-1The Barrens

From Orgrimmar, the party headed southwest, through the red dusts of Durotar, the orcish country on the coast of the sea, to the much greater expanse of wasteland known simply as the Barrens. Though divided only by a river, the two areas were vastly different. The Barrens, a vast desert, laid near the center of Kalimdor, and acted as a great crossroads between several regions. Appropriately, the outpost at the desert's center was named the Crossroads, with roads branching off in the four cardinal directions toward different regions.

"We'll cross the river, then head north toward Ashenvale, where I assume this contact is waiting for us," Lucius said, "There's no need to waste time by stopping at the Crossroads."

The Prince winced, "ooh"ing with trepidation, "That's not going to work for me. See, I need to turn in a quest at the Crossroads. So if we could just make a quick stop."

The Undead mage rolled his eyes. "Fine, one quick stop, but then we're moving on."

So the group headed in the opposite direction, toward the Crossroads. There, the Prince handed a letter to an annoyed butcher. The orc scowled at the priest. "I asked you to deliver that meat months ago! Why are you just now getting back?"

"I was busy, and I forgot," the Prince then took the meager amount of money the butcher gave him to the inn to buy alcohol, ignoring Lucius's protests.

After an hour, Rosham sighed. "This is borin'! I'm bored! Ya hear me? I'm gonna go kill something."

Lucius stood up, waving his hands desperately. "No no! As soon as that troll comes back, we need to go to Ashenvale! It's not too late to stay on schedule!"

The tauren waved his hand dismissively, resting his rifle on his shoulder and strutting away. Lucius kneaded his temple while Ornery and Kival stood around for a moment before following Rosham.

As the trio approached the exit onto the road, Ornery happened to notice two soldiers conversing, a rogue and a warrior, by the looks of them. The warlock paused to listen, and was immediately baffled.

"Can u beleve that noob? He's a durid! He doesn't need LETHER!"

"Thats notin! I met a durid that wanted to tank! I was all 'l2play and heal', but he was all 'it's a free country, I wanna tank'!"

"OMG, Chuck Norris!"

Ornery was unaware of a large droplet of drool that was beginning to emerge from the left corner of his mouth, as he was also unaware that his eyes were glazing over. One might have thought that the swift blow to the back of his head by a large shield might have revived him, but instead it knocked him unconscious.

Not long afterward, Ornery awoke, as he was being dragged unceremoniously across the ground by Kival. He made several noises, which caught her attention. "Oh, you're up. What's that? I can't understand you. If you would stop gasping in agony- oh."

As soon as she stopped dragging him by the throat, Ornery's vocal capacities suddenly increased tenfold. "What happened? Where am I?"

"Y'all were spacin' out," Rosham had paused in his ceaseless marching to glare back at Kival and Ornery, "That's what Barrens chat will do to ya. The best way to avoid it is to… well, not listen, basically."

Ornery blinked. "Barrens…chat? What do you mean?"

Kival sighed. "You have a lot to learn, obviously. I hope you don't turn out to be a cliché clueless hero or something."

"Don't be ridiculous!" Rosham shouted, "I am clearly the hero of this group! Now come on ya pansies, or I'll leave ya behind!"

While both were wondering it, only Ornery actually cared enough to ask, "Where are we going?"

"I got a quest to kill stuff," Rosham said without looking back, "Something about collecting fifty boar tusks… er killin' fifty quillboars… anyway, it involves killin' things and takin' their facial features as trophies, which is good enough fer me!"

The warlock tapped his chin thoughtfully. "That doesn't seem very nice. Maybe if we ask politely, they'll just… give us their tusks."

That was enough to cause Rosham and Kival to stop in their tracks, the tauren with a minor skidding noise. He whirled around to glare at Ornery with disbelief. "What? A solution that doesn't involve violence? Are ya mad? That's unheard of! Nothin' can be solved with… with negotiation! This is the world of warcraft, not the world of pansycraft!"

Ornery recoiled fearfully. "S-sorry! I didn't mean to offend you, sir…"

Rosham snorted. "I should HOPE not! Now come on, y'all bunch of procrastinators! I'm a hankerin' for some pork fer dinner tonight!"

