(IC) DND 3.5 Enter Planescape

[Brendan Byrd]

The creaking movement of the tenement as it floated on Sigil's surface barely registered in Aril's mind...until they matched the warning motions a pilot would give a sleeping crew right before executing a 360° ballast-jettison. Reflexively grasping the hammock's edge Aril braced for contact with the upper deck and a call to battle stations...that never came.
As the attic beams came into focus, the sensation of being aboard the Hoarse Eclipse dispelled, like the last wisp of fog on a bright morning.

With a yawn and a wry chuckle, Aril eventually emerges from the hammock, attends to ablutions(1) and Devotions, and then heads downstairs to investigate early breakfast possibilities.
'About six bells to peak, give or take?' Aril wonders, while carefully navigating the foyer.

Matching the landlady's grin with one as wide as possible, the friendly 'who can pretend to be the cheeriest in the morning' contest begins.
In spite of their best efforts so far, neither of them has been able to pull off that fully deranged grin that makes even a hardhead pause.

"My thanks, as always" Aril says, slipping the unopened envelope into the beltpouch.

"Did you, perhaps, send someone to Last-Chance-Lerrys?(2) I see you've had a better than average doss-down. Dark for dark?"(3)

Spoiler: Context, feel free to read.

(1) The blessings of a pure water source, via Create Water, should not be underestimated. Aril has enough for today in the waterpot, but will need to cast it again tomorrow.

(2) The common nick-name for Lerrys' Provender, Provisions & Groceries, which is the last place you want to go when looking for fresh, unspoiled food.

Spoiler: DM's eyes only.

(3) Aril appreciates unopened messages promptly delivered. "Dark for dark" is Aril indicating a willingness to cast Purify Food and Drink on a container of "food", without looking at the contents beforehand...or afterwards. Not that this interaction has ever happened before, or that the right sized container is about...1 cu. ft.

Aril reads the message as soon as it can be done unobserved.

Edit: added Italics to the ship name.

 

[OneCrappy DM]

Wawaate

Spoiler: Roll Results

Bluff vs Sense Motive +5 for it being a little hard to believe.

Only a fool or someone not to be messed with would walk up on the tip of a blade surrounded by ten ruffians, the cold blue light you cast earlier still clung on your body, your muscles poise a frosty disposition, and the glint in your eyes staggers back the thug. "Might of diced it on this Iceberk" one of the starved men gets out. The leader puts down the blade "Styx it." he spits on the ground, " You ain't worth countin' portals"

The ruffians leave without taking your coin, this place isn't like your home but Negafook still grants you his strength. The young orphaned girl with sharp eyes and tangled copper curls of hair steps back out of the shadows, "Them thugs called you an Iceberk" she says cutting through the noise of the street, "you asked about the wintercourt, ya blittzin'?" she pauses eyes flicking down the road "Do You need a Tout?" Sounds like an offer of some sort.

 

[OneCrappy DM]

Luke Cinders
The barman squinted at you when you asked for red wine, eyes sliding over you slow and practiced, weighing boots, cloak, and stance. In the Hive, that look wasn’t rude—it was survival. He was counting the odds you’d try to stiff him or start trouble once the cup was poured. "The real stuff. I’ll pay the jink if it is untainted." you said. That settled it. He turned his back and reached high, fingers brushing past cracked mugs and bone handled knives until he pulled free an ancient green bottle resting upside down in its cradle. The glass was choked with dust thick enough to mark decades. He set it down with care. “Twenty jinx,” he grunted. ((20 GP))

You ask the Prime at the bar if he's new to sigil, and he took that as his cue. He leaned your way, eyes bright with the kind of hope only a clueless berk still carried. Started droning on about a place he called Faerûn. Claimed he’d been a small time merchant, took a simple run to Waterdeep, and somehow ended up here instead. His hands shook when he lifted his drink. Asking what all this Berk talk and cutter business was about, he's grown quite confused. The door banged open before you could answer. Another patron came swaggering in, loud with borrowed confidence, slapping jink on the bar and shouting about spending it while he had it. The Hive loved that sort people who didn’t know how fast fortune turned. Voices rose, chairs scraped, and for a moment the whole place leaned toward chaos.

