I quashed the response I knew my monsters would cry out. Causing a scene wasn’t what we needed right now, no matter how much I wanted to scream at the man. My mind rapidly filtered through responses, attempting to find the one that would lead to the most ideal outcome. We needed the knights to know we were friendly to them, for now at least. We needed them to know that we were serious about the church, and all their nefarious deeds. Thankfully, that second half didn’t seem so difficult.
The church members were all enthralled.
“Tabitha.” Abby snarled, her eyes locking on a certain priestess.
“I’ll get Garroway.” Owyn said, calmly loading his gun.
Felecia placed a hand on the grate behind her husband. Her voice was low and serious. “Open the gate. Run. Leave these ones to us.”
“Run?” Mr. Bellamy questioned. His knights were looking back and forth between us and the enthralled church knights. “But… they’re…”
Garroway’s pupils slimmed to slits. He and his knights acted as one, charging at the confused city knights with weapons drawn. The city knights reacted far too slowly to counter them. Their movements were far too coordinated to be coincidence, but thankfully, besides Garroway, they all seemed perfectly human.
We’d have to use that to our advantage.
Abby gripped the iron grate in front of her, bulging as muscles fought metal. Rivets popped, one after the other, like buttons. She slipped through an impossibly small gap, like her bones were mere suggestions, in order to charge through the knights to head directly for the priests in the back. Mycroft, Angler, and the other more muscled monsters did the same, pulling apart the gate at the seams to allow the smallest ones to surge through.
The mimic crabs charged in. Those with weapons and shields engaged directly with the church’s knights, two or three to one, while the more humanoid ones attempted to pull back the city knights without letting them attack out of fear. The fish monsters charged in next, as the gaps widened, ensuring that the mimic crabs were never overwhelmed. Finally, the puppets jerkily ran in, wildly thrusting their weapons into the fray.
Owyn raised his gun to point at Garroway, who saw the action and disengaged with the knight he was just about to smash in with his mace. He even dropped his mace, getting ready to run.
But nothing happened.
Oh shit. Owyn’s thought came directly to me. I’m enthralled.
And!? Shoot hi-
Oh.
Shit.
The enthralled can’t use magic.
Garroway noticed Owyn’s pause. He grinned, dashing in, avoiding all points of conflict in his charge to get to Owyn.
The humans still within the gate area backed up. Mycroft gave up on opening the grate any wider and set herself in front of the humans, blocking my view of the battlefield. Owyn, in the meantime, shoved a free hand into his quiver, pulling out a fragment of the core we defeated outside. He closed his eyes and gripped it tight.
What are you doing? I asked, just a hint of worry in my voice.
Owyn’s eyes flared open, just as I heard the small voice of the core fragment speak to Owyn. Wha- obey!
“Let it take me!” Owyn shouted at me, pulling his arm back to toss the core to me.
I didn’t question him, just letting Owyn decide what he was doing.
The instant before the fragment left his hand, I felt Owyn’s control leave me. Then the core fragment touched my own core.
----------------------------------------
I was brought back to the dungeon space. Without even letting either of us come to terms with the change in scenery, I dove for the core fragment, crushing it in my hand as fast as possible.
----------------------------------------
Owyn gasped, half raising his gun to aim at me before quickly shifting his focus to outside the gate. Garroway, seeing he couldn’t reach Owyn within the cage, had returned his attention to the city knights, pulling weapons away from two of them while kicking a third. His back was turned.
BANG!
Half of the battlefield froze. The humans who’d never heard the sound of a gunshot going off hesitated for just an instant, which gave my monsters the openings they needed to dispatch a large number of the church members or shove away those most threatening. After the shock wore off though, the church members resumed battle.
Garroway’s body fell to its knees, then face first on the street below.
Mana flowed into me from several sources, and soon the battle was over.
“The hell was that?” A knight muttered, looking at Owyn.
Yeah! I confront Owyn. The hell was that man!? Since when did you figure that out!?
Owyn, of course, doesn’t respond. I get Felecia to ask for me.
“And…” She adds hesitantly. “Is it possible for me to do the same?”
Owyn nods. “Yeah, obviously. We’ll just need a sacrificial core I guess.”
“When did you… how long have you known?” She sounds equal parts relieved and hurt.
Owyn shook his head. “It just came to me. I’ve been thinking about what I’d have to do to escape if I were you for a while now, but it was never a priority, exactly. I thought that if there was ever a problem, I’d just… kill Lucid myself?”
