Moments earlier-

Vailin’s armored boots crunched through the fine gravel shoreline, ripping through the disgusting water protection around the bulky “musket”. The larger crunching of the rowboat being dragged on shore echoed softly in the predawn misty fog, “Quickly now, we need to secure the point.” The three Aquilar seamen with her grunted in response, lifting their own new weapons and turning to follow her, “Vierin, take two, eyes on the tree li..”

Three dull thuds puked smoke from the tree line, and something heavy slammed into the rowboat. Two more thuds echoed, but one produced a burbling roar as one of the Aquilar fell to the gravel, clutching his stomach that was quickly soaking in turquoise. “To Arms!!” Vailin heard her own voice bark just before no less than a dozen pirates broke from their hiding positions in the tree line less than 50 yards from the landing party. Three Fay flew toward them shrieking their fury and waving small, jagged daggers in each hand. Six Aquilar followed closely behind them waving rough huen swords of various lengths. Lumbering behind them were 5 Orcs of the larger warrior subspecies, each of them carrying their own muskets of some kind. They appeared strange with a long arm tipped with a smoldering rope attached to a small metal arm bolted to the side of a wide heavy wooden stock, housing a massive thick but stubby iron barrel. The back of her mind seemed to equate it more with one of Benjamin’s cannons than the weapon in her hands.

A harsh reminder of their situation came on the wings of the two remaining musketeers. The massive orcs were clearly encumbered by their ungainly weapons, but they lifted them all the same. The two barrels belched flame and smoke, but these two shots were less carefully aimed. Both shots flew wide, whistling overhead and splashing harmlessly into the water behind them. Vierin rushed to the fallen seamen, quickly beginning to glow as she looked over the fallen man. The two other Seamen bellowed their challenge, raising their own muskets. The twin reports boomed sharply, and Vailin’s ears rang as she barely dove out of the way of the seamen who were still behind her. None of her near brush with friendly fire registered. She had been just far enough ahead to be in front of the acrid cloud of smoke, the universal constant in black powder explosions, and witnessed what came next.

Each buck and ball cartridge carried 4 projectiles that left the weapon at a little over 1000 feet per second. One of the Aquilar seamen had fired too high, but his shot sent those 4 balls straight through the group of Fae who were flying in at just over head height on an Aquilar. The larger round ball slammed into the lead Fae. The impact ignored her ragged leather armor entirely, exiting the other side of the body in a cone of bone, blood, and gore that covered the leading element of the pirates behind her. The second Fae faired only marginally better. Three of the buckshot pellets struck the second Fae in the wings, severing the one while punching holes in the other.

The second Aquilar had fired lower. His roundball slammed into one of the Aquilar on the left, and he fell with a burble, struck cleanly through the chest. Each of the three buckshot balls slammed into two other Aquilar and one of the Orcs, but the smaller buckshot rounds failed to take their victims completely out of the fight. Vailin shook herself from the grim scene. Her dive toward the ground had landed her behind an old piece of large driftwood, and she threw her musket over its lip. ‘Aim here’ Benjamin’s instructions reminded her at the last second, and she lowered the front bead of the musket to the waist level of the closest group of pirates, closed her eyes… and pulled the trigger. The impact to her shoulder threw her from her hiding spot, having failed to properly brace herself from the recoil. When she opened her eyes, one of the Orcs lay writhing on the ground from a buckshot strike to the throat. One of the injured Aquilar also fell permanently, taking a roundball hit to the head that ripped the top of her skull off in an explosion of blood, fur, brains, and bone.

One more explosion heralded Veirin firing her musket. All of her buckshot pellets missed, but the roundball slammed into one of the Orc Musketeer’s in the hip, spinning him in place as he fell. Vailin took flight, dropping the heavy musket in favor of her familiar lance before meeting the last surviving Fae in the air. Her fight last spring was a shocking event that struck a pointed tip on her deficiencies as a warrior, but she had a secret. The strange being known as Benjamin had shown the true power of Majik in that fight. She was able to see the basics of how he created his “godlight” through her connection to those same gifts.

