Shara ran up a set of invisible stairs, leapt over a spiked thrust between a web of magically suspended chain, and then jerked her arm hard the other way, pulling the flail’s fist in to collide with the side of the monster’s head.

WHOMP, power exploded at the impact – so satisfying – and the thing flipped over sideways.

All things considered, it was going pretty well.

She wasn’t dead yet. Tel wasn’t dead yet. And the Tailcoat who seemed to be on their side – for the moment – wasn’t…

Okay, maybe he was dead. Lying face first on the ground wasn’t a good sign.

“Damn,” Shara grumbled and drew her arm back and then snapped it forward again. The motion was, in a way, unnecessary. The chain was long enough to wrap around the room several times – and already encircled them all at least twice over – and her magic directed its unstopping momentum.

Like a runaway cart, when Shara had unleashed the weapon, the fist flew forward with no sign of stopping, and with a force well beyond what she could ever put behind it. The weapon’s magic carried the fist, while the chain grew and grew, no end in sight. Even better, maybe because it was shaped like her fist, it also acted like her fist, and she channeled her magic through it to create a surface for it to ricochet off of.

One of the creatures stumbled towards the prone Tailcoat who twitched and pushed himself up – maybe not quite dead yet, but he would be if she didn’t do something. The question was, did she want to? The only reason a Tailcoat was there was because he’d been following them. Which meant he was probably at the enclave.

Then again – Shara took a quick look at the sheer number of the monsters already in the room, along with the scratching at the walls like many more wanted in – having an ally couldn’t hurt.

“Damn again,” she said, spinning on her heel and cutting the hilt in her hand left then right. The gesture still wasn’t necessary, but it did help her visualize where she wanted the weapon to go, and the unstoppable fist hit a plane of pink energy to ricochet off and hit a second pink plane. From there it was a straight shot right into the center of the chest of the monster standing over the Tailcoat.

Another satisfying whomp – she could get used to that – and the thing flew back as the top-hat-wearing fop got to his feet and lifted his sword.

“Thanks, I owe you one,” he said, and something in his eyes shimmered metallic, while silver light sheathed his blade.

So, that’s the Trance I’ve heard so much about. I wonder…

The Tailcoat vanished and reappeared off to her right, his sword-arm a blur as blood exploded off one of the creatures in wide arcs that painted the others nearby a grisly red. A blink and he was gone, no, behind the same creature, that wicked sword carving the beast up like a turkey.

“Just you remember that when you start thinking about killing us later,” she said flatly, but two of the ugly creatures charging at her from opposite sides demanded her attention.

Fast and durable, the things were hard to put down, but they weren’t very smart, and the weapon she’d found from the Escalation Wars – if what Tel said was true – could do the job, with enough hits.

Another quick glance at the Tailcoat to make sure he wasn’t blinking in front of her with that sword, and she did a quick twirl in the air. Around and around she went on her tip toe, lifting the weapon up and down the length of her body so that the chain spun to encompass her like an ever-moving cocoon.

Clang, clang, the chain blocked the stabbing arms that came for her – maybe the weapon was alive, the way it always seemed to be in just the right place – and Shara turned her attention to the flying fist. She’d purposely let it keep soaring back and forth while she’d run, jumped, and done her best to delay the creatures. Now, who knows how long after they’d burst into the room, nothing but her, and maybe that crazy Tailcoat, would be able to move far without having to duck or jump the constantly moving chain.

And if they didn’t avoid it, like a creature behind her found out in a bloody spray, it’d saw right through flesh. Ouch.

Clang, another impact on the chain right by her legs drew her eyes back to her immediate problem, and she poured her magic into the weapon. Pink butterflies landed on the hilt, vanishing in a heartbeat, and consecutive pink flashes across the room redirected the fist back in her direction.

“You might want to duck,” she said to the creature as she looked at it between the spiraling chain. Whomp, and it was gone, as was the other one that’d been standing right beside it. “Guess not,” she said with a shrug, then climbed straight up, like she had a ladder, and out the top of the chain cocoon.

The instructions mentioned she could dispel the chain and recall the fist with a command, but that would remove all of the chains. Including the ones she’d put in front of Tel to try and dissuade the creatures from going after him. So far, it’d worked, and they were far more eager to try and catch up to her.

“Look out, it’s one of the twitchers,” the Tailcoat shouted at her – Why was he on the ground again, and pale? – and pointed towards the door.

