MTG Salvation

Prologe


It was meant to be a place of learning. It was meant to be a horde of knowledge. It was even, I suppose, meant to test the power of Wizard-kind, but this I know: it was not meant to be a slaughterhouse. My name is Alphorus Denoctie, Formerly a Senior Researcher at the prestigious Riptide Project. I do not enjoy living in the past, but this account has been asked of me so that the past is not forgotten, and the Wizards after us forget not the scourge they have loosed on the world.






Chapter 1



"Pemmin!" Cried a voice through the haze, "Pemmin!" Pemmin woke with a start, swatting away the unpleasantly damp tentacle that had been shaking him, "Gerroff, you great lump of chum," he said blearily, staring up into a huge, beaked face that looked particularly furious. Now why would a Junior Researcher be so angry at…….? Pemmin jumped to his feet, nearly knocking over his stool, and causing an avalanche of fact orbs, which rolled noisily away. "Director Nemian, how delightful to see you!" he said, with a false shroud of busy cheerfulness suddenly governing his demeanor, "I didn’t expect you so soon, I was just reviewing some statistics and…"

" Enough Pemmin."

"Yes, sir."

"Resting your eyes again Pemmin?"

"My eyes make their demands, Sir"

"Quite so. You are lucky to have been given this…, this office." Said Nemian, saying "office" like one might say "sewer", "I sujest that you use it more wisely in the future." Something about his tone coupled with his normal state of icy fury worried Pemmin, the implication was clear that if he were caught sleeping again, something more unpleasant than a tentacle would awaken him. Pemmin knew he was indeed lucky to have his office, most Wizards preferred expansive lecturing halls, or courtyard demonstrations, and would not stand for another’s work being done in secret. Pemmin didn’t want to keep any secrets from all the pompous fools; he just wanted to have a little time to "rest his eyes." Pemmin was no ordinary wizard, he was, in fact, the youngest senior researcher on staff ("somewhere near twenty five" by his count) This coupled with a constant absent-minded know-it-all look glued to his face, and the skills of a wizard twice his age, did not make him popular. Pemmin’s eyes shifted about his bare stone-walled office (it was converted from a storage closet) as the lecture continued, "I have come from the council of progress," said the peevish Cephalid, " I am to check on the success on your assignment." Pemmin groaned inwardly, it was common knowledge that the progress council was an insatiable beast as far as results went. "Success for the mutation project is pending," he said smoothly while distractedly sorting fact orbs on his desk, " but we have reason to believe, with a bit more funding, that…"

"Pemmin, you know full well that I will not believe a word you say in defense of your pitiful research," said Nemian scathingly, "Why not let your data speak for you?" Nemian delicately, and without bending over, plucked a fact orb from the number sitting in the middle of the floor. A faint light glowed as he played small amount of magic over the orb, and a faint whisper of sound whispered as the backdraft of magic fed research statistics directly into his brain. "Bah!" Nemian dropped the orb, as one would toss away a particularly disgusting slug, "You have narrowed the cause down to "some kind of source" have you? Pemmin bristled, "It’s coming from a single source sir."

"No more of this charade, Pemmin," said the Cephalid disdainfully, " you are being reassigned."

"Sir?"

"You are being moved to the ra Project."

"Sir?"

"Your mutation project is being put into more capable hands."

"Sir?"

"Stop saying "Sir" you worthless little man!" said Nemian, inflating with rage, "Any attempt to disobey the council, directly or indirectly, will result in the immediate suspension of all your duties, Good Day!"

With that the director swept from the room, leaving a small trail of ink on the bland stone floor. Pemmin glared dourly at the cheap walls of his only respite; he knew this was his last chance, he was being forced to get results out of a bad project. It was as good as a -curse. After the walls had been stared at sufficiently, he sighed, put the orbs on his cut-price desk, and left his office. He emerged in the hallway with the usual grimace of disgust on his face, the cephalid builders had tried to go for a "mystic’ look and, in Pemmin’s personal view, had gone out the other side to "weird". Large vaulted ceilings overhung the expansive hall; the walls had an odd, wavy, eye-watering effect meant to make it look like it was sculpted from water. Pemmin rather liked stone better. It took awhile to get to the lab given to his former project, which was in an out of the way hallway in the third building (the building used for mainly storage and magic resiviors)

As he walked into the room he took a second to take it all in, the gigantic rusted hulk of the mana alternator, the diminutive silvery form of the second-hand search weave, the cells lining the walls…… All built in what had clearly been a lab for standard magical theory tests, with out-dated mana-filters, unknown bits of obsolete machinery, and dust and debris everywhere. He looked at the cells, knowing that he would probably never do any of the tests he planned.

An elf watched him with eyes full of , all it’s energy had been spent long ago, beating at the magic field. Other various creatures occupied the other cells, even some humans. The selection process for the test subjects was, of course, very fair. The only creatures that were taken were ones that had clearly attacked Riptide emissaries, usually. A grubby head poked out from underneath the mana- alternator, it’s hair thick with grease. "Hey Mel!" Pemmin rolled his eyes, his assistant Lerief was the only one on earth to recognize he had a first name (Meldictus), let alone call him by it, "We were just going to start it up, you’re just in time!" Faint scrabbling noises came from within the alternator. Pemmin glanced at the great pile of corroding metal; it really was a genius invention. It was based on His own theory that the mutation running rampant in the world these days was due to "veins" of mana, some veins were made of normal everyday mana, but some were made from some kind of corrupted mana. Moving from one "vein" to the next caused some kind of magical friction, he theorized, causing magic to alter the very body and mind of a creature The mana alternator alternated blasts of pure and impure magic, causing accelerated mutation, making most of the creatures frightening beasts. . So far, the search weave had not been able to locate the source of the corruption (if only he could get a better weave!). The young Lerief jumped up and vaulted over a dusty, cloth-covered machine. Lerief was a junior-researcher of 18. No other senior had wanted him because of his odd looks and odd habits, but Pemmin saw his potential. " We’ve finally got the clearance to run full spectrum on a goblin!" said Lerius, radiating enthusiasm. The look on Pemmin’s face told the story. " We aren’t going to get to test the goblin, are we?" he said; now his lanky teenage body had deflated like a balloon. " You have my permission to stay with this project, if you wish," said Pemmin quietly," I could write you in as a permanent attachment." The boy looked up, his mouth a determined line; once again, no words were needed. " Right then…. follow me." Pemmin turned on his heel and left the room. "Sir, we have to…"started Lerief, shuffling hesitantly across the junk-strewn floor. Pemmin didn’t look back, "Let our ‘capable’ replacements handle it!"

"But sir, where are we going? "said the startled assistant with alarm. Pemmin continued to walk, "Dominara project my dear lad!" Lerief scowled as he closed the doors behind him and said, " Great, back to the boring old slivers."






I just wanted to see what you guys thought. I don't know if i flew in the face of the story-line at all, so input would be welcomed

I don't know if you really can fly in the face of the storyline with Pemmin and the riptide project...they aren't in the books at all...just some flavor text. Will this story cover the Riptide project itself, and the creation of the slivers? I hope so. Even if not, good job, in my opinion.

