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Visit us at http://www.cybertown.com/
A Cybertown Adventure
--- Part Three ------
by b1a1b and a bunch of Cybertown characters
Setting: This is the kind of multiverse where Old Earth is under attack, the Internet is under attack, and personal life styles are under attack. There is one brave planet in the fourth quadrant that is tired of defending and merely holding off the barbarians at the portal. And, of course, that planet is under attack as well...
There were probes at every point of the defensive perimeter that night. The camp ground was hard. The wind blew all through the night, howling viciously at various times. I slept a little anyway. Although the defense seemed to hold, Mickey advised us to take turns guarding the camp and so we did.
Every two hours someone would wake someone else up, and they would assume the position- no, not that one- the staring out into the night, wishing, and hoping to be back in our safe city with our friends position.
Ablu took it upon herself to station herself right beside the new citizens. I heard them sobbing throughout the night. One of them was worried about a huge block event they were missing. The other just wanted to see her friends. Dazz prayed over cheercoach all night, with a pragmatic cold compress, and tossed in several kind words. The fae was looking better but it was obvious that she was still hurting.
I couldn't sleep well and knew why, I never handle the unknown well, particularly when it involves the lives or feelings of people I genuinely care about and respect. I didn't know exactly why we had been sent here, or what we faced, but the mission lingered on my mind. We had evil to find and destroy. Hawk would have never sent us here without good reason. He also wouldn't have sent us some place that we couldn't handle. It wasn't like him. So we could accomplish the mission and we would. We just didn't know how or what.
I think we all had begun to get used to our new skills. We were doing well so far. It was kind of wild that we just became amplified personifications of whatever we were to ourselves.
I figured out that I became a wizard because in real life I like to view myself as someone who is fast thinking. I am mentally able to adapt to almost any issue. At least I think so … and I've wished so often enough. Now I could wish with a spell, although there were some pretty spectacular restrictions.
As I was thinking about the inherent magic now residing patiently inside me, my eyes opened up to see that the sun was sliding slowly up over the horizon. We all began to wake, stand, stretch and feel our legs beneath us. I felt the vibrations from each of our party. We all felt somewhat refreshed and more ready to journey on. The day was glorious and full of possibility, even though the night had been long and potentially very dangerous.
cheer survived, revived, and neatly healed in the early hours before dawn, and was now flying again. I began to have greater hope that our future- a successful one- was right in front of us again. Those nagging questions of what and where came up again. We needed answers.
Mickey immediately stepped up in front of the group, in his human form. The sun was bright. The wind was a mere breeze and the day was beginning to warm up nicely. "Everyone, we are going to do this in battle formation today. If you are a hand to hand fighter, and that would be Ablu, Tala and myself please come to the front." He took a shaky breath before he continued " Spell casters towards the back and please guard the citizens. But first b1 if I could have a moment with you"
Walking over to Mickey I could sense the frustration and see the worry in his eyes. "Brock, we are going to need to KNOW where we are going, something that I am not able to see myself or even get a scent on. Do you think your magic could be of use here?"
I thought about his question for a couple of moments, that seemed long to me but were short to the waiting group under the heating sun.
"It just doesn't work that way Mickey. A Wizard's magic is more of the bam bang fireball type. I can blow things up. I can shield things. Heck, I can even heal things if given enough time to think and concentrate. But we need someone with intuition and a more nature based talent. In short, we need Dazz." I turned back to the group. "Dazz will you come over here please?"
Walking up with a big grin on her face, Dazz looked at us. "I knew you two men would eventually recognize the need for a women to get you out of this. Back up, boyos. Give me some room and let me work." We both stepped back, grinning at each other. Dazz was the same old take charge gal she always was.
Carrying a pitcher of water that just appeared, she sprinkled the liquid in a wide circle around her. Picking up some sand from the ground Dazz began to chant quietly, then louder, and louder again. I could feel the power growing around us. I knew whatever she was doing was calling up some major mojo.
As she reached the crescendo of her call, she threw the sand into the air. The weird thing about the sand was that it did not simply fall to the ground. It formed an arrow about five feet up in the air. The arrow was pointing to the mountain in front of us. Suddenly a path lit up on the ground that wound off into the distance and probably right up to the door of whoever we were hunting. Maybe the what and who was that easy.
"Well, there. I think that's clear enough even for you two." Daz said as she grinned and walked away.
