DM themed play-by-post D&D game : STORY THREAD

[beowuuf]

Westian examined the potions with interest, however the brown ones just seemed...brown. And organic. No true magic created these, and thus surely they were harmful? Haynuus could not really add much more to the thought on this - except they did look very earthy. MEanwhile, Westian saw Ameena's blue potions were obviously VI healing potions, though he could not tell how strong. Still, the scent and bluness of them was intense. They were probably quite powerful.

Westian checked out Ameena's wounds. A nasty wound on her limb very much corresponded to a bite like a rodent's. And the oprientation showed Ameena had not bit herself. However, there was also a weird mark on the back of Ameena's head. Westian recalled getting a spider bite from a harmless dorm spider once. For some reason he flashed onto that spread of marks. Except, of course, this wound was...bigger. The spider would have had to have been comparably sized to Ameena if that were the case!

Still, none of Ameena's wounds looked infected, and all seemed to be easily treated with his own VI potions. Especially as he felt more blessed by his god now, after his brush with death. The healing magic came stronger (ie, you levelled up )

[oh_brother]

Westian listened to the murafu's rambling story with an expression of rapt interest on his face. His face picked up when she mentions the Grey Lord, but then a slightly insulted look crosses his features. "Horns?! The Grey Lord does not have horns!" he added, looking somewhat put out by this. Suddenly a thought crossed his mind. "This man, who you say had horns, did he perhaps change form? From a grey-robed man to a dark-robed one?" Westian thought for a moment and looked as if he were about to speak, but then thought better of it.

He allowed her to finish her story.

"So I cannot remember anything before we met at the dungeon entrance. Or at best only flashes. And you cannot remember much after we woke up. Or indeed how we ended up all together in that room, with no memory of what had happened. I would love to know if that grey-robed man is still about, or the dark-robed man. Do you remember anything else about them?"

"Well even if the past is a mystery, the future need not be. We heal, we go on and find Deephold, and we see if we can learn anything else about Theron, Gholst or the Grey Lord. And we watch the gnome like a hawk," he finished, his voice just a whisper.

[Ameena]

As Westian mentions the "Grey Lord", Ameena remembers the word she'd forgotten. Lord, that was it. The Grey Lord. And the other one...wasn't he a Lord too? Ameena isn't sure. So she decides to speak, at the same time answering Westian's question.
"I'm not quite sure how much I remember." she says. "Maybe there were two people. Maybe...well, as you say, maybe one of them...turned into the other. Now you say that, it...makes sense, somehow. I think...I think maybe the Grey Lord was the one in the grey robes...I mean, that would make sense, wouldn't it? Maybe he was the one with red...no, blue eyes. And then the bad thing happened and it made him get very angry and he turned into the...the other one. With horns."
Ameena gives a slight involuntary shudder as she says this and an unpleasant mental image begins to form. Her mind balks at it, however, even as she consciously realises that that particular image is one she really, really doesn't want to think about. But she vaguely remembers something else concerning them, and mentions this too.
"I think I remember there was something to do with a...rock. Or...some kind of...stone? It...we had to...find it, I think. Or maybe we had to fix it. I can't remember, but that was something to do with the Grey Man...the Grey Lord too. But I think...we did something wrong. Something happened that made the bad thing happen which made the Grey Lord throw us all away."
When Westian mentions "watching the gnome like a hawk", Ameena thinks of the birds that some species call by that name. Hawks. A predatory bird, one that most definitely eats rats, even if they're too small to take on a murafu. But there are bigger birds out there, ones the murafu do watch out for. And yes, they watch. They keep their eyes wide open, watching the ground for prey. A black, swooping shadow that can be the last thing you ever see. Ameena isn't too sure she likes being compared to a predator whose larger kin might normally try to eat her, but she lets it pass and instead rather timidly brings up a subject Westian mentioned in passing shortly before his mention of predatory birds.
"Umm...do you think, maybe, I could...I mean, if you have any...if it's not needed for anything more important...maybe, one of those magic healing potions? It's just...I think I'd like one. I don't know how long we have to rest and I'm...hurting, somewhat. I...don't know how much you remember but I've never used magic. I can't make potions like that myself. Otherwise I would have. Oh...and you might find these more useful than I would..."
At this point Ameena reaches back into her pouches and produces two empty flasks, which she sets on the ground in front of Westian.

