(G316 27/05/2017 via Roll20 - AP(GM), JF, MJ) RL6

(G316 27/05/2017 via Roll20 - AP(GM), JF, MJ) RL6


DAY 343 (10th Alturaik)(February) cont ...

The fighting continued in the cellar. I found it hard to identify some of them, but there was a powerful skeleton, some of the superior zombies and another strange thing that reminded me a bit of the morgh we once encountered in Sasserine.

Danovich the cleric, died quickly in the melee, as Sylvia and Ashlyn fought beside my sleuth of bears. It was he that had slain poor Mr Badgerington.

Sylvia tried again and again to turn the undead, but they were too strong, so she swapped to healing Ashlyn as she held back the zombies. Tie-pie summoned a flaming sphere and I hit them with a splinter bolt. I then also summoned a sphere.

Yli's arrows did deadly damage from above, destroying the skeleton. Then Tie-pie's sphere killed the 'morgh'. My bears did damage, but primarily held the monsters at bay while Yli and Tie-pie shot at them from above. The last zombie was finished off by a lightning bolt from the sorcerer.

I flew back up, once the fighting was over, and turned into my human form. I mourned for Badger, but there was work to do. We searched and looted the church and found Danovich’s journal. An entry caught my interest;

''
There is a book, the Tome of Strahd, that might shed light on the steps necessary to destroy the monster of the castle. It is well known that Strahd kept meticulous notes from ancient  times on all he did or said. Perhaps some weakness of his could be found there. This tome was once located in Ravenloft’s library, but now I’m not sure where it is. I asked Madam Eva about it, and she mumbled something indecipherable. Why do seers always speak in riddles?

Ireena Kolyana is not the natural daughter of Kolyan Indirovich. Ireena never knew, but old Kolyan found her one day at the edge of the Svalich Woods near the very foot of Ravenloft’s  crag. Kolyan adopted her as though she were his own and loved her dearly.
''

After we had finished here, I turned into a giant owl and took Badger's body into the forest. I placed him in the roots of an oak tree by a stream, as good a spot as a badger could hope for as a final resting place. I was sad, but had comfort in knowing he was in a better place.

I returned and met the others at the tavern. Everyone seemed in a better mood as killing  Danovich's undead had had the affect of stopping the dead from rising. The remaining zombies  could be more easily dealt with and no more would come to torment the townsfolk.

Free drinks all round, but I was in no mood for it. I thought of waiting a while before summoning another animal companion but after talking to Yli he convinced me this was as good a time as any.

Ideally I would have preferred to do it out in the forest, but gauged the chances of performing the 24 hour ritual unmolested was slim, so I began upstairs in my room. I warned the landlord to expect something big and hairy this time tomorrow.


DAY 344 (11th Alturaik)(February)

It was a long druid ritual, similar to the one that I used to awaken Rolanda the Rat. Not  long after ten in the morning a huge dire wolf arrived in town and padded into the inn. I can just imagine their faces as it walked past the bar and up the stairs. Dire wolves are the size of horses!

It entered my room and sniffed at me, then licked my face with it's massive tongue. I stood up and ruffled his fur. He was a young male, tall and powerful looking, nearly the height of a man and nine feet long.
He was going to be a lot harder to get into pubs and things than a badger so he needed all the help he could get to appear inoffensive to humans.
'Greetings to you, my friend,' I said. 'I will call you Fluffy.'

(G315 20/05/2017 via Roll20 - AP, JF(GM), MJ, HK) WA4

(G315 20/05/2017 via Roll20 - AP, JF(GM), MJ, HK) WA4


DAY 289 (24th Nightal)(December) cont...

Now, as a druid I am always fascinated by all aspects of nature as you can imagine. Over the years I have seen many strange and wonderful creatures of nature and heard of many more.

In the Cheron Forest there is a very rare creature indeed, known locally as a 'Tree Climbing Shambling Mound'. There is said to be no more than a handful of breeding pairs left in the forest.

They are aggressive and territorial so when Fenrir encountered two of them on his next scouting trip forward of the others they set upon him at once. Fenrir being Fenrir started blasting at them and took to the sky, or the upper branches of the trees anyway.

To his surprise though, they don't call them 'tree climbing' for nothing and using their tentacles they swung after him. They even managed to use their slam attacks on him a couple of times before he blasted them to death, but in the end they did not last long.

