by Robert Bevan
Cooper looked at his wrist. “Holy shit. Look at the time.”
“You have a lovely family, Trista,” said Julian. “Thank you for everything, but we really should be on our way.”
“Before you go,” said Trista, slithering up to Julian. She put her face right in front of his, so close that Dave feared it might inspire jealousy in Sami. “Could I bother you for a small favor?”
Julian stared back at her, slack-jawed, like he was in a trance. “Anything.”
It wasn’t enough for these sadistic monsters to just kill them outright. They had to make a game out of it. She was going to ask Julian to choose one of his friends to leave behind. Dave was fucked.
Trista grinned. Her forked tongue flicked out between her horrible white teeth. She broke eye contact with Julian and retreated back to her babies. “Your life changes when you have children.”
Dave and Tim exchanged puzzled glances.
“Yes,” said Julian.
“Your priorities change,” Trista continued. “You have new responsibilities. You can’t just go on living carefree like there’s no tomorrow.”
“Yes,” said Julian. He wasn’t really flexing his Diplomacy muscles like the situation required.
“I’m sorry,” said Cooper. “I’m confused. What the fuck is going on here?”
Sami hissed, sending shivers up Dave’s spine.
Tim punched Cooper in the leg. “Shut the fuck up and let her talk.”
“A stream runs just outside our home,” said Trista.
“Yes,” said Julian.
“That’s right,” said Tim, picking up Julian’s slack. “We followed it up to the lake.”
“We made our home here for that very reason,” said Trista. “Wandering travelers ensured us a steady supply of food and entertainment, which was just fine when it was only Sami and myself. There is little in the forest which could threaten us. But, like any mother, I fear for my children’s sake. I want them to be able to play outside without fear of being killed. There’s far too much foot traffic along that stream. It fills me with anxiety.”
“Yes,” said Julian.
Dave wished he could walk over and slap Julian, but he was frozen in place with fear.
“What would you like us to do about it?” asked Tim.
Trista looked at Tim with sad, grateful eyes. “If it’s not too much of a bother, we’d like you to travel back up to the lake and divert the course of the stream.”
“Is that all?” said Cooper, his voice heavy with relief. “Naga please. We are on that shit.”
“Wonderful!” Trista smiled in a way that might have looked perky if her mouth wasn’t bristling with nightmare fuel. “Stop by again anytime!”
Julian clapped his hands together. “Daylight’s a-wastin’. Let’s get moving.”
Dave willed up the courage to speak. “So we can just go then?”
Sami slithered around him and joined his family. “Of course. You can’t very well divert the course of a stream from here, now can you?”
Julian walked casually out of the cave. Tim and Cooper backed out more cautiously.
Sami and Trista stared down at Dave. He took a tentative step backwards. When they failed to jump on him and tear his face off, he took another. With his third step, he turned around and waddled completely out of the cave to join his friends on the other side of the camouflaging greenery.
“Way to step up to the plate,” Cooper said to Tim as the four of them made their way back to the stream. “You bought us four tickets to the fuck out of there. Stupid nagas.”
Julian winced. “I really wish you’d stop saying things like that.”
“And I wish you would have said something other than Yes. Yes. Yes,” said Tim. “You sounded like a goddamn robot. What the hell was that all about?”
“I guess I just choked,” said Julian. “They were scary.”
Cooper snorted. “The way she was looking at you, I was sure she was going to make you do weird snake sex things with her in front of her husband.”
“Ew,” said Julian. “And her kids?”
“Who knows what kind of freaky shit nagas are into?”
Julian sighed. “Look. I understand that’s what they’re called, but it still sounds really wrong when you say it.”
“Hey,” said Cooper. “Where are you going?”
Dave wanted nothing more than to put as much distance between himself and Sami as possible, and thus found himself in the rare position of leading the party when they reached the stream. He stopped and turned around. While he, Tim, and Cooper had turned downstream, Julian was headed back up the hill.
