After so many years together, in many ways, this guild is more like a family than a guild. The silence from before has been replaced with small talk about the weather, gear, abilities, and other players. None of them mention the orc horde, even though it must be weighing on minds. We all know the orcs are out there, on the other side of the wall. It is impossible not to hear the pounding of the drums and the screams of their victims, but we still pretend to be unaware of their presence.
No matter the cost, even if they come to fear me, I'm not going to let them die at the hands of the orcs. I'm going to see that these people get home to Earth.
Once the meal is finished and the camp policed, the rest of the guild retires to their tent and hopefully a nights sleep, but I'm not tired. Even after being up for two and a half days, this body still isn't anywhere near fatigued, and my mind is too restless to be able to relax.
Digging out my tobacco pouch, I ruefully bounce it on my palm. It's more than a year since we found any supplies of decent tobacco, and my pouch only has enough left for three or maybe four more pipes. Though, if I don't smoke it now, I may never get another chance to. Taking out my pipe that is carved from a block of petrified wood, I fill it.
“Steel is stubbornness.” The words whispered under my breath are inaudible to anyone else. Even though I don't need to actually say the words aloud anymore, a feeling of nostalgia prompts me to do so anyway.
With a muttered mnemonic, I create a glowing spark above the tip of my finger and light my pipe. As the rich warm smoke flows into my lungs, the rich flavor of tobacco without any artificial additives fills my mouth. I smoked in my early years, around the time I was in the Marines, but I quit before I was forty. This body was being accustomed to smoking, I reacquired the habit as a Taereun player and never gave up once The Great Fuck Over began.
“Hey, old man.” Kamehameha's words reach me, as he cockily struts out of the Darkness. He had been watching me for a while, but he probably had no clue I could see him in the night and rain. His mannerisms and attitude are off. This isn't the usual brash and arrogant to the point of offensiveness Kamehameha.
“Kameha.”
He stares at me for more than a minute, before taking a chair and setting it down so there's about a forty-five degree angle between his and mine. With our chairs' positions, we have to turn our heads to look straight at each other. More than a quarter hour passes, while Kamehameha sits in his chair looking at me out of the corner of his eye. In the background, the partially drowned out screams of the players being raped and tortured by the orc die out.
“Why?” Kamehameha's voice is hollow.
“That's a pretty open ended question.”
“Why do the orcs have do that? Why won't you and the others save them? Why… I don't know. . .why is everything so fucked up?”
I sigh. The hollow empty feeling inside of me that I've been trying to ignore seems to dig deeper, clawing at my pride and self-worth.
“There are too many of them and too few of us. There was no way we could have saved them, and if we tried, we would have just been killed. Orcs like hurting and killing. I think it's a part of their DNA.”
“So why is the world so fucked up?”
“If you figure it out, let me know.”
“We're gonna make it out of this, right?” Kamehameha sounds like he's trying to suppress his anxiety. In the almost twelve years of The Great Fuck Over, he's never been in a situation as bad as this one. There is no way anyone could blame him for being scared shitless.
I don't try to stop from sighing. “No. Unless we get really lucky, we're probably not getting out of this in one piece. The odds are stacked so hard against us, it'll take a miracle to survive.”
Even though I'm still looking mostly away, Kamehameha stares at me for a couple minutes without saying a word. His breathing is a bit ragged. Finally, he takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out.
“Yeah . . . that's what I was afraid of. I guess this means it's a good day to die?” The questioning tone is clear in Kamehameha's voice.
“I didn't think you young ones knew that phrase anymore.”
Kamehameha smirks. “I'm special.
“Uh, so how do we get lucky? I got some loaded dice if that will help.”
I chuckle and struggle to keep my frown in place. “No, that's not gonna help none. If Danleib manages to find another viable way back into the Labyrinth, we'll get lucky. If he doesn't, it'll be better for you if the orcs don't take you alive.”
