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Post by Zylaa on Jan 5, 2011 0:03:22 GMT -5
"We should probably make sure none of the Fleet go off without one of us with them. That's just asking for trouble in this place. And I guess Zari will be going with Speck. Anyone who wants to come with me is welcome, I suppose. I'm going to sparkle it up and see what I can find out.”
"Anyway, I hope you don't mind if I tag along with you -- I feel like I haven't done anything in ages, and I kind of want to start now."
"Why on earth would we-- I mean, he-- mind?" asked Zylaa. She twitched her nose, smelling the wonderfully familiar smells of port. Time to do some exploring. Despite the threat of death from a dragon, she was happy. She'd been through worse, after all. And life was a lot more interesting this way.
Finding a tavern in an unfamiliar city alone, on the other hand, would be a bit too interesting. As Zylaa's main mode of defense was summoning 300 weasels, she was pretty sure that wouldn't fall under the category of "inconspicuous." So she, Goosh, Ikkin, and anyone else who decided to retcon themselves into the party set off to find a promising source of gossip.
The first tavern they passed had a full-scale brawl going on inside. The second was dark, dingy, and had suspicious green liquid oozing over the counter. But the third one looked to be just the right mix of disreputable and hospitable. Zylaa entered warily, but nobody seemed to care about the Yurble, weasel, and kitsune in the party. Parnassos got all types, it seemed.
Zylaa ordered some rum, handing over some shinies from her own savings, and trying not to think about the dwindling stock of money on the Weewoo. She turned to her crewmates and spoke, trying to keep her voice low enough that nobody else heard.
"Let's split up, like we're looking for a place to sit. If you find someone saying something interesting, scratch an ear, and we'll mosey over. Or at least, Goosh, you mosey over. Sparkle charms should help us learn what we want to know."
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Post by Fraze on Jan 8, 2011 10:44:07 GMT -5
Before Fraze joined Spacefleet, during his days of covert special ops missions, he frequently floated through empty space in his skinsuit, without even a ship, completely out of contact with anyone and anything for days or weeks on end. This was, in a word, boring. He came and went through many different ways of passing the time. The Universal Box that had been given to him back then was a convenient way to transport and store various entertaining materials, which was probably the only thing that kept him sane back then. On one particular mission, on the way to sabotage treaty negotiations between two forces that were potentially hostile to Fraze's organization, he became interested in knots. Learning and practicing knots occupied him for a good three days straight during that time, and he could still remember how to do most of them from memory with his eyes shut. Nonetheless, he listened to Keng's explanations out of respect. Also, hearing her talk about bunnies and trees to Haggoth was unnecessarily hilarious.
Then the dragon came.
The rider was really full of himself, but seemed quite familiar in more ways than one. Fraze listened as intently as he could to the rambling, rather unhinged monologue. When it got to "seek to sever all ties with the villainous Spacefleet menace and make examples of all the agents of that evil entity who dare set foot on our precious soil," Fraze slowly became more and more engrossed in his section of rope, to the point that he seemed to fade into the ship and (hopefully) escape the notice of anyone present. It seemed to work.
Hiding will not help. I know what you are.
...Or maybe not. Fraze felt a thought from the dragon's direction--a sensation which sounds cool on paper, but is markedly disconcerting when it actually happens to you.
But my rider does not. Listen to what the weasel girl has to say. Assist her and this ship's crew with what I ask of them.
Well, that was cryptic.
Hey, work with me here. Holding two telepathic conversations at once is hard enough, but people just don't take you seriously unless you sound like you're giving someone a Quest.
That seemed reasonable. Fraze tried a tentative thought, not knowing if this communication was two-way. How did you know, ahem, what I was?
I tried to talk to your friend over there-- Fraze felt the telepathic equivalent of his conversation partner pointing over his shoulder (another rather confusing sensation) and realized Haggoth was there--but I couldn't. Which means that, somehow or other, he isn't from this world. He didn't look like any demon or mystical creature, so he had to be an alien.
Maybe he's just a mystical creature you haven't seen before?
Fraze was hit with an intense feeling of disdain directed toward him. Look, I'm a dragon. I have to know this stuff, it's in the job description.
Fair enough. So you want me to help the Pirates with something?
Yup. Get help from the others in your organization.
Fraze soon found out exactly what it was that the dragon needed help with. "He knows you've got 'Fleeters onboard your ship, he talked to me as well. I don't think he knew my rank in Spacefleet, but I think I'm stuck with helping you. Haggoth, Zari, any help you can give would be appreciated. But I'm not in an order-giving mood now since I'm still trying to make this a vacation, so treat it as a request. Just know that things could get very ugly if we get outed here."
Fraze tagged along with Zylaa & Co. down archetypically dingy alleyways, finally settling on an archetypically adventureish tavern to gather information.
Now this, finally, was something within Fraze's comfort zone. Information gathering wasn't his specialty, but it was something he knew quite well.
He ordered a pint of beer. Not very strong so he could easily keep his wits about him, but much more volume than hard liquor so it would last longer and look less conspicuous than a guy sitting at a table with an empty shot glass.
Unfortunately, the beer tasted rather like someone or something had already drunk it. Fraze chose a table roughly in the middle of the room and sat meditatively, catching small bits of conversation here and there.
"...found out through her niece..." "...three days! Three days they wanted..." "so I says to myself, I says, buddy, you..." "...camels and this giant tub of bacon fat, I mean..." "...never even heard of rhinoplasty, thought it was a..." "...caught some of those flying sky people..." "...thought it was hidden under the baking soda..." "...his hat, but I opened the box and it said..."
Wait, flying sky people? Fraze focused in on one particular table, a bit behind and to the left of him. "...'official business,' but they wouldn't say what it was. When Robert the Heroic asked who sent them, they said it was that Spacefleet. Guess they hadn't heard that we don't want anything to do with 'em."
Fraze looked around the room until he was sure he caught the eyes of one or more of the pirates, and scratched at his right ear with vigor. It had suddenly started itching, which helped a bit.
