Part 19 - 31 Leagues Beneath the Sea. Another Town Bites the Dust.

When we get back the town seems quieter than usual. All the guards are sleeping. It made sense for them to sleep during the day when the danger seemed to come at night. Melinda was still fast asleep with the unicorn in our mud hut, but the fire has long since burned out. I go to find more wood in case we stay longer.

Everyone knew when Kedra returned, “That was amaaaaaazing!” she said exuberantly, and louder than necessary, “Is this what you do aaaaall the time?” As Kedra keeps talking my mind goes blank and my vision blurs. Her words seem to come faster and faster like uncontrollable diarrhea. Suddenly my neck prickles and I’m snapped back into reality as she says, “Can I come with you?”

The others are silent, but I’ve decided to put my foot down, “You know Kedra, there aren’t that many people who speak giant here. What if you’re town has problems with other giants? There seems to be lots of giants in this area. Your services are invaluable to this town. They need you here.”

Perhaps Kedra could hear the blandness of my tone or maybe it was the bleak stare I was giving her, but she seemed to get the hint…and left crying.

Melinda wakes close to dinner time and rushes off. We find her and Roselyn in the infirmary, and tell them that we’d dealt with the giants.

And then Kedra is there. When she finds us she’s her warm bubbly self again, and she’s gloating about going on an adventure with…ARAJA??? Wha-wha-whaaaaat? I guess someone thought it would be funny to undermine my life saving desire to leave – her – here!

Isaac gets down to business and asks Melinda more questions about the Well and her master. The story is the same. Her master tried to enchant an item with an anti magic field, but just as he was about to complete the spell, he was dragged down into the well. Several rescue attempts were made, all of which were unsuccessful, and the rescuers themselves were never seen again.

When Isaac mentions the Under Dark, Melinda pulls out a book, “That’s what Sven was talking about!” she says mysteriously, “He was researching this!”

It turns out Sven was Melinda’s teacher and he’d been trying to find a way into the Under Dark for some time. Why would he want to go there? I think, shuddering. That was his reason for coming to Rhem because of stories heard and his desire to learn more. Melinda thinks Sven is still alive and contemplates a way to go to the Under Dark. It would also explain why none of our magic items worked. Sven’s anti magic field was indeed working.

“Tell you what,” I say, business like, “We’ve all ready been down there and know what its like. On our first trip down, we lost a lot of our gear that we’re really interested in getting back. If we help you find Sven, will you help us get our stuff back?”

Melinda’s face glows, “The Gnomes!” she says aloud and rushes off. We follow her as fast as we can. Along the way she tells us about a ship the Gnomes have been repairing that can supposedly submerge itself under water. Perhaps we could use the vessel as a means to safely get into the Under Dark and collect our lost gear.

We come to a shed where the sounds of Gnomes feverishly pounding and banging away at metal rings toward us. The ship is like one I’ve never seen before…a tin can with holes all over it…actually it was more like a metal turd that when dropped into water, the water would separate out of its way, allowing it to plunge unceremoniously, until it splattered flat against the hard bottom of the sea…

We’re to set out at dawn the next morning. The Gnomes have assured us that all repairs would be complete by then. They seem overly eager for a chance to try out their…new toy.

For understandable reasons, I was unable to sleep that night. Not only was the ground hard, wet, and cold, but visions of us plunging back into the acidic waters of the Under Dark in the Tin Turd had me tossing and rolling in my sleep. Araja had an anxiety attack and feinted just before she finally found rest, but at least she got some sleep! It wasn’t until I saw the sky lightening with the rising of the sun that I finally blacked out from fatigue.

I’m rudely awakened a short while later and it’s time to go! Breakfast is over, and Isaac and Araja are dragging me to my feet and shoving me out the door! Melinda meets us as we head toward Rhem. Isaac asks her about the integrity of the ship, but all Melinda can tell us is that the Gnomes have everything under control! Am I losing my mind? Is this a dream?

