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Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
SERENITY
Isha looks right back at you, quiet and unapologetic. "I know," he says, plainly; and as bitter a smile creases his old wrinkled face as you've ever seen.

"Ha, ''know this', like I didn't know it already. Like all us idiots didn't know, signing up to live and work on a floating goddamn city-state built on a conman's dreams. One big trouble, that's us. That's me. But, hell. Maybe the kids down here are all right after all. Half this poo poo was their idea, you know? I was ready to give up on all of it, but what would you do when the kids come to you with all these crazy ideas; when they come to you and say, 'master Isha, give me a new body, this old one won't work down here', what the gently caress am I supposed to do?"

"New bodies for a new world, they say, but it's never really new, none of this is, all they did was just...wake it up again. So I keep it running. Teach what I can. Learn when I can. They'll really be something if Murgo doesn't kill us all."

His eybrows fly wide when you tell you him where you came from. "Johannes' gilded youth haven't poo poo in their own nest yet, eh? I should have guessed. Moreno always was a troublemaker...but problem being, the kids smashed all the comms equipment when we came to power here. Wanted to hunker down, work in silence 'til we're ready to declare sovereignty. They'll have to talk to us, and even then we can only listen: we've got no way to talk back to them without making it obvious we're here. I'll put the word out; see what the kids think; but don't expect any miracles."

"To work, miss Greymist. It was a pleasure meeting you."

* * *

The annidati don't need a chosen one or a high priestess or a fated savior. What they need, as it turns out, is a nanny. The shrine of Eihaix has been converted into a spawning creche, and the lunar clergy are overwhelmed with the demands of their care. Mutely the attendants entreat you, speaking in that odd sign-language so common to those of Isha's creed: please, Dame Greymist, help us care for our infant children. The lunar cult survives here, safe beneath the surging tides; and the survivors among the Aqualantean faithful have reëstablished a center of worship in what was once the Silver-home chandler's quarter.



A gentle whirlwind of domestic labor envelops your concentration for the next couple hours.The tasks would be unfamiliar to any surface dweller - the annidati have radically altered their reproductive physiology, spawning like salamanders in great communal pools - but any infant has needs you've dealt with before, no matter how far evolved from its natal stock. Before long, you find your hands warming to the rituals of bathing, feeding, and cleaning, and soon your broad scaly back plays host to dozens of scrambling amphibian scamps, eager to climb out of their blood-warm birthing pools and out into the new world their parents have made for them. An effigy of Eihaix, a salvaged surface bronze, watches kindly over the scene: a slim, curly-haired youth with an ambiguous flirty grin and a conspicuously missing foot, probably lost somewhere in the city sea-wrack.

Finally, when everybody's put to bed and the attendants are cooling their aching feet in the grown-ups pond, you have enough time free to make your prayers to Nashira, in the district's former public library building, gutted and repurposed for Her worship. Most of the old literature has succumbed to damp and mold, but what knowledge remains from the surface world is gathered here. No statue for the Moon-Maiden here, only a ritual space beneath one of the skylights on the second floor: an empty brazier, a low altar and some salvaged candelabra, sporting glowing mushrooms in place of candles.

Nashira awaits your prayers. What is your new Quest, and what boons do you ask of Her?

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
RAMONA
McKinnin gives you that look, the "oh is that what you're thinking about?" look, before he tucks his copy of the invoice into his coveralls. Well, at least he isn't going to proposition you for 'oysters under the table' anytime soon. Prick.

"Aye, you 'n McAlister have done well enough together," he says gruffly, "'an considerin' as Sunny Jane decided to throw 'er towel in for a fuckin' necromancer I think I can see my way to arguin' for leniency in your sake. Most like, I can get your sentence down to penitentiary labor...and then 'ave that discharged for lay services rendered to th' Church in course of riddin' the earth o' the aforesaid fuckin' necromancer."

"Finance...." he sucks his teeth and wishes for a cigar made out of something more palatable than your invoice before going on, "finance...will be harder. Th' lump sum I can promise you, once that ship's in your hands; lodging willnae be a problem...but it's past my authority to just sign a heathen cap'n over to the fleet's books without so much as a by-the-by up th' chain of command. Maybe if you were willin' to convert, an willin' to take orders from th' Abbot...but I'd not ask that of you lightly. No, independent contractor is what you'll be - 'mercenary' by anyone's books but the accountants' - and it takes special dispensation from th' high muckity-mucks for suchlike to sup from the Church's table."

"I'll get the staff together an' start drawin' up some plans for the assault. Meet you in..." he checks his wrist instinctively, but the watch that used to be there is long-lost at sea by now. "gently caress. Twenty minutes."

"Godspeed, lass. And good luck."

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
Several hours later. . . . . . .


* * * * *


EVERYBODY
Serenity, when you emerge from your prayers at the shrine to Nashira, Kaude is there to meet you, after emerging from their own lustrations at the Jairan courthouse-temple on Fisherman's Hill. Their skin has changed since you saw them last, from a pebbly toad-brown to a bright, shocking red with a stripe of pure black down their spine, like a poisonous salamander. They look frightening, grim and warlike - ready to fight for their future, no matter who's standing in its way.

* [Heal]er, the [fisherman? (this probably means the triton)] is not OK... *, they sign to you worriedly.

* I - S - H - A almost finished, needs someone to [plug the dam]. Please, come; [fisherman] is very sick. *

* * *

Ramona and Branwen, you're hashing out your plans to assault the Visible Hand when Kaude and Serenity hustle past like somebody just called in a Code Blue at the intensive-care ward and they've got the only pair of defibrillators in town. Which, as it turns out, might be pretty close to the truth.

The sick triton is floating in a waist-high tank of clear water, and she's suffering clear symptoms of exposure to some vile poison. Waves of shivering wrack her body every few seconds, and her scaly underbelly is mottled red-and-white with patches of heavy bruising. Her gills pulse erratically, gasping for breath - and she gulps air from the surface too, in great gasping heaves that rattle to a halt as quickly as they begin.

