Hell's Frigidaire

[Eleanor Lamb]

I should’ve summoned a heavier jacket.

Stormtrooper Guy’s armor almost blends in with the snow, but thanks to the stylish black coloration of all his joints, I see him crumpled up a few yards away from me after passing through the gate to the Frozen Fields.

The name’s not kidding. This place is literally covered—every goddamn inch of it—in snow. Between this and the place we just came from, I haven’t seen this much white since my last visit to Wall Street.

I hug my leather jacket more tightly around me, my feet crunching through the snow towards my little friend. After digging in the frozen shit to find his leash, I nudge him ever so slightly. With my foot. Pretty hard, actually. “Ow,” he groans, rolling over and quitting his ruse of unconsciousness.

“No sleeping on the job, guy,” I say. “…sorry, what’s your name again, bro?”

I’m not really sure why I apologized. I mean, didn’t this douche technically threaten me back in the big white land of emptiness? Okay, okay, ‘threaten’ may be a strong word, but he definitely at least aimed his little Star Wars laser gun in my direction. And although I know from memes on my Facebook that Stormtroopers have shitty aim, the guy was basically almost in point blank range—close enough for me to punch him, anyway—and so I couldn’t take any risks. Right?

Before you say anything snarky, yes, it has dawned on me by now that I’m essentially kidnapping this poor sucker. But he pointed his laser rifle at me.

“I go by the designation TR-8R,” my buddy growls. That’s too many numbers and letters to remember, and they all seem super random.

“Jessica,” I say, reminding him, “I’m gonna call you Trey.”

His distaste for that idea is apparent even with his face shrouded by that ugly helmet of his. Ignoring his frustrated mumbling, I forge ahead into the blizzard, dragging his ass behind me. This time, though, he’s awake, so after a brief pause to move my knots from his ankles to his wrists, he can at least stand on his own two legs and follow me. I don’t have to listen to his head bop, bop, bopping along the ground, which is a definite plus.

Trey and I journey through the Frozen Fields for what seems like ever without a single word between us or a hint of civilization. Hyperbole aside, it’s probably like half an hour before I finally stop in my tracks.

“Sooooooo,” my buddy pipes up behind me, “Where exactly were you planning on going, Jessica?” The snideness in his voice irks me.

“Don’t test me, Trey,” I turn back to him, pointing a finger very threateningly at him, “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. And it especially hath no fury like a Jessica Jones scorned, you get me?” I can’t tell what his face looks like through that helmet, but his silence implies that he picked up what I was putting down.

During our little trip, we’ve been flirting with a mountain range that sort of snaked around us and now lies directly in our path. Given my high degree of unfamiliarity with the populace and wildlife of this snowy hell, I’m not too keen to find myself trapped in closed quarters, just in case a huge monster jumps out of nowhere and decides that Trey and I are exactly what it was craving for dinner. But—despite being from New York, which has been snowstorm central lately—I am also not the biggest fan of blizzards, and so I make the tough decision to take shelter in a cave somewhere in the foothills of one of the mountains.

Trey protests, going on about trolls and giants and other weird things that honestly just seem like shit he’s making up.

“Listen, dude,” I shoot a glare in his direction, “I’m willing to suspend my disbelief that you’re not some weird cosplaying convention freak and believe you when you tell me you’re actually a Stormtrooper and you actually serve the Emperor and what the fuck ever else, but you’re not about to try and pull some World of Warcraft bullshit over my eyes. No way José. No way.”

“But—”

And then a very sharp pain streaks through my entire abdomen, and I look down to find myself on the business end of a very rustic-looking spear. A motherfucking spear.

“Ow,” I say involuntarily, and the spear is yanked out of my stomach. I spin around, suddenly feeling very lightheaded, to see a very ugly-looking, pointy-nosed creature that really and truly can only be described as a troll giggling maniacally. I fumble with Trey’s laser rifle and eventually it slips through my fingers as I tumble onto the ground.

My vision starts to get blurry, but I can still see enough to see Trey lunge for the rifle and pick it up with his tied-up hands. The troll rears back with its spear, but my Stormtrooper buddy proves his worth: he takes aim and fires, like, five times straight into the ugly monster’s chest, sending it falling backwards into a wall. Its bosom is steaming, and the light leaves its eyes as slowly it slides down the rock wall of the cavern, dead. As I try to pick myself up, I can’t help but say one of my favorite words.

