Death Hunters 06: Cave Guardian

      “Can I ask you something?” asks Betty as they party walks through the dark and dreary forest.

    “Yes Miss Betty?” queries Hollia.

   “Its…uh…I mean you’re like part elf?”

   “Yes,” says Hollia.

   “Well, I know we said back there like I’m an angel, but it sounded like you guys already knew angels are elves.”

   “Yes,” says Hollia puzzled, “My mother told me all about all sorts of elves, she said the ones that have bird wings are called angels.”

   Betty cocks her head very confused.

   “Allow me to explain,” says Rhulan, “On this world Elves are well known, in that stories are told about them, the general lore describes at least most elf species, your basic Light Elves like Jasma, Dark Elves, Tempest Elves, Angels, and Bone Elves. Personally I know of several other sub-species, some of which on this world would be mistaken for various other local creatures like cat-girls, Marina-Men, and even Draconians. However I imagine you’d be surprised to learn that the concept of angels as you may be familiar with being mistaken as on many worlds does not exist here.”

   “Really?” asks Betty.

   “Really what?” asks Hollia genuinely curious.

   “Well,” says Betty, “Most like places I’ve been would mistake me, if they knew my true nature for a semi-divine benevolent entity, the, well, opposite of a demon.”

   “Cool.” says Hollia, “Angels must have a really good reputation on alien worlds.”

   “Huh,” says Betty smiling as they continue on their way, genuinely confused, apparently on this world, if she was to go around with her wings out the locals would treat her like any other kind of elf; not that she would even that much attention to her none-human nature, but at the very least she wouldn’t have people dropping to their knees in tears and praying. She thinks back to the Necro-Phantom and wanders if he was viewing her as a benevolent guide to the next side or a magical Elf exorcising him.

    ******

    In the red tower Ole-Tomash is looking over the video recordings of the trials in order to create an accurate review for the adventurer guilds and prospective clients for those who complete the tower, or in the case of most how far they got and how well they did. He marks on a tablet to be entered in the database later what skills and abilities they used and how well they did, however as he gets to the Shadow Raven trial he pauses at the moment before Rhulan destroyed the confusion gem that created an ever increasing feeling of being drunk. He rewinds and watches each party member individually, rewinds again, and looks and listens to how they walk and talk realizing something he hadn’t at the time; only the sorceress called Rhulan actually got tipsy.

   “Well,” he says nodding his head back and forth, “one is a dragon, and one is a cat-girl. As I recall cat-girls can’t get drunk so naturally the magic that imitates and initiates with-in the subjects the biochemical responses and reaction of being inebriated simply wouldn’t effect her. Hmmm, guess the No-ma really is just for the princess and this one.”

   He taps the screen on Cata, “really is a cat-girl. Interesting.”

   He looks at Betty and Hollia, “well the princess is at least part elf, and they said this other girl…”

   He flips through his notes, “yes, she is an elf also.”

   He strokes his beard, head tilted back remembering something from long ago in his youth, “aw yes, I remember hearing stories of elf girls downing brandy in bars like it was water, heh heh, much to the frustration of foolish pervert adventurers trying to get them drunk.”

   He blushes a little, *cough* “at any rate, that leaves just this one woman to be effected in this party. Hmm, I was going to deduct points for having such an un-balanced party, one sword user, two sorceresses, and…I don’t recall the elf girl using any weapons, huh,”

   He leans in close to the monitor and produces some glasses, “I think I see a sword on one side and…well a gun on the other. Very unusual.”

   He shrugs, “then again balanced parties have failed in my tower time and time again, so..”

   He scratches out the balanced party points row, “This is just un-necessary when the party is high level I guess.”

   *yawns*

   “At any rate,” he continues, “they were certainly interesting. I wander how they’re doing?”

    ******

    *squuuaaa!*

   The piercing scream of some high pitched beast rings in their ear-drums as they scout out a good place to make camp. Someone having a head start or not, its really not a good idea to wander into a cave filled with who knows what at night; and besides according to Cata the scent of who ever it was that had gone ahead of them in the woods veered off in the wrong direction only a short distance past the tree line anyway.

    They rush in the direction of the scream to find a very unusual sight, on the ground is the headless, well maybe headless as there are tattered bloody remains of what used to be a head sticking off the neck of a giant bird.

   “A gobglarkus?” says Rhulan.

   “Don’t worry,” comes the voice of an unknown woman stepping out of the tree line from the direction of the sound of running water, her weapon a massive black mace with silver spikes dripping wet; clearly been cleaned after killing this creature, her deep red full lips off-set by her pale face speaking, “I killed this monster, so you pretty little dears don’t have to worry with me around.”

   She easily holds the mace in her black leather glove clad hands and forearms. They look her up and down, she is most certainly not dressed for the forest or anywhere most of them could think to see someone dressed like this. Her large breasts are held high and tight by a black leather bikini top too small for her bust size with thin shoulder straps. Her feet clad in some shiny black leather calf length boots, whose material looks too fragile for the thorny plants of these woods, but doesn’t look as though they have been damaged ever. Most of her body is bare, save for the black leather bikini at least hiding her privates from the view of the world, but not leaving much to the imagination with their thin hip straps. A black belt around her waist would seem to be holding nothing up and serve no purpose if not for the strap on her left side indicating where she carries her mace while walking, which must be uncomfortable.

   Almost as though reading this, the spikes on her mace retract, the holes closing up and the mace shrinks perhaps four times smaller before she ties it to her hip.

   “So,” she says in a throaty, seductive voice, “as much fun as I could have with you girls I really must be on my way. Do you girls know the way to a red tower, I really need to get there before sun-rise and I seem to be no-where near where I was last night.”

   If magical floating question marks could appear above the heads of people in this world they most certainly would above the party in this instant.

   Hollia quickly summons her cane and yells out, “Stay back!”

   “Woah,” says the woman, “I wasn’t trying to say I wanted to fight when I said have fun, no need to get…”

   “you’re a demon.” says Hollia.

   “Huh?” would be the reaction of the rest as they look at the woman, but what Hollia saw now draws their attention, a movement behind as she walked from the deeper shadow of the tree line…a black tail with a triangular, almost hear shaped tip. So black in fact that if not for its living movement one could have easily mistaken it for a costume accessory or a shadow.

   The woman turns her back, sticking her rear and bust out along with dawning a pouty face, “I also got deese wittle wings.” She says showing off the very tiny bat like wings between her shoulder blades.

   Hollia just glares at her only calming down when Rhulan puts her hand on Hollia’s shoulder.

   “You’ll excuse my friend,” says Rhulan, “the last few demons we ran into have been trying to kill us, so you’ll understand her apprehension at seeing one clearly not dressed for this environment standing over the bloody remains of some random animal, all too conveniently running into our group in the middle of no-where in the middle of the night.”

   “huh?” says the woman putting her finger to her lip. She leans over, hands on knees, squishing her oversized bosom together and smiles at Hollia, “Oh, wipe away that scardy meany face kitty cutie. I didn’t mean to scare you, friends? I’m just sorta lost okay. I was looking for this tower because I heard the guy there has No-ma…”

   She stands up and gestures with her hands, “its like, this plant you see, all leafy and junk, I need it to cure this little problem of mine you know.”

   “Well,” says Hollia lowering staff, “I guess that makes since.”

   “If you say so,” says Betty glaring at the woman.

   “Lin Lin hasn’t reacted,” says Rhulan pointing out the sleepy dragon which has taken to roost on Rhulan’s shoulders when they started running for some reason, “each demon before Lin Lin reacted, so I don’t think this girl is our enemy, despite the evil-sorceress outfit.”

   Betty thinks to herself, “More like dominatrix, just like someone The Thing Named Jim would have working for him.”

   The woman caresses her outline, “with a body like this, it would be a crime not to show it to the world.”

   Hollia blushes.

   “Any who,” says Rhulan, “We just came from there, there is someone ahead of us in fact looking for the No-ma, some girl who the wizard described as odd looking and easily passing the trials of the tower by herself. Our friend here,”

   She points at Cata.

   “was able to track her scent a short ways into the woods before she veered off in an odd direction.”

   “I see,” says the woman looking all thoughtful, “you’re the dom of this group aren’t you.”

   Rhulan blushes, “What? *cough* I’m the co-leader of the group maybe, but…”

   Looking around she realizes only Betty got the reference, “Any who,” she says.

   “Oddly dressed girl,” says the woman, “who easily beat…trials?”

   “The wizard insisted on us passing some trials,” says Cata speaking up and stepping forward her eyes glancing at Rhulan for a moment as though to remind her that she was or rather is the captain of a large pirate ship and under no one’s command, “I take it you aren’t that girl.”

   The woman smiles glancing back and forth between Cata and Rhulan, and then at Hollia who is still eyeing her suspiciously but stops as Lin Lin yawns and floats down into Hollia’s arms.

