Big Trouble

by Andrew Seiple

  “The undead can see in the daaaaaaark,” Father Gronk explained. “We caaaaan’t. This helps.”

  “All right,” Chase said, staring at the maze and heading back to sit on the steps. Father Gronk went with her. “You’re not going to help fight?”

  “I’m low. We’re higher level thaaaan you lot. We didn’t get enough experience to level from the inn fight, so we didn’t refill.”

  “Well, we can fix that,” Chase said and headed to the kegs, checking around until she found some sweet summer wine. “What are you low on?”

  “Saaaaanity mostly, so nothing alcoholic. My moxie’s fine.”

  “Right. Don’t want you getting drunk,” Chase said, wrinkling her nose and moving from the wine, over to a keg of grape juice. “That’s one heck of a horrible... debuff...” she said, freezing in place.

  An interesting idea teased at her mind.

  But by itself, it wouldn’t be enough to justify the risk. She needed more, more to make something like a plan.

  “I know that grin,” Greta said, as Chase returned with a cup of grape juice. The frog downed it gratefully, and Chase ran back for a refill. “You have an idea, Chase Berrymore,” Greta said, keeping up with her.

  “Yeah. But we need to track down the Necromancer to make it work. And we need to get him to the church.” Chase puffed out her lips, let breath escape. “I mean, he might be there already, but there’s no guarantee. It’d be a big help if we could get back into contact with Renny and Gadram.”

  “We caaaaan,” Father Gronk said.

  “What? Really?”

  “Maaaaaddie.” Father Gronk said, hopping over to the red-haired adventurer.

  She looked up, then down again, at a glowing black gem in her hand. “What?”

  “We need you to send a messaaaage.”

  “She can do that? She’s a Scout?” Chase pushed forward. She knew how Scouts worked... well, sort of. They could whisper messages that could be heard from a long distance away. No wonder they hadn’t needed Gadram to scout for enemies; they had an honest-to-god Scout already in their group.

  “Aye,” said Maddie. “What do you want me to tell ‘im? That he should run and keep on running?”

  “Maaaaaadie. It’ll be fine,” Father Gronk said, patting her shoulder with one webbed hand.

  “My sister’s dead,” Maddie said, in a flat voice. She finally looked up at the frog-man, up and through him as she glared. “We’re all going to die down here. Then the Necromancer will take our soulstones and lock us inside shambling shells until we’re torn to bits by his next victims. It is not fine!”

  “No.” Chase said, moving forward until the woman turned those glazed eyes down in her direction. “It isn’t fine. It’s pretty horrible. You see that girl over there? Her name’s Greta. Greta’s my sister, too. And if anything happened to her, I’d want to break. I’d want to fly to bits, and scream, and cry, and lock myself away until I could get the sadness out of me, and I don’t know that I ever would.”

  Maddie’s shoulders sagged. She closed her eyes.

  “And that’s why my father wants us back here. Not because I can heal. That’s the excuse,” Chase said, realizing that she was right. “He wants us back here because we’re what he’s fighting for. I know how you feel. I know you want to fall apart.”

  “It’s not like I want to.” Maddie muttered and opened her eyes again, staring at Chase with weariness.

  “I know.” Chase said. “Believe me, I know. You would not believe the day I’m having, and after it’s done, I’m pretty sure I’m going to lock myself in a room with a tub of cream and a whole pie and not come out for a very long while. But... if I do that now, then Greta probably gets eaten by zombies. And so does my Dad. And so does everyone else I’ve ever known or care about.” Chase let out a long breath. “So you see my dilemma. Which sucks, because there’s some really awesome pie around here.”

  Maddie snickered.

  Chase took it as a good sign. She patted the human’s knee, reaching up to do so. “Do you think you can help me? Really, I just need you to send a message. I can handle the rest.” She glanced back at the jumbled maze... and winced, as the sounds of groaning and metal thwacking flesh rose. Someone had found a zombie or vice-versa. “Well, probably most of the rest. With a little help from my friends.”

  “Whaaaaat do you need?” Father Gronk asked.

