Vai's head throbbed violently, almost believing for a split second that she was waking up to her duplex with Nora, and simply suffering from another stress induced headache. She finally gained control over her vision, gazing around her surroundings in an attempt to analyze her location. She felt dread and grief envelop her as she realized what she had experienced wasn't a nightmare. Her throat swelled, and sorrow hit her like a brick wall, as thoughts of waking up to Nora reassuring her after a nightmare infiltrated her mind; thoughts of Krahn playfully whining about getting up early for work. Tears spilled out of her eyes, suddenly feeling overwhelmed by the situation she and her friends had been coerced into.
"Vai? Vai!" Krahn's fuzzy voice broke through her trance, causing her tears to subside only slightly. "Hey, are you there?" Mano's voice intruded as well, causing her eyelids to flutter open slightly, meeting his gaze. "Mano?" Vai murmured, her yellow eyes glazed as they locked with Mano's crimson ones. He smiled slightly at her, but then it immediately disappeared when Nora noticed it. Vai's head was in Mano's warm hands and she was somewhat lazily laying on top of him while he cradled her head. His thumb brushed against her cheek in a small attempt to coax her back into the waking world.
"So you're finally up! Thank the heavens, we were worried sick about you!" Krahn interjected, poking his head into Vai's peripheral vision. "What happened?" Vai mumbled, turning her head slightly so it could rest more comfortably in Mano's hand, making him blush slightly. "You were talking to loverboy here," Krahn began, before Mano responded to that pseud with a growl and provoked a nervous chuckle from Krahn. "Ahem, Mano, before you had a coughing fit and passed out," Krahn finished, crossing his arms as he looked down at a half conscious Vai. "You said something before you did though, what was it?" he chimed, his cyan eyes sparkling with curiosity.
"Iso," Mano answered, almost grimly. "Iso Dunar? Isn't he the guy that overthrew the government a while back?" Nora asked from the room over, sounding dumbfounded even from a distance. "Yes, he is," Mano answered bluntly, apparently not finishing his sentence. Krahn stiffened at Mano's sudden silence, seemingly anticipating him to mention his and Vai's visit with the infamous Octarian. Mano glanced at Krahn, making eye contact with him for only a moment and then staring back down at Vai once more.
"Mano," Vai whined quietly, snuggling deeper into his lap. "Vai, stop," Mano whispered quickly, sounding alarmed and growing more flustered as moments passed. Krahn laughed hysterically at this notion, toppling over on his back. "Shut up Krahn!" Mano snarled, glaring daggers at the cackling octoling. "Don't go pitching a tent now! You know we don't have nighttime around here, why would we camp out?" Krahn jeered, laughing again and snorting at his own joke. Mano only huffed angrily as a response, desperately attempting to reach his hands further under Vai's head to move it.
"Hey guys, is Vai awake yet?" Nora came strolling in from the neighboring train cart with C.Q. Cumber trailing after her. "Oh, she definitely will be in a minute if Mano doesn't move her head out of his radius," Krahn once again interjected. "I said shut up!" Mano whisper-shouted back at him, visibly flushed now as he gently held her head in his hands, notably a safe distance from his lower region. Nora giggled at the interaction, apparently aware of the issue.
"She's kind of awake," Mano finally answered slowly, somewhat uncertain of himself and rightfully so. It was difficult to tell while she was in that state. Mano gently lifted her head up above his lap and placed it on his knee to rest there as he sat cross-legged on the tiled floor. Vai trembled slightly, seemingly bothered by something while mumbling inaudibly.
"Vai, I've chosen to follow you during your journey," Iso's voice echoed within her mind once again, making her shudder. "W-what? Why? How?" Vai thought, muttering pathetically as her thoughts crumbled. "Well, firstly, when you fell into my dwelling, you cut your forearm and a small portion of my ink got into it. This allowed me to infect you," Iso answered, simply as always. "Odd, but why do you even feel obligated to tag along?" Vai asked quietly, her voice slowly becoming clearer, but to her friends' alarm, her half-lidded eyes remained glazed over. "I thought I didn't break my skin when I fell," Vai replied, uncertain of Iso's claim. "Oh, you must not have noticed then. You weren't bleeding, but there was an open wound," Iso reaffirmed, sounding confident in himself. Vai didn't have the willpower to lift up her arm and inspect it, but she trusted his judgement regardless.
