Not totally sure about this arc. One thing about Band of Blood Brothers, was that i never gave any screen time to Eck. Not sure if that was good or bad, since i think the character developed in an interesting way. Anyway, when i first wrote this arc, it had Taff and Rendal, both from BBB. I then changed it to Taff and Rykers, a new character. After that, it became Eck and Rykers, which i'm happy about it. I hope you enjoy this arc, and as always, reviews are welcome.

Chapter 7

"Wake up."

Eve Rykers didn't know whose voice that was, or where it was coming from. There was no one around her. She was all alone, in an empty darkness. And she was cold. So cold in the empty void.

"Wake up."

"She heard the voice a second time, a moment before a burning sting settled on her cheek, and she realized she'd been hit. That woke her up, tore her out of the darkness, kicking and thrashing furiously.

She lashed out, and her fingernails dug into flesh before she gained enough composure to look around. Not that that did her much good. The only source of light came from a small window in the door at the far wall. That became her focus. Groping blindly in that darkness, she stumbled and tripped before finally reaching the bars. She screamed. She begged. She stretched her arms through the bars as far as they could go, in a desperate hope that someone would see her. But no one came to her aid.

"Please stop that," said the voice.

"Who are you?" she demanded.

"My name is Jonathon Eck. You?"

"Rykers," she said. The presence of another being was relieving. She wasn't alone in this darkness, thank the Light. "Eve Rykers."

"Stay calm, panicking won't do us any good. Our captors provide us with lanterns. I was saving them for an emergency, for all the good it does us."

A flicker of light. Her company held up a struck match and ignited a lantern, before lifting the illumination to his face, and she shivered. Now she could see the rotting corpse, his

ghostly features and sickly skin a cruel mockery of her noble kind. He approached, and extended a bony hand to nudge her. Years of training told her what to do next. She took hold of his wrist and pulled him close, her thighs closed around his throat. Her feet locked behind his head, and she began to squeeze her legs together, compressing his throat. The lantern rolled off, the light flickering and dancing off the shadowed walls.

The undead wretched and clawed at her thighs, but she held him tight. She wasn't sure if an undead could be killed in such a way. She didn't care. The undead was showing he was in pain, and that was good enough for her.

Then he bit her. He opened his jaws and closed them around her inner thigh. Jagged teeth tore clothe and flesh. The throbbing pain rattled into her leg, and she immediately pushed herself away. Upon inspection, she decided the wound was not too deep, and so she pressed her attack. He was stumbling, trying to escape. She dove upon him. Her fingers found his throat, and she placed her full weight behind her hands.

His forefinger and thumb pierced into her eyes, and it was only her backing away that kept the fleshy orbs from popping. She stumbled to her feet, only to be met with a fist into her gut, another across her jaw. She stumbled down, and the undead swung a kick into her ribs.

She heard a loud, groaning whine, but was confused as it wasn't her own (she wouldn't give the undead the pleasure of showing pain). She looked up to see the undead's attention had left her, and smiled at her advantage. A strong kick to his knee knocked him down. She smashed the sole of her foot into his snout. Then, mounting his back, she coiled her arm around his throat and began to squeeze the life from him.

There would be no escape this time. The undead could thrash and kick all he wanted, but he couldn't break her hold. She wrapped around him like a constrictor, squeezing him until his struggles grew faint and weak.

"Please."

The word was forced out of the undead's collapsing, rotting throat, so Rykers wasn't sure if she had heard right. The second time he said it, "please," it was undeniable. She eased her arm, just enough that he could take a shallow breath in.

"Please spare me?" the undead said.

She was about to wretch his head from his shoulders, but she caught herself, and instead asked, "Why should I spare you? Why does a monster like you deserve mercy?" She tightened her grip until he choked, just to display her power.

"Because if I die, there will be no one to care for her."

Rykers followed the undead's gaze, and looked a few feet to the left to where the lantern had rolled, and she noticed a vast form of muscle and fur. A tauren, Rykers thought.

The undead swung his head back into her nose. He was given enough to scramble out from her. He moved to the tauren cow's side, and took up a defensive combat stance.

Rykers looked to the undead, to the tauren, and back to the undead, slowly gathering herself and rising to her feet. He was a sickly looking thing, as most of his kind was. Pale skin clung stubbornly onto sun bleached bones. Greasy hair hung down at little past his ears. His jaws, those same jaws that had bitten her, were jagged and his teeth stained. He was nude, save a pair of tattered pants, torn before his knees so clawed toes were exposed. There was no flesh on his joints: the bare knees or elbows, and she wondered how the abomination was able to stay intact. Just a testimony to the dark magic that sustained it.

But the tauren. Rykers had worked with night elves on occasion, and they often spoke of the tauren's good nature, their honor, their calmness. What was one doing in the company of an undead wretch?