Now she released what she had learned. She didn’t know what they were called, but she felt the positive and negative forces pulling on one another when Benjamin did it. It had taken time, but she had learned how to manipulate the relationship between the particles she had seen from him. She raised her lance toward the last airborne Fae, ripping at the particles inside her own target. The Fae instantly paused in the air feeling the hair on her entire body stand on end. Vailin ripped everything she dared to from the Fae and the air around her until the blade on the end of her lance began to dance with power… Then she released…

It wasn’t the brilliant explosive power that the ‘human’ exhibited, but the it was enough. The arc of godlight leapt from her speartip, slamming into the Fae who fell the ground shrieking and twitching as electrical burns spread across her skin and boiled leather armor. The move seemed to shock the remaining Pirates to pause their charge just before one of the Aquilar seamen managed to get his weapon reloaded, and fired again, felling two more of the Aquilar attackers. One of the surviving Orcs managed to stand and begin reloading his weapon from a bulky horn of some kind hanging from his neck, and the two surviving Aquilar redoubled their attack with a bellow. Veiran howled a challenge, having finished stabilizing the fallen Seaman, and rushed to the fore along with the two uninjured seamen. Both had attached the bayonets to their rifles and joined the Vin lancers as they rushed the survivors. The Aquilar seamen each charged their pirate counterparts in what appeared to be some sort of cultural challenge. The two Lancers worked together quickly doubling up on the injured Aquilar pirates in quick strikes before moving on to…

Vailin’s chest exploded in agony as she was thrown over a dozen feet backward.

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-Now-

Benjamin’s head snapped up at the sound. “Fuck, tie it off. There!” He hissed still trying to keep his voice down. It turned out to be futile as a pair of thuds from the treeline announced their own ambush. Benjamin was driven back by an explosively painful impact directly on his chest. The projectile shattered on impact with his tool steel breastplate, sending shards of white-hot metal in all directions. Several of them embedded themselves in his arms, while a few others bounced of the arrow deflecting lip around his neck. It drove Benjamin to the ground, gasping for air. Val was just reaching him when a bellow echoed from the treeline. No Fae immerged from this treeline, but their enemies still measured a dozen. 6 Aquilar and 4 Orcs emerged, the Orcs again wielding what Benjamin realized was some kind of hybrid HandGone/Matchlock musket that appeared the comical rendition of an Arquebus with an oversized barrel for its bore. The Warrior Orcs were likely the only beings capable of making that weapon even remotely useful in combat…

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Unfortunately for Benjamin, this group appeared to be more aware of their weapons. The Aquilar still charged, but they charged from the center, and the two Orcs that fired seemed to be interested in reloading from a flask and ball pouch rather than engaging in close combat. Two more booms echoed as the second pair of Orcs fired from the opposite edge of their brethren, using their position to shoot at Benjamin, and his women without risking their charging compatriots. “On Me!!!” coughed Benjamin, who struggled to one knee as Viola arrived to them, “*cough* focus the middle. Shoot then go to pistols!” Benjamin’s smokeless rifle barked in unison with the twin thudding booms from Viola’s and Valtrya’s muskets…

The Volley immediately ended 3 Aquilar lives, while peppering the rest with individual buckshot hits in nonfatal places. The Aquilar clearly understood the slow reloading attributes of early muzzle loading firearms, and they redoubled their charge. The leader was just stepping over his fallen comrade when his head exploded from Benjamin's straight pull repeating rifle. The second quick crack of the weapons report startled the charge.. the third halted it altogether. The last surviving Aquilar was just reaching the treeline when a high velocity spitzer projectile ripped into his back just below his shoulder blades and ruptured his heart.

Vi and Val had followed Ben’s instruction, drawing their pistols to take the Orc Musketeers under fire. The range was long for a handgun shot, but they managed to score hits on two of them before they too retreated into the treeline. “Over here,” Benjamin gasped, and the three sprinted to a small outcropping of rocks to their left just as the survivors began peppering the gravel beach with sporadic musket fire. “Stay down!” Ben growled, resting his rifle on the rocks, and taking potshots into the fresh clouds of smoke. He ripped off the last 6 rounds in his magazine in quick succession before pulling a pair of clips from his pouch and slamming the fresh ammunition into the rotary magazine. “Loaded!” Val called out, pulling her musket up next to Benjamin just for a musket ball to pulverize the stone directly next to her. The smattering of shrapnel knocked her down behind cover again, and deep purple blood began oozing from half a dozen small cuts about her face and neck. “I.. live… Fuck!” Val hissed, blinking the dust from her eyes.

“Shit, here they come again!” Benjamin growled just as almost 20 Aquilar appeared in front of them. 5 Orcs appeared this time, all with bulky Arquebus and shooting sticks. They kept firing, each in turn as the formation of Aquilar pirates advanced. “Save your shots, let me thin them!” Benjamin yelled between shots. Emptying his 10-round magazine to claim 6 more Melee chargers. “Shit!” he hissed as he pulled the trigger on an empty gun, “Reloading! He was only able to slam 5 more rounds into his gun before Val’s cry of “They're almost here!” Benjamin spun to lift his rifle up over the rocks alongside Vi and Val who already had their weapons up.. “Fire!”