"You need to wake up now, alright? Your friends are expecting you," Iso concluded. Vai didn't respond. "Any time I wish to communicate with you, I will temporarily take over a small portion of your mind. No worries though, I don't plan on controlling you completely, since I have no reason to do so. There isn't enough ink in your system for me to do even if I did want to," Iso added that last part almost playfully, but with his usual foreboding tone. "Awaken to them," Iso finally ordered.
Vai flinched back to full consciousness, her eyes snapping open as she finally regained complete control over her senses. "Vai!" Nora squeaked happily, rushing toward her and clutching her tightly. Vai smiled gently, starting to calm down after her unusual interaction. "What happened?" Krahn asked, obviously worried but seemingly trying to cover it up with his joyful attitude. Vai paused before she answered, wondering if she should tell them about Iso.
"Don't. This is between you and I," it seemed like her own mind didn't generate this thought, but as if more than one person was in her head. She assumed it was Iso communicating with her in a subconscious way and she remained silent. What was weird about this was that she didn't hear his voice, but the sentence came like a normal thought out of her own mind which made her contemplate the ways Iso could communicate with her. "Must've taken the exercise pretty badly or something, I'm not sure," Vai muttered, rubbing her temples slightly and trying to distract herself and her friends from her lie.
"Are you sure?" Mano's deep reassuring voice sounded from above her head, causing her to look upward at him and Nora to release her grip on her. Vai smiled slightly as she made eye contact with the other octoling, causing him to glance off to the side slightly. He seemed embarrassed about something, but Vai couldn't recall what it could've been. "You look flustered," Vai commented quietly, trying to keep her voice out of earshot from the other two Octarians beside them. Mano didn't respond. He only turned his head further to the side to avoid eye contact. Krahn giggled slightly, apparently holding back laughter. Vai was confused but didn't prod any more, mostly out of concern for Mano.
"Never mind that, we need to see if we accomplish anything else soon," Mano muttered, his gaze still pinned to the wall. "Right! Let's get out of here ASAP," Krahn chimed, appearing to be enthusiastic at Vai's return. "Alright," Vai murmured in agreement, sitting up now and meeting the gazes of the two octolings in front of her. They both smiled at her, standing up. Vai stood with them along with Mano, who was behind her.
"So, C.Q., which challenges are left on the list right now?" Nora asked, looking down at him. "You have only unlocked line A at the moment. After completing your first task, you have unlocked two new options. You can go left or right," C.Q. finished, looking at the four expectantly. "What stations are they?" Mano asked, impatience present in his eager tone. "Roll Out station and Bounce With Me station," C.Q. answered. "Roll out station?" Nora asked. "Yes, the four of you will have to dodge barricades of sorts and defeat enemies at this station," he began. "Is that it?" she pressed, skeptical of the simplicity of the task at hand. "No, it is not. All of you must use the special weapon 'baller' in order to complete this," C.Q. finished, leaving the group shocked.
"Only a special weapon?" Krahn echoed, dumbfounded, much like each of his teammates. "Indeed," C.Q. confirmed, gazing upon the starstruck Octarians standing before him. "And about the other one?" Vai queried, sounding more curious than afraid. "Essentially the same idea, but you all will have a blaster as a weapon and you all will be on bounce pads for the majority of the test," C.Q. explained to her, observing the facial muscles of the other octolings starting to relax slightly. All of them were silent, taking their time to process the information handed to them.
"Let's try the Roll Out station," Mano suddenly said, causing everyone else to snap out of their train of thought. "What? We didn't decide together," Vai attempted to interject, concern present in her voice, but Mano cut her off. "Any objections?" The room was quiet. After a few more moments of uncomfortable silence, Mano spoke once more. "Roll Out it is then," Mano concluded, picking up the CQ-80 that was left on the seat behind where he stood. He switched it on and the large screen projected in front of the four of them. He flicked the joystick to the left and clicked down on the new station, causing the train to slow to a stop. Almost immediately after, it started back up and seemed to start moving according to a different route to accommodate the selected station.
