His pod is very cosy, which is to say it's claustrophobic and he can't move his arms and legs and he barely has enough room to try to push himself closer to the dome of tinted glasslike material separating him from the room his pod is in. But the room is circular, and not that badly illuminated, so he can make a lot of it out, though he might wish he didn't.

There are three other pods like his, arranged in a circle around the center of the room. A mind flayer is standing there, looking at an elevated pool of glowing yellowish liquid, its back to Astarion. It looks over its shoulder at him when he materialises inside the pod, its expression too inhuman to be readable despite the sudden animation of its face tentacles, then looks at the pool again to reach into it and grab... something... from it.

Oh he bets it's something disgusting.

That depends on how he feels about weird squirming tadpoles. The illithid floats over to Astarion's pod and the pod opens at a thought—

Which means Astarion can talk. "Excuse me! I believe there may have been a misunderstanding. I am not Cazador."

The illithid's words form in Astarion's mind:

Your identity is immaterial.

"—I'm sorry? No, you see, I was in Cazador's manor when you attacked but I am not Cazador, he is on a trip—"

We care not about the one of whom you speak.

...wait, so this wasn't targeted? It was just—random?

All will bow to the Absolute.

And without waiting for a response, the creature leans forward to bring the disgusting tadpole close to Astarion's left eye. From this close he can see the circular rows of sharp teeth and the eyes to either side of its "head" and the four little tentacles—

Aaaaargh, there must be something he can do—

There isn't. The creature lands on Astarion's cheekbone and waddles the rest of the way up to his eye and its four little tentacles irresistibly push Astarion's eye open so that it can make its way around his eyeball and into his skull.

He doesn't pass out, though he wishes he would. Instead he feels the pressure of the larva making its way up his eye nerve all the way to his brain. And people don't have a sense of touch in their brains so even though he feels like he should be able to feel it there all it feels like is a dull pressure in his skull that slowly fades as the tadpole flattens itself against his brain.

His brain.

He has a mind flayer tadpole in his brain.

It's a good thing he's a vampire because he thinks if he had a normal digestive system he'd throw up and that would just be pointlessly making his day more upsetting. He'd been having such a nice bath.

The illithid leaves him to his suffering, letting the lid of the pod he's in fall shut again as it turns to leave. A door that looks more like an enormous asshole opens to let it through and then closes again, leaving Astarion alone with his thoughts.

Well, alone with his thoughts and the three other poor souls in the other pods.

Good. Great. Awesome. Terrific. Wonderful. Absolutely fantastic. He's ecstatic, really, that's exactly what he wanted in his life after two hundred years of slavery and torture by a sadistic vampire overlord, is be kidnapped by psychic octopus-people who are doing some kind of absurd mind surgery on him using disgusting squirming toothed worms. No, really, there's nothing in this world that he wanted more than this—

The ship suddenly shakes rather violently, the way ships tend to do when they are suddenly hit by something either very heavy or going very fast. Astarion's cosy pod at least means he doesn't get too badly jostled—there are not enough degrees of freedom for his limbs to get jostled—but it's still dizzying. And there are more such violent shakes, one after another, indicating that, well. Something is going on. The mind flayers are not just peacefully kidnapping harmless vampires from their masters' baths with zero resistance.

Good for whoever's doing the resisting. These mind flayers need some resisting. He hopes they're being resisted very violently and bloodily, that'd be the best kind of resistance.

But then there's a lurching feeling along none of the normal spatial dimensions and it's even more dizzying in a completely different way, like having your stomach be pulled out of your body without going through any other parts of it.

why is this happening to him

The assault on the nautiloid continues, and the decrease in flight stability suggests that whoever's attacking is very plausibly winning the fight. There is occasionally a noticeable feeling of decreased weight that suggests the ship is losing altitude but it's unclear if the losses are due to damage or tactical flying.

And then there is fire.

In his long, long life, Astarion tried praying to all manners of gods. Good gods, neutral gods, evil gods, lawful gods, chaotic gods. None of them ever answered.

There is only one god he could forgive this from.

So when he thinks he might be having his last thoughts in the face of the conflagration, his prayers go to Tymora.

But he doesn't die. The fire mercifully does not destroy his pod, and him with it, flammable as he may be. But it does destroy enough of the pod of one of his neighbours that she manages to kick herself free and jump out of her pod.

...the pointy ears and froggy skin, she's githyanki, which means—

"Hey! Excuse me! I need help!"

She does not look at him, either unable to listen or entirely ignoring him. After getting her bearings she steps through the ex-asshole that is now just a round charred hole on the wall and then she's gone.

Fuck. Come on!

Wait, maybe the fire could've weakened his pod? That'd be really useful, and some further pulling on the disgustingly fleshy machinery holding him suggests more give than there was before.

Ah, the beauty of being in a ship that is also a living thing. Means that if you damage it you are hurting it and so everything starts working less well.

Mind flayers are stupid as fuck.

