Neblae was frightened,but not wanting to go and leave this strange little man to defend her. She called down to Narchi from the top of the pile of boxes. "Hey, hat-man! Are you sure? I can fight by your side. I'm not a coward." Narchi sighed in irritation and looked up at her. He blinked at the look of naked concern on her face. He cleared his throat. "Look. That air-shaft is a clear passage out of this death-trap. It goes a hundred feet and ends in a culvert by the river. YOU do NOT know the lay of the land here! I do. I want you to live. If you stay here, you may get killed accidently by one of the god-aweful traps here. There are horrors that make my skin crawl here! Now scoot!" He turned to run up the stairs, but stopped when she said quietly, "Lords of light go with you, Narchi." He turned back in time to see the grating swing back into place and she was gone. He was all alone. He knew that was an illusion. He could feel the presence of the ancient thing in that basement room, he had not told the Trow girl about. He knew it had heard every word and was mulling the words over. He knew that worst case scenario, he would lead the Cyclops class battledroid down here to confront that ancient horror and the battle would level the building. If that happened he actually had a small chance of survival. He shook his head and muttered, "C'mon! Try to be optimistic, old son! They're just psycho religious canibles!" He sighed and ran up the stairs to arm the first trap. Media is Poser 6 This is sort of a bridge before the crap hits the fan in a big way. I'll try to alternate with other scenes to keep this from becoming a gore-fest.