Farrel Sea

[Graybeard]

Another threat, and another cannonball, thundered across the gap between the two ships ... just as a high-speed airship appeared on the distant horizon.

[Graybeard]

[OOC: OK, let's get this thread closed out, and return the participants to Rinkaiel...]

"They will not come, my uncle," Scrobian said, dejection in his voice. "The Small Ones have abandoned us."

Grope disagreed. "They haven't abandoned us," he said, "but they may have run into something they can't handle. My Blood-Binding scar, that binds me to my Small One friend Lucas, has been burning badly for hours now. He's in grave danger ... and I can't do anything about it. That's a terrible feeling -- wait, what's that?"

The discomfort in the scar vanished like that.

"Well, that was strange," Grope added. "Whatever trouble he was in, it just went away. Bang. All of a sudden. But I have the feeling there's still something weird going on..."

------------

Indeed there was, as a huge airship dropped from the sky, seized the ship bearing Jamie, Lucas, etc., in a magical attractor beam, and sped northwest, toward Rinkaiel ...

... But not before the stunned passengers noticed a familiar hot-air balloon drifting out to sea below them.

[OOC: OK, anybody want to throw any parting insults at the pirates, etc.? Arrival in Rinkaiel in a couple of hours, and then we'll lock the thread.]

[Sareth]

As the airship ran past, the outraged pirates glared up at the escaping prize. As they did, one of them suddenly cocked his head to the side.

"Is that an ass? Is he mooning us?"

The pirate next to him grabbed a spy glass and looked upwards. "She."

"..."

[Graybeard]

"They're on the way back to Rinkaiel," Gryffyd announced, to the considerable relief of everyone else on the conference call. "The airship should arrive in three or four hours." He very carefully did not say whose airship, but it really didn't matter.

"I think we may have learned a lesson here," Peter said. "That group attracts weirdness the way crap attracts flies." (The boss wasn't on the call, so it was okay to cuss, he thought.) "We probably shouldn't let them get that far from our supervision again. No offense, Gryffyd, but I don't think your people were up to this particular challenge."

"I would agree," the Seeadler man gurgled. "I will be speaking to my security people about this problem. Now, however, there is another problem. The dry-land part of our Rinkaiel operation is outside my sphere of control. I would prefer not to bring their supervisor into the picture, even slightly." Rumbled opinions around the call (which is to say, around the world) indicated agreement. "That leaves us short on people to keep eyes on them."

Peter cleared his throat. "I have some forces on the ground in Rinkaiel, as you probably know -- don't worry, they know not to horn in on anything you have going." Yet. "I think I can divert some of them to help. There'll be a few complications, but nothing we can't deal with."

If Elke was surprised at this declaration, she didn't show it. "Sounds good to me," she said. "I'll leave them to your tender mercies. I'm going to be out of pocket for a week or so --" on what amounts to a honeymoon, but I'm not going to tell any of you that -- "and when I'm back, we can get back together. We should know enough about the possible Terror of the North by then to make some decisions." The call broke up.

[OOC: And with that, fast forward to the landing; let's proclaim the thread finished and pick up in the other one.]