Chapter 44: Chapter 44

THE NEVER ENDING TREASURES

Kitee, North Karelia, Finland

Floor stared wide eyed. "No, it can't be!" She charged forward, beating against the tall stack of God only knew what. "We can move it!"

The creature let out another harsh scream. It wasn't loud enough to make them bend, but it was still powerful.

Esa fired a couple of shots. "Floor, we have to find another way!"

"There's not one!" Lydia was looking around with wide eyes. "I can't see another way!"

The creature hissed. If Floor didn't know any better, she would stay that it was taunting them, almost making fun of them for that matter. It just wasn't right for something to that to another living creature.

Floor cursed. The blockage was tall and she couldn't see the top of it. There surely had to be a gap between it and the ceiling. There just had to be something, some kind of weak place or anything. There was always a weak place with any strength.

"We have to go up!" Floor screamed.

Esa glanced over his shoulder, still firing heavy on the creature. "We can't! It's too risky!"

"It's either that or stay here and die!" Floor was already gripping the lower layer of the blockage. "We have to do it or die!"

Lydia smiled, already climbing around Floor. "I would rather die up here, then do there. It will at least give us a fighting chance."

Floor started climbing, not really bothering to look to see if Esa was coming behind them. It was just going to have to be every man for them self.

A few seconds later, the shooting stopped. Floor looked down at her feet. There was another figure climbing up behind her; the creature still was down at the bottom hissing, trying and failing to come after them.

"Looks like we're okay," Esa muttered once he reached Floor.

Floor stared as the creature managed to make it up a few levels, only to slide back down to the ground. It glared back up at them.

"Is it wrong that I want to laugh at it?" Lydia asked. "The poor thing just can't seem to get its food."

"Let's not taunt the monster," Esa muttered. "We really don't need to make it madder than it already is."

Floor nodded. "Yeah." She stared at it as it tried to come up again. "Well, you can't say that it gives up easily."

"No, you have to give it that much credit," Esa echoed as he checked his gun. "I don't know how much I have and I can tell you that law is probably on their way."

"Well, let's get going," Floor muttered as she started climbing upwards.

The climb was actually longer than she thought. Every muscle in her body was burning, screaming at her to stop. Below them, the creature was still attempting to up after them. It was getting closer to getting a grip with each passing jump. She just hoped that it did not figure out at way to latch on.

Lydia started climbing again. "I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't want to sit here and find out how this ends."

Exchanging looks, Floor and Esa took off after her. The creature was having even more success now. It was actually starting to shake the stack a little bit more. Floor just hoped that it wasn't actually attempting to knock down the blockage. It would actually be a smart move on its part, but it just would not end well.

Floor could actually see the top now. There was a gap between the ceiling and the stack, but it wasn't very big. She wasn't even sure if Lydia would be able to fit through it and she was tiny.

Esa turned and fired a couple of more rounds at the creature. It let out a pain filled roar and the shaking actually grew harder. Floor found herself digging in even deeper. Rubble raced past the, so of it quiet large.

Lydia screamed in pain as something bumped into her. Floor turned just in time to see the jeweled vase race past her. It sailed through the air before exploding into shower of vases. The identical vases rained all around the creature without hitting it. It was next to impossible to tell which was the original and which was the fake.

Lydia stared at her arm. "It burned me!"

"What the hell?" Esa said as the same time.

"It does not happen to everything." Floor felt a frown forming on her face as she reached the top. Jeweled objects lined the top of the pile. Reaching out she touched the first one. Almost right away, she felt her skin burning. Yelping, she jerked away, nearly hitting Esa in the face. "The jewels are cursed!"

Esa yelped as one of the cups hit him in the face.

"Don't move!" Floor yelled. She looked closer at the objects. Most of them looked like metal, burning metal that was sure to do a lot of damage on contact. "What is going on here?"

She looked up and down the length of the top. It was going to be next to impossible to get over the top without touching anything. She touched a small looking coin. Within seconds it exploded, sending a great cascade of fake money rolling down over the other sight. She stared back at her skin. It hadn't burned as bad as the vases, but you could still see the damage.

"Is it getting hotter?" Lydia whispered.

Floor frowned. It was actually getting hotter, but she didn't see or smell any fire. Plus, snow was still drifting down through the hole in the roof. So, it couldn't be getting hotter outside.

There had to be a weak spot somewhere and it had to be found quickly. Not only was the creature probably making progress, but she could hear sirens. Somehow she doubted that she could sweet talk her way out of this one.

"Look!" Lydia roared, pointing just to Floor's right. "I think that's what it doesn't want us to get!"