Julian stared back at the rest of them like they were aliens. “I’m going back up to the lake.”
“What the fuck for?”
Julian furrowed his eyebrows as he stared at Cooper. He then looked at Tim and Dave. The four spent a moment in a stalemate of confusion.
“Don’t you remember? We’re supposed to divert the stream.”
“Fuck that,” said Cooper. “We’re in the clear. Let’s go get some food before we have to eat Dave.”
Dave was moderately certain that Cooper was joking, but still shivered at the memory of naglets tearing apart a dwarf leg.
“But we said we were going to.”
“And if they’d asked, I would have said that I wasn’t going to jerk off to Trista’s big snake titties later on, but that doesn’t make it fucking true.”
“Seriously,” said Tim. “Let’s just remember to never come up this hill again, and we should be okay.”
Julian put his hands on his hips and glared down at them. “Do your words mean nothing? Dave?”
Dave frowned. “I didn’t actually say any words.”
“Tim?”
“We were afraid for our lives,” said Tim. “We’re not honor bound to keep promises made under duress.”
“Cooper?”
Cooper looked down at his loincloth, then back up at Julian. “I, too, was underdressed.”
Julian shook his head. “Shame on all of you.” He turned around and began stomping his way upstream.
“What the fuck, man?” Cooper called out after him. “Is this some kind of white guilt thing?”
“Screw you, Cooper!” Julian called back without turning around. “Have fun jerking off!”
“I will!”
Tim threw his hands in the air. “What kind of bullshit was that?”
“Okay, you caught me,” said Cooper. “I was bluffing. I won’t be able to concentrate properly while Julian’s out here alone.”
“No,” said Tim. “I meant when did Julian turn into such a sanctimonious little shit?”
Dave stroked his beard. “He didn’t.” The pieces were beginning to fall into place inside his head.
“Were you not paying attention just now?”
“He’s not honor bound,” said Dave. “He’s spellbound.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Trista wasn’t getting all up in his face to make sexy-eyes at him. She was casting a spell on him.”
“How do you know?”
“It just makes sense. That’s why he kept saying yes to everything she said. That’s why they just let us up and leave. They knew the rest of us would ditch them the first chance we got, but Julian would move that stream or die trying. It’s a Quest spell. Tim, you used it when we were playing C&C back at the Chicken Hut last Christmas. Remember when you made the town sheriff piss the lyrics to Jingle Bells in the snow?”
Tim grinned. “That asshole was drunk off his tits for a week.”
Dave sighed. “I guess there’s only one thing we can do.”
“Club him over the head and drag him back to town?” suggested Cooper.
“I was thinking more along the lines of helping him divert the stream.”
“That’s another valid option.”
“Fuck,” said Tim. “Let’s go and get this over with.”
Dave, Cooper, and Tim trudged back up
the hill until they found Julian, soaking wet from the waist down, struggling to carry a rock as big as his head.
“What do you think you’re doing?” asked Dave.
Kersplunk. Julian dropped the rock into the stream at a point just before it widened into the lake. He didn’t even give them a glance as he searched the bank for another rock. “I’m doing just what I said I was going to do.”
Ravenus provided what little contribution to the cause that he could, flying over the stream and dropping pebbles.
Tim rolled his eyes.
“I know,” said Dave. “We’re here to help you.”
“Wait, what?” said Cooper. “When did my plan get taken off the table?”
“More specifically,” Dave continued. “What are you doing?”
Julian stopped what he was doing and turned to face him. “I’m damming up the stream.”
“That’s a terrible idea.”
Julian wagged his finger at Dave. “If you thought you were going to come up here and talk me out of this, you wasted a trip. Integrity means something to me. Tomorrow I’ll look at myself in the mirror and not be ashamed of the face looking back at me.”
Tim cupped his hand over the side of his mouth. “Cooper’s plan is starting to grow on me.”
“I’m not trying to talk you out of it,” said Dave. “I just think you’re going about it the wrong way.”
Julian wiped the sweat from his brow with his palm and sat on the bank. “I’m listening.”