That’s when you shifted focus over to the dwarf. He sat apart with eyes never still. As the noise swelled, his quill moved faster. He was writing names, descriptions, habits each patron reduced to marks in a thick ledger bound in worn leather. The commotion earned a few extra lines, maybe a symbol or two. Not bookkeeping. Chant keeping. Dark or otherwise. Some sort of private tally of who mattered and who didn’t. He looked alone, but no cutter like that ever truly was. In the Hive, anyone keeping that much chant usually had an attaché tucked away watching a door, listening from the rafters, or waiting just outside the Cage’s ever hungry streets.

 

[OneCrappy DM]

Mr. Black

It wasn’t carelessness alone, though the Hive always punished that, but the constant effort of learning the Cage’s cant, the rhythms of speech, the way every word here carried two meanings. Somewhere between jink, berk, and tout, your guard slipped. That was when the purse vanished. You didn’t feel the cut, just the absence, the weight gone from your belt, the familiar tug no longer there. When you finally looked down, your fingers met only air and worn leather. A slow breath followed as you turned, eyes sharp now, scanning the square. Not in vain. Ragpicker’s Square was alive the way a wound was alive. Rubbish piles formed crooked islands between leaning buildings, and the stink of rot, smoke, and cheap ale clung to everything. The square boasted only one bar a sagging, smoke-choked den already loud with voices and clattering mugs and from somewhere near its door came a sudden burst of noise you knew too well. Laughter. Shouting. The sound of jink changing hands fast.

Some cutter was offloading a payday, quick, sloppy, and loud exactly the sort of commotion a light finger would melt into after a clean lift. You were sure of it now. You won’t get far in Sigil without coin. Jink. Copper, silver, favors whatever name the Cage gave it, it all bought the same things: food, shelter, silence. Without it, you were just another body in Ragpicker’s Square.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

Spoiler: Mr. Black (mini-sheet)

Mr. Black Perception: 0 Sense Motive: 4 Search: 6	AC: 14; FF: 13; Touch: 11	Spell Slots" 0: [X] [] [] [] [] 1st: [X] [] [] []
HP: 8 Init: 1	Fort: 2 Ref: 1 Will: 2	Buffs -Detect Magic??

---

He moved fast, hustling towards the bar, pausing only a moment to cast a quick spell. His backpack and leathers melted away leaving only drab, plain clothes. His hair and facial features also changed.

His eyes were laser focused on the group outside the bar as he moved towards them, trying to determine who hands now held his pouch.

He doesn't approach immediately. He wants to be sure where his money is and who has it.

Spoiler: OOC Rolls

Pre-emptive disguise self so the guy doesn't recognise Mr. Black as he approaches and put them on the defensive.

Can I see whose hand the pouch has traded hands to?
I rolled a 13 and 9.

I'm relying on Perception(+0) and Sense Motive (+4)

 

[Neurotic]

Luke Cinders
The barman squinted at you when you asked for red wine, eyes sliding over you slow and practiced, weighing boots, cloak, and stance. In the Hive, that look wasn’t rude—it was survival. He was counting the odds you’d try to stiff him or start trouble once the cup was poured. "The real stuff. I’ll pay the jink if it is untainted." you said. That settled it. He turned his back and reached high, fingers brushing past cracked mugs and bone handled knives until he pulled free an ancient green bottle resting upside down in its cradle. The glass was choked with dust thick enough to mark decades. He set it down with care. “Twenty jinx,” he grunted. ((20 GP))

You ask the Prime at the bar if he's new to sigil, and he took that as his cue. He leaned your way, eyes bright with the kind of hope only a clueless berk still carried. Started droning on about a place he called Faerûn. Claimed he’d been a small time merchant, took a simple run to Waterdeep, and somehow ended up here instead. His hands shook when he lifted his drink. Asking what all this Berk talk and cutter business was about, he's grown quite confused. The door banged open before you could answer. Another patron came swaggering in, loud with borrowed confidence, slapping jink on the bar and shouting about spending it while he had it. The Hive loved that sort people who didn’t know how fast fortune turned. Voices rose, chairs scraped, and for a moment the whole place leaned toward chaos.

That’s when you shifted focus over to the dwarf. He sat apart with eyes never still. As the noise swelled, his quill moved faster. He was writing names, descriptions, habits each patron reduced to marks in a thick ledger bound in worn leather. The commotion earned a few extra lines, maybe a symbol or two. Not bookkeeping. Chant keeping. Dark or otherwise. Some sort of private tally of who mattered and who didn’t. He looked alone, but no cutter like that ever truly was. In the Hive, anyone keeping that much chant usually had an attaché tucked away watching a door, listening from the rafters, or waiting just outside the Cage’s ever hungry streets.

