The Road to Salaband

[Alberich]

Udo totally wanted to do that. However, what he wanted more was to get paid. His brokeness gave cautious counsel. No pay, no rations, no next-leg-of-the-journey. So he settled for using the drawing materials provided by the Falkenrohr and painstakingly sketching the most distinctive of the weapons. He signed his work with a flourish.

"Okay," said Baldwin, "Now back in the kitchen with you."

But Tom was feeling magnanimous. "Give 'im a break, why don't'cha?" he said. "And one drink on me, his choice. Oh, and, ah, take care of that bottle" - he gestured to the one Jade was polishing off. Then he turned back to his patrol leader, Wilfred, and gave him Udo's sketch and some orders. Soon the men would take the pack and weapons off to a secure place.

Back at the bar, Baldwin nodded. "Okay, Blubbo, whaddayawant?"

"Oboy! Rum with a dusting of powdered I-root!"

"Rum and adjusting of what? I don't have that!"

"Okaaaay...howzabout rum and some delicious Southern Continent fruit juices..."

"I don't have any goddam Southern Continent fruit juices."

"Okaaaaaay....howzabout rum and...and...more rum? Darkest you got!"

"One for you, and that's it. Then you get back to work!"

Udo took his place at the bar and rubbed his hands in glee as he awaited his sweet treat of a drink. He could use the rest anyway, as his energetic style of dishwashing had taken a little out of him. But it was a great warmup for the extreme training he was hoping for later!

Oh, and there was a girl, the kind he'd normally want to buy a drink for himself, just to be friendly and all. And she was even getting sozzled. But he was a little too broke to be helping her along with that. So he just smiled and said "'evenin'!" Well, maybe she'd want a friendly ear or something.

The bartender slid the price of Jade's bottle back to her, and nodded over towards Tom Odd. "That's on him," he said. "Oh, and you've got the Winslow suite, long as you care to stay." Then he rolled his eyes and went back to serving the returned riders. None of them had a real thirst. In time the evening crowd would come and there'd be more to do.

[Jack Rothwell]

OOC Just to clarify. The staff of the weapon is collapsed, not folded. Essentially it's designed to extend in a straight line so, no hinges./OOC

"It's bad manners to touch a lady's merchandise without permission." Jade muttered, not turning to look at the cause of her most recent aggravation.

[Alberich]

"Didn't lay a finger on you," said Udo innocently, holding up his hands and turning them over to show they'd been nowhere near Jade's "merchandise."

[OOC: Edited the other post to talk about "sliding parts" instead of a "hinge."]

[Jack Rothwell]

OOC Gracias./OOC

"The weapons." Jade replied, still staring straight ahead. "Between the manners of the local 'law enforcement' and your grubby paws I feel positively violated today. Did you even know how to use them?"

[Alberich]

"Those are yours?" he asked, fascinated, ignoring the insult. (Udo had been ignoring insults, especially from girls, all his life. He'd've made a lousy Gorielian.) "Oh, yes, all of 'em! Most of 'em in the last three days! Was that really a Korotsu classic disassembled? That was more than field stripping..."

[OOC: Feel free to add dialogue for Udo in any weapon talk. He actually knows a fair amount, but he's too opinionated and sometimes his mouth outruns his knowledge...not enough to be rude to Jade though. His dedication to the Special Weapons Mark VI Frontier Blaster puts him in the minority of Yuuki-type staff users. And he is going to be asking about that collapsible halberd before he's done. He's not trying moves on her, at least not right now he's not.]

[Jack Rothwell]

"Hasty trading from a failing company." Jade answered, fairly truthfully. She didn't add that the 'trade' was lifting those parts in lieu of the back-pay she was owed which, thanks to the catastrophe in the Port, she would no longer receive, and that the Black Guard was unaware of it. She doubted that anyone from the organisation would turn up looking for the scrap, after all, they had bigger problems to worry about than a few missing guns. "That was money that was supposed to hold me for a while, now it's held hostage and I doubt I'll ever get it back."

Jade tilted the fresh glass to her lips and swallowed a mouthful of cider, thinking over what the dishwasher had said about his use of weapons. A sudden suspicion flashed through her mind.

"What did you mean anyway? That you've 'used most of them' lately? Is there a rifle range around here or something? Where does a man on pub worker wages get his hands on a high powered rifle?"

[Alberich]

"Oh, I'm on a kenpo training journey, minimal distracting material possessions and all that," said Udo, "And some dirtbag stole my wallet. But make no mistake about it, I'm an adventurer! I got the rifle from enemy soldiers on the Southern Continent, while defending the kobolds from their worst enemies - the Ralkin!"

