Last update is reposted in this one as some slight changes have been made.
In which lots of planning and stuff happens and the scene is being set for a big showdown. Also, enter Maverick
Tower Defence
"That's incredible," Strop said, shaking his head slowly. "If I had known, no, I should have known."
"There there," Moe verbally patted him on the back. "Now that you know, we can all move on."
Thoad guided the moderator squad through the labyrinth of traps, emerging from the moat onto the yard not fifty yards from the castle, at the base of the wall, complete with a makeshift trench surrounded by obstacles and caltrops and other spiky objects of doom. As hastily constructed as it was, the wall couldn't have been more than ten meters high. But, standing right at the bottom, such that it actually obscured the view of all but the highest tower of the castle, it seemed almost substantial. A rope ladder tumbled down, and they clambered up, to be greeted with raucous cheers and backslaps from the volunteers clad in makeshift armor from helmets to saucepans and trash cans. As surreal and illogical as the whole mess was, everybody allowed themselves the indulgence of basking in the warmth of the moment.
But as moments went, this moment wasn't to last very long. From this vantage point, it was plain to see that the rioting mob was recovering from the chaos of Manta's dash and their sudden encounter with the treacherous crater, and were picking their way towards the first of Thoad's traps. Strop motioned to Thoad. "Quickly now, what do you have going here?"
"The traps are set to go, Crimson's manning the siege defences, seeing as he was the one who made the wall. Chill's next to him, on buffs and enchantments, that'll slow the new***s up a bit. And then we have a thousand battle ready AGers ready to defend this castle to the death!"
Strop nodded in approval. "That's good. That's really good. Now, what's-" He stopped suddenly as an old man stumbled into him and groped his muzzle. "Hm, that feels like a certain bogan horse-"
"Let's not start that now, Kingbogan," Strop chided the amnesiac archivist. "And what are you doing with that sword?"
Kingryan swung it around feebly, almost knocking his crown off in the process. "I'm here to fight off those young whippersnappers..."
"No you're not, not in this way, you aren't," Strop steered him away from the wall's edge, where he was more than a little worried the veteran might topple over the edge. But with a sudden burst of strength, Kingryan shook him off.
"How dare you treat me like that, you're but a young whippersnapper yourself!" he rasped. "First you won't let me participate in the tournament despite my efforts, now you won't let me defend my own city!? They burnt down my library. My library, the archives that I kept since Beta! Now, all I have is this sword. And... these books, that people turn into when I hit them with the sword... but this is my own body, I'm my own person, and you should at least grant me that right in this time to do with it as my convictions compel me to!"
Standing before the old man, Strop actually took a step backwards. He saw a fire in his eyes he hadn't seen in any citizen since the fires started consuming the city, including his own. But if anybody would know best in this time, it wasn't him, no, it was the veterans who had been around since the very beginning. He put a hand on the old king's shoulder, partially to steady him, partially to appease him.
"It's not that," he said. "I told you we needed your archival skills, now I ask you to lend us the power of your quill."
"Well now that you put it like that," KingRyan grunted, "What would you have me do?"
"Ever heard of a command console?"
"A what?"
"A command console. Your quill would be perfect for setting one up and you could update it with all the info from the upcoming battles."
"What battles?"
Evidently the fires weren't particularly sustainable, Strop thought to himself. "Look, gimme a moment," he said, turning aside so quickly he didn't notice KingRyan promptly falling asleep on his feet, in time to see the other moderators getting mobbed by the volunteers on one side, and Manta and his fishmen charging (completely oblivious) towards the traps attempting to ambush the raiders trying to cross the crater. But first things first, "Guys guys guys, give them some room... and take a breather."
"What, now?" Asherlee asked him. "This day isn't close to over."
"No it isn't, but nothing's going to be any good if we all pass out from exhaustion, right?"
Zophia, Asherlee, DM and Dank looked at each other and shrugged before they nodded, a little tension easing out of all their shoulders. This left one dragon and one brain-in-a-jar, and the dragon was busy smoking a cigarette, or more accurately alternating between attempting to light a cigarette (and failing) and coughing his lungs out. As quietly as he could, Strop addressed Moe, who was quietly propped on the wall.
"Look, I know the whole taking on everything myself is a problem, but you need to take five too."
"It's okay," Moe said. "I've had problems too."
Strop crouched until he was at the level of the jar. "Regardless of your state, you're the most powerful of all of us. We've all known that from the beginning. But I think what you need is just a little extra time to rein in everything that's going on."
