Knightmare - Are You There?

"Blurry hell! I ever thought I'd get out of there!"

Iokus sprang to his feet and peered under Paul's helmet. The jester wasn't as tall as the Dungeoneer, but something in the tone of his voice suggested that he could definitely give the arrogant boy a run for his money. Paul shoved Iokus backwards a couple of steps.

"Please don't get so close." He scowled blindly. "Remember, I rescued you."

Iokus stopped jigging on the spot at his newfound freedom and stared. Then he rolled his eyes.

"Oooooh...you're one of THEM. 'I rescued Iokus so now he has to kiss my feet'. Well tough luck, mate - you got the wrong jester!"

Iokus made a quick movement and disappeared as if into thin air. The team in the antechamber gawped and wondered if they had all blinked at the same time. Kully sniggered at the bemused looks on all the others' faces - obviously she had been the only one to see where Iokus had gone.

"How dare you talk..." started Paul. Lou cut him off.

"He's gone, Paul - completely disappeared!"

"How? Oh, forget it. We've got no need for troublesome entertainers. Get me out of here."

Harold paused. "Erm, I don't think we can."

"Why not?" sighed Paul in frustration.

"There's no door."

***

After some reasoning between the team and the Dungeoneer, Paul gave in.

"All right, I'll do it. Don't expect me to make a habit of it, though." He grimaced in distaste before calling loudly. "Iokus! Iokus, come back...we need your help."

He felt a sharp jab in the ribs and Iokus' voice came from behind him, filled with amusement.

"I knew you'd need me. That's why I hung around for a bit. Took your time, dincha? Thought you wouldn't need a joker, I suppose."

"Just get on with it." Grumbled Paul. Iokus grabbed him by both elbows and steered him towards the wall. The team were watching in horror - was this idiot going to slam their leader into the stone wall?

"Hold your breath," advised Iokus. "Or you'll come out the other side with brick up your nose - I know, I've done it."

And with that, the jester and the Dungeoneer melted seamlessly into the white wall and the vision of the room faded away.

***

Paul heaved a great breath in the next room and coughed dust into the air.

"Yeah, I did that last time - the wall's thicker than it looks."

"Damn fool." Spluttered Paul angrily.

"Wa-hey...aren't you a ray of sunshine?" Iokus backflipped across the room to a tall archway and studied it closely. Seemingly finding nothing of immediate danger, he sauntered back and prodded Paul in the right direction.

"Caves." he declared. "Haven't seen them in level two for a while, but its where you gotta go."

"Is he coming too?" moaned Silver in disappointment.

Paul asked and got a hearty. "Of course!" before Iokus cartwheeled into the darkness.

"Ok, walk forwards." Directed Lou. Treguard and his assistants watched quietly. The team seemed to have forgotten all about them with the new travelling companion. Iokus was blunt, loud and uncontrollable.

Might do them good, thought Treguard.

***

"Heh." Snorted Iokus, as he clapped some feeble flames to life with some equally feeble magic. He looked in the direction of the team and they suddenly got the strangest feeling that he could see them in the antechamber. Harold glanced at the flickering flame on the stone ledge and gave Lou a sceptical look.

"Hey, I'm a jester - not a magician!" Retorted Iokus, and turned back towards the dark tunnel ahead. The three boys gaped for what seemed like the hundredth time. Surely they couldn't be seen...

"Onwards, boys." Said Treguard darkly, making the three of them jump. Frego grinned to himself. Obviously the Dungeonmaster didn't approve of the dungeon dwellers making it clear that the screen worked two ways.

"Sidestep right. Now walk forwards." Harold directed Paul around a great lump on the floor and made him follow Iokus, who was lighting more ledges as the ones that Paul passed flickered out.

"Stop, sidestep left, and again...now forwards."

Harold got more and more frustrated and handed over the directing to Lou. The mounds on the cavern floors were being come across more and more frequently. Paul kicked one angrily and called for the jester.

"Iokus! Why don't you make this quicker for us both and guide me through here?"

Iokus came bounding back up the tunnel and gazed at Paul in shock.

"Shhhhh...you daft git - you'll wake them up!"

Harold, Lou and Silver all went cold in terror. There was something else in the darkness with Paul?

"Wake what up?" Kully whispered to Frego, but the halfling was staring at the scene before him. On the screen, behind Iokus, something was stirring in the black, and it obviously wasn't good.

"What's going on?" Asked Kully. Getting no answer from Frego she scuttled over to Treguard and asked him instead. "What's going on?"

Treguard waved her away and continued to study the screen. The elf sighed, feeling useless, and looked back to the view of the dungeon. When she did, she didn't know whether to be extremely worried or to giggle at the peculiar site before them.

Paul seemed to have gone weak at the knees and was leaning drowsily on the joker.

"Crikey! What's come over you?" demanded Iokus uncomfortably. "You haven't been travelling that long, have you?"

"I'm...tired..." mumbled Paul. Harold rapped his pencil on his writing board, as if it would help wake Paul up.

"Come on, Paul! Get a grip on yourself!"

