Death by Cliché (4 page)

here are laws of the universe: Nature abhors a vacuum,
but it abhors an atmosphere more, so check your suit seals.

There are laws of romance: You can ruin the most romantic mood by calling out the name of another woman. You can absolutely shatter it by calling out the name of another man.

There are laws of the land: Bullets fired at a cop will return to you sevenfold.

And there are rules of storytelling: Do not tell, show.

So let’s break that one and save us all the tritest scene in fiction. What I tell you three times is true. Hraldolf was a bad man; Hraldolf was a bad man; Hraldolf was a bad man. Believe me? No? All right, I’ll show you, but you brought this on yourself.

Hraldolf sat in a hall of immense power. Beneath him cowered a throne made of blackened bones. Behind rose a xylophone of glimmering ribs arching off a backbone that would make the most honest chiropractor start shopping for a boat. It culminated in a tail that snaked into the air. The seat was to vertebrates what the Bikini Atoll test was to firecrackers.

Hraldolf rested both elbows on the arm bones of the vanquished, and his hands rested on the skulls of two creatures that would make Roger Corman start sketching like mad. It had fangs to say the least. Smilodon
people
.

Hraldolf didn’t consider the throne. It was an extension of his body. He didn’t consider the room that should have belonged to a galactic overlord. He didn’t consider the priceless paintings on the wall. He didn’t notice the tasteful pillars or the majestic ceiling or the plastic carpet that was brown not because it was a tasteful color, but because eventually blood
dried
.

He certainly didn’t notice the guards. They were thoughtlessly loyal and built like Lou Ferrigno with anger management issues. They wore enough metal to give them even odds in a head-on with a Volvo.

No, he only noticed the two Henchmen.

These two are called the Henchmen for a reason. They aren’t going to be around long enough for you to learn their names.

“Tell me,” Hraldolf said.

“Lord Hraldolf,” Henchman A said. “We’ve searched the world over, but the Artifact is nowhere to be found.”

There are rules of fantasy too. There is
always
an Artifact. Blame Tolkien.

“I need it,” Hraldolf said.

“We know, my lord,” Henchman Two said.

“But we can’t find it,” said Henchman Prime.

Hraldolf heaved a fatherly sigh. The kind of sigh a man releases before he tells one of his twins the boy came with a convenient spare. It’s the kind of sigh a man lets loose right before saying, “It puts the lotion in the basket.” There are sighs that punctuate sentences. This is the kind of sigh that punctuates
people
.

He rose with far more dignity than a man with his name had any right to possess. He moved with the grace of a ballerina. His feet caressed the stairs down from his throne as they crossed one in front of the other, in dainty slippers. Finally they stopped, and Henchman the Junior stared up at stockinged legs that would have made Louis the XVI bitch-slap a nun.

Hraldolf saw fear as the man stared at sagging tights hugging those gymnast’s legs. Slowly the Henchman’s eyes rose.

“Don’t look at me,” Hraldolf said. He smiled.

The beauty of that smile flashed through the Henchman’s eyes, popping them like Lawrence Welk bubbles. The sweet eye juices dribbled down the man’s cheeks even as his smile fixed in a rigor of ecstasy.

Then he fell over dead.

Henchman the Wiser kept his eyes on the ground.

“You may leave, but find the Artifact, or I’ll blow you a kiss,” Hraldolf said.

The henchman withdrew, weeping hysterical thanks.

Hraldolf smiled and strolled back up his dais to his throne, and picked up a delicate feathered mask from the seat. Carefully, he put it on.

“You may look,” he said.

As one, the guards lifted their sealed visors, and their gazes swept the throne room. Then one of them walked forward and hooked the dead body under one arm. Already, it oozed blood from every pore as the guard dragged it down the plastic carpet and out the door at the far end.

Hraldolf sat on his throne and never once wondered about his own motivations. He did what he did, and no one, not even the great Carl above, knew why. He was simply the villain.

Hraldolf stroked the feathers of his mask and studied the paintings around him, admiring art that wasn’t half as exquisite as his own face. Admiring with the vacuous expression of the hollow. Admiring because he couldn’t admire himself. Or rather he could, but a full-faced look in the mirror would be his last.

And that might have been the greatest cliché of all.

Chapter Five

“See, no quote… wait. Dammit!”

—Bob Defendi

amico!”

Damico snapped out of his reverie and faced Arithian, standing in the light of the blazing “C” cups. The room was wide and perfectly square. Damico was willing to bet it reached exactly thirty feet by thirty feet. A single, perfectly proportioned passage led out the other side.

“Damico,” Arithian said again.

“Huh?” Damico said.

There had to be a better explanation for all this, an explanation that didn’t involve him hugging himself in a rubber room for the rest of his life. Or worse, lost in a coma, adrift in a sea of his own mental chemicals.

“Prithee, art thou all right?” Arithian asked.

Damico shook his head. He was insane. Cuckoo. He couldn’t even convince himself this was all some trick. He’d been shot in the head. That kid couldn’t have missed.

“I’m… uh… fine.”

“Your name is Damico?” Lotianna asked.

“Yeah.”

“Funny,” she said.

He still didn’t know why that was funny.

But he knew what wasn’t. If he was still alive, if this
wasn’t
Hell, then he was bleeding to death in the real world. Soon his heart would beat its last. The final ounce of blood would dribble into Carl’s trunk. Soon.

