Episode 8 - Lunar Landing Lads

## **Episode Synopsis**

### **Recap**

After surviving the Tikul madness, the team were saved by Valentine. They did some shopping and learnt about the blue flower and how they were made. They continued onto Randy's cave and returned his fire. The team feasted and got prepared for their trip to the moon.

### **Episode Summary**

The team, with newly joined Apophis and Randy, are flying to moon island. Randy advises they land in a clear spot on the island to get their wits about them before finding the place to travel to the moon. They come to a patch near the bottom of the island and see all the insectoid people flying back in. They land and Apophis decides he wants to come along to the moon with the team and Randy. They walk into a very dense jungle following Randy, Norman looks off into the jungle and can see some movement of insectoids watching. Norman gives everyone the heads up.

Randy explains that Liik's garden and this island is not from Ome, it's from the beast lands plane and came here after his time as a Greeder. When he was a Greeder, there were more sigils on the ground for gazers and more gazers on Ome as well. People could teleport from sigil to sigil using the gazer glass allowing for long range teleportation. However, after Wesnia was destroyed and the first Greeders came out of the first treasure, the world was all different and the sigils were hard to come by. The Greeders used the sigil to get to the moon as they learnt the moon is the way to find the grand treasures.

Once teleported up there, they will arrive into a town called Glimpse. They'll need to walk for a while and they will arrive at a large city with tall rectangular towers. There, they can put their grand treasure clue in and it will show them a map. Randy does warn them that they're may be security and advises them to break any white crystals if they see them.

They come up to ruins resembling a church with architecture that looks similar to that of Dariun's home of Holven. Zippy immediately hears a slam, sounding like a crate being moved. He looks around and sees crates with familiar glowing coming from them. He can also see, among the grapes, blue bullet pills. They all see a tall slender figure wearing a white waistcoat with blue lining, an ornate mask and helmet with metallic braids coming out of the back and brown mow hawk coming off the helmet. They look around and see a double sided glaive on the wall and notice he has not noticed them.

Zippy alerts them all to the crates and Randy asks about the Ammow company and if they are dangerous. They give Randy a very brief recap and brainstorm what they should do. As they are discussing, the figure hears them and walks out. Everyone tries to hide behind pillars but Norman and Zippy are not quick enough and Randy is too large, Dariun and Apophis hide successfully. The figure reaches their arm behind them and the glaive flies into his hand. He stabs it into the ground and looks at them.

Norman puts his hand behind his back and prestidigitation to create a scroll and attempts to tell the person that he is lost and looking for some help but the person is not too interested in talking and slams the glaive into the ground. The top blade flies out and cuts Norman's shoulder. The glaive comes back and Norman throws his void cloak and catches the blade in the void. The figure slams the now one bladed glaive into the ground and they hear a loud clang followed by the sound of buzzing from the surrounding insectoids coming in.

Randy tells them to get inside and Norman nominates to be the person to look for the gazer sigil on the moon while everyone else protects him. Zippy creates an ice storm on the figure while telling everyone to get close to the figure. The person start running and goes into the church, putting their hands on the ground. They all feel the ground shaking and the church starts to split. Dariun channels planar warrior and draws his black bow, shooting two arrows and both hitting. They become blinded and their white waist coat starts to redden with blood. His mold earth stops and Dariun runs up besides Zippy.

Norman runs forwards and touches his ring of the grammarian and changes hideous laughter to hideous slaughter. Slices appear from Norman and go out but it misses the figure. Zippy casts hold person, restraining the figure but they break free. Norman and Dariun notice small metallic butterflies coming into the church. Insectoids are coming in with some taking bullet pills and grapes from the crates around them. There are at least 200 insectoids surrounding them.

Norman recognizes the butterflies from the coliseum and suddenly there is a light beam that reflects from all of the small butterflies. It goes to hit them but they all dodge as the butterfly warrior appears. Apophis tells them he'll stay at the front and Randy is given the all clear to let loose. Flames start billowing, cooking a lot of the insectoids in the tree line.

Dariun runs inside, pulls the katana and slashes twice at the mystery fighter, hitting both times. Norman runs past the figure and comes to the sigil and pulls out the telescope to look at the moon. He's adjusting, looking at the moon to find the other sigil. Randy tells them to just go but is trying the remember something very important to tell them. Apophis tells him to use his brain as he pummels some insectoids.