   “the other woman,” she thinks, “she doesn’t trust me in the least.”

   She shrugs, “Yeah I’m not her, but I think I know who it was, we’re in a race you see, each trying to get the No-ma first. She got a head start one me, and got me lost in these woods.”

   “I see,” says Rhulan who is looking down at the dead gobglarkus and pondering something.

   “tell me something,” says Rhulan, “well two things, first your name, we haven’t introduced ourselves yet you know, and second do you intend to eat this gobglarkus all by yourself.”

   Betty looks at the giant bird thinking, “gob..what-a-kus? Looks like an oversized turkey to me.”

   “Sorry,” says the woman putting her hand above her bosom, “I am Dark Cookie.”

   “The dark cook?” asks Hollia remembering what Ole-Tomash said as they were leaving about what the strange girl had said as she leapt from the tower into the woods.

   “huh?” asks Dark Cookie.

   “Sorry, Miss Dark Cookie,” says Hollia, “its something Mr. Ole-Tomash said the other woman said as she left his tower.”

    “yeah, must have been me she was talking about,” says Dark Cookie, “but I’m not a very good cook.”

   “Which brings us back to the second point,” says Rhulan, “this bird.”

   “What about your names?” asks Dark Cookie.

   “Oh, I’m terribly sorry,” says Hollia, “both your accusing you of being a demon and our rudeness. I am Hollia.”

   She pets Lin Lin on the head, “and this is Lin Lin”

   “I am Rhulan”

   “The name is Cata. Captain Cata, but you can just call me Cata.”

   Betty hesitates, “Betty,” she says quickly.

   “A pleasure to meet you all,” she says looking between Hollia and Rhulan, “oh but how I’d rather have met you all someplace cozier than this.”

   “Great,” thinks Hollia remembering the woman named Plunder, “another flirty crazy girl in the middle of the woods. At least this one doesn’t want to fight us.”

   “and what’s all this talk about this monster?” asks Dark Cookie.

   “its not a monster,” corrects Rhulan, “it’s a flightless bird that is a popular dish on holidays and must be prepared right to get out the flavor, which can’t be done over a fire pit, especially with out the right cooking utensils. So now its just going to go to waste.”

   “Been awhile since you’ve had one?” asks Cata half joking before remembering the whole, statue for a thousand years thing.

   “riiight,” says Cata a bit embarrassed as Rhulan glances at her.

   “I take it you killed it with one blow?” asks Rhulan.

   “yep,” says Dark Cookie proudly, “no big bird monster stands a chance against my mace.”

    “Seeing as we are after the same thing,” says Rhulan, “how about teaming up with us for this job?”

    “huh?” says Dark Cookie.

   “You are after the No-ma, we are after the No-ma, or did we not say that?” says Rhulan

   “I think you said you came from the tower…but, my memory is bad, we’ve been going all over the place talking.”

   “I see,” says Rhulan, “do you see my friend here, this young cute kitty as you called her? We need the No-ma to help her with her ear problem.”

   Hollia blushes as Rhulan once again rubs her ears, but only for a moment.

   “really?” says Dark Cookie, “I think they’re sexy.”

   Hollia turns beet red with embarrassment.

   “Any who,” says Rhulan stepping a little between Hollia and Dark Cookie, possibly doing so sub-consciously with out realizing it, yet none-the less is comforting to Hollia who sighs internally.

   “What do you say?” says Rhulan, “We have something you want, and you have something we want.”

   “really?” asks Betty exchanging an un-easy look with Cata, who just shrugs, she couldn’t care less about having one more hand along.

   Rhulan ignores Betty and says to Dark Cookie, “We are on a mission, from which when we return to the tower we will be rewarded with No-ma, we also know the way too the tower out of these woods, as well as to where we need to go and what to do to be rewarded. I can say with certainty that this other, this competition of yours and ours also knows all this as she is also on the same mission. You have in exchange your own skill, which one more hand to fight an uncertain adversary, seeing as the wizard didn’t tell us what specifically we would be facing, which I just gave away part of what I was trying to be vague about, but any who, plus you have your kill which honor wise is your decision as to what to do with, but would make a nice payment in exchange for tagging along with us. I am certain from what I have seen that the wizard has more than enough No-ma for both you and Hollia.”

   “Share and share alike,” says Dark Cookie with a smile, “sure.”

   Rhulan turns to Hollia, who had been un-easy, but she smiles her approval, although Rhulan makes it a mental point to stay between her and Dark Cookie, least this girl they’ve just met gets any crazy notions. However Betty would be another case, Rhulan has no doubt she doesn’t trust this Dark Cookie.

    “But what are you…going…to do…?” asks Dark Cookie gesturing to the gobglarkus carcass as Rhulan takes off her cape and flattens it out on the ground like a sheet.

    “All right,” says Dark Cookie with a smile.

   “Don’t get any weird ideas please,” says Rhulan.

   She turns to Hollia, “if you would please cast a snow cocoon spell on the meat.”

   “Okay,” says Hollia as she turns her staff sideways in her hands, Dark Cookie taking some steps away from the body and standing next to Cata who she smiles at and bats her eyelashes, earning her a quizzical look and a step back from her.

   Hollia chants,

“Frow, spirit of ice and snow,
   come forth with your mighty cold to create and engulf
   Snow Cocoon!”

   A flat blanket of ice flows forth from her staff and wraps around the gobglakus body, even lifting it into the air, wrapping it in frost.

    “Okay,” says Rhulan, “everyone stand back.”

   She stands over her cape, between her and the gobglarkus body. She holds her hands, palms facing each other, a gesture as though to summon some spell saying, “Aesperia Prime, interface, arise and take this meat into storage!”

   *shiiiii, fwiiiii!*

   Everyone, save for Rhulan jumps back as metal tentacles fly up from her cape as though it were a hole to some metallic hell with some great metal demon octopus tentacle monster waiting on the other side.

   “oh, wow.” says Dark Cookie blushing and smiling, a small drop of blood actually drips from one her tiny nostrils.

   “yeah, she has to work for Jim.” thinks Betty seeing this.

   The metal tentacles grab the frozen gobglarkus and pull it into the cape’s blackness. Rhulan simply leans down and scoops up her cape afterwards and reconnects it to her collar.

   “Okay,” says Rhulan, “the cave is only a short distance, I trust our new friend here would like to get this done before sunrise.”

   “huh?” thinks everyone, except for Dark Cookie, Hollia whose mind is occupied as she walks next to Rhulan and looks at her
cape thinking back to all the things she has pulled out of it before, and Cata…okay just Betty wonders about the stopping for the night part they were just about to get to before running into this strange woman.

   As they start back down the trail Cata comes up next to Rhulan and says, “That back there is going to give me nightmares now you know that right.”

   Rhulan just smiles.

   --Dark Cookie has joined the party—

   Hollia looks up for a moment thinking, “there’s that voice again.”


   ******

       One path diverges in a wood, three paths criss-cross between hills. A small stop by a river to catch some fish and cook them for a supper; Hollia laughs along with Cata and Rhulan as Dark Cookie shares some story or another from her own travels, and onward they go again. The trek to the cave is longer than they would suspect. With the way Ole-Tomash had talked one would have thought the cave closer to his tower, and his map while giving where to turn on the roads and land marks to look for lacks a crucial element of any map, distance.

    The light of the full moon has kept the path illuminated, however now the cave stands before them, its darkness almost palpable.

    *rrrrr*

   A growl from the woods draws their attention as a shaggy man-beast leaps from the tree line. It looks almost human save for being covered in fur, and a patchwork shirt with torn pants. Its hand and feet have claws instead of finger nails, yet still very human looking hands and feet. While its ears may be pointed and leathery in appearance they are still placed where human ears would normally be, the creature’s muzzle can hardly be called a muzzle, only protruding slightly beyond normal human jaw lines with long canine teeth and a black dog like nose.

    Dark Cookie’s mace leaps into the air on its own, spinning and growing in size. The spikes extend just as she grabs it in mid air.

   “Elemental Mace, Ice” she says as a cold aura comes over the spikes and then over the entire head of the mace.

   As the Lycanthrope leaps at them Rhulan flashes past Dark Cookie and grabs the creature’s arms. Before it even has time to react she spins once and flings the lycanthrope into the air.

   “Fire Sphere!” yells out Rhulan as she throws the red glowing orb with its fire symbol in the center, which on its way up shoots out a fiery jet stream like a miniature rocket.

   *Fra-Koom!*

   “hooowwwwwl!” screams the Lycanthrope as its badly burned and smoking body falls back to the ground quite a distance away.

    “Lycanthropes.” says Rhulan, “where there is one, there are more.”

   She points at the woods as movement in the shadows moves further away.

