Monroe

Chapter Four. Wolves.

It turned out that closing the boxes was a simple as concentrating on having them close. It took a few seconds at first but Bob quickly got the hang of willing them closed.

As he closed the last one, his attention turned to the delicious smell of seared meat that was emanating from the fire.

The wizard had deployed some sort of metal stand from the bottom of the plate, and it was now a few inches off the fire.

Bob squinted, interested in the design. It looked like a tripod, with simple hinged legs that folded down. Ingenious really.

The swordsman as Bob had decided to label him, gave him a quick poke in the shoulder, and offered him the canteen again, which he gratefully accepted.

After a few long swallows, he glanced hopefully at the plate of meat cooking over the fire. The swordsman picked up on the nod, and pointed at himself, the wizard, and Bob in turn, then motioned eating. Or at least that is what Bob was hoping for. Swordsman wasn't ever going to be headed to a national competition for charades.

Swordsman stood up and was in the process of stringing a rope between two pines when the air was split with a loud howl from somewhere nearby.

Swordsman dropped the rope and took a few steps forward, picking up his sword and drawing it from its sheath.

Likewise, Wizard let the fork he'd been using to poke at the meat lay against the plate/pan's side, and stood, taking his staff in both hands.

"You think that wolf might be hungry enough to try us?" Wizard asked Swordsman as he looked around his eyes sharp.

"I'm more worried that it might have hungry friends," said Swordsman in reply as he scanned the area as well.

Bob was a city boy. He'd never heard a wolf howl except in the occasional movie. This sounded much more real, and much closer.

He struggled to his feet. He mentally recalled a conversation about wolves he had read in a book once, about how wolves could track you for miles, see the sweat on your brow from a hundred feet away, and bite clean through your calf in one chomp.

Bob wasn't sure how truthful any of that was, but he was absolutely certain he didn't want to find out.

Wizard and Swordsman were clearly taking things seriously, and they looked ready to fend off the local wildlife.

Bob took a deep breath and released it slowly. 'You've got two badass guys here, who seem somewhat invested in keeping you safe, or at least themselves safe,' he thought as he closed his eyes and focused on his breathing.

His eyes flew open as he heard a snarl from ahead of him, and a voice, the Wizard, he thought, say "Incoming!". A pack of wolves, four maybe five, were engaged with the Wizard and Swordsman.

The Wizard's staff apparently doubled as a fucking flame thrower, as it was spewing out a cone of black tinted flames towards a pair of the wolves, who were backing off rapidly, yelping in pain as their fur caught fire.

The Swordsman wasn't as flashy, but his blade lashed out quickly and left deep bleeding cuts on the three wolves that formed a half-circle around him.

Bob was panting for breath as he took in the fight in front of him. He was in the process of trying to take a deep calming breath when it was forced out of him as heavy, snarling weight him from behind, bearing him down to the ground. Sharp tearing pain shot through him as slavering jaws latched onto his collarbone and started to rip.

"FUCK!" Bob screamed as the wolf on top of him seemed to settle in for a good mauling.

'Inventory,' he thought frantically and focused on the rope tying his hands together - 'Store!'

His hands came free, and he tried to roll out from under the wolf as he twisted his right arm in front of him, his left arm not responding very well.

He managed to get a hand on the wolf's neck and managed to yank its head to the side slightly, causing him to nearly blackout as the wolf's jaws tore the flesh from his shoulder.

'Inventory,' he thought frantically as his vision narrowed, concentrating on the wolf, 'Store!'

Inventory Error. Sapient creatures cannot be stored without their consent. Target subject [Wolf] is unwilling to enter Inventory.

"Motherfucker!" Bob screamed, and with a heroic burst of effort managed to roll over. A part of Bob's mind dispassionately noted that presenting his face and throat to the snarling hell beast intent on devouring him may not have been the best choice.

There was another part of Bob's mind that was well past survival concerns. Was well past any concerns really. A torrent of endless rage broke through the carefully constructed societal barriers, and Bob was once again carried away by the current.

"Die Motherfucker Die!" Bob screamed in rage as he started pummeling the wolf's head with his bare fist.

The wolf wasn't quite sure what to make of this. The prey was wounded, perhaps mortally. He had swallowed a chunk of its meat already. It wasn't supposed to be fighting back. It latched onto Bob's wrist, putting an end to the pounding.

Bob used the wolf's grip on his arm to lever his body forward as he leaned forward and sank his teeth into the wolf's neck.

The dispassionate part of Bob's mind noted that he probably didn't have the jaw strength needed to break through the wolf's fur let alone tear out its throat.

The wolf didn't know that. It let out a yelp, releasing Bob's wrist and backing away, shaking off the strange human that was biting into his neck.

Bob staggered to his feet, blood sheeting down his chest and back. His left arm was out of commission, too much damage had been done to his shoulder. He still had one mostly functional hand though.

