“I sent my Soul through the Invisible, some letter of that After-life to spell: And by and by my Soul return’d to me, And answer’d “I Myself am Heav’n and Hell.” —Omar Khayyám, The Rubaiyat”

"HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE." - Terry Pratchett, The Hogfather

Wanted: Dead or Alive, but Mostly Dead - KLAUS - Murderer. Smuggler. Thief. Rum & Weapons Runner. Spreader of Lies. Bandit. Scoundrel. REWARD: 50,000 gold pieces and an Imperyion Commendation  - Text on an Imperyrion bounty poster found in most Compact-sympathetic businesses and pubic buildings in the Outer Grinder

"We create the stories that create us." - Klaus

'Twas two weeks before Life Day

Deep in the Grinder

Algail ast’roid wove and rolled

To escape what’s behind her

The Compact wasn’t happy

By any account

A Void Stalker’s expensive

An inord’nate amount

Havelock had moved his rocky home,

Once heroes departed

And others prepared. Our

Adventure has started…

Three weeks have passed in a merry blur. The Heroes of Ancorato and the Inordinate Privateers took up residence in the unoccupied village of Algail. 

Leisure Time

Khalid: reading books from their growing library

Shroktath: hanging out with his brother from another mother, Orag

Baisile: discussing engineering with Brail

Luckums: examining the G-NOME, theorizing about time, cooking with Edgar, hanging out with Mauveen, storytime with the goblins and reading to Shilynn

The goblins were deeply moved by the decision to resurrect their fallen comrades, Lewis and Charlotte. However, some rejected the idea, at first. It was later determined that those who rejected the idea owed the deceased money. Never in their wildest imaginings would they have thought they ever would have merited such treatment, let alone from their superior officers.

Repairs to the Inordinate Amount, assisted by Chenwulf and Orag, have been completed as well as could be done on a docking tower with few skilled labourers and only seabourne ship specialists. With Mauveen’s assistance, Brail declares the vessel “spaceworthy enough” to get you someplace where proper repairs can be completed. Most importantly, thanks particularly to Basile’s clever contraptions and the bounty offered to the goblins, the Neogi infestation has been eliminated. Mauveen has confirmed that none remain.

Following the departure of the Heroes of Ancorato through the Azlanti Stargate, Brail began the process of moving Algail Asteroid deeper into the Grinder. Grdlbrdl had warned that Compact sympathizers were getting agitated over the party’s frequent visits to Fish Head, and more capable bounty hunters and Imperyion officials had been called in.

The energy moving through Algail Asteroid that allows it to automagically navigate the densely packed belt and respond to the myriad competing gravity fields creates a strange set of weather phenomena on its surface. A wintery micro-climate has worked its way from the nose, where the atmosphere has been compressed, to the aft. With the falling temperatures, much of the ground is covered with snow and the halo-falls are partially frozen and the source of actual cloud cover.

Not long after Brail started moving Algail, Coalman took the gobs out for field exercises – they’ll never look proper in parade, but their capacity for tactical innovation is remarkable. He figured on capitalizing on their strengths. Mauveen, who has long been away from her own people, has joined them, to Brail’s delight. They’ve been gone for the past week and have another week to go.

During that time, you’ve noticed Brail grow more anxious. At first, you think he might be missing Mauveen, but he responded, “Wha? Not a tik. It’s nice not having that little fussbudget underfoot for a change.” Some sheep have gone missing, so then you worry that your goblins might be helping themselves to extra meals or worse, using them for target practice. To that Brail responds, “Eat as many as you want. Damn things are like rabbits.” Then you think you might be overstaying your welcome. Its yet another idea he brushes, though this time with even more Gnomish expletives, and you think that maybe you ought to stop asking…

However, prying a little more, he softens somewhat, “Thank you for your concern,” he deflects, “Allow an old man his little anxieties. Now, these mutton pies aren’t going to eat themselves… tuck in!”

You all hear it before you see it. The distant sounds of bells jingling on harnesses and traces soon give way to the sight of eight snorting bison, galloping through Wildspace as though on land. Eddies of asteroid dust leave a twinkling trail in their wake, kicked up by their hooves. Behind them, they haul a prodigious sledge, like the kind you might find loaded for bare in a lumber camp.

