Fear of the Dark [IC, DM: Ur-Quan]

[Ur-Quan]

As your party was traveling, you decided to camp for the night, as usual. One of you was holding watch. The whole night passed by uneventfully, but as more and more time passes, you notice there's no sun rising after this moonless night.

The sky seems to be completely dark, now, without even stars to light it, and the surrounding area is gloom and invisible in the darkness. Everything you see is your camping equipment around you and the short undergrowth of the forest below you. Not even a tree is in the range of your fire, which is rapidly dying, without any reason at all.

[SlyJohnny]

Doxx, the dwarven tracker who's been with you for a week now, rubs at his eyes as he stares out at the sky, wondering if he's going mad. He normally has such a good sense of time. The sun not rising exactly when his mind is condition to believe it will just strikes him as wrong. He turns back to his partymembers, and each is woken in turn by him gently shaking you, and by the feel of his long, ropelike moustache batting against your face as he leans down to wake you.

"Hey. Hey! Wake up, y'all! Somethin' ain't right. I swear I ain't crazy, but it's well past dawn, and sun ain't coming. Fire's dyin'. Look alive and put a hand to a weapon. We oughta move." he murmurs, urgently.

Doxx peers out over the blackness, trying to calculate where they are, where the nearest settlement is. He produces a rope and passes it to the first person to stir to wakefulness.

"Figger we oughta be roped together like we're explorin' a cave. Should move out, see if this is just some magic trick, if it gits better further out."

((Knowledge (Geography): [roll0] ))

[Ur-Quan]

You can't see anything. You're pretty sure that isn't natural. Fire's all embers now. As you try to determine your location, you also notice there's no wind blowing, none at all.

[The Big Orc]

Waking slowly, Milo pushes his waker away, saying "If the sun hasn't risen yet, then should we not take advantage of it by sleeping a little longer?" Finally realizing how dark it was, the small halfling will grab his bag and pull out a candle. Lighting it with his flint, he will walk to the edge of the camp with a dagger in his other hand, looking out to see if anything is coming.

[NeoSeraphi]

Marcus yawns and sits up. "By Gruumsh, I swear I will cut up the bloke who just woke me up." The half-orc stretches and then opens his eyes, frowning as he realizes that the night sky hasn't lifted yet.

"Doxx..." Marcus says, his anger slowly reaching its peak, "why did you wake us up before the sun rose? I ought to grab my axe and...huh?"

Marcus looks down at the ground, confused. He can't see his axe. Or the ground for that matter. Rubbing his eyes again, Marcus reopens them and is shocked. The ground is completely blocked out by darkness, as is the sky and everything else.

"Nine Hells! What's going on? Doxx, can you see anything? It's like someone blindfolded me! This isn't any ordinary night sky!"

[SlyJohnny]

Doxx passes out the rope to Marcus. "Way I figger it, we got two options. We sit tight here for a spell, hope it passes us by. Or we pick a direction and start walkin'. Mebbe it's like a squall, mebbe we'll just walk right out from under it and things'll be normal. An' I don't like the idea of just sittin'. You an' me, we got our darkvision. We should take point."

Doxx encourages the others to tie his rope around their bellies, so they're all tied to one another, even if they can't see each other in the dark. He pulls a sunrod from his belt, looking at it reflectively. Then he strikes it across the coarse part of his chin stubble, lighting it up. He wonders if sunrods will work properly in this gloom.

[Ur-Quan]

Both the Sunrod and the candle glow brigtly for a fraction of a second and then die out, leaving only dim, ember-like light illuminating maybe a 10-15 centimeter radius.

In the moment the items flash, you notice one huge winged and horned creature at a close distance.

[Jheska]

Anita screams at the shape that quickly vanished in the darkness, swift to smother over their lights. Panting heavily, heart racing she murmured a swift spell to herself, fingers dancing through arcane symbols as she scans the area for magic. This darkness is too unnatural.

"Did everyone see that?" She asks, clinging on to the rope around her. "Doxx, whats going on?"

((also cast detect magic, spellcraft roll if there is [roll0]))

[Ur-Quan]

As you concentrate on detecting magic, you get overwhelmed by an aura. You faint for a second and collapse on your bottom before composing yourself. The aura emmanates all around you, most powerfully from the direction of the recently seen apparition.

[Aika]

OOC: Do I have my spells ready or do I need to pray for them first?

[hr]

IC:

Loud voices pierced through the dreams of the sleeping black-haired human girl. Her eyes squinting, Armine sat up straight and groaned, "can't you shut up someone's slee---". She abruptly stopped talking as it dawned to her that they were covered by vast darkness.

Darkness was one of Armine's greatest fears. Her tendencies and issues attack whenever faced with darkness. But this time was more difficult since the shadows were so thick that it led her to the feeling that she was alone, a perfect recipe for a psychosomatic attack.

Armine's whole body was shaking. Her throat felt dry and her insides felt like being twisted. Her hand on her chest, clutching her very clothing while feeling her chest tightened. "SOMEONE BRING FORTH LIGHT!" she cried.

[The Big Orc]

Milo fumbles around to find one of his daggers, "Who goes there? Friend or foe?"

Listen check to attempt to locate the creature we saw in the flash [roll0]

[SlyJohnny]

The arrow is flying from Doxx's bow towards the creature a scant moment after the darkness envelopes it once more. The distinctive thwack of the bow string impacting against his thick leather bracer sounds very loud, over everyone's alarmed whisperings.

