Cut Rate Slayers
Dark Crystaline Eschaton

3: Gambit! So the world's not going to end this morning!



"Because it's a lot of work pumping myself up to usual human height," Quorinelya told Amelia.
Amelia (played by the back-up muse, Malehelicon) paused on the stairs down to the tavern common room. She struck a dramatic pose, then said, "But, O Spooker of Dragons, do you deem it a show of adequate gravitas to set yourself to cadging rides on other people's shoulders?"
Quorinelya bounced herself on Amelia's left shoulder. "Yours is comfortable enough," she said. "Do you have any idea what a pain it can be when everyone in the group you're with decides that they simply refuse to go anywhere except garbed in chainmail?"
"Are you used to settings with strict dress codes?" Amelia asked.
Quorinelya shook her head. "I'm talking about having to sit on those metal wires all day," she explained. "And getting your butt caught between the links when the mail shifts under you -- never mind. It's not a problem with this group."
Amelia resumed descending the stairs. "You're going to stay small, then --"
"At least until after breakfast."
"-- and annoy master Zelgadis terribly?"
"It's his own fault for miscasting the part so badly."
"You think any fool could play Lina Inverse?"
"Hardly. I just think I'm scarcely the right fool."
"Could you please cut that out?" Zelgadis, played by Fafred the Producer and once again clad in pebbles and robes, appeared behind Amelia on the stairs. "Lina never lacks for self-confidence and it really annoys me when you screw up that part of her character."
Quorinelya glared at him. She surveyed the lumps of mineral-colored plasticene that were scattered across his otherwise gray-painted face and said, "Sod off, doughboy. It's your fault I'm in this mess. Your fault and your gross stupidity in appealing to Nick for help."
Zelgadis shrugged. "Unlike the rest of the multiverse, he at least responded to my plea for help. Now look: Over breakfast, we're going to set the plot for the Dark Crystalline Eschaton in motion -- don't say anything, Amelia!" he added quickly, as the latter seemed about to launch a speech. "I'm feeling peckish and would like to get to the food before sunset."
"I am not long-winded," Amelia complained. "I merely bring an element of high drama to these otherwise tedious and pedestrian proceedings."
"Noted," Zelgadis said. "But this time, let's just walk to breakfast. Now," he added, and, with a sigh, Amelia turned and descended the rest of the stairs. Following behind her, Zelgadis continued to Quorinelya, "And I think that the rest of the cast will find it easier to play their parts if you acted yours as accurately as possible. That means --"
"I know, I know," Quorinelya interrupted. "Get big. But I've got to get my food first."
"Why?"
Quorinelya grimaced, then said to Amelia, "Don't wait for us," before jumping across to Zelgadis's shoulder. "I'm going to repeat something I've already explained to Gaurry --"
"That's Gourry," Zelgadis interrupted.
"I thought there were legal issues around that," Quorinelya said.
"There are," Zelgadis agreed, "but I've been assured by my accountant that Zel has a better chance of seeing a cure for his skin condition than I do of seeing any profit from this fiscal disaster."
"Oh. Um --?"
"Since this ain't gonna be commercial, I've therefore decided to go the artistic integrity route."
"Prepare, Lina, to become totally and hopelessly lost," Amelia declared.
"Why don't you go suck a grapefruit?" Zelgadis said to the princess.
"You might as well, Amelia," Quorinelya told her. "I'm just going to explain to Zel why I need to be small at mealtimes. I've already explained that in front of the camera, so it doesn't need to stay here with us. It can come with you."
Amelia shrugged. "Oh, goody," she said dryly. "We shall record for the ages my conquest of the fruits of the inn. Yippee." She brushed off her shoulder, and then went ahead into the tavern's common room. Gourry was already there and already eating. Amelia gathered some bread and fruit from the sideboard, poured herself some tea and then went to sit with Gourry.
"Good morrow, Master Gourry," she said to him.
"Mmmph," he replied.
"You didn't feel like waiting for anyone else before digging in?" she asked, beginning to quarter her fruit.
Gourry swigged some tea, then said, "Why should I? I was hungry and it's not like I have to worry now about Lina getting enough to eat. She'll probably eat less than you do in this series."
