A Dance in the Dark - Chapter Three

> "*All I know is Charlotte's going to be pissed.*"
> ― Fraya Love
>
>

**Legs for Days** is the forty-fifth episode of Queens of Adventure. In it, the party continue their journey through spider web covered tunnels in the underdark.

## Synopsis

As a swarm of rat sized spiders charged at the party, Irene Dubois hurls her javelin of lightning at them. The weapon transforms into a bolt of energy and disintegrates about half of the swarm.

Coming up behind her ally, Arson Nicki raises up on her hind legs and gnashes her teeth to try and intimidate the rest. The spiders are unphased.

Fraya Love steps forward with her decanter of bountiful water, before realizing she can't freeze them, and isn't sure how much water to use to drown. So Butylene O'Kipple casts *burning hands* to create a cone of flame. The entire room becomes engulfed in flame. It pops more of the egg sacks and now all of those spiders rush towards them, on flame. Fraya grabs her decanter and pulls out enough water to *shape water* a bubble around most of the party. Butylene, fire resistant, steps away, and Arson uses *blink* vanishing. All but ally Lamont Du Pont avoid the spiders. He takes a few bites. Butylene slashes through the spiders the flames don't kill.

On the ethereal plane, Arson can see the room as it was in the past. On the wall, in undercommon, are instructions telling people to wait in line for their possessions to be searched. There are symbols prohibiting wigs, makeup, and heels. She blinks back to the smoldering room. Lamont is cleaning himself with a lint brush. Fraya shapes water to create a water mask over his mouth to help with the smoke. Irene borrows the lint roller.

They progress through the room, which has a long counter across it with a small gap. On the other side of the counter they find a small case. Fraya smashes the ancient lock with the handle of her trident. Inside she finds coins and jewels. She pockets some before the creature they met outside, Xorn, comes up from underground. Fraya gives him the rest of the contents of the case. He gobbles them down, and satisfied, offers to help them navigate the city. He eyes Arson warily after Fraya says she is okay.

The voice in Arson's head returns, saying all the friends she attracts are inferior.

On the other side of the door is a long hallway. Halfway down is a portcullis. Beyond it is another room covered in debris. Arson wonders if Xorn could eat the bars and turns to Fraya who passes on the idea. LaMont puts his hand on Fraya's shoulder to try and boost her persuasion. But the attempt fails. Xorn says the metal smells of spider fingers. Arson casts *prestidigitation* to make it smell like fresh metal. Lamont supports her persuasive efforts, but it also fails.

Irene tries to give him an 'encouraging' kick in the tail. It upsets the creature, and the two of them begin an intimidation face-off ending with Irene extending her frills. Xorn snorts and dives into the ground, abandoning them.

The group considers their options to get past the grate now. Arson puts her feet and face against the webs on the portcullis and tries to sense anything, but fails to notice anything. The voice mocks her for being disconnected to her heritage.

Irene, suddenly thinks to try lifting the bars. She effortlessly does so and the group goes through it. This leaves them in a large circular room. A raised path leads to another door. Around the top of the room are openings that might be windows or collapsing pieces of wall.

Arson walks up the walls to investigate. Looking through the arched windows, she sees a long narrow room with smashed barrack style bunkbeds and empty racks for weapons. She tells the others.

Down below, Irene begins to cross the room to the door. As Arson begins to descend, the group hears a clacking sound and three giant spiders come out from the archways. Two begin to cross the webs on the ceiling and lower themselves down, one over Irene, one over the others. A third hangs back on the wall.

The one over Irene bites her on the shoulder. The second spider bites Butylene. The last spider, up on the wall, shoots webs towards Irene, who dodges.

Butylene decides to go for the spider looming over her. Trusting in Fraya to save them if the webs catch fire, she casts *firebolt* at her attacker. It ignites the spider and catches the web line it came down from. Flames begin to lick outward from the point on the ceiling it is attached. Butylene commands her new familiar Hella to attack and throws her up onto the spider. The glowing centipede chomps down and poisons the spider. The flames on the spider do a small bit of damage to Hella.

Lamont draws a longsword and rushes towards Butlyene's spider. Just before the burning web breaks, he slashes the spider hard. His second swipe kills the spider and it drops to the floor, catching the floor on fire. Hella stands on it, triumphantly thinking she killed the spider.

Up on the wall, Arson fires two *eldritch blasts,* one at each of the remaining two spiders. The first smashes into the spider near Irene, wounding it. The second shot misses, and cracks the wall.

Irene takes out her great axe and slices the spider over her clean in half. She stuffs some pieces in her sack before throwing her hand axe at the other spider on the wall. It lodges in its chest. For a bonus action she sprints at the spider and tries to bite it, but misses, biting her tongue.

As Fraya prepares to act, a sound next to Arson signals the appearance of a blue and white spider. It tries to bite Arson but misses with its mouth pincer. Fraya shouts out the biological name for them "Chelicera", and then casts *bane* on the new spider.