Grinning and clearly relieved, Brail calls you to gather you all in the meadow between the cottage and the village as the remarkable procession circles above. After it lands, you see that the man who disembarks is either a giant of a human or a dwarf of a giant. Dressed all in grey traveller’s clothes trimmed with white fur, he is wrapped in a cloak dyed a deep crimson with a floppy hat to match. His full belly belies his muscular build and massive frame. A shaggy black beard and curly hair turning white at the edges hide round, jolly features. A great broadsword, as long and wide as Shroktath’s leg, hangs from his scabbard. A crossbow is flung easily over his shoulder. His eyes sparkle as he looks at Brail with great affection. He smiles and laughs easily. Listening to the ancient Gnome go on, he looks up and gives you a conspiratorial wink, radiating charisma and good will. 

It occurs to you that this man’s arrival was the source of Brail’s anxiety...

BRAIL: “And this is my dear friend, Klaus. He runs a delivery service of sorts amongst the various settlements of the inner Grinder – moisture farms, wildcat mines, refugee camps, revolutionaries. The lost, the dispossessed, the desperate, all look to him as a sort of lifeline. Gentleman smuggler, eh boy?”

KLAUS respond with a booming, barking laugh. “Ho-ho-ho! And don’t forget, toys for the children. Brail’s busy hands make thousands of the dam things every cycle. And every cycle, just before Life Day, I come and take them off his hands. It’s a public service. If I didn’t, his little asteroid haven would be overrun with wind-up hopping birds and flapping clockwork dragons.

“You led us on a merry chase. I didn’t think I was going to find Algail in time. Damn grinder gets more dangerous every cycle. But I shouldn’t have worried. When will I learn to trust Onslaught and Helhest to smell their way to the steel cut oats in your stables,” he thumps the rumps of one of his steaming chargers.

BRAIL: “Aye,” Brail mumbles, “We’ve had some trouble with the Compact…”

KLAUS looks grim. “I thought as much. Something has changed in their patrol patterns. Rumblings about going deeper into the Grinder, and increasingly there are Ylfe with them – Guardians of Dignity & Culture no less. They’re looking for something. Or someone’s, eh?” With this, his smiling gaze takes the measure of the party.

With this, Brail introduces you all as his guests, and Klaus speaks to each briefly.

KLAUS: “Forgive me comrades, but I have a matter of some urgency to discuss with Master Bonnydock, I hope that we can better make each other’s acquaintance soon.” 

With that, the two hastily excuse themselves and rush off.

That evening, curiously, there is no welcoming meal and you are not invited to the cottage, which is strange. Brail does like to make a show of being a generous host.

Most of you are fast asleep when a banging followed by a tearing sound wakes you all from your slumber. Metal being ripped asunder. Rocks crashing. A terrible animal howling that you pray must be the wind. Trouble at the cottage!

Your eyes adjust to an unusual gloom. A massive blizzard has begun buffeting your windows, driving big fluffy snowflakes horizontally. This is not the novel though gentle snowfall from the halofalls that you’ve been experiencing until now. Outside the wind shireks.

The starboard side of the rock against which Brail’s home is nestled, has collapsed right up to the foundation. A massive cavern and holding cell is revealed beneath a ruin of rock and timber and torn steel. The entire site is already covered with a layer of blowing snow.

Brail is feeling his way around in his sleeping clothes, up to his knees in a snow drift. His face is streaked with tears.

BRAIL: “Somehow, Klaus broke out. But not Klaus. Not for another week. For now he is the Krampus.” Brail sighs and collapses exhausted in the snow. “I had hoped to spare you the burden of all this.”

“Klaus suffers a sort of lycanthropy. Most of the cycle, he can stay one step ahead of it, so long as he traverses the sphere in his Sledge-jammer. But once a cycle, he must succumb. His body becomes an extra-planar gate for a demonic creature called Moloch.

“He’s a good boy. Algail has always been a safe place for him to transform. Between the cell I built and Mauveen and her family, we’ve been even able to keep the Krampus under control. Mauveen knew he was coming and would have sensed his arrival. The fact that he was able to break out must mean that something is wrong – something has happened to her.

