Cliffhanger

  Zach’s mother took his book away with his half eaten bowl of breakfast cereal as she rushed him out the door. “You’ll have time to read it later. We need to go or you’ll be late for the academy.” She said to him as he struggled to keep his temper. He only had one sleeve in his jacket as his mother pulled him out the door.

  Greeting the carriage driver and giving him the address for the academy. They hopped in the sleek vehicle that rose from the ground to hover before the driver carefully merged with the overhead traffic.

  “My boys all went to the academy. They are all older than you, I doubt if you’ll ever meet them.” the driver said. Zach just stared at him in the way that teenage boys do that makes you wonder if they even heard what you said. Being a father of four very academically oriented children, the driver knew how to pull some light into the boys glossed over, disconnected eyes. “So what are you wanting to specialize in?” He asked as he professionally maneuvered from the residential flightpath up into the commuter flight path and smoothly accelerated.

  Zack looked down and fidgeted for a second before shyly answering. “I want to be a Dungeon Author.” His mother smiled at him before giving a quick wink to the driver. She knew her boy struggled with social interaction and appreciated the driver showing interest. The driver nodded in understanding.

  “So, do you have any ideas for a story yet?” He asked.

  Once again, Zach acted like he had just discovered he had hands and was testing to see what they were capable of as he rubbed the back of his head, zipped his coat up, and unzipped it again before looking down and saying, “Nothing set in stone yet.”

  “What about the story you’ve been writing in your journal? The Hunter one.” his mother said encouragingly.

  “Oh. Hunters are always popular. However, you’ll really have to work to find something unique. What kind of powers are you going to give him to use with his rifle?” the driver asked.

  Zach’s eyes went wide and for the first time he met the driver’s eyes in the mirror. “Rifles are nothing more than glorified wands. He uses a bow.”

  The driver smiled and nodded. “Old School. I like that. Archers are rare nowadays, but they can still be very powerful. Is he going to be the youngest son of a noble family that joins the resistance to overthrow his older brother or the weak to strong trope of a loser finding a special weapon.” The driver asked not seeming too thrilled with either of the overused story lines.

  Zach shook his head. ‘He’s going to integrate into the system.”

  The driver nodded. “Following in The First Defiler’s footsteps. Tough act to follow, but those are my favorite dungeon adventures. Something about someone completely new to the system finding their path really holds my interest.” He said as he lowered the carriage into the path to the unloading docks at the academy and settled into a hover over the spot the traffic control directed him to.

  As the door opened, he turned and offered his hand to Zack. “It’s been a pleasure, future dungeon author. I’m looking forward to seeing your dungeon. I’m Garrett.”

  Zack felt his mother react to the name and go wide eyed for a second. He shook Garrett’s hand and thanked him for the ride. “If you’d like a piece of advice from your driver you just met and will probably never see again, get the skills to go into dungeon finance or a similar high in demand field and save up to buy your own dungeon. Don’t sign on to one of the big dungeon publishing companies if you want to create your real story. They’ll ruin your creation trying to fit it into whatever style is hot at that particular moment. Build your story on your own and do it right. It will be worth it in the end.”

  “Thank you, Mr Bivouac. For the ride and the advice.” His mother said with a nod that almost looked like a bow. Zack stared at her wondering how she knew his last name. Garrett waved and shouted as the door closed, “Study hard and make your story your way.” Zack remained confused as the door closed until his eyes focused on the logo on the door. Bivouac Logistics. You call. We haul. He realized he had just met one of the richest men in the solar system who had built his company by focusing on the convenience of his customers. Zack had once read an interview in which Garrett talked about spending time in the field, meeting the customers, and testing his company's systems.

  “Zack!” a voice called out. It was his neighbor and lifelong friend Astrid. Zack smiled as his eyes met hers as she reached out to straighten his tie and adjust his coat that he hadn’t buttoned correctly. She wrapped her arm around Zach’s as he turned to say goodbye to his mother.

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  “Go ahead Zack. Astrid will take good care of you.” his mother said with a strange smile and her eyes glowing. Astrid smiled back and told his mother she’d keep Zack out of trouble until she got home from work before dragging Zack by his arm towards the main building.

  Once inside they had to go in different directions. Zack promised to meet her for lunch and agreed to tell her and some friends of hers more about his story. He felt bad because he had to stop right as he got to the part where Jake met Villy when his mother had arrived at Astrid’s parents house last night to pick him up. Something just didn’t feel right about leaving her hanging right before such a key moment.

  As Zack walked to class, he felt his perception tingle. Something important was about to happen. Nothing dangerous, just important. Looking around he felt a pull towards the restroom. Glancing at the clock, he had time. He went in and began to wash his hands. A light flashed behind him and Zack spun around to see an older man with a white beard, shaved head, baggy shorts with lots of pockets, comfortable looking shoes, and a shirt depicting a dark scaled man holding an eyeball out to a man wearing a wooden mask saying, “Lick it. You know you want to.”

