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Romance in the Runes

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YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

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Dimka and Ali raced away from the road—the lankier Dimka cutting long, bounding strides, Ali only making up for the times she tripped on her robes with sheer panic.

"The Fletcher's Guild must have flooded the market again!" Al shrieked, clutching her hat's brim to the sides of her head.

"What makes you say that?" Dimka asked, leaning to the side as an arrow whizzed by her head.

"They have way too many of these— shit !" Al ducked as an arrow embedded itself in a tree ten feet off. "By Senntisten, that's mithril!"

She risked a glance back. The Saradominists had exited the mist cloud and were still riding after them, but the horses were clearly having trouble in the woodlands of East Lumbridge. The two archers looked cross. "Okay, I think they're finally remembering their pocketbooks. We might be okay."

"Hey, Al? Al??"

"We should get off the road. Their horses won't—"

" Ali !"

"Hum?" Al turned around. At the same time, she heard a sound like a million wine glasses shattering from the direction of the Saradominists, followed by a feral roar.

A fair ways up ahead, she saw the source of Dimka's concern: Coming up the road were around a half-dozen men in straw hats. Farmers. Heavily-armed farmers with a strong "bloodred" color motif. And they were staring right at Al and Dimka.

Al blinked.

"Oh, it's the Zamorakian Farmer's Co-Op. How quaint."

And she dove behind a tree as their leader raised his crossbow and let the bolt fly.

She heard a solid thunk from the other side of the trunk. An adamant bolt, judging by the sound. "Let's get—" She was cut off by another roar from up north, followed by several distinctly Saradominist screams. "Can someone please shut up the honey badger?"

She raced deeper into the woods after her business partner, swearing loudly as the Zamorakians fired sling bullets and quarrels after her.

"Dimka!" she called. "Would you—"

And it was at that moment that Ali felt a most curious pain in her left buttocks.

22-Jun-2018 10:17:39

YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

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“Aw, Abyssal Tangles, Marim, didja get 'em, uh, right in the troublespot?"

“Naw, the damn wind took it.” Marim was busily re-cranking his crossbow. He glanced up and scowled. "Aw, now where'd those two get off to?"

As the honey badger up north let out another snarl, Marim hurriedly scanned the trees. Was that a glimpse of maroon? A flash of white silk robes?

"Them's lost us in the trees." Nev dropped another bullet into his sling with a grimace. "Could be trouble if we follow 'em in."

"Hm." Marim rubbed his chin. "Well, we ain't lettin' no Zarosian traipse around our forest. An' 'trouble' never stops us from makin' a mess. But... hey, we doesn't gotta go in no trees, does we?"

"Badger's dead," he heard Hugh call.

"Yeah, let 'em gain some distance, get confident." Marim nodded as he came to his decision. "See, way I figure, they'll hafta head back to the road eventually if'n they wanna use the bridge or the gate" He started walking south. "Keep an eye out for gobbins, but don't slow up. Keep everyone in sight. Hugh, can y—"

“Yeah, uh, not t'rush or none, Marim, but, uh...” Hugh gestured up north, as the sounds of hoofbeats within the forest grew rapidly more insistent. Marim caught a flash of silver between the trees. “I, uh, reckon things's about to get excitin' on us.”

22-Jun-2018 21:32:45

YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

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A cacophony of shrieks, screams and steel-on-steel failed to move Dimka's attention from her fallen compatriot, but it did encourage her a little. “Sounds like we're missing some fun,” she whispered, as she dragged Ali into the ditch.

"Mrrf," Al replied, her face dragging against the dirt and grass.

Dimka looked around the woods, her heart pounding. This much noise was bound to attract goblins soon, and after the experience she'd had at the Grand Exchange, she would be thrilled if she never saw another goblin as long as she lived.

The trees around her were young—kept thus by years of woodcutting in the area—and many of them bore the scratchings and bloodstains of recent battles. She could just barely make out the road from her hiding place. Up north, the sounds of battle heightened with another shattering sound. It seemed the Zamorakians' summoner had conjured up another friend.

She looked back down at Al, biting her lip. Her business partner of two weeks wasn't looking good.

"The arrow's stuck right in your ass, Al."

