Legend Of Zelda Fan Fiction / Mega Man Fan Fiction ❯ Gatecrash ❯ Chapter 23: Dungeons ( Chapter 23 )

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Chapter 23: Dungeons
Mega Man found himself lying on his back, deep within a realm of darkness.
The high fall had disoriented his sensors and he recalibrated them as he stood
back up with a groan. The light was coming down from the opening where he had
fallen, casting him in a peculiar natural spotlight.
Shaking his head to clear the cobwebs he called out, "Link? Link!" He waited
a bit. "Are you there? Link?"
No answer. Something may have happened to him. Perhaps the crows nabbed him.
Or he could have been able to fend them off. Nonetheless, Link wasn't there.
Mega Man was somewhere under the lost woods and he had to get out of there.
Jumping out of the pit wasn't an option, much too high. He had no rope to climb
out and no way of making a ladder either. He had experience in situations like
this before and there was always some alternate path. He felt around the walls,
using infra-red vision to navigate around the chasm. His sensors picked up an
unusual outcropping of dirt and roots. He touched the projection and it gave
way, falling inward. A door opened up for him and he eagerly passed through
it.
He now found himself in the middle of a man-made corridor, made from tile and
brick. Torches lined the walls at regular intervals. Archeological designs were
inked on the walls, apparently made with no special meaning in mind. There were
two paths for him to take, east and west. Both ends tapered down to darkness.
Neither way appeared better than the other. He needed to find the one that would
lead him back above ground.
An abrupt squeaking sound alerted him. It was similar to a rodent from his
world, but much deeper and larger. He set his arm cannon ready just in case.
Sets of glowing red eyes blinked open in the darkness above. Bats.
The eyes flipped over and began flying at him, shrieking like demons from
hell. They were twice the size of normal bats, with fangs and hooked wings. They
swooped in and began fluttering around Mega Man's face, picking at his metallic
shell, at the synthetic skin on his face. The robot flailed his arms, trying to
keep them away, not wanting to hurt the innocent animals outright.
"Ackk, get away, get away," he shouted. The bats continued their assault.
Mega Man opted for an easier route and scurried down the hall to the right, his
vision partially obscured by the leathery wings beating down on him. He shut
them to protect his eyes and held out his hand in front of him before he ran
into something. Out of a brief blink, he saw a door just ahead. He put his legs
to maximum output and began outrunning the bats. As soon as he opened the door
he curved around smoothly and shut it just as the bats caught up. He could hear
the soft impact as the rodents hit the door, scratching, trying to win their
prey. Mega Man relaxed and turned around.
Unfortunately, it appeared that he just ran into a dead end. This unusual
room was walled in with gray-green brick. There were four armored statues, two
on the east wall, two on the west, and a wide full-length mirror at the end of
the room, in which Mega Man could see his semblance. The robot looked around for
an alternative means of escape as he moved forward. Moving back out the door
probably wasn't too safe - those bats were voracious. They would be ready to
strike as soon as he walked out the door. Of course, if there was no way out in
here, that could pose a problem. He could dig out, maybe, depending on the
strength of the brick. Or he could go back and face the bats, maybe engineer
some sort of strategy so they weren't all on him at once.
Mega Man noticed behind the mirror there was a large painting hanging on the
wall, stretching to the ground, almost like a mural. In it was some sort of
round, cowled creature with yellow eyes and four hands, each holding a torch,
spread out like a star. Each of the torches had a different colored flame - red,
blue, green, and yellow.
Something set Mega Man's bewilderment off. This was obviously not a conducive
environment to be displaying valuable art. Plus the picture's aesthetic value
was nil, at best. Something about this room wasn't clicking with him. The knight
armor's, the mirror, the painting. Something was really screwy about this.
Mega Man trodded back in front of the painting and gazed at his reflection.
Maybe there was some sort of answer in here. But what was the question. The
question was how to get out of here. This room offered something in that way,
either some sort of passageway or something else. It would have to be something
valuable or else it wouldn't be encoded like this.
Encoded. That was it. The problem wasn't to find an answer, it was to find a
solution. The materials he needed were in this room, he had but to activate them
the right way. And the key was in the painting. Mega Man turned around to the
knight statues. They were holding their cupped hands out as if they were holding
something... or waiting to hold something. He turned back to the mirror. If he
stood just right, the angle of the mirror and the placement of the statues'
hands would show whatever the knights were holding in roughly the same position
as it would in the painting. But where would he find torches?
