Archive of Our Own

“I don’t wanna,” Kristen whines. “Is that not enough?”

Riz chuckles as Kristen flops over sideways, collapsing half her weight onto Gorgug with a dramatic swoon. “‘Don’t wanna’ for any particular reason or just—”

“Plain ol’ don’t wanna,” Kristen groans. “How many quests have we taken on this year? And how many have people bothered to thank us for?”

Riz flips open a folder, scouring for a certain page, papers scattering across the cafeteria table rapidly. “Nineteen,” he declares. “We’ve taken nineteen quests this year.”

He huffs out a breath at the realization, not particularly surprised but not unimpressed with that tally. Senior year has been busier than any other year at Aguefort for the Bad Kids and that wasn’t made any easier by Aguefort’s new strategy of throwing the region’s largest disturbances at his students and hoping they’ll figure things out.

Just last week, extra credit was offered for the first party to return with the head of a hydra that had made itself comfortable on the shore of Shimmerstone Lake. The seniors had raced out of classes that afternoon and, through all the kerfuffle, had made things endlessly worse. In their race to secure the head, each party seemed to forget the important thing when it came to killing hydras: burning the stumps.

Before Riz could blink, the hydra had sprouted up an extra five heads and the other parties had disappeared, racing back to campus. The Bad Kids were left fighting a monster that was, frankly, out of their league with no backup.

Thanks, Arthur Aguefort, Riz thinks bitterly.

“A nice, round nineteen,” Kristen says pathetically. “Let’s stop there.”

“Ah, yes, nineteen. The world’s roundest number” Fabian says, sarcasm on his tongue.

“Don’t tell me you want to get involved,” Kristen says, jerking upright. “I was sure you’d be on my side.”

“Oh, I am,” Fabian replies, nodding. “Nineteen’s plenty, guys. Let’s not get ourselves involved in whatever insane disaster is plaguing Solace now.” Adaine smirks and looks down at her lunch tray, hiding her face.

Riz can’t help but understand where Kristen and Fabian are coming from. What do the Bad Kids get out of all of their selfless acts? Torn to bits, that’s what they get, at least most of the time.

“We have to,” Riz says. “This time, we have to.”

“What? Why?” Fig asks, perking up. She rolls up her straw wrapper between two fingers and prepares to launch it at Gorgug’s forehead. Riz snaps his hand out, grabbing the wrapper out of the air mid-flight and tucks it into his pocket.

“Because,” he begins, “if we don’t, someone else will.”

“Exactly!” Kristen says, smiling. “Wait, what? Are you on my side? If we don’t do it, someone else will deal with it so let’s not do it. Am I right?”

“Not this time,” Riz says, sighing. “This one’s too dangerous to let fall into anyone else’s hands. If we don’t do it, Aguefort’s gonna let other parties step up to the plate and they’re not gonna survive it. If we don’t take this one on, people will die.”

“That’s what people do,” Fabian insists. “They die.”

“Aw, come on, dude,” Gorgug says, reprimanding Fabian’s callousness. “They don’t have to.”

Fabian rolls his eye. “So you want us to die instead? Die for the cause?”

“I doubt Riz would have suggested it if he thought we couldn’t handle it. Right, Riz?”

“Well,” Riz says, voice rising in pitch. “I think if anyone can, it’s us.”

“But you’re not confident,” Adaine says, eyes narrowing.

“I’m not.”

“Why?” Fig asks. “What’s the quest anyway?”

Riz slams his notebook shut and leans forward conspiratorially. The other Bad Kids lean in, too, preparing themselves for a deluge of information.

“How much do you all know about the island that appeared in the center of Harroway Bay?”

“Sailboats are not meant for this kind of water,” Fabian says.

Riz would laugh if he wasn’t sure he was about to die. The waters of Harroway Bay are angry, it seems. Not the tall waves of the ocean but roiling currents that come from every direction, bashing the ship left and right, up and down, as if the waves got confused about which way the shore is and started fighting one another for dominance.

Riz clings onto the edge of the ship and prays that Fabian knows what he’s doing because, if not, he has no clue how they’re going to get to the island that the city reported having sprung up one day in the center of the bay.

That’s that quest, after all. First, investigate the landmass that’s now floating on the waves. Then, figure out why the last five groups of adventurers all disappeared after doing the same thing. And finally, make it out alive.

Easy, Riz thinks. It’ll be easy.

(He knows he’s lying to himself but, when he’s half sure he’ll die on the way to shore, he needs to lie to himself to survive.)

With each passing minute, the shore gets closer and closer, somehow. Riz doesn’t know how Fabian is doing it but he’s closing ground between the Bad Kids and the island. Before Riz knows it, they’re on land.

“Thank the gods,” Riz says, resisting the urge to kiss the rocky shore.

“We survived,” Adaine says, looking paler than usual. “Good gods, if that was the quest, it would be hard enough to deserve extra credit.”

“But it’s not,” Kristen complains.

“But it’s not,” Adaine agrees. “So, let’s get started.”

Kristen groans but Fig comes to her side and puts an arm around her. “It’s okay. We’ll be out of here in no time.”

“Yes, dinner tonight at Krom’s. It’s on me if we all survive,” Fabian says, off-handedly.

“If?” Kristen asks, eyebrows shooting up her face.

“Don’t scare her, dude,” Gorgug says, shooting Fabian a disappointed look.

“Just being realistic here,” Fabian says, raising his hands in surrender. “What makes us different from the last five parties that tried to investigate?”

“We’re the Bad Kids, man,” Fig says. “We saved the world, like, four times. We can do it again.”

“I don’t think this is a world-saving issue,” Riz remarks, drawing his gun and holding it by his side. He doesn’t know that he’ll need a weapon, not yet, but it doesn’t hurt to be prepared.

The island isn’t beautiful, not like Riz was imagining. It does not have white sand beaches or tall, billowing palm trees. Underfoot, there is only rock, shell, and dirt. There’s not a single tree on the island. Just tall ferns and scraggly bushes. Riz frowns. It’s not a picturesque place, but he does get the feeling that someone is lining him up in their sights and watching him, as if through the lens of a camera. He swears there’s someone just over his shoulder, watching him.

Riz whips around, pointing his gun at—

Nothing.

No one.

“The Ball?” Fabian asks.

“I thought—” Riz cuts himself off as he lowers his gun. “I thought I heard something,” he lies. “My bad.”

Fabian’s eye narrows ever-so-slightly, and Riz can tell that he doesn’t believe him. Riz presses his lips together tightly and shakes his head minutely. It’s fine, he tries to convey. It’s nothing.

Fabian nods and raises his voice to the rest of the party. “Let’s take a look around, then,” he calls out. “There’s… there’s a lot of caves around here.”

Riz noticed that, too, from the ship. The edges of the island are lined with caverns, holes carved into the side of the land. They’re all half underwater, which prickles some sort of panic response in Riz, his heart racing. He doesn’t like the idea of treading into these half-drowned caverns if a large wave comes through, knocking him under the surface.

He’ll do it anyway, because there’s no other option.

“Sure,” Gorgug says. “Let’s check ‘em out.”

He takes the lead, stepping into the shallow water along the shore and walking carefully through the tide pools and ankle-deep water along the edge of the sea. It’s a dangerous walk, Riz realizes after the third time he almost slips, never more than a few seconds from falling and bashing his head into the sharp rocks. Nevertheless, they circle the island carefully, looking out for any signs of life.

Riz takes up his position in the back of the group to keep an eye on everyone but, more importantly, to keep an eye on his own back. He can’t seem to shake the feeling of being watched. He’s glad the other Bad Kids can’t see him, holding up the rear, for how frequently he checks over his shoulder for the mysterious eyes on his back.

He sighs quietly. Nothing, again. No matter how many times he checks, there’s still nothing behind him.

The other five Bad Kids laugh and joke about something Riz can’t quite hear from the back of the group. He’s listening to something else. A whisper in his head, a call. Not of his name but of his soul.

“Come, my child. Come inside.”

Riz obeys, splitting off from the party and wading into the nearest cavern. In the very back, hidden behind a few stalagmites, is the entrance to a tunnel.

“Come,” the voice repeats. “I will guide you.”

Riz nods and enters the tunnel, trusting this voice to take care of him. He follows it, eyes unfocused and head even less so. He follows it because he trusts it implicitly and because he knows it will take care of him.

Riz disappears into the tunnel, wading into deeper water, his friends none the wiser.

“Let’s take a break,” Gorgug says, turning around at the sound of Kristen’s tenth complaint this hour.

