The party is flying on broomsticks in an asteroid field. It is an older field in a stable configuration. All surfaces of the asteroids are fully covered with moss and lichen, and in most places a layer of loamy soil has developed. Grasses and flowers are growing in this soil, their roots holding it in place in the absence of gravity. In some places the soil is thick enough to support vines and shrubs. We see birds and butterflies flying around.
Marching order: Tsinta and Sofonisba in front, Mary and Mabellyne behind them, Ra fal and Gladys in rear. Sofonisba navigating, Tsinta and Mary on lookout, Mabellyne mapping, Gladys looking at plants. Ra fal coordinating.
Suddenly, six giant centipedes burst from burrows in the asteroids. They are evolved for zero gravity; long, light, and thin, with most of their legs transformed into flat thin membranes like dragonfly wings. Their mandibles click and their leg-wings buzz as approach the party from all directions, hungry for protein.
We react and take the initiative.
Sofonisba shoots one with an arrow, killing it.
Mary steadies herself and readies to attack anything that comes next to her.
Ra fal casts Vicious Mockery on a centipede and it dies. Still not sure how exactly that works.
Mabellyne scores a critical hit with a crossbow bolt. Three down.
Move forward and attack. Critical hit slices centipede head off.
Tsinta casts Eldritch Blast. Hit and kill.
Final centipede moves in to attack Ra fal. Mary reacts with a scimitar attack. Another critical hit, another clean kill.
That was easy.
'Loot' bodies. Inject with preservative. Four of them will be edible, the others already ruined. Strip off legs, add to backpack.
Continue exploring, same marching order.
Another brood pops out of rocks to attack. Nine of them this time. Five in a cluster, four coming from other directions. We have worse initiative reactions this time. Could be trouble.
Sofonisba reacting quickly again. Shoots one with an arrow, killing it.
Move to protect Mary and Mabellyne from the cluster, ready action to attack.
Mary readies an attack.
Eight Centipedes move in. Kill one with readied action. Mary crits and kills her centipede with her readied action. Nice.
Get targeted by four remaining centipedes in the cluster. Two of them flank for advantage on their attacks. One bites through armor joint, but the venom does not penetrate tough skin. The other three miss, their jaws scraping harmlessly off armor.
One attacks Mabellyne. Miss, she dodged away.
One attacks Ra fal, bites only armor.
Tsinta casts Eldritch Blast at the one next to Mabellyne, misses.
Ra fal casts Vicious Mockery at the one next to Mabellyne, it dies.
Mabellyne shoots and kills the one next to Ra Fal.
Party has killed all centipedes except the four attempting to eat face. Do not know if should be annoyed or flattered.
Sofonisba shoots and kills one.
Attack another one. Critical miss, overextend, fall off broom. Broom still on wrist strap, scramble to regain saddle, succeed. Still surrounded by three bugs.
Mary flies in, flanking and attacking one of the bugs. Just barely hits it and does enough damage to kill it.
Am attacked by remaining two, with flank. Get bit twice. Still no effect from poison, thanks to drug-enhanced resilience. Have suffered enough damage from bites to make most civilians or rookie adventurers pass out or even die, but not even feeling bloodied.
Tsinta's eldritch blast kills one, Ra Fal's Vicious Mockery kills the other.
We win. More looting. Five more bodies in pack.
Go back to ship for feast and short rest.
Go to sleep to sound of Ra Fal's Song of Rest pounded out on orcish war drums. Wake up mostly healed, find that party (minus Mary, who guarded ship while resting) has killed remaining small brood using fly-and-shoot kiting tactics, taking no damage.
Party has finished off half a dozen Level 1 encounters and a Level 2, without using up any spell slots and only costing about 1/3rd of tank's natural healing ability. Lots of practice developing tactics and teamwork. Good start to the adventure.
Next (Ra fal)
Next Gladys
All for one and one for all
4c: Mabellyne Centipedes
[Scene: A small ship's wardroom. There is a small table with five chairs. The walls are wooden, with portholes, and on them are a variety of fantastical tools, devices, and weapons. GLADYS and RA FAL are seated at the table calmly and methodically cleaning green slime off of their armor. MABELLYNE is also seated, tinkering with a crossbow and sharpening crossbow bolts. MARY is pacing around, excited and full of energy.]
