Agitated by the moans, shouts, and general commotion, the woman wheels on those making the most noise. In a stern voice, "Quiet! All of you pipe down. You will all have your turn soon enough.
Jacqueline's aim is surprisingly good. The sharpened trowel gashing the woman's face. Her expression twists with insane fury, and something more. Her features warp until a perfect copy of the white-haired woman stands before you. Ignoring the patch of frost Li's strike left on the cell bars, she looks at the silver blade, "This is unacceptable. Residents are not permitted to have weapons. Give it to me!"
The false Jacqueline reaches through the bars, suddenly clawed hands digging deep into the magus' sword arm. Wrenching as though trying to tear the offending limb off, she slams Jacqueline's head into the cell's bars, releasing her as unconsciousness causes the offending blade to wink out of existence.
As the woman moves, you can see a ring of keys hanging from her waist.
Li
Laine
Jacqueline
Zadok
Laufey
Fifteen
Jacqueline staggers. "Oh, bloody hell, not again!" she exclaims as she slumps to the floor.
Zadok hustles back against the back wall. He closes his eyes and focuses on better times. "Dawnflower, please aid me." His eyes fly open and he almost screams. As he reaches for the spark of the divine, he feels darkness closing in on his mind. The warm sunlight of the Dawnflower is muted by the horrible darkness. He pushes through the darkness, forcibly reaching out for his divine power and finishing the chant. "Guardians of faith defend the innocent and defeat evil."
Laine extends a hand through the bars holding her body captive, splaying her fingers out toward the false Jacqueline, as her other hand goes to the side of her head, brushing against her temple as she focuses her mind. "Let go of her..." she says in a soft, gentle manner, then repeats it over and over again, in a softer, quieter, more whispery manner each time. "Let go... let go... let go..."
Fifteen doesn't look up from the lock, even as screams begin to ring around the room. Lockpicking with fingers and a shard of pottery is not an easy task and required all her focus. Suddenly something gives within the lock and Fifteen winces, hoping that it is not the only leverage she has on the hasp.
Li stays at the back of the cell, beyond the reach of the woman. She takes a move action to drag the wounded woman back with her. Then she flings another bolt of blue energy at the insane woman.
As she studies the cell's bars Laufey hears the torturer woman yelling at the people who were making all the noise. Then she hears what sounds like a fight breaking out.
Laufey begins to curse and pull frantically at the bars. Those idiots are going to be killed, which means we will go onto the table even sooner! Or worse, they've grabbed the woman and will kill her, leaving us here to starve to death in these cells unless someone else happens along and decides to free us instead of kill us for killing the woman!
Equally infuriating is that Laufey can't join the fight to tip the scales better in their favor. She frantically scans the tables looking for any implements that would make decent weapons. As she becomes more and more convinced the chances of escape are slipping away, her anger builds to overflow
The woman flinches back and goes slightly pale as Li's blast hits her.
From the more isolated cell comes the groan of iron being stretched and bent. As Laufey's rage builds, the bars bend enough to all someone to squeeze through.
And the two spellcasters chanting continues.
Laufy and Zadok can now squeeze out of their cell. Zadok and Laine's spells will also come into effect this round.
Fifteen, unfortunately making a DD check without thief's tools increases the DC by 10. Your check would have made it otherwise. Unless you roll a 20, it is impossible to open. I didn't realize this until checking the skill after your roll.[/ooc]
Zadok breathes a sigh of relief as the majestic bird manifests as expected. Knowing that he won't have the creature long, he barks an order. "Stop that woman. Quickly, before she hurts anyone else! Strike against her evil!" The eagle cries out and its talons flash with golden light as it dives at the woman. He staggers back against the wall, feeling the darkness encroaching on mind again. "No... no, no, no... " He screams as he forces the maddening cloud away from his mind, sending it directly toward the torturer.
Fifteen, unfortunately making a DD check without thief's tools increases the DC by 10. Your check would have made it otherwise. Unless you roll a 20, it is impossible to open. I didn't realize this until checking the skill after your roll.[/ooc]
Fifteen mutters something uncomplimentary as the pottery shard breaks, destroying any hope she had of successfully picking the lock. Seeing her cell companion engaged in spellcasting Fifteen takes a few steps back from the grate and waits, aware that there is nothing useful to be done in this situation.
