"The car's gonna have a bit of a hard time making it, but if we ride her gently and stop to pour some water in her, we'll be good."

She blinked, pulling her costume back on as she sat cross legged and tight-less on the bed. "Oh... well we don't have to go that far if it will be an issue. I hadn't really factored that in." She flopped over to reach for her phone, tapping in a generalized search for possible pumpkin patches closer to them.

"..oooor we could call an urber." She glanced over that option quickly, too. "I mean, I don't wanna kill your car for pumpkins, but if you think it will be fine i'm fine with whatever."

Reclaiming her camera, she snapped a few pictures of him while he finished getting dressed.

Saph scoffed at the idea of having some stranger pick them up.

"Nah, it'll be fine. We'll prolly only have to stop once or twice." He opened the door, and headed out, clearly not taking no for an answer. "Sides," He said from around the corner, "We all know you miss my drivin!"

The ride there was... something else. Saph liked to go 80 on the freeway, and other people didn't like to go 80 on the freeway, so Saph went around them. The thing was, when you were going 80 on the freeway, but stopping every so often to pour water into the radiator reservoir, you tended to get passed by those same people you passed. Afterward, you tended to swerve around them again.

This meant there was a fair bit of flipped birds and 'what you gonna do about it' faces throughout the journey.

When they finally reached their gps coordinates, his car sputtered into the parking lot, and wheezed as he pulled into a space.

Saph hopped out, patting the car as it enjoyed it's well earned period of rest.

"Here we are! Never been to a patch this big before! Wonder if they got food here..."

She just grinned guiltily at him as they left the room, scratching one cheek hesitantly. Oh, yeah... she totally missed his driving. Just about as much as she missed driving on I-5 in heavy rush hour traffic.

Still, once they were out of the out of the busy parts of the city it wasn't so bad. Like, she didn't have to clench the sides of her seat and shrink back into it every five seconds. It wasn't even totally his fault, either! She just really hated freeway/highway driving.

Whatever the case, after presumably ticking off countless individuals they made it to the patch. Even better, the sky was clear, and while it was a little cold it was pretty much perfect pumpkin picking weather.

While Saph hopped on out, she edge her way out and struggled with closing the door a few times before it latched. She grinned at him over the roof.

"Here we are! Never been to a patch this big before! Wonder if they got food here..."

"The website said they do. Roasted corn and some kinda special hot dogs or something." Personally she'd pass on the hot dogs. She still couldn't think about eating 'mystery meats' like that without getting terror sweats.

"Wanna get food first, then go conquer the corn maze, then get our pumpkins?" With a grin, she skipped around the hood and bounced to a stop before him. Her costume had pockets, which she gladly stuffed her hands into after making sure her camera had survived the ride.

"The website said they do. Roasted corn and some kinda special hot dogs or something."

Saph clapped his hands together and rustled them together. "Heck yeah, I ain't had a good hot dog in ages." He let her take the lead, looking around in a sort of youthful excitement. Seriously, None of the families he'd lived with as a kid would have taken him to a place like this; grocery stores sold pumpkins, after all.

He tapped her shoulder when he caught sight of the hotdog place. "Ima go get a dog. You getting corn or something?" Odd, that they were two different locations for the food there. If you wanted a hot dog, you went to one place, if you wanted corn, you went to another. Terribly inefficient.

He headed that way, digging into his pocket for some money.

When he came back he had a classic New York dog in his hand. Pile of sauerkraut on top, spot of spicy mustard, aaaaand nuthin else. He started eating, pausing to talk with his mouth full. "so uh... what now?"

They split ways. When he came back she was struggling with how to she was theoretically supposed to eat a giant cob of corn without getting any of it on her face. Challenge accepted.

"Well, first we eat." She grinned at him, turning and plopping down on a large hay stack near them. There were quite a few scattered around, so she assumed they were meant to be sat on. Very farm-y themed seating. "Then, we will go utterly destroy the maze."

She started in on her corn, nibbling at it experimentally first. She paused a few moments later, unaware that she had bits of it on her chin. "This place is a little bigger than the one I used to go to in Washington." She swung her legs a little, kicking her bat themed rubber boots out. "There were a few farms in my area... but they were squashed in between residential zones and cities, so they couldn't expand very far."

She wiped her mouth, and finished off her cob. "We would go every year to walk the mazes. They did these really awesome shaped ones, like sharks and zombies and stuff. We'd walk it, then get pumpkins and head back to my house to carve them."

She smiled at him and stood, dropping her trash in a nearby bin. Saph looked happy, excited even. It made her happy that he was having a good time, or at least entertained by it. Grabbing her camera back up, she switched it on and scooted towards him. Her camera had a little screen you could pop out on the side and flip around. It made taking selfies really easy. Go millennials! Woo!

