Archive of Our Own ^beta

Splitting up seemed like a good idea when it was suggested. 

They had come to an area of the dungeon that had a maze acting as a gateway to the next level. 

It was simple enough, mainly just a labyrinth of branching corridors mostly leading to dead-ends. Chilchuck had seen it before, years ago, and it hadn’t had any traps that he’d encountered. The main purpose seemed to be confusion and disorientation. Maybe hunting - when more intelligent things lived on this floor, which was now inhabited mainly by scorpions and skeletons.

The maze seemed to be split into two main chambers, so they agreed splitting into groups would make finding the exit a lot faster.

“Just be careful alright.” He’d said, as he and Laios parted from Senshi and Marcille.

“Use the marks like I showed you, meet back here when you find the exit or run out of options.”

They went their separate ways.

For the most part, going through the maze was just plain boring. A lot of walking, a lot of turning around and walking back to where you just were. 

Right entrance first. Mark dead-ends and loops working back from right to left. Move onto the next entrance. Nothing difficult about that.

He and Laios talked easily as they went. 

“So what was it like the first time you were here?”

“Boring, so roughly like this. Actually it was probably worse since  our party leader insisted we stay together. Took us hours to get through.”

“Oh.” Laios says. “So how come there’s no marks on the walls from the last time?” 

“This part of the dungeon is always shifting - slowly, but it is. Least that’s what my old party leader told me. May as well be true either way, everywhere looks the same in here.”

Laios’ stomach groaned at the suggestion of ‘hours’. 

“Back then we had this one guy - Benji, man” Chilchuck shook his head with a smile. “Couldn’t handle closed in spaces. Refused outright to go in,”

“What?” Laios exclaimed.

“Yeah. He said the ceiling was gonna collapse on us or something.”

“What did he think a dungeon was supposed to be?” 

Chilchuck laughed.

“Some people. Our mage ended up having to cast a sleep spell on him and have the fighters carry him through. Can you believe that?”

“Closed in spaces huh. Makes even less sense than Marcilles fear of bugs.” 

“Hah, yeah.”

“Hey you remember that one time-”

“Wait-” Chilchuck put his arm out to stop Laios.

“What is it?”

“There’s a trap there.” He said, pointing to a tile, that to Laios, looks exactly like all the others. 

“Oh.”

Chilchuck moved in closer.

“Should we go back?”

“No, it’s easy enough to disarm, plus this could be the exit. Stay there.” He crouched down to tinker with the pressure plate, using his tools to carefully release the weighted latch of the trigger.

“You know it’s weird, you don’t normally see traps this simple this far down, I figured once people were in this far they didn't bother with the easy ones.”

“Maybe the dungeon’s just waiting for you to get complacent.”

“Well it’ll be waiting a while.” He said, as he snicked the trigger free. 

There was a whirring sound like a weighted string dropping.

He knew that sound.

“Get down!” He shouted to Laios, but it was too late. 

A thick wooden beam, that had seemed to be only a nog in the wall a moment ago, flung out and struck Laios on the back, slamming him into the wall. His armour clattered against the ground, and at the same moment there was a deep sound like the crash of an enormous gong being struck on the other side of the wall.

Chilchuck jammed his hands over his ears, the floor shaking with the noise of it.

He shook himself and scrambled over to Laios, who was lying on his side near the wall.

“Shit! shitshitshit-” He wasn’t moving. 

“Laois!” He said, shaking him. He cursed under his breath. Fuck .

He had to get him up, he didn’t want to know who’d come calling when they rang the dinner bell. 

Probably it was set by orcs back when they occupied this level, made to look like a regular trap but set off by ‘disarming’ it. Clever . 

The orcs are long gone, but other things have ears here too. if only Marcille were here, if he’d had her abjuration magic that would’ve been like nothing. He hoped in his heart that the others had heard the noise, hopefully they’d come to see what was going on.

He strained to roll the tallman onto his back to get a better look at him. His head lolled to the side. There was a deep graze where Laios’ head had struck the wall, and red blossomed there immediately, starting to creep crimson through the blonde of his hairline.

