The Rifleman - Bk1 - Ch.17 (Patreon)

Chapter 17

Wavering

Wesley didn’t even try and say anything, just leaving it to Pris. 

Mace had seemed to be a really friendly guy up until they entered the dungeon, but since the moment he stepped aside in the first encounter and threw Wes in the deep end, it had seemed like the man’s entire personality had switched.

To make matters worse, Wes had no idea why it had happened. He went over everything that had happened in those few minutes, and honestly? 

Nothing had happened. Wes hadn’t even spoken to Mace since the tunnel, where everything had seemed fine.

Pris had just finished explaining what happened when they separated, so he thought it would be a good time to mention his missing arm.

“Pru, can you help me here?” Wesley asked and waggled his stump in her direction.

“Sure, Wes,” Pru immediately started to walk over to him, only for Mace to tell her to stop.

“No, wait,” Mace barked, putting out a paw to stop her. “We might need it in the next challenge. After that, we will get to a rest zone and can stop until tomorrow. Then you can heal him.”

Pru looked at Mace with visible shock, her eyebrows almost touching her hairline.

“Seriously?” Pris asked.

“The decision is made,” Mace said, turning away and walking over to the lockbox to loot it.

“What the fuck, Mace?” Wesley yelled.

Mace ignored him completely, looting the item, whatever it was, and handing it to Pru, who shrugged apologetically. 

Alber wasn’t meeting his eyes, and as for Pris, she was nearly vibrating with rage. 

“Did I do something?” Wesley whispered to her.

“No!” Pris hissed back. “I’ve never seen him act like this before. Just stay by me in the next encounter; let Mace and the others do all the work.” She patted his arm. “After that, I promise you will get your arm back.” 

“How rare is the skill to regrow arms?” Wesley asked.

“Very common in healers,” Pris said. “Why?”

“No offense to you or the others,” Wesley looked up at Mace, “But if we get an exit portal, I’m taking it. Mace is risking my life here.”

“… I understand, but please, I will get you that arm back,” Pris said earnestly. “You gave it to save me; I can’t believe he’s even doing this.”

Wesley nodded and sat down to wait.

A little under nineteen minutes later, Wesley stepped through the portal to the next encounter with Were-wisp active. Doing anything else just seemed like asking for trouble. So far, they had not been attacked in the first few minutes, but there was a first time for everything. 

Speaking of a first-time for everything, Wesley was carrying his bayonet in his right hand and his axe in the left. The last fifteen minutes of rest had been spent with Wesley thinking as quickly as possible to come up with a plan.

To put it simply, he no longer trusted his party to keep him safe. He could probably trust Pris, but while Alber looked uncomfortable with things, neither he nor Pru had spoken up for Wes. As for Mace? If even Pris, who had been with him longest, had no idea why the bear-man had taken a dislike to him then Wesley sure as hell wasn’t going to figure it out. 

Whatever it was, Mace was not willing to waste a skill charge on him, so the big bastard obviously considered Wesley expendable.

In short, he had to come up with a way to protect himself in the next encounter. A little experimentation with some of the dense travel rations had shown his axe and knife were still at least able to cut things in wisp form, so Wesley would be doing the next encounter as a melee fighter.

If he had to fight, that was. 

It went against his nature, but if Wesley could, he would let the others do the work this time. He simply couldn’t afford to risk his own life here.

Not anymore.

The encounter seemed to take place in an arena. The place had clearly seen better days, with something like an earthquake having torn it to pieces. Giant cracks ran through the dull stone seating, and the gate on the far side was twisted and destroyed, lying on the ground next to the tunnel it used to close.

Mace growled orders to the others as Wesley hung back with Pris, as she had suggested.

Wesley could feel his tension as he gripped the axe and bayonet, waiting to see what they would face here.

The first enemies came shuffling out of the far tunnel, and he felt a wide grin spread across his face.

Zombified gladiators emerged, their weapons dragging at the end of their rotted arms. All eyes turned to him.

“Yeah, yeah,” Wesley said with a laugh. “This one’s on me.”

He shot across the cracked and broken ground, body glowing with Emergency Flare the moment he was well out of range of Pris. The fight barely counted as one, his weapons glowing with the same energy as the rest of him, eliciting explosive results as he struck. It took less than fifteen seconds to completely decimate them. 

