The Pit of Misery

TYKE

Rotten eggs.

Parasite-infested blood.

The wire slips briskly between my hands.

Beached hydra soaking in puss...

We're whisking ourselves down, lurid images spinning in my head as I try to grasp what this foulness is all about.

Fuck, it stinks.

There is something dead down there, foul and sharp, that has the smell of carbonized remains and maybe a hint of something old and fossilized.

It's too pungent to escape, even with an oxygen mask.

And I grunt. I keep grunting, clearing my throat from this stench. Even my bile is dying to crawl out of this place.

A suppressed chuckle crepitates in my headset. "You sound like a beast, Captain Kar'Ael."

My eyes jack up and settle on this floating elf, matching my controlled pace as she descends above me.

I won't answer. Instead, my head sways to my left shoulder, scratching a nervous itch with a tusk peeking out of my respirator. The last thing I need is for any of these vampires to wake up.

I redirect my gaze, tracking every shadow, shape, and patch of dark that stands out a little too much, sifting the hollowness for just about anything that could deep-six us.

Not to get all philosophical here, but dangling upside-down on a wire with my throat ripped out, gushing blood like meat on hooks isn't how I'd like to go.

In fact, dying at the hands of a vampire is the worst death that could happen to me—and the fear is equally shared. It's like our respective species are allergic to one another. Vampire venom knocks us with a fever we can't get out of, and orc blood brainfucks them so badly that they can't eat for days. Either way, these guys are psychos and well known to prefer the thrill of the bite over their own existence.

The hate between us is organic, embedded so thoroughly in our bones, it's swimming in the marrow. I bet even Mother Nature thinks our hatred is legit. More so, our scent is even repellent to the vamps. While I cannot detect my own scent, Fay says I smell like flowers and moss. Some might say it's a defense mechanism against a predator we can't kill, but I doubt that.

I swallow hard.

Vampires and orcs... I'm braiding my strengths with theirs, and I can't say it looks pretty. Fay says I'm shredded. I get that I must be the big guy for ordinary-sized folks. Still, I'm trending toward the leaner side of things when it comes to my kind, and even though my build makes me more agile than the rest, I'm not as fast as these vicious bastards.

At least I've got a Silverstroke... The mere presence of my firearm warming my back is soothing. Knowing it can fire ten rounds in three seconds will surely give me an edge...

Thinking about this makes me gag. Being forced to equip myself with fae weapons is one thing, but being a jerk to my axe is another...

Tyke, there's no place for the weak in Nikresh!

It's all good.

Come on, buddy, you've got this. The scar running down your left thigh serves as a reminder.

Yes, I've got this... I was a hunter once, and a damn good one. I was known to be sharp-eyed and an ace for close kills. Oh, I swung my axe alright. Hunting was my school.

But this place likes to remind me of my learning curve, of the one mistake that never left me. A behemoth tusked me on that infamous day, teaching me beyond any other lesson to never underestimate the power of silence. You can neither trust, nor abuse, this mute fucker... And right now, the cathedral is so quiet, we can almost hear the storm's roar every time we breathe. The thing is, I want to take advantage of it, not be roped into it. If only these plops tapping on my helmet could stop...

Mold and brittle stone flake down on us with every scrape of our wires against the rim's hole.

Every time the grit hits the ground, it's like listening to bouncing marbles, pretty much angst screaming into my ears. The echo is drying my mouth out.

We're being too loud.

And as if this suffocating smell wasn't enough, the longest of my tusks won't fit in the breather. Insidious smoke keeps slipping into the narrow gap, coiling into my nostrils, gradually replacing this stench with the perfume of flames.

Creak.

Crack.

My lungs block. Under us, sputterings weave in and out of a faint hum. The latter is veiled with the warm murmur fires are made of and timidly creeping into the air.

"Where is this fire coming from? Have you noticed any glow?"

Vine's too damn talkative.

I grip my trad rack and halt in my descent. Vine mimics my move and stops at my level, awaiting my next move.

With a finger over my lips, I tell her to shut it.

