"Rise and shine, wyrmfilth. It's judgement day." A cruel voice wrenched Sapphira from her dreams. She slowly faded back into reality, the shadows of her mind melting away to reveal Storm's leering face more inches in front of her. Storm had a rough grip on Sapphira's chin, forcing her to look up at her. Sapphira wrenched back with a snarl, only to find she had a metal muzzle on her face, which only allowed her to open her mouth a small amount. It was chained behind her head, and had a solid dome shape at the front, presumably to prevent the usage of her breath weapon. Sapphira's arms and legs were similarly shackled, each pair cuffed together and held in place by metal brackets affixed to the stone wall and floor, respectively. And sadly, Sapphira was no longer a giant dragon, but rather had transformed back into herself, complete with the blanket wrapped around her as her only covering.
"Ugh, just kill me already so I don't have to see your stupid face anymore." Sapphira spat, glaring at Storm with venomous hatred.
"Oh, I will. Slowly. Horribly." Storm sneered, leaning still closer and causing Sapphira to shrink back still further in discomfort. "But first, I will chop off each of your fingers. Then your toes, tail, and horns. And then I'll skin you, one scale at a time." Storm almost seemed to drool in excitement at the thought, as her eyes bored into Sapphira's, relishing her fear. Sapphira narrowed her eyes in disbelief at the cartoonishly-explicit threats.
"...What is WRONG with you, you absolute psychopath!? How does the Magistrate even allow you to act like this?"
"You're a war criminal in a testing laboratory. I can make you suffer as much as I want before you die, and as far as anyone cares around here, it counts as science." Storm smiled smugly, standing tall and looking down her nose at Sapphira.
"Is that seriously the only reason I'm still alive right now? It's not enough for me to be dead-- You want to torture me first, because you're butthurt that I got the better of you in battle one freaking time?" Sapphira snapped angrily. "Grow up, you insecure prick! Some of us have real problems!"
"WHAT?! HOW DARE-!?" Storm roared, leaning down to get in her face again, but Sapphira wasn't finished.
"My family are now stuck as guinea pigs in a secret mad-science lab just because they tried to escape the bloodshed without getting caught up in your nightmarishly-under-supplied and over-regulated refugee camp!"
"SHUT UP!" Storm shouted even louder, stomping her armored foot on the end of Sapphira's tail. Sapphira grimaced and wriggled her tail free, sliding it safely to the side as she continued ranting without so much as a pause.
"...My entire CITY just got leveled, and most of my friends were slaughtered because some Magistrate jerk decided the best way to deal with a scuffle in the marketplace was to crush people's skulls in with unrelenting force!" Sapphira snarled ferociously. At this, Storm calmed down a little and gave another satisfied grin.
"Oh, yes. You'd think the people would have calmed down when I shot that disrespectful merchant, but they just HAD to escalate things from there..." Storm side-eyed Sapphira, picking at her gauntlet. Sapphira's gears turned for a moment as she put the pieces together.
"No... YOU started all this!? YOU SPARKED THE FIGHTING!?"
"They would have fought anyway." Storm scoffed, giving a cold look. "I was assigned here after there were already rumors of dissent. After the curfews and the harsher regulations, those foolish revolutionaries were just WAITING for an excuse to commit treason. I was just the perfect storm." Her lips curled into a smirk. "They wanted a straw to break the camel's back, so I gave it to them. Then I broke down your walls. I broke your spirits. And I broke the bones of the last people fighting, and finally restored peace to this wretched place."
"You call this peace!?" Sapphira sputtered in fury. "How many civilians died in the crossfire as you tried to quell this rebellion? How many lives and businesses and families did you ruin, just to hunt down a few fiery vigilantes?"
"It's worth any cost to wipe the Realm clean of all Resistance, and finally win the war."
"You monsters don't care what's good for the people you govern. You just want control."
"The MAGISTRATE wants order. What I want is very different. I want JUSTICE." Storm sneered. "I want every last troublemaker like you to cower in fear before they submit to their fate, so others will shudder and fall in line."
"People will never fall in line as long as the Magistrate acts like this. There will always be others who fight back." Sapphira shot back defiantly, staring Storm in the eyes. Storm's scowl deepened and she leaned in close once more.