OOC - Don't forget to add these flasks to Westy's inventory list, as well as the two potions Ameena gave him before (the ones he just IDd as being health potions), if you haven't already . One of the flasks is the one Helm was given when he and Ameena parted ways with the group - I don't know whether it had any identifying features (I recall there being one flask that got yoinked from Arbrut and had some kind of engraved message to him on it but don't know if this is it), but if it does, I imagine Westy may recognise it. Not that that's really relevant to anything, just thought I'd mention it .

[beowuuf]

Aurek has a potion flask (ON healing potion Westian gave to Farel), Ameena as said has two - one given to Helm by Westian, and one grabbed from a soldier, and Westian had one but I believe that was the one Falkor now has with a stamina potion in it.

[oh_brother]

OOC: I thought that in Beo's update at the top of this page Westian had given a healing potion to Ameena. If not I will rectify it now!

"Of course Ameena, of course" Westian said in soothing tones. He picked up an empty flask and cast the now familiar runes of UM VI. A blue liquid appeared in the bottom - he rubbed a small amount directly onto he wounds and then handed her the rest to drink. He listened as she spoke about the two men, and he looked deep in contemplation. As Ameena began to improve he cast again, this time looking at the rest of the walking wounded that were nearby.

[ian_scho]

Haynuus, wriggles his eyebrows. In orcish, it means I'm next yer fucker, but the half-orc has seen halflings do the action so often that he realises that with other races it has different connotations... Especially if you have bits of grak-grak giblet still attached to the side of your face.

[Ameena]

OOC - Ahh, I must have misinterpreted that bit - I read it as though it said Westian thought a potion would do the trick for healing, not that he actually used said potion . Ohh, and how many hps do I get back from this? 1d6? Or was that for Lo...maybe Um is 2d6 or something...? Though that sounds a bit much...

BIC - Ameena keeps still as Westian applies the healing potion. She's glad he's doing it, since the wound around the back of her neck would probably be a bit tricky to find by herself in order to apply the potion properly. She grinds her teeth briefly at the relief brought by the potion as it touches her forepaws - they had really been stinging. Then, when Westian gives her the rest of the potion, she sits right back on her haunches and holds the flask up in both forepaws, tipping it back and lapping at the potion as it comes within reach. The ache in her head fades and she feels generally better all over. Well, mostly. She flexes her right foreleg, moving it about a bit before passing the empty flask back to Westian and returning to her fully-crouched position.
"Thank you." she says, gratefully.
Then she roots around in her pouches and pulls out the food she finds within. There isn't a huge amount of it left (though she has no idea how much there was to start with), but she nevertheless has already decided that she won't eat it all, despite the gnawing hunger inside her. How long as it been since she last ate? Far too long, that's for sure.
She crouches on her haunches again and munches on the food. After a bit, she returns the remains to her pouch and pulls out the small water-flask (OOC - Note, this is the hip-flask thingy she got way back in that first supply room - it isn't a glass potion flask in case you think she's been holding out on you ) from another pouch. It's almost empty. She sits back and, as with the healing potion, holds the container up and tilts it so that water trickles out - this she laps up before it can fully drip free. But again, as with the food, she leaves a small amount - not knowing when she'll have access to more, she doesn't want to use all of it. A shame she didn't have time to visit the water-fountain she knows she passed upstairs. But that would have been too much of a risk, she knows, what with those human soldiers nearby.
Having managed to mostly recover physically and to finalyl get some eating and drinking done, Ameena now sets about achieving the final task she has planned for now, the one that's been nagging at her the most - to sleep.
She settles herself down at Haynuus's side once again, arranging herself inside her cloak in such a way that she's both sleeping on it and under it at the same time, curls into a relatively comfortable ball, gives one final wriggle to make sure she is snugly settled against the side of the half-orc, and finally lets herself fully drift off. While a lone murafu would be vary wary about letting their awareness drop so low in a place like this, she knows she isn't alone - she has her friends. Like murafu, they keep watch for each other and call the alert if anything strange should happen. And they've done this before, plenty of times. Ameena doesn't quite remember, for the moment, that actually not everyone may remember having done this plenty of times before, but even if she were to do so, it probably wouldn't make much difference - she's been through enough in this comparatively short space of time that it's exhausted her in more ways than one and right now all she needs is a break from it. An escape. So she takes it.

