Rule 20

Perfume is Dangerous & Shotgunners Explode

Statement: Death is a story until it’s made real. It exists in abstract, as a theory, as a remote concept that applies to other people. There are many, many subjects that are the same. Love, lust, murder, theft. To each of these things we reach a crossroads where impulse and logic war. We don’t know which wins the battle—until the choice has passed.

Here’s the real question—one with no clear answer. Was there ever a choice in the first place? Are we honed by nature, time, and experience—then fooled into believing we were given an option to choose our fates? Or were we bent to a course, destined to land where we land? I cannot speak for others, for so many choices I’ve had since the event felt like foregone conclusions—as if I had known what I’d decide all along, as if I knew where I’d land.

I decided that throwing my knife wasn’t the best idea, considering there were literally tons of well-formed objects ripe for being thrown. Instead, I prepped a bomb spell and tossed it into the throng of wildly charging mini-orcs.

Tracking the tagged monster in a mob of wildly erratic creatures became impossible. They were shouting and literally humping air with each awkward step. One fell down, ten feet from me, and started giving a hole in the ground an absolutely brutal plowing. He thrust away without regard, chanting “treat” and grinning.

Post Note: The first thought through my head was disgust, quickly followed by amazement, since that had to chafe intensely. It didn’t help that he was gnarled, tusk-toothed, and wearing a blazer that probably belonged to some six year old’s basketball team.

He wasn’t alone. Others stumbled. Their swarming friends charged onward with wide eyes. Each one seemed to be fighting between the urge to hump a hole and reaching the hydra.

The large monster still sneezed and hissed. Its face had been messed up by the perfumes. Glass shards could be heard crunching between the shouts of mini-orcs. The cracking sound faded as more lusty monsters swarmed.

I wondered if the hydra might drown under the tidal wave. Studying it would give me an edge.

There was an explosion. A handful of mini-orcs turned into chunks. The hydra ate three at once and coughed up body parts onto other small attackers. A lantern wielding mini-orc screamed and waved his red light.

“Defeat!” it shouted

Blood caught fire, including the bits splattered on other mini-orcs. They barely noticed and continued charging toward the large monster, ready to fornicate with every hole in its three heads. I pooled another explosive rune and prayed no one would suddenly notice me.

I tossed the mark at a mini-orc and missed. It landed on the ground, forming a pattern. Two mini-orcs went flying seconds later.

My supply wasn’t strictly unlimited. Each additional rune made my head heavier and the world a bit fuzzier. I could maybe do ten, or twelve unless this battle dragged on for a long time.

The hydra took a deep breath. Two of the heads hissed while the slightly larger middle one puckered its cheeks. I vaguely remembered being in poor shape and seeing the creature toss fire or something at Coach’s truck. It could have been in my head.

The side two heads turned and yowled. They had large fins or gills on the side that fluttered madly. Green barf or flames or whatever spilled over the crowd of advancing monsters. Those in front melted. More screamed. Three chanting lantern users lifted their torches.

Blood from the dead and dying pooled into fireballs. The first major attack shook the hearts of the mindless monster train we’d summoned. Still, a few charged, and a lone angry shotgun wielding goblin stood off to the side of the hydra’s heads. His ears were melting gobs. It leveled the gun and blasted the still spitting hydra.

It roared and reeled back. The other two heads twisted around, grabbed the shotgun wielding monster and chomped. Something clicked. A muffled “Bleat!” could be heard. The hydra’s neck bulged as the creature detonated from inside, and not as a result of my explosive runes.

Post Note: Apparently shotgun wielders are super tough, and blow up when they die. But why didn’t that winged gargoyle not pop? More testing is needed.

“Retreat!” someone shouted.

“Defeat!” I quickly yelled, desperate not to let my cannon fodder escape. They were whittling down the large monster. I readied another explosive spell and slapped it onto a car under one of the lantern wielders.

So far, they had completely ignored me. Despite there being so many of the monsters they hadn’t discovered me slinking around the battle’s edge.

“Beat!” I shouted encouragements. More creatures poured in. They weren’t running out.

Some were dumb enough to believe it. Others shouted conflicting orders. The hydra wailed through it all. It was being hurt, but still winning.