"Then it's a good thing I will always be around to END THEM." Storm whispered. Sapphira let loose a yell of rage and head-butted Storm in the face with all the force she could muster from her seated position with her arms chained to the wall behind her. Storm grunted in pain, stumbling back to the other side of the cell and drawing a forearm across her bleeding nose. "Oh, you're going to regret that." Storm promised, taking a powerful step across the room and slamming the toe of her armored foot directly into Sapphira's ribs. Pain exploded in her abdomen once again as the wind was knocked out of her, leaving her keeled over, gasping, and hanging from her arms behind her.
"STOP! Leave her alone!" Another voice interjected from Sapphira's right. Sapphira stole a glance over that direction as she continued her labored breaths. Maltheus was chained a few feet beside her in the same position, far enough where they could not reach each other, save for their tails. He was wearing his chainmail and red-stained shirt again, and was also no longer a dragon. He looked tired, though no longer as deathly pale as he had been before his transformation. He glared at Storm as he spoke again, his voice slightly muffled by the muzzle on his face as well. "If you're going to beat up someone, make it me. I can even insult you, if you like." He teased. Storm kept her attention on Sapphira, who was wheezing with her head hung. After a moment, Storm seemed satisfied with the suffering she had caused, and turned to him with an unimpressed expression.
"Good, you're awake too." Storm sighed, taking a step toward him. "I was sent to congratulate you on your most gracious pardon by Commander Vivian." She informed him, once again wiping the trickle of blood that dripped down her face. He blinked in surprise.
"Excuse me?" He replied in bewilderment.
"Your father is being secured as we speak. As it turns out, the commander thinks it wise to avoid angering a famously-destructive dragon, after seeing what you two did to our other cell."
"I... I don't understand... I never told you how to-!?"
"Oh I know you never told us how to find him or capture him, or whatever you were going to tell us. But here's the thing: We didn't need your help. The moment we found out who you were, we were already sending word through the grapevine that you would be executed unless Drogoz turned himself in. And lucky for you, he turned up. I'm surprised he thought you were worth it, frankly." She scanned a disgusted eye across Maltheus' bloody shirt.
"Wait, but... What about the deal we discussed? About setting the citizens free, instead of me?" He protested.
"There IS no deal with you, Goldilocks. Trust me, if there were, we would have broken it by now... The only reason you're getting out of this at all, let alone with a clean record, is because your father demanded it, and the commander is too much of a coward to break her word with an overgrown lizard-demon. If it were up to me, you'd be in the same boat as Smurfella over there." Storm gestured to Sapphira, who was taking raspy breaths as she recovered from the kick to the chest.
"But... I..." Maltheus seemed at a loss for words.
"I think the words you're looking for are... 'Thank you for not turning me into a dragon pureé.'" Storm smiled, crossing her arms.
"Please, there's gotta be something else I can do... You can't just keep those innocent people in prison."
"There's nothing you CAN do. Just accept your freedom and move on. Try to forget about these ones that didn't make it out. Because if you go spreading rumors around about a science lab under a ruined city, you might find yourself mysteriously disappear." Storm threatened. "No one would believe you anyway." She chuckled as Maltheus sadly met Sapphira's eyes. He looked desperate. Sapphira winced at her 900th injury of the week, and tried to give him a reassuring smile.
"It's ok, Maltheus... We'll be fine." She lied as soothingly as possible.
"Can... Can I at least see my father? To... Say goodbye?" Maltheus pleaded, sounding distraught. Storm immediately burst into laughter.
"You WISH! Not even I have clearance to go down there! The best you might get is to convince me to deliver a message for you. ...If it's worth passing along." She snickered. Maltheus twitched his jaw in frustration.
"Only thing I have to say to him is that he deserves this." Maltheus grunted. "I assume you'd love to pass that along."
"Very much so." Storm smiled.
"But do you know who DOESN'T deserve to rot in this facility and get experimented on?"
"Oh, stuff it." Storm turned on her heel and began to walk out of the cell.
"...Uh...?" Maltheus called after her as she slammed the barred iron door shut behind her.
"Someone will be along to escort you out after they finish securing your father. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a 'matter' to attend to." Storm growled, holding her nose as she disappeared to the side, revealing a view of one of the crisscross bridges that spanned the central pit. Maltheus then slumped down against the wall dejectedly as Sapphira tried to calm her heavy breathing. And for a moment, there was silence.
"...You ok?" Sapphira asked him, cautiously sliding her tail towards his.
"I should be asking you that... You were the one who got kicked in the ribs and told you were going to die. All she did was pardon me and pat me on the back."
