The Berserker and the Pedant (17 page)

"The lives of fifty goblins traded for that of thirty dwarves," Gurken said. "I've never had a head for math, but it seems to me that fifty is more than thirty."

"They're goblins, Gurken. They live but five years. Dwarves live two hundred. That's six thousand years of dwarven life traded for two hundred years of goblin."

Gurken looked at Gimnur with disgust. "You've learned math from the elves."

"You mean, I've learned to multiply? I've known how for some time."

Gurken shook his head sadly. "Your head may know how to multiply, Gimnur, but your heart has forgotten how to count. Don't discount the life of a goblin, don't devalue their contribution. We do battle this way because we must. We trade the lives of less effective warriors for the lives of more effective warriors, but that does not mean the cost is less."

They looked back and saw what was left of their army. A thousand… now nine hundred and ninety-nine goblins and fifty ragged, tired dwarves.

A familiar voice came from behind. "Surrender, Gurken. This world is ours!"

They turned to see Arthur, orbs gleaming in the air about his head, tentacled creatures spreading out behind him as far as they could see. Three Pellonias stepped out from behind him.

"They got you, Arthur?" Gurken asked, frowning. "What have you done to Pellonia?"

"I'm with the Phage, and the Pellonias are with me, Gurken. Soon, you'll be with us, too, or you'll be dead." All four orbs unleashed their full power towards Gurken. Flames rippled, ice cracked and lightning crackled, a beam of light pierced the air. Dwarfen runes glowed on Gurken's axe and the powers of the orbs struck an invisible shield in front of Gurken. Gurken stood there, unmoving. His lip curled.

"It will take more than Leon's toys to get to me, Arthur."

"Fortunately, we came prepared," Arthur said. He waved an arm forward and the creatures swarmed towards them. The goblins ran toward the writhing swarm and Gurken marveled at their courage. The tentacles made short work of the goblins, devouring their minds even as they made contact. The dwarves came up on either side of Gimnur and Gurken, and stood ready to receive the charge.

As the goblins and tentacled creatures swarmed down the valley, there was a loud TOCH TOCH TOCH and an enormous trench collapsed under the goblins and many of the tentacles, who fell to their deaths. Ants of various sizes streamed out of the newly formed gorge, devouring tentacles as they came. A tentacle latched onto the head of an enormous ant and was swarmed by smaller ants, which ripped it to shreds with strong pincers.

The tentacles latched onto smaller ants and squeezed, crushing them, but were themselves overrun by more ants. 

Gurken got out his sleep sack and stepped inside of it, pulling it over his head. Gimnur watched Gurken for a moment, then did the same with his sleep sack. The other dwarves, not understanding what their leader was doing, nevertheless took out their own sleep sacks and piled inside. Giant ants grabbed the sacks and climbed into the gorge.

An ant the size of a kitten approached Arthur amidst the chaos. The ant stood ten feet from Arthur and looked up at him, antennae quivering. The Pellonias patted their legs and gestured for Antic to come closer. Antic sniffed the air, but didn't approach. He flexed his pincers at Arthur.

"Well, well, Antic," Arthur said, ignoring the Pellonias. His brow furled. "Nicely played. It seems we have a nemesis we didn't consider. We may not take this world through overwhelming force, but one way or the other, we will take it."

Antic spit a gooey substance at Arthur, then turned and skittered back down the gorge. Arthur stepped to the side as an enormous ant burrowed up from underground. Flames shot out of Arthur's orb; the giant ant crackled and shriveled in the heat. Arthur set his orbs to burning, freezing, beaming, and shocking a path through the battle and walked back toward the alien ship, the Pellonias following behind.

Epilogue

Arthur walked into the hall of wizards, dressed in his silken wizarding robes and carrying an oaken staff. On the tip of the staff sat the orb of light. The tap-tap of the staff striking the floor echoed through the hall as he strode down a long red carpet with mystic symbols embroidered along the edges. Wizards of the lower ranks sat near the entrance. As Arthur walked down the hall toward the eight seats of power on the far side, the rank, importance, and power of the wizards on either side of him grew.

Arthur strode up to the eight seats of power, the epicenter of mystical might in this world. The most powerful wizards sat before him, and those powerful enough to scheme to take their place flanked him. He was surrounded by the strongest wizards the world had to offer.

Arthur stood before them, holding the gaze of the wizard at the center of it all, the acknowledged leader of the wizards and the greatest living mystical talent. The throne behind her rose high, in almost comical proportions. She wore black silken wizarding robes and a matching hat with twisting black silken horns.

"Well, Arthur," she said. "You've petitioned to speak before the assembled body of the wizarding council. Please, speak your mind."

Arthur nodded. "First, a small matter. I wish it enshrined before this body that the correct possessive form of the word dwarf is dwarven, not dwarfen."

A murmur spread throughout the hall.

"You wish to spend this august body's time on triviality when this world is being invaded?" she said. "I thought you had matters of import, matters that would change the way we viewed the world. Why else would we allow you, a wizard of the tenth rank, to address us?"

"Grammar is no small matter, grand wizard. It's the basis of the control of magic. Properly phrased spells are of the highest import, for when wielding the powers of magic, a misused term could result in catastrophe! The meaning of words also gives power to an idea, and it's important that this distinction be drawn so that those who are our enemies don't have power drawn to them."

A grumbling of acknowledgement and agreement filtered through the room.

"Very well," said the high wizard, dismissively. "All in favor of using dwarven as the possessive instead of dwarfen?"

The cry of "aye" echoed through the halls.

"All against?"

Silence.

"There you have it, Arthur. Please, continue. And come to the point quick."

Arthur nodded.

"A follow-up. It's always rankled me that the word 'it' shouldn't have an apostrophe when used possessively, as nearly all other pronouns do. Why should that be 'the grand wizard's seat' and 'its seat' instead of 'it's seat'?"

