Difference between revisions of "Dirge"
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| − | | caption = | + | | caption = Fuck you, Matt McClintock. |
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| birth_place = The Underdark, Prime Material Plane | | birth_place = The Underdark, Prime Material Plane | ||
Revision as of 18:36, 11 February 2015
| Dirge | |
|---|---|
 Fuck you, Matt McClintock. | |
| Born | The Underdark, Prime Material Plane |
| Occupation | Seeker |
Dirge is an Illithid Bard who is seeking the music that underlies the multiverse. Yes, the entire genesis of this character was the Flayer joke.
Dirge is a character played by Benjamin in Jeremy's campaign.
Background
Dirge started out life like most Illithid, but one day consumed the brain of a Seeker of the Song who happened to stumble upon get tricked into entering the Underdark. When the bard's brain was consumed, Dirge first heard a phrase of The Song that underlies Everything, and has been seeking it ever since.
Dirge is actually native to the prime Planescape setting, but has been transported to this mirror universe by a magical transporter accident. Why do you all have goatees?
Motivation
Dirge's goals are two:
- Seeking the Song
- Finding a way home
Origin Story
The delivery was on time, as promised. And well protected as well, as it would need to be to survive the journey through the Underdark. Apart from the Drow, enough interference on their own, there were many dangerous creatures which might interfere with this sort of business.
But, the goods had survived, safe and sound.
A youngling, who would one day be known as “Dirge”, had come to receive the delivery. It was an important task, and one that provided great reward. Dirge would be able to select any one item from the goods to take, and looked forward to this greatly.
Dirge inspected the delivery, tore away the defenses. One contained great physical strength and martial prowess: boring. Another contained what passed for wisdom on the surface, dedicated to some so-called god; boring and useless. The third: arcane arts and knowledge. Pedestrian. Dirge’s people were already far more advanced in this area.
Ah, but the last item. The music!
It was new.
It was unique.
Dirge put the other goods away neatly and settled in to relish the selection. It was exquisite. The musicality that had initially caught Dirge’s attention paled in comparison to the creativity, the knowledge, the secrets contained within. And the hidden music. It was unlike anything Dirge had encountered before. It was like a glimpse into the inner workings of the Planes themselves.
But the secrets, the secrets were troubling. Were they true? Was the immortality of the Illithid a lie? Dirge probed for the source. This bard had had ways of combing myth and legend, combining scraps and hints into knowledge and truth. There was little in the way of specific, solid evidence, but there was enough to sow doubt.
Dirge could not return to the colony. Even if it were not true, the Elder would not let this spread, even as rumor. Dirge would not go home again.
...caesura...
Dirge had settled into a routine at the Civic Festhall. It had taken time, but finally the Illithid had found a place and people who valued novelty more than their prejudice. And who didn’t mind upsetting more than a few Gith. A “Mind Flayer” who sought to become a bard was indeed a novelty.
Dirge had a steady flow of visitors in the beginning. Some who wanted to study an Illithid who wasn’t actively trying to consume their brain. Some who saw Dirge as an exemplar of their own pet philosophies about the ultimate redeemability of even the most evil of creatures, though Dirge’s “good” behavior was mostly out of a strong sense of self-interest. Many who simply wanted the experience of meeting such an aberration, without the usual risk inherent in this sort of encounter.
Overall, the Society of Sensation was an easy fit for Dirge, that is, once a solution for the usual urges was found. And there was a man among them, a human wizard researching magical means of immortality, who shared a similar worldview with Dirge and became a patron. He called himself Mahir. After losing the promise of immortality as part of the Elder Brain, Dirge also shared his interest in arcane methods of immortality. It was this wizard who gave Dirge the name that others would use. He had said it fit the mood of the music Dirge was trying to play.
One day, Mahir made a proposal to Dirge. The wizard called it the path of the lich, but Dirge already knew of this path by another name: Alhoon. They were outcast among the Illithid because they forsake any chance of joining with the Elder Brain. This was now irrelevant to Dirge.
Mahir’s proposal involved turning Dirge into a lich in a controlled, monitored fashion. He was blunt, he wanted to study the process in another being before attempting it on himself. Normally it was required that the subject cast the spells themselves to effect this transformation, but Mahir thought he could exploit Dirge’s psionic abilities so they could cast them together. This would also allow him to experience the transformation along with Dirge, without risking his own person.
Dirge thought upon this for a long while, but eventually agreed. Mahir gleefully began preparations. In order to pay for the materials required, Dirge sold or exchanged many of the magical items that were included in the delivery, no, held by the people who had been consumed by Dirge in the Underdark. Dirge couldn’t bear to part with a set of musical Ioun stones the bard had owned, and had to part with most of the other pieces to keep them. The appointed time came and the deed was done. As the magic took hold, Dirge’s consciousness faded out…
...caesura...
Dirge awoke with a start, in ramshackle sleeping quarters with little light and no circulation. Neither concerned Dirge. It was concerning that the room was unknown. What had happened with the spell? Where was Mahir? Dirge felt different. Everything felt different. At the end of the room was a man furiously writing at a desk. The man was as dishevelled as the room.
Dirge approached him. Mahir? No, the man looked the same, but felt.. different.. to Dirge’s psionic touch. At right angles to the man Dirge had known. This man was not Mahir, but he had a shadow of Mahir’s body and a mockery of his mind. Dirge consumed this parody, though no hunger compelled, and no satisfaction was gained by it. The mind was every bit as threadbare as the room and it’s body had been, and Dirge learned nothing of use from it.
Upon a moment’s reflection, Dirge realized that wasn’t true. Dirge no longer felt the urge or hunger for sentient cranial matter. Perhaps the transformation was a success after all.
Dirge left the room, left the building, and stepped out into a darkened street. The hub stretched out around and above, but it was no part of Sigil that Dirge could recall from experience, map, or description. Dirge wandered the street, searching, seeking, and began to psionically hum a tune through the Ioun stones. To Dirge’s delight, even though everything else had changed, one thing, at least, remained unchanged: The Song.
