How To Git Gud, Well… Not Really
Chapter 4 – Rafter Rush
"No, no."
"Come on, how hard can it be?"
"No, no, no and don't forget no."
"It's the only way into the castle."
"It's also the only way to an early grave."
"This coming from the woman that wrapped herself around the leg of the Asylum Demon and self-destructed?"
"It was a do or die moment, and you know it."
"No, this is a do or die moment, and we both know it because it is literally the only way to get into the bloody castle guarded by too many spear demons and giants with shields."
"Tch! Where in Gwyn's name did they all get those sick ass spears from anyway? Have you seen them?"
"Yes, I've had the pleasure of being stabbed by a few when you used me as a human shield."
"Details, details."
"They were imbued with lightning, Aria. Yellow sparks of freaking lightning!"
"So, you got spit roasted by a few pale and fleshy poles that ended up finishing too soon. So what?"
"Now you're just wording it like that on purpose!"
"Geez, don't scream so loud. Do you want to attract more of them?"
"I'm screaming because I can't hear myself say shit, those attacks numbed more than just my limbs, you prick!"
Aria closed her eyes and her expression soured as she wiped off the spittle that flew at her like throwing knives. She knew Gordon was procrastinated under pressure; she didn't know much until today. And to think he was so collected when they had prevented a deathmatch with that woman guarding the Second Bell in Blighttown. Then again, perhaps the only reason he had been so driven to prevent harming her – she doubted he could though when she was half arachnid – was because she was smoking hot. And don't forget breathtakingly naked. Don't look at her like that, even a woman could admire another woman when it was obvious who was the better looker.
"Why did I allow myself to get dragged into this prophecy with you?" Gordon muttered to himself dramatically and she rolled her eyes. He always said things like this when he was blaming her for something that had happened to him. Like the time she had 'accidentally' shot the tail of that fire drake and it had burned him to cinders after she had 'nudged' him into view. Or that one time they were hiding from that Knight of Thorns guy and she had thrown a fireball at the Astorian as a distraction so that she could backstab the bastard and send him back to whatever ditch he came from.
"Because you were the one that didn't want to allow that brave idiot in the cell to die needlessly. Honestly, you Astorian's and your chivalry."
It wasn't her fault his size made him the perfect distraction. She was just using that trait of his to their advantage. Even if they hadn't officially agreed on it, it went more or less like this: he would run around in that Elite Knight armour of his like some dipshit in a bedtime story killing hollows and making as much noise as possible, whilst she used her wide array of shoddy sorceries to snag the good stuff, shank the boss and loot his disintegrating corpse before he burst into a mass of souls. Whether he bopped her upside the head every time he resurrected or not with his fist was a small price to pay when the tactic got the job done more times than she could remember.
"Again, you're wrong." Gordon growled as he lifted his visor to plant his grey eyes on her. "It was you that I had to stop from stripping a wounded undead down to his bloody gambeson whilst he was still alive. The reason I decided to continue the prophecy without your consent is because it was both my duty as a knight and common decency after nearly defiling his body like the scavenger you are!"
Aria shrugged, tossing her chestnut hair over her shoulder. "I'm one of the Deprived. Its my nature to not let good shit go to waste."
"As if! I had to stop you from swiping his sword whilst he was still talking."
"And your point?"
Gordon's eyes bugged out of his head as he took a step closer. "He was still alive. Ergo, that 'good shit' was still his shit!"
For the umpteenth time since the two of them began their journey, Aria poked a pinkie into her ear and looked away before saying the words that made her righteous companion's blood boil.
"Velka's scrotum, you shout any louder and you may get indicted. You're disturbing the peace." She watched as Gordon flared his nostrils in rage.
"VELKA'S A WOMAN YOU COCKY DOLT! AND FOR THE LAST TIME THERE IS NO PEACE TO DISTRURB, LORDRAN IS ABANDONED!"
Aria smirked at that reply before winking and striking a pose. "And yet there are still birds flying around."
