Burrows & Behemoths

by Lee Duckett

  ~You mean like when he kept saying that nothing was going attack him, so he could catch something attacking him?~ Badger asked.

  ~Yes!~

  ~Didn’t you say you were going to shoot him if he kept doing that?~ Aria asked

  Fayne smiled evilly. ~As a matter of fact I did!~

  ~I was just bein’ careful!~ Rurik defended. ~Besides, she’s the one who said something like that, not me!~

  ~If that’s what happened, then you can’t shoot him over it,~ Aria decided imperiously. ~Either way, come on to the Chief’s room. We found a chest and need you to make sure it won’t explode if we try and open it.~

  ~Is that something that could happen?~ Rurik asks.

  “You could open it and find out,” Fayne told him, striding off towards the end of the hall.

  ◆◆◆

  The elf and dwarf walked into the room, the bed piled haphazardly with weapons, coin-purses, and trinkets. At the base of the bed sat a chest, upon which sat a grinning gnome.

  “Are you sure you want to do that?” Fayne asked as Badger jumped off.

  “Traps go off when you open or move a chest. Having a trap go off when you rest something on it is just stupid.” he responded.

  “You’re relying on an orc’s intelligence?” she shot back.

  “They’re not all stupid, just brutish and evil,” he told her, standing next to her as she worked.

  “Well, it’s not trapped,” she said, “just locked. Aaaaaaand,” there was a click from the chest, “now it’s not.” She opened it, the inside filled with a lot of coins, a mix of silver and copper, with a few gold coins, as well as several vials, a few gems, and a tattered book.

  Fayne laid a hand on the chest and said, “This is mine. Character Sheet Open.” A moment later she read off the chest’s contents. “3 vials of cure light wounds, one of cure moderate wounds, and two unknown potions. Hmm, I wonder why it didn’t tell my what those two were. The books someone’s old spellbook, but just flipping through it they were a novice, only cantrips and first levels spells here. I’ll copy the ones I don’t already know into my own later. The coins and gems, all together, are about three hundred gold.”

  “Three hundred?” Rurik asked. “There’s easily over a thousand coins in there!”

  “It’s mostly silver,” Badger said, looking under Fayne’s shoulder. “Remember Reginald, ten copper is worth one silver, and ten silver is one gold. A thousand silver is only worth one hundred gold.”

  The dwarf glared at him for a moment before nodding. “Right, I shoulda known that.” He nodded towards the bed. “What’ve ya got there?”

  “Most of the orc’s weapons had preservation and repair enchantments on them,” Badger explained. “It’s not worth as much as a combat enhancement, but it makes them more valuable. Other than that, it’s another hundred gold worth of coins, gems, and valuables. Can I see the potions?”

  Fayne handed them to him and his eyes glowed as he identified them as a potion of Water-Breathing and a potion of Levitation. “Give them to Rurik,” Aria advised. “Out of all of us, he has the heaviest armor and is the most likely to drown.”

  “Oi! I-”

  “-Because of his heavy armor and because he has no ranks in his Swim skill,” she continued without pausing.

  “Fair enough,” the dwarf relented.

  Fayne handed him the potions as Aria piled the coins into a sack, handing the fifty pounds of coins over to Fayne for storage in her Bag of Holding, who struggled a bit with the awkward weight. She maneuvered it inside the small metallic pouch, along with the Orcs’ weaponry. “How big is that thing?” the aasimar asked, “Not that I’m complaining.”

  “I’m not sure.” Badger said, glow fading from his eyes. “But when you can’t fit anything else in, it’s full. The most basic type can handle two hundred and fifty pounds, but I’ve seen those, and they’re made of cloth, not whatever metal thread that is. As long as it keeps working, it doesn’t really matter. We ready to keep moving?”

  Fayne nodded and led them back out the way they came, out into the main tunnel. They followed it a bit farther, coming to another door on the right. Rurik tried it, and found it to be locked.

  “Let’s keep goin’,” he advised. “If it be locked, then it might be best ta keep it that way fer now.” The rest of the party agreed and continued around a bend in the slowly descending road, only to come up short. The path in front of them was completely caved in and had been for a while, if the lichen growing on the rocks were any indication. The group cautiously approached the rubble, but it formed a solid barrier to their progress.

