RECAP
People we met: Fanya (a teenage girl who lives at the orphanage); Tessa (Cedric’s bae, Felix’s obsession); Milivoj (aka Milli Vanilli, aka Milly Rock, aka Milly – beloved groundskeeper); a demon (possesses children, creates love triangles, and vandalizes furniture with witchcraft); two unnamed orphan girls (good at doing laundry, afraid to use the outhouse, very helpful); a stranger on the road (TBD)
Places we desecrated: The outhouse (Thaldir takes full responsibility for his actions. Where is the bidet when you need it?)
Creatures we defeated: One nasty demon (“I’ll have a glass of holy water with a side of critical damage.”)
Things we picked up: a locket (Term); a 1st edition book by the Baron (Syrren); two healing potions (Group Loot)
Things we lost: a hairbrush (Tilly); a few rations (Syrren); a locket (Term)
THE MYSTERY MACHINE
We find our not-so-young friends (and their even-older-than-dirt companion, Syrren) in the office of Headmistress Claudia Belasco. Felix is the newest child. He’s been standoffish and is picked on by the other children. About the time of the last festival, it seems, all of the children began to act strangely and have bad dreams. It’s been getting worse every day since. The festivals have kept the Devil himself at bay, but, still, this ill has befallen the orphanage. Tilly hits the gray-haired lady with rapid fire questions, but nothing comes to light that can help the little ones.
Just as the puzzled posse goes to leave and do more interviews with the hapless waifs, Headmistress reveals one more important detail. She presents them with a locket that Cedric was wearing. She believes it may be evil, but there are not clear signs of possession or ire. Term receives the item with his oven-mitt-like Mage hand and Thaldir promises to appeal to his Deity to discern its properties. They depart to explore the halls of the orphanage, promising to return with a report for the headmistress.
In the hallway, they run into Emma, who is only too happy to talk with them – especially about her departed friend Cedric. It turns out, Little Cedric was quite the bully! Emma is full of questions for the strange visitors, but she is hesitant to share too much about the little girl with whom Cedric was smitten, or to tell many secrets about the creepy orphanage and “Miss Bully”, the headmistress.
“Merrick, Stephen, and Anton have run away – and the Headmistress doesn’t even know they’re gone yet!” Emma says that the boys were scared because they shared a room with Cedric. With some convincing (and negotiating by Emma for a special present from Blinsky’s), they get Emma to open up and spill the tea. She leads them to Cedric’s old room.
BEDPOSTS, BABIES, AND BOOKS
As he looks around the room, Term makes a chilling discovery: a set of runes etched into one bed post. He finds similar runes on the other bedposts. When he alerts Syrren, the dust elf confirms that the symbols are in the Infernal language – that of demons, fiends, and any enemy of Liam Neeson. Irena checks her book to see if she can find out what the symbols mean. An angry Tilly scratches out the runes on Cedric’s bed posts.
The heroic team makes haste to try and investigate the rest of the room – doorways and desks, beds and brooms – but no other dark symbols are found. Most notably, there are NO runes on Felix!!!! Emma had shown them his isolated bed over by the fireplace. Emma describes him as “weird” and recalls how often she sees Felix with Milly.
Thaldir asks to see her room. The group follows Emma into another room with beds and finds more runes. Suddenly, something catches Emma’s eye, and she runs to the bed to pick up a doll with red straw hair and ONE brown eye. She proudly shows off her doll, with the patch on the back that reads “It’s no Blinksy, no fun.”
Next, they pass the baby room, with it’s door closed tightly. Emma presses a finger to her lips and says, “we have to be quiet because the babies are sleeping.” The group enters another room with beds. More runes. More money. More problems. Thaldir urges his compatriots to return to the Headmistress post-haste and fill her in on the runes. But, before they do that, they peek in the babies room to try and get more information from Fanya. Fanya beckons them in as she sits in a chair rocking one of the three babies. She is barely older than a teenager. In addition to Fanya and the three babies in the room, there is another girl (Emma says her name is Tessa) reading in the corner.
