Two months ago.

Cold. Freezing cold. Bubbles, and cold, muffled screaming under the water.

It was so cold. This wasn't air. Freezing cold, but not the Desolace wind. How are there bubbles? And so much cold?

Water. The cold bubbles are from water.

The two grunts laughed down at the short-tusked jungle troll, his scarlet mane now soaked from the bucket of ice cold water they had just dumped on his head. It was still dark out, and within the time zone of Desolace the sun wouldn't be rising for another hour and a half or so. Khujand coughed as cold water and phlegm dripped from his nose, rolling over and assuming the position despite this method of waking him up being totally new. The dirt at the bottom of his metal cage had turned to mud, and he shivered slightly as the wind chill made the water dripping down the back of his neck feel even chillier.

"Not a word, mongrel," the grunt with the cage keys growled at him. "Do NOT wake the others yet." The cage door swung open as Khujand tried to calm his heart rate and figure out what was going on.

"Out!" The grunt puncuated his command with a swift kick to Khujand's lower back and he quickly rose and exited the cage backward as was the norm. He glanced around; all the other inmates were sleeping and there were still stars in the sky. As the bucket was placed in his cage which itself was then shut and locked, the defeated troll stared at the ground between his feet. There was no urge to ask questions at all. His will to question and understand what was happening to him had been broken ages ago by enough whippings, starvings and days chained to the septic tank inside a latrine.

Like a dog under the shadow of a rolled up newspaper, he trotted forward as each grunt held him by an arm; they hadn't even bothered to handcuff him, though he didn't notice. Whatever. Perhaps he would be unceremoniously thrown off the cliffs now, or was merely being called for some emergency cleanup in the town smithy. Whatever. It didn't matter either way.

Khujand only looked up when the glow of a mage portal shone before him in the latrine area, the latest officer who had been rotated in to Shadowprey standing beside it. It wasn't until he could feel the vibration of the portal's arcane hum on his skin that he realized he was being dragged right into it.

Reeling to the ground and catching himself with his palms, Khujand was only barely able to recognize the dark crimson hue of the woven carpet underneath him before he felt the furry hand of a tauren helping him to pull himself up. The tauren's other hand was gripping a mahogany stick wrapped in leather and enchanted with an electric charge. Wearing nothing but tattered prisoner's shorts, he stood barefoot before Lorthiras. The Forsaken lawyer's hands were folded over top of each other in front of his body as he stood next to his large, rectangular desk. The hustle and bustle of the Orgrimmar streets could be heard outside as the tauren bailiff attempted to lead the hefty troll to the dull gold chair in front of the desk. Their body weights were nearly even now, and the baliff quickly turned his head back toward the prisoner in shock when he realized that he wouldn't be able to just pull Khujand around like last time.

The crackle of the enchanted stick uploaded a flashback of the office to his brain, memories of his last meeting there running through his head. Despite all those years of desensitization and forced submission, his survival instinct rushed back to him like a crashing wave and the sound of the electric crackle compelled him to choose to sit down - to choose to - in order to avoid bodily harm.

"Good to see that you still have your wits about you," Lorthiras addressed him without stirring from his position. "You've changed considerably."

Khujand hunched over in the seat, staring at the floor. With the bailiff wielding a weapon right behind the chair, the prisoner repeated the pattern of behavior that had been beaten into him over so many years. Observing his surroundings was not a right he felt he had.

"I'll need your full attention, Khujand. We don't have much time, and my colleague will need your presence in the Blasted Lands within half an hour."

If there was anything that could snap the broken man out of his stupor, it was the logically incomprehensible sentence that just bored its way into his ear. Sitting up fully straight, the full color of his surroundings invaded his eyes as he searched for the man who had staved off his death long enough for Khujand to live in hell for almost a fifth of his entire life span up to that point in time. The Forsaken and the Darkspear looked at each other for a long time, Lorthiras wanting to grant Khujand all the time he needed to let that sink in. The tauren bailiff reattached his weapon to his belt and relaxed a little.

"Could ya please...ah...qualify ya statement, sir?" the demure prisoner asked. "If that's okay with ya." He suddenly realized that he had been making eye contact with a non-prisoner who was automatically higher than him in society, and quickly cast his eyes down again.

