Bukaru loses her footing and slips down to the bottom of the rope.
Meanwhile, the Orc stares at Ben confused, but he understands the bullet in his gut just fine and grunts in pain.
The Orc decides to run off, but it doesn't get very far before it collapses and dies.
The Orc swinging his falchion takes one final swing at Jake. But its swing is wild and off-balance. He seems to life the blade one more time, before he simply falls backwars. He's dead before he hits the ground.
The last Orc seeing himself alone also tries to run away. But like his comrade, he doesn't get very far before succoming to his wounds.
[ooc]Orcs at the top are all dead.
***
The Giant Orc's knees are ripped open by the Steel Dynamo, Gizmo. And then a beautifully placed bomb from Loveless burns her in a spectacular blaze of arcane fury. The good Doctor's aim must have improved as this time, Leland's mechanical marvel is spared.
But the Giant Orc is not through yet.
"Die!" it cries out before dropping his mace onto Gizmo.
The Orc's strike is true, as he utterly destroys Gizmo with a single crashing blow. The force of the mace shakes the ground and all those around it. Gizmo gives off a stuttering mechanical whir that sounds like a death cry before lying very still.
Doc growls as he sees Gizmo go down (though, thankfully, not by his own hand this time).
"Brother!" he shouts to Leland. "This is for Gizmo!"
In a flash he raises a phial to his mouth, rips loose the cork with his teeth, and knocks back the contents. Moments later he pulls another from his pocket, slams it against his leg, and tosses it after a brief shake.
Jake saw the three orcs drop, and frowned. He looked at Ben with a questioning expression. Ben had gutshot the one facing him - that made sense. But the other two?
Still, he wasn't the kind to look a gift horse too closely in the mouth. So he tucked his flail into his belt, picked up the falchion at his feet, and proceeded to make sure the orcs were, in fact, dead.
As he did, he glanced over at the big ugly thing that had just smashed the steam animal. Then he looked at Ben again.
"You think they can handle that thing, or do we gotta get all heroic again?
As the magical ties binding Gizmo to this plane of existance give way, Leland gives of himself, to keep him in the fight.
He casts another spell, and suddenly an oily slick seeps up under the giant's feet.
Saved from the brink, Gizmo attacks again.
Pleased to see the giant orc distracted by Gizmo and not advancing on herself and the Doc, Mallory takes more careful aim this time, and fires a shot right into the creature.
"You think they can handle that thing, or do we gotta get all heroic again?
As nonplussed as Jake by the sudden deaths of the orcs - maybe the Mustang heard me, he thought with a twist of his lips - Ben lowered his increasingly heavy sword and turned to look over his shoulder.
And saw what the fight with the orcs had been distracting him from.
"Bells of Perdition," he swore, stepping back from the cliff hurriedly. It looked like something out of a drunk's nightmares. At least the giant seemed busy with the rest of the "caravan guards."
"I don't know about you, Lonergan, but I don't fancy gettin' heroed by takin' on a giant, even if they write a nice poem 'bout it on my tombstone," he drawled, concentrating hard on his accent. He bent and used his sword to see to it that the orc that had nearly killed him wouldn't be rising again this side of Judgement Day. No sense in not being careful.
Not hearing the sounds of battle from above anymore, Bukaru cups her hands to her mouth and shouts "What is going on up there? Jake, Ben, are you ok? Come over to the edge of the cliff where I can see you!"
Rustler's black boots, woman, don't bring its attention on us! Ben thought with an alarmed glance at the giant orc. His first inclination was to duck behind some rocks and clam up, but he suspected that Buckaroo would likely keep yelling until someone responded.
"We're all right," he called back down, his voice strained from trying to be loud enough to hear and soft enough not to be noticed by the giant at the same time.
A splash of arcane fire burns the Giant Orc, weakening it enough for the renewed Gizmo to close in for the kill. The mechanized marvel runs up the Orc's back, and sinks its teeth into flesh, and violently twists its neck.
The Orc comes crashing down with a wet thud. The wounded Gizmo stands upon the dead Orc's form, triumphant. A few moments later, the body shrinks.
Doc gives a satisfied nod, eyes sparkling as they reflect the flames still licking at the fallen orc's form.
"Don't that beat all," Ben said as he limped up behind them, having managed to climb down the rope at an excruciating pace. "That contraption's still standing, right in front of the Doc and everything." His grin was ruined a bit by how pale-faced and sweating he was.
