From alt.pub.dragons-inn Sat Dec 24 11:00:03 1994 Xref: netcom.com alt.pub.dragons-inn:8006 Path: netcom.com!ix.netcom.com!howland.reston.ans.net!vixen.cso.uiuc.edu!uwm.edu!news.doit.wisc.edu!f180-161.net.wisc.edu!user From: jepeter2@students.wisc.edu (Skatha) Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn Subject: Re: Bladefire [FIRE] Followup-To: alt.pub.dragons-inn Date: 23 Dec 1994 14:59:54 GMT Organization: UW-Madison Lines: 82 Distribution: world Message-ID: References: <1994Dec19.203107.1@vax1.utulsa.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: f180-161.net.wisc.edu The inn was quiet until a figure entered. The flame red hair and bright green eyes belonged to Fire. Former street urchin turned ninja (It's a long >story, and it has been posted before). She walked up to the bar with her elegant steps and turned to face the crowd "I hate to risk repeating a cliche, but is their a Cleric in the house? I have a sick man outside, he's lost a lot of blood, and my skills in the healing arts are meager." A tall, thin woman in gray and gold clothing sneezed from the back of the inn. Fire looked back curiously at the source of the sound. The woman raised her hand. In her other hand were two crystal spheres that she unconsciously rotated around each other. "I'm a healer," she admitted. She got up and walked towards Fire, muttering about a family curse. "What kind of curse?" Fire wondered. "It always happens," the woman grumbled. "No matter where I am, I can never avoid getting involved when trouble arises. My uncle, for instance, got killed when a war came past his village...." She stopped and smacked her hand to her forehead, and put the two spheres away into a pouch. "Sorry, I forget myself, sometimes. My name's Kal Taresh. Where's the man who needs help?" Fire held out her hand. "People call me Fire, but if we are in a crowded theater it's best if you call me Mariko." The pair shook hands. "Ok, he's outside." Fire led Kal out of the inn. At first he didn't look too bad, until Kal realized that his skin was naturally a lot redder and that this shade was quite pale for him. Fire spoke: "I stopped the bleeding, but there was some sort of paralyzing poisoning in their claws." "Whose claws?" "They were some sort of flying halflings, they look cute and innocent, but they have nasty poisoned claws. Psychological warfare, I guess. Hard to attack something that looks like a cherub, until they actually attack you. Sort of guaranteeing a first strike." Kal cringed as she began to look at the wounds. "Nasty, I mean about the flying hobbits - but these wounds definetly fit under the nasty category, too. I think I can mix up an antedote for the poison before it reaches his autonomic system." "His what?" Fire asked. "His heart and lungs and such," Kal replied. "Now be quiet when I start working on an anti-toxin." Fire followed directions and was silent, while Kal started rummaging in another pouch that had been hidden in her clothing somewhere. "Let's see...eye of newt, ear of frog, tongue of bat...tongue of bat? How'd that get in there? Ah ha, here it is..." She pulled out a vial of blue liquid and an empty bowl. Setting the bowl down on the ground nearby, she poured in a small amount of the liquid, then added a few drops of the man's blood. The blue liquid darkened for a moment, then turned a brilliant yellow. "Oh, my. Really nasty stuff, I do believe. Vaguely reminiscent of curare, in a way. But what one man can cause, another man - or woman - can cure, that's my motto." Kal returned to her pouch and dug into it again, this time pulling out a various assortment of powders and multi-colored liqiuds. She eyed the bowl on the ground for a moment, then shrugged and dumped the contents out, and she started putting together a new mixture. "Don't worry about it," she told Fire, who had seemed a little uneasy at her actions. "I'm not usually this unsanitary, but I don't have the time to find another bowl. Besides, there wasn't anything in the other stuff that would harm him." "Hinaniwa never used 'eye of newt'." Kal laughed as she measured everything out, "A professional joke, that's all. I mean, where would one get an ear of a frog in the first place?" Kal's attention returned to her task. "I wish I knew what race he was," she murmured to herself as she stirred the mixture, "but since he's humanoid, it shouldn't make much of a difference...I hope." Gently, she poured most of the mixture down the man's throat, then dabbed the remainder on the man's wounds. She stepped back a little and waited. Fire noticed that the two crystal spheres had returned from their pouch, and were once again rotating around in her left hand. It seemed to be a nervous habit. "Well," she said casually, but Fire could hear the tension in her voice. "Let's see if this works." ----Skatha (jepeter2@students.wisc.edu) "I dream in Technicolor!" Surreality is your friend. And so is Bob.