I ran a wonderful Dungeons & Dragons session last night, one I had put considerable planning into as the culmination of the party’s recent quest. Continuing on our sci-fi adventure, the party had been searching for a lost science ship known as the Prophet I, last seen in the rings of Pelagius, a vast blood red gas giant in an unclaimed region of space. Our players began having strange dreams and headaches as soon as they arrived in the system, but they were able to complete the side-quest on a nearby moon to fire up a relay tower with which to locate the craft.
Last night they found and boarded it, only to discover that the interior was immaculate, warm food left out on the tables, the television in the corner playing some old comedy movie… The party were incredibly suspicious of course, and determined that the two spacesuits in the corner were not only enchanted, but had something inside. After going right up to the glass case they were in, their cleric had the smart idea of using the spell command on the enchanted suits, with the order to reveal, and I read out the following text:
You cast the command, and the space suit on the right begins to turn. Its body creaks as it faces you, one hand reaching up to the golden visor that obscures its face. As it pulls back the visor, you see the emaciated corpse within- and suddenly everything changes. The lights go out, and you see how the room truly is; a horrifying husk of a living space. Most of the furniture is broken, the floor littered with blood and rotting debris. Messages have been scrawled over the walls in haphazard, jagged letters. “I must pour it out of my head”, “This is the dream”, and much more illegible mess. There is a shrine against one wall, a painting of the planet and rings in blood and some other dark liquid, maybe engine grease. Below is the message “Praise the red god”, the letters irregular and smeared. Turning back, you see the second space suit suddenly jerk into motion- and both begin to step towards you.
They were then trapped for several quite nasty fights. In time, they discovered that something about the planet itself was off; it corrupted the minds of those who tarried near it for too long. Alas, the poor crew of the Prophet I had been there a very long time. They were able to rescue the lone survivor in the cargo hold, who had sealed themselves in there and constructed magical barriers to keep the madness at bay- and then they got the hell out of there. As they flew away, they spotted the frozen body of a lone crewman who had thrown himself out of the airlock years prior- even in death, his body bowed in prayer to the red planet.
It was a great session, and one I very much enjoyed running. They were highly unnerved by each new horror as they progressed further into the ship. D&D has been on my mind a lot recently, as I will be running a unit with the university focused around tabletop gaming.
In unrelated news, the Civilization Battle Royale is approaching its 100th chapter. I’ll make a post about it in mid September when that comes to pass. I have also added a bar for it with the other novels, as its now over three quarters of the way to completion. Till next time!