Land of the Giants, page 3
Stur shared a look with the marshal that was difficult to gauge under his bushy eyebrows. “I see much has changed during our long slumber. Please, call me Stur. Weapon Master just feels so stiff.”
“Yes, and the lot of you better stop calling me Lady or Marshal. Kyra will do just fine,” Kyra commanded, adding, “And that includes you too, Stur.” She left no room for any objection, not that Logan minded. He had no inclination to grovel before the Acadian like his dutiful brother.
“Looks like the two of you are ready for a fight. Where are you headed?” Logan asked, having noticed Kyra also wore a bronze xiphos, a style of short sword with a blade that was shaped almost like a teardrop, strapped to her slender waist.
“We were coming to find you,” she stated flatly, making him feel even more foolish for getting worked up earlier.
“Now we’re talking!” Bipp exclaimed. “We have been bored out of our brains waiting in here!” He hopped off the counter, rubbing his palms together eagerly.
“How can we be of service, Marsha—err, Kyra?” Corbin asked. Logan rolled his eyes, which did not go unnoticed by the massive weapon master.
“The main transport has been repaired, but it seems to be stuck on something up on level five. It’s only a short walk to get there, but we deemed it wise to have you accompany us,” Kyra explained.
“All these people awake, and you need us to help get an elevator moving?” Logan questioned.
“These men and women are scientists, and they have enough work to do as it is. Stur is one of the only warriors we have awakened, and I have his men busy clearing the lower level exits of those monstrous spiders. We’ve decided not to wake any more of the soldiers until we better understand our situation,” Kyra explained with an edge of acid in her voice at being questioned.
Logan smirked, holding his palms forward. “Whoa, whoa, relax, there Lady Tarvano. I’m only messing around with you. We are more than happy to get out of this room and have something to do.”
Kyra turned and headed for the corridor. “Alright then, fall out, men,” she commanded over her shoulder, twirling her finger in the air. “But Logan, perhaps you should stay close by my side.” Logan moved right up next to the marshal, wearing a cocky grin. “This way I don’t have to worry about you staring at my ‘nice little backside’,” she added, wiping the foolish grin from his face and causing Stur and Bipp to chuckle in unison.
True to Kyra’s word, it was a quick hike through the network of dusty rooms before they arrived at their destination. Logan had grown up in a log cabin in Riverbell. Since leaving the small village, he had come across many strange and fascinating structures in his travels. However, none of them could have prepared him for the oddly comforting rooms and corridors in the Citadel. The place was both sterile and familiar. Most rooms remained unlit, but a good portion of this floor was lined with artificial lighting that ran parallel to the floor in lines that clung to the metal walls.
They took a hard right out of the corridor into a rounded out lobby that connected to other hallways in the complex. An androgynous looking fellow waited for them at the elevator shaft in the center of the room, holding a kopis and kite shield as if they were a bundle of laundry. As they approached, he became oddly animated, springing forward to meet the party.
“Greetings, Marshal Kyra Tarvano. This one has procured the requested equipment.” He spoke oddly, rhythmically enunciating each syllable.
Bipp walked right up to him, gazing at his side and looking around at his back as if he were a museum piece.
“Excellent work, Nero. Please give those to Logan Walker here.” She gestured to Logan.
Logan looked down at the offered bundle, puzzled. “What’s this, then? Is it my birthday so soon?” He took the kopis, feeling the weight of the curved sword. The pommel felt secure in his fist, and he admired the sharp studs on the curved bar that protected his knuckles. “Me likey. But hey, how about a revolver instead, eh?”
“My sincere apologies for your disappointment, Master Logan Walker, but the armory did not fare well through the strains of time,” Nero offered.
“That’s a shame. I was hoping to get my hands on another of them laser rifles,” he jested, keeping the sword and waving away the other equipment Nero offered.
“It is somewhat of a surprise to hear your people are still using such advanced weaponry, after hearing from Lady Kyra about your humble roots,” Stur observed, truly interested to hear more about the Falian people.
