Chapter 1: New Prospects

[Vardaen]

Tadoka looks at you quizzically, "What are you talking about white man? I come to you too late. I see you traveling from a far, but by the time I get there you are gone, inside the mound. I speak words with you when you exit mound." After some conversation with the Indian you come to realize that he was NOT there in the camp before you went to the passage. He is adamant that he wasn't there, that he didn't talk to you, and you start to wonder if the strange lapse in time while in camp, the strange day to night change, the tentacle attack, the Indian who wasn't there, was all some shared hallucination! The realization is hard to process, but there seems to be little other choice, perhaps you were drugged, yes that's it, perhaps that mountain man drugged you! You dreamed the whole god damn thing the moment you left him till you actually went into the burial mound!

It is the only thing your rational mind can accept as true.

[ManWithDoor]

Tobias has the shakes again, his mind trembling at possibilities it is not prepared to process, let alone accept. The fact that the man in front of them looks exactly like the one from their 'shared hallucation' is quickly and quietly suppressed into his subconscious, the contrary information hidden away to save his sanity. "Just a drugged dream, that's all it was. Bad booze, too much wood alcohol. That must have been it."

[RorytheRomulan]

Delton blinks and wrinkles his brow, cut by the deception. "I gave him an entire sack of sugar for that tea."

[Hungry Xenomorph]

Jimmy raises his hands to the his head, his hands digging deep into his hair, as his hat falls to the dusty ground. "I... uhm... I am sorry, i don't know what is going on, it feels like my brain is being torn apart. What the hell is going on?"

[RorytheRomulan]

"Let's just head back to town like our friend said, and keep an eye out for Colter and the Irishmen," says the doc, shivering absently. "Tadoka, we sort of forded across the river in a hurry to get here. Can you point us in the direction of a bridge?"

[Vardaen]

Tadoka walks over to each of you and reaches out with his painted hand. He places it on your forehead before you can stop him. He closes his eyes and hums a little. "Yes, you are missing time. Chaos." He does this to each of you and agrees with his first assessment of the group.

"I will take you to the ford, then I will return to my people and see what must be done next. I will return to you in ten days time. We can fix this still." He then leads you back to a trail and puts you on the river's bank, you'll have to travel a bit and cross the ford where John Colter Jr. took your sugar and crossed you at the Muskrat River."

[ManWithDoor]

Tobias nods, not really having words to respond. Missing time from his mind is too disturbing, and his sanity clutches to the earlier explanation of just being slipped some bad booze. Once Tadoka suggests they move to the ford and then back on to the town, he starts walking in that direction without argument.

[Hungry Xenomorph]

Jimmy's shoulders slump forward, weary of everything that has happened up to now, he runs a hand through his hair before putting his hat back on, "I think we should get a move on, I don't know about you but I want to be as far away from this place as possible."

[Vardaen]

Its dark out, you are exhausted both physically and mentally, and its raining out.

Someone says, "This night couldn't get any worse. "

That jinxes you.

You close the last few miles to the ford when you hear a gun shot ring out!

[RorytheRomulan]

Wait, wasn't it just light out? What the devil? The gunshot comes just before Delton can push the words out:

*BANG*

He instinctively looks toward the source of the shot and then hunkers down. "God--bless it, it's the r-ruddy Irishmen," he whispers, stammering as four-letter words flow to his subconscious, crossing himself as he goes for his gun.