We Unhappy Few

by G R Fabacher

  The dragon nodded and coughed up mud.

  “Did you kill any other dragaons?” Damon asked.

  “No, I only held this one off because Shaya and the rest needed to chase down some man with some kind of wand.”

  “That must be how they’re doing it.” Damon said.

  “Another wrinkle, leader man.” Joyride said, “There is so much magic we’re having trouble locking onto the other teams’ channels. We need to get closer.”

  “Why is there suddenly so much magic flying around?” Damon asked. The wands and collars weren’t nearly enough to cause that level of interference with modern magical communications.

  “My guess?” Oslo said, “I think the Union have reached the door to the Magi complex and are probably opening it if they haven’t already.”

  “Nothing motivates quite like a sword over your neck.” Damon said, making a knife hand and urging his people back up the column.

  “That’s the unofficial Lich Corps motto.” Joyride said.

  “Phoenix Actual.” Damon said, calling out the Guild call sign.

  “Go for Phoenix, Cutthroat One.”

  “Can we get some air support to the following location—“

  “The music box is on fire!” Urani said.

  Damon ignored her. She grabbed his shoulder and pointed up.

  Overhead the dragons had taken flight and were attacking the support craft. The high speed bombers were beyond their grasp, but those were of limited use in a swamp like the groves near the old Magi capital.

  “Negative—“

  “Yeah, I know…” Damon said, cutting the line, “there goes our big air support advantage…”

  The rest of his squad looked to him and Damon realized they were waiting for him to come up with plan.

  “Okay,” he said, taking a breath, “Joyride, can you get this transport working?” Damon pointed to an officer’s car idling at a hover.

  “With my eyes closed.” Oslo took off at a jog.

  “Urani,” Damon asked, “how are you doing?”

  “I’m feeling better.”

  Damon cracked open his field-aid kit and dumped chelation powder in canteen on the transport and gave it to her. She drank it.

  Joyride started the transport and it rose up to a driving position. “Everybody in!” The team driver said.

  Jurza mounted up on the turret and checked the magazine. He flipped off the safety rune, and the first flechette cycled into the camber. Everyone else clambered and brandished their weapons at the Union troops.

  “New plan.” Damon said, “We shoot all the paladins. They’ve definitely got the wands.” The transport zipped along the ground, it wasn’t as fast as the vehicle could go, but Oslo’s skill at the yolk was not negligible. Jurza howled happy to spray bullets into every white-clad figure, and many of the regular Union troops.

  The rest of the corpsmen joined in. They knew they killed one with a control rod because the dragons would land and rip the collars from their necks. The angry fire-breathing reptiles began doing the Lich Corps work for them, happy to dole out payback against their Union slavers.

  The Unies were in full route toward the Magi ruins. The dragons had lost interest in pursuing the Union troops further.

  “Why are they leaving?” Damon asked.

  “I don’t think that dragonkin like magical sites. They think it’s a taboo to dwell in them.” Hellaina said, “There’s some latitude among the clans as to how taboo, but I think they’re just done for the day.”

  “We could really use their help.”

  “Hey, boss, if you want to go argue spiritualism with an eight-foot-tall musclebound fire-breathing lizard, I can pull over right now.” Oslo said.

  “No, I’m good.”

  Old Magi columns rose up out of the muck, covered in massive shrouds of thorns and moss. The road grew more complete as they headed up the column.

  “If there’s an old ruin up there, I’m not seeing it through all the nature.” Hellaina said holding the roll bar of the transport as it skimmed along.

  “There,” Damon said picking out the faded white edge of something that could only be made by a sapient being.

  “Lieutenant, this is Bard, we’re following Shaya’s team into the ruins, no sight of the Rangers. Can we get backup?”

  “We’re working on it, but with the dragons deciding to leave, we’ve got to mop up this Unie resistance. They’re holding on strong. The paladins are trying to make a rally. Sorry, Sacreon, you’re on your own for now. Be careful.”

  “Affirmative.” Static squalled across the skyrcomm.

