With it becoming more and more important to leave Grothlosburg as soon as possible, Norman decided to check on his exit strategy instead of going to work. Norman knew he would end up in a similar predicament to what Brigette landed in if he got caught but he had to risk it. Besides, it wasn’t the first time he had skipped work, it was just the first time he had done it so openly.
The trick was not to get caught shirking your mandatory work. With Norman’s skills and knowledge, that was quite easy. Since CDT didn’t check on him anymore during his shifts, Norman just blocked off the doors that protected the teleporters and nobody was the wiser.
A problem Norman quickly ran into was actually getting to the southern end of the city. The teleporter platforms just stopped fifty miles from the edge of the zone. Meaning he would need to walk or catch a ride if he wanted to get closer. Neither choice was an option since he wasn’t supposed to be out here anyway. He was glad he hadn’t waited until the day he planned to leave to find out this little fact.
The farther he moved toward the edge of the zone, the less and less non-gron he spotted. He also started to see more and more compliance officers roaming about. It was a clear sign that trying to push any further would likely get him detained.
Not wanting to be arrested and stuck in a labor camp, Norman turned around and was about to head back when he got a call.
“Mr. President, what can I do for you today?”
“Nothing today, lad. I called you because I have something that can help you.”
Norman listened as the president spoke, a big grin spreading on his face. “I’ll be there in half- make that an hour.”
A piece of the puzzle that Norman hadn’t quite been able to figure out had fallen into place. He hurried over to the teleporter to meet up with the President.
“Ah, Norman, you are right on time,” The President greeted him with a firm handshake. “Our guests are inside and waiting for us.”
“You’re sure it’s safe?”
The President chuckled. “I can assure you, it’s perfectly safe. Us gron may not look all that intimidating, but we are pound for pound far stronger than humans. The bigger one put up a fight, but we managed.”
Norman rubbed his hands together in glee, “alright, let's do this. Do you have the stuff I asked about?”
The President handed over a small case filled with a dozen vials of black liquid. “These are made from magically enhanced glass. While it can still break, it’ll take a lot more than just dropping it to do so.”
Norman accepted the case of poison with a smile. He wanted to take the stuff with him when he left but wasn’t willing to risk carrying the poison around in normal glass vials.
“Shall we?” the President gestured.
Norman nodded enthusiastically and followed the man inside the single-story mat grey building.
The warehouse was filled with odds and ends stacked nearly to the ceiling on sturdy-looking shelving. The two of them moved through the tight rows of shelving until they came to an open area where two large cages sat.
“Grobert!” Norman exclaimed, not expecting the former President, “What are you doing here?”
“Grobert was the one who spotted our caged friends over there,” The President said.
“Well, I guess my thanks are in order,” Norman bowed toward Grobert.
“Bah, none of that now. You did me a solid, Norman, this is the least I could do.”
“I do have to ask,” Norman gestured to the far cage, “who is that?”
Grobert shrugged, “beats me. I ran across your big friend by pure accident, and that wiry-looking fellow was with him. Some sort of fire mage. Not very good though. Barely managed to singe my hair with his spells.”
Norman did notice the man’s hair was a bit frazzled, although he had mistaken it as just being unkempt.
“They’re both still alive?”
“Aye. Although the big one put up a fight. Perks of being undead, I didn’t feel much when he punched me,” Grobert chuckled.
Norman walked up to the cage holding the unconscious Eugene and smiled. “Well, friend, you get to become my next experiment.”
The president cleared his throat and Norman turned to him. “What do you want to do about this man?”
Norman rubbed his chin in thought. He didn’t know the man, but if he was here with Eugene it was probably with the express purpose of helping him to kill. “Well, I was just going to use a bunch of those rodents for this one spell, but I think it would be better if I used another human. So, let's keep him sedated for now.”
The President shrugged. “Don’t matter to me.”
Norman began to clear a section of the floor out. When he was done, he paused and looked at it.
“Whatcha doing, lad?” Grobert asked in interest.
“Making room for a spell circle. Can you drag the big man over to the center of the cleared area?”
