Getting buried alive wasn't really on the list of things Ghost Spider had been expecting when she and Batgirl went after the Riddler. But as far as death traps went, this one seemed…lackluster.
It was, afterall, just a big glass box filling with sand. And she had super strength.
"Cover your head, I'm not sure how this is going to break." She told Batgirl, walking up to the wall and cracking her knuckles. Her friend crouched down and pulled her cape up to cover the rest of her.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you." Riddler's mocking voice came from the TV.
Ghost Spider ignored him, pulling her fist back and then with a shout slammed it into the clear material…
"Ah!"
…only to collapse on the slowly rising layer of sand clutching her hand in pain when the wall refused to break.
"Ghost Spider!"
"Reinforced polycarbonate acrylic backed by a transparent aluminum mesh." Riddler said smugly. "Guaranteed to stand up to anything a certain flying rodent might be carrying with him. But don't worry. There's still a way out if you're fast and clever enough. If not…" He waved at the sand still pouring in and the implied demise it represented.
While Ghost Spider flexed her hand a couple times and growled at the supervillain, Batgirl was studying the room they were trapped in. The Riddler had a psychological NEED to prove himself more clever than everyone around him, even to the detriment of himself in several situations such as giving away his current location when he could have simply vanished after his string of robberies.
There was someway out of this that they just needed to put the clues together for.
The wall they had come in from had been secured to the rest of the hourglass with thick metal clamps on the outside. The walls themselves had no distinguishing marks and there wasn't anything obviously visible in the warehouse either.
That meant their way out could only be in two places. The funnel where the sand was coming from…or the floor below them.
"GS, try doing something about the sand! I think the exit is on the floor!" Batgirl shouted and began doing her best to shift the sand out of the way so she could reach the bottom.
"The sand, huh?" Ghost Spider muttered, looking at the falling stream of the stuff. She experimentally shot a line of webbing through it to try gumming up the whole, but the falling sand easily swallowed it. "And what am I supposed to do about it?" She complained, but started shooting webs around the top of their section of the hourglass.
Eventually the wallcrawler was able to build up a pretty thick sheet of webbing to slow down the stream, but the sand was too heavy and fine to stop completely. Bits were still falling through the gaps but Ghost Spider was too busy making sure the entire thing didn't collapse under the weight to plug them.
"You better hurry, I don't think this is going to last long!"
Batgirl didn't reply, too busy shoveling sand out of the way. Her heart fell for a moment when her fingers brushed over a metal floor with no sign of a way out, but it picked back up when they caught on a hidden latch.
Giving it a solid tug revealed a tablet with the message 'What flattens all mountains, wipes out all species, destroys every building, and turns everything into pieces?' displayed on the screen.
"Oh, you have got to be kidding me!"
"What now?!"
"He's got the thing hooked up to an actual riddle!" Batgirl exclaimed. "And it's one about time when he stuck us in a giant hourglass!"
"Yes, a bit on the nose I'll admit." Riddler chuckled from his screen. "But I figured I'd start off easy. A little something to get the thinking juices flowing." Then he scowled. "Although having a partner to give you a leg up probably made it a bit too easy. Nevertheless, you got the correct answer. On to the next riddle!"
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
He pushed a button on the top of his cane. Suddenly the floor of the hourglass dropped away, allowing the two heroines to fall into the darkness below.
-o-
Having the floor drop out from under her wasn't something Ghost Spider had been expecting but that wasn't to say she didn't react to it.
Her first reaction was to try shooting a webline back into the hourglass to stop her fall, but a sharp panel closed over the hole and cut it. Her next thought – though it was more instinctual reaction – was to grab Batgirl and keep her close so they wouldn't end up separated and blindly shoot a web into the dark in hope that it would break their fall before they hit the ground.
She was half successful in that as she managed to stop them from falling into what was probably the next trap, but was completely unprepared when a second later a sheet of metal swatted them out of the air until they crashed into a room filled with water and had to quickly swim to the surface.
"Pah! You alright?" Batgirl sputtered as she spat water out of her mouth. She was a little worried because her friend was the one to take most of the impact from the thing that launched them here.
"Y-yeah, nothing broken at least." Ghost Spider hissed even as her side and shoulder throbbed with each movement as she tried treading water.
"You have to stop taking hits like those."
"Trust me. I'm not doing it on purpose."
The two stopped talking as they inspected the new room they found themselves in since they were pretty sure this was another trap. Not many places had giant underground water tanks lying around afterall.
Unfortunately for them, their surroundings were too dark to make much out. Beyond some shadowy impressions of the edges of the tank everything was pretty much black.
"Think you can pull us up to the ceiling?" Batgirl asked after a bit. "I'm pretty sure we skipped over one trap already. I'd love to do it again if we could."
"I'll give it a shot."
Ghost Spider once again shot a webline straight up, but before it got too high there was a flash of something metallic that flew through the air and severed it.
