Woah, even bigger chapter this time! And I seriously think, next chapter this will be finished.

Wow.

That's crazy.

Anyway, please review and I hope you enjoy!

Cheers!

~Ice.

Chapter 21

'Volcanoth is the turtle god in the cave that these primitives worship,' Grapplehammer said bluntly, pointing to a huge, rounded cave entrance, about a hundred metres behind him. 'It's not really a god.' He rolled his eyes. 'But it is tough enough that I'm going to have to devise a new weapon for you from the only functioning boot we have left. I think that the age-old motto of "fight fire with fire" applies here. Plus, I like fire!'

Marcei rolled her eyes back at him. 'Gee, I wonder how I knew that?'

'Let's get some fire glands from Volcanoth's children,' he continued, as though he had not heard her. 'That should give me some time to modify the rocket boot into something more fitting.'

Marcei paused. 'Wait. You want me to rip these things out of their bloody throats?'

'How else are you going to get them?'

Feeling slightly revolted, Marcei whirled around to face the rest of the scorched and blackened caldera, which was strewn with giant turtles. They were orange, with blue shells, covered in spikes. As she watched them, one or two let out a stream of fire. Great. Fire breathing turtles. Shotgun time.

In the end, Marcei guessed that those turtles had a pretty soft hide. Bullets had no trouble penetrating it, and she had killed a handful pretty easily. Now she had to do the real work.

Walking over to the nearest turtle, she wrenched open its jaw and knelt down, looking down its throat. Right at the back, she could just see a red gland, most likely the fire one. Heaving a sigh, Marcei pulled out her knife and cut it out.

'Careful with those glands, Marcei, careful!'

Glaring, Marcei passed over the fire glands to Grapplehammer, who inspected them keenly. 'And now to load them into the refashioned shredder boot. I'm certain that you'll be amazed by my genius invention.'

Marcei closed her eyes and exhaled slowly. 'Yeah, yeah.'

A handful of minutes later, Grapplehammer passed over a completed weapon that still looked a lot like a boot.

'It took a lot of blood, sweat, and tears, but the Bootzooka, patent-pending, is ready for use. These no-good pygmies have been feeding our people to their "god", and they're about to unleash it on our town! So, you have to get into that cave and kill that thing before it's too late. Just be careful with the Bootzooka . . . it may fire some extra missiles from time to time.'

Marcei took a moment to absorb all of that, and Grapplehammer peered over her shoulder at the mouth of the cave. 'There they are!'

The sounds of a violent scuffle ensued, and Marcei whirled around to see a handful of pigmy guards being kept busy by some well-armed goblins.

'Go in now, while they're occupied,' Grapplehammer advised. Fully agreeing with that, Marcei ran up past them and into the giant cave. Marcei ran along the tunnel, getting increasingly hotter as she neared the inside of the volcano. In the distance, she could see the tunnel open into a giant, steaming cavern, and there was an outcrop of big rocks just before it. She could see a giant pair of gleaming, red eyes, which clearly belonged to the cave's inhabitant. Volcanoth.

She inched closer to the giant, fiery turtle, constantly keeping her eye on it as it came into better view. Then, as fast as she could, she slipped behind the rocks and readied the Bootzooka in her hands.

She took a breath. This was for Ace, in case he had been sacrificed to this monstrosity by those mental pigmies.

Marcei poked around the side of the rock and fired the weapon multiple times, sending an explosive barrage of something or other towards Volcanoth. They went off with ear-splitting explosions and the turtle gave out a roar that was just as loud. Marcei ducked back into her hiding place just as a column of fire shot where she had been only moments before. Once it stopped, she leaned around again, firing just as rapidly. One of the missiles spiralled off towards the roof, hitting a stalactite on the ceiling and sending it crashing down on the turtle. That apparently did some damage too, as the "god" let out another anguished bellow. Marcei hid behind her rock again, as Volcanoth fired once more. A few more shots should do it, she decided. She was going to roast in here otherwise. She took a breath. Okay, one last shot. She wasn't sure the Bootzooka was going to hold up much longer. It was crackling and sparking.

