“This is a nice change. No nasty monsters, tricky statues or men with nasty
explosive sticks trying to take our heads off.”
“Just rows of odd instruments and a weird looking roundabout in the
middle of the room. Merlissa, do you know where we are?”
“It is an ancient laboratory, where the Astromancers first began to plot
the stars. That is an orrerry.”
“With one too many syllables, if you ask me.”
“Can we use it?” asks Getrude. “Can we find out how to defeat these
pernicious invaders we keep running across?”
“Or locate the room with the Greatest Treasure the World has Never
Seen?”
“Worth a stab.”
“There’s a lever.”
“Woof!”
“Yes, I know, Scruff, but Gnawbone’s gone off on his own now. We’ll just
have to figure out how to pull it by ourselves.”
Getrude grabs the lever, pulls. There’s a whir of orbs and planets,
gears and chains. A brass arrow shifts across a map of the known universe (that
is, the Chambers of Challenge and Challenge Island). There’s a little green
stick man in one corner. Using a digital interface (i.e. her finger) Merlissa
moves the little man onto the map. It grows larger, and larger, pictures of the
many rooms they’ve visited scrolling before their eyes.
Until they light on one
that’s unfamiliar. What looks like a mass of tangled straw, with bones sticking
from it, and something unidentifiable trickling across the floor.
“The Lair of the BEAST”, says Merlissa. “We’ve not been there. Yet.”
“The beast?”
“No! The BEAST! With REALLY BIG LETTERS! And, ideally, BOLD
ITALICS and a couple of really offensively large exclamation marks!! It’s where the
greatest monsters in all the land gather for purposes no-one has every
successfully escaped from to report on. It looks like your precious Gnawbone,
now he’s a monster, is heading there to join them.”
“Ah,” says Elfbow. “Then, probably, perhaps, all things considered – I
guess he’s managing quite well on his own. Doesn’t need our help, is my guess.”
“And what’s through that door behind you, Merlissa?”
Merlissa considers the exit in question, a solid oak door set squarely
in the far wall.
“What, that door there? Hmm. I’m not sure. Let me enquire.”
She peers intently at the orrery, then glances at her crystal ball.
“Whoa!” she says, after a moment. “I see great danger. Could be a
Rakshasa. Might be a pack of rabid wolves. Yes, definitely dangerous Encounters
of the Furred Kind. Looks like we really don’t want to go in there. Unless….”
“Unless what?”
“Let me borrow that stick of yours, elf. I need to check something.”
Elfbow pulls his glittering spear away from her defensively.
“What, don’t you trust me? Didn’t my infinite knowledge of that pointy
stick just save our lives in the last room?”
Elfbow squints suspiciously at Merlissa.
“Ok, then,” she says, shrugging. “You try it yourself. Just tap that
door with the stick. I’m absolutely sure there’s no real chance of peril.”
“Here you are,” says Elfbow, tossing the spear to Merlissa. “But I want
it back, mind.”
Tentatively Merlissa approaches the exit. She raises the spear as if to
strike the door, then stops as if she has suddenly noticed something, bending
towards the door handle, quizzically. Then, of a sudden, she grabs it, twists,
pulls, and steps into the doorway.
“You stupid elf, I knew I’d persuade you sooner or later. This, you
pointed ear leaflover, is the Spear of Density. It can change any substance to
any other substance at the tap of a tap. With it I can make gold as light as
air, and carry the entire Snowlord’s treasury back to my master, Grimwizaj,
and he will at last give me the nose job I desire! And this, to answer your
question, is the door to the Snowlord’s Treasury! Rhinoplasty here I come!”
With that she
sweeps through the door, slamming it behind her. Elfbow rushes after her, but
it’s too late, the door has been turned to solid stone almost as impenetrable
as the elf’s head, inseparable from the walls around it.
"I knew she was up to something," screeches Elfbow. "I knew it. That scrawny-lipped scryer is as two-faced as a pair of lizards."
And at that
moment, just as you’d expect, in the corridor behind them there are sounds of approaching gunfire …
***
Next, and, ideally, with more than undue haste, I'm hoping for a sorceress. Anyone seen one passing by?
The orrerry is by Terrain Crate. I wish I'd seen Sander's before painting mine, as he had a great idea for a worn out version, to make a virtue of the bendy plastic. Mine isn't supposed to look worn out - it just does! I like the rendering of the planets, though.
Scoring: 20 points for the Laboratory and perhaps 2 for the Orrerry? Total: 22
