An Inconvenient Problem - Secret Santa for Blah!? (Complete 1/21/19)

[randomguy]

Hi @Blah!?! I'm you're Secret Santa this year! I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get this up. I was hoping to post it all in one go, but here we are at the deadline, and I'm only about 70% done. There's only one part after this, and I'm hoping to have it up before the end of this next week. Unfortunately, I can't just post everything I have (for reasons I can't explain just yet), so I'm posting up to a point that make sense. I'm not happy with how few sneezes there are here, but this is only the first act; you'll get plenty more in the next part!

Before we start, I just wanted to say that I've felt deeply honored to have you as my match up. You're a legend on this forum, and you've been a huge part of this community since before I even knew about it, much less became a member. Seeing your name absolutely made my day, and I really wanted to make something as awesome as you are. I did some research on you before I started writing (not too creepy, I hope ), and I tried to work in some of the stuff I found, but two things especially. The first was an idea inspired by what you did with "The Adventure Club," only there's no voting in this one. You'll see. The second is... well, you'll probably be able to figure it out on your own  (though you may not understand why I included it until part 2, I'm afraid).

Okay! This preface has gone on long enough. Let's jump right in!

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“No way! Are you serious?”

Jazzly winced at her friend’s overly loud exclamation and turned down the volume on her HoloDisplay.

“Yes, Kelyn, I’m serious. And keep your voice down. I don’t need the commander finding out that I-”

“That you skipped recon training to play a card game?” Kelyn interrupted with an oh-so-irritating smirk.

“Fortitude is not just a card game!” Jazzly shot back. “It’s a multi-sensory strategic battle simulation experience… that happens to involve some cards…”

“…and also be a game?” Kelyn finished, her smirk becoming just a tad more irritating.

Jazzly rolled her eyes and lay back in her cot, the HoloDisplay’s projection mode changing automatically to her ceiling.

“Okay, fine, it’s a card game. So what? It’s not like I didn’t get clearance for a quick Earth visit. I just… kind of… left the ‘Purpose of Visit’ line a little vague. No big deal.”

Kelyn shook her head. “You and your shenanigans.  So how’d the tournament go? Did you win?”

“Well, it wasn’t exactly a tournament, just a game with a woman I met on the Network. But yeah, I won.”

“Really? And how’d you manage that?”

Jazzly shrugged, choosing to ignore her friend’s little jab. “Just got lucky, really. Her deck was mostly curses, mine is mostly effect removal and defense.”

“A curse deck?” Kelyn asked incredulously. “Wow. This chick sounds like a massive troll.”

 Jazzly smiled. “Yeah, it definitely felt a little troll-y. It held up pretty well, though, right up until the last round. She tried to play Inconvenient Allergy, but-”

“Wait, I’m sorry,” Kelyn interrupted, “Inconvenient what now?”

“Inconvenient Allergy. Curse deck, remember? It’s supposed to make you allergic to one of your own cards, only when she played it, get this: the system GLITCHED!”

“What?! A glitch in the Fortitude system? I didn’t even know that was possible!”

“Neither did I! But it happened! She played Inconvenient Allergy, then the system glitched for some reason and the card didn’t have any effect! It was just wasted mana for her, and I took her down real quick after that. I pretty much won on a technicality, but, y’know, I’ll take it.”

Kelyn looked about to respond, but the volume on her chat window suddenly dropped as a tiny pink-haired sprite zoomed into view, accompanied by her usual tinkling chimes.

“Hiya, Jazz!” the little avatar bubbled excitedly. “Guess what? I got a message for ya!”

“Not now, Miki,” Jazzly said, waving the chibi girl away, “I’m in the middle of a chat.”

“Oh, but this message is from Commander Rushworth! And he marked it urgent! Sounds exciting, doesn’t it?” she answered, accompanied by a nauseatingly saccharine giggle.

“I already told you, not now!” Jazzly insisted, repeating her irritated wave a couple of times. “How come I can’t get rid of you?”

Miki curled her thin lips into a pout. “Sorry Jazz, but Commander Rushworth made it unskippable. He must reeeeeeeally want you to hear it right away! Why don’t I just show it to ya, then I’ll be outta your hair, okey dokey?”

With a sigh, Jazzly nodded, and a message in florescent orange text appeared.

ALL MEMBERS OF CIVIL RECONNAISSANCE DIVISION ECHO SQUAD REPORT TO TRAINING DECK

ARRIVE IN TACTICAL RESPONSE UNIFORMS FOR MISSION BRIEFING AT 1800 HOURS

 “Training?” Jazzly groaned, “Ugh! But training hours are over!” She flopped back against her pillows dramatically and pounded her fists against the mattress, coming dangerously close to throwing a tantrum.

“Training hours are whenever I say they are, Private.”

Jazzly’s eyes bolted open at the deep, booming voice coming from her doorway, and she sprang to her feet.

“C-Commander Rushworth!” she cried, every muscle in her body tightening as she snapped to attention. “I… I didn’t realize you were-”

“Pipe down, Pvt. Jazzly, your mouth is more likely to do you harm than good at this juncture.”

“Y-yes sir.”

Jazzly kept her spine as straight as possible and stared straight ahead, as was standard when a superior was around. Now, however, she was presented with a problem she hadn’t had before: her nose was itching. Jazzly sniffled as quietly as she could and subtly wrinkled her nose, but it didn’t do any good.

Unaware of her dilemma, the imposing, dark-haired man took a step into Jazzly’s room, though not an intrusive one. There were policies regarding personal space, but even if there hadn’t been, Commander Rushworth never overstepped his bounds.

“We missed you at training today, Pvt. Jazzly. I only came by to ensure you’d returned from your… how did you phrase it on your clearance request again? Ah yes, your ‘Tactics Research Excursion.’ How did that go?”

Jazzly felt her cheeks begin to blush. “Sir, it… it was fine, sir.”

Jazzly’s heart was racing. It was quickly becoming apparent that no amount of sniffling or nose wrinkling was going to stop this sneeze, but she wrinkled her nose again anyways. Maybe, just maybe, she could hold it back until the commander left.

“Good. Then I assume you’ll have no trouble following my orders? Despite it being outside of normal training hours?”

“Nih… n-no sir… hah...” Jazzly sniffed yet again, a little louder this time. The commander gave her a concerned look.

“Are you alright, Pvt. Jazzly?”

Jazzly nodded. “Yeeehh… y-yes suh… sir… huh…” This itch was driving her insane! Damn, she wished she could rub her nose.

The commander looked her up and down. “Are you sure? Don’t you lie to me, private.”

Jazzly bit her lip in thought. She didn’t want to just sneeze in front of the commander, but she wasn’t sure if she could hold it back either.

Should Jazzly…

hold it back?

Spoiler

Jazzly clenched her fists in determination.

“Yeh… y-yess, sir, I’m sh… huh… sure…”

The commander looker her over again, and she bit her lip a little as the tickle got worse. God, why wouldn’t he go? She tried not to meet his eyes as she wrinkled her nose again and tried to will the sneeze away. At last, the commander spoke.

“Fine, then. I’ll expect you in 20 minutes, Pvt. Jazzly. As you were.”

The middle-aged commander turned and began to walk away, and Jazzly finally relaxed and let the tickle take over. She let her eyes squeeze shut and brought her cupped hands to her nose, and she was just starting to draw in a deep breath when the commander’s voice came again.

“And Jazzly?”

Panicked, Jazzly jammed her finger under her nose and stammered “Yuh… huh… yeh… yes, suh… sir?”

“You played your Smite Condition far too early. You should have waited until your opponent thought she had you beaten and got sloppy. I expect better of my squad members.”

The blush in Jazzly’s cheeks deepened, darkened, and spread until her whole face resembled nothing so much as an overripe tomato, and all at once, the tickle became too much to handle.

“Yuh… huh… yes… huh-mmmpfch! Yes, sir… huh-MMMMPFCH!” she muffled the sneezes into her hands as best she could, but still cursed herself inwardly over her lack of control.

When the door slid shut, she finally let herself draw in the massive, shirt-straining breath her lungs had been craving.

“HAAAAAH…. HAAAAAAEEEESSSSSHOOOOOO! EEEEEEEETSSSSHOOOOOOO! Heh… HEEEEEEEASHOOOOOOOOOOOO! Huh… heh… heh-isssssssshew!”

After taking a few moments to catch her breath, Jazzly rubbed her nostrils against the back of her wrist. Then, she remembered the HoloDisplay. Rolling her eyes at what she knew was coming, she unmuted it just in time to hear the tail end of Kelyn cackling mercilessly.

 

 

just sneeze?

Spoiler

 

Reluctantly, Jazzly admitted to herself that there was no hope of holding this sneeze back, and she certainly didn’t want the commander to catch her in a lie. With a sigh, she muttered, “I’m sorry, sir,” then cupped her hands around her nose and let her eyelids flutter shut.

“Haaaah… HAAAAAAAESSSSHOOOOOOO!” The sneeze burst out at last, and Jazzly’s slim figure bent at the waist.

“Bless you, Pri-”

“HAAAAAAAASSSSSHOOOOOO! AAAAAAASSSSSSSHEEEEEEW! HEH…HEEEEEEIIIIISSSSSSSHEEEEEW!”

Jazzly straightened up again.

“Bless you again, Pvt. Jazzly. Are you all finished?”

Jazzly’s nose twitched, and she found herself blushing. “Uh… one… one more…”

The commander rolled his eyes. “Get it over with, please!”

Jazzly nodded and raised her cupped hands again. “Heh… ih… heeeeeh… heh-ISSSSSSHEEEEEW!”

She sniffled and rubbed her nose, blinking back the sneezy tears that had formed. The tickle was gone, replaced by complete humiliation.

“I’m so sorry, Commander. I… I’m done now, I promise. I’m sorry, I don’t know what-”

“Enough apologies. You couldn’t help it. Now if there’s nothing else, I’ll expect you in 20 minutes, Pvt. Jazzly. As you were.”

The middle-aged commander turned and began to walk away, and Jazzly had just started to relax when he paused just outside the door.

“And Jazzly?”

“Sir?”

“You played your Smite Condition far too early. You should have waited until your opponent thought she had you beaten and got sloppy. I expect better of my squad members.”

The blush in Jazzly’s cheeks deepened, darkened, and spread until her whole face resembled nothing so much as an overripe tomato.

“Y-yes, sir…” she stammered as the door slid quietly shut.

She stood in silence for a few moments, unsure of what to do next, when she suddenly remembered the HoloDisplay. Rolling her eyes at what she knew was coming, she unmuted it just in time to hear the tail end of Kelyn cackling mercilessly.

 

 

“-AHAHAHAHAAAAAA! Oooooooh, boy, are you busted, young lady!”

“Yeah, yeah, I was there, I know what happened. Did you get the message too?”

“Sure did. Bless you, by the way. Those were some impressive sneezes.”

“Thanks. That was really weird. I don’t know where they came from!”

“Yeah, it happens. Hey, how about we meet up and walk down to the training deck together? I’d like to talk to your doomed ass once last time.”

“Yeah, sounds good. I’ll meet you and your snarky attitude in 10?”

“10 it is! Me and my snarky attitude will be waiting. Love!”

“Kisses.” Jazzly closed the chat window and summoned Miki back into view again.

“Hiya Jazz! What can I do for ya this time?”

“Deploy my Tactical Response Uniform for training, please. Uniform slate grey.”

“Erm… I’d love to, Jazz, but… I gotta tell you-”

“Please, Miki, I’m in a hurry. We can talk later.”

“B-but Jazz! I’m scanning through the TRU’s coding, and there’s a script in there that-”

“Miki, please! I’m already in trouble with Rushworth, I can’t be late too! You can scan the coding all you want later!”

With a resigned sigh, the sprite began the deployment process. Jazzly was already wearing her TRU, but it was in off-duty mode, meaning it looked like everyday civilian wear. After deployment began, the nanofibers in her sleeves and pant legs lengthened and tightened until they fit her slim figure perfectly. The uniform turned regulation slate grey and added twin golden triangles on her shoulder to indicate her Private First Class status as well as the outstretched wings of Recon Division.

With a troubled look, Miki darted off the wall and integrated with her uniform, appearing in her HUD and giving her an encouraging wink before disappearing until she was needed.

Before heading out the door, Jazzly took a few moments to examine herself in the mirror to make sure the TRU had deployed correctly, and possibly also just a little bit to admire the way the uniform outlined her gentle curves. She had always liked the way the uniform looked on her. The muted color made her green eyes pop, and it complemented the light dusting of freckles that covered her cheeks and her small, upturned nose.

She had heard that, many generations ago, standard uniform was much bulkier, not sleek and fashionable at all like the one she sported now. Of course, the armed forces was a much different organization then. It used to be all about conformity and rigidity and power, and those values had served well for many years. Someone with a face and personality like hers never would have fit into that world.

Of course, the advancement of space travel had changed all that. As humankind’s reach had extended further and further past the limits of our galaxy, the space sector of the armed forces had recognized the need for a more accepting, diplomatic culture among their ranks. After all, if their first contact with an extraterrestrial civilization involved everyone pointing guns at one another… well, that might not go so great.

Now, budding space cadets like Jazzly, with their pink-haired anime fairies or their trading card games or  their secret dream journals (not that she had one, as far as you can prove), were welcomed with open arms and treated as family. The halls of Spectrum Station and other extra-orbital facilities were home to a vast and colorful array of personality types, all of which belonged.

Jazzly gave her reflection one last look as well as a wink she would never admit to having given before heading out the door.

There were two ways to get to C Ward, where she’d meet up with Kelyn. She could take the right corridor, which was more direct, but ran right by Rushworth’s office, or the left corridor, which was longer, but didn’t pose any risk of an unfortunate meetup with the commander.

Should Jazzly…

take the right corridor?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly checked her watch. She figured if she wanted to meet Kelyn in time, she’d have to take the more direct route, risky as that may have been. She took a deep breath and headed off down the hall, treading lightly so as to avoid attracting any attention.

She was about to creep past Commander Rushworth’s office when the commander’s booming voice came through the doorway. In a panic, Jazzly pressed herself against the wall beside the door.

“With all due respect, sir,” came Rushworth’s powerful voice, “it’s my squad, she’s my private, and it’s my decision.”

“I’m well aware of that, Sergeant,” replied a second voice, and Jazzly paled as she recognized it as belonging to Lieutenant Burcham, Rushworth’s superior. What was he doing here? “I’m questioning the reasoning of your judgement, not your authority to make it.”

“I understand, sir, and I understand also that it must seem strange to you, but I have my reasons.”

“Dammit, Rushworth, I’m trying to help you! Your private intentionally skips out on your training session, you find out it was for a non-urgent matter – a game, no less! – and she gets off without so much as a slap on the wrist? You’re practically begging for insubordination! At least give her KP duty!”

Jazzly began to tremble as the gravity of the situation hit her. Her boss, and her boss’s boss, separated from her by nothing more than a few centimeters of steel, and they were arguing over her? She began to tremble a little harder as she thought about how much trouble she’s be in if she got caught.

And that’s when her nose started tickling.

“No,” she thought, as she desperately mashed her clenched fist against her long, narrow nostrils, “no no no no no oh God, not now!” She pressed harder, but the tickle was as persistent as it was irritating, and she couldn’t stop her breath from hitching.

“hhhh… hih… hhhhih…”

“Liutenant Burcham, sir,” continued the commander, “Pvt. Jazzly is one of the most promising cadets I’ve had in a long time. I don’t pretend to understand why she did what she did, but I’m certain she had a good reason for it. She’s a damn good private, and I trust her.”

Jazzly squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hands over her mouth, frantically willing the tickle away. As if in defiance, it grew even stronger.

“hihhhhh… hah… ihhhhhh…”

Liutenant Burcham gave a resigned sigh. “Well, the decision is yours of course, Sergeant. I only hope your trust in this private of yours isn’t misplaced.”

“My instincts are telling me that it isn’t, sir. You’ll see soon enough, I’m sure.”

“Fine. That’s enough of that. Now, would you mind closing the door, Rushworth? The air conditioner must have gone on in the hall, and the sound is driving me crazy. Sound’s like someone having an asthma attack out there.”

Jazzly rubbed furiously at her nose, but still the tickle grew until it felt like her entire nose was on fire. She made the mistake of letting her breath hitch one more time, and she realized in horror that the hitch was turning into a full-on gasp for air as her head tilted backwards and her chest swelled against her uniform shirt and the tickle became an absolutely unstoppable urge.

“Okay,” she thought, “this is it. This is how I die.”

She pressed her hands to her face and prepared for the inevitable.

“hahhhhhhhhh… HAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEESSSSHHYEEEEEEEEEEEW!” she sneezed, louder than even she had thought possible.

Miraculously, at the exact same moment, the office door slammed shut with a loud BANG that was just a little bit louder.

Out of instinct, Jazzly began to draw in another breath to prepare for the sneeze that would surely follow, but she was relieved to find that the tickle had vanished completely as though it had never existed.

Wiping sweat from her forehead and sniffing tentatively, she stood completely still for a few moments, but the door never reopened. She breathed a huge sigh of relief and smiled, unable to believe her luck, then hurried off towards C ward.

 

 

take the left corridor?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly checked her watch. She figured if she hustled, she’d be able to take the long way around and still meet up with Kelyn in time. She quickened her pace a bit and set off down the left corridor.

Everything was going well right up until she was about to pass the mess hall. It was at that point that she heard two very familiar voices coming from the inside. She flattened herself against the wall immediately, then ventured a peek into the mess hall’s window.

There they were. Jezper and Shaw. The other two members of Echo squad. Jazzly flattened herself against the wall again, rolling her eyes in disgust. She wasn’t afraid of these two boys, but their arrogant and condescending attitudes got under her skin enough that she wanted to avoid an encounter with them, especially without the commander around. She checked behind her to make sure nobody was watching, then dropped to her knees and started to crawl along the wall, underneath the sightline of the mess’s window.

“I don’t know why the commander’s punishing us,” came Jezper’s unmistakably snide voice. “We didn’t miss training today, not that we even need it. It’s that damned Jazzly who couldn’t be bothered.”

“Yeah,” affirmed Shaw, his voice the perfect blend of stupidity and bravado, “I don’t know why we gotta get extra training just ‘cuz Freckles doesn’t show.”

Jazzly clenched her fists tightly. Shaw didn’t always use that nickname, but when he did, Jazzly’s severe hatred of him always became just a tad more severe.

“I mean, really,” continued Jezper, “I’ll never understand why they let her in to begin with. She’s clearly got no place in this line of work. I get that they need friendly people or whatever, but couldn’t they have stuck her someplace where she wouldn’t hold us back?”

“Yeah, like the surface of the sun!” answered Shaw, which sent both boys into a chorus of evil-sounding snickers.

Jazzly’s whole face flushed red in anger at the blatant stupidity sitting just on the other side of the window. She gave serious thought to just standing up and calling the boys out right then and there, but she realized that with two against one and no supervision present, things could potentially turn out very, very badly for her if she were caught.

That, as fate would have it, was the moment her nose started tickling.

