The Thieves Guild ch.09

     The following day, outside the southern gate of Fit-Town a show down begins. The dusty trail, the noon-day sky, the wind, the plants, and a handful of local wild life are the only witnesses as Hollia, Scrags, Rhulan, Betty, and Cata stands with the town as their back drop to their obstacle in their continuing journey, the man known as Impchin. As he stands, arms crossed beneath his over sized shoulder guards much like those worn by another Scrags knows of, Drache, a style of armor worn by only a handful in the thieves guild, something they strangely call the space warrior style; he taps the ground with his oversized red tail with its large almost heart shaped tip kicking up dust. His tail reminds Betty of an animal she has seen in books of ancient Earths, a creature called an Ankylosaurus or something to that effect, only his tail is flat not a club.

    The man called Impchin chuckles as he moves his hand up, fiddling with a gold medallion around his neck and tapping the ground with his large boots and thick legs, which cause Rhulan to raise an eyebrow as he is wearing what looks like black tights for pants, off-setting his plastic like armor.

   “So you’re the guys my boss sent me after huh?” he chuckles, “What a joke, this should be over shortly. Your power levels don’t feel all that high to me.”

   He points dramatically at them, “I will kill all of you but the prize, and bring that one back for my reward.”

   “What are you talking about Impchin?” asks Scrags twirling his daggers about his fingers, “You said last night this has nothing to do with the guild. So what in the name of hell fire are you up to? Why’d you send Pillage and Plunder after me? What could I have possibly done that would get you acting all crazy like this?”

   “You?” says Impchin with a twisted smile

  *haaa haaaa haaa haaa*

  He laughs with a deep throaty laugh.

  “You? You have jack and shitless jack to do with this. You are scum to be crushed beneath my boot.”

   *haaa haaa haaa*

   “I just didn’t want to get my own hands dirty, no reason to throw away my financially lucrative career as a thief on this floating rock plate if I don’t have to.”

   *shrugs*

  “Well, too bad. Gotta do what I gotta do. You, you stupid little thief messed that plan up, got those two freaks to actually question my orders. No doubt they called Drache right away.”

   He clinches his fist and smiles broadly, “No matter, in the end no matter the financial gain the thieves’ guild was just a game to me. My loyalties lie higher than any mere mortal organization.”

   *haaa, haaa, haaa, haaa*

   “My master is a god!”

   He points at Betty, “My master is the Alpha Que! The one known to you ; his chosen bride, as the thing named Jim.”

   Betty pulls out her second gun from its pocket dimension, “Let me guess,” she says coldly in a voice that brings them back to her loosing it in the cave, “If I come quietly you’ll spare my friends, huh, like, like that’s the deal huh?”

   *Haa, haa, haa, haa*

   He laughs in the face of her question, “If I was going to do something like that would I have sent those two buffoons ahead of me? No, I am going to kill your friends, and bring you back half-dead if I have too. You will learn to show my god some respect! And we who are his minions are gifted, I will show you my strength, and you will be awed by it. You will beg the Alpha Que for new life and he will grant it. You will thank me for the experience, my future queen.”

   *haaa, haaa, haaa, haaa*

   “Enough of the stupid talk.” says Rhulan as she summons a Fire Sphere into her hand, “Let’s just kill this idiot and get on with our journey.”

   “Fire Sphere!” she yells as she throws the explosive spell bubble into his face.

   *ka-boom!*

   As the flames clear Impchin stands un-harmed, un-moved, and still smiling that creepy wide fang filled smile of his.

    Lin Lin rises into the air coiling around as flames dance around her
forming a sphere, a serpent of flame rises from the sphere and strikes out at Impchin.

   *sshhhsshs-fwoon!*

   The fiery serpent comes down on Impchin engulfing him, as the flames clear Betty takes a shot with her red gun blasting a fire ball dead center into his chest, the explosion adding to the flames of the Salamandra attack.

    With a wave of his hand Impchin casts the flames aside, a gleam in his eye seeing another assult coming from the tree line. With movements too fast for most eyes to see he grabs several blue fiery daggers from the air.

   “Nice try.” says Impchin to the unseen Scrags, hiding invisible in the trees to the side of the road behind the party.

   “You like that?” says Betty, “then try this!”

  She extends her hand, an archaic symbol appearing on the ground in front of her, a sight they had seen before back in a cave, a deadly move that required a barrier to protect them from the backlash, only this time Betty is keeping her hat on and not giving into her anger. From the symbol the cannon appears.