Ravenus fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes. “Thank heavens!” he said between labored breaths.
“You can throw all the rocks you want in there,” said Dave. “The water’s just going to go around them and work its way back to the stream long before it gets to the naga cave. It’s got to go somewhere, right?”
“Yeah,” said Julian. “So what are you suggesting?”
“I’m suggesting that, before you try to stop the water flowing through here, you give it somewhere else to go.”
Julian nodded. “That makes a lot of sense. Thanks for coming back.”
Dave willed himself to ignore the rumble in his stomach. “Don’t mention it.” Not recalling any great locations to the right of the stream where they had been fishing, he started walking clockwise along the edge of the lake. “We’ll want to find a spot a good distance from here, so that the water doesn’t just work its way back into the stream bed.”
Julian sent Ravenus off to go scavenge, and then he, Tim, and Cooper followed Dave for a good forty-five minutes. Dave stopped several times to assess potential locations for a new stream, but nothing jumped out at him as being terribly convenient. Either the ground didn’t slope the right way, or there was a big tree they’d have to uproot, or they’d have to dig through solid rock. Dave had packed for fishing that morning, not for creating and destroying ecosystems.
And then he saw it. It was like Mother Nature herself was lying naked on a bed and begging to get fucked. A perfect storm of natural anomalies. A single boulder, about as big as a cow, was all that stood between the water and a sheer, thirty foot drop in elevation. For how many centuries had this unlikely chunk of stone denied the creatures which inhabited this hilly forest the beauty of another small waterfall?
Dave placed his palm on the boulder. “It’s perfect.”
Cooper frowned. “What am I looking at?”
Dave hopped down into the shallow water. “If we can push this boulder off the ledge, our problems are solved! Hell, we probably won’t even need to go back and dam the other stream.” He leaned his shoulder into the stone and pushed with his legs. It didn’t budge. “Cooper? A little help?”
Cooper jumped into the water. He and Dave shoved as hard as they could, but to no avail.
“Maybe you should try pulling instead of pushing,” suggested Tim.
Julian tugged at his long ears. “What difference would that make?”
“Objects are easier to pull than they are to push,” said Tim. “It’s basic physics. Why do you think you put a horse in front of a wagon, rather than behind?”
“Umm,” said Cooper. He abandoned his effort against the boulder and looked up at Tim. “So it can see where the fuck it’s going?”
“Remind me,” said Tim. “Who’s got the highest Intelligence score here?”
“Well let me explain some basic fucking physics to you, Professor. Even if I could climb over that rock, secure a grip on it, and pull it free, that leaves me with a thirty foot free fall, hugging a goddamn boulder.”
“Who said I was talking about you?”
“No?” said Cooper. “In that case, sweet. Dave, I’ll push. You pull.”
Dave looked at Tim. “What?”
Tim raked his fingers through his curly hair. “Jesus Christ. I’m talking about a horse!” He pulled a coil of rope out of his bag. “Julian climbs down there and summons a horse. We tie one end of the rope to the horse and the other end to the boulder. Horse pulls. We push. Problem solved. We all go back to town and get some fucking dinner.”
Julian rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “It could work.”
Tim raised his hands out to his sides. “Any objections?”
Dave shrugged. Cooper farted.
“Okay then. Julian, work your magic.”
Julian hopped and skidded down the side of the hill where it wasn’t quite as steep while Tim got busy tying an adjustable knot on one end of his rope.
“Horse!” said Julian from down below.
Dave peeked over the edge. Sure enough, Julian was combing his fingers through the mane of a sturdy-looking white horse.
“Here,” said Tim, tossing the looped end of his rope to Cooper. “Loop this around the rock, and throw the other end down to Julian.
Cooper did as he was told.
Julian caught the loose end. “It’s too short!”
“What are you talking about?” Cooper shouted down at him. “You’re holding it!”
“But I don’t have enough rope to tie it to the horse.”
