Farrel: Ladies' Day Out

[Jack Rothwell]

"That way!"

The group pounded dirt like the ground had personally offended them, each taking turns to periodically drop back and fire a barrage at their pursuers and the other two reloaded. Jade ducked as a bullet pinged off the top of the yukki staff still strapped to her back. She pulled forward as they hit the incline that led through the woods to the hill they crested on what felt like an eternity before.

'So much for the rescue operation...'

There was nothing they could do for the tomboy now. A jet of flame showered a nearby tree, turning it into a smoking torch, the blacksmith cursed the idiocy of the men who chased them as she reloaded, and then cursed again as she realised she only had six shots left in her revolver. To top it off something was nagging at the back of her mind. She'd forgotten something, and the situation meant she couldn't spare the time to figure out what it was. She put the last bullet in it's chamber.

"I'm running out!"

"Just keep running!"

Things were definately looking bad as the group cleared the trees near the end of the incline. As the space opened up realisation hit the merc like a hammer. The trolls. Big bloody trolls. And directly in their path.

"Oh shit!"

Jade cringed and hoisted her weapon, fixating her gaze on oversized rock in front of them.


[OOC Edit to turn the heat down./OOC]

[Graybeard]

[OOC:

A jet of flame showered a nearby tree, instantly laying down the foundation for a raging forest fire,

As one who got chased out of his house by a forest fire not many years ago, and is constantly vigilant for them during the dry season, let me say that roasting a single tree with a Yuuki staff isn't going to start a "raging forest fire" all by itself. They take some conditions that aren't present here, like ultra-dry wood (Farrel isn't semi-arid, there has been rain in the story line) and strong wind (in which that airship would not be flying). However, it fits the story, so ...]

<"This won't do,"> Grope told his companions. The fool down there with the magic staff was becoming a threat ... and he was also getting too close, and stupidly, standing still and not firing from behind cover. Well, there was an antidote for such behavior. Grope's bow was at the ready, and he used it.

There was a hissing noise as an arrow flew over the heads of the approaching Jade, Faye and Jasmine, and a strangled "AAARGHH!" as it found its target down in the valley. Grope permitted himself a brief smile; his aim was back, after too many recent occasions when he'd missed with the bow.

Of course, he'd have been happier about things if three armed women weren't approaching, one brandishing a pistol in his general direction. The pistol wasn't a huge threat itself, but the woman also had another of those magic staffs ... but she looked like she was on the lam from the people with the strong magic. Friend or foe? Grope made a snap decision.

"Duck ... behind ... here," he rumbled, his grasp of the human language adequate to get the thought across. "We ... will ... protect you." I'm not sure exactly why ... but I think this group of female Small Ones is on our side.

[Jack Rothwell]

OOC I'll be away til wednesday on work./OOC

"Duck ... behind ... here, we ... will ... protect you."

If Jade had been expecting anything; a surprisingly coherant stream of vocabulary from the rumbling troll's mouth hadn't been it. Curiousity won over caution and she leaned round the oversized boulder, and came face to face with the trolls with the figures they saw before. Only this time she really had the chance to take in the craggy brownish skin, the gnarled features and the giant frames. She bit down on a girlish urge to scream. But no club collided with her skull to turn her brain to jelly. From what she knew about trolls (which admittedly wasn't very much) that was a very good sign.

'Screw it. At this point, I'll take allies where I can find them.'

She tipped a reluctant thumbs up to Jasmine and Faye and vaulted over a shallow part of the stone as the other women moved to join her.

"Thanks for the help." The blacksmith said, fighting her trepidation and holding out a hand that looked like a child's in comparison to the enormous creature she guessed was the group's leader. "That trouble'll be here soon. Maybe it's best not to stick around."

Shouts growing in volume in the near distance illustraited her point.

