The Smiling Manticore, like most bars, was dimly lit with many dark
corners to hide those who didn't wish to face the light of day. Like
most bars, it had an assortment of shady looking customers sitting in
these dark corners going about their shady looking business. Like most
bars, it had a buxom blonde barmaid. Like most bars, there was betting
on just about anything - from games of skill to whether some young bravo
would get a kiss from the buxom barmaid.

Unlike most bars, it had a drunken hero sitting at the counter. Ok,
heroes were common enough in Caera, and when it came to certain breeds
of heroes - mostly the Tarbisians - drunken heroes were reasonably
common as well. What was uncommon about this hero was that he wasn't the
sort you'd normally expect to see sitting in a bar unless it was to very
vocally denounce some vile going on. This hero wasn't doing much
denouncing, in fact he seemed far more interested in mumbling vague
obscenities at his nearly empty bottle.

The bartender took in the scene at the bar. He had seen plenty of people
drink themselves into oblivion in his time, and his time as a bartender
wasn't all that long. In fact he really wanted to be a priest, but he
just didn't seem to have the talent for clerical magic. That beside the
point, a drunk at his bar was an easy to deal with, and rather
profitable situation. Judging by the scattered bottles, the hero had
already drained seven fifths of imported Mercant vodka.

As the bartender approached, he bottomed off the eighth, slammed it to
the bar and bellowed, "More!"

The bartender grabbed a bottle, but his priestly morales kicked in and
he paused, "Haven't you had enough, sir?"

The hero deftly plucked the bottle from the bartender's hand. He paused
to look defiantly at the bartender before opening the bottle and taking
a deep drink. "I've most certainly had enough, between a pile of
unbelievably bad luck, the worst case of undying enemies I've ever seen,
and just general lack of anything ever going to plan, I've most
certainly had enough."

He took another drink then continued. "I suppose I should tell you...
where should I start? Oh yes, we'll start with the introductions. My
name is Julian Kestrel, and this is why we're all going to die."

================================================
Saving the World Again
Chapter 19: Divided They Stand, United We Fall

Original Concept by Thomas Wilde
This Chapter by Freedom Colberg
================================================

"We arrived in Kussos a few weeks ago to meet with the Grand Druid, but
when we arrived at the temple here in town, he wasn't in."

The bartender nodded knowingly. "Yeah. He's like that."

"So we found out. Well, we were weary, and we'd fought hard, and damn
it, we decided that we were going to take a vacation while we were here.
I mean these beaches are beautiful, the only thing more beautiful than
them is my wife Arica." Julian glanced back into the bar as he said
this. "Anyways, after a couple days of fun in the sun, we decided that
it was time to get on with the business of saving the world from
domination, or annihilation, or whatever it is this fool Damane wants to
do. So we go back to the temple and ask after the druid...."

==========

"Immaculate white marble, why are all temples made of white marble. Not
just temples either, that floating citadel we encountered, that was
white marble too. The sunken ruins we passed in the modified Aqua
Terror, white marble. I mean where do they get it all. You'd think there
would be a shortage of something...."

Julian put a comforting hand on Arica's arm, "Calm down sweetness, we
need to find the Grand Druid and ask him how to defeat Damane."

The group had been wandering the temple for hours without encountering a
soul. After wandering a pillar filled corridor, they finally reached a
set of ornate double doors with a sign hanging over the handle.

"Vat's it zay?", Hans asked, "Ze writink iz too fancy for me."

"Anything other than ABCs for Barbarians is too fancy for you",
Darrow said.

Arica and Julian stared at it while Aquila impatiently watched their
backs in the hopes some ferocious beast might break the monotony.

"I can read it!", Catherine piqued up, "It's in an old dialect that I
was forced to learn. The tutor was a really stuffy old lady who felt
that I should constantly practice, I wasn't even allowed to ask
questions, I had to write everything down, it made my hand really
sore too."

"Maybe she just wanted some quiet", Darrow muttered to Julian.