Smiling, she snapped a picture of them together, then turned the camera back around to insect the picture.

"Maybe we should make this a new October tradition?"

Saph sat on a hay stack and devoured the hot dog. "Mmmf, oh man, nuthin like a New York dog...good stuff. How do they make em in Seattle, anyway?" Not as good as NYC, of course.

"Then, we will go utterly destroy the maze." Saph almost choked on a bite, laughing at her rambunctious reply. "Heh! Don't stand a chance against us." He chuckled again, eating the last bite, and then reaching over to pluck a piece of corn from Shelby's chin. He listened quietly as she talked about her past.

"Never been to a patch like this before, actually. It's something else. Kinda like an amusement park with no rides, huh?"

Saph got up an walked along with her; they headed for the maze now. He couldn't help but stumble a bit when she talked about making this a tradition. Waitwhat? He played it off like he'd tripped over something, and coughed nervously. "Ahem, yeah... Yeah..." She saw them together in a year, then... Like... still dating, like this?

He wouldn't mind, but... he hadn't honestly thought that far ahead. "Let's see how fun this is before we decide, eh?"

"In Seattle?" She thought about that. Really, there weren't very many ways you could reinvent a hot dog. But, Seattle liked to think they were pioneers in a lot of ways... so...

"Well, I guess the Seattle version would be a hot dog with cream cheese. Like, bun, meat, and cheese. That's it." She'd eaten many that way in her life. "... Sometimes with onions." Then again, the few times she'd gone to outdoor festivals in the city, there had been some pretty imaginative versions. "Tried a gator dog once, too. Don't recommend it."

"Never been to a patch like this before, actually. It's something else. Kinda like an amusement park with no rides, huh?

She chuckled. "It's got a different kind of appeal." She nodded off to one side slightly, as a group of kids ran around attempting to find the perfect pumpkins. "Kinda like a race against everyone else to find just the right squash, so you can slap a spooky face on it and put it outside at the mercy of teenagers."

Oh, all the poor unfortunate pumpkins she'd lost days before Halloween to nefarious teens with too much time on their hands.

... or wildlife. "Or raccoons."

She stopped to take a picture of the pumpkin field, fiddling with her focus for a moment. Then they were on their way into the maze, but first they came upon a map and a little pile of papers with numbered locations and punch spots.

"Ahem, yeah... Yeah... Let's see how fun this is before we decide, eh?"

She furrowed her brows at him for a moment, before shrugging it off. His response had been... weird, but whatever. She'd show him just how fun a maze could be!

--

"...I told you we should have taken a left three turns back." She stared down at the paper in her hands, which had a very small depiction of the maze on the back. They were lost... and she wasn't sure where exactly in the maze they were now.

"... I think we need to go back a bit and take that turn... and that should end us up... um... here?" She pointed at the map and showed it to him. "See?"

They'd gotten quite a few of the punches already... but had been in the maze for a half an hour or more already. And to top that, they hadn't run into anyone else the whole time!

Huh, he'd tried the cream cheese thing before... wasn't bad, but it wasn't home, you know?

"Barbarians, all of you over there."

Saph chuckled as she brought up the great race of finding the right pumpkin. "Oh don't you worry." He looked along at the crowd of kids running about. "We can take these guys. The perfect pumpkin will be ours."

He got into a boxing stance, jabbing the air a little bit, as if he were going to go all kung-fu out on some toddlers.

They got past the awkward moments, and he gladly ventured from the conversation to the pumpkin patch.

And then he wasn't glad.

They were lost.

They were going to die in here.

"Uh..eh... no, see... see we're here, right?" He squinted at the tiny map, and pointed to a spot on it. It... could have been where they were? Maybe.

"Oh wait..." He turned the map upside down. "Might be there." He turned around in the maze itself and stared at the path behind them. He'd been so confident when they'd started. "Uhhh... wander until we find a point, and then go from there?"

He started walking down one of the longer hallways.

"Oh don't you worry. We can take these guys. The perfect pumpkin will be ours."

She giggled at him and snapped a picture of his silly boxing stance. "Those kids don't stand a chance."

--

"Uh..eh... no, see... see we're here, right? Oh wait... Might be there."

She squinted at him as he turned the map this way and that, fiddling with the zoom on her camera absently as she watched. She was generally good with directions, but with the payout of this maze even she was more or less lost.

"Uhhh... wander until we find a point, and then go from there?"

She shrugged and followed after him, attempting to peek through the stalks as they went past. Unfortunately they were in thick enough rows that she couldn't see through to the other side.

"...This is probably the best maze I've ever been in. Most of the time they are super easy."