"Eh, sexism. What can you do?" Sapphira shrugged jokingly. Maltheus met her gaze with a confused look. "...Anyway, it seems like you're taking the news worse than I am... Why is that?" Sapphira probed, so used to expecting death at this point that she barely cared.
"How could I accept a chance to walk away from all this scott-free, knowing that I directly made things worse for every family I tried to help?! How can I leave like they expect, and forget you and everyone else that's stuck here!? But I... I don't know what else I could do, to fix this... I'm just one man..."
"You could go find the Resistance, if they're still out there somewhere..." Sapphira suggested. "You could lead them back here, and bust us out..."
"But... I'd be too late to save you." Maltheus clenched his teeth, looking at her meaningfully. "That woman is going to tear you limb from limb before I even found them."
"Hey, its ok... At least you'd save my family. That's enough for me." She smiled, laying her tail on his.
"But not for me." Maltheus grunted back.
"Maltheus, NO. Don't throw away your second chance at life..." Sapphira urged him.
"I can't just sit back and let you die!"
"But you can't do something stupid again, like I always do!" She shouted at him. "Don't get yourself killed by trying to fight an entire facility of tech-powered Magistrate guards. ...We know how that went last time, remember?"
"I wasn't fighting last time." Maltheus stated determinedly, looking ahead towards the cell door.
"Maltheus, no..." She warned.
"I could walk free, but I wouldn't be able to live with myself. It's not the right thing to do."
"You need to survive, Maltheus! You need to get out and tell our story! Otherwise no one will know we're here, and we're ALL dead. Do something that will matter. Maybe you can sway the politicians. You can change the world for the better. THAT is the right thing to do. Please, listen to me!" She wrapped the end of her tail around his in an effort to garner his attention. He continued looking the other way, his jaw set. He gave a low grunt in response. "Oh, my goodness, Maltheus, if you ruin everything just for my account, I am going to... I'll... I'll revive your corpse after the Magistrate is done with you, and I'll freaking kill you again!" She squeaked in frustration at him. He simply grunted at her in response again. "I'm not liking what I'm hearing." She glared worriedly at him.
"You know... I never liked the Magistrate... But they were legally the ones in charge, so I always tried to give the benefit of the doubt for their decisions, thinking that they were just doing their best to make the right call... But these people... I don't know if these are just bad apples, or if the Magistrate is like this in every town... But these people are doing evil, terrible things, and they need to go down." Maltheus growled. Sapphira looked up at him nervously.
"So... What are you going to do?"
"...Something that matters." He narrowed his eyes, which seemed to glow with a twinge of the draconic fury his father was known for.
"Maltheus..." She worried as they began to hear the jingling of keys from somewhere outside the cell. A guard in black armor emerged into the doorway, holding a large key ring, which clattered noisily against the bars of the iron door. No one spoke as the door creaked open and five additional guards walked in, giving a wary eye to Sapphira as they entered. The Magistrate seemed to have learned after underestimating her previously. Maltheus' eyes still burned with a dangerous fire as he wordlessly raised his cuffed hands towards the first guard with the keys. The guard carefully unlocked the shackles on each of Maltheus' wrists, and then on his ankles. Maltheus wordlessly nodded to him, then stood to his feet, his tail still intertwined with Sapphira's. He reached up to take off the muzzle on his face, but one of the guards quickly put his hand on his sheathed sword hilt, shaking his head with a disapproving grunt. Maltheus sighed, but left the muzzle on. Then he turned slowly to Sapphira, and they locked eyes meaningfully for a moment. He gave her tail a reassuring squeeze, and then turned to walk out of the cell with the guards, leaving her behind. Sapphira's heart fell as he turned his back without a single word of farewell. She wasn't entirely sure if it was because she was because she was being abandoned to her death, or because of the many varying things that could be going through both of their heads right now. Her eyes began to involuntarily water, despite her best efforts. But before she could properly begin her emotional crisis, two of the guards had exited the cell to lead Maltheus out, while the other four followed behind to flank him.
She watched the two guards step out onto the catwalk, crossing the yawning abyss below, and Maltheus followed after a moment of hesitation, looking down over the edge. Maltheus seemed to then take a brief survey of his surroundings as he stepped out onto the platform with them. The guard with the keys was the last to leave Sapphira's cell, and he fumbled with the keys to lock her up once again as the other three stepped out onto the bridge, their backs and helmets obscuring her view of all but Maltheus' head.
