LevelUP: an 8-bit novel by Micah Joel. Author's definitive online edition.

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Chapter Fifteen

1-2: Boss Fight

The uneven flicker of the OIL can marks Max’s reemergence at the start of the loading screen. The second time through, it’s easier. Climbing seems second nature. Max even grabs the hammer and smashes a few barrels.

He works his way back to the green pipe and emerges in the blue-skied overworld. Despite the warning about randomization, all enemies are in exactly the same as before. Up top, when he smashes the same brick that yielded a coin previously, nothing happens. It’s not even a brick anymore, but a bolted down steel plate, hanging in the exactly in the way bricks never do. Another brick, higher up with no obvious way to reach it, reads, ‘POW.’ Max hurries past, all the way back to the previously-locked door.

The ground where the key was hidden is stained black. A dark trail, like oil poorly scrubbed away, winds through the now-unlocked door. Max peers inside but can’t see anything…until he crosses the threshold. As soon as he sticks his nose through, an irresistible force pushes him through. Or maybe it’d be more accurate to say that while he stood still, the entire universe moved past him. From the far side he can’t see back, or even re-enter. A one-way passage. The only way out of this loading program is through the exit.

The new level is darker and lined with grey bricks. It reminds Max of the actual tunnel he went through to get here. Despite the lack of an obvious light source, he can still see. Heavier splatters of the black sludge mark the site of a violent struggle. And in the middle of it: a coin Possibly the coin, though how could one ever tell for sure? If Pixel Hadley dropped it, that meant that he’d lost a life as well. Max scoops up the coin, and it chimes into inventory. But where was the rest of Hadley’s inventory? At a minimum he held a weapon. At the far end of the cave, Max spots something—not a blade, but something cylindrical and yellowing.

Between him and the item, there’s a droplet of the black oil, the size of a grape, quivering and straining to stand upright.

“Hey there, blobby little creature,” Max says. “Don’t mind me. Just passing through.” Max takes a step and the slime rears up like a cobra, hissing. Somehow, it’s ballooned in volume, not to mention threat.

Max takes another step closer, and the slime doubles again in size, adding a slender lupine snout. It lunges, restrained only by its own elasticity. Max freezes. He’s close enough to see the item better. It looks like a tightly-wound scroll. And if Max knows one thing about these games: always pick up a scroll.

His only chance is to outrun the slime. Max abruptly charges ahead, adorable puffs of smoke appearing at his heels. He dives for the scroll. The sudden movement throws the black slime off his scent, at least for the half-second or so needed to scoop up the item. It chimes into inventory.

Max scrambles back to his feet, but a filament of the black slime wraps around his ankle. Max’s arms flail wildly for a moment as he tries to regain his balance, but to no avail. Before he knows it, his legs are hopelessly tangled. His balance topples past the point of no return. The world seems to move in slow-motion as he tumbles. The ground barks against the meat of his palm, a painful jolt shooting through his overextended wrist. He tucks his head under and turns in a complete summersault, keeping his flailing momentum pointed toward the exit still ahead. Max flings his arms forward as hard as he can, taking advantage of every ounce of momentum. Not an elegant maneuver by any stretch. No animator would’ve done it that way. But it works.

Dad called this training. He was getting the hang of maneuvering through an 8-bit world. Max pushes off and hurls himself toward the exit, so close that the background stops scrolling.

Max tempts fate with a look behind and immediately regrets it. The black slime is at his heels. A doorway’s just ahead. Just in reach. As his body sprawls across the threshold, a razor-bottomed metal doorway whooshes down from above, in guillotine-fashion. Max wrenches his body through the doorway, contorting in directions he didn’t know his body could bend. He feels the blade graze his ribs, taking with it a section of his shirt. With a horrible screech, it severs the snout of the black slime creature. The bits of it that make it through the door condense into sticky tar.

What happens now? As if in answer to his thoughts, a second metal gate slams shut, leaving him locked in a room with no exits. This place is a battle arena. The armored door adds a dramatic sense of finality. This can only mean one thing.

This is what Molly would call a boss fight.

Given the mishmash of game ideas so far, Max isn’t sure what to expect, but—

Max nearly throws up when the creature drops from above—a hairy spider as big around as a kiddie pool, armed with vicious fangs. It hits the ground and springs forward on wiry legs. The thing moves sideways faster than it does forward, its movements unpredictable and menacing.

Stumbling backward, Max doesn’t take his eye off the creature, making it quite difficult to attempt darting glances to the left and right, searching for a weapon. Anything.

Every one of Max’s nightmares converges in the horrific scene that follows as the spider disgorges searing blue laser beams from its maw, in short bursts of three. Max scrambles back until he’s pinned against the door.

Max hurls himself sideways—narrowly missing a shower of sparks from a laser blast. The gate glows red-hot where the beam bombarded the metal.

He can’t keep this up forever. Or even for a minute. He desperately scans the arena looking for anything useful.

No weapons.

No defense.

Nothing.

No way to escape without going through that thing with too many eyes.

Taking his attention off the creature proves to be a mistake. Another laser blast nearly clips his chin. Even the near-miss is enough to bubble his skin.

Max pushes the pain aside and rolls again, in the only direction that avoids imminent bisection. This puts him nearly in the center of the arena, fully exposed. As he rolls, he notices something in the pocket of his jeans. Of course. The coin.

Its yellow pixels form a disk, far larger in his hand than it was in his pocket. It lacks the detail to have a heads or tails side, but one side has white glints suggesting polished metal.

The coin grows even more, to the diameter of a saucer. Reflective side out, Max extends the coin away from his body like a talisman, keeping it between him and the monster’s maw.

The attack comes faster than Max can track. He manages to block the next bolt without charring his fingers, and as expected, it reflects it back, though the shot goes wild. Max moves in even closer.

For the next attack, Max lines up better, and the reflected energy bolts strike the spider in the head, whereupon it emit a piercing shriek of anguish, followed by repeated orange blinks, every pixel of the creature flashing in unison like a neon sign. The creature lets out a final whimper and crumples into a heap.

That was easy.

Then it rises, hissing with rage.

Too easy.

The creature rounds for a fresh attack, now moving twice as fast. Seeing the thing skitter across the room makes Max’s skin crawl. Energy bolts seem to come at him from all directions, a continuous rain of red-hot plasma without the brief delay Max had been depending on to catch his breath. He’s not it the position he’d like, and as he swings the reflective around to protect his head, the energy attack sears through his pixely fingers. His whole arm might just as well have turned into fire, if the waves of pain are anything to go by.

It’s not real. Not real. Not. Real. None of this is happening. As hard as he tries, Max can’t even remember what it feels like to be in his original body. He left it somewhere, in a colossal cave. Someone else was there with him.

Molly was there. Is here. Someone he was willing to stand up for.

Max rises. The coin is fused to the smoldering stumps of his fingers. He lines up the angle, and the next laser blast reflects back into the spider’s head. Every hairy segment of the spider’s body, then each individual leg, erupts in animated explosions. The gate falls away. Max is free to exit. An item drops down from above—a prize for finishing the level. It’s a gleaming trophy, excessively ornate for the resolution in which it’s rendered. The inventory noise chimes as he makes contact with it.

Max exits.

There’s one more room. A pixel princess is there, dressed in a pink flowing dress and strawberry shortcake hat, but words materialize in the air:

YOUR PRINCESS IS IN ANOTHER CASTLE.

As Max looks on, the pixels fade in intensity, revealing a concerned Molly Matheson underneath.

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Copyright 2018, 2019 Micah Joel. All rights reserved.