Julian nodded slightly before speaking, "That's wonderful Catherine, but
we're really in a bit of a hurry, so if you could skip the history
lesson and let us know what it says, we'd appreciate it."

"Oh of course, silly me, it says 'The Grand Temple of Kussos is closed
for the season, we appreciate your interest, please come again."

"It says what?", Arica near shrieked, ripping the sign from the girl's
hands, "Wait, there's more on the back."

Catherine hesitantly took back the sign and read further, "If it is well
and truly an emergency, you can reach the druids in their great forest
hideaway."

"What kind of cruel joke is this?" Darrow fumed.

Hans looked puzzled at the sign, "Vhy didn't ve zee this sign when last
ve vere here?"

"Because last time we didn't make it past the foyer.", Julian said,
while placing a hand on Arica's arm.

"What could be more of an emergency than this, let's go find the
druids!" Catherine said.

==========

PiPis were a strange breed of Caeran wildlife most closely resembling
large strangely colored penguins. They have a unique role in the ecology
in that they never are found in the wild, and have been domesticated for
as long as history can recall. It is assumed that they are highly
intelligent, but nobody has been able to effectively communicate with
one, or decipher their strange musical language. They are gentle with
children, and seem to enjoy giving them rides, singing whenever they
have a passenger. They also seem to play a part in almost every hero's
story, as a mount, a savior, or a pet.

===========

"They're pink." Darrow stated.

"Well yeah, pink penguins do tend to be ... umm ... pink."
Julian replied.

"Yes but they're... pink."

"Right, well they are also the only creatures trained to carry travelers
to the druids."

Julian walked up to a PiPi, causing it to chirp loudly as it ran off. He
sighed and moved towards it again and got a hold of the PiPi, which
promptly ran off dragging Julian along with it. Julian let go and was
stealthily trying to sneak up on a different PiPi when a voice
interrupted him.

"You need a fiffle fish if you want to ride a PiPi."

Julian looked up and saw a guy in overalls chewing on a piece of grass.
He had a mildly amused look on his face.

"A what?" Julian asked.

"A fiffle fish. PiPis love fiffle fish, and if you give one to a PiPi it
will allow you to ride it. Well it's either that or you have to be a
virtuous maiden, pure of heart. Looks to me like you'd have more luck
with the fiffle fish."

"Sounds easy enough, where do you get a fiffle fish?"

The man's face grew into a big grin, "Oh yeah that is easy, just need to
go to the coast during the full moon, that's when they are spawning."

"Didn't we just have a full moon 2 days ago?" Arica asked.

"Come on, this is fun!" Catherine exclaimed from the back of a PiPi.

==========

Julian was interrupted at this point by shouts of anger. An argument
appeared to be breaking out over a game of daggers. A rather burly
looking man was attempting to regain face after losing rather badly to
Aquila.

"Well it's like this, you're a woman, see?"

Aquila stared at him.

"Well you're a woman, and woman, not being warriors don't have to train
in swordsmanship. I mean I see you carry a sword and all, but we both
know that it's just for show."

Aquila continued to start.

"So you have plenty of time to kill, not having to practice
swordsmanship like a true warrior. And a dagger isn't that far from a
kitchen knife, a 'weapon' all women are familiar with, so of course you
have time to practice at a game involving cooking utensils.

"Would you like me to show you how good I am at carving a pig?", Aquila
asked, then noticed Julian at the bar.

Ignoring the stammered response from the man, she advanced on Julian,
yelling the entire way. "Julian Kestrel is this any way for a hero to
act? It is time to get back to saving the world again right now!"

"There's no point, everyone was right. There's just no way to beat
Damane. We should just turn ourselves in to the heroes guild and get on
with our lives. A new chosen one will come along, and if not, the
villain had to win some time."

"The Grand Druid said that it was possible we could defeat Damane with
the splitting, do you want me to drag you onto a PiPi and get back to
the Grand Druid and have him tell you again."

Julian shuddered, "Thank you, no! I don't care to listen to those stupid
PiPis humming their moronic song to each other every step of the way."

