[Blood Bowl 04] - Rumble in the Jungle

by Matt Forbeck - (ebook by Undead)

  “Hostage is such an ugly word,” Big Richard said, wincing. “How about ‘bargaining point’?”

  A thick, sharp knife appeared in Dirk’s hand, and he brought it up between him and the pygmy dwarf. “I’ve got another point I’d be happy to bargain with.”

  Big Richard folded his tiny arms over his chest. “You don’t scare me. I was chosen to be captain of this year’s team. What can you do to me that’s worse than what the Werejaguars have in store?”

  Dirk loomed over the little man. “I’m willing to find out.”

  Dunk put a hand on his brother’s chest. He felt Dirk lean into it for a moment, and then back off reluctantly, the knife still at his side.

  “Let our friends go, and we’ll discuss this,” Dunk said to Big Richard.

  “I don’t think you understand just how desperate we are. We paddled out to your gigantic ship and drugged everyone with poison darts. Then we dragged them out to a secret location on the island. When we realised we’d missed you, I set up here to greet you when you came looking for us.”

  “How did you know we’d come after you?”

  Big Richard scowled. “Tat II is nothing if not predictable in his treachery.”

  “They’ve killed them already,” Dirk said. “Let’s toss this joker into the sea and figure out a way home.”

  “That doesn’t add up, son,” Slick said. “Why send this little guy out to chat us up if they did? If they captured the rest of the crew, they could take us down too.”

  “They got the others in their sleep,” Lästiges said. “We’re wide awake and ready for them.”

  “Really,” Big Richard said, “we don’t want to hurt anyone. We don’t want to eat anyone. If we did, we’d have snatched the ogre in the middle of the night. We could have fed the whole tribe on his flesh for a week.”

  M’Grash recoiled in horror from the tiny man.

  “We’ll do it,” said Dunk.

  “You have to be kidding,” said Dirk.

  “Why not? We’re not playing for anyone else. Think of the pygmy halflings as our sponsor.”

  “You can’t give in to kidnappers.”

  “We’re not giving in. We’re helping them. In exchange, they’ll help us scout out the opposition and give us a better chance to win. We’ll do it.” Dunk looked at Big Richard. “But if we win, we keep the purse.”

  The little man broke out in a grin that seemed to be bigger than he was. “All right.” he said. “I can’t wait to tell the others! Keep the money. We’re only interested in breathing.”

  “Will you let the others go?” Spinne asked.

  Big Richard’s smile fell. “I’m afraid we need some way to ensure you’ll help us. We will treat them like kings and bring them to the game in perfect condition. Better than that even!”

  This made Dunk nervous, but he decided to go along with it. “Just tell us who we’re playing for this time out.”

  “The other teams just swat us like flies, so that’s the name we took, from the Island of Sacrifice, of course. Welcome to the Sacrifice Flies!”

  21

  “I don’t like this,” Dirk said as he helped to row the boat away from the Island of Sacrifices and towards Tobazco Island, “not one damned bit.”

  “With Pegleg in the Flies’ custody, I’m the one in charge,” Dunk said, working another oar. “It’s my call.”

  “You made a bad one.”

  Dunk put up his oar for a moment. The others stopped rowing. “You had a better idea?”

  “Sure. Wade into the island and kill them all.”

  “That’s barbaric.”

  You’re talking to a Blood Bowl player. Hell, you are a Blood Bowl player.”

  “We don’t kill unless we have to.”

  “I think having most of the team kidnapped qualifies for that.”

  “I don’t.”

  Dirk stood up and stabbed a finger into Dunk’s face. Before he could say anything, though, Jiminy grabbed the sides of the boat and gave it a good rocking. Dirk tumbled backward into his seat once more.

  “Boys, boys, boys,” said Jiminy “I can see your parents had a double handful between you two.”

  Dirk started to stand up again, but Jiminy sat him down with a grin. “I can also see you ain’t spent much time on a boat if you’re dumb enough to stand up in one. Try it again, and you may find yourself taking a swim.”

  Once Dirk had taken his seat again, Jiminy continued. “Tell me, boys, just why are you here?”

