Síchel was silent. Death was silent. Rastamus was playing with his scythe.
"So..." I asked, "what do we do with whatever it is we're trying to do?"
Síchel's body rolled inwards, thundering.
"We go back to Overworld."
Allen and I smiled nervously.
-
Overworld
*bang*
A gunshot shattered the morning silence, and a flash lit up the sky.
Atop a tower of metal scraps and tree trunks, the hunter sat. A small radio gently played Earth music as he hunted.
Three more shots shrieked as the song played.
'Some things in life are bad, they can really make you mad,'
He took a drink from his canteen before reloading.
'Other things just make you swear and curse,'
He sharpened his knife.
'When you're chewing on life's thistle, don't worry - give a whistle!
And this'll help things turn out for the best...'
John already knew the words,
"And... Always look on the bright side of life!"
Suddenly, a light appeared in the sky. Something was coming straight for him.
"Always look on the light side of life," he mumbled as the radio died.
The light intensified, and John grabbed his weapons and put on his armor. Light meant trouble.
When the beam hit the ground, raising a huge cloud of dust, he turned on his goggles, only to see the one thing worse than a dead radio.
-/-
"Hey, you!" Death looked different, a little more solid, and his voice sounded less wispy.
"We're not here to kill you," he said.
A voice, easily Australian, called out from above us in the tower,
"Then why'd ya come here?"
Síchel, a glowing manikin now, replied,
"You have a relation to the Prince of Death. You know what we want."
"Well I ain't helping!"
Alan and I exchanged glances, confused for a second before running after the Deaths and Alayna .
This would be fun, I thought to myself. There can't be anything better than being stuck in the place after death with three Deaths, your idiot friend, and a random girl who somehow knows about all this crap. Joy, oh joy.
"So," John asked while he wiped red dust off his rifle, "what exactly do you and these... earthlingswant?"
Rastamus, now a tall walking pile of ash, lit up a little as he spoke,
"We need your shard of the Light, mon. Hand it ova."
"The hell is a shard of Light?" Alan
"I don't do no personal favors for free. If you want me to give you something," John offered, "you have to do me a favor."
Death's mask opened a little, but his speech was interrupted.
"No, not to you! I don't trust you guys," he dodged Síchel's glare, "but I do trust a kid who's with you and hasn't died. I have a thing with Earth people."
Alan and I smiled nervously at each other, Alayna gave us a judging glare.
"So... What do we do?" Alan asked.
A laugh, then "I've had some trouble recently, with bandits. Go to their camp, get in, and give 'em a good old' fashioned beating-the-crap-out-of!"
We didn't have any time to react before knives and guns were tossed to us with a loud, "Good luck!"
-/-
Bandit Camp
Overworld
At the top of a particularly rocky hill, Alan asked, poking at a red rock.
"Why doesn't it feel much different here from Earth?"
Alayna rolled her eyes, "Everything living is designed to survive on either world. How long have you been here?"
"Three hours."
A light wind had started blowing, faintly tinting the air with crimson. Of all places, the desert had to be where we ended up.
A barely noticeable smell lingered on the winds. Alayna picked up her crossbow,
"I smell smoke. This way."
We followed after her, as she leaped among a lake of boulders, following the smoke trail. Every now and then, a gunshot would ring out from behind us, where John had returned to his hunting.
Finally, we got over the hill, pulling ourselves and our weapons up. We arrived at the top to see the area John had mentioned. It was in shambles. What looked to be once clay houses was in ruins, flames still going from some recent happening. A massive crater ate half the camp, and several smaller ones peppered the area.
"Come," Alayna beckoned to us from twenty feet away, on the top of a horribly disfigured wall.
We followed after her. As we walked further into the camp, it became even more apparent what had happened. Clay houses were reduced to piles of dust, some still with bricks intact. Now we were in the center of the biggest crater. At the exact middle, the ground glowed where dirt had been replaced with fire. Embers lay scattered everywhere, and the first skeleton appeared.
"The hell is this?" Alan went over and poked it, a mix between a human and a wolf-shaped skeleton.
When the rib he was poking at snapped, I grabbed him by the collar and told him,
"I think we're done here. Let's go back."
Alayna modded next to me.
-/-
John's Cave
"Are you bloody kidding' me? Craters? Skelly-tons? Houses in dust? Without me noticing?"
John was, in a word, furious. Our story hadn't amused him in the least, and even we thought a little that we'd hallucinated or something.
"Well, like it or not, that's what we saw." Alan sat cross legged on his chair.
Death, silent before, spoke up.
"The child may not be lying."
"And what makes you think that?"
"He's been looking for something."
John's face darkened.
"I knew you meant no good coming here. I bloody knew it."
He cocked his rifle.
"Now, the only thing I want to know is," He grinned, "How do I help?"