11) A burning sensation

Several things happened in rapid secession.

The skeletons drew two and a half swords. The one in front of Erin had its blade snap off as it drew it from its metal plated sheath which was in better shape than the other two's. Still on fire, but otherwise still firm enough to break off a rusting blade.

Sandra screamed, "Protect me!" Which was a blessing. On us, for protection.

Rob waved his hand at Captain Bernard which made the blowtorch vanish from his undead hand. Which made Bernard give his hand a look of disbelief before he turned his head back to glare past me and shake his fist. Probably at Rob.

It would have been nice if Rob waited until Bernard was in the middle of a fight to throw his off when he tried to use the blowtorch. But it was still a good move on Rob's part, plus it freed him up to do something else rather than just wait around for the chance to mess with the undead captain

With the barrel of my rifle a whole seven inches away from the skull of the undead guy trying to rush me. I managed to blow off most of his head with one shot. I'm sure the fire which had taken him down a fourth of his health bar helped. But one shot, one kill was doing pretty good for me.

Kev parried his opponent’s blade to the wall and held it pinned while he kicked it in the pelvis on the other side. Knocking it into the wall as well and throwing it completely off balance.

Sue meanwhile grabbed her opponent by the shoulders as it looked down at the broken blade it was brandishing in front of it. Then she head bunted it down to a narrow strip of red on its health bar before lifting it a few feet off the ground by its shoulders with its burning coat clutched in her hands before tossing it back into the crowd behind it.

Nice. But I hoped she had been counting on Sandra's blessing to keep from burning herself, rather than just getting lucky.

Then I lucked out as a Hunkey leaped over the one I had put down. I tried and failed to swing the stock of the rifle forward to knock it back. But it got past the rifle, wrapped its arms and legs around my right leg, and bit down on the side of my hip.

One. That hurt, a lot. Two. I said I was lucky because at least it wasn't an on fire Hunkey. And three. I realized I couldn't see my health bar to tell if and when I needed to heal myself in a fight.

Maybe if I glanced up? But not right at this moment. "Falling back, need a..." I didn't have time to say assist as Rob swung a conduit bender of all things into the Hunkey. Once, then twice before its health bar ran out and I was able to shake it loose.

Sue side kicked another skeleton into the wall as it tried to follow the Hunkey and slapped aside a blade coming at her aside. Kev was slowly hacking his off balance one down bit by bit. He wasn't killing anything all that quick, but he was keeping his lane plugged up.

Rob stepped up to my place and I was turning to ask Sandra how bad off I was when a burning bench came tumbling through the air above us. Sue ducked it which meant it slammed into Sandra. Catching her with a corner on her head and knocking her down with nearly half her health gone.

As well as knocking her out cold. Evidenced by her crown vanishing along with its light. I didn't know if her blessing was gone as well.

If her blessing was in effect, then healing her to consciousness to get her to put up another one was vital. But if it lasted as long as she was alive, then there wasn't much point in healing her.

We could see just fine by the light of the burning undead and once she cast her blessing… Well frankly, she didn't have anything else to contribute to the fight. So why waste my healing on her when I could heal a fighter that could make a difference in if we lived or died?

But I apparently stood too long over her crumpled form since Stist asked. "Arn't you a healer."

I looked at her and pointed up above my head. “How far am I down?”

The lizard woman looked up, "You're down a quarter. Are you going to heal her?"

I sneered at her and jerked my rifle over at the fight. "None of your concern. Get over there and be ready to replace someone if they have to fall back." Then I looked down at Sandra. "Lister, heal her head wound until she wakes up and then a bit more to make sure she's can tell what's going on."

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As my spirit dealt with that. I took advantage of having a fairly sound, if slightly on fire. bench to have a place to stand on. At least after I set it upright, and then I would be able to shoot over the heads of my team.

Bonus. The bench had been burning mostly on the bottom, so I would have time to get off at least a few shots before my legs started to really burn. Sandra let out a groan and began to look around as I climbed up.

As I began to line up a shot on Bernard, I asked. “Is your blessing still up?” She groaned but still answered. "Yeah, we're good." Dam, I could have let her recover on her own. "Then make yourself useful." I took my shot at the skeleton captain and missed as one of his way past scurvy crew stepped in the way and took a shot that put it down to a quarter of its health. "Grab the metal drink bottle from my bag and try to put out the fire on this bench."

I felt the tug on my bag as I took another shot and completely missed. But at least I had Bernard's attention as he picked up another bench and flung it at me.

Ducking down saved me from getting brained, but it made me lose my balance. I ended up having to sort of half fall half step down from the bench.

Rob backed out of the fight with a deep stab in his ribs, and Stist jumped right in. As badly as he was hurt, Sue was still in the fight and down a third. "Sorry Rob. Lister go heal Sue!"

Rob looked around, then nodded at me in agreement. Then looked behind me with his eyes going wide.

