Escape from the Clutches of Death

((( Continued from https://dragonageafter.forumotion.com/t320p30-journey-under-the-mountains#5934 )))


The stone room was dark as night and as damp as a swamp. The sound of dripping water echoed softly in the darkness. It came from above, dripping slowly but steadily.

The only sounds where of heavily breathing and the gently movement of sleeping bodies.

A small creature skittered across the floor and stood next to one of the sleeping figures. It's eyes were accustomed to the darkness and could see the great heat that this body gave off. It's heightened sense of smell knew that this was indeed a tasty morsel and it would be able to gorge on it for days even weeks.

The creature took skittered closer, its sharp claws clicking on the stone floor of the room. It moved into time with the dripping water in hopes that it would mask its approach.

Again, it moved closer still; so close that it could feel the warm breath of the person who slept.

Suddenly the sleeping being's eyes shot open; they glowed white with flecks of red and blue. A white light pierced the darkness, casting shadows to all corners of the stone chamber both Kaine and Sloane occupied. However, there were no corners as the room was round.

With quick, trained reflexes Kaine snapped out his hand, plucking the scaled rodent from the ground. It seemed to be a cross between a rat and a lizard of some sort. He had never seen anything like it before, yet he squeezed, crushing the critter in his fist. Seemingly on instinct, Kaine bit into the creature and sucked what blood it had from its lifeless corpse.

A tiny bit of energy seemed to flow into him, however not nearly enough to sustain him for long. The reaver inside of him knew that he needed blood to regain his strength and needed it soon.

He saw Sloane on the far side of the chamber; she lay there almost peacefully if it were for the bruises that covered her body, and the blisters that yet covered the bruises.

The fight with the two Revenants was bad enough, but then the Hunger Demon stepped into the battle, tipping the scales out of their favour and into its own. It didn't take much for that powerful of a demon to overwhelm them and defeat them with extreme brutality.

He too was covered in painful bruises and like Sloane, he was covered in the same blisters caused by the lightening that had been forced through their bodies, charring their flesh and causing every nerve ending in their body cry out in agony.

He sneered at the though of the demon; and vowed his revenge when it was found.

He shook his head to clear it, as he was still dazed from the assault.

How long were we out? he thought to himself. This room showed no passage of time, just the constant drip of water.

At least we have something to drink.

He crawled over to the sleeping body of Sloane. He shook her in an attempt to rouse her from her forceful slumber.

Sloane was on a boat, lost at sea. She could hear water, yet she was dying of thirst. Blisters covered her body from days of sun exposure. Then the boat began to rock and she groaned.

Slowly the dream faded and Sloane clawed her way to conciousness. She was happy to escape the dream until she opened her eyes and realized reality wasn't any better. Every last millimetre of her body hurt. She could swear even her hair ached.

She groaned as she slowly pushed herself to a sitting position. Memories began to flood into her memory as she woke up further. "So much for our shortcut eh boss?" She asked, her voice rough from pain and thirst.

"Yea, so much for the short cut." he said quietly.

"Don't move, just rest a moment."

He went to the small pool of water; his lyrium tattoos lighting the way.

He scooped up some water; as much as he could with his hands and slowly crept back to where Sloane lay.

He put his hands to her lips allowing her to take a long refreshing drink.

"Take it slow, you are very dehydrated, you will get sick if you take to much at once." he warned her.

He pointed over to the shallow pool of water, " Clean your wounds there, while I see what we got ourselves into."

He got up slowly as his muscles still ached from not moving for so long. If he had to guess, it was at least two days since they were captured. But he could not be certain as there was no way to reference the passage of time down there.

The light from his tattoos dimmed as a weakness over came him; his energy level was low and he knew that he needed blood quickly otherwise he may not last much longer.

He braced himself against the stone wall as the room seemed to spin for a moment. He shook his head to clear it and realized it had been more like three or four days since they were captured, as he could easily last that long before the reaver hunger took over.