((To hit: [roll0] +1 if Point Blank shot applies. Damage: [roll1]))

He stares into the darkness after the arrow, wondering if he hit anything.

"Cain't rightly say." he murmurs, apparently answering Anita. He nocks another arrow to his bow as he speaks. "Normally, I see at least a little even when I'm a mile underground with no light to speak of. But darkvision ain't cuttin' it here. This here, tain't no normal darkness."

His eyes flick over to Armine, full of concern, but then his gaze turns back towards the direction of his quarry, not willing to take his attention away from where it appeared. "We're trying, ma'am. Candle don't cut it, sunrod don't cut it, fires dyin'. Hey, we're gonna be just fine. Not to fret."

He slowly lowers his bow to get a better look at the ground ahead. He takes a step backwards, half turning and walking away from the direction he saw the creature.

"Y'all tied in to the rope, there? Good. Now that everyone's all woked up... what say we just... slide on out of these here woods? I'll take point."

[NeoSeraphi]

Marcus felt around for his axe and picked it up, charging towards the creatures just before the light passed out. He closed his eyes and tried to listen carefully, sensing the air around him as best he could. Gripping the handle of his axe carefully, he readied himself, preparing to swing as soon as the creature attacked him.



Listen Check: [roll0]

[Aika]

Upon hearing Doxx asked if everyone had he rope tied around their waists, Armine quickly set her hands on the ground and tried to feel the rope on the ground while heaving and making throwing-up sounds . "Rope...rope...arggghhh...ROPE!"

[Ur-Quan]

Your arrow breaks with a distinctive sound that means you've probably hit a wall. You can't hear anything but the strong sound of the shot.

[Jheska]

Anita picks herself off the floor shakily, her spell broken perhaps fortunately by a bout of unconsciousness. "We..." she gulps and takes a moment to compose herself. "We're in the strongest magic I've ever seen."

She twists around wishing there were light, any light by which to see. "We need to get out of here but if that thing is making the darkness then we probably mean nothing to it. I.."

"I think this might be it."

((knowledge arcana: [roll0]))

[NeoSeraphi]

Marcus snarled. "You want us to get out of here? Fine then, why don't you lead the way? Oh that's right, we can't see you!" He was really upset. The grip on his axe was shaky. He had slaughtered goblins, bears, and even managed to take down a tiger with his fellow hunters before. But this?

The creatures themselves didn't bother him in the slightest. If they stopped being cowards and showed themselves to him, Marcus could cleave through them in an instant. But Marcus had never met a foe he could not best with his Strength. This was a new feeling...Marcus was afraid.

He couldn't hear anything other than his comrades bickering. They had no more control over the situation than he did. Not even that bloody spellcaster. What was magic good for if she couldn't even light a torch?

Marcus's fear started to grip him. These bastards weren't playing fair. It was only a matter of time before they struck. He started to back away, towards what he hoped was the campsite, though of course he couldn't see anything.

Marcus tripped over something as he backed up, falling down on his back, wincing in pain and willing himself to stand up.

[SlyJohnny]

"Lemme help you there. Milo, could you see to Anita?" Doxx moves rapidly to the half-orcs side, grabbing his arm and hauling him up. He dusts him off with an affected casual air, and then murmurs "Marcus. You're the strongest of us. Others are lookin' to you for protection. Cain't have you panicking and mouthing off scared like this. Look, there's somethin' out there what don't mean you no good. But. It ain't come for you yet. And if you weren't no threat to it, it woulda just chewed you up by now, right? I figger it's waiting for it's moment. It don't want to face a big feller like you unless all it's cards are flush. Now you're tied to me on the rope. Follow close and I'll see us all out of here. I swear to it."

He slaps Marcus on the shoulder and heads over to where he can hear Armine scuffling around on the ground. "Would you mind holding this for me, ma'am?" He murmurs quietly, moving his gently-glowing sunrod directly under her face, putting the light close enough to the ground that it'll help look for the rope, and also so it will illuminate both their faces. "I'm scared too, ma'am. We've got to get out of this here dark, and that means we got to move. Doesn't Pelor say that the longest night is always followed by the brightest dawn?" He smiles reassuringly, hoping he didn't mangle the half-remembered scriptural quote too badly. "You're a preacher. These people look up to you, an' they need you. We all need to be brave. Why don't you keep ahold of that light, there?" he says, passing it to her. He helps her locate the rope, and then lights another sunrod for himself, tucking it behind up on one of the straps of his backpack.

"Well, folks... you can put your boots in the oven, but that don't make em biscuits. My arrow hit somethin' solid that didn't sound like a tree, over there. I say we move there. We're all tied to each other, so noone will get lost. Y'all ready to move?"

Doxx begins to head off in the direction he fired the arrow, as soon as the others say they are ready.

[The Big Orc]

"Hmm, I would be glad to see to Anita, if I could see Anita. However, I suppose I could just feel around in the dark," Milo states as he starts to wave his hands around, trying to figure out were Anita is.

[NeoSeraphi]

Marcus stood up, grumbling and grabbed onto the rope that was wrapped tightly around his waist. He started pulling and walking slowly, following Doxx towards the rest of the group. "Milo, speak louder. I'll find you and tie you to the rope, so we can stay together."