  “A lot of pluck, a little luck, and some help getting back through to the church after you send that message. Also a bottle of scumble...” Chase was rummaging as she spoke and pulled one free from a rack. The amber liquid coiled gleaming golden in the light. She wasn’t fooled. This was what apples wanted to be when they grew up. This was the reason you didn’t let bulls forage in orchards after the harvest. “...yes, this’ll make a good backup plan.”

  Maddie and Father Gronk shared a look. “I haaaave to staaaay here,” Father Gronk croaked. “But with enough juice I can cover healing. We can spaaaare you.”

  “I’m going with you,” Greta insisted.

  “Yeah, I didn’t figure I’d persuade you otherwise,” Chase shrugged.

  “I’m going too!” Millie declared.

  Chase looked at her.

  “Um. If you need me?”

  “I won’t say no. But I’m not sure what you can do,” Chase replied. “Why don’t you stay here and help keep Father Gronk full up on sanity?”

  The little halven set her mouth into a line and looked between them. But as her bangs swung wide, Chase caught a flash of relief in her eyes. “Okay,” Millie conceded, clearly trying to keep relief out of her tone. “I can do that.”

  “Good. Party Screen. Kick Millie.”

  “Hey!”

  “Relax. Now the Father can invite you into his.”

  “Oh. Uh, right.”

  “This plan of yers,” Maddie asked, rolling the soulstone across her knuckles, before grabbing it and popping it into a pocket. “Does it involve meeting back up with Renny and Gadram?”

  “Yes. It hinges on that. Without them things get a lot trickier.”

  Maddie nodded and rose to her feet, towering over the rest of the people left behind. “I’m not just a Scout. I’m an Assassin.”

  Millie Wheadle gasped. Greta elbowed her in the side.

  “That’ll help,” Chase said. “If you’re up for more than just a message.” She’d been firming up the plan as they talked, figuring out how to stack the odds in their favor. It was still pretty bad, but maybe, just maybe, she could make it work.

  “Tell me the message first, and then we’ll see if I feel like takin’ a walk with ye.”

  Chase did.

  Maddie laughed. “Yeah. Yeah, I think he can do that.”

  She sent the message, and the group turned to face the maze. Moans and yells, and the sounds of metal hitting flesh and wood alike filled the cellar. The battle was in full swing now, the halvens making their last stand.

  “Yorgum’s Blessing on your Luck,” Father Gronk said.

  You have gained the buff; Blessed!

  Your luck has been buffed by 28!

  “Thank you,” said Chase.

  She knew she’d need every point of it for what was to come...

  CHAPTER 22: THE GREATEST SHOW ON GENERICA

  Before, the maze of junk had been creepy. Now, moving back into the darkness as wood splintered in the distance, shouts called warnings across the aisles, and desperate, brief struggles happened out of Chase’s sight… now the creepy had been transformed into the blatantly dangerous. The small group moved with care, trying to skirt the edge of the enormous cellar.

  It basically boiled down to Maddie leading the way, using some sort of Scout trick to make her nearly invisible in the shadows, and Chase and Greta padding along behind. The plan was to give her a one-minute head start to disarm any traps and steer them around trouble, then follow as best they could.

  And like any plan, it fell to pieces once they were in the thick of it.

  “Stop
and hide!” Maddie’s voice hissed in Chase’s ears. Chase froze, punched Greta’s arm and wriggled into a gap between two boxes. Greta backed up, whipping her head around, finally diving into a box with a soft “Ow!” Yuletime tinsel sprayed out, settling in soft puffs, and Chase hissed between her teeth. If a wight was with this group, there’s no way it wouldn’t miss the softly falling strands…

  But halvens are called fate’s friends for a reason, and the duo of groaning clowns that shambled past them were zombies. Tinsel covered them, sticking to smeared greasepaint and draping bobbled hats, bringing to mind the creepiest snowmen Chase could imagine.

  Once they were through, Chase snuck out and tapped on Greta’s crate. After a second, her sister’s head poked up from the tinsel, eyes wide in the dim light. “I gained a stealth level,” she told Chase.