He can make some progress towards freeing himself, but the thing that finally allows him to shake himself loose is another bizarre lurching feeling along no spatial dimension he can sense.

He gets spat out of the pod just as that happens. Right onto the fleshy, gunky floor.

And he's naked.

Great. Amazing. Awesome. At least he didn't fall into the disgusting little pool with the disgusting little tadpoles in it.

Anyway, he'll make his way to his feet, then, and... look around. He supposes.

Now that the not-glass of the pod is no longer obscuring his vision he can make out... a right mess. Even outside the fire that damaged a good chunk of the room, there are corpses of two mind flayers on the floor, not looking like they died of the fire at all. They had probably already been there when Astarion got kidnapped. And the two other pods were a bit too close to the fire when the fire happened and the people inside them appear to have been, ah. Cooked.

Once again he is very thankful for not having a normal digestive system anymore because that is revolting.

Okay! What next, then?

He spends a moment considering the idea of checking the illithid's bodies for valuables before discarding it. The chance of there being some sort of trap is too high, he doesn't want a second tadpole in his brain thank you kindly. Onwards through the ex-asshole, then, careful not to step on the still-blazing bits of floor because he continues to be a vampire and extra flammable no matter how many little parasites he is now the host for.

The next room has some more dead mindflayers but most importantly the corridor beyond it is entirely exposed to the elements as apparently it ran along an outer wall of the ship's that has been destroyed. And what he can see beyond are many red dragons, the kind the githyanki like to ride, and, uh.

...uh.

The fires of Avernus.

Kidnapped by mind flayers and then sent to Hell! He kind of thinks that he should be cursing Tymora, here, there is just no way she isn't laughing her ass off at him. That'll teach him to think things even remotely flavoured "it couldn't get any worse". It could always get worse. You could always go to Hell.

And fuck him, that exposed hallway is probably where he has to go next because (after some exploration of the room he determines that) there is nowhere else to go.

Fuuuuuck him.

But just as he's stepping out the githyanki jumps out of nowhere in front of him, sword in hand. "Abomination. This is your end!"

"—no! Enough things, that is too many things!!!!"

The woman tenses up to move to drive her sword through Astarion and—

Astarion doubles over in pain, a pain mimicked by the githyanki woman. His head pulsates in pain, and he gets pins and needles all over his skin. And while that's happening, he can see, see...

- a dragon's wing -

        - a silver sword -

    - a mindflayer's dead body -

- his own face, through the eyes of the stranger -

And then he's back, still on the ship, still in Avernus, reeling from seeing—his face—no mirror, no screen, he hasn't seen his own face in centuries, and the first thing that comes out of his mouth is—

"I look disgusting and I need a bath."

"Tsk'va. You're no thrall?" says the other, recovering at the same time as he did. "Vlaakith blesses me this day! Together we may survive." She unsheathed a knife from her belt and offers it to Astarion, hilt-first. "Can you use a blade?"

"...yes but back the fuck up why were you just trying to kill me???" The sword isn't actually silver so it wouldn't have worked but it's the principle of the thing.

"We carry ghaik parasites in our brains, you and I. Somehow we resist their powers now, though I do not know how. But unless we escape—unless we are cleansed—we will become ghaik, ourselves."

"...oh that's wonderful. We have parasites that will turn us into mind flayers?" He accepts the knife and spits on the floor. "Tymora mocks me. What do we do?"

She points in the direction of the only room they can go to. "Find the ship's helm and take control of it. Kill any infernals we run into. Now move." And off she goes.

"—right, then. Pleasure to meet you, too." He follows after her, half trying to commit his own visage to memory half trying to not think about how he is entirely covered in mind flayer gunk. And it's only going to get worse from here.

There are infernals up ahead, but only weak ones: small flying imps, the lowest of the low, feasting on the corpses of... thralls? Other non-mind flayers, at least, scattered around that room.

Well he sure hopes they're level one imps because he will almost certainly fail to do anything about anyone stronger than that.

The githyanki herself is clearly higher level than that, given the ease with which she tears through them.

Good, good, good for heeeeey that imp was about to sucker stab her and now it is not. If there is one thing Astarion can do well it is scurry around in shadows and take people unawares and this imp should know better than to try to copy his style.

She whirls around to see the corpse of the imp falling lifelessly on the floor at Astarion's hands and makes a pleased hmming sound. "Surprisingly adequate. Come."

"H-hold on, let me steal some pants—"

"We do not have time for you to undress the dead for your sense of propriety. Come." And she goes.

...it's not for his sense of oh whatever.

"I suppose I won't deny you your eye candy if you want it so much."

She ignores him and continues to make her way onwards.

He's not sure he's personally doing much to keep her safe but she's definitely going to be keeping him safe so he'll follow her. Even as they have to climb fleshy vines to reach an exposed higher level of the ship and walk over things that go squelch when you step on them.