Mary: That was intense! I was part of a fight, a real fight. You all were amazing, by the way. Did I say that before? I will say it again. You were awesome. When all those wolf-sized centipedes with their big poison jaws came swarming up at you, you just kept calm and started hacking them to pieces like you were just squishing roaches. And when I was freezing up at first not knowing what to do, all I had to do was look at you and I knew that things would be okay.
Ra Fal: You did pretty good yourself, for a rookie. That was good battlefield awareness, the way you flanked and whacked the one that came up behind Gladys.
Mary: It was obvious that I had nothing to be scared of. It was attacking Gladys, not me, and everyone was protecting me. The two of you plus Sofonisba had the front line, and Tsinta and Mabellyne were ready to shoot anything that got past you. I could tell that they would shoot the thing if I missed it.
Ra fal: You barely needed protection. You handled yourself and that scimitar better than some sellswords I've traveled with. I bet you could easily take out one of those things all on your own.
Mary: Really? Wow.
Gladys: I calculate that if Mary saw it coming and had the initiative, she would have a 75 to 80 percent chance of winning a melee fight with one centipede.
Ra Fal [to Mary]: There you go.
Gladys: That means that if she did not have allies, there is a 20 to 25 percent chance that it would bite her, paralyze her, and then slowly eat her alive. Those are unacceptable odds. She needs assistance.
[MARY looks uneasy. RA FAL glares at Gladys. GLADYS does not notice and continues cleaning.]
Ra Fal: Of course none of us are going to go out alone. Nobody with any sense ever explores alone without backup. Even after we have destroyed all the broods, there will be lone centipedes, and even I could get killed by one of those things if it surprises me and I get unlucky.
Mabellyne: And then there are environmental hazards like pits, rockslides, toxic plants, small venomous things, asteroids falling on your head...
Ra Fal: Right. We always travel in groups. [to Mary] But next time we see a single centipede, I think we can let you handle it. If it bites you, we will immediately kill it and then heal you. Are you ready for that?
Mary: Yes.
Ra Fal: That is the spirit. You will be an adventurer in no time. Your family did a good job training you with that scimitar, and we can finish the job with real field experience.
Mary: When can we start? My blood is still up from the fight we just finished.
Ra Fal: The elves need to finish their scouting. Now that we have cleared out the ones close to the ship, we can take the time to plan our extermination campaign after they locate all the broods.
Mabellyne: Extermination? When did we agree to that? I thought we were just stopping for a day of training.
Ra Fal: I think we can exterminate them all in a day. We have come this far, we might as well leave our mark and really clean the place up.
Mabellyne: This island is close enough to the trade routes that if we kill all dangerous creatures, note all hazards, and leave a cache of emergency supplies, we can mark it as a refuge and collect a bonus from Space Command. We can vote on it when the elves return.
Gladys: I need to calculate what that would do to the ecosystem.
Mary: Why?
Gladys: If the centipedes were the only predators, the rats and rabbits would multiply, and then they might eat all the plants and turn this into a dead space rock.
Mabellyne: I do not think that would affect our bonus.
Gladys: They pay more for refuges with edible biomass. And the elves would probably object to any serious ecosystem damage. Plus I have my professional ethics.
[MARY and MABELLYNE look confused.]
Ra fal: Of course. It is obvious that, as a botanist, you cannot allow such a catastrophe. [MABELLYNE looks embarrassed and hurt.] When the elves return, we will ask them about other predators and then figure out how many centipedes we can safely kill.
[There is a brief moment of silence as GLADYS, RA FAL, and MABELLYNE focus on their tasks.]
Mary: So, um, have any of you fought in zero gravity before?
Ra Fal: No, we are all new to it. After we practice our teamwork on the island, we will do some zero-gravity training and then take our broomsticks into the asteroid field to finish the hunt.
