Delvers LLC: Welcome to Ludus

by Blaise Corvin

  The maid from the house returned with some thick tan cloth. Henry used it to fashion a crude but effective bag to hold the extra balls he created. Lastly, he created two more large armor-busting projectile prototypes. He created retaining clips for these on his holster rig too, but there was only room for two. Perfect. He placed the last projectile in its oversized tube and loaded the other four barrels with ammo balls as well. All done.

  He stood up and donned his armor, just a breastplate and a helm. He armed himself with a few knives and the khopesh. He also fixed the large shield he'd taken from the Jaguar Clan armory to his left arm. All of it together was fairly heavy. He would be able to handle it okay in a fight, especially with the addition of his magic, but traveling with this amount of gear plus provisions on foot wouldn't be ideal.

  He remembered that knights during the medieval period on Earth generally didn't wear their armor all time; they put it on if they needed it. Unfortunately, Henry didn't have a squire nor much time to put on gear if shit hit the fan. He had a plan, though.

  The tickles of an idea had come to him right after he'd gotten to the Jaguar Clan and was still holding his earth strength. As he gradually became less worried about a Clan member trying to tear his throat out again, he began relaxing his power without releasing it and was mildly surprised that he could do so.

  So now, standing in his full fighting gear, he tried absorbing power from the earth at only about twenty percent of his maximum strength. It took some time, but the experiment was successful. Henry moved his body and swung his arms back and forth. Even with all his gear on, now he felt like he could function easily all day.

  A surprising and welcome benefit to this new ability was how little magic power it used. Cranking himself up to be as strong and as fast as possible usually consumed a large amount of his total reserves. However, dialing the power of the ability down like this required a relatively small amount of power, less than he'd thought it would. He reasoned that the amount of power needed for the ability increased proportionally the faster he buffed himself. Since he'd only used strength from the earth at maximum power before, it had drained him significantly.

  As an experiment, Henry tried slowly dialing up his earth strength until he hit his maximum. "Wow," he whispered. Increasing his strength slowly used less than half the power it took to go directly to his max immediately. No wonder he and Jason kept using up all their power! They didn't know what they were doing and still had a lot to learn.

  He walked over to Jason and kicked his friend's foot. "Hey, are you done communing with nature or the cosmos or whatever? I think I might have solved my range problem, and I think you'll want to see this."

  Jason opened his eyes and cocked an eyebrow. "Sure. But first, please throw a rock at me."

  "What?"

  Jason stood up. "You heard me, throw a rock at me. Don't use magic, just a normal throw."

  Henry eyed Jason skeptically but dutifully stepped back, found a rock, and let fly with his natural strength. The rock sailed past Jason about five feet away, not even close to hitting him. Jason eyed where the rock landed. "Really?"

  "Shut up, dude. You know I have aiming issues." Henry dug another rock out of the ground and concentrated carefully before throwing it. This time, it was only a moderately horrible throw. The rock might have brushed Jason's shoulder if it hadn't stopped in midair and fallen to the ground. The area in front of Jason looked sort of opaque and Jason's eyes were narrowed, his jaw clenched. As soon as the area in front of him returned to normal, the strain vanished from his face.

  Henry was impressed. "What was that?"

  "I'm calling it null-time. I think I'm basically stopping the flow of time in a small area that's only an atom or two thick, but even that's a strain. The result is a barrier. Of course, all of this was theoretical until I just tried it out."

  "Then why the fuck did you tell me to throw a rock at you?"

  Jason grinned. "Because you can't hit shit. I knew if it didn't work I would've been fine."

  Henry frowned and thought, This smug bastard right here... "I can't hit anything, huh? Okay, let's go over to that rock." Henry pointed to the huge fifteen-foot-by-fifteen-foot rock at the corner of the Jaguar Clan estate.

  Henry had been planning to test his standard-size barrels at full power first, but Jason had pissed him off. He slapped his larger barrel with the armor penetrating projectile onto his steel forearm. Jason looked at the contraption curiously but didn't say anything.

