He quickly grabbed a bottle of Gin, and then pulled the torch from the wall while climbing to the top of the bar. "Hey there, you blasted blue devils!" he shouted to gain their attention, succeeding famously as they all turned toward this new and obviously easier source of liquid refreshment.
He could see the look in their eyes. He had also seen what they did to the Human. "How ironic," he intoned, a faint smile forming as he raised the bottle.
As they all began to move toward him in unison, his smile broadened. This won't be so bad, he thought. At least I've seen my last jail cell.
At that moment, the painting slid wide open as Magnatha literally leapt out of the darkness, armed with teeth, canes, and eyes blazing with fury. She had spent a great many summers perfecting her control over the rage. Actual articulation was almost unheard of while in its grip, but she had even managed to overcome that obstacle. "I am a Warrior of Arbitos!" she half hissed, half growled, with saliva running down her chin and blood flowing from her ears and tear ducts.
The Dark elves wheeled about, and then hesitated. She was obviously very old, but the expression on the old woman's face was just plain eerie.
"Come to me," she crooned pensively, almost like a child desperately calling to some precious little pet she longed to coddle. Then her grin broadened further, offering her victims an even better view of her formidable teeth. At this, several of them actually took a step backwards, until, that is, her display of ferocious rage became somewhat tarnished as her false teeth fell from her mouth.
***
{Umm, you might want to think about easing off the Jumping jacks, Mrs. Hoffman. I don't think the template can take much more.}
"I…don't think…I can run…much farther," Selina croaked between ragged breaths.
"There's the Sea Beetle!" exclaimed Marcus, pointing to the great ship.
They continued down the pier until they reached the main entryway. Here, Reginald held up a hand, gesturing for them to come to a stop. Selina seemed more than willing to oblige.
"Look," Reginald prompted, pointing toward the ship, and the line of people still waiting to board it.
"There must be several hundred on board already!" Borin exclaimed.
"Yes," Reginald agreed hastily. "And perhaps that many more waiting."
"OK…what now?" Selina asked between breaths.
"Why are you breathing so hard?" Marcus asked.
"You'd breathe hard too, if you had just run the entire length of the city in a full corset," intoned Borin with a grin. He stopped grinning when he caught sight of Selina's hard stare.
"There is only one thing we can do," Reginald offered resolutely.
"I'm almost afraid to ask," Selina intoned wearily.
"We make a stand," said Reginald, facing north and equipping Amara's bow.
"Sounds like an excellent plan to me." Borin concurred, pulling both swords from the scabbards mounted on his back.
"And I," Marcus agreed while equipping both sword and shield.
{Are you exercising again?}
***
Grins formed on their faces as Magnatha's nose came quite close to resting upon her chin in the absence of her oral prosthetics. Their toothy expressions lasted for only an instant.
The Dark-elf farthest from Magnatha dropped to the wooden flooring as the flying bottle of Gin shattered on the back of his head, temporarily drawing the attention of his cohorts, and thus allowing Magnatha time to retrieve her lost denture.
They turned once again toward the Dwarf. The old woman could wait, as her bark would appear to be worse than her bite. That's when the Dark-elf farthest from Crumly was struck by a lightning bolt emanating from the darkness beyond the opening of the painting's interior. He too crashed to the floor.
They turned once again toward the old woman, who had just reinserted her false teeth. They had not actually witnessed the origin of the attack. They now found themselves reappraising the old woman's prospective bite radius. Their appraisal was to be short lived.
Crumly's torch landed on the same Dark-elf whom he had smashed with the Gin bottle, the contents of which now covered his head and soaked into his tunic. In reaction to the torch, said former contents ignited, along with the Dark-elf's screams as he quickly regained consciousness.
The writhing, screeching fireball that had once been their comrade then came up from the floor like a Fire Demon arising from a lava pit. They all quickly drew away from him to avoid a similar fate.