Aquila walked over and grabbed the front of Julian's shirt and lifted
him. "Now listen to me, snap out of it, you are going to get your ass
off of that stool and be a hero again if I have to drag you out of here
myself!"

At this point two uniformed gentlemen entered the bar. After briefly
talking with the man Aquila had humiliated at daggers, they came over
and grabbed Aquila.

"Come with us ma'am, you are under arrest for disturbing the peace."

"Fine Julian, sit here and drown in self pity. I don't need you to save
the world, I'll just go off and do it myself!" Aquila shouted as she was
being led out of the bar.

Julian stared down at his drink until the bartender coughed politely.
Julian jumped a little and then shook his head. "Sorry about that, where
were we? Oh yes, fiffle fish and," Julian shuddered again, "PiPis. We
did get the damn fish and rode the PiPis to the Grand Druid's place in
the forest...."

==========

The PiPis stopped in front of a huge tree.

"This is it?", Arica asked, looking up at the huge tree. Right at that
moment a doorway opened in the base of the tree and a man in robes
stepped out carrying a clipboard.

"Oh hello, are you here to see the Grand Druid?"

"Yes we are," Julian said getting off of his PiPi, which promptly took
off. "Well it looks like we're going to have problems getting home."

"Goot think ve brought more fiffle fish", Hans said, dismounting. Hans
watched the bird run off. "I vonder vhy it iz zat they stop singink
vhenever ve get off."

"Maybe they're not singing, maybe they're complaining about how heavy
you are", Darrow  snidely replied.

The man in the robes ignored all this, glanced down at his clipboard,
and looked up at the party. "Well I don't see that you have an
appointment, did you -urk!"

Aquila placed the tip of her sword at the druid's neck looked at the
name tag clipped on his robe, and said, "Now 'Harrole', what was this
about an appointment?"

The druid looked down at his clipboard again and said hurriedly, "Yes,
yes I see it now, 3 o'clock appointment with bloodthirsty lunatics."

Aquila withdrew her sword and everyone followed the Harrole into the
tree. He led them to a great hall where the Grand Druid, a small little
withered man who didn't look like he was doing so well, was seated.

"Hello ... Mr...umm...Grand Druid sir. My name is Julian and these are
my companions"

"I know who you are, you must go defeat Damane now, while he's weak."

"Wait, we can defeat Damane? We were told that only the chosen one could
so that, and he died. We've been trying, that's why we're here. How can
we kill him?"

"You're the heroes, not me, but in case you hadn't noticed, Damane is
currently not in his own body. You must attack him now while he is
vulnerable, now go!"

"Now wait a minute", Arica said, causing the group to stop. "Isn't
Damane currently in the body of an eight year old boy?"

"Yes he is, that is why he is vulnerable, my child."

"I refuse to attack an eight year old boy, even if he is sharing his
body with a megalomaniac currently."

"Well technically he is over a thousand years old Arica",
Darrow pointed out.

Arica glared at him, "I am not attacking an eight year old boy."

Julian stepped in before this could get out of hand, "I agree with
Arica. Grand Druid sir, if we were to find a way to split Damane from
Jerry could he still be defeated?"

The Grand Druid thought this over.

"Yes, I believe you could, you would just have to make sure that Damane
did not make it back to his former body. He had left it behind when he
entered the Mecha body. He has still not made it back since his defeat
at your hands. Unfortunately, you did not defeat his soul."

"Harold, do you think that the professor would have anything that could
help us?", Julian said turning to Harold.

Harold, startled that anyone talked to him, or even notice that he was
with the group, stammered, "Yes, I believe he can."

Harold paused, looking worried. "Of course, you do realize that whatever
it is, it will be untested, and he's extremely likely to make a few
unrequested additions."

"We'll just have to deal with them then", Julian said. "Now that we have
a plan, let's go find those PiPis.

After the group left the room, Harrole scurried up to the Grand Druid.
"Why did you tell them they could defeat Damane when the chosen one
isn't among them?"