  “Zack, you don’t know me yet, but you will. I’m pretty sure you’ll hate me, but that’s not important. When we meet again, I’ll say, ‘MJ is the GOAT’ so you’ll know it's me and I’m being serious. Trust me. What I’ll have to say is important if you want to finish your story.”

  Zack just looked at the odd wizard for a second before the weirdo disappeared. Shaking his head, he hurried into essence manipulation class and greeted the four eyed, blue instructor as he rushed to his seat as the bell rang.

  *****

  Bret appeared on the mountaintop next to the Malefic Author’s castle. The patreon chat had been busy as Jake was approaching B grade. He had a long list of things to research and make up something close to the truth to tell the patreons or just make up something completely insane instead. It didn’t really matter. They never believed him anyway. What mattered was getting petty vengeance on the Malefic One for leaving them hanging on a cliff every day.

  As he turned to head down to his hidden entrance into the Malefic Author’s castle grounds, he froze mid stride and his jaw dropped. The castle wasn’t there. The mountain top was barren. He quickly checked for illusionary weaves hiding the compound, but it just wasn’t there. Quickly he stepped into the shadows and began making his way to the entrance of Zack’s dungeon.

  Finally arriving, he stepped out of the shadows a final time and once again froze. Instead of seeing the lines of people waiting outside the dungeon’s understated and ominous entrance, Bret’s eyes looked around at the tacky lights and obnoxiously large sign saying, “The Hunter’s Dungeon. A Bizney live action adventure.” Beside it were statues of the hunter and some sort of weird blue imp. There was almost nobody there.

  Bret’s mind went into overdrive, which to be honest probably still didn’t approach the level of a reasonably intelligent adult human, but for him, it was thinking really fast. What happened to the dungeon? What happened to Zack? Did I screw up the timelines? Is this all my fault?

  Seeing a bored looking teenager dressed to look like Villy in a flamingo costume, Bret ran up to him. “What happened? How did Bizney get control of the dungeon?”

  “You been living under a rock? They bought it shortly after it went viral.” the teenager explained.

  “What happened to the Malefic Author?” Bret asked and after seeing the confused look on the teenager's face, he realized Zack might not have been known by that name if he sold the story early. “Zack Garth. The author.”

  The teenager shrugged. “No one knows. He disappeared after handing rights to the dungeon over to Bizney.”

  *****

  Zack nearly tripped over his own feet when he saw the group of students gathered around Astrid at the lunch table. He tried to steady himself and finish the walk to the table without dropping his tray. Why are there so many?

  Halfway there he nearly threw his tray in the air as his system interface buzzed to inform him he had received a notification. Opening it up, he read it:

  Cliffhanger Skill learned: Increase reader engagement and interest by ending a scene, section, or chapter with an unresolved, precarious, or suspenseful situation. Gain twenty percent more leveling essence in your class with successful uses of cliffhangers.

  …

  Cliffhanger upgraded to Level 5: Gain fifty percent more leveling essence in your class with frequent use of cliffhangers.

  Zack blinked the notification away and sat down nervously looking at the crowd. He turned and met Astrid’s eyes and everything in the world seemed perfect as he thought for the millionth time that her dimples were quite adorable when she smiled.

  “So I brought everybody up to speed on your story, but they wanted to know what happened when Jack met the evil god.” Astrid looked at him and her eyes narrowed slightly as he reflexively started to correct her on the hunter’s name. Remembering all the times she had told him not to always correct people when they made a small unimportant mistake.

  Clearing his throat, he focused back on the story and without putting any emphasis on the name said, “The god tried to scare him off and force him to leave him alone. He figured Jake was a member of his order that had somehow found his way into his domain…” Zack went on for several minutes describing Jake meeting the god and receiving his blessing and a class for alchemy which included some legacy skills from the god. He hadn’t even realized how much time had passed until he heard the bell signalling the end of lunch ring and he finished by saying, “so Jake returned to the challenge dungeon, but there was just one small problem. He would die in a few days if he didn’t find a cure for the poison.”

  Zack blushed as he realized everybody was staring at him, but Astrid pulled him to his feet saying they needed to hurry if they wanted to get to Runescaping class on time. As Astrid led him away he heard several people ask at the same time, “How does he cure the poison?” A smile came to his face as he received a notification that Cliffhanger had leveled again.

  *****

  Bret paced back and forth mumbling to himself. “Was it Belgium or Denmark? Nobody even knows what he looks like in this timeline. Does he still look like Zack? What the hell has happened? How do I fix it?”

  A smile came to his face and he snapped his fingers, “Dragons.” He quickly pulled a bunch of electronic components and crystals and engraving tools and got to work. By the time he had finished, he came up with the perfect way to get the array into orbit. It was just a happy coincidence that he would get to meet Katy Perry in the process. He activated his amulet.

  Bret looked around the empty capsule and cursed. “Dammit. They did fake it. Sometimes I hate this timeline.” When the effect of gravity was obviously greatly reduced, he opened a portal and stepped outside of the capsule and quickly activated the enchantment that would position the array over northern Europe before activating his amulet.