"Hey! Boss! Uh... This guy just sort of showed up here... He... said that he wanted to talk to you about somethin'!"

The hairy shirtless guy leads me past his group of other shirtless companions. I think about pointing out their apparent aversion to full clothing, but decide against it when the tip of some guy's axe catches my eye.

Besides, they have a few people with clothes... Like... that guy. In the robes. With the giant hat.

Huh. That guy's wearing that too. They're probably trying to compensate for the lack of clothing on everybody else.

My escort is pretty gentle for a bad guy. I suppose that this kind of thing happens when a random person pretty much volunteers to get captured.

The man leads me into a big room at the end of the little hideout these bandits have set up. The room is befitting of a man who feels the subconscious need to act selfish and pompous, probably in order to combat whatever tragedy that happened in his childhood that drove him to a life of ordering around a bunch of barely competent bandits while repeatedly robbing villages in the same general area.

The hideout itself is actually somewhat impressive. It's pretty big, for one thing. I suppose that it would have to be, what with the enormous amount of baddies that swarm this place. This place also seems pretty maze-like due to my short little escort from the entrance to the boss's room - it was pretty much impossible not to notice the multiple branching paths that we passed. Still, it was pretty easy to memorize which paths we took to reach this room.

The decor of the place also caught my eye. I noticed a few fancy stuff either carefully placed on some wall or dumped on the ground. But most of the decoration seemed to consist of piles of gold that were dumped on the floor. I suppose that these guys never really go on that many shopping sprees since they can get a 100% discount on everything they want simply by grinning and holding up a couple of axes.

If Rhys were here, his eyes would probably pop out after taking one look at all of this gold...

Still, the fact that the head of these baddies tried to give himself some miniature throne in order to make himself look more impressive as he sat in a room doing absolutely nothing, just waiting for an excuse to dramatically get up from his fancy chair...

Well, it's pretty pathetic. Almost funny.

The boss of the baddies, who looks like a mountain and seems somehow even more shirtless than everybody else in the hideout, looks down at me from the steps that lead to his chair, frowning. He's almost half-menacing. He then turns to the man who was kind enough to bring me here.

"Why the hell didn't you just kill him?"

"W-well, he... He just came up here, and said he was unarmed. I checked him, and he was, and then he just... asked if he could... I-I mean, it's not like we normally get visitors who just... volunteer themselves like that."

Mt. Shirtless turns to me. "How the hell did you find this place?"

Out of habit, I rub the back of my head and frown, pursing my lips. "You're kidding, right? If you spent any time in any of the nearby villages not destroying everything, then you'd hear at least seven different variations on the rumours about monsters or bandits or something or other that hide out somewhere near the gigantic mountains. The only reason nobody else has ever stumbled over here is that nobody who's heard of you is stupid enough to try and come all the way out here to kill you."

A smirk creeps on the Mountain's face. "And yet here you are."

I make sure that my expression shows just how unamused I am. "Do I look like I'm here to try and kill anybody? Your manservant here already mentioned how I'm unarmed. You did hear that, didn't you?"

"...Then what the hell are you doing here?"

I clap my hands together. "Right. Down to business. That last village you plundered - sloppy job, by the way, you guys are noisy enough that you could wake up anybody if they pulled the sheets over their head, plugged their fingers in their ears, and starting singing loudly - you kind of took something of mine."

The Mountain laughs. "So, you came here to bargain for some gold that we took, did you?"

"What? No - of course not. Gold isn't worth risking my neck and sense of smell by visiting you morons. I just want my horse back."

"Your horse...? Er... How do you know we haven't just killed your horse?"

I can't help but smirk. "Believe me, you couldn't kill Shadowfax if you tried... In any case, he's probably been more trouble to you than he's worth, right?"

"He broke one of our men's ribs..." my escort speaks. "He just wanted a new mount, so we stayed behind the rest of our group to find one, and we saw that horse of yours, and figured we could ride it back. That demon chased us all the way here - we barely managed to lure it into our horse pen."

"Wait, you actually managed to get him into a pen?" I ask - I can't help but be impressed. "Nice job. It took me forever before I could get him to do that..."

"Anyway!" the Mountain interrupts me. "Why should we just give you that horse of yours? What's in it for us?"

