Return of the Emblem Chapter Nine: Consolidating Forces

[Acacia Sgt]

The night finally made way to morning. John woke up and stretched before standing. One look at sea showed the warships closer to shore than usual. <Not surprising,> he thought. <Now with not only one but the two events, security around the port is gonna be tighter.>

A quick look around showed Fred was still around, now surrounded by some sailors. <Hmm, who knows if Raquel has woken up yet, but she might not want to take the news first thing in the morning. Well, time to hear it out first from this guy.> And so, he decided to approach them.

-----

Sophia had a peaceful rest. Sure, the cot wasn't the most comfortable place to sleep on, but after the events of tonight, even the cot was comfortable.

She woke up with a yawn. I guess sleeping wasn't enough... at least all that is in the past. Though the reminder of last night's events reminded her of the damage done to her clothes. She made a quick glance at them before sighing. I suppose it can be patched up, though removing the blood stain would be harder. Too bad my things were left back in Ursium. Well, she never expected the whole teleporting business, so what's done is done.

So now with a new day ahead, she proceeded to to head to the deck.

-----

Not long did John left did Gil began to rise. Truthfully, he was already awake, but after seeing John still sleeping, he decided to remain lying to not wake him up. Now that he wasn't though, he was free to move now.

It seems however that he payed no attention to him and went on his way. Probably too look for that human female no doubt. Well, it seems he would be on his own to get some breakfast then. However, seems there were more humans on the sea judging by the ships. Seems it wouldn't be a good idea to try to get away too much, and mostly likely their presence would mean less fish on the area as well.

Oh well, back to plan A it seems, whenever that would happen.

[Snowy_One]

"Whoa whoa whoa!" Fred had been sleeping upon the deck. It hadn't been a peaceful sleep due to the heavy armor and stress from fighting, the blood was still on his armor after all, but it was still sleep! Now he had sailors surrounding him sounding like they were going to pick a fight with him and he still had sleep-sand in his eyes! Cautiously he raised his hands up, as if surrendering. That Tina girl must not have woken up or told them yet.

"Don't worry. I did my share of the work. That Tina girl? I carried her back here last night after some fight. I was too tired from fighting so late and just fell asleep. Ask her if you need to validate my story."

All the shouting as the sailors surrounded Fred was not unnoticed by Robin. She had been sleeping calmly in her little corner on the deck, a faint blush on her cheek from her dreams, only to be awoken by Fred and the sailors. With a clumsy and uneven stance she got upright, trying to balance herself out. "<Right. It's morning. I have to serve breakfast for everyone.>" she mumbled to herself as she looked over at the newcomer. Who was he? Had more people suddenly appeared overnight? How the heck was she going to feed all them?

[Acacia Sgt]

So he was now explaining his presence there. Well, might as well lend a hand.

''There is no need, I saw them arrive last night.'' John spoke up. ''Seems some ruffians tried to attack the Arena. They got involved in the fight, and was too tired to leave the ship after helping her get back.'' He explained.

[-Cynthia-]

Connor

Connor had fallen asleep in the middle of adjusting Gabbie's armor and woke up against a surprisingly soft piece of leather. Yawning, he stretched a little and decided to get back to work as quickly as possible. He expected some other people might want upgrades after their most recent battle after all.

Nadya

Nadya woke up with her head resting on Luca, looking around her with some surprise. Where the hell am- oh right ship. she realized to herself as she woke up.

She decided to go over and brush Riley, who had been whining the previous night. "Doubt Pinky's coming down anytime soon- someone oughta give ya a little attention at least," she said to him in a vague attempt at comfort.

Veronika

Veronika woke up in the small bunk with her side still aching from the battle the previous night. Her first visit in the morning was the infirmary where she decided to pay a visit to Raquel. Seeing Reign nearby, she glanced over at Raquel's sleeping form before asking.

"So...how is she?" she said bluntly.

[Phoenix]

Leverager

"What are you some traveling bum, doing people favors for a place to sleep? Well I've got some bad news for ya, pal; it's morning. 'Sleep time' has now become 'get the hell off our ship time'." the sailor came back cuttingly. Luckily John stepped in to elaborate on things, which kept the sailors from reacting too harshly. "Hmph. Just make sure he's off by noon. The repairs on our 'twin' should be done by then and we've got places to be."

The infirmary had a visitor, which was no surprise to Reign, though he didn't have much of an answer for her. He would have been beaten to it by 'Mister Apathy' either way. "Still asleep, but I'm optimistic. Barring a slow acting poison, if there were anymore complications coming we would have seen them by now. She's going to be pretty sluggish when she wakes up, though, so make sure she's not by herself when she tries to move around the ship ... don't let her near any guard rails."

