Chapter 5: Searing Visions, Acrobatic Maneuvers, More Questions Than Answers

Two confident, powerful steps brought Lilith into something she didn't expect; an empty room. There was nothing on the white floor, nothing on the white ceiling. The walls were bare. Something else was missing, too.

("There isn't a door on the other side.")

She turned around. The door behind her was closed. The black panel above the door was dark. This door was her only exit.

("So I'm going back the way I came when I'm done? Or is this the end of the line?")

Lilith turned around and froze. The room was far from empty now. Four thin, almost waist height pillars were positioned equidistant from the corners and the center of the room. Each one had a large button on top.

None of this was too surprising; objects had already appeared and disappeared in the rooms before. But what stood in the middle of the room is what froze Lilith in place.

("What...the fuck...is that?")

It looked like a mannequin made of shadows. The proportions were monstrous; it stood at least eight feet tall with wide shoulders and thick limbs that tapered down to points where its hands and feet should have been. Its head was a sphere of darkness that hovered in place an inch above its shoulders. It had no markings or reflection of any kind, like the light that touched it ceased to exist.

~[PRESS ALL FOUR BUTTONS WITHOUT BEING DIVIDED BY THE MINOTAUR. THERE IS NO TIME LIMIT.]~

("...please tell me that thing isn't the Minotaur...")

As if on cue, the shadow abomination raised its right arm. A matching sword of darkness materialized beside it. The blade was easily the size of Lilith. The Minotaur pointed its arm at the handle.

Deja vu wrapped itself around Lilith like the crushing fist of a giant as a wave of visions flashed in her mind;

She saw herself screaming in place as the Minotaur stepped forward once and jabbed its pointed left arm through her face and out the back of her skull. Her head was obliterated, yet her headless body stayed on her feet, waving her arms, both her attached and detached hands coiling in pain;

She was running full speed at one of the pillars across the room. The black blade swung in front of her, cutting her in two at the waist. Her fallen top half watched as the blade swung at her legs, taking them both from her body mid thigh, sending her pelvis spiraling into the air;

She saw herself slam her wrists down on one of the buttons. The moment she made contact, the blade blocked her vision, taking both of her arms off mid bicep. She had enough time to scream before something blunt slammed into her chest, pulverizing her left hand and breasts as her body soared into the wall;

She watched her headless body drop to its knees as her head soared through the sky; she saw herself leaping to get above the blade only to be caught in the ankles, her feet flying off while her body flipped in midair; she saw the point of the Minotaur's arm burst through her chest from behind and felt it as she was lifted and slung away;

All of these visions and many more came one after the other like gunshots, ending with a final vision of Lilith turning from a pillar to see the Minotaur with its arms raised straight up. It slammed the sword down through the top of her head, cleaving her and the pillar in two. She felt her body fall both to the left and the right, her shirt and bra opening, leaving her top halves exposed and her left hand twitching on the ground.

The visions, bad enough alone, each had one other thing in common. At the end of every one, as she was writhing in pieces, Mr. Logic said, ~[YOU HAVE FAILED THE CLASS.]~

Lilith was gasping for breath when her vision returned to the room. The Minotaur was standing where it had been when she entered. The arm that was inches from the blade moved down. The blade moved with it, as though an invisible hand was keeping it in place. Deja vu thickened the air around her like humidity, uncomfortable and inescapable.

("No more freak outs, no more panic, no more freak outs, no more panic...")

Lilith clenched both of her hands. Her right made a tight fist. Her left painfully clasped around her breast.

("No more taking this bullshit.")

~[BEGIN.]~

Lilith took a false step to the left and darted full speed to the pillar on her right, operating on instinct. The Minotaur fell for her feint. It took a step to the wrong pillar and stopped, reorienting itself in a moment, and turned to Lilith. She activated the first button in stride, maintaining speed to the far corner, as the Minotaur charged for the pillar she was aiming for. The black behemoth was deathly silent.

Lilith kept her mind clear. No time to think about why she knew she had done this before; no benefit to planning her moves and breaking the instinct she was reacting with; no time to doubt, to fear, to scream; only time to trust herself with her life.

She glanced at the Minotaur during her full sprint. Its bladed arm pulled back with startling speed. The instant the arm was cocked back, poised to unleash a catastrophic swing, Lilith dropped her legs, swinging her feet forward.

She did a baseball slide, her whole body only inches above the floor. She felt a blast of wind as the blade cascaded above her by a narrow margin. She rolled her legs under herself, somehow poised on her feet, and sprung into the air above the second pillar.

