HUMERUS
By Mayavan Thevendra
Part 1 of 8
AFTERNOON OF THE LIVING DEAD
Beneath the fiery red banner of 'Dreadwhisker the Mewling', the Sabre Cat army pressed onward across the searing sand, whining and groaning in their guttural tongue. Their terrible captain raced at their head, cocooned in bronze armour, her spear raised high above her. In front, the gleaming spires of the Jewel City pricked the sky; Lut Gholein, pulsing with life, and roaring with the noises of a populace unaware of their own humungous peril. Dreadwhisker spat a curse, as her animal mind conjured images of the human mercenaries, whose spears had slain so many of her kin in their previous assaults on the city; but now, with all the clans of the desert sabres united under her leadership, the Jewel City would be hers for the plucking, and she would strip the flesh from the mercenary captain's gullet with her teeth!
The warhost passed to within fifty yards of the city's walls, and still there was no sign of resistance - too late for your spearmen to rally, now, thought Dreadwhisker, "Too late for your acne-faced boy-sultan to raise the defences," she purred, "or your *hack-SPIT!* red-robed, goat-loving wizard to conjure his magicks!" she roared, spraying thick, stringy gobs of spittle and furry bits, "Your city is mine, you monkeys! Dreadwhisker is coming! Rhaarrrgh!"
At precisely that moment there was a bright, white flash, and Dreadwhisker the Mewling, scourge of the Eastern desert, terror of traders, and idol to thousands of impressionable sabre-kittens, fell to the ground, dead. For a half-a dozen yards or so, she slid limply onwards, as the army at her back came skidding to a halt. Shocked, stunned, generally not terribly pleased in the slightest, they stared numbly at their commander's lifeless corpse, and sensing the faintest glimmer of movement against the heat-haze before them, they looked towards Lut Gholein. A man, or at least something man- like, stood before the gates, dressed from head to toe in black. Fearsome, yet oddly fashionable arrangements of what appeared to be bone were draped across his shoulders and waist, and a great, horned skull adorned his head. Sand whipped at the man's feet, and brandishing a long, cracked leg-bone in his hand, he swaggered forward to confront the throng of sabre cats. At his sides were four others, three of whom appeared to be extraordinarily anorexic humans. The small party faced off against the murmuring sabre cat battle group, outnumbered as they were some fifty times to one, and with some apparent sombreness, the man in black's companions peered down at Dreadwhisker's cadaver. Abruptly, one of them spoke.
"Fucking hell!" said Barry the skeleton, and peered across at the Man in Black. "You bloody killed her! Well, that's all right, we can all go home now, right chief?"
As one, the saber cats gave a roar that shook the dunes for a mile in every direction, and with pure hatred burning in their slit eyes, they launched themselves at the strangers. Barry briefly pondered on the fact that had he still possessed a bladder, it would surely have emptied by now - and then the fighting started. The Man in Black raised his bone-wand, sending wafer- thin lances of white light deep into their ranks, slaughtering dozens of them in a hot, bloody flash. At once, the Man's companions rallied themselves - the other two skeletons began to fire orbs of magical energy at the sabres, one freezing them to icy blocks with bolts of sheer cold, the other barbequing them extra-crispy with fire. The man's fourth companion lumbered ahead, a great, dripping juggernaut of flesh and sinew, as well as various meaty appendages that are best left undescribed, and eviscerated the bawling felines with crushing swipes from his bony forelimbs. Where the sabres fell, their bodies exploded in great grisly puffs of intestines and matted fur, or burst into clouds of noxious gas. Strange arcane enchantments ripped the air, striking the cats down with sudden blindness, or stupidity, or the sudden urge to vomit up their last meal, along with whatever other hairy nastiness they may have swallowed in the last day or so. In less than a minute, the entire army of the desert sabres had been decimated, the few battered survivors scurrying away towards their refuge in the hills.
"Ye'd better run, ye fekkers!" howled Morag the skeletal mage in her broad Scottish twang, and shook her smouldering fist after them. "Yeh bastard furry arses'll be mine to toy with if I sees yuz again, and I'll shove me boot so far up ye cracks, I'll use your teeth as toenails! Ye fekkers!"
Barry rubbed his skull, and dragged himself to his feet. Another fight spent cowering in the dirt - nothing new there, but he really figured that today would have been the end of it. So many of them, and all it would have taken was one solid blow to his neck, or to that slender, narrow length of spine that now constituted his waist, and it would have been over, and he could have escaped this joke of an existence - wandering around with mister goth wannabe over there, and the other three losers he'd dragged here to do his dirty work. He couldn't remember where he'd been before he was summoned, but it had to be a good deal better than this, surely.
