Chapter 5 - First Blood

Striding purposefully in the direction of Sol’s voice, I took the opportunity to do a quick evaluation of my condition, as well as my armament. The fact that it only took me about 5 seconds was rather depressing.

The Scholar’s starting set was far from ideal. It consisted of a lightweight robe of some scratchy fabric – probably cheap cotton. It included a truly confounding number of pockets, which to the average scholarly-minded fellow might have been a god-send. You can never have too many pockets when you’re eyeball deep in scrolls and potions. However, to a frugal, combat-minded man such as myself, it was a nightmare of appalling bulk and awkward weight distribution.

And, that was it. No plate, half-plate, cuirass, boiled leather vest, cloak, cape.. hell, not even a flimsy token leather cap, for crying out loud. Nada. An itchy robe, some woolen socks and cheap leather boots which were starting to pinch my toes already. On a simple 5-mile march, the blisters would probably swell up like the Vesuvius, requiring lancing before they burst and became a real bastard to deal with.

Oh, and no weapons. I had some strange kind of knapsack which hung from my neck. The insides looked thoughtfully designed to hold several scrolls or vials, neatly compartmentalized. Nowhere to even stow a weapon, even a humble 6-inch utility knife. Hadn’t these nerds even heard of something called concealed carry?

At least, I mulled in the back of my mind, I still had my trusty rock. Fat lot of comfort that was. Well, to be honest, feeling the weight of it in one of the larger pockets of my robe WAS of some comfort. Logically speaking, I could have stopped by to pick up a sturdy branch or stick, which would serve as a poor man’s truncheon. However, I refrained. I had the strangest feeling that I absolutely did not want to part with it. I suppose it might have something to do with the fact that it stood as the sole witness of my one moment of fame and glory in this whole blasted world. And who knew, perhaps the fact that it had materialized along with me from the world of souls – or whatever it was called – gave it a magical mojo of some kind.

One can always hope, right?

As I rounded one final corner and caught sight of Sol, I pushed all other thoughts aside and put my game face on. Time to wreck some havoc. Finally.

Ever since I’d been a youth, I’d never been entirely successful at curving my more violent impulses. The fact that I never even tried probably had something to do with that. I’d always been a problem child, which put old Gramps through hell. So much so, that I figured the best favor I could do the old man – the only family I had left in the world – was enlisting in the core as soon as I reached the eligibility age. Whether Gramps himself agreed or not, that was another matter entirely.

In any case, I’d been born for the game. A high stakes game, but a game nonetheless. And I always played to win.

You know those school bullies that surround the class nerd to shake him down for some change to use at the arcade or the vending machine? Well, I was not one of those guys. I was the maniacally cackling demon-spawn spraying blood left and right as I pounded every one of them wanna-be bullies into the ground. Then stomped their faces till the only sound that could be heard was their sobbing pleas for someone, anyone to come and save them.

Hey, to be fair, likely more than half of that blood was my own.

In any case, my troubled childhood led into an adulthood where I had developed the confidence to walk into a room, any room, and stare everyone down because I had the absolute knowledge – not cocky self-assurance, mind you, but a deep-seated, rock-steady, stake-my-life-on-it kind of certainty – that I was the toughest, roughest, meanest bastard in the room.

Old habits die hard, and in this case they served me well. I saw 6 adults, of which only four were used to any kind of physical activity at all. Three were busy struggling to hold down a snarling, blood-matted storm of fur and claws. Reaver. I could see from my cursory examination that he hadn’t gone down without a fight – most of the men had flesh wounds, and one of them was still bleeding profusely - but it was over now. Three of the men were holding him down using long wooden poles that ended in nasty looking iron hoops ringed with spikes on the inside. I could see fresh blood spurting from where they pressed against Reaver’s neck, and though he didn’t look as though he was ready to surrender quite yet, another had already placed some sort of leather muzzle on his head and was hastily tightening the straps.

My eyebrows rose in spite of myself. Three grown men just to hold him down. He was a fighter, that tough bastard.