  “Good. Come on!” She looked ahead to try and find Maddie but saw nothing. “Where is—”

  A withered white hand shot out from the rack behind Greta, and the big halven girl shrieked as it burst through her crate.

  “Greta!” Chase shouted, grabbing the nearest thing to hand and charging the shelf.

  “It’s got me! It’s cold!” Greta shrieked, and abruptly she was gone, yanked backwards through the shelf, leaving a spray of tinsel and broken ornaments to burst out in her wake.

  “Like hell!” Chase shouted and leaped through the rack, feeling wood give, hearing paper rip, and bursting through into an open area among the crates.

  The clown-thing, who was grappling with a squirming Greta, barely had time to turn before Chase brought her makeshift weapon crashing down on its flank.

  At which point Chase noticed three things:

  The first thing was the set of words appearing in her sight that said:

  Your attack is ineffective!

  The second was that the undead she’d smacked was turning to face her, with blue glowing eyes.

  The third thing was that she was holding a broken tube of wrapping paper.

  “Ah.” Chase said, staring up at the wight, as it stared down. It was hard to tell, but she rather thought their shock was mutual. “Lesser Healing?”

  You have “healed” Wight_06 for 28 points!

  Your Lesser Healing skill is now level 27!

  The wight howled and dropped Greta. Greta reached back, came up with a yule log, and properly kneecapped it.

  But the damned thing staggered, twirled like a dancer with unnatural agility, and crouched there, hissing, claws reaching out to rend and tear—

  —and swiping over Chase’s head as she ducked, and scampered back. “Lesser Healing! Lesser Healing! Lesser Healing! Foresight!”

  That last one didn’t help much. The wight’s kick filled her vision, and she realized that she had absolutely no way to dodge it. Chase shielded her belly with her arms, hunkered down, and did her best imitation of a ball as the undead thing punted her with its busted leg, and she hit the ceiling of the cellar, crashed down onto a row of boxes…

  …and somehow managed to knock an entire row of spare wagon axles down on a passing line of zombies.

  LUCK+1

  The zombies fell, gasping. The shelf she was on toppled.

  Chase, curled around her wounded midsection, fell as well. As she went, she caught a glimpse of Maddie leaping out from behind the wight and sinking twin daggers into its back, and Greta continuing to beat the thing with a log… and Chase also saw the silhouettes of the undead clowns coming up behind them, drawn by the noise and the violence.

  Then she scrabbled past groping dead hands and honking noses as the zombies squirmed among the wreckage, trying to writhe free. Chase managed to throw the debris off and run for it…well, hobble for it, heading back to the fight and hissing lesser healings to get herself un-wounded again. That was good for a quick skill-up, but her head swam as she straightened… so much sanity used, in such a little time. She couldn’t keep doing that forever, and the grape juice was across the way, back with Father Gronk.

  Fortunately, with one leg reduced to meaty pulp, the wight finally gave up its balance, and Chase got there in time to kick it in the head a few times as Maddie and Greta finished it off.

  “Yes!” Greta snarled.

  “What?” Chase looked over at her… and past her, face paling.

  “Yes, I want to be a Berserker!” Greta growled and shuddered as she seemed to expand, getting just a bit more muscular. She shook her head and glared as her sister kept staring past her. “What’s your problem?”

  Chase pointed.

  Greta spun around and saw what Chase and Maddie had already noticed.

  Clown zombies marched in ahead of the trio. Behind them, the ones who had been toppled by the falling shelves struggled to their feet, blocking escape to the rear. Alone in a heap of holiday rubble and spare parts, the three surveyed the opposition and found the odds bad. Very bad.

  “How’s your mana?” Maddie asked.

  “My what now?” Chase returned.

  “Your healing zap. Your pool. Whatever you use to do the thing.”

  “Don’t know and no time to check.” Chase reached down, came up with a jar of sweets. It was weighty enough to throw and held circus peanuts, which Chase couldn’t stand, so nothing of value would be lost.

  “Tell me you’ve got a plan,” Greta said, glancing around her, and swinging the yule log in wide arcs, knocking back the first groping hands.

  “In fact, I do!” Chase said, grinning. “HELP!”

