Quantum Scrambled Eggs
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Chapter 4
Gourry stepped into the tavern, one of several in Atlas City, but this one was by far the seediest he'd ever seen, but it was rumored to have the best food, too. Gourry shrugged in indifference, if he didn't like it he'd take his money from the caravan guard job he'd just completed and eat somewhere else.
Gourry sat down and a waitress came along and took his order. Her eyes boggling at the triple portions of the two main dishes and one of all four of their salads that he ordered, evidently she thought it was a bit much for someone to eat, even for someone of Gourry's stature.
While he was waiting Gourry heard some of the other caravan guards talking, they'd come here immediately after arriving Gourry guessed. He had gone off into the small woods outside the city and tested something out. It was the book, part of it hadn't made much sense, detailing something about detaching the blade and calling the light… so Gourry had finally gotten around to testing it, and that light-blade, his hilt, named the Sword of Light, according to the book, had cut through even the largest of trees with ease. The book also had a section on the non-standard tactics that the previous bearers had used to kill various monsters and demons.
Gourry had continued eating and listening to the conversation between the other guards, it wasn't eavesdropping, not when they were talking that loudly. Something about a previous job, an encounter with bandits harassing a group of beautiful women who would be eternally grateful to the men that saved them, all in all it sounded like a fairy-tale, but it was rather entertaining nonetheless.
• • • • • • • • • • •
Ten days later, Gourry found himself in the middle of a forest. He didn't have a mercenary job because he was just wandering, taking a break from all the work for a little while, after all he had the funds to do so for a bit, and he wanted to explore the world around him.
He was walking along, minding his own business when he crested a rise just in time to see what was obviously a bandit bulling an innocent victim, in fact he could just hear the lead guy say, "Prepare to die, we'll shred you into mincemeat!"
Gourry did what any decent guy would do, he intervened, shouting "You'll do no such thing!" It had the desired effect, drawing the group's attention to him. Next, he figured to offer them a chance, "If you want to live you'll run away now, if you do that, I might not hunt you down and slaughter you like the scum you are."
Gourry reviewed that in his head for the instant it took to draw his sword, it sounded too… too… well it didn't sound right. He'd have to think of something better, but later, as the fight demanded his attention.
"Shut up! You stay out of this, it's not your business!" The lead man said, taking a step towards Gourry. He probably meant it to look menacing, but it came off as unsteady and unsure."Who the hell are you, anyway?" The bandit asked.
"Why should I let Scum use my name?" Gourry retorted, bring himself into a defensive stance ready to spring to the offence. Taking in the placement of everyone he figured he'd have enough time to yawn between opponents… but he would keep on his toes, there's not any point in opening yourself to underestimating your opponent.
"Great, it's a battle of cliched men." Lina muttered under her breath, Gourry couldn't hear that because of the indignation the bandits were voicing.
The bandit's leader suddenly ordered them all to attack Gourry first. Which was what he'd hoped, the easiest plan was useless if they came at both of them or just concentrated on their victim, but they'd played into his hand. Their charge was doomed as it began, Gourry's opening strike knocked swords out of two bandit's hands and sliced off the straps of a breastplate on a third. Gourry didn't particularly want to injure anyone, but then again he wasn't adverse to killing the whole lot of them if he had to.
Gourry sprinted into a counter-charge just as Lina was contemplating helping the big guy out, but on second thought… "Eeeek, Help me! Save me! Ohhh, eeeek!" Lina screamed, it was after all the part that the girls were supposed to play when their hero came to save the day.
A short time later Gourry had dispatched the last bandit, save their boss-man, with a solid strike to the neck with the flat of his blade. This left Gourry and the boss, who fell into a circling duel-like 'dance' … which was cut short by the sudden movement Gourry made when he lunged forward and bounced around to the guy's side, just out of sword-reach.
"Ha, what kind of swordsman are you? You didn't even hit me!" The bandit thrust a finger at Gourry, causing his clothes to fall off and into a nice ring-shaped pile around his feet. "Guh-uh, I-I-eeee…" The bandit sputtered then ran off in shame.
