Authors' Note: Man, I can't believe it's been over a year and a half since my last update. This chapter has been sitting quite completed in my Google Drive for even longer than that. I do quite enjoy writing this well ahead of publishing, and then rereading every so often to check for errors. Well, this fic has recently popped back into my brain, and I'm feeling inspired, so here we finally finish up Door [2]. Hope y'all enjoy it.
Nonary Game: Resonance
(Current path: 52)
(Suggested listening: Data)
"Topaz." Leo's voice cut through the ice that had crept into the edges of Robin's psyche, grounding him back into the present. "You good?"
"Yeah," he answered, giving his eyes a serious squeeze before continuing toward the composite. He sighed internally, adding the voices to the growing list of problems to solve sometime later.
"Yes, this has gotta be it!" Leo said, admiring the composite again. "There are eight people on it, and each has an eight letter name. If we factor in the clue on the banner…"
"One from one, two from two…" Robin recited, the lightbulb in his head slowly illuminating. He retrieved his notebook again, looking at the names beneath the images. He read them slowly, writing each name down below the previous into a square of letters. "OBURIDEN, THYMINXE, KREUTWEV, ALEGHAXT, KHIVTROR, PHRUMITE, KATBELXY, PONTVIES."
"What do we get if we take the first letter of the first one, and… so on?"
Robin circled the diagonal of his square, finally admitting the resultant word was too difficult to pronounce. "OHEGTIXS," he spelled. "We'd better get this to the assistant's computer." He let Leo go first, as he wanted a bit of distance to continue processing what he'd heard in the back of his mind. Clutching his notebook firmly in both hands, he followed a few seconds later.
"Alright," Leo said. The voice said something about Door [2], Robin thought. "If you wanna go ahead and type that, that's all you." So whoever said it must be familiar with the Nonary Game. "You better keep it in all caps. Passwords are case sensitive." Wait… all of these have just been in my head… "There we go." Oh god, I think I'm going insane. "Uh, Topaz?" But I never had anything like this happen before today… maybe it's just a side effect of whatever they drugged me with. "Bro." Whose voice was that?
Robin was shaken from his thoughts by a soft bonk to the back of the head. "Hey," he called, insulted. "Who said you could slap me?"
"Dude, you were majorly zoned out," Leo answered, crossing his arms. "When you were typing, your eyes were all blank, like you were a robot or something. You didn't even look at your sheet, which was a little creepy. Unless you memorized it or whatever."
Ignoring the judgements with a glare, Robin prodded the Enter key, advancing the screen to a short welcome message. A loading spinner came up then, circling for several seconds, almost long enough for Robin to consider slipping back into thought, but he highly doubted Leo would appreciate that. Thus, he drummed his fingers on the desk, waiting for the monitor to display something new.
In that time, Lucky joined them, plopping the remaining files atop the tabletop calendar. "I figure we'll need these more out here than in there. I mean, I hope we're finished in there. It feels like we've been in this room long enough."
"Let's see what the computer says," Robin said in singsong, continuing to drum his fingers. Finally, they heard a small ding of acceptance, and they were greeted immediately by a document. Each line began with a different letter of the alphabet, followed by a class name.
Lucky began to read them aloud, perhaps unconsciously. "R: Literature. N: History. W: Algebra. T: History. K: Algebra…"
"Yeah, we get the point, bud," Leo interrupted. "No point saying all of them aloud if we can just read them off."
"Too bad these aren't in order, though," Robin groaned. "That's gonna make looking for the right letters a hassle." With a sigh, he flipped open the top file, the one named Lytre, and glanced at the schedule field. "R, T, Q, K," he read. Fortunately enough, three of those letters were at the very top of the reference document, and Robin filled in the class names at the bottom of Lytre's file.
"Well?" Leo asked.
"Looks like Lytre's schedule goes Literature, History, Chemistry, Algebra."
"Oh!" Lucky called, reaching a hand underneath their vest. "I still have that memorandum from earlier, the one with the correct order of classes."
"Oh yeah, what was it?" Robin asked as Lucky smoothed the sheet open again.
"Literature, Algebra, Chemistry, History."
"So Lytre is right out," Leo said, a ghost of a grin warming his face.
"Moving on to Sbarrebi," Robin continued.
"No, dude," Leo responded. "That's definitely a fake Italian name, and we roll our r's. Sbarrebi," he continued, curling a hand in the air before him.
"That was rather beautiful," Lucky lauded.
"...Right." Robin highly doubted Leo could prove the fake name hadn't come from some other fake nation, but he felt his time would be better spent checking the next file. "His schedule is H, P, W, B."
