Originally Posted by Shin
(Post 715006)
My dwarf cunningly stepped in behind the zombie, flanking the beast and hopefully leading us to a swift victory. Sadly however, this left no room for any fireballs, at least not without hitting my companions and losing one buddy per fight was pretty much my limit.
Well, it was these days anyway. As a youth I had hung out with a rather rough bunch of kids. Not through choice of course, it was simply a case of geography. Living as we did on the plantation, the only kids even vaguely my age around were the children of the workers, a mixture for the most part of half-orcs and humans. Oh yes and a single minotaur family. Their son, we called him Steak, I never did find out his real name, was the de facto leader of our group on account of being 15 stone of pure muscle and having sharp horns on his head at the age of eleven. As the only elf of the group, I was subjected to endless friendly ribbing and games like "How long can the elf hold his breath underwater", "Pin the tail to the elf" and everyone's favourite "Elf-hunt" were common. Still, I was one of them and as Steak always told me, "AAAARGHFFRF RRAAARGHFFMMGF MMMRAAFGHFGH MMMOOOOOOOOOOOO!". The combination of a hair lip and a massive brass ring through his nose did make him rather difficult to understand certainly but luckily, one of the scrawniest half-orc kids, one many suggested was in fact a half-goblin, was able to understand Steak perfectly and conveyed his meaning and wishes to the rest of us. Apparently Steak had been saying that should I ever get in trouble then to come to him because if anyone was going to hurt our elf it was going to be him.
One day, I had accompanied my father to visit the nearby village to collect supplies. Father said we'd work quicker if we split up so sent me off to the general store to pick up 25 shovels and a new millstone while he went to source something or other in the tavern. It was several hours later that I, having managed finally to get the millstone onto the cart and spent a good while waiting for my father, was accosted by a gang of youths, local village kids for the most part and all elves. We exchanged pleasantries, me asking how did they do and them asking if I was the "Funny looking queermo from the forest who hangs out with orcs" and questioning my parentage. The first question was perhaps an understandable one but as soon as one of them mentioned my beloved mother, I flew into a fit of rage and launched myself at him, fist flailing, looking to dish out some rough justice to these base-born curs.
My father eventually found me half submerged in the village's communal latrine and took me home and sent me to bed with a good thrashing to think about what I'd done. The next day, after relaying my tale to the group, Steak decided that retribution was in order and a plan was hatched. The half-goblin kid suggested that we arrange to meet these village kids somewhere quiet, away from prying adult eyes and give them a good beating. The decided location for the rumble was Hellspawn Cave, my objections being quickly put down both by sound reasoning from the half-goblin (There wasn't really any dark underworld creatures living there, the adults just called it that to keep kids away because they liked hanging out without kids from time to time, you know, those meetings where they all wear red robes do that funny chanting stuff) and a heavy punch to the temple from Steak.
A messenger was despatched to the village kids and we headed out to the cave to wait for the appointed time, sunset. The group took up positions inside the cave entrance, whilst I waited outside alone, the plan being to ambush the village kids when they arrived. The evening grew colder, unseasonably so as I recall and as the sun set, shadow filled the cave mouth and I felt strangely alone until finally, I saw the gang from the village marching up the path towards me.
I remember little of what happened after that. There were some insults exhanged of course and I remember shouting a rallying cry to the boys I knew were hidden in the cave but after that the evening becomes fuzzy. To this day I have dreams about the wet, ripping noises from behind me, the looks of abject terror on the faces of the village kids, the odd bellow of pain (which I knew couldn't possibly be coming from Steak as it sounded almost like a young minotaur having his limbs ripped off one by one by some demonic monstrosity and I had been assured there were no demons in the cave) and the sight of several bodies, well bits of bodies anyway, strewn around the cave entrance and the path.
I was later told that the fight had got out of hand and a few kids had been badly hurt and that Steak and the goblin kid had both been killed, with all the other kids having to move away, although I could never understand why their families never went with them, especially as they all looked so sad afterwards. Still, I never had any trouble with the village kids again, in fact I never saw any of them again, they must have been avoiding me, like everyone else in the village seemed to after that day. From that day forth though, every time I drank any milk I'd pour some on the kerb for Steak and remember the good old days of the West Plantation Crew.
I sighed at the memory of my childhood chums, wondering if I'd ever see any of them again. Almost as an afterthought I sent another gout of flame towards the flying zombie, hoping to actually hit the fucker this time.
Flameburst at Rotwing
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