For the final time, Marcei leapt out from her hiding place and fired repeatedly, the barrage overwhelming the turtle and the explosions making Marcei's ears hurt. But it worked. With one final, weak cry, Volcanoth crumpled and lay, unmoving.

The volcano trembled violently and Marcei tumbled backwards, her head smacking into the wall of the tunnel. With a groan, she straightened up to see a plane zooming into the cavern from another entrance. There were cracking noises as rocks broke from the walls and hit the floor of the cave. Marcei could just hear Sassy's voice over the chaos.

'Marcei, come on! Get over here!'

Not even stopping to hesitate, Marcei sprinted over to the hovering aircraft and stood just below it.

'I managed to get everyone else safely back to town!' Sassy called. 'Jump in, we gotta get out of here before the volcano blows for good! We'll make a flyby of the town, and then I'm gonna get you to some old friends!'

Marcei grabbed onto the rope ladder that was dangling from the plane and hauled herself up. The plane zoomed away and out another entrance on the other side of the volcano. Loud rumbles shook the whole island, and Marcei could tell it was already exploding. At the end of the tunnel, she could see fireballs shooting through the air and into the jungle below.

With a loud 'YEEEEEEEEEE HAAAAAAAAAA' Marcei could just hear over the din, Sassy shot the plane out of the volcano and straight towards the Town-In-A-Box, which was completely overrun by lava. Sassy turned the plane, and instead they went towards the Wild Overlook, which was relatively unharmed. Everything else was either burning or completely gone, and the air around them was a hazy red. Marcei surveyed the wreckage around them in shock, completely lost for words.

'Get in the back seat,' Sassy called. 'We're getting out of here. I know where the orcs are.'

Marcei felt herself relax slightly in relief. She made her way up the precariously swinging ladder and pulled herself into the back seat, tumbling in awkwardly.

'First Kezan and now here,' Sassy said. 'We are toast if we don't find a way off of this island soon.' Marcei agreed.

The plane finally touched down in the Wild Overlook, where the orcs were waiting. Marcei climbed out of the plane and ran to Thrall, desperately wanting news.

'I told you we would meet again, Marcei.' He gave her an appraising look. 'Unfortunate that it's under such dire circumstances.'

'Where are the others?' she asked anxiously. She couldn't see Izzy anywhere, or any of the other goblins for that matter.

'Your friends were all taken prisoner by Trade Prince Gallywix while the volcano was exploding,' Thrall said grimly. 'We are going to have to deal with the Alliance quickly if we're to rescue them and get off of this island.'

Marcei choked. Izzy. She took a shaky breath. That bastard was trying to take away everything she had.

'The Alliance have caught back up with us at just the wrong moment, my friend,' Thrall said. 'We took care of their ships, but they still have plans that are dropping their vaunted 127th Mountaineers onto the coast below. It's all that the battlesworn and scouts can do to hold the two ramps against their overwhelming numbers. I'm certain that if you were to aid them, the tide would be quickly turned.' Marcei nodded, and looking satisfied, Thrall turned to another orc, instantly becoming engaged in dire conversation.

Sassy had been looking over the edge of the cliff, and was coming back to her. 'The paratroopers have mined the beach!' she said indignantly. 'The Warchief asked me if there's anything we can do about that before I came to get you. I told him, 'You bet we can!'. I was thinking maybe you could take this satchel of grenades and detonate the land mines from a safe distance.' She passed Marcei a small bag and grinned slightly. 'It's how we do things, right?' Marcei nodded and took the bag, peering over Sassy's shoulder. Aggra was kneeling beside a row of dead battlesworn, her back to the group. Marcei excused herself and made her way over. As she approached, Aggra looked up.

'These orcs were murdered in cold-blood by the Alliance down on the coast. We did nothing to provoke them.'

Marcei made a small "o" with her mouth and knelt down beside the orc.

