Chapter 289: Flights Without Flight

Up, up, and away we go! Into the strange hotel found deep underneath this mountain! What could these halls hold that meant most of it was preserved for so long? Find out, my cute worshiper!

Ann lunged forward into the darkness, gauntlets poised and claws at the ready.

It was a room. A plain, grey, barely furnished room. More like the idea of what a room should be and hold, but with nothing of what made it somewhere someone lived. Colour was absent; plants and little knick-knacks were nowhere to be seen. There weren’t even books in the lone bookshelf.

There were also no monsters.

The room was deathly quiet. Quiet to the point it made Kat and Ann’s sudden rush deafening. Nothing leapt out from behind the shitty couch. No ghosts came screaming through the ceiling. No sinister trap triggered as Ann slowed her momentum.

Just a room.

“Well, that’s feckin’ borin’,” Kat sighed, lowering her weapons.

“What? Is anything in there?” Bren asked from behind.

“Nae! Just a room. Let’s keep movin’!” Kat called back, turning to leave.

Ann followed her after a quick glance into the attached bedroom. Nothing there either. So strange. Maybe this was just a ruin?

“Alright, we can’t be checking every one of these floors, or we’re going to be here forever,” Minnie said. “More scouting?”

“We could, but let’s just stick together,” Ann proposed. “Lucia and I getting too far ahead isn’t going to make much of a difference here. Not when there’s only like… ten floors before we have to find another way up.”

Rosalyn and Lucia agreed. Too much time spent scouring the place when they were here for a specific item wasn’t ideal. Ann would just take a quick jog down each hallway to see if she heard anything, then they’d move upward.

The next two floors were blocked again, so that spared Ann a bit of time, but the sixth was open. It was too early to establish a pattern, but Ann noted that it’d been every three floors so far.

A quick run down the hallway later, she paused to listen. Silence. She could only hear her own breathing and the echo of quiet conversation from the stairwell. Checking the doors, she did notice that some were better defined than others. One even had some details, like chips taken out of it. Another had crooked numbers, and one had a number missing entirely. Strange.

“Alright, can’t hear anything. Up we go,” Ann said as she got back to the group. “Some of the doors are more detailed here, though. No clue why.”

“Memory, perhaps?” Bren asked as they started the climb again. “If we assume that theory is correct, perhaps whoever built this place remembered specific details better than others. Perhaps those doors are ones they knew well. Those of friends or family?”

Ann shrugged. “Could be. Still, it’s strange how some of the doors seem run-down, and the rest of the place is all fancy.”

Rosalyn tapped a horn in thought. “Maybe it’s like perception or something? You know how you always felt like things were huuuuge when you were a kid, and now they’re normal sized or small?”

“Or like home, and it being nicer than it was,” Ann nodded. With a smile, she tousled her girl’s hair. “That’s a good one.”

Rosalyn beamed up at her. “Thanks!”

Sure enough, two more floors, and they hit the last opening. It turned out Ann’s depth perception had been wrong, and there were only nine floors. Above them, a rough ceiling of natural stone blocked their way, and there were no stairs leading further up, regardless. It was a dead end.

The hallway was exactly the same as the others they’d come across so far. Long, rectangular, dimly lit, and holding rows of doors. They filed into the space in the usual order, then fanned out to check the doors.

“Here!” Lucia called.

Ann joined her and paused when she saw why Lucia had called them. The door had a name.

“Annita, I cannot read these runes,” Bren said, coming up behind her. “Can you?”

“Yeah, that’s English. It just says ‘Briggs’. I’m guessing that’s the last name of whoever owned this room.”

“There is incredible detail on this door, surpassing others from even this floor,” Bren mused. “Look, small grain in the stone that mimics wood!” He shouldered past Kat and Rosalyn to get a closer look, pointing at details. “Here again, the top right of the second g is nicked further than the other. Stone here is a different colour, and appears to have been a stain in the old wood! Even the door itself is a bit warped, and doesn’t fit properly into the frame. Such detail is incredible!”

“Thinks home. Mage’s home,” Lucia clarified. “Old beyond old.”

