An Illicit Sense of Foreboding...

Episode 20: The Mission to Eldritch Mountain!

Everyone was healed. The ship was ready. The journey to Eldritch Mountain could begin. But first, a little swing by ‘The Floating Isle” to see if Mad Jack McMad’s tip about a sighting of the Mind Flayer ship was in order…

As Der Chelonian approached the Isle, the all-too-keen-eyed Takemiya spied a thin plume of smoke rising up from the middle of the island, between the two forested peaks. As the ship drew closer, Saladin could detect some faint background psionic static, and immediately the crew took up battle stations.

The ship took to the air for a flyover, and while the crew found a crash site, Takemiya picked up voices with his telepathic powers – voices that could see Der Mobile. Paranoia quickly took over, and the crew was soon raining white-hot death down upon the site of the crashed nautiloid.

As the smoke cleared (and infravision normalized), the inhabitants of the island revealed themselves to be the Death Commandos from the Hammer of Grapthar. Gollum, Li’l Sauron, Object, Aaa’oo’aaa, and Velva had not only survived the crash (and a ship full of illithids), but were in fact the ones who had killed of the mind flayers in the first place. Der Mobile gratefully gave the Commandos a lift and made their way to Guildenstern to rendezvous with Elof the Singing Blacksmith.

While Xeno dealt with Elof, the saw blades and a commodity to be named later, Iryien and Xoe headed up Eldritch Mountain for a little scouting mission. On the way, they found malevolent and rudely-stacked cairns marking the trail. Both felt strange, maternal urges as they climbed towards the temple. And just as Xoe had reached the rocky summit and laid her eyes on the temple for the first time, she turned to see a nude Iryien prancing about, doing some sort of interpretive dance whilst clutching a large golden carrot and smearing herself with rabbit droppings.

While this sight stunned Xoe, it was nothing when compared to the shock she felt at seeing Iryien quiver, shimmer, then disappear mid-leap. Xoe had seen enough for one scouting mission, and raced down the mountain to tell the others.

Sitting around Elof’s forge, the men folk had taken to quaffing some ale; but Xeno suddenly choked, and a well-placed Heimlich from Kobayashi shot a gallon of beer and a ninja-shaped voodoo doll out of Xeno’s esophagus. “Strange,” said everyone, but when Xeno came to, drew his swords and began cursing an unseen ghost, everyone took it as a sign of things actually being pretty normal.

The Ghost of Pomegranate Chen made a brief appearance, sucked face with (and 7 years off the life of) Xeno, then disapparated before Saladin could get a perusal through the Psionic Handbook in edgewise.

And with that, Xeno took off to the ship for a nap.

It was then agreed that Xeno should be escorted to Marguerite to see if she could unhaunt him; but alas, before they could even offload in Rosencrantz, the Ghost of Pomegranate Chen returned to slay the Harbormaster, bewilder Saladin and trick Xeno into crippling three Sulians with a blast of Crushing Despair…

So far the Mission is NOT going according to plan…

Episode 19: The Anniversary

It was early morning. Xeno and Saladin had been up all night, playing with the Deck of Many Things. They had all their limbs intact. Xoe instantly knew that something must be wrong.

There was a knock at the door.

It was Death.

"TAKEMIYA SMITH?"

Saladin stepped back and allowed the zombielike Takemiya shuffle to the door.

"YOU. OUTSIDE. NOW."

Takemiya followed Death out the door and into the sunlight. Xeno and Xoe took up positions on the couch. Blankets were pulled up over heads. Saladin and Iryien looked on with curious trembling.

As Takemiya followed Death up the path that led from the building, the ground trembled, and a great bone coliseum rose up from the atari, cutting the two of them off from the rest of the world. Hoots and screeches issued forth from the skeletal crowd. Death turned to face him.

"YOU FIRST, SMITH."

As the monk moved in to strike at Deaths nether regions, Saladin hurried up the tunnel that led into the coliseum. He could see that Takemiya was in some trouble, and wanted to help...

Death deftly sidestepped the monk and slashed him across the back with his scythe. Takemiya immediately sent his helmet shooting up int the air and Death followed it, clanging his scythe off the magical metal and sending pretty amber sparks flying.

By this time, Saladin had arrived in the circle and was immediately confronted with *POP!* a Death of his own to fight. Luckily, before he could get TOO killed, Takemiya's body grew to 40 feet tall, picked up Saladin "Fay Wray-style" and started hauling him up and out of the coliseum.

Meanwhile, Helmet decided to kamikaze Death, and the dice favored him. Death #1 was cleft in twain by the speeding Helmet, each half falling to the ground on either side of the crater that had now become Helmet's new home.

