My stomach heaved to and fro as the weird portal transported us through time and space. Probably. I was more likely lying in a ditch after being drugged with experimental LSD by a Nicaraguan crackhead. I fucking hate Nicaragua.
I briefly smelled burning wood and heard screams, but that was whisked away in a moment. I assumed that I had likely caught a glimpse of the aptly named burning-wood-and-screams dimension.
A moment later, I saw Ryan for a moment, then was immediately glad that he whisked away, too. I fucking hate Ryan.
However, God didn’t seem to agree with me, as he rudely opened a portal right in front of me, ejecting my sorry ass out of the blue-and-swirling-colors realm, and onto some sand. A lot of sand.
I picked myself up, brushed the sand off of me (I fucking hate sand) and observed my surrounding. As I looked further into the horizon, the endless desert stretching on and on, my worst fears were confirmed.
I was in Africa.
Just as I was about to fall to my knees in despair, I spotted a tall building in the distance. Very faint, but the prospects of survival in this hot desert were even fainter. And also seeing as there were no countries rich enough in Africa to make any sort of building whatsoever, this means that I had yet again avoided being deported to Africa. I made it my objective to go pay that little tower a ‘friendly’ visit before remembering Ryan, AKA the person carrying most of the ammo, and turned in a circle.
Conveniently, he was ejected from another portal that opened up behind me. He too, made a small scream as his face was filled unceremoniously with coarse, rough, yellow sand that gets everywhere.
“Gah! I hate sand! It’s coarse and rough, and it gets *cough* everywhere!” Ryan cried out, then he looked up at me.
“... oh hey Alan. Or should I say, the BIGGEST LOSER ON EARTH!” Ryan leapt to his feet and shoved me. I, obviously, didn’t react (I stepped backwards 5 feet and almost fell over).
“Sooooo, what’s the sich’, eh? Where we goin’?” Ryan said with an upbeat tone. Pretty sure he had some sort of extreme mental disability or something.
“Hey buddy!” I said playfully. “See that big, fun tower in the distance?”
“Uhhhhhhh… I don’t know…”
“We are gonna go on a field trip, right to that tower! So come on!” I started walking in the direction of the tower, my boots sinking in the sand. I took them off and opted instead to go bare feet, and, ‘let the dogs out’, as the kids say.
“Ok!” Ryan said childishly as he followed me.
. . .
“Are we there yet?”
“No, Ryan. Cut the shit already, man. Joke got old about a thousand feet back.”
“... okay…”
The tower hadn’t changed in size, position, or even color, despite us having been walking for a few hours at this point. Ryan chugged water like a motherfucker and never let me have the bottle, so I had to confiscate it from him and ration what little we had left. Ryan then proceeded to throw up all of the water he had drunk, so there's that.
“Alright Alan. We need a game plan. Despite that tower not having even changed color, which might sound like a weird thing for a tower to do either way, we still need to plan. And I know you love planning Alan.” Ryan turned towards me while twisting his torso in a way that shouldn’t be humanly possible.
“Well, I’m thinking that find a way to interact with the locals, and then make our merry-fuckin’-way to some good American men.”
“There’s other soldiers in Nicaragua?”
Just as suddenly as Ryan’s mother had smacked him across the cheek for ‘cussing’, the tower rapidly grew in size, and walls appeared around it. Surprisingly, the tower changed from a dark black to a normal gray color.
“Holy shit! Ryan! Look! Land ahoy!”
“Thar she blows or some shit like that!”
We started sprinting towards the now-correctly-colored-and-correctly-sized tower. I wasn’t sure how the tower had magically made things appear around it, but I didn’t exactly give two shits. I also didn’t even give two FARTS about the faint breathing noises behind us as we made our way closer and closer to what was most likely a fresh source of water. Probably.
. . .
Holy shit, those two were FAST, Aris thought as she sprinted as fast as she could without alerting them to her presence. However, she doubted she needed to, seeing as they weren’t smart enough to notice that her portal had opened shortly after them.
They seemed to be making their sprinting a race, which would further exhaust themselves due to the large packs on their backs. How they were moving that fast even with the backpacks, Aris didn’t have the faintest. But, she was determined to get that catalyst.
. . .