In the makeshift stables, Luca had been dreaming of running up the side of a massive Kigenese castle, and he had a twin brother for some reason. Instead of a single saddle, he and his twin were connected to a single one and Nadya stood atop it clad in gold and defying gravity like nobody's business. It was a long way up, but with his twin's help, he carried her up to the top of it and they took gold from the high and lofty ones with ease. When he couldn't feel Nadya sleeping against him anymore, he woke up and began looking around. She was speaking to the black one. That reminded him, the pink and black human had been hadn't been back since yesterday. The cute one seemed to be handling it well enough, but the black one looked depressed. Luca laid his head back down after he finished taking in his surroundings. He wasn't going back to sleep, but felt like lazing about for the moment.

Riley was happy to be getting attention, again. First his human had been taken by some rival herd, then the smaller one began showing up less, and he wasn't getting out much. It was starting to become depressing.

In the Dauntless, Gabbie was surprised to see Connor get straight to work. "Wow, you don't quit. No breakfast?"

Not Leverager

It was an unusual sight, Talitha and Mandy on horseback with flowers in their arms instead of weapons. "Flowers for the dearly departed. Why are we delivering these? Don't we have real work to do?" the former asked.

"Not really. With the tournament postponed until the investigation is complete, there's not much for us to do. There aren't enough people coming in for exams to warrant us butting in so we might as well get out and see the town. Plus ... I'm thinking we should probably move on, soon. We've been here for a few weeks, already. That's a bit longer than usual."

"Yeah but with what just happened ..."

"That's the other thing. If we stay even longer to watch how all this pans out, we'll be here for even longer. Sooner or later, we've got to head out to the other guilds and solve those little problems that nobody else can~"

"I guess so, but let's at least see how Faatina and the others are doing before we start packing our things. I'm not sure when they'll be setting sail."

"They were getting tested for tournament entry so they probably weren't planning on leaving quite so soon. But I guess it would be a good idea to check on them ... after that fight last night, they're probably still recovering ..."

Still Not Leverager

Volya sat down against a wall in a dark alley staring up at the morning sky. He wasn't really alone, but the thugs roaming about were keeping to themselves for the most part; Volya's fists were still bloodstained and the damage his cloak took from the axe was still present. They could tell it would take more than just a handful of them to get this guys coin bag. "What should I do ...? Report now or ... confirm it first ...?"

"Oi, dark fly boy. Tell me, somethin', do you like to fight?" One of the thugs spoke up.

Volya slowly turned his head toward the man with a half dead look on his face and answered "... I do."

"Hah! Then I've got just the niche for you," the thug replied, clearly happy with the answer. He began approaching Volya trying to be careful but also pretending to be casual. "My boss would love to have a tough one like you around."

"I already serve a master."

"What? You're in another gang already?! Blast ... who?"

"Don't worry about it ..."

"Come ooooon, come clean. Who do you work for?"

Volya slowly picked himself up off the ground and dusted his cloak off. "It's not a gang, nor would I want to work for a bunch of bandits. Do yourselves a favor and find a better lifestyle before you get yourselves killed. You people just aren't cut out for war, believe me." It was meant as advice but it really rubbed the man the wrong way, and he roughly put his hand on Volya's shoulder as he past in order to stop him for a moment.

"Listen, you may be some kinda punching fiend, and I respect that, but don't tell us how to live our lives, black pigeon. You don't know what the hell we've been through. This isn't 'war', it's survival!"

"... if you're willing to give up anything you have just to 'survive' the next five minutes, then what are you ...?" With that, Volya continued on his way, leaving the thug to his thoughts. He didn't know what was so wrong with putting survival first and shook his head.

[-Cynthia-]

Dauntless

"I didn't know we had breakfast," Connor replied to Gabbie. "And I'm not sure I'm hungry enough to be eating...sailor grub anyway. Not that I'm expecting every meal to be on par with the chefs back at the estate, but it doesn't hurt to have some standards. Here, try these gauntlets for fitting," he said, going over to the edge of the Dauntless and handing them to her.

Infirmary

"She probably shouldn't be spending much time alone anyway," Veronika said darkly. "Speaking of the ship there may be a change of plans- the smugglers apparently still have ships in the area so the Leverager may be in danger soon. I wanted to talk with Raquel about the possibility of changing ships, but she's not in any shape to be making decisions right now," she said, frowning.