“Damn,” she thought, pressing a finger under her long, thin nostrils. It usually did the trick, but for some reason, the tickle grew even stronger this time. “Crap,” she thought as the seriousness of this situation started to dawn on her, “crap crap crap! What the hell, nose?” She pressed her hands to her face and squeezed her eyes shut, but she was unable to stop her breath from hitching.

“hih… heeeeh…”

“Well,” Jezper driveled on, “it doesn’t matter much anyway. If the commander wants to give me another chance to show up that little brat, I won’t disappoint him.”

“Yeah, show her up!” Shaw echoed. “She won’t know what hit her!”

“heheeeeh… ihhhhhhh…” hitched Jazzly, mashing her freckled nose a little harder. The stubborn tickle got even worse, like it had a point to prove.

“Come on, Shaw, let’s get going. Can’t be late to Jazzly’s ass-kicking!”

“Alright, but let’s head out the back entrance. I want to drop by my quarters first.”

Jazzly rubbed and rubbed at her nose, but no matter how hard she rubbed, the tickle only got stronger until it felt like her nose was on fire.

“hiiiiiiiihhhhh… ahh-haaaaahhhhhh… hhhhaaaaaaaah… eeehHHHHHHHHEEEEH…”

“Oh, screw it,” Jazzly thought. She didn’t know what Jezper and Shaw would do to her, but it couldn’t be worse than this damn tickle was doing. She cupped her hands over her mouth and nose and let her head dip back as she drew in a huge, gasping breath that strained the threads of her TRU.

“HAAAAAH… HEEEAAAAAAAAHHH… HEEEEEEEEYASSSHOOOOOOOOOO!”

She had only a moment to think “Damn, that was loud” before she sprang to her feet, ready for action.

“Alright! Bring it on, you motherfu-”

But the mess hall was empty, the back entrance door still swinging. She quickly dropped her defensive posture before sniffling and wiping her nose. “They got lucky this time,” she convinced herself.

She gave another tentative sniff, but the tickle seemed like it was really gone. With a shrug and another sniffle, she glanced around surreptitiously to make sure nobody had seen her before continuing her brisk walk towards C ward.

 

 

Edited January 22, 2019 by gingerdean
Fixed faulty spoiler tags

[NoV]

Really like the 'choose your own adventure' set up. Unfortunately, on my just for sneezes I ended up reading all the options  

[Sneezingnonstop]

I loved the choose your ow adventure set up as well!! I’ve never seen or heard of it like this and it was just great! Still read all of them anyways but that didn’t stop me from enjoying it!

 

[Blah!?]

Yesssss, please continue to stroke my ego. That's exactly what I need these days.

Anyway, this has been a lot of fun so far! I'm liking the choose your own adventure aspect, though I also must confess that I did read all the choices. I'll be interested to see how that pans out in the second part. Jazz is a fun character too, and I've actually always wanted to do something with a goofy digital assistant character.

To be honest, I'm mostly just glad I could be an inspiration. I feel like it would have been very self-serving to outright ask people to write their own stories based on my stuff, but I can't say I didn't kind of want it to happen anyway. Thanks a ton!

[poiub]

Loved this, very original setup

[alicex]

I really really liked this!! I love the options altho I read them all anyways. I know you said you have one part after this but if you continued after that I'd definitely read 

[randomguy]

Hello again, @Blah!? and everyone else! I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get this part of the story posted. It turned out to be a massive undertaking; the finished file is 66 pages long, though you won't read all of them at once. I may have gone a little overboard with constructing this story, but I really hope you'll find it paid off!

A couple of notes about this part of the story. First of all, Part 1 was an extremely small portion of it. This part is much, much longer and has a lot more sneezes.

Second, unlike part 1 which consists of isolated choices, this part is constructed more like your typical CYOA story, with branching paths. However, there's only one real story path throughout it all. The only true choice here is the first one; every choice after that will either continue the story or end it. As such, I suggest that you read the story all the way through once, trying to reach the end. After that, feel free to go back and experiment with other choices. There's lots of sneezes for you to discover, I promise 😉.

Okay! With no further ado, here's the rest of the story. I hope you enjoy!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jazzly and Kelyn took their time riding the verti-shuttle down to the training deck, but they still managed to arrive about two minutes early. As they stepped through the door, Kelyn shot Jazzly a mischievous wink and a taunting “Good luck, partner!” that belied the tiniest hint of genuine worry.

“Pvt. Jazzly! Pvt. Kelyn!” Commander Rushworth’s loud, barking voice was unmistakable, and the two girls quickly snapped to attention, chanting “Yes sir!” in unison.

Jazzly couldn’t stop her forehead from sweating as Rushworth approached. He looked them up and down several times, silent and imposing. She tried not to allow herself to imagine what horrible punishment he would deliver when he finally did speak, and she tried to pretend she didn’t notice Kelyn’s nervous glances at her out of the corner of her eye. This was going to be bad.

At last, Rushworth spoke up. “You did well to arrive early, privates. But you would have done better to arrive earlier. Get into formation, please.”

As Rushworth walked away and Jazzly felt her heart start to beat at a normal pace again, Kelyn called out, “You mean you’re not going to say anything about Jazz going to-”

Jazzly cut her off with a quick elbow to the ribs, but it was too late. The commander had already heard, and he rounded on his heel.

“About what, Pvt. Kelyn?” he shouted. “About Jazzly choosing to use her properly-obtained leave time to seek out alternate training methods? No, I don’t have anything in particular to say on the matter, and that’s the last I want to hear of it. Formation, please! Now!”

The girls glanced at one another with smiles that bordered on giddiness before hurrying to their colored dots in the center of the room.

Jezper and Shaw strolled in a few seconds before 1800 hours, as was their custom, and took their spots opposite Jazzly and Kelyn, where they stared at the girls with eerily identical smirks. Jazzly tried to avoid making eye contact with either of the other half of Echo squad. She wasn’t afraid, but she wasn’t entirely sure she would be able to look at their supremely punchable faces without doing something reckless. Tackling them at most. Sticking out her tongue at the very least.

“Echo squad, attention!” barked Commander Rushworth, and all four squad members straightened up immediately. “Privates, you are now entering month four of your training with Civil Reconnaissance Division. Here in CivRec, we believe in the importance of early application of your training principles. That’s why, for today’s supplementary training, you’ll be applying the skills you’ve been practicing in a your first simulated reconnaissance scenario. Get used to these drills, privates. They’re going to be a lot more common from here on out.”

Jazzly bit her lip a little to keep from smiling. Her first drill! She’d been waiting for this since her first day on the squad! She could hardly wait to see what this would involve.

“For today’s drill, we’ll be simulating a search scenario, one of the most common situations you’ll face in the field. We’ll be splitting into teams of two. We call this drill Detection and Evasion.

“Evasion team’s objective is to effectively avoid detection until the “All Clear” signal has been given. Detection team’s objective is to apply their training to detect the evasion team as quickly as possible.”

 “Wait… hide and seek?” Jazzly blurted out before she could stop herself, and Rushworth shot her a withering glare.

“Why yes, Pvt. Jazzly, I suppose you could call it that if you were a five-year-old child with no greater aspirations in life than sucking her thumb and playing with her dollies. Is that what you are, Pvt. Jazzly?”

“N-no, sir,” Jazzly answered, fighting not to giggle at his overly descriptive insult.

“Jezper and Shaw, you’re A team. Jazzly and Kelyn, you’re B team. Once detection team has accomplished its objective, the teams’ roles will switch. The first team to evade is…”

Should Jazzly and Kelyn…

seek?

Spoiler

 

“…A team. You have two minutes to find your spot. Anywhere in the station that you have access to is fair game. Are we understood, privates?”

“Yes, sir!” shouted Echo squad in unison.

“Your drill begins now. Go!”

Jezper gave the two girls an infuriating sneer and a slight shake of his head before he and Shaw bolted from the room. Jazzly looked up at Rushworth to see if he had noticed, but he simply cleared his throat and said “Give them two minutes, B team,” before taking a step back to observe.

When the two minutes had elapsed, Jazzly and Kelyn gave each other a surreptitious fist bump before dashing out the door.

“What now?” Kelyn asked. “They could be anywhere.”

“We need to split up,” Jazzly answered. Her mind was already buzzing with potential search routes. “Why don’t you take this deck and the storage bay? I’ll check the wards and operations deck. If either of us catches sight of them, we’ll message the other. Sound good?”

“Sounds like a plan, Star Student,” Kelyn answered with a wink. “Let’s do it!” They exchanged one more fist bump before tearing off in opposite directions.

It didn’t take long for Jazzly to clear the operations deck. It was mostly control panels and conference tables, though she took note of the air vents for future reference. The wards, on the other hand, were considerably larger, with considerably more cover. She checked their respective dormitories first, but there were no signs that the door had been recently opened.

The mess hall offered lots of cover, but even with her night vision and auditory enhancement activated, she couldn’t pick up any signs of life. She considered checking the office wing, but the boys didn’t have access to any of the offices.

Jazzly groaned as she realized there was only one more area left to check on this deck: the Cadet’s Lounge. This would be an incredibly stupid place to hide as there was no cover at all, at least none that couldn’t be cleared in a heartbeat. Which meant that was probably exactly where she’d find them.

She approached the lounge cautiously, taking care to avoid dragging her boots across the metal flooring. A smile crossed her face as she neared the entryway and heard their voices, clear as day, coming from inside. The smile quickly vanished when she listened in to what they were saying.

“Seriously, Shaw, I don’t see what’s confusing you!” Jezper shouted. “The virus opens a backdoor to the station’s operations system. We leave it for a day or so to avoid drawing attention, then access it through the Network, make the change, and let the system complete its weekly purge. Our tracks are covered and nobody’s the wiser.”

Jazzly froze in her tracks. She wasn’t just walking in on one of their typical puerile conversations. These boys were talking sabotage, maybe straight up treason.

“I know that,” Shaw answered, his voice tinged with irritation, “but why do we have to do this now? Can’t we just sneak in after everyone’s asleep?”

“Don’t be idiotic! The station will be on lockdown then, and any other time, Jazzly or the commander could walk in on us. But when they’re hiding? It’s the perfect opportunity! After B team finds us and it’s our turn to detect, we sneak into operations and start the download, go out and nab the little bitches, then complete the procedure during our two minutes of hiding time. It could not possibly be any simpler.”

Jazzly didn’t move a muscle. The situation was dire. She was within five feet of the doorway, and if the boys spotted her now, things were going to end very, very badly for her. She started to retreat, taking cautious steps backwards. Then, all at once, she froze again as a panicked realization hit her.

Her nose was tickling. Badly.

“Jezper,” came Shaw’s voice, “I… I don’t know, man. I mean… I hate her as much as you and all, but… if we get caught…”

“For the last time, Shaw, we’re not going to get caught! We’re going to go through with the plan and alter Jazzly’s record. She’ll get discharged, and we’ll finally get some attention around here!”

Jazzly’s blood ran cold at the mention of her name. Worse, though, the tickle increased.

Jazzly lifted her finger to her nose and rubbed slowly, mindful even of the sound of her finger sliding against her nostrils. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying desperately not to sniff. Try as she might, though, she couldn’t stop her breath from hitching.

“h-hih… hhhhhh…” She tried to at least keep them quiet for now. Realizing, though, that they weren’t going to stop, she pressed both hands over her mouth and cautiously began her retreat again.

“Okay, man, I get it,” Shaw said. “I just… we’ve never done anything like this before.”

“We haven’t. I have. I know what I’m doing. Look, Shaw, you’re either with me or against me. We don’t have time to debate, so which is it?”

“hh-hahhhh… hihhhhh…” Jazzly hitched, the sound muffled by her hands. She pressed them to her face a little harder and checked behind her. Almost around the corner. Almost safe. If she could just go a few more steps without making a sound…

“I’m with you, man, you know I’m with you. As long as you’re sure you can do it.”

“Of course I’m sure. Just do as I tell you. Now come on. They’ll be getting here soon, and we’ve got to find a place to hide.”

Jazzly scrunched her nose as hard as she could, but still the tickle grew. “hhhhhiiiiihhhh… haaahhhhhh…” The hitches were getting louder. She knew she didn’t have long before she sneezed. Pressing her nose as hard as she could, she risked one last glance behind her, then whirled around the corner and pressed her back against the wall. Out of sight.

She could hear Jezper and Shaw’s footsteps leave the room and head off down the hallway. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to hold her breath as the tickle somehow got even stronger. Just a few more seconds… If she could just hold out for a few more seconds…

After what seemed like an eternity, the footsteps turned a corner and became inaudible. Before she even had time to feel relieved, Jazzly’s eyelids fluttered and her head tilted back as she drew in a deep, gasping breath.

“HAAAAAAAESSSSSHOOOOOOOOO!” she sneezed into her cupped hands, then sniffled and let her head tilt back again. “HEEEEEEEEEYAAAAAASSSSSHOOOOOOOO! EEEEEESSSSSHEEEEEEEEEEW! IIIIIIIISSSSSSHEEEEEEEEW! Hah… AAAAAAEEEESHEEEEEW!”

Exhausted, Jazzly let herself slide down to the floor, where she sat panting deeply for a bit. She had no idea what had made her so sneezy, but it seemed to be over now.

Finally, she recovered enough that the gravity of what she had just witnessed began to sink in.

“Oh my god,” she said to herself. “Miki, call Kelyn, please.”

The tiny sprite flitted up into her HUD and flashed her a smile.

“You betcha, Jazz! Connecting now!”

“Miki, please drop the cute act. Now isn’t the time!”

Miki pouted a little. “Sorry, Jazz, but it’s the only setting I got.”

Jazzly rolled her eyes. “Of course it is.”

Kelyn’s smiling face flashed onto her HUD.

“Hey Jazzly! I have good news!”

“Not now, Kelyn. This is an emergency. Jezper and Shaw are planning something, and they’re going to put it into action while we’re hiding. I’ll tell you all about it in person, but for now, don’t try to find them. We need time to talk to Rushworth without them around.”

Kelyn’s smile drooped and became a troubled frown. “You don’t want me to find them?”

“That’s an affirmative.”

“Oh. Then… I guess my good news is actually bad news.”

***************************************

Back on the Training Deck, Jazzly clenched her hands nervously, trying to put the thought of what she’d overheard out of her mind until she and Kelyn were alone. She glanced up at the commander, who was busy setting his timer. At last, he spoke.

“Your drill begins now. B Team… go!”

Jazzly and Kelyn shot out of the room and dashed around the corner before Jazzly held up a hand.

“We’re out of earshot now. We have about a little over a minute to figure out where to hide.”

“How about the storage bay? Lots of cover.”

“That’s what I’m worried about. They’re sure to canvas the area thoroughly. I say we take the verti-shuttle to the operations deck.”

“Operations? There’s almost no cover at all!”

“That’s the point! They won’t think to check too hard! If we can find a good spot, they’ll never find us.”

Kelyn pulled up the timer in her HUD. “We don’t have time to make it to either. I say we hide here on the training deck, then move after they’ve passed us.”

“Point taken. Field simulation area. Now!”

Both girls raced at top speed to the field simulation area, which was outfitted to look like an actual field environment. An alleyway, in this case. It was designed to provide cover, which meant A team would definitely be checking here at some point. As long as they didn’t check here first, it would be okay.

As soon as they had dashed through the open archway, the girls instinctively ran for the same stack of boxes and dove over it, huddling up behind. They had only a few moments to catch their breath before the voices of Jezper and Shaw drifted down the hallway towards them.

“They didn’t have time to make it to the Wards,” Shaw was saying.

“Right,” Jezper affirmed, his voice getting closer and closer. “They could be on this floor. Then again, they could have gone down to the storage bay, or they could have taken the verti-shuttle up. But which do we check first?”

Their voices were right outside the area now. They couldn’t have been more than 30 feet away. Jazzly was in the middle of thinking how embarrassed she’d be if they thought to check this room when her nose started to tickle.

Trying not to panic, Jazzly tried wrinkling her nose. It did nothing at all, and now her breath was starting to hitch.

“hhhhh… hih…”

Kelyn shot her a glare and held her finger to her lips. Jazzly mouthed “Sorry” and held her finger under her nose.

“Well,” came Jezper’s voice, “let’s do a quick survey of the storage bay. They can’t have hidden there very well. Then we’ll check if the verti-shuttle’s gone up. We can decide which to search afterwards.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Shaw answered, and their footsteps set off in the direction of the storage bay.

Kelyn turned to Jazzly, and angry look on her face.

“Did you forget we’re supposed to be hiding, Ms. Noisy-Breath?”

“I’m sorry, it just… nevermind. Let’s head out.”

“Move now? Are you, crazy? They’re just doing a survey! We have to stay put or there’s no way we get hidden in time!”

“But this was only a temporary spot! If we don’t move now, they’re definitely going to check this room!”

Should Jazzly and Kelyn…

move now?

Spoiler

 

Kelyn chewed her lip for a moment, but she nodded quickly. “Okay, but let’s hurry.”

The two girls crept from their hiding place and, after a cursory visual exam, they dashed from the room and down the hall, zig-zagging from doorway to doorway as they’d been taught.

As they neared the training area where they’d started, Jazzly quickly motioned the two of them inside. They both diverted their course, careening through the doorway and pressing themselves against the wall inside. Commander Rushworth was still there, but he only regarded them with a cool detachment.

“We never decided,” Jazzly said between ragged breaths. “We can make a run for the verti-shuttle and head up the operations deck, or we can wait for them to pass and head to the storage bay. What’ll it be?”

Kelyn had wanted to hide in the storage bay, which offered more cover but was likely to get a more thorough canvassing. Jazzly had wanted to hide on the operations deck, where there’d be less cover but might not be searched as well.

Where should Jazzly and Kelyn hide?

The storage bay

Spoiler

 

“I say we wait until they’re done in the storage bay, then head down there. I’m sure we can hide someplace they won’t find us.”

Jazzly sighed in resignation, then nodded. “Storage bay it is. Just stay quiet for now.”

They didn’t have to wait long. Jezper and Shaw’s footsteps soon passed them and headed off towards the verti-shuttle, moving just a little too leisurely. Jazzly held her finger to her lips and motioned out the door, and the two of them crept down the hallway in the opposite direction.

They waited to break into a run until they were through the hatch of the storage bay. The area was huge, one of Spectrum Station’s biggest, and it held all kinds of storage. The girls sprinted through the aisles between the shipping containers, stopping when they reached the middle.

“What do you think?” Kelyn asked.

Jazzly scanned the area with her trained eye, looking for shadowed areas that provided concealment from multiple angles. There were lots of options: crates, palettes, shipping containers, even moving equipment, but all of it would yield quickly to searches. Suddenly, she got an idea. She laced her fingers together and held them out for Kelyn.

“Quick! Get up!”

“What?”

“On top of the shipping container! Get up and lay low!”

Kelyn continued staring for only a moment before shaking off her confusion and letting Jazzly boost her up. Once she was safely atop the large metal container, Jazzly immediately jumped into action. With practiced ease, she ran halfway up the wall of the neighboring container, sprang off in the opposite direction, and somersaulted into a landing next to Kelyn.