Has he mentioned mind flayer ships are revolting? Because they're revolting. He's used to skulking in the underbelly of Baldur's Gate but at least when he does that there are thick leather boots between his feet and the bodily fluids that inevitably paint those streets and alleyways, and this is substantially more unpleasant than that.

The next room is another one of those rooms with pods with people in them. Unlike the room they came from, however, there's no brine pool in the center; instead, there's a mildly pulsating fleshy organic access terminal (which accesses... what?) and four slanted operating tables. Two of them have humans strapped onto them, still breathing but seemingly insensate.

"Do not touch these machines," the gith hisses. "We do not know what they do."

"When you ask so nicely..."

He walks around the machine to inspect the two humans.

Once he's angled such that he can see the top of their skulls he'll notice that they've been cleanly and smoothly cut off to expose the brains inside. The gith ignores this and goes on to explore the rest of the room, watching for traps.

At which point he'll be able to hear the muffled sounds of cries for help from within one of the pods.

Astarion whirls around to look at the source of the noise, his grip on his knife tightening, but then relaxes when he sees what it was.

Also: this means that the gith could totally hear him in the other room and just chose to ignore him. Ice cold.

He walks over to the pod.

"You! Help me out of here, please!"

"We have no time for stragglers," she says, having walked over to investigate whatever had grabbed Astarion's attention.

On the one hand, yeah. On the other...

...he wishes the gith had helped him.

"I will look for a way to get you out!" he calls before starting to examine the pod.

"Try that contraption next to the pod! They did something to it when they sealed me in."

Contraption next to the pod... aha, there it is. Aaaand he is just as unfamiliar with this as he was with the one from earlier.

However, he can feel a tug in his mind, something almost... calling to him.

Oh, wonderful, something calling to him from weird mind flayer machines, what could possibly go wrong.

...well, if he's about to turn into a mind flayer himself, he might as well make use of his newfound psychic powers in the interim.

"I will not stay and watch you die at the hands of this contraption," the gith declares. She turns around and goes into one of the two anus-doors leading out of this room (other than the one they came in through).

The parasite starts to squirm inside Astarion's head, the pressure growing into pain... and then fading. And then another sensation washes over him: authority.

Psychic powers ahoy.

Open, he thinks intently at the device.

It works. As he does that, the pod opens, releasing its captive.

She falls to her knees, gasping for air, and looks up at her saviour. "I thought I would die. Thank you." Pause. "Why are you nude."

"I was kidnapped while I was in the middle of a very relaxing bath, and my day has only gotten worse from there. Until, that is, I met you and that other beauty. Things are looking up."

And then they connect, and for a moment he can feel her thoughts. Gratitude towards him, wariness towards the gith, unwavering purpose washing through her.

"...the parasites."

"Mmhmm. I fear this will not be the last time, at least until we become mind flayers ourselves."

"—we must not. I have a mission." And speaking of the mission, she climbs to her feet and reaches into her pod for an artefact: a strange regular metal icosahedron with slightly concave faces.

None of his business.

"I'm Astarion. 'Tis a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

She puts her artefact away and looks at him again. "Shadowheart."

That's a title, not a name.

Whatever. They should—

"It seems you yet live. We must away."

Astarion jumps nearly out of his skin when he hears her voice. "Decided to come back for us? I feel so loved."

"It was a dead end. Let's move." And once again she does not wait for them before going towards the other exit.

And her sword has new blood stains it did not have before. The imps don't bleed, so what exactly did she fight in there...?

Well, no matter. She's right, they need to go.

"When we get to the helm, do as I say," the gith says, without looking over her shoulder at them.

"We'll follow your lead, milady."

"Save it."

They make it to the helm in short enough order, and once they do what they see is a battlefield: two mindflayers, half a score of imps, and three cambions.

Thrall, "says" one of the mind flayers who noticed their arrival. Connect the nerves of the transponder. We must escape. Now.

"Do it," the gith hisses to the other two in an undertone. "We will deal with the ghaik after we escape."

Shadowheart nods curtly and moves.

Astarion bows and moves faster and with more agility. He's very used to this.

So since the infernals (who are also under the impression these three are on the mind flayers' side) don't seem to be able to get their hands on Astarion they focus their fire on the gith and Shadowheart.

Thankfully they are both armoured and higher than level one.

So he dodges, sprints, and dashes until he reaches the control console, which is...

...a bunch of tentacles. Of course. He can't say he doesn't respect the consistency in this species's aesthetics, he guesses. But he doesn't know which of these tentacles he's meant to connect so he just kind of grabs two of them at random and pulls them towards each other.

Once again there's that lurching feeling—and then they are no longer in Avernus. Instead they find themselves on the Prime Material, rapidly approaching the ground. Either the damage incurred by the ship or whatever Astarion did (or, perhaps more likely, the combination of both) seems to have entirely destroyed the navigation system and it is inexorably making its way to a very messy crash.

Figures. He supposes that's as good an end to this adventure as any. Took a while longer for him to die than he'd expected but at least he's not going to become a mind flayer.

