A guide to bas

Eleven letters, all I had translated. That's all.

It had been a few days since I had given Canary my ultimatum.

-----

Boss stood in front of my group, which sadly included me. "Right. Combat training." She stated, her magic sword which we still hadn't figured out what actually did as a result of it being magic cast aside to be replaced with a dull sword.

I looked over at Canary. "You do have a few healing spells, right?" I had a really bad feeling about this.

The Scourge, like many other things about the world I have since lived in, confused me greatly. It looked like someone had lifted a chinese junk ship straight out of Earth and put it into this world and gave it a bad case of rust and overmetalplatitus. And then, after I had apparently gone psycho and ate souls, the front half had been converted into iron instead of wood. It was mostly black as well, with a hastily scratched out name in the side. Catastrophe had been all too happy to maim the ship to scrawl out The Scourge.

Oh yeah, and then someone attached a balloon to it. There were three cannon hole things, you know, where the cannons poke out? I'm not a ship builder, don't ask me. We had cannons for those holes, though the existence of cannons confused me as it would imply that there was gunpowder, but there were no guns...

Right...

Well, besides the one on that cow. Why were there cannons without guns?

"IVAN! Stop getting introspective." Boss growled, cross the gap and hitting me with the broad side of the sword. The impact, as you can imagine tore me from the thoughts of other weapons beside the one in her paws.

I stared at her and nodded. "Fine."

"Canary! Ivan. You both are not front line fighters." Which kinda stung, I mean, what guy hasn't dreamed of being in the thick of combat waving some sort of massive sword through the air and through other people while his companions showered beneficial spells and arrow rains behind him?

Canary nodded beside me. "And what are we?"

"You are both to hang back and let us do the real fighting while you take care of anybody that may be trying to sneak up on us." Boss looked at me and kicked the thin knife I had almost killed myself with earlier across the flat deck of the boat. The hilt caught on a ragged plank and spun into the air and I caught it smoothly.

Wait a second... I'm not that coordinated... What... Oh yeah. I'm in an adventure world novel. Characters learn fighting quickly.

Boss walked over to the pile of weapons and grabbed another sword, doubling her effective swordliness. Seriously, I'm not a fighter, don't ask me what you call it.

"Can anyone tell me why most beings would laugh at someone who uses two swords?"

Catastrophe smiled smugly. "You have no defense." I didn't look at her, knowing that I wouldn't be able to look away easily. I held the knife in my mouth as secure as I could manage, looking at Boss.

The dog nodded in a satisfied manner, her tan fur almost shining in the sun. Her prosthetic twitched around one of the blades, making me think that it was not quite as secure. Which reminded me, I needed a bath. Where did she get her sparkling fur from? "Exactly. I have two swords, neither of which can be used to block unless I use both at once. How does someone with a shield compare with someone with a blade?"

I answered, though I had to speak around a blade. "Someone with a shield can block and strike?" It made an odd sort of sense.

She frowned. "It's like that, but not really. A shield is primarily used for defense."

Obvious statement is obvious, I guess. I've never really tried to cut someone with a shield before...

"And it weighs you down. A good shield weighs quite a bit more than a good sword." She hit the blades together and made them ring out. Catastrophe visibly winced at the sound. "These are not good blades."

"Weapons of choice?" Boss called out again after the griffon had stopped glaring.

"Knife." I stated lightly, then narrowed my eyes at the weapon in my mouth. Seriously, I wanted hands or talons. Holding something you wanted to fight with in your mouth was a horrible idea.

"Staff." Canary stated and I just realized he didn't actually have a weapon. Dang.

A few words from the book I had read on zebra magic floated through my head. General foci can come in a variety of forms... staffs of wood may make for good healing...

Foci.

I nodded as something seemed to click in my head. Like, audibly. I'm pretty sure that the world was trying to fuck with me but I didn't care.

I closed my eyes and felt for the magic around me. It's one of those things that is infinitely easier to do than it is to explain, you understand. I felt like I was projecting pieces of myself outside of me and then waiting for the response. I suppose it was a bit like a ping system. I simply pinged the air and waited for a response.

I felt through my pouch with my eyes closed and my mouth well away from it. I pinged my pouch with magic, and felt one of the little balls of prepared fireball react.

I smiled lightly with my eyes still closed and set the fireball off. I shot it off the ship and then tried to see exactly what happened.

I replayed it in my head until it became blurry, trying to understand exactly what caused it to happen.

"Oh great, he's doing one of those things again." Boss's voice echoed from afar.

The world twisted with the magic... like a weave...

The energies of the world twisted to form a pattern and the world reacted to the deliberate manipulations of the energy to change the nature of reality to force something to happen.

