Move 416: More Quaggoth PrepTunnels--Late, Day 41 (Marpenoth 24)
Kanon began praying while Jana finished off the quaggoths. Blacky drew blood when he checked to see if he could cut himself. Arachne offered healing to Dalgaer. Jana moved to the front where Kanon was praying, and Blacky moved to the rear. Kanon's prayer yielded a dust devil about five feet high and three feet across at its widest. It was in the tunnel in front of he and Jana. Other than that, nothing appeared in the tunnel, but there was noise coming from that general direction. The noises were faint, and they did not necessarily sound like they were getting closer, although something like that would have been difficult to be certain about.
All of Dalgaer's wounds disappeared, much like Azrun's had during the earlier fight. In the relative quiet, a short, quiet pained moan was heard from that general direction.
The Aloysiuses peered down the passage. "I'm going to look again," they said, "since this illusion should protect me from ambush."
Glancing back at Blacky, he added, "That doesn't mean the draught isn't still working, Eric. 'Tis . . . . complicated." With that the Aloysiuses headed back down the passage, light stone in hand.
The priest stepped back out of the tunnel entrance to allow Blacky or some other warrior to assume the frontline. He left the Dust Devil in its position waiting patiently for the Quaggoths to arrive.
Jana slipped her shield on her off hand as they waited.
Everyone held steady, except for Aloysius and Kanon. Kanon moved to the side to allow anyone by who wanted to get by. Aloysius headed back down the tunnel once again while the others waited.
Azrun looked around as if wondering where all the bad guys were, "Ummm....you think maybe they decided to change tactics and use a real strategy against us?"
"I wish I'd gone ahead and let Arachne brain-suck the ones we had," Jana groused. "Got too panicked, dammit. Maybe we can catch s'more."
"I'm going to hold steady here, in case all these tunnels are connected." Blacky said over his shoulder from the other end of the group.
Echo stayed behind the front line and pulled up her cowl. "This might not be the best time to mention this, but I feel that magical presence again. From down this tunnel."
Azrun shook his head, "Wonderful, this just gets better and better. What are we going to do? Move forward, wait, or back up?"
"Down the way we hear more of those fuzz-balls?" Jana asked, "or back behind us?"
Kanon looked over at his dust devil and then to the others, "I say we move up to meet them."
Dalgaer seemed distracted with something going on, possibly with Arachne since she had just healed him. Other than that, everyone tossed out ideas, questions, or general remarks while they watched Aloysius go back down the tunnel. After a short trek, Aloysius turned and made a bee line back to the party. As he hurried up to them, narrowly avoiding running through Kanon's dust devil, he advised that "There are 10 after me and another 2 dozen beyond - with leaders!" As he approached the front line, those looking at him could see that his skin was red, like he had been scalded. There was a clamoring behind him, but there were no quaggoths following within the range of his light.
Blacky continued to hold position where he was, unless he was needed on the other front.
The Aloysiuses stopped upon reaching the party's front rank, turning around to look back up the passage.
"Hold here until they come," they said, digging in his robe pockets for spell components. "The spell I've been withholding should work well here, now that I've seen the rest of the passage."
After producing a small rod and a piece of cloth, the mage and his images glanced at Jana.
"Their leader . . . it burned me with just a glance."
Azrun looked at the spell components Aloysius pulled out and smiled, "I've been wondering how that spell would work down here. This ought to be quite interesting. Shame we don't have a big puddle of water for all of them to stand in, he he he."
Azrun leaned his staff against the cavern wall and pulled his bow and knocked an arrow, "In case I see one of the leader guys you know."
"We take out the burny-eyes one first," Jana said. "Aloysius, tell us which one and Azrun'll hit it with arrows. We might oughta think about that sticky-web spell, too. Maybe one in front of us and one behind them, to trap 'em. There are too many and I don't think me 'n' Blacky're invulnerable no more. Any of ya got spells that'll kill a bunch of 'em?"
"Very tall, very large sword," said the Aloysiuses to Azrun. "You'll know it when you see it."
