Birthvar woke up, a small comfort he never took for granted. However, he wasn't exactly where he fell asleep. Naturally, only three days after leaving the Underdark, he had been kidnapped in his sleep and brought aboard a mind-flayer spaceship.
The scholars in his clan called these ships nautiloids, named after some ancient sea creature that lived in the Above World that the vessel superficially resembled. Brithvar much preferred the term spaceship. It's much like a regular skiff or sailship, but instead of cutting through water, it goes through space. None of Brithvar's family used the term, but he was sure it would catch on one day.
A sudden memory rushed back into Brithvar's psyche: the image of a mind flayer depositing a parasite into the eye of a githyanki woman in the pod next to him as she struggled and screamed obscenities at the mind flayer. At least, Brithvar assumed they were obscenities; he didn't speak with them. In fact, outside of knowing that githyanki and their cousins, the githzarei also had beef with mind flayers for reasons similar to those of his people; he had no clue about Anything about them.
When he was a child, Brithvar was often told stories of mind flayers, and none of them were pleasant. So, getting a mind-flayer tadpole shoved in his eye wasn't exactly the most rewarding or enjoyable experience in the Realms. He had several nightmares about this exact scenario.
It took him a second to acknowledge that he wasn't in the Underdark or the Material Plane. From the glimpses he could steal through the wounds on the mind flayer spaceship, he saw swarms of imps and what he assumed were cambions flying through the ceilinged sky.
Oh joy, he was in one of the Hells. Brithvar was pretty sure he would wind up there anyway when he died. It's scarce that a duergar lives a life worth going anywhere else. But to get thrown into hell while he was still alive? That just felt rude.
Brithvar had gone his entire life without seeing any githyanki. They only went to the Underdark a few times. Maybe it was out of fear of the mighty drow cities and his duergar forgetowns. Perhaps they didn't even know it existed. Probably the former.
After being abducted by a mind flayer and somehow escaping his pod, he was now face to face with two of them. One of them was female and on the younger side. She scarcely looked more than a quarterway through her life, if even that. Though not by much, the male was older and had the most unfortunate rothe-licked hairstyle Brithvar had ever had the displeasure of seeing. It was awful. Brithvar had half a mind to take his dagger to the male githyanki's scalp and put that hair out of its misery. Unfortunately, that probably wouldn't help Brithvar make friends, which he needed now.
"Lae'zel, you still live! May the Queen's favor be yours!" said the male with a charming grin. Brithvar found himself taken aback for a second. None of the few stories Brithvar had ever heard of githyanki had characterized them as friendly, even to each other. The male's friendliness almost made up for that Earthcaller-forsaken haircut.
Upon getting closer to the githyanki duo, Brithvar finally got a good view of whatever was happening in a chunk of the spaceship where the hull had been ripped off. It wasn't good. First of all, yeah, he was clearly in some layer of hell. Several thousand imps were battling with something upon three floating columns of rocks about half a mile away.
A red dragon flew past and roared, not necessarily as a show of triumph but probably as a warning to the legions of imps not to get curious.
Before Brithvar could take in more of his surroundings, a pounding headache pounced on his brain like a hungry spider on a deep gnome.
Three visions passed by Brithvar's mind very quickly. So quickly, they may as well have been still images.
The first image he saw was of Lae'zel in what appeared to be a demented classroom, clashing with another young male githyanki who glared at her with vicious, passionate hatred. Lae'zel regarded him with an equally venomous disinterest. While Lae'zel wasn't far beyond her childhood now, this memory was clearly from her childhood, which Lae'zel held very profoundly.
The next instant, the githyanki man stood before a devil, something well beyond the scope of a cambion. The man was gesturing towards a beautiful Warhammer, with a head made of jagged ruby and a handle with overly ornate and perfectly executed designs all over it, likely gnomish in origin. The devil appeared to be gently declining whatever offer the man was making.
Finally, the third image was of Brithvar shielding his sister Philomeen from harm as they sprinted towards the boats anchored at the shipping dock by Grymforge. Brithvar got Philomeen out that day, but many good gnomes are still toiling under Thrinn's boot.