"Hey, that wasn't bad." Lina said, almost high praise, as she looked up at Gourry.
Gourry turned to the bandit's victim, "Are you alright?" he said in as smooth a manner as he could, then got a good look at Lina. There she was, a blazing red-haired girl, short, probably twelve. Gourry couldn't help a jaw-dropped stare at the small girl.
'Oh wow! He's totally stricken with me!' Lina thought, 'My, slim, sleek, extra-petite body, my big expressive eyes, my super-cute face… he's hopelessly in love with me, love at first sight!'
"Um, hey, little girl, where's your parents?" Gourry said, looking around for anyone who she could be traveling with, while muttering to himself, "Ah, I guess everyone you save can't be a babe… well, even wide-eyed little girls need help too… I guess it could be worse, it could be a nun… or a small boy who would idolize me and follow me around like a stray dog."
Lina's spirits crashed with the first part… sure she was kinda short for her age, and underdeveloped, but… what the heck was that about nuns and idolizing dogs? "Sometimes I wish my hearing wasn't quite so good, like now." Lina muttered to herself.
'Well, he probably thinks I can't hear him grumbling, and he did save me… even if I had everything under control myself, so I should thank him, it is how I was raised.' Lina thought to herself, then turned to Gourry, who was mentioning how out-of-luck he was. "Gee, thanks-for-saving-me." Lina blurted out, it was forced and sounded like she was saying something distasteful.
"Eh, no problem, little-girl, there's no need to thank me…" Gourry replied. "Were you hurt?"
"Little-girl?" Lina questioned the big blond swordsman.
"Well, it's dangerous for little-girls to go walking out alone… Say, where are your parents?"
"Oh, I'm all alone." she answered, intending to explain it further.
"That's no good." Gourry interrupted, "I suppose I'll have to walk you home, which way do you live… this way?" Gourry pointed down a side path that could have been a farmers path or a game trail.
"Wait, no, I'm fine… hold it." Lina said.
"That way?" Gourry pointed down the road Lina had come.
"Hold it!" Lina screamed, getting fed up with this guy and his 'big-brother-ing'.
Gourry looked up at her and stared, waiting for her to explain or say something.
"Well, um, you see, I'm traveling, um, alone…" Lina said, then realized that was no good for getting rid of this guy, "I was headed for Atlas City! Wanna take me there?" She hastily added, question and all, hoping that it would too far out of his way, and at ten days away, Atlas City was pretty far away. 'He cant buy that.' Lina thought to herself.
"I see." Gourry said, nodding. "You poor thing, it's so far away and you have to go there all alone… but don't worry, you're not alone any more, I'll take you to your home in Atlas City!"
"Uh, well, I…" Lina was surprised at his readiness to help someone, she'd really been hoping to get that ridiculous idea out of his head. "I just like to travel around and see things, ok?"
"Well then it's settled, I'll see you to Atlas City!" Gourry declared, sure this little-girl seemed a bit weird, like she was trying to get rid of him or something. But it simply wouldn't do to leave a little-girl wandering about all alone.
'Whoa, whoa, whoa!' Lina thought, 'Slow down buddy, you're so quick to help me out that you're a nuisance!'
"I understand completely, you need somebody to take you there." Gourry continued.
'No, Atlas City is TEN DAYS from here! If I spent that much time with 'big-brother' here, I'll get a stomach-ache from the stress!' Lina thought, frantically trying to find a way to dissuade the guy of his notion of escorting her.
"Now that I have everything straight, let's be off!" Gourry said with finality and firmness that made Lina wish she'd just left it at 'thanks mister' and walked off.
"But that's not 'straight' at all!" Lina mumbled… "Oy, this guy…"
"Oh, right! I haven't given you my name." Gourry said, "I'm Gourry Gabriev, a traveling warrior and mercenary."
"Now look!" Lina began, but then thought better of it, he did seem like a decent sort of guy, and he was only being helpful… and he was genuinely concerned about her… so maybe it wouldn't be so bad to let him escort her to the city.
"Come on," Gourry said, his next statement toppling the scales Lina was mentally balancing, "I'll get you something off the kiddie menu in the next village, alright?"