"And how'd that go?" asked somebody, whether it was Jade or not.

"Therein lies a story!" said Udo. And Baldwin decided to let this go. If this Udo was a colorful raconteur, a good story would keep the drinks flowing, into him and his listeners.

"So there I was, in the Northern Confederacy, travelling with my best companions -- a kobold and a smokin' hot elf..."

And here Udo launched into an extremely colorful account of his Southern Continent adventure. While his memory was distorted and generous to himself, it wasn't ungenerous to his companions --

"And with us was an elite Tsuirakuan demolitionist - Khoo the destroyer!"

"He a heliomancer?"

Udo laid a finger aside of his nose. "Well, now, I'm not saying he is and I'm not saying he isn't. The real operators, they don't talk about it. What I'm telling you is, somewhere or other he learned how to scrounge up the right stuff to make some major-league boom. Lock him in your kitchen and he'll find a way to blow the door off! And somewhere or other he learned combat magic like you've never seen, and extreme wind wizardry, so he can blow his enemies down with a hurricane before he blows 'em up with a bomb! And somewhere he learned to be cool under fire, even faced with a hundred enemy rifles, and just cut 'em to pieces the way most folks would eat pie. Now maybe he got all that in high school and maybe he got all that 'somewhere else,' but I leave it for you to say.

"So, anyway, we knew these Ralkin use forbidden elf magic and had a grudge against the kobolds. But the kobolds are the mightiest warriors that walk this earth, and don't let anyone tell you different...!"

Regulars at this inn had had their own kobold experience not so very long ago, and that lent his tale more plausibility than it would've carried inland. Actually Udo had been there too, but no one had recognized him in his changed circumstances, and the men he'd traded blows with in the ensuing bar fight weren't here just now anyway. Also, memories of that night tended to blur, and it must be said, Jamie and Tamina were a good bit more memorable than Udo.

"...so, anyway, that was the temple cleared out. That was the first of my tests! To lead kobolds in battle, you have to prove yourself worthy, and that means you must also hunt the big game -- armed only with a spear -- out there among the ants that could strip a pig in minutes, and snakes so deadly, you can't make it a hundred steps after a bite - just scribble your will out nice and quick..."

By this point, the audience included a couple of new Falkenrohr recruits who were ex-Black Guard. They didn't know Jamie or Udo either. And they didn't know what a "Ralkin" was, exactly, but they'd heard about the disastrous expedition to the Southern Continent, could find survivors of it back in Port Lorrel if they'd been of a mind to. They'd also heard rumors of betrayal, that the expedition had been sold out by traitors, and this was why it had fallen into a trap -- swarms of kobolds and waves of impossible magic, as exaggerated as Udo's tale but in the other direction. These particular men had found the "betrayal" story credible. That was one reason they'd fled Port Lorrel after the other night's events.

The tale of the kobold feast included a rendering of the song, "<(Unintelligible) Is Spattered on my Fur>." This was not the first kobold song that had been sung in this town. Then it was back into the action....

"...and if you pass that final test, she'll paint 'virility marks' all over your chest and body, a sign that you're a real man, the way kobolds see it, and you show 'em all over the village so they know you're fit to hunt and fight and make love with the best of 'em. And not a moment too soon! The elves got spies, and those spies are everywhere. You can bet a hot elf chick shows up in disguise with a sack of gold, she can get the secrets outta anyone! If he'd under eighty she can skip the gold! And so we got the word - Ralkin shitbags on the way...!"

Now to some kinds of tale-teller, glory was a zero-sum game. What he gave himself must needs be taken from the others who were present. Not so Udo. His imagination wasn't about grabbing a bigger slice of the pie. It was about making a bigger pie!

"Six wizards...and foot soldiers, swords and rifles, more foot soldiers than you could count! Infinitry, like...at least two hundred...and their leader, Captain Gabriel -- now there was a villain! Magic proof armor, sword and pistol, and he was channeling the power of a mage through his magic Ralkin crystal..."

The true tale of the battle is well known to readers of these adventures. An uncharitable listener who'd actually been there (of which there were none such here) would complain that he hadn't taken quite the leadership role he was claiming, nor had personally accounted for near so many of the enemy as he seemed to be saying. And his own personal fight with Gabriel hadn't lasted very long, and he'd ended it a lot more unconscious than he was saying here. But he had led the ambush, had struck down the enemy wizard, had been wounded in battle, had held the breach in the kobolds' wall alone and shown defiance to the enemy, and really, that ought to count for something. He did not conceal Sensei's role; in fact his expanded account gave the monk a wider scope for personal glory than the smaller army of reality could've afforded anyone. And it's not as if Sensei was going to show up in this bar and tell a different story, anyway.

