High Fantasy Modern Storyhour - The Long Road (updated December 7)

[RangerWickett]

October 29, 2005
2:45 pm

"Robert-san," Wiji-wiji says, "I gotta you zhi tahki reggo."

Robert accepts the turkey leg, takes a bite, then notices that one of the turkeys sitting next to Wiji-wiji has no legs. It's not bleeding; rather, it's body is fully smooth.

"Good stuff," Robert says, looking off and thinking. "A little dry. Hey, how are you here?"

"I ama touristo."

"No, I mean, how are you here? On 'Gaia'? With a flock of turkeys. No wait, don't answer that last one. I don't really care. But yeah, how'd you get here?"

The Japanese man chews on his own turkey leg, smiling at Robert with narrow eyes.

"We pray gorufu, ne?"

A moment passes when Robert thinks it would be a good idea to kill this man. As fun as he is, he's a little irritating, and this is a bad time for irritation.

"Alright," Robert says. "Where does the course start? Oh, and can the others play too? It's kinda bored, you know, with sitting around here trapped on Gaia that you can apparently just show up in and leave whenever you want and I think some golf would be fun."

"Ah, werry good, Robert-san." Wiji-wiji stands up and pulls a pair of putters from his golf bag. "Of cosu yoru friendso can pray choo. More prayers is werry fun, hai. Totemo tanoshii yo!"

"Hold on a sec," Robert says. "You said golf. Those are putters. We've gotta tee off first."

Wiji-wiji shakes his head. "Oh, no no. We pray putt-putt gorufu. Werry fun."

Robert laughs, hoping to manipulate the strange man. "Wait, you're Japanese. You should know putt-putt isn't golf! I mean, I'll play golf, if you want. And you've got the clubs. But I wouldn't be interested in a kid's game like miniature golf."

Wiji-wiji looks confused, but then he accedes. "Hai, hai. Wakarimasu. Givu me . . . ano . . . ten minutsu. Make a new gorufu coursu."

"Sure thing," Robert says. "Hey, can I get another one of those legs. The other guys are probably hungry too."

With an eager grin, Wiji-wiji bows, then pulls a leg off one of the turkeys. It instantly transforms into a nicely cooked piece of meat, cleared of feathers, and he hands it to Robert. Then, with a short nod, Wiji-wiji heads off slightly uphill toward the area of the RenFest called Sherwood Forest. The turkey flock follows him, gobbling eagerly in what almost sounds like words. The stragglers are a one-legged turkey that hops after the flock, and a no-legged turkey that rolls itself across the ground like a ball.

Robert heads back inside to let the others know they've been invited to a game of golf.

John and Belladonna decide to join in, while Scarpedin stays behind and tries to shape things with his mind, believing he might actually be in The Matrix.

Wiji-wiji has set up perhaps the worst location for a golf game ever. Starting at the far end of the area known as Sherwood forest, and ending with the green right where he had been sitting earlier, it's a Par 5 course with no fairway, and trees throughout. Wiji-wiji proudly displays his putter, assured that it will help him win. Robert actually knows how to play golf, so he chooses the appropriate clubs, and John follows his cue. Belladonna is uncertain what to take so Wiji-wiji suggests one club in particular. It looks very old, and the metal isn't shiny like the rest of the clubs, but Wiji-wiji promises:

"It werry goodo crubbu! Hit werry hardo."

They take turns with their swings, Robert driving it cleanly around the trees, while John and Belladonna keep getting their shots deflected by branches. Wiji-wiji somehow manages to get his ball in a bird's nest, and refuses to take a penalty and remove the ball from the hazard. When Robert gets his shot in, he's at par. John comes in 3 over, Belladonna 5. Wiji-wiji stops after twelve putts, impressed with his opponent's skill.

He collects his clubs, except for the one Belladonna took, and then hands Robert a PDA.

"Congrashurations, Robert-san. I wirru shi you in Sabannah. Good rucku, and shank you for werry good games."

Robert is about to ask Wiji-wiji about what he meant involving Savannah, but just then Scarpedin shouts from the candle store that Debbie found Terry. Robert, Belladonna, and John turn in suprise, and when they look back, the well-dressed Japanese man is gone.

 

[RangerWickett]

October 29, 2005
3:47 pm

"Now," Debbie says, "we don't know for sure that this is your boy Terry, but there's some pretty weird stuff going on, so we think we got the right place."

Robert and Scarpedin exchange glances at the 'weird stuff' comment, and both of them give one quiet and mirthless huff of laughter. Belladonna waves for them to be quiet, and John hides a wry smile behind his cigarette.

They can't see Debbie. Her s ghost, Chandler, is relaying the message in Debbie's voice.

"There's this place not too far from here, Lover's Lane. It goes behind the jousting field, has a nice little treeline so you can't really see inside it. Basically it's a long road with bends and lots of benches for people to sit and be romantic. But everybody who's gone in there the past hour or so left in a hurry. David, one of the guys who works for me, he said it was cold in there, and he thought something was watching him. But he's a good man, so he went in anyway. Said there were two guys - a big guy and a short black one - standing around like they were on lookout. They told him to git, so he done git."

They recognize the descriptions - Rex and Hex, the two men who attacked them right before Terry somehow got the four of them stuck on Gaia.

"Stupid Terry," Scarpedin says. "His ass is lucky he's our only way back."

The group thanks Debbie, and then Chandler hands them a specially-prepared candle that, when they light it, will let the group see into Terra, and give them enough solidity to interact with people and things there. Meanwhile, Robert has been looking at the PDA Wiji-wiji gave him. There's only one interesting file - a scan of an old book, in French, with a few of the pages translated into English. Everything else is in Japanese.

When Scarpedin gets a look at the PDA, he realizes the scanned book is the same one that he was trying to get back in the New Age magic store right before they were attacked by Rex and Hex. Scarpedin thinks it was a spell book, and indeed, once they take a look at the translations of the French text, it appears that the book has instructions to cast a few spells -- invisibility from fey, some sort of animation/divination spell, a spell to locate magic, and then many more still in French.

While Chandler gives Belladonna and Robert directions on how to get to Lover's Lane, Scarpedin and John decide to give one of the spells a try. After a minute of struggling over awkward French pronunciations, they manage to make Robert's folding straight razor hop out of his pocket, open itself, and then walk around and dance like it had two legs. The spellbook has instructions for interpreting the dance in order to read the future, but none of the group bothers. They're just stunned that they did magic.

Robert glowers and takes his straight razor back -- it still is slightly rusted from when the nymph blew on it. But he's not angry. Instead he takes a look at the spellbook and tells them, "Alright, do this one now."

He's pointing at the "invisibility from fey" spell.

"That one looks kinda hard," Scarpedin says. "I haven't really, y'know, done this before."

"I don't care," Robert commands. "Do it. Look, if I'm going to believe I'm really in a fairy world, I'm not going to be stupid about it. Do you see that title?"

Belladonna looks now, then smiles and says with a charming Southern drawl, "It definitely does look useful."

Scarpedin wavers, and John sighs impatiently, takes the PDA from him, and reads what the spell will require. Almost too soft to hear, he mutters something about ". . . are all pussies."

 

[RangerWickett]

October 29, 2005
4:05 pm

The French comes surprisingly easily to John. It reminds him of Latin, which is strange, because he's never studied Latin. At least not that he knows.