But before the ship can crash there's an explosion—a system failing, a spell going wrong, a spell going right—a big one, and the wall on this side of the ship was already damaged enough to barely be there so this explosion is enough to finish it off and push Astarion out into the air to fall to his death.

And it's daytime! Jolly good, there are many things trying to kill him.

He closes his eyes and waits, feeling the sun burn him as he rapidly approaches terminal velocity.

But he doesn't die. A second before he hits the ground he suddenly decelerates, stopping upside down a few inches above the ground, and then he finishes falling but from a much less dangerous height.

Also: the sun isn't burning him. It is just... heating him up. The thing he's feeling on his skin is not fire, it is merely the normal heat that normal mortals feel when they are outside in daytime. He is not being consumed by flames.

Wait, what.

What????

What.

He reaches a finger into his mouth and pokes at his fangs. They're still there, still sharp.

He places a hand on his chest. His heart is still unbeating, his skin is still not warm.

He pays attention to his senses. His vision is still just as good, he still hungers for blood.

He is still a vampire.

But it seems that he is now a vampire who can walk in the sun!

Naked, no less!

He sits up and looks around, noticing from the widespread destruction around him that he must've passed out at some point because he failed to witness the final crashing moments of the ship even though it very much did crash over yonder. He pushes himself to his feet, and he's still not burning. He fell off a crashing ship and he didn't become paste.

Yeah, he's got nothing.

But from his curent vantage point of "standing up" he can see Shadowheart a ways over there, lying unconscious on the sand.

...okay it is simultaneously less strange and stranger that someone else managed to survive, too. Less strange because it's not something weird that happened to him specifically, stranger because why is there something specifically saving the not-thralls of the mind flayers?

Well, he supposes maybe the mind flayers did this somehow. He'll have to see. For now he'll check on his new friend, grabbing the dagger the githyanki gave him from where it was lying on the sand over there on his way.

She jolts awake, pushes him off her, and rolls to her feet.

Then blinks. "I'm alive."

"And so am I, yes. Shall we move on to more pertinent things or do you also want to remark that it is daytime and water is still wet"

"Why are we alive?" she asks, frowning in annoyance.

"A more pertinent question! One that I am, alas, not equipped to answer."

"Hmm." She looks around, then at him again. "I do not know where we are, either."

"Ah, well, too much to hope for, I suppose."

"No matter. We need food, shelter, and someone who can do something about the parasites in our heads."

"'We'? Why, darling, I didn't know you felt that way about me."

"We have better odds of survival together."

"That we do. And I may have a lead: the githyanki seemed to know of a way for us to get rid of our parasites. Which stands to reason, given the givens. Assuming she survived, she might be our best chance."

"A big assumption."

"Nevertheless."

"Hmm. We follow the tentacles, I suppose.

"...and thank you."

"Whatever for?"

"Rescuing me. On the nautiloid. I have a life debt to you."

"Oh, darling, these sweet honeyed words of yours will get you places."

"...let's move."

"Lead the way."

Leading the way is easy enough: as Shadowheart said, follow the tentacles.

And boy are there tentacles.

The nautiloid's many gargantuan tentacles decorate the landscape, forming barriers and arches and dangerous terrain but most importantly giving them a direction to find the crashed nautiloid. And although they can't literally just climb a tentacle and follow it—if nothing else, that would be extremely dangerous and reckless—they can follow the environmental storytelling. So they walk past these dead fishers—

Wait, fishers?

Indeed, it seems like the nautiloid crashed straight onto a fishing village.

Excellent. Astarion will acquire clothes and no longer be naked as on his nameday. People will be deprived of his beautifully sculpted form but as they say, sometimes concealing is sexier than revealing.

Literally no one cares.

Ahem, anyway, as the narrator was saying before being rudely interrupted, after diverting a dead body of its clothes for Astarion's benefit the small party continues to try to find their way to the crashed airship—

While diverting the dead of their other belongings! Now that Astarion has pockets he can carry things, like money. None of these people have a better knife than the githyanki blade his new friend gave him, though, so he supposes it'll have to do.

...is he done with the interruptions?

Yes, they may continue.

Well now the narrator lost track of the plot. One moment, let's see, Astarion survives the crash and the sun, finds Shadowheart, wakes her, they decide to look for La- for the githyanki together, ah yes and they're now on their way to the crashed nautiloid.

The small party makes their way towards the crashed nautiloid and when they're close enough to it they can see some rather unsavoury survivors: brains. Brains with legs, four little white clawed things that allow them to walk around, and four thin little tentacles sprouting from their sides and swaying in the wind like antennae.

"Don't suppose they're friendly?" asks the vampire in an undertone from where he and Shadowheart are looking at the disgusting little creatures from around a corner.

"...no."

"It was a humorous obviously-incorrect remark, to lighten the mood. You need to relax."

"I'll relax when I'm dead. Let's kill them."

"—really? I was thinking we could instead just, you know, walk around them, avoid a fight altogether..."

