2d6 (Caverns and Creatures)

by Robert Bevan

  “That doesn’t leave many options,” said Dave. “Best we start wa—FUCK!” He swatted away a giant cockroach that had just flown into his face. The stunned insect fell to the ground. It was as big as Dave’s finger, and Dave had thick dwarven fingers. As soon as it got its bearings, it scurried back toward him on its creepy-crawly legs. A shiver ran up Dave’s spine from the encounter, but he kept control of himself enough to bring his boot down on the bug.

  “This just isn’t your night,” said Julian. He called up to the roof. “Ravenus! It’s time to go.”

  “Five more minutes!” said the bird.

  “Now!”

  Ravenus peeked over the edge of the roof. “Oh all right. Ooh! What’s that?” He flapped down from the roof and greedily gobbled up the squashed cockroach.

  Dave was just getting ready to start the long trudge back to the Whore’s Head when two more cockroaches flew all up in his face.

  “Yahahahoohahoohooha!” cried Dave as he swatted the huge bugs away. “What the fuck is going on!”

  Dave didn’t have to worry about these two cockroaches getting in his face again, as they were devoured by rats when they hit the ground.

  “Yawahawahaaa!” said Dave, jumping into Cooper’s arms.

  Cooper, of course, dropped him on his ass. “Fuck, you’re heavy.”

  Five rats were nose to nose with Dave, squeaking at him as if trying to communicate.

  “I think they like you,” said Tim.

  Dave bounced up to his feet and kicked a rat, sending it flying to the other side of the street.

  Cooper called out after it, “You were too good for him anyway!”

  No matter how Dave stepped, danced, or hopped, he couldn’t get away from the growing swarm of vermin. He had to sweep his arms continuously all over his armor like a madman to keep it free of cockroaches. “Make it stop! Make it stop!”

  “What’s all this noise?” demanded a Kingsguard, coming around the corner of Halor’s temple.

  “Help me!” cried Dave.

  The Kingsguard actually started laughing. “Looks like someone displeased the gods.”

  “What’s so fucking funny about that!”

  “Calm yourself, dwarf. The vermin won’t hurt you.”

  Dave did not calm himself. He continued dancing and brushing away cockroaches.

  “Excuse me, sir,” said Julian. “You appear to have more of an idea of what’s happening here than we do. Might you shed some light on the situation?”

  “Creatures of the night.” The Kingsguard nodded toward Dave. “The rats and bugs, they’re attracted to the unholy mark on your friend’s head. It’s been far too long since the last time this happened.”

  “I can’t help but find it odd,” said Julian, “that you take such pleasure in watching my friend writhe in a swarm of vermin.”

  “Oh, I take no pleasure in that,” said the Kingsguard. “It’s a disgusting sight to behold for sure. But it’s great for the city. We need a good rat purge every now and again. It’s probably a good time to mention, I’ll need to escort your friend out of the city at once.”

  “But we need to rest,” said Dave. “We’ve been awake for nearly an entire day.” He was too exhausted to continue sweeping the bugs away. They crawled all over him, through his hair, under his armor. While he would prefer they not be there, the worst of the terror was behind him.

  “Good luck with that,” said the Kingsguard. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you’re covered in cockroaches and rats.”

  Dave sighed, ejecting a cockroach which happened to be crawling across his mouth at the time. It spread its brown, papery wings and flew right back into his face. He started walking.

  Tim, Julian, and Cooper walked in a wide arc behind Dave, giving the growing swarm of rats plenty of room, while the Kingsguard strutted ahead of him like they were in some kind of goddamn parade.

  Other guards they passed, as well as the few residents of the city who were up and about this early in the morning, actually cheered as the procession passed. At first Dave assumed they were mocking him like a bunch of self-righteous pricks, but through the squeak of rats and the flap of cockroach wings, he actually began to make out words of encouragement.

  “Good luck on your quest!”

  “May you walk in the Light again!”

  “Thanks for clearing out all the rats!”

