Although she can't see Zendara, she can hear her voice and looked straight at her and whispered, "S$~#, I hope I don't regret this..."
With that she gingerly got up although the room was spinning and tottered towards the Jakes. Her uncle noticed and laughed, "So you're not a camel after all. I wondered how long it was going to take!" With that he downed his chaser and took a deep pull on his ale.
Eloise pretty far gone, so nobody payed her any heed when she was extra careful with the door. Perhaps it was for the best because at that moment her stomach rebelled and she rushed to a cubicle to be sick. Zendara did what she could to make her look presentable and with the cloak over her head and back she looked quite different. Then it was a matter of walking her out, she was practically leaning on Zendara but mercifully she was slim unlike her uncle who was speaking to the barmaid, "Oi Meghan, Eloise has been a while. Be a darling and check on her would you?"
The barmaid rolled her eyes before heading for the now empty Jakes, it was time to get out of there, fortunately Edwin had already paid up. The group headed for the exit and it dawned upon the, that the square was strangely quiet. The Doorman from earlier opened the door as you left and warned you, "Mind how you go, something's happened and there's tons of garista's about..."
The atmosphere outside was oppressive, not only was the day hot but everyone looked scared. Toughs where harassing people demanding, "Have you seen a foreign woman, a half-elven hussy with weird black eyes, long black hair, about 5' 4" tall? WELL HAVE YOU?"
As you start walking towards Giuseppe street and the cab you notice a trio of toughs are in your path, harassing the dozen or so people in between. There is a side street down which you could try to evade them although it'll add a couple of minutes to the journey.
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Zendara stashes Xindyra and Eloise in the alley, prestidigitates her hair to a bright blue, uses her Sleeves of Many Garments to copy a mid-upper-class outfit that was in the window of the shop they had been to earlier, then walks closer to the guards and says
I think I saw a girl like you are asking for. She's the one I passed that said she was going to put a knife in the Cappa. She was crazy. Who would say that? My husband didn't want to get involved, but when I heard her I knew she was a sneaky little assassin, and I came back here to warn you. Let me show you where we passed her, less than half an hour ago!
After Edwin paid the bill, he stepped out of sight for a moment, and cast a spell to change his appearance. A moment later, a halfling in regular work clothes walked out and joined the others. He whispered, "It's me, Edwin. Let's get to the cab."
When he saw the toughs, he whispered to the others through his Message spell, "Let's take the side street! I can delay anyone following us, but it would create a scene."
The tough sneered when a posh looking blue haired woman approached, but when Zendra told her story he eagerly demanded, "Show us and be quick about it!"
The group of garistas rushed away as Zendra lead them on a wild goose chase. Meanwhile nobody paid Edwin, Xindrya or the Eloise much notice, despite her rolling gate. After ten minutes or so the trio found themselves in Giuseppe street and they caught sight of the cab.
Once Zendara sees that the others have gotten through she points to a spot and says
This is where we saw her, right here in the street, talking right out loud about going to put a knife in the Cappa. I couldn't even believe it. She was headed that way, I think...
She points to a direction that makes sense for the area (not pointing right into a building), but which is not towards Giuseppe street, and also not towards the docks.
But I can't be sure, because there were too many people, and my husband was pulling me away. You should definitely double the guard on the Cappa, or even triple it! Filthy assassins!
I have to go back and make sure my husband hasn't burned the house down (he doesn't do well cooking alone), but I can make a sketch of what she looked like if that would help, and bring it to you... and if you catch her, I'll testify. I'd know that sneaky face anywhere.
The toughs frown at the blue haired stranger's story and somewhat dubiously replied, "The half elven witch was ranting about the Cappa?" They glanced among themselves and one spoke up, "He's going to be pissed if hears about this, she's pointing towards Henrietta Street that's where his mistress is..."
Another one swore and urged the others, "If something was to happen and we didn't check it out, we'd be done for."
The first one reluctantly agreed, "All right. We can take it from here Ma'am. You better head home theres a curfew starting in half an hour."