My kind of company.

The other two men would have been identified as merchants by any other people. Not to me, however. Oh no, I was used to dealing with scum like them. Some things never change, whether on Earth or Aeterna. Always some playground bully trying to put the squeeze on an easy target.

One of them – a bucktoothed, rat-faced fellow with thin shoulders and mean, squinting eyes - was cruelly hauling Sol to his feet by his hair, eliciting a sharp cry of pain. The other, a rotund man wearing fancier clothes than the rest, was rubbing one of his knuckles. Glancing back to Sol, I could see one of his cheeks was scuffed and darkening with a bruise.

“Told you to be quiet. That beast has caused me enough grief. Well, no more! I finally have all the witnesses I need,” he sneered at the fellow holding Sol, rat-face.

Right on cue, rat-face chimed in, “Oh yes, I saw him drag one of Fat Bar.. err.. Mr. Barik’s goats by the neck behind a tent. Never saw it again, but there was blood on that beast’s nuzzle.”

“That’s not true! Reaver would never..!”

The rest was cut off as the fat man raised his hand threateningly. Chuckling at the cringing Sol, he lowered his hand to cup Sol’s chin and look into his eyes. “No other witnesses, and you’re a minor without a guardian. Tribal law says if you can’t pay me back for the loss, you and everything you own are mine to dispose of as I please. Well, I’m not pleased. I doubt you have anything of value except for that lump of iron on your back, but you’ll fetch a good enough price on the slave market.”

Sol was sniveling pitifully, “Guu.. I’ll do any.. anything. P.. please, at least.. at least spare Reaver. He’s my only family..”

“Hah!” Interrupted Barik. “Not a chance. Maybe they’ll be willing to buy some more beasts for the arena. I hear they always need fodder for the Sand Tigers.”

“NO! You can’t!” came Sol’s agonized cry.

I had seen enough. Ideally, I would have preferred to fight on ground of my choosing, but my vision was already turning red and I was on autopilot.

You know, I retract myself on the whole rock vs wooden club debate. A nice sturdy stick, like the wooden handle of the broom someone had kindly and very conveniently left leaning against a nearby wall would do wonders to improve my mood. Can’t speak for the person on the other end, however.

I went through a mental tally of my opponents and the optimal order to follow in delivering a beatdown with the utmost efficiency. I had no time to waste against low-rent trash like these. Let’s see. Trash. Trash. Trash. Rat-faced trash. Fat trash. Ho. That last fellow, with the nasty scar running down one cheek and hair gathered in a ponytail. He didn’t look like much at a passing glance, but his center of gravity was perfectly placed, ready to move in any direction at any moment.

Yeah, he had dangerous eyes, that one.

Wordlessly, I moved behind one of the men holding Reaver down, directly opposite from scar-face. He’d go down last. Scar-face noticed me as soon as I drew close enough to pose a threat, but couldn’t reach me in time. The others noticed me about two seconds too late to do anything about it. One of the men standing opposite to me followed Scar-face’s eyes and frowned at me.

“Hey, what are yo..”

The hoodlum nearest to me started to turn his head in order to see what his comrade was frowning at. Couldn’t have timed it better if he’d tried. You know, before I got fed up with all the holier-than-thou attitude of upperclassmen in my middle school baseball team and gotten permanently banned for crushing their collective up-turned noses, I had been scouted as quite the talent with a bat in my hand.

See, I always swing for the fence.

*BLAM*

Splinters flew in all directions as my two-handed swing neatly intercepted, then reversed the poor devil’s turning motion. He wobbled crazily for a couple heartbeats, but just as I raised my shattered makeshift baseball bat for another crack at a homerun,, his eyes rolled up in his head and he obligingly collapsed on the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.

“What the..?!”

“Zayed..!”

“Damn..”

“Mister? Be careful!”

“Get him!”

