I will take the extra adventure card for next quarter. Fishing for another Renown! LOL
***
Jude watched the ghostly, cloaked figure move through the crowd, touching the dead, finally touching Vick’s body on the forehead before Jude slipped into blackness.
An hour later, Jude stirred. He groaned in pain as the warped burnings from the Annihilation spell shot pain through him.
“Nikki…” he murmured as his childhood dream faded.
Jude shivered, managing to roll over and stare up into the darkness outside the hotel. He could see his breath in the air.
“So anyone get the number of that truck?” he quipped. His mouth was parched.
Jude hears familiar voices and looks around. Beside him, Vick’s armor lays, pristine, but Vick’s body is nowhere to be found. Jude frowned, looking confused. He remembered the ghostly apparition. What had that been? Tesse was gone, too.
“Crystal…” Jude groaned and forced himself up. His old armor was basically shredded by the spell. In fact, parts of it seemed to have been turned to glass, which shattered, embedding shards in his body. Other parts seared to his skin. It was going to hurt just getting out of it.
Jude stumbled his way over to Diamond and Crystal. Crystal looked pale, even translucent, a bit.
“Did you get what you needed from Tesse to save Crystal?” Jude asked, almost desperate to save his ex.
“Where did Tesse go?” Jude had wanted to save her, too.
Jude looked over to where Sarah’s body had lain. It, too, was gone. He looked over to Cantrell and scowled, a bit of resentment rising up in him toward his sergeant. It was stupid, he knew. Sarah had been about ready to put a gigantic hole in his head. Cantrell had saved his life. But he had loved Sarah once. Could he have saved her, too?
As the heat started coming back on, Jude walked over to Geist, hauling the unconscious woman up.
“So who is this, if it isn’t the Geist that did all...this.” He gestured to the destroyed city outside the hotel.
“Do we have a place to lock her up?” Jude studied the woman’s military uniform. What was the Future Brigade?
Diamond started introducing everyone, and some woman berated the 13th and the Black Company, offering the destroyed city as an arena if they really wanted to duke it out. Jude looked over at the BC.
“That can wait,” he said.
“If there are people out there that need saving, and they’re willing to help, we can shelve it for now. But they are coming in with us. They have crimes to answer for.”
Then talk turned to Scara and her Tower. Jude perked up, listening.
“Rene said something about someone named Scara. So did Tesse. Who is she, and what does she have to do with all of this? Tesse said she was the one that made her and the other CEALs.”
Jude walked over to Zieja.
“How you doing? How’s your...arm?” he asked. Okay, that was a bit lame. Her arm was gone. Of course it was horrible.
“Um...about before…” Jude actually looked a bit shy!
“Sorry not sorry I kissed you,” he said with a boyish grin.
“I gave you something...a letter. Could I have it back, please?” he asked sheepishly.
“Guess it wasn’t my time yet.”
As everyone started to disperse, Jude looked over at Crystal.
“Let me help you to bed,” he said. He gave Diamond a nod and slipped his arm around the platinum blonde, helping her to the lift and up to his room.
“Anything you need, you comm me.” Pulling her closer, he gave her a kiss, then winced as his armor pulled at his flesh.
“I might need some help getting this off.”
It was a painful process, but Jude finally got out of his old armor, and Crystal managed to pick out most of the glass. She even tried something like Libertas’ little healing wand, but the wounds resisted healing, though the bleeding did stop.
“At least it’s not the face,” Jude said with a chuckle. He pulled out a change of clothes and then examined Vick’s armor.
“I can help adjust that,” Crystal said, getting her tools.
“It’s enchanted.”
“It is?”
Crystal pointed out the runes decorating it.
“Looks like some kind of invisibility and sonic blast.”
“Huh. Anti-paparazzi armor. I guess that makes sense,” Jude said with a smile.
It felt good to have Crystal’s hands on him again, even though they had physically reunited again a couple days ago.
“Reminds me a bit of Stormspire,” he said with a smile.
“You always did make me stand like a dummy.”
Crystal chuckled.
“It was all you were good for, dummy,” she teased, cinching up a seal.
“Not a lick of magic or psi talent in your body.”
“Must be all that Chi-Town drinking water I grew up on,” Jude said.
“Like a vaccine.”