Suddenly, two simultaneous screams erupted from outside her cell, and Sapphira witnessed a blur fall to either side of the catwalk. The guard locking her cell immediately whirled in terror, seeing his three companions reaching for their blades. Maltheus's head had disappeared behind the soldiers, but it quickly re-emerged from between two of them as Maltheus drove his shoulders into two of the remaining guards, sending them hurling off either edge of the platform. As one fell, Maltheus simply reached out and grabbed their sheathed sword, which practically uncovered itself as a result of the soldier's momentum. Now armed and facing only two soldiers, Maltheus struck like lightning, pressing his advantage before the guards knew what hit them. Maltheus' blade sprouted from one soldier's neck just as they finished drawing their sword, and they fell to the ground with a gurgling whimper before their surprise had even worn off. Maltheus withdrew his bloodied sword and turned his fiery gaze on the final soldier, who still held only the key ring in his hands. The soldier faltered and stumbled backwards against the cell door, yelling out in alarm as he tried to shield himself with the keys. Maltheus slowed his advance, still poised to strike, but he seemed hesitant to strike someone so... Pitiful.
"Hey... Sir... Could you please go take the day off?" Maltheus suggested, his sword drooping as he faced the cowardly guard. The guard quickly tried to reach for his sword, but Maltheus grabbed his arm, holding him in place. "I'm sorry about this." Maltheus sighed, grabbing the man's helmet with his other hand, and bashing his head into the iron bars of Sapphira's cell with a loud clang. The man crumpled to the ground in a heap, and Maltheus quickly began unlocking the door with the keys once again.
"...What did you just do?" Sapphira gawked in awe as he entered her cell. "Why are you throwing it all away on my behalf?"
"You matter to me." Maltheus replied matter-of-factly as he powerfully slammed his sword into the chain holding her wrists together, breaking it in two. She dropped her arms in relief and looked up at Maltheus with a mix of admiration and apprehension. "Now let's get your family out of here." He commanded, tossing her the keys to her shackles.
"Me and you against this whole place...?" She reminded him.
"We make a good team. If they try really hard, it might even be a fair fight." He grinned. "We're unstoppable dragons, remember?" He encouraged, stepping out of the cell to drag the unconscious guard into the room. Sapphira laughed as she held a hand over her blanket, which still was the only thing keeping her decent right now.
"Alright, I like the confidence... I do need some clothe- ...Oh, that's what the guard is for?"
"That's what the guard is for." He confirmed with a nod. "Get dressed and get ready for a fight. There's no way that scuffle went unnoticed." He pointed out grimly, walking to the door and gripping his sword at the ready. He looked left and right along the corkscrew path, but seemed to determine that the coast was clear for the moment, seeing as he then lifted his horribly-stained shirt over his head and removed his muzzle, chucking them both into the corner of the cell as he waited for action, his grimy chainmail shining in the multicolored torchlight glow.
Sapphira unlocked the last of her shackles, shamelessly stole the heavy black armor of the unconscious guard, and commandeered his sword for good measure. Then, all the while stealing glances at Maltheus to make sure he wasn't peeking, she exchanged her toga-like blanket for a proper set of protective plate armor. To his credit, he instead remained vigilant towards the paths that potential enemies could appear on, only diverting his gaze towards his feet as he scooted the other corpse into the cell behind him. Within a couple minutes, Sapphira was geared up and ready to go, only having had a problem in the fact that this human's armor did not come with a tail-hole, so she'd had to adjust the fit a fair amount in that regard. Otherwise, her tall dragonborn stature had been a close match for the male human guard, who still lay peacefully in the corner of the cell.
"Alright, I'm ready. What's the plan?" Sapphira asked, marching up to Maltheus in full armor and feeling like a legendary hero.
"We bust my dad out." Maltheus replied quickly, turning to face her. Her eyes widened in surprise.
"After all you said about him being a mass-murderer that actually deserved prison...?"
"We bust my dad out, he busts everyone else out." Maltheus clarified the plan as he stepped back into the cell and pocketed the keys.
"Ah. Fair enough. Where do you think he is?" Sapphira asked, leaning down to pick up the guard's helmet, which had not fit over her curved horns.
"Sounded like they were keeping him below. I say we spiral down until we find him. Maybe grab some more fancy potions from rooms on our way." He decided curtly, seeming antsy to get moving. Before he took off moving down the main ramp, Sapphira held out the helmet to him.
