by Ramy Vance
“Wait, you guys can do that?”
“Yes, we have ways to communicate with each other. Old magic. Where is yours?”
“They took him. That’s one of the reasons I didn’t want to just bounce the fuck out of here. It was as soon as I got captured. Someone had mentioned back in boot camp that the Dark One had a way to separate humans from their familiars, but no one took it seriously. It seemed like it’d be too hard.”
“It would be a good plan. But how are you still here? Humans require their familiars to tie them to magic. If you are out of touch with magic, you should have been transported back to Earth. Explain yourself.”
“Okay, buddy, just because you have a chain around my neck doesn’t mean I’m not going to kick your ass, so watch your fucking tone. That’s what I thought too, about the familiar. We had it drilled in our heads pretty thoroughly that we were to do everything that we could to keep from being separated from our familiars. Boot camp also really stressed that it’s extremely fucking hard to separate us, so hard that it can be traumatic enough to kill both the host and the familiar. Trust me, I was surprised when they ripped Ros’ten from me and I didn’t get sucked back into a magical vortex.”
Fred considered this. “The Dark One must have designed a way to keep you two connected. That has to be it. There is absolutely no way your familiar can be separated from you without causing you to return to Earth. The connection must just be different than it was before.”
“So how does all that work? I mean, is Suzuki inside of you?” Beth asked.
“To an extent. When we bond with our hosts, a pocket dimension within the host’s subconscious mind is created. Since we are of magical nature, our physical existence is already tied to the vast unknown of the mind. It is hardly a hassle to revert to pure energy to exist within that domain. As our powers are combined with our human’s, it also gives their bodies more elasticity. That is why humans are able to perform feats of magic without burning themselves alive.”
“Are you saying that you change the ways our bodies work?”
“It is… irritatingly difficult to explain to humans. You have been so long without magic that you can’t even wrap your head around the basics. It will suffice to say that looking at the world simply as physical atoms and nuts and bolts only distances you from the truth. When I was bound to Suzuki, I occupied a place within him that is not bound to space or time. I exist within him. All of him, everything that he has ever been, is, and will be. That is what Suzuki is doing with me right now.”
“Sounds pretty intimate. Not something that I would expect a demon imp to be willing to do.”
“It…was uncomfortable at first, but it has grown on me. He is surprisingly good company. It has been…interesting to experience what he feels me experience, and interesting to be so connected with a human.”
Fred and Beth turned a corner. There were two orcs standing and chatting. They jumped to attention immediately. “You’re stuck with that one today,” one of the orcs joked. “Don’t let her get close to you with her mouth.”
“Clear tore off another guy’s ear a few days ago,” the other orc said.
Beth grinned widely to show off her teeth and then chomped down hard. “You fucks are lucky that’s the only thing I could get my mouth on,” she shouted as Fred led her forward.
Fred yanked the chain hard enough to pull Beth off her feet. She hit the ground with a dull thud, grimaced in pain, and glared up at Fred, who snickered evilly. “Silence, human,” Fred said. “I don’t have time for your theatrics. Yours either.” Fred turned his attention to the orcs. “I am transporting this…trash. They are going to require a series of humiliating tasks to break down her psyche. Where can I find a shovel and a large pot?”
One of the orcs raised its eyebrows and leaned in to get a better look at Fred. “Who exactly are you?” the orc growled.
“Lieutenant and emissary to the viceroy,” Fred hissed back.
“We didn’t hear about the viceroy sending anyone to—”
“Does the viceroy regularly convey her orders to you?” Fred growled. “I failed to realize that the two orcs guarding the shit room would be personally notified of her direct intentions. I apologize if you’re offended. Next time I will make sure the viceroy notifies any and every sack of shit I come across. Should I also relay that I was obstructed by the guards of the shit room? Your names, please.”
“Hold on, hold on,” the larger orc said. “We don’t need to take it that far. I know where you can get some shovels. We can just keep this talk…between us.”
“Good. Now, where can I find a shovel and a pot?”