[beowuuf]

Everyone gets back full hit points. It's 1d6 per level plus 1d6 because Westian rules at healing. You have the time to recover for once without it going insane, I'll ret-con the time required next week.

[Ameena]

OOC - 1d6 per my level, or Westian's? Actually it doesn't matter since we're both level 6 now...so that would be...6d6+1d6, or in other words 7d6hp back from one Um-level healnig potion? Bloody hell, if that's really what I get then Westy does rule at healing . Somehow I think I'll get back the 16hp I'm down from that...just for the hell of it I will roll and see what I get...6, 5, 3, 3, 1, 1, 1...so 20hp back. Hmm yes, I think Ameena is healed .

[oh_brother]

It was good to see Ameena somewhat recovered, and the sleep with do her good. He stood up quietly so as not to disturb her.

Westian was normally good at reading body language, and the dramatic dancing of Haynuus's eyebrows told that something was required. It did not take long to identify the problem: the various assaults from the grak-graks really had left their mark. Actually it was surprising that the half-orc was still upright.

Westian pulled out one of the VI potions Ameena had given him, and repeated the process he had performed on Ameena. He plucked out shards of something (wood? bone?) from the open wounds with surprising ease..this was not a skill he had learned from his order but now it seemed to come relatively easily.

He moved around to Falkor, the halfling seemed to be rather unscathed. Still, some low level healing potions for him and Aurek and the group was starting to look more respectable. With that Westian sat down and began work on his own wounds.

OOC: Once everyone is healed Westian will start filling up the 4 flasks: 2 x ON VI and 2 x UM VI.

[ian_scho]

"Thanks" the half-orc grunted, and rested. He felt a lull in events, as if a weekend was imminent....

OOC - Nooo don't use the 'big' potion that you picked up on Haynuus - you can use one of your own. He'll can wait for you to cast one of your own potions

[beowuuf]

A quick aside to fit in at some point, assuming Westian's mind would drift at some point. I'll move this back to the main thread later next week, to keep your charatcer thread clear.

Westian doens't remember falling asleep, but surely he must be. No one else is reacting to the black-armoured figure stalking between the shadows of the room. Slowly the figure winds its way here and there, until he spots Westian and makes a bee line for the half-elf.

"Interesting..." says the figure, his voice a hiss. Closer, Westian can see that the figure is a scarred elf male, his features somehow dark. "Do you know who I am?" the elf asks eagerly. "Do you know my name?"


Feel free to answer the elf, interrogate the elf, try to wake up, or roll anything you want to roll

[beowuuf]

At some point I assume Haynuus's thoughts might drift, or he'll snatch five winks. This little run will be placed back across to the main thread to unclutter your character thread next week.

Haynuus finds his mind drifts off. Before he knows it, he is standing looking across at not one, but two half-orcs who look familiar, and similar. Haynuus realises these must be what he looks like - after all, didn't the grak-graks form a half-orc that looked like this? Wow, his tongue doens't really look huge when there's a large jaw hiding it from plain sight. However, these twins look neither evil nor like grak-graks, somehow he knows they are actually him.

One, that seems to be dressed as Haynuus is dressed, beckons the half-orc across. The other one, dressed in much better armour and weapons, is is waving the half-orc urgently away. Haynuus can't work out if his better dressed twin is warning Haynuus from coming approaching that twin, or is warning Haynuus away from approaching the worse-dressed twin.

In between Haynuus and his twins is a strange crack in the floor. It seems plain, and boring, and yet nothing has ever twrrified the half-orc as much as it.


Feel free to react to this little day dream as you wish

[beowuuf]

A little aside as Falkor sleeps:

Falkor has a strange run of dreams at one point. Soorec is sitting cross legged beside him, patiently explaining some of the scrolls that Falkor found earlier. Falkor tries to ask Soorec about some of the odd items the halfling found in the gnome's pockets, but the gnome always says, "no time, no time!" The gnome usually produces a raven or false wand from his sleeve to distract the halfling, and then the gnome continues explaining the scrolls.

