Regius (16 page)

Taking a deep breath, I
turned around and located the stone he was talking about and
pressed my palms flat against the dark grey brick, pushing so I
could line it up with the rest of them. The moment it did, a noise
sounding very much like a 'click' and then it was followed with the
ground trembling softly beneath my feet.

"Please, please tell me
there aren't any more dogs."

"No dogs this time." He
replied, confident.

I relaxed my posture,
blinking at the streak of light coming from a linear gap forming in
the stone on the right side of the room. I eyed it carefully as
just a section of the wall slid further down into the ground,
creating a window I could easily climb through.

"It's your way out of this
place," The kid clarified. Nervously, I made my way over to it and
then couldn't help but look worriedly back at the
camera.

"Will you be with me on the
other side?"

"I know you don't believe
it yet, but I see us as a team now."

Offering the camera a
smile, I then proceeded in making my way over the remaining edge of
the wall that hadn't disappeared into the ground. Once I’d climbed
to the other side, I turned the flashlight off all the while
adjusting my eyes to the bright lights in the room.

"Are we still in the
dungeon?" I was in awe as I looked around the chamber. It was
slightly bigger in size than the previous. It was still made out of
stone, but the humidity was gone, as was the stench. The bricks had
been painted ivory with golden swirls patterns. There were three
tall doors, one facing me, another on my left and the last on my
right. All three of them were the same shade of blue. In the middle
of the room was a small table covered in golden velvet fabric, top
of that was a blue cushion that carried three golden
keys.

"This is still part of the
dungeon." His voice softly interrupted my observations while I
heard paper ruffling as he continued to mutter something under his
breath that I couldn't make out. "There's a riddle. Well, not
really as the purpose of it is really rather clear." He puffed out
some air. "A fanciful message more like it."

"Bring it."

"Thre ex thre, etiamnunc
unus vos may utor.
Sulum mos plumbum vos alibi, vobis statuo quod
unus."
His Pallium was perfect. "The
translation would be," He continued. "Three out of three, yet only
one you may use. Each will lead you elsewhere, for you to decide
which one." Why was it in Pallium though? He answered my unspoken
question. "This place isn't what you think it is." That was
vague.

"I have to pick one
door?"

"Yes, no turning
back."

"Right." I nodded. "Well,
each of them must lead to something horrid."
Naturally
. "Might as well just pick
randomly and hope for the best." I muttered as I stepped towards
the small table with the three golden keys.

"I'd go with the left one."
The kid suggested.

"Why?" The keys looked very
delicate, thin, but quite graceful as the light coming from above
bounced off the gold with a shine.

"Well," He started. "As you
said, each of them must lead to something horrid. I'm not saying I
know which one is less bad, since I don't, but might as well go
with the left one. You know, good, neutral and evil. That, to me,
would be the logical way of placing the doors." I took the left key
between my thumb and index finger, turning it over as I stared at
it. Altors, Palliums and Regius, or so it would be expected of me
to envision good, neutral and evil.

"But don't they say that
too much good, utopia, is just as wrong as too much evil?" I
mumbled. "Wouldn't that be wrong?"

"Then why are we still at
war?" Dropping the key back onto the cushion as if burnt, I took a
step away from the table, pressing my lips tightly together as his
question reeled its way through my head. I knew why. Because
neither party seemed to be able to understand that getting rid of
the Altors entirely wasn't going to happen. That same applied to
the Regius. And the Palliums. And the Civilians. There were too
many of each of us.

The kid sighed. "Do us both
a favor and pick the one in the middle. It's where we are at right
now. We are neutral."

I preferred this offer.
Nodding, I picked up the key that lay in the middle this time,
closing my fingers around it tightly as I made my way to the center
door. The keyhole was very detailed, again, golden swirls
decorating it.

Shakily, I stuck the key
into it and then turned the lock, taking a step back quickly,
having no idea how this door would open. It shifted backwards,
sliding down and disappearing into the floor. A long hallway was
revealed, also relatively well lit, which made me happy because I
really didn't want to exhaust the flashlight batteries. The stones,
although no longer painted a beautiful ivory with gold detailing,
didn't bother me that much since the sewer stench wasn't present
here either.

"At the end of the hallway
there's another door. You have to go through that and it'll lead
you into..." He trailed off in confusion. "A bedroom. You'll stay
there until part three starts." He muttered. Frowning, I cautiously
peeked into the hallway, sticking only my head in before shuffling
towards the entrance.

"Just like that?" I didn't
buy it.

"Sic."
The sound of his voice made clear he didn’t buy it
either.

I grimaced as I placed one
foot inside the hallway, waiting a split second to see if anything
happened and when it didn't, I moved into the narrow passage fully.
Still nothing happened.

"Straight on and you'll get
to the door." He repeated his earlier instructions
nervously.

"A load of crap, I tell
you." I began walking forward, following the curve in the narrow
hallway and I saw the door he'd been talking about. The moment my
eyes landed on it, the flutter of a warning settled into my
stomach.

"I never thought I would be
that character that dies first in a horror story." A loud crash
could be heard and when I looked over my shoulder, my eyes widened
and my body froze at what I saw. The door had closed back up and
was slowly moving forward into the hallway.

"Run, Solenum!" The kid
shouted, snapping me back into action. Doing as he suggested, I
pushed off my feet sprinting towards the door at the end of the
hallway. It was far away and what was I going to do if it was
locked? I wouldn't have the time to figure out how to open it
because the wall that was now blocking the passage was moving in my
direction faster and faster, hell-bent on crushing me once we'd
reach our destination.