Kelyn stuck out her tongue. “Showoff.”

Jazzly chuckled a little. “They’ll never think to check up here, and they won’t see us from the ground if we lay on our backs. The only things that can give us away now are sound and motion, so stay still and stay quiet.”

Kelyn nodded, and the two girls lay flat against the roof of the shipping container.

It wasn’t long before they heard the hatch swing open and the voices of Jezper and Shaw drifting towards them. Kelyn rolled over and looked at Jazzly, laying a finger to her lips. Jazzly nodded gravely and mirrored the gesture in understanding.

Ironically, that was the exact moment her nose started tickling.

“Of course they’re down here, Shaw,” Jezper was saying. “The training deck was empty, and the verti-shuttle hasn’t been moved.”

“Yeah,” Shaw responded, “but she could’ve sent it back down.”

Jezper chuckled. “No, no, she’s not smart enough to think of something like that.”

Jazzly would have been furious if she hadn’t already been so worried about the growing tickle. She wriggled her nose a bit, hoping that would take care of it, but nothing changed. She tried wrinkling it a couple of times too, but it was like the tickle hadn’t even noticed. Realizing that this was only going to get worse, she took a risk, slowly raising her finger to her nose and pressing.

Kelyn shot her a look and whispered, “Jazz! Are you seriously going to sneeze? At a time like this?”

“I… I’m s-sorry, I c-can’t heh… help it…”

Kelyn rolled her eyes. “It’s okay. They’re still far away. Just keep them quiet!”

Jazzly nodded and pinched her freckled nose as she pressed the other hand to her mouth. She relaxed, let her eyelids flutter shut, and got ready to muffle like she’d never muffled before.

“hhhhh… hih… ih… ich’ngx! h’tchngk! hhh’chkmpf! hhh’eschmpf!”

Just as she’d expected, Jazzly’s sneezes came out muffled and quiet. However, there were several other things she hadn’t expected. First, each sneeze had rocked the container they were on a just a little more until the whole thing was producing a quiet metallic groan by the last one. Second, the storage bay was large, with concrete walls, meaning even the tiniest sounds produced a somewhat noisy echo. And third, she wasn’t even close to being finished.

The boys’ footsteps froze.

“Did you hear that, Shaw?” Jezper was asking.

“Hear what?”

“Maybe nothing. But maybe… something…”

Jazzly pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut, but her breath was starting to hitch again.

“hihhh… K-Kelyn…” she whispered, “I’m guh… gonna s-snuh… sneeze… heh… again…”

“Don’t,” whispered Kelyn. “Please, Jazz. He heard it last time.”

“I know, buh… but I c-c-cah… hah…”

“Don’t Jazz! Don’t do it!”

“I’m sah… I’m s-sorry!” Jazzly was trying not to, but she was clearly losing the battle. She pressed her hands over her mouth a little tighter as her nose scrunched up against her will. “Huh… Huh… Huh-mmmmpfch! Huh… huh-eschmmmmpf! Heh-CHMPF! Huh… heiiiiisssssshhhmmmmmpf!”

Jazzly’s sneezes were getting louder and making the whole container vibrate and rock. The metal sides were shaking now, and the base was starting to creak against the palettes it rested on. The echoing sound was like thunder in the silence of the storage bay.

“Oh, that’s definitely something,” Shaw spoke up.

“Agreed,” Jezper answered. “Now it’s just a matter of finding the something and seeing whether its them. Quick, Shaw, you start opening the shipping containers. I’ll start checking behind the crates.”

“Roger that.”

The pairs of footsteps split off in opposite directions, moving quickly now. They were definitely going to canvas the room now, but there was still a chance they wouldn’t think to check the tops of the crates. Jazzly tried to hang on to that hope, and she did for a while, until her nose made it clear that it was dead set on ruining her chances.

“Huh… K-kelyn?” she whispered.

Kelyn sighed deeply. “You’re gonna sneeze again, aren’t you?”

“Uhhm… y-yeah…”

“Dammit. This is the worst way to lose ever.”

Jazzly was about to answer, but suddenly, the tickle seized her with new ferocity, and she drew in such a deep, gasping breath that her back arched up off the roof of the container.

“HAH… HHHHAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOO! EEEEEESCHOOOOOO! HUH… HUSHOOOOOOOOO! Eh… HESSSSSSHEEEEEEEEW! Ah… AH… AAAAAAAASSSSSSSHEEEEEEEEEW!”

Exhausted, red-faced, and humiliated, Jazzly let herself flop back against the metal roof of the container, not even caring about the loud metal thunk it produced.

“Bless you,” Kelyn said, not even bothering to whisper anymore. “Remind me not to do this drill with you again.”

Jezper’s face peeked up over the side of the container, the world’s smuggest smile spanning his face.

“Yes, bless you, Jazzly. And thank you, Jazzly’s nose! You’ve been a tremendous help.”

Jazzly covered her reddening face with her hands, but she knew there was no hiding the shame she felt inside.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

The operations deck

Spoiler

 

Kelyn shook her head. “I don’t get how Operations is going to work for us, but I trust you. Let’s move.”

“Roger that,” Jazzly said with a nod, and the two girls sprinted to the verti-shuttle at top speed. It got the to Operations deck quickly, but Jazzly took an additional moment to send it back to the Training deck before darting out.

“Next time they check it, it’ll look like it hasn’t left the Training deck,” Jazzly said in response to Kelyn’s quizzical expression. “Maybe it’ll take them a little longer to figure out we used it.”

The girls took in their surroundings. Operations deck was large, but it mostly consisted of large computer displays, input terminals, and banks of large server towers. Lots of big, blocky shapes. Not much cover. That was the idea, of course: hiding in the one place they’d think nobody could hide. As Jazzly looked around, though, she started to worry that the plan might backfire. Then, an idea hit her.

In a room with so much equipment running all the time, overheating posed a potential threat. For that reason, the area had a much more robust climate control system. With much larger vents.

She grabbed Kelyn by the sleeve. “The vents! Come on!”

Motioning for Kelyn to follow, Jazzly vaulted onto the nearest server tower. They leapt onto progressively higher towers around the room until they were near one of the vents at the top of the wall. In a synchronized series of fluid motions, the girls took their multitools from their belts, unfastened the grate, dove inside, and refastened the grate, all within a matter of seconds. They resisted high-fiving, but they couldn’t help flashing proud smiles at one another.

“So,” whispered Kelyn, “what now?”

“Now we wait. They won’t see us, but noise could give it away. Just keep quiet when they come, and we’ll be fine.”

Kelyn nodded, holding her finger to her lips in understanding, but Jazzly shook her head.

“Wait. There’s something I need to tell you first. Jezper and Shaw, they-”

But at that moment, the sound of the verti-shuttle ascending cut them off. Jezper and Shaw strode in.

Jazzly knew right away what was happening. Their manner was too relaxed, too at ease. They weren’t here to search. They were here to put their plan into action.

“Shouldn’t we check the room first?” Shaw was asking.

“No point. There’s nowhere to hide here. Just watch the door while I’m busy.”

Jezper pulled a small, black stick from his pocket. A transfer drive, Jazzly realized. Her skin felt hot. This was how they were going to implant the virus.

“Um… Jezper?” Shaw was asking. “How long is this gonna take?

“Not long. I’ve just got to shut down the safeguards and bypass the firewall. Then it’s about 15 minutes until the virus is downloaded to the mainframe.”

“15 minutes? I can’t stand guard for that long!”

“Shaw, we’ve been over this. We start the transfer now, go out and find those little bitches, then come back and remove the transfer drive while they’re waiting for us to hide. And before you ask, no, nobody’s going to find the drive in the meantime. Not with the girls hiding and the commander supervising the game. Now quit talking and keep watch. I have work to do.”

Jazzly leaned over to Kelyn. “This is what I was going to tell you about. They’re going to implant a virus and use it to alter my records. They’re going to try to get me expelled.”

Kelyn swallowed hard. “This is bad, Jazz. This is really, really bad. And... um… I… I think they’ve got blasters on their belts.”

Jazzly’s eyes snapped to the boys’ utility belts. Sure enough, there were the telltale bulges of concealed weapons. How had they managed to get these? Jazzly’s heartbeat accelerated as she came to the full realization of just how much trouble they were in if they were caught now.

And that was the moment her nose starting tickling.

“So… what?” asked Shaw. “Is that it? Does the virus just… expel her?”

“Not until we alter Jazzly’s record. Make it say something really nasty, like she murdered someone or she stole a spaceship or… or she… murdered someone and stole their spaceship, I don’t know. Then we just have to wait for someone to notice the glaring red flag that they somehow overlooked. Now for the last time, stay quiet and let me work!”

When Jezper mentioned her name, Jazzly felt the tickle in her little freckled nose go wild. She pressed her palm against the end of her nose and rubbed, but it wasn’t doing any good, and her breath was starting to hitch.

“hhhihhhh… eh… o-oh crap… Keh… Kelyn?” she whispered. “W-we’ve guh… got a… huh… another puh… problem.”

“What is it?” Kelyn’s face fell as realization dawned. “Oh my god. Are you gonna sneeze?”

“I’m suh… s-soh… huh… sorry! Hih… Oh god… It’s c-coming…”

Kelyn nervously looked out the vents. “We’re pretty high, and they’re pretty far. You should be fine if you keep it quiet. Just get it out of your system now, before they come any closer!”

Jazzly nodded and pressed her hands over her mouth and nose, waiting for the tickle to grow strong enough.

Only it didn’t.

“Come on, Jazzly” Kelyn spat. “Do it now!”

“I… I’m… huhhh… trying… it’s stuck…”

Kelyn sighed in frustration, then plucked a long, brown hair from her head.

“Here, let me help if you can’t get it out.”

Should Jazzly…

let Kelyn help?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly nodded. “O-oh… huhhh… okay…”

Though the girls were already huddled close together, Kelyn knew she’d have to get even closer. Moving cautiously so as not to make a noise, she crept nearer and nearer to Jazzly’s front side until her knees straddled Jazzly’s hips. As serious as the situation was, Kelyn couldn’t help but blush a little. She couldn’t have been more than a couple of inches away from her friend’s freckled face and small, twitching nose.

“O-okay,” she stammered quietly, “keep them quiet, remember?”

Jazzly, her eyes still shut and her breath still hitching, gave a gesture that Kelyn took as a nod. She gently laid a hand on one side of Jazzly’s face to keep it still, and with the other, she slowly inserted the brown strand of hair into Jazzly’s left nostril.

Jazzly’s reaction was immediate. Her nose started to wriggle, and she started to draw in deep, shuddering breaths that stretched the nanofibers of her shirt. Finally, when the sneeze seemed inevitable, Kelyn pulled the hair out, and Jazzly pressed her hands tightly against her face.

“hhhhh… h’cktch! hhhhhktch! nnntsch! hhhhhcksh! Hhhh… h’ncktsh!”

“You can be a little louder,” Kelyn whispered. Jazzly nodded, squeezing her eyes shut.

“hhhhhhmmmmpfch! Hhhh… hhhhhhchmf! mmmmpfch! Hihhhh… hih-CHMPF!”

Muffled though it was, the last sneeze came out a little louder than Jazzly had intended. In the room below, Shaw froze.

“Jezper! Did you hear that?”

“Hear what? I was busy.”

“I… I thought I heard something. We should go check it out.”

Jezper nodded. “I’m done here anyways. Let’s go. We’ll come back when the transfer’s done.”

The boys strode out of room in the same easy manner they’d come in with. When they were out of sight, Kelyn breathed a sigh of relief.

“They’re gone. You all done, Jazz?”

Jazzly sniffed experimentally. “A… a c-couple more. Can… can you…” She bit her lip, a very slight blush coming into her cheeks. “Can you… do the other side?”

Kelyn chuckled a little as she inserted the hair into Jazzly’s right nostril.

“No being quiet this time. Get ‘em all out!”

Jazzly answered by drawing in a huge, gasping breath and raising her cupped hands to her nose, and Kelyn retreated to a safe distance.

“HAAAAAAH… HAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEESSSSHEEEEEEEEEW! HEEEESSSSHEEEEEEEEEEEW! Ah… AAAAAAAASSHHEEEEEEEEEEEW! Hah… hah-EEEEEESHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HISHOOO!” Jazzly sighed and rubbed her nose, the tickle finally gone.

“Wow,” Kelyn said. “Bless you. You okay there?”

“Yeah,” Jazzly said with a sniffle. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me today.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s the weirdest thing. I’ve been sneezing constantly, ever since I got back from the Fortitude match. The strange thing is, it’s always at the worst possible times. It’s like I’m… I don’t know, allergic to bad situations or something.”

Kelyn chuckled at that. “I hope not. That would be a pretty-”

The realization hit both girls at the same time, and they looked at each other in horror.

“Inconvenient Allergy,” they said in unison.

“But… but no, that’s not possible! Is it?” Fear was starting to rise in Jazzly’s chest.

“No,” answered Kelyn, “no, not unless… wait. Don’t tell me you were stupid enough to wear your Tactical Response Uniform to the match.”

“Um… if I don’t tell you, will that make it better?”

“Jazzly!” Kelyn’s voice was a combination of anger and panic.

“What? I like how it fits me! I put it in off-duty mode so it looked like civilian clothes.”

“That’s not the problem! Didn’t you read the notification after our last system update? They’re still beta testing this version! We’re not supposed to wear it outside the station until they know how it’ll interact with outside systems!”

“Oh my god.” The color drained from Jazzly’s face. “That glitch. Right after she played Inconvenient Allergy. And Miki said there was something off about the TRU’s coding.”

At the mention of her name, the pink-hair sprite flitted into Jazzly’s vision.

“This is what I was trying to tell ya, Jazz! A new script’s been added by an anonymous source! The script’s already been triggered several times today, and every time it does, you sneeze. A lot.”

“Okay,” Jazzly said, her breathing becoming increasingly frantic, “so the Fortitude system added the Inconvenient Allergy script to my TRU’s coding. Miki, can you delete it?”

The little sprite shook her head sadly. “Sorry, Jazz, but I don’t have access to core functionality.”

“Hey,” Kelyn chimed in, “can’t you just change your clothes? It shouldn’t be a problem if you’re not wearing your TRU, right?”

Miki shook her head again. “Hate to be a drag, but it’s not that simple. Fortitude’s coding affects your body directly. After all, you don’t wear anything special when you play, right? Their system issues a termination command once the game ends, but I don’t have that scripting. We’d have to get it from Fortitude, and that could take weeks!”

Jazzly groaned and smacked her forehead. “So let me get this straight. We’re trying to stay hidden, two armed assholes are trying to get me expelled, and I’m stuck with a violent allergy to bad situations. All at the same time. Today just keeping getting better and better”

“Well, let’s just get down there and pull the transfer drive out!” Kelyn suggested. “Better one problem than two!”

“No! We can’t interrupt a data transaction in progress! It could crash the station’s whole mainframe! There are safeguards against it, of course, but Jezper said he was shutting them down, dumbass that he is.”

Kelyn sighed. “So we can’t just pull the thing out. Of course. That would be waaaaaay too easy. Come on, Jazz, we’ve got to get you out of here.”

Jazzly stared at Kelyn, an incredulous look written on her face.

“You mean leave this spot? And risk getting caught by trigger-happy dickwads? Why?!”

“Think it through, Jazzly! When they don’t find us in the other areas on the station, they’ll come right back here, only they’ll actually be looking this time. You’ll sneeze and give us away, they’ll realize we overheard them, and I’m sure you can figure out how that ends. We have to move to a new area! If we stay in the vent, we’re done for!”

Should Jazzly and Kelyn…

move to a new area?

Spoiler

 

Reluctantly, Jazzly nodded. “Okay, but let’s be quick about it. They’re out there, and we don’t want to run into them.”

Kelyn nodded her assent, and the two girls pulled their multitools from their belts, removed the grate, and began their descent. All was going according to plan until they reached the entryway. Just as they were about to leave, they heard a set of very familiar voices drifting down the hallway.

“It’s a waste of time, Shaw,” came Jezper’s voice. “You saw the place! There’s nowhere to hide!”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, just… we never really checked it out, and we could be in serious trouble if they were in there and overheard us. And we’re gonna go past this floor on our way down anyway, right?”

Jazzly’s eyes went wide. They were going to check Operations deck! She hurriedly looked back up towards the air vent, but there wasn’t nearly enough time to reach it now. She frantically motioned Kelyn towards a nearby input terminal, and the two girls ducked behind it just as A team entered.

 “Looks like the transfer is going well,” Jezper said. “Only about nine minutes. Now let’s clear this room as quickly as possible and get down to the training deck. I don’t think I checked that Field Simulation Room well enough.”

The boys’ footsteps slowed as they began the unmistakable circular pattern used for clearing a room. They were so close now that Jazzly was afraid even the sound of her breath might give them way. You can only imagine the panic she felt, of course, when that familiar tickle returned to her nose. She looked at Kelyn, her eyes wide with panic, and Kelyn’s eyes went equally wide when she realized what was about to happen. She frantically shook her head no over and over, but it was no use. Jazzly was seized by a completely irrepressible urge, and her eyelid’s flicked closed as she unwillingly drew in a deep breath.

“HAAAAAAH… EEEEEEEEYASSHOOOOOOOOOOO! HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOO! AAAAAAAASSSSSSCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! HAH… HUUUUAAAAAAAAAASHOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Jazzly sprang to her feet the second her sneezing fit was over, hoping she and Kelyn could sprint out of the room and get help before they were found, but that hope was dashed the second she saw the muzzle of a blaster pointed at her face. Jezper, wearing his smuggest expression yet, had his finger on the trigger. Jazzly closed her eyes, knowing there was no escape, and the world’s most insincere “Bless you” became the last thing she would ever hear.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

stay in the vent?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly shook her head. “Those clowns? No way! They’ll never admit that they missed us the first time around. When they don’t find us, they’ll either give up or take so long that the hour runs out.”

Kelyn crossed her arms angrily. “You’re underestimating them, Jazz. They’re stubborn and arrogant, sure, but they’re cunning too. Plus they’ve got blasters! This isn’t a game anymore! Please, Jazzly, let’s just go!”

Jazzly bit her lip nervously. She was certain that staying in hiding was the right choice this late in the game, but Kelyn had a good point too. And weren’t they supposed to be a team? She puzzled over it for a little longer until she was struck by an idea. She took a hopeful glace back over her shoulder. Bingo.

“I have an idea, Kelyn.”

“An idea?”

“Mm-hmm. For how we can stay up here and also move to a new area.”

“Well, what is it?”

“You’re not gonna like it.”

“Just spill, Jazz!”

“Look behind you.”

Kelyn turned and looked at the long, dark air duct laid out behind them, leading to the rest of the entire ventilation system. She gulped nervously.

“You’re right. I don’t like it.”

“Come on, Kelyn. We can do this. I’ll go first.”

