A panicked creature must drop anything it holds and flee at top speed from the source of its fear, as well as any other dangers it encounters, along a random path.
Merely a desire to "get away"? That random path bit is going to cause havoc.
Mahjik shouts: "Quick! Get ready to defend!" His call is followed by a rapid serious of hand gestures as he moves to the front to cover Shokambe. His hand movements seem silly for a moment, but then his skin begins to change, taking on a distinctly gnarly appearance.
Activate barkskin ki power; move to E73 (or as close as possible)
Mahjik nods affirmatively, "By all accounts, if there's something that can quieten a monumental horde of monkeys, it is likely dangerous. Hey... if there was a big flappy, what about a big monkey? Shokambe? Is there such a thing?"
"Mwangi god that wants trespassers to die. Could be worse, wise man fears those who eat flesh of their kin." Mahjik mumbles as he tries to keep more alive.
AC 22; HP 43/53 Full round: flurry! Swift: ki attack
Mahjik ignores the currently unarmed warrior, and instead focuses his attacks on his newest assailant. He leads with a powerful kick that thrusts right upward in front of the Mzali and connect right underneath the jaw - uppercut-like - followed by keeping the momentum going and a secondary kick straight into the gut.
AC 20 (due to charge); HP 53/53 Swift: mantis style Full round action: charge
Mahjik charges the Mzali warrior almost directly south #9, getting to T54 and attacks, using his momentum to produce a jarring punch to the ribcage that should knock the air out of the warrior and stun him temporarily.
Mahjik grins to himself, amused at the little gnome's earnest antics. He marches with Ishirou, "I'm pleasantly surprised by the most recent developments. I've not really imagined it possible - but the Mwangi is full of surprises, it seems."
Mahjik grins his familiar smile at Sasha, and mentions quietly - as not to disturb proceedings - "Wise man doesn't kiss and tell. But I can tell you that I found a friend to my other obligations in this world. It isn't much, but anybody trying to chase us will find themselves a little bit inconvenienced when in Kalabuto."
"Good day to you," Mahjik bows slightly, "we've not been introduced. I am Mahjik - I was delayed in Kalabuto a bit longer than everybody else. It is an honor to meet you and you too Tar'kanas."
Mahjik spends the rest of the afternoon waiting out the shift. In the first hour he still orders a secondary light meal - but after that he just nurses the food before him slowly. Toward the deadline he begins stretching a little - not enough to draw attention - just limbering up a little while seated.
When Ntisi indicates she is done, Mahjik presents two open palms to her - one indicating the room, the other outside, an open question to her.
Mahjik bows his head in gratitude, "I understand that you are compromising your position for me. You have my thanks. ...for the purpose of my work... will you accept a sparring match with me? As the mind studies, so the body studies too. Perhaps it can also help ease the problems that will come from having associated with me."
I'll take a little bit of a gamble here and make some assumptions on the waitress - feel free to retcon as appropriate.
Mahjik smiles in return and lets the waitress continue her duties. He enjoys his stay in the tavern - it has been a while since a lazy hour or two could pass for him. While nursing a drink of two over the next couple of hours he pays some subtle attention to the waitress and her demeanor. After that time he nods to himself, satisfied that very little gave away the potential prowess of the waitress. This in itself was quite a feat - as most people could be fairly quickly gauged to be quite dangerous or rather harmless - regardless of the accuracy of such evaluations - but the waitress... not her.
Mahjik nods to the girl, when he feels the place is running into a relative dry spell over the early afternoon, and beckons for her to sit at his table. As she approaches he indicates a series of subtle gestures that are easy to miss or disregard by the uninitiated, but to a follower of the Kusari-Gama faction of martial artists the signs were meaningful. The girl sits down and responds appropriately with a few symbols of her own.
Bowing his head subtly in respect, the little man speaks: "Irori's thoughts on our meeting. I am Mahjik-san, someplaces known as the Flink. It is an honor to meet you. I've been traveling for quite a while now - gathering the progress and new insights of the Kusari-Gama in the less accessible places on Golarion. Kalabuto was to be my last stop before returning - though it seems I'll spend some more time in the jungle." He bows deeper now, obvious to anyone who cares to pay attention in the tavern, "I humbly ask to learn what I may from you."
Mahjik nods, friendly, pushing some coin toward the waitress. "There is much that wise men, and women, have said - but the wisdom is not easy to grasp, so where the words are offered freely, grasping their meaning may take weeks of thought, sometimes years." Slurping a good spoonful of the broth he aaahhhs in enjoyment, then adds, "The cusps of noon and midnight have bothered me several times. I used to think that maybe it is advice to heed danger, be wary of things both at day and night - but... more recently I've begone wondering if perhaps the true wisdom in those words is to acknowledge the purpose of each, find work by day, and rest by night." He grins, "Though probably the biggest wisdom is not to arrive at an answer, but to seek it instead."
