A/N- Here's the one shot I said would be coming in my profile. I hope you enjoy it. It links to the other story in the Orc Empire I series at the time of writing but is otherwise standalone. It also features links to a couple of other stories as some characters are featured in other stories.
A/A/N- Contains depictions and mentions of torture of various kinds and mass murder. Not too graphic in my opinion but you have been warned all the same.
Anyway, on with our little story.
Orc Empire I: Only The Good I
In the heart of the Empire, a prison camp was overflowing with prisoners of war; Greenskin prisoners of war. It was the hottest day of the year so far and felt like the kind of heat you'd find in the desert.
It was located on a series of hills between Auerswald and Kemperbad in the state of Reikland and was located there because of a good road and rail network that was nearby. The road and rail network allowed prisoners to be transferred there by the tens of thousands. Because of the ongoing partially cold war with Outer Heaven as well as battles with thousands of Greenskin insurgents and pro-Outer Heaven political movements, the camp had thousands of prisoners entering it everyday. Most Greenskin prisoners never survived more than a few days before dying in various ways.
At the highest point in the prisoner of war camp, a number of prisoners were chained to large metal reinforced wooden stakes. They could do nothing except turn their heads slightly. Those who were alive anyway. One Greenskin who survived had held on for a few years. He was a Night Goblin but, given the distinctive lack of black robing around him, a passing stranger would've thought it was just another Goblin. He was severely dehydrated and his body felt as stiff as steel thanks to being restrained in the same position for several days without a break. His rage kept him alive despite malnutrition and thirst and the arrogance and callousness of his captors made him seek revenge. One day, he got his chance.
That day came on a hot summer day and he was being tortured by some of the camp's guards. They beat him with various kinds of bats and tortured him with electric rods, eliciting moans of pain from him but he otherwise refused to give in to his captors.
"This fucking night gobbo is one hell of a fighter." One of the red coated guards commented as he looked at the seemingly broken body of the captive Night Goblin. He gave the bound and physically wrecked Night Goblin a sickening smirk.
"He sure is." One of his comrades agreed as he looked at the Night Goblin, an arrogant sneer plastered on his face.
"He must also be very lucky or something. I know the nurses have been giving many of the other Greenskin prisoners carbolic acid. I've seen some of the corpses still twitching." Another guard remarked.
"Yeah. I know there was one Orc who had to be give several injections of the stuff and when the nurses and the guards with them went to dispose of the body, he woke up and almost strangled one of the nurses to death. He then had to have his head bashed in by the guards helping those nurses." Yet another guard said to his friends.
"Well those green skinned bastards deserve everything that comes to them. They should be in the ground alongside their long dead emperor." The first guard said, his hatred of the Greenskin race shining through.
"You know that the Greenskins have not been entirely green skinned for thousands of years now, right?" The second guard pointed out to his comrade. "Furthermore, there is that faction who fight alongside us."
"Whatever. They still deserve whatever fate has lined up for them." The first guard replied dismissively. The unclothed Night Goblin began laughing sinisterly, his voice deeper and rustier than other Goblins or Night Goblins because of the torture and dehydration. "Is something funny you green skinned freak?" The red coated guard asked irrately.
The unrobed Night Goblin laughed for another minute before answering. "You talk about my people as monsters, yet you murder us in great number whilst we're your prisoners? We may be monsters, yet I refuse to be judged by your standards, pathetic monster." The unclothed Night Goblin then took a punch to the stomach as the increasingly irate guard lashed out. Rather than groan in pain however, the Night Goblin resumed laughing briefly before speaking again. "Fate has looked upon me favourably and it favours me at the moment; what does fate think of you?" Before any of the guards could answer the question, gunshots rang out throughout the entirety of the camp. They circled on the spot frantically, unable to tell where the shots had come from before looking at the unclothed Night Goblin. "I think your time is almost up. You had better hope that fate is merciful to you... because I won't be."
Smoke began filling the air and the movements of all the guards across the camp. Some of the guards began attempting to run back to the living quarters where their families were in order to protect them. Others began to execute the Greenskin prisoners of war so they'd not be allowed to escape. In the smoke, blazing orange light could be seen and the agonizing screams of other guards could be heard and, in the nearly blinding confusion, the Night Goblin, despite his lack of strength or energy, began attempting to free himself of his restraints. He sensed that the guards that had been in front of him had fled somewhere to presumably protect their families but that knowledge was of no use to him when he, despite his determination, was unable to free himself. He quietly laughed to himself as he thought he had tasted true defeat for the first time in his life. He saw in the distance that some of the smoke had become blue and wondered what was going on. The Night Goblin saw a figure approaching him through the smoke and was unsure if he should say anything when the figure spoke to him first. "Do you wish to live?" The figure asked him. "Do you wish to inflict your fury on the ones who have murdered your kin?"