"By Vlaakith's touch, what is this?" asked the male.
Brithvar racked his brain for what Vlaakith could mean but failed his history check. Whoever Vlaakith was, they sounded important to the githyanki, but Brithvar couldn't determine Anything else.
"Tsk'va, the parasite has already taken hold." spat Lae'zel. We must go to a creche and be cleansed."
"But first, we need to take control of this ship." said Brithvar, announcing his presence, "Or at least get to the helm. I can help."
Lae'zel and Haircut looked at each other as if they were communicating telepathically. Brithvar had no idea if Githyanki could talk telepathically or if Githyanki were just like that.
"He would slow us down, Losiir. We cannot risk our lives on the incompetence of an istik."
"He is khorsh'vrack, Lae'zel. It is not as if he is thrall'kesh or lys'riin; he can assist." Haircut put a pretty good emphasis on the word 'can' in that sentence. He wasn't entirely convinced. "Or at least not burden us."
Brithvar wasn't exactly jumping for joy when Haircut described him, and by extension, all duergar, but it was certainly better than Lae'zel arguing to leave him behind.
"I'll follow your lead," Brithvar offered Haircut, "Anything you say is done. Until we're off this ship, just consider me an extension of your will."
Haircut nodded, and although Lae'zel looked frustrated, she said nothing. Haircut was the one calling the shots here. Good to know. "We risk turning into mind flayers, but purification will have to wait until we take control of the ship."
A few imps that had somehow infiltrated the ship were feasting on the corpse of a mind flayer. Upon Haircut, Lae'zel, and Brithvar venturing deeper into the ship, where the hull had remained intact, the imps raised their heads and hissed.
"Let us see what warriors of Creche K'liir and the Underdark can do!" bellowed Haircut with glee, realizing that he was going to be able to get into a fight. "Htak'a!"
"Htak'a!" roared Lae'zel as they both charged into battle.
It was fascinating to see how Lae'zel and Haircut fought differently. Lae'zel's weapon of choice was a longsword that Brithvar was sure he'd have trouble lifting. Lae'zel, likely from the brutal training he had gotten a glimpse of earlier, was a cruel and unforgiving war machine, wielding her longsword as if she was born to do it.
Haircut, on the other hand, was a little less flashy. He wielded a much smaller scimitar and parried and flourished much more than Lae'zel did. He fought defensively, taking advantage of the pristine gith armor he wore. It's almost as if how he fought made his armor marginally more effective.
It's not as if Brithvar didn't contribute whatsoever. His hand crossbow did claim the life of an imp, and he mocked one of the hellebores on board by calling it "near future bacon" to distract for a moment while Haircut carved it up.
Githyanki, or at least Lae'zel and Haircut, were mighty warriors and not to be trifled with. Naturally, Brithvar was probably going to wind up trifling with them anyway. Such is the way of a bard.
After neutralizing the imps and hellebores, Lae'zel and Haircut went up a ladder and through a scrotum. Birthvar was pretty sure that it was a scrotum. What else could it be called?
In this room, someone was conscious, pounding against the wall of their pod. "You!" she called in a distinctly elven-sounding voice. "Get me out of this damn thing!"
Brithvar looked to Haircut for a directive, but he was at a loss for words. This was a moral dilemma he was clearly unprepared to address.
"There is no time." Lae'zel said, "We need to get to the bridge."
"She can help us, too." Brithvar objected, "There might be some nasty customers at the helm. Better we have four blades than three."
"To call yourself a blade equal to a githyanki warrior is delusional, minstrel." retorted Lae'zel. Brithvar had to make a conscious effort to refrain from grinning. Trap laid and set.
"Which is exactly why you need her." argued Brithvar.
The elf, or rather, half-elf, going off how pointy her ears were, was caught by this. She never expected a duergar to be the one arguing for her freedom. Brithvar often relished in those emotions he caused in people, the pleasant surprise he caused when those in precarious positions realized that the big scary duergar wasn't there to make it worse.
"The istik is right. She could be ghustil," mused Haircut, "Or at least another blade. The khorsh'vrack is not as formidable as I thought. Fine in a supporting role, but not a fighter."
