Monster Party Book 1: I hunt therefore I am!
Chapter 5: Looks for the bare necessities, the simple bare necessities!
"Cal, James and Mirri weren't able to find anything worthy of talking about, even rats, I hope you have better news." Alexander greeted the two as they returned from their journey.
"Good news? Oh believe me, for once I'm all about good news. Devi lets show boss just what we found." The alchemist and the elf dragged the barrel they had retrieved over and then unscrewed its top once again.
Sunlight glinted off its contents as everyone gathered around to take a look.
"Remember, to only drink it all in with your eyes and not any other parts of your body." Cal boasted.
Sloshing back inside the barrel were several gallons of fresh water. Enough that with Devi's emergency canteens they were officially more likely to die of starvation than dehydration, not that the group would wanted to consider matters in that particular light.
(Scene Break)
In the darkness of night one of the jungle island's brightly colored fowl rested in the high branches of a mighty tree. It had buried its head under a wings to help block out whatever light remained, confident that its position several dozen feet off the ground and lack of natural airborne predator's offered security.
There were no other housecats on this island, James was relatively sure of that. After all, one had to keep in mind the "domestic" part of felis domestica, if there were no demi-humans (and they certainly had not encountered any yet) it only made sense that there would be no cats.
No others hunters who were exactly the right size for disposing all manner of avians. Not only that, but within the body of James Firecat was natural feline agility and hunting prowess married to human intelligence and general primate familiarity with trees.
He shot upwards with speed that would have impressed most monkeys let alone most cats, and in the minimal light of a new moon his bright red pelt might as well have been midnight black. Foot after foot of bark fell behind him he ascended upwards, his movements swift and sure.
Then he finally came level with the branch that held the sleeping bird. Hunger was making James feel considerably less merciful than normal and so his plan for this hunt was to be upon the bird and shatter both of its wings with his paws before it had a clue what was a going on.
That deed done he'd be able to interrogate it at length without fear of it flying away. If it was intelligent, he could carry it back to Florence for her to heal, otherwise...
The bird's feet rested firmly upon the tree branch no doubt ready to wake at the slightest disturbance. Sadly for this particular parrot the natural grace of a housecat refined with years of practice dealing with delicate booby traps had left James with footfalls that could make even his fellows felines seem loud and boisterous.
No, his prey had been perfectly selected, his approach brilliant, all that was left was the pounce.
Before he could strike a shocking scream filled the air. It sounded almost human, like a condemned soul being dragged to the deepest abyss. The scream resounded throughout the entire jungle and at once the bird was awake.
It squawked in anger and either only now sensing James' presence or simply disturbed by the loud noise took flight. James watched it go his body starting to lengthen and expand as he became a mixture of man and cat which would be far more effective for making his retreat back down the tree trunk.
That scream... it sounded familiar to him, but he couldn't quite place it. Still there was one thing he was certain of, after a noise like that he had no chance at all of coming upon any more birds comfortably and completely asleep. Not tonight at the very least.
(Scene Break)
In his hybrid form James slunk back to the camp and hefted up the lid of Mirri's coffin. It began to slam shut almost as soon as his handpaws left its side, but with almost serpentine speed and slenderness he slithered inside.
Between Mirri's knowledge that she wouldn't always be sleeping alone and her own innate vanity she'd made sure to pick out just about the largest most spacious coffin she could find, which meant that there was room for a layer of dirt and two full grown people inside it, provided they had no use for personal space.
"How is my might hunter doing?" Mirri asked playfully, glad to have James return to her side.
"I came, I saw, I feasted." He responded with all his trademark exuberance.
Mirri pressed a gloved hand to his lips before he could speak further.
"James, do you really think you've ever spent enough time licking yourself clean that I couldn't smell blood on you after you've eaten? You didn't catch anything." She noted with a frown.
Her hands reached out and ruffled James' hair.
"It's been a long time since you last lied to me, what's gotten into you?" James blushed, thanks to her keen senses (and his own distinct lack of skill at dissembling) Mirri tended to peg his lies almost faster than he could tell them.
Ones of omission were about the safest he was likely to get.
"This place just doesn't agree with me. Lots of new animal sounds that I haven't heard before, stuff like that throws of my hunting mojo. I'm sure I'll manage to find something worth eating by tomorrow night.
We both know how I like to avoid waste, but if I have to I'll start hunting in hybrid form and take down something biggish and share what's left with Alex and the others." James promised her.
"See that you do, I don't like it when you don't eat." The vampire told him in a voice that brooked no disagreement.
James began to fiddle with the buttons of his collar, revealing the skin that lay beneath it, and how it was marred by a pair of small circular scars located near the base of his neck.
"I'm not exactly a big fan of it myself." He admitted ruefully,
"Remember, if you start to starve, then I'll start to stave, and I can't have that." Mirri pointed out even as her eyes alighted on James neck.
James took Mirri's gloved hands in his own and gripped them tightly.