“Are we to push ahead, good my lord?” Arithian asked.

Damico stared at the man, trying to parse those words into meaning. Slowly, his brain caught up. He nodded. What could happen to him in his own dream? Could he die, and if he did, would he die in real life? If he didn’t, did he have to look forward to the life of Prometheus? The endless pain of death over and over every day for the rest of eternity? What horrors did this world hold?

“Come on, Buddy,” Gorthander said, gesturing to the far hall and trudging one hobnailed boot at a time.

Madness.

No, he was right the first time. He had to get out, and since standing here and throwing a temper tantrum wasn’t likely to accomplish that, he’d probably better follow the dwarf.

They walked down the hallway, and Damico tried to keep his eyes peeled. If this
was
Hell, there was probably something extremely nasty at the end. If this was a game, there’d be something worse.

They came to a door like the last, swollen, and obviously all but sealed by grime. Omar reached for the large copper ring, green and scaly with age.

“Wait!” Damico said.

“Huh?” Omar asked.

“You said the door we came through was the only way in or out?” Damico said.

“Aye,” said Arithian.

“Then how come all the doors are all warped like they’ve never been used?”

“So, you’re saying it might be a trap?” Gorthander asked.

“I’m saying this doesn’t seem right.”

“You know how to disarm a trap?” Omar asked.

“Well,” Damico said, “no.”

“I do,” Omar said, and yanked the door open.

There came a gentle whooshing sound, and a speck of fire flew out of the center of the doorway. Damico was vaguely aware of everyone scattering around him as the speck grew closer and closer, a malevolent orange flicker of doom. He didn’t have time to swallow his tongue before the thing hit him in the center of the chest and detonated. Son of a b—

Take a large metal barrel and half a pound of fireworks. Climb inside with the fireworks and seal the thing closed behind you. Then start a match, and, in the echoing depths of the barrel, light the fuse. Do not stick your fingers in your ears. If, just before the fireworks detonate, the barrel gets hit by an eighteen wheeler, you’ll have the right idea of the noise.

Damico did something he couldn’t quite describe with his middle bit to try to dodge the explosion. One moment he stood there, the next he… well, he still stood there, but his clothes were clean and sharp while everyone else in the party picked themselves up and patted out little fires all over their clothing. Damico didn’t understand how he was unharmed.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” the dwarf said.

Damico carefully studied his limbs, checking for damage. He couldn’t find any.

“That was some dodge,” Lotianna said.

Oh. A game mechanic. Abstract. You dodge the fire, but your miniature stays in the same place on the map.

“I think I’ve taken three levels of thief,” Damico said. “Let me examine the doors from now on.”

“Either that or you’re a martial artist,” Gorthander said.

“I wish I’d seen my character sheet before the little prick shot me in the head.”

“Come again?” Gorthander asked. “I didn’t quite make that out.”

“Never mind.” Damico patted his sword. “I’m a little well-armed for a fighting monk.”

Gorthander grunted and gestured toward the open door.

Damico slinked ahead and peeked through the doorway. On the other side, five creatures stood frozen in the room. They had green skin and wore scale armor and furs. Great tusks emerged from their bottom jaws, and they clutched scimitars.

“I’ve always wondered why monsters in these dungeons never seem to move from room to room, helping one another,” Damico said.

“I didn’t catch that,” Lotianna said.

Why didn’t they hear him? He hadn’t spoken softly or slurred.

“Sneak in there,” Gorthander said.

He nodded and placed one foot carefully after the other, hugging the wall, doing everything sneaky people did in movies. He even tiptoed.

As he broke the plane of the doorway, the creatures—they had to be orcs—started moving. They didn’t do anything useful, though. They just sort of moved their arms and torsos aimlessly while standing in place. The Country Orc Jamboree.

Damico glanced back at the doorway, and he couldn’t see the others, but the orcs didn’t even seem to notice the door hung open. He didn’t know how many times he’d seen monsters behave like this in games. It wasn’t any less stupid in real life.

He slipped behind one of them and drew his sword. His body moved effortlessly, familiar with the skills even if he wasn’t. He didn’t think as he glided into place, as he put his longsword point-first into the back of the closest orc, as he grabbed it by the throat, as he
thrust
.

This wasn’t right. This wasn’t real. He wasn’t a cold-blooded killer but a person, a real person, and he wasn’t supposed to feel the slick-hot flow of blood over his hands, down the front of his clothing. He expected to see the point of the sword come out the other side covered in green or black blood, but it came out glistening a perfect, beautiful red. Against the green of the creature’s skin, it looked absurdly festive. Christmas with Mussolini.

As quickly as it started, it was over. The orc kicked once, twice, then went limp on his sword and became a two-hundred pound deadweight. He let it fall, guiding the monster to the ground.

This wasn’t real. It
wasn’t
real.

Omar and Gorthander burst through the door, their weapons high, bellows echoing from their lips. Frick and Frack. Mutt and Jeff. Tweedle-Die and Tweedle-Doom.

Arithian strode in behind them, strumming a mandolin. Bolts of white light flew past his head, blowing the chest out of a second orc. Damico barely had the time to think before he charged, just aware of his own actions, and lopped the head off another one.

The orcs lay in broken heaps on the floor. Damico didn’t know if it was his stomach or if the room really swayed like that, but one of the orc heads rolled back and forth to his queasiness, so he decided to give himself the benefit of the doubt.