Academy of Magic - Familiar Troubles

There were three new Freelancers.  Hanno was a half-orc with animal training skills, and he started immediately helping out with the flying bears.  Murai was a bit of an enigma, the poorly dressed Wind sagani didn't quite know what to do with themselves.  Timmy was initially quiet, but as halflings do, soon opened up and was chatting with the other Freelancers in the tavern.  At 3'2", he was much taller than Cathance.

He was also much older, and while a Djogeon, his blond hair told Cathance somewhere along the way had acquired another ancestor.  While diffident, possibly from having just left apprenticeship to a wizard, he seemed determined.

Ondar saw the two halflings and, itching to act after a day of playing with the winged bear that was not yet suitable as a mount, suggested they try a mission together, so the three of them went up to Arnari's office to ask about work.  As they entered, Arnari looked up from her papers at the quinametzin and the two halflings and perhaps her eyes twinkled a little bit.

Timmy of course took the most appropriate-sized chair.  Cathance beat Ondar to the biggest chair and sat in it, kicking her feet impudently.  Ondar straightened a little, then carefully lowered his bulk into the smallest chair that would support him.

Arnari shuffled her papers, putting a couple aside with a small sigh; she'd have to get Julian to take this other mission.  The others she flipped through before saying to Ondar and Cathance, "As long as you are careful with Timmy, I have four missions.

• Seek out hippogryph eggs for House Aldous.
• Check out pollution cleanup along Pirates River.  Ondar was there, for bears!

Ondar interrupted, stiffly, "Everything we found was perfectly normal."  Arnari retorted, "You might want to check it out again.

• This might not be a good idea, but check out where the kobolds are attacking Orderly Stones Monastery.

Arnari stood up and went to the map on the wall, then said to Timmy, "Here is Orderly Stones, and their goat herd have been attacked by trained apex predators in roughly this pattern -" here, she pointed out a semi-circle around the monastery, "- and there are signs that kobolds have been training them, and shrines to The Snake."  She sat back down.

• Check out Academy of Magic.  The student labs have problems with magical components gone missing, familiars attacked.  Garth Nimblefingers is another halfling, and really would like Freelancers to check out what's going on.

Timmy sat up.  "I'm intrigued by the Academy of Magic," he confessed, "also the kobolds, but… not much known about kobolds," he finished sadly.

Cathance agreed, "Also Academy of Magic."

"The reward is 200gp/person," Arnari noted, and Timmy's eyes opened wide.  Ondar said, "Ondar guesses wizard's apprentices aren't paid well," and was rewarded by a startled glance from Timmy.

Anyhow, they took that mission and walked over to Academy of Magic, which was 4 long blocks east of Freelancers Tavern, on Sparrowhawk Street.

The Freelancers were directed to the Dean's office, and found Garth Nimblefingers therein.  The Dean was also a Djogeon halfling, with brown hair and brown eyes.  As he spoke to them, his quill continued to write on the paper on his desk, on its own accord.

Garth explained, the events weren't happening in the professorial labs, but in the big student labs.  Each professor has their own lab, but the students share.  He'd thought at first a student was pranking the others.  But the stuff was taking place when people were not present; or, if present, then "other side of the room."

Ondar said, "Ondar would like to see the lab which this happened most recently."  Garth said, "sure," picked up some keys, and started leading them down a hall.  The quill kept writing.

Cathance:  when was the most recent event?
Garth:  mostly continuously.  Last night, a student sent their familiar to a work station, and it never came back.
Cathance:  are you sure this happened in the lab?  The familiar could
Garth:  yes, we've been tracking events.  Familiar.  Before that, it was missing components.
Timmy:  how many incidents have occurred, and how many students are at the academy?

Ondar, meanwhile, had been checking for goose prints.  He did not find any, but did see prints from other birds that were familiars.

Ondar:  Ondar assumes detect magic has been tried, but must ask anyhow.
Garth:  that's hard, in a student lab, but nothing out of the ordinary.  Shut down one, elevate another.
Ondar:  Ondar is convinced this is the celestial Goose.

Timmy rolled his eyes, but anything he was about to say was precluded by their arrival at the lab.

The lab was a big room, 40'x60' with 20' ceilings and the floor below ground level.  Wile en route, Timmy had been considering the questions he would ask the students.  But as soon as they got there, Garth threw all the students out, preventing the Freelancers from interacting with them at all.   Cathance's eyes narrowed, as she wondered if the Djogeon halfling Dean was trying to hide something, but it appeared he was just concerned for their safety.

And for the safety of the rest of the academy, too:  the Dean bowed, and said he was worried about the creature, and promptly shut the three Freelancers in the lab, invoking magical protection to keep them from getting out.

The Freelancers shrugged and fell to it, although Timmy was still thinking of interviewing the students.

• Cathance, mindful of Ondar's hypothesis, looked around for how any of this would relate to the Goose or any other god, and it didn't seem religious; killing familiars was kind of weird.
• Ondar checked around the lab, unsure what to look for, but heard skittering noises in the opposite side of the room, and noticed the eyeshine of a small creature under a table.  Possibly in a busy lab that might have been missed.
• Timmy looked around the corners of the room, basically doing a perimeter check, but did not find anything.

Ondar was still staring at the eyeshine.  "Come look at this," he said to the two halflings, without moving his eyes away.  Cathance moved next to Ondar, and followed his gaze.  Timmy turned around to look, and they all saw, what looked like a slightly starved sphinx cat staring back at them.

