Guess who's up and writing at three in the morning again.
So I noticed that 75% of these chapters mention Dage's…supplies or something relating to the topic in some form or another. I decided to raise it to 80%.
I will also warn you that this chapter is very very inappropriate so kiddies, stay out and for those of you who still want to keep going, brain bleach is needed.
Though I could have made it even more inappropriate, I decided not to. There is a point when you have to draw the line and say "Enough."
Stop Talking Unless You Have a Death Wish!
The day after Dage the Evil's surprise victory over Nulgath, the world had settled down if only for a short while.
The heroes who had fought against each other during the bloody fiasco were now greeting each other as old friends in the not so quiet town of Battleon. With the conflict over, there was no reason for any immediate bloodshed.
Mostly.
After managing to cause chaos on both sides of the Nulgath and Dage clash, the three friends-soon-to-be-bitter-enemies decided to hide out in the Battleon inn to wait the trouble out.
Of course, as soon as the trouble blew over, things got too boring for a certain monster. And when things became too boring, it got dangerous.
"Hey, Ash?" Ty said, pulling up her hood. There seemed to be a chill in the air. "Do you ever have one of those days where you wake up and say 'oh boy. I can tell that this is going to be a shitty day. I really should just roll over and die' or something along those lines?"
Had Ash been fully conscious, he would have replied 'But that's been every day.' Instead, Ty's words bounced off of him and flew into the abyss.
"C'mon, Ash. It's been weeks." Ty heaved a heavy sigh, her shoulders slumping as Alison yawned.
Just then, the door of the inn swung open and in walked the ranger from the Sandsea. An idea to ward off boredom formed in Alison's head and like most ideas that spewed forth from her mind, it wasn't safe for any mortal's soul.
"Zhoom? What are you doing here?" Ty noticed the ranger enter the inn, stuffing another spoon of vanilla ice cream to a still very catatonic Ash.
He hadn't recovered from his mental breakdown and kept muttering nonsense as the white cream dribbled down his chin.
Alison would have made a crude comment about this but her attention had already turned to the half-elf.
"Greetings, Ty," Zhoom bowed to his old friend before nodding politely to Yulgar who was behind the juice bar. "The war between the forces of evil has ended with a clear victor. I was coming to see if the relations between the heroes of Battleon have remained civil."
"So you're here to see if we haven't started to put bounties on each other for obscene amounts of gold."
"Basically."
"Some things never change." Ty and Zhoom laughed together.
"But what about you?" Zhoom pulled out an empty chair and sat himself down between Ty and Alison. "I've heard rumors that you disappeared after the first victory on Dage's side. And another thing, is he okay?" Zhoom frowned at Ash's empty-eyed stare.
"No," Ty stated bluntly, shaking her head as she glared at her sister. "Absolutely not."
"Twenty years." Ash mumbled, briefly glancing at Zhoom.
"Oh and you see, some stuff happened and now I can't look Nulgath in the eye anymore and Alison isn't allowed to go see Dage and they won't tell me why," Ty coughed into her fist, eyes shifting from one end of the inn to the other. "Luckily, Dage booted Nulgath out of this dimension like a busty bikini model body slamming the competition away from the camera and off of the boat. I don't need to see that creep ever again."
"Interesting choice of comparison," Zhoom said, checking around the inn as he tried to push the strange picture that he had conjured up to the back of his mind. "I see that no one's taking the result of the conflict to heart."
Heroes from both sides of the war were conversing in the crowded inn like what had transpired the day before had never happened at all. Members of Dage's Legion and Nulgath's Army were standing side by side discussing the weather, organizing adventuring parties and talking about that one weirdo who thought that AQworlds was a dating game and that he was a stud.
"You're out of luck around here, Zhoom," Ty smirked as she dabbed the vanilla smears off of Ash's mouth with a napkin. "We only get rowdy when items and gold are at stake. I think both leaders already knew that."
"I suppose it is so," Zhoom grinned, feeling a sort of relief wash over him. That relief was sucked into the dark void when he noticed that Alison had gained a strange interest in his chest. "So, what have you been doing to keep busy? Whatever you had been doing when you disappeared without a trace that one time?" Zhoom continued, attempting to ignore the undressing stare.
At that, Ash snapped out of his stupor and shivered, reminded of the time Ty had decided to coop herself up in her own house for a week and a half.
She didn't tell anyone so her friends assumed that she had gone on an adventure by herself but usually someone would get a message from her after a few days.