"Oh, I don't think she's as radically transformed as that --"
"Are you going to finish that apple you're eating?" he interrupted.
Amelia glanced at Gourry's plate. It was almost, but not entirely scraped clean. She glanced at the sideboard; there was still some food there. She looked at her apple; three quarters were as yet untouched, but the question was so unfair! "Yes!" Amelia exclaimed. "Yes, I was planning to finish this apple. If you're still hungry, Master Gourry, there's more food still available over --"
"Lina wouldn't," Gourry said dully. "Not now. She says she isn't good for more than about one brussels sprout at a meal."
"-- oh." The princess looked around. "What's she going to do?" she asked. "I don't think they serve brussels sprouts at breakfast."
Gourry didn't have an answer to this question, so he left it unnoticed. "What do you think it is, Amelia?" he asked back. "Some weird wasting disease that only sorceresses get?"
"Uh, could be, yes," Amelia said. "That is --" Amelia stood up. Lacking any food to distract his attention, Gourry stood up with her. She looked at him. She looked up at him. She looked at his chair.
"Sorry," he said, sinking back in his seat. "Didn't know which code I should be following."
"Right," Amelia said dryly. Then, in her most uplifted voice, she said, "Mayhap our most boon companion has indeed been struck by a most fell and obscure malady. Mayhap her humours are misaligned in a manner most strange --"
"You think something's funny about her?" Gourry asked.
"Of course something's funny about her!" Amelia exploded. "She's only thirteen inches tall! That's so out of character it isn't funny!"
"But you just said --"
"Oh shut up!"
A pink missile, which was tiny Lina Inverse landed on their table. She rolled briefly, then came up on her feet. She regarded Amelia and Gourry a moment, then asked, "Are you two arguing? I thought you were both too chivalrous and idealistic -- not to mention sweet-tempered -- actually to get into a fight. Except maybe if you had me around to instigate it."
"Well, you did...sort of..." Gourry mumbled.
"It was a discussion," Amelia said, staring unhappily down at the tiny sorceress. "An impassioned discussion."
"Oh," the small sorceress said. She regarded Amelia a moment, then asked, "Are you going to finish that apple?"
"Good ol' Lina!" Gourry exclaimed, while Amelia ground her teeth.
"I just want one section," Quorinelya said.
"Oh, go ahead," Amelia told her. "Take both quarters -- I don't mind." She turned and went to the sideboard again. "I shouldn't," she told herself. "It's what the character ought to do -- steal any food I have left on my plate while assessing the edibility of the local crockery. Grrr..." She grabbed a grapefruit that she knew would be sour. Citrus, she felt, was a taste that would match her present mood.

"In vita major habeo," Quorinelya said absently over the section of apple that she'd picked up.
"Huh?" Gourry asked.
"Oh, just concentrating the nutrition in my food," Quorinelya told him, as she began nibbling on her apple quarter. Biting into his own apple, Zelgadis walked up to the table and stood by it chewing apple and glaring at the tiny Lina Inverse.
"That is just so wrong," he muttered.
"So what's on for today?" Gourry asked Zel and Lina.
"We ride forth in the service of truth and justice, of course," Amelia said, returning to the table. She tossed her grapefruit onto her plate and then leapt up onto her chair. Standing on it, she declared, "Where we shall find deception, we shall disperse it with our illumination. Where we shall find oppression, we shall o'erturn it with our equity. Where we shall find aggression, we shall humble it with our luh -- Hey!" The chair broke under her.
Zelgadis gazed at Amelia, lying on the floor and surrounded by kindling. "I had no idea the set for an obligatory tavern could be that cheap," he said.
"Still, it sounds like a plan," Quorinelya said. "Are you OK, Amelia?" she asked.
"Fine," Amelia grumbled, getting to her feet. "Who do I sue?"
"That's a plan??" Zelgadis asked loudly. "Wandering off aimlessly in search of trouble is a plan? Listen, if no-one has anything better to suggest, I've got a plan: I've heard that a priest at the Heights Temple up in the Rakers may be able to help me eradicate my chimerase."
