Around the slick, shimmering slopes of the gleaming ice mountains, a sharp breeze freckled with tiny granules of ice swirled through the air in small gusts and billows. Deep gullies were spilling over with pockets of accumulated powder snow that subtly crunched beneath each trudging footstep. The thick and brittle frozen blade was pressed tightly within her gloved fingers. By all means, she should have been blue in the face and blacked out on the ground.
Dang, this second skin is really pulling its weight, Fionna noted. I'm not even shivering!
Plodding slowly through the mountains en route to a mysterious labyrinth, she took the time to drink in her surroundings. After all, she hadn't seen all that much of the ice mountains up this close before, only during the occasional skirmish with her so-called nemesis. For all the babbling the Queen had done about how beautiful the mountains were, Fionna was decidedly unimpressed.
There were tall, bright blue peaks jutting out of the ground, a blue very unlike all the ice she'd seen anywhere else in the world. The peaks shimmered in the sunlight, making them hard to look at head-on. There was snow, definitely a lot of snow, stretching out in every direction. Unremarkable, white powdery fluff that would have felt pretty significantly cold and wet if not for the second skin she was wearing.
Just up ahead though, in the vague direction the Queen had given her, she could see twin ice pillars wrapped up in intricate patterns from top to bottom, split by a narrow mouth into darkness. A classic labyrinth entrance if ever she'd seen one! Her eyes lit up a bit as she homed in on the spot, purpose filling her stride.
This is more like it, she thought, kicking up snow with each step. THIS is my element! This is where I really belong, out here challenging down puzzles and facing up monsters! Not tucked away in some danky cave, getting all makey-outey with weird old ladies...this is my time to finally shine like the diamond I know I am! I'm gonna make this dungeon skittle and shake!
Boldly stepping between the looming ice pillars, she took a moment to breathe deep the sharp, cold air smell. It was weird to think she could still smell through the second skin without feeling the familiar nip of winter air on her nose. She wasn't even sure how the magic worked. But second skin or not, the scent of adventure hadn't changed; it was as fresh and enticing as ever.
And with that in mind, Fionna stepped into the first chamber of the labyrinth.
Eyes adjusting to the low light, the first thing she noticed was the icy walls in front of her. They glowed with the same soft light as Ice Queen's cave, a pleasant, low aquamarine color. The walls were very smooth and refined, and they curved inward around her, forming a simple bubble of a room with four exits.
She puffed up her chest and adjusted her grip on the ice sword and shouted "Vaya, exploradora!", marching down the hallway to the left.
This is gonna be easy as pancakes, she thought. I'm great at mazes!
The corridor made a slow curve around and eventually spiraled back in on itself. Fionna halted the moment she saw the walls come together to form a dead end in front of her. "Aw, whatever!" she snorted, and pivoted back to the way she'd come in.
Figures, I take the wrong path first, she thought, rolling her eyes. I must be out of practice or something...
Back at the first chamber, she turned to the corner of the ice wall beside the hallway and kicked it with the side of her boot a few times, until a small notch was formed.
"Rule number one", she said aloud. "Leave your mark on society so you know where you've been!"
She strolled down the corridor on the right this time, running her free hand along the wall and humming a song she'd picked up from one of Beemo's games. Much like the first corridor, it was starting to curve back inward on itself.
What a basic dungeon, she thought, once again unimpressed by the Ice Kingdom's supposed splendor. This is like greasy kids' stuff, just plain vanilla dead ends. I'm already losing hype, this is getting boring fast!
Is this what Ice Queen kept talking about? She was always prattling on about how she wants a thrill from life. If I lived in this snoozefest, I'd get bored too...
Her train of thought was cut short when the hallway again reached a dead end.
"Wow, two wrong moves in a row," she grumbled out loud, blowing a raspberry. She flipped herself around to retreat again to the first chamber. "I used to be better at this choice-making biz, I swear to glob. How could I forget that it's ALWAYS the middle? Guess I've been distracted or something…".
Yeah, distracted by old Powder-Snow-Puff and her weird thrill fetishes. And her mission that I kind of accepted. And I guess I was thinking about her mind-blowing ice kiss powers...that crazy soft hair, her snow-sparkle eyes, and those fierce thighs that could probably crush a-
NO.