Actually, this was probably also the most plain maze she'd ever been in. There wasn't a fancy pattern cut into the field; shapes or gimmicks. It was like they had based it off of labyrinth style mazes. She wondered how many people struggled with it like they were.

"I went through haunted maze once, too. Now that was fun."

Saph shook his head forlornly as she stated how great the maze was. "I wouln't say that. Why they gotta make it so har..." His eyes suddenly squinted. "The..." The rugged mutant stopped in place, eyeing the hall of corn stocks before them.

"Shelby... stand here and Look down that hallway... real close. got me?" He stepped back a few steps. pointing to where he wanted her to look as he reached back to grab a stone from the ground. He pulled it back, and tossed it back the way they came with all of his might.

Where she was looking, a stone flew past.

"@#$%... I thought something felt funny... Thought it was just my imagination..." He looked worried. "Hold up..." He turned and ran as fast as he could; as soon as he rounded the corner from her, he was staring at her from the other end of the pathway.

"Something's going on here, Shelby... Come here, and stay close." Had Roach found them? What the hell! How did he know they were here?!"

"It loops in on itself... Musta happened after that fourth hole punch."

She blinked, half rolling her eyes at his complaint until he stopped. It looked like he was fixated on something, and yet she couldn't spot anything at all that stood out. She lifted a brow at him as he directed her to look in a specific direction, then did so. What, was she gonna see a ghost or something? She prepped her camera, just in case. 

Randomly, a rock went flying past. She blinked again. 

"@#$%... I thought something felt funny... Thought it was just my imagination... Hold up..."

Then he hobbled quickly off, and soon she was staring at him from a direction he had definitely not been in before. "Huh." She snapped a picture of him, pretty non-nonchalant about the whole thing. "And you said this wouldn't be fun!"

She grinned at him, attempting to lighten the mood again as she wandered closer. He sounded worried, and while it was weird, she wasn't convinced that they needed to get super anxious about it yet. "Hey, maybe this is part of the maze? Lemme see the paper again, maybe there's some kinda trick to it." 

She made grabby hands for it, and when she got it she smoothed it back out and set about picking apart everything printed on it. It was printed, nothing abnormal about that. None of the text explained what was happening, or even hinted at it. It didn't appear that there was any sort of puzzle or hidden message anywhere. She frowned slightly.

"Nope. Nothing." With a sigh, she rubbed at her eyes behind he glasses with a thumb and finger, and stuffed the map back into her pocket. "Well, if it loops we can't go forward. It would just loop us back here over and over again. So," She glanced up, where the stalks of corn ended and open air began. "That leaves up as a possibility. Why don't you just fly us out or whatever?"

"Huh. And you said this wouldn't be fun!"

Saph shot her a slightly incredulous look. Clearly she hadn't come to the same possible conclusions here that he had. "Shelby, stay alert, we could be in danger here." He made his way quickly to her side, his eyes darting about as if her were trying to find a fly he'd lost sight of.

"That leaves up as a possibility. Why don't you just fly us out or whatever?"

His face started to turn just a bit red. "I mean, it's not exactly that easy, okay? I can't just... you know, poof, fly... It's more... I mean... Like... I jump off something and... I don't fall, is all..." Goddammit it sounded so much cooler to be able to say he could fly.

"I, uh... can't really go up... I guess I could store up some energy, and then... jump, sorta." He gave a short nod to himself, and shortly his trusty crowbar was in his hands. He wailed on himself for a while, and then gave a solid jump. half way up, he suddenly disappeared into himself and came out the same way he came in, but upside down, and falling toward the ground. He landed on his feet more due to his reflex than anything.

"The hell was that?!" He looked around, somewhat disoriented by the experience. One second he was jumping up, the next he was falling in the direction he'd jumped, toward the ground.

"... we're stuck, Shelby..." He'd never seen an ability quite like this before... it was crazy! Strange doctor crazy, almost. "This is bad... Any ideas?"

"Shelby, stay alert, we could be in danger here."

Okay, fine. She'd be serious about it. "Sir, yes sir!" She mimed a Salute and clicked her heels together.

... Slightly serious about it.

"I, uh... can't really go up... I guess I could store up some energy, and then... jump, sorta."

Oh... well, there went that option. She didn't comment so much on the 'I just don't fall' part. She'd need to process that one a bit more before she had any proper questions about it.

Then he started hitting himself, which if she was being honest was one of the weirder aspects of both his power and their relationship. She had to have the only boyfriend in the world who was quicker to punch himself then join a fight. She quietly snapped a few pictures of him as he prepped himself.

"...Huh, it just dawned on me why you call yourself the Masochist. Totally makes sense now." She paused, squinting off to the side. "Man i'm slow."

