End of Summer Night
End of Summer Night
Through moon lit back waters a black furred grizzly bear with red hair and gray eyes poles a skiff in a lonely stretch of swamp with a lady timber wolf sitting on a bench watching him. Both are wearing black which contrasts more with her gray fur as she wears a dress that makes her look like a witch while his is black chain mail with green leather accents including the tree of life emblazoned on the jacket. At his waist he keeps a war blade, a powerful sword designed to be used with one or two hands but it has no guard to speak of.
"This is really nice, Sheriff," the she wolf coos as she enjoys the scenery as the skiff features tiki torches that are lit to banish away the gloom. "But why do you really have me out here, Kodyax?"
"To have you alone with me for awhile," Kodyax answers honestly. "I hope you don't mind, Niagara."
"Not at all, Kody," Niagara says with a smirk, "Not at all."
"Hey, Boss!" A ferret with a bowl haircut calls from a canoe with three other ferret guys.
"The wizards of Star Gazer Tower have a message for you," Another ferret, this one with wing like hair on either side of his head says to follow up his brother.
"Yeah, boss," A third ferret with his hair parted down the middle says, "And the council figured since you was already out with the Witch Niagara..."
"Soytenly!" A bald ferret calls out.
"Boys, boys, boys," Kodyax says with a despondent sigh. "Yer killing me here! Moe, Larry, Shemp, Karl, did I not leave you with a message that I was NOT to be disturbed?"
"We might as well hear what the Stooge brothers have to say, Kody," Niagara offers and then under her breath: "So we can get rid of them if nothing else..."
Just then a flying saucer cruises over head and all six of them watch it go by. Kody and Niagara give each other a conspiratorial glance as Moe hands his boss a scroll. A perfect fool's errand has been thought up for the deputies.
"Follow that flying saucer but do not engage," Kodyax orders. "When it lands or goes off into space, get back to base and report your findings to Belladonna."
"RIGHT!" All four say as one and quickly go paddling after it.
"Now we're alone, Kody," Niagara coos and then sees him opening the scroll. "Do you have to?"
"Unfortunately," Kodyax says with a sigh, "I know it's a 'to do' list but you know as well as I do how anal the astronomers are."
"Ugh! Don't remind me," Niagara grunts. "I'm not going near that tower ever again because of them."
"Unusual comet coming according to this,:" Kodyax says and looks to the sky. "I love how much notice they give."
Niagara notices a fireball starting to dominate the sky and asks fearfully: "Uh, Kody, are they predicting us getting hit with something in Shadow Water?"
"Yeah, next week but dated a week ago," Kodyax says with some annoyance. "Either they couldn't leave this at my fort or they gave it to Moe and he just remember he had it."
"Equal chance of each unfortunately," Niagara says with a shrug of her shoulders as the comet streaks over head past them. "Where is it headed?"
"Looks like tits headed for Carnival Isle," Kodyax observes. "Do we really want to deal with the Red Clown right now?"
"Do we have a choice?" Niagara asks factiously. "Red Clown will put in the side show or the freak show if he gets his bony hands on it."
"Hey, Shoop!" Kodyax calls to a plesiosaur that just surfaced, "Can I get a tow to Carnival Isle?" The ancient reptile just nod as Kodyax lassoes her neck and she actually facilitates the attempt. "Thanks, I want to make sure we get to the crash site as soon as possible."
Swamp monsters like Shoop are well known to the council and there has been inroads made so that agents of the council like Sheriff Kodyax can get cooperation form them when needed. Shoop senses something bad coming on and that the ranger is the one best able to deal with it and thus helping him keeps her and her fellow monsters safe. When they arrive at the island with its endless midway they see an undead red and black harlequin pacing the dock listlessly.
"Inconceivable!" The Red Clown yells to nobody in particular. "I saw it with own unloving eyes and I still find it hard to believe!"
"What happened, Red?" Kodyax asks mockingly, "Somebody snooker you?"
"You might say that, Sheriff," Red Clown says with a heavy sigh. "I saw that comet coming down and thought to myself that a new toy would just land in my lap and then the tank-wyrds surface to grab it as soon as it splashed down!"
