Chapter 82: Murphy's Laws of Combat

‘This is bad! This is very very bad!’ Tom screamed at himself internally, waiting for his eyes to start working again. The green light of the goggles eventually returned, even if he had a vicious spot in his vision. He took the time to listen for either Jackalope or Zarko screaming. To his relief, though, he didn’t make out either.

He peeked back over the small ridge he was hiding behind, struggling to make out anything. Jarix had seemingly not only survived the collision but had gotten back on his feet and was currently backing up towards Tom, clearly trying to appear menacing. The bat thing looked rather dead, even if it was still twitching, which was a relief. Tom guessed that had been the crunching sound then.

“You okay?!” Tom shouted out. Jarix gave a start at the sound coming from behind him, though he didn’t turn to look back. Tom heard arrows coming in, one bouncing off Jarix's helmet, another finding a perch in his soft side.

“No! That fucking hurt!” Tom definitely believed that statement.

“Get your ass back in the air there is still another…” Tom didn’t get to finish warning Jarix of the third bat thing as it came down onto Jarix’s back, driving him into the ground, digging its clawed feet in deep. Jarix roared out in pain, thrashing his head around to try and grab the massive thing on his back as he tried to get back to his feet.

Tom’s vision was still rather fucked, so he ignored the scope, instead just aiming center mass on feel at the huge target. He ran the action as quickly as it would go, shoulder be damned. It would seem that the bat thing was rather lacking in the armor department as it shrieked loud enough. Tom felt even more sorry for Jarix and his powerful ears. He needed to save the revolver, so he moved back behind the rock to reload, having emptied the rifle.

Then he heard Jackalope open up, coming in on the wing. He didn’t see where she was but the shrieks of the mutated bat betrayed her target. ‘Go get ‘em girl!’ Tom thought to himself as he reloaded. She let loose all six shots in rapid succession. He looked up, trying to spot her, and caught either her or Zarko as she pulled up, going over Jarix and heading straight for the keep. ‘No you crazy bastard! They can see you!’ Tom protested disparagingly as he watched her race for the keep. He didn’t spot any arrows coming up, nor did he see her take a hit as she banked to clear the keep, going into the darkness. ‘That was fucking reckelss,’ Tom thought to himself, looking back down to reload his rifle.

With the rifle reloaded, he looked back up. The bat thing was beating its wings, still holding on. Even through his night vision, he could see the blood pouring out of it splashing over Jarix's back, its movements a lot slower and less frantic. He also saw several darklings moving around Jarix, some with long pikes, others wielding bows, all aimed at Jarix. Then the grenade went off at the base of the keep, illuminating Jarix and the monster on his back as clearly as a damn Hollywood movie.

Tom didn’t take the time to appreciate the moment, though, as Jarix roared out again, his open maw filling with crackling lightning. He swept his head in an arch in front of him pouring forth a stream of snaking lightning bolts, arching into the night looking for victims. Tom gave up on the goggles, flicking them up again. There was too much bright light around, and the torches around the keep gave him a decent silhouette to use anyway as he brought up the rifle, trying to find the head of the beast which was still clawing at Jarix's back with its legs, using its wings to steady itself.

'How the fuck aren't you dead yet!?’ Tom cursed as he tried to keep track of its head, failing to keep a bead on it as the creature thrashed around. He mentally crossed his fingers, pulling the trigger. His first shot missing completely.

He forced himself to draw a slow breath drowning out the cacophony of shrieks, roars and screams as he ran the action again. That fucker needed to die right now. The second shot hit but was low, seemingly hitting somewhere in the creature's chest, the thing shrieking out in pain once more. ‘Come on you useless idiot, hit!’ Tom cursed as he ran the action again. He aimed higher, the shot hitting something, though not having much effect. ‘Goddammit!’

The fourth found the mark, taking the vile thing high in the neck. The creature screeched again, stumbling as Jarix finally managed to shake it off; grabbing it with his jaws and ripping it from his back with a strong pull, sending it sprawling to the ground. Then Jarix sent a shock running through it. The abomination gave a final shriek, the electricity springing between its claws as it spasmed.

“Run Jarix!” Tom shouted out, hoping that the dragon was somehow still flight-worthy. Jarix didn’t move, his head swinging around as if he was getting his bearings. Tom frantically set about reloading the rifle. “For fuck’s sake, run!”

