Imaari’s Tale: Part Four
This is the last installment from our first session. We’re going to play again on Friday. Should I continue to share? Crossposted to Ao3.
Imaari drifted. Sometimes, there was only a black, timeless void. At others, she felt swept along in a velvety dream she couldn’t make sense of. Over and over, she had the vague notion of a strange workshop with books and odd devices arrayed on tabletops and desks, always lit by a large window of startlingly bright blue sky and filled with the rising and falling of distant voices.
“Again?” she heard once, quite distinctly. It was a woman, sounding both bewildered and frustrated. “Why does this keep happening?”
Then the voices receded again, enveloped in the inky blackness. Imaari floated.
Footsteps, then, a thud scrape , and the same woman’s voice. “Wake up now,” it said. “It is time to wake.”
After that, Immari’s consciousness began to rise. It was a slow resolution of consciousness, as in a too-dark room after sleeping too heavily. She could feel her body but could not make it move. It felt strangely weighted, as if by a heavy blanket, but rather than feeling warm and comforted she was pressed in on all sides with a damp chill. Imaari’s fingers twitched, and she felt the movement on her shoulders.
Thud scrape, she heard again. It was a little closer this time. Imaari’s eyes slitted open, or she thought they did. There was no change in what she could see: there was nothing but blackness, like before. Was she really waking at all?
Thud, scrape.
Closer again, and accompanied by voices heard as if from underwater. Imaari’s fingers tightened, her head rolling groggily from side to side, and her eyes opened wide as memory and realization washed over her.
She’d felt the shifting of cloth over her skin as she’d moved, damp and clinging but unmistakable, and her arms had been crossed over her chest like a corpse laid to rest.
Thud, scrape.
Because she’d been hung. They’d killed her, wrapped her in a shroud, and buried her in the cold earth. Imaari was dead.
Panic crawled up her throat as her mind struggled to understand. She had died, hadn’t she? But if she were dead, how could she feel the warm puff of her breath against the damp shroud? How could she feel the shifting press of the earth above her?
Thud, scrape.
Had they buried her alive ? Her breath came in short pants as she struggled, mindless with panic.
Thud, scrape. Thud, scrape.
The sound was close enough now that some small part of Imaari’s mind recognized it as the sound of a shovel, thudding into the ground and then scraping as it lifted. Digging her up?
The voices had come closer as well, moving more quickly than the shovel. They were men, Imaari registered dimly. Angry men. “They fucking what ?!” someone said, his voice suddenly very close, until it began to fade again. “What kind of bullshit…”
Thud, scrape, coming now from all around her. Thud, and then an unmistakably pained groan, somewhere to her left.
“I think I found one,” said another man’s voice from the same direction. “Come help me dig him out.”
One of the shovels came closer still, and she felt the earth shift above her. A bit of light began to seep in through the shroud. Something hard grazed her side, drawing a shriek. Having now found her voice, she gave in to sobs as she struggled, squirming as much as the tightly wrapped shroud allowed her to.
“There’s another one here,” she heard directly above her. Another man. There was a soft thud, as if the man had thrown his shovel to the side, and hands began to seek her body amid the loose soil. “Come on,” he said gently. “Let’s get you out of there.” The weight fell away from Imaari’s body, the dim light brightened, and she felt hands lifting her shoulders. “I’ve got you.”
Imaari stilled, no longer fighting, but she continued to weep.
“Another one!” came another shout, from another direction.
“Hold still,” said someone else, a woman this time. “I don’t want to cut you by mistake.”
“What? Cut me?” came the shrill response. This voice sounded vaguely familiar. “What is this? I-I was hung!”
“Please sir,” the woman said. “Please try to be calm.”
“Gods,” came another familiar voice. “We’re in the fuckin’ Paupers Pit.”
“Who is managing this operation? I demand answers!”
Hands pinched the fabric over her face, pulling it away from her skin, and she saw the point of a knife tear through it. When the hole was large enough, the blade disappeared and was replaced with dirty fingers which rent it wider still, opening a window to the cloudless, star-speckled sky above. Imaari gasped in the clear night air, reminding herself that she was alive to feel it, and began to struggle anew once the hole was large enough to free her hands. She shoved the shroud back from her face and wriggled free as quickly as she could. Escaping the shroud wouldn’t erase the memory of this experience, but she wanted to distance herself from every part of it that she could.