" I know. "

"Yeah." Dimka sucked in a deep breath. "This... this isn't great."

"Some expert nishkalin analysis from the Fremmenik over here." Al's eyes were squeezed tightly shut, her teeth grinding together hard enough to be audible.

"I'm trying to help you, witch," Dimka said sharply, stung. She looked both ways, then climbed out of the trench, scrabbling forward—almost on all fours—towards the road.

She could hear what sounded like a carriage approaching. That better not be more trouble, Dimka thought, ducking behind a cluster of ash trees.

She look a deep breath as the sound grew nearer, then leaned around to spy on the new arrival.

Dimka found herself staring into two dark eyes, sparkling with an expression somewhere between amusement and concern. They belonged to a slightly paunchy Kharidian man sitting at the front of a cart drawn by a mule.

“Ask him if he takes hitchhikers,” she heard Ali mutter.

23-Jun-2018 22:49:58

YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

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“Hitchhike.” The man, whose name, Dimka understood, was Ali the Carter, gave a short whistle. “That's an interesting word. 'Hike' means to lift something, and to 'hitch' means to lift up with a jerk.”

“She's the jerk,” Al and Dimka said at the same time.

There was a pause.

Ali gave a whistle, thumbing up north. "Any idea what's going on up there?"

Dimka glanced up. Just around the bend, the sounds of pitched battle had been joined by an enraged whinnying.

She chewed her bottom lip. "If I had to guess, I'd say someone summoned a unicorn now."

"Really! How magical." Ali's head tilted to the side. "Well, I'd been hoping to stop by the ranch and pick up some cowhides, but life is far too short to get into some sort of whimsical forest battle." He tugged on the reins, and the mule started to turn around. "Should I assume the unicorn is somehow connected to your friend's most ill-placed arrow?"

"He talks fancy," Al muttered from the dirt. "Is he a mod? He has to tell us if he's a mod."

His eyes glinted. "I'm not with law enforcement, I can promise you that. I just pay attention."

Dimka stared at him a long moment, trying to gauge... something. Anything. But the Carter's face was at once perfectly honest and perfectly unreadable, like an expressive mask. All she could get was his surface emotions.

"I don't want to be rude," she said slowly, "but are you going to let us ride with you or not?"

Ali returned her stare. This time, she detected some hesitancy. "Why are they chasing you?"

"It's..." Dimka coughed. "It's a long story. We didn't kill anyone, and we didn't steal anything, and we aren't out to take over the world or summon a demon or anything."

"... Well, now I'm curious." Ali hopped out of the cart and strode over to Al, wrapping his arms around her and hefting her up out of the ditch. "All aboard for Al Kharid!"

“We're heading for Kharid?” Al asked, as she was carried like a sack of potatoes. “Cover me with a blanket. I owe those guards fifty coins.”

24-Jun-2018 23:28:01

YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

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“Well, this was fun!” Marim clapped his hands together with excitement, beaming down at his fellow warriors—most of whom were currently on the ground, and three of whom were almost definitely dead. He himself was seated in a low-hanging tree branch, an arrow stuck in his gut.

The Saradominists were little better off. Their leader, a tall, gaunt fellow wearing the shining white of a Falador knight, was currently lying in the midst of a large rosebush. His struggles to remove his helmet had stopped for now, owing to the adamant crossbow bolt embedded in his shoulder. Two of their horses had been killed by the honey badger, and the rest had run off—one with a very panicked rider in tow. Too bad. Marim knew Nev had needed a new drafthorse.

The unicorn grazed nearby, beside the bodies of two fallen servants of the God of Light.

"I hate you all," said the rosebush knight, his voice muffled by the helmet. "All of you. You are all filth."

Marim gave a low sigh. "We had it handled 'til y'all crashed in."

"We were handling it . We would have happily ignored your little operation here."

"Well, why din't y'all say somethin'?

" You dropped a honey badger on us! "

"Aw, that there's just Handy Hugh's way of sayin' hello, ain't that right, Hugh?"

Hugh lay flat on their back nearby, underneath one of the aforementioned dead horses. "In hindsight," they mumbled, "maybe should've let alone."

"You too, Hugh?"

