melodiesofeternity | Player Plot: It's Die Hard on a Ship

Entry tags:

Player Plot: It's Die Hard on a Ship

Who: Closed to those who (before this posting) signed up for the plot. Feel free to comment to the Job Interview thread even if you haven't!
When: On or around early-mid November.
Where: In the sky! On the Pravoka Interviews take place at Ashelia's apartment in Lavode.
What: It's Die Hard on a ship.
Warnings/Notes: Violence, cussing. Okay, all done! Tag in, y'all! Please reemeber to tag yourselves :) Yippie ki-yay, mofos!

Loading up the ship seems to be going smoothly enough, despite the harried look on Lady-Captain Ashelia’s face. She walks to and fro, Kupozencrantz struggling to stay by her side, as she refers once, twice, three, four, more times to her iMog slate. She makes a call - and after a short discussion, appears to acquiesce. Loading and boarding seems to proceed apace. The crew is signed in, inventory is checked and double checked, and the maiden voyage of the Pravoka under Lady-Captain Ashelia B’nargin Dalmasca is on her way.

The atmosphere on the ship is calm and easygoing; there’s a lot of cargo to guard, but a lot of people to guard it. The meals are generous, just on this side of lavish, the mattresses in the (albeit cramped) bunks are surprisingly soft and fluffy (is that memory foam? Does memory foam exist on Vaikuntha?) and the air circulation would put some spas to shame. It’s a more or less pleasant time. Until it isn’t.

Shortly before midnight, with the crew scattered about the ship, the lights are cut. Radar and monitoring equipment just shuts down. The ship shakes and groans and, depending on where you are, footsteps can be heard. Hushed voices. Then, you smell something. Or do you? Before you can react, everything goes black. Blacker. More black.

When you come to, you have no idea where you are for a good couple minutes. The room spins around you. You try to move, but find you can’t move your arms. They’re tied behind you, or to the arms of another one of your companions, or above you...are you in the brig? No, you realize as you feel yourself sinking into the plush mattress beneath you. Not the brig at all. Regardless, your next course of action is clear: get free, figure out who did this, and make them pay.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Klonoa starts working on his own ropes to make it easier for Ann to shear through them. For the first time, those in the room get a look at how terrifyingly sharp Klonoa's teeth are as he chomps and gnaws against the bindings to whittle them down significantly.

"Phff, phlehh..!" Agh, he's got the fibers on his tongue...

"I think they used these ropes to tie up.. fish or something." He complains. "Is anyone injured?"

Great, tied up with ropes used for fish. Gladio hopes the smell doesn't linger on them, especially not on him though. Ravus would be so displeased...

He feels the ropes giving way more easily and turns to look at the kid - Adrien!

As soon as the bindings finally fall away, Gladio rolls his shoulders and makes quick work of the ropes around his legs. "Thanks Adrien, appreciate the assist." To the weird cat-looking thing (he calls it like he sees it), he responds, "No injuries on my end. If anyone's muscles or joints are locked up, come to me and I'll do what I can. Back home I trained in physical therapy."

It's more than he's said since waking up, but if they're going to find and wreck whoever tied them up it's best if everyone is at full form. And expending any energy or using potions to cure something as simple as a cramp is a waste in his mind.

He felt the bonds coming loose and sighed in relief. He was getting real friggin' tired of getting surprised and hauled off somewhere. He'll have to repay the kidnappers with a solid fist in the face. He didn't need asterisks for an ass-whoppin'!

"Thanks," he nodded to Ann.

"Now let's get outta here and kick the shit outta whoever did all this."

Klonoa chomp chomps through the ropes, gnawing and chewing until he finally manages to get one of them snapped in two... which helps, but is less of a triumph than it could be considering the other set binding his wrists to his waist.

"Nngh.. Little.. help please?"

"Sure, hold on."

Ann moves over and cuts through the rope binding Klonoa's wrists to his waist. That should do it. She returns the shears to Kanji and nods.

"Alright, we ready to go?"

Klonoa rubs his wrists, and then checks himself over before giving a firm nod and holding out his hand.

"Alright, let's get going!" Says the fluffball, throwing up a Protective barrier that forms all around the entire group before fading from view.

Casting Rampart on himself and the others, Gladio nods and heads towards the door.

"Who wants to take point with me?"

He's eager to bust some heads so he doesn't really wait for anyone to join him and simply exits the room they'd all been stuffed in, turning in the direction he remembers the cargo bay to be.

