Arc 3 Part 3-1

As we approached city limits, Emily said, “the best thing we can do right now is get close to Clint Bower. He likely doesn’t know anything about us but he’ll know the most about what

Alabaster and Kaiser are up to.”

“What do you suggest?” I asked, as the city was in plain view now. Everything had an early 1900s feel to it. The architecture was quaint and so were the citizens walking about. It felt like an H.G. Wells' novel meets The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Emily did an excellent job of getting us to blend in. In addition to the outfits, we wrapped Arduwan’s sword in fabric and Wraith hid his daggers in his bag. I opted to just rely on my magic until the situation called for weapons. This was just espionage for the moment. “There’s a club that he hangs out at downtown. I’m gonna try and score a date with him.”

She seemed so confident.

“If I can get him drunk and talking,” she continued, “maybe he can let me know what he’s financing for them and where to find them.”

“Is that safe? For you to get that close to him?” I asked.

“Oh yeah. Don’t worry. Bower is a push over. He’s a spoiled rich kid and a light weight. I’m pretty sure after two or three drinks even I could kick his ass if he got too handsy.”

We were now walking along a cobblestone road. Towering buildings surrounded us and steam powered cars chugged alongside. Soon we found ourselves in front of a large, five story building, draped in red tapestry. The Arliss. A boutique hotel at the center of downtown Brasshaven. Emily had stayed here the majority of her time scouting ahead for us while we were in Callist.

Arduwan and Wraith’s room were on the second floor. Emily had specifically chosen a fifth floor room so she could get a good look of the street from her window. I brought my bag up to the room and dropped it on the bed. It was daytime so the room was naturally lit with the curtains open. It was a nice place. Probably the nicest hotel I’d stayed at in any world, including my own. There were long halogen light bulbs along the wall, oak furniture, and red linens to match the overall aesthetic of the building.

Emily walked in behind me with her hands behind her back. She only partially closed the door before asking, “So, are you okay staying together this time? Or do we need a locked door between us again?”

“Haha, very funny,” I said, “it’s not like it’s a leisure trip anyway.”

I sat down on the bed and put my face in my palms. Emily came over and sat next to me. She put her hand on my back to comfort me.

“Hey,” she said, “it’s okay. You’ve been going through a lot. I’ve had it easy here compared to what you must’ve gone through in Callist.”

I sighed deeply and replied, “It wasn’t that bad. The place can grow on you. It’s just that…I was so sure we had a way to get Anabel and Stephanie back. But just like Higgins, she’s gone forever. I mean, I’d finally gotten over the two of us as a couple. But she’s still one of the best friends I’ve ever had. And poor Anabel. Just when things were starting to brighten her up and she had adjusted to life in my world.”

I held back my tears once again.

“She’ll be okay,” Emily consoled, “She’s pretty tough underneath it all. If we live through this, she’ll be happy when we’re all back together again.”

“I’m not gonna let any more of you get killed. This bastard dies this time. No more time outs in jail.”

“Well don’t get too far ahead of yourself. We gotta find him first. Then search for an opportune moment to take him out. Come on. Let’s go get the others and get something to eat before showtime at the club.”

The four of us had a nice fish dinner at a local restaurant. We went over the plan with Emily before heading down to the Gatsby Club where Clint Bowers liked to hang out.

“Okay, let’s go over this one more time,” Wraith said, “the three of us are going to go in separately and get a table. Then Emily will come in. She’s gonna try and isolate Bowers at the bar and see what she can get out of him. If the plan needs to change, her signal will be to go to the ladies room. That’s when Arduwan will get up and meet her in there to relay anything back to us.”

“Right,” Emily confirmed, “it’s best Bowers doesn’t see me with any of you. If anyones in the restroom we can wait for them to leave before I say anything. Otherwise, you guys just sit back and observe unless something crazy happens.”

“Something crazy is gonna happen,” I added.

“Let’s hope not.”

* * *

When we went into the club there was an immediate notable difference in atmosphere from everywhere else. It looked like an upper class 1920s Jazz club, with a band to boot. Virtually everyone in here was rich. I was rich in my world, but I had no desire whatsoever to hang out with a crowd like this. Luckily, we were still dressed nicely and the club was dark, so we didn’t stick out going to our little table.

About five minutes later, Emily came in. She only gave us a quick glance, just to know where we were in case she needed us. But she quickly gravitated towards the large circular bar on the far side of the room. There was a small group of people huddled together. Mostly younger men but a few girls as well. Emily joined them. We couldn’t hear what they were saying but it became visibly obvious that she was talking to Clint.

He was a tall, thin, young man about twenty five years old. He had dirty blonde hair slicked to one side and it was clear he was digging Emily. The way he fumbled for a lighter to light her cigarette. I could do it without the lighter you know.

She was laughing and cutting up with him. I saw that she was ordering drinks that were heavy on the ice so as to not get drunk herself. But this guy was drinking whiskey like water. If what she said was true about him, I was worried he’d pass out at the bar before she got enough information out of him.

After about thirty or so minutes, the cue came. She got up to go to the ladies room and gave us a quick glance on her way.

“You’re up, Ardu,” I said.

“Hey! Watch it! That’s a boy's name, remember?” she corrected before seeing herself off.

A few minutes went by. Emily came back first. Then Arduwan came back to our table.

“So what’s going on?” I asked, subtly but enthusiastically.

Arduwan had a disturbed look on her face. She said, “Emily said she’s going back to Clint’s place with him.”

“What?! Why?”

“She said, it’s not as easy as she thought to get it out of him. That he just keeps saying vague stuff about how him and his new partners have big plans for Brasshaven. She says he might be tipsy enough for her to distract him and find some information at his house.”

“Yea…information,” Wraith said, as he tipped back in his chair with his hands behind his head. I just looked at him in disgust.

“I really don’t think that’s a good idea, Arduwan,” I said once I turned my attention back to her.

“Yeah, neither do I. But Emily said for all of us to trust her and follow them but keep our distance. She said that If we could avoid killing him, we should since his involvement is unwitting.”

I was uneasy about this. But after all, I was the one that said we needed to trust Emily and follow her lead on all this.

A few minutes later, Clint’s entourage started to evaporate and he began to escort Emily to the front door. A chauffeur pulled up in what looked like a steam powered version of Casanova Frankenstein's limo from Mystery Men.

We didn’t want to lose them so we quickly grabbed a cab with the few Cogs we had left that Emily gave me.

“Follow that car!” I said, for the first time in my life.

The limo dropped Emily and Clint off at a small but upscale townhouse with a doorman. We couldn’t get too close without looking suspicious. But with it being dark out and a few park benches diagonal from Bowers place, we were able to remain inconspicuous enough.

I didn’t know how long we would have to wait but I knew we needed to be nearby incase Emily needed us. Of course we had no way to communicate with her from here. Hopefully she could find some way to signal us if push came to shove.

Fifteen minutes went by. Then thirty. Fortyfive. I wasn’t sure how long she was going to be in there but it sure seemed to drag on. The thought crossed my mind how serious she was about her detective work and how her nonchalance about sex could mean that she might actually have slept with him. It bothered me but at the same time it wasn’t like we had some kind of exclusivity agreement. I mean, we hadn’t even slept together. As erratic as she was about that kinda stuff, I guess I couldn’t blame her. She was as loyal to the cause of fighting Devils as any of the rest of us.

Finally, after nearly an hour, she emerged from the front door. The doorman offered her a ride home.

“No, thank you. That’s quite alright,” she replied before meeting us down the street.

It was late. Nearly midnight. We walked along back towards our hotel underneath gas powered street lights. We were far enough away and no one else was around so we could talk casually about what she had found.

“Check this out,” she said, giddily as she pulled a tiny box shaped camera out from between her cleavage, “I got it shortly after I arrived here and it turns out tonight was the perfect opportunity to use it!”

“What did you find?” Wraith asked.

“In Clint’s office, there were letter exchanges between business partners, including Kaiser Roboto and Alabaster. There was also a map of the location they were setting up shop together. I couldn’t get a good look at it while I was in there but when we develop this film we should know exactly where to find them.”

“That’s fantastic!” I exclaimed, “But just curious…why were you in there so long?”

Emily stopped walking in her tracks and looked at me with an expression of surprise. The others stopped walking as well and so did I.

“I had to finesse him,” she said.

“Finesse?”

“Yeah. He wasn’t just gonna hand this stuff over. He was pretty drunk when we got back and I must confess, even with the watered down drinks, I wasn’t at my best either. When he finally passed out, I was able to take a look around. But even then, I had to be careful because he had full time staff living there.”

I bit my tongue, gulped, and nodded.

Emily’s expression turned a bit angry before she added, “Well, I didn’t sleep with him if you must know.”

“I never said you did! I just wasn’t sure what finessed meant in this context.”

“Oh please. It’s pretty obvious what you think I’d do under certain circumstances. Just because I’ve got a history of chewing guys up and spitting them out like candy doesn’t mean I’d stoop so low as Clint Bower!”

“Remember that conversation we had about intimidation and saying overly direct things? Yeah, this is one of those.”

“Errr!” she growled, as she stormed off ahead.

“Ummm, excuse me,” Wraith interjected, “is there something going on with you guys that we don’t know about?”

“Can it, Ernest,” I huffed back to Wraith.

When we got back to the hotel lobby, Arduwan and Wraith went to the bar. Emily said she was going to bed and started to pick up speed to get back to our room. I followed her to the elevator andWhen she got on the door I saw a faint glimmer of tears in her eyes. Was she actually upset that I thought the worst?

“Hey. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply…”

“We’ll talk about it later. Just make sure those two go to bed too. Tomorrow might get busy,” she said, as the elevator door closed.

I went back to the bar, fully expecting to get a flurry of questions from those two about me and Emily. Until now, we hadn’t advertised that there was chemistry between us. Wraith just knew she came on strong to me when we had first met and Arduwan was…Arduwan.

To my surprise though, they didn’t mention it. They were having a nightcap and Wraith was trying to work moves of his own on Arduwan. It’s funny to me, you know. This woman, who by her own admission wasn’t exactly inexperienced with men, was completely clueless that someone was coming onto her.

“So you really can’t sleep on a mattress, huh?” he asked, slyly.

“Nope. It makes my back hurt. I tried a few times at some inns back in Callist but I found it was just better off to sleep on the ground or in a hay barn,” she answered.

“I see. Well, from what I could tell about our room, the linens are made of this world’s equivalent to Egyptian cotton. That means that it could be the most comfortable rest you’ve ever had!”

I’d had enough of this. I made them down their drinks and then escorted them up to their room to make sure they didn’t get into anything else before we had a chance to find Alabaster.

After dealing with Wraith and Arduwan’s antics, I took a deep sigh and went back to my hotel room. When I opened the door, there was Emily, sitting on the side of the bed, looking dead at me. She had her hands at her sides, palms down, and a blank expression on her face. She was wearing a black negligee, and her corset was on the floor beside the bed.

Arc 3 Part 3-2

The following morning, I awoke to find she had already gotten out of bed. After dressing myself, I went into the hotel hallway. I found Wraith coming up the stairs, probably to wake me up.

“Morning, sleepy head!” he gestured, as we went down the stairs together.

“Where’s the girls?” I asked.

“They’re having breakfast on the second floor balcony,” he replied, “I figured you’d want a little something before we got to work today.”

“Have fun with Arduwan?” I asked in a joking manner as I yawned.

“Well, I managed to get her to sleep in the bed…only problem was…she zonked out pretty quickly and threw fists like Mayweather in her sleep. I’M the one who ended up sleeping on the floor!”

“Ha!”

He led me towards the sitting area where guests were eating. It was a second floor deck with about twenty tables that seated four each. Emily and Arduwan were at the far end of the deck. Emily was sipping her coffee and dragging a clove cigarette. I hesitantly stopped for a moment before her and Arduwan noticed us.

Wraith smirked and prodded, “So what happened with you two last night anyway?”

I smiled a little but brushed him off as we started towards where the girls were seated.

“Come on, buddy,” he continued, “Emily’s gotta be into some pretty freaky shit right?”

“It’s not like that,” I chuckled.

“I mean, did she have you tie her up? Did you piss on her?”

“Dude, seriously, what the fuck?!” I scolded him discreetly, merely a few feet from the breakfast table.

Arduwan was in her own little world looking off the balcony but Emily looked up to acknowledge me with a smile.

“I ordered you an egg and sausage croissant. They’re excellent here,” she stated.

It was clear she wasn’t gonna make anything about us awkward. Wraith on the other hand was close to getting clocked.

After breakfast, we set the next phase of our plan into motion.

“So here’s the deal. We’re out of cash, and we’re gonna need a lot of it,” Emily said, as she reached into her purse and pulled out the two gold coins I gave her, “Wraith, you and

Arduwan take these coins down to the precious metal dealer that’s two blocks over on Tomorrow Street. Eric and I will be at the photo development lab on Rocketeer Boulevard. Meet us there when you’re done.”

Wraith raised his hand and said, “One sec, please. I have a question. Hypothetically, if we ran into Alabaster Creole or Kaiser Roboto on the street before we meet up with you guys, would it be okay to go ahead and…you know, obliterate them?”

“Depends,” Emily answered, “have either one of you ever seen Alabaster or Roboto before?”

Wraith and Arduwan looked at one another. Arduwan shrugged her shoulders and shook her head before Wraith said, “No…”

“Then how would you even know it’s them?” Emily replied.

“That’s a good point,” Wraith conceded.

* * *

The two of them then made their way to the precious metals dealer while me and Emily went to go get the pictures developed with her tiny spy camera. She has never ceased to amaze me with her skill in the art of investigation.

As we stood there in the darkroom, there was only the faint glow of red light used to prevent film from over exposure. It was the faint relic of a bygone era in my world but the norm here in Brasshaven.

“Okay, now we just need to wait a few more minutes,” Emily said, as she turned to me.

There was a silent pause before I decided to say something.

“Emilly…about last night…”

“Hmm,” she perked up with a nervous look, “sorry. Was that too strong too quick?”

“Oh, uhh, no. That’s not what I meant. I meant earlier. With the Clint job. I’m sorry about the implied accusation. The truth is, even if you did, I know you would’ve been doing it for the greater good. We’re literally dealing with the most evil people in the universe and there's a means to and ends with it all.”

She gave a half smile and said, “it’s okay. Don’t worry about it,” before putting her hands behind my neck and leaning up for a kiss.

Just then, the door opened up and Wraith and Arduwan came in. Emily scrambled to break our embrace and cover the film.

“Jesus!” she shouted, “are you guys for real?! It’s not like I have this photo saved on a thumbdrive, you know.”

“Sorry!” Wraith apologized, “the guy at the counter said you were in this booth and I forgot all about how this stuff worked.”

“Well, can you remember to go pay the bill for us while we’re waiting?” Emily gruffed, sarcastically.

A few minutes later the film was developed and we could clearly see what the map was.

It was an old Sprocket and Tool factory that Clint had purchased for Kaiser Roboto and Alabaster. God knows what they were going to use it for. But Wraith seemed to have an idea…

“Okay, I’m telling you. I said it once, I’m saying it again,” he noted, “they are definitely building a giant robotic spider in there.”

“Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a good look at the correspondence letters between the three of them. So there’s no way to know for sure without checking out ourselves. It’s a big complex and I don’t see a way for you three to get in there and get to Alabaster without being noticed. It’s probably best for us to figure out what they’re doing before we do anything drastic.”

“What do you have in mind?” I asked.

* * *

After reviewing the map from Emily’s photos, we came up with a plan to investigate Creole and Roboto’s mysterious complex a little closer. Emily had me come with her to a place on the far side of town that rented out hot air balloons. Apparently, they were hi tech enough in this world that you could be taught how to use one in a crash course lesson in under an hour.

The site of the mystery complex was about fifteen miles east of the city, in the desert. It was nearly a square mile in size. You couldn’t get near the place due to the security personnel, who regularly patrolled the place in dune buggies. There’d be no good excuse for just wandering out there to take a look. So we opted to fly over and take some aerial pictures to see what was going on.

We had Arduwan and Wraith go on ahead to a nearby cliff where they could observe us with binoculars. If they noticed anything out of the ordinary they could signal us with a flare gun that we purchased. We would execute the plan just before sundown. This way it would be bright enough outside for Emily to get some good pictures but we’d have the cover of darkness to slip away into once we had passed over.

“Ah, there we go,” Emily said, as she finished fixing a larger telescoping lensed camera to the bottom of the balloon basket.

I had been sitting on the ground nearby waiting for her to finish. I used that time to think a little. What would we do with the information we discovered? Would it be enough to know how we could get to Alabaster in a clean fashion? Or would we find out we were up against a lot more than we were prepared to deal with. I didn’t like the idea that he was teamed up with a guy that gave my dad and Higgins so much trouble for so long and that they had this big facility at their disposal.

“You good?” she asked me.

“Yeah. I’m fine. I just hope it’s not too late to do something about all this. We better get going. We’ve only got a couple hours of daylight left.”

