17 March, 2011

Tekumel 9

Inspect glassware and clockwork: 89
Get another corpse, tied up: 40
Open remaining boxes: 100
Try finding controls on the cabochon: 23
Examine the hat: 81
Prise out gems: 9


You press several of the other gemlike protrusions around the cabochon, testing them for possible removal as you do. They resist any attempt to loosen, and seem to have no response when touched. After cautiously manipulating it for a few minutes, you are left with the impression that you've had no effect. If the baroque and esoteric designs scribed into the surface truly divide it into sections, they seem to be only decorative, yet their form troubles you at an atavistic level. It is almost as though you can see them more clearly when not looking directly at them.


You head back into the room with the long row of occupied tables. The sheeted occupants await your experiments blithely. Another examination of the gemmed table at the near end discourages your attempts to pry any of the glittering morsels free, and you are left with merely attempting to manipulate them. Several begin glowing at your touch, but there seems to be little result. Remembering the precaution of tying one up, you select a table from the line and remove its cover. A short creature, less than a meter long is revealed. It has four bowed-out legs, two arms with three-clawed hands, and a bulbous midsection, now somewhat deflated-looking. It is one of the gnomic tinaliya. The enormous eyes above the beak-like mouth are a dead filmy grey. You bind it to the table, ripping the cover into strips to do so. The thick brown hide of the creature creaks as you tighten the bindings.


With some difficulty, you force past the will of those more wary within you and begin uncomfortably pressing the dull gems and spidery arms of the contraption on the ceiling above. Suddenly, almost as though a vein has been opened in the air itself, a column of shining blue-tinged blackness pours forth into the quiescent form. You are shocked backward. The small form tries to rise, struggling slowly against its bonds. As it moves, the bulbous little segments making up its body slosh disgustingly. It slowly turns its opaque dead-grey eyes on you and the beak-like mouth moves. No sound emerges.


Part of you wishes to immediately repair to the laboratory, busying yourself with instruments, alembics and coggery, but what will you do with this new arrival?

3 comments:

C'nor (Outermost_Toe) said...

"Well, nice to see you're awake. Good morning to you. I'm sorry about the ropes, but the last one that got up tried to kill me, so I hope you'll understand that I don't untie you. Now, what's your name?"

As for the impulse to busy ourselves in the laboratory, I believe we should wait. There's plenty of time to do that after we've learned more about this creature. After all, we want a willing test subject, don't we?

netherwerks said...

Shen watch tinaliya. They sneaky. Not taste so good either. No gems come loose. Not understanding this place. Overlooking something? Mechanism-thing seem to make undead. Not so good. Taste bad, often make sick if eat them. Yick.

Two bodies now become undead. Are we undead? If not, how we end up different than last two? Big question.

Time to re-examine the space, sort out if there are other areas, entrances/exits, maybe find someone who knows more about this place. Not having much luck figuring out mechanisms. Maybe more clues. Maybe more better think to re-look at everyting from beginning.

If tinaliya not help, smash in it's brain so it can't hurt either.

Sloshy tiniliya not good bet for helpful companion. Most likely flesh-eating undead thing.

Maybe we need ot try another sequence on the mechanism-thing? Can we switch it to another setting on tinaliya before we need to smash in its brain-pan?

C'nor (Outermost_Toe) said...

Well, up to here the assumption has been that the Human part was firmly in control. However, something about that beam must have woken the other bits up.

Shen: 91

Kindosi: 15

Human: 82

Shen-part say to be careful of sloshy-tinaliya. Changing settings sound like a good idea. Maybe if we can, we should set it at the gems? Tinaliya are sneaky, they might be good thieves, know ways to get gems out safely.