"I would like to take a moment of silence... for all of the sweet treasure we're about to steal. Hey, not like these corpses need it, right?" Razza takes a cursory look around , putting out her own Detect Magic spell as she does. Ludvic seemed like a nice enough dude, but she did not want him claiming any magic loot that might be lying around and melting it down for "experiments" or whatever before she could get an eye on it.
"I full heartily agree with that. It's nice like these corpses need their corpses. You are right though Fraejia, I will do a quick check to make sure they do not bare any signs of disease."
Ludvic will strip them to their undergarments after he commands the skeleton to stop, checking their pockets and such before making sure their are no obvious signs of disease before he commands Toolkit to get back to work.
There is a secure storage area in the back of the common area where the corpses are. Or at least, it's intended to be a secure storage area, but given the crew had the door open when they died, it's not very secure right now.
Inside is a crate, approximabely 6 ft long, 3ft wide, and 2 ft high. It's eerily similar to a coffin... There are arcane marks on the crate and writing in a language other than common.
WARNING! TO BE OPENED BY OWNER ONLY!
THANK YOU, HAVE A NICE DAY.
Fraejia was rather disturbed at Ludvic's reaction, and even more worried when he wanted to bring the corpses on board. She spoke up and said, "Ludvic, it might be best to check them for disease first. It wouldn't do to bring illness on board the ship." Having said her piece she looked to Razza and Opal and Nevve and said, "Shall we go explore the place ladies? I'm curious as to what happened here."
Ludvic's enthusiasm for the dead was very off-putting, though it didn't show anymore than anything else did on Opal's face.
Yes. We should investigate.
I do not understand this language. Do any of you? She speaks as she casts detect magic as well, focusing it on the crate.
"Hrm... Can't say I do. Looks similar to Abyssal at first glance but even though the writing style is similar all the words are different. Maybe I can read these other markings with a bit of wizardry I've picked up." Razza goes through her usual routine of Detect Magic -> Read Magic, attempting to decipher the arcane markings.
Hey, if no one claims the bodies then you can have 'em otherwise they should be going to their families
Ludvic will try to catch that smile before he walks over to help investigate. "Ohhhh maybe it's another body. I can't seem to make out the language myself, though it does seem to resemble daemonic a bit as well. So far it's got two very evil things involved with it though. Lets check for trap before we check what's inside. First he will check for traps.
Then he will do a detect magic, followed by read magic and then finally a spell craft check.
If their is no dangerous magic on it and no trap seems to be implanted on it he will grab the crowbar from Toolkit. "Well if it is safe, lets see what is inside of it. He will wait a moment to make sure it is ok with everyone or in case some one else noticed a trap he did not before he tries to pry the thing open.
The lid prizes up, and there is a 'POP' sound as air rushes into the crate, which was previously under negative pressure. Once the pressure equalizes, the crate lid pops up.
Inside it is filled with small polished wooden balls ranging from 1/4" to 1" in diameter. On top of them, in the center, is a yellowed envelope.
When the envelope is retrieved, a hand shoots up out of the wooden balls, sending some of them scattering over the floor. The hand also appears to be made of wood.
The thumb of the hand moves with a light ticking sound, articulating slowly at first, then rapidly. Then the index finger does the same. The middle finger attempts to do so, but stops halfway to the palm as if locked up. The ring finger is next and moves slowly then rapidly, then the pinky as well.
The fingers all begin to move rapidly, with the middle finger experiencing issues. Then the middle finger splits along invisible seams, revealing itself to be hollow, with bits of metal on the inside and small bits of electricity flowing along. The finger breaks apart into small wooden squares, and as it does, several of the polished wooden balls drop to the pile.
The wooden finger reforms into a normal finger again, and all five fingers now move in intricate patterns with full range of motion.
Then the hand flexes, bending forward and backward. Then it rotates left, then right, then rotates completely around 3 times clockwise, then 3 times counter clock wise.
Another hand thrusts up out of the wooden balls, sending more scattering on the floor. The fingers and hand do the same routine.
Next both arms in unison bend at the elbow, up, down, then the lower arms spin around clockwise, then counter clockwise.
Once done, the hands grasp the sides of the crate, and the entire surface of wooden balls heaves, sending thousands of them skittering across the floor as a wooden torso shoots up out of the wooden balls.
The torso has two legs, and the feet of the wooden 'man' move and flex, similar to the way the hands did. Then the knees flex and spin, then the hips. Finally the entire lower torso spins at the waist 3 times in each direction a complete 360 degrees.
