Authors: Sean Fay Wolfe
The King Kev actor picked up Stan's axe, attached it to his belt, and then picked up his own sword. The instant it touched his hand, the sword darkened to black to match the tunic and cap the actor had pulled on. The King Kev actor cleared his throat, and spoke. “My name is Emerick, corporal of the Noctem Alliance. My agents and I have captured and taken your president hostage. As such, I now claim this city in the name of the Noctem Alliance and its leader, Lord Tenebris.”
And through the stunned silence of the crowd around the imitation bridge, all the black figures gave the same unanimous cry that had haunted Stan's nightmares.
“VIVA LA NOCTEM!”
W
ith the sword held against his neck, Stan could barely breathe, let alone turn his head to see the looks of terror on his citizens' faces. Stan willed himself not to panic. He knew this bold attack by the Noctem Alliance would ultimately be useless.
Even as Stan thought this, arrows flew from the plain-dressed guards Stan had positioned throughout the crowd, an added security measure suggested by Gobbleguy. Stan saw with a painful glance that several of the Noctem troopers who had been holding the crowd at bay with potions had already been felled by arrows, and the rest had disappeared in bursts of fire.
Stan felt the grip around his neck loosen, and he broke out of the Avery actor's chokehold. Spinning around, Stan found him dead on the ground, an arrow protruding from his forehead. Stan lunged sideways and scooped up the dead actor's sword.
“Pursue the attackers!” Stan bellowed at the guards in the crowd, who pocketed their bows and began chasing the remaining attackers, who were fleeing the scene. A small smile crossed Stan's face as he turned his attention to the Noctem corporal named Emerick who, inexplicably, was returning the expression.
This didn't sit well with Stan, and his own smile
vanished. “Why are you smiling?” Stan demanded. “Your troops are dead and your little hostile takeover lasted less than ten seconds. What part of this do you find amusing, exactly?”
Emerick's smile just grew, and in a matter of seconds a low, evil chuckle sounded from the Noctem corporal. Stan suddenly felt a surge of rage toward Emerick and the Noctem Alliance that he served. His attempt to seize power had failed, yet he still found something to be happy about? Was this some sort of trick?
Stan lunged forward, sword in hand, ready to sink it deep into Corporal Emerick, but the corporal feinted backward faster than Stan had ever seen a player move before, and with one jump, he launched himself high over the crowd. A series of black orbs, barely visible against the black sky, flew from Corporal Emerick's hand and hit the ground in a burst of fire. As he disappeared into the smoke from the fire charges, Stan barely made out the faint blue and orange smoke curling off his back.
No!
Stan thought.
If he's using Potions of Swiftness and Fire Resistant, how am I gonna catch him?
Corporal Emerick was clearly the head of the operation, and Stan knew that bringing him to trial was imperative. Stan then noticed the possessions of the Avery actor laying on the ground behind him. After a moment of rummaging, Stan found what he was
looking for. Wasting no time, he poured the two potions into his mouth, and leaped into the flames after the corporal.
Stan, having never drank the Potion of Swiftness, or QPO, before, was amazed by how lighthearted and free he felt. It was as if he could do no wrong, and he instantly felt that regaining the huge lead Corporal Emerick had taken would be nothing short of easy. Stan recognized the pleasant tickling sensation that came from running through the flames the fire charges had left on the ground.
As Stan burst from the smoke, he saw Corporal Emerick sprinting full speed down the main street, a trail of blue and orange fumes in his wake. Stan followed in pursuit, his own feet feeling like they weighed nothing under the effects of the potion. He soon realized he was not alone. Stan glanced behind him and saw DZ and Archie running alongside him, trailing blue wisps of smoke themselves.
“Hey, Stan!” said Archie, surprising Stan. He hadn't realized the potion enabled them to talk easily while running.
“Hey, Archie,” said Stan with a grim smirk. “Sorry all your plans got ruined.”
“Honestly, I'm just thankful we all got out alive,” Archie replied.
“So nobody got hurt in the attack, then?” asked Stan.
“Nah, our snipers took 'em all down,” said DZ. “I gotta say, if this is the Noctem Alliance's idea of an attack, then we
really ain't got too much to worry about.”
“I'm still getting over the fact that the organization still exists,” said Stan, his face reflecting the worry boiling within him. “I gotta be honest, these Noctem guys have shown that they can be both really smart and really rash and dumb.”