"Oh, there. H is Literature," Leo pointed.
"Yeah, but… P is Chemistry. This one's a no too," Robin stated, crisply slapping the file atop the other failed one. "Moving on to Kobro… V, F, D, N."
"There's V. It's Literature as well. F is Algebra," Lucky stated.
"Yep, and D, N, right there," Leo added, leaning toward the screen. "Chemistry, History. It's perfect."
"So, this is our guy," Robin said, holding up the folder proudly.
"Let's not get too carried away just yet," Lucky warned. "We might as well check the other one to see if it's got the right schedule too."
"That seems like it wouldn't make any sense," Robin debated. "Why would our kidnapper leave us between two possible correct files? There aren't any other clues with information that we could use to decide between them, so we'd have to just hope that we guess right."
Lucky smiled, which was hardly what Robin had been expecting. "Humor me."
With a sigh, Robin conceded and pulled open Moguziden's file, although he decided only to read it in his head. "S is Literature…" Admittedly, he would have liked to have the others' assistance, but they could damn well read the file over his shoulder if they really wanted to. "K is Algebra…" Alas, neither of them said a word, presumably as they assumed Robin had wanted to take on this minor challenge on his own. "J is Chemistry…" A small pulsation in his gut told him the last letter just before he found it. "U is History."
"So, the truth comes out," Lucky quipped.
"Again, this doesn't make any sense." Robin spun around in the chair with both files in hand, facing Leo and Lucky. "How are we supposed to be able to tell which is the right one?" He held them up in the air, jerking his hand once for emphasis.
"Flip them on the desk," Lucky stated.
"Do what?" Robin asked.
"Flip them on the desk," Lucky repeated. "That is, put them on the desk. But flip them." Robin gave them a drawn-out stare of disbelief before slowly spinning around and placing the two folders on the desk. He flipped one of the folders over, pausing as he saw a series of symbols written on the back.
"Did you know about this?"
Lucky shrugged. "Please. What have we got?"
To Robin, it looked like the top half of a D, two circles, and a full D. Leo, however, seemed to have a different idea. "Does that say "nooD," am I reading that right? Isn't that… spelled wrong…?" Robin refused to dignify that with a response, instead flipping the other file to reveal two additional shapes similar to the first half D, although one was inverted.
"I guess we're supposed to line these two up…" The two designs were simple enough, and in no time, the word "DooR" was laid out before them. "Why do you suppose the o's are smaller than the D and R?"
"They're supposed to be lowercase, I guess," Lucky figured. "Maybe we're actually getting two messages here. "Door" and "DR" would make sense, right?"
"What are the digital roots of the two PINs?" Leo asked. Robin reopened the two files, showing the required information.
"Kobro has 2158," Robin read. 2 plus 1 plus 5 plus 8 equals 16; 1 plus 6 equals 7. "And Moguziden has 6167." 6 plus 1 plus 6 plus 7 equals 20; 2 plus 0 equals 2. Robin shared his findings with the others.
"Since Moguziden's digital root matches the door we came through, I'm betting that's the correct PIN," Lucky concluded.
"I don't know," Leo answered. "I mean, I agree, but this clue feels like it was more of a reach than anything else we've solved. You think these puzzles are getting harder?"
"We'll have to check that with the others when we see them again," Robin contended. "But it looks like we're just about out of here."
Leo and Lucky took half-steps back, allowing Robin to do the honors of opening the lockbox. Inhaling deeply for no apparent reason, he typed in "6167," thrilled to see it immediately replaced by "OPEN." Indeed, the panel veered open, revealing its contents. As expected, it contained a standard metal key, which certainly was for the exit, but Robin noticed the bow had been engraved on both sides with an "R."
"That's gotta be this room's letter," Leo said. Robin briefly recalled the letters they'd found in the last three rooms, all of which Leo had been with him for. Looks like our kidnapper isn't content to just puzzle us in these puzzle rooms. He scribbled the letter into his notebook, finally closing it up and returning it to his bag.
The lockbox had also been containing another card key, its obverse imprinted with a bold "2" and its reverse with a clean stripe. "This must help us shortly after we leave this room," Robin figured. "Hopefully the other teams are all finishing up in similar time." He pocketed the card key, holding up the metal key with satisfaction.
"Alright, time's a-wasting," Lucky said. "Let's book it."
With a click and a turn, the door out of the main office was opened.
However, the three found themselves somewhere familiar. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me," Leo deadpanned.