   “Cannon Fire!” yells Betty as the ball of Lava flies forth crossing the expanse between Impchin and themselves in no time at all.

   Impchin turns, swinging at the lava ball with his tail.

   *ka-boom!*

   The ball explodes; the lava and fire scorching the earth and surrounding vegetation, obscuring Impchin from view. His intent seems to have been to smack the ball of lava away, un-aware of its explosive nature.

   However despite this, as the flames subside he stands behind the smoke, smiling and laughing. His eyes suddenly widen as Cata swings her sword yelling out “Air Slicer!” the blue arc aims right for his neck.

   He dives backwards; twisting in the air as the moves flies over head and slices through a tree by the side of the road. He lands with one hand dragging the dirt, clawing into. He stands, his smile somehow more twisted than before.

   “Fire doesn’t work.” Whispers Cata, “He really is a demon from hell it seems.”

   “Looks like it.” says Betty.

   Scrags can hear this and more that sounds like praise towards Impchin and the power of demons, but at the same time he notices Rhulan’s lips are moving but no words are coming out that he can hear. Cata’s ears twitch, as do Betty’s.

   They nod at each other as they take off, Rhulan instructing Hollia to erect a barrier, with out question Hollia erects her Saint’s barrier keeping herself, LinLin, Scrags behind them, and Rhulan separate from the area that Impchin stands in, now with Cata running to the right, Impchin’s left, and Betty to the left, Impchin’s right.

   *thud, thud, thud, thud, thud,*

   *thud, thud, thud, thud, thud,*

    They make no attempt to run silently, their boots kicking up the dirt.

   Impchin looks back and forth, “Two at once, bring it weaklings.”

   “Air Slicer!”

   Impchin doesn’t dive, no instead he lowers his head and takes the shot right on his shiny head. His smile his short lives as sparks shoot off the back his head with bits of smoke, he grimaces.

   Looking behind him he sees Betty holding up her blue electric gun and winking, “what?” she says, “You think I have to yell out an attack name to shoot a gun?”

   “Clever bitch.” He says rubbing his neck, “no wander the master likes you, you got the same twisted sense of humor.”

   *zap, zap, zap, zap*

   She fires rapidly at him, however unfortunately he smacks away each electric bolt with his hands leaving behind only small electric arcs on his fingers that fade quickly.

   Behind his smile he just mumbles, “Thicker skin on my knuckles than neck girly girl. Going to take more than some bastardized version of a celestial blaster to take me down.”

    Betty leaps high into the air.

   “What now…” says Impchin as his instinct kick in and he jumps into the air just missing an electric shock wave beneath his feet ripping apart the dirt going hand in hand with Cata yelling out, “Earth Slicer!”

   Impchin looks back down at her as he crashes into the earth sending the rocks flying from the defiled earth left by her blast. Betty lands further back.

   Flames rise around Impchin, seeming to shoot from the earth its self beneath his feet.

   “Lets see your little tricks work now.” He says laughing, “Behold the power of hell fire’s aura. Haaa haaa haaa haaa!”

   Scrags appears behind them all, appearing from thin air with a look of concentration on his face, a yellow archaic symbol appearing on the ground in front of him with a wooden looking treasure chest with hold metal frames floats out of it and hovers just off the ground.

   As Scrags yells out, “Sacred Treasure!” the chest opens with a tsunami of gold coins, rings, crowns, scepters, pearl necklaces, jewels, and all manner of other valuables flying at Impchin…and melting into yellow vapor upon contact with the hell fire aura surrounding him.

    He eyes the vapor, “What is this?” he growls, “gold against fire? Are you retarded?”

   He flicks the gold vapor with his fire covered hand, “and illusion gold at that.”

   Scrags falls to one knee as the treasure chest vanishes.

   “haa haa haa…huh?”

   Impchin’s laugh is cut short as he sees that out of the corner of his eye the barrier is down and Hollia is starting to cast an ice-spell.

“Lord of the Frozen depths,
     Keeper of the world below the cold…”

    “Spirit Barrier!” yells out Rhulan, breaking Hollia’s concentration as…


    *Ka-boom!*

    A fire ball thrown by Impchin explodes on Rhulan’s barrier, the flame twists and circles back into a larger fire ball. It fires back at Impchin, however as before the flames accomplish nothing against him.

   “Not so fast.” says Impchin with a smile, “Time to kill every one, haa haa haa haa!”