   “To avoid a long needless fight you have to show them an excessive amount of force, show them they don’t even stand a chance by taking out the scout, whose whole purpose is just to test their prey for weaknesses.”

   She turns towards Dark Cookie, “sorry, but knocking a swinging claw off or two with an icy smash would likely lead to a fight lasting longer than five seconds. These things aren’t very bright, they easily would have concluded they might stand a chance and come in full force.”

   Dark Cookie just shrugs, “No problem, I like strong women.”

  “Any who,” says Rhulan, “Illumination!”

   A red ball of light forms in her hands which she squeezes slightly causing the color to turn blue somehow, a neat trick lost on everyone save for Hollia who also summons an Illumination orb to help light their way in the dark cavern ahead.

    As they walk into the cave a great black mass descends upon them the flapping of a million wings can be heard.

   Dark Cookie’s mace comes forth, upon springing out its spikes she says, “Elemental Mace, Fire.”

   The spikes turn red, flames issue forth from around their bases, spreading out along the cone shaped spikes and flowing around the head of the mace like clouds of fire to form a fiery aura; all of which occurs faster than the human eye can see.

   She swings her mace back and forth at the mace which flies over head.

   “uh Miss D.C.,” says Hollia, as before during their meal Dark Cookie had told them if they want they may call her D.C. as she finds it less formal, and saying Dark Cookie over and over again can get weird, she had confessed it is more of a “stage” name or “fun” name not a general conversation name. In fact she confessed that she came up with the name as something to call herself when she appears before people, something fancy, something impressive, something short term, something people can call her that makes her feel big and dominant over others. Of course during that conversation Rhulan steered the talk away from that, and towards her actual name, which she insisted she didn’t have one. The better part valor is discretion so she opted not to continue that line of questioning.

   Hollia continues, not that the flash back took any real time in the real world, “those are just bats.”

   “Oh.” says Dark Cookie as she puts her mace away.

   The tunnel is rather straight, yet something is wrong, they have reached an end to the cave and found nothing.

   “Is this the wrong cave?” asks Hollia.

   “Well,” says Dark Cookie in a sultry tone, “there are other fun things besides fighting monsters a group of ladies in their prime can do in a dark cave in the middle of no where.”

   “The wall is fake.” says Rhulan shaking her head.

   She puts her hand right through it, the wall vanishing, blinking green and then gone.

   “Too bad.” says Dark Cookie falling in line, with Betty and Cata behind Rhulan and Hollia.

   “hmm,” thinks Dark Cookie as she leans in to Cata whispering, “Hey, like are those two a couple or something?”

   Cata smiles, “or something,” she says, “they’re a master and student pairing.”

   “Master…and student,” hums Dark Cookie, “I bet, tall and sexy and all filled out dressed in black with a shorter more timid girl all dressed in white, or yeah, Oreo a goody snack in-deed.”

   Cata shakes her head, Betty narrows her eyes thinking, “What ever, your ditzy act is faker than mine chaos demon.”

   Only a short distance into the new cavern they come across a steel door with a gargoyle above it.

   As they approach its eyes light up and speaks, “Halt! Only the sorcerer Gondo-Tomash may enter with out proving his worth.”

   “Another trial?” sneers Cata brandishing her swords, “this had better be better than those jokes the other Toe smash provided.”

   “You must answer my riddle to prove your worth,” says the statue.

   *rrrr*

   Cata puts away her swords.

  “Go on.” says Rhulan to the statue.

  “Fire burns, water flows, ice burns, lava flows, disease, contain, must, provide.”

   “uh-huh.” says Rhulan.

   “What the hell?” says Dark Cookie.

   “uhhh,” says Hollia as Lin Lin cocks her head.

  “I…like..don’t know where to begin.” says Betty.

  Rhulan shrugs, “never mind.”

  She puts her palm on the door, the entire surface glows green and then the energy cracks like glass and vanishes. She then gently pushes the door open to reveal a well lit interior chamber.

   “No!” screams the gargoyle, “Cheater! Thief! Raaaaa!”

  *rumble, crack*

  The gargoyle dislodges its self from the stone and flies into the center of the room belching fire.

   “Saints Barrier!” yells out Hollia blocking the flames just in time.

   The moment it stops breathing out flames she swings her cane yelling, “Ice Shard!”

   A spear of ice flies from the air at the pinnacle of her swing towards the gargoyle.

   *smash*

   The gargoyle smashes the ice shard in mid air, however the magical ice does its work and encases the gargoyle’s claw in ice sticking it to the ground.

   *creee*

   The ice spreads across the ground to the other front claw pinning both to the stone floor.

   “My turn!” yells out Dark Cookie leaping into the air.

   As she lands before it she says, “time to have some fun. Now feel the wrath of my…Demonic Passion!”

   As she says, “Demonic Passion!” chains shoot from the ceiling and cave floor and wrap around the gargoyle’s limbs yanking it into the air.”

   *praaaw!*

   The claws of the gargoyle are ripped off as it’s yanked into the air by its limbs. Magically a giant wooden table sitting at a slight twenty degree vertical angle. The gargoyle is laid on its back to the table, the chains holding it down. Phasing up from the floor varies tables appear with strange instruments on them that on Betty and Rhulan can even half guess as to what half of them are. Dark Cookie’s mace vanishes and is replaced by a black leather whip. A black curtain appears from no-where and wraps around the whole scene.

   Various manly screams are heard, sounds that can’t be coming from anything behind the curtain, not Dark Cookie, and certainly not the none-sentient pre-recorded, feels no pain, gargoyle.

   “Uh what’s going on?” asks Hollia as the curtain pulls back.

   The gargoyle collapses into dust on the ground as all the strange instruments vanish just as they had arrived. Dark Cookie’s mace is now back and with a proud stride she walks over saying, “Some men just have no stamina for a good time.”

   “That…” says Cata in a half whisper, “wasn’t a man…and…what…did…” she points back and forth from the spot the dust pile is in
and Dark Cookie as she walks over to the entrance to the well lit area beyond the gargoyle chamber. Cata just shakes her head; however as the rest follow into the next room Betty goes last, literally holding her tongue in place with her teeth.

   The roar of a magnificent waterfall, a vast chamber lit by large crystal lights hanging like stalagmites from the ceiling, the ground stretches out into a peninsula of land hanging over the chasm in which the waterfall pours.

   “So where’s the treasure?” asks Dark Cookie looking around.

   “Search me?” says Rhulan

   “really?” asks Dark Cookie with a wide smile on her face

   “Who dares enter the chamber of Mata-go-lucky?” says a loud harsh voice.

   From the chasm a giant turtle shell, as tall as a house, so like ten feet or so, with big white spikes on its back floats up, spinning as it does so.

   The voice emanates from the head hole, “You are not the one who summoned me, you are not Gondo-Tomash. He is not with you, go or I will destroy you!”

   “I think we found the guy guarding the treasure.” Says Cata.

   “Please don’t tell me it’s at the bottom of that cliff.” says Hollia imagining having to go back and get ropes to tie around a giant treasure chest, then again come to think of it they didn’t bring any thing… “oh yeah,” says Hollia out loud, “Miss Rhulan can just use her cape to hull off the big treasure chest.”

   “Treasure?” says the monster, “then you are thieves!”

   *RAAAAA!*

    The very wall shakes with its roar.

   “Oopsie.” says Hollia as she summons her staff, Lin Lin taking up her battle position.

   Rhulan summons her sword, Cata draws her blades, Betty brings out both her guns, and Dark Cookie equips her mace, all in time for the snapping turtle head to appear from inside the shell, which has two large tusks jutting from its lower jaw for some reason. Two large white angel like, yet unrealistic looking, wings appear on its back; how exactly they could be attached or where they came from isn’t clear as they could have sworn the back was just covered in spikes, emerge as it stops spinning.

   *fwoosh*

   Fire jets issue forth from where its lower legs should have been, and what should have been upper arms instead come forth turtle legs with Gattlingguns for hands.

   *ratta, ratta, ratta, ratta, ratta, ratta,  ratta, ratta, ratta,  ratta, ratta, ratta, ratta, ratta, ratta,  ect…*

   The guns fire purple energy orbs.

   Betty and Cata take to the air and split up, Hollia and Rhulan erect their barriers which merge into the Aegis shield, however the energy they fire back is green orbs which upon contact release healing energy into the monster called Mata-Go-Lucky”

   “Damn,” says Rhulan, “Poison shots, the opposite and enhanced throw back is healing orbs! Hollia we have to split up or our barrier will keep merging into the Aegis Shield and keep healing this thing!”

   Hollia nods, she and Lin Lin run to the right as Rhulan runs to the left. As they move apart the Aegis Shield vanishes replaced by their standard Spirit Shield and Saints Barrier.