“Ah-”

Chilchuck's eyes widened. He felt his gut clench at the sight of the blood. He placed his hands on Laios' chest plate and shook him. 

“Laios!” He called, close to his face. It was silent.

His ears did a sudden adjustment as he recognised the sound of approaching footsteps from the corridor behind them. His heart caught in his chest, pounding in relief.

“Hey!” he called to his companions, his voice thick with worry. 

But there was no returning call. Chilchuck frowned. 

“Shenshi, Marci-,” His voice dropped off as the footsteps resumed, a scuffling, unsteady sound. 

His hairs stood on end. 

He clamped a hand over his mouth, but he knew it was too late. His eyes darted over to the torch that lay still burning on the ground.

He jerked himself out of his frozen panic, heart rate rising once more. He turned back to Laios and shook him violently. 

“Laios! Laios, come on!” He said in an urgent whisper. He looked around desperately. Think. 

It sounded like a 2-legged, they didn’t usually have a keen sense of smell or anything, so if he could just get them out of sight maybe they’d be fine. 

Unless Laios woke up, it was their only shot. 

Getting to his feet, he got behind Laios and grabbed him under the arms, shoving him into a sitting position, then he hauled backward with all his might. He shifted only about a foot with each pull, and his plate mail, dragging over the cobblestones, made a horrible grinding, clanging sound with every step.

Chilchuck winced, but kept going, keeping a close eye on the end of the corridor. Nothing in sight yet.

He was getting close to the corner, only a few more pulls and they’d be clear. His arms were weakening, Laios was heavy . He grit his teeth and got ready to pull once more, but then he saw a figure appear just within reach of the torch at the end of the hallway. An undead.

Fuck. 

He pulled with urgency, fear and panic rising. What am I doing? It’s seen us, this isn’t going to work. I have to think of something else. 

The undead continued ambling, slowly but surely toward them, a deep thin moan emitting from its maw. 

He dropped Laios and wheeled around to stand over him, once again making an attempt to rouse him. 

“Come on! Laois!” He shouted. “Wake up!”

The undead made it past the torch, reaching out its decomposing hands toward them. 

The idea flickered in his mind to abandon Laios and run.

Instead, his hands - betraying him - drew Laios’ sword, and he turned to place himself between his friend and the monster.

The sword was heavy, and it took two shaking hands to hold it up. He grit his teeth. 

The undead had moved past the torch and the light on its right side, made the hollow places of its face look sharp, and cavernous like a deadly crevasse. 

It paused for a moment, as if studying the trembling halfling, stanced to challenge it with a sword almost his own height. It tilted its head to one side. 

A bead of sweat rolled down Chilchuck’s face.

It pulled back its arms in one strong motion, and flung them at the sword, unconcerned with damaging itself. The sword was thrust from Chilchuck’s hands and clattered on the ground. 

He stumbled backward and tripped over Laios’ legs, falling to the floor next to him. 

He gasped, trying to gather himself, the stink of the rotting flesh choking him now that the monster stood only a step away from devouring them. 

He reached for the sword again, but there was already a hand on it - Laios’. 

Chilchuck was bent forward by the force of the tallman rising quickly to his feet behind him. He pushed Chilchuck back with a protective hand, and with the other he issued one great slash that cut the monster near clean in half. It fell into two writhing pieces on the ground. 

Chilchuck looked in awe and disbelief as Laios drove his sword though the undead’s skull. Its writhing ceased. 

“Laios,” Chilchuck sighed in utter relief.

“You good?” He said, pulling Chilchuck up by the hand before he could answer. 

He was about to speak, but a sudden frown from Laios stopped him. His amiable face creased in pain, and he brought a hand to his bloodied forehead.

“Woah, hey be careful! You’re hurt!” Chilchuck said, reaching for his arm.

Laios winced at the blood on his hand. “What happened?” 

“Old orc trap I'm guessing, modification of one of the dungeon’s original traps - which is why it set off differently than I thought. You got knocked down and the sound lured that thing.”

Laios looked like he was trying to listen, but his eyes screwed shut and his face was getting pale, he lowered himself a little to keep himself steady.

“Woah, woah, hey. You alright? You gonna pass out again?” Chilchuck held his arm tightly, trying to be reassuring.

