Jumah sighed heavily as he looked out the window into the dimly lit expanse beyond the room he had been forced to stay in the previous night. To say that he hated the city of Talanor would be, at best, an understatement. However, he would never use the word ‘hate’ to describe his feelings about the city. Not because of any need he might feel to use more complicated words, or because he was afraid some lover of the subterranean city would over hear him disparaging their home.  No, he would not use that word because that was a word he felt should be reserved for those things in life that were generally worse in nature than anything else one had ever encountered. It was not a word to be used, or taken, lightly and to his credit he had used it only once in his entire life; on that terrible day so long ago.

He sighed again as he looked out the window, craning his neck to try and locate the ceiling of the massive cavern the city was built within. The dim, constant illumination seemed wholly inadequate for the task, but his supernatural sight still allowed him to see the far off roof over head. It’s smooth, stone surface long ago chiseled clean of any stalactites in an effort to prevent them spontaneously breaking loose and impaling some unsuspecting visitor to the city.

Finally turning away from the stone orifice to get ready for his day he shook his head slightly causing his long, unrestrained blond hair to shift back and forth across his back. He just didn’t understand how people could feel comfortable living so enclosed all of the time. He longed for the open air of the Plane of Serenity, with cool grass beneath his bare feet and blue sky over head. This trip couldn’t end soon enough for his taste, he didn’t like the cold feeling of loneliness this place seemed to bring about in his normally happy demeanor.

He crossed the short distance to the tiny bed where he had laid out his few things and quickly set about preparing for his day. With smooth, practiced ease he slid the leather harness over his shoulders and fastened the belt snugly around his waist. Testing the harness for a tight fit he then picked up a small leather cord and used it to restrain his mane of hair behind his neck in a loose tail and finally picked up his swords from the bed.  Holding the weapons firmly he spun them a couple of times with practiced ease, creating a blurred arc in front of him as they whisked through the air with a satisfying swishing noise. Gracefully he worked his way through one of his sword katas, slashing the air with a series of quick movements to his left and right, planting his feet in firm stances with each movement. With a flourish he completed the form and then gracefully spun the twin blades around one more time and slid them home in the crossed scabbards on his back just as a barely audible, almost frantic knocking sounded off of the thick hardwood door to his room.

“And so it begins.” He said quietly to himself, preparing himself mentally for the assault he knew he was about to endure as he crossed to the ancient looking door and released the overly-complicated locking mechanism. He watched in wonder as a series of gears, pistons, and levers whirred into motion on the door’s surface. He guessed that it took a full thirty seconds for the mechanism to finally release its hold on the stone threshold surrounding the door, but the diminutive person he knew to be waiting outside obviously had some understanding of the process because as soon as the gears and machinations began to move, the knocking stopped.

As the door slowly opened itself Jumah looked down to where his tormentor stood outside his room. She was a tiny thing. Not that needed to be said when speaking about a Gnome, but even as Gnomes went, she was a tiny thing. She looked up his six and a half foot frame and grinned from ear to ear, revealing a set of brilliantly white, perfectly formed and spaced teeth. Her tiny face was thin and pleasantly featured and her tiny button nose was adorned with a set of tiny, round spectacles that were barely as big around as her clear, steel grey eyes. Her hair was, for lack of a better way to describe it, a complete disaster. If it had been properly cared for it may have been lovely but as it was the mop of fiery orange strands was pulled straight back from her face, restrained through some unknown means into what looked like a small explosion frozen forever in time on the back of her miniscule head.  And to complete the picture she was wearing a very nice, expensive robe that had been totally destroyed by the liberal application of grease and soot over an unknown, but presumably long, period of time.

‘Good morning sleepy head!” She chirped, her grin growing impossibly wider.

Jumah put on his best ‘Help me for god’s sake I am locked in a cave with a cheerful Gnome’ smile and nodded down at the woman. She barely crested the top of his knee cap, even with the interesting hair situation taken into account. “Good morning m’lady. How are you?”

She beamed up at him. “Spectacular. Couldn’t have hoped for better weather for the expedition!”

Jumah looked over his shoulder toward the window in his room and tried to imagine any other type of weather Talanor could experience. Turning back to the Gnome he opened his mouth to ask the question but suddenly stopped short as he saw the twinkle in her eye that said she was more than willing to talk, at some great length no doubt, about the subtle variations that were likely to occur from day to day in the climate of a cavern such as this. Finally he settled on, “Good to hear. So what’s the plan?”

She looked almost sad for an instant, probably because he hadn’t asked her about the weather he surmised, but bounced back quickly, grey eyes sparkling in the constant light that seemed to come from nowhere in this place. “The porters are ready with the equipment and all of the permits are in order. All we have to do is make our way into the old mines and start looking for it. I anticipate no less than a ninety nine percent success rate on this expedition given current circumstances and forecasted trends in the geo thermal activity in the area. Furthermore, if my calculations are correct there is also a high degree of likelihood that we will encounter at least three mechanized stationary sentry units within the immediate proximity of our final destination.” She smiled again.

Jumah blinked at her a couple of times before nodding at her with a complete lack of understanding. “Sounds good. We should probably get moving then eh?” When he was done here he was heading straight to the Plane of Serenity and running flat out until his body could simply not take it any more and forced him into unconsciousness. He had to have been completely out of his mind to think he could work with a Gnome, in a cave, on an expedition. Yes, what was left of his people needed the money for supplies this winter, and then there was Riana, he wanted to get her something nice. But he was beginning to have second, and third thoughts about this.

Gimbobble, that was the Gnome’s name. Turned around in a haphazard way that made Jumah think of an infant that had been walking less than an hour, then moved down the hall toward the main door of the small stone structure they had slept in. He wasn’t sure if it was her house, or her work shop, or just some other strange machinery-laden building gin the city, but he knew he was glad to be free of it the moment they stepped out the front door. He was no stranger to the emerging sciences of the world, and he was far from being against its development and proliferation, but something about Gnomish contraptions always set him on edge. Maybe it was there propensity to explode at the most inopportune moments. Maybe it was their inexplicable need to be so much more complicated than was ever really necessary. Either way he could never seem to feel at all comfortable around their gadgets.

The short walk to the mines in question seemed to take forever as he worked exceedingly hard to not step on Gimbobble or leave her alone. Each of his steps was equivalent to a dozen of hers and she didn’t seem to be in any form of rush either. Finally they arrived at the cave in question. There was a pair of frightened looking Gnomes standing at the entrance to the mine, each of them bearing a pack on their back that was easily five times their weight and between them they had a platform laden with equipment, bearing handles for them to haul it into the cave.

“Are we ready?” She chirped as she stopped in front of the pair. They both looked up at Jumah from his mid-thigh area with pleading looks on their faces, as though they were scared to death but afraid to say anything. Finally the complete lack of response seemed to click in Gimbobble’s brain as an affirmative and she moved off into the mine boldly. “Alright then here we go!”

The two porters sighed sadly, then picked up the equipment between them and followed their diminutive leader into the darkness of the mine.