The medical staff swarm around her, administering what care they can - but it seems to be only forestalling the end. "Dammit," one staffer snarls, "it's another exposure case...where the hell is Isha?!"

"Ten minutes," another one responds, "he's decanting the antidotes now; we just need to hold on that long..."
What does everybody do?

Shardix
Sep 14, 2011

The end! No moral.
Serenity
HP 21/21 | Armor 2 | Load 1/9 | XP 2/15

Serenity will dedicate herself to discovering the truth of Gretchen's whereabouts and intentions. She will ask for the boons of invulnerability to drowning and a mark of divine authority

The children here would be fine. Serenity had taught a particular song to the creche mothers that ought to make nap and bed times quite a lot more manageable. Some things were truly universal, and a mother's song of safe and peaceful rest was one of them.

---

Serenity only spared a moment to apprise herself of the situation before slipping through the push of nurses and raising herself up above the tank. She wasn't fluent in Triton and had no training in the ways of their tidesingers, but she could at least comfort the woman and grant her strength while they waited for the antidote. Slipping into the tank, Serenity held the triton, a warm and reassuring presence.



Arcane Art: 2d6+3 11
Healing and Assisting the triton to keep her alive and fighting.
Healing Song: 2d8 10

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 5/14 XP; 1 Armor; 5/11 Load, Scarred
The Triton reminds me of rich people's pets dying in their aquariums. That's exactly the kind of experience a rich shitbag like Murgo, thinking of how to poison a bunch of fish, had to draw on. Fish, to him, were two things: food, and pets. You were only allowed to recreationally poison the latter, and the most common way to accidentally find out how to do so was with cleaning agents. Aqua ammonia. The visible symptoms matched, so I start talking about cycling her water again especially if she's fouled it–more ammonia in the waste–and adding a little vinegar to it.

I try to reassure the Triton in her language as she has to watch more chemicals, likely the cause of her distress, being added to her water, "This will help. You're just a little basic."

2d6 SL = (4+5) = 9

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
Branwen McAlister
HP 20/20 | Armor 1 | XP 8/12 | Load 4/12
Spells: Light[ ] Sanctify[ ] Guidance[ ] CLW[ ]
Bless[ ] Cause Fear[ ] Magic Weapon[ ] Sanctuary[X]
Boom[ ]