  “You mean in the larger sense?” asked Lästiges. “I’ve been wrestling with that a lot myself lately, and…” Her voice trailed off as she realised everyone was staring at her. “Sorry.”

  Jiminy’s grin washed Lästiges’s embarrassment away. “I mean, why are you here in Lustria? Sightseeing? Fortune hunting? Vacation? On the run from the law?”

  “No,” Dunk said, “nothing like that.”

  “We’re here to play Blood Bowl,” Spinne said.

  “Really?” Jiminy arched an eyebrow at the woman. “They don’t have other teams back where you come from?”

  “Actually,” said Dunk, “we’re here to find our sister.”

  Jiminy stared at Dunk and Spinne. “You two are brother and sister? The way you were going at it the other night, I had you figured for something a little less, ah, close, relatively speaking.”

  Dunk blushed and pointed to Dirk. “Our sister; we lost track of her and our mother and father back when an angry mob ran our family out of its keep in Altdorf.”

  “You boys really know how to make friends.” Jiminy’s good-natured grin kept Dunk’s ire down. “I thought you resembled each other in a family way but if you have the same parents how come one of you’s a Hoffnung and the other’s a Heldmann?”

  “It’s complicated,” said Dunk, putting his back into the rowing.

  “What in life ain’t? Anyhow, the point here is that if you’re looking for your sister, do that. Don’t worry about the game so much, unless that’s why you’re actually here.”

  Sitting next to the singer in the front of the boat, Slick clapped Jiminy on the back. “The man has a point, sons. It’s a simple matter of priorities. Of course, there’s the purse for winning the tournament, and that’s nothing to pish-posh either.”

  “No.” Dunk shook his head. “The Tobazco Bowl is only a tissue-thin pretence. We’re here for Kirta.”

  Slick shrugged. “Just doing my job as your agent, telling you not to ignore your professional commitments. As your friend, though, I wholeheartedly approve.”

  “Can’t we do both?” asked Spinne. “Look for Kirta and play the game?”

  “Sure,” Dunk said, leaning close to her for a kiss as they stroked the oars again. He looked up at Jiminy. “How long do we have before the game?”

  Jiminy shaded his eyes and stared at the top of the volcano that occupied most of Tobazco Island, which grew closer with every stroke. “They usually wait until she’s just about ready to blow,” he said. “They think the lava flows add to the drama.”

  “How often does that happen?” Lästiges asked, shivering despite the tropical heat.

  “Bout once a year,” he said, “right about the same time. That’s how we’ve known it’s tournament time. Some say Tobazco, the God of Heat, chooses the date to fit him so he can watch the game in his favourite chilli bowl.”

  “I thought the lava would make it hot,” said Dunk.

  “Hot enough to melt the nails in your boots.”

  “Then why is the bowl chilly?”

  Jiminy laughed. “Chilli’s a food, not a temperature, my friend, and the hotter, the better.”

  “Why do they call it chilly then?”

  Jiminy scratched at his chin. “I suppose it’s something like why you call a fat man ‘Slim’, or a pygmy halfling ‘Big Richard’.”

  Dunk nodded, understanding how this worked, but not why.

  “Not worth wasting brain sweat over,” Jiminy said. “We’ll get you a bowl sometime, and
you can make up your own mind about it. In the meantime, from the way that crater at the top of the volcano’s started to smoke, I suspect we have three, maybe four days before the games begin.”

  “So we have some time to look for Kirta first.”

  “I’d say so.”

  Dunk jerked his chin at the volcano. “Then we’re going to skip Tobazco Island for now. We’ll go straight to Amazon Island instead, and see if we can find Kirta before this whole mess begins.”

  22

  “I don’t like the way this place smells,” Slick said, wrinkling his nose at the wind as they sat resting on the beach.

  “It’s not much worse than the sulphur spewing from the volcano,” Dunk said. He had to agree, though, he’d been holding his breath for most of the time since they’d landed.

  “We all needed a rest,” Lästiges said, inspecting the blisters rising on the palms of her hands.

  “What’s Xocibiki mean, anyhow?” Slick asked.