He took back the shears and packed his things. He stood and brushed off, ready to go on a rampage like the good old days- all he needed were his fists after all, and-

Whaaaat is this bunny dog thing? Had he been tied to this little dude the whole time??

Kanji squeaked, unsure of how to proceed for a minute, but it's Gladio that snaps him from that distraction. With an awkward grunt and a nod, he hurried to take point.

"I can help too. I'm not really classed for anything unarmed jobs here, but I studied some martial arts back home."

It looked like Kanji would mainly fill the point, but Adrien kept pace with the other boy. More hands taking down these guys and they should succeed... unless they used something to knock them out again.

He nodded to Adrien. "Got it. Gimme a holler if you need some extra back-up."

Yet how did they all get jumped like that? He had to get to the bottom of this. He was no detective, but he could knock the answers out of people if he got the chance.

As soon as Gladio opens the door, he'll be greeted by the backs of two sitting sky pirates. They've been talking and quite distracted, apparently. The pirate on the left has an ax propped up on the leg of his chair - a berserker. The pirate on the right has a bow resting on his lap - a ranger. On the floor beside the berserker is a small pile of what looks to be iMog slates.

The pirates turn around when they hear the door open, surprised. They jump to their feet almost immediately, weapons in hand. "Shiva's tits, they're free!"

"Get the shit and run!" the ranger yells, already more than halfway down the hall to the galley.

The berserker stoops down to grab the slates, barely managing to hold both them and his ax, before he starts running for the door to the galley himself.

...Uh oh.

Well, he wagered there were people outside but they reacted pretty damn quick. He wondered if they were too loud inside. But that didn't matter, as they quickly gathered up the slates and began to scatter.

Kanji visibly bristled. "Hell no ya don't! Get back here!"

He grabbed the nearest chair and took off after the berserker, before he wound up and hurled the furniture for this fucker's head. If Kanji Tatsumi had a 'preferred weapon' class, it was furniture. Suck it.

Adrien was just as startled as the Beserker and Ranger outside, but his eyes narrowed as they began to flee.

With Kanji going after the Beserker with a chair (woah!), the blonde teen darted around and gunned after the Ranger. If he got away, he'd likely alert whoever else was behind this - also, if he got distance, he might start shooting arrows. Good thing he had Swordmaster active and Ninja passive because the boost to speed and parkour helps.

Just needed to get him before he actually entered the galley.

"Hey!"

Ann is pretty fired up herself. She joins Adrien and chases after the Ranger. She's got Black Mage active, but using an elemental attack on them seems a little cruel. So...

She does the only other thing she can think of. She grabs a wooden crate and uses it as a shield as the Ranger starts to shoot arrows.

"I'll cover you!"

Seeing the pirates ignites Gladio's normally well-controlled rage.

These assholes managed to disarm them all, take what he assumes are their slates, and tie them all up. Anger at other things has been simmering inside of him and that only adds fuel to the fire.

Gladio sprints after the berserker and, since he's currently without his sword, aims well-placed kick to the back of the pirate's knees in an attempt to take him down. Once the jackass is on the ground, he plans to beat the man bloody and steal his axe. While not his preferred weapon, he can at least swing it around if he needs to.

"Who the fuck are you and why'd you tie us up and take our slates?"

He needs his slate, if only to assure himself that one name remains un-greyed out. And he's pissed about the other stuff too.

Klonoa frowns, watching the pirates through the door. The good thing about being a spellcasting asterisk though, is that you don't really need a weapon to get the point across.

"Not while we're around!" He calls out to them as he stands behind Kanji and Gladio, holding his hand out in front of him and making a sweeping motion as a huge burst of wind appears. He's casting Aero just a few feet in front of the fleeing pirate. That oughta help out. Besides, nobody's injured yet, he's officially on the fight team!

The berserker is hit by the chair and, stumbling, he drops an iMog slate. That hit is followed up by Gladio's, and it looks like the berserker may lose his balance...but he doesn't. He does drop another iMog slate though, before stumbling through the open door.

The ranger turns to go through the door as well, seeing Adrien approaching, but the door is blown shut by Klonoa's Aero before he can. "Why the feck you think?!" he shouts through the damage of the wind spell, turning and loosing an arrow at the approaching swordmaster. It misses.

The first iMog slate dropped is Kanji's. The second, Klonoa's.