The four Octarians sat down, eagerly waiting for their destination, while C.Q. returned to the front of the train. After what seemed to be a few minutes, the train finally screeched to a stop and they all stepped out to the new test, and with an entirely different setting. C.Q. got off of the train with them and stood in the corner, wishing them luck whenever they gave him an uncertain look.
They all took a deep breath and pressed the button to launch them all forward. All four of them catapulted out of the cubicle, landing on a checkpoint and a baller encasing them as they landed on a platform. Soon after, a timer appeared high above them, reading one minute. "What the hell?!" Krahn yelled, panicking at the sight of it towering above them. "I guess we're timed, let's go!" Vai replied quickly, rolling ahead of her teammates.
She rolled onto the dash tracks ahead of them, which caused her to shoot even further ahead onto the next platform. The other three followed her with a brisk pace, the timer making all of their minds go haywire. "Those platforms are moving," Vai remarked quickly, alerting her teammates as they approached. They all let out a huff as they heaved themselves onto the next platforms, now afraid of falling off, but still being careful to not bump into each other. "We can't save each other if we fall, so we just have to be careful! We can't afford to have anyone fall behind with the timer going, and time doesn't have a kind heart," Vai shouted back again, still considerably far ahead of everyone else and apparently not struggling as much with it as much as her other friends. They all managed to get across, finding another dash track and jumping onto it. Vai had already been very far ahead of them. When her other three comrades heard an explosion come from in front of them and a sea of pink ink splash into the air, they all panicked and rushed forward.
"Vai? Are you," "Let's go," Vai cut off Krahn's worried call, the baller encasing her once more, which confused the other Octarians by her side. "What happened?" Mano asked, staring at the new baller around her. "I manually detonated it. There was a sanitized octotrooper there. I assume we will be seeing many more of those as we go along," Vai explained quickly. "Now let's go, time isn't on our side," she commanded once more, rushing forward to more dash tracks ahead of them.
"Wait, wait! That's just a wall!" Krahn yelled, staring at the tall barricade in front of them. "Then we climb," Vai responded, flying forward and sticking to the wall, which shocked the rest of her teammates.
"Here we go," Nora grimaced, bracing for impact. Surprisingly to her and everyone else, the plastic absorbed the impact and they didn't feel any pain. While Vai was blazing upward, the other three were desperately trying to pull themselves upward. Nora was starting to slip, apparently exhausted. "Nora, come on, you can't fall!" Krahn screamed, still pushing forward with all of his might. "I- I'm sorry," Nora heaved, almost sounding like a sob. "Detonate! Right now Nora!" Krahn shouted, seeming desperate for a solution. "Krahn, what the hell are you doing?" Mano shouted, almost reaching the top where Vai already waited impatiently. Nora only groaned as her baller exploded and her body fell toward the abyss below them. Krahn had detonated his own baller at the exact same time and grabbed her wrist as they both fell. Krahn's baller encased the both of them now as it reappeared and it clung to the wall by a thread before Krahn pushed it upward with all of his strength. Krahn eventually made it to the top with about 20 seconds left to spare. When they both reached the checkpoint, it finally activated and added a generous thirty seconds to the timer.
"Thank goodness it adds time," Vai sighed, pushing forward once again. "How will she get out of there?" Mano asked Krahn, starting to trail closely after Vai. "I'll take care of her until we get out of here. She's like a twig, she can't handle much," Krahn answered, following behind Vai closely as well. "Isn't the baller heavier?" Mano pressed, apparently irritated with him. "Didn't I just tell you? She's a twig, she weighs almost nothing. Don't worry! Let's go," Krahn replied, leaving Mano behind as he stared.
"Vai, what's that?" Krahn asked, terrified as a massive stick, turning clockwise, was hurtling towards them. "Ink stick. We can jump on top of it with the baller, but it would kill us if we hit it ourselves without armor on. Keep calm and stay on," Vai answered quickly, promptly challenging it and jumping on top of it. It flung her upward and almost off of the platform, making Krahn gasp as he watched, but he sighed with relief when she fell to the other side of the stick.