Adaine shakes her head. She doesn’t want to rest, not yet. Not until they get something. A sign of life, a clue that might lead to the other adventurers or, if they’re lucky, maybe some sort of indication of the very thing on this island that keeps eating parties alive.

That’s overly dramatic, Adaine tells herself. You have no proof of that, not yet.

She sighs and follows Gorgug as he climbs up the flatter rocks, finding one that’s tall enough to be kept dry from even the tallest waves. He offers her a hand up and she takes it, letting him pull her to the relative safety of the perch.

He repeats the process, helping each of the Bad Kids up—because he’s Gorgug and that’s what he does—until Adaine counts to six…

Five.

There are only five Bad Kids settled in on the rock. Just five.

She swallows.

“Where’s Riz?” Fig asks curiously, tilting her head to the side.

“Bathroom break?” Fabian asks.

“He would’ve told us,” Adaine says, worry creeping into her voice. “He wouldn’t have walked off on his own.”

“And yet,” Fabian says, struggling with keeping his voice nonchalant. Adaine can see straight through it. He’s as worried as she is, consumed by the same slow-acting fear that bleeds into her veins like poison. “Where else would he have gone?” he asks, talking to himself as much as he’s asking anyone else.

“Maybe he got attacked,” Kristen says, humming a question under her breath.

“Attacked?” Fig asks. “We would’ve heard that.”

“Well, what else would’ve happened?” Kristen asks. “He didn’t go take a piss, he didn’t get attacked. Why else would he have disappeared on us?”

“That’s the question,” Adaine mutters. “Shit.”

“Let’s backtrack,” Gorgug says, standing up again. He jumps down into the shallows and offers his hand to Fabian. He takes it, letting Gorgug support him as he half-jumps, half-slips his way back into the water. “We’ll find him.”

“How far?” Adaine asks.

“What?”

“How far back do we backtrack? When did we lose him?”

“Well, what’s the last thing he said? We only have to go as far back as we last remember him being with us.”

There’s silence that hangs in the air, nervous silence, as the Bad Kids try to remember the last sign of life they had from Riz.

“He’s just so quiet,” Fabian finally says, breaking the silence. “He doesn’t say much on adventures.”

“Right,” Fig agrees. “The last thing he said…”

“I don’t think he’s said anything since we started circling the island,” Kristen says, pressing her eyes shut. “He could be anywhere.”

“Let’s stay calm,” Gorgug says, a natural mediator. “What are the options here?”

“Well,” Adaine says, glad for the distraction of a well-asked question. “He could’ve climbed out of the tide pools and gone back onto the shore.” The others nod. “But I feel like we would’ve heard him if he started scrambling on the rocks.”

“He could’ve swam out to the ocean,” Fabian offers.

“Same thing,” Fig replies. “We would’ve heard him cutting through the water. Besides, why would he just start swimming?”

“Why would he leave us at all?” Fabian asks, and no one responds.

“If he didn’t swim away and he didn’t climb out, the only option…” Adaine trails off. She takes a deep breath and lets it out in a sigh. “The tunnels.” She nods into the caves carved into the side of the island, tunnels scattered in the rocky walls of the inside. She’s been keeping her eye on those tunnel entrances as they’ve walked, preparing for some sort of creature or beast to burst out of them and ambush her party.

It turns out she didn’t have to worry about what might come out of the tunnels, but what went into them.

Or, rather, who.

“Again, why would he leave us just to go into some creepy tunnel?” Fabian asks.

“Maybe he saw something, a clue or, I don’t know, something like that,” Gorgug says, shrugging.

“He would’ve told us he was veering off path.” Kristen chews on the inside of her cheeks nervously. “Wouldn’t he?”

“Maybe he couldn’t,” Fig says hesitantly. “Maybe he was under some kind of spell.”

“What are you thinking?” Adaine asks, wishing more than anything that they had the party’s resident detective to solve this mystery. She’s not good enough at this part of the job, the piecing-things-together, though she’s no slouch at it either. Just not at the same level as the master investigator himself, the one currently missing in action.

“I dunno,” Fig replies. “I’m just… I’m thinking about the other adventurers. How do twenty-five people disappear? Capable people, ones who are used to dangerous quests. If something can make them vanish, why couldn’t it make Riz vanish, too?”

“Because it’s The Ball,” Fabian protests. “He doesn’t get caught up in stuff like that. He doesn’t get tricked or fall for any traps. He’s too smart for that.”

“Right, that’s why I think it’s a spell,” Fig reminds him. “Something that would tempt him off the path against his will.”

“And into the tunnels?” Adaine asks nervously.

Fig shrugs. “That’s my best guess.”

Gorgug nods. “That would be my guess, too.” He pauses, chewing on his lower lip. “So we go in?”

“To the tunnels?” Fabian asks, eyebrows shooting up on his face.

“We have to find him,” Kristen says. “Hope you’re not scared of the dark.”

Adaine frowns. She’s not scared of the dark.

She’s scared of what’s inside it.

“This is a labyrinth,” Adaine says, fatigue lacing every corner of her words, consonants dragging together, vowels barely making their way out of her mouth.

They haven’t been able to rest since entering the tunnels. The caverns are flooded, water up to Adaine’s thighs. If she tried to sit, to rest her muscles, she’d drown. It’s been hours, according to her watch, and they have no way of knowing if they’re any closer to Riz than when they began their hunt.

“It is,” Fabian agrees. “And we’re lost in it.”

“We don’t know that,” Fig says, a false sense of confidence infusing her words. “He could be around the next corner.”

“You’ve said that before,” Kristen says quietly. “A few hundred corners ago.”

“Well, it’s true.”

Kristen scoffs and rolls her eyes, opening her mouth to speak—

“Can we take a break?” Adaine asks, huffing out a breath before a fight can break out. “Can we just take… a five minute break?”

“What, just stand still for five minutes?” Fabian asks.

“Well, we obviously can’t sit down,” Adaine retorts, a bite to her words. “Yes, just stay still for a few minutes. And think.”

“What are you thinking?” Gorgug asks.

“I’m not sure,” Adaine says, checking her watch again. Three hours have passed since they entered the tunnels and, as far as she can tell, they’re no closer to Riz than when they began. “I just don’t know if the best move is to wander around in the dark, you know?”

Fig gestures to her guitar, lit up with a Light cantrip. “Not quite dark.”

“Pretty dark,” Kristen responds. “Thank Cassandra we all have dark vision.”

“You know what I mean,” Adaine says, huffing. “I just… Do we wander until we find him? What about when we get tired and need to rest? The shallowest water we’ve seen so far is still too deep to lay down. We’d drown.”

“Then we don’t rest,” Fabian replies quickly. “We don’t rest until we find The Ball.” He flexes his jaw, tension evident in his face. “He’d do the same for us, you know.”

“I know,” Adaine says through a sigh. “Gods, I know that. Fine. We keep walking until we find him, no matter how long it takes.”

“I mean, fuck, what else are we going to do?”

“Let’s just try to be smart about this,” Adaine says, “and make sure we’re not doubling back. If nothing else, let’s make sure we’re finding new parts of the labyrinth to search. I don’t want to pass the same stalagmite for the fifth time.”

“The one that looks like a dic—”

“Yes, Kristen,” Adaine says, quickly cutting her off. “I never want to see that stalagmite again, actually. For multiple reasons.”

Riz’s eyes are barely open, for two reasons. One, he doesn’t want to let his captor, whoever that might be, know that he’s awake. He doesn’t know what they have planned for him but he wants a chance to collect as much information as possible before that plan of action plays out.

The second reason is the deep exhaustion in his bones that holds his eyelids shut. He has to fight with all his might to open them, even just a crack, to fight against the lethargy in his bones.

Why is he so tired? Riz wonders. That’s not his only question though. Where is he? Why is he here? Why does his chest feel so tight? Why is he hanging by his wrists, toes barely scraping the ground? Why is it so dark? And where are the others?

He remembers a call, something that tempted him off the path. Come, my child, it had said. Riz was helpless but to follow. Now, he wishes his mental acuity was just a bit sharper, or maybe that his willpower was just a bit stronger. If he could’ve resisted the spell, even for just a moment, he could’ve warned the others about what was happening to him. Instead, he split off from them and got himself lost.

Maybe not lost, not exactly. He’s not wandering through the tunnels, though his brain remembers a long walk to make it to this place, the memory filtered by a heavy fog. He’s in some sort of central chamber. It’s enormous, at least a hundred feet across, with ceilings just as high. It’s cluttered with a mixture of strange objects. Gear, weapons, trinkets, and supplies litter the corners of the chamber, stacked heavily atop one another.