"Is that them?" Niagara asks as a quartet of lobsters with faces like a nautilus, each one the size of a modern day battle tank take a glowing greenish yellow pod that needs all four of them to escort it anywhere into to deeper waters.
"Yeah, and I'm already sent a set of zombie otters after them," Red Clown fumes. "The leather egg absorbed them into itself!"
"This is bad," Kodyax states fearfully.
"Very bad," Niagara agrees just as fearfully. "Is that Dagon's Maw their headed for?"
"Yup," Kodyax confirms. "And I think I see a periscope."
"I see it too," Niagara says. "Derro submarine in the bay, I can't recall much in the way of spells that I can cast to do much at this point."
"Not much we can do," Kodyax states, "I need to make a report and see what the Council decides."
"You're not serious !?!" Red Clown whines. "I'd rather see the Council imprison whatever that thing is than let those scrawny albino gnomes get it!"
"There is literally nothing I can do right now, Clown!" Kodyax thunders back. "She doesn't have any spells that can do anything in this situation and neither do I! This is not what I had in mind for tonight!"
"Calm down, Kody, he's not worth it," Niagara whispers in Kodyax's ear as she jumps on his back. "Please! Let's just go back to the castle."
Shoop tows the skiff to Castle Island, the seat of power for Shadow Water swamp, which was once the stronghold of a cabal of necromancers but was taken over by the druid council as they took over the entire region. Niagara regrets her request almost immediately as she catches wind of her brother, a Lord from Priviligia, a neighboring kingdom that has its eye on Shadow Water but one the Council does not trust due to the priest hood that backs the nobility and its claim of a Divine Right of Kings. In fact Niagara fled her home in Priviliga because her grasp of magic would have gotten her burned at the stake back home but here in the swamp she is supported and respect for her power and with that respect her spirituality became in step with the prevailing theology of the region.
Viscount Guido Decosta is arguing with a sentient shrub over his right to see the Council when he wants and how he wants due to the fact that he is a noble and is not taking kindly the fact that the Council is in session and does not want to be disturbed. However when Kodyax and Niagara arrive a small mangrove tree opens its eyes and welcomes them warmly before urging them to proceed to the main floor of the Conference Hall where members of the Council are eagerly awaiting his report. Guido recognizes his sister but not the bear and upon seeing them pass through where he is forbidden; he starts to get livid.
"I have to wait and make an appointment while my sister and that bear go in, as free as you please? This is an outrage!" Guido screams.
"That bear as you want to call him is Sheriff Kodyax and he is expected." The plant creature states calmly. "For all practical intents and purposes he is Viscount here, not you."
"That is a ranger, not a proper Lord," Guido grouses.
"Not b y out standards," The shrub argues. "Unlike some people in this world who are just handed thing because they popped out of the right womb. Here titles are earned. And Sheriff Kodyax has proven time and again that he is the right man for the job."
In a soggy cavern deep underground as all this is going are a cabal of humanoids not taller than four feet even with milky white skin and hair to match. They gather round the pod the tank-wyrds brought in and chant the name "Cthulhu" over and over again. Eventually the thing inside comes out, a green gray skinned giant with dragon wings and a face like an octopus. Wordlessly, the hundred foot tall titan of evil splits itself into 20 smaller copies of itself that appear in the dryer portions of the chamber as blue skinned five foot humanoids in blood red robes and over coats trimmed in dull metal bearing archaic runes with the personal symbol for Cthulhu himself prominently displayed on the back.
The derro lead their masters to a fleet of flying saucers set around the crater of a smoldering volcano. With only the power of their minds the beings who now insist on being called Krakatoa both singularly and collectively for they all share the same mind, what one perceives all will know, power those flying saucers they themselves plan on using and one by one thy fly off to explore the rest of the area and possibly the world. Derro man the craft not used by their new masters and they set about to collect specimens to be examined in detail for the glory of their way of life.
Kodyax gives his report before the council with grim honesty and answers their questions to the best of his knowledge. His report alarms the Council but they also have little idea to deal with the situation. The fact that Sherif Kodyax will implement their wishes to best deal with the situation and protect the citizenry is a non-issue as he has maintained his position by tempering justice with mercy in such a way that the region is as safe and secure as it can be without overbearing those that live here in relative peace and prosperity.