Sometimes the rolls switch, and Falkor realises in the dream he is Soorec, and Soorec is Falkor. And Falkor finds himself patiently explaining some of the elementary spells to himself. Although the basic knolwedge disappears when he wakes up, Falkor still recalls the lessons to himself - and infact it feels strange that he couldn't recall such basic spells previously. Infact, didn't he always know those spells? Falkor drifts back to sleep again...


My way of letting you know Falkor will gain access to quite a few spells once I can get back to it. Note Falkor is really just 'speaking' to himself in his dream, but if there is any question you want Falkor to ask his subconscious, make an appropriate knowledge or sense motive check, and ask away

[beowuuf]

This is a quick aside which I'll put into the main thread next week to keep your charactert thread clear.


As Ameena sleeps, it is as if she is trying ot have a dream. This would be odd anyway, however even stranger is that whatever her mind tries to show her, it darkens almost instantly and the dream is replaced by simply feelings of terror.

Heh, a simple one for you - for understandable reasons! Would Ameena try to push through the blackness to see the images, or would she try to wake up, or would she just passively wait for the feelings to pass? No will sve with this one, unless you want to actively make one.

[Ameena]

Well, let me see...murafu don't dream that often, that they know of, and when they do it's nothing scary - maybe just weird random colours or something, or images they know from their daily life such as flowers, trees, rivers, other murafu, generally things they tend to think about a lot. Then they wake up and think "Ohh, I just had one of those sleep-vision things" and think little more of it (though they'd probably tell any nearby murafu about it just 'cause it was something moderately interesting to talk about). However, in this case, Ameena is seeing something that's actually scary, in which case I suppose she'd revert to instinct and just try to get away from it. Since this is a dream, she might either dream herself trying to run away or cower from it (and possibly failing - you know those dreams where you try to run and for some reason you're just not physically going anywhere...), or just wake up and find herself physically reacting and trying to wriggle around or bolt. Fortunately she's next to Haynuus so that will offer some vague comfort since it's also part of her instinct to react positively to the feel of someone beside her (You know how rats seem to like sleeping in just a random big jumbled pile with legs and tails and stuff everywhere? Murafu are the same ). So she might not actively panic, but she would be likely to try and practically climb straight through Haynuus's chest or something .
Her reaction's gonna be made even stronger by the fact that this is the first time this has happened (at least, as far as she can remember...obviously if it happened on the First Run, neither she nor I have a clue ), so she isn't expecting it and has no way to deal with it. She might be scared to go back to sleep after this and will almost certainly be terrified of going to sleep alone.
At what point should I post my IC response? Are we waiting for some kind of update from you (in the main thread) to indicate that time has passed (and if so, how much?) during which people have slept, or can we just post reactions at any point?

[beowuuf]

No, huddlingn away is probablty the best she can get I guess! Weve already discussed the general repercussions of Ameena sleeping, there's nothing further to be evil about

Feel free to post reactions in the main thread then - keep them short for money's sake, and feel free to post the internal thoughts abotu them here first :p

These side threads will happen in parallel if the main thread gets too active, or before the main thread activity otherwise.

[Ameena]

Well, since I've pretty much described here what Ameena's reaction will be, and we both know what it is she's seeing and why it makes her so scared, I can get away with being brief in the main IC description since reactions ot something scary are gonna be quick anyway. I mean, if you see a giant, great big, fuck-off spider (or if not one of those then insert the terrifying object of your choice ) suddenly right in your face, the amount of time which elapses between your first seeing it and your actually carrying out some kind of reaction probably isn't going to be very much .

[Ameena]

Ameena sleeps peacefully, for a time, her mind happy in itself and glad to get away from the numerous stressful encounters it's had to deal with lately. She remains curled up in her cloak, nestled against Haynuus's side, making no sound and seemingly oblivious to the rest of the world.
For a time.
Then she suddenly jolts awake, twisting round onto her feet (at least, three of her feet - her right forepaw she keeps raised slightly off the ground and close to her body) in a split second and getting half-tangled in her cloak as she attempts to back away from something that she seems to believe is in front of her.
Feeling the warmth of Haynuus beside her, she practically jumps on top of him, claws frantically scrabbling as she practically tries to burrow through his chest with her nose. Her eyes are wide open and she is clearly terrified and is definitely panicking.