A minute later he has completed the ritual. Though the spell's text did not explicitly state how he was supposed to aim the spell, that too comes fairly easily. A momentary smear passes before his eyes, and he sees something similar cover Robert, Scarpedin, and Belladonna.

"So?" Robert asks.

John picks up the PDA, tucks it into his coat pocket, and pulls out a cigarette in the same motion. "I think it worked. Not sure how long it lasts. Let's go."

Debbie wishes them luck, and they hurry out of the candle store. Less than a minute later they find the entrance to Lover's Lane. Belladonna lights the candle and passes it around the group. Now, in addition to the strange visual smudge across them, they all feel like they're covered in a thin layer of wax, and all around them people begin to appear as they straddle the border between Terra and Gaia.

There's a crowd around the entrance to the forested walkway, and they look on in nervousness as four people appear before them. Scarpedin waves to the startled group, and then the four of them hurry into the lane.

It's dark here, darker than just the shade of the trees overhead should provide. There is a chill in the air that feels eager to crawl out of the air and into their hearts, but it does not frighten them away. After going about two hundred feet down the path, John holds up his hand for them to stop.

"I'll go ahead," he says, "try to sneak up on the guard."

Belladonna frowns. "You're going alone? He'll kill you."

John shrugs, seeming genuinely uninterested. "Better me than the rest of you. I'll be fine."

Scarpedin unslings the map case he has been wearing over his shoulder. He pops off the cap and draws out an ancient-looking, well-oiled sword. He shakes out his arms, pats something under his right armpit, then grips the sword in both hands.

Belladonna adjusts the stilettos holding her hair in place, then draws a pair of two-shot derringers from her dress. She smirks.

"We've got your back, John."

John looks from Scarpedin and his sword, to Belladonna with her pistols, to Robert.

Robert looks back at him, his expression blank. "What? Oh, sorry! I didn't bring a lethal weapon with me on a frkkin' greyhound bus! I'm sorry. I'm not that sort of person."

"Good," John says. "Then let me borrow your razor."

Robert puts a hand to his pocket, defensive. "My razor."

Groaning, John pulls out the iron skillet Ded Bob sold them. At this, Robert acquiesces and hands over the straight razor.

"Okay," he says. "I can't have you risking your life with a frying pan."

John takes the razor, flicks it open, and hands the skillet to Robert. Turning away, he takes one last draw on his cigarette, drops it, grinds it out with his foot, then crouches low and slinks ahead of the rest of the group.

When John isn't looking, Robert puts the pan on the ground, shaking his head. He pulls a stun gun out of his pocket. To Scarpedin and Bellaonna's accusatory looks, he says, "What? I'm not going to risk my life either."

* * *​

"I'm going to get a steak tonight," Rex says into his cel phone. There's a pause as he listens to Hex on the other end, then he laughs. "Hell yeah. No other reason to come to Texas, right? Except maybe Tex-Mex. Hey, let me guess, you're going to have fried chicken?"

John sneaks up, bent low, hidden in the tree line. Rex is facing the wrong direction, oblivious on his phone, but he has his pistol in his other hand. It's a Walther PPK, equipped with a silencer.

Rex laughs again, "Well if the shoe fits, man. . . . Nah, nothing out here. Like Morgan said: in, out, easy. Like sex with your mother."

The flow of conversation is easy to anticipate, and John's steps all land while Rex is talking. He gets in behind the tall man and slowly, over a minute, he makes his way to within arm's reach. The bastard certainly has it coming; John can also faintly hear Hex's voice further down the trail. The two men are having a conversation on cel phones when they stand only thirty feet apart. They attacked him earlier, so he is justified in killing them. It's all so familiar, catching a foe off guard, and it feels good to do it again after such a long . . .

John stops, right as his arm is coming around to slice Rex's throat with the razor. He doesn't know where the memory came from, but now, for just a moment, he hesitates, unable to kill.

Then he sees the cat. It's the size of a panther, set to pounce, ten feet away on the other side of the Lover's Lane trail, crouching in shadows that seem to flow off its body. It's eyes are vivid green, just like the tiny cat that was spying on them in the candle store, and for a moment it's gaze falls directly on John. Though a moment later it starts to look away (for it cannot see John under the effects of the invisibility to fey spell) in the instant he is held in its eye, John draws in an anxious breath.

Rex, listening to his cel phone, hears the noise, right behind him. He spins, and reflexively John slashes across the man's jugular vein.

Rex shouts in pain, dropping his cel phone so he can put his hand to the gushing wound. John is too shocked by his failed ambush to press the attack, giving Rex the moment he needs to step back, raise his gun, and fire.

 

[RangerWickett]

Continued. . .

The silenced gunshot is too soft for them to hear, but John's cry of pain is quite audible. Scarpedin sprints down the trail, not even trying to keep to cover. His sword is drawn back for a swing, and he shouts, "Die mutherf*ckers!" as he charges in.

At the last second he spots the giant black cat, rocking nervously on its paws. Its ears flick, and it's clear it knows that Scarpedin's coming, but it's eyes sweep right across him. The invisibility to fey spell hides him from the beast, and so for perhaps the first time in the history of the world, a man gets the drop on a cat. His sword chops into the panther-like fey's shoulder, and the cat snarls in pain.

It rears up on its hind paws and bats at where it thinks Scarpedin is. The first swipe misses, but the second catches the man on his left breast. Almost instantly the cat fades into the ground, leaving an inky pool of shadow behind, and then immediately the cat rises from shadows behind Scarpedin and lunges to bite him. But Scarpedin has already experienced Terry's "disappear and tap you on the shoulder" trick twice today. Instinctively he dodges the attack, and takes another heroic swipe at the fey cat's face for good measure.

During all of this, of course, he's ignoring John, standing barely ten feet away with a gun shot wound in his belly.

In the confusion Scarpedin caused, it's easy for Belladonna and John to get close to Rex. The thug, still clutching his bleeding throat, spins to try to take a shot at Robert, but John lashes out with a fist and cracks Rex's jaw. The man's shot is knocked slightly, and Robert takes a bullet in his right collarbone instead of in his chest. The bullet slows Robert down, but he forces himself to move while there's an opening. One jolt of a stungun later, Rex is on the ground. John picks up Rex's silenced pistol, then notices Hex shouting in worry over the cel phone.

John plucks up the phone and whispers into it, "Say 'bye' to your friend."

Belladonna flinches as John blows Rex's brains out of the back of his skull, and a fraction of a second later, Robert also flinches convincingly. But they don't have time to argue, because Scarpedin is spinning back and forth, slashing at the strange magical panther that is guarding the path to where no doubt they are keeping Terry.

The cat-beast is confused. In its dim, just barely above primal mind, it knows it has blood of the fey, and that worked steel like swords should not be able to harm it. Even earlier, being hit by the car was merely an irritation. It does not understand that Scarpedin's sword was cold-forged fifteen hundred years ago, crafted specifically to defeat fey and other magical races in the Great War of Camelot. It only knows that it has not been hurt like this before, and though it can hear and smell its foe, it cannot see him.

With a final spiteful flurry of bites, claws, and slinking darkness, the fey cat snarls and leaps away, bounding between pools of shadow like a dolphin breaking the surface of the sea.

