Anyone want to take odds on how many dreamwalkers the mad dog's gonna take down with him?
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Sagiro's Story Hour: The FINAL Adventures of Abernathy's Company (FINISHED 7/3/14)
- Thread starter Sagiro
- Start date
Anyone want to take odds on how many dreamwalkers the mad dog's gonna take down with him?
I'm more concerned with how Octesian's tentacles affect Dranko's tentacles.
Oooo...yes. The effects of the dreaded Tentacle Envy. I hadn't considered that. S'gonna be a mess!
;P
;P
Piratecat said:
BTW, I'm... so pleased...? that I've been pre-emptively slotted into a category that I won't have any idea about for at least 3 months.
Piratecat said:
Oh, looking back at the early chapters of the story, I can definitely see it coming. What greater journey is there for him to go on?
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 357
Far Gone
Dranko returns from his errand, and gratefully takes a bite of cheese offered by Eddings.
“You know what they’re saying on the street?” he says to others. “They’re saying that the plague which wiped out the fish is starting to wipe out the people as well. That’s how they’re explaining Octesian’s murders. There are crowds gathered outside every temple I went past, demanding protection.”
Morningstar spends a nervous afternoon casting sendings and arranging for her “dream team” to be brought to the Greenhouse. Throughout the evening they arrive, most of them teleported from their home temples. Other Ellish priestesses show up as well – eighteen extras in all – whose job it will be to heal the bodies of the dreamers while they engage the enemy in Ava Dormo.
In addition to the Ellish women, one other warrior arrives, to Morningstar’s great delight. It’s Snokas, who has decided to join Scola in protecting Evenstar during the battle. He bows at the doorway of the Greenhouse. “As always, I am eager to serve.”
When the full team is assembled, Morningstar spends a final hour dividing them into groups and giving them general instructions: to hang back and cast spells, but to avoid engaging Octesian directly if possible, and to focus on any minions their nemesis may bring to the fight. To bolster their effectiveness and confidence both, Morningstar distributes a pile of the party’s spare magic weapons, rings and armor pieces to her troops. Soon after the collected Sisters break into small knots, talking quietly of the coming encounter while Previa and Evenstar circulate with tactical advice.
As the midnight hour approaches, Morningstar is approached by Fautish. By dint of her natural charisma and talent, the tall and beautiful paladin has assumed a secondary leadership role.
“Excuse me,” she says. “Morningstar, we wanted… all wanted… to make sure you understood. It has occurred to every one of us that some, or perhaps all of us, will not survive tonight’s encounter. And we are all very, very okay with that. We will do our best to help you, and whatever happens will happen. From what we know of Octesian, there is no finer way for any of us to leave this mortal life, than in bringing about his downfall.”
Morningstar bows her head. “Thank you,” she says earnestly.
“And along those lines,” Fautish continues, “if you find that you need to… expend… one of us, in order to achieve victory, we all expect that you will.” She looks hard at Morningstar, almost as if daring her to object.
“Thank you for that as well,” says Morningstar. “I’m honored.”
“The honor belongs to us,” says Fautish. She looks down at her feet for a second – an uncharacteristic gesture – and then meets Morningstar’s gaze again. “Though it is not much discussed, we all realize that our collective poor treatment of you these past several years has been shameful. We are all, collectively, trying to atone.”
Morningstar shakes her head. “I think the omens around me were created in order to test us. And I think we’ve passed that test with flying colors.”
“I would agree,” says Fautish. “I suppose that make tonight the final exam.”
Morningstar smiles. “The only think I can think of that’s better than standing with the Company against my foes, is to stand with them and my sisters as well. It has been an incredible honor.”
“Very good,” says Fautish with a grin. “And I think that’s enough small talk for one evening. Let’s go kick Octesian’s butt.”
While the collected sisters cheer, Morningstar thinks silently to herself how relieved she is to have Fautish to energize the troops, sparing her the burden. Ernie leans towards her and whispers, “Kick Octesian’s butt? That makes you the Mother Superior of Kicking Posterior.”
Morningstar laughs. “We have to assume he’s set some wily trap.”
“Yes,” agrees Aravis. “Let’s go spring it.”
