In Harmony We Trust, Ryan Matthew Harker [rooftoppers .txt] 📗

even perpetuator of countless unspeakable acts, could hardly stand the sights before her and was helpless to advert her gaze.
A low and terrible rumble began deep in Absinthe throat. It began softly at first until it grew to match the cacophony of Candlelite’s howls, a sound completely out of proportion to the still relative smallness of her body. But then as if triggered by her growls her body began to swell and expand and her clothes ripped as brown expanses of fur covered flesh broke free. Her legs and feet grew and reshaped themselves as she sloughed off her pants and boots to reveal more coarse brown fur. The same was happening to her arms and her hands stretched sickly until they were massive paws with wicked claws that matched the ones that had sprouted from her feet. All of this change was accompanied by the crunching and grating of her shifting bone structure as it reconfigured, and her muscles stretched and bulged wildly with wet sucking and popping sounds as they stretched to accommodate her growing mass. Soon the woman-bear-thing had grown so large that she was entirely blocking any view of the similar transformation being experienced by Candlelite.
Finally the huge bear turned and stared at the frightened bunch of humans, her head brushed the high ceiling of the hallway as she rose to her hind legs and roared.
Everyone clapped their hands over their ears.
“Damnit Absinthe!” Jeshux hollered back as he regained his courage. “Not so loud! I can barely hear as it is.”
Abashedly the big grizzly dropped back down on all fours and settled on her haunches.
Transformed Candlelite was by far the most horrible of the pair. While Absinthe more or less attained the size and shape of a grizzly bear the young man became a salivating monster. Stepping from behind Absinthe’s hulking form he stood erect like a man but unlike a man he was covered with silver streaked blue-gray fur with bits of his natural blonde interspersed throughout. He had grown in height by over two heads which put him from just shy of six feet to well over eight. His musculature had also expanded exponentially. As a man he was very fit and trim but now he was a raging hulk whose body rippled sinuously as he moved. His shoulders and arms were massive, leading to large long fingered hands tipped with scimitar sharp talons. His chest heaved mightily with every breath and his legs, backward at the knees, were heavily corded running machines that ended in huge paws that were also equipped with razor sharp claws. His head was like that of a timber wolf, lean, viscous with yellowed fangs dripping saliva under a wet black nose. Long, fur tufted ears twitched excitedly as they tested the air for every sound and his eyes were blood red with jet black pupils that were darker than any black hole.
The salivating werewolf walked over to Jeshux. He looked the mercenary commander dead in the eye, raised one hooked talon, and used it to carve the fine finish of the wood inlaid wall. “Sorry about that. So what’s next?” the scratching read.