Niagara gives her brother a hard stare when they come out the conference as he is still trying to uses his power and influence as a noble of Priviligia to get an audience with the Council Guido wants to set up trade here but his county has little to offer that they don't already have. Unfortunately for her, the trade commission is only a set up for his real mission of finding her and dragging her home to perform her duties for her family.
Or at least this is what Niagara perceives that Guido wants which is why he calls her Gina instead of the name she took when she came here and set herself up as a witch. A tank wyrd makes its way from the docks towards the concession hall where many druids are having their evening meal and discussing what can be done. The abomination is here on a mission: kill the druids who would impede the krakatoa in their plans and abduct specimens for vivisection.
Kodyax takes one look at the monster and draws his warbrand, violently offended at the thing's very presence in the compound. Furs and plant creatures scatter as Sheriff Kodyax rushes towards it with the blade of his sword over his head. Niagara is behind him beginning the chanting of a spell as Guido draws a dagger in anger.
Guido is ready to murder his sister and erase the stain of having a witch in the family line. The embarrassment of letting her live would put too much of a strain on his family back home to permit her continued existence as a godless heathen in this gods forsaken land. Unfortunately for him, as a Witch in Shadow Water County her existence is protected and as he approaches her from behind the Stooge brothers are coming in to give a copy of the report to the council when they see him.
All four draw their crossbows and take aim at him as Moe calls out to him and asks for his intent. Guido sees the ferrets as mere peasants unworthy of his time so he refuses to answer them. When Moe threatens to shoot him he gets belligerent.
"Don't you dare, peasant, I am one of your betters!" Guido growls.
"This ain't Priviligia, pal," Shemp snarls back.
"Hey..." Larry starts to say and notices that Kodyax engaged with the tank wyrd. "Uh, Moe, the boss is busy, what do we do with this guy."
"Shoot the schmuck?" Karl asks.
"Mack, I'm going to ask you one more time to put the knife away or we shoot," Moe threatens, "we got bigger issue than you to deal with right now."
"He's aiming for the witch!" Larry yells and then fires his crossbow.
"She is a stain on my family..."Guido starts to yell as the bolt gets him between the eyes.
"Great shooting, Larry!" Moe beams to his brother. "Now let's help the boss!"
"Just lemme reload..." Larry says as they all begin moving towards the bear to back him up.
Kodyax opens up his assault with a mighty spell laced roar that stuns the abomination before him. Niagara sends shards of light that look like wasp winged stilettos that hurl themselves at the tank wyrd and slam into it at full force in a kind of suicide bombing run. Kody's blade cuts a deep gash in its side as the brother set up a crossfire with the monster in the middle but mindful not to get neither Kodyax nor Niagara in their crosshairs.
All four of the brothers are determined to hit the aberration and not the ranger and the witch fighting it for different reasons. Niagara they don't want to hit because she is a witch and by the very laws that they struggle to uphold she is someone to defend, and not hunt down unless ordered otherwise by the council. Kodyax is their boss and even if they don't agree with him all the time he is still their boss who trusts them and treats them with respect even if nobody else does.
Their collective aim is true and only serves to further enrage the beast but Kodyax gets another deep gash with his backswing that threatens to finish the monster off. It screams something and tries to attack Kodyax with its claws as the brothers reload. Fortunately for Kodyax, the thing is still shaken from the effects of his terrifying roar and its attacks are easily parried.
It's at this time that Niagara thinks of a better method and chants another spell that manifest as a ray of green from her fingertips to surround the blade of Kody's sword. His own murderous thoughts of righteous rage helps the spell lace his weapon with extra destructive power so that when he cuts open the monster again it is for the last time as the creature heaves its last before collapsing on the floor. Even before it hit the floor it was starting to decompose into putrid nothingness.
Apprentice druid opossums armed with push brooms clean up the mess of the dead monster as Negara goes over to her still breathing brother. She begs Kodyax for mercy and against his better judgment prays a healing spell over the brother to save his life. Despite everything else he is till family but for his actions, Guido is deported and branded with a mark that will prevent him from entering the swamp again.