Quote from Chin_Yisou »

I don't know if you really can fly in the face of the storyline with Pemmin and the riptide project...they aren't in the books at all...just some flavor text. Will this story cover the Riptide project itself, and the creation of the slivers? I hope so. Even if not, good job, in my opinion.

thanks chin yisou. I plan to cover the creation of the slivers and the subsiquent fall of riptide

Quote from Vimesy »

thanks chin yisou. I plan to cover the creation of the slivers and the subsiquent fall of riptide

Eeexcellent...slivers...incidentally, I see you read Discworld, as do I.

EDIT: Oh, and, you're welcome.

Chapter 2.



Pemmin opened the unbolted, decreped door. And peered inside. He was surprised that this old project still had a lab at all. The Project had once been viewed as a shining opportunity, it seemed like a long time ago, but Pemmin realized it had only been a couple of months. The Project had been fully funded, a rare feat. It was supposed to work like this; a ship with a select team of researchers would sail across the sea, being magically assisted by a team of weather mages at Riptide. The team would proceed to make contact with the locals, trade secrets, and take notes on their culture. The team would then collect fossils, sketch creatures, and take magical samples. The result, ideally, would be ancient knowledge, new philosophical ideas, artifacts of power, and the revival of ancient species of another continent. In reality, the people were desperate, bitter, and untrusting. They seemed to have no ancient knowledge; their culture had been ruined by some huge disaster. Philosophy was a no-show, and all of the artifacts were broken. Then there were the Slivers. They had seemed to be the only real success of the mission; the replicator had produced the first sliver to the suspense of an expectant crowd. It had been one of the most stunning disappointments in Riptide history. The Sliver had turned out to be a rather weak, incompetent predator. The general consensus was that there was a good reason there were only fossils left. It died within hours. Pemmin stepped gingerly into the small room, and peered around. It was mostly empty, even for it’s size. Lerief stepped in behind him as he walked to the far end of the room. Lerief’s faded blue robes caught in the door for a second before being pulled free. "Nose to the grindstone, eh, Mel?" he said with nearly sincere cheerfulness. Pemmin glared at the derelict samples of artifacts, daring them to work. "See what you can make of these, Lerief," he said wearily, waving his hand at the pile of metal on the low shelf. He liked the way that Lerief looked at the world differently than anyone else; it balanced out the boy’s nervous twitching. The boy was almost the opposite of Pemmin; he was hard working, enthusiastic, earnest, and jumped up. He was also Pemmin’s only friend, albeit his subordinate. Pemmin squinted gloomily at the room, with it’s dim lighting, and chrome surfaces that had looked modern three years ago. There was no equipment anywhere, not even a database, only scribbled descriptions of the various items, antiquities, and rubbish. The room was a convenient trashcan for a ed project. Pemmin sighed, pushed some junk off a chrome bench, and sat down, his tatty robes getting in his way (he had never liked the robes). Lerief glanced at his supervisor over his bony shoulder, he could feel it, Pemmin was going to get in to one of his sarcastic moods. "My goodness," said Pemmin bitterly, " I wonder where they put the crowning jewel of this fine project."

He found what he was looking for in a small, unlocked cupboard. A flat rock was sitting on it’s own shelf illuminated by a poor attempt at dramatic lighting. Pemmin tipped the rock unceremoniously onto the floor, causing some of the edges to crumble. In the rock, there lay the remains of what looked like a fearsome beast. " This is junk," said Lerief bluntly, turning around, " just metal twisted in funny shapes." Pemmin chewed his lip and stared at the fossil, if he wanted to stay at Riptide, he had to get results, and the artifacts weren’t going to help him. "Work on a suspension spell," he said, still staring at the fossil, "I’m going to call in some favors."



It was tough work, carrying the rock all the way to the replicator. It was heavy, and had an awkward shape. The builders of the project had an obsession in grand staircases. When Pemmin finally entered the Replicator room, he was disappointed. There didn’t seem to be anyone working at the moment. Just then, a Cephalid straightened from fiddling with the controls…..Ahh just the squid he was looking for.
" Hey, Squidy!" called Pemmin, setting down the fossil and leaning against a wall, "I got some work for you."
The Cephalid turned slowly; showing that "Squidy" was not his favorite alias. "Human," he said in a acidic voice, " you know that it’s off hours."
"You know me Squids," said Pemmin to a glassy stare, indicating that "Squids" was not a favorite either, " Surely you can do me a little favor?"
This looked extremely unlikely to happen.
The jovial smile disappeared from Pemmin’s scruffy face, " Or perhaps I should tell someone about your ‘experiments’ with the replicator."

"Genetic experimenting is all well and good Squidy,"he said, his voice reaching a dangerously low tone, " but not with a live wizard."
Pemmin's words seemed to have moved "Squidy" to compassion,
" This is on your head, Pemmin," the Cephalid said, while readying the equipment. Pemmin was already placing the fossil in the import field, " No problem, Chum… while you’re at it, why not make it a double?"



Pemmin carried the two wriggling slivers, one under each arm. He would have to go back for the fossil later. The little beasts kept trying to slash him with their weak claws. Pemmin hoped that the suspension spell would hold both of them, he didn’t want them to die right away, like the first one made. The lab was still a tangle of junk, but it was noticeably better than an hour ago. A dirty lump disentangled itself from a particularly large pile, "Got the Slivers I see," it said placidly. "Yes my boy," said Pemmin, setting down the tied-up slivers, and eyeing his grease-coated assistant, " you have a spell for me?" Lerief pulled a spell- holder from his pocket. The short stick of crystal buzzed with a fresh spell. " Shall I do it now?" he asked eagerly. Pemmin sighed; you could tell the length of time someone had been a wizard by how exited they were to use spells. " Fire away," he said boredly. A small amount of magic was all it took to release the spell. A silent burst of blue white light filled the lab, sending orange after-images floating through Pemmin’s vision. The slivers sat on the bare floor, surrounded by a faint blue aura. " You out did yourself this time, Lerief," Pemmin said, rubbing his eyes. Sometimes his assistant surprised him, some days he would struggle with the simplest of spells, and other days…… Lerief stooped to examine the Slivers, " Not very impressive…" he said reluctantly (He always hesitated to criticize anything Pemmin did). Pemmin snorted, " The same could be said for your pile of rubbish." They stared a while at each other’s endeavor.

"Let me help you a bit with the sorting,"

"No, the Slivers are more promising."

"Well…slightly I suppose."

" If only they weren’t so dull."

Now there was a thought. How to get more exciting slivers?

A grin spread over Pemmin’s face.



"But Pemmin!" Lerief whispered hoarsely for what seemed like the hundredth time, " It isn’t our project!" Pemmin rolled his eyes, it wasn’t time to move yet, he could still hear voices beyond the door.

" That’s no fault of our own boy."

"What if we’re caught?"

"We’ll say we got confused! For pity’s sake, calm down, this happens all the time: wizards ‘borrowing’ from other wizards."

" You can’t be serious!"

"Of course I’m serious! I’ve done it dozens of times!"

"That doesn’t mean everyone does it!"

" Trust your kind, old master young man." Pemmin knew that his "wise old master" act silently annoyed Lerief, and that’s exactly why he did it. The door finally swung open with a creak, two laughing voices went down the corridor.

" ….bunch of junk, know what I mean?"

" Yeah, I think we can close the book on this -end… how did he get any funding at all, anyway?"

"Slept with the fishes?"

