Beachhead

JURNAL:

TIAN MONASTRY

Somthing is wrong. 

The munks came to me and told me I needed to get Kory and the JUSTICAR. They hav been talking in a diffrent room. 

I think it may be bad. I smell feer a

[The entry stops abruptly here.] 

The alarm sounded, and Cael rolled out of her bed, out the door before her mind was fully awake, grabbing sword, shield, and- a new addition to her arms- a double bladed spear. Sleeping in her armor was uncomfortable but, as it turned out, a good idea. The invasions came one after the other now, wreaking havoc indiscriminately. 

A mage, pasty-faced with exhaustion, threw open a sloppy portal for herself and the other fighters coming from barracks and wherever they stopped to rest until the next invasion. She handed him her canteen wordlessly before she stepped through it, one hand on her blade, her wolf baring teeth and snarling. 

She remembered the Justicar’s words, as her body ached from use and abuse, as her tired gritty eyes feverishly blinked away sleep and the smell of fel hit her, a slap in the face. 

The screaming and burning unnerved her before. Now, she was used to it. Cael located the nearest demon and threw herself at it, golden eyes ablaze. 

“All of you here, gathered in the most frozen continent of the world, I ask you: Will you fight?”

[Written in worse handwriting than usual, with worse spelling than usual, on a charred piece of parchment:] 

JURNAL: SECRIT

Evrything is bad and wrong. Koryander [scratchout] had to go back. She sed there were demons. I did not understand. We hav killed demons before. But Kory told the JUSTICAR that she should go to [scratchout] STORMWIND insted. I went with her to help. (She is VERY larj now.) [scratchout]

STORMWIND was bad. There were demons [scratchout][scratchout] evrywhere. I met her son Taran. We got him to saftee back in PANDARIA. [scratchout][scratchout] The munks were verry worreed. I am verry worreed. I do not know what is going on. There were so many demons. 

I think the JUSTICAR and Kory know. I want to ask but [scratchout][scratchout][scratchout] I am afrayd. I do not know if I am scarred they will or will not tell me. [scratchout]

I hav packed my bags agen. I think I will be leeving [scratchout][scratchout] soon despite not having lerned evrything yet. I have put the litl pink [scratchout] tree in a bigger pott. 

The munks are coming I must go

-CAEL

Her swordhilt slipped in her grip, slick with green, the same green matting her fur and coating her shield. And still, they came. Even as she distapcted the last of this wave, more of the endless demonic army, heralded by wingbeats like thunder and a booming, terrible voice, landed to reinforce the lines. 

She loved it.

Or a part of her did. 

The wolf hadn’t seen this much combat -this much knock down, drag-out, no holds barred, no quarter given, relentless, merciless combat- in forever. It howled with joy just under her skin as she almost elegantly slew a felhound charging her and kicked it into the small infernal on her left. 

The lessons of Pandaria seemed far away here, in the battlefield, where her left boot squelched as it stepped into what remained of a ribcage mixed with voided bowls and she barely noticed. She barely noticed. Cael knew death and violence and carnage. She knew the indignities of injury and death. But this…. 

Light’s and Goldrinn’s fucking teeth, what could possibly prepare for this??

Hard to believe just a few short hours earlier, she was sitting in a meeting in the Keep, learning the King was dead and the world under siege by the literal forced of darkness with Kory and Mosur and all the rest. 

In the breathing space afforded to her, seconds, nothing more, she latched on to those memories, anchoring herself.

Anthai, her disturbingly racist and fanatic tendencies. Cael agreed, but there would nothing to take revenge ON if the world was burning in green felfire. 

Marshall Walkinson, an idea, hope. Fel crystals, she remembers. The source of their power. Go after them. 

The staggering idea that these fucking things didn’t fucking stay dead, but returned to the wherever it was to come back next time. It didn’t hinder her wolf, but how did you win against such a force? 

The earth shook as the dreadlord landed, and a concerto of battle cries rose from the ragtag defenders as they surged en masse toward the demon, Cael leading the front.

“Will you fight without end-“

Tanaris, sand scalding her feet mixed with ichor and gore to make gunk that sticks to her and dries hard as rock; using her sheild as a makeshift sled on the dunes to rocket toward one towering demon and take him by surprise, leaping up, stabbing him in the neck. Goblins screeching about their wares. Really? Dead and dying in a chorus, darkside echo of the mortal’s defiance; the freezing cold of the desert, like a frozen corpse in Northrend, as fighting went well into the night before the demons were repelled.  

“-sunrise or sunset-“

Orcs at the Crossroads with spittle flying and murder in thier eyes rushing past her to engage not herself but the enemy; she almost flinches, almost falters, almost, almost loses it completely at the sight of a fleeing green back (huntkillmakethempayREVENGEKILLTHEM), but wrenches her attention to imps currently setting a troll on fire; the screams will stay with her for days; sun and smoke burning her eyeballs. 

“-even when your shield is shattered and your bones broken-” 

Tarren FUCKING Mill is almost the end of her, in more ways than one. The Forsaken are everywhere. So are the Templars and other Alliance forces. The wolf, berserk with blind fury, threatens to rip control from her, keening for blood. Thankfully the dreadlords are massive hulking delightfully obvious targets for the rage pounding behind her eyeballs, threatening to burst the dam. It’s all a blur of chaos and the taste of blood in her mouth and the burning in her arms and the pain, the pain as a backhand blow sends her sprawling and snaps her leg like a child’s broken toy, armored greaves notwithstanding. A priest, whose name she doesn’t know, throws healing on her. Cael throws back her spare canteen, still full, all she is capable of in way of thanks for speech is beyond her, and picks herself up, and fights on. 