I blink. "Well... The horse won't listen to you. And he's going to start terrorizing your entire hideout if you don't get him out of here soon. I figured that that would be enough incentive for you to do what you could to get him safely out of your hair before Shadowfax decided to bite it off."

"I don't know what you've heard about us, boy," the Mountain spits, "but we don't just give things to random people on the street for free."

"Yeah, yeah, you do the exact opposite. I get it. You're bandits. You do that kind of thing." I sigh, and reach into my pocket. "Fine. I didn't want to have to do this, but if you want gold, then I guess I'll-"

"You do realize that you're unarmed and in the middle of a bandit hideout, right?" the Mountain interrupts me. "We'll just take that gold off of you ourselves!"

I groan. "Jeez, I just want to get my freakin' horse, and you just won't let that happen, will you? The dumb beast won't even do anything you tell it to - just what do you hope to do with him, anyway?" I look the man up and down. He's definitely a short-tempered guy. This'll be a piece of cake. "It's not like you'd be able to ride him either way - you're far too heavy. You'd probably end up crushing him."

And with that, the Mountain turns into a volcano. But he hasn't exactly erupted just yet.

That's all right. I just need him to be active enough so that he doesn't think clearly, but if he erupts, then my plan might not work...

...This volcano analogy should stop, now.

"Who the hell do you think you are, boy?" the Mountain spits.

"The name's Philandros, but most people call me a lazy, incompetent, annoying, know-it-all, smartass pain-in-the-neck. Who the hell are you?"

"I don't have to answer that."

"Really? Well, if I don't have a name to go on, then I suppose I'll just have to give you one."

"Oh, shut up, you insufferable brat!"

"Whoa! Just calm down, there, Susan!"

And now there's an axe at my neck. Perfect.

"That's it," the Mountain says to me through gritted teeth. "You'd better give me a good reason to let you live right now, or you'll be lying on the ground in two places at once."

Okay. Keep your eyes on the axe. Widen your eyes. Wider. Wider! Good. Now, make your lip quiver. Great. Now start stuttering.

"O-Okay then. S-sorry, I-I... Uh... L-Look, y-you guys want to ride that horse, r-right? Well, he - he only listens to me, s-so I... I could g-get him to listen to you guys, a-and then I... I'll just go! I'll... I'll leave you alone!"

The Mountain grunts. "Fine. You stop that horse from being a nuisance, give us all of your gold, and then I'll let you leave in one piece."

My gold? Act like you hate that.

"M-My gold? I-" Dart your eyes at the axe... "F-Fine! Just... promise you'll let me get out of here!"


The only way this could have gone better is if the Mountain had just handed Shadowfax to me and booted us out of his hideout.

What the villagers had said about the Mountain's temper was spot on, apparently. He was always getting mad at something in the entire short while it took him to raid the town, and his temper made him, predictably, pretty damn irrational. Well, more irrational. But, best of all, he is fucking terrifying once he's set off. He's scary enough that none of his subordinates have been able to point out the obvious flaw in his plan that involves opening my horse's pen and placing me right next to him.

Even if the guy's planning to kill me sooner or later, he's still an idiot. And I love idiots. They always manage to give me exactly what I want.

Well... maybe not always. But usually.

As the Mountain continuously shoves me through his maze of a hideout, make certain to memorize the pathways we go through.

This moron of a leader didn't even bother to blindfold me. Either he's very confident that I won't be able to remember my way through his hideout, or the idea of me trying to make a run for it hasn't crossed his mind yet. Either way, this guys making it really easy for me.

Okay... We've taken four rights, three lefts, one right, two more lefts... That was three turns from the path from the entrance...

Wait... That's the fifth right we've taken so far... We passed an unlit torch like that one before we started that, and... Yeah, that's the same guy we passed before! With chip off of his ear! We've walked around in a complete circle!

All right, so then I'll just backtrack from those last few turns... Heh, maybe this guy isn't as much of a moron as I thought.

The Mountain then looks everywhere around him, and mutters, "What in the hell...Which fuckin' way is it supposed to be...?"

...Okay, he's still an idiot.

I make certain to watch out for any other circles the Mountain pulls. I count two other full circles before we reach Shadowfax. By then, I've managed to memorize the exact path I need to take in order to get out of here as quickly as possible.