Kamehameha stares off into the rainy night, a despondent look on his face. From things that I've heard in the past, I know he was only a high school kid on Earth. Like Ahlred said, he hasn't grown up much during The Great Fuck Over. That seems to be pretty much the case for all the teenagers that got caught up in this mess.
While we're sitting here not talking, Danleib comes near the camp but stops a distance away. He is far enough out that Kamehameha should not be able to see him, but he's close enough that with Dvergar senses he'll have no trouble hearing what we say.
“Hey, Kameha, where the hell did a kid like you learn about Dragonball? It was on the banned media list for thirty years, until they banned the banned list.”
Kamehameha laughs smugly. “Middle school. We found a stash of old flash drives that had movies, books, comics, manga, all kinds of shit. There was Tarzan, Conan, Captain America, Lord of the Rings, Bleach, Dragonball. Dragonball was the best. I've always wanted to be like Goku, a hero.”
A string of emotions flashes across Kamehameha's face. As he roughly rubs his cheeks, he almost looks like he's ready to cry. “I'm no fucking hero though. I already learned I don't have the balls to do it.”
As his eyes seem to focus on something far away, a grin splits Kamehameha's lips. “Did I ever tell you I saw Talon in the Battleground. It was Noobageddon. We were new to the game. We were trying to be heroes. We couldn't do it. Thug Horde was killing us, and he showed up. A couple Thugs crapped their pants for real. Talon killed them all.”
“Yeah, Talon loved Noobageddons. He always went Thug hunting.”
Kamehameha starts to laugh. He laughs so hard tears start to leak out of the corners of his eye, or maybe, the tears aren't falling because he's laughing. “We didn't know who he was. When we called him a hero, I thought he was gonna kill us. I nearly shit my pants.”
I can't stop from sighing. “Talon was just another survivor. He hated Thug Horde. Killing and torturing them was a game to him. Even after The Great Fuck Over started, he still killed any of them that was dumb enough to fuck with him. I should be disgusted by that or look down on him for it, but with Talon, I just can't do that.”
His face nearly purple from rage, Kamehameha stares at me. “You say he was a survivor, but he's dead now. Survivors don't save people they know are gonna kill them. Heroes do that. He helped that bitch. He saved her ass a bunch of times that I know about. He helped her guild, and those fucking cocksuckers murdered him.
“If I find them when they don't have backup, I'm gonna kill them. I'm gonna kill all of them and shit on their corpses.”
*Do you understand what's going on with him?* I use my whisper charm to talk with Danleib.
*Without counseling, I can only make an educated guess. He has a bad case of hero worship for Talon, but Talon not living up to his ideals has left him with some very contradictory feelings regarding Talon. I'm not going to play counselor for him.*
I snort. *I'm not asking you to.*
His attention drawn by my snort, Kamehameha looks at me, and then, looks around. At first, he doesn't notice Danleib, but after a few moments, his stare settles on the darkness where Danleib is standing.
“Who's there?” Noticeable hostility fills Kamehameha's words.
Danleib walks into the camp. Even with his feet shod in Dvergar steel sabatons, his footsteps are silent.
“I'm not a hero either, kid. I stopped believing in heroes long before the best part of you rolled down your mommy's leg, and you shou
ld probably just give up on killing the Bohemian Cats.”
Bristling with anger, Kamehameha rises to his feet in a confrontational manner. “What do you mean by give up? I'm going to kill those backstabbing mother-fuckers!”
Danleib's smile is cold as ice, and Kamehameha unconsciously flinches.
“You're lucky I'm not Ahlred. He would just slap you to the ground instead of giving you the chance to sit down again. You're not bad for the typical run of players. You have become stronger, since the start of The Great Fuck Over, but you're not a Dvergar. This world is harsh, and if we survive, you had better learn who you can and cannot offend.
“Now, sit down!”