He felt along the walls, trying to see a way out. Even the dim light he was giving off was far to little even for the short distance he was from the wall.

Finally his hand went from damp stone to cold hard metal.

This must be a door, he thought.

He felt around for a latch but could not find one. He banged on the door in frustration, only to have it creak open on him.

What? That was way to easy.

He looked back at Sloane, wishing he could do more for her. He slowly opened the metal door just a bit, hoping it wouldn't make too much noise.

With the door open a jar, he managed to peek outside. Again, nothing but darkness, and with the energy inside of him waning he knew he stood no chance of seeing what lay outside.

He sniffed the air and almost gagged. He was surprised that he didn't smell it before; the smell of rotting flesh.

He knelt down, getting as close to the floor as he could; he sound a small outline of a thin object in the dark. Kaine snatched it up to take a closer look. But as soon as he touched it he knew that he didn't need to see it any longer. It was a bone and from the length of it, a leg bone. He measured the thickness, took a step back and dropped it.

"That can't be right. No way in hell that was right." He stepped back to the door, this time flinging it wide open, allowing the foul stench of rotting flesh into the room.

He took a step outside the room and no sooner had he done so, that the ground beneath him crunched. His step was unstable as there were many objects that covered the ground.

He knelt down and felt around in a wide arch before him.

He jumped up back into the room, slamming the heavy metal door in the process.

If anyone could see the color of his skin, it would have seemed more pale than usually, from the sickening gray that it usually was, to the whiteness of ivory.

"This is not good Sloane. Not good at all. The area on the other side of that door is covered in bones; Darkspawn bones, some of them belong to Ogres."

Sloane gratefully accepted the water and then growled as Kaine spoke. "I'm not a new recruit you know. I do have some sense in my head." she snarled, her voice sounding better already. Sloane was in a lot of pain and it was making her a might bitchy.

Slowly she slid over to the pool of water, snarling against the pain that threatened to force her to unconciousness again. She was stiff from lack of movement and sleeping on a stone floor. She was covered in bruises and blisters from the fight. Slowly she took another sip of water and then began washing the worst of her injuries.

As she listened to Kaine moving about she began doing an inventory of herself. First she checked her injuries. She was bruised and blistered everywhere, but nothing appeared to be broken. Her ankle might be sprained but it would hold her weight if it had to. She still had her armour and several daggers. She had lost a few in the fight but stilll had plenty more.

Sloane had just put her armour back on and levered herself to her feet, using the wall for support, when Kaine began to talk again.

"Nothing about this trip has been right or good since the moment we left Highever. Why would it start now?" she commented, attempting humour but failing miserably. "I'm pretty bruised and blistered, but nothing worse than a sprained ankle. You?" She asked as she couldn't see him well. She could hear from his voice though that he was pretty weak.

"The lyrium in my body is having a hard time keeping me sustained. I need to feast. And I am not talking food here, the reaver part of me thirsts for blood."

"My right arm is useless as I can barely lift it. We need to find out where we are and get the hell out of here as soon as possible." Kaine said, stating the obvious.

The sound of clacking against stone came from behind the metal door. The sound was familiar to both of them; they had heard it when on the surface, just before they entered the tunnels below the mountain.

"Sloane? How do you feel about bugs?" he looked over at her, his white teeth seemed to glow against the fading light of his lyrium based tattoos.

"Or more importantly, how to you feel about BIG bugs?"

"How much blood are we talking here? I don't think I have much to spare." Sloane asked, half joking, half serious.

"Why is it always bugs. And big bugs when I've got nothing but a half dozen daggers." She shook her head really wishing she hadn't left her sword and shield back in that tunnel. "I prefer them nice and dead. I've got a few daggers left, do you have any weapons?" She asked, slowly testing how much weight her ankle would take. It hurt, but as long as she didn't have to run, it should be okay.

"More blood than you have to offer. But I guess its the thought that counts right?"