  He stretches out his arms and starts to spin, the flames rising around him like a cyclone, “Fire…Tornado!” he yells out following it with his boisterous laugh.

   A large black circle appears beneath Betty, “Shanghai Getaway!” she says while falling down into it; reappearing from thin air like a ghost behind Rhulan and Hollia, and nodding to Rhulan.

   “Air Slicer!, Air Slicer!, Earth Slicer, Air slicer!” none of Cata’s attacks even phase Impchin’s attack, which he just stays in one place, apparently enjoying the futility of her attempts to break his attack.

   Scrags rises up and holds out his arm, focusing, straining, and grunting. The fire around Impchin  wavers a little, some of its going in, or stretching, warping in odd ways.

   “I see,” thinks Impchin, “He is what the locals call fire specialty; heh, a pyrokinetic, try all you want.”

   “Try all you want!” he says loud enough for all to hear as he spins, “a mere mortal like you can’t control demonic flames! Haa haa haa haa!”

  Rhulan drops the barrier; Betty holds her hat under her arms, her long blond hair falling down her back and pointed ears revealed again. Hollia’s staff glows with an icy blue aura, and Lin Lin rises in the air with a blue sphere around her.

     Betty                         Hollia
“Hat Trick!”            “Frozen Blast”

    A rush of salt water blasts from Betty’s hat hitting Impchin, throwing him from his off-tilter spin; as the blue beam filled with ice-shards from Hollia’s attack hits him, the cold rush of air drowning down the flames.

    While on the ground, and trying to sit up he sees in the air the fruit of Lin Lin’s effort, a white serpent dragon with sawed off antlers comes down on him from above with a mighty roar, crashing into him, covering him and the ground with spikes of ice.

   “RAAAAAAAH!”

   *kra-koom!*

   Ice flies in every direction as Impchin stands, arms and fists thrust out in anger roaring, “damn you…” he hisses hunched over, “damn you all to deepest…darkest…hell.”

    *rrrrrr*

    He holds his hands together at his side charging up an attack of spinning fire, churning and turning, growing tighter and whiter.

   “Oh shit!” says Rhulan, “everyone get back!”

   Faster than a flash Scrags is behind all of them, earning him a scowl from Cata who had leapt behind them around the same time Impchin was hit by the water and ice a moment before.

       Rhulan                           Hollia                           Impchin
      “Spirit Barrier”            “Saint’s Barrier”            “Inferno Blast!”

If one were to be able to see faster than sound, faster than fire, faster than magic they would see the impossible take place. As the inferno blast with its blazing whiteness rages through the air, exploding bits of oxygen as it goes they would see another fantastic sight take place as Rhulan and Hollia’s barriers meet. Where they touch, they stop, they ripple, and then like waves crossing directions over two seas a redness appears, a redness with hexagonal armored plates cascading over the two barriers changing the two into one new one.

   *fra-kooom!”

   the Inferno blast hits the new red barrier, Rhulan stares in amazement, her amazement adding to Hollia’s own as she notices the shocked expression on her instructor’s…her idol’s face.


   Like with the Spirit Barrier the fire stops then spins around on the barrier. However this time it vanishes and is replaced by a green aura that changes to icy blue that spins wide as a circle. A brilliant icy blue beam with shards of ice explodes from the circle; the very air at points seems to freeze solid. Impchin has neither the time nor the energy to react as the beam overtakes him. Even a scream has no time to escape his demonic lips.

    As the beam vanishes it reveals on the ground frozen earth and wisps of white smoke that are in fact the rapidly reheating remains of frozen air. Beyond Impchin’s still form the beam is revealed to have aimed down, only damaging a small distance beyond him. Impchin now lies on the ground, on his back, his armor is cracked, his skin a pale pink with split areas all over his skin. The shining crest upon his head now looks charcoal grey, cracked, and brittle soft; one may even mistake it now for graphite.

    They walk over to his apparently deceased form only to be taken back by,

   “*cough*…you…bas…bas…die…uuhh”

   Impchin is simply too weak to talk, his words but a whisper.

   “Okay,” says Rhulan, “time to start answering some questions”

   Impchin weakly raises his hand and taps the left breast of his armor, a small trapezoid shaped area lights up. His body vanishes as though a light were erasing him from the ground up.

   “He teleported?” asks Betty.

