"Travis!" came the yells from the kitchen. He ran in to see Paul giving Gary a healing potion; he had to tip it down his throat. Gary had been behind the wall when the lightning blast came through; he escaped the main brunt of it, but it was an AOE spell, and the backlash hit him hard. Vincent was almost killed instantly, but on pure adrenaline, Gary was able to drag him to the kitchen, where they both fell unconscious.

"Do you have a high-level healing scroll? A potion won't work," Paul asked Travis. He had blood all over him, but it appeared not to be his.

Travis didn't, but he knew who did. "Clyde, are you there?"

"Yes, what the hell happened in there? It looked like a bomb went off."

"It pretty much did. How close are you? Is it clear, and do you have those healing scrolls? Sorry, but we don't have time." They had decided to leave the high int scrolls with Clyde since only he had a high enough intelligence to use them. The thinking was that he could use it in a pinch to save Travis.

"Close, yes, and yes, I'll be right there."

***

Clyde drove a block or so closer; he was as far away as possible while still keeping an eye on the house. He pulled up to the next block, grabbed his bag, and got out. He thought he saw eyes behind a fence two yards over. When he was going into Vincent's gate, he saw eyes in the house next door. What could he do, though? He would tell Travis, but he wouldn't need the scrolls unless someone was in a bad way so he had to hurry.

Clyde came running into the kitchen. He saw the absolute destruction and started to worry a little. Maybe they should get out of here. Then he saw the shape of Gary and some other guy and knew they wouldn't be leaving for a bit.

"Good job getting here fast, Clyde. Read the best scroll you can over that guy; his name is Vincent. This is his house, and he's an ally."

Paul noticed that Travis gave this new guy a rundown before he helped him. It might not mean anything, but it was interesting. Gary was starting to come too now. He still had wounds up and down his body, but the bleeding had slowed, and he was regaining some color.

"We really need to get them both back to the base. Sophie can administer regular healing as well as magical," Travis thought.

"Get him to the point where he can move. Shit, that reminds me; where is everyone else?" Travis wondered all of a sudden.

Paul looked at him, "they aren't upstairs?"

"Five or six are, but there were five people down here when I ran upstairs to see what you were doing."

Paul was silent. Clyde spoke up, "that must be them against the wall inside." There were remains of bodies all along the wall where the couch had been.

The people from upstairs started to trickle down. "I told you to stay upstairs!" Travis yelled, more in frustration with their situation. He didn't even know these people's names. They all kind of looked at him.

"Don't mind him; he means well, but he can be an asshole."

Travis looked and saw that it was Gary, finally well enough to talk, and talk shit apparently. He laughed. "I've been called a hardass plenty of times in the army, but 'asshole' has a nice civilian ring to it."

Paul alone laughed, another sign that he served at some point, but the joke at least diffused the tension.

Clyde was over Vincent, and he was sweating. He had his eyes closed and honestly didn't look great himself all of a sudden.

“Clyde, you okay?” Travis asked in a soft tone, afraid to break his concentration. Then Clyde fell forward a little bit but composed himself. “I think those scrolls are supposed to be for people with higher levels. But it worked.” Vincent appeared to be breathing normally but was still out. Clyde had set his legs straight so that they could mend properly.

“How long before he can move?” Before Clyde could answer, Travis knew they were in trouble. He pulled his gun, but something told him to hold fire. Kobolds streamed into the house with weapons drawn, but they were just surrounding the kitchen. Two werewolves came in; these looked bigger than the ones they had seen so far, and they were decked out in armor and weapons. Travis had a feeling what was about to happen.

He muttered, “Bodyguards.”

“For who?” Clyde and Paul said at the same time. Before he saw him, he heard his voice in his head, “Hello Travis, or should I say, main character.”

Torak, the werewolf mage, so overpowered that the DM had trouble slowing him down, walked into the kitchen. The Kobolds opened up a hole for him and his bodyguards, but it would have been a tight fit, so they stayed in the open doorway. Again, in his mind, “Travis, you and your companions have no reason to fear me today. That is, of course, if you have the answers that I am looking for.”

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Travis did believe him, at least based on their last meeting and the things this wolf mage said, but he could also sense potential danger. He knew he didn't have any answers that would satisfy the wolf, so he changed the subject.

“You control the Kobolds now? Very impressive,” he said this out loud. The mage laughed dismissively. Now, out loud in far better English, though still with a guttural filter, “Yes, they are my minions now. The orcs are too stupid to submit, so they will have to be destroyed. You and your companions, though, have the same choice. Do you want them to leave here alive, Travis?” (Though when spoken out loud, it sounded more like "Tra-vus.")

“That would be preferable to the alternative.”

Now in his mind, “Yes, it would,” a tinge of pain accompanied that phrase. “What have you learned about this game?”

Travis wanted to answer out loud as much as he could so everyone knew what was going on, or at least had an idea. “Please forgive me, but what exactly do you mean?” A sharp pain hit his mind, almost like being stung by a jellyfish on the brain. “Listen! I know this is someone or something's idea of a game. I know there are players and characters and magic and items; none of this existed a week ago.”

