Rocky all Over the World
So we began our careers in service to the academy; a few minor missions, nothing terribly worthy of record here, we were however joined by a fourth compadre so could now engage in productive pastimes such as playing bridge. So who was the final point of our compass? A ruggedly handsome warrior perhaps, or a sly and cunning elven sorcerer? Perhaps another jif for Pablo to argue spelling with? No, Aleav is, well, a blob. Yes we’ve been reinforced with a plasma creature, an amorphous jelly like mass whose resting state is a cylinder roughly seven feet long and two feet in diameter.
In order to minimise offence/ confusion/ disgust/horror from onlookers, Aleav normally assumes humanoid form. To avoid inter species confusion, (and probably a lot of unnecessary violence) Aleav is unable to communicate, although of course my telepathy enables me to hold conversations with him, usually about how disgusting in appearance he finds non plasmoid creatures with their oddly, brittle inflexible bodies which make them unduly fragile and prone to damage. (Not that he finds this a problem).
A fighter type, his body makes him highly efficient in combat as he (if indeed the term is correct as plasmoid reproduction involves total body merging followed by an explosive separation into many offspring.) is what we in the trade call an extremely tough cookie.* His physique also means a reduced vulnerability to certain attack forms, including piercing weapons, acid, poison and withering sarcasm. His somewhat frenzied combat techniques reflect a somewhat barbaric outlook on life, and I’m not sure if he breathes exactly, as he tells me he can remain underwater for up to an hour with ease.
*Or possibly jelly baby
His body can contract to around and inch width to slip through small cracks, though the massive great sword he habitually carries would obviously be a problem in such an endeavour, nevertheless his combat skills without his sword are pretty impressive. Although I cannot discern organs of any sort in his translucent body, something gives him a visual capability, even in darkness. For those of you not already sufficiently grossed out, his party trick is to extend a tentacle-like pseudopod up to ten feet from his body, which certainly livens up any visit to a crowded bar or tavern…*
*Readers wishing to know his point of origin are advised that the planet Bhal is the celestial body to delete from your star charts.
Anyway despite the occasional issue caused by Pablo’s hungry hippo appetite and lack of moral compass, Aleav’s prejudices against any race unable to mould itself into a mark 16 interstellar toilet bowl,* and Elethiel’s drinking problem, we manage to perform our missions in an exemplary fashion: a delivery here, a troublesome alien eliminated there, life is good. We decide, on reflection unwisely, to enjoy a well-earned rest on the delightful planet of Toril.
*Breaks the ice at parties
Well, we bestow our patronage on a little bistro near the docks that proclaims itself as the home of the finest Torilburgers and Torillean Throat Ale. The talk around the tables that spill into the road outside is all about the plentiful deluge of falling stars that have graced Torillean skies for the past several nights. Depending who you listen to, these are thought to be:
a) Shooting stars, one of the great spectacles of nature
b) Invaders from the planet Zog- look there’s one at that table over there nicking nuts off the bar with his ten foot tendril
c) Just a normal side effect of three or four Torillean Throat Ales.
d) A warning of imminent disaster from the gods some sort of plague is coming, we’ll all be wearing face masks this time next month you mark my words and may that wall over there be blown down if it’s not so.
One far-fetched story seemed a little more concrete than others, although possibly unrelated: A burly blacksmith was telling anyone who would listen that the bakery next to his forge had been badly damaged when a strange crystalline rocky ‘spike’ smashed its way up through the floor and front wall. He called on disbelievers to see for themselves, Mrs Miggin’s bakery would be playing no roll* in the city’s bread industry for some time.
*The blacksmith was a bit of a comedian in his spare time
Suddenly there was a deep rumbling sound, but before we could look accusingly at Pablo, the ground began to shake and a distant sound of crashing and splintering drew our eyes towards the city centre. The noise and shaking grew and some people, fearing a ground quake ran into the street as several unsecured items toppled off tables or fell from window ledges.
Now something appeared over the rooftops, a huge serpent-like projection of crystalline rock looking very like a giant version of Mrs Miggins’s nemesis. It was difficult to gauge its size but the volume of the noise caused by the destruction it was wreaking suggested it was a good distance away, which meant it had to be well over a hundred feet tall, and still it surged upwards.
The motely group of sailors at the next table, having carefully evaluated the behemoth’s size, position and demeanour,* the amount of liquor remaining in their glasses, the proximity of the landlord and lack of any members of the law enforcement community in the vicinity, decided to move off smartly, summed up by their ringleader’s cry of ‘Back to the ship lads!’.
*Angry about something it seemed.
Sounds of panic and terror much closer reached us now as more tendrils of rock began bursting through the street. These rock serpents were human sized duplicates of the distant towering monster and they lashed out at fleeing citizens with grappling crystalline tentacle like horrors. Noting their crystalline structure I cast a shatter spell, badly damaging three creatures as well as the adjacent building. Pablo with his unfeasibly dexterous skills shinned effortlessly up a drainpipe and somehow merged his frankly hideous bulk with the roof tiles, I don’t know how he does it and I’m a chameleon.