Brithvar didn't have to speak githyanki to know what khorsh'vrack meant. The way Haircut said it made Brithvar feel vaguely like a slur, but now probably wasn't the time to make a moral stand against racism. Not when Haircut and Lae'zel could quickly abandon him on a mind-flayer spaceship in the middle of one of the Hells.
After about three minutes of searching to get the half-elf out of the pod, Lae'zel found a rune on a corpse in the next room over, which she used to free the half-elf.
"I thought that damn thing was going to be my coffin." grumbled the half-elf. "Thank you."
Everyone's mind lurched again. The same memories as before, a beautiful ruby warhammer, the wing of a silver dragon, Brithvar's sister looking at him smiling. A recap, Brithvar supposed, in case someone missed something before. Then he saw the much younger half-elf being hunted down by a gargantuan canine-like creature. Nothing in the Underdark even remotely resembled it. Some emotions bubbled up in his psyche. The half-elf genuinely appreciated being freed, but she was also wary. She didn't seem to be the number one githyanki fan.
The half-elf turned to Brithvar. "You keep dangerous company."
"Oh, you better believe it. I've seen them fight; it's terrifying." Brithvar responded, hoping his bravado disguised his unease. "It's a good thing they're on our side, right?"
A flicker of pride graced Lae'zel's face for the briefest of instants. The same expression also adorned Haircut's visage, though he didn't bother hiding it.
"Fair point. Looks like there's plenty of fighting ahead." conceded the half-elf. Almost as if on cue, deep, echoing laughter came from the scrotum to the west of this conversation. From what Brithvar knew about mind flayers, they were incapable of laughter, like physically incapable. Their anatomy didn't account for them ever laughing. Whatever archdevil ruled over this layer of the Hells, which Brithvar unfortunately still didn't recognize, now the newly formed party would have to contend with them. Whoop-dee-doo.
"Let me come with you. We can get off this ship and watch each other's backs along the way," the half-elf offered.
Reading her cadence, Brithvar succeeded in his insight check and realized that the second half of her sentence was directed only at him. Suppose Lae'zel or Haircut tried Anything funny or turned on him, or even their xenophobia stopped being entertaining and started being hurtful. In that case, the half-elf was offering protection in exchange for protection.
"Sounds like a deal. My name is Brithvar. This is Lae'zel and Hai-I mean, what's your name?"
"I'm Losiir." said Haircut.
Brithvar waved his hand dismissively. "Sure."
"Shadowheart." Brithvar nodded, doing everything he could to stifle a laugh. Sweet Earthcaller above, that's a ridiculous name. Naming conventions had always endlessly fascinated Brithvar as a bard who loves recording and augmenting stories. It differed from species to species and generation to generation. Some species with unfortunately short lifespans, like tortles and aarakocra, have name conventions that evolved very quickly because a generation for them is only about seven to twelve years. Some longer-lived species, like duergar, have naming conventions that grow very slowly because most duergar don't choose to have children until they're around a century old, if not more.
But the humans, and by extension, half-orcs and half-elves, always have the most ridiculous names. One time, Brithvar met a pair of siblings, a human and a half-orc named Tuesday and Z'Rell. Brithvar didn't even know what a Tuesday was; maybe it was a human or a surface dweller thing.
But Shadowheart took the cake. It's almost as if her parents had thought, 'Hey, what's the least trustworthy name we could give our daughter without outright naming her Liar Liar Pants On Fire.'
Haircut took point as the group stormed the helm. His scimitar, red from the hellion blood spilled on it, pointed the way, almost as if Haircut was using it as a conductor's wand, and the party was his orchestra.
Brithvar wondered that, if it were a different world, that's precisely what Losiir would've been.
The helm had seen better days. Within the two seconds of the scrotum opening and Brithvar collecting himself for a fight, he saw a mind flayer rip the head off a cambion, double over in exhaustion, and get clawed into ribbons by a quartet of imps. Assuming Brithvar survived this, which, to be fair, he probably wouldn't, this would be an incredible story to tell.
A voice echoed in Brithvar's mind, "Thralls. Eliminate Commander Zhalk. Join the tentacles so we can escape Avernus."