Saladin manage to wrest Death #2's scythe from him and break it in half, and in a surge of self delusion made to destroy the other Death's scythe. But as Saladin struggled with the right half of Death's body as it hung onto the scythe for dear death, Saladin transformed himself into a hawk, taking Death (or 49% of him) and his scythe with him in the transformation.

The coliseum disappeared, and a rather confused and embarrassed Death #2 slipped quietly away, mumbling to himself.

Takemiya's body rejoined with Helmet while Saladin went of to be ALONE WITH HIS THOUGHTS... which frightened him more than a little.

There was a hilarious bit with a canary, but if you weren't there it doesn't really translate.

Oh, and not to be outweirded, Xoe played with The Deck.

Strange things are now afoot at the DCM. Stay tuned for...

RETURN TO ELDRITCH MOUNTAIN!

Dungeon Master's Support Group

There is a tavern in the multiverse unlike no other: gamers aren't allowed, the wenches be perfectly buxom and the drinks aren't watered down.

It be the Dungeon Master's Bar & Grille.

DMs from everywhere gather here to swap stories of brilliant campaigns and particulary well-drawn frontier maps.

There is a saying at the DMB&G: "Why do my best players have the worst ideas?"

Another one goes: "Why do my worst players have the most brilliant ones?"

It is at this point that DMs usually just shake their heads and go back to playing whist.

The Gem of Recording...

That night, the last night of the Week of Peace, Ben Firenze comes calling to DCM HQ...

"I've finally unlocked the Gem," he says with a flourish. "It took some doing, I don't mind saying... Whoever created this item didn't want it to be tampered with. But a series of divinations, hyperspatial delvings and a minimacromicroscope were needed to glean the pass word to unlock the Gem and listen to its contents."

"What's a minimacromicroscope?" asked Saladin.

"Its a device I created to look at something very bigly, as if I were quite small," He glanced at Xeno, barely supressing a grin. "By projectinig the gem's surface into fourth-dimensional inverse-space and simultaneously retrojecting myself into obverse-space, I found..."

"You found what, exactly?" Xeno interrupted with gnomish contempt.

"I found the pass word engraved on the bottom of the stone!" Ben couldn't quite hide his glee.

"Give me that," Xeno swiped the gem fromk Ben and held it up to the light. "Hey! There IS a word here. And it's gnomish!"

"That's the second weirdest thing I discovered..."

"Efilnikufesin!" cried Xeno, and the Gem started to speak...

"Gallumbits"

The sound of footsteps... a door opens.

"Ah, Ragnar. Do come in. Have we heard from Voletare?"

"Not yet, my Count. But I have arranged payment for the statues at the designated place. They will comply. They are writers, after all. They need the coin."

"Excellent. my Master will be pleased. He believes these statues could be very promising, very promising indeed."

"Could you refresh my memory as to whom your master is?"

"What a queer question, Ragnar. Are you feeling quite alright?"

"No, actually, I do not. This mission to the Outer Planes has me worried. I've never enjoyed travelling there. The people give me the creeps."

"Worry not, Ragnar. Lemuria is so caught up in herself she'll never notice one painting missing. The plan is airtight. Have you got the cube?"

"Yes, my Count."

"Good. Now get back to DCM before they notice you're gone. I don't want anything upsetting our plan. Rest assured, Master Eel will reward you most handsomely for your work."

"Are you sure he won't have me double-crossed? He's done it before..."

"Relax. Its not like I'm going to just have you shot once you hand over the painting. That would be just too trite... haha."

More footsteps, and a door opening and closing.

"Eccentrica."

A few moments of silence follow, and then...

"....hehehe. Just don't ask TOO obvious a question. We need him to mention Chang, not to get suspicious."

"Just play it cool, Ragnar. Like you always do."

"You can count on me, Xoe... Oh, by Grunther's Beard, this thing's still on. Eccentrica!"

Episode 19: Deal or No Deal

Having dispatched the last of the jellyfish spawn, Der Mobile and The Hammer returned to DCM HQ. Plans were made, money was spent and everyone got back to their gentle routines back at home.

Then Takemiya pulled out The Deck.

The power of the Deck must have gotten to him, really. Why else would someone pull out what is surely The Most Dangerous Artifact in the known spheres? A surge of that magical power must've been directly responsible for him stating "I will draw four cards."

Everyone else slid back from the table as if he'd just let an ace mistakenly fall from his sleeve in a poker game with Bludgeon MacSplosion.

Takemiya placed the Deck on the table in front of him and turned over the First Card.

Euryale, the Dread Medusa.

Takemiya felt his body change on a molecular level. Weaken. Warp. Arteries hardened. Muscles stiffened. An image of a woman, snakes for hair, screamed through his mind. He wasn't sure what happened, but he was QUITE sure he didn't want to run into one of her kind in real life. He wasn't sure if he'd be able to handle it.

