Chapter 100: Limbering Up

Yeah, it was worse.

The party had moved on from the territory the harpies controlled, crossing an intersection, then ducking inside a building. This wasn’t a store, but more of an office building reception. Flickering fluorescent lights lined the ceiling, illuminating the white linoleum floor. Boots squeaked as Kat and Ann cleared the room. Nothing jumped out from the singular door in the back, nor behind the fake wooden desk.

“So, where is this Guardian?” Ann asked, returning to the group.

“Wanders,” Lucia said, shouldering Fillianore. “Is large. Should be easy to find.”

“Yet we have seen neither hide nor hair,” Bren pointed out. He’d pulled his notebook out and was sketching the room.

“Maybe one of those towers can get us a look?” Rosalyn suggested. “I mean, they’re the tallest thing in this place. It’d be great for scouting, right Kat?”

“Aye. Nearest one’s a few streets o’er. Let’s make our way tae it, then we can climb an’ get a view.”

“Do you know what the thing is?” Ann asked Lucia.

“Abomination. Same as all. Well, maybe not. Many things in one. From what brains said, has a core. Need to kill that to finish fight.”

“Sounds like it’s gonna be a fucking pain,” Ann grumbled.

“Magic, too,” Lucia added.

“Of course it does. Well, let us move on,” Bren said. “Back outside would be our best bet.”

A few minutes later, they stood before one of the large, spiraling skyscrapers. The horizontally twisted heights towered over them, gleaming glass reflecting the setting sun. As Ann inspected it, she found there were no breaks in the glass for the structure to hold the panes in. Just pure, uncut glass.

“Fucking weird,” she grumbled under her breath.

Kat cautiously pushed the door open, then stepped through. “Clear.”

It was a two storied reception, desks to the left and right of the main floor and what looked like it could have been a cafe on the second floor. Marble floors complemented the tasteful pillars holding the second floor up. The stairs were the one thing here that didn’t look right. Each step was a different height, and a few slanted to the left or right.

“Would it be too much to ask for the elevators to work?” Ann pleaded, jogging over to the metal doors and tapping the button. A groaning, creaking sound echoed from within, after which the doors scraped open. The elevator car was mangled, bent and twisted like the shaft itself was as messed up as the exterior of the building. It seemed to work, regardless of its state, but Ann didn’t trust it. “Ugh, guess so. Stairs it is.”

“Quiet. Hear somethin’,” Kat said in a loud whisper. “Second floor.”

Ann looked up. Having moved to the other side of the room, she could see up to the not cafe. Four of the dusty zombies were shambling around up there, silhouettes moving back and forth in the gloom.

“Didn’t notice us. Let’s just go,” Ann whisper shouted back. Looking around, she saw the sign that should read stairs, but the pictographic man had two heads and all legs. “This way.”

The stairwell was, thankfully, normal. The flights went up and up, switching back on themselves as they went. Ann looked up the gap in the middle, but didn’t see anything moving above.

Rosalyn whined as she saw how far up it was. “I’m not built for this.”

“Hey, this is gonna suck for everyone,” Ann said, trying to comfort her. “Even Kat.”

“Will be fine,” Lucia scoffed. “Not going all the way. Maybe ten floors. Should be enough to see.”

“Hopefully,” Kat nodded. “We’re gonna check every other floor. Can’t ‘ave ambushes on our way out wit’ only one way down.”

“And I would prefer to not jump from such heights. Unlike you, Ann, the rest of us don’t have your knack for surviving falls,” Bren chuckled dryly.

Kat started up the stairs, with Ann taking up the rear.

“Not like I do it on purpose,” the Lupine grumbled.

“You were offered a skill for it,” Rosalyn laughed.

“That was after the first time!”

“Yeah, well, maybe it was trying to inform you of something,” Bren said, looking back with a grin.

“I’m, wait, no, I might be sprouting wings at some point, so, ugh, fuck you,” Ann grumbled.

Bren laughed and returned to the stairs.

They got to the second floor and huddled up around the singular door. Kat pressed her pointed ear to it and took a moment to listen.

“Movement. Lot o’ it. Footsteps an’ some weird draggin’. Probably more o’ the dusties an’ somethin’ else mixed in.” She stood, regarding her companions. “Ann wit’ me. Lucia an’ Rosalyn behind. Bren bring up the rear. Tell us if ye hear anythin’ comin’ from behind.”

Everyone nodded confirmation, and Kat cracked the door.

More fluorescent lights flickered over the room. Well, it was less of a room and more of an open floor, the type Ann had worked on doing call centre work. It stretched out from the elevator to the wall in an unbroken line of sight. The Seed, however, apparently didn’t understand what a cubicle was. They weren’t open, but closed off cubes about five feet high made of a material that resembled asbestos. Ann ran a claw over the surface, scraping a groove into it.

“I have no idea what this is, but try not to breathe it, just in case,” she whispered.

“Two dusties tae the right, three tae the left, more further in,” Kat whispered back. “No sign o’ whatever the draggin’ thing is. Might be short.”

“Sounds like it’s further away, too,” Ann pointed out, her own ears swivelling to follow the sound. “Make a ruckus and draw it out?”

