Once Hacker is gone, the tense unease slowly bleeds away, even the little Treasure Bear looks a bit scared out of its golden head. But also, with Hacker gone the crashing realization that I’m helpless to do anything to help my “safe” brother creeps in.

As much as I hate to admit it, Hacker was right, if only because it didn’t tell me how to help, but I’m stuck, a puppet to its whims until I either figure out how to free Zeke with its help or on my own.

I sigh, running a hand through my pink hair less to push it out of my face and more to give my hands something to do that’s not tearing open my palms with too tight fists again. It feels wrong to purposefully make myself bleed with my brother in the room.

I want to both keep looking at Zeke and also stop, heart torn in two separate directions, I need to know he’s safe, but seeing him trapped, frozen still like a corpse is even more painful. So, I focus my attention on the only other thing in the room, leveling the weird little monster with a look, “You going to tell me anything useful or you like Hacker and full of stupid ass riddles?

“Master can only tell us so much! It’s not their fault!”

“So, you know more then?”

“Uh…” it shifts where it stands and dives back into its chest, “master only tells me what I need to know.”

“So, you're useless,” I summarize, “great.”

“I’m not useless!” it defends, stomping its little feet. “I’ve done my job! I’ve kept the hero safe all this time!”

I level it with a dark look, even though I know its not really its fault. Hacker is just as much its boss as they are mine, but still… it’s a nauseating feeling to realize that my brother is meant to play a role in hacker’s schemes. But just to make sure I ask, “Is my brother the hero?”

The treasure bear points to the crystal, “That’s the hero, I was born to protect and guide him for master.”

“And?”

“And...” the little creature trails off, glancing away from me, “and that was all I needed to know.”

‘Fuck,’ I think, forcing out a sigh to ease my rising blood pressure. I really want to smack something, but first I need to finish this pointless conversation, maybe this thing knows something useful. “Do you know how to free him?”

“Oh!” It cheers, hoping excitingly, “Of course! I wouldn’t be worth my gold if I didn’t know that! Every Treasure Bear knows everything about the treasure they are born from!”

“Wait really?” and I move over to peer into the chest, a real smile stretching across my face. ‘Seems I really did strike gold with this weird little thing!’. “How?”

It squints its little eyes up at me at my sudden mood shift and glances around as if expecting Hacker’s window to blink to life and warn it to not say anything. Honestly, I’m expecting Hacker to do the same and shut down my one chance at getting any info, but either the not-system is too busy elsewhere or it doesn’t care what we talk about as long as we don’t kill each other, because oddly enough, no threatening, bolded window appears.

Still, the little monster gives me a wary look, seems it is a better judge of character than I first gave him credit for. “Master said you could know that?”

“Yep,” I agree popping the P, to give me a few extra seconds to scramble for a believable lie. “They told me earlier but said I should ask you for the details.” It’s rushed, but I think it sounds at least half convincing, plus the little guy has already shown to have a bit of an ego, all I need to do is play into that and he’ll spill anything. Thankfully the little guy also isn’t the shiniest gold coin in the bunch and happily nods eagerly, nearly bouncing where it stands in excitement.

“Then I shall tell you all you need to know to free the hero!”

With a little hop it lands on the edge of its chest, and gestures out towards Zeke, “It’s pretty simple. I believe players have legends and fairytales about things like this already, so I’m surprised you didn’t already guess how to save him. A prince encased in ice, forced into a magical slumber, and guarded by a helpful magical creature is a classic right?”

‘Oh shit, now I’m being quizzed on fairytales?’ I think in a brief panic as I race through as many as I can remember. Snow white had a princess in ice, didn’t it? But she was dead, wasn’t she? Sleeping beauty maybe? The little guy did say he was asleep. But what about the helpful magical creature? Is this a Cinderella spin-off but the fairy godmother is a talking pile of gold?

“Uh…,” my head spins with rushed ideas, but none of them seem to make any sense, “You have any more info on what story I’m supposed to be thinking about here?”

It shrugs, “No idea, that’s only what I know from Master. I’ve never met another player to ask.”

‘Well, if that’s all he knows, guess the exact story doesn’t matter,’ I think in relief, glancing over back at Zeke. He looks like he’s just asleep, and with a brief call of his name, he will wake up and beg for me to give him five more minutes because he always hated getting out of bed.

“It’s a bit weird that Hacker mentioned it’s like a fairytale though,” I mutter, unable to get that thought out of my head, it feels like a pointless piece of information, but if I’ve learned one thing about Hacker it's that they choose their words very carefully. “Normally a princess in those stories but sure,” I agree, cause who is really going to split hairs over that, but once Zeke wakes up I make a vow to not tell him anything about this, “if it’s a boring fairytale curse then I just need to find a knight right? Or another prince? Princess?”

The treasure bear laughs and shakes its head, “Silly player, no!” and it gestures around very seriously, “What’s the thing that always causes these problems in your stories?”

I can feel my eye twitch. I really don’t want to play any more guessing games with an over-glorified gaudy garden gnome, but Hacker was very clear I couldn’t punt the little thing. “I don’t know, a bad guy?”

“And they are usually….?” It leads with a little wiggle of its eyebrows.

“I don’t know what you want me to say? A monster? A witch? An evil stepmother?” I guess pulling the first bad guys I can think. It keeps looking at me expectantly so with a sigh I continue, “An evil king? A cursed spinning wheel? I’m running out of ideas here treasure monkey.”

“I’m a treasure bear, not a treasure monkey!”

I glance down at its long tail made from stitched together rings and coins, “Yeah sure, whatever you say.”

“Come on meanie player I know you can get it! the classic foe of any hero story!”

I shrug and blurt the first thing my tired brain thinks of, “A dragon? An evil knight-?”

“Yes!” It cheers, clamping its little hands together. “You got it!”

“An evil knight?” I repeat, thoughts of course flashing back to Night, sucks I might have killed the dude who could have saved my brother, hopefully, I can find another crazy shadow guy.

“No,” it pouts with puffed-up cheeks and waving its arms around angrily as if that somehow helps drive its point home, “the other one!”

As the words register my heart plummets, There’s no way…’

“You’re not serious, are you? I need a what?”

“A dragon!” it repeats in the same happy tone. “It is dragons who steal away the treasure in stories and capture heroes. So, you need another bigger dragon to undo the curse and free the hero!”

‘This can’t be real?!’ I desperately think to myself, trying to wrap my head around it. “To be clear you need me to go get a dragon to free my brother?” I ask just one more time to be sure, because I don’t think I’ve ever heard such a ridiculous statement as needing a dragon to do anything let alone play nice and break a curse.

“Yep! Only a dragon will do! The more powerful the better!” and it pauses giving me a not-so-subtle once over, “but-but a little one will work just fine! It will just take a bit longer!”

It’s obviously an insult, one that does cause a flicker of rage to ignite in my bones, but it is quickly extinguished. At this point I don’t think I have any anger left to get mad with and I just sigh, pinching the bridge of my nose to try and stave off the pounding headache. ‘Just when I thought this place couldn’t get any more fucked up, a dragon?!’

I force myself to sigh again pushing out all the angry thoughts, I can rage later, its still being helpful so I should milk this for all its worth. ‘This is for Zeke,’ I remind myself as I force a smile, “And where exactly do I find a dragon?”

It grins up at me, waving its little arms and says in a way to happy tone, “No idea!”

“Great…" and I can’t help the sarcasm bleeding into my words, “you are just as helpful as Hacker.”