Back at where he had left them, Harvel and Arahel played hide and seek, thinking that they could lay an ambush, but it was not required.

Now that both Harvel and Fenrir were injured they decided to camp and Arahel found them a good site not far away, a few hundred yards down the track.

They decided not to light a fire, but Harvel (the only one without a magic bedroll) found he was soon shivering with cold. It was winter after all and even in his own regular bedroll he felt the low temperature.

A few hours after the sun had set, they heard whistling back up the track, a noise that slowly came towards them.

Arahel was still in the form of a snow owl (from her camp scouting trip) so she flapped down the path a bit to take a look. She saw an animated skeleton wearing plate armour and carrying a two handed sword. How it was whistling she didn't know, in that it had no lips, but she flew back and warned the others.

He was not a threat though, when he arrived he asked them about what they were doing in the forest and when they said, 'To see Nexelmode,' he offered to take them to her.

Nexelmode's cave was no more than half a mile away. It was large and warm, being lit by several fires. It was divided into two main areas. The area by the entrance had about fifty goblins in it, some were warriors but a good portion of them were females and young ones.
A chasm divided the cave and Nexelmode inhabited the portions of the cavern beyond it. There were also several beings that looked like hags or witches.

At first Nexelmode was indifferent to their presence but when Arahel revealed here true form to be a kiloren, she was delighted.
So much so, that Arahel grew a little concerned about all the hugs and kisses the strange women gave to her as she said, 'What have they done to you? You are cursed? Why do you hang around with these nasty humans? You should be in the forest where you belong, with me!'

The skeleton warrior, whose name was 'Mr Rattles' was not very friendly but was willing to answer questions from Harvel and Fenrir while Nexelmode examined Arahel.

Harvel asked about the goblins and Nexelmode answered;

''
This lot just turned up. There are hundreds of them all camped out in the upper reaches. What am I supposed to do with them? They are a pest, but I'm not a butcher. If they kill a few poachers then that's fine by me. Those stinking humans from Ferbone are always hunting in my forest. If a goblin gets one and puts him in a cooking pot that's a good thing for me. Go ask they chief if you want. I just get confused gibberings when I ask him why his tribe just turned up here.
''

Harvel could see, looking across the chasm, a goblin that looked like the chief, taller than the others and treated with reverence.

Nexelmode removed the curse from Arahel. It had been the side effects from being resurrected by Es Sarch back in Pedestal and the tough little kiloren was strong enough to throw it off with the help of the other druid's magic.

Fenrir asked a few questions of Nexelmode also and turned on the charm. He got the feeling that she warmed to him.

Finally, the witches (or whatever they were) brought food and they settled down to sleep in  the 'guest area' of the cave.

DAY 290 (25th Nightal)(December)

In the morning Nexelmode's servants brought them their breakfast.

Then the final part of the magic that was required, a Break Enchantment spell, was cast on Arahel and she was completely free of Es Sarch's curse.

Arahel bowed to Nexelmode and thanked her, but then said she needed to be going. As Nexelmode tried to convince her to at least to stay for lunch, Fenrir and Harvel went to talk to the chief.

It was impossible at first, as they shared no common tongue with the goblins, but then Fenrir remembered he had heard Mr Rattles talk to them so he called him over.

With the skeleton translating the chief named himself as Chief Redfeather of the Blue Cloud Tribe  and said;

''
We here. We travel old ways. We come from east. Black cloaked men come. They kill us. Drive us out. We here now. We stay. Green lady is good to us. She tell us that humans are good for eating. She is correct. Humans are good for eating. Black cloaked men come from old castle. Old castle was empty. Not empty now.
''

Fenrir tried his best to convince the chief to stop attacking the humans. The chief said he would try but pointed out that as often as not the humans attacked the goblins, 'We have lost many of our number.'

Things were getting a bit tense elsewhere in the cave. Harvel was skulking about in the goblin cave and making some of the warriors so nervous that one of them struck him with his sword.

And then Arahel suddenly decided she didn't want lunch, turned into an owl and flew out the cave. As Nexelmode turned into a giant bat, the two men ran for it.

