22

A Fistful of Tongue

Scorpion woke again in the darkness of his cell with a pounding headache—the matted fur on the side of his face stuck to a pool of dried vomit. The scent stung his nostrils. He had not dreamt. Instead, he woke to the vivid memory of staring up the needle into the witch's open beak. He saw the larvae of some parasite crawling about the roof of her mouth—some dripping onto her dry tongue, only to be swallowed, while others crawled back up into her sinuses.

At the thought, the ratling vomited again, for what he assumed was the third time today. The muscles in his side clenched and ached. The right side of his chest felt inflamed—somewhere beneath the ribs—and he started to roll away from that side, but the pressure actually reduced the pain.

"I'm so sorry," Beth's voice came from the adjoining cell. "Are you okay?"

Scorpion nodded, then realized she could not see him. But he was too tired to speak.

He panted heavily. Cold sweat dripped from the tip of his nose. His eye stung from drying tears.

He started to respond to his neighbor, but instead closed his eye and caught his breath.

He vomited again, with such force that it clanged against the iron wall of the oven and echoed throughout. The vomit sprayed from his nose. Still he felt his stomach tighten, though he knew it to be empty, and his body convulsed. The ordeal lasted over a minute, during which time he could not breathe.

Finally his stomach loosened and he fell onto his back, despite the pain it caused in his side, and panted for air.

"I... saw... Sank," Scorpion blurted, then realized the other ratling might not be acquainted. "Did you know him?"

"I did. His nickname is short for Sanctuary. He was a cleric in my village."

Scorpion laughed, which caused his side to ache more. "The... ratlings you know... are very..." he paused to catch his breath, "different from the ratlings... I know."

"How so?"

Scorpion shook his head, realizing again that she couldn't see his response. "I don't know... they... sound different. Let me catch my breath."

Beth waited until the ratling was ready to talk again.

"She's infected with something. I think it... reached her brain. Maybe she'll die before she gets to you."

"She already got to me," Beth answered.

Scorpion pondered what this meant exactly, but chose not to ask. "I'm sorry."

He thought he heard Beth weeping. More from a lack of her breathing than anything tangible, but he gave her a minute.

When she spoke again, there was an edge of pain to her voice. "It's eaten half her brain. When the rudra comes, he speaks directly to her mind, so forcefully that I can hear it. So I know. I know... everything they've done. I even hear words that I don't understand but I know their meaning."

"I have a friend like that."

Beth made a gasping squeak.

"He's... not like this rudra."

"They were arguing over who would receive a new brain. Baba Kesu needed it to survive, but the rudra wanted it more. He shut her down. Since then, her experiments have become more brutal."

"How can you get a new brain? That's what makes you who you are."

"She only needed part of a brain. He could have saved her. He knew how. But he refused."

"Don't go feeling sorry for that Bitch," Scorpion answered.

"But it's still... so horrible."

Scorpions arms began to ache at the shoulders. The pain was unbearable. All of his muscles burned, even the amputated arm. He felt pain clear down to his missing fingers. In spite of himself, the ratling felt for the phantom limb, but nothing was there.

His tail coiled and twitched, swelling up. In the midst of the throbbing pain that seized him, he lost control of his bladder, and the small oven filled with a pungent, stinging scent like rotten onion.

Every one of his senses suffered, and Scorpion tried to pass into sleep, hoping to wake in a better state. In his agony, he tuned out the words of the female ratling.

*****

"What?" Cricket repeated a third time.

Bax slowed his lips down and accentuated each sound, but Cricket still couldn't make out a word.

The insect stretched Bale's severed arm behind his back and scratched at a hard-to-reach spot. He began to rifle through the trollblood's belongings, looking for anything of interest. In truth, lots of things were 'of interest' but the kind that he knew Oydd would disapprove of tampering with. Unless Oydd were here, of course. Then he might know which items were safe for play.

Cricket came across Scorpion's dagger and grew excited, looking for his own equipment. He found his pouch first and checked to make sure his belongings were still inside, as well as the mouseling's magic bag. He still had two invisibility potions, and an energy potion he'd forgotten he put in there from when he was training with his clones.

Bax tugged on his elbow excitedly and pointed at some alchemy equipment as well as many flasks full of odd fluids in the corner of the laboratory.

Not understanding his words, Cricket simply nodded, "Uh-huh."

The gnome grinned from ear to ear having received Cricket's permission and bounced off toward the dangerous-looking apparatus.

Cricket found his weapons and armor in a corner, along with the broken Nightcrawler bow. The black bow had entirely cracked in half, revealing severed fibers of some sort, and the two halves dangled from the loose string. As such, it didn't really resemble a bow, so the insect didn't feel any attachment to it. He tossed it aside and fitted himself with the jade breastplate. When his hand wrapped around the jeweled handle of the first khopesh, he let out a long, contented sigh. He transferred Bale's arm to one of his lower hands and grabbed the second khopesh, then looked about for his daggers, but couldn't find them. He paused to retrace his steps, and frowned as he remembered them tumbling to the ground from the dangling cages, likely to never be recovered. He missed his sickles too.

Cricket hastily created a shadow. It waved, and he gestured toward its antennae.

The shadow cocked its head, not understanding. He pointed at his own missing antennae and then again at the shadow.

In alarm, the shadow registered what he was asking and began shaking his head furiously.

"But I can't hear anything," Cricket reasoned.

The shadow shook his head one more time in an exaggerated fashion, giving a stern and final 'no'. Cricket dismissed it, and scratched his chin in thought. He retrieved the shadow dagger from his hip—the one that had materialized as he fought the trollblood—and studied it as he pondered.

Cricket sat on the ground as if to meditate. He dismissed the dagger with a thought, then tried to will it back with no success. He focused on his empty hand and struck a jade khopesh against his chest, feeling the familiar vibrations. He felt the shadow magic around him—an invisible energy, eager to take form, and then he let it go. He tried again, focusing on his hand and imagining only a dagger, rather than an entire clone. A very thin wisp of black appeared in his palm, but billowed away when he closed his hand.

Sadly though, the effort drained him at least as much as creating an entire clone. The insect groaned in frustration and stood again. His head rose above the top of a nearby table just in time to notice a troll lumbering up behind the distracted gnome. Cricket could not see it earlier, nor hear it, until it was nearly upon them. But he should have noticed the smell!

Fortunately, it seemed the troll had not registered his presence either. He rushed it just as its massive fingers were about to wrap around the gnome, and it turned at the last instant. Cricket attacked with a quick combo, slashing twice at its throat. Reflexively, he lashed out with Bale's claw, and the five-inch violet claws tore through the thick skin of the troll's upper arm as if nothing were there at all. The troll's arm was much thicker than five inches, however, but the insect succeeded in wholly lacerating the triceps along with removing several chunks of bone.

Cricket brought the claw back with a backhand toward the troll's face, but took a stiff fist to the chest in the process. It knocked him from his feet, and he lay on the ground for an instant gasping for breath.

Cricket scrambled to his feet, hoping to finish off the troll before it regenerated, but he found it already crumpled in a heap before him. The gashes on its face had not even begun to heal. Rather, they grew in size. Nearly two inches of leathery skin covered the creature's skull, but Cricket watched as its hide slowly withdrew from the bone. Next, even the bone cracked, exposing the brain.

It slowed to a stop, and Cricket continued to watch to ensure that it did not regenerate. Suddenly horrified, he lifted his own wounded arm up to inspect where he had been scraped by Bale's claw earlier. The gashes on his arm had more than tripled in size. Thankfully, they had started out small, but the black shell surrounding the claw marks had withered and greyed. As he watched, a loose chunk fell from his arm.

He noticed the gnome watching, wide-eyed as well by this point.

Having been momentarily abandoned, a fuming beaker of fluid boiling above a blue flame began to foam and overflow its container. By the time he noticed, the foam had begun to glow red, and the gnome panicked, diving to the floor for cover. Cricket followed his lead, and a moment later the foam exploded, rather violently, sending shards of glass and smoking wads of foam across the room.

Cricket jumped back to his feet, smiling.

The old gnome got up a bit slower, and shook his head. Cricket was fairly certain Bax mumbled something in disappointment.

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Remembering the claw, Cricket lifted it up quizzically. He had used it to scratch his back. After some deliberation, the insect decided not to investigate further. It would only lead to sorrow. Still, his shell could not feel pain, and if it had penetrated the shell, he would surely have felt it by now. He did notice a sort of crawling sensation.

Thinking about his itchy back only brought the itch back, which reminded him of the raw part on his side where he had slid down the stairs. Instinctively, he reached around with a lower arm to see if it had dried, but found the rough patch had only grown slightly sticky.

As he thought about the itch and the wound, he began to feel an intense sting where he had scratched himself with Bale's claw. He felt a sizzle as a layer of fat beneath the carapace began to melt away beneath the scratches and he howled and fell to his knees. It hurt enough that he thought he might have been able to hear the wound growing, if he had his antennae.

A warm hand on his shoulder brought him back to the tower, and Cricket looked up into the gnome's concerned eyes. Bax looked along the shelves, among the many vials of bright-colored liquids, but evidently saw nothing that he might use to assist the insect.

While painful, the sting was not overwhelming, nor the worst of his current injuries, and after about a minute, Cricket was certain it had stopped growing.

"Scorpion..." Cricket uttered suddenly. "We have to find Scorpion."

Cricket could not read the gnome's response, but his face looked inquisitive.

The insect darted from the room far faster than the gnome could follow.