Conveniently at the same time, the bandits activity in the West had ceased almost completely. Once Ty had emerged from her home, the bandits returned at full force with a renewed vigor, giving her and the other adventurers more than enough to handle
"You never did tell us what you were doing that whole time." Zhoom said.
"Yeah, Ty," Alison smirked, her eyes still trained on Zhoom's chest. "Just what exactly were you doing so hard?"
"I want to know too," Ash said, making Ty jump and almost drop the spoon in surprise. Flustered, Ty juggled the spoon until she got a firm hold of the stiff handle. The sticky vanilla ice cream dripped from her fingers as her face reddened from the memory. "What were you doing?" Ash asked, a hint of accusation in his voice.
Zhoom watched the three, wondering if he was missing something important.
Steadily, Ty breathed in and straightened her posture and cape. Regarding the others with calm disinterest, she placed the bent spoon on the table and wiped her hands in a nearby napkin. Leaning herself on the table, she raised her hand and Yulgar came by and placed a small glass cup and a green bottle on the table.
"From your private stash." Yulgar said before moving on to clean another table.
In a lax manner, Ty grabbed the neck of the bottle and poured the clear liquid into the cup, staring levelly into Ash's eyes, making him sink in his chair.
Zhoom read the label on the side of the bottle, squinting to make sure he wasn't seeing things.
100% Bad Boy Tears. Extra Bitter.
Zhoom flinched as Ty downed the entire cup in less than a second before slamming it back on the table and smiling brighter than a group of light elementals at a rave party.
"It wasn't anything I couldn't handle," Ty shook her head and laughed jubilantly, having gained color and strength from the strange drink. "I had good company and they stuck around for the clean up."
Ash gulped and folded his hands neatly on his lap. Alison nodded and leaned in closer to Zhoom's chest.
The air around the table became heavy and at another table nearby, a necromancer's nose began to bleed from the sudden rise in pressure.
"Anyways…" Ty pushed the cup aside and took a swig from the bottle. "I'm expecting a call today. The Empress will summon me back to Shadowfall and we will discuss how to handle Dage's victory," Ty sighed, anticipating the boring ordeal. "I bet I'll get to hear the full brunt of his smug gloating for the next century. I mean his butt is nice and all but then he starts talking and it's all downhill from there." Ty muttered that last part only loud enough for Ash to hear, making him shudder.
"Ty, you do know that you are always welcome to come back anytime you…Alright, what are you looking at?" Zhoom turned to Alison, unable to ignore her staring any longer.
Alison didn't answer immediately. Rubbing her chin thoughtfully and nodding to herself, she sat back up and said "I was just checking to see if the rumors I heard were true."
"What rumors?" Zhoom narrowed his eyes and Ty and Ash exchanged a worried glance. Ty took the bottle off of the table, worried that what was about to ensue would spit the table down the middle.
"The one about how elves can shoot streams of razzle-dazzle from their nipples when they're mad." Alison announced loudly enough for the adventurers on the second floor to hear.
All commotion in the inn died down as Zhoom's jaw became slack. Glasses were dropped and the air in the room went dead still. All eyes had turned to him either from morbid curiosity or creeping dread.
Wordlessly, Ash and Ty stood and left the table, heading for an empty one on the other side of the inn.
"Pssst," A cleric leaned over to a necromancer. "Are we allowed to say the word…" She looked over her shoulder nervously. "Are we allowed to say nipple?"
The necromancer flinched, assuming the worst was about to happen. His worries were met by silence as Alison reclined back in her chair with a smug grin, making a tweaking motion with her thumb and index finger at Zhoom's chest.
"If that's the case-" Alison said, hearing the cleric's concern. "Let me reword it. Zhoom, is it true that elves can shoot streams of razzle-dazzle from their sensitive chest raisins when they're mad? And since you're half-sand elf, does that mean you can only shoot with one?"
"What kind of nonsense are you going on about?" Zhoom asked through clenched teeth. The muscles in his arms strained to keep themselves under control and a vein was bulging out in his neck.
Their audience watched cautiously and the only sounds that could be heard in the inn were the bated breaths of the adventurers and the shuffling of those on the second floor, trying to slide closer to get a better look.
"What's razzle-dazzle?" Ash asked Ty from behind a group of adventurers that they would use as shields when the situation became ugly.
To the question, Ty shook her head and bit down on her lip. If the rumor that Alison supposedly heard was right, they were all going to drown in razzle-dazzle anyway.
"They also say that the prettier the elf is, the higher the velocity the stream shoots," Alison kept pressing, disregarding the safety of the other lives in the inn. "If that's also true then I expect yours to have the strength of a rusty water fountain."
