Hey guys! Whooooohooooo we are at 25 reviews! *fireworks* Thank you guys, it means so much!
Guest reply Wolfgirl916: I know what you mean. So many stories have Rapunzel not be very useful. I've try not to do that, but I'll try even harder now.
Inspiration for this chapter came from billy joe bob jr. goddin9. I used both of your ideas in this chapter. I hope it won't disappoint. (I didn't get your name wrong. The program is stupid and won't let me type it in right.)
Here we are with your new chapter! ENJOY!
The floor was the face of a giant clock. It was fifty feet in diameter, at the center was the spindle. They appeared to be standing on the hour hand that was jetting out beneath them, the minute hand was moving away from them. The time line wrapped around the spindle, at the top, it shot out to twelve different doors.
The doors, that was going to be complicated. Merida looked at the door they had just came out of. The hour hand was pointing at the twelve. She scanned the rest of the doors, they all were pointing at the next number. She let out a sigh. It wasn't going to be quite as hard as she thought. There were vertical wood beams at the top of each door. There were some kind of mechanisms attached to them. As she followed them up with her eyes she gasped. They were trapped in a humungous hourglass! The wood beams all connected, going at an angle at the curve, forming a trap door. Above said trap door, through the small funnel, was the most sand Merida had ever seen.
"Look out!" Hiccup called.
Merida snapped back to attention. The minute hand had come back around, heading strait for them!
She hit the deck. Hiccup and Rapunzel beside her. She noticed for the first time, small bumps separating each hour. There was a thin slip down the middle. An orange light was seeping out.
The minute hand passed over them. Two things happened. One, the hour hand moved out from underneath them, and they rolled on the floor. Two, some of Merida's hair on the back of her head was sliced off. She couldn't see how much, but she could most definitely feel it.
They all stood up. Jack came back to the ground. They all watched the minute hand speed away.
"It's going really fast." Hiccup said, "That was thirty seconds."
"Wait, two questions. You actually kept count? And what do you mean thirty seconds?" Jack baffled.
"Always count how many seconds it takes for someone to come back around. That's how a blacksmith knows if something's balanced. Under most circumstances-"
"Answer the next question please." Jack interrupted.
"It swung back after thirty seconds. If we're not careful, it might cause us some major harm."
"But this is a clock." Jack argued, "It's supposed to go for sixty seconds."
"How am I supposed to know that!? We don't have these machines on Berk! I don't know how they work."
"It doesn't matter how it works! We need to find which door to go through." Merida voiced herself.
Everyone looked at her. Rapunzel noticed the back of her head.
"Oh my gosh! Merida your hair!"
Merida instinctively touched the spot where the hand a cut. Then she became self conscious about the fact that Hiccup was staring at it. She pushed the feeling down as the minute hand, once again, came at them.
Its passing came a little bit easier, now they were expecting it, and knew how to handle it. They recovered much faster.
"How about the door now." Jack suggested. He scanned every door and scratched his head. "Which number were we on?"
"Ten." Rapunzel replied immediately.
Merida looked over to the ten. If they hurried they could reach it before the minute hand reached them again.
"Come on." She ordered. She stepped to the right, and regretted the action.
The small light she had noticed earlier leaped up six feet. It went from orange to red. She felt an invisible wall. It rippled like water, distorting her vision.
She immediately stepped back. But it was to late. The trap door opened part way. Spilling sand into their half of the hourglass.
"We need to go around." Rapunzel said hastily. "We can't break the time flow."
"And we should probably try to beat the hour hand back." Jack concluded. "I have a feeling that this won't go well for us if it finishes its cycle. And we have about four minutes."
"Make that three and a-half." Hiccup corrected as the minute hand passed.
They hurried through the first two hours without much resistance from the light walls, which popped up when they passed over them. The color turning from orange to a mild yellow. But the third wall gave Jack a fight.
"Why is this so much harder for me than you guys?" He complained.
"Well, it might be relevant to what happened in the room." Rapunzel thought aloud. "In the third room we entered, it was all lava. You almost died."
Jack finally morphed through. "Good idea as any."
"If she's right." Said Merida. "This is going to take longer than we thought."
Rapunzel's theory proved to be correct. As they tried to pass the next hour, both Jack and Hiccup had great difficulty getting through. Courtesy of the buzzing that had taken over their brains.