Gourry had already begun to walk back in the direction of Atlas City, when he stopped and turned around. "Oh yeah, little-girl, I forgot to ask, what's your name?"
"It's Lina." Lina half-yelled at him, just before breaking into a trot to catch up with him, "Lina Inverse!"
• • • • • • • • • • •
Later, Gourry and Lina made their way into a small village just outside the woods. It being slightly after noon they were both very hungry. So, upon finding a restaurant they immediately entered and were led to their table quickly by the waiter, who handed them their menus and waited at the edge of the table, as everyone else had already ordered he could afford to wait on a bit for these two to order.
"Well… What should I get?" Lina asked eyeing the menu suspiciously.
"I said it's my treat…" Gourry said with a smile, "so get whatever you like."
Lina's head shot up, "Really? You're not kidding are you?"
"Nope." Gourry replied, "get whatever you want."
"Okay!" Lina exclaimed, motioning the waiter over she indicated a whole section of the menu, "I want all of these."
"Wha…" The waiter looked at the courses she indicated, then back at her, there was no way she'd be able to finish this. Maybe he could win some money from the cooks by betting that she wouldn't be able to eat it all. "Okay miss." he said with a twinkle in his eye.
"And I'll have…" Gourry stared at the menu for the briefest of seconds, then indicated what he wanted, "This, this, this… and this… in triple portions."
"Triple portions?" The waiter stared at Gourry, sure he was big, but twelve meals… this might be his lucky day, he could finally win back some of that money he'd lost making stupid bets, now he could start making smart ones.
When their food arrived Gourry and Lina attacked it like voracious, ravenous animals, thereby scaring most of the rest of the other patrons out of the establishment. There were several small fights when Lina strayed from her side of the table into Gourry's food, but other than that it was peaceful, as peaceful as two people eating at accelerated rates, emitting occasional slurping dinnertime sound, and grunting at each other occasionally can be that is. The waiter, who observed all this, looked on with horror.
• • • • • • • • • • •
"Ah, I'm so full…" Lina sighed.
"Are you sure, there's some soup left." Gourry said, nodding to a bowl that was only a quarter full.
"Oh, no. I couldn't…" Lina laughed, then gestured to her belly, "See, my stomach's about to burst."
"I see." Gourry said, glancing down, "It looks ready to pop like a balloon…"
"What was that?" Lina demanded.
"Um, nothing at all." Gourry said, though a bit defensively, "Nothing worth fighting over, anyway."
"Pardon me good travelers." Came the voice of an old man, interrupting the fight's beginning and drawing attention to himself.
Gourry and Lina looked up to see a wizened old man with a walking stick approach them. He had odd hair that flared out and a long, white beard that drooped nearly to his knees, though the most remarkable thing about him was that he was shorter than even Lina.
The old man stopped right before the table and coughed a few times. "I am Saman, the elder of this village." he said, then continued after coughing once more, "Excuse my again, but would you, miss, happen to be Lina Inverse, the famous sorcery genius?"
Gourry looked up at Lina who was acting embarrassed, like she would laugh or blush any second, she did neither, instead she rubbed the back of her head and said "Well, um, yeah, that's me."
"What?" Gourry blinked at her for a moment, "So you're a sorceress?"
Lina's eyes suddenly narrowed at Gourry, "What, did you think I dressed this way for fun? Of course I am, what did you think I was?"
"Well, I thought you could be a waitress or a librarian." Gourry replied so innocently that Lina nearly pulled her own hair.
"What kind of a waitress wears something like this?" Lina demanded angrily.
"Well, I thought it could be one of those theme restaurants…" Gourry explained, it made sense, in the kind of way that made Lina grit her teeth.
"Are you blind or stupid?" Lina yelled at Gourry, though she really didn't have to, as he was sitting right across the table from her.
"Excuse me… Might I continue?" The Elder interjected into the blossoming argument thus, once again, preventing a fight between the two, "You see, we have need of you, the Dragon Spooker", for your bandit-killing skills, Lina Inverse."
"So, you're famous are you?" Gourry asked Lina, who merely nodded in response.