  ~I think we’re going to have to find a different way,~ commented Fayne.

  ~Ya don’t say, lassie,~ snarked Rurik.

  ~Is there another way?~ asked Aria.

  ~Well there is that locked door,~ pointed out Badger. ~It’s awfully convenient.~

  ~Max did say he had this adventure planned out. It wouldn’t be much of an adventure if we could only get into the first section and had to turn back,~ Fayne agreed.

  They retreated to the locked door and kept watch as Fayne worked it over, finally unlocking it with a heavy click. ~It’s open,~ the scout sent over the link. ~Rurik, can you go in first? I tried to do it quietly, but anything on the other side probably heard the lock~

  ~Aye lass, I can do that~ the dwarf responded, unsheathing his swords but keeping his katana unlit. Aria moved off to the side so that her light wouldn’t spill directly through the doorway, waking whatever might be inside. Fayne opened the door quietly as he crept inside, armor clicking slightly as he moved.

  Inside was a large long room with a high ceiling. Unlike the areas so far, this one was in complete darkness, but, like Aria, that was no impediment to him. His darkvision extended sixty feet into the perfect blackness, though it only presented a monochrome image to his dwarven eyes.

  Rurik continued inside, looking around, but saw nothing hiding in the darkened, oddly empty chamber. The walls behind him and to the sides were bare, as was the ceiling, though the far wall was far enough away that all he saw was an empty, black void.

  The walls and floor were slick with water, and the air held a humid weight, which suggested some kind of leak. The fact that they were so high up made that odd, but Rurik knew that with superior dwarven engineering, getting a water source this high up a mountain was child’s play. After walking in forty feet Rurik stopped, seeing a hole in the stone floor.

  ~I be seein’ somethin’,~ he communicated, stalking forward slowly. ~I think it be our way down.~

  ~Knew it!~ responded Fayne.

  ~Is there anything else in there with you?~ asked Aria.

  ~Let me check,~ Rurik moved closer, revealing the missing floor to be a staircase, winding down into the dark. A quick circuit around the room showed the far wall to be just like the others, completely bare. The corners of the ceiling forty feet up were rounded off, so nothing was hiding in them either. The entire room had been slightly eroded, the walls a little uneven, the corners at the top worst of all, whatever material they’d used hadn’t held up well over the years. It was patchy, uneven, and bulging, with a few holes in it, likely some kind of plaster instead of honest rock.

  ~Rurik?~ his mother called, concern in her voice.

  ~It be safe, Aria,~ he responded, walking back to the doorway, boots clicking on the stone.

  The door opened again, and Aria’s light spilled in. Fayne and Badger coming in, followed closely by the aasimar. Fayne wrinkling her nose in disgust. “It’s a bit off in here.” she commented, looking around.

  “And wet,” agreed Badger. “There must be. . .”

  “What?” Aria asked, turning to look at him, then following his gaze to the ceiling. In each of the four corners were rust colored bulges that didn’t match the surrounding stone, looking a little too similar to wasp nests for her liking. “Rurik?” she called tremulously. “I thought you said there was nothing in here.”

  Rurik, seeing the hives, had re-draw
n his swords and was backing towards the door. In the monochrome, he hadn’t been able to make out the details were highlighted from the holy light, starkly revealing the ‘damage’ he’d first spotted to be organic matter. “I din’t see ‘em lass. Darkvision only goes so far!” he hissed out. The hives started to vibrate as the party started to move towards the door. “Move!” Fayne whispered as the first monster emerged, a grotesque, orange creature.

  The crossbreed of bat and mosquito took to the air, waving its six-inch proboscis about as it sought its prey. Aria broke first, running full tilt for the door, armor rattling as she fled, hand pressed to her mouth to suppress her cry of terror. At the noise the hives started to disgorge their contents, over a dozen of the creatures taking flight. “Go!” Rurik called, igniting his katana and waving it about, getting the attention of the monsters. “They track ‘eat above light! I’ll distract ‘em!”.