"Sh*t," John says. "You okay, man?"

Scarpedin grins through his bloodied lip and the cascade of blood from a gash on his forehead. With utmost sincerity he says, "Never felt better. C'mon man, let's get Terry."

Robert points at Belladonna, then to Scarpedin. "Quick, put a bandage on him or something, before-. Wait, put a bandage on me first. Ho-lee sh*t, that bastard shot me."

From the cel phone in John's hand, the familiar notes of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" begin to play. John can almost feel magical heat emanating from the phone.

"Dah," he says, and he flips the phone closed. The music ends, though they can still hear it faintly from further down the trail.

The group gathers together, huddling near the trees for cover. As Belladonna tears part of Scarpedin's shirt to make bandages (because she would never ruin her own clothes), Robert looks John in the eyes. His gaze dips to the wound in John's belly, the blood barely visible against all the dark leather the man's wearing. Again Robert looks at John. John just shrugs, bends over slightly, and pulls out a cigarette.

"I know who you look like now." Scarpedin points at John, his tone a mix of pleased and accusatory. "Billy Baldwin."

John grimaces, then gestures down the path. "I'll go through the woods. In a minute, you head down the path, and we'll come at them from two directions."

Robert nods. "Good plan," he says, his expression one of being moments away from going into shock.

"Oh, and here's your razor. I got a gun now."

John slinks into the woods, a little less gracefully now with his belly wound. The three of them watch him go, and then Scarpedin begins to count by 'Mississippis.' Robert spends thirty Mississippis looking at the corpse of Rex, and then he puts out a rubber glove, picks up two bullet casings, and tucks them into his pocket.

They're getting ready to move when the ground around them begins to shake. Grasses and weeds burst from packed dirt, and trees branches leap out at them, snaring ankles, arms, and weapons. Scarpedin tries to hack his way clear, but he's bound securely.

Demurely, gorgeously, with all the proper bouncing and swaying, the nymph from before walks pertly out of the woods toward them. She catches Belladonna's eye and seems to sigh lustily at her, and then she moves beside Robert. The entangling foliage parts for her, but only seems to tighten around Robert, pulling his arms back.

She poutily says a few words in German, but then there is a mighty metal clang, and the nymph reels. Groaning somehow seductively, she clutches her head, staggers away, and turns to see Belladonna awkwardly pressing her way through the entangling brush, holding the cold iron skillet Ded Bob sold them. Belladonna smirks at the nymph, then takes another swing, catching the nymph in her chest.

Scarpedin manages to pull free of the plants, and he lends his sword to the beating. The nymph cries out, turns into a fox, and tries to flee, but Belladonna lunges and thumps the flat of her frying pan onto the back of the tiny woodland creature. The fox cracks to the ground and whimpers, unconscious.

* * *​

Lover's Lane bends near its end, where it opens into a small clearing with a gazebo and several stone benches. From the cover of the trees, John spots Terry tied face down to one of the benches. Ten feet from the gazebo, hiding behind a flowered trellis, is Hex, listening intently to his iPod as he cycles through songs, apparently looking for the right spell. The man's not looking at all in John's direction.

Given the choice between rescuing Terry discreetly and killing an unaware enemy, John only briefly hesitates. There is a moment, as he approaches Hex from behind, when he wonders if he should take the man alive to find out who they were working for, but he decides it's not necessary.

Hex is intently watching the path, waiting for his enemies to come down the straight path, not in from behind or the side. Careful to keep in Hex's blind spot, John comes within 5 ft., points the gun at the back of Hex's head, and fires.

There is the pifft of a silenced gunshot, and then the metallic twang of a ricochet as the bullet is deflected. A flash of light appears behind Hex's head as his magical shield saves him from the execution. Suddenly the head phones shake with piercing volume as Hex spins, his eyes filled with tears of rage. Johnny Cash plays furiously, and a ring of fire begins to form around Hex's hand.

* * *​

"We gotta go," Scarpedin says, cutting Robert free. "Our Baldwin brother is going to rescue Terry without us."

Robert and Belladonna nod, and they start down the trail at a run. But just before they reach the bend that will lead to Terry, a figure steps out of the shadows directly in front of them. In the instant they have to look at him as he attacks, they see a tall, dark-haired man, dressed in a solid black suit, with a white rose on his lapel.

Scarpedin could swear he looks like Christian Bale.

Long legs snap out and catch Robert in the belly, and strong arms gracefully deflect Robert's lunge with the stun gun. Belladonna raises her gun at the black-clad attacker, but he reaches out, twists her hands until she loses grip of her gun, and then fires Belladonna's own derringer at her chest from point-blank range. Only luck and reflexes save her as the bullet hits the frame of her corset and is deflected slightly away from her vitals.

"Holy sh*t," Belladonna curses, backing away and drawing a second derringer. She can't get a clean shot, though, because the man leaps to the side and puts Robert in the path of the bullet. "Dammit! Out of the way."

Robert is suddenly completely business. His face is blank as he slashes a feint with his straight razor, then follows up with the stun gun. He strikes a glancing blow on the man's suit, but somehow the fabric blocks the debilitating electrical charge. Scarpedin moves in around to the man's back side, but when he slashes the man bends over to dodge, then lashes out with a backward kick to Scarpedin's kidney. As he stands back up, the man pivots and uses a sweep kick to trip Belladonna.

A flinch of rage crosses Robert's face at the gall this bastard has to not be hit. Robert attacks again, but the man is back on his feet and he deflects the attacks his martial arts. Scarpedin chops downward and cuts off the left shoulder of the man's coat, revealing the white lining beneath but not drawing blood. Belladonna, back on her feet, pulls stilettos out of her hair and begins fiddling with vials in a pouch on her hip.

A third attempt by Robert to stun their attacker is again fruitless, and before Scarpedin can take another swing at the black-clad martial artist, the man catches Scarpedin's eye, and a chill runs through the air. The man's evil eye casts a spell over Scarpedin, and despite the warrior's furious efforts to resist, he finds he cannot resist his master's will.

Robert glances between the two of them, instantly realizing that something has changed for the worse in Scarpedin's demeanor. As Scarpedin draws back to cut down Robert, Robert realizes he's now going to have to kill two people to get out of this alive.

To be continued. . . .

 

[Steverooo]

With a shrug, Robert tosses the Scrabble tiles into the air, then steps back. They manage to all fall very close to each other, forming a rough line that spells out "M.A.R.I.E. L.A.V.E.A.U."

Marie Deuveau, you know you love me, Witch!
Give me a little charm that'll make me rich!
Give me a million dollars, and I tell you what I'll do,
This very night, I'm a-gonna marry you!
And it'll be Mmmmmmmmmm, another man done gone!



Now look out, if the Wicked-Ranger starts throwing in one-armed alligator-hunters named Amos Moses!

 

[RangerWickett]

. . . continued

Robert backs away in a hurry, but Scarpedin catches up to him and slashes across his forearm. Robert gasps and grabs the wound, stopping for a moment to glare at Scarpedin with disbelief before trying to drop him with the stun gun. Scarpedin parries the tiny plastic gun with his ancient Arthurian longsword, then slashes into Robert’s thigh. Robert staggers backward, cursing at his own foolishness, and Scarpedin raises his sword for a killing blow.