"You need to go faster!" He
sounded just as nervous as my rapidly beating heart was.

"I'm trying!" I pushed
myself forward with my hands on the walls on either side of me,
hoping the extra leverage would help. It had seemed to be such a
harmless hallway. "Please tell me I don't need a key!"

"No! Keep going, Sol!" I
barely registered the nickname, but it processed through me
nonetheless.
Cali.

I shrieked loudly as the
wall was awfully close.
Cali!
Roaring in determination, I threw myself forward,
planning on simply ramming full force into the door that I now
pretty much considered my sanctuary. But I was once again reminded
that nothing,
absolutely nothing,
went the way I wanted it to go.

I screamed in fear as my
footing disappeared beneath me, falling down straight through the
ground, the door that was supposed to lead me to the bedroom
whooshing out of my reach. I landed on my feet, groaning loudly but
the kid didn't leave me much time to whine.

"Move!" I didn't even so
much as wonder why, simply let my body follow his instruction,
jumping away to the first corner I could locate.

Breathing ragged, my heart
tried to find a way out of my chest while I eyed the wall that had
fallen through the hole right after me. It wasn't moving anymore,
which is all I could care about, really. It had broken on impact,
now lying shattered in pieces in the center of a room.

My eyes snapped up when a
loud slam reached my ears and I saw the trap I had fallen through
was now closed. Pushing away from the wall, I wiped the dust off my
clothes, scanning my surroundings. It was slightly less lit, but I
wouldn't need my flashlight. It looked less dreary than the dungeon
I'd spent the night in, but it was a severe disappointment compared
to the room I'd had to pick the key in.

I shook my head. "I'm not
satisfied with this chamber; escort me to the next,
please."

"I'm not your
bellboy."

Turning my head, I located
the camera and speaker somewhere high up the wall. "Better that,
than having me cry dramatically over my fate." I
snapped.

He cleared his throat.
"Okay." He was ignoring my irritation. "The maps tell me there
isn't anything special about the room you find yourself in now-" He
tried, but I cut him off.

"Lies!" I shouted, throwing
my hands up in frustration. "All of it, I tell you!"

"At first glance..." He
finished dully.

"And at the second?" The
noise of papers ruffling together was all I heard for a
moment.

"Can you see the
gargoyles?" Not sure what ‘gargoyles’ were, but I looked around
anyways. "The demon looking faces nailed at about middle height on
the walls? Hard to miss." He remained silent, so I decided to move
over so I could stand next to the rubble, turning around slowly as
I continued to check things out. Four square walls, all grey stone
and on two of them were two 'gargoyles' while the other walls had
only one pointing their way outwards. The ceiling was very high up
and looking down I realized the floor wasn't completely straight.
It seemed to slope its way towards the center.

"How many gargoyles are
there? I need to make sure I'm looking at the same room you're
in."

"Six in total. Are you
telling me you weren't certain about my location?"

He grumbled. "There's two
more like the room you are standing in right now. I'm assuming they
are the ones you would have found yourself in had you taken the
door on the left or right." He hummed thoughtfully as I heard a
book slamming closed, followed by another thud before I heard the
distinct sound of someone typing on a keyboard.

"You can find gargoyles on
old churches mostly." I raised an eyebrow in confusion. What were
churches?

"Churches are buildings
considered to be the house of God in the countries surrounding
Zinc."

“Countries surrounding
Zinc?” I spelled out. That couldn’t be right. We didn't have
neighbors.

“Solenum.” I raised an
eyebrow and couldn’t help but let a small smirk play on my lips at
his condescending tone. Clearly he thought me an idiot. “I am a
genius.” Oh, right, of course, how had I not seen that? “While I
most certainly couldn’t get my bodily self out of Zinc, there are
other ways to transport oneself over a border that is supposedly
blocked.”

“And how did you do that,
oh great genius?”

I heard him chuckle.
“Virtual connection, of course. I’m not exactly sure how I did it,
but only a genius could make a mistake so fortunate.”

“You are telling me you
found out about countries surrounding Zinc by making an error on
your computer?”

“One day I was using the
research engine to learn more about Zinc in its entirety, a good
way to pass time when bored.” That’s when I’d pick up a sword and
spared with someone, but I guess everyone had different ways. “I
was checking out the source code of Z3WR.zc and I found a link
there that didn’t make sense. I clicked on it and landed on this
entirely new page where I was faced with a wall of such complex
coding, it took me a while to decipher it. But once I did and
uncovered the website, I realized I was no longer using Zinc's
frequency created by the Palliums.” I’m not sure I got much of
that, but I kept listening. “Stop frowning, it’s not that
complicated. The virtual connection the Palliums and Altors make
use of that allows them to communicate with one another through
computers and port phones is settled in this machinery that is
placed somewhere in Cobalt City. It’s on the ground.”

“And this is important,
because?” I'd never had a conversation with a camera
before.

“With my hacking skills, I
was able to find the location of the machinery that contains Zinc
frequency, and luckily that knowledge was enough for me to find out
that the virtual connection I was using after uncovering the source
code I bumped into, didn’t come from the ground. Our neighbors
launched the machinery that holds their virtual frequency up in the
air. The barrier that blocks us off from the outside world doesn’t
apply to foreign frequencies. I 'chatted' with someone that wasn’t
from Zinc at all, Solenum.”

"You're sure one of your
fellow geeks didn't dupe you?"

"Sol." He scolded.
"'Genius' can't get duped."

Well, his words
were
compelling. And
there was the matter of the gargoyles and those houses of Gods he'd
spoken about. “Does Xania know?”