Swamped

a fake name

You're a desert wizard and they better help you get out of this swamp if they don't want to be immaterialized.

You don't see a need to share your real name.

"Vivian Dorret," you say. "And all I want is to leave this damned swamp."

"You got a funny way of leavin'," Crosswinds says. "If you don't want to be here, hidin' under the floorboards isn't the way to get out. So how'd you get in here?"

"What does it matter? Maybe I'm a wizard testing a transportation spell. Maybe I've got a terrible sense of direction."

"Or maybe you're a spy," Crosswinds says. "And not one for the Bogknights - they wouldn't send a grebling without warning 'em about me."

Despite everything, you find yourself wondering who else would bother spying on a bunch of soldiers in a swamp. But you can't really concern yourself with that at the moment; right now, you need to convince Crosswinds that you're not a spy.

How can you do that?

tell them you are a spy, it's the last thing a spy would say

Confess that you were hiding under the floorboards because you figured humans who discovered you would end up treating you... well, exactly the way Crosswinds has.

Anyway... could a spy do this??!?!

(Then start spouting off scientific facts about desert climatology and meteorological anomalies.)

"I was hiding because I didn't want soldiers knocking me out and tying me to a bedpost."

"Fair," Crosswinds says. "But see, here's the thing that's really been bothering me." They hold up your mask. "For someone who doesn't want to be in the swamp, you sure are well-equipped for it."

Urgh. Well, there's not much sense in hiding the reason behind that.

"It's actually designed for the desert," you say. "It's just that a suit which protects against the harsh desert winds is also pretty good against the waters of the swamp."

"The desert, you say." Crosswinds looks thoughtful, though you can't tell if that's good for you or bad.

"Yes. What of it?"

"Maybe somethin', maybe nothin'. So let's talk about what I found on you, hmm? A pouch of mistflower, for one. Interesting fact - we found some mistflower in here last night, after someone tried to make us think there was a fire. And up until right now, we thought one of the prisoners had done it."

"Wasn't me," you say. "I wasn't here last night."

"How about the fire report from the swamp this morning? You going to tell me you didn't have anything to do with that, either?"

Well, here you're going to have to either own up or lie. How should you respond?

Distract them by telling him about the actual fire you found and (hopefully) extinguished. Try to work loose your bindings in the mean time.

Distract him by telling him about the actual fire you found and (hopefully) extinguished. Try to work loose your bindings in the mean time.

massage the truth, tell him where the duraflame log is

You decide to try shifting the subject a bit.

"Maybe that was a real fire," you say. "There was one going off under your floorboards a little while ago, so who's to say there weren't more of those?"

You can tell Crosswinds noticed you didn't actually answer the question, but they seem to be taking an interest in what you're willing to volunteer.

"Now, hang on. What's this about a fire under the floorboards? I'm sure you noticed how wet it is down there."

"It's near your mess hall. The main source of the flames was a stick of darkwood, but there was a full campfire built around it. I took the darkwood out, and put it in the cold cabinet in your kitchen. Best option I could find for putting it out."

"Darkwood?" Crosswinds asks, startled. "How the hell did that get there?"

"I don't know. But I imagine a much larger blaze would have started if I hadn't noticed it. You can check for yourself; I didn't move the bulk of the campfire."

"Which means no one's keepin' an eye on you if I go and check," Crosswinds says, scowling. "Bet you think that's a pretty clever trick you got there, isn't it? Get me out of your hair while you slip out of the ropes."

You hadn't thought of that, specifically, but you were hoping to get out.

"That's not what I-"

"Save it. I got an answer to that problem."

And the next thing you know, they stuff a leaf into your mouth. Before long, you lose consciousness.

You wake up some time later, and see something surprising.

Row upon row of sharp, glistening teeth.

Teeth. Very sharp teeth. And an unpleasant smell that you quickly place as a greatrat's.

Then you hear an unpleasant sound and a piercing shriek as it falls off you.

"Guess I shouldn't have left you alone," Crosswinds says, pulling a pike out of the vanquished beast. "Gotta figure out how it slipped in, too, but that can wait."

They shove the greatrat's corpse aside and give you another look.

"So your story checks out. Found what looked like a doused campfire, and I checked Keeper's place for the darkwood. Still burnin', too, that stuff's freaky."

"You still suspect me, though."

"Well, you're not exactly being honest with me. I don't care what your name really is, but I think you're hiding stuff about what you've been doing here. That, I got a problem with."

