"Are you guys going to help?" John asks over his shoulder to the others.
"Help with what, exactly?" Miniel, at the back of the line, is still confused and concerned.
Broom peeked around the corner to see what all the commotion was about "There is a strange guy talking to a bunch of dolls trying to hurt John!" she called out.
The doll lecturer rushed John, screaming and swinging a crowbar.
But the inexperienced combatant couldn't overcome John's superior skill and armor.
"Calm down .... we're just looking for a way out of here." John tells the crowbar guy as he blocks his swing.
"Look out John!" Broom called out needlessly as the assailant swung the tool at him.
"That crowbar looks useful. We would like one."
"The implement he is wielding looks useful. It would be good to have one."
In her mind she conjured up memories of the deep places cold and dark, and the strange things that lived there. As she did so the words came to her lips and her hands moved in those gestures which were both familiar and alien. The purple sparks began to crackle around her hand as she tried to reach around the corner of the door to touch the madman.
She couldn't quite reach him, however her hand got close enough that a small spark leapt from her hand to the metal rod he was carrying. John's assailant received a little jolt through the crowbar.
Near the back with Reine, Desdemona debated explaining to the woman that she understood what the ratling had been saying before the spell... but she couldn't explain how.
Then the sounds of tumult from the front of the group began, and she gasped, clutching her glowing dagger.
"What's going on up there? Do you need..." She trailed off, uncertain what she could possibly do to help.
Uneasily, she glanced to the side, at her shadow. It hung on the wall innocuously, mirroring her movements.
Was Broom right? Could she learn to command it?
Xander doesn't think he can get a sling shot off very accurately down this hallway, but he doesn't want the creep to smash John either. He waves one arm while pronouncing a silky smooth phrase.
Broom shot an arc of electricity past the edge of the door but it didn't put the madman down.
The crowbar was suddenly covered in slick grease but the man in dingy yellow managed to keep a grip on the crowbar in spite of Xander's spell.
Halfway down the hall, the other door on the left burst open and another cultist in yellow robes rushed John. This one was an orderly's truncheon that had clearly seen some use.
Even with the element of surprise and the double team, though, the cultist couldn't get through John's defenses.
"They're popping out of the walls around here. I wonder where they all got matching yellow robes?"
"I don't think they're very dangerous. I kind of feel bad about killing crazy people."
He switches to a two-handed grip on his sword and slashes back at crobar guy.
(power attack, favored enemy, 2handed)
"But not that bad...."
There isn't much Miniel can do from her position, but she lines up a shot from her bow, trying to arc it over the crowd. Unfortunately, the arrow gets stuck in the ceiling...
John brutally cut down the doll lecturer even as the other cultist flailed at him with his stolen truncheon.
Broom cringed as the madman was cut down. She didn't like seeing people getting hurt like this, even if they were threatening the group.
She was also in a bit of a fix. With John right there in front of her fighting the other man, she had little chance of shooting without putting John in danger. On the other hand if she tried to slip into the room she might get hit by the truncheon.
She could try to run all the way back, but what good would that do?
In the end, faced with doing nothing or trying anything, she chose to try anything.
Broom waited a moment or two before ducking under one of John's swings and tried to dash behind him through the door. Once inside she noticed that the door the other madman came through led into this room. Seeing something to do she continued moving through the room and out the other door into the hallway, drawing her sickle as she did. She came up behind the other man, menacing him "Please surrender, We don't want to hurt you." she pleaded.
The man in the dirty yellow robes spun around when Broom came up behind him, fruitlessly trying to keep both her and John in sight at the same time.
Still not seeing an opening, Xander stood ready to jump in if needed.
The cultist glanced back at Broom and her very threatening-looking scythe and made a split second decision to try to duck into the doorway to try to get some cover.
It turned out to be the wrong choice, though, as John blocked his way. With a scream of rage and frustration, the yellow-robed man swung his truncheon at the heavily armored warrior.
But he couldn't get through John's defenses.
"Not so fast...."
John slashes the cultist in the yellow robes as he tries to get past.
(2h, favored enemy, pow atk)
"and a one ... and a two!" he says under his breath as he adopts a two weapon attack routine.
Then he drops his two-hand grip on his sword and follows up with a combination attack from his sword and armored gauntlet.
(twf, favored enemy, pow atk)
Even though there are less bodies in the way, Miniel decides to not try and shoot again. Instead, she moves through the hallway, past John and into the room where the cultists had come out of.
I don't know what else I can do...
John drops the cultist as he tries to dodge past him, leaving two yellow-robed bodies on the floor just inside the storage room door.
"Do you think these guys are what they're calling 'Apostles in Orpiment'?" John asks the others.
He bends down and searches the two unfortunate former patients for clues as to their identity.
He picks up the crowbar from where the lecturer fell and hands it to Broom.
"I think you were admiring this."
Then he drags the two dead men back into the room and arranges them in some semblance of order on the floor.
"There's a lot of work for the gravediggers once this place is set back aright."