Taking a swig from his flagon and trying not to grimace, Fraze turned and glanced at the table of interest. It looked like an average group of guys enjoying a few drinks after work--average, of course, being a relative term given the other things Fraze had seen on this planet. ((Fraze's note: this means I can't come up with interesting character designs, and so I leave that to other people.))
"Robert tried to detain them in the jail at the town guards' office, but they claimed diplomatic immunity or something like that. Said they were here for peaceful negotiations. They were nice and all, but, I don't know, the way they said it made it sound like they would--" the man at the center of attention used a phrase that quite creatively pieced together several different obscenities and scientific terms in a way that was both awe-inspiring and enormously offensive "--if we didn't let them go."
"So what did you do?"
"What could we do? We had to let them go. Robert the Heroic--darn it, he always makes us call him that, it's become a habit even after I leave the office--he was fuming. He's probably still there throwing a fit."
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Post by Goosh on Jan 8, 2011 15:02:47 GMT -5
Goosh had ended up over at the counter, attempting to look inconspicuous and pick up some information. He had been mulling over his drink for a while now, directing some sparkles toward the bartender in an effort to charm some knowledge out of him.
What Goosh didn't know was that the bartender was an ex-mage who had blinded himself while preparing an experimental enchantment years ago and now got around using a magically enchanced form of echolocation. It was possible that the high pitched squeaks the barman was making as he served his drinks should have tipped Goosh off, but he had never been all that interested in biology.
Casting his eye around, Goosh looked for someone else promising, and saw Fraze attempting to claw off his own ear. Strolling over with his drink, he cranked up the sparkles a bit more and tried to turn on the mellifluous, honey-tongue voice thing.
"What could we do? We had to let them go. Robert the Heroic--darn it, he always makes us call him that, it's become a habit even after I leave the office--he was fuming. He's probably still there throwing a fit."
The others gave a chorus of agreement. Goosh noticed that one of the men was still wearing his uniform--a vest with a silhouette of a proudly posing dragon on the vest.
"That's a neat creature he has," Goosh said, pleased when he noticed his voice had a friendly, persuasive air floating about it.
The man with the vest shrugged and leaned toward him. "It's something of a brute, honestly. They're supposed to be able to talk, you know, it's what my mum told me, but in the time he's had it it's never said a word to any of us. Rob says it talks to him. I bet that overgrown lizard's too good for us." He snorted, as though he had told a joke, and Goosh grinned appreciatively. The man smiled back, eyes flicking over the sparkles that twinkled on his fur.
"Where does a man even find a beast like that? Did he win it a card game, or raise it as his own or something?"
"It's a funny story," vest man said, and his voiced dropped so that had Goosh had to lean in even closer and listen intently. "and by funny, I mean awful. See, the legend goes in this parts that in order to ride a beast like that, you have to defeat in a fight. So Robby's adventuring across the land, freeing buxom maidens while I'm working a desk job and barely making enough to--anyway, so he finds a dragon and asks to fight it, but the thing's a dragon, not an idiot, and it says no."
"So Robert tricks it by going after his pride?" Goosh whispered.
The man's eyes widened and he slammed his drink down on the table. "No! In the dead of night he sneaks up and kills the dragon's parents, right in their beds, and when the dragon finds out of course it wants to fight when Robert challenges it. But the creature's tired and horrified and it goes down in minutes, and so now it belongs to Robert until death do they part."
Goosh could barely believe what he was hearing. "Does everyone know this? Seems like he wouldn't be such a great hero if they knew he was, you know, a murdering coward-type guy."
"Nobody knows. He told me, when he first came here and hired me, only he tried to make it sound more hero like, you know, foul beast, cursed monster, that sort of thing? Only I told him it didn't sound very good and he might want to go with something better on the official record, which was the raised as a babe thing."
"What do you do for Robert, exactly?"
"I'm head of his PR department, actually. So, uh, don't go around telling anyone what I told you. You wouldn't want me to get fired, would you?"
Goosh slapped him on the back. "Of course not! You know, I have a pretty good story about how I singlehandedly freed an entire race of gentle giants from an ancient temple. It's a pretty good one." He stopped then, remembering that he was here to find information and not give it away. "But maybe I should save it for another time." He looked around the bar, trying to find Zylaa or Ikkin so he could share the news.
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Post by Huntress on Jan 11, 2011 16:36:32 GMT -5
As the crew headed into town, Hunty did what every trusting captain with a loyal crew does: set her meepits on them. After what she'd heard from Bob, she didn't want to risk sending them all off on their own without a rabid little ace up their sleeves. Besides, she needed a way to find them later. As captain, she couldn't storm off to a pub first, she had things to do.
And she did those things. She went and met with the harbour officials to get the paperwork done and her logbook back. She smiled the smiles and lied the lies and learned that yes, her Wanted posters hadn't reached this corner of the world, something that she always needed to learn the hard way because whenever she walked into a new harbour office, she didn't know if anyone would know who she was or not. She also learned the hard way that Port Parnassos was currently being governed by a dwindling sort of hierarchical tyranny which basically meant that the city officials held all the de facto powers and didn't hesitate to use it to add a little extra income to their already hefty salaries. Admittedly, she had an odd sort of liking for this sort of paperwork: it was nasty, and it left a bad taste in her mouth and a big hole in her wallet, but it always made things work out extremely fast.
"This might have been a bad idea," said Bloody Mary when the captain stepped out of the office.
"Come again?"
"I checked out their prices on our way in," said the meepit - the kind of character who paid attention to those kind of things. "They've a weak economy here. Low prices. You gave one heck of a huge bribe in comparison."
Hunty shrugged. She was an economical thinker but when it came to greasing gears, she didn't know how to skimp. When people were stupid enough to show her how exactly to influence them, she'd heap on the influence.
"What I mean is, they might start keeping a close eye on us," said Bloody Mary. "If you give them a lot, they'll want more."