He took a breath and tried to calm down, “but I don't know what specifically you want me to comment on. Also, and I truly hesitate to say this, but I do not want to lie (even under extreme duress, Travis could still work over his abuser). I have not learned anything groundbreaking. But!” He put his hand up, “but I will tell you everything I know; just tell me what it is you want to hear first.” He waited for pain, but it never came. Torak wasn't sadistic, and he didn't think torture would get truthful answers in the place of regular questioning, not with Travis at least, but he would not allow games, and if he thought Travis was playing them, he would hurt him.

“What has your,” he took out a journal from a bag, “journal told you?” Travis had a look of slight confusion. The wolf decided to be generous this one time and expanded on his question, “what has it told you about what you are to achieve? Is there an... end game? Yes, that is the human phrase. Does it have an end game for you?”

Like with all interrogations or hardline questionings, Travis wanted to give as little as possible but still satisfy this wolf.

“It has given me mostly minor tasks, but it seems to want me to get stronger. I also think it wants me to find a base of operations. I haven't paid as much attention to it as I should be, THAT I swear to you is the truth.”

That was a mistake, and Travis knew it the moment he said it.

“So nothing else you are telling me is the truth?”

Paul could sense the error as well. He had been scoping out the kobolds and bodyguards since they took their positions. There was a chance for escape, but it was a low probability. Obviously, this wolf had killed a PC; he needed to be stopped, and they needed to get out of here.

He made eye contact with Clyde to try and get some support for an attempt to fight back, but Clyde shook him off. The kobolds and werewolves were engrossed in watching their leader do whatever it was he was doing, torturing Travis right now.

Clyde knew two things that Paul did not. First, he had used his heat vision and saw that there were more werewolves and kobolds outside. They were set up in a defensive position, not from what might come from inside, but from outside.

The second thing is that this wolf seemed to have a thing for Travis. It could have killed him multiple times but did not. They needed to find out what it wanted and then get out of here with no bloodshed. Clyde could now see Gary starting to get a fire under him. He had to do something before all hell broke loose.

“Lord Magister” (it was the best he could think of off the top of his head), "may I be so bold as to ask a question of you, lord?”

The mage, who was not thrown off by Travis' attempt at flattery, was a bit taken aback here. "Lord Magister," he had to be honest, he liked how that sounded. This was the ‘mage’ of the group too, wasn't it, if the word could be used for such a low-level human? He would humor it. “You may,” Torak said out loud.

“Are you and ‘Major’ Travis connected in some way that is not apparent to our human senses?”

A good question, Torak thought, wait, “Major” Travis.

“Your word major does not serve as a title, explain what you mean,” this was said in Clyde’s head. He started to think that the wolf spoke via telepathy when it had more to say, so as to not embarrass itself. Sort of like a native speaker using its own language over that of the country it's visiting when it wants to be really understood.

“Travis was a ‘Major’, or an officer in this nation's military before things changed. It was by far the strongest army on this planet.”

“Is that where he procured the weapon he so skillfully uses?”

“Yes, but that weapon was at the low end of power, before most of them stopped working.”

Torak pondered this. He had seen the two-handed ‘guns,’ they called them, that the human security forces had. They didn't work, but what if they had? This MC could kill his underlings with so little effort; imagine how the bigger ones worked.

This was an important piece of the puzzle, the mage thought. The humans had large and organized security forces, and each man down to the lowliest warrior was armed with those incredibly deadly weapons. Then, at the same time he appeared in this strange world along with other lesser creatures, those weapons ceased working. From the questions he had asked that one head warrior before killing him, he learned that no one knew why they failed to fire either.

Somehow, this human, this Major Travis, the main character, was the key to the mystery. This time in everyone's head, “Your Major Travis and I are connected in some way. You will all walk out of here, though in part due to that. Not out of any sentiment, but out of a desire to find out why. Travis, you will find out more, or next time we meet, I will end your run.”

Vincent and Gary were in shock and didn't say anything; having someone in their heads was a first that they wouldn't get over quickly. Paul was in the same boat, but he was made of sterner stuff. For Travis and Clyde, this was becoming old hat. They all assented in their own way, and the Psionic wolf mage seemed satisfied.

Then a kobold came in and got his leader's attention. They must have had a brief conversation because the wolf turned and growled something to his bodyguards. They headed outside, looking ready for war.

“So the orcs are not done yet. We have been having a little bit of a tussle over this area. Your human domiciles are very... quaint, yes, that is the human word, they are quaint. This place makes for a good base camp, though. Why don't you show me why I have so much faith in you and come join us in battle?”

He was looking at Travis, but again the message went to everyone. Paul stood up and walked next to Travis, “We will fight with you,” and he bowed his head. He knew they needed as much experience as they could get. This oversized rodent would pay, but not today; he is too strong. “So much spirit you humans have. Well, let us go then.”