“I guess hangin’ didn’t take,” someone observed dryly off to her left, and Imaari recognized Hardwin’s voice easily.
The man who’d cut her free rose and leaned down to offer his hand and she took it gratefully. He frowned at her, though, and when she’d regained her feet, he leaned forward to look at her more closely. The moon was full, but it was the only light available and human eyes were not as good as hers “Aw, shit,” he said, looking dismayed. “A fucking half elf?”
Imaari took another step back, suddenly afraid again. Did he now regret helping her, now that he knew her heritage? They were in a large graveyard, in a large section of freshly turned earth. A mass grave , she thought, shivering. She looked back at the place where she’d lain and saw bits of pale cloth showing through the dirt in several places. She shivered again. She did not want to go back to being a corpse.
The others all turned to look more carefully at the people they’d exhumed, and one of them cursed. “There’s another one here,” he said. Imaari followed the sound to see a huge man jerking his thumb at the figure beside him.
“Yeah, well, fuck you too!” he shot back.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” the man protested, turning. A scar pulled one side of his mouth into a perpetual frown, and disappeared beneath the high folds of his cloak.
“That you, Daetrik?” Hardwin asked. He stood next to his grave and the woman who’d dug him out, pressing his wrappings into a tight ball. He was almost looking in the right direction, but not quite.
“Aye,” Daetrik replied, and Hardwin’s gaze turned accurately towards it.
“What you got?” he asked. “I can’t see shit.”
“Sir, please,” someone interrupted. It was first the woman, her hand set placatingly on Well Dressed’s arm. “If you will just be patient, the Lieutenant--”
“Wait a minute,” cut in one of the voices she’d recognized earlier. Imaari turned, seeking its owner. Skeet still sat amid the ruin of his own shroud, staring. He looked at Well Dressed, but pointed at the woman. “Who the fuck is this?” He looked at her, then around the group. “Who the fuck are you?!”
No one answered. Imaari looked from one person to the next, searching. There were one or two people near each of the ones she’d recognized from that morning (had it only been that morning?), each of them wearing dark cloaks and showing varying degrees of frustration, compassion, apprehension and chagrin. Two more people stood off to the side, arguing heatedly. They were distant enough that she had no idea what it was about; only the occasional curse or exclamation was loud enough to carry. Behind those two, she saw a tall man with dark tattoos stalking through the cemetery with a large package perched on his shoulder.
“This is a travesty,” Well Dressed announced, his pompous voice recalling Imaari’s attention. “Buried not even three feet below the surface!”
“Could have been worse,” Daetrik said. “It could have been six feet below the surface.”
“I’m just glad it wasn’t a cremation,” Skeet said.
Hardwin and Daetrik chuckled darkly, but Well Dressed looked aghast. “Can’t a man get a proper burial?”
“So, you boys military?” Daetrik asked in the following quiet, his tone conversational. “What unit you with?”
A few of them started. “Yeah, a few of us are,” the scarred man confirmed. “Marines. You?”
“Yeah, I served,” Daetrik said. “The uh, the Elven Wars.”
“Oh, shit! Where at?”
“North of Tessington, up by Shinfael Gift.”
“No kidding,” the man said.
“Enough of this bullshit,” Hardwin said at the same time. “Sergeant?” He barked the title, a senior officer addressing a subordinate, and the man at Imaari’s side straightened in surprise. Hardwin’s eyes narrowed on the man, knowing his reaction for the confirmation it was. “Hey man, level with me,” he said cajolingly, changing tack. “What the fuck is going on here, Sarge?”
The Sergeant glanced around at the others, then cleared his throat. “Wait for the lieutenant,” he said, nodding toward the pair who still stood arguing. As if on cue, the taller one held up his hands in the universal sign for stop and began to make his way towards them.
