Planescape Torment REBORN - PART 4: The Mortuary

Ei-Vene is a tiefling putting her razor-sharp talon-like fingers to good use for the Dustmen, embalming and stitching up corpses. She's an expert in her field, maybe she can do something about your sc

You see a sole zombie stands towering in the corner of the next room. there’s only one enormous stone slab in the middle of the chamber, much like how the second room was.

The zombie stands in silence, facing the wall. He looks to have been a heavy-set man in his early years, and judging by the condition of the body, he died recently. The freshly-stitched number on his forehead reads ‘1664’. It seems to be serving as a librarian, for it is carrying a huge stack of books in its arms. These books appear to be old mortuary ledgers, none of them of any particular interest. As you search through the stack, however, you notice a loose page folded between 2 of the books. You are suddenly struck with the feeling that someone tucked it there to hide it, so you took the page out. it doesn't look like it belongs with the ledgers… it looks like it belongs in a log book. The tear is clean as if with a knife, so you suspect the page was removed on purpose.

You take a moment to read through the page… it’s a list of dead bodies brought to the mortuary and logged in the receiving room. all the entries appear to be recent arrivals.

 

 

                “16537, 5^th night: drunk - chest wound - cause of death: mauling/Abishai? - collector: pox - 3 commons paid - no possessions.

                16538, 5^th night: desiccated corpse - cause of death: indeterminable - age of shell prevents identification* - collector: Pharod - 3 commons paid - no possessions (stripped? Knife marks evident from dissection.)

                16539, 5^th night: scarred shell - cause of death: indeterminable (scars do not appear to be cause of death - shock trauma?) - collector: Pharod - 3 commons paid - possessions logged: 1 pair of fist irons, 13 commons - middle table, receiving room.

                16540, 5^th night: desiccated corpse no.2 - cause of death: indeterminable - age of shell prevents identification - collector: Pharod - 3 common paid - possession logged: knife marks evident from dissection, but the dissection was not thorough enough - copper earring found lodged in abdomen: earing has been locked in preparation room. have an initiate from the 3^rd circle examine it: has strange markings, like those on contracted worker #79.

                16541, 5^th night: skeleton - cause of death: indeterminable - age of shell prevents identification - collector: Pharod - 3 commons paid - no possessions (similar knife marks)

                *As with the previous entries, these shells Pharod has brought also show signs of having been prepared. I've asked that initiate Emoric launch an investigation into the matter. furthermore, entry 16542 is one of Pharod’s gang. I have seen the individual before - I would ask Emoric to pay heed to how the man died.

                16542, 5^th night: tiefling, male - cause of death: slash marks/discoloration of wounds are consistent with grave rot (ghoul claws maybe) - collector: Pharod - 3 commons paid - no possessions (similar knife marks).”

 

 

                You’re clearly number 16539, there’s nothing of significance about the entry of your arrival, which is a good thing, according to the journal on your back. You collected the iron fists, the copper commons and the ring sealed in magic, there’s nothing of use left in the logs. It’s time to move on to the next chamber.

 

                You open the door just enough to peek and squeeze through, again. As you push the door slightly, warm and humid air slithers through your fingers like snakes. They slowly creep up your nose. The smell is particularly fresh of flesh, blood, and chemicals. It’s warm and stink. Peeking through the door crack, besides a small slim figure wearing a big robe covering it from head to toe standing next to a slab, you see more of the same cabinets and zombies. Obviously, you want to know, what the standing figure has in mind.

                As you slowly creep up from behind, the mysterious figure doesn’t seem to notice. It’s a she. Her arms are small and intricate, darting in and out of the corpse lying on the slab in front of her. The corpse’s chest cavity is wide open, the flesh and skin are stretched just enough for them not to be torn. The woman’s hands are like knives, removing organs with rhythmic precision. But she’s not holding any knives… her fingers are talons. She has pointy claws for fingers, they are sharp and glowing. Almost as if polished by the constant exposure to blood and the chemicals.