   “Thieves Guild technology.” says Scrags, “normally we only use it to get close to a target; it’s dishonorable to use it to either get inside somewhere or for an easy escape. We’d only use it if we had no other choice.”

   “Like almost getting killed,” says Cata, “but then again I doubt he’s going back to your guild.”

   “Yeah,” says Betty, “He worked for the Thing Named Jim.”



   Scrags narrows his eyes remembering what Impchin had said last night and before the fight.

   As they, except for Rhulan, turn to walk back towards town Scrags just has to ask immediately, “Okay, Rhulan, no offense but why didn’t you help out back there?”

   “But she did.” says Cata, “before the fight she said she had a powerful spell, but she needed that guy distracted, too angry to react quickly, possibly harmed…and maneuvered into position.” She shakes her head, “You saw it.”

   “Actually,” says Rhulan, “I didn’t plan on what happened, I never got to the part I needed him maneuvered into position for.”

   She turns, “Hollia, erect a Saints Barrier.”

   Hollia nods and once again erects her barrier. Rhulan snaps her fingers.

   *Shhhiiink!*

   Everyone, save for Rhulan steps back as numerous long black blades in the shape of broadsword blades shoot up from the ground exactly where Impchin had been standing. The blades seem to melt, becoming fluid as they come back down and flow into the earth. Up from the ground Rhulan’s runic sword emerges and flies hilt first towards her hand, vanishing into a black portal before her outstretched fingers.

   “That,” she says, “Is the attack spell I was working on. It’s a special shadow blades impaler move. It takes a great deal of concentration and time to move the sword silently through the ground. It can’t be too deep or too shallow, not too mention the incantations and the concentration involved in that. After all he was immune to fire, and electricity barely did anything, the guy was just too tough, so I thought of this on the fly; unfortunately a trap spell has to be placed; not summoned at will. It takes time to place the correct incantations like I said it takes a great deal of concentration, add on the fact that the spell is as I said a trap, anything would set it off, I had to focus to keep it from going off beneath any of you instead.”



   She sees Scrags’ look, “oh, don’t worry I was about to set it off and recall the sword before you asked anyway. Shame though, kinda a waist of a spell like that.”

   *shrugs*

   “That’s the gamble with trap spells though.”

   As they head back towards town Rhulan says, “At any rate lets get some food in us to recharge before heading out.”

   As they head back into town Scrags takes one more look back and shakes his head.

   Rhulan puts her hand on Hollia’s shoulder, who is carrying the tired Lin Lin who had used a great deal of her power for her powerful ice attack.

   “Hollia,” says Rhulan, “We need to talk about that spell.”

   “What spell?” she asks.

   Rhulan looks turns Hollia and brings her blushing face in awfully close to her own as she leans over, “hmmm,” says Rhulan, “I see,”

   She stands up, “Well my dear, looks like we have our first combo spell.”

   “Combo spell?” asks Hollia.

  “That’s right,” says Rhulan cheerfully, “when two spells merge together to become a new one, it can’t happen unless two important conditions are met, one the spells are compatible and two the ones using the spells are compatible.”

   Hollia blushes red as a beat.

  *cough*

  “Its an ambiguous description.” says Rhulan a little embarrassed herself, “It means the spiritual essence of those two people are similar in regards to how they call up that spell.”

   “Oh,” says Hollia, “Okay.”

   “Any who,” says Rhulan, “Hollia, first thing after lunch we need to find a nice wide open area and practice doing that again.”

   “Really?”

  “Yeah, believe it, what we just did was an Aegis Shield, one of the hardest and most powerful shield spells in existence.”

   Hollia’s eyes open wide, “by the goddess, that…that really was one wasn’t it? So..soo…sooo…COOL!” Hollia jumps up and down in glee “yeah, yeah, yeah, yippee, I don’t believe it! So cool, so cool, so cool!”

    She jumps up and hugs Rhulan before realizing how she is acting and regaining her composure, “I mean,”

   She brushes off her robes and straightens herself, “I mean that is indeed splendid and very…useful…”

   Rhulan laughs a little, “Lets save the happy jumping till we see if we can pull it off again okay?”

   “Okay.” says Hollia enthusiastically.

  Cata and Betty just smile to themselves as they head for a restaurant. Scrags shakes his head thinking, “crazy, I am traveling with a circus of craziness.”