Laufey sticks her head out through the bent bars and takes a look around. She sees a woman who looks quite different, but who must be the same one that was cutting up the man on the table, free to move about. She also sees a bright and beautiful eagle harassing her. She figures the eagle must be the boy's doing given what he's been saying.
Hoping the eagle will be distracting, she slides through the bars and moves as quickly and quietly as possible to the tables.
Laine's action on this round will depend on whether Sleep succeeds or not.
If Sleep fails and the doctor remains standing, Laine casts
If Sleep succeeds and the doctor drops, then Laine will wait and see what happens.
-11
The woman flails at the eagle, whose sharp beak tears into her, "Get out of my head! This is all wrong!" before collapsing into unconsciousness as Liane's spell takes hold.
"Don't kill her! She may have valuable information! See if there's anything to tie her up with! She won't be asleep for long!" Laine doesn't do anything other than speak, as there appears to be no imminent threat with the doctor sleeping, and she has no way to get out of her cell. So she tries to instruct the others on what she perceives as the optimal avenue of approach.
With the woman on the ground, Zadok squeezes out of the cell and hurries to the next cell over. He drops to his knees and reaches through the bars. "Oh healing light, restore this flesh and bind this woman's wounds." He presses his hand to the woman's shoulder, another woman from his dream, and golden light begins to seal her wound. As he completes his new spell, the eagle fades away in a shower of golden sparkles.
Round 2
Laufey makes it to the tables and scans the implements on them. Nothing is suitable as a weapon. Her fists are better.
When the woman falls she guesses that the words of the woman in the cell behind her are the reason. Obviously she is a witch.
Looking over the woman on the ground, Laufey sees the keys. She approaches the woman carefully, eying her closely.
She lifts the keys and passes them back to the women in the cell behind her.
Round 3:
The woman is alive, and will not stay down for long.
Laufey picks up the smaller table and grasps it firmly. Standing over the woman's head, she brings it down on it with all her strength, crushing it.
Halted.... Laufey doesn't yet bring down the table, although she doesn't lower it either. Tie her up with what? She asks the witch. And how? She can shift forms.
Jacqueline blinks her eyes open. "Oh. I believe this is the second time I've asked this, but am I dead?" Seeing Zadok's concerned face, she smiles weakly. "Again, apparently not." Jacqueline is about to move up, then groans and slumps once again. "It appears that I was injured more heavily than I initially surmised. I'm afraid I won't be of much use like this." She looks towards the man on the table. "Is he alive?" she asks, concerned.
"Can you let loose the victim and strap the woman onto the table instead?" Laine calls out in a half-whisper, trying not to wake the sleeping woman. She looks to Zadok then. "I think I saw a set of keys on the woman -- see if you can take them and open our cells with the keys."
Laufey is unimpressed with the witch's suggestion. "She is asleep? How do I move her to a table and strap her there without waking her? It would not work."
"As long as you don't hurt her it ought to." The man on the table puts in. "Magical sleep. Short of slapping or hitting her, she should be out for a minute or two." He breathes shallowly, wincing from numerous wounds. We use it all the time.
Struggling meaningfully against his bonds, "With the Mistress taking the place over though, I wouldn't recommend dawdling. Please, get me off of this."
Laufey starts slightly when the man on the table weighs in. She had largely forgotten him, given him up as dead. Somehow I know that's true... She shakes off the thought and puts down the table with some reluctance.
Walking to the man she looks at the straps that hold him to figure out how they work. She also takes the time to look him over carefully, wanting to make sure he is indeed in his true form. No reason to believe he is truly human either. There is nobody to trust here.
Laufey resigns herself to the uncertainty of the moment and starts working open his bindings.
"Easy, you shouldn't be talking too much in that condition," Zadok says, hurriedly moving over to the man. "Just breath slowly and try to stay calm. The last thing you want to do is speed up the bleeding. I don't think I have the strength to heal all of this, but I can try once we've got you out of that."
He quickly tries to unfasten the bonds, but his hands keep slipping as he messes with the straps. "You seem to know what this place is. Please, can you tell us what's going on?" He turns back to the others. "Someone help me with these."