Magic was energy designed to alter the world.

And...

Something hit me aside the head again, sending the blade in my mouth tumbling out and myself landing on my side. I shot my eyes open to find myself face to face with Boss. "Look. Pay attention in a fight." She rolled her eyes.

I forced myself to my feet, my borderline break through slipping away from me with a frustrated grunt. "Yes." I lifted the knife with magic over to me, and bit down on the hilt. I held my eye contact with the dog.

"So, someone is coming towards you. What is your job?"

I hadn't been paying attention. "I don't know."

Her right blade smacked against the side of my face and I felt a welt start to raise up. I glared at her.

"You dodge." She said simply and I jumped back from her left sword flashing out. "You keep dodging until you get an opportunity to stop me."

She lunged at me and I realized with a bit of a shiver that the blades were definitely still sharp enough to cut through my skin.

Which, admittedly, would explain why I had a non dulled knife.

I ducked away from her sword swings and tried to get my mind to help me out. Her sword flashed to the right and my magic swarmed out of me in a wave.

"Guardian." Saying it was almost involuntary.

The yellow bubble did what it had so many times before and deflected her strike for the few seconds I pumped magic into the spell.

And then when it faded she was back to trying to kill me. "Come on Ivan. All you have to do it keep me away long enough for someone to save you, right?" I could barely see, from the corners of my eyes because I was not going to look away from Boss, the rest of the creatures aboard the ship watching us.

And then her swords flashed out and I didn't parry, jumping back from her. And then it occurred to me that I was on a bloody airship and maybe jumping backwards was not a good idea.

"Got it." I mumbled around the blade, dashing away from her on a reflex. Not that I really had combat reflexes, but whatever. The point was that I would be safer away from her.

And then she dove across the half of the ship I had just put between us and swiped at me with her sword.

My body felt unexpectedly lighter and I suddenly felt bare. I leaped away from her and tried to ignore the smile on her face.

And then she rushed at me again and I fumbled, dropping the blade from my mouth as one of my legs smashed into the chest I had kept the slaver flag in.

"Shit!" I swore.

Boss kept right at it, and I fell on my back. The rough rust scraped against me in an unpleasant way.

"Guardian!" I shouted and the barrier popped up just like I had expected.

And then Boss stopped dead cold and looked at me. "I just... cut off your satchel..."

I was still pumping magic into the spell and it was far more draining than normal, slowly sucking what energy I have. I dropped it and looked to my side. "What." My satchel was gone from my side, sure enough.

We both stared at each other for a long time, not sure what had just happened. She spoke first. "Do that again."

I forced my magic out into the spell. Surprisingly, I felt the spell catch without the topaz it required. "Uh..." I blinked at it and dropped it.

Canary slowly walked over to my side. "I think Ivan might need to focus on magic. If he can cast spells without foci..." He flashed me a light smile and I tried to smile back. All I could really think of was how he had doubted me.

Boss looked at him. "So... I get to have you two practice magic while the griffon and I spar?" She shrugged. "Fine. Might actually make him worth something in a fight."

The insult stung cold at me and I brushed it off without a word, knowing it to be essentially true. I needed to get stronger. I walked over to my dropped knife and my cut pouch and frowned at the pouch, pulling out a feather and slowly tying the leather straps back together with a simple knot.

The knife slid into the pouch just barely. I smiled and then frowned sadly, missing Disconsolate for the first time in a long while. Having a knife that stuck to you was pretty ok.

I shook my head and put the satchel on, looking around.

Boss sighed. "Hey. It's time we went back to Oblivion." My body sang out a solo of pain and bruises from where Boss had smacked me and when I had been stupid enough to stub my leg.

"Aye Captain." I mumbled. I had pretty much given up being the authority on the ship, Boss, towering over both me and Canary seemed to cut a far more confident form.

That, and she really looked like she could beat you to a pulp without feeling bad about it.

I still looked pretty adorable.

----

A guide to basic met

"If this turns out to just be a guide book I will start screaming." The magic code on the book had changed again to a complex formula involving exponents and a simple cipher.

"Damn it." At least there weren't any proofs involved.

I looked around the room and tried to put my mind off of what we might find back in Oblivion.

----

Catastrophe's back half was far darker in color. Her dye was fading out and to be honest, black was totally her color. That previous Tawny brown, while accentuating the muscles when they contorted and spasmed didn't do quite as much as the mystery that the darker color seemed to invite.

I really should stop staring at her, I'm going to end up getting meta on her description. The point was that I realized quite well that she didn't actually like me in the manner that I wanted her to and that she was only teasing me because she didn't really want to crush my heart in her talons just quite yet.

Or maybe I was overthinking things again.