Zendara watched them go before rushing down a side alley to change her disguise. It took her a while to find a cab and in the end she had to share with a portly gentleman who had a Kez uniform. He was reserved at first but told her after a while in thick accent, "You were lucky to get this cab, something's riled up the local warlord and they announced a curfew. Driver! This is my stop..."
They were close to the main shipyard and in the distance Zendara saw the hulking but damaged presence of the Kez warship. There was a hive of activity around it as a small army of engineers made repairs.
The cab then turned onto the outer road explaining that they wouldn't be allowed cut across the town. About fifty minutes and several gold later Zendara was dropped off at the folly where the Dawntreader looked about ready to go.
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A rather anxious looking Dr Munroe hailed Zendara as she arrived, "Ah good you're here! Hop aboard we're heading out."
Zendara literally had to hop because the airship was good couple of feet away from the folly's upper level, it's fans whirring as it kept steady.
Zendara is relieved that she got to the ship on time, and hopes that they've confused things enough that there won't be any immediate pursuit, although she's sure that they'll get around to looking eventually.
Yukarii had finished stashing things away and helping to get the supplies and rooms arranged. She may not have skill in flying or navigating and airship but she can certainly help organize!
When She saw the others return from rescuing the girl Yukarii said to Zendara, "Cloudchaser-dono was talking about removing the limiteter or something that slows ship," as seemed to happen when stressed Yukarii's speech became more broken and her accent thicker, "He need help to do."
Just before he boarded the cab, Edwin ended the illusion of looking like a halfling: no need to raise the driver's suspicions. When they got back to the Dawntreader he listened to Braenar's idea of removing the limiter.
He replied to the engineer, "I can help if you're confident in you skill. It would be rather awkward if didn't go well, and our departure were delayed."
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Xindrya found Braenar in the engineering deck where he'd opened up a number of panels in the walls and floor to reveal power conduits and various strange devices.
He greeted the Tiefling warmly, "Glad ta see ya lass! Can you see that power management console over there?" He pointed his spanner at a veery complex looking collection of dials and knobs and she nodded.
"See where those thick cables come up from the floor? That small grey box at the bottom, that's the limiter right. See how the main power cable runs through it? Right we need to cut it out and splice the ends back together and remove the sensor wiring without tripping its failsafe device which as you probably know is a small explosive device. First we need to simulate battle damage leading to a power outage and shift it only to battery backup after at least 30 seconds. That puts it into a safe mode and it won't be fussy about loosing sensor input. Of course you know all that right! OK lets get started I'll throw the breakers and you can handle the delicate stuff."
In theory this was all quite straight forward, but actually doing it was tricky - there wasn't much room and the power cable splicing had to be done right or there'd be a arcing leading to power loss and quite possibly a fire next time the engines where used. In the end it took about twenty minutes but the job looked good.
As Zendara hopped over from the stone folly onto the airship she looked down and had a moment of vertigo for there was a sheer cliff and below that an expanse of sky that seemed like it would never end. The air was clear and you could see miles down deep into the interior of Oberon, with layer after layer of wispy clouds that seemed like they'd never end. There was a three dimensional structure to the weather system below the likes of which large island dwellers rarely get.
The deck thrummed gently as the bow motors spooled up and the ship drifted away from the island. On deck where most of the crew, along with Elliot and Elouise who had a tearful reunion. Watching them was Mrs Harris who had tears of joy and worry in her eyes. She approached you and gave a heartfelt, "Thank you so so much, I can scarcely believe we're all here!"
Yulia and Tasha (who was very excited to be aboard a real airship) wandered over too. Yulia was very emotional saying, "I can't believe it either, it's like awaking from a nightmare. I don't know how we can ever repay you!"
Just then Tasha who had run over to the starboard rail pointed at some dots on the horizon, "Momma what are those?"
Yulia replied, "Airships Tasha, quite a few airships..."
Mariam grabbed a spyglass from a rack and looked before crying, "They're warships..."
From the wheel house Braenar put down his own spyglass as he laughed, "Slow obsolete warships. They might have been trouble if we still had a limiter!" He shouted into the listening tube which went down to the engine room, "FULL POWER!"