“That's a good point,” said Archie, a frown crossing his skeleton face. “One day they override the redstone circuits of the courthouse, something we still haven't figured out, and the next, they pull something like this? I mean, this was, like, the worst-thought-out offensive of all time!”
“It scares me, to be honest,” said Stan, speaking truthfully as they rounded a curve, following the corporal onto the main street of the government district. “When there are inconsistencies like this, it makes it hard to draw patterns. Are these guys from the Noctem Alliance smart or not? And, more important, are they a serious danger to the city?”
“Well, hopefully this little jerk'll give us some answers. Look where he went.” DZ smirked, pointing as Emerick disappeared into the front doors of the Avery Memorial Courthouse.
Stan's heart roared in triumph. The courthouse walls were made of obsidian. Corporal Emerick had just trapped himself in the building.
As they ran up the front steps of the courthouse, DZ yelled out, “Here, Stan!” and Stan saw something blue and
brown flying out of DZ's hand. Stan caught it and recognized it as his own diamond axe. He nodded a quick thanks to DZ, holding it in his hand as he pocketed the sword he had been carrying. DZ drew out two glowing diamond swords, and Archie drew his bow. The trio burst into the courthouse. Stan reached back without checking his speed and, in one movement, punched a painting off the wall near the door and pulled down the switch hidden behind it. The iron doors of the courthouse slammed shut behind them. Stan heard the mechanical whirrs of various other mechanisms within the building ensuring that escape would be impossible until Stan input the security code.
The effects of the potion were beginning to wear off. Stan, Archie, and DZ walked into the main courtroom immediately adjacent to the entrance hall, which was the only room in the building. The room sat stagnant as ever, the same rotunda of wooden seats around the main floor. Obsidian pillars stood looming in the middle of the rotunda seats. The Noctem leader could be hidden behind any of the seats, or any of the pillars, Stan realized.
Stan, Archie, and DZ looked at one another in silence. A series of eye and head gestures seemed to indicate that splitting up was in order. As DZ snuck around the pillars and Archie stood ready to shoot at a split second's notice, Stan crept through the seats, methodically and meticulously
checking behind each and every row. However, the search yielded no results, and a quick shout down to DZ confirmed that his search had been equally unsuccessful.
Stan was stumped. Corporal Emerick was clearly somewhere within the room, but Stan had checked all the hiding places. From where he was standing, Stan could see the entire courtroom, including behind every single seat. He saw DZ and Archie checking around the pillars for a second time, and the looks of bewilderment on their faces were indicating that it was to no avail. Where was . . .
“AAAAUUUGH!”
Stan almost stumbled forward off the seats at the yell from DZ that echoed throughout the rotunda. A pained grimace had taken to DZ's face, and he was clutching at his arm, staring in surprise at the arrow that had just sunk into it. Stan whipped his head to the side, wildly thinking for a moment that Archie had betrayed them, but his skeletal face showed surprise to mirror DZ's and his own.
Stan heard a whizzing sound, and he turned in time to see an arrow flying out of the vacant seats toward his face. Stan lunged to the side, the arrow sinking into the wall behind him. Sheathing his axe and drawing his bow, he tried to distinguish the source of the arrow. As he stared intently at the place where the arrow had originated, utterly confused and terrified as to what was happening, he noticed something
from the corner of his eye. An iron sword, having materialized in midair in the middle of the rotunda floor, was now flying across the room, on a collision course with Archie's back.
“Archie, hit the dirt!”
Stan bellowed. Archie did so without hesitation, and the sword soared over him just as Stan sent an arrow toward the sword's point of origin. The arrow connected. Stan heard a grunt of pain as the arrow found its unseen mark. Stan saw Corporal Emerick flicker into visibility for an instant, with an aggrieved look on his face, before vanishing once again.
“Guys, he's there!” Stan yelled, directing DZ's and Archie's attention to the place where an arrow was being yanked out of the unseen player's shoulder and tossed to the ground. “You can't see him, but he's there!”
Recognition flashed across Archie's face. “He's using an Invisibility Potion!” he cried, sending an arrow toward the invisible corporal, which Emerick sidestepped. Now that Stan knew where Emerick was, he was certain he could see a slight shimmering, as if heat were rising off of pavement, wherever the invisible player was. Stan saw Emerick darting across the room. A visible diamond sword appeared from thin air in what Stan assumed was his hand, flying right toward Stan himself. Stan drew his own axe to engage the corporal in combat.