Ann pressed her ear to the door, feeling the soft fur spread out against the stone and picking up any subtle vibrations. Nothing.

“Seems clear. Kat, we lead?”

“Aye,” the warrior nodded.

If there was anything in here, it was in for a rude surprise. Maybe it’ll be more interesting than the complete nothing that was the last floor.

One countdown later, they were met with another room with the same layout as the one before. Short hallway, small kitchen to the right instead of left this time, a living room, and a door to a bedroom. It was almost disappointing until Ann noticed how trashed the place was.

The neat couches and chairs, bookshelves, and other furniture that adorned the other room were here as well, but shattered into rubble. The coffee table had been split in half, one half thrown against the wall so hard it’d gouged a chunk out. The chairs were nothing more than pebbles. Ducking her head into the bedroom, Ann found it in a similar state, with the bed in a melted pile of stone. The doors of the closet were hanging on broken hinges, and the inside of the closet had its share of detritus.

“The feck happened ‘ere?” Kat asked, staring at the chaos while everyone else entered.

“Seems like someone ran a magic temperfit,” Rosalyn whistled. “Had my share of ‘em, but not after I got magic. This is bizarre!”

“Or someone who was infuriated,” Bren muttered. He walked over with a stone journal much like the one he carried. Well, not exactly. Ann noticed the pages were stone as well, making it more like a book of slates rather than a real book. There was writing on them. Scratchy, angry-looking writing. “Annita?”

Ann took the offered book and held it up to a dim, shattered, but still working lamp crystal. “It’s… huh. Nailed the pissbaby tantrum.” She read aloud.

“My name is Anthony Briggs. With the coming of these ‘Gods’ we’ve been gifted with these incredible powers. I feel like a fucking superhero! For some reason, I can make rock do whatever I want! It’s awesome! Came up to this mountain range to really get to work on practising. It’s been a good idea so far, but I’ve only just started!”

Ann turned the slate. There wasn’t anything on the back of the page, so she went on to the next. “Alright, it’s been a month out here living off random-ass vegetables and whatever I can kill to eat. Kinda easy to hunt when you can just make the ground swallow up whatever you want. Took a while to figure out what was good to eat, though. Don’t come grilled with fries and a large drink. God, I miss fries. I know you need olives or some seed shit to make it, but what if I choose the wrong stuff? Also have no clue how to find potatoes. Sucks.

“Wait, right, training. I got my shit going much more reliably. I can make walls without too much trouble, but if I do too much, it tires me out. Figure that’s mana or whatever those nerds called it. So, I guess I keep doing this and getting stronger until I can do more. Ugh, I miss home. Wait, maybe that’s an idea! Old building got atomised by some psycho, maybe I can build a new one out here?”

Ann had a feeling she knew where this was going. She flipped to the next slate. The last slate in the book. “God fucking DAMNIT! I can’t get it right! This stupid shit is only making it kind of my old place! I’m supposed to be awesome at this! It’s been three months and I can’t even make a fucking building? I’ve even started being able to make some cloth and metal! I found these weird glowing rocks for the lights, but it ISN’T RIGHT!”

A crack ran through the tablet, then some more scribbles. “Starting the fuck over, I guess! Goddamn waste of time! I’ll get it right next one. Gotta. Miss my apartment, man. Alright, Anty out!”

That was the end. Ann closed the book and handed them back to Bren, who gently placed it into his bag.

“Dude had a temper,” Ann whistled. “Kinda surprised this was all standing.”

“No, it makes more sense than it had a few minutes ago,” Bren said, looking around. “When he started over, he did not simply destroy the building. He sank it! Straight into the mountain, and left it there for thousands of years!”

“So we’re digging through someone’s pet project?” Minnie asked. “Feels… dumb. It’s a building. Why’s he care so much? Couldn’t he make something new and way better with all of the magic he had?”

“Attached,” Lucia grunted, kicking over a chair that shattered further into pieces. “Stupid. Still, people do. Poison. Weak… not weakness. Ugh.” She looked like she’d eaten something sour as she kicked another rock.

Ann knew a can of worms when she saw one, and that was not something to open right now. Still, Lucia was right, in a way. This guy was trying to get back some of his old life with the new powers he had. Apparently he had a temper, or a sense of perfectionism, that made him throw out something that wasn’t just right and smash the room.

