Chapter Text
Back in the castle hallway, Cassandra couldn't help but notice that some things had changed a little. The knight costumes were no longer blocking the winding staircase, as they were now very politely standing to the side, but the strangest thing to her was the statue of the old oak tree that was now located on one of the stone bases. The statue very accurately depicted the grumpy nature of the gem keeper, whom Cassandra was glad she wouldn't have to face ever again. Cassandra took a quick look and analysed the metal structure top to bottom, and noticed a gold plaque on the base of the statue. It read;
'The tired and grumpy old tree and former guardian of Vora forest does not like to be disturbed by forest trekkers. Wake at your own risk!'
She dreaded whoever or whatever she would have to face in the next world.
Walking up the steps which were lined with a fancy purple rug, Cassandra looked at some of the portraits on the walls which included the toadstools, tiny timbers, and a strange looking clown on a unicycle. Cassandra grounded.
"Don't tell me that's what's behind the next door. Shit."
There were four doors in total on this second floor. Two that were placed either side of a giant circular base that lay dead in the middle of the walkway, one chained up and another not. Another was an arch doorway that was blocked by another suit of armour. The fourth door was placed to the right, and to Cassandra's surprise, it was not locked either. Cassandra knew that she was supposed to go through the door to the centre left, but she felt like she had to check out the other unlocked door purely for curiosity's sake.
Cass headed through the fourth door, and found herself in a corridor decorated with bizarre relics such as barrels, trophies and liquorice. Cassandra followed through the long corridor and out onto the balcony, where she got a proper view of the exterior of the rest of the castle. She was surprised at how incredibly dull everything looked. When she'd first entered the castle, the atmosphere was vibrant and welcoming, but from this side, it looked like a thunderstorm was incoming. There was another turreted tower not too far away from the balcony, but there was no way to get there.
Just as Cassandra placed her hands on the edge of the railing, Sabrina appeared out of nowhere.
"Where exactly do you think you're going?"
Cassandra jumped. "Oh, I was just-"
"The bridge to the other side will not appear until you have succeeded in collecting all seven of the rainbow gems."
"But I-"
"Tut tut tut. No excuses, Cassandra. There is still work to be done." With that, Sabrina disappeared once more. Cassandra buried her head in her hands as she moaned. Back to the house of tricks she went.
Cassandra entered through the only other unlocked door on the second storey. Unlike the entry to the enchanted forest, this door was nicely decorated with some dominos and playing cards that bordered the doorframe. Cassandra could immediately tell that this second world would be vastly different from the first.
Walking through the doorway, Cassandra facepalmed as what she had quietly suspected turned out to be true; the second world was an oversized playroom. This really was the House of Yesterday's Tomorrow. Cassandra turned to leave, only to find that the door had already vanished behind her. She took a few steps to the right, away from the large blocks and boxes that were stacked next to her, forming a staircase upwards through the room. Unlike in the forest, Cassandra was now free to move in any direction she wanted. The hard marble floor was a dark sandy colour, and crayons and dominos were scattered everywhere. Cassandra swerved around another nutcracker that was marching towards her, and climbed up the first two red building blocks that led up to the staircase.
From the angle she was currently at, Cass was able to see where the staircase of toys led to; a mysterious green box, yellow around the edges and decorated with stars. Nowhere else in this entire room would be able to lead Cassandra to the keeper of the orange gem. There was nowhere to go but up.
As Cassandra hopped up the next eight or so red building blocks with diamonds and crescents carved into their sides, another two nutcrackers started making their way down, heading right towards Cassandra, who didn't have enough space to simply let them past this time. But that didn't stop her from trying. Even though it didn't work, and Cassandra slipped over the edge and plummeted back down to the beginning.
Laying helplessly on the ground, Cassandra placed the back of her left hand over her eyes. She needed time to think about how she was going to cope with this. Maybe not all all of the worlds would be a piece of cake after all. And she needed to think fast, as the light hanging from the sapphire chandelier on the ceiling was really bright. Did Sabrina expect her to jump on the nutcracker's heads just like all the other enemies? That would make Cassandra feel and look very fucking stupid.
She clambered to her feet, ready for take two. One by one, Cassandra climbed up the blocks, each about three feet tall, and after the fourth step, the two nutcrackers respawned. Cassandra bent her knees and spread her feet to match the width of her shoulders, ready to jump on their heads. As the toys got nearer and nearer, Cassandra began to question if this was really the right decision, or if she would end up making a fool of herself if she ended up getting knocked down again. In the end, she decided to not do as planned, and simply smashed the nutcrackers on the tops of their heads, like one might for a button. Good thing Sabrina had healed her hand.