"The only weapon I have are the claws in my gauntlets. And with one of my arms being useless me fighting with them might have little effect. However, I still have this," Kaine said as his shield expanded from his arm.

"I could bash our way through." Kaine chuckled.

The clicking sound was quite a bit louder now, it was as if it was coming from right behind the door.

It stopped momentarily, the silence was followed by a smashing of the door. The door may have been made from metal and three inches thick, but whatever was banging on that other side was making some serious dents in it.

The strength of whatever wanted in was quite apparent; the metal door bulged and the stone around it began to crack and crumble.

"Whatever wants in, is getting in. We had just better be prepared for it when it happen."

Kaine looked around the room, not really seeing a strategic position and he figured that was a purposeful design.

"Well, I guess we do this the only fashion way. I will keep in front and act as your shield, while you work around me by attacking whatever it is that is about to come through that door. I will do what I can to take the brunt of its attacks while I deflect them with my shield."

Just as he was finished explaining what they should do the door came flying through the air, passing between them to stick into the solid stone wall.

The rest of the stone around where the door used to be, crumbled away. And a monstrous maw came from the darkness and into the dim lyrium lights. The skin of the creature was rock like and it had two tentacles waving about in front of it.



Kaine took a step back not believing what he saw. This was definitely the kind of creature that horror stories were made of. The ones that you told little kids to make them go to bed or eat their vegetables.

Kaine looked over to Sloane and gave her an evil grin. The claws on his one good arm extended and with his shield in front of him he charged, roaring at the creature in defiance.

(((Consider this an Elite creature for RP combat purposes. It has the ability to attack you with each tentacle, where it will try to wrap it around you to pull you into its maw. The skin of the creature is rock hard, but is soft in the neck area, under its head. The tentacles are soft as well and can be damaged, however if an attack is made against them there is a chance your weapon will be taken away or knocked aside as they are in a constant state of flailing.)))

"You sure know how to show a girl a good time boss," Sloane commented, some of her sassyness returning now that adrenaline was pumping through her system, giving her a boost.

Sloane watched and quickly assessed as she watched the giant nightmare monstrosity enter the room. Kaine's plan was a sound one given their lack of resources. She decided the tentacles presented the most pertinent threat and decided to go for those first as Kaine charged the massive beast.

As Kaine attacked the creature head on Sloane pulled out two daggers from their hiding spots and approached the side of the creature hugging the cave wall. She crouched down, coiling herself for a jump and timed the waving of the closest tentacle.

Sloane launched herself at the tentacle stabbing both daggers into it while wrapping her legs around it to hold on.

Before Kaine could get his first shield bash in, Sloane and circled around and leaped upon one of its tentacles, plunging her daggers deep within its soft flesh.

The creature roared in pain as it began to wildly flail that tentacle around.

Kaine smirked as his second in command took a daring leap into battle. Kaine bashed his shield against the creatures maw, hoping that it will prevent it from chopping down on him. Instead the creature latched on to the shield, its teeth over lapping and coming dangerously close to his arm. With all his strength his pushed against the creature, hoping to keep it occupied as Sloane tried to find a weak spot.

The creature's roar was slightly muffled by the shield in its maw, however it was not having any of this as it sent the tentacle with Sloane on it towards Kaine.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the attack coming, but was unable to respond, as his shield was lodged in the creature's mouth.

He closed his eyes and braced himself. The impact came with a such brute force that it knocked the wind out of him and tore the shield from the beasts mouth as we went flying through the air. Shards of jagged teeth went flying as the creature spewed black ichor from its mouth.

Sloane held on for dear life as the tentacle flailed through the air. She managed to get a few more slashes in with one dagger before the tentacle went flying toward Kaine.

Just before the tentacle impacted with Kaine Sloane managed to slid herself around and vault onto the creature's back. She missed though and hit the creature's side instead. The templar tried to catch herself with her daggers, but then bounced off the creature's thick skin and she hit the ground with a thud.