"You can do that if you want. I am going to kill them."

"Well, far be it from me to stop you."

And with that he—hides. Which is to say he makes himself unobtrusive, out of the way. If someone is looking directly at him or for him they will have no trouble with it but he becomes... easy to overlook.

...useful talent. But not hers.

She charges.

The walking brain creatures are, in fact, hostile. Though not extremely difficult to kill, even if those claws are awfully sharp.

And despite his words Astarion does show up, more or less out of nowhere, to stab one or two of these things. "Maybe that's what will happen to our brains next."

"...it would be imprudent to discount the possibility. Let us hope it does not come to that, but if it does... may Shar help us."

"...Shar, really? I suppose 'Shadowheart' makes some sense."

"This name was given to me by my Lady's worshippers, yes. I am her humble servant."

"To each their own insanity, I suppose," he says with a shrug.

Well, time to explore this place some more.

The ship has effectively fused with the ground at places, such that it's hard to tell where ship ends and packed earth begins, and the ruins are more like the putrid insides of a living creature than like wreckage of flying machinery. And they can find some more dead bodies, of mortals and other brain thingies and a few mind flayers and...

...that mind flayer there is still alive. Half-buried under rubble, though, in a pool of its own blood, looking like it's going to die very soon.

Oh, it's going to die very soon, that much is certain. By his hand. Vile creature.

"Be careful."

"What can it do? Glare at me?" he scoffs, walking over to it.

No. What it can do is make Astarion feel... feel...

...compassion.

...compassion?

"No. I refuse. This is my mind, understand? Mine!"

It is... but it should not be. He should be punished for it, for this hatred and this, this independence. He should... bow. He should bow to his true master, and... provide the sustenance it needs to thrive. His life is nothing, means nothing, before the mighty creature before him.

"Do you think you're clever? Better men than you have tried this and failed. And you." He steps on the flayer's exposed brain hard enough to squeeze. "Are." He does it again. "Not." Again. "Good enough." Again and again and again and again until there's nothing recognisable left of the creature's head, only a bloody tentacled mess.

The grip on Shadowheart's mind is released as soon as it is on Astarion's and she watches, impassively, as the elf does... the only correct thing to do in this situation, really.

"Death is too good for it."

He turns around and stalks off in a random direction. "Let's leave. The gith will not be here."

Yeah. Fair enough. She jogs to catch up with him.

When she does he is stripping some dead goblins of their valuables. They were killed by the crash, but through sheer luck they did not get entirely carbonised, and soon enough Astarion is in possession of a crossbow and a few bolts.

"Much better," he says, his erstwhile cheer returning. "I much prefer not to be in close quarters if I can help it."

"...what's that?"

"What?"

A strange magical disturbance on the rock face a short walk east. It looks like a... portal of some kind? And an arm is coming out of it and waving uselessly.

"...that looks like a trap."

"A trap? For us?"

"...well, I suppose not."

Shadowheart carefully walks over to it, weapons in hand and an incantation at the tip of her tongue.

"I heard that! I hear you! Hello? Some help, please?"

"...what?"

"I heard that too! I'm just, I'm stuck! I just need someone to pull me free!"

Shadowheart starts to reach towards the hand—

—but Astarion places a hand on her chest. "Don't grab the hand of some mysteriously 'stuck' interdimensional traveler. I'm very fond of you and don't want to see you die."

"...you're right."

"—what? No, he's not! I'm just a guy! I just need some help!"

"You got yourself into whatever... situation you're in. You can get yourself out of it."

And without further ado he turns around and walks away.

"Wait, no, please! I need help, I need someone, please!"

No, the elf was right, this is far too suspicious and they have no reason to get involved in this. It's not their problem.

"...these tracks," she says, instead, looking at the dirt. "Someone walked this way. Those are boot prints, and... heavy. Could be the githyanki."

Astarion ignores the continued pleading of whomever and looks at where Shadowheart's looking. "...I suppose I see it. And I also suppose you'll be better than I am at following these tracks."

"Hmm." It's probably true, so she leads the way again.

And after following the track a ways up north they can hear a faint conversation.

"...dangerous?"

    "Of course it's dangerous! One of them carved up Zorru's whole squad!"

"So we should leave it."

    "And leave it to the goblins? No! We take it to the Grove."

It? A mind flayer, perhaps? Except, hmm. He lifts a finger to his lips and does his little trick of hiding in plain sight then draws closer.

The sources of the voices turn out to be two tieflings, red and horned with demonlike tails.

"Let's just leave it!" says one of them.

    "If it allies with the Goblins it will come after us!"

"Why would it? And besides, we'll be on our way to Baldur's Gate!"

And the "it" they're talking about is indeed the githyanki, who seems to somehow have run afoul of the tieflings' trap and is being held in a cage hanging from a tree. And unlike the tieflings, she notices Astarion's arrival, and though her lips don't move, he can hear her just fine.

