Ambushed in Camp

The combat was really only meant to be difficult due to the fact that Jade, Renee and Olivia had already been drained of some of their hit points and abilities in the bar fight. Of course, the dice didn’t always want to agree with the best-laid plans, and over the course of the first two turns of combat, things got sticky for the three heroines.

“Fuuu-uuuck,” Tori groaned. “That’s… a flat ten.” She winced as she said it, already knowing that her kick hadn’t landed.

“No luck,” I said, shaking my head. “He manages to reel backwards in time, waving his hatchet in front of him to keep you away.”

“Shit,” Tori swore, grimacing at her die. She grabbed the d20 and shoved it back in the bag she kept her dice in, fishing around and pulling out a different one. “That die is getting retired for the night.”

Renee was up next, and she was already crackling with dark energy - the problem was that two of the three bandits that she was supposed to ward off were armed with crossbows and she’d already barely managed to avoid a bolt getting planted in her skull.

“Fuck it,” Renee muttered, summoning up a spell. She said some arcane words and then released the shadowy magic missiles that spun out from her out-thrust hand and radiated in to strike the bandit that had stumbled down the rise and was getting ready to bash her over the head with a heavy club. The bolts pierced into his chest, bursting out the back in shadowy gouts, and he went down to one knee and then collapsed face first in the dirt.

“Yes!” Elyse crowed, clenching a fist at her success as she grinned down at the damage die she’d rolled.

“Finally,” Rhia sighed. “One down, just another five to go.”

The fight continued and the enemy bandits managed to only land one more strike on Olivia, Renee using her Shield spell to bounce another crossbow bolt into the ground instead of her guts. That meant she was running low on spells, though.

And then Jade kicked a man’s head clean off.

To be fair, it wasn’t a natural 20 but she did max her damage die, and Tori had definitely had a bit of a rough time with the dice for the whole session. So when I asked how she put the guy down, and she said she wanted to ‘kick his face off,’ I extrapolated to separating a man’s head from his body.

“Steel-tooooe!” Rhia cheered, making Tori laugh.

With Jade now able to rush up the hill and start pressuring the crossbowmen, and Olivia finally starting to roll better than a six in the combat, things wrapped up relatively quickly. The thing the three adventurers had to worry about was the fact that, while they hadn’t jumped in to help, there were probably a dozen bandits from other groups that had been watching the fight and even laying down bets on who would win.

And now Renee was out of spells, Jade was looking bloodied and Olivia was only slightly better.

“I think we need to get out of here,” Olivia said, eyeing the loose ring of ne’er-do-wells that were hanging around. “Before we get jumped for our shit.”

There was a brief argument over whether they had time to loot the bodies - not that they were expecting to find all that much, but it was still a possibility one of them might have been carrying some coin. Olivia’s primary worry was the big convincing factor though, and they abandoned the unlooted corpses as a distractive measure - within moments of them leaving the scene, the dead bandits were set upon by the others and would be stripped near-naked in minutes.

“I think we need to rally back at the tent, maybe see if Fergus is back from his scouting mission,” Elyse said. “Renee is seriously tapped out, and I’m worried about us getting into another fight right now.”

“Facts,” Tori nodded. “And that’s your third of the day, Rhia.”

“Yeah, but I got a short rest after the first one so I was doing OK,” she said.

“Well, that actually sounds like a good place for us to break for dinner, as you three heroes slip off among the trees to make a beeline to your tent,” I said.

“Mm, good idea!” Rhia said, pushing herself back from the table. “That also means we need to get dinner going. No coming into the kitchen until we call, Shane.”

“Alright,” I chuckled, holding up my hands innocently as the other two ladies got up from the table as well, making a little parade of costumed coeds walking through my house.

Giving me time mid-session to plot was rarely a good thing for the characters - well, sometimes it wasn’t a good thing. Sometimes it led to a new and surprising sexual encounter. Often it gave me a chance to adapt whatever I had next to find those little tension points and poke them a bit harder. The girls didn’t know that yet though.

The thing was… I wasn’t sure I wanted to. Not because I didn’t think it would make for a more intense game, but because I could hear the three of them laughing and bickering good-naturedly in the kitchen and it reminded me that my house was so quiet so often with just me living in it. Sure, I hosted game nights and had people over for dinner, and Mel was here several times a week for our morning coffees and shit like that. Listening to the three of them, three young people in the house, was like a reminder of my own college days living with roommates and always having someone around. And it reminded me that all of my friends, my best friends, had full houses of their own. Kids around, always something on the go. And for all that they included me in their lives where it made sense, I still didn’t have a life like that even if I was happy with the one I’d built.

“Hey, you OK?” Elyse asked, surprising me out of my reverie - I’d been pretty much staring off into space, lost in my musings.

