Lucy spun the wheel right, the speed that they were going meant the wave that hit them caused water to slosh over the top deck. She had warned James, Teddy and Kyra through the interface and they all grabbed the nearby handles while fighting.
It was the second morning after leaving the cargo ship, the previous day had been blissful, shooting across the bright sunny water, rotating drivers to ensure they never had to stop or slow down, putting as much distance as they could between them and Greenstone, gaining whatever lead they could before the ship got in to dock and any would-be pursuers learnt of their craftiness.
This second morning they had been chased since almost as soon as the sun came up. A huge silver rank monster the size of a blue whale had breached the water just behind the Serenity and only cranking the boat to full speed had Lucy got away from the huge maw. The monster had only tried to attack the boat that one time and twice more, coming short each time.
Since then it had changed tactic. It could keep up with the Serenity but it couldn’t catch it, so it chased close enough to the surface that its back was exposed. Rows of barnacle-like protrusions along its back started erupting, firing like mortars towards the boat, the projectiles that managed to hit the boat turned out to be bronze rank monsters. They were very basic. They were round squishy blobs just bigger than a beach all that had four tentacles underneath them. On the deck they were at an obvious disadvantage, they looked like they needed at least three of the legs to stay upright, if they fell over they needed all four legs to get back up. Their only other attack was to produce spikes on their bodies but seemed unable to fire them.
The wash of water over the top deck had washed some of the monsters over board and knocked over the others. James used his Everglades staff to lever them off the edge.
“Nice driving babe, oops, left again.”
The silver rank monster let loose another salvo, a dozen monsters arced through the sky towards the Serenity. Lucy spun the other way, only the first few monsters managing to grab on to the rear rails and climb up.
Kyra was at the rear of the top deck and met them. Her summoned spear had taken on an interesting quality while they were at sea. The summoned weapon was still technically a spear but had appeared as a huge diamond trident. She used it to impale the monsters or push them off the boat.
[Lucy! Area of reefs just populated on the map, come half right and keep the speed on.] Teddy said.
Lucy spun to face the shallower water. They knew they could probably outlast the monster but Lucy was having to feed the Serenity bronze rank coins and use her Magical Artisan power to eke out every knot of speed to keep them ahead.
The monster must have seen the reef coming and tried one last time to lunge out of the water to swallow the Serenity. It didn’t even come near, the lunge costing it more distance and it fell back roaring.
For good measure Teddy launched a pair of grenades into the open maw, Kyra lobbed her spear and James kicked a bronze rank spawn into its gullet. It wasn’t enough to hurt it but the chase was over anyway. They laughed and kicked some of the errant limbs of the monsters overboard where Teddy had chopped their legs off.
The three of them that weren’t driving relaxed over the edge of the railing, all leaning on it and looking over into the reef below. They saw schools of tropical fish swirling below in tight packs.
Teddy was standing between his brother and wife and only had a seconds notice as a red dot appeared underneath them and he pulled back both of them away from the railing. The spike of rust coloured coral hit the underside of the Serenity and scraped up the outside and off the railing where they were just standing. Teddy took the opportunity to slice it in half as it was exposed.
You have defeated Calcareous Stick
“James! What the hell is a Calcareous Stick?!”
“Watch out! Don’t touch it!”
Teddy had just been about to loot the half that had fell onto the top deck by nudging it with his boot and at James’ warning he stopped.
“They’re a fairly common iron rank reef monster, but I wouldn’t expect them here but they’re what we would call an invasive species. Luckily they actually support the habitat they move into as they are a mostly dormant monster that doesn’t move.”
“Err, dude, that one definitely moved.” Where the body was on the deck a spread of what looked like rust expanded about a foot in each direction before stopping and drying hard. “And it’s still moving! What’s that?”
“That’s why you don’t want to touch it, on contact with air anything that touches it causes a mycosis which permeates the skin and temporarily paralyses their target. It causes a predator of coral rock to grow on the target. Out here anything that gets paralysed and heavy is going to drown or be attacked by more. They swarm when one launches from the sea floor.”
“They swarm…” Teddy said. He checked his map for any more red dots, but hadn’t seen any before the first attack. “Damn, any good news?”
“Not really, if we’re lucky we’ll get to see the very rare Calcareous Reef Guardian. The bronze rank variant but like I said they’re rare.”
“Oh yeh, so lucky.” Teddy moved to where Lucy was driving. “Any damage showing?” He asked, looking over the rows of dials.
“No but I wouldn’t want a hit much bigger than that considering what we have on board.”
“Good point.”
