Demons of Astlan

It turns out, the "Demon Weed" actually is a Gateway Drug! Who knew? Tom Perkinje certainly didn't. He had never smoked anything in his life, but as the new kid in town trying to make friends, he foolishly let his new buddy Reggie talk him into trying a joint that he'd picked up from a new dealer. Before he knew it, Tom was having a seriously bad trip; a total out-of-body experience where the world had dissolved around him. The next thing Tom knew, there were these deranged myopic wizards from some place called Astlan calling on him in some sort of pig Latin mumbo jumbo. They had somehow mistaken Tom for a demon! He tried to flee, but the wizards were relentless and were determined to conjure him into their world and bind him as their demon slave for all of eternity. And these crazy wizards? Turns out, they were going to war and planned to use their new demon slave as a secret weapon to obliterate the enemy!

Tom Perkinje, the reluctant Greater Demon and recent transplant from Harding, New Jersey, to the Abyss, has defeated and captured the not-so-valiant Sir Talarius, Knight Rampant of Tiernon, and has humiliated and demoralized the army known as the Rod of Tiernon. Unfortunately, to do so, he had to hack the mana streams between the god Tiernon and his High Priests, and now his buddies are telling him that Tiernon is going to send a Host to investigate this unprecedented event. Oh, and the fact that he reversed a Holy Artifact of Tiernon has not gone unnoticed, either. The folks upstairs are not pleased. His actions have completely disrupted the plans of not only the Rod of Tiernon but also the Sky Fleet of Oorstemoth, who had thought to bring Tom to justice for illegally destroying the ship trying to obliterate Tom and his friends. The two armies are now looking to unite and rescue Talarius and arrest Tom (permanently). Of course, there are also the three Arch Demons trying to steal a book that Lenamare, Tom's Accursed Master, stole from Oorstemoth; and whose demon horde had been infesting the wizard city of Freehold.

The current tour of duty for Leftenant Trig Bioblast, Second Shaman of the OCSS Skull Crusher, had been completely routine, and, disappointingly, uneventful. The days of revolution were a distant five hundred galactic years in the past. Today, there was very little in the cluster that could significantly challenge an Oak Clan Star Ship, nor, admittedly any other clan cruiser in the horde. The last battle that had actually required the Skull Crusher to marshal her full might had been with a squid ship, nearly four GY ago, well before Trig had joined the ship. While on duty, Trig had received an Automated AEthereal Message from the OCSS Bone Wracker: a Call-To-Arms, an extremely rare type of message that was only issued when a ship encountered a situation that was beyond the capabilities of a single OCSS. Of course, the truly exciting news was that his superior, Thargus, was temporarily incapacitated, making Trig the acting First Shaman, giving him a front row seat to the investigation as part of the First Away Team. It appeared that, at long last, his on-duty life would get exciting enough to distract him from his off-duty life. About two Galactic Weeks ago, a long dormant shaman stone passed down his family tree for thousands of years had suddenly become active, much to Trig's surprise. Upon examining the stone, he'd discovered that it was linked to another stone-in a different universe, beyond the Astral Plane. And the people who had activated the stone? Well, they were an ancient army of mythological immortal warriors that his grandfather claimed had once ruled a vast Multiversal Empire, but then vanished for no known reason. A worthy adversary for their ship and a heated battle or two should serve to keep his mind off his mythological being problem.