Under Zenith

  “Why on earth would I trust you? You’ve given me absolutely no reason to.”

  “You’ve made it this far haven’t you?” he asked smugly.

  “No thanks to you. I’ve made it this far despite your best efforts to sabotage me at every turn.”

  “So we’re just forgetting about the help I’ve given you?” he asked, surprising me that he was actually the one to bring up the one time he’d broken the rules for me.

  “Sorry. Thanks for the one time you helped me because I was about to be sliced in half and you exercised one ounce of human decency,” I amended sarcastically.

  Really, I was grateful that he’d helped me during the last task since I was definitely only a few seconds from dying again. But still, it seemed like the only decent thing to do to break the rules a bit to stop someone from being torn to pieces. I would hope Hayden had at least that much humanity in him.

  “What are you talking about? You needed motivation for the first task and I provide that to ensure you didn’t fail,” he said, sounding like he really believed his own terrible reasoning. “You didn’t think you could jump over the gap on the second task so I helped you along.”

  He failed to mention that ‘helping me along’ meant lying to me and practically throwing me over the ledge against my will.

  “I stayed conscious long enough to explain what the third task was so that you’d have an idea of what you were supposed to do. Not to mention the fact that I had to endure your terrible hospitality and having an arrow shot through my shoulder.”

  When he said everything back to back like that, I could almost understand his unsound logic. But then I’d remember how he’d discouraged me, lied to me, taunted me, and generally made me miserable.

  “You really think you’ve been helping me?” I asked in disbelief.

  “You really think I haven’t been?” he asked, equally shocked by my view.

  “You’re a real piece of work, you know that?”

  Shaking my head I got to my feet, brushed off my dress, and began walking back in the direction of the task. I knew Hayden wouldn’t let me waiver from our strict self-imposed itinerary for long, but I’d hoped he would give me at least a few minutes to think things through.

  “Arrogant, self-important, conceited man,” I mumbled under my breath, while Hayden walked by my side with a self-satisfied smile on his handsome face.

  He was enjoying my anger way too much.

  “You might want to stop for a second so I can tell you about the task,” he began, though I completely ignored him and continued walking toward the brightly colored pools in front of me.

  “I’m sure you have lots of ‘helpful’ things to tell me,” I shot back sarcastically, fuming at just how crazy Hayden made me.

  I didn’t slow my pace at all, practically jogging down the hill until I was right in front of the rocky landscape.

  “Hey!” Hayden shouted, grabbing me by my upper arm and pulling me backwards into his chest with a bit too much force.

  “What?” I yelled back, spinning around to face him.

  My intimidation factor was somewhat lessened by our height difference. Staring up at someone angrily while resisting the urge to stand on your tip toes wasn’t exactly terrifying. It was just a little sad.

  His face quickly transitioned from urgently annoyed to cool and cocky once more.

  “As much as you don’t like me, you’re going to need to listen to my instructions for this next one,” Hayden said disinterestedly.

  He always sounded so detached and above it all. It was infuriating.

  “What’s the task,” I asked, turning away from him.

  I tried to make my voice sound as annoyed as I possibly could, though I suspected the message still didn’t quite get through to him.

  “Task five: Strategy.”

  “Strategy. I can do strategy,” I said confidently. “Strategy usually doesn’t involved being chased, or killed, or eaten.”

  “Not usually,” Hayden began with a gleeful expression.

  “Seriously?” I asked. “What’s going to kill me this time?”

  “A pool of acid,” he responded simply.

  I took a few steps away from the brightly colored puddle in front of me and finally took a good look around. The terrain ahead was rocky and desert like, despite the woods around the little valley. I could see the safe house in the distance at the top of a series of podium like structures made from rock.

  It looked like after navigating the valley full of pools, I’d need to jump from podium to podium until I got to the safe house, which resided on the tallest of the rocks.

  “So the pools are acid?” I asked with a humorless laugh.

  “This is why I need to explain it to you…to help you like I always do,” he said.

  I thought his use of the word ‘help’ was a bit loose, but didn’t say anything. I let my pride take a back seat for a moment so that I wouldn’t end up falling into a pool of acid. A fair trade off.

  “First of all, you’ll need these,” he said, handing me five small glass vials, each with a different colored liquid inside. “Each liquid does something different depending on the color. Now it doesn’t matter if you drink it or simply touch it with your skin, the effect will still work.”

  Glancing out over the pools once more, things were beginning to make sense.

  “Not all of the pools are acid,” I guessed.

  “Only the orange ones,” he confirmed.

  “And I luckily don’t have an orange vial.”

  “I resisted the temptation.”

  “How very ‘helpful’ of you Hayden,” I said, making sure I emphasized the word he didn’t seem to understand.

  “I’m nothing if not helpful.”

  “I would never call you ‘nothing’,” I responded sweetly.

  He shot me a fake and short lived smile before continuing.

  “I’m only going to say this once, so I suggest you make a mental note of which colors do what,” he went on. “When you leave the grass you won’t have control over your own body anymore. You’ll begin walking and there’s no way to stop yourself until the task is complete. That’s very important to understand.”

