Sanctuary of the Elusive Captain

Leon began the day entering a whole new world of excitement. Tons of new features had been discovered in the week since the glasses were issued. Mini patterns could be placed anywhere to be dodged at any time, making the whole ship come alive. Even the halls were full of magic!

And danger.

He knew Roxie was lurking somewhere, but didn’t see any sign of her.

A thin blue laser shot out of the door to his left.

“Hmhmhnn~!” Roxie poked her head out of the infirmary. Now that Leon thought about it, it made sense for a medic to be there. “It is I! Here to make sure you get your morning medicine!”

Leon stopped just in time to avoid floating into the laser, but Roxie summoned a syringe-shaped projection to fire a spread of shots. As fast as they were coming at him, he’d be a sitting duck…

If he weren’t wearing cool new air jets! The other prototype given to the crew last week were pairs of ankle straps with air jets attached to them.They required a flex of the ankle to use, which felt awkward, but it was worth it! No longer did Leon need to rely on the walls, the floors, or a cape to get around. He could fly as free as a bird!

And he flew straight into one of Roxie’s shots.

“Huhuhu! I got you~” Roxie used her own jets to float back toward the kitchen.

“Hmph…” Leon’s pout quickly turned into a smile. “I love these glasses so much.”

“Aren’t they great?” she tapped her own. 

“Yeah, I can’t wait to show off my patterns to the new guy!” Since finding out the Celestion-5 would be welcoming a new member, the rookie ranger hadn’t been able to get him off of his mind.

“Me neither! Wait, how do we know it’s a--Owwie!” Roxie smacked lightly into the kitchen door. “How do we know it’s a guy?”

“There’s an empty bed in me and Aiden’s room.” Leon reasoned. “Unless they’re like Jun and Aiden, they’re probably a guy.” 

“Ahhh! That gets me thinking…”

“About what?” He pressed a foot into the ground to prevent him from colliding into Roxie.

“About Lorie.”

“Who?”

Roxie folded her arms, chuckling like a villain. “You haven’t been paying close attention…” She dropped her smugness. “Sometimes Emil talks about one called Lorie… He gets really cagey when you ask who it is, though.”

“Ohhh, I remember now! Maybe that’s the new guy’s name.”

She shook her head. “The captains found out we’d be getting a new pal when we did. I personally like to think that Lorie’s a gnome who lives in the ship and fixes things, like the storage room lights and the chest machine.” 

“I don’t… think Lorie’s a gnome.”

“A girl can dream!”

“I wonder who that is, though… Maybe the captain knows?”

Roxie lifted her head. “Oh yeah, where is he anyway? He never gave me any punishment for speaking out last week. I would prefer he not, but I haven’t seen him since.”

Leon tried to remember if he’d seen the captain since then, but his mind drew blanks. “That’s weird… We should go look for him!”

“We think alike! But I have one catch.” The medic lifted a finger. “Let’s make it a race! First one to find the captain wins.”

“Wins what?”

“Glory, my boy!”

That sounded like a good enough prize to Leon. “Okay, you’re on!”

“Okie-dokie! Let’s begin!” 

Roxie pried herself off of the door, opened it, and went through. It seemed like an unfair advantage. Leon followed her into the kitchen, where a familiar freckled face buried itself into a manual.

“Mia!” Roxie propelled herself over to the table where her roommate sat.

Leon did the same. “Good morning, Mia!”

“Hi, Roxie.” She lifted her head from the manual. “Um, good morning Leon.”

He leaned toward her. “Have you seen the captain lately?”

“Yeah-- what?”

Roxie followed suit. “Do you know of the one named Lorie?”

“I’m not--”

“You have seen the captain?” Leon leaned closer. “Great! Where is he?”

“I didn’t mean--wait!”

“Are you not allowed to speak of Lorie?” So did Roxie. ”What is the true nature of this entity? I must know!”

“I don’t know, I don’t know! I don’t know anything about anything I’m just trying to figure out how to make patterns please!” Mia shielded herself with the manual. 

Leon tilted back. “...Oh.”

The freckled redhead took a deep breath and lowered it, returning to her calm, collected self. “Um, my apologies. Could you… maybe ask a little slower?”

“We’re trying to figure out where the captain is so we can ask about Lorie.” He explained.

“...Who?”

“We don’t know~” The dyed redhead chimed in. “Did you say you needed help with your patterns? We could assist you!”

“Yeah, we’d love to.” offered Leon.

Mia looked between the two. “I mostly need someone to test out what I have so far. Is that okay?”

“Of course, my dear Wattson.” Roxie placed a hand on her chest. “Allow me to set my glasses to Defensive Mode.”

“I’ll set mine to Offensive.” Mia put on her pair of glasses, which were sitting on the table.

Leon floated in place. “I’m already ready already!”

He waited for about a minute as the other two reconfigured their glasses.

Roxie finished first and gave a midair bow.” Shall we dance?”

 “It would be my pleasure.” Mia giggled, returning it. Upon making eye-contact with Leon, she stopped, and so did her warm smile. “Um, I mean, let’s begin.”

With a wave of her hand, Mia started her first pattern. A curved, pink wall began to sweep the room, straightening out and curving in the other direction as it moved across. 

“Wooooah.” Leon watched it, dumbstruck.

“Is this too much?” She asked. “The manual says we should try to make them dodgeable.”

“It is sufficiently dodgeable, I think!” Roxie reported from a safe corner of the room.

Leon narrowly avoided the pink wall trying to make it over to where she was. He smacked into the real wall cheek-first.

“Uwaaah! Rookie, are you hurt?” She moved her curls out of the way to properly look at him. “Roxie Safety Tip! Always look where you float. Lucky for you, you were blessed with squishy, round, highly pinchable cheeks for cushioning.”

