Sally couldn’t help but grin to herself as she watched another skeletal dwarf unload a barrel of grease down a chute beside the doorway. The roaches had spent the last few minutes banging on the first gateway, and hadn’t made it into the corridor yet, but she was almost giddy to watch everything play out.

  She turned her eyes as Archie came to sit up beside where. “Where have you been?”

  “The dwarves have an interesting carved mural of our arrival, down on the next floor,” he replied. “Worth a look once you have the opportunity.”

  “Cliff notes.” She clicked her fingers. “We are about to go Helm’s Deep all up in this. I’ll either be cackling over the bugs enjoying the slip and slide, or sharpening my dagger for our final stand.”

  The cat sighed. “Well, to start with-”

  “Actually, I changed my mind. Let’s go look.” Sally turned to the demon, who was lying on a stone bench with his eyes closed. “Call me if they get through the door, Eddy.”

  He grunted and didn’t open his eyes, which was good enough for her.

  Archie led her through a short doorway over to the left. Humphrey was helping the dwarves set up the defenses, while Bully had been taken away to peruse their alchemical supplies. It had been a relief to have this respite from the fighting outdoors, even if they were trapped for now.

  After going down a spiral staircase that hurt her legs because of the low ceiling, the pair emerged into a wider chamber with soft lighting. Much like the cat had said, the opposite wall had an intricate carving depicting… something like the Outsiders.

  “I had one of the nice priests translate for me,” Archie said. He sat on the floor and curled his tail around his paws. “Their artwork is reasonably straightforward, even if the elements are abstract from our perspective.”

  The large skull that appeared to be chewing on the planet like a gobstopper was simple enough. Death of the System. Along the bottom half of the carving were all the other races and tribes of the world in varying states of being maimed by the invaders. The depictions of the aliens were rather basic, not looking like cockroaches at all. More like an 8-bit hotdog with legs.

  To the left of death eating this System were the dwarves themselves. At the top, they were fleshy and prosperous. A transition showed them sliding out of their skinsuits as if they were taking off a sweatshirt. Then, the final row was of the dwarven occupants as they appeared now - living skeletons. Less prosperous, but more… sagely?

  She saved the best for last, as the right of the skull had five figures that must be her oddballs. Rather generic humanoid shapes, instead of being detailed they had runes engraved beside each.

  “They had names for us?” she asked the cat.

  “Translated directly, your title is She Who Lives On Annoyingly.” He tilted his head to glance up at her.

  “Don’t tell me fibs, Arch.” Sally wrinkled her face up. “The prophecy couldn’t have been that accurate.”

  He smiled. “They are rather blunt with their words. The spirit of it is a compliment of your undying persistence in the face of adversity.”

  Ah, that was more like it. She couldn’t fault them for picking that up, as it was one of her core traits. Sally raised an eyebrow. “Just how did everyone and their grandma get prophecies about me and the gang? I bet it was the Thrimble incident.”

  “Astute, as that is a possibility. Perhaps it has something to do with me and my connection here. I honestly am unsure.”

  The zombie tapped her foot on the floor, trying to chew her way to an answer. Nothing came up, and she sighed. “It just better not be more Theo time travel bullshit, or I will write a letter of complaint to whomsoever is in charge of my destiny.”

  As competent as the vampire was, he had the occasional habit of not coming straight back to Sanctuary. The first time, he had gone back after going insane, allowing his past self to kill him so that he could respawn back in the present. That alone made her head hurt to think about, and she just glazed over any time he tried to explain how he’d messed up the old Architect… which used to be Archie? It went far over her head.

  “Any of the other goobers have a funny name?” she asked, to shuffle away those thoughts.

  “Edward is Underworld Bastard.”

  The demon sneezed. It was difficult enough to think of ways to betray these new allies while they were making such a racket and kicking up dust. This bench wasn’t comfortable either, not that he was tired. He just wanted to get out of doing any hard labor to help with the defenses.

  So far, this adventure on a new world had been a lot more exciting than pretending to work on the Council back at Sanctuary. Fewer targets to stab in the back, but if he waited long enough, tripping up the zombie at the final hurdle would taste all that sweeter. Every success she had over the years was just raising her up for that harder fall.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  It was almost enough to make him salivate. Although… Theo might not be too pleased with him. Worse than the vampire getting revenge on him, he didn’t want to lose a friend.

  He opened a blue eye as a wide shadow blanketed him.

  “Sleeping on the job?” Humphrey asked. “If you are so prepared to head home, I can put you back on the Omen myself.”

  “Perhaps I just have a little more faith in our new allies.” The demon rolled his eyes. “Do you doubt them?”

  “We are facing an unprecedented foe; I will not be found lacking when it comes to readiness. Stand and help, or I will sever your head.” The flames at the back of the Death Knight’s helmet rose a little higher.

  Edward sighed. “Always so quick to resort to violence. It’s no wonder Sally is the way she is.”

  Humphrey watched him with narrowed eye sockets. It would take more than that to get a rise out of the Death Knight. It might be better to play along for now - there could be a way to be sinister while appearing to help.