“Damn, I’m surprised we managed to sprint all the way here without further exhausting ourselves.” I wiped a single bead of sweat off of my forehead, which was due to the heat, not tiredness. I wasn’t tired.
“Same, brotha. Even WITH these heavy packs too.”
“Anyway…” we both said at the same time before looking up at the gates of the wall we found ourselves outside of.
It was about ten feet tall, with a dark, looming shadow. It was made of stone bricks that were weathered and chipped, cracking in many places. I heard the noises of people talking, clanging and the rolling of carts. Some animals too.
“Hello?” I shouted. No answer.
“HELLO!?” Ryan shouted except louder. This time, I heard scuffling on the steps, and what sounded like curses in a foreign language.
A head popped up over the wall. It belonged to a dude with dark skin, wearing a poorly strapped-on helmet. The man yelled at us in a language that we didn’t understand. Then, when we didn’t answer and simply shrugged, he unnecessarily escalated things by drawing a crossbow and pointing it right at Ryan’s forehead.
“HEY!”
“Woah there bucko, let’s chill out. That’s my comedic relief you’re pointing that thing at.”
“I DON’T WANNA DIEEEEEEEE!”
The man growled, then yelled at someone behind him. He turned back and continued aiming the crossbow, which brought forth another slew of insults and protests from us, some of which were pretty discriminatory.
A hand reached out to the wannabe soldier, carrying something that was obstructed by the closed fist surrounding it. Helmet Guy took it, and tossed it down at us. It was a pair of rings.
“Uhhhhhh…” Ryan began awkwardly.
“I don’t swing that way bro,” I looked at the rings distastefully.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
Helmet Man began making gestures with his hands. He made a small hole with his left pointer finger and thumb, and pushed his right pointer finger through the hole, which Ryan and I reacted very poorly to.
“BRO!”
“YOU GAYYYYY BRUH!”
Helmet Guy threw his head back and groaned, and disappeared from view. Then, a moment later, the gates began to open. Helmet Loser stepped through, and looked at us distrustfully before stepping forward, grabbing the rings, and shoving them on both of our respective fingers.
“Ohhhh, that makes more sense.”
“Yeah, why didn’t he just say that?”
“Because we couldn’t understand each other, you fools!” Helmet Fucker angrily spat. “How did someone as dumb as you have the willpower to both trek through the desert and pierce our observation spell?”
“We’re fast, man.” I said, smugly.
“Top of our class, man.” Ryan said, more smugly.
Helmet Bitch sighed, then turned around. “Follow me, ‘travelers’. I’ve a place to take the two of you.”
“Is there water?” I gasped.
“Bad bitches?” Ryan gasped.
“Riches?” I gasped.
“YES! We have all of those things! Except riches, maybe. Just follow me, for N’Makto’s sake!” With that, Helmet Dweeb turned around and marched into the gate. Like actually marched. I hate Helmet Nincompoop. He’s a big loser.
We followed him into the walled village, and the doors were shut behind us by two others who looked exactly like Helmet Inferior. They also glared at us exactly the same.
“So, you are now under the authority of the West K’MIllar Authority. We are the TRUE inheritors to the legacy of the Kar Noxonorea Imperium, despite what all those other… *sniff* INFERIOR warlords of the east have to say.” Helmet Ignoramus turned around and clamped his legs together, turning his body into an upward plank position. “You will address me as First Lieutenant to the General Baktaaing, or otherwise First Lieutenant if you find yourself lacking the intelligence required to pronounce that many words. And NOTHING else. Understood? And especially do not make fun of my helmet!” Helmet Stupid said.
“Sure, man.” I said.
“Sure, dude.” Ryan said. Copycat.
“Good! I will now escort you to the questioning room, where we will employ our most advanced interrogation methods on you to find out where you came from! It shall be so swift and so sudden that you won’t suspect a thing!” Helmet Dumbass turned around and began marching towards a small shack that looked as if a strong gust of wind would blow it down. We followed.
Helmet, you know what, the lieutenant, marched on over to the rickety wooden door and swung it open. Me and Ryan went inside. In there, there was a table, and three seats, two of which were on the same side. The lieutenant took out a match and lit a lantern hanging from the ceiling, and gestured for us to take a seat. We did, but not before arguing with each other about which seat was better and who should get the better one, if there even WAS a better one.