“Ah, we don’t really have too many of those,” Logan lamented. “I mean, I used to own one, but that’s a long story.” He had grown very fond of the laser rifle Elder Morgana bequeathed him on her deathbed and missed it ever since it was destroyed at the ruins of Ul’kor.
“Logan Walker, are you positive you would not like this shield? Statistics show that warriors who wield a shield in combat are thirty-three percent less likely to experience fatality.” Nero offered the kite shield again.
“What’s with this guy?” Logan arched his eyebrow at the strange man. The Acadians had no idea his right hand was mechanical since he had been wearing leather gloves he found in the Citadel, nor the devastating capabilities it possessed, and he was not going to reveal his ace card at the moment. “Nah, I’m good pal, thanks for the sword, though.”
“He’s not real,” Bipp explained, flicking the man’s leg as if he were testing a theory.
“Ow.” Nero backed away from the prodding gnome, who was surprised to be incorrect.
“That is quite enough,” Kyra reprimanded before dismissing Nero, who walked in the oddest manner quickly down the corridor, leaving them alone in front of the open elevator shaft. Once he was out of earshot, Kyra directed her gaze to Bipp. “You are wise to see the truth of Nero, yet not completely correct. He is what we call an android, an artificial life form created to serve the Empire in times of war,” she explained.
“What is that supposed to mean? So the guy’s, what…like a machine or something?” Logan asked doubtfully, looking down the hall the man had disappeared into.
“Yes and no,” Kyra said. “Originally the androids were created just as machines to serve us in the same way as any other tool would. Yet over time we saw these creations had a spirit, not unlike a soul.” She hopped across the expanse of the open portal into the shaft, grabbing a ladder rung and beckoning for the party to follow suit.
“Interesting construct. I would love to pick your brain more on the subject another time, if you don’t mind?” Bipp asked, enthusiastically pondering the useful applications such beings could pose to gnome civilization.
“Sounds like more witchcraft to me,” Logan grumbled, wary of anything new after his recent turn of luck. “How many of those people you woke up are these android things?”
“They do not like being called things. They prefer the names they are given at creation, much like us,” Stur corrected, taking the rear as he entered the unlit shaft.
The air inside was thick and dusty. It tickled Logan’s throat and he had to cough to clear it. Corbin looked uneasy at far down the shaft went and seemed determined to keep his eyes upward.
“And Nero is the only android we have awoken. Hang on, we are almost there,” Kyra called down. She had outpaced them fairly quickly, moving lithely up the shaft on iron rungs.
Reaching the half-opened door above, Kyra slipped through the narrow gap where the elevator cabin was stuck between two floors. Logan was not sure the giant weapon master could fit through the small opening, but Stur forced his way past, rocking the suspended room above. Logan gulped a knot that swelled in his throat, looking at the shaky outline of the cabin above. He was happy to climb out through the gap.
After they were all in the dark hallway, Kyra motioned for them to help her back inside the shaft, this time entering the stuck cabin through a wide opening where the doors were stuck ajar.
Before they entered, Kyra stopped to whisper, “We have been clearing out spiders for days now. But nobody has had a chance to take care of the upper levels yet, so keep your eyes peeled.”
“Bossy lady, eh?” Logan jested, nudging the large man, who glowered down at Logan’s open show of disrespect in the middle of a serious situation. Logan took note of this and sobered up, brandishing his new weapon in his left hand and eyeing Stur’s massive sword.
“Corbin, give me a boost,” Kyra said.
She jumped off his cupped hands into the elevator then pulled him inside after her. Stur lifted Bipp like he was no heavier than a babe and gently set him inside the compartment before joining them. While Logan was still pulling himself into the cabin, the small room jolted downward an inch, letting out a sharp screech of grinding metal that echoed up and down the elevator shaft.
Kyra shot him a dirty look from where she stood perched on Corbin’s shoulders, opening the overhead emergency hatch.
Logan scowled back. “What? Like I’m any heavier than the ox over there?” He pointed at Stur.