"No impure thoughts during my dungeon crawl!" she shouted, kicking a notch in the wall to mark the corridor before marching off down the center corridor in a huff. "I am a driven snow white maiden of purity, possessed by the demon-spirit of ADVENTURE!"
This is my element and my special private time, she continued mentally, the loud scuffle of her boots against the icy ground echoing throughout the domed ceiling overhead. I'm gonna savor this ALONE, and it's gonna be awesome. This is my chance to do something entirely for myself, without her involved, for the first time in what, months now? So yeah, I'm here for ME right now!
...okay, so maybe I'm technically doing this because she asked me to, and it's kinda my fault I have to do it anyway, but...but...aww spam, who am I kidding? I'm not even doing this for myself at all, it's still all for her sake!
Her...AGAIN!
She grit her teeth and growled audibly, looking up ahead of her in time to see, yet again, the walls meeting together and forming another dead end.
"What the barf?! What kind of stupid maze are you, anyway?!"
She stamped her foot, sending a ripple of vibrating pain up through her body. "Garbage!" she yelled as she slumped back against the wall behind her, sliding down to sit and hold her leg for a moment.
...what was that for, Fionna? she asked herself. Why are you getting all angry again? Didn't you already go through your frowny phase? I thought you had this part kinda figured out now, and that you're done acting like such a dang bratwurst! What's the matter with you?
She inhaled again. One deep breath, then another. Push out the spice, breathe in the sweetness. Remember the smell of adventure? The scent of excitement? Yeah...there it is. Keep that smell.
A bit calmer now, she slowly rose to her feet again, shaking out her sore leg and putting her free hand against the wall. "Alright, I'm sorry for that little outburst just now, ice maze. I'll be a better sport now and treat you with the respect you deserve. You're just doing your silly maze trickery, right? Like any good maze is s'posed to! I just let my anger get the better of me...again. I'm sorry, bro. Forgive?"
"Yeah Fionna, we cool," she said in a low, gravelly voice.
"Awesome," she replied, giving the wall a light bump with her fist.
And with that, she stepped forward again, following the hallway all the way to its end.
"Oookay then," she began, taking stock of her situation. "I'm at the end of the corridor. There's walls in all three directions that I can see. I can't climb the walls because they're slippery and sheer, and I have cute fuzzy mittens that aren't built for that sort of jazz. The ceiling is really high and kinda shimmery. I guess it's supposed to be pretty cold in here. Also I kinda have to pee but I'm not sure where exactly it's gonna go if I let it out in this suit, so I'm gonna do my best to keep holding it. Now, most importantly...if I were a polar bear, and I was building a maze to protect my junk, what the heck would I put here at the end of this hallway?"
She stood still for a moment, allowed her adventurer's mind to shift gears. She suddenly dropped to all fours and growled. Not an angry growl like before, just a casual, gutteral sound not unlike the kind made by furry, arctic-dwelling beasts with white fur and a penchant for eating penguins. She shuffled her weight from side to side and crawled forward, toward the dead end wall, letting her natural adventure spirit take control.
Without "human" thoughts to complicate things, everything seemed to settle into a strangely familiar scene. From back behind her eyeballs she could see it in her mind, like a sudden deja vu relapse. Shuffling forward down a hallway made of ice. Heavy breathing noises. Bear growls. A feeling of fur against her hands.
Her face lit up in excitement. "ILLUSION WALL!" she accused, pointing a finger at the end of the corridor.
She hauled herself up and brazenly charged forward, shoulder-first. She shut her eyes and slammed into the wall, falling backward on her bottom.
...it wasn't an illusion wall?
She shook her head and glanced around. The wall was still there, but from this angle she could see that yes indeed, there had been an illusion after all. To the left of the dead end wall, a very narrow stairway was cut into the floor where the gleaming ice corners met, veering off from the rest of the corridor. It was definitely not noticeable from any other angle.
"Ha! Level one, gone and done!" Fionna said triumphantly as she hopped to her feet and put a fist in the air. She cocked her head at the stairway, trying to gauge just how narrow of a fit it would be. "...well, probably."
She flipped herself sideways and tried to force her way through the opening, but her coat bunched up against the walls and refused to budge. Her brow furrowed and she rubbed her nose idly. She placed the sides of her hands against the corners of the opening and held them up to her body for measurement.
Hmm...but what if...
