Chapter 3: A Headache from the Stars

Thankfully (Or unfortunately I haven’t decided yet) the elf with the Mage-pistol only fired once, in my weakened state I’m sure I would have lost consciousness otherwise.

It feels as if thousands of needles were underneath my skin and stabbing me from the inside to get out. My muscles spasm and convulse even several minutes after that elf shot me with that lightening spell, yet despite the fact that I retained my consciousness I still laid limp as several pairs of hands drag me from the ground and wrap bands of metal (Shackles perhaps?) around my arms and legs.

There are a few moments of confusion among my captors when they went to bind my wrists, only to find I was lacking my entire right forearm. After several seconds of debate and awkward experimentation with wrapping the shackles around several parts of my body they settled with locking my arms behind my back with the shackles set just above my elbows.

Problem solved, good job idiots.

The worst part about this whole ordeal was that they interrupted my channeling of [Eldritch Regeneration]. Portions of my crushed leg and abdomen were still angrily swollen and, in some parts, broken or missing entirely. When that elf shot me full of electricity my muscles seized and convulsed hard enough to rebreak several of my barely healed bones causing the sharp fragments to slice my already damaged flesh and renew hemorrhaging in my open wounds.

I can’t start [Eldritch Regeneration] from scratch, so now I can only do damage control, but now I got an audience and they seem to have no issues plugging a dying man in a ditch with lightening spells.

Not even an hour into my triumphant return from the Dark and already I have someone on my shit-list.

Elf with the Mage-pistol, check.

After they bind me my captors unceremoniously drop me on the ground somewhere nearby. I feel heat roll over my burnt rags and raw skin and the creaking and hiss of burning metal intensify so I assume they hauled me closer to their crashed ship. Why bother going through the trouble of dragging my broken ass just to drop me a few meters away? I was better off in the cool embrace of my little ditch. Jerks.

A tiny shuffle and the sound of a foot dragging through the dirt peaks my interest. There’s someone beside me, and they seem to be sitting just above where my head is resting in the dust.

The tiniest puff of warm breath tickles my ear, sending my thick and wild beard hair standing on end. My mystery companion is leaning over me and seems to be nearly nose to ear with me.

I think I’ll just lay here and see where this is going, not like I have anything else better to do.

I hear a tiny sniff and an adorable squeak of revulsion from my companion. Yeah, sorry I don’t exactly smell like a bed of roses, sweetheart. Not bathing in a few centuries and getting pulped by a fucking space ship will do that to a guy.

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Lydia woke to the smell of burning flesh and screaming. She didn’t know where she was, what was going on, why this was happening. She couldn’t see and no matter how hard she tried she couldn’t move. She was scared, terrified. She honestly thought she was going to die.

Just a few days before she had been begging for death, but not like this, not burning alive. She wanted it to be quick, painless, death by fire, smoke, and slag is anything but.

She struggled against her restraints and, against her better judgement, opened her irritated, reddened eyes.

Then she instantly wished she never had.

All she could see in the fire’s dull red glare was a dark rolling cloak of smoke bellowing out from the many hull breaches scattered across the spacecraft like an abstract pin cushion.

Lydia was curled in a fetal position and crammed firmly into a container just large enough for her thin, bony frame, her three foot long brunette wolf tail curled between her legs and throbbed at the base from sitting on it for so long.

She choked and gagged, her lungs fighting with the rest of her malnourished body until she felt her abdomen clench hard and she retched, spilling her meager stomach contents over the cargo hold’s scalding hot surface.

The young Wolf-folk struggled to free herself from her container, but her body refused to cooperate, she screamed and strained against her rebellious muscles, but they never budged.

She couldn’t move no matter how much she tried, she was a Nameless after all.

Nameless, the title given to those that had their True Names stolen from them. True Names are bound to the soul, if someone holds the key to your soul they hold your life in their hands.

Lydia was ordered by her handler to stay in her container, even if she were to burn alive or even be attacked she would be unable to defend herself or even run away.

She was going to die here, and she knew it.

“HELP!” She cried. “SOMEONE! ANYONE!”

“Hey! Some of the cargo’s still alive!” A grating voice called out.