Then Tom heard a shriek from above him. He looked up being greeted by a smaller black shape descending on him, stinger poised to strike. He was too slow going for his revolver as it smashed into him knocking him over, stinger hitting his thigh, bouncing off the metal plate. He didn’t have time to thank Shiva this time as the creature drove him to the ground, retracting the stinger for another strike. Tom yanked the revolver from its holster, bringing it up, firing wildly from the hip, and sending three shots into the vargulf. “I blew you up shit face!” he screamed at the thing. It replied in a gurgle as its insides were turned to mush.

The creature let go from where it had latched on with its claws, staggering back off him. The vargulf swung its tail at him one final time, the stinger catching in Tom’s side. It wasn't a deep wound, but he could feel the hit of the poison. He brought up the revolver up to eye level, blowing a hole in the creature's face. He slumped down behind the rock he was using for cover, hand pressed to his side. It was little more than a deep cut, but damn it hurt.

He looked to the sky for more of the bastards, flicking the goggles back down. Those things were damn near pitch black so he had no chance of spotting one without them. He couldn’t see shit though, and more importantly, Jarix hadn’t gotten his arse out of there. Glancing at the wounded dragon, Tom saw that he was limping backward towards him. He was being harried relentlessly from above, letting out a weak splutter of lightning into the sky which seemed to catch one or two. This was a losing battle and Jarix seemed to know it as he continued to back up.

Tom ejected the spent rounds, reloading the revolver then holstering it. Looking back to Jarix he spotted a darkling diving towards the dragon with what looked like a lance of sorts. Tom lifted the goggles to bring the rifle back up, slamming a round home as quickly as possible, trying desperately to track it through the darkness. A white dragonette then came rushing out of the gloom, an audible crack being heard as Jackalope’s warhammer crushed the foul creature's skull.

“Way to go, Jackalope,” he murmured to himself approvingly, finishing the reload of his rifle. Then he took off running around the left-hand side of Jarix back the way he came. He couldn’t see any movement on the ground, and they had likely seen his fight with the vargulf from above so he needed to move. As he ran he made out a new sound amongst the screaming and roaring: the sound of a massive rachet working away.

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“In total, a few hundred I should imagine,” Viantius replied.

Sapphire was starting to see Dakota’s plan coming together. Money for the drawings, money from the Flaxen's, supplies from the Royal Guard. They were gonna be set for life at this rate. Of course that wasn’t gonna happen. Factoring in Tom’s thirst for materials Sapphire was reckoning on this all being gone by the end of the year. ‘I wonder what the whole sugar idea could be worth?’

“So less than the bribe they offered?” Balethon questioned.

“Wouldn't you want to pay a bit to avoid going to jail if you could?” Ulrik replied, sipping his tea. “They will likely try to drag things out as well.”

“Bastards think they can buy their way out of anything.”

“Do we have any idea how long this might take?” Dakota tried, looking to Viantius.

“Depends on how amenable the court is to their requests. If they want to drag things out the court has to let them.” Victoria cracked a very slight smile at that one. “And the lady isn’t exactly in their favor following her actions. We need to emphasize that she lied to the court to bring accusations of treason against a keep which has just been praised by the king. And is currently in His Majesty's service, if I remember correctly?” She held the stern yet cordial face she so commonly wore, though it was clear she was intent on ruining Lady Flaxen.

Sapphire guessed she took the slight against her extremely seriously, then again looking around at where they were this was not the home of a modest family. Her name was likely extremely important to her, and it had been sullied.

“That we are indeed. Jarix headed out with Tom, Jackalope, and Unkai. They left Radexi behind though,” Dakota replied, with a slight nod.

“They should have brought the kid. He needs the experience if they are to make a proper team.” Victoria replied.

“Have you heard back from them yet?” Ulrik then questioned, leaning forward with his cup of tea.

“Not yet, they should return sometime late tomorrow, if nothing was amiss,” Dakota replied.

“Here's to hoping,” Ulrik then continued, raising his cup. “Sure it's nothing young Jarix can’t handle, not to mention your little demon.”

“I can assure you he is no demon. Not until you hurt the kids at least. Then he turns scary” Sapphire added, lifting her cup.

They all lifted their cups, giving a toast to the good luck of those back home.

“You know he sounds almost like a big softie to me,” Ulrik mused, leaning back.

“I guess,” Sapphire had to agree. “The most dangerous softie you are ever gonna meet though.”

“Hah, hardly. I still remember when I caught Baron attempting to stack some bricks he found like some kid playing. He still insists he knocked them over and simply wanted to clean up his mess”

Victoria gave a chuckle at that, stirring her tea. “You know he’s gonna kill you when he finds out you are still telling people about that.”

“Hah, I doubt it. What about Jarix? I’m sure he's struggling to adapt to life outside the training field. He’s just lazing about all day ain't he?”

