//------------------------------// // For the Horde // Story: A Battleground of Kindness // by StormDancer //------------------------------// * Wake the Master. * Make tea. * Prepare the next plot to destroy the Master. * Realize that the plot is doomed to fail. * Shelve books until the Master has more need of me. * Avoid the infernal spawn of Genocidal Tendencies and the Infinite Dragon Flight that is her slave/butler/pet. * Keep the Master happy at all costs. My routine is as simple as it is repetitive but, so far, my skin is still on my back as opposed to lining some whimsically decorative teapot cozy. I'm ok with my skin remaining mine. That being said, I was just finishing up sanding the scorch marks from my latest escape attempt off the restroom door when I heard the main door open downstairs. A quick glance told me that the Master was still resting peacefully under a pile of 'fallen' books and I knew that the spawn of evil was out searching for more rare components, so it couldn't be anyone who was supposed to be here. For the briefest of moments, I was unsure of what to do. "Twilight?" came a voice from below, the sound somehow drawing up half forgotten memories of blackened spear tips and meat hooks glowing orange from the heat of smoldering coals. "Twilight, ya here? I got your apples and 'Mac's haulin' the cider for next week 'round back." No one disturbs the Master while she's resting. No one disturbs the Master while she's 'studying.' Crisis averted: I must kill the interloper. With the first sense of joy I've felt in nearly a week, I threw the sanding block I had been carrying onto a nearby pile of blankets before hopping over to the second floor landing to peer down into the main room. If the Master were to wake, she would be upset. If, on the other hand, I could dispose of this distraction and let her rest, I could present the flayed hide to her with the latest volume of Dissociative Compulsive Obsessions Weekly (a day by day accounting) and perhaps curry a bit of favor. There wasn't much hope, but anything is better than nothing with her. With that thought in mind, I looked below to see what manner of creature would brave my Master's lair. It was another one similar in shape to the Master, but bright orange and lacking the Master's wings and head-mounted pike. Where the Master was all dark colors, ranging from midnights and lavenders to the streak of near-rose in her hair, this one was a clamorous pallet of bright oranges and yellows. Where the master was a little plumpish, likely from reaping the rewards of years of the pandering pleasantries of her pet, this one was lean and well muscled. Where the Master was unclothed, this one wore some kind of thin leather helm. It must be some kind of conjured lack-wit hunter or perhaps a brain damaged mercenary out to secure a bit of gold. No sane being would intentionally invade the domain of a warlock as powerful as the Master without at least a few other idiots to use as meat shields. Even a paladin would baulk at the thought of foolhardily charging into a warlock's den... and they're stupider than the average winner of the annual "free full frontal lobotomy" promotion the boys put on at the orphanage in Nagrand. Spying accomplished. Now, to implement the standard protocol for killing anything that moves: Fire. A quick glance told me all I needed to know. It was looking around expectantly, probably thinking that its ploy of a 'delivery' would be met with a cheerfully unguarded target. THAT was not going to happen. I checked the nearby piles of discarded books, stacked haphazardly near the ledge, and considered how much force I would have to use to 'accidentally' cause a collapse. With a frown, I came to the conclusion that, despite it being a nearly perfect plan, it would make too much noise... and thus risk waking the Master. Additionally, the Master was rather fond of her books... damaging them may be counterproductive. Perhaps a few simple firebolts? The entire place (even the oil and candles now) was fireproof. There would be little to no damage that could be traced back to me. But, again, the agonized screams of the hideous invader would likely wake the Master, and cleaning up the greasy smears afterwards would likely become my duty. Something quick and efficient then. Not as classy or showy as I'd like, but perhaps elegant solutions had their place after all? The rogues that traditionally spelled the doom of careless warlocks were notorious for their stealthy executions... both of deed and of dead. I know I'm not a rogue, but I do rather enjoy my skin. If she asks later, I can just say I was trying to 'improve' myself and become 'more efficient'... she likes those words. With a quick nod, I skittered over to the stairwell, careful to phase before the howling idiot below could see me. I listened as it clomped around below, probably rummaging through the desks and cabinets looking for loot, as I waited. I wasn't too worried, after all, I know the Master doesn't leave dangerous tomes, artifacts, or spell components laying around. I've looked. Still haven't found any... she's that good at covering her tracks. The only real risk at the moment was if