The Innkeeper

"God damnit, this is not what adventures are supposed to be like," Jack grumbled as he pushed away the countless paparazzi. Tiny-Sparkles, the unicorn suffering from dwarfism and the Jolly Ranchers first mate, snorted in agreement - though its snort sounded like crystal bells ringing, and glitter flew out of its nose.

Its' clear dissatisfaction was lost on the paparazzi, though, who could not get enough of the sparkling tiny horse and kept taking photographs with their old school cameras.

"No good deed goes unpunished, captain," said Ollie, who was seething with jealousy over the attention the unicorn was getting.

The crystal alligator, though, was just looking around curiously. It did not understand what was happening.

"There was a giant gorilla monster hanging from the building swatting down planes," Jack said. "What was I supposed to do? Ignore it? You know I love aerial dogfights with the Jolly Rancher. It was just one stupid monster fight. How we went from there to having Tiny-Sparkles become the brand ambassador for world peace is completely beyond me."

All around them were Orcs, massive and dark and, stated politely, not the best looking creatures Jack had ever seen. Like them, everything in this world was dark and colorless and beautiful on the inside, but definitely not on the outside.

Whatever world they ended up in, for some reason, was monochrome. Even Jack, his ship and the rest had also been affected by the strange noir aesthetic, and only Tiny-Sparkles remained unaffected.

"Captain, permission to hasten our journey?" Ollie requested as it spread its wings.

"No, Ollie, you cannot blow away everyone on the street. We're the good guys. Well, at least for now. Plus we still haven't figured out what that stupid tower wanted us to do."

Once all of them had been teleported, Jack saw a tower he knew too well. It was the tower of providence. But unlike his previous experience, he got no guidance this time in his objective. He was just told that a realm needed his help, and was sent over. Fighting off the giant gorilla Kong Kong would have been too easy a task, but one could hope. Unfortunately, it had not panned out.

Since then, Jack and the rest had been trying to explore the realm and see how they could help it. Somehow, in the process, they became known as heroes, and Tiny-Sparkles particularly became beloved across the land.

Eventually, though, the gang of heroes broke free from the crowd and got into their roofless limousine and were driven away. Each of them sighed once they left, though all of them had different reasons. In the case of the crystal alligator, it was just because it was copying everyone else.

"So what's on the agenda for today?" Tiny-Sparkles asked, his voice deep and buttery as always, relaxing and soothing any who heard it.

"Well, unless you want to accept one of your numerous marriage proposals, we're going to camouflage ourselves today and explore this realm a bit. We need a better understanding of the situation. We can't be randomly killing monsters everyday. For all we know, the monsters are the good guys."

"Captain, your fixation on the concept of 'good guys' is unusual and contradictory," said Ollie. "Do you not recall the time you put an entire nation of Jelly bugs to sleep to steal their supply of Gummy trees? You collapsed the economy of the place overnight."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Jack said, out right denying any such accusations. "If you want to say that I stole the trees, then show me where they are."

"Captain, you ate them!"

"Exactly. You have no evidence. Stop slandering me. Tiny- Sparkles, work your magic."

The unicorn's horn began to glow, before it shot out a yellow colored light that enveloped the whole group, changing their appearances.

Jack took on the appearance of an Orc child, though his body appeared to be much larger than he actually was, while the rest took on the appearance of various common pets. Once their appearance changed, Jack teleported all of them away from that place, appearing in the heart of the closest city.

"Follow me guys, I've already planned things out," said Jack as he began to navigate the nearby streets, avoiding the crowds of tourist orcs, haggling over the price of locally produced cudgels.

In only a few minutes they arrived at an alley that was almost empty, save for a single orc standing in a shadow smoking, wearing a trenchcoat.

"Are you Mr. Homes?" Jack asked, walking up to him with confidence.

"Maybe. Depends on who's asking."

"Someone with money," Jack responded, and flung a small coin purse towards the orc, who caught it midair. The soft jingle of coins clinking against each other sounded as he shook the purse before slipping it in his pocket.

"In that case, I am Mr. Homes. How can I help you?"

"I have it on good authority that a major catastrophe is about to strike, but I don't know what it is. Can you find out what it is?"

"Do you have any clues about it? Can you tell me who gave you this information?"

"I have no clues, and it doesn't matter who gave me this information. You just have to treat it as if it's real, and tell me if you can find out anything."

"Without any clues, it'll be tough to find the right direction for investigation," he admitted directly.

Instead of responding, Jack threw him another coin purse. This time, Homes smiled and threw his cigarette on the floor and crushed it beneath his feet.

"Come back here tomorrow at the same time. You'll have what you want."

The orc tipped his bowler hat, and then disappeared into the darkness. Or well, he tried. Since Ollie had a high affinity for shadow, it saw clearly the orc tiptoeing in the shadows, careful not to be seen by anyone as he left. The rest did not need to see him, for the smell of his cigarette still hung on his clothes, which meant it was easy to detect him.

"Are we really going to rely on him?" Tiny-Sparkles asked.

"Of course not. We have about 99 more detectives to hire. Let's go."