   Dark Cookie is not so lucky, she stands her ground a grimace on her face as a purple aura surrounds her, “what…the…hell…is…this!” she screams.

    “Miss D.C.!” yells Hollia behind her, “its magical poison, come here, I’ll heal you while Lin Lin gives us cover!”

   “What?!” screams Dark Cookie, “what…is…this…a…video…game?”

   She raises her mace at Mata-Go-Lucky and screams, “Give me a kiss!”

   A heart shaped pink beam of energy fires from her mace hitting the monster, its stun, its body writing in what can only be described as a matrix of pink electricity and light.

   Cata and Rhulan begin to rush in with their blades to take advantage of it being stunned, however Dark Cookie teleports in really close and kisses the thing right on what…can’t really be described as lips.

    The others stop in their tracks, confused looks on their faces, well…except for Betty who has crossed her arms and just says, “uh, huh.”

    The purple aura around Dark Cookie vanishes, she smacks the monster once in the head with her mace and then teleports back to where she was standing, as if the whole action was some pre-programmed motion.

   The monster shakes off the stun, the mace had done little damage to it.

   *fwooosh*

   It bellows out fire forcing Cata to back off and Rhulan stand and block with her barrier.

   “Goddess Wind!” yells out Hollia releasing her powerful wind attack which throws the flames back into the monster’s face and into the waterfall behind it, causing great clouds of steam to rise from it.

   *click, click*

    The monster brings its guns back to ready and fires

 *ratta, ratta, ratta,  ect…*

 Hollia is forced back into defensive mode, Rhulan and Cata have gone to slicing the poison bullets with their swords, and Dark Cookie dodges back and forth, seemingly vanishing, possibly teleporting. Betty on the other hand has surrounded herself with a golden aura which is deflecting the poison bullets.

   She aims with her red gun.

   “Fire Gun!” she says as the fire ball blasts forth and just deflects off the monster’s head.

   It doesn’t even seem to notice. She fires another at the wings, but the same thing happens.

   “So,” she says, “it is immune to fire. Okay then.”

   She aims with her blue gun, “try this. Electric Gun!”

  The electric bolt blasts it near the guy causing it to both wince and cease its poison bullet assault.

    *rrrrrr*

   It growls up at her.

   Cata takes advantage of this moment to launch her own attack, “Air Slicer!”

   The arc hits its left wing, from its view point…and physically speaking of course. Small electric arcs dance around the smooth feather imitating surface.

   *fwoosh*

   It bellows fire into the air, going back and forth trying to hit its two air born assailants.

   Rhulan swings her sword yelling out, “Mystical Arc!”

   A large arc of purple and black energy flies from her sword and smashes into the monster’s mechanical gun hands.

   *Boom!*

   The gun hands with their many rotating cannons are blasted to bits.

   However the monster rather than growling or retreating or any expected reaction instead holds its arms out, leaving its body totally open and starts to spin. Before their eyes purple, blue, and green energy flows from the air around it into its arms. The gun hands are actually regenerating.

   “How,” says Hollia in total disbelief, “how can metal regenerate?”

  “I thought so!” yells out Rhulan who then yells up to Betty, “It’s a La-mopo! Look for the Dream Stone, if I’m not mistaken that has to be the treasure that idiot Ole-Tomash sent us after.”

   “What?” asks Dark Cookie and Hollia in unison, maybe Cata thought it but she has started to fly up with Betty and try to see if there is something out of place hidden amongst the crystal lights on the cave ceiling.

    “A La-mopo,” says Rhulan, “A monster born from the Dream World, that Gondo-Tomash guy has to have been a Dream Stone Master, they were just starting to appear back during the empire. They harness the power of the dream world into purple crystals which allow them to by-pass normal physical laws to do impossible magic…sorta like the things Dark Cookie here did with that weird attack on the gargoyle.”

   Dark Cookie holds her hands up, “hey, I got nothing to do with le-mops or what ever and stoner dreams or what ever.”

   “I know,” says Rhulan, “I was just making an example, your attacks don’t have the same astral dream aura as a Dream Stone based summoning of objects from no-where. But only dimensional attacks will even harm this thing, like my attacks, and some things like electricity discomfort it. But so long as the Dream Stone is around and has power in it that thing will be able to regenerate even from fragments.”

   “You done?” says the monster Mata-Go-Lucky, “So nice to hear a thief say what I really am for a change, but if your hear to steal my Dream Stone. Too bad, I swallowed it, it is a real treasure indeed, a massive orb, yes a smooth Dream Stone, larger than you skinny little girl’s waists all put together.”

   Dark Cookie looks around, “You have to be exaggerating, these babes have some full hips, just check out the pirate chick and this dom-delightful sorceress, they are stacked and fully loaded in the hips.”

   The monster somehow actually blushes, “in that case,” it says, “maybe I should have a little fun before I kill you.”

   Green vine like tentacles emerge from its mouth.

   “Oh hell no!” screams Rhulan along with a, “Mystical Arc!”

   This blast hits the head blasting it to bits.

   It starts to quickly regenerate, however Lin Lin who had been bristling this whole time looking at flies into the air and spins in a circle glowing with a blue electric aura. She increases in size, a lot. Landing with a thud and a mighty roar in front of Hollia, Rhulan, and Betty, if her curved snake like yet fur covered dragon body were to be stretched out she’d easily make twenty to twenty five feet.

   *ROAR!*

  Lin Lin’s mighty roar as she stands guard in front the three women draws the attention of Cata and Betty from above.

   *CRRRR*

   She growls as she lunges at Mata-Go-Lucky, half wrapping around him and actually *crunching* into its shell on the left side of its regenerating neck and head. The crunching shell around the bite begins to vanish in little green specks of light.

   *RRRR*

   She growls between her teeth, glaring up with her dark blue eye as Mata-Go-Lucky’s head fully regenerates. He stares down with his, we can assume its male at this point, red eye, not noticing another figure rushing at him.

   Rhulan, her sword glowing with a purple aura rushes Mata-Go-Lucky with a mighty, “hiyah!”

   Her blade stabs into its shell, causing the beast to release a mighty, followed by weaker breathing *haaa…aaaa..aaa*.

   The area around the stab wound starts to vanish in green sparks well. Rhulan pulls out her sword, throwing it to the ground behind her when the wound gets bigger than the blade. With her hand, now with a purple mystical aura, she punches into Mata-Go-Lucky’s gut, actually leaning in up to her shoulder; something that worries Hollia thinking perhaps Rhulan is being pulled in, and kicks off its shell with her leg. As she does so she pulls free from its body a large purple sphere.

   As the wings vanish and the jets go dead, Lin Lin lets go, shrinks, and flies back into Hollia arms, who cuddles the exhausted familiar, tears in her eyes with joy at her braveness at coming to their aid in such a valiant manner.

   “Damn..” says Mata-Go-Lucky, “got…sloppy…must…flee.”

  As it falls into the chasm, from above Betty and Cata can see a black portal with a spinning blue edge appears, into which Mata-Go-Lucky falls.

   “It got away.” says Cata upon landing, Betty close behind.

   “No matter.” says Rhulan, “With those injuries it will have to either stay in the Dream World for decades to recover or somehow convince a Dream Stone Master to accept a badly injured La-mopo as their partner in order to siphon from their Dream Stone.

    With the large Dream Stone in hand, the treasure Ole-Tomash wanted, and Rhulan’s sword recalled to its pocket dimension, they head back out of the cave.

    ******

    As they exit the cave dawn approaches.

   “Is it morning already?” ask Hollia.

   “Oh shit.” says Dark Cookie as her body starts to glow.

   “What’s going on?” asks Cata.

   “I knew it!” yells Betty drawing her guns at Dark Cookie.

   “Put down your guns jumpy.” says Rhulan, “She’s just transforming to her day time form.”

   “What?” they all say in unison.

   As the light clears where Dark Cookie stood now stands….Dark Cookie, except her tail is gone, her lips are now a lighter shade, her little demon wings have been replaced by little white angel wings, which are very un-natural looking, somewhat similar to those Mata-Go-Lucky had, only tiny and cute rather than big and silly. Even her mace is gone, replaced in her hands by a feather duster; which fits perfectly with her biggest change, the black, white, & grey maid’s outfit she is now wearing.

   *yAWn*

   “Good morning.” she says bowing to the party, “If I may ask, you misses, where am I?”

   “Uh…” says Cata.

   “So,” says Rhulan, “you have no memory of what Dark Cookie does huh? One of those types of conditional transformations, I imagine your name is…something like…Light Cookie?”

   “Sorry miss.” she says, “It was very rude of me not to introduce myself before asking anything from you misses. I am Cookie Clean.”

  Rhulan dips her head and sits down on a large rock by the cave intrance, “that fits.”

