Death by Cliché

by Defendi, Bob

  “We need to start gathering intelligence,” Damico said. “See what Hraldolf’s up to. Come up with a plan to beat him.”

  “What if there is no plan?” Omar asked.

  “There’s always a plan,” Gorthander said. “It’s an adventure. There’s always a way to win.”

  “Most of the time,” Damico said, “you don’t even lose half your hit points.”

  “It seems rough,” Gorthander said, “but it will be exactly as hard as we can handle.”

  After a time, they realized their drinks weren’t imminent, and Arithian wasn’t coming back. Oh, look. A rocket scientist.

  Anyway, Damico went to the bar and fetched their drinks, and Omar and Gorthander became quietly hammered while they argued about whether the newest d30 Fighter’s book was worth buying. Eventually they wandered off to bed, leaving Damico and Lotianna alone at the table in an alcohol glow.

  “What do we do now?” Lotianna asked.

  “Stop coming on to me, you scandalous woman!” Damico said.

  “Oh, you think I’m coming on to you?”

  He considered her, his expression a carefully crafted leer. Hers was an expression of comic innocence.

  “I’ve come to expect it,” he said. “My lot in life.”

  She moved closer to him. “What would you say if I told you I was just being polite? Taking pity, even?”

  “I’d say it’s a pity you’re such a liar,” he said, rolling his head back to watch the room.

  There was a pause, and he felt her mood grow more serious. He glanced at her and found her attention inward. He left her to her thoughts.

  It was a while before she said, “What’s happened to me?”

  “What do you mean?” he asked, his voice carefully even.

  “I was nice, and then I was awful, and then I was shy, and then… then I don’t remember much until one day… one day, I just sort of woke up.”

  Damico nodded and took her hand. “Does it matter?”

  “Yes.”

  Damico caught her chin, urging her to face him. He leaned in and kissed her gently, then eagerly. He pulled away.

  “Do you want to go upstairs?” he whispered.

  “Yes.”

  He smiled. “Good. Then I’ll explain everything afterward.”

  She leaned in, nibbled on his ear. “Are you that eager?”

  “You’re the eager one, you wanton woman,” he said with a smile.

  “Then why not tell me now?”

  “Because if I tell you now, it will sound like the biggest pick-up line ever.”

  And with that, he swept her up and carried her to bed.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  “If you lived in this book, you’d be home right now.”

  —Bob Defendi

  ou don’t get to know what happened next. If you must read about it, you have the entire internet to satisfy you, and several online bookstores will deliver adult material right to your phone. Anyway, if Carl has to be in the dark, you don’t get to peek in the window.

  Later that night, they lay tangled in the sheets, the musky smell drifting languidly in the air. Damico smiled and stared at the ceiling, lazily considering waking Lotianna up for another go.

  A bump and a curse echoed in the hall. He smiled. Another patron heading for bed, drunk. It wasn’t that the walls were paper thin—the plaster was so thick it splintered under its own weight—there was an inch gap below and above the door.

  He rolled over and studied the vertebrae of her back, each one outlined under the skin, following one after another from her lustrous hair to the triangle of her pelvic girdle at the edge of the blanket. That small-of-the-back spot women in the real world liked to cover in tattoos.

  The creamy skin gleamed softly in the moonlight from the window, and he traced the vertebrae carefully with the tip of his finger… one and then another and another. They felt warm and hard under his touch. A braille map down the axis of her body.

  She stirred slightly and moaned. He reached up and stroked her hair, and she went back to sleep. He smiled again. He must look like an idiot.

  The door shattered inward, and the latch hook whipped across the room, striking Damico in the eye. He screamed and reached up in pain, and so it took him time to realize men flooded the chamber. He didn’t notice until the pitchfork slid between his arms, catching him under the chin, in the throat.

  “Isn’t this pretty?” a voice said.