Pemmin waited until the fit of laughing faded into the distance before stepping from behind the box. The hall was crowded with the things, filled up with magical supplies. Lerief stepped out behind him, his hands fumbling with the frozen Sliver from. The room was still intact, thank goodness. He stepped over to a panel and punched in some commands. " Hey you..Yeah you, big wizard!" came a horse voice from the shadows. Lerief dropped the Sliver with a ‘thunk’ and turned on the lights with a flick of magic.

The voice was coming from an elf in a cage. " You think you got the best of me, eh?" the elf was lounging, it’s feet hanging out of it’s cell "Not so, wizard…. Burdock got the best of you." Pemmin stood staring, speechless; no elves had spoke to him before.
" You got pitched, big wizard. You got fyred." It pronounced "fired" oddly, it was obviously wasn’t an elvish expression. Pemmin still gaped, unable to find his voice, he knew many elves spoke common human, but none who had been brought to this lab ever had.

The young elf let out a dry chuckle, it was suddenly obvious to Pemmin that it was a , her head was shaved, and she was extremely ragged-looking, but it was a she. " I’m going from this lab," she said, " Far away from this smell-hole." Pemmin found his voice, " Probably to a worse one," he said, with an air of one who knew. The elf shook her head defiantly " Couldn’t be worse than this heap, Gourna." Pemmin bristled, whatever a Gourna was it sounded offensive. "Uhh… Pemmin?" said Lerief quietly. Pemmin glanced at his assistant; the anxiety was starting to get to him. His left eye slowly twitched, and he peered around fearfully for hidden watchers.
"Well you’ll have to find out for yourself, won’t you?" Pemmin said briskly, punching in the information into the computer he knew so well. "Put the Sliver inside, would you Lerief?" he said. " I’m going to run minor spectrum white this time, okay Lerief?"

"S-sure." said Lerief shakily; his breathing was getting heavier. Gods! How did he advance so far with a conscience? Lerief silently broke the spell down with shaking hands, and dropped the struggling Sliver into the alternator. Pemmin realized the elf was still insulting him. "You think you’re so big? When I tell them you came back they’ll mulch your great self!" Pemmin held back a number of comments about the probability of any group of wizards listening to the testimony of a deranged elf, even against him.

"Are we ready Lerief?’ he said, hand poised over the button. "All c-clear, sir," said Lerief, backing away. Pemmin blinked in surprise, this was only the second time Lerief had called him "sir".



Then he pushed the button.


Lerief and Pemmin hurried down the hall, passing the newly subdued Sliver back and forth. "Well," speculated Pemmin, " It’s not terribly impressive, just thicker plating."

"And it’s longer!"

"And it’s longer."

" And it has more head spikes!"

"And it’s got more spikes."

" And…."

"Alright! It’s all around more impressive," said Pemmin peevishly, "But it won’t win awards" He stared at the bigger, better Sliver. He had seen more impressive things. "We’ll run some tests at the lab, and…" said Lerief exictedly Pemmin shook his head impatiently, cutting him off, " We’ve got no equipment."

"Well, we can ‘borrow’ some."

Lerief had gotten over his skittishness as soon as the Sliver was out of the alternator. Pemmin grinned as they came up to their lab; "I’ll see what I can do."



Pemmin plodded into the lab an hour later, straining under the weight of some basic equipment, and was almost knocked over by an ecstatic ball of assistant. "Sir, You’ve got to..,., Lookit! Mel..I, the Slivers, they.."

Something about the jabbering made Pemmin drop the equipment, which made a crunch. Lerief continued to overflow with misplaced fervor, but his gleeful dance led to the corner where the Slivers were kept. Pemmin strode across the room. A shadow past over the light from the doorway; Director Nemian crept into the room. " The council of progress demands to know your results." He said peering suspiciously at the pile of equipment. Pemmin didn’t answer him; he was staring at the two frozen slivers, which were now identical.

I clap my hands in your general direction, as you have made another well-written chapter. It is a really interesting writing style. I likes it. Can't wait for the next installment!

Chapter 3

Pemmin picked up the expensive contact weave from his new desk. "Get me Nemian," he said with a smirk, "I want to speak with him." With that he leaned back in his comfortable chair, smiled, and went to sleep.

He was awaked by a polite harumphing. He looked up into the irate face of Nemian. "You wanted to speak, Pemmin?" he said icily. " I did indeed Nemian," Pemmin said languidly, " You seemed to have been falling behind in work." Every inch of the Cephalid’s face showed cold fury. " I’m not going to report it to anybody, but perhaps you’d better shape up, eh?"

"You can’t order me around like this!"

"I’m not ordering you around! This is a polite conversation between directors."

Nemian apparently did not trust himself to speak. He slunk from the room in a cloud of rage. Pemmin looked at his new office, with its windows facing a spectacular view of the sea, its woven rugs on a wooden floor, and it’s full-length mirror. A toussle-haired man in new robes grinned back at him; it had been a satisfying couple of weeks.

It had happened very quickly after that fateful night. The council of progress had increased his non-existent funding on the spot after examining the slivers. They also gave him full use of his old lab, and limited use of the replicator. The results after this increase were even more astounding, and caused further increase. The potential for mutation in the sliver's genes was unrivaled, and not only that, they were a self-improving species, all the new mutations discovered by one were shared by all within close range. The potential uses of certain factors of the sliver gene were unending. They could turn humans into shape-shifters, make weak humans strong, and even turn humans into nightmarish beasts. Human testing had, of course been limited.

Then there were the slivers themselves. If they could be harnessed, they would be the strongest, fastest, most efficient army on the planet. Many slivers were already controlled by the wizards control slivers, pale, veiny little things in jars, which were, in turn, mind controlled. Already two new alternators had been built, and two smaller ones were on the way. Ten percent of Riptide’s total funding was being used on the Sliver Project, and twenty percent of the lab space.

Pemmin sighed contentedly, all he had to do now was look through these reports on new mutations, the labs were printing out tons these days, many of them reprints, so he need not read them all. There was another memo about the elf escapee also; he didn’t need to read that, he had seen it dozens of times already. He suddenly wondered what Lerief was doing. Pemmin had been promoted to director, so naturally Lerief had taken his place among the senior researchers, breaking Pemmin’s own record for youngest ever. Pemmin and Lerief hadn’t had time to talk since the project had gone big, but Pemmin had sent him a memo…an important one, but it didn’t count he supposed. With feelings of randomized guilt, Pemmin put on his new cloak. He picked up the contact weave and said, " I’m going out."

Pemmin hesitated for a moment

" If Nemian comes back, inform him that he is a slimy know-nothing."

Lerief’s personal lab was in building one, showing how much he had moved up in wizard society. Pemmin had to stop by many of the fledgling sliver labs, each designed to study certain aspects of the new mutations, he also had to have a short chat with many eager to succeed wizards on the way. He finally got to building one.

Building one had an altogether over-theatrical amount of staircases in Pemmin’s opinion.

When Pemmin finally reached the lab’s door, he Was about ready to forgo the friendly chat he had planned in order to give his former assistant a lecture about choosing a lab on the top floor of the building furthest from his. Pemmin slowly pushed open the door.

The room inside was lit with a ghastly light that only made the shadows deeper. The room was filled with racks of equipment, which were now frightening shadows. They obscured the middle of the room.

"Let none know of your mission, young one." Said a cold, almost reptilian voice from the center of the room.

"Y-Yes master," said a much more frightened voice.

