36: Arachne Escape Studios
“Arachne Escape Studios?” Ava read aloud, grimacing as she looked at the shimmering silver tickets right in front of her.
“Exactly!” replied the stranger enthusiastically, waving the tickets animatedly. “We’re currently on our way to becoming the hottest event in the whole city. I’m sure you’ve heard of us!”
“Coooooool… But I don’t really have the money for it,” Ava lied, turning back to her economics book. Of course she’d heard of Arachne Escape Studios. The company had popped up overnight a few months ago in an old industrial building and was making one headline after another. Tickets were expensive and hard to come by. An experience not to be missed under any circumstances. However, the name was something that put Ava off, and being locked up by strangers in the first place was something she didn’t necessarily want to experience. Any more than necessary.
“Oh! Sorry, didn’t I mention that? You and three of your best friends have been selected to test a new escape room! You can help with its creation and balancing! For free!” the woman said cheerfully, grinning widely. Ava looked up at her again. This time, suspiciously.
“Saying that about such a successful company seems a little hard to believe to me. Especially in this city. Don’t you have staff for that?” Ava asked.
“Of course! But we also want to see things from the customer’s perspective! And I assure you, the tickets are real, and you and your friends have nothing to fear!” she said, beaming, and showed one of the tickets, which had a watermark in the shape of a spider. Ava flinched and slid away from the woman.
“Yeees, I’ll pass. I’m afraid I have to get back to studying, so could you…” said Ava, trying to keep her voice sounding friendly.
“Oh… I see. Well, um, have a nice day,” said the woman disappointedly, her shoulders slumping. She had apparently imagined the conversation going quite differently. Disheartened, she walked on toward the campus exit.
“I thought I’d never get rid of her,” Ava muttered, taking a deep breath to refocus on the book. It certainly wasn’t an easy read, so she had to concentrate on every single sentence. Which was difficult when someone was dancing around Ava or poking her in the side, as her lively uniform Greed was doing right now. Ava flinched again.
“I was friendly, Greed! Until she got on my nerves. Now be quiet. I have to…”
“AVA! AVA! AVA!” called the familiar voice of her friend Summer, immediately snapping Ava out of her concentration.
“Summer, Summer, Summer…” Ava said with a laugh, turning to face the pink-haired whirlwind with a smile. Summer was definitely a pleasant distraction, but Ava’s smile froze on her lips the moment she saw her friend waving a fan of silver tickets.
Ava tried not to let on, for Summer’s sake, but it was hard for her not to panic. The ticket included not only admission to the new escape room, but also a ride in the company’s limousine and a dinner as a thank-you. Of course, the limousine had to be plastered with the spider logo everywhere. If Caitlyn and Cass hadn’t been holding her back, she would have toppled backward onto the street when she saw the huge, glowing spider logo on the floor of the limo. Even Greed could only partially calm her down.
“Are you okay, Ava?” Cass asked while Caitlyn chatted with Summer. Ava had been staring straight ahead the whole time. A quick, nervous sideways glance at Cass confirmed to Ava that no other spiders were lurking in that direction.
“I… I didn’t really want to come here. The… um,” she gestured briefly downward. Cass followed the movement and immediately recognized the problem.
“Ah… I see.”
She was silent for a moment, then leaned forward slightly so she wouldn’t have to raise her voice.
“I just thought you’d be better at dealing with spiders by now.”
Ava’s gaze drifted down to the glowing logo. She pursed her lips and shook her head.
“No. What makes you think that?”
“Well…” Cass said, tugging at Ava’s shirt. Now it was Greed’s turn to flinch. “I mean, because of your parasite.”
“Still, Cass, Greed isn’t a parasite. He’s my partner and my friend,” Ava muttered sharply, as if to make it clear she’d had enough of this kind of conversation. Cass raised her hands in a soothing gesture.
“Hey. I just want you to be careful.”
“Fine. I am… but I don’t have to be.”
“And that’s the mistake, Ava. You rely on him too much. What if he’s not there one day? What if he wants something from you one day and you can’t give it to him? Are you willing to pay that price?”
The corners of Ava’s mouth twisted. But before she could answer, Cass continued.
“You used to manage without him. You pushed through training despite all the difficulties, and now? How much are you still training? Or are you letting Greed do everything?”
“I train without Greed’s help. But I can’t take him off anymore,” Ava said, but then quickly added when she saw the horror on Cass’s face: “I mean, I don’t want to take him off anymore. Not for a long time…”
Ava fell silent and looked over at Summer.
“Last time could have ended badly. Worse than it did anyway.”
“Ah, yes, the Sarah Games. Well… I have to admit, without him you’re not completely defenseless, but… You saw for yourself what he can turn into.”
Ava lowered her gaze as the limousine slowed down. Cass reached for the door, but then paused.
“I hope this conversation gave you something to think about and that it distracted you enough from the logo,” Cass said with a smile and got out as the car stopped. Ava watched her for a moment and then looked down at the spider logo on the ground.
“Are you okay, Ava?” asked Summer, who noticed that something was wrong. Ava brushed her hair out of her face and forced a smile. An honest one, just for Summer.
“I’m fine now,” she said and climbed out. She would prove to Cass that Greed was more than just a parasite. He was her sword, her shield, and above all, her friend.
The studio complex was massive and spanned an old industrial site. Arachne Escape Studios had repurposed the old manufacturing halls and office spaces to create technically advanced and large escape rooms. Ava even felt a little reminded of Sarah’s playground; she hoped it stayed that way. At least her detective friends—or even Caitlyn—hadn’t been able to find any connections.
“Everything okay, Ava?” Caitlyn asked, and a small vein appeared on Ava’s forehead, beginning to throb. But she forced herself to stay calm and smiled at Caitlyn.
“You’re already the third person to ask me that today. Yeah, I’m fine, I’m just worried.”
“You don’t need to be. I’m right here,” said Caitlyn with a wink. Ava rolled her eyes.
