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Cassandra and Damia are in Arden, alive and dead, respectively. Malachai is with them. Norton and his head people are there, except for the Corwin simulacrum, which is missing. There is something Corwinish in the Corwin corpse, but nobody took a base-line measurement beforehand, so they cannot determine if that is where the simulacrum went. Random and Martin are around, as are Serena and Tazik.
Osric is playing in his lab with Mellor.
The Mountain King has just told those around him to eat up. Celeste conjures the rock she is eating into bread while it is in her mouth, and the bread is conjured back into rock on her second bite. It's the Mountain King, ensuring that she has good dwarven food, not that moldy stuff. Celeste notices that Brand has shapeshifted his teeth and his tongue and is grinding the rock with ease; she's not sure what else he has done to his digestive system. Celeste conjures another row of extra-hard teeth with which to grind the rock.
At one point during dinner, a wart-hog-looking thing nudges up against Celeste's leg, and then starts gnawing on her chair legs. When she ignores it, it wanders off and starts gnawing on the wall. The Mountain King spots the wart-hog and asks Celeste why she brought that creature here. Celeste denies responsibility for the creature, and the Mountain King declares a hunt. He pulls a sword three times her size off the wall and goes running off after the wart-hog, which gives off a grunt of fear and flees. The room rapidly empties, leaving Celeste alone with Brand and one other being. That being stretches out an arm and starts swiping rocks off the Mountain King's plate.
Celeste and Brand talk about their sole remaining companion; Brand thinks that he might be Darkstar. Celeste tells Brand that Darkstar was spotted recently outside Faerie, so that probably isn't him.
Celeste tries to introduce herself to their companion. He says something, Celeste grows warm, and Brand claims that it was a magical attack.
Celeste and Brand prepare to leave, and their companion steals the rocks off their plates.
Celeste leads Brand off, trying to backtrack towards the bookkeeping gnomes. They become lost. Celeste tries to create a spell to make her footsteps glow, a task that would take an hour and a half. Brand joins in, and they finish in fifteen minutes. When the spell is finished, many, many footsteps all over the place glow. There are footsteps on the ceilings and walls, and there is no clear path out. Brand flips a coin and they start wandering randomly.
Malachai is leading the mob towards Amber.
Jean realizes that he is still in contact with the simulacrae that he budded into the Nortons, and starts sharing information with his hosts. Jean starts tormenting the Ilk simulacrum in the Norton in Amber by giving him bits and pieces of information about the battle in the defense of Home. "Ooh - that thumb thing is neat!" Jean tells the head people that Deirdre is telling stories about gophers to Flora. Ilk questions Jean out loud about Deirdre. Cassandra tries to acquire more information, so Jean starts scribbling on a wall in Norton's mind in crayon and Ilk projects his drawings into the air. The Deirdre floating in mid-air looks about sixteen and is severely dressed. She looks like she might grow up into Deirdre, some day.
Cassandra recognizes the Sha'um playing with the gryphon ahead of them as Gillian. Gillian pounces directly at her. Malachai notices that Gillian is heading for Tazik, who is directly behind Cassandra. "Tazik - incoming!" Ilk Logrus-pulls the Norton collective out of the path of the incoming Sha'um, and Norton starts hearing a buzzing in his ears. Tazik vaults over Cassandra and heads for Gillian. Gillian and Tazik have an enthusiastic reunion. Cassandra notices that a gryphon is gnawing on Gillian and throws a knife at it. The gryphon scwalks, flies up into the air, and tries to pull the knife out. When Cassandra retrieves the knife with the Force, the gryphon follows the knife back and whimpers in front of Cassandra, offering its wound for her inspection. Norton offers to fix the gryphon, and is thoroughly ignored. Cassandra binds the wound, and the gryphon wanders off to wait for its turn to play with the kitty-cat again.
Jean leaves Flora's room and looks for an outside window. He finds a window, looks out, sees Norton, and waves to himself. Norton waves back. After a while, Jean gets bored with waving to himself and starts wandering through the castle. His bodyguards are no longer invisible and seem uncomfortable; one of them is a top hat on his head, and the other is a bow tie around his neck.
The group continues walking towards the castle. Serena stays behind with Tazik and Gillian. The remaining group reaches Castle Amber, and sees the neatly killed servants.
The Damia zombie wanders off in search of the rest of the AD&D run. Janus releases Cassandra to Malachai's care and heads out to "take care of something". Cassandra heads to her rooms. Malachai heads towards Prospero's office, and the rest of the mob follows Malachai.
Osric is doing experiments. There is no apparent crossover; the one on the right still has Mellor-shape, and the one on the left still has wings. He's not making any progress, beyond determining that both the Mellor and the virus are mutating. Osric lets the vicious Mellor take a non-fatal bite out of one of the others, then separates them again. He notices that after a bit the non-fatal chunk has grown back, and there are no other signs of change. The one that took the bite is changing; it is chomping less voraciously and seems to be budding wings. The area around the eyes and the eyes of the winged Mellor are becoming darker.