Once done he turns to the room the robed guys were in and spends a couple minutes poking around.
Broom cringes as the man in front of her gets cut down. She uncomfortably watches the spreading mess for a moment before answering John. "We think the yellow robes means they probably were. And that one was preaching to the dolls in the room."
She smiled and cast the cantrip to clean the blood and soil off the crowbar before happily taking it from John and putting it in her magic pack.
"Let's see what is in the room"
Broom went back into the room she had just run through and started looking around.
Slipping past the row of people in the hallway with a few murmured apologies, Desdemona came to a halt over the dead. "Were they ghouls?" she ventured. "Why did they attack you?"
She knew that, most likely, there was no reason to it that they would consider good. There rarely were, in dreams.
She had been mulling over the rat-man's words. They confirmed her worst fears - well, her second-to-worst fears.
Firming her lips with determination, she bent to look over the dead men as well, her shadow falling over them as she poked at them.
With their yellow-clothed assailants down for the count, Miniel begins looking through the storage room, though she takes care not to touch anything.
Racks cluttered with boxes and sprawling collections of haphazard junk filled the dusty storage room. It looked like this room holds the personal effects of hundreds of Briarstone patients, present and past. They were likely collected on the day each patient was first admitted and await the day when their owners will once again be fit enough to reclaim them and leave. Befitting the likelihood of such hopeful prospects, most of the items were covered in a thick layer of dust.
The storage room has been partially ransacked, with some of the shelves knocked over and their contents scattered across the floor. While most of the valuable items have been looted from this room, some useful tidbits remain. Between them, the group of survivors find two vials of some kind of silvery alchemical paste that Xander identifies as silversheen and a vial of oil that he says is Oil of Align Weapon.
"Hey! I think these are my boots...." John says as he lifts a pair of brown leather boots off the shelf.
He immediately sits down on the floor and starts tugging off the boots he has been wearing and pulling on the pair he found on the shelf.
As he stands up, he tucks one of his daggers into the top of his right boot.
"I knew those other boots didn't feel like they fit right. They must have belonged to someone else in this place."
He lifts up the pair of discarded boots and places them on the shelf so that their rightful owner might be able to find them the same way someday.
To Miniele says: "Miniel, take one of these vials of silversheen and this oil of Align Weapon in case we encounter an enemy resistant to normal steel. I'll take the other vial of Silversheen."
Broom looked disapprovingly at the dusty boxes before pulling a small rag out of her pack and with the help of a little magic began cleaning them off as she searched for one that might be hers.
It took a little bit, she had been looking for a box with the name "Broom" on it and it took a moment or two before she remembered that it would probably have the name "Mashiki Malbourne".
Finding the box, she smiled as she opened it. It was kind of exciting to see what this Mashiki that she used to be had been carrying.
Miniel accepts the vials with a nod. "Thanks." She then proceeds to join Broom with the box hunting, She eventually also finds a box with her name on it, though there isn't much worthwhile inside, just some clothes no better than her current set. In a pocket, however, she finds a small brooch inscribed with Sarenrae's holy ankh, which buzzes with a little latent divine energy when she touches it. The elf quickly packs it up, then replaces the box and rejoins the rest of the group.
Broom pulled out a set of sturdy but well worn set of traveling clothes. A light grey with some red trim, they looked a little fancier than average. There were a couple of fine cloths one might use for cleaning fancier items like silverware or jewelry, a small jar of polishing paste, a box containing some more exotic spices than the ones she currently possessed and a little book of recipes.
Broom smiled as she reclaimed the items "We think We might like Our other selves. Since We are or were Them, There shouldn't be any problem taking these." She carefully packed away the newfound treasures in the ever handy magical haversack.
The door at the end of the hall on the right was blocked by rubble, evidence of another collapse, but the door midway down the hall was unlocked and even partially open. Once entered, it was clear someone had already been in here. The handles of dozens of drawers frowned down from the faces of numerous matching cabinets. Many of the drawers were open and their contents - volumes’ worth of stray parchment and scattered folders - blanketed the floor.
A few minutes inspection revealed the personal histories and treatment records of Briarstone’s patients, titled by name and neatly recorded by date and full of patient histories, staff notes, and treatment regimens. The room’s recent ransacking had destroyed much of the room’s former meticulous order. While the PCs could probably find details on the background of almost any of the asylum’s patients here, it would take hours to do so and result only in largely mundane trivia.
It is quite likely their own files were in here somewhere, though, and that might make taking the time worthwhile.
John flips through a file that has his name and description on it.
"There was a girl I loved ... but I barely remember her."
"How can they take away memories like that?"
Broom looked about the room in dismay. While the others searched for papers related to their former lives, she only saw a mess that used to be meticulously organized. Each folder had names that went into them and each report had a collection of dates that put the papers in order. Unlike other messes that simply had a vague notion of needing to be cleaned, this one had a strong sense of needing to be put back into the proper order.