I whipped around to see Erin with her eyes gone solid black, shimming her hips back and forth as she waved her hands around in front of her and above her head. What…? You know, never mind, as long as it wasn't something coming up behind us like I was worried about, let her do whatever she was up to.

Then I looked back and saw the zipper on Sue's duffle bag that she had dropped to the floor open up from the inside. Long white finger bones that ended in sharp points pushed the zipper wider to let out the small but long naga like skeleton that began to emerge from the bag, and emerge, and emerge until its entire tail was free and it began to slither forward with a warning from Erin. "Sue! Keep 'em spread for something long and hard!"

The orc girl still jumped a bit as the naga skeleton slithered between her legs and grabbed one of her opponents in passing, but she still managed to take advantage of her opponent being pulled off balance to land a deadly punch to its mid sternum. Punching through the bone with a crack to put it down it.

As I climbed back up to my bench I could hear Erin explain that "I can't animate the ones already up and the ones who are down are too damaged. I don't have many magic points left. But I'm going to use a healer vial and use what magic I got left to heal the cuts on you."

I assumed that was directed at Rob as I tried for another shot at Bernard who was running back across the room to the door in the back. As he paused to do something with the to it, I managed to nail him in the back of his head, dropping him nearly a full health bar down. He shot me a look as he finished with the door pushing it open before commanding. "Frick, frack. Get out here and kill some people."

Great, reinforcements. Team breather had taken down about half the undead, whose remains were giving the rest of them poor footing. While we were outnumbered from the start, the skeletons were going down pretty easily. At least the ones Sue was hitting. Kev and Stist seemed to be more focused on first not getting killed. Then second, holding the undead in place. This meant they were both slowly stepping back which would soon leave Sue exposed.

I only had two shots left and unknowns coming into the room. But what good would the two shots do us if Sue went down?

Jumping forward off the bench again I yelled "Kev, on your left." Our captain leaned right giving me enough space to stick my rifle forward enough that I didn't have to worry about hitting either him or Sue. My shot passed through the ribs of the one in front of me, but it caught a shoulder bone for enough damage to finish it off. Then I lifted the rifle over Sue's head while calling out. "Stist, on your right."

The former Corsair didn't seem to really understand what I meant, but at least she wasn't distracted by the rifle suddenly pointing past her. She did flinch when it fired but followed up my shot with an overhead swing at the not quite dead again undead's skull. Dropping it as well.

Several shuffling forms began to press forward into the open spots, Kev stepped up on his own, but I had to push the lizard woman into place. "Fill the gap. Hold it so you don't expose Sue!"

I heard an "Oh no." from behind me. Turning around I saw Sandra on my bench looking over the top of the fight. Glancing down at me she pointed forward. "Remember those two carvings on the side of the entrance?"

The two giant undead apes weren't quite tall enough to see over the crowd, but I could see the tags over their heads.

Mongeys. Then below that, Heavies. In red of course.

Maybe I should have held my shots… Or brought the shotgun.

Rob had grabbed the other bench that had been thrown over the crowd and was running forward, holding it by the nonburning end with both hands as he threw it with a yell and enough force to clear the entire fight and send it tumbling along the floor well short of Captain Bernard and his two ape like reinforcements.

Who both flinched.

Unlike the others who had rotted away to bare bones. Those two looked to have just dried up. But on the other hand, they were fairly large and were in a room filled with launchable, burning, furniture. I did not want to be on the wrong end of an old Donkey Kong game.

“On the word step, take a step back. One, two, step!”

Stist was a half step behind, but Kev was on the ball. Rob grabbed Sue by the hair and guessed right when he had to yank her back and yell. "Move! On "step", step back. Step!"

Slowly we backed down the tunnel, tempting not only the two Mongeys down the hall but from the look of it Captain Bernard behind them. Even if we didn't suck him into the fight in the long tunnel, he wasn't going to be throwing anything above the heads of the two towering gorilla like undead monsters.

Kev yelled out. "Hey Bram, you know what would have been really helpful with two giant flammable apes? A flaregun.'

Sometimes the guy just gets to me. Even enough to make me waste my breath in the middle of a fight. "You would have used them all by the time we got here!"

I could just hear him admit "Fair enough" I heard Bernard begin yelling, "What the hell! Get off me!'

Which was fairly confusing until I hear Erin yelling behind me. "Yes, Glitter for the win! You get him, girl!" Oh, her skeleton. Good, keep him tied up, at least until he commands the two big apes to tear it off of him and to pieces.

As Kev finally finished slowly killing his undead opponent he called, "Stepping out" and dragged the body of the otherwise motionless skeleton with him by a nonburning part of its baldric belt. I jumped into his spot stocking bunting the skeleton trying to rush forward back with a hard thrust of the rifle stock.

I was really hoping Kev was going to do what I was guessing he would. A moment later my trust in him was rewarded with a bench leg wrapped in burning big pirate coat cloth went flying over the fight and caught a dried up undead Mongey in the face before falling out of sight.

Just in time as Bernard began to command the two of them, "Frick, frack, get this thing off of me.