[Script]

A Man Called Gar

Dang, Armor-guy the first decided to sort everything out on his own. And here Gar was desperately hoping for something more interesting to happen. Though at least he got the name of the rexian girl from armor-guy the second: Tina. Well anyway, after armor-guy the first cleared things up, the sailors went and wanted the second off by noon. That was a decent bit away, but not a lot of Raquel's group was up, and waiting on them for a shopping trip could end up being unwise. Oh well, he'd wait it out.

Gar took another bite of his apple. Though he couldn't wait too long, this was his last apple...

[Acacia Sgt]

<The Utka will be ready by noon? That certainly sounded faster than the last time. I wonder if something happened to speed up the process.> John thought. Well, moving on from that, there was still this guy.

''Well, I suppose now you can go on your way.'' He told Fred.

[Phoenix]

Leverager: Dauntless

"That was fast," Gabbie noted as she took the gauntlets and put them on. "Heheheeeeeh. I'll need to get in some practice before the next foight, but these are pretty loight; I think I can get around easy enough."

Leverager: Infirmary

"It's that bad?" Reign sort of half asked, half commented.

"Huh, I guess we should have expected this. Though it would be nice to run into regular smugglers for a change. Seems a bit better for our overall health." the man remarked.

"Veronika, was it? I've got a question if you're not busy." Reign asked.

[-Cynthia-]

Dauntless

"Good, good," Connor said, looking rather pleased with himself. "The other pieces probably should be done soon- shame I can't recreate your old weapon though. Seems silly for Uncle to have taken it away now that I think about it, given how much fighting you've been doing," he said thoughtfully.

Infirmary

"Captain Bogdan seemed pretty worried, but I admit I'm reluctant to move out. Finding another ship might be difficult and staying too long here could be dangerous..." she mused aloud. "Anyway, feel free to ask me anything," she replied to Reign, snapping out of her own thoughts.

[Mercakete]

People came and went. The night went on to the point where she couldn't stay awake. Then morning came and she was still sleepy from how long she'd waited, absolutely silent. It hardly registered that she was hungry. It was so dark... The air was thick and musty. There was no sky. The world she was trapped in wasn't stable -- it shifted constantly and groaned miserably. The chain clinked softly as she turned her head to look at it again. Why? This was something she could not break or cut. She hadn't seen him, either, but others had been visited. Had she truly been abandoned in this lonely, choking place?

Rizen took a few paces away from the others, if only to move her legs some. She knew she wasn't the only one suffering. The alpha female human -- Riley's newer human -- hadn't shown up either, though he was being consoled by another human from the herd -- perhaps even having been sent by the alpha female herself. What did this mean for her, though? It was always difficult being away from her human but... Why was she left here? And why was this unbreakable bond holding here in this terrible place attached by her human himself? And so the dismal pegasus continued to quietly stand around, keeping her head low for the time being.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The previous night had gone splendidly. Many succumbed to her stealth and cunning. She was a huntress and food was abundant. True, many of the vermin had scurried off, but not before one of their own was caught and killed. And so, Maw continued to live up to her name -- her maw was quite the weapon, exceedingly potent in dispatching the rats who sought to fester and feed on the humans' food.

Now that it was morning again, however, it was time to find the human who tended her wound and provided protection between voyages. Gytha was fairly easy to locate: still asleep, as usual. So, Maw silently and nimbly leaped up and sat down on the mariner's chest, looking down at her with her one, blue eye and waiting for the human's awakening.

[Phoenix]

Dauntless

"Well, that's okay!" Gabbie replied, raising her voice a bit cheerfully all of a sudden. Connor was quickly seized from behind, though it was gentle enough not to hurt much. "At this rate, you'll be able to come up with somethin' better~"

Infirmary

"Anything, huh?" Reign replied with a smirk. Anything to distract him from the crick in his neck. "Right ... you've been traveling with Raquel for awhile now, right? Is she just trying to rescue her father or is there more to it? I'm guessing she wouldn't call this whole thing quits and go into hiding if her father was somehow returned safe and sound?"

"Heh, I doubt it ... Tartarus hath no fury like a woman scorn." the doctor replied first.

Yeah, that's nice, but I was asking her ...

[-Cynthia-]

Dauntless

"Oh, uh thanks for the vote of confidence Gabbie, I'll try to think of something," Connor said, blushing a little at the unexpected seizing.