"They needed the encouragement, and a new chosen one will be found
shortly," the Grand Druid paused a moment. "It is odd that the auguries
haven't pointed out a new chosen one for us yet. One should have been
born as soon as the Tyler's soul left this plane."

==========

"You know", Julian pondered, half to himself, "I haven't seen Darrow or
Harold since the battle. Now Harold I can understand, he never wanted to
be with us in the first place. The only weapon he knows how to use is a
crossbow more likely to kill him than his enemies, and he's a bit of a
coward. Darrow though, this is exactly where I'd expect to find Darrow.
I wonder where he is, I do hope he's ok."

"I'm sure he's fine," the bartender responded reassuringly.

"Well anyways, we had Harold contact the professor to make us a device
to split Damane from Jerry, but we got more than we expected...."

==========

Harold had been in irregular contact with the professor via a rather
bulky looking transmitting device attached to his right wrist. However,
it had an unreliable power supply, which took long periods to recharge.
Fortunately, Harold was rather enjoying not having to put up with the
professor's requests and hadn't actually spoken to him in weeks, so when
the heroes decided to contact the professor it was easy, and unlike most
things in their lives, prompt.

The professor told them that he would finish the device as specified
shortly, and would then send it to them. He also informed Harold to make
sure that he did not remove the device from his wrist, as this would
interfere with the arrival of the device. While Harold found this to be
a rather ominous warning, he really didn't have much choice in the
matter, having tried to remove the device in the past, he found it was
quite firmly clamped on, and nothing less than the full focus of the
tools of the professor's lab had a chance of removing it.

It was nearly a month until the party was ready to face Damane. This was
not entirely due to the wait for the requested device, but also due to
the necessity of healing Harold after it's arrival from above, through
the roof of the building he was in at the time. Also the owner of the
Demonic Leprechaun, the building Harold was in, very politely, and with
the support of several armed thugs, requested that the heroes repair his
roof and pay him for his troubles. This was for the best however, as it
gave  Harold time to research the instruction manual that arrived the
next day. (As an added positive note, Harold was outside when the manual
arrived, and only received a mild concussion upon its delivery).

Now armed with the weapon that they hoped they needed to bring upon the
end of Damane's threat, and even avoid the slaughter of a young boy in
the process, our heroes set out for Damane's castle. It was not
difficult for them to locate, Damane, in his arrogance, had chosen to
set it up near Kussos so the druids could see how powerless they were to
stop him. Almost all of the residents knew exactly where it was, though
why they hadn't chosen to mention any of this until the party was
preparing to set out was an interesting question. Furthermore, well,
Brandomere and Damane had been busy with some very important plots,
leaving one Jerimiah Obidiah as the usual dominant personality. Able to
draw upon his full powers, and the resources of Rothschild Damane, he
resumed the type of experiments that brought about the doom of his
previous home. This caused much damage to the surrounding area, and a
lot of multicolored, but at least pretty, smoke.

==========

"Everyone have their part down? Catherine, Aquila, and Harold wait here
with the device while Arica, Hans, Darrow and myself head down to the
castle to attract their attention. Once we've gotten it, we run back to
this hill, luring them with us, and Harold activated the..."

"...Damane Disembodiment Device Mark III", Harold filled in.

"Yes that. Any questions?"

"Just one, what happened to the Damane Disembodiment Devices Mark I
and II?", Arica queried.

"Its probably for the best we don't wonder too hard", Harold said.

"Time to do some serious damage", Aquila said.

"I couldn't agree more", Jerry added.

"Well there goes the element of surprise", Darrow sighed.

"Harold, now!", Julian shouted.

Harold dove for the device and pushed a large square button, the machine
hummed, pointed several extremities in Jerry's direction, and expelled a
piece of lightly browned toast. The toast bounced off of Jerry's
forehead and hit the ground.

Jerry grinned as he picked up the toast and took a bite, "Mmmm, lunch,
and it's just the way I like it."

"Harold?", Julian asked.

"Sorry, that would seem to be the built in toaster, I'm sure I have it
this time."