The Minotaur, relentless, ignorant to emotions of shame and embarrassment, finished its failed swing and whipped the blade forward again like a bat out of hell.

Lilith's landed her foot on the button of the second pillar and pushed herself back into the air. The sword passed within a hair of space under her foot. She flipped twice, landing past the pillar and rolled. When she came to her feet again, her back was against the corner wall. She was breathing fast, her arms and feet pressed against the wall, her eyes locked on the deathbringer in front of her. It launched itself with blinding speed, bringing its sword arm back, ready to jab forward with the force of a rocket.

("Perfect.")

Lilith used the wall behind her to propel herself forward into a dive straight at the Minotaur. The blade raced above her and stabbed the wall. It impacted with a horrifying crash. Fragments of white tile exploded outwards. The lights in the room flickered and stabilized. She scrambled to her feet and darted past the Minotaur towards the far corner. It extracted the blade in an upwards arc, keeping momentum to bring the blade over its head, positioning itself to slam the blade down on Lilith.

Unable to see it, unable to hear it, yet still knowing for certain the blade was coming, her body reacted. She sidestepped to the right, dodging the sword as it plunged into the ground beside her. The floor rumbled under her sprinting feet. Sparks erupted into the air. Blind luck alone kept Lilith from electrocution.

She reached the third button, pressing it in with her left stump. Her right hand grabbed the thin pillar to redirect her momentum, spinning herself around to a path straight for the final button.

The Minotaur shifted its body to face Lilith. It left the sword embedded in the ground. Electricity danced and flashed on its surface. None of the light reflected on the blade. The Minotaur burst forward in a shoulder tackle with the power of a freight train.

Lilith dove again and gasped; the Minotaur stopped on a dime and caught her in the bend of its impossibly black arm. One fluid motion from the mechanized beast sent her sailing straight towards the ceiling. She rotated in the air like a leaf in a cold winter's breeze. The Minotaur had an arm in position to jab upwards and skewer her.

Lilith felt like she was floating on the deja vu that still surrounded her. She reacted without thought and flailed her head and limbs backwards. It slowed her rotating just enough for the point of the lance to fly past her. She grabbed the arm with her right hand, used the moment of her twists to land her feet on the arm, and launched herself in a backflip towards the button. The Minotaur already had its other arm ready to strike her landing position.

Lilith spiraled and flopped erratically. She contracted into a cannonball on her descent. Just as the feeling of deja vu left, just as the Minotaur chose to strike, Lilith went from a tight ball to full extension outwards, horizontal in the air.

The arm flew underneath Lilith. She landed on it laying down. Her weight and force was great enough to press the arm onto the fourth button and trigger it. The Minotaur froze in place.

~[CONGRATULATIONS. YOU HAVE PASSED THE CLASS. PLEASE ENTER THE NEXT ROOM, THEN WE CAN BEGIN.]~

Lilith let her body relax. Her arms and legs hung off the sides of the arm. She focused on getting her breath back while her mind stewed with questions.

("I still don't know how I knew what to do. I certainly never trained as a gymnast or a warrior. How did I pull that off? Where did I learn that kind of skill? This kind of thing takes time, dammit!")

She slid her leg over the side and planted her feet on the ground. She rested her upper body on the deactivated Minotaur arm, her breathing becoming regular.

("And those horrifying visions...are they warnings of my possible future? If they are, why didn't I have any in the maze? Why did I have so many of them here? Why do all of my visions show me being mutilated?")

Lilith looked up to the entrance door. It was still closed. The black panel above it was still blank. She backed away from the arm and turned around.

("That definitely wasn't there before. How can things in these rooms just...appear?")

There was another door in the wall across from the entrance. It was open. The black panel above the door was blank on the timer side.

("...that can't be right. Can it?")

The number (once 500, once 499, twice at 496) was down to 432.

"Why is my number so low?" Lilith asked.

~[THE NUMBER IS A REFLECTION OF YOUR RESULTS. PLEASE ENTER THE NEXT ROOM, THEN WE CAN BEGIN.]~

Lilith hung her head.

("Looks like I get to figure this out for myself, Lily. If I live that long.")

She turned to look around the room one more time. The pillars and the Minotaur were unchanged. The sword and the massive gash it created were gone, wiped back to white.

As Lilith turned to walk through the door, she noticed the other wall, so badly damaged a minute before, was as pristine and flawless at it was when she entered the room. That had only been five minutes ago, tops, yet she felt like she had been awake and moving for hours upon hours. She took her time walking  into the next room.