  “So,” says Hollia, “Please to meet you Miss Cookie Clean, we met…uh, Miss Dark Cookie.” She looks over at Rhulan and back at Cookie Clean, “Sorry this is a little confusing.”

   Cookie Clean bows, “I apologize for anything my sister may have said or done to embarrass any of you. I will understand if you don’t trust me or are now afraid of me, I will take my leave.”

   “Why?” says Rhulan, “You’re just a conditional shape-shifter. Far from the first I’ve met.”

   She sees them all looking at her, except Betty who is clearly deep in thought and very confused as she focuses on Cookie Clean’s wings.

   “Well,” says Rhulan, “Back in the day when I would travel between dimensions, actually I traveled through time and space so its actually possible that out there right now somewhere there the past me is right now in some universe or another having an adventure…kinda trippy when you think about it. Well in my travels I met all sorts of people like our Cookie friend here, met this guy who when he got angry would turn into some odd colored giant, neither had memories of what the others would do. Poor guy would find himself in all sorts of places when the big guy would calm down.”

   She laughs, “that’s no where near the weirdest, I ran into this kid once who would turn from boy to girl…had…something to do with water…or…temperature…okay its been a very long time, kid had friends who turned into animals or something too…”

   She shrugs, “then there are the ones that would turn into wolf-men at night and human by day.”

   “Like Lycanthropes?” asks Hollia

  “Well…” says Rhulan, “in name only, a lot of them also called themselves werewolves. But unlike our Lycanthropes they were perfectly functioning humans by day…or between full moons, which for some reason a lot were relied on, but just makes ours more aggressive, rather than becoming those weak savage people by day, although in my day we hypothesized that these lycanthropes were the lycanthropes of the precursor civilization and all that so their human forms are as weak as they would be, you know like that guy that was on Cata’s ship.”

   Hollia thinks back to the man named Peter, or Mr. Jones as Cata called him saying, “Oh yeah.”

   Cookie Clean starts to cry.

   “Did we hurt your feelings?” asks Hollia.

  “No, no,” says Cookie Clean, “I am happy, when ever either of us change into the other who ever we are traveling with wants nothing to do with us or thinks we are something evil, or cursed.”

   Betty grimaces a little at the “evil” part.

   “If I may ask,” asks Cookie Clean, “miss how were you aware I would transform? My…sister isn’t the type to tell anyone from my experience, and what little I can remember from what she does.”

   “You can remember some of it?” asks Rhulan.

   “Yes,” says Cookie Clean, “unfortunately it is like a dream, I only remember bits and pieces. The…situation is when its day I am awake, when its night she is awake. The other is sleeping while the other walks, was the words of the one that cursed us to be one person.”

   “I see,” says Rhulan, “well to answer your question, the rush to beat someone with a name like Dark Cookie that Ole-Tomash told us about, the fact that Cata here…”

   Cookie Clean turns to Cata and bows saying, “Pleasure to meet you Miss Cata…oh my, so sorry Miss…”

   “Rhulan,” says Rhulan, “and this to my right is Hollia, her sleeping familiar is Lin Lin, and the orange pirate is Betty.”

   Cookie Clean bows to each in turn.

   “Okay,” says Rhulan, “any who, then Cata as I was saying detected that your scent, despite the fact that you knew the way thanks to Ole-Tomash, veered off in some odd direction, which I assume was to throw off Dark Cookie come night fall.”

   She puts her hand up to stop the question she could tell was coming from Hollia, “I’ll get to that in a moment, then it turns out Dark Cookie is interested in the No-ma as well.”

    She stands back up and stretches while yawning, “Any who, yeah the whole Dark part was the clincher, and besides all that *YAWN* I figure you both think the No-ma will cure you of the other and are racing to get it first or what ever.”

   Cookie Clean looks down, this dark thought is not something she has even accepted from herself, “I…its just until we can find something to separate us. The constant changing back and forth has…”

    “Driven you both a little nuts.” says Rhulan

   “Miss Rhulan!” gasps Hollia.

   Rhulan just shrugs.

    “Tis true.” says Cookie Clean.

   “Any who,” says Rhulan with a yawn, “we’ve been up since yesterday morning, I say we make camp and take at least a three hour nap before heading back to the tower and…”

   “One moment please.” says Betty with an oddly stern voice as she walks over examining Cookie Clean, “I thought that Dark Cookie was a chaos demon.”

   “She is,” says Cookie Clean, “Although Miss Betty I am surprised…”

   “She didn’t tell us,” says Betty, “I just happen to know what they look like and the weird kind of moves they would use in a fight. But you…I know there was something about your face that was throwing me off as Dark Cookie, you’re a chibi-winged Angel aren’t you.”

   Cookie Clean looks genuinely surprised, “Yes miss but how…”

   Betty spreads forth her large white wings.

   “By the goddess!” says Cookie Clean who quickly bows and cups her hands between her knees, “My apologies miss I didn’t know you were a Royal Angel.”

   “I’m not,” says Betty as she retracts her wings, “At least not right now. I was, but I…left, I couldn’t stand their strictness…and hierarchies, and rules, and higher than thou attitudes about everything, and…please stop bowing.”

   “Yes miss,” says Cookie Clean.

   “And that’s part of it,” says Betty, “All the chibi-winged angels being maids or cleaners, one of my best friends as a kid was my nanny, Muffin, but for my mother she was just one of like a hundred hand maidens who served in the castle…”

   She realizes how much she has said, “*ahem*, I mean its totally unfair how your people are treated.”

   “So, she’s an elf too?” asks Hollia.

   “Something like that,” says Betty, “except they’re all girls and…sorry I honestly don’t know anything beyond that, I didn’t even know they could fight…I mean..”

   “Yes miss,” says Cookie Clean, “I am also able to fight just like my sister,” she blushes a little, “only not the same way of course.”

   “Of course,” says Rhulan, “and if we are all done with the back story exposition and introductions I think we *yawn* need to go to sleep.”

   “*yawn*, yeah.” says Hollia, “but right here? Weren’t we attacked by a lycanthrope earlier, and there are all sorts of animals.”

   “I will be awake.” offers Cookie Clean.

   “No need,” says Rhulan throwing her cape on the ground, “you remember how after Scrags left the group that I put the supplies in my cape? And how I stored that gobglarkus earlier? Well there is a whole dimensional ware house in here. We just jump in, it will fold up behind us, and when its time to leave we can reappear right back here.”

   “Seriously?” asks Cata, “You seriously had something like that this whole time? This whole time we’ve been spending money on inns, and camping out, taking shifts in dangerous areas where wards wont always work, and this whole time we could have just been using a sub-space environment you keep in your cape?”

    “Yes,” says Rhulan, “if you would have liked to spend each night sleeping on a cot, in a large lifeless dark warehouse, filled with all manner of dangerous things. And to be honest if it had just been me and Hollia…and of course Lin Lin we would have been using this instead of camping out, however, and no offense but you and Betty are both pirates, pirates who recognize
technology, and Scrags was…well is…but not with us right now…not…okay I need to sleep…*shakes head*…a thief.”

   Cata shrugs, “got me there. But you’ll let us in now.”

   “yeah sure,” says Rhulan, “over these last few months you haven’t tried to kill and rob us in our sleep or anything. And besides now that I think of it, unless I let you out, you’d be trapped in there anyway.”

   “Okay, pleasant thought.” says Cata.

   “Any who, in you all go.” says Rhulan gesturing to her cape. Hollia with Lin Lin in her arms jumps in first, then Betty, then Cata.

   “I could stand watch.” says Cookie Clean, “I wont be able to sleep, I mean miss I can’t sleep.”

   “No problem,” says Rhulan, “you know what a television is?”

   “Yes,”

   “well there is one in the room with the green door across from the cot room, just touch the screen and select from like a million…quite possibly literally…movies and TV shows to watch. But don’t tell Hollia about that, just please say you’re going to read a book or something, television is something I have been trying to keep away from this world.”

   Cookie Clean doesn’t understand but agrees as she jumps in, followed by Rhulan. The cape folds in behind her, leaving only a black archaic symbol shining darkness floating above the ground where they were before, generating a force field around its self that repels everything, even small insects flying too close.

    With in Cookie excuses herself to the green room to “read a book” while the others go into the barracks like cot room. The inner area of her cape is as she described a place of soft light and a seemingly endless space with rows and rows, like a labyrinth of shelves covered in boxes and crates with little view screens in front of them, likely an inventory system. Cata seeing all this understands why Rhulan wouldn’t have wanted pirates and thieves of any kind to know that the dimensional space she pulled her sword, and little gadgets out of was indeed such a massive sub-space pocket filled with so many ancient things, after all she is Rhulan, the Empress, the dimension hopping hero before that apparently and…Cata shakes the kleptomaniac thoughts from her head.

     “Damn,” she thinks, “close your eyes girl and go to sleep.”