Kyra was halfway through the ceiling hatch when Corbin asked what she saw blocking the way. She deftly slipped off his shoulders onto the elevator’s roof and motioned for them to be quiet and join her. Stur was far too large to make it through the opening, so he helped both brothers up in turn. As the weapon master lifted him, Logan could not help thinking how the man’s hands were as big as his head.
It took his eyes a couple moments to adjust to the darkness after spending all that time in the artificial light of Kyra’s base. Once they did, his heart jumped and his skin crawled. All around them were the familiar thick strands of spider webbing, exactly like those they had encountered when they first made it into the Citadel and found Kyra hanging in a feeding sac.
Unfortunately, it was not just webbing that surrounded them. There were also spiders the size of dogs, their long legs curled around fat hairy abdomens that moved ever so slightly, as if in slumber. There had to be six or seven of the black arachnids huddled together along the walls.
“Guess we found what’s been blocking your machine.” Logan’s whisper bounced off the walls, echoing up the shaft. The group tensed up. Wincing, Logan started to apologize but Kyra covered his mouth with her palm and put a finger to her lips before directing Corbin to take the left flank with surprisingly straightforward hand gestures. She popped her head and arm through the elevator porthole and signaled Stur to be ready then slid over to put her back against Corbin’s. Signaling with her fingers, she counted down—three…two…one—and then made a fist.
As her last finger went down, the party exploded into action. Corbin vaulted into the air, slicing down two of the oversized monsters. Kyra jumped against the wall to throw herself up high, cutting down another, and even Bipp let his small hammer fly, knocking one of the creatures loose from the wall onto its back.
Logan ran in before the dangerous fanged predator could flip over and traced a line across its exposed hairy abdomen with his sword. As he moved out, the creature wildly thrashed its eight legs and mewled like a wounded feline, trying to escape the stinging feeling of death.
It all flew by in the blink of an eye. Yet no sooner had they dispatched the first four beasts than the three others woke from their slumber to unfurl long, hairy legs and drop from the wall, ready to turn the tables on their attackers, while a fourth scurried faster than they could hope to catch up the shaft away from them.
Logan tried to warn Bipp away from the spider that had landed behind him, but having eight legs made the wretched thing swifter than he anticipated. Bipp let out a cry as the large, fat fangs clamped into his back, lifting him into the air and tossing his already paralyzing body aside like a ragdoll.
Logan lunged in, howling for his friend, and stabbed his blade deep into the creature’s fanged maw. Desperate yellow eyes flickered up to him as the spider tried to backpedal and escape the blade lodged in its face. As it moved away, Logan’s sword went with it. Before the monster could escape, though, Logan clamped onto one of the two-foot-long legs with his metal fist. He squeezed hard enough to snap the leg in half and gave himself enough leverage to pull the beast back toward him. Another thrashing leg almost bowled him over as the terrified predator turned prey desperately thrashed about, trying to escape. Logan rolled with the blow, throwing himself sideways to the floor and feigning unconsciousness.
Kyra saw him and moved to help, but Corbin blocked her path, shaking his head. He knew his older brother well enough to know a ruse when he saw one.
The spider moved in to claim its new prize, and Logan spun from the floor to grasp his sword with both hands and wrench it through the bottom of the monster’s face. Sickly yellow ooze poured out of the spider’s ruined head.
Kyra was already focused back on the two dangerous arachnids facing her. Corbin danced in toward one that was circling them. The creatures ran around the wall to their left, and Corbin jumped back, rhythmically avoiding a hissing stream of poison shot at his feet.
Another spider violently charged in, planning to overwhelm Kyra’s small form. The experienced and battle-hardened woman deftly rolled out of the way, letting the spider barrel past her. In the blink of an eye, she was up on one knee and released a cord on her gauntlet. Rows of platemail spun open clockwise, locking in place across her forearm to form a shield, which she used to ram the surprised beast from the side, knocking it down the exposed opening into the elevator below. Before the surprised monster even had time to react to her ruse, Stur had sliced it into three separate, twitching pieces.