Toying with the idea for a moment, she shrugged and leaned her sword against the wall. She fumbled around with her hands behind her back until she found the seam of the second skin and gently pulled it open to step outside of it.
She regretted it immediately. Cold air shifted and whisked over each and every individual exposed hair on her body. Biting her lip and moving quickly, she grabbed the ice blade in one bare hand, and the suit in the other, turned sideways, and tried forcing her way down the stairs again. To call it a tight fit would have been a gross understatement.
She yelped as the icy wall made contact with her bare belly. With a deep breath, she sucked it in and pushed back, bristling as her shoulder blades and spine pressed hard against the wall behind her. It took several awkward contortions to accommodate for her breasts, squashed uncomfortably against the burning cold wall. She had to tilt forward and put her forehead and the tip of her nose against the ice. It felt like there wasn't a single part of her body that wasn't inconvenienced in some way. Turning her feet sideways and keeping her eyes on the steps below, she slowly shimmied her way downward, one painstakingly freezing step at a time.
Guess now I know how an ice cream sandwich feels, she thought bitterly above the chattering of her teeth. Being smushed between cold things isn't exactly the high, glamorous life they make it sound like...well, I guess I'm not really one to talk, am I? At least Ice Queen isn't solid like a freaking cave wall. She wouldn't squash my chub-chubs like this...heh heh...
"Bleh, I thought I said no impure thoughts!" she shouted, sidestepping faster and nearing the foot of the stairs. "Even if my almost-nudey body being jammed up by super-chilled rock hard ice is a very apt metaphor for my current predicament in life!"
When at last her foot reached the open space of the small dome chamber below, Fionna cartwheeled her way out of the claustrophobic embrace of the ice walls and hastily hopped back into the suit, feeling it seal up on its own again. She hunched over and shivered in place for a few moments, allowing the suit to help her warm up again before pressing onward.
"Level two, I whupped you!" she half-chanted, half-shivered, pumping her fist. "I warned ya, I'm a verified ACE at this stuff!"
She paused to kick the frame of the brightly lit doorway to the next chamber a few times, leaving a notch to mark her path as she'd done before. Spirits properly lifted, she charged forward, only to stop moments upon entering the much larger cavernous chamber. Everything had gone completely sparkle white, and she couldn't see a thing anymore. Narrowing her eyes into tiny slits, she allowed shapes to slowly take their own comprehensible forms again.
Arching high above her head was a dome covered in a sprawling complex of triangular, glittering ice crystals. The floor formed a path in front of her, on either side of it a long, long drop into a sea of shining snow. There was a small circular bit at the center of the bridge, in the dead center of the room, like a checkpoint. Every last thing in this room sparkled and refracted hundreds of tiny rainbows and light flares. It was like stepping headfirst into a kaleidoscope.
Very cautiously, she took a step forward onto the bridge, trying to make out whether or not there actually was a doorway at the other end. The height of the bridge, coupled with the hinted sound of rushing air somewhere around her, made her stomach queasy. What kind of challenge was this?
She tried to focus on the bridge at her feet, baby steps bringing her closer and closer to the centerpiece. The harsh glare didn't get any better as she drew nearer to the centerpoint, and before long she had to shut her eyes alogether. The moment she did though, she locked up and dropped to her knees, trying to grip the bridge with her furry mittens. The windy sound wasn't comforting in the least and made her limbs feel like jelly. She forced her eyes back open, trading an upset stomach for a dizzying headache.
This must be an endurance room or something, Fionna grimaced, using the ice sword as a cane to pull herself back up. Ain't nothing to do but keep walking and fight through the beating, right? Bring it on then, beat me all you think you can!
Steady again, she resumed baby-stepping, trying to pick a point in the room that didn't hurt quite as much to look at. The approaching centerpiece seemed like as good a focus points as any other. She homed in on it and forced herself forward.
The moment she stepped into the circle, the room started spinning rapidly. Shapes melded into each other and all the colors merged into one painful, shining train wreck. She screamed and fell forward, expecting a distant, plunging fall into eternity.
Her hands abruptly hit solid ice, pain shooting up through the second skin all the way up the length of her arms. She swallowed back the urge to vomit. It took several moments of heavy breathing to steady herself. What just happened?
She dared to turn back and look behind her. Everything was exactly the same as she'd left it. She was still on the bridge, headed toward the door at the end of the path in front of her. The door behind her still looked exactly like the one ahead. She frowned and pushed herself on to her feet, brushing the ice particles from her mittens and checking to make sure her sword hadn't chipped or split along the blade.
