bent. She groped around until her fingers found Sass’ house, then lifted her hand to gingerly test her nose.
“That was unfun.”
“Agreed.” Dan pressed his back flat and stared at the top of the bubble then shifted to look at Abe. “What was that?”
Abe gave a shrug then winced as it tweaked their neck. “Ink? I think. Ink.”
“Like yours?”
Abe considered it a mikro, weighing the sensation of the darkness that had pooled in their palm. “No.” They reconsidered. “Not ink. At least I don’t think. I don’t know.”
“You drew it implying it was ink.”
“It didn’t feel the same as mine. It felt,” Abe trailed off, considered the feeling again, “darker. Deeper. My ink is, uh,” they waved a hand vaguely, “formed. Its words. Even though it looks like a solid mass of ink it isn’t. It’s a lot of individual elements, layered over each other. That,” they waved a finger towards the general direction the fist had plunged into the sphere, “is unformed. Chaotic. I guess that’s the best way to explain it. There’s no structure. It’s like,” they trailed off again as they struggled to explain something that was an amalgam of all the knowledge they’d developed about their Magick. “When we are in The House I can see all these lines of words, like run on sentences, in streams and strings that shift and form patterns that make the solid things in The House.”
They sighed and frowned. “This is really hard to articulate.”
“Is it like strings of code?”
Abe frowned at Dan’s example. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen code.”
“What image makes more sense to you?”
“Uh. When I was a kid I had a toy. It was the picture of a guy’s face. Over it was a thin clear cover. Between the picture and the cover there were flecks of magnetic metal. You used a magnet on a stick, like a pencil, to move the filings around under the cover to form things like eyebrows and a moustache on the face. The filings followed the magnet and moved around, shifting the picture you drew. I guess maybe that’s close. Ish?”
Dan gave an assessing huff. “So, applying that logic what you did to that arm was draw the fillings away from that part of the picture?”
“Yes?”
“So, whatever that is lacks the structure of your ink which you see as words.”
Abe nodded then winced as their neck tweaked. “Like your word. Yes.”
“Not to be a bitch. Okay, I’ll be a bitch,” Patti interjected, “what does this have to do with anything?”
“Just curious.”
“Because, yeah, lying in a bubble of Magick while something attacks us is a kicking time to exercise curiosity.”
“True.” Dan turned his head to look at Patti then rolled up to sit with his knees held to his chest.
Abe eyed him. “Why are we trying to roll the ball?”
“To get away from that thing?”
As if on cue the wall of the bubble near her shoulder shimmered and bulged inwards. Muttering a quick, “crap,” Patti reached over and punched out with fist and voice, stopping her fist short of the wall and instead hitting it with her voice. The bulge reversed then snapped back into place and the bubble rocked slightly but remained centered and anchored by their weight on the floor.
“But why?”
Patti cocked her head at Abe. “Because.” She stopped, thought, then gave a shrug. “Because that’s what we,” she raised her hand, pointed a finger up and circled it to encompass herself, Abe, and Dan, “do? We run. We come in and do the clean-up. We aren’t the A Team.”
Dan grunted. “There’s an A Team?”
“Yeah. And we ain’t it.”
“Why not?” Abe asked with a frown.
“Because.”
“Who said? Us? Did we say? Because otherwise that’s ass.”
Patti raised her brows at Abe’s word choice. “That’s ass? Who are you? Where’s the real Abe? Are you a doppelganger? A doppleabe? An abelganger?”
Abe chose to ignore Patti’s teasing and surged on. “The only ones that say who we are is us.”
“I’m not the B team,” Dan said.
“You seem pretty fixed on this whole A Team B Team thing,” Patti replied.
“Because I’m not the B Team.”
Abe turned their head to look at Patti, pressing their cheek into the giving surface of the bubble. “Dan isn’t the B Team.”
“Fine Dan isn’t the B Team.” Patti rolled her eyes. “Pick another name for Not-the-Heroes.”
