Volkanenborg

As we play, occasionally we'll close a thread and open a new one to keep the size of threads (and relative complexity) down to a dull roar. Here's where we store the closed posts from the history of Errant Road.
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AdamZero
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by AdamZero »

(ooc: and I'll do the honors)

I can deal with a lot. Pain, I mean. It's a negative force on the body, so necromancy is aligned to a degree with it. It doesn't mean I can't just whistle away the hours while my insides are rearranged and put back into place with the sort of meticulousness that comes from centuries of exiperimenting. However I am thankful I'm experiencing this sensation AFTER the 'lethal' phase is overcome.

Again, it still hurts. ALOT.


I hate other necromancers. Their either dicks, annoying bastards, self-righteous bigots, or really big fish. wait, no not fish. Litches. This bastard, this red one. was a Litch. He just had to be. I mean... SERIOUSLY. if not in the physical sense then in the formula by which he carried himself.

As I hung against a smooth, cement, wall in the more 'modified' sections of the bastardized cave complex, I took the time to observe one of the few pleasantries of my capture.

For whatever reason, the people in charge of housing decided to room me with the lady from the coffin, who was a dead ringer for the wildly dressed woman Lucas had gone off with, but more so in the wildness. She was bound in some serious magick blocking steel, I didn't know if she was a mage too, or if they just got a bundle deal with my shackles and figured they'd work just as well on whoever was being bound up.

I'd wanted to make polite conversation, to pass the time, but both of us were gagged sufficiently that all we could manage were looks of mutual empathy.

(ooc: that seems reasonable enough, if you don't want our wild girl in the same room as Marcus I could always edit it out... but this is fun!)
"Now he's gone too far. NOONE ATTACKS AMERICA'S FOOD COURTS!" -Deadpool.
"Don't be so naive. I've got ulterior motives. MANY. Two, maybe three. Probably Four. I am one BIG ulterior motive." The Great Teacher, Onizuka Eikichi.
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Viking-Sensei
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by Viking-Sensei »

Neverinal looked at his pocket watch and sighed.

Elves don't die. Well, they can, but mostly they don't, unless acted upon by an outside force... say a heavy blunt object, an eager and irrational errant, or a small mountain being thrown at them. The rules regarding elven immortality, on the other hand, really don't cover the issue of hunger. Starvation, for instance.

When an elf starves, they don't die. The damage caused by their body eating away at itself is not so great that it cannot be repaired via magic... however, without food or water for an extended period of time and under the influence of having their magic slowly being ripped away as it constantly struggles to build and rebuild damaged tissue, rolling ever onward in a constant state of perpetual agony, eyes too dry to blink or see, lungs too raspy to scream for help, system too damaged to free yourself, but still no death.

Never death.

Neverinal had been there and, as the humans say, done that. And, following his adventures chained to a rock for over six human months (for crimes which, honestly, he DID commit), roasting in the noon day sun and freezing in the winter's cold, naked and alone with his suffering, he had decided that if he ever did get free (obviously, he did) that he was going to do his best never to go hungry or thirsty again.

And that, as they say, was that. That was the moment when he stopped being the sissified elf of classic lore and became the practical elf that he was today. His services weren't cheap, but then again, nether were his tastes, and unlike the elves (who had little sense of money or of property, because taking turns was a lot easier when you had forever) the humans had all this wonderful currency, of which he was now profoundly interested in obtaining as much of it as he could.

Up until the waward boy had wandered into their path, this had just been "another job" to him. Dampen a few security fields, confound a few guards, melt a wall or three, and provide back-up to the ground stooges (heroic men who jump and die, occasionally on each other) until the hostage was safely tucked away.

Of course, the bridge leading to Hideout A was... well... it went away, but the others said it was probably due to some sort of insane Mesuinu Security Systems plan... hell, it sounded like one from what he'd heard about the wretched woman... but that's why he'd insisted on a secondary meeting place, aka this cavern. It connected (via a long and rather claustrophobic series of tunnels) to the original Hideout A... which meant that their big boss, AKA the guy who was paying Neverinal, was still making route now from A to B, and was running late.

"Sigh." Neverinal said, closing his watch. "Guess I'll go torture the prisoners until someone arives to stop me."
How could a plan this awesome possibly fail?
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Graybeard
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by Graybeard »

"Up and at 'em, kiddo," Faye said as she knocked on Layla's door.

Layla wasn't in the best of moods; Zachary had been uncharacteristically fussy during the night, possibly a bit overstressed by the evening's dinner and having mommy away for much of the day -- not that that was going to get any better today, from the sound of it. "What's the job?" Layla asked wearily as she nursed her son before getting dressed.

"At the moment, just reconnaissance," Faye said. "There has been some manner of kidnapping of a VIP from up at Volkanenborg. I don't know the details."