Grobert nodded, opening the cage that held Eugene. Eugene must have been playing possum because he surged to his feet and struck out at Grobert, landing a deafening boom of a punch to the man’s jaw.
For all his strength, Eugene’s blow barely made Grobert’s head deflect to the side.
“Oh, that was a decent hit,” Grobert smiled. “Had a bit more fight in ya then. Good. I guess it’s my turn now.”
Eugene tried to throw another hit, but Grobert ducked under the blow and delivered an uppercut to Eugene that lifted him off his feet.
Norman winced as the man’s body stiffened like a puppet with its strings cut before collapsing to the ground.
“Aw, that wasn’t even a workout,” Grobert pouted. “You humans are so fragile.”
Norman just nodded, making a mental note to never get in a fistfight with a gron.
Grobert grabbed the newly unconscious Eugene by his remaining arm and dragged him to the center of the cleared area.
“Here good?”
“Yes, thank you.”
Grobert grunted and dropped Eugene.
Norman wasted no time drawing the complex magic circle while the two presidents watched. It was a little weird having an audience for this but Norman tuned out their muttered conversation while he focused on his work.
When the circle was finished, Norman stood up to inspect it. He frowned when it didn’t activate.
Norman mumbled to himself as he looked at the circle to see what he did wrong. “I don’t see any problem.”
“Needs more magic energy,” Grobert replied, breaking Norman from his inspection.
“Huh?”
“I said it needs more energy.”
Norman looked back at the circle, then at Grobert. “Uh, how do you know?”
“I don’t, but have you tested a working version of this spell before?”
“Yeah, on rodents though.”
Grobert grunted while the President remained silent. “Therein lies the problem. Mass. More mass equals more energy requirement. I had a similar issue when I first started making teleporters.”
Could it be that simple? Well, one way to find out. Norman pulled a bottle of magic dust out from his pocket and started sprinkling it over the spell circle.
“Blood magic,” he heard the President mumble. Although the man said it with a bit of surprised shock instead of derision or disdain as Norman might expect.
It took nearly half the bottle to get the spell to flash to life. Eugene was a large man.
As the spell circle began to glow, Norman stepped back to join the other two to watch the magic spectacle.
The resident spoke up as the spell took effect. “Interesting choice of magic, Norman. I won’t tell you not to use it, it’s not my place. Just be careful how you do. Never use your body's blood to power a spell. The wrong spell could drain you completely and you would be powerless to stop it.”
Norman nodded, not taking his eyes off the slowly glowing circle and the groggy Eugene that had just woken back up.
At first, Norman was concerned the man would just rush him for the kill. Norman certainly didn’t have any defenses to stop the man. And Eugene did try, but he ran into an invisible barrier that flashed red when he tried to cross the circle boundary.
“Ey, big man, you can’t cross an active spell boundary. But don’t worry, I’ll mix it up with ya once this spell’s done.”
Norman looked over at a widely grinning Grobert, then back to a snarling Eugene.
“You let me out right now, Norman, and I will make your death swift and painless. If you don’t I will make sure you suffer pain that you couldn’t even imagine.”
“Um, I’m gonna take a hard pass. As nice as your ultimatum is, I’ve already suffered pain far worse than I think you could ever dish out. Besides, I don’t think you could get past Grobert here.”
Eugene pounded on the invisible barrier. “Let me out! I knew I should have just shot you in the back of the head when I first spotted you.”
The man continued to yell as the magic circle slowly finished powering up. Norman wished he had built in some sound-dampening ability to the spell. He was getting a headache listening to Eugene yell.
As the outer circle completed its activation, the spell flashed and Eugene staggered back as a red wall of energy slammed into him and soaked into his body. It was the same effect the rodent suffered, only on a much larger scale. Not that Norman expected anything different.
What Norman failed to account for was the spell completing and Eugene getting free. Norman flinched as the man wasted no time after the spell circle died to dash across the intervening space. He had to give Eugene credit, the man was focused on a goal and would carry it out no matter what.