Infirmary

"I don't think her father's rescue would be enough at this point- she wants to take the entire organization down. Can't blame her, with the combination of kidnappings and murder attempts I doubt I'll be able to sleep soundly knowing they're still out there," Veronika said to Reign.

Edited July 21, 2012 by -Cynthia-

[Phoenix]

Infirmary

That's what I was afraid of ... "I just hope you people aren't getting in over your heads. How many people have they thrown at you already?"

[-Cynthia-]

Infirmary

Veronika shrugged. "It's hard to say- not sure how many of them attacked Weyland's estate in total. We don't know where they're based or how many of them there are. Our only clue so far is that they seem to be after the emblem piece," she said. She briefly considered that saying this in front of the doctor may not be the wisest idea, but she remembered that they had discussed their journey in the dining hall already. Besides if we can't trust the crew of the ship we're on, we're done for regardless.

[Snowy_One]

"Wait? You want me to leave you? I don't think that would be a smart idea!" said Fred as quickly as he could to the sailors. He needed to sell them on keeping him around, fast, or he would be homeless and out on the streets without a coin to his name again. "Now I know what you're thinking. 'Yarrr! What doth this crazy lout thinketh he be? A giant ward against kraken? He be naught but a blimey barnacle on this here tub!' Well good sirs, while I may not be as sea-worthy as you fine folks I am a VERY capable guardian! Do you have valued cargo? A passenger who needs escort? I am as tough as nails! I can take any blow and withstand it! Not only did I rescue the dear dame Tina last night from a hoard of uncloth bastards through my thick armor and fighting skills, but yesterday I stood alone against a powerful and beautiful magician by the name of Synthia. She was a master of the wind, skilled and practiced in the art of magic. Against any other knight she might have won, but I have trained myself to withstand the blows of the arcane as much as refined steel! She fought me and I... swept her off of her feet and defeated her without hurting her! Any who doubt my skills and armor, feel free to take a swing at me now! I shall withstand your strikes! Now, I know what you're thinking now as well 'if he be so good, he must be costly!' Well good sirs, I am not! My only asking price for serving as your guardian is that you NOT throw me off this ship until either the next port or another employer comes along! So I am FREE! No cost at all! I am packed up and ready to set sail right away!" he said, finishing his sales pitch with a wide grin on his face.

Behind him Robin quietly paced back and forth on the deck. The group had approved of her meal last night, so she would need to cook another, and another, and another. She was the cook now! She couldn't sluff it... but what could she do? Grain cereal was cheap and she was sure she could pick up a load to feed everyone easy, but that wasn't tasty at all. Zach would probably not... No. Robin shook her head. She shouldn't be thinking of Zach right now at all. Eggs could work as well but at two eggs a person she would need a LOT and they were so fragile! What if she broke them? How could she pay for it anyways? Ask Zach for some mon... No!

"UGGGG!" she exclaimed as she tried to not think about him. He was her best friend, not her husband. Even if he was her husband she shouldn't have to seek his approval for everything! She liked having him back but... No. "<Where is Gytha? I need something to knock me out flat and do some brain damage.>" she moaned to herself.

[Acacia Sgt]

Sophia finally reached the deck. Seems there weren't that many of the group around, which highly likely included Raquel. However, she did found was the latter part rant of some person in armor's speech. Huh? Who is he? She thought, a confused look on her face.

And if she was like that, the imagine John who was much closer to him and heard it all.

<Well well, looks like someone's in need of work.> He sweat-dropped. <He had a duel with Synthia and won? I suppose that in addition with the events of last night means he has some credence to his claims... despite how verbose he is. I guess it wouldn't hurt, we're not exactly the most normal bunch of people around anyway. Besides, if last night was also an indication, we certainly need more people willing and capable of taking hits for others.>

''Well, I suppose you can get hired by our employer.'' He said. ''Shall I lead you to her?'' <Hopefully Raquel has already awakened. But if not, then I can just go look for Veronika instead.>

[Script]

A Man Called Gar

Armor-guy the second tried pleading out his case to stay onboard the Leverager. While Raquel's group certainly could use another wall of armor... actually there was no real downside to this was there? Armor-guy the first thought so to, and offered to lead the second. But... "Our leading lady's still enjoying her face-down time," Gar called out to armor-guy the first. "Though that might have changed since I was there," Gar shrugged and continued eating his apple.

[Phoenix]

Infirmary

"Seth Weyland?" Reign inquired, seeing if he had the right one ... not that he knew of any others. "They are crazy, or have enough men to waste lives ... or both. I guess I've got to assume both for now. Is Raquel really up for this? You're going to lose people trying to take down a group like this ... no getting around that."