“Just follow this tunnel down the hallway and turn left at the second entrance. It’s a maintenance room. There might actually be a sign there. Fuck if I know why it’s the only room for miles that’s got a sign. Guess people are looking for shovels a lot.”
“There are a lot of bodies to bury.” The second orc chuckled.
“Good.” Fred yanked on Beth’s chain again, forcing her to get to her feet to follow him. “Come on, human. We have torturing to do.”
Beth stumbled to her feet and followed Fred, tripping over the chain and her feet every couple of steps. She cast a hateful glance at the orcs, who chuckled at her as she walked by. When the orcs were out of earshot, Beth whispered, “You can loosen the chain a little bit, asshole.”
Fred did as he was asked. “Sorry,” he said. “There was… I had to pull from Suzuki’s memories for…inspiration. Lying is not something I am used to.”
“What the fuck memory did you get from Suzy where that made sense?”
“Something called BDSM. I believe humiliation is a subcategory of sadism. He has significant memories—”
Suzuki forced his words out of Fred’s mouth. “We are NOT talking about those memories,” Suzuki growled. “We are paying attention to our fucking mission, right?”
Beth tried to stifle a laugh. “Wait, are you telling me that Suzuki has BDSM porn locked up in his memories?” she asked.
“You don’t need to know what I have locked up in my memories.”
Beth jogged to catch up with Fred, leaned forward, and whispered in his ear, “We are going to have so much to talk about once we kill our way out of here. You have not heard the last of this.”
Fred and Suzuki pointed ahead at the left turn that the orcs had told them about. “I believe we are here,” Fred said, regaining control of his voice. “We should continue the charade in case we are questioned again.”
Beth slowed down and resumed her posturing as a captured, beaten prisoner. There was no one in the hall, only the door they had been informed about. Fred approached the door hesitantly and knocked twice. When no one answered, he pushed it open with his clawed foot and casually stepped inside.
The room was barely lit, but it was full of tools. Hoes, shovels, and all manner of gardening tools were shoved against the walls. There were also quantities of binding materials, and some huge machines whose purpose eluded Suzuki. He thought they might have something to do with moving earth. They were large enough to have been used to dig the massive tunnels that composed the majority of the prison. “Map this room to my HUD,” Suzuki told Fred. “We might be able to use those…whatever the fuck they are.”
Fred sighed in irritation but listened to Suzuki. “Why would we mark something for potential use?” he asked.
“Come on, dude, just trust me. You’re trying to get used to this whole roll-with-the-punches thing. So am I, and I have a good feeling something that big could be used to cause some serious damage. Trust me, it’s a real good feeling.”
Beth grabbed one of the shovels and propped it on her shoulder. She turned to face Suzuki and, even from behind Fred’s eyes, his heart dropped at how gorgeous she was with a shovel in one hand, her other resting lightly on her hip. Suzuki was always surprised by how graceful Beth looked performing the most mundane actions. The chain around her neck might have been helping, but it was probably best to
think about that later. “Let’s hurry up and get out of here,” Beth said, interrupting Suzuki’s thoughts. “I don’t know a comfortable way to walk out of here without looking suspicious. And don’t you even look at those handcuffs over there, or I swear to God I will rip you both apart.”
Stew and Sandy were five feet underground. Completely underground. GB had outlined his game plan for the dig. Initially, he had been too excited to talk to any of them; he had just gotten to digging. His claws and hooves had removed enough dirt to build a small mound, and the whole time he had muttered a few words under his breath over and over as a mantra: gotta dig, gotta dig. And digging he was! Eventually, after peeking his head over the rim of the hole he’d dug and seeing the looks of bewilderment on the faces of the Mundanes and the Horsemen, he pulled himself out of his soil paradise and explained his methodology.
“We’re going to dig down for a few miles like I’m doing now. Dig it, gotta dig it up good.” His emphasis was almost uncomfortably sexual. “But we’re also digging at a slant. Diagonal. Until we come to the first rest stop. Then we dig out. We make ourselves a little bit of room. Then we start digging up. Then make another rest stop. We keep digging on this zig-zag until we come up in their room.”