"It's different, but it's starting to make more sense now." Moe confirmed. "Five minutes. I'll work something out."
"Alright, good man, er... brain." Strop awkwardly corrected himself, before rising. "Devoidless!"
"I'm still good to go," Devoidless grunted, blowing fire on his soggy cigarette one last time before thoughtlessly crushing the butt against the helmet of a passing volunteer.
"That's good, because I need to borrow your wings again," Strop said, clambering aboard without waiting for permission. "Guys if you're ready, the other users could use some platoon leaders." He didn't really need to say anything, for the other mods had already peeled off and had started dividing the volunteer army up. Strop nodded to himself, then kicked the dragon's flanks.
"Right 'voidy, we're gonna net us some fish."
---
Fish net
"Chaaaaaaaar- oh what the f-"
Manta, in his youthful enthusiasm (a phrase often attributed to Strop but Manta was probably Strop's junior by quite a margin), hadn't appreciated where he was going or the consequences of his blind charge, so intent was he on leading his men against what he could see of the enemy that he didn't realise he was running straight into tricky terrain until his foot got caught in the vulcanised rubble, as did everybody else's. Then it was suddenly a matter of gingerly extricating their feet from the ground before swinging wildly at their similarly trapped opponents. It was a squalid affair: with everybody almost rooted to the spot, trying to grab each other but slipping and sliding off in the pouring rain, it almost looked a bit like an ice hockey match.
"I can't even use half my power, men, this won't do!" Manta yelled into the din.
"You're telling us! What do we do now?" one of his fellow tribesmen yelled back at him while gouging the nostrils of some hapless troll. Manta thought about this a moment, took a swing at the nearest target, then thought some more.
"I don't know! Men, we chaaaaaar-"
A bandaged fist clocked him upside the head, sending him reeling, then teetering back and forth as his feet lodged in the ground again, planting him firmly down. "Hey, what was that for!"
"You idiot, Manta, we wanted to keep the raiders away from the castle, not chase them to our doorstep."
"Strop? Strop!" Manta slicked back his sopping wet hair. "Aw come on man, I'm happy to see you too! And here I was thinking you'd thank me for whoopin' these guys, but no, you gotta ruin the moment!"
"Hey," Strop backpedalled, "I am glad to see you and your, uh, fishman friends here, but I'd be more glad if you hadn't sent an entire stampede towards the castle, if you know what I mean."
"Oh hey, sure, the castle probably can't stand up to much right now, I get it." Manta was quick to realise and quicker to speak. Strop doffed him on the head again.
"Could you like not broadcast that to the entire world while you're at it? Look, I need you to divert as many of these rioters from the crater and down the side streets. Taunt, melee, make noise, do what you do best, okay? Buy us some time, coz when it comes down to it, you're the one who's gonna be on the frontlines at the moat."
Manta nodded enthusiastically. "Got it."
"One other thing," Strop held up a hand, "I've sent for Chill, he'll temporarily provide you with some ranged backup. Kingryan will relay your route to you, you'll see instructions when they come. There's a wall on the other side of this crater, don't try to cross the ruins of the courts, Thoad's set up traps there. Crimson's built a wall at the moat, the rendezvous point is there. Try to stay fresh up to that point, and good luck. I'll see you at the wall."
With that, Strop tip-toed along the craggy ground, before jumping up onto the remains of a brick wall. The rain seemed to stop for a moment, then a great wind swept over everybody as a big black silhouette swooped low, snatched Strop up, and rose into the sky again.
Manta summoned his leader voice. "RIGHT MEN, LETS FALL BACK!"
Five Minutes
With the addition of a few veterans and leader figures, the wall was looking slightly more organised. It was still a crowded chaos, but there was some method to the madness. Now everybody seemed to have some kind of weapon in their hand, and positions were filled strategically. Under the sound of the pounding rain, a quiet undercurrent of uneasiness ran, and everybody hunkered down, like Rebel troopers on a Corellian frigate.
Strop landed back on the wall with a tap. "Thanks 'voidy."
"I'm going to run reconnaisance. And shred any airborne hostiles."
"Sounds good, I'm going to put Kingryan on a tactical vantage point in one of the castle guard towers. If you could relay extra info to him that would be good."
"Roger that." In a rare display of camaraderie, the two bumped fists, awkwardly. Devoidless turned and crouched, ready to spring into the air, but was stopped.
"A question, 'voidy."
"I'm all ears, ponyboy."
"...will you be doing any more burninating today?"
There was a long pause. "I don't think so."
"I thought as much," Strop nodded. "Still, it goes without saying. Engage at will."
