Hunter Or Huntress

Chapter 31: Under the Table

Tom had not proven much help, apparently, he couldn’t actually remember what they had done last night. He didn’t seem drunk anymore, it was like he was sick if anything his head hurt that was certain, But he had assured Sapphire nothing was wrong, so who was she to judge?

They had woken Shiva up. It seemed she was capable of remembering a bit more of the night’s activities. Apparently, Tom had begun questioning how you were supposed to fight a dragon. Shiva had tried her best in drunk as she was, to explain you often needed either another dragon, some very heavy siege weapons or you would have to go for death by a thousand cuts.

Tom had then exclaimed it would be so much easier to just use a canon. Of course, this sparked the interest of both Jackalope and Shiva and before long they had coaxed the human into telling them what a cannon was, including the stuff he called black powder, needed to fire it. Then Tom had tried to explain how that worked, given up, and elected to try and show them instead.

They had taken charcoal from the forge that stinky bird shit fertilizer Raulf had insisted on acquiring and sulfur from Apuma's alchemical supplies. When asked how they had gotten their hands on the sulfur Shiva had looked to Tom for a second, who just looked bewildered. Right then even when drunk locks were not a problem.

They had mixed the ingredients, but evidently, it hadn’t worked. Perhaps because nobody involved had been even close to sober. The three had been left to sleep off the worst of it and clean up the mess they had made, while the others went about dealing with the mess from the night before.

As they left, Fengi made her opinion clear on the matter

“Here we were thinking Jackalope finally found somebody crazy enough for her and we found them making weapons in the smithy with her mother instead. I don’t believe it.”

“Hadn’t Tom made it quite clear he didn’t want to teach us how to make weapons?” Kokashi was sounding as confused as usual when it came to Tom.

Sapphire joined in. “Well, he has either changed his mind or was too drunk to remember. I wouldn’t be surprised if Jackalope dared him to do it if I’m honest. Besides, it’s not like it worked.” The others were at least moving slow enough for her to keep up, even if it wasn’t exactly graceful.

“Do you think he can get it to work though?” Kokashi chimed in.

“I have no idea what he was even trying to do” Sapphire admitted, “but it seemed to involve fire and that strange powder."

“Think it’s like flash powder or something?” Rachuck added. He had a point there. if they didn’t have dragons they might have come up with an alternative.

“Maybe, but it didn’t look like he was trying to set fire to the place.” Kokashi seemed to ponder that one.

“The drawing was weird too, it didn’t look anything like his guns. I think it was just a part of it.” Esmeralda added.

“Do we have any flash powder?”Sapphire asked that might be useful for Tom if he was set on playing with fire.

“Maybe we don't exactly use that stuff regularly, but I’ll go check. Vulzan will definitely have some blitz powder though maybe that will be useful to” as Kokashi ran downstairs the group made it back to the grand hall, there was quite a bit of cleaning up to do. For once Sapphire was happy she was still on her crutches.

“isn’t that stuff incredibly dangerous,” Fengi asked

“Sure it is when dry you just store it wet for travel” Rachuck clarified

“Vulzan will be here for some time, no rush let’s find out what Tom is planning first.” Esmeralda concluded “For now there is work to do. I swear if Jacky wasn’t still too drunk to stand I would make her do most of this.”

“That sounds familiar” Fengi added with a sigh.

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Right okay, they knew at least somewhat what firearm was now, and depending on how much Jackalope and Shiva could remember, they had the rough recipe for black powder. This was once again not how Tom had imagined this would go but what the hell. Perhaps he should just roll with it?

The scoreboard of bad idea=great result was still holding up. Besides he had literally been sent here to change the world. he sat in the corner trying his best to come up with excuses for his actions, for quite a while his head still pounding. He had tried to go back to sleep but the headache put a stop to that. So he just sat there, eyes closed half asleep when he opened them to the sound of something moving.

He was greeted by Jackalope’s face far too close for comfort sitting staring into his eyes.

“Good morning” He tried

“ I’m cold” was all he got in response, she didn’t seem quite awake yet or maybe she was still wasted from the day before.

“Hi cold, I’m Tom” Why did he say that? Why did he say that! She just stayed there staring blinking a few times appearing to process what he had just said.

“No, you’re hot” She finally went then grabbed him by the shoulders pushing him to the floor. Tom was not quite sure what to do here, She was undoubtedly pretty and all, but Jesus Christ he wasn’t exactly ready for interspecies romance. He had weapons technology to ponder and an evil hangover.

He was dealing with a trained killer that had him beaten in both strength and natural weapons. Not to mention she was drunk. Best to just lay still and hope this all blows over. Hopefully, she would just go to sleep again.

Then she proceeded to curl up next to him folding her wings around him, letting out some contented sounding grumble, and seemingly falling asleep immediately.

