Inescapable Escapism

The wheel didn’t move. I tried harder, throwing all my weight behind me, but the wheel didn’t budge at all. Giving up, I glanced over my shoulder at Dina, who was facing away from me and watching for creatures.

“I… might have been wrong,” I admitted.

“Or maybe you’re not strong enough,” Dina teased. “Do you want me to have a go?”

I snorted softly, looking back at the wheel.

“If that’s the issue, I doubt you trying will help,” I shot back playfully.

“Try again,” Dina said, and I could almost hear her rolling her eyes at me. “If that doesn’t work, we’ll go for plan b.”

Reaching for the wheel again, I paused.

“What was plan b?”

“I don’t know. Either finding a way to power it up or working out where exactly on this door we can shoot to disable the damn lock.”

I chuckled, eyeing the door as I tried to work out if that would be possible. Maybe it would if we knew exactly where to hit it. I didn’t know enough about locks to feel confident about that, though. There were no marks or anything to give us any clues, either. A few pockmarks dotted the metal, but the placement seemed almost random.

Confusion washed over me as I stared at the nearest dent, touching it lightly with my finger. It wasn’t big, about the circumference of my index finger, and only a couple of centimetres deep, if that. The rest of the marks were about the same size, too. They were too uniform, too similar to be a coincidence.

“I don’t think shooting it will work,” I muttered, pointing my torch at the floor.

“Why not?” Dina asked, glancing over her shoulder at me.

There. Scattered on the floor in front of the door were crumpled lumps of metal. Bullets, I realised slowly. I’d either somehow missed them before, or they’d been slow to load. They looked old, though. There was a thin layer of dust on them.

“Someone already tried that.”

I heard Dina swallow audibly.

“Well… in that case, I hope those workouts you’ve been doing really pay off,” she said, her tone slightly unsteady. “Either that, or I’m finally going to find a use for all the engineering work my parents have forced me to do over the years.”

I couldn’t help the soft laugh that slipped from my lips.

“About time,” I said, gripping the wheel again and starting to pull it before stopping as something occurred to me. “Wait… this might sound stupid, but… which way should I be twisting this? Left or right?”

There was a slight pause before a snort escaped Dina. She slapped her hand to her mouth to muffle her laughter, and I waited, pressing my lips together to stop myself from joining in.

“Wait, wait, wait,” she finally managed to get out. “Clea, do not tell me you’ve been pulling it the wrong way? Have you been tightening it?”

A faint hint of embarrassment flared within me, but it was mostly eclipsed by amusement at my own mistake. Even so, I had to fight the urge to minimise the game and check to make sure no one was watching. It was too early still. School hadn’t quite finished yet.

“I don’t know!” I hissed at her, a grin pulling at my lips. “Which way should I have been twisting it?”

“Left!” Dina cried, her voice barely above a whisper. “Lefty loosey, righty tighty!”

I bit the inside of my lip, trying to hold back the laugh that threatened to escape.

“Yeah,” I said, my tone making it clear I’d messed up. “That’s totally what I thought. Who would have thought clockwise made way more sense?”

“Clea,” Dina groaned, dropping her head back for just a second. “If you tightened it, I swear to the founder, if you’ve made it impossible to open, I’ll kill you myself.”

“It won’t be impossible,” I reassured her, not quite believing my own words. “The devs wouldn’t do that to us… right?”

“Oh no,” was all she replied.

I snorted again.

“Get ready,” I warned her. “If this opens, chances are we’re about to be attacked.”

I felt her posture shift as she lifted her gun, preparing for the inevitable attack. We might have never been in the lab before, but the devs always did stuff like that. We’d reach an interesting-looking shack or building, find a way to pick the lock, and then, the moment the door opened, a creature would leap out of nowhere and attack us. We were almost used to it at that point. We expected it.

Still, anxiety thrummed in my stomach as I glanced at the illuminated and flickering stream of snow in the centre of the building. The monster would be there. If it didn’t burst through the door or jump up out of one of the holes in the floor, it would fly at us from there.

