The ground rushed up to meet me, and I was suddenly unable to breathe or move. The music faded in my ears, replaced with a high pitched ringing. When the air whooshed back into my lungs, I was numb all over. Then the pain charged in, following suit. 

 

I looked up. My eyes were blurry. It was all a bright orange glow. I was wet. Was I bleeding? There was a lot of wetness. No, I’d fallen into a shallow pool. Probably the reason I wasn’t dead. 

 

Faces. Lots of faces were on me now as I pulled myself to my feet. I tried to cover my eyes but my arm wouldn’t move. I looked down to find my left one just hanging there, a floppy noodle. That’s when the pain in my shoulder washed over me like a raging cat-bull. 

 

“There he is,” boomed a voice from the crowd. Unable to breath from the pain, I looked up to find Gooch pushing her way through the quieting crowd towards me. “My prize,” she said, shoving two hucks to the ground to get to me. She looked around at confused faces. My face was the most confused of all. “For winning! I won me a human man toy.” She produced a whip and cracked it. I flinched, wide-eyed, and so did the other’s around me. “Well come on then, man toy!” She shouted at me behind clenched teeth. “Before they catch wind of your—”

 

“What is that?” said a huck, sniffing the air. 

 

“This human is … different,” said another. 

 

“I want to touch him,” said a third. 

 

“I want to … to … FUCK HIM!” 

 

Gooch cracked her whip again, waved the letter from Kaylisex at me, and shouted. “Hurry! Follow me!” 

 

The pain in my shoulder was agony, but I knew if I stayed around any longer I’d be shredded dick meat. I ran after Gooch who was cracking her whip left and right, clearing space for us to hustle through the crowd. 

 

The hucks behind me snapped, the lust magic kicking into full effect, and came charging after me. We cut through the hucks, picking up Jovi and Rova along the way. Jovi quickly tried to explain that Gooch was on our side now, and she was going to get us out of here, but I’d already picked up on that. 

By the time we climbed on top of the rock platform, recently used as a rape-wrestling stage, we had hucks closing in on us from all directions. Some had been stung by my curse. You could almost see the progression of emotions clicking in on their faces. It went from “what the fuck’s going on?” to “What’s that feeling inside me?” to mindless, horny, cum-starved zombies all in a matter of seconds as I passed by. Most, however, who were not in proximity to me, were just curious why everyone else was chasing after us, so they joined in. 

 

“There’s another exit that way,” said Gooch, grabbing a torch from a huck’s hand and jumping off the stage into an empty void. She ran towards a dark tunnel. 

 

We followed Gooch into the darkness, hot on her heels. I held my limp arm, gasping for breath between the surges of pain that followed every step. Hucks hollered and cursed and pleaded for me as they pursued.

 

Breezy showed up, zipping past my head. As we approached a cluster of boulders, I saw a huck grab Rova’s ankle. Rova turned, activating her soothe magic. The huck let go and fell into a crack in the rock, a big, pleasant smile on her face. 

 

Gooch climbed up onto a flat surface, turned around, and offered her hand to me. I gave her my good one and she yanked me upwards. I turned around to help Jovi up. She grabbed my limp hand and inadvertently popped my shoulder back into its socket. I let out a scream and nearly fell over the edge. But I held on, and pulled her up. And then she fell on top of me. We gasped together, our faces inches apart, before scurrying back to our feet. 

 

“It’s just up there,” yelled Gooch, snapping at a huck climbing over the edge. Then snapping at another. “Run!”

 

She didn’t need to tell me twice. Jovi, Rova, Breezy, and I booked it as fast as we could towards the small pin prick of light in the distance. I tripped three, four times as I chased that light. It grew, bigger and bigger, brighter and brighter, until it became an obvious exit, a huge hole in the side of the cave. It opened up into a vast meadow. 

 

To our left, the meadow dropped off onto a sheer cliff. Straight ahead, beyond the meadow, was a tree line. The entrance to an ancient forest. From where I was, it was nothing more than a green thread on the horizon. We didn’t have much in the way of a plan, other than get away from these crazy dick-wielding horn-dogs chasing us, so we sprinted through the meadow. 