“All right, Officer Caitlyn,” Ava muttered dryly and looked up as a woman appeared in a doorway and invited them in. They found themselves in a cozy and spacious office. Two long sofas stood in front of a low table, and the woman motioned for them to sit down.
“Welcome to Arachne Escape Studios. My name is Camille Ardent, and I’m the assistant to the two CEOs. Unfortunately, they’re unable to be here. That’s why I’ll be accompanying you until the event and afterward. I hope you enjoyed the drive here?”
Nervous and eager nods.
“Good!” said the woman with a smile, handing each of them a clipboard with a sheet of paper on it. “Please fill out this slip completely and read the safety instructions carefully. Our new escape room is more challenging, very realistic, and different from what you may have experienced elsewhere. We wouldn’t want you to reach into something and lose your fingers because of it, hahahaha,” Camille laughed. Cass coughed dryly. The woman looked up at her kindly.
“You must be Chloe, right?”
“No, Chloe couldn’t make it, unfortunately, because of a clothing issue or something like that. That’s why Summer asked me to fill in,” said Cass, tapping around on a spot on the paper.
“It asks here if we have heart problems, a latex allergy, or an allergy to… Nerathin-17…”
Caitlyn looked up, narrowed her eyes, and said, “Nerathin-17 is a…”
“Quite right. It’s a sleeping gas we use in the new escape room.”
Silence. The friends stared at Camille with their mouths agape.
“As I said, this escape room isn’t your average one. But we use it at Arachne Escape Studios under a special license. I’d be happy to show you the paperwork.”
Caitlyn and Cass immediately stood up to look at the papers in question, while Ava and Summer exchanged nervous glances.
“And that’s legal?”
“Indeed. We operate under a special permit. All substances used are tested, documented, and remain well below any critical threshold,” the woman explained, pointing out the relevant sections to Caitlyn and Cass.
“It’s legal,” Caitlyn confirmed in disbelief, collapsing back onto the sofa alongside Cass.
“That’s why we asked about allergies—so nothing unexpected happens. We’re also constantly monitoring your vital signs so that if anything does happen, we can react immediately,” Camille explained with a smile. “Of course, we won’t force you to go into the escape room. We just want you to know what you’re getting into. Our creators described it as our most realistic, toughest, and in some ways, most unfair yet.”
“Unfair? Well, we’ll see about that. Come on, guys. We did get a ride in a limo, after all. If they really wanted to hurt us, they could have just used the sleeping oxide right there. Plus, that latex allergy warning isn’t there for no reason. I definitely want to find out what’s behind this now,” Summer announced and signed the paper. Caitlyn signed next. Cass followed, shaking her head, and now it was up to Ava. She picked up the pen and began to sign.
“My parents would spank me if they knew about this,” she said and signed her name.
“Well, maybe they’ll be participants in our newest escape room themselves soon. Thanks to your great work today, we’ll definitely be able to improve it further so it can open quickly,” Camille said, collecting the papers. “If you’d like to follow me now? I’ll take you to the escape room and we’ll get started right away.”
As the four friends followed Camille to the escape room, she explained about Arachne Escape Studios.
“As you can see, we have a lot of different classic escape rooms in our catalog. Thanks to the size of our property, we don’t have to worry about running out of space anytime soon, even though the new one takes up a good 50% of our area. But we’re already in talks with the city to buy more land. Since the old industrial warehouses were just sitting there anyway, we can buy them cheaply, renovate them at a slightly higher cost, and install our escape rooms.”
“I’ve read that so many rooms are also very necessary with the high demand you have here.”
“Indeed. Within a short time, we were completely booked out and had to expand and expand. “Our builders even had to sleep here at times so they wouldn’t waste time commuting,” Camille said with a laugh, stopping in front of four steel doors. Above them, a digital screen displayed: “ISV Kerberos.”
“More Greek?” Summer remarked.
Camille smiled happily and nodded as she opened the doors with a button.
“Pay close attention, Summer. Many of our escape rooms are inspired by Greek mythology.”
“Who was Kerberos, anyway?” Ava asked quietly as the steel doors revealed small rooms measuring two by three paces. Summer furrowed her brows and whispered, “The three-headed hellhound that guarded the underworld.”
Ava swallowed and stopped in front of her door. That information wasn’t exactly inviting, and the room didn’t make it any better. Metal covered the walls, the floor, and even the ceiling. A locker, a screen, and a bench were all that stood inside. At least it wasn’t a prison cell. Ava thought, though she missed a bed and a toilet. She looked up at Camille, who just smiled encouragingly at her. She had a bad feeling about the whole thing, but did she even need to worry? After all, she had Greed on. Ava finally nodded defiantly at her and went inside. Camille pressed the button, and the doors slowly closed behind them.
“Good luck, girls! We’ll see you as soon as you’re done!”
“Wait? Is there no time limit?” Cass asked, but her question came too late as the door closed behind her and sealed itself with heavy bolts.
“No time limit?” Ava asked now as well and turned around immediately. The door was definitely not meant to be opened from the inside. There was no doorknob or keyhole in sight.
What have we gotten ourselves into here, Greed? Ava thought, hugging herself as she felt a chill in the small metal room. Greed reacted immediately and pressed closer to her body. She stroked her shirt—and thus Greed. As long as he was with her, she knew she was safe.
“But how do we get out of here?” Ava asked, turning back to the bench, locker, and screen, which had now flickered to life. She paused when she read her name and a number after it. At the same time, a computer voice sounded, sending a shiver down her spine. The whole escape room was too similar to Sarah Games.
“Prisoner: Ava. Your transfer to the Interstellar Security Vessel Kerberos has been successfully completed. You are now in a standardized intake unit of the high-security area. You are hereby ordered to remove all personal belongings immediately. Undress completely and put on the uniform provided. This uniform is mandatory and serves for biometric registration and monitoring during your stay. Deviations from protocol will result in disciplinary action. You have fifteen minutes. Your 500-year prison sentence begins immediately thereafter.”