…okay then, I'm still alive. How, I don't know, but I ain't gonna question the miracle of life! Better push forward and try to leave behind the crazy in this room for good.
Inhaling deeply, Fionna trained her focus solely on the darkness of the doorway at the end of the bridge, merging everything else into a blurry white blob, like an unfinished painter's canvas. Deliberately and rhythmically placing one foot in front of the other, she drowned out the discomforting gleam of the room and crossed the threshold through the open doorway in forcible peace.
A sigh of relief escaped as her eyes readjusted to the low light, her mind dropping back into normal operations. She arched her back and stretched her arms, trying to think up a good victory line as she sized up the room for the next challenge. She once again stopped short after only a few moments.
"What the frickle frack…".
A certain familiar claustrophobic staircase loomed before her.
"No way," she snarled, fingers balling around the ice sword. "Not a rotten chance in a million years! You're a lump of man baloney if you think I'm doing THAT again!"
She glared back down at the base of the doorway entrance, eyes landing on the chip in the frame she'd left with her boot. Had she gone backwards somehow?
"Is that one of those crazy spinny floors?" she asked, all but demanding the labyrinth itself answer her. "Cause that would means it wasn't just a random upset stomach spell going off in there. Did you just legit loop-de-loop me around like a weenie?"
She growled and stormed her way back down the bridge, allowing her anger to color the whiteness with a bit of red around the corners. This proved much more effective, as it was something very easy to focus on. The airy sound returned as she again approached the centerpiece.
She clenched her teeth tighter and braced herself as she stepped back into the circle, determined to overcome the sensation. Again, the moment her foot touched down, the room spun in a maddening circle of glittering lights. She tried to forcibly put one foot forward against the intense, swirling counter-pressure, and ended up once again pitching face-forward onto the bridge. She collapsed on all fours, heaving and fighting back the urge to scream at the jolt of pain in her arms and knees.
She looked up and squinted hard at the door frame ahead. The chipped frame stood out, breaking the symmetry of the scene. She beat her fist against the bridge, thoughts buzzing audibly in her skull as she coughed and sputtered her way back to stability.
"What kind of sick freak would build a spinning floor of queasy death like this?" she asked, pulling herself to her feet. "A person's stomach is sacred ground, man! You don't cast barf magic on somebody, that's the lowest curse imaginable! Who would do such a horrible thing? I bet a dang polar bear wouldn't even be that sadistic!"
Glaring over at the entrance door again, the chip in the doorway stared back at her mockingly.
"Shut up, or I'll puke on you," she muttered.
She felt her blame radar homing in on Ice Queen yet again, and retrained her attention back on the intersection. Calm thoughts, old girl. Don't let her get in your pants again. Yet…
Okay, so I'm obviously not supposed to force it. Cake's always been telling me that just cause I'm good at rushing things doesn't always mean doing it will win the battle. I gotta learn to be sneaky and brain-first, not brutal and head-first. That's like rule numero uno of dungeons, right? You can totally beat problems with your brains! I even did it to Flame Prince that way. I beat him with a volcano instead of a sword!
She smacked her lips a few times, looking around to size up the bridge room once more. There really wasn't much to work with, least of all a volcano. The ceiling was too high to reach and was physically painful to look at. The bridge itself was flat and narrow, no slopes to bounce off of. The floor was much too far away, and there was no telling how deep the snow covering it was. The underside of the bridge was an enormous tangle of icicle daggers.
I...don't really have any other options here, do I? she thought glumly. Cake says I have to learn to be more tactical, that I can't just headbutt things until I win...but what happens when I can't be tactical? I HAVE to headbutt things! And that's a thing I'm really good at, too!
Man, I never realized how much dungeons are like real life, she continued as she lined up with the doorway. It's good to know how to do a little of everything, and even better to push yourself, but sometimes when you're stuck, you can only do what you already know you do best.
I HAVE to force it, she began repeating in her head. Rush in head first, booty last.
She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Then another deep breath.
"Faith leap!" she shouted as she shut her eyes and dashed down the bridge headlong, picking up speed as she went. She listened for the rushing air sound, waiting for it to make her dizzy. The muscles in her legs tightened in anticipation. The moment the whoosh peaked in her ears, she leapt forward, thrusting as hard as humanly possible.