"I would have done as much anyway," Devoidless grinned sardonically, before taking off. Strop jumped up onto a makeshift wall tower, scanning for familiar faces. Having spotted the unmistakeable figure of the larger-than-most Spartan, he jumped down and found a small conference.
"Oh hi Strop," Thoad grinned, obviously enjoying the new dynamic. "We were just inventorising and delegating."
Strop cast his eyes around, and realised there was one notable (but unsurprising) absence. "Has anybody seen Leon?"
Thoad scowled visibly. "No, he hasn't been around since all this started. What good would he be?"
Strop shrugged the question away and changed the topic. "Nevermind then. I'm going to send KR up to the North guard tower. Dank, you've got the skills, so do you think you could set him up, then replicate his setup here, and set up a remote interface between the two locations?"
Dank made a show of looking reluctant, but his words suggested otherwise: "Seeing as desperate times call for desperate measures, I'll do it."
At Thoad's raised eyebrow, Strop explained. "How'd you like a virtual interface that shows you everything that goes on in this battle, so you can send commands to any unit?"
Thoad brightened visibly. "Command any unit? Hell yeah!"
"Good," Strop said shortly. "You can do it then, coz I suck at RTS."
Then he turned and started sifting through the crowd, calling for Kingryan.
---
Meanwhile at the other end of the wall, a crisis was unfolding. Several users were running around with their hands in the air, their heads in their hands, and various other variations of distress and despair.
"What's going on?" Zophia asked.
"We've just discovered we have precisely enough munitions to defend against about five minutes of sustained assault." Crimson explained dourly. "That is to say, once my scrolls run out, which they probably will, the wall won't last much longer."
"Hm," Zophia chewed her lower lip. "That's not good."
"No," Crimson agreed. "It really isn't."
They stood around, watching the users panic for a few seconds. Then Zophia remembered she was holding the 'fone. She raised it to her lips.
"ATTENSHUN EVERYBODY!!!"
As expected, practically everybody was now staring at her, a familiar sight whenever she used the 'fone. "Well, uh, we're about to embark on the most critical battle yet, to defend the castle." There were some cheers, but they did little to ease the tension. "Thing is, we might, uh, be running short on munitions." A definitive ripple of consternation spread through the ranks at this, but Zophia hushed them all. "What we need are some brave volunteers to travel to the Wilderness to collect two items, gems and arrows. Some volunteers? Any volunteers...?"
Alas, nobody stepped forward. Rather, they all stepped aside, one by one, the crowd parting like the Red Sea, until a lone figure stood isolated in between all of them. Belatedly, it realised its position, but by this point it was too late.
"Well what do we have here," a familiar ninja horse, attracted by the noise, strode onto the scene.
"A volunteer for the munitions run!" Zophia chirped. Strop looked the figure up and down, a lean, young man dressed so unobtrusively in faded clothes and cape it looked as if he was trying to blend in, slouched, head slightly bowed, and now shifting a little uncomfortably since Strop was almost literally breathing on him. In reflex, he tightened his grip on his satchel and bow. Finally Strop nodded approvingly.
"Fancy that, a runner and an archer! You look just the man for the job... er... what was your name again?"
"Maverick, sir, and it's an honour to meet you." Maverick stammered, still slouched.
"Believe me, the honour isn't in the meeting, it's in serving alongside your fellow AGers!" Strop riposted. "And you've done us all a great honour, volunteering for this mission!"
"Well, I didn't really vol-"
"What we need!" Strop obliviously continued, "Is time. Time is of the essence, here, so really, what we need, are Arrows of Time! Being an archer I know you'd know where to get those, yes?"
Slowly, it dawned on Maverick that volunteer or not, he was going on this mission, and he could not fail. "Yes. Yes I do." he declared, drawing himself to his full height. It was at this point that Strop realised that Maverick was actually taller than he was, which was slightly awkward.
"Well, right. Good, er, man," Strop said, slapping him on the back. "In that case, go now, and God speed, Maverick, God speed."
Maverick needed no further reiterations. With newfound admiration, along with the hopes and expectations of a city on his shoulders, he set off for the wilderness, and soon slipped behind the curtains of the rain.
Strop watched Zophia go back to attempting to mix her paints while preventing them from running in the downpour. Even now, he couldn't tell whether things were coming together, or falling apart. One way or another, by the end of the day, it probably wouldn't matter.
---
Okay guys, hang tight, once I get internet back, you'll see the assignments that come as a result of the present updates.
TO BATTLE!
