Arena of the Blood Moon Part Three

 

ARENA OF THE BLOOD MOON

First published online in Abandoned Towers Ezine October 9-September 14, 2009

Part Three

“It’s really no use, you know, my boy,” the shrill voice said to him.  Brackett looked up at the defeated expression on Professor Tholgrum’s long face.  “There is only one way out of this terrible place.”

Slowly, Brackett took his hands off of the wall.  “Yes,” he said slowly,” It does appear that way.  But if that’s the only way, then it’s the one we’ll have to use to make our escape.”

The Professor chuckled, letting loose a sound not unlike the sparkling Drassis birds on Glowasoo.  “Ah, to be young and have hope!” he marveled.  Then, he sighed heavily.  “You are a new one, not one of the officers meant to deliver me.”

“No sir, I’m Captain Brackett.  My partner and I were sent to find you and your escort, and deliver you to the space station.” Brackett declared with determination.  “And that’s just what I mean to do.”

“Impossible!” the Professor declared.  “The only way out of this cell is into that arena.  If you can get past whatever opponents or animals they throw at you, you would still have to get past a small army of well-armed Nilboggi!”

Brackett fixed the Professor with a steady gaze.  “Yes sir, and I will fight each and every one of them if I have to, in the course of my duty.  Even their leader…”  With a pause, he frowned down at the floor.  “…whatever his name was.”

“You mean Gom’jol?” the Professor asked.  “He must be a great warrior.  Nilbogs will only follow warriors who pose a formidable threat to their enemies.”

Brackett considered this with no small concern.  “Well…” he said at last, “The ideal thing would be to find a way out through the arena, preferably with minimal combat involved.  But I’ll have to have a look over the place before I can plan anything.”

It was a long wait, and the mounting suspense made him anxious.  Twelve hours later, the doors finally opened to reveal the arena and Brackett did not like what he saw…

The doors slid open to reveal a great, round, chamber cluttered with free-standing wall partitions of metal plates or steelglass.  The perimeter wall featured several pairs of doors, doubtlessly leading to other holding cells and high above it all were tiers of stadium seating, filled nearly to capacity with jeering Nilbog spectators, interrupted at one point by a separated platform for those of high rank.  On this platform, Brackett quickly spied Jol’bur seated to the right of a Nilbog clad from head to toe in an armored suit.  They were surrounded by guards and other Nilboggi.

The other prisoners in the cell reluctantly found their way towards the arena.  Professor Tholgrum sighed.  “Time again.”

“Why don’t we just stay in here?  If we refuse to fight…” Brackett started.  As if in answer to his question, a steady hissing sound began above him.  He looked up and saw several nozzles sticking out of the walls near the ceiling, each one spitting out thick green gas.  With an incredulous frown, he followed the other prisoners into the arena and the doors closed behind them. 

***

Brackett glanced around at the arena. “We’ve got to protect the Professor, and find a way out of here!”  He scanned the arena and swore when he realized that the air vents were twenty feet high on the steep perimeter wall, an impossible climb for any mere human.  “Well that won’t work!”

Jol’bur stood and addressed the prisoners, his voice booming from speakers scattered throughout the arena.  “Those of you who survive this challenge will be one step closer to your freedom!”   He made a grandiose gesture towards the seated figure in the armor.  “You have the word of my P’Trohg, the Wor-osh of Oublaat, that those who conquer their rivals will be rewarded!  But only the strong shall survive, and you must first prove your strength!  This battle shall continue until six of you have fallen.  Commence!”

A throaty roar erupted on the far side of the arena from somewhere behind the free-standing barriers. It was immediately followed with a scream of pain, and a chorus of other screams ranging from battle-cry to fear.

Brackett took off towards the sounds of the fight.  He rounded the partitions and found a group of insectoids being attacked by a humanoid creature that stood seven feet tall with elongated facial features, thick fangs that protruded from his lower jaw, and a single squat horn that sprouted from the top of his head.  In its hand, it grasped a length of pipe, an insectoid cowering on the floor below it, one leg sporting an extra, unnatural joint where the exoskeleton had shattered.

“Galactic Patrol!” Brackett barked out of habit, “Stop this, now!”

The brawny humanoid growled at Brackett as he raised his bludgeon high. “Quiet down, runt!  I’m gettin’ off this moon alive!”

The alien brute towered over Brackett, his length of pipe pulled back.  A blue-and-white blur came out of nowhere and latched on to the arm with the weapon. 

For a fraction of a moment, Brackett gaped, then, as the event registered in his mind, he sprang into action.  He launched himself at the alien, tackling its legs, and dumping all three of them to the floor.  They writhed and wrestled until Brackett managed to seize the length of pipe, wrenching it away, but he had no time to celebrate the achievement before a meaty fist struck him with enough force to send him sliding across the floor.

Brackett scrambled to his feet and charged. 

With a savage thrust of the brute’s boot, the other Patrol officer was knocked away and without missing a beat, the alien swung a fist, knocking the pipe from Brackett’s hand.  His antagonist grabbed him and threw him aside like a rag doll.

Brackett flew through the air to collide with his fellow officer, sprawling them both across the floor. 

“Nice shot, Brad!” Ginsberg huffed.

“Sorry,” Brackett returned as he climbed back to his feet. “This guy’s tough!”

“Yeah,” Ginsberg agreed. “He’s a Marquadian. They’re all tough!  But he’ll be easy enough to take down if we can get him in a choke-hold.”

Brackett looked across the arena at the alien through narrowed eyes. “All right, divide and conquer.”

They turned back to the brutish alien and separated, walking around him in a wide circle until the Marquadian stood between them.  Without warning, Brackett started forward.  The alien swung a thick fist, and he ducked beneath it. 

Ginsberg charged in as soon as the thug’s back was turned, but the Marquadian was too quick. He spun around and lashed out, knocking the patrolman sprawling once again. 

It was all the time Brackett needed.  Even as Ginsberg took the hit, Brackett jumped onto the alien’s back and wrapped one arm around its neck.  The Marquadian flailed about in a panic, gasping desperately for air.  Brackett held on tightly as it began to turn blue and fell to its knees.