Gordon stopped his ranting to stare at her blankly. She couldn't be this oblivious… could she?
"There is only one bird in Lordran and that's the familiar of Velka."
"Eh?" Aria froze with her hand still on her hip whilst the other was raised in front of her eye to form a peace symbol.
"The only other creatures that have ever flown in the sky since we've arrived here have been a large drake, the smaller ones outside the New Londo floodgates and the gargoyles and minor demons we just killed off today."
"heh…"
"Also, the fact that you haven't realized this shows you are not only useless at observing your surroundings but also inept at retaining any and all information given to you; especially when it's right in front of you."
"Alright, I get it already, I screwed u- ow! The hell was that for?!" Aria screamed as she rubbed the spot on her head the knight had planted his brace against.
"That was for your stupidity. Now, stop stalling and go up that rafter. We don't have all day."
"Um, we do have all day. The sun never sets if you haven't noticed."
"Don't get smart with me, hurry up and do your job!"
"I don't wanna!" Aria wailed like a child being scolded by her parent to have a bath before bed.
They had arrived at this secluded area of the castle after taking down two Sentinels is and half a dozen winged demons. Whilst it irked him that the ones that had carried them to the Shining City were far more docile than the ones he had been forced to plough through with his straight sword, he had been even more peeved by the inconsistent activity of his 'companion'.
From the first day they had met after being freed by his fellow kinsman to the days that they had spent grinding for souls and humanity in the Undead Burg, she had done nothing but use him for hard labour, a springboard, a cushion to break her fall, and lets not forget all the times he was forced to be the distraction whereby he would undoubtedly lose all the souls he had gained. To make matters worse, when he eventually fought through the revived hordes of foes that conveniently resurrected with him, he would stand before her in confusion when he found that his bloodstain had been pillaged. Besides the fact that she was manipulative, she also had the gall to steal from the one person that actually helped her ass and then blame it on a freaking hollow . For the love of Lloyd, he was as intelligent as Logan and she knew that. Why she couldn't bother to even conjure up a decent lie was just boggling to him.
As for the sorceries she bragged about on a daily basis, it was only because of him that poor Griggs had even agreed to teach her anything – and at a lower price since he felt bad that she was also illiterate – and even after his dedicated tutelage, she could only manage to cast three jittery soul arrows and two pathetic impact-softening chants.
But that wasn't the tip of the snowy peak, no sir! What was, was the fact that the one time she was supposed to be useful and blast one of the stronger monsters in the face, her bloody spell had instead targeted him and ruined not only his beloved armour but caused them to die from decapitation – yet again!
He couldn't even abandon her because it was his knightly duty not to give into his anger. Besides that, she was an absolute cry baby when he had told her to guard him whilst he caught a few hours of shut eye under a smouldered tree. Besides that though, even if he did leave her behind one day while she was asleep – which he contemplated almost every time they rested – her stupidly good luck would just make her encounter another sane undead. And he couldn't allow some poor soul to suffer her disease of obnoxiousness.
Gordon sighed as he watched Aria curl up into a ball and sulk. Out of all the undead he had to encounter in his lifetime, why did it have to be her of all people?! She was the epitome of the word useless, a liability to his equity and a hazard to his health! By the gods, he swore there was literally no one else that understood the suffering he was going through right now.
Meanwhile, in another far away nation, in Axel, a small town in Belzerg, a young boy currently berating a blue-haired goddess for blowing their rent money felt a strange stirring in his chest before he accidentally sneezed in the face of the woman he was shouting at.
"EW! Say it, don't spray it, idiot!"
"Look in the mirror, you sorry excuse for divinity."
"Excuse me, I AM still a goddess!"
"I'll believe it when I see you do something god-like, now cough up that one-hundred-year-old wine you were saving for tonight!"
"Waaah!"
"Enough of your stubbornness, climb the rafter and scout the perimeter."