Once they had begun to walk again, Kival turned to Ornery. "Shouldn't you have some sort of demon companion to help us fight?"

The warlock blinked, realizing that, once again, the imp was nowhere to be seen. He sighed. "Sometimes I get this crazy and clearly inaccurate impression that Piznik doesn't like me. Oh well, I'll just summon Volgrax."

"Twenty-eight bottles of beer on the wall! Twenty-eight bottles of beer! Take one down and pass it around, twenty… twenty… Drat, hey Pizzy! What's after twenty-eight?"

The imp hiccupped. "Twenty-nine."

"Oh, right. Twenty-nine bottles of beer… blah, skip that. Pass it around, twenty-eight bottles of…. Hey wait, I just did that! Pizzy! Something's wrong with the numbers!"

Piznik cursed wildly. "I told you not to call me that!" After a moment, however, the Prince and the imp had forgotten whatever it was they had been arguing about.

A moment after that, Piznik blinked. "Curshesh! That dratted Ornery is dismissing m-" The imp froze in the middle of a word before fading away.

The Prince blinked, the shrugged. "More for me! Twenty-eight bottles of beer on the wall! Pass it around, twenty… oh hell, I still can't remember."

Lucius sighed. Being the only competent member in a group of idiots was certainly a difficult task, but it was even worse when he was ignored by the narration, a narration that was foolishly passing the fourth wall for no reason. The mage sat in the shade of a guard tower, wondering if the Prince would ever finish his drinking bout, and when the other three would be back.

Just then, an alarm was sounded by the guards. One rode by on a wolf, waving his hands wildly while shouting "The Alliance is coming! The Alliance is coming!" However, waving his hands made it rather hard to balance and control his mount, and the rider ran straight into the Flight Master, who was knocked out.

"N00b!" a nearby troll shouted furiously, "How can I fly to TB now?"

The rider blinked. "TB? What's TB? And why are you leaving? You need to help defeat the invaders!"

"No way! Too busy! Too low level! Can't do it! N00b!"

Lucius stood and ascended to the top of the guard tower. From that vantage point, he could see several approaching figures, but not nearly the number he had expected to cause such a panic in the Crossroads. When he returned to the ground, however, the outpost was in an uproar.

The guards of the east entrance charged when the Alliance came close enough, and were quickly slaughtered. Powerful attackers Lucius thought, unhappily. His group had abandoned him, the Crossroads soldiers were being slaughtered, and the Flight Master was down, removing his best method of escape. This sort of thing happened far too often to someone of his supposed competence.

The first invader Lucius saw was a gnome, apparently a rogue. He was chanting some sort of warcry, and it took a moment for Lucius to understand what he was saying. He grimaced when he realized that the gnome was repeating "Honor Kill!" over and over.

Just behind him was a Night Elf, which made Lucius grimace. It was a female, of course, and by her outfit (all black, far too tight leather) she was another rogue. She wasn't saying anything, but she was stabbing things.

The last of the attackers, shockingly, was not a rogue. Rather, it was another night elf, a druid in cat form. Lucius did not consider himself an expert on druids, but according to his studies, the cat form of the druid was very similar in capabilities to a person trained as a rogue.

Three rogues… I can handle rogues. I can handle anything.

As soon as Volgrax was summoned, she began to fuss over Ornery. "Look at your head! Hair or no hair, you need to do something by way of washing that! Your robes are all dirty! You look like you were dragged through the desert for a mile! And I still don't see an engagement ring! I hope you don't think I'm taking care of you forever."

The Voidwalker then happened to notice Kival standing there. She smiled at Ornery, leaning close to him. "Is that your new girlfriend?"

The warlock shook his head, too oblivious to be embarrassed. "I don't think Kival likes anyone."

"Oh, don't be shy! Introduce me!"

Rolling his eyes, Ornery motioned toward Volgrax. "This is Volgrax. Volgrax, this is Kival."

"Hey," the warrior said indifferently, before turning away.

"Why hellooooookay where is she going? How rude! Ornery, must you be attracted to such a rude woman? Honestly, I thought I had raised you better! I practically raised you, and people are supposed to be attracted to people similar to their caretakers in personality. Are you implying that I am rude by dating someone who is rude?"