Takemiya turned over the Second Card.

Death.

Outside, Death Himself appeared. He pulled out an hourglass and glanced at it casually. His dark eye sockets smoldered with supernatural fire as they gazed at the sign on the door which told him that he'd come to the right place. He put the hourglass back inside his robe and reached for the door...

He wasn't sure what made him pause. Did he have the right place? He tried to look through the door, see through Time, but for some reason....

Nothing.

This place was a blank spot, a nothing in his field of vision.

"INTERESTING," he thought to himself. "I'LL JUST HAVE A BIT OF A WAIT." He turned and sat on a largish stone some way up the path that led from the house. Little did he know that he was not the first Immortal to have parked his Undying Keister on that particular piece of rock.

Meanwhile, Takemiya turned over the Third card, the idiot.

Um, I mean, The Idiot. The card.

Takemiya suddenly felt the strange urge to do all sorts of things. Dumb things. Silly things. He couldn't say why, but he just felt like doing the next thing that popped into his mind...

Like drawing another card.

The Donjon.

At that moment, Xoe saw the lights go out in Takemiya's eyes. Saladin noticed that a rosy glow had started to emanate from Takemiya's midsection, and it rose slowly up his torso, up his neck and towards his mouth. Takemiya's mouth opened and out of it floated a small amber sphere. It bobbed slowly up and down as it floated across the room, and everyone - everyone save Takemiya, that is - everyone followed it with their eyes as the sphere floated across the room, towards an open window and...

pLuB!

The sphere seemed to hit a soft, invisible barrier and pLuBbEd quietly back into the room where it bRoBbEd silently for a moment before fLuRkInG its way back towards Takemiya. A few whispered comments and gentle pokings ensued, whereupon DCM surmised that it was in fact Takemiya's soul that was silently gLeRnKiNg just over his right shoulder.

Takemiya ceased to draw any more cards.

While everyone debated what they were going to do next, Xeno scooped up the Deck. "Well, looks like he won't be needing this anymore," and he stowed it away. He then turned towards the Helm of Telepathy, where it was sitting on the old stuffed penguijn that had, for some reason, come to be in the office. He had what would later, in the history books (at least the ones that weren't used to line penguijn cages), be called a Moment of Inspiration.

He took the rather large and unwieldy helm and with an embarassed whisper asked Saladin for a boost. The bewildered giant dwarf picked the gnome up under the arms and hoisted him up towards the amber globe.

Xeno carefully placed the Helm over the globe and slowly, slooowly loosened his grip on it.

The Helm stayed there, floating.

(rattle, rattle...)

Then, just as slowly, just as carefully, the helm turned - slowly and silently - in midair, until it was facing the dangling gnome. It then did something that it had never done before in all of the the seven hundred and fifty three years of its existance:

It blinked.

Episode 18: The Badger Cannot Be Buggered At All

Saladin screams.

Kobayashi shifts his hands inside the massive chest cavity, trying to stem the flow of blood. Left coronary artery, left anterior descending artery, vena cava... all were being stoppered by one of Kobayashi's nine remaining digits. Bless the gods, he thought to himself, that the Harmonious Bags of Wind hadn't been perforated. He hadn't the fingers to spare, and he thought he could at least keep him from bleeding to death until the Hammer of Grapthar's Medicus could relieve him.

Suddenly, Saladin coughed, and a great spray of blood showered Kobayashi with bad news. The Bags had indeed been breached, only a million times over with wounds too small to see...

Saladin opened his eyes, and Kobayashi saw madness there. His features shifted, and his internal organs started to shift and move rapidly, shrinking away from Kobayashi's hands as the chest cavity closed up like an angry red clam. The monk was just able to pull his hands away in time to avoid having them sealed inside what now appeared to be a sullen, golden-haired badger. The badger regarded him for a moment with a look akin to disdain before its features shifted again and grew to the size and likeness of Saladin once more. The sucking chest wound was gone, but the look of madness remained.

"Medicine..." he gasped, and stumbled off to the hatchway thet led below decks.

Nastiness ensued.

Saladin, who was being mentally dominated by the mind flayers, knocked Takemiya off the helm in order to break off pursuit.

Above decks, a giant white worm was dispatched to further harass the pursuers. Xeno and Xoe did wonders for its health, however, and it soon ceased to be an issue.

Kobayashi dispatched (with a perfectly-timed 20) the Invisible Stalker that was threatening Takemiya with a messy death.

Saladin then proceeded to throw Kobayashi overboard.

This vexed Xeno, as reentering the atmosphere with a glowing monk in tow did not facilitate the greatest of chases.

The mind flayers got away....