The wooden head, also flexes, forward, backward, and then spins around and around several times.
The wooden automotan then lifts itself up on one arm, and lowers it's legs to the floor, standing up, carefully pushing wooden balls out of the way.
It's left hand splits apart, folding back to form a cuff around it's arm that spins rapidly in place and a dull hum can be heard. Then the cuff breaks apart and reforms the hand. The right arm does the same thing, although no hum is heard.
Then the right hand raises up, and the fingers split at the tips, and tools emerge from the finger tips.
Finally, the thing opens it's chest plate, revealing a hollow cavity filled with bits of metal coating the interior, with small bits of electricity flowing along. A row of what looks like bullet cartridges seem to be on a metal slide tray as well on the inside of the torso. The construct bends it's head forward to peer into it's own chest cavity.
Finally it closes up, and the construct settles down.
"Tik'Klik!"
Dear Lord Selvarius,
Per your request, a Mark VII Golem has been enclosed. The control crystal given to you when you placed the order must be present upon activation, so the golem knows who it's master is. As was stated to you at purchase time, not having the control crystal will cause the golem to shut down, and it will not reactivate.
The golem, as requested, is equipped with the tools necessary to handle exploration of old ruins. It does not require a fuel source.
It is hoped you find your golem all you need on your expeditions into the void, and thank you for your Patronage.
Dominick Revith, Master Golem Crafter
Revith Golem Werks
Ludvic will suddenly jump back when the apparent coffin opens, holding the crowbar up as a weapon. "Ok looks like the surprise can't wait! He raises a eyebrow though when it opens to reveal it's contents. "Been a while since I saw so much wood." He was just about to grab the letter when the hand shot out, this time causing him to jump back once more. He watches in silence as the creature begins to emerge from the box. Once it had finally emerged Ludvic slowly reaches down to pick up the letter and hand it to what ever it was. "I think this may be for you." After he reaches down to pick up three of those wooden balls while he tries to think if he had seen anything like this creature before
It looks like a very old Mark VI to Mark VIII wooden golem. However, it's not acting like a golem. It hasn't had it's activation crystal mounted in it's chest. And Ludvic hasn't heard of any that could split their bits apart. It's construction looks to have been of the highest quality though. Without a detailed inspection, identifying who built it would be impossible.
If it is an old Mark VI to Mark VIII golem, it would be over 2000 years old, back in the very early space flight, when magic was used more than tech. Modern bots don't use magic, this thing seems to use magic.
Also, old golems didn't talk, this thing is making clicking noises with it's mouth.
"Tik'Klik!"
A wooden hand takes the letter, examines the envelope, and then slides it into it's mouth where it vanishes. A dull thunk sounds from the thing's chest, as if the letter had fallen down inside it's chest cavity.
Opal watches construct form itself, almost like a performance. She listens to the clicking and humming it makes, aware of the feact it may attack them, but willing to wait and see.
This wooden man is interesting. I believe we've found the magic source in the ship.
Ludvic scratches his helmet as he watches the golem. "Well aren't you a special one. What could we have here? Some sort of custom job? How long have you been inside of that coffin. It seems that you can understand me. Can you only reply like that?" As he waits for a answer he will reach back into his pack and pull out some parchment and ink. He will hand it out for the golem to write on if it so chooses. He turns back to address everyone."Well this is hard to tell but I think we just found ourselves a old wooden golem. Amazing though, it seemed to self activate. Tell us, do you have a name that you go by wooden one?
I think the answer will be "Tik'Klik." Opal responds dryly.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
"Tik... Klik?"
The golem responds hesitantly.
You find 100 credit disks lying haphazardly over the floor of the common area, along with a half-emptied pack of 12 All-Purpose Power cells, a deck of playing cards, and stale foods.
For those of you who have them, your comms ring, and Mercer's voice sounds on the other side. "Have you found anything?" He asked.
10 dead people, credits, and a tree man Neve responds to the comms. She looks around to see if there's any indication of the ship's name, where it's from and where it was headed.
Ludvick clicks his tongue before replying to Mercer. "Neve is right. I'm taking back the bodies to my room. Found some power cells to as well, they seem to still be carrying charges. Found some stale food to, least that will tide us over. Were going to keep searching as well. We might have just found a new crew member as well. It's a old wood golem. Strange thing though, can't figure out how it turned itself on. I'm gonna vote we take him back to the ship. Either we found ourselves a simple golem or we might have found one that seems to have generated sentience. Ohhh I can't wait until I can check if it generated a soul." Ludvic sounded excited as he stepped to the coffin "We should take this with us as well. It might be important to... Tikklik? Think it will mind if I call him Tik for short? He asks Opal.
