Her head throbbing and her vision blurred, she began to come to. The world was a buzzing, shifting mass of different shades of green and yellow. She tried shaking her head, but that only made her dizzy. She tried yawning, but that had little effect. So finally, she just closed her eyes and held still.

Someone had her hanging from her arms, but her shoulders were no longer dislocated and so other than the dull throbbing in her skull, she wasn’t in any pain. What happened? Where am I and who healed me?

“Long time, no see.”

Her eyes followed the voice just as one of the emerald orbs floated around the corner. There, sitting in a cage hanging from the ceiling was Lefty. His blue robes were tattered and the cage was so small he had to sit with his knees against his chest, but there he was, looking down on her from only a few feet away.

“Hey,” she said.

He nodded, “Hey.”

An awkward silence followed. Somewhere in the room wooden gears were turning.

“So how have things been going?” Lefty asked.

“Oh you know, just hanging out.” She gave him a wry grin. “So … how did the hot chicks work out for you?”

“I regret nothing.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Do you really?”

Lefty shook his head. “No. Shortly after you left, they all ganged up on me and stuffed me in a cage. I didn’t get anything.”

“Not even a handy?”

“What’s a handy?”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

A look of realization hit the mage’s face. “Ohhhh …”

As the mage’s voice trailed off, the sound of the wooden gears took over. Calista wondered where they were in the dungeon. Have I been transported up or down? Does it matter? I’m probably never getting out of here.

“So really, how have things been going for you?” Lefty asked. “Any better?”

She shot him a sharp look. “Does it look like I’m doing any better?”

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“Ah …” the mage stammered.

“I got lost. Then I got betrayed, captured, carried, cursed at, threatened, tortured a bit, traded, healed for some reason, and now I’m here hanging from a wall. Still can’t log out. Zero stars out of five so far. Worst dungeon in the game. Would not recommend.”

“Huh,” Lefty watched another of the green orbs pass by.

After a moment she asked, “What do you mean: Huh?”

“I mean I thought you would be gloating more,” Lefty said.

“About what?”

“About me being conned by all those naked women.”

“You’re a man. Of course, you were conned by the naked women.”

“Huh.”

The gears continued to turn, wood grinding against wood as something large wooden creaked and groaned in the dark.

“What do you reckon that is?” Calista asked.

“It’s a water-powered Antikythera* mechanism.”

She shook her head. “Excuse me, a what?”

“An Antikythera mechanism. It’s an analog computer that tracks the heavens and whatnot. It’s very useful for high level magicians. Which, obviously, this Severin is.”

“So it’s not a torture device?”

“Only if the torture involves a lot of math.”

She nodded, “I see. So quick question.”

“Fire away.”

“Have you tried to log out lately?”

“Yes actually, I have.”

“And?”

“And I’m still a prisoner in a dungeon that appears to be rigged and I’m not terribly happy about it.” Through the cage bars, Lefty watched another orb throw eerie shadows against the wall as it passed. “Whatever bug or malfunction the game is experiencing is seriously impeding my enjoyment level as well. I’d like to write a nasty letter to someone, but my ‘contact an admin’ button seems to have disappeared.”

“Mine too,” Calista said as another orb passed over her. This red glowing ball didn’t give off much light, but as it circled the room she could make out the forms of a few tables with various tools and instruments sitting on them, and then beyond that she could see a series of shadows spinning slowly in the dark.

“We’re obviously in a complex laboratory of some kind,” Lefty said, “but I can’t figure out why they’d bring a pair of prisoners here.”

Calista shook her head. “What’s important is how we’re going to get out. The woman who brought me here said that Severin wanted to question me, which can’t be good.”

Lefty bobbed his head and shrugged. “Well, I’d love to help with that, but I’m almost out of spells.”

She fixed him with her best death glare. “You still have spells?”

Lefty was sheepish. “Yeah.”

“Then why wasn’t that the first thing we talked about? We could have been brainstorming our escape this entire time.”

“Well …” Lefty seemed to think about this for a moment. “… well, I thought that we were kinda in a hopeless situation, you know? I had kinda resigned myself to my fate.”

“What spells do you have?” She snapped.

“Uhm …” The green orb reflected off Lefty’s face as he thought. “I suppose I have about four or five points left. So I could like … cast a level two and two levels ones, or like two level

twos, or something like that.”

“Do you have a ‘grease’ spell or anything that can loosen my wrists and hands?” She asked.

“Yeah, I suppose,” he said. “That’s a level one. You want me to try that?”

She wiggled her fingers in the air, “If you can cast it on the manacles holding my wrists, I’m as good as free.”

*Per Wikipedia: The Antikythera mechanism was a very real hand-powered orrery in Ancient Greece. First discovered in the bones of an ancient shipwreck off the coast of the island Antikythera in 1901, this oldest known example of an analogue computer was used to predict astronomical positions and eclipses decades in advance. It was. Since, several modern replicas have been made, including a Lego recreation by an Apple engineer by the name of Andrew Carrol.