"The big ones, yes. The small fish will just be glad that they got more than they'd hoped and are afraid to get too greedy, lest the big ones notice." They'd gotten back to the Weewoo in the meantime. Hunty stopped on the pier.
"Go find out which way the others went. I'll settle this one last thing and then we'll go join them."
As the meepit darted off over the cobbles, Hunty went up, put the necessary documents away or hid on her person, locked everything that needed to be locked, told the remaining meepitgang to keep an eye on everything and then went and did something very uncaptainy: fetched the slop bucket and emptied it over the board. Then took half a herring that'd been left at the bottom of the bucket and threw it farther away into the water.
Something huge and dark came near the surface for a second, then followed the herring and disappeared deeper again. The signal had been picked up.
Hunty walked down the entire pier, to the very end where there were no more ships or people milling about. Here she sat down and kicked a pebble into the water.
The blarf surfaced and took a deep breath. He could spend nearly two hours holding his breath but he obviously didn't like it, so he seemed to be thankful to finally be allowed up. Hunty wrapped her arms around her knees and looked down at the beady black eye of the huge creature who, for some odd reason, liked to follow them around.
"The Great Megahexapod, huh?" she muttered.
The blarf, knowing that he wasn't allowed to make a sound, just blinked. This was probably the first time that the captain really considered how little they knew about the blarf. He was this huge soppy monstrous puppydog who they'd released and who'd been swimming along with their ship since, despite being a land-dwelling mammal who didn't really like having to stay underwater for secrecy's sake. He was at least as smart as her meepits and could talk, even if he did it rarely because his speech took ages. He'd never told them what he was, or where his race had come from. And they'd never asked. They tended to treat him like a big puppy or a glorified steed, sometimes both.
"You're a good boy, arentcha?" Hunty muttered again, with a bit of grim self-deprecating irony thrown in. There was another blink.
"Well, you're our boy, whatever you are. It's dangerous in this harbour. Stay away from here while we're in the city. Try to keep closer to the ocean. If something happens, swim away."
Another blink, and the blarf sunk off. Hunty got up, her heart oddly heavy and her head full of questions she felt she should've gotten long before she'd read that book in Mage Manor.
And that was even besides the info she'd gotten from that other book, that suggested that the Port Parnassos people may have invented some sort of a sun mirror that they used to fry enemy ships and assorted sea monsters.
She went and found Bloody Mary who showed her the way, headed off to town, found the tavern the rest of the crew had found, edged in, ignoring everyone she knew, popped down by the counter and ordered a pint, her face like a thundercloud.
"A pint of what?" The bartender, like most people in his profession, seemed to be the kind of guy who's seen everything and isn't easily swayed. In a job where people can randomly march in and order three bottles of whiskey and an assassin, you more or less have to be.
"Whaddya got?"
"Eggnog?"
Hunty paused. "Bit out of season, isn't it?"
The bartender shrugged. "Wasn't able to sell everything over the holidays. How about it?"
She got the pint of eggnog and turned around on the barstool to sip it and watch the everyday commotion in the bar and especially the progress of her undercover crewmembers, then curiosity got the best of her and she turned around again.
"Why exactly," she asked, "do you squeak at the barrels?"
"I'm blind," the bartender said matter-of-factly.
"Ah," said Hunty. "In which case you can't tell that I'm currently sporting a politely blank look on my face that's expecting you to connect those two statements without me having to ask more awkward questions."
Over the next few minutes and a good third of the eggnog pint, she got to hear the bartender's rather interesting story. Unfortunately he got called off to pour more drinks just as it was getting good, leaving Hunty to mull over the idea of turf wars between undead penguins and zombie dolphins. Then something struck her.
"Hey, barkeep!" she called when the man was squeaking his way towards her end of the counter again. "You said that you were a bio-mage?"
"Yes?"
"This is a bit of a stretch, but have you ever heard of Great Megahexapods?"
The bartender's face lit up. "Ooh, now there's a fascinating beast - they say they're just legends, really, but I've heard stories-" At that point, he got called off again and he snorted impatiently, then pulled out a book from under the shelf. "Sorry, busy afternoon. Here, read this, it's got all that's know about them."
Hunty turned around on the stool again, opened the book, took the glass in the other hand and, keeping half an eye on the people in the bar, got to reading.
For a while, she stared at the book in disbelief.
"So," she then said to Bloody Mary. "Can you read Braille?"
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Post by Ikkin on Jan 12, 2011 22:04:47 GMT -5
"Let's split up, like we're looking for a place to sit. If you find someone saying something interesting, scratch an ear, and we'll mosey over. Or at least, Goosh, you mosey over. Sparkle charms should help us learn what we want to know."
Ikkin nodded, then walked over to the bar, weighing her options. Her kitsune hearing was good enough that sitting around and pretending to drink left her able to hear any conversation she wanted to in detail -- but that meant she needed to order something to drink, which wasn't something she found particularly appealing. Even if she enjoyed alcohol -- which she didn't -- she'd still have trouble getting past the dirty taste from the glasses in this sort of place. And, as a pirate, she couldn't exactly order the kind of drink she actually liked, because ordering non-alcoholic beverages at a pub was just embarrassing.
Fortunately, someone else was already ordering a drink, so she didn't have to decide right away. And, even more fortunately, that someone else seemed to be a pretty good source of information himself, hinting at the frustrations of her day in her manner of ordering her drink.
"Ugh, I think I'm gonna need the hard stuff tonight, 'keep. Had to deal with that so-called 'Hero' twice today. Can't stand bein' around that bas----. Makes you feel wrong, y'know?"
Looking at her, Ikkin wouldn't have been surprised if she was a pirate herself -- she wore a long red coat, partially concealing the wider sort of cutlass that she carried from her belt. She had black hair that had been braided a hundred times, then tied back with a gold ring, skin that was too dark to just be tanned, and a very striking scar across the bridge of her nose.
"Did you have a run-in with that Robert guy, too?" Ikkin asked, hoping the woman wouldn't mind a stranger butting in on her conversation.