They all had a bit of a look at each other. They didn’t know more than the few snippets of news they had gotten from Nunuk, through Dakota.

“Not exactly. Tom had him out hunting and plowing fields before the scouting expedition,” Sapphire replied, cautiously. She had no clue if that was good or bad, only that she had never heard of a dragon of the royal guard undertaking such efforts.

“You are sure this Tom isn't some demon? How does one even begin to convince a young, flamboyant, and, by my beautiful wife’s reckoning, rather reckless dragon… to plow fields?”

“Tom promised to fight alongside Jarix in future.” Dakota dismissed the question, glancing at Victoria.

“My gods, if that did it, then I wanna see this Tom in combat at some point.”

“Oh he’s spectacular,” Balethon let out excitedly. “You won’t even see him coming. He hides like some scared fawn, then boom you're dead.”

“To the scared fawn that killed a Dark Knight then,” Ulrik went, refilling his cup and raising it again.

“To the crazy human,” Sapphire went as they toasted the crazy bastard. She could get used to this as well.

Then the conversation fell onto matters of what should be disclosed and by whom during the inevitable trial. They would be running a tight schedule, with the first session luckily taking place the day after their meeting at the academy.

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Tom looked up to the keep to see the massive door to their landing pad inching open, figures emerging out onto the platform some raining down arrows from above. “About fucking time,” Tom let out, as he took up position on Jarix’s flank.

Looking towards the front entrance he saw armor, shields, and body parts strewn around; the side of the wall was charred black, and there were bloodstains splattering up its side. ‘Good riddance,’ Tom cursed as he looked to Jarix. “CAN YOU GET UP THERE!”

Jarix didn’t respond, though he looked in Tom’s general direction and then glanced up towards the opening gate. He looked rough as all hell. Tom got a better look at the beating Jarix had taken, from this angle. He could see the dragon’s helmet was dented, and the left side of his face was mauled severely. Some of the plates running along his neck were missing, others were dangling from their mountings bent and ruined. He stood there for a second before a fresh arrow landed in his back; he roared in pain, though the vicious anger of earlier was replaced with a more desperate tone.

His head came back to look in Tom's direction. “I won’t leave you.” He replied in a tragic voice.

‘Goddammit Jarix’ Tom cursed the dragon. If he went with Jarix he would be turned into a pincushion.

“No. I hide, you go. Now move!” Jarix reluctantly turned back to the keep, setting off at a limping run, his right foreleg apparently broken. He looked like an injured dog as he tried to run, bringing out his wings. Injured as he was he didn't have far to the keep. Driving his wings down and using his hindlegs to kick himself into the air he crashed into the keep, latching on with his claws and biting down on some kind of wooden beam, likely for a hoist, which creaked and groaned under the strain. The jump had him two-thirds of the way up as he started to climb, slowly and painfully, up the side of the keep. Several archers on the platform were clearly doing their best to cover him. Despite their best efforts though, Jarix was still taking arrow fire. One darkling was even dumb enough to land on his back with a sword and shield.

Tom blew that bastard to kingdom come. The sky was becoming a flurry of combat as the clearly visibly white dragonettes were chasing the darklings around the sky. They seemed to be trying to keep the darklings off Jarix, but Tom couldn’t work out whether they were winning or losing as making out the darklings was no easy feat at night and he had no idea how many were left.

‘Maybe a night battle wasn't the best idea,’ Tom thought to himself as he spotted movement near the main door. Some pissed looking motherfucker coming out in very familiar looking black armor. The knight looked up towards Jarix, and got out what Tom recognized as a potion bottle. ‘Oh no you don’t.’

Tom swung the rifle around, lining up on the Dark Knight as another came out as well. The two of them seemingly started to argue. The bastards were a little over a hundred meters away, since Tom had moved closer to get onto Jarix's flank. He tried his best to steady his ragged breathing, fighting the paralytic poison and aimed for the bottle. Tom had no clue what was in that bottle, but as he pulled the trigger glass splinters went flying everywhere, the precious liquid spilling to the ground.

That most definitely got the attention of the two bastards as they turned to look in his direction. Tom debated firing again. those were his targets, after all, the ones he was supposed to kill in this now rather ruined plan. He topped up the rifle and got into a good stable position to aim. The first one then lifted its hand and pointed right at him, bringing up its shield.