She nods curtly, and I can tell she's annoyed by how she's zipping past me.

As much as orc women were built for war, I'm not sure this stick here won't snap under the first blow. Bloody woman! There's a reason why I'm a captain; she's a sergeant, and captains take the hit first!

My gaze bows at my partner being swallowed up by this buzzing darkness that seems to absorb everything in its path, including this idiot. I snarl as my tusks hang low and bring my thumb to my goggles' side frame, activating the night vision. Green streaks flood my vision, the cable running through my gloves soon burning to a crisp.

While falling at a rate I didn't ask for, snaps and crackles are slashing at the vaults, whose growing volume is outstripping vertigo's grip on my senses. I don't need to cock my head. Raw and rousing, an orchestra of twigs popping and splintering is rolling out, eating away at the pints I'm currently sweating, but not as much as Vine is. She is the starving kind that's going to wring me dry, I just know it. It's merely a question of time.

And as I near-drop into this pit of misery, my chest expands. Under me, a lean figure is growing longer and broader, the lines of my partner's body changing from teal to a vivid green—though the same cannot be said for me. I'm sure my skin turned a light pastel from this gravity-free ride she's forcing me to take because I can hardly feel my face!

To her sight, my breath comes in hard and fast. Sure, two feet on the ground... yet nothing sways or sounds from the girl's helmet. Something is blocking her lips, and I'm eager to know what because I'd like to thank it!

But then, the elf's behavior isn't budding well with me because of this soundless reason.

My eyebrows bend to a V, hairs bulging on my arms, my faint groan scratching at the knots in my tightly bound stomach. Vine flies in the face of danger; I know this because, after spending two weeks with her, I discovered two interesting facts: she loves to punch people in the nose and, mostly, to get into fights with no real intention of ending them. Vine is more inclined to throw herself into the heat of the moment rather than curb it. And what's happening down here is nowhere near the norm.

My body brushes against hers, my grip tensing the cord as I raptly slow to a halt, landing inches from Vine.

What is this?! I join her frosted state to this unsettling crunch under my feet.

My eyes crane above her helmet, my pulse spiking at every humerus and phalanx splintering under my boots. As I walk my painful gaze down my sergeant's body, it picks up on her trad rack. She's clutching her metal rope as if it were her lifeline.

I understand. Really, I do. It's getting warm under my suit, sweat prickling my eyes while I try to get a handle on things.

Ah... Duhkal, I really don't need this now. My fingers slide under my eyewear, rubbing the acid eating away at my eyes, which are already experiencing a rollercoaster of blurs and hyper-focus strains. They don't need this extra salt...

"Gods, what happened here..." Vine's voice drops at least five octaves, and for the first time, her newly discovered vibrato is giving me a funny feeling. "Bones..." Those tremors at the back of her throat remind me of when Fayra had finished a book and realized it was part of a series, and then learned the next book wasn't out yet. She was a real storm in a teacup that day. I still don't get why, and I think I never will. I'll admit, it did make me laugh, but not for long. Fayra was spritzing glitter like a volcano firework.

I kill my simper before it takes over and loosen my hand on my weapon's grip to rub my partner's back.

The latter is warm, hiding a heart strongly beating against its cage. Vine lifts her head to me, and although I can't see her eyes, I can tell they are troubled. "Everywhere..."

Everywhere and in pieces. There's a brittleness to them, too, crunching like crackers with every shift of my weight.These bones have been charred to near dust.

"It's alright, Bell. Just stay behind me."

Without losing time, I free my harness from the wire, allowing it to hang freely, and grab the weapon across my shoulder. Struck by a familiar sensation, one hand tightens on the grip and the other just as solidly on the hand guard. Shivers of war wash over me, roiling in my gut. I've walked on this surface before.

It's a mass graveyard, the only remains of the dead being ebony shards and ash...

The wafts of smoke are growing stronger, twirls of its thickness highlighted in silver. I wince, and it doesn't matter how hard I rub my neck, those gray ribbons swirling in front of us have decided to dizzy me.