"...before I do." A young girl's voice snaked out of the shadows beyond Iokus' last lit fire. Iokus glanced behind him briefly, and then back at the semi-conscious Dungeoneer slumped on his shoulder - his eyes became very wide and his voice became very small.

"...blimey."

***

She looked like a young girl, perhaps fifteen years old or less, but her face was marked already by time and she looked...well...odd.

Her shoulder-length hair was as green as her eyes, and she was thin and spindly - looking too weak to be carrying the great mace that was clutched in her left hand. When she stepped into the light, they saw that her clothing was old, tattered, but looked as if it had once been a twenties- style day dress.

Almost as if the shock had taken him, Paul slipped completely to the floor and lay there, breathing deeply. Iokus jumped back, as if he had seen a ghost.

"You stepped into my caves." Said the girl, in an almost child-like manner.

"What's she done to Paul?" yelled Lou at the screen.

Iokus was backed up against the wall. "You didn't kill him, did you? I mean...I know he's arrogant and mean and..." He fell silent as the girl raised her mace.

"He's sleeping."

Iokus and the team breathed a sigh of relief.

"He'll never wake up. They never do. Anybody who steps into my caves is put to sleep by my power...wondrous...power of sleep." She lowered her mace and looked curiously at Iokus. "Except you."

Iokus gulped. "I can sleep if you want me to? I'll even save you the trouble by..."

The girl raised a finger to her lips and he stopped talking, but still didn't fall asleep.

Back in the antechamber, Treguard had a contemplative look on his face.

"Who is this, Master?" Asked Kully, loudly. Treguard scratched his beard.

"This is Ahopae - mistress of the unconscious. She hasn't been in the dungeons for long but anybody who comes within a stone's throw of her falls into a deep sleep until they are taken from her presence. Unless we can get Paul out of there, he's as good as gone."

Frego was puzzled. "Why isn't that Iokus affected by her, Treguard?"

"Well, Frego, my deduction is that when he was locked up in that case, he had all the rest he needed and now it must be extremely difficult to make him fall asleep."

"So, when the weeks' worth of rest wears off, he won't be so energetic and uncontrollable?" asked Harold hopefully.

"Actually, no. He was like that before." Said Frego. Harold looked upset.

Ahopae was trying in vain to put Iokus to sleep, but there was no result. He felt odd, standing amongst the sleeping figures of all those who had wandered in unknowingly, but the last thing he wanted to do was fall asleep.

Ahopae gave an angry cry and threw her mace to one side. "Years I have been here! I don't even know why. I hate this place. All these sleeping, happy people who know who they are..."

She carried on in this confused thread for some time. Treguard scratched his beard once more. She seemed familiar, but he could not pinpoint the face. Just as Iokus started to edge away from the screaming girl, Frego shouted.

"Wait a minute! Samantha?!"

The girl stopped screaming immediately. She had heard Frego's cry and stared dreamily into space.

"Samantha...I know this name..."

Kully was even more confused than before. "Frego - who's Samantha?"

Treguard was already one step ahead. "Samantha - you don't think this is that girl...that poor girl..."

Frego nodded eagerly. "She was a Dungeoneer many years ago, don't you remember? She got lost in the days of level five...she died."

Kully gasped loudly and the team looked at the Dungeon master in horror, hoping that what Frego was saying was a lie. Treguard, however, was nodding gravely.

"I can see it now...yes. The time warp - her body fell into the pit and she was sucked into it. Her body and soul must have parted and the soul is what we see here. A twisted spirit of hate caused by years of being trapped in a place that reforms - taking her with it..."

Frego was in front of the screen.

"Frego, what are you doing?" Kully looked scared. The halfling gave no indication of his plans. "Frego?"

"Samantha?" Frego called into the cave through the screen. Ahopae turned and looked straight at him. Iokus squatted by Paul and tried to shake him awake as Frego spoke to the girl.

"Samantha, remember yourself! You were a Dungeoneer, years and years ago. You don't belong here."

"Can I go home?" For all their dullness, Samantha's eyes lit up momentarily.

Frego hesitated. Then realised that wherever she went, it was likely her family would also be there, for it was so many years after the incident...

"Yes. I think so."

Frego put his hand through the screen as if he had dipped his hand into water. Samantha walked forwards and took his hand and let him pull her towards the screen.

Frego's hand pulled back into the antechamber side, still in the clasping position, but his fist was empty. Furthermore, Ahopae was gone, and so was Samantha.

Treguard looked awed. "Frego - you freed her soul! That must be the nicest thing I've ever seen you do..."

Frego looked at Treguard incredulously. "I'm not a monster." He said, simply, and sat back down in his corner. Treguard turned back to the team, not wanting to push the matter.

"Look, team - Paul is waking up!"

Paul stood shakily to his feet, whilst Iokus and his team-mates filled him in on the details of the past few minutes. He pondered this, and then asked.

"So why am I the only one who as woken up?"

Iokus shifted uncomfortably. "Well, I think we're the only ones to have come in here for a long time."

They gazed around at the unmoving heaps that they had taken to be asleep.

"I think these dreamers gave up a long time ago."

Paul felt Iokus pull him along by his sleeve, and for once followed without retaliation.

"Let's go." Said the jester, quietly.