Ah, where to start! I am writing while overseeing the loading of our new ship. We have a ship now! I have a 9% share in it! It's a Turtle ship! It's only slightly cursed and/or haunted and there is some severe blight set deep into some of the wood so we got it very cheaply, but it's a spaceworthy vessel nonetheless. And a Turtle ship! Navi is extremely enthusiastic about getting it all provisioned. I'm just keeping a weather eye out for sleeks. Surely the ship isn't cursed enough to keep a sleek at bay? One cannot launch without a sleek on board, any good sailor knows that.
After I concluded my last entry I spent some more time making music with Nickelodeus, until the morning hour indicated it was time for the sleepers to rise and breakfast.
I know on inner worlds this cycle is dictated by the nearest sun, which tickles some dim deep-set Kreen memory, but it is still a strange concept. Ships and outer worlds keep our own time. I suppose it is more important if one sleeps, so as to avoid heat or predators. Suns can be very hot. Aren't they just eternal fireballs? Why? Dim memory says they are important and we can't just put them out but I wonder why not.
The Collector provided breakfast and then sent us out to the Cracked Husk on the other side of Bral. They have a... I don't remember what the word is. A box for moving people from one side to the other, but it is on rigging and pulleys and operated by a massive hand-crank. Like a ship-loader but it only goes up and down. Elevator? That doesn't look right. Dumbwaiter!
The proprietor of Cracked Husk is a great ogre called Urzob who operated the dumbwaiter crank himself and met us at the opening. Very genial man. He seemed surprised we wanted a ship. Even at a distance, I could see why, as his is much less a ship-yard than it is a ship-breakers. We had many dealings with this type. Not me specifically, but Tak'led let us watch some of the negotiations from afar. Urzob's pickings were familiar in that way.
Along the way we passed a mollymawk, a natural sight on a dock, and Navi tried to cast a spell at it! I stayed his hand immediately. He insisted they were pests! He was even going to use a fire spell! From that moment it became painfully clear that Navi's education is sorely lacking and he is deeply unfamiliar with basic safety in wildspace. I imparted on him the grave dangers of harming a mollymawk as well as reckless use of fire in an air pocket, and after a few minutes he seemed suitably admonished.
Urzob called for his offspring to show us around, then when neither answered he called for Zarl, who emerged from working to amalgamate two roughly-halved Flying-Fish ships into one.
Zarl is a minotaur, as large as a giff but covered in curly white fur splotched yellow with sweat, and with solid dark horns and hooves. One would think he would be intimidating but he has a rather quiet, almost anxious demeanor, which came to the forefront when Urzob asked him to show us around. When he was just talking about the ships he did alright, although I doubt some of the things he was saying. Rather than question him I regaled Seb with descriptions of the ships we passed, as she has never been around spacecraft before. Finding ways to describe them that she would understand proved an interesting challenge but I daresay I was up to the task.
Zarl showed us down to the operable ships, a decent Dragonfly and rather lovely Squid, but our eyes were drawn to the end of the dock where a Turtle was moored some hundred yards out. Even from the outside we could see it was in bad shape, the eyes shattered out and the whole thing floating counter to Bral's gravity, but it's a Turtle ship! Of course we were immediately fascinated. Zarl said that Urzob's sons had brought it in and nobody had taken a look inside yet. It took very little convincing to let us check it out.
Now, we had an inkling that something was wrong, nobody just abandons a Turtle ship, damaged though it was. Aside from the shattered windows the hull seemed fine. Inside, however, the wood is warped in a rather unnatural, almost corrupted way that brought to mind a Kreen memory of wizards sapping energy from the natural world to power their magic. Very distressing, and honestly I was tempted to quit the ship right then and there. The portholes, too, are painted over with ships' tar. Something very bad happened on this ship. Just a few minutes before I was lecturing Navi on sailor etiquette and now ignoring such clear signs of ill will?
The wood is still warped. We will have to get that replaced as soon as possible. I avoid touching those boards. And the tar circle is
I think a sleek has slipped aboard! Huzzah! I could not ask for better timing. That is a good omen. I could not stay in a ship that even the sleeks have forsaken, contract be damned.
Anyway we dealt with the worst of it. Seb found three desiccated bodies in the vault room, looked like they had barricaded themselves in and died of starvation. Seb liberated them of their (oddly unused) swords and Navi shuffled the remains out the back hatch. We could probably have made a derelict claim on them if we'd identified any next-of-kin but that's always a lengthy process and rarely worthwhile unless they're nobility.
Seb then -- Seb wanders off quite often on her own and finds quite a few things, I would be concerned were she not proven capable of handling herself, probably better than any of us. She said she was abandoned by her tribe for her blindness and yet survived, and I am inclined to believe her. Navi definitely tells some tales but Seb seems very earnest and straightforward in her dealings.