"Keep it on," I grate. Vine's tinkering with her mask, and I'm staring not at it, my eyes tightly sealed, wishing to teleport my mind for a brief but inarguably necessary moment, dreaming so hard about it, I might believe it to happen. Though I like Vine and find her the easiest to work with among her peers, I never want to work with an elf again. No damn order's getting through to her. Feels like I'm hollering at the wind, wasting my breath. "Keep. It. On."

"If we can smell, it means they are defective, captain."

Maybe they are. Perhaps it's crap. Mine is too small, and hers doesn't work. But a filter is a filter, and there are fumes.

"On!"

"Later..." she breathes out.

"Leave it on, even if it does half the job. Carbon monoxide is a silent killer."

Of course, she unstraps her respirator, freeing a wispy voice. "I wanna know where this fire's coming from." Well, it'll have to be a fuck it moment because I don't want to tickle the insubordination beast. It's a relationship killer.

"It's too silent." Her nose up in the air, Vine doesn't appear to notice my struggle, which suits me fine.I need her focused on the mission. "They know we're here."

"They do, and they seem more concerned by what's burning than greeting us..." I add, shaking my head to hurl this queasiness from my skull. Not to mention the smell is making my headache worse as I blink like a mad orc.

And again, I blink.

It's taking me a while to adjust to all the shades of green scattered across the lenses. The device is tearing at my perception, distorting my sight at every flickering of the eye. And that's because orcs have a sharper retinal focus than any other creature.

I'm tempted to take my goggles off, but it would be a rookie move, and I'm not prone to suicidal idealization, either. Right now, I'll just have to suck it and... well, see.

My left boot goes forth, and as I finally make out what's in front of me, I decide it's best to leave my other flat on the ground. The mission's briefing said we would land in the chancel, and it looks like we're right where we should be...

My mind races back to the nightmare I had two weeks ago. The relief I felt when Cerberios woke me up, a pool of slime dripping from their jagged teeth down my cheek, was beyond words. I tried to erase the vision of Fayra's bloodied face, but it wouldn't go away. Whimpering as she lay still on an altar, her tiny body, ruby-like at first, glinted at me, her arms open, beckoning me. I blinked again, and the gem-like aspect of her left for the one of blood. Vampires were tearing at her limbs as she screamed for me...

Yet, here I am, facing the exact surroundings of my dream, and there isn't one hair on my body that isn't standing up.

I throw my head back, twisting my neck in a 360 rotation, making every ligament crack, trying to get a semblance of calm, which is nearly impossible.

I suck in a breath and glance around, Vines's bobbing head doing the same. I'm basically looking at a web of green lines. It's a mess. Parchments and damaged books are strewn across the floor, as if thrown from a shelf, their ripped sheets draping the bones we're standing on... Tapestries pile up in slumps at the base of the walls, probably too withered to hang from.

And then I throw my attention to what I've been uncomfortably avoiding while scanning the place: the imposing altar. It's standing proudly before us, displaying its items for our viewing pleasure.

It's covered in a thick layer of dust, giant oversized candle holders are tossed over it, torn sheets lie strewn about the surface, and underneath, the source of my sky-rocketing blood pressure: a skeleton with a dagger pierced through the sternum. The blow must have been strong enough to crack the altar in two, sending a fine split down the rock's base.

Although I wasn't expecting to be greeted by sleeping beauty. Not only does she—he?—look way past the expiration date, but it also seems prince charming had changed his mind in a rather brutal way, making me want to bolt out of this place, get to my short rental, dig out my phone from my bag, and call Fayra, just to ensure this decaying thing is not her...

My jaw locks, and I groan from my tusk's tip needled into my upper lip. I don't know what I'm thinking. I've got to fucking relax!

"Black magic," I catch. Vine sped through her words so quickly, I can tell I'm not the only one needing a Pepto.

"Maybe." No, it's more of a hard yes. But I don't want to wind her up more than she is. Not right now... As I check on my champion at my back, I notice she's defrosting nicely. She unhooks her trad rack, the cable swinging behind us, entangling with my own, and walks to settle her shoulder next to mine—well... next to my elbow.

