John was a child when Pittsburgh first disappeared, when it reappeared and story's spread about what were it went, and that elves and magic were real. As he grew to man hood he had always been thinking that he did not belong in this time, like all his instincts were for an earlier time.

Growing up john read everything he could find on elf home, he started MMA (Mixed martial arts) lessons along with the Archery and free running. He joined reenactor and survival groups to learn trades like metalsmithing and leather working did every course like basket weaving and pot making he could find at any YMCA he could get to.

By eighteen John was a tall fit young man with brown hair and brown eyes trying to get approval to move to Pittsburgh. By the time he got authorization to go to elfshome he had black belts in jujitsu, mai thai and kung fu, an expert rank in small arms shooting competitions the same in archery and had spent months at a time surviving in some of earths most deadly locations on earth.

In his first few days in Pittsburgh he had a small apartment near the rim and soon contacted others like himself who had come to elf home/Pittsburgh to live a different kind of life. hunters, warriors, Adventures, all seeking a world where they could be truly themselves and not five to nine worker bees.

Over the next year, as the group slowly grew, and they learned about this new world they started by moving in to together, john's apartment block and two others on the same streets near to the rime was agreed on to be their new home and soon all the building on these streets were full. they shared story's, skills and knowledge of this new world among themselves, learning low elvish and bits and pieces about the magic in this land.

They were a small community unto themselves, with their own store run by mike scoldings, a gun nut and metal working hobbyist, with their small communities help he soon had a good smiths/gun shop going selling ammo, arrows, swords, light Armor and other basic supply to the outdoors type. An older women Ellen conrow, a retired U.S. army major started a small dojo in one basement teaching self-defence and more brutal killing technics.

Four of the building had knocked their garden walls down to make a long archery and gun range. All in all, they were happy, even going so far as to call themselves a clan and going un noticed in Pittsburgh, quietly hunting and exploring this new world. Even if this meant working around the elves.

Thing changed when Tinker zedome trapped Pittsburgh in eflshome and then wolf who rules, domana cast and head of the elves in the western lads had announced that the humans needed to from households to part of the elven world. The meeting was being held on the archery grounds, the meeting was to discuss what to do now that Pittsburgh seemed to be stuck on elf's home and that apparently there was a war going on among the elf's and oni.

montcrew, 26 stood with a small group of men and women the nominal leaders of their small community, nearly 200 strong, they were arguing about wind wolfs announcement not so much to form a clan they already saw themselves as one but how to structure it.

with the elves you had the one head of clan, no council to speak of, that head had body guards trained to be body guards under them you had the leaders of various tasks for the clans like farming, training, housekeeping, etc. The community at large had nominated five people to fill these roles but left it to them to decide with of the five did what.

Mike scoldings, a gun nut and metal working hobbyist, mad inventor ( Maker )

Ellen conrow, a retired U.S. army major, hand to hand master, ( training )

Shane adams, neat freak and one of life natural micro managers ex nurse ( housekeeping )

Ben Jolkings, retired U.K. shop owner and general scrounger (Trade

''I won't do it'' john shouted , how could these people be so dense, they wanted him to be the head of the clan, this was so stupid he was only 26.

''shut up john and grow up'' Ellen always made him feel like a dirty child when she used that tone of voice, at 50 she could still kick the crap out of any three others which was at odds with her grany'ish ways 'were all older true that also means were stuck in our ways and their going to be allot of learning to do, people like and trust you, you've led groups in to the wilds and by all reports do an excellent job, we will still be here to advise you, but YOU are the best choice for clan head

mike scoldings, Shane adams and Ben Jolkings were nodding in agreement with Ellen 'she's right john you are our best choice' mike was saying, a man of normal height with arms like a oak tree 'you have the clans respect and still young enough to learn what you need as well as being one of the few of us who speaks high as well as low elvish''

''Look john were all great at what we do because we had years of training to get that way, but leading on this scale is not something we ever learned, but your still young enough to do it as were to old' Shane adams, always calm even when up to his elbows, patching some on up after a run in with a locale beastie,

'It's time you man up, boy' said Ben Jolkings, for some reason john always thought ben was about 'harrumph' a short man who was almost as wide as he was tall.

