* * *

The best case scenario for the second phase of the rescue mission would have been for the chaos generated by the rockets' bombardment to be enough to keep the residential areas completely unpatrolled by soldiers while they looked for, found, and escorted Jag and Jaina out of the fortress. Unfortunately, this is not how reality now presented itself. Mere seconds after passing through the entrance, the party encountered their first group of troll soldiers, which had spotted them coming up the path and were advancing to intercept.
Luckily, however, they had anticipated not experiencing the best case scenario and had a course of action laid out for just such circumstances. Marckus ran out in front of the party and, raising his hand up toward the sky, summoned Hammers of the Righteous onto three of the soldiers. Stunned in place, Serac and Jesiach then ran up and made quick work of the incapacitated trolls. Meanwhile, Koto and Voud took the flanks and took care of the remaining footmen. Their path clear once again, the party pressed on.
As they went on, it truly seemed as though the chaos had been short-lived, much to Voudka's disappointment. She was really hoping the trolls wouldn't pull themselves back together so quickly...but then again, maybe they were just meaning to give off the impression that they had. Regardless, there were obvious defense stations set up throughout the residential areas, and they would have to fight their way through as many as necessary before they found Jag and Jaina.
As they finished running up a staircase into the next level of the fortress, the party spotted their second guarding post. Koto immediately went into stealthed hiding, but not before giving the rest of the group a confident wink. As she crept cautiously over to the trolls, the rest of the group snuck back behind the staircase wall, in an effort not to reveal their presence...just yet. Koto continued making her way to the trolls, making sure not to make a sound. Normally, anyone would be hard-pressed to find Koto in a state of silence, but with her good friend Jag in danger and the party in general so close to reclaiming him, her mind was entirely focused on the present, on her job right at this moment, and it so happened that bubbliness and glomping were not a part of her job here. Playful taunting, on the other hand, was never explicitly excluded. So as she tip-toed behind the group of oblivious trolls, she uttered in a sly, teasing tone, "You can't see me..." The trolls immediately turned around to find the source of the eerie, female voice that just spoke from what sounded like right behind them, but it would have made no difference even if they had found Koto. She was too fast and already making her move. While still stealthed, she Sapped the tallest, ugliest looking troll of the lot (hoping it was the leader), rendering him immobile and debilitated. Seeing their leader dazed and wobbling with his head hung down (haHA! She guessed right!), they began swinging their swords and axes wildly. But again, Koto was too fast. She was already sneaking around to stand "in front of them", between them and the staircase. Holding in a playful chuckle, she then ran past each of the trolls, slashing her daggers through each soldier's ankles. Immediately, the trolls collapsed to the ground in incredible pain as she suddenly reappeared behind them. As they each in turn saw the night elf standing before them, they began to yell in outrage. They would have gone after her, but the pain in their bleeding ankles was so intense that all they could do was, well, nothing. They couldn't get up. Pleased with her execution, she whistled a brief melody and hearing it, the rest of the party walked out from behind the wall. Koto ran over to rejoin them, and as Voudka caught a glimpse of what her rogue friend had done, she said proudly with a big smile on her face, "Looks like someone might make a good High Elder yet!" Koto displayed a beaming smile as the group traveled deeper into the fortress.
They had made it a decent amount further into the fortress before they came across their next group of trolls. This time was different, however. This time, the soldiers were not scrawny footmen, but huge, hulking, monstrously muscular trolls...and they were running straight towards the party to apprehend. "That is not natural." stated Serac.
"Doesn't matter whether it is or isn't," Jesiach responded coolly. "They're coming this way!" The five of them spread out in a row to take up the entire width of the path and got into their respective battle stances. Jesiach suddenly shouted, looking to either side, "Serac! Marckus! Koto! SGS! Voudka, cover Marck!" Everyone knew what that meant, so they nodded in acknowledgement as Marckus and Koto ran about seven yards out ahead of the rest of the group. Koto blinked out of sight while Marckus stood in plain sight, clearly ready to do his part. As the troll mutants stampeded sluggily towards them, Marckus began to raise his hand towards the sky, in the same way he had earlier. When the group of stomping trolls had come close enough, Marck summoned a Hammer of Justice down on one of them, stunning the hulk immediately. Then, Marck stepped away. Once Jesiach had a clear view of the newly stunned troll, he used a Death Grip on him, grabbing him with what looked like a purple lightning bolt and launching him into the air and down towards where he and Serac were standing. Serac stood ready about a few feet in front of Jesiach, with his sword held outstretched in front of him with both hands. He watched as the mutant grew closer and closer, looking ever more menacing with each millisecond.