But I couldn’t think about that. I needed to focus all of my attention and strength on trying to get the door open. If we couldn’t… I really didn’t want to have to search the entire building for supplies. Sure, I planned to search it anyway, but it would be less fun if we had to drag everything all the way back up again. What if they’d programmed the items so they wouldn’t fit in our pockets? They’d done that before, and it was so annoying.

Pushing that thought aside, I took a deep breath before gripping the rubber coating on the wheel as tightly as I could and pulling it to the left. For a moment, nothing happened. Doubt flared within me, but I gritted my teeth, forcing myself to try harder.

An earsplitting squeal exploded from deep within the door, and my heart leapt into a sprint as I let go and span around, my hands reaching for the rifle on my back. My head was spinning as my head whipped from side to side, eyeing the darkness around us.

My breath caught in my throat as a roar sounded from somewhere deep within the facility, but it was what came next that sent a chill down my spine. A sharp, hacking noise, sounding almost like a laugh, seemed to echo around us. It was impossible to tell where it came from. It sounded like the creature, whatever it was, was standing right behind us.

It wasn’t, though. It felt like it was probably a trap, but I still needed to check. There was nothing behind me apart from the door. The noise couldn’t have come from there. I was almost sure of it. The metal would have been too thick… wouldn’t it?

My heart pounded in my ears as I held my breath, trying to listen out for footsteps or wingbeats, anything to tell us which direction the monsters were coming from, but there was nothing. The lab fell silent again. The only noise came from us.

“I think it’s… okay,” I said after a couple of minutes.

I couldn’t quite bring myself to say it was safe; that felt too extreme, but it felt alright. If we were going to be attacked, it would have happened already.

“Is it open?” Dina asked as she continued to sweep her gun back and forth in practised arcs.

“No. It barely shifted.”

“Okay,” she said, fear making her voice tight. “We can’t do that again. There has to be a way to do it without leading every monster in the building to us. Can we grease the mechanism, maybe?”

The idea of turning my back on the darkness and looking at the lock terrified me. The horrible laughter still echoed in my ears, but I trusted Dina. If something came at me whilst my back was turned, she’d stop it.

“I’m… not sure,” I said slowly, trying to examine the base of the wheel, but the angle and how close it was to the door made it hard to see. “Wait… Actually, we might be able to! There’s some rust! If we can break it, we might be able to pour oil inside!”

“Switch places with me,” Dina requested, slipping her gloves off and shoving them into her pockets. “I want to have a look.”

I straightened up immediately and turned towards the darkness, knowing that Dina would be more likely to know what to do. It was her area of expertise, after all. She might say she didn’t really enjoy it, but she was great with anything mechanical.

Clipping my torch onto my gun and shuffling out of the way, I kept watch as Dina examined the door. It took every ounce of my resolve to ignore the urge to turn around and see what she was doing, but I managed it. It would have been so stupid to do that. She was trusting me to protect her, and I couldn’t ignore that.

Instead, I forced myself to wait as rustling came from behind me. The noise heightened my need to peek, but luckily, Dina spoke before long.

“Okay, I think I can get the face plate of the base of the lock,” she said. “Hopefully, that should expose the mechanism below, and then I’ll be able to see what we’re dealing with.”

“Great,” I said, letting out a sigh of relief. “Do it!”

Part of me had been worried that she’d say it was impossible, and I felt that fear start to edge back into my mind as she hesitated.

“Well… I need something to hit it with. Like a rock or something,” she said.

I looked around, my eyes darting toward the ground as I tried to keep watch whilst also looking for something that she could use. It would need to be fairly long to reach around the wheel. Either that or she might be able to reach through the spokes…

“There!” I called softly. “Eleven o’clock!”

My gun followed Dina’s movement, knowing it would be the perfect time for a monster to attack, but she grabbed the rock and scurried back without incident.

“It’s perfect,” she whispered. “There’s even indents for my fingers. The devs must have put it there!”

“Great.”

There was a slight pause before Dina spoke again.

“Okay, ready?”

My heart leapt into my throat, and I swallowed, trying to push my fear aside.

“Ready.”

“Three, two, one…”

The thunk of stone slamming into metal made me jump, even though I’d been expecting it. I held my breath, looking around as the rush of something, small flakes of metal, fell to the floor. Finally, the noise stopped.

“So?” I asked. “Did it work?”