A sense of dread settled over him as he realized he was not getting out of this 'Fine but if I screw up it's your fault' was his feeble response. The four others turned to the crowd and announced '' Men and Women of the clan we give you John montcrew head of the clan '' there were no cheers but some light applause and a shiver of excitement and fear as he realized he was the leader of nearly 200 men, women and some children.

one Week later John was nervous, today they were going to announce themselves to the elves by sending a delegation to the elves the group would be john as head of the clan his five guards and Ellen. We should have done this sooner he thought what with all the details to be sorted, like whom fit in to what part of the clan, who would be their version of the Sekasha body guards, their clan colours were a greenish silver like light throe tree leaves and cold iron grey.

Shane had found a tailor so john felt like an ass in his official clothes and mike had come up with a light half Armor for his guards made of leather and steal and they all looked deadly they all had one gun a razor sharp sword as well as fold down compound bows and 20 arrows each, because none of them could use magic they had equipped themselves in a way that their weapons and Armor played hell with magic. AS to being body guards and the training necessary, a surprisingly large percentage of their small clan was ex-SAS or Navy seals.

From the night he had agreed with be the clan head he was never alone now and boy how it chafed. A knock on the door brought his head up as Ellen walked in ' were ready john, Prince true flame and Viceroy wind wolf are at the enclave and the cars out front, it's time we announced ourselves' As the two cars stopped in front of the gates and number of fire and wind clan Sekasha stepped foreword but stopped in surprise as everyone got out, the elven Sekasha recognized what the human guards were doing but not why humans were doing it.

While the elves were watching his guard's john and Ellen along with his first a man named Dennis and ex-marine who was stationed in the Asia he had master of Kendo and karate. Approaching the lead most elf john announced, ' My name is John montcrew and I am the head of the Iron clan' the elf's had snapped to john and widened as he continued ' this is clan elder Ellen conrow and my first Dennis, I with to speak to either prince true flame or wolf who rules'.

The elf looked like someone had just introduced him to a talking banana, but a runner was soon sent to wind wolf and true flame. A few minutes later, a time of total silence and allot of stare down contests among the two sets of guards, a guide came to escort them to an audience with wind wolf as well as prince true flame.

Coming in to the large room he motioned for Dennis to stay near the door and for only Ellen to fallow him, but if the look Dennis gave him said anything he was in trouble later. Coming to stand before the two sitting elves, it looked like they had been having tea, he introduced himself again. ' my name is john montcrew and I have the honour of being the first head of the iron clan and this is Ellen conrow one of the clan elders'.

taking a deep breath he continued turning his head more to wind wolf ' viceroy, after Pittsburgh was stranded hear you said humans needed to come to together to form households and clans, for the past few years I have been part of a group of nearly 200 who came here to seek, what is for as and older way to live and we found it, we have considered ourselves a...louse clan for some time but with your announcement we have gone all the way and formalized it between ourselves, We are the iron clan i am it head, and so i come to you today to make ourselves-known to you''.

The silence in the room was deafening for nearly a full minute, before prince true flame spoke and asked a question ' Why Iron clan?' Being slightly taken back by the odd question and calm voice it took John a moment to answer.

' as humans we cannot use magic, but we can use tech and metal, iron and steel for example, which from what we have seen plays merry hell with your magic and the oni's magic. We also use science to offset some of the limitations we have, our composite bows for example are more powerful than your longbows and the iron heads can disrupt shields'

another silence before wind wolf asked the next question 'If you and this...clan have been hear so long how is it we have not heard of you till now?

John smiled to himself ' we came here for another life, like i said before all of us have hunted and explore beyond the rim, we have adapted our skills to survive hear we sell what we do not need to others like meats from the forest, leathers and wild foods, we are self-sustaining and self-equipping we feed ourselves, arm ourselves and train ourselves. as a group we did not want to be broken up or have someone who does not understand us, giving us orders, we became the iron clan'

the silence this time was longer a full two minutes before a cough next to him, reminded him of Ellen she was handing him a scroll, as he took it of her he set it down on the table between the two powerful elves 'this scroll has out information, our structure, our numbers, skills and abilities, there is also another scroll inside, it's the promises that the iron clan will help prince true flame of the fire clan and wolf who rules of the wind clan in the defence of Pittsburgh and the eradication of the oni'

more silence as the elves take turns to read the scroll's Taking a breath to get the elves attention ' i must leave now i have clan matters to take care of, but please send a message if there is anything we can do' giving them a shallow bow and a step back he turns and strides out picking Dennis back up at the door, back at the cars it looked like no one had moved.