Broom began to gather the papers and folders together. She might not have enough time to sort them out now, but she intended to put them back in their proper place later. As she did so, a flood of thoughts invaded her mind. She recognized that many of them were not her own, they were from the Others who's minds she often touched when searching for answers to a question. They were meticulous in their organization of knowledge and as she tried to put everything back into place their knowledge bled into her mind.
Still, even with their skills in organizing information, she wished that she had some help in putting everything back together. Almost as if in answer to her desire, a part of her instinctively recalled an arcane formula. Without much thought, Broom muttered the strange words that came to her mind and her hands wove an alien incantation. She wasn't sure what had just happened until suddenly there was a stirring in the papers around her.
A bunch of the pages stacked together seemingly of their own accord an then raised up as if being offered to her. She looked at the stack floating in mid air with amazement. Her eyes slowly went wide and she covered her mouth as a wide grin grew over her face. She didn't know exactly what happened, but she knew that she had conjured it.
Broom tentatively reached out to try and touch whatever was offering her the papers, but felt nothing. She accepted to pile of reports and watched with wonder as the invisible helper proceeded to collect another sheaf of papers and offer them to her.
She turned to the group and whispered with joy "Do you see this? We made it! We don't know how, but isn't it great!"
Broom became more solemn as John asked his question. "We have been remembering a lot of stuff, but it hasn't been Our own memories." She looked down at the pile of papers in her hands. "why can We remember other people's thoughts but not Our own? Maybe the answers are in these papers. We will sort them out and maybe help everyone remember their own thoughts."
With the help of the unseen assistant she began putting reams of paper into her magical pack until it was full. This evening she would have to put them in order and help everyone remember.
John, a little disturbed, watches the papers moving around on their own as if ghosts were sorting the files.
"That's great Broom...." he says without conviction as she shows off her haunted reports.
Broom did not know that the magical pack could be filled up, but somehow she had done it. With the pack unable to take any more, she look at everything that was remaining "We will just have to come back later to do a proper job"
"Keep stacking the papers up until we leave, then follow us" she told her unseen companion.
The pages dutifully continued to form neat piles as Broom turned her attention to the door. She reached out and tried the handle, only to find the door locked. "Can anyone open this?" she asked hopefully.
"Yes, let's try that door." John says, happy to have something to take his mind off Broom's haunted paperwork.
Just like the larger room, this smaller room was crowded with more filing cabinets, these arranged along the walls. The filing cabinets looked like the room's only features except for one spot where a dreary, battered old painting of a somber, towering structure hung on the wall.
Unlike the files in the larger records room, the files here all recorded more disturbing and sometimes supernatural phenomena that plagued the asylum and its patients. While hundreds of unexplained events and brutal dramas unfold in these pages, the group didn't see anything that seemed related to their current dilemma.
See handout.
The general takeaway is that the Zandalus the PCs have heard from multiple people about is much changed from the silent artist detailed in these accounts, and that a Count Lowls has a special interest in the man.
In addition to the records there is a locked lockbox and a short sword in a crimson scabbard. The pommel is sculpted in the shape of a cardinal and an etched gold band bears the name Red Destiny.
(+1 for traps)
"Hey Broom, there are lots more records in this office."
Broom entered the little room with curiosity. The horrors of the last few rooms had already faded from her mind. Inside she was happy to see that all the files and papers were still in order. Her only misgiving was that the place looked a little dusty.
With everything in the room already largely in order, Broom turned her attention to the picture. She stood before it admiring the painting and wondering about its dour subject when something caught her eye; the frame was just a little crooked.
She tried to adjust the picture but found that it kept sliding askew. As she peered behind the frame to see if she could re-adjust the way it was hung she noticed a little brass latch in the wall.
"This looks important." she said, drawing everyone's attention to her find. She carefully took the painting down and without hesitation pulled the latch and opened the little recess to reveal its contents.
"Nice catch Broom. I should have thought to look behind that painting." John says to Broom.
Do you want to read these records while I try to open this box?"
"Seems like it is stuck....."
"That looks like a fancy sword. I wonder why they locked it up in here?" John says as they examine the contents of the cubby.
"Must have belonged to a patient."
"Open the box." Broom said to the air beside her. A moment later the box shuddered a bit as the unseen servant tried without success to open the lid. "We can't open a lock without breaking it" she said apologetically.
Broom looked at the sword "Do you suppose Red Destiny is the name of the blade, or the person who used to wield it?" she asked to no one in particular. She stared off into the distance as her mind wandered to see if she could find anything special about the name.
John will pull the lockbox out of the safe and set it on the desk.
"We may have to leave this here and come back later for it. I don't think we can carry it with us, and I can't open it right now." John says to the others.
When Broom asks about the sword, John asks "Can you tell if it is magical, or if it is just sentimental for some reason?"
Xander murmurs the words of a spell and grunts appreciatively. "It's definitely magic. Strong, too."
Broom couldn't remember any stories about a sword called Red Destiny, though she did recall a vampire general called the Red Cardinal who served under the Whispering Tyrant for centuries before being destroyed by Arazni in the last few years of the Shining Crusade.