Belladonna lunges at Scarpedin with a stiletto, managing to stab him in the kidney, but she pays for it as the black-suit-wearing warlock grabs her arm. He twists her arm behind her back, then steps around beside her and knees her in the stomach before tossing her away. As she catches her breath, though, she sees Scarpedin coughing blood. The poison will be taking effect soon.

Maybe it will be soon enough for Robert to get free and come to her aid. Right now she has little defense against the warlock’s lashing kicks.

* * *​

“You killed Rex!” shouts Hex.

John tries to scramble away, covering his face with his arms to block the impending burst of flame.

“You killed Rex!” Hex repeats.

He fumbles with the volume of his iPod, trying to intensify his spell. For a moment the man is distracted, and John tries to shoot him. Hex panics, raising his hand to shoot the ring of fire, but as he does he presses the wrong button on his iPod, and the volume surges. With a scream, Hex pulls off his headphones, losing control of his spell from the intense sound. The flames explode across Hex’s face, and when John looks down Hex is a charred corpse. The iPod is melted.

Just to be certain, he fires a bullet into Hex’s skull before he runs to untie Terry.

* * *​

“Boss,” Scarpedin shouts, coughing blood. “I’m hurt boss. Dammit, Christian Bale, help me out!”

“You’re really embarrassing yourself,” Belladonna calls back. “A real gentleman wouldn’t leave a lady in peril.”

Scarpedin growls at the insult, and Robert, weaving and running to avoid sword swipes, yells back, “Oh, that’s great. Keep antagonizing him. Hey, how about we switch?”

Belladonna ducks for the cover of the treeline, dodging kicks from the man who looks like Christian Bale. He has very long legs, and though he misses Belladonna, he ends up cracking the trunks several small trees. She pulls her second-to-last derringer and takes a shot, but he manages to dodge. With a pleased smile, he leaps up to her, yanks the gun from her hand, and then thrusts a powerful kick to her stomach, knocking her out of the treeline to the ground.

Less than ten feet away, Scarpedin has cornered Robert against a thick tree. His first, backhanded chop narrowly misses, but as he draws back to behead Robert, Terry and John arrive.

“Scarpedin!” Terry shouts.

Terry yells in a foreign language, and Scarpedin feels the weight of the evil eye fall from him. Finally he’s free to do what he’s wanted to for several rounds of combat. Continuing with the circular motion of his swing, Scarpedin reaches into his coat with his left hand and pulls out his uzi. He spins and sprays Christian Bale the warlock with half a clip of bullets.

Unfortunately, as much as he loves his gun, Scarpedin doesn’t really know how to use it. One bullet of the entire volley strikes the warlock, and even then only in the man’s thigh. It’s a minor wound, but nevertheless he turns to flee, seeming to realize he’s outnumbered now.

Scarpedin sprays again but misses entirely. John and Belladonna are both too injured to give chase, and only Robert is close enough to catch the man.

“This assh*le is not getting away,” Robert says, his tone cold, as he charges after the warlock.

Terry, forty feet from the fleeing warlock, raises a hand high, then swings it down, making fist. An invisible force strikes the warlock, knocking him off his feet and to the dirt. Scowling, the well-dressed warlock concentrates, and his body contracts into the tiny form of a raven. He starts to give flight when Robert finally catches up and stabs the bird with his stun gun. The raven squawks and falls to the ground.

“Don’t kill him!” Terry shouts, running up. “We need to find out who he works for.”

There is a moment’s silence, and then Scarpedin yells, his voice ragged and fierce. “Terry! Get us the hell off of Gaia!”

 

[RangerWickett]

Author’s Note: When I started this campaign back in May, there was still a New Orleans. I planned to set the adventure a few months in the future so I could diverge the timeline a bit. Now that New Orleans has been all but destroyed, we simply have to assume this is an alternate reality. Not too hard with a fantasy game, but still, I wanted to bring it up in advance so that readers would not be surprised by what might be a somewhat sensitive topic.

It would make me very happy if New Orleans were healthy enough by late October for the events of this game to really occur, but I’ll have to be content with my memories of the great, old city.


October 29, 2005
4:15 pm

“Wow,” Terry says.

He runs a hand through his hair as he takes in the sight of the arrayed unconscious or dead bodies. The warlock in the business suit is now an unconscious raven, and the mind-numbingly beautiful nymph is now an unconscious fox. John picks up both the critters and looks around for a bag to put them in.

Behind him, the music mage Hex is dead from self-inflicted spell burn, and in front of Terry, Hex’s partner Rex is dead from a clear gunshot wound to his temple. The fey cat has fled, but jagged-leafed flowers are sprouting where its blood was spilled on the ground.

And then there are the four people who rescued him. Belladonna, John, Robert, and Scarpedin, who has a sword and an uzi. But from Terry’s expression, it appears that he cannot quite process that bit of information yet.

“Thank you,” he stammers. “You guys-”

“Is that how you cast a spell, Terry?” Scarpedin seethes. “It doesn’t sound like a spell to me. I’d like to hear you casting a spell to get us off Gaia.”

Perhaps that is the moment Terry realizes his rescuers are all fairly well-armed, but Terry nods quickly and nervously. He eyes them as he waves for them to gather together.

“That’s weird,” he says. “You shouldn’t be able to show up on both sides at once like that. But it helps me target you, so just stick close. This should work.”

Robert says, “What do you mean ‘shou-’?”

And then Terry gestures with a subtle twist of his fingers, and the four of them have to struggle to keep their eyes on him as powerful magic encourages them to look away and ignore the sight of magic. But the compulsion passes, and then weight returns to them. The heaviness and hollowness of Terra returns, and it is like taking your first step onto land after a long, relaxing swim.

The feeling passes after a moment, and suddenly the real world rushes back to them. The distant sounds of the Renaissance fair’s festivities, and much closer the dismayed shouts of people trying to get into the Lover’s Lane past the fair guards.

“We’re back?” Robert says.

He looks to the others. They nod, not wanting to jinx it.

“We’re back,” Robert repeats. “Good. Okay, now how do we get out?”

“Good job Terry,” Scarpedin says, slapping the young man on his back.

“Who were these guys?” John asks, using the two animals he’s holding to gesture at the dead bodies of Rex and Hex.

“Later guys,” Robert says. “Work with me here. We just killed two people, and turned two more into animals. The cops will be on the way sooner or later. How can we explain this?”

Scarpedin smiles, but Terry cuts him off. “No. Don’t even think about talking about ‘magic’ to cops. We’ve got to leave. That last spell took a bit out of me, but I should be able to conceal us. Dammit.”

Belladonna has tucked away her derringers and is adjusting her hair. “Do you have a problem, Terry?”

“Thanks for saving me,” Terry says, “but . . . ahh, this is just a bad situation.”

John has lit another cigarette, and he looks more calm already. “Can’t you just put their bodies on Gaia?”

Terry blinks in confusion, but Scarpedin laughs and Robert nods at the novel plan. After a few moments of discussion, Terry meditates on the rather unusual spell.

Five minutes later, when the police finally overcome their fear to enter Lover’s Lane, they find a mysterious patch of thorny flowers and a few snapped, sliced, or scorched trees, but no bodies. Rex and Hex’s body lie hidden in the untamed woods of Gaia, just another part of the Unseen.

