Today the Bones Blog brings you Chapter Four of this Bionicle Paracosmos blog-exclusive "Adventure Mystery" short epic, which serves as a slow-reveal of the winner of the Monster Mystery Art contest.



In Le-Metru, I had just entered the cave that the Unseen Monster used to leave the scene of its kidnapping…

Hujo ran down the cave, holding his Blue Fire Staff up for light, and staying partly in his trance state so he could sense the Monster’s path.

Five minutes over.

As he’d been doing every five minutes, Hujo stopped, flared the blue flames brightly for a moment, then, seeing no threat, closed his eyes. Sunk deeper into the trance state.

He ‘saw’ the Soulsong traces on the floor and walls of the cave, and then reached ahead with his sense.

Soon he would enter a large cavern, he saw. The monster’s Soulsong was all over this place. Its lair?

Hujo pulled out of the trance and ran forward.

Finally he reached the entrance to the cavern. He slowed, flared the staff again, and entered. Blue light cast upon a jumble of sights.

First, the cave was also the intersection of two chutes.

Only one of the two transportation tubes was in operation, magnetized protowater flowing along it with various pieces of cargo floating inside. Where the two tubes met, there was a large raised structure that looked like a long-unused chute transfer station. Bits of rubble from this ancient structure and from the broken second chute littered the ground.

Second, there were a number of pipes on the far side of the cave.

Dirt piled underneath that part. Hujo gathered that something – the Unseen perhaps? – had dug there, expanding the reach of the cave to this pipe structure. Some of the pipes were almost as big as the chute. Either type of tube could probably be used by the Unseen.

Third, to the right of the pipes, there was a corner of a foundation of one of Le-Metru’s skyscrapers. This too looked like it had been dug open. The protocrete in one part had been shattered, perhaps by the Unseen, perhaps by the Great Cataclysm a millenia ago, and this hole too was big enough for the Unseen.

Fourth, there were many stalactites hanging from the roof, the pipes, and the chutes, as well as stalactities and columns clogging the cavern.

In some places these formations were so thick and numerous they resembled a jungle, especially by the cavern walls. If the Unseen dug out those pipes, Hujo thought, looking at the stalactite buildup there, it’s been here a long time.

It was possible.

The Matoran had only just returned to Metru Nui days ago, and from what Hujo had read in the Unknown’s tablets, whatever the monster was, it could easily have been a normal, if rare, Rahi until now. The Third Faction altered every Unseen before sending them on their rampages.

Hujo pushed these thoughts aside. There would be time for analysis later. Was the Unseen here now?

Hard to tell… he thought, looking at the countless shadows cast by all the stuff here. And ‘here’ could be inside that skyscraper, along the chute tunnels, in the pipes…

There was only one easy way to tell. Time for another soulsong trance.

Meanwhile…

Volitaos snuck back into Turaga Dume’s throne room…

The room was empty.

He ran around behind the throne – his feet making no sound thanks to the hoversandals, and he stayed invisible.

No Dume.

He couldn’t help it – the shapeshifter wondered if the Unseen had been here.

But was the Unseen actually in its lair?

Hujo created a firecage around himself, then slipped halfway into his trance state.

He heard no active soulsongs…

And no traces.

He opened his eyes. Even though he’d sensed the Unseen’s traces abundantly before he’d entered, once he was inside, he couldn’t sense it at all. Why?

Answer: Something must be dampening his sensory power – but not affecting the Blue Fire, thankfully.

Hujo carefully retreated to the cavern’s entrance, and stepped outside. Made another firecage. Trance.

Nothing.

The dampening effect must have a range…

So he ran back the way he’d come, to where he’d sensed the cavern before. Firecage. Trance.

There. He sensed it all again.

But the problem was, it was so complex and he was so far away, it was like trying to read a tablet full of small text from across a village. He couldn’t tell if he heard only soulsong traces, or if among those traces, the real thing lurked.

So I’ll have to do it the hard way… Great.

Back in the Coliseum…

Volitaos found Turaga Dume, alive and unharmed… physically, anyways.

The elder was wandering the halls alone, in direct defiance of Hujo’s advice to remain in groups of five. But then, Dume was the ruler of this city, and long ago, Hujo was just another Ta-Matoran under the Fire elder’s watch. Volitaos could only imagine what Dume felt towards the Jahurungi giving out such advice… or orders, arguably. Resentment? Jealousy?

But Dume had been honorable in his time. Volitaos for one had never expected this psychological downward spiral, even with all the hardship Dume had suffered.

What could be done about it?

He didn’t know.

From Dume’s perspective…

Where was that safe? Dume thought to himself, as he walked from room to room. It had been well over a millenia since he had considered opening it, so it was understandable that he’d forget it.

Finally, he found it. Still locked, just as he’d left it.