  One pretty young woman stepped out onto the top balcony of a three story building as Dave passed underneath. She smiled down sympathetically at him, plucked a rose from the vine entwined around the railing, and tossed it down to him. It was, of course, immediately devoured by rats, but Dave appreciated the gesture.

  “Seek the Light,” said the Kingsguard escort, stopping just before the open gate.

  “We’re going to die out there, you know,” said Dave.

  “Have faith, son. The gods will provide you with all you need.”

  Dave had heard similar bullshit back in the real world, usually only involving a singular god. The Kingsguard’s words did little to encourage him.

  “So,” said Julian after the gates closed behind them. “Should we like set up camp or whatever?” He spoke loudly to account for the distance away from each other they all stood and the noise from all the rats now surrounding Dave.

  “Do you honestly think any of us could sleep right now?” Dave shouted back.

  “So what then?”

  “I’m going to go find those gomblies and get rid of this curse.”

  “But you know we can’t take them. They’ve probably got more gomblies by now.”

  “Then I’ll die!” shouted Dave. “I’m fucking tired, and I’m crawling with fucking bugs and rats. I can’t live like this.”

  Dawn was breaking as Dave trudged through the meadow, headed to where they’d had their previous encounter with the goblin necromancer and his gomblies. The rest of the group followed. The noise wasn’t as deafening out here, presumably because the rats were busy consuming whatever food they could hunt or scavenge in the tall grass.

  “Cooper,” said Julian. “Would you mind carrying me?”

  “What are you, six years old? You can walk just like everyone else.”

  “It’s going to be a long walk,” said Julian. “If I can get my four hours of meditation in, I can have spells ready when we meet the gomblies… or in case we need to make a speedy retreat again.”

  Cooper sighed. “Fuck. All right.”

  “Oh that’s adorable,” said Tim.

  Dave turned around. Julian was sitting snugly in Cooper’s arms, elf head nestled peacefully against half-orc man-tit, slender arms wrapped around fat, leathery neck. They looked like they should be crossing a threshold.

  “Keep moving, shithead,” said Cooper. Dave turned back around and kept moving.

  Only when the thick grass of the meadow gave way to the first trees of the forest did it become clear just how many rats had joined Dave’s entourage. It must have been in the tens of thousands.

  The sun was high in the sky when Ravenus reported the first zombie sighting.

  “He’s just over that rise,” said Ravenus, settling on higher tree branch than he normally would when giving a surveillance report, presumably to keep a healthy distance away from a horde of hungry rats. “Funny thing is, this one’s not a goblin. It’s a half-elf.”

  “That can only mean one of two things,” said Tim. “Either it’s a wandering zombie not associated with the goblin necromancer or, more likely, that fucker has had a busy night, and his undead army is growing.”

  “That would be bad,” said Julian.

  “Hey,” said Cooper. “How long have you been awake?”

  “A few minutes now.”

  Cooper dropped Julian and stretched out his arms. “Dick.”

  “Okay,” said Tim. “Dave, you stay here and try to keep your little friends as quiet as you can. The more we can pick off one-at-a-time, the fewer we’ll have to face when they finally catch on.”

&n
bsp; It was as good a plan as any. Dave agreed.

  “Julian, Cooper,” said Tim. “You guys go hide behind those two trees. I’ll run ahead, shoot the zombie, and run past you. When he passes between the trees, you two beat the shit out of him. Got it?”

  “Got it,” said Julian.

  “Good plan,” said Cooper. He and Julian took their places behind their respective trees.

  Tim pranced silently ahead of them on tiptoes until he disappeared over the rise. After a moment, Dave heard the familiar snap of Tim’s crossbow being released.

  Seconds later, Tim bolted back into view, darted between the trees, and turned around, already loading his next bolt.

  After a few more seconds passed, a jarring sound clanged out from right around where Dave guessed the zombie was supposed to have been.

  “What the fuck is that?” asked Cooper.

  “It sounds like a cowbell,” said Julian.

  Tim ran back to the top of the rise. “Hey, man! Knock that shit off!” He fired another bolt. The ringing ceased.