“Yeah,” I said, blinking a couple of times and then shooting her a smile. “Ready for me?”

“Almost,” she said, smiling back but coming back into the Game Room from where she’d been halfway leaning in the doorway. Elyse came around to my end of the table and I immediately flipped over my notes. “Sorry,” she said, eyes going wide. “I just-”

‘“It’s OK,” I said. “**** of habit. You were…?”

She gave me a look that was hard to discern, like she was considering me for a moment, then she reached down and put her hand on my knee, pulling it out to the side and having me shift so I was almost sideways in my chair. Then she sat on my knee, scooched a little closer and looked me right in the eyes from maybe six inches away. Her eyes, a cool grey, were gorgeous this close up.

“I’m sorry for whatever was going through your head,” she said. “Was it something we said?”

“Really, Elyse,” I said. “I’m fine.”

“You didn’t look fine. You looked sad.”

“I was just thinking it’s nice to have a house full of people, that’s all,” I admitted.

Her face softened a little, not that she’d been giving me a hard look to begin with, and she leaned forward and hugged me. I had almost expected a kiss, but it was just a hug, her arms around my shoulders as she squeezed me tightly and rested her head on my shoulder.

“Hug me back, Shane,” she prompted me, making me chuckle. I wrapped my arms around her, and she wriggled a little closer until she was pressed against me. “Better.”

“Thanks,” I chuckled.

“Well, this is not what I expected to find going on up here,” Rhia said from the doorway. Then she put on a silly cartoony voice. “Gross. Gag me with a spoon.”

Elyse broke into a laugh, pulling from the hug lightly, and I let her go. She turned and shot a very pointed middle finger at Rhia, who stuck her tongue out in return, and then Elyse turned back to me and planted a chaste, firm kiss on my lips before pulling away fully and standing up. “Dinner is definitely ready now,” she said before heading for the door, passing by Rhia. They traded looks and then she was gone.

“So, what was that?” Rhia asked, turning all her attention on me.

I raised an eyebrow at the tone in her voice. “Maybe this was a bad idea,” I said. “I think it’s best if we pump the brakes on your plans, and let the game just be the game.”

Rhia blinked, physically rocking back on her heels for a moment. “Wait, no, that’s- What? No, Shane, that’s not what I meant.”

“Rhia, honey, this whole thing collapses in a pile of ash if jealousy-”

“Nonono,” Rhia said, coming forward. We’d both been talking quietly, not wanting to be overheard from the kitchen, and she dropped her butt into the chair to my right and leaned forward, lowering her voice even further. “I just meant that- Fuck, when I followed Elyse back here I thought I’d find her making out with you or something, but instead you guys looked like you were having a moment and not, like, a moment and I was confused.”

“You didn’t sound confused, Rhia,” I said. “You sounded accusing. And jealous.”

Rhia worked her jaw a couple of times before letting out a long sigh. “Maybe I was a little… accusing,” she said. “But I wasn’t jealous. I don’t care if you have intimate moments with Elyse or Tori; fuck, I want you to. They are both over the moon about you. It was more just like, ‘What the fuck, why are they emotional?’ when everything was going fine before we went to get dinner ready, and Elyse made it pretty clear to me and Tori that she was coming back up here to flirt with you. I’m sorry I didn’t- Fuck, I should have said it a better way. Or something.”

It was my turn to sigh. There was still a part of me that worried that she was trying to cover something up, some feelings that I didn’t think would be good in the long run. But then, she also seemed completely and utterly honest during her word-vomiting of an explanation. I sucked in another breath and then reached out and took her hands in mine.

“OK,” I said, trying to be as even as possible. “Just- This doesn’t work if you or either of the others start feeling jealous, or possessive. And that’s not just about me, that’s about any of us, and about my feelings as well. We need to be completely honest with each other on that front, Rhia, or else this thing will probably end with you losing two very good friends and you and I being in a super awkward, uncomfortable situation. And I don’t want any of that.”

She swallowed, frowning a little, and nodded. “I- OK.”

“Are you guys coming or what?” Tori called from back in the kitchen. “Ringa-ding-ding, I’m sounding the dinner bell!”

“Calm your tits, we’re coming,” Rhia called back to her friend, then turned to me and lowered her voice again. “Can I kiss you, Shane?”

I exhaled through my nose and nodded, and she leaned forward. I met her halfway and we kissed - not passionately, and not even lustily like the short ones from before during the game. Closed lips, sincere, and a little emotional.

“Thank you,” she said after she pulled away. “For being you. And for all of this.”

I swallowed, trying not to get a little emotional again myself, and nodded. “Come on,” I said as I stood, pulling her up with me. “Let’s see what three college coeds can scrape together for a meal between them.”

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