Zhoom was speechless and unable to decide whether to take offense to Alison's comment or not. Pumping her head full of arrows was starting to sound like a good alternative.
"Well, Zhoom does look kinda scary sometimes." The cleric whispered to the necromancer again.
"You know what?" Zhoom took the bow that was slung over his shoulder and threw it to the side. "I won't even need that," He said, brandishing an arrow. "I'll stuff it down your throat myself!"
Zhoom lunged for Alison over the table as the girl cackled madly, spreading her arms to will Zhoom to attack. The adventurers gasped and some were about to either flee or join the fray.
Yulgar acted first, jumping in to grab Zhoom around his waist and dragged him off of the table.
"Just let me stab her! Just once!" Zhoom struggled in Yulgar's sturdy grip.
"Sorry, Zhoom. No fights are allowed inside the inn. Both of you, take it outside."
"Careful kiddies!" Alison called out to the audience. "If you look directly at the streams, you'll go blind from the fabulousness."
All at once, the adventurers began to scramble and scatter in a panic. It sounded unbelievable but Lore was built on impossibilities. The fact that elves could shoot streams of razzle-dazzle from their raisins wasn't that hard to stomach.
"Can razzle-dazzle pierce through walls?" An adventurer flipped a small table over and about twenty and a half people jumped behind it.
"Let me stab her! It'll create world peace, I'm sure of it!" Zhoom shouted, gripping the arrow so hard that the shaft had snapped.
"Calm yourself!" Yulgar kept Zhoom in place.
"Yulgar, it's totally fine if you want to throw us out," Ty called over to the man, keeping her spot in the back of the inn. "Just do it. We deserve it."
"I've let stranger conversations fly in this place." Yulgar sighed.
"I'm quite comfortable here, thank you very much," Alison snickered, playing with the ribbons on her dress. "I've been so bored lately without Marshmallow Buns to make fun of and Sugar Buns is way too easy to rile up. Besides, Zhoom was the one who resorted to violence first. Control that temper of yours. Your raisins'll leak and make a mess everywhere."
Zhoom could no longer use real words to voice his rage.
"Hey," Cysero leaned out of the bathroom, letting bubbles and soapy water drip from his damp green clothes. "Is there a party going on out here?"
"No!" The adventurers on the second floor screeched and stuffed him back into the bathroom.
"Can't you stop her?" Ash cradled his face in his hands, his words muffled by his quivering fingers.
"It would take a miracle." Ty replied in a voice that would make even the dead complain that she was a downer.
Then the miniature crystal ball Ty kept in her bag vibrated. It was as if Ty's corpse like voice summoned the Empress of the Undead herself.
"Here it is," Ty rolled her eyes and backed her chair into the corner of the inn to take the call. Ash followed her and leaned in to listen. "My Empress? You wish to summon me?"
"You have received the news by now, yes?" Gravelyn's voice resounded clearly off the walls of the inn, bringing the commotion to a halt. Even Zhoom momentarily forgot about his anger and turned his attention to Ty and the crystal ball.
Alison, irked by the abrupt end of her fun, stood and moved to place herself at her sister's side.
Realizing that they had gained front row seats to an actual 'private' discussion between the Queen of Evil and her Champion, the adventurers scurried forward. Ty took no notice.
"I may have heard about Dage's victory." Ty said with nonchalance, letting the crystal float up into the air.
"Will there be any rifts created in my forces because of this? Perhaps it would be beneficial to slay the remainder of Nulgath's underlings."
"Make an example of them," Another more crackly voice joined the conversation. Noxus. He and Sally must have joined Gravelyn in the throne room. "Show them that there will be no tolerance for failure."
"I would advise against that," Ty interjected, watching the adventurers murmur to each other anxiously. Quite a few of them were part of Nulgath's army. "Though they had been divided by their loyalties to the two commanders, there is no question about their loyalty to you as far as gold and personal gain is concerned."
"A large portion of the war was also fought by mercenaries with no allegiances and even some of Alteon's people joined the fray. Eliminating the leftovers would be a waste of pawns and a waste of time. And if there does happen to be some discord stirred up in our forces," Ty lowered her voice to a darker and more menacing tone. "Let Dage take care of it. What sort of ruler of the underworld would he be if he couldn't handle something as trifling as that."
"I will consider it," The orb flickered with Gravelyn's words. "I expect that you will return to Shadowfall with your kin?"
"Of course, milady." Ty replied, poison laced into her voice.
"This conversation will continue in the evening." Gravelyn said with finality and the crystal ball's red light faded away.