He was ready. He knew what he had to do. Once the mutant got within range, he'd swing his sword across the mutant's body, surely killing him. The troll wouldn't know what hit him, since he'd really just be coming out of the stun as he neared Jesiach and Serac. This was the plan, how the second "S" in SGS had been defined when the strategy had first been devised...but Serac was no longer feeling confident with his timing, not when this troll that was clearly at least three times as big and tall as him was about to come down right on top of him. Would he be able to pull it off?
"Maybe I won't have to..." Serac thought to himself, as he kept his sword out in front of him. Maybe he could redefine that second S... And so Serac stayed put, not changing his stance by even a millimeter. Jesiach noticed this and quickly grew concerned, but there was nothing he could do about it. The mutant was fast approaching and even stopping the Grip at this moment wouldn't stop the mutant from flying right into the two of them through its sheer momentum, knocking the two of them to the floor and assuredly, putting them in a position to get beaten helplessly by a physically recovered mutant troll. He was about to negate the Grip and try to pull the two of them out of the way when suddenly he heard the gasping and gurgling sounds of a dying troll. He opened his apparently half-squinted eyes to see the mutant laying on top of Serac's blade, the sharp point of which was poking out of the mutant's back.
"Impalement, eh?" Jesiach questioned with a wide grin.
Serac turned just his now blood-speckled head around to catch the expression of surprise and amusement on Jesiach's face. "I prehfer teh use the word 'skewered' mahself. It'll make fer better storytellin' in the taverns."
"Right." Jesiach said. "Well, we've still got some mutants to 'skewer', so let's get back to it, alright?"
Serac simply nodded, then turned around to realize he still had a mutant troll, now a dead mutant troll, laying on his blade. With speed that could only be matched elsewhere in the party by Kotonoha only when she's sprinting, Serac dropped his sword to the ground, dead troll included, and with his right foot firmly planted on the dead troll's chest, he pulled the blade out of the troll's mortal wound. He was now ready for another airborne mutant.
While this exchange was going on, Voudka was busy fending off a second mutant that had come after Marckus after he'd stunned the first one. She fought valiantly, dual wielding with a sword and axe with superb agility and efficiency. She looked like she was dancing a warrior's dance, evading and striking with precision timing. The dance, while a thing of beauty, was fleeting, as she was able to quickly defeat the mutant in this one-on-one combat duel. It was just in time to see another mutant suddenly stop in place, right where she and Marckus had last seen Kotonoha. With the mutant now standing dazed in place, Koto reappeared directly in front of him and waved with a big smile and her eyes closed. A second later, Jesiach yanked the troll up over Koto with another Death Grip, sending him into Serac's awaiting blade.
Another four dead mutant trolls later, the party was alone and ready to move on once again. "You know, as fun as this is," Marckus said, "we can't keep fighting off these soldiers forever."
Jesiach agreed. "You're right. Let's hope we can find Jagauric and Jaina soon before we actually do get worn out." With that, he and the rest of the group began to resume walking down the path in the direction they had been heading prior to the most recent attack. Everyone except Serac, that is. He was just standing still. He hadn't moved one step. And he was looking straight ahead, in the opposite direction.
"Is something wrong, Serac?" Voudka inquired.
"Ummm," Serac responded somewhat unsurely. "No...not exactly. Well...look. Do yeh see that lone hut with the one lone scrawny troll standin' outside?" He pointed straight ahead so Voud could follow it down to where he was speaking of. "Do yeh think that's worth checkin' out?"
"It's certainly worth checking out, Serac." she answered with more and more excitement in her voice as she spoke each new word. "Let's go."
She and Serac were about to start running right for the hut, thinking the other three would follow right behind, but they heard Marckus say, "Wait up! We need a plan."
Always the cautious leader.
"Bet Marckus." Serac went to argue. "There's just one stoop-"
Marckus interrupted him. "Yes, Serac. There's just one stupid troll standing outside. And what if the whole thing is a trap and there are five or so other footmen lying in wait inside the hut? Or two more of those blasted mutant abominations? What then?"
Serac wanted to respond to that, but he couldn't find any words to do so. Marckus, as always, was being very sagacious. "You're right," Voudka said. "We need a plan."
There were a few seconds of total silence before Koto spoke up. "I have a plan. But I'm going to need your help if it goes terribly wrong."