"Why do I have to do it?" Aria whined, grabbing a hold of his shoulder cape, and wiping her eyes and nose on it.
"THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?!"
The next thing Aria knew, she went face first into the floor, a spot on the centre of her head steaming from the punch Gordon landed on her in anger.
"Owowowowowowow!" she moaned in pain and curled up into a ball.
"Damn ungrateful, stupid, lazy and manipulative…. Urgh!" the Astorian muttered as he lifted a handkerchief to wipe of the snot she left on his garments. As if crap from Blighttown and blood from the Parish wasn't enough, now he had to worry about staining it with vile residue from this wretch's nose?! Screw chivalry for once in his life, he was going to throw her over the damn railing of the balcony they stood on if she pissed him off again.
With a deep breath to calm himself down, Gordon hooked his arms under his companion's armpits and lifted her up. She was lighter than she looked despite the amounts of food she could put away and although she had first appeared before him wearing nothing but chest bindings and a loincloth, she had taken his advice when he said that wearing actual clothing was both protective and more appealing to honourable men. Besides, he may hate her guts from more than one moment in a day but she was still his companion.
"Alright, now listen closely…" Gordon whispered in a soft voice as he placed her battle axe in her hand and straightened the brigand armour covering her chest. "It's just a short run up the beam. You'll need to curve around that pillar but after that the next beam is short than that. After you check the place out you can drop onto that balcony on the right."
She nodded at him with those large doughy brown eyes of hers and he couldn't help but allow a small smile to grace his normally cross features. She made his life worse than hell, but in time like these when she listened to him, she seemed almost like the little sister he had once had when he was human.
"Everything will be alright, I'll follow right behind you when you reach the top, 'kay?"
"Okay." Aria sniffed and placed a determined look on her debatably cute face – he refused to call her anything but mildly attractive when she acted like a little imp that argued like a banshee all the time.
With a fresh burst of courage, she took her first step into the railed rafter. There was no sign of anymore winged demons around and there was no way a Sentinel could be hiding behind the next spire so all was well so far. Soon, Aria began to walk up the beam with steady footing, and then her brisk walk became a confident jog.
She was halfway up the beam when she turned around to wave at him with a joyous smile on her face. Gordon smiled back brightly in reassurance and she beamed at him. There, so she could be a normal girl after all. How pleasing to see.
That pleasant moment became a chaotic dash for her, however, when a pair of arrows the size of javelin's impaled the railing on either side of her, the sharp points hitting her with such impact that she flew back, skidding against the tiles on her ass.
"Silver Knights!"
"Shit, made a run for it!"
She heeded Gordon's words, got up and sprinted for cover behind the next spire. To her extreme right Aria caught a glimpse of shiny steel and finally noticed the archer hidden around the corner of the wall. She paled when he drew back the drawstring of a bow twice the height of herself and picked up the pace.
Another arrow pierced into the left side of the beams railing, showering her with broken stone and dust as the loud sound disorientated her. She screamed as the archer on her right fired off another round that nearly took her head off. Where the Gwyn were these archers coming from and how had they evaded even Gordon's overcautious vigil until now? She was a goner if she didn't make it to that spire, she realized as she rolled under another spear-like arrow. She needed to get there in time, she just had to! But how was that possible when her legs felt like jelly and her heart threatened to burst from her chest in fear.
"Gordon!" she screamed as she continued to run frantically for cover.
The Astorian, meanwhile, was biting back the torrent of laughter threatening to break from his usually calm face. This was just golden! Of course, he had known that there were Silver Knights stationed on the balconies of the castle, he would be a failure of a knight if he had not noticed them from their cover and recognised the classic tactic of defence.
Furthermore, he had known that she would have been forced to run like a headless chicken if she didn't want to die again. In fact, he had behaved so sweetly in order for her to amble on forward blindly with only his word as her trusted map. And he was loving every second of dismay she was currently facing. It would serve her right for all the times she had taken advantage of him. She knew he was too virtuous to strike a woman, no matter her classification as beast, human, undead or otherwise so she had capitalized on making him seethe in anger every time she did something to intentionally annoy him. However, he was not the Chosen Undead for nothing – that was right, he was the undead of prophecy, not her. By the stars above, the world would have decayed long ago if it were her.
