Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn
From: rigler@galileo.ifa.hawaii.edu (Michael Rigler)
Subject: Thk [Low City] sorts a few things out.
Message-ID: <1992Jun17.214219.12586@news.Hawaii.Edu>
Keywords: Thk, Panarchus, Kron, Captain, angry mob
References: <1992Jun15.191158.12833@rice.edu>
Date: Wed, 17 Jun 1992 21:42:19 GMT

The oversized lizardman shuffles along slowly, occasionally pausing to 
rub his head.  It still aches (***) and there are fireflies dancing just
beyond the edge of his vision.  He is not completely sure of how he came
to be here...

   First, there was the garden:  The cat-man, the bird-man, and then...
   the tree that came alive and stabbed him!

   Then, the warehouse:  He came to his senses bound to a frame.  The 
   powerful Minion of the Sea God, Sssilliith, answered his call, and
   restored him somewhat, but declined to set him free.  Then, the human 
   in Generican leathers had entered and knocked him out.

   And finally, The Dream:  A hazy vision of the events of years past --
   the brutal sack of defenseless lizardman villages.  And along with this
   vision, a name!  The Sea God or one of his Minions had chosen to favor 
   Thk with the name of the demon responsible for those attacks:  the 
   human named 'Kron'...

And now, Thk finds himself stumbling through the labyrinth of deserted 
alleys and crawlways.  Deserted, he wonders?  Or are there not sinister 
eyes watching me from the windows, doorways and gratings?  Eyes not 
human.  And an occasional slithering step behind him or off to one side,
as though marking his progress...

No, something is wrong with him.  His head is feeling better by the minute, 
but he feels a growing fire in his veins.  Poison?  Thk has been bitten by 
snakes before, and this sensation is similar.  He holds up his arm.  The 
green scales shine in the moonlight, but there is something more -- a mottled 
blue sheen and a faint smell of oranges.  Yes, definitely poision.  Res-
ponsible, no doubt, for his delirium.  As usual, Thk is prepared:

Leaning shakily against a tilted pillar (the whole geometry of the street
has become strangely warped), Thk growls the words and makes the required
gestures:

    "Rrrath - Shazzuth!  Znarth!  thrummiririth!  Sssteth - znort!"

Upon pronunciation of the final words, he lacerates his left thumb with
the talon of his right, and holds it aloft.  The thumb swells briefly, 
then a greenish fluid sprays out of it -- the last of the expired (and 
deadly) CALAMIDRIUM with which Panarchus had dosed him.  His regenerative
abilities had been fighting a losing battle with the decayed substance, but 
now he has purged it from his system.  He watches the greenish vapor disperse
as it is taken away by the gentle sea breeze, while the laceration on his
thumb closes and knits itself.

Thk slumps to the ground, drained, unaware that the shadows around him
_do_ have eyes, the Cthulhoid eyes of the Mother's servants, who are pacing
this tool of Panarchus to the boundary of their territory in this abandoned
section of the Low City...

After a brief time, Thk climbs to his feet.  Whereas his mind was a void,
now it has been filled with three goals:  (1)  To obey the Minion Ssilliith,
and regain possession of the Sea God's Trident (and make the necessary sac-
rifice to get back into his good graces), (2)  To locate the human, Kron,
butcher of his people, and "bring him HERE!" and (3)  To find the Generican
warrior who stabbed, clubbed, poisoned and then released him.

The latter goal -- a personal vendetta -- can wait indefinitely.  Thk
is extraordinarily patient, for a lizardman.  The second task is more
important, for it pertains to his tribes.  But the first is the most
vital of all, for it is a Holy Obligation to his Gods.

Thk strides off into the inhabited sections of the Low City in the vague
direction (he hopes) of the Dragon's Inn pub...

----
Rigler  (aka 'Thk')
--