Lydia recognized it as one of the Nameless Handlers aboard the Spacecraft responsible for the transportation of herself and the other Nameless. In any other moment she would be dreading seeing the likes of him, but here, now, he was her only hope.

She didn’t want to die.

A bulky Gray-skinned Orc clad in an orange skin tight space suit with pieces of gray armor attached barreled through the smoke. His head was encased in a boxy helmet with a single sliver of tinted glass for a visor and a radio antenna attached to the side of his head.

He spotted Lydia and cocked his head to the side. Even though his face was hidden Lydia was sure he was grinning behind that visor.

“Well ain’t you a lucky bitch, eh?” He laughed.

As he spoke more of the spacecraft buckled and melted around them, cold spikes of anxiety shot from the pit of her stomach straight to her brunette wolf ears, making her feel light-headed.

‘Hurry the fuck up and get me out of here!’ Lydia bit back her panicked scream, but only just. This slaver was taking his time and seemed to be enjoying the terrified look on her face.

The smirking orc finally kicked into gear when a portion of the rafters gave and came crashing down with a thunderous roar of rolling flames and heat.

The armored slaver held out a hand at Lydia. “Get out of here.”

The invisible force that stilled her muscles evaporated, allowing the Wolf-girl to scramble from her container with a frantic fervor.

Lydia landed on the floor on her belly and tried to climb to her feet to no avail, she resorted to crawling on her elbows and knees. The slaver ignored her and busied himself with popping open the other containers, completely indifferent to the young girl crying out in pain as she crawled across the scalding hot floor.

Somehow Lydia made it out of the cargo hold. The air in the hallways was thick with choking black smoke and the floor was rife with sharp protrusions, sparking wires and crevices eager to snag and twist limbs.

“Come on… Just do it!” Lydia spotted a tear on the corridor wall. She wrapped her fingers in the crevice and bit back a curse as the sharp ragged metal sliced into her fingers. She needed to do this fast or she won’t be able to do this at all. She pulled with all her might and clambered to her feet, albeit with a visible tremble in her knees.

“Yes!” She grinned and then inhaled. The smoke slithered down her throat like a hot gritty snake intent on sinking its teeth into every inch of flesh it could find. The frail Wolf-girl’s body bucked as she coughed violently and puked again. She barely caught her balance before toppling onto a smashed section of floor.

Another crash rang in her ears and a wave of heat and smoke seared her eyes, forcing her to close them. Panic boiled up in her chest as the world around her closed in around her.

‘I got to get out of here!’

Inch by inch Lydia felt her way down the hallway, the skin on her elbows and knees were flayed and burnt to the bone, her feet did not fare much better from the bits of scrap and the rended edges of smashed walls and appliances that littered the corridor. Several times she tripped when she stepped on a sharp piece of metal or into a crevice. Her lungs burned for oxygen and her breathing was taxed with constant coughing fits. She risked opening her eyes a found she was nearly at the ramp!

A shove out of nowhere sent the Wolf-girl tumbling onto a wicked cluster of metal teeth, the long jagged metal points sank into her flesh and hooked in deep. An agonizing scream tore from her throat as blood pumped around the metal in her flesh, staining the floor red. Her primal flailing attempts to free herself only shredded more of her flesh against the jagged edges and the bent metal teeth hooked in deeper. Lydia’s burning eyes shot open and she whipped her gaze around in a desperate bid to find some way to escape.

Instead she saw the slaver.

The orc had shoved her out of the way onto the metal teeth.

Huddled shapes stumbled and cried out in pain behind him.

It was the other Nameless, the ones from the other containers.

Naked sacks of skin and bone with dead eyes and masks of frozen terror were all that was left of the people they once were. None even spared her a passing glance as they stumbled past.

Seeing the Namelesss’ thin backs vanishing in the smoke filled Lydia with dread. They don’t even care that she was impaled on the floor of a burning ship.

Lydia gave up.

The light in the little Wolf-girl’s eyes died and she curled in on herself as much as the spikes of metal in her side would allow. She drowned in her acceptance of death, something that seemed so surreal to her. Never in a million years did she think she would go out this way. Burning alive in a space ship on an unfamiliar planet? The odds of that happening are astronomical!

