Chapter 15: Human Creativity
Jayce looked to his right and then his left examining the rickety staircases before them. This was the only way for them to reach the door he assumed was at the bottom of the room. The stairs looked like they were hundreds of years old but he knew they were simply part of the simulation and were maybe minutes old in reality. Stepping onto the stone gingerly he slowly moved his body weight from the cliff to the stair. After it didn't collapse he jumped up and down to make sure it was sturdy before waving his friends on to join him.
Micu and Jenira stepped slowly down before taking Jayce's outstretched hand and joining him on the first few steps. Ralnas, though, was looking around with a curious look on his face. 'C'mon Ral we don't have time to critique their simulation right now." Jenira went to pull her brother's sleeve before he turned to face her. "Remember those old skateboarding video games we used to play Jayce?"
Jayce thought for a second, "You mean like the Tony Hawk games from Earth? Ral we haven't played those since we visited that antique arcade when we were little." Jayce was about to start sprinting down the stairs when Ralnas' hand shot out and caught his shoulder. "No no, do you remember them?"
Jayce turned back to his friend annoyance buzzing on his face. "Ral we don't have time for this!" He was about to continue but Ralnas had already pulled out one of the floorboards that decorated the walkway that they had entered on.
He placed it on top of the stairs and tested to see if it would get caught on the ornate handrails. Noticing that the wood would slide pretty easily he climbed back on the cliff and then positioned the wood on the handrail before pushing himself off like a snowboarder starting a descent down a mountain. Micu ducked out of the way quickly as they watched Ralnas speed into the darkness.
"It's just like hoverboarding!" His echoing voice called up to them. They were all momentarily stunned and it was Jenira that was the first to react as she quickly pulled another floor board out and hopped on the handrail to follow her brother. Micu was laughing with glee as he followed after her. Jayce was the final one to come back to his senses. "My friends are awesome," he thought to himself. He grabbed one of the larger pieces of wood and quickly hopped on the handrail, zooming into the unknown.
Jayce wasn't nearly as good on a hoverboard as Micu or Ralnas and he had to focus quite intensely to stay balanced on the bumpy handrail. He knew he was going slower than his friends but he preferred that to falling off and forcing them to restart the room. Finally seeing the exit his shoulders relaxed. His three friends were waiting for him next to the door cheering him on.
Jayce grinned and tried to jump off his board as his character had in those skateboarding games. Instead, he misjudged the distance and crashed right into Jenira. Mumbling a "sorry" he pulled himself up off of a very surprised Jenira. She smacked his cheek lightly. "Idiot," she started laughing, "let's actually get a good score before you start trying to handicap the team." Blushing profusely Jayce scampered into the doorway before the other two could tease him more.
Jayce was transported into a room with a large pit in the center with what appeared to be poisonous snakes in the pit. On the other side was the door. The room was only about 50 feet long and the pit took up the entire middle section of the walkway. Walking up to the edge of the pit Jayce peered over before he felt a shove from behind him.
As he fell forward he twisted around and saw Ralnas and Micu laughing their heads off. He landed and a snake darted towards him and bit him. Jayce was then transported back to the front of the room where he had initially started. Seeing the two were still rolling on the ground he was about to charge up and push them into the pit before Jenira grabbed his shoulder.
"Hey hey," she smiled at Jayce, "you would have done the same thing in their shoes," Jayce admitted that the opportunity was too good to pass up and then smiled at his friends. "Okay guys very funny, but for real I want to get first so no more jokes." Micu managed to pull himself together and then saluted at Jayce. "Yes, sir! I will be 100 percent serious from now on sir!" This caused Ralnas to lose the little progress he had made towards regaining his composure and he fell back down howling with laughter. Jenira crisply walked past the two laughing members of their team, "You know there was a reason people always said we were the slacker group. We've never been able to be serious during these team exams."
Jayce thought back to one of their first times he had been on a team with Ralnas during exams at the Chiron school. It had been when they had just entered the high school levels and it was to determine who would get to represent the school during the regional tournament. They had been closely tied with Isabel's team in points until Ralnas noticed that if you shot the targets too many times they exploded and made a sound that kind of sounded like someone was farting. After that, he had become far more occupied with making it sound like other teammates were farting than with winning. Jayce had been so mad he swore he would never be on a team with Ralnas again. Smiling at the memory he remarked casually, "I guess that some of us never grow up."