BRAIL: “As far as I can reckon, the Krampus will not yet be at his full power. If that should happen, no living thing on the asteroid is safe. And if he escapes Algail on Klaus’s Sledge-jammer, no living thing will be safe in the Grinder for the next cycle. Just as Klaus can stay ahead of Krampus, the Krampus will be able to stay ahead of Klaus. And their will be no Life Day for the children…

“We have a narrow window of opportunity to stop him.”

Solution

“The Lycanthropy Cycle and Life Day” was an instruction manual written in Celestial by Klaus himself. It is the key to defeating the Krampus. A successful Research check reveals the following: place an IRON COLLAR around the Krampu's neck, followed by an INNOCENT KISS BENEATH A SPRIG OF MISTLETOE, in the spirit of the SINGING HEART OF LIFE DAY (part of the Druididc tradition at the heart of “Life Day”)

The Inordinate Amount and all else is encrusted in ice. This includes the spelldashers, and you can see that at least one of them has been smashed to kindling by the lurching Inordinate Amount. The Inordinate Amount bucks and smashes into the docking tower causing it to shake and shards of ice to cascade downwards, and all of you to brace yourselves.

It takes a couple hours to find signs of one of the goblins’ most recent encampments – though the age is hard to tell, given the snowfall, which has increased tenfold. 

BRENDON, DAKOTA, CHARLOTTE and GLENN confront the party…

BRENDON: “HALT! Who goes there?”

DAKOTA: “You idiot, it’s the bosses. Uh… Would you rather hear the good news or the bad news?

Good News: There were 7 of us left… well four of us now…
Bad News: 10 of us are missing… including Baby Blue. Or maybe it's 9... (begins counting on fingers)

CHARLOTTE: “When we heard you banging around the snow, we thought you were one of them… they took Mauveen and Coalman first… and from there started picking us off one by one when we went looking for them…”

• Gurunk and the Shannons were with us, but a couple hours ago, Gurunk picked up the scent of something and went running off into the woods, chasing something (probably a squirrel). The Shannons tried calling him back, but he was having none of it… They’ve been gone a while (no they haven’t) at least a day (no. an hour or two… no its been forever)

• We think they are hiding them (8 Goblins, Mauveen and Coalman) in the caves.

• It started last nights.

• Formians! Ant-like insectoid soldiers. Not at all fun.

• It must be the remnant of the force that we fought here.

• There’s one that is bigger and badder than all the others… a leader that makes all of his followers bigger and badder. We thought he was killed during our first battle, but apparently he was not. He’s a stealthy one.

• We’ve killed three of them, but they are using some guerilla tactics…

• We don’t know how many more of them there are…

We were trying to think of a plan of attack when you showed up. You’re mildly impressed that they didn’t just go charging in… Progress?

There are places in these otherwise rocky tunnels that are filled with organic materials probably carried here by flowing water before it evaporated and started the cycle again in the asteroid’s micro-climate. A web of roots cracks through the rocks from the forest above, raising questions about the stability of the ceiling. The tunnels are dark, cramped and muddy; damp and only slightly warmer than it is outside.

You come across another empty organic “punch bowl,” signs of another sheep inside.

Chamber 1: This chamber has been expanded recently. Four occupied punchbowls can be found at its center. A small formian worker, with a soft white exterior that still looks wet and translucent is tending to pupae wriggling at the bottom of each punchbowl. At the top of each, you can see a goblin head sticking out, unconscious, with their mouths covered by sticky excretions. 

Chamber 2: Another recently expanded chamber, this time with three punch bowls at its center. Two occupied by goblins one by a sheep.

Chamber 3: This is the largest chamber there are 5 sheep-sized punch bowls, each with the head of a goblin sticking out of the top. Coalman is stuck to the wall of the chamber, exhausted and in pain, his weeping eyes wide with terror.  A long fleshy tube extends from his mouth to the floor. Every few moments he vomits forth something large and wriggling into the birthing canal. Peristaltic covulsions deliver it to the sphincter where a waiting formian worker helps to draw out a squirming pupae sack. There are three other workers busy reinforcing the walls with excretions. There are one or two squirming pupae at the base of each of the crusty acid pots. Some have cracked open to reveal a larval thing inside reminiscent of a legless pit bull.