Dume went up to it, and unlocked it with the key. Inside, he found…

“Nothing?!” The elder stared at the empty inside of the room. The other part of the key was missing…

He looked down at the key in his hand. Beautiful, yes, but incomplete.

There are still ways, though… The elder started walking. Towards the next safe.

Volitaos followed him…

The invisible shapeshifter walked along, wondering what Dume had expected to find in the safe. Whatever it was, Raogahk’s intangible pet had just stolen it. Volitaos had worried the move had just been a distraction so the Unseen could attack Turaga Dume.

But now it looked like Dume knew something important, and Raogahk was after it too. And the Third Faction, if the Trickster was truly working for them.

Suddenly Dume stopped at a window and roared in laughter violently again. Volitaos stopped abruptly, honestly a bit scared at the outburst.

“Oh Trickster!” Dume shouted out the window. “Bright minds think the same! HAHAHAHA!”

Then Dume started walking again, as if he was acting perfectly normally. He nodded at a group of five Matoran guarding another safe – they just stared at him – and he unlocked it.

Dume looked in for just one second, then grabbed the shoulders of one of the Matoran, his muscles tight. “THE BEAUTY IS MORE COMPLETE!”

He ran in, laughing so hard it could really only be described as a cackle, and grabbed another key. Then he placed both keys together – some of the various and seemingly random cubelike shapes on them interlocked.

“Stop guarding this spot now,” Dume announced to the Matoran, suddenly in a calm, authoritative mode again. “Nothing left to guard.” Then he launched into his giddy mode as if someone had flipped a switch.

As Volitaos watched the Turaga practically dance down the hallway – and pause once to smash a perfectly innocent potted plant – he couldn’t help but wonder…

Maybe the keys were safer with the Trickster.

Back in the apparent lair of the Unseen…

Hujo had spent several minutes searching through the cavern to no avail, when finally something happened.

A dark shape, a blur of motion.

It was among the jungle of pipes and stalactites. Hujo sent tendrils of Blue Fire that way, hoping to illuminate the shadowy corners. He called on his mask of Precision, using the Btou staff in his pack to activate its powers, and the flames expertly avoided touching or melting the pipes.

He saw nothing.

The Ta-Matoran froze in indecision. He could move in himself and search every corner directly… but he was afraid. The Blue Fire Staff couldn’t protect him if he was knocked out in a surprise attack. The pipes were so closely packed, he knew he’d have to actually crawl through portions. And who knew how many holes there were in the pipes on the sides not facing him, making the pipes themselves hiding places for the Unseen?

Yet, who else could explore it? A Toa certainly wouldn’t fit, if any were here – and they weren’t.

Then he had an idea.

A better approach would be to triangulate the source of the dampening power. Since the Blue Fire still worked, he could just destroy that source, presumably some kind of artifact, and then his ‘soul-deafness’ would be lifted.

Triangulation meant he needed to find the borders. But the borders were probably all outside this cavern. The cave entrance formed one point of the triangle… now he needed two more.

He looked at the dark tunnels of the defunct chute.

That will work.

And back to the Coliseum…

Surkahi knew that Volitaos was nearby. How he knew was a secret he tried not to focus on, in case of a telepathic spy. But he did indeed know that the other Unknown was trailing Dume invisibly.

Yet Surkahi was totally visible, in his normal sand-colored bulky Matoran form, standing in the Turaga meeting room, when Dume entered. At any other time, this contrast would be a contradiction... but this was a time of change for his people. From Unknown, they were becoming Known... but still only 'becoming.'

The other Turaga were there as well, even Turaga Takanuva, although Dume had forbidden Takanuva from joining in normal elder meetings. This was not a scheduled meeting; this was just where the Turaga had decided to stay as long as the monster was loose. Surkahi was acting as a guard, of sorts.

Dume came in, holding a strange key. But he didn’t speak.

Instead, he just went up to the table in the center of the room, and banged hard on it.

“What was that for?” Turaga Nokama exclaimed.

But then they all saw. Dume had banged the table so hard, a hidden panel had bounced up. Dume had then slipped a finger under it before it fell back down. And lifted it totally open.

Surkahi stared, amazed that he had never seen that panel before. What was going on?

Dume placed the key in a hole inside the panel, and turned it.

“That,” Dume said, “was what the Trickster didn’t want me to be able to do. Just the first part in the only plan we have left now.”

Then the elder calmly walked up to a potted plant near the door. Tilted his head at it, as if admiring its beauty.

Smashed it with his staff.

Surkahi jumped a bit. The other Turaga glanced at each other.

Clearly, they hadn’t been included in this 'plan.'



Feel free to review, theorize, ask questions, etc. by adding a comment to this chapter blog entry, and stay tuned for the next chapter as a new blog entry.