Pocket dungeon, p.19
Pocket Dungeon, page 19
“I have decided that I like Mexican food,” she announced with a curt nod. “It is very delicious. I would like to have this and cookie butter ice cream for the rest of my days.”
“There is so much more food in the world,” I reminded her. “But those aren’t bad choices.”
We continued the rest of our dinner in relative silence as we finished watching A New Hope. As soon as the credits began to roll, I went ahead and queued up The Empire Strikes Back, much to Yasha’s delight.
I checked the time on my watch once I had finally decided that if I had one more bite of food, I would explode and also throw up. Then I saw that it was already time I could use the crystal again.
The movie was only about twenty minutes in, but I still felt bad for having to hit pause. Yasha looked at me like I had done something terrible, and while I was very much into how into Star Wars she was, we had to get a move on.
“It’s time. We can use the crystal,” I explained.
Her face softened for a split second before she wore a look of firm concentration.
“We must go, then,” she said. She looked like she was ready to stomp out the door then and there, but I held a hand up to stop her.
“Whoa,” I laughed. “I think you may need to go put some real pants on first.”
Yasha looked down at her bare legs and heaved a tired sigh, like it was some sort of great inconvenience that she had to go and get dressed. But before she could make her way back to my bedroom to grab something to wear, someone hammered their fist on the other side of my front door.
A chill rolled down my spine as I remembered what Yasha had said about people potentially tracking me down to steal my crystal.
Then whoever it was knocked again.
Fuck.
Chapter 13
“Get back into my room,” I hissed to Yasha. “Hurry.”
All of the fox-woman’s relaxation had disappeared from her posture. Her muscles were now taut and coiled. She was clearly ready for action.
“Are you certain?” she asked as she wavered in my bedroom door.
The banging on the front door continued, and if anything, picked up in intensity.
“Yes,” I said. “Go.”
I was afraid that whoever was outside my front door was about to bust through at any second. As soon as Yasha disappeared to hide in my bedroom, I moved toward the front door.
I didn’t want to open it empty-handed, just in case it was someone who wanted to kill me, so I grabbed a kitchen knife from the butcher block by my sink and made my way back over.
After I inhaled a deep breath and steadied myself, I cracked the front door open just enough to obscure most of my body and the knife. If whoever it was wanted to kill me, I wasn’t going to make it easy on them.
The person’s fist was still raised in the air to slam on the door yet again.
But my hackles suddenly lowered as I realized the person in front of me wasn’t about to kill me. I mean, they might have been there to tell me that my rent was getting jacked up, which was a death in and of itself, but given my new source of income, that one was tolerable.
“Yes?” I asked my landlord as politely as I could manage, even though he’d just been about to bust my goddamn door down. My grip loosened on the kitchen knife hidden behind the door as I waited for a response.
Mike’s face soured, and he dropped his fist back down to his side. It was like he wanted to slam on the door again. He took a step back from the doorway and folded his arms over his chest.
He was a bulbous man with a round beer gut and a perpetually swollen nose. The thin metal glasses he wore always looked as if they were getting swamped by the rest of his puffy face.
“Do you have any electronics in your apartment, Mr. Rhodes?” As he asked the question, Mike leaned to one side and tried to see around me and into my apartment.
I was glad I’d told Yasha to hide, even if my landlord wasn’t here to kill me.
“Do I have any electronics?” I repeated what was definitely an absurd question and raised an eyebrow. “I mean, yeah? Who doesn’t have electronics?”
Mike huffed, like I was somehow being difficult on purpose.
“Big electronics, Mr. Rhodes. Something strong enough to create a power surge,” he droned. “After numerous complaints from residents about the power outages, we were forced to do some investigation into individual unit usage, and it appears the surges have been originating from your apartment.”
My thoughts flashed back to the crystal. “Oh, how strange. I haven’t used anything large in the last few days.”
Mike sighed. “Just don’t use your microwave and your hair dryer at the same time.”
“I don’t have a hair dryer…” I said, but he’d already turned to make his way back down the hall toward the elevator.
I slammed the door closed once he disappeared out of sight and flicked the lock closed. I felt a wave of relief wash over me now that it was clear I wasn’t actually about to die.
“Can I come out?” Yasha asked through the bedroom door. I could see the shadow from her feet as she stood just on the other side, and I let out a laugh.
“Yes,” I told her. “You’re fine. It was just my landlord.”
“Land lord?” She opened the door and furrowed her brows in my direction. “What is a land lord.”
“It’s the person who owns this building,” I explained. “I pay him rent each month, and he lets me live here. It’s a whole thing.”
“But what does he do?” she asked. “Does he simply own the building?”
“Pretty much. Oh, and bothers residents, I guess.” I moved into the kitchen to return the knife back to the butcher block. I was glad I hadn’t needed to use it.
“And you pay him to live here,” she continued. “Does everyone else who is here pay him as well?”
“That’s how it works,” I said.
“But what of when he has surpassed the cost of the building?” Yasha asked. “What then?”
