Beam POV: Day 69

Current Wealth: 21 gold 31 silver 14 copper

Thinking about it, with hindsight being 20/20 and all, I think there’s a good chance that making the decision to spring into the heart of our enemy’s base had been poor judgement on my part. Even I wasn’t sure why I’d done it. At first. But then I felt that familiar, grating presence inside myself, rooted right down in my core, driving me to act, to fight, to kill. I’d thought I was getting used to it, managing a handle on it, keeping it nice and separate from myself.

Obviously, I’d thought wrong. One did not get thrown face-first into enemy territory by something one had a handle on, no matter what Solitaire insisted.

Inside, the fort felt a lot bigger. I’d not thought it would have room for corridors, let alone several, but I’d found myself within one, and I could hear enemies on both ends of it. The rational, clever part of me was tempted to wait for them, and ensure that I fought them in a cramped and tight environment where their numbers couldn’t be brought to bear. Partially, it was the knowledge that they had bows that kept me from doing that, and partially it was simply raw, primal fear. I continued onwards in any case, not stopping until I found myself stepping out into a wider chamber.

There were orcs in it, of course, close to a dozen. And one of them was taller, wider, and dressed from head to toe in thick, jagged plates of pig-iron. Just perfect.

Behind me I could still hear more coming, and the place wasn’t big enough that it’d take them more than a few seconds to be right at my back. That made my options fairly limited. Option, singular, really. I attacked.

Fortunately, my sole advantage seemed to be that the orcs hadn’t expected me to be mad enough to try and hack all of them apart by myself. I closed in on one before he could even react, crossing a half-dozen strides in no time at all, swinging wide and hard. My ethereal blade found that magic spot in his neck, fountaining blood in all directions as it scythed open an artery and continued to take the head almost fully off. Before he’d even fallen I was onto the next, swinging again, finding my blow blocked, but still sending the orc stumbling with the force of it. One tried to circle me, so I twisted around and threw a back-kick into its body, catching a hip and breaking bone on impact. Before it had even fallen I was back at the blocker, this time taking a foot off and moving on.

There were a lot of them, but as long as I kept moving, kept killing, I’d be changing the fight’s dynamics before they could properly organise themselves. Just needed to leverage my momentum, and keep blocking theirs. Easier said than done, though.

Easier said than done when the big one suddenly reared up in front of me. He swung a hammer so big that I doubted I could’ve even lifted it over my head before coming to Redacle, and I barely evaded the bludgeon. I felt it pass me by, air displaced by the sheer strength involved, and stumbled back to retake my balance before another blow followed it up. I struck first, this time, stabbing hard into the orc’s shoulder. Somehow the iron deflected my blade, leaving nothing but a deep furrow in the shoddy metal as I went off-kilter. The next swing caught me full in the chest, actually lifting me off my feet with the impact.

My armour was tough. We’d not exactly had the equipment for modern-day stress tests, but over the past few weeks Solitaire had taken the time to confirm that it was at least in the same ballpark as steel, albeit more rigid and stiff. That stiffness probably saved my life. The hammerblow cracked my breastplate with a terrifyingly loud noise, cutting through my ears as I flew back entire feet before finally landing. My shoulders hit first, and I used them to roll back, managing to turn my momentum around and bring myself up into a crouch just in time to dart back from another swing.

The orc kept coming, like a tornado with steel jutting out, and I just carried on scrambling away from the hammer, still feeling a sharp throb in my ribs where the first swing had almost split my torso open. It was a delaying response, and something that would only last so long. Even moments after starting I could see the enemy drawing in close, death coming towards me inch by inch.

Well, that wasn’t ideal, so I took a leaf from Solitaire’s book. See he’d learned to fight, not win contests, and in a fight you had to do more than just touch your opponent to gain an advantage. Which meant when I lurched forwards and let the hammer’s handle clatter off my shoulder, my enemy was no closer to killing me than if he’d thrown some mean words my way.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

I was closer, though. Close enough to press my sword into a gap posed by his bending knee, then twist it inwards. It tunnelled through the skin and flesh below easily enough, leaving thick, sludgy blood to free itself from the wound. The orc snarled, swinging for me with a fist this time.