  “Got it,” I said with a wave of my hand.

  “Once you start this task, you cannot stop it,” he emphasized, obviously not trusting that I really understood him.

  “Oh. Kay,” I said dramatically, matching his serious tone, though mine was completely sarcastic.

  “You’ll use the liquid in the vials and the different pools to navigate yourself through the landscape. In fact, you should probably take your boots off so you can ensure the liquid touches your skin if you walk through it.”

  I gave him an odd look, but followed his directions, taking my boots off and handing them over to him once more.

  “The first two colors are pretty easy. The red liquid slows you down and the green liquid speeds you up. Just like traffic lights.”

  “That’s simple enough so far.”

  “The blue liquid will allow you to go backwards, but only for a few seconds before you’ll automatically start moving forward again. But there’s no liquid that will change your backward movement. You just have to wait until the blue wears off if you want to move forward. The purple liquid will help you jump over gaps and obstacles, including pools, which might just save your life if that pool happens to be orange.”

  “Which would make it acid,” I repeated, just to show that I was being a good little listener.

  “Very good.”

  “So what does the yellow vial do?” I asked.

  “Turns the sun back on,” he explained, completely baffling me.

  “Wait. What?”

  “Every once in a while, the sun is going to go out on you. When that happens you’ll need to drink from the yellow vial to ignite it again. On that note, you may want to conserve that one if you can.”

  “Somehow I missed the whole ‘sun going out’ thing on my trip to Yellowstone
when I was little,” I deadpanned.

  “Not sure how you could have,” Hayden responded.

  “Must be because I’m an uneducated hick.”

  “I was going to say it’s because you’re a woman. But it’s probably a combination of the two,” he agreed with a solemn nod.

  I reached out to hit his arm, but ended up dropping the yellow vial in the process. It shattered the second it hit the rocky ground and I gasped, bringing my hand up to my mouth in shock.

  “Would you please at least begin the task before completely failing it?” Hayden asked with a raise of his eyebrow as he pulled another yellow vial from his pants pocket and handed it to me.

  “Sorry,” I responded with a wince.

  “I’ll forgive you this once. Now I’m sure it’s pretty obvious by this point, but your goal is to get to the safe house up there and avoid falling into the acid.”

  “And the strategy comes in where?”

  “You can only use one color at a time. Not only that, but you have a limited amount of each liquid so make sure you don’t use up all of the yellow in your vial if there’s a perfectly good yellow pool right in front of you. In fact, I’d avoid using the vials at all unless you absolutely have to. The pools are a much better option.”

  “Got it. Is there anything else?”

  “Just one thing,” Hayden said, looking like he had absolutely no faith in me. “Good luck.”

  Chapter 17

  “This isn’t so bad,” I called over to Hayden; and so far, it wasn’t.

  Of course I hadn’t run into any pools of acid yet and I hadn’t really needed to use the vials.

  “Would you stop talking and just focus please?” he said simply.

  Hayden had been walking along the perimeter of the task, avoiding the pools and not offering any help. It seemed like he was hardly paying attention to me at all, though it was surprising that he was staying with me rather than meeting me at the safe house like he normally did.

  I considered how close we were to reaching my Destination and I couldn’t help but think that this made him nervous. This was the closest he’d gotten to successfully guiding someone and now he was taking extra precautions, as was evident by his refusal to leave while I completed the task.

  “There’s a purple pool coming up which is…,” I let my words trail off as I racked my memory. Good thing I wasn’t in any danger yet since I seemed to forget what each color did almost instantly. “Jumping?” I guessed.

  Hayden looked extremely put out by the cavalier manner in which I was treating this task, but his anxiety made me happy.

  My legs continued to carry my forward of their own accord.

  At first when I’d begun the task, the loss of control over my own legs had frightened me. Now, I wished I could turn this ability on whenever I wanted. It was like driving a car; I got to my destination, but I didn’t have to expel any energy to do it.

  The second my bare foot touched the purple puddle in front of me I felt my knees bend and my legs flex. In the next instant, I was being propelled through the air at an alarming rate; the wind whistling past my ears and my hair fanning out around me as I reached the peak of my arc.

  The jump didn’t move me forward as much as I’d hoped. Instead it seemed to be a very vertical jump, and by the time my feet hit the ground once more, I had barely cleared the purple pool.

  “Good to know my ‘jumping’ is so wimpy,” I said to Hayden, hoping I’d be able to clear the gaps between each podium on the way to the safe house.

  “Think of the other colors,” he responded cryptically.

  I knew he couldn’t help me outright, but it sure seemed like he wanted to. I didn’t think Hayden trusted me to complete this task at all.

  “I can’t use two at a time,” I answered in confusion.

  “True, but some of the effects last for at least a few seconds.”

  I looked down at the vials in my hands and suddenly wondered how long the green liquid would speed me up. Really, if it were any duration of time longer than a few seconds I’d have time to try some of the purple liquid and get a running jump as a result.