“Then we keep paying him,” I said. “It’s just how these arrangements work if you don’t own your own place.”
“But he continues to do nothing to earn the money.” Yasha was oddly heated about the unfairness of landlords in general, and I found myself somehow even more attracted to her than I had been before.
“It’s complicated,” I said to redirect the conversation before we could get stuck into a discussion of the moral and ethical nature of the existence of landlords. “But I think that was one close call too many for the night. We definitely can’t use the crystal here.”
“I agree,” Yasha let herself be derailed.
“Would you be willing to come with me to find the correct sort of place for me to use the crystal?” I asked hopefully. “You don’t have to come with me into the dungeon, but I’m still a little hazy on where exactly I should try to use it. I don’t want to go somewhere that’s going to lead the people who may be searching for me right to me.”
“Of course, Wes.” Yasha seemed surprised that I even had to ask. “I would love to help you, but I do not think I am quite in fighting shape yet.”
She lifted her injured leg to show me exactly what she had meant.
“You need time to rest,” I said. “The offer was there, but I probably would have tried to dissuade you from coming with me anyway. I don’t want you to get hurt any worse.”
Her gaze softened. “That is very kind, Wes. Very kind.”
I had the sudden, painful realization that Yasha probably didn’t have many people in her life before who prioritized her wellbeing over the promise of a dungeon, and that fact was enough to make my blood boil. She was a person, even if she was a warrior, and she should have been allowed safety and comfort, as well as the chance to make her own decisions.
Now that she was here with me, I was going to make sure she got all of those opportunities she had been missing before.
“Come on,” I said gently. “Finish getting dressed, and then we can get out of here to scout out a location to use the crystal.”
“Right,” Yasha said. “That is a good plan.”
She nodded her head in a show of agreement before she turned back around and half-hobbled, half-marched back into my bedroom. The gait provided me with a fantastic view of her ass, and while I was far from complaining, it did remind me that we really would have to get her some more clothing of her own at some point.
But that was a problem to deal with later. We had a location to find and a crystal dungeon to scour.
I waited patiently outside of my room for Yasha to reemerge. A few minutes later, she shuffled back out wearing the pair of sweatpants I had left for her and… a pair of my shoes? It was a strange, jarring sight, but I quickly put together why.
With her sprained and swollen ankle, I couldn’t imagine that putting on her boots was anything close to comfortable.
“Here, let me get you a jacket,” I said. “It’ll be colder out than it was earlier, and riding around on my motorcycle isn’t going to help that any.”
“Colder?” Yasha repeated, as if she had no idea what that could even mean. “Like the desert at night?”
I nodded as I made my way over to the hall closet and pulled down a leather jacket that didn’t quite fit anymore.
“Yeah, the weather changes pretty quickly here, especially when the sun goes down,” I replied.
“We have some things in common, then.” She smiled at the thought, and I returned the gesture.
“Here you go.” I passed her the jacket.
“Thank you, Wes.” Yasha wrestled her arms into the sleeves. Despite the jacket being slightly too small for me, it was much too large for Yasha, but she didn’t really seem to mind.
“Grab your helmet, I have to get the crystal from my room, and then we’re good to go,” I said.
Yasha nodded like I had tasked her with something great. She carefully walked off to locate her helmet as I ducked into my room and made my way over to my dresser.
The crystal sat exactly where I had left it with the pile of gold I really needed to deposit. I probably needed to find a new pawnshop or something soon, too. I doubted Dale or whatever his name was would buy the dead uncle story for much longer.
I snagged the crystal and tucked it into my pocket before turning and making my way back out to where Yasha waited for me. The fox-woman passed me my own helmet, and together, we made our way out of the apartment and down to the parking garage.
Just as I had predicted, there was a bitter, biting coldness to the wind that hadn’t been there before. I watched Yasha snuggle in closer and pull my jacket around her from the corner of my eye, and I felt a small surge of pride at the gesture.
“I’m going to head toward the outside of the city. If you see somewhere that looks like a good place, can you let me know?” I suggested. “It’ll be sort of hard to hear you over the bike, so just tap me, and we can slow down if there’s something you have to say.”
“That sounds like a good plan,” Yasha said. “Let us go.”
I fought the urge to salute her, mostly because I figured the joking gesture would be lost on the alien woman. The two of us climbed onto the back of my bike, and together, we pulled out of the parking garage and merged onto the road into the night.
Traffic was a little less busy than I had expected, and so it wasn’t too difficult to navigate out of some of the busier parts of the city.
Every so often, Yasha tapped my shoulder to indicate which direction I should go, and honestly, it was a pretty good system. I began to enjoy the ride, and the concerns I’d had about being tracked down by mysterious people who wanted my crystal started to melt away.
Sometimes it just felt good to go on a ride, especially when I had a beautiful woman holding onto my waist.
But that joy didn’t last long. When I turned the next corner Yasha indicated, I caught sight of a car just out of the corner of my eye. There wasn’t anything inherently odd about the fact that a car was going in the same direction as me, but something about the sight of it sent the hairs on the back of my neck standing at attention.