Again, Solitaire’s bag of tricks worked wonders. I lowered my skull and headbutted the creature’s knuckles, letting the ethereal plate guarding my brow take the brunt. My head snapped back, wits shaken for a second, but I wasn’t too stunned to feel the sensation of bone crunching against me, nor hear the cry of agony from its unfortunate owner.

Things took a sour turn, there, because as the leader seemed to lose his advantage, more orcs closed in to snatch it back. I wasn’t that fast, and I couldn’t dodge everything if ten attacks came from ten directions. I didn’t get the chance to find out how many I could manage, though, because that was around the time the cavalry showed up.

Solitaire came in first, helmet gone, for some reason, but axe still tight in his grip. He buried it in one orc’s head, splitting the skull open like a watermelon, and battering the corpse to one side. A gunshot rang out, blowing a nice chunk out of another, and then Argar charged in. He went straight for the leader, of course. Argar was prone to Argaring after all.

It was just when Helena had joined the fight herself that I snapped myself out of the stunned stupor I was in, pouncing on the nearest enemies to help my side out. I have to say, as far as melees went, it was a brutal one.

The main orc was probably the one making most of the difference, because even nursing a broken hand he was good enough to tie up Argar. One or two others were tougher, bigger and quicker than the ones outside, however, and I started to consider that our enemies had some sort of hierarchy based on fighting power. The weakest got stuck with the shit work guarding the frigid air outside, while the strong got to snuggle up nice and warm behind walls and ceiling.

Mind you, it wasn’t my most thoughtful reflection, because every time I started to so much as polish a coherent idea in my head, someone interrupted me by trying to chop it off. I fought more defensively now that I wasn’t racing to thin the herd, forced to take less risks, and obligated to guard my allies’ backs as I darted around between swings. Now, with some breathing room, I could take in the sensations of the battle, and more particularly of the enemies. It was remarkable.

The vampire had been faster than me, it was a vampire after all, and I’d be lying to claim the world was exactly slowing down now, but the physical swiftness of my body meant that it might as well have. Compared to that, every swing my way was sluggish, every dodge clumsy. Compared to me my enemies were drunks or toddlers.

I almost felt bad killing them. Almost.

A club caught me in the head, bouncing off my helmet, and I flailed back with a retaliatory strike that drove the offending orc away, but left me open for two more with spears. One I sidestepped, the other I stepped into, forced to trust my armour again and feeling my heart skip a beat as the metal tip slid dangerously close to a joint before passing me by. Another swing caught on my part, this one successful in taking most of a jaw off, then I was barging an orc off its feet with a bodycheck.

Turning, I looked for the one who’d swung the club, only to find Solitaire already had it pinned against the wall, snarling with his teeth bared like some vicious animal, thumbs pressing down on its eyes. He didn’t stop, even when the creature’s struggles weakened and blood started to fountain down both cheeks, didn’t stop even when its screams turned to whimpers. Only when Xango asked him to step aside did Solitaire acquiesce, and even then he seemed reluctant.

My guts were hollow as I watched my friend blow the thing’s head off, my eyes not even on the execution, falling instead onto Solitaire. He seemed impassive as ever, or as impassive as one could seem with a flood of adrenaline coursing through his veins. Eyes clear, face relaxed, hands opening and closing casually to work the excess energy out of himself as he looked around the room.

“So.” My friend asked. “Anyone hurt?”

I looked around, too, seeing the carnage we’d made of everything. I had a few cuts, some bruising for sure, but nothing that was more serious than aches and pains. Nothing that would persist for more than a few days, or eat into our precious profit margins by demanding a magical healer’s touch.

“None.” I replied, cold. It’d been my mistake, thinking like that. A sword didn’t think, question or feel for the throats it cut.

A sword didn’t worry about what its wielder might do next.