Neve stands her ground somewhat nervously when Ludvic talks about the bodies. These people prolly had families that'd like to bury them. What're you going to do with them?
"Tik'Klik."
The little golem walks out of the secure storage room, and sees a skeleton walking around, and it's gem like eyes begin glowing red.
"TIK'KLIK! TIK TIK IK KLIK!"
It's right arm comes up, and it's hand splits and forms a cuff around the end of the arm. A humm fills the air as it brings up the arm, and a ball of sparkly white energy pulses out of the arm and...
...strikes the skeleton!
Their exploration finished Fraejia found herself in the room with the coffin as it opened. She observed the small creature and couldn't help but comment, "I think he's kinda cute actually, I met a being not so different from him once, a friend of my parents, he was a lot bigger but rather friendly, once you got through the rock exterior." It was at roughly the time she saw Toolbox come through and Tik'Klik's response that she realized there was a problem. She called out, "Tik'Klik, NO!" But it was too late, he'd already fired at Toolbox and she didn't want to see him get hurt for his gut reaction, she wanted to do the same the first time herself. She quickly moved between Toolbox, Ludvic, and Tik'Klik putting Tik'Klik behind her and gestured, a thin wall of ice appeared before her to block Toolbox and Ludvic from being able to retaliate. She turned and knelt before the small golem and said, "I don't know if you can understand me Tik'Klik but they aren't your enemies, Toolbox won't hurt you. Will you please stand down, if you don't they may choose to leave you alone on this ship."
I dunno. I'm kinda on tree guy's side. Those things are screwed up and I think he wants to make more of them with these poor people! Neve is relieved that at least someone else is as freaked out by the necromancer as she is.
"Tik'Klik!"
The golem's eyes rotate, staying red, and it's 'blaster' arm points in the general direction of the skeleton.
"Tik'Klik! Klik ik Kik Tik! Tik'ikTik tik Kik Klikt!"
The golem seems highly agitated, but doesn't continue blasting.
Ludvic was still in the middle of his thinking when he saw Tik suddenly blast Toolkit. The skeleton shook violently before simply falling into a pile if inanimate bones, what ever magic having held it together destroyed. It was true, Ludvic looked angry, but it was not directed at Tik. "Nethys damn it! I always forget that skeletons are supposed to be scary. I should have told warned him about it. Fraejia you don't need to worry, I'm not angry at the golem. He did what anyone would have done if they had seen a uncontrolled undead. I apologize for surprising you Tik. Still Ludvic seemed hurt as he walked over and picked up the skull. "Alas Toolkit, I knew thee. At least you got the corpses done for me. He tucked the skull under his arm before turning back. "Also Neve, you don't need to worry about that. Haven't figured out how to channel enough magic to actually animate a dead body. I found Toolkit and took him over by chance. I just need these bodies to practice my surgery on for now. Need to know what I'm doing if I ever wanna work on a real human being. I'm sure Toolkit would be hurt as well if he could hear you. Didn't you see how much he blushed when he looked at you?" Ludvick grinned as he began to gather up his tools from the destroyed skeleton. By the time he was done he looked like he was having a hard time carrying it all. "Anything we need to do on the ship? I need to drop this off in my room. It's a little to heavy to carry around on my own."
"Tik'Klik."
When the skeleton goes down, the red eyes turn back to black, and the cuff reconfigures into a hand. Stepping over, the golem watches the stranger dig through the bones for all the tools. When it's obvious he can't carry them all, the golem holds out a hand.
"Tik'Klik?"
With the threat of further violence ended Fraejia dismissed the thin wall of ice and said, "I don't disagree with you Neve, they are creepy, but unless he's binding a soul inside of it I can let it go." She turned and bent to help dig through the pile for tools and handed some to Tik'Klik when he held his hands out as she said to Ludvic, "Having said that, if I do find you binding souls I will eradicate you from the face of existence." Her words seemed more a statement of fact rather than threat with the calm way she said it. She attached some of the tools to her own suit as well and rose when she was finished, "There, that's better." She looked at the rest of the group and asked, "So, is there anything else we need to do or should we get back to our ship?"
If we can figure out what this ship's name is and where it was going and how it died then we can probably get some creds for the info.
"Tik'Klik!"
