K and K 29
It was one week later and most of them were back in Silverymoon doing some shopping since they had used up a fair amount of their magical items in their last attack. They had set up their tent and rested, recovered spells, and worked their way back out the way they had come in. It had taken time but they had not encountered any trouble. Presently they were selling Drow Armor and Drow Weapons along with the Bolts of Sleep and the hand crossbow.
They had gotten 9,000 gold pieces for the 2 Drow swords and another 9,000 gold pieces for the Drow armor which gave them 7,430 gold pieces per person after adding in all the platinum pieces, gold coin, and other items they had sold. It still wasn't enough for Kate to get what she wanted so she wasn't spending anything and had actually elected to stay home in Relfrin.
Four days later they were all back. "Hi guys, what did you decide on?" Kate was curious.
They had a Necklace of Fireballs VI (Lanie), Vest of Escape (Kevin), seven Elemental Gems (Jenny - Earth and fire) (Rick - Fire) (Kevin - Water) (Javi - Air and water) "The Horn is only usable once a week so we thought we could use some extra combat support," Rick explained. Though it was technically one week later, they might need to use it. "And I know you couldn't afford it since you have your heart set on the rod you saw, so I bought you one," Rick told her and handed over a brownish Gem (Earth). It earned him a quick kiss of thanks.
"Dinner is ready so go get cleaned up and I'll have it on the table. OH, I also filled another 8 pony kegs with Allspice, Cumin and Red Pepper Flakes. We can sell them next trip to Silverymoon," Kate told them. It had taken a lot of time and some serious work to keep pouring for hours on end but she'd done it. She really wanted that rod, so a little hard work that made her arm sore was worth it.
"We're going back in the same way?" Jenny questioned. "It's only been a few days and I doubt a larger garrison has found out they are dead yet, so yes. We'll naturally need to keep our eyes open for signs. If any of the dead bodies are gone, things are moved, that kind of stuff."
"Oh, and I think Guri gave us something. The food downstairs is now frozen solid just like I have back in my world. You can confirm it if you want, but I'm thinking that the shelving down there is magical and is making what we have in the freezer section to be frozen, while what's in the cooler is only cold," Kate informed them since she had inspected both rooms.
"Was that on the list?" Lanie asked and saw them shaking their heads. She wondered what they needed to do for those magical items. Nothing was ever free especially magic items.
"Get some sleep and we'll leave before the sun comes up again," Kate advised. However none of them got that much sleep that night. She had shared her sponge trick on how not to get pregnant with the other two women so three sponge slices soaked with the oil got used that night.
There were 6 totally sated lovers come morning.
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"Have you two been here before?" Martha looked around at the restaurant they had taken her to at a local resort. "A couple of times, yes. Katherine is a terrible cook Grams," Alexis teased smiling widely.
"I actually cooked for myself when I was old enough to since my parents worked out in the fields," Katherine explained. "Your parents are farmers?" Martha inquired. "We owned a nut farm. Walnuts, hazelnuts, and pecans. I think we were doing alright. I wasn't involved in the money part," she clarified. "Well I'm sure your parents are proud of you. You've obviously done well for yourself," Martha mentioned thinking about the house, plane, and car.
"My parents are dead, killed when I was 19," Katherine told her. She used Kate's past to tell her about her parents. "Oh no, I'm so sorry dear. It must have been hard for you. Still you've done well; I'm certain they would be proud of how you've done," Martha assured her.
"Alexis tells me you met on the beach." Martha forged ahead to learn more about the woman who has her granddaughters heart.
"I had decided to get out of the house and away from the problems of that house. We were both running the same way down the beach," Katherine replied. "I invited her out to eat and she saw the house and offered one of her spare bedrooms. To be honest it was the ants in that house that got me to accept. I probably should have moved to a hotel but I didn't and now I'm glad I didn't," Alexis grinned at Katherine in answer to Grams.
"I tried to talk her into getting her money back or at least put in a complaint, but she wouldn't," Katherine explained a little. "It was my mistake to rent it so I was going to just live with it till Katherine came along," Alexis said defending herself a little.
"Well, I thank you for your kind gesture. Alexis has suffered enough lately and didn't need to be in a house she didn't like," Martha remarked. "Her father, she told me. It was a pain I could relate to," Katherine replied somberly.