There were some out in the hall, but they didn't match up with what the
creature in the art piece was holding, and neither were they colored. Mega Man
inspected the mirror. It was framed in gold or brass casing with a small
skull-head emblazoned at the top. It looked like it belonged in some
swashbuckler's quarters. It was also in the same dimensions as the painting,
further proving his hypothesis. But how would he get the tools to solve the
puzzle?
He looked around the back and saw four torches in place-holders, unlit and
ready for use. Excellent. Mega Man took one and placed it in the hands of the
nearest knight. Now he had to figure out how to light it, though. He had no fire
weapons, that would have come in handy now. Nor anything to strike a flame to.
Mega Man could see how this puzzle was meant for the people of this time. They
would have elements for making fire with them nearly all day, especially
adventurers like Link.
A plasma shot might generate enough heat. It might also disintegrate the
torch. It was a risky maneuver, but he was seeing fewer and fewer choices, short
of opening up his heating coil. He would have to aim his arm cannon just above
the wick so the shot would just graze it. Plasma was highly volatile and hard to
control in its state, much like fire. Mega Man did the appropriate calculations,
held out the torch and his arm cannon at the precise number of degrees he
thought it needed and fired. The shot flew in the air, singing the torch and
hitting harmlessly against the wall, leaving a scorch mark. The torch, after a
spark, lit a brilliant purple. Success! Mega Man put the torch into the knight's
waiting hands and grabbed the other torches.
Obviously since there was already a burning flame, there was no need to
repeat the experiment. He held each of them to the lit torch and they each
ignited into luminescent red, yellow, and blue respectively. Mega Man couldn't
find any reason why the similar torches would be burning different, and such
unusual colors, but now was not the time to find out. With the torches in place,
each knight holding one, he stood in front of the mirror.
There were four torches in place, one in each corner of the mirror, burning
brightly. But nothing was happening. Mega Man checked back at the painting.
Maybe the colors needed to correspond with where they were in the creature's
hands. He went to work replacing the torches, switching them around until they
matched what was in the picture. When he was finished he stood in front of the
mirror again. Nothing was happening.
This was strange. Maybe he was going about this wrong, using the wrong logic.
Whoever built this room was from a world where they didn't think like he
thought. All Mega Man could do was process the problem logically and find a best
solution. And he thought he had. The torches were exactly parallel to the
creature, in the same order. They looked like that was where they should go. The
picture should have been a mirror image.
No, not a mirror image. That was the problem. He was looking at the painting
in the mirror. But if the picture was reflecting in the mirror, the image would
be reversed. Mega Man switched the torches from one side of the room to the
other, setting the torches to what they would be if the creature were holding
them in front of the mirror itself. As he placed the last torch in the knight's
hands he heard a click.
He turned to the mirror, thinking something had unlocked. Within the
reflection, the ghostly figure from the painting was holding up the four
torches. But this was real... and floating behind Mega Man.
The robot quickly turned his head to look at it, but the ghost was not behind
him, not outside the mirror. He turned back to the reflective pane. The mirror
had vanished, disappearing with vaporizing puffs of smoke. In its place a small
treasure chest remained. The painting itself somehow spontaneously unhinged from
the wall and fell face forward, revealing a door.
A little off-put by the strange encounter, he approached the treasure chest
and took a look inside. There was a shiny silver metal key lying in the bottom.
Just in case, Mega Man took it, not really knowing why he would need it, but
thinking it would be best. Certainly wouldn't want to be kept out of a locked
door by a key he had the opportunity to get before. Pocketing the object, he
opened the door and continued on.
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Link hunkered down in the tree trunk as the birds passed overhead. They
apparently didn't see him duck in here so he kept silent until he was sure they
had passed. His eyes were kept skyward, looking for an indication of the birds.
The trunk was damp and cold, keeping him shrouded in shadow. He thought he
should have felt cowardly, but his self-preservation instincts justified his
actions. The sound of wings flapping and their calls eventually faded away. He
knew Mega Man hadn't made it as far as him and was wondering where he had gone,
hopefully not attacked by the crows.