Ava swallowed. Was this still part of the game, or had she walked straight into a trap? But if that were the case, why only now? Summer had raised an important point. Ava hesitated, probably for a moment too long, because the next moment her tasks appeared on the screen along with a countdown that, as punishment for her 15-minute hesitation, had now jumped to ten.
“Fine!” she said hastily and opened the locker. Inside hung a black latex suit with white lines running from the neck all the way down to the built-in high heels. She realized that they would accentuate her breasts and hips as soon as she put it on. She was just about to ask Greed if he could transform into that when she paused. Camille had said they would be monitoring her vital signs. That meant she couldn’t wear Greed, not even as jewelry, since that wasn’t allowed either.
“So…”
Ava looked down at herself—and at Greed.
“Fuck.”
Glancing at her watch, Ava cursed again and took Greed off. She sensed that he was confused and worried. Ava was too, but she still didn’t have time to think it over. She hung Greed next to the latex suit and gave him a quick stroke. One last touch before she was alone. Ava took out the catsuit and hurriedly unzipped the front. She sat down on the cold bench and slipped her legs into the suit. She knew immediately that it was one of Celine’s suits. For a moment, the thought crossed her mind that maybe the company wasn’t so bad after all, but then she remembered that even villains could buy Celine’s suits. She did, however, find a small surprise when she got to the high heels. Ava had to push hard until her feet slipped into the shoes. Finally, she pulled the suit up over her body and slipped her hands into the sleeves until they slid into the gloves. Ava zipped up the suit and fastened a tab at her neck at the last second.
“That was close.”
“Prisoner: Ava. Select control unit and place on zipper.”
“Control unit?” Ava asked as a flap opened at that moment, revealing several glowing triangles of different colors. They felt warm to the touch.
“I’ll just take the blue one before I get threatened again,” Ava muttered. She took the blue triangle and placed it on the zipper of her suit. Immediately, the white lines lit up blue and began to pulse.
“What now?” Ava asked, looking back at the screen, which now displayed her vital signs:
Heart rate: 102 bpm
Respiratory rate: 21/min
Body temperature: 36.8°C
Blood pressure: slightly elevated
Oxygen saturation: 98%
“Put your legs and hands into the ports and grip the handles tightly.”
“Handles?”
Ava saw two holes open in the floor and two more in the wall. She quickly slipped her limbs into them and grabbed the bars in the holes. As if on cue, metal closed around her wrists. Instinctively, she pulled, but she was stuck.
“Prisoner: Ava. Welcome to the ISV Kerberos,” said the computer voice, and with a hiss, a hidden door opened in front of Ava. Her hands were freed, and she realized that thick handcuffs had been fastened on her, connected by a cable. The same thing had happened to her ankles, and the cable connecting them allowed only short steps. She hadn’t even had time to fully take in her situation when she was pulled forward. A third cable was hooked between her handcuffs and pulled her along a rail in the floor toward the exit.
“Great…” Ava muttered sarcastically and stumbled into a long metal corridor. To her left and right, her friends followed suit. Each of them was wearing the same suit, except Caitlyn had taken the purple control unit, Cass the green one, and Summer, of course, the pink one.
“Hey, Ava!” Summer said cheerfully, grinning widely, and waved at her. Meanwhile, Caitlyn looked around intently, while Cass seemed pretty annoyed.
“Hey, Summer,” Ava replied, glancing back at the locker until the door closed with a hiss. The cable started moving again, pulling the four friends down the corridor.
“So the key to escaping this escape room is to escape this prison ship? Cait, as a police officer, how do your prisoners escape from your jails?” Summer asked, glancing over her shoulder at Caitlyn. She stopped, looking bewildered.
“You say that as if it happens every week and the LCPD knows about it and does nothing about it!” Caitlyn said indignantly, only to be roughly pulled along by her wrists.
“Don’t they?” asked Summer. Caitlyn began to grind her teeth, and for the first time since Ava had been there, she had to smile too.
“It’s still under investigation… again,” muttered Caitlyn, and Cass had to groan. “Anyway. I think we should get rid of these handcuffs first, or at least the cables connecting them.” “
“Oh, really? I wouldn’t have expected that at all, you supercop,” Cass exclaimed sarcastically from the back row. Caitlyn had to close her eyes against the internal pain, while Summer was led around a bend first.
“Um, guys, I think we have to get past another hurdle first,” Summer called out as Ava was pulled around the bend. On her right and left, prison cells were built into the walls. Summer was led into the left one by her restraints, while Ava was now being pulled into the right one. Caitlyn and Cass ran past them. Once they were all in their cells, Cass said, “Well… if they let go of the leash, we’ll get out of here pretty quickly.”
At that moment, red panels lowered from the ceiling and locked them all inside their cells. A humming sound echoed through the cell at the same time, and the guide cable attached to their handcuffs detached and disappeared into the track. Their hands and feet, however, remained shackled.
“Can we agree to stop tempting fate?” Caitlyn called out, annoyed. Ava could only agree, even though she probably had the darkest thoughts about the escape room so far. She turned around carefully in her high heels and walked over to the tinted glass pane.
“So we have to escape from these cells first,” Ava muttered and pressed against the pane, which she immediately regretted. An electric shock shot through her suit and made her flinch backward. She tripped over the cables and fell hard on her back.
“AVA!” Summer shouted and wanted to rush to her, but she stopped in front of the pane before she touched it.
“I’m fine!” groaned Ava, rolling onto her stomach before getting up. “It just startled me.”
“I thought latex didn’t conduct electricity,” said Caitlyn.
“Neither does glass,” said Summer, pressing her face close to the glass pane as if she could see the current flowing through it. “That’s not glass, those are radiation shields.”
“Sure, Summer,” said Cass, and they heard a bang from her cell. “Oops. Maybe we should have screwed that in.”
Ava glanced diagonally across at Caitlyn, who was staring spellbound into Cass’s cell. Shortly after, she started fiddling with a panel in her cell and broke it out of the wall as well.
“There are cables behind here,” Caitlyn told the others and bent down.