  Dave ran up to the top of the rise. There was no point in trying to keep quiet now. A dead half-elf lay on the ground, a bolt in its neck, a bolt in its eye, and a fucking cowbell in its hand. “What the hell was that all about?” His entourage of rats descended on the corpse, leaving behind nothing but bone and bell a minute later.

  “We’re so fucked,” said Tim.

  “What’s with the cowbell?” asked Julian.

  “Why didn’t it chase you?” asked Cooper.

  “Those weren’t its orders,” said Tim. “Zombies follow their creators’ simple commands. Usually the command is ‘Kill anything that comes near’, but there’s no rule that says you can’t have them wander about and raise an alarm.”

  As if on cue, the undead began to shuffle out through the trees on the northern and western perimeter of their visibility. The first wave was at least two dozen strong, mostly gomblies, but sprinkled here and there with other humanoid creatures. Dave knew that there would be far more than that. He looked down at the skeletonized half-orc corpse and smiled.

  “The gods will provide,” said Dave.

  “Like fuck they will,” said Tim. “We’ve got to get out of here. Julian. Do you have your spells back yet? Can you summon up some horses?”

  “No,” said Dave. “The gods will provide.” He picked up the bell and rang it as hard as he could.

  “What the fuck does he think he’s doing?” Cooper shouted over the clanging of the bell.

  “I think a cockroach must have crawled into his brain,” said Tim.

  Dave paused in his bell-ringing. “You guys may want to climb up some trees or something.” He rang the bell some more. “Praise be to Halor, Father of Gods!” He couldn’t be sure over the sound of the bell, but he thought he might have heard a gong.

  Sure enough, more and more zombies shambled out from the trees. There must have been over a hundred. When they entered the rat zone, the furry little bastards went to town on them, devouring their feet almost instantly. The zombies stumbled and were overwhelmed by a swarms of rats. The rat mounds shrank like deflating balloons until there was nothing left but bone. Not a single zombie came close to within striking distance of Dave.

  When the last of the zombies collapsed before him, Dave saw the goblin necromancer and his standard bearer off in the distance, atop their wolf mounts.

  “There they are!” cried Dave. “Get them!”

  Cooper hopped down out of his tree. “Julian! Horse me!”

  “Horse!” said Julian, and a black stallion appeared next to Cooper. Cooper unstrapped his greataxe and charged after the goblins.

  The standard bearer dropped his standard. He and the necromancer began to flee.

  “Magic Missile!” shouted Julian. A golden bolt of magical energy left behind a trail of sparkly dust as it swerved around trees and eventually zeroed in on the necromancer, knocking him off of his steed.

  The sight of a charging half-orc on horseback brandishing a greataxe must have trumped the black wolf’s loyalty to its rider. It bolted, as did the still-mounted standard bearer.

  “FUCK YOU!!!” Cooper shouted, swinging his axe underhanded into the stunned necromancer. Dave couldn’t be sure from this distance, but he doubted the pile of gore Cooper’s axe had just created would be sufficiently in-tact for any other necromancers who happened by to be able to animate.

  A couple of cockroaches crawled out from Dave’s hair and flew away into the forest. He noticed the congregation of rats seemed less dense as well.

  “Dave!” said Tim. “Your tattoo is beginning to fade!” He held out his dagger for Dave.

  Dave accepted the dagger and held the blade up, adjusting the angle until he found his reflection. Sure enough, the black was fading, and the gold was losing its shimmer. “Oh thank god,” he said. “I’m so fucking tired.”

  “Well you can rest easy,” said Julian. “I only used one Magic Missile, so I can summon two more horses. Tim and I are small enough to comfortably share one, so you and Cooper can each have your own. We’ll take it slow so you can even nod off in the saddle.”

  “You know,” said Dave. “I think I just might do that.” He gave his body a good shake, and a few more cockroaches fell out of his armor.

  “Horse!” said Julian. A short and sturdy brown horse appeared next to Dave. It was perfect for him. In fact, he might even be able to climb up on top of this one without Cooper’s help.

  “Horse!” Julian said again. A sleek, chestnut-colored mare appeared next to him, perfectly suited for himself and Tim.

  “You fuckers ready to roll?” asked Cooper, trotting up on his own horse.