It had to be hard to have your whole life uprooted like Anty likely had. Not like she had anything to say on the matter. No way. She’d been just fine. Not getting shot in the head and sent to magic future Earth. Ann understood the homesickness, to say the least. She empathised with the frustration. Sometimes she forgot it’d been months since she’d woken up here. Winter hadn’t even ended yet. So much had happened that it felt like a year. Maybe two. How many times had she nearly died?

Ann shook her head back into the present. “Alright, so we’ve got a guy trying to get his life back through his magic. Anything else in here?”

“Not finding anything! Just more rocks and… oh!” Rosalyn squeaked from the bedroom.

Ann’s blood ran cold, and she tore into the other space. Rosalyn was in the closet with… something wrapped around her arms? They were translucent, pale, and impossibly long.

“Uh, crap?” Rosalyn shot up into the ceiling. Up and into a gap that hadn’t been there before.

“KAT!” Ann yelled. She was already moving, running to the closet and leaping into the dark crevice. Her claws sank into stone, grabbing at ledges and indents as she hauled herself upwards. Rosalyn had been taken! Her mate! She had to get her back!

Ann heard someone coming up behind her. Probably Kat. She didn’t look back. She just climbed. Climbed hard until her head broke into another cavern. Ann vaulted into the space and spread her paws wide, tail thrashing as she looked around for threats.

“Hi Ann!”

Ann’s head snapped behind her, and there was Rosalyn. She was sitting there, on a couch that looked much more comfortable, completely unharmed.

“Whu?” Ann asked intelligently.

“Dunno! Think it’s more ghosts. They just kinda dropped me off here and left? I only ever saw the arms. Almost like an…”

“Elevator?” Ann finished for her. “What the hell is this place?”

“Beats me. Bren’s gotta be having the time of his life,” Rosalyn giggled, then trotted over to the hole. “I’m alright! Some ghosts just pulled me up! There’s another floor!”

Another floor was a bit of a simplification. It was the same floor as the first, just different. Better. Ann’s eyes flicked around, and she saw details that were missing before. Carvings in decorative flourishes didn’t look melted now, but had real definition. The couches and chairs were way more comfortable and looked used. The security station had been updated from the shitty apartment facade to a proper reception desk. It was just so much more cohesive than it had been.

“This is different,” Ann mused, looking around before Kat reached the top of the climb. “He got better?”

“Seems like it. Practice does make perfect. Well, kinda. Perfect’s an impossible thing to hold people to, and Ma and Pa always had words about perfect. Shouldn’t set it as a goal, and if you stumble into it, then awesome! If not, you did your best!”

“Good words,” Kat grunted, hauling her bulk out of the floor. “Help me tie this rope off on that pillar.”

Ann and Rosalyn helped set the rope up to help the others climb. Bren was hauled up with the end of the rope.

“By Qu’s silver tips, this is a fascinating repetition,” Bren gasped, getting a second to look at the rest of the room. “I can see what you meant by the prior iteration being a jumbled attempt at what the man wished to create! What is that smell?”

Ann sniffed. She hadn’t noticed a smell. She sure did now, and Lucia was glaring towards the far end of the lobby. Something stank of rotten flesh. Not the flesh of something that’d been out in the sun, but a thing that’d lain here in the dark, cold caves under a mile of stone. Or… an air-conditioned house.

“Think whatever that is is what the ghost was warning us about?” Rosalyn asked, pulling Minnie backwards toward the rear of the group.

“Dinnae. Could be somethin’ else. Could be anythin’ else. Could be some monster what crawled up this arsehole o’ a buildin’ an’ croaked,” Kat muttered. She was grinning, flicking her sword side to side and adjusting her shield. “Though it’s gettin’ closer, so I’m bettin’ against the death part o’ that theory.”

Kat was right; Ann heard the dragging coming from where the front door stood. It was weird.

Draaaag.

Click click click.

Draaaag.

Repeat.

Three legs? Maybe two, and the claws were hitting the stone? Whatever the monster was, it wasn’t breathing. It pulled itself along with agonising slowness.