/*/
At one minute before midnight, Morningstar and her twenty allies arrive in the Ava Dormo reflection of Gohgan’s basement. The single large chamber, into which Morningstar had earlier transfigured the subterranean ruins of Pinfaro’s palace, appears undisturbed. There are no obvious traps, and no sign whatsoever of Octesian. Morningstar scans the area with true seeing and all is as it seems.
The final minute ticks away in silence. Precisely at midnight there is a quivering disturbance in the center of the room, and a large black portal appears, round, ten feet across, and facing Morningstar at a direct perpendicular. The portal is a flat, shadowless black, and framed by a brown tentacle as thick as a man’s thigh. Smaller tentacles, three to four feet long apiece, sprout from the frame like the spokes of a wheel, or the rays of an obscene black sun.
Stuck onto the tapered tips of these tentacles are human heads. All but one of these is unfamiliar, but the tentacle at the keystone position of the portal skewers Swan’s head, her dead face’s expression fixed in utter horror. Finally, the entirety of the portal sits in the interior of an enormous partially-open (illusionary) iron maiden, its long spikes pointing inward. They will have to enter this huge torture device to go through the portal.
Dranko mutters, “Let’s not do our bedroom like this.”
Morningstar shouts into the portal. “You are such a coward!”
Her voice returns no echo.
Aravis takes a moment to study the portal, and guesses it’s nothing more than a simple gateway to a demi-plane. No one makes a move to go through, but as the seconds spin away from the midnight hour, the iron maiden creaks a few inches shut. Octesian won’t wait for long.
Ernie decides this is a good time and place for a miracle, and steps forward. “If there are any negative environmental effects in the demiplane beyond this portal, or negative effects which result from passing through it, I pray that they will not affect any of us for the next hour.”
He casts his spell, and power blows out of him in a golden wave, slamming into the flat black surface of the portal and vanishing inside it. The dark gateway ripples, and for a moment sparkles with flecks of green and golden light, before returning to its natural state, while the air smells sweet, and the vile aura of Cleaners is forgotten.
Morningstar grunts in satisfaction. “Let’s go.”
As a group, they move into the jaws of the iron maiden, and through the portal, to whatever waits beyond.
/*/
The place in which they find themselves is extremely… strange. Morningstar immediately senses she’s still in Ava Dormo, but in a demi-plane inside the dreaming, and beyond that nothing seems familiar.
Beneath their feet the ground undulates gently, giving them the sensation of being on a ship at sea. It flexes slightly as well, as though they’re standing on a taut rubber sheet. Scattered here and there, rising like trees in a forest of madness, enormous tentacles rise from the ground and vanish into the darkness above. They sway in time to the flexing of the floor. Distance is hard to gauge, but the gathered heroes get a sense of unbounded space all around them. Purplish, sourceless light bathes everything in a sickening glow.
Everyone here can feel a terrible fear, borne of Cleaners, beating at their psyche, and yet it doesn’t deter them. Something is deflecting or absorbing the terror. The air itself feels sticky and humid, and while parts of their animal brains scream of poison, it is nonetheless perfectly breathable. It seems that Ernie’s miracle has saved them from some grim consequences of this wretched place.
Though they entered the portal in a group, they have arrived scattered about, with Morningstar in the relative center. The thickest of the tentacle-trees rises up before her, and held to its flesh with a spike of bone is what looks like a giant-sized piece of parchment, ten feet high and five across. Across the top of the parchment is scrawled, “The Book of Morningstar” written in her own handwriting. Beneath that, rather than words, are a series of shifting images, scenes from various Ellish temples around Tal Hae. In each of these images there are priestesses talking, and their voices blend together into a cacophony, though each is distinctly audible.
“She’s a freak; I don’t know what she’s doing here.”
“She’s not really one of us, you know. She’ll be out of the church in a month.”
“The sooner she gives up and goes home, the better.”
“Oh, dear Goddess!” exclaims Morningstar, her voice a-drip with sarcasm. “They don’t like me! Whatever shall I do?”
The central image shifts to Amber, talking to someone outside the picture. “I don’t have to like her,” Amber is saying. “I just have to use her.”
