Heroica RPG- Quest #96: Tying up Loose Ends

[Pandora]

"I'd stash the weapons upstairs, before we go down the hatch. If you don't want to go in at all, I can't force you, but it's the best place to talk, this city has eyes and ears everywhere, but not there."

"So why the hell can't we take our own weapons in and just stay upstairs? Why do we have to give them to you?"

"Ya, still ain't doin' a good job of explainin' why we ain't takin' weapons in there. If it's regarding the deity we got mixed up with last time, as long as we ain't touchin' anything, I thought we were fine."

"Yeah, what he said. I'm completely with the big guy on this."

"You'll have to forgive me for not taking you very seriously. You're talking in circles." Boomingham glances over at Skrall and then at Nyx. "We'll go in." Boomingham tosses his two swords to the man. "Lead away, Purple. But know I haven't forgotten that someone ratted us out last time, and I don't forgive betrayals."

"And what the hell do you mean "we"? Is that the royal "we" your highness? It had bloody well better be, because I don't need you making my mind up for me."

Nyx crosses her arms and stamps her foot, getting more and more exasperated.

"I apologize, Purple, but my friends here are more inclined to the "smash through things"-kind of tactics instead of the stealthiness of your trade. But if you are sure we are better off without our weapons, then we will give them to you." Ellaria turns to the others and gives them a meaningful look. "Aren't we, boys and Nyx?"

Nyx stares at Ellaria.

"Are you serious? We're just going to hand all our weapons over to Purple because he says so? Don't you remember what happened the last time we gave all our weapons up? How we got ambushed and everything? How can you be so naïve as to just agree like that? And make it seem like we're savages for even suggesting it might be a bad idea and that all we want to do is smash things, sheesh, thanks so much for that."

Nyx shakes her head with incredulity. In the face of the rest of her team surrendering their weapons she does the same, very slowly and with a ferocious scowl on her face.

"Keep your ruby in hand, once you, Nyx?"

Nyx just glares at Boomingham.

[CMP]

"Don't you remember what happened the last time we gave all our weapons up?"

"Yeah, I killed, like, three guys with my bare hands, and you, Rufindel, and Cronk all smacked down an undead necromancer unarmed. Purple says goin' in without our weapons keeps us from havin' to fight. I'll take that with a grain of salt, but even if he turns out to be wrong, we could probably smash those statues and take him out even without our stuff. Hell, I could do with a challenge. Those thugs were pushovers."

[Sandy]

Ellaria becomes distressed when her party mates start bickering over the weapons. "Please, this is our employer we're talking about here! If we can't trust even her right-hand man, then we should just turn around and go home. Let's just get in and get this situation sorted out. Then we can reclaim our weapons and continue bashing heads all over the streets of Strivvi."

Ellaria hands over her weapons to Purple as well.

[Zepher]

Boomingham just raises his eyebrow at Nyx. He slinks away to stand closer to Skrall. He makes awkward and flitting eye contact with the Ogre, but then darts his eyes away quickly and mumbles something under his breath that no one can hear.

[Scubacarrot]

The heroes hand over their weapons, some more willingly than others. First Boomingham gives up his swords and wand, Skrall hands over his Bow and Crossbow, then Atramor his staff, claws and dagger, then Nyx her staves, wand, book, dagger, and when Purple keeps holding his arm up, her collection of gems as well. From Ellaria finally he takes her Crossbow and two staves. The Infiltrator effortly opens the door with his full hands, the planks that seemingly barred the thing now giving way with hidden hinges. In the room they enter, there is a single bedroll, a large chest, and a hatch, the heroes know where it leads. Purple stashes the weapons in the chest, before taking off his own armguards and putting the weapons there too. He closes the chest, but does not lock it, the heroes see. He opens the hatch, and signals the heroes to follow him.

The heroes, after climbing down the ladder, Skrall barely fitting, arrive in a familiar, but different space.

"Thank you, Heroes, I know it's not an easy thing to give up your weapons and leave you helpless, while you know what once was down here. After we figured out that the statues dislike weapons, we had no attacks since leaving our arms up. Then, I'll get right to it. I found out where the Wolfgang is hiding, and the likely position in the vault. It hasn't been easy... Roman is dead. Zoe... indisposed. What has Patricia told you so far?"

[Zepher]

"Love what you've done with the place. Are you a disciple now too?" Boomingham glances around at the majestic room. "Patricia told us what she could - seems that you haven't been keeping in contact all that well. Ellaria there has a little list of things that we were told or a list of things we need to find out... traveling through space and time always muddles my brain, and I'm still not all patched up from the last little fight we had. On top of all you're about to tell us, feel like explaining who the Hel the Nightmaster is, and how he knew who we are?"

