quest/src/epistolary/00048.md

title	created	updated	syndicated	public
00048	Wed, 28 Dec 2022 16:08:10 -0700	Wed, 28 Dec 2022 16:08:12 -0700	yes	yes

00048

Alex snatches up his new hemo friend cheering huzzah as he does. We've got a pirate ship little guy!

Rushing about the deck Alex quickly takes stock of what's left, plenty of ammo, general supplies, fuel, perfectly provisioned for a quick crystal kidnapping. Smart move pirates, but not smart enough.

Alex heads to the helm and steadies the ship guiding it out and away from the library, can't have any of the remaining cyberplasms easily reboarding it now can we? Once the ship is out of range Alex checks his S.T.A.G drone's twtxt feed for updates.

@<drone/fhsoa7483/video> Cyberplasm approaching crystal
@<drone/fhsoa7483/gps> approx library, top level
@<drone/fhsoa7483/audio> Cyberplasm threatens violence
@<drone/fhsoa7483/video> Inky, bread, confidence enter subvertly
@<drone/fhsoa7483/video> Visual feed impaired due to unknown smog
@<drone/fhsoa7483/audio> Angry tones, uncertain who

Not particularly helpful, and it rules out my first thought. I could blindly fire the broadside canons into the library hoping to hit the cyberplasm, but I'd be just as likely to hit Inky, Bread, Confidence or any other innocent bystander. I've got to get a message to her.

Alex quickly dispatches a command to the S.T.A.G

@<drone/fhsoa7483/cmd> Seek Inky
@<drone/fhsoa7483/relay> Secured ship, inform A.I of intentions, will coordinate rescue via the stolen ship

If all we've got is this, then we'd best be ready for a quick rescue. Alex busies himself preparing a new zipline and mooring lines. He then loads the boradside canons and the top deck swivel canons. It'll need to be quick, but if I'm ready I can swing the ship in close, deploy a zipline for Inky to zip down to the ship with, and defend the retreat with the swivels. If everyone retreats to the ship we can take a note from the pirates playbook and blast them to hell with the broadsides while we make our retreat. Or simply run I suppose, but I dislike the idea of leaving innocent people to deal with angry pirates

The hemogoblin cheers you on as you take possession of the airship, accidentally squirting a few jets of rust colored blood in its excitement. Must still be quite young. They don't gain full control of their blood sacs until well into adulthood.

You check your S.T.A.G. drone's twtxt feeds. This A.I. seems especially reliable, you note with satisfaction. Its updates are regular and detailed. Even when there's not much to report.

You load up the canons and take control of the helm. The hemogoblin stands at attention at the broadside canons with a cracklesparkler, ready to light the fuse at your command. You steer the ship a short distance away from the hotel, hopefully out of reach of the cyberplasms. But within range of your own canons and ziplines.

While Inky has the attention of both guides, they close the door again until it is slightly ajar, and make a series of hand gestures. First pointing at themselves, at their own forearm and fist held stiffly to mimic the shape of the captain's arm cannon, to indicate that Inky will handle the Cyberplasm. Then Inky points the two fingers of a hand at Bread and Confidence, turns the two fingers downward and swings them back and forth in opposite directions to convey walking. This was followed by a single finger pointing in the general direction they had last seen the hotelier; then the finger hooks inward, the arm repeating a yanking motion once or twice before ending the gesture with a thumb tossed over their shoulder towards the hallway away from the staff entrance, to ask them to get their boss out of the library to a safe spot.

Without waiting for confirmation from the toques, Inky opens the door, abruptly stops, turns and shoves a compostable bag of mango-flavoured croutons at Bread, gives them a thumbs up in return and a mildly disturbing, eye-crinkling smile behind their kerchief, before slipping inside the smoky room. One hand is already pulling out a thin, extendable metal walking pole with a carrying strap visually resembling the type used by hikers from their courier bag to check for obstacles amid the lowered visibility.

Confidence watches all of your hand gestures closely, and then nods resolutely. They draw their large hoe, and turn and start to crouch run toward the main entrance to to the main hall of the library.

Bread looks confused, but ready to follow Confidence. They grab their heavy meat tenderizer and crouch down in imitation of their fellow toque. Before they can run off, you shove a bag of croutons into their arms. "Small. Toasted. Bread," they intonate slowly in wonder. The confusion falls from their face as they break into a wide grin. "Now I'll never disappear without a trace," they laugh. They thank you and run like a duck after Confidence.

