Time to Say Hello

Inside the mountain, everyone was scrambling. Mark and Merida rushed to check on the others and found them unharmed in their rooms, getting dressed. Except for Kitty, who seemed to be processing everything still. Merida reached into her bag and grabbed out a sports bottle, twisted the cap open, shoved it into Kitty’s mouth, and squeezed. Shortly, Kitty grabbed the bottle and started sucking down the contents.

Mark asked, “When and how did you get a bottle of that? The store is closed, and I don’t remember donating.”

Merida gave Mark a disbelieving look. “Ye reelly want tae know that now?” Merida just shook her head. “Kitty realized she sud stock up yesterday. She tauld me ye were sort o' oot o' it when she milkit ye for it. I hae twa bottles… had twa, I guess. Kitty has twa, and Hilde has twa.”

Once the bottle was empty, Kitty said, “Okay, what the hell just happened?”

Mark shook his head. “We’re not sure. If I had to guess, though, we’re under attack.”

Aubrey leaned into Hilde and Kitty’s room and said, “The orcs just messaged me and have taken heavy casualties. There are a bunch of new entrances to the base as well. Luckily, none of them bypass any of the rooms to the ritual chamber. Slevia said they’ll try to get us new, accurate maps of where there are entrances as soon as they can, but it’s too hot for them to do so right now.”

Hilde asked, “Too hot? What do you mean?”

“I don’t know. I would guess whatever they used to create massive holes in the side of the mountain came in fast and hot, so the whole area needs to cool down first.” Aubrey replied.

Merida asked, “Can ye tell hoo mony orcs we lost?”

Aubrey breathed out a sigh of relief. “Luckily, very few. A lot are 1 HP from incapacitation, though. The crown saved them. The ones directly in the line of fire disconnected from the crown to spare the rest of us. Still, the force lost more than half its HP pool. I’m going to go join the orcs and provide healing. Even if I can only do ten of them at a time right now, I should at least be able to make a dent in getting them back up before they can send forces down the new tunnels.” Aubrey didn’t wait for a response as she went to help the orcs.

Chloe and Ellen waited in the hallway. Merida turned to Chloe. “Can ye check on the rooms tae the ritual chamber? Even if the blast didnae reach them, it’s possible that they were damaged. Efter that, I think it’s time tae use aw thae defensive measures ye made.”

Chloe nodded and rushed off towards the workshop.

Merida looked at Hilde, Ellen, and Kitty. “Ye three roam and assist in takin' oot their elites; report back tae me if ye fin' onyone on the ither team.” Mira appeared next to her. “Kitty, tak' Mira with ye; she can back ye up and relay info tae me. Hilde…”

Hilde gave Merida a salute. “I understand. I’ll pass info to an orc who can pass it to Aubrey, so have Merigold with her.”

Merida nodded. “That’ll work. Mark, can ye gang help wi' the healin'?”

“I’ll do what I can.” He confirmed.

Ellen asked, “What are you going to be doing?”

Merida said, “Coordinatin' everything while hopefully gettin' the finishin' touches on a final surprise for the ither team.”

Ellen raised her eyebrows. “You’re going to craft? Now?”

“Mira and Merigold hae aw ma spells and copies o' ma items. Whit I need tae dae disnae tak' ma mana and, if we’re lucky, will result in us incapacitatin' at least ane person on the ither team. I’m almaist tempted tae bring Chloe in tae help, but at least at the moment she has really guid AOE, which is whit we need.”

Ellen said, “Fine, good luck.” Ellen shifted into Hilde and the two Hildes zipped off, with the rest splitting up for their respective tasks.

Ellen had just separated from Hilde and was about to start looking for places to attack when she felt a connection in her mind.

“Ellen, can you hear me? This is Mary.”

Ellen blinked a few times and said, “Mary? Not Mark?”

Mary rolled her eyes. Ellen still found it weird that she could tell that. “Yes, Mary. The part of me attacking the mountain. Sorry about the abrupt wake-up call.”

“What do you want, and why wouldn’t Mark ask me?”

Mary sighed. “I’m relaying an offer. I want to make this clear: I am not advocating or pressuring you to take this offer or to refuse it. I will not be upset with your choice, no matter what you choose.”

