Startup 37: Headhunting

Arodus 28, Evening

I met the half-drow woman’s eyes for only a second before time stood still. She smiled slightly, relieved, when she saw the state I was in. Maybe she was thinking “ah, good, he’s chained up. Should be an easy day.” Whatever she was thinking, I lost any faint spark of hope it would be good for me as she started her lunge.

I didn’t know who she was, and all Autopilot volunteered was that she was a half-drow and definitely wasn’t House D’Lann staff. I was chained up, though thankfully Nendra had left my feet detached from my wrists. I wasn’t quite as fragile as I’d been when I arrived in Port Peril, but I was in no state to brawl. I let my mind race for a minute or two before establishing a sense of calm.

Alright, step one. Put something between me and the bad lady so she can’t pound my head into the concrete. Seems pretty obvious now that I think about it.

I’d been in a similar situation once before, so I fell back on what worked last time. I thrust one hand out, and called forth a guardian directly in the woman’s path. The pony appeared from Elysium in a flash of multicolored light. Its coat was pure white, accented by an electric blue mane and big dewy black eyes. It reared up on its hind legs, front hooves flailing towards the heavily robed woman. I braced against the wall to scramble to my feet.

She could have run directly into my guardian, but she responded with shocking grace. The half-drow stopped on the ball of her foot and pivoted out of the way, bringing her offhand forward in a vicious hook. Her pale knuckles met the pony’s jaw with a resounding crack, and the summoned creature’s shape fuzzed like static for a fragment of a second.

One hit and it almost unsummoned the horse? Damn.

The pony landed heavily. It was still laying there, eyes open wide with shock, when time stood still. I checked its status; 4 out of 11 hp, and it was stunned. I’d blocked the first strike, but she was already looking at me again. I didn’t have long. I wrapped myself with a veil of illusion, fading from her sight while I scooted along the wall away from where she’d last seen me.

In a frozen moment, I considered what I knew about this girl.

Ok. SRD only had like… two common unarmed classes. Monk and Brawler. Monks have an ability called stunning fist; I think she just used that. Monks were a kind of fast moving generalist fighter with no bad saving throws. So she’s probably weakest to getting punched in the face, and she’s probably a lot better at that than I am.

“I can hear you, M’Dair.” The monk said, aiming a kick several inches to my right. “Surrender and I’m sure we can come to an arrangement. What loyalty do you have to House D’Lann anyway?”

Not much, but what I do have is written in blood. Can’t really betray them at this point, even if I trusted you. Not that you know that.

“Hunter.” She said, craning her neck towards the door briefly. I assumed it was some sort of signal, as a faint dusting of white divination magic settled across the room. (Sense Motive 4+11+5(evident cause)=20) My invisibility spell disrupted the white particles, but I was fairly sure a hole in the information gathering magic was almost as good as a clear ping on his radar.

“Yeah, he’s still in there.” A familiar voice replied, though I couldn’t quite place it. “Near the back left corner.”

Shit, they have a team behind them.

The monk turned towards me, looking a bit to my right. A smile played across her lips.

Worth a shot, I guess.

“I’m willing to hear your terms.” I said with my own voice, leaving Autopilot to take a proper turn.

She lunged at me, her aim distressingly close to to the mark, and I was only barely able to twist out of the way. I saw the pulse of ki energy in her fist disperse harmlessly into the wall.

I stood very still, the monk’s focused expression only a foot away from me. My heart was racing. I looked at the wall and saw a tiny chip of stone frozen in the air, broken off by the **** of her strike. I was struck by the situation, one which I’d never experienced before.

She just wants to kill me. She doesn’t want to capture me, or humiliate me, or negotiate. She’s not a monster, I’m not intruding on her territory, I don’t even know who she is. The moment I move more than a few inches in any direction she’s going to try again. Stunning Fist is a fortitude save; my fortitude is still pretty abysmal. She could stun-lock me; beat me to **** before I get another turn. I might die here, in a dark closet, and not even know why.

Do I use the scroll? Fuck, no, that would barely help. I’d get like… a minute of breathing room, but then I’d need to get away from D’Lann before they killed me, then away from whoever these people are before they turn around and try to kill me again. It might be my only chance, though.

I heard an affronted nicker from across the room; the pony was on its feet and back in the fight. A trail of unreasonably bright scarlet dripped from the side of its mouth, stark against its otherwise pristine white coat. It surprised me; this little guy just got laid out, and he was back for round two.

I laughed, letting the tension that had been building for days out. The monk heard me; her eyes flicked to my position, but she was still frozen. If anything my situation got worse, but I was grateful. I had time to compose myself, to really look at the problem properly. There had to be a way out of this; any other possibility was not worth considering.

She has backup that can sort of counter my invisibility, but not completely. Loud noises are my friend; Dovnu wouldn’t risk pulling something like this with the contract in play, so this is a third party. She’s probably not going to try to fish for my location while something is attacking her. The pony got laid out by one hit, but it didn’t die.