I readied another explosion and slapped it onto the back of a mini-orc. It flinched then lifted a weapon.

“Defeat!” I shouted, giving it my best high-pitched shrill.

The hydra ate another shotgun carrier, and two of its heads lifted a car to throw it. Fireballs slammed into its side in retaliation.

“Feat?” someone asked.

“For treat!” I insisted.

“Defeat! Treat! Meat,” the dumb creatures echoed as they ran.

My earlier bomb carrier made it ten steps before blowing up. That marked my third attempt at turning one of these creatures into a walking bomb. Ten paces wasn’t a lot and would put me in range of that breath weapon. My grand plan of using mini-orcs as unwitting suicide bombers wasn’t going well.

There were no signs of any creatures turning into orbs either. The mess simply got bigger. Piles of melting and still glowing goo lined the hydra’s front yard. I waited, sure there’d be more mini-orcs cascading in. After all, in the first few minutes we’d had about fifty, and were rapidly working up to one hundred more. The smell hadn’t carried that far yet.

It had to be magic. There was no other explanation for a hoard of monsters appearing out of virtually no-where. Or I might be dreaming. I lost my step and simply stared at the unfolding chaos.

“Beat!” a mini-orc shouted.

They were riled up. The smell had reached me but didn’t seem strong enough. The hydra’s acid breath might have done something, or the mini-orc’s fire magic. I said a prayer of thanks that Little Shade had thought about those perfume lures. The middle head took a breath and the side heads hissed.

I’d seen it once, now I had to test out the effects. Range, damage, and if I could interrupt it.

My vision dimmed and arm tingled as another explosive rune came to life. The book at my waist burned with pleasant heat. I slapped a vaguely toss-able piece of metal with the spell and lined up a shot.

The makeshift missile missed the mouth and slammed into a side head. It reeled from the boom. One head hissed as the other twisted and writhed. Green acidic flame cut off as the third head stared at its side head in confusion.

Post Note: Honestly, I was confused too. A creature with three heads is weird, especially when they can act independently.

It wasn’t enough. That one explosive had torn part of the creature’s hide. Mini-orcs swarmed. I needed to kill them all and clear the place out. They were intent upon fighting each other but still in my way.

Admission: In hindsight, it would have been better to let them sort each other out—then clean up the leftovers. Yet, in the moment, it was impossible for me to consider such a course of action. I wanted to be the one to kill the tougher monsters. The shotgun wielders, the lantern bearers, and that fire truck-sized hydra. I wanted to kill them personally.

I ran my hand along the book’s thick pages counted to three, and pooled black energy. The knife pulled out from one palm and hung in the air, long enough for me to grab it with my other hand.

“Defeat!” a lantern user shouted. A pocket of mini-orcs turned toward me with raised golf clubs, toy swords, and pieces of fencepost. “Eat!” they chattered, this time at me.

I’d fought a few at a time, this was a lot more in a small scale war zone. Within a few seconds, I summoned an explosive rune in my right hand. The gesture was the same as using the left but mirrored. I’d practiced both methods.

One monster charged me. My foot shot out and planted into the creature’s face. It reeled back waving a fence post club. Two more swung and a fireball formed from fallen mini-orc blood. This one was not going toward the hydra.

Fire crackled as the mini-orc shouted their annoyingly repetitive phrases.

“Retreat!” I shouted. A dimwitted mini-orc actually flinched. I shoved my summoned blade into its neck and spun while tossing an explosive rune with freakish accuracy under the lantern wielder. All those years using a Frisbee and softball had finally paid off.

It went boom. A dozen mini-orcs splattered. The fireball missed, I assumed it was due to the now dead lantern user. The hydra stomped out of its cubbyhole and squished enemies as it headed straight for us.

One of the shotgun wielders turned toward me. The hydra took another breath in the background. A smaller head hissed and bit a mini-orc in two.

I killed two of the worthless mini-orcs and ran out of range. The hydra moved slowly while blasting a spray of green fire. I wove past a shotgun wielder. He turned and fired, catching my arm in a spray of damage that sent me sprawling. Behind me, enemies melted. Their bodies joined the deformed pile of goo on the pavement. Acid continued to eat through the ground with a bubbling hiss.