In two cases they have begun pulling themselves up the side of the victim sacks with bony mandibles, slobbering acidic digestive juices down the outside…

[Placeholder]

An icy wind sighs through the tunnels, chilling your bodies heaving with sweat from your combat exertions. Looking at the shadows stretching towards you down the cramped underground corridors makes your eyes ache and your chest clench. The darkness seems to grab fistfuls of earthen wall with clawed hands, pulling forward a writhing anthropomorphized mass of every childhood fear you ever had. Vague horns loom over burning eyes and, oh gods, it's begun to speak...

A chilling laugh and a voice like chewing tinfoil, “Basile and Luckums, Shroktath and Kahlid ... Although I can tell you've all been naughty – I have come for the goblin child... I can smell her. I can smell them all. They are enough like children. Step aside or don't. It is no matter to me. I shall collect the rest of them all in my sack whether you are dead or not.”

You have the sense that the feral shadow thing is smiling toothily before kicking the sack it drags behind it with something like a hooked chain.

He crushes several larval formians beneath his hooves when he scoops Mauveen from her encrusted womb. With one swoop he sticks her in his sack.

“It is far too warm and cramped in here…”

He heaves his should and smashes a hole in the top of the mound, letting in a burst of cold air…

And leaps into the swirling snow outside…

DEFEAT

Crane shot… The asteroid’s swirling blizzard begins to fade. From the outside it looks like a thing you shake up and it snows inside.

Klaus recovers fully in a matter of days. Putting Algail back together again takes a bit more time. It is well under way as the snow begins to melt once Brail's Asteroid emerged from the inner grinder wall, and adopted a more felicitous orbit.

He delights in the goblins’ company and they in his. It turns out he is quite the engineer and project manager. By the time he is prepared to depart, the Inordinate Amount is in slightly better shape than Chenwulf and Orag left it. 

At this point you realize it’s not the first (second or third) time that this place has been put back together again.

A great meal has been assembled to celebrate…

But first there are gifts wrapped in animal skins beneath a great oak.

• For the goblins, masterwork weapons.

• For Bronwyn, a magical tiara.

• For Gurunk, a small knitted rabbit with button eyes

• For Khalid, Needful Bullets: they penetrate any sort of DR

• For Shroktath, Bracers of Titan's Grip: +2 CMB & CMD, +4 for Grapple checks

• For Basile, Alluring Golden Apple:  Add your Magic Modifier (INT) to the DC

• For Luckums, A Major Ring of Libraries

• For Shilynn… an escape from the Brain Box

With apologies to Charles Dickens...

Brail’s cottage is transformed. The walls and ceiling are so hung with living green, that it looks a perfect grove; from every part of which, bright gleaming berries glisten. The crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe, and ivy reflect back the light of faerie fire spells and dozens of bees wax candles, as if so many little mirrors had been scattered there. A mighty blaze is roaring up the chimney in such a conflagration as only a goblin could have constructed. Blaine stands beaming before his creation. Heaped upon the groaning table, are geese, game, great joints of meat, glistening tureens of goat curry, spring lamb with mint jelly, long wreaths of sausages, mince-pies, plum-puddings, barrels of Wildspace oysters, red-hot chestnuts, cherry-cheeked apples, juicy mango-rines, luscious bowls of glazed plums and pears, hot seed bread, immense layered milk cakes, flaky cream filled delights, and seething bowls of punch, that made the chamber dim with their delicious steam.

Life Day Toasts

To strength and honour.

Companionship and fellowship.

The success that we all have by working together.

To adventure.

To kindness and understanding.

The board is alive with happy chatter and song. Mauveen spins flocks of toys through the air. Shannon-2 plays a reel on pipes you didn’t know she possessed. Edgar keeps the rhythm with a pair of spoons and his knee. Bronwyn insists she is a space princess and sings a bawdy song that is probably not a life day carol. Goblins laugh and dance and drink and feast and sing and argue and lie and fight and fall over and do it all again.

As the day’s celebrations last well into the night, Brail grows unusually silent. He takes long pulls on his pipe and sighs, drinking it all in. Mauveen is asleep, her tiny blue head resting on his shoulder. A half dozen fruity desserts are half eaten on the table in front of her.