Clunk.
She held still a few moments, waiting to see if she'd only imagined landing her jump and whether or not she was still about to faceplant into the distant snow below. The dreaded whooshing sound was decidedly coming from behind her now. She slowly opened one eye.
The cavern twinkled back at her, it's whiteness blinding as ever. Turning her head slightly, could see no chip in the door frame ahead. Her stomach was not undergoing olympic gymnastic training anymore either. She slowly rose to her feet, snickering to herself, then laughing out loud.
"Level three, no match for me!" Fionna bellowed in a deep, heroic voice as she flexed her arms. "Feel that raw muscle, huargh! Who's next, huh? Who wants to trangle with this?!"
Riding on the wake of victory, she strode proudly through the doorway into a much dimmer hallway, glad for the ability to see without squinting again.
Okay, so it's definitely a challenge, she mused, but I am making hecka progress through this thingy. I may be a hundred levels of out of practice thanks to all the butt-sitting and drama bombs I've been dealing with, but I still got it. I'm thrashing this place! No matter what it throws at me, I'm gonna find that stupid book and bust up that bear's face, I swear it!
Wow, I guess I forgot what a rush this stuff gives you, she continued, swinging her arms a little more in stride. Every room I conquer just gets me more pumped for the next one! The thrill of victory is sweet like chocolatey cake!
Heh, the thrill...that's what Ice Queen kept mentioning. Said I give her thrills, even though she gives me chills. I wonder if this what she meant? Like I'm some kind of labyrinth chamber to her, and each time she screws with my head it's like getting closer to the prize at the center?
She sighed heavily, shaking her head. "But why are you talking about her again, you silly girl? You're deep in a dungeon crawl, you gotta focus!"
And then she fell.
The ground opened up beneath her feet and she plummeted headfirst, air rushing past her second skin and swirling around in her second ears. She flailed her limbs helplessly, grasping at thin air for something to stop the descent. She shut her eyes and screamed, bracing for impact with the ground.
Great, and to top it all off, I had Ice Queen on the brain when I fell off the world. My last waking thought was about her. That's gonna be the final words at the end of my great legacy? Frack!
The air was still rushing past in loud waves, and she hadn't made contact with anything yet, despite plunging rapidly and flailing every available limb.
How deep is this pit, man? she wondered, frowning. Not that she was welcoming the idea of ending the fall and meeting a gruesome, splattery sensation anytime soon, but she didn't expect it would take quite this long. Could this be a true-blue, actual bottomless pit?
And if so, who could have dug one? she continued. Did Ice Queen make this too? Did she really make this whole labyrinth? What was she saying before when I wasn't really paying attention? She said this whole domain is like a snowflake or something. Well yeah, duh, it's a LOT of snowflakes. What an idiot.
She has to make everything sound so grand and mysterious, even though it's really not. This whole place is literally just snow and ice. Frozen water! For gob's sake, I learned all I need to know about ice on like my first day as an adventurer! It's just hard slippery water that you don't wanna step on if you value the softness of your booty!
She thrust a hand out to the left and found herself self surprised when it hit a solid wall. She pressed her hand flat against it as she and her reflection continued to fall. Though a bit hard to make out in the dim light, she looked her reflection over, admiring what she could see of the queen's handiwork on the second skin. She had to admit that the suit definitely bore a striking resemblance to her, and that she didn't look half-bad, for a hero rapidly plummeting to the bottom of a pit likely lined with icicle spikes in a dark-ish cavern.
"But," she said out loud, perhaps hoping in the back of her mind that she wasn't completely alone, "That's not exactly me, is it? That's not Fionna."
The second skin was a fake, a magic trick, and she knew it. It wasn't the real thing, just a very accurate replica. Actually, it looked like a more pampered, well-groomed Fionna. It didn't have the real Fionna's tangled hair, or her fat rolls, or her dirty underwear, or the heavy burn scars you couldn't see but still felt buried deep. No, this Fionna was a doppelganger. A real glamour girl.
Ice Queen's glamour girl.
She sighed audibly. There's just no escaping that woman. Not even in my home turf or my private thoughts. I should be able to forget about her, lock her away in my brain vault and swallow the key like it was made of chocolate. Or at the very least, I should be able to whop her with my sword a few dozen times until she begs for mercy and I say no and kick her crown off and then sit on her and threaten to fart real loud until she promises to back off but then comes back a few weeks later anyway to do it all over again...poop.
