know it. Even if it's brand-new, it might be a reframe of a classical puzzle. Or I can logic it out. I mean, it has to be solvable, you know?'
She rubbed his shoulder affectionately. 'I'm gonna trust you. '
'With a face like mine, who can blame you?'
It was a face, Acacia decided, that only a mother or a desperate Loremaster could love.
She made her choice with the touch of a finger. The screen cleared. A cool synthesised voice spoke while matching words crawled across the screen.
'A hunter leaves home one morning. He walks a mile south and finds nothing. He walks a mile west, sees a bird, runs it down, and spears it for his supper. He walks a mile north and is home again. Tell me: What probable color is the bird, and why?'
Acacia stared, perplexity creasing her lovely face. 'I've heard that one,' she said. 'It's too easy. The bear is white.''
'Bird, not bear. So the answer can't be 'It's white, it's a polar bear, he's at the North Pole.' So.'
The Maze around them began to throb, smoke pouring from beneath the nearest sliding panel.
Captain Cipher's eyes defocused. 'Spears it. Runs it down and spears it. That takes…'
'Can you solve it?' They could take their loss and scamper, or try to answer the question. Every second cost them another five points.
'I've already got half of it, milady. The bird…'
Acacia decided to let him work. She raised her sword high, set her back against the Captain's, and waited, ready for danger, but never forgetting for a moment to keep tummy tucked in and chest lifted high for the camera. The eternal 'Cheese.'
Her body, once lean as a runner's, was now carefully ripened, so lush it almost burst out of her costume. Fashions change, she told herself, but mammalian response remains the same.
In every Game, players had a variety of factors going for them. Stamina, fighting skill, intelligence, luck, memory of obscure trivia
… all these figured in the actual playing of the Game. An additional quality was needed to create a champion:
Showmanship.
A true champion needed to spend an inordinate amount of time playing the Games, traveling from one area of the country and the world to another. In order to do that, she had to be popular with the players, the NPCs, and ultimately the millions of people who would never play a Game but would pay to watch it. Professional Gamers competed to divert as much of that loot to their own pockets as possible.
To that end, as well as the others, Acacia had deployed her considerable charms. She considered her alter ego, Panthesilea, to be the best mixture of brains and beauty, brawn and bravado in the Gaming world.
The Warrior-woman's past was sketchy. Panthesilea was known to be the great-granddaughter of Hercules and an Amazon queen, a second-generation product of parthenogenesis.
Acacia had played Panthesilea for almost ten years, had nurtured her carefully. She had never died in a Game. She had ascended through time and effort to become one of the most powerful and highly ranked Player Characters in the
International Fantasy Gaming Society.
During Games Acacia disappeared, immersing herself completely into the Warrior-woman from afar.
The mirror behind Captain Cipher flamed red. A mouth had appeared in it now, glowing brightly, a vast, grinning diamond shape, chockablock with needle teeth. Flames danced within. Insane laughter rang in her ears.
The demon of the Maze. This was the final trump. If Captain Cipher failed, all of their accumulated points might vanish. If he succeeded but she was killed by the materialising demon, the Troglodykes would hunt Cipher down and fillet him.
'Have you got an answer?' she hissed.
'Never published. Brand-new puzzle. Lovely!'
And the demon leapt.
Acacia screamed Panthesilea's battle cry (an assiduously practiced blend of Johnny Weissmuller and Ella Fitzgerald) and The demon froze in midleap. Captain Cipher had begun to answer the question. Mutilations were temporarily suspended.
She peered anxiously over Cipher's shoulders.
He had typed, 'Black and White. Penguin.'
A politely inquisitive demon appeared on the screen. 'Why?' he/she/it asked sonorously.
Cipher looked around. 'The camp is one plus one over two pi times N miles north of the South Pole.'
Acacia stared. 'What?'
'The hunter runs it down, yes? The bird's flightless. Penguins. The tuxedoed darlings are found only near the South Pole.' He was typing furiously: 1 + 1/2Pi(N) miles north of the South Pole (N a positive integer)
'Just so the demon knows Captain Cipher means business,' he said arrogantly. 'Now, Hunter set his tent just north of the pole, right? He walks a mile south, toward the pole, then circles the pole. That takes him a mile west, see? If he's closer yet, he can circle the pole two or three or four times. Then he backtracks, one mile north, and he's back at base camp. Only place he can do that is at the South Pole.'
She felt dazed. Captain Cipher waited coolly, matching gazes with the ruby-flame apparition dancing in the glass before him.
'Dinner,' it said, 'is served.' Its mouth opened wider, wider. A tunnel to the beyond. ' Bon appetit,' the demon said in a very bad French accent.
Acacia whispered, 'Stay here' in Panthesilea's husky voice, and stepped through the portal.
The entire Crystal Maze revolved around her with a barely audible vibration. The path beneath her feet remained stable.
The important thing was that she could see the enemy, but they couldn't see her. The three surviving Troglodykes had found their own console and were attempting to defeat their own demon. If they made it, both teams would have an equal footing, and Acacia was doomed.
As always, Tammi was stunning. Her icy-blond hair framed fashion-model cheekbones and blue eyes that burned with a challenge few men could ignore, and none surmount. Makeup made her pale skin even paler. Her shimmering white costume was radiant in the rotating lights. Her partner Twan Tsing was busy at the console. What would their chosen category be? Acacia had no idea and couldn't afford to guess.
Just concentrate on the action to come. Brain and brawn. Beauty and bravado. The Troglodykes were said to be the Crystal Maze's Dynamic Duo. Better than any individual, better than any other team.
Like hell.
Tammi kept her staff at the ready, as alert as a cobra. Behind the walls of glass, lights slid past like the eyes of disembodied jinn. Her nerves burned. What was it? Could she subliminally sense approaching footsteps? Or a change in noise level from outside? Or was the tension simply beginning to get to her?
Behind her, Twan labored through a three-dimensional maze. A rolling red ball guided by a set of delicate finger controls crept its way through a forest of swinging axes and flopping trapdoors, toward an opening at the top of the screen.
The Troglodykes had invested two thousand points here, but if they made it, the entire Maze would turn transparent. Superior forces would trample what remained of Acacia's team.
'Almost…' Twan said.
Tammi glanced at Appelion, the Warrior Warlock at her side, with satisfaction. He was a burly, hairy brute in matching black leather, and a stalwart companion. He growled, 'I want first crack at Panthesilea-'
— who promptly stepped out of the wall and scythed him down. He squeaked incongruously and started to swing, then (hearing the death-buzz in his ear) toppled.
Tammi screamed and leapt.
Terrifying. Acacia had never confronted Tammi, the Warrior half of the Troglodykes. Tammi's staff, padded composition plastic imbued with a mystic glow, blurred to the attack. Panthesilea's sword swooped to counter.
Her sword was pure Dream Park. The components of a hologram projector were woven around a rigid, padded core, with a gyroscope in the handle to simulate weight and heft. She could parry and block with it in safety,