If I’d learned anything since starting to use the crystal, it was that I should trust my gut.
Instead of following along on the original path I intended, I turned to the right. Sure enough, the sleek black sedan followed me. That alone wouldn’t have been that strange, and if anything, it would have been entirely understandable. But I made another right turn, and once again, the sedan followed.
“What are we doing?” Yasha shouted. Her voice was barely audible through our helmets and over the sound of my motorcycle’s engine.
“I think we might be being followed,” I called back to her.
As soon as traffic began to move again, I took a final right turn. I had successfully made a giant fucking square, and while it wasn’t all that uncommon to watch drivers make ridiculous patterns as they drove in the city and looked for shit like parking, I highly doubted that was what the sedan was doing.
“Hold on tight,” I urged Yasha.
She barely had time to respond before I pushed my bike to go faster and cut through a lane of traffic. The gesture was met with the expected blaring of horns, but other than pissing off some locals, and probably scaring some tourists, it felt like we were home free.
I didn’t risk looking back over my shoulder to see if the sedan was still there. Instead, I put the metaphorical pedal to the metal and started to speed out of the city’s immediate limits as fast as I could.
Once we managed to cut onto the nearby interstate, Yasha’s arms were like a vise around my waist as I maneuvered in and out of traffic. I was usually far more careful when I drove, but there was something about seeing that black sedan for the second time now that set me on edge. When I paired that with everything Yasha had told me about the crystals, and how I could be tracked while using it, I was more than a little concerned someone had already set their sights on me.
“This is very fast!” Yasha shouted to be heard over the roar of the wind and the rumble of my motorcycle. “Should we be going this fast?”
Despite her question, I thought I heard her laugh into the wind. She didn’t seem frightened by my evasive attempts. If anything, the fox-woman seemed to be having a blast.
The wave of relief I felt rushing through me was cut short, though, as I risked a quick glance over my shoulder and saw a black sedan speeding toward me. In the dark, its grill and headlights made the front of the car look like a shark’s gaping maw as it sped forward to devour its prey. It was a far from welcome comparison.
“Fuck,” I hissed to myself. It would be harder to lose our tail now than it was in the city, but I had to try. “Hold on tight.”
I leaned forward and urged my bike to go faster. I knew just how much speed the machine could give us, because I was the one who’d built the damn thing from the ground up.
Yasha’s sharp nails dug into my stomach as I pushed the bike even faster. There were quite a few cars around us, and there wasn’t going to be an easy way around them.
I didn’t have to look back over my shoulder to know that the sedan was still gaining on us. I was running out of time to figure out what to do. Prior to this week, I’d never been in a car chase once in my life, and now I’d been in two. How did you even practice for this shit?
Watch all the Fast & Furious movies?
I pulled out in front of the minivan to my left going nearly seventy miles an hour. My heart pounded in my chest as the minivan slammed on their brakes and let out a piercing wail of their horn.
I waved one of my hands up in the air, as if to apologize, before kicking the bike into higher gear. The dangerous stunt I’d just pulled put a little more distance between me and the sedan, but it still wasn’t enough. The car seemed determined to stay just a hair behind me, presumably so I wouldn’t be able to see who was driving.
When the coast was clear to my right, I quickly switched lanes again. I dropped my speed down to what felt like a crawl after the pace I’d been setting and let the cars on either side of me whiz by.
The sedan wasn’t able to slow down without causing a traffic build up, so I watched as it continued down the interstate. It was a little too dark to fully make out the license plate, but I had seen the numbers one and six, as well as the letter ‘A’. It wasn’t much at all, but it was better than nothing.
I kept my pace slow, and despite the death glares I was undoubtedly receiving as I moved down the interstate like a goddamn snail, I took the next exit. I wound down the ramp before pulling off toward what looked like some sort of construction site. There wasn’t any equipment in the area, though, so I assumed it was one of those cases where the funding had simply run out.
We weren’t near other people, it was abandoned, and there was clearly no electricity in use in the immediate vicinity.
“Would this work?” I pointed to the lot and waited for Yasha’s response as I idled along the side of the road.
She flipped up the visor on her helmet and squinted toward the scene.
“Yes,” she said finally. “Yes, it is a good place for this.”
She didn’t have to tell me twice. As soon as she gave me the go-ahead, I slowly made my way toward the barely paved driveway that led back to the abandoned construction site.
It looked like it was supposed to be a bank or a drive-thru, something like that, but that didn’t really matter. All that mattered was the fact no one else was around.
I pulled my bike around to the very back of the lot and finally threw it into park when I was sure no one would be able to see it from the road. The entire area was pitch black without the aid of any streetlights, but I supposed that was for the best, too. I really didn’t want to alert anyone to my position when I actually started to use the crystal.
As soon as I had the kickstand down, Yasha clambered off the back of the bike and shook her light-red hair out of her helmet. Her golden eyes were the only thing illuminated in the dark. She stared at me with large, widened pupils.
“What was all of that, Wes?” she asked and set her helmet on the ground. “Was that… thing following us? The metal beast?”