And around the edges of the room, equidistant from one another, are a few dozen cages, filled with people who look much like Riz. They’re tied up by their wrists in some sort of iron shackles, toes scraping the rocky ground. The water is ankle deep in this chamber, keeping their feet soaked through. Around their chests are more iron restraints, wrapped around them tightly, holding them in place.

Fuck, is Riz’s only thought. I’m so fucked.

He doesn’t know how he can possibly escape this one.

He doesn’t know what he can possibly do.

Adaine checks her watch. Seventeen hours in the labyrinth. At this point, she’s been awake for more than twenty-four hours and she can feel the exhaustion seeping into every corner of her body. “We have to sit,” she says, every word an effort. “Please.”

Gorgug slows, then stops, in the front of the group. He nods and turns around, taking a quick head count. They’ve been sounding off once every ten minutes, making sure everyone is accounted for but that hasn’t stopped Gorgug from doing his own counts more frequently than that. It’s clear that he doesn’t want to lose another Bad Kid and Adaine doesn’t blame him. She can’t imagine what the rest of them will do if someone else splits off from the group.

“We can’t waste any more time,” Fabian argues.

“Please,” Adaine repeats. “The water’s shallow here. We can sit for a bit.”

Shallow doesn’t mean much, considering she’s still soaked up to her knees, but at least she can kneel without plunging her head under the surface of the water. She’s so sick of these flooded tunnels. She can’t take the feeling of wet socks or pruning skin for another second.

But she must, she reminds herself. She has to, for Riz’s sake. She’ll find him, no matter what it takes. She’ll find him even if it means she stays awake for days on end because Bad Kids don’t leave Bad Kids behind.

“Adaine’s right,” Fig says quietly. “We need a rest and, if we wait, the water could get deep again.”

Kristen nods, dropping down and sitting on her heels. “I’m tired,” she says, barely a whisper.

“I know,” Adaine replies, kneeling down. The rocks dig into her knees but the chance to get off her feet is such a relief that she hardly feels it. “Me too.”

“Me three,” Fig says.

Fabian doesn’t respond, mouth pressed shut. He exhales through his nose, a sharp blast of air.

“Say it,” Adaine says, rolling her eyes. “Whatever you’re about to say, just say it.”

Fabian twists his lips up into a firm line. He sighs. “I’m guessing The Ball is fairly tired too. Wherever he is,” Fabian says, cynicism painting every word on his tongue. “But we wouldn’t know because we’re letting him down.”

“We’re not letting him down, dude,” Gorgug replies, putting a hand on Fabian’s shoulder and guiding them both to the ground. “We’re trying our best to find him, yeah? There’s nothing else we can do.”

“We can keep walking!” Fabian says, his voice an explosion in this quiet cavern. “How can you take a break when you don’t know where one of your party members is? I certainly can’t.”

“Because we’re exhausted, Fabian,” Adaine protests, feeling guilty for not having the same fire that Fabian seems to have, the drive to stay on his feet. She wants to find Riz, more than anything, but she’s just so godsdamn tired.

“And we’re not getting anywhere,” Kristen offers.

“Well, we’re certainly not if we’re sitting down!” Fabian says, exploding to his feet. “I can’t do this,” he mutters, storming off down the tunnel on his own.

“Shit,” Adaine mutters. “We can’t let him go off on his own.

“I’ve got him,” Gorgug says, jumping to his feet. “I’ll talk to him.”

He disappears, too, turning a corner and fading into the dark. Adaine swears under her breath, wondering how the hell the Bad Kids are going to find their way out of this one.

It’s not looking good, she thinks. It’s really, really not.

Riz is exhausted. His muscles burn from the effort of keeping himself upright. Not like he has much choice, he thinks bitterly, considering his restraints. He underestimated how painful it might be to be lashed up by his wrists but he’ll never forget the pain of it now. The sides of his torso ache, stretched out too far. His core feels like he’s just done a hundred sit-ups and was asked to do a hundred more. He can barely breathe through the iron bars around his chest.

Except they’re not quite bars, not traditionally, anyway. They’re patchwork metal, made up of various pieces of rusted gear. A sword, bent and twisted into a circle, wraps around his ribcage. Four large gauntlets were hammered flat before being used to constrict his stomach. The pieces of metal glow slightly, imbued with some sort of arcane force. Besides the magic keeping them together, these restraints are primarily made up of the same scattered gear that fills the chamber and Riz can’t figure out why. Is this some sort of dragon’s lair, filled with an abundance of treasure? If so, what are he and the other few dozen adventurers doing here?

There’s something that creeps in the corner of his memory. A creature he learned about in Beast Slaying class. The textbook didn’t have much to say about it but, in an appendix, there was listed a beast known as a morkoth. A large, tentacled beast who is known for its command of psychic energy, its ability for interplanar travel, and its incessant urge to collect. Not just treasure, not like a dragon might, but everything.

Including, perhaps, people.

Riz sees movement in the corner of his chamber, the twitch of a limb.

Except it’s not a limb, he realizes with a sick feeling in his stomach.

It’s a tentacle.

“I hear something,” Fig whispers urgently.

Adaine freezes where she’s standing, gesturing at the others to do the same. She listens, in the silence, for whatever Fig heard until it becomes apparent. Gentle splashing. There’s something up ahead, she realizes. A sign of life.

“We go in quietly,” Adaine whispers. “As sneakily as we can manage.” She looks at Kristen pointedly. “Please, just—just try your best.”

“Yeah,” Kristen says, no joke on her tongue for once. Adaine supposes that’s what happens when you’ve been searching for a missing friend for almost thirty hours. The jokes have long run out.

She gets distracted by the stinging of a cut on her leg. She rolled her ankle yesterday, toppling over and scraping a long gash down the side of her calf. It hasn’t healed, yet. Without rest, it won’t heal until she can lay down for the night and recover.

She wonders how Riz is doing. Is he hurt too? Unable to heal?

She shakes her head. No use wondering about it if she’s about to find him. “Ready?” she asks. When she receives four nods, she gestures for Fabian to take the lead as he turns the corner in the tunnels towards the sounds of the splashing.

Adaine follows close behind and stifles a gasp behind her hand once she sees what lays beyond the corner.

An enormous chamber, hundreds of feet, maybe, across. Filled with scattered objects, piles of them that look close to toppling over. At least two dozen cages filled with adventurers and, worst of all, one of those adventurers is a very familiar goblin.

“Riz,” Fig whispers, getting his attention from across the room. His eyes are half-lidded, looking too exhausted to open them fully, but he clearly recognizes the others. A bit of optimism seeps into his face, a tiny smile in the corners of his lips. Then, he buries the emotion, fear overtaking it.

“No, stop,” Riz whispers urgently. “You have to get out. You have to go—”

The splashing returns, accompanied with the shaking of the ground in this large chamber. Adaine freezes, terrified about what’s to come.

“Hide!” Riz calls out in a whispered shout.

The Bad Kids waste no time. They scatter behind various patchwork cages, pressing themselves between the adventurers and the walls of the chamber. Once they disappear behind the bodies, they stay, frozen, listening to the regular splashes. They get louder. Closer.

The sound explodes into the room, along with one of the largest beasts Adaine has ever seen in her life. Almost as large as an adult dragon, this tentacled beast fills the chamber with its hulking body.

She’s never seen anything like it, not even in her textbooks. It stands dozens of feet tall, mostly made up of a single gaping mouth, with large, unblinking eyes, slitted pupils cutting through them. At the bottom of the face—if you can call a single, colossal mouth a face—isn’t a body, not like Adaine would expect, but a mess of tentacles emerging directly from the creature’s head. The creature walks on its tentacles through the water, only ankle deep in this part of the tunnels. It looks like it belongs in deeper water, somewhere it could swim, but it’s getting around just fine in this cavern on its “feet.”

It’s terrifying, she realizes, as her chest shakes with nerves. It’s an intimidating presence, something that makes her heart beat hard. Especially when she can see Riz just across the room, trapped by a mixture of iron parts and some sort of arcane cage.

“Attack?” she signs to Fabian, making the gesture in Solisian Sign Language.

“Not yet,” he signs back, displaying a surprising amount of patience for someone who’s been chomping at the bit to find and rescue Riz. It’s the right call, though, she thinks. Collect information before acting.

It’s what Riz would do.

She turns to her left and signs, “wait,” to Fig, nodding at Fig to pass the message along to her left and knowing that Fabian will pass it to his right until every Bad Kid knows to stay, motionless, until the call to action.

