Session 11: Entry to Runespace Report

General Summary

Previously

• Almost 3 months after leaving Port Shurius, including about a month for a relatively quick transit through the Phlogiston, the Surprise has arrived at a crystal sphere that must be Runespace according to Hobart's charts. As we start the session, the ship is plunging into the portal, with the crew (human, Kzinti, goblin and syllix) at their stations, or secure below decks.

Entering Runespace

• Zayer is on the helm, and Windellian is on the Conn
• As the ship approaches the portal, the crystal sphere seem to fade away for a for a moment, before solidifying again. This is not normal, and of major concern to the veteran spacefarers.
• The crew feels a shock of "downshift" to normal space as they enter the sphere. There is normally a feeling of transition, of shifting, when a ship enters or exits the Phlogistion, since this is really shifting into another dimension. However, this shift is far, far worse. Many of the crew are briefly incapacitated, and Zayer (on the helm) struggles to maintain consciousness and control.
• The portal disappears behind the party very quickly.
• The planetary locator in the chart room starts an urgent pinging that none of them have ever heard before.
• On deck a sailor party vaguely knows (some older man. Saunders? Smithers? Oh yes, Old Man Withers) screams in agony. He clasps both hands to his head, as though trying to keep it from bursting. He drops to his knees, and you see the skin stretch tight over his face. His skull expands to huge proportions as his body withers. Blood trickles from between his fingers as they fuse with his scalp. His hands fall away, leaving his fingers projecting from his swollen, orb-like head: ten tentacles, with an eye that opens at the end of each! The skin rips between the eyes on his face. Underneath you see a single, Cyclopean eye as big as your head. As his body disintegrates, his head grows into a sphere nearly five feet across. It's covered in tough grey plates that harden even as you watch. The creature that was the sailor opens its mouth, tearing the skin as it reveals a grotesque double row of fangs that drip a yellowish slime. With an inhuman cry of fury, the monster eyes the party and crew, and then disappears.

The crew and owners eventually recover from the shock. Prax leads the crew in searching the ship (in case the beholder is still aboard), while the rest of the crew head to the chart room. Disturbingly, neither the portal locator nor Windellian's innate ability can detect any sign of a portal back into the Phlogiston. Based on their knowledge of the Phlogiston, and what Keriacus told them about the log found on the derelict ship, Zayer and Windellian speculate that perhaps the connection to magic in this system is weaker and more variable than normal--which could be a challenge when the ship wants to leave the system.     The planetary locator gradually updates its display, as the data on the system comes in. It shows a relatively small system (25 SJD in radius, based on the outermost planet), with 5 planets at varying distances and sizes from the central star. The orbit of one of the planets (the 3rd) is odd, and very elongated. The locator also shows a strange energy anomaly on the 2nd planet, a size E earth body.   There are also some strange shimmers in the plot, that come and go across the system--like weaker versions of the energy anomaly on the 2nd planet. The innermost planet is a smaller, size D earth body, and the two outermost planets are size G air bodies (gas giants).   Windellian, a veteran traveler of Realmspace, studies the planet in the ellipitical orbit carefully, its statistics oddly familiar. With a shock, Windellian recognizes the distinct characteristics of Chandos--a planet that disappeared from Realmspace a few years ago. According to the rumors, a Chaos Mage named Grimbald accidentally made it disappear when attempting to enhance a There/Not There Cannon created by his mentor Heisenberg. The accident involved a Wild Surge of magic, and an artifact called the Horn of Chaos, taken from the infamous Zolnar's Asteroid. Windellian resolves to investigate.   Their is also a strange icon on the plot, the apparent source of the urgent pinging, that takes Jessa a while to decode (she has to pull out the manual). This is apparently a distress signal, which is a little known option sold by the Arcane, and something no one actually pays for.   The Owners resolve to set a course that will take them to investigate the distress signal, then in to the planet with the energy anomaly, swinging around the sun to investigate Chandos, and then catching up with the Hive as it slowly makes its way towards the outer system. (While the Hive is too small to show up on the display, Zayer and Windellian have been making careful calculations en route on its current location, based on Hobart's charts and notes). With the current geometry of the system, this will add only several days onto their journey to the Hive.   Meanwhile, Prax has discovered the Beholder in the lower hold, where its magic apparently failed to obscure it (much to its annoyance). The Beholder, whose main eye appears milky and blind, converses with Prax, and confirms it is Captain Hobart, who apparently managed to coax the surviving Orbus on the beholder ship it attacked from the Skyrunner (See Session 0: Campaign Prelude Report ) to take it into Port Shurius where it waited FOR WEEKS while the party was gallivanting around the outer reaches of Greatspace. When the Arcane Merquat refused to give back HIS SHIP, he replaced the drunken Withers aboard this ship. Hobart says his goal is to enter the Hive, and retrieve the Queen's Eyes to unify the beholder tribes. It is willing to make a deal with the crew, and let them take whatever else is aboard the hive.   Prax leaves a pair of Kzinti marines to watch the beholder, while he confers with the rest of the crew. They quickly come to the decision that their is no way they can trust Hobart, or allow him to get the Queen's Eyes from the Hive, and return down to the lower hold with the intent of killing the monster. Unfortunately, when they arrive, the beholder is gone, one Kzinti has been petrified into a statue, and the other is cowering in the hold, apparently terrified.   Another search ensues, with no success--until Prax notices an odd pile of dust outside the door to the hold. They confront the second Kzinti, flanked by the remaining Kzinti marines--and the creature returns to its Beholder form. The party squares off with the Beholder, combat imminent.