That last command was shouted by Tarik himself, and two more challengers stepped up to the plate. One of them was rat-face, who had drawn a thin dagger from his belt. The other was the guy who had just finished securing the muzzle on Reaver. Since the latter was still unarmed and within a short stride away, I flipped the remains of the ruined broom at Rat-face. Couldn’t do any real harm, but he flinched and ducked.

Excellent. That bought me plenty of time to finish off my next victim.

I feinted left, and the sucker bought it. As he lifted his arms to block a straight I’d never intended to deliver, I launched into an explosive overhand hook, stepping so far inside my opponent’s guard that I could almost feel his breath on the back of my neck. I deftly executed the smooth, graceful twist of the hips, carrying all the momentum up from my legs, and into my arm, which would descend like the hammer of the gods to shatter his chin into a thousand pieces.

CRACK

I heard the bone break, and I could almost feel sorry for the guy.

“What the..?” I heard him mumble, and that was the first sign that something was seriously wrong.

The guy that was supposed to be sailing through the air to land 6 feet behind with a mild concussion was still standing here, right in front of me. He shouldn’t have been able to utter any words other than maybe a strangled croak.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the guy I’d grand slammed into kingdom come slowly getting to his feet and dusting himself off. What the hell? Were these guys zombies in some cheap indie flick?

And then the pain hit me.

It was like someone had shoved my entire arm into a bed of red hot coals. I cried out involuntarily, and it was a wonder that I did not pass out right then and there. What the hell?

Hands roughly grabbed me by the collar, then tried to shove me back. Bad idea to let an opponent create enough room to swing a weapon or fist when you’re entering shock from the pain, leaving you completely defenseless. I was too experienced to make such a rookie mistake, however.

I dug my feet in, and twisted my neck in a smooth jerking motion that should leave him overbalanced for a precious moment while I gathered my wits. Only, it didn’t. Instead I was effortlessly launched through the air to land in a messy pile of jumbled limbs and.. wait, was that blood?

Propping myself up dizzily on one elbow, I lifted my right hand and stared dumbly. It was bent at an unnatural angle, and blood was pumping furiously from the spot where a jagged bone had ruptured the skin.

*BLEEP*

Alert! You have sustained damage!Your HP has gone down by 2 points!Current HP:1 / 4

Alert! You are bleeding!You will continue losing HP unless treated.Current HP:1 / 4

Alert! Your health is critically low!Seek medical assistance immediately!Current HP:1 / 4

*Ttrring!*

Congratulations! You have earned a new achievement: “Training day disaster”!

What. The. Hell.

I was still staring dumbly at the hand that had betrayed me when hands roughly grabbed me by the hair, lifting me off the ground. I just couldn’t believe it.

“Get up, you piece of shit!”

“Gahahah, did you see that? Pulped his own hand, poor bastard..”

“Some hero he turned out to be..”

“I tell you, you can’t make up this shit.”

They guffawed and hollered at my expense as the guy I’d broken my wrist on dragged me by the hair, leading me towards Tarik. With his other hand he scratched idly at his chin. That wouldn’t even leave a bruise.

I could hear the panicked cries of Sol and Reaver’s snarls intensifying as the sounds of paws clawing at dirt and men grunting in effort grew louder.

I was simply stupefied.

I had executed a perfect overhand hook, one I had used time and time again to break chins, dislocate jaws, knock molars out, you name it. There was no way I’d miss the point of impact or land the blow with a crooked wrist.

“Damn, scared me shitless for a second there..” muttered a voice darkly, and a quick glance to one side showed the first guy I’d knocked senseless.. only he hadn’t been. There was hardly even a mark on him, except for the dust on his face.

“Puhahah, you got spooked and fainted like a little girl, didn’t you?” accused one of this fellows.

“S.. shut up! I just slipped trying to duck the blow!” he snarled back, but he was a bad liar.

“Mister! Don’t let them catch you!” Sol lay on his knees, fat tears streaming down his face.

“All of you, shut up! Bring him here,” Tarik ground out, glaring at me menacingly.

