Fantasy Online Polynya

by Harmon Cooper

  Finally, FeeTwix gets the opening he needs.

  He kicks off the orc’s chest, blasting the mahoosive son of a giant with a cloud of steam out of the bottom of both his feet. Once in the air, his Gatling gun starts rotating as he fills the orc with lead.

  We’re winning! Ryuk thinks as he goes for another mag of black molten marbles. He takes a step back, and as he does, someone grabs him from behind, disarms him, and cuffs his hands together.

  “Hey!”

  Ryuk is pushed to his knees by a man wearing sleek black armor and a facemask.

  Before he can make out his features, the man grabs Ryuk’s cuffs and disappears. They land amidst the mayhem below and Ryuk’s tossed to his stomach. The man flashdances away, and soon Hiccup meets the same fate.

  “What the fick?” the goblin cries out. “Who the hell is that?”

  Ryuk’s heart stops.

  Aiden? He recalls the immiNPC who was one of the first members of the Knights of Non Compos Mentis. He’d only met Aiden once or twice, but he’s the only person that Ryuk has seen move in that way.

  Zaena, partially recovered, starts whirling her blades around her body to prevent the masked man from cuffing her.

  Ryuk pushes himself up as best he can just to see Aiden’s handle appear as a peculiar rifle takes shape in his hands.

  Aiden Level 99

  HP: 6969/6969

  ATK: 6,888

  MATK: 313

  DEF: 3,320

  MDF: 2,459

  LUCK: 119

  Aiden pegs Zaena with a netgun, which Ryuk instantly connects to the weapon FeeTwix first used to stop the Thulean back in Sotla.

  FeeTwix zooms towards Aiden in his steamsuit and the masked man is gone in a flash. A series of explosives at FeeTwix’s big brass feet toss him backwards and Aiden takes shape on top of the steamsuit as it crashes to the ground, causing a small crater and creating a small cloud of dust.

  Before FeeTwix can swipe Aiden away with his buster sword, Aiden uses a sword that looks suspiciously like the Swede’s slice bang to crack the steamsuit cabin open.

  He reaches in, yanks FeeTwix out, and golden cuffs appear on the Swede’s wrists. FeeTwix struggles, tries to access his inventory list, and as he does, Aiden grabs him by the top of his overcoat and pulls him over to Ryuk.

  From there, Aiden drags Hiccup over, who kicks, screams, and farts the entire way, and he keeps Zaena pinned with the bolonet.

  “Aiden!” Ryuk shouts. “It’s me! I was a Knight!”

  “You know this ficker?” Hiccup yells incredulously. “What the fick, Marbles, I thought the Knights would receive us well!? Fick! I lost my pacifier too! Coming down over here … this is shit, real shit.” The goblin starts to shiver. “Someone find my pacifier! I was a Knight too!”

  The Empress’ royal guard, known as the Knights in White Satin because of their long white capes, take shape around the pinned and cuffed Mitherfickers. The captain of the guard turns to Aiden and growls, “We got it from here, immiNPC.”

  “It’s Aiden,” he says, “and I was here first.”

  “You’re out of your jurisdiction, immiNPC,” the captain says. “That’s right, the Knights have no jurisdiction because you’re a fucking guild. Did you somehow forget that?”

  The captain looks from Aiden to the four Mitherfickers.

  “That’s the one who attacked Empress Thun earlier.” He points at Ryuk. “Like I said, we’ll take it from here. Pay my regards to Sophia.”

  A wolfish grin appears on Aiden’s masked face. He nods and dematerializes one pixelated line at a time.

  “This is for Empress Thun!” The captain approaches Ryuk, pulls his armored foot back, and kicks him square in the jaw.

  Chapter 25: Mani-Pedi and a Royal Confession

  “Fick you!” Hiccup screams as he’s tossed into a damp and dirty cell.

  The wall of the cell has a single bench on it large enough to fit two people. Next to the bench is a bedpan with a steaming pile of shit in it, and resting on the floor next to the bedpan is a pillowcase that looks to be filled with rocks.

  There are no windows, the only light available comes from between a series of slats on the ceiling.

  Ryuk is the last to go in.

  The guard throws him in the hardest, and he stumbles forward and faceplants on the rock pillow, where he’s gifted a whiff of the bedpan.

