3- Down the Hole

3

Down The Hole

There are things in this universe that are beyond understanding or comprehension. When something like this happens to a human without the ability to comprehend the information that is being shown to him or her, the brain has very peculiar and very human response.

It guesses.

So, when Cathleen, the tattooed Celtic warrior woman, grabbed Zachariah and used her robin tattoo to teleport the two of them across miles of earth in the span of a second, Zachariah’s brain had to deal with moving through time and space in a way that was incomprehensible.

So for that second, Zach felt like he was taking a shower.

This feeling quickly ended as he hit the ground with a thud and rolled a couple of feet before coming to a stop, breathless.

His chest hurt, his head pounded, and he felt like he should dry off for some reason.

“The headache passes.”  The voice of the Celtic woman snapped Zachariah out of his pained daze.

Zachariah scrambled to his feet in a panicked rush trying to get his bearings.  He did a quick spin and then saw her and stopped.  Zachariah was standing in a clearing of knee high grass, surrounded by heavy forest.  In the distance, Zachariah could see rocky, rolling mountain-like terrain.  The landscape had completely changed.

He wasn’t in Ohio.  Nowhere near.

The Celtic warrior stood four feet in front of him.  Her tattoos had stopped glowing.  “Calm yourself, we are safe for a time.”

Zachariah raised his eyebrow.  “Oh, so we are safe?”

“Yes.”  She said.

“From the ninjas?”  Zachariah asked.

She didn’t catch on to his sarcasm. “Yes, they can’t follow that fast.”

It was at this point that Zachariah’s mind was flooded with the million, very important questions that had arisen from the events of the last five minutes.  Due to the stress however, his thinking organ was unable to rationally regulate the order in which Zachariah asked all these questions, so instead he tried to ask them all at the same time.

“ What, to me you, how and, how did they with that no, no, I think, could you, I mean, can you, why would she do that, where are, who are….nope.”  Zachariah finally stopped in order to not hyperventilate.

There was a thirty second confused pause.

Cathleen shook her head.  “I didn’t catch any of that,”

Zachariah shook his head.  “Didn’t expect you to.”

“My name is Cathleen.”  The Celtic woman took a passive and warming voice that didn’t suit her.  “I am here to guarantee your safety”

Zachariah did a double take.  “Do you even know what the word ‘safety’ means?!”

Cathleen frowned again.  “Well, you’re alive, aren’t you?”

Zachariah threw his hands up.  “Honestly, I have no idea!  I don’t think I have gathered enough information on the subject to know!  Where are we?”

“The Canadian wilderness,” She answered.  “You are the Roghnaithe, and you have to be here.  It is your destiny.”

Zachariah felt the wind exit him as if he had been punched.  “The Canadian wilderness? Are you fucking kidding me?!”

Cathleen seemed to take a deep breath.  “Look… Help me help you.”

Zachariah stopped and stared.  “Jerry Maguire.”

Cathleen looked confused.  “Who?”

“Oh come on!  It’s the movie that quote is from!”  Zachariah yelled, angrily.

Cathleen frowned.  “I don’t watch movies!”

“Screw it, I’m outta here!”  Zachariah said, giving up.

Cathleen shook her head.  “To where?  You need to come with me.  I’m-”

Zachariah cut her off.  “Why should I trust you?  The Ninja told me you were trying to kill me!”

Cathleen looked surprised.  “You trust the Ninja?”

Zachariah stopped and shrugged.  “You have a point.”

Cathleen took a step forward.  “Come now, we have to go.”

Zachariah shutter-stepped backwards.  “Not a chance.  Fuck that and fuck you, pirate hooker!”

Cathleen’s eyes narrowed.  “I AM NOT A PIRATE!”

“‘Pirate’ was the part of that you found offensive?” Zachariah asked.

Cathleen huffed and took a step forward and Zachariah turned and bolted into the trees.  Cathleen took a deep breath and shook her head, then began to walk after him.

****

She called out to him.  “I just fought three Ninjas.  What makes you think you can out run me?”

“I’m wily!”  He screamed back as he trampled through the trees like a bull.

Zachariah knew he couldn’t outrun her.  He wasn’t stupid.  What he needed was time. Time to devise a plan.  Time to think.  Time to understand what the hell was going on.

James Garner had left this part out.

