Company of the Random Encounter ('complete' 14 Nov 2004)

[Capellan]

"Good Friends & Fine Spirits" by Mystic Eye Games - Part 10

After Briar has endured the reproofs of his alarmed comrades, he shows them the box, the dagger and parchment still within. Putting the blade aside for the moment, Macwood quickly unfolds the message, but his look of expectation gives way to disappointment.

"It's just a message," he reports, "Instructing them to procure a book. Doesn't say which book, or who they should get it from."

"Or how." The Padre observes, rudely peering over the bard's head.

"Respectable merchants don't hide out in the sewers." Briar grins, "So you can put your last copper on them being either smugglers or thieves."

"Well now they're just roach-dung." Anastria reminds them calmly, folding her arms, "As the girl will be if we don't find her soon."

Reminded - however inelegantly - of their quest, the group presses on, following the tunnel branch away from the small room, further into the sewer complex. With no tracking skills to tell them where the roaches took the girl, they are forced to stop and investigate every side tunnel: a painstaking process that nets them nothing more than a couple of quick, confused melees with more of the unusually large vermin. The roaches inflict a couple more of their painful bites, but these fights are becoming more and more one-sided. Well armed and armoured, the adventurers are more than a match for their opponents in any kind of stand-up fight.

Shortly after one of these encounters, the group pauses when their lantern-light gleams off a large metal object ahead. Approaching cautiously, they find a wide steel door set into one wall of the tunnel. The door is covered in grime and pitted with rust, but appears very solid. It has huge hinges, far larger than even a door of this size would need, and they seem to have been reinforced, to make tampering as difficult as possible. Even this was evidently not enough for whomever installed it, however, for the door has also been welded shut, the seams where door meets frame sealed by intense heat.

"Well, someone really wanted to keep people out of there." Briar's interest has obviously been piqued. He frowns thoughtfully at the hinges.

Surprisingly, no-one posits the alternative that the door might have been intended to keep something in. As ever with the Company, the focus is not on the danger that lurks in dark places, but on the loot it is guarding.

"Think you could get in?" the Padre asks, gesturing at the door. Briar shakes his head reluctantly,

"Not with the tools I have here." He admits, "There's no lock, so I'd have to work the hinges, and they're too big for anything I'm carrying at the moment."

"I do not believe the roaches would have been able to remove them, either." Ming Li observes blandly.

Sirdros nods,

"Whatever is behind there can wait. We need to find the girl."

There is a general mumble of agreement, and the group moves on. The Padre cannot help but cast back a few yearning looks at the door, however. It offends his adventuring sensibilities to let a potential treasure go unplundered.

"We're coming back for you." He promises the inanimate hunk of metal, before returning his attention to the task at hand. The group presses on, heading further into the damp, moss-slicked sewers. After travelling for a few minutes, they reach a large circular chamber. Rusted gratings are spaced evenly around the walls, and several of these drip foul-smelling liquid into the foot-deep slurry that covers the floor. In many places, the accumulated run-off has dried and hardened, creating solid lumps of congealed sewage.

There are approximately a dozen of the huge roaches present, scuttling from lump to lump within the sludge. Unlike previous examples of the vermin, however, these exhibit no sign of aggression, and scurry off into the darkness as the adventurers approach.

"Charming." The Padre grimaces.

"Look." Macwood points, "I think we're on the right track."

The others follow the halfling's gesture, and see that he has spotted a narrow tunnel opening, gouged out of the dressed stone on the far side of the chamber. Through the opening, the adventurers can see that a cramped crawlspace has been dug through the black, damp-looking earth. The tunnel cannot be any more than three feet in diameter, with roots and stones jutting out into the already narrow space.

"Do you think we can fit?" Sirdros, dressed in the heaviest and most cumbersome armour of the group, looks doubtful of his chances.

"Most of us can, though it will be tight." The Padre crouches at the entrance and peers in, "I'm not sure about you, though. It's going to be damn tight. And dark ... we can use a light spell, but our bodies will block a lot of it, so probably only the person at the front will be able to see properly."