"Failure is not…"

Pemmin tripped on a cord while sneaking closer, trying to get a look at the speaker. The normal lights instantly went on, and the voice was cut off mid-sentence. Pemmin finally caught a view of Lerief on his knees, his face pale, his brown hair slick with sweat. Lerief waved a hand.

Pemmin strode into Lerief’s well-lit, modern lab. Lerief was sweating like a pig, bent over some machinery.

For a second, every thing seemed wrong, there was a brief flicker of blue around the edges of his vision… Then Lerief was striding towards him, smiling, and everything was fine again. "Pemmin," he said with his normal enthusiasm, " How good to see you!" Pemmin smiled, clasping hands with his friend. "Always nice to see a former pupil doing well." he said. "Well I don’t know about that," Lerief said, geusturing at his at his alternator, "Running full spectrum red on one of the slivers over-heated the whole thing."

"Full spectrum red? Did you get a stable mutation off it?"

"I sent you a memo…"

"Nobody reads memos!"

They stared at each other for a while. "By the way," said Pemmin embaressdly, "I sent you a memo asking for…" Lerief nodded, wiping his hands of hurriedly with a rag " I thought you might ask. Come with me."

Pemmin and Lerief surrveyed row upon row of suspension chambers. They were basically beams of pure magic, held in line by rune covered stone. In each blue-white beam was a different kind of sliver.

"And the results, Lerief?"

"I don’t know why you’re so suspicious. The beams are perfectly safe."

"The results?"

Lerief sighed "The numbers don’t add up. Even with allowances for ‘borrowing’ of specimens, there is definitely a difference in the number taken out and the number put back in."

"How many?"

"Five at least."

Pemmin clasped his hand over his eyes. "Which ones?"

"It’s hard to tell."

"When the slivers are taken out…"

"They are always suspended en route, and revitalized in controlled rooms, under the influence of a controller sliver," said Lerief, who was clearly prepared for this question. Pemmin leaned on the railing of the viewing deck. "Keep this quite for now, I’ll try to clear this up."

Pemmin strode down the hall, trying to avoid the brown-nosing remarks of his colleagues. He didn’t know where to begin searching for escaped slivers. He had just walked in a random direction from his office, carrying a pocketful of prepared spell-sticks. If he were an evil-minded little beast, where would he be? He had noticed it in the earliest of his experiments. Slivers were viscous little balls of muscle, armor plates, and predator instincts. It just made it worse that they were a hive mind, they could communicate without making a noise, bringing down huge creatures with only a few casualties. Pemmin was certain of one thing; survival of the fittest had not factored in their extinction. Put together the right (or wrong, depends on how you look at it) combination together and you had a group of unstoppable little blighters. If I were an evil minded little beast, thought Pemmin, I would be somewhere where it was nearly empty dark, and a good place to lay an ambush. I would be in magical supplies and mana-storage, that’s where.


There was nothing near the magical supplies except a few suspiciously empty boxes. That was okay, suspiciously empty boxes were normal in a community of wizards. The mana-storage tanks lay ahead. An ingenious wizard had discovered that it was possible to hold mana under great pressure in rune-inscribed metal. The great storage tanks were monoliths to his glory. Each one held millions of Thomas of magic, they were large, cylindrical, and held in iron frames a foot from the ground. There were some new ones, Pemmin saw, which were being built to hold corrupted mana, for the mutation process. The blue and green ones were already built, with a red one almost finished. Pemmin looked under the tanks, nothing but dust it looked like, but it was hard to tell, the only light was from lamps swinging on chains from the ceiling.

Well, everything seemed to be in order. Pemmin turned around… Then he turned back. There was what seemed to be a body lying slumped against the under-construction red tank .It was probably just a worker who fell asleep on the job. His buddies had probably left him there as a practical joke. Pemmin walked up to the body a shook it. "Wake up!" he said a little more urgently than he planned. The body slid to the floor.

It was covered in stab wounds.

"Mister Pemmin!" said a voice in the suck-up tone Pemmin had come to expect, "What are you doing down here?" A junior researcher was standing hesitantly at the edge of the lamplight, he was probably just sent on a routine check, poor kid... From the darkness beyond the tanks came a slithery sound. "Run away," said Pemmin in a calm voice despite the fact that all his nerves were screaming at him.

"But Mister Pemmin…" The slithering noise grew louder, and if possible, more sinister.

There was no more time for warnings.

Pemmin swung around and pulled two spell holders out of his robe’s pocket just as a sliver slipped liquidly into the light.
Older wizards do not often test their skills in battle, and while Pemmin was no old wizard, he had put his dueling days behind him. Dueling is initially a way of testing a wizard’s aptitude; sometimes the best wizards were sent to the pits to earn some money for Riptide.

As it had turned out, Pemmin was an ace at magical theory, but was merely average at practical magic.

He wished now that he had been good enough to have gone to the pits.

In the split second before he blasted the Sliver squarely in the, for lack of a better word, chest, he tried to see what kinds of silvers had been let loose. The sliver had longer head spikes, which pointed to a plated sliver. He trotted over to the burnt sliver( he used fire charges). It had egg sacks….that was not good. A silver leapt at him out of the shadows. Pemmin was too slow; he stood quickly, fumbling with the spell holder, trying to line it up. The sliver’s single claw swung upward, gleaming.

The sliver was knocked out of the air by a stasis spell from the junior researcher. Pemmin sprinted over to the frozen sliver; it looked slightly insubstancial, even when frozen. That would be how they got out then, it was a mistform. The spell was well done. He personally was using the more effective red magic sticks, but it was still a good spell. He gave the researcher an appraising look, and then tossed him a spell-holder. "They won’t make the mistake of a frontal attack again," he said grimly to the wide-eyed researcher, ‘So look sharp."

He was right. A sliver dropped on his head.

Wizards are not used to close combat. They are trained to identify and eliminate their enemies at long range. Traditional wizards therefore go into battle armed with only their spells, and their wits.

Luckily, Pemmin was not a traditional wizard.

He gripped the claw with one hand, and with the other he pulled a letter opener, shaped like a sword. The sliver went mad, trying to stab Pemmin’s eyes with its pointed beak and whipping him with its tails. Pemmin flailed at his attacker trying to stab the sliver between the chinks in its plates. Pemmin was aware of the boy fending off a closing circle of slivers.

The sliver finally pulled its claw free, slicing open Pemmin’s palm. It quickly wrapped itself around his head, blinding him. He could almost feel its claw rising for one final strike.
He took one more desperate stab upwards.
The sliver loosened and crumpled to the ground, he must have hit its spine.Pemmin thanked random fluxuations in space-time for his luck. The boy was not doing well against the slivers. The ones he had managed to blast were recovering… the slivers had black markings. He hadn’t authorized black spectrum runs… had he? No time to think of that now. He pulled the last two spell holders from his pocket, and pointed them at the end of the sliver’s circle closer to the exit.

" When I let these off, boy, we run!" he shouted. The boy seemed to nod, or least shake more. He let them both off.


Pemmin and the researcher ran. The slivers pursued.

"Stay in the center of the tanks, boy! They could be any were on top of those tanks!"

The researcher stumbled and veered to the left.

A sliver jumped from beneath the tank onto his ankles.

Pemmin spared a look over his shoulder, and after barely hesitating at all, threw him his letter-opener while still on the run

There was a chance he would survive.

He didn’t want a letter opener covered in sliver goo anyway.