They had less than three minutes. They'd almost caught up to the hour hand. They lost precious time when they tried to pass the sixth hour.
"Hurry it up Hiccup." Merida pestered.
"I'm sorry, but as you can see this stuff doesn't like the fact that I almost got my brain fried. According to you anyway."
"For the love of..." Merida placed her right hand on his left hand. It was the only part of him that was almost through. She got a firm grip and pulled. She felt the resistance it was giving Hiccup. It almost made her let go. But she refused, and pulled him through. They ducked down at the coming of the minute hand, both breathing heavy.
"Thanks." Hiccup gave her a small smile.
"Don't mention it." She smiled back. She felt a flutter in her stomach. Her heart rate increased a tiny bit. She killed the smile and slapped him on the shoulder. Barely managing to stop herself from turning pink.
The sand had crawled up to their calves. It was starting to slow them down.
They all hesitated when they realized what wall they were up against. The horrid visions were next. Things of their futures for three of them.
Jack stepped up first. Encouraging the others to do so.
Merida felt the full force of the wall. The sensation was very strange. Like trying to push her way through a stone wall. But the stone kept turning from rock to butter, making it hard one moment, then almost falling forward from effort, then back to hard.
When they finally broke through, the minute hand was right on them. They barely managed to get under in time. Even then Merida heard Rapunzel give a small cry. She turned in concern, worried the blade had caught her hair. But instead, there was a cut on Rapunzel's arm. She must have put it up instinctively when the blade passed over. Merida could see that it wasn't deep, just a nick compared to some of the things she'd seen. But Rapunzel had probably never had a actual injury before in her life.
Jack was immediately beside her. "Let me see."
"It's not bad." She was trying to mask her pain. But she was failing terribly.
Jack gently began to wrap Rapunzel's hair around the wound. But Rapunzel stopped him.
"We don't have the time."
Merida was impressed by Rapunzel's willingness to deal with a bleeding arm until they were all to safety. The girl was stronger than she looked.
They passed the hour that had the bubbles with ease. Merida couldn't resist a smile at the fun they'd had. She'd have to introduce the idea of bubbles to her brothers when she got back.
If I get back. She had tried to avoid thinking of the reality of the situation. This was a mission, they were supposed to fight an evil time lord. There was a chance she wouldn't survive, that none of them would. They were picked for the fact that they could defeat Uncle Time. She had been picked because she was going to be a hero, not because she was one now.
She made herself not think bad thoughts. She would survive, and she would return to her family. She'd seen her future. Sure it wasn't happy, but at least she had one.
The sand was up to their knees. Soon, it would be very hard to duck when the minute hand passed.
The last obstacle was before them. Merida wondered how hard it would be to go through the last wall. The hadn't completed the room yet, would it just let them pass? Or would it make them fight for passage? She waded through the sand and pressed her hand a against the wall of light. Instead of the mellow yellow, it turned bright red, as it did when she had attempted to go backwards.
"How are we going to get through?" Rapunzel asked.
"I guess I'll have to fly you guys over." Jack pondered the thought. Then he added. "If that's even possible."
"We don't have the time!" Merida exclaimed. The sand was crawling up her thigh as she spoke.
"I have an idea!" Rapunzel said suddenly. "We need to get out of this sand."
"How?" Hiccup inquired. "There's no way that Jack can hold all of us."
"He just needs to take one of us. More specifically one of you two." She pointed to Hiccup and Merida.
"I'll take Merida." Jack requested.
"Fine."
The minute hand passed over again. Merida pushed herself against the sand. She felt the breeze it made as it brushed her hair and a little more of it came off.
They had one minute left before the hour hand would reach the twelve. They had to do this fast.
Jack pulled himself out of the sand with a wind that came out of nowhere. Then he moved next to Merida. She placed her arms around his shoulders. As the wind pulled them up, he put his arm around her waist, making sure she wouldn't fall if she lost her grip.
Rapunzel threw her hair into the air. It wrapped itself magically around one of the angled wood beams. She tugged once, satisfied with the resistance.
She turned to Hiccup. "Hold on tight and make sure nothing dangles."
Hiccup looked to shocked to argue. With great hesitation, he held on to Rapunzel as she climbed her hair. At first Merida thought that they were going to end up stuck in the sand. But Rapunzel hoisted them up, gaining height.