My body rolled out of habit. The pavement scraped skin raw and tore a hole in my borrowed pants. I stifled a scream but couldn’t stop tears from filling my eyes. Dozens of those darned creatures swarmed me. From the blur, it felt like being in the car wreck again, with people looking down at me as I suffered waves of pain.

I scrambled to get upright, no longer cocky in my ability to fight. The ground grew cold, despite the heat from that strange breath. A shadow passed over me and robbed my eyesight. I yelled, terrified at being helpless.

Post Note: I’d thought those times were behind me, but clearly trauma appears at the worst moments. Was my desire to fight recklessly tied to some attempt at regaining my self-confidence? What good did being reckless do me if I died as a result?

The darkness was deep and empty. Sight vanished, along with sound, and finally my sense of time. I couldn’t say how long I hung there, trying to feel my fingers or any hint of reality. It was like a waking coma.

A sharp pressure in my eye socket grew in intensity. Warmth blossomed as quickly as it’d vanished and I screamed from the onslaught. My skin burned. One hand grasped around something protruding from my eye. The other extended, driving a starry blade forth into a mini-orc’s chest.

It was dead, hanging loosely on my blade. A pile of dead combatants lay scattered across the yard. Water blurred my other eye’s vision. The sound of my hoarse screams felt like background noise as the pain clicked off.

My muscles twitched but were nearly numb. Abruptly the screams ended. I grabbed the obstruction in my eye and pulled. The sound of squishing made me gag. There was a scream as something nearby died. I fought to keep myself level headed and instead beat two mini-orcs to death with the fire poker that had been in my eye.

I swung at another creature, hooking part of its neck. There was a light tug as its body jerked to one side. The screaming made me smile. Mini-orcs died in clumps. Many twitched on the ground. I tilted my head to get the sweat pooling in another direction. More creatures died. I stepped on one’s head, kicked another, and beat a third into submission. Each one made me happier.

The hydra reeled as well. One head lay on the ground, being dragged along. The big middle one recovered first, lifting up. Somehow that darkness had resulted in one of them being useless.

My other eye fluttered shut as pain continued to jolt me in spurts. Whatever I’d been turned into, Hawthorn, or oddly cold blooded killer Lance, I could block the agony and still function. But it wasn’t enough to remove the hurt completely.

I stepped forward and fell sideways as a leg gave out. The pain didn’t register, but the sudden tilting sensation and failure of my hands to extend were giveaways.

Post Note: Being unable to feel pain also means being unable to feel muscle reactions. I’d equate it to being on the best drugs ever while trying to function.

The enemy took a breath. I grabbed a club from a dead mini-orc, charged my spell, and threw it before the hydra could breathe its nasty green fire. This time the explosion caught its main head. Mini-orcs screamed. I got up and hobbled forward, pooling another spell intent upon letting loose.

My fingers burned and refused to be muted. It was worse than my eye, which was simply malfunctioning, if such a term could be applied to a probably damaged beyond repair body part.

“I’ll live through this,” I muttered through grinding teeth.

A smarter man would have survived by simply not fighting such a powerful creature. For all my attempts at logical thought processes, intelligent, I was not.

A hole was visible on the hydra’s side that hadn’t been there before. My earlier blast that had gone wide left a spot to throw another explosion. I shuffled faster and took care not to let my leg give way again.

I had to end this fight, before fear and panic won. Staying steady was impossible. Instead I leaned with the motion and stumbled for the wounded side. Mini-orc voices faded into background noise.

The larger head intercepted me, preparing a new breath of acid or flame. I reacted on instinct, driving my dagger into its looming eye socket, my body splayed across its opening jaw. The hydra’s mouth clamped shut as it drew back. It howled, lifting me away. Green liquid escaped from its jaws, burning my arm off and separating my hand from the dagger.

I hardly felt anything, but screamed anyway. It roared from a garbled, spit filled throat. Its other head bent over the middle one, preparing to bite me. My already dim vision turned into a narrow spot. Only witnessing the monster chomp dozens of mini-orcs gave me a clue what was happening.

The monster’s roar was cut off by a fresh boom sounding. The main head writhed and thrashed. My body flung one way as its head flopped the other.