“Right.”

So we fired up the burners and took flight. I had never been up in a balloon before. It would’ve been kinda fun had it not been for the circumstances. Not exactly the ideal date to go on with Emily. Though if you think about it, our first “date” was equally as troublesome. I’m referring to the incident with The Black Hand at Mr. Cadaver’s house of course. Wild to think about everything that has happened since then. Alliances made, people who’ve died. I really hoped that things could calm down for a little bit if we somehow pulled this off.

Up ahead, we could see the facility coming into view. I looked through a spyglass to try and find Wraith and Arduwan’s position. They were comfortably perched on the cliffside, just as we had discussed.

“I’d say, about three more minutes and we’ll be directly over the main buildings. Let’s try and get all the pictures we can in one pass, that way we don’t draw too much attention,” I suggested.

“Don’t worry, I’ve got this.”

Emily started snapping photos the moment we crossed over the outer wall of the facility. We were about a half mile above. There wasn’t much we could see with the naked eye. But it was clear there were soldiers present. Roboto’s men no doubt. It became clear after a moment as well that parts of the factory were up and running. That wasn’t a good sign. In less than two weeks, Alabaster had managed to secure a financing deal and begin production of a madman’s technological terrors that this world had thought it had seen the last of.

We drifted over the complex for a good three or four minutes and it seemed like all was going well. At the very least we’d been able to gauge the magnitude of what we were dealing with here. Best case scenario, some of these pictures would indicate how best to deal with Alabaster.

That’s when it happened…

*BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!*

Seemingly from nowhere, a rapid succession of gunfire, like that of a Maxim gun or an anti-aircraft, sprayed in our direction. The balloon was struck. Our basket was struck. And alas, Emily had been struck in the back of her left shoulder. She collapsed towards me. I caught her as she fell forward. It looked as though her lung was punctured! She spit blood out of her mouth.

*BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!*

The shelling didn’t stop. We were just past the outer wall, heading due east, opposite of where we had started. But our balloon was so badly damaged that it was maneuvering out of control. Not to mention that our propulsion system had caught fire from being struck.

Flames surrounded us. Wind was rushing by. I did my best to hold Emily up in the wake of all of this.

*BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!*

It didn’t stop!

“Eric?” Emily mustered with bated breath.

“Hang on, Emily! We’re going to crash. Just hang on!”

“Eric. I don’t want us to die like this. Not now,” she said, before she passed out from blood loss.

I wasn’t sure how much her spinal implant could help against blunt trauma and blood loss, but she wasn’t looking good.

*BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!*

It was so loud. The flames were so hot. Smoke was fluttering up from the propulsion system and I could feel our descent escalating. The only thing I could do was hold Emily there in my arms and hope for a miracle.

Arc 3 Part 3-3

I blacked out.

I had tiny flashes of recollection after the crash. Armed people, pulling me from the wreckage. But it was just a flash. The next thing I knew, I woke up on a hospital bed in some kind of infirmary. I had been bandaged up. I was sore and had burn marks.

I tried to get my bearings by looking around. There was no one there. Least of not, Emily. A moment later, the door opened up. A man looking like a doctor or a scientist came in.

He said, “Ah, I see you are awake.”

Immediately, he pulled out a small aerosol can and sprayed me in the face. This put me under once again.

I awoke again, unsure of how much time had passed by. This time, I was in a jail cell. There were a half dozen other cells around me. No walls, just bars. But I was the only one being held there. I didn’t see any guards around. So I went to the door to see if it was possible to get out. That’s when I took a massive shock of electricity that sent my flying back.

Less than a minute later, I heard commotion outside the room with all the cells. About a half dozen individuals were coming into the room.

The first was a man that could be none other than the infamous Kaiser Roboto. He had a

dark brown military style coat on and a Prussian style helmet, minus the point on top. His face looked like that of a gas mask, but I knew better. That was his artificial replacement of a face. According to Emily’s research, he had so much work done that he may not have any living tissue left.

He was flanked by two robotic guards. Steam exhausted from their shoulder blades every few steps. They were armed with shoulder carry rifles.

Behind them was someone who strangely looked familiar to me. But I know we hadn’t met before. She was dressed in an orange and black dress, similarly to the saloon girl outfit Emily had taken. She had strawberry blonde hair, but her face and hands had clearly been converted into mechanical replacements. Her eyes were covered by a silver visor that emitted a red laser dot which tracked back and forth across her face.

Before the other individuals came into the room, Kaiser started in with his questions.

“Who are you and who were you sent by?” he said, with a metallic toned voice.

I gave him no answer except, “where is Emily?”

Just then, the other two individuals made their way into the room. It was Alabaster Creole, the Devil of Murk. He was wearing his signature white suit except this one was more fitting of our environment.

He said, “you mean, Detective Grimwood?”

He was immediately followed by Emily. Who entered the room behind him with her hands clasped right in front of her and a blank look washed over her face. She stopped right next to the other woman and just stared.

“Emily!”

“Again! Who are you and who sent you to spy on us?” Roboto continued.

“Just hang on a moment my friend,” Alabaster said, with his slick cajun accent, “I know you…I know you don’t I? You’re that bodyguard that Detective Grimwood had back during the trial?”

There was a pause for a moment as I refused to answer his questions.

He continued, “Could it be? That that house back in the other world was yours? Are you the one responsible for all this world hoppin?”

“We should dispose of him,” Roboto interrupted, “I only had him nursed back to health for answers.”

“What did you do to Emily?!” I shouted.

“Oh, you mean, my gift from my new business partner, Mr. Roboto?” He placed his hand atop Emily’s head, but she didn’t move at all. She just looked blankly in my direction as Alabaster went on to say, “the mind of Detective Grimwood is a terrible thing to waste. I’ve had it out for her for some time now. But ya see, she’s my puppet now. And I don’t plan on cutting her strings for a long time…I guarantee.”

“When we recovered you from the crash,” said Kaiser, “we brought you both in to get you well again. That was two days ago. During that time, I discovered that the young lady had some sort of advanced neural implant in her spine. I took it upon myself to make some modifications to her. Of course, in time, we will consider fully robotizing her, like Miss Italix here.”

Italix? Could it be that this other woman here was Italia, Higgins and my fathers former ally? But she was killed more than two decades ago? It had to be her though. The resemblance to the woman I had seen in Higgins locket hologram was uncanny.

“If it’s any consolation to ya,” Alabaster added, “I didn’t particularly enjoy murdering the young girls back at your house. The idea was just to send a message not to fuck with Alabaster Creole.”

My blood began to boil, but for obvious reasons I wasn’t going to mention anything about Anabel.

“To be honest, I should thank you,” Alabaster continued, “I’ve spent my life building my business empire in Sin City. Another five years and I would’ve owned the city. Another decade and I could’ve been president. Hell, maybe I could’ve been king of the world. But because of you…you have opened my eyes to new possibilities. With the power of the stones, what’s a few miserable streets when I could conquer entire realms?!”

This was really bad.

“Are we killing him or not?” Kaiser pressed.

“No. No, we’re gonna figure something else out for the young man. I have an idea. But I wanna run it by you in private first.”

Before leaving the room, Alabaster walked up close behind Emily and put his hands on her shoulders. He leaned down and took a big whiff of her hair before adding, “you know what Detective Grimwood’s hair smells like? It smells like the victory of trampling over your adversaries.”

Kaiser held up a small rectangular box that looked kinda like one of those radios they used back in WW2 and pressed a button. He then said, “Italix, Grimwood, we’re leaving.”

The girls followed suit as the two villains left me all alone in my cell once again. How could I have let this happen? It would’ve been better if we had died in that crash. Emily fought for her freedom from the last madman that made her his puppet, only to find herself under the control of another. She had done so much for me and the cause that I’m fighting for. But I’ve allowed her to fall into her worst nightmare.

* * *

A couple of hours later, I heard a ruckus down the hall. The door opened and in came Roboto again. This time he had six of his robotic foot soldiers with him, each had a steel rod in hand with a loop on the end. They had apprehended Arduwan! She had two loops around her neck and two others restraining her arms behind her back. The other two walked parallel to her with loops around her waist, forcing her to walk. She was still dressed in her tan explorers outfit but minus the hat. It was clear she had given them a fight.

“Seems your friend here was mounting a rescue attempt,” said the metallic echoing Kaiser, “she destroyed a dozen of my newly minted droid soldiers before we apprehended her. I wanted to execute her on the spot. But Creole thinks that keeping you two alive will serve us. We shall see.”

The soldiers put Arduwan into a cell opposite of mine. The moment they released her bindings she charged the cell door, only to be flung back by a charge of electricity.

Just then, a human minion of Kaiser’s came into the room. Behind him were two more robo soldiers with Wraith in tow.

“Sir! We’ve found another infiltrator,” the man said, “he scaled the outer wall but was caught almost immediately. He was carrying only this.”

The man held out Wraith’s satchel with his daggers. Kaiser reached in and sifted through before pulling Wraith and Arduwan’s hotel key.

“Hmm, a key to a room at The Arliss Hotel in Brasshaven. Just like the one found on the girl. Have a detachment sent into town and investigate the hotel. See what you find in their rooms and bring any more of their cohorts you may find to me.”

“Yessir!”

Wraith was then placed in a separate cell. We refrained from talking until the guards left us. But before I could say anything, Wraith spoke up first…

“Don’t worry, Eric. I learned a lock picking skill from the thieves guild…”

“No, wait, Wraith, stop!”

He was zapped hard in his vain attempt to free us. We were totally at the mercy of these monsters. I walked over and sat on my cot to try and think of something.

“I appreciate you guys coming for us. But I kinda wish you hadn’t. Enough people have died already because of my lackluster preparation.”

“Eric, where’s Emily?” Arduwan asked.

I looked up at her and said, “Creole’s got her. He had Roboto turn her into a mindless slave.”

“How? With some kind of spell?”

“Kinda. There’s something you guys need to know about Emily. It was a secret I was keeping for her. But it doesn’t matter now. You see, in her world, she was in a horrible car wreck when she was younger. A mad scientist recovered her body and gave her this spinal implant that brought her back to life. Roboto found out about that and rewired her. She’s not in there anymore.”

They were quiet for a moment before Wraith, in a rare moment of seriousness, said,

“Aww, man. I’m sorry. There’s gotta be something we can do. Have you tried any magic yet?”

“I haven’t. I can’t think of any spells worth trying. If they found out I could use magic and it didn’t work then they might restrain me even more. I’m gonna wait until a more opportune moment.”

Arc 3 Part 3-4

Another day went by and we were served food but saw no more appearances from either Kaiser nor Alabaster. I wondered what they were planning for us. Kaiser said that it would serve their purposes. We only had fragments of what they were doing anyway.

Just to recap…Alabaster Creole and Kaiser Roboto were being financed by a rich young investor named Clint Bowers. They had bought this old Sprocket and Tool factory that we were being held in and turned it into some kind of laboratory and production facility. At the very least Roboto was rebuilding his mechanized army that he had used in the Neo-Techno Empire that my father and Higgins helped destroy. What else they were doing here, I could only imagine.

Our conversations were brief and sporadic. We didn’t know who could be listening or when. There really wasn’t much else to say either. We only had about twenty square feet each in our cells and if we touched the bars we were electrified. If by some chance we could get out of here, we had no weapons. Only my magic and limited athletic skills, Wraith's parkour abilities, and Arduwan’s strength. We’d be fighting through an entire legion, only to find ourselves out in the desert. Escape was not an option at this time.

That was no longer on the menu but it didn’t need to be. Finally, on the morning of the third day, a human guard brought us food and said, “eat up. You’re being taken out of this facility in an hour. Kaiser’s got something special planned for you.”

I wasn’t sure what was going on, but after he left, I figured we should make some kind of game plan.

“Arduwan?” I asked, “I need you to do me a favor.”

“Yes, Eric?”

“If they try to separate us or take us away, don’t fight them unless you are absolutely sure you can get clear. You can’t overpower their bullets, okay?”

“Ugh. Yeah. I don’t like it. But I understand.”

“Wraith? Same goes for you. Let’s just see what they’re up to and try to stick together.” “Gotcha,” he replied.

A while after we ate, a large patrol of guards came to retrieve us. They had triple the number for Arduwan as they did for us since they were expecting a fight. But she behaved herself on my account.

We were taken outside in a chain gang with shackles on all three of our legs. They marched us through the outer facility and passed several buildings. Inside of one, the large garage door was open and we saw an assembly line constructing robot soldiers like the ones we had been seeing. Every minute or so a droid would drop off the line and a man in a lab coat with a clipboard would ask, “what is your primary objective?”

To which, the droid would salute and say, “To hail and serve Herr Kaiser.”

This was really gonna suck if we didn’t find a way to put a stop to this pretty soon. There were probably a couple hundred of those things around the time we arrived here. By now, there had to be over a thousand of them. Creole probably was in possession of the stone by now since Emily had left it in our hotel room and they had raided it. No doubt he was gonna have Kaiser march these things all over the realms once they cleaned up this world.

The guards led us to a bus-like vehicle that ran on tank tread. We still didn’t know what was going on. For all we knew, they were just gonna drive us out into the desert and kill us. But that didn’t seem to be the case. We were loaded onto the vehicle and a human driver drove us away from the facility. There were only four droid guards on the bus with us but we were soon flanked by two dune buggy-like vehicles that seemed to be manned by a human driver and a robot guard. It would appear that these droids weren’t quite good enough to pilot vehicles so Kaiser used his human followers for that task while the robots acted as infantry.

The bus drove us for a good thirty minutes before finally arriving at what looked like a small coliseum out in the desert. There were a lot of people arriving. A lot of very well to do looking people. I didn’t like what this looked like.

Still in shackles, the three of us were taken off the bus and received by another squad of those robot soldiers. Still no sign of Alabaster or Herr Kaiser. We were brought into a windowless room inside the arena. We could hear the noise of at least a few hundred, if not, a few thousand people outside. That’s when a human cohort of Kaiser’s came to speak to us.

The man said, “Good morning, lady and gentlemen. I would assume you have realized that you have not been brought here as observers, but will be taking part in a demonstration.”

“Demonstration of what?” I asked.

He replied, “Kaiser wishes to show off his latest technology against worthy opponents to convince potential backers to support him. It’s been a long time since he’s had any real power and he plans on making a statement today.”

“Where’s the girl I was captured with?”`

“Oh, she’s around. You’ll be seeing her soon enough.”

The man turned around and walked away before I could ask anymore questions. Looks like we really were going to have to fight our way out of here.

“I don’t like this, Eric. When should we make our move?” asked Arduwan.

“Don’t do anything yet. They’ll kill us if we step out of line. Looks like they’re at least gonna give us a fighting chance if we play along.”

A few minutes later a guard opened the large iron garage door in front of us and released us from our shackles. The three of us stammered into the arid arena as the door shut behind us. The stadium was filled with onlookers. Many of them were dressed in a way that seemed very high class.

Ladies wore big hats and had little binoculars on sticks to see us better. It was like we were at the Kentucky Derby.

But not everyone was high class. There was a subsect of angry people. I was starting to get the feeling that these were former adherents to the Neo-Techno Empire. There must have been around a thousand people in this small arena.

That’s when my heart skipped a beat. Directly ahead of us as we slowly walked out towards the center of the arena was a small open air observation deck. Kaiser sat with two droid guards flanking him and to his left was that Devil himself, Alabaster Creole. But beside him, still in her trance-like state, was Emily. She just looked onward, blankly.

When we reached the center of the arena we stopped. From Kaiser’s right, a certain young, rich boy with slicked hair came into view. It was of course Clint Bowers. Kaiser’s primary financier. The arena was small enough that a microphone wasn’t needed. The acoustics were enough. Bowers raised his hands to get everyone's attention.

“Greetings all! Old friends. Former allies. New partners,” he gestured towards Alabaster, “we have all gathered here today to unite under a cause. The cause is to transform Brasshaven and the entire world into a new Technocratic Hegemony. I have seen the light of Mr. Creole’s philosophy of corporate unity and we all know of the past successes of Kaiser Roboto’s military prowess and inventive mind. Today, we hope that you too shall join us in creating this new power. And so to convince you, we have brought you three of the finest warriors to display our might against. These three will show you their skills and strength. And in turn, we will smite them with our awesome scourge.”

Alabaster leaned over and whispered something to Clint but we couldn’t hear. He continued…

“Very well. To make this a fair fight. We shall allow the combatants to have the items they infiltrated us with.”

A human guard came over to the ledge of the arena floor and tossed Arduwan’s sword, Wraith’s satchel, and my…nothing, because I had decided not to bring any weapons until needed. Dammit, because now I needed one.

Clint then turned to Alabaster and said, “Mr. Creole. If I may, that woman you have in your company…she made a fool of me in my own home and is just as much responsible for compromising our facility as those three. With your permission, I would like some retribution.”

Alabaster gave his sinister grin and replied, “Why yes, Mr. Bowers. Go ahead and have your retribution.”