"Look. I just want to get out of here. Before you caught me, I took some risks because I thought they'd bring me closer to getting out. Maybe tossing a mistflower to fake a fire was one of them, maybe it wasn't, what does it matter?"

Crosswinds walks up very close and looks you right in the eyes.

"It matters because someone's been poisoning us. So, y'know, if a spy's been hiding out under the floor, that'd be a pretty good suspect for who, wouldn't you say?"

Well, you haven't been poisoning them. If you could just prove that, maybe you could end this whole unpleasant mess and finally get back to the desert.

But how can you prove it?

ask them how you could prove it, and urge them to search you

"What exactly do you want from me?" you ask. "You've already had plenty of chance to search my things, haven't you? So what exactly did you find that you think I used to poison your people?"

"I didn't say I thought anything yet," Crosswinds snaps back. "I want to hear your side of the story, and then see if it fits the facts."

Well, you can think of one thing. The poisoning probably didn't start today.

"I've only been in the swamp since this morning. How long's your problem been going on?"

Crosswinds is giving you a fierce glare.

"Since this morning. And how much of that time was in our fortress, hmm?"

You're not sure where they're taking this line of questioning, but you'd better think about your answer. Just how truthful are you going to be here?

i was over by the other one first, took a couple hours to get here

You guys live in a rotting wooden shack in a swamp. You're probably covered in poisonous slime right now. What's so scary or different about today's poisoning cases?

"I woke up in the other base. I ended up here because I couldn't find a way out of the swamp and this was the only other place to go. I might have caused some trouble because I was trying not to get spotted. Probably took me a couple of hours to get here, I wasn't exactly keeping close track of time."

"So that smoke was you?"

"Maybe." You shrug as best as you can while tied up. "Why's this poison such a big deal, anyhow? There's probably lots of ways to get poisoned in this swamp. That muck can't be too healthy, after all."

"It's not," Crosswinds says. "But the thing is, we know most of the poisons in this swamp. The only one with symptoms like this is murderfly toxin, except this is slower. So, our best guess is it's murderfly blood mixed with something else to keep it potent. Which means someone's got to be doin' the mixing."

"And you think that's me?"

"Maybe, maybe not. But you're my main lead right now, so this is where we are."

Well, this doesn't seem to be getting you anywhere. Maybe there's a place you can lead this conversation that would be more productive for you.

wait, yeah, i'm familiar with that poison — and its antidote!

I can't help but think we're being caught up in some kind of conspiracy. Someone spirited us here from the desert to serve as a patsy, a fall guy for the true poisoners... The only way to clear our name is to uncover the motives and identity of the poisoner. First suspect is obviously Crosswinds, since they're trying pretty hard to pin it on us. But on the off chance Crosswinds is on the up-and-up, maybe they can give us a lead.

Why would someone want to poison you folks? Who are you and why are you in this swamp in the first place?

You stop and think.

On the surface, Crosswinds' argument makes sense; you're not with either faction and yet you're wearing a protective suit that makes it look like you planned to come here.

So what if you were brought here intentionally, to serve as an obvious suspect?

Well, the immediate problem with that theory is that you woke up in the Bogknight base, not the Marshguard one. But it would explain a number of things if someone were deliberately transporting things to the swamp; most notably, it would explain the darkwood fire.

Perhaps you were going to take the blame for something in the Bogknight base... which makes you wonder if there's another suspect who was meant to go here. Even the greatrat might have been transported here to take care of you once whoever's responsible realized you were off-script.

So where does Crosswinds fit in?

They're certainly pressing you hard, but if they were trying to pin the blame on you - well, why interrogate you alone, in this small room, and even go out of their way to mention that they're not informing their superiors yet?

Unless they're trying to work out if you're smart enough to prove your innocence. But then, why kill the greatrat... even if it wasn't specifically sent to kill you, Crosswinds could just take your corpse in and not many questions would be asked.

Well, you've got few options now. You may as well take Crosswinds at their word, and assume they're only interested in whether you're a threat. If you're wrong, it's not as though you can really do anything about it.

"Why would someone want to poison you, anyways? You're all the way out in a swamp, how much threat could you be?"

"Well, in case you hadn't noticed, we're at war. So the first suspect is the Bogknights."

And you just admitted to sneaking over from their base. Wonderful. You must have really hurt your case with that one.

"So, what. You think I slipped over from there to deliver the poison quietly, and provide a layer of deniability?"