She rolled over on her back in mid-air, putting her arms behind her head and crossing one leg as she continued to plummet in the almost-darkness. Waiting helplessly for your own bones to shatter on impact was actually quite a calming place to be, she found. A place really designed to shut out the world and allow complicated, messy thoughts to sort themselves out. Over the constant drone of updraft wind, anyway.
"I can't get rid of her," Fionna said out loud, amused to listen to her voice bounce off the hollow ice walls all around. "Everything I try doesn't work. It's like a show for her. Some kind of big goofy game, and I'm just a piece on the board. All she wants to do is play me like one of those decapitated horse-head guys that move funny. I ain't no hunk of plastic! I'm a person! I don't fit on the game board, cause my butt's too big for the squares! I'm not a game piece! I'm a game PLAYER!"
She smacked her lips. "...so if that's true, then why doesn't Ice Queen play WITH me, instead of play with me? Not Fionna the glamoured-up game piece. Fionna the opponent! Fionna the Player Two! She should play her little games because she wants to play with me, not because I'm the thing that wins the game!"
There was a loud cracking sound somewhere above her. She decided shouting probably wasn't the best course of action in a cave made of ice.
"Anyway, I've seen that look in her eyes before," she continued, lowering her voice as she replayed their last kiss in her head. "It was buried down deep in there, but I dang well know it when I see it. She was excited. She was nervous. Maybe even afraid of me! I had her in the palm of my nubby little hand. I totally could've done anything to her right then, and she wouldn't have been strong enough to do anything about it. She knew her life was kind of on the line, but she kept pushing it anyway. She was pushing it even though she was nervous, because she wanted to see if she could still win anyway."
The air felt a little lighter.
"So maybe she IS playing the game with me? Is THAT what she's been talking about? She likes the thrill she gets when she knows she might lose?"
She licked her lips. Boy do I know THAT feeling…
"Okay," she continued, brain working faster. "So she gets excited because I probably could kill her, right? That makes sense, I get excited when I could kill her too. It's adrenalistic! She knows I probably won't kill her, because of stuff, but she loves the idea that I COULD do it. So, this thrill thingy she keeps harping about is just a hunger for danger! How can I blame her for that? She's just hungry for two scoops of that sweet, sweet adventure rush! And we all know I'm the adventure-mongerin' QUEEN, so maybe...maybe THAT'S why she's naturally attracted to ME!"
Choirs of tiny cherubs assembled inside Fionna's mind and sang out in a harmony most glorious, "Finally, she understaaaaaands!~"
Making a fist around her ice sword, she thrust herself forward, swimming through the air. Staying in one place was getting boring anyway…
"I just unlocked the secrets of the whole bleeping universe!" she shouted triumphantly.
Quite unexpectedly, she tumbled uncontrollably and landed on all fours in a bank of soft snow. She paused, readjusting to the feel of solid ground beneath her as she could still hear the roar of the updraft bouncing off the walls, and confirming that this wasn't some kind of near-death hallucination. She turned around to look behind her.
A huge metal cylinder sat on the floor, thrumming loudly and vibrating to the touch. Inside, huge metal blades whirred around in a furious frenzy.
"This is a giant wind tunnel machine!" she yelled into it, listening to the blades chop up her voice. "You blew me so hard that I just kind of got suspended in the air for a long time! You're a FAKE bottomless pit! Holy cheese, what a rip off!"
She hopped to her feet and gave the machine a light kick, adding "Level four ain't no more!"
After a quick shake of her arms and legs to bring the feeling back, she promptly marched onward into the rounded tunnel ahead. The low aquamarine glow had returned, illuminating the walls enough to reveal an opening in the wall at the end. A row of icicles hung menacingly from the top of the doorway, and there were two small holes punched above and to either side of it. Fionna stopped in her tracks for a moment. From this exact spot, the windows and door resembled a glaring skull.
"Aww yiss, boss room!" she shouted, pumping her fist into the air. "Finally! That's gotta be where the bear is!"
With a skip in her step, she readied her sword and strode forward through the mouth of the ice skull, ready to greet the climactic conclusion of this long, frozen dungeon crawl.