“-I ask you: Will you fight?” 

The creaking, groaning crack of an ancient on fire ends in a massive thunderclap as the leader of this wave breaks the guardian of the forest underhoof. It goes down swinging, giving the defenders time to mobilize night elf glaive throwers to great effect, but at the same time, two fell reavers dropped from the sky, blaring destruction in a teeth-clenching noise of pure terror. She’s running on autopilot, bleeding from several minor cuts and one not so minor clawing on her arm from a felhound, all ignored as she hacks savagely at the ankles to bring the demon down. 

“When I ask whether you will fight, I know that you have fought already. I know that you have seen some of the enemy thusfar.”

[On a sheet of crumpled, dirty paper, written poorly, with no outline, with several wrinkly circular areas, as if it had been rained on:]

Blackwald [scratchout] is gone. 

All Esre hears is water. He was at the shors and they had [scratchout][scratchout] hevy losss and he is gone. 

A lot of people are gon. I cannot [scratchout][scratchout] find Mosur. I need to find him I need to I have to becus if he is ded

[This section is mostly scratchouts and ruined ink smeared with some type of water.]

Blackwald is ded too and so is the [scratchout] King and that is important but the King was not my fren and he is DED and I 

[scratchout][scratchout]

[scratchout]

[More ruined ink, and heavy scratchouts.] 

“What I am asking of you is whether you will do it again.” 

I need a mount. 

Warhorses, griffins, wyverns, even more exotic things like dragons and some great, bipedal, scaly lizard THING with far too many teeth threatened to outpace her as the defenders moved together to the next target. Cael kept up on foot, worgen fleetness keeping her abreast of them, but it would be highly ignominious to trip, fall, and be trampled to death by the Alliance forces defending Westfall. She made a note in the back of her head, and then it was gone, as the demons came, howling obscenities, and she did, too, silent but for the eyes that burned molten copper and the snarl twisting her lips, baring teeth. The sword was new, whistling as she whipped it through the air. Her last one broke on the back of some great armored whateverthefuck that was. It took three mages and herself to kill it, and only one mage was left by the end. 

“And again.”

Too close, too close, much too close, some part of her gibbers hysterically as she is yanked back to the real world by a tauren druid with glowing hands. The corpse in front of her still steamed deliciously, tempting, she didn’t get breakfast or lunch because she was in the Eastern Kingdoms fighting some flaming bitch commander woman and she’d only had time for half a cup of cider before the call went out again and her wolf, her wolf- 

She jerked away, hastily backing up, and looked for the next target. 

Cael found it in a doomlord, and her world narrowed once more. 

“And again.”

Slash, block, hack, swing, deep stance hold hold HOLD against the blow turn axe slides off overbalanced KILLTHEMEATHIERHEARTS up under the chin yank free- and she’s on to the demon at her left, harrying a hunter and his snowy cat thing. Cael guts him from nose to navel. 

“Tirelessly-“

Roll with the impact ow ribs ribs ribs INTRUDERSINTERLOPERSMYTERRITORYMINEKILLTHEMKILLTHEMBLOODBLOOD pop up move leftleftLEFT gogogogogo take them down- Cael barrels shield-first into a pack of felhounds approaching a gnome warlock, crashing into them like a bowling ball. 

“-without pause-“

BANG BONG BANG BONG BANG BONG! rang the claxon, and Cael almost knocked over the bench she was laying on, on arm thrown over her eyes, as she scrambled to get to the portal. Sleep would wait.

“-keeping the invasions at bay-“

“They’re bearking the line! They’re- aaaAAAHHHHGGG!” the watchman screams as he’s immolated from the inside out. Ash gets in her mouth; she can’t eat for hours after, it’s all ashes and blood, ashes and blood. 

“-and sending the first wave of our enemies back to their shadows.”

[Written in fur-smeared ink, with a number of suspect smudges, blood drops in the corner, and smelling faintly of copper and sulfur:]

JURNAL: I have lost trak of numbrs

WESTGUARD

It is called the [scratchout] Legion. They are very bad demons who want to kill and invad evryone. They are verry verry verry VERRY bad. 

The [scratchout][scratchout] Draeni culd not stop them. They had to leeve. 

This is not good. 

I am scarred. It is a lot. I [scratchout] am not redy. The demons do not care. The wolf is wild and wants blood. 

But I have oths. I swor. I made the choice. I want to be a defender like the JUSTICAR and Mosur and [scratchout] [scratchout] Blackwald thinks I mite can be. I culd not do evrything in Pandaria but I will manij.

I am verry tirred. Writing is hard when tirred. Did you know your ibals burn somtime when yur tirred? I have been fighting a lot and when I am not fighting I try to [scratchout]  eet and then help delivr things. [scratchout]  I asked peepl if they had spair things to plees giv them to me so I can giv it to the peepl who lost howses and things. 

Sleeping in my armor makes my [scratchout] nek hurt. The cook gave me a pillo so it does not. She has soop always now on the fire and bred and chees. I am not the only one [scratchout] tirred. I smell bad, wich is funnee. I hav nevr had lots of baths before. I nevr cared befor how I smld. [scratchout] [scratchout] I wuld try but I am scarred of the alarm when I am in the bath. 

Going to try to sl 

alrm by

-CAEL