"Outrageous!" came a cry from some wizard in the audience. A murmur, louder than the first, reverberated through the hall.

"I propose we flip the usage of an apostrophe in its, so that it's is possessive and its is the contractive."

The council of wizards burst into an uproar.

"Scandalous!" someone yelled.

"Heathen!" yelled another.

"Get him out of here!"

"Disaster!" the shouts continued.

The grand wizard stood and raised an arm; silence fell through the hall. She shook her head. "Arthur, you've wasted our time. It's not going to happen. I won't even bring such blasphemy to a vote."

"Oh, its going to happen," Arthur said. Three orbs sprung from under his wizarding robes, and fire, ice and lighting rained upon the seats of power. The strongest wizards in the realm threw their arms up reflexively, working together to form a powerful barrier, staving back the aggressive blasts.

"Intentoque lux trabem!" Arthur said, sounding bored.

The light in the room dimmed. Several wizards instinctually called to their orbs and staves for light, but the light flowed towards the orb like smoke to a sucking fan. A powerful stream of blindingly white light poured forth from the orb on top of Arthur's staff and pierced the defensive magics of the most powerful wizards of the wizarding council, slicing through them in half a moment. The back of the tall throne fell with a tremendous crash. It was over before anyone else could react and light returned to the room.

Tap-tap. Arthur's staff, the tip glowing with the radiance of the sun, echoed through the silence of the great hall as he walked to the large throne in the center, pushed the former grand wizard's corpse off the seat and sat down. He leaned over and pulled off her wizarding hat, placing it upon his head.

"If anyone else is against changing it's to its, please speak now."

"I-" a wizard managed to get out before a white-hot laser burned a hole in his head.

No one else spoke.

Arthur glared around the room. "Very well, then let us vote. All those in favor?"

Silence. 

Arthur burned a hole through the head of another wizard.

"Aye." The low murmur echoed around the room.

"Then its so, it's shall henceforth be its and its, it's. Now that that unpleasantness is over, its time to get down to business…" Arthur tapped his staff down in three loud, stiff strikes against the floor.

A hundred tentacled creatures, the last remnants of the invading Phage, dropped from the high ceilings, ensnaring wizards of every rank. There were more wizards than creatures and some of the creatures died before they could control their prey, but most struck their mark. The most powerful wizards of the wizarding council were now under Phage control.

Harold absentmindedly reached into the bag of potato chips while watching the computer monitor. His fingers closed on nothing. He looked in the bag. There was nothing but crumbs. He sighed.

"Well, there goes the best part of the day," Harold said. He turned the bag upside down, emptying the crumbs into his mouth and licking the oil off his fingers.

A red flashing light appeared on the monitor. Harold took a swig of his soda, emptying the can. He tried to crush it with his hand, but it only dented a little. He threw it towards the recycling bin, but it bounced off the rim and fell to the ground. He scrunched his lips to one side and wiped the last of the oil off his hands and onto his shirt.

"Well, let's see what this alert's all about," Harold said. He grabbed the mouse and moved the cursor over the flashing light and double-clicked it. That brought up Bugzilla, the bug tracking software they also used to track important requests. They hadn't brought anything on board specifically to track important requests, and apparently no one wanted to spend their Awakening working on something as trivial as ticket tracking software, so Bugzilla it was. The alert was a priority one bug. 

"Oh-ho, a P1," said Harold. "This might be an interesting day after all."

He opened the bug and read the title.

It read, "Two subjects requesting immediate transportation off planet M4D-058." Harold clicked the link to look at the description. It read, "Melanie Amadi and Penelope Amadi for immediate evacuation from planet M4D-058. Click here to execute transport."

Harold smiled, remembering a bag of mixed nuts and chocolate he'd saved. He opened the drawer on the side of his desk and dug around for it. He found it and tore it open. He poured some into one hand and tossed them in his mouth, one piece at a time. He clicked on the execute transport link and spun his chair around to face the transport pad.

Two transparent tubes large enough to hold a person lit up a bright yellow from the LEDs that formed a ring inside. A monofilament cable unspooled from the tubes beneath the ship, guided by artificial gravity and nanobot workers, descending toward the planet's surface. After a few moments, the spools stopped spinning with a metallic ker-chunk. They spooled back so fast, it made a whizzing sound.

Harold stood up, cleaning his hands on his pants, and wiped the crumbs off his clothing. Two figures zipped up the tubes. Melanie stepped out a large hole in the front of the tube, the monofilament cable releasing her automatically. Penelope stood in the tube, mouth open, eyes comically wide, looking around the room.

"Did you see it?" Melanie asked. "Where'd it go?"

"Where'd what go?" Harold asked.

"It. The Phage. It had ahold of me, now it's gone."

Harold shrugged. "I didn't see anything," he said. "You can always report to the decontamination chamber." Harold pointed to a door. On the door was a sign that read "Showers."

Melanie spun around, looking around the room. "I guess it fell off," she said. She shuddered. "I think I will take a shower." She turned to Penelope, saying, "Wait here; I'll come back and get you in a few minutes and we'll get you situated." Melanie ran to the shower room.

Harold looked at Penelope. She appeared to be a girl of twelve, but Harold knew that didn't mean anything. She could be a thousand years old; she had the gift that prevented her from aging. She was the All-Mother's granddaughter, after all, and the All-Mother decided which humans were worthy of the gift. Harold always did the prudent thing, and when your bosses' bosses' grand-daughter appeared, that meant keeping quiet and keeping your head down.

Penelope didn't seem to agree. "Pardon me," Penelope said. "But is there any way you can get me out of this thing?"

Harold pointed towards himself, eyes raised in a questioning look.