 

It was nearing nightfall now. The sun had a good three hours left in the sky, maybe, before it called it a night. As I ran, I turned back to find Gooch sprinting out of the cave and into the meadow. That crimson beauty was fast as hell. After about thirty seconds, hucks started pouring out of the cave like ants from a hill. 

 

We ran and ran and ran and ran. For a good ten minutes all we did was sprint towards that nearing forest, slowly growing in the distance. My heart was pumping so hard, my throat sore. I contemplated stopping. What would happen if they caught up to us? Would they kill everyone and take me as their collective sex slave? The thought made me push harder. I looked back over my shoulder. They were gaining on us. When I turned back, however, I found Jovi and Rova sliding to a stop. I nearly slammed into their backs. 

 

“What the … why did you st …” my out of breath question fell flat as I looked to my right, huffing and puffing. A bit further down the tree line, figures were coming out of the forest, emptying out into the meadow and running towards us. 

 

“The fuck you kids stop for?” shouted Gooch, sliding to a halt behind me. 

 

Jovi pointed to the mass of creatures. Goblins by the look of it. Hundreds of them, all green and ugly speeding towards us. I squinted. There was something in the middle of the group. Something big. A creature carrying a person on its back. 

 

“Oh no,” said Jovi. “A lust magic tracker,” she said softly. 

 

I huffed, looked back at the hucks gaining on us, bent over and put my hands on my knees. “A What?” I said. 

 

“I can sense the spell,” said Jovi. “I’ve made one of those devices before. Tried to at least, they require extremely complicated spell formulas. And …” 

“The fuck you talking about, elf?” said Gooch.

 

“That person over there! She’s tracking someone she’s lusting for. She’s—”

 

“Ah shit,” said. “Fucking Rita!”

 

“What the hell do we (huff, huff) do?” said Rova. “We can’t make it to the forest before they intercept us.”

 

“And we sure as fuck can’t go back,” said Gooch, pointing her thumb over her shoulder to the nearing hucks. 

 

I turned and looked at the cliff to my left. Below and beyond it stretched for hundreds of miles. There was another forest down there. A mountain range in that direction. No way we would survive the drop.

 

Breezy landed on my shoulder. My good shoulder. And for a moment, we simply stared at each other. 

 

Then my eyes went wide. 

 

“Breezy!” I said. “You can get us out of here! Your wind magic. You can—”

 

“I can’t, Jak. Remember. I need a full day for the magic to recharge.” But then her eyes went wide. “Wait,” she said, and fluttered up in front of my face. “I have something even better!” 

 

“What?” I said. 

 

Breezy flew up into the air. “Run to the edge,” she said, pointing to the precipice. “All of you, run, hurry, go!”

 

We all looked at each other. We were flanked on both sides. We had probably a good ten heartbeats left before both sides were upon us. 

 

Jovi and Rova ran toward the edge. Gooch let out a litany of curse words and followed. 

 

“Go,” said Breezy, to me, then pulled out her magic feather pen. I did, and as I came to a halt, I turned to find Breezy drawing a horizontal line in the air about waist high. The line curved in a semicircle around us and stretched for a good twelve paces. The line was so thin, it looked like a long strand of hair caught in the wind. 

 

When Breezy dematerialized her pen, it came to me what she was doing. The fae flew to the center of the line. With goblins approaching from one side and hucks on the other, Breezy pried open the line, opening a void of loaded, high pressure water. 

 

What followed could only be described as a wet explosion. Water didn’t just pour out of the void, it came jetting out so fast that it cut the first ten rows or so of creatures clean in half, hucks and goblins alike. 

 

And it just kept coming and coming and coming, its speed never slowing. The sound of it like a … well like a rushing river, loud and never yielding.

 

“Well, fuck me,” said Gooch, standing by an awe struck Jovi and Rova, a few steps away. Making an effort to keep her distance from me. 

 

“You know,” said Breezy, zipping over to me. “There’s a squirting orgasm joke made here, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.” 

 

“I fucking love you,” I said, then collapsed to my knees.