As the tools are handed to the golem, his hand clicks apart, folds around the tool, and it vanishes. The next tool gets the same treatment. If it's too big for his hand to hold, his arm opens up and folds over the tool.
Once he's done, as he walks, there's a faint 'clink'ing sound from inside it's body.
"I'll never understand you humans and your obsession with corpses. Once it's dead it's just a worthless bag o' meat. The golem's more of a person than any of these stiffs. If their families wanted the meat for something then they should've beaten Ludvic here, I say."
Razza turns to the aforementioned golem, giving him a sly grin. "On the other hand, flipping out and lazoring Toolkit into oblivion? Hilarious. And potentially useful later on. We're keeping 'im, right?"
He smiled as the two came over to help. "Well thank you very much. I appreciate the help. He gives Tik a pat on the shoulder as they load up everything. His face goes a bit blank as she simply stats her intent to intent to kill him if he ever started to raise intelligent undead. "Ehhh binding souls from my research can get a little messy. They get angry that you are controlling, break free, kill you in your sleep. Never ends well from what I hear. So I have no plans to trap any souls to their bodies. It's all about consent in my book.He smiles at Razza's comment and shoots her a thumbs up. Heading the rest of it though, his smile turns into a line on his face as his hand turns to the side, his thumb hovering between a thumbs up and a thumbs down. "I can go and check the computer system if it's working. If so i can probably figure out the name and maybe a destination.
Ludvic will go to a computer console and try to get access to the system.
He will get as much information as he can.
Fraejia nodded and said, "Good, I'm glad we understand each other. Shall we see what we can find on these computers?" She sat down at a terminal nearby Ludvic and said, "Se where are you from Ludvic? It's not often that I hear people who are practitioners of necromancy and aren't corrupted by it."
"Tik'Klik."
The golem begins looking around curiously as well.
If any locked things are found (lockers, doors, crates), he'll attempt to open them.
Opal watches the scene dispassionately for a time, not having many thoughts on the undead.
I will collect the credits then. I assume we should bring them to our captain so he may distribute them between us. And she does just that.
He gives a slight shrug. "Well, I'm from Eox. I don't talk about it much but I'm one of the last living people from that planet. About....I want to say two hundred years ago I was working in a lab to help develop necroweapons for a war we were engaged in with two other planets. One day while I was researching we were instructed to head into stasis. When I came out I found I was the only one who had woken up. After some investigation I found that they had launched a super weapon at the enemy planet. Scanners showed where the two neighboring plants had been was replaced with a asteroid belt. What ever my leaders did was to powerful though. It destroyed our atmosphere. Most Eoxian's who did not turn to undeath simply died. Now the planet is mostly barren rock, ruled by liches called Bone Sages. At this point he grins. "Lucky for me I convinced one to come pick me up. Unlucky for him, I outsmarted him and stole his ship to flee. I'm sorry to disappoint, but this is a story of men who ended up being corrupted by it. My goals for the craft are different though, don't you worry. I'm not cowardly enough to sacrifice the innocent in my goals. Now you got to hear about planet lich, where are you from?"
Fraejia replied to his story, "I'm sorry to hear all that, I understand the loss of everything you know, all of my kind do. As for my home world, well, I guarantee you'd never have heard of it, but it wasn't a terrible place. My parents had settled on Zerk'xtic for quite some time, it was a rugged world whose natives were of insectoid ancestry. They were very advanced and had colonized a large portion of their quadrant as bugs will do. Their home world was kept as natural as they could make it, plenty of plains with great cities dug into the ground beneath them. They hollowed out mountains to make their first star ships and turned them into great spaceports when they were done. We lived in the city under the great northern plane near a polar ice cap, a place imminently suitable to my mother and I. We moved from there to another world when I was reaching adolescence, a jungle planet called Beldone, that was held as a nature reserve. I found the place far too hot, mom did too, but dad was right at home there." Her voice turned wistful as she continued, "When I reached my age of majority I had to begin my walkabout, I chose this region of existence to do it in. My parents dropped me off and left, I won't see them again until I complete my journey's here."
In additioon to picking up on the security cams, basically the crew running, screaming, suffocating, and in some case, eyeballs exploding, you pick up on a quick image from the hull cameras. A large, jagged war vessel painted in black and red, with a devil painted on the side.
Tik'Klik finds 300 more credit disks and, hidden amongst a pile of debris, a stone tablet with occult markings over it, none of them immediately recognizable, but the more magically-incline among you feel something unusual radiating off of it.
"Tik'Klik!"