Clint walked over to Emily, who just stood there with her blank gaze. He stopped just a foot away from her and looked at her, almost as if he expected an acknowledgement. Then a moment later, he smacked her straight across her face. It was so hard that her head knocked to the left. He waited a moment and then started smacking her again, repeatedly. Emily was completely unable to respond, or even register that she was being hit. Her face started to redden. After a good thirty seconds of slapping, he grabbed her by the shoulders and kneed her in her gut. She dipped forward and then recomposed herself as if nothing had happened.

I was dying inside seeing what was happening. Arduwan was fuming. Clint had just put himself on the kill list assuming we would ever be able to enact it.

“Thank you, Mr. Creole. I believe I have reached satisfaction,” he said, politely.

“You’re quite welcome, Mr. Bowers. Should you require any more satisfaction from Detective Grimwood, I’m sure we can make some sort of arrangement after today's festivities.”

“Why, that would be delightful, Mr. Creole.”

“Enough with the pageantry. Let’s see what these three can do,” said the metallic voiced Kaiser Roboto.

On his signal, another steel door opened dead ahead of us. About two dozen robot infantrymen came running out and surrounded us. They weren’t armed with guns though. Each of them carried an electrically charged police-style baton.

“In the interest of fairness, since you cannot harm us from that distance with only melee weapons,” Kaiser continued, “we shall only battle you with melee combat.”

“Got those daggers handy, Wraith?” I asked.

“Yeah, here, take one,” he said as he tossed one to me and secured the satchel to his shoulder.

“Eric! I can’t fight like this!” Arduwan said, as she fanned her hands downward at her explorers outfit.

“Go ahead, Arduwan. Do it.”

And with that command, she ripped her clothes to shred and revealed nothing underneath except a set of white bra and panties. There was an audible gasp from the audience as wives attempted to cover their husbands eyes.

Kaiser then clapped his hands together and the soldiers surrounding us started to close in.

“Alright guys,” I said, “huddle in close as long as we can. Let Arduwan draw as many as she can and hit the ones in her blind spots.”

“Got it,” Wraith affirmed.

Over half a dozen droids closed in and just before they got within striking range with their batons, Wraith felled one with a dagger. I did a scissor kick to one that was getting near me. Me and Wraith’s shoulders almost flush with each other’s and Arduwan’s, so that kept her back clear long enough for her to destroy the four robots right in front of her with a few mighty slashes of her Great Sword.

The next wave of bots didn’t like what they had just witnessed and swarmed us at once. Wraith immediately leapt into the air and landed on the shoulders of an attacking droid. He pressed downward and leapt off its back, diving into another with his fists extended. I took a more direct approach and started brawling with one using Wraith’s dagger and my bar hand. I tried to get its baton away from it. Arduwan also took a direct approach. Remember her tornado attack from back at the Bard’s Tomb dungeon? Yeah, she did that again.

By the time I had disarmed the bot with the baton and turned it on him, I noticed that Arduwan had reduced about eight others to scrap metal. But as she was slowing down, I could see she was dizzy and trying to get her footing again. I finished off the droid in front of me and ran to help her. On my way, I bashed the head of the droid on the ground that Wraith sprang off of. He was busy fighting two bots at once at the moment.

After keeping the ones attacking Arduwan at bay while she gathered herself, I saw Wraith forcibly headbutt two droids into one another to finish them off. Arduwan easily dispatched the remaining few. We were winded, but we survived this entire platoon of bots with relative ease.

“Impressive,” Kaiser announced, “you are every bit as skilled as Mr. Creole had inferred you would be. But that contest was merely to display to the audience what you were capable of.

That way they will see what we are capable of.”

He clapped his hands together and the door ahead of us opened up again. He then raised the device he had been controlling Emily with up and pressed three buttons. We could see the silhouettes of three beings inside the area where the gate had lifted. A red light shined in the center.

The three of us gathered ourselves and prepared for the next fight. Arduwan and Wraith formed up around me. Wraith to my right and Arduwan to my left. A moment later, the figures emerged from the darkness.

On the far left, directly across from Arduwan’s position, was a cyborg-like muscle man with a curly mustache. He must’ve been six foot four. Even taller than Arduwan!

At the center, my worst fear was realized. It was the former lover of Higgins, Italia. But she was now the mechanical subservient cyborg known as Italix. A pawn of Kaiser Roboto.

But on the far right, a non-humanoid figure emerged. Also over six feet tall, what appeared to be a robotic scorpion scurried out in Wraith’s direction.

“Well, maybe you didn’t get your giant robotic spider. But it looks like you’re not going away empty handed,” I joked.

Arc 3 Part 3-5

The three droids slowly crept in our direction as Kaiser shouted down, “Italix! I have disengaged your projectile offenses, but use any other means necessary. Bruno, Scorp-201, do your worst to our enemies!”

Looks like Arduwan was handling the big guy and Wraith was gonna dance with the scorpion. So that leaves Italia for me.

In a matter of moments, Arduwan lunged at the strongman with her sword. He caught the blade with his bare hands and flung Arduwan overtop of himself like a suplex. It completely knocked the wind out of him.

Wraith immediately started using his extreme agility to dodge powerful and swift strikes from the scorpions stinged. I had yet to see him move so fast!

Italia slowly got within ten feet of me before her right arm transformed into a thin chainsaw blade. She took a swipe at me and grazed my suit vest. The next strike knocked the baton out of my hand. All three of us had so much to handle on our own that there was no way we could possibly help each other.

Arduwan caught her breath and got to her feet. She opted not to pick her sword back up and started to grapple with Bruno. It appeared to be an equal display of strength and the crowd was most impressed.

Wraith on the other hand was running out of steam. In a last ditch effort, he retrieved the flare gun we had bought from his satchel and set off the shot at the droid, but it barely fazed it. The scorpion barreled towards him and landed a strike on his rib cage. This sent him to the ground and the scorpion crawled over him. It struck its stinger down at the ground and he dodge his head to the side just in time. It was everything he could just to not get killed. He may have had ‘plot armor’ as he put it in Callist, but here in Brasshaven, his skills only took him so far.

I on the other hand wasn’t fairing much better. Italia wasn’t as fast as the scorpion or as strong as Bruno, but she was a cunning and fearful opponent. It was all I could not to get hit. Up until this point, I hadn’t used magic. I wanted it to be an opportune moment. Well, I got my chance. When Italia took a downward swipe at me with her chainsaw arm, I caught her just before the chain.

“Chill!” I shouted, as I cast a freezing spell that enveloped the bottom half of her forearm. The ice jammed up the chainsaw blade from rotating. She leapt backwards to see what had happened.

I noticed Kaiser jump up from his chair to get a better look. After a moment of observing, he said, “What was that? How can he do something like that? Italix! Keep his brain intact! I wish to examine it after the battle.”

With that order she straightened back up and started walking towards me again. I saw that Arduwna was neck and neck with Bruno and Wraith was probably going to be killed within moments by that scorpion.

Things were looking bleak. Time slowed down for me. I looked up at the balcony and saw Emily standing there. Her face battered and bruised from the slapping. Beside her was a smiling Alabaster. I didn’t have much time to take it all in, but they say when you’re about to die, your life flashes before your eyes. Well, mine didn’t. My time with Emily’s did. I reminisced about how we met that day at her office. How we survived the night at Cadaver’s manor. The attack on our hotel room and the trial that put Creole away for a short time. Then she came back to my world with me and befriended Anabel and Higgins. She gave my ex-girlfriend a tongue lashing. And she almost threw up in disgust of the pastel colored World X. Everything led us up to this moment and I felt our time together getting cut short. I know there was only one thing that would ensure at least one of us had a chance to make it out of here alive.

“Finish this!” Kaiser ordered, still standing on the edge of his balcony seating.

As I held my hand up and took aim in the direction of the observation deck, I could see Alabaster’s worry wash over his face.

“Lightning bolt!” I yelled, casting a precise streak of lightning from my hand to the deck.

But you must be wondering, what was my aim? If I had used this on Italia, I would be completely drained of energy and likely still killed by Bruno or the scorpion. So that wasn’t my best utilization of this spell. I could’ve aimed for Roboto but that would leave Alabaster alive. And likewise, if I had killed Alabaster, Roboto would still have been there. What I took aim at…was Emily’s freedom.

The lightning shot from my fingertips and zapped across the arena, ultimately landing against Kaiser’s droid control box. It blasted to pieces and appeared to badly damage Kaiser’s hand in the process. I saw Alabaster and Clint shielding their eyes as I collapsed to the ground in front of Italia.

The arena fell silent and Italia stopped dead in her tracks. She slowly turned around and looked up at the deck. Then suddenly, almost as fast as the lightning bolt, she took off running in that direction and leapt up eye level with Kaiser. Beneath her skirt you could see that she was propulsed by CO2 powered canisters protruding from her calf muscles. As she hung in the air for a moment, her arm converted into a large machine gun and she unleashed dozens of rounds straight into the chest and midsection of Kaiser Roboto. Her dress acted as a parachute and she began to slowly float down as she turned her fire on the two guards flanking Kaiser’s destroyed body.

Just then, I heard Arduwan smash Bruno to pieces and run towards the scorpion droid overtop of Wraith. I was too exhausted from exerting that much magic at once to do anything. But when Arduwan got to Wraith, she smashed the idle scorpion and said, “Oh, Wraith, oh no!” He had taken a stinger strike to his right lung.

Emily had just started to come to, from her zombified state as Alabaster was recovering from shielding himself from potential shrapnel coming off his no defunct cohort. The moment she realized she was in control again, she ran screaming towards Clint, knocking him off the balcony. He wasn’t dead, but he wasn’t in good shape. The entire arena was in an uproar. People were screaming and clamoring to escape the scene. Italia was on a rampage killing every human officer in Kaiser’s militia that was in sight.

Emily then turned her attention to Alabaster, who was still seated. She wasn’t a physical threat on her own at all, but she reached for one of Alabaster’s fallen guards rifles and in an uncharacteristic move, started to shoot. A bullet caught him in his shoulder and he fell out of his chair and started to crawl. She went after him and fired again. This shot missed. When she pulled the trigger again she realized she was out of bullets. Alabaster rose to his feet and ran down the stairs to the balcony clutching his wound.

I was still almost completely incapacitated. All I could see was Wraith motioning to Arduwan to give him his satchel. She did and the next thing I saw was him pull a small vial with red liquid out. He drank it down and within moments, sprang up to his feet. It was another healing potion!

He and Arduwan made their way to me quickly. The stadium was still in a panic but none of Kaiser’s men were concerned with us. Wraith knelt down and produced yet another potion. He started to give it to me as I lay there.

“Wraith, you brought potions!” I expressed.

“Yeah, man. We’ve been through this. You think I’m dumb enough to come to a place like this without some?”

The potion touched my lips and as I drank I began to feel my fatigue relieved. I saw Emily coming down the outer staircase to the balcony and I decided to keep a little of the potion for her since I knew she had been beaten so hard.

“Emily!” I shouted as I met her embrace. I gave her the last of the potion.

“Eric, I tried to kill Alabaster but he got away. I’m certain he has the stone, so he’s likely to go back to the mansion and jump worlds again.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll stop him. But first…” I said as I motioned my comrades to the severely wounded Clint Bowers that was crawling across the stadium floor away from us.

Things had quieted down. The observers of these gladiator games had all dispersed and Kaiser’s men were being hunted down. You could hear the sound of Italia’s gunfire rattle in the distance every so often.

We all walked over to the injured rich punk and stood over him as he began to cry. No one said a word. We just stood there as he pathetically tried crawling away. He left a puddle of piss behind like mucus from a snail.

“Clint!” Emily said, firmly, “I wanted to let you live since I thought your role in all of this was happenstance. The four of us aren’t murderous barbarians…”

“I am,” Arduwan corrected.

“She is,” Acknowledged Emily, “but as a unit, we aren't.”

“So what are you going to do?!” he cried, afraid to look up at us as he laid there on his stomach.

“To be honest…I’d like to let you try and claw your way out of this desert. That should be a punishment fitting enough for a…”

*BAM* *BAM* *BAM* *BAM*

Before Emily could finish her thought, Italia landed on the ground next to Clint and finished him off for us. Smoke fumed from the barrel of her arm gun until she transformed it back to her normal arm. She then turned to us.

“I had to eliminate him,” she said, “you don’t know the terror they were planning. He was not innocent in this matter.”

I was taken aback but understood. I wasn’t quite sure what to say to Italia, since we didn’t really know each other. But she addressed me first.

“You are Noble’s son, correct?”

“That’s right.”

“I loved and respected your father. We had common goals.”

I was unsure if I should say anything about Higgins, but I figured she should know what happened.

“I want you to know something, Italia.”

“Yes?”

“Reginald trained me to be a world walker. He was like a father figure to me since I never really knew my dad.”

“Was?”

“Yes. He died. It was a few months ago.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” she continued, with a tremble in her voice.

“But he spoke to me about you. He loved you very much. I buried him with the locket you made for him. Tell us…what happened to you after that day on the train?”

“Your father and Reginald had a mission to accomplish. They had assumed I was dead and couldn’t afford to keep my body. But after the incident in Chimney City, Kaiser’s scouts recovered me. He worked tirelessly to rebuild me but his work was cut short during the final battle at the foundry. I was in a stasis until Kaiser resurfaced and resumed his work.”

“So you have no memory of the time between then and now?” I asked.

“No. Thankfully. It would’ve been far too painful to have lived that long as a mindless drone.”

Emily put her arm around the back of my waist.

“What will you do now?”

“I’m going to hunt down the remaining members of the miltian and then I’m going to destroy the droid production facility.”

“Then what?”

She paused for a moment before answering, “self terminate.”

“But you can’t! You should come with us! You’re practically family. And I promise you, you wouldn’t be the strangest woman at my house.”

“No, Eric. I died on that train all those years ago. The life in me now is artificial. I have my memories but my blood isn’t my own. It’s time for me to end Kaiser Roboto’s legacy.”

I guess I understood where she was coming from, but I was still sad. If only Higgins had known she was alive all this time…or at least, kind of alive. Maybe things could’ve been different.

“You should go now,” she noted, “Alabaster has the stone and is certainly on his way back to the waterfall. If you don’t kill him now, he could do this again in another world.”

She was right. We had to go now if there was even a remote chance we could intercept him.

“Goodbye, Italia. Thank you for everything.”

Arc 3 Part 4-1

After Italia stormed off to decimate the remainder of Kaiser Roboto’s militia, the four of us hastily made our way back to the waterfall where the entrance to the well was. We used that bus that brought us to the arena to get there. It was slow, but so would Alabaster be with his gunshot wounds.

We drove straight there, hoping that we would get ahead of him. But as we got there it was starting to set in that he likely had beaten us. I had Arduwan stand at the ready just in case he hadn’t arrived yet while I checked the well portal area. Sure enough, there was the stone. It had turned green again, so we know he had left the world.

Rather than waste time in Brasshaven anymore, we traveled back to my Mansion. Ever so cautiously, we emerged from the well. No telling if Alabaster was planning to try and ambush us. Though, with his wounds, I doubted he would do that.

The first thing we noticed was that he had created a diversion. He had tossed all seven stones into the well after arriving to mask his movements. Did he go into one of the worlds? Or was he out here in my world? Arduwan and Wraith secured the basement staircase while Emily and I examined the stones.

Six of the stones were green now, leaving only the Callist stone slowly flashing red. So we could rule out that he went to any world other than that one. And boy, would he be in for a surprise if did! Still, if he had gone there and survived the dangers, it was extremely troubling that he could ally himself with the Devil King of Callist next.

Alternatively, he could be in this world. He could be hiding out right here in my house. Or maybe he slipped out the back door and ran into the forest? If he was bold enough, he could’ve gone out the front door and tried to hitch a ride off the street.

I cast Perimeter Check, a spell that could detect movements within a hundred feet while concentrating on it before we made our way upstairs. I was fully recovered from earlier but I could only maintain a spell like that for five or ten minutes and couldn’t cast anything else while using it.

“Arduwan, check out back. Wraith, you go upstairs,” I said.

Emily stayed close behind me as we went to the front door after quickly checking the downstairs rooms. No sign of him anywhere. It was broad daylight and we couldn’t see him. My spell detected no movements on the property other than my friends. It looked as if Alabaster had gotten away this time.

* * *

Once we were sure he was gone, we could all finally take a breather and get our heart rates down. Things had been so tense for the past few days. We were tired, hungry, and mentally drained. Without Anabel here to cook we ordered some pizza. Three of them actually. One for me, Wraith, and Emily. And two for Arduwan.

“MMMM, yum! Berserker raging makes me hungry!” she said, as she ate her first slice.

We all sat around the dining room table, eating, and just absorbing all that had happened. It was so much more quiet around here without Anabel and Stephanie. We still hadn’t gotten used to Higgins being gone with this all happened.

“So when do you think you should go get Anabel?” Emily asked.

“I don’t know…with Alabaster on the loose, maybe it’s best to just leave her there.”