  He dry heaves, again tries to move his hands to log out, and once he realizes that he can’t, he uses his chin to push himself back to a kneeling position, and from there, he stands.

  FeeTwix’s eyes flicker as he reads messages from his fans. “Shit!” he laments. “No one knows anything about what’s going on outside of the city.”

  “And inside?” Ryuk asks.

  Zaena plops down onto the bench, just about as furious as Ryuk has ever seen her.

  To control her ghost limbs, they’ve outfitted her with special Thulean restraints and cuffed her wrists at her side. She doesn’t struggle to get out, she already did plenty of that while they were cuffing her and managed to toss a few of the Empress’ guards in the process, but if the look on her face were enough to cut through the cuffs, the four Mitherfickers would be halfway to Aramis by now, a trail of dead bodies in their wake.

  Hiccup paces back and forth nervously, his big paws cuffed behind his back. “Fick! We don’t want to be anybody’s bitches so look tough!”

  “We’re the only people in here,” FeeTwix reminds him.

  “Pfft! In case you didn’t know, goblins excel at counting. Aware, Twixy, that’s what I’m saying, and to quote myself, I’m not going to be anybody’s little bitch, especially Marbles’!”

  “Why are you dragging me into this, Hiccup?” Ryuk asks, angry and annoyed.

  “You’re the one that got us in here!”

  “But what does that have to do with being ‘someone’s little bitch,’ as you put it?”

  Hiccup goes from hyper-tense to full-on panicking. He runs to the cell door. “Fickers! Someone get me my lawyer! Goes by the name of Solon!”

  “No lawyer for wankers,” an inmate across the hall calls out.

  Hiccup bangs his head against the bar. “Fick you! I’m crazy, you hear me!? Come over here and I’ll be dining on your chalupa while I make you watch, you little fickered pinko twat!”

  “What the bloody hell is a chalupa?”

  “Fick! Fick!”

  “Quiet, goblin,” Zaena says.

  “We’re going to die! Shit. They’ll take me first. Always do. Racism and heightism and I’m the shortest and I’m a goblin. FICK! This is bad; Marbles will be next, then Twixy, then Liz. Shit! They’ll learn about Wolf and go get him and Conan. Enway too, but I don’t know her so well so that’s fine. But fick, Snowballs! He’s so young!”

  FeeTwix approaches the goblin. “Holy hell, Hiccup, get a hold of yourself! Your fans are watching! Don’t act like a little fickboy in front of your people.”

  “This is bad!” Hiccup grinds his teeth together and moves over to the bench. He plops down and lets one rip.

  “Gross!” Zaena stands.

  “Stress related flatulence, Liz. Fick! We’re gonna die, we’re gonna die … I’ll never see my son again!”

  “Your son?”

  “I told you!” he screams at FeeTwix. “Spew Gorge may be mine. Dunno. Doesn’t matter. Well, it matters because if I die, I want him to get the five percent Marbles promised me.”

  Ryuk sighs. “It’s two percent.”

  “Three, but you get the picture!”

  “Hiccup, I think you are overreacting,” FeeTwix says. “And if Spewy is your son, why do you call him your cousin? A cousin means your father or mother is related to his father or mother.”

  “What? You’ve never bumped nasties with your aunt? I find that hard to believe, especially coming from a Swede. But that’s not what is at stake here, Twixy! We’re fickin’ doomed!”

  “Relax, I think you are coming down from your concert high.”


  “Fick! Why couldn’t we have just stayed at the concert. It was so beautiful there! All those choice bits of ass, and that DJ Ride the Lightning ... I’ll have whatever he’s on, am I right? Ha!” Hiccup frowns miserably and lies onto his back. “Son of a ficklord, we’re beyond ficked.”

  FeeTwix walks to the cell door, turns, and uses his cuffs to make a ruckus. “Guard, I have a question!”

  “Shut up!” a guard yells from down the hall. “And stop running your cuffs along the bars!”

  “What’s the bail looking like?” he calls back.

  “No bail!”

  “Ah, don’t be like that. What’s it going to take, buddy? Work with me here. We got loads of rupees, coming out the wazoo if you ask me.”

