The Intelligence Test

Chapter 4

"A giant snake?" Skylar asks. "In the dark?"

"It could be a dragon," I suggest, in an attempt to slow down my racing heart. "Maybe a giant lizard."

"Comforting."

"You're welcome."

"I never got a thank you for saving you from the robotic cats, did I?"

"I helped you put the skeleton together! Doesn't that compensate?"

"Fair enou-"

The loud hissing interrupts us again. This time, it's accompanied by loud footsteps and the swishing of a tail.

I slow down my pace. "Reptiles can see in the dark, right?" I whisper.

"That's not helping!" Skylar whisper-shouts back.

"It's sort of helping me?"

"My bad!"

"They really should've given us flashlights..."

The bottom of the staircase comes into view, leading to a stone platform. There are a few torches on the wall. This provides light, but not enough to see our opponent.

I nearly collapse with relief when I see black metal gates on the left. Whatever was hissing must've been behind it. A long, scaly green tail hits the gate angrily, as though to prove my claim.

"Don't falter," Skylar says as quietly as he can. "It could still break the gate."

I turn my attention to the floor. "Look..."

The floor has the three same symbols as on the walls; Triangle, Omega, Circle. They're much larger this time, taking up a third of the floor respectively.

As far as I can tell, there's no way we can get past these symbols without stepping on at least one. That's a bad thing, due to the fact that space around each symbol is carved into a giant tile. This means that they are pressure plates.

This also means that stepping on the wrong one might or might not open the gates and grant us a bloody, painful death.

The beast within the gates thrashes again. Blood sprays across the middle Triangle tile.

Skylar flinches. "Is it one tile, or two?"

He has a good point. Two people can stand on two at once. But which ones would be the correct ones? I didn't see anything in particular from the wall carvings that would give it away.

Skylar must not know either. He says," I'll go back up to look for clues-"

I follow him back up. He wouldn't want to go alone anyways.

The omega means last.. Or 800 in the Greek metric system. In the same context, triangles represent change, or delta. The circle symbolizes protection, the Circle of Life.

"Do you think Circle's the right one? Y'know, 'cause circle of life... we'll live.."

I peer up at Skylar. I must've been speaking aloud. "Or it could be Delta. To change the creature inside."

"What if it turns into a bunny rabbit? Then we wouldn't have to be scared of it.."

We stop where the blood stains stop. There's gotta be some sort of telltale...

I see the greek numeral for two on one of the tiles. When I point this out to Skylar, he says," I guess two tiles need to be pushed then..."

I don't know how Skylar eventually formed the theory that it should be Omega and Circle. I don't have any other ideas, though, so I follow.