A sigh of relief left the walls of the inn taking with it the prospect of more bloodshed, not that everyone was opposed to the idea. It was just that one war after another would be tiresome and usually the adventurers had about a week to recuperate between disasters.
Slowly, the adventurers began to disperse.
"Speaking of Dage," Alison said, having lost interest in Zhoom's raisins and the adventurers promptly surged back into the room, waiting to see what would happen next. "You know what I'm wondering about?"
"Let it go, man." A warrior patted Zhoom's back as he fumed, relaxing his muscles as Yulgar released him.
"What you're thinking of…" Ash said, scratching the back of his head. "Am I going to have to wash out my brain again?"
"Not this time. What I'm thinking of is tame in comparison," Alison pulled her hair over her shoulder and absentmindedly began to braid them. "Ty, you talk to him a lot, don't you?"
"For official business purposes." Ty said carefully, worried about where her sister was taking this.
"If your eyes were pointing where I think they were pointing, do you happen to know if Dage's butt glows in the dark?"
"How the crap would I know that?" Ty scowled, pulling her hood over her face. "He doesn't do a strip tease when we talk…which is a shame by the way."
"Someone please kill me." A rogue said, pressing his palms against his ears.
"What are you all looking at?" Ty spat at the crowd, letting the shadows that gathered around her feet flicker. "Get lost!"
At that, the adventures shuffled around, pretending to slowly go about their own business while still keeping an open ear to the strangely fascinating conversation.
"I hear something fun going on. What are you all up to?" Cysero opened the door of the bathroom to attempt to step out again only for the adventurers to shove him back in.
"Why must life be so hard?" Ty groaned, rubbing her tired and dry eyes. It had taken only ten minutes of Alison's antics to completely drain her of weeks of rest.
"I'm just saying, if he's a lich and he always glows blue, I'd bet that if we stole his pelvis it would make a great chandelier." Alison concluded, flashing her cutest smile to her sister.
"No, Alison! We are not launching operation 'steal that fine piece of dead ass.' No fucking way!"
"Awwwwww," Alison whined as snickers and cries of agony echoed off the inn's walls. "But now that the main competition got thrown into another dimension, there'll be nothing to stop us!"
"Yeah nothing except, you know, Dage," Ash said, wanting to smash his palm through his face to end it all. "I think he'd object to that. Also, why would Nulgath want Dage's butt in the first place?"
"As a trophy of course," Alison crossed her arms and nodded knowingly. "I mean, do you see the way he dresses up the ladies of his army? Nulgath noticed their…attributes. The fiend had a good eye so there's no way he could've missed the Hills of Pleasure when Dage knelt for him during their master and apprentice days. I'd think he would've went straight for the promised land the moment Dage fell."
"That's crazy! Nulgath wouldn't do that!" Ash argued even though her knew he wouldn't win.
"It's entirely possible. I mean, how are you going to disprove it? Ask Nulgath?" Alison smirked.
"Where would he have put it?" Ty asked, giving into her sister's delusions. "On the wall? On the mantle? Turn it into a necklace? Use it as a nightlight? Throw it on his bed like a decorative pillow? What-"
"Ty?" A younger and higher voice interrupted Ty's train of thought.
Recognizing the sound, Ty's blood ran cold as she turned to the floating crystal ball. It was still clear but the voice had come from there.
"Sally? Is that you?" Ty tensed, tentatively reaching for the floating crystal.
"The connection wasn't severed." Sally said, knocking five years off of Ash and Ty's lifespan.
"How much did you hear?" Ty ventured, fighting to keep her teeth from chattering.
"Everything." It was Gravelyn who spoke that time.
"Is Dage there?"
"Yes." The crystal ball shook as Dage's hiss lowered the temperature of the inn to below freezing. The blood red crystal shifted to a cold and piercing shade of blue.
Everything in the inn with a pulse felt their blood vessels freeze and shrivel. No one dared to move. No one except Alison; a smile began to creep on to her face and it terrified Ty and Ash.
"I don't know about you folks but I am not dying here." A rogue smashed a window and leaped through followed by a steady stream of panicked men and women.
Zhoom and Yulgar, like the smart people the were, had abandoned the inn the moment Dage had spoken.
"Uh, hey Dage. How's the victory glow feeling? Good?" Ty stammered, trying to bring the situation under control.
There was no answer.
"You know, we didn't mean it as an insult," Ty tried to plead their case. "We were just…we were just…okay look," Ty grabbed the orb and glared into the blue sphere. "What do you want me to say? No, I don't think your butt would make angels cry? Well, fuck you Dage. I can talk about how much they inspire hope for as long as I want."