"Hold on," Lina began, "bandit killer I can understand… but why Dragon Spooker?"
"It's short for Dragons Step Past Out Of Clear Revulsion." The elder explained, then laughed, "Get it, S.P.O.O.C.R., Spooker?" The whole thing degenerated into a coughing fit that ended with the old man hacking something up just in time to beg Lina not to hurt him.
Fortunately for the old man Gourry had restrained Lina from using her chair to bludgeon the old man to death, and when Lina had calmed down enough the elder continued once more, after explaining once more that he didn't make it up.
"So what do you want from me?" Lina asked, forcing herself to be civil, though she was clearly still steamed about the whole 'Dragon Spooker' thing.
"Well, there's a gang of bandits that have been harassing the town lately…" The elder began.
"You mean the Dragon Fangs?" Lina asked, interrupting the oldster once more.
"Oh, so you know about them?" The old man asked in reply.
"Yeah," Lina nodded, sitting back in her chair, "If that's the case, then I've already taken care of them."
"You WHAT?" The elder couldn't believe that she'd taken care of everything…
"Yeah, I got most of them yesterday," Lina said with a grin, then indicated Gourry, "and this guy took care of the rest today."
"Oh, so you mean those guys from before…" Gourry muttered to himself.
"You managed to kill the black dragon!" The elder took a step bak in shock. "The one those bandits were keeping as a pet… the one that made the Dragon Fangs unstoppable for our city-guard!"
"You are truly great, Lina Inverse!" The old man looked like he was about to do a dance, then ran off saying, "I should tell everyone the good news!"
"So, uh, did you kill the dragon?" Gourry asked as the watched the old man leave.
"No, I didn't even know they had one." Lina admitted.
"So then you mean… that there's a dragon running around loose?" Gourry asked calmly.
"I guess." Lina shrugged.
"'I guess'!" Gourry exclaimed in shock, "You've got to do something!"
"It's not really my problem." Lina countered, "but if you want to go hunting a dragon, go right ahead. God only knows where it is now."
"THE BLACK DRAGON!" Came screams from the street.
"God… and all those villagers." Gourry said dryly, making a bit of a joke at the situation.
Gourry ran out of the restaurant dragging Lina behind him only to run into Saman.
"You didn't kill the dragon?" He accused irately, "What is the meaning of this?"
"I never said I killed it," Lina began, "I only said I took care of the bandits, the Dragon Fangs."
"I don't believe this!" Saman said, "How could you not kill it?"
"Well, I didn't know it was there." Lina replied.
"Good lord…" Saman swore as the dragon took a pass at the outskirts of town, snatching two of Phil's prize winning hogs, and turning around in mid-air to take another pass at the village. This time it looked like it would swoop down very near where they were standing.
"So, how much are you willing to pay?" Lina asked.
"What?" Saman asked, tearing his attention from the dragon for a second to stare at the small sorceress standing near him.
"How much, for killing the dragon?" Lina repeated, sure she'd get a good deal out of it.
"T-t-twenty gold pieces." Saman said, it was half of what was left in the city treasury, but if he didn't pay there wouldn't be a city left.
"Hum, thirty." Lina said, making a big show of lolling about.
"That's a lot!" Saman exclaimed.
"Do you want me to kill it before it wrecks your village?" Lina asked.
"Aaaa, twenty-five." The old man offered.
"Lina…" Gourry said in a disapproving tone.
"Fine!" Lina exclaimed, then grabbed Gourry by the collar and began dragging him off, "But you're coming too!"
The dragon overtook Lina and Gourry as they were running, but they finally caught up as they entered a clearing in the wreckage where it had landed.
"Wow! It's huge!" Lina said, looking at the giant black dragon as it ate some bacon, freshly cooked from the remains of what was the village forge.
"How did a bunch of bandits get that thing?" Lina asked Saman, who had somehow kept up with them.
"Legend has it that the gang boss found it when he was a child after it fell from a wagon of a performing circus when it was little… so little that he could carry it in his arms, but apparently he grew."
"Yeah, apparently!" Gourry couldn't believe that Saman had said that… it was rather intuitively obvious to the casual observer.
