No Mario for me
No Mario for me
Bunny
I walked the tunnels at random. They twisted and turned every which way. Always on a flat plane though, never up or down, which was odd. The light made no sense either. There were no lamps I could see, and yet everything was illuminated and there were multiple shadows under me, as though there were hundreds of invisible point light sources all around.
Every few hundred meters the tunnels branched off to the left or the right. I could be going in any direction. I should be panicking, but something about the tunnels felt... homely. It was an odd sensation, like a warmth in my chest that mirrored the warmth in the crystal that I still cradled close to my heart.
And there was no pain! The raging misery in my hip that had eaten my life for so long was gone! I was so light, I could almost skip, but I held the crystal close in two hands and walked carefully.
There were some beautiful calcite deposits here. I leaned in to look at them. A small rectangular popup appeared. It was not bright and mysterious like the green writing had been, just ordinary writing in a white box that hovered a few inches in front of the wall.
I pulled my hand back, but the popup remained. There was an X in the corner with a countdown timer next to it, as though it would self close if I did nothing. It was slightly translucent, I could see the minerals behind. I leaned in to read the writing.
Purchase map tile y/N
Mana cost: 1
Starting mana: 100
It was just like a computer game, but it was real somehow. I was actually here, walking about, whatever that meant. Carl had never much liked computer games. I had owned a Nintendo when I first met him, but that was just one of those things that I needed to cut from my life, after we bought the house and things got hard. No Mario for me.
I put out a cautious finger and poked at the popup. It flowed out of the way, and my finger touched the limestone behind.
Purchase map tile? It was a nice mineral deposit. Could I actually buy it and take it home? Was this some sort of collect the minerals quest? Would I get a screenshot or something?
I tried stabbing at the letter "y" but the popup flowed out of the way again. I had no keyboard, no desk to put a keyboard.
"Y," I said experimentally, and suddenly my mind unfolded.
It was like stepping into a warm bath, everything unrolling and unravelling and opening up. Like a stretch that just keeps getting bigger, out and out until it can't fit inside your body. Like a Jacob's ladder, rolling around forever.
I could feel the tunnel. I could sense it like it was a part of my body. I understood the curve of it, and the branch up ahead to the left, and where that would take me, towards a big cave, a big open space with pillars, just on the edge of my awareness.
I stumbled, my hand going to my chest. I could feel my heart humming there. I could feel the bright crystal beating in time with it. I could feel the minerals and the strata, the tunnel driven through the strata, a naive imposition onto the perfection of it. It was all me. Everything was me.
It was intoxicating, the size of myself, and I could just hop around for joy.
There was still something stuck to my head. Time to care about that later. I set off through the tunnel that was part of me, headed for the big cavern.
Cat
Dumb tunnels everywhere. Each one going nowhere, curving back around. The big cave went back a long way, full of pillars and weird broken statues. I kicked at a rock and hurt my toe. My morning latte felt like a lifetime ago. I hadn’t even finished it.
Dumb blond girl hadn’t even let me finish my latte before drugging me or shooting me or chucking me down a hole, or whatever this was.
“Dungeon core to the north, mistress."
Something whispered in my ear, very close to the side of my head. I felt the puff of its breath on my neck.
“What! Get off! Get the fuck off me!"
I clawed at my shoulders and felt something slimy there, like a cold glob of snot stuck to my jacket. I hurled it away. It tumbled and fell with a little plop. Damp residue clung to my fingers.
“Ugh! What the fuck?"
The thing was lying on the floor completely still. A misty little grey shape. I nudged it with my toe and was rewarded with a whimper.
“Did you just talk to me?"
The little thing didn’t reply, just lay there crying.
“If you can talk, I want you to talk to me."
It was sobbing now, little shudders going through the misty body, and a pool of wetness spreading around it.
“I’m ordering you to talk to me," as if that would do anything. Still, I couldn’t think of anything else to try.
“Mistress is angry," whispered the little blob thing.
“You’re darn right I’m angry. What the hell? Why am I here? What the ever-loving shit is going on?"
“Mistress is confused..."
“I’m not confused, and stop calling me mistress. I’m no one’s mistress. You can quit quivering."
The blob thing uncurled and stood. It was a lumpy little man, six inches tall, made out of goopy grey stuff with misty edges.
“What were you doing on my shoulder?"
“Please, mistress, I dropped down while you were not looking. I waited in my hiding place. Waited so long, so many centuries all the same."
Creepy little thing.
“Well, you can go back to your hiding place and wait another century or whatever. I don’t care."
“Mistress does not want me?"
“Mistress certainly does not want a goopy little dwarf clambering around in her hair."