“Ooookay… it really sounds like you might be given your emphatic qualifiers at the start.”

Mary sighed again. “I really won’t be. The others on my side would like to extend an offer to you. We already know you were given a chance to betray your own team. We also know you tried to get Sadie to accept the equivalent offer she was given.”

“That wasn’t me, that was Symbietta.”

Ellen could feel Mary’s confusion and then understanding. “Ah… She’s still mostly you, from my understanding. Regardless, not what I want to talk about.”

“Right, the other team’s offer. I’m not sure. Symbietta sort of proved me wrong, and I’m now in a much better place in the challenge than a few days ago. I don’t know if I want to sabotage my team just to gain a couple more spots.”

“Up to you. Anyway, their offer is thus. First, if you agree to help and actually render assistance to us after the main quest is completed, assuming you haven’t been incapacitated by your own team, the members of this team will let you incapacitate up to two of us who remain standing at the end. You should realize that that, plus whatever Cassandra is giving you, is going to net you more than a few places. Second, the team is willing to fund up to 6000 BP in purchases of your choosing for yourself.”

Mary could feel that Ellen was incredibly tempted by the offer. Then Ellen asked, “Why are you making me this offer and not Laura?”

“Laura didn’t want to leverage her relationship with you to get you to accept the deal.”

“Mary… that’s not all, is it?”

“She was also the only one opposed to the offer, but insisted I make the offer or she would on behalf of the team.”

Ellen pursed her lips. “How long do I have to decide?”

There was a brief pause as Mary conferred with Talia and Sadie. “They say as long as you actually aid us in a meaningful way, that is fine, but if you wait too long to act or it isn’t that impactful, they might reduce how generous they’ll be. Talia also notes that she understands you might have to maintain a pretense of being hostile for a time and attack our forces. As long as you don’t actually attack anyone on our team, that will be tolerated, but if you encounter and put up more than a token resistance directly against us, we will assume the deal is void.”

“One last question. What happens if Cassandra just ends the challenge when you stop the ritual? I’ll lose out on the challenge points then.”

Mary paused once again and then said, “Talia isn’t sure what we can offer you as compensation, but promises we will do our best to find something of similar significance.”

“I’ll have to think about it. And yes, I know I don’t have long.”

Mary nodded and cut off the connection.

Ellen was immediately set on by Lucia and Symbietta, talking over one another.

Ellen mentally shouted, “SHUT UP! Both of you.” Both fell silent. “Thank you. Now, Lucia, you can go first.”

“We’d be idiots not to take the deal,” Lucia said.

Symbietta replied, “We don’t need it! We don’t need to betray our friends! Yes, I know it would help other people you care about, but didn’t you hear Mary? Laura didn’t want you to do this.”

Lucia replied, “Laura also wanted to let us make our own choice. She knew refusing to give us the offer would be a betrayal, because it is a good offer. Assuming we get the points from two of them, that would put us in third right now.”

Symbietta countered, “Exactly! So let’s just get third by taking them out!”

Ellen mentally focused on Symbietta and asked, “Will you respect my decision on this, or not? Regardless of what I decide.”

Symbietta frowned, “Yes. It’s your body, and you’re my friend too. I don’t like the idea of betraying friends. If I have to pick between siding with you to betray the team and betraying you, I’ll side with you. Under protest! I want that clear.”

Ellen shifted her focus to Lucia. Lucia said, “Remember I’m you? I already know what you’re going to pick, and if we fight, it’s because we’re truly conflicted. I’ll contact Laura and let her know.”

Ellen shook their head. “No. Don’t. I need time to think.”

Lucia rolled her eyes at that.

Ellen said, “Don’t even start. Also, Symbietta, I’m going to hand over control to you. Act as if we aren’t taking the deal, but don’t do anything to cause them to retract the deal either.”

Lucia said, “You realize she’s going to attack them, right? She’s definitely going to attack them.”

Symbietta replied, indignantly, “I AM NOT! How dare you, how dare I say.”

Ellen relinquished control, and Symbietta went to work.

Allie was glad to be free of Samantha’s grasp. Her girlfriend was apologizing profusely for tossing her in a pile of women and sitting on top of them all. Allie was annoyed but found it hard to stay mad at Samantha since she knew dragons only hoarded things they valued. She might have found it slightly less endearing if she realized she was categorized as a set of fluffy pillows within Sam’s hoards.