I banged into a wall and lay gasping for air. It refused to come. The good hand moved in uneven jerks, reaching for the spell book. I’d go down fighting.

There was another boom, then another, and a third. The monster roared. I told my arm to scoop out the spell and toss the rune pattern toward the hydra, but I couldn’t feel or see anything. I only heard cries.

The mini-orcs shouted conflicting orders of “Treat” “retreat” and occasionally “too leet.”

“Retreat,” I shouted in garbled tones. All this would do me no good if those damn scavengers were still around, thrusting their badly covered pelvises in holes. Hopefully whatever bewitching powers the dirt woman had had would also work for me. They’d been listening to my orders earlier.

It grew quiet. I thought about wiping away my eye, and must have, because the small tunnel of vision I was operating out of became clearer.

The hydra stood, staring at me with one eye. The other two heads were dead and my black star made dagger sat in the other eye socket. Then its back leg buckled. The creature swayed and fell to the ground.

I took deep breaths and almost felt elation. My body was too numb for the tingling sensation to make it through.

All around, mini-orcs were dead in droves. I watched, waiting to see if the hydra would heal, but the semi-truck-sized creature didn’t stir. I didn’t stop staring until its body turned into glowing yellow orbs, and my dagger clattered upon the ground. Eyelids fluttered as the realization that this giant boss creature gave no special powers hit me. All that work, the near death, an endless hoard of mini-orcs, for some so-far useless orbs.

The idea that I’d near killed myself made my heart patter rapidly. Drumming filled my ears and slowly faded to background noise. Other bits of light fluttered and spun. There were no more mini-orcs anywhere that I could see. Maybe they’d all fluttered away in “retreat” from the madness of multiple explosions. Any scent of perfume had faded, replaced by char and ash.

Even more light flew into Little Shade, who stood in the distance. She hung against a wall with her arms tightly around her waist. The darkness that had surrounded her was faint, almost natural.

She’d earned part of the kill somehow. Maybe whatever magic ran this world simply considered her contribution of the perfume lure to be valuable. That large sightless effect was probably hers which might have given her orbs.

She pushed away from a wall and swayed. The dark nimbus around her filled in once more. Little Shade scared me. It was that simple. My body slipped forward. Pain laced up my stomach and down one arm. I couldn’t feel my legs. I had run out of nearby weapons to use and ended up shoving my arm into the hydra’s body with explosive spells attached.

My forearm was gone. I stared at my brown-skinned stump and marveled at the lack of pain and slowly knitting flesh. I wondered if this was what video game characters felt like when they magically healed after big fights.

“Well. I’ma go inside and explore. You know, before the heat of battle and that magic skin you slipped on make me drop my panties and take you for a roll. Mmhm. Ain’t fair when a man’s muscles move like that. No it’s not.” Her shadow doused head shook. “All glistening. I bet your sweats made of pure crack, it is. What’d them Greeks call it? Ambrosia. Bet it’s like that. Too bad you’re all broken there. Maybe fancy a tangle after you don’t look like road kill, yah?”

I blinked. She was insanely unfiltered in speech. The passive sounding lust was probably a side effect of my current form. I chuckled to myself and followed the quickly escaping woman inside. Prizes were waiting for us and the foul smell inside would be enough to keep me from being distracted.

It took more time to reach the doorway than expected. A few minutes passed while I healed. I wanted to see the prizes inside but nothing moved right. It was full on daytime by the time I braved standing. My body moved poorly, I used a wall to brace myself and slowly went inside.

The place was wide open after all the explosions. That hydra body had smashed and broken half the walls to compound the damage. I couldn’t remember any of that, but it hadn’t been there during my earlier exploration, so it must have been from the fight. The majority of the damage had probably happened as my vision dimmed and arm pumped out explosive spells.

Little Shade kneeled in front of the locked door. A dozen dead mini-orcs lay around her, with their heads separated from tiny bodies.

They turned into light orbs as I walked up, implying fresh kills. She fiddled at the door while I watched a cascade of lights come pouring in from the deceased bodies outside. They were taking longer than normal, but it might be because of how many dead creatures had been left in our wake.

