|| -------- -- -----  A E R I E   O B L I V I A N A . singular book of text wandertainment by Frank Edward Nora ------------------- ----------- DEER EXPRESS--CUP 10--"GATEBREAKER" <-------  ||  Severe Repair  ||  Deer Express  ||  -------> (Cup SRde010, Created v2 (6/7/99), Copyright 1999) = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Lemon lifted her leg and kicked the window with all her might. It should have broken, but it didn't. The force of her kick was so great, though, that she was propelled backward across the chamber, slamming into another window. It didn't break either. Stunned for a moment, Lemon shook her head and got up, staring down the offending window. "Ooh, you're gonna pay for that!" Lemon said, and as she crossed the room, she began reciting her gatebreaker spell again. Her pitchfork hummed in anticipation. She finished up the spell and was about to blow the window away when she saw something in the huge chamber beyond the portal. She paused. A horse and rider, entering the chamber from the far side. And the rider--some sort of deer man. Cute, Lemon thought. Nice horns. She watched him begin to cross the chamber, then raised her pitchfork. Right when she was about to strike, though, a commotion broke loose in the chamber. A whole bunch of giant, furry, mammalian turtles with deer heads began to emerge from every opening in the chamber, and they began to surround the rider. Lemon saw a look of such utter horror on his face... "Gotta help him!" Lemon yelled as she touched her pitchfork to the window. The window and the wall around it were blown away, but the chamber and the imperiled rider were receding, pulling away into a gray void. Without another thought, she leapt as hard as she could, and when she landed on the chamber floor, a shock rang through her body. She was totally winded and stunned. She opened her eyes, and through the wild ringing in her ears she could hear the dreadful deer-turtle things chanting accusations is deep, earthquake tones. "Hey, leave him alone!" she yelled as she struggled to recover from the shock of crossing into this place through the gray void. Immediately, all the deer-turtles swung their heads around and began screeching at her. "Shut up!" she bellowed, and in the next instant, one of the creatures leapt a great distance across the chamber and landed right on top of her. "Aaahhh!" Lemon exclaimed in horror as the thing put its full weight on her. Evil saliva dripped from the monster's snapping deer jaws, full of razor sharp fangs. And she felt arcane energies swirling around her, seeking to bind her. Lemon was being crushed. She shut her eyes tight and fought--not the creature, but herself. She could feel the hellfire burning within her, and she wanted to hold it back. She didn't want to go back to what she was. Tears leaked past her eyelids as she tried to hold back. But the beast began biting, tearing at her face. And she couldn't move--somehow it had cast a spell on her. There was no way to hold back, no way. Paralyzed! Biting her face! Aaaaaahhhhhhgggggghhhhhh! She screamed forth a banshee wail of hellpower, letting loose with all the fury and darkness within her. She opened her eyes just in time to see a momentary look of bafflement of the monsters face as the flesh was washed from its head in her infernal wail. In just a few seconds, it was a clean deer skull that was glaring down at her. Then it went limp, and collapsed on top of her. With a grunt she slipped out from under the horrid corpse, huffing and puffing as she used her pitchfork for support in getting up. Across the chamber, several of the deer-turtles began to walk slowly toward her, chanting unknowable magicks. Another of them bit the leg of the horse the deer guy was riding on. The horse turned gray, then stumbled, then fell apart. The deer dude managed to land on his feet, but seemed helpless, surrounded by the monsters. Her hellpower still surging, she transferred a huge flow of it to her pitchfork. It rang with energy, and she could have sworn it said "Yeah!" She blasted forth fire from the pitchfork, and managed to immolate one of the deer-turtles, reducing it to ashes in seconds. The rest of the monsters leapt like toad, disappearing in all directions. The deer guy stood in stunned silence, staring at her. She must have looked pretty evil, all that hellpower surging through her. Not a great first impression. -------> ------------------- ----------- -------- -- -----