  “Go up to the ramparts,” he was instructed. “I can trust you to handle gas bombs, correct?”

  The demon’s mouth widened into a sharp-toothed grin. He certainly could be trusted.

  Bully placed his hat down on the short stool and massaged his skull. He could admit that he wasn’t exactly the best under pressure. Fighting the Radochs in the forest while trying to brew potions had earned him several levels in Battle Alchemy, but he didn’t exactly feel any better about it.

  Being inside the fortress at least gave him breathing space… where his weird mix of elation and panic could form a headache-inducing tornado within his skull.

  He was improving in leaps and bounds. The weaker Glue flask utilizing new materials, the Expert Dodge potion, and the Greater Homonuculus were all flashes of brilliance. He had been told that adventuring with Sally was worthwhile if you could endure both the stakes and her constant yapping. So far, this had been worse than he imagined, in both regards. Yet… he just needed to survive.

  Now his mind was racing as a pair of skeletal dwarves had led him to an alchemical lab. There were at least a dozen reagents he had never heard of, not to mention several variations on things that were common on Sanctuary. He could spend three days mixing and learning and still not discover all that there was to gain here.

  He turned his large eyes to the dwarf skeleton wearing an apron over robes. “Are you sure I can take what I need?”

  “Yes, sir. We have little need for most kinds of potions since our emergence, and we have a separate storage for the ones that we do.”

  “Thank you so much, then. This is a real treat.”

  The dwarf smiled, his toothy jaw upturning uncannily. “Better than that, my good sir. You can even borrow our recipe book.”

  Bully gasped as the fellow alchemist slapped a thick tome on the table. Being an Outsider wasn’t so bad after all.

  While it lasted.

  Sally crouched as she walked back up the uncomfortable stairs. “If it doesn’t say we save the world, and the System still dies… why become skeletons?”

  Archie followed her up. “They assumed that in sealing themselves away, they could just outlive whatever destruction befell the rest of the world.”

  “While it lasted,” she murmured. “If they truly believed that, they wouldn’t have let us in, right? We’re not going to stay put for long.”

  “Do you have a plan if the current attack is rebuffed?”

  Now that was a question and a half. Images from the Omen looked favorable in the short term. While they were in the fortress, the nearby bugs couldn’t find their scent, so the attack was currently limited to those who had been on the way during the forest battle. That was still… at least a hundred or more bugs - so this wasn’t a walk in the park.

  But what would they do, assuming the dwarven defense was successful?

  She knew what she wanted to do - take a bite out of those spaceships and punch whoever was in charge. The several-thousand strong army tearing apart the world wasn’t likely to just let her do that, however.

  “Other than finding your Infinity Stone or whatever, we don’t have many bullshit options to pull out of our sleeves, huh?”

  Archie shook his head. “None currently known to me.”

  That just meant someone else knew them. If there was one thing Sally was good at, it was breaking eggs. She had the complaints from the local farms framed in the bathroom to prove it. It was just a question of whether an omelet could really cut it with what they were up against.

  They moved back into the front chamber, where the defensive preparations were almost complete. Humphrey was standing to the side, his arms crossed and a grin on his face. He was watching the demon pack up tubes of grenade-sized objects.

  Sally put her hands on her hips and gasped. “Eddy, you told me you were allergic to hard labor. Are you okay?”

  He gave her a dull glare and continued his task without responding.

  “The roaches are finding it difficult to get through the first door.” The Death Knight tilted his head at the zombie. “There is a chance the ones with a few brain cells will call in some of the tougher monsters to break through.”

  She thought of the radioactive giant snail and pulled a face. There were much worse out there than roaches. Getting stuck in here wasn’t ideal. She had a long list of feedback for Chuck on improvements that could be made to the whole process. Starting with not sending only five Outsiders to save an entire world.

  If they really wanted to simulate a defense of Sanctuary, then they could at least send a hateful eight. Maybe a dirty dozen.

  Four wasn’t fantastic, but it was a thing. They had to make it work with what they had.

  She furrowed her brow as she watched the last of the dwarves get into position. Maybe she wasn’t using her team to its best ability. As an Outsider, prowess and grit on the frontline was a given - but they weren’t all brawlers like her. Edward was a master spy and saboteur. Bully was best left alone to work on his craft. When pushed to it, Humphrey could be a nigh-invulnerable tank, at the cost of some of his offensive capabilities.

  If only she could turn the bugs into zombies, the scales could eventually tip in her favor.

  “Sounds like they’ve brought something big,” a dwarf called down. A repeating crash could be heard echoing up from the first door.

  Sally closed her eyes. There was a reality where Theo was tearing across this world unhindered, and she was chin-wagging with the two powerful Players from a different System. Chuck wasn’t the sort of person who would get something like this the wrong way around, though.

  She pressed her tongue against one of her sharp teeth. Life always found a way.

  With a dull glare toward the defensive wall, she brought out her crossbow. It was time to gather some puzzle pieces.