Inside, Inky lobs the empty glass vial that had held the unpleasantly pungent organic catalyst at a spot the floor several paces roughly from where the Cyberplasm — presumably the leader of the group — had been standing earlier, in the opposite direction of the staff entrance in an attempt to divert attention from the hotelier's last location. As they edge along the wall towards the tower stairs, walking pole looped over one hand, Inky grabs a few small hardcover novellas from a wall shelf. Straightening from their crouch, Inky tosses them one at a time horizontally in quick succession like a discus, but without the full-body turning motion, across the hall towards the sounds of frustrated groans and angry muttering. The first starting higher around where a human head might have once been, one at waist height and another at the juncture below where ectoplasmic knees might meet prosthetic legs.

You pick up three hardback novellas. If it wasn't so smoky, and if you weren't so much in the middle of a potentially life and death struggle with the Cyberplasm captain of a pirate airship, you might notice their titles: Stop and Smell the Crystals, Living the Corn, and A Big Moon.

Anyway, you start flinging.

After you toss the catalyst, you can see a plasmic form heavily blurred and obscured by the smoke turn in that direction. You fling Stop and Smell the Crystals at it, and it spins like a discus and smashes into the pirate right in the face, above the chin. It howls and brings its hand to its face, and turns and charges up its arm cannon.

Mostly going on sound now, you fling Living the Corn at the pirate's moan and at the electric whine of the canon charging. You hear the canon discharge but the half-blind pirate fires wide. You see the flash of the energy blast hitting something, someone, else obscured by smoke in the middle distance between the two of you. A man screams out in pain. Right after the muffled thump of his body hitting the ground, you hear the clinking and ringing of something heavy and metallic striking and rolling across the floor.

Living on Corn strikes the pirate in the elbow, and with a fizzle and a spark, the arm cannon sputters offline.

The pirate stumbles forward, half-lame and half-blind. It stoops and scoops up a heavy melon-sized object. It stomps its cybernetic boot, and small rockets spring out from small compartments on either side of its ankle. They start to fire up and the pirate is about to make its escape when A Big Moon hits it right above knee and severs the ghost's final connection to its final enhancement.

It groans as it starts to dissipate, dropping the heavy object once more.

"My crew, it is too late for me! I shall never have a new body now! But it's not too late for you! You must bring the quintessence to Mother!"

And then the pirate's essence is diluted in the smoke filling the library.

At that moment Inky hears a very low whirring accompanied by clicking sounds behind them and without glancing backwards, swings the walking pole at the source of the buzzing. The stick collides with something, sending it careening backwards with a light clatter through what is likely a row of bookshelves around the area already partially emptied of their contents. From the static noise that ensues, Inky realises whatever it was may or may not have been one of the wizard's bugs hovering in the shadows earlier or a disembodied, ectoplasm-spewing prosthetic limb after all. Inky calls out sheepishly, "Sorry, Young Master Alex! Was that yours? Oops? Haha?" before smashing two more empty glass bottles as a distraction for any remaining Cyberplasms lurking on the same floor, and sprints up the tower stairs, using the banisters as a guide.

The Amber Imp is feverishly reporting all the goings on from inside the S.T.A.G. drone when Inky strikes its conveyance with their walking pole. The bug is destroyed on contact. The imp barely manages to fire off one final End Of Transmission post before ejecting from the craft, which sinks below like an exploded firework. It drifts on the currents of smoke and flows out through the hole in the wall into the open air outside. The imp falls through open space and starts to think back on its life. So much time and energy spent chasing its hopes and dreams, its goals and aspirations. So much of its life wasted in pursuit. Always reaching, never grasping. Is that all it gets? Is this the end? Did it ever really even get a chance to really live?

These thoughts race through its head as it falls, but are cut short when it abruptly lands on a hard bed of cloudstuff. It tumbles and rolls and comes to a stop. And when it looks up, amazed to be alive and vowing to make the most of this second chance at life, it looks up into the benevolent smiling face of a pink zephynos.

~

Inky, you cross the floor to where the pirate had its last stand. You find what appears to be approximately one-fifth of the hotelier, and wonder idly where the rest of him might be. And you notice a conspicuous lack of Ginnarak Crystal.

You do however notice a soft crunch underfoot. And when you bend down to inspect it---disorganized cyberplasms running amok in the smoke behind you---you discover a trail of mango flavored croutons leading across the hall to the tower stairs.

You sprint up the stairs using the banisters as a guide. The breadcrumb trail ends on the seventh level, where Confidence sits slumped against the wall between two bookshelves. They have one arm around four-fifths of the hotelier, his shocked gaze telling you everything you need to know, that he is entirely dead but just doesn't know it yet. Their other arm is around Bread, who has suffered a massive wound to the chest and is only slightly more alive than the hotelier. On the ground between Confidence's legs is the Ginnarak Crystal. Several loose pages are stuck to its sides, held in place by drying blood and ectoplasm.

Confidence looks at you and smiles wearily. "We left a trail for you. It was Bread's idea. They were a good guide."

WHAT DO YOU DO

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