“Shiiiit.”

“You okay?” Trey asks, turning around and helping me up.

“I, uh,” I stammer, obviously not feeling okay, “I… think I’m, uh, bleeding.”

I feel the hole in my abdomen, and I’m totally right. It’s wet with fresh blood. Thankfully, Mr. Troll didn’t seem to be shooting to kill, so he missed my major organs, but I’ve still got a nasty hole straight through me and I’m bleeding profusely so I figure that we need to find some help. Somehow. Someway. Though I honestly have no fucking clue where to start in this ridiculous fantasy world.

“I think there’s a dwarf city a little ways away, deeper beneath the mountain,” Trey tells me, and my eyes grow wide once again.

“…dwarves?” I screech. This is too much for one day.

But I follow him anyway, because damn, it fucking hurts.

Begin Quest: Into the Hall
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[Eleanor Lamb]

Fuck. Fuck. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.

Like seriously, if you had asked me yesterday if I thought I would have to worry about being stabbed by a spear made of really sharp rock today, I may have answered in a way that could not be repeated in front of children. Granted, most things I say probably couldn’t be repeated in front of children. Especially not the litany of expletives my good buddy Trey had to endure on our way to the dwarf kingdom.

I can’t believe those words are real. Dwarf kingdom. What the hell?

“It should be just a little further,” Trey assures me as I limp along behind him, blood oozing through my fingers as I grip my wound with my hand.

“You said that twenty minutes ago,” I growl through gritted teeth. He huffs in frustration—he’s obviously not a fan of my attitude. Whatever, he can get over himself. I didn’t ask to be stabbed by a troll. Who would?

The caves seem to go on forever without changing. Just some boring-ass gray rocks broken up by the occasional stalactite or stalagmite, a little foggy because when I breathe it literally comes out white. I mean, I live in New York City—I’ve been able to see my breath when it gets cold. But this stuff looks tangible.

Suddenly, a faint reddish glow starts to flicker around an upcoming corner. “Bongo, bongo, bongo!” I hum absentmindedly.

“Huh?” Stormtrooper Guy glances over his shoulder. I’m sure behind that helmet he’s giving me a ‘this chick is cray’ look.

“Danny Kaye?” I raise an eyebrow at him. “The Andrews Sisters? Civilization? It’s a song, dumbass.” He stares at me for a good second, and then I shake my head and move past him. I don’t have time for him to not understand my pop culture references, I’m bleeding out all over this icy floor, for Christ’s sakes. Around the corner is more tunnel, but this one is lined with torches spitting some dank-looking red flames. And unlike every other corner of this depressing cavern we’ve been traveling through, there’s a light at the end of this tunnel.

In my crippled state, it takes a hot second for us to get all the way to the end, but when we do, we leave the dark mountain tunnels and wind up walking straight through a side entrance to one of the most gloriously over-decorated cities I have ever had the opportunity to visit. Seriously, everything is lined with crystal or some sort of high-priced metal. I want to vomit, though it’s hard to tell whether that’s because of my disdain for the design or caused by some bleeding out-related nausea.

“This is Dwarveholm,” Trey says, taking a moment to stop and observe his surroundings. I snicker a little bit about the name. “What?” he asks, turning back to me, “what’s so funny?”

“It’s just… Dwarveholm?” I chortle some more despite the splitting pain it causes in my torn-up abdomen. He nods. “It sounds like ‘dwarf home.’” Saying it out loud makes me burst out into full-on laughter. Blood is practically spitting out of my wound now, but it doesn’t matter. It’s too hilarious to not cackle about.

Is that lightheadedness I feel?

“Oy! You there!”

I look up and through blurry eyes see a tiny, tiny man—must be a dwarf, right?—with a thing, ginger beard all braided up. He’s not talking to me. He’s got one of his stumpy little fingers pointed at Trey. His arms and legs are so stubby that I just start laughing harder. His beady little eyes glance over at me. Sorry ‘bout it, bro, I can’t stop laughing, this is just too much for me right now.

He doesn’t dwell too long on me. “We don’t allow Empire scum like you here in Dwarveholm,” he says, and there’s the name again and I’m laughing more, crumpling to the ground. He returns to me. “Did this man do this to you?”