[Graybeard]

<"This looks bad, my uncle,"> Scrobian said, and Grope could only agree. <"The fault was mine. We should never have stayed so long. Now we can only fight and die, as a warrior -- say, what's that?">

Suddenly, the group that had been chasing Jade, Jasmine and Faye turned and ran the other way, as more shouting came from back at the camp. Grope could barely make out the voices, and the other trolls, whose grasp of the human languages was much more tenuous, couldn't make any sense of them at all, but the three women understood it loud and clear:

"Forget the women! The trolls will eat them anyway. Fall back and re-arm! We've gotta bring down that other airship before it reports our location!"

Grope looked at the other trolls, looked at the three women. <"Thank the Five Great Mothers,"> he rumbled to Scrobian and Harzh'biah, then turned to the humans with the closest thing a troll could muster to a smile on his face, and spoke in the Tsuirakuan language. "We -- do not eat -- your kind...."

Meanwhile, the second airship was preparing to become airborne, but the trolls really didn't care any more.

[Sareth]

Jasmine looked back over her shoulder. "Honestly? Right now, I'm far less concerned about being eaten than other things." She shook her head. "Mercenaries..."

[Jack Rothwell]

"Amen. Well, since our friends over there are busy with the giant ship in the sky I reckon now would be a good time to get out of here."

Jade hoisted herself back to her feet and patted herself down to make sure she hadn't dropped any of the new equipment she'd 'borrowed'.

"If we haul our backsides we could get back to the warp-gate within the hour. I think we've got some serious planning to do."

[Graybeard]

OOC: We're now at a point where Jade, Jasmine and Faye could merge back into the Rinkaiel thread by hopping a warp gate home, if that's what people would like to have happen. I don't mind having the trolls go inactive again; they live ten times as long as humans, after all, and they have to learn patience. We'd need to work out something involving Jamie, but since she's already on the airship, that can be done painlessly -- or not, depending on preferences. (Sareth? This one is really your call. We could work it out off line, or in "Background Noise" rather than here, if appropriate.) What are people's druthers? To be honest, I'm kinda running out of things for the trolls to be doing -- other than fleeing.

[Jack Rothwell]

OOC Well I'm for heading back unless someone has something they'd really like to do before we go. It's a shame Jaime and Trolls aren't coming with./OOC

[Graybeard]

[OOC: OK, so making it so ...]

"Here's our chance!" Faye shouted as the mercenaries pulled back. "Run for the warp gate!"

The three women took off at a run, the younger Jade and Jasmine being impressed that middle-aged Faye could still set a good pace. Grope too nodded as they set off, then turned to the other trolls. <"They have the right idea. Let's get out of here."> They started to beat feet to the south.

---------

One more surprise awaited the three women, however: just as they arrived at the gate, it functioned with the usual foooshhh ... but what it was delivering wasn't another armed party, whether friend or foe, but a very dead body. A body with a bullet hole in the middle of its forehead.

And a characteristic Gewehr emblem, known only to insiders (and not even all of them), scratched on a paper jammed in the corpse's mouth.

"Looks like our people back in Rinkaiel have scored one for the good guys," Faye said with some satisfaction. "And about damn time, one might add..."

[OOC: Still have to sort out what's going on with Jamie before running the curtain down. Earth to Sareth! Come in, please...]

[Jack Rothwell]

"Looks like our people back in Rinkaiel have scored one for the good guys, and about damn time, one might add..."

Jade trotted over to the corpse with an unreadable expression and stared; there was nothing unusual to be determined about the cause of the man's [OOC I'm assuming its a guy/OOC] death, a bullet in the head was a bullet in the head after all. There was no telling what to make of the paper.

"Bullets, blood and bodies..." she muttered. "I'm just walking on sunshine."

She resisted the childish urge to poke the body with her new favourite toy. In truth, Jade had found it difficult to concentrate once they'd cleared their pursuers. Possibilities had begun exploding in her brain regarding the weaponry the group had acquired and drove her to distraction. The future would have a forge for her work in if she had any say in the matter.

"I don't know what you want to do about this guy." She said. "We could take him with us if you think there's something to be gleamed from further examination, personally, I'd like to say a 'thank you' to our oversized companions here." She indicated the trolls with what she hoped was a cheery grin. [OOC Are they still with the women?/OOC] "And get back to Tsuiraku-town before those mercs decide we aren't trollbait after all."