"They should've killed me with them when they had the chance." The Night Goblin answered without hesitation. He was willing to overlook the fact he had no clue who the stranger was in order to get revenge on his jailors. "My fury is unbound; it's just my flesh that needs liberating."
"That's good." The figure said, sounding very pleased. "I've come to liberate my kind and you seem like the kind of person to help me."
The unknown figure's statement caused the Night Goblin to become curious as to the person's identity. "Who are you?"
There was a chuckle from the figure before he answered the tortured Night Goblin's question. "I suppose you wouldn't know, would you?" The figure stepped forward and revealed himself to have a human appearance. "It's been a very long time since I've had our characteristic skin colour. I suppose it matters little what we look like or what our genetics are like these days though." He then mused, more to himself than to the still restrained Night Goblin.
"You're not who I think you are, are you?" The Night Goblin asked the human-looking figure, uncertainty lacing his rusty voice.
The human-looking figure ignored the question and examined the unclothed Night Goblin's restraints. "They really didn't want you to be able to get away or even do anything, did they?" He examined the metal chains and he silently determined that they were too tight to be removed by hand and simply ripping the chains could hurt or even kill the restrained Night Goblin. "I need those chains to loosen up and drop down rather than come to or go further away from me." He muttered to himself. He pulled out an object that looked like a wooden stick but the Night Goblin knew it to be the tool of a magic user. More specifically, the Night Goblin knew the tool to be a wand belonging to certain kinds of wizards; certainly not the kind found in the Empire and its colonies. The human-looking figure looked the Night Goblin in the eyes and spoke to him, "I need you to remain very still as I will be destroying a few sections of the chains restraining you. When I've done that, you should find that the chains will have dropped to the ground." The human-looking figure then took several steps back, "Close your eyes. There may be some tiny bits of shrapnel about to fly everywhere." He pointed the stick at the chains and beams of energy shot out of the stick, dissolving sections of the metal chain and outright destroying other sections of it. The chains immediately loosened up and began falling to the floor. As the chains dropped, the Night Goblin began to drop with him, forcing the human-looking figure to catch him mid-fall, "They definitely did not treat any of you boyz well, did they?"
"They are self-righteous hypocrites. They proclaim they stand for justice, order and civilisation and yet they commit the same acts they accuse us of committing." The Night Goblin said in disgust. The figure sat him gently down on the ground while kneeling beside him.
"Well, whatever we do, at least we wear our morality on our sleeves. We will never be like them; it'd be like trying to use a choppa with a bow." The figure commented to the Night Goblin.
"Well, I hope you have something to deal with the guards coming to capture you?" The Night Goblin asked as he spotted several guards armed with rifles and submachine guns rapidly approaching them. The guards spread out and circled around the pair. All the while, gunfire continued to crack around the camp.
"Hands up!" One of the guards barked at them.
The human-looking figure showed no fear at being surrounded, much to the shock and admiration of the Night Goblin. "You're right... your hands should be up." The figure said to them. Upon hearing the figure's words, the guards looked at him and each other with complete and utter confusion, enabling the figure to get up on his feet and swiftly deal with the encroaching guards, taking them by surprise and defeating them with ridiculous ease, stabbing a couple of them with a bladed weapon before shooting the rest with his pistol.
The Night Goblin was stunned and he was more certain than ever about the identity of his liberator. "Who are you? Who are you really?"
The human looking figure raised a finger and gestured for the Night Goblin to stop talking. "I'll tell you later. Right now, I need to help my trusty commando team eliminate the rest of the guards and free our people from their captivity."
"You'll find many survivors but far more of the prisoners have been killed. This is no prisoner of war camp; it's a death camp and I don't think they can quite tell the difference anymore." The Night Goblin told the human looking figure grimly. The figure stood briefly and then went further onwards, disappearing through the smoke that laid over the entire camp. The Night Goblin was left staring at the space where the figure had been and saw nothing but dense, blinding smoke. The gunfire began dying down a few minutes later and screams began to break out across the camp, causing whispered chatter or outright silence among the prisoners.