Sloane rolled toward the wall, narrowly missing being trampled by the pissed off beast. She scrambled to her feet as Kaine went flying through the air. In a desperate attempt to distract the creature from Kaine she went flying at it with a scream, diving at the tentacle once again.

Kaine flew through the air, slamming into the wall of the stone room.

Before he could even regain his sense, the rage and anger within him boiled to the surface. It was too much for him to be captured and fed to some creature, let alone betrayed by someone he knew.

The tattoos flared to life, engulfing the room in a bright white light, tearing away the shadows and darkness.

Everything seemed to slow down as it usually did when the berserker side of him took over.

He felt the power of lyrium course through his body once again. His lifeless arm sprung to life as it activated his gauntlet claws.

He charged the beast, his shield retracted as both sets of claws were activated. He saw Sloane once again savagely slice large gashes in one of the creatures tentacles.

He knew the creature was crying out in pain, yet the thundering of his heart drowned out all the sounds around him.

As he came close to the creature he used his powerful legs to spring into the air.

Some how the creature knew where he was, as a tentacle came flying at him. Without breaking his momentum, Kaine met the tentacle head on as he used both claws to slice through it.

Two pieces of tentacle fell to the ground in a shower of black ichor; they continued to flop around, almost as if they had a life of their own.

He landed roughly on the creatures back, where he dug both sets of claws into the exposed flesh of the creatures neck.

The strange tentacled beast roared it pain, but instead of retaliating, it began to flail its tentacles around in a panic.

Sloane managed to get a few good hits in on the creature's tentacle before being thrown clear once more. She landed on her back somewhere behind and to the side of the massive beast. I have GOT to learn to fly she thought idly to herself as pain shot through her already damaged body.

The templar was partly blinded as Kaine's tattooes lit up while she was trying to pick herself off the ground. Luckily the beast's bulk blocked much of the light and she was only affected for a few seconds.

As Kaine went flying toward the beast Sloane saw an opportunity to strike and made a dash for it. She came in low from the side and slid on her back under the creature's belly, slicing through it as she went under. She came out on the other side soaked in blood and endtrails as her daggers had made large slices in the soft underbelly.

Unfortunatly she failed to get to her feet in time and was slammed into the wall by the flailing beast, black clouding the edges of her vision as she fought to remain concious.

The spray of gore drenched the reaver from head to toe. The stain of death did not last long as he absorbed it into him.

The rage inside his continued to burn through him; with each slash of his claws he dug deeper and deeper into the neck of this beast. Even after it succumbed to the thralls of death he continued.

Soon his arms grew tired and his body weak from the exertion of his berserk rage. His breathing was laboured as he fought for each breath.

It took me several moments to regain his composure, but with the new found strength he rushed to Sloane's side.

"You've got to stay awake soldier. No sleeping on the job." He retracted his claws as he gently, but firmly slapped her on each side of her face, trying to keep her in the land of the conscious.

Sloane lay against the wall dazed as Kaine finished off the creature. She knew if she had a head injury she had to stay awake and fought desperatly to do so.

The badly injured templar gave Kaine a crooked grin as he approached her. "Yes boss," she replied weakly at his orders. Sloane looked down at herself noticing she was covered in blood from head to toe. "I found you some blood," she joked.

Slowly Sloane attempted to get to her feet using Kaine and the wall as support. She gasped and just about screamed as she attempted to put weight on her ankle. As the adreneline left her body she realized she had made the injury much worse during the fight. "Not sure I can walk boss."

"That you did, that you did. Good job back there, couldn't have done it without you." he smiled at her, which was scary in itself, as his face was the type that didn't and shouldn't smile.

"Where is there a healer when you need one? Damn fade bastards never around when you really need them. Only around to annoy you." Kaine said as he shook his head; droplets of blood flew from his dreadlocks as he did.

"If only you were a reaver, this battle would have healed you up nice and good."

Kaine looked around the room, his tattoos still keeping the darkness at bay. His eyes came across the strange creature and an evil grin came across his face.

