SURVIVAL OF THE SMARTEST
Story Summary: Faolain likes thorns. But Eir has a flash of insight and... boom. Or maybe it's just recalling that the only thing she'd be able to do if she ever got out was maybe lie on the ground. She'd thought that one up before the Commander ever got there. So perhaps she just has a good memory.
Chapter one: Prisoners of the Dragon
Author's Notes:
Yes. I posted a different story. It didn't impact my other story posting, though, did it? See, I have a limited amount of time before a computer/laptop/phone screen for health reasons (I cannot sleep within two to four hours of being on a device for a length of time... I know, right?) so I wrote this in that time. By hand. Yes, I wrote it out by hand.
And then, in the recent 'I-need-feedback-I'm-waiting-on-you' interval, I put it on the laptop because what if Laura or Vinn or even Eden gets to my notebook? Umm, no thanks.
So, here you go!
Of course, being written by hand, it's not nearly as good as the ones I write solely on the laptop - which is okay, because I can't copy+paste, I'll have to copy by hand. Only, type not write. Anyway.
The hand-written version is not in one tense. Meaning, I'll switch between two tenses a lot. But I hope that problem will be eradicated when I type it (I've got a pretty solid present-tense habit by now, yay me!).
Oh, and HoT spoilers starting in Prisoners of the Dragon.
Annnyway...
Okay, here's the story now...
Eir is studiously ignoring her cell-mate. Well, not entirely. That would have been foolish. Faolain is a formidable enemy, or at least one to reckon with, even captured and unarmed. Eir is, of course, more than a match for Faolain (even though Eir is also captured and unarmed) for the simple fact that norn just so happen to be physically stronger and larger than sylvari, at least generally speaking. I mean, it's not every day a sylvari beats a norn, now is it?
But, both of them are wounded and starving, and so who knows how that fight might turn out.
So, Eir is watching Faolain out of the corner of her eye, and has no doubt that Faolain is doing the same.
There had been no food or water for days, and Eir is wondering if she'll be able to go anywhere if she - Eir shakes her head violently to clear the thought, startling Faolain badly. 'Not if - when. When I am rescued,' Eir thinks firmly to herself.
She studies the landscape on the other side of the vine wall that makes up the tiny Mordrem cell. Two asura shouldn't have been able to fit inside, yet somehow both she and Faolain manage it.
It is mostly open space outside of the cell. Eir idly begins thinking up random scenarios for her rescue along with mitigating curcimstances, and what she would be able to do about them in her condition.
She shifts slightly, and winces as her cramped muscles protest the movement. She grimaces, and decides that even if she is rescued without any mishaps, she won't be going anywhere for a bit.
Eir snorts to herself. As if there'd be no mishaps.
"Are you trying to attract Mordrem attention, Stegalkin?" Faolain hisses. "Stop making noise,"
"It might make them realize we're here, and feed us," Eir retorts, but remains quiet.
Faolain glares at her.
As the day passes, the heat from the jungle sun just gets more intense, but still, on schedule, a different pair of Mordrem walks by the cell, on patrol. Every ten minutes. It is routine.
Every ten minutes, a different pair of Mordrem passes. The same pair passes by every hour, in order.
Then, the double pair that normally comes by doesn't show. Neither do the next couple patrols. Half and hour after the first patrol missed, Eir estimates, (although she has no way of knowing exactly, the Mordrem patrols had been her clock) she hears the next one coming. She hopes they ignore her, like normal. She stays still and quiet.
Then, she sees the Commander hurrying down the path. Braham is there, as well as - is that Rytlock? Eir squints at him. He is wearing a blindfold and is carrying Sohothin. Eir is impressed he'd gotten it back - or returned at all.
"A rescue party..." Eir breaths. "Then Wolf did hear me, in here..." she speaks to the rescue group: "they're starving us, no food or water for days."
"That's because Moredremoth doesn't care if we're alive or dead when it plugs us into a Blighting Tree," Faolain snarls scathingly. "Release us. Now!"
"Faolain?" the Commander says in surprise. "Why is Mordremoth locking up so many Nightmare Courtiers?"
"You know nothing of the Court," Faolain replies imperiously. "We seek freedom, and Mordremoth's yoke is even more onerous than the Pale Tree's."
"Forget her," Eir says desperately. "Just get me out! The Mordrem took Logan and Zojja and Trahearne deeper into the jungle, and I don't know why."
"Hang on, Mother," Braham says, viciously attacking the vine cage. "We're about to bust you out of here."
Faolain and Canach are having a conversation,* but Eir is glancing over the landscape with a worried frown. This had happened way too easily. Just as the network of vines surrounding Eir and Faolain comes undone, Eir sees movement in the underbrush, and tenses, right as a large Vinetooth launches towards the group.
She barely hears Braham's frantic "run!" or Rytlock's "head to the overpass!". The only reason she has any chance of getting away is her split-second sooner warning. She is running, ignoring the protests of her cramped muscles as she moves for the first time in days.
A vine snakes out ahead, in front of Faolain, tripping and trapping her. Eir pushes the vine aside with a hasty "we have to keep moving," but Faolain swiftly snatches a thorn from the now-limp vine, and stabs Eir viciously.
The wound is not deep, nor is it fatal, but it is very painful. Eir's hand closes around the thorn, intending to finish the now-fleeing sylvari, but rationality catches up to her - she had never had any time for Faolain, even to help her up - the Vinetooth is almost upon her.
She lets out a painful, agonizing groan, and collapses on the ground, landing heavily. She does not move.
Faolain turns to laugh gleefully at Eir's prone body, which is her undoing - a gigantic vine whips out from the jungle and carries a screaming Faolain away.
With a scream of rage (and no Faolain to vent it on) Braham charges at the vinetooth, followed by the rest of the team.
When Eir had collapsed, the Vinetooth had changed direction, now heading right for the rest of the group. It and Braham face each other head-on.
It isn't an even fight. Eight-one odds never is.
The moment the Vinetooth is dead, Braham rushes to Eir's side.
"Is it dead?" Eir whispers cautiously, half opening one eye.
"Eir? You're alright!" the Commander asks in surprise.
"I'm fine - well, relatively," Eir says, getting unsteadily to her feet. "What?" she asks, looking at her rescuer's shocked and relieved expressions. "Never heard of playing dead?"
"That's great, Eir! Brilliant!" the Commander says at last.
"Where's Garm?" Eir asks.
Everyone blinks. Rytlock's eyes snap to where Garm usually stands, by Eir's side, and back again.
"Wasn't he with you?" Braham asks.
"On the airship? Yes. But I don't think the Mordrem took him," Eir replies.
"Will he be alright on his own?" Taimi asks. Then she blinks, as if an odd thought had occured to her.
"He should be, he can manage on his own," Eir replies, but she still looks worried.
"Let's just get out of here," Rytlock says.
"I agree. Our work here is done." the Commander replies.
Author's Notes:
Wow. One short chapter. I suppose most will be like this, but then, you're getting them all at once, so you don't really care.
* This normally only happens if you have a sylvari character, but as the sylvari character never interacts with the conversation and it shouldn't have anything to do with whether your character is a sylvari or not, I put it in anyway. The Commander in this story is a human and her class doesn't matter (because it never does in storyline) but she's a ranger. (speaking of the Commander, I tried having the Commander not be me, for once. We'll see how that works out.)
Did I keep everyone in character? I wrote this by hand a while ago, and some things I couldn't understand why I'd written them, and some things I left out altogether.
Anyway. Hope you like it. Review, please.