“Aww, but I miss Annie,” Arduwan expressed, “I miss her food and her cookies and the way she’s nice to me when I wanna watch cartoons or if I break something.”

“I know. I miss her too,” I concurred, “I miss Stephanie too.”

Wraith tried to console me, “Man, I know it's hard. We did our best. There’s not much you can do in the way of bringing someone back to life. Not without a powerful Cleric around. And I’m certain that finding one in Callist would make getting that Rod feel like getting milk from the fridge.”

“Yeah. If only there was a surefire way we knew how to find one, then we could concentrate on that being our next quest.”

Arduwan let out a deep sigh and said, “I just wish there was a way my boobs could help this time.”

We all looked at her funnily.

“W-What?” I questioned.

“Well, last time we had trouble finding someone, my boobs helped us locate Celica,” she noted.

We were all really confused.

“Arduwan…what are you talking about?”

She finished off her current slice of pizza, stood up and replied, “The Oracle of Vale. He needed to feel up my boobs in order to see where we could find Celica, remember?”

Suddenly, I felt a whirlwind of memories rushing back to me. I hopped up from my chair and ran over to Arduwan. I put my hands on her shoulders and kissed her directly on the lips. “Arduwan! You’re a genius!” I praised her merrily.

She just smiled ear to ear and said, “What did I do?”

It was all coming back to me. I explained to everyone, “It’s the Forget spell that I cast on those agents! The repercussion was for me to forget about the Oracle of Vale! I couldn’t regain those memories until someone reminded me of them.”

“Right!” Emily interjected, “you said since you cast that spell on both of them that you would forget two really important things. That must be the first thing since you now remember!”

“Wait a minute,” said Wraith, “I’m just now recollecting those memories too and I wasn’t even here when he cast those spells.”

“Well…that’s because…,” I stammered, “I had already cast Forget before…on you

Wraith.”

“What? Why?!”

“It was right after we got you ready for the heist on that gold caravan! I needed to test the spell and I figured I’d test it on you to make you forget about the Oracle.”

“Why would I need to forget about the Oracle?!!!”

“Because I didn’t think it would do us much good to leave you in Callist, knowing that you could bring one of your harem chicks to allow that guy to feel up just so you could go off on some adventure that I might have to rescue you from if you used his visions for something crazy.”

“Why would I do that?!”

I gave him a look before Emily stated, “Hang on a second. If you used that spell before, then that means you actually have three important memories to be reminded of.”

“No…ehh, just one more.”

“Oh, you already have been reminded of the first forgotten memory?” she inquired.

“Yeah, actually. You see. The memory I lost from casting Forget on Wraith was…well…it was about having that conversation with you after Higgins funeral.”

“What? Really?”

“Yeah. When I came back from Callist the first time, I genuinely put it off because I was still processing things. But after that Dwarf mine raid, I got reminded we were supposed to talk and the memories flooded back and I got scared. So I put it off again.”

“Talk? Talk about what?” Wraith asked.

“”Don’t worry about it,”” we both said, in unison.

“Anyway,” I continued, “the way it works is the person Forget is cast on will forget any chosen memory. The caster then loses an equally important memory but can be reminded at any time. Though the target of the spell can only be reminded if the person they cast the spell on tells them. That’s why you didn’t remember the Oracle until I said something. So that means that there's one more memory I’ve lost and I just know it’s gonna bite me when it comes back around.”

There was a pause for a moment before Emily suggested, “Well now that you know you can find that Cleric using the Oracle’s vision, you should make a plan to go find him.”

“Emily, there’s no way we can take you to Callist. Look how bad things got in Brasshaven. I can assure you…Arduwan can assure you that it would be too dangerous for you to go to Callist.”

“Mhmm Mhmm,” she agreed as she grabbed another slice of pizza.

“Well that's okay. I wasn’t suggesting I go anyway.”

“But we can’t leave you alone here at the house, We’d be gone for days, maybe even weeks. What if Alabaster comes back? He’s probably already rallying a gang of goons as we speak.”

“I’ll be fine. Just give me your old pistol that D.A. Ralph gave you in Murk and we can set up some kind of security system here.”

She had a point. It was high time we modernized this Mansion. Every generation of Nobles had done something to upgrade it. My Great Uncle Cornelius upgraded the plumbing and the living spaces, and my father modernized the kitchen and the fitness room. I needed to make the perimeter of this place secure using technology. Starting tomorrow we'll have every corner of the property fitted with a surveillance system. I still didn’t feel good about leaving Emily here, but I knew what she was going to do. She was going to watch the net and search for any signs that Alabaster was surfacing.

“Okay. I’m with you. Once we get a system in place, Wraith, Arduwan, and I will go back to Callist to talk to the Oracle. We’ll find where the nearest Cleric is that might be powerful enough to help us revive Stephanie. But while we’re there we’ll ask him to tip us off as to when Alabaster makes his next move.”

“What do you think he’s gonna make Arduwan do?” Wraith asked.

“Who? The Oracle? Pshh. That greasy old guy probably just wants another feel,” I responded before turning my attention to Arduwan, “I really don’t like doing it, but are you okay with doing what you did last time?”

“You bet, Eric! If it means getting Stephanie back, then I’d even let the Devil King feel em!”

Keep in mind, this woman was still sitting there in a bra and panties while eating pizza.

Her body was like the furniture to us at this point.

Arc 3 Part 4-2

The next day, we had a very reputable security agency come to the house and install a state of the art surveillance system. I paid top dollar to ensure that every square inch of the property near the house had an electric eye on it. They even installed a couple solar panels to keep the cameras rolling if the power was cut.

Inside, we had the main hall from the front door and the kitchen surveyed as well. No need putting one upstairs since any infiltrator would be caught on an exterior camera while scaling the wall to the upper floors. But in the basement I had a camera fixed facing the well and one in the room with the safe that we kept the stones and journal in.

Next, Emily took the records she kept from the trial in Murk to be able to upload a picture of Alabaster into the facial recognition software. The system was linked to my phone and Emily’s. If he set foot on this property then a special alert, different from the normal alert, would notify us that it was him.

“Now do you feel better about leaving me here, Eric?” Emily asked, as I gave her my pistol and made sure she knew how to operate it.

“Of course I don’t! If it were up to me we’d be out there hunting him down. But I know that would only draw attention to us right now.”

“You guys just worry about finding a Cleric for Stephanie,” she diverted, “I’m gonna spend my time scouring the net and the news to see if and when he makes any moves locally.

Even if you find out more from that Oracle, I can’t just sit here and do nothing.”

She was right. Situations like these she was pretty helpless in. We couldn’t take her to Callist but we needed to get going if we were going to kill two birds with one stone. Find a high level Cleric to revive Steph and figure out Alabaster’s next move. We certainly weren’t going to go get Anabel back yet. Not with Stephanie’s body decaying downstairs and that Devil on the loose in this world now.

“Well, I guess we’ll find out soon enough. It’s time for us to go.”

I geared back up into my chainmail and Arduwan donned her leather bikini and loincloth once again. Of course Wraith was back to playing Prince of Persia. The three of us would be heading back to Callist once again and I was damn determined to be quick and methodical in our quest.

The others went into the well first. I slowed my entry to say my goodbye to Emily without them in sight. We were still kinda being informal about what was going on between us. I’m not entirely sure the reason why, but I could feel that it helped Emily with taking things slow.

“Promise me you won’t die?” she said, as she draped her arms around my neck and leaned up for a kiss just outside the well.

“I’ll do my best. But if We don’t make it back, don’t come after us. The mansion is yours and I’ll trust you to carry forth and make the best decision on what to do.”

“Don’t even suggest something like that!” she scoffed, “I need you, Eric! If that’s what's gonna motivate you to come back in one piece, then just remember that I can’t survive against our enemies on my own.”

“Alright, alright. Sorry I even mentioned it. I won’t die, okay?”

And with that, I stepped over into the well and we made our way to Arduwan’s homeworld once again.

* * *

The first thing Arduwan did when we left the canyon was call for three horses. With utmost haste we began the long journey back towards Vale, the forest kingdom. Wraith wanted to stop by his trading post but I told him we were forging on ahead. We didn’t have time for him to visit with ‘his girls’.

Without that distraction, we made it through the guard post and into the forest in no time at all. I was ready for the lecherous Oracle this time. Even though Arduwan said she didn’t have a problem being groped for the info we needed, I had some left over treasure from our previous raids. I had forgotten about it until I found the little sack tied to my adventuring belt in the laundry room.

Once inside the city of Vale, we quickly made our way down to the building where the Oracle saw paying customers who wanted the advantage of knowing things before they happened. The receptionist took us into the room where the fat little bald man was sitting perched on his pillow.

“Oh, welcome back friends,” he greeted, “I knew…”

“Knew we were coming. Yeah, I know. Oracle humor,” I interrupted with a lack of amusement in my voice, “Look. We have something pretty serious to ask you again. I’ve got money this time.”

I held up the sack full of gold pieces and shook it around a little. The Oracle looked at it and opened his mouth in amazement.

“Ah, I see.”

“Yes, you see what?” I asked.

“I see…that you’re under the assumption that my old pricing was still in effect.”

“What?! Your old pricing?!”

He crossed his arms, closed his eyes, and nodded his head before answering, “yes. You see. Being an Oracle is quite lucrative. But it is also quite demanding. I’ve had many wealthy people come to see me over the years who wished to expand their wealth. And word of mouth has gotten around, so it has become a daily, if not, hourly task to answer all the questions. It’s really become most tiring. So unfortunately, I’ve had to raise my prices to thin the herd so to speak.”

I was skeptical but took him at his word.

“Yeah, okay, I guess that makes sense. What’s your new price?”

“One thousand gold pieces.”

“A thousand!” I shouted, “you’ve gotta be kidding! It was five hundred last time. I mean, we could’ve swung six fifty or maybe seven hundred, but you’re trying to buy the banker!”

“I’m sorry. Perhaps you’d be more suited speaking to the fortune teller in the alley several blocks over?” he teased.

“No no, it’s fine. I know what you want,” I let out a big sigh and said, “Arduwan. Get those tits out.”

Before she did and before anyone else could say anything, the Oracle interrupted, “Ah, ah, ah…while I appreciate the gesture…”

Here it comes.

“Just as my monetary price has gone up, so has the legal tender of Arduwan the

Barbarian Princess’s exchange rate.”

“What are you getting at?” Wraith asked.

“Simply ogling and fondling Arduwan’s bosom is not sufficient for my services any more.

It’s how you might say, ‘been there, done that.’”

“Just get to the point. What do you want her to do?” I plead.

“Actually…nothing as lewd as what you’re probably imagining. I would just like for Lady

Arduwan to sit across my lap whilst I summon your query.”

“Arduwan, you good with that?”

“I told you before, anything to get Stephanie back,” she replied, somberly.

“Anything?” the sly Oracle inquired.

“...Let’s…just stick with your initial request,” I stopped him.

“Fine,” he gave in, “shall we begin.”

I looked over at Arduwan and signaled her to make her way over to this middle aged balding man's lap. He sat with arms wide open and a huge smile across his face. He was almost as short as Emily and the towering Arduwan looked ridiculous climbing onto his lap in the Bridal Carry position. She looped her arm around his right shoulder to try and get in place while her bottom half swung over his left knee as he sat cross legged.

“Okay. Nice and comfy. Now. What can I answer for you?”

“We’re looking for a powerful Cleric,” Wraith explained, ” No one specific. Just one good enough to bring someone back from the dead and preferably close enough to travel to with relative ease.”

“Oh my! A tall order indeed. I’ll see what I can do.”

The little perv scrunched his eyes closed and stroked Arduwan’s hair with his right hand while cradling her thighs with his left.

“Ah, I see! There is a Cleric of the highest order just across the sea to the northeast of

Vale. He’s in the Tower of Mardur.”

“The Tower of Mardur!” Wraith exclaimed.

“Wait, what's the big deal with that?” I asked.

Wraith had a very disturbed look on his face. He shook his head fervently, and said, “we can’t go there. No one lives in those lands but monsters. Higher level monsters. The tower used to be a beacon to signal across the sea that forces unfriendly to Vale were coming and to give the people time to prepare for an amphibious assault. But during the last great war, it was overtaken and no one was left alive to signal from there again.”

“Well, somebody is there,” I noted, “wonder why a top notch Cleric would take up residency in a place like that?”

“Maybe he’s trying to restore the beacon?” Arduwan suggested.

“Hmm, could be,” said Wraith, “oh well, doesn’t do us any good. It’s too far and too dangerous.”

“Come on, Wraith,” I prodded, “you’re always looking to get into some kind of adventure. What’s different about this?”

“The difference is, there's not a lot of payoff to going. Going on a raid, dungeon delving, sure, I’m in. But what are we going to the Tower of Mardur for?”

I gave him a stern look and said, “We’re going so we can get Stephanie back.”

“Eric…Eric, Eric, Eric. Listen. You know I love Steph. She’s a great person. The best. But maybe her number was just up. Like Higgins and that Celica chick. I mean, besides, you’ve got Anabel, and Emily, and Arduwan now. Do you really need to risk your life…our lives, for an ex?”

I started to get angry and made myself very clear by saying, “Wraith. You should be ashamed of yourself. You’re lucky I don’t take you outside and kick your ass. I have half a mind to…”

Arduwan suddenly interrupted, “Lord Wraith, sir. If I were to try and find an exception to the rules of courtship during a life debt, would you agree to go with us?”

We all just stood there stunned for a moment as she made her case.

“Perhaps we could go on that date you wanted. And maybe I could even sit on your lap like I am the Oracle. Maybe I could join your harem? I’d do just about anything to get Stephanie back and stop Anabel from being sad.”

Wraith’s tongue nearly rolled out of his mouth like a Tex Avery cartoon. He never gave a straight answer, just mumbled and shook his head yes.

“One more question, Oracle. Can you tell me when the next time Alabaster Creole will make a move against my home?”

“Wait just a minute. What makes you think I can answer a second question?”

“You want the gold right?” I teased, “Last time, we gave you what little gold we had plus the boob squeeze. This time we just agreed to the lap sitting.”

“Why you! It was implicit that I was getting the gold and Arduwan’s company. You tricked me!”

“It’s really not a big deal. You already gave us the one vision. What’s the harm in another? It’s easy money. Arduwan’s already on your lap.”

“Well…okay. I should deny your request on principle. But the truth is…I really like all of you. Alabaster Creole you say?”

“Yes. He’s our top enemy at the moment.”

“Let me see,” the Oracle said, as he closed his eyes again.

A minute passed before he finally responded, “Hmm, this is very strange. I can’t see anything about Alabaster Creole.”

“Huh? Are you sure? Do you need any more details about him?”

“No. I can see him. I just can see his next move against you. You see, the threads of destiny are thin. And since the future is in motion and not predetermined, I can only see so far ahead. Usually a couple of months. Ninety to a hundred days at best.”

“Then that means he’s not going to do anything in the near future at all?”

“Correct. But it's more peculiar than that. I got curious about him so I looked closer in time to see if I could find where he would be even if he didn’t come back to your mansion anytime soon. But that’s the thing, I can’t find him at all!”

“How can this be?!” I asked.

“If I am unable to see someone else's future, then that can only mean one thing…they’re dead!”

Impossible. He’s one of the Seven Devils. How could he have been killed so easily after crossing worlds? Was he hit by a car? He was bleeding pretty badly after Emily shot him and I’m sure he ran on adrenaline back to the well. Is it possible there is an expiration date on Devils that cross into my world? But then how did Celica last so long? None of it made sense!

“Ah, well. That was easy enough,” Wraith nonchalantly pointed out, “good riddance to him. He had it coming anyway.“

“Wraith, are you not at all concerned about how he could’ve been taken out so easily?”

“Don’t worry about it, Eric. Now you can at least rest easy knowing that Emily is safe while we’re getting killed by high level monsters across the sea.”

He had a point. I did feel better about the whole thing knowing that Alabaster wouldn't resurface in the next ninety days. But it was just all so sudden and shocking to find out he was gone completely.

“Right,” I resigned myself to comfort and planned for our next move, “we should prepare to cross the sea. How far is it from here?”

“The nearest port is ten hours east of Vale. But you’ll need to secure a ship and fight the tempestuous sea to reach the otherside. The journey is typically two days,” said the Oracle, as a smirk crossed his face, “But! If you’d like. I can call that eagle back again?”

Arc 3 Part 4-3

2 Hours Later

The Giant Eagle comes swooping into the continent across the sea from Vale. It’s a dark and brooding land. A stark reminder of a bygone era of war and untamed evil. The Eagle sat down the rolled carpet that carried myself, Wraith, and Arduwan in. As we unraveled ourselves it took us a moment to find our footing again. Not only were we a little dizzy but our muscles were cramped from laying in place for so long.

After the bird left, Wraith posed an interesting question.

“How are we going to get back?” he said, as we watched it fly away back over the sea behind us. We had been placed right atop some coastal cliffs with waves crashing below us. Up ahead was the dark brush of an unknown land.