As the Marquadian fell to all fours, Brackett released it and landed on his feet. The brute frowned up at the patrolman with a furious gaze, sputtering and choking as the color returned to his features. “You nearly killed me!”  He croaked, then gasped a few more times before asking, “Why didn’t you?”

Brackett frowned back incredulously.  “I don’t want to kill you!” He turned to the group of other prisoners that had gathered around to watch them fight.  “We are citizens of the Allied Worlds. We don’t play by Nilboggi rules!”  He looked over the throng of prisoners, almost daring them to disagree. 

A murmur of consent swept through the prisoners.  One insectoid alien looked down at the length of pipe which he had picked up.  Slowly, he dropped it onto the floor and backed away.

Brackett nodded with satisfaction, then turned towards balcony of the Nilbog chief.  In a loud, clear voice he called up to them:  “We will not fight one another for your entertainment, do you hear?  We will not fight!”

Jol’bur trembled with rage as he jumped to his feet.  “If you will not fight against one another,” he shouted, “then you will fight against my gladiators!” He turned to a nearby underling and bellowed, “Send in the Sen’oggi!”

At Jol’bur’s command, a pair of doors beneath the platform creaked ominously open.  Brackett and the rest of the prisoners waited with baited breath as the sound of footsteps grew louder from the yawning portal. 

As six Nilbogs, each one carrying a metal staff and naked from the waist up except for a heavy pair of gauntlets and a metal collar around their necks, marched into the arena with military precision, the prisoners backed away from them. The Sen’oggi stopped as one, and turned on their heels.  They looked up to the Nilboggi officials, and raised their hands in salute.  Gom’jol, the Wor-osh, raised one armored hand in acknowledgement.

Jol’bur sneered down into the arena. “Now you will fight for us, or you will die!  Sen’oggi!  Slay!”

The six Sen’oggi tapped their rods against the floor. Each staff belched forth energy in the shape of an axe-blade.  The warriors each turned in a different direction, and began their ominous advance on the prisoners.

“Brad, it was a beautiful speech,” Ginsberg muttered under his breath, “but suddenly, I think it was a bad idea to give it!”

Brackett clapped his partner on the shoulder.  “Come on, Ginsberg!  You, me, and Sorenson are the only Patrol officers here!  It’s up to us to protect these citizens!  They’re unarmed!”

Ginsberg frowned back at him.  “So are we!”

Ignoring Ginsberg, Brackett charged. 

The Nilbog gladiator paused then swung his laser axe, and Brackett ducked beneath it. He tackled the Sen’oggi warrior, and they both rolled across the floor. When they came to a stop, Brackett found himself lying atop the Sen’oggi.  He swung his fist, slamming the alien’s head against the rough metal of the floor and knocked the gladiator unconscious. 

“Brad, look out!” Ginsberg called.

Brackett jumped to his feet with the laser axe in his ready hands and faced a pair of charging gladiators. 

The Nilboggi advanced with their weapons trained on the patrolman as he backed up a few cautious steps.

“Aw come on, guys,” Brackett said, “I don’t want to die here today, and you don’t either, do ya?”

“It is an honor and a privilege to die for the Wor-osh,” one Sen’ogg snapped as he thrust his axe towards Brackett’s chest.

Brackett jumped back and swung his own axe wildly. As he knocked the invading weapon aside, he spied a third Nilbog gladiator coming towards him and backed further away, deftly dodging the laser axes.  He stopped moving when he backed against one of the wall partitions that littered the arena. 

Three Nilboggi laser axes pointed at him. 

The patrolman gulped.  “So that’s the Nilbog way, huh?  I guess none of you could handle a fair fight.  Not you, or you, or you,” he said as he gestured to each one in turn.  “Not even your precious Wor-osh.  After all, you guys are only down here risking your lives because he’s too cowardly to do his own dirty work, right?”

The three Sen’oggi gasped.  One rasped, “What was that?”

“I said if your Wor-osh wasn’t such a coward, he’d come down here and fight himself!” Brackett shouted. A murmur rippled through the audience of Nilbogs above.

Jol’bur glared down at the cornered patrolman.  “You filthy you-man!” he cried.  “You dare to speak so about…”  He was silenced when the Wor-osh beside him grabbed him by the shoulder.

Gom’jol stood, his synthesized voice booming throughout the vast chamber.  “That sounded like a challenge to me. And I accept!”

To Be Continued...

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Wrath of the Volcano God Part Three

 

 

WRATH OF THE VOLCANO GOD

A Pulp Adventure

Part Three

"Then you two had better get off this boat, and fast!" Lewis told them as he struggled to break free of the ropes.

The pilot snorted.  "Not without you, buddy-boy!  Grab him!"  Ethan grabbed the ropes encircling Lewis' shoulders as Wayne grabbed the prone man's legs.  They ran for the gangplank.  Halfway down it, the dynamite exploded.  The main deck shattered, shot into the air like a volcanic explosion.  The gangplank lifted up under their feet and launched them onto the sandy beach.

Debris from the ship rained down into the water and along the beach.  Jigsaw pieces of deck or walls.  A cabin door.  A twisted length of the ship's railing.  Boxes from the hold, a lantern, a prybar and other tools.  The ship itself sunk lower in the water, no doubt the hold blew itself wide open somewhere below the water line.  The ship finally settled on the ocean floor at an angle, the prow of the ship sat higher than the stern.  A bit the foredeck, the main cabin, and dirty smokestack were all that jutted up from the water.  Just like that, the Josephine's Joy was no more.

Sarah stood from where she lay Bethany, sitting up against a rock.  She looked over the aftermath with despondent eyes, for she saw no sign of their three companions.

The gangplank landed with one end on a boulder that jutted up from the sand near the water's edge, the other dropped into the loose white sand.  One side jerked, then rose like a door on a hinge.  It slid off the boulder, which now held the gangplank propped up on one edge.  The three men emerged from beneath it.

"Thank Heavens you're alive!" she exclaimed as she rushed to them.  "Are you all right?"

Lewis took a quick stock of the situation.  "Yes, I think so.  How about you, Wayne?"

Wayne's ashen face told them that he was shaken.  Nevertheless, he picked himself up and slapped his Stetson onto his head as he said, "Had worse falls gettin' bucked offa broncos!"