We find the sorry excuse of scrap metal – that looks more like a 21^st century car wrapped around a telephone pole from high velocity – sitting on its keel near the well. The Gnomes are still pounding away, making adjustments here and there. Some of them look like their pounding just to hear the melodic sound of their hammers on steel. The sound was very familiar…like that pendulum that smashed that poor warrior against the wall in the dwarven ruins…

Anyway, Isaac devises an ingenious plan to launch the T.S.S. Halibut – as the Gnomes fondly called it – down the well. The only question now was what to do once the Halibut cleared the hole. There was still a long drop before it would hit the water. Those crafty Gnomes had an answer for that though, WINGS! In fact the wings were assembled on sight, and then attached willy-nilly to the sides of the ship like a two year old with super glue.

At this time Araja started having another anxiety attack and I couldn’t take it any longer. If we were going to die in this ship, I might as well get a good look inside the hull. Surprisingly, the interior of the ship was substantially better then the outside. I felt like I could live in there! Oddly enough, the interior of the ship is clearly more specious than the outside.

As we prepare to depart, Isaac, Melinda, Kedra, and the Gnomes drag a screaming Araja along like a pig to slaughter. They show us to the passenger quarters, which turns out to be a panic room for wary sea faring customers. The gnomes now show us to the real passenger quarters, but not before turning the lights out on Araja to conserve power. Tee, hee, hee!

We seat ourselves and before us is the control room. Glass walls separate our quarters from the control room and we can clearly see the Gnomes flying about like gerbils on crack as they press buttons and pull levers to get the ship going. The ship begins to shake and lurch. I grip the arm rests of my seat until my knuckles turn white. The ship groans as it finds its way into the chute and it deafeningly grates forward, gaining speed.

And then there was a feeling of weightlessness as gravity pulled my weight toward the ceiling against my restraints. We fall, and fall, and fall. The Gnomes scratch their heads and shrug to one another. They look back at us when they suddenly realize we’re watching. A couple of them hastily give us a thumbs up as they go back to pressing buttons and pulling levers. You’ve got to be kidding me –

Suddenly I fall back in my seat. The wings have deployed! The gnomes shout excitedly and high five each other, and belly bump, and then realize no one is at the controls. They hastily steer the ship in a wide arch, and the Halibut lands with a splash in the lake.

Again the Gnomes rejoice, “We’ve made it!” one shouts over the intercom. With more excitement than I care for. Their rejoicing is short lived as I feel the ship list to one side. Again the gnomes scramble until the ship is able to maintain equilibrium. Watching through the windows, we can see the ship sink, and sink, and sink, into the depths of the lake. “We’ve never made it this far without a fire!” I hear a Gnome say. My heart begins to race. You’ve done this before?

My heart begins to settle as the time passes, but all too soon a yellow light starts flashing. The Gnomes report numerous fires! They tell us no to worry and send some of their crew to deal with the problem. One Gnome returns a minute later, but the other doesn’t. The light begins to flash faster.

“Would one of you go check on Billy?” A Gnome asks, “He should have been back by now. He went to this room.” Isaac and Kedra bravely volunteer and go quickly to see what the problem is. The light continues to flash and a Gnome tells Melinda and I, if the light should go steady, we should press a button next to our chairs, but he doesn’t say why. Melinda and I exchange nervous looks and we watch the flashing lights intently.

Finally, the lights turn off. Isaac and Kedra return with an unconscious Gnome. After a very long time, and a couple more fire scares, the Gnomes announce they’ve detected the bottom! We were currently…30 miles deep…and the bottom was still a mile away. The Halibut gracefully hits the bottom. The strange lights that illuminated the lake before shine bright, but the silt from the lake bed makes it hard to see anything.

