The Hell Hole that is Home

Molly sits silent for a moment. Dead orange eyes flickering from Rai to Cebra, then back to Rai. His ears twitch as he could hear a bit of commotion outside but thought nothing of it as they were preparing for war after all. “Don’t blame yourself. My kind have a tendency to be too stupid for our own good. It’s just in our nature.” He shrugs, although rather surprised the church didn’t believe her even with his cloak pin. Usually the backing of a white was good enough to be listened to. If he had thought it’d go that sideways he would have gone himself, however if that then who to prepare Teirni?

Gritting his teeth in pity he studies Cebra, as if judging if he were in good enough condition to continue. The poor man had to have fought tooth and claw to have gotten out of Rome alive with a half-executed reaver in tow. Sure enough he looked like he’d been dragged through hell once already but who was he to turn him down if he wanted to continue. Just as Molly was about to speak up, the door to the bar swings open to a still silent Hayseed.

“Out with it.” Molly hums, rather annoyed at being interrupted.
With a deep breath Hayseed sets a cloth sack on the wooden table with a loud thump and rattling of its contents to free up his hands to speak. He quickly signs a few quick gestures as Molly squints.

“The ballsy fucks sent a messenger… with that.” He crosses his arms over his chest in frustration.
Hayseed clenches his jaw, refusing to sign any further, just staring hard at Molly, bloody tears welling at the side of his scarred and marked face. Molly seems to pale even further than a corpse should before slumping down further in his seat. He is silent for a moment before slamming his fist down onto the wooden table as the sack seeps a bit of reaver ash as it splinters under his gauntleted hand.

“Of course it’s her.” He murmurs as Roth suddenly catches on and seems to bite his own lip to stay silent.
“Roth, Hayseed, show him where he can help. We’re going to beat these fuckers or we’ll all be dust trying.”

“Molly, are you going to b-”

“I just need a moment. I’ll catch up with you.” Molly’s eyes well with blood as he stares straight to Cebra. “This is what happens when you love one of us. You get handed a bag of bones and dust one day. Remember that.”

Roth takes the que to lead Cebra somewhere else, lest the man lose his composure. “Sorry you had to see that. Molly um.. Ari and Molly were kind of a-”

Hayseed quickly gestures to his ring finger in a sort of rough-sign language.

“I wouldn’t necessarily say married… Lets just say the two have been close for about thirty years or so.”

Hayseed rolls his eyes before making the gesture again, this time with a bit more dramatic flair.

“Whatever. You look like hell. How about you rest a moment while we finish dragging up every scrap of metal we can and- what in fucks name.” Roth stops short as what seemed to be a procession of reavers marching their way through the gates of Teirni. About fifty, all fresh and equipped for a fight.

“Ox?” Roth calls to a whitecloak in the ranks as he stops his horse.
“Hey, thought you could use the help.”
“What the fuck are you doing with your men here!? You’re supposed to be in Folgino. In fact all these fuckers are.”

The white cloaked reaver hops off his horse, boots clacking in the street mud. “Yeah. But one of my men came running back from Rome saying a guy beat the ever loving shite out of him the other night to steal a girl off the pyre, I decided we might want to take whatever threat would drive a man to do that seriously… So I might have changed our plans a bit.”

“Ox, you crazy fuck. They’ll scorch your ass for this.”
“What are they going to burn 56 men over it? If they ask, we stopped for provisions.” Ox smiles brightly as The horn to the gate blares once again to allow another few ranks of reavers. “Looks like more than just my lot are coming.”

Ox then looks Cebra up and down before laughing under his breath. “Helluva thing you did to Korra’s balls. He’s been walking poorly ever since… Hey, Sorry about your girl, I’m sur-”

“She’s alive.” Roth asserts.
“You’re shitting me.”
“I am not. She’s alive. Anyway, you boys get set up. We’re going to teach this man how to use a ballista.”

“Right. I’ll catch up later. I gotta tell Shryks about this.” Ox waves as he leads his horse near the tail end of his group.

“Looks like your trip to Rome wasn’t all for nothing. We’re getting reinforcements regardless, lets just hope it’s enough… Anyway, ever shot a crossbow before? We’re about to set you up with a really big one.”