“Are you sure we should just break the panel out?” asked Summer, who had watched everything happen with Cass and was now looking worriedly at her own panel on the wall.
“Then they should have installed the panels better,” Cass growled. A hissing sound could be heard, and her glass door slid upward; Caitlyn’s followed shortly after, and both stepped out into the hallway. Cass looked indifferent, while Caitlyn had a triumphant smile on her lips.
“Come on, then. Just break them out and we can look around here together,” Caitlyn said.
“I don’t know. I think that’s the wrong way,” said Summer, looking around her cell. Cass rolled her eyes and walked past them back into the long hallway.
“Cass…” Caitlyn called after her, shaking her head, “I… make sure she doesn’t escape without us. Just break that thing out.”
Summer just shook her head and felt along the wall beneath the panel. Caitlyn, on the other hand, followed Cass and disappeared around the corner.
“Cass?”
Silence.
Ava and Summer looked at each other for a moment and then back at the corner.
“Caitlyn?”
Silence.
“Okay, we have to get out of here!” Ava called, turning toward the panel. She felt along the wall, just as she’d seen Summer do, but she didn’t understand what Summer was supposed to have felt. Frustrated, she finally wedged her fingers into the panel a few minutes later and yanked it down. Behind it were cables of various colors. They were plugged into colored sockets. The wrong ones, as Ava realized, and she hurriedly pulled the cables out to plug them into the right ones. The glass panel rose, and Ava stepped out. Before she followed Caitlyn, however, she looked into Summer’s cell. “What the hell are you doing in there, Summer?” Ava asked as Summer lay under a large metal plate that was presumably meant to serve as a bed.
“Getting out of the cell?” Summer replied with a raised eyebrow, fumbling under her bed before the plate opened on its own. “I’d never heard of solving escape rooms by force.”
She sorted the cables into the right sockets and her “radiation shield” disappeared.
“Yeah, yeah,” said Ava, heading ahead to see where Cass and Caitlyn had disappeared to. It still bothered her that she could only take short steps, but as long as she didn’t have to run away, it wasn’t too bad.
“They’re definitely not in the long hallway,” said Ava as she turned the corner. Summer stumbled after her, but suddenly called out, “Ava! Watch out!”
Ava jumped in fright and turned toward her just as a metal rod whizzed past her head. At the same time, something adhered to her body. Ava was so taken aback by the rod and the sensation of something pulling at her body that she realized too late she had stepped into a trap. The rod began spinning around Ava at lightning speed, wrapping her in several rolls of turquoise-shimmering adhesive tape. Her mouth, arms, and legs were wrapped up so quickly that she couldn’t scream or run away. But the pole didn’t stop there; it kept spinning, tightening the bindings already in place and even holding Ava steady so she couldn’t fall. Within seconds, she was transformed into a turquoise mummy, with only her eyes still visible. She felt dizzy and staggered around the hallway until she saw Summer, who was just covering her mouth in shock. Then she suddenly lost her footing as a trapdoor opened, and she slid down a metal ramp. She barely had time to look up at Summer’s frightened face before the trapdoor closed, leaving Ava in the dark as she slid into the unknown.
“Mmmmmpppffff!” Ava screamed into the duct tape, broke through a flap, and landed with a squeak on a cot. She held her breath briefly in shock and just stared at the ceiling of the room until she remembered to breathe again. The duct tape wrapped around her entire body made it difficult, and she had to take short, rapid breaths. It took a few more seconds before she dared to look around her new surroundings. Aside from a shower with a glass cylinder, she had apparently landed in a first-aid room that looked like the ones in various science fiction movies. Robotic arms with sensors, test tubes containing various liquids, and screens, some of which displayed strange symbols. Some showed multiple colors, and another displayed the vital signs of the four.
Ava:
Infirmary
Heart rate: 138 bpm
Respiratory rate: 32/min
Body temperature: 37.4°C
Blood pressure: significantly elevated
Oxygen saturation: 96%
Now that she saw it, she could feel her heart pounding in her throat, and she closed her eyes to calm herself. No easy feat, since Greed had been helping her with that lately and was now missing. Ava opened her eyes a crack and saw that her vitals had improved at least a little. According to the screen, Summer seemed to be okay, at least, and on the run. Caitlyn was a little cooler, but her oxygen levels were excellent; she seemed to be in a containment chamber, though. Cass, however, was the complete opposite. She was hot, her heart was racing, and she seemed to be having trouble breathing. She had apparently done something so bad that she was in solitary confinement.
Cass is in trouble! I have to help her! The thought shot through Ava’s mind immediately, and she hopped off the stretcher. She put her feet on the floor and heard a rustling sound. A glance down told her that Cait and Cass had been here too. Remnants of the duct tape were scattered all over the floor. Apparently, the two of them had suffered the same fate and had been wrapped up like mummies. At least they’d managed to free themselves, even if they’d left a battlefield behind. The tape was torn and scattered carelessly across the floor. Ava looked up at the screen, where Caitlyn and Cass’s stats were displayed. They weren’t doing much better than she was, while Summer was probably searching for more puzzles in the main hallway.
But why wasn’t Summer wrapped up too? Ava wondered, sitting back down on the couch. She tilted her head slightly to the side and looked toward the exit, which was simply open.
“Mmmmh.”
Ava wiggled a little in her cocoon. She believed she could free herself effortlessly if she really wanted to, but it was too easy.
What if we get punished for taking the easy way out?
Ava stood up again and hopped over to the screen with the colors and strange symbols. With her high heels, it was a real test of balance. Ava could see that the colors were related to the symbols. She couldn’t say what they meant, though. Ava looked down at herself and examined the turquoise adhesive strips.
Maybe I have to match the tape’s color? What’s the opposite of turquoise? Orange? Ava wondered, leaning forward to press the red button with her nose. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw one of the test tubes empty and fill the shower cylinder. Ava nodded and pressed the yellow button. The cylinder turned orange, and she hopped into the shower, which turned on immediately.