Then, a green light starts flashing. One of the Goblins gasps. Araja’s air supply was accidently turned off! We rush to go check on her with some of the Gnomes in the lead. Fortunately Araja appears to be fine. The Gnomes release her from her restraints and take us to the observatory, a large glass bubble at the bottom of the ship. Now that the silt has settled we can see items scattered all around! Now it’s just a matter of collecting it –

A large fin moves past one of the windows, then BOOM! The ship groans and shudders as it begins to roll to one side. I trip over a railing, but as the ship continues to roll, I land on my feet. The others manage to keep their footing. We make out way back on deck and buckle ourselves back in our seats. The Gnomes are rushing around in the control room again. They turn on some flood lights, which illuminate a gargantuan creature! As it swings around for another attack, the Gnomes prime our only defense.

A laser beam fires at the creature, but it misses and the ship rolls again. The Gnomes look back at us for a second as the T.S.S. Halibut makes an eerie groan. Suddenly the Gnomes scramble out of the room, pressing a button as they leave.

“Where are you going?” we shout. We struggle against our belts, but they won’t release us. Isaac frees himself just as Melinda says, “Hurry! We must get to the escape pod – ” A whooshing sound comes from outside the ship and we’re able to make out a tiny, round ship that’s hastily propelling away from us. The Gnomes had abandoned us!

Isaac hastily frees the rest of us and we make for the control room as the creature continues to assault the ship. Araja, Isaac, and I man the laser and land a few good hits, but soon more fires are breaking out, and suddenly the laser died! While Araja tries to fix the laser, Isaac, Melinda, Kedra, and I go to put out fires. We find where more extinguishers are stored and put them to use.

As I go from room to room, I realize there’s a lot of strange things stored on the ship. In room B there’s a lot of crates. I suppose that wasn’t so odd, but I didn’t have time to see what was inside. There were other fires to put out. There were some cargo nets in room E that looked like they were holding something against the wall – again, no time to look. Room F contained…plants?

I meet Melinda on our rounds. Her extinguisher is out and she warns me not to go into room Z because there was something strange in there… Now room C – the room we were getting the extra extinguishers from – was on fire. We quickly put out the fire and load up on more extinguishers. Then we discover the O room – the oxygen room – is on fire! But where is it? Neither Melinda nor I had discovered the room’s location and it wasn’t between room’s N and P. We’ve got to find it before the ship explodes!

Somehow we manage to get all the fires under control. The one in the O room must have burned out all on its own because we still haven’t been able to find it. When we return to the control room Araja reports that another creature seemed to have detoured the Abolyth – the creature that sought to destroy us.

With a moment of calm, go back to the observatory to see about collecting our items. Most anything that wasn’t made for durability would have been dissolved by the acid by now or broken due to the sheer pressure of the water.

Suddenly the silt stops glowing. A shadow falls over the ship and we can see the Abolyth decending toward us! A dark substance is leaking from it…moments later the Abolyth’s body lands in the silt, dead. As we look closer, the Abolyths body lurches once, twice, then we realize something is sucking it under the silt, as if eating it!

Araja tries to manipulate the controls to move the ship. The lights all around us continue to fade, and then it begins to come back. After repositioning the ship, we search for more items. We use the robotic arms to collect items and pull them into the ship. The light goes out again. Isaac concludes where the light isn’t glowing, magic doesn’t work.

There’s a thud against the ship. Isaac sends Brook to investigate. Brook finds lots of bones, and goo, and rocks. Melinda brought along a led box to store the stone that was enchanted with the anti magic field. But how do we go about collecting it and which one? Melinda then yields a led bag. With some repairs it would serve as a net we could use to scoop up a bunch of stones. We would know once we captured the stone that the light would return.

After a tape job that would have satisfied any school teacher…or Gnome for that matter… the bag is deemed fit for duty. We jerry rig the bag on one of the robotic arms, and after a few sweeps, we manage to capture the stone! With the stone successfully captured, we try to collect more items.

As time goes on, we suddenly see a spherical object floating down. It looks similar to the escape pod…only it’s in poor shape. Isaac sends Brook to check out the wrecked and twisted heap. He reports that there were no Gnomes inside. The hatch though, looked as if it’d been ripped off its hinges. I shudder not wanting to think of such a horrible death.