Suddenly, Zachariah’s priorities changed as his right foot failed to find ground, and in the next instant he fell forward through the loose shrubs that covered a large hole in the ground.

He toppled into darkness and the light of day vanished as he fell.

Zach was falling.

He quickly tried to find a way to stop this by reaching out in all directions.  His right hand caught the wall, but he was moving so fast that the wall almost ripped his arm off and sent his full body spinning.

Zach was falling and spinning.

Awesome.

Something caught him and snapped under his weight, like a vine of some sort.  Then it happened again over and over as if he was falling through a web of vines, each slowing his fall into he hit the bottom with a thud and an ‘oof’.

Every part of his body was sore.  He slowly coughed trying to get the air back in his lungs.  As he did, he inhaled some kind of wretched smell, which seemed to make him cough more.  His headache had not dissipated, contrary to what Cathleen had said.

Most would still consider themselves lucky to be alive.

Zachariah was not one of those people.

“Man did you pick the wrong hole to fall down.”  A voice rang through the darkness.  It was male but a slightly higher tone.

Zachariah recoiled and narrowed his eyes trying to see through the blackness.  Abruptly, a blue light illuminated the dark and standing before Zachariah was a man of extremely short stature who was obviously afflicted with dwarfism.  He was wearing blue jeans and a polo shirt, both custom made for his size.  He had long brown hair tied in a loose pony tail.

Zachariah stared in bewilderment.  “Who are you?”

“My name’s Mel.”  He said and extended his hand.

Zachariah looked surprised and shook his hand.  “Wow, I was expecting your name to be something strange like Frodo, or Mxyzptlk”

Mel frowned and snatched his hand away.  “We’re in Canada, asshole, not Lord of The Rings.”

Zachariah felt bad.  “Sorry man, this day has been rather crazy.”

Mel shrugged and seemed to relax.  “No worries.  After all, we are about to be eaten by a rock troll.”

****

He was gone.

How had he done it?  Just vanished into thin air?  Was there something the elders had left out?

Cathleen felt a desperation clutch her mind.  Zersch’s awakening was a mere forty eight hours away and she had lost the Roghniathe.  She was bordering on the first to fail.

She was coming close to allowing the end of the world.

That was when she felt them, the world bending around them as they followed the ethereal trail she had made when she teleported.

The Ninjas.

Cathleen became quiet and hid in the shadow of a huge tree while watching the clearing.  Kahn was the first to appear out of thin air.  The lady Ninja took a look around then calmed.  Ninjas began to appear behind her.

Cathleen frowned, not believing Kahn to have the ability to follow Cathleen’s teleport exactly.  Ninjas continued to come out of the portal and she realized that Kahn had brought nearly her entire clan.

Cathleen decided it had to be done and reached deep inside herself.  Her abdomen began to glow and her wolf tattoo began to come to life.

She could now smell and hear like that of the wolf.  She caught Zachariah’s scent immediately and began her quiet stealth move into the trees.

She had to find him before the Ninjas.

Next week:  Zachariah’s mysterious journey has only just begun.  As Cathleen and the Ninja struggle to find him first, Zachariah must decide if his new friend Mel is an ally or another enemy.  All this, while trying to escape the Rock Troll!

It all continues next week!

Stranger things

TO BE CONTINUED….

2 Druid Vs Ninja

 2

Druid Vs. Ninja

She moved.  As her muscles began to flex and tighten in order to send her into motion, the tattoos covering her arms and shoulders seemed to dance and float around her. Zachariah couldn’t believe his eyes as he watched.  A brilliantly colored bird, Zachariah thought it was a robin, and a detail laden, thorn vine came alive all across her body.  The beauty of them mesmerized Zachariah in a sort of trance.  He lost himself in the fantastic moving patterns while trying to figure out if they were really moving or if he was just seeing things.

She crossed the ten foot distance between them in a second, maybe two.  Zachariah couldn’t comprehend the speed of her movement.  As she closed in, she brought the sword up.  She thrust it at Zachariah’s head, which was, just then, coming out of the tattoo trance.  Having decided conclusively, that they were moving and he wasn’t crazy, he could only watch.

 The blade however, did not pierce his face nor any other part of his person for that matter.

The blade stabbed past the right side of his head leaving only an inch or two to spare.