Meanwhile, 'Bludluxor the Chill-handed Defiler of Worlds' surveyed the carnage at his bony feet, and grinned, liplessly. Soon, his plan to overthrow the land of, well, wherever the hell he was, and rule over it with an iron, icy fist, would come to fruition. These fools who fought at his side, though vaguely useful for now, would soon feel his frozen wrath, and feeding off their strength, he would -
"Oy, are ye coming, Kevin?" asked Morag.
"Damn it, witch, I told you!" hissed Bludluxor, fuming, "My name is Bludluxor the Chill-handed Def-"
'MINIONS FOLLOW' boomed the psychic voice of the Man in Black, as he marched back towards the city.
"We will continue this later, you smoke-faced hag! I warn you, I will not tolerate such impertinence for long!" spat Bludluxor, and stormed off after him.
Morag shook her head, and wandered over towards Barry, who was stood looking rather forlorn and hopeless, staring at a sabre cat carcass.
"Y'a'right there?" she asked.
Barry sighed, and looked at the ground. "Christ Morag, I don't know how much more of this I can handle. God knows how many bloody years I've spent dragging my sorry arse around behind that tosser," he said nodding over at the Man in Black, "and what's it gotten me? Nothing. I dunno how you and Kevin deal with it. I've dreamt about a nice, weighty battle-axe coming right down on top of my head - cleaves me in two it does, and then that's the end of it. Peace. Just.final peace. But it never comes."
"Aye." Said Morag, and pushed the sand around with her toes. "Well, regardless, it was a right brave display ye put on today, Barry, an' no foolin."
"Oh, shut it."
"Nay, seriously!" Morag laughed, "It was one fer the books! The way ye actually buried your head under the sand like one o' them big fluffy birds, it was marvellous! Ha!"
" I swear Morag, one of these days, I'm gonna."
"Ye gonna wha'?" said Morag, clicking her jaw.
"I'm gonna kick yer arse."
"Oh aye, like ye could, ye big girl's blouse. Now come on, or we'll be late, and the Man'll get angry."
Leaving the cat corpses behind to fester in the sun, Barry and Morag scuttled off to rejoin the others, and like some vast, jiggling mound of mincemeat, the flesh golem shambled after them.
By Mayavan Thevendra
Part 1 of 8
AFTERNOON OF THE LIVING DEAD
Beneath the fiery red banner of 'Dreadwhisker the Mewling', the Sabre Cat army pressed onward across the searing sand, whining and groaning in their guttural tongue. Their terrible captain raced at their head, cocooned in bronze armour, her spear raised high above her. In front, the gleaming spires of the Jewel City pricked the sky; Lut Gholein, pulsing with life, and roaring with the noises of a populace unaware of their own humungous peril. Dreadwhisker spat a curse, as her animal mind conjured images of the human mercenaries, whose spears had slain so many of her kin in their previous assaults on the city; but now, with all the clans of the desert sabres united under her leadership, the Jewel City would be hers for the plucking, and she would strip the flesh from the mercenary captain's gullet with her teeth!
The warhost passed to within fifty yards of the city's walls, and still there was no sign of resistance - too late for your spearmen to rally, now, thought Dreadwhisker, "Too late for your acne-faced boy-sultan to raise the defences," she purred, "or your *hack-SPIT!* red-robed, goat-loving wizard to conjure his magicks!" she roared, spraying thick, stringy gobs of spittle and furry bits, "Your city is mine, you monkeys! Dreadwhisker is coming! Rhaarrrgh!"
At precisely that moment there was a bright, white flash, and Dreadwhisker the Mewling, scourge of the Eastern desert, terror of traders, and idol to thousands of impressionable sabre-kittens, fell to the ground, dead. For a half-a dozen yards or so, she slid limply onwards, as the army at her back came skidding to a halt. Shocked, stunned, generally not terribly pleased in the slightest, they stared numbly at their commander's lifeless corpse, and sensing the faintest glimmer of movement against the heat-haze before them, they looked towards Lut Gholein. A man, or at least something man- like, stood before the gates, dressed from head to toe in black. Fearsome, yet oddly fashionable arrangements of what appeared to be bone were draped across his shoulders and waist, and a great, horned skull adorned his head. Sand whipped at the man's feet, and brandishing a long, cracked leg-bone in his hand, he swaggered forward to confront the throng of sabre cats. At his sides were four others, three of whom appeared to be extraordinarily anorexic humans. The small party faced off against the murmuring sabre cat battle group, outnumbered as they were some fifty times to one, and with some apparent sombreness, the man in black's companions peered down at Dreadwhisker's cadaver. Abruptly, one of them spoke.
