Young Writers Society

Mari winced and opened her eyes, coughing twice. The logical part of herself took over, immediately seeking to find some measure of control over the situation. She could dissect the incident later. Right now, she had to have control, and that meant having information.

First, the wound in her arm had probably re-opened. That wasn't great. Neither was the fact that something had just been detonated in a research lab full of experimental substances. As soon as she'd assured herself that nothing was broken (thank Darkness), she stood up slowly, took a moment to regain her balance, and looked around for Ilias and Dr. Goldencracker.

Dr. Goldencracker was slumped against the remains of a lab table, likely concussed but alive. Mari held out her right hand. "Come on, doctor. Let's get you to the nearest hospital. Do you think you can walk?" Her voice sounded strange to her ears, which were still ringing.

The doctor nodded feebly, and Mari helped her up. They stumbled down the stairs together, avoiding the rubble strewn across the moonstone steps. On the first floor, some survivors were gathered. Mari guided Dr. Goldencracker to the remains of a couch, then hesitated. Should she look for Ilias? If he was... she forced herself to think it. No point in dancing around unpleasant theories anymore. If he was Skater, he'd be better off dead. But if he wasn't... she'd be dooming an innocent civilian who'd been--well, she didn't think kind was the word, but... willing enough to take her to the asteric realm and to this lab--to death. She sighed and trudged up the stairs.

The room was worse than when she'd left. The opposite wall had fully collapsed. Mari waved away some stone dust in the air, then started casing the room from left to right, front to back.

She was about halfway through when she spotted blood near the back of the room. Mari paused. She wasn't bleeding, and Dr. Goldencracker had been a bit banged up, but she hadn't had any serious injuries. So unless there had been another person there... "Ilias?" she called. She started using her right arm to pull away chunks of rubble. There were more streaks of blood on the ruined floor. Suddenly, she came across a body.

Mari was a little proud at herself for not screaming her head off. But really, it was overshadowed by... she couldn't find the word. Some mixture of horror and guilt, she supposed. She still felt rather detached from everything right now. She examined the face, maintaining control over her emotions. A streak of blood coming from a gash that went along the side of its nose covered half of the body's face, the other half looked like his face. It had short black hair like Ilias, and, oh, who was she kidding? There had been no one else in the room but the three of them.

The body was pinned down under a chunk of the ceiling. She didn't want to risk moving it, in case there was still a spark of life in him. Mari flew down the stairs and called for help, feeling as if she was swimming through a nightmare as some first responders organized their gear and went upstairs. This was unreal. Well, everything about the asteric plane had felt unreal. But an explosion? Perhaps even an attack? That was practically unheard of in the asteric plane. Of course, commoners like herself weren't updated with all the day-to-day goings on of the asteric plane, but surely news of something of this scale would have leaked if it had happened before.

She felt dizzy. She sat down in an out-of-the-way corner.

Unbidden, her mother's voice came to mind. It was smooth and cool, like a polished slab of marble. "Mari, you must stay focused. Kill efficiently and painlessly, because that is the greatest mercy one can be afforded. Save the torture for our enemies. Now, aim for the target again." The target. Right. What was the target...? Dr. Ghee. Dr. Ghee and Skater. Oh look, she could say his name easily now.

Mari rose as if on autopilot. That had been her real reason for coming to the asteric plane. Now, for a quick and painless assassination. There was a lab with chemicals she needed a few floors up. So, she went there. It was straightforward enough: no more distractions.

~◇~

It only took an hour for Mari to concoct her usual weapons. She missed her bow, but throwable crystal containers (grenades, she supposed) would do in a pinch. It was inconvenient to have to hop between different labs when certain sections of one was wrecked, but it didn't slow her down too much.

She heard voices coming up the corridor, so she ducked into a stairwell and climbed the steps two at a time. She'd wrapped the crystals with cloth so they didn't clink together. She'd also stolen a lab coat for its additional pockets, and now it flared behind her as she flew up the stairs.

The roof had collapsed in some areas, but Mari was able to avoid them. Now then. She still had a few gold pieces and diamonds, so she should be able to hail a cab. The only problem was determining Dr. Ghee's location. The person who'd hired her had mentioned that he was famous for being a recluse who spent most of his time in the asteric plane. A few days of poring over asteric plane texts in the library (the few texts that had been approved by the ruling families, meaning the ones that were sparse in information) had done her no good. She'd had to visit an old friend for more useful information that had revealed a few options.

Diamond-19 orbited this city, albeit at a large distance, Topaz-10 was on the far side of the plane, and Onyx-11 was on the other side of the plane as Topaz-10. Each of them had fewer than ten inhabitants.