Summoning her courage and activating her night vision, Jazzly began to crawl down the long, dark air duct with Kelyn following close behind. The crawl got very tough very quickly when the duct narrowed, but the girls dropped to their bellies and pushed onwards. This was what they’d trained for, and it was second nature to them by now. They ran into their first real dilemma after about five minutes, when they crawled into a junction box. The girls crouched low, looking over the network of vents leading off in a myriad of directions.

“Well, this is a problem,” Kelyn said, still trying to keep her voice low.

“We’re at a junction,” Jazzly answered, the disappointment and resignation clear in her voice. “There are a few different ways we could go, but I don’t know where any of them lead. Do you?”

Kelyn shook her head. “We didn’t think this through, did we?”

Jazly sighed heavily and slumped against the metal wall. “Not we. It was my idea. I’m really sorry, Kelyn.”

Kelyn took Jazzly’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “It’s not your fault. We’re in this together, remember? Hey, why don’t we just pick a direction and go with it? See where it takes us?”

Jazzly shrugged. “What does it matter? I’ll still have Inconvenient Allergy. Jezper and Shaw will still have their virus. We can’t tell the commander about either without looking weak, and he probably couldn’t do anything about it anyway. We might as well just go back and let ourselves get caught.”

“Hey!” Kelyn gently slapped Jazzly on the shoulder. “Don’t start sulking on me now!”

Jazzly smiled tiredly. “I’m sorry. But I’m not wrong, Kel.”

The silence that followed sounded huge in the dark, still vent. It was a frightening silence, and for a long moment, it seemed it would be the only answer. Then, Kelyn shifted a little and met Jazzly’s eyes with a surprising amount of force.

“Can I tell you something, Jazz? When I was a little girl, I used to dream of visiting the stars. Did I ever tell you that? Every night, I would imagine myself floating in space, looking out at the stars and the planets and the moons. And there were times when I thought I would do anything, anything at all, if it meant my dream would come true. It was stupid, even then I knew it was. The odds of me getting picked for something like that were insanely low. But I guess I never learned, because here I am. And you know how I felt on my first day in the station? Come on, do you?”

Jazzly shook her head, and Kelyn smiled confidently.

“Terrified. I thought it would be the happiest day of my life, but I was terrified. I had everything I’d ever wanted, and I suddenly realized I didn’t know how to handle it. The training, the commanders, the other privates on the station. I thought I’d made the biggest mistake of my life.”

Jazzly nodded. “What changed your mind?”

A warm smile crept onto Kelyn’s face. “I met you, Jazz. You were so determined and so confident, and you always gave 110%. You tried, and you tried, and even when things were hard, you kept trying. You showed me how to be strong, Jazz. You showed me how to never give up.”

Kelyn took Jazzly’s shoulders in her hands and squeezed them firmly. “And now I’m not giving up on you. I’m not going to lose my badge, and I’m not going to lose my best friend. I want to keep living my dream with you, no matter what it takes. I want to stay here, in the stars. So let’s figure this thing out together.”

Jazzly was quiet for several seconds, letting the words sink in. Then she swallowed hard and nodded firmly. “Thank you. I needed that.”

“Of course. So what do we do first? We don’t know where to go. Any way we could find out?”

Jazzly chewed her lip in thought for a moment until an idea occurred to her. “Miki.”

Without warning, Miki flitted back into Jazzly’s vision, making her jump a bit.

“Hiya Jazz!”

“Jesus, Miki! You scared me!”

“Sorry! I heard you were confused about where to go. Can I make a suggestion?”

Jazzly sighed deeply. “Yes, of course, but please make it one that gets us out of here fast.”

“Well, see, I’ve been looking over that rogue script of yours, and I’ve been analyzing Jezper’s virus you too. I think we might be able to solve both problems at once, if we play our cards right.” The little sprite winked. “No pun intended!”

Jazzly rolled her eyes as Miki giggled annoyingly at her own joke. “Just get on with it, please. And are you sure you can’t turn off the cuteness thing? Or at least turn it down?”

“Sorry, Jazz, but my cuteness setting is already at minimum,” Miki responded. “But let me tell you my idea! So it looks like the virus is opening a data tunnel in the station’s mainframe that connects it to the Network. I can follow that data tunnel back to its source and cut it off. The virus would still be on the mainframe, but nobody could access it. It would just sit there until the system’s purge cycle deletes it at the end of the week.”

Jazzly nodded. “Okay, I like where this is going. How do we solve the second problem?”

“Well, the data tunnel also gives us an opportunity. Before I shut it down, I could use the Network connection to port in some of Fortitude’s scripts and apply them through your TRU.”

“So you could use the termination script? You could get rid of Inconvenient Allergy?”

“Well… no. Only the makers of Fortitude have that. But I could apply a different script, as long as you have the card to activate it. You don’t happen to have your Fortitude deck, do you?”

Jazzly’s hand immediately went to the pocket where she’d placed her deck after the match. A little smile came to her face as she felt the familiar rectangle of the deck box.

“About time something went right. So let me get this straight: you’re saying you can transfer the effects of one of my other cards to me? Just like Inconvenient Allergy got transferred in the first place?”

Miki nodded. “That’s right… um… but…”

Jazzly sighed again. “Of course there’s a but. What it is?”

“W-well… um… see, I can’t access the mainframe or your TRU without admin permission. W-which means… we’d need to be at an admin console.”

“So we have to break into Commander Rushworth’s office to do this?”

Miki bit her lip and shook her head. “His clearance isn’t… quite… high enough.”

Jazzly’s face went pale as she realized what Miki was saying. “No. You… you don’t mean…”

Miki nodded, her face going a little pale as well. “Lieutenant Burcham.”

There was a long, tense silence as the reality sank in. It might have gone on even longer if Kelyn hadn’t spoken up.

“Okay,” she started, “this sucks. Breaking into my boss’s boss’s office is very low on the list of things that  seem like a good idea. But suffocating in an air vent is definitely a lot lower, so can we please keep moving? We’ll figure it out when we get there!”

Miki gave Jazzly a nod and projected the duct schematics onto her display. “I’ll give you directions. It’s not too far.”

The two girls resumed their slow crawl through the station’s ducts, twisting and turning down the metal tubes until it felt like they’d been crawling forever and they had no idea where they were. They didn’t speak at all during the journey, not that they had any air in their lungs to do so after all of that straining and pulling in a space barely big enough to breathe.

After nearly a quarter of an hour crawling through the darkness, Jazzly was about to snap. She was starting to imagine getting lost in the vents and having to live the rest of her life there, eventually forgetting how to talk and walk and just scrambling around on her hands and knees and babbling like an animal. They’d probably tell stories about her on the station. Stories of the silly little girl who disappeared one day, never to be seen again. Legend has it that on quiet nights, you can still hear her crazed gibbering coming through the station’s air vents.

Jazzly grimaced. Jezper would probably love that.

“HIYA JAZZ!” Miki darted back into Jazzly’s view with a loud exclamation, making her jump for the third time that day.

“Dammit, Miki! Quit sneaking up on me!”

“Sorry, Jazz. I just wanted to let ya know that we’re here!”

Jazzly looked around at their entirely metal surroundings. Yup, definitely just more air duct.

“Miki, is your navigation system broken? Last I checked, Liutenant Burcham’s office isn’t in the middle of an air duct.”

“No, silly! Not here here! Liutenant Burcham’s office is right above us. Just one little climb, and we’re in!”

“One… little…” Jazzly poked her head forward and peered around the bend in the duct ahead. Her face went white at what she saw.

Ahead was a large, vertical metal column, a massive and violently spinning fan at the bottom. A series of rungs ascended up the metal wall towards the deck above them. A series of rungs that looked just a little too rickety for comfort.

Jazzly gulped. “C-climb those? Um.. M-miki? Are you sure this is safe?”

“Of course!” said the sprite with a smile. “The odds of you and Kelyn falling and getting sliced to death by the fan are only 42.3%!”

“Great. Thanks putting that image in my head. Come on, Kelyn.”

The girls pulled themselves into the larger chamber and pressed their backs against the wall to avoid the fan. Kelyn gave Jazzly a look.

“I don’t like this plan either, you know.”

Jazzly looked up at the long, upward ascent. “Same here.”

The girls began their climb up the side of the metal tunnel. They’d climbed similar ladders in training, but the combination of the vent’s unsteadiness, the running fan underneath, and the fact that they’d been crawling through the vents made the already precarious climb exceedingly more difficult. Before they’d even gone twenty feet, they were already sweating and panting.

“Woah!” Kelyn shrieked as, without any warning, the rung she was clinging to snapped free of its screws. It fell down towards the bottom of the shaft, rebounding off the fan and colliding with the metal wall with a loud CLANG!

Jazzly looked down at Kelyn. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“What happened?”

“The rung just snapped off! This part of the system must be older. No sudden movements, Jazz. We don’t want any more of them to break off.”

Jazzly was just about to agree when an unfortunate thought struck her.

“Did… did you say no sudden movements?”

“Yeah, why?”

Jazzy squeezed her eyes shut, the tickles already beginning. “I w-wish you hah… hadn’t said… that… hah…”

It didn’t take Kelyn long at all to figure out what was going on. “Oh no. No, not now!”

Jazzly was wrinkling and wriggling her nose as much as she could, but the tickle was stronger than ever this time. The violent hitching of her breath alone was enough to start a slight tremor in the metal walls.

“Jazzly, come on!” Kelyn screamed, “Keep moving! Get to the top before the sneezing starts!”

With a determined nod, Jazzly lunged upward. The fought to keep her eyelids from closing, and she just managed to grasp the next rung before the first sneeze forced its way out.

“HRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAASSSSCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Her whole body jerked forward, and the rung groaned ominously at the movement. Jazzly gritted her teeth and prepared to leap again, but just as she was about to push off, another uncontrollable urge seized her.

“HAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW! RRRRRRRAAAAAAAAASSSSSSHEEEEEEW!”

It proved too much for the rung she was holding, which pulled right off the wall. Reflexively, Jazzly pushed off against her footholds and sprang upwards, but her balance was thrown off and she only managed to grip the next rung with one hand.

Now dangling nearly thirty feet above the whirring fan with only one rung to hold her up, Jazzly knew she was in serious trouble if the rung didn’t hold. She tried to keep her panic under control as she swung her left hand upward and tried to grasp the next rung, but instead, another powerful sneeze erupted from her.

“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAESSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

The whole wall shook, and the rung creaked and bent. Jazzly took a moment to wipe the beads of sweat from her forehead before making another swing upward.

“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Another, even more massive sneeze burst out. The wall shook even more, and Jazzly yelped as the rung was pulled free of one of its screws. Jazzly managed to hold on to the now vertical freely swinging metal rod, but her panic swelled and began to take over. She started flailing her legs, searching desperately for a foothold, but she only kicked the smooth metal surface of the wall. And then, right when it seemed things couldn’t possibly get any worse, the uncontrollable urge seized her again.

“HYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

The sneeze was the biggest yet, and it proved too much for the rung. It snapped free from its final screw, and Jazzly shrieked as she fell down, down towards the bottom of the shaft, down towards the fan, down towards the end. Her eyes were wide with panic, and she thrust her arms outward, flailing hopelessly, and blackness began to creep into the edges of her vision.

Then, just when it seemed it was all over, a set of slim fingers grasped her firmly by the wrist, and Jazzly jerked to a stop, the tips of her toes barely grazing the fan. She looked up into Kelyn’s straining face.

“Not today!” Kelyn screamed as she pulled Jazzly toward her. Not wasting any time, Jazzly quickly located the rungs in front of her and gripped on as tightly as she could, panting heavily as she caught her breath.

“Listen!” Kelyn shouted over the roar of the fan, “You’re allergic to bad situations, and this is as bad as it gets. You’re not going to be able to stop sneezing if you make this climb on your own. Here!”

Kelyn pulled her thin metal utility cord from her belt and clipped in, then lowered the other end. Jazzly quickly took hold and clipped in herself before flashing Kelyn a quick thumbs up. Tethered to one another, the girls continued their climb, pulling and straining until their faces were red and sweaty with the effort. Jazzly’s tickle threatened to return several times, but with the safety line, things never got dangerous enough to trigger Inconvenient Allergy again. At last, the girls pulled themselves over the final rung, squeezing into the large duct opening at the top and collapsing breathlessly onto the metal floor.

“Congratulations!” Miki shouted as she flitted back into Jazzly’s view. “See? I told ya you could-”

“Miki,” Jazzly interrupted, “there has literally not been one moment in my entire life when I’ve wanted to see you less.”

The pixie blinked, startled. “O-okay… when should I come back?”

“When my lungs aren’t on fire.”

With an awkward nod, Miki flew out of view, and Jazzly resumed sprawling next to Kelyn.

“So…” Kelyn panted, “how much… time?”

“Whaaaa?”

“How… much time… left… in the drill?”

Jazzly checked her timer. “17 minutes. It should be just enough. And… hey…”

She rolled onto her side and met Kelyn’s eyes. “… thank you. For… you know, for saving me. My life would be over without you.”

Kelyn gave her a tired smile and squeezed her hand gently. “Without you in it? Mine would too.”

These girls had had the dedication and training to make themselves into proud, courageous fighters. They weren’t particularly prone to sentimentality. Yet right then, they had to allow themselves just one, quiet moment to be thankful for one another. Then they rolled onto their stomachs, ready for action once again, and finished the short crawl to the vent looking down into Liutenant Burcham’s office.

Kelyn squinted and peered between the slats. “You see anything?”

“No, nothing. I think the coast is clear.”

“Copy that. What’s next?”

“Well, first I’m going to hack into the Lieutenant’s computer and get Miki in. Then she’s going to play one of my Fortitude cards on me. I’m sure I’ve got something in here that’ll get rid of this damn Inconvenient Allergy. Then she cuts off access to the data tunnel, we go back to hiding, and we wait for Jezper and Shaw to admit defeat.”

“Sounds easy enough. In and out before anyone knows we’re here. Are you good to go?”

“I’m ready. Miki, are we good to start the process?”

Miki flew timidly back into Jazzly’s vision. “Y… yes, ma’am. And… am I good to come back now?”

Jazzly chuckled dryly. “Yeah. You’re good. Okay, Kelyn. Let’s do this.”

Working as silently as shadows, the girls unfastened the vent grate and dropped softly into the dark office below, relaxing only when they’d thoroughly scanned their surroundings.

The lieutenant’s office was smaller than they’d thought. Dark, too, though their night vision took care of that easily enough. For someone of such a high status, it was surprisingly ordinary. One wall was filled with Burcham’s various honors, another had several bookshelves filled with military texts pressed against it. The third wall was where Burcham had placed his desk, his quietly humming computer console sitting unassumingly atop it.

Jazzly was starting to approach the desk when, to her surprise, Kelyn’s face screwed up.

“heh… heh-tschew! nxtchew! hisssssheeeeew! Heh… heeeeisshew!” Kelyn sniffled and rubbed her nose, and Jazzly shot her an amused smile.

“Not you too!”

Kelyn laughed and sniffled again. “Dust id the vedts. You’re still the odly ode with the weird allergy.”

“Aw, darn. Well, ready to keep a lookout?”

Kelyn flashed a thumbs up and went to the door, and Jazzly woke the commander’s computer from its sleep mode and took note of the interface.  It was encrypted, sure, but not as heavily as you might expect. The door was usually locked, after all. Jazzly was able to bypass the security in just a few minutes.

“Okay, Miki, I’m in. Do your thing.”

Miki gave Jazzly one of her characteristic winks. “Way ahead of ya, boss! I’m in the lieutenant’s filesystem, and I’ve got the cybernetic patch process running. Connecting to the mainframe… and there’s Jezper’s data tunnel! Okay, we’re through to the network and the Fortitude system. This is gonna take a couple minutes to load. You should find the card you want now so I can activate it when the time comes.”

Jazzly nodded, removed her deck box from her pocket, and began sorting through cards. She noticed a few that might do the trick, but most of them were too limited in scope. Instants that doubled or tripled effects, Environments meant to bolster mana or slow life drain, Creature with high Life and low Strength. None of them were particularly useful. At last, though, she settled on one.

Her hands trembled a little as she read the effects of the card. Purge Curses. It seemed like the perfect choice. Almost.  She took a deep breath and called out to Kelyn.

“I found it, Kelyn. I know which card I’m going to use. This’ll all be over soon!”

“Oh, good!” Kelyn answered in a whisper, a hint of worry thinly disguised in her voice. “So, um… h-how long until you can apply it?”

“A few minutes. Why?”

“Oh… um… no reason. But… um… could you keep your voice down? And… maybe hide a little bit? Like… just for fun?”

“Kelyn, what’s going on?”

“Nothing! Nothing at all! It’s definitely not a bad situation or anything, so just calm down, okay?”

Jazzly straightened up. “Oh crap. Burcham’s coming, isn’t he?”

Kelyn whipped around, her eyes wide. “Whaaaaaat?” she whispered. “What would make you-”

“Ihhh… It’s too…” Jazzly pressed a finger under her nose, the tickles already growing. “It’s t-tuh… too late… huhhh… heeeehhhh…”

Kelyn balled her fists. “Dammit. Quick, get under the desk!”

Together, they dashed under the lieutenant’s desk and huddled close together, Jazzly pressing her hands over her mouth to muffle the sound of her worsening breath hitches. Kelyn turned to her and held a finger to her lips. A needless gesture, but Jazzly nodded anyways. She was trying.

The sound of heavily booted footsteps drew closer and closer, finally pausing just outside the doorway. Both the girls froze in horror when they heard the second set of footsteps. Two people, moving much more stealthily. They paused near the door as well.

“Private Jezper, Private Shaw,” came the lieutenant’s voice. “I thought you were instructed to be on the Training Deck.”

Jazzly’s eyes got huge upon hearing those names, and suddenly, so did the tickle.

“hhhhh… hhhhiiiih… h-hiiiiih… heeeehh…”

Her fluttering eyes brimmed with nervous tears, and she sniffled and rubbed her nose desperately, but the tickle was growing beyond her control.

“Yes sir,” Jezper was saying, “we were. We’re completing the drill given to us there, sir.”

Kelyn turned to Jazzly, a desperate, pleading look on her face.

“Jazzly,” she said, her trembling voice even lower than a whisper, “please, please hold it back. We’ll get kicked out of the division. They’ll send us to Earth, and we’ll never be able to come back to space again. It’s all over if you sneeze. For both of us.”

Jazzly sniffled quietly and mashed her nose harder. “Yuh… y-y-your muh-making it wuh-worse…”

“J-Jazz…” Kelyn’s voice sounded different. Strangled, choked back. Jazzly managed a glance over at her between blinks, she and was surprised to see her friend’s face covered with tears. “J-Jazz… p-please… I… I can’t lose this. You can fight it, Jazz. You were always the strongest.”

“I see,” Burcham’s was saying outside. “As you were, priva… hold on.”

“Is there a problem, sir?” Shaw’s voice this time.

“It would seem so.”

