Easter Island, Part Four: August 29, 1926

But What About Ron?

Ron Deluca wakes up on the couch in the Bernouse guest house, aching and feeling as week as a kitten. As he opens his eyes, he perceives a vaguely humanoid figure standing in front of the living room window. Ron blinks the exhaustion from his eyes and the figure eventually resolves into the more familiar shape of Nathan Torpley.

Hi! Me, Again!

Nathan apologizes for responding to Ron’s summons a little late and asks him if there’s anything he can still do to help Ron out. Ron struggles upright, goes to the phone, and calls his son, Ron Junior.

His son is both perplexed and annoyed to receive a call from his father. After asking Ron about how he feels, Ron Junior wants to know if he can speak to Liam. Apparently, while Ron was out, Ron Junior asked Liam to come to the guest house and watch over Ron until he recovered. Ron confesses that he hasn’t seen hide nor hair of Liam, and then asks his son to come over. When Ron Junior asks why, Ron insists that he has something to show his son and hangs up the phone.

Ron Junior arrives, simmering with anger and demanding answers. He is only momentarily taken aback when he encounters Nathan Torpley, and assumes from Nathan’s words that he is a criminal who is paying his father to do a little favor for him. Ron insists that this is not the case, and that Nathan is a powerful…thing…and that everything he’s told Ron Junior and Connie is the god’s honest truth.

Seeing that is words are not convincing his son, Ron asks Nathan Torpley to “show Butchie” something that will convince him. Nathan Torpley grins, grabs both Delucas by the shoulders, and teleports them to Easter Island.

Bedtime

Mikhail is brushing his teeth in the barracks’ lavatory when Nathan Torpley, Ron Deluca, Sr., and Ron Deluca, Jr. teleport in just behind him. Mikhail, fortunately, does not choke on his toothpaste.

Ron Junior is completely overwhelmed by being instantly transported to an island in the Pacific and proceeds to vomit in the bathroom toilet. In the meantime, an exhausted and physically weakened Ron tries to explain what he’s doing and where he’s been to the members of the London Group who get out of bed to confront him in the bathroom. This is technically everyone but Viv (though she does yell at him through the bathroom door) and Johnny (who remains in bed, covers his head with his pillow, and wishes that Ron Deluca would leave as quickly as he arrived).

Ron Junior - Not a Fan of Easter Island

Nathan Torpley, amused at the chaos that he has wrought, vanishes, leaving the London Group to their own devices.

After a few moments, the group manages to calm Ron Junior, who is horrified that he’s really in Easter Island and that somehow Liam is also there, too.

Ron suddenly exclaims that he is too weak from summoning Nathan Torpley to help the group any further. He offers to take his son back to New York through the gate box. The group (especially Johnny) lets Ron take his son home. Ron Junior humors his father by getting into the gate box, closing the lid, and instantly returning to New York. The state of his sanity after this jaunt is currently unknown. Ron bids farewell to the rest of the London Group and follows his son.

August 30, 1926: The Birdman

The next morning the group meet up with Aneru and travel to the southwestern-most tip of the island, to the slopes of Rano Kao, another of Easter Islands many volcanos. Aneru explains that the top of the volcano is also the home of Tangata-Manu, the Birdman. She attempts to communicate to the group that they need to speak to the Birdman with proper reverence, and that they will face a hard climb up the side of the volcano to reach the Birdman’s cave.

The climb is slow and very difficult, but the London Group work together and eventually reach the summit. There amidst a colony of roosting sooty terns, they meet a man clad in a thong, feathers, and fantastical body paint. Speaking perfect English, the man welcomes the group and invites them into his cave. As he does so, the terns all take flight, forming a perfect spiral above the volcano as they ascend.

The Tangata-Manu, the Birdman

Within the cave, the Birdman asks the group their purpose on the island. Sensing that the priest could be a very powerful ally, the London Group decides to hold nothing back. Johnny, notably, tells the Birdman that he wants to “kill that fucker, Carl Stanford,” without elaborating, which is something that both stuns and amuses the priest.

The Tangata-Manu tells the group a bit of the island’s history. Briefly: The long-eared people were the first inhabitants of the island, with the ancestors of the modern-day inhabitants arriving several generations later. The long-eared people made terrible pacts and mated with evil creatures of the sea, and began to make war on and sacrifice the ancestors in order to gain even greater power. This let the ancestors to rise up against their aggressors and drive them into the sea. The Birdman knows that the long-eared people have returned, and are working their evil magics within Rano Raraku. Unfortunately, he is unable to leave the peak of Rano Kau, and can do little more than observe.

After hearing the London Group’s story, the Birdman decides to trust them and give them magical aid against their common enemies. He tells them that the ancestors prayed to Noa, one of their gods, and received three great treasures to help them in their battle with the long-eared people. The first of these is the Crystal of Noa, which is kept hidden in an underwater cavern some distance from shore. The second of these is the Mask of Noa, which allows the wearer to breathe underwater, and which will allow them to acquire the crystal. The last is the mighty Spear of Noa, which the Birdman only allows them to take after he gets them to promise that they will clothe and shoe every native on the island (1,100 inhabitants all told). Judge Putnam agrees to this demand on behalf of the group, and both he and the Birdman seal their oath in blood.

