THIRTEEN ADVENTURERS IN TIME AND SPACE

[Maharg67]

Thanks Species5478!!!

 

http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt9/Dragonpen61/Forum%20Additives/Oblivi0009.jpg

[Maharg67]

-6-

THE THIRTEEN IN THE COLOVIAN HIGHLANDS

PACING THE ANCIENT CLIFF CITY OF SHEGRATHO

 

The urchins that followed the three of the Thirteen were led by a highly annoyed young woman hefting a short wooden club. She was dragging a younger female urchin along by the hand. The female was a half human-elf and the male a half human-gnome by the looks of them. It was typical of such urchins that they were the unwanted offspring of prostiutes unable to support them. Yet there was a sense that somebody did care for the urchins, clothing them, feeding them and making them do things like clean their teeth and brush their hair.

 

Drazen fronted the young woman in a garden alcove with the words. "The boy is fine. We have him. He is not a hostage. He is a young fool to try to pick pocket one such as we."

 

The urchin woman looked much relieved. "Timmkins is like that. He is quick but it is clear you are much quicker. Orphans have been vanishing of late. They come too late to safety when the curfew bells ring and the nocturnals leave their quarters. The Sisters Compassionate are very angry but what can they do? They are Cyrodilin Imperials and this, well this city is semiautonomous of the Empire. The Duke will do nothing as long as the city keeps feeding his large tributes from their casino gaming tables, gladiator arenas and brothels. The Brother Protectors have no authority here. There are mercenaries here but they will do nothing unless paid to do so. The Legionaries are corrupt fools as is the Imperial Sheriff in the region."

 

At this point Drazen knew he should have just turned around and walked away. At this point he should have focused on the real reason the Thirteen were there and it was not to help stupid urchins. At this point Drazen sighed and spoke. "How can the Thirteen help?"

 

The young urchin woman thrust her chest out. "Right now you can take me to where that silly young fool Timmkins is."

 

So Drazen took her there, with the other urchin, while three of the Thirteen kept moving through the city. They gawked like tourists at some of the huge and intricate statues carved out of the rock. They bought fruit salad and ate it with dabs of fresh cream. They sent many items back to the Globeship and to those who were there.

Edited August 10, 2010 by Maharg67

[species5478]

What's an urchin?

[Maharg67]

Species5478, Urchin is a homeless child or one who lives on the street. See also 'street urchin'. It is a term used in some parts of the world.

 

I did not make this term up. Just google it. Warning you will get many entries referring to 'sea urchins' being a kind of sea creature.

 

http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/tt9/Dragonpen61/Forum%20Additives/465px-Chennai_street_children-1.jpg

 

There are 'many millions' of street urchins around the world, often starving, often exploited, often murdered.

Edited August 7, 2010 by Maharg67

[species5478]

How very sad...

[Maharg67]

Yes it is sad and what is sadder is that the world could actually choose to save many of them if enough of its wealth was diverted to solve the underlying problems behind the problem or just to give them safe homes to meet their needs.

 

-7-

THE THIRTEEN IN THE COLOVIAN HIGHLANDS

PACING THE ANCIENT CLIFF CITY OF SHEGRATHO

 

The three street kids, or urchins, were clearly amazed by the Globeship domechamber and who could blame them. Each was bathed by a female or male adult of the Thirteen along with a neobaby who was fussed over by the urchin. Eggie, Appie and Ollie were the neobabies. The urchins and they fell in love with each other at once.

 

The Thirteen learned about the 'nocturnals' and the curfew. All people except for those who actually owned and ran the city, had to be either out of the city or indoors by the time of cerfew. The only peoples banned from living or even visiting the amazing vertical city were other nocturnal peoples such as wozzle like wuzzles with their pale white fur and larger eyes. Nobody seemed to know anything much about the nocturnals except that nobody seemed to know much about them. There were a fair few people who badly wanted to know more about them including the Cyrodilin Empire. It was an open secret that the Empire wanted any excuse to take the city over to use it as a staging post for a future military campaign to finish its conquest of Skyrim.

 

The other three, they moving through the amazing city, briefly encountered Legionaries in Legion Standard magical power armour and with Legion Standard magical power weapons, shields and other devices. There were only a thousand of them in the city because an agreement with the nocturnals kept them to that number.

 

Emperor Uriel Septim VII was not as warlike as many Emperors and Empresses had been before himself but he wanted Cyrodiil to have greater access to the oceans of the world, to more port cities, and Northern Skyrim had plenty of big fortified port cities to choose from. Now that foreigners had begun to arrive from the far off super continent of Liermat and the great Friendlies Archipelago, along with others, trade was becoming of far great importance. The Liermattins had a poorer understanding of and use of magic but they had steam engines, gunpowder weapons, strange and wonderful spices and other things that the Empire found itself wanting.

 

The three of the Thirteen went looking for the Sisters Compassionate outpost in the city to inform them of what had happened to the three urchins.

Edited August 10, 2010 by Maharg67

[species5478]

Maybe the Wozzles will give the urchins a valuable gem...

[Maharg67]

Species5478, a gem? Most interesting! A magical gem? Why not? Worth much money but with more value than that.

