Disclaimer: I do not own Dark Souls or Darkest Dungeon. This is a prequel of sorts to "Bad Bitter Bits Fan Fiction" and focuses on the four members of Nic's party(aside from Nic) and how they came to know each other.

As Baldwin awoke, the first thing he noticed was his pounding headache, the second thing was that he was in a cell, the third thing was the Vestal sitting beside him in rich emerald green robes. He groaned as he tried to stand up, tripping over his own feet and face-planting the cold, hard stone floor.

"Don't bother trying to get up," The Vestal said from where she sat, "the door is locked and I haven't seen any guards. We're stuck here"

That's a bleak way to look at it Baldwin thought through his migraine. "You know what happened to us?" Baldwin sat down a couple feet away from the Vestal, he sighed as he realized that he had sat down in an icy pool of water. Baldwin took this time to take a look at the cell they were in. It was small and cramped, with barely enough room for him and the Vestal. The walls were cracked and in disarray, with the cement and stones falling out in chunks and pieces, leaving several holes but none big enough for someone to slip through. The iron bar door was in a similar state, the bars were bent and more rust than iron. There was even a hole in the middle of the ceiling, with a pile of rubble underneath it.

"Us and two others, an Arbalest and a Crusader, went out for drinks after getting a pretty good contract to go kill some bandits. I didn't drink, but you and the other two got plastered. The Arbalest and the Crusader got a room together, and the less you know of what happened after that the better. We got a room as well, but to save money not for whatever is going through your head. Then we woke up here" She ended with a sigh, it was clear that she was irritated about not knowing what had happened.

His head feeling as though Ayn herself was trying to rip his brain out, Baldwin closed his eyes to sleep away the hangover.

Baldwin was woken again by someone shaking his shoulder. With weary eyes, covered in sleep he barely recognized the Vestal who shared his cell.

"C'mon wake up" She shook him harder. Her eyes wide with terror.

"I'm up, I'm up. What's going on?" The look in her eyes was the same he saw some poor Crusader have when he went into the Weald for the first time, pure and utter terror.

"There is a giant mother fucking demon on the roof!" She whisper-shouted. Baldwin stood up immediately, with no weapons, they were helpless against a demon.

"We need to get out, now" Baldwin shook his head, and quickly removed his gold plated mask to wipe the sleep from his eyes.

"No shit Sherlock, I think we can shoulder check the door hard enough to open it, if not rip it off of its rusted hinges"

"Well fuck you Watson let's get this over with!" He said with a heavy sigh as he put his mask back on. There was about five feet from Baldwin from the door, not much room, but it would have to be enough. He channeled his rage, rage at being stuck here with no reason, rage at the hangover he had a few hours ago, rage at not being able to sleep longer, all of it, and he charged the door.

Turns out the door was held together with spit and prayers as it shattered when Baldwin's shoulder hit it, raining bits of rusty metal down onto the cobblestone. Baldwin barreled out into the hallway, and crashed into wall. His nose was broken and his shoulder was bruised, but hey at least the door is open.

Of course this caused no small amount of noise, which said demon apparently heard, since as Baldwin recovered from his meeting with the wall, a deafening roar filled the halls of the prison.

"MOVE!" The Vestal shouted, it took Baldwin a moment for him to comprehend her what she said. Without hesitation the Vestal grabbed Baldwin by his wrist and sprinted off down the hall, pulling the Leaper along with her. Baldwin did his best to keep up, but his iron breastplate weighed him down just enough to make it harder than it should have been.

They kept running down the hall, further into the prison until they heard someone shouting.

"Hey! Let us out!" The voice was distinctly feminine, but it echoed throughout dark dimly lit hallways.

"That sounds like Lucy" The Vestal stopped for a moment, allowing Baldwin to catch his breath and readjust his breastplate.

"Who?" He tightened the leather straps, not wanting his only bit of real armor to fall off while they ran.

The Vestal groaned, "The Arbalest"

"Oh" He cast his eyes about the dimly lit hallway they were in. It was in slightly better condition than the hallway that they came from, there were less holes in the walls, and none so far in the ceiling. The only light came from the torches that were on the walls. Numerous cell doors lined the walls, but they held only corpses and pink skinned humanoids who wore nothing but rags and moaned constantly.

"We should try to find the others" Baldwin said as he adjusted his mask.

"Probably, but I think that finding food and clean water should be our priorities" The Vestal remarked.

"We can look for them while we search for supplies. Also, sorry if we were introduced yesterday, but what's your name?"

"Jessica, nice to meet you" She held out her hand.

"Baldwin, likewise" he gave her a firm handshake and started walking down the hall, Jessica followed right behind him. "We should also be on the lookout for weapons, in case some of the other prisoners want to try something" He didn't mention the demon. Two people, no matter how well armed, stood no chance to a demon.

"Definitely"

They slipped into a tranquil silence as they walked down the hall, looking through the iron bar doors of every cell. Baldwin managed to find a very dull short-sword in the grip of a dead knight in one of the cells. It might have once been an impressive blade, but time and much use, judging by the cuts in the iron bars of the cell, has dulled it to barely be able to cut skin.

Jessica took a wooden club from another corpse, its head was splitting, but it would allow at least one solid hit before breaking.

They walked a bit further into the hallway, then the sound of metal on metal started ringing through the hallway. Baldwin and Jessica turned and faced each other at the same time.

"It might be them" Baldwin said as he shifted into a stance that would allow him to react a bit faster if they were ambushed.

