Section F: Fairy Tales & Physicists

Chapter 29

The Fields of just twenty-four hours ago would have been appalled. Appalled by the colossal column of rippling green light towering behind him. Appalled by the bevy of bizarre beasts arrayed before him. And appalled to the absolute outer limits of his appallability by the merest speculation of even thinking about daring to consider fighting just one of these monstrosities.

But that Fields was gone. That Fields was history. That Fields had long since vanished into the inter-dimensional ether, washed away by an ongoing, incessant onslaught of one unbelievable, incomprehensible occurrence after another.

In his place was a new Fields. A vastly different Fields. A Fields that was a whole other kettle of fermions. An encroaching horde of freaky beasts? Beastly freaks, even? This new Fields took on the whole lot without a moment's hesitation, grinning like a madman as he did so.

It wasn't bravery. It wasn't foolhardiness. It wasn't even insanity.

It was, quite simply, an overwhelming, irresistible and monumental desire to just bloody well hit something.

There was such a joyous purity to it, thought Fields, as his fist broke the nose of the pig-wolf. Such beautiful simplicity, he reasoned, ducking under the grasp of the siren, while simultaneously punching the crotches of two more of the encroaching beasts, hoping fervently as he did so that said crotches contained something worth punching.

No more humiliation, he exulted, while leaping over the crumpled forms of the two beasts, their crotches indeed having proven pleasingly susceptible to a good knuckle-dusting (pleasingly to Fields, anyway). No more confusion, he reflected, dropping the pre-plastic-surgery-orc with a roundhouse kick to the head, before diving into a combat-roll, just as two more attackers charged him from either side, managing to knock each other unconscious with a brutal, crunching head clash.

No more being pummelled by Peregrine, no more Featherstone-induced befuddlement, no more codpiece assault and battery by Embers. No more feeling lost, no more feeling confused, no more feeling completely and utterly, Mariana-Trench-level out of his depth.

No more.

That was then, this was now. And now was nothing more than the next beast to battle. The next creature to fell. The next monstrosity to punch right in its stupid, fat, fairy-tale face. Now was purely and simply the fight. And while Fields may not have been much of a one for theoretical physics, while his mojo may not have extended to quantum cats and interdimensional diplomacy, he sure as hell knew how to fight.

And so, it appeared, did Peregrine. Although somewhat distracted by his own seemingly never-ending series of opponents, Fields couldn't help but become aware of his partner's...activities. Her very enthusiastic, very loud, very rapid, and—above all else—very violent activities.

Having been on the receiving end of the 'friendly' variety of Peregrine's physicality, Fields supposed he shouldn't be surprised by the more antagonistic version proving to be a little brutal. And he probably wouldn't have been, were it just a little. But it wasn't. It wasn't just a little brutal, at all. It was a lot brutal. It was brutal taken to a level of brutality Fields had heretofore been unaware of. And kind of wished he still was.

The genial Peregrine he'd come to know and...well, to know, was transformed. The carb-loving, joke-cracking, wasabi-wielding weirdo was gone. In her place was some sort of diminutive, unruly haired, completely terrifying beserker-banshee-barbarian cross, seemingly devoid of any semblance of human restraint.

She gouged eyes. She kicked crotches. She clawed, she slapped, she head-butted (and knee-butted and elbow-butted and butt-butted and butted with things that Fields hadn't even realised could be butted with). And she did it all with a manic, ferocious glee he could scarcely comprehend, accompanied all the while by an ear-splitting selection of squeals and screeches, interspersed on regular occasions with an emphatic, guttural "Ha!"