Timmy thought it was cute.  Trying to tempt it out, he took out a piece of bread, and moved a bit towards the cat, away from Ondar and the door.  He put the bread on the ground, without looking at the cat, and backed up

The creature moaned at Timmy, a very un-cat-like sound; it sounded like a cry for help.  Two more creatures moaned, from the walls on either side of Cathance and Ondar.

The first cat sneered at the bread, and fixated on Timmy with murder in its eyes.

Catahnce said urgently, "Timmy, there're three cats coming for you, they're weird looking!"  She cast ray of frost at the black sphinx cat, closest to her and Ondar, and… it bounced.  And forked, shooting at herself and Timmy.  While it didn't hurt Cathance, Timmy got frosted, so she moved to stand next to him.

• Timmy's initial impression of "adorable" shifted to "o shit," and he jumped up on top of the lab table.  The cat he'd seen initially was too far for poison spray, so he cast chill touch.  The skeletal hand dreached up from the ground and grasped the cat, necrosis spreading from it… and the cat exploded, dead.  However in its place was an entire swarm of cats.
  • Despite being a wizard's apprentice, Timmy had never seen this before.  He ran to Ondar, crying.
• Ondar moved forward, pulling out his longbow, and shot at the swarm of cats.  His arrow skewered one of them, leaving… a swarm of cats, which hissed at Ondar.  Ondar hissed back, and became Large.  He must have been 5 times Cathance's height.
• The black cat came up to Cathance, who wasn't that much bigger than it, and tried to claw her, but it overbalanced and fell, then got up like it meant to do that. 
  • Large Ondar tried to use his Stone Rune to charm it, but it just licked a foreleg real quick, like cats do when they meant to do something.
• The red cat from the other side of the room tried to claw Large Ondar, but he just blocked it with his shield.
• The swarm of cats attacked Cathance, who used a very different shield against their claws.  She might not have bothered, and was badly sliced for her pains.

Cathance pulled out her warhammer, and swung at the swarm with booming blade.  She missed, then used misty step to get behind Large Ondar.

• The red cat was close enough, so Timmy cast poison spray on it.  The cat died, but all three Freelancers were struck with force.  Large Ondar and Timmy shrugged it off, but Cathance was injured slightly.
• Large Ondar walked over to the cat swarm and crit with his vicious scimitar.  A bloody mess was left in the scimitar's wake and the swarm was no more.
• The black cat tried to claw Large Ondar, but was ineffective.  It growled.

Cathance cast ray of frost at the black cat, and missed.  The cat reached up and grabbed the ray, and healed.  Astounded and disturbed, Cathance moved in front of Timmy.

• Timmy pulled out his daggar, and after a moment's hesitation, threw it and nailed the black cat.  It just shook the weapon off.
• Large Ondar swung his vicious scimitar at the black cat, and bisected it.

And that was the end of the "cats."

After a moment, the Freelancers inspected all the cat corpses in turn, and shrugged.  They were cats, albeit hairless.

Cathance started looking under all the tables.  In the corner furthest from the door, she found a little cat nesty under the table.  It was lined with crumpled up spell books, components, and whatnot.  "Hey guys!  Check this out!"

Timmy and Ondar came and peered under the table.  They spotted hairballs nearby, laced with glitter, like they'd eaten a familiar.  They went back to the door to the room, where some of the more senior students were keeping watch, and pounded on the door.  "Go fetch Garth!"

Dean Nimblefingers was fetched, and upon his arrival the protections were lowered.  As the Freelancers explained what they'd found, he was unhappy to find the cats, and grabbed a half-made wand from one of the tables to poke at the corpses.

"These aren't natural cats," he told the Freelancers, "they eat magical energy."  Cathance exclaimed, "They ate my ray of frost!

"Yep!" Garth said enthusiastically, "I've heard of these before!"  His demeanor turned… administrative.  "I'll have to do remedial familiar classes.  They happen when the spell goes wrong, but they hate the summoner."

Garth paused, surveying the room.  "Why are there nine, when you said three?"  Timmy replied, "Necrotic damage made it explode."  Garth's unhappiness returned.

Ondar:  is it the form of someone's desired familiar?
Garth:  no, this is just what failed familiar looks like.  Someone copied the spell wrong; will have to check spell books.
Cathance:  looks like someone's spell book is in that corner.

Garth went to the corner and poked at the nest with the half-made wand.  He ignored most of it but retrieved the spellbook pages.

Ondar:  Ondar suggests that those students without familiars are suspicious.
Garth:  possible, but could have figured out the spell since then.
Ondar:  does the Dean need more assistance from the Freelancers
Garth:  best the professors question the students.  Not really as intimidating as the Freelancers.

They started heading back up to the Dean's office.  Ondar was shocked, shocked that anyone thought Ondar is intimidating.  Garth patted the tall quinametzin's knee.

Once in Garth's office, the halfling counted out 200gp each.  Timmy's eyes were wide again as the Dean admonished them, "10% to Arnari!!"  Once he finished, he said, "Thanks for your work.  If this turns out to be malicious instead of a student accident, may want Freelancers again."

Cathance:  so, detect magic couldn't detect these?
Garth:  it's a student lab, so there's a lot going on for it to detect.  These do not show up as magical themselves.
Cathance:  so, they're anti-magic?
Garth:  not really?  Weird, failed familiars.

On that note, the Freelancers departed, walking back up the street to the Freelancers Tavern.  Timmy was still a little wide-eyed and breathy.  "Is Timmy okay?" Cathance asked solicitously.  Timmy nodded, "I'm not really scared."

• Timmy → lvl 1 Monk

<Narrator voice:  Shout out to Russell Borogove for his weird, inspirational cats>