Chapter 52

Temple Runs, Fake Emotions, and Needless Distractions

I don’t like to think of myself as a prima-donna, but maybe I am. But somewhere along the lines I think I got offered a damaged set of goods.

You ever wonder about war heroes? Ones you have seen and fought with and against dozens of times. Ones who just hearing their names was once enough to send a chorus of dread and excitement through your body. Only to then meet them and realize they are complete garbage? Well garbage in a fight, they freeze up like they have the worst PTSD. Thirty seconds, the first thirty seconds of any fight they are utterly useless. Sure, they show up for practices, but when the real action starts, they are nowhere to be found.

That is what I got with Rayquel. Also, she is apparently terrible at running. We did suicide drills for days straight, literally only taking breaks for meals. And her Agility didn’t go up at all. Almost like it was forever stuck at fourteen points. I know it was a cutoff point, but still, something should have happened. In the two weeks since my meeting with the counselor, my Agility rose by two points. Apparently, I was really close to getting to eighteen points and got that on my first day. Then the nineteenth point came after two straight weeks of non-stop practice.

During that time, I had several Physical attributes increase.

Attribute Initial Final Strength NA 15 Dexterity 18 -> 19 Agility 17 -> 19 Endurance 15 -> 16

My Strength didn’t go up, but we weren’t going for weights so much as pure speed. I remembered to add in a few hand drills to the equation and of course my moon light serenades to continue pushing Rayquel through the night.

Finally, it was my second burst of Agility that caused the General to get involved. She called in Rayquel for a private conversation. During which I felt so many emotions come through our bond that I almost felt ill.

At one point she was crying, even when she came out, she had that wobbly legged movement that only someone who was barely regaining control of their faculties had. Sort of the drunken stumble, where you reach out to walls and support structures for both guidance and stability.

It was odd seeing her in such a state, but before I could think too much on that, the general called me into the office.

“I will cut through the crap. You two are going on the Gemini Temple run in two days’ time.”

“Two days?” I asked.

“Yes. In two days.”

“What about the Attribute threshold?” I asked, noting that this was a big thing. I was certain that Rayquel had not broken through her personal boundary.

“Don’t worry. For the time I am cutting my own personal requirement. You two can go on ahead.”

I had thought that was it, so I began to leave. “Soldier.” She said, getting me to pause for a moment. “You will likely need to do more than your fair share of lifting in this run.”

“If you are questioning Rayquel’s combat ability, know that I think she is more than capable. Her work on Endar was exceptional.” I said, recalling our first mission together. The one where I realized I wouldn’t mind working with the Iron Butterfly on missions. It was odd how her seemingly terse personality changed quite dramatically after that. In all she had become much more enjoyable to talk to, but she was now clearly lacking in combat effectiveness. I was about to go down that rabbit hole when the General cut me off.

“Yes, during that time something happened to her. She was profoundly changed by the near death she had experienced.”

“From when she was impaled by the world tree branch?” I asked.

“Yes, that’s it exactly. She was changed from that moment onward and it is safe to assume you will have your role cut out for you in the Gemini Temple. I will warn you that how well you do there is graded by the way you work as a team. She will need to contribute at least half the kills of any level to your total score.”

“You sound like this will be tough? She is an extremely capable fighter.” I said.

I remember the way she would mercilessly gun down rows of monsters and soldiers alike. Using her iron wings to move through space and slice apart soldiers. The flashback comes like it happened yesterday.

My first life. My first death. It was space combat on a station. For whatever reason I was part of the ground forces. Oh, wait I remember now, this was before I got my pilot license. Back then my only way to contribute to combat was as a combat medic, as my Affinity rating was too low to merit a position in the back of the line.

So, there we were, holding down the space complex while a wild-eyed Iron Butterfly came in blasters blazing straight from space. Within moments she zipped around causing damage and destruction. Her movements too erratic to keep up with. I could see her heightened Dexterity on full display there as she danced and fluttered about.

Some of the soldiers made wide sweeping bursts of small arms fire inside the space station. Enough wild hits mounted, and somewhere in there an explosion occurred.

Boom!

The station was apart, and I felt myself floating in space.

“Ahh!”

“She’s still coming.”

Voiced cried out about the still ruthless assault of the Iron Butterfly. She was an efficient cold-blooded killer, utterly ruthless in her assault. She was a guard dog who had no restraints, nor boundaries. No life was sacred to her, as she offered up all souls to the god of war.

Even a Support Class mage was offered up. I had no blaster, nothing of a weapon. I tried to burn her, but nothing. I tried to squash her mind, but she had a Mind Shield in place, or an item that offered similar resistances. In the end, she killed me quickly. Flying past me, and cutting off my arm with her iron wings, before moving on.