Mabellyne: After the hunt, will we have a big feast to celebrate? Sofonisba does a good job with the galley, but I would really enjoy a nice barbeque.
Ra Fal: Those things start going bad the instant you kill them, so you have to either start cooking really fast or take them alive.
Mabellyne: I think we can manage that with preparation. Or we could follow Tsinta's example and eat parts of them raw right after the kill.
[MARY looks queasy.]
Gladys: I would not recommend that unless you know exactly what you are doing. Most of the flesh is unappetizing, and some parts are toxic to most races.
[MARY smiles with relief.]
Gladys: However, if I talk with the elves I might be able to come up with a plan to chop out the good parts and treat them with a basting solution that will preserve them.
Mabellyne: That would be great, assuming you can make it safe.
[MARY looks nervous.]
Gladys: I will need to check my books, and run some experiments first. We will need to take some live ones for testing.
Ra Fal: We can manage that. Once there are only one or two left, it should be easy enough to wrestle them down. Will they stay alive if we chop the legs and fangs off?
Gladys: They would probably last about an hour before the shock killed them.
Ra fal: Is that long enough to run your tests?
Gladys: Yes, I think so.
Ra fal: Good. So when the elves get back, we will debrief them and plan the campaign. Then we get you some live bugs for testing, take down the island broods without you while you experiment, and then do the zero-gravity training and fights together.
Gladys: Sounds good
Mabellyne: I agree.
Mary [forcing cheerfulness] Sure.
Next (Gladys)
Next Mabellyne
Mary: That was intense! I was part of a fight, a real fight. You all were amazing, by the way. Did I say that before? I will say it again. You were awesome. When all those wolf-sized centipedes with their big poison jaws came swarming up at you, you just kept calm and started hacking them to pieces like you were just squishing roaches. And when I was freezing up at first not knowing what to do, all I had to do was look at you and I knew that things would be okay.
Ra Fal: You did pretty good yourself, for a rookie. That was good battlefield awareness, the way you flanked and whacked the one that came up behind Gladys.
Mary: It was obvious that I had nothing to be scared of. It was attacking Gladys, not me, and everyone was protecting me. The two of you plus Sofonisba had the front line, and Tsinta and Mabellyne were ready to shoot anything that got past you. I could tell that they would shoot the thing if I missed it.
Ra fal: You barely needed protection. You handled yourself and that scimitar better than some sellswords I've traveled with. I bet you could easily take out one of those things all on your own.
Mary: Really? Wow.
Gladys: I calculate that if Mary saw it coming and had the initiative, she would have a 75 to 80 percent chance of winning a melee fight with one centipede.
Ra Fal [to Mary]: There you go.
Gladys: That means that if she did not have allies, there is a 20 to 25 percent chance that it would bite her, paralyze her, and then slowly eat her alive. Those are unacceptable odds. She needs assistance.
[MARY looks uneasy. RA FAL glares at Gladys. GLADYS does not notice and continues cleaning.]
Ra Fal: Of course none of us are going to go out alone. Nobody with any sense ever explores alone without backup. Even after we have destroyed all the broods, there will be lone centipedes, and even I could get killed by one of those things if it surprises me and I get unlucky.
Mabellyne: And then there are environmental hazards like pits, rockslides, toxic plants, small venomous things, asteroids falling on your head...
Ra Fal: Right. We always travel in groups. [to Mary] But next time we see a single centipede, I think we can let you handle it. If it bites you, we will immediately kill it and then heal you. Are you ready for that?
Mary: Yes.
Ra Fal: That is the spirit. You will be an adventurer in no time. Your family did a good job training you with that scimitar, and we can finish the job with real field experience.
Mary: When can we start? My blood is still up from the fight we just finished.
Ra Fal: The elves need to finish their scouting. Now that we have cleared out the ones close to the ship, we can take the time to plan our extermination campaign after they locate all the broods.
Mabellyne: Extermination? When did we agree to that? I thought we were just stopping for a day of training.
Ra Fal: I think we can exterminate them all in a day. We have come this far, we might as well leave our mark and really clean the place up.
