Chapter 185: Talking with Joe
Ben saw Rolly coming into the Town Hall. As he did every day in the past week, Ben was trying to help Suzette and Billy run the town, the work crews in the city, and supply what was needed at the keep. Each person had a different style of getting things done, and meshing the three together was Ben's constant headache. Suzette focused on the town, solving problems and looking out for the workers. It was the other two that played tug-of-war with the limited resources they had.
Billy demanded to not be bothered, wanted to know everything that was happening, and had an ever-changing list of demands for work crews. One day it was gargoyles on the front gates or oak trees planted around the ACME building. Not saplings, full trees. Somehow, he thought that could be done with shovels and wagons. The next day he'd ask for one of the empty buildings to be turned into a department store for magic items and later on he'd want a 'visitors' center. It was like the man was mad, with more than one personality in his head. And like as not Layla would come along and tell him to forget about anything that Billy started. Ben compromised by picking a project, completing that project, and starting up the next one on Billy's list that made sense. He lied to Billy a lot about what was going on, and promised miracles.
Ben had huge hopes that his talk with Ozzy would straighten things out. As Ben had left the ACME building that night, he'd seen Ozzy shifting from "Shucks, folks, I'm just a simple sausage maker" to "Here's the truth, whether you like it or not." He'd expected to see flames roaring up the ACME building at some point, but in the end, Ozzy said things went as well as could be expected.
Jorges approached his project with a frighteningly narrow tunnel vision. He saw the work he needed to do, and not much else. If a road needed building, nothing better be in his way, and he would run it straight across the countryside making the landscape move aside and get out of his way. Building the Keep was a much bigger project, but he approached it in the same way. Nothing was more important than getting the work done, and Ben often found materials and workers had disappeared from other projects and were reallocated to the keep building project.
In a way, he was right. The rebuilding of Rowan Keep was essential to everything. On the other hand, not having a harvest because the food was rotting in the fields was going to cause problems. So Ben was trying vainly to keep track of everything, and make sure it all got done. Currently,
was adding more information on what was formerly a large white wall of the Town Hall. Scraps of paper were stuck to the wall with glue, notes were scribbled in pencil or charcoal, and multi-colored yard connected everything. Too many of those bits of yarn went to a large circle marked "and then a miracle occurs!"
"Busy Rolly. I have to figure out how to do too much with not enough resources, not enough organization, and too much weird shit going on."
Rolly glanced at Ben with a scowl, and then looked at the wall for thirty seconds. "Not your problem right now. I'll help you fix it tomorrow. Grab your hat, we have a smoke golem to talk to."
Ben hurried to do just, that and followed after his friend. Rolly was serious, and not smiling, and that wasn't good. Not good at all. Squirmie wasn't even talking. Just sitting quietly on his shoulder. "What happened? Trouble with the Sphynx? I was trying to get an hours work in before you dragged us off to the Menagerie."
Rolly shook his head and answered in the same serious tone. "Nope, she's fine. All settled in."
"Suzy got hurt really bad by a Ghoul Lord while they were walking out of the city. Ozzy caught on fire and went berserk to kill it. You know how he gets when someone hurts her bad. Then he turned into smoke and blew away. You and I are going to go visit with the old guy teaching him smoke magic and see if we can't get some answers."
Ben processed all of that as they walked. "Well, shit. I suppose you want me to do the talking as usual?"
Rolly stopped and looked at Squirmie. Ben got the oddest feeling they were arguing. Then Rolly smiled, tossed the butterfly in the air, and she few away. "Naw, I should talk."
"I don't mind speaking to him, Rolly. Talking to people is sort of my job. And Joe seems like a decent guy. Is there a problem?"
Rolly stopped and considered Ben's words, but then shook his head. "Trust me, whatever Joe is, he's dangerous and powerful. Squirmie can feel it. There's a lot more to him that you can't see. So, if trying to get information about Ozzy pisses him off somehow, it might as well be me that takes the hit, and you can try to run. I have someone in Tartarus I need to visit again anyway."