The fans spooled up alarmingly and the Dawntreader shot away from Carina into the glorious open sky. The chasing airships put on a burst of speed too and started to gain a little but Braenar just laughed, "HA! They can't keep that up for long, their engines will overheat and they'll have to stop or risk them seizing up."
Sure enough one by one the ships started to fall back until there was a lone cutter chasing. Designed for speed this ship was heavily armed with twin forward ballistae, but it was lightly armoured and Braenar fancied his chances in a fight. It didn't come to that though, suddenly there was a distant bang and smoke stared pouring out of the cutter's port nacelle and it started to recede into the distance.
Yukarii was glad they had managed to get away safely from that horrible town. She took a great delight in watching Tasha's antics in her excitement at being on board the ship. Given some of what they had run into Yukarii felt some concern that they had passengers on board but it was far too late for second thoughts now besides, she suspected they were all better off here than back in that town.
As the adults expressed their relief at all that had been done for them Yukarii nodded and said, "I am glad that we could help you." Yukarii saw Tasha run to the railing and point at the dots and looked in that direction. When Yulia said they looked like warships Yukarii felt a great deal of concern.
Given what they had just done, and what they had done before their journey even began, Yukarii didn't think this could be a good thing. As she looked at those gathered on deck she said, "I believe that those without knowledge to run ship should go below for now. Come, I will go with you," she looked at the dots again quickly and then back, "I must prepare in case this becomes a problem."
Before she could get anyone out of the way Yukarii heard Cloudchaser-dono yell for "Full Power". The sudden surge of speed caught her off guard but Yukarii was shocked at how quickly the following ships fell behind them. All but one ship quickly disappeared and that one even vanished after it started to belch smoke. She didn't know what that meant but it could only be good for them.
Yukarii turned to face their captain and bowed deeply in respect as she called out, "You did well Cloudchaser-dono, my deepest respects to you and your crew."
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As day turned to evening a big celebratory meal was served complete with glorious sunset. Instruments where brought out and several of the crew where playing and dancing, along with Marek who turned out to be a very good violinist who knew a lot of sea shanties.
Once everyone had eaten their full Dr Munroe got up to make an announcement. The music stopped and the chatter ceased and he smiled, "First I'd like to welcome our new passengers! I hope you enjoy the trip, we have an exciting itinerary ahead. For the members of the crew I'd like to think you for tonight, the food has been wonderful, I trust you all managed to get a little R&R while we where on land. Now the archeologists among us will be glad to know the next stop is the Xunlai archipelago, or at least the marker buoy that'll let us find them. As most of you know the Xunlai islands are moved by strange currents which have historically been impossible to predict. What you probably don't know is this morning Mariam detected the buoy's signal. It's very faint but she got a bearing, we're headed South South East folks!"
A cheer went up from the expedition members. When this died down Dr Munroe added, "We estimate it'll take us just under a month to get there, give or take. So settle down and relax, and enjoy the journey - but please be ready for adventure. Nobody has explored these islands in over a thousand years and yes I'm aware the navigation buoy itself is over a thousand years old. Don't make things like they used to!"
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Xindyra eagerly got busy on the removal of safety measures.
"If it's designed to dampen potential, then it's our adventurous duty to remove said dampener and fly as free as a bird."
.... "Success!"
Xindyra makes a small stroll around the deck, letting the wind blow away the warmth of excitement and working on removing the limiter.
The sound of people giving pursuit gets her to walk over to the side.
"Huh, they're pretty eager, if you ask me."
But Braenar said what she sort of suspected, their own ship was much faster.
"Ah! Hahaha...oh my gosh, this is hilarious. They just went and blew their electric fans."
She leans on the side, smiling and enjoying the breeze.
During the celebration Yukarii danced to the music at times. Occasionally alone, sometimes with a partner, Once little Tasha was asleep she called out Yukaari and the dance they did was much more adult in nature. Though nothing elicit was shown the implications were there as they moved together in an intricate dance.