"Hey! Will y'all hurry up back there! We have to hurry up if we're ever gonna find them boars and tear their tusks out!" Volgrax blinked, then noticed Rosham leading the way.

She glared at him, then turned to Ornery. "You could be leading the group, you know! Be assertive, you big chicken! How do you ever expect to get married if you aren't assertive?"

As it happened, they were very close to where the quillboars had built their crude huts against a stony hill, wrapped with massive thorny vines. The boar-men wandered around, burrowing for… truffles or something. Rosham paused when the village came into sight and breathed deeply. "We're close. I kin smell 'em."

"They're right there," Kival pointed out in a moan.

Rosham glared at her. "I know that! I smelled 'em a mile away with this here smeller of mine! How do ya THINK I found my way here"

"I assumed you were following the grisly trail of dead, partially eaten orcs surrounded by hoof-prints."

"Ya take all the fun out of everythin', ya know?"

"Yeah, I know. Everyone tells me that. I wonder sometimes if my utter lack of happiness and enthusiasm is the reason that I have no friends, let alone lovers, and feel a constant emptiness deep within my soul."

The tauren blinked at her, then shuddered. "Don't ever talk to me again."

"I get that a lot too."

Volgrax elbowed Ornery in the gut. "Hear that? She's single! Go ask her out."

Ornery made a face at the Voidwalker. "But I don't wanna. She might say no. I barely know her. Where would we go? What would we talk about? She probably doesn't like me. I'm too shy. I have prior arrangements."

The demon sighed huffily. "Why do you bother to summon me if you're not even going to listen to what I have to say? Fine, don't ask her out! That'll sure show me! I hope you realize that the perfect woman isn't going to just throw herself at you some day!"

Ornery was going to answer, but was interrupted when he heard a bestial squeal from behind him. Before he could turn around, a hefty quillboar had landed on his back, driving him to the ground. It proceeded to pummel him mercilessly with a large club. Volgrax sighed. "Now see what you've done? If I've told you once, I've told you a million times: pay attention to your surroundings!"

The quillboar refused to move, until Rosham handily shot it off with his large rifle. He cackled evilly while he loaded another shot and blasted the creature again. Kival started to tell him that the beast was dead after the fifth time he shot it, but decided that he probably wouldn't care anyway.

Ornery stood, rubbing the back of his head. "Thanks Rosham! You're a real pal!"

The tauren turned, blinking at Ornery. "Yer alive? I was sure that thing had finished ya off. Guess I shoulda waited an extra minute…"

The warlock laughed, slapping the much larger Rosham on the shoulder. "You're such a crack up! I'm glad I have such funny friends!"

Rosham glared at him. "I ain't yer friend, baldy. And don't touch me. Cummon now, I figured out how ya kin help me beat the pigs."

Ornery was glad that the plan turned out to be simple, but after he had acted as bait for three quillboars and sustained significant injuries, he started to wonder if he might switch places with Rosham. "Ain't possible," the hunter explained, "If I was the bait, who would shoot the pigs?"

"Well… maybe I could do it…"

"Oh puh-LEEZ! Y'all couldn't handle Gertrude here. She'd backlash ya to Orgrimmar and miss to boot! No, it's best if I handle the shootin'."

Ornery sighed. "I can't argue with that logic." Volgrax slapped him over the head, then floated away to stand behind Rosham, and far away from the crowds of quillboars that the hapless warlock was attracting.

Fine, so maybe he couldn't handle three rogues by himself.

The fight had gone well at first. Lucius had used polymorph to turn the night elf into a sheep, leaving her helpless. He had then struck the druid with a pyroblast. He had ignored the gnome, having decided that it wasn't much of a threat by itself.

The giant cat, of course, had charged him after he had hit it with a giant ball of fire, so Lucius had then used Frost Nova to freeze it in place. Moving backward, he had proceeded to blast the beast with frost bolts, harming it and slowing it down as it tried to approach him. In that way, he would have managed to kill it so he could then turn his attention to the other night elf, before the polymorph wore off.

Unfortunately, Lucius did not look where he was going as he backed up. With its dread call of "Honor kill!", the gnome sapped Lucius. The night elf returned to its roguish form, and the ice wore off the large cat, and soon three Alliance attackers surrounded the helpless mage.