"Tartarus? Why in hell would...no, you know what? Never mind. I don't need to know." Ben knew better that to get bogged down in Rolly's stories and plans. It was better to just wait and see if anything happened. "Your call on Joe. I'll back you up. Is this a case of where there's smoke, there's fire?"
"More like, where there's smoke, there's a lot more smoke. Squirmie says most of Joe is somewhere else, but he can see it if she looks at him just right."
They arrived at the rapidly growing smoke house. Every day, the piles of lumber and stone that were placed nearby seemed to disappear. It was nearly finished at this point, and totally enclosed. The large double doors on one side were firmly shut. Rolly walked up and pounded on them. "Hey Joe! Mind if we talk a bit? Somethings up."
Nothing happened and Rolly pounded again. From inside, a voice said. "Go away if you know what's good for you. I'm busy."
This got a smile from Rolly. "Did you ever know what's good for you Ben?"
Ben returned the smile. "Nope, I've tried and tried, never could figure that one out."
Rolly opened the door and he and Ben started to walk in. Before they could take a step inside, shiny metal chains shot out and grabbed them both by a leg and dragged them inside, hauling them into the air. The door slammed shut.
Ben and Rolly found themselves being hoisted up into the top of the smokehouse, where billowing clouds of smoke swirled around some overly cooked sedge beasts. Ben grabbed the chain above him, held it with one hand and freed his legs as soon as he had the slack to do so. The chain fought against him, making it more difficult. Rolly was free even quicker. Ben saw him change his form, becoming something else and pulling his legs free. They nodded to each other and dropped. Rolly simply landed hard and stood up. Ben swung from chain to chain as they tried to grab him, and then did a dismount to floor, just like he was falling off a horse.
They saw Joe across the room, struggling to put a sedge beast carcass on a hook while avoiding becoming tangled in the chains. Rolly walked over, knocking aside chains that got to close. "Looks like you have this handled fine. But maybe Ben and I can help you get the rest of that pile done?"
Joe glared at them. "I'm not your boss, do what you like. But let's get this done quickly, it's waking up and getting stronger. Where the hell is that lazy Butcher? He should have been back by now."
Ben grabbed a carcass while Rolly got a chain and hook ready. As soon as they put the hook in the carcass, the chain drew it to the top of the smokehouse. Ten minutes later, they were done. Joe turned to them. "Job's over. Go find Ozzy and tell him to get his ass back here."
Rolly started to walk out the door. "Can't. He's gone. I'm sure you don't want the story." Ben left as well. Before they could get out the door chains of black smoke enveloped them, dragging them back through the smokehouse, and out the other door. These chains didn't let either of them go as they struggled. Joe dragged them out onto a small patio made of unmortared stone bricks. Several wooden chairs sat around a table where Makken, the dwarf Peppermancer was pouring out shots of whiskey. "Taking a break, are we? And dragging in some volunteers to try my fermented pickle juice? How nice. Drink up boys!"
The chains disappeared and the workers sat down at the table. Rolly tossed his glass of green colored alcohol down his throat. He smiled, and reached for the bottle. Ben took a sip, choked, and put his glass in front of Rolly. "Hell on High! That really is pickle juice, isn't it? Mixed with what fermented horse radish?"
Makken laughed. "Got it in one sip. You have talented taste buds."
"Formalities over. Tell me where the hell the Butcher is. This pit of his is Tier 3 now and getting hard to keep in line. It's heading to Tier 4 soon and I'm not sure I can keep it under control unless he gets his ass back here and hits Tier 3 himself."
Rolly was continuing to slowly sip the Pickle Whiskey, but started to tell the story. "...and they said at the end of the fight he was almost all smoke and fire. Killed the big ghoul with a giant, smoky cleaver and then floated off on the wind."