That night Yukarii and Yukaari spent with Marek. After the events of earlier they both wanted some attention and Marek had become as close to a boyfriend as either would allow themselves to have. It turned into a quite enjoyable night, and morning, and left Yukarii to awaken late the following morning.
Zendara smiles and finally relaxes. They had gotten away. It was a good day.
One it seemed that the Dawntreader had evaded their pursuers, Edwin could finally relax. It had been a hectic few days, and although at the time he had despaired of resolving the competing challenges, somehow it had all worked out. He felt very pleased at all they had been able to accomplish. That feeling was better than any monetary reward.
The weather was good for the first week's travel and the travel so smooth it was easy to forget you where flying. Then one morning a crosswind picked up causing The Dawntrader to pitch uncomfortably and then it stared raining as if an ocean was being poured from on high. Perhaps it was, visibility was down to less than twenty yards which made Braenar nervous, and that was before the thunder started. Water found its way into all sorts of compartments and some of the lower parts of the ship needed to be bailed. The only lights where those of the ship and the occasional flash of lightning.
Monotonous days passed and the crew grew tired, fractious, sloppy. It was an accident waiting to happen, everyone knew it. But then suddenly the rain stopped and when the bedraggled crew gathered on the slippery deck they marvelled at the great grey-black wall they'd burst out of into the sunshine. It seemed to extend forever as if some god had built a wall of storm cloud that stretched to infinity.
Bind you Dr Munroe explained, "Oberon's atmosphere is made up of lots of different layers most are stacked vertically but a few horizontally like that one although they shift about. Some layers are attuned to different elemental planes, I'll give you two guesses which plane that one was attuned to!"
The sun came out even stronger as he spoke and it's rays caused the standing water on the deck to start softly steaming. He added, "This layer might get quite warm, we'll have to see..."
Marek was leaning on the airship's stern railing, marvelling at the imposing wall of cloud they spent what felt like weeks traveling through. Suddenly he pointed and cried, "Look! What are those?"
The Dawntreader was half a mile from the wall clouds and perhaps a mile below there were a series of dark shadows within the clouds. The shadows were long and thin, with a shape suggestive of an eel or some kind of fish.
Half a week later and everyone was sweltering with the layer of torrential rain and its imposing storm wall a fading memory. The atmosphere below had taken on a reddish hue although the sky above was blue and dotted with occasional white fluffy clouds.
More and more frequently slowly tumbling boulders of varying sizes were spotted below. The general assumption was a sizeable island had disintegrated leaving a widely spread debris field. The debris seemed to be confined to a layer a few hundred feet above which the Dawntreadder was gliding on its stately south-south east procession.
Just now you noticed a particularly large reddish-grey boulder - easily 600 foot long. This wasn't unusual in of it self, but the remains of a crashed airship possibly of Kez design defiantly was! Perhaps a salvage operation was in order...
Pointing at a a particularly large reddish-grey boulder - easily 600 feet long -- in the debris field, Zendara says
Hey, there is crashed airship up there... maybe we should get closer and try for some salvage. What do you guys think?
Braenar was off duty relaxing in one of the couches and upon hearing Zendara he replied, "Oh aye? Lets have a look." He looked through spyglass and replied excitedly, "Oh yeah I see it now... Hmm. There's a lot of smaller boulders I don't think it would be a good idea taking the Dawntreader down there but we've got a runabout stowed aft, small and nimble just the thing for getting there and back."
Edwin got confused by the the the different boulders in the debris field, and couldn't figure out which one Zendara was talking about. He volunteered to go anyway, assured that she knew were it was.
Braenar lead you to a quarter deck on the stern you've not visited before. This was dominated by hoisting machinery and a large object under a green tarp. It took several of you to remove the tarp and stow it safely, underneath was a sleek outline of a gleaming steel runabout called 'The Winking Maiden'.
"The Wink has seats for four and a decent sized hold. It's not quite as fast as the Dawntreader and only has the range of about a day's travel without recharging but its very nimble and small enough to navigate down there without issue." explained Braenar.