As they were talking the Serenity was rocked by two more hits. The first monster hit the hull and shot out angled back out to sea and the second was stopped from coming down on the deck by Kyra’s trident she had re-summoned. The monster was easy to see impaled on her trident, a blotchy rust colour, it looked like a stick man with jagged coral rock fingers, it waved around sleepily, its main attack was obviously its explosive launch off the coral bed up to unsuspecting targets. Rather than risk being contaminated she flung the monster overboard with the trident still impaled and summoned another. Teddy summoned a rift portal in the path of one that deflected off the hull.
You have defeated Calcareous Stick.
Calcareous Stick has been wholly annihilated, it has been automatically looted.
10 [Rock Darts] (iron rank) have been added to (Theodore Mitchells) inventory.
1 [Monster core (iron)] have been added to (Theodore Mitchells) Inventory.
10 [Iron] spirit coins have been added to (Theodore Mitchells). Inventory.
“Out of the fire into the frying pan…” Teddy was thinking trying to see how they could get warning of the monsters before they went over the top of them. He marked the map for the shortest way out of the far side of the reef for Lucy to follow. “Lucy, let me take the wheel. Your Astral Projection can use some other powers through it right? Can you use your Psychic scream?”
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“Yes I’ve used it before, you want me to go ahead of the boat and bang away like a sonar to make the monsters appear so you can avoid them.” She was already moving while she was talking, heading toward the prow.
“I love not having to explain things all the way.” Teddy said to himself as he settled into the captains bucket chair.
The plan mostly worked, with a few exceptions when the power wasn’t used soon enough and they were only glancing hits. The rust coloured patch on the deck had started to flake in the wind and blew away and James assured them as the monster expert that it wasn’t infectious anymore.
Back out in the deep water they all relaxed. The silver rank monster was on the far side of the reef, the coral monsters were gone and the contagion they spread had blown away.
“Shame we didn’t see the big daddy.” James said, looking back at the reef.
“Yeh it is really.” Teddy said surprising him. “Check these out Lucy.”
Item: [Rock darts] (Iron rank, common)
Darts of rock looted from a Calcareous Stick, almost like fingers. They contain the same contagion as the monster.
Effect: When thrown they have a paralytic effect in the immediate area around impact. They cause a small growth of rock to form at the site of impact.
“Interesting, not something that we can easily replicate with what we have on board, we need some more alchemy supplies but it would be useful to outfit you with a range of darts given your Swift as an Arrow power.”
“Just what I was thinking. Also, anyone mind if we cut back towards the coast sooner than planned? This getting caught out on the water is giving me the willies. I’d much rather be on land for a bit more tactical mobility.”
“Seconded, there’s not a lot I can contribute out here, I’m not jumping in the water with this crowd.” James grumbled.
Teddy changed course to head on an intercept with the coast, they wanted to head as far as they could up the coast on the water but the threat was turning out to be too high. At least on land even if they were going to run into monsters it was somewhere they were more comfortable. Teddy had to zoom his map out quite far to see the coastline, he didn’t head straight for it, wanting to keep making progress north.
The others were used to letting Teddy drive now. They took turns but Teddy took the lions share, his knowledge of how the Serenity was put together, what it was capable of and his added agility from his swift essence made for the best driving experience. They were scrubbing down the top deck with a few stiff brushes to get the last of the monster goo and rock dust off when Lucy popped up a feed on the interface.
[Guys, Lechuza has spotted a heist in progress.]
Teddy set the Serenity on cruise hold on track the course it was on while he watched the feed. They saw a large container ship like the one they had received their cargo from, there were two beat up old boats hastily lashed on a the bow and stern. They could make out a row of prisoners with their hands on their heads being driven below deck by a bunch of men with swords, bows and spears.
“Pirates.” James said, no hint of joy in his voice at the thought of confronting them.
Teddy came back to the others “Then we have a choice, we have a mission, and a very valuable and delicate cargo, that ultimately people will rely on to protect them from monsters. We can risk that cargo in order to help these people from…”
“These monsters.” Kyra interjected. “There is no choice, we cant stand by and let this happen.” James and Lucy took a moment then both nodded in agreement.
“Ok then, lets think this through.” Teddy said, marking the container ship on his map.
They planned what they were going to do. Between Teddy and Lucy they were able to mark the pirates on the map and number them, luckily when the marked pirate went inside the ship and off the live feed from Lechuza and then came back out their number stayed the same. The pirates were fairly spread out over the ship, they had the enemy vessels at the front and the rear to contend with and James brought up a good point.
“Err guys, are we on kill or capture? There’s twenty eight of them marked so far and only four of us.”
“I think we need to be realistic, we don’t want to kill anyone but we can’t risk success by not killing. I think we need to come up with a subterfuge to get in close then take as many as quick as we can. The ship is further away than you think and its getting dark, we’ll slow up and attack in the morning so we have plenty of time to think of a few ideas.”