Riz doesn’t seem to be in any immediate danger. He’s trapped but not visibly hurt. The creature is ignoring his presence, instead, digging through one of the piles of gear. Eventually, after a minute of tense silence, the creature pulls out an object with his tentacle wrapped around it, some sort of amulet, and crosses the room again, disappearing into the tunnels.

No one moves. For at least sixty long, long seconds, not a single breath comes from the Bad Kids until, all at once, they explode into action.

“The Ball,” Fabian whispers, leaping out from behind the cage and rushing to his side.

“Are you okay?” Fig says, quickly following after him.

As much as Adaine wants to check in on Riz, she crosses the chamber and posts herself by the exit that the creature used, keeping an eye and ear out for its return. She trusts her other party members to rescue Riz. She’ll be smart, not emotional, and be the lookout.

She hears the other speaking in rushed whispers.

“How do we get him out?”

“Are you alright?”

“Please—”

“Come on!”

“What do we do?”

Adaine shakes her head. She wants nothing more than to turn around and get involved. She wants to pry Riz out of that cage with her bare hands herself, to feel the metal bend beneath her fingers, because if that’s what it takes to get him free, she’ll do it happily.

Adaine’s body tenses as she hears splashing.

“We have to go!” she calls out over her shoulder. “It’s coming back!”

“We can’t get him out,” Fig calls back, muttering curses under her breath. “How far is it?”

Adaine peers around the corner, hoping to the gods that she won’t be spotted. She sees the creature in all of its horrific glory lurching down the tunnel but it doesn’t seem to see her. She hopes.

“Thirty seconds,” she says, sprinting over to the others. “Lemme, uh—”

With a twist of her wrists and a quick gesture with her fingers, she casts Dispel Magic on the arcane cage but the dispelling fizzles out, met by a magic too powerful to cast away. “Fuck!”

“What do we do?” Fig asks desperately, digging her claws under the metal restraints, trying to tear them open. They don’t give an inch.

Riz begins to panic, his eyes opening wide, even through his apparent fatigue. “You have to leave. The five of you have to leave right now or you’ll be killed. We can’t beat a morkoth; we can’t.” He looks desperate to shove the Bad Kids away but he doesn’t have use of his hands, still tied over his head. His shirt has come untucked, exposing a line of his stomach. Adaine hates to see him like this: disheveled and afraid. It’s not the Riz she knows, the one who prides himself on being put together and capable.

Trapped like this, he’s helpless.

She feels helpless, too.

“We stay and we fight,” Fabian declares. “Find a place to hide, everyone. We’re going to ambush this ‘morkoth’ fucker and we’re going to kill it for this.” A fire burns in his eyes, simmering anger under every inch of his skin. Adaine can relate.

“Fuck yes,” Fig says, dashing behind Riz’s cage. The metal blocks her from view and she crouches down, fingers on the strings of her guitar, ready to jump out at a moment’s notice.

The others follow her lead, finding other cages to tuck themselves behind. Adaine takes a moment—just a moment—to consider the state of the adventurers in these cages. Their eyes are shut, or nearly shut, and they look delirious with lethargy. They can’t seem to see straight or to process what they’re seeing. If they could, they’d surely be remarking on the five adventurers who just appeared out of nowhere, ready to throw hands at their captor.

She’ll worry about them later, Adaine decides. Once Riz is free, she’ll take her time rescuing each and every one of the missing twenty five adventurers. But her priority, of course, is her best friend.

Riz swallows, pain coating his throat from how parched he is. How much longer will he survive without a sip of water? He’s seen the morkoth spraying the other adventurers, the ones who have surely been here for more than a couple of days, with water from an enchanted Everfull Canteen, which they lap at lazily, the only thing keeping them alive.

Riz had been waiting his turn, when the Bad Kids arrived, to be provided water in the same way. He wishes it had come first, so that his throat wouldn’t hurt quite so much, but he supposes he can’t complain about his rescue coming sooner rather than later.

And they will rescue him, he tells himself. Somehow. They will because they have to because if they don’t, Riz will die guilty, knowing that their blood is on his hands. If the morkoth kills all six Bad Kids today, Riz’s final thought will be how the others could’ve survived if they had just listened to him and ran away while they still could.

He shakes his head, ignoring the way it makes him dizzy. He can’t worry about that. He has to stay clear headed.

He can’t help in this fight, he knows, except to be a caller. Without his sword or gun in hand, without the ability to move an inch, his only contribution will be warnings, tactical declarations, and to be a pair of eyes, seeing what the others cannot.

And it’s time, he realizes, as a tentacle crosses the boundary of the central chamber. It’s time.

He half-closes his eyes, not wanting to betray his awareness. The morkoth must expect him to be fatigued and so he will play that part. But, through his lidded eyes, he watches. He watches as the morkoth lurches through the room, burying his attention in a pyramid of treasure and gear, his back turned to the others.

“Now!” Riz shouts and the fight begins.

The others explode from their hiding spots, flinging out spells and battle cries. The morkoth whips around but his beastly body is too slow. His movements aren’t lethargic but they are slow, weighed down by his heavy tentacles and his too-large head.

Each Bad Kid gets a free hit, mercifully. An Eldritch Blast from Fig that goes straight into one of the morkoth’s eyes. A bolt of purple magic from Adaine—a spell that Riz doesn’t recognize—goes down its throat. Two slashes, one from Fabian and one from Gorgug, across its closest tentacles.

Kristen doesn’t attack straight on, spending her precious few seconds of the ambush to cast Spirit Guardians on herself. Then, she dives into the fray, getting up close and personal with the morkoth, and her Spirit Guardians begin to sear its tentacles, leaving behind burn scars from the holy fire.

It’s an incredible start to the fight.

It’s about to get much, much worse, Riz knows. The morkoth isn’t an enemy to sneeze at. It’s an interplanar beast, an ancient quasi-demigod with the power to move entire islands. It can command creatures through their psychic signatures. It can bash their brains out with its heavy arms. It can destroy five Bad Kids. Easily.

Riz closes his eyes for a fraction of a second and sends a prayer to the gods that they’ll, somehow, get an upperhand. The Bad Kids have fought impossible fights before. They can do it again.

Right?

The morkoth roars a wordless cry that shakes the chamber. The walls shake and small rocks come tumbling from the ceiling, sprinkling down on Riz and peppering him with tiny bruises and cuts. He curses. The worst case scenario would be these tunnels collapsing during the fight, leaving all thirty one adventurers inside to die. Sure, the morkoth would be dead, too, but the cost would be too great.

The morkoth lashes out, sending its tentacles flying across the chamber. Gorgug, Fabian, and Kristen are all thrown off their feet and into the walls of the cavern. Riz cringes as he sees their bones smash against the rocks. Fabian recovers fastest, leaping back to his feet and wasting no time in approaching the morkoth once more. Riz sees blood leaking from the back of his skull.

Gorgug and Kristen aren’t far behind. They’re obviously tired, battered already, too, but there’s no lack of dedication and fire in their eyes.

It’s amazing what someone can do when they are fighting for something—or someone—they care about, Riz realizes. That realization gives him the drive to fight, thrashing in his restraints, trying to wrench himself free.

He loses track of the fight, too tired to focus on both watching the battle play out and trying to escape at the same time. Instead, he puts all his energy into flexing his muscles, attempting to break out of the iron cage with brute force. Riz has never been particularly strong but, as he watches the Bad Kids get battered out of the corner of his eye, he knows he has to be. He has to break himself out so that he can draw his gun and protect his friends.

With a wild buck, Riz suddenly, amazingly, feels himself come tumbling out of his restraints. The arcane lock fizzles out and all the patchwork metal parts fall to pieces, clattering in the ankle-deep water with a few heavy splashes.

“Shit,” Riz says, tumbling to the ground with the sudden weight on his legs. They haven’t held him up in hours, maybe even days. How long has he been hung by his wrists? How long has it been since his legs were able to hold his body up?

Riz tries to wake up his muscles, kicking the butterflies out of his feet, but suddenly, his skin starts to crawl. Like before, he feels the sensation of being watched. Then, the feeling of something crawling into his brain, tickling his neurons.

A voice whispers in his head.

“I grow tired of this barrage, my child, and I need only one of you to remember this day. Slay your allies.”

Riz draws his Sword of Shadows. He stalks through the water on unsteady feet, eyes locked onto the back of his friend, his ally, his party member, Fabian.

He raises his sword, pulling back and preparing to strike.

“Fabian!” Adaine shouts, making him whip around a quarter of a second before Riz’s sword would’ve embedded itself in his back. Fabian barely catches the edge of the blade with his own sword and the metal-on-metal clash echoes through the chamber.