In easy state at the head of the table sits Klaus, larger than life. Even seated, his head barely clears the rafter. He sits up then, risking bumping his head, and lifts his horn, dripping with spiced wine.

“Friends! Old and new…” he calls. The rooms falls into such a sudden silence that Mauveen suddenly awake and looks around. All eyes turn to him. This is not a man who has ever been at a loss for words, and yet now, he bows his head. Finally… “I am humbled. You humble me, with your courage and your grace. Thanks to you…” he trails off

After a drawn silence. Someone clears their throat…

Klaus lifts his head and raises his horn. “To life.” He murmurs… “To life” everyone responds, almost politely… At this, Klaus casts a sidelong glance at the assembled and roars “TO LIFE!” and the entire board responds with as mighty a cheer as though he had just called you to battle.

Brail smiles stroking Mauveen’s blue hair, and if you were sitting close enough to him. You would have heard him whisper… “Aye, and to the living of it.”

When Klaus leaves, his Sledge-jammer is loaded to overflowing. He bids each of you good health and long life in a long and warm embrace

Khalid: If ever you need us, we would gladly fill the role of "Santa's Little Helpers"

Basile: Gives Santa a hug. With 30 brothers and sisters, he was always last in line to hug Santa...

At long last, he boards, and his bison begin to charge down the meadow in a thundering tumult. He bellows..

On Helhest and Onslaught,

Gulltop and Bolayde,

Arvakr, Alsvior,

Ricasso & Forte

From the back of the asteroid

To the Top of the Falls,

Dash away, dash away, dash away all!

And you heard him exclaim, ere he drives out of sight—

“Happy Lifeday to all, and to all a good flight!”

With a coughing fit, Coalman finally manages to spit the formian birthing tube out of his mouth. His chin drips with ichor.

 “Gah. Whew…” He pants and looks around. “Huh. They’re probably busy. I’ll just wait here. I’m sure someone will remember to come back shortly.”

 He waits. Hums for a bit. The camera draws away from him to reveal the ntire chilly, darkened chamber. He remains glues to the wall by organic excretions.

Another moment passes.

 “This is fine.”

[...]

Freeday Claireweek Weegassa in the 48th Annum Independencia - The Eve of Life Day

We were in our halcyon days after the Battles of Algail.  Battle and incredible challenges had tested and tempered the Inordinate Privateers and we were stronger for it.  Routines were beginning to form and even a discipline of a sort settled in such that it felt like things were getting easier.  I actually was able to read a book for leisure from our small and eclectic library, “The Mysterious Travels in the Wasteland”.  Not for long, mind you, but long enough to be called free time away from burning and goblins.  All of our ship’s company had found time for rest and study.  I was happy to approve the great initiative of Coalman to hold a field exercise with the goblins.  It was clear there was only so much that could be gained from Sunterran training methods and such a field exercise would channel their natural battle proficiencies more towards something we could use.

Brail moved the asteroid through the Grinder with incredible control and snow began to fall on that tiny world.  I had read about snow as a boy but had never seen it until those days.  It was two weeks before Life Day when an amazing figure arrived at Algail named Klaus.  He was an old friend of Brail and they spoke of his efforts to provide supplies to revolutionaries and toys to small children.  He also indicated that we had made quite the impression on the Compact.  He and Brail set off to a private supper as a cold night sent us early to bed.

That night we were awoken by a loud and terrible noise.  Outside was a terrible snowstorm the likes of which barely came close to the one's I struggled to imagine in the epic stories I had read in my youth.  I recalled in one that intrepid adventurers would travel outdoors tied together by a rope because of the blowing snow.  We made this and other serious precautions to trek to Brail’s cabin.  We found it destroyed and Brail in a panicked state.  He said that Klaus had transformed into a demon named Krampus that if allowed to venture from this asteroid would cause untold damage and destruction.  We quickly set to disabling his Sledgejammer when Brail provided a book authored by Klaus himself called “The Lycantrope and Life Day”.  It provided a ritual to break Klaus’s curse.  Shroktath and Luckums returned to the Inordinate Amount to get an iron collar and mistletoe.