My shadow appeared directly behind her, but it seemed that she expected that. The puppet swept its leg low, and she hopped directly over the strike. While she was distracted, I dropped to the floor as quietly as I could manage and reached into my robe. She seemed to prefer aiming for the upper body, so going low seemed like it might buy me just enough time.

The monk spun and planted an elbow directly into my shadow’s ribs with a loud crack. It’s torso rippled like disturbed water, turning into smoke that reformed into a hazy cylinder. She tried to follow up with a palm strike to the face, but my shadow was able to deflect her blow with a sweep of his arm.

The pony dove in with a shoulder block, ramming into the woman and knocking her off balance. My shadow’s leg flicked out again while she was off-center, and this time it worked. She was knocked onto her back, and my shadow bent to strike her in a single motion.

Shadow Puppet has struck Monk Assassin for 6 damage

It was the first time I saw one of my perks in action: Pack Tactics. When I’d gotten Owlbear home, I’d earned a perk from Architect of a Thousand Dreams. On paper, it only served to double my minions bonuses from flanking. It didn’t work with my party members, so I hadn’t thought about it much. It seemed that it also helped my summons to wordlessly coordinate their strikes.

I continued to contort my body around, reaching for a weight pinned against my side using my thick sash, while the pony and Autopilot’s puppet struggled with the Monk. She weathered another round of strikes while she stood, her face contorted into a mask of rage, and directed another blow towards the pony. She brought down one fist on its spine, and it exploded in a cloud of multicolored glitter.

She looked down, and saw the dusting of sparkles settle upon me, huddled at her feet.

Now or never.

Hip fire isn’t accurate, even when you aren’t literally holding the gun at your hip. Caulky’s old revolver bucked in my hands, which literally couldn’t hold the gun properly while chained behind my back. I’d mostly pulled the thing out for the bang, to draw attention to my location. That said, if you haphazardly pull the trigger five times in a small room, there’s a good chance someone is going to get hurt.

I could fire more than once in a turn, though not with any accuracy. One of my shots, I think the third, tore through her bicep. She cursed and dropped a small ball at her feet, which started to hiss and release smoke. It smelled overpoweringly sweet, with an antiseptic undertone.

“We’ve got a live one!” She yelled, edging away from my shadow carefully. My puppet pursued her as she went to the door.

I regulated my breathing carefully as I breathed the gas, taking in as little as I could and consciously directing the toxins through my mana-enriched kidneys.

You have resisted Knock Out Gas

Fortitude 16+1+3(Great Stamina)=20

You are not fatigued.

The popup repeated every time a turn ended. I was lucky it was fatigue based, since that let me apply my one Body Control talent as an immediate action. I watched and waited as the glitter vanished off of my body. My puppet fared far worse, inflicted with fatigue, then exhaustion, then sleep as it tried to strike the monk. I couldn’t stay in this room; my luck would run out quickly. I feigned exhaustion, slumping down against the wall.

Her allies opened the door for her, and in the split second of opportunity that provided me I struck. My entire body dissolved into freezing mist and I shot out into the hallway, directly past my assailant.

Energy Leap

Unaware target did not dodge out of the way.

Overrun attempt: 19+9=28

Target Fortitude Save Failed

Monk Assassin took 11 damage and is staggered

Target Fortitude Save Failed

Illusionist Assassin took 11 damage and is staggered.

I reformed and landed heavily in the hallway, directly next to Nendra. She was wearing a corset under a dress so sheer that it was practically transparent. She looked at me with wide eyes, shocked at my sudden appearance.

No, that’s not right.

The edges of her body blurred in my arcane sight, the only color in the dimly lit hallway, leaving a trail of indigo whenever she moved. Illusion. The monk fell to the floor heavily, her body covered in frost. Just down the hall, keeping watch around the bend, a man turned his pale half-elven face to look at the fallen monk.

“Ma’ra!” He yelped, his eyes then focused on me. “You bastard!”

I saw the fear and despair in his eyes as he left his post and lunged towards me. I was still bound. I used another of my precious second level spell slots to quickly Energy Leap past him, hoping to get to the end of the hall and flee.

Opposed caster level check 5+5=10

Your spell has been countered.

A whip of multicolored light flicked out of “Nendra” and shattered my spell while it was still forming. I was too surprised by the discovery that counterspells were a thing to do more than hastily backpedal, almost tripping due to the chains.

He went for my gut, forcing the air from my lungs. A wave of ki energy rippled through my body, and everything was a distant haze.

Fortitude Save vs. Stunning Fist 7+1=8

You have been stunned for 1 round.

You have been punched for 3 damage.

I was alone, without Autopilot, and this man was better than me. I’d never been in a fight with stakes higher than a bar tab before I came to this world, and I sure as hell didn’t know how to fight with my hands literally tied behind my back.

Maybe if I were in my old body, with a few inches on this guy and a hell of a lot more mass… who am I kidding? I’d be fucked anyway. Maybe if it was just the illusionist chick.

Fortitude Save vs. Stunning Fist 2+1=3

You have been stunned for 1 round.

You have been punched for 8 damage.

One fucking mistake and I’m down for the count. Maybe someone heard the gun?