  “Looks like you’ll have an opportunity to test it out up here,” Hayden told me and sure enough, a green pool sat only a few feet ahead of me.

  The next pool, only a few more yards away, was orange.

  “Acid,” I said to myself, noting that I should have a purple vial ready for when I reached the deadly pool.

  With no way to stop it, my feet touched the green colored puddle and I instantly began running at a breakneck speed; faster than I ever would have been able to sprint on my own. I held the purple vial to my lips for just a moment, waiting until the very last second to take a sip.

  Surprisingly, the liquid tasted just how it looked; like a melted grape Popsicle. To say I was pleasantly surprised would be an understatement. I’d figured that in this place where everything seemed like it was out to get me, the liquid in each vial would taste like rotten eggs.

  In a split second, my body was forced to jump and I was propelled over the orange pool as well as a yellow pool. Once my feet hit the ground again I continued to run for a good thirty seconds before slowing my pace once more.

  “Wow,” I breathed.

  I was surprised I had actually managed to clear the pool, and exhilarated by the feeling of flying I had just experienced.

  “Guess it lasts for quite a while,” I called over to Hayden.

  “You dropped the red vial,” he responded, his hand over his face as if he couldn’t bear to look at me and all of my failures.

  “Uh oh,” I said, looking behind me at the smashed red vial.

  I had dropped it behind the yellow pool and suddenly, I couldn’t remember which vial would take me backwards.

  “I didn’t really need to slow down anyway, I’ve got this,” I told Hayden, sounding even less confident than I felt. “Besides, all of these vials are just weighing me down and confusing me.”

  With that, I dropped the blue vial on the ground, remembering finally which color would take me backwards after deciding it wasn’t important.

  “What are you doing?” Hayden practically shouted. “Are you completely insane?”

  “I don’t need to go backwards. Why on earth would I need that?” I asked, looking at the other colors in my hands and wondering which ones I could discard just as the sun went out.

  “Crap,” I mumbled.

  I hadn’t been looking ahead so I couldn’t be sure there wasn’t an acid pool only a few steps away. Bringing each vial to my nose in turn, I hoped the rest would smell how they looked and give me some indication of what they were, since it was far too dark to see what colors the containers held.

  The first smelled like grape and I knew it was the jumping vial. Definitely didn’t need that at the moment. The next vial smelled like apples and for a moment I wondered how I could possibly still be holding the red liquid when I’d seen it smashed behind me.

  “Green apples,” I clarified after a moment, leaving only one other color in my hand.

  The lemony liquid hit my tongue with a vengeance, instantly igniting the sun once more and alerting me to the orange pool only a few steps ahead. Moving quickly I took a small sip of the green, followed almost immediately by the purple, giving me enough of a running jump to get past the final pool of acid before the podium jumping that lay ahead.

  “Well done,” Hayden said, though I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or not.

  It was always safer to assume he was defaulting into his normal habits.

  “Now I just have to impossibly jump from podium to podium,” I responded.

  Looking at the task ahead, I tried to assess the whole thing like one of the video games my brother had always forced me to play with him in the arcade. The green liquid definitely lasted long enough to keep me running all the way to the safe house. Technically, I could drink the rest of the green liquid, throw it out, and only have to worry about the purple and yellow.
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  It would definitely simplify things to only have two vials to worry about.

  “You look like you’re thinking, and that always worries me,” Hayden called.

  “Just thinking of ways to get rid of even more vials,” I assured him, though he looked far from assured.

  “You do realize what a stupid idea it is to get rid of vials as you go, right? There’s a reason you need each of those, and getting rid of them isn’t going to do you any favors.”

  “I’m fine,” I replied, not listening to his advice for a second. “Here we go!”

  With that, I drank the rest of the green vial and threw it to the ground, loosely holding the yellow vial in my hand while the purple one was brought to my lips, ready for every gap that came my way.

  I could only guess at what was on the ground between each podium, but if I was being logical, I’d say an orange pool of acid was the most likely option. Not a theory I really wanted to test out.

  My legs carried me forward quickly, over the rocky terrain and up the steep slope toward the first podium. As soon as I neared the first gap, I drank a bit of the purple liquid, causing me to jump through the air and land gracefully on the second podium.

  I repeated this pattern three times until I was on the last stretch of elevated land, just before safe house on the other side of my last gap.

  “Piece of cake,” I called to Hayden who now stood at the front door of the safe house.

  “You’re a bit of a show off. Did you know that?”

  “It’s not showing off if it’s pure skill,” I joked.

  “Yeah it is.”

  I grinned over at him happily, finding that this task was actually exciting rather than horrifying and it had lightened my mood considerably.

  I still ran at full speed, though I could swear I was slowing down every second. As long as I had enough speed to bridge the last gap, I didn’t care.

  “Maybe you should stop gloating and pay attention so you time the jump properly,” Hayden suggested.

  “Yeah, I’ll get right on that,” I shot back with a laugh just as the sun went out, casting me into complete darkness.

  My feet continued to run and the final gap continued to loom ever closer, but suddenly, in my moment of panic I couldn’t remember which vial held the purple liquid.