  “Just a minute,” said Dave, staring at the reflection of the fading tattoo on his forehead. “I don’t want to take any chances.” When the mark had completely vanished, he handed back Tim’s dagger. “Okay, guys. Let’s – Ow!”

  He looked down. A rat had crawled up his boot and bitten him on the knee. He smacked it off. “You ungrateful little shit.”

  Just then, all three horses began to scream. Rats were climbing up their legs. Cooper’s horse threw him off and started bucking wildly. Four more rats tried to climb up Dave’s legs. Even more were scurrying toward him.

  “Run!” cried Tim. He, Julian, and Dave ran away from the rats, and the rats let them go, favoring the three immobilized horses.

  Cooper ran out of the frenzy with about ten rats still clinging to him. “Ow! Ow! Ow! Shit! Ow!” said Cooper, as he rolled around on the ground shaking rats off of himself.

  Dave, Julian, and Tim watched helplessly as, one by one, the horse-shaped mounds of frenzied rats suddenly collapsed as the magical horses inside died and vanished.

  The walk back to Cardinia, and even still farther to the Whore’s Head Inn, was a long, arduous, but fortunately uneventful one. They finally arrived in the late afternoon, and immediately crashed on the floor and fell asleep. All except for Dave, who was forced to sleep out back in the animal pen until he sorted out his cockroach problem.

  The End.

  Cornholed

  A low level Caverns and Creatures mini-adventure.

  (Original Publication Date: April 4, 2014)

  “This must be the place,” said Tim, looking up from the scrap of paper in his little hand.

  The house wasn’t anything Julian would call fantastic. It was a nice place, large and wooden with a wrap-around porch, but it wouldn’t have looked out of place back home. Beyond it was a seemingly endless sea of bright green corn stalks. It reminded Julian of the time he had to drive through Indiana.

  Ravenus circled above catching large flying insects, but Julian could feel his familiar’s hunger for decaying flesh. His stomach turned with a mixture of desire and revulsion at the thought. It wasn’t always pleasant to share an empathic link with a carrion bird.

  “You should probably go up and knock,” said Tim. Whenever they came across a door, there was an evolving protocol forming for which one of t
hem would approach it. If there was reason to believe the door might be trapped, Tim would check it out first. If they were in a hurry, Cooper would smash it down. If they spent too long talking about it, Dave would get impatient and suffer whatever consequences came from just walking up and opening it. But in a case such as this one, where they were reasonably sure that no one on either side of the door wanted to murder anyone on the other side, the task fell to Julian. He had the highest Charisma score of anyone in the party. He was The Face.

  Julian only had time to take a single step off the dirt path when the front door of the house swung open.

  “You the boys Skip Wiggins sent?” said the white-haired gentleman at the door.

  “Who the fuck is Ski—“ Julian, Tim, and Dave all glared at Cooper. He knew better than to talk while Julian was using his Diplomacy. “Sorry.”

  Julian looked back at the owner of the house and flashed what he hoped was a charming smile. “That’s us!” he said, probably a little too enthusiastically.

  The man stared back at Julian for a time. His coal-black eyes betrayed no hint of offense or amusement. He was short for a human, but as short as Tim or Dave. He wore a simple white cotton tunic. A beige shawl covered his shoulders, and a matching wide-brimmed hat shielded his sunburnt face from the sun. He had bushy white eyebrows and a handlebar mustache. The most curious feature was the medallion, a red stone a little smaller than a golf ball, the man wore around his neck on a simple silk cord. It wasn’t particularly decorative, and didn’t really go with the rest of his outfit.

  He rubbed the white stubble on his chin as his eyes moved from Julian to Dave, then to Tim, and finally to Cooper. He spat a mouthful of something brown on the sun-baked earth near Cooper’s feet.

  “Y’all s’posed to be warriors?” he said.

  “That’s right, sir,” said Julian. “We were told that we would be well-suited for –“

  “You look like a bunch of cob gobblers to me.”

  Julian’s face remained frozen in a stupid grin. He was unsure of how one was meant to respond to that.