Chapter Four: Imogen
The next morning, Alex left far too early, as usual, to go to work at the repair yard. As soon as he was out the door, I crept upstairs to Zeke’s bedroom and perched on the end of his bed. He didn’t have to return to work for another month; the school at which he taught was out on break. I never really understood the point of a three-month school break, since it left the children to their own devices and allowed them to get into far too much trouble, but it was a tradition on most human planets, and so, Exodus had adopted it early on.
Zeke was awake when I found him, but he seemed to be trying hard to get back to sleep.
“Good morning, Imogen,” he grunted, as I made myself comfortable.
“Good morning,” I returned. “Although, it looks as though you’ve had rather a rough night. Alex told me that you met a man at the bar!”
He snorted a laugh, shook his head, and propped himself up on his elbows. For a moment, his human arms were covered in bright blue scales before the color disappeared, smoothing back into the rest of his pale pink skin.
“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” I pouted. “Your natural form is very handsome, you know. There’s certainly no reason to hide it from us.”
“I’m not hiding it from you, or from anybody,” he said, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and chugging a glass of water that he kept on the side table. “The stares just piss me off. I don’t feel like dealing with them, so I don’t.”
That sounded to me as though he absolutely was hiding his true form, but it wasn’t worth the argument; not today, at least. We had much more important things to discuss.
“Nevermind that,” I went on. “Tell me more about this man.”
“Nope. Not happening,” Zeke assured me. “Turn around; I’m not wearing pants.”
I quickly turned around, and soon I heard the sounds of rustling fabric, zippers, and soft cursing.
“Today,” he said, “I’ve got a job to do, and if you’re bored, you can come along. Alright, I’m decent.”
I turned back to find him still wearing the same purple shirt and grey dress pants he’d inexplicably manifested for the ceremony yesterday. After so much wear, the outfit was significantly rumpled.
“No,” I informed him. “If we are going somewhere together, in public, then you are going to shower and put on clean clothes. You will also brush your teeth.”
“Say ‘please,’” he sighed.
I raised an eyebrow.
“Do I really need to ask you to ‘please’ exhibit basic personal hygiene?” I inquired, batting my eyelashes.
Zeke just gave me a distracted half-smile, shook his head, and wandered off to the bathroom.
***
“I’m simply wondering where this Mateo’s parents are,” I exclaimed half an hour later, as Zeke and I made our way through the jungle. “Isn’t a parent’s job to make sure that their child doesn’t run off and get involved in dangerous police investigations?”
“The kid might not have parents.” Zeke shrugged. “Lots of them don’t. A lot of the kids who live in the Unbearable stayed behind in the on-world detention centers when their parents got picked up by the Cleanse. He’s probably one of those.”
“Oh.” I might possibly not have considered that. “Well that’s … that’s very sad.”
We were approaching the portal that led to the Odds of Olympus reality, and I finally voiced the concern that I’d been feeling ever since Zeke had first explained to me his plan.
“Please understand that I’m not trying to be rude when I say this,” I told him, “but I really must remind you that you haven’t been anywhere near a game since our triumphant prison break. Are you sure that you want to do this? We could just wait for Alex-!”
“We don’t need to wait for Alex.” Zeke was pressing the activation switch on the portal before I’d even finished my sentence. “This is an easy game, and I’m drunk, not dead. We can handle this search and rescue just fine without him.”
There was something strange about that statement that drew my attention, but before I had time to consider what it might be, we were standing on the other side of the portal in a beautiful, sunny meadow, gazing up at a massive, golden mountain peak in the distance.
WELCOME, came the introductory message, this one in a deep, booming male voice, TO ODDS OF OLYMPUS. DO YOU WISH TO ENTER THE ARENA?
Zeke selected “yes,” from the cloud-shaped menu box that appeared before us.
HEROES OF THE MORTAL REALM, continued the voice, A CHOICE LIES BEFORE YOU. WILL YOU DESCEND TO THE GRAVE OBLIVION OF THE UNDERWORLD, OR ASCEND TO THE MAJESTIC REALM OF THE THUNDER KING?
At that moment, the ground split open right in front of us. We could now see a winding staircase of tangled black branches stretching down into a chasm that seemed to go on for far too long.
Simultaneously, a bright bolt of lightning struck the mountain that loomed ahead of us, and thunder clapped perhaps three or four times; far more times than was really necessary to get the point across.
