18 | February | 2015

by William Hohmeister

Last time on Planescape: Torment:

The living dead walk! Floating skulls talk!

Dhall, you’ve been a big help, but you smell. Goodbye.

On my way I try talking to every zombie and person I see. This has a few rewards:

Zombie Worker: The corpse is wobbling unsteadily back and forth, trying to keep its balance.

Nameless: Give the corpse a push.

Morte: “Uh… Chief… you might not w-“

Zombie Worker: There is a *crack* from the corpse’s left leg, and the body falls like a dead tree… the left arm seems intact.

Nameless: “Hmmm, I wonder if I could make use of that arm…”

Good news: I can use it as a weapon!

When not vandalizing zombies, Nameless helps a deaf and semi-blind Dustman named Ei-Vene. She wants needle and thread and embalming fluid. All three also act as health potions and buffs* to Nameless. He agrees – sort of. Ei-Vene thinks Nameless is a zombie because of his scars. To carry this off he has to stand there silent like… a zombie. It’s the role he was born to play.

On the way to find the goods, Nameless finds an Anarchist spy disguised as a zombie. The Anarchists are another faction in Sigil – the city we still haven’t seen. No idea why he’s spying, but he offers to tell Nameless how to escape for – surprise – embalming fluid and needle and thread. I find some on this floor, but for the rest I have to head up to the Crematorium.

And the Crematorium is filled with curious Dustmen, like that guy in the lower left yelling at Nameless. Fortunately, the Dustmen don’t mind Morte, so I send him off to find the supplies, then head back downstairs.

I get two things from Ei-Vene: an extra permanent hit point and a memory. The hit point comes when she stitches Nameless up, still mistaking him for a zombie. And by watching how she stiches, Nameless remembers leaving a stash inside of a zombie. So that’ll be fun to look for.

True to his word, the Anarchist tells me how to escape: a portal in the northeast memorial hall, opened with a crooked finger bone “key.” Portals are all over the place, apparently, and almost anything can open them.

The Anarchist also disguises Nameless as a zombie, allowing me to reimagine Thriller. Oh, and to sneak past all the Dustmen. Back in the Crematorium, Nameless finds his stash-zombie – now decayed to a skeleton – and recovers a knife, money, and two Clot Charms, a type of healing and buff. All this is in an extra-dimensional space in the corpse’s rib cage. I head to the ground floor

I love these zombies: right beside the stairs a zombie is loitering with the awesomely named Tome of Blood and Ash. It contains runes and spells and the kinds of stuff to make Cthulhu squee. I take it, of course. I’m kind of a jerk to these corpses. When I find actual people, I swear, I’ll be nice.

I find a use for the Tome right away; in the middle hall are four giant skeletons – literally the reanimated skeletons of giants. By using the Tome, Nameless reverses the enchantments on their armor. This destroys the skeleton and leaves behind a magic rune item. I can’t use it yet, but soon. Just gotta become a wizard.

Finally, Nameless finds the memorial hall. He inspects the area but finds nothing. Just as he’s about to leave, the ghost of a woman named Deionarra appears. She knows Nameless, and may have been a lover at some point, though she’s now bitter over a past he can’t remember. She knows he’s immortal, but describes it as a curse because of the memory loss resurrection causes. She fears Nameless will one day even forget that he can’t die.

So thanks for making me think of that, Deionarra.

She points Nameless to the portal exit, but as he leaves she offers a prophecy. I love prophecies, so of course I ask to hear it. Then she hits me with this:

Deionarra: “First I require a promise. Promise that you will return. That you will find some means to save me or join me.”

Which leads me to several choices:

I can try to talk my way out of it; I can refuse; I can lie; or I can promise. I’ve researched the game a bit, and these choices supposedly matter. If I lie it makes me more evil or chaotic. If I promise I become good, but if I don’t keep the promise… well, I’m not sure. But there are supposed to be repercussions.

I choose to promise I will save or join her. I’m supposed to be channeling the Doctor, after all, and while he may lie, cheat, and screw people over, I don’t believe the Doctor would willingly abandon someone. I’ll do my best to help her.

Deionarra speaks her prophecy: