No Pain for Fiends

[Strazio Rockwell]

“Oh you bastard,” Strazio growled as Aurelias took aim at the high blood. Strazio strained his body, forcing it to move faster. His feet dug into the dirt and he pumped his arms as fast as he could. Alas there was no outrunning a crossbow bolt. It slammed into Gamzee’s back, burying itself deep into the troll’s chest. Gamzee yelped and slumped over. Strazio cussed and turned towards Aurelias. With a signature disregard for his own safety he bull rushed the revenant and invited a withering storm of bolts. They did not stop his charge and in moments he was upon the reanimated hunter. Feral and enraged Strazio pummeled his foe. Each hit bruised his knuckles and sent tremors of pain through his forearms, the man was filled with lead. 


“Strazio,” Gamzee said, but went unheard through Strazio’s torrent of obscenities. The troll looked down at the reverting Peter and back at his vicious friend. Sure the bolt hurt, hurt like hell to be honest, but it wasn’t like Gamzee was a pushover. Gamzee stood and walked over to the scuffling duo. Strazio raised his hand and charged it with a crackling malignancy that rivaled a bolt of lightning. Before it could be brought down upon Aurelias Gamzee grabbed the mage’s wrist. “Stop it,” Gamzee said, “everything’s good, it's all good, Peter ain’t a wolfman anymore so Mr. Zombie has no reason to fight us anymore.”


“Let go of my arm,” Strazio snarled, not taking his eyes off the downed man, “he’s gonna pay for everyone one of these arrows sticking out of our bodies.”


Gamzee did not oblige him and instead observed, “killing him is probably the kindest thing you could do for him.”


No one said anything for a long time. The troll kept a hold of Strazio’s wrist and Strazio did not look away from Aurelias. The revenant had the eyes of a dead man, cold and pallid, filled with an apathy that Strazio had only seen once before. Death would be welcome to the dead man. Death would be a release. Death would set him free from his binds and death would release his soul to the afterlife. Strazio smiled. There would be no death today. The sparks that swam around Strazio’s body fizzled out and he stood up, allowing the Revenant to do the same. Aurelias glanced past the duo and to Peter, whose body had a distinct lack of fur. The revenant nodded. He left without a word.


Peter coughed and Gamzee rushed to his side. Although the man was no longer a wolf, the silver bolts that covered his body still proved to be a threat. Blood drizzled from wounds and his body shuddered in shock. Strazio crouched down next to him and set to work cauterizing every open wound. Small semi-controlled bursts of magick nipped at open blood vessels and sealed them shut. It certainly wasn’t enough to save the man, but it would buy them time. The duo heaved Peter up and carried him with arms draped across their backs. It would be a long walk back, but they hadn’t come this far to leave him for dead. 


They arrived at Darkshire when the moon was high in the sky. Strazio flashed his crest and the guards let him in without incident. Peter had grown cold by this point. This worried the duo, but neither of them said a word. They trudged through town towards Mama Godwin’s hut. Gamzee knocked on the door, while Strazio strained to keep Peter up.


“Oh my Peter,” she exclaimed and brought her hands to her cheeks.


Before anyone could say another word Strazio spoke, “aight lady, we don’t have a lotta time, he needs some kind of healing juice or concotion, he’s lost a lot of blood.”


“Yes, bring him in, bring him in,” she said and scurried off inside her hut. Once inside she found a red vial with the label “Mama’s cure-all”. Gamzee cleared off a table and Strazio lifted Peter onto it. Mama cradled her son’s head and fed him the contents of the vial. It took a few minutes to start working, but Peter’s breathing stabilized. His once-cold body was now flush and he started to sweat profusely. “It’ll be awhile until he’s back to full strength,” Mama said and turned towards the haggard adventurers, “but, y'all brought him back safe and sound, an’ I ‘preciate that so here’s a li’l somethin’ somethin’ for ya’lls.” She handed them each a bottle full of a shimmering blue liquid. They were labeled “Mama’s Spirit Juice”. Gamzee smiled, thanked her, and went to drink his. Mama smacked his hand and said, “now now child, don’t you go wastin’ that now, it’ll rejuvenate your mystical energies, and it’s bitter, so only drink it when ya needs to, now it’s late and y’all need to get to bed, so go on and get now.”