The figure looks bloodied but they see a faint blue light from him and his wounds start to close. Zippy notices three ant people coming in from the sides, he runs to Norman and casts stone skin on him. The mysterious figure goes to disarm Dariun but he evades and slashed him. Dariun uses distant attack to slash at all three ants. He teleports to each and kills them all. Dariun then runs back to be between Norman and the figure. Norman keeps searching in the sky.

The butterfly flies up and their wings start reflecting the sunset light off all of the smaller butterflies making it hard to see. Zippy looks up angrily and uses call lightning but it only just hits the butterfly causing the light to diffuse slightly. The figure starts to crouch and they appear to be readying to jump. Dariun tries to hit him as he goes but the figure jumps and is caught by some tarantula hawks who fly him away.

Dariun goes again with distant strike and attacks three more insectoids, killing them all. Randy starts to create a poison gas from his mouth and it spreads before he uses a spark and it explodes, taking out a number of insectoids. The butterfly keeps up the light, blinding them all again. Zippy transforms into a giants eagle and surrounds Norman to protect him. Dariun pulls out the wind fan and uses it to knock away the six insectoids that have come in and the butterfly person to make sure the light doesn't blind Norman.

Dariun slices through more insectoids knocking 12 down before backing up to eagle Zippy and Norman. Norman finally finds the town and a sigil in the center. The sigil flashes white and beneath them they feel the building in power. Zippy gets hit by some remaining insectoids, Dariun hits two more. More insectoids flood in and Zippy's eagle form drops. He uses gust of wind around them to push some back and Dariun swings at five more. The power is building but is not quite ready. Zippy pulls out his flame sword and swings at some and Dariun slices through even more insectoids. Randy calls out and tells them he remembered what he needed to say but just as he is about to tell them, they teleport to the moon.

They slam into the surface and a cloud of moon dust go around them. Three ant soldiers teleported with them and Dariun swiftly slices off all of their heads which slowly fall to the floor. They look around and see a bubble around the whole town which has similar architecture to the Fey. In the distance is a large glowing blue bug the size of a whale. They speculate about the Ammow companies involvement with the sigils and question if they were using it to teleport the pills and grapes around the world.

Zippy and Norman notice large square footprints heavy in the ground heading away from where the giant bug is and towards an observatory in the town. Dracken tells them there could be a chance the surviving Wesnians came to the moon and Norman feels that they could learn a lot here if this is true. Dracken is adamant they need to burn this place down if this is where Wesnian's went and believes he did the world a favor for destroying Wesnia as they were greedy people.

Norman gets his medallion of detect thoughts and can tell the giant bug is alive but he can't comprehend it's thoughts. He also tries to hear Dracken's thoughts but he only hears static from him and Dracken even notices and calls Norman out on this. They continue to discuss Dracken's actual motivations and then try to decide where to go.

They hear from behind them a high pitched battle cry and see, from the direction of the observatory, a person wearing black clothing and goggles holding a broadsword that is way too big for them running at them. They all see and know pretty well that they aren't a threat. Dariun walks up and as they get close, he swings his katana, disarming the boy and trips him.

Suddenly, dozens of similarly dressed soldiers appear all around them holding weapons pointed to them. Dariun sheaths his sword and raises his hands and tells them he is not a threat. Someone uses thaumaturgy to tell them they are not welcome and must leave if they are the Flock. Norman speaks up and tells them they are travelers doing research but they are still aimed at them and go to fire but someone grabs the shoulder of the person talking. The person starts walking towards them and they come up to Norman.

The person takes of their hood and goggles and they see a grey scaled lizard folk who Norman knows is Krit. Norman is speechless and asks if it is really him before embracing him. Krit praises Norman for his efforts in Ome and Norman thanks him for all of his help right before he met team 8. Norman introduces Krit to Dariun and Zippy as the person who saved him in Sanguine.

Krit welcomes Norman home and tells him he expected Norman to make it here one day. Zippy is confused and Norman asks what this place is. Krit explains that this town is Glimpse, a gazer outpost from long ago and is now a sanctuary for tether candidates who were not chosen by the gods, for hollow people like Norman. Krit goes on to say that he was drawn to Norman in Sanguine as he knew he was a hollow. In Sanguine, he protected Norman as the Flock were roaming and they want hollow people. The flock would do something unspeakable to Norman if he found them. Krit properly introduces himself to Zippy and Dariun and tells them he is a gazer in training.