Even some of the dead bodies inside the hydra’s den were fading. It implied the system which governed our new world could separate out monster kills by damage done. It was yet another bit of nonsense to take into consideration. I debated the merits of taking the majority of a kill then leaving other people to clean it up.

The door creaked open. Little Shade bolted inside, I felt far less urgent. My body was sluggish from the damage being healed. Vision had yet to recover in one eye. I fought a wave of panic and muttered, “I’ll be okay.”

It was like that darn car accident all over again, only I’d done it to myself. The pain was worse, if I thought about it.

A scuffling sound came from inside. I stepped into the room. Wrappers were everywhere, torn packages, and a small window that let in a waft of foul air. Someone had been camping in here.

“Well shit,” Little Shade muttered. I couldn’t tell where she actually stood.

A small shaft of light gave me something to see by, not that I really needed it. Two very tall people huddled in the back. They cowered in the corner with comically lengthy bodies despite being in a fetal position.

They were elves, straight out of the movies. I may have been ignorant on the original names of those goblins or hydras, but everyone on the planet knew what an elf was.

“You ain’t be bringing them back to the camp,” my stealthy companion said in a rush that almost sounded like gibberish.

I turned toward her voice and raised an eyebrow.

“Coach Big Balls, he’ll enslave them, like he done everything else. They’ll kill him”— Little Shade’s pale hand came out of the darkness like a ghostly limb to point at the male—“and use her as a sex slave. Like the others.”

The elves tried to grow smaller and failed.

I focused on a different word altogether. “Others?”

“Four. Elves. These ain’t the first. You’d think they were scary on account of all the movies, but they’re powerless. Something happened to them.” Little Shade hopped causing the dark blob that made up her outline to gyrate wildly. She rambled on and I only caught parts of it.

In short, there were fantasy people being held prisoner by Coach Big Balls. Or Madison, or whatever his name was. She babbled in spurts of facts that she’d apparently sneaked around to find out. I was able to establish the following by listening to Little Shade’s fevered rambles.

Someone in Coach Madison’s camp could enslave other people.

They only enslaved those useful in some form.

I would be enslaved as well if I came back alive.

Those enslaved had black chokers tattooed onto their necks.

Absolutely none of it rang a bell and Little Shade could have been lying. She pointed to her own neck multiple times but I couldn’t see past the darkness cast by her large brimmed hat.

“So you can’t take them to Coach Big Balls.”

Little Shade wiped her forehead as though she was sweating. I couldn’t tell for sure.

The hydra was dead. That was the deal I’d made with Coach Madison, but I detested his very existence if he was really enslaving people. That practice bothered me. Here we were, kidnapped in mass, subjected to an insane situation, and someone had the nerve to inflict further harm onto our own kind. It made my stomach turn.

I had to pause and remember that these elves, if that’s what they were, were not “our own kind.” They were another kind of humanoid. Maybe they had been changed. It occurred to me that they hadn’t said a single word since our arrival. While Little Shade had had a bout of verbal diarrhea, they’d cowered.

Post Note: I’ve wondered what brought on the sudden vile turn of my guts at this revelation. It might have to do with my changed nature. We were all subjected to something, such as the woman with dark skin and her giant husband. Or perhaps I’d hit a wall. It might have been standing there—at a crux between two choices. Save the elves, enslave the elves, or kill them (Which the giggling voice in the back of my mind repeatedly suggested).

“I can take them to my dad,” I said. We could take them to the man who had left a note at my house and a large monster that ate other creatures. I briefly wondered who would have won, the hydra with its acid fire, or the giant horse with wings and a stony face. The easy bet would have been the hydra, but the other creature could fly and walk through walls.

“Kay. We’ll do that, but I need something else first.”

My arm scabbed over rapidly. It could potentially go even faster if I pulled off this “Hawthorn” disguise, but the elves were enraptured despite cowering, and stared at me with what might have been longing. It was hard to tell what their wide eyes, huddled forms, and grasping hands meant.

As for Little Shade’s roadblock of an idea, I didn’t feel too worried. Everyone in this new world wanted something. The old reality hadn’t been much different. It was like those quests people used to talk about at school.

“What?” I asked.

“Midge the Tattletale. I need to free her.”

She made less sense than normal. I felt too exhausted to argue.

“Okay.” I nodded. “But we need rest first.”