She jumped a bit at Ikkin's voice, but seemed pretty willing to talk once she decided Ikkin wasn't a threat. "Did I ever. Bas---- thinks he can just waltz right up and demand a bigger bribe any time he d--- well pleases, whether your papers pan out or not. He don't really care if you're legit, as long as you ain't with the sky people and dance when he tells you to. He prob'ly feeds anyone who can't pay to his dragon. Not that anyone seems to mind around here." She took a large, angry gulp of the large glass the barkeep had just placed in front of her (which smelled far more powerful than something ordered in that quantity had any right to) and placed a few coins in front of her for him to collect.
"No one has a problem with that kind of corruption?" Ikkin asked.
"You're not from around here, are you?" the woman asked derisively.
"I'm crew on a merchant ship," Ikkin said cautiously, using the standard line.
"Tch. Right," the woman said, rolling her eyes and taking another swig of her drink. "Merchants like you are always dyin' to figure out whether the 'Hero' has any enemies. Sorry to say, he don't. Bas---- has some kind of mind-control, I swear. Hard to think straight around him. Makes you want to agree with him, even if you rightly ought to hate his stinkin' guts, and it seems to affect anyone 'nice' even worse 'cause they don't have no reason to fight it. There might be a few like me who'd love to see him eaten by that giant lizard of his, but there ain't many, and good luck gettin' all of them together, 'cause they won't work together, and I wouldn't work with most of 'em either."
"You really seem to have thought about this a lot, haven't you?" Ikkin noted.
"I've thought about it once or twice," the woman admitted. "But that dragon of his makes it kinda hard to dispose of the bas----. If he didn't have that thing, he'd have been long gone, brainwashing or no. Thought of takin' it in its sleep, but it's just too risky to be worth it."
"You know where it sleeps?" Ikkin asked. Now, this could be useful...
"It's not exactly a secret. He keeps it in a giant glass den right outside his 'palace,' all the better to use as a threat to anyone who crosses him. It's kinda hard to miss."
"I guess I'll have to go see that, then," Ikkin said with a smirk.
"Good luck with that," the woman said. "Keep me in mind if you figure out some way to depose the 'Hero,' okay?"
"I'll do that," Ikkin said, turning around to see if anyone else had found anything while idly scratching her ear. She noticed Goosh, who looked like he'd been trying to catch her attention too, and made her way over to him.
"I think I know where we can find the dragon," she said. "How about you?"
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Post by Zylaa on Jan 16, 2011 22:05:49 GMT -5
Zylaa had moseyed over to the far left corner of the room, where she saw a large crowd passing through into a back room. She figured that would be a good place to pick up some information.
Unfortunately, the massive crowd was gathering only for gambling on a wrestling match, and she overheard nothing but people shouting bets, and a few insults with enough creative profanity to strip paint off walls. By the time Zylaa had determined that there was nothing worth hearing and turned around, more people had pressed in behind her, shoving her forward. The girl sighed and began to, for lack of a better word, weasel her way through the crowd.
One particularly rude gentleman banged into her elbow, and her rum spilled onto him. There was a moment of horrified silence.
"My coat!" said the man.
"My rum!" said Zylaa. She glared up at the man, realized that he was in fact large enough to be eclipsing the lantern light from the walls, and backed away. The man wasn't going to be dissuaded that easily, though, and advanced a couple of steps towards her.
She did what any self-preserving girl would, and quickly drew her spoon, twitching it just a bit.
A weasel appeared out of midair and landed on the man's face.
In the roar and confusion, Zylaa nipped out of the room into the main body of the bar and casually-- but very quickly-- sauntered over to Goosh and Ikkin.
"I'm going to just wander outside and make sure one angry rum-soaked man can't find me," said Zylaa. "Carry on."
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Post by Fraze on Jan 22, 2011 3:10:20 GMT -5
Fraze casually found his way over to the coalescing party, conveniently leaving his drink on the table.
"I might know where you can find your farmer. He should be in the town guards' office. Which is mostly useful because you'll know how to avoid him. But he's been actively taking hostile actions against Spacefleet, which means that this is now my business too. Actually, I'm surprised this information never got to me before now. I get building requests for an extra bathroom in some remote part of the seventh wing that no one will ever use, but when two of my officers get detained by a planetside government I don't hear about it until I go there on vacation and vacation this is a vacation I keep forgetting that."
He took a breath, paused, and continued on a more coherent track. "So it would seem, the next thing you need is a map, unless you know your way around here."
Fraze felt a tug on his arm. He looked around, then down, seeing an archetypal street urchin. Assuming the obvious, Fraze said, "I'm sorry, I don't have any money."
The child shook its head. It looked to be a girl, but Fraze wasn't sure. "Sky people?"
...Oh.
Trying a neutral route, Fraze answered, "What do you know about them?"
The child looked down and shifted. "They helped me when everything was rock."
Ahhh. This could be good or bad.
"Everyone says they're bad, but they saved me."
Hmmm. This could be very good or very bad.
"I tried to help them once, but Robert the Heroic found out and stopped me."
"The space people need help again," Fraze told the child. "Can you show us where Robert the Heroic keeps his dragon?"
The child shifted again and looked down. "He'll be mad if I do."
Fraze got down on one knee. Putting all of his meagre childhandling abilities to use, he said, "That's okay, we'll keep you safe."
The child looked up and around, presumably judging the people around Fraze. She took particular time in examining Ikkin, finally saying, "You're glowing a lot." As if that pronouncement made up her mind, she got up and started to walk toward the door. "It's this way."
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Post by Huntress on Jan 22, 2011 12:42:10 GMT -5
thunk.
Hunty didn't usually gather intelligence when she was at a bar. She didn't do subtlety well, always saying that you can't shoot a crossbow in a curve, and so she always suspected that if she tried to spy on anyone, she'd come off like a guy who's just climbed out of a fancy villa's outdoor pool in a tuxedo. So she preferred to stay in the background, watching and waiting and overseeing the progress. Someone had to do it, anyway. If the situation got ugly, it was good to have someone around that the local brutes didn't consider to be part of the troublemakers' group.