Mabellyne: This island is close enough to the trade routes that if we kill all dangerous creatures, note all hazards, and leave a cache of emergency supplies, we can mark it as a refuge and collect a bonus from Space Command. We can vote on it when the elves return.
Gladys: I need to calculate what that would do to the ecosystem.
Mary: Why?
Gladys: If the centipedes were the only predators, the rats and rabbits would multiply, and then they might eat all the plants and turn this into a dead space rock.
Mabellyne: I do not think that would affect our bonus.
Gladys: They pay more for refuges with edible biomass. And the elves would probably object to any serious ecosystem damage. Plus I have my professional ethics.
[MARY and MABELLYNE look confused.]
Ra fal: Of course. It is obvious that, as a botanist, you cannot allow such a catastrophe. [MABELLYNE looks embarrassed and hurt.] When the elves return, we will ask them about other predators and then figure out how many centipedes we can safely kill.
[There is a brief moment of silence as GLADYS, RA FAL, and MABELLYNE focus on their tasks.]
Mary: So, um, have any of you fought in zero gravity before?
Ra Fal: No, we are all new to it. After we practice our teamwork on the island, we will do some zero-gravity training and then take our broomsticks into the asteroid field to finish the hunt.
Mabellyne: After the hunt, will we have a big feast to celebrate? Sofonisba does a good job with the galley, but I would really enjoy a nice barbeque.
Ra Fal: Those things start going bad the instant you kill them, so you have to either start cooking really fast or take them alive.
Mabellyne: I think we can manage that with preparation. Or we could follow Tsinta's example and eat parts of them raw right after the kill.
[MARY looks queasy.]
Gladys: I would not recommend that unless you know exactly what you are doing. Most of the flesh is unappetizing, and some parts are toxic to most races.
[MARY smiles with relief.]
Gladys: However, if I talk with the elves I might be able to come up with a plan to chop out the good parts and treat them with a basting solution that will preserve them.
Mabellyne: That would be great, assuming you can make it safe.
[MARY looks nervous.]
Gladys: I will need to check my books, and run some experiments first. We will need to take some live ones for testing.
Ra Fal: We can manage that. Once there are only one or two left, it should be easy enough to wrestle them down. Will they stay alive if we chop the legs and fangs off?
Gladys: They would probably last about an hour before the shock killed them.
Ra fal: Is that long enough to run your tests?
Gladys: Yes, I think so.
Ra fal: Good. So when the elves get back, we will debrief them and plan the campaign. Then we get you some live bugs for testing, take down the island broods without you while you experiment, and then do the zero-gravity training and fights together.
Gladys: Sounds good
Mabellyne: I agree.
Mary [forcing cheerfulness] Sure.
Next (Gladys)
Next Mabellyne
4b: Tsinta Centipedes
I remember
my flock had learned to fly well in space
my pack felt it needed its first hunt
we hunt giant insects for first blood
I pray
to the spirits of the hunting
to the faeries of the wild
to the ancient hungry spirits
to the bloody savage godlings
let us join as hunting pack
let us feel the primal rush
let us stalk and pounce and kill
let us taste the flesh of prey
let us bind our souls as one
I feel
a pounding of the pulse
a rushing of the breath
a lightness of the mind
a tingle in the hands
a quickness in the feet
a balance in the core
the pack gathering
it is a new pack
unsure of itself
some are just young pups
it is their first hunt
it is pack's first hunt
pack sniffs cautiously
I smell
cold crisp space winds
verdant grasslands
autumn flowers
musty soil
upturned soil
deep cold burrows
moldy dead things
insect droppings
I hear
grass rustles
footsteps crunch
armor thuds
claws scrabble
stones skitter
pincers click
leader shouts
bowstrings hum
warspells buzz
I see
insects
people
weapons
armor
battle
carnage
target
prey-thing
burning
bloodshed
I pray
run
jump
scream
aim
burn
fry
bleed
crush
kill
eat
grin
Next (Mabellyne)
Next Tsinta
my flock had learned to fly well in space
my pack felt it needed its first hunt
we hunt giant insects for first blood
I pray
to the spirits of the hunting
to the faeries of the wild
to the ancient hungry spirits
to the bloody savage godlings
