Castaway Diary, Day 8 cont.

Okay, now that the entire weekend has passed, let’s go back over my notes about what happened on Thursday night: “Sloop Zom-B”, “8 Ropes!”… that… appears to be it.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUs8xGd-nco

 

Good notes David, this is sure to come flooding back…

 

 

 

Victor and Malicia stood watch for the prowler in the jungle and Orny made sure the zipline did not dump any more idiots in the water. Nobody, meanwhile, was in the water, drowning while a Staggered Uun watched on. Floki and Rolifson were investigating the cabins of the wreck as Percy clambered over to join them. A cold and wet hand emerge from the surf just below the wreck’s decking and grabbed Percy’s ankle, but he pulled it away and told everyone what had happened, before he suddenly stiffened and keeled over.

 

Of his assailant there was no sign, but Uun was moved to pull Percy away from the water’s edge and get Nobody out of the water as quickly as he could. Cutting one end of the grappling hook zipline, he let the end sink into the sea – right by Nobody – but while Nobody had managed to surface, he sank again while trying to grab the rope. Uun made his way back across the other rope, carefully and slowly and arrived at the grapple-end as Nobody had managed to haul himself towards the rocky ledge and get all his important breathing bits out of the water. Pulling Nobody up, Uun – Barbarian Lifeguard, hauled the Tiefling onto the safety of the rocks.

 

 

When Percy hit the deck, rigid limbed and unmoving, Floki broke off his search of the cabin and turned to face whatever threat may be giving people the willies from the sea. Rolifson paused his planned ransack of the cabins a little as they remained wary of attack from the sea.

 

Quite right too, because when their party was split between ship and shore, two Lacedons, aquatic ghouls, leapt up and attacked. Floki engaged as Rolifson sought an angle to shoot off acid splashes at them. The Blodvin Marine was able to take down one, then damaged another badly before his blade bounced back off the iron-like bones of the undead and hit him in the face, leaving him with a gouge that ran from brow to chin. Uun and Nobody rushed over to the rope and Nobody lashed himself to the zipline and fired a shot at the lacedons as he slid down. It missed, but still: A for effort.

 

 

The fight claimed Floki, his system overwhelmed by the ghoul’s paralysing touch and the ghouls began knocking other people down, their bite and claw attacks wicked and strong. One ghoul, grabbed at his prey and hauled it overboard, seeking to feast on it later in the safety of his underwater… grave… I’m not quite clear where these guys hang out. Nobody, having landed badly from his ziplining, reloaded, rolled over on the deck and put a shot into the water and through the retreating Lacedon’s skull.

 

 

A small amount of patching up went on as everyone came too. Most of this came from Orny, who cast a healing Hex on as many people as complained at him, which I think was everyone. He’d kind of zoned out there, getting some kind of mystical vision from Bongripper that was tough to figure out quickly.

 

 

Rolifson, meanwhile, wasn’t going to let almost everyone dying get in the way of snooping around the ship and in the ship’s store they found a mostly-picked clean, but still quite orderly cabin. One thing of note was the circular hole cut into the deck above. Some of the stuff they found was cool. They found a saddle, again. And I think another Potion of Reduce Person. There’s going to be some serious Shetland Pony parties when they get back to the mainland.

 

Examining the navigator’s room, Rolifson was jumped by the most inept of the three Lacedons, who had hidden well, and jumped out at the halfling well, but wasn’t all that follow up on the ambush. Rolifson flubbed his Acid Splash and the squirt went wide, but the magical dissonance he caused covered him in a thick layer of biting frost. Rolifson backed out as Floki went in and the remaining Lacedon was cut down. In the Navigator’s room, they found little of use, except an extra store of hard tack. The box had 24 days worth of old dry, barely edible biscuits. Result!  The deck of this room had been cut too, a circular hole that led to the sloshing seawater below. Although some were feeling up to underwater exploration, others felt that the water was turning out to be a dangerous place to be.

 

In the end, the more cautious plans won out and the party quit the Bloody Doll wreck and proceeded back to the shore. Victor and Malicia were nowhere to be found. Percy decided to stay and watch for them, before heading back to camp. But assuming that they could take care of themselves (Uun was “confident of victory” should Victor and Malicia be tested) the rest of the party continued with their plan to head south. They set up camp near the shore and kept a watchful eye on the island around them.

 

 

Some time late in the night, a mournful keening was heard above the sounds of the jungle from further south, a lamenting wail that they could not identify. Nevertheless they woke unmolested and pressed on again, with Orny delivering another round of healing to the quite badly beat up expedition.

 

As the shore curved southwards they found themselves in a wide bay. Before them lay a beached ship, damaged and derelict, but mostly, it seemed, whole. Its figurehead, magnificent in its grotesqueness, was the likeness of a snarling demon. They felt somewhat certain that they had located Jask’s target – the Brine Demon.