"Clap?  You all right?" Lewis asked.

Ethan patted down his jacket, finally pulled out a pack of cigarettes.  "I'm still working on that 'alive' part.  I mean, my whole life flashed before my eyes!" He put a smoke in his mouth, lit it, took a long drag.  "You never paid me back for the Red Robin, by the way."

Lewis laughed.

Then the water beyond the whore began to churn.  It swirled and roiled.  In a few short moments it came to a bubble as though it had come to a rolling boil.  Large objects moved beneath the bubbling water, as though some undercurrent pushed them up toward the beach.  The first one emerged from the sea, it seemed to the shallow dome of a reddish-gray rock.  More clustered up to the edge of the beach, remaining submerged in the oncoming surf, at least for the moment.

Next to one of these rocks, a crab's claw reached up and out of the broiling surf.  It was of a monstrous proportion, easily two feet in length.  The pincers clacked twice, it may have been nothing more than a morning stretch, but it seemed like a signal as the rocks chose that moment to climb out of the water.

They were giant crabs, some as large as four feet across their barnacled shells.  Each one armed with a massive pair of claws that could crack a person's head wide open. 

Sarah screamed, ran back to pull Bethany to her feet.  Shouting exclamations of their own, Ethan and Wayne pulled Lewis to his feet.  Then they each grabbed the coil of rope and pulled it over his head.   Wayne let go of the rope, but some habit made Ethan pull the coiled rope over one arm and onto his shoulder without even realizing it.

The white sands were swarming with the monstrous crabs, one came upon a few boards from the ship's deck that were sticking up out of the sand.  With a single clack of its claw, it snapped the boards in twain.

"Run!" Lewis ordered, and the three men bolted inland.

Bethany, still weakened from the poison, was pulled to her feet by the younger woman.  Sarah wrapped one arm around Bethany's waist, pulled one of Bethany's arms over her shoulders and urged across the sandy beach.

Wayne paused, plucked a twisted piece of railing from the ground and chucked it at the oncoming horde.  It bounced off one crab's shell, rolled off another, but did nothing to slow their advance.  Lewis grabbed what appeared to be a stairway plank and threw it into the throng with similar result. 

The crabs had advanced upon their flank, cut off their path to the ravine-path they had followed to the beach.  They turned, and continued toward the cliff wall.  The humans ran at full speed, and gained a lengthy lead as the crabs scuttled forward at a slow but menacing gait.  As the distance lessened between them and the cliff face, they saw it was riddled with caves.  The lowest one was perhaps fifteen feet above the sand, and out-of-reach from their armored pursuers.

They were nearly out of the field of fallen debris when Lewis pulled a curved metal rod from the sand.  He cocked his arm to catapult it when he suddenly realized that it was a large three-pronged hook. 

The crabs marched on, clicking their pincers in their mad chase.  Sarah cried out as Bethany stumbled and nearly pulled them both to the ground.

"Clap!"  The pilot turned to him and Lewis tossed him the hook.  "Tie this to the rope so we can get up to one of those caves!"  Ethan caught it, nodded.  Lewis ran over and picked up Bethany fro where she fell.  He instructed Sarah to continue of, then followed carrying the crumpled woman in his arms once again.

Moments later they made it to the rocky wall and stood below one of the lower caves.  Lewis propped Bethany against the cliff as Ethan hastily tied the grappling hook to one end of the rope.  Wayne pulled out his six-guns and fired at the oncoming horde as Ethan whirled the hook up toward the cave above.

Wayne's bullets bounced off their heavy shells or cause a small burst of sand as buried itself in the beach at their feet.  Either way, that crab would pause, sometimes take a step back, and cause a minor logjam in their advance. It was only a momentary reprieve, then they would continue with their ominous charge.

The hook crashed into the sand.  Undaunted, or just desperate, Ethan tried again.  The hook clanged against the rock face and hurtled down a second time. 

"Dagnabbit!" Wayne cried, "You can't throw a rope to save your life!"  He slammed his revolvers into their holsters and took the rope away from the pilot.  He swung the hook in a circle, then launched it skyward.  It caught onto the cave mouth and stayed put.

Wayne pulled his guns out and resumed firing, which seemed to slow the onrushing crustacean mob, if only a little.  Lewis slipped his pack from his shoulders and handed it to Ethan.

"Take this, and get up there so you can help Miss Turnbull," Lewis instructed.

"What about her?" Ethan asked, pointing at Bethany Gale.

"I'll get her," Lewis said as he leaned over and pulled a large knife from Bethany's belt.  "Now get up there!"

Without argument, Ethan pulled the spare pack onto his shoulder where the rope had been moments before.  He grabbed the rope in both fists and walked up the rock wall to the cave. 

Lewis cut a few feet of rope from the bottom, then waved Sarah toward the rope.  "You're next!"

"But how..." the girl began.

Wayne fired off another round.  "No time to argue, just get!"

Though plagued by dissatisfaction and worry, Sarah climbed up the rope.  As she neared the cave, Ethan leaned out, grabbed her, helped her climb in.

As Sarah climbed, Lewis used his newly cut length of rope to tie Bethany's wrists together.  He pulled the girl to her feet, turned his back to her, then pulled her tied hands over his head.  Lewis took the rope in his hands and said, "Don't wait too long!"

"I weren't plannin' to," Wayne told him.

With a nod, Lewis hoisted himself up to the cave.  Below him, the crabs closed in on Wayne Johnson.  He leveled his pistol at one oncoming beast and pulled the trigger.  He was rewarded with a disappointing click and remembered the shots he had used on the ship.  He holstered that revolver, grabbed hold of the rope as one crab charged up to him.  He turned his pistol at it, squeezed the trigger.

The revolver barked a thunderclap and shattered the heavy shell between the crab's two eyestalks.  The monster trembled, then it's spidery legs collapsed beneath the dead weight of the body.

Wayne shoved the gun into it's holster, grabbed the rope and was instantly pulled off the white sand of the beach.  His friends pulled him into the cliffside cave and looked down at the monster-sized crabs clacking their claws in anger below.

They rested for a while near the cave mouth, nibbled at their provisions, sipped from their canteens, reloaded their guns, wiped their brows and caught their breath.  The stoic crabs stood stubborn guard below them, clicking and clacking their pincers with a promise of savage pain.