  “Shite!” Urani cried.

  “Must be the ruins.” Hellaina said.

  “Gun it, Oslo, we’re the only backup they’ve got.”

  The vehicle accelerated down the overgrown avenue toward the ruins. More and more ruins of outbuildings rose up from the swamp.

  Damon saw it out of the corner of his vision first, a beam of orange magic streaked toward their transport.

  “Shite!” Damon shouted, “Brace!”

  Hellaina jumped forward, both her hands extended, a bright purple wall of energy blossoming from her palms. The ward went up nick of time. The missile slammed into the ward. The vehicle flipped onto its side. Emomnu was ejected from the back first. The massive golem disappeared into the trees behind a massive plume of dirt, mud, and grass.

  Urani and Jurza jumped clear, and Sparky was thrown. Damon and Joyride went down with the vehicle. Damon grunted and crawled from beneath the transport. Joyride was doing the same. Mud sizzled from his faceplate as Damon focused on a group of four figures clad all in cutting edge black armor and one in blinding white

  Damon placed a safe bet the leader was the one in the white armor and sash denoting his status as a high-ranking paladin.

  “Kill the witch first.” The leader said, either not knowing or caring that his comms were compromised.

  The largest of the troops moved forward. He was huge for a human. Damon grunted. Joyride was closer to Sparky who wasn’t moving.

  “No.” Damon said. He reached for his Manticore but someone stepped on his back and pushed a barrel to the base of his neck.

  The large man flipped the tiny little Hellaina over and engaged his wrist dagger. Suddenly there was an explosion of motion and Oslo jumped forward. A move that could only be done from his prone position if he crammed every ounce of magic into the enhancement in the armor. Magical energy flared from the armor’s joints at the knees and elbows.

  The carjacker slammed into the large man and tackled him to the ground. Taking advantage of the distraction Damon called on his own enchantments to throw his body into a roll. The man was quick. He shot right for Damon’s face. The burst of fire was accurate, but the best round pinged uselessly off his war mask. Damon pulled out his Manticore and fired a single shot, taking his attacker with a round through the chin and out the top of his head.

  “Weasel!” A female voice screamed.

  Damon plucked a grenade from his belt and lobbed it. It was set to shockwave. The explosion wasn’t a powerful as a high yield, it was meant to cause havoc with shrapnel and a powerful outward wave that would knock over the unprepared.

  The bard scrambled to his feet. Urani was moving toward Joyride. Damon set his sights on the leader, taking shots. The man in the sash ducked behind a tree.

  “No!” Urani screamed.

  Damon looked to see the massive man on Joyride slam his gauntlet blade into the corpsman’s ribs several times. The female orc launched herself into the man, her knee contact his head and shattering his visor.

  Damon moved to help but the leader made him seek out cover of his own.

  “Damn it!” Damon shouted.

  Jurza was engaged with two of the remaining troops. They both had short swords out, and Damon watched as the orc lost an arm to the sharp steel.

  “Em, we need you!” Damon shouted.

  “I am coming! I lost a leg in the crash!”

 
The large man hefted the tall orcess up and pitched her into a tree. Damon tried to take a shot, but the leader was not letting up on the flechette fire.

  He heard Hellaina scream and watched as she hovered forward and thrust her hand out. The large man left his feet as he hovered in the air. The diminutive mage’s eyes were nothing but violet energy as she began crumpling her hands like she was balling up a piece of paper.

  “You killed him!” She screamed, her voice distorted with pure rage and the magic coursing through her body.

  The large man began to shrink. Damon could hear his bones snap and his armor shriek in protest at its metal joints. The ceramic crumbled into black powder. The worst part was the man’s screams. They were primal shrieks of pain and suffering, then suddenly, like a popping soap bubble the man’s body quit. There was a flash as the last of the wards gave and he went silent. Finally, a mass of blood and entrails squeezed out as the man became nothing more than a ball of guts and armor.

  Hellaina passed out.