“heeeeh… ehhhh… haaaaaah…” Jazzly squeezed her eyes shut, putting as much determination as she could into holding back the urge to sneeze, but the sneeze was just as determined. It was too much. She wasn’t going to be able to do this. Not alone, anyway. She looked over at her friend, whose fists were clenched as she chewed her lip nervously.

 

Should Jazzly…

ask Kelyn to help her?

Spoiler

 

“Ihhhh… It’s t-too muh… m-muh… much… heh… help me, K-Kelyn.”

Kelyn swallowed hard. “What should I do?”

Jazzly, her fluttering eyelids filled with sneezy tears, tried to answer between strangled gasps, but her lungs were screaming and her face was hot and she knew if she tried to talk again, she wouldn’t be able to hold the sneezes back for another second.

“Okay,” Kelyn whispered. “Okay, don’t worry. I’ll take care of you. J-just… um…”

Making a split second decision, Kelyn swung her leg over Jazzly’s, straddling her hips for the second time that day, and pressed her hands tightly over Jazzly’s mouth. Jazzly winced a little at the pressure, but Kelyn held tight.

Meanwhile, Burcham was still talking to the boys outside.

“Attention, gentlemen. Prepare for inspection.”

“S-sir, we-”

“STAND AT ATTENTION!”

Kelyn drew close to Jazzly’s ear, her voice a nervous whisper.

“Okay, Jazz. Let them out.”

Jazzly’s eyes went wide, and she violently shook her head.

“Jazz, it’s okay. Just keep them quiet, and I’ll keep you covered. Trust me.”

Jazzly’s eyes flicked nervously back and forth a couple of times, but then they started to glaze over as her eyelids went slack.

“hhhntschk! hhtsch! nnntssch! Hhh… hssssshnck! hhhnnn’xtch!” Jazzly’s bleary eyes flicked open momentarily and met Kelyn’s, who smiled back at her. It was working. They were staying quiet. For now.

From outside, the sound of scuffling as the Lieutenant inspected the boys.

“Well, well. Would you look at that.”

“Sir, they were just-”

“I don’t recall asking for your input, private! I’m well aware of what these are.”

“B-but sir, we just-”

“These are standard issue regulation blasters. Off-limits to untrained privates. You’ve got no business having them in your possession.”

“hhhhtsssssch! Hhhhh… hhhnnnnntttttsssssch! Hhhhhtsssssssssh! Hhhhhhhih… hitssssssssssch!”

Kelyn bit her lip. The sneezes were still quiet, but they were getting louder. And they weren’t stopping. “Um… Jazz? C-can you keep it down… a little?” she whispered.

“B-but sir!” Jezper was shouting outside, “Th-they were only for training! W-we were doing a drill, and-”

“You expect me to believe my own sergeant would be stupid enough to put live weapons into the hands of a group of rookies for a drill? I take that as a direct insult to my intelligence. In fact, I think you I ought to take you to Rushworth now. We’ll see what he thinks of your story.”

As the sound of their footsteps echoed off down the hall, Kelyn relaxed and dropped her hands.

“All clear.”

At those words, Jazzly squeezed her eyes closed and gasped in massively, her back arching so hard it seemed about to break.

“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACHOOOOOOOOO! HUH… HUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Huh… HEH… Huh-EEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!”

Exhausted, Jazzly flopped back against the side of the desk, panting and wiping sweat from her brow.

“Damn,” Kelyn said with a smirk. “Bless you. I can’t believe you held all that in.”

Jazzly sniffled and rubbed her nose against her shirtsleeve. “I think Inconvenient Allergy makes them bigger than normal. They feel bigger, anyway.”

“Speaking of which, we’d better take care of that now. The boys are out of our way, but Burcham will probably be coming back soon, and we don’t want to be here when he does.”

Taking that as her cue, Miki projected herself into the vision of both girls.

“No prob! I’ve got the Fortitude program all booted up. Now you just gotta give me the card, and I’ll use it on Jazzly.”

With a tentative nod, Jazzly reached into her pocket. But she found it empty. She began looking around.

“What’s wrong Jazz?”

“My deck is gone. The card I need is on top.”

Kelyn began to look as well, but it didn’t take her long to find it behind Jazzly’s back.

“I got it,” she said as she began opening the box. “Must have fallen out when you were sneezing. The top card, right?”

“No!” Jazzly shouted as she reached for the deck. “Wait Kelyn! Don’t look!”

But Kelyn’s eyes were already drifting over the text of Purge Curses, reading it over and over.

“Jazz. What… is this?”

Jazzly dropped her eyes. “It… it’s the card I need Miki to play.”

“This card?”

 “Um… y-yeah…” She began nervously wringing her hands. “It… it gets rid of curses. It’ll get rid of Inconvenient Allergy.”

Kelyn looked up from the card and stared intently. “Do you know what this card does?”

Jazzly bit her lip hard, holding back tears. “It’ll fix me. It’ll make everything okay again, and then we won’t get kicked off and you can stay here. Just give Miki the card, Kel.”

“Jazzly, this is an attack card. Target takes 500 damage per curse removed. This is going to kill you.”

Jazzly shook her head, avoiding Kelyn’s gaze. “We don’t know that for sure. We don’t know how much 500 damage is in real life. Maybe it’ll just hurt me a little.”

“And maybe it won’t. Jazz, we can’t do this.”

“It’s risky, I know. But we have to. There’s no other wuh… huh… hhhiiiihhh…”

The tickle in Jazzly’s nose had come back once again as the girls heard footsteps approaching briskly. Lieutenant Burcham had returned, and he’d be arriving at any moment. Jazzly squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her finger under her nose.

“Guh… huh.. give M-Miki the cuh… the c-card, Kel.”

“No.”

Jazzly gritted her teeth and pressed harder, gasping in quietly. The tickle was growing faster than ever before. Jazzly wrinkled and rubbed her nose as hard as she could, but there was no stopping it.

“P-please, Kelyn, th-there’s nuh… no tuh… tuh… time! Guh… give h-her the cuh… the card n-now!”

“I can’t do it, Jazz. There’s got to be another way!”

Jazzly’s nose was in agony. She squeezed it tightly and blinked, but the tickle was growing and spreading like wildfire, and the lieutenant’s footsteps couldn’t have been more than 10 feet away.

“K-kel, thuh… there is nuh… no other… wuh… w-way… j-juh… huh… just… do ihh… hih… hiiiiih…”

The door swung open, and the lieutenant’s heavy footsteps walked through. That pushed Jazzly’s tickle over the edge. She couldn’t stop it, couldn’t hold it back anymore. This was the end of the line. Gritting her teeth and covering her mouth, she drew in a deep, deep breath, stretching the nanofibers of her uniform so hard that the color flickered, and tilted her head back.

Nothing happened. After a few seconds, Jazzly realized the tickle was gone. Vanished, like it had never existed at all. She exhaled quietly and opened her eyes to see Kelyn’s calm, smiling face.

She’d done it. Somehow, she’d done it.

Thankfully, the lieutenant never approached the desk. He grumbled to himself as he grabbed some texts off his bookshelf, then left the office as quickly as he had arrived. The moment he was out of earshot, both girls broke out into a fit of relieved laughter and hugged each other tightly.

“Miki,” Jazzly called, “is it over?”

The little sprite zipped happily into view, her wings shimmering. “It sure is! The script is gone, the data tunnel is closed, and… what do ya know? The hour is up! You win this round of Detection and Evasion!”

Jazzly sighed in relief as she slid to the floor.

“You okay, Jazz?” Kelyn was still smiling brightly.

“Yeah, just had enough adventure for one day.” She sat up and leaned in close to Kelyn. “How did you do it, Kel? I didn’t feel anything at all!”

Kelyn’s smile widened. “I gave Miki a different card.”

“A… a different…”

“Yup! I’ve seen your deck before. I know what’s in it.”

“But… I thought I checked all of them. Which card did you play?”

“Mirror Shield. Reflects the curse to a new target.”

“W-what? But you can only use that at the moment the curse is played!”

Kelyn shrugged. “I had Miki modify the script a little.”

“That’s… that’s…” Jazzly sighed again and smiled as she took Kelyn’s hands. “That’s amazing. You’re amazing.”

Kelyn gently squeezed Jazzly’s hands. “We’re in this together, remember? Until the end.”

Jazzly nodded. “Until the end.” Then, after clearing her throat a little, she asked, “Hey, I was wondering… Mirror Shield… it lets you choose a new target for the curse, right?”

The smile on Kelyn’s face changed just the slightest bit. It looked a little mischievous now.

“That’s right.”

“And it’s supposed to be a random target, but I’m guessing you had Miki modify that too, right?”

“Yup.” The smile widened. Clearly, Kelyn knew what was coming.

“So… who’d you send it to?

************************************

Jezper sighed deeply. He looked over at Shaw, whose face looked equally upset even in the dark storage closet where they were hiding. It was so unfair. They hadn’t even used the blasters, and they were going to have to stand trial just for carrying them! How ridiculous! They’d surely be let off easy. Right?

To make things worse, the virus was confirmed to be installed, but he couldn’t seem to access it for some reason. And to think; on top of everything, they hadn’t even been able to find Jazzly and Kelyn during the first round. What a horrible day.

Jezper check his timer. 20 minutes in, and no sign of the girls yet. He smirked. Of course not. They’d never find him and Shaw. Probably didn’t even know where to start looking.

All the same, he turned to Shaw and held a finger to his lips when he heard the girls’ voices from down the hall. They were close now, but they’d never think to look in here. They probably didn’t even know where the storage closet was. They were completely, totally, 100% safe, Jezper thought.

That’s when his nose started tickling.

YOU'VE REACHED THE END.

CONGRATULATIONS!

try to hold it back on her own?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly squeezed her eyes shut again. She couldn’t ask Kelyn to do this. This was her problem to fix. She squeezed her nose so hard that it made a little squelching sound, but somehow that only seemed to make it worse.

“hhhhhhihhh… eeeeeeh… heeeeeehhhhhh…”

Outside the door, the lieutenant continued, “Step inside my office immediately, privates, and prepare for inspection. I want a closer look at those bulges on your hips.”

As the door swung open and the footsteps came inside, Jazzly vaguely registered the fact that Lieutenant Burcham had spotted the blasters Jezper and Shaw were carrying. She opened her eyes at the thought. Maybe it would be okay. Maybe they’d get taken away, and the virus would be discovered, and the two of them wouldn’t get in any trouble. Maybe everything was going to work out.

Then the lieutenant flipped on the office lights, and Jazzly couldn’t take it anymore.

“HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOO! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HUH-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASHOOOOO! Huh… HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW! Ih… HIH… HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIITSCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!”

Jazzly sniffed and buried her face in her hands. Damn it.

“What the hell?!” the lieutenant roared, and a flurry of footsteps raced up to the desk. Jazzly looked up into Burcham’s beet-red face.

“Private Jazzly! Private Kelyn! What the hell are you doing in my office?!”

“N-nothing, s-sir…” Jazzly stammered. But then the tickle seized her again. “I was… HUUUUUUUUUESSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOO! It… it was foh… huh… HAAAAAAAAAAAAASHOOOOOOO! …for the… heh… Heeeeeehhhh…”

“Quit your sneezing this instant, Private Jazzly! Your superior is talking to you!”

Jazzly bit her lip, but it didn’t help. “heh-IIIIIIIIIISHEEEEEEEW! I’m s-sorry lieutehh… heh… HEEEEEEEEEEISHEEEEEEEEEEW! I c-can’t… huh… stuh… HUH… HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUHEEEEEEEASCHEEEEEEEEEEEW! I can’t stop!”

“Clearly,” growled Burcham.”Jezper, Shaw, you two can wait. Girls, step out from under my desk. You’ve got some explaining to do.”

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

 

 

 

 

try to get it out?

Spoiler

 

“N-no,” Jazzly insisted, “I can… I caaaahhh… can do iiiiih… it… hih…”

Jazzly closed her eyes and sniffed. That usually did the trick. This time, though, despite the tickle getting stronger, the sneezes just weren’t coming. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly and sniffed harder, but still nothing.

“I cah… I caaaaahhh… I can feel ih… it… it tih… tickles so bad… but it… wuh… won’t… come… out…”

“Come on, Jazzly, hurry!”

In desperation, Jazzly sniffed in as hard as she possibly could. Too hard, as it turned out.

Both of the boys in the room below froze and looked around.

“Did you hear that?” Shaw hissed.

“Of course I did. Forget looking out for a bit. Help me search the room. And Shaw?”

“Yes?”

“Blasters out.”

The boys began a canvassing pattern, their blasters pointed in front of them.

“Oh no,” Kelyn murmured.

She would have murmured something considerably stronger had she been aware of what was about to happen. The sneeze Jazzly was wrestling with, which had become impossibly huge, had chosen, without any warning, to stop being stuck.

“HAAAAAAAAAAAESSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOO!” The sneeze burst out before Jazzly could do anything to stop it. She vaguely registered the sound of Jezper shouting “The vent!” from far below, but before she even had time to think, she found herself drawing in a huge, gasping breath in preparation for the unstoppable fit of sneezes that was coming.

“Haaaaaahhhhh… HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH… HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEESSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOO! AAAAAAAAEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEEEEESHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! HAH… HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HEEEEEEEH… HEEEEEESCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!”

When the fit was over, there was a brief, terrifying moment of complete silence. It didn’t last long. Just long enough for Jazzly to think how funny it would be to have DEATH BY SNEEZES written on her tombstone. Then the vent was assaulted by a hail of blaster fire.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

 

 

 

stay put?

Spoiler

 

“Jazz,” Kelyn argued, “they said they were going to check the verti-shuttle next. Maybe they’ll check the upper floors while they’re at it, and we can move then. Okay?”

Jazzly thought it over for a moment, but before she could finish thinking, the voices and footsteps of A team returned.

Unfortunately, so did the tickle in her nose. Only this time, it was worse. Much, much worse.

“Hihhhh… huuhhh…”

Kelyn shot her another angry glare and slapped her lightly on the shoulder, but she could barely register it.

“You go check the verti-shuttle, Shaw,” came Jezper’s voice. “I’ll look around here.”

“You got it,” replied Shaw’s voice. His footsteps faded, but Jezper’s slowly drew closer. Kelyn looked at Jazzly in horror. He was about to search the Field Simulation Room! Jazzly would have had the same look on her face had she not been far too busy dealing with the massive tickle in her nose, which was somehow still growing.

“Heeeeeh… ah-aaaaaahhhhh…” Jazzly cupped her hands around her nose and mouth, trying to muffle the sounds, but it didn’t do much good. Kelyn squeezed her shoulder and hissed “Shut up!” as though that could somehow stop her breath from hitching, which of course it didn’t.

Jezper’s footsteps were drawing closer and closer.

“Hhheeeeheeeeh… HAAAAH…” Jazzly hitched, her nostrils widening as her chest expanded.

The footsteps paused, dangerously near the stack of boxes they were behind.

Jazzly’s eyes widened in panic for only a moment before they fluttered shut.

“H-HAAAH… EEEEEEEH…”

“I heard that,” Jezper’s said, an audible smirk in his voice. But his footsteps hadn’t moved. Not yet.

Jazzly tried to fight it, she really did, but her body clearly had other plans for how this would go as her head began to tilt back against her will. Kelyn’s eyes widened as she realized what was about to happen, but she was powerless to stop it. They both were.

“HAAAAAAAAAA… AAAAAAAAAAAAAH…” Jazzly hitched hugely, and finally, the last of her fight left her. “HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEESHOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

“Gotcha!” Shouted Jezper, his footsteps resuming once again. But Jazzly wasn’t done yet.

“EEEEEEEAAAASHOOOOOO! HEEEEEEEIIIIIIISSSSHOOOOOOOO! Heh… HAAAAAAAAAEEEEEESCHOOOOOOO! Huh… HAH… HASHOOOOO!”

In despair, Jazzly lowered her hands to her sides, gathered her courage, and looked up into Jezper’s sneering face.

“Bless you, Jazzly dearest. And thank you so much for that wonderful display. It would’ve been tougher for me to win this game if you hadn’t been so, so bad at it.”

Jazzly’s face turned a deep red and she looked apologetically at Kelyn, who only shook her head in disappointment.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

 

hide?

Spoiler

 

“…B team. You have two minutes to find your spot. Anywhere in the station that you have access to is fair game. Are we understood, privates?”

“Yes, sir!” shouted Echo squad in unison.

“Your drill begins now. Go!”

Jazzly and Kelyn shot out of the room and dashed around the corner before Jazzly held up a hand.

“We’re out of earshot now. We have about a little over a minute to figure out where to hide.”

“How about the storage bay? Lots of cover.”

“That’s what I’m worried about. They’re sure to canvas the area thoroughly. I say we take the verti-shuttle to the operations deck.”

“Operations? There’s almost no cover at all!”

“That’s the point! They won’t think to check too hard! If we can find a good spot, they’ll never find us.”

Kelyn pulled up the timer in her HUD. “We don’t have time to make it to either. I say we hide here on the training deck, then move after they’ve passed us.”

“Point taken. Field simulation area. Now!”

Both girls raced at top speed to the field simulation area, which was outfitted to look like an actual field environment. An alleyway, in this case. It was designed to provide cover, which meant A team would definitely be checking here at some point. As long as they didn’t check here first, it would be okay.

As soon as they had dashed through the open archway, the girls instinctively ran for the same stack of boxes and dove over it, huddling up behind. They had only a few moments to catch their breath before the voices of Jezper and Shaw drifted down the hallway towards them.

“They didn’t have time to make it to the Wards,” Shaw was saying.

“Right,” Jezper affirmed, his voice getting closer and closer. “They could be on this floor. Then again, they could have gone down to the storage bay, or they could have taken the verti-shuttle up. But which do we check first?”

Their voices were right outside the area now. They couldn’t have been more than 30 feet away. Jazzly was in the middle of thinking how embarrassed she’d be if they thought to check this room when her nose started to tickle.

Trying not to panic, Jazzly tried wrinkling her nose. It did nothing at all, and now her breath was starting to hitch.

“hhhhh… hih…”

Kelyn shot her a glare and held her finger to her lips. Jazzly mouthed “Sorry” and held her finger under her nose.

“Well,” came Jezper’s voice, “let’s do a quick survey of the storage bay. They can’t have hidden there very well. Then we’ll check if the verti-shuttle’s gone up. We can decide which to search afterwards.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Shaw answered, and their footsteps set off in the direction of the storage bay.

Kelyn turned to Jazzly, and angry look on her face.

“Did you forget we’re supposed to be hiding, Ms. Noisy-Breath?”

“I’m sorry, it just… nevermind. Let’s head out.”

“Move now? Are you, crazy? They’re just doing a survey! We have to stay put or there’s no way we get hidden in time!”

“But this was only a temporary spot! If we don’t move now, they’re definitely going to check this room!”

Should Jazzly and Kelyn…

move now?

Spoiler

 

Kelyn chewed her lip for a moment, but she nodded quickly. “Okay, but let’s hurry.”

The two girls crept from their hiding place and, after a cursory visual exam, they dashed from the room and down the hall, zig-zagging from doorway to doorway as they’d been taught.