A small fire casts shadows around Bran, secluded from the noise and movements of the medical ward, barely seen among the bioluminescent fungus. With solemn grace Bran pulls a small water-logged block of wood from a puddle and tosses it into the flame, which hisses and pops. Sighing at the meager offering she has, Bran closes her eyes and begins to pray.

~~~

As Serenity hums Bran walks the edges of the room, quietly chanting praises to Bombarda and asking her to watch over and protect those within the ward and speed their recovery. As she finishes circling the room, the path she tread becomes a warm orange glow the color of the sky as the sun sets, filling the room with a wholesome warmth.

@ArkInBlack: 2d6+2 Cast Sanctuary = (3+2)+2 = 7
Losing the spell as the cost

ArkInBlack fucked around with this message at 05:00 on Nov 8, 2018

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
EVERYBODY
Serenity, you slither into the triton's tank and entwine her in your song - but she's too far gone, lost in a poisoned dream...her body and mind won't accept you! Madly she struggles against your embrace, berserk with fear and pain. In your well-meaning touch she finds only the terror of the deep, the crushing grip of the kraken's coils. Her pulse is wild, erratic - you can't find a beat to anchor the rhythm of your magic to. You can't hold on - you're losing her!

Branwen's invocation of sanctuary couldn't be more desperately needed. Bombarda may be best-known as the Matron of Detonation, but even her most ardent devotees need someone to salve their burns after one too many close encounters with a keg of gunpowder. The glimmering mushroomlight recedes as she paces the ward, overtaken by a power too long absent here, so far beneath the waves: the golden light of the setting Sun. Her prayers invoke succor for a wounded soldier, adherence to the laws of war - an aid and comfort beyond the power of the lunar tides to give.

Gradually, oh so slowly, your patient's convulsions begin to calm. Her breath comes less raggedly. But you're not out of the woods yet - still she struggles blindly, her mind lost in delusion. Serenity's magic is no use against it; neither Branwen's blessings -- what it takes to bring her out of it is Ramona, and her completely ordinary words of reassurance. It takes time and patient repetition to get through to her, but ever-so-slowly the madness leaves her eyes. She stops babbling about krakens and wurms and the terrible crushing black and takes a deep breath of freshly flushed tank water, gill-slits rippling wide.

"W-- cough, gasp --...where...?" she manages to choke out.

"Easy," a nurse shushes her, her eyes squinted against the bright Bombardan dawnlight.

"Easy, easy. You've been badly poisoned. Hold on. Just hold on. The doctor's coming with the antidote."

Two or three minutes pass in an agony of strained activity. Healer, nurses, preacher, and staff: all of you together do everything you can, but this poison has claws. All you can do is slow its progress. The glassy sheen is starting to creep back into her eyes when Isha limps heavily down the stairs.

He looks terrible. Like he's been doing about fifty different kinds of drugs over the last few hours. The scum of mildew across his scalp has noticeably grown since you saw him last, and his limbs shiver like the tremor in McKinnin's hands. He holds up one arm to shield his eyes as he steps across the sanctuary bound, hardly able to bear the light. A nurse rushes to his side to support him.

"H-h-hhh-here," he stammers. "Had-d-t-to s-s-suff-fer it to. T-t-t-o heal it. T-t-t-t--ake. Take it." His arm's shaking so hard he almost drops it - a clear jug full of pale orange liquid, like the probiotic drink from hell. A nurse takes it carefully from him, unscrews the cap, takes a deep sniff - you catch a whiff of citrus fruit and nightshade berries - and glugs half the contents right into the triton's tank, no time to waste!

The effects are immediate and dramatic. Within a half dozen breaths her convulsions are stilling, her pulse coming back down to the realm of sanity. The nurse measures out another portion into a beaker and feeds it to the triton, mouthful by careful mouthful. Her breathing slows and deepens, and, with a sigh of profound relief, the triton slips quickly into a healing sleep.

Anyone who ingests the antidote gains permanent immunity to Murgo's nerve gas, and resistance to all other poisons like it. Serenity, you don't have gills, so but you haven't been dosed involuntarily (unless you want to be).

What does everyone do now?

Alumnus Post fucked around with this message at 17:58 on Nov 12, 2018

Shardix
Sep 14, 2011

The end! No moral.
Serenity
HP 21/21 | Armor 2 | Load 1/9 | XP 2/15

Serenity, once assured the triton was in no further danger and peacefully resting, slithered from the tank and approached her companions. She hadn't realized they were in the area, but it was certainly well that they were. Some wounds went too deep for even her songs to heal alone.

Squeezing the water from her hair, she spoke. "Thank you for the help, Morning Glory. Mona." A quick sign of lunar providence before she continued. "Do we have time to wait? I cannot deny that I would like to speak with the triton woman, and I am concerned about our host." She eyed Isha for a moment, conflicted. He had offered them hospitality and aid, and for that he had her gratitude. Yet the things he spoke of were...concerning, to put it mildly. "However. Sitting on our hands is not going to get anything useful accomplished so I can certainly understand moving onwards at the earliest convenience."

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 5/14 XP; 1 Armor; 5/11 Load, Scarred
I know if Serenity helps Isha without his publicly and memorably asking for the help and he later dies, from anything, I'll catch the blame. I sign at the old frog, "Isha, you look worse off than her now. Do you need my elf to help you? Tell her either way." If he does, I can talk to the triton I guess.

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
RAMONA
Old man Isha just splutters; it's the closest he can get to a laugh right now. You get the feeling he's thinking exactly what you're thinking - you won't let Serenity be seen to offer even the appearance of poisoned aid - this despite your heroic efforts just now to resuscitate an enemy combatant in full view of all his medical staff. His aide hands him a beakerful of antidote and he gulps greedy swallows from it, orange liquid spilling down his cheeks. It doesn't seem to do him much good.

"She c ccan ttrr yyy yye," he manages to get out.

Meanwhile, the triton is sleeping soundly, her deep barrel chest rising and falling in time with the gentle pulsing of her gill slits. It might not be best to wake her now, not when she's just passed through such a harrowing ordeal. You could wait, of course...but is that time you can afford to spare? Even now the Visible Hand waits in drydock, undergoing its final preparations for launch. Perhaps it's already gotten underway in the time you've spent here. You found your way into it last time like that, of course -- but something tells you Scrimshaw won't be so stupid as to invite you in like Murgo did...
The choice is yours. Wait, find something else to do in the meantime, or move on?

SERENITY
Isha's nurses escort him carefully to a bench and help him sit. One holds a cloth to his lips while he coughs violently. Man, he's really messed up. 'She can try,' is that what he's trying to say? How sick is he?
What do you do?

Alumnus Post fucked around with this message at 04:18 on Nov 13, 2018

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 5/14 XP; 1 Armor; 5/11 Load, Scarred