Crumly bolted forward as the blue crowd parted, thereby opening a clear path, with the exception of the burning Elf himself. When he came to the fiery Wognix, he dropped to the floor and slid, allowing momentum to carry him forward as he shot between the agonized Elf's legs too quickly for the flames to adhere.
As he came to rest at Magnatha's feet, he felt yet another twinge of irony. From this vantage, the painting loomed in the background like a giant Tarot card, prophesying a fair parallel to what was now occurring.
"Hi ya, Granny!" he exclaimed cheerfully.
"Get a move on, runt!" she exclaimed while backing quickly into the painting's interior.
***
The massive horde was closing fast. She could already see their snarling faces.
"I really hate to be the wet blanket here," intoned Selina nervously, "but there looks to be about a thousand of them, and there's only, one…two…three…four… Yes, four of us!"
"Wet blanket?" Marcus asked.
"We will die as true Defenders of Arbitos!" Borin proclaimed with a fierce pride that was only to be matched by Reginald's own expression as he gazed at the true Warrior his son had become.
"Yes," Marcus agreed, smiling. "It is a fine day to meet the Gods."
Not good! [Umm, Doctor Kwibee?] {Hang on, I'll be right with you. There appear to be two massive groups of N.P.C.'s, mixed with players. The largest of the two is heading along a southern route, quite close to your position, while the smaller group is actually shown to be slightly off shore, as if several hundred of them suddenly decided to go swimming at the same time. This is fascinating!} [No…they're on a ship.] {Really? That's rather odd.} [Not really.]
***
The first to reach her received the customary noggin-bonking at which she and her canes were so adept. The Elf fell backward into the others, with his eyes crossed and dilated. This also served momentarily to retard the progress of the remaining Dark-elves.
Magnatha had resumed her own backward progress into the Rogue Guild, and then suddenly tripped. With her canes being used as both a means of offense and defense, they were not available for their other function. As a result, she found herself tumbling to the floor, where, upon reaching said unscheduled destination, she felt and even heard the unmistakable sensation and sound of the one thing anyone of her age group fears the most about falling. She attempted to sit back up, only to confirm that she had in fact broken her hip.
The blue mob had tossed their unresponsive companion to the side, and were already resuming their thirst-quenching Quest that was now centered on the helpless figure of the old Human who had fallen.
Abruptly, there came a faint humming. Although several of their number did glance about, the majority overlooked it, as their concentration was on the helpless victim before them.
The humming grew, becoming a buzzing that quickly manifested itself as a glowing cloud of some form of swarming, stinging insect, initiating a series of slapping, shaking, jumping, scooting, and general howling among the Dark-elf numbers.
Preceded by several failed fizzes, the aura of his successful casting faded. Jester then lunged through the doorway, grasped Magnatha under her arms, and dragged her back toward the guild interior.
Just then, one of the Dark-elves who had stood behind the others and just outside of the swarm's range, abruptly leapt forward at the unsuspecting Druid, but was intercepted in midair by Tobar's dagger. He landed in a heap at Tobar's feet as Jester finally pulled Magnatha across the guild's threshold.
T
obar turned to assist Jester. As he did this, the heap on the floor rose to its feet, behind the old Rogue, who obscured the injured Dark-elf from the guild's interior.
The injured raider pulled the dagger from his shoulder, and prepared to return it to its owner. But just as he was about to insert the blade into the old Rogue's neck, he experienced a sharp, crippling anguish as Goren inserted his own serpentine dagger into the Dark-elf's knee, then attempted to pry the plate of the knee cap loose. The Dark-elf immediately loosed a high-pitched scream while instinctively thrusting his own dagger downward and into his assailant's back.
Goren fell to the floor without uttering a sound.
As he withdrew the dagger, he was instantly struck by both of Magnatha's projectile canes, Tobar's spinning back kick, and Jester's bolt of lightning, the combined effort of which centered primarily about the Dark-elf's head and upper torso, which then vaulted him up and back some ten meters to finally fall dead on the other side of his comrades, who were just then beginning to recover from the swarm spell.