Get rid of them.

Right, psychic powers.

Do I get a kiss if I do?

If you do not I will hunt you down and relieve you of your entrails when I free myself.

I hadn't realised we'd grown so close, darling, you'll make me blush with all this kinky talk.

If you want to live and not become ghaik you need to get me down.

Ah, that's what I wanted to hear! Positive incentives.

"Excuse me!" he calls to the tieflings.

"Ilmater guard me," exclaims the first tiefling.

    "—hello," says the second one. "Who are you?"

Wow these people's survival instincts are garbage.

"A friend who has come to solve your issues. That gith? Is extremely dangerous."

"...well, yes, that's what we were—"

"And you're clearly unprepared to deal with it," he continues. "Leave it to me. I can kill it—and my friend here better than me," he adds, hiking a thumb in Shadowheart's direction. "But if you stay around you are very likely to be collateral damage. You should go."

    "...but..."

"If it's as dangerous as you say he is," says the first tiefling to the second, "then he's right. We're not fighters, how do you even want to bring it to the Grove? If we bring it down it'll kill us."

    "...I suppose."

"What is this grove you speak of?"

"The druids' Grove to the northwest, where our people are staying—"

    "Nymessa, they may be friendly but you shouldn't just tell people like that!"

"You really shouldn't," Astarion agrees. "Now go."

They look at each other then nod and bow to Astarion. "Thank you, stranger. Selûne light your path."

Shadowheart makes a face but does not say anything to that.

Astarion waits for the tieflings to be out of earshot and then walks over to the trap to regard the gith. "You seem to have found yourself in a bind here, hmm?"

"Enough gawking! Get me down!"

"Say 'please'."

"Never."

"You would expect some more politeness when you're the one up there and I'm the one down here."

"You would have expected more intelligence when you are the one who will turn into ghaik and I am the one who knows how to stop the transformation."

"You'll also become one," he points out.

"And so you know that I have no reason to mislead you."

"...you know what, that's fair enough." He can find wherever the cage is attached to and cut the ropes. "Brace for the fall."

She does, and then she's on the ground. "I see the tadpole hasn't scrambled all your senses yet. Auspicious."

"What's your name? I'm Astarion and this is Shadowheart."

"Lae'zel. Now come, my people will possess a cure for this infection. I must find a crèche; you will join me. And you will not call me gith again if you want to keep your tongue."

He ignores the threat in favour of the more important bit. "A 'crèche'."

"A place my people maintain on the Prime Material. We will find a ghustil there, which will purify us of the ghaik tadpole."

"I suppose of all people githyanki would know best. And there's no way to stop the transformation without losing the powers...?"

Because, he has realised, the main thing that changed between when he was having his nice bath last night and now is the fact that he has a magic psychic tadpole in his head. So maybe...

"No. Your choices are purification or beheading."

It's a wide, wide world. He'll keep his options open. But this gith does not need to know that.

"I suppose we make our way to this crèche, then. Where, ah, is it."

"I do not know. But if we find this 'Zorru' those devilspawn mentioned, they may be able to tell us where they found my people."

"...I see." So she doesn't even have a proper lead. Figures.

"...I spotted a temple to the east. We should go there."

"East? The devilspawn spoke of the little druid's Grove to the northwest."

"And it will soon be sundown and we need to find somewhere to stay for the night before that happens."

"The parasite in your brain will not sleep. This is a waste of time."

"Maybe the parasite won't, but we must." Sort of. He's still a vampire (spawn) and an elf so he doesn't really have the same needs, but Shadowheart is a half-elf and does need to sleep. "How long do these transformations usually take?"

"Seven days is how long we have before the transformation is complete."

But...

"I caught that hesitation."

"We should be seeing signs of the transformation already. That we do not is... disturbing."

"But promising! Perhaps we do not need to worry so much."

"If you will not seek a cure I will kill you myself and rid the world of one more monstrosity," she says, reaching behind her back to wrap her hand around the hilt of her sword but not yet unsheathing it.

"We'll seek a cure. Tomorrow. When we are better rested and have not just miraculously survived a nautiloid crash and have better hold of our bearings."

"Very well. But the moment I see a tentacle, I will end you."

"I'd expect nothing less."

When Shadowheart said she spotted a temple to the east she meant that actually there are the ruins of a temple right around the corner over there. Which is easy enough to find.

However, there are already people there.

People, hmm? Time to eavesdrop—

"Charge!" cries the githyanki, rushing ahead into the group.

What? "No, no, do not charge—" He lunges at her to arrest her momentum before she gets them into a fight they very much do not need.

But of course when a githyanki warrior loudly yells "charge" that tends to attract some attention, and not the friendliest kind. The spot they arrived at was overlooking the main entrance to the chapel and there was one halfling scout there but another halfling, a half-elf, and an elf soon run up there to see what the ruckus was about.

"Not another step!" says the scout, pointing a crossbow at the party.

"Unhand me at once!"