I'm gonna spout lore about what's wrong with isha
based on what little alchemy i learned since the last campaign because while gurgle was useful i never wanted to rely on someone like him ever again if I could do it myself instead.
1d6+1d8 SL ha:poo = (3)+(3) = 6
e; if isha's anything like gurgle he brews in his own body
which is like a Mr. Burns-tier clown car of lethal poisons and poo poo
I'm guessing if the bezoar cures them, it upsets the ecology of his system
because bodies attenuate to those kinds of things, organs stop doing work that chemicals are doing for them

slydingdoor fucked around with this message at 22:15 on Nov 13, 2018

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
While Bran's expertise is more on the explosive side of alchemy, Bombarda's faithful have found their fair share of non-combustible knowledge in pursuit of their Matron's majesty.

@ArkInBlack: 2d6+1 Aid Another = (5+5)+1 = 11

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
BRANWEN
Now that things are cooling down in the intensive care ward, you have some time to check in with Brother McKinnin. He's poring over some salvaged sheets of paper in a side room, scribbling with a stub of old pencil and conferring intently with the rescued envoys.

"What the gently caress you mean 'they didn't get the domes up in time', Connelly?" he grumbles caustically, reaching for a scuffed-up eraser. "Half the bloody market in their pockets and they don't take the time to fookin' seal their dockyards. Ah, gently caress my w-- oh, there you are McAlister. Sit, sit." He motions for you to the table and hands you a mug of coffeeish he cadged from the nurses.

"You did a right good thing in there, lass," he says, clapping you warmly on the back. "That fin in there you saved? None other 'n one of the high muckity-mucks of th' Whale Clan: Khaswahi wh'nGai her ownself. We've got the fins in our debt now, ha - she's the Carkhariasses chief lieutenant!"

"Now then," he continues, "we've got the heist to think about. We've hired on yer lass Sahagún as pointwoman, and you're on permanent secondment to 'er as part of the contract, so you'll be leading the assault head-on. I 'ad one of my lads check out th' stuff you brought outer Tian. Portable airlock, massively fookin' useful seein' as there's hardly a foot of air to be had between here and there. As for the rest of us..."

The plan, as I understand it so far, is a stealth assault, combined with a diversionary feint to draw Murgo's forces away from the Visible Hand prior to the attack. What else am I missing, and who should carry out the feint?

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
RAMONA
Finally, you have some time to walk and think - leaving the medical ward behind for the misty, moss-choked streets of the Annidate. An offhand remark by Branwen sparks in you a moment of insight: Isha dosing himself with nerve gas was probably enough to derange his internal chemistry somehow. Not every alchemist works that way, but Isha's obviously a member of the "gently caress the rules, I do what I want" school, so he probably had to brew the antidote in his own stomach or something equally disgusting.

Seeing as the last alchemist you knew was a smorgasbord of revolting secretions, sexual innuendo, and bad life decisions, you have little reason to believe Isha is any different. His body is no doubt a tottering clown-car of dangerous drugs and bizarre replacement organs by now - that's what a century of using your own meat as a lab bench gets you. It's anybody guess (including his) how the hell the mad old fucker managed to survive this long...but it's starting to look to you like his number might be up.

Anything Serenity does to heal him might easily screw up some other part of his body - do as much harm as good, or at best just stave off the decline for a while longer. Getting him back to stability would take more time than any of you have. You'll probably just have to leave him be. One more first-generation Aqualantean consigned to the depths. Hopefully the external ecosystem proves more resilient than his innards.

* * *

It's comfortably cool and dark out here in the streets, away from the Bombardan prayerlight. It makes you wonder how long it's really been since you've seen the sun - and piques your memory about something Isha said. How long they've been working Down Here, he said; it felt like years...it makes you wonder if he was actually telling the truth.

The city's all gone to hell in the four short months you've been away, that much isn't surprising; but it beggars belief that this place could transform so utterly in such a short timeframe. Murgo's military hardware; the annidati's children; the massive forests of fungi and the gigantic supporting dome-pillar...how could any of this be carried out in mere months, with eight in ten dead?

Light and Law have abandoned Aqualantis, this much is obvious...but just how much has grown fluid here beneath the waves? Bodies, hearts, and minds; space and time; the very borders of life and death....oh, what a mess you've landed in, huntress.

And it's about to get a whole lot worse.

* * *



Out there beyond the great dome, past the colossi of industry and the glittering towers of Warwick's Wunderland, a new sun is rising, the color of sodium-arc streetlights against a clouded sky. The annidati in the streets stop in their tracks, looking up in horror as the light begins to wax; from candlelight to streetlight to the noonday sun through fireclouds, blotting out the gentler illumination of algae and fungal gill. You feel a throbbing through your feet, like a bell ringing too deep to hear.

Murgo's power is on the rise. You'd better get moving.
What do you do?

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 5/14 XP; 1 Armor; 5/11 Load, Scarred
I get moving.

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
SERENITY
Isha's attendants move respectfully aside as you approach him. His breathing is thick and phlegmy, but a spark of fierce determination still blazes in his one good eye.

"Here....to....try and...save me?" he rasps, one side of his mouth quirking in a parody of a smile. "Ahh...you're kind to...an....old gently caress like me." He holds a rag to his lips and coughs wetly. When he takes the rag away it's stained with dark fluid. "Hehhehhh....can you feel it? Clever old bastard..." Isha sighs. He rises laboriously from his bench and starts to hobble upstairs, against the protests of his attendants. "Murgo took a...page out of...our book."

"Light is...law....isn't that right, ...moon...maiden?" He tries to laugh. It sounds like a dog choking on a bone.

True to his words, you can feel a change in the ambient light from outside. It's harsher, yellower; like the electric lights you remember seeing in some of the more modern orcish cities. A subsonic throbbing passes through the floor, so low-pitched you hear it through your bones, not your ears.

"What's....possible...what isn't....what's...just a dream. It's the light that....that makes it real."

"Tell me...," he breathes, "hh...how....monstrous....do you think we really are? Hehheh....how monstrous...do you think....he thinks...we are?"

"...The new sun....is rising. It's time to...to go to war..."

Alumnus Post fucked around with this message at 03:28 on Nov 16, 2018

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
BRANWEN
The plans are made and the parting is at hand. Your small group of three will push forward and lead the assault, while McKinnin and his squadron will lead the diversionary attack. He's identified a piece of vital industrial equipment not far from the outer borders of the New Annidate - a tidal generator drawing power from the ley-line deep beneath the ocean floor. An assault on it should draw forces away from the military drydocks at the far end of Panakteia, buying your fireteam enough time to slip through the surveillance cordon and assault the Visible Hand directly.

