Man Overboard

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Tuesday 5th August

Flung Chow Wong - Male Human Monk (FW TF) - Ian Luxton
Jack Rabbit - Male Halfling Thief - Darryl Sherwood
Polly Ester - Female Human Bard - NPC
Ulotta Puck-off - Female Shield Maiden Parry-Fighter - Edwin Muir
Finn Finnegan - Male Halfling F/T - Jeff Clendon
Mel Licious - Dwarf Psionicist - Steven Krijnen
Asi van Dit - Male Halfling Thief - Adrian McKinnon

DM - Andrew Earl


Having thwarted the plans of the Imag priests by purchasing
one of the ship's slave girls (girls rescued from Sancho harbour)
and getting the Captain to agree not to sell any of the others to
the priests, Flung waited on the deck and watched with interest
the antics of the priests the next morning.

After a slow drift across the deck to the Captain's cabin, the two
black spheres literally raced back across the deck to their cabins.
I'm sure they could get jobs with the Gnome post, with suitable
levels of dark emotion they seem to be able travel with the
quickest of races. I'm also sure I could hear a distinct muttering
from deep within the darkness, quite in counterpoint to Flung's
grin which was almost audible it was so big.

A few minutes latter that grin fell right off his face as the
spheres emerged again onto the deck and drifted over to the 2nd class
cabin occupied by the Gnomes. Perhaps they were going to apply
for jobs with the post!

"Bugger, they pran buy new shrave from gnomes," muttered Flung as he
hurried over to stand nonchalantly within earshot of the darkness.

"Please, I have pran, very good oppa-unity for you," said Flung.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, 'GOOD'?!" retorted the Imag priest.

"Oh so-re, what I mean is you no sac-fice innocent gir-ree. On boat
is despicable murd-ra-ra. You help find murd-ra-ra. Can take and sac-fice
in prace," suggested Flung in desperation. "Is much prefa-bull, I think."

"WE UNDERSTAND THAT THE PSI (HISSSS) IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE MURDER."

"No so. We have proof of Psi insent. Karn pop head nobody."

"MMM, WE WILL SPEAK WITH DEAD AND DETECT LIE FOR YOU. YOU HAVE
TODAY TO FIND THIS MURDERER. WE WILL MAKE SACRIFICE TONIGHT AS IMAG
IS ASCENDANT AND ITS DARKNESS WILL RULE. YOU WILL NOT STOP US."

"Oh rite, kay," stammered Flung. "Get oar suspect round up."

Of course no one wanted to be subject to a Detect Lie,
especially one cast by an unknown sphere of Imag darkness, so
Flung was stuck with asking McTavish's dead body a few extra
questions. Totally useless, with no additional information obtained.

"The psi, kill the bloody psi!" yelled the crew. Everyone knows that
sailors are never swayed by the truth, only by opinion, and I suspect that
first mate Smee held a pretty strong opinion on the matter.

Needless to say, no murderer was found, the Imag priests purchased
one of the Gnomes' slave girls (for a VERY big bag of gold), paid
off the Captain (with another VERY big bag of gold) and she was duly
sacrificed that night over the Imag shrine on the bow.

Still, a few good things came from the whole episode. The Captain
was satisfied that Mel was innocent (of the murder), no one else
was killed (except for the slave of course, but they don't count),
and I noticed that the female Half-elf passenger Druscilla was
of the noble thieving profession. This came to light when she
yelled out from the middle of the deck "Any other thieves about?"
(in hand cant of course). We had a brief "discussion" about the
large amount of gold that seemed to exist in the Imag priests'
cabin, but I managed to convince her that they were possibly
a little too "unknown" to risk a visit to their rooms.

Still, the next day both the priests spent about a half hour
praying over their shrine, which, by the way, was now englobed by
a permanent sphere of darkness of its own, plenty of time to
carry out a reconnoitre of their rooms I suspected. Unfortunately,
they didn't repeat that length of devotion again till much later.
Or perhaps that was actually fortunate, sometimes you just can't
tell how things will work out, but I'll write about that later.

We sailed on down towards Snub for the next few weeks without
notable incident. Mel was back on duty and Smee was still giving
him all the shitty assignments, like bilge duty and jakes. Poor
bastard, but rather him that me. Aye!

Having decided not to take the shorter O'Rileys passage on account
of the risks, but to sail round the end of the Snub, we headed down
the rocky coastline towards the infamous Snub point.

The next day the Captain turned the boat to windward and began
heading away from the cost. You could hear him cursing and
swearing all the way from the crew quarters.

"Secure all quarters and cargo for storm conditions!" he yelled.
"We're in for a big one in a few days."

"Whart da fook, its arse still arse ar mill poond!" Jack exclaimed.

Seems that Sharon, the Aquamarina priestess, can predict the weather
out to three day's advance and had seen a huge storm heading our way.
We had to get far enough from the rocky coast of The Snub that
we wouldn't get blown back to break up on the rocks. Sounded
like a pretty good suggestion to me. Asi and Jack thought it
would be a great opportunity to be lashed into their bunks with
female companionship and made the appropriate arrangements.
Ulotta slept through all the preparations!

Sure enough, three days later the storm hit, and it was a big one!

Smee ordered Mel and I up into the rigging to reef sails,
lash masts, and keep a lookout for any problems. I lashed Mel
to the mainmast and secured myself to the foremast before it
became too rough. The rest of the crew disappeared below-decks,
except for Smee who yelled that he would be keeping an eye on us
to make sure we didn't slink off as soon as it got a little
rough, and the other Half-Elf sailor Marconi.

Pretty soon it was so rough that the tips of the masts were
dipping down into the tops of the waves and the deck was mostly
underwater, washed down with every huge wave. The waves where
like giant mountains of water rushing up behind us and pounding
the ship with fists of icy water, pounding us as well.