"Anyone I'd know?" Layla inquired, meaning the kidnappers, not the victim.

"Apparently not. Peter is being mum on the personal side of things, but he says the perps aren't any of ours, and they are definitely not on our side. So he wants you and Ace airborne to conduct surveillance until they -- we -- at least know what they're dealing with. There's an information packet waiting in the airship."

"Anyone going along on this other than Ace?"

"Yeah, Barb will be there too," Faye said, watching her daughter's reaction and getting one. "I know you don't like her, but she has excellent vision, which is what's really called for here. No weapons work except for defensive purposes, just keeping eyes open. Now get dressed and tooled up and run along; I've packed a breakfast for you, and there'll be relief ready by noon, if the event is still in progress." Layla sighed and did as she was told, wondering how Faye could be so perky when the sun wasn't even up yet -- a question that Faye was asking herself as well.

[OOC: This is written at least partially with the goal of generating a map for the Volkanenborg area, which we really are starting to need. Layla will be genning one up some time today, and I'll post it for her...]
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Sareth
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by Sareth »

Lazily, I gave a nice, long stretch. I have no idea what the sheets had been like at my original accommodations, but the place that Elka had put me up in for the night had been rather nice. Soft, warm, flea free... Nice digs. Only thing that could have made it better would have been a little company.

I yawned. Hard.

Okay, maybe not a little company. Apparently I was still a little short on sleep, and that wouldn't have exactly encouraged me to get as much as I could have. Ah... well...

I quickly dressed, then padded down the hall. The previous night I had watched Elke as I'd padded off to my room, in order to ascertain which was hers. Elke had even been nice enough to let me get away with it. Which was rather decent of her, considering all the lest than decent things she'd been making a habit of doing. Encouraging her to continue to do decent things sounded like it would be a darned good idea, but my mother had often referred to me as "fool child" for a reason.

I banged on the door loud enough to wake the deceased, hoping I was interrupting something. After all, it may have been petty of me, but I still had a little bit of a grudge over the whole putting spy things in my body fluids bit. "Wake up in there!" I called. "Put down the boy toy and lets get food!"
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AdamZero
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by AdamZero »

I had found a comfortable spot against my slab, while the woman across from me slept off her last bout of torture. I was starting to think Nevernial put me here just to mock my inability to alter his actions. I couldn't stop him from destroying Boris's body, I couldn't stop him from torturing me. I couldn't stop him from torturing this lady. I really needed a name for this chick.

They way she was filling out that dress gave me a few ideas, none I'd repeat to her face, unless she was inebriated enough to laugh it off.

As the necromacer elf returned to the room, I just let out a long sigh.

"Futility is the core of living..." I grumbled under my breath.
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by Graybeard »

Mom says Barb has good eyes, Layla thought as she jogged over to the field. How can she see anything with 'em, with all the damn pancake she's going to have on? I can't believe that she can even blink without her face falling off. Her thoughts didn't get any more charitable, or any less catty, as she arrived at the curiously empty space where the cloaked airship awaited. Ace was waiting for her, and ushered her on board with a discreet hug -- discreet, but it still felt good. And then ... Layla smelled her before she saw her.

A tall, wide, extravagantly bosomy blonde who looked to be in her mid-thirties was waiting in the gondola. She was indeed swimming in makeup, as Layla had predicted, with elaborate eye shadow and liner, false eyelashes long enough to need combing, a shade of lipstick suggesting that her mouth had been hemorrhaging, and cheek blush that suggested a perpetual embarrassment (which Layla was quite sure was alien to her personality). An elaborate web of gold chains adorned her neck and shoulders, even atop the functional, working jumpsuit that all three travelers were wearing. She looks like what she is, Layla thought; the word on the street was that Barb had worked as a so-called "seamstress" before joining the Gewehr, used the profession as cover on certain of her hits, and still kept her hand in professionally when she wasn't getting Gewehr gigs. As it happened, all of this was true, and courtesy of some files she'd gotten a glance at once when Faye brought them home, Layla knew it.

But it was the odor that assaulted Layla's senses most violently. Barb might have had superior vision, but as far as Layla was concerned, it only partially compensated for what she must have lacked in her sense of smell. The woman was positively awash in a particularly rank perfume that made the prospect of a one-hour ride up to the surveillance area, not to mention Luminosita knew how many hours on station, all in an enclosed airship gondola, all but unendurable. Unfortunately, the woman was a full Wraith and outranked Layla in the ad-hoc seniority system of the Gewehr, and she was pretty close to the top of the heap in number of successful hits. That meant that she was going to be able to comport herself on this little expedition however she damn well wanted to. How many of her victims just succumbed to poison gas? Layla wondered, as the two women exchanged a silent, perfunctory handshake.