As they neared the training area where they’d started, Jazzly quickly motioned the two of them inside. They both diverted their course, careening through the doorway and pressing themselves against the wall inside. Commander Rushworth was still there, but he only regarded them with a cool detachment.

“We never decided,” Jazzly said between ragged breaths. “We can make a run for the verti-shuttle and head up the operations deck, or we can wait for them to pass and head to the storage bay. What’ll it be?”

Kelyn had wanted to hide in the storage bay, which offered more cover but was likely to get a more thorough canvassing. Jazzly had wanted to hide on the operations deck, where there’d be less cover but might not be searched as well.

Where should Jazzly and Kelyn hide?

The storage bay

Spoiler

 

“I say we wait until they’re done in the storage bay, then head down there. I’m sure we can hide someplace they won’t find us.”

Jazzly sighed in resignation, then nodded. “Storage bay it is. Just stay quiet for now.”

They didn’t have to wait long. Jezper and Shaw’s footsteps soon passed them and headed off towards the verti-shuttle, moving just a little too leisurely. Jazzly held her finger to her lips and motioned out the door, and the two of them crept down the hallway in the opposite direction.

They waited to break into a run until they were through the hatch of the storage bay. The area was huge, one of Spectrum Station’s biggest, and it held all kinds of storage. The girls sprinted through the aisles between the shipping containers, stopping when they reached the middle.

“What do you think?” Kelyn asked.

Jazzly scanned the area with her trained eye, looking for shadowed areas that provided concealment from multiple angles. There were lots of options: crates, palettes, shipping containers, even moving equipment, but all of it would yield quickly to searches. Suddenly, she got an idea. She laced her fingers together and held them out for Kelyn.

“Quick! Get up!”

“What?”

“On top of the shipping container! Get up and lay low!”

Kelyn continued staring for only a moment before shaking off her confusion and letting Jazzly boost her up. Once she was safely atop the large metal container, Jazzly immediately jumped into action. With practiced ease, she ran halfway up the wall of the neighboring container, sprang off in the opposite direction, and somersaulted into a landing next to Kelyn.

Kelyn stuck out her tongue. “Showoff.”

Jazzly chuckled a little. “They’ll never think to check up here, and they won’t see us from the ground if we lay on our backs. The only things that can give us away now are sound and motion, so stay still and stay quiet.”

Kelyn nodded, and the two girls lay flat against the roof of the shipping container.

It wasn’t long before they heard the hatch swing open and the voices of Jezper and Shaw drifting towards them. Kelyn rolled over and looked at Jazzly, laying a finger to her lips. Jazzly nodded gravely and mirrored the gesture in understanding.

Ironically, that was the exact moment her nose started tickling.

“Of course they’re down here, Shaw,” Jezper was saying. “The training deck was empty, and the verti-shuttle hasn’t been moved.”

“Yeah,” Shaw responded, “but she could’ve sent it back down.”

Jezper chuckled. “No, no, she’s not smart enough to think of something like that.”

Jazzly would have been furious if she hadn’t already been so worried about the growing tickle. She wriggled her nose a bit, hoping that would take care of it, but nothing changed. She tried wrinkling it a couple of times too, but it was like the tickle hadn’t even noticed. Realizing that this was only going to get worse, she took a risk, slowly raising her finger to her nose and pressing.

Kelyn shot her a look and whispered, “Jazz! Are you seriously going to sneeze? At a time like this?”

“I… I’m s-sorry, I c-can’t heh… help it…”

Kelyn rolled her eyes. “It’s okay. They’re still far away. Just keep them quiet!”

Jazzly nodded and pinched her freckled nose as she pressed the other hand to her mouth. She relaxed, let her eyelids flutter shut, and got ready to muffle like she’d never muffled before.

“hhhhh… hih… ih… ich’ngx! h’tchngk! hhh’chkmpf! hhh’eschmpf!”

Just as she’d expected, Jazzly’s sneezes came out muffled and quiet. However, there were several other things she hadn’t expected. First, each sneeze had rocked the container they were on a just a little more until the whole thing was producing a quiet metallic groan by the last one. Second, the storage bay was large, with concrete walls, meaning even the tiniest sounds produced a somewhat noisy echo. And third, she wasn’t even close to being finished.

The boys’ footsteps froze.

“Did you hear that, Shaw?” Jezper was asking.

“Hear what?”

“Maybe nothing. But maybe… something…”

Jazzly pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut, but her breath was starting to hitch again.

“hihhh… K-Kelyn…” she whispered, “I’m guh… gonna s-snuh… sneeze… heh… again…”

“Don’t,” whispered Kelyn. “Please, Jazz. He heard it last time.”

“I know, buh… but I c-c-cah… hah…”

“Don’t Jazz! Don’t do it!”

“I’m sah… I’m s-sorry!” Jazzly was trying not to, but she was clearly losing the battle. She pressed her hands over her mouth a little tighter as her nose scrunched up against her will. “Huh… Huh… Huh-mmmmpfch! Huh… huh-eschmmmmpf! Heh-CHMPF! Huh… heiiiiisssssshhhmmmmmpf!”

Jazzly’s sneezes were getting louder and making the whole container vibrate and rock. The metal sides were shaking now, and the base was starting to creak against the palettes it rested on. The echoing sound was like thunder in the silence of the storage bay.

“Oh, that’s definitely something,” Shaw spoke up.

“Agreed,” Jezper answered. “Now it’s just a matter of finding the something and seeing whether its them. Quick, Shaw, you start opening the shipping containers. I’ll start checking behind the crates.”

“Roger that.”

The pairs of footsteps split off in opposite directions, moving quickly now. They were definitely going to canvas the room now, but there was still a chance they wouldn’t think to check the tops of the crates. Jazzly tried to hang on to that hope, and she did for a while, until her nose made it clear that it was dead set on ruining her chances.

“Huh… K-kelyn?” she whispered.

Kelyn sighed deeply. “You’re gonna sneeze again, aren’t you?”

“Uhhm… y-yeah…”

“Dammit. This is the worst way to lose ever.”

Jazzly was about to answer, but suddenly, the tickle seized her with new ferocity, and she drew in such a deep, gasping breath that her back arched up off the roof of the container.

“HAH… HHHHAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOO! EEEEEESCHOOOOOO! HUH… HUSHOOOOOOOOO! Eh… HESSSSSSHEEEEEEEEW! Ah… AH… AAAAAAAASSSSSSSHEEEEEEEEEW!”

Exhausted, red-faced, and humiliated, Jazzly let herself flop back against the metal roof of the container, not even caring about the loud metal thunk it produced.

“Bless you,” Kelyn said, not even bothering to whisper anymore. “Remind me not to do this drill with you again.”

Jezper’s face peeked up over the side of the container, the world’s smuggest smile spanning his face.

“Yes, bless you, Jazzly. And thank you, Jazzly’s nose! You’ve been a tremendous help.”

Jazzly covered her reddening face with her hands, but she knew there was no hiding the shame she felt inside.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

The operations deck

Spoiler

 

Kelyn shook her head. “I don’t get how Operations is going to work for us, but I trust you. Let’s move.”

“Roger that,” Jazzly said with a nod, and the two girls sprinted to the verti-shuttle at top speed. It got the to Operations deck quickly, but Jazzly took an additional moment to send it back to the Training deck before darting out.

“Next time they check it, it’ll look like it hasn’t left the Training deck,” Jazzly said in response to Kelyn’s quizzical expression. “Maybe it’ll take them a little longer to figure out we used it.”

The girls took in their surroundings. Operations deck was large, but it mostly consisted of large computer displays, input terminals, and banks of large server towers. Lots of big, blocky shapes. Not much cover. That was the idea, of course: hiding in the one place they’d think nobody could hide. As Jazzly looked around, though, she started to worry that the plan might backfire. Then, an idea hit her.

In a room with so much equipment running all the time, overheating posed a potential threat. For that reason, the area had a much more robust climate control system. With much larger vents.

She grabbed Kelyn by the sleeve. “The vents! Come on!”

Motioning for Kelyn to follow, Jazzly vaulted onto the nearest server tower. They leapt onto progressively higher towers around the room until they were near one of the vents at the top of the wall. In a synchronized series of fluid motions, the girls took their multitools from their belts, unfastened the grate, dove inside, and refastened the grate, all within a matter of seconds. They resisted high-fiving, but they couldn’t help flashing proud smiles at one another.

“So,” whispered Kelyn, “what now?”

“Now we wait. They won’t see us, but noise could give it away. Just keep quiet, and we’ll be fine.”

Kelyn nodded, holding her finger to her lips in understanding. The girls stayed quiet as they watched the entrance for any sign of A team. The air vent was large, but they huddled close together anyways, waiting. Finally, the verti-shuttle ascended, and Jezper and Shaw strode in.

Jazzly detected instantly that something was wrong. Their manner was too relaxed, too at ease. Like they weren’t planning to search at all. Like they were there for some other reason.

“Shouldn’t we check the room first?” Shaw was asking.

“No point. There’s nowhere to hide here. Just watch the door while I’m busy.”

Jezper pulled a small, black stick from his pocket. A transfer drive, Jazzly realized. Jezper was planning to transfer something onto the station’s main computer system. But what?

“Um… Jezper?” Shaw was asking. “How long is this gonna take?

“Not long. I’ve just got to shut down the safeguards and bypass the firewall. Then it’s about 15 minutes until the virus is downloaded to the mainframe.”

“15 minutes? I can’t stand guard for that long!”

“Shaw, we’ve been over this. We start the transfer now, go out and find those little bitches, then come back and remove the transfer drive while they’re waiting for us to hide. And before you ask, no, nobody’s going to find the drive in the meantime. Not with the girls hiding and the commander supervising the game. Now quit talking and keep watch. I have work to do.”

In the air vent, the girls gave each other matching looks of shock at what they’d just overheard. Jezper and Shaw were going to install a virus on the station’s mainframe! This went far beyond their usual messing around. This was sabotage, maybe straight up treason.

As Jazzly was letting the gravity of the situation sink in, she felt a tap on her shoulder.

“Um… Jazz? I… I think we’ve got a problem,” Kelyn whispered.

“Yes, I know. I heard it too.”

“No, not just that. I… I think they’ve got blasters on their belts.”

Jazzly’s eyes snapped to the boys’ utility belts. Sure enough, there were the telltale bulges of concealed weapons. How had they managed to get these? Jazzly’s heartbeat accelerated as she came to the full realization of just how much trouble they were in if they were caught now.

And that was the moment her nose starting tickling.

“So… what?” asked Shaw. “Is that it? Does the virus just… expel her?”

“Not quite. It opens a backdoor to the entire mainframe, including student records. We just have to wait a couple days to avoid suspicion, then access it and change Jazzly’s record. Make it say something really nasty, like she murdered someone or she stole a spaceship or… or she… murdered someone and stole their spaceship, I don’t know. Anyway, we just have to wait for someone to notice the glaring red flag that they somehow overlooked. She’ll get expelled, and we’ll finally get some attention around here. Now for the last time, stay quiet and let me work!”

When Jezper mentioned her name, Jazzly felt the tickle in her little freckled nose go wild. She pressed her palm against the end of her nose and rubbed, but it wasn’t doing any good, and her breath was starting to hitch.

“hhhihhhh… eh… o-oh crap… Keh… Kelyn?” she whispered. “W-we’ve guh… got a… huh… another puh… problem.”

“What is it?” Kelyn’s face fell as realization dawned. “Oh my god. Are you gonna sneeze?”

“I’m suh… s-soh… huh… sorry! Hih… Oh god… It’s c-coming…”

Kelyn nervously looked out the vents. “We’re pretty high, and they’re pretty far. You should be fine if you keep it quiet. Just get it out of your system now, before they come any closer!”

Jazzly nodded and pressed her hands over her mouth and nose, waiting for the tickle to grow strong enough.

Only it didn’t.

“Come on, Jazzly” Kelyn spat. “Do it now!”

“I… I’m… huhhh… trying… it’s stuck…”

Kelyn sighed in frustration, then plucked a long, brown hair from her head.

“Here, let me help if you can’t get it out.”

Should Jazzly…

let Kelyn help?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly nodded. “O-oh… huhhh… okay…”

Though the girls were already huddled close together, Kelyn knew she’d have to get even closer. Moving cautiously so as not to make a noise, she crept nearer and nearer to Jazzly’s front side until her knees straddled Jazzly’s hips. As serious as the situation was, Kelyn couldn’t help but blush a little. She couldn’t have been more than a couple of inches away from her friend’s freckled face and small, twitching nose.

“O-okay,” she stammered quietly, “keep them quiet, remember?”

Jazzly, her eyes still shut and her breath still hitching, gave a gesture that Kelyn took as a nod. She gently laid a hand on one side of Jazzly’s face to keep it still, and with the other, she slowly inserted the brown strand of hair into Jazzly’s left nostril.

Jazzly’s reaction was immediate. Her nose started to wriggle, and she started to draw in deep, shuddering breaths that stretched the nanofibers of her shirt. Finally, when the sneeze seemed inevitable, Kelyn pulled the hair out, and Jazzly pressed her hands tightly against her face.

“hhhhh… h’cktch! hhhhhktch! nnntsch! hhhhhcksh! Hhhh… h’ncktsh!”

“You can be a little louder,” Kelyn whispered. Jazzly nodded, squeezing her eyes shut.

“hhhhhhmmmmpfch! Hhhh… hhhhhhchmf! mmmmpfch! Hihhhh… hih-CHMPF!”

Muffled though it was, the last sneeze came out a little louder than Jazzly had intended. In the room below, Shaw froze.

“Jezper! Did you hear that?”

“Hear what? I was busy.”

“I… I thought I heard something. We should go check it out.”

Jezper nodded. “I’m done here anyways. Let’s go. We’ll come back when the transfer’s done.”

The boys strode out of room in the same easy manner they’d come in with. When they were out of sight, Kelyn breathed a sigh of relief.

“They’re gone. You all done, Jazz?”

Jazzly sniffed experimentally. “A… a c-couple more. Can… can you…” She bit her lip, a very slight blush coming into her cheeks. “Can you… do the other side?”

Kelyn chuckled a little as she inserted the hair into Jazzly’s right nostril.

“No being quiet this time. Get ‘em all out!”

Jazzly answered by drawing in a huge, gasping breath and raising her cupped hands to her nose, and Kelyn retreated to a safe distance.

“HAAAAAAH… HAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEESSSSHEEEEEEEEEW! HEEEESSSSHEEEEEEEEEEEW! Ah… AAAAAAAASSHHEEEEEEEEEEEW! Hah… hah-EEEEEESHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HISHOOO!” Jazzly sighed and rubbed her nose, the tickle finally gone.

“Wow,” Kelyn said. “Bless you. You okay there?”

“Yeah,” Jazzly said with a sniffle. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me today.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s the weirdest thing. I’ve been sneezing constantly, ever since I got back from the Fortitude match. The strange thing is, it’s always at the worst possible times. It’s like I’m… I don’t know, allergic to bad situations or something.”

Kelyn chuckled at that. “I hope not. That would be a pretty-”

The realization hit both girls at the same time, and they looked at each other in horror.

“Inconvenient Allergy,” they said in unison.

“But… but no, that’s not possible! Is it?” Fear was starting to rise in Jazzly’s chest.

“No,” answered Kelyn, “no, not unless… wait. Don’t tell me you were stupid enough to wear your Tactical Response Uniform to the match.”

“Um… if I don’t tell you, will that make it better?”

“Jazzly!” Kelyn’s voice was a combination of anger and panic.

“What? I like how it fits me! I put it in off-duty mode so it looked like civilian clothes.”

“That’s not the problem! Didn’t you read the notification after our last system update? They’re still beta testing this version! We’re not supposed to wear it outside the station until they know how it’ll interact with outside systems!”

“Oh my god.” The color drained from Jazzly’s face. “That glitch. Right after she played Inconvenient Allergy. And Miki said there was something off about the TRU’s coding.”

At the mention of her name, the pink-hair sprite flitted into Jazzly’s vision.

“This is what I was trying to tell ya, Jazz! A new script’s been added by an anonymous source! The script’s already been triggered several times today, and every time it does, you sneeze. A lot.”

“Okay,” Jazzly said, her breathing becoming increasingly frantic, “so the Fortitude system added the Inconvenient Allergy script to my TRU’s coding. Miki, can you delete it?”

The little sprite shook her head sadly. “Sorry, Jazz, but I don’t have access to core functionality.”

“Hey,” Kelyn chimed in, “can’t you just change your clothes? It shouldn’t be a problem if you’re not wearing your TRU, right?”

Miki shook her head again. “Hate to be a drag, but it’s not that simple. Fortitude’s coding affects your body directly. After all, you don’t wear anything special when you play, right? Their system issues a termination command once the game ends, but I don’t have that scripting. We’d have to get it from Fortitude, and that could take weeks!”

Jazzly groaned and smacked her forehead. “So let me get this straight. We’re trying to stay hidden, two armed assholes are trying to get me expelled, and I’m stuck with a violent allergy to bad situations. All at the same time. Today just keeping getting better and better”

“Well, let’s just get down there and pull the transfer drive out!” Kelyn suggested. “Better one problem than two!”

“No! We can’t interrupt a data transaction in progress! It could crash the station’s whole mainframe! There are safeguards against it, of course, but Jezper said he was shutting them down, dumbass that he is.”

Kelyn sighed. “So we can’t just pull the thing out. Of course. That would be waaaaaay too easy. Come on, Jazz, we’ve got to get you out of here.”

Jazzly stared at Kelyn, an incredulous look written on her face.

“You mean leave this spot? And risk getting caught by trigger-happy dickwads? Why?!”

“Think it through, Jazzly! When they don’t find us in the other areas on the station, they’ll come right back here, only they’ll actually be looking this time. You’ll sneeze and give us away, they’ll realize we overheard them, and I’m sure you can figure out how that ends. We have to move to a new area! If we stay in the vent, we’re done for!”

Should Jazzly and Kelyn…

move to a new area?

Spoiler

 

Reluctantly, Jazzly nodded. “Okay, but let’s be quick about it. They’re out there, and we don’t want to run into them.”

Kelyn nodded her assent, and the two girls pulled their multitools from their belts, removed the grate, and began their descent. All was going according to plan until they reached the entryway. Just as they were about to leave, they heard a set of very familiar voices drifting down the hallway.

“It’s a waste of time, Shaw,” came Jezper’s voice. “You saw the place! There’s nowhere to hide!”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, just… we never really checked it out, and we could be in serious trouble if they were in there and overheard us. And we’re gonna go past this floor on our way down anyway, right?”

Jazzly’s eyes went wide. They were going to check Operations deck! She hurriedly looked back up towards the air vent, but there wasn’t nearly enough time to reach it now. She frantically motioned Kelyn towards a nearby input terminal, and the two girls ducked behind it just as A team entered.

 “Looks like the transfer is going well,” Jezper said. “Only about nine minutes. Now let’s clear this room as quickly as possible and get down to the training deck. I don’t think I checked that Field Simulation Room well enough.”