Corbin ran to the right, danced out of the way of another stream of poison, then spun to the left. Coming in hard, his feet clambered right up the wall with such speed it seemed as if he were walking sideways up the shaft. Hopping off the wall to land behind the cornered spider, he rolled into a ball, spinning sideways with the blade of his voulge sticking out like a top. By the time he stopped, the headless spider was already falling to the roof of the elevator, dead on arrival.
Logan pulled his friend’s body off the floor, slapping his sickly grey cheeks. “Bipp! Bipp, wake up, buddy!”
Kyra ran over to give him a hand, propping the gnome on Logan’s lap and lifting one of Bipp’s eyelids to reveal an undilated, yellow, bloodshot eye. “He will live, but the poison is paralyzing, as I know only too well. Bipp can understand us, he just can’t move. Help me lower him back into the cab.”
Logan was relieved to hear the good news. His mind had gone into shock from the moment he saw his friend get bitten. Together, he and Kyra carefully lowered Bipp’s limp body into Stur’s waiting hands below, while Corbin worked with his voulge to clear the thick clumps of sticky webbing built up around the elevators wheels preventing them from rolling up the tracks set in the four corners of the shaft. Once enough was cleared away from the mechanism, which had been pushing against the webbing all this time, the entire cabin suddenly heaved upward, grinding past the remaining filament and tossing everyone about as it settled to a stop.
Kyra called for them to get inside the cab, and they rode it back down to the third level, where she had some attendants take Bipp to the Waking Chamber for medical attention. Logan felt guilty for not sticking by his friend’s side, but Kyra assured him the gnome would be fine and insisted he accompany them to the top level, where she reasoned they would most likely need his skills.
The party stood huddled together, silently brooding over their sloppy victory as the elevator headed for the surface. Despite Bipp’s injuries, Logan could not help feeling a trickle of excitement grow inside him, eager to see what was above. Growing up in the underworld lands of Vanidriell, deep inside Acadia’s core, the young man had often found himself daydreaming of adventures and was the first to gather around when the traveling bard, Claudio, came to town with stories of epic battles from the days when humanity stilled dwelled on the surface world. The companions had travelled long and far to get to this point, and he could barely contain his excitement.
As the elevator whirred up the shaft, the car jarred, hitting something heavy overhead, which slowed it for only a second. Logan looked to Kyra for an explanation, but it was Stur who spoke.
“Another of the arachnids, no doubt. Unless it knows how to open emergency hatches, I’d say the abomination is about to become spider pâté,” the weapon master said confidently, pointing at the ceiling hatch.
Logan was about to ask what pâté was when the car suddenly slowed to a jerking halt, reaching its destination. The trapped spider above screeched as it was crushed to death between the cab and the top of the shaft.
“Top floor, men. Get ready and stay on your guard,” Kyra ordered, flicking open her folding shield and assuming a battle stance.
Logan was too excited to see what lay beyond the elevator doors to be annoyed with being ordered around. He did not typically go in for filling the role of an obedient follower, and last time he made an exception, a man was murdered.
The cab gave a low ding and the metal doors slid open, flooding the small compartment with blinding light from the room beyond. It was as if someone had thrown stinging water in Logan’s eyes. He clamped them shut immediately as the bright light flooded the cabin. Blocking the light with his hands, he could barely make out that his brother was encountering the same problem, but their Acadian companions were not. Kyra and Stur exchanged questioning looks at the men’s reaction.
“I was afraid of this,” Kyra said. “Your people have lived in the underworld so long your eyes cannot take the light of the surface.” She moved her body to shield some of the light from his face. Stur had moved out of the cab, surveying the room beyond for more enemies.
“Maybe that was something you could have mentioned to us before the doors opened, lady. I think I’m blind,” Logan grumbled, his eyes squinted so tight the marshal became no more than a blurred dark shape against a backdrop of blinding white light. He could hear cloth tearing and saw a blotchy form moving toward him. Logan lifted his sword to defend himself.