Cebra pays attention to Molly and his words steeped in frustration, he does not acknowledge the claim that he has feelings for Rai. He was not one to easily give away his feelings either due to training, programming or just the natural instinct to protect Rai and himself. At the same time those words echo in his mind and cause him to be pensive for a brief moment. He's had a fairly long life and seen the bones of people he once cared for deeply, it had not turned him cold but made him always follow his mind over his heart. Then Rai came along and made him falter, he was willing to follow his feelings about her despite whoever she may have been. At this point he was too fascinated by her to turn away now.

Cebra's stride is with a limp but still he manages to keep up with Roth. He doesn't say anything to the reveal of Ari and Molly's union, though it explains the outburst. "I'm good to fight, been through worse before. I could use some water and a cloth though." A lie he told as he could no longer rely on his ability to recover, make advanced weapons or use great strength. It was then that a formation of armed soldiers marched into view, Cebra thought they might be here to seize him from the garrison and his eyes sunk. As it turned out they were here to reinforce this place. Cebra averts his eyes when the commanding Reaver brings up the violent altercation from earlier, he didn't feel particularly great save for the fact he managed to save Rai. It was so rare violence was a pleasure for Cebra more than a necessity, a means to an end and preferably the last arrow in his quiver.

"I did what I had to, nothing more." A stoic gaze as he meets the commanders eyes, this soldier is ready to work.

"Crossbow?... Right. Yes I've used such a weapon before."

“If there is worse than that, I’d hate to see what that looks like.” Roth mutters as Hayseed makes another gesture a bit more forcefully. “We have a number of balistas. They fire a lot like a crossbow just bigger.”

More gesturing from Hayseed comes as they arrive at the top of the palisade walls. “And yes. A bigger pain in the ass in some way.” After walking past a few ballistas they come to one absolutely massive monster of a ballista. “This is magnus pinguis damnia. Quite possibly the largest ballista in all of Dis.” Hayseed snickers under his breath as he begins loading on the six foot long bolt into the pulleys. “I know. Her name is hilarious but fitting. Means for Big Fat Bitch.”

Once the bolt was loaded, Roth motions to two levels about waist level on the machine pulling one and pushing the other as the mechanism catches the bow string and walks it back on a track with rudimentary ratchets. It took a total of three minutes to see the strain on the throwing arms and a loud THUNK as the bolt settled into firing position. “There will be a few men to help you reload and keep a good supply of bolts. We have hundreds per ballista so running out shouldn’t be a problem. This one’s bolts are about 17 stone and can go about two hundred yards.” This was the era’s best substitute for a heavy turret, and Cebra was being handed, an absolute feat of engineering for the time.

“Alright, step on up here.” Roth motions as he moves off the end of the ballista to make room for him. “Okay those two handles, if you lift them, it’ll pull it off it’s rest and you can pivot the frame around on the pedestal.” Roth glances down and quickly pushes a stone block behind the wheels of the base. “Watch for that. This thing kicks back and if those aren’t there it could roll right off the walls.” Hayseed at this point catches a glimpse of something near the gates and kind of wanders off to investigate as more reavers seem to be flooding in.

“Okay those are like the crosshairs on a crossbow. Exactly the same idea.” Roth points out further down the arm to a small metal prong sticking up with notches. The further up the three inch protrusion indicated firing at a closer range target as further away ones required tilting the nose upward to get the right arc.

“Alright. Your job in this seige is to be taking out large priority targets we can’t get men to like siege towers, enemy trebuchets and ballistas. Secondary targets are going to be larger demons that our colossus slayers are swarming. On those, try to stake in bolts about 60 feet up as it gives the slayers a good foothold to go for higher targets.” Roth blinks a moment staring at the bronze tipped bolt before grinning. “Take a practice shot… See that tree over there with the hole at the base?” Roth points out about 50 feet off the wall. “Hayseed hides his gold stash in there. Blow it the fuck up. You know… since we did all the work of loading it. Pull that string over there to fire her.”

Cebra was a bit taken back, his adrenaline instinct had been firing out of control dealing with the stress of his loss of powers and still fighting. He was having a moment of clarity now as he looked over the massive weapon while listening to Roth go on about the specs. Cebra knew how to handle a crossbow and the principle was the same.

"A test shot... Hmm." Cebra grabs hold of the head of the ballista bolt and concentrated a jolt of his own power, power that was already bottoming out. The head of the ballista bolt grew barbs on it in such a way that any large creature hit would have it buried in their flesh and have to rip it out with bloody consequences. "Now let's see here." Cebra turns the weapon and adjusts the aim towards the three in the distance. Cebra hits the lever and the bolt fires with such a reverberating force it shakes Cebra. "Huh!"