She played the spectator as he hopped up, managing to capture a very bizarre picture of him mid whatever-the-hell-just-happened. When he landed again she had a wide eyed look on her face and just held the screen of the camera out so he could see for himself what had just happened.

"Kay, starting to worry now."

Fishing that paper with the map out again, she slung her camera around her neck and got her phone out. If they couldn't physically leave the spot they were in, maybe she could call out for help? There was a little hand scribbled phone number at the bottom on the back. After punching in the number, she held the phone to her ear and waited as it rang. After a few rings, someone picked up.

"...Hello?"

It was a dudes voice. "Uh, yeah... hey, so is this the u-pick pumpkin patch off of 36th? Cuz we're out here in your corn maze and we seem to be trapped. Like... some kinda bizarre time loop is physically keeping us trapped in here. Any suggestions on how to get out?"

There was a pause on the other end, and then the guy suddenly started laughing. Like, deep manic laughter. Shelby held the phone away from her ear for a moment, blinking at it, before she tapped the speaker function on.

HAHA! Finally! God, i've been waiting all day for a new sucker like you to wander in there!"

"Excuse you!"

"Alright, so... lemme get my stuff straight here. S'been a while." There was the faint sounds of shuffling paper. Shelby turned a very confused expression Saph's way.

"Alright, so... here's how it's gonna go down. I can let you out of there, but in order for me to do that you gotta give me Ten thousand dollars. Let's consider it a, uh... finders fee. You got that?"

Her confused expression morphed into an offended on. "Okay, First of all--!"

"Oh Shi-- gotta go, boss is coming. Call me back in like, ten minutes!"

He hung up. She stared at her phone in her hand for a moment before looking up at the wall of corn in front of her.

"... Saph, why does this kind of thing happen every time I leave the house?"

Saph rolled his eyes like a bored teenager when she mocked the graveness of the situation they were in. She mentioned not knowing until now why he was called the Masochist, and couldn't muster a response, as he was entirely too busy beating the crap out of himself.

By the time she called the number, Saph was poking at a corn stock, trying to figure out what exactly was going on here. He noticed her getting a response, and stumbled forward.

"What're they saying?" He heard the laughing from his new location, right next to her, and his face slowly started to turn red. He wasn't happy. "You tell that son of a-" He hung up on them.

"... Saph, why does this kind of thing happen every time I leave the house?"

"@#$%, I ask myself that every day..." He turned and looked around once more.

"Maybe we should try clearing out some more space..." He pulled out his crowbar, which had found it's way back to the holster during the phone conversation, and started using some of his stored energy to cut out a few swathes of corn stalk. "We at least can make some room, and get comfy, eh?"

"We ain't giving him no ten thousand. He will get an ass whoopin, though. That's due to him. Tell him I'm an X-Man. Maybe he'll be scared... Better yet, gimme the phone. Ima reach through it and kick his-" He went on for a moment longer, clearly not in a great mood over this. For one, he'd been scared, but it was probably some mutant kid looking for something to make his rural life interesting.

Saph would make it interesting, alright.

She watched him move around, cutting down some of the surrounding stalks. He had a point. If they were going to be there for a while, they might as well get comfortable!

... Wait a sec.

"We ain't giving him no ten thousand. He will get an ass whoopin, though. That's due to him. Tell him I'm an X-Man. Maybe he'll be scared... Better yet, gimme the phone. Ima reach through it and kick his-"

"Calm down, i'm not negotiating with him." She was busy poking away at her phone. They had quite a few minutes left anyway, before she was apparently expected to call him back. She watched minutes tick by as Saph did his own thing. When it was time, she redialed him and waited for him to pick up. She didn't have to wait long.

"Wow, ten minutes exactly. Really want outta that maze, huh? Haha! The Corn Stalker strikes again!" He cackled. She sighed. "Really? The corn stalker?"

"What? It's a good villain name!" She rolled her eyes. "Ahem... Alright, so, i'll need you to wire the amount to a specific account, and-"

"Uh, yeah, gotta interrupt you there. So, I was looking a few things up while you so politely had me waiting to call you back, and I happened to notice that the hours for this particular orchard are ten am to seven pm." The guy went silent, so she continued. "So that means that in, oh.. four hours this places closes. I'm assuming that, like most other pumpkin patches open to the public, when this place gets close to closing someone is going to come through to make sure that the grounds are empty... am I correct?"

She heard him take in a breath, and interrupted him right before he was about to speak again. "SO. instead of paying you your ridiculous ransom for our freedom, i'm going to make a counter offer. You are going to let us out of this... trap... or we are going to start systematically ruining the whole maze. You have until seven tonight to re-think your decision. Until then consider this a sit-in, in protest of that s@%$y villain name you came up with. When you have an answer for us, call me back Corn Stalker"

She promptly hung up and crossed her arms.