“Would you put that down before you hurt yourself?” Kyra scolded as Corbin pressed a strip of cloth to his brother’s face, dulling the light to something more manageable for his sensitive Falian eyes.
“Yes, and the lot of you better stop calling me Lady or Marshal. Kyra will do just fine,” Kyra commanded, adding, “And that includes you too, Stur.” She left no room for any objection, not that Logan minded. He had no inclination to grovel before the Acadian like his dutiful brother.
“Looks like the two of you are ready for a fight. Where are you headed?” Logan asked, having noticed Kyra also wore a bronze xiphos, a style of short sword with a blade that was shaped almost like a teardrop, strapped to her slender waist.
“We were coming to find you,” she stated flatly, making him feel even more foolish for getting worked up earlier.
“Now we’re talking!” Bipp exclaimed. “We have been bored out of our brains waiting in here!” He hopped off the counter, rubbing his palms together eagerly.
“How can we be of service, Marsha—err, Kyra?” Corbin asked. Logan rolled his eyes, which did not go unnoticed by the massive weapon master.
“The main transport has been repaired, but it seems to be stuck on something up on level five. It’s only a short walk to get there, but we deemed it wise to have you accompany us,” Kyra explained.
“All these people awake, and you need us to help get an elevator moving?” Logan questioned.
“These men and women are scientists, and they have enough work to do as it is. Stur is one of the only warriors we have awakened, and I have his men busy clearing the lower level exits of those monstrous spiders. We’ve decided not to wake any more of the soldiers until we better understand our situation,” Kyra explained with an edge of acid in her voice at being questioned.
Logan smirked, holding his palms forward. “Whoa, whoa, relax, there Lady Tarvano. I’m only messing around with you. We are more than happy to get out of this room and have something to do.”
Kyra turned and headed for the corridor. “Alright then, fall out, men,” she commanded over her shoulder, twirling her finger in the air. “But Logan, perhaps you should stay close by my side.” Logan moved right up next to the marshal, wearing a cocky grin. “This way I don’t have to worry about you staring at my ‘nice little backside’,” she added, wiping the foolish grin from his face and causing Stur and Bipp to chuckle in unison.
True to Kyra’s word, it was a quick hike through the network of dusty rooms before they arrived at their destination. Logan had grown up in a log cabin in Riverbell. Since leaving the small village, he had come across many strange and fascinating structures in his travels. However, none of them could have prepared him for the oddly comforting rooms and corridors in the Citadel. The place was both sterile and familiar. Most rooms remained unlit, but a good portion of this floor was lined with artificial lighting that ran parallel to the floor in lines that clung to the metal walls.
They took a hard right out of the corridor into a rounded out lobby that connected to other hallways in the complex. An androgynous looking fellow waited for them at the elevator shaft in the center of the room, holding a kopis and kite shield as if they were a bundle of laundry. As they approached, he became oddly animated, springing forward to meet the party.
“Greetings, Marshal Kyra Tarvano. This one has procured the requested equipment.” He spoke oddly, rhythmically enunciating each syllable.
Bipp walked right up to him, gazing at his side and looking around at his back as if he were a museum piece.
“Excellent work, Nero. Please give those to Logan Walker here.” She gestured to Logan.
Logan looked down at the offered bundle, puzzled. “What’s this, then? Is it my birthday so soon?” He took the kopis, feeling the weight of the curved sword. The pommel felt secure in his fist, and he admired the sharp studs on the curved bar that protected his knuckles. “Me likey. But hey, how about a revolver instead, eh?”
“My sincere apologies for your disappointment, Master Logan Walker, but the armory did not fare well through the strains of time,” Nero offered.
“That’s a shame. I was hoping to get my hands on another of them laser rifles,” he jested, keeping the sword and waving away the other equipment Nero offered.
“It is somewhat of a surprise to hear your people are still using such advanced weaponry, after hearing from Lady Kyra about your humble roots,” Stur observed, truly interested to hear more about the Falian people.
