Another Round of Rifts

So, we left our intrepid adventurers about 3 miles south of Alliance.

They weren't trying to be quiet, and the explosion at Alliance put everything within a ten mile radius on high alert for anything. Our party was deciding on which direction they were suppose to be headed and got turned about by the confusion that ensued after their departure.

After concluding that they were headed in the wrong direction, they set off towards the way that Roger was leading them. They were traveling towards the southwest when they noticed a tree on top of a neighboring hill. One of the party noticed a humanoid figure crouched at the base of the tree. Roger noticed a glint from a scope and after telling everyone about it, noticed Ralph running towards the tree.

BLAM!

A shot rings out and everyone gets ready to fight. Dirk takes care of his horse, tying it to a nearby shrub after dismounting. Roger starts forward on his floating slab of earth and Ralph keeps running towards the tree. Thunderheart positions himself and his hovercycle in order to get a clear shot at the humanoid figure underneath the tree.

Everyone notices a large sphere of darkness encompass the area where the figure was standing. The sphere was about a five-foot radius around the base of the tree, making it very difficult to see the now standing figure.

When Ralph entered the sphere that everyone was closing in on except Thunderheart, who continued firing from his hovercycle, he knocked the big energy rifle out of the guys hands and put on his Thermal sight. Thermal didn't help at all; this guy wasn't putting out any heat whatsoever. Ralph then switched the Thermal off and got a good look at the guy. He was scary, totally made out of worms that were the size of large snakes, so Ralph took off running in the opposite direction after taking a couple laser blasts from the figure and from Thunderheart.
At this time Roger had dismounted his flying saucer of earth.

The rest of the party saw Ralph booking in the direction they had just come from; all of them thinking that there must be some kind of scary dude in the sphere, but then they all realized that Ralph is afraid of everything. Roger had moved about 40 feet while Ralph was inside the sphere, but now that Ralph was gone, got back up on his floating disc of earth and proceeded to close the gap between him and the sphere.

While Roger and Dirk were closing the distance, Thunderheart continued firing from the hovercycle. Ralph and Dirk noticed as a three simultaneous shots came from the sphere and hit the hovercycle dead on the front of it. Thunderheart somehow kept the craft in the air. Then again, a three-shot burst from the sphere, but this time it hit Thunderheart in the chest with pinpoint accuracy. Still he kept the hovercycle in the air. Agian, one last three-round burst from the sphere and again to the front of the hovercycle. Galantly, Thunderheart tried to keep the craft in the air, but the machine had taken too much damage. Thunderheart, however, had enough wits about him not to crash his cycle into the ground below him. He landed, but hard, knocking some of the components that he had attached loose and some of them completely off of the cycle.

Roger had closed in and had started hurling earth at the sphere, enough to encompass the entire sphere, making sure not to miss. Dirk had also closed in enough to get a clear shot, he took aim and fired at the tree protecting the figure. Dirk had surmised that the figure had used some sort of spell that covered him in darkness and somehow had melded with the shadow of the tree; by taking out the treetop, maybe it would make it easier to see him. Dirk was correct, now that the treetop was gone, the party could make out distinct shadows within the sphere. Roger was already within the sphere when Dirk had taken his shot. Roger was now in hand to hand with the figure and he wasn't as frightened as Ralph. Roger and the figure were now trading blows, each dealing slight M.D. to each other.

Ralph was now back and ready to fight. Thunderheart had picked up one of the guns that was attached to the hovercycle and was firing again. And with Ralph ready to go into the sphere, Thunderheart got a lucky shot and the figure dissipated, but not before one of the worms had attached itself to Roger.

Now that combat was over, Ralph pulled for his alcohol and started pouring it over the worms, which weren't moving at all, and ignited them. Roger instinctively flicked the remaining live worm onto the ground and it slithered away. Dirk approached after a few seconds and saw the remaining corpse of the figure, Ralph had missed a couple of the worms. Dirk pieced together everything that the figure had done with the physical description that his party members had told him. Dirk, after a few moments, stated that he knew what it was that they had just encountered; it was a Worm Wraith.

Afterwords, Thunderheart, Dirk, and Roger followed a trail that led to another tree about 3000 feet away and found a horse with some nice M.D.C. barding and a pack pony. On the animals, the found some nice armor and some more weapons that the Worm Wraith seemed to have collected.

Untill next time.