(2022-03-29) The Tall-and-Small Murdershow

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Author:	inkie
Summary:	Tadget finds her elven contact at Telredor, and the search for Inkie begins.
Rating:	T for Teen

Arc: In Search of Inkie

Eilanthe detaches herself from the shadows of the covered walkway and scans the open platform. At her side, a massive frostsaber yawns and then shakes his head irritably in the rain.

Tadget spots An Elf, and approaches. She has likely been doing a lot of this.

[Tadget]: "Hello, excuse me. Are you looking for a gnome of my approximate description?" She helpfully whips off her hood.

Eilanthe considers the gnome of approximate gnomish description. "Slipshank?" she asks in a low-voiced, gravel rasp, and flicks another glance around the platform.

[Tadget]: “That's right, Sgt. Tadget Slipshank, 6th E.U., 7th Legion.” Tadget takes a moment to wring some water out of her bangs; when she does so, they spring back to defying gravity for a time, until they get drenched again.

Eilanthe nods and rests her fingertips lightly on the head of the saber, who is looking decidedly disgruntled by the weather. "Eilanthe Stormlight. Black Company. You received the letter, then."

[Tadget]: "Yep."

[Eilanthe]: "We should speak someplace less — this." The elf glances up into the rain, then inclines her head toward the space beneath the ramp to the right.

[Tadget]: "Sure. Lead the way."

Tadget takes about three steps for every one of Eilanthe's. "The cat's been fed, right?" She eyes the huge saber up and down.

Eilanthe leans casually against the wall of the tunnel beneath the ramp. The frostsaber gives a very toothy yawn and settles down at her feet, chin on his paws. "He does not eat gnomes," Eilanthe says. It is unclear, from the hoarse monotone, whether this is a joke or not. "The Commandant would not condone it."

[Tadget]: "We're kinda gristly anyway."

Eilanthe nods gravely. She studies Tadget. Possibly for gristle, possibly just sizing her up. Or down, ha ha.

[Tadget]: "So Inkers has a whole company of mercenaries, but they write me for help. I'm not sure whether I should be flattered, or terrified, or what." She speaks quietly, and her tone is so flat and casual as to attract no attention or interest from anyone who'd be anywhere near earshot.

[Eilanthe]: "Some of the Company are with them. Wherever that is. The rest have — missions of their own. And this one is … complex. You are a failsafe. The Commandant gave me the letter and asked me to dispatch it if they had not returned within three days' time. They did not, so I did."

"Where did they go??" Tadget manages to convey absolute incredulity without raising the volume or pitch of her voice.

[Eilanthe]: "They were following a trail. Something the sin'dorei have concocted." Even in the rough monotone, Eilanthe manages to put a disdainful twist on sin'dorei. "The Commandant saw a great conspiracy, threading through … several groups’ interests." Eilanthe glances back toward the plaza.

[Tadget]: "Ho boy. I hope they haven't misjudged my skill set here. I'm usually more on the stabbing end of things than the investigative end, though I mean, I can solve puzzles if it's required of me, I am a gnome after all. But I'm not a very good gnome."

Eilanthe arches a silvery brow. After a moment she says, "I do not think the Commandant is a very … good gnome either, Slipshank. In … senses. Perhaps that is why you are suitable?"

[Tadget]: "I trust their judgment. They're smarter than I am, so if they think I'm the person for this job I probably am. I guess. So what's next?" Tadget peers up at Eilanthe with intense, peridot-green eyes.

[Eilanthe]: "One of the threads led from this place to Terokkar Forest. There has been … an incident there. With some of the Cenarion Expedition's people. This is the thread I was told to pull, if the thing had to be unraveled."

[Tadget]: "Innnnnteresting. So you want me to tag along with you and check it out?"

[Eilanthe]: "If you would. This seems to have been the Commandant's plan. You are … better-suited to some tasks than I. And I have other connections to … protect."

[Tadget]: "Yeah, I'm probably better at going unnoticed, if that should be required." She eyes Eilanthe up and down.

Eilanthe smiles faintly. She seems to know how to do that after all. (It wasn't entirely clear.) “We will go south, then, to the forest.”

[Tadget]: "'Kay."

They ride south, and pass out of the marsh and through the southern foothills.

Eilanthe halts and surveys the forest ahead.

[Tadget]: "I kinda like it here."

Eilanthe nods once. "Yes. It is pleasant. I like the smell of the trees."