    ******

       The alarm device…three hours later, Hollia is asleep, Rhulan is asleep, Betty is asleep, Cata however is not. She looks around at the sleeping forms of the others on their green cots, then back up at the ceiling, then back at the clock. She reaches over, three hours remain till the alarm goes off, she resets it to five more hours and floats up from her cot, making sure to only levitate enough to float from the cot to her feet but not so much that she fears the energy may awaken any of the others, knowing full well all three possess the ability to sense energy. Although secretly as she walks with her feline like stealth past them she wishes they would awaken.

    She peeks into the door across the hall, Cookie Clean is laughing at a screen depicting some man standing in front of a brick wall talking into a voice amplification device with a spot light on him. His motions are spastic and Cookie Clean is laughing, although Cata can’t hear either her or the screen.

   “A sound blocker?” thinks Cata pondering that Rhulan must have placed it so any noise wouldn’t disturb their rest.

   Beyond the hall in the more wide open area she sees the rows after rows of shelves, ladders on wheels connected to them for going up and down the shelves to examine what would look to be endless numbers of identical silver and black boxes with small screens in front of them on the shelf, screens Cata imagines must be indexes for the contents of each box, which are devices Cata recognizes thanks to her Kuhrai heritage, however that such devices could exist with-in a sub-space field isn’t something she has ever heard of.

   “Temporal storage containers?” thinks Cata thinking back to when she was young, her father showing them to her and explaining their function as devices used to store large numbers of items in a small space in a time distortion field so nothing inside could be damaged, or even age during transport. However she had always heard that such technology was incompatible with being kept inside a sub-space field, due to the two forces working against each other as essentially it would be a time distorting sub-space pocket inside another sub-space pocket.

   “Unless,” thinks Cata as she walks up to one of the chest high lower shelves, “the ware house isn’t inside a sub-space field.”

   For the last thousand years pirates, thieves, historians, and treasure hunters in general have been trying to find the secret private treasure trove of the Empress Rhulan, and now Cata is standing inside it, alone, before one of the countless containers, each of which could hold inside it millions of objects the size of carriages, mountains of treasure, weapons, armor, magic trinkets, and who knows what else given Rhulan’s past before she was the empress of traveling through time and space.

    She touches the index and she sees a long list of…coins. She brings one up, a small silver coin with what looks to be a man with wool like hair on one side and an eagle of some kind clutching some twigs and arrows in its claws on the other. She brings up the next item, a cold coin with another similar man and a woman or something on the back. Image after image are similar things, different people, different objects, as well as paper bank notes, odd coins, each with what appears to be its value from where ever its from next to it.

   “A coin collection?” thinks Cata to herself practically growling that her first box to try is nothing but chump change that
due to material alone could be utterly worthless in this world.

   She examines the next box, the first thing in its index is a green plant with seven leaves with the words next to it changing to match her language somehow, “Positive probability alteration 0.0003%”

   She quickly scans through finding a metal horseshoe, “Positive probability alteration 0%: actually purpose, warding of evil spirits, cultural meaning of object changed over time.

   She flips through a large arrangement of odd objects each with some fractional number next to it, she stops on one that has 3% next to it. It looks like some piece of paper with a string and bell connected to it.

   “Hold on,” she says to herself in a whisper, “positive probability alteration…these things are good luck charms!”

   She cringes, even though she is whispering, that was still a loud whisper. She looks at the box she had just examined and back to the one she is looking at and says to herself, “this is where she keeps her sword, that robot creating egg thing, no doubt where she stored that gobglarkus, and who knows what else, armory, magical item and technology deposit, as well as food storage, no doubt despite us eating out and hunting she even has a food synthesizer in here able to replicate any food its scanned. After all these storage containers are Kuhrai technology, no doubt she has that one as well, and it seems this is also the collection of random nick knacks of a two thousand year old pack rat.”

    She walks back out to the end of the aisle, on the aisle wall is a silver device with a black center. She had thought it a light, but it isn’t emitting any light, and each isle has one.

   “Could be an index of the themed storage containers.” She thinks, “but then again they could be fire alarms…”

   She imagines one scenario of pressing it and a screen appearing showing her what all is to be found, and another of having to explain herself to the rest of the party after an alarm goes off.

  She shakes her head, however while doing so something catches her eye at the end of the next isle; blue rune like symbols in the shape of a rectangle on the far wall. As she walks down the isle it becomes clearer that they outline a door.

   “A fire exit?” she thinks while examing the door, but finds it devoid of any trigger mechanisms.

   “Do you wish to go outside?” asks a mechanical woman’s voice startling Cata.

   “Who?” asks Cata

   “I am Lola, the record keeper, would you like to go outside miss Cata?”

   “uh…sure.” says Cata apprehensively.

   The door doesn’t open, it doesn’t slide apart or swing to the side or go up or down, no it just vanishes.

   Outside is light, taking a step out she sees the entrance is in the side of a rocky cliff, before her is a lush jungle, various creatures make strange noises. She looks up but something is wrong…

   “Where’s the sun?” asks Cata outloud for despite the light and blue sky with its scattered puffy white clouds there is no source for the light to be found, no sun adorns the sky here.

   “Where are…”

     *RRRRIIIIIINNNNGGGG!!!!*

    Cata shoots up right in her cot screaming, “What the hell!”

   She look around herself, she is sitting on the cot she went to sleep on, Hollia with Lin Lin sleeping on her chest get up, Betty gets up, and Rhulan gets up. However Both Hollia and Betty have the same confused expression going, “huh?” as they wake.

   Rhulan waves her hand and the alarm stops, “Okay,” she says get ready, I’ll gather up Cookie Clean, rise and shine time to head out.

   “Was that a dream?” thinks Cata looking at the clock, which has gone off at the time it was originally set for.

   ******

   After they have all exited from Rhulan’s dimensional pocket she flings her cape over her shoulder. Betty notices that the black inner lining from when she took it off turns to red, thinking back she recalls that the inner lining was always red, but changes to black when ever she pulls something out of it like their supplies, her nano-egg, or even when she summons her sword.

   “Now then,” says Rhulan as she buckles the cape back in place, “I trust you all…except Cookie, are very confused.”

   “Cookie?” asks Cookie Clean.

   “I assume that’s your real name.” says Rhulan, “one body, one name, two adjectives to differentiate the two.”

   Cookie Clean nods.

   “Any who,” says Rhulan, “what the rest of you experienced last night.”

   She pauses as she looks at Cata who hides her surprise but internally feels as though Rhulan knows what she dreamed.

   “Was not a dream,” continues Rhulan startling Cata, “As you know what we fought last night, this morning, which ever, was a La-mopo, I believe I explained that it’s a creature of the Dream World, well it wasn’t killed and fled back into the Dream World. So going to sleep and dreaming so close to where it had vanished would not have been a good idea. So I placed an Astral Lock around the ware house, each of you projected into a different part of the environment. I kept watch over you to insure nothing went wrong.”

   Cata looks worried, but Hollia is blushing as she remembers her dream. She had found her way through the jungle to a paradise, a soft waterfall cascading over a silvery grey cliff into a warm pond free of plants or animals. She and Lin Lin had taken the opportunity to bathe, laughing and splashing about as they enjoyed their privacy and the first bath they’d had since leaving Stratalia.

   Hollia looks down and realizes that her skin is in fact freshly cleaned.

   “huh?” she sputters.

   Betty remembers sitting in meditation of the edge of a cliff over looking the lush jungle, watching as some Sauropod like creature in the distance and its herd munched on the tree tops and strange creatures like a cross between pterosaurs and dragons flew about in the air.

   “So,” says Cata, “you were keeping an eye on us?”

   “Yes,” says Rhulan whom Cata had expected to scowl but only smiles, “in fact I chose where you would appear. You see in that world, I am quite literally its god. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha”

   Rhulan’s sudden burst of laughter is creepy; in fact Cata swears even the birds stopped chirping.

   “Any who,” says Rhulan, “With the nature of some of the things in there, and the danger of that La-mopo, I thought it best to place all somewhere that from what I have observed would prove the most distracting and pleasurable.” She pauses looking at Hollia who is still beet red.

   “I see,” says Cata deciding not to pursue it any further, “In any case we’re rested now.”

   She looks back at the cave, “I’d rather not stick around any longer.”

   “Of course,” says Rhulan as she pulls the large purple orb from her cape rolls it over in her hands and puts it away again, “we need to go have a little chat with Ole-Tomash the red wizard now don’t we.”

   As they head down the trail Cata sniffs the air, the scent around them has changed, Hollia and Lin Lin smell of mineral enriched water, Betty smells of jungle scents carried on the wind.

   “A dream?” she thinks, “Astral Projection?”

   She replays the scene in her mind, staring at the ceiling, levitating off the cot. Did she look back to where she was sleeping? Did she see herself sleeping there?