“Oh, Patti, do you actually feel that way about yourself?” Woe colored Abe’s words as they looked at Patti.
Patti reached over and poked Abe on the tip of the nose. “Shut it.”
“We need to take care of this attacker. Find Ben. And get back to the path,” Dan pulled out a pen and made a note in one of his notebooks then replaced it in the chest pocket of his tac vest, “We aren’t the B Team. And we are not Not-the-Heroes.”
Patti clapped her hands. “Excellent motivational speech, Coach!”
Dan to his credit made a clear attempt to not roll his eyes. He failed. But the effort was noted by Abe who gave a smaller clap before carefully rolling to sit.
“Let’s handle this attacker. And find Ben. And get back on the path. We’ve got this!”
“Excellent pep, Pep Squad!”
Abe grinned and shook their head at Patti. “Not the Pep Squad.”
“Grumble Grumble,” Patti didn’t actually grumble. She rolled up and braced her shoulder against Abe’s. “Not the B Team. Not the Pep Squad. I’m trying here but you all have to work with me!”
“A Squad?”
“Lame.”
“Pep Team?”
Squeak! Sass made their rejection clear or at least that’s how Abe read the squeak.
“What would you call us then?” Abe tipped their head to look at the mouse hanging out of the window of the house on Patti’s belt.
Squeak squeak! went the mouse.
Abe looked to Patti for a translation. Patti shrugged. “Heroes.”
Before Abe could “awwwww” at the cute, the side of the bubble bulged especially big, the bubble rocking under the force of it, then two hands punched through the wall. The hole widened as the hands moved outward.
Abe threw up their right hand hand, clawing the air with their fingers and willing the dark matter on the hands towards themselves. The action pulled the dark from the hands to an extent, drawing it away like a thin film. It also served to yank the hands into the bubble, arms following close behind.
For a mikro Abe didn’t know whether to let go of the dark or keep pulling. The ink on their arms made the decision for them, spooling in the darkness, dragging it and the hands closer to Abe. As the dark hit Abe’s skin it coalesced into a swarm of words, moving too fast for Abe to read, before soaking into their skin.
The arms drew back as the black leeched from them, fighting Abe’s tug. The invading appendages gained traction, hauling back until the hands were at the edge of the bubble again. Abe, still holding on to the unspooling dark, skidded across the surface of the bubble, toes of their boots digging for purchase. Dan lunged up to his knees and wrapped his hands around Abe’s lower legs, stopping their movement forward. He and Abe leaned at a sharp angle as the arms pulled back through the hole in the bubble.
Abe squeezed their butt hard, grit their teeth and yanked, determined to win the tug of war. The black snapped loose from the hands grasping the edge of the hole in the bubble and Abe went flying backwards, their butt smacking hard into Dan’s face and eliciting a solid oomph.
“So,” Abe rubbed their butt and grimaced. Before they could continue the thought the bubble gave a shudder that carried throughout the entire surface, vibrating up Abe’s feet into their knees and shaking their sore butt. The oil spill surface danced, then went opaque as it bulged inwards. Abe tensed and raised their hands, prepared to throw ink forward, then froze and goggled as a body came flying through the bubble with enough force to send the bubble skidding and hopping.
Abe stared wide-eyed at Ben, body curled up in a ball on the floor of the bubble, cheek resting on Patti’s foot, eyes clenched tight.
“Fuuuuck.” Ben drew out the word as he lifted his eyelids then uncurled from his fetal position. “My arms fucking…” the words stuttered out as he held out arms which ended abruptly at the elbow.
Right at the elbow Ben’s arms were a mess of flesh and exposed bone and tendon. Just below that there was an echo of arm that appeared to be composed of light. As they all stared in horror the light ‘arms’ pulsed, grew fuzzy along the edges as particles lifted away from the light like a swarm of glittering gnats, and exploded with a jarring pop.
Impelled by the blast Patti, Abe, and Dan went flying backwards into the side of the bubble; Ben flew in the opposite direction.
And then the screaming started.
Enter The Woods 