This is the part Lucius thought to himself where someone will show up to help me. Bah, who am I kidding. Heroic, last minute rescues never actually happen.

Sadly, irony did not rear its ugly head, and no rescue came. Or perhaps the fact that Lucius was despairing with the hope that what he thought couldn't happen in order to be ironic would and ending up being right to despair was the irony of the situation. In any case, Lucius was creamed.

The mage fell to the ground, and with one last gasp, died.

Luckily for Lucius, death is but a temporary thing in the World of Warcraft. And for that matter, he was Undead, so technically he had already defied death before.

Anyway, he opened his eyes and found himself in a world almost completely lacking in color. The only colorful thing in sight was the angelic being that floated above him, glowing blue. The spirit healer gazed at him impassively.

Lucius would normally have returned to his corpse and revived there, but his killers were still there, and now he was vulnerable to attack. Instead, he spoke to the Spirit Healer, who quickly restored him to his living flesh. Or in his case, non-living flesh. Un-living, perhaps. Undead flesh. Adjectives aside, Lucius quickly made his way away from the Crossroads, at least until he was no longer vulnerable to attack by the three rogues.

When he judged that he was safe, the mage sat to recover his strength and wait out the resurrection sickness. While there, he checked his map. Thanks to modern magic, he could use his map to immediately find not only his position, but that of his group. The Prince, predictably, was still in the pub within the Crossroads. The other three were to the south, and seemed to be traveling further in that direction. Lucius cursed. Couldn't they follow simple directions? This was all that cursed troll's fault!

With a sigh, Lucius rose and started for Rosham's position. Obviously it would be better to stick together. If they were lucky, perhaps the Prince would be killed by the raiders. Lucius sighed again when he remembered that the priest had the same benefit of resurrection that he himself had just utilized.

He must have done that on purpose.

Meanwhile, the Prince had just awakened from his alcohol-induced doze to realize that the inn was empty. He stood groggily, holding his head and moaning. His massive hangover clouded his thinking somewhat, but he did manage to realize that the Crossroads should not be devoid of life.

He started to stumble outside, but backed away, both because of the painful light and because he saw a trio of Alliance attackers raiding the town.

The Prince, of course, could not speak a word of the Alliance common tongue. Therefore, this entire exchange would have sounded rather like gibberish to him. It would be unfair to have more knowledge than the poor troll, so if all the readers would kindly pretend everything below is unreadable, the Prince would be very grateful.

The night elf rogue chuckled villainously. "These Hordies are such pushovers!"

The druid, still in his cat form, nodded in agreement. "Remember when all the good fighters were on the Horde and the Alliance gained the reputation of being full of idiots? Hah! Those days are certainly past!"

She grinned, though it wasn't visible under her… bandana thingy. "It's probably because of those blood elves. Geez, who thought it was a good idea for them to join the Horde?"

The two night elves had a good laugh about that, but were interrupted by the gnome, who ran past them, jumping needlessly and shouting "Honor kill!".

"Why did we bring him along?" the druid asked, "He's kind of undermining the point we just made about Alliance superiority. Next thing you know, we're going to suddenly be attacked by blood elves that immediately defeat-"

The druid, of course, was cut off by the sword of a blood elf paladin standing behind him. The other night elf moved to attack, but suddenly shrieked with terror as a dark aura surrounded her. In the grips of the Fear spell, she ran around helplessly while the other blood elf, a warlock, cackled melodramatically. The paladin kicked the gnome forcefully, and he ran away.

The druid rose, howling with rage. "Traitorous descendents of my people! I will tear you limb from limb, and feast upon your corpses! You shall suffer for betraying the Alliance and the night elves in ages past, fallen highbourne!"

Sadly, that wonderful speech was not understood by the orcish-speaking audience, which proceeded to stab and blast the druid with bolts of darkness. He ran away, followed by the other rogue, both whimpering.

The paladin, a handsome male blood elf with flowing blonde hair that reeked of bishounen-ness (whatever that means) raised his broadsword into the air to cheer. "We are victorious! Dear sister, no fiend of the Alliance can defeat us! The misshapen night elves, denizens of darkness, are no match for the champions of the light!"

