The Crossing

[rubyrubyruby]

It's a pretty cruddy day out if one isn't fond of getting wet, or doesn't benefit from the positive quirks of having the blood of storms coursing through your veins. Rain just doesn't want to let up. Cold and blustery, hatches are battened down and some are wearing slickers. A rope bridge has been slung between the Beast and Ark #1. Some quite excellent exercise opportunities to hand-over-hand it across the turbulent sea...and people gambling money on who might fall into water.

Ruby just so happens to want to get over to that Ark, for reasons. She eyes the rope bridge, and then eyes the water. Her lips purse. She rasps out a command to grab the 'bloody flying rug' in case anyone is not at all keen on making the crossing through sweat and effort. A large alhambran carpet is fetched and kicked until it is rolled out flat upon the deck. It is rapidly soaked with the driving wind and rain. Maybe it's not the safest means of conveyance either. "Should be three ways, but...faaah. Choosers can be beggahs."

Chase eyes the rope bridge and the carpet skeptically, "Why do we need toget to the Ark?"he asks, adding "I can carry you Ruby...I don't trust the carpet...and the bridge looks sketchy"

Sidonie is right as rain in this weather, pun intended. She's been helping, or attempting to help, adjust the rigging to account for the driving wind, and is only just tying the last knot. At the sound of Captain Incarnate's voice, Sid turns to look at her. "What's that, Captain?" The flying carpet gets a wide-eyed look, with more than just a tinge of excitement. What does it do?!

RPG: Ruby declares that she owns this token:
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Author: Faust Held By: Ruby
Date: Mon Aug 21 15:28:08 2017 Focus: 6
Title: HighPile
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Created via Magic Carpet (REC-MC): rechargeable special token-3 token-6 type-magic

Merri's highwayman cloak passes for a snappy raincoat once he turns up the collar and draws up the mantle in a cowl hood. He's propped meditatively against a siderail, observing the dark wet wall of the massive barge while the rope bridge was launched and secured at either end. As a secondary purpose,, he's been on hand in case of any victims tumbled into the drink beyond the standard rescue floats and ropes. Now he straightens up and approaches the gathering, his steady tread on the slick and swaying deck a prelude to the suspension brudge challenge. "Well you've still got a bunch of lively critters," he calls over to Ruby. "Restive, though. Could be the weather, but could be the stress building from a long voyage. I want to go over and see them."

Ruby screws up her face into a mask of grimaces. "Only tha best things come in three's. Three is a good number. When it comes tah choices, if you gots more than two ways, usually tha means there be a middle option tha be grey or murky, or pivotal. Yes or no makes me skin crawl. Order an Chaos. Right or Wrong. Life should be less...stark. Room for wiggle." Ruby gestures somewhat distastefully to the carpet, which rises damply up into the air to hover. "Met a strange man named Faust an did some trade. Beats longboats if we travelin too fast for oar-work. 'Ow it works be beyond me. Creeps me out."
"I ain't bed-ridden yet, so I don't need 'elp." That last almost snarled defensively. Oooo! Hormones!
Ruby rolls her head upon her neck, popping a few joints and limbering some. She squints cock-eyed to Merrisol. "You wanna go over an see them? 'Ave a 'eart tah 'eart? Be my guest. I s'pose we could make it a group trip then? There be a creche 'o kids over there tha I need tah check on. They gots some wet-nurses an nannies. So I gots reason tah poke my nose over there as well."

Chase's lip curls showing some teeth (much less impressive in human form.) "fine, I'll play life guard" he rumbles, "I know someone is gonna end up in the drink." he looks sky ward, rain soaking his hair and skin. Heaving a sigh he dives over the rail into the wind and rain. *NO SPLASH*

Merrisol's mention of critters seems to peak Sidonie's interest, even more so when actual kids are mentioned by the Captain. She wipes away some wet hair plastered on her forehead and approaches. "Do you think it'll be alright if I come with you, Captain?" she says, looking hopeful the answer is a yes, and that the transport is the MAGIC CARPET.

Merrisol offers no objection to Chase's becoming a Baywatch Dragon, even baring a quick grin after the transformation takes flight. "You take the high road, I'll take the low road, and we'll see who the Mandrake catches first?" he maybe-jests, giving the soaked carpet a not-unfamiliar look. Hauling himself up to the edge of the bridge, already jouncing enticingly for him, he looks back at Ruby and Sidonie. On your mark.. get set...

Carpet it is. Because expedience is a thing. "This sounds like a dare..." Ruby makes space for Sidonie on the right. Look at all those funny tassels at the fringe. "I swear it works for everyone. Aye...you drive it Sidonie. I gots too much on me mind. Grab a tassel and think 'o direction or focus on destination in sight...tha bloody 'ocus-pocus does tha rest." Ruby sits cross-legged on the wet rug, and eyes Merrisol. She hisses out of her mouth to Sidonie, "Rebmans. Mandrakes. Sea...Sky. Aye, we can be tha middle way. Tha's good."