If she was going to die, Ty was going to go down being herself.
"Ty. Control yourself." Gravelyn said and it was obvious that there was an underlying threat in her warning.
"I saw you!" Ty accused, shaking the blue orb. "Don't you fucking lie to me! I saw you reading that book! You want the ending? Good luck getting it with me and my friends six feet under."
"Oh ho," Alison laughed quietly as Ash looked on in horror. "That's positively evil."
"…Carry on." Gravelyn said, backing out of the conversation.
"Empress?" Sally gasped in delight. "You read it too?"
"Has everyone in Lore read that goddamn notebook?" Ty tugged on her hair in frustration before Alison pushed her aside to get closer to the crystal ball.
"Since Dage is here, I might as well ask him. Does your butt glow?"
Alison's question was met with an eerie silence but she waited patiently along with those who decided against their better judgment to see this slow moving train-wreck to its apocalyptic end.
"Well?" Noxus spoke up from the other end of the connection. "Does it?"
"I will not dignify that insolent question with an answer." Dage growled.
"He didn't say no." A brave and foolish adventurer commented.
"If you're going to play hard to get, then allow me to share a cute little story I heard with our exalted empress." The look in Alison's eyes was disturbing. They stared death in the eye and challenged it to a wet t-shirt contest.
"Carry on." Gravelyn replied curtly.
"A good friend of mine recently lost an ex to a recent war," Alison faked a sob and Ty's stomach inverted; she knew exactly what her sister was planning. "They actually weren't that close. One time he played the lucky guy's flute but that was it."
"Does that mean what I think it means?" Ash whispered to Ty but she was too busy trying to stave off a panicked seizure to hear.
"When his ex fell in glorious battle, at that exact same moment my friend felt his teeth tingle. Tell me, Dage," Alison twirled the flickering crystal and laughed. "When your former master fell through that portal, did your teeth tingle?"
Alison's question being a blatant rip off of Silence of the Lambs aside, the collective internal screaming it prompted in the inhabitants of the inn was so intense that if one were to strain their ears, they would hear the faint sound of children weeping.
"Whatever you fear most…" Dage's voice made the inn shake. "It will be nothing compared to what I have in store for you. You will burn in agony in the depths of my underworld and no being, living or dead, will ever go through as much suffering as I will put you through."
Alison's smile disappeared and she clasped her hands together, taking a small step away from the crystal.
For what seemed like twenty eternities, Ty, Ash, and the remaining adventurers waited. Did it finally happen? Did it take Dage to finally stab fear into Alison's heart? Was she going to plead for mercy? Was she going to cry?
Alison bowed her head and closed her eyes. With sluggish feet, she shuffled back towards the orb and with a voice that was a perfect mimic of the vanquished fiend, Alison uttered the last words Lore would hear before it imploded.
"Keep talking dirty to me, Sugar Buns."
"You fucker!" Ty cursed her sister before bolting out of the inn with Ash under her arm. The others vacated the inn just as quick, leaving Alison alone in the inn.
The floor rumbled underneath her feet.
"Totally worth it." Alison smiled.
Author notes: I don't even know.
Remember how I mentioned that I sorta shipped Nulgath/Dage in the dark depths of my mind? Well, the friend who prompted me to write that chapter in the first place had just recently asked me why Ty talked about Dage's butt all the time. I told her that it was just a running gag I made up.
Then I realized something. I've never actually seen Dage's butt. We always see front shots of him or the cape is in the way. So at three in the morning, I'm wondering to myself. "Maybe Dage's butt is like schrodinger's cat. It's there and not there."
Unless someone takes a look and my friend and I concluded that it would result in death and no one would ever know.
That strange train of thought eventually lead to this chapter.
I really need to sleep.
My friend also asked me how I would feel if a staff member of the AE team ever read my works.
That sounded like a grade A nightmare that I'm probably going to have when I fall asleep.
Good night folks. I really need one.
PS. Someone tell me if the content rating for this should be bumped up. I'm gonna say it has minor suggestive themes but who knows.
PSS. Are we allowed to say nipple in the chat? I'm not actually sure.
PSSS. The actual Dage is a total babe. Like Woaaaaahhhhhh, I didn't know you were hot. Where'd you get such a nice face?
*EDIT* It is now 6pm and I feel more awake. The me at five in the morning and the me at a reasonable hour are very different it seems.
I am so embarrassed it hurts.
I did mention that this is all crack right? This is the best/worst/only crack fic stuff that I have ever done.
I also forgot to say thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed this strange bout of creativity that I experienced during a time of great exhaustion.