I hoped that Mel was OK, I could hardly see him through the
waves and water that was swirling all around us. I spotted
Marconi, his tie rope must have broken, as he was swept across
the deck and over the side like a speck of dust under a
giant's mop.

"Marn overbard!" I yelled into the night. No one heard.

I spotted Smee too, he had tied himself to the bottom of the
mainmast below Mel and seemed to be waving up at him for some
reason. Looking closer, I could just make out that he was
actually yanking up and down on one of the sheets (apparently
that's what they call all the ropes on boats). What was
he up to? I looked up at Mel just in time to see the main
pulley block fly up and thump him in the side. Bloody Smee
was trying to knock him off the mast!

I quickly released my lashing and clambered down to the deck.
The climb was like trying to have a shave in a busy market.
Every second the mast would pull off in a different direction,
the waves would pound first one way then the other, loose sheets
were waving round like a squid's tentacles, trying to pull me
from the mast and throw me over the side. But I managed to get
down without mishap and was just starting to creep over towards
Smee when he must have spotted me because he yelled out.

"Get back up that there mast you cowardly midget!"
"Boot eets noot souf," I yelled back.
"Fuck you, Hobbit! Get up there or I'll have you whipped."

I turned back to the foremast, and started to climb. Slipping
into the shadows like steam into a cloud I made sure my rope was
secure, with enough slack to reach the mainmast, pulled my
dagger from its sheath, and charged directly at him. I was
instantly toppled from my feet by the biggest wave yet, and
washed along the deck. When I bashed up against the cabins I
noted that the wave had luckily washed me half way to Smee.
Half drowned and unsteady on the pitching deck, I managed to
stagger across the rest of the way, between waves, and without
Smee even spotting me. I silently cut all the ropes that bound
Smee to the mast and headed back into the shadows.
"Thart will feex the fooker" I thought. Just then another
mighty wave lifted the stern of the boat up into the air and I
was pitched headlong towards the bow, and shoved from behind
by a fist of water.

"Twang!" went my rope, and I was abruptly halted, mid-flight
towards the rail, with a jarring squeeze round my middle that
pushed all the breath out of me. I spotted Smee, arms waving
wildly as he sailed past, bounced off the top rail, and
disappeared into the vast mountainous ocean over the bow.

"Marn overbard," I whispered. No one heard of course.

Deciding that discretion was still the better part of valour
I made my way back to the foremast and slowly climbed up to
my post. Mel waved weakly in my direction so I knew he was OK.
All we had to do was last out the storm.

A few hours later, when it looked that the storm was only
getting worse, and my hands had started to turn blue and
wouldn't work properly, I decided that maybe outlasting old
mother nature wasn't the smartest of ideas, and a cabin with
four walls, a floor, and a roof would be way preferable to
freezing to death, tied to a stupid pole, wondering if we
were going to hit The Snub after all.

And I managed to get Mel off the mainmast without too much
trouble either. (Damn, it's good having a dexterity of 19)

The storm lasted another day and a half before blowing out.

I guess the Imag priests were grateful to be still alive after
the buffeting they had, because they both came out for a
prayer session once the sea had calmed down to normal.
I figured that if they were going to pray for about half
an hour again there should be enough time to slip into their
cabin, give it a reasonable search, and be away before they
got back, with any significant goodies that were lying round.

I quickly got Druscilla and stood watch as she bent over the
keyhole for a minute. She managed to open the door and sidle
inside. Fifteen minutes later when she hadn't sidled back out
I was getting a little worried and thought I'd better take a
look. In case the rumours of a third "person" hiding in the
priests' spheres of darkness had any factual basis, I lowered myself
over the side and peered in through the porthole. I could
see Druscilla, okay, knelt down over a fancy-looking chest,
frozen in position with her pick firmly tucked in the lock.

"Bluedy grarte. A fooking troop."

Quick as a wink I was back at the door, a quick check that
no one was about, or watching, and I slipped in. I should
have checked out the chest I suppose, since she had obviously
set off the trap, but I thought I'd better get her out before
the priests returned. They wouldn't be happy if they found us
in their room, chest open, trap triggered and all.
I grabbed her under the arms and dragged her back to the door.
A quick peek to make sure the way was clear and I dragged her
out through the door and started off to her cabin.

"Hey, what are you doing in there?"
"Oh, hi John, arr, I foond this wooman een the priests' carbin
and woos juice drarging her oof to see thar captain. Geeve me
a harnd woode ya?"

"WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?"

"Oh fook," I muttered "tharts toon it."

So we had to go through all the drama.

Good on her though, she hasn't dobbed me in yet. Perhaps
I'll be able to slip her a set of picks before its to late. At the
moment the nasty Imags are getting her to "help with their
inquiries" as they say in the trade. I hope no one asks any
incriminating question about accomplices!

In fact a whole collection of crew and passengers are standing
about watching the interrogation. It now seems that she may be the
guilty party in McTavish's murder! I'm sure that those leading
questions under the Imag priest's Detect Lie don't help her case
any. And here was I thinking that nobody trusted those evil
Imag priests anyway. Guess I was wrong.

Hey, I wonder where Jack's slipping off to with such a shifty look?

At least Ulotta doesn't seem to trust the priests. Still they are male.

"YOU, SHIELD MAIDEN. YOU WILL BE OUR GUARD. WE WILL
PAY YOU WELL."

Ulotta looked sideways at the black sphere, eyebrows raised.

"YOU WILL NOT BE REQUIRED TO ENTER OUR SPHERES".

"Oh, in that case, ... Fuck off!" she said.

Maybe I could offer my not insignificant guarding talent??

Oh well, we'll see ...