let us join as hunting pack
let us feel the primal rush
let us stalk and pounce and kill
let us taste the flesh of prey
let us bind our souls as one
I feel
a pounding of the pulse
a rushing of the breath
a lightness of the mind
a tingle in the hands
a quickness in the feet
a balance in the core
the pack gathering
it is a new pack
unsure of itself
some are just young pups
it is their first hunt
it is pack's first hunt
pack sniffs cautiously
I smell
cold crisp space winds
verdant grasslands
autumn flowers
musty soil
upturned soil
deep cold burrows
moldy dead things
insect droppings
I hear
grass rustles
footsteps crunch
armor thuds
claws scrabble
stones skitter
pincers click
leader shouts
bowstrings hum
warspells buzz
I see
insects
people
weapons
armor
carnage
target
prey-thing
burning
bloodshed
I pray
run
jump
scream
aim
burn
fry
bleed
crush
kill
grin
Next (Mabellyne)
Next Tsinta
4a: Mary Centipedes
The elves of the Holy Corellon Federation understand ecology very well. This is partly due to a desire to protect nature from civilization, but mainly due to a desire to protect civilization from nature. Under certain conditions, magical creatures can grow powerful enough to destroy entire cities, and can only be stopped by a high-level adventuring party or a major military power. Knowing what conditions cause these creatures to grow, and to leave their natural habitat and move into settled lands, is a vital skill for any government.
The more chemical and magical nutrients a biome has, the more life it can support. In general, when a biome supports more life, its food web is more complicated, its apex predators are more powerful, and it is more likely to have herbivores that are capable of fighting those predators.
In space, biomes are isolated. While some things do migrate through empty space, food webs are generally contained to a single archipelago. This means that a trained surveyor with the proper equipment can quickly scan a group of sky islands and estimate how rich its ecosystem is, and therefore how powerful the creatures in it will be. The wildspace navigation charts used by League members, purchased from the Federation elves who originally charted the region of space, have this information.
On the morning of the crew's fifth day of sailing, Mabellyne approached Ra fal with a sheaf of navigation charts. "Is this a good time to talk?"
"Aye."
"When I started my shift this morning, I double-checked the navigation charts for our approach to Garcia-17, and noticed that it is listed as a Level 3 biome."
Ra fal glanced over at Mary, who was practicing tying knots and looking at some clouds in the distance. The human did not appear to be listening to them, but Ra fal guessed that she probably was. "And it would probably be best for everyone if we did a Level 1 island first."
"Unfortunately, none of the Level 1 turnip islands are close by. There is a nearby Level 1 archipelago with both gravity islands and zero-gravity asteroids for us to practice in."
"How much would that delay us?"
"Only a couple hours for the course change and docking, if we make the course correction now. Plus however much time we spend training."
"It is worth spending an extra day on this." Ra fal grinned. "It will be good for us to kill a lot of bugs together."
"Should we wake Sofonisba and Gladys and have a crew meeting to discuss this before we commit to changing the plan?"
"Yes. They will almost certainly approve, but we should always be in the habit of doing things based on consensus."
Everyone quickly agreed to the plan. Sofonisba had not entered her meditation trance yet and was fine with talking. Gladys gave explicit permission for the crew finalize future decisions without her input if at least four people agreed, with the obvious implication that she cared more about her sleep than the feeling of being consulted, and went back to bed. Mabellyne and Tsinta made the course correction.
Later that day, after the shared meal, when Mary and Ra fal would normally be sleeping, they approached the island to dock. By unspoken agreement, Mary and Sofonisba were on their broomsticks again, moving alongside the ship as the rest of the crew prepared for their first island docking. Also by unspoken agreement, Sofonisba explained what was going on.
"In order to dock, you need to know exactly where the island's gravity plane is, and how far out the gravity bubble extends. They are going to toss a gravity probe soon."