From his perch he hurled a force grenade, blasting one creature and a luckless human. Elethiel picked off a couple with her deadly bowmanship* and Aleav, taking a leaf** out of her book, piled in killing two more in a frenzied attack. But then, all of the fallen crystal worms rise up – they regenerate/ were not harmed at all/ enjoy toying with their opponents/ All of the above, #invincible bastards.
*bowelfship?
**Been dying to get that in
Pablo throws a second force grenade from his improbably invisible hiding place aloft, but this one is a dud. Elethiel damages another opponent with her sacred flame and I fire off a thunderwave, damaging three but they seem immune to the force aspect of the spell. This unfortunately unexpectedly leaves me in attack range of the creatures. I withdraw rapidly calling on my comrades to do so too, our only advantage appears to be speed. Pablo, who has become grenade happy* throws a third damaging five creatures and killing another civilian. He also injures Plasma Boy, who seems to shake it off with little concern.
*Possibly a tribute to Kev of blessed memory, who never threw one grenade when two would do
I use a magic missile, downing one and Elethiel and Aleav bring down others, but the four ‘dead’ quickly re arise to menace us again. Aleav is surrounded but not too bothered, seemingly enjoying a good scrap. Elethiel firing her bow manages that legendary achievement spoken of in hushed tones when tales of horror, terror and stupidity are told in the dead of night wherever adventurers congregate, namely a double one to hit.
Pablo shoots one grappling a civilian with his musket, an acid splash from me again ‘injures’ another, but we all fall back, Elethiel leading the way, Pablo hopping from roof to roof. Aleav actually picks up a citizen and still outruns his pursuit despite his burden, indeed he can run faster carrying someone than most of the crowd.
We put some distance between ourselves and the horrors and arrive at the docks, which are thronged with crowds of frightened Torilleans. A galleon and two longships are at the quayside, but a dozen escapees from an ugliest goon convention are preventing access to the galleon explaining the non-accessibility of the said vessel to the crowd with the aid of various clubs, whips, knuckledusters, billhooks and daggers.
A red headed figure with two bodyguards surveys the scene from the poop of the galley. A woman we later will know as Captain Elena Sartell bellows out ‘That’s my ship!’ Pablo from his rooftop meanwhile has decided to take matters in hand. Using his autorifle he delivers a tremendous shot against the red bearded target, critically injuring him. He falls and is dragged back into cover by his bodyguards as Pablo drops to the ground.
The crowd, startled by the shots and brutal beatings they are receiving, pulls back a little and I take advantage blasting a fireball into the centre of the thugs, badly injuring nearly all of them. They are now easy pickings, Aleav and Elethiel take out several, I kill three with three magic missiles, Pablo meanwhile is going for the ship, using his superb athletic skills he leaps from the quayside onto the deck. Which turns out to be a lot wetter than he expected, mainly because he fell short ending up in the sea. Still he did get a 5.9 from a passing Torillean judge.
Crimelord Traveus (our red bearded friend) has been taking some healing and re-emerges to defend the gang plank, but one of his bodyguards spots the bedraggled gif that is Pablo, who has clambered aboard the bow of the Moon Dancer and is now looking at scaling the foremast, no doubt to fulfil further sniper/ grenade tossing ambitions. Aleav and Elethiel face off at the gang plank and I sleep the bodyguard with Traveus, freeing Elethiel to shoot the bodyguard chasing after Pablo. In another fine display of the targeteer’s art, both her arrows bite home, although there is a minor hiccup.
To be fair I think Pablo took being shot twice by a crazy elf, really well, but you know what they say, sleep with one eye open and some sort of heavy weaponry if you upset a gif. Anyway, before you can say ‘Are you blind you pox ridden elf slut whore?’ Traevus surrenders and we take him and his two survivors into our custody.
Meanwhile the huge crystalline entity is now reaching the clouds and we are mindful that its minions will be arriving very soon. We take on sixty passengers and captain Sartell shouts orders to Flapjack, who is apparently a flumph spelljammer and the Moon Dancer lifts off into high orbit. Having trussed up the prisoners and deprived them of weapons and cash (pathetically little actually) Pablo attends to any wounded passengers while Elethiel and I check the cargo and recover spells. The cargo is mainly food but there are also some mules and many crates of weapons, the latter Captain Traevus’s contribution to the ships manifest.
The whole planet appears infected with the crystal creatures, there is no safe port here. Captain Sartell sets course for the Rock of Bral. The Captain describes this as a Freeport with little in the way of formal authority. The rock is an asteroid, broadly it comprises the low, high and mid-city,* Prince Andru, a major player, employs our host as a privateer. Other major figures are the four so called under barons: Ozamata, a human, the big cheese for the docks and low city; Meredin Sandyfoot is a Halfling who controls the burrows and is associated with the world’s craft guilds; the Juggler who is a female elf and the unknowable one, a shadowy crimelord type.(Apparently there will be questions later.)