Ethan pulled the stub from his mouth and flicked it at the mob below.  "Looks like they ain't going anywhere anytime soon."

"That's all right.  We all got up here in one piece and we can follow this cavern," Lewis announced.  "If we're lucky, we'll find another way out."

Sarah stared down at the crustacean swarm.  "Do...do you think they got Dr. Carlsbad and his man?" The worry in her voice was genuine.

"I hope so," Bethany spat.  "Serve him right."

"What a horrible thing to say about another human being!" Sarah exclaimed, aghast.

Lewis grabbed the young woman in a firm embrace.  "If I know Everard, he got away from the crabs all right.  And that means he'll still be after the Heart of Tiki-Taki.  We've got to get to the Temple first if we're going to stop him."  He shot a furtive glance as the giant crabs below.  "You should take a couple of pictures of them," he told the girl.  "For posterity's sake.  That's what your father sent us to do, isn't it?"

"Yes it is," she agreed, and readied her camera.

Lewis turned to the rest of his crew.  "Dig out your flashlights, we're heading out!"

Sarah estimated the daylight, determined there was no need for the flash.  She aimed her Kodak, and took the picture.

*  *  *

The cavern was long and twisted.  It climbed, it dipped, it doubled back.  They found off-shoots that turned out to be dead-ends, and others that branched off in different directions.  Lewis led the expedition through the dark and winding caverns, and even Bethany Gale followed under her own power, although she steadied herself with one hand on the rocky wall.  After an hour of wandering through the labyrinthine tunnels, Lewis turned a corner, entering a large cave.  His light flittered across the uneven floor, across the far wall and over the crude images of a primitive mural.

"Hello!" he let loose a jovial cry, "And what's this?"

They stepped into the wider cavern and Sarah gasped with delight.  She rushed to the mural, giddy with glee.  "Some sort of pictographs!"  She smiled as she looked them over, wiped away dust and cobwebs.  "Substantial proof that a primitive civilization once lived here on Tiaganu Island!"

"I thought we already knew that?" Ethan asked as he looked over the weird symbols.

"It was only supposition then!" Sarah exclaimed as she pulled out the camera and the flash.  "Even second-hand stories and journal entries are still just stories, not actual proof!  That's what..."

"What Professor Sunnybrook always said!" Lewis recollected happy memories.  Sarah aimed the camera, held up her flash and released a burst of light with the click of a button.

"Well that's really swell," Bethany grumbled, "But I thought we were here to prove there was a Cult of the Volcano God, maybe even a Temple to Tiki-Taki?  Does this stone-age graffiti give you any clues about that?"

Lewis rubbed his chin and studied the mural as Sarah took more photographs.  Finally, he was forced to shrug in defeat.  "I don't know.  I can't read this stuff."

"What do you mean you can't read it?" Bethany exploded.  "What are we supposed to do now?"

The pilot stepped between them, waving for cooler heads.  "Hey!  This is not a problem!  How hard could it be to decipher?  Here, I'll read it!"

"You?" Bethany snorted in disbelief.

"Sure, why not?  It's just a petrified comic book!  Let's see now..."  He frowned at the symbols on the wall and stroked his chin.  After a moment he snapped his fingers and cried, "Aha!  I got it!  It's easy!"  He stepped up to the wall and pointed at various vignettes as he narrated:  "See...these stick figure guys, they lived in some kind of a spider web until one day they came upon a river of catsup.  They were so pleased by this that while this sheep dog was sleeping on its back, they held a party where this guy apparently did jumping jacks.  They knew the party was done when there was nothing left of the bonfire but a pile of burned sticks, the fire was dead--as signified by the skull--but the sticks were still smoking, see?  So then, they sat down on some giant, rotten bananas and looked at the other islands to see where to hold the next party!  See?  Piece of cake!"

Lewis hid his growing grin behind one hand while Bethany and Wayne stared with faces contorted by confusion.

"That has got to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life!" Bethany shouted.

"Hey, at least I tried!" Ethan barked back.

Sarah snapped another photograph and said, "And I really don't think you were too far off."

"How so?" Wayne asked.

Her eyes flitted across the mural bemusedly.  "Well, I think I can translate it."

"You can?" her fellows chorused, almost in unison.

"Well, I haven't been attending Munsey University for nothing!" she told them.  "Professor Sunnybrook and Dr. Drummond are very knowledgeable about primitive cultures, and even Dr. Carlsbad taught an excellent course...before he was disbarred, of course..."

"What does it say?" Bethany interrupted.

"Oh!  Well..."  Sarah pointed to each set of cave drawings as she explained them, just as the pilot had done.  "It appears that the Kazoolis used to live here, in fact they probably originated here on Tiaganu.  They lived in these caves--not a spiderweb--until they were evicted by some magma that bubbled up from the volcano.  Naturally, they sought to appease Tiki-Taki, the Volcano God.  So they made sacrifices of what appear to be goats and also of people.  They did this before the home or temple of Tiki-Taki; a skull-shaped cave in the smoking volcano.  It does not say whether or not this stopped the volcano from rumbling.  But the Kazooli natives took their canoes to live on other islands, but return annually to offer sacrifices to Tiki-Taki, probably in the hopes of placating him so he won't demolish the whole island chain.  At least..."  She hung her head and shuffled her feet.  "...that's my interpretation."

"Sounds like a good summary to me!" Lewis exclaimed.

Wayne found another cave painting a little further down the cave wall.  "What about this one?"

Bethany was surprised that she recognized it at once.  "That's a map of the island!"

Lewis pulled out the one Bethany had handed him on the plane.  He compared the two and declared, "She's right!"

"But look at this!" she pointed at different features on the cave painting.  "Giant carvings of heads...totems...a ravine...distinctive rock formations...this one's chock full of landmarks!"

"Maybe we should get us a copy like that," Wayne suggested.

"I'll take a photograph!" Sarah volunteered.  She stepped forward and clicked the shutter, the flash released a blinding burst of light.

"That'll be great once we get back to civilization and you can develop the film," Bethany told her.  "But it doesn't do us any good right here, right now."