Sandy raised her hand and instantly felt embarrassed. For a moment, she’d betrayed a nerdish habit leftover from years of intense schooling. “Um…” she murmured. “How are we going to deal with the tunnels when we leave? Aren’t we just leaving a trail to be followed?”
“Nope, nope! I’ll let you guys go ahead, and I’ll come up behind you and knock the tunnels down. I don’t have to worry about them collapsing on me. As long as Stew’s good, I’m good. Isn’t that right, buddy?”
GB jumped and gave Stew a high five. They laughed together like a couple of jocks who had had too much to drink too often and still weren’t tired of it. “Dude, we are going to dig the fuck out of that mountain,” Stew shouted.
“Dig the fuck out of it and fuck it,” GB shouted.
Stew’s smile disappeared. “No, dude. No. We are not going to do that.”
GB hid his cartoonish ass of a face behind his hands. “Oh, I know. We’re just digging. Well, got to get back to it!” The familiar whipped around, flapped his wings, and dove back into the hole.
Diana walked up between Sandy and Stew and watched the donkey gargoyle dig into his pit. “You guys know that familiar is a little off in the head, right?” she asked.
Sandy nodded. She was beyond being surprised by GB. This was the least odd thing she had seen him do. “Yeah, we know he’s fucked,” she agreed.
“Like, really weird.”
Chip leaned into the conversation with a wide, beaming smile, the face of someone trying to stir up trouble and start shit. “She wants to know if you two lovebirds been porking with the ass,” Chip butted in. “Me too, to be frank. He’s a little…horny, to say it in the politest way.”
“Nah, not really our thing,” Sandy said as Stew went beet-red. “Although he does work some pretty good magic on a cock when we want to spice things up.”
Chip’s eyes nearly popped out of her head. “Oh, this is a need-to-know tale. Why have you been holding out on all the gushy details?”
Stew stepped in front of Sandy, Chip, and Diana, still blushing bright enough that he should have passed out from too much blood pumping to his head. “All right, ladies,” he said as he cleared his throat. “Shouldn’t we be getting to the digging? We’ve got a lot of miles to cover, and friends who are depending on us.”
Diana pulled out her wand and went to stand over the steadily deepening hole that GB was digging. “Stew’s right,” she said as she waved her wand and conjured each party member a shovel. “We can talk while we work. I’ve always been interested in the role that familiars play when using magic to enhance or augment sexual performance or pleasure. I’ve been thinking about writing a paper on the subject. I know it happens, but I rarely meet anyone willing to talk about it.”
“I am not willing to—”
Sandy pushed Stew out of the way and blew him a kiss as she jumped into the hole. “Of course.” She giggled. “I have been wondering the same thing. Like, I know that some people have to be using magic to get their fuck on.”
Stew stood in the clearing with Chip, his face burning brighter and brighter. He was holding his breath, and his acne looked ready to pop out of his skin. Chip walked up behind him, smiling and shaking her head. “Ooooh, boyo, you are in for an uncomfortable next few hours.” Chip whistled as she walked past Stew. “You ever had your sex life dissected by a group of eggheads with a thirst for unknown, profane knowledge?”
“No. I talked to my doctor once about a lump on my balls.”
“Was it a profane lump?”
“It felt pretty profane.”
“Boyo, you in for a long night. If you need a shoulder to weep on, let me know. Unless your gal is a jealous gal and thinks you’re trying to get slobbery on my neck places…unless she’s into that. Either way, this’ll be a teeny bit interesting.”
“I fucking hate you, GB.”
Fred, Suzuki, and Beth made their way back to the cell that Beth had been found in. They didn’t come across any other guards along the way. They closed the door and locked it with the chain that Beth had worn around her neck. Beth looked down at the dirt floor and sighed as she sank the shovel into the ground and removed the first clump of dirt. “This is such a shitty idea.” She groaned as she dug up another clump. “How long do you think this is going to take?”
Fred tossed his shovel on the ground. “Much too long for two people. We should at least use all of our bodies. Are you certain that you locked the door?”
“As certain as I am that both of you were getting off on me being chained up like a bunch of little pervs.”
