The Gauntlet (The Cage 3)

She handed over several scraps of paper. Cora took each one and studied them carefully. Her hands shook a little as she imagined being in the Gauntlet itself just days from now. Willa had been there once, sequestered in a ten-by-ten-by-ten puzzle cube, trying to solve this very same puzzle. What had been going through the chimp’s head? Had she been confident? Scared?

Each paper held a number.

46

823

4164

38

1022

Willa took out her notebook and wrote:

Sort out the numbers and you will end up with one word. The word will be your key to solving the puzzle.

Cora took a deep breath. Rolf would have probably been able to solve it in thirty seconds. But Rolf wasn’t able to help her now. She was on her own, just like she’d be in the Gauntlet. No Lucky and his morals. No Rolf and his number games. No Nok with her gift for language, no Leon to climb walls for her.

She set the scraps of paper on the bench and started rearranging them. She tried to order them like a numerical crossword, but it led to nothing. She tried reading them backward, then tried using multiples, and then tried factoring numbers by each other. Nothing.

Sensing her frustration, Willa picked up the 46, set it at the top of the bench, and then drew out a 2 in the dust beneath it.

Cora studied the scraps of paper. “Two? You mean that the missing link between four and six is two? But how does that form a word?” It suddenly clicked. “B? You mean it’s alphabetical?” She started moving the squares faster, using trial and error until she found a relationship among all the numbers, then translated them alphabetically into letters that she rearranged to spell a word.

B-E-L-O-W.

“Below?” Cora said.

Willa wrote in her notebook:

Good. In the Gauntlet, each chamber has six doors, one on each wall. When I solved this puzzle, it told me that I should go through the lowest door—BELOW—to move on to the next. Of course, each iteration of the Gauntlet is different. It is unlikely you will get this exact puzzle.

And then she added:

It took me only sixty seconds to solve.

Cora read the note and rolled her eyes. “We can’t all be genetically modified supergenius chimpanzees.”

Willa smiled.

Cora looked again at the number puzzle and her mood shifted back to one of worry. “Cassian said some of the puzzles were dangerous. A lot more dangerous than just getting the wrong door. He said that out of eleven humans who have run the Gauntlet before, none of them survived.” She paused. “Isn’t there anything else you can tell me about it? How it works, how it strategizes? Why it’s so dangerous?”

The smile fell from Willa’s face. Her fingers started drumming anxiously over her pencil. Cora couldn’t see her eyes behind the goggles, but she sensed Willa was thinking back on memories she’d rather not remember.

At last, the chimp wrote:

The Gauntlet wants you to feel confident—a false confidence that will trick you into arrogance. The psychological tests start from the very beginning. They get harder. I made it as far as the eighth puzzle chamber. It was a moral puzzle—

The pencil stopped moving in her hand.

“A moral puzzle?” Cora asked, surprised. “I thought you failed in a perceptive one.”

Willa shook her head and then held up the pencil in the air. When she took her hand away, the pencil hovered in empty air. Cora started. All this time, Willa was that effortlessly perceptive? And she had still failed the Gauntlet?

Willa plucked the pencil out of the air and wrote:

The Gauntlet gave me a perceptive puzzle in module five. The puzzle chamber caught fire on all four sides. I couldn’t get to any doors without putting the fire out, but there was nothing but sand in a box too high to reach. I had to use telekinesis to move the sand to smother the fire, or I would have died.

And then . . .

She paused, her hand shaking slightly. Cora wasn’t certain she would continue until she wrote:

Puzzle six was an intellectual puzzle. A word problem, but in real life. It was about determining when two trains would intersect. The trick was not to crash them. One broke through the wall, letting me into puzzle seven. That module was a physical puzzle. Balance. That one was easy for me, of course, but a Conmarine runner in a different module fell and died. And then puzzle eight. The moral one.

Her lips were set firmly.

After a moment, Cora rested a hand over hers and said, “You don’t have to tell me. Not until you’re ready.”

Willa hesitated for a few moments and then wrote:

The final four puzzles make up the third round. In the third round, they will make it personal. They need to know that the Gauntlet is real for you. That round is when I—

Willa stood abruptly.

It doesn’t matter. I failed. That is all you need to know.

Willa left in a hurry. Cora sat on the bench alone, studying the scraps of Willa’s notes, wondering what had traumatized Willa so much that she couldn’t even discuss it. When she looked up, she saw Anya standing by the doorway, half hidden behind a white fern. How long had she been there, watching?

Cora held up a hand in a small wave. “Anya?”

Anya hesitated, her features tight, and quickly crossed the balcony to Cora’s bench. She sat a little closer than normal. Her hands were shaking again.

“What did Willa say to you?” Anya asked.

Cora’s eyes widened. “Willa? Just the usual advice.” She tilted her head. “Are you okay? I know we haven’t had a lot of time to talk outside of training, but you haven’t been acting like yourself ever since Fuel Station Theta. I’ve barely even seen you except for trainings and meals.”

“I’ve been trying to see if I could get any information from the children,” Anya said. Again, she looked toward where Willa had gone. “Willa didn’t say anything else about the Gauntlet? No other advice?”

“Not much. I think it troubles her to talk about it.”

Anya’s face relaxed slightly.

“What’s wrong?” Cora asked. “I thought you and she were friends.”

“I thought so too,” Anya said. “But I sense something different about her. I can’t put my finger on it, but I don’t think you should trust any advice she gives you. It’s been a long time since I knew her, and her loyalties might have changed.”

Before Cora could ask more, Bonebreak came onto the balcony.

“Well, little childrens. Guess what just landed on the surface.”

Cora felt a nervous thrill. “The Gauntlet?”

Bonebreak nodded. “The preliminary modules docked at first light. It is constructing itself as we speak. And fortunately for you, I have some friends who monitor the transport hub near the surface. I’ve arranged for them to be conveniently absent so that we can take a private tour.” He rubbed his hands together in glee.

Cora started. “Now?”

“Yes, while the storms are holding off.”

Cora stood.

Anya jumped up. “I’ll come too!”

“No.” Cora wasn’t even sure what instinct had made her answer so quickly. There was no reason not to trust Anya. Anya was more dedicated to humanity’s freedom than practically anyone else in the universe. But Cora couldn’t shake an uneasy feeling. “You still haven’t entirely recovered. You should rest. I’ll go alone.”