[[how much of the floor went, there?]]

Carl is silent and tense as a strung wire, looking off into the dark along the passageway. After several moments of hearing nothing but rockfall, his own heartbeat, laboured breathing and Murphy's coughs, he stoops to hand Murphy the torch. He picks up the man's fallen hat, smacks him upside the head with it and replaces it where it should be, then goes back to listening awhile to be sure the unwary step hasn't attracted unwanted attention.

A bead of sweat shivers its way in starts down his spine as Carl tries his best to pick out the sounds not of their making. Unfortunately, what he's not sure he doesn't hear turns the rapid thudding painful in his chest. There's something out there. There ain't. (Teeth. Finger-bones strung on dried sinews, reaching...the young miner screaming down 7 shaft, lungs emptied over and over in wordless agony, unreachable...prayer faltering to sobs and awful silence beyond the rock.)
O Mary, Mary help me.


[[Carl Allans rolled 1,0 using d6-3,d6-3, rerolling max with rolls of 4,3. Notice? Nope. I don't think Carl is going to be noticing anything but 'I'm underground, I can't get away, I'm trying really really hard not to hyperventilate' any time soon, really...]]
This message was last edited by the player at 21:05, Sun 09 Sept 2012.

"Ow", Murphy protests, quietly, "wasn't my fault..."

23:08, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 7,1 using d8,d6, rerolling max with rolls of 7,1. Notice.

He puts on the hat correctly, then peers into the darkness.

Just like that time in Tooreenfineen... With less Bloody Saxons abound, though.

The crumbled section of earth forms a crescent rip three feet wide and almost seven feet long. Murphy can't see the bottom of the hole he nearly fell into, even with his torchlight.

As the echoes of the collapse fade, Murphy could swear he hears slithering from down in the hole, and the faint rattle of angry snakes...it's a good thing he didn't fall in.

Aside from the new hole in the floor, the only way out of the burial chamber is the passageway Carl tossed his light down when he grabbed the Irishman.

And suddenly the pair is aware of more grinding, and the bit of floor they're standing on begins to sag...

Carl gestures for Murphy to take the torch - carefully this time - further along the passageway, hastily leaning around the doorway to reach for and untether the rope before following. They'd use it to mark the next way out. Couldn't be far.

Murphy takes the torch and walks ahead, gingerly as if walking on eggs.
"Don't be afraid of no snakes, Carl. You remember Saint Patrick, don't you? Us Irish have a way with snakes..." He offers his friend a reassuring smile.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:48, Tue 11 Sept 2012.

Carl looks up, bemused, then gives Murphy what might be the trace of a grin. Snakes were one thing he'd never been scared of.

"Rattle end's the tail," he manages, moving past the place his younger self had stood and stared at the darkness, then turned back and run stumbling for the sun. It's something of a running joke: Murphy's first encounter with a rattlesnake had been confusing for all involved.

Carl edges carefully past Murphy so that at least one of them's not getting fire-brightness in their peripheral vision, looping the rope into a coil over his less injured left shoulder. He moves normally, though he's still frog-belly pale and Murphy will hear the ragged edge of someone forcing themselves to breathe deeply whilst the wrangler's close to. Carl nods at the wall, touching it lightly but clearly afraid to tap it. "Don't like close spaces."

Murphy shakes his head. "Why didn't you say so, Carl? Jesus, I wouldn't have said anything about going down here, then." He has an idea and his face lights up with a smile.
"Hah, that's only half the truth isn't it? I knew a feller once, back in the Old Country. Was downright scared when he was inside someplace. But we were always hiding out from the bloody saxons, and you don't do that out in the open, you know? So I ask him, how he does it? And you know what he tells me? 'When I'm in there with friends, it's not so bad', he says. 'It's the being alone with you thoughts that's so bad, when the world's closing in on you', he says."
He stops and grabs Carl's shoulder, the uninjured one, all serious at once.
"Well, mate, you're not alone in here. I'm right with you. We're gonna have it nice and cosy in here, and then we'll be out in the open in a hurry."


OOC: Not sure if there's anything I can do to alleviate Carl's claustrophobia. Persuasion, maybe? Or straight spirit?
22:17, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 6,2 using d8,d6, rerolling max with rolls of 6,2. Persuasion?
22:18, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 16,3 using d10,d6, rerolling max with rolls of (10+6)16,3. Spirit.

Carl shrugs a little - it was a good suggestion, though now they'd need to find another exit soon or some way to avoid the Injuns and follow them to theirs.