He rubbed his face. “...Thanks, Roxie.”

Another pink wall emerged from the opposite direction, just a few feet away from them. Before Leon could register what was happening, Roxie hooked an arm in his and dragged both of them toward the corner opposite of where they came in.

“Now I’m starting to wonder if it’s too slow.” Mia thought aloud.

“Hmmm, maybe! You could probably add some smaller projectiles as the wall drags across.” Roxie let go of Leon and turned around to face her.

“Not a bad idea…” Mia took a notebook from the table and jotted something down.

“‘Pageturner.’” Roxie read the name of the pattern. “Cute name!”

“It’s kinda cheesy, I know.”

“Ohhh! ‘Cause it looks like a page turning!” Leon realized. He also realized Roxie was about to smack into the wall again. He grabbed her arm just as she was about to collide with it. “Always look where you float.”

“Oops!” Roxie knocked a fist on her forehead and stuck a tongue out. Sometimes Leon found it hard to believe she was a real person and not an anime character come to life.

“Ah!” Mia flinched, probably from a stun. She hovered over to the other side of the kitchen table. “Here comes the next one.”

The pattern name changed to ‘Crescent Fall.’ Mia mimed pushing something forward, and from the wall behind her appeared a bunch of spinning, white, crescent-shaped projectiles. They approached the wall where Leon and Roxie floated, but the crescents were so slow and so spread out that the two had no trouble dodging them.

“Hmm.” Mia observed them. “Too slow.” She jotted something down in her notebook.

“I dunno, I kinda like it this way.” Leon felt at ease watching the crescents go by. “I like how they spin!”

“They’re pretty!” One of the crescents circled around Roxie’s waist, narrowly avoiding her. “Was that supposed to hit me?”

“Probably not.” Mia looked between her notebook and the manual floating beside her head. “The white part didn’t hit you, did it?”

“Nope!”

“That’s intentional.” 

“Yay!” Roxie lifted her hands. She tested her luck with another crescent, but it hit her instead.

The crescent fall unfortunately came to an end when the title changed to ‘Pageturner v2.’ Much like ‘Pageturner,’ a pink wall formed, but this time in the middle of the room. One side curved toward the door to the hallway, closer to Leon. The other side curved toward Roxie, who still floated closer to the door to the stairway. 

Leon found himself trapped in the back corner of the kitchen. He hovered over boxes of food as the wall closed in on him. At the last second, he realized he could hide behind them. 

Suddenly, he heard the sounds of metal clanking behind the kitchen wall. “What’s that noise?”

“What’s what noise?” Roxie had no boxes to hide behind, but staying in the very corner of the room seemed to work for her.

Mia carried herself and her books back to where she originally started. “The metal sounds? I’ve been hearing those for the past few days.” 

“Is it coming from the storage? Or maybe the infirmary?” Leon pressed his ear against the wall. “It kinda sounds like a big hunk of metal. There’s nothing like that in either room, not that I know of.”

“Me either.” Mia set her books on the air beside her. “It’s probably nothing, but if it is something, then… well…” She ended her thought with a shrug.

“That’s concerning!” remarked Roxie.

Leon thought so too. What concerned him at the moment though, was the next part of the pattern.

Mia clasped her hands together, summoning another wall. It parted from where she was, which meant Leon and Roxie had to move to the opposite corners of the room.

She flinched again. “Okay, last pattern for now.” A faint smile crossed her face. “I’m actually kind of proud of this one.”

The freckled ranger lined up two fingers together and moved each outward in an arc. Green, glowing orbs lined the room in a similar shape. She clasped her hands together, and it began to close in. Gaps between the orbs grew smaller, and after a certain point, escape became impossible. It looked pretty threatening, but there was one problem.

Leon and Roxie were safely behind the arc when it started.

Mia put her face in her hand. “I should’ve thought that through…”

“It was a valiant effort!” Roxie cheered on her friend.

Leon joined in. “Plus, ‘Dome of Restriction’ is a really cool name!” It reminded him of the Moon colony, where Mia lived. “It’s kinda like Lunaria, but bad!”

Mia chuckled to herself.

“Maybe you could put more rows of shots behind the arc.” suggested Roxie. “That way there won’t be as big of a blind spot.”

“Good idea!” Mia paused the simulation. “In fact, there’s something else I’d been meaning to try.”

The other two waited for a little bit as she changed some settings.

“There.” She put in the final touches. “Hopefully this won’t backfire too. Are you ready?”

“Yep!” answered Roxie.

“Me too!” Leon seconded.

The simulation started back up upon Mia summoning the arc again. This time, four rows of shots popped in instead of just one. Leon made way for the arc to form and joined Roxie in the middle of the room, across from Mia.

Instead of clasping her hands together, she raised them into the air. She then crossed them, flinging each half of the shots to different parts of the room.

“Yes.” She smiled. “It worked!”

“You did--Nonononono!” Roxie narrowly dodged a shower of orbs.

“Yaaaaay, I’m so happy for y--Huah??” A few barely missed Leon’s target.

Mia wrote in her notebook while continuing to sling shots left and right. 

Leon pressed himself against the stairway door while trying to avoid them. As he did, he thought he saw the captain through the gym’s doorway. That’s right! He was looking for the captain! It was obvious he wasn’t in the kitchen, but Leon wouldn’t leave when Mia still needed help.

At least not normally, but a slew of projectiles came flying at him and he panicked. The hallway door shut behind him just in time to save him a hit.

Roxie pointed at him from the kitchen, shouting something before getting hit by an orb. Leon couldn’t help but snicker. He mouthed an apology, then fled the scene.

When he got closer, he could see that Jun was in the gym, not the captain. Not that it stopped him. Maybe they knew where he was! Heading inside, he hoped he would be one step closer to the captain, Lorie, and a little glory.