P. Power - Knight of the Realm

Neither man wanted to be bothered, but finally one of them walked off, coming back with a sergeant a while later. He didn't recognize Tor either. He also didn't seem to think much of his claim of being himself. His clothing was a bit dirty, even though clearly quality for all that. Really, Tor guessed, it was all about his being short. All these men were taller, most of the elite military were. They looked at him and thought “commoner”. Or more likely, “commoner piece of shit”, from what the first men had said.

“Sorry, we don't have anyone available to check out your claim right now, maybe after breakfast?”

Did people actually show up at his front gate claiming to be him all that often? Probably not, which meant that these guys were just pushing him around because they thought they could get away with it. Well, he wasn't in the military, and he was kind of short, but still… Tor nodded and stalked off. He'd just go through the gate around back entrance, he told them, getting another laugh.

“There is no gate in the back.” The sergeant said, obviously deciding that he was a crank or possibly insane.

“Not yet.” Tor grumbled softly enough that they probably didn't hear him over their own laughing.

That was, he realized, about the last straw. This was his house. They were just guests and he hadn't even invited them. None of them except Kolb's people and the ladies of industry, the whores. The military personnel had come in uninvited and set up shop. His house, his rules, right? Well one of his rules from now on was that no one kept him out. He had time to think about this while he walked around the outer wall, it took nearly ten minutes to work his way around to the back. Right in the center of the wall he stopped and took a deep breath, which caused his head to ache even more somehow.

Dropping into a deep working state he started building a cutter, a simple magical field that just told matter to go in two separate directions really, on a very tiny level of being. It had to be strong, but wasn't hard to make, not after all the building practice he'd had. It was one of the first things he'd done using direct effect like this. He didn't want to take time to build an actual device right now, so this one just hung in the air in front of his right hand, following it as a guide.

Holding his focus steady he cut through the stone wall as if through warm butter. Tor started with a half circle no taller than he was, then made a line on the bottom. The weight held it in place, but a line appeared where his hand moved. Then he bisected it, cutting the new door into several pieces. When none of the chunks looked to be bigger than his fist Tor let the cutter fade and waited for a second. Then he waited for nearly a minute. The cutter hadn't faded much at all. Heh. That was a strong field for one hastily built. He must be finally getting better at things like that, he realized. A small sign of mastery, even if it was a bit annoying right now.

Holding his right hand out so he didn't accidentally cut anything he wanted off his body Tor kicked the focus stone wall a little awkwardly, a stomp about three foot high. The first kick made some of the pieces slide a little, but it took a dozen more to open up a hole and about five minutes to move enough out of the way for him to walk through. It was five foot thick after all. The action made both his right foot and ankle, plus his head, ache. Whee.

Plus he'd have to fix the hole in the wall now, or make an actual gate back here. Tor decided to bother with that later, after he had some rest and got cleaned up. The cutter had finally faded, almost at least, so Tor just walked in, being careful not to trip as he made his way past the five foot long pieces of smooth red and black stone littering the ground.

“Stop right there!” A voice screamed at him forcefully. Maybe “scream” was unkind? It was a manly bellow maybe. Whichever, it made him wince, head throbbing. Ten military men stood around holding force lances on him. Ah. Still no one that knew who he was? What the heck was with that? Had he come to the wrong compound made of focus stone in the wastelands?

“Down on the ground, now!” The one in front screamed. Tor had a shield on, but no weapons. He let his mind turn to rebuilding the cutter, which sprang back into place almost instantly, though it wasn't very strong yet. That would come, if he had a few more seconds. He decided to buy some time.

“I don't think so. Put your weapons down and move out of my way. This is my house and I won't be treated this way here.” Tor knew his voice shook with rage, but the man in front of him didn't seem to care about his feelings at all. Kind of rude of him really.

“I said get down!” The bully in front screamed again, making Tor a little mad. He didn't care for people trying to bully him in general, and his tolerance for it in the moment was gone completely. The ache in his temples was too much to allow forbearance. It wouldn't have been a problem if they would have done what he said or even left him alone… So of course the moron in front tried to kick Tor in the stomach, because if you don't get your own way, don't bother trying to think, right? No just go right ahead and attack a man in his own house. Not that he was doing so hot in that department himself, thinking, but he had a reason for that. These men didn't, they were just morons.

The move cost the man his left foot as Tor reflexively blocked the move with the cutter field. The man didn't even realize his foot had been removed until he tried to set his leg down. A cutter wound didn't hurt after all, but the man, a captain if Tor recognized the little blob on his collar, certainly screamed loud enough when the stub hit the dirt. The raw wound had to sting a bit. The man crumpled to the ground and grabbed his leg, bleeding profusely.

Then, probably not realizing that Tor hadn't been attacking at all, just trying to defend himself, the remaining nine men opened up with their weapons. They turned out not to be force lances, but a variety of military weapons. No air chokes, thank god. Nothing they had touched him at all, so he started walking.

“I'm Tor you morons, stop attacking me and get this man medical attention! This is my house…” No one listened to him at all. He yelled it again. Finally he just decide to go home, the men screaming at him the whole time. At least one of the men, a private, had enough sense to get a tourniquet on the downed mans leg. None of the men had shields on for some reason, which was too bad for the captain, or he'd still have that foot. For a moment Tor wondered if he could fix it. The cut was really clean and if he could repair the field, like he had his own leg, would that work? He could try, if these morons would stop getting in his way.

They didn't though, trying to tackle him and getting more people to join in. What fun, let's beat up Tor! Finally voices started telling them to stop, first a female voice, one of Kolb's instructors, Petra. Petra Ward. Even if her brother and sister in-law had tried to poison him, she seemed all right. Nice even. Being cute didn't hurt either. After a few seconds she stood in front of him, and started knocking out anyone that came towards him. Less than ten seconds after that half a dozen combat giants took up position around him too.

“Stand down!” One of them, a huge man that stood at least seven-six and was a full Baron ordered the military men. “I said, stand the fuck down!”

“Tor…” Petra said softly, “What happened? Why are they attacking you?” She sounded baffled.

“They kept me out at the front gate, so I came back here and made a new one,” He gestured behind him. “Then they attacked me, probably for doing that, but it's my freaking wall, if I want to put in a new gate, I can. That one there, Captain moron? He tried to kick me, so I cut his foot off. I didn't mean to, acted on instinct. They're just lucky I didn't do the same to the rest of them!” His voice had moved into a half yell. He snorted as he took a deep breath through his nose.