The knights quickly glance at my monsters, but none of them react negatively to the threat. They know Owyn well enough by now to know he wouldn’t actually kill me. Probably.
Abby walks through the mingling knights and monsters. Her hands and chin are covered in blood that she casually tries to wipe away. It just leaves a streak. She notices the blood coating her hands and hesitates, but ultimately ends up joining us. “Going deeper into the city will be a mistake. We’d encounter too many regular people, and probably the church. There’s a closer entrance, but…”
I pick up her train of thought. It’s where Isabelle died.
Abby nods.
I glance at Felecia and her husband, who is maintaining distance from everyone. Would you mind? I can’t imagine it’d be a pretty sight.
Felecia hears me, but she doesn’t respond. She patiently stands behind the gate. “Dear? Would you mind?”
A few city knights attempt to attack my squirrel piloted puppets, but the fish-men stop them, holding onto the offending weapons and glaring at the knight in question. The knight relinquished their weapon and backed up to the Baron. He, in turn, glares at me.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“I thought you said the church was the enemy.”
“They’re not under their own control.” Felecia explains. “They’re puppets. It’s… disturbing. Now, would you release us?”
Mr. Bellamy hardly pays attention to her. His eyes have found Owyn, who’s brought a scrap of cloth to Abby for her to wipe her hands with. “You… He was enthralled.”
“And now I’m not.” Owyn says casually.
“That’s impossible! Dungeons can’t let go of their thralls! You… you were enthralled to another dungeon! I knew it! You’re not working alone! What sort of-”
Without even talking about it, Owyn reaches back into his quiver to recover a new dungeon fragment and tossed it to Felecia. She confidently catches it and stares daggers into her husband. She holds the core over mine, poised to drop it. I allow my control to slip over her just long enough for her to swap ownership, and then she drops the core onto mine.
Felecia is now a free woman.
The knights, especially the Baron, stare blankly at Felecia. She turns to the side and passes my core over to a nearby mimic crab. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind?”
----------------------------------------
The villagers within my ranks happily converse with the knights. Both enthralled and freed seem much more relaxed now that we’re within the city, despite the apocalyptic feel. Shutters are closed, the streets are mostly abandoned, and those that aren’t quickly clear out when they see Mycroft round the corner.
Felecia and her husband have taken the lead, far away from the rest of us to have a private conversation. Abby’s ears flick in their direction every now and again, but I don’t think she’s listening. She’s riding with Owyn on top of Mycroft, and Owyn is obsessing over her ears. She’s as red as a beet and I’m loving every second of it.
The fish men have donned the armor of the fallen knights, both of the city guards and the church. The humanoid mimic crabs are still too small to wear the armor, but they’ve taken to carrying whatever they can as well. Several of them seem to have taken on dedicated roles as slingers, using leather strips and pebbles as weapons, while others carry barrel tops like shields and loose sticks for swords. It’s adorable and depressing at the same time. We hadn’t come out of the skirmish unscathed, and I felt every loss. However, I couldn’t let it hold me down. We had a mission to complete!
I had to keep telling myself that.
This wasn’t just about me. As much as I just wanted this to be a dream where I could completely control the outcome, this was real. There were things that mattered here. Actions had consequences. Permanent ones.
Which was exactly why I found the church’s actions damnable. We’d arrived at the spot. An otherwise identical road to all the others, but with a large crack leading into an alley and broken buildings on either side. There was no blood, like I thought there ought to be, but it was still a reverent site. A place where everyone simply stayed quiet with the knowledge of who and what was buried here, and what it all had meant.
Abby squeezes Owyn’s hand before slipping off Mycroft. She quietly gets to work picking up a large rock and throwing it off to the side.
Mycroft joins in, and I have to command Angler to get the rest of everyone else moving. The puppets and combat oriented mimic crabs keep an eye on the perimeter. The city knights awkwardly do the same, keeping an eye more on my monsters than anything outside.
Birds… Abby says, continuing her work.
The mimic crab carrying me looks up, and sure enough, half a dozen ravens circle overhead.
I teach my mimic crab what ‘giving the bird’ means.
The Sneakies slither out of Arty’s cannon, making their way to the rubble. Finding the small gaps, they make their way through, scouting the area ahead for us. Damian and the other flier kids take off to deal with the bird spies.
