Chapter 11: Jail Guitar Doors

Everybody just stared at me as I studied the card. I was turning it around this way and that in my bony fingers, looking for a way to use the card when Church cleared his throat.

“Should we be in one spot for too long? Won’t we get another warning?” he asked.

“Jay, should we be in one spot for too long? Will we get another warning?” I asked Jay.

Jay blew her tentacles out at me and said, “I can hear what he says, Max. And y’all are okay for now. It takes about 60 minutes for the warning to happen. Also, what are you doing with that card?”

I stopped fiddling with the card and turned to Jay. “Y’all?” I asked. Jay’s tentacles went up to her face in a shy gesture. I returned my attention to the card as I said, “Also, sixty minutes before we get a warning? How the hell are we supposed to sleep?”

Church was leaning forward, trying to decipher what was being said between me and the invisible-to-him cephalopod. Jay said, “You sleep for short bursts. It’s part of the weeding out process. They only want the strongest and fittest to be left. Again, what are you doing with that card?”

I was now poking at the words on the card one by one with my finger, seeing if that did anything. “I’m trying to see how to activate this stupid card,” I said. I brought the card up to my face and gave it a sniff. Nothing.

“If it’s actually a game card, you need to press it to your token to activate it,” Jay said flatly. I held out my palm and positioned the card above the token.

“Yeah, that makes sense,” I said. I pressed the card down on my token, and the world went dark. There was no sensation or anything; it was just as if I had closed my eyes, even though they were open. The world was dark, and then the next, it was bright white. Again, I couldn’t see a damn thing, but the white light soon cleared out.

We were all standing in the middle of a well-furnished room with recliners, a couch, a TV that was playing the Home Shopping Network, and a few dozen mini fridges. There was even a doggy bed near a barred window that shone light down on it. Patti was sniffing it before curling up on it. Church went over to a mini fridge and read a note on it aloud, “PB&J with crust?” He looked at the mini fridge stacked atop that one and said, “PB&J without crust?” He opened it, and a few Uncrustables fell onto the ground. He picked one up, and the packaging was red. “Strawberry? Hell yeah, that’s the best!” He opened it up to take a bite and continued looking around.

The walls and ceiling were cement, and there wasn’t any door to leave. There were barred windows that appeared to show the cell next door. I began to walk towards one when a zap of blue light appeared with a loud crack. In the middle of the room now stood Jessica. She was wearing my Dead Kennedys shirt and nothing else. The shirt tail was long enough that it covered everything, luckily, but it was still a shock. She had her crazed grin, and it went wider when she saw me.

“You came!” she exclaimed. She ran up to me, stopping very closely in front of me. She looked up and asked, “Did you miss me?”

I was going to say a very hesitant yes, but her smile disappeared, which caught me off guard. Jessica turned her head to Jay, who was now looking nervous. “No game manuals in jail, bitch!” Jay was then gone. No poof, no zap, she just disappeared. Jessica turned back to me and gave me a hug, arms wrapped around my neck. She was smelling me furiously when I pulled her away.

“What did you do to Jay?” I demanded.

Jessica clicked her tongue and said, “She knows she can’t be in here. She’s okay, though, just offline while you’re in jail! Now tell me you missed me!”

Jessica just stared, unblinking and waiting for my answer. Instead, I asked, “Is she okay?” Jessica’s face became pouty.

“She’ll be back when you go into the maze again!” she said. Her voice became very deep for the next bit, “Now tell me you miss me, Maxi.”

She was staring intently before I said, “Yeah, of course I did. You’ve… you’ve actually been a big help, Jessica. Thank you.” I did mean that, as weird as it was to admit. Jessica smiled widely, and her face became bright again. She went off walking around while she talked.

“So this is jail! This is a construct that we use for players. Sometimes it’s punishment, sometimes it’s for somebody’s class, and sometimes it’s a reward! The card you’ve been given allows you to enter here for a maximum of twenty-four hours! That’s neat! Just know, for however long you stay inside, that’s how long of a cooldown your card has! And of course, every time you come here, I will know it and I’ll come visit!” She had ignored Church and Patti the entire time. Patti didn’t seem to mind one bit, and Church was quietly eating his sandwich. She stopped in front of me again and asked, “Any questions?”