*****

Something scratched the outside Scorpion’s tank. The wheel turned, and the hatch clicked as it unlocked. Despite all his training and all the horrors the ratling had seen on the battlefield, he now found himself trembling, dreading another encounter with the witch. He was not ready to feel more pain. He needed at least a few moments.

The hatch opened to the silhouette of the azaeri matron, backlit by candlelight. And he waited for the irresistible urge to obey her. However, before he felt so much as a twitch, the silhouette erupted into a mass of tentacles.

In his daze, at first he thought the witch had transformed into some sort of eldritch horror. Then, he recognized the tentacles as belonging to Ixitl and thought the octopus must be mimicking the witch.

It still took some time before Scorpion realized that the witch and Ixitl were both there, standing before the hatch, locked in combat.

The mimic had assaulted her from behind. It struggled to wrap its arms around her face, pulling the few remaining tufts of black feathers from her pimply skin as its beak gnashed at her throat.

Scorpion tried to stand and help, but wobbled sideways and crashed into the wall of the tank with a dull clang.

Three of the mimic's tentacles now wrapped around Baba Kesu's face, and she snapped out with her beak, severing one near the base. It dangled, still connected by a thread.

The mimic screeched, and the witch took advantage of his shock, managing to snip another tentacle clean off about halfway up. With one of her hands, she grabbed the dangling tentacle and ripped it free as well. She took a bite from it and began to chew.

The mimic withdrew, squealing, and suddenly sprayed a thick, blue ink all over the witch's face.

The azaeri matron cawed, wiping the goo from her eyes with her wrists, and retreated into the back room repeating her caw more forcefully, like an alarm.

Scorpion slipped like a wet fish through the opening of his tank, onto the ground. He rose, wobbling to his feet.

"You didn't forget me, did you, Xitl?"

The mimic screeched in irritation.

"Ksitl... Skitl?"

The mimic started to screech again, but paused and chirped a quick sound of acceptance.

"Skittle? You like that."

The octopus chirped again as Scorpion lifted the wounded mimic onto his back.

It felt oddly lighter, even factoring in the missing tentacles. Scorpion started to run, and realized he stood taller. Nearly four feet hunched. Large blisters bubbled all over his arm, some as large as an apple, filled with clear liquid. His fur was slick with red and black vomit.

Scorpion wiped a bit from his chest, but gave up since his arm couldn't clean itself. As he started to leave he noticed the second oven and opened the hatch to let Beth out. What he saw was far from what he expected. There, in the center of the tank, she lay stiff on her side, unbreathing. One enlarged black eye stared back at him unseeing. A second eye had started to grow beneath it, shoving the original to the side. Additional bones grew from her elbow, like two smaller forearms, one terminating at the wrist, and one with three malformed fingers. All of her golden fur lay in a pile beneath her, mixing with the ash of the oven.

It appeared she had only been dead for a matter of minutes.

Scorpion only stared for an instant before rushing from the room to evade the witch.

He passed Ty'lek's remains, which helped orient him, and quickly located the stairs he had ascended with Cricket.

The ratling ran down the stairs as fast as he could, somewhat limited by his blurry vision. His eye constantly dripped tears and it felt swollen. For an instant he imagined bits of rust stuck in the white of his eye, or old dried blood from the previous test subject, but he quickly pushed those thoughts away.

As he ran, one of his main incisors fell from his mouth. The bloody tooth bounced down the stairs in front of him.

The ratling pressed his tongue against his three remaining front teeth, and found two of them loose. He tasted blood. But even the taste of his blood was off.

After descending three flights of stairs, he heard the gnome humming in the distance. He paused, listened carefully, then ran toward the sound.

When he came upon Cricket and the gnome, Bax let out a high pitched wail at the sight of the warped, bulging ratling, covered in dried black vomit. He lifted his bare hands in fists and stood protectively in front of the insect.

"It's me," the ratling tried to assure them, but his voice cracked. "Scorpion," he added.

Bax, embarrassed, turned to Cricket. "That's not what my real scream sounds like. It's much deeper usually."

But Cricket ignored him, unable to hear anything. He took a step toward Scorpion hesitantly. "What happened?"

"Do you even care?"

Cricket tried to read his lips but failed.

Scorpion growled, noticing the insect's missing antennae for the first time. He stood on all three legs, bristling, like a bull about to charge. His eye twitched.

Cricket, if possible, looked pale in the face. Finally he stammered, "We should head back to the portal." He lifted Bale's hand. "Do you know where the main stairwell is?"

Without a word, Scorpion turned and ran back down the hall the way he had come. He paused at the end of the corridor to make sure the others were following, and led the group back to the stairwell.

Cricket hurried down the steps and traced his way back to the portal chamber.

The magical gate remained exactly as Cricket had last seen it—a sea of shimmering silver ripples with a faint pink glow.

Cricket looked at his missing finger with a sigh.