OOC - Ooh, went all sort of third-person there. Oh well, it can stay that way - it's better like that for this one, I think. Umm, Ian...you now have a very scared murafu trying to push her way through your (err, Haynuus's) chest with her nose while her legs are scrambling all over the place. Obviously we can hardly have one PC doing damage to another PC so we can just say her claws are scraping harmlessly off your armour or getting caught in your clothing (depending on where contact is made) or whatever . I'm just glad she had Haynuus that close in order to cling to him, otherwise she'd probably be either halfway down a corridor or have half-become a rather nasty stain on the wall by now .

[ian_scho]

This all must have some significance, Haynuus thought. He was brought up around people of shamanistic beliefs, so it was important that he understood the origins of this dream, and to what it might lead to...

He had no idea.

He knew that he was in a dream, but it's significance was lost on him. Of the two half-orcs opposite him, he could not discern which he liked most. While being in shiny armour was always a fighters dream, it wasn't one that Haynuus had craved to become. Perhaps the better dressed one represented the future? The crack in the floor however was what concentrated his mind. A little jump was all it would take, but he knew... He knew that it was more than that to get over. Just as he thought it would be a simple matter to escape from his previous life - a change in geography did not have the immediate relief from the suffering that he had hoped. No. For now he would stay here and wait, for ten thousand millennia if necessary until the dust and detritus filled up the crack in the floor in front of him to enable him to pass in safety.

Haynuus was a man of action, and he chose to do nothing... It was then he heard a scratching.

[ian_scho]

The half-orc was never the deepest of sleepers but the weight of a small child landing on your chest with a noise that was similar to 'that screeching & scratching sound' in jaws (remember, finger nails on the black-board) woke him up immediately and made him make a grab for his sword. It was then he saw a nervously flicking tail that was just starting to tickle his nose... Ahh rats.

"Ugh, thanks. I was just about to make the wrong decision in a dream." He relaxed. Sleeping was a most complicated affair down here in the dungeon. He wondered if he was just unlucky. "You ok?"

[beowuuf]

Haynuus felt oddly at peace (except for his fast beating heart at having a murafu landing on him). While he was still swimming in an ocean of oddly contradictory memories, and while he was still slightly disconnected from the action around him, that wasn't really too much different from not wanting to associate with his previous life, and allowing other people to guide his actions now.

For some reason, the crack he had imagined did not seem as terrifying now.

Good old Haynuus, his terrible intelligence seems to get him out of more dangerous situations than it actually causes!

Feel free to keep posting in the main thread again with Ameena.

[Ameena]

OOC - Heh, tail tickling his nose? Maybe my description wasn't good enough - Ameena totally panicked and was (well, still is) on top of Haynuus's chest (her head facing his head, so her tail nowhere near his face) and more or less trying to dig straight through him. But yeah, maybe my description wasn't so good there. Let me see if I can amend it in this post...

BIC - Ameena hears a voice very near her head, and the familiarity and total non-panickedness of it somehow gets through her own panic and causes her to hesitate briefly. She blinks a few times, glances up and sees where she is, then gives way and slumps down in a mixture of relief and lingering fear. She's still lying on Haynuus's chest, lengthways across him with her whiskers under his chin and her tail trailing away over his legs. She's also still partly entangled in her cloak - it's wrapped around her right forepaw which is sort of wedged underneath her. Her left forepaw is draped over the half-orc's right shoulder while her hind legs are sticking out behind her. Although the terror of her sleep-vision is fading, for the moment it still lingers and she can't stop shaking.
Whatever Haynuus just said to her has evaded her notice entirely - only the fact that he spoke at all has somehow got through to her.

OOC - Yeah, blame it on the GM for giving her scary dreams. Nasty, mean, nasty horrible GM :O. Fortunately Haynuus is a big strong half-orc, and Ameena isn't exactly huge, so she's hardly squashing him - like you say, she's probably about the weight of a small (human) child. And about the same height, too.

[ian_scho]

Ameena seems to calm down. It amazes the half-orc that she can move so quickly, it's as if she has the heart beat rate at the speed of a sparrow.
"I guess you had a bad dream as well?" He lies his head back, and stops trying to strain looking down to look at the murafu. "They say that dreams are like windows to another world yet... You should never make decisions solely on what goes on there though. I saw two Haynuus's, yet I can't relate to either of them as I've never had a crevass to jump over before. I wonder what it all means?..."