Once you've secured the vessel, the Bombardan SCUBA squad will be waiting for you to make rendezvous at the nearest thing to a neutral landmark in this desolate abyssal plain: the foundation for a deepwater cargo tether, located some ways outside city limits, on the border of the Panakteian debris fields.

Anything you can find or take is lawfully yours, a legal prize of war. Anything you can blow up along the way is lawful fuel for Bombarda's glory, and if blowing it up thwarts Murgo's plots, so much the better.

"This is it, lassie," McKinnin says, saluting you with all due formality. "Good luck and Godspeed. Lady's grace go with you." He shoulders his air tank and flashes you a roguish grin.

"I'll see yer on the bridge."

* * * END OF SESSION * * *
There's no time to Make Camp or Level Up this session. We'll be jumping into the next chapter right away! See you all real soon...:getin:

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug

quote:

There's no other land, my friend, no
other sea; for the city will follow you,

In these same streets you'll wander endlessly,
The same mental suburbs slip from youth to age,
In this same house go white at last -

The city is a cage.

-- Constantine Cavafy

:siren: EVERYONE :siren:
Make sure everything's in order before you leave. Resolve any Bonds, mark XP from the previous End of Session, and get your character sheets (including inventory) all up-to-date. It's going to get very dangerous here in...


CHAPTER VIII: THE WIDENING GYRE
========================================================================================


SERENITY
You left the Annidate just in the nick of time. You had little more than time to say your farewells and give your last requests as battle erupted at the district's edge. The hue and cry of war was already audible as you packed your things and fled. Kaude nodded their assent to your last entreaty, shuddering as the hypnotic compulsion took root in their hindbrain: seek thou allies among the tritons. If the ocean's newest children can reach accord with their elder neighbors, then maybe -- just maybe -- there's a future to be made here after all.


What gift did Kaude and Isha give to you before you left?


BRANWEN
A tremendous greasy fireball lit the night as you left the safety of the Annidate, nearest the locks to Wunderland -- and a ragged cheer broke out when Bigjob realized then that your load of timber was missing half its weight. The Church, at least, seems to find its due share of glory here; and your contributions to the war effort have not gone unrecognized.
Your timber blows up really good, by the way. You could probably break a dome wall with this, if it was small enough and you blow it up against a weak point. (Hint, hint.)

McKinnin's squadron traveled with you for a time, then, clambering onto your jury-rigged bubble sled to conserve body heat for the icy waters ahead...and to make very, very clear to the monsters in the deep that you didn't number among their enemies.



One by one, they rose from the murk, called by the annidati to defend their home: chuulob, crocodiles, creatures less identifiable. Bloodcurdling wails and shrieks tore the air as they arose to cast themselves against the rising light. The fungal caps were alive with lithe, swift-leaping forms, only distinguishable from the native fauna by the weapons and armor they bore. Once, a hulking mound of rotting vegetable matter slid right past your fragile cart, pushing a great black wake of swamp-slime before it. A wizened toadshape sat upon the hill of its viney brow, the jutting brim of a white fungal cap distorting the lines of its skull. Your dreams of the night before swam queasily at the back of your thoughts as you watched the monsters pass you by.

The troops huddled in utter silence. When the waters were quiet again, they donned their SCUBA gear and dove. If all goes well, they'd provoke a response and then retreat, slipping away before overwhelming force arrives. Time is of the essence, for both your missions. Make haste, O ye faithful...
What piece of equipment did the Bombardans give you to aid the mission ahead?


RAMONA
Your debility is cured by now, unless you forgot to keep up with your care instructions.

Now you're standing at the edge of the Silver-home dome wall, near a set of old locks that one of the nurses said is a back way over to Panakteia's main commercial and pleasure wharves. One of the bigger domes in the area still protects that place. It would make a prime staging-ground for you to find your way into the military drydocks where the Visible Hand is moored.

There's also some kind of purpose-grown basidiospore set into the feet-thick supermaterial of the dome wall, right where a network of patched cracks converges, just above the interior sea level. It looks like it's a makeshift airlock, but one that opens onto the open sea instead of onto an air-filled utilidor. Evidently the annidati have needed some structural reinforcements to their survival blanket in the months since the Sink. Your bubble sled would fit through its organic lock -- it's sized big enough for heavy equipment to pass. Should you wish to take the ocean's road, this too is open to you.



The balancía weighs heavy in your hand, balancing the weight of your trick shield and arm-cannon. You can hear, vibrating against the dome wall, a faint, tidal rushing sound, like a river moving against its riverbed. Savior pulses steadily, ominously, within his containment shell; a constant heartbeat against your own, the rise and fall of it just a little too fast and harsh to be entirely human. The air is still and cold, riven occasionally by distant screams and the booms of heavy gunfire.

You're off the map now, huntress. Out there be dragons.
What do you do?

Alumnus Post fucked around with this message at 07:54 on Nov 18, 2018

Shardix
Sep 14, 2011

The end! No moral.
Serenity
HP 21/21 | Armor 2 | Load 3/9 | XP 5/15

Resolve "This is not my first adventure with Ramona", and replace it with "Savior has Ramona caught in its wake. I will do what I can to free her from its influence."
We learned about New Annidate and by extension, Old Annidate.
Daughter of the Firmament: Serenity discovered the truth behind the sinking of Aqualantis.


Having said her farewells and hopefully set the wheels of peace between Isha's people and the Tritons in motion, Serenity double checked the supplies and repacked her things carefully in her newly gifted satchel. It used what she suspected was Triton ingenuity to ensure the storage space could be sealed and kept dry against any eventuality. Beads and dried shark skins decorated the belt that held the satchel in place; traditional protections against the dangers that lurked in the depths. The sheathed dagger found a home on her new belt as well, a guardian for when Ramona was not immediately available.

Finally, a brief note penned for the Triton woman. It wished her and her clan well, along with a reassurance to Isurus that she still lived and still intended to aid them in their battle against Murgo's forces.

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 8/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
Did we learn something new and important about the world? O
Did we overcome a notable monster or enemy? X
Did we loot a memorable treasure? X
Free someone from literal or figurative bonds? Kaude