Everyone looked over the stern railing to the churning debris field a few hundred feet below. The majority of the debris looked to be the size of pebbles although there where larger boulders in the mix. Fortunately everything was widely spread enough to make navigation by a small craft possible.
After discussion had settled down Braenar said, "When you're ready lets get you strapped in and I'll show you how to start it. Oh in case you're wondering how to land it back here, there's two ways. The first is to simply manoeuvre it above and descend gently, easy to say a bit tricky to do especially if the wind picks up. The alternative is to come along side and use the winches. Much easier for the pilot but I'll have to let out the winch lines and one of you will have to go along these catwalks and attach the hooks to this ring here and that one there."
The catwalks themselves looked pretty scary, although they did have a line you could attach yourself to with a harness.
Zendara paid attention to the instructions in case they needed to use the winches when they came back.
She got into the Wink and looked over at the others.
Whoo-hoo. This should be fun. Who else is coming?
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"Airsip?", Xindyra sees what Zandara's pointing at.
"Neat! If the military hasn't reclaimed it, i'm all in for taking a look at its interior."
Braenar showed you the pilot's seat and explained the various controls, pointing out the yoke the forward throttle the lift crystal controls and various trim controls along with foot pedals and a bewildering array of switches dials and breakers.
"Ah nice simple controls, takes me back." mused Braenar without any hint of irony, "So whose gonna fly this thing?" He looked at each of you in turn as if weight up your piloting skills.
Xindyra looks at Zendara first, as the question is asked.
Edwin climbed in and fastened his harness. "I have no experience with flying craft. I'd just as soon let someone with some experience do the piloting."
When Marek called out about the strange creatures Yukarii went to go look at them. She had no idea what they were either, certainly not in her realm of expertise, so she just enjoyed the view until they were out of sight.
Eventually they were going through a rather massive debris field when they spotted a wreck. It seemed that events got away from her and they had decided to go explore the wreckage for anything of value. While Yukarii wasn't keen on getting on those catwalks and into the small landing craft she knew she should. It was quite possible there would be spirits that needed to be set free and she had already proven that Yukaari could be very useful at times when the others couldn't get through to something.
"I have no ability to operate it at all but I will go with you," Yukarii said, "Who knows what might be haunting the place."
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Zendara listens closely as Braenar shows her the controls, trying to memorize them
Then, seeing that she's been elected pilot, she gets in and, after making sure everyone is strapped in and safe, she takes the ship out, headed for the wreck.
With everyone strapped in to the cramped but functional cabin, Zendara settled down in the pilot's seat and it was like coming home. She raised the altitude control slider and pressed a button which disengaged the magnetic docking clamps. This caused The Wink to quickly but not uncomfortably rise from the deck. Once there was a safe distance between it and The Dawntreader she pushed the throttle forwards and the craft's fans whirred into motion propelling it forwards.
She then executed an entirely unnecessary but fun loop around The Dawntreader before plunging down, zooming towards the site of the wreck, dodging numerous boulders the size of horses on the way. The islet the ship had crashed into was barely more then a particularly large vaguely peanut-shaped boulder. From a distance it looked to be a Kez scout ship design from the previous century and it had landed hard shattering much of its superstructure.
Zendara takes a look at the ship as they get closer, and it looks like a Kez scout ship with an old design.
Then, perhaps overconfidently she pilots the craft down to land on the rock.
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Making it look easy, Zendara confidently flew right up to the spinning islet, matched rotation and performed a textbook landing. No fuss. No drama.
As the engines spooled down she opened the hatch and you got out to take a look see. It was rather disturbing being on this tiny speck on land, floating in mid air exactly the way bricks don't. Looking down over the edge is vertiginous at best behind The Dawntreader's stout railings, here its terrifying, if you where to fall...
Eyes focused on the relative solidity of the shattered ship you walked forwards, ignoring the yawning precipice all around. Up close to the ship you notice a pair of skeletons propped up against a bounder in front of what once might have been a fire pit. Just then the wind picked up and whistled thorough the shattered remnants of the ship, and the loneliness of this truly remote location came crashing down upon you. It seems whoever they where, they died hand in hand.
