Book Five, Chapter 33: Rodeo

“I’ll test it out,” Antoine said. We had left Bobby’s room and had gone up ahead of the NPCs to scout and see if there was anything tricky about the Phase Ballast.

I didn’t know if IBECS would have a problem with us walking through its halls, but it didn’t seem to. All of our tropes designed to help us with stealth seemed wasted—we weren’t part of the movie; we were just around.

When we reached the part of the ship where everything bottlenecked and a giant locked door prevented us from using the Cross-Ark Hall, we found a human-sized ventilation shaft that would allow a person to enter the Phase Ballast matrix.

“I could get that thing off of there,” Antoine said, staring at the cover of the ventilation shaft. At first, it appeared to be an obstacle in and of itself.

“Yes, but then it wouldn’t make sense why the ventilation shaft was already broken open,” I said.

The solution was far more straightforward. We had brought a screwdriver from Bobby’s workshop.

It wasn’t difficult to get into the ventilation shaft—in movies, it never is.

“Here goes nothing,” Antoine said.

He was eager to help. So far, all we had done was guide people around and come up with ideas. He didn’t feel like he was really contributing as much as he could. But testing out a potentially suicidal jungle gym? He felt that he could do that.

He dropped down into the room, and I followed right after him.

It definitely was an obstacle out of a sci-fi movie. The Phase Ballast was basically a giant boardwalk about the length of a basketball court that connected two platforms on the ends of a large tube, which was the room we were in. I couldn’t see the walls because everything was dark, but there were sci-fi lights attached to the platform and ambient light that allowed us to see in front of us.

As far as I could see, the ballast itself did not touch either of the platforms or connect to anything else—it was floating free.

Therein lay the challenge.

As soon as Antoine stepped foot onto the Phase Ballast, it started to move, and he was instantly down on all fours, finding handholds where the lights emanated from or where wires stuck out. It wasn’t explicitly designed to be climbed on, but there was plenty to grab onto.

The thing moved, tilted, and spun around with him right on it, but ultimately, he held on.

It was just a test of strength and dexterity.

For some reason, it reminded me of a rodeo, as the ballast moved and turned and bucked but ultimately submitted once Antoine had shown he was not giving up easily.

Antoine made it to the other side with a sheen of sweat on his forehead, and then he waved me forward.

“No, I’m good,” I said. “Time to come back—we need to instruct the NPCs.”

He rolled his eyes. “What? Coward!” he yelled.

I wasn’t afraid to cross the ballast; I was concerned about time. Second Blood would be here soon, and I wanted the NPCs to be far past this room when it got here.

I was also a little afraid to cross the ballast.

Once we got Bobby alone, we explained everything that we saw to him. Of course, his character had every reason to understand how the ship worked, so he explained it to the NPCs quickly.

Everything was going according to plan.

Until it wasn’t.

As the NPCs approached the Phase Ballast, we watched from the shadows, itching ourselves but excited. Getting past this obstacle was a colossal checkpoint—the helm was only a few more puzzles away.

“Remind me of why we didn’t try to exterminate the bedbugs again?” Antoine asked. “I’m going crazy, and I haven’t even been bitten yet.”

“Cristobal,” I said.

“Cristobal?” Antoine asked. “The harem sorcerer?”

“That one,” I said. “Grace and Chris said that his high level was enough to know that he wasn’t to be messed with. Enemies that are way too high level are a distraction, not meant to be beaten. They’re a red herring—a time waster. The bedbugs are deeply ingrained. Yeah, there are all sorts of things we could do about them. Heck, Andrew spent a day and a half trying to keep them away from some of the officers. It didn’t work. It won’t work. I know so. I’ve seen their tropes, but all I needed to see was the plot armor. That’s part of the secret language of the game itse–“

“I get it,” Antoine said. “We still could have tried.”

“Let’s try that after we win,” I said. “We can come back here and set them all on fire.”

“I didn’t say I wanted to come back,” Antoine said. “This is one story I don’t care to master.”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

We turned and watched the surrogates as they finished their dialogue setting up the Phase Ballast. Bobby’s technobabble was far less elaborate than IBECS’.”

“We cross the giant metal beam that controls gravity,” he said. “It won’t be easy, but we can do it.”

The surrogates peppered him with tech questions, many of which he seemed to answer gracefully because his character was well-informed. Others, he just floundered.”

“It’s best not to think about the specifics,” he said. “Just get to the other end.”

And so they prepared themselves. Michael told a story about basic training and how his drills in anti-gravity were probably similar to the interior of the artificial gravity machine. Basic surrogate filler material.

Just as they were about to climb into the Phase Ballast, a scream sounded from toward the back of the ship.

Then another.

Then another.

“They’re waking back up,” Andrew said. “We have to go sedate them again. They won’t survive off life support. Goddammit, I’m going to make sure that everyone knows what they did to us here.”

He and Michael immediately ran back toward the sleeping bay against Bobby’s protests. Lila instead ducked her head down into the Phase Ballast matrix to take a look, and then she sat waiting.

She wanted no part in the screaming passengers. Her ivory skin covered in blood as she sat in the industrial ship’s hallway was an image that could have been on the movie poster—the blank look in her eyes as if the lights had gone out.