“Ah, we don’t really have too many of those,” Logan lamented. “I mean, I used to own one, but that’s a long story.” He had grown very fond of the laser rifle Elder Morgana bequeathed him on her deathbed and missed it ever since it was destroyed at the ruins of Ul’kor.
“Logan Walker, are you positive you would not like this shield? Statistics show that warriors who wield a shield in combat are thirty-three percent less likely to experience fatality.” Nero offered the kite shield again.
“What’s with this guy?” Logan arched his eyebrow at the strange man. The Acadians had no idea his right hand was mechanical since he had been wearing leather gloves he found in the Citadel, nor the devastating capabilities it possessed, and he was not going to reveal his ace card at the moment. “Nah, I’m good pal, thanks for the sword, though.”
“He’s not real,” Bipp explained, flicking the man’s leg as if he were testing a theory.
“Ow.” Nero backed away from the prodding gnome, who was surprised to be incorrect.
“That is quite enough,” Kyra reprimanded before dismissing Nero, who walked in the oddest manner quickly down the corridor, leaving them alone in front of the open elevator shaft. Once he was out of earshot, Kyra directed her gaze to Bipp. “You are wise to see the truth of Nero, yet not completely correct. He is what we call an android, an artificial life form created to serve the Empire in times of war,” she explained.
“What is that supposed to mean? So the guy’s, what…like a machine or something?” Logan asked doubtfully, looking down the hall the man had disappeared into.
“Yes and no,” Kyra said. “Originally the androids were created just as machines to serve us in the same way as any other tool would. Yet over time we saw these creations had a spirit, not unlike a soul.” She hopped across the expanse of the open portal into the shaft, grabbing a ladder rung and beckoning for the party to follow suit.
“Interesting construct. I would love to pick your brain more on the subject another time, if you don’t mind?” Bipp asked, enthusiastically pondering the useful applications such beings could pose to gnome civilization.
“Sounds like more witchcraft to me,” Logan grumbled, wary of anything new after his recent turn of luck. “How many of those people you woke up are these android things?”
“They do not like being called things. They prefer the names they are given at creation, much like us,” Stur corrected, taking the rear as he entered the unlit shaft.
The air inside was thick and dusty. It tickled Logan’s throat and he had to cough to clear it. Corbin looked uneasy at far down the shaft went and seemed determined to keep his eyes upward.
“And Nero is the only android we have awoken. Hang on, we are almost there,” Kyra called down. She had outpaced them fairly quickly, moving lithely up the shaft on iron rungs.
Reaching the half-opened door above, Kyra slipped through the narrow gap where the elevator cabin was stuck between two floors. Logan was not sure the giant weapon master could fit through the small opening, but Stur forced his way past, rocking the suspended room above. Logan gulped a knot that swelled in his throat, looking at the shaky outline of the cabin above. He was happy to climb out through the gap.
After they were all in the dark hallway, Kyra motioned for them to help her back inside the shaft, this time entering the stuck cabin through a wide opening where the doors were stuck ajar.
Before they entered, Kyra stopped to whisper, “We have been clearing out spiders for days now. But nobody has had a chance to take care of the upper levels yet, so keep your eyes peeled.”
“Bossy lady, eh?” Logan jested, nudging the large man, who glowered down at Logan’s open show of disrespect in the middle of a serious situation. Logan took note of this and sobered up, brandishing his new weapon in his left hand and eyeing Stur’s massive sword.
“Corbin, give me a boost,” Kyra said.
She jumped off his cupped hands into the elevator then pulled him inside after her. Stur lifted Bipp like he was no heavier than a babe and gently set him inside the compartment before joining them. While Logan was still pulling himself into the cabin, the small room jolted downward an inch, letting out a sharp screech of grinding metal that echoed up and down the elevator shaft.
Kyra shot him a dirty look from where she stood perched on Corbin’s shoulders, opening the overhead emergency hatch.
Logan scowled back. “What? Like I’m any heavier than the ox over there?” He pointed at Stur.