The next morning Teddy was in one of the buggies that behaved like a jet-ski headed towards the ship, there was no buzz of protective magic from the hull and he was certain the pirates had disabled it to give themselves access.
He thought back over the last few days at how quick everything had been, large plans put into action every few days with not long to plan each. The realisation dawned on him then that it had been happening for longer than that. Since they had left the academy they had been bouncing from adventure to adventure. That was a bad thing, he contemplated to himself, they had these wonderful new powers that needed using and training to make the most of them. They had helped a lot of people that would be in a lot of trouble if they hadn’t been there and they had made so much money. The amount they made off this trip would mean that they didn’t need to work for a whole year or more each. That wasn’t including whatever money they made from their adventure along the months long journey.
While he was reminiscing Teddy realised he couldn’t remember when he last slept properly. Since being at sea they had slept in mini shifts but they had been fairly busy since leaving the cargo ship, before that he had slept at the church of hero but a drunken stupor hardly counted as restful sleep. He gave his head a wobble and tightened his grip on the wheel, he needed to be alert for this next bit, it was amazing that he wasn’t terrified. The changes that they had all gone through over their time on Pallimustus were significant; none of them bat an eye at the act they had decided to go four vs thirty career pirates. All he felt was the focus to follow the plan. Once they had done this they were going to get of the water, find somewhere safe on land and have a proper nights rest.
The ship had been stopped from moving when the pirates boarded. Teddy could see the giant harpoons stuck into the boat now that he was closer coming from the prow of each pirate boat.
He ran some circles around the ship, shockingly the pirates hadn’t posted a lookout. After a few laps enough of the pirates had seen him and traced his progress in, keeping a close eye incase any decided to attack him he prepared to enact the plan.
He affixed a fairly goofy smile on his face and waved genially up at the boat. The pirates acquiesced and let down a rope ladder for him to come aboard. He climbed up and let the buggy drift away powered down. In the second time in this week Teddy found himself surrounded by a semicircle of armed men on the deck of a cargo ship.
“Well hello there.”
There was a beat of indecision why the pirates tried to work out who this obviously simple and stupid to climb on a ship full of two boats worth of pirates.
“I’m Mr Destraciõn of the Understone cargo transport union, I’m here to check that you fine gentlemen are receiving the benefits that you rightly fought for and received in your union terms. Tell me, are you receiving adequate breaks? Is there a selection of healthy alternative snacks in the break room? What entertainment channels are you getting?”
“Err…” one of the nearest pirates confusedly gestured at Teddy. “Turn out yeh pockets, lets see what you’ve got.”
“Quite right! Quite right, let me show you.” Teddy reached into both his robe pockets and all the hands around him stiffened on weapons, he pulled out stacks of pamphlets and gave one stack to the pirate who addressed him. “Please read through the information carefully as the union has been very busy since you’ve been at sea, we have been working on the provision of service animals as a right for every person with anxiety, to either be sourced personally for a bursary or indeed sourced by the company employing the individual. We all know that parking at the docks can be a nightmare at the best of times and when a few ships all embark at the same time it can be next to impossible. The Understone Cargo Transport Union advises all its members to carpool as much as possible to save the planet,” he nudged the next nearest pirate with his elbow, “you know, to save us from that beastly global warming, but the Union has managed to secure designated parking at all major ports and docks up and down this coastline.”
Teddy started walking amongst the pirates handing out the leaflets from his other hand. As he spoke more and more pirates came from around the ship to see what was going on, and who the man speaking such nonsense was.
“If you take a look at the card I’m handing out, don’t worry there should be enough for everyone, it’s a simple sign up card, for you who are already members of the U.C.T.U. this allows us to update our records. For anyone who is not a member then why not join today! The union boasts an excellent record of achieving at least a ‘satisfied’ from almost all of its members, our Christmas hampers are an absolute riot for the four lucky winners on this continent.”
Teddy continued to chat absolute rubbish for a few more minutes until the baffled pirates parted. A scarred pirate with a wild bronze rank aura stepped forward.
“Ahh the company man! I assume you are the Captain of this ship and here to stop me from encouraging these good men to band together in the union?”
“What do you think yous doin? Why haven’t you killed him or tied him up? For fucks sake why are you just standing around?”
“Cap’n, he says he can get us guaranteed vacation time!” A witless pirate said.
Teddy’s stance changed, he was no longer the friendly union member trying to con them into joining, he was all business.
“So you are the pirate Captain. I am Theodore Mitchell, this is your one and only chance, surrender. We don’t want to hurt anyone.”
There was a stunned silence and then the Captain started laughing, he gestured around and all the other pirates took their cue and started laughing, he motioned for them to ready their weapons and they started to walk on to Teddy. Amongst the fifteen or so pirates the Captain stopped.
“We?”
Then for him and his men the deck of the ship exploded into fog.