Tom's first shot rang out as he caught it in the neck, much to Tom’s delight. As it stumbled back clutching at its throat, the second one charged forward with more speed than Tom believed possible. It was larger, so likely a female, and she was moving fast into the darkness. He certainly didn’t have time for a grenade, so he ran the action again, taking aim at the now ducking and diving target sprinting towards him. Pitch black as she was, Tom could hardly make out the knight once she was out of the torchlight. Firing near-blind three times, Tom held the last shot, for the last possible moment, praying the rifle could punch a hole in the armor at point-blank range.

He knew that was rather unlikely though, so as he held his breath he gave a silent prayer for some kind of damn miracle, hearing the pounding footsteps coming for him. He was answered by Jackalope coming swooping down behind the knight, legs extended and claws bared, her warhammer held high above her head. She slammed into the vicious creature, driving it into the ground. Jackalope kept it pinned down as they skidded along the ground, using her wings to keep balance. Then, screaming with a vengeance, she brought down the warhammer spike first. The handle of the warhammer broke on impact, the spike being driven into its target and sticking in place.

Tom stood stunned for a split second, before the Dark Knight began to squirm beneath Jackalope, trying to get its arms under itself. Jackalope drew her knife, clearly intent on finding a hole somewhere in its armor. Tom took aim at the bastard's head, ready for the thing to look up, then shouted at it, “Up here you black pussy!” It wasn’t elegant, but it got the desired response as the knight looked up at Tom, receiving a bullet to the face for its troubles. It screamed and squirmed, somehow still not dead as Tom drew the revolver, advancing on it.

He didn’t need it though, as the distraction bought Jackalope the time she needed to slide her knife into the knight's neck, stamping on it to drive it home. As Tom holstered the revolver and brought the rifle back up to reload, he felt a set of claws drive into his own shoulders driving him to the ground.

“Get off him you idiot, he’s on our side!” Jackalope borderline roared, as Tom struggled to get back up. Whoever was on his back right now not letting go, their talons digging into his vest’s shoulder straps and piercing through slightly.

“He is a dark-thing look at him! He tried to kill you!” The protest came from another female voice he didn’t recognize. Then he felt the impact as something hit whoever was on his back, throwing her off.

“I said get off him!” He heard Jackalope shout. Then he felt strong hands grabbing him by the shoulders, helping him to his feet. “You okay?” Jackalope questioned, looking at him with an expression of genuine concern.

“Never better, but we need to get out of here,” Tom replied, lying slightly. He looked to the sky worriedly. He might be hard to see, but Jackalope and the other dragonette sure as shit weren’t.

“What the fuck are you?!” The female voice questioned from behind him. Tom didn't respond yet as he moved Jackalope to a side with an arm. Then took a knee leveling the rifle at the dark knight he had hit in the throat. it was currently so kind as to be leaning up against the wall looking up towards Jarix exposing the nearly unarmored underside of its jaw. Tom put a round in the chamber and sent it straight into the fuckers brain. It was likely already dead but now it certainly was.

Tom then got up and turned to see a dragonette, seemingly a silvered huntress who looked like she had been through hell. “Tom, human, here to save your ass. How many inside?”

She paused for a second, clearly not sure if she should answer that. “Answer the damn question” Jackalope then demanded, clearly not pleased with the woman right now.

“No clue, a lot of them came out here. There's one more of the Knights though. They have made it to the third floor.”

“Jacky, we are going inside. We need to kill the last one,” Tom went as he began reloading his rifle, then looked back to the new huntress. “You defend Jarix at all costs, understood? I’ll fix your little indoor problem if you don’t try to kill me again.” Tom didn’t wait for a reply, instead turning back to Jackalope who looked ready to enact some carnage. “Let’s blow these bastards to pieces!” That got him a downright evil grin as she unholstered the revolver.

They made it to the wall of the keep next to the door. Tom stacking up on the door, Jackalope looking at him for a second before stacking up behind him.

“You ready?” Tom questioned, looking back to her. She was fumbling with the revolver, hands shaking slightly as she tried to put the rounds in.

“Fuck this is hard,” she let out in frustration, as Tom looked around for signs of imminent death approaching. He did not want to be surprised from the air a third time tonight.

“Hey, you're doing great. This is called stacking up. and we are about to breach and clear” Jackalope looked up at him for a second with a strained smile, before returning to the task at hand.

“God that sound so much better than fighting indoors”

“Do you know where Zarko is?” Tom questioned, setting down his rifle and bringing out his second grenade. He removed the cap and got his lighter ready as Jackalope finished her reload. They really needed to work on that.

“Don’t know, somewhere up there, she’s trying to keep them off him. She’s got help now though,” Jackalope replied as she shut the cylinder on the revolver, looking back up. “Ready.”