her looting might cause the Master to stir. Admittedly, that would be a very bad thing, but the plan required it not to know of my existence until it was too late. After a few more moments, I took a deep breath and carefully schooled my voice into a passable version of the Master's, "h-hello?" The sounds from below abruptly stopped. "Twilight? That you girl?" I waited a few seconds before coughing softly and teasing out another line to tempt the would-be assassin. "please... help m...help me," I coughed again for emphasis. The act worked like a charm. I should probably think about dating a succubus with skills like these. Eat your hearts out boys! The scrabbling of the invader's plated feet told me it was coming at speed. Makes perfect sense really... if you sneak in pretending to be some innocent delivery-sap, can't find your target or loot, and manage to stumble upon the sucker already injured, you want to get there as fast as possible to stick your sword into the deep squishy bits and lop its head off. Killing. Sometimes a sword is just a sword... and always when you're killing something with it. Freak. The important part was that it was running up a flight of stairs, without a guardrail, and not paying attention to potential threats. I waited until it came into view, which it did MUCH faster than I had anticipated, at which point I hurled a ball of bright orange flames, point blank, into it's face. Well, I would have, if it weren't going so fast that it was half over me before I hurled the firebolt. Which isn't, technically, right either... since it did rather stomp on my face as it ran... ... riiiight as I was about to throw the firebolt. ... For the Fel, it wasn't my fault. That THING stomped on my head and I missed. I was phased so it didn't hurt too much, but when its foot stomped down, it kind of slipped. One moment, I was the last line of defense for my Master, and the next I have a face full of orange fur that smells like rotting fruit mixed with an orc's armpit... and THEN the firebolt connected with the wall next to us. Fireproofing is great for keeping things from burning. Funny thing though, explosions of demonic fire.... not really covered in the 'burning' category. Suffice it to say that while the wall didn't light up, the loud boom and concussive wave hurled both myself and the cesspool of poor hygiene that was using my tongue as a sodding washcloth over the edge and into a shallow arc across the lair. Not what I had planned exactly but, in retrospect, there had been a certain amount of painful gravity testing involved. True, I hadn't imagined I would be assisting in quite the same manner but at least I knew I would survive it. That lavatory scented cutpurse would never know what hit it. -~oOo~- "GAKHAM!" the Master bellowed from somewhere above, "What Did You Do?!" The world was kind of fuzzy at that moment. Kind of warm and fuzzy. Kind of warm. Kind of moving really fast and I'm pretty sure I heard something rattling in a tin can as it all came to a stop abruptly. Something was in front of me, swimming around slowly in a pinkish-purple glow. Rather pleasant colors really. Complimentary colors actually... complimen... The cold pit of fear that formed in my throat suddenly contracted, painfully paralyzing the organ which controlled my screaming while simultaneously hunting down and killing all the warm fuzzies that had momentarily occupied my vision. The Master was glaring at me, eyes angry slits and lips peeled back in a tightly controlled show of tooth grinding anger. I was, not surprisingly, floating in her magic cloud thing, helplessly trapped as her eyes bored into my own with the force of a Fel Reaver's stomp. I began to sweat. I had woken the Master. There were very few things that I had found merited waking the Master. I did not know for certain if 'someone was sent to kill you and I tried to stop them' would be an acceptable excuse for my Master. She isn't quite right in the head. Attempted murder isn't quite the same as 'the dragon burned a book', 'there's a giant animal destroying the town', or 'a new edition of some-stupid-Illidan-be-damned book just showed up.' Don't give me that look... she's crazy. My fearful thoughts suddenly derailed as I saw movement behind the Master. A number of books shifted, sliding down to the ground almost silently as the slightly charred form of the assassin slipped smoothly back to its feet. I watched wide eyed as it quickly donned its bizarre helm and slunk up behind the Master. For a moment, I envisioned my freedom coming; all it would take would be a moment of inaction and I would be free. Gloriously, mercifully, ironically, free! And then I remembered how impossibly durable my Master was. In a snap decision, I flung my hands out and cast the fastest firebolt I've ever cast, burning through enough mana to make a felhunter drool, as I hurled the bolt at my Master's would-be-assassin. The world slowed. I could see the Master's pupils fight to dilate from the surprise as they struggled to shrink from the blaze of light. I watched as the shadows played across her mutated muzzle, a few hairs twisting and curling from the heat as she yanked her head away