Move 435: Still Fighting the Hook GuysAzrun positioned himself to see down the tunnel, but the tunnel filled with webs before he could start casting. Two more creatures pulled free, but the webs stopped the entrance of any more than that, at least for the moment. Echo backed up into the darkness as Blacky and Jana went forward to help Dalgaer with the four. Kanon followed Jana, touching her on the shoulder and healing some of her injuries. Blacky, still glowing, dispatched on of the monsters before it could touch him. Two of the creatures went after Dalgaer. He hit one of them with his axe and took a single hook wound in return. Jana badly wounded the fourth monster, and she managed to avoid getting hit. The creature came back strong, however, catching her with both a claw and a beak before she was able to take it down. Dalgaer and Blacky finished off the other two without taking any more wounds.
"Burn 'em?" Jana asked as she watched the webed nasties warily. She looked a bit worse off than she had before the healing (and after the subsequent snacking). "How many of these fuckers can there be?" she grumbled.
"Well, bugs do tend to breed underground." Blacky laughed. "If we burn the webs, we let the rest of 'em in right? Why don't we see what else is in this cavern before deciding." He suggested
"Arachne?" Dalgaer said, watching the trapped beasts warily, "Are you okay?"
Azrun looked at the critters int he web, "Well we can't leave them for too long cause they'll probably cut their way through. Why don't we heal up those that are hurt bad then set up to receive them warmly. I'm guessing we're all on this side of the web...right Renn? Arachne?"
"Back away," said Aloysius, his voice sounding as if he was getting closer to the ground.
"The webs won't hold them for long. Clear a path. Let the rage of storms consume them." His voice crackled with excitement.
Azrun looked up, "Oh crap...." He moved away from the opening....well away from the opening.
"Just don't rain on us," Jana muttered as she hastily backed away and out of Aloysius' line of fire.
"I'm here," Arachne's voice said, from nowhere near Dalgaer for once. She was moving from the rear of the cave toward Jana. "I was getting myself out of the way of the fighting and -- um -- everyone was hurrying toward Dalgaer and I didn't want to get stepped on or anything -- I'm not sure," she said quickly, sounding eager to change the subject. "But somebody might've been carving on the walls of this chamber. I saw something that looked like a giant eagle beak." The gnome's voice had stopped by Jana. "You look like you need patching up," Arachne suggested.
Dalgaer sounded worried and he walked over towards her voice. "Are you hurt? Did the beast hit you? We cannot see you, or if you are harmed. Don't be afraid to use that powder if you need it!"
"Only scraped me..." Arachne's voice said. As usual, she sounded distracted.
As the thunderous noise from the lightning bolt faded, Arachne could be heard whimpering. "Shells! Oh, shells! Shells! Shells! Shells..." The sound moved close to Dalgaer.
"Don't _need_ to use the powder," Arachne's voice said, though it sounded as though her voice was tensed up saying the words. "Whole point is I can _wait_ to get healed. Not going to fight. I hide instead. So I shouldn't get hurt ... more than I can handle -- but it hurts!" The last cry was belatedly muffled (most likely using Dalgaer's body). There was a whimpered pause and then, "Sorry... Everyone's hurting. Big deal if I am, too. Um, don't you still have monsters to kill?"
Everyone scrambled out of the way as Aloysius announced his intentions. He shot a lightning bolt through the webbed tunnel. The electricity lit the webs and they started to burn rapidly, the fire making it difficult to see what was going on with the creatures entrapped within. Meanwhile, some of Jana's wounds disappeared. A couple of other people moved around enough in the cavern that their lights revealed the rest of it. It was unremarkable but for a couple of things. There were a couple of small furry bodies, probably quaggoth young, tossed against one of the cavern walls along with the dismembered remains of a few more. There were some larger carcasses there as well, but only a couple.
More remarkable was the rock protrustion on the far eastern wall. It was black and shaped like the beak of a large bird of prey. Echo was standing near it, studying it carefully without touching it.
After making a cursory look around the cavern, Blacky positioned himself where he could see anything coming out of the smoke from the tunnel.
"That would seem to be the most pressing inquiry," said Aloysius. "Although I am doubtful that these creatures could withstand such power."
The mage stood tall, his head up and eyes ahead. He brimmed with more confidence than anyone in the group had noted before. "If they yet live, they shall wish they had not," he said matter-of-factly.
Kanon drew a small bottle out of a sack on his side and walked over behind the others facing down the tunnel, "Arachne take this from my hand and drink it." As he watched for the hook creatures to return he rubbed his thumb and forefinger over a small peice of granite in his gauntleted hand.