The broad looking tree explodes in a wave of splintering wood and a sound like a thunderbolt. "Looks ready to me."

Roth laughs his usual booming thunderous crackle as the tree is reduced to matchsticks under the massive bolt. It scatters along the grass as Hayseed sprints down the battlement and slams a fist into the metal of Roth’s breastplate, yet still silent as ever. The punch didn’t do anything but force more laughter from the dreadnought class reaver as Hayseed’s fingers are a flurry of many aggressive symbols. With a last huff, Hayseed gives one last gesture that was rude in almost any language in the form of a middle finger at Cebra before grumping away.

“Ah, He’ll get over it. Pay back for loading my saddlebags with pig shite last week.” Roth wipes a bloody tear of laughter from his eyes before turning back to Cebra. “Very impressive though, red blood. Perfect man for the job. They’ll have a helluva time pulling those bolts out their arses.”

Roth gives a heavy slap on the back before perking to note Molly standing just below the wall. His expression was stoney and arms crossed over his unarmored chest. A broken man watching the inflow of reavers with the emotionless touch most reavers seemed lulled into. “Need the whitecloaks. Scouts bring news.” Was all Molly claimed, eyes locking on Cebra for a second, betraying no inner thoughts.

Roth blinks for a second before shaking his head. “Come, come red blood. You’ve more than earned a spot in the war room.”


Xxxxxxxx


The war room was a relatively crowded affair, each squadron leader seated on a stool around the table, beer in hand and stroking their chins deep in thought. Molly had carved a rough outline of Terni, all labels done in common. Scattered around were stones of many shapes, supposedly to represent reaver units and each whitecloak clutching a good number of them. The back of the tavern was full of reavers, all of which raised an eyebrow at what looked to be a human in the company of two other whitecloaks.

“Relax. He’s with us.” Molly hums, placing his tokens down on the table. Broad squares in the front, round circles mixed with triangles on the second ranks and tall tower-like shapes in the very back ranks.

“Current status, the church has abandoned us and cares not whether Teirni lives or dies. We all risk the pyre by breaking rank to defend. Anyone who is not willing to burn is free to leave.” Molly announces, waiting for a moment but none chooses to flee. “There were about 50 reavers here prior. 25 dreadnaughts, 10, er.. 9 scouts, 10 skirmishers and 5 colossus slayers. What else have we gained?”

“I’ve brought with me 50 skirmishers and 5 scouts.” The white cloak throws down 50 stone circles and five towers.

“20 Dreadnaughts, 2 colossus slayers and 5 scouts” He throws 20 rectangles, 2 triangles and 5 towers onto the table.

The cycle continues until the final count comes to about 500 reavers in total. 150 dreadnaughts, 200 skirmishers and 120 scouts.

Molly sighs, head hanging for a moment. “We only have 30 colossus slayers.” The whitecloak groans, before rearranging all the pieces for a moment. “Our scouts have brought news that they’re using warcarts hauled by balrogs.” There was a bit of murmuring amongst the leaders before Molly spoke up again. “And we know they have at least three seraphims.” That one had the room silent. “Not to mention they’ll have us at least four imps to one reaver and one maybe two hell knight to each white cloak present.”

The silence turned to murmuring as the reavers just leaned to one another whispering in reaver tongue. “Oh come now, It may be bad, but not impossible.” Molly rolls his shoulders in a light shrug. “You. How many imps do you think your men can kill before they go down?” He points to a random whitecloak who fumbles his words for a moment.

“Um. About five? Three for the fledglings.”

“Okay, so the numbers advantage for the imps doesn’t really matter, does it?” Molly reasons. “Does every reaver here feel capable of killing at least one hellknight?”

Every reaver raises their hand, seeming to be thinking it over at the least. “What about the seraphims? Doesn’t matter how many imps and knights we can kill if we get blasted off the field.”

Molly blinks for a second. “Okay. Let's say they have three seraphims. We have ten colossus slayers to each.”


“And the balrogs? They can’t be killing balrogs if they’re killing the seraphims and if they get those carts to the wall, we’re all screwed.”

Molly sits in a defeated huff. “We need a plan. We can’t swarm them like we usually do or we all die. Just give it a second.”