"It might be more prisoners"

"It would still be worth to check it out, we might even get you a better weapon"

"That would be nice, but I would prefer our companions, meat shields aren't cheap" She smirked at that last bit.

Baldwin couldn't help but chuckle at it as well. As they proceeded down the hall, they banging grew louder, until Baldwin couldn't hear anything else. As they approached the hall that held the source of the banging. Baldwin held his hand up with five fingers, and started counting down.

Five. He sighed, and started controlling his breathing.

Four. He prepared his mind for the possible horrors ahead.

Three. He tightened his grip on his short-sword.

Two. His heart remained slow and steady, he needed to remain calm for this.

One. Move!

Baldwin Sprinted down the hallway, and came upon a large group of the pink skinned prisoners. Not taking any chances, Baldwin buried his blade in the shoulder of the nearest prisoner. The scream it produced rived that of the eldritch horrors he had fought, as a jet of crimson erupted from it shoulder.

The other prisoners turned on him immediately. Several of them clutched broken swords and sword hilts with only the first few inches of the sword still attached.

Baldwin leaped backwards, avoiding the first slashes from the prisoners. They barreled towards him, flailing their arms with no rhyme or reason. He brought his blade up and met the first strike, then their numbers overwhelmed him, forcing Baldwin to do nothing by try to block their attacks. Despite his best efforts, several made it through, cutting into his shoulders and arms. Thankfully do to the horrendous condition of the blades, they did not cut deep, but if he survived he would have to worry about infection.

Then a golden bolt of lightning came from behind him and fried one of the prisoners. Using the opening Baldwin thrust his sword through the chest of a prisoner and kicked the blade out of the hand of another. Another bolt of lightning killed another prisoner, and Baldwin brought his blade down on the head of the last prisoner, cutting into its skull and spilling brains all over the hallway.

"Thanks for the support, you really saved my ass" Baldwin was breathing heavily, his wounds were aching and he could feel the hot, sticky blood run down his shoulders, arms and back. One of the bodies started moving again, and Baldwin stomped its head it.

"No problem, now let me see to your wounds" Jessica said, her hand glowing gold.

"Are you always able to use your spells without one of your books?" Jessica's golden light washed over him, closing his cuts and giving him the feeling of a good night's sleep.

"Yes, but they are much weaker, and not as reliable" The glow stopped as she picked up one of the better conditioned broken swords from the corpses of the prisoners. "They acted mad, I hope we don't run into any more"

Same I don't know if we could take on a larger force Baldwin simply nodded in agreement as they walked down the hallway.

"Hey!" They heard someone shout.

Baldwin turned to Jessica. "That one of them?" She nodded and they proceeded along the hallway, coming to a stop in front of a cell with two not dead people inside.

"Hey what took you so long?" The one in plate mail with a crimson surcoat as red as the prisoner's blood on the walls said, raising his head to look at them.

"Insane prisoners, you know, the usual" Baldwin could feel a small smile forming on his lips. Now we will have a proper team. We can get out of here.

"Sounds like we missed one hell of a party out there" Said the girl next to the knight. She had blonde hair tied up in a ponytail, and had a steel breastplate covering some green leather coat. Her bright blue eyes were cutting into him, trying to read him. She must be Lucy.

"Yeah you could say that, you won't miss the next one, promise" Jessica had a small smile on her face as well, having a full team of experienced adventurers would make fighting the demon a great deal easier, even with the poor equipment that they had.

"So are you going to get us out or not?" The Crusader asked.

"Yeah just one seco-" Baldwin stopped as he realized that the iron bars were not nearly as rusted as they ones that held Jessica and himself. "Why do you guys have a better door than us?"

Jessica wanted to punch her leprosy stricken companion as his idiocy finally came about. "Who cares, now we probably have to find the key to get it open"

The smile that had been filling Lucy's face fell into a deep frown. "Well shit"

That sums this up quite well. Baldwin let his mind wander, trying to think of ways to open the door. Jessica might be able to use her lighting to blow the door up, but that might injure someone and with her powers weaker that what they should be, she might not be able to heal someone if the injury is severe enough. I could give Lucy one of the swords to try to pick the lock, but the only sword with a point that fine is mine and it's the only decent weapon we have, and I would be loathe to part with it.

Too many problems and not enough solutions, filled Baldwin's mind as he tried his best to think of a way to open the door without having to get the key.

"Baldwin!" Jessica's shouting finally shook Baldwin out of his stupor.

"What is it?" Baldwin then noticed that there was another person in armor and that they cell door was open. He was dressed in some very fine steel, at least he assumed it was steel, plate mail with a dull blue surcoat that had some design in golden thread. "And who it this?"

"My name is Oscar, pleasure to meet your acquaintance" He held out a gauntleted hand.

"Baldwin, and the pleasure is mine" Baldwin gave Oscar's hand a good firm handshake. The man was quite strong, and had a very strong grip.

"So when are we going to kill the demon?" The Crusader, Michael asked.

"Right now" Jessica said with a devilish smirk that was not befit a person of her religious beliefs.

A/N: This is a prequel to Bad Bitter Bits Fan Fiction and I would like to get some feedback to improve this. Knowledge of Bad Bitter Bits Fan Fiction is not required, but recommended to enjoy this. Also if you are going to read BBBFF, avoid the first two chapters, they are the definition of cringe and I would like to rewrite them at some point in the future. So warning.