Dungeon Keeper

[cityship]

The Tapestry had spoken. Not in words, but in ideas and images, ciphers and cryptic nonsense that had been laboriously deciphered, interrogated with spells and technology, pieced together from scrap. They had led here.



Planet Designation: AST994-III
Status: Terrestrial, K-class.
Non-sentient life: None.
Semi-Sentient Life: None.
Sentient Life: None.
Water: None.

Climate: Desert/barren.
Landscape: Rocky crags.
Air: Normoxic concentration: 29% oxygen, 60% nitrogen, 3% xenon, 6% trace gases, such as hydrogen, krypton, and argon.

Air Pressure: 14.352 pounds per square inch.
Sky: Red. Cloudless.
Sun: Class A star.

Warnings: Information from Tapestry indicates significant underground population. Subsurface information not available. Use caution.

Mission: ?

Somewhere down there, an object valuable and vital to the mission lay in wait, something so important that its existence was encoded into the Tapestry itself. Whatever it was, they needed to get it.

The only problem was, how to get in? The subterranean world had no access to the surface, and to physically breach it would not only be prohibitive, but catastrophic to the point of apocalypse to that underground world. Science could not solve this problem; thus, the crew turned to magic. The Tapestry had provided what were, after some analysis, unquestionably teleport coordinates. Five of them, for three people each.

To ensure the crew members were not lost, nor left behind without help, contingent spells were laid upon them, to return them to safety and help should they become injured, or should they find the item.

Without further ado -- with no natives to meet and negotiate with, no further preliminaries to make or plans to be made -- each of the five groups, with their supplies and equipment, were taken to the start.

[OOC: Don't worry too much about posting order. I will jump in where a response from the mysterious sky narrator is needed! Going with this, if you feel you're getting lost or outraced in posting, let me or the group know and we'll slow it down. The explicit purpose of this plot is for everyone to have fun, so please speak up if there's anything anyone can do to make that happen better!]

Comments

[snarkingscribe]

Stealth definitely isn't Veronica's strong suit, no.

"Guess you can bring up the rear, then," Veronica remarks at Grif - mostly teasing. As they move down the hall, she does peer a bit at the runes - can't read 'em, but she kinda wishes she could - or at least had time to do so.

The sound first makes her think of nightstalkers from home, but it sounded...oddly intelligent, rather than a bunch of the creatures barking and hissing over each other. "Seems a reasonable guess," she whispered to Ian, then nods. "Give a shout if things go south."

[cityship]

Creeping down the hallway, without people in armor clanging along, proved fairly simple; the voices up ahead were enough to cover any incidental noise.

A few twists and turns later, and Ian would find himself peering around a corner at a number of small, semi-reptilian, vaguely doglike animals on the near side of a reinforced wall across the tunnel, with a two-gated passage through said wall. The five creatures were clustered around a table, evidently playing some sort of game that involved both cards and dice, as well as a quantity of coins being used as bets. They had taken no notice of Ian as they gambled.

[splendid_roman]

Ian nodded and crept along the passage, pausing every time there was a bend, in case whatever was up ahead was round the next bend. When he reached the gamblers and found they hadn't seen him he stopped to look around. He might be able to sneak past them, but the other two wouldn't. And besides, he couldn't be sure the gates would be soundless.

He returned to the other two to tell them what he'd seen. "They're intelligent," he concluded, "but I can't tell whether they're friend or foe." They might well decide anyone alien was an enemy.

[whyarewehere]

"Is it people, then?" Grif muttered. "Really weird, hissy people?"

He would hold out on that remote hope for as long as he could, because the other option coming to mind was that it was bats.

Grif was not sure what he would do if there were bats. It was best to just not think about it.

[snarkingscribe]

"People or not, they're hopefully friendly. I suppose the easiest way to find out is to just waltz right in." Probably not the smartest way, but given the lack of options...

"No way to get around them, I take it?"

[splendid_roman]

Ian shook his head. "I can't see a way round them. We're going to have to face them one way or another." Or they'd be stuck here. "Let's try and look non-threatening." Although for all he knew, the people he'd seen might view different things as non-threatening. He started off back down the passage, this time not bothering about being quiet or cautious.

[snarkingscribe]

"Guess worst comes to worst, we could pass as bodyguards of some kind..." Veronica half-shrugged, and then followed alongside Ian as he went forward. Thankfully, she had no obvious conventional weapons - the displacer glove blended in with the armor to a degree.

[cityship]

This time, particularly when they heard the commotion, the guards were prepared... or at least as prepared as they possibly could be. Rounding the corner revealed the group now standing in sharp formation, spears leveled to prevent a barrier and a threat. The creatures didn't attack, though; they were clearly surprised and confused. After all, they were supposed to deal with threats from the other side of this gate!

[splendid_roman]

Ian stopped, the way they were standing intended as a threat, even if the creatures looked confused. "Hello." Ian smiled, hoping that bluffing their way past would work. "Don't mind us, we're just passing through." He took a confident step forward.

[cityship]

Ian was immediately met by leveled spears. The creatures glanced among each other, a swift and furious mental conflict, before one lifted its head slightly to growl/hiss out a few intelligible words. "You not supposed to be here. Prisoners now!"

[snarkingscribe]

Veronica raised her hands up, and waved them a bit while shaking her head, to show disagreement with what was said. "Well, we're not planning on staying here - like my friend said, just passing through. That way you don't have to worry about the fact that we're not supposed to be here."

Times like this she was thankful for the helmet hiding the nervous grin on her face.

[splendid_roman]

Ian stopped at the spears' movement and put his hands up. "We'll be no trouble at all," he promised. "You'll never know we've been here." He really hoped they didn't have to return to the same place in order to get back to Stacy.

[cityship]

"You want.. go through?!" A pair of the creatures reflexively checked behind them in alarm, as if to make sure they were still in front of the gate. All of them seemed particularly baffled, if not aghast.

[snarkingscribe]

There's a pause before Veronica answers, though said answer is hesitant. "...yeeees, we would like to go through. We're just passing through."

[splendid_roman]

"That's not a problem, is it?" Ian asked, sounding as if it was a perfectly reasonable request. Which it was.

[cityship]

The creatures gabbed amongst themselves for a moment, looked at the humans, gabbed again, then sort of came to a universal agreement. They stepped aside, spears still leveled in case of treachery, and one of them reached for the first of two massive wheels with chains wrapped around them. This the creature began to turn, raising the innermost gate so that the three of them could pass into the fortified tunnel that lead to the outermost one.

[splendid_roman]

"Thank you." Ian hadn't expected it to be that simple, but he was glad it was. He smiled at the creatures as he stepped past and into the tunnel. "I hope this isn't a trap," he said quietly to the other two.

[snarkingscribe]

Well, that seemed all too easy, but better to overthink good fortune. Veronica added her thanks to Ian's, and nodded at his whisper. "You and me both," she answered, following him.