 "Not a problem," Lewis said as he shrugged off his pack.  He dug through his supplies and came up with a small journal.  He flipped through the pages and a folded document fell out.  He snatched it from the floor, slipped it between two pages deep in the book.  Then he found a blank page and pulled out a pencil.  He consulted the cave painting as he scribbled a copy into his book.  "Ok, got it.  We'd better get moving."

They resumed their venture through the winding caves and before long, were rewarded with daylight.  They emerged from the side of a rocky plateau and found luscious foliage all around them.  The wind blew here, and carried with it the songs of birds and the call of monkeys.  Lewis pulled a compass from his pocket, consulted it, then pointed and said, "It's this way." 

After marching for the better part of an hour, they came upon a glade centered around a stone pillar crudely carved into an ugly, leering visage.  Three smaller stones surrounded it in a triangular formation, each baring mysterious carvings. 

Our heroes gawked at the stone for a moment.  They approached for a closer look at the head and the perimeter markers.  Suddenly, Bethany's sharp eyes turned toward the surrounding jungle, but only Lewis seemed to notice.  Sarah reached for her Kodak, and Lewis withdrew his journal.  He pulled on the folded document so it stuck out from the pages, handed the book to the pilot. 

"Get me rubbings of these marker stones, would ya, Clap?"

"Yeah, sure, Lew," Ethan replied, and took the book.

Lewis stepped beside Bethany as the others investigated the landmark.  "What is it?"

She shook her head in slow uncertainty.  "I got the feeling we're being watched."

Lewis listened, but no birdsong nor monkey chatter.  There was a faint breeze, but not so strong as the sound of rustling leaves just beyond the jungle's edge.  A twig snapped somewhere behind him.  A bush shook, but only for a moment.

It could have been his imagination, he hoped it was.  Another heartbeat passed, and then they knew for sure...

To Be Continued...

Quest to the Kobold Caves Part Three

QUEST TO THE KOBOLD CAVES

A Dungeon Adventure

Part Three

Mediphon, tangled in the net, was dragged through the caves like a rabbit in a sack.  It took nearly a score of kobolds, but they pulled him through the tunnels to a wide chamber where a wall of wooden bars was constructed to block the opening of a bubble-like cul-de-sac.  The kobolds gave up; leaving him in the center of the chamber, then returned the way they came, panting for breath as some of them dragged an arm across their brows.  Three human-sized creatures entered from a second tunnel.

The Cleric looked up at them and saw three hobgoblins:  two had mottled orange skin and stringy gray hair, dressed in loose shirts and leather jerkins.  The third had ruddy red-orange skin and long reddish-brown hair cascading from the lizard skull that was the basis of its weird headpiece.  This one wore a poncho and breeches, and many bracelets and necklaces that rattled with the bones of small animals.

The three of them leaned down, their ugly faces regarding him with evil, yellow eyes.  The one in the red jerkin placed his foot on the prisoner and shook him.  "Hey there!  Why you ugly yoomins come here for?"

Mediphon, still in the net and surrounded by monsters, gulped.  "We…we were sent here."

"By your ugly yoomin king?" the one with the lizard skull accused.

"No!  By a ranger!" the Cleric corrected him.  "A…a sort of guardian of the forest."

The one in the yellow jerkin leaned down and snarled at him.  "We know what a ranger is!"

Mediphon gulped.  "Oh, good.  Well, he asked us to come here and make the kobolds go away."

The one in the red jerkin scratched his chin.  "And what of us?" he asked, waving his clawed hand to indicate the three of them.

The Cleric shook his head.  "He said nothing of you.  We all thought that all you hobgoblins were on the other side of the kingdom."

The one in the red jerkin issued a gravelly chuckle that devolved into a wheeze, and slapped the back of one hand against his comrade with the lizard-skull headpiece.  "There, you see, Horkrist?  The yoomins know nothing!  All goes according to the Chief's plan!"

"Hail Ozbaddin!" the one in the yellow jerkin exclaimed.

Horkrist, the one in the lizard-skull headpiece, wiped away the other's distasteful touch and cast a sideways glance at his two comrades.  "Well he knows now," he growled amid the rattle of bones.  "He must not be allowed to leave here, Razzam."

Razzam snorted through his crooked nose.  "He shall not leave."  He looked at the one in the yellow jerkin.  "Korzadub, place him in the cage with the others, and his companion as well!"

The third hobgoblin nodded in obedience, pulled out his sword and opened the net so the prisoner could crawl out.  Mediphon surrendered his flail and raised his arms.  Korzadub corralled him to the wooden bars just as a door was opened for him by Horkrist. 

Within the cul-de-sac he found ten other prisoners, all humans.  He tugged at his mustache with worry and wondered which of his other companions had been captured.  He was surprised when Korzadub picked up the inert body of Haldraginor from a shadowy corner of the chamber.  The monstrous jailers dumped his body in the cage without care, then bolted the door behind them.

The Holy Man stepped up to the bars and stared at the three hobgoblins.  He couldn’t help but notice the lighter color and pallid complexions of the two in the jerkins.  They seemed unhealthy to him, as though suffering from some disease.  Then, he turned to his fallen friend and began to bless his body with the rites of death.

One of the prisoners approached him, placed a hand upon his shoulder.  Mediphon looked up into the face of a middle-aged farmer.  "He is not dead," the man said.  "It is some foul magic, he cannot move at all.  But he is not dead!"

Mediphon stared down at the prone warrior with awestruck eyes.  "You mean…he is merely paralyzed?"

"Call it what you will," the veteran prisoner told him, "But it should wear off."

"But how…" the Cleric's voice trailed off.

The farmer shrugged and pointed at the hobgoblins. "Those two, and a third one like them.  I do not know how they do it."

Mediphon stared at them curiously, new theories percolating in his head.

"Korzadub!"

At the sound of his name, the one in the yellow jerkin turned.  "Yes, Razzam?"

Razzam waved one clawed hand toward the prisoners in the cage.  "These are but two of a larger group, still running loose in our caves.  They must be found and killed.  Take a pack of kobolds and hunt them down!"

Korzadub nodded and saluted in acceptance.  "I shall need more of the potion."

"Of course you will," Horkrist said, his tone flat.  He gave a disinterested gesture toward the second tunnel.  "There is more to be had in my workshop."