"I can cast one as well." Sirdros volunteers. "The person at the back could carry that light ... that way everyone should have at least some illumination."

The plan is adopted, and soon the six adventurers are crawling half-blind through the dank and musty tunnel. Sirdros, in his half-plate armour, lumbers along at the rear, trusting that the passage of the others will have widened the space enough for him to squeeze through.

For several minutes, the darkened journey takes place in near silence, with only the occasional grunt of exertion to be heard. Then Anastria suddenly shouts, and scrambles onto her back, struggling to draw a dagger as she does so.

Dirt showers down upon the group, and suddenly the others see what Anastria has already spotted. But by then it is too late. The roof and walls cave inwards as over a dozen of the roaches burst out of the earth, swarming onto the group and biting with their enlarged jaws.

Well armed and armoured, the adventurers are more than a match for their opponents in any kind of stand-up fight. But this is no stand-up fight.

 

[Talix]

And now all of the adventurers have the flaw: Claustriphobia.

That's just... evil.

 

[Capellan]

"Good Friends & Fine Spirits" by Mystic Eye Games - Part 11

Of all the group, Ming Li is perhaps the least hampered by their current predicament. Falling easily into the meditative calm of combat, she crushes one of the roaches against the tunnel wall, while slapping aside the lunge of another.

Unfortunately, apart from Macwood - whose small size gives him some room to manoeuvre - the rest of the adventurers find themselves fighting at a significant disadvantage. This is most pronounced for Briar and Anastria, who normally rely on their speed and agility to protect them in combat. The elven woman in particular seems utterly unable to contend with the scuttling roaches in these tight confines. She thrashes wildly, her blows striking only air or dirt, while one of the vermin bites at her exposed face, and another at her flailing feet.

"Someone help Anastria!" Sirdros calls from his position at the rear of the party. The roaches are little threat to him - they bite harmlessly at his heavy armour - but his voice is strained with concern over his sister, whose cries he can hear, but for whom he can do nothing to help.

"I've got my hands full!" the Padre half-snarls in reply. His words are literally true: he cracks a roach in half as he speaks, his gauntleted fists tearing it in two.

"Look on the bright side!" Macwood calls cheerily through the melee, while lumps of dislodged earth shower down around the adventurers, "At least if we die here we'll save on burial costs!"

Briar responds with a string of invective about the halfling's parentage, punctuating his remarks with a dagger blow that skewers a roach to the wall. A second roach lunges in and bites the rogue's hand, drawing a high-pitched yelp from the young man, but he hangs on to the weapon.

By now the stabbed or crushed carcasses of almost a dozen roaches litter the floor of the tunnel, but enough remain that only Ming Li is free of attackers, while Anastria is still plagued by the two that originally attacked her, neither of which has she yet managed to harm.

The monk pauses, glancing at the two people on either side of her. Seeing Briar still fending off a roach with his bleeding hand, she snaps out her foot, knocking the insect onto its back. Briar gives a shout of glee and pins the stricken roach with his dagger - then stabs it several more times for good measure.

Quirking an eyebrow at the rogues vigorous dispatch of the roach, Ming Li turns back to her other neighbour, but Macwood has by now killed the insect he was fighting. Broken bits of chitin and smears of roach innards cling to his sleeve from where he crushed it under his forearm.

"I've heard of moths in your clothes but this is ridiculous." He quips, then wriggles forward to assist Anastria. With the bard's help, the elf finally manages to kill the two roaches that have been plaguing her, though she bears several bites to her legs and a deep gash on her cheek as mementoes of the fight.

"Anyone badly hurt?" the Padre asks, "Other than Anastria's pride?"

Having determined that no-one is in danger of dying from their wounds, the group presses on, moving even more slowly now, as they constantly scan the walls of the tunnels for signs of another ambush. After a time - it's difficult to say how long, though their light spells have not yet run out - they notice that the tunnel is beginning to slope slightly upwards. This gradually becomes more pronounced, though the slope remains quite shallow: they are still able to crawl, rather than climb, along.

