The Trapped

1-4- Katana (In-game)

The katana still rested upon the stand, which had unexplainably appeared from the floor.

Both of us looked at each other, confused. Craig walked around the case and again picked up the index card from the table, placing it into his pocket.

"What does a sword have to do with ants, fire and water?" Craig asked.

"I don't know..." Mal said. "But maybe, if we get it out of the case, somehow, we can-"

Craig elbowed the glass, smashing into it.

"No, Craig, it could be a trap!" Craig crashed into it again, this time leaving a crack. "Just trust me, Mal. I got this," Craig said.

"Craig!" I yelled. He stood back a few feet, and charged towards the case. It smashed open, sprinkling glass shards all across the floor.

I winced, waiting for a punishment from the room for not playing its game, some sort of lethal death, some sort of knife, or poison, or gun... but there was... nothing.

After a few minutes of each of us looking around, nothing happened. We decided it was safe to break the silence.

"The lady said, 'no rules'. So I figured she meant it!" Craig smiled. 

I laughed in relief. "Well, that's one way to open a box."

Craig looked down at the glass shards, picking one of the larger ones up. "In fact... we could use one of these to cut something, if we wanted." Craig tossed the glass shard across each of his hands, testing out its weight. "I bet one of these would be easier to use than that sword thing."

"It's not a 'sword thing', its a katana," I said. "A Japanese sword."

"Oh! A real Katana? Like in those animes?" Craig seemed delighted. He reached out to touch the katana. 

"No, don't-" but it was too late. Craig already gripped the katana's handle in his hand, caressing the blade. Luckily in the process of doing so he had managed not to kill himself. However, upon his contact, the glassless stand began descending once-more into the floor.

The katana seemed to draw Craig's attention away from the descending stand. "It's smooth, like steel," he said. He put his face up to it. "Cold, too." From the bottom of the handle, which apparently was hollow, suddenly, a small bronze key dropped. Craig looked down at it with curiosity. I snatched it up into my pocket, determined not to lose it.

"We have to keep it safe," I reassured him. "It must be very important."

"Yeah, right..." said Craig, resigning himself not to touch it. "Guess all this katana is important for is hiding that key on the inside, not cutting up things to pieces like in the movies."

Hiding that key on the inside... something about that phrase... On the inside? Then he said, 'not cutting up things to pieces like in the movies'... In the movies... In what movie?

Suddenly, in my mind, I recalled a samurai, steadily holding his sword in front of a melon, which was recently thrown into the air. The melon, frozen in time, was waiting for the samurai's steady hands, guiding a silver weapon towards the fruit. Time seemed to slow down. With careful precision, the samurai sword seemed to be executing its action like a guillotine, final, and resolute, yet prolonged. Something was in this scene. Something important.

Melon. Round. What else is round? A ball? A basketball? A balloon full of air?

My mind continued imagining. The samurai sword, in slow motion, made contact with the fruit, still suspended in the air. Now, a squishing sound could be heard as the blade sliced through, exposing the melon's sweet orange flesh.

I was close. Something round... maybe think bigger. The Earth? What was so special about the Earth? It couldn't be the Earth. It was too large. What was smaller?

The sword gleamed, victorious, as the fruit divided into two. Time returned to normal speed, and I was back in the room.

Something round. Something that we can slice.

The globe!

"Craig!" I suddenly yelled. "You just gave me an amazing idea. May I see the katana?" I asked.

Craig, reluctant at first at rescinding his new prized possession, was coerced into handing the katana to me. I raised it, prepared to make a gamble.

"Craig, put the globe on the floor." My hands were shaking, but I needed to do this. I was no coward.

"What? Craig asked.

"I said, put the globe on the floor. Please," I added.

"Why would you want to do that?"

"I told you, I have an idea."

Craig walked over to the globe, a perplexed look on his face. He placed it on the floor, looking into my eyes. "Oooh," he realized. "That sure is smart."

There used to be billions of ants on this anthill. But the core's been cracked open; and now time won't stay still.

I slashed the katana through the globe. I heard a metal-on-metal clang. I hacked again. Another clang. A third time, and I thought the globe was damaged enough for us to get to what was inside.

"Damn!" exclaimed Craig, jumping to the challenge, prying apart the remaining pieces of globe that remained. 

"What do you see?" I asked.

"There's a ball inside," he said, handing it over to me. What remained of the globe was indeed a circular ball of iron, with a slight crease near the bottom. Upon examination, we discovered that at the bottom, a single keyhole stood out. I fumbled in my pocket, dropping the key onto the cement tile in the process. I winced, and picked it up, hands still shaking. After three tries of me nervously attempting to jam the key in, I succeeded in turning the key to the right. The box clicked open. I screwed off the top. Inside was a single red button.

"There's a button in here," I said. Craig ripped out the index card from his khakis, and reread it. "Oh, I get it! The billions of ants are the people on Earth. Them people on the globe! And the core was really the Earth's core! Woah! Well, I think we did crack the core, but what about time not standing still?" He asked.

"Guess we'll find out once we push the button," I said. I handed it over to him. He carefully took the button out of the circular box, and held it, palm open, in his hand. He looked at me. "You ready?" I nodded. "Then we press it, together." I nodded again. "On three, two..."

A loud rumbling was heard. The arched ceiling began opening up, to reveal an even larger arched room with brighter fluorescent lights, filled with grated vents.

"I hope that means we did it right," I said.

Suddenly, a sizzling sound permeated the room. The lights dimmed. From the vents, steaming water began dripping. The droplets fell across the glass case of the anthills, creating a waterfall effect, as if the ants themselves were crying, while simultaneously shrouding the room in mist. Suddenly, various tiles within the room began lowering to a different level. The mist from the steam pooling within the lowered tiles began growing thicker, until almost nothing was visible. Just as quickly, the water changed temperature, and a faint screaming sound could be heard.

What was stranger still was what we were about to witness.

"Good God," I said in astonishment. I couldn't close my mouth.

"What in the hell?" Craig said.