She catches my side glance, and my nostrils flare. Funny how I know she's about to slingshot another of her sucky lines to me by the way she angles her head. Taking a lungful, her chest heaves, filling my mouth with sighs. "Wanna tie the knot, captain?"

Right on time... "I do, and when the time comes, you'll be sitting in the first row. It's a promise."

I can't help but smirk as she looks away. She's freeing whatever tension is building inside me. In retrospect, there's some good about her little interventions—they take a certain edge off the mission, and I need that.

While contemplating the alley we're about to cross, my mind flickers with a very Vine-like visual. The girl's contagious... A curl of my lips runs amok as my hand extends toward her sulking self. She's going to love this. "Fancy walking down the aisle with me?"

And she does.

Immediately opening like a flower in full bloom, she places her little gloved hand in mine, and it's not long before her whispery titter flies up my ears. "There's nothing I'd like more."

"Stay behind me, keep a lid over your mouth, and put your damn oxygen mask back on. Something tells me we're expected..."

"Yes, captain."

I lead the way, descending a flight of stairs eroding under my weight. I measure and calculate the placement of my foot with every step to avoid unwanted echoes, but it's pointless. And despite this place being a dwelling for giants, breathing in it is like having a microphone stuck between teeth.

Vine follows closely behind me, the tip of her rifle at five o'clock. Taking sentry duty, we move down the alley, dodging the rubble that obscures an old worn-out carpet, ripped in many places, and powdered with dust that lifts from one step to the next.

I'm nodding from left to right like a weathervane, not wanting to miss one row of these wooden benches as we move down the aisle. All of them are covered in spiderwebs, some smashed into a straight line as if by a massive boulder.

My fist goes up to signal a halt. The middle of the alley is obstructed in half by a bench fragment, the most prominent of its splinters pointing at us.

I squint at it. Blood is dripping from its sharp tip.

... Looks like someone lost their cool recently...

Of course, Vine's tongue unbuckles itself at this precise moment.

"They couldn't help but choose an Elvexican cathedral, could they? Desiccating our religious sights, little shits..."

As she rambles on, a slithering movement ebbing toward our boots catches my eye. I study this creeper, a feeling of déjà vu nagging at my brain. Yellow scales, a tail spiked with thorn-like protrusions, and a missing paw that causes it to walk sideways.

What are the odds? That's the same dwarf dragon I saw on the roof.

On my left side, an unexpected firearm heaves up with an aim that doesn't sit well with me. The idiot!

A bang flashes before my eyes as my hand tries to grasp Vine's emotional barrel.

Bang!

While her shot still resounds in the entire fucking cathedral, I yank her by the shoulder, a savage urge to whack her.

I spin her to face me and grip her neck. My clasp tightens, my suppressed roar jarring against her two tiny hands clutching at my wrist as I grate, "You have a death wish?"

Something glazes the floor as I bring my head to her gapping self, fucking trying not to dismember her.

"Captain..." She coughs. As I stare straight into her eyepiece, every pulse of hers against my hand unleashes a rush of shame, overtaking me, slicing across my soul, and letting my worst side loose.

What am I doing? My grip trembles around her throbbing neck, my body stiffening.

I release her fast—something I should've done straight away. Because I realize I lifted her by the neck, the glazing sound no other than the tip of her boots stroking the slate. As much as the Kor' Kron Orcs might be born killers, they are, before anything else, protectors of the birth givers, the pride of the whole trove, as our hearts bleed for theirs. In all cases, Kor' Kron do not touch females, enemy or not. And I just rough-handled my partner...

Fear is releasing the monster in me, and it's on a rampage, crashing against the worst parts of what makes me, and the girl here gets to have it all.

The pit that is my stomach is now endless.

"Keep your emotions in check." My words stagger, quivering from a shaky breath. I'm not myself.

I squeeze my weapon as I allow Vine a much-needed breathing spell.

Rubbing her neck, the lass grinds, "Yes, captain," before spitting to the side, inches near my boots.

And I don't blame her.

Fuck.