He was about the same height as Hardwin, though not as broad, and carried himself with a definite air of authority. He was probably in his forties, his dark hair threaded with grey and already receding from his brow, with tanned skin and a grim expression. Like the others, he wore a dark, nondescript cloak. It shifted as he moved, giving glimpses of unadorned leather armor.
“You the Lieutenant they told us to wait for?” Daetrik asked when the man stopped in front of them.
“I am,” he confirmed, taking in all of his people with a glance and indicating that they should join him with a nod of his head. They gathered at his back.
Skeet pushed himself up from the ground as they moved, and took a few steps forward. “The fuck is going on here?” he demanded.
The Lieutenant turned to him, frowning, and then paused. “Wait,” he said, his frown deepening to a scowl. “I know you. I fucking know you!” He turned sharply to the man he’d been arguing with, who stood behind him, and pointed at Skeet. “Who is this? Torch. Lantern! Someone, get me a gods-damned light!”
Several people moved, scurrying to obey his orders, and Imaari shielded her eyes instinctively as light flared to life in darkness.
“Who the fuck is this?” the Lieutenant repeated.
The man at his back, surprisingly short and older than the others, shuffled forward to frown at the hard-faced Skeet. “I’m...not sure,” he admitted.
The Lieutenant looked at Skeet. “Who are you?”
Skeet smirked goadingly. “What’s it to you, buddy, eh? I asked you first.” The man’s face darkened, and Skeet snorted. “Listen, guy. I fuckin’ died a while ago, right? And now I’m heah and you dug me up and while I appreciate the helpin’ hand, maybe you could clue me in on what the fuck is going on. Then we can exchange pleasantries.”
Daetrik nodded in agreement. “The man has a point, Lieutenant.”
“Yes!” Well Dressed agreed, nodding emphatically. “We were just poorly executed and poorly buried. What is the meaning of this?”
The Lieutenant hung his head and took a deep breath. “You’re right,“ he sighed, looking up. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Let me start over.” He paused, considering his words. “Arch...needs you.”
Daetrik scoffed. “Arch needs a lot of things.”
“That’s a stupid way to start.”
The Lieutenant ignored Daetrik, but shot a dirty look at the heckler among his own people. “The whole thing is stupid.” he said angrily. “Listen, you have been--” He stopped abruptly, awkwardly, as if struggling for the right words. “You have been chosen to serve as part of a fighting force to help root out Arch’s rivals.”
A beat of silence followed that announcement, and Imaari felt her mouth fall open. Of all the things she might have expected, that had not been one of them.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Hardwin said, incredulity drawing the words out more slowly than usual.
“Was the killing us part of that?” Daetrik asked, almost on top of Hardwin. “Or could we have just skipped that, maybe?”
“You could have asked us without killing us first!” Imaari burst out, her voice shrill.
The people gathered behind the Lieutenant exchanged glances, shifting uncomfortably, and he held up his hands as if to hold back their comments. You’re right. Let me, let me go into this more. You have all been chosen for your skill sets. Er, you would have been chosen for your skill sets, but, I don’t think that you’re the group we were expecting.”
Another pause, and more uncomfortable shuffling.
“I--I don’t understand,” Daetrik said at last.
“Yeah, I--I don’t even know what to say to that.” The two men shared a look, and then Hardwin turned, shaking his head. “Fuck this. I’m leaving.”
“Yeah,” Daetrik agreed. “I did my time.”
Imaari stares after them for a moment, torn, then moves to follow as well. He was still the only one who’d given her any reason to trust him.
“Tell me the people who killed us ah the ones weah goin’ afteh, that it wasn’t you, or I’m goin’ with them.” Skeet said.
“Wait, please!”
Imaari hesitated again, arrested by the genuine pleading in the Lieutenant’s voice, and looked between the people gathered behind her and the men walking away from them.
“Unless you plan on killin’ me again,” Hardwin called over his shoulder, “I am done with this shit.”
“Please,” the Lieutenant said again. “Please, just wait and listen .”
Hardwin and Daetrik shared another look, then turned back to stare at him.
“Thank you.” The Lieutenant sighed heavily. “Look, I--I can’t--tell you--that,” he said haltingly, shifting his attention to Skeet. It took a moment for the man’s meaning to fully penetrate.