Shara followed the gesture to find one of the creatures standing just inside the room, but unlike the others, that was all it was doing. Standing. Just standing. Okay, and maybe twitching like the Tailcoat said. So?

Then, just like the Tailcoat had done, the creature vanished and appeared right in front of her – in the air – its spiked arm jabbing straight for her. Shara tried to react, but the thing was simply too fast, and she barely moved her arm before the Tailcoat’s back also materialized between her and the creature.

Clang, and gravity pulled both the Tailcoat and the monster back to the ground, arms and sword flashing faster than she could see. They battled there below her for long seconds before the twitcher vanished and the Tailcoat swung at nothing but air.

Spinning around, he pointed his sword across the room, then promptly dropped straight to the ground as one of the pulses washed over him.

“Uh, you okay?” Shara asked, but her attention was on the stationary twitcher. Why wasn’t it attacking?

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“Been…better…” the Tailcoat said, back on his feet but looking like he’d run a marathon and really needed to vomit.

“Well, I hope you can…shit,” Shara said as she caught sight of one of the creatures push its way through the chains she’d put in front of Tel. Flesh tore off in great gobs and painted the floor red as the thing crawled out the other side, its legs useless, but its spiked arms still just as dangerous.

“You hope I can shit…?” the Tailcoat asked.

“Just…wait,” she said, flicking her wrist left, up, right, left, and then down hard to slam the fist into the crawling creature from straight above. The satisfying whomp smeared the creature in a wide circle and cracked the stone floor, but then the fist didn’t have anywhere to go, and it stopped.

She’d read something about what would happen if it stopped…what was it?

The fist vanished, along with all the chain in the room, to reappear at the end of the cudgel in her hand.

“Was that supposed to happen?” the Tailcoat under her asked.

“No, that was not supposed to happen,” she snapped as several of the creatures finally seemed to notice Tel and the clock. No time for anything fancy, Shara flung her arm forward, the fist detaching from the cudgel and silver chain magically appearing link after link.

“Where are you even aiming?” the Tailcoat asked as Shara’s chain-whip shot far wide to the left of all the creatures.

“Right there,” she mumbled back, channeling her magic through the weapon. The rocketing fist hit a pink pane of energy and abruptly changed its angle to shoot straight right, and directly into the side of the first monster. With a whomp, the fist took the creature clean off its feet and slammed it into the one right next to it. That took those two out of the picture for the moment, but it still left far too many.

“No matter what happens, we have to protect…” Shara started.

“Tel!” the Tailcoat shouted. “Look out!” And then he promptly flopped over as another wave of energy rolled out from the metal poles. Luckily, that same wave staggered the creatures in the room, a few of them simply exploding if they were caught by overlapping pulses, and gave the Clocksmith a chance to get his weapon up after the warning.

The pink ball of death slammed into the closest creature, hurling it back in a spray of blood, and Shara brought her whip’s fist in to take care of the next in line.

“You dead?” she called down at the Tailcoat, her attention firmly on picking off or slowing down the creatures moving towards Tel – whose name the Tailcoat knew. And just why was that?

“Feeling like I might be,” the Tailcoat said. “But I’ve got time until the next pulse,” he added, then vanished, the cracking stone where he’d been standing the only sign he’d even been there.

But he didn’t appear over by Tel.

Where…?

Shara jerked her arm left, pause, right, taking two more creature’s out of the fight for the moment, then glanced around the room. Ah, there he is.

Blinking in and out of sight like they were teleporting – Can Tailcoats actually teleport? – the Tailcoat and the twitcher flashed around the room. Sword met spiked arm every time they appeared, but neither one seemed to be getting the advantage.

Was there something she could do to help? If that twitcher finished off the Tailcoat, what hope would she or Tel have? No, they were moving too randomly and too fast.

Beside the door, the Tailcoat ducked the spike. Vanish – beside the poles he countered but came up short. Vanish – right beside Tel the Tailcoat parried both spikes. Vanish – against the far wall the Tailcoat landed a kick beside the grotesque chest-mouth.

Vanish.

No, only the monster vanished!

“Look out!” Shara shouted as the Tailcoat stood still, the creature appearing a few steps behind him. Both spikes raised for the kill against the unprotected tuxedo back, the thing took a step forward to run the stupid man through.

Until the pulse of energy hit it, and it staggered to the side, shaking its head like it’d taken a haymaker to the chin.

