"SO," SAID SHEBA, eyeing the stone dubiously, "all I gotta do is lay my hands on it?"

"In theory, yes," Kraden replied, adjusting his spectacles so they sat higher on his nose. They immediately slid down again.

"Theory?" Sheba pronounced the word as though it were a sign of the apocalypse. She wasn't exaggerating. She knew Kraden too well.

"Well, that is what the tablet says, Sheba," Jenna snapped. The female Mars Adept was not in a good mood. She was hot, hungry, tired, and her hair was a total mess. This outing to Air's Rock had taught her the true meaning of the word 'windswept'.

"I can read, you know," replied Sheba, who couldn't. Literacy was considered the devil's work in Lalivero, so that basically eliminated her ever learning it.

"Just touch the darn tablet before I kill someone!" Jenna shouted, her patience rapidly disappearing. Not that she had much to begin with. "We shouldn't even be here! While we're traipsing around some giant boulder, Picard is rotting in the Madran jail! Who knows what they'll have done to him by the time we get back!"

Felix shot his sister an amused look that clearly said Why are you so concerned about Picard, hmm? Do you like him, perhaps?

Jenna decided to vent her rage on her brother.

"That's enough, you two," Kraden said vaguely a few minutes later, as the sibling's battle drew them perilously close to the edge of the platform. "Sheba, go ahead and touch it. The least it can do is nothing."

"What's the most it can do?"

"Send a surge of pure Psynergy through your body and kill you."

Sheba stared at the scholar. He was totally serious.

"Go on, now," the old man said, pushing her forward gently. "Don't worry. If we lose you, we can pick up another Jupiter Adept in Garoah."

"So very motivating you are, Kraden," Sheba muttered.

But she did as she was told. There was nowhere to run, anyway. Climbing the last few steps, she laid her hands on the smooth granite. The stone instantly began to glow. She watched it nervously, expecting it to be the last thing she saw.

Just as suddenly as it began, the glow stopped.

"We're sorry," said a cool female voice from inside the stone. "The item you wish to download is unavailable at this time. Please try again later."

"What?" asked Felix, showing off his extensive vocabulary.

"Fascinating!" Kraden exclaimed, his eyes lighting up. "The stone can speak! I wonder if it's related to the Wise One..."

Jenna ignored him. "I think it's broken," she said, walking forward and poking the stone with her staff. Nothing happened. She poked it harder. Still nothing. Frustrated, she slammed her weapon against the rock as hard as she could. The wooden shaft shattered, sending fragments of stave flying across the room.

"Good job," Sheba said dryly, as Jenna cursed and dropped her remaining two feet of weapon, hands ringing from the shock of the blow. "And it's still not working."

Jenna uttered a few more curses Sheba knew the Laliverans would not approve of their god-child hearing.

"There must be some puzzle left to solve..." Kraden said, bending over the tablet and inspecting it closely.

"Well, hurry up and solve it!" Jenna said through gritted teeth. She fished around in her pack for her backup weapon, a short but deadly looking sword. Felix and Sheba immediately edged away.

Kraden stood up and shook his head. "It should have worked," he said dejectedly. This was obviously a hard time for him. Never before had he been unable to solve a puzzle he encountered. "I guess we should just do as the voice says... try again later."

"How long is later?" Jenna snapped.

Kraden shrugged. "Maybe five minutes, maybe an hour... maybe even tomorrow. Who knows?"

"Tomorrow?" Jenna said, her anger steadily reaching the breaking point. The tip of her sword quavered slightly. Felix and Sheba edged farther away. "I can't wait till tomorrow! I want to get out of this stupid rock NOW!"

"Just be patient, Jenna," Kraden said calmly. Felix and Sheba looked at one another. Telling a Mars Adept to be patient was like telling the wind not to blow or the sun not to shine or a volcano not to erupt and kill everyone in a twenty mile radius.

"Why don't I try again now?" Sheba suggested quickly, noting that Jenna was reaching that eruption point.

Kraden shrugged. "It can't hurt, I guess."

Sheba nodded and stepped onto the dais once more, reaching out to touch the ancient inscriptions on the tablet. It began to glow once more, but this time, it didn't stop.

"Downloading... Please wait," came the cool female voice, and the glow intensified slightly.

"Is it doing something?" Jenna asked, watching Sheba dubiously.

"It appears so," Kraden said, rubbing his hands together excitedly. "At this very moment, the power of Reveal is being transferred into Sheba's mind."