"Alright, I'll try to make this quick," Lorthiras said as he began pacing in his theatrical fashion, his hands behind his back. "Connections and favors, if you remember our last meeting five years, eleven months and thirteen days ago. I managed to keep you alive in the process of granting a favor to a colleague defending a prison transport official who needed the death of two inmates in a wagon fire covered up. You took the fall for the wagon fire, served the sentence of a highway robber and another man was sent to be executed in your place."

Something inside of Khujand began to wake up. He remembered all of these details. This was something which he experienced. He. He was a person with a life. The concept was alien yet familiar.

As Lorthiras continued to speak, the slightly less meek troll liften his head and was almost nervous at all the colors around him. This wasn't the mountainous grey tomb he slept in at Desolace. The deep crimson color of the cushion he sat against matched the paint on the walls. His former lawyer's personal library still lined every wall, the bindings of the books forming disorganized rainbows that surrounded them on three sides. The undead was wearing a brand new jet black suit with white stripes. The grey flecks in the bailiff's fur had increased since the last time. Everything was so vibrant, so colorful. It should have been overwhelming, it should have induced another nervous breakdown like he had experienced in that same chair, it should have caused him to retreat in his shell. Yet none of that happened. He was so different now, yet he felt as though the day his tusks had been clipped, when Lorthiras had first informed him of his lot in life, was only yesterday.

"Well, the man who was supposed to be Garot'jin escaped and only three men were executed that day instead of four. It was technically the fault of the prison officials transporting him, though the prosecutor of the case was held at fault publicly." Lorthiras stopped pacing for a moment and turned to face his former client now, hands still folded behind his back. "That prosecutor is in debt to the authorities, who are calling him in for a favor and now he is calling me in for a favor. The latest campaign is ready to march in the Blasted Lands. I was contacted via a portal messenger, which they only do when time is of the essence. They need someone, an elite fighter to fill out a unit. Now. This afternoon. My portal specialties allowed me to contact the prison officer there in Shadowprey when it was still early morning in that time zone, though it was a risk spending time with such an attempt."

Lorthiras reached forward and, for the first time since they had met years ago, made physical contact by placing his hands on Khujand's shoulders. "Every minute counts. I'm going to need you to snap out of it for what I am about to say."

Too much information. Too much, too fast. Khujand was supposed to be in prison with many months still left in his sentence. This couldn't be happening. This didn't make sense. He began to bend over as the information overload gave him a headache. Lorthiras pulled back and folded his hands behind his back again.

"You were trained by Shadow Hunters and now I need you to take another portal to the Blasted Lands so the prosecutor who failed to provide a fourth scapegoat for the torture scandal years ago can fulfill a debt to a Horde military tribunal who are in a bind because they need one more hero unit to fill the second row of the left flank of the initial push through the Dark Portal into the Tanaan Jungle on an alternate timeline version of Draenor so you can help the real Horde fight against the Iron Horde."

"Bleeeecchch!"

"How vulgar."

"Whoa, nasty!"

The exclamations of Lorthiras and the bailiff as well as the sound of Khujand expelling any bile and water left in his stomach all occurred simultaneously. He had managed to slide his feet off to the sides just in time, though the expensive looking carpet was now soaked. Hands trembling against his knees, he dry heaved one more time with his head almost down between his legs before rising back up again and slumping in the chair. Surprisingly, he felt a lot better.

Lorthiras beckoned with two fingers and his spectral secretary phased into the room with a spectral mop that somehow cleaned up Khujand's non-spectral vomit from the carpet; the jungle troll didn't even bother adjusting his sitting position to make the cleanup easier. "I suppose the portal sickness finally caught up with you," the undead said in a voice that could almost be described as wry. It was more a combination of that and the fact that what Khujand had just heard the most insane and ridiculous news he could have imagined.

"You'll have to get over that porto-phobia quickly. The main reason why the prosecutor contacted me was time. The march is starting in just a few hours and they will need someone at the Shattered Landing in only half an hour to shower, get equipped and get squared away with the logistics officer." Lorthiras, ever the armchair psychologist, tried to force his horrendous, undead face to look sincere. "You're in for a lot of porting this morning, but it's for a noble cause."