"Fucking hell!" said Barry the skeleton, and peered across at the Man in Black. "You bloody killed her! Well, that's all right, we can all go home now, right chief?"
As one, the saber cats gave a roar that shook the dunes for a mile in every direction, and with pure hatred burning in their slit eyes, they launched themselves at the strangers. Barry briefly pondered on the fact that had he still possessed a bladder, it would surely have emptied by now - and then the fighting started. The Man in Black raised his bone-wand, sending wafer- thin lances of white light deep into their ranks, slaughtering dozens of them in a hot, bloody flash. At once, the Man's companions rallied themselves - the other two skeletons began to fire orbs of magical energy at the sabres, one freezing them to icy blocks with bolts of sheer cold, the other barbequing them extra-crispy with fire. The man's fourth companion lumbered ahead, a great, dripping juggernaut of flesh and sinew, as well as various meaty appendages that are best left undescribed, and eviscerated the bawling felines with crushing swipes from his bony forelimbs. Where the sabres fell, their bodies exploded in great grisly puffs of intestines and matted fur, or burst into clouds of noxious gas. Strange arcane enchantments ripped the air, striking the cats down with sudden blindness, or stupidity, or the sudden urge to vomit up their last meal, along with whatever other hairy nastiness they may have swallowed in the last day or so. In less than a minute, the entire army of the desert sabres had been decimated, the few battered survivors scurrying away towards their refuge in the hills.
"Ye'd better run, ye fekkers!" howled Morag the skeletal mage in her broad Scottish twang, and shook her smouldering fist after them. "Yeh bastard furry arses'll be mine to toy with if I sees yuz again, and I'll shove me boot so far up ye cracks, I'll use your teeth as toenails! Ye fekkers!"
Barry rubbed his skull, and dragged himself to his feet. Another fight spent cowering in the dirt - nothing new there, but he really figured that today would have been the end of it. So many of them, and all it would have taken was one solid blow to his neck, or to that slender, narrow length of spine that now constituted his waist, and it would have been over, and he could have escaped this joke of an existence - wandering around with mister goth wannabe over there, and the other three losers he'd dragged here to do his dirty work. He couldn't remember where he'd been before he was summoned, but it had to be a good deal better than this, surely.
Meanwhile, 'Bludluxor the Chill-handed Defiler of Worlds' surveyed the carnage at his bony feet, and grinned, liplessly. Soon, his plan to overthrow the land of, well, wherever the hell he was, and rule over it with an iron, icy fist, would come to fruition. These fools who fought at his side, though vaguely useful for now, would soon feel his frozen wrath, and feeding off their strength, he would -
"Oy, are ye coming, Kevin?" asked Morag.
"Damn it, witch, I told you!" hissed Bludluxor, fuming, "My name is Bludluxor the Chill-handed Def-"
'MINIONS FOLLOW' boomed the psychic voice of the Man in Black, as he marched back towards the city.
"We will continue this later, you smoke-faced hag! I warn you, I will not tolerate such impertinence for long!" spat Bludluxor, and stormed off after him.
Morag shook her head, and wandered over towards Barry, who was stood looking rather forlorn and hopeless, staring at a sabre cat carcass.
"Y'a'right there?" she asked.
Barry sighed, and looked at the ground. "Christ Morag, I don't know how much more of this I can handle. God knows how many bloody years I've spent dragging my sorry arse around behind that tosser," he said nodding over at the Man in Black, "and what's it gotten me? Nothing. I dunno how you and Kevin deal with it. I've dreamt about a nice, weighty battle-axe coming right down on top of my head - cleaves me in two it does, and then that's the end of it. Peace. Just.final peace. But it never comes."
"Aye." Said Morag, and pushed the sand around with her toes. "Well, regardless, it was a right brave display ye put on today, Barry, an' no foolin."
"Oh, shut it."
"Nay, seriously!" Morag laughed, "It was one fer the books! The way ye actually buried your head under the sand like one o' them big fluffy birds, it was marvellous! Ha!"
" I swear Morag, one of these days, I'm gonna."
"Ye gonna wha'?" said Morag, clicking her jaw.
"I'm gonna kick yer arse."
"Oh aye, like ye could, ye big girl's blouse. Now come on, or we'll be late, and the Man'll get angry."
Leaving the cat corpses behind to fester in the sun, Barry and Morag scuttled off to rejoin the others, and like some vast, jiggling mound of mincemeat, the flesh golem shambled after them.