“...tits,” said Zeke, chewing unhappily on his lip. “I didn’t realize there’d be a split path.”
“You said he’s a teenage boy, correct?” I sighed. “He’ll have gone down into the Underworld. I’m certain.”
“You’re probably right,” agreed Zeke. “And if we don’t find him down there, we can just go back up and try the mountain path next.”
I was rather hoping that we found the child on our first attempt, but I supposed that doing a little extra training wouldn’t be quite so bad.
Zeke selected “Underworld” from the pop-up menu.
A COURAGEOUS CHOICE, announced the game. YOUR BRAVERY IS COMMENDABLE. ZEKE, PLEASE SELECT A CLASS WORTHY OF A GREAT HERO.
A new menu appeared, this one presenting a series of starting classes that were available to Zeke. He flinched away from it as it materialized, and I frowned. That was not a good sign, but I wasn’t really surprised; he hadn’t exactly been making excellent progress on his recovery plan.
Honestly, he barely seemed to be trying.
“We should wait for Alex,” I repeated, but Zeke muttered something under his breath and began reading through the class descriptions, completely ignoring me.
I did not yet receive a class selection menu, indicating that I would not get to choose until Zeke did. This was particularly frustrating, because there was no question that Zeke would take absolutely forever to read through every single option before making a selection. Considering the number of available choices, this could therefore take hours.
I yawned and watched over his shoulder as he perused. A few of the classes were immediately interesting; there was one called “Love Nymph,” and another called “Muse of Fire.”
Zeke selected the description for “Fate-Touched Vessel,” which provided the mysterious”Threads of Tomorrow” spell. He frowned, and finally turned to me.
“Genie,” he asked, “what kind of class do you want? You wanna try out being a tank?”
I clapped my hands in delight. ‘May I?? Oh, please!!”
He nodded.
“Alright,” he said. “Then I’m choosing a support class with a couple of long-range attacks. I’ll be a ‘Sun Worshipper.’”
Considering how often Zeke didn’t wake up until mid-afternoon, I thought that was rather amusing.
He made his selection, and his body began to glow. A shimmering cream and lavender robe settled itself over his shoulders, and a crown of laurels appeared upon his head. He also received a slim, golden bow and a quiver of fine-tipped arrows.
“For fuck’s sake,” he muttered, glaring down at his new outfit. “That’s heavy-handed. Um, okay, Genie. Go ahead.”
IMOGEN, bellowed the game. PLEASE CHOOSE A CLASS WORTHY OF A GREAT HERO.
By now, I knew exactly which class I wanted.
“I choose ‘Poet’s Muse,’” I declared. “After all, I’ve always been Alex’s inspiration. He’s no poet, but I suppose there’s something artistic about his chaotic heart.”
“That’s one way to put it,” snorted Zeke, as my body glowed gold, just like his had. I was soon wearing a set of pleasantly form-fitting white-gold armor, and some very stylish strappy sandals.
Unfortunately the sandals did not match the breastplate at all. At least I received a sword, which was a weapon I’d never had the privilege of wielding before. I’d always wanted to try out a sword.
I swished it excitedly through the air as Zeke grinned at me.
“Lemme guess,” he said. “Is the armor you’ve got on called ‘plot armor,’ by any chance?”
I raised an eyebrow at him.
“Yes,” I replied. “And I think it’s a rather clever pun. This is a charming game, so far.”
He just laughed under his breath, hoisted his bow a bit higher on his shoulder, and stepped onto the staircase.
***
“How many levels does this one have?” I asked.
Our shining weapons and armor created a faint halo of light all around us as we descended into the darkness of the Underworld. I could hear small skittering sounds coming from every direction, as though we were about to be beset by unreasonably large rats.
Zeke paused a moment, probably consulting the in-game guide, and then winced.
“More than I’d expected,” he admitted. “Looks like there are 99 in total; I’m guessing that half of them are down here, and that the other half go in the opposite direction.”
I gaped at him.
“Are we really going to search 99 levels for a foolish child who ran off to seek adventure?” I demanded. “That’s … I do understand that you want to impress this gentleman, Zeke, but this, I think, is a bit above and beyond. What did you say the man’s name was, by the way?”
“I didn’t.” Zeke stopped and frowned around at the muddy, dripping walls of the cavern that we found ourselves in. “Stay away from the walls; the slime crawling down them isn’t exactly the same color as the walls themselves, so I think it might be a creature, or, at the very least, a trap.”