    ******

    Across dimensions, across space, across what ever else happens to be crossed when going to a pocket dimension manufactured by an immortal mad-man. That’s right this is the world of the Thing Named Jim, his white room, white furniture, and still the door remains. The gold framed door with the brick wall barring his way to the universe known as Other World, the home universe of the world of Aesperia remains even though he could un-summon it, yet he refuses too out of some ancient and yet childish stubbornness to admit defeat.

   In his crystal ball he watched the battle between Impchin and those who aid his would be love, who would rather shoot him twice in the face than touch his lips. He places his palm over his face in disbelief, “Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, damn, and so and so forth…” he says with a sigh.

    The Adorable Death Bringer has stayed and watched along side her employer, after all she is a reaper, she does not need sleep, and there is nothing else she needs to do…at least not until…now.

   “A.D.B,” says The Thing Named Jim, “Its your turn…”

   *rrrrrrummmmbbblllle*

   *vrink-chink*

   The Thing Named Jim snaps to attention, never in all the time he has dwelled in this place of his own creation as there been an earthquake he did not create. The second sound however comes from the gate, he looks over to see an impossible sight; the brick door has vanished. In its place now stands a metal door with silver spikes, and crisscrossed chains connected to a silver skull shaped lock in the center with red jewel eyes.

    *rrrriiirrriirrruummmmbbble*

    Panels from the ceiling fall all around as a massive skeletal hand smashes in the roof.

   A voice, a woman’s voice, yet tinged with a certain something, a certain something that Jim doesn’t like, a tingling long forgotten from a time he views as a dream.; dread, the fear one feels in the company of death.

   “This one is mine,” says the voice as it encases the Adorable Death Bringer as one would pick up a pet mouse, “find your own minions lesser one.”

   Into a cloud of darkness the giant skeletal hand disappears with Adorable Death Bringer in its palm, not resisting in the least. The cloud vanishes, the door however remains a black symbol of death; a symbol of death that shocks The Thing Named Jim, literally, as he tries to touch it. He puts his finger into his mouth to ease the pain…pain…

   A worried look over comes him as he sucks on his finger, pain isn’t something he has feels on a regular basis, “What the hell?” is all he can think to say as he looks around, waving his free hand to will the ceiling fixed and the room clean.

    ******

    Plates emptied with only some stains and a few bones to mark the passing of the meal sitting on top of a wooden table in a quant restaurant in the small yet robust town of Fit-Town. Hollia, Rhulan, Betty, Cata, and Scrags sit back enjoying the aftermath of their well deserved meal after the battle. They set down their gold for the meal and head out.

     Outside the southern gates, they once more see the broken ground, the scorched plant life, and a few mud puddles left behind from the melted ice. Scrags stops, looks around, “Giant monsters,” he says drawing the attention of the others, “pirates, insane magical spells, shadow spirits, floating freaks that eat people, killer robots, *sigh*, nut-jobs.”

   He shakes his head, “We got that freaky dragon lady oracle thing talking about some conspiracy, you people actually plan to go to the other end of the world, those Dah-hoth things tied into the Croix Empire, what ever the hell Satasar is, some ancient Witch with a stick up her ass about Rhulan here trying to mess with my head, and on top of this bull shit now we got some other scary psycho sending weird assholes after our dear ole happy go lucky Captain Betty. You know I’d rather not see what else shows up to come after the rest of you, no doubt there’s some scary son of a bitch with issues with Cata, and who knows what else will get dug up along the way after Rhulan.”

    He tugs his pack and turns west, “I stick around with you guys much longer and for all I know a hundred foot tall metal man is going to step on me.”



   He clears his throat, “My contract with Rhulan was up when I helped you guys out back on Los Rodos. To be honest I have a contract out this way, and…that’s why I was traveling with you.”

   He forces a smile, “I’m really not the world saving type you know, I’m a thief, I got my own shit to take care of, a contract or two to complete.”

   He shrugs and turns to the woods, as he crouches about to spring away he says, “Oh yeah, one more thing, I’ll see you guys later. I figure by now Rhulan owes me a ton for the over time, heh.”

   “Wait a minute.” says Hollia.

  “Yeah?” says Scrags.

   “For what its worth,” she says, “I liked having you along Mr. Scrags.”

   “You’re alright kid.” He says as he leaps away into the tree line, leaving the others to continue on their way.

   *Scrags has left the party*

   “Did you just say something?” asks Hollia looking at Rhulan.

   “No,” says Rhulan,

  “weird,” says Hollia, “I could have sworn I just heard a woman say Scrags has left the party.”