For Guido, any vehicle he is in finds it cannot enter the swamp where his sister dwells if they are unaware of his presence or the significances of the mark and those that know of the mark and what it signifies will refuse to have him as a passenger no matter how much money he offers for passage. Vehicles he pilots himself behave as if they hit a force field of invisible force that he cannot penetrate. Similarly teleportation magic just flat out refuses to work for him to travel into the swamp and kill his sister.
Spies working for Guido can enter and leave the swamp just fan but those he hires to assassinate his sister invariably end up dead if he can hire anyone at all. When he tries to hire the infamous Scarlet Letter Guild of Assassinations they threaten to kill him if he tries to pester them with an impossible mark. The information Guido gets back incenses him as his sister gets increasingly friendly with the Sheriff to the point where he might even breed with her but as looks further into methods of getting her killed he learns something about Shadow Water law that mitigates his lethal agenda: He has already made it well known that he wants to see his sister dead, so if she is murdered, Kodyax will be charged by the Council to murder him in retaliation.
Guido's spies go unnoticed by Niagara actually as she goes about her daily business as a Witch-Sorceress. She is tasked with aiding Kodyax in dealing with the growing threat of whatever the derro acquired as the Council is unsure of just what happened. This assignment is supposed to be a punishment for bringing the drama of Guido's actions into Shadow Water County but for Niagara the assignment is a blessing.
A note is delivered to Niagara from her family a year after Guido is banished informing her that she has been fully disowned and that all property that she had left outside of Shadow Water County has been declared forfeit as if she had properly died. By this time she has fully moved in with Kodyax as part of his staff and has the letter framed and hangs it with pride in her office. They are not officially mated as neither a Witch nor a Ranger under council law may be mated as part of their pledge of service to the Council but the fact that the pair shares a bed is an open secret.
In fact with the exception of the odd assassin, Niagara hardly gives her family any thought. She fled to Shadow Water County to get away from the politics and drama of her noble station so to have it stripped away to her is a blessing, not a curse. The only thing she even thinks about doing about it in retaliation is bear Kodyax hybrid children and maybe go to her former home and show off the bastards to shock and dismay her mother.
Niagara even goes so far as to have scowling portraits made of her parents to place alongside the framed note. Their disapproving gazes look down on her as a kind of mockery to them and a kind of mental torture for herself. In spite of what she may tell herself, the letter does hurt her as it means the approval of her birth family will never be forthcoming despite what kind of family she may have gathered around her here.
While the wolf is dealing with her family in the span of a year's time the derro and their cult especially their new masters have been entrenching themselves in the bedrock of the region. Tunnels are dug to facilitate kidnappings of the residents above that much more easier. But while they are trying to keep a low profile, even lower than they have before, their activities do not go unnoticed.
Badger miners occasionally find their tunnels and report it back to the druid council, which only adds to their paranoia. Sheriff Kodyax and his deputies are on the look out for any and all monsters that might e new and abhorrent as a result of whatever visitor fell to the waters. New undead are attributed to the Red Clown as part of his on going experiments into expanding his circus as far as it can go, but aberrations, weird alien looking monsters are probably the result of the newcomer.
Often when aberrations are found it becomes a race between Kodyax and the Red Clown to see who can get to it first. If Kodyax gets to it, the monster is destroyed and catalogued as something new to look out for. If the Red Clown gets it, it becomes part of the Freak Show sideshow attraction of his circus.
As much as Kodyax would like to round up a posse to destroy the Carnival of Carnage that the Red Clown runs, the Druid Council forbids it. They are afraid that if the Carnival is destroyed something worse will take its place. Better the devil you know, they reason.
What the Council is unaware of is that the derro have made overtures to the Red Clown of secret alliances. The idea of a surgical theater to be added to the list of his attractions is strangely appealing to him. Of course the fact that the shows are mainly live vivisections of the surrounding populace strokes the dark fires of his abysmal undead heart even more goes without saying.