Korzadub saluted again, then left.

                                                   *  *  *

Pamblyn wandered the tunnels alone.  She paused, leaned against the rock wall and pulled her helmet from her head.  Straining her ears, she could not hear anything to suggest the kobolds still pursued her.  She was confident that she had lost them. 

With one hand, she pulled a handkerchief from a pouch on her belt and dragged it over her forehead.  She exchanged it for a skin of water, which she held up to her lips and drank from as she accessed the situation.

By her reckoning, it was pretty bad.

True she'd lost the kobolds, but she also lost Mediphon, and the rest of her party as well.  She had witnessed the sudden deaths of Gray Dan and Haldraginor, and had no clue as to the well-being of her remaining companions.  The chances of completing the quest dropped significantly with the dwindling of the party.  She wasn't sure what to do, and desperately wanted a sign.

And then she saw it.  Down the tunnel, amid the flickering light of yet another torch was another Black Pillar. 

With a curious frown, Pamblyn turned and walked toward it, helmet cradled in her arm.  She returned her waterskin as she approached, and ran her hand along the smooth black stone.  With this cursory inspection, she surmised it was identical to the one the party had found earlier:  a simple column which bore no writing, no symbols.  The incongruity of its location was a mystery she was unable to fathom.  

Pamblyn heard the faint clang of metal-on-metal.  Straining her ears, she turned her attention down the ongoing tunnel.  There were grunts and barks, thuds and clangs.  They were the sounds of battle.

As if awaking from a trance, she turned away from the Black Pillar and started down the tunnel.  She took a single step and a spear erupted from the rocky wall beside the Pillar.  Pamblyn jumped at the sudden movement, and let loose a brief startled cry as the spear slammed against the shield she carried.

"Damn kobolds," she muttered as she grabbed the shaft of the spear.  She pulled, but it would not come out of the wall.  She pushed and felt some tension behind the spear, when she released her grip, it sprang forward again. 

She gave the surrounding cave a fleeting glance as she pulled the helmet back onto her head.  Spying no other traps, she rushed down the cavern and turned a corner, sword in hand.

"Kill the Elf!" the orange-red kobold commander ordered; his back to the human warrioress.  Beyond him, six rust-red kobolds charged at Sunthorn with their long knives and short maces.  The Elf parried, dodged, and danced around the midget monsters, deftly deflecting their bevy of blows.

Pamblyn seized the opportunity for a surprise attack of her own and crept up behind the orange-red kobold.  She raised her sword high for the killing blow when a sudden alarm was called out by one of Sunthorn's attackers:  "Watch out, Korzadub!"

The kobold leader side-stepped and Pamblyn's sword came crashing down, the blade biting into the cavern floor.  "Die yoomin!" Korzadub cried and reached out with his bare, scaly hand.

Pamblyn remembered the mysterious killing touch that Haldraginor suffered at the hands of the previous orange kobold, Drang.  With a backhand swing, she slapped the monster's hand away with her sturdy shield.  Korzadub yelped in pain and jumped away.

Sunthorn called out in distress, and Pamblyn charged the throng surrounding him.  A swing of her blade, a swipe with his scimitar, and kobolds fell to the cavern floor. 

"Quick!  This way!" Pamblyn ordered and raced back down the cavern from whence she came.  The Elf slammed his leaf-shaped shield against one canine head and followed her.

"After them, you dogs!" Korzadub bellowed, "Don't let them escape!"  His three remaining kobolds ran in pursuit, and he ran behind them.

Pamblyn ran back to the Black Pillar and screeched to a halt.  Sunthorn turned and leveled his scimitar at the onrushing kobolds.  A few quick swings with their flashing blades and the kobolds were dead.  Korzadub, madness glowing in his eyes, jumped over the kobold corpses and grabbed Pamblyn's shield.

The warrior woman shrieked in surprise, turned toward the spear that still jutted out from the rock wall and charged.  Korzadub jerked as he was skewered, a cry of pain only gurgled in his throat.  Pamblyn pulled away from him and he fell off her shield with no resistance, and landed on his feet.  He looked down at the head of the spear thrust through his torso, looked up at the pair of adventurers, then his body slumped with death.

The Elf and the Warrioress both sighed in relief.  They leaned against the cavern wall, and stared at the impaled kobold and the Black Pillar beside it as they regained their breath.

"It is good to see you," Sunthorn said at last.  "I feared the worst for all of you."

"Likewise," Pamblyn replied.  "I lost Mediphon in the caves; I fear he may have been captured."

The Elf nodded gravely.  "I lost Padrelle in the pit.  It seems she will torment Gray Dan for all eternity."

The Warrioress harrumphed.  "So much for being unkillable."  Then they both stared in muted wonder as a light flashed by Korzadub's doglike head.

A spark appeared in the air above the impaled kobold's shoulder.  Sparks burst in the thin air, obscuring the corpse with flashes of light and brief clouds of smoke.  Little burning embers appeared from nowhere, flew from the body, fell away and burned out before reaching the ground.  Streams of smoke marked the path of each spark, and quickly dissipated.  Then the brief spectacle was finished, the kobold body was gone, the larger corpse of a man-sized monster was impaled on the spear in its place.

"He's not a kobold at all!" Pamblyn exclaimed, "He's a hobgoblin!"

Sunthorn regarded the new body with one raised eyebrow.  "A rather sickly-looking hobgoblin.  His skin has a pallor, it should be a darker red, and his hair is gray.  There is something…wrong with this hobgoblin."

"But these are supposed to be kobolds, what was he doing here?" Pamblyn asked as she approached the body for a closer inspection.

"Don't you mean 'what are they doing here'?" Sunthorn asked.

Pamblyn's face snapped toward him and she stared for a moment with a puzzled expression.  Then realization exploded on her face.  "The other orange kobold!  Drang!  How many more of them are there?  What are they doing here?"

Sunthorn rubbed his chin.  "Perhaps they were driven out," he suggested.  "They could be infected, or diseased, or cursed…then driven out of Ozbaddin's horde.  And now they've taken over this pack of kobolds."