The rest of the night went calmly without any real digging into Katherine's past. Martha was presently content.
It wasn't until morning when she rose early to find Alexis in the kitchen cooking that she brought up Alexis and Katherine's relationship. "Morning my darling," Martha caroled as she came up behind her and kissed her head. "Morning Grams. I'm making omelets if you would like one," Alexis offered. "I believe I will dear, thank you," Martha replied, opening the refrigerator where she found the juice and poured a glass.
"Please tell me you're happy here. You shouldn't be wallowing in pain after losing your father. He spent his entire life trying to make you happy," Martha pleaded. She wanted to talk alone finally.
"I'm happy Grams. I like it here and I think Dad would approve," Alexis answered her and continued, "Kat makes me happy, she's amazing."
"And what about the age difference dear?" Martha questioned, wondering if she had heard correctly. "I know there's a difference Grams, but I don't see it to be honest. Maybe if she was a few years older I might, but I don't and I'm not going to let it," Alexis answered, serving Martha's omelet and starting work on hers now. "She is going to get older dear," Martha pointed out. "And so am I," Alexis countered.
"What about your classes, don't they start soon?" Martha inquired. Did Alexis have a plan for that? "I know and we've talked about it a little. I even asked her to come to New York if you don't mind," Alexis responded. Martha still lived in the loft with her. "Of course I don't mind. Katherine obviously makes you happy. Does she want to come?" Martha asked. She knew New York City wasn't for everyone. "And what happens if she hates New York?" she questioned.
"We haven't talked about that yet. And she'll like New York." Alexis made a silent prayer since she didn't know what she would do if she didn't. "Just be careful dear, I don't want to see you hurt," Martha cautioned.
"It'll be great Grams and I love her so we'll think of something and we'll do it together." Martha had her answer and it made her thank Katherine for this just a little more. Provided that it worked out.
"You should go change into something light. It can get hot here especially later in the day. The A/C units work but if we go somewhere, you'll bake in anything heavy," Alexis warned her as they finished their breakfast.
"I hope we're all ready to see me in a swimsuit." Martha wasn't looking forward to it even though she had gone out and bought two one-pieces before coming here. She was convinced it was not going to be pretty. Alexis grinned. "It'll be great Grams and I promise we're not going to judge."
Katherine finally showed up after Martha had left to change. "Omelet or something else?" Alexis offered. "I'm thinking just fruit and toast and no," Katherine said firmly. Alexis laughed since the "no" meant no coffee. "Where's your grandmother?" Katherine asked while looking in the refrigerator.
"Grams is changing into a swim suit. Please don't say anything when she comes out. She's convinced it's going to be a disaster," Alexis asked her. "I'm sure it won't be that bad, but I promise anyway," Katherine assured Alexis.
They could hear Martha's flip flops before they could see her. It took a lot of will power for both of them to not say anything and keep their faces neutral. Martha really could stand to gain just a little weight. "I warned you two," Martha said. She saw through everything. "Wait here," Katherine told her and jogged to her bedroom. She was back a moment later and tying a wrap around Martha's waist. She stepped back to look everything over. "Perfect," Katherine announced.
"Shopping later? Maybe find something you can't live without?" Katherine suggested. "We can take the boat to Australia while you're here or have Simon fly us if you can't find anything you like here," she offered.
"I believe I will just stay here and shop, though being in Sydney has some appeal. I've never been down under," Martha stated. "Then we'll just have to go. I'm going to go take a shower and get ready for the day," Katherine announced and headed for her room. "Me too," Alexis chimed and went to her room first before sneaking into the master bedroom and slipping into the shower Katherine was using.
Both of them were in different bikinis and glowing when they joined Martha near the pool. She was reading a book she had found. "Have you tried the Xanth series. I love those books. I still have a few I need to finish," Katherine gushed and grinned over those books. "I believe I'll stick with this one for now, thank you though," Martha replied.
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Martha found out over the next two weeks that those two were a very active couple. Going to the beach, out on the boat, out to do all kinds of things, only a few of which she joined them in. Where they both found the energy escaped her.
"Are you coming with me? Please." Alexis wasn't above begging. She liked Fiji but she needed to go back to New York and go to college. "Maybe we can find you something in college to study. Please!"