The machine hummed much louder this time, a siren went off, and several
bright light beams struck Jerry. As the heros watched, the light beams
seemed to be drawing out the form of Damane. Then a louder siren went
off, the machine emitted some smoke, more light beams hit Jerry, and
they dragged out another form, that of Brandomere.

Julian looked at the three figures and blinked. He looked at Arica, then
back at the group of three, yes three figures. "I can't believe this, we
killed you!"

"How can you be here too?", Arica asked.

Brandomere just laughed and said, "That, my friends, would be telling."

"We still out number them two to one. Darrow, you and Hans take Damane.
Aquila, you and Catherine are on the boy. Arica and I apparently still
have some settling to do."

Everyone nodded, and the heroes entered the fray.

==========

The door to the bar slammed open. A little girl in a frilly pink dress
stood in the entryway. Upon seeing Julian, she rushed over to him and
began to frantically tug at his sleeve..

Tears sprang to Catherine's eyes as she began to plead, "Julian, we have
to do something about Mewly!"

  Julian brusquely brushed Catherine's hand aside. "I don't care about
Mewly, and frankly I think the world would be a better place without it.
I know my life would be easier." Julian turned back to his drink.

Catherine began to sob. "How can you say that, Mewly almost died
protecting us. I thought you were a hero Julian, I wanted to have grand
adventures and then grow up and marry someone like you. I guess I was
wrong. Well I'll find a way to save Mewly myself. After that we'll go
and save the world. Mewly and I are much better heroes than you any
day."

Overcome by emotion Catherine turned and ran out of the bar. The other
bar patrons stared at Julian momentarily before going back to their
previous activities. Julian did his best not to meet anyone's eyes.

"Seems you have a lot of heroic ladies in your life", the bartender said
softly, "I hope nothing happens to them."

Julian nodded slightly and pushed his empty bottle forward. Pretending
to search around, the bartender slipped a potion that was supposed to
sober up the worst drunk into the next bottle before passing it on.

"I guess I should let you know what has her so choked up...."

==========

The battle was going well for the heroes, hardened by their trials, and
with the advantage of numbers, it appeared that the villains were
doomed. Catherine had Jerry buried under a pile of daisies, Hans and
Darrow had beat Damane, who usually relied on invulnerability more than
skill into a bloody heap. Arica and Julian had beaten Brandomere before,
and while Julian didn't have Darkslayer, they still were more than up to
the task.

This was when Alder showed up. The demon had been lying in wait at its
master's request, and when the battle was going poorly joined in. Darrow
heard a loud roar, and barely had time to turn before the demon's charge
sent him flying. Hans saw his friend go flying and tackled the demon. As
the two of them wrestled, Damane crawled away and began to heal his
wounds.

Jerry took advantage of the sudden commotion to slip unseen from under
his flowery prison. Leaving evil Mewly to keep Aquila occupied, he snuck
behind Julian and struck him with a bolt of purple lightning sending the
hero sprawling. Arica ran to help her badly wounded husband, Brandomere
temporarily out of her thoughts.

Catherine who saw things were going badly, called upon Mewly to help
them, but she was already tired from the battle, and summoning her pink
friend brought her to the brink of unconciousness, this left Mewly to
hold the field alone.

Brandomere, Damane, and Jerimiah grinned. The heroes were exactly where
they wanted them. They began moving in strange pattern, chanting loudly.
A bluish tinge came over the world and they finished their chants as
one. "TRIPLE TYRANT TREAT!"

The world went blue, then white, then red, then black. Pure energy
rushed out draining the very life from the heroes. Mewly, realizing that
the battle was lost, and that Catherine wouldn't be able to maintain the
summoning much longer mustered its energy and cast a powerful spell, one
that it had only seen Jerimiah use once before. What Mewly didn't
realize was that with the once again mortality of its master, it was too
being affected by the life drain.

The party disappeared as one in a puff of pink smoke, shortly after,
Mewly vanished as the summoning wore off.