Mari ran across a few roofs, analyzing her options. Diamond-19 housed a contact of Dr. Ghee-- Mr. Glee. Her information was a few years outdated, but it couldn't hurt to stop by.

A short while later, Mari was standing in front of a cheery home. She knocked on the door, and in a few seconds it was opened by a man in his mid-forties. Mari gave him a bright smile. "Mr. Glee?"

He gave her a faint smile and brushed a hand over his brown hair. "That's me."

"Hi! I'm Camille Iya. Do you have a few moments to talk?" She stood confidently, as if it was totally normal to show up at a stranger's front door wearing a lab coat. At least she'd cleaned up and no longer looked like the victim of an explosion.

"Depends on how long your 'few moments' are."

"Ten, fifteen minutes tops," Mari promised. "I'm a scientist and aspiring writer, and I'd love to interview you about one of your old friends, Dr. Ghee."

"Come on in." He opened up his door completely.

Mari nodded in thanks and entered the house. Inside, a few pieces of furniture were arranged around a living room. There was a coffee table made of marble. Mr. Glee invited her to sit down, and Mari took out her notebook and a pen.

"So, how did you and Dr. Ghee meet?"

He smiled, with a gaze going off in the distance like he was remembering a great time. "We first met in high school, though it wasn't until college that we became friends. You should've seen him back then! He was the life of the party. So different from the isolated scientist he is today."

"That's wonderful. Would you happen to know where he is right now? You see, I was interested in his research, and I'd love to speak to him directly as well." The thing about lying was that it worked best when you believed what you said. In that moment, Mari forced herself to believe that all she wanted was to talk to Dr. Ghee about his research on the properties of fluids in the asteric plane. Which, honestly, were pretty fascinating.

"Well, we haven't spoken in quite a while, but I suspect he's still living in the same place. You know when we were around your age, maybe younger, we first travelled to the asteric plane, since it was considered a safe place for us to experiment with the crystals. And we were both minor members of ruling families, fortunately. It was so beautiful, before they put all these cities in. Of course it's still beautiful, but it had more of a natural beauty."

Mari listened and nodded along. "Yes, I wish I could have seen it as it was years ago. And pardon me, but where would that same place be?"

"Ah yes, where he lives. The last time I was there he had a grand party. That was a few years ago, but he had just gotten his third child, a son."

Mari tried her hardest to be patient. "That sounds lovely. Where was that party? Which city?"

"You know I saw that city being built. Each and every building I saw start from a foundation and build upwards."

"Yes, and that city is called...?" Mari prompted. She'd come here for one thing: a location. Not a history lesson. Although, she supposed, if Mr. Glee didn't mind exceeding the fifteen minutes, the history lesson was alright too. Anything that could educate her on the asteric plane.

"That city's name changed 5 times. If I remember, it was Avolado. No, that's not it. Avolado is the third city that I watched get built."

"Mhm... what's the city's current name?" Mari wrote down "Avolado" in her notebook, just in case.

"Well, one of them was Scaltine, that might have been the second one. The third one was Malcium."

Mari smoothed her face into a slightly strained smile. "Those are great names. But what I'd like to know is, using the modern-day naming system of crystal dash number, what is the name of the city?"

"Relax, I'm getting to it. The fourth was Grant, and the current one is Garnet-13. They've made such unoriginal names. You can mix up 13 and 12 and miss an appointment."

Finally! Mari jotted down "Garnet-13" and stood up. "Thank you so much for your time, Mr. Glee. I really appreciate it." This time, her smile was genuine. "I'll tell Dr. Ghee you send your regards."

"Thank you, young miss." He smiled.

Mari nodded and left.

The cab ride took two hours, even with the use of citrine to speed the travel. Afterwards, Mari was down to seven gold pieces and a diamond. But if things went well, she wouldn't need to spend any more money here.

Mari found herself on a deep red rock. It was too generous to call it a city, seeing as there were only a few ramshackle buildings on it, around halfway between the center and the edge. Shrubbery of silver filigree covered the ground, and there was a dying pomegranite tree sagging under the weight of its stones.

She took out a rainbow mask from her pocket and pulled it to expand it. The material unfolded like an origami flower blooming. Then she put it on, chose a few potions, and crept towards the nearest building, which looked like it had been given at least a semblance of care. That is, the windows were only about to fall off their hinges, not already separated from them.

There were no signs of life. Mari cased the building and pulled herself through an open window, landing lightly on the floor. She slipped through the rooms, most of which looked to be unused. The silence was heavy.

Finally, she reached a kitchen-like area, and a study that was adjacent to it. She entered the study and stopped in her tracks.

Dead. Dr. Ghee was already dead. And on the floor next to him was an unmistakeable scratch mark.

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