Pamblyn let out a thoughtful hum as she considered the theory.  "We need to know for sure," she said, "I wonder if he has any clues on him."  With a grimace on her face, she proceeded to check the pockets in the yellow jerkin and the pouches on Korzadub's belt.  She found a handful of silver and copper coins, a flint and stone used to light campfires and torches, a partially eaten rat, and two earthenware vials.  She pulled out the stopper of one vial and took an exploratory sniff.

"Healing potion?" Sunthorn asked.

The Warrioress shook her head.  "It doesn't smell like a healing potion to me."  She passed the vial to the Elf and pulled the stopper from the remaining vial.

Sunthorn sniffed at the bottle.  "I'm not sure," he said, "but it may be a polymorph potion.  This could be what gives them the shape of kobolds."

Pamblyn took another whiff and sneered in distaste.  "I suppose there's only one way to know for sure?"

The Elf nodded.  "To drink them, yes."

Pamblyn sighed.  "Well, it will certainly be easier to travel the cave-complex if we aren't attacked every few feet…and we may learn what happened to the others."

Sunthorn nodded in agreement and held his vial up as though proposing a toast.  "Shall we, then?"

Pamblyn clinked her vial against his, then they both drank.  Each of them was engulfed in sparks and smoke.  Once the magic had taken effect, they looked at one another's canine snouts and horned heads.  Then they looked down at their own scaly, clawed hands.  Pamblyn gasped with amazement.  "It worked!"

Sunthorn raised one eyebrow on his now-canine head.  "Indeed," he said, "Let's go see what we can see."

To Be Continued...

The Case of the Accursed Amulet Part Three

THE CASE OF THE ACCURSED AMULET

A Phantom Sleuth Adventure

First published in Apeshit!, 2013

Part Three

A few short hours later, Brian Twain was in a private room in Stockport General Hospital where Jane Wayland hovered over him like a mother hen.  The knife had been removed from his back and given to the police, the wound stitched and bandaged.  Brian was then placed in a room for overnight observation, and the nurses came and went in a steady stream under Jane’s careful scrutiny.  Eventually, a man in a white doctor’s coat entered.

“Good afternoon, I’m Dr. Saunders.”

At the sound of the name, Brian looked up with immediate interest.  He didn’t recognize the face with the bulbous nose and sagging jowls, but he knew the voice behind the disguise.

“You’re not the doctor we saw earlier,” Jane remarked.

“No ma’am,” said the man in the white coat as he stepped up to the bed, grabbed the clipboard and began looking through the charts.  “I’m a specialist on nerve damage.  My colleague asked that I make the time to give your condition a quick appraisal.”  He looked up at Jane, smiled.  “Miss, would you mind stepping outside so that I may conduct my examination?  I promise it shall be brief.”

Jane absorbed the worrisome prospect of nerve damage and quickly consented.  The man in the white coat thanked her, held the door open as she left the room.  Then he closed the door, pulled the shade down on its window and turned back to the patient.  “I came as soon as I heard, Brian!  What happened?”

Brian grinned and said, “Hello Byron!”  He lost the grin.  “I’ll tell you what happened:  I was stabbed in the back by a monkey!”

Byron Twain frowned through his disguise.  “A monkey?  You’d better tell me everything.”

Brian wasted no time in relating the adventure thus far.  The account was cold and factual, a detailed history, with no words wasted for the sake of entertainment.  As Brian came to the end of his tale, he reached out to the nightstand by his bed, seized a scrap of paper and held it out to his disguised twin.  “Jane has threatened to watch over me all night long.  You’ll have to pick up the trail and this is the only clue I can offer you.”

The man in the white coat took the paper and frowned at the name and address at the top of the page.  “An empty receipt from the Jade Lotus Laundry?”   He turned it over and recognized Montgomery Fisk’s address, written in neat, penciled letters.

Brian nodded.  “I believe the Chinaman dropped it in Fisk’s gardens during our little tussle.  It could lead you straight to him…”  Then he slumped in his bed.  “…or it could be a dead end.”

Byron stowed the receipt in a pocket of the white coat.  “I’ll look into it.  In the meanwhile, you heal up.” 

* * *

The Jade Lotus was deep in Stockport’s Chinatown, a neighborhood cramped onto the brick-and-stone quays across the harbor from the shipping docks where the Gertrude Burrows made port.  It was a three-story brownstone with crumbling mortar, boards criss-crossed over the windows and doors, and a painted sign for the laundry which bore chipped letters and fading image of an exotic green flower. 

Byron Twain; now clad in the gray hat, coat, and mask of the Sleuth’s costume; skulked through the deep shadows of dusk seeking an entrance to the disused edifice.  At the rear he found a pair of double-doors which covered a basement entrance.  Close inspection revealed that although the boards were crossed over both doors, they were only nailed to one.  To the casual passer-by, it offered the illusion that this entrance was barred like all the other portals of the building.

The Sleuth cast his eyes up and down the back street.  Spying no lookouts, he entered through the sham-blockade and pulled the doors quietly closed behind him to maintain the illusion. 

He descended the creaking stairs into a basement crowded with boilers, furnaces, and water pumps.  The spaces between these dusty, rusting machines were filled with crates and stuffed sacks that were piled up like sandbags against a flood.  Out of the corner of his eye, the Sleuth spied a movement off to his right.  With soft footsteps, he proceeded to investigate. 

A gray skull lunged out from behind a crate, surrounded by a mass of golden-brown fur.  It screeched at him with sudden ferocity, and instinct forced him to step back.  Before he could suppress this basic human urge, strong arms emerged beneath his own arms and reached up to his neck in a submission hold.  Grunting in exertion, he struggled to break free, but failed.  Unable to extricate himself, the Sleuth heard urgent voices behind him babbling in what he assumed was some Chinese dialect.  There was a burst of pain on the crown of his head, and everything went black.

*  *  *

The Sleuth awoke with a throbbing head.  He wanted to rub the pain away and found his wrists tied to the arms of the chair he was sitting in.  His ankles were likewise secured to the chair legs.  A quick look around revealed that his chair was in a cement-lined depression—not unlike a swimming pool—with a drain in the center of the floor and a pair of pipes that stretched up to the ceiling high overhead.  A set of narrow stairs led to an open walkway that surrounded the pit, but there were no other features.