"Who are you?" Rykers demanded. The tauren was unconscious, so she wouldn't posse a problem. And she knew she could kill the weak bodied undead. She would kill the undead, but before that, she wanted answers.

"Sergeant Jonathon Eck of the New Horde," he said, looking over his shoulder. He picked up the lantern and inspected the tauren with gentle care. His attention was on the tauren cow, tending to a nasty wound on her left breast. She had a fur pattern like an animal: ebony black with sizeable white spots sprinkled throughout. She was a huge creature, drastically larger than Rykers, or the undead who cared tenderly for her. Yet she was on the ground, defenseless, weak. Rykers didn't allow her attention to wane. Her focus was on the undead.

"Lay one hand on her, and I will kill you, human. I don't know how, but I will."

The warning was unnerving, but Rykers clenched her fists together and demanded, "Where are we?"

"I don't know," the undead said.

"You're lying."

"No. I don't know. I was working in Thousand Needles with Samsera, this tauren. We were attacked," he said, turning to the paladin, anger burning in his eyes. "By you humans. When I woke up, I was in this cage. Sam had been shot in the struggle. That was four days ago.

"That's a lie," Rykers grunted. "That wasn't our humans. It couldn't have been. They wouldn't have attacked me."

"Perhaps your little Alliance has finally imploded."

Rykers clenched both hands together, before swinging them into the undead's skull in a motion similar to swinging a sledgehammer. Eck crumbled, rolling along the ground before coming to rest a few feet away. He was slow to rise, bones grinding against each other and filled the cell with a crushing sound.

"You will show me respect. I am Private Eve Rykers, soldier of the noble Alliance and a warrior of the Light. I could banish you to eternal damnation with a single word."

"Go right ahead," the undead said. He turned his attention back to the tauren, bony fingers brushing over the bloodied fur of her chest. "Your magic won't work human. Neither does mine. If only it did, I could help her."

Rykers tried to let the Holy Light fill her, like she had done a hundred times before. But she couldn't feel it within her. "What happened?" she screamed.

"Our captors are not stupid. They've injected us with drugs, or they have a way to steal our mana. It does not matter. Our magic doesn't work. Our weapons have been taken. There is nothing we can do. At dawn, what I assume its dawn, guards will come in and beat us. And they will leave just enough food to get us through the day, and a fresh candle. And then they will be gone."

"You pathetic little bastard. You just give up?"

"I cannot try anything. Then there would be no one to care for Sam."

"Keeping your meat fresh?"

When the cow began to thrash, Eck placed a gentle hand on her, soothing her into calmness. "We are given a minimal of food and water. If she should die, then I will do what I must to survive. But so long as she lives, I must help her."

"You're a monster," Rykers muttered.

"Yes," he agreed. "And so is Sam. Us monsters have to stick together."

---

Wonki didn't like running. Short stubby legs and small lungs meant sprinting was nearly impossible. The fact that she was chasing a human: long, lanky, athletically built, didn't really help matters. She had one advantage however. The streets of Sentinel Hill were littered with vendors and farmers. Small and agile, she could easily scurry through the civilian's legs. Her target wasn't so lucky, and clumsily stumbled through the crowds, tripping over carts and pushing people out of his way.

The target was Braze "the Red" Leary, a suspected member of the Defias Brotherhood. A rash of kidnappings had lead to a standard investigation, and the investigation would start with interrogation.

Leary turned into an alleyway, then a blind corner, expecting to lose the gnome in the darkness. Instead, he was met by a draenei woman, who took him around the throat and threw him against the wall. She was taller than he, and stronger, judging by how easily she held him off the ground, his legs feebly kicking beneath him.

"Let him go, Gretel," Wonki said.

The draenei let him go, and took a few steps back, standing behind the gnome.

"Now, Mr. Leary. This is how its going to work. I'm going to ask a question. You're going to give me an answer, or I'm going to let my tall, voluptuous friend here do whatever she wants to you. There have been a rash of kidnappings: civilians, soldiers, or any race and gender. Where are they."

"How would I know?" he asked.

Gredel coiled her leg back, before striking forward, the sole of her hoof crashing into his chest. He felt something crack, before bending over in pain.

"We know that the Defias Brotherhood is the ones who have taken them. Where are you keeping them?"

Leary looked away, teeth clenched, hands cradling his ribs. Wonki sighed. "You are going to jail. But if you tell us where we can find the captives, then I can tell my superiors, and you may have a chance at release. To be in the Defias, you have to be skilled. Those skills can be used for the Alliance. But if you keep your lips tight, then I hand you over to Stoutmantle, and I can guarantee execution. He's a bit ornery with your kind."

"Jangolode Mine," he whimpered.

"Jangolode Mine? That's where they are?"

"That's what I've heard."

Wonki brushed her green hair out of her eyes and put it behind her ears. "Makes sense: out of the way, out of sight. No one to bother them. Why are they taking people though?"

He shrugged. "Why not?"