Delphi, who had only just noticed Goren's figure as it lay on the wooden planks of the Gallery floor, then issued a shattering scream of her own as she rushed to assist Tobar retrieve his grandson.
As soon as they all crossed the threshold, Jester slid and bolted the door shut and locked.
Delphi glanced about desperately. "Where is the Cleric!" she shouted frantically.
Unexpectedly, Goren was then bathed in an incandescent blue aura that continued to pulsate for several seconds after Jester finished casting. After fizzing twice more, he followed this with a renewal spell, and then finally collapsed against the wall. His mana was spent, and so was he.
Goren slowly opened his eyes to see Delphi's anxious face. "Am I dead?" he asked groggily.
In response, Delphi's brow furrowed as she issued a forced smile, more closely resembling a grimace. She had no words. Her visible relief and the tears falling freely from her good eye were all the answer she could offer. She placed a trembling hand on the boy's chest, just as Tobar placed his hand over hers.
After a few moments, she slowly exhaled. Regaining a small measure of composure, she gave Goren a more confident smile to let him know that everything was all right, got to her feet, and walked over to Jester.
He looked up, offering her his own wan smile. Abruptly, she fell against him, leaning on him, even as he leaned against the wall. For a moment she merely rested her chin on his shoulder, allowing her nerves time to recover. Jester felt her trembling and began to understand the bond she had formed with the boy.
Then she turned her face up to his, kissing him fully and with as much passion as could be mustered. After a moment, she put her hands on the wall above his shoulders, pushed away, and then turned about to sit beside him with her back against the wall.
Without forewarning of this most unprecedented form of gratitude, in his weakened condition he simply allowed his legs to buckle as he slid down the wall to rest beside her.
Magnatha, who had managed to raise herself up on one elbow, watched this with an odd mixture of pain from her broken hip and amusement at Jester's reaction to Delphi's show of appreciation.
"See? I told you they liked each other," Goren intoned smugly.
Chapter Seven-Without A Trace
{Just calm down! I didn't say there was nothing to be done at all. What I said was, there wasn't anything we can do without drawing the attention of others who might be monitoring the program.} [Tell ya what, Doc! You just keep blabbing away and we won't have to worry about your precious little link anymore! 'Cause here in about half a minute, the particular body I'm occupying is gonna be diced up into about five hundred easy-to-serve portions!] {Well, there's certainly no call for shouting, Mrs. Hoffman.}
With that, Kwibee clicked on the virtual representation of IBOT's lag meter while drawing the filter's slide bar all the way to the right.
Sarah prepared for the impact by holding her hands over her eyes. After a time, she peeked between her fingers, and what she witnessed was completely unprecedented. Hundreds upon hundreds of Dark-elves, approximately thirty meters to the north, were just standing there-just standing and drooling, exhibiting nothing but that same blank stare that Dieter had, only in here instead of the real world.
[What the hell did you just do?!] {I suppressed the local lag synchronization while increasing your filter to full gain. It should have neutralized any possible threats in the immediate area.}
She looked about, noticing that the Doctor's solution had produced the same effect on her three companions as well. [Well that's just great, Doc! You just nuked everybody, including my husband! Now he's brain-dead in two places!]
{The effects are only temporary. If I hold it at this level for too long, the filter will either overload and collapse, or someone back at the lab will get a fix on us. I suggest you get yourself, and anyone else you wish to preserve, out of the immediate area.}
***
"Can you stand, Goren?" Tobar asked. "I can carry you if you're still weak."
"I'm not a baby!" Goren exclaimed, fairly jumping to his feet.
"No, of course not," he smiled.
Crumly took on an odd expression, as if listening for something.
"I can promise ya, they're still there," Magnatha whispered sardonically.