Bond replacement: "Serenity promised to save me from hell itself, so I'll die for her if I have to." with "I'm not a woman of faith, not even in Serenity, let alone the gods. I trust myself and my training above all to guide me to eternal life."


I put Bran on point. Bargained for her might as well make use of her.

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
Branwen McAlister
HP 20/20 | Armor 1 | XP 11/12 | Load 4/12
Spells: Light[ ] Sanctify[ ] Guidance[ ] CLW[ ]
Bless[ ] Cause Fear[ ] Magic Weapon[ ] Sanctuary[X]
Boom[ ]


Bran looks at Ramona as she puts her in lead, her helmet in her hands. She starts to say something, pauses, considering it, before galvanizing her will and saying "So. Why exactly did you lump me in with the rest of your pay? The words 'permanently' were in there." Bran glances at Serenity as she says this, trying to read her reaction to this. Seeing if maybe she had a hand in it. "Your rep doesn't have you as the leader, more a lone gun. So, why get someone, and why specifically me?"

We learned a lot about the locals and Isha.
Resolving "Serenity broke my mothers heart. I haven't forgiven her." and replacing it with "I don't know how I feel about Serenity right now, or how I should."
Dropping "I'm working on converting Nori to my faith."
And Bran using herself as a focus for an explosion is plenty dangerous and adhering to Bombarda's Scriptures
Gonna think about longer about what Bran got from the Bombardans, I'll slide a flashback in here as an edit or later on or something when I get an idea.

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 8/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
She wasn't there for it, so I tell her what went down, "When you negotiate your own pay for a living, you get everything valuable you can, and the people who owe you try to give you as close to nothing as they can and keep the rest as profit. Your church gave me excuses instead of other things I asked for, but not for you, then tried to convert me. Unsubtle. The unspoken challenge was could I get more value out of your adventuring than they get using you to get me to convince me to work for them for free. I took that challenge." I see her glance at her stepmother.

"My rep isn't like her tail. A godgiven limb that carries her and she cares for in return. It's more like a mangy dog someone I 'wronged' owns and sent to stalk me that hides when I yell at it and tries to kill me when I spend too long anywhere. People who know the dog don't know me."

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
Branwen McAlister
HP 20/20 | Armor 1 | XP 11/12 | Load 4/12
Spells: Light[ ] Sanctify[ ] Guidance[ ] CLW[ ]
Bless[ ] Cause Fear[ ] Magic Weapon[ ] Sanctuary[X]
Boom[ ]


"Well, can't really argue I don't know you, then. But you really didn't answer the question. McKinnin may not have balked at it but he sure as hell didn't volunteer me. So why did you ask for me?"

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 8/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
"So you need to be told what is your value to me. You can kill and heal with your magic, and your heart is capable of feeling intense negative emotions about someone for a long period of time without forcing your whole body to kill them. Finally, you can keep watch and can kill disgusting enemies by hand."

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
Branwen McAlister
HP 20/20 | Armor 1 | XP 11/12 | Load 4/12
Spells: Light[ ] Sanctify[ ] Guidance[ ] CLW[ ]
Bless[ ] Cause Fear[ ] Magic Weapon[ ] Sanctuary[X]
Boom[ ]


Bran looks skeptical and starts to say "Do you re-" before pausing and grimacing a bit. "There's that dog, then." Bran exhales sharply. "So not because Serenity asked you to, ultimately. That... Helps? I think." Bran gives an apologetic shrug. "Sorry for, assuming. About you, and... That second bit you said isn't really the positive you tried to make it sound. Maybe I can carry something like that and not crack, but I still carried it all this time. But that's enough time mine sweeping." Bran puts her helmet on, sealing it into place. "We should stick the domes best we're able, preserve whatever the sled has left in it for when we have no other option but use it."

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug

quote:

At the beginning of each session, the GM will ask you something about your homeland, why you left, or what you left behind. If you answer them, mark XP.


Tell us what happened when you first realized you could see and speak to the spirits of the dead.

RAMONA
It's a sensible enough decision. Keep the air around you while you still can, since before long you may have to fight for every scrap of breath you can hold on to. You head through the airlock and out the other side: at once the cold metal of the Aqualantean underbelly reasserts itself, and Isha's fungi are left behind.

It's pitch dark in here except for the lights you've brought, cold and still and hostile. A faint, subliminal rumbling comes through the bulkheads, more felt than heard; and now that you're outside the bounds of the Annidate, your spirit-sense is telling you that the dead are near again. Somehow you can still sense the greasy glare of Murgo's heretic sun on the back of your neck.

Savior is wide awake, more malevolently alert than ever you've felt him. You can feel his awareness straining hungrily towards something in the distance, like a pebble tied to a string and dipped into a flowing current. He wants something here, wants it like you've never felt him want before...and whatever it is, you're pretty sure you're moving straight towards it.
What do you do?

Alumnus Post fucked around with this message at 06:31 on Nov 23, 2018

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 8/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
I tell everyone about the evil spirit compass's twitching.

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
BRANWEN

You lead the party through the dark corridor without further incident. You can't quite shake the crawling feeling on the back of your neck, though, that you're walking right into somewhere you'd really rather not be. The rushing sound at the back of your hearing gets faintly louder as you emerge into the openness.



Where tourist and tyrant once mingled under the arches of whalebone and glass; where the boardwalks once thronged with their multitudes; where near every ship on the Sea of Crescents once kept its berth...this is where it all came together. Panakteia: the port of every shore.

This was once its main shopping drag, the place where all the wharves converge...but when the ships stopped, the beating heart of this place went with them. Now the blind eyes of the shopping arcades are all dark. No fires crackle merrily in the hearths of Aqualantis' most famous taverns and pleasure-houses. The great dome arches above, slicing through the clean lines of the boardwalks and jetties, twisting and foreshortening the taller architecture. Whole blocks have collapsed entirely, deck and building alike tumbled helter-skelter into deep lakes of still, black water. Murgo's heretic sun looms over the desolation -- a sourceless flat glare from the high towers of Wunderland, the color of old butter, and the deep black shadows it pours out along your path.

The way to the industrial works would be right here, just through the immense portal of Aqualantis' ceremonial "front door"...but apparently that's exactly where Isha decided to anchor one of his resin generators when the Sink came upon this place, and now that set of district locks is buried under twenty feet or more of superstrong, superhard alchemical resins. Good luck getting through there.

Panakteia lies before you, and your mission.
