Arcana 99: Stage One

Karin peeked through her door for the fifth time that hour. The hallway beyond her room was empty. At its end was a staircase down to the lobby and the door to Grenfell and Maxwell's room. She hadn't seen Grenfell all day, and Maxwell had locked himself behind the door after he kicked her out for "testing the limits of my hospitality." She didn't dare challenge the creaky floors to not during her escape, so she remained. Bored inside her newfound prison. No books, no television, no games, no people to talk to, and—worst of all—nothing to do. Her only hope of enrichment was to gaze out the window, but even that was pants. She could see neither the lake nor the strange city that appeared in the night.

Odd that no one mentioned the city. Well, none of the foreign reporters anyway. Though, I guess they'd never even heard of Flores before they arrived.

All the window gave her witness to was the wall of another building and a small alley between them. The window was barely large enough for her to crawl through and was only a dozen feet off the ground. She forced the glass up and pushed the shutters out until they struck the wall. She put her head through to double-check the height.

Yup. Just as I thought, an unpleasant drop but easily doable.

She put her head back in and heaved one leg over the ledge. A knock at her door forced her to pull it back. Karin unlocked and opened it. On the other side, was an irate Maxwell.

I didn't even hear him open his door.

"Ms. Bernays, were you," As always, he spoke in his strange deliberate manner. Each word chosen with great care, "attempting to escape through your window?"

She gave him a smile, "Nope."

Would it kill you to stomp a little?

Maxwell clearly didn't believe her, but felt his arrival was enough reminder of Karin's position to keep her in the room, "My mistake then. By the way, Mr. Grenfell should be back with your books soon."

'Soon'? I asked a few hours ago. . . It better not be in Spanish.

Satisfied, Maxwell left, and Karin closed and relocked the door. She went back to the window, and stuck her head through it again. There weren't any windows to Maxwell's room or the hallway, nor could she see any cameras in the street below.

Just luck I guess.

She hoisted her leg to the window, and stopped when she heard a tap at her door.

Are you fucking-

"Hello, Maxwell, what brings you to my door. . . again?"

He kept a straight face, "Are you certain you aren't. . trying to leave?"

"Nope." Wait, does that mean I am trying to leave? Crap.

"I see. . . I would recommend. . . stopping. You are already pushing the limit of your life's convenience."

Karin didn't give Maxwell the satisfaction of showing his back. The moment he stepped away from the door, she slammed it in his face.

When she arrived at the open window once more, Karin pushed both her arms through it. No knock. She put her head through once more, followed by her chest all the way to her hip. Silence.

She went to the desk in the corner of the room. It marked the only furniture aside from the bed and was littered with contracts from various companies around the world. She pushed the now useless papers onto the floor before dragging the desk to the window. She made it four inches before Maxwell interrupted her.

Upon opening the door for the third time, Karin noticed that Maxwell looked. . . angry.

"Such a racket you are making. I can't concentrate on my," he caught himself and returned to his usual drawn out monotone, "work through that noise."

"Sorry about that. I've got nothing better to do so I decided to rearrange the furniture. Wanted to have a nice view of the brick wall while I contemplated lost opportunities."

"Yes. I see. . . Would you like. . . assistance then?" These pauses were not his normal attempt to find the right word. Maxwell was stupefied by how brazen Karin was being with her escape attempt.

Karin nodded and let him enter the room. They each took a corner of the heavy desk, and Karin took great care to lift as little of her end as possible. Maxwell carried his end with ease; he didn't even struggle. When they had moved it to the window, Karin wasted another minute of his time 'lining it up just right.' Satisfied, she thanked Maxwell and he left the room once more. This time, he closed the door while Karin stayed at the desk.

"You're alive because it's convenient" my foot. You talk big, but you're like every other rich man I know. A pushover unwilling to rock the sinking boat for fear of it capsizing. You already know I'm not going to tell, so you don't care what I do unless it implicates you. Despite what you know, you can't risk me leaving either. Time heals wounds and cheapens threats both. The only way I'll get any sense of proper freedom is if I get some collateral. I already know they won't kill me so long as I behave. I just need something to ensure they can't kill me.

Karin climbed atop the desk and once more stuck her head and hands through the window. She waited until the Sun's heat burned her hands to pull them back inside. Then, she tried a foot. She sat parallel to the window and slowly put her left foot through it. After a minute, she had her leg dangling off the ledge. After ten, she had both legs kicking into the air.

He can't hear me, and he can't see me. How does he know when I'm escaping? I've got two legs out now and he hasn't even knocked. Surely it wasn't just a coincidence. He had to know what I was doing.