The warlock, in the meantime, was examining her hand. "I think I broke a nail… Oh, those beasts. I'll make them pay for this later."

The paladin gaped at his sister. "Darthellia! Are you not exhilarated by our fantastic victory?"

"Not really," she replied, not looking up, "They were just an irritating distraction from our mission. Come, Ethael. We head north, to Ashenvale. Our mission's goal should be there, and then we shall gain the prize, which I shall use, regardless of the master's intent, for my own purposes!"

"The purposes of heroism!"

"Sure, fine, whatever." With that, the paladin mounted a large warhorse, and the warlock a demonic steed, and together rode off to the north.

When the two were gone, the Prince shrugged. "Freaks. Why did we let them into the Horde, anyway?" The troll rubbed his head, then headed south after the rest of his party.

While Ornery recovered from his grievous wounds, Kival glanced over at Rosham, who was cleaning his rifle. "I've been wondering… if you're a hunter, where is your pet?"

The tauren scoffed, then began to guffaw. "Idjit! Real hunters don't need no pets to take the hits for 'em! I kin defeat any opponent all by me lonesome! Beasts TREMBLE before me!"

Ornery looked over at him. "But don't you ever get lonely?"

Rosham snorted. "Pshaw! I'm a hunter! We're all lone ranger types. So long as I got me gun here, I don't need no other company! Now heal up them wounds, baldy. I wanna get back to shootin' quillboars!"

"We've already finished the quest, you know," Kival said tonelessly, "We don't really need to kill any more quillboars, or mutilate their corpses for tusks. We could go back…"

Rosham glared at her. "Have I told ya before that ya take the fun outta everythin'?"

"Yes," she said.

"Well, it's still true. Ornery, are ya ready yet?"

The warlock jumped to his feet, nodding and grinning exuberantly. He ran off, waving his arms and shouting, and soon attracted several attackers who quickly ran him down and began savagely beating him. Volgrax sighed, shaking her head. "It's almost embarrassing to say that I am his slave," she said with a moan.

With a moan, the Prince collapsed to the ground melodramatically. He was now lost in the desert, his group nowhere in sight, and countless unknown beasts all about him, perhaps waiting for the perfect opportunity to jump out and attack him.

A rustle in the nearby shrubbery caused the Prince to jump to his feet, mace in hand. After a moment, a thought occurred to him. Why is there one bush sitting there, surrounded by barren nothingness? And furthermore, why is it moving

Said bush suddenly stood up, supported by large, hoofed feet, and took several steps closer to the troll before dropping back to the ground. The Prince sighed. "You're not fooling anyone. Just come out before I start smiting you."

"Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! I'm trying to use stealth here, blue guy!"

The Prince blinked. Blue guy? Then, without warning, a large brown blur rocketed from the bush, through the air, landing, or rather, crashing to the ground behind him. He turned to see a female tauren sprawled on the ground, looking rather sheepish.

"I-I meant to do that," she said, standing up and brushing herself off. She was wearing all black leather, and the Prince noticed a dagger at her side, and so did not put his own weapon away, just in case. After she had regained her composure, she did indeed draw her dagger, crouching down in an attack stance. "Surrender the gold, or I'll start eviscerating!"

The Prince smirked. "What's with the dagger? Couldn't find a real weapon?"

"Don't be silly! All the best rogues use daggers!"

That statement threw the priest off balance. He blinked at her, then sighed. "Lady, you're a tauren. Tauren can't be rogues because-"

She sighed, rolling her eyes. "Yeah yeah, I know. We're too honorable."

"Actually, I was going to say it's because you're all too bulky and fat to be sneaking around, but I guess that works too."

She stamped her foot… hoof angrily. "I don't care what those old farts on Thunder Bluff say! I'm the first ever tauren rogue!"

"Uh huh," the Prince sighed, "So what's your name, kid?"

"Rouge!"

He blinked. "I hope you didn't pick a name like that because you weren't sure how to spell 'rogue'. I guess your parents might have named you that, but they must have been really short on ideas to have-"

"Don't be silly! Rouge means red, and red is my favorite color! Now fork over the gold, Tusky the clown!"