The ship was moving very slowly under propeller power, with the sails furled and the wings in steering position. When it was a few hundred feet away from the island, they saw Gladys toss a disk toward the island. It spun slowly through space in a straight line, flinging off a cloud of glittery flakes that expanded in a cone.
When the probe was about 150 feet from the island, its trajectory suddenly changed into the familiar parabola of a stone thrown in gravity. It hurtled down for about a second, but then, when it went under the ground level of the island, its motion changed again. It slowed down, and then started rising back up to the ground level just as fast as it had fallen. When it passed the line, it started falling again. It repeated this cycle, bobbing up and down three times before hitting the rocky side of the island.
"Why does it do that? I thought it would just keep falling down?"
"A gravity plane actually attracts things from both directions. It extends a lot further out in the Air direction, but right at the plane, when a thing passes through, gravity reverses for it and it falls back."
"Weird."
"Yes. You can use it to your advantage, sometimes, if you can get accustomed to what the gravity changes do to your stomach. We may get a chance to practice later."
The flakes it had been spinning off followed its motion, falling and bobbing with it. Soon they had settled down, slowed by the air, and were drifting on the gravity plane and making it look like a rippling water surface. The flakes further from the island, however, simply stayed in space without moving, making it obvious where the island's gravity started taking effect.
"Now they need to line up the ship's center of mass as close to the gravity plane as possible, so that the ship does not bob up and down too much when it enters the bubble."
Mary and Sofonisba watched as the crew carefully inched the ship forward and lined it up with the island's gravity plane, using the wings to make small corrections up and down. Mary held her breath as the bow of the ship came within a few feet of the gravity bubble, even though the painted center-of-mass line on the ship's hull was almost exactly lined up with the glittering flakes. Closer, closer...
And then a sudden gust of wind pushed the ship forward and down.
At any other time, this would have been insignificant, a deviation of a few feet easily fixed by shifting a wing. But the elemental keel was turned off for the approach, and before anyone could react, the bow of the ship was inside the island's gravity bubble and under the plane.
The bow lurched up, while the stern kept moving down on its previous trajectory. Soon, all of Fortuna's Kiss was inside the gravity bubble, bobbing around like a ship on a stormy ocean, and moving towards a collision with the side of the island.
Mary screamed, "What do we do?"
"Catch anyone who falls overboard. Go between ship and rocks. You take starboard."
Mary nodded at Sofonisba's calm command as the elf rapidly moved to the ship's port side. She moved her broomstick forward a bit, and closer to the ship, looking at her friends to see who might be in danger of getting thrown off.
Gladys, Ra fal, and Tsinta were fighting with the wings and sail and accomplishing little, but Mabellyne quickly shifted the engine into reverse and activated the overdrive. The propeller spun rapidly, quickly stopping the ship's forward momentum and saving it from any collision.
However, the sudden change in the ship's velocity happened at the same time that the ship was under the gravity plane, meaning that it and everyone on it were falling up. Ra fal, able sailor that she was, had a firm experienced grip on the railings and rigging that would be dislodged by almost nothing. Mabellyne was prepared for the velocity change and holding on, but both Gladys and Tsinta flew forward over the ship's railing as it reversed.
Gladys was flying starboard toward Sofonisba, and Tsinta was going directly forward. Mary flew her broom forward as fast as it could go to catch Tsinta, but misjudged the velocity and overshot. She then wheeled around, putting herself between Tsinta and the island, and then used her foot to stop the velocity of the slowly spinning elf, just like she did when bouncing off asteroids. Then Tsinta was able to grab her waist and get on the broomstick behind her.
"Where should I take you?"
"Back to the ship."
Mary moved the broomstick forward, but was surprised at how much harder it was. It was like she was carrying the elf while running. She could feel fatigue build up by the second. But it only took a few seconds to get back over the still-bobbing ship. Tsinta leaped gracefully off the broomstick, but ended up landing badly and sprawling on the deck as the ship heaved unexpectedly.
Mary looked over to check on Gladys, and saw that Sofonisba had already landed her on the island.