Any clothing or gear the skeletons might have worn in life seems to have disintegrated long ago.
(pass)
(fail)
In looking over the skeletons, Zendara can't really tell anything about how they died, although she can guess, but she does notice some corroded dog tags, which she removes from the skeletons.
(pass)
In examining the dog tags further, she reads that these were Captain A.R. Sanders and Lieutenant J.J. Sanders. These aren't Kez surnames, so she wonders if they were Merchant League.
She shares her insights with the group, and then moves forward to find a way into the airship.
Yukarii looked at the ship with trepidation as they approached it. Yukarii spotted the dog tags and was about to point them out to the others when Zendara walked over and picked them up. Yukarii's gaze took in the two skeletons and felt loss and sorrow coming from them. She felt loss and sorrow but was unsure if it came from her or them. She suspected them and that they had left someone behind and never gotten closure.
Yukarii's gaze shifted to the crashed airship and what she felt made her shuddered. The ship had a strong, brooding, presence that Yukarii didn't quite understand. She was fairly sure she didn't like it whatever it was. "We need to be careful of this ship, it has a presence about it, it broods of something."
Yukarii walked over to the two skeletons and knelt next to them. She focused her mind inwards and worked to sense if there was a lingering spirit about the two. She hoped that she could learn something helpful as Yukaari drifted out of her and moved to sit between the two corpses, her ethereal form's arms carefully not pressing through their bones as she too began to focus and try to contact them.
"How sad. A military couple stranded in the middle of nowhere."
Xindyra goes down on one knee, examining the remains.
"I'm no physician but, look here, those skull features are human.
Remember those anatomy models used in biology classes?"
"Sadly for them, they seem to have more fractures than is desired. A beating, combat prior to stranding, perhaps?"
Edwin secured a rope to the Wink, and tied the other end around his waist; it made sense to take precautions here. He keenly felt the isolation of this place remarking, "What a forsaken place! Do you think they were marooned here?"
"Given the vessel, i think so."
When Zendara approaches the ship she looks at it more closely...
This isn't a Kez ship... it is a Merchant League Kestrel class scout ship... from about a century ago, but it is disguised to look like a Kez ship. That's so strange.
Then she heads through the gash in the hull, entering the hold.
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Your interpretation is this pair of spirits have almost entirely moved on but a sliver remains. Perhaps they had unfinished business compounded with the lack of proper funerary rites (most Merchant League folk favour cremation, or being consigned to Oberon's fiery depths).
As well as the contents of several smashed crates, you notice a number of mostly undamaged crates. Wether their contents is undamaged in another matter - likely not if they contain anything remotely fragile.
A glance at the floor, ceiling, walls and structural members shows evidence of wide spread cracking consistent with a high speed crash. In addition there's a number of small holes and gashes suggestive of ballista strikes. As you look around the front of the hold this theory is confirmed by several crates with huge ballista bolts sticking out of them.
The rear of the hold is in darkness and chill goes down your back, even with your darkvision you don't fancy going that way alone!
<--- NOPE NOPE NOPE
Light streams in from a ladder leading up through a hatch to the engineering deck, it seems positively inviting by contrast. You climb this and find wreckage of iridescent purple fragments of lift crystals mingled with burned out equipment. Judging by the looks of things as well as a crash there was a fire at some point which was put out before it could gut everything.
Above that the ladder leads to the crew quarters and the cockpit. The fire damage is extensive in the crew quarters but the cockpit was spared. Despite the lack of fire damage, all the glass instrument panels have shattered along with the windows.
Yukarii felt the sadness the two skeletons gave off, their sense of loss, of something left undone, but also that there was little left holding them on this side at all. With what she knew of the people from the others based off of the dog tags Yukarii felt certain that all that kept them here was the lack of a proper burial.
Yukarii saw the others going on into the spooky ship but she did not follow. She thought through the rituals she knew of and tried to determine how to consign a person to Oberon's fiery depths.