Showdown at Elaine's

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Tuesday 3rd June

Smorgus Bord - Male Halfling Thief - Ian Luxton
A la Carte - Ogre Strength-Fighter - Darryl Sherwood
Polly Ester - Female Human Bard - Andrew Earl
Finn Finnegan - Male Halfling F/T - Jeff Clendon
Ulotta Puck-off - Female Shield Maiden Parry-Fighter - Edwin Muir
Arzie Vandit - Male Halfling Thief - Adrian McKinnon
DM - Steven Krijnen

I (Polly) decided to go for a reconnoitre to the town Barracks to try to
get a hold of Captain Alcatraz.

En route I was assailed by arrows, shot from a two-storey building, some
of which had sticky green goo on them. Thus I beat a somewhat hasty retreat.

Back at Elaine Gilmore's mansion, I collected Smorgus, Ulotta and Arzie.
A la Carte was still unconscious and Finn had not returned from his
night's adventuring - or was dead.

We snuck and skulked back to the Arrow building. Staying at street-level,
Ulotta would provide a solid target for the felons while we snuck up
behind them from roof top. So us brave three climbed the side of the
building and stalked our prey. There were two of them, backs to us,
surveying the street.

I signalled to Ulotta that there were two, but she wasn't looking:
Daydreaming, window-shopping, and searching for turnip-shaped clouds.
We saw her go down. No arrows. Just drop. Either invisible felons or
powerful magicks (like Sleep, for instance).
'Arrows at the ready, boys,' I signed in Thieves' Cant. 'Take the guy
on the left.'
We fired. One hit, one bounced on his chainmail and one missed.
They took cover as did we.
We skulked about. They must have too. Because we were surprised - an
arrow and magic. Colourful lights (Colour Spray) stunned Arzie,
he dropped, and slid off the roof crashing two-storeys to the
cobbled road below, landing on his skull.

Myself and Smorgus returned fire both targeting the wizard. We had
the satisfaction of seeing him drop as we both passed out from the
same spell. And Smorgus, the 1-hp wonder, taking an arrow to boot.
When I came round, there was no sign of the arrow firer. Smorgus
was in the last signs of poisoning. Luckily, I had a Neutralize
Poison potion on my person and administered this to the sickly
hobbit.
The wizard's body was there and I recovered his Spell Book.
Being a bard, my road to magic begins! I also decapitated him
and took his head - to claim reward.

Back down on the street revealed that Arzie was only unconscious
and a bit unwell, the bone of his skull saving his life by
collapsing inwards, like a chocolate Easter egg, into the soft
tissue padding of his brain.
Ulotta had come around by now. I managed to draw her attention
away from the gaily decorated shop window displays and the
turnip-shaped clouds enough to help carry the two halflings
back to Elaine's.

We got back, but only just in time.
An ugly rake-wielding crowd had arrived and they started to hurl
oil flasks and rocks at Elaine's mansion.
"Give us the ogre!" they kept howling.
Across the street, wizards had taken up positions on the roofs.
No sign of any town guards.

We taunted the ugly crowd by yelling abuse and invective.
Strangely enough, this only enraged them more. But none were
brave enough to charge. They just kept up the relentless assault
of oil and rocks. At some stage, some wag ignited all the oil
that now soaked the tinder-dry mansion.
As we predicted, Elaine had powerful magics in place so the
fire didn't actually do any damage. With this new-found sense
of protection, we upped the insults and abuse.

I shaved the head of the wizard we had beheaded (from the
roof-top), stuck it on a pole, built a makeshift body out of
some of Vicki's old clothes and pieces of Elaine's priceless
antique furniture, and paraded this grotesque manikin in front
of an upstairs window shouting out "I'm a psi, I'm a psi.
I'm going to head-pop you all!"

In hindsight, this probably was not such a good idea with all
those wizards about (wizards *hate* psis). The next thing I
knew there was a mighty crack and a large gout of lightning
blew the manikin to pieces.
We laughed hard - well, those of us who were still conscious
anyway - secure in the knowledge that that wizard had wasted
three power points to blow up a stupid manikin.

Elaine arrived back and was not very pleased.
Especially seeing all the bodies on her ground floor, all her
windows broken, her estate grounds aflame, and lots of her
furniture smashed to be used as barracades.
She kept on whining "what are you going to do with all those
bodies?" gesturing to the corpses from Vicki's wrath
littering the floor.
What did she expect? Hurl them at the crowd?
And she blithely refused suggestions to animate them and walk
them outside, shambling to the crowd.

Ulotta had an idea, so we got Elaine to Teleport her into the
centre of the Town Barracks.
Here, Ulotta actually found poor old Captain Alcatraz, who
was now quite mad, and the rest of the (honest) town Militia
who had barracaded themselves into the Barracks. This place
was also surrounded by an ugly crowd.

Finn turned up with Ulotta. He had been out visiting Sandy.
There was no sign of Randy and his thieves anymore, so Sandy
and her mob had moved into town.

We now have the job to quell the riot.
And, I guess, satiate poor Elaine, whose house in now in
rather a mess.