“Mmm… not quite. I think I need to hit it again,” Dina muttered.

Frustration washed over me. It wasn’t fair, and I knew it. It wasn’t Dina’s fault that the metal hadn’t given, but it felt like we were wasting time. The longer we stood there, the more dangerous it seemed. Even though we couldn’t hear anything, monsters could easily be gathering below us, just waiting to strike.

“Go on.”

She didn’t bother counting down that time. Instead, she just slammed the rock into the face plate again. For a moment, there was no noise, and then a faint whine of metal scraping against metal sounded.

“Crap!” Dina hissed, and I heard a muffled bang as she dropped the stone.

I had to force myself not to turn around as she fumbled loudly with the face plate, trying to stop it from smashing into the floor. Somehow, I think the struggle was louder than if she’d just let it drop, and more rasping laughter exploded into the air.

It sounded further away that time, but it was still hard to tell. Why would it be moving further away from us, though? That didn’t make sense. Perhaps there was only one way up to the floor we were on, so it had to fall back before it could come any closer? I wasn’t sure, but the thought scared me.

The monster was weak. It had to be. We were only on the first level and barely had any equipment. They wouldn’t put anything too strong there. I told myself that again and again, but it didn’t make me feel any better. Something about the lab just felt… off. It was different from a normal level, and that meant the usual rules didn’t apply.

“I think they’ve messed with the pain settings,” Dina grunted, “because that really hurt.”

Fear edged into my stomach. Normally, they were fairly low. If we got mauled or hit, there was a flare of pain but nothing more. It was worse on the higher levels but never that bad.

“Really?” I asked. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, it’s fading now,” she muttered. “Maybe I was just being a baby.”

“Maybe,” I said with a slight chuckle, but I didn’t feel any better.

Her words had just confirmed my suspicions about the level being different, and I couldn’t help but pull up my menu.

“The gears seem to be in pretty good condition, so as long as we find some lubricant, I should be able to get this thing open,” she said as she turned away from the door to search. “There’s got to be some around here somewhere…”

I barely heard her. I was too busy staring at the number at the top of my screen.

“Dina,” I said, blinking the menu away to scan for monsters before recalling it. “I know this sounds like a stupid question, but… what level does it say you’re on?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her stop moving. Her torch fell still.

“Huh,” she said. “That is weird.”

A prickling sensation started to climb down my spine.

“What’s it say?”

“Zero,” she said, confirming what I was seeing too.

“Yeah, mine too.”

“That’s not normal,” she said. “Even when we’re in the lobby, it normally says we’re on level one, right?”

“It does.”

There was a pause, and her torch bounced around before she spoke again.

“What do you think it means?”

“I really don’t know,” I said.

I didn’t. We’d never been on that level before, and I’d never even heard anyone mention it. It felt wrong, like we weren’t actually in the game, but I knew we were. Everything else about it was normal. The system was still the same; we were in the usual outfits, and there was nothing unusual about the storeroom where we’d started.

“Maybe there’s been an update or something,” Dina suggested, but her tone made it clear she didn’t quite believe that.

“Yeah, maybe,” I said, mostly to make her feel better.

It was just a game, I reminded myself. We weren’t actually there, so it didn’t matter what was happening or if it was normal. We were just in the arcade.

“Oh, I think I see something,” she said, causing fear to spark within me. “Three o’clock, near that bolder.”

My eyes snapped to the place she’d pointed out, and I spotted a shape glinting in the nonexistent light. A canister of oil, I realised, letting out the breath I’d been holding. Collectables and useful items always shimmered slightly in the game, even without the buff. It wasn’t a monster.

“I see it.”

“Cover me?” Dina requested.

“I will.”

Dina darted forward, her torchlight bobbing in time with her steps until she stopped and crouched down, picking up the yellow container. I scanned the area carefully, making sure nothing pounced on her as she raced back towards me.

“It’s leaking,” she groaned, holding it out in front of her body with a disgusted look on her face.

I couldn’t help the laugh that slipped from my lips. She was used to getting grease or dirt on her hands, but there was something about it happening unexpectedly that she hated more than anything. Once, early on in our Ice Escape endeavours, she’d lost her gloves in a fight and landed in a puddle of blood, and I genuinely thought she was going to puke. She wouldn’t let us progress to the next level until we’d found a stream for her to wash her hands.