Now if you have ever had your arm cut off, it hurts. Added to that was the fact that we were in space and my once sealed suit now had a gaping hole, along with my body. I froze in seconds, though my mind registered the death process as hours. We will of course agree to disagree on the amount of time, but suffice it to say, the time was intense and too long.

Then finally my heart and mind stopped working, and I was reborn again. Looking back on it, it was that death that led to my want to learn to pilot a ship. Noting that if I ever fought the Iron Butterfly again, I would want to be on somewhat even footing.

To go from that nearly indestructible engine of death to the somewhat meek creature before me spoke volumes.

Worse the commander was right. Oh, the temple floors themselves are easy. No literally, they are set to easy mode. Easy mode and Rayquel still flinch and hesitates. It is the oddest thing; it is almost like her entire brain and body lock down for the first thirty seconds of combat.

How do I know it is thirty seconds? Is this just me choosing an arbitrary number and saying that? No, it is literally me comparing video feeds and time stamps.

Something was off, way off by the operations. On our first easy floor I got 100% of the kills, and we received an ‘F’ rating. Despite us killing all the monsters in what appeared to be record time.

From there we came up with a process, I would subdue half of the monsters, while killing the most dangerous of the groups. Then once Rayquel got out of her combat stupor, she would join. This worked. I Telekinetically-X held down all the monsters until Rayquel could break free from the mental fugue that had overtaken her mind.

“So, what is it exactly that causes you to pause like that?” I asked.

I had known she had been sandbagging it during our operations. For a while there I had seriously wondered if it was just her worst possible timing gene, or something else.

Still, she persisted.

I had to give her credit; she was in this for me. Apparently, she would have quit a long time ago, had it not been for me being here with her. I of course got this through our bond.

She was embarrassed by her performance, or quite honestly her lack of performance. By the tenth easy floor we had a system down. I would play the role of support, and all-around field controller. While Rayquel would begin killing off all enemies she could once she worked her mind free of whatever PTSD she was suffering from.

I had seen a lot of PTSD, but this was odd for certain. Thirty seconds, exactly without fail. Still, we were making good time and good progress. Finishing the Tenth easy floor also offered something very important. Our first free Attribute point to add. I of course put mine in Power.

Attribute Initial Final Power 33 -> 34

That was an impressive Power rating, but still was not as grand as the ten Attribute points I had been expecting on our run to this point.

“We should do the next ten as easy as well.” Rayquel noted.

I of course protested, vehemently.

Rayquel noted that she was all but useless for those first thirty seconds. “If we go to a tougher stage, how will you be deal with monster that will only scale in power.”

Hearing that, she was right. But dang it, I hated going slow, like this. After this set of ten she swore we would then do the next set at Intermediate. Again, while it wasn’t the same thing as getting one Attribute point every level, I realized we were getting graded as a team. Apparently, the way the Gemini Temple worked was, it based your final prize at the end of the temple on how well you did as a team. While we had the one ‘F’, we had made up for that with perfect ‘A’ ratings ever since.

I will not bore anyone with the mindless repetitive assaults we did. These were so simple that even working for two, they offered no real challenge.

To put it simply bunnies came up, they hopped. I held them in place. Rayquel broke herself from her mental coma, then she began killing indiscriminately. Once she was at half, or near half killed. I would either crush the remaining half, or Mind Rend-X the survivors.

It was simple. I kept expecting a second shoe to drop at any time, but nothing came. At least not for the second set of ten floors. Where we received yet another Attribute point.

Twenty floors, and two Attribute points. We were literally getting the participation trophy for temple runs.

Attribute Initial Final Power 34 -> 35

Finally, after the twentieth floor, we were allowed to change our difficulty rating from Easy to Intermediate. Again, nothing truly changed.

Rayquel was still useless for the first thirty seconds of each battle. I easily held down the enemies and divided the groups into halves. I even went so far as to destroy my half during those first thirty seconds. That way Rayquel had to just worry about killing the now giant wolf like creatures. Giant wolves that were splayed out on the ground as if they were in a particularly dense gravitational field.

Some tried to move, to get away. While others tried to cast spells. Starting our third main section of floors and finally spell casters show up. Still taking care of the casters was a joke for a seasoned spell breaker.

Most of the spells were just damage enhancements, a few curses. All the spells I just redirected towards the other wolves. This of course made it so the wolves that were hit by the spells were less than thrilled with the actions of their comrade.

I was tempted to let those wolves go wild on their brethren, but instead just stayed the course. The fact that they were more worried about the actions taken by their own kind, versus me was just an added benefit.

“So, what is it exactly that you feel, when we first enter combat?” I ask.

Hearing this, she pauses before going down to the next level. We have at least three stages complete for our pair bonding, which means that all the first thirty floors should be available to us. This was from us completing the first, third, fourth, and likely all the fifth stages of bonding. By that estimation we should be allowed to go to the fortieth floor. Or at least close to the fortieth floor.