"No, Granny. I know what you think of me, but whether I'm drunk or sober, my hearing is still Dwarven." Then he pointed down the hall. "Sounds like your missing Cleric to me."
"Let the others rest," Tobar whispered to Crumly, and then motioned for the Dwarf to follow. "I believe I know what has become of our reluctant healer."
"Master Stelthak?" Jester called. "He's no good to us dead."
There was a short pause, then, "Agreed."
"Not good fer much alive, neither," whispered Magnatha when Tobar was out of earshot.
Several minutes later, Tobar and Crumly returned with the Cleric.
"Found him in one of our floor traps," Tobar said, shoving the man into the area of the main group.
"He was hanging onto the upper floor by his fingertips," Crumly snickered.
"I just got lost, that's all!" cried the Cleric defensively.
Delphi started to get to her feet. Her expression made her intentions toward the Cleric obvious.
Jester put a hand on her shoulder. "No. Please?"
She slowly relaxed, and leaned back against the wall again, but continued to glare at the man.
"I appreciate your restoration back at the fountain…"
"Perdil. Perdil Shiverley," offered the Cleric in introduction.
"Well, Perdil, as I said, I am grateful for your help back there. But all things considered, I believe you still owe me one. After all, my ailments weren't fatal."
"I'm afraid I don't follow," Perdil replied while shifting positions nervously.
"He means he just kept two Rogues from slitting your throat," Crumly added, still beaming cheerfully. It was nice to see someone else on the hot seat, for a change.
Perdil's eyes widened with fear as he started to back up, only to bump into Tobar. He quickly scooted forward with a squeak.
"Now," Jester continued. "You weren't here when the boy needed you."
"He would have died if Jester hadn't had enough mana!" growled Delphi.
"Or if the wards had been stronger," Magnatha added, her own voice calmer than Delphi's, though holding an undertone of intent that was no less dangerous.
"I'm sorry!" Perdil shouted. "I couldn't help it. I never can help it. I just get scared. I get scared, and I hide."
"I think I'm gonna puke," Magnatha mumbled in disgust.
"Listen to me, Perdil!" Jester demanded, thus grabbing the frightened man's attention. "You are a Healer. No one expects any extraordinary bravery from you, but they do expect you to take up the responsibilities of your Class. That means you never abandon those who depend upon you. All right?"
"I'll try," Perdil offered meekly.
"No, Perdil. D
on't just try. You had better succeed, or else I may just kill you myself."
***
She didn't like the idea of leaving undefended people at the docks. She supposed that Selina was still having some small influence on her. Still, it wasn't as if there was anything she could do. Then, right after loading Reginald into the wheelbarrow, she got an idea.
She approached the front line of the blue army, and then began pushing them over, one by one. Just like tippin cows, she thought, amused. After several minutes, she had managed to knock over the entire front line of Dark-elves.
That done, she returned to the task of evacuating the last of her party. She pushed the wheelbarrow up the incline for the third time. This was her last load and she was glad of it.
After dumping the brain-dead form of Reginald beside the brain-dead forms of Borin and Marcus, she pushed the barrow around the corner and out of sight.
[How much longer?] {I can give you about thirty seconds. After that, I'm dropping the gain, with or without your consent!} [OK, just hang on!]
She lay down on the grass, beside the others, trying to position herself to look as if she had been deposited as they had. Then she calmed herself, and her breathing became easier.
[Wait!] {What?} [Just give me ten more seconds!] {Hurry up!} She fumbled drastically with its drawstring for several agonizing seconds, and then tossed it into a nearby barrel. Finally, she was free of that unholy corset.
***
"Thank you," offered Magnatha begrudgingly. She would have preferred to wait for Jester's mana to recharge, but she knew they were short on time.
"You're welcome," Perdil returned, failing to notice Magnatha's disdain. He was himself grateful to be distracted from the others, who were currently of an unfriendly nature.
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