Even as he said that, one of the muddy droplets hit the ground with a squelch, shuddered, and then made its way over towards us, gaining in size with every inch of ground that it covered.
“I … believe it heard you,” I whispered.
“Tits,” said Zeke. “Imogen-!”
“I know.” I already had my sword in both hands, and was enjoying the feeling of power that I got from wielding such an elegant, classical weapon.
I turned and pointed it straight at the tiny ooze thing, and a notification appeared. The voice of the game read it aloud at the same time.
KIRI SLAVE, announced the game. LEVEL 2 BLOOD GOLEM.
“I thought golems had to be made of something solid,” I remarked. “Are blood golems allowed?”
“Genie,” snapped Zeke.
“I know, I know.” I swung my sword at it, cleaving it neatly in two.
The two halves immediately oozed back together, reforming the creature.
IRRITATED KIRI SLAVE, the game declared. LEVEL 3 BLOOD GOLEM.
“TITS,” repeated Zeke, with much more emphasis this time.
“What?” I glared at it. “This is only the first level of the Underworld, and already we’re dealing with this sort of nonsense?”
And then, Zeke did something that I’d never witnessed him do before. He rushed forward, placing his body in between me and the monster, essentially shielding me.
“Zeke, this is absurd,” I shouted. “I’m the tank, remember?”
He didn’t seem to hear me.
Instead, he fired several shiny blasts of what appeared to be targeted sunlight at each of the two blood golems. They evaporated … and Zeke kept firing.
“Zeke,” I cried. “Enough! It’s over.”
Again, he wasn’t listening. Sweat dripped down his brow, mixing with the blood that lay pooled on the floor; the remains of the dead golems.
“Oh dear,” I murmured, as the golems began to rematerialize. “Zeke!” I grabbed his harm. “Calm down, for the gods’ sake! You’re making it worse!”’
I trod gently but firmly on his toe, and he winced.
“Aw, shit,” he finally said, shaking his head as though something in him had snapped awake again. “Fuck. We…we gotta run.” He desperately tried to wipe the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand, but the damage was already done.
“It’s really alright,” I began, but he wasn’t to be soothed. Grabbing me by the arm, he turned and ran, and I ran with him, mostly to avoid having my shoulder dislocated.
Luckily for us, the knotted black staircase that led down presumably to the next level was mere feet away from us, and we were able to reach it before the newly revitalized creatures could “attack.”
It was only when we reached the floor below that he finally stopped and turned around to ensure that nothing had followed us down.
“It’s alright,” he gasped. “We made it.”
I took a quick breath, placed my hands on my hips, and met Zeke’s bloodshot eyes.
His whole body was shaking, his teeth gritted in … no, it wasn’t fear. Well, perhaps it was partially fear, but there was something else in his eyes, as well.
In his gaze, I also saw pure, panicked rage.
“Sit down,” I ordered him, and, unexpectedly, he did as I asked. He then pulled his ever-present flask out of his back pocket and took a long swig. I rolled my eyes and tried to choke down the spike of fear that shot through me every time I saw that stupid thing.
“I’m sorry,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Sorry, Genie, that was … I dunno what happened. Something just came over me, and I couldn’t … I couldn’t. I’m sorry. Fuck. I’m sorry.”
“It’s quite alright.” I seated myself beside him and took his hand in mine. “We’re safe. Do you understand me? You’re safe, Ezekiah Survice. Nothing is going to harm you. Even if it did, you know I would do whatever it took to protect you.”
I smiled at him, and he grabbed me by both shoulders and glared me straight in the eyes with an intensity that took me aback.
“Don’t you ever say that again,” he growled. “Don’t you ever make that damn threat again.”
Instead of replying, I leaned in and kissed the top of his head, and he began to shake.
I was vaguely aware of one of the blood golems off to my right, but we seemed to be out of its line of vision, which was lucky. It didn’t approach us.
“I feel I must insist,” I said quietly, “that we return home and get Alex. I’m quite serious.”
“I know.” Zeke took a deep breath. “Okay. You’re right. I’m … I’m sorry.”
He was completely silent as we got up and prepared to climb the stairs back to the beginning level. I kept my hand resting on his wrist the whole time, and he seemed to draw some strength from the contact.
I did, however, allow him to take the lead, since his sun spells were obviously more effective against the blood golems.
I’m not an idiot.