(closed) the captain called all hands and swore

[necrolord]

Who: John and friends. This is the CLOSED log.
What: A boat trip.
When: 7/05
Where: Out on the sea.

Warnings: blood, violence, murder of helpless victims, drowning, grief, body horror, eldritch bug monsters.

[ It's time for BOATGATE, a player plot full of murder, corruption, and vengeance. This log is closed to John's close CR. Here is a timeline.

PART 1 - BOAT FIGHT
1.1 - The Preparations - John invites his friends out sailing.
1.2 - The Trip - They have a briefly pleasant time.
1.3 - The Raid - John asks his kids to capture some NPC pirates.
1.4 - The Sacrifice - John asks his kids to execute the pirates. This goes wrong quickly.
1.5 - The Sinking - Mariana rebels and the ship goes down. Waves, Beasts, chaos.

PART 2 - BEACH FIGHT
2.1 - Washing Up - Characters make it to shore, react to the chaos, and decide to fight or flee.
2.2 - Fight Fight Fight - Several new combatants enter the scene.
2.3 - The Immediate Aftermath - Survivors limp home.

Participants, feel free to mingle and tag around below. Everyone else, please see the OPEN log for PART 3 - CONSEQUENCES. ]

Comments

[the_obedient_servant]

Mm. It's not as if this place is ever pleasant.

[They take a piece of chocolate that they keep on their person at all times and pop it in their mouth.]

I'd probably prefer to deal with Marina than the Reckoning anyway.

[necrolord]

Any theories about what she'll be like?

[ He settles in to look out over the ocean, and gestures vaguely back towards town. ]

When she arrives, I mean. The Reckoning. At least Mariana seems to mostly keep to herself.

[the_obedient_servant]

She'll have to be pretty impressive to scare these people so much. They already live in an endless cycle of tragedy and suffering, after-all.

[They'd be lying if they said they weren't a little excited to see it.]

So far, none of the patrons have particularly impressed me.

[necrolord]

None of them? Tough crowd.

[ He looks a little amused, a little genuinely intrigued. ]

I haven't had the pleasure [ ha ] of meeting many face-to-face.

[the_obedient_servant]

Most are evil. At least as far as humanity is concerned. [There's a slight note of scorn to their voice, for humanity or for the Pthumerians - who is to say, really. Could be both. They're both tyrants.] But it takes a bit more than that to impress me, honestly.

I've met the Moss King, Bausphomette, Remina, Never-Mind, Madame Generosity, Marina in a manner of speaking, Argonaut, Mother Superior...

[necrolord]

[ That's a fascinating route to go down, but he doesn't pick at it. ]

Well, if you have any info on Mariana, this is her territory we're in. [ He gestures to the brewing storm. ] Most of my encounters have been a little more secondhand.

[ In that they torment him from afar, and he stews about it. ]

[the_obedient_servant]

No information that I can't imagine you don't already have. [They have, after-all, read his notes front-to-back.] She's almost certainly the strongest of them all, controls the resurrection cycle, et cetera.

When I say I've met Mariana, I mean that I've seen a short communion with her.

What interests me is the fact that we are so very far away from Mariana Trench, and yet this place - which used to be Maine - is clearly named this way as a reference to it.

[necrolord]

[ It throws him for a loop, every time. Every single time someone acknowledges what this place used to be.

It shows only in a tightening of his expression, around the blacks of his eyes. ]

It's funny, right? All these people throwing names around and none of them knowing what they're meant to mean. That world is just a legend, to them, if it's anything at all.

[ He leans forward on his arms against the ship's edge. ]

I guess nothing lasted long once the Pthumerians came to town. Makes me curious about where they came from.

[the_obedient_servant]

Mm. [They had picked up on his tendency to use memes from the 21st century, and make little references to things that they have seen, but it's only now that it really sets in that the man standing before them, for all his power and all his barely concealed malice...

Is human. Was human. In the same way that they were. It's not a grand secret they've uncovered. They don't believe he was even hiding it. But it's a strange revelation all the same.]

That's the question, isn't it... It might have even been answered. I don't know, I believe I've told you before that I missed the Dream. Or at least have no memory of being there if I was at all. [They stare out into the ocean, a small wry smile on their face.] The Pthumerian Queen wanted to breed Pthemerian and human blood together as an elaborate experiment. There's too many Half-Pthumerians for it to have been a one off. I saw a memory of her speaking to Mother Superiority about it, who objected at the time.

And now the Pthumerian Patrons rule over the bloated corpse that used to be the Earth as arbitrary kings and fickle gods. It certainly turned out well for them, right?

[necrolord]

[ He exhales a hah, a bitter breath of a laugh. This whole thing is just a pointed parody. It hurts in new and visceral ways every time he hears that name. ]

I'm told they came across the sea.

[ Chara is— well, Chara is a vicious and horrible revenant, which makes two of them here in this boat. There's something weirdly freeing about it, being on the same page. Not having to give a line about peace and friendship with the local gods. ]

So here we on their sea. Let's see what we can learn.

[ He says it like it's only a step short of Let's wage war. ]

[the_obedient_servant]

[In terms of vicious and horrible revenants, Chara isn't quite convinced that they're alone on this ocean. This entire planet might as well be a ghost in it's own right, from the way it reflects the murder that was committed against it.

But there is a point of familiarity in the way he says that. To learn what they can about the unknowable is a breach of their greatest defense, to reach past the mystery and lay their identity bare. The Pthumerians are gargantuan and inhuman, incomprehensible to the mortal eye. That is what is at the root of their existence.

But they aren't mortal. Not Chara, not The Necromancer. Neither, in all technicality, is any Sleeper who has been fished out of the ocean and thrown on the beach to resemble something almost human.

And if they aren't unknowable, then they aren't unbeatable.]

If you know your enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the outcome of a hundred battles. [They say with a small bemused smile.]

I suppose some of the others don't like to think of it that way.