I try to shake my head and say no, but through my laughter-induced tears it’s impossible. Ginger Dwarf looks extra concerned, and it strikes me that perhaps he thinks I’m just sobbing. Ugh, shit, this guy’s gonna think I’m like some fragile fucking damsel. No, dwarf douche, I just got stabbed in the gut by one of the WoW trolls you let run around this place. And not the easy-to-deal-with, acne-ridden trolls who just sit at their computer, the ones with pointy chins and obnoxious nose rings!

“Please,” Trey pleads, “She’s hurt. She needs medical attention.”

Ginger Dwarf glances down at my wound. I lift my hand up, and there’s some nice blood oozing down my black tank-top.

If I could see Trey’s face, I imagine it would look super concerned, but I suddenly realize that that doesn’t make any sense. Why is he helping me? I kidnapped his ass, tied him up by the ankles, and literally dragged him—against his will—through the snow. I look up at him, and try to say: why are you helping me?

But it doesn’t come out. The effort to open up my mouth overwhelms me, and I plummet from my knees to the floor. My face slams against the stone and I’m out like a light.

Post Wordcount: 879
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[Eleanor Lamb]

Darkness swirls around me, refusing to let up for what seems like an eternity. Silence lingers in my brain, and it’s just me in the void—alone, empty, quiet. Until… suddenly… there’s old lady singing ringing in my ears.

I bolt up and immediately lurch over in pain, clutching the spot on my abdomen where Mr. Dead Troll decided to shove his spear. There’s no hole there now, though—just stitches. Like I’ve been sewn up. Somebody’s mom fixing a hole in a pair of edgy light wash jeans. Except instead of jeans, it’s my skin, and instead of ruining my reputation with the sk8r boi crowd, whoever closed up my hole saved my life, probably.

There’s still the matter of that old lady singing, though. A little time spent making connections and using my deduction skills helps me figure out this woman with the voice of a vulture probably holds the title of ‘Jessica’s Sticher-Upper,’ but I’d love to put a face with a rasp.

Speaking of light wash jeans, mine are currently slumped over a chair just across the room, slid up under some fancy stone desk. The dwarves and their stone. I slide out from beneath the sheets of this semi-comfortable bed they threw me on. It feels like some soft-ish material thrown on top of a flat slab of boulder. Once again, so much rock, so little Dwayne Johnson to make it worth it. How hard would it be for these dwarf losers to invest in some Tempur Pedic mattresses?

The correct answer is ‘not too hard’ since you can summon anything you fucking want with omnilium. I mean, come on, you guys.

I pull my pants on faster than I would when desperately trying to escape morning-after shenanigans at a hookup’s house. Zipped up and buttoned in record time, I lean through the archway these people probably call a ‘door’ (I mean, it’s not like I can talk after how long my door’s front window was covered with cardboard) and try and pinpoint the source of this Amy Winehouse-wannabe.

Then, I see it.

Another fucking troll.

“Nope,” I say audibly, “Not about that.” Troll-in-a-Dress turns and looks at me. She doesn’t have the same bloodthirsty fire in her eyes that the first one I met did, but I’m not about to take any chances. That means, of course, that I’m running in the opposite direction as fast as my still-aching body can take me.

Unfortunately, just as I’m about to reach the door, it slams and locks without anybody touching it. I tug on the handle as hard as I can, but all I manage to do is rip it off. Let’s be real: sometimes super strength is a really sucky power.

I turn around and glare at Mrs. Troll. “You gonna poke me with a spear too, lady?” Hopefully my tone accurately conveys how unbelievably irritated I am. Also, was that some fucking magic she just pulled to make that door close by itself? Or the Force or something? Given that there’s Stormtroopers in this weird fantasy world, that doesn’t seem to be a farfetched guess. Speaking of which, where the hell is Trey? He should be helping me fight this bitch.

“Leaving so soon?” she drones, and already her speaking voice is even more nails on a chalkboard than her singing voice. Which I honestly didn’t think was possible. My head cocks to the side involuntarily. Sometimes I can’t help being bitchy.

“Look, I don’t mean to be rude,” I sigh, “but accepting help from people who look like Meryl Streep in Into the Woods before she turned hot again isn’t exactly on a list of things I’m likely to do. So thanks for sewing me up, if you did that, but I really should go find my pet Stormtrooper.”

“He’s being taken care of,” the crone waves the subject off, folding her hands over her cane and looking up at me. “You’re Jessica. I’m Magda.”