“We’ll have to figure that out later,” I replied, “for now, we just need to cautiously move forward.”

We gathered ourselves and our things and started inland. According to the Oracle, the Tower of Mardu wasn’t far from the coast since it was once used as a beacon to signal impending threats to citizens of Vale. We certainly would have seen it ourselves on the way in if not for being wrapped up in that carpet.

As we scurried into the brush, I halted for a moment and made a suggestion.

“Hang on a minute. If I cast Perimeter Check, then we’ll be tipped off by anything we come across that tries to get the jump on us. The only problem is, I won’t be able to cast anything else while using it. So Arduwan, stick close beside me and I’ll keep my sword drawn. Wraith, you walk just behind us so you can make an evasive maneuver if we get into a fight.”

They both nodded to me and got into position. But then the unexpected happened. The moment I cast the spell, fear washed over my face.

“Eric, what’s wrong?” Arduwan asked.

I couldn’t bring out words. I was completely shaken in fear. Every fiber of my being trembled. I could tell the others were getting scared just at the sight of my paling complexion.

Just as I was about to faint, Arduwan put her hand on my shoulder and asked, “what is it?”

“Yeah, buddy, what’s wrong?” Wraith added.

I was finally able to muster the words, “Hundreds…there’s hundreds of adversaries appearing on my psychic radar from the Perimeter Check spell.”

“What?! What are they?” asked Wraith.

“I…I…I don’t know. The spell only indicates locations. I can’t even determine friend from foe with it. But do you really think that whatever it is out there in this place is friendly? I mean, I doubt we’re stumbling upon a woodstock concert.”

“Well,” Arduwan courageously noted, “there’s only one way for us to find out.”

She took a few steps forward into the bush and looked back at us to signal for us to move ahead. At least we knew there was something out there even if we didn’t know what just yet.

Wraith and I stepped forward and were shoulder to shoulder with Arduwan as we moved through the brush. We made it about fifty more feet from where I first detected the presence of foes. Through the treeline, we could see what must’ve been the tower, so we crept a little closer to the edge of a clearing.

All three of us got down to a crawling position as we peered through the vegetation to get a better look. And there it was. A white tower, comparatively about twenty stories tall to buildings in my world. We were about three quarters of a mile away from the base of it. And lo and behold, between us and the tower, was a field of orcs!

The orcs were stationed in multiple encampments between us and the tower, as if they were guarding it. No, it was as if this was a rallying point for something greater. Nothing about their positioning looked like it was permanent. There must’ve been easily two hundred of them. If not, three hundred.

We were slightly uphill from them and the nearest group of orcs was about a football field's length from us. Most of the orcs we could see were about six foot tall, not much more than me and Wraith. But they were bound with muscle, had thick, pale green looking skin, and pig-like facial features. They mostly carried crude weapons such as clubs, axes, warhammers, and spears. Some had shields and a few had pieces of armor, clearly pillaged from fallen warriors.

“Well, we’re dead,” Wraith resigned himself and declared our defeat.

“Not so fast, man. We can figure something out. You’re the great strategist here after all.”

“I have a plan, Eric,” said Arduwan, who usually followed our lead rather than make decisions herself.

“What do you have in mind?”

“You know how fast I can run. If I can get out there and cause a diversion, I’m sure I could lead most of the orcs away from here. You and Wraith should be able to fight your way to the tower then and get the Cleric out. He’s probably trapped in there since all of them are here out front. I can circle back around and meet with you once I think the coast is clear.”

“Arduwan, that’s a great idea!”

“Holdup,” Wraith interrupted, “I’m not so sure about this. I mean, you do realize this isn’t some Disneyfied fairy tale right? Those things are like First Edition AD&D orcs out there. You know how amorous those things can get? They’re gonna take one look at Arduwan and become uncontrollably ravenous.”

Arduwan sighed and said, “Uhh, Wraith. I can handle myself. I know what they’re capable of and that’s why I thought to do this. Don’t worry, I’m confident I can outrun them. Ask Eric. I can run for hours without getting winded.”

That was true. During our training together we would sometimes loop the country roads near the mansion and after a while she would lap me.

“It’s alright, man. Trust her. She was born to do this stuff,” I said.

He didn’t seem convinced, but he looked at Arduwan and saw her resolve before saying, “alright. It’s not like we have many other options. Do we?”

“No, we don’t.”

So after a few minutes of preparations and going over the plan one more time, we decided to take action.

Wraith and I stayed undercover not far from where we first looked out over the orc horde. Arduwan went lower downhill before exposing herself from the brush, that way she could get a running start before any of them noticed her. It would be on her signal that we would act.

“Now remember, Wraith. I have to maintain concentration for this to work. And I’m gonna be pretty weak once we reach the tower door from casting another spell, so I may be out of magic for a while.”

“Yeah yeah, I gotcha. Let’s just hope she gets enough of them out of here to make it worth it. Then we won’t have anything to worry about.”

Suddenly, Arduwan burst from the treeline in a full sprint. She tore off running like Usain Bolt in a direction away from the tower but flat enough for her to have little resistance. Even under these dire circumstances it was hard not to admire the sculpted elegance of Arduwan’s physique. It was like a scene from Baywatch of her running in her skimpy adventuring outfit as her thighs jiggled and her ample bosom bounced.

The entire orc encampment looked in her direction. You could see their salivating gaze even from where we stood. Without hesitation, a large group of them began moving in her direction. Just as she was about to disappear into the treeline once again, you could hear what was almost like a clap of thunder from the mass movement of well over one hundred orcs. A moment later, dozens more joined their ranks in pursuit of the buxom blonde barbarian beauty.

“It worked!” I noted, careful not to alert the remaining orcs, “look, there’s only a few dozen left. And they’re pretty spread out.”

“Yeah, but there’s about ten of em near the tower door,” Wraith pointed out.

“Let’s just go. We can’t let Arduwan run out there forever so let's use this advantage she gave us.”

“Right!”

“Wall’s of Reflection!” I said, as I cast a spell around me and Wraith that made a perfect square of invisible walls that would project around us what was on the other side. Basically, if you stood between two people, each person would see one another but not the person in the middle casting the spell.

We moved quickly. I had never used this spell before and even though I had been flexing the magic muscle quite a bit lately, I could already feel myself fatiguing from projecting a double sized wall around the two of us.

We were now down in the field. The other orcs seemed to be distracted from the excitement moments ago and went back to doing whatever they were doing. Some built fires, some cooked, others just grazed.

There was a fair bit of ground to cover before we reached the tower door but I was confident we could at least make it there before I ran out of MP. Getting the door open and passing the orcs guarding outside was a different story. Wraith would probably have to kick it into high gear for that one.

Hastily, we made our way down through the clearing. We easily passed by the small encampments of orcs without any of them noticing us. Thankfully, we didn’t have to get too close to any of them anyway. That is, until we got near the larger group at the base of the tower.

I signaled Wraith to stop about ten yards away from the group of orcs we saw earlier. I counted nine of them. I was just about to signal for us to rotate around them and get to the door to try and open it and get inside before they noticed when something unexpected happened. A single orc stood up and walked in front of me. We stood completely still. He started sniffing the air, but remained in place about three feet away from us. After a moment, he grabbed his axe and swung mightily in our direction.

Wraith and I sprang backwards and my lack of concentration broke the spell. We were now clearly visible. The orcs sense must’ve indicated humans were here and he instinctively reacted. The benefit was, I wasn’t nearly as drained from the spell as I should’ve been since I ended it earlier than I had originally planned. The disadvantage was, now we had a fight!

The orc stepped forward and swung again. I dodged to the left. Wraith went airborne and somersaulted over the orc. When he landed behind him, he drove his scimitar into the orcs back. By now, the other eight orcs nearby were coming to their feet and advancing on us. I drew my bow and immediately felled two of them in rapid succession. Thanks Higgins.

Wraith was completely in rock and roll mode too. After the first three orcs went down, he dropped a smoke bomb and cloaked our movements. One, two, three, four! Using his throwing daggers, he eliminated four more of the orcs. When the smoke went up, I shouldered my bow and drew my sword. I had eyeballed the location of the remaining nearby orcs and annihilated them under the cover of smoke.

Of course, the other orcs in the area didn’t just let all of this happen. They had started converging on our location the moment the battle began. Thankfully, they were spread out and far away from the tower. We had plenty of time to open the door and get inside before the smoke cleared and they reached us.

Arc 3 Part 4-4

Once inside the tower, we began barricading the big wooden door behind us. After lowering the metal drawbars inside we started stacking furniture up. There were a few wooden benches and some metal floor sconces nearby. With about twenty five to thirty orcs outside, it wouldn’t hold forever, but at least nothing had been waiting for us in here.

We dashed instantaneously towards the spiral staircase that led up the tower. The Oracle’s vision showed that the Cleric was on the top floor. Even though it was physically tiring to take so many stairs at once, it allowed my magic power to regenerate even further and we could process things once again after that fight outside. Finally, we reached the top of the stairs. It led out into an open room with no door. You could see 360 degrees around the outside of the tower from up here. There was a large circular magnifying glass in front of a fire pit. That must’ve been the beacon. Standing just on the other side of it was a man in lavish blue and white robes with a matching Roman Catholic style Mitre hat and a wooden staff. He had to be the Arch Cleric.

“Excuse me sir, might I have a word?” I asked.

“Who are you? And what are you doing here?” he replied, in an almost viscous tone.

“My name is Eric Noble and this is my partner, Lord Wraith of the desert. We’ve come here to beg for your help.”

There was an awkwards silence. The Cleric did not immediately respond. He simply stared at us. I was confused. Was he trapped here? Did he live here? Finally he replied, “Dost thou have any clue as to who ye are beseeching?”

I turned to Wraith, who looked just as confused as I was. Then I turned back and said, “We were told that we would find a powerful Cleric of the utmost divinity here in this tower. Is that not you?....err, ye?”

He answered, “Yay. For I am Apollo, Dark Cleric of the Chaos Pantheon and General of the Devil King’s army.”

…

“Excuse me…”

No further reply. The next course of action was Apollo casting a Divine Sacre Fire spell at us. Wraith and I dodged in opposite directions.

“Sorry, sir. We didn’t mean to intrude on your home,” Wraith apologized.

“‘Tis not my home ye foul meddlers!”

He then manifested two transparent black swords and said, “Unholy Sabre!”

The two swords flew towards both Wraith and I and we found ourselves in combat with them. How do you defeat a sword with no swordsmen? Wraith raised up his plasma rifle, which up until now he had strapped across his back as a last resort. The dark blade sliced the barrel right off before he could pull the trigger. I decided to tuck and roll underneath the sword attacking me and cast a spell of my own.

“Wind Blade!” I shouted as I slashed forward, producing a piercing gust through the air that flew across the room and struck Apollo. Both of the dark swords disappeared. We held out ground and waited for his next move.

“Who hath sent thee to disrupt our mission?”

“Your mission?” I questioned, “we just came here to ask for help for our friend. We didn’t know that there was gonna be an orc army here and that you’d be a Dark Cleric.”

“Thou hath stumbled upon the first wave of advancement the Devil King doth make against the Kingdom of Vale.”

Well shit. Looks like we could’ve used a few more details about this particular cleric. It’s not the Oracle's fault though. All he was doing was looking around for us. It’s not really any different than someone going to the grocery store to get milk for you and bringing back the wrong brand.

“Listen! This has all been a major misunderstanding. We can talk through all of this,” I said, trying to smooth things over.

“Ye know not of misunderstanding! For I am High Priest of the misunderstood. Year after year I bore the scoffs of many til the Devil King brought me unto his tutelage. He hath shown me the true light within the darkness!”

Just then, we heard noises outside. The cleric rushed over to the window and looked down. We were far enough away from him but still in range of the window to look ourselves. Down below, we saw the orcs that were trying to get into the tower just a moment ago heading towards the forest. An arrow struck one. Then another. Then another! They came from Arduwan, who was now walking out of the treeline with her longbow drawn. She looked like hell, but the fighting spirit was still alive.

Apollo reacted by questioning, “What is this insolence?!” “She’s in trouble! We gotta help her!” I said to Wraith.

Before I finished my statement, he launched himself at Apollo and struck his shoulder with a dagger. The cleric countered with a sweep of his staff. This knocked Wraith onto the ground.

“I shall chastise thee with all the vengeance within my very soul. Divine Harm, Divine Harm, Divine Harm!” said Apollo, as he aimed his staff at Wraith and seemingly caused bodily aches and pains to his body.

“Ahhh!” Wraith cried out in agony.

This was bad. Arduwan was bracing for an attack from the oncoming orcs and it looked as though some of the other orcs that had followed her were starting to come back out of the forest as well. Wraith was in grueling pain and I don’t think I could cast another spell without fainting immediately. I did the only thing left I could think to do.

“Wait!” I begged. I dropped to my knees and began pleading, “Please! Someone I love is dead and their death came unfairly. It was even partially my fault that it happened. And that’s my best friend you are torturing. I don’t know what kind of pantheon of gods could give divine power to a clergyman for this kind of wickedness, but of course something like that would exist in a place like Callist!”

The evil priest stopped hurting Wraith and we could hear the clashing of steel down below. I couldn’t see, but I knew Arduwan was down there fighting her last fight judging by the condition I saw her in when I last looked.

In a somber tone, the cleric asked, “Did thou say, someone ye loved was killed?”

“Yes!”

“And these are thine friends? Of whom ye care for as well?”

“Absolutely! They mean the world to me. The blonde more than him, but I’d still die for him!”

“Hey!” Wraith said, still writhing in pain on the floor.

The cleric took a step closer to the window and waited a moment. The sounds of battle still going, accompanied by waning grunts coming from Arduwan. Apollo then raised his hand out the window and held it there a moment.

“Divine Smite!” He hailed.

Suddenly, a flash of light struck from the sky and obliterated every living thing on the ground except Arduwan, despite striking precisely where she was standing. I rushed over to

Wraith and helped him get to his feet. The two of us stammered over to the window next to

Apollo. Down below, we saw Arduwan sink to one knee. And crutch herself with her Greatsword. “Why did you do it?” I asked, “Why did you change your mind?”

He responded first with a sigh and then said, “When one begins the path of the spiritual, they are usually motivated by compassion. But my path was motivated by resentment. Your cries for your loved ones made me a believer again in humanity. I have broken my covenant with the Chaos Pantheon by helping you. My only redemption will be to form a new covenant with spirits of light instead of darkness.”

Wow. This was deep. I had no idea that just by having friends I could deconvert an evil priest. This guy must’ve been bullied hard back in the day. But then I realized something… “Hey! What happened to your old English dialect?” “Excuse me?” he asked, seemingly confused.

“The thee’s and the thou’s and the ye’s and the doth’s. Where did that go? It just disappeared from your speech!”

He fumbled a little bit and said, “Oh, well, you see, that was part of my covenant as well! I see, you must have freed me from that cursed lexicon!”

Yeah right. I get the feeling this guy is a lot like Wraith. Which by the way, Apollo started using healing magic to get Wraith feeling well again.

“I’m terribly sorry, Lord Wraith. Please forgive me.”

“Ah, it’s all good. As long as we’re all friends now!”

“Friends! You mean, we’re friends?!” He asked with excitement.

Wraith replied, “Sure thing! I mean, you can’t be friends with the Devil King anymore if we are. But if that’s alright, we can be bros!”

“Oh, we weren’t friends or anything. I was just a subordinate of his. In forty two long years, I’ve never had a real friend.”

This was odd but I wasn’t going to complain if we got what we came for and we were all better people because of it. A bunch of dead orcs was a nice bonus. Speaking of which!

“Hey, guys,” I interrupted, “sorry to cut this short, but do you think we could get down there and heal Arduwan?!”

Arc 3 Part 4-5

The three of us rushed down to the ground level. Apollo went to Arduwan’s aid. She was badly bruised and cut and dirty. I had never seen her in such bad shape before! She was tough but fighting an orc army by herself was a pretty tall order.

“So what happened when you ran off?” I asked her.

She sat up on the grass and looked at the cleric with confusion as he healed her wounds. Then she looked up to me and replied, “Well. I ran and ran as those things chased me. I wasn’t sure if I could find my way back if I went too far so I decided to head towards the cliffs where we first arrived. With a little fake leap I managed to trick nearly fifty of the orcs into falling off the cliff!”

“Whoa! Then what?!” Wraith asked.

“Well, when I climbed back up, I found myself completely surrounded by them. I started fighting and was doing really well at first…probably killed another fifteen or twenty of them. But then, they started to grab me. They were planning on having their way with me!”

“So what did you do?” I asked.

“When the first orc grabbed me after my sword was knocked out of my hand, another orc shoved him back. It seems they couldn’t agree who would have me first so a fight broke out. The next thing I knew, nearly a hundred orcs were brawling with each other. It was enough for me to grab my gear and slip away. I had to fight a few more of course but after that, I made my way back here. That’s when that light came down from the sky and killed the rest of them.”