"Ow...what...Horde and Iron Horde?" The man who was not quite a prisoner and not quite free raised his head despite his dizziness only to feel a bit worse once he saw his former attorney wheeling that blasted chalkboard over from the corner. Within seconds, it was filled with the familiar style of arrows, circles and names. The entire explanation of what had transpired on Azeroth during his imprisonment must have taken at least ten minutes, during which Khujand and the baliff both remained silent. Lorthiras was amoral, but he was also brilliant and knew how to get a point across.


Sighing despite not needing to breathe, the lawyer gripped the now filled chalkboard with his left hand while half-turning toward his former client and pointing at him with the chalk. "Let's review, shall we?"

Khujand sighed himself, feeling mentally exhausted though knowing that the recap would be necessary. This was too much information right after he had been brought out of his physical and mental prison and into Lorthiras' office only fifteen minutes ago.

"Thrall stepped down as Warchief and relinquished the title to Garrosh Hellscream in order to focus his efforts on saving Azeroth from the return of the insane dragon Deathwing the Destroyer whose original name was Neltharion and the dragon's return caused a worldwide series of natural disasters known as the Cataclysm. Garrosh continued to harass the Alliance as well as neutral entities without provocation, eventually unearthing a doomsday device on a previously unknown continent inhabited by a race of sentient, non-furbolg bear people and caused a civil war within the Horde. Both the Alliance as well as members of the Horde opposed to Garrosh's tyranny led a joint rebellion which lead to his overthrow and the installation of Vol'jin as the third Warchief of the Horde. During Garrosh's war crimes trial, a renegade bronze dragon aspect helped him to escape to an alternate timeline approximately thirty-five years ago on Draenor where he then betrayed said bronze dragon aspect and prevented his father from drinking the Blood of Mannoroth which corrupted the orcs and led to the First and Second Wars. They formed a new Iron Horde which is using modern-day technology to launch a new invasion of modern-day Azeroth from the alternate timeline Draenor from thirty-five years ago but not thirty-five years ago in our timeline and there is now a joint Alliance-Horde effort to preemtively invade the alternate timeline version of Draenor from thirty-five years ago in order to stop the Iron Horde before it's too late. You're going to fill in an empty spot for an elite unit that needs to be filled within an hour and fifteen minutes all the way on another continent because the logistics officer functioning under a military tribunal holds the debt of the prosecutor who provided only three war criminals six years ago instead of four and that prosecutor is a colleague of mine who already owes me one favor for covering for the failed prison transportation officer in the first place and now owes me a second which is how the legal world turns. So now you're going to be ported to the Blasted Lands and outfitted for war on the same morning you were in a secret prison in Desolace but not really because it's a secret and then ported again to a different planet on an alternate timeline upon which you aren't really expected to survive."

Moving back from the chalkboard, Lorthiras stood at attention with his hands at his sides and white dust still settling from all the furious chalkboarding. It took everything the slack-jawed, short-tusked jungle troll had in him to fight off a brain aneurism.

"The end."

Khujand didn't know whether to be more impressed by Lorthiras' chalkboard drawing skills or the fact that he had said all of that in under thirty seconds. The jungle troll facepalmed, trying to take it all in.

"We're running out of time, Sir Lorthiras," the bailiff said in a lecturing tone.

The Forsaken nodded and then turned back to the dumbstruck mess sitting in the chair, placing a hand on the head of the chair and leaning a bit closer. "I negotiated an early release for you as part of the deal," Lorthiras told his former client in his best attempt to use a soothing voice. "You'll help secure the Tanaan Jungle at first, to let second and third waves of the inter-factional force come through. If you do happen to survive Tanaan, you'll be on parole while on Draenor, but once that's finished, you're free to go wherever you want and do whatever you want. You'll be free, along with a semi-clean slate to start over with. And you'll be defending the world we live on. It's better this way." It reminded Khujand of the way Lorthiras had spoken to his orcish assistant all those years ago when handing some letter to him.

"Ya mean..." his voice trailed off a bit as he tried to comprehend all the information flying his way. "Ya mean...they want me there? At the march?"

"Well, no, not you specifically," Lorthiras corrected. "They asked me for somebody. I offered to take you off the Shadowprey site's hands. The logistics officer has been informed that you're coming, but they didn't ask for anyone in particular."

