TEST DRIVE 001b

[pyracy]

Try on those ridiculous clothes, sample the catering, and run through your lines. It's time for the Long 18th Test Drive.

ARRIVAL: Characters come to in a dark, tropical forest in a huddle. There are the sounds of strange birds, animals, and insects all around, some of them perhaps worryingly close. With a closer inspection, arrivals realize they're on an incline: Going up will prove fruitless, no matter who they are. The ground there starts to grow rocky the further they climb, and they may find themselves slipping back down to their arrival point, even if they're expert mountain climbers. The ground sloping downward will eventually level out leading toward light, music, and noise. But for the moment, they're simply a group of lost people (or monsters/bipedal animals/robots/etc) with no idea where they are or how they got here. Now's probably a good time to ask, "Who the hell are you? Where am I?" Time to use the buddy system.

TORTUGA: There's a town off the coast of Hispaniola that never sleeps, and that town is Tortuga. It's swapped hands more times than anyone can count, but for now, the French have it. And they do like the extra money the pirates that frequent it bring in; they like it so much that they imported over 1600 prostitutes from Europe to keep them happy. So you might as well relax while you're here, as much as you can with random gunshots and fist fights, anyway. Drop in for a drink at the Faithful Bride, check out the wares for sale (provided to you tax-free thanks to piracy) near the dock front. Visit the warehouse where those ill-gotten goods are stored and distributed. Maybe you're looking for work on a ship? The captains can usually be found - frazzled and busy - in the taverns and at the shipwrights and everywhere in between (just look for the hats), and if they're in a good mood, they might be willing. But the key point of Tortuga is this: Have fun. Some examples might include: A barfight! Wandering into a brothel (maybe by mistake)! Getting duped into joining a crew! There's no end of trouble to get into.

MIRROR POST: When they arrived, every person found, in a pocket or a bag or tucked away somewhere on their person, a little compact mirror. It's nothing fancy: Square, with hinges and a latch that keep it closed, the outer casing carved from seashell, the inner mirror a little spotted with age. But if it's played around with enough, it quickly becomes apparent it works as a communication device. Here you have access to all of the marked folks, no matter how far and wide they might spread. Need to have a heart to heart with a buddy in Singapore? Want to send out a general ad to everyone at large? Looking for answers to questions? This is the quickest way to get all of that.

CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE: The world is open, and it's full of pearls that are just waiting for you to take them. Maybe you want to have some quiet time to scrub clean in a bathhouse in Singapore. Perhaps you're visiting the fabled pirate city of Libertalia in Madagascar. Maybe you've found yourself lost in Mayan ruins or stranded on an island. Or you were shipwrecked in a hurricane. Or you've decided to relocate to Port Royal or one of the American colonies for a quieter sort of life. Either way, this is your story, might as well make it a good one.

Comments

[ambitionorhonour]

I'm perfectly all right. [And he is, he just doesn't know how.]

It isn't my blood. [Not true, but it seems the easiest way to assuage the girl's concerns.]

[quixotically]

Are you sure? [She already has a stim in hand. She actually steps back, but it's so she can get a better look. The blood pattern on the fabric looks more like it seeped in, not spattered or something. But... Maybe he was... holding someone?

... against his stomach?

Elle's brow furrows, and her eyes flick up to his face. If he'd lost that much blood, he'd probably be dead. He doesn't look especially pale or anything...]

... okay. [She lowers her hand. She bites her lower lip.] And... um. Thank you. I don't know if he understood what I was saying...

[ambitionorhonour]

Even if he did understand you, he would pretend that he wouldn't. [That's Norrington's opinion of Frenchmen.

He holds out a bent arm for the girl to take.]

Allow me to escort you to your destination, miss. Tortuga is no place for an unaccompanied woman of virtue. [Although her clothes don't look virtuous at all, but Norrington has travelled sufficiently far and wide to know that people from foreign lands have very different ideas about appropriate dress.]

[quixotically]

[... ????? Literally no one has ever done this to her before. Not just the arm offering, that's happened before on occasion, but like -- This entire... chivalric... thing.

... she's definitely never been called a "woman of virtue" before. She has no idea what to make of that.

She starts to reach out to take his arm, but then hesitates before making contact.] I, um... I wasn't really going anywhere in particular. Just trying to get to know the place, really.

[ambitionorhonour]

[He sniffs in disdain. Not at her, but at the place.]

Believe me when I say that there is nothing in Tortuga worth knowing. Nothing and no one.

[And he spent enough time here, drunk, to know.]

[quixotically]

Well... I dunno. I have a feeling there's something going on here. [She doesn't know how much she should explain. He's apparently actually from here -- not... this town, but, this place in general. She doesn't know if he'd believe her.] It's... hard to explain. But I really need to take a look around and see if I can find any clues.

[ambitionorhonour]

[That catches his suspicious eye.]

If you're seeking the supernatural, abandon your search now. It will bring you only misery if you find it.

[Bitterness you say? Why yes!]

[quixotically]

[Blink.

Blllllllink.

Elle tilts her head. And, before she can entirely catch herself, she asks,] Define "supernatural."

[ambitionorhonour]

Cursed pirates, ocean goddesses, sea monsters, magic compasses, the dead rising from their watery graves.

It's a broad category and far more common in these waters than I once thought. And if you know what's good for you, you'll stay well clear.

[quixotically]

[...]

Huh.

Uhhhh. I mean... That's not the kind of thing I'm looking for. I hope not, anyway. So I'm not gonna really... try to seek that out? Not on purpose, anyway.

[Actually, there's a pretty good chance that that's exactly what she's going to have to track down. It's not that she doesn't believe in... supernatural stuff, exactly. The Ghost of She happened, and everything. And she does hope that Joshua's god is real. But... She just also knows that, a lot of the time, when people have superstitions about stuff like this, that there's something else going on. And that level of "we don't know how to explain this other than magic" probably means that whatever brought her here is under that umbrella.]

[ambitionorhonour]

I consider it my duty to warn you. What you do with that warning is your decision.

[He can't protect every hapless person whose wanderings cross preternatural foes. He's only one man and he can't be everywhere. He doesn't have the kind of reach that commanding an armada gives one, and even when he did command and armada he wasn't able to protect Elizabeth. Fortunately, she proved quite capable of protecting herself without him.]