"Don't move."

He jumped up, activated the claws on both gauntlets and marched up to the beast. Without hesitation he dug into the creature with both sets off claws, ripping the flesh aside.

The top half of Kaine's body soon became hidden within the beast. Sloane could hear cracking and breaking of bones. Moments later Kaine came out gripping a long bone, curved at the top.

"Here, try this for support. Should be just the right size to fit under your arm to take the weight off your ankle."

He offered her his arm so she may get up off the ground and try out the make shift crutch of bone.

"Whereever she is, she better be taking good care of Sobaka." Sloane commented with a weak grin.

She watched as Kaine rooted around inside the creature, wondering what he was up to. Sloane couldn't quite supress the laugh when he returned, triumphantly holding a large bone. Maybe it was the head wound, but she almost collapsed in a fit of giggles.

When she had calmed down and regained her breath she took Kaine's arm and unsteadily tested out the makeshift crutch. "Well I sure won't win a beauty pagent, but bonus points for ingenuity boss." She said as she took a few experimental steps. She grimaced in pain but was able to make forward progress.

The templar growled and leaned against the wall for a minute to push the blood soaked hair out of her face. She untied a spare leather strap from her arm and used it to tie her hair out of the way before continuing.

"So now what's the plan boss?" She asked as they headed toward the doorway.

"Plan? I figured I would just wing it." he winked at Sloane as he laughed.

"But seriously, we need to get out of here. Especially if there is another one of those creatures out there. You're not going to be much help this time around and I am not in the mood to be bashed up against the walls anymore. It gets rather annoying."

"I can light the way a little bit, but it won't cut through the darkness very far. Trying to find Selene and Saboka would be a good start as well. First things first, we need to find out where we are so we can go from there."

Kaine nodded to Sloane, crept to the shattered entrance to the room, looked both ways. After he was sure he didn't hear or see anything he hugged the left side and began to creep along it slowly.

The darkness was all around them, the light from his tattoos only broke through it a few meters in front of them. He kept his only weapon at the ready, his gauntlets. He wanted to make sure he would be able to react on a moments notice if something were to jump at them through the veil of darkness.

Bones of many unfortunately creatures crunched beneath his feet. He looked down and saw that the ground was littered with them. It would see this creature had been feeding in this place for quite some time.

"Getting out of here would be an excellent idea. I may already be partly cooked and well marinated, but I really don't fancy becoming monster chow." Sloane quipped with a laugh.

The laugh was cut short as Sloane grabbed for her side. "Damn, I think I have some cracked ribs. I guess that means I'm also pre-tenderized!" She grinned, but managed to stop herself from trying to laugh again.

Using her crude crutch Sloane limped slowly after Kaine, a grimace of pain and concentration on her blood streaked face. She kicked weakly at some of the bones. "If all these things managed to get in here there has to be a way out."

"These aren't cavernous walls either, " Kaine pointed out as he moved slowly along the wall, "These were constructed by someone."

As he continued to move slowly forward he came to a startling realization, "This room is circular. I can feel it as we are moving along, we are ever so slight moving in a circle. And there is only one kind of room I know of that is circular; an arena."

"These bones are bones of creatures that were sent here to fight that monster. Or at least to fight; it is strange that they don't remove the dead after a battle. Oh.........." Kaine's voice trailing off for a moment.

"......this is not good. I just realized another kind of circular room...A feeding pit."

Suddenly the stone wall gave way to a metal portcullis, "This must be one of the entrances into this place, or the only one for all we know."

He looked through the iron grille and saw faint torch light coming from down the corridor. He squinted and saw the outline of another portcullis about a dozen or so feet behind this one. Kaine knew this was a typical safety measure with all gates of this design, especially in an arena or feeding pit.

The first gate was raise and then closed after whoever it was was made to enter. Then the second gate was opened to allow whoever it was into this area. Many castles used these as defensive points and some of them even had killing zones behind, in front or even in between them.