Then why am I even here, Khujand thought to himself. Lorthiras seemed to notice the puzzled look on the jungle troll's face.

"I could have grabbed anybody, you know," the Forsaken said as he folded his arms and leaned against his desk in the most casual manner Khujand had ever seen him in. "The only thing they asked for was someone big and intimidating who could inspire all the units of new recruits that will be positioned around the Shadow Hunters. It would have been possible, in the mere hours I have to provide this favor, to pull any scary thug from the normal prison here in Orgrimmar.

"But I didn't do that, Khujand. I didn't do that because I never forget my clients. And if by some chance the person filling in this spot does survive Tanaan, I know that you're one person who wouldn't squander the opportunity at a second chance for a clean, straight edge life. Even trying to contact the prison in Shadowprey via portal was sapping precious minutes from those hours. I did that because I believe you can do this, that you are willing to do this, and will reciprocate by doing your part for this planet we live on."

Despite all the emotions he hadn't known for a long time bubbling up inside him, despite the excessive load of information dumped on his head, despite the crushing pressure of now having to make decisions and choices on his own, there was something that clicked inside of the burnt-out jungle troll.

Go.

Khujand looked up at Lorthiras. "None of this makes any sense, but...I'm ready," he rasped, his throat still raw from throwing up just a few moments ago.

"Splendid," Lorthiras beamed as he clapped his hands a single time. "And we're a bit early as well. At the Shattered Landing, you'll be able to shower and have access to a special armory for the unit - two Shadow Hunters and a Berserker died during the Iron Horde's initial assault in the Blasted Lands and you'll be allowed to scavenge what you need from their gear. A subordinate to the logistics officer is impatiently waiting in the makeshift armory hut at the Shattered Landing. Once you're suited up, you'll be led to your unit and marched up for the assault on the Dark Portal."

His head was still spinning from all the information, but Khujand somehow willed himself to stand, a sense of real purpose returning to him after so much time spent pulling trees. The sensation of the bile passing through his throat had been enough to convince him that this was all real, that the past fifteen minutes weren't a dream. It was all so bizarre, just as bizarre as the initial identity swap Lorthiras had organized for him six years prior. He had given up while in prison. Full stop. There was zero hope for any end other than being released on time and dumped in the wasteland with no food, money or shelter. He wasn't overwhelmed anymore, but he was so shocked that he was aware that he must be numb as a reaction; it would sink in later, and when it would, it would feel like being caught in an elekk stampede.

But there was no time for that now. Every action he took was merely a reaction to what was happening around him. There was no time to think.

"Thank ya, Lorthiras," he said in a normal yet tired speaking voice, finally able to make eye contact. "You've given me a life. It ain't the life I once had...but maybe I don' want that one back anyway."

Lorthiras nodded and without a word, squatted down a bit and stretched out his arms. A dark green-black portal swirled into existence to the right of his desk, the red, cracked soil of the Blasted Lands barely visible. Khujand stared, still having difficulty comprehending the fact that this wasn't a cruel practical joke. Papers swirled around the room and off the desk as a strange force - not the wind - orbited the unstable gateway.

"Just for your information when this is all over," shouted Lorthiras over the sizzling energy of the portal, "I've established contact with the real highway robber who escaped execution after the identity swap. He's been living his life as Garot'jin the Outcast Terror for the past few years and sent some threatening letters about hunting you down and 'thanking' you for trying to have him executed in your place. Nothing you can't handle though, right?"

Khujand's eyes were about to pop out of his head. "What?! Wait, how did you contact-"

With a running start, the bailiff rushed forward on his hooves and shoved Khujand through the portal entirely, making sure that the hulking former prisoner would move this time.


Khujand realized that he must have blacked out for a second as he pushed up off the cracked soil with both hands; his chin, chest and palms were sore as though he had fallen. It was only the third time in his life he had used a portal and he didn't like it.

"On your feet, uh, let's see...Khujnad!"

From his hands and knees, he could see an orcish officer with a clipboard holding a messy stack of papers and leather bindings. Her armor was light though the axe at her waist was...

...wait, her? Khujand quickly jumped to his feet, not even bothering to dust himself off. He didn't even notice that they were inside some rickety makeshift storage house with aluminum sheets for walls. And a roof. This was the first time he had been within conversation distance of a woman...God, in how many years?