At least it’s not cold. Ava thought, closing her eyes as warm, orange water pelted her back. She squirmed a little again to check if the tape had loosened yet, but she was disappointed. It melted on the surface and reformed around her body, becoming a solid shell. At the same time, the heat made it tighter, squeezing her already constricted body even more. The tape might as well have been a latex sleeping bag—and probably was one now. Ava knew that her attempt to escape had just gotten a little harder. She pressed against the material, but it was so unyielding that she couldn’t even make a dent in it.
Come on! Ava thought and started wriggling, but that only caused her to lose her balance and fall flat on the floor. Fortunately, the tape—now a latex sleeping bag—cushioned her fall. Still, she saw stars for a moment.
Fuuuuck.
Ava began fighting against the embrace with all her might, but the latex held her firmly in its grip. She pushed and kicked until she had to gasp for air and lay on her back in a rage, unable to process this humiliation. Even her fear for Greed and her situation as a whole had vanished. Ava even had to admit that she was having a little fun.
Was that what I liked about bondage? The attempt to free myself? Ava thought, tensing her muscles. One last attempt to escape the cocoon.
“Ava?”
Ava looked up in surprise as Summer entered the room. Her arms and legs were still in the handcuffs, but at least she wasn’t wrapped up like Ava was. Ava tried to sit up, but the tension of the latex cocoon was too great, and she looked up at Summer with pleading eyes.
“What happened to you?” Summer laughed and helped Ava sit up. “Did you get yourself a latex cocoon?”
Ava nodded shyly and gestured toward the shower and the screen.
“Oh? What do we have here? Did you want to end up in this sexy cocoon, just for me? You didn’t have to do that, even though I appreciate the gesture.”
Ava looked up in confusion, and Summer looked over her shoulder at her.
“Didn’t you? You were following the instructions on this note, right?” Summer asked, flicking a yellow sticky note that was stuck to the edge of the screen. Ava blinked in confusion.
How could I have been so blind? Ava thought as she saw the combinations on the note. Two blues and one yellow would have freed her, while red and yellow…
Ava closed her eyes in frustration at her own stupidity, while Summer cheerfully hummed as she mixed the colors.
“So what do you think, Ava? Pretty cool, this escape room, huh?” Summer asked as she helped Ava out of the shower.
“Yeah… breathtaking,” Ava said sarcastically, stretching as best she could. “Did you figure out how to get out of here? At least out of the handcuffs?”
“Not yet. I had to save you idiots first.”
“And where are those two?”
“Are you blind? It’s right there,” said Summer, tapping the screen.
Caitlyn was still in the containment chamber, and Cass in solitary confinement.
“Ah, I thought you… never mind. Looks like I really am blind,” Ava said, shaking her head. But then she smiled, “Let’s rescue the other idiots and get out of this rat hole!”
Summer started grinning widely.
“You finally get it. “Come on, I think we have to go this way,” said Summer, awkwardly dragging Ava behind her, past a steep staircase and through a corridor labeled “Solitary Confinement.” The path there led through narrow tunnels and many twists and turns, presumably to confuse them, like in a maze, but Summer seemed to know exactly where she was going. Eventually, they came to an elongated room with thick steel cell doors at the end. Ava thought she heard Cass’s strained groans coming from one of them.
“Oh, that was quick,” said Ava, about to run off, but Summer held her back. “What?”
“Too fast and too easy. Don’t you think a solitary confinement area should be a little better secured?”
Ava nodded and looked around. Nothing suggested that anything was wrong, but apart from a computer on a table with a chair, the room seemed empty. Nevertheless—or perhaps precisely because of that—it smelled like a trap. While Summer walked over to the computer, Ava looked around the room. Several pipes emerged from the wall next to her, running a few steps along the wall until they shot up toward the ceiling and came down on the other side. There was another valve there, and the pipes shot back up toward the ceiling after a few more steps. This pattern repeated all the way to the isolation cell, where the pipes finally ended.
“Hmm, with this we can open the doors to the solitary confinement cells for five seconds,” said Summer, pointing to a button mounted on the table as she examined the computer for clues. Ava looked down at her leg restraints and then down the hallway.
“That could be problematic. What else do we have?”
Summer looked up from the computer and now examined the pipes as well.
“I can overload the cooling system. I assume these valves have something to do with it.”
“Go ahead then,” said Ava. Summer immediately did as she was told, opened the valve, and started pressing buttons on the screen. A red line appeared on the pipes, growing until it reached the first valve. From one second to the next, steam shot out of it and flooded a small section of the corridor. With it, red light barriers became visible, and Ava stumbled back as one of them passed right in front of her nose.
“Oh shit, that was close!” she stammered, eyeing the lasers anxiously. They formed a grid covering the first few steps to the next valve.
“Come on. Touch one of them to see what happens,” Summer whispered, as if perched on Ava’s left shoulder.
“Are you crazy?!”
Summer grinned like a shark and waved her hand toward the solitary confinement cells.
“Why do you keep asking me that? You’d better do something useful and free Cass.”
Ava and Summer stared at each other. Summer with a mocking grin. Ava with narrowed eyes.
“Thin Ice from Nachtschwing.”
Summer flinched at the mention of her last name.
“Thin Ice, Miller,” Summer replied as their expressions shifted. Ava turned toward the lasers before Summer could get the idea to just shove her in. She dodged the laser right in front of her nose and ducked underneath it. Taking one step at a time, she made her way to the next vent. The cable between her legs, however, made the task more difficult than usual.
“Is this working, Ava?”
Ava rolled her eyes as she had to be careful in a particularly tight spot to make sure the cables didn’t touch the lasers.
“I’d be happy to invite you to try it yourself.”
“I could’ve easily reached the valve by now.”
Ava shook her head, grinning. Summer was just trying to throw her off so she’d make a mistake.
“The invitation still stands, Sumsum.”
“By the way, that suit really shows off your butt!”
This caught Ava off guard, and she jumped up in outrage.
“Summer!” she shouted, looking at her friend. She just grinned, but then she made a disappointed face.
“Come on, Ava, just touch one of the lasers already!”
