Silvana used a reversed Age Plant to regress the second grove, clearing the road for the Western army's advance. The party decided to start heading back west through the woods, hoping that the halflings could use their natural hiding abilities to avoid encounters in the forest. (They party went south of the road, figuring they'd rather run into beetles and kill them than run into mercenaries and have to talk to them.)
Before long, the party came upon several trees that looked gnawed on. Thorongil examined the area and concluded that a beetle (one of the three remaining in Lifeblood, according to the most recent commune with nature) had come through three days ago, been attacked with an explosive missile, and charged off after whoever had tossed it.
- Halflings: [after getting the scoop on the beetles' abilities]
- "Sounds too high level for us. We'd rather do something easy like shooting dragons."
The party followed the trail and came to a burrow entrance; beetle tracks led into and out of it. Thorongil converted to treant form, Frankel enlarged, Ganeth got out some mothballs that release flammable gas, and Stealth's unseen servant put the mothballs into the burrow. After a turn had gone by and the gas was well and truly released, Stealth put an Evard's around the burrow and Gorakheel blew the gas with a flame bolt (using Mirchi, which he'd borrowed from Thorongil for this). A very singed beetle came out and was tentacled, shot, and magic missiled to death before it could engage anyone. A second beetle then burst out of another burrow and did get to engage, but it died quickly anyway. The party learned that beetles at home tended to have their hypnotic patterns going already. The beetles were around 12 HD.
Pepper's danger sense was still tingling, but the party didn't notice anything amiss. Stealth went off to scout. Eight rounds later, four giant spiders came out and attacked; these were beat upon and holy damaged unto death, and an invisible imp got caught in the effect and taken out as well.
The sense of danger continued; Ganeth put up DI, but nothing showed. The spiders disappeared, revealing their summoned nature. Thorongil and Gorakheel banged the hosed imp off the plane. And then the party followed the tracks the spiders had made, coming upon six large spiders (size S, but large compared to normal spiders, I suppose). Silvana cast Aura of Terror and immobolized them, and they too were beaten to a pulp and vanished.
As the large spiders were mopped up, five huge spiders appeared, popping into existence like the summoned monsters they were. While the fighters engaged them, Frankel noticed a phase spider by Silvana; oddly, it didn't show up on DI. (G thought it might be an illusion, Silvana thought it might be some sort of magic resistance, Stealth thought it might be spell immunity vs det invis.) The phaser started moving away; Silvana, Pepper, and Ganeth went to investigate and walked into a humming effect that caused mental paralysis in the elves (Pepper saved). Pepper attacked the spider and found it to be insubstantial.
The following round, the melee with the huge spiders continued. Stealth returned, reporting that he'd found the third beetle. Pearly grey webs sprang up around the decoy phase spider; Pepper teleported himself and Silvana out, and the web began to glow red. At the end of the round, the glow faded away...and so did Ganeth.
The next round, Silvana recovered and called Tylerion, the last huge spiders were squashed, and Gorakheel cast dispel magic on the web area; he may have gotten the paralytic humming effect, if it hadn't vanished previously. Frankel moved up to the web and heard soft retreating footsteps (so someone may have had spell immunity to DI after all).
Tylerion disappeared to look around. Meanwhile, Silvana got out her crystal ball and activated her scry lock on Ganeth:
Silvana gazes into the ball and sees Ganeth lying on what might be an altar. The room is dark and looks like it may be made of stone. There is a single lamp burning from above. Examining G is a robed person with a golden mask. He/she is waving a rod over G. Ganeth himself is locked down with some kind of silver shackles at hands and feet, and has a frozen snarl on his face. A black cat dozes by the foot of the human. It wears a jewelled collar.
Silvana examines the masked person. He/she is wearing a golden dodecahedron made of wire around his/her neck (wireframe model). Inside the dodecahedron might be a jewel -- hard to tell from here. Silvana is not sure if that is a magic item or an amulet.
The cat wakes up and its hair stands on end. It begins casting...
Silvana disengaged, and Tylerion reported back that Ganeth had certainly been on the ether; his guess was that Ganeth was taken through a conduit to a demi-plane somewhere.
After some discussion, the party decided that the attack wasn't really Rakni's style; if anything, it was reminiscent of the devils who had been posing as spiders in Cthul-Ra. (The imp, the ordinaryness of the spiders, and the illusory phase spider all support this hypothesis.) Silvana scanned the area on See Unseen and found a 3' wide grey spider in a nearby tree; she used Speak with Animals to converse with it and learned that it was just watching, and that the web was not the work of any spider.