Gourry sighed loudly. "You're always chasing after rumored cures for that," he said.
"Yeah, well, you may have noticed that I haven't met with any success, yet," Zelgadis told him.
"Gee, I don't know," Gourry replied. "Have I noticed that?"
Cursing under his breath, Zelgadis went for tea. Quorinelya paused her devouring of the apple quarter and said to Gourry, "It's a negative, which, yes, you might not have noticed. But if he'd gotten a cure, you very likely would've noticed that --"
"Don't be too sure," Amelia said.
"Sure he would," Quorinelya said. "Something along the lines of 'Hey Zelgadis, there's something different about you... Did you get a haircut?'"
"I guess that's possible," Amelia conceded. "What would Zelgadis look like if he were cured, anyway?"
"Better groomed?" Gourry offered.
Zelgadis interrupted the others' consideration of how a cure might improve him by returning to the table. He was accompanied by a large, muscular man for whom walking was apparently proving a challenge. His face was stubbled and his homespun clothing was disheveled. He smelled of wine and whisky. Amelia shrank away from him.
"This man would like to speak to the renowned Lina Inverse," Zelgadis explained.
"Thash rye," the man agreed. "I would like to speak to the re...renow... -- the famush sorsh...sorsher... -- witch, Lina In... -- yuh know 'oo." He wobbled in front of the table, peering at Gourry and Amelia. "Yuh know 'er?"
"That's me!" Quorinelya called brightly from the surface of the table. She hopped to her feet. "I'm Lina Inverse. Right here. What can I do for you?"
The man looked down at the tiny girl on the table, wobbling closer for a better look. "You're Lina In...In... -- Uh oh --" He vomited. Then he collapsed on the table, his vomit, and Quorinelya.

Momentarily stunned, Amelia screamed and leapt away from the mess. Also momentarily stunned, Zelgadis then sprang to pull the drunk man off the mess he'd created. Stunned the longest, Gourry watched, then asked, "Was he attacking Lina?"
"No," Zelgadis grunted, dragging the man to a comparatively clean portion of the floor. "He's obviously spent the whole night drinking his paycheck and -- "
"He's getting paid for being in this?" Amelia asked.
"-- and a whole lot more," Zelgadis emphasized. "Any money he got from me was very nominal. Mostly it went to insurance."
"I don't think I should be comforted to know that," Gourry said.
"Just see how Lina is," Zelgadis told him.
"Can't," Gourry said, after a scan of the table and vicinity that was anything but thorough. "She's not here."
"She's not?" Amelia asked.
"You're sure?" Zelgadis added.
"I really do not want to make sure," Gourry admitted. He stood and backed away from the mess. "Anyone else want to search for her?"
There was an awkward pause. "Is this part of the plot?" Amelia asked Zelgadis.
"It is now," he replied. "Wasn't in the last version of the script that I saw, if that's what you're asking."
"Well..." Amelia looked disgustedly at the mess on and around the table. "This is Lina Inverse we're talking about. We do need to find out what happened to her --"

"I'm all right," Quorinelya said from the street door of the common room. She was human-sized and cleaned up. Her hair was still wet.
"That was --" Zelgadis began.
"Got a bath in the horse-trough outside," Quorinelya said, walking over to the others. "Very invigorating. I don't recommend it. Re-costumed and, since I've had as much breakfast as I think I can stand eating for a while, I made myself look a little more like what you all want to see. Right?" They nodded. "So was that assault or an accident?"
"You can ask him when he wakes up," Zelgadis told her, indicating the unconscious man.
Quorinelya looked down at the drunk. "That could be a while, couldn't it?" she asked. "Of course, we're not in any hurry."
"I suppose not," Zelgadis allowed. "But there's no sense wasting film stock."

Late in the afternoon, the common room had long since been cleaned up. The passed out stranger was now lying on one of the tables. Amelia was sitting in a distant corner of the room reading a modern translation of the Claire Bible, which she'd found upstairs in her room. Zelgadis had gone off somewhere to shmooze. Gourry and Quorinelya were sparring using their respective magical swords. After yet another exchange of thrusts and parries that proved nothing except that sleeping drunks can ignore the clatter of a couple of pieces of metal, the pair paused.