"Lae'zel, beautiful Lae'zel, we do not randomly attack people, do you understand me? Shadowheart, you back me here, don't you, sweetheart?"

"Hmm."

Better than nothing.

"What's this about?" asks the arriving halfling, also armed with a crossbow. "You here to loot the crypt? Or the ship? Move along, now, they're ours."

"No, no, nothing of the sort, just." He clears his throat then gets off Lae'zel. "My friend here is woefully undersocialised, I'm afraid. We do not wish to—ah, did you say ship? The illithid ship over yonder?"

"Don't see no other ship, now, do I?"

"Ah, I see, it's just, well..."

"...well? Spit it out, lad, before I fill you with holes."

"It's just we were just there and it's, you know... crawling with illithid."

"Illiwhotsits?"

    "Mind flayers," says the elf.

"...you're pulling my leg?"

"I mean, you're free to go see the place yourselves, of course, but we barely escaped with our lives—"

"No ghaik threatened me."

"—despite my friend's bravado. It is a nautiloid, after all, and we all know mind flayers are telekinetic so I figure that's how they survived. I wouldn't want to go back there myself. I'd probably leave this area too if I were you, I can't imagine they'll be limiting themselves to the ship."

"...a very convenient thing for you to say." But Astarion will be able to tell that his words are having an effect: both halflings have lowered their weapons and the elf and half-elf have been trading worried looks.

"We just came here to warn you. ...well, I did, my friend here as stated is not the greatest at not attacking people on sight. I suppose she really wants to flex that sword arm."

"...yeah, uh, that, ah, won't be necessary, I feel," says the halfling, probably their leader given how the others seem to look to him for reactions. "We can come back sometime later, once these il- illi- mind flayers are well and truly gone."

    "I told you it was a bad idea to stay around..." says the half-elf.

"Alright, shut your trap. Let's go. And, ah, thank you for the warning, lad."

"Of course, of course."

"It would have been faster to kill them," says Lae'zel, once they're gone.

"They probably have friends inside the temple that would've come to their aid, and I did not want to deal with that. Now we only have to deal with the friends."

"...they would abandon their allies? Disloyal cravens."

"Opportunistic bandits are not known for being particularly faithful to each other, no. Let's scope this place out."

The temple overlooks the rivershore they crashed onto, giving them a view of the river in the distance and the smoking remains of the nautiloid. The structure seems to have been dug into the rock, with stairs leading down to a door that probably used to be more underground before the temple lost its ceiling and most of its walls; as it is, it's just stone ruins and a stone floor and the stairs, exposed to the elements. Whichever god this temple was dedicated to, it was abandoned by their followers long before the nautiloid's arrival.

Ah, a door. Now, do they try to fib their way in or get inside otherwise undetected...?

"Lae'zel, I promise you will have much opportunity to kill and maim but for the moment please follow my lead."

"...very well."

So he goes to the door and knocks.

"That you, Gimblebock?" comes a muffled voice after a few seconds. "Everything alright out there?"

These people do not have a single brain cell between them. "Gimblebock triggered some trap! He needs help, now!"

"I told him it wasn't safe out there. Get inside, I'll rustle up some bandages..." The man unlocks and opens the door to let them in—

—and Astarion pulls him out by his shirt, one foot stretched out to push the human out of balance, and a hit to the back of the man's head with the butt of his dagger is enough to knock him clean out.

"...and I suppose you will ask me not to kill him?"

"For the moment, yes. He may prove useful."

Or... he may prove food. Astarion has never tasted a person's blood...

He should not get distracted by the thought. Into the ruins they go, dragging the unconscious man with them.

The room they walk into has a hearth and a table covered with various types of long-shelf life food as well as a nook with some books that even from a distance looks dusty enough that it's clear the place's current denizens have not, themselves, touched the place.

Shadowheart looks around with somewhat more interest than she's been showing... most things, really. "Strange," she whispers. "It tends to be more obvious, who exactly is worshipped in a temple."

"No one else here," he whispers back, looking at the other door leading deeper into the crypt. "These people really do not know what they're doing."

"Let's kill them," says Lae'zel, not whispering.

"Tymora help us all," Astarion breathes as he looks around for some rope to tie their new unconscious friend. He gets some but before he ties the man up he takes the man's shirt off to make a gag out of it. Then he ties the man up.

"This skulking around is dishonourable and pathetic."

"Lae'zel, gorgeous, I am not as high level as either of you and if we get swarmed by ten people I will be the first one to die. I would like to not die. So I want to take care of as many threats as I can before we are inevitably forced into conflict."

"You can just stay back and watch."

"Or I could instead use the skills I do have so that I can level, too."

"Tsk. Coward."

"It is to the benefit of us all that I become stronger. Especially if we're planning to storm a whole druid's Grove filled with druids and tieflings and who knows what else."

"Tsk. Fine."

Excellent, talking to people still mostly works.

To the door he goes, so he can press an ear against it and listen for other threats.

