“Amelia… Raphael…” I heard myself whisper.

“Take this,” someone said. Maybe Lumi. The voice was distorted. The white before my eyes became black, and darkness seeped into my being, threatening to take me away. How quickly this nightmare had unfolded. How swift its delivery.

I felt the rounded edge of a glass vial pressed against my lips. A cool liquid slipped down my tongue. I tasted berries and something slightly acidic, a little tangy. It was something I’d had before.

“Come on, Tae.”

I must’ve swallowed it. It went down, reaching my stomach and spreading out in ripples of sharp pain. My muscles jerked. I couldn’t control any of this. The blackness took over. It prevailed. My inner light went out.

Snap. And it was over.

Riza

My eyes popped open. I sucked in a desperate breath, suddenly remembering how I’d fallen, in the first place. Relief washed over me as I realized that I was still alive. How or why, I wasn’t sure, until I noticed the aftertaste in my mouth. The healing potion.

Lumi.

“Herakles!” I cried out.

Someone stirred beside me. Above, the ceiling stared back at me with its cold light beams. There were levers on all the walls. Oh, no… I didn’t dream it. It was real. The Soul Crusher’s insane puzzle was real, and we were stuck in it.

I managed to push myself up into a sitting position, to find Herakles by my side. He’d been the one I’d felt, seconds earlier. He was alive, his chest moving slowly with each breath. A white, powdery substance lingered over his lips. I wiped it off with my sleeve. The memory of him choking and literally foaming at the mouth made me shudder.

He’d pulled a random lever, and it had released some type of gas. It was extremely toxic. It probably would’ve killed us, had it not been for Lumi’s quick thinking. Lumi…

I looked around in a panic. They were all here, each of them still breathing and gradually coming to. I said nothing for about a minute. Herakles opened his eyes and smiled upon seeing me. Somehow, at some point in this journey of ours, we’d gotten so close to each other that it had become increasingly difficult for us to be apart. I didn’t mind it one bit, since my thundering heart had already declared my feelings for him… but I worried. I worried so much now, in this room, in this crazy place.

What if we never got out of here? Snap out of it! We only tried one lever. Hundreds more still left. That was true, but what other traps waited behind them? What else would the Soul Crusher throw at us before we found the right lever? Poison? Blades shooting out from the walls? Some evil sudden-death type challenge that would kill more than half our crew before we made it out?

“Are you okay?” he asked me.

We helped each other up. “Yeah. The potion worked quickly.”

“Thank the stars.”

“No, thank Lumi,” Raphael replied, pulling himself together. Amelia checked his vitals with loving concern, and he gave her a soft smile. “Look at you, nursing me.”

“Hey, if I can’t take care of my first boyfriend, I’m friggin’ useless,” she said jokingly.

“First boyfriend? How many were you planning on having?” he shot back, and they both laughed lightly.

I smiled, almost reflexively, pleased to see their moods still up after what had just happened. Lumi groaned as she got up, rubbing the back of her neck. Nethissis took out a cloth and soaked it in volcanic lake water, using it to wipe Lumi’s mouth, then hers.

“That was a nasty little gas,” Nethissis said. “It was quick and vicious. I’ve never experienced something like that before.”

“I know. My insides were literally burning,” Eva grumbled, as Varga helped her up.

Taeral shot up almost instantly, blinking rapidly as he looked around. We all sympathized with the sigh he let out as soon as he saw that we were all okay. Eira hugged him tight, whispering something in his ear. He seemed surprised by her gesture, but he welcomed it, giving her a warm smile.

“I’m glad you’re okay, too,” he said slowly, and glanced at us. “You’re all good, right?”

“Yeah, magic lady over here saved our asses,” Raphael replied. He gave Herakles a hard nudge. “You need to stay away from the levers from now on. You’re bad luck.”

“Hey, man, I stand by my actions. Someone had to pull one of the damn things!” Herakles shot back.

I squeezed his shoulder briefly. “It’s okay. We’ll be more careful next time.”

“It’s not okay. Don’t enable him. He will never learn, otherwise,” Raphael retorted, still pretty angry with Herakles. I understood where he was coming from, but his reaction was just too much for this situation, and it could easily lead to unwanted and unproductive friction. The last thing we needed in this place was tension or conflict.

“I mean, there’s a reason why Riza warned you,” Varga muttered. He, too, was cross with Herakles. Taeral didn’t seem too happy about it, either, and I didn’t know what to do to defuse this.

“The odds were that the same would’ve happened if any one of us had pressed one of the levers,” Eva interjected before Herakles could reply. “Let’s just take it as a lesson and maybe find a way to better screen the levers before we press them.”

“We’re all on edge here,” I said. “Let’s not lose focus.”

“For what it’s worth, I am sorry this happened. But I just couldn’t stand idly by anymore,” Herakles said. “Time is of the essence, no matter what the Soul Crusher tells us. Whether we get a few extra hours in here or not, as opposed to the outside world, it’s irrelevant unless we do something with them.”

I was terrified without my powers. I barely recognized myself. Words came with great difficulty, and all I could think of was how nice it would’ve been if I could just teleport everyone out of this place—which was the one thing I couldn’t do.

“What do we do, then?” I asked, feeling useless.

Herakles sighed. “Try again?”

“Not you, though,” Raphael shot back with a smirk. “Someone else. We could take turns.”

“We should be careful, still,” Lumi advised us. “There’s a limited amount of healing potions and volcanic lake water left.”

“My vampire blood is still…” Amelia’s voice trailed off. “Oh, no, what if the Soul Crusher took that away, too?”

“Oh, honey. You’re definitely the brightest out of the group to consider that possibility.” The Soul Crusher’s voice boomed through the room. “But even I am not skilled enough to do that. I’d have to strip your DNA to a bare thread, then reassemble it, and that’s just a massive headache. So, how’s everybody doing?”

“Just peachy. When do we get dessert?” Varga replied sarcastically.

The Soul Crusher laughed. “Good, good, keep that humor up, darling. You’ll need it. Anyway, Herakles here is right. Keep trying. I’m watching, so don’t disappoint me, okay?”

“I don’t get it. Amelia can still heal, but I can’t turn into a snake? That’s part of my genetic makeup, too!” Eva said, frowning.

“Now, now… What did I tell you? There isn’t much time. Will you spend it questioning me or getting the heck out of here?” the Soul Crushed replied.

“He’s right,” Taeral interjected. He paced the room several times and stopped in front of another lever, on the wall opposite the one that Herakles had tried first. “We should keep trying. Lumi, Nethissis, can you two handle the dispensing of healing potions, if needed?”

“Sure. I might as well pass the vials around now, so we all have an even quantity, readily available in case we set off some other poisonous trap,” Lumi replied.

“Where’d the gas come from?” Nethissis murmured, studying the ceiling. “There isn’t a single hole for it to come through.”

“It could be hidden. Some kind of retractable opening,” Eva suggested. “I mean, this is old-school Reaper magic, and we don’t even know enough about the present-day Reaper magic. We’re wasting our energy wondering how he’s pulling this stuff off.”

Raphael stilled, his brow furrowed as he glanced over his shoulder. He flexed his muscles briefly with a grunt, and his wings exploded behind him. He shot us all a broad grin. “Couldn’t take these away, it seems.”