"Well, you're very good at avoiding getting hit," Gourry told Quorinelya.
"You're holding back, though, aren't you?" she asked him.
"Not as much as I should be," he said. She frowned. "I mean that you're either holding back too much yourself or you're lousy on the attack. Either way, you're not giving me much to worry about defending against, so I'm not getting punished if I attack sloppily."
"So..."
"So you're not a good sparring partner for me," Gourry said.
"Want to stop?"
Gourry sheathed his sword. "I'd like our mysterious drunk man to wake up already so that we find out why he wants to talk to you."
Quorinelya let go of her sword. It vanished. "So let's wake him," she said. "He's snoozed long enough."
Amelia looked up from her book. "He'll be very cranky if we do that," she warned.
"He'll just have to control his temper, then," Quorinelya said. "After all, he's the one who wanted the conversation. I wasn't looking for him." She went over to the table he was lying on and tried to shove him awake. "Could use a little help here," she grunted, since the man's bulk was thwarting her.
"OK..." Gourry came over and rolled the man off the table. He fell onto the floor and stopped snoring. After a stunned moment, he grumbled a curse.
Quorinelya nudged him with her foot. "You wanted to talk to me," she said.
"Later," the man moaned.
"Now," Quorinelya corrected him. "You wanted to talk to Lina Inverse, remember? Not a good idea to go trying to get an interview with someone like her. Even less smart to go throwing up on her when you do finally get to see her. And worst of all is keeping her waiting while you sleep the day away. Do you want to have slimy green skin and have to sit around in duckponds for the rest of your life?"
"Gods, no," the man moaned. "I just ..." Carefully, the man got up on hands and knees. He looked up at Quorinelya. "I threw up on you?" he asked. Quorinelya nodded. "Sorry about that," the man mumbled.
"Yeah," Quorinelya said. "Well, it's pretty much OK with me -- as long as it doesn't happen again. But there's some costs that the taverner here wants to see you about reimbursing him for."
"Buckets!" the man swore. "I suppose you're wondering why I wanted to talk to you."
"Uh huh."
"Well, see, from what I've heard of you hero types, you're good and honest folk who strive to bring justice to the land --"
"Hey Amelia!" Quorinelya yelled (while the man cringed). "Score one for you and your spin doctoring. This guy believes that we're good and honest folk who strive to bring justice to the land."
"That's because we are," Amelia said smugly. She snapped the bible shut and got up to join the others.
"Either that or because he wants us to do something for him and can't come up with a better excuse for us involving ourselves in his troubles," Quorinelya said. "Might I suggest money?" she asked the man.
"Uh, I can't offer much in the way of payment," the man said.
"On account as you've drunk it all?"
"On account as my drinking was all on account anyway. I kind of owe everybody."
"Uh huh," Quorinelya said. "Well, we'll leave resolving that little problem as an exercise for the customer. What problem did you actually want Lina Inverse to help you with?"
"Uh, my dad, Jacob's gone missing. He was driving a wagonload of supplies up to the Heights Temple in the Raker Mountains. So my li'l bro, Larion, he thought the old man'd probably got hisself snowed in. So he went up to fetch him home. Now, he ain't come back either. I hate to guess what might've happened to them. Do you think you can help me?"
There was a silence before Quorinelya said, "You want me to find a couple of missing people for you."
"That's right."
Quorinelya turned to Gourry. "Am I missing something?" she asked him. "Wouldn't I turn this guy into a frog for asking for something like that?"
The man glowered. "You'd turn me into a frog for asking you to do a good deed?" he roared.
"Well, what's up with you?" Quorinelya asked back. "You let your Dad go off with this wagonload by himself when it's pretty obviously a dangerous thing to do. Then when he disappears, you let your little brother go off by himself to look for the old man. Then, with both of them missing, you get yourself stinking drunk while trying to find me or somebody else to go try to hunt down your missing relatives. You're a real piece of work --"
With a roar, the man swung at Quorinelya. He caught her by surprise and his fist slammed into her chest. She flew backward, landing on a table and sprawling there. Immediately, Gourry was on his feet, drawn sword in his hand.
