Wonderland Session 8

After an extremely long break between sessions due to illness, schedule issues and other shenanigans, my little troupe met again.

We have M- Sir Epperson the Third; Captain and Noble
B- Squeakers the Clown
Z- The Policeman
L- Sorceress
K-Tennessee Jones, Explorer
C- Alistair, "Batman"
K-Lem, Ghost

Lem and Alistair were not able to make the session, but we went ahead with the adventures.

The group landed on the shores of Meridia safely and made their way towards the main settlement after parking the boat, to which Squeakers has developed a method of communication.  The settlement is built into a large grotto which is dotted with random rocks across the landscape. The rocks are tall and similar-ish to those found at Stonehenge, but in various colors. The buildings of the settlement are tucked into the grotto, along side the rocks in a fairly random fashion.

No palm trees, though.

The group makes its way to the center of "town". While in the center of town, the group notices that there are plenty of women out and about, but no men or children appear visible. Tennessee advises them to let her do the talking, as there are "special circumstances" around. She is then greeted by a former acquaintance. The acquaintance makes several comments which alert the group to the fact that men are treated far differently on Meridia than Miracle City, and most of the males start to worry just a little. Sir Epperson is not phased, and is loud and obnoxious, which gets Tennessee some funny looks. As Tennessee is conversing with the resident, Squeakers feels the presence of two children, whom he impresses with a few tricks.

The group is then greeted by Axaris, the mayor.  Axaris is accompanied by a large contingent of assistants and so on, and following up the rear is her male companion. He is extremely good looking and appears to be a trophy of some sort. She talks with Tennessee for a bit and then escorts the group to a large hall for dinner, rest and so forth.

Among the smattering of NPCs accompanying the PCs is the monk, who has become his "regular" age, and is exceptionally good looking. Living quarters are directly in proportion to the status of the person staying there, and Tennessee has earned a great deal of status through her "possession" of a large male entourage with such a handsome man included.  The quarters are very plush, and fine food, warm baths, clean clothes and fresh beds are abound for the group.

The group does some minor exploring in the quarters, finding a small trove of books native to Meridia. There is a decided lack of religious writing of any kind, which causes a bit of consternation among the majority of the party. They do discover books on many other topics, and Tennessee remembers seeing some books on geography and so forth at an outland camp, which the group plans to visit the next day. They then retire for the night.

Squeakers discovers that he feels run down, and needs recharging. He decides to investigate the town while the remainder of the group is sleeping to find sources of energy. He is discovered out exploring, and despite his charming ways, is sent back to bed.

The next morning, the group prepares for their adventures. Squeakers prevails upon Tennessee to find the school, and the group heads in that direction. Squeakers is pushing a makeshift cart of what appears to be garbage, and unloads it in front of the school while Tennessee goes inside to talk with the teacher. The school comes out for an assembly, and discovers that Squeakers has assembled a makeshift Punch and Judy show out of random household knickknacks.

He proceeds to put on a puppet play about the group's adventures thus far, including many of their stops and trials along the way. He makes special mention of the squid baby and the storybook island, while invoking the other members of the party to say special lines. His prompts include "do YOU know where the Gods are?", which he uses to great effect and gets the children chanting along with him. He concludes with a great flourish, and the young people laugh, clap and cheer. The remainder of the group is similarly impressed. Squeakers then passes Tennessee a note with a list of items he's swiped to make the show, along with a bill, which elicits a grimaced chuckle.

Tennessee knows that the Gods aren't a big thing on Meridia, so she hustles the group off before they get into any real trouble. The group makes their way out of the grotto and towards a copse of boulders. They enter the gathering of rocks, which are much closer together than the grotto they just left, and immediately feel "weird".

The rocks are somewhat magnetic, and the group tries to use this to their advantage. However, something about the rocks defies their attempts to magnetize items and use the polarized fields to find their way out of the stand. The disoriented group spends some more time trying to get out of the rock formation with no avail. Squeakers gets a message from the boat that "she" is worried about the group, and that she doesn't like the rocks.

While they are bungling around, Alistair (substituted by me) remembers he can be a bat. He flies above the rocks and looks around. He finds the way out, but as soon as he lands and becomes a person again, he forgets. The group then makes him into a "bat kite". They tie a string to his leg and let him fly them out of the grouping.

Once the group finds their way out of the rocks, they proceed towards a hunting village set up on the outlands. Tennessee used to frequent the area, learning to tame animals and evade traps, so she is familiar with most of the inhabitants (who are all male).  She notices a distinct differences in how they treat her, and asks one of the hunters what has happened since she left. She's told that things have become worse, and the inequities have become more entrenched.

The village is different from other areas of Meridia, in that things are gathered into twos. With the exception of the tannery, every building or enclosure is one of a pair. They look around the village and find a small collection of books, one of which is generally about geography. As the group is looking through the book collection, they find small snippets of information that they find helpful. The key piece is almost  literally a two sentence bit about how Meridia used to be a larger "pangea" but is now split, and that a bridge would join it together with it's other part.

Spurred on by this information, Tennessee asks if there are any people who might remember the Gods or the older history of Meridia. While Tennessee is talking, Squeakers quietly places a holy book on the bookshelf, and Sir Epperson carves a symbol of the Gods onto a nearby tree. Tennessee is directed to the fishing village, as there's an older man who might hold some information.

They make their way to the fishing village, which is comprised entirely of men. The men are on a huge lake, and they seem to be having the time of their lives fishing, swimming, and generally enjoying the world around them. The group is invited to come fishing or generally relax.  Both the sorceress and the policeman decide to partake in skinny dipping in the swimming area, while most of the rest of the group heads out to the center of the lake to visit with some of the fishermen.

There's a moment when one of the group wonders aloud if the Gods or Elith (squid baby) might be under water, and Sir Epperson sticks his head underwater and shouts "helloooooooooooo", but nothing happens.

Squeakers sees what he thinks are the tubes from the underwater island, and makes his way around the lake to that area while the remainder of the group does their thing. Once Squeakers determines that the tubes seem to have a function, he gets Sir Epperson's attention, and the two attempt to use the tubes to talk to whomever might be underwater, if there is anyone.

The two encounter success and the underwater "village" , which is surrounded by a force bubble of some sort, begins to surface.

This acts something like a dam opening, and all the water in the lake is pushed back to the other side.

The group all find their way to the activity, and are faced with a giant "mouth", with a road inside it. Inside, they see one of Jershaw and Elith's relatives, holding out the telepathic trident for the group to use to communicate.

The group asks a lot of questions, and finds out that this underwater group is similar to but separate from the other island they previously visited. The inhabitants know of and can talk to each other, but can't get back.

As the group is talking, various members parse together bits and pieces of various conversations and details from their adventures, and wonder if the island could be "steered" much like the boat. They then realize the only way to do so would be to have every person concentrating on the same thing at the same time, and it would be very difficult.

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We left off about here. I think I got it all, but it was a long session with a lot accomplished so I might have missed things.