 

-8-

THE THIRTEEN IN THE COLOVIAN HIGHLANDS

PACING THE ANCIENT CLIFF CITY OF SHEGRATHO

 

Drazen walked into the large carved out stone chamber of the Sisters Compassionate and Brother Protectors. There was plenty of activity goiing on. The poor were gathered waiting in one area for various goods and services. Behind a great big wooden counter were Sisters Compassionate in curious saffron kneerobes. It was obvious that there were too few people trying to do far too much work even with the assistance of eager locals with typical Tamriellan clothes with volunteer armbands added.

 

Drazen walked right up to the counter with two of his comrades following. He exposed his face and looked around at the rushing people. He tried to get some attention until a tired and cranky young Sister Compassionate stopped and faced him. "Get a ticket and wait like everybody else. Just because you are some kind of soldier in fancy, immodest armour, does not mean you can just push ahead of the others."

 

Drazen smiled in a way that he hoped was diplomatically charming. "I came to offer goods, not to ask for goods or services. We have three street urchins to pass over to you." He took out three very accurate coloured sketches of the three. "Do you know them?"

 

The woman suddenly stopped and nodded. "Timmkins, Wantonie and Pillie. They are on the wilder side of being streetkids and we wish we could help them more but no families wish to adopt them and the orphanage in the city is already full to overflowing. We would send them southwards to the Bruna Orphanage but we lack funds to do so. See those empty shelves over there. You can put any goods over there."

 

Drazen shook his head. "They could not hold even a small part of what we wish to give you. A hundred blankets, a hundred dayboxes of rations, a hundred knives in scabbards, a hundred handlamps, a hundred litrejons of lamp-oil, a hundred firelighters, a hundred healing serum quadpaks and four big wheels of buttercheese. Just find me an empty chamber to have them delivered into. Consider all of this to be a donation."

 

"Nobody gives that much away with out wanting something for it." The young Sister Compassionate responded. "So, want do you really want?"

 

At that moment an older, tired but smiling Sister Compassionate bustled up and gently but firmly pushed the younger one to one side. "Now, now, Elsie, we don't want to drive the nice young man away, do we. If he has something to give us of such a generous nature, why we must take it to carry out our mission better." She turned to Drazen. "Elsie is very tired and is not as used to such stress as many Sisters Compassionate are. Please forgive her. You do not seem to be much older than her."

 

Drazen shrugged. "I am a hundred and eighty-five years old." He responded and both women looked surprised. "Tell me about the missing street urchins and the nocturnals, if you have more information that is. Oh, yes, we would like information about tamriel, the Empire, the varied peoples, cultures and much else. Maps, books, almanacs, other forms of data recordings."

 

The older woman smiled. "My name is Cassie and it seems you do want something after all. Information is worth a good deal but what you are offering is just what we need but let us take your offer as just a opening bid. Please follow me. Elsie, go have some sleep or I will have two Brother Protectors carry you to your bed and chain you to it. You do us no good by exhausting yourself into the ground."

 

Elsie flounced off to bed but could not hide her tiredness and relief. Cassie, who now seemed like an older version of Elsie, then spoke again. "Please come this way. Yes, we need your assistance in more than one way. By the way both you and your two comrades move, you appear to be very deadly killers far beyond the capacity of the Brother Protectors, bless their courage and strong loyalty."

 

Drazen did not bother to deny it. "Lead on, McDuff."

 

The woman gave him an odd look. "My name is Cassie."

 

Drazen smiled. "Sorry, just a quote from a long dead playwrite. Please lead on, Cassie."

 

Cassie gave him an odd look and then did just that.

Edited August 10, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

-9-

THE THIRTEEN IN THE COLOVIAN HIGHLANDS

PACING THE ANCIENT CLIFF CITY OF SHEGRATHO

 

With a sparkling shimmer the big chamber filled up with tradegoods. The Orbship energy-banks had been badly drained, down to 34.34%, but it had been worth it to gain the great deal of information the Sisterhood of Compassion had given them. Not only had Sister Compassionate answered many questions but she had passed over books, maps, journals, newslets, scrolls, scrollbooks and even some oil paintings. Why? Partly because the tradegoods were badly needed but partly because she wanted the valuable items to be cared for and the Sisterhood of Compassion, even with the Brother Protectors, did not have the ability to do that.

 

The tradegoods main list had grown slowly over years in length and variety but was still fairly basic as was the weapons and armour sublist. Another was a special sublist of backpacks for with each backpack bought came contents of both standard and semirandom surprises. Each normal empty backpack cost tradecredit-1, or tc-1, but a full backpack cost tc-10 and yet each one could turn out to have far more value than tc-10.

 

In the standard list were kits of cooking utensils of sturdy, basic design and construction. Each kit cost tc-10.

 

Yet another sublist had some interesting surprises such as a musical instrument sublist of three subvariants of three types of instrument being harps, horns and lutes.

 

There was also a very valuable sublist of books, each being tc-10. The sublist expanded as gained books were copied and added so now the new books were copied as were scrollbooks, journals, maps, collections of newslets and almanacs. But the processing time was long and copies would not be available for some days to come.