  “Bloody nasty!” said Edgar. M’Grash, who sat next to the treeman, shrugged. His nose ring often cut off his sense of smell, and for the first time Dunk saw how that could be a good thing.

  Jiminy squinted into the sun for a moment. “I think it’s got something to do with voodoo, but I don’t know for sure.”

  “What’s voodoo?” Dunk asked.

  “An island flavoured hodgepodge of all sorts of different religions tossed into one. It involves evil priests, walking dead — they call them zombies — and formless spirits that ride their worshippers like a man rides a horse.”

  “How do you know so much about it?” Dirk asked, his voice soaked in suspicion.

  “Cause Xocibiki is the home of voodoo in these parts, maybe any parts at all.”

  Lästiges shot to her feet. “Then what are we doing here? Aren’t we tempting fate by even landing here?” She shuddered and stared around at where the beach ended in a long line of untamed jungle, which somehow seemed both closer and darker now.

  Jiminy waved off her concerns. “Zombies can’t stand salt water,” he said. “Pour a little bit of salt on them, and they shrivel up like slugs. That’s how come they never get off the island. Long as we stay on the beach, we should be just fine.”

  “Who’s the voodoo priest in charge around here?” Slick asked, his eyes growing wide.

  “Baron Somebody” said Jiminy.

  “You don’t know his name?” asked Dirk.

  “That is his name: Somebody. Baron Somebody. Sometimes he goes by Mr. Big instead.”

  “Is that something like calling a fat man ‘Slim’?” asked Dunk.

  “No, this is more of a what-you-hear-is-what-you-get thing. Somebody who’s about as fat as they come.”

  “A dark-skinned man who runs around without a shirt and wears his hair in long clumps?” asked Slick.

  “They call those dreadlocks,” said Jiminy.

  “Dreadlocks, right, through which he sticks bits of people’s bones?”

  “Right.” Jiminy laughed. “He’s even got one of a pygmy halfling.”

  “That he wears right smack in the middle of his fat forehead?”

  Jiminy stopped laughing. “That’s right. Too right.”

  “How do you know about Baron Somebody?” Dunk asked.

  Slick, who’d been staring out at the jungle the entire time he’d been talking, raised his hand and pointed straight into the thickest, darkest part. “Because he’s standing right there.”

  The others leapt to their feet, kicking sand everywhere. There, right before them, Dunk could see a dark, round shape coalescing under the shelter of the jungle’s thick, green canopy. Then the shape came towards them, moving like a landed whale.

  Baron Somebody, for that was the only person that this could be, looked exactly how Slick and Jiminy had described them. As he grew closer, though, Dunk saw that they had omitted a few salient details, like the way madness danced in his oak-coloured eyes.

  “Greetings, strangers!” Baron Somebody’s voice boomed as if his words had been beaten out on a wide, low drum. “I would like to know if you have accepted Death as your personal saviour.”

  Dunk stopped, stunned. He looked to the others. They all shrugged at him, confused.

  “Ah, no,” said Dunk. “Should we have?”

  “It is the only way to salvation! Without Death, we wander cold and lonely through life! How much better to embrace the senseless existence of Death.”

  “Ain’t the grave supposed to be cold?” Jiminy said.

  “But of course!” Baron Somebody said. “But when you are gathered in Death’s arms, you can’t feel it. You can’t feel a thing!”

  “And that’s good?” asked Dunk.

  The voodoo priest’s face fell into a look of grim determination. “Think of the struggles of life! Think about all the troubles it brings. Imagine if you never had to feel hungry or thirsty again; if you never had to feel pain, or emotions of any kind.”

  Dunk frowned. “But you couldn’t feel warmth, or love, or a human touch again either.”

  “A small sacrifice to make for immunity from all else. Death can save us all! It knows no prejudice. It accepts us each as we are.”

  “If it’s so bloody wonderful,” said Edgar, “how come you’re still breathing?”

  “As a bokor, a voodoo priest, it’s my solemn duty to spread the gospel of Death to all that can hear it. Sadly, I cannot do that if I am dead. Although I long for Death’s release, I will delay that day so that I might serve both Death and my fellow living creatures, guiding them towards the darkness.”