“No, I won’t, Summer! Now shut up if you can’t help me!”
Pouting, Summer turned back to her computer while Ava opened the next valve and the steam revealed more lasers. She stepped over one of the obstacles in question, the cable of her ankle cuffs just a few inches away.
“OH!”
“Summer! I need to concentrate here!”
“Sorry, Ava! But I figured out how to loosen the cables on our restraints! You’re welcome, by the way!” Summer called back. Ava was about to cheer, since this would make her obstacle course much easier, but she froze in shock. The cable came loose from her right cuff and pulled toward the left. The same thing happened at her ankles. Ava froze as the cable broke through the laser barrier as if in slow motion. Her eyes widened, and then the alarm blared. Red lights flashed, and a shrill sound echoed through the facility. Ava and Summer covered their ears.
“TURN OFF THAT ALARM!” Ava yelled, and Summer turned back toward the computer. In doing so, she didn’t notice that a hatch was opening beneath her friend again, and her friend disappeared into the floor, screaming. Ava didn’t even have time to brace for impact when her legs touched a narrow, smooth surface. The momentum of the fall sent her sliding deeper, with a squeak, into a tube that squeezed her legs and arms tightly together. The tube pressed against her neck; a click was heard, and a metal collar sealed it shut. A second later, Ava fell onto a soft mat. Breathing in panic and with her eyes wide open, she tried to get her bearings in her new surroundings. Another cell with a red glass pane. Ava tried to stand up, but the tube was tightly secured to her body, making it difficult to move forward. She exhaled.
“They’ve got to be kidding me.”
Summer had furrowed her brows as she frantically tried to turn off the alarm. Her ears were ringing, and she wanted nothing more than to cover them, but she persevered and finally turned it off. Summer exhaled with relief and looked at Ava.
“Uh… Ava?” Summer asked when her friend had disappeared from the laser grid.
“Great. What do I do now?”
Summer looked at the missing valves and then at the button on the computer that would open the cell. She pressed it. Summer heard an electric hum, and the door behind the lasers clicked. After five seconds, it closed again. Summer pressed the button again and held it down. The door stayed open.
“Well, at least I can do the puzzle on my own,” Summer said to herself, stood up from her chair, and placed it on the button. Immediately, the door opened again, and she stretched before entering the laser maze. Without the cables on her ankles and wrists, it was easy for her to traverse the maze and open the valves one by one. Eventually, the room was almost completely filled with steam, revealing the lasers. She was almost tempted to see what would happen if she touched one of them, but Summer didn’t. She was the proud space pirate trying to escape this damn prison ship! She couldn’t give in to her desires.
Her curiosity.
Her… desire.
Summer ducked under the last laser and looked back. One finger would be enough. After all, she had to find out where Ava had gone, didn’t she? Summer licked her lips and extended her finger. A finger’s breadth away from the beam of light.
“What are you doing, you idiot?” she finally asked herself and let her hand drop. Instead, she turned to the steel door and pulled it open. What she found there was almost as good as finding Ava.
“Hey, Cass. Stuck a little, I see?” she asked cheekily, leaning against the doorframe, much to the annoyance of Cass, who was hovering over a pit from which steam was rising. Cass herself was strapped into a steel frame that held her arms and legs out from her body, forming an X.
“Get me down from here, Summer!” Cass growled irritably. Clearly, she wasn’t in the mood for games or for the escape room in general.
“Hmm, I certainly could. But we don’t want to cheat, like you and Caitlyn have probably been doing so far. That’s why you’re in these sticky situations,” Summer explained as she surveyed the room from the doorway. It had several monitors and switches that were undoubtedly there to somehow free Cass… or let her fall into the pit. Summer licked her lips again.
“Summer, no!”
“But Summer wants to…”
“Summer!” Cass said firmly, and the pink-haired girl pouted before walking over to the switches. As she passed, she studied Cass’s restraints. Metal rings held her fast to a frame—several on her arms and legs, as well as across her upper body. Even her forehead was secured by one of the shiny metal rings, so she couldn’t look around. Summer used this to her advantage to buy herself a little time while solving the puzzle, admiring Cass’s toned body through the latex of the suit.
“Do you know that latex looks really good on you?” she asked almost casually, while pretending to operate the computer. Cass made a grim face.
“I bet you’ve already told everyone in your circle of friends that.”
“Well… if it’s true,” said Summer, shrugged, and pushed a lever that jolted Cass forward, causing her to sway. Cass groaned in annoyance.
“Spare me. I have more important things on my mind than attending your stupid fetish parties.”
“Mhm, I see,” said Summer, pushing the lever back so that Cass swung back over the pit.
“What are you doing?! You almost had it! “
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Summer said, startled, but grinning widely, “this puzzle is very difficult.”
She pushed another lever, and suddenly Cass dropped down, right into the steaming pit.
“Summer… SUMMER!” Cass cried in horror, straining unsuccessfully against her bonds.
“I… I don’t know. The lever isn’t responding anymore!” lied Summer, who desperately wanted to know what would happen to Cass in the pit.
“You little…” cried Cass, who immediately saw through the lie and hissed in anger, “Fine! Have it your way. Next time I’m coming with you, no matter what!”
Summer pursed her lips and looked from Cass to the lever. Then back to Cass until she let out a disappointed sigh. She lifted Cass up again and set her down in front of the pit before connecting a few cables to the frame, freeing her friend.
“You’ve lost your mind,” Cass muttered and walked back through the door into the laser room.
“Maybe,” whispered Summer, looking down into the steaming pit, “Next time.”
When Summer also left the solitary cell, Cass snapped at her right away: “Where are the others?”
Summer shrugged.
“No idea, to be honest. Cait was with you, and Ava disappeared back there,” she said, pointing toward the lasers. Cass rolled her eyes.
“Screw it. Let’s just get out of here,” Cass said, heading toward a hallway next to a sign that read “Escape Pods.”
“But what about the others?” Summer asked, running after her.