from the uncomfortably close magical discharge. I studied the flow of her hair as it briefly drew tight from the motion before springing away from the path of the firebolt as it screamed to connect with the orange killer behind her. I choked as I saw that same killer's eyes snap up in recognition before it leapt out of the way in a feat of speed beyond what any simple combatant should be capable of. Great... pissed off the Master and there's a pit fighter trying to kill her. My musing's were cut short as the explosion and subsequent blast of reflected magic sent the Master's surprised face into an absurdly painful collision with my own. "I don't care what it is Twi, that thing's dangerous!" Applejack snapped as she glared at the strange creature Twilight kept suspended in a globe of some amber colored glass. "T'ain't safe and it sure enough ain't making a case for itself with all that screeching." Twilight cringed a bit as her friend snapped. It wasn't actually a bad point. Gakham had apparently attacked her and tried to blow up the library.... again... but through his screeched apologies and begging, he had tried to 'warn' her about the 'assassin' that had snuck in while she slept. Despite his murderous tendencies, she understood that he had been trying (in his own horrible little way) to protect her. She couldn't let it go, but she couldn't punish him severely when his intentions had, for the first time, been good. With a sigh, she looked back to Applejack. "I know he's got a few rough edg-" "ROUGH EDGES?!? HE tried to KILL me!" Applejack shouted. "... es, but he was only trying to protect me Applejack. He didn't know!" "Didn't know! He didn't KNOW? Didn't know what? That blowing things up can kill ponies?!? That attacking somepony MIGHT HURT THEM? That KILLIN' IS WRONG!?!?" The Apple farmer's face inched closer with each exclamation until she was nearly bumping noses with Twilight. "He's only a week old Applejack... he was trying to protect me!" Twilight's plea seemed to arrest the angry shouting as Applejack's head snapped back. "He's what!?" Applejack blinked back as her tone fell. "He's just a .... he tried to.... Twilight...." She plopped down with a confused expression on her face. Clearly she had every right to be upset, that little monster had tried to knock her down the stairs, blown things up, and threw fire at her, but... if he was just a baby.... With a moment's thought, Applejack's head snapped back up. "Look Twilight, I don't know what yer doing with that thing, and I don't rightly care, but I can't believe you'd be fool enough to not at least train it to behave if yer plannin' on keeping it." She took a moment to rub a hoof over her face before looking back up. "You know I'll be there for ya Twilight, but you're not makin' a lick'a sense." Twilight's expression slipped slowly from pleading apologies toward a worried frown before she turned to face the imp suspended in the reflective magic bubble behind her. "Gakham..." she started slowly, "Why did you attack Applejack?" The imp squirmed visibly, his discomfort clear even to the normally stoic apple farmer behind Twilight. "mmmmmrrrREEEEE Because the Master was in Danger!" "She was not yah durned liar!" Applejack snapped before a glance from Twilight silenced her. "Gakham, why did you think I was in danger?" The words slipped out before Twilight had considered them. Applejack's eyebrows slid up and her ears perked as she picked up on her friend's acknowledgement of a title like 'master' but she remained silent. "Because Master was sleeping and it came in and lied and tried to find the Master while the Master was sleeping and was trying to kill the Master!" the imp shrieked in it's barbed-wire voice. Internally, Applejack flinched. She liked to think of herself as a pretty good judge of character, but that little critter was a ball of tangled everything. On the one hoof, it was a violent, hostile, dangerous, equicidal monster... but on the other, from what she could tell, it seemed to honestly believe that Twilight had been in danger. She frowned. Even so, it didn't excuse the violence it had attempted. "Gakham, Applejack was just coming to visit..." Twilight looked back to Applejack and raised an eyebrow, "I think?" "I was bringin' the cider for next week, well, Mac was at least. I was bringin' your apples." Applejack replied. "Right... she was just bringing the supplies for the celebration next week. Why did you think she was trying to hurt me?" The imp fidgeted briefly before looking up and starting a high pitched whine. Twilight squinted against the steadily rising pitch before lightly bapping the imp with a rolled up newspaper, silencing him immediately. "Stop that! Now... calmly, because I'm not going to kill you or maim you or light you on fi....dowse you with water... why did you think Applejack was trying to hurt me?" Applejack's expression became a startled mask of shock as she heard Twilight's words. Why would she even have to say she wasn't going to do those things? Had she threatened that little thing before? Suddenly Applejack wasn't quite as comfortable with her assessment of the situation as she had been. She still completely trusted her friend, but suddenly the critter's actions seemed a bit less drastic. The imp cowered for a few seconds before a soft assurance from Twilight caused him to hop from foot to foot in agitation. "The Master was in danger! The Master was sleeping when her lair was invaded! I didn't want the Master to end up like Stitchface!" His howl was enough to cause both mares to flinch. "Stitchface?" Applejack questioned. "No idea," Twilight shrugged as she glanced back to her friend before once more turning to the imp. "Who is Stitchface?" "Stitchface was Master before Master." "Twilight... what's with this 'Master' thing anyway?" Twilight blinked for a moment as she took in the imp's words. 