She was clearly an officer...was she ma'am? Or still sir? Oh no, where should he look? Would eye contact be considered flirting? Would no eye contact be considered insubordination? He would have been more prepared for fighting the fake alternate Horde with a pointy stick than this!

"Alright, I have your ID here," she said with disinterest as she shuffled the papers on her clipboard. "I trust your legal counsel briefed you on the conditions of your addition to an elite hero unit for the purposes of the initial landing at Tanaan."

Oh, she's talking to him? There wasn't anybody else here. Oh God, there wasn't anybody else here! Was that even appropriate? "Uh...washyu want me do?" His old accent from childhood came back as he sought for what to say. She's your superior he tried telling himself, treat her like a man with a smaller shoe size.

The officer rolled her eyes non-sarcastically. "Ugh, ok. They put you in the elite hero unit with the other Shadow Hunters. Several heroes who fell with the initial Iron Horde assault were also Darkspear, hopefully their gear will be large enough to...uh...accomodate you. Take what you need, suit up, and get your ass out there. Once the landing from the Dark Portal is secure, you will be considered a hero unit due to your skills, on the level of Death Knights or Archdruids. You'll be free to roam Draenor for the duration of the campaign and trusted to use your own judgment to help the war effort as needed. Once your parole is over, go do what you want."

Listening to her speak helped bring him back to reality. He was a war veteran. He fought in the Third War when he was only seventeen yeard old, barely considered an adult by the standards of the Horde. He could do this.

Plus she had a much nicer sounding voice than a man would have. It was both informative and somehow nice to listen to.

"And, listen, sir..." She looked away for a moment and clutched the clipboard to her chest both both arms, appearing a bit shy to say what was on her mind. "You can grab a spare change of clothing in the gear scavenging area to your right here. Grab some clothes and go take a bath. You smell awful."

Well, that certainly deflated him quickly. Everybody in prison smelled. He had so much civilized behavior to re-learn. The officer walked out and closed the asymmetrical door behind her, leaving him alone to clean himself up.

Considering how depressed he had been up until this morning, the giddiness Khujand experienced when selecting gear and even clothing from the armory was like a whole other world. Looking over a long wooden table wedged against the wall full of various articles of clothing, he had scoped out a clean, almost knee-length loincloth that was thick enough to provide some warmth and was attached to a firm leather belt. Immediately screaming out to the more paranoid side of his brain, he found an unused steel protective cup which could strap on underneath; while most of the brave warriors were probably worried about protecting their heads and necks, Khujand had been kicked in the balls twice in prison fights and was worried about getting kicked a third time. He took both articles of clothing and placed them on a much shorter table next to the back door leading to the shower; there was no one else around, but his paranoia compelled him to hoard things that he wanted in hard-to-notice areas.

The shower in the back of the makeshift armory/shower gazebo was more like a five-foot high partition with a small roof over it and a bucket full of water that wasn't quite warm enough. There wasn't even a fence behind the gazebo and armory shed, and his bathing activities allowed him to take in the view of the vast, red, barren expanse that was the Blasted Lands.

Before he could actually take a full shower, there were other hygenic necessities which he needed to attend to, things that had been denied to him for literally years. He started by trimming and shaping his chinstrap beard with a straight razor from the armory and shaved the sides of his scalp to regain the mohawk typical of the older generation of trolls - he couldn't understand the whole spiky hair thing many of the Darkspear his age were doing now. He had found a super thin piece of metal wire intended for rogues to garrote people with in the armory, using it to floss his teeth for the first time in years. His cleansing spell had allowed him to detect that there were no cavities, but the opportunity to clean his teeth was still too much to pass up on; what was a daily chore to normal people now felt like a coveted luxury. Not even the bleeding of his gums could detract from the satisfaction of having clean teeth. One squirt of liquid soap into his mouth (there was no toothpaste available) followed by some gargling, and there was finally some semblance of mouth hygeine.

It was only once Khujand began lathering himself that he realized how much he had needed to bathe. Bathing himself with only a small, bright pink bar of soap and a wire mesh brillo pad while standing inside a partition composed of weathered plywood made him feel like royalty. The only parts he didn't furiously scrub with the soap and brillo pad were his eyeballs (he did scrub his eyelids). Extra care was taken to scrub hard behind the ears, inside the ears, the bottom of the feet, under the nails and inside every nook and cranny of his body. Prison had robbed him of many things but by God, his love of cleanliness was as in tact as ever.