Harvel was first out and hid amongst the trees. Fenrir flew into the upper branches and Arahel was next out. Then a giant bat flew out and assuming (correctly) it was Nexelmode, Harvel loosed off a psychic blast that injured her enough to make her flap back into the cave.

For a few heart beats there was silence, then howls and screeches as dire wolves and giant bats streamed out of the mouth of the cavern.

Harvel had awakened the wrath of Nexelmode.

(G314 29/04/2017 via Roll20 - AP, JF(GM), MJ, HK) WA3

(G314 29/04/2017 via Roll20 - AP, JF(GM), MJ, HK) WA3

DAY 288 (23th Nightal)(December) cont ...

Grumbling to himself over the lack of success with the Night Masks Fenrir considered joining the city watch and discussed how this could be done with Harvel.

In the morning Arahel felt sick again and coughed up blood. She decided to go see Weynay back down in Ferbone to see if she could help. It was just five miles away so she turned into a bird and  flew down.

Meanwhile, a young lady called Gelly was at the door and representing the Night Masks offered to give information on the Night Parade for 300 gold coins. Fenrir accepted and was told;

''
I have the name of a being that describes herself as the leader of the Night Parade. There is a house on Snip Street that can only be found by those that really look for it. It is said by some that this is the dwelling of the last members of the Night Parade in Westgate. Her name is Bezebelle and she is said  to be unspeakably evil.
However, I have heard from a usually trustworthy source that she knows the location of a Snake Gate.
How I don't know, I suppose you can ask her, but if I was to guess I would say that creatures that are essentially nightmares made flesh have skill in moving between Planes.
''

Fenrir liked the look of young Gelly and opened a bottle of wine. She stayed and chatted for a while.

In Ferbone Arahel initially confused Weynay by not turning back into her true form. Weynay was not overly concerned about a talking bird but her diagnosis was improved by Arahel revealing her kiloren nature.
'Oh, I think you have been cursed Arahel,' said the cleric. 'There is a woman not far from here called Nexelmode who can remove curses, but she is not very nice and the forest she lives in is dangerous. Perhaps you should gather your friends before looking for her.'

Arahel saw the sense in this and flew back to Westgate. She landed on the kitchen table back at the cottage and asked Fenrir, 'Have you mated with this female yet?'
'Not yet..oops!' replied Fenrir, forgetting for an instant that Gelly was still present.

After lunch Fenrir, Arahel and Harvel set off for the short walk to Ferbone.

At the Westgate city gates they saw that a merchant's cart had spilled its load. Rather than wait for it to be cleared Fenrir and Harvel helped to move all the bales of cloth that were lying everywhere.

Harvel earned them a silver, all the while Fenrir pretending he was Harvel's servant. Fenrir presumably wanting people to think he was not the one in charge (laying the foundation for excuses that may be required later perhaps?).

They arrived at Ferbone, by cab, at three o'clock. Weynay told them she could arrange someone to take them part of the way to Nexelmode and that the could also do her a favour as she explained;

''
For some reason there are goblins in the forest south of here. They seemed to arrive a few months ago. Well, the locals hunt the forest for rabbits and deer and such and a few of them have either gone missing or been found dead now. That area of forest is Nexelmode's domain. She will know what is going on. Perhaps you could find out while you are there and either put a stop to it or let me know? Be very diplomatic with her, she is quick to anger and very powerful.
''

Harvel dismissed the cab driver and Weynay arranged them rooms at 'The Dead Badger Inn'. Now, the landlord's daughter was young and very pretty and Fenrir's eyes caught her's very quickly.
The landlord was a tall and strong man called Kreggen, while his daughter was named Tweppy.

Fenrir tried his best to woo her, but in the end was stymied (or to use a coarser term - 'cock-blocked') by Arahel once more. She turned into a human lady and loudly proclaimed that Fenrir was her husband and that he should leave the tavern wenches alone!

Fenrir did his best to smooth everything over and succeeded, but went to bed alone that night.


DAY 289 (24th Nightal)(December)

They set off the next morning, Weynay having arranged a man called Hew the Archer to take them most of the way to Nexelmode's domain.

It was two miles to the edge of the forest, then another five to an old stone bridge over a fairly large
river. Hew informed them that they only had to follow the path another mile or so and they would be at their destination. Hew himself dared not go any further.