[Tadget]: "I know it's weird, but I've always liked forests and jungles and stuff. Lived all by myself in Feralas for a while."

Eilanthe looks back and raises an eyebrow. She contemplates Tadget again. "I also lived in Feralas for a time."

As they approach the Cenarion Thicket, they are abruptly attacked by a giant, brilliant-green moth. They kill it.

"WOW! RUDE." Tadget kicks the moth.

Eilanthe contemplates the insect’s corpse. "That was a very aggressive … moth."

[Tadget]: "I could ride one of those babies."

[Eilanthe]: "They are peaceable, in general, here. And yes. I expect you could."

Tadget eyes Earthbinder Tavgren. "Is that the okay kind of moocow?"

[Eilanthe]: "Yes. This … moocow is … okay. One of the Cenarions."

Tadget gives the moocow a jaunty wave.

They are promptly attacked by another green moth: a regrettable choice on the moth’s part.

"Yiiiikes, these are some angry moths." Tadget sheaths her daggers.

Eilanthe approaches Moocow Tavgren to speak to him about the trouble that Inkie has evidently sent them after.

Eilanthe takes a moment to process the news that all of the druids in the Thicket were killed. Possibly by the angry moths. She surveys the arches and towers ahead warily. "Well. I suppose we … follow this thread."

They proceed warily into the Thicket. The ground beneath the towers and among the various buildings is littered with the corpses of Kaldorei and taurens, some of them in cheetah form as they appear to have tried to flee … whatever killed them. The brilliant green moths are everywhere, and there is a strange, low-lying mist.

"Well this is a grisly scene …" Tadget looks around.

[Eilanthe]: "Mn."

They spot a Kaldorei in druid’s robes wandering among the dead. He looks a little dazed.

Tadget points. "That one seems okay."

Eilanthe eyes him. "Yes."

They approach the wandering druid. He begins to rant desperately at them about eyes, EYES, always watching him, they need to put out the eyes, eyes in the tower!

[Tadget]: "… Okay maybe not entirely okay."

Eilanthe looks around warily. "Eyes?"

They set off toward the Tower of Alleged Eyes. They are obliged to kill many moths as they go. Conversation continues despite the best efforts of the moths.

[Tadget]: "I am … about sick of eyes if we're being honest."

[Eilanthe]: "Oh? Have you had many of them, lately?"

[Tadget]: "Well there was this whole kinda … Old God situation going on."

[Eilanthe]: "Oh, yes? In Silithus, yes?"

[Tadget]: "Yep. I was part of that whole… army."

"Ah." Eilanthe has a facial expression. It might be impressed? Or maybe she needs to sneeze.

[Tadget]: "The God had this whole eyeball situation going on, very unsettling."

[Eilanthe]: "Eyeball situation," she repeats thoughtfully.

[Tadget]: "Anyway so I'm technically on leave now. But bored."

[Eilanthe]: "A bored gnome, in my experience, is a dangerous thing to leave lying about."

[Tadget]: "7th Legion is real good about giving folks time off after things like that, but yeah."

[Eilanthe]: "My experience is limited, mind you, but all the same."

[Tadget]: "Those Cenarion folks were pretty helpful out there, too."

[Tadget]: "Also, weirdly, Horde, at times."

[Eilanthe]: "Hm."

They are deep in the Thicket now, and in the strange mist.

Eilanthe peers at Tadget. "You look … more green than you did."

[Tadget]: "Really? I’m feeling fine…" She seems oddly defensive.

"Ah. Well, I wasn't sure." Eilanthe shrugs an agreeable shoulder. Gnomes do be like that sometimes.

[Tadget]: "I think the light's just weird here."

[Eilanthe]: "Possibly. Light is not always my strong suit."

[Tadget]: "Dang. So many dead elves."

[Eilanthe]: "Yes."

They arrive at the Tower of Alleged Eyes, and make their way cautiously up the ramp. At the top, they do not find eyes, but a gigantic moth. I mean, the moth has eyes. But it’s just a super big moth.

[Tadget]: "Whoooooa."

[Eilanthe]: "It is another moth."

[Tadget]: "King moth."

[Eilanthe]: "A moth monarch."

They disrespect the monarchy. The King Moth dies. They proceed back down the Tower of Actually Just a Really Big Moth and continue through the glade. They also continue to be attacked by brilliant green moths.

[Tadget]: "They're kinda pretty. And murdery. Pretty and murdery is my favorite."