“Shit,” said Tim. “I probably should have tested the rope length before I had him go down there and summon the horse.”
“Now what are we going to do?” asked Dave.
Cooper leaned over the edge and looked down. “I say we eat the horse.”
Tim groaned and rubbed his belly. “Don’t even talk about that.”
“What’s wrong with that?” asked Cooper. “Lots of cultures eat horse meat.”
“Hey, I’m with you, man. I would murder a pile of horse steaks right now. That’s not the problem.”
“So what then?”
Tim glared up at Cooper. “Come on, man! You know those magical horses disappear as soon as they die!”
“That’s right,” said Cooper. “I’ve considered that. But how much of it do you think we could eat without actually killing it?”
Tim bit his lower lip and peeked down over the boulder.
“Tim!” said Dave. “Tell me you’re not actually considering this.”
“I’m so fucking hungry,” said Tim.
“I’m hungry, too,” said Dave. “But come on, man. You want to rip the flesh off of a living, breathing creature? That’s fucking barbaric is what that is.”
Tim looked at Dave with wide eyes. “That’s it!”
“Oh shit, what?” Dave was not comforted by Tim’s sudden manic grin.
“Cooper!” cried Tim. “You big fucking retard!” He punched Cooper in the leg.
“Hey, man,” said Cooper. “What the fuck?”
“Use your Barbarian Rage!”
“Oh.” Cooper pursed his big lips. “Yeah, I could do that.” He stood up. “Take a step back, Dave.”
Dave hurried out of Cooper’s way.
“Hey guys,” said Julian, scrambling back up the slope. “Tim got me thinking about physics. What if we made some levers out of –”
“I’M REALLY ANGRY!” Cooper’s muscles ballooned out like time-lapse video of baking bread.
; Julian laughed and rolled his eyes. “Doh! Why didn’t we think of that before? It could have saved me a –” His smile suddenly vanished. “Wait, Cooper! No!”
Cooper roared like the T-Rex from Jurassic Park as he hugged the bottom of the boulder and pushed up with his legs. Even with the Strength bonus from his Barbarian Rage, he struggled to move the big stone. But he kept roaring, and the boulder finally broke free. Once he had it dislodged, the weight of an entire lake’s worth of water helped him push it over the edge.
Dave leaned over to watch the boulder fall, spotted Julian’s horse grazing just below, and turned his head away just in time to hear, but not see, the crash. The lack of accompanying horse screams suggested that at least it went quickly.
“Goddammit, Cooper,” said Julian.
“What?” asked Cooper, deflating to his normal form as the Barbarian Rage ceased.
“You killed my horse.”
“Oh shit. My bad.”
Water rushed out of the breach like a god taking a piss after having held it in during a long bus ride. Once the lake reached an equilibrium, the force of the water would likely subside, but for now –
“FISH!” cried Julian, pointing down to the water.
Try as they may, the fish which got caught too close to the edge of the lake couldn’t outswim the sudden current. Cooper immediately squatted down and began scooping them out of the water just before they made it to the breach.
Julian, Dave, and Tim waited eagerly to catch whatever Cooper flung from the water. Julian caught a nice, fat, shiny pink fish. It was eyeless, and had tentacles growing out of its face. It looked delicious.
Dave caught a blue fish with its pectoral fins on the bottom.
Tim caught a naked green woman.
“JESUS!” screamed Tim, flailing his arms and legs about wildly. “GET IT OFF ME! GET IT OFF ME!”
Dave stepped back and caught himself just short of falling off the ledge. The fish, flopping and twisting out of Dave’s grasp, wasn’t so lucky.
Tim’s Catch-of-the-Day slapped him in the face with her green, webbed hand before rolling off him. “How dare you toss me around like an oyster shell!”
“That fucking hurt,” said Tim, rubbing his red cheek.
The woman’s hair was a darker shade of green than her skin, and hung down like seaweed to cover her small breasts. The rage in her aquamarine eyes turned to fear as she backed away, finding herself outnumbered four to one.