“Jessica Jones, Private Eye,” I shrug, “If you need someone found, I’m your gal. I don’t make house calls though, so I’m gonna leave. You can come to my office if you need me.” I smirk, placing my hand on the door. “…when I get an office.”

A little pressure and the door separates from its hinges, falling down onto the rocky cave floor behind it. The troll lady glances down, surprisingly not irritated.

“Yeah, sorry about that,” I bite my lip. This is a bit awkward, so I turn and step out of this lady’s little hovel and back into the slightly-familiar streets of Dwarveholm. I don’t hear footsteps behind me, so I assume that Magda is still standing there, hands folded over her gnarled little wooden cane, staring at my ass. Fucking creeper. At least Trey didn’t leer at me like some kind of weird stalker. Or did he? Hard to tell through that tinted-ass helmet of his. We’re gonna have to make a rule that he can’t wear that around me anymore; it’s pretty necessary for me to always be able to see his face.

I stop. I turn around. Yep, she’s still staring.

I step over the door and lean back into her place, once again cocking my head slightly to the side in confusion. Something she said just registered in my brain.

“…what do you mean he’s being taken care of?”

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[Eleanor Lamb]

After a few more minutes listening to her vaguely Jamaican-sounding ass try and spit me some bullshit through her crusty old-lady lips, I finally manage to get her to level with me and tell me that my Stormtrooper buddy got himself arrested after I’d fainted. Apparently, the dwarves think some alabaster white armor and a slightly hazy disposition are enough to throw someone into the dungeons.

Which, of course, means that’s exactly where I head. I may still be a little uncertain on Trey’s motivations for helping me, but at this point, I kinda owe the guy my life, so it’s the least I can do to try and defend his honor and ensure his freedom.

From the dwarves, anyway. He’s still my fucking prisoner.

“The redheaded guy,” I bark at Magda once she’s done droning on about dungeons and extensive security measures, “he’s the one who probably arrested him, right?”

“There be a lot of fire-headed dwarves, girl,” Magda sasses me, and to be honest, I don’t really appreciate her tone. Her little cottage is a hop, skip, and a jump away from the tunnel I used to get into this goddamn place, so I’m pretty sure she knows full-well which guard tower Ginger Dwarf works at. I approach her, hostility pulsing through my every muscle. I hope it’s incredibly evident that I’m not afraid to lay the smackdown on her if she keeps putting me through her obnoxiously ambiguous answers. I don’t like violence more than the next hero (ugh, that word) but this bitch is a full-fledged fantasy creature witch doctor lady. I can make an exception.

She thrusts her too-pointy chin up in the air at me as I get closer to her. She smacks her lips a few times—literally the most annoying sound in the world, and it’s even worse when it’s a World of Warcraft creature doing it at you—and then finally says:

“Your friend is bein’ held in the East Tower.”

“Thank you,” I scowl, ever polite, and then turn to head out. I’m almost to the door when I stop one more time and glance over my shoulder. “Um, where is that?”

* * *

“Five minutes,” Ginger Dwarf says to me. I groan. “Five minutes,” he repeats, as if I didn’t hear him the first time. I shoot him a sarcastic smile and hold up my hand, shooing him away. As soon as he’s gone, I dart down the hallway containing the East Tower’s holding cells until I reach the last one, where I’m told Trey sits.

I’m met with quite the unfamiliar sight, though. Instead of the stark white armor I’ve grown so used to seeing my Stormtrooper buddy in, I find myself unexpectedly introduced to the TR-8R beneath the helmet.

He’s… different than I imagined. Dressed from head to toe in some black under-armor clothes, he’s built rather well considering how pathetic of a soldier he is. His skin is a dark olive shade, and his facial features are slightly more rounded than I expected. His hair, too, is much longer than I would expect on someone who makes a living as a career soldier. Without his helmet on, it probably falls to his shoulders. He slowly glances up at me, noticing the surprise in my eyes.

“Like what you see?” he jokes.

“Don’t get your hopes up,” I quip. For a moment, there’s a silence between us as I press my face to the bars separating me from him. “Well, you certainly don’t look like that actor from Attack of the Clones,” I shrug. It’s true—this guy may have some Latino blood in him, but he’s definitely not as chiseled in the face as whoever the guy all Stormtroopers are supposedly made from.

