Descent into the Depths of the Waterworks

[Jim Roberts]

[Feb 5 AM – The Waterworks]

> So it was only a matter of moments before Laurelin could call out
> lightly, “Oh, boys? Thank you for guarding the corridor, but you can
> look now.”
>
> And now they could set off into the deeper depths of the Waterworks,
> opening up the range between themselves and the blood soaked
> battleground.

The Abbot’s Away Team made all due haste leaving the scene of the Great
Goat Slaughter. Not exactly hurrying, and most certainly not running…
but nobody thought that delay would be prudent. The amount of blood
liberally sprayed around the battlescene, and now draining and flowing
who knew where, would quite likely be attracting attention.

But as of yet, nothing more horrific than a blood sucking leech, its
presence more guessed at rather than seen in some rancid water, came
across their path. Though the Glowing Globe made certain to alert
Laurelin to its presence.

Shortly after the Goat Abattoir, the underground corridor turned
northwards as expected per their map. And not long after that, again as
expected, they came to another large room with an expected “crossroads”.
Per the map, the eastern fork should dead end at the last sighting
report of Crumble, the giant forlorn rust monster, as well as a surface
exit that needed to be cleared. The north branch would lead even deeper
into the Waterworks, wending its way through a series of side branches,
many ending in surface exits, and one the last known sighting of
Gnarkill, the elf hating Troll Hunter. And beyond that… a possible
location of Ecru.

First, however, they had to overcome this next room, which at a quick
glance from the doorway seemed every bit as large as “The Room With Four
Bridges” that had occupied so much time earlier that morning. And this
room, too, appeared to have a drop off, though leading to what was not
visible from the doorway. However, the stone floor extended out some
ways before coming to an abrupt edge, and the shadowy impressions of
stone walkways could just be glimpsed.

Laurelin sighed, and signalled for the rope. As it was being secured
about her, the priestess was staring intently at her Glowing Globe,
clearly giving it some new instructions as it drifted closer to once
again hover over her shoulder. Once again, she would take point
wandering into the room, backed up by Finfin’s Feather Fall, should the
floor give way, buying her time to either activate her Boots – or to
rely on the rope. Having a backup was always a fine notion.

Soon afterwards, the Valyan priestess gingerly stepped into the room,
and when nothing untoward happened, mentally commanded her Globe to
activate its brightest possible glow. Even the humans found themselves
blinking at the welcome but piercing bright light, while Laquendi had to
shield her eyes to give them a rather more gentle transition away from
Darkvision.

And soon, everyone could see the entirety of the room with its central,
brilliant illumination. It was, broadly speaking, on two levels, with
their entry point, the priestess, and the exit Northwards on the upper
level. The far side of the room, however, was connected to the near side
by a series of narrow stone walkways, stretching out over an open space
below. Though any who wished to avoid such a narrow space could stick to
the left quarter of the room, where some twenty feet of wide flooring
offered a safer passage from the near to far edges. Just why the SJE, or
whoever had designed this room, had built in in this manner, was
entirely opaque to the Tall People visitors.

Looking over the dropoff, Laurelin could see that rather than a pool of
unknown and probably vile liquid as found in the Bridge Room, down below
some ten feet or so was another stone flagged floor, no more damp than
what they were already standing upon. A nearby ladder led from the upper
deck to the lower level… and on the east wall of the “basement” or lower
level was another valve controlled door.

This was their intended direction, if they were to stick to the plan of
attending to Crumble and the nearest of the exits first. Otherwise, that
would leave a known Nastie and lots of unexplored space at their backs,
something that nobody relished.

“Now this,” Laquendi observed bluntly, nodding towards the ladder, “is
once again in MY wheelhouse.” Nobody seemed inclined to argue, and
instead the Away Team escorted the silver haired elf towards the ladder.
Just in case, it was now Laquendi’s turn with the safety line, on the
chance that the floor below turned out to be illusionary, or some such
twisted crock. And gingerly, she eased herself down the ladder, testing
each and every step at a time.

Before reaching the floor, however, the dusky elf paused, and with one
hand firmly wrapped around the ladder, carefully extracted her poka
pole. After extending it fully, she used it to stoutly tap the floor
below. It was solid, and did not suddenly crumble away. Nor did anything
dramatic happen when Laquendi gingerly stepped onto the lower level’s
flagstones. Or even when, using the ladder as a support, she firmly
stomped on it, doing her best to simulate the impact of Abbot Kenobi’s
armored footfalls. Laquendi did not look exactly happy with the result,
as this was by no means a closed form PROOF that the area was safe… but
it was as good as could be obtained in the circumstances.

None of the silver haired elf’s silent predictions about what COULD go
wrong happened as one by one, the rest of the Away Team descended the
ladder, though all stuck together as they then moved on towards the
eastern door. Here, Laquendi peered intently at the floor mounted valve.
It looked like every other door control they’d seen so far, but that did
not mean that THIS one was somehow safe, and dutifully, she did her best
to check the mechanism before giving its wheel a spin. And the metal
door slid open with the usual metallic screech, leading to more corridor
beyond.

The Away Team arranged themselves into their refined “march order”, with
the three elves up front, Jeyshann, Tramma, and Lomi several paces back,
and Ben holding up the rear. And once again, Laurelin’s Glowing Globe
had been instructed to both dial back its illumination, as well as to
follow the priestess at a distance that roughly had it always around the
Abbot. This allowed the humans to see well enough to avoid walking into
the usual pitfalls present in this glorified storm drain, while not
fouling the elven nightsight, boosted by an elven friendly “con light”
coin held by the fair folk ahead. And best of all, it allowed Laquendi’s
tuned Darkvision to probe a long distance into the gloom.

After a few minutes march past the two level junction room, Laquendi
hissed, and first the elves, and then the humans stopped. “Ahead,” she
breathed quietly. “A shadow among the shadows on the ceiling. It is
moving. Slowly, and towards us.”

Sadly, even as excellent as Laquendi’s Darkvision was, it could not
penetrate the dense blackness.

“Folks?” Lomi asked. “Can anyone cast a Light spell on one of my arrows?
I can light it up, if you tell me how far ahead it is.”

“Best not to actually hit it,” Laquendi quietly warned.

Meanwhile, Laurelin reached into a seldom opened quiver, and carefully
extracted a single arrow. Lomi looked blankly at the offered weapon.
“You’d rather I use one of yours?”

Jeyshann hissed in annoyance, not (for once) at any of the people
present, but at being left out of something. “It is an ELF arrow, Lomi
Long Legs. It probably has a light blessing that only THEY can see.” A
nod from the elves confirmed the speculation.

Shrugging, Lomi nocked the arrow, and sent it precisely into the wall at
the updated range estimation. For a brief moment, all of the elves could
see what Laquendi had noticed. A blob of pure darkness, nearly as wide
as the corridor and twice as long, slithering along the ceiling towards
them. Details were hard to make out, probably less because of the brief
duration of its illumination, and more because there really did not
appear to BE any details to be seen.