"He he he heeeeeh," he snicked to himself with a slightly manic, satyr-like voice as he vigorously scrubbed. Having a real shower after years of hard labor brought him a joy that people on the outside would never understand.

By the time the shower had finished, the entire bar of soap had dissolved. Lifting the bucket over his head, he rinsed the soaps suds off and noticed that the runoff water had a slightly brown tinge to it from all the soot and grime. There was an inch of water left in the large bucket and he rinsed himself one last time before using a wool sweater he had found on the clothing table as a towel to dry off before donning his loincloth.

Back inside the armory, he was like a kid at the candy store. Jungle terrain would be rough and he forewent the habit of walking barefoot for a pair of two-toed leather shoes, along with a matching set of leather grips for his hands and cloth wraps for his knees and elbows. While mail was supposed to be the heaviest thing to wear - a Shadow Hunter was analogous to the orc and tauren shaman - he still felt that a lack of armor around his joints would grant the most flexibility and he could compensate by protecting other areas well. He covered the entirety of his shins and forearms with long arcanite shinguards and bracers, but used the wooden red-and-yellow planks of the Darkspear on his shoulders for the sake of nostalgia. He was still shirtless and his thick thighs, torso, neck and upper arms were uncovered. Avoidance and mobility would have to be his main tactics, just as he preferred.

From the weapons rack, he grabbed a double-bladed fel glaive like the one he used in the Third War and, much to his delight, a kodo femur that could be wielded like a giant, two-handed club. He secured everything to his back along with a long travel pack using a combination of leather straps and steel chains wrapped diagonally across his body. Before leaving the rack, he spied a serrated combat knife that reminded him of a shiv he once got caught making behind a bush in the dinner area at Shadowprey and strapped its holster to his belt just in case. Having not had the luxury of a mirror for so long, he spent time tying some raptor feathers with leather straps around his biceps and thighs and combing his hair for the first time in years.

Khujand finally felt like a real, living being again. He spent an inordinate amount of time looking at the massive change in his appearance - especially after bathing - until the war horn sounded.

"Khujnad, get your ass out here!" the officer shouted as she banged on the asymmetrical door.


There were no words to describe the Dark Portal. The sheer size was unlike anything else on Azeroth - no citadel, no castle, no fortress, nothing even from the era of the great troll empires or pre-Sundering elven architecture could compare. The height alone was unbelievable - how long could it have taken to construct such a thing? The dark green and black energy swirling in the portal had slowed down at that point - another push from the Iron Horde had been staved off for the moment.

Khujand had arrived late, not knowing anyone other than the orcish officer who gave him his ID card back and not quite knowing where to go. By the time he had reached the Portal, the initial fighting at its steps had ceased. All around him were hundreds, perhaps more than a thousand champions representing all the races of Azeroth. All along the beaten paths leading to the entrance, on the tops of the hills and on the sides, pushing, marching, leaning against each other. If he hadn't been overwhelmed in Lorthiras' office upon hearing about this march verbally, he was certainly overwhelmed now. Not since the Third War when he served at the rear at the Battle of Mount Hyjal had he seen so many people in one place, and all for the same reason. The Horde and its champions were amassed on the left side of the Dark Portal, a swirling mass of pikes, bows, guns and mounted cavalry; the Alliance, people whom he killed on the battlefield without remose just a few years ago, were all on the right side. They would never be his comrades, but there was no animosity on that day. There was something more important happening now.

Drums. Cheers. Chanting. All around him. The body heat and grunting of a thousand people was blocking out almost anything else Khujand's senses could pick up and he had to fight to focus on anything. The officer had sent him off to a group of other tall Darkspear jungle troll fighters, off on the left flank. Upon seeing them, there was an internal struggle to stave off the sense of guilt rushing back in. They were gaunt and lean but stern, many of them greying and scarred and intimidating with the amount of experience they must have had. They all stood on a small hilltop perhaps a few hundred yards from the steps of the Portal, all six of them in a line. They were surrounded by lower ranking recruits, their presence - like that of the other hero units - intended to inspire those around them.