  Damon heard the thundering footfalls of the golem as he came loping in on his hands and one leg, kicking up large splatters of clay and murky water.

  “Em, protect Sparky!” Damon ordered.

  The golem nodded and threw his bulk over the fainted girl. Flechettes pinged off his hard body.

  Jurza roared, his helmet having been ripped off. The large orc picked up the female attacking him and slammed her down. His stump had stopped bleeding, but he looked pale, his rough green skin almost pastel in color.

  The orc dropped his knee to hold the female while he ripped her rifle from her hands and shot the other man with a burst of fire.

  With his last ounce of strength he roared and bit the throat out of the prone woman, spitting out armor, blood and muscle before collapsing.

  Damon heard the click of an empty weapon and the leader stepped from behind the tree and threw his weapon down. He pulled the glowing sword of his office from his back.

  “I never thought my Blackguards could be taken out by a rabble of thieves and whores.” The man seethed.

  Damon stepped from behind his cover. Em made a move to help.

  “No,” Damon said over the vox, “Stay there, you can’t risk moving.”

  The bard tossed away the battle rifle he’d stolen from Weasel.

  “I see you carry a paladin blade, boy,” He said. “Let’s see how good you really are.”

  Damon pulled out his Manticore and pulled the trigger, he shot the man in both knees, then the wrist, blowing off the man’s sword hand.

  “No,” Damon said. “I’m not playing any of that hero shite.”

  He walked up and kicked the sword out of the man’s reach. Damon dropped the clip from his pistol and loaded his last one.

  “I should have expected as much from a whoreson criminal. Not even your own nation wants you, scum.” The leader coughed.

  Damon put a foot on the man’s chest and reached down to pop the man’s helmet off using the manual release under the jaw.

  “Yeah, I’m scum, but you’ve lost.”

  The man’s dark face contorted into a pained smile. “Lost the battle maybe, but I die for the Purpose. Can you say the same?”

  Damon, “I guess nothing I say with stop you from thinking you’re in the right, huh?”

  “Never…”

  Damon shot him in the head. “Good to know.”

  The battered corpsmen regrouped. Emomnu sat back and made a sighing noise. It must have been a tic that the golem picked up from its time around other beings because it was spot on. Urani limped in from the woods. She grunted and shakily slapped a fresh clip into her weapon. Damon walked over to Hellaina. The mage was cradling Joyride’s unarmored head. She wiped the trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth.

  “I closed his eyes, that’s what you do right?” She said. Damon put his hand on her shoulder.

  Damon reached forward to take Oslo’s rune tag.

  “No,” she said, “he died saving me…” Her shaking fingers grasped the circle of metal with Joyride etched into it. She held it in both her hands for a long time before pressing it to her chest. Damon’s hand went to the one fused to his armor.

  Hellaina gently set Oslo “Joyride” Durbray’s head on the marshy bank underneath the massive, gnarled roots of a weeping willow. She pushed down on the ground and stood up. She opened the storage compartment at the small of her back and reached in. From it she pulled a foil-wrapped bar that smelled faintly herbaceous. She took large bites of it, but the bar was not yielding.

  “Em,” Damon turned the golem. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, quite, I will fashion a new leg soon, but other than the perambulatory issues, I am fit for duty.”

  “Well, you’re going to stay here and guard Joyride until the Lieutenant comes to collect us all. You’re not going to fit in there.”

  The golem turned his head to the shrouded entrance then back to Damon. “I agree with your tactical assessment, Bard, but I want to go with you.”

  “I know you do, buddy.”

  The golem nodded.

  Damon retrieved the mounted weapon from the back of the transport and with the help of Em’s strength ripped the trigger guard off. “Here, shoot Unies.” Damon said.

  Urani came back hauling Jurza over her shoulders in an impressive carry. Damon helped her unload her burden next to Emomnu.