“Shit, we need to get you to Marcille. Can you walk?”

“Uh, yeah, I think.” Killing the monster had clearly used up what little stamina he had, and with the danger fading, so was he. 

Chilchuck ran to retrieve the torch, which was mercifully still burning, and then back to Laois’ side.

“Come on.” He said, positioning himself under Laios’ elbow as best he could, to help keep him upright. He encouraged him to keep the other hand on the wall for balance.

“If you fall, I won't be able to catch you.” He said. Laios nodded grimly.

Slowly, they made their way back toward the meeting place. They had been around an hour into the maze when they’d encountered the trap, but they’d doubled back at several dead-ends along the way. By Chilchuck’s calculations it should only take them around fifteen minutes to walk back. At a normal walking pace. At this rate they were looking at around half an hour. 

Half an hour. They could do this - he tried to tell himself. But, Could Laios even walk for that long in this state? Chilchuck focused on the time, and tried not to let his anxiety leech into his voice as he talked to Laios, trying to keep him alert. 

“I hope Marcille and Senshi fared better than us.” Laios said tiredly.

“They probably found the exit already.” He hoped the optimism in his voice didn't sound too forced.

They made it to a marking near an old caved-in fountain. Chilchuck’s spirits lift. 

“Hey I know where we are!” He said excitedly.

“Only a little while longer okay.” The weight of Laios’ arm on his shoulder grew heavy in response, then heavier.

“Laios? Laios!” He looked up to see Laios’ face turning slack in the torchlight. The arm on his shoulder became a crushing burden, and pushed him to the floor as Laios’ dead weight fell like a crumbling pillar. 

This time as the torch fell to the ground, its light died.

-

Marcille was fidgeting with her staff anxiously. 

“They should’ve been back by now.”

Senshi nodded, and they agreed to go look for them. 

Following the corridor Laios and Chilchuck had gone down, they tracked the familiar signs of Chilchucks marking system, turning aside at the marks that denoted a dead-end. 

After some time, walking in anxious silence, Marcille’s light glinted on a shining figure slumped against a wall, and behind it were two eyes glinting in the dark.

“Laios!” Marcille ran up to him, only seeing the halfling behind him as she got closer. 

“Marcille?” 

Chilchuck was cradling the knight’s head to his chest, Laois’ limp form slumped against his small body, practically pinning him to the floor. 

She saw the smear of blood down Laios’ face, and on Chilchuck’s hands, his face was also smudged with red.

“Chilchuck! What happened?” 

“He hit his head, Marcille- I- It’s all my fault, he won’t wake up, you have to do something!” He said urgently. 

Marcille drew herself up, stood back, and began to chant. The magic flowed around her, she gathered it in the ring of her  staff, and gently touched it to the top of Laios’ head.

Laios immediately woke and let out a yell, grasping his forehead. The others sighed in relief, knowing the spell had done its job.

Laios finally settled, bent over his knees with his hands in his hair and let out a groan.

“Thanks Marcille.” He said in a grumbling voice.

Chilchuck let out a heavy breath, and let his eyes close for a moment. 

“Your turn Chickchuck.” 

“Oh, I’m not hurt.”

“Your hands-” Senshi pointed out.

“It’s Laios’” He said casually, pulling himself stiffly to his feet on aching joints. 

He suddenly felt all the attention in the corridor shift to him. His face heated up. It was already fairly red from fresh teartracks and he wiped at his eyes self-consciously.

“What! I thought he was dying!”

The air was knocked out of him by Laios lunging at him and gathering him up in a tight hug that made him wheeze. The knight was still a head taller than him on his knees, and Chilchuck found himself clamped to his metal chest.

“Thank you Chilchuck! You saved me,” Laios said in his usual corny way. 

Chilchuck feigned a struggle, but truly, he was too glad to see him safe to mind. He gave up the urge to preserve his image and resigned to the embrace, letting his eyes shut with a sigh. 

“You’re quieter when you’re unconscious, but I have to admit I like you better this way.”

“Aww, I knew you cared.” Said Marcelle, cooing. 

“Shut up.”