"Well, I thought there was a good chance, up until you said you were over there this morning. If you were working on behalf of someone over there, you'd have been fed a better cover story."

You're not sure if you feel relieved or insulted.

"Of course, you might be working for someone else who wants us to think the Bogknights are out for blood now. So don't go thinkin' you're in the clear yet."

"Really? And who would that be? I've got no idea what's going on in this swamp, I don't even know what you people are doing here."

Crosswinds looks you directly in the eyes.

"Well, I can't speak for the Bogknights, but us? This is our home. We'll all fight for it, because it's all we got. So for your sake, I hope you really didn't do nothin'. If you did..."

You get the picture.

"Can you describe the symptoms of the poisoning in more detail?" you ask. "I don't know what murderfly toxin does."

"Well, it usually takes a couple hours for anything noticable to happen. Only early sign is that you feel a little hot, and you keep getting hotter. Then when you start feeling really hot, you pass out, and usually you don't wake up again unless you get treated fast; clean water with a little pill in it, shoved down your throat. Takes about three hours to unconsciousness, twelve to death. But this poisoning is more like twelve hours to unconsciousness, and if we give 'em the treatment, they wake up again but they're still sick. And then they collapse in about six hours or so and we gotta treat 'em again."

Well. That sounds more than a little familiar.

"High body temperature, twelve hours to unconsciousness, relapses with conventional treatments... this 'poison' of yours sounds a lot like desert fever."

Crosswinds stares at you.

"Oh really. And would you care to tell me how this 'desert' fever came to the swamp? Because that sounds a little funny to me."

shrug. mosquitoes?

Zombie mosquitoes.

Didn't we see some zombie mosquitos desert bees earlier?

"Well, you've got desert bees hanging around. I don't know how they got here, but however it happened, they probably brought some sand with them. Especially if their hives came along."

"Sand?"

You don't like giving away details of your research, but it's probably your best shot at getting out of here.

"We were testing a theory that the sand causes desert fever. Confirmed it a few days ago, when we isolated the key substance in it. Now we're moving on to trying to find an antidote."

"Well, isn't that convenient. And then you show up with it to help us with our problems, so the Marshguards owe you something."

"If that were the game, it'd make more sense for me to bring the antidote to begin with," you point out. "All I've got is the mistflowers, and while they'd help with keeping temperatures down, they're no miracle cure."

Crosswinds is looking thoughtful. You're not sure how that bodes for you right now. All you can really do is sit there and wait for their next question.

Know any card games?

"You play cards?"

You can't think of a response for a while, so you just blink a few times. Finally, you decide to just give up on a direct answer.

"That's a sudden change of subject."

"Bear with me a sec. I'm takin' another angle here. Might be one that's good for you, even."

Well, here the truth seems essentially harmless.

"A little. There isn't a lot to do for fun out in the desert, especially when the winds pick up, so a number of us play cards in the tent. I only join in every once in a while, though."

"Why's that? You got something else you do?"

Well. That part, you definitely don't want to get into too much detail on. It might lead to uncomfortable questions about why you're out there in the first place.

"I handle a lot of the work that isn't weather-dependent. So I tend to be busier than most of the crew."

"So what sort of games do they play?"

"There's no gambling, if that's what you're asking. We play fairly low-key games; Three Leaves, Swords and Shields, sometimes we play a touch of Rebellion... oh, and there's one we made up called Sand Pit. I only tried that one once and didn't quite understand it, though."

"You any good?"

You shake your head.

"We've got a scoreboard. It says I've played fifteen games and won twice. So, not particularly good, no."

"Right," Crosswinds says. "I'm satisfied. You may be a troublemaker, but you're not the poisoner."

There are more than a few of your team members who'd throw a laughing fit if they heard you were called a troublemaker, but you're going to let that slide.

"What the hell was that about?" you ask as Crosswinds unties you.

"Figured I'd change to a less charged subject. Get your guard down, get a better read on when you're hiding things and when you're flat-out lying. Seems the only outright lie you told me was your name, which I don't give two shits about."

"So can I finally get out of this swamp now?"

"Not just yet. I need to report your desert fever theory. And I'll need you along to back me up. Don't worry, I'll make sure Razor doesn't do anything rash."

You really don't like the thought of meeting someone who goes by the name Razor. Your immediate thought is to flee at the first chance you get.

But - you've managed to earn some goodwill from Crosswinds, and it wasn't easy. Perhaps you shouldn't squander it so readily - especially if you'll get a chance to leave if you cooperate here.

What should you do?