'Master before Master?' Had he lost his previous master somehow? Had she stolen him away with an idle spell and inadvertently kidnapped him? She certainly didn't think of him as a slave, but he always referred to her as his master. Was his previous master murdered? Just what kind of life had the little imp lived before she had summoned him up? She blinked a few more times, considering questions she hadn't taken the time to ask. She'd been so focused upon identifying his species and controlling his outbursts that she hadn't even taken much time to consider him as a sapient being. Had she, in an act of innocent negligence, inadvertently even caused his previous master's death? What if 'master' was a different word for friend where he came from. What if it was more than friend? What if she had stolen him away fr- Twilight's thoughts were arrested by the firm grip of Applejack's hoof on her shoulder. "You alright there Twi?" Shaking her head clear, Twilight glanced back at the imp for a moment before nodding. "Yheah.... just... just thinking." The smile she put on was a bit more forced than she was aiming for, but it seemed to assure Applejack enough. Taking a slight breath, Twilight turned back towards the imp as her smile fell. "What happened to... Stitchface... anyway, Gakham?" "She got in a fight and I tried to protect her but I couldn't heal her from the sword in her head before you summoned me." Twilight's heart stopped as she felt her knees go weak under her. -~oOo~- Somewhere, she heard faint voices as her imp's words played back in her head. "But I couldn't heal her from the sword in her head before you summoned me." She swallowed. Hard. "I couldn't heal her from the sword in her head" Her skin felt like ice. "before you summoned me." She could feel the sensations of movement vaguely, distantly, but everything seemed muffled. "You summoned me," she thought, "but I couldn't heal her because you summoned me." Her throat was too dry to swallow again as the echoing sentence shifted again and again in her head. " The sword in her head. I could have healed her, but you summoned me." She felt sick. "I didn't want you to end up like Stitchface, who I could have healed, before you summoned me." As soon as Twilight hit the ground, her magic fizzled out. Applejack rushed forward but froze as the little smoldering creature got between her and her friend. Despite his size, she remembered clearly what he was capable of, and yet, she couldn't just leave Twilight on the ground like that. "Now lissen up yah little monster, I'm not trying to hurt Twilight. I'm her friend. I'm just trying to make sure she's okay." Applejack watched the imp's face carefully, biting back the urge to buck it clear out of Equestria to get to her friend. It wore an expression halfway between a snarl and a manic grin, something that sent little shivers up and down her spine, but at the same time, she could clearly see it was not attacking Twilight... or for the moment, herself. For his own part, Gakham was torn. On the one side, his Master was down, stunned or afflicted with something he hadn't been able to deflect. On the other, his Master was DOWN... he could escape and flee this hell-hole and get back to the wanton violence and depravity that his kind so loved. And on the other, other side, his contract clearly stated not to be 'naughty' which fell clearly in the realm of 'behave and listen to the Master.' Ultimately he clenched his dagger-like fingers and performed a simple spell to burn away hostile magics. For the briefest of moments, his Master's body rippled with searing orange embers before they extinguished, leaving her unharmed. Confused, he had just stopped to examine her when he felt the unmistakable impact of a greater ebonsteel warhammer as it launched him across the room and into a bookcase with enough force to dislodge the entirety of the books upon its eight shelves. "How DARE you after she stood up for yah?! You.... you Buck-Eyed, flaming, parasprite bait!" Applejack leapt between Twilight and the pile of books before suddenly spinning, ready to stomp the imp out of existence. "Applejack don't," Twilight's voice barely above a sob, "it's not his fault." Taking in the tearstained face of her friend, the farmer who had bucked manticores in the face and stomped a changeling army into the ground suddenly found herself feeling like she had just kicked a foal which, as Twilight's words slammed back into her, she realized, might be too kind even for her.