  “I guess you should watch after Jurza, too.” Damon said. The male orc was unconscious. His stump looked like a massive scab. Orcs were known for their regenerative abilities, but the loss of a limb looked to be more than an inconvenience. Urani had administered what aid she could with their limited field kits, but she ultimately decided as long as he wasn’t bleeding out it was good enough.

  “Is he going to live?” Damon asked.

  “I believe so, we orcs are very resilient. This isn’t even the leg I was born with.” She held up her armored left leg.

  Damon watched Hellaina scarf down the last unappetizing bites of the bar. Her face was the picture of tortured resignation.

  “What’s that for?” Damon asked her. She didn’t answer.

  Damon sighed after taking stock of their fighting strength. It wasn’t great.

  Suddenly, his scrycomm crackled to life, “This is… going into the ruins… chasing… brass…”

  Damon worked with the runes and got the scrycomm refined in time for another message.

  “This is Willow… into ruins… Union top brass have… head start… backup.” The scrycomm cut out.

  “Well, we’ve got our mission. We’re not going to leave Willow, Boudira, or any of them to face whatever lies in there alone.”

  Hellaina finished guzzling down a canteen of water, tossing it aside. “Don’t need to tell me twice.” She said. “I’ve got some important Unie bitches to kill.” She picked up her helmet and slid it over her head. With a twist at the collar it snapped into place. Her faceplate slid down and lit up.

  Damon handed her a rifle, nodding.

  The bard began walking toward the archway, his team falling in behind him. “Come on, we’re dead already.” He said.

  Chapter 25

  Damon held his rifle up as they stepped through the archway into the vestibule. It was a large room, and the geometries were wrong to his eyes. The Magi apparently liked strange combinations of circles and curves. There were no light fixtures, and their absence made Damon feel acutely unwelcome. He supposed when you could manifest light as easy as walking you didn’t need magilight orbs.

  “I can’t believe the dragons just left us.” He muttered.

  “It is the way of their people. Places of magical desolation make their skin crawl, just like the lack of modern magical fixtures makes me shudder.” Urani said.

  “Glad to know it’s not just me.” Damon muttered.

  The three-person squad picked their way around the debris and fallen bits of masonry.

  Hellaina grunted.

  “What’s up, Sparky?” Urani asked.


  “My teeth are tingling.” She said.

  “Hey guys,” Damon said as something drew his attention to the ceiling. “If the Magi didn’t need magical lamps then why is the ceiling glowing?”

  The squad stopped and watched as orange and purple magic pooled at the apex of the dome. The faded designs on the walls came alive.

  “I don’t think those are lights…” Urani breathed.

  Suddenly there was a flash and a ward appeared over the archway they’d just stepped through.

  The corpsmen brandished their rifles, waiting for the inevitable floods of security measures to crash over them. After thirty seconds, nothing happened.

  Urani looked around, “I always heard stories of Magi ruins being guarded by eidolons or horrible abominations plucked right from my nightmares. But none of that is real…”

  Damon turned on his heel, “Huh, usually those kinds of statements are followed by a swarm of monsters, at least in the movies.”

  Urani slapped the back of his head.

  “Are you two done?” Hellaina seethed.

  Damon let his shoulders droop and nodded. He rolled his right shoulder and squared up his rifle. They walked a few more yards down the hallway. The remains of Union troops littered the passage; more than a few of them were nothing more than gnarled hunks of smoldering flesh and bone. The walls seemed unaffected by the ravages of the magical fire.

  Damon had never been happier to have a suit that created its own air in his life. The path before them was clear.

  “Look.” Hellaina said, pointing to the opening up ahead. The long corridor seemed to finally reach another room and an unearthly light could be seen casting a ghastly pallor over the strange stone the Magi used for their buildings. The mage took off at a run.

  “Hellaina wait!” Damon said. “Shite…”

  Damon and Urani prepared to give chase, but stopped when an unearthly howl filled the chamber, reverberating off of the walls, distorting and becoming even more horrible.

  The two of them shared what could have been an incredulous look save for their concealing helmets. They broke off into a run, trying to catch up with Sparky before she got into too much trouble.