ONE HUNDRED TWENTY FOUR
(I/C)
Lyra looked in the empty room. “This thing…”
“Ballista,” Lannis supplied.
“Ballista,” she said with a nod of thanks, “It’s pretty heavy. I’ll bet they have hobgoblins helping them. Something to keep in mind.”
“There is so much I don’t like about all this,” Lannis replied.
Wyn took some of the longer splinters of wood from the racks and poked the pockets of the cloak, feeling nothing inside. Abraxas was looking at the puddle of green slime in the Ballista room, testament to where the food the group had left some remained. “My concern, amigos, is the slime. Eet would be grande malo to face it again.”
“Oui!” Wyn agreed. “So we give ourselves a benefit.” He took the cloak off the hook and went to hand it to Kovid who was already taking his Tarp out of his backpack. "Monsieur Dwarfriend, put dis ova your armor. Give you one extra slimin'... oh... you already have de tarp on... Monsieur du Lac? You want de coat? If not, Wyn will wear eet."
Brendon took the cloak and wrapped it around his shoulders, tying it in the front and patting it down flat. “More cushion to the pushin’.”
“Exactement!” The elf then took both cushions off the couch and slit open the back of them. HE then tossed the padding out until he was left with the two filthy couch coverings. "Monsieur Salazar, Priestess Adder, present shields, s'il vous plaît." He then proceeded to place both shields inside the couch pillows.
"Señor Wyndefs,” Abraxas smiled, “that is an idea bueno.”
"Dere,” he said with finality, drawing his bow once again. “You get one extra hit of de slime before losing de shields."
“Great, great,” the Magic User replied nervously. “Let's keep going, carefully."
Kovid, making sure his tarp was tied in place tightly like a poncho, picked up his hammer again and gave its head a spin, muttering, “Hmm west and north we go. Gowan Suhkit with a gut full of fear, dying time’s here.”
"Ok... scoutin' formation. Maybe we stop at each intersection to listen for disturbances... den we head toward de Hallway of Questionable Dimensi... wait... Dwarf, are you givin' deze places silly names on purpose?”
Kovid shrugged with a grin.
“Ha! Merci friend. I needed de laugh at dis moment."
“Not very professional,” Lannis noted, “Never see anything silly like that on the Dariusial Map Collection.”
Pointing north and west, the elf indicated, "Forward. I be sick of deze kobs. Allons-y."
“Si! Let us continue on our path, muy quiet."
With Brendon in the front, the Scout approached the corner with care and looked around, the passage went north without issue or change, smaller side passages to the west that led to the water were still open. With slow movements, Brendon let the group north, stopping at each side passage to check the floor and listen. After a few moments he motioned the group to continue again.
The first and second side passages were without issue. It was beyond that that Brendon stopped and crouched low, looking with care. “Hello,” he whispered, “What’s this?”
Kovid bent lower, “What have you got, Manling?”
“Scratches. In the floor. Something heavy dragged through here.”
The dwarf studied the marks in the floor. There were a few of them, nothing longer than a foot, but they were heavy scrapes on the stone floor running parallel to its passage (>Stonework, Yellow 6). “Yep,” he agreed, “Something heavy, dragged along here. Here too,” he noted ahead.
“Heavy?” Abraxas asked, “Like a Ballista?”
“I thought they oiled the machine?” Lyra asked.
“Probably did, but it is old and the wheels could freeze up.”
“Explains why the scrapes are maybe not constant? Like a wheel is working and then it doesn’t? and then it does again?”
“Si! Like in the Supermercado. I hate when that happens.”
Brendon continued on, noting that every so often there was another scrape in the floor. At the 3rd passage to the west (that led to the food stores) he paused again to look and listen, but nothing was down there. And that brought the group to the stairs.
“Um,” he stopped, looking, feeling the faint cool breeze wash around his ankles from below, “chips on the stairs,” he noted. “Fresh. Do you think they brought the damned thing down stairs?”
“Eets ‘eavy,” Wyn noted.
“At least 150 lbs,” Kovid said.
“Oui! 175 for sure.” The elf ignored the staring at his back. “Bringing a war machine down a flight of steps. I don’t know?”
Brendon tapped his foot and then suggested, “Let’s check the bottom of the steps, the passage turns. If there is a broken ballista on the floor there, there we know that is what they did.”
So the part went down the stairs with slow care, the chill feeling from the cool air currents washing against them. Kovid noted many fresh cracks and crumbled pieces of the edge of the steps along with some scrapes running down the center of the entire 20’ of steps going down. Finally they arrived at the bottom where the passage went for a dozen paces and then turned to the west.
Brendon crept up to the corner, ear to the ground, fingers splayed and listened (<Hear Noise +20 bonus, Red 12) until he stood up and turned back to the group. “I hear nothing down there. If they are there, they are being really really Poseidon deep of the ocean quiet.”
Time now is 7:30
(OOC)
What’s the plan? Around the corner? It was a long passage and ended at a door.
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