[Scubacarrot]

Purple sat himself down unceremoniously against a pillar, and pulled a skin of wine from somewhere and took a drink. He did not offer the heroes any wine but offered the heroes to sit down on the floor anyway.

"Patricia said I had not been keeping in contact?! The sodding bitch. Will be glad when this job is done and I got my due salary, should be a bloody lot by now. After gonna quit and gonna go to the Eversummer Islands and drink gumballs on the sodding beach with pretty fairy girls at my sides. Erhm. I did not do any decorating. This place, it shifts. The patterns on the wall and floors move, statues change, artifacts appear and disappear. Stuff you leave goes away. We decided to sleep upstairs when we first found out. Anyways, I've been sending messages any time I could, we weren't exactly left with a lot of funds. What were we to do? We aren't like you heroes, although mayhaps we should, I can't just go around playing vigilante and taking whatever we can. The Wolfgang call themselves vigilantes too, you know. Heh"

The infiltrator chuckled, and took another drink. For some reason the infiltrator paused. It gave the heroes a good look around the room. There were four tiny torches burning in the corners of the room, along with the shimmer of the gold in the room, it produced a paltry amount of light, yet somehow the room did not seem dark to the heroes. The room was covered in the same smooth black and crimson red stone as before, yet the room was clearly different than before. Where there were three statues before, now there was only one, a statue that could only be a depiction of Pseudos. The eyes of the figurine broke the room's palette of black, red and gold, and stared down at the heroes (or up, in Skrall's case) with white, blank eyes.

"A disciple? Me? This is not a room of worship, this is a room of magic. Tell me, what do you know of the Strivvian 'Pseudos'?"

Edited March 13, 2014 by Scubacarrot

[Waterbrick Down]

Skrall leaned up against the pillar, keeping one eye on the statue.

"Not much to tell, at least on my part. Haven't had any real dealin's with him outside of Strivvia. You said ya had a good idea on where the Wolfgang were hidin' out?"

[Scubacarrot]

Purple took another large swig, but stared up at the ogre with dry eyes.

"Strivvia? What's that? Some sort of organic sweetener? All in good time, are you in a hurry to be somewhere? Let me tell you something about the people you just fought, or rather about the only one that was worth more than a second of your, I'm sure precious, time. The man's as much Wolfgang as the late great Donny Dozenhands." The Infiltrator threw up his hands in some sort of mocking worship.

[Waterbrick Down]

Purple took another large swig, but stared up at the ogre with dry eyes.

"Strivvia? What's that? Some sort of organic sweetener? All in good time, are you in a hurry to be somewhere? Let me tell you something about the people you just fought, or rather about the only one that was worth more than a second of your, I'm sure precious, time. The man's as much Wolfgang as the late great Donny Dozenhands." The Infiltrator threw up his hands in some sort of mocking worship.

"Stivvi."

"And yet he knew we were coming, which means someone on the inside alerted him to our presence."

Edited March 13, 2014 by Waterbrick Down

[Zepher]

"I figured as much. I've killed a Wolfgang General before, but never outside of Eubric. It doesn't bode well for us that they've reached this far." Boomingham exhales sharply. "The Ogre's right, though. He knew who we were and that we were coming. My face is fairly well known in Eubric at this point, at least among the Wolfgang, but I don't know about in Strivvi. Gives one pause."

"And I know a bit about Pseudos, or at least enough to know that I'm a devote follower of his, but a refresher couldn't hurt. Does he factor into this? I remember something about murder related to him - the high priest was killed, wasn't that it?"

[Sandy]

Ellaria listens to the others talking to Purple intently while writing notes to her little book.

"Well, this gets us at least a little further..." she mutters. "Purple, please tell us what you know and also what happened to your colleagues. As you can see from this list, we have an awful lot to do, and we've been delayed long enough for things to get bad to worse in here..."

TO-DO LIST:

1. Talk to Purple and the other infiltrators. Found Purple, Roman dead, Zoe incapacitated (?)

2. Locate the Strivvian branch of the Wolfgang and take out its leader, calling himself the Nightmaster.

3. Discover what happened to the missing guards.

4. Find Mortimer and learn the location of the vault that the Keystone opens.

5. Take out the treacherous Captain Lorenzo el Diablo and recover the stolen ship, the Armoury, if we can.

[CMP]

"It was probably that damn cyclops. I mean, come on, he teleported us right into the middle of a Wolfgang ambush. I have a hard time believin' that was a coincidence."

Atramor crossed his arms. McCafferey eyed the Pseudos statue almost suspiciously.

"Well, don't leave us in suspense, where the hell are these bastards?"