And then the third beetle came wandering through. It was a juvenile (10 HD), it went down, and Tylerion unloaded his cargo of healing in the aftermath. The party checked on the halflings, who were fine. And through it all, Pepper continued to sense danger.
After the webs flared, Ganeth was transported to the ethereal; once there, his awareness was suppressed by one of his body's other passengers.
You wake to the smell of sandalwood incense, a sharp pain in your chest, and a dull throbbing in your ears. As you open your eyes, you notice the silver dagger protruding from your ribs, a red gem in its pommel pulsing with your heartbeat. You are lying on your back, on a cold marbled altar, in a darkened stone room with a high vaulted ceiling (reminiscent of the Veins of Abbathor). Silver clasps bind you at wrists, waist and ankles; they hold firm even against your augmented strength. It is unsurprising that you are on the weekly table, with your mind freed from memorized spells. Fortunately, your captors, in their hurry, strapped you in while still wearing the blue dragon scale mail, normal clothing, and cloak. Your other equipment was probably stripped from you while you lay unconscious.
As you glance about the room, you notice the other occupants: a malevolent looking black cat lies beside a small fireplace; an invisible phantom dog guards a stone door (the only obvious exit); and, a gold-masked person wearing dark robes reads from a large tome mounted on a grimoire-stand beside the altar. Noticing your motion, the gold-masked person stops reading and addresses you, "Ah... finally... I assume that you are the Ganeth that we seek..."
The voice is low, and artificial, possibly generated by the golden mask. Before you can ask any questions, your captor begins to give what sounds like a prepared speech (summarized below):The captor says that it does not know much about your mission, for reasons of safety, but has been asked to tell you that it involves destroying the Acheron Dustworld plane. Currently, the captor has been asked to gauge Ganeth's initial interest level in the mission. If you prefer to go into imprisonment, then the captor says that this can be arranged without further discussion.
- Your captor assures you that it has no personal interest in torturing you, killing you, stealing your mortal wealth, or corrupting you. The dagger in your body should not be taken as a sign of malice -- it is just a precaution against Chaos.
- Your capture was sponsored by a consortium opposed to Rakni. Your captor is working under a contract.
- Your earlier violent outburst, including the tragic murders of your captor's associates, will not be held against you. Everyone understands that you were in a stressful situation and reacted badly.
- The consortium has anticipated rescue attempts by your loyal friends, and have arranged this demi-plane to eject you in the event of a breach.
- The consortium respects your adventuring potential and wishes to recruit you on a suicidal mission and hopes that you can convince some of your friends to join you.
- Should you succeed in the mission, the Consortium will ensure that you and your equipment (minus any items of utter chaos) will be safely returned to the place of your choice.
- Should you refuse the mission, the Consortium regrets that it will have to keep you alive and imprisoned on a slow plane so that your dangerous spirit is not freed.
Since DI was still running, Ganeth had been out for less than about thirty-five minutes. The walls of the confinement area were ethereally solid, the golden mask worn by his captor (aka his "liason to the Consortium" -- whoever it was wouldn't give a name, preferring to keep its relationship with G purely professional) had an ethereal projection, the cat had a strong astral presence, and the dog appeared to be able to detect things on the ether (probably Mordenkainen's hound).
Naturally, Ganeth was willing to hear a little more about this mission (it's actually something he and Silvana have been discussing for some time, though he hasn't mentioned this to his captors), but he specified that planning input and logistical support were among the terms of his agreement. The liason didn't have any further information but promised to obtain more details; it also wasn't cleared to tell Ganeth what he'd done to those colleagues during the missing half hour. The liason asked if Ganeth would be willing to write a letter to involve his friends with a minimum of bloodshed; he suggested a sending instead. The liason agreed, though the Consortium would be screening the content, so G composed one. (Incidentally, Silvana has taken to calling these sendings "high elven haiku.")
Frankel spotted someone wearing a dark hooded robe behind a nearby tree. He went to engage, and Beeel fired off his hold person; neither had any effect. Silvana caught a glint of metal under the figure's hood, possibly a golden mask. And Tylerion made an MR check and pointed out that the figure was an illusion; he went off to try to trace the projection's origin.
- RMD: [short for "robed masked dude"]
- "I bear a message from you dearly departed friend. Sorry for the delay, but it took us some time to heal him."
- Silvana:
- "So what is the message?"
- RMD:
- "I quote:
`On demiplane altar, weekly, itemless. Ejection if plane breached. Choice: destroy Rakni's Dustplane (with any willing comrades) or eternal captivity. Awaiting details. Two sendings later.'"