The phantom pressure on Carl's chest increases as Murphy talks, until Carl has to speak. Oddly, these words come more easily and feel less like bleeding; Carl concentrates on shaping them as he scans the dark ahead. "Cave-in that shut the mine killed 'bout fifty people. Weren't the first time there'd been rockfall - mine always had been dodgy, 's the rock 'round here, but it'd been holdin' well awhile an' Wendell wanted to push on fast t'the heart of the lode, even though there was coal trace 'n firedust comin' up." Carl tries to see where there's no seeing, swallows."Mostly they died together. Friends, strangers, fathers, sons - daughters, in 'least one case...Wendell pulled out in a hurry, no surety, bastards wouldn't even help us dig."

"Was Blackthorn dug for them - everyone, freedmen to Widow Bradshaw, though she passed out early, corset-faints - day'n night, goin' at the rock with picks, barehanded, whatever. Saved some o' them, 'cludin Pa, but only got close enough t'hear the rest die, closest 'bout twice the length I am from you now. Couldn't even hold a lamp up f'them t'pretend it was the sun." Lacking much tone, the speeded rhythm of the tale is all that carries the echo of that awful helplessness and dread of dying closed-in in the dark.

As the floor fees reasonably solid where they're halted, and since no unnameable things appear from the dark ahead, Carl risks a look back at his companion, equally serious. "Ah will not let you die here, an' we'll catch th' shaman if'n it means goin' to the centre of the Earth or all to Hell, that's all. You want t'help, pray for me, 'cause fucked if I remember how."


[[Carl thinks Spirit! ...though maybe Murphy needs that roll for himself to keep from second-hand trauma at the ramble there...not that Carl wasn't claustrophobic before the cave-in, but yeah, dying a terrible terrible death together doesn't help]]
This message was last edited by the player at 22:47, Tue 11 Sept 2012.

The tunnels the pair enter are narrow and twisty. There's struts holding up passages here...this was once part of the mine, the parts that got played out early, it seems, because there's a layer of dust everywhere. The paths cross and recross themselves, turning the area into something of a maze.

((OOC: Make Tracking rolls at -2 please.))

[[07:51, Today: Carl Allans rolled -6,-6 using d4-7,d6-7, rerolling max with rolls of 1,1. white chippit.
07:50, Today: Carl Allans rolled -6,-6 using d4-7,d6-7, rerolling max with rolls of 1,1. trackin'. THE DICE GODS SAY NO. Oh, and naturally those're -8 if the mine itself brings a situational modifier to the claustrophobic one, but it's sort of academic. Didja answer Murphy there?]]

In reply to Carl Allans (msg # 60):

((OOC: I figure that would be something that should be worked out between you and Murphs, as you're both PCs. RP is the best method for that, rather than die rolls.))

[[Righto. Hopefully Murphy'll realise Carl means it, then. What's the tracking penalty for, by the way? Orientation? Dust's a great print-holding surface and we have a free-burning fire hazard light source]]

((OOC: Mostly the penalty reflects the difficulty of orientation and the fact that a lot of these tunnels loop back in on themselves or dead-end, forcing backtracking.))

11:36, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 9,5 using d4-2,d6-2, rerolling max with rolls of (4+4+3)11,(6+1)7. Tracking, unskilled white chip.
11:36, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled -1,1 using d4-2,d6-2, rerolling max with rolls of 1,3. tracking, still unskilled.

Murphy hadn't known the particulars of the cave-in... it was a hushed secret, nobody in town liked to talk about it all that much. And he understood why. Best to forget such a thing.
"You're not the only one who lost friends, Carl. It's always tragic. It always hurts. You always feel responsible, even if there was nothing you could have done.
The bloody British", he notably doesn't use "Saxons" there, as he usually does for the English oppressors, "they came one day and busted a few of me mates and meself in a tavern. Blocked the door, then started shooting. So we shoot back. So they..." he smiles a sad smile, "so they start burning it down. Good structure, that tavern. Solid stone walls. Nice thatched roof. Small windows. Only three of us made it out there, Carl. Just the three who was small enough to climb out the chimney. Burnt off me arse hairs, I can tell you that!"
The crude joke is ineffectual in hiding his grief.
"Boy, did I feel guilty. For them to die in such a way and me to live. But you have to carry on, pick yourself up and remember them, honor them. That's what me father used to say. You have to trust an Irishman on this, Carl. We know loss and sorrow.
Wasn't too long before a garrison of the British burned down. Bad storm, they say it was. Bad storm. Gave them lots of trouble finding recruits after that, too."

He nods, his lips tight, then breaks into a smile again at Carl's promise not to let him die down here. "Didn't plan on dying down here or up there anytime soon, mate. Got a beautiful daughter and another kid on the way. Flora would kill me if I'd die, you know. Trust me, you don't want to see her get mad. Wouldn't like her when she's angry, me Flora. But I'll be happy to pray with you."

