The problem, as an irate Nurm jabbed out in sign language that Jesse struggled to decipher from how sharply he did it, was that Ellegaard- the baroness that they needed to get ahold of, seeing as (as Isa put it) it would be rude as hell to just barge into her city and do a bunch of magic without at least letting her know what was going on- wasn't there.
Or, rather- from what they could gather from the clerk talking to them, who was named Calvin- she was in the city, she was also just up in a thing called the Dome of Concentration.
And she wasn't coming out.
For who knew how long.
And there was no way to send messages to her.
The only way to get in was to go through the Dome of Concentration, which Calvin apparently initially protested to until Isa flatly told him she was one of the three lords of Hizelk and that if he didn't let them through right that instant she'd make Ellegaard have to get a new assistant. So, problem solved, right?
Well, if it had been solved, Jesse and Hadrian wouldn't have been standing in front of the frustrated group in front of them.
"The Dome's interior defense wall is currently up, and while there are openings, uh, most of us can't exactly squeeze into spaces that small. Some girl called Olivia's also guarding the entrance, so even if we get there, she might not let us through." Lukas groaned and fidgeted with the edge of his blindfold, gesturing at the first block they'd come to.
The holes weren't too bad; if they'd been a shallow tunnel through everyone could've probably popped down and come out fine.
Unfortunately, they were more like little tunnels, and once you got your elbows in it was a super tight squeeze, with the only way to proceed being to backtrack.
Lukas had tried using a bit of magic to open it up some, but it was so tight that they would've had to basically slick the inside with oil for anyone to proceed.
Hadrian frowned, glancing at it. "You're sure there's no way to send anything to her?"
"We can send something, but there's no guarantee she'll understand who it's from. Or even if won't get lost in transit," Aiden muttered, scowling at the wall as if it was entirely the inanimate objects' fault.
Jesse went and inspected one of the holes.
"... can I try going through?"
Hadrian glanced at Jesse. "Go ahead, slugger."
Jesse wormed in. The hole was a snug fit, but they could still army crawl through if they wanted to, so they wiggled and started making their way in.
"... oh, the kid actually fits."
A brief pause.
"Well, that was a simple solution."
Aiden bent down and peered through a hole. "Jesse? What's on the other side?"
Jesse poked their head into the hole he was looking into, wiping their face slightly. "Um... it's a lot of clear glass pipes with stuff floating through it..." Jesse glanced back, watching the stuff float for a moment.
... it was vaguely mesmerizing.
"... there's also a lot of stairs," they reported, after shaking themselves out of their state and realizing they'd just drifted off without actually finishing what they were saying.
Aiden made a humming sound. "Huh, okay... well, since the rest of us aren't coming through, mind going ahead and seeing if Olivia'll open up the gate?"
"I wish Petra were here; she's on friendly terms with her," Lukas murmured.
"Well, she isn't, so we'll make do," Aiden shot back.
Jesse looked up at the stairs.
Back at the hole.
Back up at the stairs.
"It might take a while..."
"Kiddo? Go do what they said." Despite the way Hadrian sounded a little dismissive- almost annoyed- Jesse could tell that was a direct order.
... well, that meant they had to do it, they supposed, so time to go climb a billion stairs.
"... okay... will you guys be okay waiting here?"
"No. This is the ultimate challenge. Two members of the October Children and one of the lords of Hizelk have met their match- a giant door," Aiden deadpanned back.
Jesse giggled at that, then blew their nose. "Okay, I'll try to hurry..."
The human pulled away and padded to the bottom of the stairs, looking up and up and up at the spiraling staircase leading to the top.
"... this really might take a while..."
The top of the staircase neared the top of the dome, light seeping through slightly from the cracks of the metal plates covering the dome. Jesse liked meandering so far; something they might've called this place- with gleams of red dust that glowed in the dimness (redstone, right?) and giant cogs and gears and steam blowing everywhere- was steampunk.
They'd always thought steampunk was neat...
"State your business."
Jesse jumped and nearly fell down the stairs, turning to look. There were a set of mechanical doors- not super big and grand, but practical- and standing in front of it, leaning on the door, was a dark-skinned demon girl wearing a black lab coat over a red tunic over a black polo. Her leggings almost matched her boots exactly, the black, worn leather melding to cling to her legs, except for the rim of red along the top that differentiated between the two.
The girl's eyes gleamed red as she regarded Jesse- tiny, harmless, nose tipped pink from blowing their nose, a blanket wrapped around their shoulders, and looking like they were anything except their full seventeen years. Her hair was tied back in pigtails, which would've looked childish on anyone else but looked almost practical on her.
The dark-skinned demon crossed her arms and scowled at Jesse, red eyes practically glowing in the dim dome around them. "Well? What do you want?"
Jesse blinked at her.
Then blew their nose.