Kyra was halfway through the ceiling hatch when Corbin asked what she saw blocking the way. She deftly slipped off his shoulders onto the elevator’s roof and motioned for them to be quiet and join her. Stur was far too large to make it through the opening, so he helped both brothers up in turn. As the weapon master lifted him, Logan could not help thinking how the man’s hands were as big as his head.
It took his eyes a couple moments to adjust to the darkness after spending all that time in the artificial light of Kyra’s base. Once they did, his heart jumped and his skin crawled. All around them were the familiar thick strands of spider webbing, exactly like those they had encountered when they first made it into the Citadel and found Kyra hanging in a feeding sac.
Unfortunately, it was not just webbing that surrounded them. There were also spiders the size of dogs, their long legs curled around fat hairy abdomens that moved ever so slightly, as if in slumber. There had to be six or seven of the black arachnids huddled together along the walls.
“Guess we found what’s been blocking your machine.” Logan’s whisper bounced off the walls, echoing up the shaft. The group tensed up. Wincing, Logan started to apologize but Kyra covered his mouth with her palm and put a finger to her lips before directing Corbin to take the left flank with surprisingly straightforward hand gestures. She popped her head and arm through the elevator porthole and signaled Stur to be ready then slid over to put her back against Corbin’s. Signaling with her fingers, she counted down—three…two…one—and then made a fist.
As her last finger went down, the party exploded into action. Corbin vaulted into the air, slicing down two of the oversized monsters. Kyra jumped against the wall to throw herself up high, cutting down another, and even Bipp let his small hammer fly, knocking one of the creatures loose from the wall onto its back.
Logan ran in before the dangerous fanged predator could flip over and traced a line across its exposed hairy abdomen with his sword. As he moved out, the creature wildly thrashed its eight legs and mewled like a wounded feline, trying to escape the stinging feeling of death.
It all flew by in the blink of an eye. Yet no sooner had they dispatched the first four beasts than the three others woke from their slumber to unfurl long, hairy legs and drop from the wall, ready to turn the tables on their attackers, while a fourth scurried faster than they could hope to catch up the shaft away from them.
Logan tried to warn Bipp away from the spider that had landed behind him, but having eight legs made the wretched thing swifter than he anticipated. Bipp let out a cry as the large, fat fangs clamped into his back, lifting him into the air and tossing his already paralyzing body aside like a ragdoll.
Logan lunged in, howling for his friend, and stabbed his blade deep into the creature’s fanged maw. Desperate yellow eyes flickered up to him as the spider tried to backpedal and escape the blade lodged in its face. As it moved away, Logan’s sword went with it. Before the monster could escape, though, Logan clamped onto one of the two-foot-long legs with his metal fist. He squeezed hard enough to snap the leg in half and gave himself enough leverage to pull the beast back toward him. Another thrashing leg almost bowled him over as the terrified predator turned prey desperately thrashed about, trying to escape. Logan rolled with the blow, throwing himself sideways to the floor and feigning unconsciousness.
Kyra saw him and moved to help, but Corbin blocked her path, shaking his head. He knew his older brother well enough to know a ruse when he saw one.
The spider moved in to claim its new prize, and Logan spun from the floor to grasp his sword with both hands and wrench it through the bottom of the monster’s face. Sickly yellow ooze poured out of the spider’s ruined head.
Kyra was already focused back on the two dangerous arachnids facing her. Corbin danced in toward one that was circling them. The creatures ran around the wall to their left, and Corbin jumped back, rhythmically avoiding a hissing stream of poison shot at his feet.
Another spider violently charged in, planning to overwhelm Kyra’s small form. The experienced and battle-hardened woman deftly rolled out of the way, letting the spider barrel past her. In the blink of an eye, she was up on one knee and released a cord on her gauntlet. Rows of platemail spun open clockwise, locking in place across her forearm to form a shield, which she used to ram the surprised beast from the side, knocking it down the exposed opening into the elevator below. Before the surprised monster even had time to react to her ruse, Stur had sliced it into three separate, twitching pieces.