As the bravo holding me complied, I noticed rat-face grinning wickedly and fiddling with his dagger. Maybe it was supposed to look intimidating, the prospect of having your guts riddled with holes. However, by my standards that puny little thing hardly qualified as a toothpick. Besides, I was still busy just trying to comprehend what had just gone down.

“Now, you have 10 seconds to tell me who you are, before I let Quigs here play house with your guts.”

Everyone chorused in with the typical, obligatory evil minion laugh after the villain delivers cheesy villain-like threats. Or rather, not everyone. I noticed Scar-face watching me intently with narrowed eyes. He tilted his head sideways as though he were looking at a mismatched jigsaw puzzle he couldn’t make heads or tails of. Then I had other things to worry about.

“Arrrgh!” I gritted my teeth against the pain as Tarik mercilessly pulled me closer by my broken wrist and twisted. Stars swam across my vision as my pain receptors overloaded.

I heard more cries of protest from Sol, ending in a sharp thud of flesh meeting bone and a sharp cry. Then subdued sobs.

“Do I have your attention yet?”

As soon as I had my breath back, I did the only reasonable thing. I hawked and spit right in his eye.

Bullseye!

As he flinched involuntarily, I stamped my heel on the toes of the guy holding me from behind, then nailed him with a stiff elbow straight to his solar plexus. A muffled grunt and the sharp exhalation of air told me his diaphragm would be contracting reflexively for the next 20 seconds or so, giving him a lot better things to worry about than holding on to a guy with a broken wrist.

Thusly, I celebrated my newly acquired freedom by stepping into the still-reeling Tarik and delivered a vicious headbutt to his nose. If delivered properly, a good headbutt can end most any fight right then and there. Even if the other party doesn’t pass out in virtue of a particularly thick skull, a broken nose hurts like a bitch. Besides, you can hardly swing your fists when you can’t see what you’re trying to hit in the first place because your eyes just won’t stop tearing up and spoiling your vision.

Of course, I’d forgotten I was still trapped in the cheap indie zombie flick. My headbutt was successful in stunning only one person: Me. Tarik stumbled back a couple paces, then bellowed in rage as he drew a dagger from belt and brandished it against me. An quick glance at his grip told me he had likely never even gutted so much as a fish.

I had to force myself not to grin. Wouldn't do to spoil the surprise when I sidestepped the telegraphed thrust, then shook the knife from his fingers, reversed its grip and painted a nice smiley face in bright crimson across his throat. Yeah, come to papa.

Then someone decided to crash my party. Arms wrapped themselves around me from behind. Hell, not again. So, struggling to gasp in a breath guy wasn't really struggling at all, and he had me. I knew it the moment he locked his hands in front of my chest. I couldn't even make him budge! Just how weak was this damn body?

I returned my eyes up front to see Taric snarling and spitting pure hatred as he thrust his dagger toward me, aiming for my heart.

The cretin.

Knives are for cutting or lancing soft tissue. You avoid the chest area because they're liable to get deflected or worse, stuck on a rib. Then your opponent could calmly wrench it out and slaughter you with your own weapon. I wish I could tell him all of that, but it didn't look like it'd do me any good just now.

After one last desperate struggle, I managed to wriggle one of my arms enough that I could reach inside of my pocket, where I desperately fumbled for.. you guessed, the rock. There! My blind groping about yielded a hard object. Without a second's hesitation, I pulled it out and I swung it blindly over my shoulder, hoping to nail the guy behind me in the eye or nose. From this angle, I couldn't get enough leverage to crack his skull. All I could hope was to cause enough pain that his grip would loosen. Hey, if I got lucky enough, maybe I could get the fat boar charging at me to plow straight through his own minion.

Then three things happened almost simultaneously.

First, though the feedback was all wrong, the grip did loosen, for which I was infinitely grateful.

Second, I cocked my hand back and threw the rock at Taric's looming face. It was a big target, and I did not miss. I did mention being scouted in middle school, right?