Trey’s expression betrays the fact that he has no idea what Attack of the Clones means, but he plays along anyway. “At some point they stopped using clones,” he explains, “and they just started recruiting us from birth.”

“Birth?” I say, incredulous, “In that case I don’t know if ‘recruiting’ is the most accurate term.” He chuckles a bit before standing up and taking a few steps toward me.

“Glad to see you’re doing okay,” he smiles, and this time, I laugh. I step back, lifting up my ripped up tank top to show him the hastily-stitched wound on my stomach. The skin around it’s still red, but he seems satisfied with how I’m recovering. I pull my shirt back down, and lean against the wall opposite his cell.

For a moment, there aren’t any words. But five minutes is a short amount of time, so I don’t let the silence linger for too long. “What’s your game, anyway, Trey the Stormtrooper?” I ask pointedly, skipping the rest of the inevitable small talk.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he bullshits me.

“Your game, your play, your big plan,” I clarify, waving my hands around like a crazy person, “I punched you in the face, tied you up, and dragged you through the frozen wasteland for several hours. And then suddenly you were all concerned about me? Is this all part of your master plan to take me back to your evil Emperor and run some crazy tests on me because I’m a—what word did you fucking use?”

“A prime,” he nods.

“Yeah, a prime,” I say. Is that it?

He seems to understand my last unspoken question. “No,” he responds simply. “I have no master plan. I’m a sheep. I don’t make plans, I follow them.”

That floors me for a second.

I… I’m not really sure what to say. Then:

“Well, follow this plan,” the words spill out of my mouth before I can even think of them, “I’m going to get you out of here. Right this instant. This is a dwarf city, right? So what, they’ve got like a dwarf king, certainly? Or a president? Some sort of miniature prime minister? Certainly there’s someone I can talk to and explain that you’re not one of the crazy murderous Stormtroopers, just a potentially crazy murderous one that actually has a heart of gold and helps poor girls who got stabbed by trolls find medical assistance.”

Trey is laughing at me for rambling, but there’s really no time to be amused. I blaze on in my line of questioning, trying to get him to answer before our precious, short five minutes together is up.

“Come on, Trey,” I grit my teeth, “who’s in charge here?”

“King Bruenor Battlehammer.” I glance over to the end of the hall. It’s Ginger Dwarf. He’s been hanging out around the corner eavesdropping and decided to pop in uninvited to our conversation, it seems. Nevertheless, I’m grateful for someone giving me an answer, since Trey seemed content to giggle his fucking freedom away.

“Okay,” I shrug, “Where is he? May I—ahem—request an audience with him?” My voice drips with venom as I try my best to do a good ‘girl at a renaissance faire’ impression.

“That will be more difficult than you think, I’m afraid,” Ginger Dwarf sighs, taking a few steps down the hallway. “You see, King Bruenor has locked himself away in Mithral Hall, and only allows champions of a certain composition to sit with him inside.”

I shoot a glance at Trey.

Oh, well. Gotta get you outta here somehow.

“What do I have to do?”

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[Eleanor Lamb]

“Does this parka make me look fat?”

“Shut up,” I shout at my Stormtrooper companion, who has now—against his will—traded in his alabaster armor for a blue, fur-lined parka. It’s just a bit too small for him and has some weird looking stains on it; I can’t help but think it belonged to some classy dwarf lady before she got eaten by a carnivorous mountain creature.

I glance back at him and give it a once-over. “Honestly, the armor was probably more flattering to your figure,” I shrug and let out a chuckle. Behind the thick hood, I barely see Trey’s face crack a smile.

You probably can’t imagine how difficult it was to convince the dwarves to let him accompany me out of the city. I don’t really get what their problems with Stormtroopers are—aside from the fact that generally they’re brainwashed from birth to work for an evil, tyrannical Empire—but they seemed particularly reluctant to allow me any help on this little journey they sent me on, especially from my jailbird buddy.

Eventually, though, my undeniable charm managed to schmooze the pint-sized warriors into some circumstances that they could agree to.

“Quit your gabbin’ and get moving,” the grumbly voice of Ginger Dwarf barks.

…well, I never said it’s a perfect situation.

The three of us clamber over a low rock face; as we reach the top, I look out and see a range of mountains not visible from the gate to the Nexus (that’s what Stormtrooper man called the big, white void I appeared in). There’s so many. And they’re all so… tall. And intimidating.

“Do people live in all of these mountains?” I ask absentmindedly.

