The man with no name thought about his predicament a little more before he started
shooting. He didn’t know what would happen if he fell off the tower. He didn’t know
if there was a person responsible for the thing. And he didn’t know how much trouble
he was actually in.
He did know it was connected to the Alvas he had been hunting, but he didn’t see his
quarry anywhere.
He had walked into an alley, and then fell here. He had crossed a dimensional border
somewhere. And he had no way to cross back.
He bent down and examined the blocks he stood on. They were wooden to the touch,
about ten feet long, and looked to be cut eight by eight thick. They were uniform
enough to come from a saw mill, or magic design.
He didn’t see any openings. He paced the roof of the tower as he thought about his
next move.
He thought that if he had some kind of door magic this wouldn’t be that much of a
problem. He could just reverse the process and land back in the alley.
He looked over the side again. He didn’t see the ground. There were too many clouds
in the way. He saw something poking out of the wall of the tower. It looked like one
shoe.
He supposed he knew what happened to the owner of the single shoe from the alley
now. He wondered if he was going to undergo the same process. He didn’t like that
at all.
He didn’t have anything to worry about as long as nothing came at him while he was
trying to think of a way out of the place.
Maybe Stupid would think of something. He smiled at that. He doubted the horse
cared about what happened to him as long as he found someone else to feed him.
And somehow he knew as long as he was in this place, he didn’t have to worry about
the time limit he was under until he got back to the real world. The only thing he had
to worry about was what might be in the space with him.
And finding someone who could send him back might be the best way to use his time.
He still had a stack of cards to serve. He couldn’t depend on someone coming to look
for him just because he had fallen off the map. That would be asking too much for a
second man with no name to find him.
One of the pieces of wood started to slide away from the roof. He watched it as it fell
off the roof and headed down into the clouds. He saw that there was a second layer
of wood crosswise to the roof pieces.
He frowned as he considered pieces of wood being pulled out of the tower while he
was still at the top. What would happen him if the thing collapsed? Would he survive
any type of fall?
How much could he take before he couldn’t go on anymore? Did he want to find that
out?
He needed to start making his way down before he found out the hard way.
He decided to kick one of the edge pieces over the side. He could keep doing that to
make steps if he was careful enough.
He walked over to the edge of the roof and pushed one of the roof pieces off. It felt
lighter than it should from the way it was built. He didn’t watch it fall. He considered
the next piece he needed to push off.
A piece from lower in the tower was pulled out. He felt the ground shake as the wood
moved under unseen hands.
How many more could be pulled out before the thing fell over. He had to work faster
if he didn’t want to be crushed, or drop into a bottomless hole.
He picked a piece on the layer under him and sent it out into space. That gave him
part of a step.
The third layer was crosswise in the same direction as the roof. He nodded. That was
just like he expected. He decided on a piece there as another piece was shoved out
from a random layer below him.
He decided that the piece pulling was to seem fair for some reason. Four pieces pulled
out in the same place could drop part of the tower like that. Apparently it was better
to just pull one out in a different layer and let the tower drop when it reached a certain
limit. He had to be below that limit if he wanted to keep moving down.
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He kicked out the third layer piece and decided that might give him a hand hold if he
decided to start climbing down the outside of the tower instead of waiting for it to
fall.
He looked for a fourth layer piece and decided to knock one of the edges out so he
could have another handhold. He might be able to form a ladder if he was fast
enough.
Was that what the other guy thought before he was crushed?
The dead man took a moment as the next piece was pulled far below. There was no
way he could knock out enough pieces with his hands to avoid the problem of the
tower falling. He needed a faster way down that didn’t require him pulling pieces out.
He couldn’t climb down because the pieces were too smooth to get a grip and the
edges were pressed together so he couldn’t get his fingers in the edges. If he tried
that, he would just slide to his death.
And he was not willing to be beaten before he was done with his job.
He leveled one of his pistols at the floor. He pulled the trigger. Flame blasted a hole
in the wood. He nodded. He was going to have to shoot his way out of his problem.