Pemmin staggered into his office, bleeding on the rug. He fell into his chair and looked at his mirror. His robes were torn, his hand was a mess, and his boyish face had several gouges in it. He picked up the contact weave on his desk with his good hand. "Get me…Nemian." He said weakly. Then he passed out.

He was awakened by a loud impatient noise. His hand was on fire.

"You rang?" said a voice dripping with distaste. Pemmin tried to think through the mist of pain. "Nemian…I messed up…big time."

Nemian clearly did not believe what he was hearing.

"What?"

"The slivers…they’ve escaped."

Nemian was prepared to accept that Pemmin would beat himself up and mutilate his own hand rather than say this to him.

"They’re nesting in the mana-storage facilities," said Pemmin, while trying to steady himself on his desk rather than slip under it.

"Why are you telling this to me?" said the Cephalid, voice laden with distrust.

"Because you are the only one I know that won’t try to shush up the fact that I made a mistake."

Pemmin slid quietly under the desk.



I don't think i can keep up this break-neck pace on the week days, sorry guys!

I'd love to have any feed back any of have for me. What you liked, what you didn't, that kind of thing. thx.

M.N.

Quote from The Squirle master »

This story has a rollercoaster pace! I didn't expect the Slivers to escape so early on in the story. How much chapters are you planning to do? Till the fall of the Riptide Project or even further?

I have some plans for this, don't worry.
The wizards don't even think they're in trouble yet, so thet're in for a surprise.

Sorry for the late update guys, Ive been really busy, enjoy.

Chapter 4.

Pemmin stared into the shadowed faces of the main council. They seemed to prefer a feeling of mystery around them. The majority of them were, of course, Cephalids. All of it had gone according to Pemmin’s hasty plan. Nemian had blown the whole thing way out of proportion, spreading false rumors and soiling Pemmin’s already grimy reputation in whatever way he could. This had caused a large security down. It was hard to tell, but Pemmin did have a conscience, he had probably saved a dozen lives by doing this. The security down had not been too soon, buildings one, three, and five had already reported sliver victims. Pemmin just wished now that he didn’t have to deal with the consequences of the plan.

The hearing was not going well. The council definitely favored Nemian, the prosecutor. It was no surprise; one wizard was, well dressed, competent-looking, and most importantly, a fellow Cephalid.

The other appeared to be leaning causally, even when standing up. He wore a sardonic smile, mocking life in general.

His hand was heavily bandaged, and his face had a number of well placed bandages.

"In closing," said Nemian in a triumphant voice, "This is a man who not only let several slivers slip out from under his nose, but also carried out sliver mutations unbeknownst to the council. For this I recommend no less than a demotion to the rank of junior researcher." The presiding councilor nodded, "We will take your account into consideration, director Nemian." The bulbous face turned sedately. "Do you have any closing comments, Director Pemmin?" it said, preparing itself for the obvious result of the question.

"I do, councilor. I would like to comment that Director Nemian is a lying sack of…."

"If we had known that you would have made comments like that," said the face, voice full of loathing, " we would have denied you request for self-representation."

The head council-member leaned back, and shuffled papers on his desk absent-mindedly. "The council will reach a decision within the hour." He glanced up at the two directors, who were glaring at each other.

"That means you leave."

Pemmin lounged in his chair, idly throwing a paperweight into the air and catching. Lerief sat forward in a chair opposite him, fidgeting. He had come to talk with Pemmin about the trial. "I don’t why they hold you responsible," he said in an agitated voice, " There’s no way you could have known!"

"They needed a scapegoat," said Pemmin distractedly, staring into the middle-distance. Who could have done the secret mutations? It wasn’t as if it was easy to gain access to the highest priority labs in Riptide and run several unauthorized spectrum runs without anyone noticing.

You would have to be trusted, or a talented memory mage. Pemmin peered across the table.

Or you could be both.

"What?" said Lerief

The shadowy faces of the council looked slightly disgruntled.

" Wise Council," said Nemian in sickly sweet tones, "have you reached your decision?"

Strangely, the question was not addressed by the head of the council, but by a wheezing human voice to the left of him, "Indeed we have, Nemian," the voice said hoarsely, "No need to butter us up."

A stern cough issued from the head of the council.

"Right, right….I know," said the voice exasperatedly, "Let the record show that councilor Denoctie has taken the floor."

The voice had a slightly senile tone, but it still carried an edge of dangerous sharpness.

"I and the rest of us in the minority group have convinced the others in the council that in the interest of peace…"

"What councilor Denoctie means to say," said the head of the council over the top of the rest of Denoctie’s statement, "is that the council has collectively decided that…"

"I’m perfectly capable of handling this, Caprious." Said Denoctie with quite menace.

The Cephalid turned his head slowly toward the old human.

It was difficult to see the expression on the faces of the two council members; the lighting in the room designed to shroud the faces of the councilors.

Denoctie apparently won the silent battle.

"Meldictus Pemmin will not be demoted."

Nemian billowed, readying protest.

"Hold yourself," said Denoctie looking up from the paper he was reading, "He will, however, be reassigned."

The face of the old wizard clearly held a grin now; "He is the new chairman of the committee to eradicate the sliver infestation. This committee will be directly subordinate to this council."

Councilor Caprious cleared his throat purposefully.

"Oh yes," said Denoctie vaguely, "Lerief Contepri will be his second on this committee."

"Meeting adjourned… if that’s alright with you I mean, Caprious."

The head of the council nodded wearily.

"Right then… we’re done."

Lerief met Pemmin outside the courtroom. "How did it go?" he said nervously, fussing with his robe.

Pemmin glowered at his new assistant. That old fool had gotten the best of him! Almost as bad as Nemian, that old geezer he mentally concluded. Well, he would show him, he fumed. He would find a way out of this.



The first meeting of the committee to eradicate the sliver infestation was the next day. Pemmin looked around the table. He had truly been given the dregs of wizardry, and most of them were angry to be assigned to this project. The problem was that none of the wizards even thought of the escaped slivers as a problem, or they thought of it as a problem that would go away. Sure, the occasional happened, but it was just less competition for them.

Truthfully, Pemmin wasn’t very excited about the committee either. He did recognize the need for it, he just thought that it should have been given to someone with less important work than him. He had stayed up all night searching for a way to overturn the council’s decision. Pemmin covered his eyes with his hand.

"Hello to all of our new members," he said sleepily, "Welcome to the committee."

The new members were nonplussed.

"We have been formed for a reason," he said, steepling his hands, "and make no mistake, it is a good reason."

He leaned back in his chair at the head of the cheap wooden table.

"Now if we were told what we are supposed to do about it, we would be set."

The committee did not like this at all.

"For now," Pemmin said, "We are going to patrol and guard." He regarded Lerief, who was at his right side, looking nervous as usual. He had his suspicions of his newly reinstated assistant, but for now he would have to trust him.

"Fill them in Lerief."

"Three of the five buildings have reported sliver attacks," he croaked, licking his lips, "We consider two of them safe enough to patrol."

Pemmin cut in, " Those would be Building One, higher level labs, and Building Five, general apartments. Who wants to volunteer to patrol Building One?" About five wizards raised their hands slowly.

"Good, good… Building Five?" a further four raised their hands. "Wonderful… The rest of you realize that this means that you have to guard the exits to Building Three right?"

There were various groans from around the table.

"No good complaining," said Pemmin, aiming a stern scowl around the table, "You’ll all rotate anyway."