"Oh, you really shouldn't've done that," the blonde swordsman said.
"Gourry," Amelia interrupted.
"What?" Gourry asked.
"Before you thrash this dishonorable cur within an inch of his life --"
"Already there," the big, hungover man moaned, now clutching at his skull.
"-- may I borrow your cloak?" Amelia finished. "Lina needs it."
"Huh? Yeah, sure." Gourry tossed his cloak to Amelia, all the while not taking his glare off the big man. "Now prepare to be thrashed, you dishonorable cur!"
"I suppose this means you guys aren't going to help me?" the man mumbled.

"Oh, hey, Wohin's awake," Zelgadis said, coming into the common room. "Has he explained his problem?"
"Oh sure," Amelia said, quickly covering Quorinelya with Gourry's cloak. "He also punched Lina's lights out."
"Oh?" Zelgadis asked, walking over to the group. "Well, he's been under a lot of stress lately, what with coming home from his last circuit run to find out that his father and brother have both gone missing up in the mountains and his frantic, half-crazed mom absolutely refuses to let him go hunting for them but on the other hand is desperate for him to make something happen that will get them back. So when are we leaving?"
"Oh," Gourry said. He sheathed his sword.
"So you've only just gotten home?" Amelia asked Wohin.
"Couple of days," Wohin mumbled. "Guess I forgot to mention that."

Quorinelya sat huddled in a chair, Gourry's cloak wrapped around herself. She stared at her bare feet while Zelgadis continued to explain:
"... So Wohin the Journeyman Mason suspects that his kin have been taken captive or killed by bad guys up in the mountains while en route to the temple and the only reason he holds any hope of their being alive is because a few of the bad guys around here sometimes like to take prisoners and demand ransoms for their release. Of course, he hasn't gotten any ransom demands or weird messages of any kind, but he doesn't want to wait until the bad guys get around to demanding money before he acts."
"Uh huh," Quorinelya sighed. "OK, so I did miss something. But why doesn't he go harass the town watch or someone like that. Surely, the local bad guys are the problem of some local good guys."
"I did go to them," Wohin said dully. "But they said they've got more important things to do than try to find a lost old coot and his good-for- nothing son --"
"Your words?" Quorinelya asked.
"Theirs. Dad's a great guy -- salt of the earth. And Larion, he's just still figuring out what he wants to do with his life."
"So the local good guys don't think your family's worth helping," Quorinelya sighed.
"Same with our customers," Wohin said.
"Who?"
"The delivery was to the Air Shamans at the Heights Temple up in the Raker Mountains," Zelgadis said.
"I got that," Quorinelya said.
"Well, it was from the Air Shamans at a sister temple here in town," Zelgadis said. "Jacob had a long term contract to make these deliveries for the Air Shamans --"
"They couldn't just fly the stuff up?" Quorinelya asked.
Zelgadis glared at her. "No," he said, after a silence.
"Just asking," Quorinelya said. "I'm sure that you can crank some numbers sometime and show me how totally uneconomic trying to do that would be."
"It'd put Dad out of business, it would," Wohin complained.
"Your Dad is out of business," Quorinelya reminded the big man. "At least, he is right now. And he might've been better off not having that long term contract with the Air Shamans."
"That'd seem," Wohin admitted. "The damned shamans didn't want to know anything except when was their damned shipment going to get to the other temple. They said I should let the city watch hunt for my missing Dad. No help from them at all. I mean, twenty years he'd been their contracted wagoner and they won't even send somebody to see what happened."
"And you can't go --" Quorinelya began.
"Me Mom'd throw a fit," Wohin interrupted. "An absolute fit."
"Like she doesn't already," Zelgadis said dryly.
"Those are just her warm-up exercises."
"Clever line," Zelgadis applauded. "So when do we leave?" he asked the others.
Quorinelya looked up at him. "That's it, then? We're going to save the world by finding these two losers?"
"Who're you calling losers?" Wohin bridled.
Quorinelya sighed. "I was calling your family losers, but you're right and I'm wrong. They're not losers. The losers here is me, for letting myself get cast in this mess --"
"That might be, Lina," Zelgadis said. "You might indeed be a complete loser - -"
"You would never say that if the real Lina were here," Gourry warned him.