Floor followed Lydia's gaze. There in almost a spotlight manner was a large and fancy looking ring. It gleamed in the faint, early morning sunlight that was making its way through the hole in the roof. Floor couldn't tell what if it was actually worth any money, but it just had to be important.

Floor reached out to grab it, only to be hit away from it by Lydia. "Remember what happened with everything else?" Lydia snapped.

Floor gave Lydia a long look. "It's obviously important. We can't leave it here. I won't touch anything!"

Esa fired a couple more shots as the stack shook even more violently than it had before. "Hurry up! I think it's figuring it out!"

"We need something long and skinny," Floor muttered. "Something that can be used to hook through the gap. If we don't touch anything, it should be okay. The problem is that we don't have anything long and skinny."

Lydia cleared her throat loudly. "Well, that's not actually the problem." She reached under her shirt and pulled out a wicked looking stick. "You just never know what you are going to need"

Floor seized the stick; much to her surprise, Lydia did not protest. "Hopefully, it works."

Floor reached across the way, but there was one problem. She was not tall and long enough to reach it from here and she was the tallest of the group. The heat from the already ever growing pile of metal was staying to reach them. The creature still rolled below them; Floor could only hope that the heat would get the best of it.

The sirens were getting louder. They would be upon them within a minute or so. They were trapped. They were going to be arrested for who knows what. Plus, there was still the matter of the creature and the magic to explain. If only people could believe what was right in front of them instead of being so thick.

Floor looked over. She could see the terror in Lydia's face; it was a little less unclear in Esa's, but it was still there nevertheless.

"Lydia," Floor muttered as the sirens grew louder. "I have to get the ring. We've got to get it. Something tells me that it is linked to Ajatar or less that thin would not be here."

Lydia looked down in the creature's direction. "What do you want to do?"

"Don't move. I'm going to come around you and try to hook it at a different angle. If anything happens and I'm buried, don't save me, just make sure that you and Esa get out. Find out what is so damn important about it." Floor stared back up at the shinning ring. "There has to be something. We have to be getting close to figuring this out."

Lydia nodded. "It's not going to work."

Floor gave her another long look. "It is too. Now, if you could just let me slide around you, it would be a big help."

Sighing, Lydia flattened herself against the rough edges of the stack.

Grunting, Floor slowly made her way around Lydia. It was actually kind of difficult to get around her without actually touching anything above. She winced as her fingers would brush against the hot metal and more replicas would burst down upon them. Screams of pain erupted from Lydia and Esa as they knocked objects to the side. The replicas rained down on the creature, whose own terrible roars added to the mix.

"Stop!" Lydia screamed, as she foolishly tried to knock some of the objects to the side, which only added to the messy mix. The burning metal gained momentum as it rushed down the sides. Floor found herself hoping that it actually burned the creature to death.

The worse scream of them all actually made Floor pause. It was deep and male sounding. Esa was all but covered in the burning metals. He looked up at the females, his eyes wide as more treasure bumped against his already red fingers. It looked as if he was barely hanging on. If he were to lose his grip, he would most certainly die.

"I'll go!" Lydia roared. "You keep going!"

Floor didn't even time to object before Lydia started scaling back down the wall, only pausing briefly as more junk rained on her. As soon as she reached Esa, she grabbed his brunt fingers, pulling as he roared.

"No!" Floor screamed as she felt her grip let loose. Grunting she reached for the closest object, grabbing it just in time to prevent herself from falling. A big part of her wanted to see if Esa and Lydia were fairing okay, but she just had to keep going.

Keeping a tight grip of her stick, she slowly climbed back toward the ring. It was a couple of rows back, surrounded by large looking objects that were sure to burn if she managed to touch them.

"Come on," she muttered. "Come on!"

Below her, she heard Lydia and Esa yelling. Gunshots were firing, which was actually a good sign.

"Come on!" Floor yelled. The stick was just centimetres away from the ring. She had to get it just right or it would all be lost. "Yes!"

The tiny ring was skewered by the stick. Carefully, Floor lowered it down to her, keeping it slow so that it would not be flung into the massive amount of ever growing treasure.

"Come to me," she whispered.

Below her, Esa's and Lydia's yelling grew louder. It was so loud now that Floor could not hear the sirens.

"Yes!" Floor yelled as she grabbed onto the ring. She could not feel it burning her flesh, even as hundreds of relics burst all around her. "I've got it!"

Esa and Lydia just looked up at her.

"Can you come up here?"

"Yeah, it's just what we've been dying to do," Lydia muttered. "It's not like we've been fighting for our lives down here or anything like that."