RMD noted that it was only an intermediary, subcontracted for this job by the Consortium, its anonymous employers, and offered to relay a return sending to Ganeth. It doesn't own the demiplane it's using ("Ownership is difficult to define"), but it's leased it for a while. And it said it tries to avoid bloodshed.
Beeel noticed a black cat in a tree near RMD; he claimed to hear something, took Stealth off to scout (in a different direction), pointed out the cat, and returned to the party claiming he must have imagined the sound while Stealth set up for a backstab. So Stealth shot the cat (which had prehensile paws, a sinister smile, and more shadows than it should) out of the tree, which RMD did not find especially pleasing.
Meanwhile, Silvana composed her sending:Scried your location. Party agrees to go to dustplane if Silvana handles all negotiations. Samodesu preferred contact. Found uninvolved Rakni spider near web site. Silvana
- Gorakheel:
- "We can't deal with Evil mercs, but we can work with devils?"
- Silvana:
- "We aren't working with devils. The devils are trying to make an agreement with us."
- [to RMD]
- "You realize that we do not wish to negotiate with Evil, even for the life of our friend, but we will agree to hear what the Consortium's negotiator has to say."
Silvana pointed out that if she chose to, she could have Ganeth's life force cut off, which would detonate him right in his captor's faces. And Beeel proposed a plan of his own:
- Beeel:
- "Why don't we keep the cat hostage? After beating it unconscious."
- RMD:
- "For Good people, there is a remarkable tendency toward violence here."
Beeel also pointed out that they'd need proof that Ganeth was alive and sane; RMD said it could arrange a Dream Conference (a ten-minute meeting between people who've ingested a dose of something called Dream Powder before going to sleep) and sell them some Dream Powder.
- Beeel:
- "Oh, that sounds safe."
- RMD:
- "You are dealing with Evil, sir. That is never `safe.'"
Tylerion returned and identified the evil black kitty as a hellcat. As the party prepared to attack it, the cat cast some sort of black fire shield (as a 9th-level caster, according to Tylerion). Stealth shot the cat, downing it; one of its shadows disappeared, leaving eight. RMD (after noting that the entire combat was completely gratuitous) cast and fired a crackling black bolt at Stealth; it looked like enervation, except for it having a cat's face, but it missed. Gorakheel dropped a dispel magic on the cat and doused its flames. Tylerion whacked it (for a hellcat, down is hardly down); Frankel tried to whack it, but its AC was better than -1. And RMD eventually conceded the cat to the party for the duration of the negotiations, though it wasn't happy about it and expected that the hellcat would not be mistreated. (Since the hellcat will only stay with a Lawful and a paladin is not an appropriate choice, it latched on to Beeel.)
- RMD:
- "I must return now. On a personal note, I hope that your spirits get destroyed violently for your thoughtless actions. All of you are completely and utterly insane. These last two statements do not reflect the opinions of my employers. They are merely unsolicited observations on my part."
- Silvana:
- "And we wish you well too."
RMD vanished, and Tylerion noted that the projection seemed to be coming from somewhere around the lower planes. Silvana asked Tylerion to inform the ki-rin that they'd be needing an air creature to track Ganeth and mentioned the possibility of a plane shift into the ether for an assault on RMD's demiplane. And the deva departed.
Off on the demiplane, the liason turned to Ganeth and relayed Silvana's sending. (The hellcat there hadn't gone anywhere, btw.) It also mentioned that the Consortium was being informed of developments and that a future meeting between Ganeth and the party was possible, though the parameters were still to be determined.
- Liason:
- "Obviously we cannot allow the opportunity for a foolhardy rescue, since your friends are rather reckless. Such an opportunity would only cause loss on all sides."
- Ganeth:
- "They're probably pissed too."
- Liason:
- "Their anger is understandable. That is why it is our responsibility to promote sanity in these proceedings."
(This seems like a more laid-back reaction than the party received, so either the liason regains composure quickly or it and RMD are different beings.)
- Liason:
- "I have been instructed to examine you more fully. You will be rendered unconscious. Again, I wish to stress that the pain I cause is a harmless side effect."
- Ganeth:
- "Do I get to look at my chart later?"
- Liason:
- "My employers are eager for you to learn more about yourself, so there are hopes that we may share this information."
- Ganeth:
- "Always nice to have something to look forward to."
- Liason:
- "Such optimism."
The liason twisted the knife in Ganeth's chest, producing a brief interval of blinding pain and an unspecified interval of oblivion.