Rainbow’s vision was blurry, but after what had happened before he was knocked out, this was understandable. Wait, what was it that happened exactly?

“You there! Rablin! How dare you steal from me!” yelled the familiar voice of a lizardwoman he was despising more and more by the second. Oh right; Rainbow teamed up with an old gnome to get the pearl back, but ended up getting knocked out instead.

“Yeah, I’m really in a position to steal right now,” the rablin sarcastically replied. His vision was getting clearer; Liz was standing next to him with her two daggers drawn while her two lizardman goons watched the door.

“Oh, shut up. Now tell me what I want to know or I’ll kill you!” the enraged Liz screamed.

“How am I supposed to do that if I’m not talking?” Rainbow knew he wasn’t helping his own cause at this point, but he was really annoyed at this point. He figured this woman was going to kill him as soon as she got what she needed anyway, so why not annoy her fi...wait, what was that?

As he had to deal with the shrill voice of the lizardwoman who was yelling at him again, the rablin noticed other voices too. And these weren’t lizardman voices either; mostly humans, with a boarman and an elf thrown in as well. It was somewhat difficult to make out what they were saying, but the words “strike,” “thief” and “prisoner” were discernable. Whoever these people were, they were on his side by virtue of being against the lizardwoman.

The ear on his head really wasn’t just for show.

“...and you’ll tell me NOW!” 

Oh right, Liz would kill him if he didn’t start sharing [i]something[/i] of use. Time to calm down and play along until help arrived. Well, the gnome had betrayed him, so he deserved whatever Liz would do to him and then some.

Rainbow started. “Well, this old blindfolded gnome man-”

Liz interrupted him “With a walking stick?”

“Yeah, he was a real-”

Even with the events that had preceded this interrogation, this new piece of information made Liz even angrier than before. In her most disdainful tone yet, she uttered a single name: “Scer’Pi’Kenes.” The lizardwoman didn’t really have time to say anything else as the Thorn City Army charged into her base immediately after that. Between their training and the lizard leader’s yelling, the Army had done a good job of gaining the element of surprise.

Liz could see that she was outnumbered by at least five to one, so she ran to a trap door and escaped, but her two comrades were not so lucky. Try as they might to fight, they were caught by surprise and overwhelmed, so they were killed by the Army in short order. Rainbow found it very satisfying to watch.

One young man who was with the group noticed the injured rablin and yelled to his leader. “Captain! Come quick, there’s an injured rablin here!”

A man who was apparently the leader of this squad made his way inside the treehouse. “A rablin? No way, I’ll believe it when I...”

And as the rest of that saying goes, he did see it, so he believed it. “Wow, you weren’t kidding! A rablin, way out here, whodathunkit. Alright son, you and Johnson help the rablin and get whatever info you can from him. Everyone else, follow me!”

The soldiers did as instructed, following their leader out of the base and out of earshot.

“Are you okay, sir?” the soldier asked as he untied the rablin.

“I’ve been better, thanks for saving me” Rainbow responded.

“No problem. Can you tell me anything about Liz or what was happening?”

“Of course, but can we do it while we move? I [i]really[/i] could use a doctor right now.”

“Oh, I’m sorry!” the man responded, flustered at his own apparent insensitivity. “Here, I’ll carry you. There’s a hospital nearby I can take you to, if you’d like.”

“Thanks,” Rainbow replied as he got picked up by the man, “but I know a better place. Can you take me to 182 Blossom Street instead?”