And it shifts one final time, to High Priestess Rhiavonne, addressing a council that includes Swan. “Thank the Goddess she’s in such a dangerous business,” Rhiavonne says. “She’s bound to die before she becomes a real problem.”
These images then blend in with the others, ever shifting, each one repeating the theme of Morningstar as outcast. And included in these are some spoken by the very priestesses in her team, many of whom are looking somewhat guilty as they stand scattered and confused.
High above them, and nearly directly over Morningstar, an illusion of Octesian’s head appears. He wears a goatee and a wicked sneer, but his complexion is green and rubbery and riddled with protruding tentacles.
“So… happy to s…s… see you, Morningstar!” it exclaims.
Morningstar gestures to the ‘Book of Morningstar.’ “These games might have worked, if I were still, oh, I don’t know, fifteen years old.”
“Then how old are you?” asks Octesian. But before she can answer, he continues. “It doesn’t m… matter. I’ll taste your mind before we’re done. I promised Him that I would.”
“Promised who?” Morningstar asks.
The eyes on the huge illusionary head sweep over the assemblage. “The Great and Terrible One,” he whispers reverently.
“I’m curious,” says Morningstar. “How did you go from serving the Emperor, to serving the Adversary?”
“What do you think the E.. Emperor was doing?” Octesian shrieks. “We are all in His service. It’s the whole point! To wake Him up. And He’s waking, oh yes, He’s waking. You can feel it, can’t you? You can feel it in the ground. You can feel it coming up from the oceans. And when He’s done waking, he’ll eat… everything! He’s much more mad than I am. He’s been trapped there so long, He doesn’t know where He begins, and where the madness ends. I think…” And here Octesian’s facial tentacles squirm and curl. “…I think they may be one and the same.”
His head quickly swivels, and the huge eyes fix upon Dranko. “You have it… worse than I do, don’t you?” he whispers. “I’m appalled!” Octesian lets out a long, gurgling sigh. “And… I’m jealous.”
“You clearly have some personal issues,” says Ernie. “And I know a way we can make it all better for you.”
Octesian’s face splits into a huge grin, and they can see tentacles writhing inside his mouth.
“Then let’s play!” he screams.
…to be continued…
Far Gone
Dranko returns from his errand, and gratefully takes a bite of cheese offered by Eddings.
“You know what they’re saying on the street?” he says to others. “They’re saying that the plague which wiped out the fish is starting to wipe out the people as well. That’s how they’re explaining Octesian’s murders. There are crowds gathered outside every temple I went past, demanding protection.”
Morningstar spends a nervous afternoon casting sendings and arranging for her “dream team” to be brought to the Greenhouse. Throughout the evening they arrive, most of them teleported from their home temples. Other Ellish priestesses show up as well – eighteen extras in all – whose job it will be to heal the bodies of the dreamers while they engage the enemy in Ava Dormo.
In addition to the Ellish women, one other warrior arrives, to Morningstar’s great delight. It’s Snokas, who has decided to join Scola in protecting Evenstar during the battle. He bows at the doorway of the Greenhouse. “As always, I am eager to serve.”
When the full team is assembled, Morningstar spends a final hour dividing them into groups and giving them general instructions: to hang back and cast spells, but to avoid engaging Octesian directly if possible, and to focus on any minions their nemesis may bring to the fight. To bolster their effectiveness and confidence both, Morningstar distributes a pile of the party’s spare magic weapons, rings and armor pieces to her troops. Soon after the collected Sisters break into small knots, talking quietly of the coming encounter while Previa and Evenstar circulate with tactical advice.
As the midnight hour approaches, Morningstar is approached by Fautish. By dint of her natural charisma and talent, the tall and beautiful paladin has assumed a secondary leadership role.
“Excuse me,” she says. “Morningstar, we wanted… all wanted… to make sure you understood. It has occurred to every one of us that some, or perhaps all of us, will not survive tonight’s encounter. And we are all very, very okay with that. We will do our best to help you, and whatever happens will happen. From what we know of Octesian, there is no finer way for any of us to leave this mortal life, than in bringing about his downfall.”
Morningstar bows her head. “Thank you,” she says earnestly.
