21st Century Orc Read online

  CONTENTS

  Dedication

  Chapter One - New Beginnings

  Chapter Two - The Fuzz

  Chapter Three - Staredown

  Chapter Four - Idiot brother

  Chapter Five - Absolute Idiot

  Chapter Six - Interlude

  Chapter Seven - Elvenheim

  Chapter Eight - Inciting Incident

  Chapter Nine - Interlude

  Chapter Ten - Roomenya Drift

  Chapter Eleven - Ready?

  Chapter Twelve - Drive

  Chapter Thirteen - We're jagd

  Chapter Fourteen - The Fuzz... again

  Chapter Fifteen - Kiss my ass

  Chapter Sixteen - Interlude

  Chapter Seventeen - Not completely useless

  Chapter Eighteen - Exposition

  Chapter Nineteen - What to do?

  Chapter Twenty - I got it

  Chapter Twenty-One - Of Cops and Orcs

  Chapter Twenty-Two - Interlude

  Chapter Twenty-Three - Upgrades

  Chapter Twenty-Four - Second Chance

  Chapter Twenty-Five - Tension

  Chapter Twenty-Six - Interlude

  Chapter Twenty-Seven - Prep Time

  Chapter Twenty-Eight - Toretto Trials

  Chapter Twenty-Nine - Blood on the Asphalt

  Chapter Thirty - Rust, Dust and Guts

  Chapter Thirty-One - Tipping point

  Chapter Thirty-Two - Interlude

  Chapter Thirty-Three - Just like old times

  Chapter Thirty-Four - Thieves and orcs

  Chapter Thirty-Five - ...Just like old times

  Chapter Thirty-Six - Interlude

  Chapter Thirty-Seven - Recital

  Chapter Thirty-Eight - Ruins

  Chapter Thirty-Nine - Relapse

  Chapter Forty - Magic Fair

  Chapter Forty-One - Blight

  Chapter Forty-Two - Ten Minute Retirement

  Chapter Forty-Three - Lashing out

  Chapter Forty-Four - Interlude

  Chapter Forty-Five - Ready?

  Chapter Forty-Six - Ready as ever

  Chapter Forty-Seven - Grand Prix

  Chapter Forty-Eight - The Magnum Orcus

  Chapter Forty-Nine - Witness!

  Chapter Fifty - Epilogue

  To all those who supported me in this journey — through all the heart-ache and heartbreak, who encouraged me to write and publish my first novel. To my family, my friends, my teachers and, especially, Professor Potts. Thank you.

  CHAPTER ONE

  New Beginnings

  “My world is fire and steel, the pulse in my veins is the roar of my engine, and the path before me the road of rage.” - Anonymous Orc [Suspected Criminal]

  That night, the ghosts of Gore’s past caught up with her. While Gore worked on her car, her brother stumbled back into her life.

  Dragging a haze of alcohol and drugs through the garage door like always.

  Finishing up the modifications on her car’s underside, Gore ignored those leaden footsteps, those stumbling steps like she always had. This time, however, Gore reached for a weapon. Her olive-green hands, stained black with engine oil, wrapped around a socket wrench. She would defend herself.

  The footsteps stopped and Gore slid out from under her car, rising to her feet, ready to fight for her life. Like always.

  “Nice car. Haven’t seen this baby in a long while,” said her brother, raising his hands in surrender as he walked around the cramped garage. Calm eyes slid over Gore’s car, pausing on the muscle car’s exposed supercharger. “The Magnum Orcus. Still missing the core, I see… I remember stealing the engines over a decade ago. How did we do it? Was—”

  “What are you doing here, Bones?” demanded Gore as she advanced on her older brother, smacking the socket wrench against her palm in a quick tempo.

  Though Bones stood taller than most, Gore didn’t look up to her brother. Only down. Their eyes met, naturally grey irises flaring against pitch-black sclera. Though, as Gore and Bones glared at one another, the orcs’ eyes changed to red, matching their emotions.

  Blinking, Bones turned away and paced to the edge of the garage. Yellow light flickered over tattooed skin, long shadows spilling from his scars, though most of Gore’s brother hid under a ragged overcoat. Sucking on a pipe, he said, “Come on. No love for your older brother? Look… I need your help.”