This was easily the most bizarre fight Stan had ever been in, and considering what he had endured on his campaign to overthrow King Kev, that was saying something. Stan could not determine any distinct part of the invisible enemy he was fighting. It was all Stan could do to raise his axe to counterattack the levitating diamond sword, which was making floating jabs and slices.
Stan felt his legs being swept out from under him, and he knew that Corporal Emerick had swept his invisible foot underneath Stan's own. Stan tumbled to the floor, barely raising his axe in time to block the sword that was coming down onto his neck. As Stan struggled to regain his upright footing, he felt an invisible foot pinning his chest to the ground. Stan felt he was being drained of all energy as his blood rushed from his heart in a wave.
Just as Stan was about to determine that it was too much, that he couldn't fight anymore, the pressure lifted the slightest bit. This gave Stan the opportunity to fling himself upward and onto his feet. The corporal tumbled down the rotunda seats, a shimmering marking his place as well as the arrow sticking from his shoulder blade.
Stan's vision on the rotunda floor refocused on DZ trying to mend the wound from the arrow he had pulled from his unarmored bicep, but he did not see Archie by DZ's side. Stan saw Archie firing arrow after arrow at the place he assumed
the crumpled form of the corporal lay. A black tunic shielded the onslaught of arrows. As the floating tunic crept farther and farther backward toward the door, Archie advanced on him at a much faster pace.
Having the upper hand, however, had made Archie overconfident. Just as Corporal Emerick was backed up against the locked doors, a potion bottle came flying out of nowhere as the black tunic disappeared into a newly created plume of black smoke. The potion slammed into Archie's red-haired skeleton head and exploded into a cloud of blue-gray smoke. He keeled over to the ground, clutching his head in agony. DZ rushed in to help Archie, but Stan was staring in horror at a lever that he had never noticed before on the wall. This lever was in the On position.
Fear coursed through Stan. He had fought far too many players who utilized explosive traps in their surroundings to not know one when he saw one. He and his friends needed to evacuate the courthouse immediately. His shout of “RUN!” was deadened by the explosion in the center of the rotunda seats behind him.
Stan didn't even have time to look toward his two friends when the wave of fire slammed into his back. He was launched forward at breakneck speed through the two doorframes that had held iron doors seconds before. Stan felt himself tumbling wildly through space, only stopping when
he was thrown down into a viscous substance. As he opened his eyes, he realized that he had landed in the bottommost pool of the Apothecary Memorial Fountain. Although it sat a distance from the doors of the courthouse, it still had one of its sides blasted away by the explosion. Stan let the current of the gushing fountain carry him down to the road. Everything ached at once from the sheer force of being caught in that blast. However, as Stan turned his head to the side, he saw something that rendered all his pain irrelevant.
He could see two shadowy figures sitting not far away from him in the darkness. One appeared to be shaking the other, who was limp and unresponsive. Stan's forehead immediately broke out in sweat, as did his palms. The horribly familiar feeling of dread bubbled up inside him, threatening to boil over as he ran to the two figures. He saw DZ, uncharacteristically shell-shocked, holding Archie's body in shaking hands, a ring of items lying around them haphazardly.
Four months ago, when Stan had stood in the tower of Element Castle alongside the Apothecary, King Kev had chosen to kill himself rather than die at the hands of Stan. The magnitude of the alarm that had struck Stan at that point could only be described in two words:
shock
and
awe
. Now, seeing DZ sobbing as he shook Archie's dead body, demanding that he wake up, another round of shock and awe whipped Stan across the face like a white-hot iron. Six hours ago, Stan had
believed the Noctem Alliance no longer existed. Now, their leader had just killed one of his friends.
As Stan realized this, he became aware of a presence watching him. As the shock gave way to furyâpure, unfiltered hatredâStan whipped his head upward to look into the smirking face of Corporal Emerick.
Stan's body acted on its own. His axe flew from his side and into his hand as he charged the Noctem corporal. He brought his axe down onto that hatefully smug face, hoping to put as much pain as possible into the strike, only to have Emerick sidestep the attack. His axe collided with the stone ground with enough force to snap the diamond blade from the handle.