  Damico glared at the peasant that stood above him. The man had a beard like pre-ginned cotton, filled with little bones, chunks of food and bits of wood and seeds. His face resembled a stress map of the San Andreas Fault, and the reek from his rotting teeth was enough to cauterize wounds.

  “What the Hell?” Damico managed. Had he lost his eye? Would it heal? It hurt so damn much he couldn’t tell.

  “Look at the two lovebirds,” the man said.

  Damico tried to see Lotianna, but the fork pinched at his throat, pressing painfully into his Adam’s apple. He reached under the cover and found her hand, she must have rolled over on her back. She squeezed.

  “What do you want?” Damico asked with more bravery than he felt, wondering if his Dodge class ability would save him if he made a move. It wouldn’t save her though. He had to think.

  His tunnel vision widened now, and he could make out at least six men in the room, all brandishing makeshift weapons. Either that or they thought he needed a good hoeing.

  “We want to stop you, stupid,” Dragon Breath answered.

  “Too late,” Damico said. “We’re already done.”

  The pitchfork brought water to his one good eye, and he realized the other bled quite freely. At least he wouldn’t get an infection.

  “You’re smart, aren’t you? The lady’s a mage, right? You think she can cast a spell if we puncture her voice box?”

  Damico searched the room with his good eye, too busy trying to figure out a way out to answer.

  “We’re stopping you from overthrowing Hraldolf, you idiot,” the peasant said.

  Wait. What? “Why?”

  “Because he’s the best thing that ever happened to us. He’s giving out extra food. He’s offering health plans. He’s set a minimum wage.”

  “We aren’t giving that up!” one of the other peasants spat.

  He actually spat it. Damico felt the splash on his cheek.

  “Then what happens next?” Damico asked.

  “That’s for the Overlord to decide.”

  Damico’s heart sank. They couldn’t be on Hraldolf’s side. That just didn’t make any sense. They were off book now, and they weren’t supposed to go off book.

  Son of a bitch.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  “Your ad here.”

  —Bob Defendi

  point of light. Perhaps it’s a star in the heavens. Perhaps it’s a torch in the distance. Maybe it’s the fiery streak of an angel cast out of heaven.

  Next to it a curve, a field of white, like porcelain. A concave shape, the play of light and shadow. Let’s pull back. The camera’s too close.

  Another curve, a slope. An eyehole. Another. As we zoom back, we can see it for what it is. A mask. Hraldolf, his posture brooding. Pull back farther.

  His chin on one hand. His furred cloak and crown. He is the evil overlord, like Conan on his throne. You know the movie I’m talking about. But that is another story.

  Watch. He stirs.

  Hraldolf rose from his throne and crossed the room, the plastic matting sliding beneath his feet. He walked over to his mirror and examined his hair. It was perfect. Everything about him was perfect. Too perfect. He didn’t seem real.

  He mussed his hair, hung his tunic a little sloppier, moved the cloak’s brooch off center. There. Now he looked a bit more like a real person. Maybe he wouldn’t comb his hair tomorrow. Maybe he’d put on an artfully aged tunic. Hmm. That might be nice. Maybe he wouldn’t polish the mask either
.

  “Not Beaver,” he said before he even realized the fat man had entered the room.

  “Yes, Your Majesty?” The tiny fat man hovered so far back in the distance that he might have been wall art.

  “What do you want?”

  “I want for nothing, Your Majesty.”

  “Then why are you here? I thought you were researching those workers’ rights laws. I want to know if workers are more productive with ten minute breaks. I was thinking also of some sort of central location where they can take these breaks. A room of some kind. Perhaps… with free snacks.”

  “Very forward-thinking, Your Majesty.”

  “The only thing I can’t figure out is why I want to call their wives ‘life partners.’”

  “I’m sure you’ll figure it out, Your Majesty.”

  Hraldolf admired himself in the mirror a bit longer then turned away.