“That was Apollo. He saw you were my friend and was in trouble so he wanted to help. He’s my friend now too,” I said as I winked and gave Apollo a thumbs up.

He smiled and said, “it was the least I could do.”

“Wow! Thanks Apollo!” Arduwan exclaimed, “Guess that makes us friends now too!”

“Really?!”

“Of course! A friend of Eric’s is a friend of mine!”

“What luck! A friend that is a girl now too! Oh, and she’s so beautiful! The gods have really blessed me today!”

We were all happy and having a good time there in that field surrounded by fallen orcs and all but then I remembered our mission. All of this was to try and get Stephanie back. I needed to know for sure if this was a possibility, so I asked him directly.

“Apollo. My friend Stephanie is why we are here. She was killed awhile back by the henchman of one of my enemies. Another friend was also killed but we revived her some time ago using a Rod of Resuscitation. But as you know, the rod could only bring back one person and it had to be by the end of the lunar cycle. I’m told a cleric's power is stronger than that. But has it been too long since she died to bring her back?”

“Hmm,” he pondered, “it’s true that a powerful cleric has the ability to revive someone who has died unless it was from natural death. And the limitation is only if the core of their body is still intact. But as long as you have their remains, it should work. However, you have a bigger problem.”

“What’s that?” I asked, fearfully.

“My power is waning. The Chaos Pantheon has disowned me. I was barely able to finish healing Arduwan. I’m sorry, but there’s no way I can revive your friend.“

I sank. All I could do was collapse on my bottom into the grass. All this work. We had tried so desperately to right this wrong but it seemed as though fate was trying to keep Stephanie in death's embrace. Maybe we weren’t a couple anymore. But I missed her. We all did. Even Arduwan was tearing up again at Apollo’s declaration.

“There is only one thing we can try,” he added.

“There is?”

“Yes, but there is absolutely no guarantee this will work. But if you have faith and we make an attempt, then it is possible it will work.”

“Anything! Please, let’s at least try it,” I begged.

“I’ll need you to take me to the girl's remains. I’m going to attempt a new spiritual covenant in exchange for her life being restored.”

“Really?! That can work?”

“It’s a long shot but I’m going to ask Delilah, the Goddess of Second Chances, to grant your friend a second chance as well as one for myself. If I dedicate myself to her, then maybe she’ll bring your friend back.”

“Wonderful! Let’s go, right away!”

“Just a minute,” Wraith chimed in, “how exactly are we supposed to get back to the spring from here?”

He had a point. The eagle dropped us off and we decided we’d figure out how to get back later. Well, it’s later.

“Apollo, how were you planning on mounting your invasion to the other continent? Aren’t orcs afraid of water?” I asked.

“My orders were to hold here until the Devil King’s campaign in other lands was complete. Then he would provide me with more foot soldiers and some ferries to cross the sea with.”

Dammit. It’s not good. We can’t swim across! Maybe Arduwan can use her Call of the Wild to get us some dolphins or we could ride in a whale's belly. Err, this world is so difficult! All of a sudden, “Look!” Arduwan shouted.

We all looked in the direction she pointed in and saw the Giant Eagle flying into view from the direction of Vale across the sea. When it landed, Wraith approached it and it dropped a small letter tube from its mouth.

Wraith began reading the letter inside, “It says, ‘Dear Eric and company. I got curious and took a peek into your futures. The threads of fate showed me two outcomes. One where you all were smeared dead across a field in front of the tower and one where you made a new friend. If you’re reading this then you know which one happened. I sent the eagle just in case either way. P.S. you really owe me for this one,’ and that's it.”

“Err, dammit! How many times are we gonna travel by way of eagle rug carry?!” I shouted in disgust.

* * *

A few hours later, the eagle dropped us off near the spring once again. On the way over, we explained that we were world walkers to Apollo. He would become one of the few who would ever come back to my house by my own volition. Up until now it was just cute girls and murderers who had passed through the well on my watch.

Back at the mansion, I immediately went to check on Emily. Thankfully, everything was okay. No sign of Alabaster. I quickly explained to her what had happened and how the Oracle couldn’t see where Alabaster was. She concurred with me that it seemed too convenient that he was dead but there was nothing we could do about it at the moment.

In the Butler's Quarters, Apollo prepared a ritual to begin asking for Delilah’s assistance. I must admit, I was skeptical. I’ve seen some crazy stuff the past year. But nothing that made me believe some goddess of second chances was gonna fly in and help, that’s for sure.

He had incense and candles burning around the room. Stephanie’s remains, still wrapped in the sheets we left her in, laid there on the bed. Wraith and Arduwan stood back near the door. Me and Emily pulled up chairs at the bedside near where Apollo was pacing and chanting.

“Oh, elegant goddess Delilah! I ask for your aid on this day. Please grace us with your presence and restore the life that was taken from this poor young woman. I offer a covenant with you in return. Forgive my past sins and wretched devotion to the Chaos Pantheon.”

At first it seemed like a bunch of senseless chanting and half hearted begging. But about ten minutes into this whole thing, something happened. The lights flickered and a calm presence could be felt. Apollo stopped pacing and stood in place in front of Stephanie’s body. He fell to his knees and looked towards the ceiling. It was as if he was having a conversation with someone. He was slain in the spirit. “I see. Yes. I see. Very well.” “What is it?” I asked.

Apollo turned around with tears in his eyes and a smile on his face and said, “Eric. She’s agreed to bring Stephanie back. But on one condition. Because of my past deeds, she’s tying my path to redemption in place of Stephanie's life. She can only be brought back if I trade my life for hers.”

“What?! Apollo, no. You don’t have to do that! It’s not your fault she died!”

“It’s okay, Eric. It’s better this way. Believe it or not, the little time I’ve spent with all of you has been the best time of my life. I know it sounds sad, but it’s been pretty shitty for me so far.”

I couldn’t respond to that. I simply nodded. Apollo turned back towards Stephanie and raised his hands above her.

“Okay. I’m ready, Lady Delilah. Take my life in exchange for hers!”

And with that, there was a flash of light. Apollo crashed onto the bed beside her body facedown. There was a swirling of light and I could see the decayed remains of Stephanie underneath the sheet begin to form back into a whole person. She began moving around as if lost beneath the sheet. Everyone in the room had a look of amazement on their faces which quickly turned to smiles as I jumped up from my chair and pulled the sheet back to awaken her.

There she was, Stephanie was beginning to open her eyes. I grabbed her by the shoulders with tears in my eyes. She reciprocated and said, “Eric!” as she pulled herself up and kissed me passionately. Something she had not done in several years.

Emily’s face turned from smile to frown as she watched the two of us. I embraced the kiss for just a few seconds before pushing her back to calm her as I felt her shake with anxiety just as Anabel did when she was revived.

“Eric! Eric, what happened?! Where’s Anabel?!” she cried.

“Shh, shh, she’s safe! It’s okay,” I assured, “we got the bad guys and we’ve spent weeks trying to bring the two of you back to life. You both will be okay now and I’m not gonna let anything happen to either of you again.”

We embraced for a heartfelt hug and I could feel the tension coming from Emily. I started to explain what had happened with Apollo, when all of a sudden…

“Hey! Good, it worked!” he said, as he sprang back up from where he had collapsed on the bed beside us.

“What the? How? I thought you gave your life?” “Eric, who is this?” Stephanie asked.

“Well, this is the cleric we found to bring you back to life. But I thought he was dead.”

“Correction! I’m no longer a cleric! Part of my covenant with Delilah was to disavow Divine Magic, even from the Light Side. When she said I had to give my life to her, she meant in ways outside of the priesthood. I’m a free agent now!”

Wraith spoke up and said, “But, why did you collapse on the bed? If you knew during your communion with the goddess that all you were doing was sacrificing your powers, what was with that dramatic dying episode?”

“Ha! I couldn’t just let my last moments as a priest simply fizzle out. So I went with a dramatic flare!”

“Alright, man!” Wraith applauded.

Yep, that settles it. This guy was the Ernest Weathers A.K.A. Wraith of Callist. How could two of them exist in one world at the same time?

Once we brought Stephanie up to speed, she ordered some pizza and took a shower, as the others got comfortable. It was time to get a certain young lady back from Bristol.

* * *

On the other side of the well, near Benjamin’s house, I found a lovely but sad looking woman hanging clothes out to dry. She had resigned herself to chores in exchange for refuge while her broken heart healed and her mind went to dark places in fear for her friend's lives.

“Hello, Anabel,” I said subtly to her.

She looked up and her face brightened before she expressed, “Eric!”

I smiled at her and said, “not just me,” as I motioned behind me as Stephanie came walking up and closed the gap between us and Anabel

“Stephanie!!!”

“Anabel!!!”

The two of them rushed together and embraced in a warm hug. They cried and held each other tightly. The long road to reunification had crossed death and multiple worlds, but not even the power of the stones and the well could keep them separated.

After a moment, Anabel looked up from Stephanie’s shoulder with tears in her eyes and said, “Eric. Thank you!”

They motioned me to join them and the three of us clasped one another in loving harmony.

After thanking Thomas and Benjamin for keeping Anabel safe and taken care of, the three of us returned to my place.

Arc 3 Part 5-1

We were in no rush to send Apollo back to Callist so we offered for him to stay the night and just relax with us. He earned it after all. The man had spent his whole life being spiteful and villainous and now, for the first time, he could just be a normal guy. It appeared as though Delilah really was the goddess of second chances.

All of us, myself, Apollo, Wraith, Emily, Arduwan, Anabel, and Stephanie just spent the night laughing and talking. It was the first time since we came home to that horrible murder scene that we were able to truly enjoy anything. And even though Emily was a little standoffish, I could tell she was happy too. Having Stephanie and Anabel back was nothing short of a miracle. It took something like that to make me recognize just how fantastical all of this was. After a year of this madness it all sorta became background noise to me. You know, jumping worlds, sorcery, steampunk villains. But I’d made some really great friends. Not to mention gain new appreciation for some old ones, through Stephanie and Wraith.

So the next day, we started to say our goodbyes. It was time for Wraith to get back to his…business. And for Apollo to start his new life outside of being a dark clergyman and general or the Devil King.

“I can’t thank you enough, Apollo,” said Stephanie, with tears in her eyes, as she hugged him goodbye.

“Yes, thank you so much for what you’ve done,” Anabel added.

Apollo appeared to be blushing as he accepted their thanks and replied, “Not to worry ladies. It was all in a day's work. If either of you ever find yourselves in Callist, perhaps you could…pay me a visit?”

He was awkwardly hitting on them, wasn’t he? This guy really did have some similarities with Wraith.

“Arduwan,” I said, “I think for the time being, either you or I should always be at the mansion unless we have to go off somewhere for something serious.”

“I agree. But why do you need to return to Callist now anyway?”

“I’m going to escort Apollo anywhere he wants to go. I owe it to him to at least see that he gets safe refuge. Besides, I have something important to talk with Wraith about.”

“Well, as long as Wraith’s with you, I guess it’ll be alright.”

After calming Arduwan’s nerves I went to grab Wraith and ask if he was ready. I found him and Stephanie talking in the kitchen. The two of them seemed startled that I came in. As if they were being cautious not to raise my suspicion about something. I didn’t like that.

“Hey, Eric,” she diverted, “Anabel has some lunches she’s packing for the three of you while you’re taking Apollo wherever it is he wants to go.”

“Great. It’ll be nice to not have to rely on rations in the desert for a change,” I said, as I feigned a lack of concern over walking in on their conversation.

Emily was already in the basement with Apollo and Arduwan as the rest of us came downstairs to get ready to leave. I knew she wasn’t going to want to do a public display of some heartfelt goodbye in front of everyone, but it seemed really weird how little attention she gave to me. There was a time where that attention was unwanted.

Nonetheless, we said our goodbyes to the girls and made our way down the well. Arduwan crossed over with us just long enough to call three horses for us. I wasn’t sure where we were going, but Wraith and I told Apollo we’d escort him to wherever he’d like to start his new life.

“Hmm,” he said, as he scratched his chin and looked out beyond the canyon, “I’ve never been to these lands before. But I’ve heard that the Grasslands are quite nice.”

“Yeah. It’s pretty lush there. Lots of interesting people. Especially in Braytown,” I noted.

“But then again,” he continued, “I’ve heard that Vale is a magnificent place. I feel bad that I was preparing to conquer it. Perhaps a new life there would suit me.”

“Perhaps.”

He paused for a moment and then said, “Though the high seas have always called out to me…”

“Just…pick a direction and we’ll take you there,” I irritably insisted.

“Okay…Braytown it is!”

* * *

So the three of us began our journey to the western city of Braytown, the place where I first met Arduwan. There were many opportunities to be found there. Apollo was as giddy as a school boy on our journey there.

“I’m not sure what I should do,” he said, “maybe I could become a bartender and hear tales of other adventurers. Or maybe I could settle down with a little wife and herd sheep. The

possibilities are limitless!”

“Well, whatever you do, just make sure to keep your head down in case any agents of the Devil King are around and could recognize you.”

“Nah, his reach isn’t as far as Braytown, yet. By that time, I’d make sure that none of them would recognize me.”

All day long, Apollo spent our ride into the Grasslands speculating about his new life. The world was his oyster. We reached Braytown early in the morning and it was as bustling as ever. It was the biggest smalltown this side of Vale.

“Well, this is where we’re gonna part ways,” I declared, ”I’ve got my own journey to get back to. I wish you luck and thanks again for everything.”

Wraith tossed Apollo a small bag of gold.

“Thank you both! I am as indebted to you as you are to me. Please don’t be a stranger if you’re out this way again.”

After we bid him adieu, we began our journey back into the desert. We rode side by side as I struck up a conversation.

“Ya know, this is the first time it’s just been the two of us since before you got dragged into this crazy world walking stuff,” I said.

“Ha, yeah. That’s true.”

“I’ve got some important things I wanna discuss with you. Most important thing first. Clearly things have gotten more dangerous. They already were, but I’m completely wiped out from this latest series of crazy. I need to chill and lay low for a while. Can I count on you for something while I’m doing that?”

“Of course, buddy. You know I’ll help in any way I can. What do you need?” Wraith assured.

“I’m gonna stick close to the mansion for a while in case Alabaster shows back up. I know the Oracle didn’t foresee it, but I’m still bothered by it. Anyhow, after him, the only remaining Devil according to stones is the one here in Callist. At some point we’re gonna have to confront him. He may not be nearly in control of this world yet, but we got lucky stumbling into his plans for conquering Vale when we did.”

Wraith sighed and said, “I agree. What do you suggest we do to prepare?”

“I want you to contact the Thieves Guild. Get as much information on the Devil King, his whereabouts, his generals, his spies, anything. We wanna be as informed as we can possibly be and hopefully be in a position to make a move against him before discovers our existence and what we’re up to. We have the advantage right now in that we’re anonymous. But he knows somebody took out one of his generals.”

“Right. I can do that. Anything else?”

I hesitated for a moment as we kept riding before I continued, “Yeah. Can you tell me what that was you and Steph were talking about in the kitchen the other day?”

Wraith took a big gulp and replied, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, man?”

“You’re a terrible liar, Wraith. If it was about how she kissed me when she woke up from death, I’d really like to know.”

He paused again and gave a funny look before changing his tone and saying, “Well, you know. That might’ve played a part in it.”

“Seriously?!”

“I don’t know…depends on how much you wanted her to do that.”

I breathed deeply and said, “Ya know, If you had asked me even six months ago, I would’ve told you that would've been the greatest thing that could’ve happened to me. Now I think it’s possibly one of the worst.”

“Oh yeah. Why do you say that?”

“Because things have gotten a hell of a lot more complicated since winning Stephanie back as a girlfriend was the primary goal. First, her and Anabel. Then me and Steph starting over fresh as good friends again. She’s even been running my business dealings in Higgins place. Then there’s the Emily thing…”

“What exactly is the Emily thing, Eric?”

I glanced over at him and debated saying anything further. I simply said, “I don’t know, man. For whatever reason, she’s wants to be reserved about the whole thing. I’ll tell you when there's something to tell.”

For once, he respected my wishes and changed the subject. We rode on until we reached the spring. I asked if he wanted to come back to the mansion again for a bit but he insisted he get back to his merchant post.

I went back by myself and when I came back on the other side, there was a fresh towel waiting for me. A simple convenience from Anabel that I had missed these last few expeditions. For a moment, I had heard movement upstairs. But then things got really quiet. It was ominous. My phone was up in my room otherwise I would’ve checked the security cameras in case there was another surprise.

* * *

I slowly crept upstairs and kept on my guard. I had my sword drawn in an abundance of caution. The entire ground floor was pitch black. When I went into the dinning room, the light suddenly flipped on.

“”””Surprise,”””” the girls shouted out, “”””Happy Birthday!””””

Stephanie ran over and hugged me. The other girls stood by with directions and confetti on the table. That’s right! It was February 16th, my birthday! Last year I totally missed it because I was in Bristol and had absolutely no concept of time.