"Zarosian mightn't've got away if we had."

"Well, there's an informed opinion," Marim snapped. "Woulda-coulda-shoulda, anyway. We oughta work together now. Live and learn."

There came a crash, and Marim glanced over to see the knight finally extracting himself from the roses.

“First, we heal,” the Saradominist growled as he advanced. Marim chewed his inner cheek as calloused fingers wrapped around the arrow in his gut. “Then...” With a yank, the knight wrested the arrow out of Marim. Marim fell into the bushes with a yelp. “... Then we hunt.”

25-Jun-2018 21:40:56

YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

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A reminder that this is a love story, and that the communist goblins are coming. They're on their way. They're going to be amazing. Thank you for bearing with us in this trying time.

25-Jun-2018 21:43:31 - Last edited on 25-Jun-2018 21:43:49 by YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

Posts: 2,888 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
“You really need to let me heal you, Al.”

“I don't trust you around my ass.”

Dimka pursed her lips. It had been a long day's ride, and Al had been in sour spirits the whole time. Over the last few weeks Dimka had known her, that was about par for the course, but Dimka couldn't very well blame her in this case. They still had not addressed the arrow in the, ah, left tender, and that was liable to make a sour apple out of anyone.

Now, they were camped out in the northernmost stretched of the Kharidian desert—a temperate region, supposedly, but still far too hot by Dimka's standards. At least it was getting cooler now that the sun had set.

She sat on the edge of the cart, watching the lump of blankets stir slightly. "Is there anything to eat yet?" demanded the lump.

"Not yet," Ali called, blowing on the hot coals of his little smokeless campfire. He appeared to be warming up something meaty. "The wind keeps eating up the fire. It will be a while."

"Emptiness consume it, this is a nightmare ." Al let out a miserable groan. Dimka bit her lip. "I just wanted to sell some nature runes. What did I do to deserve this? I bargain with the Runerunner's Union, I pay my taxes, I say my prayers every night."

"That last one is a problem," Dimka said softly, leaning against the side of the cart. "But I don't hold any of this against you, for what it's worth."

"What? Oh, yeah, sure." Al half-rolled over to make eye contact with Dimka. Her eyes were bleary and red-rimmed, and Dimka decided to chivalrously pretend she hadn't noticed Al crying out of sheer pain. In the three weeks she'd known Ali the Witch, the one thing Dimka was sure of was that she did not handle empathy well. "Hey, you think the Duel Arena would buy our runes? They haven't heard about the G.E. stuff yet. Plus, they're Menaphites. Zaros only kinda screwed with them."

"Maybe."

"Hmph. Worth a shot." Al looked up. "Food ready yet?"

"More or less." The Carter straightened. "Who likes kebabs?"

29-Jun-2018 21:39:15

YuBiusk Ink

YuBiusk Ink

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~ ~ INTERMISSION I ~ ~

The Grand Exchange was in flames.

The Varrock city guards had long since given up on getting inside. The southern entrance was solidly blocked by burning barricades. Each time the fires seemed to be ebbing, the goblins would come by with more swamp tar and yew logs to pile on. In hindsight, perhaps it had been a mistake to store quite so much flammable material in the trade capital of the world.

They'd tried the eastern entrance, through the castle, but the goblins had erected some sort of bizarre metal monstrosity—a welded abomination vaguely resembling a child's drawing of a dragon. A label, painted in blood, marked the creature as "KING ROLL". The guards were fairly sure it was a metaphor for something. Regardless, it was razor-sharp and completely took up the entrance, and climbing over it made one vulnerable to dozens of sharp little goblin arrows.

The guards knew their lives were cheap, but not even they were willing to brave that.

There was a tunnel entrance to the northwest, but as yet, only one guard was agile enough to squirm through. The only other alternative was bringing out the cannons, trying to scale the walls, and declaring a full-on siege. So far, nobody wanted to be the one to tell the clerks that.

The goblins had taken over the Grand Exchange, and nobody had any idea what they wanted with it. But one thing was known for certain:

It was all most definitely the fault of two runecrafting wizards.

30-Jun-2018 22:19:51 - Last edited on 01-Jul-2018 03:25:47 by YuBiusk Ink

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