"We both know it doesn't work like that, I'm can be semi-daily carnivore if I have to, unlike my favorite daily hemovore." He suddenly let go of Mirri's hands and began to remove his own gloves.
Then he brought two fingers to the base of his wounds and pressed hard, even giving a slight twist just to make sure he achieved the desired effect. The constantly reforming scabs waging a never ending war between Jame' lycanthropic constitution and the mystical sharpness of Mirri's fangs were torn asunder yet again by his actions.
Bright crimson droplets began to dribble from his throat.
"Whoops, clumsy me." James noted, the words so blatantly untrue that it was clear that not even he believed them.
"No sense letting good, letting great blood go to waste." Mirri admitted and leaned forward to start to lap at the werecat's throat.
By the time she was finished the pair had managed to shift positions so that Mirri was straddling James instead of the other way around.
"I'm counting today as day two." Mirri announced while holding up her index and middle finger.
"It doesn't matter if I have to make like a mother bird and kill something, chew it up, and vomit it down your throat, you're eating something before day three is over." She insisted most vehemently.
James nodded laying back against the dirt.
"I'll find something to eat soon, I promise." James said while once again grasping her hands earnestly.
"See that you do. Hunger makes monsters of more men than malice." Mirri noted in an almost sing song voice.
James leaned in and kissed Mirri passionately.
"Thank you for remembering." He said slowly.
Mirri shifted trying to look as aloof as one possibly could while sharing a coffin (even a very big coffin) with someone.
"I don't believe, but I remember all the same." She leaned in and bit James on the ear, but not quite hard enough to draw blood.
After all, if she didn't draw blood, she could bite as many times as she wanted.
(Scene Break)
With the sunlight came breakfast.
Alexander, Cal, and Devi all ate heartily. Florence simply sat out in open and casually committed photosynthesis.
Mirri (after returning her coffin to Devi's bag of holding) had staked out a position for herself in the shade of the trees, and James joined her. The werecat was drinking his fair share of the group's water and them some.
He might only need to eat as much as a housecat, but he still needed to drink the same amount of water as a normal human being, even more when his stomach was operating on "borrowed time" like right now.
"Stupid birds... stupid not stupid rats..." James muttered to himself carefully to keep his voice so low that even Mirri couldn't hear him.
The werecat would normally have filled the silence between himself and Mirri with idle chit chat about this that and something else, but with the dawning of today he was somewhere between having gone 48 and 72 hours without food.
When he hit the 96 hour mark... his parents had warned him about what happened if you went longer than that.
Suddenly his worries over keeping fed vanished as there was a tremendous rustling in the woods and a small tree was crushed beneath the weight of an approaching figure.
It was a huge malformed bear moving on its hind legs, its growling face was naught but a mass of puffy scar tissue and from its head grew horns that like those of a ram. It let loose with a bellow that would have sent lesser men running for the hills.
James Firecat stood up, drew a pair of knifes and faced the beast that most likely outweighed him ten times over with a smile on his face.
"What do you know Mirri, it looks like fresh meat is back on the menu!" James declared a wild smile filling his face.
He had no idea what this creature was, but he was willing to bet it was alive, and eating it would not prove deadly to someone with a werecat's constitution. Having already come to that conclusion, the actual matter of slaying the beast seemed like nothing more than a minor afterthought.
Not that he was likely to face it alone, Alexander had drawn his blade, Devi had uncoiled her flail, Cal was trying to draw a good solid bead on the beast and Mirri took up a position directly along side him.
Before battle could be joined however there came another crash from the woods.
What emerged was not another twisted bear, but a man. Granted he was a great bear of a man who was taller than even Alexander had considerably broader of shoulder.
He was dressed in simple brown leggings and a billowing shirt which hung down to his knees, and both garments were splattered with paint. Atop his round head was a wide brimmed straw hat. He carried a staff of gnarled wood, topped with what looked like a horse vertebrae.
"Minxy!" The man bellowed at the beast. "Don't frighten the nice people!" He commanded.
Shockingly the ursine beast obeyed, lowered itself down onto all fours, and lumbering slowly in the man's direction before vanishing back into the words. James watched it go with an expression torn between surprised relief and exasperation.
As for their mysterious savior, he favored them all with a playful smile.
"Terribly sorry about that, you must be the ship people! Wait here, I'll be right back..." He promised them and vanished back into the forest showing considerable skill (or at least knowledge of his surroundings) for someone of his size.
"Mirri how did this happen?" Alexander asked as he didn't sheath his blade, despite the fact that danger seemed to have passed.
Mirri clicked her tongue and cocked her head to the side slightly.
"No that can't be right... look we'll talk about it later Sir." The vampire suggested. Sure enough a moment later their new visitor returned holding not just a staff but a wicker basket full of berries which he thrust into James' hands.
"Here you go, house warming gift, or beach warming as the case may be. Sorry I didn't get here sooner, I was able hear the terrible storm that must have left you here of course, but it was so dreadful I thought that for sure nobody could have survived.