When Kamehameha slumps back into his chair, Danleib looks at me. “You go too easy on these smart-mouth punks. It's not doing them any favors, and where we're headed, they will only get dead, if they don't learn to behave. Intellectually, I understand your reluctance to use your strength, but it's only hurting people like this to let them think that they can act out in face of people with superior strength and live.”
Danleib's words are meant as an admonishment to both myself and Kamehameha. Glancing at Kamehameha, I see fear mixed with an unusually introspective expression on his face.
“Then, I just need to be stronger than you to do what I want.”
Danleib's smile is anything but friendly. “No. You need to be stronger than who or whatever you want to disregard. If you have that kind of strength in this world, no one will contest your right to do what you want to. At least, they won't contest you, if they value their lives.”
Kamehameha eyes move down and back up Danleib's near five feet of height before an extreme wariness becomes visible in his eyes. He knows that he's no match for Danleib in a fight.
“That's right. You not even close to being my equal. The strongest non-Dvergar among the Damned isn't close to my equal, and you're still a good way short of being his equal. So, you just sit there, watch, listen, and learn.”
Danleib takes a massive steel chair out of one bag of holding and sets it on the ground next to mine. The chair is almost a work of art. Every surface has been engraved with precise schematic like drawings of the inner workings of machinery that were done by Danleib himself. Still, he claims that on Earth he had no artistic talent and was no more than a fair shade tree mechanic before the permanent banning of internal combustion engines.
After sitting, Danleib sets up his projection crystal for displaying the scenes monitored by his constructs and inserts a crystal in one of the slots on it.
“When I sent birds to search the Labyrinth, I also sent a number of birds inland on a fixed pattern. This is a compilation of images recorded from multiple birds.”
I've never known if Danleib's equipment originally had the ability to record images or if he added the functionality. I don't suppose it really matters.
A stream of images shows the general layout of the orc horde. It's hard to make an accurate estimate of the total number of warriors, but it has to be at least four hundred thousand of them.
“There are no bitches or brats. That's nothing but bulls. If we can outlast their supplies, we might have a chance.” My words are soft, but I can hear the hope in my voice.
Tapping the control crystals for the display, Danleib moves the video to another section. “You sure? Look at those orcs. Have you ever seen that kind of military precision in an orc horde. They look like a professional elite regiment. That is close to a hundred thousand orc elites.”
It feel like a cold hand has clamped around my heart. I had seen some of these orcs in the feed but did not pay attention to them. Maybe, I didn't want to see them. The marching orcs are dressed in uniformly styled platemail, and each one is carrying a twelve foot spear resting against his shoulder. While their steps aren't at parade ground quality, they are still uniform and in sync with one another. Just being well drilled doesn't mean much, but these are orcs. Orcs never have the patience and focus to be trained into disciplined troops. Various overlords have tried in the past, but no matter the threats, the orcs always violently rebelled against strong discipline. Since my memories about this are from childhood schooling, they could be wrong, but I don't think that they are.
“This is going to be the hardest battle we've ever faced. The way the orcs carried out the second assault today was nothing like other orcs we've fought.”
I sigh. I seem to be sighting a lot in the past few days. “Most of the players have several months worth of food supplies, and a few have a lot more than that. I think we have more supplies than the horde. At least, I hope we do.”
“Even if we have enough supplies, can enough of us survive long enough to outlast that horde?”
For a few minutes, the only sounds come from the storm, the nearby camps of other guilds, and the screams of the few remaining victims of the orcs that can still scream.
Hoping to see something that will give me an idea, I stare at the spliced together footage of the orc hordes. I have no idea what Danleib and Kamehameha might be thinking about, but they both are staring silently at the same images.
After a bit Kamehameha's hand clenches into a tight fist. “I don't give a fuck how many of them there are. I'm going to get out of here, and I going to kill those fucking traitors. Even if I can't be a hero, I can kill those cowards!”
Danleib's tone is flat. “I already told you, you probably won't get the chance.”
