The Wizard Killer - Season Two

Episode 1 - Part 2

Red. Why's everything red? A shadow appears in the red, and I flinch, opening my eyes a crack. The brutal sun of the real world rages in.

My body feels like I've been trampled by a hundred horses, with a distinct pain in my chest. Also along for the ride, my stomach's upside down and that incessant buzzing is still there.

The world's a blur, but I can make out someone's got their hand on the short sword that's in my chest and I've weakly grabbed their hand.

It takes me a few blinks to focus, but I can finally see them properly. They're wearing a beige long coat, open and with the collar up, past their ears. A big pair of goggles occupies most of their face, the rest's taken up with a triangular silvery-metal and brown-leather thing over their mouth. Under the coat, they've got a long-sleeved, dirty shirt and brown pants.

They yank their hand away from mine and yell something that I'm sure's a swear. I let my arm fall limply to the ground and shut my eyes.

I listen intently as they get into an argument with someone else. The one in front of me's a woman; the other one's a guy. Huh, my mind must have imagined her as the giant. But what was she grabbing?

Peeking out, I see that they're arguing, but she's definitely the tough of the duo. Glancing down I see what the yig she was grabbing. My short sword's impaled in my chest, right where the oner woman put it.

I roll my head a bit back and forth, remembering for a moment what happened. I'm tempted to feel my wrists, but I'm pretty sure that I don't have a vine, or anything this time, to tell me how long I've been dead. And given that the scavengers aren't dead, it means the oner woman's either dead or gone.

The more the duo talk, the more it starts to make sense to me, until I realize that they've been offered money for something and need to get the job done. I'm willing to bet the job's something to do with me—why else would they still be here?

The pain in my chest's getting worse. Right. I've got to get that thing out of me, or I'm going to die for real or be suspended again. I need to think of something.

"He's awake!" shrieks the guy salvager. He's dressed pretty much the same as the woman.

I snap my eyes open and point right at the guy. "Get this yigging thing out of me."

He screams like a little girl, and I lower my hand. Wow, just pointing took everything out of me. This isn't good.

I try to draw a breath, but it hurts too much. This is going to get really bad, really quickly. My stomach's feeling oddly calm. Does that mean there's magic or not? All I know is that I'm feeling dizzy.

"How is this possible?" says the woman salvager. "The stone man can't be alive!"

Summoning everything I've got, I reach up and try pushing against the hilt. "Come on," I grunt through clenched teeth. "Get this out of me."

They grab on, and after a few tugs, it comes out.

They drop the sword, astonished.

With a hand over my bleeding chest wound, I force myself onto my side and crawl over to it.

I grab the sword and run my thumb along the etched markings at the base of the blade. A small wave of warmth trickles into me and stops. Looking down, I've stopped bleeding but still feel like complete crap.

I miss something that the woman scavenger says but catch a glimpse of her rushing towards me. She lands a solid kick in my ribs that drops me to the sandy ground. Stamping on my hand forces me to let go of the short sword. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her take off with it.

Coughing, I roll onto my side. The guy's picking stuff out of the sand from where I'd been lying. He tosses one in the air and catches it.

The charging crystals I was laying on. I remember now, the wesleks chained to the bottom of the floating side. They were ripping the life essence and mana out of everything and then they felt me... and rebelled. Instead of feeding the demonic machines that kept the city afloat, they pulled everything from it.

Blinking about slowly, I roll over and see the scavengers taking off with their hand cart.

I lose consciousness for a while. When I awaken, I'm surprised that there's nothing eating my leg or something.

Sitting up, I groan as my ribs remind me that I'm very much in the real world.

Yig, they've got my short sword. Frowning, I remember how it barely had anything to heal me.

Getting my weary ass up, I stumble over to where the guy scavenger had found the charging crystals. I kneel down in the sand and dig, finding several more. All of them are dull.

"These are dead. Is this why I'm still alive? Wait, that means that this is where the barn was."

I take a moment to look around. There's nothing. No fields, no buildings, not even a sign of the scavengers. Just white sand, and a thin plume of smoke rising in the west. I'm willing to bet that's where they went.

Glancing about, there's no sign of the oner woman or Randmon. Rubbing my wrist, I shake my head. I could have been here for days, weeks, even years. The oner couldn't have easily moved me either, as the suspend-life enchantment would have turned me to white stone.

"Assuming I was laying there the whole time and that no one tried to move me, that means it's got to be here somewhere... unless some yigging scavenger found it."

I dig until my fingertips start to bleed, and then push a bit further. My persistence is rewarded as I hit something.

A laugh escapes me. "Come on. I can't believe that you'd leave me."

After a bit more work, I pull out something wrapped in a cloth that makes my face fall. "The oner had that..." I unwrap the treasure and stare at my mana-pistol.

A smile cracks my dry lips as I slip my hand around the grip. "Glad you don't hold a charge, or you'd be useful."

I run my hand along its flat sides and stare at the blue streak that runs from the bottom of the handle through to the end of the barrel.

"I'm in the mood for getting back what's mine and dishing out some pain. You in? Good."