I'm ready for you, scaredy bear, she psyched herself up. Heck, I'm ready for ANYTHING. Nothing in this place is like it seems, so I'm gonna be ready for any trickety trick you can toss at me. I'm expecting the unexpected! Bring it right on, tufty!
She slowly moved toward the center of the room, noting that the skull door was its only visible exit. Disorderly piles of assorted treasures and goods were scattered around the place, veritably dripping with coins, chalices, pendants, flags, books, clothes, and so many other non-lethal treasured items. Oddly, there wasn't a weapon to be found here, Fionna noted with some level of disappointment. There certainly was a lot of junk here though.
...and there was a polar bear lying on its side, propped up against a stack of books.
"Aha!" Fionna shouted, approaching it. "Surrender the book you stole, whitey!"
The bear grunted and slowly rose to all fours, one such book in its mouth. It appeared to have been snoozing only moments earlier.
"That's not how ya do brain food, y'know," she said, wagging her finger. "You're supposed to READ books, gather intel and acquire power through knowledge! Or y'know...at least look at the pictures and make your best guess!"
The bear snorted and shuffled toward her slowly, steamy clouds puffing from its nostrils in the chill air.
"Oh, lemme guess, you already memorized the book, didn't ya? And now you're gonna use your knowledge to unleash horrible shadow magic on my face, right? You gonna give me a face full of oozy pimples filled with hot lava, so every time I try to pop one it burns a hole in my skin? That's gross, man! You're gross!"
She only received a low, throaty groan in response.
"Okay so come on, then! What are you waiting for, teddy? Smack me with your best shot!"
Huge paws thumped patiently on the ice floor.
"Yeah boi!"
With one exaggerated motion, the bear reared up on its hind legs, arching its spine slightly and drawing back its right claw. With an equally exaggerated motion, Fionna puffed herself up, arched her spine and drew back her ice blade. In unison they both bellowed out a deafening, echoing roar that rattled the very walls of the cavern as they thrust forward.
She felt the hulking beast's weight bearing down on her as it struggled, its jaw resting on her shoulder. Sticky saliva spilled out the side of its mouth as its breath rasped and coughed in her ear. She pushed even harder in an effort to shake herself loose, forgetting for a moment that her sword was only made of ice.
That is, until the hilt of the blade snapped off in her palm.
She gasped and rolled out from under the bear's girth, crashing into a stack of silver coins. She immediately hopped back to her feet, tossing the broken hunk of ice aside and striking a defensive pose. The bear lay flat on its chest on the ice floor.
She hopped spritely from foot to foot, waiting for the counterattack. The only sound to be heard was her own breath, trapped inside the doppelganger suit. That same sound didn't seem to be emanating from the bear's mouth. She watched as it slowly began to develop a red undertone to its pristine white fur.
"You're already dead?" she asked, dropping her arms back to her sides. Logically, the bear didn't respond.
Stepping over cautiously, she prodded the bear's snout with her foot. "Yo, wakey wakey."
She stooped down and pulled the book it had dropped from beneath its muscular frame, noting the fresh blood slathered across the cover. "No wakey wakey?"
Hesitating only for a moment before remembering that the blood was only staining the hands of the Fionna Suit, she opened the book and sifted through the pages. "...this IS the right book, right? You didn't like, hide it or any-oh, nope, this is definitely the right book, cause I spy pictures of nudey nudists right here. This is most definitely the right book!"
Aside from the fresh blood on the cover and a few toothy depressions from where the bear had held it, the book looked no different than when she and Cake had found it the other day. No missing pages, no latent incantation smell, no residual floating sparkles.
Glancing around the so-called treasure room, Fionna noticed that there really wasn't anything particularly special about any of the treasure. It was utterly disorganized, the objects were shiny but mostly mundane, there was no real sense of mysticism like the kind ice queen had made it seem would be going on here. The bear didn't even look the part of a mastermind villain beast. It looked like a standard-issue, albeit currently lifeless, polar bear.
"Ice Queen, are you off your crocker?" she asked aloud. "There ain't no mystical mumbo jambalaya going on here, it's just a dumb bear with a bad case of kleptomania!"
...that I killed, she added guiltily.