   “No,” she thinks, “I didn’t look back, but wouldn’t I have known? What is that place?”

   She stares at the now red inner lining of Rhulan’s cape.

    ******

       “Welcome back,” says Ole-Tomash as they get off the service elevator, “Empty handed?”

   He nods, “I suspected as much, so sorry…”

   “Not so fast,” says Rhulan as she pulls the large purple orb from her cape with a flick like some stage magician.

   “I do believe this is what you wanted.” she says holding it out with one hand.

   “uh..wha..huh?” he stammers as he takes the orb in both arms and places on his desk.

    “why…why….yes.” he says dumbfounded with a worried expression on his face staring at his own reflection in the Dream Stone.

    He turns sweat dripping from his forehead, “I…what…what happened? How did you?” he points back at the stone.

   “Well first,” says Rhulan, “We went into the cave, found some riddle talking gargoyle. I broke the lock, it attacked, we killed it.”

   His eyes shoot wide open.

   She continues, “then we go into this wide open cavern, and are attacked by this dumb La-mopo.”

   She pauses as his jaw drops open. She smiles as she continues, “So of course it attacks, so we fought it.”

   “Of *gulp* of course.” he says.

   “So we fought back,” she says, “and I ripped this stone from its gut.”

  She points at the dream stone.

   “How?...” he shakes his head, “Never mind.”

   He clasps his hands together and forces a smile changing his tone, “Never mind! You…completed the quest like I asked and…”

   He spies Cookie Clean with them, “and it seems my first guest joined up with my other guests. Good strategy, I can see now how you were able to defeat Ma…I mean defeat my grandfather’s monster---ers. And bring me back the stone.”

    He walks over to the cabinet and brings back the jar with the No-ma in it, “Here you are as promised the No-ma. Seeing as you all teamed up you can go ahead and just take the whole jar.”

   He hands it to them; however as they head into the elevator Rhulan says as the door closes much to Ole-Tomash’s surprise, “By the way, your grandfather was a pervert to reformat a La-mopo to be like that.”

   As they leave with their prize in hand Ole-Tomash turns to the Dream Stone saying, “Damn, I was hoping she could break that lock,”

   He thinks back to watching the trial with the locked doors, “and at the very least defeat the gargoyle, but Mata-Go-Lucky should have had them fleeing.”

   He taps his fingers on the dream stone, “Shit, how’d she get the stone out of him? The only way to hurt a La-mopo is with reality distorting power, but the only person in recorded history on our world with that sort of power was…”

   His eyes shoot open and jaw drops, picturing in his head the sorceress in black, her eyes, her face, her hair, her outfit, her words…she knew what a La-mopo was, and the power to harm one.

   “Impossible!” he screams as he dashes over to his flip book screen, knocking a pile of papers to the floor as he rushes past them on one of the many stools acting as tables in this room.

    *flip, flip, flip, flip, ect…*

    He stares at an ancient photograph, “Rhu…Rhulan!” he says aloud.

   He rushes to the window, and then to another to find them and watches the party walk out of sight down the southern road; catching one last glimpse of Rhulan’s black cape as she turns a corner with the others in tow.

   He flips back on the video feed on their trials, zooming in on a good image of her and places it next to the ancient image of Rhulan.

   “Rhulan…” he says sitting down with an amazed and fearful look on his face, “Rhulan…not just in name…but…how?”

    *deep breath*

   “Okay, the story, that’s it, the story said she was immortal and Gyro-Lee…”

   He looks back at the window recalling Hollia.

  “Holly-Lia’s ancestor…used the mirror of Syris to turn her own power against her and turn her to stone. I wander did they revive her…I guess the rumors are true.”

   He stands and walks over to the window, “The Magnus Empire has been making threats and attacking kingdoms all up and down the Archae Sea, making a play at the neutral zone. Could the kingdom of Stratalia have gotten so desperate as to awaken the Empress of Old?”

   He shakes his head, “What ever the case, with everything going on.”

   He rubs the dream stone, “now is the perfect time to leave this world. I understand there have been a large number of Dream Stone Masters gathering on a little copy cat of our world, world called Earth. Perhaps I should pay that world a visit.”

   “Is that your wish?” comes the voice and ghostly image of Mata-Go-Lucky’s head.

   “Not dead? Good.” says Ole-Tomash holding up the stone, “It not for my grandfather’s blasted riddle and that gargoyle I would have freed you much sooner my old friend. My apologies, I expected those girls to unlock the door to your cell, I never…I didn’t realize one was the empress herself.”

   “I am healing,” says Mata-Go-Lucky, “with the stone I will heal faster.”

   “Of course,” says Ole-Tomash, “now Mata-Go-Lucky! I summon you!”

  *whoosh!*

   A large blue archaic circle appears in the air from which Mata-Go-Lucky appears, its massive frame blowing paper, books, and what not everywhere.

   “woops.” says Ole-Tomash, “forgot how big you are. Dismissed to the stone!”

   Mata-Go-Lucky’s body distorts, shrinks, and is sucked into the dream stone, which it’s self shrinks down to the size of a pearl. Ole-Tomash places the stone in a ring specially made to hold it and puts it on his finger.

   “Now,” says Ole-Tomash, “My nephew has been wanting to inherit this tower for some time now, I’ll just give him a call and retire.”

    He brings up a picture on his screen of the planet Earth, above Japan.

   “This is the place where they are all gathering,” he sees noting an energy reader to the side of the screen indicating dream stone power, “hmm, that world’s equivalent of Nipponia, what a perfect stage for our arrival.”

    ******

    Rhulan gathers up a bucket of water from the peaceful running stream as Betty and Cata stroke and feed the fire.

    “Okay,” says Rhulan as she eyes the dried up brown No-man leaves with a scowl, “Just have to bring the water to a boil before adding the leaves.”

   She turns to Hollia who is with Lin Lin watching fish go by in the stream, “Hey Hollia, Cookie, do you think you could catch some fish for dinner?”

   “No problem.” she shouts back.

   “No problem?” asks Cookie Clean turning to Hollia, “we don’t have any poles or bait miss how are we going to catch fish for all of us?”

    “hmm,” says Hollia, “I can bring all the fish in, guess we could ask Miss Betty or Miss Cata to help us catch them, I have to keep chanting to keep the fish coming and Miss Rhulan is preparing our No-ma.”

   Cookie Clean looks thoughtful, imaging them trying to catch fish with their swords, she imagines Cata trying to spear fish with scimitar and Betty with a rapier, even though she has never seen Betty draw that sword from its sheath, which as she now looks at it realizes while the hilt is a rapier hilt the sheath is shaped for a one sided blade type sword of some kind.

   “Well miss,” says Cookie Clean, “perhaps I can be of more assistance than I thought, although I have never tried this outside of a fight.”

   She holds her feather duster out, feathers up, at arms length saying, “Feather Duster Smash, Net”

   From the base up through the feathers manifesting, seemingly unfolding and shaping, a butterfly net appears, with the feather duster as its base.

   Cookie Clean looks embarrassed, behind her the other three have looked up, recalling Dark Cookie’s elemental mace move, figuring this bust be Cookie Clean’s version of it.

   “Sorry,” she says, “I usually call for a sword blade, rocks to throw, or some other weapon. I guess I just didn’t picture it clearly. Sorry again Miss Hollia.”

   “Its okay Miss Cookie.” says Hollia cheerfully, adopting her mentor’s decision to call her Cookie rather than Cookie Clean, deciding on her own that this polite “chibi-winged angel” as Betty called her, is her true form.

   “I have an idea,” says Hollia, “how about saying fishing net while flinging your dust buster like your casting a net after I summon enough fish for dinner?”

   “Hmm,” says Cookie Clean, “That just might work Miss Hollia.”

   Hollia stands up right at the water and signs, she holds her arms out and shanks her hands, starting to move them as though beckoning a group to gather around her and chants, or rather sings.

       “Niera
        Nora
        Niesa-Su
        Bring the Fish to me”

    --she pauses briefly and then repeats

        “Niera
         Nora
         Niesa-Su
         Bring the Fish to me”

    And she repeats it again and again, singing and beckoning with her hands. As she does so, first small fish start to gather near the bank of the stream, then larger fish, and larger, and more and more, like an audience of fish come to listen to the music.

   “Now would be a good time to cast the net.” says Rhulan, “we just need dinner, not a feast for fifty men.” She looks up with a serious tone, “and we really don’t want what might come down that stream if the spell picks up too much strength, you know little fish, bigger fish, biggest fish, monster fish like creature from a lake down stream forcing its self over the rocks to find the source of the spell that gains strength as it continues and travels through the very molecules of the water its self.”

