Prologue

"Incoming!" someone calls out, you're not sure who, and a heartbeat later a barrage of arrows peppered with sling-stones thuds into the exterior wall of the shed where you've taken shelter. One arrow finds its way through the window slats and kicks up a puff of dust as it buries itself in the ground just inches from your foot. At that moment, the front porch bursts into flames while from the back there is a chopping sound, like someone trying to break in with an axe.

Aditya, the owner of the warehouse and the man who hired you, huddles behind a wagon, tearing out his hair, bleating like a goat.

You find yourself wondering just how in the hell you all ended up here, under fire, in a chili pepper warehouse in Pradesh?!

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Five years ago a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Port Llif underground. Today, still wanted by the Cysegrian government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire... the A-Team. the PHULES.

Cue intro music.

Another arrow punches through the window slats and thunks into the wagon Aditya is cowering behind. Someone outside yells, "We warned you to stay out of our turf, you fat piece of shit! But you didn't listen so now you die!"

The fat piece of shit wails, "Forget what I said about saving my farm! Just get me out of this alive and I'll pay you the 500 gold I promised!" He hugs one wheel of his wagon, a sturdy thing painted black with a red stripe running across the side. At present it's loaded with crates of what looks to be dried chili peppers, as well as cases holding bottles of strong chili oil. You catch a whiff of something that stings the eyes - some of those bottles must have been broken from the jostling. Nearby, in its enclosure, the seven-foot-tall draft horse clearly meant to pull the conveyance is starting to panic.

The fire on the front porch isn't a problem just yet (for the moment anyone could leap through it without getting burnt), but if it starts to really take hold it could be very bad news. This warehouse is stocked to the rafters with dried chilis and could go up in a flash.

The chopping continues to come from the back where the barred, heavy barn doors lead out to the warehouse's loading area. Definitely more than one axe being wielded back there, from the sound of it.

You count six men out front , maybe more, armed with bows and axes. What do you do?

The bottle of oil shatters against the axe-blade that has just punched through the barn door, but none of the oil splashes outside. The axe gets yanked back out as its wielder readies for another whack at the door.

The backyard thugs erupt in agonized screams as Erden's fire engulfs them. They take a moment to recover, then the chopping resumes with more urgency, accompanied by angry curses.

Urban does most of the work hitching the horse to the wagon but leaves Aditya to finish up. The spice merchant does as he's told, then climbs into the back. He seems almost as scared of Ybus as he is of his would-be killers.

Baracus tears the front door off its hinges just as Urban steps up with oil flask in hand. Six men are standing there armed with shortbows and slings. Half of these guys look like nothing but tough farm hands, while the rest carry themselves like gang enforcers, who are quicker to react, dropping their bows and drawing blades. The leader, a swarthy, mustachioed man in a turban, armed with a small shield and urumi, charges Baracus together with two of his lackeys while the bowmen and slingers take shots at Urban who is left defending the burning doorway. Laughably, the thugs all miss their marks except for the axeman, who is surprised when his weapon merely nicks the half-orc's tough skin (5 damage before DR).

The now headless and lifeless form of the axeman falls in a gruesome heap at Baracus' feet.

Urban hurls the jug of pepper oil. It breaks at the feet of the two slingers who promptly drop their weapons and claw at their eyes, moaning. One of them falls down on all fours, vomiting.

The blast of eldritch force hits the grovelling man squarely and sends him tumbling across the yard to end up prostrate in a pool of his own blood and sick.

The fire is really starting to take hold. The front wall of the barn is burning, though the flames have not yet crept inside. Billowing smoke threatens to obscure vision both inside the barn and out in the front yard.