*Generic City one was taken
Our journey proves uneventful…we wish. A vaguely moth like vessel appears and closes with us and the elves and hidozee aboard look like they mean business. Elethiel confusingly shouts something about the employment of the hostile vessel's beverage dispensing team* and the enemy ship opens fire with its mangonel and two bow mounted ballistae. Now there’s good news and bad news: We also have ballistae is the good news, the bad news is they are forward mounted with an impressive traverse capability of 45 degrees. The further bad news is that the vessel is astern, and in supplementary bad news, they are clearly much faster than us.
*‘Look out they’re going to fire their baristas’ Hmmm, on reflection I may have misheard
We start to take fire, the mangonel in particular is dealing terrible damage with every hit. Pablo shouts that we should arm the passengers, we can see three elves and ten hidozee so at least we outnumber them. He also opens fire, taking out one of the crew with his typically accurate sniper mode in full swing. We note with concern familiar crystalline patterns in the material of the enemy vessel which bears the name ‘Dark Star.’ Unsportingly the vessel appears to be made of some sort of heavy duty ceramic material so my usual fire spells will not be as much use.
Sartell realises we have to bring ourselves closer together as the mangonel will not be able to fire when we are too close and we can bring our ballistae to bear, otherwise they could stand off and pound us out of existence. She orders Flapjack to bring us about and we lurch hard to starboard. Elethiel continues to hand out weapons including possibly unwisely to our three captives….what could possibly go wrong?
Pablo continues firing his arquebus while Aleav uses his morphabilily to feed weapons conveyor belt like out of the hold to the frightened passengers. The jif scores ta least one hit on the astral elf priest and then I hit the ship with a fireball, killing five and wounding others. As I feared the vehicle itself is non-combustible, even the ropes on the mangonel are some sort of spun crystal. Our elf and gif now get one of our ballistae working and score a hit on the vessel as it closes, Elethiel and the elves then exchange volleys of arrows; our shots are true with more hits on the priest.
The Dark star’s mangonel falls silent as it pulls alongside but the priest raises his morning star and fires a barrage of fiery crystalline shards at Elethiel. The priest takes a heavy hit from Pablo who has now switched to his trusty autorifle. I fire a shatter spell damaging an enemy ballista but also killing several of its crew. Sadly the other ballista gets a shot off hitting our astral elf with a critical hit, and she goes down as we enter the ‘ Oh my god we’re all going to die, several times’ phase of the fight.
I get perforated by another volley of arrows and drop next to the body of Elethiel, Aleav kindly extends his creepy tentacle and uses it to administer my healing potion. Back up! Hit by another rain of radiance from the priest, back down!* The elves have now boarded and the priest, Captain Sartell who defends herself desperately. Aleav takes a critical arrow hit, things are not looking good.
*In a typical display of DM cruelty the DM announced the damage as ‘three ones’. Dramatic pause as relief sweeps over injured player. ‘Oh and two eights.’
Aleav plays medic again, using his own healing potion on me, he then kills one of the elves and Sartell knocks out the priest. The surviving elf falls back to his ship which begins to pull away, with another ballista hit on Aleav as its parting shot. I fire off a ray of sickness hoping for a kill and some healing but it’s an injury only. Pablo casts spare the dying on Elethiel bringing her back. We survey the damage which is pretty bad, I suggest recovering the weapons we issued to the mob but this is deferred as not important. Oops.
The priest, stripped bound and gagged is interrogated. His name is Altura* and he’s not a very nice elf. He reveals with some gentle persuasion that his ship was monitoring the situation on Toril, following its successful seeding of the planet, which will be absorbed by the crystalline infestation and then all the energy stolen will be fired in a giant pulse back to the star Xaryxis. All this under the orders of the Emperor of Xolyxia, Xavan, and supervised by Commander Vale, whose parents apparently missed the meeting about the importance of the letter X.
*Actual table top conversation excerpt: Ian: Wasn’t that the name of the girl in Forbidden planet? Sam: What’s that? Ian: You know, the 1950s film, they named the shop after it. Sam: What did they call it?
He assures us that there is no way the process on Toril can be reversed, but I feel he’s hiding something on this point…Before we can debate further, two very important things now occur:
Armed mutineers burst in, yes it’s good old Team Traevus, freshly armed by our very own astral elf, no doubt anxious to discuss our theft of his cargo and obliteration of most of his crew.
And
We slow down as Flapjack brings the ship into an asteroid field filled with giant floating jellyfish but of more concern, a vessel shaped like a spiral shell with a gaping tentacle filled maw is quartering in. A look of horror flashes across Captain Sartell’s face and she whispers ‘Mind Flayers’.
6.1.24
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