Danleib fiddles with the control crystals again. The images fast forward to the scene of a group of players being marched along as orc prisoners. Naked and chained, there are bruises, welts, and other minor wound all over their bodies.
“Fuck! The orcs have those Cat traitors!” Kamehameha's voice is loud enough to echo off the cliff.
Danleib stands and his casual backhand knocks both Kamehameha and his chair to the ground. “Keep it down! Let other people get what rest they can without your histrionics to disturb them.”
Blood running from his mouth and nose, Kamehameha stares at Danleib in shock from his position, sprawled on the wet sand.
“WHAT THE … fuck was that for?” From a roar, Kamehameha drops his voice to lower than normal conversational volume when Danleib raises his hand again.
“Control yourself! I'm not as tolerant of punks running off at the mouth as Thorrin. He's too soft and let's bratty kids get away things that he should smack them down for.” Danleib is staring at me and not Kamehameha as he delivers his statements.
I don't think I'm keeping the shock and surprise off of my face. This is not the first time I've seen Danleib go off like this, but he's never directed his ire at me before. What is going on? Why is he acting like this? When I think about how oddly all seven of us Dvergar have been acting at times in the past couple days it worries me. Talon once told me that he was barely able to handle the memories and emotions of his Half-Dvergar body when first awoke at the start of The Great Fuck Over, but while it was jarring and unsettling, I never came close to not being able to deal with the original Thorrin's memories. I never heard any other Dvergar mention any problem dealing with their memories either. Could this be some years delayed backlash?
“I don't see that bitch Talon was always protecting or the two leaders.” Anger and hate are easily audible in Kamehameha's voice.
“Their scouts are missing too. The Bohemian Cats had a couple archers that used to do their scouting, but they're not there either. The healer is Yoh and Galadri is his sister. I can't remember the rest fo their names” Even though I'm sure I've heard their names, I never paid attention. I don't like the Bohemian Cats. From the very first, their arrogance and general snottiness irritated me.
“Ha! Another Galadriel knockoff. Lord of the Rings has been on the banned list since the list was first introduced. How many of these fucks that played Taereun even know who Tolkien was?” Danleib's voice is filled with nothing but contempt.
“I read Lord of the Rings.” Kamehameha has a half confused and half belligerent expression on his face.<
br />
“You acquired some contraband copies of the books. Most people don't have that luxury in America anymore. They're too scared of the Reculturization Seminars.”
As his eyes open wide, Kamehameha unconsciously shivers. “Those Seminars are just bullshit stories to scare kids with.”
Danleib smiles faintly. “You're looking pretty scared over some bullshit stories. Lucky for you, those stories are real. I've known more than twenty vets who found themselves thrown into the Seminars after going to the VA clinics for treatment.”
“What's a VA clinic?”
Looking at each other, Danleib and I can't keep from laughing, but there is no humor in our laughter. The mix of disgust and hatred for what has been done to the country I was born in is a bone deep poison that I can't escape from anymore. On Earth, as a crippled old man, there was nothing I could do to fight back against the changes in the government, and I couldn't escape either. I never want to see Earth again.
Danleib looks toward the sky, but I don't think he seeing the clouds above. “The United States Department of Veteran's Affairs, it was abolished about twenty years ago. It used to be an agency that administered benefits programs for military veterans, including hospitals run specifically for veterans. They shut it down and rolled the medical services into the Department of Health.
“The Reculturization Seminars started at least thirty years ago, and the VA hospitals used to force veterans who still believed in the Constitution and not the rule of the government into the camps. I made sure to keep my beliefs well hidden in those days.
“The proglodyte fucks in the government and proud brown shirts in the supposedly progressive left that supported them destroyed America. We shed our blood to protect their rights, and they fucked us and destroyed our country. Now, there is nothing in the history books about what America was or what it once stood for. The media only tells you what the Party wants you to hear. Stupid punks like you think that the worlds great because you see it on the video streams.
The Survivors Part 1: The Masacre Page 9