"Here. In case you want to go incognito and keep that criminal record clean." She smirked. He raised his eyebrows in amusement, took the helmet, and balanced it on the end of one of his horns.
"Yep. Definitely will work. Very sneaky. Let's go." He chuckled, taking off at a quick walking pace down the circular, slightly-sloped hallway. Judging by the view of the pit, they were several stories below ground level, and strange shrieks and groans could be heard echoing from deeper below. Activity seemed scarcer down here, but there were still Magistrate workers and soldiers crossing the chasm and popping out of rooms every so often to walk up or down the ramped walkway. By some miracle, it seemed that no one had noticed Maltheus' murderous rampage. At least... No one up above, where the busier activities were taking place. But surely anyone working below would have noticed four soldiers inexplicably falling to their deaths. Sapphira clutched her sword at the ready and tried to walk like a confident Magistrate soldier in case a distant guard's eye skated across her armor. The pair continued down the passage, grimly waiting for the inevitable encounter with angry enemies.
As they walked, the spiraling path slowly expanded outward as small rooms and pillars began to replace their open view of the shaft, before finally the path had diverted enough to allow full-size rooms filling the area between where they now walked and the original radius of the corkscrew. They now walked in a gently-sloped hallway that was enclosed on either side, blocking their view of what was ahead and below. It granted more cover, but offered less ability to track where they were in the huge maze of nearly-identical doors. A mysterious green light shining from below a wooden door piqued Sapphira's interest as they passed by, causing her to realize something.
"Shouldn't we check these rooms as we go, in case the people we're trying to rescue are trapped inside?" She asked in a hushed whisper.
"There's no time." Maltheus shook his head. "This place will probably be on high alert any second, and when it does, we'll be lucky to even make it to my father."
"But if we get caught, at least all our eggs won't be in one basket..." Sapphira pointed out. "We're our only hope right now, but if we could free some other groups of citizens..."
"And what if we open up a door and find a group of soldiers instead?" Maltheus hissed quietly. "I don't think it's wise to endanger any more defenseless families by setting them free to wander around a death trap as it hunts for us. Unless one of us splits off to protect them while the other frees Drogoz..."
"No way. I'm not leaving your side. We're better off together." She refused sternly, catching his eye. He nodded in agreement as they continued marching together down the passage.
"We just need to cover as much ground as we can before every inch becomes a bloodbath." Maltheus reiterated.
"Well, what about finding useful items? Another dragon potion couldn't hurt..." She added, eyeing a metal door that seemed heavily reinforced, and definitely hid some interesting secrets.
"Fair enough, but let's save the poking around until we need to hide. It will only slow us down for now." Maltheus sighed. "If we can just free my father, he will hopefully occupy the Magistrate enough for us to free the others and grab some weapons afterward."
Just then, Sapphira and Maltheus began to hear armored footsteps jogging towards them up the hallway. Without a word, Sapphira opened a door to her left and ducked inside, gesturing for Maltheus to follow. He quickly joined her in the vacant room as she silently shut the door against the squad of soldiers, who thundered past none the wiser. Maltheus took off his dangling helmet and placed it on a long wooden table, strewn with various cogs, springs, and half-built clockwork automatons. After a moment, the coast seemed clear, so Maltheus and Sapphira darted back out of the messy inventor's lab and shut the door behind them as they continued on. Moments later, they heard worried voices approaching, so they dove into another doorway on their right.
This time, they had not been so lucky as to encounter a soulless room. Two Magistrate scientists with red lab coats and clipboards were standing in the center of the room beside a messy table and a series of labeled test-tubes. They gawked in fear as the door shut behind the draconic duo, sealing them all in this sweet-smelling room with only one exit. Exotic plants draped across the walls, covering the counters and cabinets with colorful blossoms, and a chalkboard held some nonsensical scribblings about the plants.
"Oh... Hello." Maltheus adopted a smile, lowering his sword and trying to act casual. "We're just checking in on you two to see if you need anything." He lied, attempting to seem cheerful and nonchalant, though the stress was evident in his voice, and Sapphira's still-menacing sword was not sending a peaceful message. The two workers nervously exchanged a glance as Sapphira rolled her eyes and slowly lowered her sword as well.
"Uhhh..." The female scientist was at a loss for words, still poised with a pencil against her paper.