"Now, what will you do if you do if see one of the little of buggers hmm? By the reading of their expression, Pemmin could tell the committee thought this was fairly obvious. "Show them Lerief," he said smugly. Lerief pulled a number of small badges out of a bag; they were each in the shape of a stylized sliver. "What you do," said Pemmin, holding the badge aloft, is run a bit of magic through this. He did so. All the other badges glowed brightly and shoed tiny arrows pointing to the badge he was holding. Pemmin grinned mirthlessly, "I know, a cheap trick. But hopefully it will keep you alive." The committee found him to be a madman.

"Every body will respond when one of these is activated, understand?"

Each member of the committee reluctantly took one.

"Everyone prepare some spell holders, okay?"

There was a half-hearted chorus of "Okays".

"Meeting closed."



Pemmin walked, Lerief talked.

It was the mindless babbling of someone who has his mind on other, more distressing things. Pemmin worried about Lerief, in a vague sort of way. He knew that something was tearing apart his partner’s sanity.

Pemmin didn’t see what he could do about it.

" It was a terribly good idea," said Lerief in a breathless monotone, "These badges." He fingered his badge nervously, staring at the surrounding walls. They were patrolling Building One, as that was where they were most needed.

"Lerief?" said Pemmin tactfully; "Do you know who did the unauthorized mutations?" Apparently, this question could be said tactfully enough. Lerief’s usual twitchy composer collapsed completely. Several tics activated themselves all over his body.

"I don’t…I mean to say…I might know, but…I mean that…"

Pemmin looked on in fascinated horror as they stopped near a large statue of a founding cephalid.

"It’s alright Lerief!" He said in a shocked voice, "Everybody does it!"

"No," said Lerief, refusing to be comforted, "This is different."

He stared up with a rictus of pain on his face. Suddenly his voice was full of mad triumph, "Normal, wizards don’t receive instructions directly from the Patriarch!"

He raised a shaking hand.

Pemmin’s eyes grew wide.

"Sorry, Pemmin."

Pemmin and Lerief walked in silence. No words passed between them for quite a while. They came to large statue of a cephalid founder and stopped for a breather. There was suddenly a blue-white rim around Pemmin’s vision. He rubbed his eyes; he would have to stop over-doing it.

"Do you really think that we can stop the slivers?" said Lerief bleakly; "The wizards we got didn’t look adept at all."

Pemmin blinked, "No," he said blankly, ‘No, but I hope we can hold them back long enough for the rest of the wizards to realize how dangerous they are."

Lerief stared into space, "Doesn’t seem very likely."

It was odd; he seemed to be perfectly composed for a change. Pemmin looked up intro the face of Lerief, which now seemed to be carved out of stone. Pemmin cleared his throat, ‘If you knew who did those mutations, you would tell me, wouldn’t you?"

Lerief continued to stare into nothing, but his lips twisted into a grim smile.

"Of course, Pemmin… What are friends for?"



Pemmin had called a follow up meeting for the end of the day. The committee assembled in the meeting room.

"Nothing!" said a particularly frustrated young wizard, "A whole day of walking around a doing nothing!"

Pemmin was not looking at him, he was looking at the empty chair behind him, they had all been full this morning, hadn’t they?

All of the sliver badges started to glow.

Sorry for the late update. Ive been sick. sorry for spelling of grammer errors, my word processer bugged up

Pemmin stared up the hall of building five with growing apprehension. The glowing of the sliver badges had stopped, but to Pemmin, this didn’t bode well. He glanced over his shoulder at his assembled group of wizards. The response to the distress signal had been less than enthusiastic, and now none of the wizards were prepared sufficiently for any sort of encounter. Pemmin groaned inwardly. He would just as soon wait until morning, if just to prepare an adequate defense, but it nagged at his conscience that a fellow wizard was out there, in the dark… alone… Pemmin blocked the thoughts running through his head before they reached the same kind of pessimistic conclusion that they always did. Instead he concentrated harder on the gloomy twilight of the passageways as he walked. Lerief had taken the few of the wizards not following behind him like scared rabbits and was patrolling behind. The end of the hallway was marked by a lamp bolted to the wall. “Are we clear?” he called to his assistant down the hall

“Yes sir.”

Pemmin’s brow furrowed for a moment. Lerief had started to call him “sir” with astonishing frequency, also something had happened to his voice. Where it had been exuberant and amiable it was now placid and had almost an icy tone… Well, no matter, there were more important things to worry about now.

Two floors cleared… well that only left the top floor. His friends had been sure that the missing wizard( an junior researcher by the name of Callow) had been patrolling with them in the third building, but that didn’t mean anything. He could have decided to go back to his old lab for a bit, or he could have even been ambushed in one of the halls connecting the six buildings. Pemmin stood at the foot of the stairs leading to floor three. As has been noted before, the cephalid builders of riptide had liked the look of grand, marble staircases. There was nothing grand about this one. Building five was the building reserved for the housing of all the human staff of riptide; floor one housed the senior and most important of the staff (Pemmin himself had recently been moved to a room on that floor, and could see why they were coveted), the second floor held the younger wizards and the student and apprentices that trained at the project. The third floor held the invisible cogs that kept Riptide running, the assorted builders, maids, cooks, and all the other hard workers that were required in such a large establishment. Pemmin had never gone up to the third floor. He tended to show the cooking and cleaning staff the same benevolent disinterest he showed most of the world outside his personal daily experience. He climbed the rough-hewn stairs now, a small group of wizards, pointing spell holders at the shadows and glancing around nervously, followed him.


The third floor of building five echoed the stairs leading up to it in general design and appearance.
It was constructed out of cheap stone blocks and was lit by a few dim lamps suspended from the ceiling from corroded chains. It was not small, on the contrary, it was about the same scale as the giant halls in the first floor, but while those put you in mind of cathedrals this hall put you in mind of ancient barns. Pemmin essayed the long hall by the dingy light of the oil lamps. He grimaced; this looked like the perfect place for the slivers to hide. “You two,” he said gruffly, “ go ahead, and hold your spells at the ready.” The two frightened wizards reluctantly obeyed, and the party made it’s way slowly down the hall, their boots making loud noises on the uncarpeted floor of the dilapidated hall. Pemmin let himself fall back to the middle of the group, next to his assistant. “ What do you think?” he said gesturing to the gloomy hall around them.

Lerief scanned the shadows with a calm that increasingly worried Pemmin. He looked back at Pemmin, frowning slightly, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this place.” he said bluntly.

“As do I boy, as do I.”

“They could be anywhere, and we’d never know with this lighting.”

“Quite so.”

“Is something bothering you?”

Lerief asked the question in a concerned tone, but his eyes were listless, and de@d looking.

“Nothing…nothing Lerief, just…get some more rest or something.”

“Pemmin!” said one of the leading wizards in a panicky voice, “You should have a look at this!”


A body was slumped on the floor, in the middle of a pool of light. “Don’t move,” said Pemmin in a quiet voice, “and whatever you do, don’t go near the body.” Pemmin knew this trick, the sliver’s had used it on him before. He turned to his assistant and held out his hand. “Do you have the spell I asked you to make?” Lerief nodded wordlessly and produced a holder from his robes. emmin grabbed it impatiently and strode to the front of the group. “Ready your spells,” he said to the group in general, “and shield your eyes.” He sent a flow of magic through the stick and covered his eyes with his arm.