“Try tae clear out the others first. Just in case. Dinnae if there’s more behind us, either. Careful.”

Ann nodded, flexing her hands. Quiet scuffs of her paw pads marked her steps as she approached a solitary zombie. This one’s head was elongated, with a gaping maw twice the size it should be. Once in range, she knocked out its knee, then crushed its skull. These things were still easy to kill, and that was good, because she doubted whatever else was in the room would be the same. At least, knowing her luck, it wouldn’t be.

A quiet thump brushed her ears as Kat took down a second zombie an aisle over. Those were the only two stragglers. The next three would be in a bunch, and likely louder.

Ann crept forward, trying to still her tail as it swished in anticipation. Peeking around the edge of one of the cube shaped cubicles, she spotted the group two rows down and to her right. Kat was leaning out of the row in front of her, taking stock of the situation. The slithering sound came again, further away and behind them, probably on the other side of the floor.

Kat turned to face her, nodding, and beckoned for her to move up.

Ann ran as quietly as she could to the cube opposite of Kat’s.

“Three. Gonna be rough,” Kat whispered. “Take left, I take right. Try tae get the third, but we might be in fer a fight ‘ere.”

“Lucia and Rosalyn can hold off anything else,” Ann whispered back. “On you.”

Kat counted down on her fingers, then charged.

Ann was right beside her, running full tilt at the zombies. She tackled her target from the back, knocking it over easily. Grunting from the impact, she pulled her fist back and crushed the papery bones of the thing’s skull. Looking to her right, Kat had just cratered her target’s skull with the pommel of her sword.

The third dusty turned, paused for a moment, lolled its head back, and let out a whooping shriek.

“Well, there goes stealth,” Kat yelled, spinning as she rose to decapitate the thing.

“Back to the party!” Ann called, already running.

She found Rosalyn casting Thorns at two zombies who’d come from behind the elevator.

Lucia shot another dusted corpse, shambling from the right. They were holding their distance advantage well.

Ann watched in horror as one of the cubes to Rosalyn’s right split open, a long emaciated arm reaching out and clamping onto the Druid’s forearm. The woman shrieked and tried to pull away, but the thing hung on with its inhuman strength.

“Fuck, those are eggs?” Ann shouted, dodging a hand that shot out from another cube next to her.

Kat got to Rosalyn first and severed the arm, freeing the Druid. “Feck, guess we know where they all come from now. This is bad. We gotta get outta ‘ere. Bren, ye good tae run?”

“Ready when you are!”

“All back intae the feckin’ stairs, we gotta block this…” A shriek killed the words in her throat.

They all turned to see Lucia fall, her chin hitting the floor hard, before sliding away.

“Fucking shit. Kat, you keep them safe and I’ll get her,” Ann called. She jumped up onto the nearest cube egg and scanned her surroundings. Luckily, the egg under her feet was solid enough to support her weight. A flash six rows over and loud curses from that direction easily audible over the whoops of the zombies.

Ann leapt to the next egg, paw sinking slightly into the material, and skipped along their surfaces towards Lucia.

“GET OFF!” she heard the Thrundol yell at whatever had gotten her.

Ann blindly jumped off the last egg over where she’d last heard Lucia. There was a warped wrapped around the woman’s legs, dragging her on her back. It was long, with pale flesh and bony protrusions. A segmented stalk made of several human torsos was carried by a dozen or so arms. Four of these arms were holding Lucia’s legs still as it moved her away. Ann couldn’t make out a head on the thing, but she couldn’t see all of it as the front was turning a corner.

She landed just behind Lucia, caught the woman by the armpits, and heaved backwards. Her paws skidded across the linoleum, claws not providing any traction as the thing carried on.

“No use. Kill it!” Lucia barked up at her.

Ann needed to free the huntress first. She dropped Lucia’s arms and ran forward, banking off an egg and ducking the arm that exploded from it.

There was the head. It turned back at her and hissed, the five hands making up the mouth wiggling their fingers at her.

No time to worry about that. She looked at the body. Each torso tapered off slightly before joining the next one. Claws out, she sunk her sharpened hands into the juncture of one.

Black blood flooded from the wound, far more than was normal, as she pulled hard. The creature might have been related to the dust zombies, but this thing was not as fragile. It twisted in pain, arms scrabbling at her legs, trying to disable her like it had done with Lucia.

Ann growled and dug in further. Flesh tore before her claws and she finally found what she was looking for. White, rigid, and bony. The spine. She reared back and hit it with everything she had, fist glowing purple as she forced a smite into the monstrosity.

The bones separated with a sickening pop as the spine split. Flesh still held the disgusting torso together, but the arms behind the fracture lost their strength.

“Out! Now!” Ann shouted, running back to Lucia.

The Thrundol was already getting to her feet. “Thank you. Owe you.”

“No life debt bullshit,” Ann laughed. “Come on. Don’t think the eggs’ll hold your weight.”

Lucia nodded and bolted off behind Ann.

Two more zombies emerged from eggs as they ran, but a shot from Ann’s revolver, and one from Lucia’s rifle put them down quickly. They knocked the corpses aside and kept running.

