Chapter 15

  The sky here was different again. No bubbles. No familiar blue. It was a pale violet haze streaked with light like distant aurora, and the sun hung overhead as a white disk that looked too sharp, as if it had been cut out and pasted onto the air.

  Kelix forced himself to sit up.

  The blue sand was gone, replaced by sticky green blades that clung to his clothes and tugged when he moved. The ground gave slightly under his weight. It smelled faintly sweet, like fruit left too long in the sun, with an earthy undertone that reminded him of damp soil and something fermenting.

  Against his better judgment, he pinched off a thin strip of the gelatin grass and brought it to his mouth. If this place wanted him alive, it might at least provide food. The texture was wrong the moment it touched his tongue. Too smooth. Too elastic. It resisted his teeth before yielding with a soft snap.

  For half a second, it tasted almost familiar. Lime, maybe. Green apple. It stirred a childhood memory of bowls of gelatin eaten straight from the fridge, wobbling and bright, stolen before dinner.

  Then the flavor turned.

  The sweetness collapsed into a sharp, eye-watering sourness that crawled up the sides of his tongue and sank into his jaw. His mouth flooded with saliva as his stomach clenched in protest. He spat it out immediately and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, grimacing.

  "Too sour." He glared at the ground as if it had done that on purpose. The grass quivered faintly where the chewed piece had fallen, as if reacting to the insult.

  He looked around.

  The grassland rolled in every direction, glossy hills rising and falling like a frozen ocean. In the far distance, strange stone formations jutted up, tall and thin, like ribs. Here and there, patches of darker terrain suggested something denser, perhaps a forest of coral-like growths similar to the coastline, or maybe something worse.

  There was no castle. No ocean. No sign of a way home.

  Just a field, a sky that did not belong, and a small cloaked creature with a deer skull head standing beside him like it had always been part of the plan.

  Kelix dragged himself to his feet and faced Endigo.

  "Where are we?"

  He waited a beat anyway, because some part of him still expected people to respond when spoken to.

  Endigo's silence did not change.

  Kelix exhaled, slow and tired, and let his shoulders drop a fraction. He rubbed his face with both hands, then dropped them and stared out over the hills.

  He had been told to fix Endigo. But he did not know what Endigo had been. He did not know what a Fledgling stage was supposed to look like for something that had arrived wearing death like armor.

  He did know one thing. Standing still was dangerous, and he started walking. He did not pick a direction because he had no map, and pretending he did would only make him angrier. He chose the nearest ridge and headed for it.

  Height meant sight, and sight meant options.

  Behind him, Endigo followed. Kelix glanced back once, then faced forward again.

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  He did not like being responsible for a silent skull-faced creature that might once have been a storm of crimson lightning.

  After another few minutes of walking, Kelix noticed something darker among the shimmering jelly-grass, a blot of color that did not belong. He slowed, eyes squinting.

  He spotted a dark blue slime sat half-submerged in the field like a drop of night that had fallen and refused to spread.

  It was not the classic blob shape from games. It was more like a gelatinous teardrop, rounded at the bottom, tapering slightly at the top, surface glossy and smooth.

  It was about half his height, which was an annoying size because it was not small enough to ignore but not large enough to be obviously dangerous.

  It pulsed faintly, and the pulse made the gelatin field around it quiver.

  Kelix stopped. He watched it. It did not move.

  He considered walking around it. He considered ignoring it entirely. He did not know if it was hostile. He did not know if it was worth time, effort, or risk. He did not know if slimes here dropped cores or if they were just living hazards that would waste his energy.

  Then again, he had already wasted enough energy today on things he did not understand.

  Kelix took a cautious step sideways.

  The slime bounced.

  It moved with sudden, springy force, launching itself like a thrown sack. Kelix barely had time to shift his arm up before it crashed into his forearm with a wet thump.

  Cold and pressure smeared across his skin.

  Kelix hissed and shoved instinctively, but the slime clung, its surface stretching like taffy before snapping back.

  His irritation flared into action. He countered with greater force. His palm drove into the slime's surface with a sharp, practiced strike.

  The impact sent the slime flying. It splattered through the air like a tossed blanket of gel, then hit the ground and reformed mid-bounce as if gravity was a suggestion. It landed upright again, teardrop shape restored, wobbling once like it was offended.

  Kelix felt blue heat crawl over his hand.

  He clenched his jaw. Of course.

  The blue fire-like heat clung to his knuckles and palm, bright and thin, refusing to burn. It did not hurt, but it made the air around his fingers feel too sharp.

  The slime bounced again. Kelix met it.

  He palmed it out of the air and kicked it hard enough to send it skidding across the jelly-grass. The sensation was wrong. Like striking a beanbag. His foot sank into it, met resistance, then pushed through soft give that snapped back.

  The slime flew, hit, and reformed.

  Kelix followed, aggressive now. He did not like being the one tested. He palmed it again. Then again. Then a knee. Then a heel kick that should have shattered something with bones.

  Nothing shattered. The slime kept reforming.

  It flattened, stretched, splashed, then pulled itself back into a glossy teardrop, wobbling as if pleased with its own resilience.

  Kelix stopped after the fifth or sixth hit, breathing steady, eyes narrowed.

  Blunt force was not going to work.

  He had fought monsters with hide and muscle and bone. He knew how to break structure. This had no structure to break. It was all give and recovery, all absorption. It took his hits and turned them into movement like it enjoyed being a punching bag.

  Kelix looked around quickly, scanning the field.

  No rocks.

  The jelly-grass swallowed anything hard.

  No scrap metal. No debris. No convenient broken sign to use as a club, which was unfair considering how many broken signs had been trying to kill him back home.

  A stick would be something, he thought, then immediately rejected it. A stick would just bounce. It would sink and drag. It would not pierce. It would not cut.

  He needed an edge. Or heat. Perhaps something that did not rely on blunt trauma.

  The slime bounced toward him again, slower this time, as if measuring.

  Kelix shifted his stance, ready to dodge and strike, then hesitated. Repeating the same thing was foolish and he was not foolish.

  Endigo tugged on his pants.

  Kelix glanced down, annoyed, and then stopped.

  Endigo had one hand on his pant leg like it was grounding itself. The other hand lifted.

  Blue-red electricity crackled around Endigo's raised paw, thin arcs that snapped and hissed in the air. The energy did not fire. It did not launch. It simply gathered, controlled, contained, like Endigo was demonstrating rather than attacking.

  Endigo gestured toward the slime. Then it looked up at Kelix.

  Its hollow eyes did not blink, but the intent was clear enough that Kelix felt it like a shove.

  Do it.

  Kelix raised an eyebrow despite himself. Was Endigo some kind of pocket-sized galactic tyrant?

  "And you're not going to help because…?"

  Endigo held the crackling energy steady, still not releasing it, as if refusing to take the obvious solution.

  Kelix's right hand tingled.

  Blue heat curled tighter around his palm, responding to his attention like a living thing. It was not a conscious activation. It was more like noticing a door and having the handle warm under his fingers.

  Kelix stared at his own hand, then at the slime.

  It looked like Endigo was expecting him to unleash energy.