Tilly can’t wait to get the little baby Fanya is holding in her arms. She takes the baby from Fanya and sings a little diddy (not about Jack and Diane) called “Someone Ate the Baby.” The little infant coos and falls asleep again. As she rocks the little one, she asks Fanya about Cedric. Fanya says that Tessa is really the one to ask about Cedric, as she was the object of his little crush. Fanya echoes what Emma told them about Felix being weird.
Tilly turns to Tessa and asks her about the book she is reading, entitled “The Adventures of the Baron von Vollavich.” The Baron gave it to her so that she would be “happy.” In one of the adventures, he fights off a wolf. Another tells of his travel to a city that is now underwater. All of these stories are the reason why, at least in his own mind, he is the “best baron Vallaki has ever known.” It turns out that the book is a first edition. Syrren tries to cajole the girl into giving it to him, to no avail. The charming Tilly is able to convince the girl to give the book to Syrren in exchange for the silver hairbrush.
THE TROUBLE WITH FELIX
Young Tessa would much rather have had the locket that belonged to her love Cedric, but Thaldir tells her he needs to keep it until he’s sure it’s safe. Tessa seems satisfied, though she makes it clear to the visitors that she loved Cedric – even though Felix was always trying to kiss her. Yuck!! As the group leaves the nursery, Tessa waves to them with a wistful stare that speaks of lost love before returning to admiring her shiny new brush.
Tilly digs around under the beds in the last of the rooms to see if there are any treasures, other than creepy dolls and discarded apple cores. Syrren goes to take a closer look at Felix’s bed. As the only one without runes, it seems to hold some mystery that the crew needs to discover. Syrren tears apart the bedding, ruining the perfect hospital corners, and, finally, finds a simple drawing etched into the floor. It’s of three stick figures: one appears to be Cedric (because of the two “xx’s” over his eyes), and the other two look to be Tessa and her admirer Felix. In the drawing, Felix appears to be (clumsily) trying to give her a kiss.
When the group reports all that they’ve seen to the headmistress, she invites them to check her room (wink, wink) and Milly’s to check for runes. There are no runes on her bedposts, so they move on to Milly’s room. No runes, but Milly’s condition is far worse than when they arrived. With the dirty footprints across his floor and the discarded shovel, itt’s as though he came in from working and collapsed. His work clothes were soaked through thoroughly with sweat. Emma came in to ask what they were doing in Milly’s room. She was quickly bored of their questions about the relationship between Felix and Milly and about the argument that Milly had with Felix just a day or two before he collapsed. Off she went to the kitchen to eat more of the apples from the orchard.
Thaldir and friends leave Milly to his suffering and go to the kitchen, where they find Emma. She is, as expected, eating apples. She mentions something about a missing knife and asks her new friends not to tell on her for allowing the knife to go missing. After trying to find out more about the argument, and the gift that Milly gave Felix, seemingly to motivate him to be a better young man, the group heads to the back yard. Thaldir takes a moment to “use the facilities” and devastate the plumbing, while his companions go to talk to the two young girls doing the wash. They echo the sentiments of the other children (and 4 out of 5 dentists) that Felix is, in fact, SUPER WEIRD!! Our would-be heroes head to the attic to find the outcast Felix.
SCOOBY-DOO (AKA FELIX), WHERE ARE YOU?
In the tradition of every bad decision they’ve ever made, the group enters the attic to find a young boy. They confirm that it is Felix and try to engage him in conversation. He is resistant and petulant, despite their attempts to be kind. Tilly tries a different tact and asks him to entertain them with the story of his parents death (since he seems to think it’s no big deal). He “poo-poos” her but does reveal that he thinks wearwolves killed them both. No one believed him. Tilly continues to try and draw him out, when, suddenly, he speaks to them in a dark and disturbing voice.
“Get back!!” With these words, his small body slumps forward, even as thick, black smoke seeps from his pores. From behind him, a gigantic dark figure emerges and looms large in front of the frightened travelers. Without hesitation, the hideous demon swipes at Syrren, dealing him grave damage. The wise elf quickly shifts into the form of tiger, healing himself, and dealing his own damage to the demonic creature.