I take a while to consider what being a dungeon means. And I mean really consider. It’s strange, I don’t think I’ve done that yet. Not in my whole lifetime as a dungeon here in this new world. My own senses were limited to my core, yet information constantly filtered in through dozens of living sources like extensions of my own body. I control the very lives of living beings, assigning them value based on nothing else but my own thoughts and feelings. Lives are thrown away in the mere hope that I might be able to capitalize on their sacrifice. Even without direction, my thralls would gladly throw down their lives to protect me. Certainly, it happened with other dungeons, as I’d seen again and again.
Life was weird here. Dungeons are created to conquer, and humans fight back. No one life sees the other as inherently more valuable than their own, leaving no room for true peace. The very nature of dungeons means removing will from people. Stealing away what makes them human. I didn’t even think about doing that myself. I couldn’t. Though I was used to controlling every aspect of my dreams, I recognized that without me, those dreams wouldn’t have aspects to control in the first place. So what was my purpose here?
Why did I become a dungeon?
Was I brought here? Some divine intervention? The will of some goddess? No. I refused. By the very nature of free will, I decided what I was doing with my life. What did it matter that I was a dungeon? What did it matter how I used my abilities? If anyone was displeased about how I lived my life, they could damn well fight me for it!
“Mr. Lucid?” A shy voice asked. Clyde. The last of the Dungeon Rats.
Yeah kid?
“I want to evolve, but… I want to choose.”
Wouldn’t have it any other way bud. What do you want? I mean, I’d prefer you have wings so you could join the others, but-
“I don’t want to fight.” He said, staring holes in his feet.
I raise an eyebrow and judge him silently for a while. His face burns up, but he stands his ground.
Ok?
“You… everyone else fights. All the humans. I don’t… I’m scared of fighting. But I…”
I hold back a sigh and ask my ride to pass me along. They do, and wander off to help the others burrow.
Look at me when you’re talking to me. I tell him. You already know what you want, right? Then fuck what everybody else thinks. Just say it. Full and direct, one short sentence. ‘I want-’
“I don’t want to be a boy any more.”
…
Well, that was a twist.
You want to be a girl? Oh man, I was not prepared for something like this. He was just a kid! I’m not going to say no and be a hypocrite, but… he’s just a kid!
But Clyde shakes his head again. “I don’t want to be anything. I want to be like you. N-nothing. You’re a dungeon, right? So you can make that go away, right? You can make it all go away? All these stupid feelings and…”
I feel where the rest of his thoughts go through my physical connection with Clyde. This time, I really do sigh.
You know it’s normal to feel these things right? There’s nothing wrong with you?
Clyde shakes his head. This time, he speaks to me and me alone. I don’t care. I don’t want it.
What is wrong is to feel nothing. I told him. Even complacency has its place. Contentment with your place in life. Feeling nothing- truly nothing is what would make you wrong. You wouldn’t be human any more. You’d be nothing more than a machine. A… golem, I guess.
I don’t want to feel nothing. Clyde agrees quietly. But I don’t want to feel these things either.
I can’t help you with that. I tell him as gently as I can. It’s simply not something I’m able to do. What I can do though, is change what you look like. But I can’t make you nothing. I need to make you into something. So don’t tell me what you don’t want. Tell me what you do want.
Clyde speaks even quieter now. As if he’s ashamed of wanting anything. I wanted to become a doctor. But, that’s expensive. And I don’t-
Good enough! I interrupt him before he can get any more mopey. Of course, the first thing that comes to mind with ‘wings’ and ‘doctor’ for me is an angel. However, Clyde says he doesn’t want to be a dude any more. Or anything at all really.
Which really only leaves biblically accurate angel in my mind.
I imagine one with a series of prehensile tentacles, tipped with all sorts of grippers, tools, and devices that would help with surgery. The image is thrust into Clyde’s brain before he has a chance to fight back.
How about something like this?
Clyde stares into space for a while. Slowly though, a smile does form on his face. “Yeah… I’d like that. But, what are all those tools used for? I only know how to wrap a splint on someone.”
I don’t even consider the consequences. With a rush, I throw Clyde into a fit of memories. Every biology class, every fun fact and science-y video I can remember, every little snippet of medical tv shows I can remember are shared with Clyde in an instant. He staggers, plopping down on the curb to absorb all this new information.
Don’t worry about knowing it all. Or even any of it. Owyn’s proven that sharing memories isn’t exactly the best way to share exact information. You’re going to have a long time to absorb this info. Trust me on that.
“You’re human…” Clyde whispers.
Abby’s ears flick in our direction.