“I hope Wraith didn’t spoil it,” Stephanie said, as she moved out of the way to allow the other girls in for a hug as well.

“No, he didn’t mention anything.”

“Good. I told him to try and have you back here by now so we’d be ready and I threatened him to keep his mouth shut. I was worried you might’ve heard us talking about it when you came into the kitchen just before you left.”

Oh! So that’s what that was. But when I had asked Wraith if it was about the kiss, he suggested it was. What the hell? But wait. Stephanie said she threatened him to keep him quiet. He was doing anything and everything he could to keep the secret. That son of a bitch!

The spread in front of me was wonderful. There was a chocolate cake with white icing and the number 29 on it. Anabel had cooked a roast duck. I can’t remember the last time I had such a good birthday.

During all the commotion, Emily finally said something directly to me for the first time since we first brought Apollo home. She leaned over and whispered in my ear.

“After everyone’s gone to bed, wait a little bit and then sneak over to my room. I wanna give you your present privately.”

Arc 3 Part 5-2

I took it upon myself to rest the next few days. I wasn’t joking around when I told Wraith that these latest back to back incidents really took a toll on me. Both mentally and physically, I was exhausted. Surely with six of the seven stones now green and the Devil of Callist still at a distance, we’d have some breathing room around here.

Still, there was the matter of Alabaster. The Oracle saw no sign of him coming back with more goons to try and take over the mansion. Nor did he see any sign that he even survived our last encounter. I was getting to the point where I was starting to take his word on that. But you know who wasn’t? Emily.

For days, she ran on coffee and cigarettes to keep herself up and glued to her laptop. She was searching the internet and news for any signs whatsoever that he may have popped up. She was driving herself sick.

“Hey, can we talk?” I asked, as I came up behind her while she sat at the desk in her room doing research.

“Sure. What’s up?” she replied, with circles around her eyes, not caused by eyeshadow for a change.

“You think you can maybe take it easy for a bit? I mean, I’m forcing myself to as well. But we’re no good if we’re completely spent.”

“Yeah. I guess I should probably cool it a little bit. Ouch!” she cried out, as she felt the back of her neck.

“What’s wrong? What happened?!”

“Oh, nothing. I’m okay.”

I didn’t believe her. That outburst was sudden and sounded painful. But all I could do for the moment was comfort her by changing the subject. “Well, Anabel said dinner will be ready in about fifteen minutes. I’ll meet you downstairs okay?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

We all gathered downstairs around the dining room table. Finally, we were all back together again with a sense of regularity. Arduwan was eating like a horse, Stephanie and Anabel were all smiles, for some reason me and Emilly were still acting like there was nothing going on between us, but whatever. I was happy.

After dinner, Stephanie was helping Anabel cleanup. Then suddenly, in an uncharacteristic fashion, Emily offered to help Stephanie. It wasn’t in a snide or sarcastic way. She genuinely extended herself. Stephanie seemed a little taken aback but graciously accepted. Before this mess happened right after Christmas, Steph had mentioned to me that they had become more tolerant of each other. Any progress between those two was progress.

But once they were in the kitchen, Emily started to lose her balance. Steph grabbed her by the arm and stopped her from falling. She was clearly dizzy and a little distraught.

“Emily! What’s wrong?” Stephanie asked.

Arduwan and I rushed into the room to see what was going on. Emily was now leaning on the countertop and clutching the back of her neck.

I decided to sternly ask, “Emily, what’s going on? I know something is going on with your implant and I’m worried about you. We all are!”

She recomposed herself before answering, “Alright. Yes, something is definitely wrong. I’ve tried to ignore it. Something like this has happened before. I’m gonna need to go to Murk to get it adjusted.”

“Really? Why didn’t you say something before? We can go right away.”

“Ah, that’s okay,” she said, with hesitant laughter, “I can go by myself. You need your rest. Heheh.”

“Don’t be foolish. We haven’t been back to Murk since all of this stuff has transpired.

Alabaster might have people still looking for you in that world. It’s too dangerous to go alone.”

“It’s okay, heh. I can take Arduwan with me. She’ll keep me safe. Besides, the place I need to go is outside Sin City. I’ll go straight to the train station once I cross over.,” she quickly suggested.

“I don’t mind going,” Arduwan remarked.

I walked closer to Emily and discreetly said, “are you nuts? How do you think Arduwan is gonna react in a world full of ghosts and phantoms?”

She thought about it a moment and said, “yeah. You have a point.”

“Besides, I whispered. It’d be kinda nice for you to show me more of your world without all the drama we dealt with last time.”

“Heheh,” she continued with her nervous laughter and a forced smile, “yea. We wouldn't want any more drama.”

“That settles it. Arduwan, you stay here and defend the mansion. You need your rest too after all you did. I’ll travel with Emily to Murk and make sure nothing bad happens but I’ll be sure to relax too. Granted it’s not been my favorite world either, but anywhere is better than Callist right now.”

* * *

So the two of us set off. We traveled down the well once more to the sewers of Sin City in Murk. It was rainy the night before, as you can guess. So the sewer was dripping. But at least the sun was out today. It kinda reminded me of the first day we went to court on my first visit here. No matter what, the place always seemed a little drab and art deco. But at least we were taking a train into the countryside so we could see some nature.

“Now boarding! Next train to Karloff,” said the loudspeaker in the train station.

We had made a quick stop at a local bullion dealer to trade some of my gold for cash while we were in Murk since Emily didn’t have much left. The train ride was going to go deep into the night and we'd arrive in the town where Emily’s acquaintance lived early the next morning.

“Hey, this is great!” I said, as we sat side by side in our train car, “it’s so comfortable in here, we’ll have no problem getting some sleep on the way.”

“Yeah, no problem at all,” Emily said.

“So who’s your friend anyway?”

“Oh, just an old acquaintance who runs a small town repair shop.”

“Well that makes it sound really simple. Surely fixing your implant isn’t as simple as changing out a phone screen,” I joked.

“Yeah, heheh. Too bad it’s not.”

Emily was acting really strange. She seemed unusually nervous. I get that she was probably worried about her spinal implant malfunctioning but she was giving me a really weird vibe. Like she didn’t want me to be here.

At any rate, the train ride was comfy and we had a good meal. I managed to get some shut eye but I’m not sure if Emily slept or not. Just before dawn, our train passed Crystal Lake. Sure glad that’s not where we were going. But before we knew it, we made it to Karloff.

The sun had just risen when we got off the train. It wasn’t dark and grimy way out here like it was in so much of Sin City. The sky was clear, there was a smell of pine in the air, and the birds were chirping. We even got a taxi cab from the train station that was driven by an actual human!

The cab dropped us off on the outskirts of town at a single story log cabin house. There was a sign in the window that said, ‘Victory Repair’. No one seemed to be home. But the posted hours said he opened at 8am and it was only a little after 6am.

“Well, what do ya know. Victor’s not here. Guess we can head back. I’m sure I can find another way to deal with this malfunction,” Emily rambled.

I stopped her, “what’s come over you? We came all the way out here and you said it yourself that he’s the only one that can fix this. Why don’t we just wait out here for a little bit?”

She just nodded and sat down on the doorstep. She was so nerved up she was shaking. I was actually starting to get worried about her. The next thing she said was the last thing I expected.

“Eric, there’s something you need to know,” her words came out of her mouth with lightning speed, “I slept with Victor! It was a long time ago. He was the young assistant to the Mad Scientist who did this to me. He was under his control too. So I made sure to wait until he was out running errands when I destroyed the lab! A few years later, this thing started acting up so I went out looking for him to get help repairing it. Well, he grew up by then and physically, we were the same age. So one thing led to another!”

I didn’t know what to say. She hit me with that all so fast. But before another word could be said from either of us, we heard the sound of a motorcycle approaching. I turned to look and there I saw him. Mr. Cool himself was rolling up.

He rode a sleek black cruiser and had a leather jacket on. His dark hair was short on the sides and long up top. He looked to be about my age, or a little younger, and hotter. He unshielded his eyes from his black sunglasses as he dismounted his bike and said, “Emily

Grimwood? Long time no see!”

Arc 3 Part 5-3

So if things weren’t awkward before he arrived, they certainly were now. I simply stood there in silence and watched those two light up a couple of cigarettes before we went in.

“Want one?” He offered.

“Oh, no thanks,” I declined.

“So Emily, what brings you back around here…let me guess, your Lazarus Chip is on the

fritz again?”

She let out a sigh and took another drag of her cigarette before saying, “yeah. Some psycho messed with it awhile back and had it retrofitted to control me. Thanks to Eric and some other friends, I made it out.”

Other friends.

“Psycho huh? Any Psycho I know?” Victor inquired.

“No, it was a long way away from here.”

She was smart enough to not mention the world walking. Last thing we needed is more people from Murk passing through the well. Especially not this 80s post-punk goth rock looking guy.

“So how did you two meet anyway?” he asked.

Emily gulped a little and glanced at me quickly before replying, “Eric was a client. We ended up helping each other out.”

So I’m a client now. First, I was just another one of her friends. Now I’m a client.

Victor smiled as he finished his cigarette and said, “I’ve really missed you Emily. It’s a shame that you left the way you did. Could’ve been fun if you had stayed.”

She didn’t respond to that. She just looked down to the ground as she put out the reminder of her cigarette as well.

“Well, let's go on in. I’ll put on some coffee, then we can take a look at it,” Victor said, as he motioned us into his home.

His house was nice. Fairly simple, but the product of a man who worked for what he earned. He was certainly a lot further along in life than I had been before I inherited my estate. This guy had a lot going for him. I was starting to think that maybe the reason Emily wanted to come here alone was because she was reevaluating her current situation. She had gone through absolute hell with me recently. No wonder she was so vague and quiet about our relationship. With Alabaster gone from this world and this guy available, why would she want to stick around with me anymore? All I had to offer was a life of slaying Devils.

Victor had Emily sit facing towards an inclined table, like an easel, where she could lean at an angle and he could operate on her neck. I sat behind her with him so I could observe and see for myself how all of this worked.

She moved her hair out of the way and waited for him to get to work. First, he put on a pair of gloves and started snipping open the row of stitches on the back of her neck. He sat the scissors down and started to part the skin away. This exposed a metal panel on her spine that looked sorta like a motherboard.

“Okay, Emily. You ready?”

“Yeah.”

With her consent, he flipped a small breaker lever downward. This caused Emily to fully collapse forward onto the easel. She was out completely. No one home. Now he could mess around with all the little components at his fingertips. He was kind enough to explain everything to me as he went.

As he went to work I decided to ask him, “so how old were you when you were under that quack's control?

“I was thirteen when he took me in. But I was fourteen when Emily destroyed the lab and freed me. By the time I came back, she was already gone and I never thought I’d see her again. About four years later, she looked me up and asked for help. She’d blown a fuse and it was messing with her.”

“Is that what's wrong now?”

“No, she hasn’t blown a fuse. There’s two in here and when one blows the other one is on borrowed time. If she ever blows both of them, she’s screwed if no one can replace them for her.”

“How come you didn’t teach her how to replace them herself?” I asked.

He smirked at me and said, “I would’ve but last time she was here she was interested in learning other things.”

That felt like a slight jab, but I couldn’t take it personally. He was probably at least a little upset that she took off without saying anything to him.

He went back to work on her and I asked, “Can you show me how to?”

He turned to look at me and said, “yeah, of course.”

Luckily, the types of fuses she took were very similar to the ones found in my world so I was certain I could replace one if need be. Assuming she was actually coming back with me that is.

“Ah ha! Just what I thought,” he said, “Yep. Somebody put a governor on her. See that? That little device is a receiver that can control her by way of a transmitter. Every now and then, this thing will ping the remote and if the connection is broken it’ll start to spaz out and give her a little jolt. Interesting design though, I’ve never seen anything like it.”

I decided to change the subject so that he wouldn’t question where we had been for her to get this modification, “so if you were thirteen when he put the implant on you, how is that you’ve aged so much when she hasn’t?”

Victor stopped working for a second and pointed to his own stitch on his neck. He said, “see what I have is a Lazarus Chip Mark I. It can only reanimate someone and keep them going. What Emily has is a Lazarus Chip Mark II. It alters the state of her cellular structure and keeps her from aging.”

This was truly wild stuff. It wasn’t enough that my life was full of fantasy, adventure, and science fiction…no, we had to throw technological gothic horror in there too. At least she wasn’t a Synth.

”Alright, there it is. I got it off,” he showed it to me before continuing, “now we just gotta let her cool down for a little bit before starting her back up again. The chips used to her normal body heat, but no sense in firing her back up right away after we’ve been tinkering around.”

He leaned back in his chair, grabbed his coffee mug and turned to me. He said, “Oh, if she ever does blow both fuses, you’ve got about twelve hours before her body will start shutting down so no big rush to get all the components together. However, after about seventy two hours, her body will start naturally decomposing and it might be too late to save her. So keep that in mind.”

“I will.”

“Here, I’ll put together a kit for you that has everything you need to work on her should the need arise,” he paused for a moment and then added, “it’s crazy isn’t it? She’s such an independent spirit. But with a little know-how, and a little work, someone can easily control her. Get her to do their bidding like a mindless automaton.”

It was a stark reminder of the fate she had so narrowly escaped twice in her life already. I would do what I could to see that it would not happen a third. That is, if she still wanted me around.

A few minutes went by and Victor handed me a little maroon zipper pouch with some basic tools, some stitching thread, and a few spare fuses. I was grateful for that, even though I could tell he looked at me like what would be considered a ‘normie’ in my world, but a freak in this one.

“Alright, we can wake her up,” he said, before he started closing the stitches on her neck.

He threw the little breaker switch and she started to move a little as he closed the remaining threads up.

“Did it work?” she asked, grasping at her lucidity.

“Yeah, you’re all patched up. It wasn’t bad at all. I even showed Eric here how to fix you next time. So you don’t have to come all the way out here unless something really bad happens,” he said, as he winked at me. Maybe he wasn’t such a bad guy.

“Thanks Victor. What do I owe you?” she asked as she stood back up and stretched.

“Ah, don’t worry about it. It was just nice to see you again. Can I put you two up for the night?”

Moment of truth. Were we staying? Was she staying? Was I about to get a gentle nudge to the road?

“No, thank you though. Eric and I were going to do some sightseeing before we found a room.”

What's this? Was I really this bad at reading women? I mean, in my defense, she was the queen of mixed signals. When we first met, she came on so strong and direct. But ever since the Celica incident, she reeled it in. Our conversation in the park that day of the attack on the mansion really showed me that she wanted to take things seriously for a change. She wasn’t doing it for me, she was doing it for herself. Maybe I had been thinking the worst of her lately.

We said our goodbyes to Victor and thanked him once more. Rather than take a cab from his house, we decided to walk into town to find a place to grab lunch. It was a quiet stroll at first. Neither one of us wanted to be the first to speak. Finally…

“”Hey,”” we both said, simultaneously.

“Sorry, go ahead,” she conceded.

“Emily, I’m really sorry. I owe you a huge apology. I’ve had some bad thoughts about you that you didn’t deserve. Between my assumptions of your time at Clint’s apartment and your intentions in wanting to come here alone. It really wasn’t fair.”

“It’s alright. It’s not like I haven’t given you and the others plenty of reasons to think those things about me. But the truth is, I knew how Victor would come across and that’s why I didn’t want you to meet him. I wanted to spare you from all that tension and discomfort.”

She stopped walking and turned to face me before adding, “I swear to you, nothing would’ve happened if you hadn’t been here. That’s why I asked Arduwan to come.”

“I believe you, Emily. I appreciate your honesty, I just wish I understood why you want to tiptoe so much around the others.”

“I know, I know. It’s just…this is my own way of letting myself feel something real for a change. Just give me a little more time and I promise we can let everyone else in on it. Okay?”

Her eyes looked more green than ever with the sunlight radiating from them as she stood there in front of me on this gorgeous late winter day. I won’t bore you with the rest of our trip, but I can promise you this…it was the start of a beautiful relationship.

For now.

Arc 3 Part 5-4

After returning to my world, it was quickly brought to my attention that Stephanie and Anabel were in sincere need for a relaxing vacation of their own. I completely understood why after all they had both gone through. Besides, Anabel was such a hard worker maintaining my mansion and keeping everyone fed and attending to us. That’s not to discount Stephanie though. She had really stepped up since the loss of Higgins. She was handling all my worldly affairs while I was away. Not only that but she had ambitions to actively grow my wealth by using our influence. But more on that another time.

“Yeah, Eric. I just really think we need to get away for a while,” she started to ask me,

“would it be okay if Anabel and I took a trip somewhere?”

“Of course. Think nothing of it. As far as I’m concerned, my money is just as much as the rest of yours. Take a week or two and go wherever you want.”

“Oh! Thank you!” she said, as she gave me a quick hug, “I’ll let Anabel know and we’ll start booking something right away.”