"No? You're all good here? Cool. Then I'll just take this, and we'll get out of your way. Keep up the great work!" Maltheus picked up a small wastebasket of plant clippings and gave a small wave as he turned back towards the door. Sapphira gave an apologetic nod to them as she followed him back into the hallway, with the voices having safely passed by.
"...Are we seriously just going to leave them like that?" Sapphira questioned as Maltheus began walking down the hall again, still clutching what was essentially a bucket of weeds. "They're witnesses now! They'll have the whole place up in arms if we don't take them out!"
"We are NOT going to hurt anyone we don't have to. I used to work for the Magistrate as a blacksmith, remember? Maybe those people just needed jobs, and this is where their paths led them..."
"You've GOT to be kidding me... If they're this deep in Magistrate kooky-town, they're probably evil."
"That's... A bit reductionist."
"But accurate."
"They were working with..." Maltheus gave the plants in his arms a sniff. "Lavender and mint leaves... Clearly that's all the evidence we need to declare them worthy of our wrath."
"Oh, you know what I mean." Sapphira huffed. Maltheus just gave her a disappointed scowl and said no more. "Hey, that garbage can is big enough to fit over your horns... Maybe if you dump it over your head, you could pass as a garbage man, and no one would pay us any mind!" She encouraged with exaggerated excitement.
Just then, a loud horn blast echoed from elsewhere in the complex, followed by a thunderous scraping of stone and metal a few moments later.
"I think they'll be on the lookout for escaped dragonborn, now." Maltheus replied glumly, tossing the wastebasket to the side and raising his sword once again.
"I don't disagree." Sapphira grumbled, gritting her teeth. "But I do still think we're less likely to overlook your father if we actually check these rooms he could be held in." She pointed out.
"Mmm, mmm." Maltheus shook his head. "If he's behind a door, it's gotta be a bigger one. My dad is huge-- Even bigger than I am." Maltheus informed her. She raised her eyebrows in surprise.
"What, was 8 and a half feet not enough for him?" She scoffed. "Did he take magic steroids to avoid being outdone by his own son?"
"I don't know... Maybe he just never stopped growing over the course of his lizardy life? I never bothered to ask."
"Ok... Well... How tall is he?"
"Like 10 feet tall." Maltheus responded curtly, seeming not to want to discuss his father any longer. "But no matter how terrifyingly big he is, he's not going to be able to cause much damage without his gear... We'll need to find his jetpack and rocket launcher as well, after we free him."
"Perhaps we should go ask your botanist friends."
"I'm sure they'd be thrilled to tell us." Maltheus sighed.
"Storm said he just got locked up, so they can't have moved his possessions far, right? Maybe it's near where he is?" Sapphira suggested, prompting a shrug from Maltheus.
"We can hope." He replied as the sounds of armored footsteps grew louder from up ahead. "Sounds like we've got company." He readied his sword.
"We're not sneaking through a room this time?" Sapphira questioned, preparing for battle as well.
"The alarm's raised. Every moment counts."
"...Won't plowing through enemies take longer than hiding? Everyone will hear exactly where we are the moment we stop to clash blades..." Sapphira cautioned, reaching for a door handle. But it was too late. Eight soldiers came around the bend in the hall, quickly catching sight of the two towering dragon kin.
"YOU THERE! HALT!" One of them shouted as the squad continued jogging forward. Sapphira growled as she returned both hands to her sword. Maltheus planted his feet and stared them down determinedly, his eyes ablaze with dangerous purpose. Sapphira adjusted her feet and prepared to charge forward, but Maltheus stopped her with a single word.
"Wait." He instructed calmly, taking a deep breath to steady himself as they approached. Sapphira remained by his side instead, the pair blocking the hallway as the soldiers approached.
"Submit to arrest, or we will slay you where you stand!" The squad leader threatened as the soldiers came to a stop just out of slashing range. The soldiers' faces held no fear as they stared down an enemy they outnumbered four to one.
