I’d grabbed him and Penny just before the previous race and shoved them into pet carriers. Rend appeared, grunted, and tried to push past me to get into the back of the truck. Donut was still in the chat with Mordecai, but she also released Mongo, who let out a screech and started jumping all around Rend, who giggled with excitement. Both acted like they hadn’t seen each other in months.
And then they both noticed the bear and the dog, who were now watching them.
Mongo let out a growl.
“It’s okay,” I said. “They’re friends.”
Mongo let out his happy oh-boy-new-friends shriek, and he started bounding toward them.
“Be careful!” Donut called. “Hedy, new gremlin guy! Make sure the stupid dog doesn’t hurt Mongo!”
“Okay,” I said. “We’re here. Now what?”
The announcement came. It wasn’t Cascadia, or Zev, or Damien. Or the AI.
It was Chaco.
Oh, hey, crawlers. Your boy Chaco here.
Mordecai: What the fuck?
Okay, so I have just been voluntold by the AI to be the Grand Master of the parade. I’m, like, really confused about what’s happening. I just know what I’ve been told. You should now have a timer in your interface, and it’ll start counting down at the end of this message. You will have ninety minutes to build your parade float procession. You may have more than one float. You may make your procession as long as you wish. There are twenty-three of you left, and when this message ends, your garage will be combined with those of one or two more teams. There will be five parade float groups. Each group is given a different theme.
The parade route is three kilometers long. You will be flanked by spectators along the route. They will not be able to attack you.
“What the hell?” I muttered.
There will be a narrative element to the parade. Near the end of the route, you will pass the judging stands, and if you have any performance, this is where it should commence. Soon thereafter, the progression ends at an arena. This arena represents the crawl itself, and that’s when you’ll be able to finally fight.
You will enter the arena, and it will be populated with monsters you previously killed on the tenth floor or their stand-ins, along with a floor boss. You defeat the floor boss, and the stairwell opens.
Simple. I guess. Yeah, I don’t really understand it, either. So I guess I’ll see you guys in ninety minutes.
The speaker blared a bit of feedback, but we could still hear Chaco for a few seconds.
“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, I’m gonna fucking die. I’m gonna die.”
Mordecai: I hope you do, you coward murderer.
A moment passed, and then the entire room flashed. It was suddenly much bigger. There was another flash. Then three vehicles appeared in the room: an ice-cream truck, one of those trucks with stairs from the airport, and a battered Toyota Tundra. And at the end of the line stood multiple gremlins, a small group of mostly human engineers, and Sweety the giant tapir. Prepotente and Jurgen were there as well.
The three extra vehicles were all from Prepotente looting garages.
Bianca let out a roar at the intrusion. Onikuma the bear roared back, and Bianca started chittering ominously. Mongo letout a screech and started rushing toward the newcomers, Rend following and giggling.
“Carl, I am in charge of designing the parade float,” Donut whispered as we walked to meet the other crawlers. “Don’t let Prepotente design anything. Also, I know we’re running low on time, but I need to get my spell book of the floor prize. I got robbed when we skipped the seventh floor, and I’m not going to let that happen again.”
Y-y-you have been assigned float procession five. You have received your theme for the parade. Your theme is “Vengeance.” You have ninety minutes to complete your float procession. You may use anything in the garage, inventory, or safe room.
Make it pretty. This is a celebration, after all.
“Vengeance?” Donut asked, scoffing. “How do we design a vengeance theme? What does that even mean? Hmmm. I guess that’s like revenge, right? It’s too bad we don’t have Katia or Juice Box. I could have them do a Blair, and you could play Nate. But I don’t know how I’d put it on a parade float.”
“What?” I asked. “Who?”
“After Chuck sold Blair to his uncle Jack for a hotel, Blair slept with Nate as revenge. It was one of the most pivotal moments in the history of television, Carl.”
“I don’t think the aliens will care about something that happened onGilmore Girls.”