“Dink is not dwarf. Dink is tunnel sprite. Dink not touch hair yet."
“You better not touch my fucking hair. Go crawl back into your, wherever you came from. Wait, is your name actually Dink?"
The little creature nodded its head. “Dink, mistress. It is a good name? Dink chose it himself, so long ago."
“You could have chosen any name, and you chose Dink?"
“It is a strong name. Dink is hero to his people."
You’re mad is what you are. I didn’t say it out loud. The weird little slug might know things.
“Maybe, I will let you help me. What is this place? How do I get out?"
“You complete the quest, mistress. Mistress knows about quests?"
Of course, I know about quests. I used to love quests. “No, tell me about quests. Don’t do any crying, just the facts."
“Green words say DESTROY THE CORE. Mistress must destroy the core, then mistress ascends."
“Ascends?"
“Mistress leaves. Dink will be all alone again." The rubbery little thing spoke in a sing song voice, like a person who’s seen some shit, then spent altogether too much time hugging their knees and singing to themselves. It curled up on the floor again, its blobby shoulders shook.
“I said no crying! Show me where this core is so we can get this over with. I’ve got a whole Tuesday scheduled."
"Dink can ride on shoulder?"
"Fine."
"Dink can touch hair?"
"Don’t fucking push it."
Bunny
The thing on my head was really bothering me, but i didn’t want to put down the crystal to deal with it. There was something stuffed down the back of my pants, too. It was a double whammy of uncomfortableness.
I brushed another wall section with my elbow.
Purchase map tile Y/n
Mana cost: 1
Mana: 91
“Purchase" I said, feeling my consciousness expand out into new space. It didn’t seem to matter what i said, as long as i didn’t say no. There was a metaphor there somewhere.
It was addictive. I was still me, inside my own head, but I was everything else, too. The big cavern was just up ahead. I could sense it, though it wasn’t a part of me yet. It was a dim outline in my mind, a misty edge.
The tunnel became wider, grander. There were little arches carved in the wall where candles could go, if I had any candles.
Purchase Candles Y/n
Mana cost: 0
What?
“Purchase," I said, and the tunnel was bathed in warm flickering light. All the little rock formations sparkled. It was... homely.
Someone had clearly made this place. The paths looked random, but were obviously too random. The sort of random you get when someone picks three or seven, rather than something more orderly sounding but equally likely like one or ten.
No natural cavern has flat floors for walking. Natural caverns are three-dimensional voids in the living rock, carved by water over millennia. This was more like a mine made to look like someone’s vision of a natural tunnel. Someone who had never been inside a real cave.
I, on the other hand, had studied Geology at Cornell.
There was a change in the air up ahead, a coldness, and then I was out, breathless in a space that made me giddy.
I was a hall full of pillars, arching up, curving up, into a valuted spider’s nest of ribs and bosses around the ceiling.
It looked, to be frank, almost exactly like the Mines of Moria. I hummed the Lord of the Rings theme to myself.
“Bummm ba ba bummm ba ba bummm"
But I wasn’t alone.
There, off in the distance, was a girl.
Cat
And there, just as Dink had said, was a girl.
Or something like a girl, anyhow. It had a strange way of walking, and were those ears on its head? Like it was wearing some dumb furry hat.
“Mistress should take care," Dink whispered. Creepy little thing had got in close.
“Why?" Maybe the nasty goblin did know something useful.
“It carries the core. It is the keeeeeeper."
“So, what, I smash the core, and then I get to go home, right?"
“Mistress is talking too loudly."
Bunny
The girl was wearing a smart business outfit. It was the same suit who had knocked on my door earlier, carrying a stack of official-looking paperwork. She was crouching a little and seemed to be whispering to herself.
Were those cat ears? There was a tail too, poking out the top of her suit pants, twitching. She had whiskers and a pink-coloured nose.
“Hello," I called out.
The cat girl seemed to notice me. She smiled and began stalking towards me. Her face was friendly, but her tail was twitching.
“Hello," the cat girl said. She sounded like a lawyer, cool and reasonable.
Cool and reasonable as they take away your house, Dad had said once, before... Before the accident that had left me in permanent pain, and my father...
Carl had been driving that day. Carl, my loving husband, who had somehow managed to walk away from the crash with only cuts and a broken nose from his airbag. My airbag hadn’t gone off, and there had been none in the back seat where my father had been. The crash had messed me up pretty badly. Dad hadn’t made it.
“It’s good to see someone else," said the cat girl. “Can you help me? I’m completely lost." Still, her tail twitched.