The only real sticking point now is where they are going to stage all this as the Red Clown wants to make it a tent in his sinister circus and the derro really don't want to be that out in the open. There is a compromise on the table though: where they will set up an underground amphitheater that can be reached from the Carnival of Carnage but can't be traced as well as be collapsed at a moment's later. It would seem the derro are more concerned about the Sheriff or his deputies poking around than the Red Clown is.
Niagara is also getting much closer to Kodyax than many think she should as the bear and the she-wolf share a bed more often than not. In fact Niagara is watching her own mood swings for the mental signposts that could mean she is pregnant. Even her attitudes towards the Stooge brothers could give her a clue as she finds them at turns amusing, annoying and downright frustrating.
Kodyax notices her agitation and makes sure the brothers give the witch her space when she looks like she needs. Being sent out on fool's errands is nothing new to the quartet and they take in stride as it usually means either the Sheriff or his witch needs time away from them and since Niagara has joined them, finding potential trouble spots before they boil over has gotten a lot easier and thus they can take more steps to nip trouble in the bud before it can blossom into a full on situation, so the brothers are more than willing to give her as much leeway as they think she needs.
This is to say there aren't times the brothers get roped up in things beyond their capabilities but that can be when it gets fun. Like when they go scouting out for something the Collectors for the Freak Show is also looking for and they find a seething ball of goo that seemed to writhe as if comprised of slimy eels and other less distinct things. A lot of folks would be content to just leave it be but none of the ferret brothers are anything approaching normal so what came next shouldn't bee too surprising.
Moe and Larry are discussing, arguing really, as to what to do when Karl finds a nice long stick and decides it would interesting to poke the thing. None of the four are sharpest tools in the shed but Karl tends to be the most blunt and while Moe is about ready to tear out clumps of his brother's hair the ooze ball notices them. The creature's locomotion is something best described as a cross between a bouncing rubber ball and a slinky on the march.
Getting into trouble seems to be a specialty of the quartet although to their credit, the skill of knowing when it's generally time to run for your life is one they quite excel at. It takes Moe, who acts like the leader of the four when Kody is not around, take all of two seconds to assess that sticking around and letting the thing get in their immediate vicinity would not be conducive to their general ability to survive and order a fighting retreat. After all four of them fire crossbow bolts that generally do nothing a full retreat is quickly and unanimously reached.
Niagara and Kodyax are enjoying each other's naked company in the boughs of a mangrove tree when the four are paddling their canoe furiously beneath them. Kodyax watches them with a bemused smirk until Niagara redraws his attention back to her and the acts of spring they were enacting. Then the shoggoth swims by and both bear and she-wolf watch with alarm as it passes.
When the canoe carrying the Stooge brothers passes by again the look of abject terror on their faces is plain to see. The shoggoth is close behind them but this time bringing up the rear is an angry sentient tree person shaking its branches and running after them. Both the witch and the ranger recognize the plant man as Mossmullet, a member of the council and one that especially hates abominations like the ooze it is pursuing.
"We really should help them out," Kodyax suggests.
"You don't like those kinds of things either," Niagara teases. "You just want an excuse to hunt."
"Hello! Those kinds of things are listed as threats by the Council!" Kodyax growls tersely. "I'm still the sheriff." He goes through his pack. "Now where did I put that salt bomb?"
"Against one of those things?" Niagara asks incredulously as the parade looks like it's going to make another pass. "You can't be serious!?"
"You'd be surprised how well it works," Kodyax says as he primes the bomb as the brothers paddle past, Moe yelling things better left to the imagination save for it is the filthiest set of admonishments a man reserves for his own kin when he REALLY wants to motivate them. "Bombs away!"
The salt bomb plops into the thing mid stride and explodes for maximum effectiveness. It slows down enough for Mossmullet to catch up to it and weakens it enough that the tree man can give the thing a good thrashing. In fact Mossmullet finishes it off and does a victory dance afterwards.
Up in the tree the witch and her ranger laugh before the witch starts to moan from the fact that his muzzles is at her rack, licking and suckling at her nipples. Mossmullet looks over and sees the pair getting busy and decides to move on. The Stooge brothers are starting to come back when Mossmullet scoops them up and transports them elsewhere for a little chat while their boss and his playmate have their quality time together.