“The Ball?” Fabian asks.

“How did he get out of his cage?” Fig shouts.

“Maybe the morkoth dropped concentration,” Adaine replies hesitantly, whipping bolts of magic through the air in an attempt to blind the morkoth. “We’ve been hammering on him pretty badly.”

Riz can barely hear their words. The room is cloudy and gray with the exception of his five allies, highlighted with beacons of light. It’s quiet, suddenly. He filters out the noise because the only sound he wants to hear is the sharp shink! of his blade against Fabian’s. Or, even better, the sound of his sword sinking into flesh.

Riz continues to lunge at Fabian, none too weak when it comes to a sword fight, but Fabian parries each blow, stepping out of range and battering away his sword with each carefully choreographed move.

“The Ball,” Fabian repeats in a hushed hiss. “Stand down!”

Riz gasps, the words somehow breaking him out of his trance. He realizes what he’s doing, hit with the epiphany like a truck: he’s not just distracting his ally from the fight; he’s trying to kill him.

He stops. Freezes.

Then, he cries out in pain, hit with some sort of psychic attack. He could swear that his head explodes into a hundred pieces because nothing else could be this painful. He must be a smear on the wall of the cavern, otherwise this level of agony wouldn’t make any sense. Riz screams in pain, slams his hands over his ears, and collapses to his knees.

“Riz!” A voice calls out. Riz doesn’t know who it belongs to.

The pain courses through him, deferred to the rest of his body, too. He’s paralyzed by it. He can feel blood drip out of his ears and his nose.

And then, it fades. There are remnants left, the ache of overactive neurons that twitch and sting, but the assault on his senses comes to an end.

“What the fuck was that?” Fig asks.

Riz wishes he knew.

He doesn’t want his sword in hand anymore—not after it was used to assault his best friend—so he sheathes it and draws his gun. It’s a less useful weapon against a beast of this size but at least it doesn’t have Fabian’s blood on it.

He ducks behind a cage where an adventurer blinks slowly at him, seeming entirely unaware that a fight is going on around him. Riz recognizes the planes of his face from the missing persons reports on television. He’s been gone for a week, tied up and captured in this godsforsaken cavern. Riz knows he has to fight this morkoth to save him and the other adventurers. As much as he wants to run, to get himself and the other Bad Kids out of this place in one piece, that’s not what they do.

“He’s lagging,” Gorgug growls from the melee. “We’re making progress.”

“My child.” A haunting whisper plays in Riz’s head and his eyes go blurry. “Slay your allies. Until they are dead, you may not rest.”

Riz raises his gun and turns, lining up a shot with Fig’s gut. He fires. He connects.

She bleeds.

“Riz, what the fuck?”

Her words try to fight their way into his head but the morkoth’s command is louder, echoing off the walls of his skull. He is forced to obey, cocking his gun and preparing for another shot.

Adaine sprints to his side and shoves him as hard as she can. “Stop it!” she cries desperately. “Riz, what the hell?”

Riz’s head crashes against the rocky ground of the chamber and it seems to knock his logic back into place. What is he doing? Why is he attacking his friends? He can resist this call to action, can’t he?

He tries, fights to holster his gun, and it works. The gun slips into his belt and he pushes himself to his feet.

He doesn’t stay on his feet for more than a second before his brain begins to bleed. He’s sure that’s what’s happening because, with this much pain, there’s no way it’s not bleeding. The agony flows through him like waves of lava, burning every last synapse that it touches. He falls to his knees and screams, the sound echoing through the cavern, then through his head.

Blood pours from his nose. He chokes on it.

“Someone help him!”

“I only have one slot left.”

“Use it!”

“But the morkoth—”

“He needs—”

“Yeah.”

Riz collapses, shoulder popping out of its socket as he connects hard with the rocks. Another scream, or maybe a groan escapes his lips. He can’t see. He’s blinded by pain.

Then, a taste fills his mouth, sweet rock candy, and the sensation of sparkling water dances on his tongue. He feels his head stitch together, the pain slowly abating.

He opens his eyes and sees Kristen’s face, her mouth curved into a grimace. She tries to soften her eyes as he blinks his own open but Riz can see the concern in them.

“Get back to the fight,” he gasps out, choking on blood. “I’ve got this.”

Riz knows that he doesn’t. He knows something that the others don’t. These aren’t psychic attacks from the morkoth. These are the result of him disobeying a command; not just any command but a Geas. He knows the rules of the game. Once a command is implanted into a target’s mind, any attempt to disobey said command will assault the target’s mind with pain, temporarily disabling them. Once per day, the counterattack has the ability to trigger, and Riz had the spell cast on him twice.

Twice, he’s disobeyed. He’s come to his senses and not followed through with attempting to slay his allies.

Twice, he’s taken the punishment.

And every day from this point on, he’ll have to go through the exact same thing. Every day, for thirty long days, Riz will be torn apart for resisting the urge to kill his friends.

He draws his gun and shoots the bloodied morkoth because it’s all he can do. Worrying about his next month shouldn’t be on his list of priorities, not until he gets out of this fight alive. Not until all of his friends do, too.

They’re close to that, too. Close to a win, close to an escape. It’s a matter of seconds until the morkoth will fall, or perhaps they will. Everyone in the battlefield is bleeding or heavily bruised. He can see blood dripping from the back of Fabian and Gorgug’s skulls from being bashed against the rocks. Kristen is limping heavily on what must be a sprained ankle. Adaine and Fig each have matching wounds from spells cast by the morkoth. No one’s doing well, least of all the beast itself.

It’s bleeding out, Riz thinks. As enormous as it is, any beast only has so much blood inside its body and, in this case, most of that blood is outside its body. Riz grins, a feral smile. He’s going to finish the job if it’s the last thing he does.

His sword in one hand, his gun in the other, Riz closes the distance between himself and the creature, tearing into it with bullets and swings of his blade. The morkoth continues to bleed.

And bleed.

And bleed.

Until its large eyes shut and it collapses, heavy, on the floor of this flooded chamber, dead and gone.

“Thank the gods,” Fabian mutters. “Good lord, The Ball. You’re scary when you’re trying to kill something.”

Riz fights back a hiss that hangs in the back of his throat, fighting to be let out. The animalistic part of himself is scratching at the surface of his skin, begging to escape. He swallows it and grimaces instead, feeling the ache of his muscles all at once.

“Ow,” he says, simply, because when he opens his mouth, it’s all that comes out.

Kristen’s eyes flash with pain. It’s a vulnerable look, something that feels almost too intimate to have seen at all, Riz thinks. “I’m out of spells,” she says.

“Me too,” Fig replies.

“I’ve got one left, but I can’t heal,” Adaine says with a sigh. “Fuck. We had to use every damn resource on that fucker.”

“Including half of our blood,” Riz says gesturing to the shallow water in the cavern, stained crimson.

“So no healing, huh?” Gorgug says. “Well, we can get some rest, then. Heal up on our own.”

“How?” Riz asks, gesturing to the ground. “We can’t lie down. We’ll drown.”

“Oh, uh,” Gorgug stumbles, tongue tying itself up. “Oh. Shit.”

“Yeah. At least the walk out of here isn’t so bad,” he remarks.

Fig’s eyebrows pinch together. “What are you talking about?” she asks. “It took us, like, thirty six hours, dude.”

“What?” Riz’s mouth drops open. “Are you serious?”

“You didn’t realize how long you were waiting?”

“I couldn’t exactly check my watch. And, besides, it only took me like three hours to get here.”

“Well, you had an advantage,” Adaine says, tilting her head as she seems to process something. “The morkoth called to you, didn’t it? It must’ve guided you through the labyrinth through the path of least resistance.”

“Labyrinth?” Riz asks.

“Worst one we’ve ever been in,” Kristen declares.

“Not true,” Fabian says, eyes clouding over, haunted.

Riz doesn’t like to think about that particular maze so he shakes his head before thoughts of the forest, the keep, the caves, and the sea can overcome him. Before he can remember Andrada’s name. Before he’s lost in thoughts of—

Stop it, he tells himself. We’re in trouble.

“It’s okay,” he says uncertainly. He doesn’t know just how grueling this labyrinth of tunnels is but, with the Bad Kids all together, they can do anything. They’ll get out of here, dragging injured body parts and bleeding sluggishly, and they’ll rest on the shore. It’ll be fine. “We’ve got this”

It’ll be fine.

“Let’s get the others free already,” Kristen says, voice antsy. “Come on. The arcane chains dispelled when the morkoth died so it’s just a matter of getting this metal shit off them.”