Unfortunately, Eugene slammed into the immovable wall that was Grobert. Grobert picked Eugene up like a toy and slammed him against the ground where the two wrestled for a bit before Grobert knocked him unconscious for a third time that day.
“Bah,” Grobert said, standing up and dusting himself off. “Hardly a worthy match with the man down one arm. You want me to toss him back into the cage?”
“Uh, yes. Thanks,” Norman replied, trying to calm his rapidly beating heart. The spell he had just cast on Eugene wouldn’t save him if Eugene had managed to snap his neck. Although it would ensure Eugene died with him.
“So, this spell,” The President asked, gesturing toward the inert spell circle, “what did it do?”
“It mirrors any damage that happens to me, to the target.”
“Ah, a blood oath,” The President replied sagely.
Oh, that’s a good name, Norman was going to use that name for the spell from now on.
“What about the other man?”
“I’m going to need Toby here for that. And some more space.” Norman looked around. There wasn’t enough room to activate the spell to fix Toby in this warehouse.
“I will try to find you a larger area for this spell. What are your plans after this? Now that your pursuer can no longer harm you?”
Not technically true, Norman reminded himself.
“Well first off, I’m gonna convert Eugene into an undead. It’ll ensure he can’t go back to his old boss. After that, I was planning on heading south.”
The President rubbed his chin, “through the deadlands then. I thought as much when I saw you down there on the surveillance. I guess it makes sense knowing what you are and what the deadlands contain. It’s sad seeing my countrymen just throw themselves blindly into the specters. But they can be quite stubborn. They always think they can simply overcome the obstacle with enough time.”
“Why not stop them?” Norman asked.
The President gave a sad little chuckle. “You overestimate my authority, Norman. This little expansion project was brought on by the current head of the Land Expansion and Requisition Bureau. I would somehow have to convince the Bureau of Work Affairs to assign someone else to that position. Which would mean having a reason for ejecting the current head of the L.E.R.B., a reason I do not have. The man is doing his job, despite being the cause of more than ninety percent of gron deaths annually.”
Norman winced at those numbers, not realizing it was that bad.
“Besides, it helps alleviate the overcrowding issue. If our numbers drop enough, I might be able to push through a motion to pause this expansion initiative.”
“Good luck with that, I’m glad I don’t have to make these sorts of choices.”
The President chuckled. “Yes, I imagine I will need it.”
“You mind if an old washed-up gron goes with you when you leave?”
Norman turned toward Grobert with surprise. “You want to come with me? Why?” Not that he wouldn’t mind having the very capable former president joining him, he was just caught off guard by the offer.
“I have seen enough of Grothlosburg over my long life. Unfortunately, not much has changed since I was locked away. And the time I’ve spent since you freed me has only made me grow angry and bitter at my fellow countrymen. It’s time I left and did something else. It also seems you could use the help.”
“I would be honored if you would join me. Now if I could get past the hurdle of actually seeing the southern border.”
Grobert chuckled. “You mean the lack of teleporters? You do know who I am right?”
Norman slapped his head. He had forgotten Grobert was the gron responsible for creating the teleporters in the first place.
“I can have a secret teleporter setup within a day or so. Will you be ready to leave by then?”
Norman thought about it and nodded. “Yeah, I just have one final thing to finish up, then we can go. Well, two if you include Eugene.”
“Very well, I will call you when the teleporter is ready.”
The President clapped his hands and smiled. “Well, Norman. I wish you luck on your journey. Feel free to stop by any time if you wish to help me cause a bit of chaos.”
Norman couldn’t help laughing at that. “I will keep that in mind, Mr. President.” He reached out and shook the man’s hand for probably the final time before he left. “And good luck with your efforts.”
Grobert and the President left, leaving Norman alone with Eugene. The other unconscious man was dragged away by the President to a new location. Norman took a deep breath to psych himself up for what came next. Before he could lose his nerve, Norman opened the cage and forced the poison down Eugene’s throat. “I didn’t want to have to do this but you left me no choice. You and Sin should have just left me alone,” Norman muttered.