"Uhm, thanks," Jana said as she suddenly looked better. She looked around and, seeing no one, was not quite able to cover up a brief creeped-out look. She shrugged to settled her armor and looked around the area again.
"I guess we know what happened to the fuzzball cubs," Jana muttered as she saw the furry bodies. Sword ready, she advanced a bit closer to the burning creatures, watching for movement.
Azrun cocked an eyebrow at Aloysius, "Behold! The great Mage Lord Aloysius has entered the cave." With that he moved over to where Echo stood and checked out the rock outcropping. "Sense anything from it, Echo?"
Arachne made the bottle disappear from Kanon's hand. "All right," her voice said, still sounding strained. "If Aloysius hasn't ended the fight..." There was a pause before she added, "But it's the same as with Dalgaer's powder."
"And you claim not to be brave..." Dalgaer murmurs, patting Arachne's shoulder (?), comfortingly.
Aloysius gave Azrun a startled look and began to blush. He then straightened his robe and tried to compose himself.
"Mock me . . .not," he said, a crack in his voice betraying his earlier confidence. "Er . . . "
He headed over to where Echo was studying the rock formation.
Azrun gave the mage a reassuring smile and nodded.
Kanon nodded slightly and stood near Dalgaer away from Aloysius and his lightning spells, "I understand but keep it and if you feel you might need it or if you feel you can get to someone who might need it faster than me due to your hiding ability then I would appreciate it. I am fully out of healing spells." He looked over in Jana's direction and then around the room, "I dunno it may be yet another hair brained idea on my part but should everyone go ahead and make themselves visible? These things seem to have no problem 'seeing' the invisible among our number with little or no trouble?" He looked over at the smoking tunnel for a moment and seemed to be in deep thought, "That way we could help those in trouble faster."
"I think it's the source of the magical presence," Echo replied. "I can't tell for sure. I don't have a magic detection spell. Rocks," she muttered.
"I'm with Kanon," Jana commented as she kept an eye out for signs of life in the creatures.
Some people checked out the beaky rock at the back of the cave while others waited for something to happen within the burning web. It did not seem that any of the creatures that had been caught were going to emerge. The combination of electricity and fire had done them in. As the fire tore through the combustible strands, it left three charred exoskeletons on the floor. Kanon gave Arachne a flask. A suggestion was made that the invisibles become visible.
"Um, I'd rather not," said Arachne's voice, still sounding stressed. It was still close to Dalgaer and she was still most likely supporting herself against him. "It's a reasonable thought and, when the hook thing was attacking me I did get out my knife because I was thinking that the invisibility wasn't doing me much good anyway. I -- Well, you can't see it anyway and I'm not likely to use it now." There was a pause. The bottle appeared on the floor. "I didn't wind up using it -- trying to attack the hook thing, I mean -- because Dalgaer saved me first and I just couldn't think how to attack such a big bug with those long arms and sharp hooks..." The bottle disappeared again. "I'm so glad you don't depend on me to do any of the fighting. Anyway, that was then -- the middle of a fight against monsters who didn't need to see us to hack at us. Now, we don't know certainly that the next bad thing we meet won't be influenced by invisibility. After all, we were expecting more quaggoths when we ran into the hook things. Chasing down the remaining hook things, we might encounter something else. "Also... I'd really rather not be seen just now," the gnome's voice mumbled. "I'm kind of a mess... We don't know where Renn is, though, do we?"
"That's not enough bodies!' Dalgaer warned, ax ready and moving forward to further investigate. "I saw at least nine more in the darkness beyond before the web. They might have fled."
"Well, crap," Jana grumbled. "Let's non-magicky types keep watch on the tunnels while the others see if we need t'do anything with or about that hunka rock."
Kanon looked back at the strange rock formation and raised an eyebrow. He reached into a small bag at his side and drew out a sling bullet. Quickly unwrapping a sling from his forearm he let it hang at his side while he closed his other hand over the sling bullet. He mumbled the word, "Light," over the bullet, loaded it, and then fired it down the smokey tunnel, "A little extra range to see by hopefully." With that he turned and walked over to the strange beak formation with the others.
"Any that were not slain are likely badly injured," said Aloysius. "Such primitive creatures would be likely frightened by such raw energy," he opined. "Doubts have I that they will return any time soon." He examined the beak.
"How did they get behind us?" Echo asked. "Renn, do you want to come look at this rock? I want to know if you feel anything from it too."
Blacky continued to guard the entrance to the cavern, regardless of the mage's reassurances.
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