Jude tried the new armor once it was adjusted, moving, getting a feel for it.
“Feels good. Thanks, love.” He gave her a kiss.
“Just rest. When I get back tonight, we’ll do something special.” He waggled his eyebrows at her and nodded to the bed.
Crystal laughed.
“If I can,” she promised, kissing him again for luck and pushing him out the door.
“I might be able to fix your old armor. It’s pretty common, so I could scrounge up some things.”
Jude joined the search parties. There were still a few odd CEALs around, here and there, so Jude explored with his rifle. He stared at it occasionally. He could have sworn he’d been carrying a JA-9, not the JA-11. He took a moment to reset the configuration to the ion blaster. It would be better in the close quarters of the ruined buildings.
Jude was surprised at the number of survivors they were able to find. It seemed that when all the chaos of Nadine’s rampage had started, and then the fire fight with the CEALs and the appearance of the Death’s Head Transport, many people had gotten into secure bunkers, either built under their homes, or in central neighborhood locations.
Jude returned that night to Crystal. She had managed to salvage his armor somewhat, and she was feeling fairly well. Jude kept their lovemaking that night short, simple, and sweet to allow them both to get some rest. In the morning, Crystal tried the healing wand again, and, surprisingly, found Jude’s injuries responding.
Back on search and rescue, Jude saw something fluttering across the roadway. It caught on his boot, and he picked it up. It looked like a pink, lacy scrap of lingerie. Looking around, Jude spotted a flickering neon sign half buried in the debris. He removed some to debris to get a better look.
“That’s the Lotus Lounge,” one of the survivors on his search team said.
“What’s that?” Jude asked.
“The local burlesque house and brothel,” the man explained.
Jude stopped utterly still and stared at the man.
“What?” The man shifted nervously.
“There was a burlesque house and brothel in this town, and nobody told me!” Jude threw up his hands.
“And now it’s destroyed!” He wanted to weep.
“Hey, do you hear that?” another member of the team said.
Jude paused, listening.
“Sounds like...a pipe knocking,” he said.
“There’s someone alive in there!”
Jude quickly coordinated the rescue efforts, eying the debris pattern and safety. They managed to get a small opening into the building basement, that was more or less intact, and Jude squeezed through, dropping into what looked like a storage room. He followed the sounds and found a steel door blocked by debris.
Jude pounded on the door.
“It’s okay! We’re here. We’ll get you out!”
They worked quickly to clear the door, and then Jude yanked, tugging the door out of the warped frame. Inside were about a score of half naked women and men. They swarmed over Jude, hugging him tightly with tears of relief. Jude returned the hugs, grinning.
“It was nothing. Least I could do. I’m sure we can find some way to repay me…”
Most of the women were human, but some were very attractive D-Bees. A tall, statuesque woman with green skin and very little clothing emerged. Her scent was like flowers wafting around him, and Jude immediately felt his body responding. She gave him a long, lingering kiss.
“Thank you for rescuing my girls and boys,” she told him.
Jude could barely form a coherent thought.
“It was nothing...anytime…”
Jude and the others ushered the Lotus members up to the Pinnacle. It was getting hard to find places for everyone in the hotel, but they made do.
That night, as Jude shed his armor and undressed for bed, a data chip fell out of his pocket. He picked it up and studied it.
“What’s that?” Crystal asked from where she sat up in bed, cute little spectacles with little blinking lights and such perched on her pert nose. She wore only one of his t-shirts as she held a data pad she was working on.
“Alex gave it to me,” Jude said.
“Said it had information about the Black Company.”
“Bring it here,” Crystal said.
Jude crawled into bed with her. Crystal plugged the chip into her pad and pulled p the information, tucking into his side as they watched. He put his arm around her and gave her a kiss before turning his attention to the pad.
Jude’s eyes widened a bit.
“Cantrell needs to see this,” he said, taking the pad from Crystal.
“Hey! I was working there! Some of that is secret!”
“I’ll bring it right back. Promise,” Jude assured her, giving her a quick kiss before exiting his room and running down the hall to Cantrell’s rooms. It was late. She was likely to be in, but just as likely to be asleep.
Jude pounded on Cantrell’s door. When she opened it, he stood there in just his boxer briefs, his tight, lean physique on display as he handed her the padd with the proof of the Black Company’s innocence.