With the Mask and Spear of Noa in their possession, the London Group bids farewell to the Birdman, leaves the cave, and descends down the volcano to meet up with Aneru.

Vivian’s Swim

Aneru guides the group down to the nearby shore, where they can all see a much smaller island a short distance across the sea. Aneru explains that the cavern with the Crystal of Noa is likely under that island somewhere, as this is the place where those who seek to prove themselves worthy to be the Birdman must swim to the small island and back again. Aneru uses hand gestures and her limited vocabulary to describe the dangerous surf, the deadly reefs, and the hungry sharks that a swimmer might encounter.

Overlooking the Island Home of the Crystal of Noa

Vivian, who is the strongest swimmer, dons the mask, takes the spear, and swims into the Pacific to search for the Crystal of Noa. Putting on the mask, Vivian feels an unpleasant sensation as the ancient wood seems to adhere to her face. More worryingly, she feels sharp pain on either side of her neck and soon realizes that she has spontaneously sprouted gills.

Leaving her friends to wait for her on the shore, Vivian swims out to the smaller island and begins her search. She soon finds the cave entrance, but she also sees that a group of deep ones are swimming just in front of it, apparently on guard. Using her strong swimming skills, her stealth, and a little bit of luck, Vivian slips past the deep ones and enters the cave. There, she finds an air-filled grotto with a sandy floor. Resting on the sand is an Elder Sign, carefully carved out of slimy, greenish stone. Resting on the Elder Sign, glowing softly with its own inner light, is the Crystal of Noa.

Vivian reaches out to take the crystal, only to be electrocuted by some kind of a defensive spell. Cursing and massaging her now numbed right arm, Vivian approaches the crystal much more tentatively and, this time, manages to pick it up without causing any harm to herself.

A quick dive back into the ocean and a deft avoidance of the deep ones later, and Vivian returns to shore with the Crystal of Noa. She is relieved to discover that she can pull the Mask of Noa from her face, dispelling her gills and returning, physiologically at least, to normal.

Rano Raraku

The group bids farewell to Aneru and crosses Easter Island to the foothills of Rano Raraku. Thanks to Judge Putnam’s previous drone surveillance, the group is easily able to find the secret pathway that leads up to the summit of the volcano, as well as the hidden entrance that allows climbers access to the interior of the caldera.

The group swiftly reaches the entrance, which is decorated with bas-relief carvings of squid-like heads, skulls, and the awful glyphs of a long-dead language. Bones and debris littler the entrance to the cavern, and an awful smell of rotting meat and sulfurous air rises up from below.

The Upper Levels of Rano Raraku

The London Group ready their weapons and pass through the entrance. Moments later, they enter a large cavern, and see something that looks like part insect and part ape begin to materialize out of the air before them. The creature clacks its vicious claws, but before it can even fully manifest, Judge Putnam presses the muzzle of his shotgun cane against its carapace and fires, blowing it to smithereens.

Kane ruefully remarks that they have likely announced their presence to any of the denizens of the volcano. Now even more on their guard, the London Group follows the pathway around the caldera and into the depths of the volcano.

The Tunnels

At the bottom of the volcano’s shaft, the group finds a tunnel which leads into a complex network of winding tunnels. The reek of death and decay is very strong here, and it is all that the group can do not to gag or pass out.

They valiantly press on ahead into the tunnels, and shortly thereafter hear what sound like human crying and screaming from some point in the far distance. Liam, desperate to be helpful, decides to separate from the group and see if he can find the source of the sounds. He travels for perhaps twenty minutes before reaching a dead end, but does not encounter anyone or anything else.

Liam returns to the group, and it is only thanks to his excellent direction sense that he makes it back to the bottom of Rano Raraku and the rest of his party. He explains his findings to the others and turns around to go off and explore another, different section of tunnels…

Only to physically run into a deep one.

A brief fight ensues, but the deep one is no match for the London Group. The sounds of the battle apparently reach whoever is crying and screaming, causing them to cry and scream much more loudly. The group traverses the tunnel complex, attempting to home in on the sounds. Just as it seems as they are about to reach their targets, they find their way blocked by six more deep ones.

Another brief and decisive skirmish ensues. Vivian stuns her companions by killing one of the deep ones with the Spear of Noa, which unerringly hits anything it is thrown at. Judge Putnam, Kane, Dr. Black, and Johnny open fire (Johnny with the shotgun he “borrowed” from Liam) and kill three more of the deep ones.

The two survivors throw down their spears and flee, gurgling, into the darkness.

The Captives

The Caverns Beneath Rano Raraku

The group presses on into another cavern, where they find almost all of the people who have recently gone missing from Easter Island. The captives are weeping, screaming, and gibbering uncontrollably, and the group has a very difficult time getting them to stop. Mikhail fears that whatever the captives have experienced in the last few days has so totally ruined their minds that they may never return to their senses again.

At this point, one of the captives grabs onto Mikhail and begins screaming. “The worms. THE WORMS!”