[Eilanthe]: "Indeed. Are they more colorful than the docile ones, or is that also the light?"

[Tadget]: "Hmmm. Not sure. I mean, I haven't really noticed any that weren't trying to kill me, yet."

They encounter the wandering druid again.

"It was a large moth. Not eyes. Just a moth," Eilanthe tells the mad druid. He doesn't seem to take note of this; he mumbles about strange lights, and wanders off.

In the next building, they find a peculiar sphere embedded with blue crystal facets.

[Eilanthe]: "Oh."

[Tadget]: "So that must be the light he was talking about. Looks like a bomb."

Eilanthe has crouched to peer at the object. She takes a dagger from her boot and pokes it experimentally, a moment before Tadget observes it looks like a bomb.

[Eilanthe]: "… oh." She stops poking the object, and rises again.

Tadget giggles.

[Eilanthe]: "Is it a bad one, then, or has it discharged already?"

[Tadget]: "Seems to be dormant, whatever it is. But still intact? Maybe like, it just emitted some kinda radiation? It clearly did something. And crazy guy was babbling about bright lights."

[Eilanthe]: "Hm. To drive moths mad, and poison druids? Whatever killed most of these druids did not wound them outwardly."

[Tadget]: "Radiation would definitely make people crazy. For soooooome reason it was the first thing that leapt to mind for me."

A short distance from the apparent bomb is the corpse of a Broken.

Eilanthe prods the corpse of the Broken with her boot. "This one is not a druid. Carrier of the bomb?"

[Tadget]: "Oh it's one of those messed up g–draenei. Yeah, looks like a suicide bombing type situation maybe."

Eilanthe nods thoughtfully and scans the area. "Yes. Some of them have been in league with the demons and the naga. I suppose we can't know about this one. If it is radiation, should we be lingering here?"

[Tadget]: "I'm indestructible." She hesitates for a moment, though, and shifts her weight uncomfortably.

[Eilanthe]: "Oh, that must be excellent for you."

[Tadget]: "It is pretty excellent, yes."

[Eilanthe]: "Well, let us say that Osa is not indestructible, then, and report back to the … moocow before he turns into a mad moth."

Osa is the frostsaber. He does not appear on the verge of mad moth-dom, but he is faintly greenish in the mist.

[Tadget]: "Maybe that cow druid can check us, see if we're contaminated or whatever."

They return to Moocow Tavgren.

[Tadget]: "Excuse me, Mr. Druid Man, person. Are we irradiated? Do you know what radiation is?"

Eilanthe awaits the radiation verdict patiently.

Tadget patiently sits for an examination by the druid. He smiles at her and seems unconcerned.

[Tadget]: "Okay, guess we're not going to start raving about lights and eyes or whatever."

Eilanthe eyes the druid as he explains he needs samples from the uncontaminated moths as well. She hisses an irritable breath through her teeth and turns away to comply.

The moths south of the road seem to be uncontaminated. They are just drifting around minding their moth business.

[Tadget]: "Oh, huh, these aren't as pretty."

[Eilanthe]: "No, you see? Docile but colorless."

[Tadget]: "Evil things are always prettier. Well, except Old Gods. Decidedly unpretty, those."

[Eilanthe]: "Have you seen many?"

[Tadget]: "Just the one. But like, all their servants and stuff are all … tentacly too."

[Eilanthe]: "Tentacly."

Tadget gestures helpfully.

[Eilanthe]: "I am sorry, I didn't catch that. Can you show me again?"

Tadget does some really dramatic wiggly motions with her arms and fingers. "Tentacles!"

[Eilanthe]: "No, I am sorry. Still I do not understand. Can you show me again?"

[Tadget]: "Sorry, if I had long noodly limbs like yours it'd be easier to demonstrate. I am compact and decidedly nontentacular."

Eilanthe nods, extremely and solemnly straightfaced. "Noodly. I see."

[Tadget]: "Now I want noodles. Wonder if I could make an Old God out of noodles and like… hm, a tomato?"

[Eilanthe]: "Why?"

[Tadget]: "To eat!" Her tone implies, of course.

[Eilanthe]: "I see."

[Tadget]: "I mean, who hasn't wanted to devour an Old God? Just me? 'Kay."

[Eilanthe]: "Well, you are the one who said they're mostly eyes. There are only a few sorts of things whose eyes I enjoy eating."

[Tadget]: "Like what?"

[Eilanthe]: "Fish. Spiders."