She looked back at the door. Nothing. Why would he be there? There was no conceivable way for him to know what she was doing. Even if he had one, it would summon him now as it did before. It had to be coincidence. He came to tell her Grenfell was coming with the book, then to double-check she wasn't escaping. Nothing more.

In that case. . .

Karin scooted closer to the edge and rolled onto her stomach. The instant she began to slide out, Maxwell opened the door. Not slowly, he wasn't attempting to be subtle in any way. Not quickly either, he had no anger on his face or body.

"Oh, uh, hi Mr. Maxwell. I was trying to, um, close the blinds. But with this desk in the way I had to climb on top. And, I, sort of. . slipped." Karin made a show of scrambling to pull her body back up.

Maxwell silently glided across the room and with one hand pulled her through the window, "Let me. . seal it then." He effortlessly closed the shutters and pulled the window down before making his silent exit once more.

Karin sat in silence on top of the desk for a few minutes.

It's not that he can see me escaping. He knows when I am trying to escape.

Feeling her last hope of freedom leave her, she was almost off the desk when she heard a muffled noise outside.

The first said something about "it" dilling(?) someone.

A second voice, much louder than the first, and seemingly unmuffled by the wall responded, "I'm standing before you, aren't I!?"

After this, the second voice continued quieter. It remained unmuffled but was barely a whisper in Karin's chamber. The only word she could make out was "Maxwell."

She didn't recognize either voice, but it was a chance. A chance that one of them would help her. With all her strength, she pulled the stuck window open and threw the shutters out.

"Hey!" Karin shouted before her eyes could adjust to the outside light. The two people in the alley, a man and a woman, looked at her. One with shock directed at something Karin had not heard, the other annoyance directed at her.

Right, I should probably ease them into the whole "help me get out of here" request.

"What are you two yelling about?"

The man composed himself before cupping his hands and shouting back a curt, "Nothing!"

Karin didn't recognize his voice from either of the two speakers earlier. She did not appreciate the same weak lie she used being thrown back at her, "Really? I thought you said something about Maxwell!" To express her annoyance with the man's non-answer, she yelled back as loudly as she could.

"That was me," said the man, "Just talking about the race we won and wondering when we'd get our check!"

Karin stopped as she recognized his face. The man absolutely was not the one talking earlier, but he absolutely was one of the three cheaters claiming to have won the first stage.

Uhh, Sharon and Hank, right? Better not say it just to be safe.

"You're the inventor, right? Grenfell said he was interested in studying your teleporter."

Yeah, to prove once and for all that you're a bunch of frauds.

The woman finally spoke up, at a normal volume, "Tell him we'd be glad to, once he meets our proposal."

Karin's face lit up, the conversation went just where she needed it to. A request, "I'll be sure to remind him, but could you do me a favor first? You're science people, right? Your job is solving problems?"

The woman nodded, "In a sense."

It was rhetorical.

"Good. Then I need your help, in a sense, to discover why I can't leave this room."

The woman gave a look that asked for an explaination. Karin interrupted her vocal request for one and recounted the details, "I'm trying to sneak out to buy something without Mr. Maxwell and Mr. Grenfell knowing, but any time I stick my leg out the window they come knocking at my door. I don't see any cameras, and they cannot see me from their room."

The woman appeared lost in thought. The man instantly piped up, "They might have some kind of tracker on you, did they give you anything recently? Like, an earring or a bracelet?"

Karin thought back to the necklace Grenfell had given her. They had threatened her to wear it, the only threat they made aside from 'don't talk'. She continued, "They did, but I got it through the window. I even got my legs out; he didn't show up until I actually started going through."

The woman, finding some hidden truth in Karin's dilemma, responded this time, "He only arrived when you started to go through? Is it possible the device could be reading your thoughts?"

"Hah," Karin hid her nervousness with faux incredulity, "Mind-reading technology? They're crazy millionaires, not space aliens." I hope. Either way, now is not the time to test it, "I'm sure it's just some laser tripwire I haven't seen. Oh well, thanks for the help anyway. Could you do me another favor then? I was trying to leave so I could buy something," Karin rummaged through the desk and gathered all the money she had. She rolled it in a spare shirt and held it out the window, "You can keep the money you don't spend, but I need it tonight." The woman reached up and Karin dropped the shirt into her hands.

Please don't run away. Please don't run away.

When she didn't, Karin added a short "Thanks," before finalizing her request, "I need a ring, a fancy style one. There's a jeweler down the street, get whichever you think is the most obnoxious."

"Obnoxious?"

Karin nodded, "The chintzier the better. I want everyone who sees me to see it and everyone who sees it to think the one who bought it had no taste."