“No,” Ginger Dwarf scowls, “Not people. Trolls. Giants. Dragons. The only civilized place in all of the Fields is Dwarveholm.”

“…according to the people in Dwarveholm,” Trey interjects. The Ginger Dwarf spins around, the expression on his face growing even more sour. The former Stormtrooper holds up his hands. “I’m just saying, the Empire’s research implies the trolls, giants, and dragons all ascribe to some form of civilized behavior, even if it isn’t the type you approve of.”

A low growl from Ginger Dwarf.

“To be frank, none of you have the type of civilization the Empire would approve of,” he continues. “You’re actually kind of lucky they’ve never come in here and tried to force you guys to adhere to their rule like they are in the Dunes right now. Not that you’d really have much luck fighting them on it.”

“ARGHHHHHH!”

Too far.

Despite my attempts to place myself in between them, Ginger Dwarf tackles Trey the Stormtrooper full force and they both go tumbling down the snowy hill that we’ve been standing at the peak of. They’re rolling, rolling, rolling… and then, at last, they slam into the relatively flat ground on the plateau below and my redheaded companion starts laying into my other, socking him multiple times in the face with his big, gnarled fists. Deciding very quickly this is a situation I need to dispel, I start down the hill toward them.

“Guys, come on—” I start, but not before I hear a whizz and see an arrow fly in from basically nowhere and strike the dwarf in his upper arm. He stumbles off of Trey and falls back into the snow. I skid to a stop just in time to see a squad of trolls—like, seriously probably ten of them—pop out of the woodwork and swarm on the two of them.

Thinking fast, I dive behind a nearby snow-capped boulder. It’s too late, though; they’ve seen me. Another arrow, this one burning at its tip, soars through the space of air I recently occupied.

Backed into a corner and with no other option, I reach for the laser rifle slung across my body and ready it. Then, I stand up.

Bolts of energy begin flying wildly toward the group of trolls. I shoot and I miss more times than I can count, but a few of my blasts manage to take down some of the attackers. As two or three of them crumple into death’s embrace, I dart down the hill to join the fray with more fervor.

One of the beasts lifts up a rather mean-looking dagger, looking like he’s about to try to gut me. “Nope,” I mutter almost to myself, lifting up my leg and slamming it into the guy’s gonads. He doubles over in pain, staggering back, and I make a mental note that even crazy weird World of Warcraft monsters still have dicks, and it still hurts to hit them there. These are simultaneously great things to know and also thoughts I never imagined—let alone wanted—to have.

I lift up the blaster rifle and fire a few rounds into the doubled over troll, turning him into a bloody pulp in the midst of a great white expanse of snow. I can’t help but let a smirk cross my face. I’ve never really enjoyed killing, but this doesn’t feel like true violence. I still feel like I’m trapped inside the weirdest never-ending videogame ever.

A quick scan of the battlefield lets me know that almost half of our unkind ambushers have been taken down at this point. Ginger Dwarf has managed to get back up on his feet, and after ripping the arrow out of his arm, is swinging his battleax around pretty wildly. I watch him long enough to see him cleave one of the trolls’ heads off. Naturally, I almost vomit.

Suddenly, dark fingers wrap around my wrist and I glance up to see the bloody, bruised face of Trey the Stormtrooper staring directly into my eyes. “Come onnn,” he urges me, his words slurred a little bit since he probably just got his jaw broken by our other friend, “Let’s go. While he’s distracted, we can get away.” I blink at him for a few seconds—my first big decision in this Omniverse. I look back at Ginger Dwarf, solo’ing the last couple of trolls while we sit here in already too-long contemplation.

He looks like he’s got it under control, right?

Right?

Trey tugs and I follow. He starts running across the plateau, his parka flowing in the wind, and without even really thinking about it I’m sprinting after him. It takes a few seconds for Ginger Dwarf to catch on and then I hear him screaming dwarven profanities at us from a few yards away.

Then, all of a sudden, silence. I spin around and watch helplessly as Ginger Dwarf is smacked in the head by a troll with a huge-looking hammer. He collapses to the ground. Another one of the remaining fighters pulls some rope from a knapsack and starts tying him up, not unlike the way I tied up Trey when he and I first met back in the Nexus.

But that’s all I see, because the former Stormtrooper yanks my arm and suddenly I’m stepping off the plateau. There’s no ground underneath me.

I fall.

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