Lucky Rabbit

The Boss held still while one of the four men behind him swaggered toward Augustus, waving his weapon menacingly. Augustus, for his part, whacked the man’s hand with his metal bar, sending the knife skittering across the ground toward Pandy. Pandy leaped forward, clamping her teeth around the grimy leather wrapping the hilt – so, so gross – and Hopped straight up, landing on the smoky roof among the spiders.

Even now, with the pheromones, or the powder, or whatever it was the Boss was doing affecting them, the arachnids kept to the deepest part of the shadows, with the smallest ones still seeming reluctant to actually attack the people below. They had no such compunctions about Pandy, however, and rushed toward her. Any hesitation about killing creatures who were being controlled by someone vanished when the first set of fangs sank into her flank, and Pandy thought,

You have been Poisoned. Poison is ineffective. You take no damage.

Shifting Faces successful.

Shifting Faces is now level 6.

03:30:00 remaining today.

For a moment, as Pandy removed the knife from where it was still clenched between her teeth, she thought that would be it. But no, the System had to get one more poke in.

You really should have read the Changelog.

Pandy ignored it, being far too busy stabbing a spider to worry about it right now. Instead, she summoned her clothing from her Inventory, wishing that she had been able to change into a pair of pants and a shirt before heading out on this mission. As it was, her skirts fell down around the spiders climbing her legs, which was very definitely not an improvement over being naked.

Shifting Faces: Clothing set

Shifting Faces: Hairstyle set

Shifting Faces: Cosmetics set

Shifting Faces: Adornments set

There, don’t you look pretty?

By the way, you have been Poisoned. Poison is ineffective. You take no damage.

She froze mid-stab, staring at the words. What was that? What had just been set, and why? How? Another spider bit her, and she yelped, the sound fortunately lost in the sounds of grunting and thwacks of metal on flesh coming from below. No time for this now, but later, yes, definitely. She was going to read that Changelog, even if it did mean the System got to say ‘I told you so’.

Shaking all of the spiders out from under her skirts took far too long, and left Pandy with a feeling of creepy-crawlies that she doubted would ever go away. Still, at least most of the tennis ball to frozen chicken-sized things were outside her tights when her clothes appeared, and some of the really little ones couldn’t even bite through the thick material. As it turned out, her beautiful new boots were also excellent for stomping.

The closest thing to weapon-training Pandy had ever had were a few hour-long self-defense classes that focused on using pepper spray and a kind of stabby thing you held in your fist and punched people with. Using a knife wasn’t like either of those things, and while she’d kind of waggled her butter knife around in the Apparition, that hadn’t really been fighting. She wasn’t sure this really counted, either, but she did actually have very small, moving targets she needed to impale or chop, so there was definitely some skill required. Mainly that skill seemed to be involved in not slicing off any of her own bits, as she discovered after removing a not-insignificant piece of her arm, but it was still skill.

She’d already healed herself a few times, but she did so again, wishing as she did that she could look down to see how Augustus was doing. It still sounded like there was fighting going on, so hopefully that meant they hadn’t simply overwhelmed him – not that she thought three thugs could take down someone like whatever-Augustus-was. Then she realized she had a simple way to not only check, but help, and shish-kebobbed a stack of spiders as she thought,

You have been Poisoned. Poison is ineffective. You take no damage.

Minor Heal successful.

Healed Pandora for 14 LF.

You have been Poisoned. Poison is ineffective. You take no damage.

Minor Heal successful.

Healed Augustus Blackwood for 14 HP.

Awww, look at that, you’re twinzies!

Seriously, what had Keros been thinking when he made this thing? Still, while Augustus was injured, he hadn’t taken a full heal, which was a positive sign that she didn’t need to worry about him, at least for now. Which was really good, because while she had overestimated the number of spiders when they first poured out of the darkness like a many-legged blanket, there were still a lot of them, and she could only stomp ‘n stab so quickly.

The whole outside edge of the roof was engulfed in flames by now, and Pandy noticed that the smaller arachnids were either all dead or had retreated back to wherever they’d come from. The larger ones seemed to be rethinking their decision to attack as well, because more and more of them were simply dodging out of her way, rather than allowing themselves to be burned to a crisp or killed in a futile attempt to bite her. Not that the biting was futile, but since she was immune to their poison, it did little damage other than poking holes in her clothes and skin, which, she had to admit, was really irritating. Also, she desperately needed more Pain Tolerance. Fire and spider bites hurt.

From below, a particularly violent crash sounded, and someone gasped loudly. It sounded like something had been knocked into one of the crumbling piles of old wood, stones, and rusty nails that used to be buildings. Pandy skewered a particularly large spider, and glanced around, glad she wasn’t even trying to breathe. The roof was sagging in places, and smoke was pouring out between the roof tiles, not just around the edges, so it was time to go. She had stopped the spiders from reaching Augustus, which had been her main goal in coming up here anyway.

