Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn From: rudnick@cfatrw.harvard.edu (Bret Rudnick) Subject: [VampQ] Matte Bring's a Guest Message-ID: Date: Wed, 13 Oct 1993 14:07:05 GMT Admin [This is posted for Matt Hebert (the true genius behind the below text) due to suspected post problems at his site. This post takes place after the other adventurers leave the city to begin their quest, and right before the "big" battle/ storm.] * * * Matte Kudasai shadowed her new companions through the city gates. She watched them carefully as they slipped away from the city. They were excellent at traveling undetected, and she had to concentrate very hard in order not to lose them. The storm which churned around them was apparently causing some perceptual problems between her and the plane wherein her party remained. She had shifted into a crack between planes as they left the inn, leaving a "marker" behind to maintain a connection with the real world. The marker allowed her to perceive the sounds and sights of the plane she had left, as well as manipulate some inanimate objects in a rudimentary way, but this evening the connection was dim and unreliable. It brought back the sense of panic that always threatened to suffocate her in her first few moments in this nonplace. This was Nowhere. [She once described it to a friend over a beer as The Place Where Lost Socks Go.] It was no world or time. Without a great deal of experience and practice she could never have lasted even this long here and not be driven mad, and without her marker she could never leave it. The fading connection made her increasingly anxious. Soon she was forced to concentrate only on sights and let the absolute stillness of the nonplace engulf her. That stillness was shattered in the instant Billy's ear was grazed by an arrow. Losing focus on the images of her companions, she was overtaken by the sensation of a sound that seemed to be tangible, a sound that invaded her mind like the shaft of a pole arm. Fighting to maintain her stability, she reached out to identify the cause of the sound. An intense pain seared its way through part of her as she touched something large and rippling. A massive, writhing entity was attempting to occupy the same nonspace she was. She felt herself on a dizzying brink, about to be cast over the edge. The entity seemed to have arms everywhere, pushing her, prodding her, showing feints from which she could only recover at the last moment. She struggled and defended for what seemed only a few moments before she realized the beast was simply too powerful for her. With a mammoth effort she grasped to trigger the way out, to open the door back to Nexus. But the latch was not where it should have been. From a side she did not expect, a blow struck her and crackling pain, followed by a heavy numbness washed into a part of her mind. She felt herself becoming confused. Images of old lovers and favorite shirts briefly suggested themselves in a dull, distracted way. Fatigue welled up around her, and she was almost willing to surrender to the comfort of collapse. It would be so easy to quietly go to sleep here.... Another blow struck her and the taste of copper coins registered in her mind. Odd, she thought, it reminds me a little of blood. She was defending herself only by reflex now, and several more blows found their mark. Soon, most of her mind was numb, and she felt increasingly heavy. It was the queasy sensation of an immanent and endless fall that roused the core of her mind. Her primal fear of falling awakened some resource she had not tapped until then. She focused on her attacker and observed a path kept clear for perception, a trail that lead directly to its mind. She concentrated her remaining energy on that route and released a flash of power that burned her as it escaped down the trail. The attacker recoiled at the impact and withdrew many of its appendages. It stumbled to one side, and beyond it Matte perceived the latch to the door. In a desperate effort, she threw herself at the trigger. Her belief that she struck the correct point was confirmed as the true space of Nexus redefined her body, and she was once more filled with warmth and air. But something attached itself to her as she flew through the doorway. Her joy at escaping was crushed, and desperation and panic threatened to overtake her. She sailed through the air of the real world, two or three feet from the ground. As she hit the earth, she rolled into a wad of broken flesh, the physical manifestation of her struggle between planes. A ringing in her ears and a nauseated feeling in her stomach accompanied the incapacitating pain, all of which were caused by the wounds which poured her blood into the ground. Before losing consciousness, she gripped a charm which hung around her neck and spoke a short phrase which allowed it to heal her. A blast of thunder and flash of lightning from the storm split the turbulent night. As if in echo, a deep tearing sound and a series of short, extremely bright bursts of light reported from the spot where Matte had reentered. They lasted only a few moments, and the lights defined an oval roughly ten feet in height. Through this space stepped a beast of equal size. Its flesh formed as it entered, and its shape on this plane was defined. Its head was large and bony. The one large eye set in its forehead bled profusely, but still seemed to function. The head was set upon a fairly long and thick neck. Its body seemed to be made of black glass, though the muscles rippled under the surface in a fluid way. Two large legs with clawed feet supported the frame, and two arms of equal proportions groped out before it. The head turned from side to side, finally fixing its stare on the unconscious Matte. Its massive jaw opened as it projected its neck to its full length, and from its mouth a thousand living tongues seemed to escape. -- |----------B. Rudnick -- e-mail: rudnick@cfatrw.harvard.edu --------| |--------------------------------------------------------------------| | All that we see or seem, Is but a dream within a dream -- E.A. Poe | |--------------------------------------------------------------------|