“Just. Die!” the Tailcoat shouted, moving like greased lightning. Sword darting in and out so fast it was little more than flashes of reflected pink light, he tore into the defenseless twitcher. Flesh fell off bone, blood painted the wall, and Shara actually turned away as her stomach came up into her throat.

Disgusting. Impressive… but holy shit disgusting.

“Tel, are you done yet?” Shara shouted, her flying fist cracking into the knee of the closest creature. A ricochet, pink flash, another ricochet, and she took out the other knee too, crippling the monster and dropping it to the floor. Still, there were too many, and more still coming into the room. Just where had they all come from? And, even if Tel got the clock working, would it make a difference?

“Yes,” Tel shouted.

“Well hurry up and finish… wait… yes?” she shouted while dancing back from a pair of creatures that had snuck up on her. Apparently, they weren’t used to fighting something above them – most people weren’t – and their thrusts were awkward and easy to dodge. Still, more were coming her way, and she backpedaled further up into the air and out of reach.

A quick cut of her wrist – whomp­ – and one of the creatures was gone.

“One second… there!” Tel shouted, and chaos butterflies burst out of the grandfather clock like a solid pink river. The pink curved up to the ceiling, spiraling around, and then separated into streams like they were following a predetermined path. Rushing towards the metal poles, the butterflies fell like waterfalls across the tall spikes, swarms of them touching the metal all at once.

In response, consecutive waves erupted out of the poles faster than Shara’s racing heart. All at once, the scene in the room changed. Monsters burst like overripe melons, pop…pop..pop.poppoppop, and the thing extending out of the portal let out another of its painful screams.

Hands at her ears, Shara still couldn’t block out the sound that felt like it was literally clawing at the inside of her head.

“Aaaaaaaaaaaargh,” she screamed back, anything to reduce the pain, but cut off as she hit the stone floor, the air rushing out of her lungs from the impact. A cough, a gasp for air, and she curled up on herself on the floor. She couldn’t… she couldn’t… breathe…

Her lungs spasmed in her chest, grasping for air, but they weren’t getting enough, and their feeble efforts were like needles.

Blarg, she vomited out the contents of her stomach, like her body thought that would somehow make room for more air, and half-digested meat-pie sat in a rank line in front of her face.

What a waste.

“Breathe,” a voice said beside her. “Just calm down and take deep breaths. You took a nasty fall.”

Easy for you to say, her brain said flatly, though her mouth couldn’t form the words. Wait, if she could hear somebody, that meant the portal-monster wasn’t screaming anymore. Did they do it?

Shara twisted her head to look away from the meat-pie, and her watering eyes settled on the blurry portal at the center of the room. Maybe it was her imagination, or the lack of air getting to her brain, but it seemed smaller.

“Shara! Shara, are you okay?” another voice said. That one was Tel’s… which meant the first had to be the Tailcoat. Was it good or bad he’d survived? Well, he didn’t see to be trying to kill her yet…

“Tel, she’ll be fine. She just needs a minute,” the other voice said.

“A… Anad…? What are… you doing here? And why are you… wearing… that?” Tel asked.

“It’s a long story, Tel, but it’s good to see you again,” the other voice, Anad, said.

“Maybe… not the best place… for… long stories,” Shara gasped out, the pain in her chest finally easing. When was the last time she’d lost control of her magic already up in the air? Wait, her stopwatch, was it…?

A new type of pain filled Shara’s chest as she fumbled with the chain around her neck and fished the stopwatch out of her shirt. The metal was slightly warm in her fingers, but it didn’t look damaged.

“Tel… Tel…” she said, holding the stopwatch weakly away from her.

“It’s fine, Shara. Maybe another small dent, but it doesn’t look broken. I’ll take a look at it later,” Tel said.

“The lady – Shara? – has a point though. Maybe we shouldn’t stay here,” Anad said.

“I fixed the clock as best I could, but it’s probably a good idea,” Tel said.

“Great. Can you walk now?” Anad asked, and a strong hand under Shara’s arm helped her to her feet.

“I could run if I needed to,” Shara said more confidently than her lungs felt.

“Good, you may need to,” Anad said, turning his attention back to the center of the room.

Shara and Tel both followed his gaze to find a sideways eye with a multicolored iris the size of a wagon-wheel staring out of the portal back at them.

“Right. Going. Now,” Shara said, and the three of them headed for the door without taking their eyes off the… eye.