Isa hadn’t actually moved from sitting right in front of Mary and letting her brush her hair. At least not until everyone else was ready to move out. At which point she realized she had continued to let Mary groom her, like the good girl she was, and got incredibly embarrassed.

Talia asked Mary, “Did Ellen accept the offer?”

Mary shrugged, “Not sure. She said she’d think about it.”

Isa complained, “Not really a lot of time to think about it left.”

Mary added, “Laura, I want to let you know, Ellen asked why it wasn’t you giving her the offer, and I told her the truth.”

Talia groaned, “So she knows Laura is opposed to this?”

“Yes, because she specifically asked about it. I’m not going to lie about it to her.” Mary replied, a bit annoyed with Talia’s tone.

Sadie interrupted the conversation before it could become an argument. “So, Talia, how do you suggest we storm the place? Should we all move as a unit or split up?”

Talia shrugged, “Ask Sam. She’d know better than me about that.”

Several people looked at Talia oddly, surprised at her admission that someone else knew more than her. Laura was quite pleased to hear Talia say it, and it didn’t come as a surprise, as she remembered Talia readily admitted areas she thought Maja and Aubrey were more competent than her.

Sam replied, “At most we go in two teams. No one should be going solo ever. If Merida or Ellen catches someone alone and trances them, that’s it for that person. I heard Merida say she was worried that if someone had attacked me while I was tranced, it would have broken me out of the trance.”

Sadie said, “Oh, in that case.” Sadie put two fingers in her mouth and blew a sharp whistle. Rows and rows of mice lined up in front of her with Cheddar standing at the front. They all looked up and saluted Sadie. “Cheddar, I need you to select three mice per member of the team. In addition to being a communication relay, these mice are to bite the individual if they get entranced.”

Cheddar tilted her head to the side, confused by the last word, and chittered back to Sadie. Sadie thought about it and then chittered back to Cheddar, putting it in terms the mouse could understand. Sadie then put three cheese wheels down in front of her forces, which vanished in seconds as the mice descended on the wheels like piranhas.

A moment later, every member of the team had three mice scurry over to them and found a place on the individual to hide.

Sam nodded as she eyed the mouse that had decided that between the back of her neck and the rear neckgaurd of her armor was the ideal place to hide. “That’s good. Still, we should have no one traveling alone if we can help it. As for groups… I think Laura, Talia, Allie, and Mary should be one group. With Brooke, Sadie, and Isa coming with me.”

Allie asked, “Why not stay as a single group? If we split up, they could send their whole team after one group and then go after the other one.”

“They might, but I think in a situation where we simply let them flee and don’t have to chase them, because we will simply move to the objective and the fact we have soldiers to watch our backs, that either group can take their whole team. There’s also the issue with fighting space. Laura is our only true ranged combatant. Talia and Sadie are also both backliners, but they’re support. We have five people who are melee, though. There won’t be enough room for all of us to fight effectively. Whereas the other team only has three melees. While we have the advantage of numbers, if we concentrate too much, that advantage goes away. So we split up.”

Sadie nodded, “Okay, and the groups are fairly balanced in terms of abilities and levels. I’m sold. Sam, I’m giving you battlefield command for the assault. You heard her, everyone. Let’s move out.” Sadie hopped up onto Bertha and held out a hand to Brooke, while Sam and Isa got on the back of Sif.

Allie spoke up with dawning dread on her face, “Wait…” Allie looked at how far up the mountain the tunnels were, and the fact that both mounts were going with the other group. “Are we supposed to walk?” Allie pointed incredulously towards their destination. “All the way up there? Kill me now.”

Isa smirked towards Allie. “Maybe if you’re a good girl, Allie, I can let you ride Sif with us until we get a lot closer.” Sam decided to add on to the teasing and patted the area right behind her invitingly.

Allie was about to accept the invite when Laura replied, “No need.” Laura scooped Mary and Talia up, holding them together under one arm and then grabbed Allie by the back of her armor with her free hand. “I got this. Hopefully you four can keep up.” Laura crouched down as her wings unfurled behind her, and she pressed off the ground hard as she jumped into the air at amazing speeds and flew towards the mountain like a missile, dragging her group through the air.