“Hurry up and use it before too much leaks out!” I whispered.

Dina grumbled under her breath, but she disappeared behind me. The thick glug of liquid sounded, followed by a splash, and I couldn’t help but wince at the noise. How much had been wasted? Would there still be enough to properly grease the cogs or whatever the lock was using?

“I hate this,” Dina whined after a couple of seconds.

“What’s going on?”

There was another moment of silence before she spoke again.

“The spout is warped and leaks, so it’s basically useless, and I don’t have anything to use, so I’ve had to stick my fingers into it to make sure everything’s greased,” she grumbled, continuing before I had a chance to speak. “I know, I know. Never put your fingers into machinery or anything like this, but how else was I meant to do it?”

I bit back my concern, knowing there was no point in repeating the warning, but it was hard to resist. It was always annoying to lose a finger in the game. It made it so much harder to do anything.

“Be careful,” I said instead. “How’s it looking?”

“Mm… I think it should be okay now. I’ve done my best,” she said. “It might still be a little loud at first, but once the gears get moving and the grease spreads, it should be better. Unless, you know… video game logic.”

A smirk tugged at my lips. She had a good point. Ice Escape was a great and realistic game in many ways, but sometimes, things worked a little too well. Like, we’d grease a hinge, and it would be silent immediately. Or we’d find one of the few rare lockpicks, and we didn’t even need to use it. The moment it touched the chest or door, it just sprung open. That was always dangerous. Once the chest had opened with such force, it almost flew off the cliff before we could stop it.

“I hope so,” I said. “Go on. Try it.”

There was a rustle of fabric, and I tensed, waiting for the squeal to sound again, but no noise came.

“You need to do it,” Dina sighed. “My hands are all greasy. I don’t want to touch the wheel and make it impossible to grip.”

Panic flared within me at that thought. If that happened, we might be entirely unable to open the door. I doubted there was anything we could use to clean the oil off, except for maybe our thermals, but that felt like a bad idea. I wouldn’t put it past the devs to spawn a horde of creatures whilst we were in the middle of stripping out of them.

“Good idea,” I said quickly. “Switch places.”

Dina was already moving before I even stopped speaking. She wiped her hands on her legs, leaving dark streaks, and gripped her gun again.

“You got this,” she told me as she nudged me with her shoulder. “Put those muscles to good use.”

I grinned, scanning the lab again before slipping my gun onto my back and turning towards the door. There was a thick gouge out of the metal where the face plate must have caught on it, and I leant towards the wheel, peering past the spokes at the glistening gears within. I didn’t really know what I was looking at, though. It all seemed to be coated with oil or whatever it was that Dina had used.

“Okay, here goes,” I muttered, straightening up and wrapping my fingers around the rubber again. “Lefty loosey.”

I jerked the wheel to the side, my face screwed up in anticipation of the noise that I expected to follow, but no squeal sounded. There was a slight whine from somewhere in the door, but it was barely audible.

“Yes,” Dina breathed triumphantly. “It worked!”

“It did,” I confirmed, continuing to unlock the door and watching as the cogs turned.

“Is it open?” Dina asked impatiently.

“Not yet! I feel like I’ve been doing this forever,” I grumbled.

It had only been a few seconds, thirty maximum, but it felt like much longer.

“Are you sure?” Dina asked. “Maybe it’s unlocked now, and you just need to pull it?”

I gave the handle a tug, but it didn’t move.

“Nope,” I said, starting to twist it again. “It’s still locked.”

“Are you sure it’s actually doing anything? Maybe one of the gears has slipped?” she questioned, her tone becoming slightly more concerned at how long it was taking.

“I’m not sure. It feels like it’s—”

I fell silent as the wheel seemed to slam into something solid, making it impossible to twist any further.

“Is it…” Dina asked, unable to finish the sentence.

I gave the wheel a gentle tug, feeling it swing forward ever so slightly.

“It’s open.”

A sharp inhale came from behind me.

“It is?” Dina asked, her tone excited.

“Yeah. Are you ready?”