  “Are you bribing me!?”

  “No, sir! I’d never do that, kind sir!”

  “Twick, Fixy … shit, you know what I’m trying to say. Dammit, how many times do I have to tell you to let me do the talking when it comes to negotiating?”

  FeeTwix ignores Hiccup and turns to Ryuk. “Well, okay, get lemons and make lemonade. Something like that. What I’m trying to say here is that it looks like we’ll need to think of another way. Come on, guys, we’ll think of one! We’re the Mitherfickers! Hell, I’ll bet we can just message Enway to break us out once Oric is better.”

  “We can’t use our dashboards or log out,” Ryuk reminds him.

  “But I can still livestream!”

  “Fick your followers, FeeTwix, they won’t be able to get us out of here.” Hiccup grows tearful. “I never would have thought that I’d be incarcerated at the young age of 154.”

  He blows his nose, and without anything to blow it onto, snot just dribbles onto his lips. He wipes it on the bench and continues sobbing. “Fick me. We’re going to die, and when we do, they’re going to rape our corpses. That’s what happens in these places, you know. I read, I know things. You can learn a lot from the ‘letter to the editor’ section of Wet Goblin Holes. I don’t want anyone to rape my corpse, especially one of those inbred guards we saw back there. You see that one with the overbite?”

  “Enough whining. I will get us out of here.” Zaena hops up from her bench.

  FeeTwix steps aside and looks at her questioningly. “How? You’re just as cuffed as we are.”

  “If not more,” Ryuk adds.

  The Thulean assassin approaches the bars and looks down the hall. “Guard. I demand your audience, now.”

  “Ha! Demand!”

  “Yhai blahte charotakh lavaka.”

  Hiccup’s ears twitch. “What the fick did you just say?”

  A guard approaches moments later, his clubbing stick at the ready. “Say that again and see what happens!” he growls.

  A tear-shaped light forms under the skin of Zaena’s forehead. As soon as the guard sees it he drops to one knee. “What is it you’d like, milady?”

  “I demand to be removed from this prison and I demand an audience with Empress Thun.”

  Ryuk glances at Hiccup, whose jaw has dropped open, and back to FeeTwix, who’s still trying to figure out what’s going on.

  “Yes, milady!” the guard says as he goes for his keys.

  (0)__(0)

  The Thulean restraints are quickly taken off Zaena and she’s ushered out of the cell. “Not without my companions,” she tells the guards and they begrudgingly comply.

  “But they must stay cuffed,” the head guard says, the one with the overbite. “At least for now.”

  “That’s fine, as long as they’re with me at all times.”

  “Seriously,” Hiccup grumbles as the guard guides him away from the bench. “You could have told us, Liz! No wonder you’d always bristle when I called you princess.”

  Ryuk stops dead in his tracks. “You’re … a Thulean princess?”

  “That’s right, Marbles, Liz has royal blood.”

  “How come none of you knew?” the Swede asks his audience as he’s led out of the cell. “And why didn’t you tell me?” he asks Zaena, suddenly a little hurt.

  “We will discuss this later.”

  A thought comes to FeeTwix. “Wait, if you’re a princess does that mean you’re related to the Thulean queen that Quantum Hughes took out in the giant tournament?”

  “No, she’s related to another queen, Twixy. Of course she is! Fick me, you’re daft.”

  “Queen Renata is my older sister, so yes, I am related to her.”

  “I’m just pissed that her royal highness over here hasn’t used any of her power to a) get us better hotels; b) better guildmates, sorry Marbles; c) rupees galore and the working gals that follow; or d) fund the Mitherfickers’ extreme vetting program. Hey! Watch the fickin’ hair!” he barks at the guard steering him.

  “A goblin with pink hair?” an inmate calls out. “I got dibs on that little pink-haired fuckboy!”

  “Fick!” Hiccup shoulders past Ryuk. “Get me the hell away from that pedo! Talk about some bad hombres! Whew! Glad we’re getting the fick out of here!”

  “Enough, goblin,” Zaena calls over her shoulder. “You are a noisy pest.”

  “Well, she is royalty,” the goblin starts to tell Ryuk, “so that would explain some of the racism. I agree,” Hiccup says even though Ryuk isn’t responding, “she should call me by my proper name, but hey, like I said, she’s royalty. Can’t live with them, and we aren’t allowed to kill them.”