"Wise man embraces the cusp of noon as he is embraced by the cusp of midnight," Mahjik declares to the waitress solemnly. "If you have a broth, some bread and cheese, I'll have those please. Thank you."
Mahjik frowns inwardly as he surveys the scene. Unsure if he's already missed any cues he gives everything a second glance, before settling down to appreciate the sense of run-down Mwangi decadence that the Shrunken Head had become.
"Not just one set, unfortunately," Mahjik responds, "but if the reason I'm still here were a threat right now, then we'd know about it. I pray that it will not come to pass in our lifetime."
Sorry, my Firefox decided that it cannot connect to Paizo for the last 2 days. Weird.
Navior:
"I don't suppose there are suitable authorities and laws in place to cope with this situation? That would be ideal. Otherwise I shall bow to your choice Cheiton."
Mahjik face brightens for a moment, then darkens, "You don't suppose the contact you found for me is a trap, do you?"
Mahjik nods at Cheiton's details. "Thank you, the Pathfinders may not benefit much from this, but you've helped me a lot." He helps Cheiton handle the unconscious prisoner. "I think the powers behind this are powerful, but not wise - quick to throw their force behind opposition rather than covertly achieve victory. They would benefit far more from quietly following in our footsteps than trying to force parity by spilling blood. Though... if the other prisoner spoke the truth, then it wasn't their blood that was spilled, but some hired mercenaries."
Mahjik thinks about Makoa's suggestion, weighing the possibilities in his head. Finally he shakes his head and says: "Unless you rather go with me, I think you will better serve the group with the rest of the party. With the group moving on, any rivals we have will want to scramble to hinder or eliminate our group. Besides, where strength lies in numbers, there lies subtlety in one."
"Cheiton, from what we've gathered these are mostly thugs led by Marouf. They were possibly hired by the Aspis; and we know this little girl was with them but escaped - we saw her earlier today trying to peddle us useless fetishes." Mahjik turns his head sideways for a moment as an errant thought strikes him. "Say, who bought any of those? We should check if they are magicked in some way to help them track our movement."
"Wise man would seek council from the earth and the trees but not expect them to answer. I've got a pretty good idea where you'll be headed; and one of me is a lot faster than the collected group. Also, even without leaving obvious signs we've not actually been making effort to hide where we're going. I think it'll be easy enough to catch-up," Mahjik replies. "Kalabuto is kind of big and my friend can be hard to find. Cheiton here knows the place well, so I'm hoping he'll be able to direct me to where I need to be. Don't worry your colorful head about it - I'll have caught up with you lot within a few days."
Mahjik nods, "I'll stay behind a bit, there's a... friend... I'd like to catch-up on. And there's still Jask; I'll see that his remains are cared for."
"That's fine then, you're right," Mahjik concedes. "We won't be able to stop whoever is hunting for us any time soon. We happen to be working with the Pathfinders, but we weren't attacked because of that - we were attacked because we're the first ones here and have valuable information. I rather suspect we'd have to worry about ambushes from the dark even if we had set out on our own. Or for that matter allied with the Aspis."
Mahjik continues: "Now I think it is important that we establish what we are doing. We can still abandon this mad race to a ruined city; or we can stick to it. But before we go towards the lost city - I want to know what your motive for going is. Me, I'm in it for what I'll learn, and I do so accepting that this is not a game. We may very well all die. But you? If I heard right about gnomes, you still have eternity ahead of you. Why risk this? I know I can trust you if you've set your mind to it, but anybody that goes on now halfheartedly is a risk to all of us."
"Why? Now we're not safer outside the city than we are inside it. Until we're done with what we need to do here, there is no point in leaving. But there is value in stopping whoever put the hit on us tonight - even if we run, they'll be able to follow us and ambush again. Here we can pin down whoever is pulling the strings and get them out of our hair."
Mahjik crouches down to captive, his nose flaring a little - perhaps the only sign of how shaken he is. "That... girl. She must be a regular about town. Who is she. Who else associates with her. And where can we find her, when she's trying not to be found?"
Mahjik enters the room solemnly. Quietly he says, "This isn't over. I made sure to keep one alive - but unconscious - along with the other one we captured, we will find out who is responsible for this. Maybe one of the other groups that are chasing us managed to send word ahead - or overtook us. Ishirou, can you identify them? Are they with the Aspis?"
Mahjik half sees Makao felling another assailant, but hears still more beyond the door. He rushes into the room too, taking momentum as he propels himself from the walls to jump passed the bandits if viable or necessary - then attacks the assailant that looks most likely to escape with a debilitating blow in the hopes of preventing an escape.
