Андреа Хёст - The Starfighter Invitation

"Well, shit."

I coughed some more—I’d breathed in at just the wrong moment—and managed a croaky: "Definitely."

"Embarrassing, would it not be, to survive the blasts only to drown?" Arlen said, though without his usual ripple of laughter. "And the question now is whether it is possible to leave this water without further attack."

"Hold a couple of shields up there, and I’ll climb up to check whether it triggers the blasters?" I suggested.

"Right," Silent agreed, and built a shield.

Imoenne added one on top, and I clambered up into a glimmering tent. Nothing shot me, so I reached down to Nova, still clinging in grim, shivering silence to the pool’s edge.

It took a combination of Imoenne and Arlen gently helping her to coax Nova to release her grip. And when she was out, sitting on the edge of the pool, I surprised myself by curling an arm around her waist and tucking her against me. I’m far from a touchy-feely person, but Nova’s transformation from mature and collected to small and bedraggled called for something more than a let’s get going .

Truth to tell, I wasn’t really ready myself, and appreciated that the rest of my group simply joined us in a line on the pool’s edge until the immediate shock had worn off. The cool light breeze discouraged anything but a temporary lull, but we still waited until Nova finally straightened up.

She’d deactivated her focus, and now squeezed water from hair that had fallen out of its twin tails, tidying it as best she could. Then she took a deep breath. "Let’s not fuck up like that again."

"One bath per Challenge is my limit," Silent agreed.

"This is the second time lower gravity has nearly been my downfall," I said, and entertained everyone recounting how I’d made it through stage one.

"Speed’s not a bad idea, but I don’t think we’ll be outrunning these blasters," Nova said, now sounding as dryly unperturbed as she’d begun. "If four of us stay on the bank and firm footing, we can keep a shield over someone while they check if there’s an exit."

"Me," I said. "Everyone else is higher rank." And only Silent and I seemed to be strong swimmers, I added to myself.

"We’ll keep one shield over us and three over you," Silent said.

With a little experimentation, we put this into action, and I walked across the bridge to find a wall, and no way to go either forward or sideways. I repeated this beneath the lotus and then the circles symbols, and then we paused to consider the enormous curve, and all those symbols with their slippery bridges.

"Pick nearest or revise our choices?" Silent asked.

For a moment no-one answered, every one of us aware that three bridges had already taken too much energy. Then Imoenne said, barely audible: "That one, please."

We looked where she pointed: a symbol only five bridges to our right. One large star surrounded by five tiny ones.

"Could represent the dawn star, I guess," Silent said, after a moment’s hesitation. "Let’s give it a go."

It hadn’t been on our original list of symbols, but Imoenne was normally so quiet that I think we would have tried it even if we hadn’t been able to see any connection at all. It was at least nearby, and we’d found that the blasters by the pool only triggered if you went onto the bridges.

Except for this bridge, where no blasters triggered at all. I stopped in the middle of the flat arch, started to speak, but then kept going forward so that I could confirm that the pleating of the wall on the far side of our fourth attempt was in fact two angled walls that did not quite intersect, but instead simply concealed the fact that they were an exit.

"Imoenne, you are awesome."

I doubted she could have heard me over the roar of the falls, so I repeated myself once everyone was safely across in the inevitable tunnel.

"What made you so sure this was the right one?" Nova asked, giving Imoenne an approving little nod.

Imoenne ducked her head, and told her feet: "The descriptions, they always, they better fit the previous Challenge."

"They do?" Silent said, then paused, clearly looking back over his Challenge log. " Enter the Maze; Choose a Path; Find Your Way Down; Behind the Shadows; Beneath the Stars; Where the Meadow Weeps, And the Dawn Blooms. "

"It’s true that we found a way down in the Behind the Shadows Challenge," Nova said, thoughtfully. "And everything was shadowy in the Beneath the Stars. I don’t remember much down in the Find Your Way Down Challenge."

"They was maybe a slight downward curve to some of the paths," Silent said. "But it did match Choose a Path way better."

"Hm." Nova shrugged. "Let’s shield up and confirm that this is officially the way out first. If it is, then I think you might have handed us the key to the whole Challenge series, Imoenne."

"Yes, dry clothes and proof of my sister’s genius, this way," Arlen said proudly, and was very shortly rewarded.

Gauntlet Successful.

Gauntlet Success Rate: 7/7 100%

Challenge Success Rate: 13/14 92.8%

Lux Points Earned: 5

Total Lux Points: 57

Challenge Reward:

[Tier 1 Consumable Pattern]

[Tier 1 Apparel Pattern]

"No-one else here," I said, gazing around the inevitable staging area. "Not that it necessarily means other groups haven’t made it this far, then logged or gone ahead already."

"But no, I am sure it means we are the first," Arlen said, bouncing ahead of us with redoubled enthusiasm. "And now that Imoenne has given us the key, we will have an advantage for the last parts, and we will be the first to unlock the System Challenge, and everyone will know our names!"

I wondered whether I’d like that—the kind of notoriety that only a couple of players had so far faced in-game—and thought it would at least be good advertising for the Bio of The Synergis and My Core Unit is a Lie patches I’d added to my uniform.

"I’m starting to believe a first is actually possible," I said.

"If unlocking the System Challenge has a custom ship reward, then I absolutely want to push hard to get it," Silent said. "If everyone’s not feeling too tired, want to take a half hour break and then take on the next stage?"

Achievement

First to unlock System Challenge

[Redeemer]

[Dread Pirate Roberts]

[Spaceman Spiff]

[Fuzzy]

[Weak Sauce]

Awarded Custom Ship (Rank One)

"Well," Silent said, after a small pause. "Looks like we’d better aim for beating the System Challenge instead. Who’s with me?"

Nova laughed. "Sure. Let’s do it."

"Insta-celebrity looks rough," my father said.

I leaned forward so I could see the TV from the kitchen. A repeat of a doorstop interview of a mid-fifties white Texan man whose online identity, Redeemer, had been part of the first group to unlock the System Challenge. Whatever pride he felt at the achievement was hidden by his shellshocked survey of the crowd outside his home.

"My Cycog told me it’s common practice to keep your focus active the entire time you’re in a lan Challenge, and my group decided to do that. Not that we think anyone’s been watching our Challenges. This guy was recognised because he’s been using the same player name since EverQuest , though, not from his aged-down Core Unit."

"So I shouldn’t expect reporters if you get to the System Challenge before it’s beaten?"

"I never link my player names with my real one," I said. "I can’t guarantee there’s not enough threads out there that someone with a lot of time couldn’t put a trail together, but I’d hope that by the time they did, The Synergis would have moved on to the next sensation. Maybe someone will reach Rank Ten and distract them with new planets."