  Aria ran out the door, closely followed by Badger while Fayne stood in the doorway and shot her electrified arrows, zapping bugs as Rurik sped towards her. Several of them had latched onto his armor and were stabbing their stingers into his segmented plates, trying to find the juicy dwarf within. Fayne tagged two off of his armor as he ran full tilt for the exit, stepping aside and slipping out as Aria shut the door behind them, holding it fast against the thuds of impact from the swarm that followed.

  Rurik swung his sword along his armor, slicing and burning the insects that still stuck to him, trying to find a meal. He rubbed his gauntlets along his armor after they were dead, removing their severed barbed legs still stuck fast to his plates. Fayne braced herself against the door along with Aria, pushing back against the occasional heavy thud of insectile impact.

  “What. Was. That?!?” Aria demanded, eyes still wide with horror.

  “Stirges,” her son responded far too calmly, in her opinion. “Poxy buggers live where it be wet an’ dark. Seen a storm of ‘em drain a dwarf dry in a minute.” He picked one of the legs off of his thigh plate, shuddering, before tossing it at the doorway, where it stuck. “Damn legs stick ta nearly anythin’. They’re not even good eatin’, due to all the disease and such.”

  “Disease?” Aria asked, concern overcoming revulsion. “Are you okay? Do you need any healing?”

  “Nah lass,” he said grinning. “Armor kept ‘em out, and none of the blighters got lucky.”

  “We might need some afterwards though,” commented Fayne, back still against the door.

  “Afterwards?” Aria asked uncomprehendingly. “After what?”

  Rurik regarded her levelly, “After we go back in and clear ‘em out, lassie. They’re between us and the stairs to the next level.” He walked over to Fayne, motioning for her to move and leaning his more substantial bulk into the door to hold it in place. “Ain’t nowhere to go but through ‘em, and I’d rather not have ‘em at me back if I can ‘elp it.”

  “But, but, they’re giant bugs!” Aria protested. “Giant diseased bugs! I don’t want to have to fight that!”

  “Honey,” Badger said, reaching up and laying a hand on her side comfortingly. “We have to. There’s no other way to get through this.”

  “But-”

  “If you don’t want to fight them, the rest of us can.” Badger told her comfortingly, Rurik nodding in agreement while Fayne just looked exasperated.

  Aria sniffled, before pulling herself up a little straighter. “No.” she stated resolutely. “If you all are going to fight, then I’ll be there with you.”

  Badger turned to Rurik as Aria straightened out her armor. “You mentioned something about heat?”

  “Aye. They can see light well enough, but they prefer to track ya through yer heat. Buggers killed many a scout that thought the shadows hid ‘em.”

  “Are they weak to anything?” the wizard asked. “Cold? Fire? Electricity?”

  “I’m just going to shoot them.” Fayne observed, restocking her quiver from the Bag of Holding in her backpack.

  Rurik nodded, “The elf’s right. There must’ve been magic in their creation, they’re certainly ugly enough, but they don’t ‘ave any resistances. Just squish ‘em before they suck yer blood.”

  Aria shuddered before taking a deep breath. “Is that all? Ugh. Okay. I can do this.”

  “Good,” the dwarf brogued, listening to the door before nodding. “It’s time for us to get their blood instead!”

  ◆◆◆

  The group burst through the door, Rurik charging forward, waving his flaming blade over his head. Badger threw a Flame Bolt at a hive in the corner, setting it alight as Fayne started shooting the few stirges who hadn’t gone back to their hives. Aria was in place behind them, mace ready. The stirges in the burning hive shrieked as they died, three making it out, but those ‘lucky’ few quickly succumbed to the flames burning on their carapaces, falling to the ground with a cracking sound.

  The other hives disgorged their occupants, the stirges flying towards the fire before re-orienting on Rurik, several falling to Flame Bolts and electrified arrows in the process. Most of the swarm focused on the dwarf, who was swinging his katana, yelling “Over here ya overgrown mosquitos!” They surrounded him and latched on as fast as he could cut them, covering the samurai in yellow-black ichor.

  Five flew towards the rest of the party, three shot down as the last two dived for Badger. The first was caught by Aria’s mace, crunching into paste under the blow, while the second clung to his chest, piercing the leather and sinking its proboscis deep in the Gnome’s chest, visibly starting to swell with blood. Aria cried out as she smashed it from the side, ripping it out and splattering blood all over Fayne as Badger dropped to the ground.