“And along those lines,” Fautish continues, “if you find that you need to… expend… one of us, in order to achieve victory, we all expect that you will.” She looks hard at Morningstar, almost as if daring her to object.
“Thank you for that as well,” says Morningstar. “I’m honored.”
“The honor belongs to us,” says Fautish. She looks down at her feet for a second – an uncharacteristic gesture – and then meets Morningstar’s gaze again. “Though it is not much discussed, we all realize that our collective poor treatment of you these past several years has been shameful. We are all, collectively, trying to atone.”
Morningstar shakes her head. “I think the omens around me were created in order to test us. And I think we’ve passed that test with flying colors.”
“I would agree,” says Fautish. “I suppose that make tonight the final exam.”
Morningstar smiles. “The only think I can think of that’s better than standing with the Company against my foes, is to stand with them and my sisters as well. It has been an incredible honor.”
“Very good,” says Fautish with a grin. “And I think that’s enough small talk for one evening. Let’s go kick Octesian’s butt.”
While the collected sisters cheer, Morningstar thinks silently to herself how relieved she is to have Fautish to energize the troops, sparing her the burden. Ernie leans towards her and whispers, “Kick Octesian’s butt? That makes you the Mother Superior of Kicking Posterior.”
Morningstar laughs. “We have to assume he’s set some wily trap.”
“Yes,” agrees Aravis. “Let’s go spring it.”
/*/
At one minute before midnight, Morningstar and her twenty allies arrive in the Ava Dormo reflection of Gohgan’s basement. The single large chamber, into which Morningstar had earlier transfigured the subterranean ruins of Pinfaro’s palace, appears undisturbed. There are no obvious traps, and no sign whatsoever of Octesian. Morningstar scans the area with true seeing and all is as it seems.
The final minute ticks away in silence. Precisely at midnight there is a quivering disturbance in the center of the room, and a large black portal appears, round, ten feet across, and facing Morningstar at a direct perpendicular. The portal is a flat, shadowless black, and framed by a brown tentacle as thick as a man’s thigh. Smaller tentacles, three to four feet long apiece, sprout from the frame like the spokes of a wheel, or the rays of an obscene black sun.
Stuck onto the tapered tips of these tentacles are human heads. All but one of these is unfamiliar, but the tentacle at the keystone position of the portal skewers Swan’s head, her dead face’s expression fixed in utter horror. Finally, the entirety of the portal sits in the interior of an enormous partially-open (illusionary) iron maiden, its long spikes pointing inward. They will have to enter this huge torture device to go through the portal.
Dranko mutters, “Let’s not do our bedroom like this.”
Morningstar shouts into the portal. “You are such a coward!”
Her voice returns no echo.
Aravis takes a moment to study the portal, and guesses it’s nothing more than a simple gateway to a demi-plane. No one makes a move to go through, but as the seconds spin away from the midnight hour, the iron maiden creaks a few inches shut. Octesian won’t wait for long.
Ernie decides this is a good time and place for a miracle, and steps forward. “If there are any negative environmental effects in the demiplane beyond this portal, or negative effects which result from passing through it, I pray that they will not affect any of us for the next hour.”
He casts his spell, and power blows out of him in a golden wave, slamming into the flat black surface of the portal and vanishing inside it. The dark gateway ripples, and for a moment sparkles with flecks of green and golden light, before returning to its natural state, while the air smells sweet, and the vile aura of Cleaners is forgotten.
Morningstar grunts in satisfaction. “Let’s go.”
As a group, they move into the jaws of the iron maiden, and through the portal, to whatever waits beyond.
/*/
The place in which they find themselves is extremely… strange. Morningstar immediately senses she’s still in Ava Dormo, but in a demi-plane inside the dreaming, and beyond that nothing seems familiar.
Beneath their feet the ground undulates gently, giving them the sensation of being on a ship at sea. It flexes slightly as well, as though they’re standing on a taut rubber sheet. Scattered here and there, rising like trees in a forest of madness, enormous tentacles rise from the ground and vanish into the darkness above. They sway in time to the flexing of the floor. Distance is hard to gauge, but the gathered heroes get a sense of unbounded space all around them. Purplish, sourceless light bathes everything in a sickening glow.