"I would volunteer, but," Jacqueline smiles weakly, "I'm afraid that if I move overmuch I will irritate one of my internal injuries and start bleeding out again." She blows a wisp of hair out of her face, then frowns pensively. "Wasn't that red before?" she asks, looking somewhat concerned.
Laufey looks into the man's eyes as she works. "You said "We". What "we" are you a part of that uses magical sleep? Are you a member of a coven?"
And is this "we" responsible for the dream?
Laine opens the door of her cell with the keys, assuming they will work. "Who is the Mistress?" she asks the man on the table. "Who are you and how did you end up here?" She nods in agreement to what the man says about the magical sleep. "We should be able to move her without waking her up, unless something goes badly wrong. Let's just get him off the table and her onto the table as quickly as we can."
Everything happens rather fast, and once the cell door is open, Jing carefully drags the insane woman into the cell she was just in, and then locks the cell door behind her, leaving the woman in the cell, and Jing outside. "Why put her on a table when we can put her in a cell?"
Then she moves over to the table, and looks at the straps. "These seem easy enough to open." She begins to undo the man's bindings.
Fifteen gives Laine a nod before leaving the cell and walking over to the unconscious 'woman'. Crouching over the body she examines it carefully and then looks up at the rest. "Why not kill her? She is a clear hostile and was torturing this man. If we need information why not ask him?" She seems genuinely confused by this and waits for a response.
It is quite apparent as Fifteen walks across the room that it is not human, at least in the conventional sense. Fifteen's 'flesh' is an odd colour, slightly off from any skin tone you've ever experienced and only covers her head, arms and legs. The chest region is bare and consists of a sculpted plate, not unlike that of heavy armor. The plate has gentle swells in approximate anatomical positions but no more. Likewise the pelvis is smooth and round, the skin coatings ending high on the thighs, presumably not to cause problems for the joints that are clearly visible.
"Can you tell us what is going on here? If so, then do so. If not, it is stupid to kill a potential source of information when it can be contained instead." Jing replies, still working on the restraints.
"Ahh...good thinking!" Laine slaps herself on the forehead when Jing locks the doctor woman up in the cell instead of strapping her to the table. "Much simpler that way." Looking over to the android woman, Laine points out, "Captives rarely know as much as captors. Passwords, guard routines and the like -- only those in power will know them. If we can get anything like that out of this woman, that would be useful."
"I'm far more interested in knowing where we are and why than patrol routes," Zadok says. "Because I'm fairly certain I was in Oppara last time I checked. This..." He gestures a bit wildly to the room. "Does not look like Oppara."
"Oh? I'm given to understand Oppara is a large city. Certainly it has its share of dungeons underneath? But... I've never been to Oppara, so I'm confused as to how the two of us are now in the same place, then."
Jacqueline instinctively reaches up to straighten her hat, then winces both at the pain and its absence. "What concerns me is how we ended up here in the first place, completely without clothing. My first instinct is a drunken bender, but unless we somehow ended up in Katapesh, I honestly have no idea about that shared dream." She looks Fifteen up and down. "And I'm fairly certain that she can't get drunk." Jacqueline pauses for a moment. "Come to think of it, I don't think I have the pleasure of your names. I'm Jacqueline Artorias, of the... of the... well, apparently I'm an amnesiac. That is also worrying."
"Zadok Warren. I'm... I think I'm an acolyte at the temple of Sarenrae in Oppara. Maybe. It... something doesn't feel right. I can't really describe it to someone who hasn't attempted divine magic before."
"Laine. Laine..." and then her forehead furrows as she realizes she can't remember her surname.
"Laufey.... Just Laufey.. I am from Karlsgard in the Thanelands. But, I had left there..."
The tall blonde woman does have a thick Ulfen accent, as if she learned Taldane haphazardly as an adult.
After spending a further moment lost in thought, she snaps to as if she decided to shut something inside down.
"But prisons do tend to look much the same wherever you are. We could be in any of the places you've mentioned."
"know not who am." She pauses to look at a tattoo on her arm. "Li... Reason... Huli... Fox... Jing... Spirit. I am apparently Li Huli Jing, Spirit of the Thoughtful Fox." She rubs at the tattoo briefly, then her face clears up, and she continues working on the straps.
The man sits up with some assistance and scoots to sit nearer to Zadok. "I'll tell you everything I can, but please remain calm."
