270: Nothing Like a Juicy Amethyst!

## Summary

Gwen and Raphina catch up with Tess and tell her about the new job at the university. The party then chat to the one of the show's performers, an ibish woman, who reveals she's an ex-member of the Sooty Gang, having escaped to try and start a new life. She urges the group to destroy the gang and gives them the location of their hideout. Sheemie appears with extremely thoughtful magical gifts for everyone and then Gwen suddenly catches sight of Gene Dudas and gives chase. At one of the bridges over the Beartoggle River, Gene unexpectedly transforms in front of them into various characters from Gwen's life before settling on the form of Moondreamer, who charges towards her aggressively. Batthwack accidentally casts another *Eldritch Blast* at Gwen but does succeed in summoning some water-like protection just as Moondreamer vanishes and Gwen is frozen solid in amethyst.

## Synopsis

The *Hands & Fingers* performers have emerged from behind the stage. Some of them seem to know some people in the audience. The ibish performer is lurking around, but Tess is heading towards the door, head down, and doesn't immediately spot Gwen and Raphina, which is understandable given Gwen's new look and Raphina's disguise. Gwen calls over and Tess looks up, her brow furrowed for a second until she recognises the dragonborn she knew behind the long blonde hair and amethyst gems. *"Gwen? Gwen?! Is that you?"* she says. Gwen greets her and reveals that her friend "Annie Parr" is in fact Raphina in disguise.

Tess explains she came down to Beartoggle after all the uncertainty in Morrow's Inlet following the paper factory fire and the dragon terrorizing the town. *"I took it as a chance to see what may await me in other places,"* she says. Gwen wonders where she learnt to perform like the show they just witnessed. Tess says there were some fringe shows connected to the Roladexaroonie that Gwen probably wasn't involved in. Gwen tells Tess about the new exotic dancing programme at the university and the opportunity for her to teach there. Tess initially thinks she must be joking, and is a little skeptical about the dean's motives. *"Is he a horny pervert?"* she asks. They say he's probably just a bit lonely.

Gwen tells Tess that the situation is complicated, and a lot has happened since they last saw each other, not least her dramatic change in appearance. Gwen and Raphina do their best to convince Tess about the university, explaining that her shows will help promote the courses, and vice versa, and also because it's brand new she'll be a real trailblazer. Raphina says *"You can be as flexible as you need. And we know you're flexible! I really wish I could get my toes in my ear. That was amazing!"* Tess is encouraged enough to say that she'll look into it.

Tess briefly mentions that it's certainly cheaper to live in Beartoggle than it was in Morrow's Inlet. Gwen says they uncovered a lot of nefarious stuff going on. Raphina wonders what the mood of the townsfolk was when they departed, hoping it had improved. Tess says she left pretty quickly. *"There wasn't much left for me, after hearing that my friend was no longer with us."* The general feeling at the time was of panic. She says it's different here, though she had heard of something going on at the Grand Staircase. Gwen gives her an apologetic summary of their adventures there too, before the conversation comes to a natural conclusion and Tess heads off.

Gwen and Raphina go back outside and regroup with Will and Batthwack in the alley. Will asks if they saw the ibish performer inside the theatre when the performers came out. He points out that they had the remnants of black circles around their eyes, even though they were faint, indicating they're probably a Sooty Gang member, and maybe this is their day job. He'd like to find some way to extract information from her about the gang. Gwen suggests just talking to her, but Will's highly sceptical that they'd talk freely and suggests using some spells. Batthwack admits that he can't cast *Zone of Truth* right now, and Will is annoyed at him for a moment, before realising how tall and imposing Batthwack is again now.

At that moment, the ibish performer appears from the theatre door and begins making their way up the alley. Raphina calls after her, *"Excuse me, ma'am. Thank you for that lovely performance,"* and she looks over at them, a little startled and scared. She thanks her, but continues on her way. Will hurriedly casts *Detect Thoughts*, and learns that she's thinking *"I don't know who these people are and I should probably leave. Who knows who comes to shows like this."* Batthwack calls after her, *"I like your eye makeup by the way."* She replies, *"I don't know what you mean,"* but thinks *"He noticed. Fuck."* This is all the confirmation Will needs. He tells the others and Batthwack suggests they follow her. Gwen takes a different approach and speaks to the ibish telepathically, saying *"Do you feel safe here?"* Her eyes widen at this, and Will reads her thoughts as *"Are they with them? They're probably with them. I can't get away."* This is relayed to Gwen, who *Messages* the ibish again, saying *"We're not part of the Sooty Gang, if that's what you're worried about,"* but there's no response and she starts walking away, faster this time. Will is just *Messaging* Batthwack to suggest she could even be an ally, when the ibish stops in her tracks and turns to look at them, doubtfully. She carefully steps forward and they all hear telepathically, *"Who* are *you all?"*

