Chapter twenty three- Into the Maze

"Judar! Are you alright?!" Jekyll rushed over to his master, astonished by the amount of blood covering the clearing.

"Did it work?" Judar asked, groaning as the servant helped him to stand.

"It did, yes," Jekyll nodded. "It was quite the process, it even scared Saber off. I'm relieved that I was able to remember the correct ingredients I used in life to change back..." His eyes landed on Cassim's body as they slowly walked past, "What happened here, by the way? Where's Alibaba Saluja?"

"He escaped into the maze," Judar replied. "I killed Cassim here, and Alibaba got a pretty good hit on me."

"Was this 'Cassim' a mage as well?"

"No, but it hit pretty close to home for Alibaba."

"You're rather cruel, Judar," Jekyll sighed sadly. "Are we allowing Alibaba Saluja and Saber into the maze?"

"We don't have a choice, I'm kinda bleeding here," Judar reminded bitterly.

"Right. What are we going to do about your wound? I know a few healing recipes, but I don't have the right ingredients."

"We need to go to Hakuryuu's. He specializes in Life magic."

Jekyll nodded, "We should stop at the school so I can temporarily bandage your chest first."

"Fine, let's just get going before someone else shows up."

~

Alibaba ran down the long, dark, staircase as quickly as he could, not looking back or stopping to breathe until he reached the bottom. He was stunned, to say the least, to see that the walls had disappeared, the open space seemingly never-ending.

"Kid? You down here?"

"Saber? I'm here!" Alibaba responded to his servant's calls.

"What the hell is this place?" Saber breathed as he stopped beside his master, marveling at the open space around them.

Alibaba looked around, just as baffled, "Al-Thamen's base, I guess. Or at least what leads up to it."

"Where's Cassim?"

Alibaba took a shaky breath. Now finally standing still, he began to notice how sore his throat was and how much his eyes were burning. His limbs were sore, and his hands felt weird. He felt weak and tired, mentally and physically. I think I used too much mana at once...

"Master?" Saber pulled the teen from his thoughts in a concerned tone.

Alibaba shook his head, "I'm fine... Cassim is... Judar...killed him."

Saber nodded solemnly, changing the subject for his master's sake, "Let's get going. I'd like to get out of here quickly; gives me the creeps."

The teen nodded in agreement, "Yeah...alright."

The pair continued down the long, open, corridor, surprised to see a large iron door at the end. Saber placed a hand on it and examined it, "What the hell is this door?"

"Can you open it?"

"'Course I can," Saber spoke, and to support his words he easily pried the door open. It screeched, trying to resist the servant with all it had, yet fortunately lost the battle, revealing another dark hall inside. Saber entered first, making sure Alibaba stayed close behind.

"There are no magic barriers," Alibaba observed.

"Must mean they're depending on their security guards to keep people out," Saber replied.

"You mean Judar and Berserker?" Saber nodded. Alibaba frowned, "No, that doesn't make sense. Judar said he didn't care if we came in here... He even told me not to kill their leader, because he wanted to..."

"Did he by chance say their name?" Saber glanced around, noticing how many twists and turns they were taking.

"Uhm...Gyokuen, I believe," Alibaba thought back, although he was reluctant to.

"Hm. Doesn't ring any bells," Saber said, his pace slowing.

"What's wrong, Saber?" Alibaba stopped just behind the blond servant.

"Haven't you noticed how weird this path is?" Saber turned around, running a hand along the wall in confusion. "We took three rights in a row, yet none of this looks familiar. We should've come out somewhere we'd already been."

"Everything looks the same, are you sure you're not just over thinking it?"

"No, I'm sure. There's definitely something up," Saber insisted. "I've been in mazes like this before."

"You have?"

"In life, yeah." Saber nodded absently, backtracking a lot, yet still unable to find anything familiar. "But this stupid maze is always changing. This is completely different from when we just walked down it!" The servant began to grow frustrated.

"Why haven't we run into anyone yet?" Alibaba wondered. "In the Church's reports they said Assassin wasn't even able to enter here cause she got attacked."

Saber sighed and shrugged, "I don't know, kid. But we should-" He paused, narrowing his eyes at the darkness before them.

"Sab-"

"Stay behind me, kid," The blond servant ordered, summoning his weapon. Not even seconds later, three masked men came from the shadows, as if they were a part of the walls themselves.

Alibaba jumped back, "Where did they come from?!" He whipped around as more appeared behind him, "Are they members of Al-Thamen?!"

"They must be," Saber assumed, his club at the ready. "Just stay by me, I'll take care of them."

"No, I can help," Alibaba insisted. He created another sword out of fire. This time it came much easier to him, although he knew he was using too much mana.

Saber glanced over his shoulder and chuckled, "When'd you learn how to do that, kid?"

"During my fight with Judar," The teen replied. He panicked as more Al-Thamen members appeared. Crap... there's too many of them to fight at once... He looked around, coming up with an idea, "Honō no Kabe!" Alibaba drew a circle in the cement around himself and Saber, enclosing them in a ring of fire that the masked magicians couldn't penetrate- at least not right away. "That should keep them out for now, but how are we going to get out of this, Saber?"

"No idea," Saber admitted. "They shouldn't be too hard to kill, but so many at once is a problem."

"Yeah..." Alibaba agreed, trying to think of a solution. "Do you have any attacks that can take out all of them at once?"

Saber shook his head, "Not really, no."

"Not even you Noble Phantasm?"

Saber chuckled, "I'm not sure my Noble Phantasm is fit for a place like this. What about you, kid?"

"Nope, nothing-" Alibaba stiffened as the Al-Thamen members extinguished his ring of fire and charged at them. There wasn't time to say more, all of their attention was focused on killing the masked magicians.

It was surprisingly easy, but their numbers weren't diminishing at all. The strangest part was after killing them, instead of blood spewing everywhere and their bodies torn to shreds, the magicians turned into strange dolls that littered the surrounding area.

Alibaba jumped back, his back up against Sabers, "What the hell are these guys?! There's no end to them!"

Saber clenched his teeth, "No wonder Assassin wasn't able to do anything. We need to get out of here." He tried to think of an escape. His Noble Phantasm wasn't suited for a maze. He didn't have any attacks he could use to clear a path, and Alibaba was too inexperienced to do so either. More and more Al-Thamen members appeared, closing in on the pair.

"Dammit..." The blond master cursed as the fire in his hands disappeared- he'd finally used up the last of his mana, if he pressed any harder he'd end up killing himself.

"Out of juice, kid?" Saber asked over his shoulder, taking out several more Organization members.

"Yeah..."

They both knew that with Alibaba out of mana, he couldn't support Saber being materialized much longer, "Then I guess this is the end..."

~