“Like I said, I’ve got stuff to do and can’t spend the whole day hanging on some shitty cross!” Cass called irritably over her shoulder and disappeared into the corridor, while Summer followed hesitantly.
“But they wouldn’t leave us behind!” Summer said as Cass entered an elongated room with several capsules at the far end. Summer guessed these were the escape pods.
“Then you can keep looking for them. I just want to get out of here and…” Cass’s voice faltered as she suddenly had trouble walking. Her steps seemed strained, as if she were fighting against an invisible force pulling her to the ground. Even her arms were being pulled closer and closer to the ground.
“What the…?” Cass asked as she was forced to her knees and her wrists slammed against the floor with a heavy “clunk.” Summer immediately thought of the sleeping gas, but Cass didn’t seem to be getting tired; she was simply stuck to the floor, as if she were glued there.
“Those jerks! Aaaargh! ‘Damn it, those assholes!’” Cass cursed loudly, and now Summer realized that Cass had apparently stepped into a magnetic trap that was pulling her restraints to the ground. She grinned widely, as she now had an unobstructed view of Cass’s butt.
“What’s going on, Cass? Are you stuck? Again?” Summer asked, leaning back against the doorframe as she had done before.
“Get me out of here right now …” Cass said calmly, but with suppressed anger.
“I’d love to, but then I’d just get stuck myself, and someone has to get you all out of here. I’ll go see where the others are and look for a key to your restraints. Don’t run away,” said Summer, waving to Cass, who started cursing even louder.
“So much spirit in such a small body,” said Summer, shaking her head as she examined her metal restraints. She found only a slot on each of them.
“Maybe I can find a key card to open them?” Summer wondered aloud and went back into the laser room.
Ava’s stomach was burning. Not because she was hungry, but because she had to painstakingly solve the puzzles under her bed in the cell with her nose, and every time she wanted to reach them, she had to do sit-ups. Her body, restrained in the latex bag, didn’t make it any easier. If she were less fit, she would definitely be facing an endless torture task.
“Damn puzzles, damn latex, damn prison ship…” she cursed every time she sat up, until finally the panel with the hidden cables opened. She rolled out from under the bunk and crawled toward the cables like a caterpillar. It was the same puzzle as in the first cell.
“At least that’s something,” she growled, using her mouth to pull out the plugs and arrange them correctly. The red glass panel opened, and Ava exhaled with satisfaction.
“At least I was able to solve one puzzle correctly,” she muttered, crawling toward the doorframe to use it to pull herself up. She considered moving forward by jumping, but dismissed the idea when she noticed the high heels on her legs again. Reluctantly, she let herself slide back to the floor and crawled through the trapped wing until she reached a fork in the path. One path led up a spiral staircase, while the other was blocked by a door. Ava held out hope of finding something behind it that could free her, as she didn’t want to risk the stairs in her condition. With great effort, she stood up again and pushed open the door. She stumbled into the cramped room behind it and froze. Before her, Caitlyn floated inside a glass cylinder filled with a light blue, viscous substance. A breathing mask with a large visor was stretched over her face, allowing Ava to see exactly what Caitlyn was feeling. Her cheeks were flushed with embarrassment, and her eyebrows were furrowed in frustration.
“Hey, Cait…” Ava said worriedly, watching as Caitlyn screamed into her mask and kicked her legs in place. The gel did an amazingly good job of preventing Ava from understanding a single word, and it seemed to render Caitlyn unable to swim. She could only flail her arms around in place. She couldn’t even manage to hit the glass of the cylinder.
“Calm down, Cait. I… I’ll get you out of there somehow. I just need to…”
Ava looked at the computers and immediately felt overwhelmed. Not only did she have no idea what she was looking at, but she also still couldn’t use her arms because of the tube she was stuck in.
“Yeeeeeaaaah. Might take a while,” Ava said, lying down on the floor to crawl toward the computers. Caitlyn looked down at her as if Ava had gone mad.
“Just a short way, Cait, and then… yeah, then…” Ava muttered with effort as she crawled across the floor step by step, hoping she could actually free Cait. Without completely embarrassing herself. Staggering, Ava sat up. Just like before, she had to use her nose to operate the mouse and keyboard. She looked at the screens and growled in frustration.
“This might take a while,” Ava muttered, hoping that Caitlyn couldn’t hear her either. She groaned as she bent down and moved the mouse, keeping one eye on the screen. As she worked, groaning, she didn’t notice that Summer had appeared. She stood in the doorway, admiring Caitlyn’s figure as she peered over Ava’s shoulder, spellbound. Her hair swirled in the blue gel like tentacles, giving her a mystical appearance. If it weren’t for the sexy latex suit with the blue stripes? Summer licked her lips and moaned softly. Ava sat up immediately and looked toward the door. Caitlyn turned around as well, and both stared at Summer.
“Want to help?” Ava asked contritely.
“Well, go ahead. You two look way too good,” Summer replied with a grin.
“Please…”
“All right,” Summer said, taking a few steps toward Ava before shoving her aside like a sack of potatoes. “Let me have a go.”
“Haha.”
Within seconds, the gel disappeared from the cylinder and Caitlyn was gently set down on the floor. The glass opened and the young policewoman stumbled out before taking off her mask.
“Can you explain to me why Summer managed that in seconds?”
Ava looked at Cait, then down at herself.
“Are you serious, Cait?”
She grinned.
“Well, thanks for trying,” said Caitlyn, hugging Ava and Summer with her gel-covered body. The latter hugged her friend back immediately, while Ava just pursed her lips.
“Come on, let’s get out of here!” said Summer, breaking the hug before pulling out a card and slipping it into her friends’ restraints. The latex bag and metal rings opened with a beep and fell to the floor.
“See, I wasn’t just sitting around while you guys were having fun. You owe me a round of fun for that.”
“Having fun,” said Ava, shaking her head and stretching, while Caitlyn giggled.
“I’ll see what I can do about that,” she said, wiping the gel off her body. At that moment, all three of them flinched as another alarm went off. A voice boomed through the speakers into all the corridors.