With it becoming more and more important to leave Grothlosburg as soon as possible, Norman decided to check on his exit strategy instead of going to work. Norman knew he would end up in a similar predicament to what Brigette landed in if he got caught but he had to risk it. Besides, it wasn’t the first time he had skipped work, it was just the first time he had done it so openly.
The trick was not to get caught shirking your mandatory work. With Norman’s skills and knowledge, that was quite easy. Since CDT didn’t check on him anymore during his shifts, Norman just blocked off the doors that protected the teleporters and nobody was the wiser.
A problem Norman quickly ran into was actually getting to the southern end of the city. The teleporter platforms just stopped fifty miles from the edge of the zone. Meaning he would need to walk or catch a ride if he wanted to get closer. Neither choice was an option since he wasn’t supposed to be out here anyway. He was glad he hadn’t waited until the day he planned to leave to find out this little fact.
The farther he moved toward the edge of the zone, the less and less non-gron he spotted. He also started to see more and more compliance officers roaming about. It was a clear sign that trying to push any further would likely get him detained.
Not wanting to be arrested and stuck in a labor camp, Norman turned around and was about to head back when he got a call.
“Mr. President, what can I do for you today?”
“Nothing today, lad. I called you because I have something that can help you.”
Norman listened as the president spoke, a big grin spreading on his face. “I’ll be there in half- make that an hour.”
A piece of the puzzle that Norman hadn’t quite been able to figure out had fallen into place. He hurried over to the teleporter to meet up with the President.
“Ah, Norman, you are right on time,” The President greeted him with a firm handshake. “Our guests are inside and waiting for us.”
“You’re sure it’s safe?”
The President chuckled. “I can assure you, it’s perfectly safe. Us gron may not look all that intimidating, but we are pound for pound far stronger than humans. The bigger one put up a fight, but we managed.”
Norman rubbed his hands together in glee, “alright, let's do this. Do you have the stuff I asked about?”
The President handed over a small case filled with a dozen vials of black liquid. “These are made from magically enhanced glass. While it can still break, it’ll take a lot more than just dropping it to do so.”
Norman accepted the case of poison with a smile. He wanted to take the stuff with him when he left but wasn’t willing to risk carrying the poison around in normal glass vials.
“Shall we?” the President gestured.
Norman nodded enthusiastically and followed the man inside the single-story mat grey building.
The warehouse was filled with odds and ends stacked nearly to the ceiling on sturdy-looking shelving. The two of them moved through the tight rows of shelving until they came to an open area where two large cages sat.
“Grobert!” Norman exclaimed, not expecting the former President, “What are you doing here?”
“Grobert was the one who spotted our caged friends over there,” The President said.
“Well, I guess my thanks are in order,” Norman bowed toward Grobert.
“Bah, none of that now. You did me a solid, Norman, this is the least I could do.”
“I do have to ask,” Norman gestured to the far cage, “who is that?”
Grobert shrugged, “beats me. I ran across your big friend by pure accident, and that wiry-looking fellow was with him. Some sort of fire mage. Not very good though. Barely managed to singe my hair with his spells.”
Norman did notice the man’s hair was a bit frazzled, although he had mistaken it as just being unkempt.
“They’re both still alive?”
“Aye. Although the big one put up a fight. Perks of being undead, I didn’t feel much when he punched me,” Grobert chuckled.
Norman walked up to the cage holding the unconscious Eugene and smiled. “Well, friend, you get to become my next experiment.”
The president cleared his throat and Norman turned to him. “What do you want to do about this man?”
Norman rubbed his chin in thought. He didn’t know the man, but if he was here with Eugene it was probably with the express purpose of helping him to kill. “Well, I was just going to use a bunch of those rodents for this one spell, but I think it would be better if I used another human. So, let's keep him sedated for now.”
The President shrugged. “Don’t matter to me.”
Norman began to clear a section of the floor out. When he was done, he paused and looked at it.
“Whatcha doing, lad?” Grobert asked in interest.
“Making room for a spell circle. Can you drag the big man over to the center of the cleared area?”