[Tadget]: "C'Thun was more like … one BIG eye and lots of tentacles with littler eyes."

[Eilanthe]: "Perhaps it would be like eating fish eyes, then. A cuttlefish?"

[Tadget]: "Or is, maybe. Not super clear if he's actually dead or just like, deeply defeated. Whatever. No longer a threat. There's a theory that Old Gods can't be killed, and that's why they're all buried. I mean why else would the Titans do that? They could've smushed em flat I'm sure. Burying them seems pretty lazy if they could be killed."

[Eilanthe]: "Could they have? Or are they creatures of equal power, do you think? Or are the Old Gods necessary to some balance to which we are not privy?"

[Tadget]: "Yeah, so like, can't as in impossible, or can't as in shouldn't. One or the other."

Eilanthe nods.

[Tadget]: "We sure seemed to kill the heck out of that one, though. I dunno. Hard to tell if a god's dead. Maybe there will be Horrible Consequences!" She seems cheered by the prospect.

[Eilanthe]: "I can see why you and the Commandant are friends."

[Tadget]: "They were my FIRST friend. We were such cute kids. Taking stuff apart."

[Eilanthe]: "This is a thing I think you both continue to do."

[Tadget]: "Oh for sure."

They return to Earthbinder Tavgren with the moth samples, which are basically just guts. Moth guts. After comparing the samples with those from the maddened moths in the Cenarion Thicket, he concludes that the aggressive moths were corrupted by an explosion of raw mana.

Eilanthe blinks at the tauren. "… mana?"

[Tadget]: "Huh. Waaaaait, Inkers thought this was a blood elf conspiracy, right? They do crap with mana."

“The radiation is … mana." Eilanthe appears to be processing this. Or not-exactly-processing this. Processing error. She blinks at Tadget.

[Eilanthe]: "Ah. The — yes. The sin'dorei." She narrows her eyes.

[Tadget]: "I bet it's the stupid elves. Uh, no offense. I mean the stupid elves, not the … you elves."

[Eilanthe]: "No, of course. I understood. We are not the Stupid Elves."

[Tadget]: "The mana-crazed scrawny ones."

The tauren keeps his thoughts on stupid vs. non-stupid elves to himself. He mentions that there is a Broken merchant who travels the road regularly, making deliveries to the Cenarion Thicket and elsewhere. Perhaps he knows something about the strange bomb-object, or the Broken who carried it.

[Eilanthe]: "Let us find this … merchant."

They set off to search the road.

[Tadget]: "I'm glad it was just mana and not like, radiation-radiation. I can handle mana."

[Eilanthe]: "The moths did not. Nor the druids."

[Tadget]: "Which is to say I am not sensitive to it in the least. I'm like… a living lead vest for mana. Very disappointing to my parents."

They spot a pair of Broken on the road ahead of them. One, slightly smaller, is dressed in embroidered finery. The other, very large, is carrying an equally large hammer.

"You there." Eilanthe addresses the Broken.

The Broken do not like being addressed, which is probably unusual in traveling merchants. The large hammer-wielding one attacks.

[Tadget]: "Ack!"

Nice try, hammer guy.

[Tadget]: "You ugly piece of crap!"

"Will you tell us now?" Eilanthe nudges the dead bodyguard's corpse with a toe and eyes Empoor coldly.

[Tadget]: "Your bodyguard sure did a crap job of guarding your body, by the way."

Empoor claims to have received a mysterious package for the Thicket from an ethereal in Shattrath City, by the name of Wind Trader Lathrai. He can frequently be found near the World’s End Tavern.

"An ethereal. That is — hm." Eilanthe glances over her shoulder toward the city.

[Tadget]: "Oh I love those things!!!"

[Eilanthe]: "So did the Commandant. For a while. Come, let's find this one."

[Tadget]: "This whole place is insane, really. Love it."

[Eilanthe]: "It is strange, yes."

They arrive in the city.

[Eilanthe]: "The World's End Tavern is the noisy one, correct?"

[Tadget]: "It certainly is when I hang out there."

[Eilanthe]: "I see several ethereals."

[Tadget]: "Hey there, good-lookin!"

The ethereal addressed by Tadget immediately flees.

Eilanthe arches a brow at Tadget. "Perhaps he is … not our one." She looks around, frowning.

[Eilanthe]: "There is one."

They approach an ethereal standing alone outside the World’s End Tavern.

[Eilanthe]: "You there. Lathrai?"