Stephanie ran off out of the fitness room where Arduwan and I had been working out when she asked me. She had overheard my conversation with Stephanie and decided to ask me something as well.

“Eric, I too have a favor,” she asked.

“Yes? Go ahead.”

“I need you to come with me for this though,” she said, as she led me out of the fitness room and into the drawing room. She took me by the wrist and sat me down on an armchair. Then she backed away and kneeled down in front of me and bowed her head before asking, “Master Noble. May I have permission to visit my people in Callist. I wish to learn of a way to be freed from my Life Debt to you.”

Well this was sudden.

“Arduwan, why do you suddenly want this? I’ve told you before that you’re free to be released from the debt at any time.”

She looked up at me and said, “yes, but it’s not so simple. The barbarian life debt transcends time and space. It can only be released under the proper circumstances and we have not met those yet. So perhaps my father will have a recommendation.”

“Okay, okay,” I laughed, “why exactly do you want out of it now?”

“Well, you see,” she blushed, “it’s not that I don’t mind serving you. In fact, my life at your side is quite exhilarating. It’s just…”

“Go ahead. Don’t be afraid to speak freely,” I assured her.

“It’s just…I wish to court Lord Wraith, sir!” Now this was a surprise.

“Arduwan…have you thought this through? Now, Wraith is my friend. And I certainly acknowledge he is quite skilled. But I think maybe you mistake a lot of his boastfulness with grandeur.”

“Oh no, Eric. I understand perfectly well that he is likely holding back much of his true nature so as not to outshine you in front of me.”

That’s not at all what I was talking about. But you know what? I’m not gonna argue this. So I stood up in front of her and said, “Very well. Go now, Arduwan, Barbarian Princess. Seek ye the answer thou…seeks.”

She looked up at me with a look of surprise on her face and her mouth wide open. But then it turned to a smile.

Suddenly, we heard Stephanie scream. What now? The two of us ran down to the basement where we discovered something unexpected. There she was, being held by a man in a dark suit. Dripping wet and with a gun to her head.

“Stephanie!” I shouted.

Tears were running down her face. She cried out, “Eric, help! This is the man that shot me before!”

That’s right! I dealt with Anabel’s killer but we never found what happened to the one who shot Steph. He must’ve been sent by Alabaster to another world. This was bad.

“I don’t know how this broad survived, but I won’t hesitate to shoot her again,” he said, with a gruff voice.

“Just relax,” I urged, with my hands extended up.

“Where’s the boss?” he asked, “he sent me to check out that other world and to come back after a couple of months if I didn’t hear anything.”

I needed to act quickly. We just revived Stephanie using the Goddess of Second Chances. There won’t be a third.

“Arduwan, get ready…Heat Metal!” I shouted, as I cast a spell that caused this goons gun to heat up bright red.

“Ouch!” he yelled, as he dropped the pistol to the ground and Stephanie ran into my arms.

Arduwan sprang forward and manhandled the guy. She could be so scary sometimes.

“Wait, Arduwan! Don’t kill him,” I remarked, as I moved Stephanie to the side and went for his gun once it cooled off.

The other girls ran downstairs to see what all the commotion was. Anabel cried at the sight of the man and coddled Stephanie.

“Emily, take those two upstairs.”

“Got it.”

“As for you,” I said, pointing the gun directly to his head as Arduwan gripped his arms behind his back, “you caught me at a good time. I’ve recently gotten over some bloodlust, no thanks to your boss, and I’m trying to relax. You’re going to tell me everything you’ve been up to for the past couple of months.”

“Alright, alright, ahh!” he shouted in pain as Arduwan tightened her hold, “I went to Canvas. But there’s nothing special there. The boss was hoping I’d find someone for us to do business with. But the place is straight-laced.”

Canvas. That’s the seventh world that I had not visited yet. It was the first world that my father and Higgins had defeated a Devil in, according to the journal. So it was of little concern to me since another Devil wouldn’t arise for a full generation. According to this lackey, it sounds like everything is still in good order there.

“Alright, Arduwan,” I smiled and said, “I know you’ve got to get going to Callist, so if you could just help me for a few minutes I’ll send you on your way.”

“What are we gonna do with him, Eric? Bury him in the garden with the other one?” she asked, evoking an audible gulp from the man.

“No. I have a fate far worse in mind for him.”

* * *

About an hour later, the man was walking in front of me with his hands on the back of his head. I held the gun pointed at his back and walked a good five feet behind him. Up ahead you could hear the faint singing of certain cereal box characters.

“What are you gonna do with me?” he asked.

“Just shut up, okay,” I said, “whatever I say, you agree with. The moment you don’t, I’ll ice you and throw you in a soda pop lake. Got it?”

We soon found ourselves down the Marshmallow Road in the presence of a certain happy go lucky former Devil Queen by the name of Josephine.

“Oh, hello, Eric!” she greeted, happily.

“Hi, Josie. Hope you’re not upset with me after that little tussle we had some time ago.”

“Oh, that? No, not at all. I may have gotten a little carried away. So I don’t blame you for what you did. Your knife hurt me though. It reminded me of the booboos I got while fighting your dad.”

Wow, she was so agreeable.

“Sorry about that. But I have a favor to ask you.”

“Sure! What’s up?!”

“See this guy. This is…what was your name?”

“It’s Frank,” the bewildered man said, still at my gunpoint.

“Frank!...Frank’s been really naughty. I brought him here for you to take care of him for me. You see, Frank has a thing for clown girls. Right, Frank?”

He looked at me in fear and nodded his head yes.

“Frank also tells me that he likes Dr. Pepper and is quite the submissive type. He’s looking for a lovely, cheerful mistress to simp to and have her tell him what to do all the time.”

Josie held her hands to her chest and with a shine in her eyes asked, “Really?”

“Yes. I think Frank would be the perfect candidate for the Scepter of Jubilation. Think of it as a good faith gift for stabbing you and a replacement for not letting you zap Emily.”

Frank looked really worried now. He didn’t quite grasp what was going on.

“Oh, thank you, Eric. I accept and will always cherish and remember your thoughtfulness.”

“Don’t thank me. Thank Frank here for volunteering. He might act a little reserved at first but once you get him to the Temple of Jubilation, you’ll be able to take care of that. And just remind him, that if he decides that this isn’t the place for him, he can come on back up to my world and we can go back to our alternative arrangement.”

That last statement caused Frank to look back at me fearfully as I sneered. But Josie looked overcome with joy and took Frank by the hand and started asking him what his favorite color was as the two of them walked off together.

* * *

When I got back to the house, Arduwan had already left for Callist. I found the other girls upstairs and went to console them.

“You alright?”

Stephanie replied, “Yeah. Just all the more reason to get away for a while. I went ahead and booked us a train trip for tomorrow to Monaco for a week. I don’t even travel down that damn well and stuff is trying to kill me. I don’t envy you.”

“Not to worry. I’ll drive you to the train station myself in the morning. I want the two of you to have a wonderful time.”

“Thank you, Eric. You’re the best,” Anabel said.

Arc 3 Part 5-5

The next day, I helped load their suitcases into the ole Royce Phantom and took them to the train station. I hadn’t got to drive much since I’d moved here. No wonder my dad had put so few miles on this car.

I bid the girls adieu and wished them well on their vacation again before heading home. It was just before noon. But as I was driving, I realized something. Something that made me exceptionally nervous.

Arduwan was in Callist and Stephanie and Anabel would be in Monaco for the next week. That meant that I’d be all alone at the Mansion with Emily for a whole week! You’re probably thinking, ‘so what?’ But let me tell you, the thought of being alone with nothing holding Emily back was scary. She had been tiptoeing around and having us sneak off to each other's rooms and what not all this time. But that big house with nobody at home and no neighbors within earshot to hear any throws of passion. I really wasn’t sure I was ready for this.

When I got back to the house, I pulled into the garage and just sat there for a few minutes. I was almost afraid to go inside. This was silly. Was it really such a big deal? So after another minute of contemplation I went in.

It was quiet. Too quiet. There was no sign of Emily. What the hell was she planning? Was I just gonna come around a corner only to have her jump me and have her way? Was she upstairs, prepping for some wild BDSM stuff? I don’t know if I was scared or excited!

But when I came into the drawing room, I found her in her normal spot, quietly reading. She looked up at me and smiled. As per usual, I had to awkwardly spark the conversation.

“So. The girls are off, heheh,” I nervously laughed, “say, are you getting hungry?”

“Actually, yeah. I kind of am.”

Oh. Well okay then. Maybe I had been over-thinking things a bit.

“Great! Well, I guess with Anabel gone, we’ll have to fend for ourselves. How about

Chinese?”

“Thanks. I’d like that.”

I grabbed my phone and then horror took over. Stephanie had my bank cards and I couldn’t remember my account information. That’s when it dawned on me. This must be the second important thing I forgot from using that spell on those MI5 agents.

I explained it to Emily and decided to call Steph. No answer. It didn’t even ring. They must’ve been in a dead spot. I’ll try calling her back in a little bit.

“Well, that sucks. Let’s check the cabinets.”

“Sure.”

The two of us went into the kitchen and started scavenging.

“No lunch meat? No chips? No cereal?” I questioned.

“Afraid not. Anabel doesn’t buy that shit. She cooks almost everything from scratch.”

“Hang on. I’ll try calling Steph again?”

It rang this time. But went to voicemail. They must’ve been in a better spot this time but she couldn’t hear the phone ring. I left a message just in case. After I hung up, I let out a sigh and said, “well, guess we’re gonna have to wait for her to call me back. Hopefully not after they get there. It’s almost a fifteen hour train ride. I tried to convince them to fly but Anabel wanted to see things from the ground.”

“Well,” said Emily, “there’s only one thing to do I guess.”

“What's that?”

“Fuck, until she calls us back.”

* * *

She didn’t call us back. Not in the time it takes to do Emily's suggested activity. We layed upstairs in my room and cuddled in bed for the afternoon.

“I’ve been thinking,” she said, “Anabel does a really good job of keeping this place up.

But there’s something missing.”

“Oh yeah? What’s that?”

“Decor. This place hasn’t had a makeover since…well, time immemorial. Do you think I could spruce it up a bit?”

“I don’t,” I joked, “you’re not gonna turn this place into a haunted house are you?”

“Nothing like that!” she insisted, “Maybe just some black sheer curtains. Some black ornamental wood molding. Black chandeliers.” “Black carpeting?” I continued to tease.

“No…maroon,” she corrected.

I decided to halfway entertain her and said, “I don’t know. Maybe I can let you pick out a few things here and there but I’m not so sure you’re cut out for interior design.”

“I am too!”

“Hey, you said it yourself that it was Anabel’s arena to keep the domestic stuff up.”

“True. But I am a woman you know. I have some sense of domestication.”

“Oh yeah? Well what can you do to fix this hunger problem we’ve got?”

She gave me a perplexed and almost fearful look in response. Like she wanted to sink into the covers and hide from me. I laughed at her and said, “It’s alright, Emily. I remember how you lived before. That tiny apartment where you survived on coffee, takeout, and cigarettes.”

“Well, I suppose I can try my hand at a little something in the kitchen,” she proposed.

“Emily, it’s fine. You don’t have to prove anything. I wasn’t doing much better before Higgins brought me over. We’re just not cut from the same cloth as him and Anabel were, that’s all.”

“No, no. There’s no challenge that Detective Grimwood can’t face. I’ll go downstairs and see what I can whip up.”

I shook my head as she got out of bed and put some clothes on.

“Whatever,” I said, “I’m gonna take a shower and I’ll be down after a while to see how it’s going.”

About thirty minutes later, I came downstairs and went into the kitchen.

It…was…a…disaster! There was flour everywhere. Sugar everywhere. Broken eggs. Spilled milk. Pancake batter. Orange juice. Melted chocolate? How did she even manage that?

In the midst of it all, there was Emily, in a panicked state. She had more color on her by way of splattered ingredients than I had ever seen her wear. Whatever it was she was trying to prove, I had to stop her. My beautiful kitchen that Anabel spent so much time painstakingly maintaining was turning into a marshland of broken culinary dreams.

She turned to me with tears in her eyes and said, “I’m so sorry, Eric. I really wanted to show you that I wasn’t just some demanding little bitch and could do things for myself.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Is that what this is about? Don’t be that way. Remember what Anabel always says when we try to help her out? Everyone here has their roles and it’s perfectly understandable that we stay within them. You serve a purpose. I don’t need you to be some hand over foot serving girlfriend.”

“Really?” she sniffled.

“Of course not. Just be you. Now go upstairs and get yourself cleaned up. I’ll take care of this mess and see if I can get Stephanie to answer again.”

* * *

“Hey, Eric. Sorry I missed your calls. Reception’s been spotty,” Stephanie said, once I finally got in touch with her.

“No problem. It’s just…you remember that whole thing where I was going to forget something important because of the spells I cast on those agents?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, looks like one of the things I forgot was all my banking information. Can you text it to me?”

“Of course. I’ll do it as soon as we get off. Everything else good?”

I looked around me at the remainder of the kitchen mess. Not wanting her to get Anabel all worried, I simply said, “yeah, we’re good. I think we’re gonna go out to eat tonight.”

“Cool. Well, I’ll check back in with you when we get into our hotel.”

“Sure. Enjoy the trip,” I said, as we hung up.

A few minutes later, I received a text message from her. It has the name of my bank, my account number, and password to online banking. Great! Now I can just use my phone to pay for food. Emily is gonna be happy about this.

Speaking of Emily. She came back downstairs just as I was finishing up with the kitchen. She had cleaned up and changed into one of her more conventional ‘mall goth’ outfits. You know, mesh sleeves, leggings with skirt above the knees, spikes, chains…you get the idea. But damn if she didn’t look good wearing it.

“Good news. I got a hold of Steph. I figured we’d just go out to eat since you probably didn’t want to sit around and wait for delivery?”

“Sure!” she eagerly replied, a smile washed over her face.

“Great. Then let’s go now.”

The two of us stepped out of the house. It was still mid afternoon. We walked over to the garage and I went to get in the car when I noticed Emily frozen still. We had never gone anywhere by car, just the two of us. It had always been a taxi, or with Higgins and the other girls in the car. Emily always rode in the back seat. It was her way of coping with the accident she had when she was younger. The only way she could muster up the courage to still use the convenience of a car.

I wasn’t sure what to say, so I just offered, “Hey…it’s okay if you wanna ride in the back.”

“No,” she said, while shaking her head, “I’m a big girl now. I can ride up front.”

So she walked over to the passenger side and got in at the same time I got behind the wheel and closed my door. I waited a moment before just driving off. She took in a deep breath and let out a big sigh before reaching for my hand. She said, “I guess it wouldn’t hurt if you held my hand though. If you don’t mind?”

“No. Not at all. That’s fine. I can drive one handed.”

She gripped my hand tightly as I drove off down the driveway and into town. We decided just to go sit down at a good ol fashioned burger and fry fast food place. We specifically chose not to go to the one that reminded us of World X. Emily had enough trauma for one day just from riding in the front seat of a car for the first time in over a decade and destroying a kitchen.

The next couple of days were awesome. I got to hang out and relax for a change. There were no crazy villains, the house was quiet, it was blissful. We spent our days watching TV, eating junk food, playing board games…other stuff. For the first time since I inherited this place I felt in control of my own destiny.

The night before Anabel and Stephanie were due to come back home, Emily stayed in my room one last time. I’m pretty sure her next phase of growth was gonna come in the form of acknowledging we were in a relationship in front of the others. But I wasn’t going to press it. The two of us had come a long way from that night at her office in Murk. We’d been through a lot.

It had been so long since I had someone to share a bed with. If Emily did decide to move on in here after the girls got back, I sure wouldn’t be complaining. She looked so beautiful off in her own slumber with only the faint glow of moonlight peering around my curtains. She could be something else when she wanted to be. But she could also be really sweet and cheerful. Certainly a valuable companion in my mission to keep evil at bay.

* * *

When I woke up the next morning, she was already gone. It wasn’t unusual for her to get up before everyone else and put on coffee. But lately, she’d been sleeping in with me. I sat there for a moment before getting up. But then, I smelled something. It couldn’t be? It was! I smelled bacon! As I got up and put some clothes on, I thought to myself, surely Emily’s not down there trying to cook again.

I ran down the stairs to put a stop to her meddling before it got out of control when I ran into…Anabel?

“Eric! You’re back already!” she said.

“Anabel? What’re you doing here so soon?”

I noticed she was wearing her classic outfit from her world. White dress with the peach accents and her little bonnet. Hadn’t seen her wear that in a while.

With a look of confusion she said, “what do you mean? I haven’t gone anywhere.”

“Quit playing around! You and Stephanie have been gone for a week. I was supposed to get you guys from the train station later today.”

She looked even more perplexed and said, “Stephanie? Who’s Stephanie?”

Before I could even respond to her, I heard movement coming from the kitchen. The smell of bacon was still in the air. Then suddenly, a shadow came from around the corner. “Master Noble? Back so soon from Murk?” said Higgins, who stood there well and alive.