"There's some kind of light, ahead." Macwood hisses back to the others. "Let me check it out." Without waiting for a response, he crawls forward, leaving the group's light behind. Within seconds, he has disappeared into the gloom.

"We should go after him." The Padre doesn't like to be left behind. "How can he even tell there was a light ahead, it still looks dark to me."

"There's a light." Anastria responds tersely, "Though your human eyes are too weak to detect it."

"We should still go." The Padre persists, ignoring the elf's comment on his race, "What if he gets into danger?"

"We'll know if he's in danger." Ming Li says quietly, keeping her eyes ahead, watching for signs of the bard's return.

"How?"

"He'll scream."

"Like a girl." Briar concurs. He shrugs when Anastria shoots him a dirty look, "It's true."

"Not that you can talk." The Padre hasn't forgotten the rogue's high-pitched yelp of pain in the last fight. Briar blanches at the comment, but the others - their attention focussed forward - don't notice.

After what seems a very long time, Macwood reappears, moving quickly along the tunnel towards them.

"The tunnel comes up into some kind of derelict house!" he reports, breathing heavily from the exertion of his fast-paced crawl. "And it's absolutely filled with roaches."

 

[Talix]

Eeew!

Of course, the easiest thing to do would be to figure out where the house is and come at it from the outside, but since when does an adventuring party do the easy thing?

 

[Mantreus]

Nudge...

This is me reminding Capellan that he's waaaayyyy behind here.

 

[jaded]

Hey Capellan, just wanted to drop by and say this story hour really is cool and is on "check daily" list for updates...

Just love the Adventurers Ethic as you tell it

You get a free bump too

.. jaded

 

[Capellan]

Just love the Adventurers Ethic as you tell it

This reminds me ...

We played this weekend, and about an hour or so into things a friend who we haven't seen in a while popped by. He watched the game for about 10-15 minutes and then he turned to me and "I see why you write the story the way you do."

So there you have it. Independant verification that the CotRE really do act like this

There should be an update later this week - possibly even two, now that I've finished & playtested my games for the BIG Weekend.

 

[Mantreus]

We played this weekend, and about an hour or so into things a friend who we haven't seen in a while popped by. He watched the game for about 10-15 minutes and then he turned to me and "I see why you write the story the way you do."

In our defence, we did have 3 of the er... how can i put it?.. most Disruptive? Funny? Peculiar? players there at the same time for the first time. i.e. Twinkle, Macwood and Myself.

It was my first time playing with Macwood, and it was very entertaining.

Without giving too much away (not that this post will be remembered 18 months from now when Capellan finally posts this particular session ), there were ghost stories, blow up candles, goat riding, pirate impressions, giant bees, lumberjacks (yes we sang the song I'm afraid) and far too many things to mention.

I'll be interested to see how Capellan writes this one up without making us look like complete idiots But we have an idea in advance on what he's going to write, as he has a little notebook he uses to keep notes on the story as he's DMing... It doesn't look good for us. I think he wrote in that more than he did anywhere else

 

[Capellan]

"Good Friends & Fine Spirits" by Mystic Eye Games - Part 12

The Padre frowns, glancing around at the Company's bloodied condition.

"We'll need a plan if we're going to fight a lot of those things at once -"

Macwood shakes his head, interrupting,

"That's the weird thing ... none of them seem to be moving. It's like they're all dormant or something. I saw a couple of antennae twitch, but otherwise they didn't even react to me." He grins, "Which is just as well, since they were right at the hole. We could have had dozens more of them down here with us."

"That would have been unfortunate." Ming Li acknowledges, while Anastria shudders and Briar goes visibly green.

"Well, nothing for it but to go forward." The Padre sounds like he is trying to convince himself, "There's not doubt that the creatures must have come this way with the girl."