He kneels down and holds out a hand for Carl to do the same. It takes a while, but when it becomes clear that Murphy won't relent, he follows suit.
Murphy takes Carl's hand and prays a Hail Mary, waiting for Carl to repeat line after line.
After that, he gets up and points into the darkness. "I think that tunnel turns about back to where we came... better to go there, don't you think?"

Carl gives Murphy a look that's hard to read, though it's not the feral blankness that occasionally stares back from Carl's direction. Inwardly, he's bemused one of his own would take him for a man shackled to his own grief...but then a lot of the town assigned him his father's traits, and words never were his strength. Perhaps he should still feel guilt, though a quick search of his soul doesn't find any, just horror, fear and traces of bitterness against all owners of mines.

He resolves to remember Murphy's story the same way he'd take in one of Charlie's, even though he'd be liable to point at Norway if asked to find England on a map and in ignorance assign the Irish all the British Isles. Enslaved by a Queen and then by the Yanks, it wasn't much of a life the Feen had had elsewhere. The comment on Flora gets a soft snort, but the marriage-bond is something for which Carl has the utmost respect. She'll get him back. Ranger, you'd better be there helping her.

Carl is biddable, though tense, and Murphy will feel the tremor in the other man's fingers peak and finally lessen as he stumbles through the prayer. He remains on the floor a few moments as Murphy gets up, clenching his fist against the surge of panic as he realises he's lost all sense of direction underground.

"Shaman won't be back there. Dint come in this way or near it; they'll have got in where Gabby did, past th' cave-in." Trust Murphy. Carl forces himself to calm enough to map the ground - tons of ground - above them, calculate distances by the Irishman's estimation, then points away from possible escape and safety, deeper into the dark.

Some Mood Music

The sharp-eyed Murphy manages to lead his friend through the tunnels. After about half an hour, the duo find their way into caves Carl can recognize better.

Occasionally, the pair hear something slithering in the darkness...it's too deep and too cold for snakes, but that's exactly what it sounds like...

((OOC: Roll Notice, please))

22:15, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 3,4 using d8,d6, rerolling max with rolls of 3,4. Notice.

[[21:05, Today: Carl Allans rolled -2,1 using d6-3,d6-3, rerolling max with rolls of 1,4. with the white chippit of annoyance. Phobia back down to Minor levels thanks to murphs, but still rolling like a brick...]]

some mood music

Murphy turns around at the sound of scales on rock, and spies two sinuous shapes rearing up behind him, hissing and rattling their tales. They look exactly like rattlesnakes, except for the horns protruding from their heads and the faint reddish glow from their scales...

((OOC: Draw for initiative!

Spirit snakes: 10H))
This message was last edited by the player at 08:01, Thu 13 Sept 2012.

[[Carl Allans drew the single card: AS ]]

13:34, Today: Mad Irish Murphy drew the single card: JD using the Deadlands system. Initiative.

Turn Order:
Carl: AS
Murphy: JD
Snakes: 10H

Carl looks back at the rattling and shrugs the rope off his shoulder to take a semi-experimental cast at the devil-snakes.

[[18:52, Today: Carl Allans rolled 1,-2 using d10-3,d6-3, rerolling max with rolls of 4,1. white chippit of annoyance. Last impulsive chip, I swear...he's mostly seeing how they react, since they're not quite like real snakes.
init. 7C ]]

The snakes slither through the rope without being noticeably slowed. It's hard to catch a long sinuous object with another long, sinuous object.

---

Murphy is up next!

Murphy tuggs on the small silver cross he wears on a necklace around his neck.
"Holy Jesus on his cross..." he whispers, then takes a step forward.
"I am Patrick of Ireland! I have banished you from the Emerald Isle, and now I banish you from these caves!"

Yes, a stupid idea, he knew. But what else was he supposed to do against spirit snakes than pit his wit against theirs?


15:02, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 6,5 using d8,d6, rerolling max with rolls of 6,5. Smarts Trick, White chip.
15:02, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 2,1 using d8,d6, rerolling max with rolls of 2,1. Smarts Trick.
Stray, if you rather see this as persuasion - same dice.


15:03, Today: Mad Irish Murphy drew the single card: 9C using the Deadlands system. Initiative.

Edit: activating Arcane Inspiration, the Protection Power.
09:40, Today: Mad Irish Murphy rolled 11,5 using d10+2,d6+2, rerolling max with rolls of 9,3. Spirit!



This message was last edited by the player at 07:42, Sat 15 Sept 2012.