"Didn't anyone ever tell you to be respectful of your elders?" Lina angrily yelled at Gourry, "Anyway…" Lina became rather sickeningly sweet in her tone of voice, and that spooked Gourry for some reason he couldn't put a finger on.
"Ray Wing!" Lina cast a spell on Gourry that sent him shooting up towards the dragon just as it was raising a three pound slab of pork on a pitchfork to its mouth.
"Distract him for me will you Gourry!" Lina called to him as he sailed.
The only reply he could think of was rather cliched, but it fit the situation, "I'll get you for this Lina!" He yelled back in response as he drew his sword and thrust it into the middle of the dragon's snout, right between the eyes… unfortunately that was he had to hold onto his sword and pray it didn't slip out or he'd be dragon chow, but fortunately he was out of immediate danger, except for the fall that was going to happen because of the wild rearing and whiping of the dragon's neck in response to the pain.
"You'd better leave, it's dangerous out." Lina said to Saman before turning her attention to the black dragon and being hit with an incoming Gourry, who'd been shaken off moments before.
"Get off!" Lina struggled under the dazed form of Gourry. "You're heavy! Get off!"
The dragon, meanwhile, was looking for a better place to eat its catch, and it spied the perfect little garden shed on the other side of the clearing, so it began to move its bulky form across the clearing to the shed. On its way, it almost stepped on Gourry, but there was a nasty squirming thing right under him, and nobody wants to step in a nasty, squirmy-thing, so it sidestepped.
Now, this was all fine and good, except that it made Lina angry, really angry. There was no holding back now. Squirming out from under Gourry she cast a quick revival spell on him, then she smacked him to his senses. "Gourry, I need you to be a decoy again."
"Again…" Gourry muttered, seeming to be in the state right after waking up in the middle of the night, where nothing but sleep matters. "Yeeeeaaaaa." He yawned, which was taken for an agreement by Lina.
This time she pushed him and he stumbled along, waking up only when he was about to fall.
"Whaaaaaaaaaaat!" Gourry screamed as he found himself nearly running at a black dragon, completely unarmed.
Meanwhile Lina was preparing a dragon slave, the most powerful attack spell in all of Black Magic.
The dragon swung its head down to look at Gourry, who did the only thing he could and leapt at his sword, which was still stuck in the dragon. The dragon pulled back, but not quickly enough to prevent Gourry from getting a hold on his sword again. This time he wouldn't let go.
"Dragon Slave!" Lina finished, sending a giant orb of destruction into the giant black dragon.
• • • • • • • • • • •
a few minutes later Gourry was digging himself out of a pile of rubble. Miraculously he'd not been killed by that… overkill of a blast.
"See, Gourry, that's the power of my sure-fire, one-shot, Dragon Slave. The most powerful black magic attack there is!" Lina said, landing softly next to him.
"Please don't do that again without warning me…" Gourry moaned, he'd be sore for a week, if he was lucky… given recent luck it'd be months before he was fully healed.
"But it makes everything turn out right!" Lina protested.
"Like HELL this is all right!" Saman appeared from somewhere, covered in dust and with debris sticking out of his beard.
"Ah, Mr. Saman! Don't forget the money you promised…" Lina said reminding him.
"Like hell we'll pay!" Saman said through grit teeth, or were they grit gums? "You were hired to keep the dragon from destroying our village! Just take a look at it!"
Sure enough, there was a giant crater right in the center of the town, in fact it was so big that most of the town had vanished.
"Gah!" Gourry stared in amazement at the sheer destruction… it was worse that an earthquake.
"Well, the Dragon Slave is pretty powerful, isn't it?" Lina said nodding in agreement with hersef.
"It's TOO powerful!" Saman exclaimed as a mob formed behind him.
"Well, maybe… I think I'll…" Lina said, sounding rather distracted, "let Gourry take care of this!"
Lina ran the other way as fast as she could, with Gourry only steps behind, and fled the mob. What a way to end lunch, being chased out of town, or the remains of one, anyway.
Author's Notes:
Well, this one came out fast, and while it was fun, don't expect another so quickly. I hope you enjoyed it and would like more.