He pulled his other pistol and started shooting. He wished had the foresight to bring
his heavy carbine, but he hadn’t thought the blaster was necessary. He knew better
now.
He sensed the pieces being pulled faster below him in the way the tower swayed but
concentrated fire on the floor below him. He blasted holes through the wooden pieces
and kicked them out of the way where he could. The remains held up the edges as he
worked his way down.
He thought he heard a growl of anger but let his pistols drown the sound out. He
could see the walls on either side of him swaying. He knew the pieces above him
might start coming down at any moment. He needed to do something about that if he
wanted to get out of this with his skin intact.
He blasted at the pieces to his right. He saw part of the wall collapse and fall into
nothing. It took that part of the roof with it. He smiled as turned and blasted the left.
That part started collapsing on top of him. He started blasting the floor, trying to
outrun the wooden beams coming down on top of him. He fell into a clear space as
the beams dropped into where he had been standing.
That had been a piece of luck. He didn’t try to stand. The hole above him was covered
with crossbeams. He had to keep going down.
He fired into the floor and continued working his way through the wood. He decided
that the invisible forces running the tower knew he was still alive. He could hear
other pieces being removed as he worked.
How many more could be taken out before the whole thing fell over?
He realized he didn’t know how far off the ground he was if there was a ground in the
first place. The tower might be the only thing in the dimension. And he was wrecking
it while trying to figure out what was going on.
A voice boomed in the air that he had reached level fifty. He paused for a second to
consider what that meant.
He had either reached the midpoint of the pile, if the pile was a hundred levels. Or he
had a long way to go to reach the bottom.
He decided that he had reached the midpoint and needed to fight his way down the
rest of the way before the tower finished collapsing. He had bought himself some
time knocking the top off. He needed to keep using that to keep moving.
He couldn’t wait to talk to whomever had created this monstrosity. They might not
be on his warrant cards but he doubted he and the man with one shoe were the only
ones that had stumbled into the space. He also doubted any of the others had firearms
to defend themselves like he did.
Being crushed by falling blocks because you were trying to climb down some magical
tower needed to be avenged by his way of thinking. And luckily an avenger was right
there to do that.
He continued to work his way down. The barrels of his pistols were red hot from the
constant firing. He let one cool down and holstered it. He would need it later. He
couldn’t overwork it now.
The dead man hit a clear space and thought he had reached another spot that had been
drawn from on his way down. He saw holes where he could see the sky beyond.
Clouds drifted by to let him know he was closer to the ground than he supposed.
He knew real clouds didn’t circle like those did unless caught up in a wind funnel.
He moved to the edge and looked out. He could see the ground now. It was a platform
of wooden blocks around the tower. They stretched to the horizon, but the horizon
was close. He supposed the world was smaller than he liked.
A piece flew out of the tower close to the ground. He could see the rest sway. A few
more like that and it would fall over with him riding it to the ground.
He decided he could take a risk now that he was close to the ground. He didn’t like
it, but it was better than letting an unknown monster kill him.
He shook the red hot weapon to cool it down to holster it. He drew the other one. He
looked down the sides of the rectangular cube. He was going to have to get out
on the wall and use that to reach the bottom without getting killed.
It sounded easier than it looked as he readied himself to go.
He climbed out through the opening. He started sliding down the side of the tower.
He took aim and fired his pistol at the wall below him. A divot appeared as he headed
for his doom.
He was able to put his foot in the divot and stop his slide. He hugged the wall to keep
from falling backwards to his death. He waited for a second as a crosspiece fell out
of the tower somewhere above where he should be.
He shot and dropped again. The top of the tower swayed as he caught himself. The
wood started to fall in his direction. He dropped the last few feet and moved to
let the wood crash off the stand that he stood on.
“You won,” said a voice in the air. “Let’s play again.”
“I don’t think so,” said the dead man. “I think you should stop with your games.
You’re killing people for fun.”
“Why else would I kill people?,” said the voice. “Let’s play again.”
“No,” said the dead man. “Play time is over.”
A face surrounded by arms appeared in the sky above him. It snarled as the arms
reached down to teach him a lesson. No one decided play time was over until she
decided play time was over.