IC VI Stormy Seas

[CoffeeIncluded]

Natalia listens closely to his words. She looks at Shiny, then Hilton.

Spoiler

Show

sorry, I was on my phone in the middle of the post when my mom called

Sense motive: (d20+6)[15].

[Admiral]

Spoiler

Show

Let's handle the conversation while I'm on a roll with it, and the Sense Motive checks for all four afterwards when Natalia, Shiny and Kurt are discussing things.

I'm going to assume that in light of the first conversation, Kurt adds something about how they can go free afterwards (otherwise that would be the first question they all ask, just like Hilton).

Axel is a skinny man with pale skin and small black eyes- when they captured him he had been bearing a net and a shortbow. He smiles with relief as Kurt makes his offer.

"I didn't think anyone would have this kind of mercy on me, or I would have escaped months ago." he says. "The fact is, I've been living with fear since I got to this continent. One of Cutler's underlings hired me for some mercenary work when I was broke in Falcor- just some bribery, courier work, and the like. I won't lie, I figured it might be a smuggling operation- but I had no idea it was slave trading- not until they sent me to Eldgar."

"Imagine my shock when I arrived in the Port of Ashford and saw the carts of people in collars, being stuck onto boats... it was awful, but by that point I thought there was no turning back. Even if I could have escaped the rest of the operation, I was stuck in the southern wastelands of an unfamiliar continent, without a guildmark- I never would have made it out. And besides, I'd been doing minor errands for Culter's operation for months- in the eyes of the continent I was already guilty. I know it's no excuse for the terrible things I've done- I was a coward, I know that. But imagine what it's like to be alone in that... community..."

He nods to Kurt with a serious expression. "You already saved me from that life. If you can also give me a chance at redemption for the evil I've done, I'll be forever grateful."

[Cavelcade]

Kurt listens to Axel tell his tale without interrupting, listening to the tale of how he felt trapped. It's unclear from his face how he feels about it - because he himself is uncertain about the feeling. "How long did you work for Cutler? And why didn't you get a guildmark when you arrived?"

[Admiral]

"I worked for him in Inman, the desert continent south of Falcor, and the surrounding islands, for about three months," Axel explains. "My job was to acquire ships, weapons and information about the local governments. I didn't know that I was covering for their operation of shipping slaves through and around the continent, to Haldon, whose plantations make heavy and legal use of slaves, and to Dimir, where the warlords brainwash them into soldiers to fuel their unceasing conflict. I think most of the operatives like me never knew they were working for a slaving operation- that made it impossible for us to betray it, even if we were arrested. That's just the sly way Culter works..."

"I was reassigned to Eldgar two months ago- some damnable recruiter learned that I was a fisherman's son, and so figured that I had a deft hand with a net." He shudders even in the warm air. "As for why I never got a guildmark- while most slavers avoided it so that they didn't leave a paper trail, in our case it was a necessity. You saw the con we were running, pretending to be barbarians (another of Cutler's blasted brainwaves, I hear)- a guildmark woulda given away the game."

[Cavelcade]

"But why didn't you get it straight away? You came here from some other continent - or did he recruit you there and bring you here?" Kurt is genuinely uncertain of the sequence of events, for now, making him suspicious.

[Admiral]

"He recruited me in Falcor, and I was working in Inman for the three months after that," Axel explained again. "When they brought me to Eldgar two months ago, I landed on the Port of Ashford, where slavers and those friendly to them run the docks. No one was there to mark me even if I wanted to. Heck, I still haven't seen a single city in Eldgar."

Spoiler

Show

Note that Falcor and Inman are countries outside Eldgar (as are Haldon and Dimir)- perhaps I could have made it clearer.

[Cavelcade]

Kurt nods slowly, looking at the man curiously. "Well, you say you want the chance and you'll get it. But what will you do afterwards?"

[CoffeeIncluded]

Natalia listens in at the door with a frown. She's disgusted by his cowardice...and honestly, a little ashamed too.

[Admiral]

"I'd go home," he says simply, "back to Falcor. I'm not sure how- maybe there's more help I can give you, and in exchange you could give me enough to catch a ship out of here- but I don't want any part of this land anymore."

[Cavelcade]

Spoiler

Show

Natalia's there - it's been done outside.

"Go stand over there, with Hilton, then. You can come with us, if my companions agree. We'll see what you can do after that."

Kurt turns away from him, troubled - for some reason that discussion unsettled him more than Axel's blunt honesty. But he can't put a finger on why...so for now he thinks he's free. He goes and gets Rocky then, leading him out to the others.

After telling him the offer - along with the possibility of freedom, he stares at him hard, trying to judge his reaction as he asks the next question.

"So, what do you think? And what would you do?

[CoffeeIncluded]

Spoiler

Show

Thanks. Also playing a video game, so sorry about the short responses.

Natalia glares hard at Axel. She got a slimy feel off of him, though she's not quite sure if it's just her imagination.

[Admiral]

Rocky listens to every word of Kurt's speech without moving a muscle or making the slightest expression. When Kurt finishes, he blinks once, learns forward, and then spits directly into Kurt's left eye- after which he closes his mouth and returns to complete silence once more.