"New York," Katherine said somewhat dubiously. She had heard Alexis play it up as the greatest city on the planet. "We can share the master bedroom," Alexis wheedled. She was willing to go into her dad's room to sleep if Katherine was there even though she needed to clean out her dad's things. Neither she nor Martha had gotten around to it; they hadn't the heart to manage it yet. Emptying the room meant coming to terms that he was gone.
"You're sure?" Katherine asked and watched Alexis nod. "Fine. I'll call Simon and we can leave in the morning. How do I take my clothes?" She had always had clothes when she got there. "We search your room for suitcases like mine or we go buy them. How many clothes do you have here?" Alexis inquired. They had both only been wearing bikinis since Alexis moved in.
It turned out she had a fair amount after searching her closet but none of it was for cold weather. It was starting to get cool in New York and only going to get colder. Still Katherine had money and New York had stores.
Alexis gave up her commercial ticket which got on her nerves a little at the waste of money, however it meant she got to be with Katherine as they all flew to New York after refueling at Honolulu.
Katherine hadn't seen buildings that were overly tall except for the resorts in Fiji. She had wondered how they built anything that tall. That was until she was in a taxi with them in downtown Manhattan as she strained to look up at the buildings that were unbelievably tall. Katherine had lots of questions but had to bite her tongue since Martha was with them. She had even more questions as they all crammed into the elevator for the ride up to the top floor where the loft was. During her time in Kate's world she had never been in anything that did this.
Without Alexis she just knew she wouldn't even think about staying in this world. Her problem now was how to convince Kate to let her stay.
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They had walked, crawled on their bellies, and walked still more. They set up their tent at their first fight and had moved on the next day, reaching their largest combat site yet no long after.
"It looks like I remember it," Kate commented as they looked around. "Even all of the dead bodies are still here," she added. Kate had dealt with her fair share of dead people seeing as how she had done the killing, so seeing them didn't phase her and certainly didn't phase the others. Jenny was the only one who had made a face of disgust about it.
"So these Drow are the powerful ones and there were only two here. That leads me to believe that these raccoon guys are just cannon fodder for them. They make all the decisions and get these guys to do all the hard work for them. Given what we found in their tent, they like comfort (they had sold everything they could stuff into their respective backpacks. Nice bedding, an intricate tapestry) and had enough to pay these people what they wanted," Kate mentioned what she was thinking.
"Meaning we'll see more of both," Jenny said a bit fearfully. She was catching on and Kate nodded in agreement.
Kevin was out in front using his Ring of Invisibility with Kate and Dapper next, followed by Lanie, Jenny, Rick, and finally Javi and Storm. They couldn't discount the possibility that someone or some thing could come up behind them. Ignoring their six might get them all killed. It did, of course, mean going deeper into the mountain they lived on.
They were doing fine till Kate got hit with still another pebble that had her groaning. "I forgot to solve that problem," she grumbled. Kevin showed up and asked her to leave Dapper behind and use her Chameleon Ring to follow him.
It didn't take that long and Kate found that their tunnel just suddenly opened up into a monstrous cave that was so tall she couldn't see the top. What had her attention was the lake that didn't seem to end. She also saw a large dock area. There were actually three walkways that went out into the lake. Tied to that there were six large boats or maybe barges would be more accurate. There was also a handful of smaller boats meant to move people. In addition to that were individual row boats that were all either on land or partially in the water. Worse, if that was possible, there were raccoon guys all over the place; it had Kate busy counting.
It looked like most of them were loading a barge with boxes, barrels, and crates using a small crane attached to the dock. There was a crane for every barge she saw. Then there was a large building made of mostly stone off to one side. None of them were going in or out of it but it still needed to be investigated.
They made their way back to the others and took turns explaining what they saw. "I'm thinking the building is a warehouse used to store goods. They load it onto the barges and go out either onto the lake or across to the far side or maybe both," Kate offered her hypothesis.
"So who are they supplying and with what?" Rick questioned. "We didn't see an end to the lake or anything on it. Obviously there is one, just how far away it is or what's out there is unknown right now," Kate said then added, "We still need a plan."