Thus, his subtle form of manipulation would do to calm his revenge… for now anyways.
"Gordon!" Aria screamed in terror. She had managed to make it to the spire for cover but now she was pinned. The relentless assault of the Silver Knights pelting her hiding spot with those dragon slayer arrows were impacting with enough force to make her bones shudder, and she feared that soon not even the architecture of the castle would protect her long before one of those arrows got lucky and stuck her forehead to the stonework like some coat on a hanger.
Right at this moment, she needed Gordon. Not so that she could claim the glory by using him as a decoy, but so that he could be a decoy that saved her life.
Aria snapped her head behind her so fast she thought she would get whiplash, scanning around for the familiar tall mass of armour and thick cloth but found nothing but the corpses of winged demons on the balcony she had just been on.
Horror filled her lungs and she was about to call out his name when realization hit her so hard that she fell to her knees and pressed her back against the spire being eroded by the continuous flow of great arrows.
He had deliberately made her run up the beam.
There was no other explanation for it. He usually always did the heavy lifting and scouting for her either due to his moral compass or her nonstop nagging. Why hadn't she noticed it sooner?
Whilst she could have attributed his command for her to survey the area for a change could be due to him being tired after killing both Sentinels and being her human shield, it didn't explain why he wasn't anywhere in sight. Furthermore, why was he not in sight when she was his companion? Did the bastard not have a heart?!
Rage filled her head, drowning out the sound of arrows pelting her spire as she rose to her feet again, his name on her tongue as she prepared herself for the curse of a lifetime. He knew very well she was one of the Depraved. Now, whilst the tales of the Goddess of Sin were more or less obsolete, that did not mean she was ignorant. In fact, she had had the great fortune of being raised in the miracles of the Witch herself! Of course, she had never really bothered to learn about the deity she worshiped or her incantations, and she had lost the talisman given to her the day after she acquired it. Nevertheless, she still knew how to sully the future of any person she crossed with nothing but a few simple choice words, and boy was she going to make this one memorable.
However, just as she was about to open her mouth to curse the man she had just wanted to cry out for a mere moment ago, the sound of a familiar and annoying creature filled her ears. Not only that, but it had also caught the attention of the Silver Knights trying to pin-cushion her into oblivion.
Aria focused on the sound. It wasn't the sound made by a creature per se, but rather a noise she had heard multiple times because she only knew of one person that it ever came from. Her eyes widened in relief.
"Gordon!"
He was standing at the foot of the beam, catalyst pointing just below the feet of the archer on the right side. Her eyes quickly found the circle of light blue energy that pulsated with each sound that emitted from it.
She should have known. He was just using her distraction as a distraction for the distraction so that she could get inside the castle. He wasn't an asshole, but a genius asshole! She reminded herself to thank him later if he ever managed to get into the castle without her help before she crept around the spire's narrow ledge, under the many arrows drilled into the other side of the stonework, and booked it for dear life.
The Knight on her right noticed her right after her feet touched the ledge of the castle wall and he drew back his drawstring before firing another shot.
"Shit!" Aria cried and dived forward. The arrow struck the spot she was standing in with enough force to crumble a piece of the architecture and she sighed that her reflexes were still good. A glance up at the Knight and a creepy smile broke across her face at the sight of him wobbling to regain his footing.
It seemed he couldn't handle the force the bow left behind after each shot.
She took that opportunity to spring to her feet, draw a dagger from her hip and stalk forward. Unfortunately, the Silver Knight recovered in time to drop his bow down the side of the castle and draw his sword before stepping forward faster than expected.