A Silvery White Dragon streaks skyward missing the carpet by a few inches as a crack of thunder peels, the winged beast rolling as he climbs, wanting some altitude (but not too much) He veers toward Merri and the rope bridge, so many to watch, and in a storm no less.

Sidonie watches Chase take a splash-less dive into the murky rain only to reappear as a flying dragon, then Merrisol prepare to cross by rope. "You mean you want me to..." She stares at Ruby for a moment, water dripping down her chin. "Well..." She places a hand on the carpet gingerly and presses down to find there's no give. Then both hands, and she climbs up onto the spot Ruby has left for her. With a look of wonder and at least a little fear, she reaches for a tassel. "Please don't get too distracted, Captain... for both our sakes?" Like driving a carriage, yes? She yanks experimentally, maybe with a bit more force than she intended to, because the carpet launches forward with a jolt.

The bridge, provided the ships maintain a steady distance so that it doesn't dip beneath the waves at any point, avails a Rebman with no racial advantage save that 'no risk of drowning' thing. That instinctual confidence melds with the Minosian muscle-memory for tricksy surfaces, putting Merrisol's chances at a safe 1:4 bet. Except, the next time he looks to the deck, the femmes are bolting from the starting gate, provoking him into a hasty push that sends him slaloming down the slope of the foot rope. Waaaaugh!

Ruby's spare coins are left behind on the deck, right around where liftoff occured. A single gold coin hilariously left to spin in lazy revolutions before dribbling to a halt. The rest of Ruby lurches forward with Sidonie on the carpet. She squints into the driving rain, her face resembling a stone gargoyle better suited to the exterior of a cathedral.

Chase keeps watch as best he can, circling in the driving rin. His voice booms like a crack of thunder, "this is a terrible idea."

A loud, uproarious whoop emits from the vicinity of the flying carpet, and it's not coming from Ruby. Grinning like, well, a kid on a flying carpet, Sidonie grips the tassel and pulls in an attempt to slow them down. This has a different effect than desired. The carpet dips abruptly in the direction of the water, then, as she yanks up in a moment of surprise, the carpet leaps up and soars over the rope bridge.
Aha! So this is how it works... Sidonie squints in the rain, trying to visualize her target: the
deck of the Ark.

The grumpy sky doesn't have the best visibility. It's a low ceiling but the tops of masts can still be clearly seen despite the rain and whatnot. The seas aren't gentle either, and the ships lurch as they crash through the primal ocean. It makes the rope-bridge shift between taut and dangly, stretched and then relaxed, all according to the natural forces exerted between the vessels. Sailors from both ships peer out into the downpour to watch the multiple crossings. Pipes come out. Coins pass hands.

Merrisol's big'n'tall mass distends a noticeable dip in the bridge by the time he reaches the midway point, reapplying his grip to the hand ropes to complete the journey with a more strenuous climb. The inevitable course corrections of the Beast and the Ark, however minute, tension him higher one moment, and slack him lower the next, presenting clotheslining hazard for the swooping carpet and dragon. The man abruptly tugs his sights downwards from his destination to stare straight down into the mess of concentric ripples that is the stormy surface of the sea. "Certainly not one of my better ones," he agrees with Chase, though his voice doesn't carry through the wind and rain, though in the next lungful, he tries his bestest: "Get higher! Hungry hunters below!"

With all the scraps to feed on recently, what emerges from the water could be initially assumed to be sharks. However, this is not the case. What launches up like silver gilled ICBMs are barracudas of impressive velocity. Nature has equipped them with the ability to propel themselves in a swarm of scaled javelins and murderous zeal in the pursuit of an opportunity. When they breach the surface of the water they make a queer hissing sound, though that could be air passing along their bodies or through their gills.

Ruby holds on for dear life. She's never been a fan of flying, and she's never taken the carpet for a spin quite like this. All of her concentration is on not letting out a cowardly yelp. Her eyes are quite wide during the flight. She murmers some sort of oath about Bog or another deity.

Chase peers to the choppy dark waters, Sharks?!? the Dragon banks coming in low tobe sure no one tumbles off the carpet to add to the sharks feast the dragon eyes the water, you know what they say, sometimes the shark gets to eat,sometimes the dragon eats the shark. "Hurry the heck up" he snarls.

It wouldn't take too much time to fly up above the crow's nest for a few turns before setting down, would it? There's a daring gleam in her eye now. Sidonie is about to do just that when she barely catches Chase's and Merrisol's warnings and looks down to see the swarm of ICBMBOIV. She calls to Ruby against the bite of wind, "Should we go fetch him!" Her flying is more smooth and steady now, less herky jerky and more confident, as they make a wide arc and turn back toward the scene below.

