Veltisiel waits for his moment. Just as Plugg is leaning into a wave crashing over the deck, V casts his spell. The grease appears under the newly minted captain. His feet fly out from under him. His eyes lock on Ravenna as he slides in the briny water toward the back of the ship. He reaches out for the railing, his fingers grasping at nothing as the ship falls out from under him and he continues his trajectory into the inky darkness of the storm.
Narwhal Tate reaches out toward him helplessly. As his patron disappears, Tate calls, "Man Overboard!"
Tate's eyes slide across the deck, finding the quickly dissolving fat on the deck.
"Worse! MUTINY!"
Ravenna does a startlingly genuine job of looking shocked and horrified as Plugg skids off past the railing, even reaching out for him just a little too late. She seems to be shouting something but nobody can really hear her over the storm. As Plugg goes over she rushes to the rails and looks over into the dark, stormy waves.
"No catching him now! Not in this storm!" shouts Raush, delighted by the offering that his Queen just received. "This demise is a teaching! Respect the Reaver, you all, respect the fiery lass that is Besmara, lest she takes you as her prize! Strong you must be, stronger than the waves! Wrestle a victory and a blessing from her, and tomorrow we'll toast to the survival of the fittest!"
As chaotic as things are on deck, it takes a few moments for the cry of Man Overboard to spread across the decks. When Scourge hears it, he runs for the railing, gazing astern. For the first time ever, you see the man's cruel face break. A moment ago, all of his dreams had come true. He was first mate on a ship commanded by Mr. Plugg. He could have hoped for nothing more. Now Plugg is gone, disappeared overboard. The storm is unrelenting and offers no sign of him. Lightning streaks the sky, illuminating everything in stark white light. No one sees a sign of Plugg. The struggle to keep the ship afloat continues.
Scourge moves toward the Sterncastle. "I am taking command of the ship in Mr. Plugg's absence. Reef the main. Chockablock that small sail."
Ordrax watches scourge as he makes his announcement. He shows no emotion and keeps his eyes down. Even after he heads to the sterncastle, he still shows no emotion.
One down, Vel thinks to himself, Just a few to go.
Then busies himself making sure that the rest of them don't join Plugg.
The storm rages through the night, and everyone seems too engaged in surviving to be overly concerned with the loss of Plugg. The captain's quarters have the benefit of a mechanical clock, so Ravenna is able to keep track of time and ring a bell for each hour that passes. Less than an hour before dawn, the ship lurches suddenly and your ears are filled with a great cracking of timber. Someone falls from the ropes overhead into the waves below, you aren't sure who. A lantern at the stern falls to the deck, but the ship is so waterlogged that even the oil cannot catch.
The ship has run aground.
Raush curses violently as the impact throws him off his feet, and scurries to the balcony on all fours. "Man overboard! Besmara preyed on another soul!" he shouts.
Veltisiel keeps his balance as the ship lurches to a stop. Glad that he hadn't been washed overboard, he rushes to the side to see who had fallen in, and if they were someone that he should try to rescue.
The storm still rages. It may not break up for hours yet. You cannot see anyone in the water, but looking around the ship you cannot account for Rosie Cusswell. Rosie is a swab, and shouldn't have been in the rigging, but in the chaos who knows what might have happened.
Holding on for dear life as he waits the storm out, D'ogryn wonders what happened.
The ship holds together as the intensity of the storm gradually wanes. Dawn paints the sky with rosy fingers as you find your exhausted body clinging to tattered ropes and rain-slick railings. In the distance, not a full mile away, you see the ragged shores of a small tropical island. On the eastern edge, a rough fist shaped stone rises 50 feet above the shoreline, to the west, higher hills rise. Between them is a low jungle. Something sits in the middle that looks like it might be a village, some low wooden huts.
The Man's Promise sits on a reef. The tide is low, and for now the ship is safe.
As most of the crew gazes longingly at the shoreline, Scourge slowly pulls himself together.
"Ruaush, Ravenna, Ordrax, Veltisiel, Grak, get a boat in the water and row to the shore. See if there are any hostiles and report back."
Ordrax silently moves to the boat and prepares to cast off.
As Ruaush comes over...
all of us in the same boat does not seem to be a coincidence does it.?
Ordrax pretend to watch the others as the prepare but his eye roam over the battered ship.
He does not see anything out of the ordinary.
"Aye-aye, Cap'n." grumbles Raush reluctantly. Damn it, Cusswell. Bounty of Besmara and all, getting you on my side cost me a lot of gold. And then you go get swept up by the second storm we meet? Leaving us without a fiddler worth its salt? That's just bad luck.
Crankier than usual, evidently brooding, and hardly saying anything, the monkey-man works the ropes tying a lifeboat, embarking the rows.
Ravenna nods and collects her rapier, then heads for the launch.
As the group gathers into the boat and lowers it, she murmurs, "You think he might just maroon us, if he can get the ship off with the tide?"