But like the lottery, someone’s gotta be the winner.

Little teardrops rolled down Lydia’s cheeks, cutting a winding trail through the ash clinging to her gaunt face. One tear found its way to her lips, it tasted salty, and a little sour.

while Lydia was wallowing in her despair she almost didn’t notice when a wrinkled hand closed around her free shoulder and gave her a shake. The little motion jerked the metal teeth in her flesh, eliciting a fresh spurt of blood and a tiny whimper.

“I got’cha young’un. I Got’cha.”

Strong, gentle hands worked her off the metal teeth, her hands found purchase in the thin arms that held her aloft. Another booming crash and a wave of heat and smoke boiled over, turning the corridor into a furnace.

The wrinkled hands worked faster.

With a final, excruciating tug the stranger pulled Lydia free of the metal teeth, though much of the twisted scrap remained embedded in her flesh.

“Hurry child. I know it hurts, just let me help you.”

Lydia no longer had the strength nor the amount of fucks to care where this old man was taking her, she was prepared to die, and she is still not completely convinced this was happening anyway, not even the gentle whisper of cool, life-giving night air across her cheek was evidence enough.

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Ragged coughing and the scuffle of bony, ragged bodies hitting the ground jolt my sensitive ears. Tiny pained whimpers and groans claw from the throat of some unfortunate creature.

Someone’s hurt, badly.

Even from here I can smell the sickly sweet coppery tang of blood and the savory, gut retching aroma of burnt flesh.

My mystery companion mercifully turns her sniffer from my admittedly ripe body odor.

I heard a tiny feminine whisper close by, probably from my anonymous sniffer. She speaks in a language I don’t understand, though it does seem familiar in a way. It sounds like Common Tongue chopped with Dwarven Thorin.

Perhaps I’ve been gone even longer then I had thought?

It wouldn’t surprise me truthfully, I have forgotten vast swaths of my time in the Dark during my many delves into insanity.

A rougher, deeper voice replies to the sniffer, again in the same strange tongue. He sounds a little frantic. He moves closer and the smell of blood and burnt flesh follows, growing stronger.

Another whimper from the wounded creature tugs at something in my chest.

Pity. I’m feeling pity. I’ve forgotten what that feels like…. I don’t like it, make it go away.

I open my eyes. There is little real reason to continue to play dead, and I do want to get rid of this uncomfortable pull in my chest.

I’m surrounded by a huddle of what appears to be a gaggle of living skeletons. It takes an embarrassingly long amount of time for my addled brain to figure out that these sacks of skin and bone were, in fact, living creatures.

I see a mix of races here, though none are elves funny enough. A good amount of them are beast-folk of one kind or another, while humans seem to make up the bulk of this sorry collection, though I do catch a glimpse of what appears to be a green skinned orc female entangled in a desperate cuddling match with another, equally gaunt gray skinned orc.

Nothing else seems special about them, except I have this feeling that I’m missing something incredibly obvious… but what?

Careful to not move my head I turn my eyes past my new companions to another group sitting in a circle close by. Slavers and the crew of this vessel I imagine, judging from their armor and clothes-

Clothes… I’m a moron. Every single one of these starved creatures surrounding me are dressed in nothing more than their birthday suits. I hadn’t had a need to wear clothes since mine were shredded while in the Dark, including the remnants of my ratty garb. Now only scraps of monster skin and my Sigil continued to doggedly cling to my frame.

I roll over, careful not to jostle my mangled leg and injured arm and spot my sniffer and the older man she was whispering with, as well as the source of the bloody stench, a tiny body curled between them.

My sniffer appears to be another beast-folk of the feline variety. Her gaunt frame boasting the pointed furred ears and the serpentine tail telling of her kind, though exactly what race of Cat-folk I can’t tell.

The older man she is speaking with is human. He is bald with dark bronze skin and wrinkles just beginning to sag, more from stress than age I’d bet. He is smaller than I’d expect the owner of such a deep baritone to own. I’m going to have to evaluate his level later.