Third, and this is the bitch of it all, what hit Taric square in the face was not a rock made of solid granite, hard enough to stave his pudgy nose in.

It was a book. A goddamn book.

I could see it in almost comical slow motion as it sped towards its intended target. It flew open on the way, as if to show me the beautifully worked leather of its cover, inlaid in gold gilt. It was gorgeous, probably the most elegant, meticulously crafted tome I'd ever laid my eyes on. And absolutely useless to me at the moment. Case in point, it smacked Taric in the mouth.. open-face first. It made an impressive WHACK sound, but that was about it. It hadn't even landed edge-first.

Taric paused for a moment to look down at his feet incredulously. I did likewise. I think everyone must have. His thoughts likely mirrowed my own perfectly.

What the hell?! A book? A BOOK? Of all the.. HAHAHAH

The only real difference was that inside Taric's head, the laughter must have been half relief at it being such an innocuous missile, half hysteria at the very idea of some stupid bastard throwing a book in a desperate last ditch attempt to fend off an assailant.

Mine was plain, simple, black despair. The sort you would hear ring hollowly out of someone who had flicked the light switch on in his house and watched the whole damn world blow up and rain down in flaming debris at his feet. Yeah, that kind of laughter.

I almost didn't notice the arms once again tightening around me, holding me still. Taric grimly resumed his advance towards me, then let out a gloating cry of triumph as he raised his dagger high above me.

I could see it coming, but somehow my body refused to respond. It felt like one of those nightmares where you see everything around you moving in slow motion. You feel as though you’re trapped in jello, and you wait for an agonizing lifetime as you watch inevitability thrusting down.

The blade stopped a scant two inches from my eyeball. The tip hovered there, trembling. Somehow, Scar-face had managed to step between myself and the dagger. His hand had a firm hold of Tarik’s arm, and though the latter was obviously trying to plunge the tip the last couple inches, he might as well have been trying to muscle a mountain out of the way.

“Enough,” Scar-face said tonelessly. “You swore there would be no deaths today, and that was the only reason I have allowed it. Go any further, fat worm, and you will incur in my wrath.”

The absolute lack of any emotion, be it anger or outrage, lent his words far more momentum than they might have had otherwise, outnumbered as he was.

After a brief moment of hesitation, Tarik snarled. “Fine, have it your way. But mark my words, Jae’thun. I will remember this.”

A sound like what I imagined a lion might produce when confronted with an angry, squeaking mouse, escaped Jae’thun’s throat, then his lips stretched into a humorless parody of a smile. “You know where to find me, worm.”

Of course, the mouse immediately averted his eyes from the lion’s gaze. It is the natural order of things. The strong rule over the weak. The latter of which included me, in this case. This was further demonstrated when Tarik flicked his head towards me, and a sharp blow to the back of my head had me seeing stars once again, only sound started to fade along with sight this time.

"Hey, check this out." Someone, couldn't tell whom, had taken hold of my book.

"Woa.. no way.." another voice chimed in.

"Hey everyone, take a look at this!" There was real excitement in his voice.

"Hah, that's rich!"

My rock-turned-book. Damn, probably a relic of potent magic taken from the very caves of the Mists of Serenity. Somehow, it had survived the passage through the Gates of Oblivion, and here it would be stolen away from me by those trash, easy as you please. Like taking candy from a babe. And then..

"Mister.."

The last thing I remember seeing as my body slumped to the ground and darkness rose up to swallow me, was that of the men retreating with Sol in tow. I would never forget his eyes, watching me resolutely through the tears that flooded them. For some reason, I knew they were tears, not of despair or rage, but rather those of heartfelt gratitude.

Because even though I had failed, and had done so most spectacularly, I had still tried.

I had fought for him, and that was enough for him.

Fists I could not remember balling up reached for Sol, but it was far too late. I was losing consciousness. Whether from loss of blood or shock, it mattered little. I was dying, and Sol..

Sol was lost.

My mind howled in impotent rage, and only hollow darkness echoed back.

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