Samson had woken up in a daze, hurting all over. His return to consciousness wasn't exactly greeted by the warmest of sights, either, as a small yet thoroughly ravaged mouse looked down at him through her one milky eye. The small re-animated corpse smiled with as little flesh as she had left around her mouth and snout, a colorful woolen ear tied in place across the exposed skull with similar assorted bands of the colored yarn across her arms and legs, and anywhere else that the flesh had been worn away to an impractical degree.

"Ah, you're awake." Grace said, "You know, we're always glad to entertain guests down here, but I'd appreciate it if you took a less direct approach to reaching this place next time."

She had said virtually the same thing to me on first meeting, and clearly thought that it was an amusing remark. I wasn't in the most humorous of moods, however, and Samson? Well, he was all the less so, defaulting to overtly serious and easily annoyed, even in the best of times. As for Grace, she was the leader of a clan of undead mice which lived beneath the streets of the Makers city. They came to being through... through...

You know what? I've had a long day, and I'm very tired. I don't feel like explaining it. The logistics of it really don't matter. All that you need to know is that immortal, undead mice which live in the sewers and are destroyed by direct sunlight are, apparently, a thing. For some reason.

While not the most happy-go-lucky of fellows, Samson did get points for being quick to analyse and adapt to a situation. "Ugh..." He sat up from his place on the stone floor. This wasn't the sort of place which had an abundance of beds, seeing as how the primary denizens of it didn't sleep. "What happened to the others?"

"Jebediah is unharmed. Apparently Meryll grabbed hold of him just before they fell, and she broke his fall." I said, with a sigh. I wasn't standing far from the undead mouse, and had plenty of time to adapt to the unusual circumstances. "She was pretty badly injured in the process, though. She's expected to survive, but it looks like her fighting days might be over."

"I... see." the green garbed mouse said, rising unsteadily to his feet. "The fall would have likely hurt me a lot worse, too, but at the last minute I used my magic to try to protect myself. It seemed to work." He said, before looking to me with a curious expression. "How exactly did you survive the fall?"

"Um... I guess I just got lucky?" I said, nervously. It was, admittedly, not a very satisfying explanation, but it was the only one that I had. Aside from a few cuts and bruises, I came out of it largely unscathed.

"Right... right." He replied, stretching out his battered body. "What about the others? We weren't the only ones who fell, and can't be the only survivors." He expressed that last part with only a small degree of certainty.

"Some of the players fell alongside us." I said, "Neither Archibald or Reginald were among them, however. I don't know whether they were killed in the initial attack, were thrown clear, or fled."

Samson nodded.

"Many of them are still wounded, and quite a few severely. As for the rest, well..." I paused, uncertain of how to state the next part, "Well, they all kind of slinked away. They left this place without a word. There's no telling where they went, but I suspect their tour of duty has come to an end."

The one-eyed mouse nodded once again. That's when he noticed the bright red cap sitting atop the head of the small undead girl. "Pretty nice, huh?" She smiled, half her jawline made up of exposed bone. "Some of those friends of yours left them behind, and we figured we might as well keep them!"

"Right..." Samson repeated once again, although there was little sign that he was paying any real attention. Not that I could really blame him. He walked past the undead leader, legs still rather wobbly, clearly with no particular destination in mind. I had considered saying something, maybe trying to comfort him, but honestly, what would I say? He clearly needed some time. We all did. The problem was that I wasn't sure just how much of it we have left.

The many linked chambers were rather busy. This wasn't the sort of places where exciting things happened very often, so the walking corpse citizens were abuzz with excitement, and also maybe just a little bit of annoyance, seeing as how about half of their city was now either crushed or exposed to the elements. Medical treatment was still being offered to the many wounded, along with efforts to dig up the still trapped mice, whenever they could. Most of the buried people were of the undead variety, however, so their lives were in no danger. Quite the contrary, many who could still be contacted seemed to be enjoying their time within the small, enclosed spaces.

