NOVEL NEXT Book 2 - Chapter 21 - Three of That
Aria was hungry. She did not have a stomach, but her drone body was craving calories from the onslaught of Essence and Core changes. Having the Relic work its magic on her had been tough work. She hadn't known what all the words and choices meant, or even really what she had done, but she had a Skill like her brothers. The little bit of Essence inside her had slotted in the card so easily! And Mort had been right. It was awesome to have a Skill.
Swallowing the handful of crunchy fries, she paused her gluttony to lean over and take a big gulp of her cookie milkshake that Alex had bought for her after she woke and demanded food from Mary's boyfriend's table.
It was time for another big bite of the double cheeseburger with all the fixings. Soooo good. She loved food. Her eyes wandered over the diminishing fries as she swallowed more juicy dead meat.
"I'm going to make more fries." She said more to herself than everyone watching her.
"More fries?" Mary asked, surprised.
"AGAIN?" Beepy asked as well.
She paused and looked up from her feast. Everyone was watching her, including Mort, who had been disappointed that she hadn't chosen one of the options that would allow him to get some of the magic.
Why would she bond with an old man? Ew! Sure, Mort knew a lot of cool things about sacrifices, but it was a whole wide world out there, and she was a young lady. She wasn't going to settle that easy.
"Yuh." She said and scooped up a giant handful of fries.
Squeezing her eyes shut, she flexed all her internal servos at once, flexing her body as she tried to push her Essence into the little black speck in her Core. To the group watching with open mouths, it appeared that there was a doll that was heavily constipated holding aloft some fresh fries in her small hands. She grimaced. She groaned. The little doll's hands shook under the oily potatoes.
The underlying fabric of reality shifted around Aria's miniature will, and some of that cosmic energy known as Essence brushed against a mathematical anomaly held in statis within her Core. A reaction happened than no scientist could comprehend or measure without several factorial more neurons or processing power. Too bad much of the world's technological innovation went by the wayside in place of Relics. With a final grunt that would have popped a real girl's eye vessels, Aria activated [Thrice This] on the eleven fries in her hands.
From somewhere, twenty-two more fries appeared and fell to the table. In actuality, Aria had ripped open a tiny tear in reality and yanked forth more fries from an alternate dimension. They were not exact copies perse, but to any measure that the world's technology could muster, they were the same molecular content, structure, flavour, salinity, nutritional density, and temperature.
Instead of contemplating the nature of existence and consciousness, Aria laughed manically and shoved the original fries in her mouth, barely chewing before swallowing. Her Core felt a little weaker, but she was still hungry. One or two more casts wouldn't hurt…would it?
"See? Now I have three bites instead of one. Awesome, right?" She beamed at them all with her hands on her hip. That pose she learned from Beepy.
"Yeah…," Alex said, scratching his head. "Pretty awesome."
Aria did not notice everyone looking at each other worriedly while she sat down and continued eating.
Boy, casting magic sure is hard work!
When she had touched the card, she couldn't see anything, but some demented voice had asked her a million question she didn't understand. Three minions? Gross. She wasn't babysitting skeletons. Again, there was a whole world to see. Three wishes? Nuh-uh. That's too little. Three people from the dead? Stupid. Dead was dead. But three of anything she wanted? That she did understand.
Mort had been sobbing and yammering in that weird language about how she had "squandered his ultimate sacrifice." What did squandered mean? Too bad! Sorry Mort. It was her magic card.
To everyone else, it hadn't looked like a fun conversation with some voice. Aria had been shrieking bloody murder while a bubble of writhing black light consumed her tiny body. Thousands of jagged ebony petals spun around her before finally closing in and collapsing into her chest.
She had plopped from the air and landed Mort first like a tossed doll. For several long minutes, they thought she was done for. Until her eyes snapped open, giggling and rubbing her belly to demand some food, apparently remembering none of the pain or the voice.