“The prisoners have escaped. Facility lockdown in five minutes. All personnel to the escape pods!”
“I think we should get out of here!” Summer shouted over the noise and hurried ahead toward the spiral staircase that Ava had avoided earlier. Caitlyn and Ava followed her immediately and ran through the hallways. The signs directed them to the escape pods, but Summer took a different route, closing door after door to block their path.
“How do we get out of here?” asked Caitlyn, to whom every hallway looked the same.
“Like I said, I haven’t been idle,” said Summer, leading them on a detour while behind them the doors now closed as well and silver vapor was released into the rooms.
“Is that…?” asked Ava, and Caitlyn nodded.
“Don’t breathe it in!” Caitlyn shouted immediately upon recognizing the sleeping gas, but they didn’t need to worry, as Summer guided them safely through the rooms until they finally reached the escape pods. Summer motioned for them to head toward the pods, while she herself ran over to the cursing Cass to cut her metal restraints.
“It’s about time!” shouted Cass over the alarm, which told them they only had three minutes left.
Caitlyn and Ava tried to open the capsules, but they failed at the final puzzle.
“The… the cables, they…” stammered Caitlyn, not understanding what she had to do to open the capsules.
“Move aside!” said Summer, pushing Caitlyn aside to connect the cables. Her hands flew over the controls until finally the capsule opened.
“Come on, get in!” Summer shouted, and Caitlyn did as she was told. Next, she went to the next capsule, while Ava and Cass simply copied Summer’s work and opened their own. The gas was closing in on them as the friends worked feverishly. Finally, the escape pods opened and they jumped inside. Ava lay down on a soft surface and pulled a breathing mask over her face, just as she had seen Caitlyn do. She leaned back as the pod closed. At the same time, a latex sheet detached from the inside of the capsule and pressed against Ava before she could react. The sheet pressed against her body as the air was sucked out. She could no longer move, only breathe and look around blindly. The noise and stress made her pulse race. She had to survive; she had to escape this prison. Ava hoped they would make it. They had to make it.
“We have to make it…” she murmured as her eyes grew heavy and her breathing slowed. A thought flashed through her mind.
But the gas. We didn’t inhale it, did we? Ava asked as she took a deep breath through the mask. She didn’t know that they had managed to escape the escape room. She didn’t know that the gas outside was harmless, but not the one she was currently inhaling through the mask. She didn’t know that they were all now stuck in the vacuum beds. She didn’t know that her friends remained in the capsules while her own slowly lowered into the floor. She didn’t know that someone was already eagerly waiting for her.
“Took a while, but here she is,” said Kelsie, one of Ava’s two kidnappers. Nia, her friend and partner, nodded contentedly and presented Ava’s latex-bound body to their boss.
“Time is of no consequence, my dears,” said Ms. Widow, smiling gently at the package now standing before her. The escape room business had been an expensive investment, but it was exactly the right move if she could add such fine specimens as Ava to her collection.
“You two really have…” Ms. Widow fell silent as she looked more closely at Ava. Her eyebrows furrowed. “Is that really Ava?”
Nia and Kelsie looked up.
“Of course! ‘The brown-haired girl who beat us up while we were asleep!’” said Nia, showing a photo of Ava and her friends as they entered the escape room.
“Indeed, that is Ava…” murmured Ms. Widow, “but she has no magic about her.”
Kelsie and Nia looked at each other.
“No magic? Ms. Widow… does that matter?” Kelsie asked, while Nia furrowed her brow.
“Of course, my dear… otherwise I might as well just put you on display in my museum,” Ms. Widow said immediately, and Kelsie fell silent at once.
“Take her back…”
“But.”
“I said, take her back!” Ms. Widow hissed, and Kelsie flinched while Nia kept her gaze fixed on Ava.
“Something’s different,” she murmured as she pushed the vacuum bed with Ava back toward the elevator to take her back to the Escape Room.
“Great. All for nothing,” Kelsie said, crossing her arms.
“Maybe,” Nia mused, thinking back to the beating they’d both received. From a sleeping Ava. This time, she was asleep, too. Would Ava be able to beat them up again if they both took her out of the vacuum bed now? Nia didn’t want to find out.
“Let’s just take Ava back. Maybe we missed something and will get another chance in the future,” Nia said thoughtfully, while Kelsie crossed her arms.
“When can we finally go hunting properly again? This escape room is so boring! “
“At least it lets us hunt every now and then,” said Nia, “and until the next hunt, we’ll run the best escape room in town, like the good citizens we are.”
Kelsie rolled her eyes.
Caitlyn felt a little dizzy. She knew she’d inhaled some of the gas, but she hadn’t thought it would make her sleep for so long.
“Damn escape room,” Caitlyn muttered, filling out the questionnaire like the others. She could only give mediocre ratings. After all, she’d been trapped somewhere for half the time.
“You can get changed now, and then we can go to the dinner we were promised,” said Camille, leading the friends to the lockers. Caitlyn frowned when music came from her locker, and she quickly searched for her phone before she froze and broke out in a cold sweat. Dozens of messages and missed calls.
“Y… yeah?” she asked cautiously as she answered the call.
“Your weekend leave is cancelled, Boot… come to the guardhouse immediately,” her instructor said and hung up. He sounded rushed, nervous. Even worried. Caitlyn frowned and opened her messages. She turned pale and immediately flung open the door to her locker room. She quickly walked over to Camille, who looked at her in surprise.
“I mean, the suits are presents for you, but do you really want to go out to eat like that?” she laughed.
“I have to go. Take me to the LCPD right away and my friends to the parking lot by the woods.”
Summer’s locker opened.
“What’s going on, Cait?”
“There… there’s been another outbreak… you stay with Celine and wait,” Caitlyn said as her emotions overwhelmed her. Fear and worry gripped her heart until she thought of her family and friends. Of Luke. Chloe, Kim. Of Cass. Her hand clenched into a fist, and she looked up at Camille angrily.
“DOUBLE TIME!” she snapped at the woman, who was now hurriedly making a phone call.