"Geez, the nicknames…" the Prince pursed his lips thoughtfully, then smiled, "Tell you what: instead of giving you gold, I'll give you some free rogue lessons. I myself am a rogue, as it happens."

Rouge blinked. "But you're wearing priestly robes…"

"It's part of my clever disguise. Do you want the lessons or not?" Rouge nodded enthusiastically, "Good. That'll be twenty silver for the lessons."

"Didn't you say the lessons were free?"

"I have no recollection of saying that," After she had paid, the Prince smiled, "Lesson number one: when using a bush as a disguise, don't move when the person you're stalking is looking directly at you. Lesson two: back stabbing works best from behind. Lesson three: uh…"

"Is something wrong, sensei?"

"Uh, nope… Oh, I know: don't attempt to mug people who can annihilate you with one blast of light magic. Got all that?"

Rouge nodded. "Yep! No wait… I forgot it all. Can you tell me again so I can write it all down?"

"Sure, but first, I need you to go buy a notepad."

"I have one right here!" she said, holding it up to show him.

"Wrong kind. You need to get one with blue paper. They might sell those in the Crossroads, but then again, they might not. Go buy a notepad with blue paper, and then come back here and I'll repeat the lessons. Oh, and you might as well pay me in advance, so that'll be twenty gold."

Rouge nodded. "Okie-day! I'll be right back!"

When she was out of sight, the Prince chuckled. "That was almost too easy."

Kival paused to rest for a moment on a large rock. Almost as soon as she sat, she saw the hunched form of Lucius approaching. She considered waving him over, but didn't feel like it. The mage walked past her before doing a double-take and returning. "Where is Rosham? I need to strangle that absurdly thick neck of his."

"He's looking for Mankirk's wife. Apparently, she died somewhere around here, but Rosham can't find the body to put Mankirk's mind at peace."

"Oh… that's nice. And Ornery?"

"He's over there, teaching those quillboars how to read."

Lucius turned arching an eyebrow. "Ah… well, anyway, go find Rosham. We need to get moving, and I'm tired of waiting for him and for that lazy idiot. I don't care if he doesn't come: we're heading north with or without that priest."

Kival sighed. "You could at least say please," she grumbled, standing to look for Rosham.

She found him after a few minutes of searching. He was busily scanning the ground for any trace of the deceased orc woman, while being followed by a large raptor that, for some reason, was not attacking him. Kival sighed. "Changed your mind about not wanting a pet?"

Rosham scowled at her. "I thought it seemed colder around here. Yar, I caved. The raptor was just too freakin' cool to pass up. Help me with the lookin' here."

"A 'please' would be appreciated. It doesn't cost anything to be polite."

The tauren glared at her. "It costs time and breath! Git down and find that dead orc lady right now, or I'll blast yer butt-ugly head off!"

Ornery waved goodbye to the quillboars when Lucius called him over. As soon as he was gone, one of them cackled evilly. "At last! With our newfound ability to read, we will be able to decipher these plans of Orgrimmar and find the best way to invade the city! Soon, the Barrens will be ours once again!"

Meanwhile, the Prince had finally shown up. Lucius sighed. "I see you finally wrested yourself from the bar. I don't suppose it has anything to do with those Alliance invaders?"

"Maybe slightly. Anyway, where's the other orc and the mad cow?"

The mage motioned in the direction Kival had gone. "Looking for Mankirk's wife, apparently."

"Why? Is she a looker? Think I have any chance on that action?"

"She's dead."

The Prince shrugged. "That doesn't matter. I can still rob her blind and force myself into the will. Why, what did you think I meant?"

Lucius turned away from him, then sighed again. "Is Kival bringing him or not?! Are we ever going to get this cursed quest over with? Dammit all, this is not worth whatever fabulous rewards we've been promised!"

Suddenly an anguished roar was heard.

Rosham lifted his gun and shot feebly at a bush. "I can't find her! I've looked everywhere in this damn desert, and she's nowhere to be found!"

With a howl, he fell to his knees, and shouted at the skies "Where in hell is Mankirk's wwwiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiifffffffffffeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee?!"

"Wasn't that kind of melodramatic?"