I hear the buzzings of swarms of blood gnats rising above the screams and cries of dwarves.
I hear their sudden hiss as they descend upon another victim, accompanied by the groans of death. A symphony of sorts.
I'm worn out; I think I'll just rest here. Just for a moment.
I toss and turn in sleep, and screams feature prominently in my dreams.
I wake with a start; Goden stands over me, a crazed look in his eye. Something tells me he wants my help, but I'm too thirsty; I brush past him, moving to the drinks stockpile.
He runs after me, scrambling, and as I quench my thirst he stands there, waiting.
Another scream rends the air outside, and I realise that the screams were not inventions of a fevered brain - they were real.
Sighing, I take Goden to the temple, and calm him down.
As I finish talking to him, I realise that the screams have stopped - the migrants must be dead. We are once again alone.
The only sounds that remain are the grunting of the diplomat and the harsh wails of the undead echidna, still taking chunks out of each other.
The labyrinth is almost ready; all that remains is to bring some beds over to our little pocket we're sealing off, and place the last brick down.
Actually, we're also bringing some stone and wood up from the lower levels, in case we need to stay sealed off for a good long while, or need to build walls.
It is slow work, but necessary.
We pasture the animals in the temple; I fear it may be disrespectful, but we can't have them getting in our way. The animals shudder at Goden's touch, but they come with him eventually.
He lugs stone, too, like it's nothing but pebbles.
We have enough in our stockpiles; the last stones are laid in the labyrinth.
Let the hordes come through!
...Well, that was an anti-climax. I made the door passable... but either they can't path to the dwarves, or they can't be bothered. Crap.
Oh, no, the first ones are coming. Just slowly; I expected more of a mad scramble than this orderly conga line.
Me and Salmeuk begin a tune of dwarven bravery, and courage in the face of despair, to bolster our spirits. We hear the undead grunt and whine as they stumble onwards, but do not break our tune.
It... it worked perfectly. Almost. I say almost because not all of the undead are trapped, and there is one that will not be moved: the echidna. But hopefully it stays pre-occupied by the diplomat. Meanwhile, Salmeuk (who I graciously volunteered for the task, being too important to attend to it myself) will dash through and grab the pick and mine his way around to us.
Holding my breath... and he made it through!
The echidna didn't even bat an eyelid!
And the fortress is connected once again!
We will, of course, stay unconnected with the top part; the only things there are corpses, and of course the echidna and the diplomat.
...But, of course, there is yet another snag. It seems that all of the soil layers, which we desperately need for farming, are aquifer layers. Hm.
And it is now summer!
...And, of course, that means another undead invasion! They'll join the ranks of those who wait for us to come out, I guess.
--OOC--
yet again I kinda lapsed into it before the alloted time, but whatever@Any previous overseer: is the aquifer light aquifer or heavy? If it's light I can use it, but if it's heavy... there be no hope for the dwarves of Smallhands.
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Topic: Smallhands - nearly 40 years and still tiny! (Read 441081 times)