Navi set to haggling with Zarl, and I don't recall why but he showed us he carried an extendable spear. I made a quip about 'compensating for something' which I have heard Theo say before to great effect, but instead of jovial laughing we somehow turned to discussing the oddities of mammalian reproduction. I think Zarl thought Navi was trying to offer him prostitution? I am not sure he wasn't. Plenty of humanoids accept such things as a form of currency.
We didn't notice Seb had wandered off again until we heard a rather dramatic thud and saw the tip of a greataxe pierce through the floor! Seb was in the cargo hold, we found, in the midst of an arcane circle painted in ships' tar. Several disembodied little humanoid hands were scuttling around her.
Zarl and Navi charged in while I readied an inspirational ballad, but I was waylaid by an icy grapple by a strange human-sized shadow creature. Navi chased it off me with a well-aimed orb of acid and I retreated to the ceiling to drum out a frenetic Bane-beat.
Between the four of us we took care of the hands and the shadow creature quite handily. Handily, hah! Zarl took out the shadow-creature with some kind of lightning-whip, Seb cut a bloody swath with her greataxe, and Navi turned one of the hands to ice and smashed it. We were not too hurt, for our part, the worst of it was one of Navi's digits was dislocated. Navi smudged a part of the symbol before we left.
We returned to the shipyard to find Urzog in a heated argument with one or more of his offspring. He emerged quite polite and calm, so I gather this is normal, despite the safe thrown through the window.
Having witnessed Navi's attempts at haggling with Zarl, I took the helm negotiating for the Turtle ship. Yes, despite our experiences, we all had our hearts set on this ship. Urzog seemed eager to offload it, for obvious reasons, so talking him down to 20,000 was a breeze. Navi wanted to add Zarl into the agreement which I thought was odd as Bral doesn't deal openly in slavery. Urzog said Zarl was free to do as he liked and Navi seemed confident he could talk him into joining us.
Navi wandered off this time, saying something about talking to the sons, so while we waited I read tarot. I drew the 8 of Swords, and Seb expressed interest so I had her draw and she got the 10 of Sticks. (It was upside-down, note to self to fix the deck so they're all pointing the right way, I always forget that.) Those seem like good omens, we already found 3 swords and we will definitely need wood to fix the ship! Looking at the 8 of Swords again I'm a little bit worried about the blindfolded person, prisoners are hard to deal with.
Navi came back while we were reading and so I drew for him too, he drew the 5 of Cups, which has cups and a cloaked figure and very clearly indicated we needed to go to a tavern.
Seb wandered off again so Navi and I went to the Collector's 'money guy' to get our note of credit. Noss Fandelia's wooden offices are very nice and very unassuming. He is, I think, a human or perhaps half-elf, hard to tell, another slender spectacled sort with very expressive eyebrows. Initially reluctant to issue us our credit, he told us about the Collector's previous hired crew going rogue, but we impressed upon him our integrity and fine fighting spirit and he agreed to write us up a contract. Oddly, the contract had signature space for five, though neither Zarl nor Theo had agreed to join us yet. The Collector's ways are truly mysterious.
We returned to the shipyard to find that not only had Zarl returned the Turtle right-way-up but also restored the stained-glass eyeports to their former (presumable) glory, with a fine image of an underwater city to carry out the nautical theme. Zarl seemed quite eager to join us, especially when Navi bribed him with a small bag of gold and his strange fruit candies.
The three of us had a brief read over the contract, which states that the Collector owns 51% of the shipshares and the rest are split between the five crew, working out to around 9% each, and we have the right to refuse any jobs he offers us. I decided to wait for Theo to approve it since he's signed such things before. Zarl signed first and then Navi, although he wrote quite a bit more than a signature. Later Noss looked over his addition and it turned out to be a caveat that the ship would turn over to 'the captain' in the case that the Collector died or was otherwise unable to give direction, which Noss agreed to add officially but only with the addition that there be no foul play on our part. (I know a murder tale or two and that seems like the sort of conspiracy to crop up in those, so I understand his hesitation.)
That done we three headed for Daggers to find Theo and Seb. Neither were present. Theo had returned but gone up to sleep, Lydia told us. She eyed Navi rather suspiciously so I reassured her that he was a disgraced noble and not one of the marshals. After some drinks, Theo awoke, and he approved of the contract so he and I added our signatures.
Navi was drinking some sort of astral elf wine that Lydia had procured and he quickly became quite drunk, which was terribly amusing, he's friendly normally but even more cheerful when he lets loose. He and Theo goaded me into telling my story of Jumpcannon and the Sun Dragon, always a crowd-pleaser.
Lydia brought us another round, which Zarl drank all of for some reason -- he is very awkward -- courtesy of a mysterious cloaked figure at a corner table. (As I was telling Navi, there is always a cloaked figure in the corner in Bral, our corners are lousy with mysterious cloaked figures.) Naturally we had to go introduce ourselves to our new friend, although Theo was more interested in flirting with Lydia.
