Tabs slipped into the seat next to Nicoli. The bar was bare save for them and the innkeeper who had disappeared on an errand long ago. In fact, the only other people in the inn were a very noise group of four individuals, or at least so Tabs had decided.
She glanced at her companion, who with very intent gray eyes, studied an outstretched parchment. She pursed her lips, and sighed crestfallen as she noticed he had gotten nowhere.
"Silly scroll," she muttered, facing completely forward. Her own image frowned back at her off the dull dirty mirror that spanned the rear wall.
"Hmm?" Nicoli turned his focus to Tabs, seemingly disrupted from straining concentration.
Sipping from her lukewarm beverage, Tabs slanted her eyes sideways and shock her head, thereby signaling no great importance. She sneered as she realized her drink was no longer to satisfaction and, under her breath so as not to startle Nicoli again, cursed the innkeeper. With no reaction from the boy beside her, Tabs hopped off the stool, and strode across the polish planks of the wooden floor to the exit.
"I so needed some fresh air," she said upon feeling the wind whip past her face. The sea filled her senses, a lace of salt and moisture that the breeze carried with it.
Her cramped and tense body began to give way to relaxation. The claustrophobia dying and slowly fading away, a loud crash from within the inn stocked the tension back into her muscles. The sound of rather unpleasant insults flooded from the swinging doors.
With a heaving sigh Tabs started to march down the deserted street. "Those obnoxious kids! No wonder Nicoli can't concentrate properly. Why by the Lady, parents let their children run wild…"
For some time she wondered onward, with, of course, no clear destination in mind. Agitation was something Tabs did not cope with well. Her only concern was to be away from the noisy, cramped inn with that forsaken scroll. Their predicament sickened her beyond her own belief. They had obtain the ancient thing three days prior, and with no great ease, form a particularly nasty Mazoku. Proudly, they had tricked him and over powered him with masterful planning and precision; however, they could not read their gain. Nicoli was an expert linguist, but for three days he had failed to decipher the hidden meaning of the parchment. Tabs knew very well there was no one better for the task.
"Those damn rowdy kids are the cause," she muttered to herself. " I should go back and throw them out on their butts!"
Her cloak sweeping up in the currents of salty air, Tabs turned abruptly. Peering ahead into the setting sun she finally came to a realization.
"Am I the only one out?" she shaded her chestnut eyes from the blaring contrast of gold and lavender. Glancing back and then to and fro she suddenly found that she was truly alone in the road. "The main road of this town no less?" she pondered.
"That is so odd…"
Even though it was tough sprinting in her knee high boots, Tabs took off back toward the inn, confusion and a very uncomfortable feeling sinking within her tummy.
Nicoli's eyes were aghast and shaking, but he spoke with a firm tone, "Put that poor girl down!" He groped for a spell rapidly as he watched the erupted confrontation. "Had they not just been arguing over a plate of food? From where did the lupine come?" Nicoli felt dazed and bewildered.
The monstrous looking fiend responded to his words with neither a glance nor with words. His grip around the poor red headed girl just tightened, and it growled to her.
"Where is the Sacred Scroll?" it vibrated the room.
"Lina! Don't worry, I'm coming!" A rather tall man with long blond locks almost as lengthy as himself cried. A sword blade seemed to spring from the sword hilt he was grasping in his hand. The saffron light that composed the saber constricted in and out with flickers. He drew it over his head, calculating at what time to strike.
"Where is it!" The monster Mazoku's razor teeth edged closer to Lina. She almost fainted from the intensity of its booming voice and reeking breath.
Clenching her own teeth, Lina responded wrathfully, "I don't know what you are talking about moose mouth!"
"Oh my, Ms. Lina, don't make it even angrier!" A dark haired maiden called from behind a scowling blue lad.
Nicoli's heart raced as he prepared to attack the creature, but before he could move the blond charged the monster. The rear two of four ears perked, and Lina saw the creature's black pupils dilate.
"Amelia NO!" called the blue-fleshed lad as the dark haired girl ran to the blond. He lay against the opposite wall have collided with it like a ricocheted stone.
"Mr. Gourry!" she sobbed.
Lina's pink irises flared with flames as she saw the site of her unconscious friend. She struggled to gasp, "You bastrad!"
"My master wants the Sacred Scroll you thieved red-haired sorceress!" the wolf shaped monster squeezed until Lina gagged. Its impossibly large hands thinning and constricting ever more tightly, Lina finally passed out.
"Lina!" The blue companion made ready to assault the creature before it could kill his companion.
Nicoli, deciding he could not allow anyone else but himself to try to defeat the Mazoku, began chanting the words to a spell Amelia and the stunned blue male had never heard.
The beast reared its jaws toward Nicoli, just in time for the silvery blond to clasp his hands for the attack.
"Lady of Nightmare, please let this work," he prayed silently.
The Mazoku released Lina and bounded into the center of the room. The lupine, now being so much closer to Nicoli, grunted, "You hold the scroll of my master!"
Nicoli braced to fire, yet before he released, he was cut off by a voice booming a spell that made Nicoli's throat gulp.
Source of all souls ignite to my call! Everlasting flame of blue, let the power hidden in my soul be called forth from the Infinite...RA-TILT!
The three remaining coherent humans were then blinded in an array of blue and white lights. Ending with a final howl of anguish from the monster, the perfectly executed and contained Ra Tilt diminished.
Nicoli's eyes stared wide and he heard the Amelia girl whimper "Lina…?"
However, Lina Inverse was still knocked out on the floor.
From the entrance the conscious beheld a young woman with flaming auburn hair beating forth in the wind.