[CoffeeIncluded]

Natalia snarls, but resists the impulse to draw her blades and cut him down there. Leave him there, for Soshima to deal with. She's...she's better than that.

Spoiler

Show

Ha! And I'll take that as a firm and resounding no.

[Cavelcade]

Kurt wipes it calmly from his face, his muscles very relaxed - but his pose is dangerous. "Why did you do that?"

[Admiral]

The prisoner stays completely silent, his eyes watching Kurt without any reaction. Kurt gets the distinct sense the man has more stubbornness than self-preservation.

[CoffeeIncluded]

"Forget...it," Natalia says. "Wants silence, denies chance...no forcing. Would spit back anyway."

[Cavelcade]

"I'm not going to force him, but I don't want to give up either. Not without a better reason than some spittle. What could Cutler have done to gain this loyalty?" Though the way his hands clench into fists behind his back indicate other thoughts are going through his mind. For a long time he stands and waits, to see if there'll be any other communication from Rocky, feeling his own frustration growing.

[CoffeeIncluded]

Natalia puts a hand on Kurt's back. "Maybe...likes it. Kurt, you okay? Need to...talk later?"

[Admiral]

Rocky doesn't say another word. He's been waiting in the cell for days, and he doesn't seem to care about waiting longer.

A call comes from Axel, who is watching while chained next to Hilton. "You won't get anything out of that one," he shouts in a helpful tone. "I never heard him speak a word, not even on the trail."

[CoffeeIncluded]

Natalia just shakes her head. Forget it. He clearly doesn't want to be saved. It's...kinda pathetic, actually.

[Admiral]

Shiny leans over to Kurt. "You know, I could make him a little friendlier."

[Cavelcade]

Kurt shakes his head after considering it from a moment, looking disgusted with himself afterwards. "No, if this is who he is...fine."

He takes him back inside to the cell, trying to take out his frustration on him and just about succeeding. "You, Karn, wait a minute and I'll be back to talk." He goes back outside then, over to Hilton and Axel.

"Tell me about him." His tone brooks no argument, he looks fed up with an attitude he just hadn't expected.

[Admiral]

"He never spoke to me, and he only ever responded to orders with nods and grunts. There was only one person I ever saw him speaking to, and that's the one who's in there with him now." He gestures to the jail. "Karn. I didn't know either of them well, but I got the sense they had some kind of history."

[CoffeeIncluded]

"Good history, or bad? Strength...compared to yours?"

Spoiler

Show

Were these two the rangers?

[Cavelcade]

Kurt nods in gratitude at that, pausing the door of the prison, taking deep breaths to settle himself before he goes inside to get Karn, taking him outside to repeat the conversations already had three times. After the offer is laid in front of him, Kurt glances at the prison.

"And can you tell me about Rocky?"

[Admiral]

Spoiler

Show

He was telling you about Rocky. Do you mean Karn?

[Cavelcade]

Spoiler

Show

Sorry - that last one was directed AT Karn. He'd gone in and gotten him from the cell to have the conversation with him.

[Admiral]

Karn listens to Kurt's proposal quietly as well as the question about Rocky, then seems to ponder it for a minute. For a moment the interrogators wonder whether he'll react the same way Rocky did. However, he finally speaks- and when he does, it is with an accent considerably thicker than that of the others.

Spoiler

Show

For the sake of imagination, picture a Russian or Eastern European accent.

"You are ordering me to fight for others," he says. "You say, if I survive your battles, I can go free."

"You are not first to make such offer to me. When I was twelve years old, wearing chains, naked in a pit with all the others, the tall man with the whip came and made such offer. He tells us if we bring twenty scalps of the other tribe, we may go free."

"I had been a slave for five years, but I had not fully lost my soul as some others had. So I made a vow to myself. Twenty scalps was all- twenty scalps and then I would never wear a collar again." He coughed, then he pulls up the sleeve of his undershirt- to reveal a series of crude tally marks carved into his skin. "One by one I earned them until I bought my freedom."

"Not long after, the man came to me who said he worked for Josiah Cutler. He offered me the chance to be the one holding the whip instead of the one under it. For me the control of my own fate was all that mattered- but the chance to have control of others perhaps sounded sweet at the time."

Shiny had been staring at the man's arm since he lifted the sleeve, as if transfixed. "There are twenty-one slashes there," he suddenly interrupts.

A small smile comes to Karn's face. "Yes," he says, "perhaps I did not hold exactly to my promise. Before I left that land, I went back and collected one more scalp- that of the tall man with the whip."

Spoiler

Show

To be continued, going to train

[Cavelcade]

Kurt sighs softly in relief as the man starts speaking, then listens attentively to the story, missing only a few words to the accent, understanding the meaning of his words, at least. "You are a dangerous fighter, then." Said with an ounce of respect, though his eyes are doubtful - he reserves judgement until the story is done.

[CoffeeIncluded]

Natalia shudders at the brutality of the man's story. But... "Then why stay? Why...pain others like yourself? Know hurt, so...why hurt others?"

Her gaze hardens. "Say you still have soul." Then why did you stay and brutalize others?

Is this what you do to the people you capture?

And what other tribe?