The arrow might miss, but an attack is an attack against a swordmaster - and the ranger was plenty close enough to activate the still active Enhanced Counter. There's no blade to draw, but did use Parkour to dart up the wall and deliver a roundhouse kick at his assailant to knock him back into the door.

Chairs and windy things! The berserker hauls ass through the door and Kanji grit his teeth in fury.

Wait, slates! Whose were they? They needed to go back to their owners. He scooped them up on his way to the door, narrowly dodging a fired arrow, and pressed their activation buttons. All he needed to do was see the desktop backgrou-

This one was his. He knew that adorable Carbuncle background anywhere. He immediately flicked to the Asterisk program and activated his recently-mastered Berserker.

"I'm goin' on ahead for the other slates!" He called, and held out the other activated slate. Anyone recognize this background??

"Whoever this belongs to, come get it!" Anybody with even a sliver of recognition in their eyes, into their hands the slate goes.

Because Kanji is a goddamn hurricane through the closed door, rattled Ranger in the way or no.

The other slate would be pretty easy to tell the owner of--it's a bad photograph of Klonoa and a green-pommed moogle, overexposed with poor framing, but you only really need half his face to know who it belongs to.

"Oh, I think that's mine!" He says, taking the other slate as he--

uh

Klonoa glances side to side, trying to figure out who they're pursuing, but once Kanji starts barreling down towards the ranger he... winces. Ohhh, this looks like it's gonna hurt...

This wannabe pirate thinks he can just run away from a fight?

Gladio lets out an angry bellow and chases the berserker again, fully intent on drawing some blood. Because he needs his slate and he needs a weapon. Once all this is over he'll find his weapon, but right now he'll take what he can grab.

Bursting through the door, he immediately casts Saint Cross just in case there are any other unfriendlies lying in wait.

Sure, he's pissed. But he's trained his entire life for all sorts of battles. He's not about to barge into a room with no knowledge of who or what is inside of it without at least throwing an attack out blindly or putting up a defense.

"Where d'ya think you're going, asshole?! Come back and fight you coward!"

The ranger is barely able to roll out of the way before Kanji and Gladiolus barrel past. He groans, head spinning from Adrien's attack.

Even in the few seconds it took for Kanji and Gladiolus to pursue him, he's been able to get rid of the slates somewhere. He turns, raising his axe to attack the Heroes - but is hit by the Saint Cross. Snarling as he enters the berserk state, he charges at them, swinging his axe at Gladio.

The galley is quite large, with many tables and chairs strewn about. Opposite of the door the party is charging in from is the kitchen, barely visible in the dim light behind a waist-high wall. Above, the room is ringed with a metal walkway circling the perimeter of the room, the stairs up to which are located in a corner of the room, on the same wall as the kitchen. On this second level waits a gunslinger, who lets loose a Concentrated Trigger Happy attack at Gladiolus; no critical hits, thankfully, but no misses either.

Also hit by the Saint Cross are a paladin and black mage, despite sustaining damage, waste no time in firing back. The paladin moves forward, looking to engage Kanji directly, opening with a Shock Break combo. The black mage raises his staff shakily, letting fly a Focused Thundaga at Kanji.

"Hrgh...!" Well, that was a ton all at once, but fine. Now it's getting interesting! The Shock Break combo was met with the handle of his hammer, thrown back with a grin. That's it, rile him up...

His vision was briefly white as lightning coursed through him, and briefly he realized what Shadows felt like when he called up his persona. Good. Least he knew it hurt. The growl that left him was that of a lion as he entered a berserk state, and he shoved past that paladin.

Get the squishy ones first, weaken the tank's resolve. He lunged for the black mage with a Fell Cleave.

He'll be back for the Ranger in a moment - he heard gunfire. Gunslinger? Most likely...

Dashing to join the others, his eyes darted around the room and soon noticed the Gunslinger hidden away of course on the second floor for optimal firing range. Well, just like the Ranger, it was time to make it clear distance and vantage point did not matter. Adrien does not need to take a conventional way to ascend to the second floor, bypassing the combat on the first floor by racing up the wall and leaping out to punch the Gunslinger.

Klonoa winces as he watches Kanji and Gladiolus both get hit. This isn't the best situation. He'll focus all the white magic he can muster to hit Gladiolus first. Cure!

"Stay steady, I'm working on you, too! We'll all get through this!" Klonoa shouts out at Kanji as he starts charging up the healing once more...

(no subject)

hashtagdaddy - 2018-12-26 06:50 (UTC) - Expand

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only