* * *​

“Agh,” Robert says, rubbing his collar where he was shot. The flesh is fixed, but his shirt is stained with blood and something still hurts under the skin. “This still hurts.”

Terry grimaces. “Oh crap. I forgot to pull the bullet out before I healed you.”

Robert blinks, shakes his head, and mutters to himself, “I knew there was a reason I wans’t believing this had happened.”

“Let me fix that,” Terry says.

Robert waves him off, trying not to get angry. “No, it’s alright. I’ve got in a bullet in me. That’s fine. Can you just . . . get the blood out of my shirt?”

“Sure,” Terry says. “Sure.”

A moment later, the bloodstain is gone.

“So what now?” Terry asks.

The five of them are near the exit to the Ren Fest, walking casually – ever so casually – back to their Greyhound bus. John has a backpack slung over his shoulder, heavy with the weight of a fox – Janis the nymph – and a raven.

“Well, who was that guy?” John asks.

Terry shrugs. “I heard them talking a bit. They called him Morgan, but he didn’t say much to me, except that it had all been a misunderstanding and that they actually just wanted to talk to me peacefully.”

Belladonna scowls, remembering Rex and Hex’s attack. “They had quite a way of doing that.”

John shakes the backpack. “Hey, these guys aren’t going to turn back to normal and burst out of this thing, are they?”

Terry considers for a moment, then gestures them over to a relatively secluded corner. He opens the bag and discreetly casts a spell inside. The discretion is unnecessary, of course, because at that moment everyone but the five of them finds something else to look at.

“That should keep Morgan stuck in raven form for at least a day,” Terry says. “I don’t know if I could do anything to the nymph. She’s at least feyblooded, and I’m not in the best condition to try going up against that right now.”

“Uh huh,” Robert says. “Well, it was fun meeting you guys.”

“Whoa, Robot!” Scarpedin steps in Robert’s way. “Why you headin’ off, man? After all we been through, man.”

“Been through?” Robert says, perfectly feigning ignorance. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Today was very uneventful, so I’m going to put my uneventful ass back on that bus and sleep the rest of the way to New Orleans.”

The five of them walk together for a bit, until they’re outside the front gate of the Ren Fest. The bus is far away across the grassy parking lot.

Terry asks Robert, “Aren’t you a little curious?”

“About what? Seriously, this is the sort of thing you keep to yourself until you need some inspiration for an insanity plea.”

“The Bureau will look for you,” Terry says gravely.

“The who?” Then Robert catches himself. “Wait, no, I don’t care. Just . . . don’t tell anyone I was with you, okay? It was . . . it was really nice meeting you all.” He eyes Scarpedin, John, and Belladonna. “Seriously, really nice. But I hope you don’t mind if I say I hope I never see you again.”

“Buh bye,” Belladonna says.

John nods a quick farewell with his cigarette.

Scarpedin points past Robert. “Sh*t. Man in black!”

Everyone looks, even Robert despite himself. In the gravel aisle leading down the grassy parking lot, twenty feet from the group, is a white man with short blonde hair, dressed in a black business suit, with black leather gloves and shoes, and an incongruously curious expression on his face. And, Robert notes, he has a concealed handgun in his armpit.

Not feeling really intimidated or worried, the group waits until the man comes up to them. He smiles and extends a hand to Belladonna.

“Hello,” he says. “My name is Nathaniel Beckford. I understand you need a ride.”

His accent is British, light and pleasant. Belladonna takes his hand for the shortest possible time that is polite. Then she looks to the others to deal with the guy.

John frowns. “How do you know who we are?”

“I don’t, actually,” Nathaniel says, his accent making him sound anything but the intimidating figure Scarpedin first expected. “You see, I know you need a ride, because I had a vision.”

There’s a pause.

“That’s definitely my cue,” Robert says with a laugh. “Bye bye.”

And he keeps laughing to himself as he walks away.


End of Second Session

 

[RangerWickett]

October 29, 2005
4:37 pm

Scarpedin once saw this freaky movie called Warlock. This new guy, Nathan, looks like the Warlock, if the Warlock were dressed like the dude from The Transporter. He's pretty sure that guy was the same actor who played the villain in The Medallion. That movie was terrible. But he liked Warlock and The Transporter.

Scarpedin is conflicted.

While this internal struggle wages in Scarpedin's mind, the others are trying to get a sense for who this guy is. Though they're not quite ready to hop in the man's car, they are following him as he guides them to where he's parked. A handful of Renaissance Festival fairgoers are wandering past them, heading home early. Robert has already left the group, eagerly slipping away to the Greyhound bus.

"You see," Nathan explains with a charming hint of British embarrassment, "I have visions that guide me, and I follow them so I can help people. I had a vision that you would be needing a ride."

John ponders while smoking. "Why?"

Nathan shrugs. "I don't know. The visions usually don't make sense until afterward, but they put me in the right place at the right time. Now come on, my car has room for four passengers if three of you squeeze in back."

At this, Scarpedin's eyes light up. "Shotgun!"

Terry laughs but shakes his head. "I don't think I feel quite right going along with a stranger."

"C'mon Terry," Scarpedin says. "He looks like a man in black. We need to talk to the men in black to find out who's trying to kill you."

"Aha," Nathan says. "I see you are in trouble. And by the way, I insist the lady takes shotgun. Sorry mate."

Belladonna nods, glad she's getting some respect. "We should consider his offer. I don't think that Robert fella was really hoping to see us again, and really, what would my friends think if they heard I rode into town on a bus? Don't you worry, Terry. My daddy taught me a thing or two about defending myself."

"Wait," John says. "We're going to talk to the men in black? You're joking."

Terry starts to answer, but Nathan interrupts.

"Here we are," Nathan says.

They stop next to a custom shroud-covered car. Delicately Nathan pulls off the cover, snapping it in the air and folding it without letting any of the fabric touch the ground. He takes his time, giving the others a chance to dazzle at his ride. It's a BMW 760Li Sedan, four doors, jet black with silver trim and black leather interior, tinted windows, and a pristine polish. It is the epitome of elegance.

As Nathan reaches for the passenger door handle, the doors unlock almost silently, without requiring any of those garish beeps most car alarms have. He opens the door and waits politely for Belladonna.

"Not b*tch," Scarpedin calls.

* * *​

Robert squints and memorizes the British man's license plates. He's apparently from Georgia, Chatham county. Robert makes a note to look that up. The others were headed to New Orleans, and so is he, and though he claims not to be interested, there's not a chance in hell he'd just let something like this slide. Terry is either possibly the biggest *sshole he's ever met, or he's being followed by some *ssholes, and either way Robert wants to know what's going on.

He's sixty feet away, casually watching from a copse of trees. No one at the Ren Fest would think anything is odd about a guy leaning against some trees to relax, staring off down the aisle of parked cars.

The British driver opens the door for the woman from New Orleans -- Belladonna Lee. Robert ticks down his mental checklist. About 5'7", 130 lbs., straight brown hair, C-cup, Louisianan aristocratic accent, vials of some sort of poison paste in a concealed hip pouch, stilettos in her hair, at least four concealed two-shot derringers in her dress, spoke of voodoo with comfortable familiarity. Highly suspicious.