'Their deaths should not be in vain, Marcei. Will you bring them to justice?' Aggra appeared as though she could barely contain her rage. Not wishing to incite it, Marcei nodded.

'There are three SI:7 leaders down there along the beach. Bring me their heads.'

They were simple orders. Marcei felt they would be simple enough to carry out. Bowing her head slightly in respect, she got back to her feet before turning to Sassy and lifting the bag of grenades, showing she was going down into the battle zone.

The path down to the beach ran down a slope that was heavily guarded at the base. Battlesworn and Alliance paratroopers were engaged in heavy combat, as more and more of the latter joined the battle. Marcei ran down to aid the orcs, pulling out her shotgun and killing off as many as she could before she had to replace the bullets. That, however, was all the advantage that was needed. The Alliance were quickly swarmed over by the battlesworn and the battle was finally taking a turn for the better. Marcei ran past them and onto the beach, now onto the next stage of her escapade. She stopped only to pull one grenade out of the satchel, inspecting it momentarily. Satisfied that is wasn't a wack-job in any way, she set along the beach, towards a tent a good two hundred yards away, also keeping her eye out for mines.

They weren't too hard to see. They were a round, grey disk shape, with a grey rod poking out from the top, and a flashing red light to cap it all off. Gnomes really weren't that smart. With a slight grin, Marcei pulled the pin from the grenade in her hand and chucked it. The mine went off with an explosion that made her step back slightly, but she felt a sense of dominance all the same. This was mine disposal, the goblin way.

Psh. Who needs gnomes, anyway?

Marcei made a beeline to the tent, which probably belonged to one of the commanders. Her suspicion was confirmed when a man with longish, light brown hair emerged, dressed quite like he had a sense of his own importance.

She didn't give him the time to think. Three shots and he was dead, and one revoltingly nasty knife job later, Marcei had a crudely hacked off head in her grip. She pretty much lost most of her stomach doing that. Really, she might be brutal, but that didn't mean she chopped off heads for a living. That was a little different.

And she had two more to get.

Restraining herself from wanting to throw up again, Marcei pivoted around a hundred and eighty degrees and headed north along the coast line, still looking for the other tents.

A good distance further down the shore, Marcei finally spotted a second tent, its owner on the prowl outside of it. And when she meant "on the prowl" she mean literally. This commander was a worgen.

Marcei felt slightly more worried now. She knew about these guys. She knew they could rip her to shreds, and, well, that wasn't something she really wanted to happen.

Shotgun time.

She really should have been quicker about it this time around, but the worgen pounced before she could pull her thoughts together. It was a good thing that shooting didn't really require thinking when it came to her.

But she could have shot it earlier, because, as of that moment, she was now crushed under a dead and very heavy worgen. Not nice.

Marcei grunted and tried to shove the corpse off her, which was proving to be very difficult. She was better off wriggling out from under it.

Scrabbling at the sand with her hands, Marcei crawled out from under the worgen and got unsteadily to her feet, feeling pretty irritated. She turned back to the corpse, looking it its head, her bloodied knife in one hand. She sighed. Decapitation time.

As she went on her way again, another head added to her collection, Marcei felt considerably relieved there was only one to go. Doing this was taking a serious toll on her mental health. Yeah, she knew she should toughen up with it came to that. It was just some severed heads. Those pigmy witchdoctors put heads on spikes for their home décor! And besides, she was probably going to do worse things in her life. Like, ripping out hearts or something.

At that thought she swore. She'd probably just jinxed herself, now.

Though, she started to think that her luck was getting pretty bad when she was the last commander was a night elf. Especially when she was spotted instantly. The elf drew her bow and aimed at Marcei, who swore and ducked for cover behind her tent. An arrow shot past her head, just missing her. Marcei poked her head around the canvas and fired multiple bullet at her target, and surprisingly enough, they hit. The elf crumpled, and feeling considerably relieved, Marcei made her way over to the body.

The only good thing that came out of all of that was that Aggra was grateful to the service Marcei had done for the fallen. Passing off the heads to someone else wasn't too bad, either. All the same, Marcei would rather have done the other jobs ten times over.