As we collect more items, others seem to be settling beneath the silt. We can see something stirring beneath the silt, as if sucking the items under. Unable to collect any more, I decide to explore the ship and check out how much oxygen we have left. At the control deck I discover our oxygen tanks are three quarters empty.

I find some pressure suits and a pressure lock in room P. I go back to room B to look in the crates and find a lot of buoys. The cargo room – room E – has tall fish tanks with six food eels inside, eww. I also find a note and pocket it. Room F – the room I found all the plants in – contained lots of flower looking plants. I’m careful to avoid them and find another note, which I take. As I’m exiting this room I bump into Melinda. I tell her about the strange flowers and she looks inside. She says some of the flowers are used in spell casting…I show her the note and then she runs off! I don’t think much of it and decide to head back to the deck.

I get back to the observatory in time as I hear a crack! Apparently Araja found her God slaying dagger, only it was imbedded in a stone tablet. When she tried to free it, the weight of the tablet broke one of the arms off. Now, the glass of the observatory was beginning to crack! We scramble out of the observatory and seal the room so if the glass were to shatter we wouldn’t be instantly killed by the water and pressure. I alert them that our oxygen is getting low and we should probably start thinking about returning to the surface…I hope we can get there…

Suddenly, out of one of the windows on the control deck, I see something moving through the silt. As the creature bob’s up again I see the Luggage! I ecstatically tell the others, dragging them to the window and point as the Luggage swallowed up an item.

I take Isaac to room P, but the pressure suits are much too small for either of us to fit. Isaac transforms himself into a Gnome – How noble! – puts on the pressure suit and hops in the air lock. I watch from the other side as water starts to fill the cabin. Once I see Isaac off, I go to put out more fires that have suddenly come to life.

When Isaac returns, not only does he have Araja’s dagger, but the Luggage as well! He looks pretty tattered though. The water hasn’t been good to him. Isaac fixes that with some cure spells from a wand it coughs up.

After a while I realize Melinda’s been gone for a long time. Isaac and I head for room Z. When we get there the door is jammed. As we try to pry it open, acidic water from the lake begins leaking through. We quickly close the door again. Isaac sends Brook inside. The room is filled with lake water. A window on the far side had broken, and Melinda…is dead. Brook says there was some sort of plant growing out of her. I tell Isaac about the plants and how Melinda seemed to be fascinated by them. We go to the room and see that it’s a mess. There are broken pots everywhere and some of the gray plants are missing… We seal the room.

With everything we need, we attempt to go back to the surface, but the ship seems to have no power. I tell everyone about the buoys in room B and hope to use them to float the ship back to the surface. Isaac volunteers to get back in the pressure suit – how noble! – to attach to buoys to the ship. More fires brake out. Was the ship finally giving up?

Finally the ship begins to rise! Isaac makes it back in the ship in time, as we float upward. A long while later, we breach the surface! We open the hatch and its pitch black. Isaac tries casting a spell and suddenly the darkness dissipates and we can see! Isaac lends me a pair of flying boots and with Kedra in tow, we fly out of the cave. The shell like structure begins to crumble around us an large chunks fall into the water and pummel the ship. We dodge the falling debris until we feel the warmth of the sun on our faces once again!

I’m afraid though, the city of Rhem is worse off than before. As we look down, we stare into the maw of a large crater that was once the city…

I see in the distance a slithering snake like creature rising from the ruined remains with a chain dangling behind it. It appears to have broken free from somewhere. The creature keen’s happily, but as soon as it see’s us, it bolts away. Isaac assures us the creature is nothing to be afraid of, though it was peculiar that someone would have it chained up. Araja and Kedra don’t seem to know anything about the creature.

Then, out of the rubble, another figure stirs. A bluish-white light seems to fly toward us. It looks like…a horse? There’s no time to react though, the creature swoops down, scoops me up and flies off with me screaming, “ISAAAAAAC!!!”