  Fayne flinched, missing her shot and looked over to see Badger fall, with Aria catching him, hand aglow. She turned back and tagged a stirge that had attached itself to Rurik’s helmet, whose mouth struck a glancing blow as it failed to get through the thick steel. It flipped off and righted itself, twisting to head towards Fayne as a wakizashi passed through its body as if it weren’t there, bisecting it.

  Rurik and Fayne continued to fight, the lightning of her arrows flickering across his armor as his swords danced, killing creature after creature. After several more moments of furious fighting, the last stirge died, shot through the wing and fried by the lightning carried by the archer’s arrow.

  Fayne took a deep breath and relaxed before walking over to salvage any arrows she could. Rurik cleaned and sheathed his swords before tromping over to Aria, who was holding onto a sickly-looking Badger with an expression of extreme worry. She looked up to him concerned “I healed him but he’s not better! The puncture’s closed but he’s still weak, is he sick?”

  Fayne looked over from a stirge corpse, tossing aside the cracked arrow. “Aria, check his character sheet, that might have something.”

  Badger shakily raised his hand and opened his sheet, the bright red writing on the window that opened up in front of him catching everyone’s eye.

  “Why does his constitution score have a negative four next to it?” Aria asked. “Is it because of a disease?”

  “I know what it is” Badger croaked. “It’s ability damage. I have a spell that does strength damage. It damages the ability, not your health so you have to heal it with a restoration class spell, like when that shadow drained Fayne’s strength”

  “Oh thank Solus,” sighed Aria, as she began to cast the spell, a ring of golden radiance springing up around Badger’s head, slowly sliding along his body, reinvigorating his pallid flesh as it passed. After she was done he stood up, hale and hearty, and hugged Aria tight. Then he looked over at the blood and Ichor splattered figures of Fayne and Rurik.

  “Oh, let me get that for you!” the restored gnome exclaimed, trotting over and casting Prestidigitation, cleaning them off.

  As he was doing so Fayne looked up at the hives, one still burning, and asked “Rurik, is there anything worth looting here?”

  “Nah lass,” the samurai shook his head, “If there be a
nything of value then it would be on their victims, and we’d see ‘em on the floor.”

  Fayne just shrugged, and after Badger finished cleaning his blood off her left the others to talk while she crept down the stairway, silent as a cat.

  Chapter Seven

  Waterslides Are Not Your Friend

  Fayne came back and reported that the stairway went on for a bit, with doorways filled with rubble, and the party descended, creeping carefully and quietly, ready for whatever came next. They continued on, stairs giving way to short hallways, which led to more stairs, which led to another hallway, each doorway or branching hallway caved in, leading them down a singular path. “I don’t be likin’ this,” Rurik grumbled. “A straight path like this’d be too easy to trap.”

  “I’m looking, but I don’t see any.” Fayne responded from the front of the group. “With the stirges back there,” she jerked her head back the way they came, “I doubt anyone has been here in awhile.”

  They continued their dank, dark descent until they came upon a broken section of passage. Water poured in through a large crack in the right wall and flowed across the hallway into a small, natural looking, four-foot-wide tunnel to the left which angled down and curved away, hiding wherever it might lead. The constant flow of fluid had worn away the stone floor of the hallway, leaving a gully several feet across, angling downwards into the tunnel. “Well,” commented Badger, “there’s another way you can go if you don’t like the way we’re going.”

  Rurik eyed the stone hole, easily four feet wide, with distrust. “If it’s all the same to ya,” he responded. “I’ll stick with the stairs.”

  Fayne shrugged, and took a running leap across the underground stream, clearing it easily. Aria picked her gnomish husband up to cross the foot-deep rushing water as Rurik tromped down. Unfortunately, the stone was slicker than it looked, and the dwarf lost his balance, falling down as the water pushed him towards the tunnel’s mouth.

  “Rurik!” Aria cried as she dropped her husband and jumped down to grab him, losing her own balance and smacking right into the samurai as he found his footing, sending them both tumbling through the hole, the water carrying them down and out of sight.