Climbing up the towering unstable staircase that was now clear of any interruptions, Cassandra soon reached a slant in the steps. A flat rectangular block was placed at a 70 degree angle and with a length of well over fifteen feet, it was impossible for Cassandra to be able to climb up, even with the firm grip of her leather boots. Cassandra knew that there must be a solution somewhere, going off of previous experiences. And a few metres away from her, was a toy sailboat.
The sailboats were either red or yellow, and they were not attached to any strings. They were just floating out in the open, presumably for Cassandra to jump onto, if she wanted to make it further up, which she did.
Although Cass knew by now that if she were to fall, especially from this height, she wouldn't be injured too much, but she did also want to get out of this castle as soon as possible. The plan was simply to make it up the staircase, grab the amber and move onto the next world. She also needed to keep the red gem safe in her pocket, as she was anxiously patting her coat every few minutes to make sure it hadn't fallen out.
Cassandra leaped on to the yellow sailboat, which was slightly bigger than the red sailboat, which was a little higher up. As Cass landed on the small circle base, she was caught off guard as the boat began to sink. Cassandra stumbled a little, holding her arms out to try to keep her balance, as the yellow boat that was right next to the one she was currently standing on moved up as hers moved down. Cass got the impression that she should jump up onto the other boat, to use as a platform to lift herself onto the red boat directly above her, but then she began to think about how that would work based on the logistics of this world. If she jumped onto the other yellow boat, would it sink in the same way this other one had? Probably. Hopefully the red boats were the ones that remained stationary. Cassandra would need to act fast.
Reaching out above her, Cassandra leaped off the platform and just managed to give the edge of the next yellow sailboat. Immediately she could feel the boat began to sink. At what felt like a cheetah's pace, Cass hoisted the rest of her body onto the base, knowing her time was running out. Just in the nick of time, Cassandra leaped off the second boat and grabbed onto the mast of the smaller red boat. Using her natural instinct, she had grabbed onto the mast with her right hand- her more dominant one- which was also now her weaker hand once again. Cassandra quickly reached and grabbed hold with her left hand as well, and used her upper body strength to pull herself up.
There was a unique paved track which led out from the top of the first part of the stair case, right from where the slanted block had cut off Cassandra's way. There was a giant toy robot which the track circled around, and it seemed like the staircase carried on around halfway down this track.
The track was unsurprisingly occupied by toys that were clearly not autonomous, as they just kept mindlessly running back and forth between the end of the track and where Cassandra was standing. One of the toys was another nutcracker (seemed like Sabrina really had a thing for nutcrackers) and the other was a clown on a unicycle, which was identical to the portrait Cassandra had noticed in the castle hallway.
First, the nutcracker. Cassandra defeated it rather quickly, in the same way as before; hitting them on the head. The clown, however, was a different story. Juggling three miniature rubber balls as well as being on a unicycle made the clown too tall for Cassandra to jump on from where she was currently standing. She took a step back and glanced over her shoulder, where she noticed a springboard button on top of the last block that led up to the track, between the long angled block and the beginning of the track itself. Having jumped down from the red sailboat, Cassandra must have missed it when she first stepped onto the track.
She ran towards the button, jumped off it and rotated her body so that she landed right on the head of the clown. The clown disappeared into thin air, which Cassandra thought was beginning to get repetitive by now, but then as she thought about it, she realised she would rather that than the clown acting out some dramatic death scene, possibly trying to make Cassandra feel remorse for killing something that wasn't real.
After the clown vanished, with the nutcracker already gone, Cassandra assumed that the path would now be free so she could make her way along the track, but once more, something happened that she truly didn't expect; the unicycle kept going. Cassandra was frozen in shock at first, so she unconsciously allowed the unicycle to run over her toes, which actually hurt like hell. As the unicycle kept wheeling to each end of the track repeatedly, Cassandra carefully managed to avoid being hurt like that again as she scrambled to find a solution. She noticed the clown's rubber balls that he had been juggling scattered along the track, so she got the idea to use them was projectiles like she had the apples in the forest. She struck the miniature blue unicycle with the tiny ball, and it popped out of existence without making an exaggerated puckering noise. Thank goodness.
The pain in Cassandra's toes burned for longer than before, but it still faded away rather quickly, thankfully. A magician's top hat lay at the edge of the track. A magician's hat that looked like it belonged to a giant.