Mary had been like a hysterical mother, angry at Jemin and Alex for some reason, and trying to perform drone CPR with a nine-volt battery. Beepy and Zippy had hidden high on a shelf to avoid her wrath. Once Aria had awaken, demanded food, and shown off her new Skill, everyone was immediately curious on just what could she make three of.
"Do you even understand what this means?" Jemin shook his head and finally took his clawed fist from his mouth.
"Aria…," Mary licked her lips and went up to the doll. She reached over to a chunk of jewellery from one of Jemin's shelves and held it towards the doll. "Can you try, what was it called? [Three Times This] on this?"
"No," Aria slurped her milkshake. "That's dumb. Why would I make three of something dumb? It's my Skill. And it's called [Thrice This]! Get it right!"
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Alex laughed quietly, and that emboldened the young woman, though she didn't let it show on her face.
"Listen to me, Aria," Mary said like a mother trying to not lose her temper. "If you could just try it just this once on this bracelet, we can figure out if it works on everything, or only things…like food, that have no magic to them."
"But I don't want three stupid magic bracelets!" She stood up and faced her mother. "I don't want to stay inside all the time anymore. I want to EXPLORE like Beepy and Zippy. I have a SKILL now."
"Here we go again." Mary groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose.
Placated that she had won her first argument with her creator, Aria smile and turned back to eating. Maybe she would try on the milkshake…
"Just give her time," Jemin said while grinning and walking towards the frustrated Mary. He wrapped an arm around her. "Eventually she'll get curious."
Beepy leapt off the shelf and landed gracefully, tooting out his feet thrusters just as he hit wood. Walking over, the drone sat cross legged next to his sister. From the same shelf, Zippy was toning our computer noises and clearly talking with Beepy.
"ARIA, YOU WANT TO EXPLORE LIKE US?" The drone asked with palms upturned.
"Mhm, Yeah," the doll said, munching on a pickle. "I don't want to just sit inside anymore. I want to see things!"
Beepy nodded like he understood. "IT IS A SCARY WORLD. THERE ARE A LOT OF MONSTERS, AND NOT ALL OF THEM ARE OBVIOUS."
Zippy let out a recorded affirmative noise and something that sounded like a snort.
"ZIPPY AND ME HAVE WAYS TO PROTECT OURSELVES. HE HAS THE KNIFE AND CAN FLY GOOD," Zippy chirped a cheer. "AND I HAVE FIGHTING SKILLS AND THIS."
Beepy banged one of his mech hands on his stomach, and it sounded like an empty metal can that of reinforced steel. Aria was eating and watching curiously, and Beepy looked around at everyone before he reached for the hidden latch of his chassis.
A false panel hissed open, revealing the empty compartment of Beepy's stomach. Previously used to hold the cursed bracelet, the drone had kept the space during his upgrade. His innards glowed and unearthly blue light, and it looked like Beepy had muscles made of gears and brushed titanium. Reaching in, Beepy pulled something out of his stomach, and Alex [Investigate]d it.
[Void Grenade]
It was the size of a walnut, ridged and dark as the deepest shadow.
"Hey!" Jemin yelped. "That's where the extra ones went. You took them after we dealt with Britanii! I was wondering what happened to those."
"Beepy, did you steal from Jemin?" Mary put on her angry mom tone again.
The drone looked over to them, and though he didn't have facial expressions, Alex could feel the facial shrug.
"I WAS…KEEPING IT SAFE…IN MY STOMACH." Zippy chirped in agreement. "SAFETY IS IMPORTANT."
Aria snatched the [Void Grenade] out of her brother's hand and immediately licked it. That sent Mary into charge mom mode, but the doll looked at her angrily. Thankfully the [Void Grenade] didn't go off.
"Ok…let me see with this then." Aria answered.
BUZZ BUZZ
Alex's phone buzzed in his pocket as Aria sat on the table, surrounded by food she had multiplied, holding a grenade walnut, and flexing like she had visited an all you can eat buffet, which, technically she had.
He knew who it was, of course. Likely Snu was asking where he was. It had been a long afternoon, and though he wore a simple black t-shirt and a pair of pants, he wished he had more time to run back home and freshen up.