"Yes, Janathell," he added in an excited whisper. "That is Stargazer's intent." He focused his gaze on the passage.
"Now I remember!" Arachne's voice exclaimed from very close by Dalgaer. "They're thri-keen -- no! That's not it. Something sort of like that -- sort of ... -- Sorry. I can't remember what she called them. She didn't have any interest in the other quaggoths and dismissed them immediately. But the quaggoth wizards -- She kept calling them something else ... which I can't remember now. But they practice spooky magic. Mind magic like mine. I remember Professor Faire talking about them. She said... Um, what did she say? ... well, you should beware of things getting thrown at you from -- from nowhere. Just jumping up and trying to clobber you. And burning Aloysius -- that wasn't by looking at him. The -- the -- the whatever he is, he just thought about it."The gnome's voice was breathing a lot between the sentences. "The other ability to worry about is that some of them can move through shadows. He sort of turns into a shadow and then can move around pretty unnoticeably. Kind of useful for spying on us... There's other abilities that they may or may not also learn. Those are the dangerous -- most dangerous ones I remember Faire mentioning. "Oh: Trying to go after them with fire risks having the fire used against you. Faire didn't recommend it."
"Down the way we hear more," Echo clarified.
"I can try to cast the spell Aloysius hit the others with before," Echo said. She stayed where she was, fidgeting with a dagger, while she watched to see how Aloysius spell went.
"Oh dear," Echo muttered. "Do you think there'll be more than one in a group this big?"
"I don't know. There could be," Arachne allowed. "We've got more than one wizard and there aren't nearly so many of us. You realize, they wouldn't all know everything. It's like me. There's far more that I might've learned which I didn't than I have learned. Had I world enough and time -- and all that. Same with them. Faire was just talking about the sorts of spookies that she'd been told that they tended to prefer. But I _did_ recognize what happened to Aloysius. That's one that Faire mentioned -- and he's going to be able to keep trying it on others of us until he gets tired out -- you know, like me -- or we kill him. And I think Faire said it can be really nasty if used on someone wearing metal armor. Um. I, uh, guess it was kind of lucky that Aloysius got it sprung on him first. Not very keen strategy to use it on the nosy wizard first..."
"Crap," Jana muttered.
Dalgaer moved towards the front, ax at the ready. "We'll just have to hack them to pieces if the spell doesn't work." He seemed angry.
As the dozen or so quaggoths rushed into sight, Aloysius unleashed a powerful stroke of lightning, replacing the smell of wet dog that predominated in these tunnels with the stench of charred hair, smouldering flesh, and electricity. Everyone standing near the wizard, those in the front line and immediately behind it, felt the tingle of static and sparks. All of the incoming quaggoths save four fell. Two of the creatures, one of whom had been hit by the lightning bolts and looked near death, charged in anyway. The other two fled back down the tunnel, snarling and yelling as they went.
Dalgaer made his way to the front. Kanon, his dust devil to one side of the tunnel now, moved aside to make sure the gnome had room.
The priest narrowed his eyes at the oncoming quaggoths and sent the dust devil ahead. The whirling dust cloud made a bee line for the strongest looking of the creatures.
"Can y'all get the ones that're runnin?" Jana asked as she rushed to meet the two charging fuzz-balls.
Dalgaer swung his axe at the closer of the two quaggoths.
Arachne lurked out of sight. She'd stopped talking before the lightning strike and did not resume.
The Aloysiuses stepped back and let the fighters handle the charging quaggoth.
"We need to get to the end of the tunnel so that the spell can be used anew," he said. "If we get caught halfway, it will rebound upon us. Echo, can you join the front rank once the others dipose of the remaining quaggoth?"
"Okay," Echo replied, but she sounded uncertain. She squinted down the tunnel after the fleeing quaggoths.
Azrun pulled back on his bow and let arrows fly at the quaggoths that were running away.
"Heat and smoke back here! All this shit must be connected pretty close!" Blacky yelled over his shoulder axe at the ready.
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