Cassandra got the impression that she probably was supposed to jump into the centre of the hat, which was steaming with a sparkling purple mist, but instead she decided to continue up the staircase, which was now constructed out of jack in the boxes. She was quite suspicious that there were no spring buttons that would help her to jump up onto the box, but Cassandra was determined to do so.
The first time she jumped up, Cassandra managed to grab the edge, but her grip quickly slipped. She glanced back over at the upside down hat, beaming with a lavender coloured light, waiting for her to jump inside. But Cassandra resisted once more, for she was firmly focused on getting that amber and getting out of there.
She removed the glove from her left hand, hoping that her grip would be stronger without the extra fabric. She put the glove into her coat pocket, so that it was preserving the red gem, and she tried again. As Cassandra leaped ip, knowing there was no chance she would be able to land on top of the floating box flat on her feet, a jack painted in clown makeup appeared out of the side of the box, smacked Cassandra in the face, and sent her flying back down, right into the centre of the open magic hat.
Wincing in pain, Cassandra's blood boiled as rage cursed throughout her body. She couldn't hold back any longer, she didn't care how old Sabrina was physically or mentally. Gripping her chin, Cassandra yelled to the heavens- or, to the non existant ceiling above her, where the rest of Toyland was no longer visible.
"FUCK YOU SABRINA!" she screamed, to which she received no response from either her or Selena, "YOU HIT ME IN THE FUCKING JAW WITH A FUCKING JACK IN THE BOX! WHAT SORT OF BITCH DOES THAT?"
The pain disappeared three seconds later, but by this point, Cassandra's usually pale face had turned completely scarlet. Her knuckles were clenched, and she was shaking with anger. With no words left to speak, she simply let out a high pitched growl before deciding to find something to smash.
Trapped in a dystopian pastel brick world surrounded by lilac fairy dust, there wasn't much for Cassandra to do other than start making her way down the path, which was occupied by several burgundy music boxes, similar to the ones Cassandra owned as a very young child living as Gothel's slave. Perfect, something to help release all of the anger from within.
Except, when she jumped up to grab the rectangle chest, the world around her changed by the time she hit the ground. It took a few seconds for Cassandra to figure out, but was she looked up to the ceiling, she realised that everything had turned upside down. Or downside up. Or maybe a bit of both.
Cassandra navigated through this strange new dimension, which turned topsy turvy every time she grabbed another music box. Seemingly getting nowhere after the first seven chests, Cass decided that the best option from here on out would be to just walk in a straight line which would eventually lead her back to either the castle or Toyland.
As she approached a gap in the ceiling floor that was too wide for her to jump across, Cassandra noticed a platform floating in mid air that was also too high for her to reach. Not wanting to take any more chances of getting hit in the face by the spontaneous appearance of a creepy clown toy, Cass started to head in the other direction, before noticing a music box a few yards below the block that was within reaching distance. It was then she realised what she was supposed to do.
Leaping off from where she was standing, Cassandra excitedly reached out for the music box, which flipped the world upside down once more as soon as it was touched. A smile beamed across Cassandra's face as her theory was proven correct. From there, she jumped down and continued along the paved pathway. She noticed another contraption like this, which looked like it would make a stairway upwards. Intrigued, Cassandra bolted towards the puzzle, hopeful that it would give her a way out of here. One, two, three, Cassandra jumped and reached out as she approached the last step, four, but at that moment, the entire structure around her crumbled and fell into nothing.
Cassandra knew the drill by now, so she wasn't surprised when she landed right back in Toyland, however, she was surprised at where in Toyland she landed. She always assumed that if she were to land in a different part of the location, it wouldn't be too much of a sticky situation for her to get out of, but in this case, she'd literally fallen into a large, indulgent cube of lime green jelly.
Swimming through the wobbly mess, Cassandra managed to reach her hand out the end of the cube, and then yank her entire body out onto the marble floor, which was now blocked by glittering blue and green presents, even though Christmas wasn't for a couple more weeks. A couple more tiny rubber balls rolled over and gently touched Cassandra's foot. Face completely blank, Cassandra bent down and picked up the balls, and hurled them at the gifts blocking the way one at a time, until the path was completely clear.
Still lacking any emotion in her face, Cassandra looked ahead at the next obstacle. Clenching her teeth as she inhaled, Cassandra mentally prepared to make her way along the brim of another magician's hat, this one facing right side up, which led on to a path of tokens that bridged between two chess boards. Desperate to get this over and done with, Cass made her way along the edge of the top hat one step at a time, and paused as she approached the red and blue bridge. She slowly lowered her foot down on the first red tile, which lit up as she firmly placed her foot on the square. So far so good.