  “No. You threw that chance away years ago,” spat Gore, at the edge of shoving her brother out of her garage and her life once more. Not again. She couldn’t let her guard down again. “Get out. I got classes in Elvenheim tomorrow.”

  “I’ve changed,” said Bones, eyes diving black, voice soft as he looked to his feet. “I’ve changed. Please, you’ve gotta believe me, little sis. I can prove it. Just give me a chance.”

  Gore rolled her eyes and snarled, “Ha! As if! You come into my home smelling like you bathed in drugs and alcohol for weeks. Just like last time!”

  “Hehe… wrong on one count, little sis…” said Bones, taking his clockwork pipe out of his mouth, twisting bronze gears between his claws. “Been sober for a month already. I gave the bad stuff up. The alcohol. The women… well, haven’t had much luck there anyway…”

  “Must be hard to find a girl who can take a punch,” growled Gore.

  Chuckling, Bones blew a mouthful of smoke into Gore’s face.

  Waving the vapors from her face, Gore snorted in disgust and curled her hand into a fist.

  One thing. Her brother claimed to have given up one Blighted thing.

  One thing couldn’t change a lifetime of woes. Couldn’t heal over a decade of scars. And most definitely couldn’t make Gore change her mind.

  “Get out,” she hissed, jabbing her hand to the road. “Get the jagd out before I splatter your brains against the ground.”

  Stuffing his pipe full of black shells, Bones spoke through a crooked smile, “Come on… we’re family… just one chance, that’s all I need.”

  Of course. Of course, Bones would play that card. Squeezing her eyes tight as if she could shut her brother out of her mind along with her sight, Gore crossed her arms, breath ragged, considering her options. She growled as the engine within her roared to life. Bones’s very presence added fuel to the ignition, maddened fire curling within her fingers.

  Then the Magnum Orcus rumbled, shaking the ground.

  Blood before water. Her mother’s words echoed in Gore’s mind as she opened her eyes. She glanced at her car. Fingering her wyvern bone earring, Gore looked her brother in the soul and sighed, “What do you need?”

  “Mostly a place to stay for a little bit.” Bones licked his lips and scratched his neck. “You see, I just got out of the ‘university’ and all my old haunts are gone.”

  “No surprise there. Too bad the cops didn’t throw away the key.”

  “And well, now, I know a guy who knows a guys who knows another guy who was sucking another guy’s—”

  “Get to the point,” growled Gore, pointing at Bones with her socket wrench.

  Bones licked his lips and glanced about, eyes wild as if he could see a hundred eyes peering through the cracks in Gore’s crumbling garage. Then he leaned in close, murmuring, “You see, a lot of people —and I’m not gonna name any names but you know them— are real interested in this year’s Underground Grand Prix, the Warchief’s Blight Festival. So if I could just borrow your car and go to Roomenya—”

  “No!” hissed Gore, almost smacking her brother with her wrench right then and there. “This is Mom’s legacy. There’s no way in the Blight I’m gonna let you ‘borrow’ the Magnum Orcus for some piss prix! Why are you even interested in this stuff anyway?”

  “Oh, come on… We were always g
ood at racing. Good enough to make the Toretto Trials with Cousin Kalask.” Gore shuddered, her tusks turning ice-cold, her grip around her wrench slacking. “But you see—”

  Before Bones could finish, howls ripped around the street corner. And a split second later, all the windows along the street closed, lights turning off. The two siblings glanced as one, then locked eyes, exchanging the same thought.

  “Blight…” said Bones, rubbing his temples as he took another draw from his pipe. His face almost melted as steam rushed out of his ears. “The Fuzz found me…”

  “What’d you do this time?” demanded Gore, glancing at Bones and then at the Magnum Orcus. She grit her tusks as her mother whispered in the back of her skull again. Family before all else. Even the world.

  Bones opened his mouth to reply.

  But as she strode past him and pulled down the garage door, Gore growled, “You know what? I don’t wanna know. Argh…” Gore shook her head. “Just hide.”