"They think they can escape me? Mewly is still my familiar, and I can
trace any magic it uses." Jerry uttered an incantation and disappeared.

On the battlefield, a demon roared and a chicken cowered unseen behind a
large piece of machinery.

Damane and Brandomere turned and looked at each other, realizing that
they both had to find a body to anchor themselves to this plane, or
they'd have a bit of explaining to do to their masters.

Damane grinned, thinking it was about time Herald moved out, and
disappeared, leaving Brandomere and Alder to stare at the ruin.

==========

"I guess that brings us up to now. Well that brings us up to this
afternoon. For some reason we survived, the villains left, and we were
able to make our way back to town."

The bartender finished wiping down the counter and looked up, trying to
come up with something, anything to say in response to this tale he had
just heard. He was saved by the bells, seven of them, woven into a long
braid attached to a huge well muscled man with a huge well oiled sword
slung across his back.

"Julian! Here you are beink. I vas beginning to zink zat you vere no
longer vith us. Rest is goot, but ve must hurry! I have saddled ze
PiPis, let us ve goink to save ze day!"

One could practically feel the effort Julian mustered to keep himself
civil to the barbarian, it wasn't enough.

"Hans, we lost! Can't you get that through your thick skull?! Arica is
barely coherent. Aquila is more likely than not in jail. God knows where
Darrow and that coward Harold are. Catherine has sulked off on some fool
quest to save whatever remains of Mewly. We're out numbered. We have a
demon we can't kill out there after us. Brandomere is back from the
dead. And we still have no clue how to even scratch Damane. Besides
this, we have an eight year old boy, who may be on the side of evil, and
I'm not up to killing a child. It's over Hans, go back to Tarbis."

Hans stood there in shock, the tone of what Julian had said stunning him
more than the words.

"I vas goink to say zat I have already found Darrow, even he iz villink
to give zings another try. I guess zat maybe ze stories were wrong, and
zat maybe it iz ve who vill be beink ze heroes. Goot-bye Julian."

With this statement, Hans von Gotrek turned and walked out.

The bar was silent. After a moment that felt like eternity the bartender
spoke, "It seems your friends are all still willing to try, are things
really as bad as you think?"

Julian smiled for the first time the entire evening. He dropped a pile
of gold in front of the bartender with a clink. "Maybe not, we'll see."

Julian gathered his things and walked over to Arica who was sitting in a
corner of the bar alone. The two of them made their way out of the bar
together, Julian assisting her. Right before the door closed, she leaned
against him and whispered, but all the bartender could make out was a
word that sounded oddly like 'bacon'. He pondered this briefly but
stopped when another customer walked up to bar and added to the pile of
coins.

"My name is Jason Stewart of SinBasInc, what can you tell me about the
man who just left?"

===============
AUTHOR'S NOTES:
===============

A while ago, as some of you may or may not recall, I posted saying the
reason I had stopped writing on Saving the World Again was that the
story seemed to have taken a different path than when I started writing
a year ago. After some deep soul searching, I decided that this wasn't
such a bad thing. Since many classic RPGs have the heroes suffer a major
asskicking before going on to triumph, I decided that instead of sitting
around in self pity because I couldn't write on a story I had grown to
love, I'd let our heroes do it for me instead.

This could appear to be a depressing chapter, but it isn't, Julian is
renewed at the end, and our heroes are ready to do what they do best.
Think of it more as a refocusing. Or maybe the Empire Strikes Back.

I didn't really include much from chapter 18, this is partially because
I decided to flash back to exactly *WHY* our heroes were vacationing
when they had a job to do, and partially because I just had no clue
where it was trying to go. Since GF's chapters are usually
comprehensible, if a bit wordy, I assume this is an inadequacy on my
behalf, and hope that future authors will be able to do something with
it.

Thanks to my girlfriend who helped me with fleshing out some ideas and
prereading. No thanks to my friends the Dugans who *still* haven't read
this story.

As always, feedback is practically droolingly begged for, and can be
sent to freedomc@mac.com.

==========

Bweeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

(Don't ask).