“We gotta fuel ‘em up, too,” Gorgug remarks. “Food and water and stuff if we want to get out of here without them keeling over and dying.”

Fig nods and opens her pack, pulling out rations and a canteen. “Let’s get to work.”

In half an hour, the Bad Kids are on the road again. The other adventurers, five parties of five, decided to split off from them, venturing into the tunnels on their own.

Riz gets it. He does. What professional adventurers would want to tie their fate to a handful of teenagers—even if those teenagers just saved their lives? It’s a hard sell when he and his party can’t promise them a smooth escape from the labyrinth anyway. He doesn’t care much, though. He got them free so his job is done. If they die on their way to the surface, that’s no longer his problem.

He has a bigger problem and it creeps in the back of his mind like a stalking canine, teeth sharp and feet silent.

He shakes his head. It doesn’t matter. For a few more hours, at least, it doesn’t matter. With any hope, he’ll be able to escape the tunnels before the Geas has a chance to trigger again. He’s not going to bring it up until he makes it to the surface because no one can do anything about it until Kristen gets her spell slots back. A single Greater Restoration will fix him, as far as Riz knows, so it’s just a matter of getting some sleep and letting Kristen fill up her magical stores again.

It’s just a matter of waiting.

And walking.

After five hours of walking, Fabian groans. “We’re officially lost again.”

“That’s sort of how labyrinths work, Fabian,” Adaine says, no amusement in her voice. The jokes have long faded, a few miles and many, many hours ago.

Riz wonders how long it might be until he can be cured of this curse. If they walk for too much longer, it’ll be tomorrow. And tomorrow…

Tomorrow, he’ll have to fight the urge to kill one of his friends.

Adaine falls back, keeping pace with Riz without complaint. She’s so overwhelmingly glad to have him back that she doesn’t care how slow he goes; as long as he’s nearby, she’s content.

“We missed you, you know. On the walk to the morkoth’s chamber.”

“Oh, yeah?” Riz asks. “And how long did it take you to realize I left?” He quirks his lip up in a lazy smirk.

Adaine’s heart clenches. “Too long.” She sighs. “I’m sorry, Riz. I’m sorry we let you get captured like that and I’m sorry we didn’t even notice.”

“It’s fine, Adaine, I’m just joking. You rescued me after all,” he says, drawing his gun with tense fingers. “I can’t complain much.”

Adaine flinches as his gun emerges from its holster. “Did you hear something?” she asks urgently, drawing her own weapon, the Sword of Sight. “Guys, weapons up!”

“Wait, no, no,” Riz says, looking at his own hand like it’s foreign to him. “No, no. I didn’t hear anything.”

Kristen turns around, groggily. She’s exhausted, Adaine can tell. And too injured to be on her feet. There’s no other option, though, of course, so she walks on anyway, just like the others Bad Kids do. She clasps her staff tightly. “What’s wrong?” she asks tiredly. “Riz, you saw something?”

“No, no, I didn’t, I didn’t.” Riz shakes his head aggressively, as if he’s trying to convince himself that he didn’t hear or see a thing. His hands twitch, the gun raising slowly. With a grunt of exertion, he slams his arm down to his side, shoving the gun in its holster.

Then, he collapses to the ground, gasping urgently. But the water underfoot is deep, too deep and, before Adaine can even blink, Riz is underneath its surface, sucking in water and twitching.

“What the fuck?” Fabian asks, an explosion of sound. He’s frozen in shock, like the rest of the Bad Kids, and Riz continues to buck until he stills.

Fabian finally snaps out of his paralysis and drops to his knees, scooping up Riz’s body, pulling him from the water. He’s limp. Unconscious. Adaine’s stomach drops, somewhere under the water that Riz just inhaled.

“We have to get it out of his lungs,” Kristen says, serious as death. “Who knows CPR?”

“How do we do CPR if we can’t lie him down?” Fig says in a panic.

“The Heimlich then, I don’t know!”

“Heal him!”

“I don’t have any spells left!” Kristen shouts back, voice raw and desperate.

Gorgug steps up to Fabian, grabs Riz’s limp body, and wraps his hands around him from the back, balled-up fists digging into his diaphragm. He squeezes urgently, setting a rhythm. Adaine holds her breath as he performs this modified Heimlich-CPR combination, wondering if it’s worth the effort or if they’re wasting valuable time.

What else can we do? she wonders. Is it this or nothing? Can they save him? She doesn’t know.

With a fifth, maybe sixth, maybe twentieth manual pump of Riz’s lungs, Riz coughs up mouthfuls of water, eyes flying open as he tries to make sense of his surroundings. Held up by Gorgug, recently drowned, and in some sort of pain, it seems. He fights to reacclimate, eyes darting back and forth.

Adaine feels ten steps behind.

“What happened?” she asks desperately. “Riz, what happened to you?”

Riz coughs, water spraying from his mouth.

“I have something to tell you guys,” he gasps out. “It’s… it’s not good.”

Riz feels weaker than ever. He’s exhausted. It’s his third day without sleep. One night passed in the central chamber. Another during their long walk out of the labyrinth. And now, he still finds himself lost in the labyrinth while the third night begins to pass. He checks his watch. 11:59 PM and the Bad Kids are still stuck in this godsforsaken maze.  

Things are about to go very wrong, he realizes.

He opens his mouth to warn the others, to remind them what he explained a few hundred tunnels earlier, that he is about to lash out.

It’s too late.

He’s too exhausted to fight for his words. Not when all of his energy is being used on trying to fight his own limbs as they move without his permission, drawing his sword and lunging for Fig’s back. He slices through her, metal meeting flesh. She hisses in pain, trying to flip around, but the motion deepens the gash through her back. It draws a line of blood from her shoulder blade to the side of her stomach.

“Riz!” she shouts. “What the fuck?”

“It’s happening,” Adaine says, digging her feet into the ground. Riz eyes her, wondering what it might feel like to slit her throat. “We have to stop him.”

“On it,” Fabian says through gritted teeth. He draws his sword and lunges for Riz, intercepting his blade as he lunges for another strike at Fig’s defenseless figure.

With a clang!, the blades connect. Fabian swipes Riz’s away, throwing him out of alignment. Riz lets the blow send him spinning, turning a full 360 degrees so that he can use the momentum to strengthen his next blow. He strikes, slashing across Fabian’s thigh. Fabian hisses in pain, but doesn’t pull back. Instead, he takes advantage of Riz’s off-balance feet, and pushes forward, aiming for the hilt of his blade. With a twist of his wrist, he disarms Riz, sending the Sword of Shadows flying into the shallow water. Riz flinches back.

He can’t think of anything but the desire to draw blood; to kill.

He draws his gun.

“Stop him!” Fig says, clutching her side. “Fuck!”

“I don’t want to hurt him,” Gorgug says, drawing his axe but hesitating.

“It’s him or us,” Kristen says grimly. “Shit—”

“Godsdamnit!”

The world explodes into yells. The voices are familiar and comforting, yet his brain has determined that each person shouting needs to die by his hand. There’s no other option. He’s too tired to fight back against his impulse so he takes his gun and shoots Kristen through the calf. She tumbles back, falling into the water that instantly covers her head. Gorgug responds quickly, dropping to his knee to wrench her upright.

The distraction gives Riz time to redirect, to aim and fire at another target: Adaine Abernant. She stumbles, clutching her hand over her upper arm where the bullet tore through her muscles. “Gods!”

“Cast something!”

“Sorry, I was just shot!” Adaine bites back at Fabian. “Gods.” She waves her hands through the air, the beginning of the gesture for Hold Person. Riz lunges forward and slices his claws through her wrist, interrupting the cast. He hisses up at her, feeling distinctly threatened by her ability to stop him.

“Grab him!” Fig shouts, coughing raggedly and attempting to pull her guitar over her shoulders without ripping her stomach open further.

Fabian nods and leaps for Riz, grappling him from behind. With strong arms, he wraps Riz up and grapples him.

Riz fights. He scrabbles at Fabian’s arms, biting his wrists and scraping his hands to pieces. Fabian doesn’t let go. He holds Riz tightly, not an ounce of laxity in his muscles, no matter how much Riz fights back.

“Fuck me,” Adaine says, face pinched up in pain. “I’m sorry, Riz.”

With a quick flick of her wrists, she casts Hold Person and Riz feels himself tighten up, rigid and erect, completely unable to move.

His head starts to clear. What the hell is he doing? How could he hurt his friends like this? Fig and Fabian, sliced up. Kristen and Adaine, flesh pierced by bullets. He would shrink into nothing more than a tiny, ashamed ball if he had any control over his muscles, filled with guilt and fear for what this means. If he can’t stop fighting his friends…

No, no. He can. He’s strong enough to resist. He can fight back. It’ll hurt, gods, it’ll hurt, but he can do it.