Natural sunlight actually manages to reach this part of the hideout. I look upwards, and see that the roof of the cave has been blown off. I look back down, and see numerous horse pens. The Mountain leads me past most of the pens and towards a man who looks as if he's debating whether or not to enter it. Two other men pointing swords at the pen stand behind him, shaking. The Mountain shoves them away, opens the pen door, and pushes me in.

"Well, you may as well get started on training your worthless horse to listen to the people that try to ride it," he spits.

I turn to him, and say, "Please, it won't take that long. Just give me a minute or two."

The first thing Shadowfax does is try to look cute and cuddly.

"Oh, give it a rest, you idiot," I say. "The puppy-dog eyes only work when you're cute."

Shadowfax whinnies, and shakes his head.

"Don't give me that - you know perfectly well that I just wanted to sleep through the entire morning, but you had to go get yourself captured by bandits!"

The horse neighs back at me.

"I paid a guy to feed you at noon! Now he'll have no idea what he's supposed to do! And I already gave him the money! I-"

"What the hell are you doing, boy?" I hear the gruff voice of the Mountain snarl.

"Quiet, Susan!" I shout, pointing at the Mountain. "I'm trying to have a conversation here!" I turn back to Shadowfax. "You see what I've had to deal with, here? And all just to save your sorry ass!"

Shadowfax neighs again.

"What do you mean you'd be able to survive on your own?! You have enough hay here to last you a day, tops! And you've made everybody else here scared shitless of you - they probably would have tried to put you down earlier were it not for the fact that that's probably what you want, so that you can return to your home in the Underworld since your mission up here observing, judging, and torturing us humans has probably come to an end recently! So, when you do eventually report back to the devil, make sure that he gets my recommendation that he, for future reference, should proceed to send up creatures that are more friendly, cuddly, and less likely to try and damage their company or themselves, so that they may gain our trust more easily! Examples include puppies, kittens, small birds, and, hell, there's probably a Risen or two out there that meets that criteria!"

"...Are you having an argument with your horse?!" the Mountain shouts from behind me.

"Well, I'm trying to, but some people here don't seem to-"

Shadowfax whinnies, interrupting me.

"Yeah, okay, we should probably continue this somewhere else..."

"Somewhere else?! The hell are you talking about, boy?! You ain't goin' anywhere!"

Another whinny from the horse.

"Yeah, he hasn't figured it out yet. Get this - he thinks I'm trying to train you so that you'll listen to these people!"

Shadowfax then makes the closest noise I've ever heard him make to a human laugh.

"I know, right?! Talk about a lost cause! ...What? Yeah, of course I can say this out loud. He'll probably just assume that this is some form of reverse psychology, or something. Yes, even if I say this. All I need to do is add 'How's the reverse psychology thing supposed to work if I don't go and say that it's not supposed to be happening even though it is, but for all intents and purposes, it isn't?' You see, he'll be stuck trying to process that whole statement, giving us enough time to do this."

I turn around and open the pen door. I then hop onto Shadowfax's back - thank the gods that my horse can't live without his saddle on him - and we begin to ride away.

"Just giving my friend here a test run," I say, passing by the Mountain as he stares in the air, muttering to himself, and moving his fingers around.

"Saying it's supposed to happen... but..." he mutters to himself. "But if he... Hey, wait! The hell do you think you're going?!"

"Okay, speed it up, buddy..." I mutter to Shadowfax, who begins to sprint through the hideout. "All right, take a left here..."

I convey the directions to Shadowfax as we pass by numerous bandits who give us many odd looks, but don't really do anything to try and stop us.

"Okay, just take a right here, and..."

Yes! Sunlight! And there're no people guarding the entrance! What luck! Let's get out of here!

Relaxed, I cross my hands behind my head, and lay down on Shadowfax as he rides out of the hideout. Maybe I can catch a few Z's right here. The ride's a little bumpy, but I'm used to that. Besides, Shadowfax is so used to carrying me while I sleep that he's able to balance me perfectly without even thinking about it. I should be able to take a short nap before Shadowfax makes it to town.

At least, that's what I think before Shadowfax grinds to a halt and I get sent flying.

I grunt as I land on my back. "Ow... Sorry, buddy, but maybe I didn't make this clear to you - we were supposed to stop after we made it to town and away from the hideout of evil people!"