He rushed back across the ground, briefly dropping his wisp form to release the spell before returning to the group. He had considered waiting for the next group to emerge—he only had so many healing charges, after all—but at the end of the day, there was no guarantee that the next group would be as easy, and he wasn’t taking the risk at the moment. 

It was a wise decision, as the next group to emerge was a pair of massive lizards, hissing and releasing blasts of fire as they charged. 

Mace was a hell of a fighter, keeping both beasts busy as he kited them slowly around the arena. Pris had called her minions, so Wes got another chance to see his ghostly copy firing again.

He had tried to assist, despite his previous decision to leave it to the others, but his attacks were too weak to do anything other than distract the creatures, so he fell back. As they moved around the arena, Wesley noted a bit of fallen masonry that might be a decent firing spot; it even had a handy lip to rest his rifle on.

He slipped behind it, letting the others open the distance between him and the lizards before changing back and using the rubble to rest his rifle on. 

A moment later, he took a shot.

The bullet hit close to where he aimed, but it was nothing like as accurate as he normally was. Still, Wes adapted, only shooting when no one could be injured if he missed. It was slow, but the damage from his M1 was significant, especially when he aimed for the short, stubby legs. 

The moment the last one fell, Wesley cast Were-wisp again and moved back to the group.

And so it went on for hours. Wave after wave came, and Wes did what he could to help. Most of the waves were living, so his wisp form was almost useless against them, but he did get to use his shooting spot twice more when the enemies were big and slow. Only a single other undead wave appeared, and he was more than happy to work out some of his tension on them.

He noticed something curious when he changed back from wisp form to drop the Healing Flare energy the second time. 

His stump looked a little longer.

As he had time and was often well apart from the rest, Wesley began to cast Healing Flare through his wisp form and hold it as long as possible before dropping it. Each time, his arm got a little longer.

A massive creature that appeared in the fifth hour of fighting proved utterly immune to his attacks, seeming to absorb and heal from any kinetic force applied to it. It gave him some time, so he retreated to his firing spot and activated wisp form again and Healing Flare with two charges before trying to mentally will the energy to gather in his left arm. The glow there did seem brighter, but that was it. Still, he held it as long as he could, watching to ensure that Pris didn’t stray close enough to be caught in the glow. 

At that point, his arm had regrown all the way past the elbow, so he was keen to see how well it would work. The creature took several more minutes for the party to finish off, and in that time, he managed to heal his arm all the way to the wrist.

When the creature fell, Wesley didn’t move to join the others. Concentrating hard, he used a third charge of Emergency Heal and focused on just his hand.

Five minutes later, he smiled as he dropped the wisp form and saw the fading skill leave behind a completely healed arm.

Wesley moved back to the others, arriving just as what appeared to be a boss wave spawned. Two large undead lizards stood on either side of a massive boar-like animal. Three sets of tusks emerged from the head while a bony ridge protected the skull itself. A dark grey hide that looked as thick as a concrete bunker was stretched over a frame with bulging muscles. The large black hooves cracked the ground underneath as it shifted from side to side.

There was no time to strategize; it simply squealed and charged. 

Wesley checked the charges on his Emergency Heal, finding an extra charge had come off cooldown while he was healing. That gave him two shots to use, so he used one straight away. The first undead lizard hissed and shook its head for a second after the bullet took out one eye before the side of the head blew out and it dropped. 

The other lizard was still up, but there was no way he was using the last Emergency Heal charge, not with no real expectation of healing from Pru. he wouldn’t put it past Mace to refuse him healing.

Instead, he engaged the undead with sizzling bullets loaded with Improved Flare, it was less effective, taking five shots to the head before it fell and started to burn, but it was the safest option.

Being stuck in wisp form for so long had a silver lining: Reload was fully recharged. He made liberal use of the bullets, targeting the left front leg of the boar to slow it down. The longer it could run, the faster it moved, and he didn’t like the implications of that. Mace had been able to contain it so far, but all it needed was one slip…

And there it was. 

The boss dodged Mace and charged across the arena, catching Purity off guard. She leaped aside but took a glancing blow that sent her spinning before Alber was hit with a blow from a tusk. To his credit, Mace acted quickly to get it back under control. 