  “Does the Magnum Orcus still have the secret compartment?” asked Bones, ambling over to the back of Gore’s car.

  “Is that even a question?” demanded Gore as Bones popped open the trunk, tossing out a few spare parts and a piece of the floorboards to reveal a cramped compartment underneath.

  He smiled and started climbing in.

  “Ah… this brings back memories. Remember when I used to sing you to sleep in here?” said Bones, curling under the floor boards as Gore strode over to him and pulled the floorboards over her brother. Then she closed the back. Bones’s voice echoed through the hood. “Used to be big enough for both of us.”

  Except the two children grew up, Gore reflected as she strode over to the driver seat of the Magnum Orcus. She, leaning in through the window, keyed the ignition. The engine purred under her touch, sending a cloud of fumes into the air, covering Bones’s stench with the scent of gasoline.

  Just in time too.

  For a split second after Gore turned on the ignition, someone started pounding on the garage door and barking, “Open up! It’s the police!”

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Fuzz

  Lovely, Gore cursed to herself as she glanced down at herself, at her mechanic jumpsuit and her bandolier of tools. Nothing too threatening. No reason to get herself shot or ripped apart by the “protectors” of the law. Gore rubbed her hands in a halfhearted attempt to clean away the oil. She glanced at the little scars she’d carved into her own skin.

  She just loved pain. Didn’t she?

  “Open up, you damned imbeciles! Open up in ten seconds or I’m gonna bust down this door! One!” roared the cop, voice muffled as though he spoke through a cavern of fangs.

  Impatient asshole. Gore sniffed the air. Gasoline and a slight tinge of Blight bug bit her nose. But the Blight bug faded under the gasoline. Good enough.

  “Two! Three! Four! Fi—”

  Gore opened the garage door to reveal a cop glaring down at her with a oversized pistol held in his oversized paws. His right pupil contracting in the garage light, nostrils flaring at the contact with the gasoline, the cop hissed and stepped away from Gore for a split second. He raised his claws into the air in a vain attempt to ward of the smell.

  Heh, Gore smirked with malicious glee as the cop stumbled back. Turned out having the enhanced senses of a werewolf bit the cop in the ass. Or in the nose, at least.

  “Asshole!” snarled the policeman, regaining his bearing with difficulty, shaking his head and sneezing. He stopped sneezing, glaring at Gore with murderous intent for a brief moment. Any other person might have pissed themselves looking at the one-eyed cop, at the fierce goblin acid scars running over his left eye. Gore just twitched as the cop raised the pistol at her. Then the cop continued his fit. “You jagding asshole!”

  “What seems to be the problem, sir cop sir?” said Gore, pretty as she could. As in not at all. Sarcasm dripped through her facade.

  The cop shook his head, shifting into a four legged form for a minute before rising up to tower over Gore in a hybrid form between elf and beast. Damned beast blood, Gore noted to herself, taking away the one advantage orcs had over the pointy eared bastards. She tried not to tremble at the sight of the cop looming above her. She didn’t stare at the gun in his hands, or at the claws or fangs that could rip through her body in less than a heartbeat. Instead, she stared at the blue uniform and the badge glinting silver in the streetlight.

  “It’s Officer Riles, ma’am…” Somehow the cop managed to make “ma’am” drip with malice and pure contempt. “And I’ve come to investigate a report that a wanted criminal by the name of Bones Tornfar has been spotted in the area. You haven’t seen any sign of a… suspicious person wandering around this neighborhood, have you?”

  The cop gestured to the other apartments, concrete blocks leaning against one another on the brink of collapse. A house of crumbling cards. Full of orcs and other undesirables. Gore raised an eyebrow. Then the cop turned back to Gore and stepped forward.

  What did you do, idiot? Gore gnashed her tusks, willing to leave her brother to the terror moths if anything happened.

  Then her mother’s words echoed in her mind once more, “Family before all else. Even the world.”

  And Gore could only curse herself once more. But beyond her mother’s words, another voice rumbled to life within Gore’s heart, coming from a lifetime of experiences. A matter of principle really, saying, “Jagd the police.”