Light up ahead signalled the stairs. “Coming in hot Kat!”

Rounding the corner of an egg, she saw her girlfriend holding the door open, anxiously waving them on.

Ann shot through the door, overshooting the steps, hitting the far wall, and having to use her claws to stop herself from falling.

Lucia was smarter about it and slid through, using friction to slow herself down. Her lower half dropped off the first step and she was prone, firing at a zombie the moment she stopped.

With the one creature close enough to cause a problem, Kat slammed the door shut and hit the edge hard enough to jam it in place.

“The feck was in there?”

“Giant human centipede thing. Way worse than the movie. Maybe. I don’t know,” Ann panted as she let go of the wall. “Don’t think it’s strong enough to break the door? Not really wanting to check.”

“Feck,” Kat cursed as Warped started banging at the door. “Alright, this is now a rush. We get tae the sixth floor, check out the windows, see if we can see anythin’ an’ hightail it out.”

“I find that offensive,” Ann scoffed. Kat gave her a confused look before Ann pulled her tail around her front.

“Idiot,” Rosalyn laughed.

“Let us move. I really would prefer not to be trapped here,” Bren insisted, already a few steps up.

Thankfully, the doors on the other floors were quiet. Whatever was in them wasn’t alerted by their scuffle on the third floor. Still, they kept as quiet as they could.

The sixth floor door loomed ahead of them, its flat face and bar handle ominously normal.

Kat edged the door open, looking around, then opened it wide. The floor was empty. Completely barren, not even a desk or a pillar to be seen. Full-length windows ran the exterior of the floor, providing an excellent view of the city around them.

“Lucky,” Lucia whistled.

“Please don’t jinx it,” Rosalyn groaned. “We’ve got up to six floors of Warped under us.”

“Spread out an’ see if ye can spot the Guardian,” Kat ordered.

They split up, each taking a direction and peering out at the city.

Ann’s point of view afforded her a beautiful view of the twisted city. The sunset was dancing off the glass windows surrounding them, sparking in amber hues. Harpies lazily circled a few blocks over, unaware of their presence. She squinted, trying to find anything massive that’d fit the description of a Guardian, but couldn’t find anything. Nothing moved, nothing disturbed the buildings or the other Warped.

“Over here!” Rosalyn called. “Think I see it. I hope that’s it. If it’s not we’ve got a really big problem.”

The group gathered around the Druid, following her pointing finger.

“Illdall protect us,” Kat gasped.

It was massive. Massive in a way Ann hadn’t really considered. She’d fought things well over twenty feet. The Croaking Oak was huge! This thing was four stories tall. Also wide.

It didn’t walk, it rolled. Pulled by what seemed to her to be an endless grasping, writhing mass of human bodies. No, it wasn’t pulled by them, it was them. The entire creature was just a mass of humanity mashed up into a giant ball. It was too far away to make out all of the details, but Ann could imagine that thing sounded awful.

“How in the hells are we supposed to fight that?” Bren asked, looking down at it.

“Shoot until dead?” Lucia suggested.

“Take too much time. Fecker’d out last us anyway, judgin’ by its looks. Gotta ‘ave a weak spot somewhere we can exploit.”

“I mean, it’s probably its core, or whatever’s at the middle,” Ann mused. She watched as the thing moved, squishing up against buildings and pushing off them. “Question is, how do we actually get in there?”

“Lightning tends to work really well, right?” Rosalyn asked, fiddling with her staff. “Get me a clear shot and I can zap it as hard as I can. It’d mean that I can’t do anything besides use Thorns and Wind Bolts, though.”

“Can pierce to an extent,” Lucia said, watching the Guardian keenly. “Not that far, though.”

“So we need to find a way to either get a ton of those bodies off it,” Bren said. “Or we find a way to trap it and begin cutting into it.”

Ann scanned the horizon, looking for something they could use. None of them were strong enough, or explosive enough, to drop a building on the thing. That’d be way too nice. She had Fistful of Love, but that was a localised burst of magic and wouldn’t be able to get through. Her kit was much better suited to medium and large creatures, not titanic things like this.

“Rosalyn, what’s yer Storm Winds at?” Kat asked.

“Um, one seventy. Enough for an Unleash and Crash. Maybe two crashes if I can shoot it a few times.”

“Might be enough. Lookin’ at it, it looks like it’s a feck ton of those dusty feckers mashed together. They go down easy, but there’s a lot o’ ‘em. What was the wordin’ on Crash?”

“Um, big damage on the primary target and… some on nearby creatures.”

“It’s a gamble, but if that thing counts as multiple creatures…”

“Then it might be able to take out a large chunk of them,” Bren gasped. “Enough for Lucia to strike at the core. If there is a core. That is still a point of debate.”

“Look how it’s rolling around. It’s always rotating around a central point,” Ann said, still watching the creature. “I’m pretty damn sure there is a core to this thing.”

“Alright, we go wit’ that. With this thing bein’ as big as it is, we’re stickin’ together. Now, how tae pull it off? I’ve got a bit o’ a plan.”

The grin on her face told Ann she was going to hate this one.