Rannar the Ragged woke to the sound of slithering, squirming wetness. It was horrific in its sheer squelchiness and in the way the sound resounded through his skull, echoing dimly in his mind as the tadpole burrowed its way deeper into the folds of gray matter that sat between his ears. He reached a weak hand up to rub at the back of his head, the pressure caused by the tiny creature's movements not dissipating in the slightest and he feebly raised his fist to pound on the window of the alien pod he now found himself trapped within.
The world shook violently and Rannar groaned softly as the strange pod slid open and ungraciously deposited him onto the floor in a puddle of unidentifiable slime. His head pounded as he pushed himself to his feet, noting for the first time the strange walls of semi-biologic material and the strong stench of burning flesh. Flashes of light seared his corneas and Rannar had to blink several times to clear the afterimages left burned into his vision.
He smacked his lips and yawned. The aftertaste of firewine still lingered in his mouth and he reached into his pack for another bottle, only to find it woefully bereft of alcohol. He rubbed his head, felt a slight tickle on the backside of his left eye, and screamed.
It was not a particularly manly scream, he was ashamed to admit, neither was it a fearsome battle cry a warrior of his skill might be proud of, but given the current situation he recognized that such a response might indeed be warranted. The ground shook again, throwing him to the floor as his head spun and his legs struggled to maintain any semblance of balance. It was then he realized the rather messy nature of this alien construction. The mind flayers that had abducted him were slobs, it seemed, having left random bits of building material strewn around the room like the aftermath of a tavern party on the eve of a new year. In addition, he would have found it horrifically untidy to leave random bits of fire burning everywhere, had he not been busy puking his guts out in the corner and trying not to look at the mangled corpses of several unfortunates that lay on nearby examination tables.
Rannar wiped away the vomit from the edges of his mouth and staggered towards the room's only door, stumbling only twice. As he leaned against the pink, fleshy doorframe he once more emptied the contents of his stomach (now little more than bile that tasted mildly of herring) and tried his best not to scream again when a faint, childlike voice spoke in his mind.
Here. It said without speaking. We are here.
"Who…?" Rannar mumbled as he staggered into the room fully, noting immediately the massive hole in the wall and the deafening sound of rushing wind as the outside world screamed past. The choking scent of brimstone filled the air, joined by the distant screams of a thousand horrendous voices crying out in mindless agony as their skin was ripped from their flesh and their organs combusted in drafts of black fire. It had been more than a few years since he'd last been to hell, Rannar realized, though he had secretly been hoping he wouldn't be back for awhile yet.
Free us. That creepy little voice in the back of his mind said. Rannar ignored it. There was a squirming in the folds of his brain. Rannar ignored that too, stumbled to the hole in the wall, dropped his pants, and let loose the first water Avernus had seen in a thousand years.
A shadow flashed across the sky. Grim and terrible it was, and it bore the presence of a creature far mightier than any that hell could conjure. Rannar thought it looked mildly like his cousin Gralkothrax the Destroyer, though he couldn't be entirely certain. The shadow flitted through the rolling haze of sulfurous clouds and let loose the war cry of a mighty red dragon. As the massive reptile swooped in overhead, Rannar suddenly realized that it was making an attack run on the strange Illithid vessel; the very same vessel that was currently hurtling its way through the ninth layer of hell with him stranded aboard.
Today was really turning out to be full of surprises.
Rannar pulled up his pants and turned around to go back to his pod and try to sleep this nightmare off, when he found a silver blade leveled at his throat and a strange frogman glaring at him through the ugliest pair of eyes he'd ever had the displeasure of witnessing. The creature was hideous, with a bizarre, upturned nose and comically oversized ears. Strangest of all was the humanlike hair that grew from its sickly yellow-green skin and the ornate, ruby studded armor the creature wore.
"You're ugly." Rannar informed the frogman.
The creature scowled and made as if to thrust the sword into Rannar's throat, when suddenly it stopped and clutched its head in pain. As if in response, Rannar's own head began to crackle with pain, his scalp threatening to burst as pressure built within it. He closed his eyes to quell the feeling, and when he opened them he was staring at a very handsome and somewhat familiar looking dragonborn. He was just about to ask this guy where he'd seen him before, when suddenly he was once more looking at the green skinned assailant with the sword.
"Ts'kva," It said in a bizarrely feminine voice, "Vlaakith blesses me this day. You are no thrall."
"Where's the exit?" Rannar mumbled, rubbing his temples with his thumbs and praying that the hangover would pass sooner rather than later, "I would like to get off the ride now."
"The only way we can escape is to reach the helm and activate the transponder." The frogman declared, "Follow me and do as I say and you might just survive. My people possess a cure for this infection. If you do as I command, I may even tell them to purify you as well."