But Khujand was no hero. He knew that. As he finally managed to tune out the defeaning roar of a thousand voices drifing from the shoulder-to-shoulder crowds of armed people around him, he could not help but compare himself to the six men he had been grouped with. They were not as powerful as him physically - though one was taller, a rarity - they were obviously far more skilled with voodoo magic and their blades, and were men of honor and glory for the Horde.

As some of them glanced at his short, sawed-off tusks from the corners of their eyes, he felt their judgment being passed on him. He didn't belong here. He was a war criminal, a torturer of the defenseless, and he didn't deserve the second chance he had been given. These men were mostly in their fifties, intelligent, wise, keepers of the lore of the Darkspear tribe. Khujand was a 27-year-old phony who had only trained with Shadow Hunters for a few years and had spent the past six years with his skills rusting while he hauled lumber.

This was not the time for melancholy, but the day had been an emotional roller coaster. So many feelings that had been pushed down and forgotten over the years.

There's no time for this now.

The voice felt so natural, so strongly a part of him, that he wasn't even shocked at its return. His thinking was cut off by chanting. All around him, hundreds and hundreds of voices, a thousand voices, all chanting in various languages as there was movement at the front of the line. An orc and a human, both wielding massive hammers, rushed into the Dark Portal with a group of adventurers a few hundred yards away.

It's started. Beat yourself up later. You're needed now.

Who could need him? He didn't even deserve to be alive. Nokar, Bralag and Lorkus had all been executed. If they deserved to die, why didn't he deserve to die?

Irrelevant.

Khujand dug deep, trying to find something there. He didn't know what, but he was searching for something, anything.

This isn't about you. It's about them. The people you hurt, the people you didn't hurt, the people you've never met, the people just trying to live their lives. You were given this second chance whether you like it or not. The world is in danger. You can sit here questioning yourself, or you can find a good death, fighting a good fight.

Drums. Cheers. Chanting. All around him. He felt the tauren riding their kodos and banging on their war drums, felt the pulse down in his feet, thumping up into his chest. The war cries and chants in a dozen languages echoed in his ears and flowed down in his veins in a physical sensation he would never be able to describe. Hundreds and hundreds of armed warriors dotting the hilltops and the beaten path up the steps, all marching together now, following the first wave of adventurers in. Their march was like a piece of art, like waves crashing upon the jagged rocks of a shoreline.

"Dis be it," the Shadow Hunter next to him shouted in a thick accent. "Dis da time! Forward! Make way for others ta follow our path!"

The pace had picked up now as their march picked up speed. Hundreds of soliders marched forward shoulder-to-shoulder, their weapons and spells readied. The Dark Portal was only a hundred yards away. Hundreds of people were still around him now, shouting, chanting, an array of different banners and skin colors and textures surging forward, all the different races and peoples of the world marching as one, all of them there for one reason.

It's time. The world needs every cog in the machine to do its part. Focus.

Khujand still knew that he was no hero, still felt like he didn't deserve this chance...but he had it, deserved or not. This was fate. Azeroth needed people now, needed him, needed to end this threat. The people were all around him, hundreds of them all on the front lines, all there to fall so others could stand. The chanting never quieted down, not even after a few hundred more troops had entered the Dark Portal ahead of him. They were running now, all of them, one wave of people and sound rushing forward.

He felt it. Somehow through his depression, through his guilt, through what was probably mild mental illness, he felt it in every inch of his body. He was evil, he was despicable, he was depraved, but he wasn't worthless. He would march into Tanaan now and die, laying his corpse down so the real heroes could march over it and march a bit more safely. He wasn't afraid of what the afterlife held for him anymore; he had this life in front of him, and the lives of the people on this planet behind him. He had to do his part and what would come after was out of his hands.

Drums. Cheers. Chanting. All around him. The defenders of Azeroth barrelled up the steps to the entrance of this alternate version of Draenor, heading into the Tanaan Jungle so others could follow them. The units in front of his were disappearing into the dark green and black swirls, and as he approached with bodies all around him, he could vaguely make out the image of the battle raging on the other side.

Khujand pulled out his bone club and charged forward for the last dozen yards, charged with a speed he had never possessed in his entire life. Seeking the death he deserved, the dark green and black light enveloped him as he entered the Dark Portal.