 

The official leaders of the city were three wealthy families but it was an open secret that they and the Shegratho Guild were but puppets of the nocturnals who were the real rulers of Shegratho. The three families were inbred, greedy, narrow minded and seemed to lack any real leadership qualities. The Shegratho Leadership Council lacked so much respect that the Cydrodilin Imperial Ambassador refused to meet with them on any terms at all. One reason was the the Leadership Council refused to acknowledge Cyrodilin Imperial claims to the region despite the city being inside the actual Empire.

 

The Sisters Compassionate did not ask why the Thirteen had any interest in the mysterious nocturnals for many shared the same desire to learn their true nature. The Imperial Secret Eye, the Blades and other Imperial securit intelligence services had sent in agents after dark but all of them had vanished suddenly with out good explanation or any real clues to what had happened. The same had happened to others such as the Dark Brotherhood, the Mythic Dawn, the Theives Guild, the Spies Guild and the infamous necromancer organisation known as the Undeathless.

 

The Thirteen had no intention of revealing the real purpose for their curiosity but did speak of a scholarly desire to learn more about the super continent and that world before they moved on. Moved on where or when? The Thirteen did not say but in reality they had no idea when they might move on, if they did, or just where they might go to.

 

On that day the Thirteen rented a large set of rooms at high cost, gained some official lines of credit through the Imperial Banking Guild and Imperial Trading Guild, and prepared to make the city a base of operations at least for a while. Selling valuable gems, gold ingots, silver ingots, rejuvenation serums and magical talismans to the Imperial Trading Guild and putting the same in deposit storage at the Banking Guild gained the lines of credit.

 

The Thirteen decided that they would not attempt to break the curfew that night or at least that was the initial plan.

Edited August 10, 2010 by Maharg67

[Maharg67]

-10-

THE THIRTEEN IN THE COLOVIAN HIGHLANDS

PACING THE ANCIENT CLIFF CITY OF SHEGRATHO

 

Addalla led this time, three of the Thirteen, being backed up by Darusa and Keading. An globetor came with them but was hidden at first in a pushcart box. It was close to curfew and others were rushing to be either outside of the city or locked away in their quarters. Even the Three Families did not seem keen to stay out though in theory they had the right to do so, that is they and a well chosen sellection of aides, servants and bodyguards.

 

The super-soldiers went into an area plunging deeper into the cliff face where tunnels where made out of carved statues or so was the illusion. The hints there indicated that the Ancients had been of human stock but quite taller than typical humans. They had also been very beautiful but also decadent and hedonistic.

 

They were tracking three missing urchins last seen by reliable witnesses in that area. This was odd because there was nothing in that area that urchins would normally want. One witness had reported to the Sisters Compassionate that the urchins had acted strangely, as if in a trance, and had ignored the middle aged woman when she had tried to give them each a basic copper Imperio, the common coins of the Empire. This had so concerned her that she had reported to Cassie. Now the two females and one male, along with a neobaby girl in a globetor, were trying to find those urchins. Deeper and deeper they went until they came upon a cast-iron gate with three big padlocks. The urchins had gone that way, according to their tracer-scanners and hunting senses, but others had opened the locks and the gate for them.

 

The three flowed over the gate and the globetor followed easily through the gap. Then they were moving quick and deadly along a large, less elaborate tunnel but the statues here were less human and more vulgar, more disturbing in their appearances as if the humans were distorted half into bat like creatures. It was becoming clear now that the Ancients had been a vampiric species of some kind and that they were capable to becoming bat-monsters. Were they true immortals? Not really and niether did such tend to be true vampires though they utilised a kind of instrinsic vampiric magic and had some distant links to true vampires. The Thirteen had once dealt with such a people, a whole city of them, and after they were gone the former vampiric population was no more.

 

Keading sniffed softly the air. "Liches!"

 

Addalla responded very quietly. "I smell the stupidly lesser undead as well. If any of the Ancients survivved they perhaps they survive as liches."

 

They turned a corner and there was now a huge chamber facing them and in that chamber was a small army of shambling zombie figures, lesser undead, for ever on the move but kept confined to the space by troublesome necromancer magic. There were fifty-two of the fairly fast shambling former men and women. By the appearance of them they could easily be people who had tried to infiltrate the area only to fall to lesser undeath magic.

 

The four of them, including the neobaby Eggie in the globetor, sensed that the urchins had gone across the chamber, the zombies letting them through. Now the three drew forth their swords and the globetor pilot activated all of its weaponry. They moved slowly into the chamber in a triangular formation with the globetor floating just above and behind. Almost as one the zombies turned and swarmed towards them, shambling quickly with outstretched arms. The stench was horrific and had an unnatural tang to it that made it worse than normal rotting bodies would have been. The globetor spat pulses of energy that exploded zombie heads, the bodies flopping to the ground and rotting into heaps of ash with unnatural speed. The three teens cut off heads as they moved with amazing speed, agility and endless grace. The zombies were shambling into a death machine that kept burning and cutting them down efficiently.

 

Then there were no more zombies but something larger, older and more powerful was coming to deal with them, they could all sense it to be so.

Edited August 10, 2010 by Maharg67