  Not Beaver was a furry pile of fidget. Either he had to use the garderobe, he had something to say, or he had a wicked case of the crabs. “Not Beaver?”

  “Yes, Your Majesty?”

  “Speak.”

  “We’ve captured your brother, Your Majesty.”

  Hraldolf’s eyebrows rose under the mask. If this were a comic book, the brow ridges of the mask would have risen too. And there would have been emotion lines radiating from his head. And the women would have been as top-heavy as an after-hours board meeting.

  “Why the ants in your pants?”

  “Your brother was injured, Your Majesty.”

  “They hit him?”

  “I think he was caught in the eye with a rupturing lock, Your Majesty.”

  Hraldolf nodded. There should be rules about building in his empire. Maybe a set of codes. Building codes. That was it.

  “Will he be all right?”

  “He might lose the eye, Your Majesty.”

  Hraldolf nodded. “Take me to him.”

  They walked down the hall and down the stairs, past the guard who slept with his key within easy reach of the cells, his sword conveniently on the table. Even evil overlords had cousins and domineering aunts who tried to get them jobs.

  Past this lay the real dungeons. The ones where the keys weren’t even kept in the same room as the guards, where the bars were electrified and the secret doors in the cells led to shark-infested wading pools.

  They walked into these dungeons, through three sets of valve-like doors, each requiring two simultaneous keys, carried by guards with clearly identifiable faces. He had done some work since their last escape.

  The hallway was dark and both dank and dusty at the same time. They’d needed to bring in an interior decorator to get the right effect. The spider webs were imported too.

  He stopped at the door. They replaced the heavy oaken doors with gates of bars after last time, so he could have a civil conversation without a prisoner tearing his mask off. It was strange. In the old days, he’d never seemed to learn.

  He stood there for several seconds before Damico and his friends noticed him. Damico wore a large bandage over one eye.

  “So we meet again,” Hraldolf said.

  “You’ve been reading the villain’s quote book,” Damico said.

  Hraldolf smiled. Damico thought Hraldolf was the villain.

  “Brother,” he said, “I’m an honest ruler. I work hard. I toil for my people. You are the rebels trying to overthrow my just empire.”

  “Your evil empire,” Damico said. He lay along a bench, his head in the lap of the pretty mage.

  “Just because it’s evil doesn’t mean it isn’t just. My people love me. I’ve improved everyone’s quality of life.”

  “And Hitler loved his mother and made the trains run on time.”

  “Now, Damico,” Gorthander said. “The first person to mention Hitler in any argument loses.”

  Damico shrugged and contemplated the ceiling. This left his blind eye on the side of Hraldolf.

  “Why, brother?” Hraldolf asked. “Why do you want to destroy me? The throne could have been yours. I would have willingly destroyed your enemies for you.”

  “Because I’m the good guy.”

  “Don’t get down on yourself,” Hraldolf said.

  “No,” Damico said with a sigh. “I’m the hero. You’re the villain.”

  “I’m afraid you have it backward,” Hraldolf said.

  “Really?” Damico asked. “Then how do you explain this?” He pointed at the bandaged eye.

  “Building codes. I’m working on it.”

  “No,” Damico said, his one eye penetrating. “I’m scarred. Branded.”

  “So?” Hraldolf asked, confused.

  “The hero always gets branded by the end of the second act.”

  Hraldolf blinked, opened his mouth to speak… closed it again. Damico was right. It wasn’t always a physical brand, but in every good story, the hero was branded.

  But no. This was just a trick. This was fast talk to bring down Hraldolf’s resolve. Damico was the villain. He was. He had to be. And yet, something tickled in his memory. Didn’t he used to think of himself differently?

  No.

  “I’m the hero,” Hraldolf whispered.

  “Every villain is the hero of his own story,” Damico said. “I didn’t think Carl was smart enough to know that.”

  Hraldolf’s stomach sank, his head light as if it might float off his shoulders. Dear God. What if Damico was right? What if this was actually true? No. No.