All magic training really consisted of was me forming a barrier and having someone whack at it until I either collapsed or they got ten good swings on it. And if I collapsed I got whacked with a stick until I woke up, so I was pretty banged up.

"What's black and white and blue all over?" I giggled to myself, loopy from the pain. "Me!" I snapped out of it when Canary hit me in the face with a ball of water. Which was an issue.

The real reason we were going back to Oblivion was to undo whatever the hell I had done to the airship. The balloon we had wasn't made for steam and it was showing with a slight leak every so often that Catastrophe was ever so unhappy to repair.

I don't blame her, getting hit in the face with jets of hot steam doesn't really sound that pleasant.

Actually, it does. Taking a bath on the ship was a bit harder than you would imagine, as most of the water went to the massive boiler in the heart of the ship that I had apparently constructed while I was sleeping.

Cold baths it was, just in case you were wondering.

I hate cold baths.

----

Oblivion appeared before us after barely an hour of being in the sky, The Scourge causing several to cheer wildly and more than a few to complain and exchange money with a few others.

One more thing about Oblivion that I should make clear.

In the port of Oblivion there is a very simple rule that most follow.

Don't attack the doctors.

It seems like a simple thing until you really think about it. Being a doctor in almost any place is a fairly high paying job. Add to it the amount of rumbles and brawls and random injuries that the scum in the wastes got into, and you get a very reliable well paying job.

A pretty perfect target for an opportunistic criminal. All a being would have to do in walk inside and hold him up at knife point until they game the criminal what he wanted.

Until the doctor didn't have enough and the doctor dies.

Which is bad, because suddenly you have quite a few injuries that need medical attention and guess what? There isn't a doctor.

Of course, the criminal is crucified for being stupid enough to kill of inconvenience the doctor, in some cases quite literally, and then there is a void that another doctor fills.

Of course, the doctor's would soon be pulled into the criminal underworld for yet another layer of protection. Just a few bits or whatever currency the doctor felt like paying and a few burly, well trained guards would be placed around his building.

Oh, and if you upset a doctor?

That's bad.

Yeah...

The ship swung around the port with Catastrophe driving, because obviously nobody else could really drive it and learning would require a bit more effort than most of us felt like putting our bodies through, especially after something as agonizing as magic or fighting practice.

We climbed down ladder to the docking station, the rugged ships and the rugged buildings looking pretty well considering that a giant monster blob tar thing had attacked. I mean, you could barely tell that there were any buildings smashed and we had only really been gone a week or so! Geez, did they have anime building teams or something?

Suddenly, my thoughts tasted like lemons and I hastily shoved the memory of the attack out of my mind.

I didn't need to deal with my mind breaking any further.

Catastrophe winced at the sight of the town, probably suffering from the same thing I was. Of course, her thoughts probably tasted of limes and I still didn't really know why she was ok with me secretly being from another dimension/universe or something, but for the sake of the narrative I decided to keep my suspension of belief up.

I followed back that last train of thought and felt like vomiting at the illogic applied.

Besides, I didn't want to upset the one thing that really convinced me that the universe didn't completely hate me. Seriously, just trying to think about what sh-

Shut up...

Getting back to the situation at hand, er... hoof? Hoof. We were greeted by a few beings from the town's mixed population greeting us warmly.

"If you g' ta' my bar, free drinks for th' lot o' you." I had never heard his accent and let me tell you it was only by the reactions of the rest of my group that I knew what he said.

Oh, and the three background ponies that I took on my ship for a while stepped off and we never really heard from them again while we were in the city. I just hoped that they got where they were going, I guess.

"Free drinks?" Catastrophe smirked and nodded at him. "I'll take you up on that offer." Distantly, I heard a few whispers.

"No way, she didn't crash the ship?"

"Look at the front of the ship, she totally crashed it." A few bits changed paws/hooves between both of them.

The rest of my group followed after the griffon without a word, all seeming to have bad memories of what had happened here. Probably not lemon tasting memories, but still, they were caustic in their nature.

I did remember that the hotel we stayed at was that place where I had that one dream with Catastrophe and-

Woah.

My face blushed lightly and I tried t ignore the questioning looks of the small crowd we were attracting while also trying to avoid looking at Cata's hind quarters.

My mind screamed that it was wrong, every time I thought of her, but the rest of me screamed that it was so very very very right.

Offering free drinks to the returning heroes seemed like a bad idea until you considered that the heroes attracted plenty of people who wanted to hear heroic tales of their heroics.

I didn't really have any heroics to share.

My group and I followed the griffon, who was in turn following a bar tender to the bar. The location was actually pretty intelligently made, what with the traffic coming seaside would almost certainly see it once they departed the ship. A bit of fresh wood on the side that had not quite been painted the same shade as the rest was the only real indicator that the shoggoth had even touched the building.