Aria's eyes widened as the elegant blade of his neared her face before curving upwards at the last minute, missing the tip of her nose. She watched as the Knight lost his footing and tumbled off the ledge with a clatter of metal. She let out a whoop of joy.
"Yeah! Take that you big lump of shiny shi-" she was interrupted from finishing that sentence when a dragonslayer arrow clipped her shoulder from behind, sending her soaring into the air before gravity made her plunge downwards into the dark nothingness below. Aria fell like a stone to her death but not before she was allowed to have the last say.
"GORDON, YOU SONVA BIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII-"
Splat!
The Astorian Knight simply huffed as his invisibility spell wore off before giving the last remaining Knight a good boot, sending him bouncing against the wall before he too spiralled down into the chasm below.
He could deal with a few curses from his stupid comrade. Its not like Oswald couldn't just disperse them. After all, didn't he say that all sin was his domain? Whilst he rid himself of the curses from his foolish bimbo of a partner, he could also ask for forgiveness for causing her to die intentionally. That had been rather crass of him.
He shook his head as he dropped the visor of his helmet and walked around the corner of the precarious ledge before finally dropping down unto the balcony of the castle with a satisfied sigh. He still felt guilty for purposefully allowing Aria to fall to her death but he had to admit it felt nice to reach a new and beautiful area without her foul mouth ruining everything and anything for him.
With a slow but cautious walk through the warm corridor of Anor Londo, he approached a door on the left side and turned the handle, sword in hand just in case. What greeted his weary eyes was the sight of a large bonfire soaking the room in orange and an Astorian he was more than happy to bound over to despite how dead his body still felt after those lightning-infused stabs. Solaire turned his head a fraction as he shut the door with a loud bang.
"Praise the goddamn Sun!"
"Gordon! What a pleasure indeed!" the Sun Knight exclaimed as he nodded at his friends greeting before he posed with his arms raised skyward.
Days may be dark – well not in the literal sense – and his soul count may have been flowing as freely as the blood that ran out of his veins whenever his idiot of a partner backstabbed him instead of the enemy, but when the envoy of the Sun met his gaze, it was as if even Death itself had been torn asunder by such a warm welcome.
"I see you beat us to the castle." Gordon said as he plopped down next to his fellow Astorian, sighing out in relief as the flames spiralling around the coiled sword dug into his muscles and eased away the wearing knots of the day.
"And I see you are tailless as far as company goes."
"Touché," the Knight scoffed and took off his helmet to allow his dark hair to rest against his cheeks. "When did you get here? I thought you were still resting at Firelink?"
"Oh, I left there quite a while ago." He replied, offering his friend a teacup he had conjured as if from thin air. "I actually just arrived here half an hour ago."
"Really now? With how cosy you look it's like you've never left this unnecessarily large room." the Chosen Undead quirked and took a grateful sip of the beverage offered to him before smiling broadly. How Solaire managed to slay monsters like they were sport, arrive at destinations before he and Aria even began their trek and had the time to brew a fantastic cup of tea was beyond him. If the Astorian didn't know anything about the Sunlight Covenant, he would have called his Sun-Bro a wondrous body, and not the magnificent orb in the sky.
"Truly? My, my, Gordon… if you scrutinise everything about me at first glance as closely like that, I might assume you have feelings for me, haha."
Gordon chuckled and slapped his friend on the shoulder.
"Well, you're not entirely wrong, although my eyes are set on a member of the opposite sex, unfortunately."
"And I bet I know just who that member is," the Sun Knight said casually, swirling his tea around like the most astute gentleman in the room – and in comparison to Gordon, he most likely was.
"Do you know?" he lifted an eyebrow and fed a small amount of souls into the fire to strengthen his agility; he would need it when fighting Gwyn's loyal Knight's. "I bet you're wrong."
"What is it you would like to wager then?" Gordon turned his head towards Solaire. He really wanted to bet on his love life? Oh well, it was Solaire he was talking about. If he had to trust anyone in this world with a secret, it would always be his Sun-Bro.