Main Deck

"Is he mocking us ...?" one of the sailors asked the others in a low and annoyed tone as Fred began his sails pitch. One of the other sailors replied with a slightly pretentious nod. He was quite offended already but waited until Fred finished his clumsily disguised plea for a job before replying. "Alright listen, you, not everybody talks like that, and you damn well don't know what I'm thinking right now, 'cause if you did, you'd be running for the flipping hills, 'cause there's no wrathdamn way you can shrug off iron shot through the brain, 'Sir Knight'! You think beating up little girls and thugs puts you in our league? I'll splatter your brains all over this damn deck!" he concluded his tangent, using his finger to repeatedly prod Fred's chest plate.

"Heh. Ya know now that he mentions it, I'm not sure what we'd do if we ran a foul of a kraken. Probably feed it that druid bastard and be on our way. Anyway, it's the captain's decision ... on the hirin' or the killin' part. Go talk to him or Raquel." another sailor replied with his arms crossed.

"Just lemme shoot'em ..."

"Let it go. The wyvern rider can take it from here."

[Psych]

Finding another boat in the harbor was harder than Adrian thought, but luckily he caught one just as it was shipping out. Of course, Adrian was stuck clinging to a net attached to the side of the ship the whole trip, but a free ride was a free ride. Some noise on deck had woken him from his sleep, and he tried to release his hands and climb up. Peering over the railing, he looked around at who was there. For some reason, there was another group besides the sailors. Maybe they would have some money. They certainly looked wealthy.

[-Cynthia-]

Veronika

"That's the one. I thought we would be safe there...I think that attack proved we're not really safe anywhere," she said somewhat sadly.

"I know we're bound to lose people- I can't believe our luck so far actually. But you can't expect her to do nothing- I doubt we can rely on someone solving this problem for us," she said, putting a hand on her chin.

[Ether]

Awaking from a long slumber, the girl got out of the bed, the feeling of freedom still... foreign. Stretching slightly, she looked down at herself and grimaced. The only article of clothing she owned was torn, singed, and stained with several unfortunate fluids... Lisandra sighed... perhaps the caravan that they appeared to have on the deck would contain some clothing?

Making her way to the deck, it seemed a decent chunk of people had gathered, surely she could find someone to show her around and hopefully get her a change of clothing.

Spotting a pretty young woman carrying a staff, who appeared to have nothing better to do, Lisandra walked towards her and pulled at her sleeve, hoping to get her attention.

[Phoenix]

Infirmary

"I don't expect her to just back down, but this is nuts. What if they've got friends in the military willing to drop a battalion on you all?" Reign didn't like being the guy that ranted about how bad a plan was, but Raquel's chances of living to see the end of their struggled seemed very low, and Veronika was right, their luck thus far was pretty unbelievable. He was still not sure what to think of the more fantastic parts of what he'd heard the previous day. It was best not to think about them at the moment.

Edited July 22, 2012 by Phoenix

[ReformBlade]

Stretching out and still feeling a little sore, Aneda sat up and yawned. "Oooooof... What happened again? Oh.... Right." she said to herself, staring at the armor on the floor. Shrugging, the first thing she did was put her armor back on proper,. "Daddy always said to use protection, hehe." Feeling ready for the day, Aneda was much more lively than she was the previous night. "What to do..." Seriously, I have no idea what's even going on right now... So without really any reason to do so, she decided to go and pester someone, and spying Zach nearby, Aneda's demeanor brightened. "Ah! Perfect!" So then she shook Zach by the shoulder. "Hey... Hey! Wake up sleepy!"

"Ah!" jolting himself awake from his doze, Davod scrambled to his feet. Breathing quickly but steadily slowing, he calmed down quickly. "Whew... only a nightmare I guess..." Looking over at Faatina, Davod sighed with relief. "Good... good, nothing to worry about... She seems to have rested throughout the night." Well that's what you think. You're having the same nightmare again and again and again. This can't be healthy. For anyone, you or otherwise. "Well what the hell can I do about it? It's not like I can pop some meds in and just whisk them away!" his voice rose a little in the excitement but he simply closed his eyes and shook his head again. "No, we're not doing this again."

[Snowy_One]

"That was not a little girl, my fine sirs, but a strong, yet caring, warrior." said Fred simply before turning to John, ignoring the rest of what the sailors had said. "And yes, I would very much like to see your employer. I need a place to rest right now and it seems the good sailors aren't taking to my natural charm and wit. Mayhap your leader will moreso than them?"