But when Hunty's glass hit the table with a thunk, it was time to go, sooner or later, blatantly or inconspicuously, as the situation may have warranted. The captain herself just got up and left without looking around, only stopping for a moment further down the counter to rattle her nails on it. Bloody Mary, who'd spent the last few minutes talking to the bartender over the book, said a hasty goodbye and off they went.
"What'd he tell you?" Hunty asked the meepit once they were outside. It was dark now, and the white city seemed to glow in the moonlight. All the narrow streets were studded with rows of blazing street lamps and the captain had to step back to let a man with a torch pass to light the lamps on the street they were on. Whoever was currently running this city seemed to be doing a fairly efficient job.
"Yeah, I'd like to run this past the blarf first if you don't mind," said the meepit. "I heard some interesting things, but there's a thing or two I'd like to specify first."
Hunty paused. "O-kay? We probably have more pressing matters to deal with right now anyway."
Trying to shake off the feeling that Bloody Mary's voice had sounded a bit odd, she turned around and glared at the brightly lit rectangle of the tavern's door, as if defying it to spit out her crewmates right this instant. Then her eyes wandered down towards the street rat.
"So you can show us the way?"
* * *
Catacombs.
All things considered, she should've been able to predict it. Port Parnassos was an old city, filled with people and a history that somehow liked tyrants who rose to power surfing the metaphorical river of blood.* People... expired. Once they had, though, they could stick around for a pretty long time. So they had to be put somewhere. Underground was the most logical option: it was out of the way, it didn't offend anyone's sensibilities unless they came down here, and most people didn't, and it presumably offered all the resting in peace a dead guy would ever want, provided they didn't mind getting piled up with all the other dead guys.
"They look pretty happy about it," Bloody Mary guessed after hearing Hunty's train of thoughts. The street urchin was leading them through a narrow walkway between seven-foot-high walls of skulls. And skeletons. And more skulls. The catacombs had once actually been pretty spacious, judging by the ceiling, but now they sometimes had to edge along sideways to get by.
"Yeah, it might be nice to have someone to hang out with after death," Hunty admitted, her voice a little shrill. "I've always thought that a grave is such a depressingly lonely place... Hey kid, you sure we're going in the right direction?"
The child nodded, hurrying on. She was carrying a small safety lantern: a lot of the skeletons were effectively mummies and open fire would probably have made the entire place go up in flames.
"They live down here," said the meepit, who was looking around curiously. "They always do. It's warm, it's dry, it doesn't rain here and nobody bothers them here. I imagine they've had time to get to know every single pathway here."
"Including the ones they shouldn't ever walk," Hunty muttered, noticing that the kid was slower now, and more hesitant. "Don't worry, we got your-"
The street urchin stopped and pointed round a corner without a word. Hunty edged past her and stopped to stare.
"-back."
In daytime, this was probably a brilliant, awe-inspiring sight: a huge cave with a dome of glass built over it. The dome consisted of thousands of little glass plates fused together, breaking and fracturing the moonlight and the glitter of street lamps outside to pour it over the cave in shades of cold blue and warm orange. There seemed to be multiple openings, all of them leading to skull-laden catacombs, plus a much bigger, wider pathway in the opposite end of the cave. And in that cave slept the dragon.
Hunty had half expected it to be sleeping on a pile of treasure, when it was instead resting on a pretty comfy-looking nest of branches and rags. It had curled up like a cat, both wings spread out and the neck curving away from the huge scaly body, hiding the head from sight. The only thing visible from the dragon's head was one huge spike-fringed ear - which was moving.
You humans, a voice rumbled through the entire crew's collective conscious, are never able to approach anything quietly.
* One of them had done it literally, down one of the staircases in the castle after a very ugly coup. He ended up colliding into a wall. Port Parnassos considers it the quickest and most embarrassing restoration of a previous reign they've had to date.
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Post by Robyn on Jan 23, 2011 17:44:00 GMT -5
"Wait wait wait WAIT WAIT WAIT-"
A square rum bottle clunked to the floor and spilled its troubles onto the ground as its partaker rushed for the exit. The doorway danced in rainbow duality, so she stopped, waiting for the alcohol to ease its grip on her senses. No such luck. She leaned against the counter for two seconds before heaving herself up and prepping for the most drunken jog of her lifetime--
"You weren't thinkin' of leaving without payin' now, were you?"
Robyn glared over at the blind barkeep.
"How'd you know?" she slurred. He grinned and made a few dolphin squeaks before holding his hand out expectantly. The girl muttered something about not having time for this as she dug in her corset. Two shinies and a quick pondering about that man's oddities later, she was marathon staggering out to the shoreline, where the White Weewoo was already a good mile away.
She skidded to a stop, her feet tossing sand into the breaking surf, and stared at the rapidly vanishing sails. That was her ticket away from this place-- away from the mage kingdoms and...well, what was here wasn't exactly important, that was the whole point. The wind tossed her champagne tresses as she weighed the options of going after them.
No, that was a lie. A half a bottle of rum doesn't exactly do one the favor of allowing them to weigh any options. Inhibitions wiped away by good old Al, she muttered a few Latin-sounding words, stretched her now-revealed-to-sight wings, and after a few stumbling flaps, coasted over the moonlit sea to catch up with the ivory vessel.
--
The sobering up began sometime along with the sunrise, and with it came the ever nearing silhouette of the great ship. Unable to believe she had actually flown out this far to sea without considering the risk of tiring out and drowning (and she was starting to tire out), and horrified that she'd chanced someone seeing her with these two ungodly appendages jutting out of her shoulderblades, Robyn tilted her wings and soared below the sights of the deck, hovering around the very thick of the hull.