He approached the portal and stared into the tranquil surface.

Scorpion scurried over by the pile of rubble where the trollblood had torn apart the wall, revealing the hidden passage.

Based on Cricket's possession of Bale's arm, Scorpion assumed the half troll was dead. He hopped atop a chunk of debris—the last place he had seen Ty'lek alive. As he looked down, he noticed his belly bulging. As if on cue, he insides churned and groaned.

When he turned back toward Cricket, the azaeri witch stood at the entrance to the chamber, hovering beneath the archway.

Scorpion cried out to Cricket, but the insect couldn't hear.

Cricket raised Bale's claw, his back to the witch, and mumbled, "How did the trollblood change the channel?"

Timidly, the insect tapped the glowing claw against the center of the portal, sending rings flowing to the edge. Almost instantly an image materialized—a purplish landscape similar to Agoth.

Scorpion yelled again, though he knew the effort was futile.

The witch raised an arm, seizing the gnome with her magic. He began to back away toward the wall with a most unpleasant look on his face, as if he were crunching on garlic.

As a last desperate motion before the witch took hold of him, Scorpion grabbed a rock in his tail and tossed it at Cricket.

The pebble bounced from the back of his head, and the insect froze in place before turning to face the room.

When he noticed the witch he fumbled for his weapons, but his limbs stiffened—two of his arms anyway. The insect put up quite a struggle and began to reach for his weapons with his lower arms.

The witch bore down on him with visible strain, but the effort of holding all three hostages drained her visibly, and Scorpion felt the hex weaken. He took a step toward the hag, and she cawed, as if calling for help, but no one came.

She forced Cricket to take two steps back. One of his arms extended Bale's claw to her, but Cricket shook his head and pulled it back with one of his lower arms.

The mimic dropped from Scorpion's shoulder and the witch howled in frustration, stomping a clawed foot. The octopus too began to seize up. Though the witch had trouble controlling its motions, she managed to hold it in place as it writhed.

The aged matron slowly climbed the steps to the portal until she nearly stood at Cricket's side. As the witch's powers spread over his companions, Scorpion noticed the compulsion was nowhere near as strong as before, and it seemed to affect Cricket the least.

With enormous struggle, the ratling shouted, "Make a shadow!"

Cricket tried again to reach for his khopesh, but even as he did so, he continued to back away from the witch against his will.

Regardless, two shadows appeared behind the witch. She clicked and flapped, quite flustered. For an instant her eyes fell on Bale's arm, just out of reach, but the shadows moved in quickly, and at the last moment, the witch lunged through the portal to escape.

Scorpion heard a quick hiss, like releasing steam, and the witch was gone. The portal returned to a vacant, silvery shimmer, and the ratling found he could move again.

Scorpion pounded his fist against the ground, literally foaming at the mouth with a red-tinged foam.

"What's wrong?" Bax asked.

"I wanted to kill her," Scorpion answered.

"Oh... I'm sorry. I would have let you do it, if I'd known."

Scorpion looked up confused. His whiskers twitched. "What do you mean? You said that in a weird way."

"If... you'd asked," Bax said slowly, as if speaking to a child, "I would have let you kill her instead."

"She... got away," Scorpion stammered.

"Oh! right. You don't know. That was an illusion. The portal wasn't really open. Though... I haven't been to Agoth, so I sort of had to guess the colors. How'd I do?"

Cricket tried to join the conversation, but this simply entailed him looking perplexed from face to face with zero comprehension.

"So... the portal wasn't open," Scorpion confirmed.

"Of course not. You can't open a portal just by tapping it with one of Bale's parts." Bax shook his head disapprovingly at Cricket.

"So what does that mean?" Scorpion asked. "What happens if you walk through the portal while it's silver?"

In response, Bax grabbed Cricket's hand and lifted it, displaying the vaporized stump of his finger.

Cricket smiled and looked obliviously at the gnome and the ratling. He waved.

"Cricket," Bax pointed a finger at the insect. "Give me Bale's hand."

Cricket looked down. A look of comprehension dawned on him and he handed the glowing limb to the gnome.

"This," Bax spoke slowly for Cricket's benefit this time, "is magic. MAGIC." He drew out the word, exaggerating the syllables.

The gnome turned to Scorpion. "I wish Oydd were here. I might be able to get it to work, but it will take some time."

Seeing the gnome working on the portal, Cricket retreated to a spot near the wall and sat with his legs crossed. He drew his khopesh, extended an empty hand, and struck the blade to his chest plate.

Scorpion glared at the insect from across the room.

A very thin shaft of black appeared in the insect's hand but instantly faded. Cricket repeated the same exercise with an identical outcome, then again. Then again.

"Hmph," Scorpion mused, speaking to the gnome. "You can't do the same thing over and over and expect different results."

"Of course you can," Bax responded. "That's called practice!"