"Okay, let's get going," Ace said without preamble, as he pulled up the stairs and put the airship in motion, Barb making (or so Layla thought) cow eyes at him the entire time.
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Graybeard
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by Graybeard »

OOC: There is now a VERY crude topographical map of the Volkanenborg area, over at the Heretic Knowledge Vault; link http://errantstory.com/wiki/index.php/I ... g_topo.gif. This will get updated as the story adds features, and is already incomplete -- I forgot about the little settlement where Toivo is currently taking a sabbatical. The black lines are topographic contours, the red ones are roads.

Please view and comment, preferably directly to me to save space in this thread. Many thanks to Layla for her work on getting this together. ;)
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Sareth
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by Sareth »

"Oi!" I beat on the door harder, as no one had responded. "Come on... Open up! You fetched me here, now you can tell me why!"

I tapped my foot, waiting as the silence continued. I didn't want to call out Elke's name, but if it came to it... Well, when in doubt, make a scene. I beat on the door again. "Don't make me come in there and steal your man!"

A passing guest, an older woman, did a double take then shot me a dirty look, making some sort of prayer to Luminosita calling for my damnation, if the part I heard was a good indication. Well... I was creating a scene. But I wasn't getting a reaction at the door, at least not yet. I looked around for something to jimmie the door.
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by Graybeard »

"I'm not in there," Elke said from behind Jamie, surprising her. "And for ghod's sake, keep it down. My -- husband is still asleep in there, and we can't protect you from everything. This place has a conference room of sorts; come on and I'll fill you in."

The two women stepped into the small room and Elke unrolled a crude map on the table. "Here's the situation. The crazy woman whose family owns the amusement park has been kidnapped and is being held for ransom -- a pretty spectacular ransom, if I understand it correctly. We think they've got her over here." She jabbed her finger at the long east-west ridge southeast of town. "That ridge is just hollow with caves and old, dead mines. She's probably in there somewhere. Our organization is one of several that are working together to get her out. Don't ask why; I don't understand it myself. And we need your help."

Noting the look on Jamie's face, which could charitably be called "dubious," Elke sighed and continued, "Don't worry, it'll pay well -- very well. And incidentally, it sounds like they've bagged your boyfriend up there too."

---------------

Most of the morning rituals completed, Grope started looking for something to eat. The hunting didn't look to be good; ever since he'd taken the goat the previous day, there had been very few signs of animals larger than Chippy in the area -- disturbingly few, actually. There should at least be droppings from deer, wild dogs, the odd bear, and so on. There weren't.

It wasn't the end of the world for a carnivore to go hungry for a day or two; that was why he'd gorged heavily on the goat (and slept correspondingly heavily), anticipating a few leaner days in the future. However, the ceremonial need for a hunt remained. That was simply what male trolls did. Sighing (or at least making the rumbling noise that passes for a troll's sigh), Grope extracted a small, rarely-used net from his traveling kit. Maybe he could at least catch a bird or two; their Wisdom wasn't much to talk about, but it would have to do. He dropped a short distance off the crest of the ridge, onto a series of limestone benches where the timber was thinner and would give him a chance for some net work. And after a moment, he became aware of something most unsettling.

The stones were screaming.
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AdamZero
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Re: Volkanenborg

Post by AdamZero »

Another 'session' passed as normal, nothing out of the ordinary, but something... was different, afterwards. There was something, out there. I tried a few basic breathing exercises, Neverinal was already shrouding himself again, but I doubted he didn't sense what I did. There was something, someONE, big very big not far away. A long life, but not immortal. A large mass, but not unnatural. A sentient mind, but instinctive AND tactical.

"There's trolls in them thar hills."

I laughed as I reached out, hoping to sense it more clearly. Maybe make contact. Mind magick was one of the toughst, and I only knew as far as 'poke' which amounts to a very limited form of communication. In fact, the odds where my mind wouldn't even reach the rock, there wasn't anything to focus through....

Wait...Nevernial didn't JUST make this dungeon... he had to have had it for a while.... I reached out in the Grey and found that I was smack dab in the middle of a Well.

Frack.

Wells are, really bad, really stained, areas where the grey was imbedded into the ground. It pool there, lingers, stagnates, penetrates, spreads.

Luckily my mind was able to reach through all the grey and it gave me a lot more distance for my 'poke'ing.

I just hoped the troll was listening.

(ooc: I assume the 'screaming' you meant with the rocks was the pain of all the people Neverinal's killed seeping through, I think it works.
"Now he's gone too far. NOONE ATTACKS AMERICA'S FOOD COURTS!" -Deadpool.
"Don't be so naive. I've got ulterior motives. MANY. Two, maybe three. Probably Four. I am one BIG ulterior motive." The Great Teacher, Onizuka Eikichi.
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