Sam started laughing as she saw Allie’s face the moment she realized what Laura was doing.

Isa asked, “Ummm… is Laura going to get in trouble. Mary sort of has a fear of falling.”

Allie had always understood her wife had a fear of falling. She also knew conceptually there was a difference between that and a fear of heights, but except for a few instances she really didn’t see a great difference between those two things. That was no longer the case, and she was fairly certain a fear of falling was now one of the many things she had in common with Mary, as she hugged the ground. Sweet, beautiful earth. I’m never leaving you again. Never again.

Laura had jumped more than a dozen times in quick succession at a rapid pace. All three of the women she was carrying were screaming the entire time, but only Allie’s were screams of terror. After Allie regained her composure, she turned to her wife and asked, “How are you okay? I was terrified. I think I understand your fear of falling a lot better now; that’s for sure.”

Mary extended a hand to help Allie up off the ground. As Allie stood, Mary slowly floated into the air and simply hovered about two feet off the ground. “Allie, I can fly right now. Even if Laura had dropped me, I wouldn’t have fallen more than a foot or two before my instincts would take over and I would just be flying.”

Mary emphasized her point by doing a flip in midair without moving, and then showing off her maneuverability and how quickly she could pivot in midair. “See, so there wasn’t any real danger for me.” Mary turned to Laura. “That being said, Laura, that’s only true for me. Talia or Allie could have been seriously hurt.”

Talia cocked her head to the side. “Wait… how?” Then, before anyone said anything, Talia’s brain made the connection. “Oh! Right… I guess Allie might have been in danger. I don’t think I would have been, though.”

Mary shrugged. “Maybe.”

Laura said, “And that’s why I made sure I had a firm grip on Allie. I knew you two would be fine, but I still had you all under control.”

Mary saw Allie’s tail bristling and went over to calm her wife. “Hey, you’re fine, right?” Allie nodded. Mary hugged her. “It’s okay, Laura won’t be doing that again, right?” Mary looked over to Laura.

Laura rolled her eyes. “At least not without asking first.” Laura looked back down the mountain and saw both Sif and Bertha making their way up the mountain quickly. Seeing that it wouldn’t take too long for the others to catch up they took a seat on a large rock before continuing further. Laura turned to Mary and asked, “Could you go imperceptible and scout ahead? We have a minute or two for the others to get here.”

Mary nodded, activated Kitty’s boon, and flew ahead to get an idea of what was waiting for them.

When the second group caught up, Sam asked, “Where’s Mary?”

Mary popped into view, floating in midair, just as the question was asked. “I was scouting.”

Sam pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. “What part of no one does anything solo did you not understand?”

Mary put her hands on her hips, annoyed. “Samantha… I’m what? Three feet away from you? You didn’t realize I was here, and you have one of the best senses of smell, not to mention our bond. I fail to see how they could have detected me if you couldn’t.”

Sam immediately replied, “Hilde could be using her transformation that lets her see the code of transformations, which, even if she can’t see you, she would likely see whatever the transformations look like to her, floating in midair where you are. My understanding of Merida’s Red Threads of Fate is that she sees literal threads between two people. She could use it to detect you. Mark could also have those copied, or Ellen could be in any number of forms that let her detect you. So please don’t go alone; it’s dangerous to go alone.”

Mary sighed, realizing she hadn’t thought about all those possibilities. “Fine, would you like to hear what I saw, though?”

Sam gestured for Mary to continue.

“So I’ve found eight tunnels up ahead. The empire is currently sending troops into five of them, but it is slow going. There were also four collapsed tunnels. Looks like we made them, and either the orcs managed to collapse the tunnels, or it happened naturally due to the blasts. There’s one more thing… It’s hot up ahead. That’s actually the biggest issue for our forces. There are heat shimmers at the entrance to every tunnel at the moment.”

Sam frowned. “That’s not good, but it likely means it is also unpleasant for those inside the mountain as well.”

Talia shook her head. “Maybe not. Depending on ventilation, it could actually be quite cool further inside still. I had actually suspected that they would have tried cooling the tunnels down when I came up with the plan, but they must have something to allow them not to be concerned about the sweltering heat and are instead using it as a defensive measure.”

