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Retreat, Hell - Episode 16.5
🕑 Added 2021-08-23 07:36:42 +0000 UTCA/N: Hey, guys! Episode 16.5 is out. We're getting another, brief look at the elves, but not with Tyriel this time!
Sketchy plot things happen! Ooooo!
Work continues on Episode 17. I've got a couple weeks off, and I expect to make good progress this week, but I've got family coming to visit next week, and back to work the week after that, so I'm not expecting Episode 17 to be done before September, but it will be done before the end of September!
I'll also have more time to write for the remainder of this year than I've had for much of the last two years, though I'll be moving in a few months, and that whole process will probably impact my writing time. But, after that, I'll have a much better work schedule and should be able to pick up a much more regular writing and posting schedule.
In case you missed it, we've got a Discord now! You can find the link here: https://discord.gg/bujmJ6sQxC
Now, without further ado, Episode 16.5!
Retreat, Hell – Episode 16.5
Pawl’ik tugged at a horn, fidgeting in the quiet dark of his lab. They’re late … aren’t they? Did the bell already sound? Did I miss it?He picked up the cup of tea he had made himself to comfort his nerves, then set it back down next to the pot, untouched.
Pushing himself off of his desk, he took another tour around the lab, double-checking his prototypes, making sure everything else was secure, and that nobody was hidden under a table or behind a desk. Just in case someone had secreted their way into his lab in the last fifteen minutes without him noticing. He paused, hand resting on a cart with a cloth draped over it. Maybe I shouldn’t do this … What if? No. No. He shook his head. We have no chance. I have to ensure Srinsi and the children’s safety.
A deep bell gonged into the night. He turned to the window, and the bell tower just barely visible across the university’s courtyard. It gonged twelve times in a steady rhythm, followed by three rapid gongs, one for each extra minute of the day. Kasha’arl’s Time …
“Do you have what we came for?” a voice asked behind him.
Pawl’ik jumped and spun around, barely suppressing a yelp of fright. Standing right in front of him were three elves. The one in the center wore dull plate that still had a faint gleam despite the dim light. The other two wore all black, and were barely distinguishable from the shadows. He recognized the one who had spoken, the elf with armor. The only elf he had ever met until now.
He swallowed nervously. They were here for something bigger than anything he had ever given. But the stakes are bigger than anything they have ever offered. “I-I do,” he said, swallowing and sweeping his ears back, striving to put some steel in his voice. “Do you have the replacements, to the specifications I gave you?”
“We do,” the elf said, his voice low and sharp, his eyes narrow. Kanalin, Pawl’ik had been told to call him. “Where are the artifices?”
“Right here,” he said, removing the cloth covering the three prototypes on the cart he had wheeled them in on. More of a wheeled table, he thought before flicking away the nervous distraction.
Kanalin turned to them, giving the artifices a suspicious investigation. The other two elves never shifted their gaze from Pawl’ik. “How do we activate them?”
“They require … a substantial mana supply,” Pawl’ik fidgeted, shifting his weight. “Several large crystals each, or, a, uh … a comparable source.” He gulped as the elf gave him a stony glare. We already discussed this. “But once the mana is supplied, the control interface is energized,” he added quickly. “It is fairly standard, and simple to use.”
“How do we properly tune them?”
“Oh, they are, they are already tuned.” He chuckled nervously, his voice cracking. “It’s hard to not tune them, actually. With the portal open, they naturally drift to sync with it.” He coughed to clear his throat. “All you have to do is adjust the precise location. Don’t want to open one under the ocean, or in a volcano, ha!”
“Is there anything else required to activate them?”
“No, that’s all you have to do. It’s just, uh-“
“Good,” Kanalin said, interrupting him.
Without warning, the two black-clad elves grabbed his shoulders and shoved him back. Back, and down. His eyes went wide and his ears flicked straight up. “Wh-“ was all he managed before the back of his neck was slammed into the corner of his desk. He heard the snap of his own neck, as much as felt it.
The elves released him, and he slumped to the floor. Fear flooded his mind as he lay awkwardly against the front of his desk. I can’t move! I can’t feel anything! Gods, no …
He watched in growing horror as the elves took his tea cup and splashed tea on his feet, before shattering both cup and pot on the ground before him. Moving swiftly but with deadly silence, they collected the three prototypes, replacing them with the fakes he gave them specifications to make.
They tipped the cart over, smashing everything on the floor. A brief spark lit the lab in sharp, momentary relief as a spellburst pulsed from a mage staff he hadn’t noticed. No. No. No. Gods above and Gods below, no …The acrid odor of smoke twinged his nostrils as the dreadful, warm glow of fire began to illuminate the room.
Satisfied with their work, the elves slipped from the room as quietly as they had arrived, disappearing from sight even before the door was opened.
The flames quickly spread.
Srinsi, Kaina, Tesh’lin, I’ve failed you … I’ve betrayed you … I can’t smell the smoke anymore … I’m not breathing …
He desperately tried to hold the image of his wife and daughters in his mind as his vision faded, but his final thought was of grim satisfaction before he succumbed to the darkness. They didn’t let me tell them everything before they killed me …
Comments
If it spawns in Detroit, Detroit will steal it, can't have shit in Detroit
ImezRuez2
Chitcago if Karma means anything anymore.
Those portals will have a full effect once, twice at worst. I bet there is quite a detectable pressure difference that happens when one opens. I bet weather satellites will pick that up real quick. If they open up a larger one in the ocean the navy will have a field day cleaning that up and heading through once it’s confirmed it will stay open.
With their luck, their gonna open up a portal to Dallas