It is indeed Wind Trader Lathrai. Oh dear, his memory is very poor. Broken, you say? Mysterious packages, you say? He cannot possibly recall. Although, perhaps if they do him a small favor ….

"A favor. For simple …" Eilanthe looks away and sucks her teeth, displeased.

[Tadget]: "This is always how it goes. This is why it takes like a week to get anything done around here."

[Eilanthe]: "Would it be uncouth to stab the information out of him, do you think?"

[Tadget]: "I'm not sure you can stab him, he's like … a vapor."

[Eilanthe]: "Ah. I suppose that would complicate it." She sighs.

[Tadget]: "Things that don't bleed are NO fun."

[Eilanthe]: "Very well. We will do your … favor. Bloodless thing."

Wind Trader Lathrai, who has endured this conversation with good grace, seems to lost a caravan of goods on the southern road to a nearby settlement of arakkoa. He wants them retrieved. Our intrepid murderduo sets out once more.

[Tadget]: "I really really want to know what happens if you unravel one."

[Eilanthe]: "If this one does not give us the information when we have collected his belongings, we can take him into an alley and find out, perhaps."

[Tadget]: "Woo hoo!"

[Eilanthe]: "Moths, moths — oh, the bird-men houses, I see them."

[Tadget]: "Also, if they're like, a vapor… can you BREATHE one in by accident?"

[Eilanthe]: "Elune's tits, what an unsettling thought."

[Tadget]: "Like one says something really shocking and you're all, GASP — hrkkk coffcoff. Blowing luminous snot into a hankie for weeks."

[Eilanthe]: "… no."

[Tadget]: "YES."

They murder several arakkoa, and search the bodies.

[Eilanthe]: "These birds are carrying a great deal of … junk. How do we know which belong to the bloodless thing?" She rifles the arakkoa's robes and then rises again looking disgusted, wiping her hand on her leggings.

[Tadget]: "Look for glowing crap?"

"Ah!" Eilanthe finds a small, glowing box in the pockets of the next one. She holds it up and nods at Tadget. "Yes. Good. We will bring him the glowing crap."

[Tadget]: "These bird guys are just… wrong. Like, even orcs have a sort of logic to them, the way they're shaped, and move …. But these guys, every one of them looks like something went horribly wrong at birth. Look how they lurch around. Yuck."

[Eilanthe]: "Well. Between these and the bloodless ones and the stone-mantises on Hellfire Peninsula, there is very little in this world that makes much sense."

[Tadget]: "Right? Love it."

[Eilanthe]: "Water?" She offers Tadget a waterskin that is perhaps a sixth of the gnome's size.

[Tadget]: "Sure, thanks.” She does look a bit winded, and sinks to the ground gratefully for a drink. "Stabbing gross bird people is hard work."

[Eilanthe]: "What things are easier to stab?"

[Tadget]: "Hmmmm. Things that stand really close together?"

Eilanthe withdraws another box from the arakkoa's robes and tucks it in her pack with the others. "A good answer. And these are as many glowing crap as I am willing to carry for that
one. Let's bring them back to him."

[Tadget]: "Glowing Crap Delivery Service! If it takes more than a half hour your Glowing Crap is free!"

Eilanthe does not look like she understood that reference.

They return to Wind Trader Lathrai.

[Tadget]: "Here you go, sir or madam, some lightly-damaged glowing crap!"

Eilanthe peremptorily dumps the glowing boxes onto the crate beside the Wind Trader. "Now information."

Wind Trader Lathrai does, now that you mention it, recall delivering several packages to Empoor the merchant about a month ago. They contained, he now recollects, some exotic engineering parts. Most of them, as far as the Wind Trader is aware, were bound for a place called Tuurem.

"Engineering parts?" Eilanthe looks to Tadget because this is obviously her specialty.

[Tadget]: "Oh, assume the gnome is an engineer. How offensive."

[Eilanthe]: "Is it?"

[Tadget]: "As it happens, I know jack squat about engineering."

"Oh. I beg your pardon." Eilanthe does not look especially penitent.

[Tadget]: "Pardon granted, since you begged so sweetly."

Eilanthe inclines her head gravely.

[Eilanthe]: "I do not know where this Tuurem place is. I will look into it. Where are you staying, Slipshank? No, don't answer that. I will meet you here, again? In the noisy tavern."

[Tadget]: "Sounds good."

Eilanthe nods once. "Thank you."

[Tadget]: "Later!"

[Eilanthe]: "Yes. Later."