Kaine squatted down and placed his hands on the bottom most grille. He lifted with all his strength; the muscles on his legs tightened along with his arms, but the gate didn't even budge.

He chuckled, "Well it was worth a try I guess. I didn't think it would work, these things are designed to not move. Plus, it is probably locked in place somewhere."

Sloane limped along behind Kaine, focusing mostly on keeping moving. She groaned as he began talking about arenas and feeding pits. Just great, she thought. All she wanted was a decent meal, a nice long bath, and a few weeks of sleep.

She limped forward and studied the portcullis briefly before moving toward the wall on the other side. Sloane began to slowly move her hands over the wall around the gate, hoping to find a switch. "Maybe there is some sort of control room nearby? There has to be a way to open this thing." Her voice sounded weak, tired, and strained from fighting the pain and exhaustion.

Finding nothing Sloane slumped against the wall and sat down. "Just leave me here boss. You can move faster on your own." She groaned and closed her eyes. "If you find a good restaurant on the way bring me back a bowl of stew and a mug of ale would ya?"

"No one gets left behind; haven't done it, nor do I plan on starting."

A muffled noise came from down the tunnel; it sounded familiar to both of the Templars, but it was still too far away for them to tell.

There it was again; this time they heard the muffled sound of a Mabari bark.

It continued to grow louder and louder, until suddenly around the corner of the tunnel a large dog like shape appeared. Only a shadow outline could be seen, as the light was not strong enough to reach them.

It bounded up to the other gate and began to whine as it pawed at it.

Moments later a huffing Selene came skidding around the bend, almost crashing into the wall as she chased after the Mabari.

"Stupid dog what have you............." She stopped suddenly and peered through the darkness, "Kaine, Sloane? Is that you guys? What the hell is going on?"

Sloane was about to argue with Kaine when she heard a strange noise from the other side of the gate. She stopped and cocked her head to listen. A moment later she heard a very familiar bark. Despite her injuries she got to her feet fairly quickly with a giant grin on her face.

"Sobaka!" She cried out happily as he got closer. "Oh good boy Sobaka!" The templar cooed through the bars, wishing she could reach him. Slaone looked up as Selene came into view. "Oh, and you brought me a mage. Excellent work. You're such a good boy!"

Suddenly the shot of adreneline was gone from her system and she sagged agains the game, barely managing to sit rather than just collapse in a heap.

"Well it would seem like you have gotten your self in a bit of a predicament. How the hell did you even get in there?"

Selene looked around, shining the light of her staff to see if she can see some sort of release mechanism.

"There must be a control room around here someone. Because I don't see a control over on this end."

"However, I could do something else....."

She took a step back; gripping her staff in both hands, she raised it above her head. She closed her eyes and her mouth started to move, silent murmurs could be heard as she spoke under her breath.

Her eyes quickly opened and the base of the staff came crashing down. A powerful shockwave slammed into the iron gate; the creaking of metal filled the air as it bent and contorted against the power of the blast.

"I think one more should do it. Stand back."

Again, she raised her staff and brought it crashing to the ground once more. This time the blast crumpled the gate and sent it flying towards the other one. The force of the blow coupled with the weight of the gate caused the stone to crumpled at the impact. The outer gate fly from the opening, sending a shower of stone in all directions.

Selene shook her head and stumbled forward, gripping her staff for support, "Not going to be doing something like that again. Not anytime soon anyways."

Before Kaine could even reply to Selene's question, the first shockwave battered the inner gate. The wrenching sound of metal bending filled the air. As Selene warned of the second wave, he grabbed Sloane and shield her body with his.

The shower of stones rained down on him, but they were just small splinters, so no damage was done.

"Are you ok?" he asked the warrior beneath him.

Sloane had barely registered Selene's words when there was a screaming of metal and stone. She screamed out in pain as Kaine grabbed her and shielded her from the second impact.

"You're on top of me, of course I'm ok boss." Sloane said with a small grin right before she lost conciousness.