"Ah, ah, ah. No more of that now." Another TV screen snapped to life showing a visibly annoyed Riddler. "Did you think I wouldn't take countermeasures against cheaters? "
"Well sorry for not obediently going along with the plans of the guy trying to kill us." Ghost Spider deadpanned, only to freeze up when something brushed her leg. "Wait, Batgirl…that wasn't you was it?"
"What wasn't me?"
Something brushed up against Ghost Spider's leg again and this time she could tell Batgirl felt it too.
"That…"
Both girls tried scanning the dark waters for any sign of what touched them, but it was no use. There was no sign of what was in there with them.
"Oh, did I forget to mention that tank is home to a particularly nasty kind of crocodile?" Riddler drawled. "I'd turn the lights on so you could see, but the switch is located at the end of the previous room. You know, the one you skipped. Ah well, do your best to figure out the answer before your new friend decides he's hungry if you can!" He waved and the TV shut off, cutting off the small amount of light it offered.
Ghost Spider twitched as she felt that thing move in the water again. It was getting more curious. It wouldn't be long until something happened. "You have any ideas?" She asked Batgirl.
"If this is anything like the first trap we need to answer a riddle to escape. And the question itself is probably hidden in here somewhere. And since we already figured out we can't go up, that means…" She looked at the water.
"The clues are hidden below us with the hungry crocodile." Ghost Spider groaned. "In the dark where we can't see two feet in front of us. Great."
Batgirl swallowed heavily. "I have a rebreather and a flashlight on my belt."
"You happen to have a spare?"
"No."
Ghost Spider sighed. "Yeah, thought so. Alright you search for the riddle, I'll put on my best Steve Irwin impression and buy you some time."
"Yippee-ki-yay, cowgirl."
Red rimmed eyes narrowed at her friend. "I'm going to ignore that for now. But after this? We're doing a TV marathon to fix your butchering of beloved TV animal icons and eighties action heroes."
"TV rots your brain." Batgirl huffed defensively.
"Possibly. Probably why I think this is a good idea." Ghost Spider responded just as the crocodile passed by again. This time, the spider-themed hero reached out and latched on using her powers, praying the croc wasn't in a position to clamp down on her arm the whole time.
The reaction was immediate. While the animal had been content to poke at the two intruders in its territory while making up its mind on which one to take a bite out of first when they were just floating there, being 'attacked' by one of its meals set it off. The large aquatic reptile instantly began thrashing around trying to either dislodge its newly acquired passenger or get its mouth on it instead.
Ghost Spider could only hold on for the ride and try to keep her limbs away from the croc's mouth.
She might have super powers, but super strength didn't do much when she had no leverage and her opponent was built for the water.
Once she saw Ghost Spider begin to distract the hungry predator, Batgirl immediately crammed the rebreather into her mouth and began diving towards the bottom of the tank. Her belt flashlight was easily able to shine through the slightly murky water, but it still took a bit of time to find anything with the small amount of light available to her. Even when she did, it wasn't particularly helpful either. Just a rock with the message '7, 3, 8 - Nothing is correct' carved into it.
Clearly only a part of the riddle. And not a very helpful one either.
She moved on.
Several messages later, Batgirl headed back to the surface. She thought she had found all the messages in the tank but there was no clear direction she could find.
6, 8, 2 - One number is correct and well placed.
6, 4, 5 - One number is correct but wrong place.
2, 0, 6 - Two numbers are correct but wrong places.
7, 8, 0 - One number is correct but wrong place.
Obviously it was some kind of three number combination, but what were they supposed to do with it?!
It didn't help that she had seen Ghost Spider still struggling with the crocodile at several points. The other girl doing her best in a contest of stamina with the animal that at any point was capable of causing severe injury with a single bite.
Once Batgirl breached the surface of the water, she looked around for any sign of where the combination was supposed to go but all she saw was a heavily panting Ghost Spider treading water.
"You okay?" The redhead asked as she swam over, doing her best to keep an eye out for the crocodile. "Any problems on your end?"
"So good, so far." Ghost Spider breathed. "But it hasn't been easy. That croc definitely isn't a normal animal. Way too strong. And it's not acting like an ambush predator at all. Or it wasn't until a second ago. It threw me off and then just vanished."
"Fantastic news." Batgirl griped. "I've got better ones though."
She gave Ghost Spider a quick rundown on the parts of the riddle she found and the lack of any further directions. Given that the spider heroine had been crocodile wrestling the entire time, she wasn't expecting Ghost Spider to have much to say immediately but to her surprise she was wrong.
"I think I know where to look. There's a grate at the bottom of the tank over that way behind some rocks." Ghost Spider pointed in the general direction.
"How'd you know that?" Batgirl asked curiously. Was it another power Ghost Spider hadn't told her about yet?
"I got scraped all across it when New Boots tried to drown me." Ghost Spider deadpanned.
"Oh…sounds fun."