Some of the citizens were significantly less visually decrepit than others, these being the mages from the university who had chosen to live and study within this place. This, of course, happened a fair bit (well, technically only a couple of weeks, at most) before Mia had taken control of the place and turned it into an efficient machine which pumped out powerful spell casters. The newcomers had very much adjusted by this point, and the novelty of their appearance had largely worn out among the old-timers, but they were still a presence which could not be ignored. If nothing else, some of them had knowledge of medical treatment, which might not seem so impressive, but one must remember that a clan of immortals has no use for such a thing, and any experience with such matters held by the older residents had long since been forgotten.

Much as I had done earlier, Samson simply roamed about for a bit, in a likely futile effort to gather his thoughts. Hardly an hour had passed since the battle by this point, but it might as well have been a century, so far as we were concerned. Perhaps it was serendipity, or perhaps it was simply due to the fact that while these caverns were incredibly vast, only a small portion of them were significantly populated, and if one were to wander long enough, it was inevitable that you've cover every room and corner. It wasn't so long before he had encountered a familiar face.

"You... of all the people to run into, or course it had to be you." The one-eyed--mouse grumbled, unable to even work up the will to feel genuine contempt, as he looked to the mouse seated in the corner. A truly ancient thing, even if still a child compared to so many of those who dwelled within this place. At first glance, one might have taken him for another withered, wandering corpse, with his small, white eyes, thin, scraggly fur and trembling hands, but no, he was a common mortal mouse. Well, perhaps not quite so common. He was, in fact, quite the celebrity.

"Yes, me." He said, wearing a faint effort of a smile upon his gravity torn face. "It is good to see that you are still well, Samuel. You are hardly in a position to be dismayed by my presence here, however. I do live here, after all, and you were the one who dropped in through the ceiling, unannounced."

"I can assure you, it wasn't by choice." The one-eyed mouse grumbled once again.

"I had suspected as much, but could not be entirely certain." Rowan replied. "You have always did have a taste for the flamboyant, after all, and the idea that you had simply wished to make a dramatic entrance felt to be entirely within the realm of possibility. I see that you still dress like some manner of circus performer, as well."

"Oh, please. This outfit isn't even very elaborate. Just because you, like most other mages, have no idea how to dress yourself, doesn't give you the right to criticize me." Samuel sighed. "Nothing has changed. Even after all this time, you're still impossible to talk to."

"I am tempted to say that you never listened." The old mouse shrugged as best he could, "...but, I suppose that would not be very productive now, would it?"

"No. I suppose not." The one-eyed mouse said, "At least you remembered me this time."

"Vaguely." Rowan said with a clearly teasing smile, "And, perhaps you are right." The old mouse nodded. "I am hardly in a position to argue against choosing the road less traveled."

"Well, sometimes it's less traveled for a reason." Samson, also known as Samuel sighed, looking away.

"And yet here you are." Rowan said.

"I had nowhere else to go." The one-eyed mouse said.

"Now, now, we both know that is not true. There are more paths to take in life than there are stars in the sky. Even if you started this journey on a whim, you could have wandered off of it at any point, but you instead chose not to. You stayed along it, all this time."

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"And look where it got me." He growled at the old sorcerer, his earlier fatigue largely forgotten.

The old mouse simply nodded in response. "I am aware. Sadly, the world can be an unfair place. It doesn't always lead us to where it should, and our efforts don't always go rewarded."

"Don't always? Heh." Samson spat, "Don't ever, from my experience."

"It is very much unlike you to be so discouraged." Rowan said, "You are uninjured, which is more than can be said for many of your companions, and, so far as I can tell, you have lost nothing. If you deem this path to be a failed one, you have no reason to continue to walk it. Not so long ago, you were willing to risk the destruction of your entire kingdom for personal gain. Yet, now, you seem to be lamenting its potential downfall. What has changed?"

"Nothing has changed." Samson grumbled, "I just... I just don't like to lose."

"I can understand that. It's all the harder, too, when you have people who count on you."

The one-eyed mouse said nothing, turning away from his former mentor.