As he waited for Lonergan and Bukaru, he added, "I reckon we oughtta clear out of here on the double, in case the orcs had friends watchin' who are, at this very moment, runnin' off to tattle on us to their tribe." His eyes flicked along the canyon walls, and he mopped his face with a hand. "I got no wish to tangle with orcs hopped up on crazy-juice."
Despite his wounds, his hands were steady as he reloaded his strange gun.
Once Jake and Ben are near Bukaru, she heals them (and Gizmo, too, if he's still low on HP - I guess by now the concept of his being heal-able has gotten thru her head) :
HP
As he waited for Lonergan and Bukaru, he added, "I reckon we oughtta clear out of here on the double, in case the orcs had friends watchin' who are, at this very moment, runnin' off to tattle on us to their tribe." His eyes flicked along the canyon walls, and he mopped his face with a hand. "I got no wish to tangle with orcs hopped up on crazy-juice."
Despite his wounds, his hands were steady as he reloaded his strange gun.
Jake had made the trip down the wall without nearly the trouble Ben had exhibited. He'd decided tossing the bodies down made more sense than trying to carry all of the weapons. It also ensured that the orcs weren't faking their condition. 'Efficient,' that was Lonergan.
"Well," he said, as he riffled through the pockets, "let's make sure there ain't anything left behind to help lead those friends to us, neither."
Leland is pretty pale, but his colour perks up a bit after Bukaru's channel."Ya Dalton, wonders never cease. Let's clear the dead dino to get things moving again."
"Don't that beat all... that contraption's still standing, right in front of the Doc and everything."
"Not at all," says Doc coolly as he puts away a phial he'd readied. "The situation on the train was critical and demanded that calculated risks be taken." He shoots Ben a loaded look and adds sourly, "At least partly because of a crazed gunslinger causing delays by threatening certain folk."
"At the time of the... incident... I was operating under the influence of a powerful mutagen," he says as he watches Jake casually tossing orcs over the cliff. "It gave us an advantage over Scalping Jack, but has the unfortunate side effect of crippling my intellect and common sense. A downside I hope to eventually engineer out of the formula."
"At any rate, it's one of the reasons I resort to that drug only in the most extreme of circumstances. This," he says, casually waving at the fallen orc behind him, "was a cakewalk. There was no need for such a drastic measure."
"Besides," he says upon hearing the summoner's comment, "I did give fair warning that I was about to become... dangerous."
Bukaru will ask the others whether they would like perhaps one more healing now, in order to be better prepared for other attacks during the day, or wait until we camp and she could heal everyone up to full at the expense of not having much to offer during any night attacks. Or some combination. She lets everyone know she can heal 5 more times before she sleeps.
Jake finished going through the fallen orc's pockets, having tossed everything he found into a pile. Then he stood up, looked around the area, and nodded at Leland.
"How do you think we should do that?" he asked, gesturing at the smoking pile of what had become a couple thousand pounds of barbeque. "Looks heavy - and hot."
Anyone who is low on HP gather round Bukaru :
The Gang puts their back into moving the carcass of the triceratops as far off the road as possible. It takes some doing, but the Caravan is up and running soon after.
Miss Wen offers Ben some additional healing.
-Posted with Wayfinder
Ben nodded his thanks to Bukaru as his wounds knitted, but when Miss Wen approached him, he seemed downright jumpy. "Much obliged," he muttered as the last of his injuries dissipated, keeping his hat low over his face.
While the others sought to deal with the dead triceratops, he slunk off to do some looking around.
Jake had felt his wounds close and his aches disappear the first time Buckaru had channeled her healing energy, so he didn't bother himself with gathering around in a circle like the others had. He wasn't sure how the gnome - Leland, he thought his name was - had got himself in such bad shape. Jake hadn't thought he'd seen the little guy in any of the fighting, but it was always possible that Jake'd been a might distracted by his own part of the business.
While the others worried about healing and divvying the loot, Jake had fetched some rope from the wagon, and convinced one of the drovers to unhitch a team and help with the roadblock.
When all was said and done, Jake had a shiny new heavy mace hanging from his belt, the caravan was on its way, and Ben had disappeared. Jake frowned, but decided that the man who'd stood toe-to-toe with those Orcs, when he could have left Jake to his own fate, was unlikely to have run off.
Still, best keep eyes open. Just cause he didn't run off don't mean he ain't gonna git himself kilt by another ambush.
Jake did his best to follow his advice to himself, though he still wasn't used to traveling with others, and found himself somewhat distracted by the noise and movement of the group.