[Ameena]

"I...don't know." replies Ameena, managing to bring herself under some amount of control by now. Since Haynuus doesn't seem to be showing any sign that he doesn't want her lying on top of him, she remains where she is - it makes her feel better to be able to huddle up to someone and feel their body warmth and heartbeat, even if that person is considerably larger than she is and could probably crush her pretty easily if he chose to lift his arms up and do so.
She lies still for a few moments, wondering whether she should try and tell the half-orc about her own vision. But...it's too recent, too close, and she doesn't want to panic again. She isn't sure how long she's been asleep, but she's still tired.
"Murafu don't...our sleep-visions aren't...well, we don't tend to experience them very often, but they're never like that." she says quietly. "I mean, they're never of anything that scares us. They just tend to show us things we know...like each other, or places we've been. I suppose because we fill our heads with those kinds of things when we're awake, they stay with us when we sleep. But that vision I just had, it was..."
She gives a little shudder and trails off, pressing her head down harder against Haynuus's chest as though to get away from the images that seem to be trying to form inside her mind. She concentrates on her friend's heartbeat instead, and the way his chest rises and falls beneath her, causing her to slowly move up and down at the same time. It sort of reminds her of something another murafu once told her, about lying on a large piece of wood which was floating in a lake, and the strange sensation of movement that he felt whilst there. That is, before he saw some kind of predatory bird-creature swooping overhead and had to quickly dive into the water and swim for safety, and...

OOC - Haynuus can, of course, feel free to interrupt this rambling train of thought if he wants to, by asking her a question or something. Otherwise you can assume that Ameena will just end up falling asleep again, still draped over him the way she is .

[money]

Falkor listened to the ramblings of the others, there was so much talking going on... Falkor listened as long as he could before the tiredness took ahold of him, he closed his eyes and started sleeping. It wasn't long before he woke, speaking with himself, with Soorec, himsef, it was all too confusing and it made no sense, it was then that he awoke, with a chill going down his spine... it had been a dream, a waking dream, it felt so real and at the same time so confusing. He looked at the others, in various stages of sleep, drifting in and out.. and before long he returned to sleep.... while he was about to drop into deep sleep he repeated the sentance over and over again..

"Am i seeroc"... "Am I Seeroc"... "Am I Seer..." he was back in deep sleep - his eyes moving frantically beneath the closed eyelids.

[ian_scho]

Haynuus relaxed and smiled to himself at having the murafu lying restfully on his chest. These were good people around him, he thought. It was a pity that he had no mental anchorage as to know where he came from or where he was going.
He twisted his ear to hear the halfling mutter. He didn't catch it all but Soorec, Seeroc, Seer? What did he say?.. He mused for a second. Maybe they were all seers? They could see visions of the future yet their fractured memories were part of the job. Where the flow of time does not flow it's steady and constant pace for those who have opened their third eye. To Haynuus all of these ideas were possibilities that he would not disregard, just as he happily accepted the predictions of his own shaman when he foretold of his change of fortune by throwing broken bits of bone onto the ground.

[oh_brother]

OOC: I assume this is not somebody I saw earlier? (i.e. I did not see him when I was dead?).

Westian sighed. "So many people must know me, but I have forgotten them. Tell me who you are." Only then did Westian realise he was speaking in elven. Whether that was because the figure before him was an elf or whether Westian normally dreamed in elven he could not say, it was not something he had been conscious of before.

[oh_brother]

OOC: So as not to hold things up I don't mind if the story thread goes in parallel with the dream. We could say that the dream is only slowly coming back to Westian as he wakes up!

Westian wakes up suddenly to the noise of claws tearing on metal. At first he thinks the murafu has gone crazy, and is making a desperate, and feeble, attempt to kill Haynuus in his sleep. Slowly he realises what is going on, Ameena must have had a nightmare. Come to think of it Westian had been dreaming himself...

"Is everyone okay?" Westian's voice sounded hoarse since he had just woken up, so he cleared his throat. "Just nightmares I hope, no problem here, is there?"

[beowuuf]

Yes, after a moment Westian would realise this is the 'opposite number' that had taken a different path in the dream. A dark featured elf in armour.

Oh, and roll me a sense motive if you would