“If we let the spell go, will you stop fighting us?”

Riz moves his eyes up and down, an approximation of a nod. Adaine nods back and lets the spell dispel.

Riz doesn’t move an inch, muscles just as tense as they were under the Hold Person spell. He stays frozen solid because he’s too afraid to move in case he twitches for his weapons again.

Then, after a full second of self-inflicted paralysis, Riz’s vision blacks out. That last thing he can feel is his body seizing, held up only by Fabian’s arms. After that, nothing.

Darkness, silence, the void.

He falls unconscious.

Everyone’s bleeding heavily with the exception of Gorgug. Adaine doesn’t know why he got a pass from Riz, maybe it was just a matter of prioritization. He went for the people who couldn’t stay up for long first; Fig and herself. He only attacked Fabian because he came for Riz directly and Kristen because the others were otherwise occupied or paralyzed by their existing injuries.

No matter the reason, Adaine can’t help but be a little jealous of Gorgug. He’s not uninjured, though. No one’s had a chance to heal up after the fight with the morkoth. Riz’s attack was just another thing to pile on top of their preexisting wounds.

They’re hurt. They’re all hurt.

No one is more hurt than Riz.

Adaine sighs. They can’t heal him and they don’t know how to stabilize him. All the pain he’s been experiencing has been psychic and you can’t put a bandage on a wound of the mind. She doesn’t know what to do to help him.

She doesn’t even know if he’s going to wake up again.

And would it be so bad if he didn’t wake for now? If he stays unconscious, at least he won’t be trying to kill the rest of the Bad Kids. But, based on what Riz told them and what Adaine knows about Geas spells, he should be okay for the next twenty four hours. He shouldn’t be a threat.

But once that clock strikes midnight, they’ll be in trouble. No one has the stamina to spare in a fight amongst themselves. Nobody has enough blood left in their bodies to survive any more combat.

Adaine walks over to Gorgug’s side and presses her fingers onto Riz’s pulse point as he rests in Gorgug’s arms. His heart continues to beat, slow but steady. She takes a deep breath in and lets it out, some amount of relief filling her heart.

“Well, he’s not dead,” Fig says, watching Adaine’s reaction. “But we need to help him.”

“I can’t watch him die,” Adaine mumbles, staring at the soft planes of his face, relaxed in unconsciousness.

“Well, he can’t survive another episode,” Fabian says, not mincing his words. “Hell, he can’t survive a stubbed toe right now. We have to get out of here.” He taps his fingers on the hilt of his sword, the only sign of nerves in his body.

“How?”

The tunnels fall silent but for the sound of splashing. The water’s shallow enough to sit but no one seems interested in requesting a break. Not when things feel so desperate. Not when they’d have to prop up the limp body of one of their party members during said break. It’s too terrifying, Adaine realizes. All of it. Not knowing how they'll escape or even if they’ll survive the rest of their time in this labyrinth.

“Fuck that morkoth fucker,” Kristen swears suddenly, making Adaine flinch. “Gods!”

“Yeah,” Fabian says, not quite as energetic but with conviction. “Motherfucker.”

“At least cast a spell that ends when you die, right? Like that’s only fair.” Kristen throws her hands in the air tiredly. “How long—”

“Thirty days,” Adaine answers. “Geas spells last for thirty days.”

“Fuck me,” Fig mutters. “What the hell do we do now?”

Riz begins to stir in Gorgug’s arms and Adaine straightens up, creeping back to Gorgug’s side so she can, blessedly, watch Riz blink open his large, golden eyes.

“Hey,” he rasps out. Riz clears his throat and tries again. “Not looking good, huh?” he asks, glancing around as best he can without moving his limbs. Adaine knows what he sees: bloodied and bruised party members. She knows what he feels, too, or at least she can imagine: overwhelming guilt. Her arm aches and bleeds because of him. Fig’s back is more wound than flesh because of him.  Fabian’s thigh is sliced open because of him.

It’s his fault, as much as it’s not. But Adaine knows a thing or two about self-blame so she can guess where his mind might go as he lays eyes on his bleeding friends.

“I have an idea,” he says, when no one else speaks, the silence weighing heavy in the air.

“Yeah?” Gorgug asks. Riz gestures to be put down and he reluctantly obliges, placing Riz in water that goes up to his knees. Riz falters for a moment, almost toppling over, before recovering and standing up straight. He stands tall and puts on a brave face.

“I think the only way to prevent the spell from triggering again or, more specifically, to keep it from hurting me again when I try to resist it, is if I give into the impulse.”

“What?” Fig asks, mouth falling open. “You’re just going to keep trying to kill us this whole time?”

“If I don’t, I’ll take another hit. I don’t know how you guys feel but I think I’m dying,” he says matter-of-factly. “I can’t take another psychic attack.”

“We can’t take another hit from you, Riz,” Adaine says carefully. “You’ll kill us.”

“No, I know. I know. Here’s my idea. And it’ll work.” Riz takes a deep breath in and lets it out. He looks up, meets the eyes of each Bad Kid, and lets a tiny encouraging smile make its home on his face, as if he knows he’ll need it to persuade the others of something. “I need you to leave me behind.”

There’s hope in his eyes, like there’s a chance in hell that any one of the Bad Kids would possibly say yes to his plan. “You’re crazy,” Adaine says, scoffing.

“Don’t be stupid, The Ball.”

“What are you talking about?” Fig’s face is the picture of surprise. “Wh—you can’t be serious, Riz.”

“I am,” Riz states plainly, his smile turning to a grimace. “I’ll give you a lead until the Geas starts telling me I need to kill you again, and then I’ll follow. That way, I’m pleasing the Geas. It wants me to kill you? I’ll give it my best shot. But I have to find you first to kill you and, if you’re way ahead of me in the maze, you have a chance of getting out and getting some rest before I do. It’ll work. It has to work. The Geas won’t hurt me because I’m trying to follow its command and I won’t hurt you because I won’t be able to find you. Don’t you get it? It’s the only option. We have to split up.”

“That’s insane, Riz,” Adaine declares, shaking her head urgently. “We can’t just abandon you in a labyrinth.”

“You have to! Or someone’s going to die. Is that what you want?”

“No, but—”

“No ‘but’s. Run. Get some distance between you and me, okay? It’s our only hope to all survive this. I’ll follow as soon as the Geas tells me I have to.”

“Riz, we can’t—” Fig’s voice breaks on the word. She shoves her hand over her mouth.

“We can’t leave you to fend for yourself,” Kristen agrees quickly.

“You’re signing someone’s death warrant, then. And we both know you don’t want that. Can’t you see? It’s our only choice.” He sighs and shakes his head. “Now get going. We can’t afford to waste any more time.”

With a sharp turn on his heel, Riz turns around, the way that they came, and disappears into the tunnels.

Adaine holds her breath.

“What the fuck,” Fabian finally says, breaking a tense silence. “He’s right but—”

“Like he said,” Adaine says through gritted teeth, “no ‘but’s.”

She mirrors Riz, turning the opposite direction, and begins to walk, praying that their escape is near and that they’ll be reunited with Riz in no time at all.

Eventually, she hears footsteps following her and lets out a held breath. They all know it; they have to listen to Riz and believe in his plan. Or at least, they have to believe in his plan enough not to sabotage it. Whether that’s out of respect for Riz or fear of this delicate situation falling to pieces, Adaine isn’t sure.

No one speaks. For an hour, not a single word is said.

Then, a sentence that sounds far, far too loud is spoken.

“What if he never makes it out?”

“Shut up,” Fig tells Fabian. “Don’t say that. Why would you say that?”

“He’s exhausted, he’s hurt, he’s under mind control. He’s alone. What if he never makes it out?”

“Fabian, it’s too late,” Adaine says, avoiding his eye. “There’s nothing we can do. If we turn back now, we’re in the exact same position we were before: a hopeless one. All we can do is hope Riz’s idea will work because if we don’t, we’re all dead.”

“I can’t believe we just abandoned him.”

Adaine shakes her head.

She can’t believe it either.

Riz trudges along, feet heavy and leaden.

He knew this was a risky plan. He knew there was a chance he wasn’t getting out of this one. But, gods, a part of him really had hoped that he would survive it. A tiny fraction of Riz’s brain was poisoned by hope and now, seeing what bad shape he’s in and how far he feels from escape, that hope has been thoroughly dashed.

So much for it.