"Well," Lucky sighed. "That explains why they didn't let us see through the glass. It would have been pretty depressing." Robin easily agreed. Again, the trio found themselves in the foyer of the school, the room they'd been in up until passing through Door [2]. Uncharacteristically, Robin found himself speechless. How are we supposed to progress now?
There was no sign that either of the other teams had passed through the area, and Robin was unsure whether that was a good sign. On the one hand, if they'd been standing there loitering, that would likely mean the numbered doors had lead them in circles. However, the possibility remained that Doors [1] and [6] had indeed moved the game forward while Door [2] had been a circular option. In spite of the short time he'd spent thinking, the option gnawed at Robin's brain. If Door [2] was not supposed to separate them from the rest of the group, why hadn't it lead them into the main office first? He assumed the auditorium was closer to the back of the school, where he figured everyone else would have ended up.
"We're not getting anywhere standing here," Leo muttered, his call to action failing to mask his minimal conviction. Nevertheless, he broke the plane of the door and beckoned the other two to follow him, turning left to head for the numbered doors.
There was little of interest to see on the way up the small staircase, and Robin gave only passing glances to the area around him to ensure that nothing had changed since their departure. In no time, the crew arrived in front of Door [2], where Leo had stopped. Unmoving, he stared at the door for a few seconds, as though his mind was trying to hatch up a plan.
Robin stepped forward after a moment, drawing the 2 key card from his pocket and holding it up to the RED. It didn't react in any noticeable way, which Robin supposed he should have expected.
Leo grabbed one of the door handles, giving it a tug to ensure it remained locked. He then thwacked his left hand against the panel of the RED, which gave a beep and lit up with a single asterisk. "Leo, there's no point," Lucky said, bluntly.
"I'm not trying to open it," Leo retorted. "I was just seeing if anything changed after we went through it." Robin wasn't quite sure that had been Leo's plan, but he offered no further rebuttal. "There are no damn… other doors around here that we didn't go through?"
"Besides Door [6]," Lucky answered, their usual sarcasm absent.
"Shit," Leo mumbled, absentmindedly slapping the wall beside him.
"Maybe we should look around the bend, back where that first staircase was," Robin suggested. "That's the only other place I can think that anything could have happened." Leo extended an upward palm as if to invite Robin to go ahead with his plan, and soon the three were jogging back down the hallway that had first brought them into the foyer, perhaps only two hours earlier.
As they passed the bathroom Robin had explored with Ian, they found themselves staring at a brand new branch of hallway. "This looks promising," Lucky stated, amused.
"What…?" Robin whispered. He had been quite sure the area had been blocked off by a metal wall… As he neared the gap, he saw that he had not been mistaken. The blockade which originally spanned the width of the hallway had swung entirely open, nestling the left wall and allowing further passage. "How is this open now?"
"It must have been one of the other teams, right?" Leo suggested.
"That's impossible," Robin replied. "When I was here with Ian, there were no input devices around here that someone could have triggered."
"Well, then it must have been triggered remotely," Lucky said, as though that clarification made the situation any more reasonable. "Perhaps one of the teams had a switch that opened this wall from whatever rooms they searched, but that too seems a bit farfetched. That leaves me with one other theory."
"...Don't keep us waiting," Leo chided.
"It's simple," Lucky continued. "Our kidnapper set it up this way. Perhaps us passing through the doors lead to this hallway opening up. Or, if none of the other teams have been through here, maybe it was just going through Door [2]." Their idea was a bit disconcerting, and Robin wondered why the game would have been set up to proceed in such a fashion, but it made more sense than any alternative explanation, so there was no reason not to accept it for the time being.
"In any case," Leo said, "we've spent plenty of time standing around in confusion. Let's just see if any of these doors open."
Robin jogged to the right wall, checking the first door beyond the precipice of the blockade. Its handle refused to budge, making him curious of how many more times he'd experience the same phenomenon before they escaped. "They're all probably jammed," Lucky sighed.
They seemed to be correct for the majority of the hallway. The three passed a large set of windows, which had naturally been completely painted over. "I wonder what's out there," Robin muttered.
"Huh?" Leo asked.
Robin twitched slightly, not expecting the other man to be so close behind him. "Oh, nothing." He continued forward, jogging past the windows until he again reached a door.
After less than a minute of searching, the group found themselves capped off by another metal barricade. However, they no longer seemed to be trapped. To their right was a set of wooden double doors, and on the wall beside it was a small card reader. "I think we know what goes there," Lucky said with a smile. "Topaz, if you will."