    Even though Hollia is chanting, and Rhulan had directed the comment at Cookie Clean, she knows Rhulan was also saying that to her, if Cookie Clean doesn’t cast the net soon she will have to stop the spell least it get too strong and travel far enough to give them trouble.

   Of course Lin Lin couldn’t care less as she sits on the ground like a cat waiting to pounce staring over the bank edge and its long blades of grass at the smaller fish close to the bank.

   *splash*

   Lin Lin snags a fish, her dinner is pretty much done, but a cooked fish from Hollia’s share would still be eaten if offered later.

   Cookie Clean swings her feather dust yelling out, “Feather Duster utensil, Fishing Net!” she decided herself at the last moment to change smash to something else meaning useful to help remove the weapon idea from her mind when summoning, which has  succeeded as a large fishing net is cast out and over the water.

    Hollia was prepared to grab the net and help hull the fish in, however Cookie Clean’s net isn’t exactly normal, it’s more like a bola net, anchored in the feather duster with weight balls on its ends which un-naturally sought each other out to tangle and tie together. The net withdraws towards the feather duster yanking a whole school of fish from the water.

    “Okay,” says Rhulan, “now we have a feast, regain our strength, and oh yeah, the No-ma tea is…ready…well.” She looks at the tea kettle she had summoned for the tea.

    “As ready as its going to be.”

   As they kill and impale their fish on sticks to place around the rather large fire pit they made in the clearing by the stream bank Rhulan pours a cup of the brownish tea for Hollia but hesitates with Cookie Clean.

   “You sure?” asks Rhulan, “I don’t know what you expect to happen, but I can guarantee it wont be what you think it will be.”

    Cookie Clean hesitates, takes a breath and say, “yes, please.” And holds her cup out with conviction with both hands.

   Rhulan shrugs and pours her one too.

   Cookie Clean and Hollia look at each other and drink their tea.

   “yuck!” says Hollia making a face, “its so bitter!”

   Small blue sparks appear around her white furred ears. For Cookie Clean the effect is more dramatic, both Cookie Clean and Dark Cookie can be seen at the same time, two ghostly images layered on top of each other and completely see through. The ghostly phasing stops and Cookie Clean returns.

   “Did it work?” she asks looking down at her self and around.

   “Nope.” says Rhulan with a chuckle pointing as she looks at Hollia who is feeling her ears with her hands confused.

   “What happened?” asks Hollia.

   “Well,” says Rhulan as she dumps out the remainder of the tea, “those No-ma leaves were dead. You have to use fresh No-ma, my guess is this junk could have been dead for years given how brittle it was, that guy was probably just keeping it on the shelf for looks and to say he even has something so rare as No-ma.”

    She looks at Cookie Clean, “not sure it would have even worked for you, but then again what we just saw was…a little weird, so who knows. You should be careful though, for all you know you could morph into some kind of amalgamation of your two sides.”

   “Sisters,” says Cookie Clean.

   She looks around a sad look over her face, “*sniff*, sorry Miss Rhulan, but I wasn’t lying we are indeed sisters, merged as one being.”

   “Sorry,” says Rhulan, “Don’t see that too often, at least not with the whole transformation thing, usually fusions result in a whole new combined being with both minds active at once.”

   Cookie Clean gasps, “thank the goddess of mercy we weren’t cursed like that?” she says sounding rather awkward, more like she was telling the others to be thankful than herself.

   “In either case,” says Cata as she bites into her fish, “this whole thing has turned into one big waste of time, no cure, no treasure, no point.”

   “Not really Miss Cata,” says Hollia as she gives some cooked fish to Lin Lin who is sitting in her lap as she sits on the log they pulled up by the fire, “We have these.”

    She pulls out the red medal they got for completing the tower.

    “heh…heh, heh,” chuckles Rhulan, “Well those might come in handy really, if we have to get work on our way to Osopika.”

    “Osopika?” says Cookie Clean as she pulls out a map, “Miss Hollia, I might have some good news for you.”

   “Huh?” asks Hollia looking at the map with its crossed off circles, one around Stratalia, the next around some town with in the kingdom of Postorina north of Lake Aisha.

    Cookie Clean summons a red marker from where ever she just got the map from, which is odd as unlike Betty who pulls things from a sub-space hole, or Rhulan from her cape, she reaches behind her back and just pulls them out.

   Betty raises and eyebrow as she watches Cookie Clean mark an X over the red tower, she has another circle relatively close to them, a place in the narrow raised ground between the Archae Sea and the Great Swamp and north of Osopika.

   “right here,” says Cookie Clean, “is our, my sister and I’s next target.”

   She looks around and explains, “we like to make back up plans, we’ve tried so many places and so many methods for cures that we’ve turned it into a race to different spots. We don’t know what will happen when we find one that works, either separating or…suppressing…the other.”

   She looks away ashamed of the last thought, “We learned of the No-ma and found at least three places in this land with them.”

   Hollia asks timidly, “What…if I may ask Miss Cookie…what happened at Stratalia, I mean, we…they have plenty?”

   “I…don’t know.” says Cookie Clean sheepishly, “I got there just before night fall, and the next day woke up somewhere in the wood tied to a giant mushroom shaped rocket upside down.”

   “Grandfather…” thinks Hollia to herself, the same basic thought, only with the name of Jinron-Lia attached to it comes to Rhulan.

   “The mushroom magician.” says Rhulan to Cookie Clean, my guess either your…sister…tried to seduce him.”

   She smiles as she sees Hollia cringe a little, “or, tried to fight him. In either case it’s a good thing you gave up on that place, he isn’t the type, *sigh* to accept that you are two separate people, he might have just thought you were some trick to scam him a different way or take him by surprise. He’s a real hard ass when it comes to things like that.”

    Hollia chuckles, “Yeah, uh, he can be stubborn and a little hard headed. But he is a good guy deep down.”

    “I see,” says Cookie Clean.

   “So,” says Rhulan, “What’s this other place you have here circled.”

   “Oh right!” says Cookie Clean embarrassed, “I’m so sorry, I got side tracked, my apologies. It’s a place I’m told is called the Cat Fortress, supposedly it has the second largest garden of No-ma on this continent after Stratalia.”

   “hmm,” says Rhulan, “I see, the were-cat preserve.”

   “Huh?” asks Cata.

   “It was spoken of in Stratalia.” says Rhulan to explain to everyone, including Hollia, as everyone here save for Cookie Clean or her darker side / sister, knows all about Rhulan’s past of being a statue for the last thousand years and only able to astral project around Stratalia.

   “In fact,” says Rhulan smiling, but shakes her head, “never mind, but the next question is rather to cross the hump of the Great Swamp to go there directly or go around to the trade road and its towns.”

   “I think,” says Hollia, “We could use some more work.”

   She feels her own ears, “I…I’m kinda getting use to these, it wouldn’t be too bad to get some more experience on the way before finding a cure.”

   Cookie Clean smiles as she rolls up her map, “I’ve waited this long I have no problem coming along with you…I mean if you still want my help.”

   “Of course.” says Hollia, “None of us are exactly normal, you fit right in.”

   Cata and Betty chuckle, “of course,” says Cata, “Just look at me, hell I get more looks than Hollia, I mean I look like a were-cat wearing cloths to the people around here.”

   Betty just indicates her orange pirate costume.

   “I just tell people my name and all eyes are on me,” says Rhulan, “of course they think I’m rather crazy calling my self Rhulan, or that my parents were crazy for naming me Rhulan.”

   “Why?” asks Cookie Clean.

   “Okaaaay,” says Rhulan, “well if you’re going to travel with us then you should know the truth, I—am—in--fact the Empress Rhulan, who conquered the world eighteen hundred years ago and ruled until a thousand years ago, I was turned to stone by Hollia here’s ancestor Gyro-Lee using a magic mirror which was created by an immortal pain the ass who is still apparently following us around…yet come to think of it hasn’t done anything for some time now to get in our way.”

    “If we are coming clean,” says Betty, “a lot of our recent trouble has come from a powerful supernatural monster that is after me and has been sending his minions after us…and,” she looks down sheepishly, “to be honest I kinda thought at first when we met you that you might have been one of his minions…sorry.”

    “I…” says Cookie Clean, “don’t know what to say, I, well I’m not really from this world, which I guess given Miss Betty’s explanation last night, or, this morning rather,  is somewhat redundant of me to point out.”

    “See,” says Hollia, “you fit right in with us.”

    *sniff*

   Cookie Clean wipes away a joyful tear, “thank you, thank you all.”

   --Cookie Clean has officially joined the party—

   “Isn’t that kind of redundant?” asks Hollia to the invisible voice, drawing a big “huh?” expression from everyone else.

    Seeing them she says, “Sorry, I was just thinking of something weird.”

   “hmm,” thinks Rhulan, “the Cat Fortress, the Were-Cat preserve, well this should prove interesting indeed.”