An hour later everyone including Dapper and Storm were invisible and spread out just a little in groups of two this time. Lanie was Kevin's hand-to-hand support, Kate was Jenny's, and Javi was Rick's. Once again Rick and his Wand of Color Spray was going to be their signal.
The best part about all of this was there looked to be only a handful of raccoon guys armed and armored like guards, though to Kate's way of thinking they were way too lax. "Amateurs," she said snidely.
Rick finally saw his best option. There were nine of them working hard, struggling with getting the next set of goods into place for the crane. He fired. They naturally screamed and started clawing at their eyes having suddenly gone blind. Javi, who had purchased every magical Sleep Arrow he could find in Silverymoon, shot one of the ones on the barge and then another quickly and watched both of them fall.
Jenny was waiting for their reaction and was rewarded with a large group of them running down the dock towards shore to attack the two people that had suddenly showed up. Jenny used up 5 more charges and was rewarded with all 11 of them screaming and scratching at their eyes after becoming permanently blind.
Lanie cast a Summon Monster II and got her beetle that shot acid at the other dock.
That got everyone who was left into the fight as Kate was twirling Lanie's staff just waiting for the first one to get into range. She hit him causing him to fall.
It only took minutes and all of the raccoon guys were either dead or blind but still willing to fight as they swung whatever they could find at every sound they heard. Kevin took his time and killed all of them except three. Jenny tried every language she knew which was an impressive number as far as Kate was concerned. However the three raccoon guys either yelled or mumbled back in a language none of them understood.
"So we still don't know what's out there," Kate commented as the last of the raccoon guys died. "Anyone good with boats?" Kate inquired. She only knew how to operate motorized boats; all of those looked like different sized row boats.
"What if there's an empty barge headed this way?" Kate questioned, seeing at least two empty spaces. "Or is already on its way to whatever's out there?" she pondered. Still they couldn't do anything about it and after searching a little they found that most of it was food and drink along with weapons and building supplies. "They're building something maybe?" Kate posed the question.
An hour later they were all in one of the boats they aspired to handle and were busy rowing out into what they hoped was the middle. Their only problem was they were all rookies at this and they could only see out 60 feet so they had no real way to tell if they were going in circles. Maybe big circles since it seemed like they were going straight but there was no real way for them to tell. Still they kept rowing and their arms were starting to complain at how they were being treated.
It was the glow of lights that got their attention and they made sure they were rowing toward it. As they got closer the number of lights kept growing and all of them wondered just what they were headed for. As they got closer Rick asked, "Is this what I think it is?" He turned his head to look harder. "We need to turn! We can't land at their dock, we'll never make it anywhere alive!" Kate warned them. They turned and kept rowing till they found a spot that had no movement. They came into shore that was a little rocky and grounded their boat. They had to get wet to tie the boat into place so they could perhaps use it later.
"It's a city, not Silverymoon sized, but bigger than Relfrin," Lanie remarked looking at everything. "It's likely filled with those raccoon guys," Jenny pointed out. One question that needed an answer was were they on the tip of a peninsula or were they on an island?
"Time to disappear," Rick asserted and took out his wand and touched everyone but Kevin, including Dapper and Storm who weren't stupid. They were beginning to see the benefit of having Rick touch them with his stick.
They stuck to the border of the area and kept the water to their right till they found a narrow land bridge that went off towards still more lights. "Peninsula it is then," Kate announced. They also saw short sections of bridges across the rocky land bridge. Staying on the land bridge, they were able to go under one of these bridges to get on the other side. They continued their tour around what was there till they came across another dock area that had a few boats and a couple of barges, one of which was being unloaded.
"This is a warehouse area filled with everything they need over there," Kate remarked. "It looks like we have some time till they will be expecting the next barge so we have time before they become aware of what we've done," she said. "Or a caravan shows up and they row across to warn them over here," Lanie countered. "They get these supplies from somewhere," Lanie defended herself. The others agreed quietly.
"I suppose we can just walk across the bridges while still invisible," Kate commented but couldn't see anyone nod because they were all still invisible. "Through the warehouses or back the way we came?" Kate questioned and the winning vote was back the way they came. They wanted to avoid combat here and not have someone they missed sound the alarm. They were here to find out what was going on and they couldn't do that if they were running for their lives.