“Um… What’s the red blood think? He’s the reason we’re all here anyway.” Ox pipes up, raising his mug of beer in Cebra’s name. The other reavers turn their attention to the red blood, some raising a beer, others sitting back just to listen… Molly hoped and prayed he could come up with something better than he had.

Cebra had been standing there motionless as he observed their strategic planning, there were so many terms he was unfamiliar with like "Colossus slayer" and "Seraphim". But he was clever in the lingo of war and deduced their meaning from how they were talked about among the Reavers. They were a smart enough group for their purpose, but from the look of things the one named Molly seemed to be overwhelmed by the odds against them. Cebra's makers made him with a shrewd and devious mind for warfare on a tactical and in this case strategic level. He could see given the manpower and fortifications available they could repel the invaders. The great benefit of having a fortified position meant they always had the terrain advantage. Indeed Cebra's mind was buzzing with ideas now.

It was fortunate then that he was addressed then, as he didn't want to step out of line and start barking orders. Cebra was not modest nor did he spare any time in getting down to business. Without so much as a thank you or a nod he proceeded to move the stones around as his eyes darted from one area to another. "We have the ballista, anyone able to wield a bow or crossbow is to take position behind the walls here and here." As he points out two wall sections. They're going to throw their weakest soldiers at us first to probe for the weakest area in our walls. They're going to reach the walls, that is inevitable however... We can keep them from taking the walls. It's vital we destroy their range siege weapons so while they scale the walls here, we need to send a small but fast strike team out of this gate here. They will circle the enemy with as much speed as possible and hit the siege weapons, they should only be lightly guarded as the enemy will press the walls"

When they reach the gate we need to have a unit of Reavers here, here and here forming a box around the gate so we can keep them enclosed in a tight ball. I'll have something ready for them that should have them utterly broken and fleeing back, destroying their moral and giving us the opportunity. If we can break their moral at the gate we can push outside without worrying about a catapult rock landing on our heads. When their moral starts to break we need to push harder and clear the walls off. Then maybe we can counter attack and strike into their heart, kill the commander of these forces and route them entirely." Cebra looks around at the gathered officers and the nervous looks on their faces, aware that he might seem strange in how he delivered all of that, but time is short and soldiers need orders. "That's my plan... But..." Cebra's mind drifts back to Rai as he mutters under his breath "If only". He snaps out of it and looks around for agreement.

The white cloaks were silently listening as Molly moved the pieces about to mirror what Cebra was talking about. All scout units behind the walls, the dreadnaughts waiting to take the brunt of the fire at the gates and skirmishers with colossus slayers waiting to close in and do some damage under the cover of chest high wheat fields surrounding the city. All eyes lift when Cebra mentions preparing a nasty surprise for enemy forces, although not one knew what that meant. It earned a smirk from Molly who was just taking in the beauty of a well formed plan. Reavers were simple creatures by nature, lacking the clever component that lended itself well to planning an attack like this.

“Told you the red blood was smart.” Molly pokes at one of the other reavers across the table with a devious grin.

“I still don’t think there's enough colossus slayers. Those Seraphims don’t go down easy.” The other reavers assert.

Meanwhile in the side room the sound of feminine fussing ensues, pulling the war room’s attention to the door leading to what could only be assumed to be the staff’s quarters. The door creaks open to a reaver barely held together. She was in a donated white nightgown, loosely hanging on her small frame and almost dusting the ground for being too large for her. Her usual black hair was paler and lacked its billowing smoke effect. Her markings are barely lighter than her pale white skin. Mariza was following along behind her, trying to take her by her burn scarred wrists and pull her back to bed and was marginally successful against what would normally be an unstoppable force.

“Sorry! She woke up about ten minutes ago and wanted to come see you!” Mariza calls. She had taken Rai's hand but quickly yanks her hand back as if unsure whether or not to handle the reaver so roughly as to force her back to bed.

If reavers could turn any paler, the entire room full of reavers looked as though they were seeing a ghost.

“Not going back to bed, I want to help.” Rai groans, voice a more quiet rasp through smoke.

“Pull her a chair. If she wants to join she can.”Molly admits as no one seems to move. “Come on then.” He barks as they scramble up, giving her the pick of seats. Rai makes a bee-line to the seat nearest Cebra, although slowly. She was doing her best to remain upright and unbothered but as she walked dust fell from under her dress and the occasional drop of blood and every so often a bare foot scraped against stone. The back of her dress was bloodstained from nape to hip and clinging to the flayed flesh beneath.

