Dungeon

CHAPTER 22 - THE KRIOTEX CONUNDRUM

"You really think he would make it that easy for us?"

Ethan turned back and saw Bryan still pondering over the letter in his hand. "What's missing? We already know he's an atheist, and he's pointing out Dalí, who was an atheist himself."

Bryan shuffled with the paper and turned to Juan with a skeptical eye. "Is this all that you have got?"

Juan gave a quick nod, but Bryan's eyes were quick enough to catch the nervousness that now spread across the officer behind Juan. He moved toward the man and shoved the letter into his palm. "You know something, don't you?"

Juan was surprised to see the sudden confrontation, yet the anxiety in the man proved beyond doubt that he indeed knew something. "Qué hiciste?"

The officer knew that he could no longer conceal the lie within himself. Bryan saw the man speaking in rapid Spanish, and though he couldn't understand a thing, he knew that it wasn't any good. Juan strode towards the man and pushed him towards the metallic door. "Apártate de mi vista!" Get out of my sight!

The officer pushed back tears of fury, gave a small bow, and left, closing the huge metallic door behind him. Juan slumped back onto the chair and rummaged through his hair. He motioned for the duo to sit down, but apparently saw the worry on their faces and shook his head. "There's something you guys need to know."

Bryan and Ethan took their seats, hesitance painted across their faces. Bryan's eyes bore into Juan's, trying to plunge out the secret he was about to tell them. "What is it?"

Juan cleared his throat and fought back the embarrassment that was welling up inside him. "Uhm, well, it so happens that the original letter didn't apparently contain anything about Dalí." As expected, he saw a gush of fury roaring within Ethan, but to his surprise, he saw Bryan calm, whose face now had a knowing smile.

Bryan moved forward, took the letter from Juan, and held it high up in the air. "The letter is written with pyranine dye. The moment I saw the letter, I understood that it was tampered with. Your officer erased the original word with lemon and replaced it with its anagram. Little did he know that this room contains blue light through which the original pyranine dye would be clearly visible."

Ethan strained his eyes, which were now high up in the air, in unison with Bryan's hand. "Me-Medial's Hoed?" Ethan's mind tried to arrange the pieces together, and it seemed to hit a definite chord. "Wait! Medial as in the celestial matron?"

Juan nodded and heaved a huge sigh. Ethan turned towards Bryan and gave him a cryptic smile. "Let's fill you in with a bit of history here. Mediel, also known as the celestial matron, is the goddess of stars who is revered by a group of faithful known as the Stellarians. She is rumored to be the consort of Krios, the god of constellations, and Kri-" Ethan's tongue felt like it did a double knot as his eyes bulged out with anticipation. He turned toward Juan and raised an eyebrow. "You don't happen to have a kriotex with you, right?"

Juan shifted uneasily in his chair, his hand slipping through a pocket on his neatly ironed pants. "You mean this weird-looking Rubix cube?"

Ethan stared in horror at a cube that now lay on Juan's palm. He took the cube from his hand and gaped in wonder. He gave a ghoulish look towards Juan and wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. "Did anyone try solving this cube?"

Juan stood up and straightened his tie. "Well yes, in fact, we tried it twice."

Ethan felt like his nerves were wracking within him. "What did you all do! The more you guys turn it, the faster you guys dig your own grave." He pointed to the timer on the screen, which now reads thirteen hours.