Chance Encounters on the Road | Rebekah Bourg

General Summary

Sparks cascaded from the arm that Colonel Blaster torn from the robot that had attacked him and which now lay in a smoldering ruin at his feet. Around him, the old battlefield was quiet except for his companions, standing a few paces away, chatting. His chair was a splintered mess and there was an irritating droning that seemed to be getting louder. They were just turning to mount their malorks when a dread destroyer crashed over the ridge and blasted the group. Everyone dove for cover or hurled themselves onto their mounts and urged them skyward. Most evaded the brutal attack.
“What are these projectiles composed of?” Alitsar demanded of the datasphere.
“Lasers,” came the unspoken answer. The group uttered a collective groan.
“Stop complaining,” chided the datasphere. “I’m a mythological figure. You’re the heroes. Do your job. I give you money.”
Staying out of range is a boring and ineffective way to fight, so one by one, the adventurers sallied forth to attack the dread destroyer. Brute easily flipped the monster onto its back, and when it righted itself, he repeated the procedure. Tala fired a hunter/seeker at the beast, then retreated. Wielding his dual axes, Blaster leapt onto the monster, calling for Vincent’s assistance, then retreated to avoid another laser attack. Alitsar whipped up a tornado, gradually adding rocks, metal shards, and fire to it in an effort to pierce the destroyer’s steel exoskeleton. Saiylar healed her companions as much as she could, but it seemed that the dread destroyer could also heal itself.
From a safe distance, Tala opened a wormhole to inside the beastie, and Colonel Blaster charged through, followed by Saiylar. They hacked away at the destroyer’s internal mechanisms, bewildered by its apparent lack of a central power system and shocked by unavoidable electrocution every time the monster attacked. Even pinned on its back, with the force of Alitsar’s tornado driving down on it, the beast could still emit devastating electrical attacks. Tala evacuated the now debilitated Blaster to the safety of a malork just as Brute delivered the death blow.

Alatsar dispersed his tornado, staring at the hulking mass of their deceased adversary, and muttered something about lasers. “That’s it,” he said. “I’m starting a war with the Fourth Wall.” And his companions wondered if Blaster’s madness was contagious as they resumed their journey to Leyden.

***

Elsewhere, Shanna encountered madness of another sort when her party was rudely awakened by a falling anene. As is customary in such circumstances, all dove for cover and when the oversized precipitation stopped, Shanna glimpsed an airship vanishing into the low-hanging clouds. In pursuit of the strange craft, she crossed paths with an even stranger man who introduced himself as Mousetrap. Once introductions were exchanged, Mousetrap hastily explained that his ship had been raided by Margrs. He had escaped along with some flyers, but many of their people were still aboard.
“I regret that you were attacked, but a common enemy unites us. Will you help us retake our ship?”
Shanna agreed and led her party aboard Mousetrap’s craft, which he piloted them up to the stolen dirigible. Not wanting to endanger the prisoners with a direct assault, Shanna created a wind sword and expertly slit the balloon so that the air would leak out slowly enough to not be noticed but still hamper their opponents’ maneuverability. Mousetrap muttered thanks for not causing irreparable damage to his home. Shanna was too gobsmacked by the pirates’ appearance to respond. They looked like people, but had the heads of goats, and were armed with broad-headed spears. They didn’t seem to notice their decent until the dirigible’s hull scraped the treetops, and by then it was too late. Shanna summoned a gust of wind to drive the craft down, smothering the ship with its own balloon and trapping its occupants inside. Shouting, Mousetrap and his flyers sprang upon the Margrs as Shanna and her companions helped the prisoners to safety.
Once the Margrs were defeated, all was well and the day was saved. Shanna offered assistance in repairing the dirigible, accepted the gratitude of Mousetrap and his people, then started once more on the road to Ghan.

Report Date

26 Jul 2021