Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn From: caz@owlnet.rice.edu (HWRNMNBSOL) Subject: [KQ] Kron [Nester's] Can't Stop The Big Boogie Message-ID: Date: Wed, 23 Sep 1992 00:18:36 GMT ADMIN: Please note the new address. Also, sorry if I contradict anything or take liberties. Strange Things are afoot in the Low City Inn called Nester's. Kron has awakened from his stupor to find himself ravenous, no doubt as a side effect of the healing enchantment that 'Raelf placed upon the party. He also dimly recalls dreams -- strange, writhing nightmares -- whose true substance elude his higher consciousness. However, his subconscious remembers very well, and Kron is troubled. Upon entering the main room to find food, Kron finds his fellow questors in conference. Thk, Prince of All Lizardkind, has returned from his sojourn into the gaps, and has brought a grisly trophy with him. He toys with his severed finger and ring, watching them squirm across the table. Kron's mind makes a leap, and he glimpses an image of something else that squirms and oozes, jelling in forgotten and dismal holes deep below ground.....but it's only a stray thought. Kron looks about him at his fellow companions. They are all mighty and powerful heroes, and have faced fell foes and perilous situations many times before now. However, Kron cannot help but feel that everybody looks a little bit haggard behind the eyes. He knows that this same haunted appearance must lie upon his own face as well. Kron is struck by a sudden and fierce sense of *wrongness*, a twisting of his perceptions. He turns his head to look about him, and perceives the descent of strong and fearless men and women into the realm of madness. Colin, proud and independent warden of sylvan glades and desolate mountain ranges, is screaming at some terror that only he can perceive. He lays about him with an imaginary sword and shield, and shrieks with a battlelust that Kron has only seen in the most vicious of berserkers. His glazed eyes reflect a great passion for whatever it is he is slaying, yet also a boundless horror directed at himself. Lady Azzar, usually a cool and collected warrior of no mean skill, has somehow been transformed into a human plaything. She capers about, doll- like, and sheds her garments in a skillful strip-tease. Kron is appalled, but he is also a man, and the Lady is exceedingly beautiful. Her peculiar tattoo, now revealed in the shape of a colorful butterfly, only heightens her grace and physical charm. Kron is attracted, but this is madness, and the vacancy in Azzar's eyes convinces Kron that something truly foul has happened to his boon companion. Marcel appears strained and tense. Captain's face is white. Even the reserved Maleiu appears to be weeping softly. Only Thk, fiddling with his finger, seems unaffected. Kron himself feels an itching at his scalp, but some subconscious reflex makes him clamp down on his emotions. Only a supreme act of self-control keeps Kron from relapsing into a fugue state. Marcel breaks the ice. He galvanizes the group into circling about the most afflicted members and fending off the crowd. As Kron gives an over- curious patron his Watchman's Glare [TM], he sees the Cyberknight administer- ing assistance to Azzar. Kron does not know what is affecting his friends, but he is certain that Marcel must have superior willpower and spirit to remain autonomous. As Marcel delivers a relaxant to Azzar, the mental whipcord that holds the party in its grasp seems to vanish in an instant. All except Thk give an audible sigh of relief as the pressure is released. They sit down and stare across the table at each other -- the humans in fear and confusion, the lizardman in bewilderment. Colin picks himself up off the floor and shamefacedly sits down. "Sssss....What'sssss the matter? You make facessss like ..... ssss... like thossssse who have ssssswallowed the ssssstinkbug larva!" Kron scratches his head. "I don't know, Thk. We all felt something strange. I think our emotions and primal mental impulses were being toyed with. I don't know how, and I don't know why you were excluded." Marcel picks up Azzar and heads upstairs. The rest of the party follows, not knowing quite what to do. Colin blushingly dresses Azzar and arranges her on a cot as the others pull up chairs to wait out Azzar's doze. They sit, and think, but do not talk. **************************************************************************** Twilight. The sun sets in the City of Fountains, sending ribbons of vivid scarlet and orange rolling across the cloudscape. Kron watches the last rays of daylight flicker across the window sill. The room grows dark, and Maleiu lights a lantern. The flickering flame dances across Azzar's face, and she stirs. A mug of cold water completes the awakening process, and the party is together once more. "Now what?" asks Azzar. "We hold conference." **************************************************************************** Downstairs in Nester's, it's too early for the nighttime crowd, so the trestle tables are mostly empty. The party sits around one of these, sipping from jars of wine and mugs of beer, while the barman anxiously polishes tin tankards in anticipation of the incipient rush. "I don't know what it was." says Kron. "All I know is that I've had the damnedest feeling in the back of my skull ever since we started tracking my sister. I felt like something was peering over my shoulder, you know? And tonight, that same feeling somehow.....lept into the front. I know you all felt it." The group is silent. "I can't help but feel that this is somehow related to what we are doing. Somehow, EVERYTHING has been related. The Wasters....Cheyenne....this madness.... it's as if everything that has happened to us and around us points in the same direction. You don't have to be a warrior from the Dark Continent to smell a rat here." Maleiu nods. "All I know is, my sister is out there somewhere. In the Low City. And somebody is messing with us along the way. I think they were testing us when we all went crazy. Still, that doesn't matter to me. I intend to head for the headquarters of the Wasters and get some real answers. I don't care if it says "TRAP" in big, hand-painted letters above the door. I've GOT to find Cheyenne." "I guess what scares me most is not that I risk life and limb here. I'm afraid of my madness. It's terrible. I guess we're all afraid of ourselves, a little bit. I can't ask you to face that." "If you want out, say so now. I'll understand." Kron pauses. Nobody says anything. Kron beams: "Good. I'll need your help, now more than ever." "Shall we?" *************************************************************************** H.W.R.N.M.N.B.S.O.L.