Corbin ran to the right, danced out of the way of another stream of poison, then spun to the left. Coming in hard, his feet clambered right up the wall with such speed it seemed as if he were walking sideways up the shaft. Hopping off the wall to land behind the cornered spider, he rolled into a ball, spinning sideways with the blade of his voulge sticking out like a top. By the time he stopped, the headless spider was already falling to the roof of the elevator, dead on arrival.
Logan pulled his friend’s body off the floor, slapping his sickly grey cheeks. “Bipp! Bipp, wake up, buddy!”
Kyra ran over to give him a hand, propping the gnome on Logan’s lap and lifting one of Bipp’s eyelids to reveal an undilated, yellow, bloodshot eye. “He will live, but the poison is paralyzing, as I know only too well. Bipp can understand us, he just can’t move. Help me lower him back into the cab.”
Logan was relieved to hear the good news. His mind had gone into shock from the moment he saw his friend get bitten. Together, he and Kyra carefully lowered Bipp’s limp body into Stur’s waiting hands below, while Corbin worked with his voulge to clear the thick clumps of sticky webbing built up around the elevators wheels preventing them from rolling up the tracks set in the four corners of the shaft. Once enough was cleared away from the mechanism, which had been pushing against the webbing all this time, the entire cabin suddenly heaved upward, grinding past the remaining filament and tossing everyone about as it settled to a stop.
Kyra called for them to get inside the cab, and they rode it back down to the third level, where she had some attendants take Bipp to the Waking Chamber for medical attention. Logan felt guilty for not sticking by his friend’s side, but Kyra assured him the gnome would be fine and insisted he accompany them to the top level, where she reasoned they would most likely need his skills.
The party stood huddled together, silently brooding over their sloppy victory as the elevator headed for the surface. Despite Bipp’s injuries, Logan could not help feeling a trickle of excitement grow inside him, eager to see what was above. Growing up in the underworld lands of Vanidriell, deep inside Acadia’s core, the young man had often found himself daydreaming of adventures and was the first to gather around when the traveling bard, Claudio, came to town with stories of epic battles from the days when humanity stilled dwelled on the surface world. The companions had travelled long and far to get to this point, and he could barely contain his excitement.
As the elevator whirred up the shaft, the car jarred, hitting something heavy overhead, which slowed it for only a second. Logan looked to Kyra for an explanation, but it was Stur who spoke.
“Another of the arachnids, no doubt. Unless it knows how to open emergency hatches, I’d say the abomination is about to become spider pâté,” the weapon master said confidently, pointing at the ceiling hatch.
Logan was about to ask what pâté was when the car suddenly slowed to a jerking halt, reaching its destination. The trapped spider above screeched as it was crushed to death between the cab and the top of the shaft.
“Top floor, men. Get ready and stay on your guard,” Kyra ordered, flicking open her folding shield and assuming a battle stance.
Logan was too excited to see what lay beyond the elevator doors to be annoyed with being ordered around. He did not typically go in for filling the role of an obedient follower, and last time he made an exception, a man was murdered.
The cab gave a low ding and the metal doors slid open, flooding the small compartment with blinding light from the room beyond. It was as if someone had thrown stinging water in Logan’s eyes. He clamped them shut immediately as the bright light flooded the cabin. Blocking the light with his hands, he could barely make out that his brother was encountering the same problem, but their Acadian companions were not. Kyra and Stur exchanged questioning looks at the men’s reaction.
“I was afraid of this,” Kyra said. “Your people have lived in the underworld so long your eyes cannot take the light of the surface.” She moved her body to shield some of the light from his face. Stur had moved out of the cab, surveying the room beyond for more enemies.
“Maybe that was something you could have mentioned to us before the doors opened, lady. I think I’m blind,” Logan grumbled, his eyes squinted so tight the marshal became no more than a blurred dark shape against a backdrop of blinding white light. He could hear cloth tearing and saw a blotchy form moving toward him. Logan lifted his sword to defend himself.
“Would you put that down before you hurt yourself?” Kyra scolded as Corbin pressed a strip of cloth to his brother’s face, dulling the light to something more manageable for his sensitive Falian eyes.
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