As it did, a loud metal on metal sound exploded in Zachariah’s ear, but he did not move. He didn’t move, not because he was stalwart with courage, but because he was locked up with fear.  Slowly, he moved just his eyes to look to his right.

The Celtic woman’s movement had been in order to parry the blow of another sword, meant for Zachariah’s head.

In the next second, Zachariah took stock of his would-be murder weapon and the person wielding it.  The sword was of Japanese descent.   Zachariah knew this because of the Japanese based role playing game he played.  Zachariah’s nerd knowledge continued to help him with the scene, allowing him to know that the sword being used was too short to be a full Katana, also lacking the small curve in the blade.

The man holding the blade was dressed head-to-toe in black material.  This included a great majority of his head, with the exception of the eyes.  The eyes announced his Japanese heritage, even if the outfit hadn’t already.

A Ninja?!

“Don’t move!” The Celtic woman yelled the command to Zachariah, and went rigid.

The Celtic woman’s thorn, vine tattoo came to life, suddenly brighter than the others.  The ground beneath the Ninja went from friendly to hostile in less than a second.  Thorn covered vines exploded upwards and wrapped around the Ninja as he struggled.

Suddenly, the Celtic woman stepped in close, spinning and bringing the sword around to Zachariah’s other side.  Her blade moved fluidly through the air and Zach heard a yelp.  He shifted his eyes from the Ninja, writhing in the web of the woman’s vines, to see another Ninja.  This one was impaled by the Celtic woman’s blade.

“Holy shit!” Zachariah screamed as she kicked the Ninja off her blade.

“I said, don’t move!”  She yelled back, her accent heavy.

The Ninja behind Zachariah started to wail now.  He was fully encased in the vines, the thorns were digging into his skin.  He dropped to the ground, futilely writhing against the tenacious plant-life.

“We have to go, now!”  She screamed and grabbed Zachariah’s hand to drag him away.

Zach didn’t budge.  “The fuck we do!  Look Terma-Irish, or whatever the hell you are, I can’t just-”

Zachariah was cut off promptly by a side kick to his chest, the force of which sent him hurling backward five feet before crashing to the ground in pain.  He gulped for air instinctively, the kick having robbed him of it all.

“Kare O Kaisai!” yelled a stern female voice.

Zachariah looked up and where he had stood was another Ninja.  This one was different from the others.  This one was slender and less stocky, and the eyes which the mask revealed were feminine.

On her command, two more Ninjas appeared on either side of Zach.  Zachariah still wasn’t sure of what was happening, but he understood that he no longer wanted to be there.  He scrambled to try to get to his feet and shake off the kick with which the lady Ninja had honored him, but it was no use.

The Ninjas on either side of Zachariah quickly did some kind of strange hand gesture and then struck the ground.

As Zachariah stood, the Earth moved, lashing up and grabbing hold of his feet.

He was trapped.

Zachariah tried to pull himself free, looking up only for a second to see the fight between the lady Ninja and the Celtic woman.  The Celtic woman advanced with a series of unrelenting sword attacks, each thwarted by the Lady Ninja, as she back-peddled.  Suddenly, the Celtic woman seemed to spiral the blade in front of her and around the guard of the lady Ninja before quickly stabbing forward into the lady Ninja’s gut.

The lady Ninja went rigid with shock and surprise at the kill shot.

Suddenly, the lady Ninja wasn’t there anymore.  Zach didn’t understand at all, but now it seemed the Celtic woman had her sword buried in the trunk of a tree, instead of the black clad, lady Ninja.  The Celtic woman seemed just as surprised.

“Hey, what the-” Zachariah began, having ceased to struggle against the ground that trapped his legs.  He had been caught up in the battle in front of him.

Without warning, the Celtic woman’s shadow moved on its own before taking shape and becoming the lady Ninja.  It was as if the lady Ninja had crawled out of the Celtic woman’s shadow.

“Now, how in the hell did she do that?!”  Zachariah yelled, confused.

“Dirty Ninja!” The Celtic woman screamed and pulled her blade out of the tree just in time to block the lady Ninja’s downward slash.

The swords rang out again, but the Celtic woman was still off balance.  The Lady Ninja was too fast.  She drove a hard kick into the Celtic woman’s solar plexus, before leaping into the air with a spinning roundhouse to the Celtic woman’s temple.

The two hard, fast kicks sent the Celtic woman, ass over head, to Zachariah’s father’s back lawn in a heap.