Allie asked, “Will Sam and I be okay? We’re both in plate armor.”

Talia replied, “I would assume Sam should be fine, you though… You might want to strip out of your plate.”

Mary said, “Or switch Allie and Isa, and if Sam uses her water breath weapon down whatever tunnel they choose, things should get a lot cooler from that.”

Sam shook her head. “No, but the breath weapon idea was something I was going to do before moving on, to help the troops. Remember, our objectives are takedowns and getting to the ritual chamber. One-for-one trades are acceptable except for Mary or Talia while they still have their incap removal abilities available. If you two are up and we’ve gone one for one otherwise, we can get most of the team back up to finish things off.”

They all moved up the mountain towards one of the tunnels where the empire forces were already working and pushing inside. They had water and ice mages trying to cool things down, but it was slow going, and there were occasional attacks launched from the darkness inside. Sam decided to make this fast and move to the entrance of the tunnel. She risked transforming into her dragon form, and was right to be concerned about staying like this for an extended period. The weight of Smug’s aura was oppressive, and she found it difficult to breathe. She grew in size and then let out a torrent of water down the tunnel. There was immediately a significant amount of steam coming out of the tunnel, but as Sam had hoped, two of the nearby tunnels had large amounts of water streaming out from them, as they weren’t that far apart. She immediately returned to her human form to relieve the pressure she felt.

A significant number of orcs also came along with the water, tumbling end over end as they were washed out of the tunnel. The empire forces attacked them immediately, but Sam noticed something odd. The orcs seemed to be falling over unconscious far faster than she thought they should.

Talia saw Sam’s scrunched-up face and asked her, “What’s wrong?”

“Even taking part of my breath weapon, the orcs feel like they are falling over quicker than they have before.”

Talia suggested, “Well, maybe they took part of our combo attack and were already weakened.”

Sam shook her head and pointed. “Right there. And there’s another one. Those two started falling over right before they were struck by an attack. All of you, hold back for a second, but keep an eye out for things.”

Sam decided to charge into the fray and fought with the empire troops. She moved through the remaining orc forces like a hot knife through butter. Talia noticed it happen again and again. It wasn’t always immediately, but it seemed like after a certain point the orcs just gave up.

Once the orcs that had been pushed out of the tunnels were dealt with, Sam returned to the group. Sam asked Talia, “So, any ideas?”

“Several. I think based upon how the orcs have acted, fighting us to their last breath previously, or making a tactical retreat, something has to have changed. I think something is keeping them fighting past the point they normally can, and it has a cost. The orcs can choose to cut their connection to whatever it is, and then they collapse, instead of paying that cost. Meaning the cost is significant to them in some way. It does seem like they only give up when it looks like they won’t be able to resist any further.”

Mary said, “I’m willing to bet they have something connecting them with the other orcs. Cassandra has shown she’ll rip stuff from things I’m a fan of for this, and occasionally even tweak them so they aren’t complete rip-offs. I bet that they all share an HP pool or can shunt damage to other orcs, spreading it out among all of them. The orcs here, though, were just going to be punching bags, which would cost their horde resources, so, as Talia surmised, they disconnected.”

Everyone looked at Mary, confused and not having a clue what she was talking about. Then Allie snapped her fingers. “Is that from that weird futuristic war game, with the marines and the aliens that aren’t Zerg but are definitely Zerg? Where the humans are all racist and zealots?”

Mary let out a half groan, half sigh. “Yes, and while that isn’t inaccurate, exactly, that is a poor description of the game.”

Laura started chuckling to herself, finding the entire situation amusing, as she realized that Cassandra had really delved deep into Mary’s interests, just to include stuff Mary liked to make her happy, almost like she might be seeking her approval or attention. Talia had to ask, “What’s so funny?”

Laura pursed her lips. “I’d rather not say. Someone would likely get upset with me.”

Talia narrowed her eyes, and then they opened wide as she realized what Laura found funny. “Yeah… best not.” Talia then asked Sam, “So where do you want us to enter?”

Sam thrust her head behind her. “Here is fine.”

Laura asked, “Then where are you going to attack from?”

Sam grinned, “I feel like someone ought to knock on their front door and say hello.”