Grobert nodded, opening the cage that held Eugene. Eugene must have been playing possum because he surged to his feet and struck out at Grobert, landing a deafening boom of a punch to the man’s jaw.
For all his strength, Eugene’s blow barely made Grobert’s head deflect to the side.
“Oh, that was a decent hit,” Grobert smiled. “Had a bit more fight in ya then. Good. I guess it’s my turn now.”
Eugene tried to throw another hit, but Grobert ducked under the blow and delivered an uppercut to Eugene that lifted him off his feet.
Norman winced as the man’s body stiffened like a puppet with its strings cut before collapsing to the ground.
“Aw, that wasn’t even a workout,” Grobert pouted. “You humans are so fragile.”
Norman just nodded, making a mental note to never get in a fistfight with a gron.
Grobert grabbed the newly unconscious Eugene by his remaining arm and dragged him to the center of the cleared area.
“Here good?”
“Yes, thank you.”
Grobert grunted and dropped Eugene.
Norman wasted no time drawing the complex magic circle while the two presidents watched. It was a little weird having an audience for this but Norman tuned out their muttered conversation while he focused on his work.
When the circle was finished, Norman stood up to inspect it. He frowned when it didn’t activate.
Norman mumbled to himself as he looked at the circle to see what he did wrong. “I don’t see any problem.”
“Needs more magic energy,” Grobert replied, breaking Norman from his inspection.
“Huh?”
“I said it needs more energy.”
Norman looked back at the circle, then at Grobert. “Uh, how do you know?”
“I don’t, but have you tested a working version of this spell before?”
“Yeah, on rodents though.”
Grobert grunted while the President remained silent. “Therein lies the problem. Mass. More mass equals more energy requirement. I had a similar issue when I first started making teleporters.”
Could it be that simple? Well, one way to find out. Norman pulled a bottle of magic dust out from his pocket and started sprinkling it over the spell circle.
“Blood magic,” he heard the President mumble. Although the man said it with a bit of surprised shock instead of derision or disdain as Norman might expect.
It took nearly half the bottle to get the spell to flash to life. Eugene was a large man.
As the spell circle began to glow, Norman stepped back to join the other two to watch the magic spectacle.
The resident spoke up as the spell took effect. “Interesting choice of magic, Norman. I won’t tell you not to use it, it’s not my place. Just be careful how you do. Never use your body's blood to power a spell. The wrong spell could drain you completely and you would be powerless to stop it.”
Norman nodded, not taking his eyes off the slowly glowing circle and the groggy Eugene that had just woken back up.
At first, Norman was concerned the man would just rush him for the kill. Norman certainly didn’t have any defenses to stop the man. And Eugene did try, but he ran into an invisible barrier that flashed red when he tried to cross the circle boundary.
“Ey, big man, you can’t cross an active spell boundary. But don’t worry, I’ll mix it up with ya once this spell’s done.”
Norman looked over at a widely grinning Grobert, then back to a snarling Eugene.
“You let me out right now, Norman, and I will make your death swift and painless. If you don’t I will make sure you suffer pain that you couldn’t even imagine.”
“Um, I’m gonna take a hard pass. As nice as your ultimatum is, I’ve already suffered pain far worse than I think you could ever dish out. Besides, I don’t think you could get past Grobert here.”
Eugene pounded on the invisible barrier. “Let me out! I knew I should have just shot you in the back of the head when I first spotted you.”
The man continued to yell as the magic circle slowly finished powering up. Norman wished he had built in some sound-dampening ability to the spell. He was getting a headache listening to Eugene yell.
As the outer circle completed its activation, the spell flashed and Eugene staggered back as a red wall of energy slammed into him and soaked into his body. It was the same effect the rodent suffered, only on a much larger scale. Not that Norman expected anything different.
What Norman failed to account for was the spell completing and Eugene getting free. Norman flinched as the man wasted no time after the spell circle died to dash across the intervening space. He had to give Eugene credit, the man was focused on a goal and would carry it out no matter what.