“I… I don’t know. I just come in, enter and then I freeze.”

She doesn’t freeze, I can feel deep anger and hatred from her body not moving to her commands. In a way I imagine it is how a mind-rape victim would feel. They are forced to sit there and suffer, while they are defenseless against what is going on.

“Do you think mind melding would help?” I pose.

She pauses as she thinks about the question. “I don’t know.” She finally answers back.

She has been pushing for us to do the mind meld. Now that we are here, in the Gemini Temple, and it can offer a potential ten more floors to us, I am open to the idea. Part of me wants to see how this goes. What would the fiftieth floor even look like?

Surely making it to the fiftieth floor would be considered much more of a challenge as a perfectly harmonized pair. Even if we were severely breaking the rules by cheating. Or rather, by having me carry the load for two of us.

Fortunately, our current method of approach, of my using my now even more powerful version of Telekinesis-X to subdue monsters, even works on robotic constructs.

While laser blasts and the like are tough to account for, the entire operation is still easy.

After two sets of Intermediate floors, we get two more free attribute points and reach the end of the thirtieth floor.

As soon as we do, a door opens letting us once again set our difficulty rating. I look to Rayquel, as the more hesitant of the group, our difficulty can only be met if we both agree. Right now, our choice is simple, either keep at Intermediate, or move to advanced.

Right now, I have earned a grand total of four total attribute points since entering this temple. All of course going to Power, but still the grind is slow and cathartic. I know Rayquel can feel my growing discontent from our bond.

“Five more levels. Then we switch to Advanced.” Rayquel offers as an olive branch.

I take in a deep breath, and realize she is likely playing for the fact that our tier five connection isn’t fully formed yet. That she will think that to go beyond the thirty-fifth floor we will need to do a mind meld.

Still, I can play the long con, that or maybe I am the con? What is the old saying, if you can’t see the con, then likely you are likely the brunt of the con? Something like that. Anyways, five more floors would get us an extra free Attribute point to add. That would be five total for the run, and basically be the same as me setting the score even for my first run. The run where I all but wasted five Attribute points to avoid speed drills. With the advent of finishing this temple, or at least the next five levels that will have been a very worthwhile investment. Because fuck speed drills.

Then anything after floor thirty-five would all be bonus.

“Floor thirty-six we switch to Advanced?” I ask.

Hearing that Rayquel nods in agreement. “Floor thirty-six, we switch to Advanced.” She parrots back.

I hold out my pinky.

“What is this?”

“The pink promise. The most sacred of human oaths.” I state as I wiggle the offered digit.

“Oh yes, this odd custom. Of unbreakable oaths made by interlocking the weakest of digits.” Rayquel replied, then after a moment’s hesitation she offered her own pinky.

We shook, and with that, a strange presence seemed to glow between us. Feeling smug satisfaction, I smile brightly.

“What was that?” Rayquel asked.

“That was the final portion of our fifth bond, the spiritual bond fully cementing itself. We now have all forty floors available to us.” I said, as a devilish grin broke out on my face.

“What? From a pinky shake?”

“A pinky promise. I did some research; the fifth connection is our spiritual connection.” This was true the entire pair bonding went mind, body, and soul. Thus, the second stage being the mind melding. Again, while there was no exact path to form a perfect bond, there were known steps to complete. This was the last step needed to complete the fourth bonding and allow us to go all the way through floor forty. The same floor where Rayquel got her wings originally. While I didn’t want wings, I did want the proposed reward that awaited us, if we ever made it out that far.

So far, I had used my Precognition to realize this was needed for reaching the fortieth floor. I also realized that I would not sprout butterfly wings from my back, should we reach the fortieth floor. At least that was what my visions told me. This was the only reason I was willing to go to the fortieth floor at all. In fact, from my visions, it seemed that I had to want the wings to sprout. As of right now, the only reason they hadn’t sprouted was my intense desire not to have any wings form from my back. Especially not butterfly wings. Why no wings? Simple, they make for an easier target to hit. Also, I could only imagine how hard it would be standing out with my odd colorings and matching wings. No, being a bedazzled butterfly was not my idea of blending in. Nor my ideal way of flying under the radar.

As such, I focused my intention on keeping my body as close to normal as possible. So far this train of thought seemed to work. Aside from an occasional itching sensation, the ointment that I had been given seemed to work in fixing a lot of the initial irritation I felt.

That was the other thing too, I knew these wings would likely be more of a distraction than anything. If their current rate of itching was any indication, then I knew I would be in for a long annoying time.

Snap.

Rayquel just snapped her fingers. I am back and staring at her.

“You ready to go on?” She asked.

Hearing that I shake my head. Five more floors. Then we can really begin to grow. I think, as I take my first step down to floor thirty-one.