Huh, so that had been literally hot… Pheew. Well, she had been sleeping on a stone floor maybe she was actually just quite cold. This wasn’t the most comfortable situation ever though. He was wrapped up on the floor like he was in a sleeping bag and there were sharp talons right next to his head jutting out from the top joints of her wings. He had already learned with the children that goggles were a good idea, especially at night. His eyelids weren’t tough like leather after all. Perhaps he should start wearing them at all times?

He wasn’t sure how long he laid there not wanting to move, aside from the talons this wasn’t too bad. It had been a while since he had any luck with the ladies back home. Even if this wasn’t exactly the same thing, it was still rather nice. She was cold though nearly as cold as the floor in fact.

He had just begun to enjoy the situation he found himself in, when he heard a loud raucous laughter coming from Shiva, apparently having woken up by now.

“Well, I see you got comfortable! What are you a hot stone or something”

“Kinda” Tom had to admit

“Shit that sounds nice actually” the laughter vanished replaced by contemplation

“No, this is my hot stone” Jackalope protested apparently not sleeping quite as much as she let on.

“Uhm, I have an opinion too” Tom tried.

“No, hot stone” Jackalope was clearly still rather drunk Tom thought. Shiva couldn’t be much better off… this was gonna be embarrassing he felt.

“Well sir hot stone, it would seem you are a goblin in a free fall” Tom didn’t even want to ask what that meant, but he would guess shit out of luck was an accurate analogy.

“But since you are awake mind explaining just what you were trying to do and why it didn’t work?”

“Uhm.. well I believe drunk Tom thought that fertilizer was Saltpeter. It isn’t, but I think I can make some with it.”

“Right, so it should still be possible?”

“Well yes, I think so”

“Excellent, you are gonna help me make one of these cannons” Okay then, that sort of settled the deal. She could remember more than him about last night for sure. Tom had the feeling Shiva was not one to be messed with either. Actually making a cannon wouldn’t be that hard if he could get the powder for it of course, But what good would an old muzzleloader do against a flying dragon, you would never hit the thing.

In an ambush maybe it could work, also what did she need to kill a dragon? It was several times larger than an elephant and those scales looked tough as old boots. Maybe a really big rifle would do the trick? But without modern powder that would be anemic at best. He needed a long barrel, large caliber, for the shot weight at least, and he didn't have any machining tools whatsoever…

That meant no rifling, no breech-loading, and no tight tolerances.

“Why need canon?” Tom knew quite well that the answer to that one was because why not, but hey.

“I need to kill a dragon of course”

“Uhm Archeon?”

“What no, of course not. I have another dragon that must die for what it did” Tom felt Jackalope tighten her grip around him for a bit. Okay, this was a family matter then.

“Not sure I wanna ask why, but...”

“We lost our home, Tom. We lost it to that piece of shit traitor. Nunuk fought in the defense of our keep, but against a rogue dragon with all the help he wanted, there was not much one could do. She helped those who could to escape and offered us a place here afterward, I took her up on the offer.”

“I see, what you mean rogue dragon and what kind of help?”

“The dragon was a fire-breather called Rhashan. It had decided that an incursion from the south by the bugs was the perfect opportunity to have some fun. So it offers its services to a doetna and he receives a small army of darklings to help him out.

“Uhm sound quite bad”

“Tom, do you even know what you were fighting two days ago?”

“Bad dragonettes?”

“No Tom, corrupted dragonettes. Corrupted by a doetna. Most likely at least, we call them darklings. A doetna is a hideous beast, not that I have ever seen one, but the stories of those who have are haunting, to say the least.”

“Corrupted?”

Jackalope spoke up now “It just needs to breathe on you to turn you. Every darkling was once a noble warrior or just some innocent person hiding. Piece of shit.”

“Darkling make more darkling?” Tom was really hoping this isn't some kind of zombie situation.

“No, they are made by a master and slaved to them we think. Though it is clearly possible to change the master afterward. Unfortunately, a doetna has way more than just darklings at their command, almost anything living and thinking can be corrupted.”

“Corrupted dragon?”

“It has happened but we think that has to be either voluntary or while the dragon is young. Otherwise, they appear able to resist the effects. Still every now and again another one is found, so it must be possible to make more.

“Making a cannon not sound like bad idea anymore” In fact, it sounded like Nunuk’s protest of trying to defend against all the bad things of this world was a more sound argument than Tom had thought. He just had to tell them about nukes so they wouldn’t question him… I’m an idiot, Tom concluded to himself.

“That’s the spirit.” Shiva let out.

“I just wanna see a big boom” Jackalope added.

“Big boom indeed,” Shiva concurred.

There was a content vibe to the room as the two dragonettes continued to half-sleep the effects off. Tom’s headache was even starting to recede somewhat. Perfect timing, he had a lot to think about. He still didn’t have what he needed for machine tools. He might be able to put together a lathe but that would leave him with precious little leftover metal.

The alternative was just making a cast smoothbore muzzleloader. If it needed to kill a dragon something like a 6 or 8 pounder might do the trick. But that would still only give a single shot in a fight. Maybe two if they got very lucky. If his recent experience was anything to go by that is.