“Heh heh. We have ways of making you talk, you know.” The lieutenant paced on his side of the room.
“Uh, when did we ever deny-”
“WHO DO YOU WORK FOR?” The lieutenant yelled. Me and Ryan cringed as spittle rained down on us.
“Dude, we will literally-”
“Fine! You leave me no choice.” He said forebodingly before reaching behind him and grabbed something on his back. When he drew his hand back, I saw that it was something I feared the most.
“No…” I said in disbelief.
“It can’t be…” Ryan also stared in horror.
“Yes, and it CAN be! This right here, is the master torture device!” He slammed the paper down on the table, face filled with malicious glee. “Mathematics!”
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” We wailed. This was gonna be a loooong interrogation.
. . .
Aris dropped the two lifeless guards to the ground. Holy FUCK, they had been stupid. She waltzed right up to ‘em, slashed their throats, and they only noticed that they were dying when she wiped the knife on her sleeve. FUCK!
Anyway, Aris climbed down from the wall she had just climbed over, and dashed off to the side. She heard the normal sounds of a town. Animals making their beastly noises, merchants scamming people out of their meager fortunes, and the occasional scuffle. As she further advanced into the town, she heard faint cries coming from a rundown shack. As she approached, she heard the FUCKING annoying voices of the two strangers. She tried her best to listen in.
. . .
“PLEASE I DON’T KNOW ANYTHING! EVEN HOW TO DO MATH!” I screamed.
“JUST ANSWER THE QUESTION! LOOK AT IT! THE NUMBERS, MAN! WHAT DO THEY MEAN?” The lieutenant shouted back in my face.
“I… I… AHHHHHHHHHHHH!'' I slumped in my chair, breathing heavily. “Fine, fine… the answer… I think the answer is two.”
I looked at the math question again. 1 + 1. I had never been that good at math.
“Good. Now, are you ready to tell me where you came from, or do I need to move on to subtraction?” The lieutenant slowly began to pull out another piece of paper.
“That’s not necessary!” I looked over at Ryan, who had passed out when he attempted to do subtraction. “Listen, I don’t know much. All I know is that my friend and I were transported to this place after a big white light engulfed us. I don’t know more than that dude. I swear.”
The lieutenant glared at me for a moment. “Hmmmmm… I believe you!” With that, he unchained me and Ryan, despite the chains having been so loose that we could’ve escaped whenever we felt like it. “Luckily for you, the General has a plan for you. I’ve contacted him via scrying, and we have-”
Just then, the ring on my finger, the one that translated words, glowed for a second, then dimmed, seeming less vibrant than before.
The lieutenant continued to speak, but his words didn’t make sense at all. It was like he was speaking a whole different language. Oh wait.
I motioned at my ring, and the lieutenant paused before rolling his eyes and tossing another one at him. I replaced my old ring, which seemed to have run out of batteries or something, and looked back up at the lieutenant and gave a thumbs up. Weird. The lieutenant’s ring didn’t seem to run out at all. Maybe he gave them worse rings.
“Right. Now, where was I? Ah yes. The General, with all his mercy and foresight, has a job for you. First of all, from this moment on, you are drafted into the General’s Kar Noxonorean Reclamation Army, or otherwise known as the NRA.”
“The WHAT?” I gasped.
“The NRA. What about it?”
“Nothing. Also, I don’t know if I consent to being drafted. The hippies changed that, all those years ago during Vietnam.”
“... I have no idea what those words mean. Anyway, you have been selected for a special operation. The General has many enemies, all of which stand in the way of the reclamation. He wants you, as the newest member of his army and therefore the most expendable, to go on a suicide mission and sabotage our current foes, the Repo Noxonorea Authority. They control one of the old mines that was used to make magical catalysts. It used to be the gem of the West Empire. Now, it’s been hijacked by these folks who seem to think that the people are able to make decisions on their own! Anyhow, you will die in the service of the great empire, Kar Noxonorea, and your name will be sung in the halls once the Great Feast commences, when our soldiers march victorious in the old capital.”
The lieutenant seemed to get teary-eyed at the thought of his old empire returning. I didn’t really care. The only country I owed allegiance to was the good ol’ US of A.