The smoke began to lift once the gunfire ceased and the Night Goblin and the other prisoners saw a ragtag group of heavily armed Greenskins enter the camp. They proceeded to release the befuddled but happy prisoners, confused at what was happening. The Night Goblin began crawling through the camp towards where the heavily armed were. It took a long time for the Night Goblin to reach them but the armed Greenskins noticed him and made their way towards him, "There's another one here crawling towards us. Get medical kits, food and water here immediately." One of the armed Greenskins grabbed a handheld radio from his belt and spoke into it, then began running towards the entrance. Another Greenskin knelt by the Night Goblin and waited for assistance.
A short time later, the Night Goblin was sitting up and saw his captors and their families escorted out from the barracks. He felt giddy when he saw the looks of terror on their faces as well as their embarrassment as the guards realised that they should've and could've been able to stop the attack had it not been for the human-looking figure. The Night Goblin then found himself sitting in a shadow and looked up to see one of the armed Greenskins handing him a seemingly inconsequential piece of rubbish. "The boss wants all of you to carry these items; the reason why will become clear shortly." Wordlessly, the Night Goblin took the item from the armed Greenskin in front of him and looked to see the human-looking figure single-handedly dismantle the camp with magical bolts of fire and lightning. The resulting fires went dozens of metres into the air, choking black smoke billowing into the air.
The human-looking figure then spoke loudly; magic amplifying the voice many times over, "The local military forces are probably now aware of the fires I've just started so we have just minutes to depart. Thankfully, we only need seconds." Indeed, less than twenty seconds after the human-looking figure finished speaking, everyone within the camp and all the nearby vehicles disappeared with a pop and arrived in the hanger or assembly area of a ship or building of some kind given that all the walls were metal. "Here we are. Sweet freedom." The figure said as he now stood on an elevated platform.
One of the Night Goblin's fellow former prisoners called out to the human-looking figure, "Where da 'ell are we?"
"You're all in a mobile base we call Balrog station. Here the old world is far behind us and a new empire will keep us safe. Until we're ready to move on, please take your frustrations out on your former captors or rest up and restore yourselves. Me and my boyz will be moving around, checking up on all of you to see how you're doing. That's all for now." The figure then left the platform and the freed prisoners were left to wonder as to what to do. The Night Goblin, like his fellow former prisoners, was left to wonder as to what he should do when the figure appeared beside him like a ghost appearing out of thin air. "Come with me." The figure practically ordered calmly, and without menace and the Night Goblin realised that the order was actually a subtle request. Wanting answers, the Night Goblin wordlessly complied with the wishes of the figure and the pair walked out of the hanger.
As the Night Goblin followed the mysterious figure through many metal corridors, he noticed that some of the rooms in the corridors were much more dimly lit than others and some walls had large splats of blood dried out on them from where the guards and others clearly couldn't be asked to clean up the resulting messes from the evident tortures taking place in the base. Screams of pain were occasionally heard by the Night Goblin as the pair walked through the base and the Night Goblin found the screams soothing. After a long amount of walking, the mysterious figure brought the Night Goblin to a seemingly nondescript room with the doors closed. The figure pressed a button and the doors opened to reveal a pretty large office and, as the pair entered the office, in one corner of it were the prison guards that had been guarding and torturing him as well as their families and some of the nurses who'd assisted in the mass murder of many Greenskins at the now destroyed camp. Besides and behind them were a number of Greenskins including what appeared to be a high ranking warrior or commander and they looked murderous and filled with rage. "What's going to happen to us?" The wife of one of the guards asked. The humanoid, mysterious figure nodded at one of the Greenskins towering over the former prison guards and their families and the Greenskin who'd received the nod stepped forward and turned to the woman, striking her in the face.
"Whilst I'm happy to see these 'umans cowering, who are you and what's going on?" The Night Goblin said to the humanoid figure.
"I want you to take your revenge on the guards who had beaten you before my arrival. Take your revenge on the nurses who killed your comrades and tried to kill you." The humanoid figure replied with a tone that was cool and silk-like. It sent shivers down the spines of the cowering humans.
The Night Goblin eyed up his former captors and a couple of the nurses, giving them an evil smile. He looked thoroughly disinterested in the families of his former captors as well as the other nurses in the room. "The only targets for my revenge are these four guards and two of the nurses. Everyone else you can handle as you see fit."