The smell of the corpses gets more and more vile as you spend more time in this chamber. It’s truly nauseating. As you look around at the other slabs, you can clearly see that the corpses here are new. many of them have their chests split open with internal organs yet to be removed. A few are drained of blood becoming chalk-white and glazed with embalming fluid, neatly-stitched seams run up and down the body. The patterns are mesmerizing. Some bodies are covered in bandages soaked with blood trickles from their wounds, even though they’ve been here for several days. Some of the desks are covered with spools of thread, strips of cloth, rusty instruments, stained vials, and bloody sheets. Multiple barrels lie around the room, many filled to the rim with murky liquid. Standing meters away from them and you can still smell a strong sense of formaldehyde and vinegar.

You turn back to the woman in robe and get a bit closer to her, just enough to peer down the hood. She’s slightly young with pale features. The sunken flesh around her cheeks and neck makes her appear as if she is starving.

“Greetings.”

The woman does not respond.

“Look at her hands, Morte.” You turn back to the skull.

“Eh… she’s a tiefling, chief. They got fiend blood in their veins, usually ‘cause some ancestor of theirs shared knickers with one demon or another. Makes some of ‘em addled in the head… and addled-looking, too.” Morte doesn’t seem to care whether or not the woman can understand what he says about her.

Not letting Morte finish, you tap the woman on the side of her upper arm to get her attention.

The woman jumps and whips around to face u… her eyes are a rotting yellow, w small orange dots for pupils. As she sees u, her expression changes from surprise to irritation, and she frowns at u. Morte is hiding behind the slab.

“Uh… greetings.”

She doesn’t seem to have heard u. she leans forward, squinting, as if she can’t quite make you out… whatever is wrong with her eyes must make her terribly nearsighted. “You-“ she clacks her taloned fingers together, then makes a strange motion with her hands. “Find thread and embalming juice, bring here, to Ei-vene. Go-go-go.”

It seems like you’ve been assigned with a quest. You don’t need to look around to know you can find the required items nearby. So, you head to the desks and cabinets. You’re inspecting more walking corpses in the room along the way too. It’s not worth noting down this mission onto your journal since you’ll be getting it finished in no time.

None of the cabinets and drawers have any needle, thread, or embalming fluid. There are a couple of new bandage rolls, which you’re not passing on. Maybe you’re gonna find something on the zombies.

 

The eyes of the zombie you’re approaching are set close together and the eyeballs themselves are slightly askew; you can barely make out the number ‘257’ traced into its bruised forehead - it looks like the corpse has taken several blows to the head, making the number difficult to read. You leave the corpse in peace after looking it up and down.

This corpse - ‘985’ - has stopped dead in its tracks; judging from the condition of its left leg, it looks as if some sort of tomb rot or corpse mold has eaten through its knee. The corpse is wobbling unsteadily back and forth trying to keep its balance. you reach out for the corpse’s left shoulder to steady it. As you grab its arm, however, the corpse suddenly sways to the right, and you end up tugging the corpse rather than steadying it…

“Uh… chief… you might not w-“ There’s a crack from the corpse’s left leg, and the body falls like a dead tree. Its torso strikes the flagstones and shatters like a rotten melon, filth and ichor gurgling from the cavity. To your surprise, no one seems to have noticed the corpse’s collapse… and even stranger, the left leg remains standing where the body was, as if at attention. After a moment, the leg falls over with a wet thump. As you gaze upon the putrefied remains of the corpse, you notice that its left arm seems intact - it has snapped from the torso during the fall, and it doesn't appear to have been touched by the tomb rot that had spread through the rest of the body. You can use the arm to bash some skulls in, the combination of thick application of embalming fluid and rigor mortis has made this arm almost as hard as wood. It would deal some significant blunt damage. But it’s a too big of a weapon for your taste.

The other heavily stitched corpse is shuffling lazily back and forth between two slabs. It’s the last zombie in the room. The number ‘506’ has been stitched on his forehead… and the side of his neck… and its right arm… in fact, the skin of this peeling corpse has been sewn up with so many stitches his skin looks like a bizarre street map. The stitches encircle the corpse, running from its arms, across its chest, up its neck, and into the damp mass of white hair, as you follow the crossroads of stitches, you notice someone has jammed a needle into the corpse’s forehead… The needle is attached to a threat stitching up the side of the skull. you could probably unravel it if you had something to cut the thread, so you pull out the scalpel. You slice the thread neatly with the scalpel, then pluck out the needle and pull the stitches out. As you do, the skin covering the forehead peels back to review the corpse's chalk-white skull - where, to your surprise, the number 78 has been chiseled.