The group introduce themselves, though Raphina gives her name as "Annie Parr" and Will says he's "Horace Gusterson". Gwen says they're here to make thing better. While Will lets the others talk and keeps an eye on their surroundings (mindful of the ibish that were spying from rooftops during the race), the ibish continues, telepathically, asking if they're with the Sooty Gang. When they say they're definitely not, she asks them to help her. Despite still speaking in their minds, she whispers *"I... I was with them for a little bit but they're bad. They're bad news."* She says she's trying to stay away from them over here in Scarlet Market. Her experience with the gang was only of mindless, senseless, wanton violence, mayhem and chaos. She lost two weeks of her life, during which all she remembers was vague colours and sounds, eventually waking up one morning in the Beartoggle River. She hid for a few days, scared that they would come to look for her. She had tried to remove the black circles from her eyes.

Gwen starts feeling really bad about the fight on the staircase, thinking that those crazed ibish probably had no idea what they were doing. Batthwack asks if she can tell them where the gang are and what she remembers about how she found them. She says it was them who approached her with an offer of a job. Having never had much, she had accepted thinking the gang might be a good place for her. *"I don't know. It was dumb,"* she says. They took her to their hideout, but doesn't remember going inside and it was at that point that her experience of lost time began. Gwen points out that after Morrow's Inlet, this is the second place they've encountered some kind of mind control. She asks if there's a place she can hide and Gwen offers to put her up in her room at the Toggle Hotel, giving her the key. Batthwack suggests they could try and stop the Sooty Gang and the ibish woman shows very little remorse for what was done to her, saying *"Kill them. Fucking kill them. Can you kill them? I don't know if I was controlled. I don't think they're good news. Fucking wipe them out."*

   Will casts *True Strike* to gain some insight into the ibish's character, but all he can really discern is that her social status is very low. She's really too shaken up to be acting naturally enough to give away anything else. Will provides some paper and she sketches out a rough map of the city, adding an X near the dam, matching up to where the bellhop at the hotel had told them it was. When Will *Messages* her to ask about whether she saw any sign of a key during her time there, she says she did not. Batthwack reminds the group of what Thalia had said, warning them about communicating telepathically.

Sheemie emerges from round a corner, a spring in his step, carrying a bundle of packages wrapped in brown paper. *"Oi! There you are! You all done with your smut show?!"* he calls out. The ibish woman turns and starts to run away. Gwen hears the ibish's voice in her head asking what room she's in at the hotel and she calls after her, saying it's room 256. Sheemie tells them he has gifts for them, which he bought with he money Will gave him. Will thinks this is blatant bribery, but Raphina jumps up and down excitedly, so he hands over a package to her, one of two small ones carrying. She rips the paper off, revealing a gleaming brass kazoo. Raphina is thrilled, saying she's been wanting to add to her brass kazoo collection. He tells her this one is different and instructs her to play a tune and while putting an image in her head. She begins to play while thinking of popcorn, and in a 5-foot radius sphere centred on the kazoo, an illusion of popping popcorn is conjured all around her in time with the music. Sheemie tells her it's called an *Instrument of Illusions*.

Gwen wonders how much money Will gave him, but Will *Messages* Sheemie to tell him to keep his mouth shut. Sheemie just says that Will's very generous, and everyone immediately suspects this is bullshit. Sheemie tosses the second biggest package over to Will, who catches it, discovering it's very heavy. He opens it, trying his best to look cool and not eager, but he's secretly very pleased to be receiving his first present in a while. Inside the paper is a metal, possibly pewter, tankard with a scowling face on the side. Sheemie pulls out a flask from his pocket, and opens it to reveal it contains a very strong alcohol that makes Will's eyes water. He pours some in the cup and tells Will to drink it. Will's adopts the same face as on the tankard, before hesitantly taking a tiny sip, maintaining eye contact with Sheemie the whole time. The noxious alcohol actually tastes like cool water. *"It's called a* Tankard of Sobriety*,"* says Sheemie and Will's expression changes into one of pure wonder. He thanks Sheemie and is genuinely very impressed and grateful when Sheemie explains he can drink alcohol from it without getting drunk. Batthwack's mind is elsewhere and can't help but wonder what would happen if you drank pee from it.

