PROLOGUE
The shadows are winning.
They are surrounded. Everywhere they turn another shadow creature waits, formless and hungry. They came prepared — or thought they had. Now they are circled, backs together, hoping that Dorian's quick thinking can pull them out of this.
Dorian surges forward. The warhammer Torbjorn swings in a wide arc, all his strength behind it. The hammer sinks deep into the place where a face should be. The substance tears with a thick, viscous rip. As the hammer pulls free there is a wet sucking sound, the dark mass clinging to the weapon before snapping back like tar stretched too thin.
Blue eyes. Small. A child's face — eight, maybe nine years old. Far too young to hold the hatred staring back at him. Deep in those eyes is a rage that burns like red hot coals.
---
Silence settled over the table as every eye turned to Ethan.
"What the hell man?" Eric's voice cut through the quiet. "That is messed up. How many?"
Ethan looked down with a rather sheepish and guilty face. "Forty-seven. Every child that has gone missing in the past two years in Falmira."
Jess had gone still. "So when Sindarin sliced a piece of shadow off..." She didn't finish right away. "They were carving up a child?"
Josh stood there with his mouth open, a half-drank bottle of Mountain Dew frozen on the way to his lips.
"Can they be saved?" Allen spoke in his normal quiet reserved way.
"They can be saved and you have the tools to do so." Ethan eyed the group as they all looked at the custom gaming table.
Eric looked at the terrain and lighting. The shadows of the pieces themselves seemed to pulse out from the dark miniatures, pushing back against the light. "This asshole needs to be stopped." He looked at his best friend across the table, then turned to the group. "Let's get back in there and burn the thing to the ground. Let's finish it, ignore the kids and kill the boss."
"Kill the boss and the children should be free?" Allen said.
Ethan did not answer. He just looked at the table. Fog and light moved the shadows in strange angles.
---
Dorian's shock at the child's face lasts for a moment. Then the chanting begins.
Words in a language he cannot understand, but the pain they cause is real. Looking over his shoulder he can see the rest of the group frozen mid-fight, gasping. His health bar ticks lower. He has one more attack before his turn is up.
He pushes forward through the pain, moving toward the source of the darkness. The Darkling children part around him without resistance, enraptured by the voice at the center of the shadow.
The shadow wall rises ahead of him — a pure black surface that impossibly reflects the light. Dorian can see himself mirrored in it, holding Torbjorn, his dead king's warhammer. Before his eyes the reflection shifts. He stands triumphant over the body of his king. That is not how it happened. His mind screams it while his body stands frozen, watching the shadow version of himself lift the warhammer and bring it down on the head of his former master.
The chanting shifts to a soft whisper. "It may not have been what you did, but you still caused his death and the death of his kingdom, Dorian. Serve me and become a king of the shadows."
Dorian roars and strikes the wall with everything he has. A whispering chuckle from behind it as the chanting continues.
---
Ellen scans the party's health bars through watering eyes. Dorian's is getting dangerously low — standing next to the shadow wall the effect must be stronger.
She takes one stuttering step forward, then another. Moving toward the friend who has saved her life more times than she can count, who has been there when she lost fingers to failed experiments and monsters alike. She pulls a potion from the bandolier across her shoulder. With the last of her movement spent she lobs it at his back. The splatter healing potion hits the plate armor, thin liquid seeping into the cracks and soaking into his wounds.
For the first time since her turn started, Dorian's health begins to tick back up. Hopefully it will be enough.
---
The rage Sindarin feels bursts forth in fiery energy. Her daggers' flames flash into existence.
Ignoring the pain, moving with a grace that belies the power of her strides, she is at the wall swinging in a powerful arc. Flames roar from the edges of her blades as they make contact. Whispers burrow into her mind like worms. "You can't save them. They are mine. The corruption is absolute and yours will be as well."
A guttural scream leaps from her mouth in defiance. The attack continues. In a moment of coherent thought she notices the shadow wall thinning where the flames made contact.
We can win. We can save the children and defeat this shadow.
---
Derringer watches from the back line, fingers working through the contents of his satchel. The health bars of his friends flicker in the corner of his vision, ticking lower as the chanting continues.
He cannot do much about the health problem. Maybe he can do something about the chanting.
He pulls a small bundle from his satchel, sets it gently on the ground, and looks at the group he has fought beside for two years. This experiment might help stop the pain. It is also going to hurt. A lot.
He pulls the waxed cord, strikes the fuse, and hurls the improvised flash bang behind the shadow wall. Out of the party's line of sight — the flash should miss them. The sound will not. A four-second fuse. Not enough time to warn anyone, but maybe enough to stun the thing behind the wall.
The world erupts in light and sound.