This mysterious stranger... hm. I'm not sure how to write this. I feel as if it needs some proper flair but I am uncertain how to convey the weight of it.
I MET THE DREAD PIRATE JUMPCANNON.
And he said he liked my storytelling.
He was just sitting there in the corner of the bar, he's in hiding right now he said, of course he is, I didn't really think he was dead, but he heard my story about the solar dragon and I thought he would be angry but he laughed! He asked about what I've been doing so I introduced him to my new crew. He checked Navi for marshal tattoos, then asked in an undertone if we would do him a favor. He's been laying low on Bral but needed some cargo moved off-rock and since we have a ship, and he assured us it wasn't any of the really difficult items that'll get you into serious trouble.
Of course I agreed immediately, Navi had some questions, Seb though-- she joined us while Jumpcannon was checking Navi's arms-- she became quite aggressive and demanded to know the contents of the cargo. Jumpcannon seemed annoyed by the impertinence but agreed to let us check it out when he brought it, which mollified Seb.
At that point our conversation concluded. Seb signed by cutting her hand and making a bloody handprint, and we returned to Fandelia's with a finished contract. He made the amendment Navi wanted, as I already noted. While he filled out the note of credit he asked us if we would keep an eye out for the last crew he mentioned and possibly recover the ship, the Red Adder, since it was quite an expense even if the Collector doesn't seem bothered by it. I think the Collector is playing some sort of long game with this Red Adder crew, but Fandelia does not seem to agree.
Outside we were met by dear Nickelodeus. He popped a strange waxy cylinder into his mouth and produced a perfect facsimile of the Collector's voice, though he didn't seem to be able to hear us in return. The Collector gave us the details for our first mission -- our first official mission, that is, given we've already got at least three now -- no, four, with Seb's missing tribe!
The Collector directed us to an event in a settlement called Smallgarden, he said that the 'Grungs' there are making a 'new god' and he wants us to retrieve the old one. I relay that information as precisely as I can remember him saying it, because it means very little to me. I take comfort that I was not the only one perplexed. Nickelodeus gave us a pouch that proved to also fold out into an embroidered map. I confiscated the fifty gold within when Navi started to count it in full sight in the street. Fandelia's is in a nicer area of Bral but it is still Bral and flashing gold around is a good way to not have gold anymore. We bid Nickelodeus adieu and went to formally collect our ship.
(Jumpcannon earlier asked if it had a name, Navi suggested 'Neptune'. Apparently it is the name of an oceanic deity, so it is fitting for the amphibious Turtle. I do not quite like the sound of it but it is an appropriate moniker.)
By the time our note of credit changed hands, Jumpcannon and two flunkies were waiting for us with a crate a good three times my size on a side. At his nod, Seb wrenched the side open to inspect the cargo. I am not sure what I expected, but the cargo in our hold now is a full dozen identical autognomes. They are not powered or awake. They are of a different make than Nickelodeus or one of the rickshaws, more obviously machine-like but with very simplified bearded gnome faces. I've never seen so many of one model in one place before. The rickshaws vary between two or three different types, but they all have some little variety to them, from repairs or customizations. Seeing so many unmoving simulacra was honestly a little unnerving, like a whole clutch had molted at once and left their shed standing at attention. I tapped on one and half expected it to either crumble or grab me.
Jumpcannon gave us coordinates out between the Outer and Inner worlds and said the delivery wasn't expected too soon, as his difficulties were known, but the sooner we can manage, the better. Navi tried to negotiate payment up. Seeing as he was still recovering from drinking an entire bottle of astral elf wine, his attempts did not impress Captain Jumpcannon, who offered no more or less than 250 for the job.
Since then we have been preparing for our first launch off Bral. Navi threw up for a bit and then was recovered enough to find a provisioner's, who have been loading the ship the entire time I have been writing. Zarl has it righted and has reassured us that it is spaceworthy, although it may not yet be seaworthy. Seb has wandered off again, probably to find more food. Theo's claimed one of the bunks and is setting up a space for himself in there.
Navi is going on about some nonsense idea to cage a displacer beast, or to procure something called a 'tressym'. I will have to deal with this. It is his first voyage, he needs a learned hand to guide him.
Addendum--
Apparently a tressym is a type of small winged predator animal. I assured Navi that sleeks would handle vermin control. He asked where he might buy one! I promptly set him straight on the matter. And here I thought astral elves had a reputation for divine wisdom and intellect! 'Buy' a sleek. The very idea!
I thought it would be best if he settled into the Helmsman role. He seemed hesitant at first, but we thoroughly assured him that though Zarl and I each have our own capacity for magic, he is clearly the best candidate. He's settled quickly into the role. The helm seems much too large for him, sized more for a Theo or a Zarl, but he's handling it well. It keeps him from messing about elsewhere on the ship. Seb and I plotted him a course and we are en route to Jumpcannon's coordinates.
The rest of us have yet to decide our positions, but we have several days to hash that out. It is good to be on a ship again.