Osric monitors the changes in the Mellor that took a bite out of the other. He notices that the virus is spreading away from the gullet towards the rest of the body, and the wings start budding when the virus reaches the Mellor's back.
An alarm goes off; one of the locked down gates opened and a non-Mellor life form went through. Osric locks the gate down again. It's on a pathway now. He reinforces the gate on the opposite end to try to trap it. The reinforced gate opens. Osric is much annoyed. One of the gates to one of the worlds opens, something goes through, then the gate locks behind it. Osric doesn't think he could do that without a remote - and he can't get a remote.
He sets up a few automated experiments, goes to his central command center, then starts backtracking the intrusion. The intrusion didn't start in the area he was monitoring - the first opening was in the warehouse where he left Malachai, Merlin, and Lazy. Osric suspects Lazy.
His computer is still searching for a match for the demons. Osric thinks that it should take another one hundred and fifty to two hundred years to finish searching all of shadow that is connected to the Fringe.
Osric exits the Fringe through the gate as the intruder. He wanders a bit, and notices a large black cat curled up on top of a tower. He explores some more, and then tries to communicate with Lazy, warning him that the area of the Fringe he just passed through was closed off for a reason.
Lazy asks Osric for the location of some other deserts with places to rest above them. Osric asks Lazy why he isn't resting in the sand, and receives a mental image of a cat swimming in a toilet. Osric offers to have some of his people build platforms over deserts, and receives a feeling of gratitude. Lazy shows Osric the location of a couple of Fringe gates in Pearl.
Osric tells Lazy that he shouldn't stay here - it's bad. Lazy subtly moves them into a subtly different shadow. Osric tries to return to his gate, but discovers that he is in the wrong shadow, and doesn't know where he is so he can't gate back. He returns to Lazy and complains. Lazy invites Osric to jump off the top of the structure with him. Everything is different as they jump, and Lazy takes a few steps then indicates a location around the corner. Osric turns the corner, and notices a slight rise, but no ring. His crystal thinks there is a gate there. The gate is closed and there doesn't appear to be a pylon. He conjures a pylon, goes through, and discovers that he is near the control center. He conjures a transport vehicle and goes to the control center, where he discovers that a life force has broken through and expanded across an area three gates in diameter. He closes off the gates, and starts working on a device to examine the intruding life force.
Random, Martin, Malachai, Norton, and dead Corwin are heading towards Prospero. Norton calls to his cat and pig. Malachai hears a grunt and the trample of short legs coming in his direction from the dining area. Into view comes a roasted, reanimated pig with a silver arm sticking out of it. Jean is visibly disturbed. Random is chowing down on pig slices. Martin is ignoring the pig and Norton.
The Ilk simulacrum recognizes the corpses in the hallways; they are the servants that Ilk pulled through to replace the serving staff. Ilk tells Jean to tell Ilk not to come to Amber for a while, but refuses to elaborate.
"Nice entourage." Prospero and Malachai chat. Prospero doesn't have any new information about the battle in the pass of Garnath. Malachai advises shortening their lines of defense to compensate for the missing rangers. Malachai and Prospero work out a new defense plan, which involves pulling most of the troops out of Arden to defend the castle.
The chained Flora is mentioned. Norton and company volunteer to go help her, but are worried about the piles of corpses in the hallways. Malachai decides to secure the castle, starting with discovering the mad servant-slayer. He recalls the castle guards from Arden and sets up the remaining rangers as pickets and scouts. Random and Martin grow bored and wander off. Norton's offer to reanimate the dead servants is rejected by Malachai, on the grounds that Flora would have a fit - zombies don't match the decor of the castle. Malachai does concede to let Norton get the corpses out of the way, for future disposition. No action is taken about the servants yet.
Damia has reached her rooms. Bleys is annoyed at Damia's current state, Theresa is amused, Maria is asleep, and Natasha offers Damia a corn dog.
Jean is bored by this castle, and has difficulty opening the locked doors, but sees this neat garden with only a single window opening onto it. He goes through the window and tries to climb down. The wall now appears flat, and Jean falls the six hundred feet to the ground. The garden is big, and there are leprous frogs hopping around. Jean is vastly amused by the frogs, and tells Norton about the window. Limbs regrow and stick together; Jean sticks extra limbs onto some frogs, and sticks frogs together at oozing stumps.
[Long-chain Frog Molecules]
[Frog Benzene]
Cassandra is being bored in her rooms, waiting for moon-rise.
Blaze has spent her time in the castle constructing things. She has a number of tools that she has begun analyzing the castle with. Theresa has a number of things Damia recognizes as having been formerly scattered across the castle. Damia recommends putting the stolen things back and returning to Cobalt. They complain that everyone leading the expedition abandoned them, leaving them no way to go anywhere.