Still curious, she laid the book aside and, with some effort, flipped the bear over on its back to see the ice blade lodged deep into its chest, already melting in the warm pool of fresh blood. She hadn't even technically made the kill, she told herself. The bear had more or less fallen forward on the blade and gravity had done the real work. She just put the blade where it needed to be, the bear had signed its own death warrant. The blood wasn't even technically on her hands. Technically.
She glanced back down at the tainted book and turned one hand over. Nope, still technically not on HER hands…
That made it easier to accept.
"Welp, I guess that about solves it, right?" she said to the room at large. "Time to scoot on back to bubblebutt's lair and claim my reward!"
What reward...? The voice in her head asked faintly before disappearing.
She took a deep breath, kicked a pile of silver coins, then half-shouted "I'm outta here, polar bub! Uh...enjoy the dead world, I guess. Send me a postcard sometime, sorry you had to leave us so early, yadda yadda, all that funeral stuff. I'm just gonna let myself out of the convenient boss chamber exit to the surface now, 'kay?"
With a flourish, she rapped her knuckles against the wall behind the bear, a self-satisfied smile emerging on her face as the ice shifted to one side, revealing a glassy staircase leading straight upward. There was always a shortcut back to the surface. No maze master would dream of running their own gauntlet every time they left the place.
Relieved to have walking space this time, Fionna strode casually up each step, summarizing the events of this chapter in her epic Ice Queen Saga.
Why did she make me kill a mostly-innocent bear like that? was the most glaring thought on her mind. She seemed to know a lot about this guy, said he was a dangerous creeper and that the freakin' world was in danger, but really he was just a little rapscalliwag. He wasn't really hurting anybody, was he? Why did she need me to knock him off? Not that I'm sorry or anything...
Click. Clack. Her synthetic shoes made impressively believable tapping sounds against the ice stairs as she climbed.
Surely she sent me out here for a good reason, but...what the heck was it? Was it to teach me something? Or to send me out in the cold in my skivvies and snicker at all the donk-ups I made? Nah, it had to be to teach me a lesson or something. Did I learn anything though?
Click. Clack. Pant. Pant.
Let's see...I missed the first secret passage because I was distracted and kinda overconfident in myself. I had to just keep moving to get through that tight squeeze. The spinny-floor was super confusing, but I just had to let go and trust thrust my way through that. The thing that looked like a bottomless pit was really only a bucket drop once I stopped worrying and tried to figure it out. And the final boss was a cake walk, because...because I was expecting it to be a some high-octane battle, right? But it wasn't what I thought it would be. This whole quest wasn't what I thought it would be. That's because this wasn't a legendary quest...it was more like an elementary test!
The footsteps stopped, as she leaned against the wall to catch her breath.
"Well glob slaggit, it WAS all a test!" she said, putting her free hand to her chest.
She never even cared about the bear at all! This whole thing was a setup to help me learn! She knew I needed an adventure to help me clear my thoughts, and she mind gamed me right into helping myself understand what this whole thing was all about! I freakin' get it now!
Reinvigorated, she finished her climb in deep thought, arriving at a small platform with a door carved into the snow, lit by the vague bioluminescence of the ice mountains themselves. She put a hand on the door, shook her head, then reared back and kicked it right off its nonexistent snow hinges, natural light flooding in from the other side and blinding her eyes.
Taking a moment for her senses to adjust, she stepped out onto a tiny unmarked snow bank off to the side of the two pillars at the entrance of the labyrinth.
"I knew it!" she shouted gleefully before clapping her hand over her mouth. The last thing she needed now was an avalanche.
Giggling to herself, she slid down the mountainside and hopped her way back through the deep snow, trying to land in the footprints she'd made on the trip in.
...okay, even if I hate to say it - and I DO - that was actually kind of fun, she admitted to herself. In a funky, rage-inducing puzzler kind of way. There's nothing that hits the spot better than nailing the coffin on a nasty puzzle!
She immediately clamped a hand to her stomach to suppress the familiar growl of the beast within. Okay, so maybe food might still be better. But only by a little bit!
Off on the distant horizon, the sun was on its way back down again, slinking away and taking all the blue of the sky with it, leaving behind yellow and orange and purple to keep the ice mountains company. Fionna stopped to stare in amazement for a moment. The Ice Kingdom finally felt alive to her, she could really see the same splendor the Queen could in that moment.
I wonder if Queeny and Cake finally made up, she thought, carrying on back toward the Queen's cave.
I wonder if they made brunch. I'm starving.