Unfortunately, Eugene slammed into the immovable wall that was Grobert. Grobert picked Eugene up like a toy and slammed him against the ground where the two wrestled for a bit before Grobert knocked him unconscious for a third time that day.
“Bah,” Grobert said, standing up and dusting himself off. “Hardly a worthy match with the man down one arm. You want me to toss him back into the cage?”
“Uh, yes. Thanks,” Norman replied, trying to calm his rapidly beating heart. The spell he had just cast on Eugene wouldn’t save him if Eugene had managed to snap his neck. Although it would ensure Eugene died with him.
“So, this spell,” The President asked, gesturing toward the inert spell circle, “what did it do?”
“It mirrors any damage that happens to me, to the target.”
“Ah, a blood oath,” The President replied sagely.
Oh, that’s a good name, Norman was going to use that name for the spell from now on.
“What about the other man?”
“I’m going to need Toby here for that. And some more space.” Norman looked around. There wasn’t enough room to activate the spell to fix Toby in this warehouse.
“I will try to find you a larger area for this spell. What are your plans after this? Now that your pursuer can no longer harm you?”
Not technically true, Norman reminded himself.
“Well first off, I’m gonna convert Eugene into an undead. It’ll ensure he can’t go back to his old boss. After that, I was planning on heading south.”
The President rubbed his chin, “through the deadlands then. I thought as much when I saw you down there on the surveillance. I guess it makes sense knowing what you are and what the deadlands contain. It’s sad seeing my countrymen just throw themselves blindly into the specters. But they can be quite stubborn. They always think they can simply overcome the obstacle with enough time.”
“Why not stop them?” Norman asked.
The President gave a sad little chuckle. “You overestimate my authority, Norman. This little expansion project was brought on by the current head of the Land Expansion and Requisition Bureau. I would somehow have to convince the Bureau of Work Affairs to assign someone else to that position. Which would mean having a reason for ejecting the current head of the L.E.R.B., a reason I do not have. The man is doing his job, despite being the cause of more than ninety percent of gron deaths annually.”
Norman winced at those numbers, not realizing it was that bad.
“Besides, it helps alleviate the overcrowding issue. If our numbers drop enough, I might be able to push through a motion to pause this expansion initiative.”
“Good luck with that, I’m glad I don’t have to make these sorts of choices.”
The President chuckled. “Yes, I imagine I will need it.”
“You mind if an old washed-up gron goes with you when you leave?”
Norman turned toward Grobert with surprise. “You want to come with me? Why?” Not that he wouldn’t mind having the very capable former president joining him, he was just caught off guard by the offer.
“I have seen enough of Grothlosburg over my long life. Unfortunately, not much has changed since I was locked away. And the time I’ve spent since you freed me has only made me grow angry and bitter at my fellow countrymen. It’s time I left and did something else. It also seems you could use the help.”
“I would be honored if you would join me. Now if I could get past the hurdle of actually seeing the southern border.”
Grobert chuckled. “You mean the lack of teleporters? You do know who I am right?”
Norman slapped his head. He had forgotten Grobert was the gron responsible for creating the teleporters in the first place.
“I can have a secret teleporter setup within a day or so. Will you be ready to leave by then?”
Norman thought about it and nodded. “Yeah, I just have one final thing to finish up, then we can go. Well, two if you include Eugene.”
“Very well, I will call you when the teleporter is ready.”
The President clapped his hands and smiled. “Well, Norman. I wish you luck on your journey. Feel free to stop by any time if you wish to help me cause a bit of chaos.”
Norman couldn’t help laughing at that. “I will keep that in mind, Mr. President.” He reached out and shook the man’s hand for probably the final time before he left. “And good luck with your efforts.”
Grobert and the President left, leaving Norman alone with Eugene. The other unconscious man was dragged away by the President to a new location. Norman took a deep breath to psych himself up for what came next. Before he could lose his nerve, Norman opened the cage and forced the poison down Eugene’s throat. “I didn’t want to have to do this but you left me no choice. You and Sin should have just left me alone,” Norman muttered.