Suzuki cringed. He knew that Beth was joking—or at least he hoped that she was joking. It was hard to tell. It was even harder to tell because it’d been so long since he had seen Beth. She had always had a wicked sense of humor. Her jokes made Sandy and Stew look tame. One of the first things that he had fallen for with Beth was how sharply she could cut anyone down. In the VR realm, her tongue was as notorious as her sword.
“We should separate,” Fred said, breaking Suzuki’s train of thought. “It will make the work go by faster.”
“All right,” Suzuki agreed. It’ll be nice to have my own hands for a little while.”
“Yes, human, that’s the body part that I assumed you would be most happy about.”
Suzuki wished that he could crawl under a rock. Now he wasn’t just getting it from Beth, but Fred was ganging up on him as well. At least Stew and Sandy were nowhere to be seen. It would have been unbearable to have four people working on him. Especially if one of those individuals had been living in the vast subconscious of his memories for the last few weeks. There was too much ammunition. Why the hell couldn’t I have been stuck with serious party members? Suzuki thought.
There was a feeling like being ripped away from sticky gum, as if his entire body had somehow been cocooned against a wall by a spider. It was not really a painful sensation, but it was uncomfortable all the same. Suzuki saw his body melting before him, bones pulled out of thin air, his muscle and skin growing out over his skeleton. The oddest feeling was his hair sprouting from his scalp. He imagined this was what the earth must feel like during spring. It was far from pleasant. But by the end of it, he was standing in the middle of the cell, heaving, trying to catch his breath, wiping the obscene amount of sweat pouring from his forehead. “Feels good to be back,” he muttered. “All the way back at least.”
Fred walked away from Suzuki and stretched out his wings. “I would have to agree with that.” Fred groaned. “I am glad to have my mind to myself for some time.” Fred closed his eyes and stretched his hands out in front of him. The cell filled with the smell of sulfur as a demonic shovel appeared in Fred’s hand. The spade was wicked and curved, the handle ending in a frighteningly realisti
c depiction of a demon with its mouth gaping. “We should begin.”
Fred, Suzuki, and Beth started to dig. It was difficult to get the first layer of crust broken up, but once they got down to the soft earth beneath, digging became much easier. That is not to say that the work went by easily. Suzuki was sweating within a few minutes. He pulled up his HUD and selected his leather armor. It was still going to be hot, but at least he wouldn’t be completely unarmed if someone were to break into the cell. He thanked whoever was in charge that his body worked overtime without any issues in Middang3ard. It was an aspect of the realm that he had taken for granted recently. Back on earth, this much digging would have winded him enough to have an asthma attack.
At Suzuki’s side, Beth dug with the routine of someone who had years and years of practice. She had perfect form. Every time she bent forward to remove some dirt and tossed it over her shoulder, Suzuki thought she looked like the ideal of someone digging. It was the definition of beauty. As Beth leaned forward, she looked up at Suzuki, her face drenched with sweat. “What the hell are you looking at?” she asked.
Suzuki coughed loudly and went back to his digging. “Nothing,” he murmured. Rather than talk to Beth about how he’d been staring at the way that her neck tensed when she gritted her teeth, he gave himself to the work. He paid attention to the rise and fall of his shovel, to the earthy grunting coming from Beth and Fred as they toiled into the ground. Suzuki didn’t know exactly how they were digging out of the mountain. He didn’t know how tunneling worked. He wasn’t even sure where exactly they were in the mountainous prison. For all he knew, they could just be digging straight into another cell. Still, it was better than waiting on their asses. He hoped that the Mundanes and the Horsemen had come to a similar agreement.
GB had stopped the digging to set up their first rest stop. There was hardly enough room to stand. The two parties had been digging extremely claustrophobic tunnels at the command of GB, who was always ahead of the rest of them, digging with ferocity. The rest of them were left to widen the tunnel enough for them to move through, but not enough to affect structural integrity. Luckily, no one suffered from a fear of enclosed spaces. There ended up being more room once they finally did stop to rest. GB paced around the small bubble underneath the mountain and continued to carve away the stone and rock until there was enough room to sit comfortably.