*"All right, who's next?"* says Sheemie, before tossing the other small package to Gwen. She expertly slices the paper open with her amethyst claws. Inside is a small, leather belt pouch with two crossed leaves on the front. One of the leaves looks like rosemary and the other like sage. Sheemie tells her to think of a spice or seasoning. *"Oh, you mean like cinnamon?"* says Gwen. When she reaches inside she finds her taloned fingers have a pinch of cinnamon between them. It seems that this magical pouch can be used to pull whatever spice she wants out of it. Gwen is really touched and Sheemie tells her that it only has a certain number of uses per day, and the guy who sold it to him said it was called a *Heward's Handy Spice Pouch*.

The last package, the largest, is for Batthwack. Sheemie hands it over very deferentially. Batthwack gives it a squeeze. It's soft. Upon opening it, he finds some folded, deep red, velvety fabric, which opens out into a cloak. Sheemie encourages him to put it on and he does so, over his *Robe of Eyes*. It's a fairly thin material and is well-fitted to his huge frame. Sheemie instructs him to stand in front of them and pose with his hands on his hips, one foot forward. Batthwack somewhat awkwardly and robotically does as he's told. Sheemie then tells him to say the word *"Billow."* When Batthwack does this, the awkward stance he's adopting suddenly makes sense as the cloak majestically billows out behind Batthwack and ripples in the air all by itself. Sheemie says this one's called a *Cloak of Billowing* and everyone's very impressed. There's a slightly alarming moment when Batthwack begins desperately trying to wrestle the cloak into submission, and they all realise they have no idea how to make it stop billowing. *"Sheemie! Very billowy!"* says Batthwack alarmedly. Raphina suggests saying the command word backwards and a cry of *"Wollib!"* has the desired effect. All is still once more.

Batthwack says his gift is going to look amazing when he next flies, glancing hopefully at Will, who immediately throws cold water on that suggestion. Hoping for some lessons, or tips at least, Batthwack asks Gwen how she managed to suddenly fly. She says that she actually has no idea how or why it happened. The same goes for her newfound ability to communicate telepathically. Will seems pretty sure that he knows; it's all thanks to the "mysterious unicorn" that gave her a magical pouch, which then absorbed into her. Sheemie assures them that his gifts are all kosher, but the party are a little dubious as to whether he paid for them properly.

The group discuss what to do next. It's around 1.30pm, so there's plenty of time before Gwen's date. Everyone's feeling fairly exhausted after the race and the drama that unfolded. Everyone's arcane reserves are feeling a pretty depleted, so the idea of a little R&R at a salon or spa is floated again. *"And seeing how we only need one more key... If you know what I mean,"* says Will, waiting for the penny to drop. Gwen is confused and when Will gets the keys out to twirl them around, she and Raphina are shocked. Will says he just found the dean's key on the ground, but they both know what this means. Gwen can't abide him stealing, but Will insists they need the key more than the dean does and refuses to give it back. He's quick to point out that Gwen killed Crumplemeyer in the name of doing good things, but Gwen says he deserved everything that came to him. *"There are consequences to everything, especially bad things,"* she says.

At that moment, having almost reached the entrance to the alley, Batthwack and Gwen both immediately recognise the large figure of the half-orc Gene Dudas strolling along casually in from of them. He looks around and they see his mouth is covered in blood. He spots them and locks eyes with Gwen, his eyes widening for a moment before he turns tail and runs. Gwen growls, *"I told him to get out of here,"* and gives chase as she immediately goes into a *Rage*. Batthwack races after them, hoping to get between them, but she's too fast. The amethyst-covered muscles in her thighs bulge as she strides off, leaving Batthwack lagging behind, his legs still a little sore from the race.

The others are left staring at each other in confusion. Though Will really doesn't want to run anywhere, he also doesn't want to miss out on what's going on, so they also give chase. Ahead of them, Gwen is pounding through the streets of the Scarlet Market as Gene does his best to evade her by ducking around corners. They're generally headed towards the river and Gwen is slowly gaining on him. Gene makes a turn onto a road leading to an arching bridge and pounds his way up. Upon reaching the mid-point of the bridge, he turns to look at Gwen, who stops in her tracks when she sees that in addition to his bloody face, he also has a rope of intestines hanging from it.