  Gore could not let some overgrown pup walk over her.

  “What?” demanded Gore, eyes glowing deep red with rage, deciding to stand her ground and go on the offensive. The cop stepped back, raising an eyebrow. “You think just because I’m an orc, that I’d automatically know where a wanted orc criminal would be?”

  “Um… no. I think you might know something because you’ve obviously been working in your garage at this hour.” Officer Riles pointed at the oil staining Gore’s shirt as he smiled. He sniffed the air again. “By the way, bad idea to leave the garage door closed while your car’s running… hmm… Nice car, too. Almost too good. Sure that supercharger’s legal? If they’re not, I’m gonna have to take you in. And they don’t treat she-orcs well in the ‘university’…”

  “Sure, they’re legal,” said Gore, glancing out of the corner of her eye at the supercharger as the fire whirled within. Or at least, the supercharger was supposed to look legal. “I got the papers…”

  Then a noise came from within the back of the Magnum Orcus. The noise of a match striking, flaring and then sizzling. Gore almost rolled her eyes in utter exasperation.

  Jagding idiot brother.

  No problem, Gore told herself as she glanced out of the corner of her eye at the growling supercharger. The noise barely rose above the rumble of the engine. And—

  “What was that?” asked Officer Riles, leaning around Gore, sniffing the air once more.

  “The engine. It coughs once in a while,” bluffed Gore. She prayed to her ancestors that the cop would be like the rest and take the bait. She reached into her pockets for a bribe.

  Nope.

  “Ma’am, I’m gonna need to take a look into your apartment,” growled Officer Riles as he cocked his pistol and shoved Gore to the side. “Step aside. Or I will shoot you.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Staredown

  “Get a warrant,” said Gore, determined, eyes steeling silver as she stepped back into the cop’s path.

  “Haha… good joke, Ma’am. Now step aside so I can search the premises. If you have nothing to hide, this will not harm you.” The cop cackled. He pointed the pistol at Gore’s forehead, right between her thick eyebrows.

  A single shot. A single pull of the cop’s fingers would end Gore’s life before she could even blink.

  It would be so easy just to let him past her and blame Bones. Let the cop drag Bones to jail. Let him take her brother out of her life.

  But her principles would not let anyone walk over her.

  “No,” growled Gore. The cop
raised an eyebrow at Gore’s words, cocking his head to the side as if he could not quite understand what came out of her lips. “I know my rights. I know you can’t search my legal residence without a warrant. Now. Get. Out.”

  “I don’t need a warrant with Greenskins,” said Officer Riles, looming over Gore, licking his lips as he leaned in close.

  “Where’s the warrant?” demanded Gore, crossing her arms and planting herself in the concrete.

  “I would not do that if I were you…” The cop smiled.

  The cop’s fangs edged within an inch of Gore’s face, saliva dripping from his lips onto her eyes. A beast of war stood before her, violence begging to be unleashed, just a second away from massacre.

  She did not flinch, didn’t even blink an eye.

  Instead, Gore said, “I’m a student at Elvenheim.”

  “So?” the cop smirked, caressing Gore’s gaunt cheeks.

  Gore slapped his claws away as she snarled, “The law professors there have fought to advance Orc rights for half a century. They’ve won cases impossible to even take into court. And if they hear one of their students has became a victim of police discrimination… well, then you’ll have awoken the dragon.”

  Taking a moment, Officer Riles blinked, realization dawning within his hollow skull, and then cursed, “By the Leaf…”

  “You sure you want that lawsuit?” This time, Gore smirked. She almost believed herself. “You sure you want to be that cop?”

  Just to be sure, Gore pulled out a little wad of cash from her pocket.

  The cop hissed as he turned away, placing his claws on his hips as he spun around, trying to come to a decision. All the while, Gore held her breath, praying to any gods out there to her in her moment of need. Or at least not punish her like always.

  At last, he made his choice and spun around to face Gore.

  “Hrgh… You got lucky this time, Greenskin,” growled the cop as he leaned in, licking his lips, claw tapping her chest. He snatched the money from her. “But next time…”