Everyone here can feel a terrible fear, borne of Cleaners, beating at their psyche, and yet it doesn’t deter them. Something is deflecting or absorbing the terror. The air itself feels sticky and humid, and while parts of their animal brains scream of poison, it is nonetheless perfectly breathable. It seems that Ernie’s miracle has saved them from some grim consequences of this wretched place.
Though they entered the portal in a group, they have arrived scattered about, with Morningstar in the relative center. The thickest of the tentacle-trees rises up before her, and held to its flesh with a spike of bone is what looks like a giant-sized piece of parchment, ten feet high and five across. Across the top of the parchment is scrawled, “The Book of Morningstar” written in her own handwriting. Beneath that, rather than words, are a series of shifting images, scenes from various Ellish temples around Tal Hae. In each of these images there are priestesses talking, and their voices blend together into a cacophony, though each is distinctly audible.
“She’s a freak; I don’t know what she’s doing here.”
“She’s not really one of us, you know. She’ll be out of the church in a month.”
“The sooner she gives up and goes home, the better.”
“Oh, dear Goddess!” exclaims Morningstar, her voice a-drip with sarcasm. “They don’t like me! Whatever shall I do?”
The central image shifts to Amber, talking to someone outside the picture. “I don’t have to like her,” Amber is saying. “I just have to use her.”
And it shifts one final time, to High Priestess Rhiavonne, addressing a council that includes Swan. “Thank the Goddess she’s in such a dangerous business,” Rhiavonne says. “She’s bound to die before she becomes a real problem.”
These images then blend in with the others, ever shifting, each one repeating the theme of Morningstar as outcast. And included in these are some spoken by the very priestesses in her team, many of whom are looking somewhat guilty as they stand scattered and confused.
High above them, and nearly directly over Morningstar, an illusion of Octesian’s head appears. He wears a goatee and a wicked sneer, but his complexion is green and rubbery and riddled with protruding tentacles.
“So… happy to s…s… see you, Morningstar!” it exclaims.
Morningstar gestures to the ‘Book of Morningstar.’ “These games might have worked, if I were still, oh, I don’t know, fifteen years old.”
“Then how old are you?” asks Octesian. But before she can answer, he continues. “It doesn’t m… matter. I’ll taste your mind before we’re done. I promised Him that I would.”
“Promised who?” Morningstar asks.
The eyes on the huge illusionary head sweep over the assemblage. “The Great and Terrible One,” he whispers reverently.
“I’m curious,” says Morningstar. “How did you go from serving the Emperor, to serving the Adversary?”
“What do you think the E.. Emperor was doing?” Octesian shrieks. “We are all in His service. It’s the whole point! To wake Him up. And He’s waking, oh yes, He’s waking. You can feel it, can’t you? You can feel it in the ground. You can feel it coming up from the oceans. And when He’s done waking, he’ll eat… everything! He’s much more mad than I am. He’s been trapped there so long, He doesn’t know where He begins, and where the madness ends. I think…” And here Octesian’s facial tentacles squirm and curl. “…I think they may be one and the same.”
His head quickly swivels, and the huge eyes fix upon Dranko. “You have it… worse than I do, don’t you?” he whispers. “I’m appalled!” Octesian lets out a long, gurgling sigh. “And… I’m jealous.”
“You clearly have some personal issues,” says Ernie. “And I know a way we can make it all better for you.”
Octesian’s face splits into a huge grin, and they can see tentacles writhing inside his mouth.
“Then let’s play!” he screams.
…to be continued…
Mathew_Freeman
First Post
This cliffhanger is making me want to break the profanity rule on ENWorld. Love it!
KidCthulhu
First Post
You do not mess with Ernie's Mom.
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
Sagiro's Story Hour: The Further Adventures of Abernathy's Company (updated 3/3
Should be soon—we gamed tonight, and Sagiro mentioned he was halfway through the battle. It has a LOT of participants. Although there ends up being fewer and fewer as the fight progresses…
Should be soon—we gamed tonight, and Sagiro mentioned he was halfway through the battle. It has a LOT of participants. Although there ends up being fewer and fewer as the fight progresses…
