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She leaned forward, eyes glowing as her face bounced to each of ours one by one in excitement. The kid slid off the stool and lazily walked down a dark hallway, calling for us to all follow when we’re done. I don't know what she was expecting from us, but she didn't let our deadpan silence bring her down as she trotted off after the kid.
Lex was the first to push through. “I don't know about you all, but I am kinda excited to do this. It seems so . . . normal.” He skipped after Ray, calling for her to wait up for him.
Avery was the next to head off, making an extra effort to not touch anything since it all looked barely pieced together. He started to mumble to himself over and over, “It's for Rayla. This will make her happy. If she is happy, I get sexy time. You got this, Avery.”
Falcon was already scrolling through his phone as he followed. “So, it says these ‘escape the rooms’ are just a few simple puzzles. This won’t take long.”
Ax and I followed in the rear, both of us not terribly excited, but at the same time, wanting to make Rayla happy. After yesterday's slights and fights, I wanted to prove to her that we were fine. That all that stuff was normal when you had several strong personalities in the same room.
The kid opened a large steel door that had rune carvings around the edge. All of us waited to get into the room as the kid sighed, leaning leisurely against the door as he called out, “Done yet? They're here.” He threw his head toward us like this was the last thing he wanted to do.
In a split second, a short, blue-haired woman popped out of the room, looking side to side before she focused on Rayla. “Ooooooooh, Mrs. Desmond herself!" The woman squealed as she ran up to Ray.
The fact that Ray didn't stop her from invading her space, giving her a softened smile, was suspicious. I could tell immediately that she was a mage by the aura of magic around her. She scanned the rest of us with an inquisitive eye before leaning toward Ray and whispering, "I can't wait for them to try it out! They will be my first!"
She sharply turned to face us, standing straight, giving us a pleasant but practiced smile. "Hello, my name is Jem Dovan. I'm an air mage with an affinity for rune magic, and I make thrilling trap rooms for teams or strangers to come together to figure out how to escape. We usually cater to humans, but recently opened some rooms for supes. When Mrs. Desmond here called with this special request . . . well, you don’t turn down a Desmond in Nevada.” She motioned to the kid leaning against the door. “This is my son, Trip. My husband is a human and runs the human side of the business while I handle the supes side." She winked at her son, whose face drooped, lips turning into a frown. She ignored it as she laughed and turned back to us.
“Let's get started, eh?” She closed her eyes and then opened them, speaking in a storyteller's spooky voice. Apparently, theatrics were also a thing of hers. “For this room, you’re all hotel investors and coming to view a run down hotel that was last open in the twenties. Once the door is closed, it wont open again until you figure out all of the puzzles.” When Falcon frowned at her, she cleared her throat. “Or if there’s a deadlyemergency, which in that case, there’s a speaker with a red button next to the door.”
Falcon nodded and went into the room first as Ray was thanking her, giving her a stack of bills and waving for us to follow him.
We all filed into this twenty by twenty foot room, feeling the buzz of magic in the air, but I could tell that all of the items in the room were real. Even the smell of the room was old and stale. The room was stuffed with various items you would find in a lobby, but the caked-on layers of dust and dirt had been aged, giving it that look like this room was really from the twenties. Sometimes, the simple things magic could do was impressive.
“Oh, my god! Do you see this?” Avery dragged his finger along the check-in desk, lifting up several layers of dirt as he screeched, “It's almost worse than outside!”
“It's curated dust.” Falcon tipped his head in thought for a second before continuing in his regular flat informative voice. “More accurately, it was dust that was spread through the room with her air magic, and then she used a rune stone to turn time forward to make it more authentic. An impressive detail for something as mundane as a game.”
“Maybe she wanted to show us what she was made of? We are the new bosses of the Syndicate,” Ax said absently as he plopped himself onto the couch to the right. A cloud of dust puffed up around him, which had Lex and Avery chuckling. There was a ticking noise that set my senses off, and I looked around the room. Was this woman trying to kill us with a bomb?
“Oooh, big boss man.” Avery continued to laugh, wiping at his eye as Ax growled.
I was slowly searching the room, trying not to alert anyone while assessing the situation as best as I could. If it was a bomb, I was glad Ray wasn't in here yet.
When the ticking grew faster, I decided that we needed to get out of this room. “We need to-” A slam sounded behind me as the steel reinforced door to the room clicked over three locks. All of us were silent for a second, not understanding what the fuck was happening.
Being the closest to the door, I lifted my fist to bang at the door open. If Ray was on the other side getting hurt by these people, I would make them pay with every inch of their lives. Just when I was about to smash a hole in the door, someone grabbed my wrist. I turned to yell at whoever it was when I saw Falcon nod to the door. “There is a protection spell around the room.”
He released me, going within an inch of the door as he narrowed his eyes. “Looks like it's a protection barrier. No amount of force is going to get us out of this room, no matter how strong you are.”
I remembered what that Jem lady said before and found the square metal box next to the door, pushing the red button as I called out, “Ray, are you okay? What's going on? It seems like we’re locked in this room.”
It took a second, but my mate's beautiful voice crackled over the speaker. “Hey, guys! I'm fine, and everything is good. So, figureout the puzzle together, and you will be released. If it happens before the night is over, you can collect your prize! Have fun! Love you all!” The air in the room was sucked out after she clicked off.She couldn't be serious, right?
“Oh, that naughty, naughty rose. I knew she was up to something . . . I just hoped that she would clue me in before she did it.” Lex growled, looking pissed at the door with his arms crossed. It was probably the first time he was genuinely upset with Rayla. My chest squeezed as I realized that I was not going to be able to be by her side or know what she was up to while I was stuck in here, and that was maddening. I needed to get out of here ASAP to take care of Ray.
I rubbed my chest, trying to dull the ache that I was feeling, and Lex gave a half-hearted shrug and looked at the door in longing.
You and me, too, brother.
Brother!? What the fuck was happening to me? The day I think of Lex as a goddamn brother, just shoot me in the head. That little stalker and I were from completely different planes of existence, and mine was based on reality, not what I made up in my head.
Avery ran up to the speaker, pushing the red button in a panic. “Rayla, you can't be serious. Open the door now.” Nothing but static came over the speaker. He tried again. “Rayla! Come on! You can’t lock us up here forever.” He looked around and grimaced. “Its fucking filthy!”
Ax snickered from the couch. “So, blood spatter, organs, and bodily fluids you’re fine with, but dust is your hard no?”
“It's not that I can't handle it . . . ” he looked around again, “it's just that I would prefer not to “hang out” in a place that is filled with microscopic bits of random dead skin, dead insect parts, bacteria, and a whole bunch of random things.”
“Learn something new every day,” Ax said as he crossed his arms and stared at Avery like this was going to be his new way of torturing him.