The body between them looks to be that of a young girl. I spot a bushy brunette tail tucked between her bloodied legs with short chopped hair to match. A Canine-folk perhaps? They are equally as difficult as Cat-folk to tell apart. Even from my poor vantage point, being sprawled on the ground and all, I can clearly see the horrible wounds stabbing from the female’s side. Wide rends of meat and flesh hang loose among twisted blades of broken metal.

She is dying.

The old man seems to be frantically milling around for something to stanch of the girls bleeding but being naked has denied him of the means to bind even just a few of the wounds.

The wounded girl twitches and lets out another pitiful whimper.

I glance at the slavers circled several yards away, still absorbed in their council to decide how to go forward.

Do I risk exposing my abilities while in my compromised state? Hell, a stiff breeze could knock me over at this point.

I look back to the skinny little creature suffering and crying out in pain.

I scan the gaggle of slavers one more time to make sure their attention is elsewhere.

Fuck it.

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Another whimper escapes the mortally wounded Wolf-girl before Rufus. The old man sighs and presses his hands back over one of the more manageable gashes just below her ribcage, though even then her thick, deep red lifeblood seeped through his fingers, further staining her paper-thin skin crimson.

“Is… Is there anything we can, like, do for her?” A calico cat-girl asked tentatively, her voice tight and barely above a whisper.

Rufus shook his head sadly.

“I don’t think so Arleen, I’m hopin’ the asshat over there that did this to her will notice and help her out, but I doubt he will. If any of them see they’re more liable to put a bullet in her head and call it a night… At this point she’ll need a miracle.”

Arleen’s black and copper flecked ears twisted around and flicked irritably. She hates watching this. This girl, stranger or not, doesn’t deserve to die like this, after surviving a crash and escaping only to bleed out or get executed just because she got hurt. Tears welled up in the Cat-girl’s emerald eyes.

Its just not fair!

“Maybe if we-“ The Cat-girl froze and her ears stood at attention and spun behind her towards a new sound. After a few seconds of hesitation her head followed her ears and her jaw dropped.

The twisted, burnt corpse that Asmodeus, the Elf in charge of these Slavers, had dumped next to her was currently sitting cross legged just inches from her face.

This thing was little more then a mutilated skeleton with charred bits of skin stretched taut over top. It was chained above the elbows with Drain Manacles, a piece of equipment that pulls the stamina and mana from the wearer to keep them weak enough to transport. It was missing almost its entire right forearm from the elbow down, hence why its arms where secured behind its back.

Its skin was blackened with burns, mud, and filth to the point that it was impossible to tell what it looked like underneath it. But she didn’t need to see past the Thing’s horrible condition to see the horrendous injuries it had incurred. Its left leg was twisted at the knee and completely facing the wrong way! The breaks in its skin spoke of huge swaths of lacerations and unnatural dips in its torso were signs of broken ribs and smashed bone.

Honestly judging from the stench of death and the layers of filth clinging to its mostly naked frame Arleen thought it was a buried corpse the Slavers had dug up.

Only its not a corpse. This thing is alive. Alive and currently close enough to kiss her.

Two orbs of blue-gray light shone from beneath a curtain of matted, shoulder length hair, with a dirty brown beard to match. The Thing held Arleen’s gaze for a moment longer before flicking his gaze past her, right at the dying Wolf-girl crumpled in the dust, bleeding to death.

Unease rose in Arleen’s chest. Potent maternal instincts rose their hackles at the creature that was staring at the Wolf-girl laying helpless behind her. Funny, Arleen was perhaps barely older than the dying Wolf-girl but she still felt that urge to protect her, even if she was stranger.

“N-no.” Arleen shook her head. “You can’t have her. Go away.”

The Cat-girl blocked the charred corpse’s view of the girl and she held her hand out to keep it at arm’s length.

The Creature tilted its filthy, matted head, as if it were trying to decipher her words and actions. Arleen could almost see the dots connect in the Thing’s head as its eerie blue-gray eyes lit up in realization that she was protecting the Wolf-girl from him. It laughed.

It was more of a grating gurgle but the way its shoulders shook, and the cadence of its breaths were unmistakably in the manner of a laugh. It actually found this funny.