He wonders how long it took the Bad Kids to realize what question he really answered with the making of this plan.

Do I want my friends to die or do I want to die? If it’s one or the other, which answer would I choose?

It’s an easy question. He couldn’t stay with them because he couldn’t live with himself if a single one of his party members was killed. But if he separated from the pack, if he made sure that he’s no longer a factor, he could save their lives.

It will just likely come at the cost of his own. Maybe there’s a chance that he gets out of here alive. But he doubts it.

He knows the Bad Kids will be furious with him if he doesn’t at least try, though, so he continues to put one foot after another and explore down as many new winding tunnels as he can, doing his best to flex his tired mind and remember which ways he’s already gone. He’s never gone this long without sleep in his life. Day four and he hasn’t even gotten a nap in. It’s torturous. It’s painful.

He has no choice but to persevere anyway.

He walks and tries to ignore the itching in his fingertips that reminds him of the other reason why he’s moving forward. He wants to feel blood pulsing underneath his claws as he tears into five bodies, ripping them to shreds. He walks ever onwards because he has to slay his party members. He can’t resist the command any longer.

It’s quiet in these tunnels, giving Riz plenty of time to think. But his mind keeps returning to just one thought.

He wishes he had said goodbye.

“We need to go back in and find him!” Fig exclaims, frustration evident in the clenching of her fists and the red in her cheeks. “We rested; we’re good. Now we need to save him already.”

“What if he makes his way out while we’re inside, hm?” Adaine asks. “What are the chances that we run into him in the same tunnel? Isn’t it more likely that we get lost while he makes his way out here and wonders where we’ve gone?”

“What if he can’t move forward? What if he needs us?”

“We just have to hope that he’ll stay strong,” Gorgug says, voice low and comforting in its steadiness. Adaine lets it warm her like a balm for a moment before her worries consume her again.

“We just have to hope,” Fig bites back. “Hope that he’s still alive.”

Kristen looks down at her hands, mouth firmly shut. Adaine can see in the tenseness of her face how upset she is and she doesn’t blame her. It’s Kristen’s job to keep the party in good shape and, right now, she’s helpless. Until Riz walks out of those tunnels and finds the Bad Kids, there’s nothing any of them can do for him.

“Hope,” Fig mutters again as if the word personally offended her. It likely did, Adaine realizes. How can she hope for a positive outcome when the universe had so thoroughly fucked them over in so many ways before this point? How can any of the Bad Kids have faith in this moment that things will be okay?

“They always are,” Adaine whispers.

“What did you say?”

“They always are. Okay, I mean. Things always end up okay for us.” She speaks slowly and deliberately, trying to convince even herself of the veracity of her words. “So what else can we do but hope—”

A bullet flying through the air. A gasp. Blood. Blood. Blood.

Adaine throws a Shield into the air, protecting herself from the bullet that she sees before its fired, thanks to her divinatory vision. Following the bullet comes a familiar figure. Riz emerges from the tunnels and stumbles up to the Bad Kids, gun drawn and held in shaky hands. His eyes are unfocused, slipping off the others. His nose is bleeding heavily, covering the front of his shirt in crusted, dark blood.

His gun continues to point at Adaine. He squeezes the trigger again but she meets the bullet with another Shield and grimaces.

Gorgug lunges in front of Adaine, another kind of shield, and grapples Riz. He squeezes his arms down to his side. Riz drops his gun on the rocks which Fabian scoops up quickly and shoves in the back of his belt.

Fig dives in and presses her hand to his shoulder, sinking healing magic into his skin.

Kristen holds her staff tightly and channels dusky purple magic through it that fills the air with the scent of cotton candy. The Greater Restoration flies through the air before diving down Riz’s throat. He chokes on it as the spell seems to fight the command inside of him. The Geas fights back but Kristen slams her staff into the ground and the bolt of restoration magic glows brighter and stronger. Eventually, something seems to change and Riz coughs, a cloud of black smoke emerging from his mouth,

Was that the Geas? Adaine wonders. Was that the very thing that had caused them so much strife, dispelled and removed from Riz’s head?

“Wow,” Riz says distractedly, eyes looking into the clouds. His words are slow and his mouth seems to be filled with cotton balls. “I made it. I didn’t think I’d make it.”

He collapses, limp in Gorgug’s arms for the second time in two days.

“What the fuck?” Fabian curses. “Did you not heal him?”

“I did!” Fig insists. “I did, I did. He’s healed, he just—”

“Did you cast Greater Restoration?” Fabian’s head snaps to Kristen.

“I did,” Kristen says, nerves apparent in her voice. “I cast it, I swear.”

“Then what the fuck?”

“He’s exhausted,” Adaine says. “I think he’s just exhausted. I mean, think about what he just went through. And all on his own? His body just… it worked so hard for so long. He needs to rest now.”

Fig clears her throat nervously. “And when he wakes up, we can yell at him for that last comment he made,” she insists, voice shaky like a young girl’s. “‘Cause that was crazy.”

“Yeah,” Adaine agrees. “I’d really like to tell him off for that.”

“I don’t get it,” Gorgug says. “Why are we yelling at Riz?”

“‘I didn’t think I’d make it,’” Adaine repeats in an impression of Riz. “He split up with us without thinking he’d survive that choice.”

“Oh,” Gorgug says. “Oh. Well, what the fuck, Riz?”

“I know,” Fig agrees eagerly. “He’s such… he’s such a—”

“Little twerp?” Kristen offers.

“I was going to go with motherfucker,” Fig says with a laugh. “But sure. Little twerp works.”

“I can’t believe him,” Fabian says, reaching for Riz and scooping him into his arms. “What a douchebag.”

“For saving our lives?” Gorgug asks.

“Yes!” Fabian protests. “Yes. If it’s at the expense of his own, I don’t know about all of you, but I wouldn’t want The Ball to save my life.”

“No, yeah, agreed.”

Adaine follows behind Fabian as he crosses the shore towards the place where their sailboat has been shored up for four days. Their escape route. Their freedom from this godsforsaken island. He struggles with stepping over the side of the ship without dropping Riz but figures it out eventually without letting his grip on his party member loosen.

“But that’s just like him to do,” Kristen says with a sigh. “All of us, to be honest.”

“Yeah, I don’t think any of us can say that we wouldn’t do the exact same thing in his position,” Gorgug says with a shrug as he helps Fig into the sailboat. He offers Adaine his hand too and she takes it, letting him pull her up over the ship’s side. “Right?”

“Speak for yourself,” Fabian says dismissively, laying Riz down carefully on a bench in the back of the ship. “Not all of us are martyrs.”

Adaine laughs. “We all know you’re secretly a softie, Fabian,” she says, smirking.

“I am no such thing,” he says, brushing the blood soaked bangs off Riz’s forehead before turning around tensely and preparing the sailboat for a departure.

“Mhm,” Kristen says, raising an eyebrow. “Sure.”

“Exactly! The Ball is the outlier here. He’s the weird one for, for, uh, sacrificing himself for us or whatever. I’d never do the same.”

Adaine blinks slowly, letting a smile grow on her face. It’s a good performance but it’s thoroughly unconvincing. Adaine knows Fabian is just like the others and just like Riz so, to Gorgug’s point, she can’t blame any one of them for making a big sacrifice to save the others. It’s just in their nature. It’s the way the Bad Kids operate.

Adaine moves to the back of the ship and sits next to Riz, scraping dried blood off his arm idly. She wishes he hadn’t had to go through his last four days. A call, a capture, a command, a chase. Riz needs a huge plate of dinner and a sixteen hour nap, she decides.

As the sailboat takes off into the sunset, Adaine promises herself that she’ll make those things happen for him. Like any good Bad Kid would, she wants to look out for her party members, especially one who almost died just to keep her and the others alive.

She owes him at least that much.

The orange rays of sun stain the shiny wood of the ship with reflective light, almost blinding Adaine. She lets her eyes drift shut, slips her hand into Riz’s, and lets out an enormous sigh. They did it. They saved the day again. She remembers Riz’s words from less than a week ago.

“This one’s too dangerous to let fall into anyone else’s hands. If we don’t do it, Aguefort’s gonna let other parties step up to the plate and they’re not gonna survive it. If we don’t take this one on, people will die.”

No one died. Thanks to the Bad Kids, no one died.

Thanks to Riz, really. Adaine smiles and shakes her head. That stupid, self-sacrificial goblin. One day, she knows that his actions won’t work out for the best.

But that day is not today so, in the meantime, Adaine watches the sunset with her best friends and basks in the warmth of a quest completed. Riz was right all along. If anyone could do it, it was the Bad Kids.