It was about noon when they were attacked by a pack of wolves. There were a few dire wolves running with the pack and they were quite strong. Fenrir attacked from above the trees and Arahel saw some of them off when she turned into a rhino. Harvel was badly injured in the fight and fell into a bush, bloody and  unconscious. Luckily for him though, his friends saw off the last of the wolves before they had a chance to eat him.

(G313 22/04/2017 via Roll20 - AP, JF(GM)) 57

(G313 22/04/2017 via Roll20 - AP, JF(GM)) 57


DAY 141 (sun) continued ...

The Caco returned to Voyager.


DAY 142 (mon)

On their return to Voyager it turned out that strange phenomenon had been occurring in the system and Ensign Kim had vanished into what they thought may be a Subspace Vacuole.

This had occurred on an asteroid in the ring of the planet Voyager was orbiting. On the asteroid were many bodies of aliens that appeared to have been prepared for burial. Every so often one more would appear.

The Caco was ordered to go scan a nearby moon. Kirk pointed out that the Caco's scanners were vastly inferior to those of Voyagers, but the Captain told him that the Voyager would concentrate on this  planet and everything else while Caco pitched in at the moon.

On arrival the Caco orbited and scanned the moon and read feint electronic signals from caves under its surface. Kirk formed an Away Team and once they were in their EV suits they went down to take a look.

They followed the signals into a network of caves and discovered an area that was full of what looked like Vidiian equipment. In the caves were also the mysterious shrouded corpses of aliens.

Kirk and the others scanned everything and gathered data. Just as he was finishing up and thinking of moving on, suddenly everything went black for Kirk. He then found himself lying down in a coffin.

He sat up and declared, 'I'm not dead yet!'

An alien male in priestly robes came over to him and attempted to communicate but the UT of Kirk's comms badge was having trouble with this new language.

As he tried to talk to the priest he observed that the coffin he had arrived in was one of many in a wide circular room that appeared to be at the top of a tall tower in a well built-up night time city.

Their attempts to talk were suddenly cut short when there was a loud bang from several stories below.
The priest made motions to Kirk to make a run for it and together they head for the stairs and up onto the roof where a hover car was parked.

The priest and Kirk jumped in and the driver took them off at speed. The UT was beginning to pick up the language and he understood from the aliens that they were a species known as the Vhnori, the tower was known as the Temple of Ascendancy where the bodies of dead Vhnori were sent on to their afterlife.
The Temple was under attack from heretics.
'Did you come from the next Emanation?' asked the priest.
Kirk replied that he didn't think so, probably he had just arrived from somewhere else in the galaxy.

As the priest formulated his next theological question the hover car was shot out of the sky by another car, presumably piloted by heretics, and the driver crash landed them in an alley.

Kirk was the only one conscious once all the crashing had ended and thinking it was probably best just to make a run for it he climbed up a six storey fire escape onto the roof of a building.

He must have been dazed from the crash and forgotten about the heretic's hover car because they saw him and did a fly-by. He jumped over to the next building then went back down to street level.

In this new alley he saw a parked car and attempted to boot in the window. A man came through a door in the alley and shouted, 'I'm calling the cops!'

Kirk smashed the window anyway and grabbed some tools out the back as the alarm went off. He then made a run for it, then seeing what looked like a police car, abandoned the tools and gave himself up to the cops.

He was hustled into the police hover car that then flew to another city skyscraper and into a landing bay on a high upper floor.

Kirk was dumped in an interview room, then half an hour later a Vhnori man in blue robes arrived.
He introduced himself as Nerel and called himself a chief investigator.

'Where are you from, alien?' was his first question.
'I'm not from around here...' replied Kirk enigmatically.
'Did you come from the next Emanation?'
Kirk replied he had come from a moon full of corpses.

The investigator called him a liar and left.

Half an hour later another alien male arrived and introduced himself as Dr Hruna.
After some more questions, the doctor then declared to the investigator.
'He's nothing more than an alien anarchist - do with him as you will!'

Nerel nodded and chucked Kirk in a cell.

Kirk had to admit though, it was a nice cell, with an en suite bathroom and view-screen with access to lots of alien entertainment and information services.

He lay down on the double bed and picking up the remote control began to flick through the channels.


DAY 143 (tue)

It was still dark outside, but Kirk felt like a day had passed.