  “Where are they going?” one of the inmates cries out as they reach the stairs. “Not fuckin’ fair, mate!”

  “Quiet, Luke!” the lead guard shouts. “Or it’s another flogging for ye!”

  “Oooo! Flog me!” screams another inmate.

  “Keep your mouth shut, Bobby!” growls the guard.

  They’re led up a flight of stairs to a long corridor, and from there, they head back down another flight of stairs to an underground passage.

  Ryuk’s mind reels as he tries to piece together all the times Zaena hinted that there was more to her story. But to find out that “more” is the fact that she’s royalty is something that he is pretty shocked to hear, especially Thulean royalty.

  As they walk, Ryuk recalls the couple of times he visited the city of Athos, the capital of the third floating continent, Ultima Thule. The mostly Thulean city filled with yurt-like buildings is unlike any place he has visited in Tritania.

  “Shit, Marbles, you look like you’re lost in thought.”

  “I sort of was, until you interrupted it.”

  “Yeah? Well how ‘bout less daydreaming and more fickin’ team leading.”

  “Zaena is at the front of the group,” he reminds the goblin. The guard behind him laughs.

  “You two always this friendly to each other?”

  “We have a special relationship, if that’s what you mean,” Hiccup grits. “And I’m not saying I’m his fickin’ lapdog here either. He comes when I tell him, not the other way around.”

  FeeTwix starts laughing so hard that the procession has to stop. “Really think about that last line, Hiccup. Just … really think about it.”

  “Fick you, Twixy!” Hiccup’s face turns red as he scowls. “You know what I meant.”

  “Quiet back there,” the lead guard shouts as they enter into a comfortable room with white marble flooring. Folding screens divide the room.

  At the far end of the room, near the other entrance, are four chairs suitable for both washing a person’s hair and giving them manicures and pedicures.

  “The four of you will now get ready to meet Empress Thun.”

  Four clothed mannequins magically appear in the center of the room, three male and one female.

  “This is great!” says the Swede as his eyes take in the clothing on the mannequins. Two white suits with embroidered silk lapels; a dazzling silver dress with long sleeves and embellishments on the collar; a white potato sack with tiny silver spikes that form a circle around the neckline – the Mitherfickers are about to get decked the fuck out.

  “Whose idea was it to give me a
potato sack?” Hiccup moans as a shoe rack appears – two white leather loafers, one pair of high heels. “And why don’t I get shoes?”

  “We didn’t have a lot of time!” A short designer with light brown hair walks into the room. She’s followed by another designer who is taller, quiet, and carries on her face one of the warmest smiles Ryuk has ever seen.

  “Come, it’s time to get dressed,” the second designer tells him, her black eyes sparkling under her bangs.

  “I’m cuffed,” he reminds her.

  “About that … ”

  Their cuffs disappear, replaced by thin golden bracelets. The guards surrounding them suddenly disappear, as if they were never there in the first place.

  “Better?” she asks.

  “Glad those fickers are gone, especially the one with the overbite. He was eying me funny!”

  “We still can’t log out or equip anything,” FeeTwix says, “but I guess it’s a little better.”

  “Who’s ready to play dress up?” Hiccup grumbles as his armor falls to the floor, revealing a chest still covered in blacklight-responsive paint.

  “Please!” the brunette designer says, horror painted across her face, “we have screens for you to change behind.”

  “Halfway there, lady.”

  Ryuk looks away as the goblin goes full commando.

  As FeeTwix films the scene for his audience, Hiccup marches right up to the mannequin and pulls the potato sack over his head.

  “Your hair and nails too,” the brunette designer says.

  “Mani-pedi?” Hiccup pumps a fist in the air. “Fick yeah! We doing it up, kiddos! Lead the way and make sure to really work my big toenails. It’s been months!”

  “We are designers,” the brunette tells him sharply. “They will be giving you mani-pedis.” She nods as four NPCs, three women and one male, walk into the room.

  The male stylist pats his chair and Hiccup rushes over there like a kid to Santa’s lap. “Now this is what I’m talking about!” he says as he wiggles his ass into the chair, getting comfortable.