She sits, jolting as soon as her back threatens to hit the chair but sitting in. The other whitecloaks slowly settled themselves, and the one she evicted moved to find another chair for himself, but all of them were still just staring at Rai as if unsure what to say. They knew burning was a bad death, but somehow it was as if surviving was worse. “I heard the plan. I think it sounds good. I’ll ride in Molly’s unit.” She glanced up at Cebra. Her eyes clouded over with death but still somehow glimmering with her usual demon slaying zeal.


“I- no you won’t You’ll be right here. You can hand the archers arrows. Or if Cebra will have you, help him out with whatever he has planned for the gates. You aren’t seeing the front lines, you’ve done enough for us.” Molly crosses his arms as she sinks a little defeated but she does perk at the idea of what was going on with the gates.

Rai leans over, energy having run out and leaning against Cebra’s shoulder. "Want help with the gates?" She asks in an even lower tone, growing tired.

Cebra was deadly focused on the battle map, he was stunned though when he witnessed Rai (or what was left of her) enter the room. Cebra stopped himself from running over to her to hold her up, he wanted to but was unsure now about how she felt about him after their falling out. He also didn't want to perhaps make her look incapable in front of her comrades. He sits back down as Rai takes a seat next to him to him, he can't help but side glance her and her injuries with a sense of anger. Though it at least seemed as though Rai wasn't holding a grudge against Cebra, he didn't feel it if she was as she leaned against him trying to stay up straight.

"Rai... You're barely able to hold yourself together." He mutters this under his breath as to not alert the other Reavers talking amongst themselves about the strategy at hand. Cebra didn't think her capable of doing more than she already has, and certainly didn't want to risk her dying in open combat against whatever things they were meant to face down. "You don't need to be on the very front Rai, you can help from inside the walls." Clearly he was trying to spare her feelings out of his own self interest but he also believed what he said. Cebra fully thought Rai wouldn't last outside the walls in her state. Though he could see on her face that drive to go out and fight.

Rai’s body was alight with pain, each breath causing shockwaves to jolt from her spine to her sides. She usually didn’t breathe by force of habit but she couldn’t help but to do so. It was her equivalent of screaming in agony. Dust fell from exposed flesh every so often, staining the back of the white dress with a combination of deoxygenated blood and what seemed to be fresh sand as she literally fell apart. She leans her head over, unable to keep herself completely vertical, cheek brushing up against Cebra’s arm to even have some semblance of staying in her chair. “I don’t feel I have done my part yet. The city is still to burn and until it isn’t I don’t consider myself to have helped at all.” Her voice a quiet rasp below the continuation of planning in the war room.

Rai’s cold fingers ball up under her fist involuntarily for a moment before she fights to regain control of her hand. “Cebra, there are seraphims coming. They’re angels… or they used to be at least. Some people think that God sent them to close the gap between hell and the world of the living, to destroy Dis all together. I don’t know what happened in the end but Dis is still here and every so often a powerful necromancer manages to scrounge up enough skeletal remains of the seraphim to do his bidding.” The seraphims were horrifying creatures beyond one’s comprehension, and what was worse was the horrid noise they made. Like a million trumpets blaring all at once with bellowing breath. “They look like giant rings of silver with eye sockets. Some of them still have what's left of their wings, feathers and bone, but they come with a hailstorm of flaming swords, spears and halberds.” A seraphim alone was a sight to behold, much less three of them in one place.

Grey, dead eyes fix straight ahead for the moment as the corpse woman experimentally runs her hands through her now smokeless hair. “Is this what it’s like to be human?” She asks, having no actual idea what mortality felt like. So far it fits how the peasants lived, lives of pain and darkness. “I’ll stay behind the walls with you. But I do want you to take me to the gates.” The demand was barely loud enough to be heard over the growing conversation that had at this point devolved into white cloak banter and beer drinking. For one of the first times ever, they had a plan and had resolved themselves to the last bit of good times some of them may have. However, Molly did not partake, rather giving a sidelong glance to the redblood and the reaver. Deep in thought himself.

“Take her. If she stays behind the gates she should be alright.” Molly confirms opting to give the two a moment that wasn’t overcrowded with rowdy reavers. “Humans tend to avoid the haystacks at the north gates.” He suggests, assuming they’d want to dodge other people for the time being.