Butylene dodges away from the fire and uses her *elemental weapon* power on her bomb to turn it to electrical damage. She chucks it successfully at the regular giant spider, then throws Hella at the spider. Hella's flames ignite the spider before she bites it, killing it. As it lands, fires begin to spread again.

Lamont draws his crossbow and fires it at the blue spider. Arson calls her pact weapon as a vibrating flail, battering it with two attacks. Irene hurls her javelin through the flames at the spider. It pierces its face, and shoots out the other end with the spider's heart impaled on it. She then sidesteps the approaching flames.

The spiders now dead, the group heads for the exit. Fraya pours a little water on Hella to extinguish her flames. They swing the door open and slam it shut on the blazing room behind them.

### Characters

#### Party

* Arson Nicki - drider warlock
* Butylene O'Kipple - tiefling alchemist
	+ Hella FizzGerald - familiar (centipede form)
* Fraya Love - water genasi cleric
* Irene Dubois - lizardfolk barbarian

#### NPCs

* Lamont Du Pont IV
* Voice in the Underdark

#### Monsters/Enemies

* Xorn
* Giant Spiders (baby and adult)
* Blink Spider

## Episode Notes

### Lore

* The sealed section of the Underdark city has what seems to be an immigration station where people heading into it were searched for illegal drag paraphernalia.

### Memorable Quotes

* "I feel like that would just jet pack me in the opposite direction." - Fraya Love
* "I'll just file that away in my memory to address farther down in the story line." - Arson Nicki
* "Smells like the green room at a drag show." - Butylene O'Kipple
* "I'll do that... with *shape water*. Take a drink!" - Fraya Love
* "We have a walking, talking GPS that only I can understand." - Fraya Love
* "It's why my thorax is so big. It's full of secrets." - Arson Nicki
* "I'm the whore whisperer." - Fraya Love
* "Rust does take a long time." - DM Matt
* "Last time Fraya's bladder saved us." - "It's always full." - Butylene O'Kipple and Fraya Love
* "I was just living for this high ceiling moment." - Fraya Love
* "I'm going to prepare my newspaper now and start swatting them." - Fraya Love
* "So the spiders are rolling poorly today as well." - DM Matt
* "She's having a constitutional crisis." - Butylene O'Kipple
* "You can, like, save us, right?" - "You could save yourself." - Butylene O'Kipple and Fraya Love
* "I could at least umbrella us with water." - Fraya Love
* "Fraya it's going to be your turn next and you can scream out the name of the mouth parts of spiders." - "Chelicera!" - DM Matt and Fraya Lova
* "You still have an action this turn." - "Aside from cussing?" - DM Matt and Butylene O'Kipple
* "Note to self: Electricity is better for spiders." - Butylene O'Kipple
* "This party and hearts!" - DM Matt

### References

* Cardi B
* "Let's Get Sickening"
* Charlotte's Web
* "Mommie Dearest"
* Star Trek - the Borg
* The Wiz
* The Gap - store, as well as commercials with Missy Elliot
* Mean Girls - "Full of secrets"
* Jurasic Park
* Nickelodeon green slime
* Sword in the Stone

### Please Welcome to the Stage

* Lee Preston
* Chelicera Flockhart

### Name That Tune

* "Those Hands" - Tatiana
* "Girl on Fire" - Alicia Keyes
* "Ease on Down the Road" - the Wiz
* "Click Clack (Make That Money)" - RuPaul
* "Heartbreaker" - Pat Benatar
* "Two of Hearts" - Stacey Q

## Behind the Queens

* In the intro and outro, DM Matt reminds viewers of upcoming Live Shows in Chicago, and announces a new live show at Gaylaxicon in Minnesota.
* Matt mentions during the episode the group's repeatedly piercing enemy hearts. This is a reference to the death of the Kracken Priest whose Heart Butylene pierced and kept.
* When Irene kills the blink spider, he asks "How do you do it?" which may have been a reference to Critical Roll, where DM Matt Mercer will use this line to signify an attack has finished off a significant battle.

**Greetings From Fire Island**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - **The Show Must Go On**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4
**Operation Watersport**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4 - Ch5 - Ch6 - Ch7 - **Trials**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4
**Ghosts of the Coast**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - **The Devil's Due**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4
**Special**: The Story So Far
**The Beautiful Place**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4 - Ch5 - Ch6 - **A Dance in the Dark**: Ch1 - Ch2 - **Ch3** - Ch4
**Drama in the Deep**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4 - Ch5 - Ch6 - **Whispers From the Heart**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4 - Ch5 - Ch6
**Danger Rangers!**: Ch1 - Ch2 - Ch3 - Ch4 - Ch5 - Ch6
**Mist Connections**: Ch1 - Ch2
**Unreleased**
Lost: Camp Crystal Light - Pax West 2018 --  vs the Lizard People
Live Shows: Seattle Style -- Minneapolis Style