"What's happened in Cobalt? And why are you a corpse?"
Damia explains what happened. They tell Damia to take them back to Cobalt; she claims that she can't and asks about the viability of using trump. They claim that their trumps of Cyndia aren't working.
Damia pockets an Amberite trump deck that she finds lying on the floor.
She takes Natasha to meet Norton.
Norton notices that Damia is coming closer to them, and tells Malachai. They wait for her to arrive. Natasha happily takes a slice from the pig. Damia introduces Natasha to Norton and the company at large.
Damia notices that the dead servants were the ones she brought through with Ilk. She declines to share this revelation with the group at large.
Natasha examines the undead Corwin, then hands Norton a bleeding liver, telling him that Corwin is missing one. Norton makes a playmate igloo cooler with a biohazard symbol on it, sticks the liver into it, and hands it to Corwin to carry.
Natasha and Norton talk and compare notes, to the disgust of almost everyone in the area. Natasha keeps slipping corn dogs to the pig. The pig likes them. Natasha gives Norton a corn dog, and he examines it. There are gas pockets in the corn dog, and if some of the gases were mixed with each other, they might explode. Norton eats carefully.
The group reaches the outside of Flora's rooms. The Flora outside the door is doing petit-point.
Jean is playing in the garden trying to determine what plants the frogs will stick to. He starts making an abstract frog sculpture.
Celeste has found something. There is a fishy thing on an island in the middle of an underwater lake. It is singing a depressed variation on "Row, row, row your boat" in Thari. It swims over to Celeste and Brand. It is wearing clothing with a faded crest on one shoulder. Its eyes are very big, and its shoes are held shut by fish bones. His hair is held pinned together by a fish bone. The thing complains that it can't leave this place - all of the corridors lead back here. The guy demonstrates, and walks towards a wall. Celeste watches as the wall moves forward to meet his hand, and the floor moves beneath his feet like a treadmill, eventually leading him back into the water.
Celeste reaches out on the god channels. She hears a voice that sounds like a hawk, and elderly man chatting with Titania, an impression of great size, and a castle complaining about having mice in it. Celeste gives a mental clearing of her throat. Titania greets her, the castle complains that they are partying in its basement, and the old man raises an eyeball. Celeste complains about being lost in a series of caves under a mountain. Titania asks if she has neglected to obtain permission from the Mountain King to leave the party. Titania suggests to Celeste that since she is royalty and a dwarf, she therefore must be the Mountain King and can give herself permission to leave.
Celeste announces that she now has permission to leave, the surrounding area shimmers, and a part of the shadow in one corner of the cavern becomes deeper. She takes Brand's hand and heads out. The insane man calls out, "Wait for..." *click* They hear the sliver of a scream cut off behind them. Brand is looking at Celeste, horrified. Celeste tries to give the man permission to leave, but doesn't know his name. She tries to head back to find him, but cannot. They leave.
They reach the surface, and carefully step over a line of eggs across the entrance. When they turn around, they cannot see the cave they just left. They are in a field, with cows. There is an advertising agent being shot in the field.
Brand is horrified when he remembers that he lost Zack's broomstick-horse.
They find scrub-brushes and walk on.
They continue in Faerie. She encounters a mad Spaniard and a tooth-stealing dentist. She sees a large trump-ish drawing that appears to be done in Merlin's hand on the ground. She levitates up to get a look at it, and notices that it seems to be a gate out. She can see a city as well, which appears to have been deliberately destroyed. Brand is juggling three oranges, peeling them as he does so. She comes back down. He gives her an orange, and says that Deirdre taught him that one.
Cassandra leaves her rooms and heads to her training room. She finds a book in her training room, it's "Basic Sword Play, by Corwin". It's the same book she left in Julian's rooms a while ago. She throws it across the room, where it explodes, leaving cream pie goo everywhere.
She goes to Julian's rooms and tries to set them on fire. They don't light. She spends lots of time working on something creative and nasty.
Norton makes blood-scouts and sends them to look after the buzzing, which became fainter after they entered the castle, but is getting louder again. He asks his gargoyles on the roof if they can hear the buzzing. They can't. His blood-spider goes shambling off on all eleven of its legs, calling Norton its master as it goes. "Don't you hate it when they do that?" "Mine never call me master; they just explode." Natasha cuts herself and catches the blood. It shapes into a little blue thing, gleefully pipes up with "I'm alive!" and explodes.
[Carlton: The Smear at Ground Zero]
Ilk and Norton experiment, trying to track down the buzzing. It's coming from behind them, closing at the rate of three or four feet a minute. They think it might be Benedict, slicing and dicing. They hide behind Malachai. The castle is full of new magic, all with Ingold's signature. Ilk looks around for teleport blocks. There are lots of them, and Ilk doesn't think he could burrow through them this close to a Pattern. They get Dworkin's trump of the Abyss ready.
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