---
"You are using that flash bang?" Eric looked at Allen. "That is going to suck. It is brilliant, but it is going to suck."
Allen smiled sheepishly. It was nice to hear praise from Eric.
Jess looked at the table. "Ethan, the flames of the daggers are digging through the wall?"
Ethan grinned. "Yeah. I thought that was a nice touch."
Down the hall the doorbell rang. Josh hopped up to grab the pizza they had ordered earlier that night. He danced back down the hall with the Knolla's boxes in his hands, singing a few lines from a random song. Everyone was happy to step away from the tension and enjoy a moment with each other.
"Ethan, we still down to play some COD this weekend?" Eric asked over a slice of the best pizza in Wichita.
"Yeah man. Assuming you still want to speak to me after the game tonight." Ethan said it half-joking.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
Allen sat quietly eating, thinking about the table and how these four people had become family over the past two years. His own family had been estranged from him since he refused the experimental treatments for the cancer that was stealing his sight.
Josh looked over at Eric, still with a mouthful of pizza. "How are things at the plant? Still keeping the planes from falling out of the sky?"
Eric had been working at Boeing since he got out of the military a few years ago. He grinned. "Yeah, that's the goal. Keep us all flying the friendly skies and fighting the never-ending battle of FOD. How is the music going?"
Josh looked at his feet for a moment. "It's going. I play in the gym most nights after I get done cleaning. The acoustics are decent but I think I am going to give it up."
Jess's head whipped around. "You can't give it up. You have an amazing talent." She turned to Eric. "Did you know he plays like twenty-seven instruments?"
Eric looked surprised.
"Yeah, and half the kids in my class sit outside the gym in the afternoons to hear him play," Jess said.
---
Ethan sat back and watched the family he had adopted. So many different viewpoints, so many different personalities, and they all came together around a tabletop game.
It had been years since he had truly been pain and anxiety free. Fifteen years to be exact. He and Eric had been on their way to the local game shop to pick up the latest minifig release. Eric was crossing the street when a car came screaming around the corner. Ethan did not think. He just reacted, shoving his best friend out of the way. Then the world bloomed in bright white searing pain.
It was a long recovery. But he managed, and Eric never left his side. After eight years in the army Eric came back to Kansas. He said he came back for work but he could have stayed in or gone just about anywhere. After all these years he still felt guilty for Ethan getting hurt, even though it could have just as easily been him shoved out of the way. He could be the one with scar tissue pressing against his spine.
---
Dorian's ears ring but his health bar has stopped dropping. That is enough.
He drops his shield and grabs Torbjorn with two hands. The wall has to break. He swings with all the strength he can muster, hitting where Sindarin's blades cut into the surface. He triggers Torbjorn's lightning ability on the strike. Cracks form at the point of impact, lightning splintering across the surface. It is working.
He triggers a second strike. Two-handed. The cracks wrench open.
---
Sindarin's ears are still ringing. She will never tell Derringer, but the little gnome's idea was useful.
She triggers the rage of the flames and forces a gout of fire into the hole Dorian's hammer made, widening the opening to the size she could fit her head through — if she was inclined to lose it. Pretty sure one of the first things she learned as an adventurer was not to stick things in places when you were not sure you would get them back.
Pressure builds in her mind. Not words. A force, pushing against her, trying to turn her blades toward Dorian. Her strikes begin to falter. The blades seem to turn on their own. She wants the blades to win. They cannot win against the wall but they could stop Dorian.
These are not her thoughts. She will not be controlled to hurt her family.
Her body freezes in place. Not moving.
---
Ellen rushes forward. Sindarin is frozen, blades turned toward Dorian.
She does not have time for this.
She rushes past, pulling vials from her bandolier, mixing reagents on the move and hurling them through the opening. If they cannot get in, that thing cannot get out. The vials shatter inside the wall and a fountain of bright light erupts as alchemical fire sears the creature and the inside of the wall. Flakes of shadow drift to the floor of the desecrated temple. The wall begins to crumble.
She grabs a glowing purple bottle and throws it at what little remains. It shatters on impact. Noxious fumes eat the last of the wall into a viscous puddle on the ground and keep going, eating into the stone beneath.
---
Derringer watches the wall crumble to the floor.
What lies beyond is a thing of nightmares. A perversion of reality itself. The dark creature is covered with the faces of children. He suspects there would be forty-seven if his mind could focus on the abomination long enough to count. Every face is stuck in an imitation of joy, as if the creature has no concept of happiness or light. Each mouth moves in time, saying something he cannot hear through the ringing in his ears.
For which he is grateful.
He moves forward, takes aim at one of the smiling faces, and fires. Once. Twice. Reloads. The face continues to smile. The mouth continues its macabre miming of song.