Edited March 14, 2014 by CallMePie

[Pandora]

"My kind of decor, at least." Nyx mutters as she enters the room. She moves to lean against a wall near one of the torches, comforted by the flame in the absence of the ruby she'd had all her life.

"Purple, you've made it more than obvious you have little time or respect for us, so can we just get to the point so I can get my stuff back? Ellaria has a well organised list, and if you've been even remotely doing the job you were sent here to do you should have a decent amount of information for us. And if you don't, we're wasting our time here anyway." she shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other, her arms wrapped tightly around her torso.

[Scubacarrot]

"Sodding heroes.... You want me to make a blasted monologue for half an hour, tell you all you need to know so you can be on your way? I don't have any magic, can't tell you all you want to know. About Pseudos... From what little I've heard the blasted thing was some sort of god, and the Strivvians violently rebelled against it's presence. Many people lost their lives. Seem to me that there's good reason for doing that with a god that sends vicious, killing statues after people. Once I asked someone, and they got away from me as fast as they could. Only good thing about it is that this room seems to be soundproof, and that people stay away."

He takes another drink, finishing the wineskin, and throwing it to the side.

"Wolfgang Ambush. And how many Wolfgang arrows were trained on you? How many of their puppy sigils did you see? Of course the bastard knew you were coming, they know I am here. They want the sodding keystone. I believe they have found the Vault. It is in some random spot in the desert, there's a camp there, were digging happens, suspicious people come and go. About our primary objective.. I think that the guards were taking there too, it's hard to think that any might still be alive after this long. Or loyal to the town watch. We can't just go and storm the damn thing. When I got overzealous before, I lost my best man, Roman. That's not going to happen this time. We are going to need Zoe, and we are going to need official permission to leave the city. Zoe had devised a plan, but she never came back. I don't think she's dead though. She's tough, and I haven't seen her body."

Purple looks over Ellaria's list, before throwing the booklet back to her.

"Lorenzo el sodding Diablo. I have good reason to think his crew or even him sold us out last time we were here. Would be nice if we'd got on the ship too... Mortimer. The rockling 'archeologist'. He's still a captive, last I heard. If we can, I want get him with us too, I know the location, but he knows the best way to get there, and possibly how to get in unnoticed."

[CMP]

"Do ya' know where Mortimer is? I'd assume they'd have him out working on diggin' as well. Probably Zoe too."

[Scubacarrot]

"Would you give an infiltrator a sharp metal object on a stick? Mortimer? It'd make sense, he's a rockling, but yet he is not. He's in some warehouse not too far from here. Don't have the capacity to take his guards on by myself."

[CMP]

"Then I guess we've got a target. Any idea what kinda force they've got up holdin' him there?"

[Scubacarrot]

"I guess you do. Strivvian Wolfgang thugs. Expect heavier armed than the rabble you fought over in Yoren's Square. Better trained. Better armoured. Wouldn't surprise me if they were lead by the Daymaster. They move Mortimer every so often. I want you to attempt to free him when the sun rises, I'll give you directions. I'll go see if I can find out more about Zoe. I had to keep an eye on you jesters appearing the last few days, I'll pick up where I left off."

[Pandora]

"That wasn't so difficult was it?" Nyx mutters, starting to shiver a little.

"I agree with Atramor, getting Mortimer seems like a logical next step." she turns to Purple "May I ask about the Daymaster, like who he or she is and anything you know about them? Y'know, if you don't mind telling us."

[Sandy]

"Sounds like we have our next destination. Can we get our weapons back now?"

"Oh, Purple, do you happen to know what happened to the slave we freed the last time we were here?"

[Scubacarrot]

"The Nightmaster's counterpart. They like to give off the message they rule the city's crime. Barely true, but they're both in league with the wolves. Don't know em personally. The slave. He went back with you guys. Any more questions, we're likely parted for a while?"

[CMP]

"I'm good. Let's get our gear, get the hell outta here, and find Mortimer."

[Waterbrick Down]

"One last thing before we head out, any idea what official we need to be seein' about leavin' the city and why in the world we need to be gettin' official permission? Keeping folks from enterin' I can understand, but leavin'?"

[Zepher]

"In my experience, and I do have insider experience, leaders don't always act with reason. We had this tradition in my kingdom. Every feast, we'd pour out the first glass of wine. I asked my father about it, once. He told me it was for the Gods. I asked why they might want to have us do that. He told me his father told him to do it. I asked him if he had ever asked his father why they did that. I don't think he had an answer for it." Boomingham pauses. "I'm ready to head out. Glad you didn't try to kill us. And Purple, if Zoe is alive, we'll save her. I promise you."

Boomingham turns to Ellaria. "Servus elected to stay behind. I can't say I blame him."