Hello all! Sorry I'm so late. I originally was going to post it 2-3 weeks ago but a combination of re- writing/slacking has delayed it. But I'm back to write up the ongoing adventures of our favorite villains! Today I'm bringing us back to the home front! Nergal will get all the headaches that his underlings have had lately. Well, let's begin, shall we…

Disclaimer- I don't own Fire Emblem, but I do own the character of Captain Lafarge, the sarcastic yet lovable ninja priest… Who is not in this fic, nor will he be in any other fic. In fact, I just made him up. But who knows! Maybe he'll work his way into the yarn (hopefully not)…

Chapter 4-

In a sparse field of weeds on the dread isle of Valor, many scarecrows were stuck in random places in the field, seemingly for no purpose. Suddenly, their purpose became painfully clear as a beam of darkness struck one of the straw men in his chest, exploding him in a hellish blaze of fire and shadow.

"Oh yeah!" Nergal yelled, throwing his hands in the air in triumph. "Nergal: 1, Scarecrow: 0!" Nergal relished "vacation time", what he called the time in which his high- ranking morphs were gone. Sonia and Ephidel were always being smartasses around him, Denning was annoying as hell and Limstella was pretty creepy. He found that he could really connect with his inner- self at these times.

"Ah, it's good to be alive!" he yelled in glee. Suddenly the Sound of Music theme song started playing. "THE HILLS ARE ALIVE," Nergal belted, running freely in the hills, throwing his arms in the air. "WITH THE SOUND OF MU…"

"Grandpa Ner-gal!" a child's sing- song voice could be heard from behind him. The music abruptly ended as Nergal swung his head back in surprise. It was Nino; Nergal was horrified to find out, giggling. "What are you doing, Grandpa Nergal? And where's was that music coming from?"

"Uh… well." The dark druid said embarrassed, his eyes avoiding contact with hers. "I was just… practicing my evil schemes… Yeah, that's right, evil schemes.

"Oh! I see. You're going to take over the world with your screaming powers, right?" Nino said excitedly.

"Screaming powers?" he asked confused.

"Yeah! You know… that terrible sound you were just making with all the music."

"I always thought I had a good singing voice." He mumbled.

"What was that?" she asked.

"Nothing… nothing…" he said. "Now be a good girl for… Grandpa… and run along. Go play with Jaffar or something. I busy right now."

Nino pouted. "But Jaffar is so BORING! All he does is stare at me and sharpen his daggers! Your fun! Your do all the exciting stuff! Hey, I know! Teach me how to blow up stuff! You do it all the time around the base when you're angry and grumpy. Yeah! That'll be FUN!"

Nergal was slowly getting a splitting headache as Nino went on and on with her mindless drabble. Soon rage totally overtook him when she started to talk about ants and how funny they were.

"STOP TALKING, INSOLENT CHILD!" he screamed, lightning suddenly piercing the sky, loud thunder shaking the ground like an earthquake. "I… AM… ON…VACATION!"

"Uh oh. I made Nergal mad! Run!" Nino squealed, running the opposite direction from the enraged Nergal as fast as her legs could take her.

"Grrr… I'll get her someday." He sighed, with the thunder and hellfire leaving the sky. With the whole atmosphere ruined, he forlornly trudged back to the Dragon's Gate. "I'm getting too old for this…" he muttered.

Nergal slept in his special dark wizard throne, (an item imperative for all evil masterminds to have in their lair) snoring incredibly loud. His peaceful slumber was soon interrupted (Hey! This is just like the first chapter!) by a sarcastic, cutting voice.

"Having a good break from your big plan, aren't you boss?" Ephidel sneered, teleporting next to Nergal.

Nergal stumbled up quickly, frightened. "You… get away from my hair… Nino." He yelled in a slurred voice. "I don't want… braids. Don't want… nothing like that…"

Ephidel smiled with a look of pity, noticing the bottles of ale strewn all over the floor, a trickle of beer trickling down his chin.

"Drowning out your sorrows with alcohol, eh boss…" Ephidel wryly chuckled.

"No!" Nergal said, bolting up, trying to cover up all bottles in embarrassment.

Ephidel snickered at his lord's incompetence, and began to contemplate why the heck he was serving this guy.

"Anyway," Nergal said after getting himself together. "Why are you here? I send you to do… stuff."

"Well, unlike you, I'm a genius, so I did some complex equations to do my job very quickly." Ephidel said haughtily.

Nergal nodded. "That sounds good to me." He then paused. "Wait… I sent you to recruit people! What does math have to do with it!"

Ephidel stammered, "Uh… um… well, if I explained it, you wouldn't understand. Piccolo players like yourself shouldn't get caught up in these matters."

"I can do more than just play the piccolo, you know! I act as well! Remember my one man play?"

"You mean, The Young and the Homicidal? Oh wait…" As Ephidel remembered more and more, he started twitching uncontrollably.

"Ephidel, I think you have something in your eye. Maybe you should get that checked out…" Nergal said, noticing the sage's chronic wincing.

"No, it's… nothing…" Ephidel said, the bad memories slowly leaving him. "So, back on topic. I have a bunch of guys under your employ, just like you asked."

"Ah yes! Those guys! Send them in!" Nergal said, excited for his new minions to come.

Ephidel whistled, and suddenly all the men, which was about 20, warped into the room, very confused.