Subtlety was key. She was lucky enough to find a few evenly-enough-spaced notches in the ship's outer woodwork that would serve as handholds as she scaled the side. Wings still flapping awkwardly, she made her way up until a lift of her neck would bring her chin to rest upon the starboard rail. Another quick spell vanished the freakshow, but even then, she knew she risked several guns in her face and a trip off the plank if she was caught sneaking aboard, and almost certainly if she was discovered after that. This was beginning to look like a lose-lose situation.
However, Robyn was not one to leave a job unfinished, no matter how drunk she'd been when it was started. Bracing herself for the worst, she hefted herself aboard-- only to find a completely deserted ship.
..."Oh. Mkay then."
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Post by Zylaa on Jan 24, 2011 17:10:54 GMT -5
You humans, said the dragon's voice in Zylaa's head, are never able to approach anything quietly.
Zylaa considered pointing out that she was, in fact, sort of a weasel, but decided not to reply. Instead she settled for feeling slightly smug.
Something was wrong about this scene, though. She watched the dragon carefully as it slowly raised its head, opening its massive eyes to regard them with a sort of baleful stare. It wasn't the nest... Although really, there should be a mound of treasure there...
Have you ever tried sleeping on a mound of treasure? the dragon asked Zylaa.
... Yes said Zylaa, shuffling her feet. Stop eavesdropping on my thoughts. It's not very nice to do that to your rescuers.
Rescuers... it clicked. Aloud, she said, "You're not chained in."
I'm not, the dragon affirmed, again to the group. I could deal with chains on my own. It's somewhat more difficult than that. This is a matter of stories.
"We heard that by defeating you, Robert made you his slave forever, or something like that," Zylaa said. Goosh had shared the story with the crew on the way over.
An old story, said the dragon. He was slowly stirring from his nest, tail twitching, wings momentarily stretching into the air and nearly brushing the beautiful glass ceiling. A load of rubbish, of course. Until someone comes along with certain... abilities.
"Like what?" said Zylaa, with a distinct feeling of foreboding. This was starting to sound very familiar.
The ability to make stories real. At least the stories she wants people to believe. Did you ever wonder why Robert was so suspicious of pirates? The dragon sighed, an odd sound coming from a creature so massive. The number of times I've heard her go on about it... she really doesn't like you guys. And she's an experienced one, your Mary-Sue friend.
"Shiny," Zylaa muttered with as much sarcasm as she could muster. Kassandra Amethyst Moonbeam, Mary-Sue extraordinaire, able to turn stories to her whim. "So how can we get you out, if you're stuck in one of her stories?"
I think you'll have to steal me, said the dragon, matter-of-factly. Zylaa blinked.
"Steal you? But... you have no chains on. All we'd be doing is going 'Hey, the exit is that way, let's go.'"
Basically. You're just going to have to do it dramatically. Oh, and probably as the villains.
"I still don't see the problem with--"
Mary-Sues can sense when they're needed for a dramatic conflict. She's about to burst dramatically into the roo--
"FIENDS! I'll never let you take dear Flame away!" a golden-toned voice, like the majestic cry of an eagle screamed from one of the pathways behind the Pirates. Zylaa turned.
Kassandra Amethyst Moonbeam barreled down a corridor into the room, wielding a glowing sword shining with righteous fury, clad today in some rather skimpy and decidedly unpractical armor. She struck a defiant pose by her entryway, letting each one of her hairs fall back into its perfectly-kept place.
"Not again," Zylaa groaned. Despite being a delicate, almost elven maiden, whose warlike demeanor belied her gentle heart, Kassandra had one heck of a sneer going as she lowered her sword towards the pirates.
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Post by Fraze on Jan 25, 2011 1:03:48 GMT -5
Fraze sighed. Typical. Actually, given the research he'd done about Sues, this was exactly why the thing had shown up.
It was a story she needed? A villain? Fine. Problem was, no one would be able to get close enough to attack the radiant beauty standing before them without feeling its effects.
Well, no "one?"
Fraze clicked his tongue. "Stun." He looked directly at the Sue. With the speed of a bullet, the security drone that had been perched in the crook of his Fraze's neck flew off toward the Sue.
The drone's stun setting had two stages: first, an electric shock for immediate control; second, a paralyzing neurotoxin for longer incapacitation. Fraze had no idea if the paralysis would hold, but anything with a nervous system should short-circuit at 50,000 volts.
Kassandra gave a beautiful wounded cry of surprise, before falling to the ground magnificently, like a dying swan, twitching randomly from the electric shock.
It was a villain she wanted? This should be fun.
Fraze gave his best evil laugh, putting forth all the resonance he could muster. He even got some nice reverberation off the walls and ceiling. "MUHEHEHAHAHAAAAAAA! Foolish little girl!" He walked slowly, making sure to have his footsteps echo throughout the chamber. On the practical side, he made sure to stay out of the Sue's range of vision--which at this point was more or less the floor and a bit of wall.
"Did you really think you would be able to stop us? You will let us take the dragon, or we will blow that beloved palace into a million pieces! Oh, I know what you're going to say." He raised his voice to a squeak. "'You'll never get away with this!' But we have, my dear, we have. And now, farewell. We cant let this...drag on1 too long."
This evil gloating thing was pretty fun, but they did have to get going.
"Now come, my new little pet!" Fraze called, and raised a knowing eyebrow to the dragon. The beast, showing what Fraze assumed to be the wisdom of centuries but might very well have been just a good gambling sense, played along
Oh no. These evil pirates are stealing me. Please help me Kassandra. I don't want to goooooooo...
Its voice--thought?--faded into the distance. Neat trick.
Um. How do we get out of here? Fraze thought to the creature.
That passageway leads to the palace, you'll get caught there. The best way would be... the dragon tilted its head skyward. ...straight up.
Joy. Magnificent stained glass windows in action movies were made with one and only one purpose: to be smashed through spectacularly by the heroes. Or villains, in this case. But those scenes hardly ever addressed the problem of flying through a cloud of thousands of shards of glass. The dragon looked like it would be all right, it was covered in tough scales, but the humans wouldn't do so well.
Fraze felt a light touch on his arm. He looked down, and saw the little urchin. "I can help," she said simply.