The green-clad hero emerged from the trunk and looked around. The birds had
flown away and sky had become cloudy, darkening the forest.
"Mega Man?" he called out quietly. He began retracing his steps back to where
they had entered. "Mega Man? Where are you? Are you here?"
Walking back down the forest, he tried to remember where he had stepped, what
path he had taken when running from the crows, difficult to do in a panic. He
found a pit in-between two trees that he had gone around before, wondering
whether Mega Man had done the same. Part of the grass on the ledge had been
ripped off, indicating that someone had fallen down and tried to grab the edge.
Link feared for the worst.
"Mega Man! Mega Man! Are you down there?" he called out.
The pit was too far down for him to jump safely. He had no rope to climb down
with either. Link wondered if Mega Man could even survive a fall down that far.
He could be lying down there right now, unconscious, bleeding, or dead. Maybe he
could use his hookshot to repel down there, but the mechanism didn't work that
way. Kakariko village was nearby. Maybe he could get some help there.
"Why if it isn't Sir Link," a voice said.
Link turned around and saw an old woman walking towards him. The same old
woman he had taken shelter from earlier. She was still dressed in a tattered
gray robe and carried a pile of firewood.
"Hello again,"
"You gave me such a start after you had left. I was wondering what had
happened to you, perhaps the moblins had come to capture you."
"No, I had a rather important dream I thought I should follow up."
"Next time, you should really wait until morning before heading out on a whim
like that. I had planned on giving you a hero's surprise when you woke up."
"Oh? What was that?"
"Oh, a big breakfast. One worthy of someone such as yourself." The old lady
strutted up next to Link and peered down into the hole. "Lose something down
there?" she asked.
"Possibly. I need to get down there in a hurry. A friend of mine might be
down there."
"Oh, really. Then if you'll allow me to repay the kindness you showed me..."
She put down her firewood and stepped behind the tree, pulling out a long ladder
behind it. "I've hidden this here to get down myself."
"What do you use it for?"
"Oh, for storing things, treasures, the little money I have. You never know
when thieves will come back. They might still be hiding behind the trees,
ramming you and snatching what they can."
Link nodded in agreement. He helped the woman by taking the other end of the
ladder and lowering it down into the hole. Just as they were about to run out of
ladder it hit bottom. Link immediately started climbing down, and the old lady
followed him.
At the dirt bottom, Link jumped off the ladder. No sign of Mega Man anywhere,
however there was a doorway opened up. He cautiously cantered in and found
himself in the middle of a temple hallway. Strange that this would be under the
lost woods. The old lady snuck out from behind him.
"Looks like your friend got away," she said.
Link looked back and forth at the two ends of the hallway. "Yeah, but which
way did he go?"
The woman stooped close to the ground. "The footprints seem to indicate he
went that way," she sped off with her nose practically rubbing the floor.
Link looked down and didn't notice any footprints. However, the lady was
already running off in an easterly direction. "Hey, wait," he called out. He
began running after her.
He followed her down the corridor at a fast jog. She was surprisingly fast
for an old woman. She stopped at a door as Link caught up with her.
"He must have gone in here," she said. "Open it."
Link opened the door and walked in. It was a large room with four pillars
standing around a colored tile.
"Where is he?" Link said as he entered the room.
"Hmm, he must have gone in the secret entrance."
"There's a secret entrance?" Link asked as he stepped into the room, looking
around.
"Yes," she said, still poised near the door. "Try hitting that tile in the
center of the room."
Link looked back at her, standing next to the slightly red raised tile in the
middle of the pillars.
"This one?" he asked.
"Yes, that one, press it."
Link stomped his foot on the tile. The four pillars began regressing into the
floor, making the horrible grating noise of stone scraping against stone. Link
could see the tops about to reach floor level and noticed they were holding some
sort of object on them. As they reached eye level he realized they were red
Cyclops statues. He whipped around to the old woman, who was standing in the
doorway.
"Ha, ha, ha. Remember, Link, no good deed goes unpunished."
As soon as the pillars finished going down the Cyclops' slowly opened their
eyes as Link's head darted around frightened.
"Goodbye, Link," she said. "Spill lots of blood for me now." She shut the
door and locked it.
The cyclops' eyes opened wide. They began charging Link.
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