Wesley knew he had two charges of his heal available now and two injured party members, but he was hesitant to take the risk…

Wesley moved, going first to Alber and pushing an Emergency Heal into the rogue. The tusk had gored his leg, but it was easily fixed, the healing energy stopping the blood flow immediately. Still, he bandaged it as best he could before dashing over to the dazed Pru. She seemed to have taken a decent crack to the side of the head, her eyes glazed over and blood slipping from one ear.

Wesley really didn’t want to use his last charge of healing, but from what little he could remember, head injuries were bad. He grumbled but used the last Emergency Heal on Pru.

Some things you just didn’t take a chance on.

Her eyes began to clear immediately, widening a moment later as she saw him leaning over her.

“You okay?” Wes asked, and she nodded.

He turned back to the fight, seeing that the others had things well in hand. Mace and Pris's ghostly summons had the boar pinned against a wall, hammering at it relentlessly. Alber was on his way back into the fight, the red mist of healing from Pru beginning to flow into him as he sped up.

The boss died a few minutes later. It had been a tough bastard, but the party was strong and well-organized. 

To Wesley’s surprise, the arena didn’t fade when the boss died. Instead, a portal arch rose in the center of the arena. Mace and the others filed through, Wesley bringing up the rear.

///////////////

He was pleasantly surprised to exit the portal into what looked like a decent room. The room was shaped like a hexagon with carved alcoves lined with what appeared to be furs. To Wesley, who hadn’t seen a real bed since coming to this world, it looked like heaven. The far wall boasted a roaring fire, and he could see a large fountain against one side spouting clean water.  

Several tables were set up here and there, some even with tools on them. 

“Right,” Mace said loudly. “Well done, everyone. That is one floor cleared, and we get twelve hours to rest before we need to move on. I suggest we get some rest, but first, I want to go over the fights and see what we can learn from them.”

That got a round of groans from the exhausted group. “Pru, you can use that charge on Lancaster now we are clear of danger.”

“Keep it,” Wesley said blandly. “I figured out how to do it myself.” He waved his regenerated arm to illustrate the point. “I guess the wisp Totem is even better than I thought.”

Mace stared at him for a long moment. “You knew you could do that, didn’t you?”

“No,” Wesley said, turning away. “I discovered it by accident during the fight.”

“I don’t believe you,” Mace said hotly. “You tried to get us to waste a–”

“Fuck off,” Wesley said, walking over and throwing his stuff on a bed. “I’m done.”

“You’re done, are you?” Mace growled. “I doubt that!”

“Done with trying to prove myself, done with justifying myself, done with whatever the fuck this is,” Wesley said through gritted teeth. “You could have gotten me killed today. More than once.” With that, he slid onto the soft furs and left them to it. 

The party talked for a while, and he noted that all of them, apart from Mace, mentioned where he had done well, but none of it mattered at this point. As far as Wesley was concerned, he was on his own from now on.

So, after some thought, he decided not to sleep around this group again. He wasn’t sure they wouldn’t attack him, not anymore. It was still something he considered unlikely, but it was no longer a risk he was willing to take.

He was still thinking that when he fell asleep a few minutes later.

The sound of voices slowly pulled him out of sleep. The party was talking again, their voices low and obviously intended not to wake him. Wesley decided to keep the illusion of sleep going and just listen.

“...leave at the first exit portal we see,” Pris was saying. “I’m not going to let him leave with no reward at all, so you need to tell us what is going on.”

“She’s not wrong,” Alber said, sounding reluctant. “This is not like you, Mace.”

“Can’t any of you see it?” Mace sounded irritated. “We spend so long looking for someone, and then, suddenly, someone comes along and trusts us right off the bat?”

“Finally,” Pru’s voice still sounded tired. “I was getting sick of being treated like a pariah.”

“That’s the problem,” Mace almost growled. “Why now? Why the sudden trust?”

“You’ve lost me,” Pris said angrily. “That is a bad thing?”

“Think, will you!” Mace hissed. “He’s a spy or something from the Guild.”

Silence.

“What?” Alber finally asked, sounding as confused as Wesley felt.

“I bet he was sent to make us trust him and then report back on us or set us up so they could throw us out!” Mace said urgently. “It’s the only explanation for why he chose to trust us.”

Enough of this.