“I have a million questions, Jessica, but for now, can I just send these two here when I need, or do we all have to come?”

Jessica laughed and punched my arm, which kind of hurt. “You’re so silly, Maxi! Next time you use the card, just think about who you want to send and that will work just fine. It works like that both for entering and exiting.” She suddenly froze in place, staring blankly at nothing. I waved my hand in front of her face to no reaction. I looked at Church, and he shrugged. He was now drinking a Pibb Xtra soda. Jessica suddenly animated again and said, “Sorry, snookums, I’ve got to go. It’s always so busy when the maze first opens!”

“Oh, okay,” I said. “I guess I’ll see you around?”

Jessica got really close to me. This time, she was pressed against my chest as she said, “Not if I see you first. Toodaloo!” And with that, there was another explosion of sound and color, and she was gone. I let out a breath and turned to Church.

“Holy shit, she’s scary!”, I said. Church drank the last of his soda and let out a little burp.

“Uh…” Church began. “Who?”

“Jessica!” I said.

“Wait, was she here?” he asked.

I just looked at him before asking, “Did you not see her?”

Church was still going through the fridges when he answered, “No.”

“Why didn’t you react to any of that? I even talked about Jay, who is now missing!” I said.

“Dude, you’ve been talking to invisible people all day. I don’t know what the hell is going on, okay?” Church gave up searching and went to sit on the couch. “So, uh, what did she say?”

I caught him up while he listened. When I finished, he just sat there before asking, “So if we’re in here for one hour, we have to wait an hour to come back?” I nodded in reply before he said, “Do we have to go back?”

I pulled the card back out and frowned at it. “Yeah, we have to make sure we can send you and Patti here whenever monsters appear out there. You ready?”

Church got up quickly and ran to the mini fridges and loaded up the backpack, which by this point was getting very filled. He slung the backpack over his shoulder and gave me a thumbs-up. I pressed the card to the token in my palm, and we exited the jail. When the world reappeared, we were right back where we were when we had entered. Patti was still curled up in sleep and lifted her head to look around before dozing off again. Jay was standing there, and I was so relieved.

“Jay!” I said. I ran up to her and continued, “Are you okay? I got really worried.”

Jay let out a puff of air that moved her tentacles. “I’m fine. I just can’t believe she turned me off! It was a really weird feeling, but I’m fine.” I cut her off with a hug, which she was not expecting. I was surprised I was able to do this, and she felt fairly normal. I was just so damn relieved.

“I was really worried,” I said softly. Her tentacles patted my shoulder before they pushed me away. I smiled at her before saying, “Okay, it’s time for us to go get Church’s token.”

“Y-yes, but first you need to level up!” she said.

“Oh, okay,” I replied.

I checked my screen, and there was a flashing tab that said LEVEL UP. I clicked it, and a series of notifications came up. It now said I was Level Three, that I gained two skill points, and I had unlocked the following spell for Zombie Angel:

Resurrection

Rock and roll will never die, and neither will you! Well, you can, but not as long as you have this spell active! Once used, this spell is active for 1 second and has a cooldown of 168 hours.

I told Jay what had happened, and she whistled. “Resurrection is the most powerful spell you could have!”

“Is it? One second doesn’t seem like much time, and it’s like a week-long cooldown. That seems pretty weak to me,” I said.

“Max, you could cheat death once a week. That’s huge. Okay, let’s distribute your skill points. Health is always a good choice, but what’s your highest skill right now?” she asked.

“It’s luck. It’s forty-two.” I said.

Jay just stared at me as I looked at how to distribute the points. I figured it out and decided that health seemed good, and I was about to add them when she finally said, “Did you say forty-two? Four Two?”

“Yeah, is that good?” I asked.

“Max, you’ll gain maybe twenty levels before the Maze closes, and you get one skill point per level. How the hell do you have forty-two? No one gets above thirty in any skill. That’s like… I don’t know, like a god or something.” She was truly in awe, and I wondered how the hell I got godlike luck?

“What does luck have an effect on?” I asked. Instead of Jay answering, there was instead a sound of something going through the air. I looked and saw the arch of a thrown flaming bottle that went over our heads, smashing against the maze wall and exploding in fire. Church then fell to the ground unconscious as Patti woke up barking.