Eyes shut, I rub my head as I seat myself back up, cursing under my breath. I open my eyes, and am immediately greeted by a swarm of familiar faces.

I don't usually like familiar faces.

"Ah! Hello there, Phil!" Inigo chirps.

No.

"Phil?" Nah says, tilting her head at me.

Oh Gods, no.

"Oi! Is that really you?!" Brady shouts.

You I don't mind so much.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Kjelle asks.

Oh, no no no no no.

I look up to the sky. Then I look to the ground. Back to the sky. And back to the ground. Back up. Back down.

"...What are you doing?" Nah asks.

"I'm trying to decide whether I should turn to the skies, and ask the Gods a very loud "Why?!", or turn to the ground below and congratulate the man downstairs on doing his job right."

"It's good to see you, too," Kjelle retorts.

"Damn, you folks weren't kiddin' when you said you ran into people wherever the hell you went," Brady says.

"...The hell are you guys doing here?" I mutter, picking myself up and scratching the back of my head.

Kjelle says, "I asked you that first."

I jerk my thumb at Shadowfax. "My pet ran away, so I had to go door to door holding a picture of him while kindly asking grown-ups if they'd seen him. No reward." I make sure to accent the word 'pet'. Shadowfax hates being called that.

"Again?" Nah asks. She frowns at the horse. "Why can't you ever stop picking fights? You know how worried Phil gets when you put yourself in danger!"

I choose to frown forward at nothing, and internalize Nah's obvious attempt at embarrassing me.

"Right. Whatever. Anyway, what the hell are you guys doing here?"

"Well," Inigo says, "when we heard that bandits were messing around with the poor people in that village, we couldn't just sit back and do nothing!"

"...Wait. So... You guys heard that rumour that an enormous group of dangerous bandits were hiding here in these mountains... and your brilliant idea was to go towards them?!"

"Well, it wasn't really our idea," Nah says. "Inigo's sister wanted to come over here when we heard about it, and she's pretty hard to say no to."

"...Oh. Okay. That explains everything," I say sarcastically, walking over to Shadowfax. "Well, the bandits are in there, so you guys can - wait! Inigo?! You have a sister?! ...Since when?! And you say that she's old enough to convince you to go kill people?!"

Inigo beams. "Well, we met up with her a while ago, and-"

"Yeah, sorry Inigo, but you'd take too long to get to the point Phil wants you to get to," Kjelle interrupts him. "Apparently he had a sister that happened to go missing when she was really little, before we all met up. Somehow, we just happened to bump into her a while back."

"...Are you certain she's your sister?" I ask, pointing directly at Inigo. "I mean, I don't want to ruin anything for you, but... Well, what does your sis have to say about this?"

"Amnesia," Brady answers. "Pretty convenient, huh?"

"...Yeah, I'd say so."

I catch Inigo hiding a frown with a sheepish grin.

"So... where is this newfound sister of yours? You said that she was the reason you guys came here, didn't you?"

"Well, we split up in order to find the entrance to this place," Inigo finally gets to speak up. "Looks like we were more successful than they were... Anyway, Morgan - er, that's her name, by the way - is together with herself, Noire, and-"

"That's great," I interrupt him, beginning to climb onto Shadowfax's back. "Don't care. Anyway, you guys just got here to start what you wanted to do, I just finished what I came here to do. So... Good luck with whatever it is you guys are trying to do - maybe I'll see you around."

"Hold it!" Kjelle says, running in front of Shadowfax. "You just got out of that hideout, so you know the layout and situation that they're currently in! You're going to stay here and help us fight these bastards!"

I groan. "All I want is to get back to the inn so I can get some rest! Is that too much to ask?! Huh?!"

The knight stays planted in front of my horse, unwavering.

"...Fine. The hideout has a bunch of branching routes that lead to many different places throughout the cave. I've only been to two of the rooms in there: the horse pen and the boss's room. The good news is that you probably won't need to put that much effort into searching throughout that place for bandits, since a large number of them should be headed this way as we speak."

"What?!"

"Well, you know how I always leave a friendly impression on the people my bratty horse decides to befriend, right? This guy didn't wasn't so keen on making friends with a person who just showed up at his doorstep uninvited and started asking for free stuff. So, when I tried to get out of his hair, he decided to follow me."