“No, it’s not,” Wesley said as he sat up and looked over at the group clustered around one of the tables. He shifted himself until he was sitting on the edge of the alcove and sighed. “The other explanation is that I was taken from my world, from everything I knew, and dumped in a world I don’t understand.” He raised his hand to stop Pris when she was about to interrupt. “I met good people and not-so-great people, but mostly, mostly, I was alone.” He looked away. “Two weeks might not seem like a long time to be alone, but it was a busy two weeks. The first time I was ever anywhere safe, the Unnamed City, I was pushed out again before I even got a chance to rest.” He smiled sadly. “I saw you lot, all close and friendly with each other. It looked nice, so I decided to take a risk. To trust, just in case I could feel safe again for the first time in weeks.” He looked straight at Mace, who seemed to have trouble holding his eyes at first. “What would I gain by being some kind of spy? Can’t the guild just throw you out if they want?”

“Yes,” Pru said sharply, “They can.”

“So what do they gain by sending a spy?” Wesley asked, honestly curious. “What could they get out of me being what you think I am?”

Mace didn’t seem to have an answer to that.

Wesley left the group to their discussion, wandering over to the other tables and looking through the various tools and items. He was guessing they were for repairing and mending items, but he honestly had no idea how to use any of them. What he did find was a set of screens and what looked like a copper bath under one of the tables. It wasn’t huge, but the idea of a bath was too attractive to give up on easily. 

The empty copper tub was light, so he dragged it and the screens over to the fountain. It fit nicely over the pool at the bottom and the steam of water began to fill the tub. Leaving it to fill, Wesley wandered around until he found something to use as a scrubbing brush and erected the screens after pulling the tub away from the stream of water. He sloshed a bit, but nothing too bad. 

A set of Improved Flares into the tub had it steaming, and Wesley felt like he was melting as he slid into the warm water. He put aside everything else and just enjoyed the warmth as he scrubbed himself properly clean for the first time in weeks. The state of the water rapidly worsened, and by the time he was done, it was simply gross. Nevertheless, he found a drain to empty it down and set it to refill. 

Not wanting to wander about naked, Wesley put on the leather armor he had been given and the linen underclothes that went with them. All in all, he looked okay. Going up a couple of Tiers had transformed his body. Not that he had been too bad before, but now… now he looked like a pro athlete, and pretty much anything looked good on an athlete. 

That being said, he got the refilled tub, heated the water again until it steamed, and scrubbed his clothes until they were clean. The simple tasks really helped to settle his mind, and strangely enough, so did knowing the reason behind Mace’s sudden change of heart. 

He was alone again, sure, but he knew how to do that now. 

In that spirit, he set about getting his uniform dry by setting up a makeshift rack in front of the fire made of bits and pieces and laying his clothes out to dry. 

Next, he searched amongst the tools and stuff until he found a needle and some thread. It wasn’t exactly a close match, but it would do to fix the worst of the tears in his gear. 

The Wyrd Watchmen were still busy whispering, but he merely tuned them out. At some point, Pru broke away and somewhat awkwardly asked him to heat the tub for her, which he didn’t mind doing. Sure, he wasn’t going to be hanging around any longer than he had to, but there was no need to be a sulky dick about it. They would have to work together, at least a little, in the challenges after all.

Some of the tears in his clothes were a bit larger than he expected, so he searched through all those cloth scraps he had gotten in the undead dungeon and got to work patching each piece of clothing once it was dry. 

A very pleasant surprise was seeing each repair fade away, leaving an unblemished uniform behind. It certainly gave him a new appreciation of those cloth scraps he had gotten. At this rate, he could keep the uniform around indefinitely. 

He quickly changed back into his uniform, keeping the leather bracers and shin pads on. After a hesitation or two, he decided it was time to eat. 

Washed, in clean clothes, and chewing on the toothpaste herbs, Wesley Lancaster felt a lot more himself. 

As such, he got to work on cooking some food in a large pot he found next to the fire. He considered cooking just for himself, but even travel rations would go off eventually. Wes had been given more than he could possibly use, so he made a quick casserole for everyone. 

When it was ready, he served the casserole into four bowls that had been in the pot and mutely passed them to the others before taking his own over to his bunk and pulling out something he should really have looked at earlier, not that he had a chance. 

The orientation pamphlet and welcome pack.