Daetrik’s jaw ticked, and Hardwin growled.
“Because you ah the people who killed us?” Skeet asked, his expression turning dangerous. “Is that what yer sayin’?”
“I’m not saying anything--”
“Because if that’s the case, then I think you owe me.” Skeet continued, speaking over the Lieutenant.
“Just, stay calm, please.”
“Answers, now,” Hardwin said flatly. “Or we’re gone.”
“I said, stay calm!” The Lieutenant’s hand twitched towards his short sword, and all of his men put their hands on their own weapons.
“So it’s like that.” Daetrik said quietly.
Imaari’s eyes bounced between them all, trying to take in the rapid-fire words and turn them into something that made sense. Was she still dreaming?
“Please just listen,” the Lieutenant begged. “I know this is insane. If it had been up to us, none of this would have happened, but there is good reason. Arch is under attack--not from Gavel or Lessen or the Stone Bloods, but from within. We had to look, ah, outside the more traditional structures for our team.”
“It must be pretty big,” Well Dressed observed, “if you had to kill us to establish our cover.”
“So did you kill all those other people too?” Skeet asked. “Did you dig them up?”
The Lieutenant hesitated, looking again at the short man at his elbow.
The man sighed. “There was--” he began, then paused in the same awkward manner the Lieutenant had. “There was another team. They were--ah, unrecoverable.” He sighed again. “That is the source of the confusion, I’m afraid. I’m sorry for that.”
“You mean it wasn’t supposed to be us,” Skeet said, stunned.
“Let me get this straight,” Hardwin said. “You were so desperate for a particular group of people that you murdered dozens of us to get them, but fucked it up so badly that you didn’t even get the people you needed?”
Daetrik shook his head bemusedly. “Bloody hell. It sounds like Arch needs more help than just us.”
“No shit!”
Skeet scoffed derisively. “You’re right, bossman, that is stupid.”
“What’s in it for us?” All eyes turned to Well Dressed, whose expression was calculating. He shrugged unapologetically.
“Fucking finally,” the Lieutenant said. “A question I can fucking answer.”
“How about an apology for killing us,” Daetrik suggested. “Might be a good start.”
“Fine. I’m sorry.”
“No, I was wrong. That’s not a good start. Fuck you.”
Chuckles eased a bit of the tension, and even the Lieutenant smiled. “Fair enough. We got off to a bad start, and maybe this is the wrong play, but we do need help excising the rot in Arch and you’re the ones we got. Each of us has been where you are, waking up in the middle of nowhere after the trauma of being murdered for no gods damned reason. Believe me when I say that I am truly sorry.”
“Wait, this happened to you, too?”
The Lieutenant struggled to answer, words sticking in his mouth, and the small man stepped forward once more.
“I think what the Lieutenant is trying to say is that we...understand, because we have all been...a part of this.” Imaari winced at the way his voice grated in her ears. His words were clipped, more halting than before, as though he struggled to force them out. “We all--we have all gone through...this and we are all still dealing with--with this.”
“Strange,” Well Dressed said, considering. ”Perhaps if we ask questions that are less direct?”
All eyes turned his way once more, the Lieutenant’s people all staring in open shock.
“How--” The Lieutenant began, then cut himself off with a shake. “Fuck, we’re talking in circles and we don’t have time for any of this,” he said. “All of you, please, we have to get moving. Come with us, and I promise that I will answer all of your questions on the move.”
“Do we have a choice?” Hardwin asked. The Lieutenant’s expression was eloquent. “Yeah, I didn’t think so.”
Well Dressed shrugged. “It has to be better than staying here.”
“You got our stuff, or are we goin’ in our ball gowns?” Skeet asked, gesturing to his dirty prison jumper.
Some of the tension went out of the Lieutenant at the tacit agreement. “You have their things?” he asked the tall man with the tattoos.
“On the boat,” he said, nodding.
“Boat?” Imaari echoed, looking to Hardwin. He looked resigned.
“Thank the Monarch,” the Lieutenant said. “This way.”