"Eek!" Krahn yelped, jumping over the stick and bouncing on it for a moment, nearly falling into the void below him, but thankfully making it over. Mano trailed behind him, seemingly eager to get out of the way of the stick.
Vai, still far ahead of everyone else, jumped onto another wall, this one instead having dash tracks on it to lessen the difficulty of the climb. Krahn and Mano both followed her and hurried when they saw the ink stick coming back around. They landed on yet again, another smaller platform, with another wall towering above them and an ink stick swinging just above Vai's head. Vai let out a short yelp, startled by the ink stick that was previously concealed by the wall directly in front of her.
The four finally reached the top of the wall to another platform and miniature maze of ink sticks. There were two now, both of which were rotating clockwise. A narrow platform was in between them, only leaving an empty space for the group to pass through for a few moments, before one ink stick or the other would fly toward them and smack them off of it to their doom. Vai already plowed ahead of the rest of the group and was far past them now. Mano got ahead of Krahn and was approaching the ink sticks with confidence. He leapt on top of one and flung himself forward as quickly as he could manage in order to escape the other ink stick that was fast approaching. He didn't really seem to like this level very much.
Krahn reluctantly followed, wanting to avoid the ink sticks all together. He paused for a moment, waiting for them to be out of the way completely and sped forward after both Mano and Vai, blazing past the two sticks and avoiding impact and confrontation with either of the two.
He landed down next to Vai and Mano and a ringing sound echoed throughout the area, signifying that this was their last checkpoint. Krahn sighed in relief at the sound of it and noticed another thirty seconds was added to the timer. While Nora was only barely conscious, Krahn and the others briefly observed what was before them. Moving platforms along with another pair of ink sticks on both sides of them. "Well shit, isn't that dandy," Krahn grumbled, pulling at his face out of stress. "Krahn, stop that, we have to keep going, we're almost done," Vai called, starting to rush towards the platforms once again. Krahn groaned and pushed forward, remembering Nora's state and making keeping her safe his priority and his motivation.
"Just keep focus, okay? We've got this," Vai called again, still bouncing ahead. Mano seemed lost in thought, trying his best to avoid falling and hitting the ink sticks simultaneously. "Gotcha," Krahn yelled back, uncertainty blatant in his quivering voice. "All we have to do is aim for those moving dash tracks up ahead and get to the data point!" Vai shouted, already almost reaching them, with Krahn and Mano close behind. "Octotroopers!" Vai warned, already detonating her baller along with Mano. There were four at the bottom, all of them alarmed at the sight of the three ballers flying above them. Both Vai and Mano's ballers exploded at the same time, terminating any octotrooper that was already there, and unlocking the data point. "Finally!" Krahn sighed, as Mano rushed forward to collect it, and complete the test.
After a few more moments, the train appeared in front of the group, its deafening roar bringing a strange sense of relief to them all, knowing that it was all finally over. Even with the arrival of the train, and about fifteen seconds left on the timer, Nora was still unresponsive.
They all boarded the train, Krahn carrying Nora inside. C.Q. came to greet them, seemingly pleased at their performance. "Congratulations on passing your second test. You're all doing a wonderful job," he remarked, commending the four on their hard work. "Thank you," Vai replied, smiling under her simple black cloth mask. "When is our next test?" Mano asked quickly, attempting to mask his eagerness to rid himself of his nerves. "Well, you all have unlocked a new station and you can complete that test, or the Bounce With Me station," C.Q. answered. "There isn't necessarily a time limit that you have to complete these tasks though, so you can take your time if you'd like. It all depends on how much of a hurry you and your friends are in to reach the promised land," C.Q. finished, looking up at Mano. Mano pondered for a moment, coming off as frustrated when he came to the conclusion that there won't be as much action as he anticipated. "Alright," Mano finally said, nodding to C.Q.
C.Q. nodded back to them and returned back to the front of the train, while the three octolings sat down on the benches – Nora in Krahn's arms – and waited for their next trial.