He goes down the same sort of facts about the others. John Rourke the chainsmoker who killed two men without qualms. Scarpedin Jones the thug with two concealed weapons, one of them an uzi, the other a . . . and Robert laughs despite himself . . . a sword. And Terry Abrams the . . . Robert can't even bring himself to think the word 'wizard.'

Terry's existence, and the things Robert has seen in the past few hours, seems wrong. Robert can't trust them, but he can't let go. He's always been that way.

As he makes his way back onto the Greyhound bus, his gaze is as ever looking for clues and threats. The bus driver, Missy, spots him and smiles.

"Hi again. I called your group, and they said you'd be the only one coming back. Is everything alright?"

Robert ponders for a moment, putting on a convincingly casual face while he eyes a mechanic crawling out from under the bus. Weird. Scarpedin must be rubbing off on him, because the man looks like George Clooney.

"Everything's fine," Robert says. "They just found someone to give them a ride."

Robert laughs, pretending to be amused by the whole situation. Missy smiles too, put at ease by Robert's casual charm.

"So," Robert asks, "is the bus fixed? We, ah, ready to go?"

Missy looks at the mechanic for an answer. He nods, pats the dirt off his jumpsuit, and cocks his head at the bus. "You've got a bit of body damage, and probably won't run completely straight, but I fixed the oil, and you're not leaking anything. I had to reset the. . . ."

Robert is bored and heads onto the bus, so busy worrying about magic, nymphs, and other things that shouldn't exist that he does not notice that the mechanic's accent, meant to sound Texan, is faked. Caught up in preparation, Robert takes his seat and looks out the window to see the mechanic get into his tow truck and drive off.

Briefly, Robert wonders what sort of danger the British man's vision might have been warning of, but he shakes off the worry. He has a hunch that if there is trouble, it's going to be following Terry.

 

[RangerWickett]

October 29, 2005
5:35 pm

The Greyhound bus follows far behind Terry and the others in Nathan’s pristine BMW. Supremely confident as a driver, Nathan presses just high enough above the speed limit to enjoy himself without attracting police attention. As John looks longingly out the window to the sky, and Scarpedin talks about his biker gang back in New Mexico, Nathan sets the satellite radio to an appropriately bluesy-station.


“When I look over my shoulder,
“What do you think I see?
“Some other cat looking over
“His shoulder right at me.”

“And it’s strange, surely strange.”

- Dr. John, Season of the Witch​

From the passenger side of the back seat, Scarpedin says, “Change the station, man. Put on something cool.”

“Hey,” Terry says, “leave it on. Don’t you like the blues, Scarpedin?”

The stare Terry receives looks like Scarpedin thinks he’s speaking in a different language. After a moment, Scarpedin shakes his head and says, “No man. I listen to rock. Metal. Drums. Hip-hop.”

Terry smiles wistfully. “I grew up in Chicago. Tons of blues there. I never appreciated it until I lived in England. Maybe I’ll get a chance to hear some live bands in New Orleans.”

Nathan asks, “That why you’re going to New Orleans?”

Terry tenses suddenly, then shakes his head. He whispers, “No.”

Nathan glances to Belladonna in the passenger seat. When she shifts and says nothing, Nathan looks to the rearview mirror at John for an explanation.

John frowns. “Somebody’s after him.”

“Why?” Nathan asks.

Terry hesitates. “Lin . . . my girlfriend Lin. . . . Someone shot her, and now they’re after me. I don’t know why.”

“My God man.” Nathan’s composure slips for a moment, but he focuses on the road. Everyone waits for Terry to say something, and when he doesn’t, Nathan clears his throat.

“I, um . . . need to get gas.”

* * *​

In 1901, the Bureau for the Management of Magicks was founded simultaneously in England and the United States. It quickly gained significant power and grudging respect among the races living on Gaia, and its influence even extended to parts of Terra. The Bureau’s mandate is to maintain the secrecy of magic from the eyes of the common human of Terra, and to police any crimes commited with magic or by magical creatures. As far as the average magic-user knows, they are strict but not malevolent. No government officially recognizes them, but it seems impossible that their existence is unknown. They wield power through obscurity. No one knows quite what the Bureau is capable of, and so few are willing to cross them.

In the United States, the three main offices of the Bureau are in the locations with the greatest concentration of supernatural disturbances – Salem, Savannah, and New Orleans.

* * *​

It’s a hot Texas evening, and the sun is setting while Nathan fuels his car at an Exxon. Terry leans against the hood, and the others listen to his story. John paces with a cigarette, suckin the dry air through his teeth along with the smoke. Belladonna stands next to the passenger door, listening with a strange expression on her face. And Scarpedin scrapes the bugs off the BMW’s windshield.

“Lin and I, we met in France.”

Terry pulls out his wallet and meekly shows them all a photo of the two of them. She looks half-Chinese, and Scarpedin can’t decide what actress she looks like.

“She was a family friend of my teacher, Russell. Russell Vanderschmidt. He’s, um, he’s just a teacher of magic in England. Introduced me to Lin, and when I passed this exam I had, a big thing, sorta like graduation, Russell paid for me and Lin to take a vacation back to the states. We were supposed to go through all fifty states. We only got to Alaska.

“We were out hiking outside of Fairbanks, climbing a little forested hill. I was holding her in my left arm, when . . . it just happened. No warning. I didn’t even recognize the gunshot until after she was dead. It was like . . . like there was a sniper. He shot her,” he points to his right temple, “right here. The shot pulled her out of my arm, and she fell, and there was blood, and-”

“It’s alright man,” Scarpedin says. “Um, c’mon Terry, you don’t have to say all that.”

Terry straightens and looks at Scarpedin for a moment. “No. I guess I want to tell someone. I need to get it out.”

Nathan nods, and his voice is soft. “I hear that’s the best thing to do.”

John rolls his eyes and looks away.

“I bent down,” Terry says, “and she wasn’t moving. Then there was another gunshot, and I got hit in my leg, here.” He points at his right thigh. “I panicked. I didn’t want to leave Lin, but I knew I had to get out. So I went to Gaia. It was just instinct.”

Nathan leans forward in curiosity, but Scarpedin waves his question off. “Terra, Gaia. We’ll explain it later man.”

“After that,” Terry says, “I was able to heal myself and struggle through the wilderness on Gaia until I was pretty sure I was back in Fairbanks. I caught the first flight I could. I’d never had to deal with the Bureau before, but I. . . . The way I figured it, they were there either for me or Lin, so either way they probably know my connection to Russell. The closest main Bureau office is in New Orleans, so that’s where I headed.

“I was smart, y’know? I charmed the teller at the airport to sell me a ticket without ID, so I was able to use a fake name. I don’t know how they could have known where I was going, but then there was the bomb threat in Dallas, and all the planes were grounded.”

John shrugs. “You’ve got magic. They’ve got magic. Couldn’t they have just used magic to find you?”

“I guess so. I still have been lucky, though. I ran into you guys.”

Nathan pulls out the pump and puts on his gas cap. “I know this probably is the wrong time to start asking questions,” he glances at Scarpedin warily, “but what are ‘Terra,’ ‘Gaia,’ and ‘the Bureau’? And what’s this talk about magic?”

Terry chuckles. “You claim to have visions, but you don’t believe in magic?”