After the light had dimmed he stared in disbelief at the hall. It was totally empty. The wash of harsh white light that now filled it showed nothing. Several of the stricken wizard's friends, now assured of no sliver menace, rushed to his side. Lerief walked up to his side, glaring at the hall. “ It could be a hit and run sir.” He said bleakly.

Pemmin scowled at the empty hall, he had really expected this to work. He had hoped to catch the slivers in their game and then rout them... Were did they go? It had to have been a sliver attack. The body was clearly stabbeted several times and it wasn’t like wizards stabbed themselves repeatedly and then called for help. Well…most didn’t anyway.

“He’s not de@d !” said a happy voice from beside the body, ‘He’s still alive!”

“Good.” Said Pemmin distractedly, he had just noticed the two drains on opposite ends of the floor.


The drains were missing the grating meant to be placed on them. They were now just holes in the floor, and from the smell, it was easy to guess what they were used for.Pemmin had sent most of the wizards to check with the residents... Lerief joined Pemmin in crouching near the first grate. “None of the residents were disturbed by slivers,” he said blankly . Indeed, several of the inhabitants of the third floor were now peering owlishly into the blinding light. “Very good,” said Pemmin briskly, standing up.Thing seemed to be taken care of; he had already sent a few of the the less competent of the group down to the hospice on the first floor with the victim. That left about ten men, not including him and Lerief. It wasn’t a lot, but they were the only ones who were going to do it. “Take five of the wizards,” said Pemmin distantly, rubbing his beard and staring into space, “and go down the drain opposite.” Lerief nodded curtly and stalked away in a curiously stiff way. Pemmin looked down the smelly drain... this would not be pleasent.


The thin pipe eventually widened into a sewer. Pemmin wished he had told Lerief to build two light spells. This was another perfect spot for an ambush. The only light came from the hastily whipped together spells cast by the wizards, the rest was a dank oppressive darkness. The blue-white light gleamed off rank water flowing underfoot, and slimy fungus on the walls. It felt like they had been trudging through dirty water for hours. There was nothing here, exept maybe somthing ly drooped down the privy.

Pemmin had had enough of this. First, there was the crawling, and falling through cramped, smelly pipes. Now there was still the smell, and even in the perfect place for an ambush there were no slivers to be found anywhere.It felt like they had been trudging through dirty water for hours, without any rests. Pemmin felt like sitting down, but there were no seats available.The sewers were also boring, mostly it was just tunnels. Every once in a while, at regular intervals there were larger chambers given to who knew what purpose, that were lighted by large lamps set in the ceiling. It had been awhile since there last room.Pemmin expected they had to be coming to one soon... Pemmin finally saw what he was looking for. A faint glimmer of light was able to be seen far down the passage. “Come on,” said Pemmin, wading past the trudging leaders, “We’ll rest in the next room.”



The room ahead looked odd to Lerief. Something was slightly obscuring the light coming from it. Lerief looked back at the plodding wizards who went with him. “Nearly there boys, then we’ll take a break.”

Pemmin sloshed up to the room. He frowned. There was something in this one…

Lerief recognized the tell-tale silhouette. He pulled a spell holder from his pocket. “Ready your spells, boys!” He yelled, and leapt into the room.

Pemmin heard a shout from the other side of the room. He stepped inside. “Oh s…” A blast of magic hit a sliver next to his ear.
The entire room was crawling with them. Under the slithering fiends Pemmin could make out eggs…lots of eggs. Pemmin hastily pulled a spell from his robe. He was almost to late, as a large group of slivers seemed to flow liquidly toward him; He fired a stream of flame toward them, blackening them.. He quickly stepped farther into the room to stop a few enterprising slivers from dropping on his head. Luckily, the collective mind of the slivers had not seemed to have noticed the wizards yet, if they had, they would be [email]de@d.Pemm[/email]in took the chance to take a look at the slivers. They were clearly a mix of nearly a dozen different types, some of them never seen before; for instance some of the slivers were ghostly, and seemed to grow at will. “Lerief!” he shouted, “Retreat right now!” Lerief could or would not hear him, and continued to calmly blast slivers away and order his followers to do so also. The hive mind began to take notice.

Slowly, more and more slivers began to attack Lerief’s group. It seemed to be all Lerief could do to keep the slivers at bay, and the wizards were running out of spells. Lerief wasn’t the only one getting noticed. The rest of Pemmin’s group finally got to the doorway. “Well?” said Pemmin furiously, in a closing circle of slivers, “Do something!” The slivers were getting frenzied now, attacking with increasing frequency a fervor they had seemed to be in some kind of trance before, but they were snapping out of it. Pemmin snarled at his attackers and pulled out a sword. He had gone into his last battle foolishly, and he wasn’t he kind to make the same mistake twice. The slivers became a bit more wary of there foe, and circled slowly, watching. On the other side of the room, Lerief was running out of spells and ideas, it was to late for retreat, and the slivers were closing in. The circle around Pemmin widened as the second group stepped in. The slivers shrank from the blasts of icy magic. “Ha!” screamed Pemmin, firing another bolt at the ever-widening circle of slivers



. Another wave of sliver crawled forward warily. “Fire.” said Lerief in a voice of de@dly calm. A blast of blue magic filled his vision, blinding him. He smiled faintly and fished another spell from his pocket, he had over a dozen left. A sliver leapt at him, clearing the bodies of his brothers. Lerief smiled a ran a current through his spell-holder. The magic rolled around the sliver like fog.



Pemmin was beginning to panic. The spells weren’t working. One of the wizards near him whimpered. None of the other wizards had thought of bringing swords. Pemmin inexpertly hacked a an approaching sliver, managing to sever it’s claw in the process. He heard a cry from the other side of the room. Lerief was sinking in a pile of slivers.

Pemmin really shouldn’t have gotten distracted.

A dozen slivers lunged

A thousand blades seemed to be at Pemmin’s body. He writhed in agony. The slivers tried to stab him through the bodies of their brothers. He was covered in sliver goo, and his own Blo0d. His sword was lying on the floor next to him, an eternity away. A supernova of darkness filled his vision.

At first he thought he was . Would hurt this much? He struggled out from underneath the bodies of the slivers, and found a room of . The fouled bodies of slivers lay in heaps, which must mark the sites of the other wizards. Only one other wizard was concius.Lerief was kneeling on the floor, -soaked,dark power still ling from his hands. Several other groans announced the awakening of the other wizards.

The heaps moved, showing wizards in various forms of mutilation. Soon, the whole group was out. Lerief was staring at a pile of slivers. Several wizards tried healing spells, with various amounts of success. Pemmin walked to Lerief. “Run.” He whispered. He was looking at a pure black sliver. It was still breathing. The slivers around it were starting to breath too. “Run!” said Lerief, suddenly his old twitchy self. The wizards did not need to be told twice. Pemmin picked up Lerief, despite the size different between the two. “This way!” he yelled.. Some of the copses were showing definite signs of life. Pemmin had seen a matinence exit a while back.Some slivers twitched.


The matinece ladder led to building one. All the other wizards had fled different ways…he hoped they made it. Pemmin laid Lerief on the ground. The boy was recovering quickly and soon stood up.

Pemmin glanced at him…”What was the magic you were using back there?” Lerief was silent. “It looked Black to me.”

Lerief stared at the ground.

“Where did you learn…”

“When the sliver project got big…I got an offer.”

