Campaign Chronicles

  CHEF  CHET Another week goes by. Greta doesn't see anything unusual, no hazy figures in doorways, no lurking shadows looming in the cornfields on her way home. There was still tension between her and her mother, Margaret, but there had been no further mention of Greta's hair, fashion sense, or television show. As Friday rolled around, Greta, with a homemade tesla coil, an octopus puppet dressed in a lab coat, and her notebook tucked carefully into her backpack, rode out to the station. As she pulled into the gravel parking lot, she spotted "Chef Chet" unloading some plastic bins from the back of his station wagon. His dog, a golden retriever named Ralph, stood off to one side, sniffing the gravel along the building. Chet nodded in her direction, and she rode over, leaning her bike against the side of the building. "Morning, Goblin Queen." "Climate Goblin," she corrected automatically. "You're here on a Friday?" "Yeah, Lione...

  03 Deepkolt 349 AC As the worg-riders rout, Kysek urges Dusk into a dive. He taps his heels into the griffon's flanks, urging greater speed from her and she slowly overtakes the leading edge of the retreat. Kysek falls into his spellcasting, drawing energy from the world around and shaping it to his will. With a cry of, " Цлоудкилл" a green cloud boils up out of the ground, engulfing the riders and their mounts below. Shadow sees the cloud form and circles back toward the raging blizzard. He shouts to Ra'ziir, “That didn’t last as long as I had hoped!  But sure was fun. Let’s hope everything is ready when we get there!  If not, Grotto will have me eating that stew!” Once they reach the ambush site, Shadow peels off to the east and casts the same spell, hemming the goblins in and cutting off another avenue of escape. With the blizzard freezing solid anyone entering it, and poisonous clouds rising to the north and the east, the handful of Worg-Riders pivot west. “...

MARGARET Sunlight streamed through the window of the Whittaker kitchen. Greta walked in, brushing her hair and found her mother seated at the table, sipping her coffee as she was finishing getting ready to go to her job at the Fairhaven Baptist Church. "You were out very late, Gretchen." "It's called a night show, Mom." "Oh, I know. Mrs. Delaney called to ask me why you started reporting Halloween weather so early in the year." Greta felt her face flush. "You don't have to dress like... that to be talented." "It's just a costume, Mom." "It doesn't look like one to me. Girls your age shouldn't be gallivanting about like that. You should be in college or maybe settling down with a proper young man." Margaret paused, "You know, Bob Mercer's daughter got an internship at a real television station in the city. Maybe you should talk to her when she comes home this summer." Margaret rose from...

  CHAD The show was over. The station was closing down for the night. Greta, her spirit buoyed by the unexpected pep talk from Dusty and Celestine, exited Studio D. For a second, she thought she saw someone standing in the doorway across the hall, a tall thin man but when looked again, nobody was there. She stepped out of the side door of the cinderblock broadcast bunker, locking it behind her, and dropped her backpack into the milk crate on the back of her bike. The crunch of tires on gravel and the sweep of headlights across the face of the building drew her attention. She turned. To her surprise, Chad Williams, the Boy Who Had Been Quarterback when she was in high school, opened the car door and stepped out of his father's old Ford Mustang. "Hey, Greta… uh, you want a ride home? I mean, it’s late, and it’s… kind of creepy out here.” He smiled charmingly, something Greta would have died for two years ago and she started to smile back but noticed his eyes lingering on her c...

  GRETA Fairhaven, IL - an unincorporated town in Northern Illinois, April 1985 The girl on the bicycle pedaled along the two-lane highway cutting through seemingly endless miles of cornfields, her bright green hair catching the last rays of the sun as it set in the west, painting the sky with a dizzying arrays of reds and oranges. Her neon fishnets, mismatched lace gloves and combat boots would have fit in with the punk subculture expanding through Chicago, but here, in corn country, she stood out. She pulled into a gravel parking lot where a plain, gray, cinderblock building stood next to a tall TV-antenna. Neon letters spelling out "KMEL13" blazed against the early evening sky. The corn stalks, just sprouts this early in the growing season shifted slightly although no real breeze stirred the air. The girl dismounted, leaning the bike against the side of the building and pulled a backpack out of the basket behind the seat. She slung one strap over her shoulder and headed...

02 Deepkolt 349 AC Shadow agrees to wait till closer to dawn to let the troops rest from their journey.  He gets some rest and prepares his spells before donning Skulk's garb again. Once the rest of the infiltration team is ready he casts Overland Flight on himself and tucks Spewer into his bag of holding, leaving his head poking out for now. “I am gonna ask you to hide in the sack and when the goblin opens it, I want you to spit in his face. Just make sure it’s not me.” Ra’ziir visits with Redclaw for a bit, feeding him scraps of meat and brushing him. “We’re planning to attack some Goblins and Worg riders at dawn… Now, I know we don’t have much in the way of flight time together, but if you’re interested in giving me a ride, it might be a good time to start accruing those hours in the air. What do you think big fella, want to fly me out there?” The griffon leans in, pushing the top of his head against Ra'ziir's hand and makes a nodding motion. ”Well alright! Rest up, ...