"Um... it's something about a negative energy issue, or something... I'm not very good at explaining it," Jesse mumbled, trying not to stammer, stumble over their words, or somehow mis-explain it so badly that they'd get thrown out.
Olivia- this was Olivia, right?- frowned and crossed her arms, pursing her lips. "Oh... so they sent a midget with a cold to fix it?"
"No, they- what?" Jesse, thrown for a loop, blinked at her.
The girl's face softened slightly at the blink, and she sighed. "You know what? Even if you end up not being a huge help, it's better than nothing."
Jesse wouldn't be surprised if they were useless. They were a lot of the time.
"... Alright. I'll take you to Ellegaard for a bit. She's the only one who can open the door... although, at the moment, even that's kind of a rough estimate," Olivia muttered, scratching her cheek.
"What do you mean? She can open that wall, right?"
Olivia made a little sound that Jesse had learned from experience meant "well..." and gestured for them to come in. "Here, it's just easier to show you..."
Jesse trotted in... and balked.
There was a huge web of what looked like sticky black strings, glowing with malevolent energy, connected to everything, like a spiderweb. Some on the walls, some on a table full of scribbled-on blueprints, some stretching to the levers...
All connected to a brown-haired woman that was hunched over some ruined blueprints on the floor and scattered mechanical bits.
Olivia's face softened further, into a worried kind of look- the look of someone who cared about someone else. "Hey, Ellegaard... uh, this is..."
She paused.
"Jesse," Jesse contributed meekly.
"This is Jesse," Olivia finished. "They're here to help out."
There was a full minute of silence.
Then Ellegaard lifted her head.
Her eyes, instead of being red, as Jesse had been slowly becoming accustomed to, were a sickly purple, the veins in her eyes black, as if struggling to completely overtake this woman.
A/N: Hiya Ellegaard xD
Welp, here's a few familiar faces! Not... so familiar, in Ellegaard's case, but it's better than nothing. xD
RQTC: How often are you cold?
Every night if I'm not wearing socks or under some blankets, I have no circulation to my hands and feet. So pretty cold, but I'm not cold myself. xD
The potato cult is taking over.
Currently I have a backup list for people who've gotten the answer right- if the first person doesn't reply by Saturday, I'm defaulting to the second person who got it right.
Responses to reviews!
TheAmberShadow: Haha, good take. / Yes. You are one with the potato. / I'm appled that you think that. Orange you glad I'm pearing with these puns? I kiwi to see what you come up with next. Be a peach and let me beat you? xP / Haha, okay. / Well, if you recall, in the chapter prior to the one that I took a while to post... there was something there as well. Plus, if you look closely, I did hint that it wasn't necessarily an omake. xD / Interesting. x3 / Haha, yeah. / Yeah, but since he did it so often he acclimated much quicker. Plus it was more of a part of him than being dragged along for the ride.
Syra Nyth: I never said it was a good deal. / Yeah, so do I xD / It's always nice! I like characters you can do a lot with. / Hehe. / Np :P
Saran: Yeah, Jesse's just being sure they didn't sign over their soul or something xD / Yep, Ellegaard xD / Nothing, Hadrian just hates people in general xD / Huh, a little bit! / Jesse's great fjdka; / I make other games too. I released the demo for one a few days ago. / Much time. xD / Yeah, Aiden's neat. Lots of writing potential.
bungaMawar001: He's extremely prickly. I think the thing here, is... there's not really much he CAN get from Jesse without someone knocking his head off xD xD / It is; truthfully I scrapped the original so this seemed like a less deadly way to implement it. / No, u potato
That's all for now! See ya, so long, and g'bye!
x.X. A.L. X.x
Inspired by a thing we were joking about on a Discord server. Silver, if you're reading this... I apologize deeply but I had to.
Filming stuff like Endermen or magic was interesting.
For example, it was either fake or nonexistent, and people had to react to thin air or to puppets, knowing they were puppets, and not humans.
For another thing, the sound was not included. You didn't exactly have Enderman sound effects that wouldn't end up sounding tinny onscreen. So you had to react like there WAS a sound.
Ivor hoisted Jesse over his shoulder, Jesse's head snapping up.
There was an Enderman (puppet) standing two feet from the demon lord. Grotesque black skin, long limbs, a torso that was ridiculously shaped in comparison...
Jesse's eyes met with the black light.
Immediately, the thing's jaw dropped open, unhinging, barely connected to the skull as black, burnt teeth are revealed and purple saliva oozes to the floor-
"SENPAI!"
Jesse proceeded to fall off of Ivor's shoulder laughing hysterically while Maya hastily tried to muffle her giggles. Ivor himself was struggling to keep a straight face as the puppeteer closed the Enderman puppet's mouth, grinning.
"Cut!"
Ivor bent over to laugh.