  Hraldolf was the hero. He had to be.

  He walked away, out of the dungeons, through door after door. He moved up through the fortress, seeking higher and higher levels, but no matter where he went, it seemed just as dark and stifling. He searched for the light.

  But he couldn’t find it.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  “What is the sound of one chapter quoting? No, wait…”

  —Bob Defendi

  urkand straightened and twitched, then relaxed. The first thing he noticed was the smell. The next was the smell. The third was the slime, but the fourth, well, it was the smell.

  He lay on a pile of garbage, and if the massive flock of birds circling above was any sign, it was a big pile of garbage. Either that or the end of days, and the crows were a host of vengeful, stinking angels.

  Jurkand had an image of angel droppings falling from the sky. He shuddered.

  He was getting too old for this. What was he now, fifty? He didn’t know. He climbed to his feet in the shifting pile, dripping garbage juice. Either his head swam or the fumes were so thick he could see wavy lines.

  Jurkand stumbled out of the trash heap, tripping over two more dead bodies and out to where he could see clearly. The wavy lines were more subtle now. They must have just been the stink coming off him.

  The town lay off to one side, a constant line of wagons leading from it to the heap, each one piled with waste, most of it rotting cabbage. Garbage day.

  He shook rotting cabbage off himself as well, wondering vaguely what this diet did to the town’s outhouse habits. Then he stared off into the distance.

  The party had to be heading on by now. They would assume he was dead, that he didn’t have three one-shot-resurrection charms. He needed to track them down before they made it back into Hraldolf’s clutches.

  It was time to tell Damico the truth.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  “All your joke are belong to us.”

  —Bob Defendi

  ake up!” the guard said, pounding the bars.

  Damico jerked and glanced over at the door. The guard stood there, mail hanging loosely from his body, one gauntleted fist poised for another round of knocking. His face resembled a bowl of oatmeal that had been left in a light rain.

  “What’s all this, then?” Damico asked in his best English bobby voice.

  The guard didn’t get the joke.

  “We’re moving you to another dungeon.”

 
“Why?” Damico asked. “Are the sharks off that one hungrier?” He’d done a little exploring since he’d gotten here.

  “No, the Overlord wants you in the high security area.”

  Damico sighed and kicked himself into the sitting position. “Wake up, boys, we’re going to Alcatraz.”

  Everyone rose to their feet. Lotianna looked confused.

  They lined up and the guard opened the cell door. Then he led them out through the three great vault doors as Damico whistled the theme song to Get Smart. Or at least he tried to. Instead, he got the theme to The Odd Couple. They climbed one flight of stairs and into another dungeon area.

  The guard here wore rusting chain mail and a mace hung on his belt, its head replaced with a big ball of duct tape, proving once and for all the stuff couldn’t fix everything. The man was round about the middle and going bald. His face was covered in acne. He had a strange likeness to Damico and a stranger likeness to Don Knotts.

  The new guard showed them to their cell, this one with an oaken door and a high window. There was only one cell. They stepped inside and the door closed. The Lock clicked, then a chair ground up next to the door. The guard leaned back on the chair and within moments, he snored soundly.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Gorthander said.

  Damico could almost sense the keys there on the man’s belt. They’d be within easy reach of the cell window if he started with a little assisted stretching. He faced the party.

  “I don’t even know what to say,” he said.

  “Maybe this is some elaborate trick to get us shot trying to escape,” Omar said.

  “He’s an evil overlord,” Gorthander said. “Why play coy?”

  Damico shook his head, trying to process this, then he craned his neck to examine the guard through the window. “I think this guard is my cousin.”

  “Well, bully for you,” Omar said.

  “No, I mean that would make him Hraldolf’s cousin too.”

  Gorthander’s face screwed into a puzzled expression. “That makes less sense. I can understand hiring him if he’s family, but you don’t give him responsibility.”