Sassy was overly proud of the job she had done when blowing up the mines.

'Score one for the goblins!' she cheered, grinning broadly. 'Stupid dwarves and gnomes.'

Her gaze then travelled to the sky above the beach, and she groaned audibly.

'What?' Marcei asked, turning around to look. Planes were flying around above the shore, dropping parachuters into the battle below.

'This is ridiculous!' Sassy complained. 'The gnomes just don't know when to stop! Goblin pride is on the line here! Marcei, you gotta jump into our plane and show them what's what!'

Marcei took another look up at the battlefield and nodded, before making her way over to the plane Sassy had piloted not long ago. Sassy pressed the keys in her hand and gave her a look so serious, Marcei almost burst out laughing. Sassy rolled her eyes. 'Get going, you.'

Marcei pulled herself up into the plane and stuck in the keys. The aircraft rumbled to life, and Marcei felt herself grin. Time to shoot down some gnomes.

Without further ado, she pushed down a pedal and took to the skies.

Going rampant with a machine gun mounted atop a plane? Why the hell didn't Marcei think of that sooner? Heck, this was the best fun she'd had all day, though, in all honesty, that wasn't saying much. But still, the homicidal side in her was being brought out to its full extent, and it would take a while to put it back where it came from.

With a euphoric screech, Marcei shot straight upwards like a bullet, before nosediving and firing at Gnomeregan fighter planes, laughing manically when they blew up. Really, it was like someone had given her drugs and let her loose in a box of dynamite. Meaning she was destructive.

She constantly swerved to avoid the fire from the other planes, still shooting like a maniac. The number of planes she sent either spiralling or blowing up was almost uncountable.

When it reached the point where she looked around and didn't see anything, Marcei couldn't help feeling disappointed. It was over already? Damn. So, grudgingly, she brought the plane back to the ground, before hopping out, catching her foot on a panel, and tumbling onto her face. With a slight groan, she got to her feet and dusted herself off.

'YES!' Sassy came running over to her and bounced around in glee, grinning broadly. 'I freaking saw that, girl; that was some crazy flying!'

Marcei laughed.

'True to his word, Thrall is going to get us going in the right direction to rescue our people,' Sassy said, the grin never leaving her face. 'He asked to speak with you.'

The hyper mood she had starting to wear off, Marcei nodded. Sassy stuck out her hand, which she shook. 'Good luck, Marcei. We're all depending on you.'

'Once again you have helped us to overcome our mutual enemy, the Alliance.' Thrall took a steady breath, giving her an appraising look. 'Now it is time for us to help you. Head back down to the coast and tell Kilag that I'd like for you to borrow Bastia. The sabre knows the way to where your friends are being held captive. Go now. I will see you again before we make our move against the Trade Prince.'

Marcei chewed her lip, giving a slight nod. 'Okay.' She turned away and ran down the slope to the beach, where a considerably smaller battle was still taking place at the bottom. Kilag and Bastia were down there, overseeing it.

'Kilag!' Marcei shouted, stumbling over her own feet in her haste. The orc looked up, and watched her down the slope until she reached him.

'Can I borrow Bastia?' she asked. 'The Warchief said that she knew the way.'

Kilag smiled. 'Of course you can borrow Bastia. That is, if she'll take you.' He winked.

Marcei stretched her hand out to the dark blue nightsabre, and almost jumped backwards when Bastia bumped her head against it affectionately. Marcei blinked. She hadn't been expecting that.

For the second time without warning, Kilag picked her up and dumped her on the sabre's back, before leaning over slightly and whispering something in her ear.

'Bastia will make sure that you get where you need to be, goblin.'

As he straightened back up, Bastia started running - into a clearing lightly scattered with trees and up a slope. The battle and the beach disappeared from view very quickly. The path the cat took changed direction so frequently that Marcei didn't bother keeping track.