The boys’ footsteps slowed as they began the unmistakable circular pattern used for clearing a room. They were so close now that Jazzly was afraid even the sound of her breath might give them way. You can only imagine the panic she felt, of course, when that familiar tickle returned to her nose. She looked at Kelyn, her eyes wide with panic, and Kelyn’s eyes went equally wide when she realized what was about to happen. She frantically shook her head no over and over, but it was no use. Jazzly was seized by a completely irrepressible urge, and her eyelid’s flicked closed as she unwillingly drew in a deep breath.

“HAAAAAAH… EEEEEEEEYASSHOOOOOOOOOOO! HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOO! AAAAAAAASSSSSSCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! HAH… HUUUUAAAAAAAAAASHOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Jazzly sprang to her feet the second her sneezing fit was over, hoping she and Kelyn could sprint out of the room and get help before they were found, but that hope was dashed the second she saw the muzzle of a blaster pointed at her face. Jezper, wearing his smuggest expression yet, had his finger on the trigger. Jazzly closed her eyes, knowing there was no escape, and the world’s most insincere “Bless you” became the last thing she would ever hear.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

stay in the vent?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly shook her head. “Those clowns? No way! They’ll never admit that they missed us the first time around. When they don’t find us, they’ll either give up or take so long that the hour runs out.”

Kelyn crossed her arms angrily. “You’re underestimating them, Jazz. They’re stubborn and arrogant, sure, but they’re cunning too. Plus they’ve got blasters! This isn’t a game anymore! Please, Jazzly, let’s just go!”

Jazzly bit her lip nervously. She was certain that staying in hiding was the right choice this late in the game, but Kelyn had a good point too. And weren’t they supposed to be a team? She puzzled over it for a little longer until she was struck by an idea. She took a hopeful glace back over her shoulder. Bingo.

“I have an idea, Kelyn.”

“An idea?”

“Mm-hmm. For how we can stay up here and also move to a new area.”

“Well, what is it?”

“You’re not gonna like it.”

“Just spill, Jazz!”

“Look behind you.”

Kelyn turned and looked at the long, dark air duct laid out behind them, leading to the rest of the entire ventilation system. She gulped nervously.

“You’re right. I don’t like it.”

“Come on, Kelyn. We can do this. I’ll go first.”

Summoning her courage and activating her night vision, Jazzly began to crawl down the long, dark air duct with Kelyn following close behind. The crawl got very tough very quickly when the duct narrowed, but the girls dropped to their bellies and pushed onwards. This was what they’d trained for, and it was second nature to them by now. They ran into their first real dilemma after about five minutes, when they crawled into a junction box. The girls crouched low, looking over the network of vents leading off in a myriad of directions.

“Well, this is a problem,” Kelyn said, still trying to keep her voice low.

“We’re at a junction,” Jazzly answered, the disappointment and resignation clear in her voice. “There are a few different ways we could go, but I don’t know where any of them lead. Do you?”

Kelyn shook her head. “We didn’t think this through, did we?”

Jazly sighed heavily and slumped against the metal wall. “Not we. It was my idea. I’m really sorry, Kelyn.”

Kelyn took Jazzly’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “It’s not your fault. We’re in this together, remember? Hey, why don’t we just pick a direction and go with it? See where it takes us?”

Jazzly shrugged. “What does it matter? I’ll still have Inconvenient Allergy. Jezper and Shaw will still have their virus. We can’t tell the commander about either without looking weak, and he probably couldn’t do anything about it anyway. We might as well just go back and let ourselves get caught.”

“Hey!” Kelyn gently slapped Jazzly on the shoulder. “Don’t start sulking on me now!”

Jazzly smiled tiredly. “I’m sorry. But I’m not wrong, Kel.”

The silence that followed sounded huge in the dark, still vent. It was a frightening silence, and for a long moment, it seemed it would be the only answer. Then, Kelyn shifted a little and met Jazzly’s eyes with a surprising amount of force.

“Can I tell you something, Jazz? When I was a little girl, I used to dream of visiting the stars. Did I ever tell you that? Every night, I would imagine myself floating in space, looking out at the stars and the planets and the moons. And there were times when I thought I would do anything, anything at all, if it meant my dream would come true. It was stupid, even then I knew it was. The odds of me getting picked for something like that were insanely low. But I guess I never learned, because here I am. And you know how I felt on my first day in the station? Come on, do you?”

Jazzly shook her head, and Kelyn smiled confidently.

“Terrified. I thought it would be the happiest day of my life, but I was terrified. I had everything I’d ever wanted, and I suddenly realized I didn’t know how to handle it. The training, the commanders, the other privates on the station. I thought I’d made the biggest mistake of my life.”

Jazzly nodded. “What changed your mind?”

A warm smile crept onto Kelyn’s face. “I met you, Jazz. You were so determined and so confident, and you always gave 110%. You tried, and you tried, and even when things were hard, you kept trying. You showed me how to be strong, Jazz. You showed me how to never give up.”

Kelyn took Jazzly’s shoulders in her hands and squeezed them firmly. “And now I’m not giving up on you. I’m not going to lose my badge, and I’m not going to lose my best friend. I want to keep living my dream with you, no matter what it takes. I want to stay here, in the stars. So let’s figure this thing out together.”

Jazzly was quiet for several seconds, letting the words sink in. Then she swallowed hard and nodded firmly. “Thank you. I needed that.”

“Of course. So what do we do first? We don’t know where to go. Any way we could find out?”

Jazzly chewed her lip in thought for a moment until an idea occurred to her. “Miki.”

Without warning, Miki flitted back into Jazzly’s vision, making her jump a bit.

“Hiya Jazz!”

“Jesus, Miki! You scared me!”

“Sorry! I heard you were confused about where to go. Can I make a suggestion?”

Jazzly sighed deeply. “Yes, of course, but please make it one that gets us out of here fast.”

“Well, see, I’ve been looking over that rogue script of yours, and I’ve been analyzing Jezper’s virus you too. I think we might be able to solve both problems at once, if we play our cards right.” The little sprite winked. “No pun intended!”

Jazzly rolled her eyes as Miki giggled annoyingly at her own joke. “Just get on with it, please. And can you, like… turn your cuteness setting down or something?”

“Sorry, Jazz, but my cuteness setting is already at minimum,” Miki responded, pouting a little. “But let me tell you my idea! So it looks like the virus is opening a data tunnel in the station’s mainframe that connects it to the Network. I can follow that data tunnel back to its source and cut it off. The virus would still be on the mainframe, but nobody could access it. It would just sit there until the system’s purge cycle deletes it at the end of the week.

Jazzly nodded. “Okay, I like where this is going. How do we solve the second problem?”

“Well, the data tunnel also gives us an opportunity. Before I shut it down, I could use the Network connection to port in some of Fortitude’s scripts and apply them through your TRU.”

“So you could use the termination script? You could get rid of Inconvenient Allergy?”

“Well… no. Only the makers of Fortitude have that. But I could apply a different script, as long as you have the card to activate it. You don’t happen to have your Fortitude deck, do you?”

Jazzly’s hand immediately went to the pocket where she’d placed her deck after the match. A little smile came to her face as she felt the familiar rectangle of the deck box.

“About time something went right. So let me get this straight: you’re saying you can transfer the effects of one of my other cards to me? Just like Inconvenient Allergy got transferred in the first place?”

Miki nodded. “That’s right… um… but…”

Jazzly sighed again. “Of course there’s a but. What it is?”

“W-well… um… see, I can’t access the mainframe or your TRU without admin permission. W-which means… we’d need to be at an admin console.”

“So we have to break into Commander Rushworth’s office to do this?”

Miki bit her lip and shook her head. “His clearance isn’t… quite… high enough.”

Jazzly’s face went pale as she realized what Miki was saying. “No. You… you don’t mean…”

Miki nodded, her face going a little pale as well. “Lieutenant Burcham.”

There was a long, tense silence as the reality sank in. It might have gone on even longer if Kelyn hadn’t spoken up.

“Okay,” she started, “this sucks. Breaking into my boss’s boss’s office is very low on the list of things that  seem like a good idea. But suffocating in an air vent is definitely a lot lower, so can we please keep moving? We’ll figure it out when we get there!”

Miki gave Jazzly a nod and projected the duct schematics onto her display. “I’ll give you directions. It’s not too far.”

The two girls resumed their slow crawl through the station’s ducts, twisting and turning down the metal tubes until it felt like they’d been crawling forever and they had no idea where they were. They didn’t speak at all during the journey, not that they had any air in their lungs to do so after all of that straining and pulling in a space barely big enough to breathe.

After nearly a quarter of an hour crawling through the darkness, Jazzly was about to snap. She was starting to imagine getting lost in the vents and having to live the rest of her life there, eventually forgetting how to talk and walk and just scrambling around on her hands and knees and babbling like an animal. They’d probably tell stories about her on the station. Stories of the silly little girl who disappeared one day, never to be seen again. Legend has it that on quiet nights, you can still hear her crazed gibbering coming through the station’s air vents.

Jazzly grimaced. Jezper would probably love that.

“HIYA JAZZ!” Miki darted back into Jazzly’s view with a loud exclamation, making her jump for the third time that day.

“Dammit, Miki! Quit sneaking up on me!”

“Sorry, Jazz. I just wanted to let ya know that we’re here!”

Jazzly looked around at their entirely metal surroundings. Yup, definitely just more air duct.

“Miki, is your navigation system broken? Last I checked, Liutenant Burcham’s office isn’t in the middle of an air duct.”

“No, silly! Not here here! Liutenant Burcham’s office is right above us. Just one little climb, and we’re in!”

“One… little…” Jazzly poked her head forward and peered around the bend in the duct ahead. Her face went white at what she saw.

Ahead was a large, vertical metal column, a massive and violently spinning fan at the bottom. A series of rungs ascended up the metal wall towards the deck above them. A series of rungs that looked just a little too rickety for comfort.

Jazzly gulped. “C-climb those? Um.. M-miki? Are you sure this is safe?”

“Of course!” said the sprite with a smile. “The odds of you and Kelyn falling and getting sliced to death by the fan are only 42.3%!”

“Great. Thanks putting that image in my head. Come on, Kelyn.”

The girls pulled themselves into the larger chamber and pressed their backs against the wall to avoid the fan. Kelyn gave Jazzly a look.

“I don’t like this plan either, you know.”

Jazzly looked up at the long, upward ascent. “Same here.”

The girls began their climb up the side of the metal tunnel. They’d climbed similar ladders in training, but the combination of the vent’s unsteadiness, the running fan underneath, and the fact that they’d been crawling through the vents made the already precarious climb exceedingly more difficult. Before they’d even gone twenty feet, they were already sweating and panting.

“Woah!” Kelyn shrieked as, without any warning, the rung she was clinging to snapped free of its screws. It fell down towards the bottom of the shaft, rebounding off the fan and colliding with the metal wall with a loud CLANG!

Jazzly looked down at Kelyn. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“What happened?”

“The rung just snapped off! This part of the system must be older. No sudden movements, Jazz. We don’t want any more of them to break off.”

Jazzly was just about to agree when an unfortunate thought struck her.

“Did… did you say no sudden movements?”

“Yeah, why?”

Jazzy squeezed her eyes shut, the tickles already beginning. “I w-wish you hah… hadn’t said… that… hah…”

It didn’t take Kelyn long at all to figure out what was going on. “Oh no. No, not now!”

Jazzly was wrinkling and wriggling her nose as much as she could, but the tickle was stronger than ever this time. The violent hitching of her breath alone was enough to start a slight tremor in the metal walls.

“Jazzly, come on!” Kelyn screamed, “Keep moving! Get to the top before the sneezing starts!”

With a determined nod, Jazzly lunged upward. The fought to keep her eyelids from closing, and she just managed to grasp the next rung before the first sneeze forced its way out.

“HRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAASSSSCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Her whole body jerked forward, and the rung groaned ominously at the movement. Jazzly gritted her teeth and prepared to leap again, but just as she was about to push off, another uncontrollable urge seized her.

“HAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW! RRRRRRRAAAAAAAAASSSSSSHEEEEEEW!”

It proved too much for the rung she was holding, which pulled right off the wall. Reflexively, Jazzly pushed off against her footholds and sprang upwards, but her balance was thrown off and she only managed to grip the next rung with one hand.

Now dangling nearly thirty feet above the whirring fan with only one rung to hold her up, Jazzly knew she was in serious trouble if the rung didn’t hold. She tried to keep her panic under control as she swung her left hand upward and tried to grasp the next rung, but instead, another powerful sneeze erupted from her.

“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAESSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

The whole wall shook, and the rung creaked and bent. Jazzly took a moment to wipe the beads of sweat from her forehead before making another swing upward.

“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Another, even more massive sneeze burst out. The wall shook even more, and Jazzly yelped as the rung was pulled free of one of its screws. Jazzly managed to hold on to the now vertical freely swinging metal rod, but her panic swelled and began to take over. She started flailing her legs, searching desperately for a foothold, but she only kicked the smooth metal surface of the wall. And then, right when it seemed things couldn’t possibly get any worse, the uncontrollable urge seized her again.

“HYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

The sneeze was the biggest yet, and it proved too much for the rung. It snapped free from its final screw, and Jazzly shrieked as she fell down, down towards the bottom of the shaft, down towards the fan, down towards the end. Her eyes were wide with panic, and she thrust her arms outward, flailing hopelessly, and blackness began to creep into the edges of her vision.

Then, just when it seemed it was all over, a set of slim fingers grasped her firmly by the wrist, and Jazzly jerked to a stop, the tips of her toes barely grazing the fan. She looked up into Kelyn’s straining face.

“Not today!” Kelyn screamed as she pulled Jazzly toward her. Not wasting any time, Jazzly quickly located the rungs in front of her and gripped on as tightly as she could, panting heavily as she caught her breath.

“Listen!” Kelyn shouted over the roar of the fan, “You’re allergic to bad situations, and this is as bad as it gets. You’re not going to be able to stop sneezing if you make this climb on your own. Here!”

Kelyn pulled her thin metal utility cord from her belt and clipped in, then lowered the other end. Jazzly quickly took hold and clipped in herself before flashing Kelyn a quick thumbs up. Tethered to one another, the girls continued their climb, pulling and straining until their faces were red and sweaty with the effort. Jazzly’s tickle threatened to return several times, but with the safety line, things never got dangerous enough to trigger Inconvenient Allergy again. At last, the girls pulled themselves over the final rung, squeezing into the large duct opening at the top and collapsing breathlessly onto the metal floor.

“Congratulations!” Miki shouted as she flitted back into Jazzly’s view. “See? I told ya you could-”

“Miki,” Jazzly interrupted, “there has literally not been one moment in my entire life when I’ve wanted to see you less.”

The pixie blinked, startled. “O-okay… when should I come back?”

“When my lungs aren’t on fire.”

With an awkward nod, Miki flew out of view, and Jazzly resumed sprawling next to Kelyn.

“So…” Kelyn panted, “how much… time?”

“Whaaaa?”

“How… much time… left… in the drill?”

Jazzly checked her timer. “17 minutes. It should be just enough. And… hey…”

She rolled onto her side and met Kelyn’s eyes. “… thank you. For… you know, for saving me. My life would be over without you.”

Kelyn gave her a tired smile and squeezed her hand gently. “Without you in it? Mine would too.”

These girls had had the dedication and training to make themselves into proud, courageous fighters. They weren’t particularly prone to sentimentality. Yet right then, they had to allow themselves just one, quiet moment to be thankful for one another. Then they rolled onto their stomachs, ready for action once again, and finished the short crawl to the vent looking down into Liutenant Burcham’s office.

Kelyn squinted and peered between the slats. “You see anything?”

“No, nothing. I think the coast is clear.”

“Copy that. What’s next?”

“Well, first I’m going to hack into the Lieutenant’s computer and get Miki in. Then she’s going to play one of my Fortitude cards on me. I’m sure I’ve got something in here that’ll get rid of this damn Inconvenient Allergy. Then she cuts off access to the data tunnel, we go back to hiding, and we wait for Jezper and Shaw to admit defeat.”

“Sounds easy enough. In and out before anyone knows we’re here. Are you good to go?”

“I’m ready. Miki, are we good to start the process?”

Miki flew timidly back into Jazzly’s vision. “Y… yes, ma’am. And… am I good to come back now?”

Jazzly chuckled dryly. “Yeah. You’re good. Okay, Kelyn. Let’s do this.”

Working as silently as shadows, the girls unfastened the vent grate and dropped softly into the dark office below, relaxing only when they’d thoroughly scanned their surroundings.

The lieutenant’s office was smaller than they’d thought. Dark, too, though their night vision took care of that easily enough. For someone of such a high status, it was surprisingly ordinary. One wall was filled with Burcham’s various honors, another had several bookshelves filled with military texts pressed against it. The third wall was where Burcham had placed his desk, his quietly humming computer console sitting unassumingly atop it.

Jazzly was starting to approach the desk when, to her surprise, Kelyn’s face screwed up.

“heh… heh-tschew! nxtchew! hisssssheeeeew! Heh… heeeeisshew!” Kelyn sniffled and rubbed her nose, and Jazzly shot her an amused smile.

“Not you too!”

Kelyn laughed and sniffled again. “Dust id the vedts. You’re still the odly ode with the weird allergy.”

“Aw, darn. Well, ready to keep a lookout?”

Kelyn flashed a thumbs up and went to the door, and Jazzly woke the commander’s computer from its sleep mode and took note of the interface.  It was encrypted, sure, but not as heavily as you might expect. The door was usually locked, after all. Jazzly was able to bypass the security in just a few minutes.

“Okay, Miki, I’m in. Do your thing.”

Miki gave Jazzly one of her characteristic winks. “Way ahead of ya, boss! I’m in the lieutenant’s filesystem, and I’ve got the cybernetic patch process running. Connecting to the mainframe… and there’s Jezper’s data tunnel! Okay, we’re through to the network and the Fortitude system. This is gonna take a couple minutes to load. You should find the card you want now so I can activate it when the time comes.”

Jazzly nodded, removed her deck box from her pocket, and began sorting through cards. She noticed a few that might do the trick, but most of them were too limited in scope. Instants that doubled or tripled effects, Environments meant to bolster mana or slow life drain, Creature with high Life and low Strength. None of them were particularly useful. At last, though, she settled on one.

Her hands trembled a little as she read the effects of the card. Purge Curses. It seemed like the perfect choice. Almost.  She took a deep breath and called out to Kelyn.

“I found it, Kelyn. I know which card I’m going to use. This’ll all be over soon!”

“Oh, good!” Kelyn answered in a whisper, a hint of worry thinly disguised in her voice. “So, um… h-how long until you can apply it?”

“A few minutes. Why?”

“Oh… um… no reason. But… um… could you keep your voice down? And… maybe hide a little bit? Like… just for fun?”

“Kelyn, what’s going on?”

“Nothing! Nothing at all! It’s definitely not a bad situation or anything, so just calm down, okay?”

Jazzly straightened up. “Oh crap. Burcham’s coming, isn’t he?”