Holding up the tablet, the golem's fingers whir on his other hand in an intricate pattern. Then the golem's eyes glow purple as it studies the tablet.
Opal casts the same, holding up one hand almost lazily. Focusing to see what school it glows with.
There is a strong aura of magic coating the tablet, but one not contained to one specific school, as far as you can tell. It's almost as if it's trying to decide itself.
"How many credits? Wait... Did you say Tree Guy?" Mercer said. "Either way, I was finally able to decypher the ship's damaged ID emmiter. It''s a Taldan vessel by the name of the "BlueWing". Readings show it only left Taldor 4 months ago."
"Tik'Klik!"
The golem opens it's chest plate and slides the tablet in. Inside are tools being held to the inside of his chest, a pile of credit disks, and a letter. The chest plate snicks closed.
The golem begins looking around again, moving into other areas of the ship, including the airless sections if they can be accessed without letting the air out of the area the meat bags are in.
"No need to be sorry. I focused mainly on my work even back then. Social and familial needs have never been a large part of my happiness. One of the reasons I went to work in a lab. It's good to hear that they are waiting for you. Sounds like you already are going to have a few stories to tell them when you meet them again. For now though lets head back with the supplies. We can start to figure out what happened there." He pushes himself up away from the machine and waits for her before he begins to head back to the scythe.
A devil ship blew this ship up? Neve shudders We should like get out of here pronto. Chelaxians might come back to loot the place any time and they're not gonna like us being here one bit
Fraejia had just accessed the database and found some video of the attack. She saw the death of the crew after the hull ruptured and then caught a glimpse of the vessel that took attacked the ship from an external camera. She stopped and looked at it not hearing Ludvic's continued words as her body started to emit a glow similar to that of an aurora borealis. A strange humming sound began and then modulate, when her mouth opened it wasn't words that came out but what sounded much like the music made by a violin as the energy field changed sounds it sounded a lot like synthesized music with a violin running through it, the sound like a stringed instrument sliding harshly between tones while the sounds the energy field generated were angry and jagged.
Ludvic raises a eye brow as he looks over her shoulder to catch a little of the video from the camera. Next he looked down at her and leaned forward to get a closer look at her face, trying to figure out what was going on with her. "I have heard of a word salad during a stroke but never a instrument salad. He reached out and took her by the shoulder, giving her a bit of a tug back against the chair. Fraejia? Can you hear me?"
He will bring up a detect magic as well to see if that will help him pick up on anything.
Ludvic could feel a burst of cold shoot down his hand where he touched her shoulder, frost seemed to cake his skin though it went no deeper. His attempt to view her through his spell was far more serious as it sent a jagged spike of agony through his head at the nigh overwhelming aura of power radiating from her as she "sang". He did, however, succeed in getting her attention and the light cut off causing the music to stop. She realized just what had happened to him and said, "Don't try to pull away yet, let me thaw the ice first. That image caught me off guard and did I forgot to use your method of speech." The frost melted from him and freed his arm quickly as her expression turned apologetic, "Oh goddesses, I'm sorry about that Ludvic, I thought I had better control than that."
Razza blinks at... whatever it is Fraejia just did. "Well. That was friggin weird. No offense. Putting that at the back of her mind, she turns to Neve and nods.
"Blondie's got the right of it, if a Chelish ship took these guys out we need to get out of here before they come back. I'd recommend cleaning out the video files just to make sure us being here didn't get recorded but who knows if we have the time. Of course, there's always the nuclear option." Razza grinned, never one to pass an opportunity to make something explode.
"Tik'Klik?"
The golem turns to look at Fraejia.
He let's out a gasp as the sudden migraine shoots through his skull, making a few of the veins in his forehead throb visibly. He does not attempt to move his hand away" realizing if the suite broke apart he would be in big trouble. Thankfully she came to her senses and melted the ice. "well that was unexpected. We will chalk this one up to me though. Touched a pretty lady without her permission. I deserve the cold shoulder." he let's the joke hang in the air as he moves his arm around trying to get the pins and needles from it. "I say we blow this place up. Been a lot of bad luck for me here."
Opal looks at Fraeija almost as coldly as she was a moment before. Fraeija! You must control yourself. No one within ten thousand miles of here knows this the way I do. She begins to walk back to the tube to the Scythe, seeming to regain her composure. I have no objections to destroying this ship, we have all we wanted from it, yes?. We should we move to a safe distance first. I have seen my fair share of explosions, they have a way of carrying further than one might expect. Opal advises the group.