"No," Mary actually growled, which pulled Aria's attention back towards her. "You're not trying to triple make a grenade in Jemin's shop!" Her voice got higher and higher as her anger climbed.
BUZZ BUZZ
"I don't need to listen to you!" Aria argued back, pulling the [Void Grenade] as Mary reached for it. "Just because you made me doesn't need I need to do what you say. If Beepy and Zippy want me to help them with their adventures, I WILL!"
"ARIA THAT'S ENOUGH!" Mary yelled, reaching again for the grenade as the doll stood up and backed away from her creator. "You get back here right now and give it to me!"
"No!" Aria leapt off the table, where Alex could see her face momentarily scared as she fell down to the floor. She landed in, not particularly gracefully, and sprinted off deep into Jemin's shop. It was piles and more piles of stacked Relics of all various sized.
"Beepy!" Mary snapped her head toward the drone, whose stomach hatch was still wide open. "You help me get her. I can't believe you HANDED HER A GRENADE."
Zippy made some noises from the shelf and hovered down to end up next to his brother.
Beepy turned to look at Zippy, garbled some electronic speak while waving his hands around. Both the brothers argued, with Zippy's noises sounding sharp, and Beepy's sounding defensive. His waving arms also took on an explaining nature. Mary barked at both of them to go get Aria, who had disappeared amongst the Relic heaps and piles.
BUZZ BUZZ
Alex couldn't help but snicker as Mary and Zippy won the argument. Zippy flew off, a shrill faux toy police alarm sounding as his lights blared red and blue. Beepy mocked a dramatic sigh before leaping off to find his sister. Somewhere deep in Jemin's shop, Aria could be heard digging herself deeper amongst the goods while holding a grenade.
"I can't believe them," she shook her head violently, turning to both Alex and Jemin. "Can you believe them?"
He pulled out his phone as Jemin was convinced to go help the boys find Aria.
Snu: where r u
Snu: get ur booty over here.
Snu: wear something nice
Snu: helllloooooo?
Snu: 20 minutes. be here. dungeon first.
Snu: those cheeks better be ready. 😘😜😜😜😜😉👅👅👅
He snickered at Snu's messages as Mary tapped her fingers on the table while all of the boys tried to get Aria to come out.
"If she was going to do it, she would have already," He offered, trying to calm her down. Mary looked worried, so he called louder. "Hey. Hey. It's fine. She's just a young kid. If she wanted to try it with the grenades, it was going to already happen by now. They'll find her and then we'll convince her to test things out in a safer way."
"I'm too young to be getting grey hair, man," Mary smacked her hand on the table one final time. "We'll find her, take her home, and try and see what else her Skill can do," She grinded her teeth. "I'm still going to kill Beepy." She looked at Alex sharply. "You know? My mother always warned me that I would have a girl that would give me hell. 'I can't wait until you have a daughter that worse than you!'"
"Text me if anything bad happens," He continued. Deeper in the shop, Aria had gotten cornered in a pile by Zippy and was yelling at him. "See? They found her."
"I see you smiling all dough eyed," Mary sighed and waved him off. "I swear things were easier when I couldn't see. Go on your date, maybe I'll see you tomorrow."
She walked off while yelling at Aria.
His gut wasn't screaming danger, so Alex figured it was all going to work out. He had a date to get to. A surprise from a Dungeon Boss at that. Indeed, he was dough eyed.
Neat.
Just to be safe, Alex checked his breath as he stepped out the door. He could easily make it to the Leather Spires in twenty minutes if he ran. Just as he stepped out, an oddly familiar Autumn chill brushed against his face.
Within the shop, Zippy was extracting a thrashing Aria who was screaming about not being allowed to do anything.
And on the table, forgotten by everyone, an ancient shrunken head named Mortholemew, who had once sacrificed hundreds for a good crop, grumbled about people and their hormones and checked in on the ghost communication network. Surprisingly, he found someone he did not like waiting on the line.