All three weapons spoke as one, and the Volley left all of 4 Aquilar alive, and then they were upon them. The remaining 4 rushed the rocks, and Benjamin drew his saber only to drive it through the first one over the top. Val dropped her musket, lifting her spear and shield from his resting place beside her. She skewered one of the aquilar before parrying a second. Vi ended that second Pirates life with a quick thrust through the throat, and Val lunged to her right, raising her shield in time to hear a pair of ringing clangs of musket balls impacting. The hits drove her to the ground, and Benjamin swung his weapon on the Orcs, taking two on the left with quick shot before running out of ammunition again. “FUCK! LOADING!” Benjamin yelled, reaching for his ammunition pouch to retrieve another clip.

“Benjamin!!! More!!!” Ben looked up, and a stone sank in his gut… another dozen appeared in the treeline, accompanied by no less than 10 musketeers made up of a mix of species who seemed to be pickin up the weapons from their fallen brethren Pirates… “Shit… We can't hold. We need to get to the…”

He never finished the sentence as Viola cried out in pain when a musket ball clipped her breastplate and deflected into her shoulder. The hit from the huge slow moving chunck of metal spun her around before throwing her to the ground. “Vi!” Ben turned to grab her, pulling her to safety while Val suffered the backlash of sharing the pain of her sister. Both girls were out of the fight for the moment, and Benjamin spun to fire only to be driven back by the constant incoming fire of 10 separate muskets firing in a coordinated continuous fire. ‘We have to get out… this is too much. What the hell did we walk into.. where is Ruui…”

A howling whistle answered that question. The first salvo of Olioorin’s vessel warbled in out of the rapidly clearing mist, he had wisely chosen round shot, but the affect was devastating. The pair of cannon balls slammed into shore just in front of the enemy group throwing fine gravel in their faces before bouncing through the formation to kill 4 enemy and injuring a dozen more with impact shrapnel. Benjamin took his chance, surging up to his knee and taking aim at the biggest threat.. the musketeers. All too soon, another 10 rounds was spent as quickly as he could find a target, and he knelt to reload, but this time there were only 3 musketeers left standing. An ear ringing boom erupted from his left as Val found, and fired her musket. She had wrapped her sisters arm the best she could, and was back in the fight. This time she killed three with her shot before dropping back behind the rocks to reload…

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“You are going to be ok.” Vailin groaned back to consciousness into relative quiet shoreline, “Your armor stopped it, but you’ve broken 4 ribs.” Vierin knelt by captain, and Vailin looked around to see that two of the Aquilar seamen lay injured beside her. The third bore a bleeding scar across his flank, and had three muskets resting against the driftwood log next to him. “We drove off their first wave, but It’s not over. More await in the treeline. A dull Thud echoed as if to punctuate, and the Auquilar seaman growled and fired the musket he was holding into the woods before handing it to one of his injured comrades who began reloading it. “Prepare.. They come again.”

Vailin tried to rise, but her medic pressed her to the ground, “You are in no condition, rest and load the muskets.” No sooner had Veirin finished when a bellow of challenge echoed from the tree line and another wave of Pirates rushed their position. Veirin and the relatively uninjured Aquilar opened fires. Shooting the 5 muskets as quickly as they could be reloaded. The hail of gunfire halted the rush half way to them, the constant rate of fire able to kill too many while the pirate’s own muskets seemed to be lacking in number. “We run low on… cartridges… we must retreat” The pain in the Aquilar’s voice was prevalent, but he spoke the truth. They were just preparing to run when Ruuigriloo arrived. Two of her guns had been set to fire upon Benjamin’s beach, but the other two made quick work of the last of the attackers rushing Vailin’s position. Longboats were launched, and more seamen were sent to each shore. Vailin was helped into the rowboats, “Captain’s orders. He wishes all of you back aboard.

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Benjamin stepped back aboard. The salty spray had washed the blood from his dark clothing long before they reached the ship, and he was immediately ushered to the Captian’s office, “Captain, I thought the plan was to hold the narrows. What’s going on.”

Olioorin simply grunted, “We were, but the Mists lifted, The inlet is tight, but… My lookouts found something. My lords ruined Vessel is here. They have built an outpost around it.” He pointed at the newly updated map. “We watched their number rush to fight you. You and yours took on an entire Pirate hoard… and won. That means there is little to defend their base. Heal up, Benjamin. We will be hitting the beach with all our forces inside the hour.”

“Captain… That’s a Risky choice…” Benjamin offered cautiously. “I know it is,” came the response from the Aquilar captain, “But my duty to Liege requires it of me. If his ship is still here, we must try.” Benjamin sighed for a moment before slowly becoming completely rigid… “Captain, Please tell me that you collected the Pirate's weapons when you picked us up..”

Olioorin nodded, “Of course. Depriving criminals of their weapons is a cardinal mission for the Navy, why?” Benjamin simply turned and gave the captain a disconcertingly grim expression.