Meanwhile, Basile and I went of to finding our goblin squad at risk from this demon.  There trail was well concealed but marked in the classic goblin fashion allowing us to follow but perhaps giving them some security.  Rejoined, the four of us tracked them through the worsening strong and deepening snow for hours.  We found their abandoned camp beside the junk yard near a creek.  While I was scouting the ravine, I misstepped and caused a small avalanche that brought Basile and I to the bottom in a painful heap.  From there we were able to follow the creek to caves that were hiding Brendon, Charlotte, Dakota and Glenn.  They indicated the rest of their squad was deeper in the caves and had been captured by formian soldier, stragglers from the Battle of Algail.  We set them in all-around defence and sent Basile ahead to scout.

[Placeholder: image of a Formian]

Deeper in the cases we found Connor, Edgar and Lewis encased in cocoons so they could be used for breeding more ant soldiers and as food.  In the next chamber we found Blaine and Veronica.  In the last chamber we found the central nest and breeding centre.  The remainder of our friends were desperately close to being attacked by these giant ants and so we set upon them ruthlessly.  My new pistol performed flawlessly but my blunderbuss was a magnificent cannon of fire.  They were fierce warriors and as the battle was turning to our victory, the Krampus Moloch entered.  He laughed as he put Mauvine into his sack.  Shroktath tried to grab him but ended up being wrapped in chain as Krampus made a hole in the ceiling and jumped through it.  I lunged for chain and tried to anchor the fiend from leaving.  On the surface, Basile snuck through the hole and grabbed the sack!.  That distraction was enough for Shroktath and I to haul the Krampus back into the cave.  Shroktath grabbed on to him and clamped the iron collar on his neck.  Mauvine jumped down and under Luckum’s mistletoe bestowed him with an innocent kiss.  It broke the curse and we returned with all our goblins and Coalman to the village.

Exhausted and jubilant, we had a joyful Life Day celebration.  We sang songs, told tall tales and feasted.  As Klaus was giving us gifts, Luckums stopped him and asked him to help Shilynn get free from her box.  Klaus was taken aback and said even if he could he had nowhere to put her afterwards.  I suddenly recalled that we had taken Dirk’s lifeless clockwork form aboard after the Shootout at Fort Kerium and showed it to Klaus.  We were happily shocked and amazed several hours later during our toasts when Shilynn walked into the party in that clockwork; a true Life Day miracle.

[Placeholder: Christmas Goblin]

Many I’ve known used to say they dreamt of meeting Klaus as a kid. Well, I did, and lived to tell the tale. 

Klaus - the Klaus of Life Day legend - turns up at Havelock’s place one day. And suddenly it sort of made sense. Havelock had been all jumpy for quite some time before those eight buffalo and sleigh of legend turned up. The moment Klaus arrived, Havelock’s mood shifted. Come to think of it and looking back, I wouldn’t say that the worry totally left him, but he sure was happy about seeing Klaus. That felt real, and strong, so maybe it covered up the worry. 

What was there to worry about? Well, it turns out, a lot. That Klaus is sort of two spirits in one. MOST of the time he’s Klaus - one of the warmest, kindest beings you’d ever meet. You’re drawn to him, you feel totally safe and happy with him. But, as we soon found out, Klaus is also on the run from a part of himself - his flip side, the demon Krampus. I guess Havelock usually helps him out with this… and something was about to go badly wrong.

We awoke in the night to a sound like a massive explosion amid howling winds, blowing snow and plunging temperatures. We made our way to Havelock’s house only to find a part of it badly damaged and its owner shivering and rocking back and forth in concern. When we warmed him up a bit Havelock told us the tale of Klaus and Krampus, and what’s more, if he were ever to escape the asteroid, the suffering he’d bring along with him. The old gnome also had some books on the Krampus. And this was the strangest thing - the book spelled out his weakness. Apparently, we needed to get an iron collar around his neck and administer a kiss of innocence under a bit of mistletoe. I’m used to weaknesses like, chink in armour under the armpit, or lighter coloured scales at the base of the neck.

And the second thing? Fat chance, but maybe I could help out with that first thing.