The Lady Ninja relaxed as she turned towards Zachariah.  She looked him over while slowly approaching him.  She got uncomfortably close to Zach and he could feel her breath on his face as he stared at her, confused.

Finally she spoke, unlike The Celtic woman, her voice gave no hint of an accent.  “So, this is the new Roghnaithe.”

Zachariah raised his eyebrow at the confusing word.  “God bless you.”

The lady Ninja ignored the comment.  “Tell me, Roghnaithe, what value would you put on your life?”

Zachariah seemed to consider.  “Twenty-seven fifty…  That’s American dollars, before taxes.”

The lady Ninja raised an eyebrow.  “Still joking, given the situation?”

Zachariah shrugged, “No offense to you and the rest of your implausible Ninjas or the tattoo pirate over there, but the situation kinda seems like a joke in itself.”

“Do you understand what is happening?” She asked.

“I tripped and fell into a bad writer’s webisode?”  He answered.

Zachariah suddenly noticed the Celtic woman moving on the ground behind the lady Ninja.  She slowly drew a small throwing axe from what seemed like nowhere, slowly bringing herself to her knees.

“I’m trying to help you.”  The .lady Ninja said, frustrated with Zachariah’s attitude.

“Then why did you kick me?” Zachariah asked, still holding his ribs.

“I kicked you to save you!” She was almost yelling out of irritation.

Zach shook his head.  “Who kicks people to save them?!”

“Orokana, orokana, rokudenashi!”  She suddenly yelled in Japanese.

Zach continued his rant, “Seriously! You can’t just run around kicking people and telling them, ‘It’s okay, I just saved you.’  It’s just not how it works!”

The argument would not find its close, as at that very moment, the Celtic woman made her move.

****

The lady Ninja was purely distracted by Zachariah’s inability to just shut up.  The Celtic woman saw her opening and took it, hurling the axe.  It spiraled through the air and connected true.  Cathleen, the Celtic woman had seen her share of Ninja magic used in the years of feuding between their clans.  The spell they used on Zachariah was no exception.  The two Ninja’s on either side of him had to maintain a perfect stance and concentration to keep him held in one spot.

Her axe sunk into the back of the head of one of the spell Ninjas.  It struck with a noise not that different from the sound of a melon being cut in half.

The Ninja crumpled to the ground and she was already in motion.  The next couple of seconds would be crucial.  She knew she didn’t have the skill to defeat Kahn the Lady Ninja in battle so it was time to get herself and the Roghnaithe out of here.

Her robin tattoo began to sing.  It became alive on her skin as she instinctively began to call on the rune’s power.

Kahn spun around, blade in hand.

Cathleen wasn’t going to make it.

Suddenly Zachariah, now free from the spell, stepped forward and cocked his leg backwards before soccer kicking Kahn with all the force he had…

…between the legs.

Kahn screamed in pain, being totally taken by surprise with Zachariah’s sudden participation in the fight.

Even Cathleen winced in sympathy for her adversary.

“How’s your vagina like that shit?!”  Zach screamed at her.  “It’s okay, I just ‘saved it’”

Zachariah was doing air quotes with his hands around ‘saved it’ when Cathleen got to him.

She heard the song of the robin tattoo, and then felt the shift of the world around them.

****

In a flash of light and the echo of a robin’s song, Cathleen and Zachariah vanished before Kahn’s very eyes as she fell to her knees in pain.  Her vision clouded from the tears that came instinctively with the blow.  Her remaining Ninja subordinates stood looking confused as to where Zach and Cathleen went.

She spoke in Japanese as she started to catch her breath.  “They are gone.  She used her robin tattoo to teleport.”

Her subordinates calmed down and went to assist their mistress.

She waved him off.  “I can stand on my own, you fool!”

He backed off as she slowly pulled herself to her feet.  “She has taken him to the Garden of Zersch.  Collect the remains of our brothers and ready the clan.  We must stop her.”

Next week:  Zachariah has avoided the threat of the Ninja, and we now know he can’t shut up, but answers only leave more questions!  The lady Ninja, Kahn and Cathleen the Druid warrior both say they have Zachariah’s safety at heart but can Zach trust either one?   Where has Cathleen taken him?  Who or what is Zersch?

Find out next week!

Stranger things

TO BE CONTINUED….