"They don't need me." He finally replied, "They never did. Even if I had never joined them in the first place, it wouldn't have made any difference."

"I find that rather difficult to believe. I can relate to that feeling, however. Looking back on my own journey, I, too, often wonder if I offered any real aid, or simply held young Jerin back." Rowan smiled once again, "But, of course I did. Just being there for others is something, and not a trivial something, either. Who is to say that things wouldn't have turned out far worse had you never decided to walk with the new hero?"

"How? How could things have possibly turned out worse?"

'You'd be surprised. Things can always be worse. Far easier than they can be better, sadly. That is also the way of things. But, I have taken up enough of your time as it is, and far too much of my own. Time is precious, and you shouldn't waste it on me. Not when you still have so much to do."

"And what, exactly, do I have to do?" Samson asked.

"You know better than I do. It is your life, after all. You can either see this road to its inevitable conclusion, or find a new path for yourself. As for which is the better option, that is for you to decide. You have always been one to do things your own way. This has always been both your greatest strength and your greatest weakness. It results in ambition, but also an unreasonable sense of expectation. You call me and those like me and old fashioned, but you, yourself, also have a very rigid perspective on things, and similarly demand that they work out in a very specific manner. Then, when the world fails to conform to your own personal standards, which it has the nasty habit of doing, for all of us, regardless of how reasonable those standards might be, you find yourself lost." The elderly sorcerer said, "Your magic is an excellent example of this."

"Oh, and your own magic is so powerful?" Samson scoffed.

"Oh, not at all. But the difference is that I was never disappointed by its lack of power. I saw it as a valuable ally, but in the end, its own independent energy. I made use of it as best I could, of course, but I knew that it didn't exist purely to serve me. It was a gift, one which I had no right to make demands of. You, on the other hand, even when you were but a child, only saw it as a weapon to be wielded, and it always destined to fall short of those expectations."

"Not all of us have the luxury of hiding away, and being able to rely on the strength of others." The one-eyed mouse glared at him. "Some of us need power to get by in this world."

The elderly mouse hmmed and slowly nodded. "Perhaps. But needing something and actually getting it are two very different things, and you know full well that one rarely entails the other. Wishing for something will not make it happen. Often even hard work will not, either. Sometimes instead you have to give up on what you want, and instead choose to make the best use of what you have. Perhaps the talents you were so blessed with were never meant for harming others, or making yourself more powerful."

"Oh, really? And what exactly are they meant for? Winning over peoples hearts with the power of friendship?" Samson grumbled.

"You joke, but that would be quite useful. But no, I suspect that wouldn't really fit your talents. All I'm saying is that you shouldn't be so quick to dismiss something as worthless or a failure just because it refuses to live up to your own rigid and lofty expectations. While you have always had difficulty believing it, you are not the center of the universe. None of us are truly qualified to judge the objective worth of things. We hardly have the right to judge anything to be a failure." Rowan looked up at his former student, "Especially not ourselves."

"So that's your advice? Just accept how awful everything is, and learn to deal with it?" The younger mouse folded his arms across his chest. "And how, exactly, would I do that? What, exactly, does accepting that you can't change the world entail in this situation?

"I have no idea." The old mouse shrugged, "All that I can tell you, is that if you still feel like you have something to fight for, you should fight with all you have. Not because others will judge you. I know full well that you have never been concerned with such things. It is because you will judge yourself, and you have always been your own harshest critic."

"Useless as always." The younger mouse sighed, "And here I thought it was only mouse women that were prone to lecturing me with vaguely philosophical life-lessons."

Rowan looked to him with a surprised and bemused expression. "Really? I wouldn't have thought Jerin to be the type."

"No, no, not her, I meant..." Samuel sighed once more, "Nevermind. It doesn't matter. But you're right. I've wasted enough time here. I should probably go find Jebediah." He paused, considering whether he should simply walk away, but he instead made an offer, "Perhaps you'd like to meet him as well? He's a little short on wits, but I guess he's not such a bad person. You've always had a soft spot for the simple-minded, anyways."