Then yesterday there was some smoke drifting from the beach and decided that I had best take a look, and well sure enough here you are! Welcome to the island, I'm Doctor Francis Vaster but you can call me Doctor Fran!" He boomed happily.
End Chapter.
FN: See what I mean by this and chapter four being too long for one regular chapter, and too short for two regular ones? On the other hand that meant this one got posted sooner so there's that.
Anyway lets take a break from that cliffhanger to discuss something much more interesting the biology (necrology?) of vampires and werecreatures in Ravenloft!
As previously mentioned James needs to eat fresh meat, and he wants to eat about a pound or so of it every day. That said, werecreatures in Ravenloft are able to go for four days straight without eating and don't suffer any "in game" side effects (in character they should be notably dour/worried about it of course), and they'll be fine so long as when they do eat they eat enough to make up for the meals they missed. (IE when James finally does find something to eat he'll want to eat his daily ration of meat once for that day, and once for every day he missed, so four times as much if he missed three days of eating) beyond that fourth day their hit points start to take a nose dive to starvation and their mood tends to shift from dour over lack of food to cartoony seeing your friends as walking drumsticks style crazy.
Vampires on the other hand will start suffering those sorts of side effects if they go a single day without feeding (and proper feeding for Mirri is 9 hit points a day which in real life would be equivalent to... f**k if I know. Hit points are and always have been an abstract system no matter what version of D&D you're playing.
Anyway, while Mirri is entirely correct to be worried about James not eating (he can't loose those hit points to starvation they belong to me!) James in turn is entirely right that having Mirri continue to feed from him is for the moment the right course of action.
Also, you can assume that James is built along Book of Souls rules for Ravenloft Lycanthropic PCs his strengths and weaknesses are something like this:
Phenotype: Werecat (domestic).
Bloodline: Firecat/XXXXX (whatever James' real last name is).
James "Bloodline" (in regards to anyone he infects) starts with him as he's a true lycanthrope.
Trigger: (James doesn't transform based on this, but if he infected anyone they would) The presence of a tiny sized rodent or venomous invertebrate (scorpions, spiders) capable of harming humans with said venom.
Weaknesses:
Allergen: The substances that James is vulnerable to (one weapon one chemical) don't just bypass his normal defenses/ability to regenerate, they also cause him pain if he's forced to simply make skin to skin contact with them. His weapon vulnerability I'm keeping under my hat, but his chemical vulnerability is Mistletoe.
Mark of the Beast: This is normally only worth one slot, but I'd argue James' ears would be worth a two slot version of it, because while he can still hide it (hat, hooded cloak) if it is revealed, there's no way he can possibly pass for any branch of traditional demi-humanity. At BEST he might be able to convince people he's a Paka, which is a lot like telling the angry mob who wants to burn you for being diseased "Don't worry guys, I don't have leprosy, it's just ebola!" A theoretical three slot version would be something that couldn't be hid at all, like if James had a long feline tail that poked out from any pair of pants he wore.
Proficiencies:
Communication: James speaks fluent cat as we've already seen.
Damage Immunity: James probably has something like a two slot home-brew version of this that basically amounts to something like DR 10/Chemical or Weapon Bane. Magical spells hurt like normal, magical weapons bypass for weapon bonus only (sorry I hate the idea that +1 or better magical weapons are as good as a weapon made of the right material against lycanthropes, it just basically means "right so I'll keep using my best weapon anyway" and is thus too easy to fully bypass).
The point being that James is incredibly hardy to traditional attacks, but I also feel it is silly/makes no sense to believe that he could ignore something like being decapitated or stabbed in the heart (Coupe De Grace style attacks doing truly massive amounts of damage) just because they aren't done with the right kind of metal. Because he is a true lycanthrope he has this defense in any shape, but in human it will look like he doesn't at first. (The wounds will show up like they would on a normal human but in reality they'll be mostly superficial no matter how bad they look)
Power of Blood: Two slots worth here (immune to any non magical disease, and age at 2/3rds normal human rate past adulthood) , James is the youngest of the group, but he tends to look even younger than he really is.
Regeneration: Two slots here also. This is what makes James and Mirri's unique relationship possible. Most people who get drained by Mirri would need a cure light wounds potion IV line or several days of rest to recover the lost hit points. James gets back one hit point back every six seconds. So yeah, it works out something like this.
James: Hey that was fun, give me five minutes and I'll be ready to go again if you want.
Mirri: WOOF! Or in this case, MEOW!
That said while it does not directly say it in the rules, I think it's clearly within the intent to argue that starvation damage can not be healed by regeneration.
Transformation: Three slots, James is in such control of his shape that he can do neat things like turn just his hands (and only his hands) into claws.
Yes I know that's seven slots net spent on lycanthropic abilities alone (he probably also has another two in knives and detect/disarm traps) so James is at least 13th level.
Keep in mind all of the above once again is more guidelines than hard and fast rules, but hey maybe you found it interesting.
Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter the next one will be of more normal length, and thus take a bit longer than this one did, savor the suspense!