  “That’s your plan?” Maddie shrieked. And then she got busy with her daggers, sending dead fingers flying.

  “About twenty-five percent of a plan,” Chase said, bashing at a zombie, thumping it with the heavy sweets jar, and watching a forlorn red ‘5’ drift up.

  And that’s when the cavalry arrived.

  The first inkling Chase had that they might survive this was when a rain of hurler stones thwacked into the back line of zombies, sending them crashing to the floor. Then small shapes were in and among them, and Chase’s heart leaped to see her father’s shield catch a zombie in the back of the knee, forcing it forward into Maddie’s daggers.

  “Clear us a way through!” she yelled, then chanted “Foresight!” as she tried to find a way out of the cordon.

  There wasn’t one. Not for the first ten seconds, not for the next ten second after that, and not even thirty seconds beyond. It was all Chase could do to feint attempts, to keep the band in her chest from tightening and snapping. She had to though, for if she lost foresight now, the plan was probably going to fail.

  But for the moment, she had other worries.

  Your Dodge skill is now level 12!

  For a hot, tense half-minute there was nothing but dodging and struggling, as the Tiny Terriers showed how they’d earned their names: nipping and darting back, playing hit-and-run, drawing off the zombies and distracting them while their comrades got stuck in for their own attacks, then turning back to fight again once the zombies shifted focus to a new target.

  It wasn’t perfect. Chase saw Magger Bance fall as a new batch of zombies came through one of the walls of barrels, toppling them on him. Then they were hunching down over him, and there was blood, so much blood. Chase felt her ears furl, and she smashed a crouching zombie in the face, sending teeth flying as it tried to do to her what its friends were doing to Magger. Then she remembered that she might be able to do something about that. Her sanity was down, but she had to try!

  “Lesser Healing,” she chanted, sparing a precious split-second to stare Magger’s way.

  Error! Target does not exist.

  She gaped at the words, and almost lost an ear to some gnashing teeth for her trouble. Her mind reeled in confusion, as she fought by instinct alone. He does exist, he’s right over there!

  The realization crashed in, along with horror, as she realized that no, to the words he didn’t exist. Magger Bance didn’t exist because Magger Bance was dead. And whatever his corpse was, it wasn’t anything that could be called Magger
Bance any more.

  “Chase! Go!” Maddie said, launching herself into a flying tackle, creating a hole.

  “Foresight!” Chase yelled, and this time the results were good.

  Your Foresight skill is now level 21!

  Chase grabbed Greta’s arm and ran.

  The good news was that the stream of zombies had cleared a good gap, and there was plenty of room to head forward.

  The bad news was that the stakes had just been raised.

  They’re all gathered in the same place now. All the zombies and any surviving wights. Dad’s hit and run tactics won’t work if they run out of space, and a lot of the maze got taken out back there. And there is no other way out of here.

  We have to stop the Necromancer or the zombies will swarm Dad.

  The two sisters burst out of the maze, and Chase breathed a sigh of relief at her luck. The fight seemed to have drawn all the undead into the jumble. There was nothing between her and the stairs up to the shattered trapdoor.

  Behind her a halven man screamed in pain, then fell silent. Chase winced. “Foresight,” she said and watched her ghost-self run up the steps, poke her head out, then shoot a thumbs up back. Once time resumed, she aped the motions, glancing around at the bottom of the pews.

  And she nearly jumped out of her skin, as a patch of darkness moved.

  “Chase,” Renny whispered.

  “Oh, thank gods. Thank Hoon? Yeah. I guess I should thank him,” Chase babbled, panting from a combination of exertion and relief. Greta crawled out of the stairwell to join her, and the two of them huddled next to their golem friend.

  “The Necromancer?” Chase asked.

  “If Gadram’s idea works, then he’s coming. I put an illusion in the bakery. It should lure him in to where Gadram can jump him.”

  “Why the bakery?” Chase asked.

  “Dwarves get advantages when they’re standing on stone. It’s a skill.”

  “Advantages are good,” Chase said, but then her brain caught up with what he was saying. “Wait! How is he going to take down the Necromancer alone? I thought he wanted you along to help with that?”