Tim gathered several key pieces of intel, being the intel gathering hunk of a Ranger that he was. A good portion traveled in on the wingman aura flown in by a Scyllatz on the main floor below. The two’s aura hooked, and a recharge sent by Ghareven activated a parachute of energy lifting the new Scyllatz to hovering six feet above the scattering of scared prisoners. Whiplike tentacles zapped new patrons to the ride like Who goes there? Just me and my forks of merciless lightning. His name was Zoonza, and he thought Tim should get right the hell up and help out.

  Party invite accepted.

  The other piece of intel, shared partly in Zoonza’s rambling about the damn guards, was the one banyon he’d faced earlier, was on this wing, chillin.

  Tim was eager to get reacquainted. One area he loved with his higher Wisdom was understanding and applying Squire Castle hand to hand moves. His belt activated additional strength and gave higher critical hit odds when he could land those moves. He had been too tired the last few days to practice much. Now he had a peppy little party to attend and oh, look at him, all dressed to impress.

  A rhino of a creature took the lead of one group of prisoners sprinting his way. One after another spilled over the guard railing. Rhino kept on, smashing a melon of a head on the wall and watching Tim the whole time. His grin revealed a blue tongue topped with cherry and pink lines, like some kind of poison touch in waiting.

  The death mallets he’d earned from his loot of Rhino’s 1 and 2 earlier removed their ‘relic’ status in his inventory and became green like gitty up. Tim activated them and smacked the flat heads in a giant Victory chant. Aura shot out in a bolt connecting to Cleanse erupting from his stomach. The supercharged bolt of sunshine hit Rocky the Rhino like an uppercut from Balboa.

  His bowed back corpse weighed the Resistance forces. Prisoners escaping in the turmoil caught up and swallowed them down in a torrent of fists and fangs.

  Tim’s mallets lacked a fraction of their weight, and a cooldown timer of five minutes meant stowing them in favor of his bow and a plan.

  Guards peppered prisoners with stun darts and smoke bombs. Their protection in nooks along the upper walls and in the corners gave them ample leverage firing down on the crowd.

  Tim’s Peel took him outside their range into an inner hall under the nearest guard. Three engaged Zoonza and his umbrella jellyfish attack. Luminescent darts lanced through his gelatinous form, dispersing strength and ejecting fluids faster than he could replenish. His form lashed out at nearby prisoners attacking with makeshift blades and an overwhelming sea of limbs straining to pull him down.

  Meanwhile, the smoke wormed into Tim’s lungs, drawing out painful coughs and spreading blindness through tears and blurred vision. It burned and made him close his eyes for relief. He activated Poison Resistance and equipped his crossbow. The warmth of his spell forming in his mind bled down into his burning eyes and spackled it with cool glory, drying the tears and enabling him to duck and enter the cloud of greenish yellow smoke.

  Packing Cleanse into his crossbow darts required the kind of focus he wasn’t afforded in the dodge and mosh pit trek through the crowd. One elbow to the top of his hand hit hard enough he dropped the bolt. It slipped and his thumb accidentally swiped a manual trigger tied to a hair thin timer. The bolt fell through his arms and hit the hard floor.

  Moonlight and destruction bloomed up from the eclipse. The grunt who’d hit him disintegrated from his boots to his shoulders, with the top half shedding like husked corn. Loot granted Tim a deposit of Aura and Spirit Memory from him and a couple prisoners around them.

  Guards fired into the clutter and hit Tim along his side in the escape. Paralyzing stretches of power layered heavily into his legs and made his foot a worthless brick to drag out of the way.

  He packed another crossbow dart with Cleanse and hustled for a stairwell up ahead.

  Zoonza was gone. No. There, in the cell, watching Tim sprint for the stairs. Pinned.

  “If you reach me, I can give you another regen packet.”

  Tim stopped at the top of the stairs and fired his ready dart at the guard perched in the cage in the corner. He didn’t have time to let Greensight lock—shards of needles and bark launched from the banyan branches, forcing Tim to fire and tuck and roll down the stairs.

  He unequipped the next bolt to use both hands on the railing and climbing over a wounded prisoner. It was a cross between feathers and human face and torso, with dozens of silver needles sticking out from its trembling hide.

  Tim’s crossbow bolt struck his target, flashing its white rays so bright he didn’t have to turn to lose the prison in the perfect cloud. In the brief distraction of cover fire, he took memory of the steps and scaled them in six quick strides, leapt at the end and cast Battleground into the area around and in Zoonza’s cell.

  His Cleanse shot on the guard up in the corner faded and the ratatat of banyan splinters cover fire returned to the brawl din. Two more dirty bastards hit Tim, spines planting at his hip and stomach. Thrown fists and contact from multiple unseen sources jarred Tim’s focus. His balance shifted off axis. Their grasp carried him outside the path he found closing between him and Zoonza. The Scyllatz punched and shocked intruders but was quickly overwhelmed in their bullrush and numbers.

  “The Trolls left spies behind to ensure we don’t interfere,” Zoonza said.