"How?" Fraze asked softly, making sure Kassandra could not hear.
The girl put both hands on the nearby wall and pressed against it. After a few seconds, a section of the wall took on the semitransparent look of something looked at through crossed eyes. The child walked through the thick wall, until her path was blocked by piled skeletons, then back into the chamber.
"You can do that up there?" Fraze asked.
The girl nodded. "Anything that's to keep people out. I'll only do it if you let me come."
Well, at this point it didn't seem they had much choice. "Okay, come on." Raising his voice again, he called, "Come, comrades! Let us depart."
Fraze came to the dragon, who put its head down and graciously allowed Fraze and the girl to climb onto it. From this angle, Fraze saw something in the dragon's nest that looked familiar. Something wooden and metal and spiky in places that were rather threatening...
"Huntress," he asked in a lower voice while still trying to sound Villainous just in case he was overheard. "Is that your crossbow?"
Once the crew had all gathered onboard the dragon, it opened its wings. Save me Kassandra, please, help, don't let them take me it opined in an emotionless deadpan, and flapped several times to get off the ground.
"Stop within arm's reach of the ceiling, if you could," Fraze told the creature. It did so, keeping a shaky altitude. The girl couldn't quite reach the ceiling, so Fraze lifted her up until she could. The entire magnificent glass window became more transparent than it already was. The dragon rose out of it with what Fraze was sure would have been great majesty, had they been in daylight with the sun shining behind them.
He sat back down and sighed. "So we just saved a dragon in distress from an enraged damsel. What. The. Hell."
1 Heheh, "drag on," get it? Like a dragon?...Okay, I didn't actually realize that until I wrote it. But I'm gonna have to use it again some time.
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Post by Huntress on Jan 25, 2011 15:09:47 GMT -5
When Kassandra of all people - or elfsues - showed up, Hunty couldn't help but facepalm. She had a vague feeling that it went against type in some way, but when it came to this particular Sue, she wouldn't let anything in the universe to keep her from facepalming where facepalming was due.
Granted, at this point the Sue was a crumpled heap of broken elegance on the floor, and that Hunty could appreciate. As far as she was concerned, Kassandra was at her most manageable this way.
"You know, it doesn't have to be this way," she called out. "Remember the last time we met? We basically saved this world together. We don't have to fight. Why couldn't you just see our cause for what it is and join us in-" She paused. "Okay, where the frek did this come from?"
"She owns this place," said Bloody Mary, who'd been humming the Imperial March on her shoulder up until that point. "Don't think we'll be anything but villains in her eyes, even if you try and nudge yourself into the smooth-talking sneaky villain category. Best just get out of here."
Hunty nodded, shot another suspicious glare at the Sue and trotted over to the huge dragon, where Fraze pointed out a crossbow to her. The captain skidded to a halt and stared at it incredulously before picking it up and weighing it in her hand.
"Seems to be mine, alright," she admitted, turning the white black-patterned crossbow around in her hands. Where had she even lost it in the first place...?
"Hunty, don't make me bite you!"
"Because I'd be a huge improvement with rabies, you've always said," Hunty snapped back, climbing up the dragon, which shifted and snarled at her touch.
Archenemy, the dragon-voice tore through their collective conscious again. Archenemy!
"Oh yeah, that business," Hunty gasped, heaving herself onto the dragon's back. "Jeebus, the way she acts about it, you'd think I killed her family and dropkicked her puppy into an air vent or something."
As the dragon took off, still twitchy with the conflicting orders raging through its mind, Kassandra let out a wail.
"Robert!"
It tore right through the heartstrings, a heartbreaking, desperate cry carefully calibrated to melt every single heart in its vicinity, a desolate soul verging on the very edge of the deep chasm to a complete breakdown, or, if you want to be a cruel cold jerk about it, the sound of a cat being driven to the vet.
And then they were out. Hunty, now risking to sit up, found dragonriding to be pretty unpleasant: there were hard scales and constant jerky motion and the night was pretty cold, but at least they were out.
"Flaaaaaame!!" This was coming from one of the tallest towers in the palace. Robert was standing there, desperately waving his sword, a mere stick figure from this distance. The dragon roared in response and turned towards the sea.
Fraze sat back. "So we just saved a dragon in distress from an enraged damsel. What. The. Hell."
"And screwed the Spacefleet over for the next ten years in diplomacy, oh great commander of the biggest peacekeeping organization on the planet," Hunty jabbed, trying to edge sideways on the dragon's back. Was there not a single comfortable square inch on this beast? "Although now of course they'll at least have a legit reason to hate you."
Something landed on her nose. She looked up. Clouds were gathering.
"Flame, come back!" a sad wail drifted to them from the palace. "You were my only friend!"
"Annnd here comes the angsty breakdown in the rain," said Bloody Mary.
Hunty was still staring up, a scowl creeping slowly across her face.
"Which means," she said, "that Kassandra's grip is so much bigger than we thought..."
Yeah, um, said the dragon's voice in their heads. I believe I'll have to kill you all now.
There was a moment of tense silence, during which the rain got stronger.
I mean, this is the Boy And His Dragon story you just interfered with. I'm a big dragon, said the dragon, whose flight was now getting jerkier and more unsure. You're just sitting there on my back. Most supervillains will at least bind you with a spell or threaten to kill your families, but as far as kidnapping goes, you lot don't exactly- gnk!
The end of this line dissolved into a screech, clear and painful like nails on chalkboard but a hundred times the volume. The dragon veered sideways in the air.
"Yeah, so I never quite got villainy down," said Hunty. "But I will admit that you don't get where I am while being a very nice person. Your back is a bit slippery, you know? Pretty hard to get a good grip."
She'd finally gotten a grip, on the hilt of her Sue-sword. The half of it that was visible was blazing with silvery light. The other half disappeared between the scales.
It burns! hissed the dragon.
"Yeah, I should imagine. You're a bit too big to be harmed by stabbing, but it is Sue-magic. I wouldn't like it either. So to save on words, go find my ship now please?"