So we set off. It didn’t take long to figure out how to track down the Krampus. Our goblin crew had headed out on exercises with Coalman, and Krampus was likely after them as (don’t tell Charlotte) they would seem the most like kids - his usual prey - to him.

We tracked down the goblins easily enough, knowing what to look for, but it didn’t take long for us to realize there was something else going on. There were little signs here and there. Like when we came across Connor, Lewis, and Edgar wrapped up in these weird, stinky cocoons. We ripped them out of there as quick as we could - smelled like we’d opened up a sheep’s guts when we did, and all this reddish goop dripping over the sides like a cracked gujamellon in the hot sun - but they were in rough shape. The lads told us that the ant soldiers they’d fought when the Compact landed a few weeks ago to try and take the G-Nome were back. This seemed to be some sort of way to feed themselves and their young.

Yuck.

Next we tracked down the anties hideout quick enough. We burst in, and started kicking the crap out of these big bugs (which reminds me - Basile! Hieronious’ holy arsehole! I don’t know what got into that little rat in the past few weeks, but he’s turned into a death dealing machine! I was proud to be fighting alongside him.), Luckums - smartly as ever - was making sure our goblin crew weren’t about to be consumed by those weird stomach pod things. Khalid was blasting every bug in sight to bits. Everything seemed to be working out. 

And that’s when a Life Day nightmare happened before our eyes. Krampus comes charging into the cave through a hole in the ceiling. Huge, horned, blackened skin and almost with the smell of evil he laughed and said he’d come to claim the goblin “children.” He scattered a bunch of toys in front of him which quickly came alive and started to fight us.

The fight did not start so hot, and the middle wasn’t exactly promising, but it ended well enough. Suffice to say, Krampus was tough. Nothing we seemed to do made much of an impact. Well at least on Krampus. I charged at him, hoping to bowl him over, and instead I passed through some sort of magical barrier... and into my childhood. I came out the other side in the body of my ten or eleven year old self. The shift was so quick and big it almost made me puke. To make matters worse, he took on the form of the most fearsome disciplinarian from my childhood - father Ubetsky. A part of me knew it was just in my mind, but I’m ashamed to say I still felt cowed. Father Ubetsky said I had been bad, and I was going to pay and I just felt frozen. And then to make matters worse, Krampus coiled some sort of magical chain around me and seemed set to take me away with him back through the same hole he’d come into the cave.

A few things came together quickly at the end. One - quick thinking Basile. Basile set off one of his bombs right beside Krampus which distracted him. Two - Luckums. Luckums cast one of her spells to turn me into a giant child (Ha! Back to my normal self?), so at least I had some of my strength back. Three - Khalid and I fake pulled, then really heaved on the chain that Krampus had coiled around me. We caught him napping, and he came crashing back through to the floor of the cave. Four - after I’d had a second to catch my breath the fear I had for Father Ubetsky quickly gave way to the hate I had for Father Ubetsky. With a snarl (higher pitched than it should have been, but still) I leapt at Krampus and clamped the iron ring around his neck. Five - Basile got Mauveen (Havelock’s strange, blue skinned goblin… child? About as innocent as we were going to find, anyway) to plop down and, as I think it was Luckums who held the mistletoe over Krampus’ head, give him a big kiss.

Curse cured. Bye bye Krampus. Hello Klaus. And thank the gods. Klaus felt badly and everything, but I think I speak for the group when I say we were happy to help. And then Klaus did the most amazing thing. I wasn’t expecting any kind of reward, but he dished out an amazingly generous load of presents to everyone. The crew got weapon upgrades, the core four got some cool gear, and then Luckums nailed the spirit of Life Day. She thanked Klaus for his generous gift, and said that she did not want to hurt Klaus’ feelings, but that he would gladly return his present if there was any way that Klaus could help our ship’s pilot. Using some sort of evil magic, Shilynn’s elven brain had been basically imprisoned in the ship. A terrible fate, and I think all of us had hoped that some day we might be able to help free her. Klaus said that without a body, this was beyond his powers, but then Khalid remembered that we’d taken that Clockwork merc’s body back on Fort Kerium. Well, it was a Life Day miracle. Shilynn was freed from her ties to the ship, and the pain button that had been used to control her.

It's hard to think up a better Life Day than that.

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