Rushing toward the eaves, which were barely visible within the leaping flames, Pandy’s Hop held enough force that it finally broke through the clay shingles, sending the rest of the roof crumbling inward. A flare of sparks rose behind her as she arched up through the air, blinking down into the relative darkness below. Her eyes had adjusted to the brilliance of the flames, and even though the conflagration lit the area, the light it gave off was nothing compared to being surrounded by it.

She landed not far from where she’d started. Dark lumps formed into fallen bodies, some slumped over objects and broken walls, while others were piled up like forgotten toys. There must have been more people still inside the house than the four she’d seen with the Boss, and for an instant, she felt fear well up inside her. What if Augustus hadn’t been able to handle them after all? What if he’d been murdered while she was right overhead, blithely killing spiders?

she thought frantically, trying to figure out which of the blurry shapes he might be. If this didn’t work, that meant…that meant…

Minor Heal successful.

Healed Augustus Blackwood for 20 HP.

Twenty? Not good, but better than no response at all. Not far to her right, someone groaned, then choked, and she spun in that direction.

Minor Heal successful.

Healed Augustus Blackwood for 20 HP.

Minor Heal successful.

Healed Augustus Blackwood for 20 HP.

Minor Heal successful.

Healed Augustus Blackwood for 20 HP.

Oooohhh, that was close.

Without an audible voice, Pandy wasn’t sure if the System was relieved or disappointed that she’d saved Augustus. Either way, it was obvious that he still wasn’t entirely better, so she leaped in the direction of the sound, still not seeing the chancellor anywhere.

“Augustus?” she called, shocked at how thin and frantic her voice sounded. Another groan answered her, and a few small stones or pieces of gravel shifted in a pile of debris next to her. Falling to her knees, Pandy began to dig frantically, wishing that her stupid starter Rabbit class had come with a Dig skill, rather than the almost useless Scratch. A few more Minor Heals led to more movement, but for some reason it was still healing twenty health points every time. He wasn’t getting better.

She freed a piece of fabric that turned out to contain a leg, which led to a foot. There was dust all over him, but no damage that she could see, so she knocked loose a board pinning the other leg and began working her way up. She found the problem in the middle of his chest. One of those nasty knives – like the one she now realized she’d dropped when she heard him groan – was buried to the hilt beneath his ribs. He was still breathing, but it was…it was really, really horrible, and she was absolutely certain she’d have nightmares about it if she still slept, but she didn’t, so she grabbed hold of the hilt and pulled and it didn’t want to come out but then it did and there was so much blood.

she thought frantically, trying to push the blood back into the hole. Normally, this wouldn’t have worked, but now it did, and finally when her fingers slid over the skin exposed by the hole in his sodden shirt, that skin was whole. There was a faint ridge, as of an old scar, but no wound, and the arm she wasn’t almost kneeling on shoved the rest of the debris covering him out of the way so he could see her. He smiled, and then, like an actor in a bad tragedy, his eyes widened, and he said, “Pandora!” as another knife drove itself through her body.

It hurt. It really did. But to Pandy’s surprise it really wasn’t that much worse than using Wings of Glory. She stared down in surprise at the tip of the blade, then poked it with a finger, giggling slightly hysterically as her finger started to bleed. Then she stood, turning to face the person who had tried to kill her.

It was the Boss. Of course it was. And he was staggering back, his face white as he stared from the point sticking out of Pandy’s chest, then up to her face, then over to Augustus, who was rising from the pile of rubble. “Dark magic,” he gasped. His eyes came back to Pandy’s face. “But you’re not supposed to have an elemental anymore. How are you…? How did…?”

Shaking himself out of it, he shoved a hand into his pocket, then yanked it out again just as quickly, throwing a handful of white powder straight into Pandy’s face. Beside her, Augustus jerked back reflexively, but Pandy took it full on, and felt like a twenty-pound bag of flour had just exploded into powder and weevils all over her. She wasn’t as taken aback as she had been when she actually took a bag of flour to the face, especially since there were no live squid involved this time, but still, that wasn’t the sort of thing normal people expected to experience more than once in a lifetime.

Of course, Pandy was far from normal, and she just swiped her hand across her eyes, then punched the Boss just the way a long-ago self-defense instructor had taught her. Ducking to move in, under the fists he instantly raised to protect his head, she delivered a straight punch to the groin, with all of her strength. Unfortunately, Pandy had forgotten that her strength was now Strength, and he lifted up off the ground with a squeal almost as terrible as that of a rabbit. He flew backwards, landing with a crunch, then instantly curled into a fetal ball.

Augustus stepped up beside Pandy, eyes almost as wide as the Boss’s had been before her punch landed. “Remind me not to make you angry, Pandora,” he said, absently rubbing the small scar on his chest.

Pandy responded the only way possible. “Okay,” she said.