  Henry positioned himself about fifty yards away from the large rock. He stared at it for a while, hoping he wasn't about to make a fool of himself. Oh well, fuck it. He took careful aim and used magic to launch the projectile like with the accelerated rocks. In an effort to be safe-ish, he kept the power to about fifty percent.

  What happened next would enter legend and song in the Jaguar Clan for generations. As it turned out, Henry's magic affinity with metal was much greater than he'd assumed. His heavy, ultra-dense bronze projectile was instantly accelerated to about the same speed and power as a small tank's main cannon.

  The sonic boom and the SPLIT-CRASH of the round punching into the rock made the ground tremble, shook the surrounding trees, and kicked up leaves from the ground. Sharp shards of rock flew past Henry and Jason, a particularly large piece flying over two hundred yards into the air before falling back to the ground. A cloud of demolished stone billowed out from the point of impact.

  When the dust settled, a new crater had been pounded out of the target over a gaping hole. Large cracks expanded both above and below the impact point. Small, sad pieces of broken stone continued to rain to the ground for an absurdly long time.

  Jason swallowed and said in a monotone, "How about you don't do that again anytime soon?"

  Henry mutely nodded. He was excited that his invention was so effective, but he was also aware that the test-firing could have gone very, very wrong. Without a proper backdrop or the fact he'd fired at a slight downward angle, who knew how much damage he could have done. His projectile could have torn through an entire line of houses like they were made of paper.

  Both men stood quietly for a while lost in thought. Henry wondered if Jason's new null-time ability would have stopped this new weapon. Maybe his friend was wondering the same thing.

  He was brought out of his reverie by approaching footsteps. He turned to find the maid Tita-abbi regarding the rock in horror. Behind her, he could see several other Mo'hali who'd come out of the house staring at them in silence.

  "Who did this?" Tita-abbi's voice shook.

  Jason mutely pointed at his friend. Henry raised a hand and said, "Guilty. I hope this rock wasn't special."

  Tita-abbi shook her head. "The rock is not important. Henry-ibbi, what have you unleashed upon the world?"

  Message in a Bottle

  Jason dodged another slashing attack and teleported back. He knew teleporting behind his opponent didn't usually work anymore--his friend was too quick. Henry was full of power from the earth, stronger and faster than a normal person. He was getting better at using his enhanced senses too and could actually hear the air being displaced as Jason teleported most of the time now. They were both training in earnest.

  Henry slapped a bronze tube onto his steel-covered right forearm and took aim. Jason knew what was coming and slammed a null-time barrier in place. Henry's bronze projectile hit the barrier and dropped harmlessly to the ground. Jason released the barrier so he could conserve energy. Holding the thing in place drained magic power and was like keeping a muscle flexed in his head.

  Henry nodded in appreciation. "That was a good block. You're getting a lot faster. If that was a full power shot, I think it barely would have gotten through, but you're almost there." Henry picked the bronze ball up from the ground and put it back into the cylinder on his arm. Then he detached the cylinder and snapped it in back into place on his belt holster with several other tubes.

  Jason sheathed his daggers and glanced over at Uluula doin
g exercises with her spear. She came out to exercise the same day Henry had scared the hell out of half the Jaguar Clan by pulverizing the huge rock. That had been two days ago. She'd pretty much kept to herself since then with the exception of talking to Jason for a few minutes every night before retiring to her room. Everything between them was off to a slow start.

  He and Henry had been sparring almost nonstop. They were both worried about the comatose Bezzi-ibbi, but there wasn't anything to do other than continue to prepare for their mission. They both stayed busy--it was more productive than just moping around. They also discovered they could get an absurd amount of training done in a day due to their enhanced endurance. Both men's healing abilities allowed them to recover from muscle pains and small wounds almost instantly too.

  Sometimes to stay grounded, Jason reminded himself that all his superhuman abilities were just from the Dhu hanging out inside of him. He wasn't entirely clear on where or what Dhu were, but remembering that his healing abilities were supplied by extra-dimensional parasites was humbling.