Ephidel folded his arms over his chest and nodded in satisfaction of his handiwork.

"Excellent Ephidel! You did it! I see a pay raise in your future!" Nergal said in congratulations.

"Does this also mean I get a nice, long vacation?" Ephidel asked eagerly.

"Don't push it. Alright, he we go." He said, taking a deep breath and beginning his proclamation.

"Welcome, welcome, welcome, Grand Army of Nergal, to the beautiful Dragon's Gate! We hope you enjoy your stay! Please register at the front desk!" Nergal said excitedly.

Ephidel sighed in frustration. "Nergal! This isn't a hotel!"

Nergal turned to Ephidel, frustrated. "Ephidel! We need to welcome out guests with open arms, not shun them away. Trust me: I know how to employ people."

"Yeah, the fact you created all of your coworkers sure shows that fact…" the sage said, smirking.

"Must you me so sarcastic all the time? Anyway, I must continue my speech…"

Nergal turned around to a stunned crowd and smiled. "Anyway. I just want you all to know that you'll be regarded as family here. Now I'm sure everyone's asking…"

"…How we get out of here…" a person in the crowd sneered.

"…what your 401(k) package looks like." Nergal continued, unphased. "Well, let me tell you that I've created a very nice benefits package for you all, which we will go into further detail in on day 3 of the seminars, right after the one about money management…"

"WHAT!" the entire crowd yelled.

"Well, what did you think! I was going to let you all become minions without proper leadership and financial backgrounds, did you! I'm not sure if Ephidel told you this, but when you signed up to work for me, you signed up to work for Valor Engineering Systems, my company that I run here."

Ephidel slapped his head in frustration. "Nergal! I didn't hire this people to work in the cubicles of your stupid bankrupt company! I thought the plan was to make them bosses of levels!"

"Was that really the plan?" Nergal asked.

"Of course! It was your idea!" Ephidel said in rage.

"Man. Then I must be getting the wrong messages from Denning…" Nergal said, thoughtfully.

"Or maybe you've been drinking too much Ilian Rum…" Ephidel remarked, grinning.

"Hey! I am not a drunk! Oh wait…" Nergal than turned around to see the audience staring in confusion at the two bickering mages. "Geez. I've got to remember I'm on stage…" he muttered to himself.

Nergal continued his long, long, long speech, and most of the gathered minions were thinking, "What the hell am I doing here…"

3 long hours later, Nergal's pathetic speech was done. Most of the people left very confused, that is, if they weren't in a coma already from the mind- numbing drabble that Nergal's talk mostly consisted of. Nergal, however, was quite pleased with himself.

"So Ephidel, how do you think I did up there?" he said smiling, walking out of the hall.

"Awful." The morph said bluntly, angry from the migraine that plagued him as a repercussion of listening to Nergal's talk.

"Oh, you don't have to lie to me. It wasn't the BEST speech ever, you know…" Nergal laughed.

"Do you even listen to a word I say?" Ephidel said in disbelief.

"What was that?" His master asked.

"I guess not." Ephidel muttered, disgusted.

"So Ephy…" Nergal began.

"Don't call me that…" Ephidel jabbed.

"Sorry. So EPHIDEL… I was thinking that maybe we could celebrate our success in the plan with a round of drinks later. What do you say?"

"Um…" Ephidel said, trying desperately to think of an excuse. "I have to… do important morph… stuff. Like right now." He added, rushing off.

"Oh well." Nergal said, plopping down on the couch, very proud of his achievements. "Denning! Come over here!"

Denning suddenly appeared in front of Nergal, ready to do as he said.

"Get me a drink! The best ale we have!" the Druid said excitedly.

Denning did not move. This not moving lasted for several minutes, until Nergal sighed, and walked to the back of Denning to see the problem.

"Uh! Broken calibrator… busted speech regulator… FLUX!" Nergal exclaimed! " I really HAVE been getting the wrong messages from Denning…"

I didn't really know how to end it, but always had a sneaking suspicion that Denning was a machine…

Anyway, I hope you guys liked that. I had to stay up 'real late to finish that last part, so I don't know what exactly was typing. I hope it was good, though. Anyway, thanks to all my readers and to all who reviewed. Now, I'm not really sure about how the reader response thing goes, and I don't think I'm big enough to defy the system, but I'd like to thank Lemurian-Girl, Rlnaruhina, Dr. D, baka-schala-neko-chan, Levenbreech Vor (kind of), Draknal, Sardonic Kender Smile (have you updated "Huzahh" lately?), Dairokkan, Frodo007, Lord of Pastries, Narakusnoone, and The Hero Hartmut. I'm really sorry that I can't write more about your reviews. Maybe when I know more about this ban… Anyway. Thanks all! I'll write the next chapter quicker…

P.S- For the one who asked; yes, Legault is very sneaky… and he digs Heath… a lot. With all the comments that he makes in the Heath/Legault convos, it's easy to see that. So I decided to make Legault kind of a pervert. Hey! I'm exaggerating character traits here! Plus, Legault is like that in a lot of fan fiction I've read…

P.P.S- For those of you who are confused about the "piccolo" thing... It's just a joke I made about Sardonic Kender Smile's review. Just to clear things up (if any of you even cared...)

But in short, Legault rocks. He's in my top 3 favorite characters!

- General Subwoofer