What do you do?



SERENITY
It'd be nice, you suppose, if any of this surprised you. You know well by now the scope and depth of the great spell They wrought here, that Aqualantis should become the focal-point for a thousand tales -- the throat of the whirlpool, around which the currents of fate must circle. What tale, then, could be older or sweeter to the Wurms than the curse to which Savior binds his victims? Conflict eternal...death, struggle, and mutation...he's found no shortage of it here, hardly; surplus beyond imagining. Of course he'd want to come. This is where he belongs.

If you concentrate, you think you're starting to be able to sense the link between them...like a second heartbeat, just behind Ramona's own, alive and aware, awakened to the power that circles here. Savior is moving within that greater motion like a hungry shark...seeking, seeking, seeking those actions which are at once the source and fulfillment of his desire. Will you bend with those currents, be the rock that dams the flood...or will that red riptide pull you under, too?

quote:

When you enter an important location (your call) you can ask the GM for one fact from the history of that location.

What do you do?

Alumnus Post fucked around with this message at 07:02 on Nov 24, 2018

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 9/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
Been hearing spirits since I was in the womb. I first realized it was significant that I could see them and speak to them in early childhood, when I put together that there were rules to who could see, touch, hear, and visit the dreams of whom, and the rules were different for me and only me. Before that I only knew there were just people everyone else ignored, and until even later I still thought when I dreamed of the living they were visiting my dreams, not my own constructs. I still trust dreams too much, but I left behind my old childlike willingness to trust anyone just based on a unique connection we shared. That scarcity only increases my leverage, it's not a sign of fate or duty.

Shardix
Sep 14, 2011

The end! No moral.
Serenity
HP 21/21 | Armor 2 | Load 3/9 | XP 5/15

Serenity snapped back to reality, a foreign marching song dying abruptly on her lips. Craning her neck, she appraised Ramona carefully, not out of suspicion but wariness; Savior simply could not be trusted.

"May I speak with it?" She offered a hand for the pearl, but her tone carried no expectation that Ramona had to do anything. Only that Savior had a great many years to learn how to twist Ramona's path. Nashira watched over hers, and no pearl no matter how malevolent could gainsay the Mother Serpent.

Hypnotic: @Shardix: 2d6+3 = (6+6)+3 = 15

Shardix fucked around with this message at 01:19 on Nov 25, 2018

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 9/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
I think of the years I spent screaming at the drat thing when it kept appearing near me like a cursed stray, all the varied efforts I wasted trying to escape its influence. Of course I'd be relieved if somehow this elf smoothed it all over with a little talk, but part of me would also probably be mad.

I hold the concrete ball out like a platter of food she ordered that I personally can't stand and look around for dangers in the meantime. She'll know nothing's gonna interrupt her probably fruitless conversation.

1d8+1d6+1 drhapoo = (3)+(4)+1 = 8 If the d6 is the higher die of the pair, the GM will also introduce a complication or danger that comes about due to your heedless pursuits.
Who’s really in control here?

slydingdoor fucked around with this message at 22:45 on Nov 24, 2018

Shardix
Sep 14, 2011

The end! No moral.
Serenity
HP 21/21 | Armor 2 | Load 3/9 | XP 5/15

The bard delicately picked up the pearl, scrutinizing it at arms length. The last time she had held it her mind had been preoccupied. Stress and frustrations leaking out over everything. Now, her mind and heart were clear. Perhaps with that clarity something could be done on Ramona's behalf. Staring into the plain concrete, she leaned in. Her words were a scant elveish whisper but she trusted an entitity like this would not be especially hindered by its shell.

"Show me your heart, Savior, and I will show you mine. Let me see why you bring so much pain to my friend."

Shardix fucked around with this message at 19:04 on Nov 25, 2018

Alumnus Post
Dec 29, 2009

They are weird and troubling. We owe it to our neighbors to kill them.
Pillbug
SERENITY
Update your character sheet with a description of your mark of divine authority, please and thank you. :jewish:

You cradle the concrete ball in your arms, curl it close, and listen. Ramona always told you he never spoke...but then, Ramona never had the mark of Nashira's divine authority branded into her with a rod of molten moonlight. The glowing sigil on your forehead flares and opens. The world rushes away from you. Your perceptions unfurl like a billow of smoke.



How could you have thought this was opaque? You can see him in there, clearly; a flaw of black crystal within the cooled and congealed stone. Glimmering in his depths there's a light, a pure white flame, a reflection of the divine radiance upon your brow. The deeper you look, the more you can start to see...other flames in the reaches, dim torchlight flickers in a realm of mists and howling wind.

Your sight is assailed with a blizzard of whipping images, just fleeting scraps in the darkness, but your hearing has unfolded somehow -- opened and multiplied into a sensory apparatus so comprehensive it feels like you've just been immured into the skin of a blue whale, so complex and textured it's hard to distinguish it from a physical touch. Savior has opened his heart to you...and his eyes and lips and ears; and other senses you cannot name.

The edge of something sharp and glassy brushes up against your consciousness like the tip of a talon. Testing. Probing.

The power of the black pearl is at your command. As long as what you want is conflict, you can probably cause it, influence it, or learn about it. However, your body is vulnerable, and you can't break free of the communion until you can convince Savior to spend all your hold!

Your vows of honor and of valor still bind you.

What do you do?

Alumnus Post fucked around with this message at 05:31 on Nov 26, 2018

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
Branwen McAlister
HP 20/20 | Armor 1 | XP 11/12 | Load 5/12
Spells: Light[ ] Sanctify[ ] Guidance[ ] CLW[ ]
Bless[ ] Cause Fear[ ] Magic Weapon[ ] Sanctuary[X]
Boom[ ]


Before parting from the Bombardans
"Oi, McAlister! Hold up." McKinnin reaches down and unbuckles the belt around his armor. "Take my piece. We got enough these museum piece rifles and powder to set things off if need arises."

Bran shoots a grin at her superior officer. "Thanks, though your revolver isn't exactly the latest model either. Might not want to throw stones in that glass house of yours."

McKinnin laughs, slapping Bran's pauldron. "Nah lassie, mine's a classic. Means it only gets better wit' time."

Presently
Branwen glances at Ramona as Serenity stares at the pearl. "So this... Savior thing? Some kinda protective amulet? Or just the kinda thing that vibrates and glows when goblins or whatever are near?"

pre:
Battle Sister Branwen McAlister  (Cleric)
Look: Sharp Eyes, Common Garb, Toned Body

Str 16(+2) | Dex 16(+2) | Con 12 | Int 8(-1) | Wis 16(+2) | Cha 9
Damage: d6 | HP 20/20 | XP 11/12 | Level 5

Alignment: Lawful Endanger yourself following the precepts of your church or god.
Race: Human Your faith is diverse. Choose one wizard spell. You can cast and be 