A stern-faced Chinaman stood over him, with appraising eyes and a bottle of smelling salts in hand.  Satisfied with what he saw, the Chinaman corked the salts, folded his arms into the sleeves of his black robes and called up to the walkway above.

Another Chinaman stepped up to the brink and looked down into the pit with hard eyes.  Unlike his fellows, he wore a voluminous yellow robe that was covered with an intricate Oriental design in crimson thread.  He had fat cheeks and a babyish face behind a long black mustache and a tall forehead that stretched up to his bald cranium.

The man in the yellow robe descended the steps and approached the Sleuth as the Chinaman in black bowed and backed away in reverence.  The man in yellow regarded the Sleuth in silent contemplation for a long moment.  Then, at last, he spoke.  “Good evening.”  His voice was nasal, his tone curt.  “When my servants first informed me of a trespasser, the news was not so engaging.  However, once they described you, my interest piqued.”

The Sleuth frowned up at him.  “Who are you?”

“My name is Lao Shiang,” the newcomer replied.  “Sometimes I am called ‘The Dragon’s Claw’.  You may or may not have heard of me.”

“I’m sorry, no,” the Sleuth admitted.

Lao Shiang smiled.  “Fear not, I am not offended.  Indeed, I strive very hard to remain anonymous and unknown in my endeavors.  However, very little occurs amid the local criminal underworld without coming to my attention, hence my interest in you.”

The Sleuth looked up sharply from his bonds.  “What do you mean?”

“I deduce that you are this mysterious Sleuth whom I have heard about,” Lao Shiang hypothesized aloud.  “You have been connected to various crimes—many thwarted, and many that were successful.  Yet you have never been apprehended, and I daresay that few can give a reliable report about you.  You come and go like a phantom.  Yes, I believe you are the Sleuth.  Tell me please, am I correct?”

The Sleuth’s eyes wandered about the dimly lit basin as he considered his answer.  “Yes, I suppose you are.”

Lao Shiang clapped his hands together in triumph.  “I have wondered for some time now whether or not you truly exist!” he laughed.  “The thought has occurred to me that you were merely an invention for the purpose of propaganda.  Either invented by the authorities in a vain effort to dissuade criminal enterprise, or by the criminal element as a red herring to confound police.

“But instead you are real!” the Chinaman marveled.  “If half of what I have heard of you is truth, then you are a most extraordinary person!  It is an honor to meet you at long last!”  He offered a deep, respectful bow.

“Funny way to show it,” the Sleuth replied, tugging at the ropes that held him secured to the chair. 

“I apologize for the necessary precaution,” Lao Shiang stated, his tone devoid of emotion.  “I have heard conflicting reports about your personal disposition.  Although Commissioner Wayland publicly denies your existence, it is rumored that he has a secret file about you, and regards you a great criminal threat.  Contrariwise, other rumors insist that you were instrumental in the downfall of countless criminals.  So, you see, I have yet to determine whether or not I can trust you.  Exactly whose side are you on?”

“I am on the side of justice,” the Sleuth said in a defiant voice.

Lao Shiang sneered.  “An unsatisfactory response, for justice is highly speculative.  Its definition depends greatly on one’s point-of-view.  What purpose has brought you here to the Jade Lotus?”

“I have come to retrieve the pendant of Mo Tzu and return it to Montgomery Fisk, the rightful owner,” the Sleuth declared.

The man in the yellow robe nodded and let loose a heavy sigh.  “That is unfortunate, for it means we are at odds.  I had hoped that you could be persuaded to work in accord with my organization?”  He looked askance at the Sleuth, who offered a wry smile and shook his head.  “A pity.  Under different circumstances I suspect we could have worked together quite well.  Instead I fear I shall have to kill you.”

The Sleuth straightened in his seat.  “Kill me?”

“Of course.”  Lao Shiang raised his arms and indicated the room around them.  “This is a sub-basement beneath the laundry.  This vat you are seated in is meant to hold seawater, pumped in from the harbor.”  He waved one hand to the pipes that ran from the pit to the ceiling.  “It is then meant to be taken up through pipes to the laundry machines on the floors above.  But we will only fill this basin, and you will drown as we abandon these premises permanently.”

The Sleuth shrugged in his restraints.  “Why leave?  Once I’m dead, I won’t be revealing your hide-out to anyone.”

“True,” the Chinaman mused.  “However, from what little I have heard of your exploits, I deduce you have some organization—whether great or small, I cannot tell—at your disposal.  Therefore, I must assume assistance in some form will come to this place in search of you.  Only a fool would risk assuming otherwise.  I am no fool, so we make haste to depart before your agents may come to your aid.”  Lao Shiang turned to the narrow stairs, paused, turned back and advanced on his prisoner.  “But first I must satisfy my curiosity.  If you will indulge me…”

Lao Shiang reached out with one hand, pulled the mask up onto the Sleuth’s forehead.  The Chinaman gawked for a long moment at the sagging jowls and bulbous nose that Byron Twain hid behind to infiltrate his twin’s hospital room.  Lao Shiang grunted thoughtfully and returned the mask to the Sleuth’s eyes.  “Your face is not known to me and not at all as I expected.”

His curiosity sated, Lao Shiang turned on his heel and climbed the stairs.  A subtle wave prompted his servant to follow him.  The Dragon’s Claw issued orders in his native tongue; the servant bowed and retreated beyond the Sleuth’s limited view.  The golden brown monkey scuttled up to Lao Shiang, chortled, held up the ornate box to its master.

“An interesting animal you have there,” the Sleuth remarked.

The villain looked down at the simian, smiled, and took the proffered box.  “Yes, he is a Sichuan golden hair monkey from the Shaanxi province.  He has proven a clever pet, and has learned many useful tricks.”

The squeal of metal on metal filled the air as a rusty valve was forced open after a long rest.  Seawater poured into the pit from some opening behind the Sleuth.  In a matter of minutes, the water covered his shoes.

“I apologize for the mundanity of this death,” the Dragon’s Claw lamented.  “I feel an extraordinary man deserves a more worthy demise.  Alas, I am pressed for time.  Farewell O Sleuth, may you go to whatever Heaven suits you best.”  Then he turned and walked away, followed by his pet.

To Be Concluded...