For some reason, this frogman was really starting to irritate Rannar. Normally he would have slain it where it stood for existing in his presence and left for places with normal looking people, but for some reason he found himself completely drained of energy. As if in response, that damn squirming in his head intensified. He grit his teeth and managed to nod.
"Good." The frogman said, "This way to the helm!"
The pair of unlikely allies continued all of about twenty feet before finding a pathetic number of lesser imps stuffing their faces on the remains of several corpses. The corpses seemed to have no rhyme or reason, being an odd mixture of Illithid, human, elvish and goblin. Rannar chalked it up to an attempt to diversify their appetite. Of course, dragonborn and frogman were very diverse in and of themselves, so he was about to recommend that he and his new companion slip by the very clearly distracted imps, when suddenly the frogman lifted its sword and shouted something in its stupid little language. The imps' heads snapped up, their maws of crooked teeth dripping with blood, and returned the cry with screams of joyous malevolence.
Rannar groaned, hefted his longsword and held his ground as the imps swarmed down upon them. The frogman made to charge directly into the incoming imps, but Rannar nimbly stepped in front of it, opened his mouth, and released a stream of fire which caught two in its flames. The last imp lost its head to the frogman's sword as it swerved away to avoid the flames.
"Never dare to deny Laezel of Creche K'liir the kill again!" It hissed, "You will lose your life. You are lucky that I require your help to–"
Rannar slammed the pommel of his sword into the back of the frogman's head. A satisfying crack resonated through the air as the disgusting creature crumpled to the ground. Rannar quickly searched its belongings for food or firewine, but was disappointed to find neither. He sighed and picked up the frogman's sword and slung it on the hip opposite his own. On the imps he found nothing, save for an axe which he took as well, before climbing a strange netting to reach a higher level of the alien craft.
Halfway through the climb, it was becoming apparent that his body was tiring rather quickly. The fight had been quick but the act of breathing fire had been far more strenuous than it should have been. Rannar suspected that was because of the little monster living rent free in his head, as yesterday he had no trouble reducing half a dozen common bandits to ash with little more than an afterthought. Well, it might have been yesterday. Truthfully, Rannar had no idea how long he'd been unconscious, though the level of muscle degradation seemed to imply that it was a bit longer than he initially assumed.
He reached the top of the mesh, stomach growling, and staggered into the room. He saw everything without truly perceiving it, eyes searching for any variety of food. Instead he found a pod identical to the one he'd been trapped in, inside which was a woman pounding on the window. When she saw him, she started calling for help, which made his head hurt, so he slowly made his way over to the pod to tell her to be quiet.
"Shut up." He told the woman in the pod, but she just kept banging on it and shouting. The thought did occur to Rannar that maybe she couldn't hear him, but that thought was quickly drowned out by the headache and the wriggling and the growling of his stomach. Anger began to build within him. "Shut up!" He yelled, but again to no response. He grabbed the axe he'd taken from the imps and slammed it as hard as he could into the pod, its head getting buried in the strange, translucent material that formed the pod's solitary window.
That shut the woman up. But when he withdrew the axe from the pod, the translucent surface cracked and splintered, and the woman inside toppled out. She had a small cut from where the axehead had found her chest, but otherwise seemed unharmed. She slowly got to her feet and Rannar made no move to help her get up.
"Thank you." She said. Rannar grunted.
When the mind connection happened this time, Rannar was able to recognize himself standing before the woman. This time, too, he was able to glimpse flashes of memory. A secret meeting in the dark of night. A mission of extreme importance. And the artefact. He saw it all, but could remember little, and the visions faded quickly from his mind when he opened his own eyes.
"What… What was that?" The woman asked, confusion evident on her face, "Why was I drinking vodka shots with a beholder?"
Rannar shrugged and said, "The things you see are probably random." In truth, he was relieved that she hadn't gotten to the end of that particular memory, especially the part where he'd been beaten bloody and left to die in the gutter.
"Oh, and we should probably get to the helm." He said, trying to change the subject, "There are dragons attacking us and I think we might be in danger."
"Dragons?" The woman asked frantically.
"Yes. And we are currently in hell." Rannar said, "So it might be a good idea to hurry."
"One moment." She said, reaching back into the pod. She withdrew that same, strange artefact from the vision and discreetly tucked it into her pocket. The look on her face made it evident that she thought Rannar wasn't looking. In truth, Rannar did not particularly care, but he was a little annoyed regardless.
"To the helm!" He declared, though the room they next entered was the wrong direction and they ended up having to double back.
"To the helm." He said again, somewhat less enthusiastically, and both he and the nameless woman advanced through the sphincter to meet whatever horrors lay beyond.