"Sorry, we've got prior obligations." Maltheus informed them, spreading looks of surprise across the confident opposers. Then with a mighty snarl, Maltheus leaned forward and breathed a thirty-foot line of fire at them all, engulfing the hallway in flames and igniting everything that could burn. Some of the soldiers tried to dive out of the way, but the small enclosed space kept them trapped in the scorching heat. In a flash, the blast of fire dissipated, save for the flaming uniforms of some of the screaming guards. Sapphira wasted no time in stepping forward to plunge her blade into the back of one of the soldiers that had not succumbed to the fire, silencing him quickly. Maltheus stepped forward as well to bonk a kneeling soldier with the hilt of his blade, causing him to fall unconscious on the ground. The remaining guards scrambled to recover, trying to pat out their clothing and retrieve their dropped weapons, but the battle was all but over. With a decisive few jabs in the chinks of their armor, Sapphira made short work of the leader and the one behind him, while Maltheus knocked out the final guard. Sapphira nodded at their handiwork approvingly. Maltheus mercifully took a moment to pat out the flames on the unconscious guards, and then quickly turned to continue walking down the hall.
"I have to admit, that went faster than I thought it would." Sapphira chuckled. "But now you're out of fire for next time... So maybe we try being sneaky?" She asked.
"You still have your lightning." He pointed out.
"I save that to turn the tide in emergencies. I'm not going to use it on an avoidable scuffle." She informed him. He nodded.
"Saving our strength it is, then." Maltheus agreed as doors began to open all along the hallway, and Magistrate soldiers and magical researchers alike started poking their heads out to see what the fuss was about.
"Ohhhh, no..." Sapphira muttered under her breath as she locked eyes with another armored soldier up ahead. His eyes flashed in anger, and he stepped out into the hall to block their progress. "See what you've done, Maltheus? You started the snowball effect. The more we fight, the more people we're going to have to fight."
"Yeah, you're right, the noise was a bad idea..." He admitted, twirling his sword. "Too late now, though." He charged forward, parrying the guard's outstretched sword to the side as he simply body-slammed the poor man into the ground with hundreds of pounds of dragonborn muscle. The onlooking researchers gasped in shock as the guard's helmet snapped into the ground with a loud clang, and the guard moved no more. "Sorry, we don't want to hurt anyone, we just have somewhere to be..." Maltheus called to the witnesses as he casually stood and kept walking at a quick pace, followed by Sapphira.
"You know, if we killed these guards, we could make sure they wouldn't be a problem for us a second time when they wake back up!" She hissed quietly as they broke line of sight with those who had heard their scuffle.
"By the time we wake back up, our battle will have already been decided, for better or for worse." Maltheus disagreed, quickening his pace to a much-faster run as they continued circling down deeper and deeper into the earth.
"That's what worries me." Sapphira sighed as she matched his pace, having to work a little harder because her strides weren't as long.
As they descended, the doors transitioned from mostly being wooden doors to mostly solid metal doors, similar to the kind she and Maltheus had blasted their way through as giant dragons. The rooms were rarely left open, and few had signs on the outside to label what was contained within, but the few that did give insight as to their purpose seemed to house significantly more horrifying things than indoor gardening. They caught a glimpse of a room stacked floor-to-ceiling with jars, each containing a living insect or slimy creature that thrashed against the glass, trying to get out. Another door had a window set into it, revealing an array of glowing crystals of various colors and unsettling patterns. As they continued descending, the faces that caught sight of them grew older and more stern, and the soldiers they encountered became more numerous, though they subsequently managed to dodge most skirmishes by ducking into these rooms. As they pressed their backs into a door for a moment, listening to urgent footsteps running past, Maltheus and Sapphira both took the chance to catch their breath.
"You know... I think this place is a little understaffed... With all of these empty rooms..." Maltheus wheezed quietly, gesturing to the abandoned room they were in. There were some downright haunting sights in this particular room, including a glowing vat of green fluid with a half-formed creature floating in the center, held in place by some dangling cords of black rubber and metal. Additionally, large machines whirred in the corners, turning cogs back and forth for some unknown reason as they belched black exhaust into the room at occasional intervals. A large purple crystal sat on a table, plugged into some kind of mechanized hat, and, most disturbing of all, a slightly-dried corpse lay exposed on the table, face twisted into an inhuman expression.
"Well, given how they mistreat their citizens, I can't imagine they make competitive employers, either." Sapphira grumbled sarcastically. "They probably kill anyone who even dreams about sharing the secrets they've seen."
Suddenly, the partially-mummified corpse on the table let out a loud gasp as it raised its' head to look at Maltheus and Sapphira with its' eyeless sockets. Maltheus and Sapphira wasted no time in throwing the door open and charging back out into the hallway at top-speed, slamming it shut behind them as they kept on running.