Still, the sign above the door way read off the name; Shoggoth's end. It was funny, because my citrus flavored memories told me I had actually taken it out a block away, but whatever.

The walls were a friendly sort of brown with red accents. It actually looked like a nice place if you didn't hear the drunken singing.

"There once was a zebra from the islands!

A griffon challenged him and dueled!

And this zebra was named Ivan!

He made him look the fool!"

I blinked and bowed my head, a sudden blush hitting me. A drunken chorus... that didn't even get much right. I was embarrassed and I didn't know why. I walked calmly over to a bar stool and looked at the unicorn bartender who hurriedly got back to his post. His semi attractive daughter, though not of the sort that I really liked helped him get back to his place.

"And then rested he with his griffon wench.

Though he knew not of what waited!

It was just after dawn, but only a pinch!

The monster's hunger was sated!"

I felt like bashing my head at the griffon comment. Catastrophe elbowed me. "I'm your wench now, hmmm?" She purred the last part and I only knew my face took on a redder hue.

"Now we all thought we were dead and gone!

Until this zebra drew his blade!

This town twas clear that he was fond!

For he stopped from getting laid!"

I groaned and I heard Boss let out a sigh of disgust. I was the hero in a lewd bar song. Woot.

"And heard we of a bounty!

Of Ivan and his crew!

Wanted alive, money counting.

We gladly paid our dues."

I looked around and tried to blot out their singing, spying a wanted posted on a wall that the bounty had been scratched out on to leave only my face.

"We sing of the great Ivan!

Who saved us with his dagger.

And we shall now hide him!

And praise him with our swagger."

The bartender rolled his eyes and his horn glowed sending out a loud booming sound. The drunks stopped from the next verse and the bartender cleared his throat. "Ivan's right here." He pointed at me.

My head hit the table with an audible thud. "Damn it..." And then the crowd rushed around me and at some point in the exchange I drank enough alcohol to get drunk.

"There I was, staring down the Alpha." I said, standing on a bar table. "Scariest fucking thing I had seen in ages. Seriously, this guy had teeth that would put a dragon to shame, right?" I paused and floated a glass of beer to my lips, chugging it audibly.

Canary sat to the side and engaged Boss in light conversation of the sort that you don't really remember when kinda drunk.

Catastrophe was beside me, being the one that was supplying me with alcohol. She also had a sexy evil smirk on her face.

"And then I... You know what!" The world kinda swirled. "It's time for a Song!"

Unexpectedly, or rather, I had expected it though it seemed unlikely, someone pulled out a guitar and others pulled out several instruments.

And then the song started. All the light in the bar, though the sun was still out and sunlight was streaming in through a window, dimmed down low.

Spread your wings Neon Pegasus

And go flying through the night

They can take your glitter

But they can't take away your sparkle

A drunken dog grabbed his friend and hugged him close, tears coming out of his eyes. "They can't take away her sparkle..." He sobbed while his friend stared blankly at him.

"I hate being the designated driver."

And the thousand arm robot octopus

Will try to grab your golden reins

But your wings are strong from the battle

Over Cupcake Mountain

"Fucking Cupcake Mountain! HELL YEAH!" Came the cry to the bar.

Never again to be lonely

Never again to be without a home

Never to bow to the gummy king's throne

Never again, never again!

The bar shouted out the chorus in a state of drunken exuberance. "NEVER AGAIN!"

Never again to be put down

By the Marzipan Girl at the silver lake lounge

Soaring over it all, high up in the clouds

Never again, never again!

Un-break your heart, Neon Pegasus

And go climbing through the stars

Out there with your dreams

Your sparkly dreams

"She... unbroke it... FOLLOW YOUR DREAMS!" I heard it shouted out.

And the genetically modified salamander

With a face just like George Clooney

Can't track you down with the

Rockabilly Worm from Space Land

The bar owner's daughter stepped up and sang the rest of the song with me, her clear voice cutting through the ragged drunkeness of my own. It was like a bell ringing through the bar.

Never again to be lonely

Never again to be without a home

Never to bow to the Gummy King's throne

Never again, never again!

There was hardly a dry eye in the bar as the song touched them deeply.

Catastrophe was laughing evilly.

Never again to be put down

By the Marzipan Girl at the Silver Lake Lounge

Soaring over it all, high up in the clouds

Never again, never again

(No matter how insane or ridiculous,

You must follow your dreams!)

The ending chords stopped ringing through and I was suddenly aware of what the fuck had just happened.

And then I passed out.

The griffon looked at the drunken bar and leaned her mouth next to my right ear. "Sweet dreams, Neon pegasus."