Ann felt her muscles tensing, then relaxing. Over and over, she felt her body go through the motions of warming itself for a fight. She hopped on her paws, listening to the staccato beat they made as she danced in place. Her legs loosened, giving her a better range of movement. Her arms shook out, muscles growing slightly as blood flowed into them. She shook her shoulders, keeping them loose against the tension that threatened to pull them taut. The gorgette from Orlana really was a blessing. Its malleable nature let her twist her neck to get any kinks out from staring at ceilings and walls.

Everyone else went through their own pre-fight rituals. Kat was adjusting her gear; Lucia was checking Fillianore and monitoring the room. She had a glowing bullet in her hand, ready to use as a trap. Bren twirled his wand and stretched his arms while Rosalyn did the same with her staff. Even a caster had to be able to move.

The clicking stopped at the door. A scraping told them the creature had reached the door, testing it. Tap. Tatatap. The sound echoed over the stone walls. Dust fell in small clouds.

“You think it can break…”

Ann’s question caught in her throat as the doorknob turned. This door had a handle to twist, and it slowly crept downward.

“Don’t like that…” Ann groaned. All she could do was watch.

The knob clicked as it reached the bottom, then sprang back up.

It started turning again.

Ann felt a shiver run down her spine. Smart enough to understand a doorknob. Not dexterous enough to reliably handle it? Her imagination was running wild, conjuring up what could be coming through that door. She knew the body-horror fuckery Warped could get up to so well by now, but that never actually made seeing it any better. It just made the anticipation worse.

The door pushed forward.

Three white bone spikes wrapped around the edge. Each clicked loudly as they fell into place and gripped the door. Slowly, it pushed the door forward.

A second set of claws grabbed the doorframe. Maybe it’d used those to turn the handle?

Ann corrected herself immediately as an eye came into view. It was a bright amber that could be seen even under the cataracts that clouded the sphere. Velvety grey fur covered the half of the face they could see, just above doorknob height.

“Oh no,” Ann groaned. Not out of fear, but pity.

The eye flicked to her as it opened the rest of the door. Rotting flesh that should have decayed thousands of years ago still clung to the boxy head. Two ears, cropped to stand upright at all times, came into view. Strong jaws with droopy jowls, teeth poking out of them at awkward angles, shut as it mimicked a bark.

Ann winced. “Oh, that’s so fucked up.”

“An undead,” Bren confirmed Ann’s suspicions. “Once a hound, I imagine.”

“Yeah, a pit bull,” Ann sighed as the shambling body shouldered its way into the room, regarding the party warily. “Damnit, I liked those dogs. Big sweethearts if you trained them right.”

“Dangerous?” Lucia asked, her rifle trained on the thing’s head.

Ann couldn’t answer that for sure. She had no clue about this thing’s training. “Can be. They were bred to fight big animals.”

“Nothin’ bigger than us,” Kat said, her earlier smile muted by Ann’s drop in enthusiasm. “Think we could…”

The undead pit bull finally dragged its malformed hind legs into the room. They were stumpy and limp. Completely useless. Fur and skin had long since been torn off of them, leaving them nothing much more than bones and connective tissue. The stump of a docked tail, just a protruding bone, was still.

“If we can, we’re gonna have to do it fast. Got meat?” Ann asked.

“Nae.”

“Sticks?”

“Fillianore?” Kat asked.

“Die,” Lucia retorted.

“Maybe try your sword? The old one,” Ann suggested. “Leave it sheathed.”

Kat nodded, grabbing the weapon from her side and relaxing her posture. “Oi, ye big mutt. Ye want the stick?” She waved the sheathed blade side to side.

Ann watched as the undead’s clouded eyes tracked the sword, tail starting to wiggle a little. A spark of hope hit her. Maybe it was just a…

The pit bull lunged, claws scraping over the stone as it accelerated frighteningly fast. It hit Kat like a truck, slobbering madly as it tried to bite her arm. Kat only stayed in place thanks to her skills.

That’s what had excited it. Not the sword. Kat’s arm.

“Fuck,” Ann grunted as she whirled to put the unfortunate creature down.