"I don't know, and I don't WANT to know." Maltheus shuddered. After not too much longer, they arrived at a large set of metal double-doors, with a large keyhole prominently featured just off-center. The door blocked the path of the main hallway, but the floor remained slanted, as though there were still more spirals to descend. To their right, a room was missing, replaced with a couple stone pillars and a short hallway that once again gave them a view across the large open shaft. Sapphira curiously stepped forward to examine the purpose of this room, while Maltheus pulled out the key-ring and began trying keys in the metal door, one after another.
This little side-passage had only four stone pillars with little decoration on them, save for a big, red button on the rightmost one closest to the edge. A comfortably-large pathway bisected the pillars, leading from the main hallway to the sheer edge, which had no railings of any kind, same as the rest of this death trap. Sapphira took a careful look out over the edge, into the main shaft once again. The shaft was the same size as always, about 300 feet in diameter from edge to edge, but at this point, Sapphira was able to squint down into the darkness and see the bottom of the pit at last, about 40 feet below. Of course, more crisscrossing catwalks could be seen connecting various points above like an awfully- ineffective spider web, but what caught Sapphira's eye just below her current level was a large metal strut that spanned the chasm, holding up a complicated bundle of machine parts in the center of the shaft, like some kind of huge, ugly chandelier. Its' purpose was unknown, but it was clearly doing something, seeing as there were wheels and belts spinning rapidly across its' surface. Sapphira looked up, her eye tracing across the numerous magically-colored torchlights that illuminated the interior of this giant, terribly-designed-but-visually-imposing space. It was difficult to notice, given its' distance and the poor lighting, but Sapphira was pretty sure she could see a ceiling that looked unfamiliar... Almost as though the shaft had been sealed at ground level by some inexplicable means. Sadly, she was too far away to gauge exactly what she was looking at, so she directed her attention to the button on the pillar beside her, instead. Could this activate that machine? Was this a terrible idea to press?
"I don't think any of these keys go to this door..." Maltheus worried in the background, looping back through some keys he had previously tried.
"Sooo... We find another way?" Sapphira poked her head out into the shaft, looking for a window or platform they could jump to, that would bypass the giant door. Unfortunately, there did not seem to be any easy way around it. However, the stones that formed the wall of the shaft were rough and had plenty of uneven portions jutting out. While rock-climbing down to the bottom may have been a stupid option, it was at least a possibility.
"Yeah... Maybe we can bust through the stone wall of one of these side-rooms... Maltheus theorized. "Or find a useful item like you mentioned."
"I also found a button we can try pressing, though it might draw a lot of attention, depending on what it does..." Sapphira mentioned, gesturing to the tempting button. Maltheus screwed up his face unhappily.
"What are the chances it helps us, versus making our lives harder?" He asked hesitantly.
"Oh, it will 100% make our lives harder, knowing our luck." She sighed. "One last option is... We can get down to the bottom now with a 40-foot free-climb, but if we fall, it'll hurt pretty bad."
"Oh...?" Maltheus joined her at the edge, squinting down into the darkness. "Yeah, that looks like a pretty terrible fall... You really think we can climb down this sheer rock face? What are we, billy-goats?" He studied the minuscule handholds unoptomistically. Sapphira extended her claws and gripped the wall as demonstration. Maltheus' eyes widened as she fearlessly turned to dangle herself over the edge. He grabbed her other hand and held on tight, trying to pull her back to safety. She simply lifted herself up with her claws, showing his safety net was unnecessary. "...Wow... Are you sure about this?" He gawked at her performance. She nodded, waiting for him to release her other hand. "...I don't think I can follow you like that... I'm a bit heavier." He admitted.
"Fine, then you go bust through a solid stone wall, like you were talking about, and I'll go free everyone and meet back up with you by the time you finish." She smiled sweetly.
"What ever happened to not leaving my side?" He laughed.
"We absolutely decimated everyone who tried to stand in our way, that's what happened." She reminded him. "I'm sure we can manage on our own for just a couple minutes. We can cover more ground to look for your father, this way. Meet me at the bottom here as soon as you can, and I'll shout for you if I need you, ok?" She reassured him, tugging her arm free of his grasp. He seemed less-than-thrilled about this plan, but nonetheless he nodded and gave her a small smile.
"Good luck." He sighed, watching her for a moment as she dug her other claws into the stone, and began to descend, a little bit at a time. And then he was gone, disappearing to find his own way into the deepest, most secured area in the facility.