  Off to the side, Mareen sat on a bench and studied a sheaf of paperwork. She was taking her job as the Delvers, LLC day-to-day manager very seriously. Jason wasn't really happy about the fact she seemed to think he and Henry were both idiots since it was obviously only Henry was an idiot. Still, she'd been enormously helpful, so he kept his grumbling to himself.

  She'd even interviewed Henry and Jason about the cost of goods on Earth and the currency they were familiar with back home, the US dollar. It turned out that Mareen was great at math and could effortlessly keep track of all the conversion rates in the Earth-style legal pad she'd gotten from somewhere in the Jaguar Clan house.

  She said she was happy to help make Ludus less confusing to her employer.

  Now whenever she talked to Henry and Jason about how much things cost or what they could earn from their mission, she used familiar units of currency. She did the same with units of measurement.

  The previous day, when she'd seen Mareen crunching numbers, Uluula mentioned in passing that she could do the same type of math in her head but she was not interested in playing mother to anyone. Henry bristled, and Jason was starting to worry that the friction between Henry and Uluula was growing. He secretly thought they might be too similar in some ways to ever be friends.

  Jason came back to the present and squared up against Henry again, determined to win this match. They used their real weapons that Henry blunted with magic. It still hurt to get hit, drawing blood or breaking bones, but Henry said they had to get used to being wounded so they wouldn't be afraid of it. Jason thought he had a point. Plus, Mareen was off to the side and could heal. She wasn't very powerful, but she didn't need to be to help with training injuries.

  Jason and Henry weren't exactly pulling their strikes, but they weren't trying to kill each other either. It was a delicate balance that would have taken a lot longer to find without all their fencing experience.

  "Are you ready?" Jason prepped himself mentally for the fight. His Magic Control had grown by leaps and bounds, but it still helped to center before each conflict. Jason's short sword, daggers, and throwing knives were already in place. He could feel their familiar weight.

  "Just a sec," Henry said, adjusting his gear. In addition to the armor he wore, he also had his projectile system, his khopesh, shield, and a few knives. He hadn't used any of his knives yet, but Jason hadn't forgotten about them. Henry was a tricky bastard and had a real knack for hand-to-hand fighting. Apparently satisfied with his gear, Henry said, "Ready!"

  Jason immediately sprang into action; he wanted to try something new. He teleported, and after the familiar wrenching sensation stopped, he was in the air two hundred to three hundred yards above Henry. The energy and focus needed to teleport this far was still draining, but it'd be worth it. He pulled a few throwing knives from the sheaths around his legs and tossed them up into the air in a wide pattern. He grinned and thought, This is going to be fun, but I only have a few seconds.

  Then he teleported behind Henry, drawing and cutting with his short sword in one smooth motion. He also slightly shortened the travel time and distance of his swing with magic, resulting in a brutally fast attack at Henry's flank. His friend's blood-stained pants were proof that this sort of attack had been successful before. Not this time, though.

  Henry didn't even move his body much. He just twisted his shield to stop the slash and jerked his other hand into the air, palm up. Jason had already teleported, though, so the small explosion of rocks and dirt where he'd been standing didn't touch him.

  Jason regarded Henry from about ten feet away and slowed his perception of time. This next part would be tricky. Henry's shield was very effective at blocking most bladed attacks, and Jason no longer carried a larger, longer blade. Good thing he could cheat.

  He sheathed his sword and pulled a throwing knife into each hand. He threw one knife off to the side, concentrating and flexing what he'd started to think of his "magic muscle". The knife disappeared and reappeared low in front of Henry, flying at an upward angle. Henry grunted and bent down to block the knife on his chest armor all while keeping his eyes on Jason.

  Jason immediately teleported behind Henry so he couldn't bring his magic cannons to bear. Once he reappeared, he began hammering out throwing knifes, teleporting them all around his friend with different, confusing vectors. Henry used his strength, speed, and senses to skillfully block or evade every attack.