  Tim met a few, though all the ugly and muscle-bound menaces were not strictly Troll. He recognized the patch from FFA tattooed into their skin between other prison tats and scars, Troll or not. Their numbers skill and brute force cut through his Rryeg’s Form, Hand to Hand and parrying.

  The gap between him and ally suffocated under their surrounding onslaught. The spines he ripped from his hip and stomach left so much poison his resistance started to drown. Nerves fell asleep and left his feet staggering backward.

  He was outside the Battleground and falling. Each jolt of pain disrupted spell formations.

  On his way down, Tim rejected the notion of letting Aura Form take him at 20% health. His was still over half, but each blow gutted him with heavy damage. Instead, he focused on channeling c-mana into a package of spells: Torture Endurance allowing him that micro barrier of concentration to mix effective components into play.

  He started with Protection and expanded on his poetic thoughts to project his mission to those around him. The boys at Shuff field fell to a wicked man named Gantus, who is now in your prison. I have an offer for Gorin that does not need Gantus or Hist for alliance. I am the priest of gatekeepers, for all Vignyia to be kept safe from Hist's invasion and the mess of his war on both peoples, this world and his.

  Smoke from the guard's grenades faded. His breathing redoubled in smoother intakes, allowing him to expand c-mana into the harnessing of his spells. Wisdom boosted how and with every fiber of strength, he sowed and separated to get the spell combo ready to deploy. His second higher attribute, Constitution helped keep him in play and mostly coherent.

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  The din included chants of 'priest' and 'white fire' as Danger Sense picked up a turning in momentum. Guards had picked off known threats and left the ones bought off to keep the prisoners from escaping.

  Tim spoke his poetic Protection through bloody gums and eyes wet with tears from the last boot to his nose. I'm here for Gantus and to rescue any who would be free of Hist's rule. My brother is Chris, and Lousa is trapped with him in Gantus's haunting. Ripples of numbness and blasted nerves trembled up and down Tim's frame. Another bash from something hard struck him in the back. He lost his spells in the gasp of pain seizing his breath and squeezing through his back to his ribs and lungs.

  A hand gripped his neck cleanly and with enough power to force submission. Its squeeze burped new tingling into his vision and bubbling up over his scalp. His lungs burned to breathe. Light restored to his view as the muscle ripped creature resembling a bulldog with white blotches of fur on his black head. Eye contact with the blues in his retinas gave Tim a last chance. He saw in them a man so concentrated in fury he presented as a volcanic hardened stone on a justified path of destruction.

  No. Tim thought. We offer a different way. I'll show you.

  The crowd parted in respect for Bulldog's discovery of loot.

  Before they grew too far apart for Healing Bridge, Tim laid a hand on Bulldog's forearm gripping punishment into his throat. Tim cast Draw, cycling out Bulldog's anger for what felt like a foregone life full of violence, manipulation of others, and the ever stacking of strength on strength to face his lack of hope for it ever improving.

  Tim read this in the exchange of aura, and into the same river he poured grace and mercy through his spirit. A new avenue opened into the Bulldog's gaze. His essence cracked.

  Tim cast Healing into it like a fine salve into a wound long festered.

  It cracked open with light so bright the rays beamed from his eyes into Tim. The aura fueled strength to expand into Healing Bridge. Yellow bolts of power shot from Tim's grip in runways of disturbance to their rampage.

  Spines launched from above. Prisoners shielded their faces, covering and cowering in an outward wave from Tim's dropping fall.

  Bulldog let go and braced a hand to recover on hands and knees. Tim’s Healing bounced back into him from the prisoners on Bulldog’s squad. The regen helped as he expanded Protection into a dome. Spines skipped off, partially penetrating while also ricocheting off.

  “Help me reach Gantus before my brother and Louisa, and the trolls they’re protecting,” Tim said, mind half engaged with keeping his Protection up to snuff against the escalating barrage from the guards, who emptied their branches in auto fire from Pinetree Hell.

  The other half of his mind was engaged in Ranger Messiah with a Gibson SG-1 tubed into a Marshall half stack amplifying get out punk rock. And momma ain’t home to turn it down.

  In the disturbance of his hailmaker on Bulldog’s squad, Tim hefted his Protection dome over his head and charged for Zoonza.

  Nine-inch nails rained into him with stinging thorns shivering into his skin like leaches with a hard on. Tim cast Cleanse and roared. His MP dwindled down the drain in alarming range compared to the distance and speed to Zoonza’s cell. The banyan pepper assault made the trudge feel uphill in four feet of powder.

  Chunka chow choo choo mother truckers!

  Tim angled his Protection dome into a sled and extended it high enough to shield into the top of Zoonza’s doorway.

  The Scyllatz greeted him with ten tentacles hovering in a hazy dance. Tim’s legs collapsed under his momentum past the line, and he fell into Zoona’s embrace. Hello. He didn’t know this was the plan, but these kinds of hugs built their own reputation. The calling card of healing and restoration passed along, and Tim couldn’t help but show thanks. Rage-glorious shouting calmed to a distance beyond, and the bang of a door. Not in the cell. No, he wasn’t there anymore.