  “We can arrange to send you off to your master straight away,” Dirk said as he stepped up next to Dunk.

  “That is not necessary, stranger, although I appreciate your kind offer. I will find my way to Death when Death wills it! In the meantime, I offer Death to all who will listen!”

  “What about those who don’t? Who refuse to listen to your message?” asked Spinne.

  Baron Somebody smiled, revealing a set of shark teeth filed to sharp points. “All listen in time, stranger! No matter how deaf their ears may be, Death comes for them all.”

  “We’re busy,” Dunk said. “We have to find our sister on Amazon Island. We can’t mess around with Death right now.”

  “But you are Blood Bowl players, are you not? The Hackers? I see you on my Cabalvision. You are great servants of Death! You kill more people in an hour than most folks do in a lifetime!”

  Dunk blushed. The fact that he made a living playing such a violent game bothered him sometimes, although he rarely talked about it. “We win games by points scored, not opponents killed.”

  “But Death cheers from the sidelines of every game! No matter who plays in the game, Death wins! Your Nuffle is only another aspect of Death. You already worship Death! Make it official. Cut out the middleman. Go straight for Death!”

  “Blood Bowl’s not about death,” Dunk said. “It’s about victory, and the ultimate victory is survival. To endure a Blood Bowl game, to come out of it not only alive but intact, there’s little better in this life.”

  “But it’s the risk of Death that makes it so sweet! Without it, Blood Bowl would be just a bunch of people scrambling around after a ball on a patch of Astroturf. Who would pay to watch something as boring as that?”

  “It’s not boring!” Everyone turned around to stare at the voice that had shouted these words. It belonged to Slick.

  “I make a living at Blood Bowl, but I’m no player. I could make better money running the family business back in Greenfield, but I spend my days devoted to this game, and the people who play the game.

  “I love Blood Bowl for the game, not the violence. It has action, drama, pathos, triumph, and more. It’s real life turned up all the way.

  “Blood Bowl is more than a game. It’s a metaphor for the humanoid condition. It represents the best and the worst of who we are and who we can be. You can’t get better than that, especially not on a Sunday afternoon.”

  When Sl
ick stopped speaking, everyone blinked at him for a moment. Then Baron Somebody spoke up. “Death conquers all! It’s one of the best ways to win a game of Blood Bowl, by killing off the other team. Give me Death, or give me Death!

  “Sooner or later, we all die! Why not come along now?”

  Growing tired of the bokor’s rants, Dunk stepped forward, ready to order an attack. While they weren’t in their armour, every one of them besides Slick and Jiminy were Blood Bowl players. That put them among the best fighters in the world, and Dunk was ready to test their mettle against whatever the baron had to throw at them.

  The baron watched the players fan out along the beach. They looked ready to take him apart. As they moved, his bulging belly began to rumble. Soon it shook like an avalanche of lard, and his laughter resounded along the beach.

  “You are fools,” he said. “There is no escape from my army of the undead.”

  “Army?” Dunk said looking around. The beach stood empty in either direction as far as the eye could see. The waters lapped softly at the sand, but Jiminy had been clear that the zombies could not be found there. If they were in the jungle, fine, but the players could just run into the water. That’s why Dunk felt so confident when he said, “What army?”

  “Boom! Boom! Boom!” Baron Somebody said.

  As he spoke, the sands around the players and their friends shifted. Rotting arms reached up from beneath the beach, followed by decaying bodies. Human figures pulled themselves from shallow graves all around, sending sand sliding away in every direction.

  “So that’s why this place smells like hell,” Slick said, a waver in his voice.

  “Brains!” the zombies said. “Brains! Brains! Brains!”

  “Kind of a one-track mind,” Dunk said as he and the others closed ranks, forming a defensive circle around Edgar and M’Grash. The two big guys stood back to back, allowing them to cover the others in every direction with their extra-long arms. Meanwhile, Dunk, Dirk, Spinne, and Lästiges could defend them against any attacks that managed to get through their defences. Jiminy stood between Dunk and Dirk, ready to lend a hand, while Slick clambered up Edgar’s bark covered side and sat in the safety of the treeman’s upper branches.