“I’ll do it, on some conditions.” I said. I wasn’t just gonna go on this life-threatening mission without some payment.
“SOME CONDITIONS!? This is the future of Kar Noxonorea we are talking about! The return of the empire that once ruled the world! And you want to negotiate!?” The lieutenant raged. If he reacted this way to him asking for a few favors, then I didn't want to see how he got when he learned of the concept of mercenaries.
“Yup. Transport out of this little backwater, and a map. Also, Ryan’s coming with me.”
“I- Well-... will you do the job if we give you these things?”
“Yeah. I’ll do it without dying too, just ‘cause I’m feeling nice.” I replied.
“Deal! Thank you for your service to the NRA, uh, glory to the NRA, uh, we love the NRA, oh whatever. Stay here. I’ll wake your friend.” The lieutenant walked into the back room, which was surprising there WAS a back room, considering the small size of the shack they were in.
He came back with a fistful of what looked suspiciously like cocaine in his hand, and flung it at the sleeping Ryan, who jerked awake as if hit by an electric shock.
“Ah! Goddamn! That’s some good stuff right there, man! Hey, hit me up again. I can take another. I did a tour in the Colombian Nationalists War, I can handle a lil’ bit of powder.” Ryan grinned. I facepalmed.
“Ah! You’re finally awake! Looks like that math did a number on you, eh? Anyway, you and your vagabond friend here have been drafted-”
“”No we haven’t.” I clarified.
“Whatever, voluntarily chosen to conduct an operation for the NRA.” The lieutenant explained. Ryan’s eyebrows shot up at the word NRA.
“The NRA? They’re here? Oh god, I need to hide my assault rifle! I put a bump stock on it, they sure won’t like that…” Ryan panickedly exclaimed.
The lieutenant looked at me in confusion before continuing. “The plan is simple…”
. . .
Aris crouched behind the shack as the door swung open, and the two FUCKers walked out, followed by some dumbass in a loose helmet. It was dark by now, as they had sat inside chatting about gods know what while in there. They were carrying their weapons, which Aris didn’t like. That would significantly complicate things, and she liked things nice and simple. FUCK!
She followed their path, trailing silently behind them as a shadow of her caliber should. Even if she was a shadow-for-hire, she still was the best in the Northwest.
Or she would’ve been if she was in the fucking Northwest.
No, instead she was here in this SHITHOLE with these fucking fuckers. FUCK!
Aris took a deep breath. She really had anger issues. FUCK!
Suddenly, the trio she was following came to a stop. She watched as they opened a gate leading out of town in front of them, revealing a pair of horses. Helmet Mother-fucking-fucker gestured at the horses, then waved them away. The two men clad in camouflage (again, strange outfit choice) looked at the horses, shrugged at each other, then hopped on their own respective steeds.
At first, it became clear that the two had no clue how to ride a horse. Aris decided this was her chance. But, as she slowly crept forward, the horses, for some reason, began to calm down. Aris looked at the one that she remembered being called Alan, and saw in his hand a carrot.
A fucking carrot.
Even Helmet Bitch looked surprised at the appearance of the carrot, and so did Alan. But, he went with the flow, and fed two carrots to the horses, one for each. From that moment on, Aris watched in horror as the horses immediately began cooperating, and then took off.
NO! Aris wasn’t going to lose this chance. Leaping forward, she grabbed Helmet Stinker, who was standing all proudly and brave as he watched the pair hoof it, and pressed her dagger against his throat.
Helmet Coward lost his posture and promptly began to beg for his life.
“Nononononono please don’t kill me I’ll do whatever you want just don’t kill me I don’t want to die…” He sobbed, and a wet puddle formed beneath his legs. Aris snarled in disgust.
“Get me a horse.” She ordered, and Helmet Clown obediently walked forward and led a horse over to her. She expertly climbed on top, fished out a low-quality catalyst from her bag, and used to cast a silencing spell, which used up most of her magical reserves. Damn, she was FUCKING HORRIBLE at magic. Then again, she had always had a practically bare minimum affinity for it. Really only good for detecting when magic is being used.
“Fucker.” She spat at the Helmet FUCKER, then rode off. He probably couldn’t have heard her due to the silencing spell, but she didn’t give two shits.
FUCK!