Pemmin stared.

“The Cabal?”

Lerief smiled bitterly, “Yes, Pemmin, the big ,bad Cabal wanted sappy old Lerief!”

“And now,” he said triumphantly, “I know much more than you, Sir.”

He raised a hand.

Pemmin’s eyes grew wide.

Pemmin hit Lerief over the head with the butt of his sword.

“You still need to learn practicality, boy.” Said Pemmin dryly as Lerief hit the floor. He shook his head.

“Wait until the council hears this.”

My computer has safety locks; The normal words for [email="de@d"]de@d[/email] and blo0d are automaticly blocked out. It sucks when you try to search for magic cards. I try to be vivid, but it's hard when I have to avoid certain words.

Just a quick one to tide you over. Enjoy.

Chapter 6

Councilor Denoctie looked at Pemmin Suspiciously over the papers in his hand. The body lying on the floor next to Pemmin was not helping the situation. "Let’s go through this again," said the councilor slowly. Pemmin seethed, it had gone on for hours. He did not have time for this. He still hadn’t tracked down the rest of his council, and Lerief wouldn’t stay under forever. "You can believe me, good council," he said with a fake grin, "or you can release me." This did not have the desired effect. The council now sat with a cloud of barely suppressed rage floating over them. "Director Pemmin," said Denoctie in a cold voice, ‘I believe you are in a committee directly subordinate to this one." Pemmin rolled his eyes…it was not unnoticed; Denoctie bristled visibly.

"That means, Pemmin, that you will do exactly as we want you to do, understand?"

A voice came from the left of councilor Denoctie, if it was possible to transform a smirk into a voice, it would be this voice, "And," said councilor Caprious gleefully," What the council wants, is your immediate expulsion from Riptide."

Denoctie turned on the Cephalid, incandescent in his indignance.

"I wish I could say differently," said Caprious in mock innocence, "but it just so happens I have a letter from the Queen." A piece of paper changed hands. Denoctie stood up and left the room without saying a word. The cephalids globe of a head turned to follow Denoctie a he left, as if he was savoring the moment. His head snapped back to look at Pemmin. "Your assistant will look after your previous duties, which will, in any case, be cut back."

Pemmin looked in disbelief at his former assistant, jaw open, then looked back up at the Chair of the council. "You can’t be serious."

"You are dismissed."

"But…"

"You are dismissed!"

Pemmin took a deep breath; he had nothing to lose. He hopped off the pedestal reserved for the audience to the council, and crossed to the Judges bench. Caprious stared in disbelief. Pemmin looked up into the cephalid’s glassy eyes with a mad glint in his eyes. Pemmin had turned into a frightening creature in the last couple of days; He hadn’t had time to shave, so he had a growth of rather dark ginger stubble. He had a large amount of scabs covering his face, and his robes resembled a bundle of once-blue rags tied to his body. "So what you’re telling me is you’re going to put a raving madman", he waved a hand in the direction of Lerief, "on the case of destroying a dangerous infestation?"

If he were not slightly hypnotized by the scruffy, desperate looking man yelling at him, Caprious probably would have made a remark regarding the sanity of Pemmin himself. Pemmin hauled himself up until he was at eye level with the cephalid. "You haven’t been down there. This is going to take more than a small group of two-bit wizards!"

Caprious, his eyes never leaving Pemmin, ran a bit of magic through a crystal on the bench.

"You’re just going to ignore it, aren’t you?" Two guards appeared from a door on the right.

Pemmin shrugged as he was frog marched out of the council room.

"Your funeral."

Pemmin sulked down the long corridor. You could do nothing against a letter from the Queen; it was a final word. It was as if the wizards didn’t care about anything besides their pocketbook. They couldn’t see that if the sliver weren’t stepped soon, there could be trouble A paper stuck to Pemmin’s still damp shoe. Pemmin bent down reluctantly, this was really not his day. The paper was another memo about the elf escapee. He had gotten countless identical memos on his desk before, it basically warned about a possibly dangerous elf that had escaped from some dumpy little lab. This was odd; Riptides security was normally top-notch, but you could never tell with those small labs. Pemmin heard the slight scrape of spine on stone, and froze. He very slowly reached for his pocket. Nothing attacked him from behind. His hand closed on a spell-holder, he whirled. There was nothing behind him. Something hit him on the back of the head. Someone giggled.



Pemmin had a headache. No… Pemmin had a body ache. It was much to dark to see where he was. He tried to stand up. The ceiling turned out to be four feet high. Pemmin went to sleep again.

Pemmin woke again, this time he crawled forward. There were bars ahead of him. There was a laugh from the darkness. Pemmin silently prepared a light spell. "How does it feel, big wizard?" said an all too familiar voice. Pemmin groaned. Whatever he had done to deserve the last couple of days, it just didn’t cover revenge-crazed elves. "I see you been tangling with, the slivers," said the elf nastily, "and well, if you’re still alive." Pemmin could hear a shuffling outside his cage. A very sharp object was suddenly thrust very close to his face.

"You will help us, little man. You will help to free the elves from Riptide, or you will die." Pemmin looked at the tool thrust in his face; it looked like an appliance for scraping very tough stains off very high walls. Pemmin had never been one to argue with pointy objects. "Alright then." He said in a slightly high pitched voice. "Come great wizard," said the elf mockingly, "Lets get moving." Pemmin released the light spell. They were in a large airshaft; a slightly disheveled elf grinned at him. He cursed under his breath; he lay in front of a short line of bars, with large amounts of unblocked space on either side.

Lerief groaned and sat up. He was in the council room. A shrouded cephalid face glared at him from across the room. "Lerief Contepri?" Lerief peered at him muzzily. He had no idea what was going on. "Huh.."

"Congratulations! You have been promoted!" Lerief rubbed his eyes. Suddenly it all came back to him, the slivers, the power, Pemmin…the sword. He groaned again.

"You will now take over all duties of your former master."

"What?"

" Meldictus Pemmin? Your former superior? Ring any bells?" said the cephalid impatiently, "He was fired, you get his job." Lerief’s brow furrowed, "But I don’t want to…"

"This is not voluntary, Mr. Contepri!" Lerief was having a hard time with current events, especially considering the past events of the last few hours. "I don’t see why…"

"This meeting is adjourned, Mr. Contepri, good day." Indeed, all the members of the council were standing and leaving. Lerief got shakily to his feet. It was always like this after he used his new power. He stumbled to the door in the back of the room, and pushed it open. Even the cool light of the halls was too much for him right now; he shielded his eyes. This was a bad idea. He was grabbed roughly by the arm and was quickly steered into a room close by. " A face swam into view, it looked annoyed.

‘So, you have Pemmin’s job now, eh?" said councilor Denoctie, "I knew he could do it boy. I knew he could keep us safe." All of this was way too much for Lerief; his brain was about to shut down.

"The question is, boy," said Denoctie fervently, "Are you ready?"

"I-I think." Said Lerief quietly.

"You’d better be boy." Denoctie gave Lerief an appraising look. "I know what you did, down in the sewers," he growled, " and don’t try your mind tricks on me, I’ve left myself some very convincing notes." Lerief sat down heavily on the floor. " Your committee will soon get some anonymous funding soon," he said unrelentingly, "and you personally will handle the sliver situation." Lerief got up slowly once again.

Denoctie grinned, "or you will have to deal with me, boy."