“Of course not,” Nathan says. “I’m psychic.”

* * *​

The next two hours of the car trip are a little awkward as Terry answers more of the group’s questions about Gaia, the Bureau, and the nature of magic, helping them know what to expect. The Bureau helped encourage the men in black myths over the past few decades, though from what Terry’s heard they’re more like the ones in the Will Smith movie than the one in The X-Files.

John seems increasingly disturbed as he hears more about the Bureau. He won’t explain why, but he clearly doesn’t like the idea of a secret organization having power and not being beholden to others. Terry shrugs and says that people on Gaia deal with the Bureau because they have to; he never really was interested in their procedures, though his mentor Russell was. Russell was very politically-minded.

Belladonna wants to know why her nana, a voodoo priest who obviously should know about Gaia, had never told her all this before.

Terry answers, “Just because you can do magic doesn’t mean you know why. Most humans need to bond with a ghost to use magic, but even if you can talk to spirits, it’s been a thousand years since there were many magi on Terra. Plus, once you find out, the Bureau inevitably gets involved in your life. I was lucky. Russell was on good terms with the Bureau, so he was able to keep most of his students away from their prying. Your nana, though, she might just have wanted you not to have to worry.”

Belladonna smirks. “I’ll have to talk to my daddy about that.”

Scarpedin wants to know about monsters, and about King Arthur. Terry has to disappoint him on both accounts, since he’s never seen a ‘monster’ before, and the closest thing to King Arthur he knows about are the ‘Knights of the Round.’ They’re sort of a terrorist group who hate non-humans and want to keep humans on Terra and magical races on Gaia.

“Maybe they’re the ones who want you dead,” Nathan says. “Hey, are any of you ladies and blokes feeling hungry? This is our last chance to get authentic Texan cuisine.”

The group decides to give it a go, stopping at a steakhouse in Beaumont, TX. Nathan becomes the topic of conversation, but he is modest almost to the point of mystery. Again Scarpedin posits that Nathan might be a man in black, but no one else thinks that’s likely.

After a fine dinner (though John ate little, only enough to be polite), the group is heading back to the car, and in the parking lot Scarpedin challenges Terry.

“Okay man, so enough about the Bureau. What about you? What can you do? Can you hurl lightning bolts?”

“No,” Terry says. “I explained this before. Combat magic is illegal to teach in England.”

“Terry,” Scarpedin laughs, “I knew you were a thug at heart. So c’mon, can you hurl cars like Magneto?”

“Um . . . yeah,” Terry says, sounding surprised. “I actually probably could if I tried. But it would exhaust me.”

“Good, good. Now we’re getting somewhere.”

Belladonna and Nathan are already at the car, but they have to wait for John to finish his cigarette before they can go.

“Can you fly?”

“No.”

“Turn invisible?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Summon a demon?”

“No,” Terry says, “but I could make an illusion of Godzilla eating the moon if I wanted.”

“Cool. Show me!”

“Maybe after I’ve had a chance to rest. I wore myself out today.”

“Can you make women sleep with you?” Scarpedin asks.

“Um, my girlfriend was just assassinated two days ago? What the hell are you thinking, man?”

Scarpedin shrugs. “Sorry man, sorry. But we should go have some fun, man. We’re going to New Orleans, Terry. Think of the times we could have there with magic.”

Terry sighs and looks at the car. The burly, sword-wielding biker seems to mean well, but Terry’s starting to get irritated his with overbearing attitude.

“Not b*tch,” Terry says.

Belladonna frowns, “I wish you’d stop with the vulgarity. I am a lady, after all.”

John chuckles. “Yeah. Right.”

He stamps out his cigarette and starts to get into the car. “Nathan, we ready to go?”

Nathan starts to nod, but then the world fades away. The parking lot pavement cracks and water floods up through rifts in the ground. A vicious wind sweeps across him, and he looks back out beyond the shore at the tiny rowboat. The bottom of the boat is filled with blood-stained water, and the seas are choppy. Beyond the rowboat, faded in the sea mist, is a beacon of light from a lantern, swiftly catching up with the rowboat.

Nathan flicks on the headlights of his car, illuminating the rowboat. John, Robert, and Scarpedin are there, but Belladonna and Ian are missing. The rowboat is nearly to shore, and Nathan tosses out a rope to help them pull themselves in.

“What happened?” he shouts.

“We’re being followed,” John says. He tucks one of Belladonna’s revolvers into his pant pocket, then grabs the rope and wraps it around the gunwale.

“By whom?” Nathan says, tugging on the rope. The rowboat lurches ashore, waves of the North Sea dash Nathan’s shoes with salt water.

“The hell if I know,” Robert says. “It killed Belladonna.”

“They’re right behind us man,” Scarpedin says, pointing.

All Nathan can make out is another ship, a hooded figure at its prow holding a staff with a golden lantern on the end. It’s coming in fast, and will reach shore in less than a minute.

“Quickly, quickly,” Nathan says.

The four of them pile into the car, and Nathan guns it in reverse up the hill, then spins and shifts into drive to reach the dirt road that led them here. All they have to do is reach the bridge, and they’ll be safe.

“Did you get what you were looking for?” Nathan asks. He’s not sure why, but he has a bitter edge in his voice.

“Yeah,” Robert says, “we got it. And now the motherf*cker’s dead.”

“Just drive,” John says.

Scarpedin is looking out the rear window. “Screw ‘drive.’ Let’s run like hell, man.”

Nathan nods gravely and glances in the review mirror. The sun is rising. They don’t have much time left.

Ahead, he sees the bridge, and on the bridge is . . . a Greyhound bus? It’s a pile of burning wreckage, with charred bodies strewn around it. And this bridge, it’s not the one they want. This bridge is in Texas.

The vision ends and Nathan finds himself slumped on the parking lot pavement next to his BMW. John is shaking him. He sits up suddenly, his clear.

“You passed out,” John says.

“No, no,” Nathan smiles. “I had a vision.”

He stands up and dusts himself off like it’s perfectly normal for people to collapse outside steak houses.

“What’d you see?” Terry asks.

“John, and Scarpedin, and Robert were coming ashore in a boat off the North Sea, and John had one of Belladonna’s derringers, and Robert said Belladonna was dead. And there was someone named Ian that I thought should have been there, but he wasn't. And you were being chased by something. But that’s not important, because it’s not going to happen for a few months.”

Nathan ignores the stunned expressions from the rest of the group. The restaurant they’re at is right next to the interstate, and Nathan watches as a Greyhound bus drives right past them, heading toward Louisiana.

“There’s a bomb on the bus,” Nathan says. “And it’s going to blow up when the bus reaches the bridge to Louisiana.”

Nathan opens the door to his BMW and gets in. When the others hesitate, he sighs and gestures for them to follow.

“Come on. I can’t do this by myself.”

The others hesitantly get into the car, and Nathan pulls out of the parking lot, muttering. “Honestly, it’s like you don’t realize you’re heroes at all.”

He checks the GPS. It’s seventeen miles to Louisiana. He switches the CD changer to his driving music and speeds after the Greyhound, confident he’ll get there in time. His visions never steer him wrong.