Glancing up at the clock it read off that they still had an hour and 38 minutes left. He turned back to the pit. "Jen any ideas how we get across the pit?" He felt stumped and was hoping she might have had some inspiration. Micu had finally pulled himself together and was testing the walkway by jumping up and down. "I was hoping that we could pull the floorboards up like last time. Looks like whoever is editing our simulation doesn't want to make it too easy on us."
"Huh?" Jayce glanced at Micu. "Someone is actively editing our simulation?" Micu nodded, "I noticed it when one of the bird teams flew to their door two times in a row. After that second room, the simulations suddenly had very low roofs so that they had to fly low to the ground and figure out the room other ways."
Jayce felt he should have noticed that too but didn't think anything of it at the time. He thought to himself, "I need to be better." He then glanced around the room. "Well, there's no way we can jump this pit, you guys."
Jenira was pulling a cord up from one of the sides of the walkway. "They always give you a bunch of ways to solve these things. Just try out any ideas you have!" She finished pulling a long cord from the walkway. Jayce instantly thought of his dad's favorite movies, Indiana Jones, and looked up at the ceiling. Hanging just above their heads was a chandelier. "Jen! Try using that as a rope to swing across the pit!" Jenira looked at him and then followed his eyes to the chandelier. "Jayce how the hell am I going to get this cord to wrap around that?"
Jayce furrowed his brow, "In the movies, it always instantly wraps around the chandelier..." Jenira smirked, "Yeah this isn't the movies." Micu then motioned Ralnas to stand directly below the chandelier. Micu then climbed up on Ralnas back until he could almost touch the chandelier. "Jenira toss me the cord!" She dashed towards him and tossed one of the ends to Micu. "Ralnas can you go on your tiptoes for five seconds?" Ralnas grunted and then tried to stand on his tiptoes for as long as he could. Micu quickly wrapped the cord around the chandelier and then tied a knot just as Ralnas' strength gave out and then sunk back down.
Hopping off Ralnas' shoulders Micu pulled on the cord twice to see if it would snap off. After feeling that his knot would hold he handed the cord to Jenira, "Ladies first." He smiled sweetly. Jenira rolled her eyes, "Scaredy cat." She then backed up as far as the cord would go before sprinting towards the pit and jumping. She swung across the pit and landed with a flourish on the other side. "See? Easy." She swung the cord back across the pit.
Ralnas grabbed hold of Micu's hand and leaned out to grab the cord. He then repeated the process. Though he landed slightly less gracefully than his sister had. He then turned and threw the cord back much harder than Jenira had. Jayce was able to stand still and grab onto it. He gulped then dashed and leaped. Landing just on the edge he was about to swing back over the pit when Ralnas and Jenira grabbed his shirt and pulled him over the edge. Jayce was so relieved that he simply let go of the cord which swung slowly across the pit. Micu suddenly cried out, "Dammit!" The three turned from dusting Jayce off to see that the cord had stopped dead center in the pit under the middle of the chandelier.
"You gotta run and jump onto it Micu!" Ralnas cried out. Jenira followed up, "Don't worry about the snakes! They can't hurt you!" Micu grumbled, "Well I had forgotten about the snakes until you said that..." He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Okay, here I go!" His friends cheering him on Micu backed up and then ran as hard as he could before leaping. His hands found the cord before he slid down it slightly. He wasn't high enough to get over the pit edge now.
Jayce slid headfirst towards the edge and reached out to grab his friend. He barely caught the scruff of his collar before pulling him as close to the edge as he could. "Somebody help!" Jayce cried out. He felt two pairs of hands grab his legs and begin pulling him back. As he went back he pulled Micu up until Micu could grab the edge with both of his hands and pull himself up.
Breathing heavily Micu turned to face his friends. "So yeah, I hate snakes and pits now by the way." They laughed in between deep gasps of air and then proceded through the exit of the third room.
Before the three of them was a simple looking room. On the tiles below them were symbols. Jayce smiled and announced, "The quickest way to figure out the trick here is to activate it." He took two confident steps forward before a huge metal spike shot out of the floor and impaled him. Reappearing at the start of the room Jayce quickly felt all over his body before sighing. "Okay, I can say with confidence that being impaled doesn't feel good."
The other three laughed and then turned to look at the room before them with frowns on their faces. "How the heck are we going to figure this one out quickly?" Micu wondered aloud.
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