"How 'bout this?" Gordon hauled out a twin humanity from his pocket. Gambling with souls wasn't worth the effort since obtaining them was easier than breathing. Armour and weaponry were also useless because it needed to fit the person's fighting style and look. So, the last resort to any betting the Chosen Undead and the Sun Warrior engaged in revolved around currency like humanity, trinkets and knick-knacks that looked cool or shiny.
"Hmm…" Solaire mused for a moment before pulling out a handful of coins engraved with the face of Allfather Lloyd. Gordon eyed it with an impressed look on his face.
"Sweet."
"Why, thank you."
"We'll say the names out at the same time. Count of three sound good?"
"Sounds great."
"Okay, in three… two… one."
"Aria." "Quelaag."
Both men turned to face one another before Solaire placed the coins into Gordon's outstretched palm with a shrug.
"The Daughter of Chaos?"
"Yep."
"So, not the Depraved?"
"Not even if the sun fell from the sky."
"But I thought the Fair Lady would have been more to your liking."
"Yeah? Why's that?"
"She's quiet."
A comfortable silence covered the two of them as they drank from their cups. After Gordon had prevented a battle between an Izalith Sister and carted over forty sprites of humanity into her ailing sibling, the dark-haired beauty had softened up to him a tad – although she still threatened to boil his groin off if he ever came closer to her sister.
In that time, Solaire had been allowed to visit, and although he couldn't communicate with the two survivors of Izalith like Gordon could due to him possessing a special ring, he had still acquainted himself well the two of them – enough so that he was their ally.
"While I agree that the Fair Lady's a dame… I prefer a woman that's more outspoken."
"Ah! Like dear Aria, yes?"
Gordon growled. "I said outspoken, not manipulatively nagging."
He heard Solaire chuckle before he placed down his teacup and asked the question that had been weighing on his mind from the moment his friend entered.
"That reminds me, where is the young lady? I had thought she was stuck to you like glue."
At the mention of the whereabouts of his annoying teammate, Gordon's frown turned into a pleased smirk as he shuffled around to face the Sunlight Warrior.
"I'm glad you asked. You see, what happened was we…"
It was three and a half hours later when the door of the Chosen Undead and Sun Warriors sanctuary was opened to admit one bloodied, ruffled and positively pissed off Aria that held the sword of a Silver Knight in her right hand.
Her eyes scanned the room until they landed on an Astorian Knight with a pleased smile on his face. She snarled like a rabid dog before limping forward.
"Glad you could make it, Aria. Old Sol and I were about to brave Sen's Fortress a second time when the day started to grow dark. Oh, wait, I forgot, the sun never does set in Lordran, does it Bro?" Gordon asked, looking back at his helmed friend.
"Indeed, it does not."
Aria simply spat in reply as she glared at her comrade with a lazy eye before flipping him the bird.
"Up yours, tree hugger."
Gordon raised an eyebrow and gaze her a once over with his eyes.
"Oh, I'm sure those Silver Knights did more than that to you in the time I was away. Why look, you're even walking funny. Did they just slap that ass of yours or did they really grab it?"
Aria snarled at her teammate again before the cusses rolled forth from her mouth like water in a stream as the Astorian simply folded his arms and chuckled in amusement.
As the scene continued to play out, Solaire cupped his helm where his chin should be before nodding to himself in certainty.
"My, my… What excellent jolly co-operation the two of you possess."
Ahhhhh! I really, really, really enjoyed writing this! I originally intended for it to only be about 3k in length, but it ended up going over 5k. Oh well, hope you all enjoyed, nonetheless.
On to other awesome news, Oregairu Season 3 has begun already, if you didn't know. From the site I'm using, episode 6 has just aired. Ah, for those of you who don't know the Japanese name, I'm talking about the anime called 'My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU'. Things are really heating up and hot damn I feel so bloody nostalgic.
Anyway, please leave a review, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Flames are always accepted. Peace out!