Bob lunged for the wolf bellowing in rage.

The wolf took a hesitant step backward and was suddenly engulfed in red and black flames.

It yelped and tried to turn and run, but the flames followed it and seconds later it crumpled to the ground.

Bob spun around fist and jaw clenched, eyes burning with rage, and found the Wizard and the Swordsman approaching him slowly.

He tried to take a step forward, but the volume of blood in his cardiovascular system was insufficient to the task of keeping him upright as the adrenaline faded, and instead, he face planted the ground, the smell of pine needles and charred fur filling his nose as he blacked out.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"Stones, he tried to tear that wolf's throat out with his teeth!" said Harv as he carefully approached the once again prone figure.

Elli walked forward to the nearest wolf corpse, and with quick and sure motions started to skin it.

"You think he has a magic item that let him get loose?" said Elli as he started to roll up the wolf hide, tying it off with a piece of twine.

Harv paused and looked down at the anomaly in careful consideration. "Could be, though I didn't sense anything on him. Probably best to strip him, and shove him into a spare set of trousers," he said.

Elli gave an unseen nod and replied, "Alright, I'll sort out these other two then you can ashes the rest. I'll gather the crystals and you strip him."

Harv looked up from removing Bob's jacket and asked "You thinking these puppies came from another Dungeon?"

Elli grunted as he yanked the hide off the third wolf he'd fought, and responded: "Could be,but we're down for the night anyway, it won't cost you but two seconds to regain the mana."

Harv grunted in acknowledgment.

Soon enough Harv had undressed Bob, and he called Elli over.

"Ever seen anything like this before?" He asked as he worked the zipper on Bob's slack up and down.

"Can't say that I have. That is some fine metalwork, though it seems a bit wasted to have it holding your flap closed." Elli responded.

Harv stuffed the slacks into his backpack and picked up Bob's phone case from the pile. "I've no idea what this is meant to do," he offered the phone case to Elli.

Elli fiddled a bit with the case, before figuring out the trick to unlatching it and exposing the shiny glass and plastic device inside.

Elli eyed it from all sides, gave it a few experimental pokes, and then handed it back to Harv. "Search me," he said.

Harv gave it a once over and shrugged, tossing it into his backpack as well.

Harv held up the suit jacket and winced. "Not much left here, between the rats, the wolf, and his own blood, I could mend try to mend it, but it's missing a lot of material."

Elli nodded. The jacket had seen better days, evenings, and nights. "I've got a shirt that'll fit him, although he's too tall for my trousers."

Harv gave a shrug and pulled a pair of tan breeches out the other side of his backpack. "I reckon they'll be a bit generous about the waist, but these should do."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Bob groaned as his aching body drew him back to consciousness.

He made to move his arms forward and realized two things.

First, he was once again tied up.

Second, his shoulder still hurt, and having his hand tied behind his back wasn't helping.

'Inventory, Store!' Bob thought, concentrating on the rope binding his hands.

"Getting better at that," he mumbled to himself as hands came free, and he brought them around in front of him, carefully cradling his left arm.

"Well, he definitely has some sort of magic to get rid of the ropes, looks like he did it again," said the Wizard, drawing Bob's attention.

There was no sign of the wolves and were it not for his injuries, you might never know he'd been attacked.

Except for his pants. And his shirt. Bob blinked hard. Nope, these weren't his clothes.

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, focusing on his breathing.

"You think he's from one of those monasteries over in Hillsbrad?" said the Swordsman to his right.

"He does seem to do a lot of that deep breathing, centering yourself stuff, but they all speak Thaylan" responded the Wizard from his left.

Bob opened his eyes. He looked at the Wizard and the Swordsman. Despite him suddenly being unbound, neither of them seemed to be terribly alarmed, and neither had taken up their staff and sword.

'Embrace the suck,' he thought to himself. They didn't speak any language he did. Chances were good that where ever they were going, the people there also didn't speak his languages.

Bob pointed at himself with slow, deliberate movements, and stated clearly "Bob."

He then used the same slow movements to point to Wizard and raised an eyebrow.

Wizard gave him a grin, pointed to his chest, and said slowly and loudly (because that is how you speak to foreigners - slowly and loudly, so they can understand you) "Harv."

Swordsman followed suit even slower and louder, "Elli."

'Thank god they don't have ridiculous fantasy names like Llelloywnlyn or some shit like that,' Bob thought to himself. He pointed at Wizard and said "Harv," then at Swordsman and said "Elli."

Nods from both parties, as both Swordsman and Wizard pointed at him and in near unison said "Bob."

'Well,' Bob thought, that is a start at least. Now to learn more words.

He pointed at the fire where a presumably new hunk of meat was cooking.

Wizar- er, Harv rather, showed uncommon good sense in removing everything from the fire and identifying each item in turn.

Thus began a long evening of playing the "name that item" game.