“Seems like you got 2 different designations there, corpse.”

Morte nods.

 

Now that you’ve attained the needle and thread, only the fluid left to find. You spy nothing of interest left in this chamber. It’s time to proceed to the next.

You peek through the door as you pry it open. you’re welcome with some more breathable air. There’s only one big slab and one big zombie in it, much like the second chamber, and the forth.

As you approach the shambling corpse, it gazes at you with vacant eyes. The number ‘821’ is carved into his forehead, and his lips have been stitched closed. The faint smell of formaldehyde emanates from the body.

 There’s not much in this chamber to investigate. you have the feeling, there might be something important in the next one.

As you cover the chamber through the door crack, no zombies are in sight. Most slabs in the room are vacant and covered with dried blood. There are three slabs in particular that have corpses lying on them, two out of the three corpses are covered with bloody cloth. The one in the middle of the room is uncovered and riddled with tubes. A yellow liquid is cycling through the tubes into a strange machine. The machine is making clicking noises, like an insect. Next to the slab that this corpse is resting on, there’s a cabinet with a jar of green slimy liquid inside, it’s the embalming fluid you’re looking for. There’s another jar in the cabinet next to a stairway leading up and a locked door with the stairway leading down behind it. The cabinet on the other side of the stairs seems to be locked after a thorough search. You’ll need something to pry it open. There’s a door leading to another chamber that’s also locked, and it seems like you’ll need to unlock both of them with the same key.

Now that you have everything Ei-vene needs, you should bring them back to her.

 

Ei-vene is still dissecting the corpse’s chest with her talons upon your return. The rhythm of the talons reminds you of something, but you can’t quite recall what. As you study the motions of her hands, you feel a prickling along your scalp, and then suddenly, you find your vision swimming, blurring…

Until…

You’re standing in front of a freshly-slain corpse, rigor mortis making a mockery of its smile; the number 42 has been stitched onto its scalp. The zombie is lying on a slab, and you have just finished stitching up its chest. You have placed something inside, something that may prove useful if you come this way again…

“Keep these things safe and wait for my return.” The memory of your voice is an Echo, strange and Hollow to your ears. You cross your arms in front of your chest, and to your surprise, the corpse does too. after a moment, its hands fall back into its sides, and as it does, the vision fades… until you are watching Ei-vene's hands make the stitching motions once more.

You tap her shoulder again. She turns, sees you, then frowns. “Dum zomfies.” she clacks her Taloned fingers together impatiently, then makes a stitching motion with her fingers. “Find thread and embalming fluid, bring here, to Ei-vene. Go-go-go.”

You hand Ei-vene the thread and embalming fluid. without missing a beat, Ei-vene snaps the thread from your hands and hooks it around one of her talons, then begins sewing up the corpse’s chest. she then takes the embalming fluid and begins to apply a layer to the corpse. And you wait.

Within minutes, she is finished. She clicks her talons, then turns to face you. To your surprise, she extends her hand and drags her talons along your arms and chest. You keep playing zombie.

“Looks like you have a new friend, chief. You two need some time together, or…?”

You keep playing zombie and ignore Morte. As she traces your arms and chest, you suddenly notice she seems to be examining your scars. She withdraws her talons, clicks them twice, then bends forward and examines some of the tattoos on your chest. “Hmmph. Who writes on you? Hiver do that? No respect for zomfies. Zomfies, not paintings.” She sniffs, then pokes one of your scars. “This one bad shape, many scars, no preserves.”

You wait patiently.

Her talons suddenly hook into the thread you brought her, and lightning-like, she jabs another talon into the skin near one of your scars. It feels barely more than a pin-prick, but it looks like she’s about to start stitching you up. And you let her work.

The sensation is curiously painless as Ei-vene begins to stitch up your scars.

When she is done, she sniffs you, frowns, then stabs her fingers into the embalming fluid. Within minutes, she has dabbed your body with the fluid… and strangely enough, it makes you feel… better. If it would take about twenty blows from a walking corpse to knock you out cold, you should be able to take twenty-one now.

“Shushhh…” Ei-vene waves her talons at you. She wants you to get lost so that she can focus on the corpse in front of her on the slab.

You bow in appreciation for Ei-vene’s work on you and take off. More surprises are waiting for you upstairs.