The battle rages on with Jaylyn dealing a fiery blow to the dark force. Nothing seems to phase the evil being, though. He resists every kind of blow – no matter how deadly. Not deterred, the brave warriors fight on. Thaldir summons his not-so-angelic spiritual weapon to try and deals the demon his first major damage. Tilly follows up with a thunderous strike. In a desperate attempt to summon help for her rescuers, Irena runs to tell the headmistress and find a priest.
It seems the demon has only become more enraged with every strike. He lashes out at Aydin, who is wounded but still standing. Suddenly, just as Syrren the tiger moves toward it, the creature retreats to the corner like a trapped rat! Unphased, Syrren attacks. Jaylyn follows that with a glancing, icy blow. Nothing can stop this demon, who cries out “King Kong ain’t got nothin’ on me!!” He laughs maniacally (as all demons do).
Term uses the Force (force damage, that is) to deal another harsh blow to the demon. Tilly turns to her crossbow and does her best to inspire her fellow soldiers Term and Aydin, even as the demon brings Aydin to his knees with another swipe.
Jaylyn, the wizard of war (and genius of love) gives the battle-weary group their first hope of victory with a CRITICAL missile, leaving the dark menace bloodied. Thaldir nearly torches the evil incarnation with a burst of sacred flame, but Tilly’s crossbow, and the limited number of spells the party has left are only chipping away at the demon, very slowly. One more blow, and the desperate demonic foe re-enters the boy’s body holds a piece of the shattered knife to his neck. “Leave, or I’ll kill the boy.” The demon’s words didn’t move the resolute heroes. Tilly calls to Term to take out the locket. Term runs toward the demon and wrestled Felix to the ground. As Thaldir takes out his holy symbol, the locket becomes hot to the touch. Term throws the hot metal object in the air, and the demon disappears as quickly as he materialized.
THOSE MEDDLING KIDS SOLVE THE MYSTERY
Felix awakens, confused, and asks what happened. From his rambling, the group is able to determine that it was Milly who found the locket and gave it to Felix. The locket was demon-possessed. The demon, acting through Felix, etched the runes on the bed posts.
Felix said that the demon told him he was bound inside the locket and needed a soul to inhabit so he could be free. Milly was the soul the demon had chosen. Poor Felix, who had been sad about the loss of his parents, and who was now recovering from a full possession by a horrible demon. Thaldir summons his divine inspiration, once again, and destroys the locket.
Out of gratitude, the headmistress gives Thaldir two healing potions for the group to carry with them, as well as an offer of a free place to stay whenever they are in the area. She says how honored she would be to have the rescued children join the orphanage. The mood is lifted further when someone bursts into tell them that Milly has regained consciousness.
MILIVOJ IS CURED!
Milivoj is hesitant to talk to the group when they go to see him. He does admit that the locket came from the church across the street, where he has been working. He refuses to give the name of the person who gave him the locket. Thaldir, who can be quite persuasive (intimidating) when the situation calls for it, managed to get Milivoj to admit that Heinrich, the coffin maker, gave him the locket.
As this familiar group of wayward warriors tries to make sense of all that has happened, Thaldir reminds them of the puppet show. As much as they had hoped to see the awesome show and meet the infamous Rictavio. Alas, there is work to be done, adventure to be had, a dragon to fight, and a princess to be rescued. They decide unanimously to return to the Blue Water Inn and, after a good night’s rest, bring their three charges to the orphanage.
As they leave the orphanage and head to their favorite watering hole, they meet a stranger on the road.
ON THE NEXT EPISODE
Who (or what) will they meet next?
Will they finally be able to get Ireena safely home?
Will Thaldir’s three little minions be happy at the orphanage? Will they be safe? (Will anyone be safe after what he did to the outhouse?)
Will Tilly every make her way back to Iosef (aka Black Jesus)???
Join us in two weeks…same bat time…same bat channel…same smell of fiery demon in the air.
Peace, love, & holy water.