As the blows kept raining down, I overheard the false Nendra. The illusionist was talking to guards from the next hall over. My heart sank as my health fell into the negatives, and the pain in my battered body receded. My mind withdrew into a comforting shadow, creeping in at the edge of my vision.

“He was attempting to flee his punishment. I am having him properly chastised.”

A twenty second reaction time and it still wasn’t enough to save me. I wonder what’ll happen to these guys? Poor guards did their best.

I felt a rush of clarity, my body shuddering to life. The male stood, his motions fluid, his face confused and panicked, and turned to face the disguised sorceress. My own body nearly followed suit, but I could not move. Wires of violet light filled the hallway, latching onto us like puppet strings.

Saving throw vs. Empowered Cloud of Rage.

12+8=20 Success!

The illusion upon the sorceress shattered as the two guards ran her through, confusion clear on their faces even before she was revealed to be a half elf in a simple robe. She backed away, shaking off the enchantment, calling for backup from her companion.

I averted my eyes as he took a swing at the back of her head. I heard a heavy thump as she landed on the stone floor, and her companion’s despairing cry. I heard more slaps of flesh against flesh.

“No! No! No!”

“Emrys!” Nendra was there suddenly, examining my battered, prone form. “Are you well? Please, please be well.”

There was a tremor in her voice, and in her hands, as she touched my face. She looked me in the eyes, and I nodded.

“Stop him.” I croaked. “He might kill her.”

She cocked her head to the side, confused, then sighed.

“Ah, her magic. Or did you want her?” Nendra said, “if she survives you can do whatever you’d like with her, my husband.”

I heard the man’s despairing cries fade, and let unconsciousness take me. I was as safe as I’d ever been since coming to this awful place.

••••••••••

Nendra cradled her husband’s head in her lap, focusing intently upon his body. She eased his pain where she could, and for the first time she wished she had studied the respiratory system as she had the nervous system. There was little she could do to staunch the internal bleeding, but she could feel where the injury was. She could sense the blood pooling within him.

“Get a healer!” She snapped at the two guards. “My Shadow is dying!”

They were wasting time, chaining the woman Nendra had already dispatched. Neither she nor the male were going to move in their current states, so why were the idiots bothering? Even if they bled out, what were two more corpses next to the three that already lay in the hallway?

Nendra’s blood boiled at the thought of these two soldier’s families being paid for this incompetence. As if dying to no effect was worthy of reward. She shut away the anger and focused on what was important.

We are making such progress. Stay with me, and I can make you happy. I can feed your demon if you help me to quiet mine.

An eternity later, one of Mother’s first-response teams arrived. Only the healer was of any value whatsoever, of course, and Nendra’s whore cousin was in the team. Nendra desperately wanted to gouge the girl’s eyes out with her fingernails, but such behavior was unbefitting. Father would be sad if his favorite niece lost her eyes, and mother would scold her to no end for depreciating an asset.

Of course, what do you call an asset that tries to steal your joy? Nendra wasn’t blind. She knew that little whore was trying to steal her man away. She’d been doing it from the start. That was why he’d rejected Nendra, because another woman was seducing him away. Just because Mih’Tzi was “stable”, because she could hide when she was angry, because she smiled and called him “Lord” of all things like a simpering surface girl.

All so easy to do when you have no pride, when you have no real responsibilities, when people praise you for servant work, when you’re “too valuable” to be punished. Damn you.

She was only thinking like that because she was angry, and she wasn’t even really angry at Mih’Tzi at the moment. When the sheer paralyzing terror of Emrys’s potential mortality faded in a soothing glow of healing magic, Nendra did her breathing exercises and focused her rage upon her true enemies. The ones who had done this to her beloved, a noble quarter fiend himself, the one who might understand her someday.

It was time for Inquisitor Nendra D’Lann to do the only job she truly excelled at.

••••••••••

Whenever my body was ****, I found myself in a strange place. It didn’t happen when I was merely asleep; usually I only visited when I’d been beaten to hell and fell **** due to low hp. The last time I’d been there for any length of time had been after I fell from the crow’s nest on the Wormwood. I’d been asked almost immediately if I wanted to skip straight to when I woke up, but this time I got no such popup.

There was nothing to see, nothing to hear, nothing to feel, nothing to taste, and nothing to smell; despite that, I knew I was not alone in the void. There were things there, at least as aware of me as I was of them. One of the silent entities I shared the void with was moving.

It was aware of me. It recognized me. It was coming closer. It was so much bigger than me. When my menu finally gave me the option to do so, I fled back to my body.

Sensation flooded back, washing away the void like the dream it was. I wasn’t in pain, but my whole body had a distant quality. I shifted slightly, with great effort, and felt a soft blanket draped over me. Even opening my eyes was hard enough that I was tempted to make Autopilot do it, but that felt like a bridge too far even for me to cross. I lolled my head to the side, and saw a familiar purple skinned redhead sitting next to my bed.

“Emrys, I’m glad to see you finally awake.” Mih’Tzi said, “We were terribly worried when you didn’t wake immediately. Nendra ordered that you be healed; you know how she gets when she isn’t given the results she wanted.”

She gently rested her hand upon mine and squeezed.