---
"Man, this is horrendous." Eric stared at the table. "Not sure how many rounds we have left but I am going to attempt to crit this thing."
He grabbed his favorite d20 — the first one he ever bought, back in middle school.
"You need a seventeen or better to crit since you have a plus-three luck mod," Ethan said. "By the way, the chanting has never stopped. Your characters can't hear it but they start to feel it resonating in their chests as the creature's chant reaches a fevered pitch."
Everyone at the table went silent as the die hit the felt-lined tray. It balanced on a point for a split second, spun slightly, and settled.
Nineteen.
The table erupted. They all knew what was coming. Early in the campaign Ethan had made a rule — if you crit, the rest of the team could assist in outputting more damage. They would skip their turns to do it. He called it the team assist action.
"Okay, how are we going to do this?" Ethan said.
---
"I am going to trigger Torbjorn's lightning attack, swinging two-handed. That will be two d10s." Eric looked around the table. "What about the rest of you?"
Everyone scrambled through their character sheets. Josh thumbed through Ellen's until he landed on a superior healing potion with the note that it had an infernal soul core.
"Ellen would like to throw the healing potion that has the infernal soul core."
Ethan paused. "You want to use a healing potion to damage the BBEG?" He considered it. "I can kind of see how you got there. Make me an alchemy check to see if it will work. DC will be fifteen."
The d20 bounced around the tray. Fourteen. Josh grabbed his sheet. "Modifier is plus-three alchemy. Seventeen total."
Ethan smiled. "The glass shatters against the head of the warhammer erupting in flames. Add three d4s plus six to the damage output. Who is next?"
Jess closed her eyes for a moment. "Sindarin bows her head and speaks words in Elvish — for fire and for cleansing." She opened her eyes. "She casts searing smite on Torbjorn, amplified with one arcana point."
Allen looked at the table and did a quick calculation of the dice that were going to be used. "I have an odd idea that I think Derringer would be able to do. But Ethan, it is up to you if you will allow the attempt."
The table went quiet.
"Derringer would like to wait until Dorian is mid-swing and then use the precision shot ability. Not targeting the BBEG but targeting the head of the hammer at the peak of its swing. Hitting it, adding rotational force to the hammer head."
You could hear a pin drop. Everyone turned from Allen to Ethan.
Ethan stared blankly at him. "Not much has ever surprised me, but that is new." He paused. "Roll investigation to see if Derringer can decide the right moment to take the shot. DC is seventeen."
Time slowed as Allen rolled. The die bounced around the tray, slowing, coming to a stuttering halt. For a moment it was a two. Then it rolled face up.
Natural twenty.
"Timing is everything, and Derringer knows this after creating so many machines running on tiny gears." Ethan's voice had shifted into the storyteller register. "Derringer lines up the shot, pausing to get his breathing just right as the hammer comes down on a trajectory to smash into the abomination that stands before you all."
He looked at Eric. "Adding all the dice together before you roll. Two d10s for the warhammer. Three d4s plus six for the potion. Two d4s from the pumped searing smite. An additional d10 from Derringer's precision shot. Roll it all and double the total — all of it goes through, ignoring the creature's damage reduction."
---
Eric sat stunned for a second. Eighteen levels had come down to this.
"I want to roll dice from each of you so we do this together."
Each player passed Eric their corresponding dice in a silent, almost reverent way. They all knew this was the make or break moment. With two handfuls of dice Eric closed his eyes and rolled. They clattered as they bounced off the side of the tray.
"Okay. Let's see." He read them off. "Nine, seven, nine on the d10s. Four, four, four, three, four on the d4s, plus six from the potion. Total is forty-nine. Double that because of the critical — ninety-eight damage total."
He looked at Ethan. "Is it enough?"
Ethan looked down at his sheet and deducted the crit from the total. It wasn't enough. Seventeen health left. He almost wished he could fudge the numbers and make it be enough, but that would not be true to the story they built together.
He looked up at the table with sadness in his eyes. "No. It's not enough. As your hearing begins to return the pain of the chanting has reached new heights. You can see your health bars plummeting."
---
Dorian can feel his life draining away. They have thrown everything they have at this thing and they cannot get the job done.
"I won't die this way, you piece of filth." Dorian roars in defiance and prepares to swing his hammer.
Then silence. Not the silence of the flash bang but true silence, like the entire world just died.
The spell was done.
---
Bright light flashed up from the table, blinding everyone in the room. "What the hell?" Eric blinked, trying to get his sight back. The room was brighter than he remembered.
Steadying himself on the edge of the table he looked around. Everyone was there. The table was there.
But the walls were gone. In their place was a vast plain of white stretching out beyond the carpet on which they all stood.