Cat
Stupid rabbit cosplay thing. Who dresses up as a rabbit? She had golden brown velvety ears on her head, poking out through the messy blonde hair. She was wearing tartan pyjamas. She looked familiar.
Wait a minute. Was this the girl on the doorstep? The dumb blonde whose husband was leaving her? The one who had drugged me or shot me or whatever?
She looked different with the bunny makeup and the twitchy little nose. It was definitely her though, I was sure of it. Right, gloves off then.
“You’d better listen carefully," I said. “I have friends. If you don’t let me out of here right now, I can make very serious problems for you. Do you understand?"
“Very good mistress," whispered Dink. “Lead with threats."
The rabbit girl hung her head. She seemed really tired. She was holding some sort of glowing crystal in two hands, close to her heart like it was precious. It pulsed with light.
“The coooooore," whispered Dink.
"What?" I whispered.
"Smash the cooooooore. Smite Eeeeevil."
OK, whatever, but I did want to get out of here.
“I'm going to have to ask you to hand over that rock," I said.
The rabbit girl just clutched it closer to her chest. She wasn’t looking down anymore. She was looking right back at me. Right in the eyes, defiant.
"Look, we can be reasonable. I've got you on at least a dozen major counts of kidnapping, false imprisonment, cooercian and duress, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Give me the rock and maybe we can talk about it."
“You can’t have it, said the girl."
“Give me the fucking rock," I said. "I’m through playing. Give me the rock now or I’ll knock you the fuck out and take it from you."
She didn't even reply, just clutched it close like it was her baby or something. Like it was her soul. I was so completely done with this bullshit. I walked up to her, nice and slow. She wasn't talking, just watching me warily. She was a good bit older than me, and she didn't look like she worked out too often. I kept a friendly smile on my face, arms to the side. Nothing to worry about here...
Bunny
The cat lawyer suit girl sprang at me. It was completely unexpected. One minute I was standing, and the next I was on my back with the cat so close to my face, scratching at me with claws, were those real claws? A sharp sting across my cheek, and then a blow to my jaw. It didn’t hurt. It was a hard jolt that made my vision jerk around. Again and again. I was being punched, no one had punched me since school.
“Get off me!" I yelled, trying to push her away
But the girl wouldn’t get off. She began prying at my fingers, trying to get the crystal. The cat’s nails were so sharp. I was bleeding from a lot of little cuts on my fingers. My hands were slippery with blood. The crystal was slipping from my grasp, and then the girl was up, off me, sprinting away down the hall, tail high behind her.
Cat
A rock, or something. I needed something heavy to smash the crystal. Maybe I could just bash it against a pillar, or throw it on the floor? I didn’t want to throw it, what if it bounced and rolled away?
The stupid bunny girl was hopping along after me with blood coming out of the scratches I had left on her face.
“Smash the coooooore," whispered Dink again.
“I’ll be glad not to see you again."
Over there, a chunk of fallen masonry, about the size of a brick. Perfect for smashing. I ran to it and snatched it up.
The bunny girl was standing nearby, not chasing me any more. She was leaning up against a pillar. Giving up already? Dumb little bunny.
Dumb Bunny leaning into the pillar.
Dumb Bunny, head down, talking to herself.
Stupid Rabbit.
“Purchase," whispered Bunny, and suddenly the hall was bathed in light.
For a moment, I was dazzled. My fingers tightened around the rock. I gripped the little crystal in one hand, the big lump of grey stone in the other. All I had to do was bring the two together, hard.
“Doooo iiiiit," whispered Dink.
Bunny
The hall was mine. Candles bloomed in every alcove. My mind washed into the space as a river rushes into a bucket. I sensed every pillar, every stone, as clearly as my body.
The cat girl was over by the wall, my precious core held in one clawed hand, business suit untucked at the back, hair wild and high around her ears, little snaggle teeth poking out of her grin.
I could feel her dirty fingers touching it, wrapped around my secret soul.
“Give me that back."
Cat girl wasn’t listening.
“It’s mine!"
I could feel the girl’s claws digging into the core as though it were my own flesh, It hurt so much, and suddenly all the rage in the centre of me, every slight from every bully. Every unkind word Carl had ever said, all came bubbling up.
“Give! It! Back! Now!"
There came a crack from overhead, and something fell.
It was a piece of ceiling about the size of a car. I hadn’t meant to do it, but once it was falling, I didn’t stop it. It took about a second to come down. There was a wet smack, and a moment later a splatter of red chunks and a pink mist that made my nose twitch.
The core bounced across the floor and rolled to a stop at my feet.
“Crap."
Cat
And everything went dark. And there was a message.
"You have died. Respawn? Y/n"