Equally glad to see their earlier fears were unfounded, Robin stuck the 2 key card in the reader, which activated. The click of the doors unlocking was immediately followed by Lucky tugging them open. "Not fast enough for ya?" Robin teased.
"Ah, sorry. Just got a little bit excited there." Alas, much to the joy of the trio, the doors granted them passage into another stairwell, strictly leading upwards. "I guess that's all for floor 1."
"I kind of want to check to see if this door locks behind us too," Leo said. He went to remove the key card but found himself unable. "Oh. Well, that answers that question. I don't see why they put a stripe on the back if it's just gonna be used like a chip card."
"At least we have a way to get back down here if we need to," Robin stated. As he started his way up the steps, he continued. "So, assuming we run into everyone else when we get upstairs, that would mean the only area we don't have any access to would be that hallway we all woke up in." He wasn't sure the information was terribly relevant, but he hoped that remembering it would assist in solving the larger puzzle behind the entire game.
"Everyone ready?" Lucky asked as they reached the top of the stairs. Robin and Leo nodded, inviting them to push the doors open to see what was in store for them on floor 2.
Standing in a loose cluster within sight of the stairwell were the other six participants, looking rather like they'd stopped in the middle of their trek forward. It was likely the opening of the door had given them pause, but they eased upon seeing their group was now completed. Although the emotions on everyone's faces seemed to range from joy to simple serenity, knowing that they were all still safe and in positive spirits was a warming feeling.
"That's round two, huh," Cody mused.
"Yeah, yeah," Boxcars answered. "Hopefully we're getting pretty close to being done with all these puzzles."
"How long have you all been up here waiting for us?" Leo asked.
"Not too long," Ian reassured. "We were actually just heading down this hallway for the first time. Did you all see anything interesting down that way?"
Robin figured he couldn't have been talking about the hall, since he'd just seen them enter it for the first time. He glanced awkwardly back into the stairwell behind him, wondering if that's what Ian meant. "Uh… not really. The only thing that's different is our way back in front of the last set of numbered doors is open."
"Really," Boxcars said, his face showing a modest mix of amusement and surprise. "Well, that's news. We can all get back into our escape rooms no problem, but that's not news, and I don't know why you'd wanna do that."
"If we can get back to floor 1," Basilio started, "then that means the key in the bathroom is still accessible. Perhaps there is a chance we will find another way to get back to floor 0 as well."
"Before we do that, I just wanted to ask," Robin said, holding up one hand. "Basilio actually just reminded me of this by mentioning the keys. Did anyone find any other keys since we split up?"
"Actually…" Ian said, reaching within his suit. He withdrew a simple key, holding it out on an extended palm for the Door [2] crew to see. "We've got another Mercury one. We found it behind Door [6]." He offered no further explanation, so Robin figured the details weren't important.
Alas, it seemed his companions didn't feel the same way. "What have you been up to past that door?" Leo asked.
Ian scratched his head in absent thought. "Well, first we went through the machine shop, which was interesting, I guess. Didn't expect to see one of those in the middle of the building. Then we had the courtyard, and… here we are."
"What about you guys?" Leo asked, turning to those who'd gone through Door [1].
"We searched a room with the pool first and then a basketball court," Delta answered. It initially struck Robin as odd that he hadn't spoken until this point, but he then noticed the man's scarf was now accompanied by a towel. Seeming to sense Robin's glance, he added: "You can guess who went in the pool. But, we did find another one of those keys as well."
"Which one?" Lucky asked.
"It has the triangle on a cross symbol, like the one in the bathroom on floor 1," Delta said, fishing in the pocket of his pants, which Robin realized were perhaps a bit tight for him. However, he managed to quickly display the key in a similar fashion to Ian, who had retracted his arm but kept his palm upright.
"So that's two of each key, then," Robin stated.
"What do you bet our kidnapper has there be a third of each one," Lucky chuckled. "That way there's nine keys. That would suit the Nonary Game, huh?" No one else seemed to think their idea was terribly amusing, but that did little to deter them.
"Who did we decide is hangin' on to all the keys?" Boxcars asked.
"Eh, that would be me," Robin coughed. Both of the keys he'd been handed seemed to be a random choice, but there was no sense in having them split up in the future. Why did everyone agree to let me have them? Clearly no one considered Robin a threat or a flight risk, which he supposed was for the better, even if he felt a bit insulted.
"Great," Ian said, seeming happy to entrust his key to someone else. Delta said nothing as the two handed their finds to Robin, instead giving him an unreadably neutral stare. "Well, I guess we'd better get to moving forward, huh? Let's see what we can find."