  “I know why you came,” Zoonza’s voice called out over his shoulder, then lost in the sun over a tree shaped like a capital Q fell on its side, grew its hair into a garden of color sprawling proportions. “And why Ghareven sent you, memory mage. I forgave him long ago but it’s good to know he has too. I will keep an eye on your stykiller pal and E’Tic’s daughter. Don’t dally. I’ve given you over to Gantus. His haunt was the only way in. The longer it takes to find your brother, the greater a hold he has on you. Swift of foot!”

  A small object flew at Tim’s face. He dodged too late to avoid said dodge, comparing itself more accurately to a flapping face plant.

  Not that Zoonza’s placement in the belly bake sale to a barb-ridden bush tall and oblong, and wide enough to give Tim no place to put his hands.

  Not hands.

  Silver feathered wings with blue diamonds tipped in black where a semblance of extension gave him fingerlike control over hollow bones best fit for flying.

  He leaned awkwardly over webbed flippers, gold as Scrooge McDuck. The bastard.

  A bush tall enough to swallow him threatened with branches barbed in thorns. Tim braced and balanced yet caught a wing through a sharp bit. The bite’s sharp teeth forced Tim’s retreat in haste.

  Red eyes brimmed over in squints intent on menace, safely hidden in the belly of the bush.

  Gantus’s stench preceded the whisper of his taunt.

  “Your new friends were clever to get you here. Too bad I read your plan from a mile away, Earthling.”

  Tim glanced side to side. The black veined, crimson stalked branches seemed to grow in the cloak of darkness, slowly encircling him. He backed up as a terror akin to falling tugged his soul.

  Its mission: delay and conquer.

  Gantus’s eyes dimmed and lowered in a nod of consent. “I do prefer a chase.” Fangs glistened in the rim of a rising smile.

  A reluctance to abide by the demon’s will gave Tim a second to consider, the branches already entwined behind him. He’d have to fly over to escape the closing boundary of its trap. Very well, Tim thought, and hopped. Shortly. Mad flapping his wings hefted him inch by inch. Branches closed in. He kicked one and leaned his weight into its bough. Thorns scoured under his flipper, but he endured, adjusted his balance forward and heaved into a wing so glorious he honked for Goose Kingdom to come, now and forever.

  Warm blood loosed in a stamp of pain on the arch of his flipper. Beyond that, his breaststroke gained momentum in the gentle sky, warmed like summer dusk. The morning rim of purple and orange carted daylight on its lazy climb over the treetops. Shadows cut lines in building towers crafted from the environment and subtle below the horizon of foliage.

  Tim recognized it as the village Lousa had taken Chris and the trolls toward. A backward glance caught the bush discolored and shriveled to a husk of its former fortitude. Still, Tim took no chances and instead worked on his wing command, flying past monkeys glaring with one eye still stuck in slumber and a few birds willing to sing his parade song.

  Tim’s beak prevented him from whistling. In the rising of the sun and the feeling of freedom in his feathers, he honked in his best attempt to keep the punk rock rhythm of Linoleum. “That’s me in the grey wings with blood falling from my foot, it’s cool; I’m chillin in the sky, not asking why. Duck billed platypus ain’t got nothing on me. Or you buttfaced shardflier! I’m here inside your head. That’s me inside your head!”

  Tim’s successful flying built c-mana and AF into channels circulating in his wings. Strength tightened into a taut spring ready to unleash. When the tree monkey threw his newly scraped turd, Tim slashed a wing like that shit owed him money. A chevron of blue-white wind struck the object into dust. The monkey stuck its tongue out and mimed something so inappropriate a Troll must have been involved. Tim honked and flapped into a backstroke and stored the aura of victory into a queued Protection spell. “That’s me inside your head…aaaadddd.” Tim’s thin neck strained to hold the long note. He swallowed and said, “Me inside your head,” then rolled over in flight and honked power chord riffs to wake the neighbors.

  Something told him he should hurry… aside from the obvious that a jail break was mid show on the other side of this haunting.

  Now he had to find his brother and he didn’t mind if anyone heard him coming. He cast Danger Sense and honked out a good one.

  The Troll village had thirty-seven occupants. No humans. One of them, the troll chieftain’s wife, Lousa, spied on him out from the bough of an old tree squat in the front yard of the largest home in the village.

  Tim waved a wing and honked unintentionally. Something about being a species of duck made him express himself vocally. Hopefully she hadn’t heard that. Nor seen the sliding turd he pinched off in his descent. Being a Brick laying Duck was humiliating. Gantus would reap what he sowed.

  Activate party connection with Lousa?

  Tim acknowledged the mental note and its monotonous tone, hoping Dryfu was okay in his efforts on the other side.

  “Tim?” Lousa asked over their Party Oversight connection.

  The one and only. He honked an exclamation point and went with it.

  “Whatever Gantus has done. I’m glad you’re here. Chris went on a mission with Kari to find Sa Reoleigh at Tia’s Pointe.”

  Of course he did.