Rubbing his greying beard while looking around at everyone. His lips curve in a hint of a smile. "Five lovely women without a stitch and me carved to within an inch of my life. Less Katapesh and more Nidal don't you think." winking at Jacqueline and beginning to laugh.
"Ohhh Midnight Lord that hurts.... Right, Abandon your Tears. Breathe and focus. Breathe and focus." Sitting up a bit straighter he begins again. "I am Campre Linweigh, orderly at Briarstone Asylum. Hospital for the troubled in Thrushmoor, county Versex of the Immortal Principality." Looking at each of you carefully, "Wherever you think you are, or were, I assure you that you are here. This is no prison. Or place of horror. If you placed yourself here, or were place here, it is because you are unwell and someone cared about you. That's where the magic comes in" turning to Laufey "No coven or witches. Just doctor Červeňák. A wizard who helps calm the most troubled patients."
To Liane, "The Mistress? The Mistress of Madness. The Mother of Monsters. The b$%#$ goddess that for now I'm blaming all this on. There are no guards or passwords here. There wasn't any need for any. We cared for those who had lost themselves due to tragedy or need help overcoming some mental abnormality."
"It started with the nightmares a few days ago. Patients screaming in their beds. Suddenly dying. The all of a sudden they went mad. Painted themselves in yellow and turn on us and one another." chocking back a sob. "People started changing, staff and patients both. Eating each other, taking other appearances. They were eating..." Campre stabs a finger into one of the larger cuts, gasping for breath. "Abandon your Tears."
Looking at everyone with slight alarm. "As I think about it. I don't know any of you, and the hospital is not that large."
"So... we're in an asylum for the mentally unwell," Zadok says slowly. "One where the doctors, orderlies, and patients all... ended up like her." He gestures to the woman now imprisoned in their former cells. "I don't... I don't think that I had myself sent to an asylum. But I also don't even remember leaving Taldor. Any yet here I am in Ustalav so..." He trails off, clearly at a loss. "I... perhaps I was traveling and something happened to me. I remember nothing of the journey here, much less arriving. And amnesia seems to be a common trait among several of us..." His rambling trails off a second time and he stares absently at the wall, apparently lost in his own head for a moment. "Perhaps we were dropped of very recently by someone who didn't realize that the staff had gone mad as well."
He pushes the man's hand away from his wound. "Gods, don't do that to yourself!"
The name of the place and principality that the man names is gibberish to Laufey. She has never heard of it. Rather than dwell on questions of where in the world they are, she decides to focus on more immediate worries.
"You are an orderly? What is that? Who is the torturer woman and why did she have you on this table? We, or I at least, had possessions with me before, weapons, armor, other belongings. Where are those things now?"
She isn't ready to trust the man yet. It's very clever of him to suggest he should be suspicious because he doesn't recognize us. He would put us on the defensive and make us try to explain ourselves rather than wonder about him. Well, I won't fall for that!
Despite her belligerence, Laufey is clearly drained by her exertions. She leans on the table for support, looking slightly flushed and woozy as the adrenaline empties from her system.
Fifteen pauses when Li poses her frankly sensible questions. On Linweigh's response however she reaches out and makes a pushing motion towards the sleeping woman's chest. From her forearm a gleaming blade springs out and pushes deep into the 'doctor's' chest, swiftly withdrawing and dripping strangely coloured blood onto the floor.
"There is no use for her. If there are no passwords or guards then we do not need her. She was clearly an enemy. Dangerous to leave behind."
Briarstone Asylum? Thrushmoor? Thrushmoor, that sounds familiar... Immortal Princip-- oh. Ustalav. We're in Ustalav. Laine lets out a deep sigh, shaking her head as she leans against a wall with one hand. "We're in an asylum in Ustalav? I'm here because...I was sick?" She concentrates on steadily breathing in and out, trying to stop her spinning head. Nothing makes sense, and yet...everything she remembers is a haze, so maybe all that is true? How can she say for certainty that she hadn't been sick? That sort of thing does happen. "Maybe I was sick", she murmurs, looking at her empty hand. "I don't know. I don't remember. It could be like that..." Then, her blood goes cold when Linweigh mentions the Mother of Monsters. "Lamashtu..." passes in barely a whisper over Laine's lips.