Once they reached a bamboo bridge, Marcei started to get the inclination that they were nearly there. Running down the side of what was part of the volcano, several thin waterfalls poured into the river below them. Bastia came bounding up to a cave entrance with a handful of goblins out the front, and Marcei knew she was at the right place. She slid off the cat's back as Slinky Sharpshiv came running over to her.

'Marcei?' She paused and watched Bastia with a wary eye. 'Nice kitty.' Her gaze snapped back up to Marcei, the look in her eyes urgent. 'Look we don't have much time here. You might have noticed that the volcano is blowing?'

Marcei nodded, looking around. The only others that were here were Evol, Maxx, Beastblast Babblesnaff (don't ask), Bamm, Warrior-Matic NX-01 and Sister Goldskimmer. 'Where are-?'

'We barely escaped with our hides intact!' Slinky said, cutting over her. 'The Trade Prince has a whole bunch of us enslaved and performing manual labour inside the cave. He's calling it the "Gallywix Reeducation Cavern." Greely helped the seven of us to get out, but she was recaptured in the process. Marcei, you're the only one crazy enough to walk into an exploding volcano! Greely will be able to help you free the others.' She bit her lip anxiously. 'Okay. We're going to move away from the exploding volcano and try to hook up with the orcs for the final assault on the Trade Prince. See you on the other side . . . I hope.'

'Lucky you,' Marcei said dryly.

'Hurry! This place is about to blow for good!'

Marcei took a sharp breath and looked at the mine entrance, before leaving Slinky behind with Bastia and sprinting inside.

For a mine that had probably been in use for less than a day, a lot had been set up. There were basic supports, bamboo mine carts, and machines everywhere. Also, lots and lots of some new expansion of Kaja'Cola. Kaja'Cola Zero One? Seriously?

But the main problem?

Hobgoblins/mooks/whatever Gallywix likes to call them. They were on guard, everywhere. Sure, they were easy enough to take out with a shotgun, but it was still a lot of the brutes.

Trusting her luck, Marcei took out a brute and followed the first right when she reached a cavern, before taking a ramp down to the second level of the mine. She did a lot of killing. Hoping she was going in the right direction, she went right again.

She finally found Greely after killing the guard that was watching her. Marcei punched the goblin in the shoulder and hissed her name. 'Greely!'

Greely looked up, blinking confusedly. 'Huh . . . what? Who?'

She was clearly bewildered. Marcei groaned. How was she going to help her find a way to rescue everyone in this condition?

Marcei looked around, her eyes landing on a can of Kaja'Cola. Maybe . . .

Marcei grabbed the can and turned back to Greely, brandishing it in front of her face. Greely spotted it, and her blank eyes seemed to come to life.

'Take it!' Marcei demanded, shoving the drink at her. Hesitantly, Greely popped open the can and downed the lot in a matter of seconds.

It was like she'd been given caffeine. Her eyes went wide and clear, and she started to shout 'I'VE GOT AN IDEA!' before Marcei put her hands over her mouth, not wanting to give them away.

Beaming excitedly, Greely pulled her hands away. 'You've got to get all the Kaja'Cola Zero-One that you can and make the goblins drink it to boost their morale and free them!'

Marcei paused. 'That's genius!' she whispered. 'Genius!'

She whirled around and scooped up all of the nearby cans, holding as many as she could. Greely did the same, and they both left their small part of the mine system, running through and shoving cans at all of the brainwashed goblins they came across. When they ran out, they collected some more, as the Kaja'Cola seemed to be everywhere.

'Have you seen Izzy?' Marcei asked as they made their way through. Greely nodded.

'They had a job of bringing her in. She's strong and she's got the mouth of a sailor!'

Marcei laughed slightly. 'Yeah, I know.'

They turned into a room-shaped part of the cave, and Marcei shot another brute before they went to begin another round of distribution. Over against one wall, there was a big machine that was letting out lots of smoke. Someone was hard at work fixing it, and despite them being covered in grime, it was impossible not to notice the blonde head of hair.

Marcei's heart stopped.

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