"If the real Lina were here, she'd be wearing clothes," Amelia said frostily.
"And regardless," Zelgadis said, giving Amelia a puzzled look, "we should all remember that a massive avalanche may be launched by a single, small snowball."
"You think that my Dad got caught in an avalanche?" Wohin asked him.
"And isn't that supposed to be my line?" Amelia asked.
Zelgadis shrugged. "So when do we leave? If we're going up into the mountains, we'll need cold-weather camping gear."
"That means clothing's recommended," Amelia told Quorinelya.
"Yeah, yeah. I get it," Quorinelya grumbled.
"That's nice," Zelgadis said. "Care to explain it to the rest of us?"
"No," Quorinelya said.
"Sure," Amelia said. "This immoral hussy was using an illusion to cover her nakedness."
"Yeah?" Gourry asked. "She sure didn't look naked."
"That's how illusions work," Amelia told him. "Until she got knocked unconscious and the illusion was ended --"
"It wasn't an illusion," Quorinelya said. "I was wearing conjured clothing."
"Which still vanished when you were knocked out."
"Well, yeah."
"That's a pretty risky thing for an adventurer to rely on for clothing," Zelgadis said. "Why'd you --?"
"Two words!" Quorinelya shouted at him. "Costume! Budget!"
"Oh." Zelgadis crumpled. "Yeah. Right. OK: End of discussion."
"What do you mean, end of discussion?" Amelia jumped to her feet and looked around for something impressive to stand on. From prior experience, though, she decided that nothing was suitable. She stayed on the common room floor. "Are you going to let Lina parade through this production wearing nothing?"
"I won't be wearing nothing --"
"She'll be wearing an illusion."
"I'll be wearing conjured clothing," Quorinelya corrected the blonde swordsman. "And I'll take more care to keep my distance from hot-tempered clients."
"I said I was sorry," Wohin said.
"And I still say that that makes strike two," Quorinelya replied.
"And I say that this conjured clothing scam is unacceptable," Amelia said. "It's immoral. What's this stuff about Lina's costume budget?"
"I don't have one," Quorinelya said. "Nick told Fathead that I didn't need one --"
"That's Fafred," Zelgadis growled.
"-- and Fathead believed him," Quorinelya continued, glaring at Zelgadis. "So, the costume budget for Lina was set to zero. I get to come up with whatever I'm wearing on my own. And, since I need to change size kind of a lot --"
"How come?" Amelia asked.
"Because Lina's supposed to be big but I can only do the sorceress shtick --" She glanced at Gourry. "I can only cast spells when I'm small," she clarified.
"So how're you going to play out Lina's fight scenes?" Amelia asked.
"Badly," Quorinelya replied. "If the results so far are any indication."
"No, but what size --"
"Excuse me," Wohin interrupted. "Uh, I think my work here's done? You've gotten the mission briefing, right? And any details we missed, Zelgadis can fill in, right? So I can go, right? Before something goes wrong and I go to strike three?"
"Yeah, OK," Quorinelya said tiredly. "Go away."
While Wohin scuttled, Gourry looked at Quorinelya and said, "Gee, I think it's getting on toward suppertime. Don't you think so, Lina?"
"I suppose so," Quorinelya agreed. "Which means that a whole lot of extras will be turning up here Real Soon and then you'll be chowing down your usual obscene quantity of food." She began shuffling toward the stairs. "Later, gang."
"You don't want --" Gourry began, with waning hope.
"Not hungry," Quorinelya said. "We'll be leaving for the mountains in the morning, I suppose? Hopefully, I'll be ready then. And, hopefully, the rest of you can take care of getting whatever supplies we need? Thanks."
The other three looked at each other.
"I suppose that is the star's perogative," Amelia said grumpily.
"And I guess I didn't really need my cloak until tomorrow," Gourry said.
A farmhand came up to the group. "Now?" he asked.
"Come back tomorrow," Zelgadis sighed. "Bright and early," he advised.

Story copyright 2002 Alan Lauderdale; parodied characters copyright H. Kanzaka / R. Araizumi.