The high ranking Greenskin who was in charge of the other Greenskins questioned the decision of the Night Goblin, "That is remarkably generous of you? Some of our kind would say that you may have gone soft on these pinkskins or that your experiences might have gotten rid of your stomach for revenge."
"Hardly. My revenge is just more targeted. Why punish the many when I can just go after those who actually made efforts to harm me. And trust me, what I have in mind would make the Greenskins of old squirm."
The mysterious, humanoid figure smiled as he raised an eyebrow. "Intriguing. I'm sure whatever you have in mind will be... fascinating to say the least."
"You won't be disappointed. I'll just need some super strong thread and a needle. Maybe some different kinds of drugs too." The Night Goblin said as he showed an evil smile. His former guards' eyes widened as they began to fear what the Night Goblin had in store for them as they were were led out of the office.
Several hours later, the Night Goblin returned to the office, holding a leash in each hand. Attached to the leash in his left hand were the two nurses, now wearing nothing but leather coated metal collars around their necks and their hands restrained by handcuffs that were connected to each other. They looked traumatized and humiliated as fluids streamed from various orifices. Their state was better than those of the former prison guards however. They were lead in by the leash in the Night Goblin's right hand but, unlike the nurses, they were only one of them had a collar around his neck. The other guards were surgically attached to the first guard like a chain with the mouths of each of the guards attached to the asshole of the one in front. Even the Greenskins and the humanoid figure winced as they saw what the Night Goblin had done to the now former guards. "Wow, okay, remind me to never piss you off." The humanoid figure said as the colour drained from his face. The humanoid figure then turned to the high ranking Greenskin, "I never thought I'd see a real life human centipede, let alone any of those movies."
"I've never heard of them at all, Boss." The high ranking Greenskin replied.
"If you want to know how twisted the human mind can be, just listen to a summary of any one of those films or watch the parody by that human cartoon." The figure told the high ranking Greenskin. The figure then turned back to the Night Goblin, "Are you satisfied with your revenge on these humans?"
"For the time being." The Night Goblin replied.
"Fair enough." The humanoid figure said in acceptance. He then changed the topic, "You should get yourself healed, fed and rested. Skak here will show you the way to where you need to go but first, you were curious as to who I am, weren't you?"
"I am. I think I suspect the answer but I won't know until you confirm one way or another." The Night Goblin answered.
"In which case, your mind does you credit. I am Samgon Gobsger." The humanoid figure revealed to the Night Goblin. "Only the good get a truly peaceful death and in this world,
"My Lord, my emperor. It is an honour to be in your presence but everyone says that you are dead." The Night Goblin said reverently.
"As far as most of the world is concerned, I am. Only the good get a truly peaceful death and in this world, no one is truly good any more, no matter how much they convince themselves otherwise. I have a new kingdom, a new empire, far from the prying eyes of my enemies and I use a number of pseudonyms so that stray enemies and most of the peoples that surround my new kingdom do not ever find out my true identity." Samgon commented, revealing to the Night Goblin what happened since his assumed death. "Most of the old world and their allies brought the lie. Not everyone though."
"The WSF, the Vampire Kingdoms and some of their allies are in some form of war with the rest of the allied powers. No major actions have taken place though as far as I have heard." The Night Goblin told Samgon.
"So I've heard myself. I guess it's some kind of Phoney War." Samgon then wished to find out the identity of the Night Goblin. "Before you head off for food, drink and medical attention, I'd like to know the name of the person, the Night Goblin I rescued."
"My name is Jurzacka." The Night Goblin said to Samgon.
"Nice to meet you, Jurzacka. You know I'm Samgon and I've already introduced Skak. He can tell you more about himself later but he is my second in command, my deputy, around these parts." Samgon said happily to Jurzacka. "I sense we'll be working together for a very long time."
Jurzacka looked into the face of Samgon and saw a freedom fighter and greatest hope of the Greenskin race. "I'm sure we will, my Lord Samgon. I am in your debt and I live to serve you alone, my Emperor."
A/N- So what are your thoughts on this? A few notes regarding characters. Skak is one of the primary characters in Orc Empire I- the Colony Builders. Samgon is in a majority of the stories I have written and was a character I created when I played Warhammer fantasy long before Age of Sigmar was a thing. Jurzacka has featured in three stories I have written so far: this one, Dark Needs I and Harry Potter and All the Skywalker Chicks. All three will definitely turn up in more as I write more.
With that said, I hope you enjoyed this story and please review.