To the front, left and right of the square, lay more blue and red tiles. The entire gap between the hat and the chess board was mostly filled with tiles, but Cassandra knew that there was no chance this stage of the course would be that easy. Maintaining her balance as she lifted her left foot, Cassandra gently lowered her food to the blue tile directly in front of her, and it vanished as soon as she went to step on it, but appeared again as she stepped away. She knew it! She repeated this process for the blue tiles from left to right, but only the right one stayed in place. She placed her full weight on the blue square, and just as she was debating where to step next, a mirror on the wall caught her attention.
This mirror did not contain all of the tiles that Cassandra could see in front of her. The tiles on the mirror led a clear path to the other side. Cassandra was standing on one of these tiles, and the tile she had just stepped off of was also one of these tiles. She smiled as she realised that this meant she was on the right track.
Cassandra followed the tiles on the mirror that lead up to the chess board, while also occasionally glancing forward to make sure she knew where she was going. Once she made it to the other side, Cassandra threw her arms in the air and celebrated as she continued running, onto the upturned drum that had the mysterious green box from earlier resting in the middle. Before stepping into what she assumed was the new arena, she took a deep breath, getting ready for what she knew would be the second boss fight of this challenge.
Out of nowhere, boxes of old board games formed walls around the edge of the drum for the second Cassandra left the brim of the path. The floor shook, almost knocking Cassandra to the ground as the jack in the box sprung into action, larger than any of the enemies Cassandra had encountered so far. Just like the oak tree, this guardian would fight to the death in order to protect his precious jem.
The jack started jumping up and down, like he wanted to turn Cassandra into a pancake. Getting this immediately, Cassandra ran around the edge of the drum and the demented toy chased her, pressing further down on the surface with even jump. Once he had stopped, Cassandra stopped as well, though she could sense that something bad was about to happen. She noticed the circle on the side of the cube that was facing her, and she ducked just in time as a giant fist came flying out the side. As the spring retracted back into the box, a couple of tiny springs popped out and scattered around her. Noticing that the jack was temporarily dazed in the same way the first guardian had been, Cassandra bounced off one of the springboards and kicked the jack's balloon-shaped head, which, unlike the oak tree, didn't defeat him instantly. It only motivated him to get back up.
Two more gloved fists burst out of the front and back of the jack as he began to spin. Cassandra took a few steps towards him and jumped over the outstretched springs every time they circled back round to her position. After he stopped, Cass once again took this opportunity to roundhouse kick her enemy, which seemed to weaken him slightly more than last time. He attacked once more. This time, he stuck out four fists, on the left, right, front and back of his box, and spun repeatedly into Cassandra, ramming into the edge of the drum as Cassandra barely escaped his touch. This guy clearly had more versatility than his predecessor.
Clearly starting to get seriously burnt out now, the jack in the box tried one last time to shoo the determined Cassandra away. He released all four fists again, only this time he stretched them all out so that there was no way for Cassandra to escape them without jumping. He spun around one way for a good twenty seconds, Cassandra was starting to get worn out by this point, so she was relieved when he eventually slowed down... only to start spinning in the other direction. It took a few extra seconds for Cassandra's brain to process this, so she actually got tripped up by the first spring. She frantically tried to pick herself up, only to be knocked down again repeatedly.
Getting weaker by the second, Cassandra needed to gather the strength to deliver one final devastating blow to tortured play thing. So she thought about those she loves. Rapunzel, her dad, Varian, Lance, even Eugene- it sounds sappy, but it really did help.
Cass pulled herself up and leapt over the last few springs as the spinning slowly came to a stop. Cassandra took no time for hesitation, and kicked the bastard with the back of her heel, knocking him down once and for all. He succumbed to his defeat, and retracted back into his dark emerald-coloured box, which proceeded to collapse on its side. The sparkling amber floated down from above and into an awe-stricken Cassandra's palm, while simultaneously another door appeared at the start of the chess board. Finally! Cass's ticket out of here had arrived. Cassandra wrapped her fingers around the diamond, tightly containing it in her fist. Not releasing the jewel from her grasp, she slipped it into her coat pocket, so it could be kept safe alongside its red counterpart.
With two of the seven gems in tow, Cassandra sprinted towards the new door, thankful that another leg of her visit to the Castle of Illusion was finally complete.