He was taken to another room and interrogated for twelve hours by Nerel and a female called Grute.
He just stuck to his story though.

After that he was dumped in his cell again.

Kirk stuck the TV back on.


DAY 144 (wed)

Kirk woke up on the second day of his imprisonment finding that it was still dark outside. The planet that he was on seemed to have a very long day/night cycle.

At the next interrogation he was told to co-operate or that they would get the judge to execute him.
Kirk decided to start lying and told them what they wanted to hear, that he was an alien heretic who had arrived in 'Space Port 3' a few days ago.

After 12 hours his confession was worked up and they took a DNA sample in the form of a signature.


DAY 145 (thu)

Kirk, with apparently no desire to escape and every faith in the justice system of an alien planet he knew nothing about spent another day lying on the bed in his pants while watching TV.


DAY 146 (fri)

Kirk woke up on the fourth day of his imprisonment and decided he as getting bored of this new life.
He knocked on the door and two fairly friendly looking guards answered.
'What?'
'When do I get out of here?'
'When it's your trial'
'And when's that?'
'It will be about six to eight months.'
'What?! Uh... how about those coffin things? Can't you just put me in one of them?'
'That's up to the judge!'

The door closed in his face and Kirk went back to the bed. He didn't want to miss his soaps!

DAY 147 (sat)

Waking on his fifth day of confinement he decided enough was enough.

Luckily they had not taken his comms badge off him and he used it to 'hack' the TV terminal and easily gained access to lots of interesting parts of the planet's Internet.

He easily hid what he was doing from the security systems of the prison and began to look for heretic groups that he could make contact with.

This took him all day.


DAY 148 (sun)

Kirk grabbed a few hours sleep on the morning of his sixth day in pokey.

Using the UT in his comms badge to translate the alien text into English he made contact with an alien heretic named 'RenegadeX'.

Kirk sends his 'police hack' to the heretic and then some more info he stole from an establishment  church on the 'Scrolls of Abala' (Something akin to the Dead Sea Scrolls on Earth).

Kirk wanted to get RenegadeX to send a message to Voyager, but he had not realised that the aliens knew nothing about Subspace comms and the ship was unlikely to be with radio range.
Also note that Subspace has a range of 40 LY only and Kirk could have been anywhere.

After more talk with the heretic, RenegadeX agreed to help Kirk escape if somehow the human could get to the roof of the building. Kirk, who did not have a plan yet, agreed.

Outside, dawn was breaking.

Trump on his way to an Appointment in Samara

Trump on his way to an Appointment in Samara

The Trump stuff has really kicked off! Just when you think it can't get any more fever pitched than it already is, it gets ten times worse!

It sounds like he miscalculated though. I'm sure he had no idea just how big a deal sacking James Comey  was going to be. I am sure he thought that the Dems would be happy about it and that he was being super clever about the whole thing.
'Haha! No one will expect that I have an ulterior motive! I'm so clever.'
What an idiot.

And as if it couldn't get any more bizarre, the next day he has two Russian diplomats in the WH. One of  whom was Sergey Kislyak. You know - that guy. That guy that is at the centre of everything and is very familiar to anyone that watches Rachel Maddow every day.

And not only that -!!! - but the US media was not allowed to the meeting while the Russians were!
Unbelievable. The pictures came from TASS. TASS for god's sake!

Well, he's certainly bought his impeachment a lot closer, which is a good thing. He rage-fired the FBI director and maybe he thought this will shut down the Trump-Russia thing but it was like throwing petrol on a fire - FWOOMPH!

He's really on the road to Samara, the more he tries to escape his fate the closer he gets to it.

If you have not read it, Appointment in Samara is a book by American writer John O'Hara that tells the story of a man on a path of suicidal self-destruction.

The book opens with this ancient quote:

Death speaks: There was a merchant in Bagdad who sent his servant to market to buy provisions and in a little while the servant came back, white and trembling and said, Master, just now when I was in the market-place I was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I turned I saw it was Death that jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening gesture; now, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate. I will go to Samarra and there Death will not find me.
The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it, and he dug his spurs in its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he went. Then the merchant went down to the market-place and he saw me standing in the crowd and he came to me and said, Why did you make a threatening gesture to my servant when you saw him this morning? That was not a threatening gesture, I said, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Bagdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.