Joe didn't seem happy. "Damn. I told him to watch his temper. I needed to build up his Heat so he'd have a good Furnace when I sent him off to learn from Old Smoke. But between the radiance and his temper he must have ignited his corruption early. That's not supposed to happen on this side, but mortals also aren't supposed to have both radiance and corruption both. And he had more than just that heating him up."
"Ok, so where is he? Dead and walking back? Or something more complicated?" Ben was curious about what Joe was saying, but he'd leave that for another time.
The smoke golem was not happy at all. "Not dead. Much more complicated. He got a bit impatient and started his trip without me going along to guide him. As soon as he went high enough, he'd get grabbed by a Cyclone and dragged off to the smoke. It will dump him into the waves somewhere along with anything else it picked up while it was visiting this plane. Sky won't want him, but Smoke will take him. That's going to make this a lot tougher to handle."
"Normally, I'd go looking for him. But this monstrosity would go out of control. It's bad now. It went to Tier 3 a couple of hours ago and it's trying to drag in anything it can cook up. Its got a mean streak in it a mile wide. Feeding a star spawn to a demonic charnel pit? What the hell were you folks thinking?"
Ben grabbed a much different looking bottle from the table, and poured a shot. The amber colored liquid went down smooth. "To tell the truth, at the time were thinking 'Don't let the damned alien monster burn out our brains and turn us into zombies'. "
Joe sighed. "Fair enough, I suppose. But actions have consequences, and now you have something that might be equally bad. I can hold it back some, but that's the job for a Butcher. It wants a Butcher in there, feeding it meat to smoke. When it hits Tier 4 it will be ten times worse and need a heavy hand to keep it in line. You don't want to have it slip it's leash."
Rolly looked at the building. "Leash? Will it grow legs and run off? That would be neat to see."
Joe looked at him strangely, then shook his head. "Maybe. More likely it will grab most of the town, eat it, and try to turn into a dungeon. With there already being dungeons in the town, and the proximity to the city, I think you'd see some horrible things happen. The Butcher of Gadobhra would probably just expand his realm and take it all over and expand the city."
Ben suddenly had a bad feeling. "This all started when a Charnel Daemon from the city formed here out of left-over meat. Ozzy told me it had a quest to kill the town and make a pit. Was this something the city planned all along?"
Joe shrugged. "Who knows. It makes for a nice story if you want to tie up some loose ends that way. Or it might be total coincidence. And I might be wrong about the thing. Maybe it hits Tier 4 and just sits here patiently waiting for Ozzy to get back."
Ben asked. "You think there is a chance of that happening?"
Joe looked him in the eyes. "Nope, not a chance in any hell you want to pick. Like I said, a mean streak a mile wide."
Makken poured drinks all around. The dwarf would hate to see them all die with bottles still full. "So, we just wait for the big lug to learn some magic and come strolling back to town?"
Rolly held up several fingers. "As I see it, we have a classic conundrum here with no good choices. One, we can get the band together and go look for Ozzy. This is tough because we don't know where he is or how to get there. Tricky details."
"Two, Joe can go look for Ozzy while we stay here and deal with the pit."
"Three, we all go look for Ozzy, since it won't be safe here. Or, four, we all stay here and deal with the pit."
Makken drank. "I'm good with any of them. I'll get a bag packed with extra socks and salsa."
Joe shook his head. "Won't work except for your fourth plan. There are reasons I'm not in the Smoke. Me going back isn't an option. And I don't see wings on any of you. Unless you do like Ozzy did, you can't get there directly. You need to go through Sky or Fire. Not happening."
The smokehouse groaned suddenly, wood twisted and stone melted. Any materials nearby disappeared and the building grew ten feet taller.
Joe stood up, and changed into a thirty-foot tall black whirlwind of smoke and chains. "Out of time. Only thing left is for it to ignite the fire in the pit. It would help if I had a constant supply of meat to feed it and keep it tired."
Rolly jumped up. "Right! Double-Secret Plan Five it is! Come on Ben, time to get to work."
Ben followed after him. "Dammit, Rolly, you never tell me about the Double-Secret plans."
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