"Well, it's taking a heck of a long time to get there," Sheba muttered.

They waited. And waited. And waited.

"How long is this going to take?" Jenna grumbled.

Sheba looked down at the stone. A single sentence glowed gently from amid the jumbled inscription on the tablet. Very discretely, she said, "Kraden, I think there's something happening here."

The scholar immediately rushed over. "What?" he asked.

Sheba pointed to the sentence. "Look."

The scholar adjusted his spectacles and read the words aloud. "Download three percent complete."

"Three percent!" Jenna shouted, looking horrified. "We've been standing here for fifteen minutes!"

"Reveal must be a very difficult power to master, I suppose..." said Kraden, looking at the tablet. "We'll just have to wait for it to finish."

Jenna made a motion as if she were going to attack someone with her shortsword, but decided better of it. She lowered the weapon and dropped to the ground in a huff, her eyes smoldering with barely contained fury. "Fine. I'll wait. I can do that."

Felix gave her a doubtful look, which luckily wasn't noticed or he wouldn't have survived long.

Sheba shifted her weight from foot to foot impatiently. "How much longer do I have to stand here?" she whined.

"As long as it takes," Kraden said sternly. "We need Reveal. We'll be stuck inside this rock if we don't get it." He gestured to the exit, which stood across a very large and stepping-stone devoid chasm.

Sheba sighed and shifted her weight again. "This is boring."

"Well, how about I sing you a song to pass the time?" Kraden suggested. "I know a very good one about the periodic table..."

"On second thought, I'm fine. I've always wanted to stand touching a tablet for a long period of time. I'm not bored at all. Really."

Seconds turned to minutes, minutes turned to hours, and the prospect of leaving Air's Rock passed out of all memory. The Adepts and the scholar sunk into a kind of stupor, staring blankly ahead as they waited... and waited... and waited.

Felix was fidgeting with his cape, working to make one of the holes in it even larger. Jenna drew patterns in the dust with her shortsword. Somehow, they always seemed to end up as pictures of her smashing various other people's faces in. Kraden had produced a book from somewhere in his pack and sat reading, glancing up from time to time to see that the download status had moved another percentage point. And Sheba... she had lost all feeling in her legs an hour ago, and her hands were starting down the same path.

The numbers crept upwards. Fifty percent... sixty percent... They crawled by at a glacial pace, every five minutes or so bringing a one-digit change to the total downloaded. Sheba closed her eyes and imaged she was somewhere else... sitting in her home in Lalivero, camped out under the stars with her friends... even being back in Babi's palace would be better than standing here for much longer. She was so absorbed in her own thoughts that she almost didn't notice when a soft chime heralded the reaching of one hundred percent and the cool female voice said, "Transfer commencing."

The next second she was fully aware, as the golden-glowing tablet began to rise into the air, pulling her with it. She squeaked in fright as her boots left the ground.

"It's working!" Jenna cried happily, jumping to her feet. Felix followed suit, a rare smile on his face.

Sheba rose higher into the air, eventually stopping about ten feet off the ground. The tablet glowed even brighter and energy began shooting out and entering her body. She closed her eyes as the light surged through her brain, imparting the secret of Reveal.

A second later, the light died. The stone dropped to the ground with a loud crash, bringing Sheba down with it.

"Ow..." she muttered, sitting up and rubbing her head. "Could they have been a bit more gentle?"

Kraden approached her, fiddling with his spectacles. "Did it work?"

"I... think so," she said, probing around inside her head. There was definitely something new there, though whether it was Reveal or not remained to be seen.

"Try it out!" urged Jenna, griping her sword's hilt tightly.

Sheba walked over to the edge of the platform, where a few feet away lay a ring of stepping stones. The center, where a stone should be allowing them escape, lay empty.

"Here goes," Sheba muttered. She took a deep breath, and cast Reveal.

Nothing happened.

"We're sorry," came the cool female voice from out of the sky. "The program you wish to use is incompatible with your hardware. Please upload the 'Jupiter Adept Transfer Patch V. 3.01' and try again."

Everyone promptly fell down and died.

Well, not literally. But, as Sheba thought as she stood once more beside the stone, with the message 'Download One Percent Complete' glowing mockingly at her, perhaps it would have been easier if they had.

-

Well, what did you think? I had a much better ending planned, but I forgot what it was... ^^; Murphy strikes again, I suppose...

Please review!