"Down seven hands? Hardly. This ship isn't doing anywhere. We may as well go ashore- who knows? Maybe there's civilization and we can leave him. To shore we go!"
Ravenna puts her hat back on, shields her eyes, and says, "As much as I would like to just give Scourge the shine by not doing what he says, I think the village is a better place to check first. You guys?"
"I'm hungry. The village may have some food, so let's check it out."
The village it is then...
Yes you are always hungry
"To the village it is, then. I don't know about you all, but the first thing I'd like to do when we land is to-" he yawns, "Sleep. That storm exhausted me."
It takes only a modicum of seamanship to bring your launch ashore in the mild surf. You consider attempting to dock wtih the rickety piers that stretch into the water, but a closer look makes you think that they are not sturdy enough. From a short distance, the village of mud huts and thatched roofs appears run down and abandoned.
The beach is muddy with only a thin stretch of solid ground that must be rooted in underlying coral.
This was a fishing village, it seems, but whoever lived here is one, possibly for as much as a decade. You could shelter here for a time if you wish. There is a path leading away from the shore into the swampy interior.
Check the village completely first and then go from there.
Grak grabs his gear and climbs into the launch for the short trip to shore. He helps inspect the huts and then prepares to follow the path into the interior of the island.
Raush visits each of the house, hoping for either food or some forgotten precious item.
"Yeah... agreed," says Ravenna. She moves along closely by Ordrax, as the two of them have had good luck teaming up before.
The huts are mostly empty, as if their inhabitants packed up and left. There are some signs of more recent foot traffic, claw-footed humanoid creatures passed this way. You find bone fish hooks, unmended nets, and broken pottery, but nothing of value or even much of use. It would seem that whoever lived here left and took their goods with them.
"Bah. I guess we'll check the swamp, but this place seems to be deserted."
Raush moves quietly though the underbrush, taking the path heading further.
Agreed
The path leaves the shore and plunges into the dense vegetation of a salt marsh. The path is firm enough, but to each side it is marshy and dangerous. The banyan trees might provide a pathway for someone who was an excellent climber. The path continues nearly half a mile before The it slips suddenly into a large green bog. Remnants of an old wooden bridge cross the bog, but only short timber platforms on either side remain, leaving just the pilings jutting from the mud.
A salt river oozes through the swamp here, forming a solid barrier of quicksand and marsh some 70 feet across (see the map). The trees reach over the river, and you could possibly climb across. You cold also leap from piling to piling. There is no other obvious way to cross.
"Not a problem. Pass me a rope and I'll tie it to the other side."
Nimble among the trees like in the Mwangi, Raush climbs over the trunk and the branches, hurrying towards the opposite side with quick swings of his massive arms.
Grak scans from side to side as they walk down the path, expecting something to come out of the muck to get them. When they reach the bog, he shakes his head.
"How are we supposed to get across this?" he asks no one in particular as he tries to remember if he's seen any usable wood on the island.
At Raush's comment, he looks back across the bog to the other side where the bridge should be. "I think you're going to need to tie 2 ropes together to reach. I hope some of you have ropes in your packs. I don't since I can only carry so much," he says looking around at the others.
"No such luck," says Ravenna. "I might be able to jump across... maybe there are some vines in the tree canopy? Raush, what do you think?"
Ordrax looks on as the others discuss the situation. He has never seen anything like this before.
Umm...what is that. I have never seen anything like this underground. Water of any kind is not safe to enter...this is common knowledge but I have never seen water like this? If you feel it is safe to climb in the trees to get across then so be it but I will not enter the water nor jump across it out.
Raush swings from branch to branch, but there is a tricky bit in the middle of the river. He is able to manage, but realizes that he could fall if he miscalculates.
Ordrax climbs up the rope and makes his way across.
Ravenna follows after Odrax, nimbly hopping from piling to piling.
As Ordrax is making his way across, he sees a swirl in the murky water and a mottled brown shape lunges from the marsh, a frog nearly 5 feet long.
Ordrax, Veltisiel, Raush go before frog, then Frog, then Grak and Ravenna.
With a look of terror, Ordrax tries to scamper across the remaining trees to the other side.
What in all the layers of the abyss is that f$@&ing thing.
He looks back down at it as he moves.
This is why we do not mess with water holes.
Veltisiel reacts in the blink of an eye, spitting an infernal word and letting a bolt of lightning zap the would-be kobold-eater.
The lightning sizzles into the amphibian's skin.
"Good news, everyone! Frog skewers tonight!" yells Raush, grabbing a javelin from his back and hurling it at the massive amphibian.
As Ordrax dances across the trees, the frog's tongue lashes out, smashing into a branch nearby.
Surprised by the sting of the javelin, and having lost its prey into the far shore, the frog sinks back into the marsh.
"Come back here, dinner!" shouts Raush, sending a javelin the wrong way. "I want something fresh for a change!"
"Oh great, we have to deal with a frog attack too?" he says, getting out his crossbow and loading it. "I'll try to cover you, Ravenna if you want to continue across."
Ravenna nods and finishes traversing the posts.