Drew was missing Katie, wishing he’d brought her rather than Trista. Logically, he knew that Katie would be needed up with the main group. But it would have been nice to know that there wasn’t going to be anything coming up behind him. After about eighty feet they came to a bend in the tunnel that twisted to go towards the glowing ley line core. He had to switch off his aura sight due to how bright the node was now that they were so close to it.
It felt weird to be without his aura sight; he hadn’t realized how much he had come to rely on it, and everything seemed duller, less full of life now. When they got to an open doorway Drew signaled for everyone behind him to stop while he bent down and poked his head around the corner. He was ready to step back in an instant if it was a trap, although he trusted Daryl to have cleared that far at least.
Drew had no idea what the room’s original purpose was; rubble along the far edge suggested it might have once been a cube farm, but it had been repurposed. Thick bars of iron stretched from floor to ceiling, creating dozens of six by six-foot cages that each held a captive. Row after row of cages stretched out with eight-foot hallways between them. Drew cursed under his breath. He would have to rely on his three single target spells or risk killing one of the humans.
There was no sign of Daryl-he was probably wandering the room looking for his wife. Six trolls patrolled the room with another four sitting at a table on the far side. Drew pulled back from the edge of the door and looked at everyone. Taking a few steps back from the entrance, he whispered a description of the room. After a brief discussion, they decided to have Robbi go first, Trista behind him, with Sarah and Drew holding the rear.
They tried to be quiet, but they were spotted almost immediately. Drew still didn’t have a good line of sight on any of the trolls, but the one that saw them roared, and all ten of the trolls came to alert immediately. Two started down the row they were on and Trista fired a shot. A line of blazing yellow-gold fire bisected the row following the path of the bullet. One troll cried out in pain as the bullet tore through him, the blazing trail of fire carving flesh as he pulled away in pain.
Drew blinked. It hadn’t killed the troll, but the line of fire remained, and the injured troll swiped at it with his claw. It sliced through the hand, sending green blood and fingers flying. The prisoners in the cages around the injured troll began screaming, filling the room suddenly with sound.
Drew launched acid arrow. The already injured one took the acid in the chest, falling to the ground silently. The other troll managed to get a hand up to block the projectile. The acid immediately began eating away its hand and it fell to its knees, howling in pain.
Trista fired another line of glowing fire at the distracted troll. It impacted at center mass and he sliced himself in half trying to get away. Everyone stayed where they were, no one wanting to fight where those glowing bars of fire lingered. Drew turned to watch their back. Thankfully the cells prevented the trolls from converging on them quickly. The captives to either side of him began begging him to open their cells. Swallowing dryly, he tried to ignore them while the fight was still progressing.
Aeon’s power began tingling at the base of his spine and he pushed it down. He couldn’t afford to collapse again, not here. Ares’ warning also lingered in his mind. There was danger in using that power. Besides, there were only ten, no, only eight, trolls, he corrected himself and the rising power subsided.
Behind him, two more trolls had rounded the corner and were advancing on the group. With a thought and a flick of his wrist, shocking acid arrows impacted their chests. The lightning caused their muscles to seize while the acid ate their hearts. They died before their bodies could hit the floor. Six trolls left.
The trolls were shouting to each other over the din, their words spoken in a guttural language that sounded like it would rub his throat raw after two sentences. He glanced over and realized that one of them was making for a second entrance on the other side of the room. “Going after the runner!” he shouted, as he blink stepped through the cages, ending up on a row right next to two trolls. He immediately rolled and shot a cone of frostfire towards the ceiling, catching both trolls head on, but hopefully not hitting anyone in a cage.
The runner was directly ahead of him, too far away for lightning bolt. With a curse, he jumped back to his feet and began running after the troll. Just as he was getting in range, it turned down an intersection in the cages. He cursed and pushed his legs to give him more speed. He was running full out now, his right hand held out as he grabbed a bar to swing him around the corner without killing his momentum. He blinked, confused as the yellow aura of his mana shield flared for a moment and he felt a sharp pain in his shoulder.
Another troll had come around the corner, a double barrel shotgun in its hands. Drew blasted it with lightning bolt without thinking. The concussive force of the shotgun blast against his mana shield threw him against a cage the blow reverberated against Drew’s skull. He pushed the pain away, and with the fleeing troll in his sight, he launched an acid arrow at its back. The troll ducked right before it would have hit him, and it splattered on the iron bars of a cage instead.
“Get back here you green bastard!” Drew shouted, and the troll turned to look at him, fear evident in its purple eyes. The prisoner whose cell it was passing pushed out an abnormally long leg, but it managed to trip the troll, sending it sliding along the floor. It was enough for Drew to close the gap and another lightning bolt ended its life.
Drew turned around; he couldn’t remember how many were left, but he looked for the rest of the group. Trista’s glowing fire lines were easy to find, and he followed them to the source. Robbi was dueling with a troll. The red sword seemed to be sucking in crimson lines of power from the cop’s body, while the troll was leaking green from several cuts all along its body. It appeared to be the last troll standing. Even as he watched Robbi charge the troll, swinging his sword wide, it jumped back directly into one of Trista’s fire lines. It burned a hole halfway through the troll’s skull before it collapsed on the floor.
Drew scanned the room. He didn’t see any trolls, but he held his ready stance. The humans in the room were divided into three groups. The first two groups were easy to identify, either screaming in terror or hovering close to the edge of their cages watching the fighting with anticipation. He only realized the third group existed after a second. They were usually sitting in their cage silent and staring off into nothing. “Search the bodies, see if we can’t find a key. We’ll get these people out!” he shouted, while he turned to loot the bodies of the trolls in his sector.
Trista ended up finding the key on one of the two that died first. She began unlocking the cages, while Drew stood near the far entrance looking to see if more trolls were coming. As he passed the cage where the captive had tripped the troll, he paused, and then cast acid arrow on the lock, opening it after a few seconds of metal sizzling.
“Thanks,” he said, looking at the teenager inside. He was short, a few inches shorter than Drew even. With unruly black hair showing a lighter color at the roots, several piercings dotted his face.
“Who are you?” The boy asked.
“IT2 Drew Michalik USCG,” he said with a mock salute. “Go help Trista and Sarah organize the captives. We’re gonna need to move out as soon as possible.” He turned away from the kid then and walked to the doorway, peeking out to ensure they were alone. His fingers found the note in his pocket that Daryl left there. He glanced around to make sure no one was watching, then pulled it out.