Luke pays with carefully concealed platinum, only two coins for a proper wine...and still easily ten times he paid for any food or drink in all the years in the hive. He reminds himself to put one in hidden cache somewhere, always good to have a backup plan.

And with this Faerun, lots of Prime names, you never know is that some new world you never heard of or just local name for something known differently. He focuses for a moment on the trader.
"Here and now, you need to focus on your best knowledge and use it to curry favor. Or pay, but be safe. Everything here is about jink. Money. You are either a mark, a player or dead body."

He looks back toward the dwarf, looking for bodyguards or telltale signs of invisible lurker around him.

"See that dwarf furiously scribbling? He gives tasks in return for favors or money. He is of course in it for himself. But if you're rich in your world and can persuade him it is on his best interest that you return to your world...he might help."
He sips the wine.
"And here and the first and probably only, free thing you will receive here."

 

[Brendan Byrd]

After speaking with the landlady, Aril saunters into the mess hall to get some breakfast.
Once the note is read, Aril burns it, using one of the lanterns to ignite it. If anyone sees this, Aril just smiles and shrugs.
That accomplished...out into the streets, and onwards to the location mentioned in the note.

 

[InVinoVeritas]

Wawaate

Only a fool or someone not to be messed with would walk up on the tip of a blade surrounded by ten ruffians, the cold blue light you cast earlier still clung on your body, your muscles poise a frosty disposition, and the glint in your eyes staggers back the thug. "Might of diced it on this Iceberk" one of the starved men gets out. The leader puts down the blade "Styx it." he spits on the ground, " You ain't worth countin' portals"

The ruffians leave without taking your coin, this place isn't like your home but Negafook still grants you his strength. The young orphaned girl with sharp eyes and tangled copper curls of hair steps back out of the shadows, "Them thugs called you an Iceberk" she says cutting through the noise of the street, "you asked about the wintercourt, ya blittzin'?" she pauses eyes flicking down the road "Do You need a Tout?" Sounds like an offer of some sort.

Everyone's language still washed over Wawaate like the wind, gone just as quickly as it arrived. He looked at the waif, remembering her playing in the avalanche a moment earlier. At the very least, it was clear that he had defused the situation with the thugs, and he would need this reputation to last a moment.

"Yes, I do," he replied to her question, not entirely sure what he has agreed to. He looks around for a scrap of wood or metal somwhere. "Lead the way."

 

[Steve Gorak]

Bimble

You spot a cloaked figure on the street, wrapped in deep violet robes that shimmer faintly. The figure is bending over a warped wooden door, sliding heavy iron bolts into place with the metallic scrape of someone used to warding themselves against thieves, vermin, and far worse things that stalk these alleys. The need to understand where you’ve landed pushes you forward. Roa pads beneath you with carefully. As you approach, the cloaked figure stiffens. Slowly, deliberately, it turns. The hood falls back just enough for the light to catch the pale, slick flesh beneath. Purplish gray skin stretched over an elongated, bulbous cranium. Four glistening tentacles hang from the creature’s face, writhing with subtle, hungry motion. Its eyes milky, lidless, ancient regard you without blinking.

An illithid. A mind flayer. A creature whose existence you may have only heard stories of to scare the populous.

You open your mouth to speak, but the creature responds before the words leave your lips. A voice blossoms inside your skull. Not a whisper. Not a thought. A presence that is smooth, cool, invasive, brushing against the edges of your mind.
“You have found yourself in Sigil. The city of doors, a place that is hard to leave without help.”
The sentence vibrates across your consciousness, resonant and absolute. No sound touches the air; the background noise seems to dull around you, swallowed by the psychic intrusion. The illithid tilts its head slightly, studying your reaction as though you were some curious insect that had wandered into its shadow.

Bimble

Bimble freezes and Roa senses his uneasiness and starts growling. The gnome pets his companion and says "down" firmly, and the dog relaxes a bit, stopping growling.

Not knowing whether to answer in his head or using his words, Bimble says hesitatingly "Thank....thank you sir. I am sorry for my dog's reaction, he has never seen someone like you, and to be honest, neither have I. As you have guessed, I just arrived here, and I am not sure how or why. Can you help or could you tell me where I could find out?"

Bimble doesn't know if he was sent here by some higher power, or perhaps because of sinister motivations of his father's rivals. Regardless, he would find his purpose.