She was about to have many more questions for Linweigh, but when Fifteen stabs at the doctor, Laine's eyes go wide and she lets out a muffled gasp. Looking aghast, she gapes at Fifteen in horror. "Murderer! There was no need for that! She was locked up!" She takes a few steps back from the android woman, not sure if she should now be considered dangerous and a potential threat. Someone as willing to kill as that... Laine backs away, putting the operating table between herself and Fifteen.
Jing looks at the tattoo'd woman, and sighs. "And now, no way to confirm man telling truth. No way find out if mad woman knew where our things were. No way to find out if mad woman know more about what happen here, or how we here, or how we lose memory." She spits out a few words in Tien*. "Insane person not enemy, insane person is like wolf with infected paw, may lash out randomly in pain and fever. May also be saved, become loyal household protector. Dead, wolf just become worm food. Now only thing woman good for is worm food. You are fool and idiot."
Curse words calling 15's parentage into question, something about a goat, a diseases prostitute, and something called a waterclock.
While the chaos is going on all around her, Jacqueline appears to be pondering something. Suddenly, she speaks up. "Fear."
The young, pale woman then begins rambling excitedly. "Fear! That's what it's all about! Of course!" She turns to the orderly. "Now, tell me, what is a doctor's greatest fear? To become a patient! And in this case, the patients of this asylum as completely, utterly mad, so the doctors' fears came true. They became the patients running the asylum. And those dreams! What other purpose were they than to make us utterly fearful for our lives! Overcome with fear, even! Whatever is causing this situation we're finding ourselves in is using Briarstone as-as a place to cultivate fear. Harvest it. A fear farm, if you will."
She takes a deep breath before continuing. "If it feeds on fear, derives power from it, then we must keep a clear head in order to shake its grip upon us."
"Zadok, heal the poor man and I up. I know you're most likely nearly out of spellpower already, but we can spend the time here fortifying this location and interrogating-" she then hears the squelch of a burst heart. "Well. Perhaps not. But we should establish a place where we can rest relatively easy, and considering what we have at our disposal and our current state, we need it sooner rather than later. I want a place we can run madly to if we encounter something too difficult to overcome once we venture out of here."
Jing listens to Jacqueline, and then nods. "Much smarter than painted idiot." She jerks a thumb at 15. Then she takes the keys, and opens the cell door and searches the body of the, now dead, woman. She takes the woman's lab coat, looks at it critically, then tears it into strips, using the cleaner parts. A third go around her chest, forming a top. Another third around her hips and waist, forming a loincloth. The other portions wrap around her hands and forearms. When she's done, she looks something like a ring fighter, and is at least nominally decently covered.
Laufey doesn't comment on the woman's death. She is still recovering and spent most of her breath on questions for the man Campre.
One less thing for me to have to do later probably. But it would have been good to question her first. Oh well, it is done. Time to move on.
When the talkative injured woman mentions fortifying their location, Laufey responds with "No. That only makes our cell larger. If anyone wants to keep us here they only need to block us in. We have no food or water. We must move."
Adding to her list of questions for Campre she asks "what is on the other side of that door?"
Jacqueline nods. "True. Still, if I so much as sit up, I'll start bleeding out again. Combined with the need to heal Campre, Zadok will be nearly out of spells."
Jacqueline then begins mulling over the combined details of the group's dream, Campre's description of what happened, and their amnesia, hoping to find a connection.
Zadok whimpers and backs away from the strange woman with swords in her arm. "You didn't need to do that," he says quietly. "If she'd been driven mad, she's not truly evil. We might have been able to do something to help her. Well, not us probably, but someone else."
His head jerks up at Jacqueline's order. "What? Oh, oh yes. One moment." He closes his eyes and concentrates, seeking out his magic. He shivers as the darkness swirls through his mind again, but it seems to leave him alone unless he actively tries to cast a spell. He can feel two glittering motes of power, glowing like stars in the void. "I... I think I have enough power for two more healing spells. I'll try to patch you two up, but then I'm going to be significantly less helpful until tomorrow." He reaches over and places a hand on Jacqueline again, calling out another burst of healing light. Then he does the same for Campre. A few more of their wounds close, but his earlier fear seems true as both are left with a few of their lesser injuries.