"What gave it away?" Macwood deadpans.

No-one has any better alternatives than the Padre's suggestion, however, and thus, one by one the adventurers move forward and then clamber out of the tunnel. They emerge into what may once have been the kitchen of a small cottage, but the infesting roaches have wreaked such damage to the furnishings that it is hard to be sure.

Several of the Company stifle expressions of disgust as they pick their way across the room. As Macwood reported, the place is literally filled with roaches, forming an almost unbroken carpet across the floor. They are forced to step carefully, struggling to find clear patches on which to place their feet, for fear of crushing one of the smaller insects and somehow galvanising the others into action.

"We should burn this place down." The Padre whispers.

"But not while we're in it." Briar counters.

"Or the girl." Ming Li reminds them, then raises her eyebrows at the Padre, "Is there a reason you always want to burn things?"

"Can you hear anything?" the Padre changes the subject by gesturing Macwood toward the door of the room. The halfling shakes his head,

"It's quiet out there." The bard slips the door open and pokes his head out into the hall, "and empty, too. I can see a couple of other doors. It's pretty dusty. Makes me want to sneeze."

"Dust? Are there any tracks?"

"Looks like it. Gimme a second." Macwood scurries a short way down the corridor, while the others pensively stare at the roaches all around them. After a few moments, the bard returns. "Yes. A whole bunch of roaches went through the hall recently. They turned left at the corner and went into another room."

"Right." The Padre nods, "Here's the plan: first, we find a way out of this place, then we find a girl, grab her, kill anything that tries to stop us, and run for the exit. Then -" he glowers at Ming Li, "- we burn the place down."

"Works for me." Briar nods. There are murmurs of agreement from the others.

The adventurers slip quietly out of the room, and into the hall. Sirdros - the last to exit - closes the door behind him.

"That should stop any of those roaches from coming up behind us." He whispers.

The group are in a short corridor, which they follow to a T-junction. Macwood points to the door where the tracks lead - it is slightly ajar - then gestures for Briar to check in the other direction. The rogue pats him on the head with a grin, then slips off, prowling silently along the dusty corridors. Within a minute, he is back, grimacing.

"There was someone living here when the roaches moved in." he reports, pulling a face, "They made it to the front door. Key's still in the lock. Take the first right turn there, and the doors at the end of the corridor."

"Any other exits?" Anastria asks. Briar shakes his head,

"Nothing off the corridor. I didn't check the rooms - didn't want to end up like the poor bugger at the door. There's not enough left of him to bury."

"Right," the Padre looks grim. "Let's get the girl."

There are nods of agreement, and the group move quickly, bursting through the door Macwood pointed out.

It's like walking into a nightmare.

A grotesque creature lies sprawled on the bed. Her torso and head is that of a human woman, though huge mandibles jut out of her grotesquely oversized jaw. Her lower half, however, is a bloated egg-sac, terminating in a sphincter-like orifice. As the adventurers watch, aghast, foot-long white grubs squirm out of the opening, writhing on the dirty, matted sheets of the bed.

Arrayed around the bed are nearly a dozen roaches, mostly of the 'small' foot-long size, but also including several of the larger specimens. Behind them, wrapped in some kind of strange webbing, is what can only be the cook's daughter. At first, it seems like the girl is wriggling, trying to get free, but then the group realise that she is unconscious, and the wriggling of the webbing is caused by several large, fat grubs, which appear to be trying to force their way inside to reach her.

For a moment, no-one moves. And then the creature on the bed turns its head toward the adventurers. Baleful, multifaceted eyes regard them for a second, before the deformed mouth opens in a hissing scream.

Instantly, there is the sound of scuttling roaches, coming from every corner of the building.

Many, of course, are trapped in the kitchen, kept imprisoned by the door that Sirdros closed.

But there are several other doors leading off the corridor, and every one of those is open.

 

[arwink]

I'll be interested to see how Capellan writes this one up without making us look like complete idiots

He tries to avoid this?