No one who believed Udo's tales of kobold ferocity would want to face one in battle, that was for sure.

"So, anyway, the survivors sang like canaries, that's elf interrogation for you! Kobold too. You wouldn't wanna get on their wrong side, you got captured! And from the spies we already knew they were holed up in Port Lorrel with their archmage and their mind control and their altar and shit...ummmmm," he turned back to Jade, "Whazz the question again?"

"Where you got the rifle."

"Oh, yeah, got it off one of those Ralkin troops that suck donkey balls down inna jungle. Issa..." -- and he actually got the make and model right.

This tale would have unforeseen consequences. What they would be remained to be seen.

[Jack Rothwell]

Jade are listened to Udo's (admittedly impressive) tale with an initially impassive demeanour, but the realization as the story rolled on that the outwardly harmless man was almost certainly one of the people who'd butchered their way through the Lorrelian soldiers she'd worked with froze her blood. The blacksmith's mind went in several directions at once as she began to size up the rotund braggart.

The problem, on reflection, was that there were too many explanations for why the Tsuirakuan was sharing a bar with her in Ester. There was, of course, the mundane possibility that he was simply making up his involvement in the affair. She hadn't seen him at the attack at the Port. Then again, she'd found herself unwillingly in the centre of the battlefield, and he hardly looked like a frontline fighter. His mention of how he acquired the rifle could well suggest he was somewhere at the rear, taking potshots far from view. She couldn't yet know for sure, but if his story was genuine, he could have been in Ester hunting down members of the Black Guard. If that was the case, his companions could be close by. There was also the question of whether he knew Jade for who she was. The grandiose tale and his employment could well be a cover to keep her off balance before a trap was sprung if he did. His companions could recognise her and do the deed instead if he didn't.

She needed more information.

"So where are the elf and kobold you said you were travelling with?" She asked him, absently hooking a thumb into her belt, resting it within easy reach of the revolver.

[Alberich]

Udo smiled a sweet rummy smile at the travelling tradeswoman. He was drunk, fair cop, but he wasn't a mean drunk.

"Out walkin' under the stars, I sh' think, 'less they wanna turn in early. In bed, might be there. They're darlin's. But not here. Aw, they're not studyin' kenpo. They went their way off on new adventures! And me, I wen' on this kenpo training ques' wi' Sensei. More new adventures! Adventures for everyone! 'scuse me, berighback." And he went off for a little "comfort break."

By now there were others in the inn who thought there might be some truth in Udo's tale. These were fresh Falkenrohr recruits, former members of the Black Guard. They weren't veterans of the Southern Continent fiasco, but they'd known men who were, and at least a few of the details matched up. Of course, the men they knew had done their exaggerating in the opposite direction, so that a historian quizzing the sides would think a much larger action had taken place than had, and that each side had outnumbered the other...

Also, these, too, were matching up what they'd been hearing with what they'd heard from Port Lorrel itself. They hadn't been present at the warehouse fight -- only one mercenary had survived that, and Sergeant Carlson had taken a different path -- but this talk of mighty wind wizards with wizard bomb skills, slashing kobold claws, and glowing elf swords did mesh with what they'd heard about that. Happily for Udo, they weren't contemplating revenge. Neither Gabriel, Aleron, Eli, nor Logan had inspired the kind of loyalty that moved men to avenge their losses just for the sake of it. They'd bought only what money could buy.

By this point, also, more of the regulars had trickled in, men and women who'd been here when Udo, Jamie, and Tamina last visited this place, and Jamie'd plugged Winslow, and in less than an hour, everyone had been fighting (only then, Udo'd had more of his hair and beard, and a chestful of shiny medals). Someone might yet put together Udo's "kobold" story with the fact he'd been before, with an actual kobold at that. Or with the fact that he'd been trading blows and grapples with quite a few of them.

[Browncoat]

Angrist chose to pass the time in physical labor. A new house was being built and for a few coins, the monk split boulders to provide the stones for the walls. Angrist had been walking past when one of the sledgehammers broke. As the workers bemoaned the incident, Angrist walked up and split the boulder with one solid strike. He was hired on the spot. And he enjoyed the work. As amazing as adventuring could be, Angrist enjoyed using his abilities to help people in simple ways.
Afterward, he'd done some browsing and managed to find there was a small group of traders due on the morning who would be heading the same direction as Angrist and Udo needed to go. Udo's stories of bandits crossed the monk's mind. He resolved to approach the traders about positions as guards.
Angrist set about searching for his companion. While working, he'd come up with a couple lesson plans.