RPG: Merrisol challenges a difficulty of 8. Merrisol chooses Wits and the gifts STY-CC and STY-PI. Merrisol succeeds.

Merri's gaze arcs from sea to horizon once the first of the large barracuda breach the waves along the shooting corridor of air between two vessels. From his perspective, it is all pretty much gaping fang-filled maws hurtling in his general direction. Even as he's bearing down on those ropes they are upon him, whizing overhead and to both sides, twisting in midair in an attempt to snag him off the bridge before they are headed back into the water. Merrisol uses the bounce of the taut rope to throw himself forward out of the way of one terribly accurate ICBMBOIV and it gloms one of the ropes instead, severing it and itself in twain. Silver scales and viscera patter into the ocean swells while the ends of the rope sproing away like silly string.

That's a lot of airborne fish. It's an impressive sight. Both the sheer number of them so hungry to try and fail to get the Merri-morsel, and how there must be a queue of them swarming the fleet and waiting for opportunities like this. But at least everyone flying is safe, right?
Unfortunately, the sight of so much sushi has triggered other opportunists, and they come from above. Shrieking cries of delight emanate from the grey clouds, and silhouettes vector their way down. Sharp toothy things coming from below. Swift diving things from above. Feathered and wide-winged, their peaceful soaring about become dive-bombers. Dusky tan pummage and pearl-white beaks and talons prepare to hit the fish. Between the ships becomes an abstract suggested shape of an upper and lower jaw seeking to meet in the middle.

RPG: Chase challenges a difficulty of 8. Chase chooses Wits and the gifts ANI-MF, BLD-MA, and DRG-BS. Chase succeeds.

Ruby raises an arm across her face when things get suicidal. She curses colourfully when the sky makes things even worse. "Bog's barnacles! It's a bloody feedin frenzy! 'Eaven an 'ell are tryin tah eat us!" The matter at hand is stumbled over before she adds her opinion on a rescue. "Shite...You wanna try a fly-by? Through tha? I 'ope you luckier than me..." She peers over the side and judges her chances if she bails. Hmmm...not good. Ruby grips her section of rug tighter. "I can try an grab...If you fly us by..."

Chase was intent on the fish he nearly didn't note the birds...almost "Shite!" the dragon swears as he engages in an undignified dodging for his life twisting and turning in the air as he tries desperatly to avoid mid air smack ups.

"Ready yourself then, Cap! Let's get 'im!" Sidonie hollers out as she pulls up the tassel and sends the magic carpet swooping down in Merrisol's direction. Once they are flying in the space between both ships, the flying becomes rocky, a swerve here, a dive there, to avoid lunging birds and flying fish. She yells out as loud as her voice can carry, she calls out to the man, "Grab on quick!" The magic carpet is brought to fly just beside Merrisol, close enough for Ruby to reach.

Merrisol has at least a couple of good ropes left spanning the wavering gulf, clutching to one with both numb hands while his foot line weaves side to side with the supports unraveling on the side that broke. But the swarm just keeps on dogging the fleet, crazy to be the one that skewers the prize. And now birds! Their wings battering the rain in sideways sprays, they hunt and likely are hunted in turn. What's a Merri to do except scramble, duck, swing, and curse the inescapable dilemma. He's just hanging out on the remaining hand rope when the carpet careens by, and he almost lashes out a kick at them before realizing it's a rescue rug. Rearing back for momentum, he does kick off a barreling barracude and swoops an arc towards his comrade, letting go of the rope at the last moment.

It's such a mess of scavenging birds and hungry fish. Swift shapes dart to and fro. Flashing silhouettes and blurs of motion. None careen into the magic carpet riders, though the passage of air from the beasties is enough to be felt as they pass. Lots of near misses. There's squelches as talon curl into barracudas, and piercing cries from triumphant birds. But the sheer number of aquatic fiends means that more than one bird becomes a prey and is chomped and dragged down by half a dozen barracuda.

Ruby can feel the pulse in her neck throb dizzyingly fierce. The windburn and near collisions have her convinced that they're going to get sandwiched by doomed. She can't believe her eyes when Sidonie brings them around in time to see Merrisol still alive and curving towards them. Her instinct is not let a single fistful of fabric go, so it's an effort to release her grip on the carpet and offer that hand and arm to Merri to grab. "Gaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"

Sidonie is focused on dodging bird and fish, and aiming the magic carpet close enough for Ruby to grab at Merrisol. She feels the impact of something or someone hit the carpet, and hoping it's Merri and not a barracuda, the flying surgeon pulls on the tassels hard, launching them speeding upwards away from the space between ships and over to the Ark's deck.