She opened her mouth to speak but before any words slipped her lips the creature sat on its butt, pulled its mutilated leg around and gave it a sharp twist. With a sickening snap the Thing reoriented its destroyed limb and flexed it with ease. Though she could be mistaken Arleen could swear she could see the ropy cords of muscle beneath its blackened skin wiggle, bulge and tighten back into place.

It just healed itself. This Thing just snapped its bones back into place and fixed what was beyond repair in a matter of seconds! It just pulled off the impossible!

Arleen’s eyes widened in realization and a tiny glimmer of hope flared in her stomach.

Not the impossible, it just pulled off a miracle.

Her hands shook with giddy disbelief and not small amount of excitement. Completely disregarding the filth and shit Arleen reached for the Thing staring at her from beneath its hair and pulled it to her. She wasn’t sure if it could understand her but she hoped she could make her intentions clear.

“Please help.” She asked.

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Huh, seems I got my point across, though I never expected such a 180’ from the Cat-girl. She looks to be a Calico. Don’t see those very often.

My head throbs from Mana Burn-out. My consciousness wavers for a moment, though the Cat-girl in front of me fails to notice.

I’ve been casting magic almost nonstop since my battle with the Gatekeeper. I’ve been running on empty for hours now, and since that elf interrupted my channeling of [Eldritch Regeneration] I don’t have anything else to give.

Well… that’s not completely true. There is one other option, though Contract Magic with an unconscious person is a risky business…

The Cat-girl grabs my hand and pulls me closer and away from my thoughts. The fire in her eyes never died, rather it simply changed. The defiant burning had simmered, giving way for a spark of hope, one that made her green vertically slit eyes shine in the night sky.

She says something to me in her foreign tongue. I don’t have to know what she said to understand was she is asking. The pleading in her tragically melodious voice is enough. She hesitantly leads me past a very confused old man to the dying girl crumpled in a tight ball on the ground.

I glance back once more at the emerald eyes entranced on my every move. It feels good to be needed. It had been so long since I’ve been around someone, even longer since I’ve been with someone that needed me.

I put my hand on the beat-girl’s flayed flank. She felt cold, even though we are a few feet from the fireball that was once a space ship. Her blood clings to my fingers and adheres my palm to her ragged flesh.

I close my eyes and pull mana from my core, writing the spell I need and drawing the magic circles from memory, just like I’ve done thousands of times before.

[Resonate] [Level:8,112]

A trickle of my mana swirls down my arm and flows through the magic circles and runes I had written. The spell activates, and a pulse of soothing mana ripples form my palm. Like sonar against a cragged seawall the feedback I get is chaotic and disorienting, so I send out a few more [Resonate] pulses.

The Wolf-girl moans in agony, her body is confused from the unfamiliar waves of mana invading her flesh. Sorry little one, I know its uncomfortable but bear with me, you ain’t going to like what I’m about to do but you’ll get over it eventually.

“Reminisce and coincide, Little spirits of the wild. Though we are flesh and you, dreams and twilight, help this weary body and mark a-twixt us, life to life.”

[Twilight’s Mark] [Level: 17]

A golden glow rippled beneath my bloodied palm, the fire behind me masks the light of the spell, hiding my actions from prying eyes.

I feel the Life Magic Contract snap into place, a tiny force like a magnet between my hand and the girl’s side.

I lift my hand to admire my work, amongst the blood a tiny golden arch inside a magic circle encrusted with runes shone defiantly through the grimy crimson. I look to my palm and see the same symbol engraved there.

For several tense seconds the little girl was still, then with a suddenly wet rattle she gasped for air and the bleeding lessened.

I smile. I think everything’s going to be alright.

Except for this splitting headache.

Oh, the world’s spinning now. Its not supposed to do that.

Ah, I’m on the ground again. Magic Burn-out finally caught up to me.

I look up and see two shining emerald eyes filled with confusion and panic. Sorry sweetheart, I gave it my all, now I’ve had a very long day so, I’m just going to take a nap.

I savor the stranger’s worried expression for just a moment longer before I close my heavy eyes with a deep, content sigh and let sleep claim me.