Chapter Text
Barry Bluejeans wakes up in a cave. The last thing he remembers is the horses spooking, falling to the ground, and gerblins gathering around at the edge of his vision as everything faded to black.
All of his bones hurt.
There's a hand guiding him up and he jumps, coming face to face with a beautiful elf crouched over him, glancing somewhere behind him as if keeping an eye out for trouble. He gets a hit of overwhelming relief for just a millisecond seeing them with blurry eyes before it really kicks in how bad everything hurts, and he grimaces.
There's a cheerful-looking dwarf with a hand raised to slap him again and the elf sighs as they push his hand down, and Barry looks between the two dazedly.
He doesn't know either of these people, and he's beat to shit, but before he can come up with any response a healing potion is pushed into his hands by the elf, who just looks impatient now, and as the dwarf gives him a cheery thumbs up he figures he can't feel any worse and downs it.
"This is- this is wonderful. Thank you." He immediately feels clearer as the potion takes effect, the small, stinging cuts on his face healing over and the bruising on his tailbone fading to a dull ache, and he sits up properly and stretches.
"Thank you, you kind soul. I will never ever forget this kindness you've done for me," Maybe he's laying it on thick, but it was a really good healing potion, and he's energised. Those gerblins really did a number on him. "-my name is Barry J. Bluejeans, and I'm ready to KICK some GERBLIN ASS. Where'd they go?"
A third head pops up in his vision and a ginger human man, who seems more familiar than the others, appears from where he's rifling through Barry's possessions chest.
He's actually very familiar, he realises, and gapes as Magnus 'The Hammer' Burnsides, silver medalist to Neverwinter's Hot N Spicy Challenge three years running, trots over cheerfully (they do that a lot, he's realising. These adventurers seem far too excited about this gerblin cave) to see what's going on.
Barry Bluejeans, gold medalist to Neverwinter's Hot N Spicy Challenge three years running, sees the lightbulb flick on when Magnus recognises him.
More accurately, he sees the fighter's jaw drop.