The others catch up just in time to see Gwen and Gene staring each other down. All of a sudden, Gene transforms in the blink of an eye into Aleister. He then transforms again, this time into a large, male, golden dragonborn, which Gwen recognises as her brother Donnor. Next he transforms into a tall, striking, half-drell in plate armour. Gwen knows this is Simon Elfar, the Eldritch Knight. Another change and this time, it's an older golden dragonborn, Gwen's father. He changes into a female dragonborn, which Gwen recognises as Yorac Phirina, her clan rival. She then transforms into Gwen's mother, seen holding handfuls upon handfuls of unopened letters in envelopes. Each transformation brings the figure closer to Gwen and then all of a sudden, standing before her is a magnificent, glittery unicorn with a rope of intestines hanging from her mouth. She starts stepping towards Gwen.

Gwen is feeling very conflicted and confused, still *Raging*. Kowl is next to her, her back arched, hissing at the unicorn as it approaches them. Gwen says *"Moondreamer??!"* and the unicorn lets out a strange high-pitched laugh. Batthwack recognises something about all this, and he hurriedly prays, casting *Shield of Faith* on Gwen and gestures with his arms to magically transfer some of his own armor's strength to her, an ability given to him by the Abbot at the Abbey of Saint Markovia, but never before used. However, instead of *Shield of Faith*, Batthwack is dismayed to see it's an *Eldritch Blast* that shoots out, striking Gwen in the back, sending her stumbling forward and fully reigniting her *Rage*. At the same time, Moondreamer breaks into a full gallop, horn pointed down.

A blue shimmery beam of energy emanates out from Batthwack's chest, arcing up and over into the sky and cascading down almost like water, onto the apex of the bridge between Moondreamer's horn and Gwen's outstretched amethyst claws. There's a flash of blinding white light and the shocked screams of passers-by are silenced for a moment. When the light fades, Moondreamer and the cascading blue energy beam are gone. Gwen is still there, but she is now entirely crystalline, frozen solid in purple amethyst, claws outstretched, a snarl on her face and her teeth bared, and her wings spread wide.

## Trivia

* The episode title is a quote from Eric. The group are chatting to Tess outside *Hands & Fingers* and Gwen is catching her up on everything that's happened since she left Morrow's Inlet, at one point mentioning her new look, *"pointing at her hair and her gem-iness."* Denise/Gwen: *"You shoulda seen the twerk that I did, like, in the street to somebody earlier!"* Eric/Tess: *"Did you roll like a 20 on your performance check?"* Denise/Gwen: *"It was so juicy. So juicy!"* Eric/Tess: *"Nothing like a juicy amethyst."* Denise/Gwen: *"Right?!"*
* It was established in this episode that it is now definitely, absolutely, 100% confirmed canon that Batthwack hit puberty while riding the lizards down the river in episode 227: Cloaca-wocka!. Or maybe it was a joke?! It's impossible to know, listeners.
* This week's episode description describes the Pork Fried Dice wiki as: ineffable.

## References

1. ↑ This was confirmed later in the episode.
2. ↑ 220: Turtles Are Highly Flammable
3. ↑ See episode 226: What CAN'T Will Turn Into? A Pleasant Person? JUST KIDDING!
4. ↑ See episodes 263: I Need Some More...Rhinoplasty through 267: Mo’s Riding Steed on the Lake in My Dreams
5. ↑ Eric clarifies things regrading ibish here: *"Unless I say otherwise... You've never heard an ibish speak out loud... So anything that an ibish says to you is in your minds."*
6. ↑ See episode 263: I Need Some More...Rhinoplasty
7. ↑ See episode 266: Mr. Mace
8. ↑ See episode 254: I'll Hug Them Until They Enroll
9. ↑ Thalia said *"No. They listen there. You can't talk like that. Don't ever talk like that. They know.* It *knows."* See episode 248: I'm Bloodhorn Leghorn and I'm a Sheep
10. ↑ See episode 209: Various Brick Sounds
11. ↑ See episode 256: SmareSmoggle
12. ↑ KT says something to give us some insight into Tivoli: *"Oh, wait, there's no guard. It doesn't matter. This is a city of lawlessness. It reminds me of another place I know."*
13. ↑ Alex transferred 2 armor class to Gwen using this ability. See episode 75: This Corruption, It Affects Pronouns.