The muffled sounds of footsteps suggest a single person patrolling the area.

Patrolling is interesting. It suggests there are multiple points of entry into the crypt; if it were just this door, there would be no reason to patrol.

He waits until the footsteps sound sufficiently faint and opens the door, not quietly because the door being opened quietly is more suspicious than it being opened normally by someone who is meant to be there, but when he slips through he is quiet and manages to slip into the shadows before the human has turned around to spot him.

"...Andorn?" she calls uncertainly when she sees no one on the other side of the now-open door.

And now Astarion is behind her, a hand covering her mouth and a dagger to her throat. "Sweetheart, if you call for help that will be the last thing you'll ever do. If you try to hit me or push me away that will also be the last thing you'll do; I have done this before and have excellent reflexes."

She is wise enough to freeze and not make any noises.

"Wonderful. Now let's slowly walk through that door and then shut it so that we can ask you some questions. Nod if you understand. Shake your head if you'd rather die painlessly right now. ...well, I assume it'll be painless, but I confess I've never had my throat sliced through and would not be able to say."

She nods minutely.

"There's a good sport."

So he walks her to the other room and motions for Shadowheart to close the door behind him.

Which she does. "You're better at this than I'd expected."

(Even Lae'zel looks grudgingly impressed.)

"Years of practice, darling." The human is placed next to her friend and Astarion keeps the tip of his blade positioned right next to her throat as he walks around her to face her. "Now, please keep in mind that you will die if you try to get anyone's attention. Nod if you understand."

She nods, looking terrified.

"How many others are there? Not counting your pal Andorn and the ones outside, we've dealt with them already."

"F-four."

"What are their capabilities?"

"T-two of them are hunters, one is very good with a sword, one is a wizard."

He cusses under his breath. "I hate wizards. Low level, though, the lot of you?"

She nods again.

"There were three other doors there, and you were patrolling. There's another way in, isn't there? Don't lie to me."

She nods again.

"Please succintly describe the layout of this place to the best of your knowledge."

"Th-the, everyone else is in the main crypt. Across the hall. The room to the left is empty b-but, there's a hole in the wall and ceiling that l-leads up. The r-room to the right, the door's locked, no handle no keyhole, we don't know how to get in. Could b-be another way i-in."

"Hmm, the bottleneck to the main crypt is concerning but can be used to our advantage. Anything else of note? Please think very carefully and very hard about this."

"W-we think there is p-probably something valuable in the l-locked room? Some b-books mention more..."

"But nothing else you've personally found so far."

"No."

"Alrighty. Thank you so much for your cooperation. I am now going to gag you and tie you up, if you're well-behaved we won't need to knock you out."

"Kill her. We got the information we needed."

She whimpers involuntarily.

"Love, if you predictably kill people who give you what you need they won't give you what you need. I want it to be possible to be cooperated with. Trust me. I know what I'm doing. If I fuck up and we fail at anything you can start ignoring me then."

"Tsk."

Shadowheart is definitely approving, though.

He aims to please.

So before anything they should check that her claims about the rooms other than the main crypt are true, which means they should still be careful just in case she was trying to lure them into a trap.

She wasn't.

He didn't think so, no.

"Do not charge in. The door's bottleneck is advantageous to us, since we're outnumbered and I am very fragile. I will draw them out and we can take them out one at a time." He looks at the human. "Are you particularly fond of any of your companions? Not that I'm promising to spare them, but I can think about it."

Headshake.

"Excellent. Let's do this."

They don't manage to finish the fight without any injuries, but all in all it's a pretty bloodless affair. On their end, that is; there's enough bloodshed to satisfy even Lae'zel, after Astarion entirely fails to be sufficiently diplomatic to avoid a fight entirely. One of the hunters begs for mercy, so Astarion merely knocks him unconscious, but the other three unfortunately perish of their injuries.

"Yes. This spilled blood exalts Vlaakith's glory."

Whatever you say, sweetheart.

Time to explore.

One might imagine that the human from earlier doesn't know what the word "crypt" means, as this is most definitely not one. There aren't any tombs or coffins, only a statue to an unknown god with a plaque in an unrecognisable language and numerous books.

Roll Perception.

Sorry, what?

While exploring the place Astarion notices one specific candleholder attached to a wall is somewhat crooked compared to the others, and not in a way that looks best-explained by age.

...he does?

Indeed.

He's so talented.

Well, nothing to it, then: time to pull the obvious lever!

It has the effect one would expect: the handleless locked door opens. And the room it opens to is... mostly empty, but there is another door in there probably leading to the actual crypts.

Plus some banners that have not frayed to nothingness with the centuries.

"...that symbol. I... recognise it... but I can't remember where from."

"I believe we should not go exploring right now and should instead retire for the day. Now that we've found a suitable place for that."

"And our prisoners?"

"We release them, one at a time, from different locations so they have more trouble finding each other again. And we lock the doors and stand watch. I am an elf, so I can take a longer watch."