It took Brithvar another second to realize where this voice originated. It was a mind flayer, beleaguered by an assault of swipes, jabs, and bursts of flame from a well-armored cambion warrior who stood at least a head taller than Haircut. That had to be Zhalk.
"How long do we have until this ship crashes?" Shadowheart asked, her voice cutting through the chaos. Her tone was urgent but controlled. It was probably not the first time Shadowheart had faced dire circumstances like this.
"Not more than 90 seconds." responded Haircut.
There was no time to lose. Shadowheart and Brithvar darted for the central control console. Their path was strewn with the bodies of imps, intellect devourers, and mind flayers alike.
Lae'zel and Haircut charged Zhalk, whose focus on the surviving mind flayer had left him vulnerable to an attack. Lae'zel's longsword flashed, hitting Zhalk's armor with a resounding clang. Zhalk flinched, maybe from just the sound, but appeared completely uninjured. The mind flayer followed up with a blast of purple psionic energy, which staggered Zhalk, but again, he seemed more surprised than hurt.
Brithvar rolled his eyes but turned around and rushed back to attack Zhalk. He felt a pinprick in his mind, small, narrow, precise, and deep wounding. Shadowheart's voice echoed in his head. "What are you doing?"
"Saving the idiots who started a fight they clearly could've and should've avoided," said Brithvar. Out loud. Lae'zel and Haircut were formidable, but Zhalk was a force of Avernus, an army commander and an extension of Zariel's will. The githyanki were outclassed.
Zhalk struck Lae'zel hard with the blunt end of his flaming greatsword, and sent her skidding across the helm's floor, a sickening sound of metal scraping through brain matter and flesh. "It's Zhalking time!" he bellowed, laughter echoing through the helm.
With a flourish, Haircut seized the moment, lunging at Zhalk's neck, but Zhalk caught his hand mid-thrust and slammed his body into the ground. Haircut groaned and tried to get his hands underneath him, but Zhalk planted his boot in the back of Haircut's head and smashed his face into the fleshy floor. Haircut yelped in pain, but it was mostly drowned out with Zhalk's joyous trumpeting of "I love Zhalking!". There was a sadistic hunger in his eyes that shook Brithvar to his core.
A bright bolt of energy shot right past Brithvar's shoulder grazed Zhalk's thigh. Shadowheart. As Zhalk snarled with rage, Brithvar darted in and aimed his dagger at a gap in the armor. He drove the blade into Zhalk's inner thigh, eliciting a roar of pain and a string of Infernal phrases that didn't sound like they belonged in polite society.
Zhalk lifted his foot in shock, which allowed Haircut to roll away. After a synchronized dagger jab from Brithvar and a psionic blast from the mind flayer, Zhalk fell to his knees. Haircut's scimitar cleaved immaculately through Zhalk's neck. The cambion collapsed, his final roar echoing through the helm.
The mind flayer's voice again echoed in Brithvar's head, cold and dismissive, "You are no longer necessary." Brithvar had no time to react before the mind flayer turned on them, blasting Losiir straight in the head with a wave of psionic energy. Losiir crumpled without so much as a whimper, a look of shock on his face as his scimitar fell from his lifeless fingers.
Lae'zel's scream of fury was utterly feral. She launched herself at the mind flayer, blade flashing once more. Brithvar, rage bubbling within him, grabbed Losiir's scimitar and joined the fray. Even though he had only known Losiir for about fifteen minutes, he had shown Brithvar nothing but kindness and respect. He didn't deserve the fate he was given.
The mind flayer fought back almost valiantly, but the truth is, there are very few forces in the Realms that can handle a pissed off githyanki and a pissed off duergar. With a final, savage swipe, Lae'zel bisected the mind flayer at the waist.
The ship shuddered as Shadowheart saw that the threats were neutralized and connected the tentacles at the central console. Blinding light filled the helm as the spaceship tore free from Avernus, hurtling toward the Material Plane. Brithvar spared one last glance at Losiir's body, clutching his scimitar tightly as the ship plummeted towards a shoreline.
The impact was sudden, a violent lurch followed by an explosion of water and fire. Everything went black.