As if on cue, we all begin to hear shouting coming from the hideout. I think I make out a, "Get to it!" an "Off your ass!" and a "Right this second!"

Kjelle turns to Nah. "All right, you go fly away and get the others!" The knight pulls out her lance. "We'll be able to handle these guys until you get back!"

"Right! Good luck, you guys!" Nah nods before turning into a dragon and taking off.

"All right! Inigo! Phil! We'll hold these guys off! Brady, you get your staff ready!"

The two of them do as Kjelle says. Kjelle kicks aside the pair of dead guards' bodies that I assume she was responsible for.

"Er... Yeah, about that..." I mutter. "See, this whole 'fighting' thing wasn't really my plan for the day. In fact, it was the exact opposite of my plan. And, since I'm pretty used to most of my plans going exactly according to... well, plan, I think I'm just going to get going, now. So, you know, good luck, I hope you don't die, break a leg - actually, don't break a leg - you get the gist of it. Bye!"

I try and kick Shadowfax into a sprint, but he remains still.

I frown at my horse while I reluctantly climb off of him. "Seriously? You know, sometimes I wonder whose side you're really on!"

"Come on, Phil!" Kjelle shouts, standing readily in front of the hideout. "They'll be here any second!"

I turn to the knight. "Even if my horse won't let me leave, I don't exactly have an available weapon to defend myself with!"

Kjelle turns to Inigo. "Inigo, you wouldn't happen to have a spare sword, would you?"

"For you, my sweet, I-"

"Just give him the sword before I decide to cut off your tongue with it."

"Er... R-right!" Inigo says before pulling out an Iron Sword and tossing it at my feet.

I look at the weapon at my feet, pick it up, and look back at Inigo, Kjelle, and Brady, who are all standing moronically in front of the cave where a group of bandits are about run out from.

I sigh, and say, "If you want to live through the day, then get away from that giant hole of an entrance."

The three of them look at me.

"Now!"

They all scramble and do as I say. I climb back onto the back of Shadowfax, and point my new sword to the left side of the cave. It is very rocky.

"Is that the direction where your other group of friends headed off to?"

"That's right," Brady answers.

"Great. Then this ride is going to get pretty bumpy. All right, you guys go group yourselves on the other side of this cave. Quickly!"

Once again, they do as I say, and sprint around the side of the cave. I would have hissed or yelled some more orders at them, but the Mountain decides to finally make his way out of the cave.

Oh well. They'll be able to figure it out. It's not like it's that difficult to comprehend.

The Mountain, with his group of bandits standing behind him, smirks at me. "I figured that you would've run off by now."

"Aw, and you were prepared to gather all of your cronies just to chase little old me? I'm touched."

"We want your troublemaker of a horse, not you."

"Of course you do. Well, I'm sorry to say that you won't be having him. I'm the only person he listens to. And even then, that's somewhere below half of the time."

"Enough talkin'! Get him!"

I sigh. I was hoping I'd be able to stall them for just a little bit longer.

Oh well.

"All right, buddy," I say to Shadowfax. "Let's get going..."

I kick Shadowfax into a run, and he sprints towards the left side of the cave. I keep an eye on the group of bandits headed our way, wary of any fireballs or arrows that may be fired at us. I guess this guy wants to see me hacked to pieces or something, since nobody begins to do this.

I'm actually kind of flattered.

We begin to ride up the mountain, moving onto rockier terrain.

Come on... Where the hell's the B Team? Good Gods, Nah, how long could it possibly take you to find them and bring them over he - ah, there they are!

Shadowfax turns a corner, and I see the lovely sight of a dragon flying towards me, leading a tiny group of warriors with their weapons out, running straight at me.

They're sporting a lot of magic tomes, there. Fantastic. Maybe I won't have to do much in this fight after all.


AN: I might have been able to finish this sooner, but I had some trouble with Shadowfax's dialogue. I wanted to make the horse snarky and sarcastic, but kind of overdid it to the point where the stuff that he said was sort of offensive. So, I had to redo everything I had made that dumb horse say. Which brings me to my next point - should any of Shadowfax's dialogue offend anyone in any way, know that the stuff he says does not reflect any of my views on anybody, or what I think goes on through a horse's head. I'm sure that most, if not all, horses have no evil thoughts like that. Shadowfax is just an ass.
(...That was a joke, by the way. I'm just horsin' around)