Mickey and I looked at each other and rolled our eyes. We figured we might be able to follow Dazz's directions. How hard could it be?
Mickey lined us up and we began a trek that would lead to our assault on that distant, gloomy looking mountain.. I thought it might be a very bad mountain. Too soon we would find out just how bad.
The walk was long and not too hard although it seemed to take forever to move anywhere near the mountain. We followed the path. There were groupings of trees and fallow fields, but no houses. A couple of run down, disintegrating shacks were the only evidence of any human type life. Birds flew. A few small animals scurried away from us. Insects buzzed. Everything seemed fairly normal... to our left.
On the right, it was a different story. It looked like a war ground or target practice field...miles long. There were craters raging from a few feet to over one hundred yards long. Some were only a coupe of feet deep, but others appeared much deeper. Cheer flew over a couple and told us they were deep. We discussed it among ourselves and stayed on the path.
It was a leisurely walk in good weather. Everyone was in good spirits but the talk was minimal. Every so often Mickey would change into his bear form and go tracking off ahead of us, checking the trail.
Every time he did, a holographic sign would appear in front of us saying "Go home" or "Leave Now". Dazz pointed out that one sign was hiding a second sign. I didn't see it. She did her thing and we could read the second sign clearly. It read "Help us, please." There was more to this than we knew or so we thought. The signs only appeared when Mickey transformed.
Cheer was in flight but was careful to stay under the protection of the treetops whenever possible. None of us knew what arrows or other nasty surprises might be coming at us. We broke for an uneventful lunch and a mid-afternoon break on our path.
Finally we arrived at the foothills. Without incident. We started to pick our way up. Dazz would make an occasional recommendation. There was a stream flowing right to left behind us, we took a break. A short nearly fatal break. It was only minutes before dusk. We had to find where we might stay safely. The path up the mountain was clear, but fading with the sunlight setting behind us.
We'd made it about a quarter of the way up the mountain before the boulder struck. The ominous voice from the night before was heard booming all over the mountain "You were warned, Cytonians. You were warned repeatedly to leave. It is unacceptable that you have come this far. Prepare for your end"
We all tensed up. The voice faded into echo, then was gone. Everything seemed all right. Sure it did. We even relaxed, a little. We had ignored all the warnings to get out of this dodgy world. Everything was fine.
Then we heard the sound of a solitary angry hawk screech in the suddenly darkening sky. The anguished atmosphere seemed to stretch or perhaps crack, reverberating with the throb of expanding magics. It was growing colder too. A rumbling, ponding, bouncing caught our ears.
"Oh NO" I thought looking around everywhere at once. Or tried, anyway. I yelled again as I spotted a huge boulder made of solid granite hurtling down the mountainside toward us, It, too, was following the path. I yelled "Get behind something fast! Ablu protect the new guys. I am going to try and handle this."
Pointing my fingers at the stream near our location I sent internal magic into the water, quickly calling out a spell. Four water horses rose from the stream shimmering in the fading light. They quickly galloped towards the boulder and flung themselves against it. That water force should have been able to knock it aside or down a tree or even a group of human beings. It doesn't take a lot of force to change the direction of a simple boulder, but the rock was unscathed and only a little wet, and coming directly toward us.
Tal watched in wonder, from behind some rocks as b1 reacted. Gathering the magic back up around him, b1 pointed so fast at every rock around him, that his hands were waving in a blur and then he threw both his hands outward facing towards the boulder. Thousands of smaller rocks flew at the bigger one with bullet speed. The smaller rocks hit the boulder ripping pieces off at odd angles away from the group. The boulder began to break up piece by piece as Brock continued to fire those chip shots at the boulder. As the rock reached the group it bounced once and hit b1 head on. By that time it was reduced to a cannon ball size. It battered the minor protective forced field, knocking b1 to the ground. The rock laid on top of b1. He was scraped, bruised, and a little battered. But the group was safe. For now. The amount of magic used, overwhelmed his system and b1 stayed on the ground, knocked out. The piece of chopped up boulder seemed to be silently screaming "Get Out!"
Dazz shook her head and tended to yet another wounded member of the party. Once assured b1 would be all right, the group quietly began preparations to camp there for the night. Mickey again took over organizing the detail. cheer once again gathered wood. They ate quietly, whispering among themselves. There would be no protective barrier this night.
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