"How are you doing that lass?" Merida eyes were wide in surprise at the girl's strength.
"Doing what?" Rapunzel asked innocently.
"Climbing up a ropes worth of hair, while carrying a person, and have an injured arm?"
"I always climb my hair every morning after breakfast. Not to mention getting mother into the tower."
Jack shook his head in amazement. "Punzie, you are something."
"Wait." Hiccup looked confused. "You pull your mother into a tower with your hair?"
Merida glanced down and saw the minute hand had passed while they'd been talking. They had less than thirty seconds to get through the door.
"Well, we used to have a door when I was little. But now we use the window. It helps to keep out the ruffians and thugs."
"Guys." Merida said with forced pleasantness. "How about we get through the door before it's too late?"
The others looked at the minute hand. The clock was about to have gone in a full circle.
"Right." Rapunzel mumbled. She swung on her hair like a swing, putting her and Hiccup over the wall that was the reason they were up there in the first place.
She didn't let go until the minute hand had passed. Both her and Hiccup scrambled over to the door. The sand was almost covering the clock on it.
Then the clock struck twelve. The bell they heard was thundering. They had to cover their ears to keep themselves from going deaf. Jack and Merida almost did.
The trap door opened up completely. Sand poured in around them. The hour hand on the door was buried.
Hiccup and Rapunzel were being covered in sand. It rose quickly around them. They coughed as it tried to get in their lungs.
"Jack do something!" Merida cried in desperation.
"Do what?" Merida looked him in the eye. He didn't know what he could do. The sand would fill in. Their friends would drown if nothing was done. And nothing was all he could do.
Merida didn't know what to do either. She looked around, in one last strained hope for an answer. And she got it.
"The sand!" She basically screamed it in his ear. "Stop the sand from coming out!"
Instantly Jack fired at the funnel that allowed the passage of the sand. It froze over. As the last bit a sand trickled to the ground, Jack and Merida landed softly.
Rapunzel and Hiccup were nowhere above the sand. Both Jack and Merida ran as fast as they could to the door their friends had last been seen. And began to dig furiously.
Merida pulled Hiccup out first. He came out hacking, gasping for breath.
"What took you so long?" He wheezed.
"Sorry, next time don't get buried alive. You really need to stop getting in trouble." She chuckled as she rubbed sand out of his hair.
"I'm a Viking. What you request is really not humanly possible."
They smiled at each other. Merida felt the flutter again. But this time, she didn't push it away.
"Where's Rapunzel?"
The two of them glanced at Jack who was getting panicked. The question hung in the air. Then a hand bolted out of the sand and grasped Jack's arm. Jack pulled with all his might. Rapunzel came out of the first try.
She laid there for a little bit. Savoring the air in her lungs. When she'd gotten her fill of oxygen, she grinned from ear to ear.
"We're alive." She breathed.
They all laughed in relief. Just how true it was. They had survived a giant spinning clock hand and from drowning in sand.
"I didn't die that one time I was being attacked by a rouge flying blade, while almost drowning in quicksand!" Jack said happily. "That's one sentence I never thought I would say!"
"You'd be surprised how often that happens to Vikings." Hiccup said. They laughed, but then stopped when they saw his face. Almost thinking he was serious. Then he broke into a grin and they all laughed again.
"But I'm telling the truth." He said again.
"Oh shut up." Merida pushed him over, sticking her tongue out at him. Then she saw the look Rapunzel was giving her, and stopped.
Then Jack lifted up Rapunzel's hurt arm, and began to wrap it with her hair. She sang her song softly, only bothering to do the first verse. When she finished, both her and Jack were gazing into each others eyes. Merida and Hiccup shared a glance, both smirking.
"Well." Merida cleared her throat. "I hate to spoil the moment. But we need to be going. We're almost through, only two more rooms to go."
"Then we do what we came here for." Jack finished.
They all looked at each other as they realized, their time together was almost over. After this they would go back to their own times. They'd grown so close in the short period they've spent together. It would hurt to say goodbye.
No one wanting to break the comfortable silence, they dug until they'd reached the hour hand on the door. When the door opened, the sand spilled out from underneath them. And they went sprawling into the next room.