 

[RangerWickett]

October 29, 2005
7:30pm

It’s harder than Nathan expected. The bus driver must be trying to make up for lost time from the earlier wreck, so she’s going 75 miles an hour. A cop’s not going to pull over a Greyhound bus, but he’ll gladly pull over a slick BMW going 90. By rights, Nathan’s constant speeding and decelerating whenever he anticipates a cop might be watching should be nauseating, but the ride is almost pleasant. Plus, every time they jump over 85, Scarpedin starts hooting in delight.

“In your vision I was dead?” Belladonna says. She laughs.

“Yes,” Nathan replies, jerking the steering wheel left then right quickly to sideslip between a pair of pick-up trucks. “But I told you, it’s several months from now. We have more than enough time to avoid that.”

The engine hums, and billboards advertising the state fair, Louisianan casinos, and fresh crawfish slip by to the beat of the car stereo. Scarpedin nods his head approvingly, and Terry leans forward in anticipation, but John has a perpetual grimace as they whip through traffic.

“There it is.” Terry points. “You said the bus is going to blow up when it hits the bridge?”

“Yes, in. . . ,” Nathan glances down at the GPS map, “five miles.”

“What are you planning to do?” Terry says.

Scarpedin fumbles for the uzi he has tucked in his armpit. “Hey man, how do you roll down this window? I’ll convince them to pull over.”

“Holy sh*t,” John says, realizing what Scarpedin is planning. “They’re in a bus; we’re in a Beemer. If we gave them trouble, they’d just knock us off the road.”

“Hold on,” Nathan says, stamping his foot on the gas and swerving onto the right shoulder for a moment. A short bridge over a creek is just ahead of them, but he jerks around an 18-wheeler and back onto the highway with ten feet to spare before they would have plunged into the creek.

“I could try to charm the driver,” Terry says. “I’m not sure if it’d work through the windshield, though.”

Belladonna tries to hold herself steady as the car shakes them. “Blessed mother,” she whispers, “we’re all going to die.”

“No we’re not,” Nathan says. “I would’ve seen that if it were going to happen.”

They pass the bus, too quickly even for Scarpedin to try to get the driver’s attention. Nathan starts to look at all his mirrors one by one, tensing his jaw. When they’re a mile ahead of the Greyhound, Nathan snaps the car up to over a hundred and ten to reach a gap in the traffic, and then he breaks hard.

“Hold on,” he says again.

Nathan twists the wheel and the car twists into a bootleg turn, skidding and finally coming to a stop horizontally across the road. Its front wheels rest in the left lane, its rear wheels in the right. Traffic is approaching from the left side of the car at 70 miles an hour, and less than a mile away on the right is the Sabine Memorial Bridge, crossing from Texas to Louisiana.

Belladonna cries out and kicks open the door, trying to get out before the oncoming traffic crashes into them. After a second’s hesitation, the others scramble out too, heading for the side of the road.

“Ah,” Nathan says, “perfect.”

He pops the trunk and swings out of the car. The approaching cars start to honk, but Nathan casually pulls a handful of road flares from his trunk. He lights them, tosses them across the road in front of his car, and smiles as the cars screech to a stop. Slowly traffic backs up as Interstate 10 comes to an end, thanks to Nathan’s stunt.

Nathan waves the others over. As they approach, a few cars honk and drive past on the shoulder, their drivers flipping Nathan off as they hurry on to Louisiana.

“Now the bus won’t reach the bridge,” Nathan says.

“The bomb is probably on a timer,” John says. “Now instead of blowing up the bridge, it’s going to explode and destroy dozens of parked cars. Great.”

“Oh my,” Nathan says. “You think so?”

“Don’t worry guys,” Scarpedin says. “I got this one.”

He sprints off along the shoulder, heading toward the Greyhound bus, which is backed up at least a quarter mile away. John rolls his eyes and starts to follow, but Terry stops him and puts a defensive spell on him, just in case they’re too late and John has to pull people out of the fire.

* * *​

The bus lurches slightly and the squeal of a dozen or more tires struggling for traction fills the air.

“Dammit,” Robert says, “not again.”

The bus comes to a stop without a crash this time, and the weary passengers – many adorned with items purchased at the Renaissance Festival – start to groan. Robert stands up and holds out his hands to calm folks down as he heads for the driver’s seat. People relax as he smiles at them. Robert just projects the air of one of those people who’ll get things done.

“What’s the problem Missy?” Robert asks when he gets up next to the bus driver.

She’s breathing heavily, irritated. “They all just stopped. There must have been a wreck in front of us.”

Robert looks out the window so she doesn’t see his grimace. He’s about to turn back to Missy and recommend they drive on the shoulder when he spots someone sprinting up to the bus.

“Oh look,” he says to himself, laughing in weak disbelief, “it’s Scarpedin.”

Scarpedin staggers to a stop next to the door of the bus, and he pounds a fist on it. His breath is ragged, and he bangs again.

“Open the door!” he shouts. His voice is muffled by the door.

“No,” Robert says. “Don’t.”

“He looks like he’s in trouble,” Missy says. She pulls the lever to open the door, and Scarpedin heaves himself onto the bus.

“Everyone,” he shouts, “you’ve got to get off the bus! There’s a bomb!”

People shift in their seats, but Robert sighs and snaps his fingers in front of Scarpedin’s face to get his attention.

“What the hell are you talking about, boy? I already got off this bus once today. I’m not getting off again until we get to New Orleans. Except maybe to use the bathroom.”

“What the-? Dammit,” Scarpedin growls. “This bus is about to explode! Get off the f*cking bus!”

He pulls the uzi out of his jacket and cocks it, then fires a few shots into the ceiling. People scream in panic and start to lunge for emergency exits, kicking out windows and fleeing the madman.

“That’s better,” Scarpedin says.

Robert is too stunned at the stupidity of what he just saw to act, but Missy reacts heroically, leaping for Scarpedin and yanking the uzi out of his hands.

“B-back away!” Missy shouts, shaking the gun in Scarpedin’s face.

“Whoa,” Scarpedin says. “Whoa, calm down. Dude, there’s no need to panic. Let’s just step off the bus and, y’know, . . . whoa, don’t shoot. We can, y’know, discuss this peacefully.”

“Give me the gun,” Robert says calmly.

Missy practically throws it at him, appearing glad to be rid of it. In the moment the gun’s not pointed at him, Scarpedin runs. And then, as soon as he’s out of the bus’s doorway, Missy and everyone else who had not yet gotten off the bus pile out the door, afraid of the bomb.

Robert sighs and turns the gun’s safety on. Since he’s the only person left on the bus, he strolls down the steps. The crowd of the bus passengers is twenty feet away, huddled amid trees beside the road.

“Seriously people,” he says as he walks up to them, “you’ve got to keep your cool in situations like-”

The explosion catches him in the back, picks him up, and hurls him into a tree. Robert lands with a thump, and the blast seems to leave nothing of the bus but a crater, surrounded by other flaming and demolished vehicles. Then from the sky the burning wreckage of the Greyhound bus crashes to the road.

After a moment of grogginess, Robert staggers to his feet and bats at the fire clinging to his coat. He’s still holding Scarpedin’s uzi, and the passengers around him scream at the sight of the gun and flee.

Robert watches them go, then glances at the massive fireball hovering over the road and back down at the tiny gun before he yells, “Oh, come on!”