  Jason teleported to Henry's side opposite his shield and swung his sword in a golden, glittering arc at his friend's sword arm. Henry managed to twist his weird, curvy sword around to block and pivoted on one foot, striking at Jason's face with his shield. Jason smiled. Gotcha! He held a bare hand up to block the shield, generating a small shield of null-time. Henry's eyes widened in surprise when his powerful strike was stopped cold, his whole body shuddering from rebounding torque.

  Jason had used a lot of magic to pull that stunt and needed to capitalize on it. He sprung forward, aiming his sword thrust at Henry's thigh. He really thought he might score a hit, but Henry dove out of the way, rolling before springing back to his feet. His friend narrowed his eyes, slapping a gun barrel to his forearm. Henry was about to start shooting again, and Jason knew he'd probably be screwed. Henry's new guns were just ridiculously effective.

  Jason threw another knife and teleported it at Henry's face. Henry just raised the corner of his shield in a blur, knocking the blade aside while still bringing his arm up to shoot at Jason.

  That was when Jason's tricky plan paid off. A bronze throwing knife bounced off Henry's helmet from above, and he blinked in confusion.

  Jason knew Henry's enhanced hearing could pick up air being displaced by teleportation up to about a hundred yards away. That was why he'd teleported so far up in the air at the beginning of the fight. Henry had no idea where Jason had gone at the start of the duel. The knives he'd thrown into the air were finally falling around Henry, creating chaos. Jason was betting the sound of knives hitting the ground and plinking off armor would confuse his friend's hearing. Henry raised his shield above his head and made a fatal mistake. He looked up.

  As soon as his friend was distracted, Jason simultaneously threw a knife in either hand out to the side, teleporting them to Henry's flanks, one angled up and one down. That done, he teleported himself.

  Henry somehow managed to block the two thrown knives, but Jason tapped him on the shoulder with his sword from behind. Jason was glad he didn't have to draw blood. Time they didn't spend healing they could use for more training.

  Henry stood still, and Jason grinned. His EMT-turned-mage friend came out ahead in most of their matches, but this time Jason had won hands down. He was about to gloat when he heard someone say, "I'm glad you Terrans aren't completely useless." The worlds were spoken in English. With slow clapping.

  Jason and Henry both turned to see a tan-skinned Areva woman dressed in a brown lace crop top and faded jean shorts. She had som
e of her long hair tied up in a top knot and three dark streaks ran from the bottom of each eye to her cheek bones. She had a simple U-shaped design on her forehead of the same dark hue. Jason couldn't tell whether the designs were makeup, tattoos, or something else.

  She was tall for an Areva woman, probably just under five feet, and stood nonchalantly in dusty cowboy boots. After she stopped clapping, she munched on an apple she'd been holding under one arm. Completing her odd appearance, she wore a large, ornate gold necklace with a complicated sigil at its center.

  And she was standing next to a robot.

  The robot looked like a giant floating egg made of shiny metal. The top of its pointed body sported a dome covered in some sort of reflective material. It didn't have any obvious appendages until a small port on its body opened and a flexible arm shot out, its three clawed fingers holding something.

  The woman kept munching on her apple, talking with her mouth full. "Don't mind the 'bot. It's mostly just here to make sure I actually came to meet you since I didn't really want to go. At least I got some Terrans to babysit, though. Dolos hates you, but I think you're interesting. I'm your priestess, obviously. You can call me Keeja."

  She snatched what the Dolosbot was holding away and stuck her apple core on one of its claws. "Now get out of here, you obsolete, useless pile of garbage! I came here like a good girl. Go tell Dolos I'm not going anywhere. These two have some potential."

  She jumped up and gave the floating robot a solid kick. The Dolosbot tipped a bit and rattled before righting itself and floating away. Jason thought the entire scene was a bit surreal. He glanced up and saw Mareen was rooted in place while shock and fear moved across her face. Uluula's expression was more guarded and serious. That's right. Dolosbots are like boogeymen on this planet... And Keeja had just kicked one like it was a stray dog.