Dariun asks about the flock and Krit explains they are religious people and are the law in terms of the gods. They enforce that no god pull ahead of another and that they are all equal as they all came from the same two; Domy and Nobus. They also has a distaste for Hollows as the gods did not choose them. Krit tells them after the ordeal in Aurum, they shut things down to prevent anyone getting the power of Salem like Turi did.

Krit guides them into Glimpse and tells everyone to relax. Zippy asks if they always stay on guard and Krit tells him yes as the Flock have been aggressive and a Flock sentinel attacked two weeks ago. When looking around, they notice broken buildings and dried blood before coming up to a large steps leading to the observatory where the very tall, deactivated sentinel lies. It has white steel, legs that bend backwards and two large arms.

Krit explains it was only with the power of their protector Sauriel that they defeated the sentinel. They look up the steps to see a tall elven woman wearing a long white gown and a pure white band covering her eyes and nose. Norman can tell that the most recently dug grave is within the observatory as he instantly has a crush on her. Sauriel opens her arms and is glad to see good people who came here. She asks Krit if he can vouch for them and he says he can with Norman not so much for the other two.

Dariun asks if she knows of The Red Bandit and Norman uses disguise self to show her who they mean. Sauriel tells them she has never seen anyone like him and he also does not wear the appropriate colors of a gazer. She tells them they can tell a gazer by the colour they wear; white band means they gaze into the heavens, a blue band means they gaze into people and a black band means they gaze into themselves. Therefore, the red bandit is not a proper gazer, leaving him a remaining mystery.

Sauriel walks by and says to Krit to ensure that his friends stay in line and if they don't, he knows where she will be. She leaves them and goes to look around. They all enter into the large dome building and they see many people of different races around the place and Krit introduces them. They continue to a side door to some stairs and they go down and enter a hidden door. They go into a hidden room and see what looks like a conspiracy theorist room.

He reaches in his bag and he puts a totem on his desk and they feel some magic go over them. Krit tells them he is glad to see them but they need to be quick. Krit tells them he told a lie when the sentinel attacked saying he had to back up on the way from Ome. Luckily, Norman and the others showed up but believes it was fate they did. Krit explains has his life on the line for them to be here so asks they do not betray him. Krit says he cannot trust people here as he believes the Flock's attack was coordinated. He believes they are after a hollow person here who has the ability to severe tethers. Krit knows there is an imposter among them and he needs their help.

Norman puts his hand on his shoulder and tells him he will help. Zippy reminds them of their task here but Norman is adamant they need to help these people like him who are created to be used and discarded by the gods. Zippy is still not fully convinced but Norman gets down on his knee and tells him that this is really important to him and asks for them to at least look into it.

Krit tells them he has transport he can give to them to get to see the grand treasure map. Dariun goes to Norman and stands him up, puts his hand on his shoulder and tells him if it's this important to him he will do it. Zippy wants to help but just wants them to keep in mind the people they left below on Ome. They agree to make it quick and Krit says he already as suspects. Norman looks into Krit's eyes, knowing that he is putting all of his cards on the table and risking his life, tears up slightly and tells him they'll find them.

## **Quotations**

* Dariun "*If I recall correctly some of those giant ants actually had blue flowers on them that they didn’t get to manifest much during combat cause were just so good and we just outwitted the DM.*"

* Zippy "*We're kinda trespassers up here…*"
* Dariun "*When are we not trespassers?*"
* Zippy "*On our ship where we belong!*"

* Krit "*I've seen a lot of tieflings in my day, but none are like Norman D. It is so good to see you again*."

* Krit "*There is an imposter among us.*"

* Norman "*Hollow people like me are created to be used like a tool and discarded by the gods. They have a hard enough life as it is.*"

## **Featured Characters**

### **Main Cast**

* Norman D
* Dariun Branch
* Zippy Westborrough

### **Returning Characters**

* Randy
* James
* Apophis
* Dracken
* Krit

### **New Characters**

* Mysterious stranger
* Moon teenager
* Glimpse
* Sauriel

## **Locations**

* Tikul
* Gazer symbol - Tikul
* Moon
* Glimpse