Wolf looks over at true 'That was...new, a self-made human clan' true flame looks up from reading the scroll that was left about their skills. 'if this is true ' gesturing to the scroll in his hands ' they have been getting around the guards we have to stop people wandering to far, as well as not only surviving but also prospering'

Wolf gives true a crooked smile 'humans are very adaptive and he was right about what he said about their equipment, but still 200 and this is the first i hear...' true flame shook his head ' and did you see his 'first' that man Dennis, i do not think a single thing happened that he did not see, he also felt like a Sekasha too, and he was right about their ability to use technology' 'I think my friend this will take some thinking on' said wolf

Aron walked in to his small r and d room he was part of the maker cast of the iron clan, he was still getting use to that, his gift for making odd things and genius at trap making had led mike you ear mark him for his r and d group, there job was fusing or nullifying the elven and oni magic his first task was to find a way to duplicate their light arrows.,

Aaron never knew and knew enough not to ask were mike had gotten three spell arrows, one had been used to test whether a normal human could use, turns out they can now he had to work out why. Taking one out of the safe he moved it over to his work desk to start copying down the runes on it, next he crossed referenced the rues, a pain staking process of many hours, before he was sure that the runes triggered the spell using the sound given off by the arrow in flight, a surprisingly simple concept that worked he finished the day by righting up his report for mike before calling it a day.

john was sitting by the table early in the morning waiting for the others to arrive for the daily report, looking out the window his mind wandered. The day after his meeting with two elves word had gotten around that there was a strange new clan of humans calling themselves the iron clan, this soon spread to the rest of pits burg and people started coming asking to join many had been turned away once they knew that they were following the elven doctrine for clans not the human one of old.

Still there numbers grew and they had to move to a place with more room so they had moved to the north side at the end of the 9279 near windmill hill plenty of room to grow and allot of old homes that were soon filled, the move had been a blessing in some ways it allowed them to organize were each group would be with his home in the centre the Sekasha facilities around that, after that it was more fluid but still organized.

There numbers had grown to just over 350. A knock at the door brought him back as the clan elders entered and seated themselves and so the daily reports started, two new members, food scales and food stores, incident reports, surprisingly no internal problems probably because everyone so busy, but incidents with the other clans mostly the earth clan was problematic they thought we were a joke, so they kept insulting us and pushing us until true flame told them to back off.

Sekasha training and arming, up to 30 now mostly ex-military but all were constantly training they were determined to show they should not be looked down on. r and d reports, we could do the spell arrows and were looking to finding a way to add them the gun rounds, as well as a thin net cap hooked to some double a battery so there was a small electric current, this hopefully would help counter some of the oni games it was to be worn under a helmet.

We also had the ear buds and coms hardened against magic interference, that was one up on the elves. As the morning wound on the others left while john went back to organizing things as a whole, every night he was asleep the second he stopped moving and had even grown used to his constant guards.

The first time the oni attacked they came with 30 fighters, it seems they did most of their work with the half breeds who were terrified of them, they had however been expecting this and were ready. It was over by the time john got dressed and down to the C.I.C in the basement, 30 dead oni, the scull capes had worked in a way, oni trying to hide looked like a tree dimensional blob of oily water, not what had been expected but good enough. with two dead and five injured, three Iron clan Sekasha went toe to toe with the oni their bullet proof Armor worked, and their razor-sharp steel swords really did screw up their shields, all three were injured, oni were all terribly strong but all three would recover and all three had the won.

the spell arrows had worked well too and when one r&d type had tried his new spell bullet it had looked more like a ball of lightning, but it did kill oni as well as giving the owner a nasty jolt, seems it needs more work. 20 minutes later the other clans showed up mostly they were impressed except the stone clan who look like kicked dogs probably because earth son, leader of the stone clan in pits berg had been decapitated by his own first for being a dush bag gimp.

Fire and wind clan Sekasha went looking for more oni so i sent some of mine own with them it was time to wok to together, in the meantime john had a guided tour to give to wolf who rules, and true flame and all of their firsts tagged along.