Rowan chuckled, "A tempting offer indeed, but I cannot." he said, "I am afraid that the months have finally caught up to me. My walking days are over."

Samson blinked, and was about to make an objection. Sure, the old mouse may have looked to be on the brink of death, but that was just his style. Rowan had looked much the same for as long as the younger mouse had known him, and likely significantly before. Within his seated position on the old, wooden chair, however, even through the blanket draped over the legs of the old sorcerer, it was clear that they were very thin. Far too thin.

"I... see..." the one-eyed mouse replied, uncertain of what to say.

"I an unsure of why you are so surprised." the old mouse said,

"I suppose I just figured that since you had looked the same for so long, that you'd remain healthy forever. That you'd be around forever." Samson replied, eyes still locked on the withered, covered legs.

"Hmm, well, I suppose that I still might be. As much as I hate to brag, I must say I've done quite a good job of it thus far, but it does feel increasingly unlikely these days." Rowan smiled once again, leaning forward with some effort. "All any of us can do is wait and see. Until a matter is truly finished, we can never say for certain how things will turn out. We might be able to make educated guesses, but the world is a funny place. Sometimes it has a way of surprising us."

"Yeah... I suppose that it does."

There was no drawn out, tearful farewell between the old master and student. They simply parted, never to meet again. It wasn't so long before he had met up with Jebediah. A normally inconspicuous individual, but even he managed to stand out among the general populace of this place, being among the few that lacked exposed bones. He simply stood, lightly swiveling the blade of his wooden scythe over his shoulder, staring off into nothing. Perhaps his head was filled with thoughts and worries, perhaps it was completely empty. As per usual, there was no real way to tell.

"I'm glad to see that you're okay." The farmer said without turning to face either myself of the one-eyed mouse.

"Yeah. Even aside from those of us who fell, most of us scattered. Most of us survived." Samson said. In truth, he didn't know this, no more than I did, but it was true, so far as he knew.

"Most. But not all." Jebediah replied.

"No. Not all." Samson answered back, earning a long sigh from the farmer. That was an even more obvious reality. It wasn't only one or two mice who had lost their lives in the onslaught, either.

"The shadow king said that my nickname suited me." Jebediah said, after a long pause, "In the end, I suppose he was right. Every step of the way, I was simply leading those poor fools to their deaths. At any time, however, I could have stopped it. I tried to pretend that I was being neutral, letting others make their own decisions, but they followed my completely unqualified example." He turned and gave a small, sad smile. "It's kind of funny. At some point along this journey, I don't know exactly when, I seemed to have convinced myself that maybe, just maybe, things would actually work out."

"Yeah." Samson said with a sigh. "I know what you mean."

"I didn't at first, of course. I was kind of just doing what others expected of me. I can't say that I regret that part, either. It was my choice, but I never should have taken anyone else along. Not you... definitely not poor Meryll. And then, time after time, I was given more and more opportunities to refuse the aid of others, but instead I welcomed them. I even went so far as to try to recruit strangers, knowing full well that I could be, would be, as it turns out, leading them to certain doom. Here, I was so worried about misusing my tools, of becoming some sort of avatar of death, and yet, in the end, that is exactly what I ended up becoming. And who knows? Perhaps had I been able to meet the shadow king mouse to mouse, without the looming threat of violence from an army at my back, things could have turned out differently."

"You know that isn't true." I interjected. "Mollenoch and his forces have been on the warpath for a long time now. You said yourself earlier that mere words weren't going to change his mind. That isn't your fault."

"Perhaps. Still, we'll never know for sure, will we?" Jebediah said, looking forward once again, into the dark path ahead, where he began to slowly walk.

"Where are you going?" I asked him.

The farmer simply shrugged in response, looking back to me with a little hint of a smile, even if not a particularly happy one. "Isn't it obvious?" He said to me, "I'm going home."

Both myself and Samson looked to one another before following along behind. Neither of us knew exactly what the words entailed, but that hardly mattered. In the end, it was the only place that we could go.