granted that spell as if it was a cleric spell. Spell Chosen:Fireball

Moves:
Turn Undead
When you hold your holy symbol aloft and call on your deity for protection, roll+Wis. 
✴On a 7+, so long as you continue to pray and brandish your holy symbol, no undead may come within reach of you. 
✴On a 10+, you also momentarily daze intelligent undead and cause mindless undead to flee. 
Aggression breaks the effects and they are able to act as normal. Intelligent undead 
may still find ways to harry you from afar. They’re clever like that.

Deity: You serve and worship some deity or power which grants you spells. Give your god a name 
(Bombarda, Goddess of Explosions) and choose your deity’s domain:
• Bloody Booming Conquest
Choose one precept of your religion:
• Your religion has important sacrificial rites, add Petition: Offering

Divine Guidance
When you petition your deity according to the precept of your religion, you are granted some 
useful knowledge or boon related to your deity’s domain. The GM will tell you what.

Commune
When you spend uninterrupted time (an hour or so) in quiet communion with your deity, you:
•  Lose any spells already granted to you.
•  Are granted new spells of your choice whose total levels don’t exceed your own level+1, 
and none of which is a higher level than your own level.
•  Prepare all of your rotes, which never count against your limit.

Cast A Spell
When you unleash a spell granted to you by your deity, roll+Wis. ✴On a 10+, the spell is 
successfully cast and your deity does not revoke the spell, so you may cast it again. ✴On a 7–9, 
the spell is cast, but choose one:
•  You draw unwelcome attention or put yourself in a spot. The GM will tell you how.
•  Your casting distances you from your deity—take -1 ongoing to cast a spell until the next 
time you commune.
•  After you cast it, the spell is revoked by your deity. You cannot cast the spell again until you 
commune and have it granted to you.
Note that maintaining spells with ongoing effects will sometimes cause a penalty to your roll 
to cast a spell.

Level 2: Chosen One +1 Wis
Choose one spell. You are granted that spell as if it was one level lower. Spell Chosen:Fireball

Level 3: First Aid +1 Dex
Cure Light Wounds is a rote for you, and therefore doesn’t count against your 
limit of granted spells.

Level 4: Divine Intervention +1 Dex
When you commune you get 1 hold and lose any hold you already had. Spend 
that hold when you or an ally takes damage to call on your deity, they intervene 
with an appropriate manifestation (a sudden gust of wind, a lucky slip, a burst 
of light) and negate the damage.

Level 5: Serenity +1 Dex
When you cast a spell you ignore the first -1 penalty from ongoing spells.

Bonds
• I don't know how I feel about Serenity right now, or how I should.
• 
• I'm envious of how easy Ramona makes it look.
• Bombarda has shown me Ramona will play an important role in events to come. 

Gear
Load: 5/12
MREs (4/5 Uses, 1 weight)
Consecrated EOD Suit (1 armor, 1 weight)
Triton Trident, headless (Close, two-handed, 1 weight)
McKinnin's Revolver (Near, +1 Damage, Reload, 1 weight)
Ammo (4/4)
Bandages (3/3 uses, Slow, 0 weight)
Adventuring Gear (1/5 uses, 1 weight)
Leather Sack
Harness

ArkInBlack fucked around with this message at 14:52 on Jan 15, 2019

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 9/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
"The opposite. A cursed object that has followed me around since I found him as a child. Savior makes everyone my enemy, in time, and traps their souls when they die by me. You'd better keep resisting that influence."

Shardix
Sep 14, 2011

The end! No moral.
Serenity
HP 21/21 | Armor 2 | Load 3/9 | XP 5/15

When you enter an important location (your call) you can ask the GM for one fact from the history of that location.

Who is/was the most notable personage of this district?

---

Serenity shuddered as Savior ran its spiritual claws across her mind. It was so, so very tempting to simply drop her defenses. Let Savior into her mind, that she could understand it and know how to free Ramona from it's hateful attentions. And more than that. The raw desire to know, for the sake of knowing. To experience the full breadth of Savior's spite, with no concern for the scars she would earn in the doing.

In that respect, she was very like her goddess. Dimly, Serenity recalled her husband saying something very similar - a part of what had attracted him to her in the first place. A stubborn refusal to leave a sleeping dragon unpoked.

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
Branwen McAlister
HP 20/20 | Armor 1 | XP 11/12 | Load 5/12
Spells: Light[ ] Sanctify[ ] Guidance[ ] CLW[ ]
Bless[ ] Cause Fear[ ] Magic Weapon[ ] Sanctuary[X]
Boom[ ]


Bran stares at Ramona for a bit. "...gently caress's sake you're serious." Bran brings a hand to her head, lightly drumming her gauntlet fingers against her helmet. "That's... You..." She exhales sharply. "Alright, that, explains the bit about holding onto a grudge. So. Stupid question time. You've seen, someone, about this right? Or is Serenity doing just that? Will she be..." Bran pauses, looking over to Serenity, before looking back to Ramona. "Right, your cursed rock wouldn't be able to be resisted if Nashira's wisdom couldn't see through it." Bran glances back toward Serenity and the black pearl. "Have you tried destroying it, and perhaps more relevantly, have any faithful tried to destroy it?"

slydingdoor
Oct 26, 2010

Are you in or are you out?
Ramona
18/26-1 HP; 9/14 XP; 1 Armor; 10/11 Load
I nod, I've petitioned many great men who claimed immunity and offered solutions. All ended up charlatans, or corrupted even if they were saints. I nod, I've destroyed him hundreds of times dozens of ways, and he always returns. Bran is trying to be a problem solver to something I've been managing and surviving for over ten years.

Will Serenity be okay, she can't finish asking. "No, something bad will happen and I will deal with it and protect you both. I prepared for that when I gave her permission to try whatever it is she's trying. That's the thing, you faithful with your deities think you can fix anything if you care about it enough, but the fact is, you can't, you don't, or they don't, or they can't. So I will continue to survive and to manage it as I have been, and you can help or watch."

ArkInBlack
Mar 22, 2013
Branwen McAlister
HP 20/20 | Armor 1 | XP 11/12 | Load 5/12
Spells: Light[ ] Sanctify[ ] Guidance[ ] CLW[ ]
Bless[ ] Cause Fear[ ] Magic Weapon[ ] Sanctuary[X]
Boom[ ]


Bran shoots an annoyed look at Ramona. "I'm just trying to..." Bran cocks her head as she trails off, thinking a moment. "...Was that the pearl just now?"

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Shardix
Sep 14, 2011

The end! No moral.
Serenity
HP 21/21 | Armor 2 | Load 3/9 | XP 5/15

In spite of Ramona's warnings, it was so incredibly difficult to hold herself back. The rational part of her knew Savior was only going to try and use her. The curious side of her, however, was far stronger. What things could she learn from the pearl? What undreamed of secrets might it hold?

It was hard to pull her gaze away from the thing, but she was at last able to tear her attention away and look at Ramona. The claw drawing across her thoughts still remained, a cold reminder of the danger and allure of the object she held. "I wish to study this. Tease out the secrets I know it holds. I may learn how to free you from it. Or I may fall into its grip and do something irrevocable. Inasmuch as Savior belongs to anyone, it belongs to you and so the decision is yours."

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