McAriicoys rode at the head of the column. His horse plodded along, head down, pace steady. The animal gave no indication that the misgivings the mercenary had were founded on anything but fantasy. Just because the population of the entire province of Gonderlund seemed to have mysteriously vanished was no reason to fear that something was wrong, nope.
McAriicoys had sent scouts ahead as soon as they had reached the city limits. None of them had returned so he had ordered the bulk of the army to stay put while he personally led a small force of a hundred men into Gontiluna. The mercenaries were seven miles into the city, less than a mile from the Citadel, one of his scouts should have returned to report by now, and the fact that none of them had, now that was cause for worry.
The grizzled war veteran kept his eyes open and his ears alert and halted his small army at the Citadel gates. McAriicoys dismounted from his horse and signaled one of the men forward to investigate the guard house.
“I found these,” the merc said upon returning. He held up the cut remains of some stout rope. It was the same rope as that carried by the mercenaries. “There were no signs of struggle.”
McAriicoys grunted noncommittally and stared through the open portal of the Citadel while he tried to decipher the secrets that might wait at the end of that long avenue.
The stillness of the late afternoon was absolute, not a sound disturbed the silence. The sun was soon to set, already it dipped low on the horizon and the temperature was cooler by a few degrees. Summer was a bit long in the tooth and in these latitudes it would not only be the nights that would get cooler.
The faint screeching sound reach McAriicoys ears at the same time someone called out the warning, “Vampires!” McAriicoys turned to look and followed the pointed finger of the one who had called out. His gaze lit upon the dark mass of flitting forms that advanced through the sky. They were coming on quick and at the rate they were moving would be on top of the mercs in a matter of minutes.
“On your horses,” McAriicoys shouted as he swung into his saddle. “Everyone to the guild hall now!” He spurred his horse forward with a couple well placed kicks from his heels and headed into the Citadel.
The mercenaries raced through the gates and down the street, the hooves of their horses flying.
The vampires spotted their attempt at escape and flew in faster. Wings flapped ferociously as the huge bat-like predators closed the distance with remarkable speed, soaring over the Citadel walls and screeching with excitement for the hunt.
Without warning the horses went ballistic. Whinnying and snorting the ones in the front stopped and reared which caused the ones behind to stumble. Some went down on impact and threw their riders. At least two mercenaries were crushed to death immediately as chaos ensued.
When McAriicoys horse reared it was slammed into from behind and fell sideways. He sprang from the saddle before it hit the ground and crushed him. He landed on both feet at a run and immediately began to fire his rifle into the air to provide cover for his foundering men.
“Dismount!” he shouted. “Leave the horses!”
The men who were not already on the ground quickly gained enough control of their steeds to get off of them without being trampled and followed their comrades in a mad dash down the wide street.
Although they quickly fired bursts over their shoulders with their rifles and dropped vampires from the sky by the dozens, the mercs were still assaulted mercilessly as every vampire that fell was instantly replaced by two more. Men were slaughtered left and right as they literally ran towards the guild hall for their lives.
“Calvary!” an anonymous voice cried as mounted goblins stormed through the Citadel gates closely followed by dozens of werewolves. The knowledge that they did not stand a snowballs chance in hell against werewolves afoot spurred the soldiers into an even faster retreat.
McAriicoys was ahead of everybody and was the first to spot the guild hall. He was also the first to notice that they ran from one fight only to head right into another one. What appeared to be a werewolf and some kind of bear were raging up and down the stairs in front of the guild. They were surrounded by scores of brown robed men and women who attacked them fearlessly, apparently unconcerned by the sharp claws and huge paws that the beasts utilized in their defense. Gunfire came from the top of the stairs and cut the brown robes down left and right. Some of them would not fall though and of the ones that did, not all of them stayed down. He heard a familiar voice cut through the din of all of the mayhem and McAriicoys yelled as loud as his already overworked lung would allow him to. “Je-shu-ux!”
The Commander General must have heard him because the gunfire coming from the top of the stairs switched from providing cover for the two on the stairs to cutting down the creatures both above and behind the fleeing mercenaries.
The two animals also heard McAriicoys beleaguered shout and stormed down the stairs flinging and throwing robed people out of the way as they came.
It had become fully dark as the mercenaries first made their way down the wide boulevard.
Although he had never seen Candlelite as a werewolf and only seen the two of them together briefly, McAriicoys knew that these two creatures were allies.
“It’s the Chosen Ones!” he bellowed to ensure that none of his men fired on them inadvertently.
Reaching the bottom of the stairs just as the mercenaries did werewolf and bear turned and again began to attack the brown robes. They kept the frenzied people at bay which allowed the mercenaries the reprieve they needed to make it to the top mostly unscathed.
Although they warily eyed the two animals as they tore apart what were, for the most part, seemingly normal looking people the mercenaries still did not hesitate to add their own efforts to the death toll. They were not stupid people and they could tell by their dismemberment and their invulnerability that the brown robes were far from normal.
They were halfway up the stairs when the werewolves joined the fray. Upon catching sight of their prey the blood thirsty brutes had bayed loudly and outpaced both mounted humans and goblins alike to quickly catch up with the mercenaries.
Unlike the horses for some reason the werewolves were unaffected by the strange barrier that had drove the equines crazy, however the steeds of their fellows encountered the strange resistance. The mounted enemy force was also forced to pursue the mercenaries on foot and this caused them to join the now three sided battle a few minutes after their lupine cohorts.
This entire time the endless screeching and swooping of the vampires continued, abated only as the mercenaries reached the landing in front of the guild entrance were able to seek cover to begin a more organized defense. Finally the winged monsters were forced into a partial retreat and flew just out of range of the mercenary weapons.
As more mercenaries reached the top of the stairs they were ushered into the guild hall by Max and Sefu who stood to either side of the massive entrance.
Once everyone was inside, with McAriicoys firing indiscriminately at both brown robes and Harmony’s forces, Jeshux signaled the two untiring behemoths to retreat.
Smashing and clawing their way courageously back up the stairs the Chosen Ones probably would have been killed right then and there if not for the tremendous barrage of gunfire supplied by the hundred or so men that awaited them at the top.
With much effort and no little amount of blood, the two fought their way to the landing and with the rest of their companions made it inside the guild hall.


“Well, Absinthe is definitely too big to make it any further into the guild,” Jeshux said after he read what Candlelite had scratched onto the wall. “So I guess, unless you want to wait out the night crammed in this hallway, our only option is to fight our way through the Zombies,” the word was unfamiliar on his lips. “get the horses and ride like hell.”
Both Candlelite and Absinthe rumbled their assent at this suggestion and moved their large heads up and down as they did so.
Jeshux looked to Max and Sefu. The scientist just raised his eyebrows and