It's... out at sea. The dragon picked up speed again.
Hunty paused. "What's it doing out at sea?"
I'm a dragon, not a magic mirror. It's not far, anyway.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 26, 2011 9:09:01 GMT -5
Nasue had been preparing herself. She'd asked questions; she'd prepared and eaten some food; she'd pulled on her belt and taken her knife and pistol. (Flintlock, of course.) She had even put on her glasses and tried to neaten herself up, all for going ashore as part of the crew for the first time.
And at the last second, she'd chickened out.
So instead, she had stayed behind and kept watch. This mostly consisted of keeping an eye on the docks and other things that needed keeping an eye on, and pacing back and forth on the deck. Nasue being Nasue, it also consisted of trying not to mentally beat herself up for being cowardly.
For all intents and purposes, she was reasonably alert. But it was still possible to catch her off-guard.
Next thing she knew, there was something - or someone - behind her, growling. She whirled around, and as her eyes flashed with a familiar yellow glow, she saw an all-too-familiar sight.
...WHAT.
It wasn't the shape of an anthropomorphic panther. It was his complete lack of colours, as if he was a void in reality.
The panther lunged towards her, and his fist went right into her head. She felt herself landing roughly on the deck as she lost consciousness.
When she awoke, the first thing the coati saw was wood.
Groaning, she tried to move her head, but found that it was stuck. So she tried her arm. Stuck. Her leg. Stuck. Her tail? The tip was free, but the rest was stuck.
And then she noticed why she was stuck. She was in a sealed and empty barrel.
Yeek! Oh no... Nonononononononono!
Nasue panicked. In panicking, she curled up and quaked. She began to rock back and forth, as much as she could in the barrel.
The barrel suddenly tipped on its side, and its stopper* came out. So did a certain blue coati, who found herself just as suddenly lying on her back on the deck, looking up at a cloudy sky with rain falling.
Wait what?! Where am I what am I lying on what just happened when did the weather change how long was I out is that red I'm seeing in my peripheral vision why aren't I getting out of the rain?
Nasue blinked and stared confusedly for a few moments. Afterwards, she slowly sat up, putting a hand to a sore spot on her head. It felt wet. She looked at her hand, and saw a spot of blood. ...lovely.
And only now did she notice two very wrong things.
First, the White Weewoo wasn't at port anymore. It was out at sea.
And second, there was a stranger on the deck.
Crudcrudcrudcrudcrud!
Nasue rapidly got to her feet, staring at this stranger. A human, but--the coati's eyes were glowing yellow again--judging by the colours she saw, probably a mage of some sort. Crap. WhatdoIdowhatdoIdo?
She reached for the knife at her side.
"Who are you?!"
--
"There it is!" One of the ninja sailors called. He quickly lowered his telescope. "There's the White Weewoo!"
"'bout time," said a second one.
Kovaran had been gazing at the deck of the ninja ship, but upon hearing those words, he looked up and grinned.
*- Apparently the actual word for one of those is "bung", but "stopper" sounds less ridiculous.
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Post by Robyn on Jan 26, 2011 17:26:23 GMT -5
Robyn couldn't have picked a more beautiful ship to more-or-less hijack. No, no-- hijack was such a dirty word. She wouldn't be commandeering it so much as she would be temporarily stowing away on it...of course, that made her a stowaway... No, she wouldn't doing be any of those things at all. She would just be an unexpected, but nonetheless helpful, new addition to their crew, so long as she wasn't killed on the spot once they came back.
The Weewoo heaved from the shove of the ocean, and Robyn was tossed against the railing over which she'd climbed aboard. The breath was nearly forced out of her as spine met wood, and she stumbled back onto the deck as the ship righted itself once more.
Wait. This ship is out at sea...and no one is on it.
"GHOST SHIP."
Defensive methods raced through Robyn's mind as she steadied herself, the adrenaline coursing through her slowly ridding her of the pain in her back. Her hands went to either side of her belt. Cutlass and pistol probably wouldn't do anything against a spirit, tangible or not.
THINK. Think back to school! Didn't they teach you how to deal with this sort of thing? YOU WERE RAISED AROUND THE SUPERNATURAL THINK THINK THINK
Wasn't there a kind of fire spell that was effective against ectocentric beings? Oh God what was the spell WHAT WAS THE SPELL
Before she could even breathe in, a fairly inconspicuous barrel by the cabins tipped onto its side and exploded in a mass of blue fur. Robyn saw a pair of yellow eyes flash, and almost instantly, she was being threatened by a knife-wielding humanoid...cat-like...red..panda...anteater? She quickly drew her cutlass in response.
"Who are you?!"
Robyn raced to study her opponent, lest she make a wrong move. She was completely opaque and threatening her with a sword, which was not usually a ghost's MO. She was also bleeding heavily from a wound on the side of her head, and unless it was for dramatic flair, ghosts rarely bled. She lowered her weapon.
"Oh my God, you're really hurt..." she murmured. Looking down, she moved to tear a strip off of the hem of her billowing blouse. "Here, you have to let me help you."
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Post by Deleted on Jan 26, 2011 21:20:26 GMT -5
Honestly, it wasn't hard to see that Nasue was scared. Even if she was standing her ground and demanding to know who ship-boarding strangers were, and even if she had a knife and a pistol at the ready (as well as claws and teeth), her hands were shaking, her fur was standing on end and her ears were folded back.
Please let this not end badly. Please let this not end ba--uh?
The stranger had lowered her weapon and was offering to help the coati with her wound.
"...what?"
Now she was confused as well as scared. Why's she doing this? I don't know her and she's trying to help? ... Is she trying to do that "get close to me and then kill me when I least suspect it" thing? Is she--does she know that panther-thing?!
"You're not--that panther. D'you know that panther? Y-you'd better not be planning to--to kill me when I drop my guard, y'hear?! I-I have a crew, y'know!"
C'mon, guys! Where are you?!
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