Kelyn whipped around, her eyes wide. “Whaaaaaat?” she whispered. “What would make you-”

“Ihhh… It’s too…” Jazzly pressed a finger under her nose, the tickles already growing. “It’s t-tuh… too late… huhhh… heeeehhhh…”

Kelyn balled her fists. “Dammit. Quick, get under the desk!”

Together, they dashed under the lieutenant’s desk and huddled close together, Jazzly pressing her hands over her mouth to muffle the sound of her worsening breath hitches. Kelyn turned to her and held a finger to her lips. A needless gesture, but Jazzly nodded anyways. She was trying.

The sound of heavily booted footsteps drew closer and closer, finally pausing just outside the doorway. Both the girls froze in horror when they heard the second set of footsteps. Two people, moving much more stealthily. They paused near the door as well.

“Private Jezper, Private Shaw,” came the lieutenant’s voice. “I thought you were instructed to be on the Training Deck.”

Jazzly’s eyes got huge upon hearing those names, and suddenly, so did the tickle.

“hhhhh… hhhhiiiih… h-hiiiiih… heeeehh…”

Her fluttering eyes brimmed with nervous tears, and she sniffled and rubbed her nose desperately, but the tickle was growing beyond her control.

“Yes sir,” Jezper was saying, “we were. We’re completing the drill given to us there, sir.”

Kelyn turned to Jazzly, a desperate, pleading look on her face.

“Jazzly,” she said, her trembling voice even lower than a whisper, “please, please hold it back. We’ll get kicked out of the division. They’ll send us to Earth, and we’ll never be able to come back to space again. It’s all over if you sneeze. For both of us.”

Jazzly sniffled quietly and mashed her nose harder. “Yuh… y-y-your muh-making it wuh-worse…”

“J-Jazz…” Kelyn’s voice sounded different. Strangled, choked back. Jazzly managed a glance over at her between blinks, she and was surprised to see her friend’s face covered with tears. “J-Jazz… p-please… I… I can’t lose this. You can fight it, Jazz. You were always the strongest.”

“I see,” Burcham’s was saying outside. “As you were, priva… hold on.”

“Is there a problem, sir?” Shaw’s voice this time.

“It would seem so.”

“heeeeh… ehhhh… haaaaaah…” Jazzly squeezed her eyes shut, putting as much determination as she could into holding back the urge to sneeze, but the sneeze was just as determined. It was too much. She wasn’t going to be able to do this. Not alone, anyway. She looked over at her friend, whose fists were clenched as she chewed her lip nervously.

 

Should Jazzly…

ask Kelyn to help her?

Spoiler

 

“Ihhhh… It’s t-too muh… m-muh… much… heh… help me, K-Kelyn.”

Kelyn swallowed hard. “What should I do?”

Jazzly, her fluttering eyelids filled with sneezy tears, tried to answer between strangled gasps, but her lungs were screaming and her face was hot and she knew if she tried to talk again, she wouldn’t be able to hold the sneezes back for another second.

“Okay,” Kelyn whispered. “Okay, don’t worry. I’ll take care of you. J-just… um…”

Making a split second decision, Kelyn swung her leg over Jazzly’s, straddling her hips for the second time that day, and pressed her hands tightly over Jazzly’s mouth. Jazzly winced a little at the pressure, but Kelyn held tight.

Meanwhile, Burcham was still talking to the boys outside.

“Attention, gentlemen. Prepare for inspection.”

“S-sir, we-”

“STAND AT ATTENTION!”

Kelyn drew close to Jazzly’s ear, her voice a nervous whisper.

“Okay, Jazz. Let them out.”

Jazzly’s eyes went wide, and she violently shook her head.

“Jazz, it’s okay. Just keep them quiet, and I’ll keep you covered. Trust me.”

Jazzly’s eyes flicked nervously back and forth a couple of times, but then they started to glaze over as her eyelids went slack.

“hhhntschk! hhtsch! nnntssch! Hhh… hssssshnck! hhhnnn’xtch!” Jazzly’s bleary eyes flicked open momentarily and met Kelyn’s, who smiled back at her. It was working. They were staying quiet. For now.

From outside, the sound of scuffling as the Lieutenant inspected the boys.

“Well, well. Would you look at that.”

“Sir, they were just-”

“I don’t recall asking for your input, private! I’m well aware of what these are.”

“B-but sir, we just-”

“These are standard issue regulation blasters. Off-limits to untrained privates. You’ve got no business having them in your possession.”

“hhhhtsssssch! Hhhhh… hhhnnnnntttttsssssch! Hhhhhtsssssssssh! Hhhhhhhih… hitssssssssssch!”

Kelyn bit her lip. The sneezes were still quiet, but they were getting louder. And they weren’t stopping. “Um… Jazz? C-can you keep it down… a little?” she whispered.

“B-but sir!” Jezper was shouting outside, “Th-they were only for training! W-we were doing a drill, and-”

“You expect me to believe my own sergeant would be stupid enough to put live weapons into the hands of a group of rookies for a drill? I take that as a direct insult to my intelligence. In fact, I think you I ought to take you to Rushworth now. We’ll see what he thinks of your story.”

As the sound of their footsteps echoed off down the hall, Kelyn relaxed and dropped her hands.

“All clear.”

At those words, Jazzly squeezed her eyes closed and gasped in massively, her back arching so hard it seemed about to break.

“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACHOOOOOOOOO! HUH… HUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Huh… HEH… Huh-EEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!”

Exhausted, Jazzly flopped back against the side of the desk, panting and wiping sweat from her brow.

“Damn,” Kelyn said with a smirk. “Bless you. I can’t believe you held all that in.”

Jazzly sniffled and rubbed her nose against her shirtsleeve. “I think Inconvenient Allergy makes them bigger than normal. They feel bigger, anyway.”

“Speaking of which, we’d better take care of that now. The boys are out of our way, but Burcham will probably be coming back soon, and we don’t want to be here when he does.”

Taking that as her cue, Miki projected herself into the vision of both girls.

“No prob! I’ve got the Fortitude program all booted up. Now you just gotta give me the card, and I’ll use it on Jazzly.”

With a tentative nod, Jazzly reached into her pocket. But she found it empty. She began looking around.

“What’s wrong Jazz?”

“My deck is gone. The card I need is on top.”

Kelyn began to look as well, but it didn’t take her long to find it behind Jazzly’s back.

“I got it,” she said as she began opening the box. “Must have fallen out when you were sneezing. The top card, right?”

“No!” Jazzly shouted as she reached for the deck. “Wait Kelyn! Don’t look!”

But Kelyn’s eyes were already drifting over the text of Purge Curses, reading it over and over.

“Jazz. What… is this?”

Jazzly dropped her eyes. “It… it’s the card I need Miki to play.”

“This card?”

 “Um… y-yeah…” She began nervously wringing her hands. “It… it gets rid of curses. It’ll get rid of Inconvenient Allergy.”

Kelyn looked up from the card and stared intently. “Do you know what this card does?”

Jazzly bit her lip hard, holding back tears. “It’ll fix me. It’ll make everything okay again, and then we won’t get kicked off and you can stay here. Just give Miki the card, Kel.”

“Jazzly, this is an attack card. Target takes 500 damage per curse removed. This is going to kill you.”

Jazzly shook her head, avoiding Kelyn’s gaze. “We don’t know that for sure. We don’t know how much 500 damage is in real life. Maybe it’ll just hurt me a little.”

“And maybe it won’t. Jazz, we can’t do this.”

“It’s risky, I know. But we have to. There’s no other wuh… huh… hhhiiiihhh…”

The tickle in Jazzly’s nose had come back once again as the girls heard footsteps approaching briskly. Lieutenant Burcham had returned, and he’d be arriving at any moment. Jazzly squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her finger under her nose.

“Guh… huh.. give M-Miki the cuh… the c-card, Kel.”

“No.”

Jazzly gritted her teeth and pressed harder, gasping in quietly. The tickle was growing faster than ever before. Jazzly wrinkled and rubbed her nose as hard as she could, but there was no stopping it.

“P-please, Kelyn, th-there’s nuh… no tuh… tuh… time! Guh… give h-her the cuh… the card n-now!”

“I can’t do it, Jazz. There’s got to be another way!”

Jazzly’s nose was in agony. She squeezed it tightly and blinked, but the tickle was growing and spreading like wildfire, and the lieutenant’s footsteps couldn’t have been more than 10 feet away.

“K-kel, thuh… there is nuh… no other… wuh… w-way… j-juh… huh… just… do ihh… hih… hiiiiih…”

The door swung open, and the lieutenant’s heavy footsteps walked through. That pushed Jazzly’s tickle over the edge. She couldn’t stop it, couldn’t hold it back anymore. This was the end of the line. Gritting her teeth and covering her mouth, she drew in a deep, deep breath, stretching the nanofibers of her uniform so hard that the color flickered, and tilted her head back.

Nothing happened. After a few seconds, Jazzly realized the tickle was gone. Vanished, like it had never existed at all. She exhaled quietly and opened her eyes to see Kelyn’s calm, smiling face.

She’d done it. Somehow, she’d done it.

Thankfully, the lieutenant never approached the desk. He grumbled to himself as he grabbed some texts off his bookshelf, then left the office as quickly as he had arrived. The moment he was out of earshot, both girls broke out into a fit of relieved laughter and hugged each other tightly.

“Miki,” Jazzly called, “is it over?”

The little sprite zipped happily into view, her wings shimmering. “It sure is! The script is gone, the data tunnel is closed, and… what do ya know? The hour is up! You win this round of Detection and Evasion!”

Jazzly sighed in relief as she slid to the floor.

“You okay, Jazz?” Kelyn was still smiling brightly.

“Yeah, just had enough adventure for one day.” She sat up and leaned in close to Kelyn. “How did you do it, Kel? I didn’t feel anything at all!”

Kelyn’s smile widened. “I gave Miki a different card.”

“A… a different…”

“Yup! I’ve seen your deck before. I know what’s in it.”

“But… I thought I checked all of them. Which card did you play?”

“Mirror Shield. Reflects the curse to a new target.”

“W-what? But you can only use that at the moment the curse is played!”

Kelyn shrugged. “I had Miki modify the script a little.”

“That’s… that’s…” Jazzly sighed again and smiled as she took Kelyn’s hands. “That’s amazing. You’re amazing.”

Kelyn gently squeezed Jazzly’s hands. “We’re in this together, remember? Until the end.”

Jazzly nodded. “Until the end.” Then, after clearing her throat a little, she asked, “Hey, I was wondering… Mirror Shield… it lets you choose a new target for the curse, right?”

The smile on Kelyn’s face changed just the slightest bit. It looked a little mischievous now.

“That’s right.”

“And it’s supposed to be a random target, but I’m guessing you had Miki modify that too, right?”

“Yup.” The smile widened. Clearly, Kelyn knew what was coming.

“So… who’d you send it to?

************************************

Jezper sighed deeply. He looked over at Shaw, whose face looked equally upset even in the dark storage closet where they were hiding. It was so unfair. They hadn’t even used the blasters, and they were going to have to stand trial just for carrying them! How ridiculous! They’d surely be let off easy. Right?

To make things worse, the virus was confirmed to be installed, but he couldn’t seem to access it for some reason. And to think; on top of everything, they hadn’t even been able to find Jazzly and Kelyn during the first round. What a horrible day.

Jezper check his timer. 20 minutes in, and no sign of the girls yet. He smirked. Of course not. They’d never find him and Shaw. Probably didn’t even know where to start looking.

All the same, he turned to Shaw and held a finger to his lips when he heard the girls’ voices from down the hall. They were close now, but they’d never think to look in here. They probably didn’t even know where the storage closet was. They were completely, totally, 100% safe, Jezper thought.

That’s when his nose started tickling.

YOU'VE REACHED THE END.

CONGRATULATIONS!

 

try to hold it back on her own?

Spoiler

 

Jazzly squeezed her eyes shut again. She couldn’t ask Kelyn to do this. This was her problem to fix. She squeezed her nose so hard that it made a little squelching sound, but somehow that only seemed to make it worse.

“hhhhhhihhh… eeeeeeh… heeeeeehhhhhh…”

Outside the door, the lieutenant continued, “Step inside my office immediately, privates, and prepare for inspection. I want a closer look at those bulges on your hips.”

As the door swung open and the footsteps came inside, Jazzly vaguely registered the fact that Lieutenant Burcham had spotted the blasters Jezper and Shaw were carrying. She opened her eyes at the thought. Maybe it would be okay. Maybe they’d get taken away, and the virus would be discovered, and the two of them wouldn’t get in any trouble. Maybe everything was going to work out.

Then the lieutenant flipped on the office lights, and Jazzly couldn’t take it anymore.

“HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOO! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HUH-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASHOOOOO! Huh… HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW! Ih… HIH… HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIITSCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!”

Jazzly sniffed and buried her face in her hands. Damn it.

“What the hell?!” the lieutenant roared, and a flurry of footsteps raced up to the desk. Jazzly looked up into Burcham’s beet-red face.

“Private Jazzly! Private Kelyn! What the hell are you doing in my office?!”

“N-nothing, s-sir…” Jazzly stammered. But then the tickle seized her again. “I was… HUUUUUUUUUESSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOO! It… it was foh… huh… HAAAAAAAAAAAAASHOOOOOOO! …for the… heh… Heeeeeehhhh…”

“Quit your sneezing this instant, Private Jazzly! Your superior is talking to you!”

Jazzly bit her lip, but it didn’t help. “heh-IIIIIIIIIISHEEEEEEEW! I’m s-sorry lieutehh… heh… HEEEEEEEEEEISHEEEEEEEEEEW! I c-can’t… huh… stuh… HUH… HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUHEEEEEEEASCHEEEEEEEEEEEW! I can’t stop!”

“Clearly,” growled Burcham.”Jezper, Shaw, you two can wait. Girls, step out from under my desk. You’ve got some explaining to do.”

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

 

 

 

 

try to get it out?

Spoiler

 

“N-no,” Jazzly insisted, “I can… I caaaahhh… can do iiiiih… it… hih…”

Jazzly closed her eyes and sniffed. That usually did the trick. This time, though, despite the tickle getting stronger, the sneezes just weren’t coming. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly and sniffed harder, but still nothing.

“I cah… I caaaaahhh… I can feel ih… it… it tih… tickles so bad… but it… wuh… won’t… come… out…”

“Come on, Jazzly, hurry!”

In desperation, Jazzly sniffed in as hard as she possibly could. Too hard, as it turned out.

Both of the boys in the room below froze and looked around.

“Did you hear that?” Shaw hissed.

“Of course I did. Forget looking out for a bit. Help me search the room. And Shaw?”

“Yes?”

“Blasters out.”

The boys began a canvassing pattern, their blasters pointed in front of them.

“Oh no,” Kelyn murmured.

She would have murmured something considerably stronger had she been aware of what was about to happen. The sneeze Jazzly was wrestling with, which had become impossibly huge, had chosen, without any warning, to stop being stuck.

“HAAAAAAAAAAAESSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOO!” The sneeze burst out before Jazzly could do anything to stop it. She vaguely registered the sound of Jezper shouting “The vent!” from far below, but before she even had time to think, she found herself drawing in a huge, gasping breath in preparation for the unstoppable fit of sneezes that was coming.

“Haaaaaahhhhh… HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH… HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEESSSSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOO! AAAAAAAAEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEEEEESHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! HAH… HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESCHOOOOOOOOOOOO! HEEEEEEEH… HEEEEEESCHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!”

When the fit was over, there was a brief, terrifying moment of complete silence. It didn’t last long. Just long enough for Jazzly to think how funny it would be to have DEATH BY SNEEZES written on her tombstone. Then the vent was assaulted by a hail of blaster fire.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

 

 

stay put?

Spoiler

 

“Jazz,” Kelyn argued, “they said they were going to check the verti-shuttle next. Maybe they’ll check the upper floors while they’re at it, and we can move then. Okay?”

Jazzly thought it over for a moment, but before she could finish thinking, the voices and footsteps of A team returned.

Unfortunately, so did the tickle in her nose. Only this time, it was worse. Much, much worse.

“Hihhhh… huuhhh…”

Kelyn shot her another angry glare and slapped her lightly on the shoulder, but she could barely register it.

“You go check the verti-shuttle, Shaw,” came Jezper’s voice. “I’ll look around here.”

“You got it,” replied Shaw’s voice. His footsteps faded, but Jezper’s slowly drew closer. Kelyn looked at Jazzly in horror. He was about to search the Field Simulation Room! Jazzly would have had the same look on her face had she not been far too busy dealing with the massive tickle in her nose, which was somehow still growing.

“Heeeeeh… ah-aaaaaahhhhh…” Jazzly cupped her hands around her nose and mouth, trying to muffle the sounds, but it didn’t do much good. Kelyn squeezed her shoulder and hissed “Shut up!” as though that could somehow stop her breath from hitching, which of course it didn’t.

Jezper’s footsteps were drawing closer and closer.

“Hhheeeeheeeeh… HAAAAH…” Jazzly hitched, her nostrils widening as her chest expanded.

The footsteps paused, dangerously near the stack of boxes they were behind.

Jazzly’s eyes widened in panic for only a moment before they fluttered shut.

“H-HAAAH… EEEEEEEH…”

“I heard that,” Jezper’s said, an audible smirk in his voice. But his footsteps hadn’t moved. Not yet.

Jazzly tried to fight it, she really did, but her body clearly had other plans for how this would go as her head began to tilt back against her will. Kelyn’s eyes widened as she realized what was about to happen, but she was powerless to stop it. They both were.

“HAAAAAAAAAA… AAAAAAAAAAAAAH…” Jazzly hitched hugely, and finally, the last of her fight left her. “HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEESHOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

“Gotcha!” Shouted Jezper, his footsteps resuming once again. But Jazzly wasn’t done yet.

“EEEEEEEAAAASHOOOOOO! HEEEEEEEIIIIIIISSSSHOOOOOOOO! Heh… HAAAAAAAAAEEEEEESCHOOOOOOO! Huh… HAH… HASHOOOOO!”

In despair, Jazzly lowered her hands to her sides, gathered her courage, and looked up into Jezper’s sneering face.

“Bless you, Jazzly dearest. And thank you so much for that wonderful display. It would’ve been tougher for me to win this game if you hadn’t been so, so bad at it.”

Jazzly’s face turned a deep red and she looked apologetically at Kelyn, who only shook her head in disappointment.

GAME OVER, MAN. GAME OVER!

GO BACK AND TRY AGAIN.

 

 

 

Edited January 22, 2019 by randomguy
Fixed faulty spoiler tags; colored dialogue

[Blah!?]

Hey, thanks again for doing this! I've always wanted to write my own choose your own adventure story, more in this kind of style than what I did with The Adventure Club or anything like that. It was really cool to see how this played out. This felt a lot like a sort of saturday morning cartoon, which is another style I've always wanted to take a stab at.

And again, it's just really cool to be an inspiration. Thanks a ton for that.

[poiub]

A masterpiece...!

[Mimaneneko]

This is super interesting, well done!