The ship's bobbing was less violent now. Mary saw the wings catch the air and slow the ship down a little with each motion. As soon as Gladys found a firm footing, Ra fal threw a line to her. The line missed, but Sofonisba quickly flew out to grab it where it had fallen into the gravity plane and handed it to the goblin. Gladys carefully hauled on the lines to control the bobbing, heaving and tugging with her great strength. As she was doing this, Ra fal and Tsinta used the wings to get the ship back under control, and soon the three of them were able to bring the ship in close to the island.
Tsinta tossed another line to Mary and gestured to her to tie it to a rock. Ra fal threw another to Sofonisba, and soon the ship was securely berthed.
They found Mabellyne curled up in a ball near the engine, nauseated and barely able to move. She had been violently ill, but had managed to catch everything in a waxed paper bag.
Gladys gave Mabellyne water and a pill, which seemed to help, and then Ra fal held her hand.
"You did good. You saved the ship from crashing by reversing the engine."
Mabellyne nodded weakly.
"Do you want me to get you to land?"
Mabellyne nodded again. Ra fal easily and tenderly picked her up and carried her over the gangplank to the island.
"Most people get spacesick the first time they bounce around on a gravity plane. The lurching up and down and gravity changing direction even started to affect me, and I have been sailing rough waters for years. You kept yourself together really well. Did you have that bag on you the while time?"
"Yes."
"Smart woman."
Ra fal deposited Mabellyne on the green grass and soft loam, but only after making sure that Gladys, Tsinta, and Sofonisba had formed a perimeter to keep watch for any danger. She raised her voice to address everyone.
"Well, that could have gone a lot better. But we are all in one piece, the ship is fine, and we got some good experience. You all did good, really good. Now we can prepare for the hunt."
Next (Tsinta)
Next Mary
The more chemical and magical nutrients a biome has, the more life it can support. In general, when a biome supports more life, its food web is more complicated, its apex predators are more powerful, and it is more likely to have herbivores that are capable of fighting those predators.
In space, biomes are isolated. While some things do migrate through empty space, food webs are generally contained to a single archipelago. This means that a trained surveyor with the proper equipment can quickly scan a group of sky islands and estimate how rich its ecosystem is, and therefore how powerful the creatures in it will be. The wildspace navigation charts used by League members, purchased from the Federation elves who originally charted the region of space, have this information.
On the morning of the crew's fifth day of sailing, Mabellyne approached Ra fal with a sheaf of navigation charts. "Is this a good time to talk?"
"Aye."
"When I started my shift this morning, I double-checked the navigation charts for our approach to Garcia-17, and noticed that it is listed as a Level 3 biome."
Ra fal glanced over at Mary, who was practicing tying knots and looking at some clouds in the distance. The human did not appear to be listening to them, but Ra fal guessed that she probably was. "And it would probably be best for everyone if we did a Level 1 island first."
"Unfortunately, none of the Level 1 turnip islands are close by. There is a nearby Level 1 archipelago with both gravity islands and zero-gravity asteroids for us to practice in."
"How much would that delay us?"
"Only a couple hours for the course change and docking, if we make the course correction now. Plus however much time we spend training."
"It is worth spending an extra day on this." Ra fal grinned. "It will be good for us to kill a lot of bugs together."
"Should we wake Sofonisba and Gladys and have a crew meeting to discuss this before we commit to changing the plan?"
"Yes. They will almost certainly approve, but we should always be in the habit of doing things based on consensus."
Everyone quickly agreed to the plan. Sofonisba had not entered her meditation trance yet and was fine with talking. Gladys gave explicit permission for the crew finalize future decisions without her input if at least four people agreed, with the obvious implication that she cared more about her sleep than the feeling of being consulted, and went back to bed. Mabellyne and Tsinta made the course correction.
Later that day, after the shared meal, when Mary and Ra fal would normally be sleeping, they approached the island to dock. By unspoken agreement, Mary and Sofonisba were on their broomsticks again, moving alongside the ship as the rest of the crew prepared for their first island docking. Also by unspoken agreement, Sofonisba explained what was going on.
"In order to dock, you need to know exactly where the island's gravity plane is, and how far out the gravity bubble extends. They are going to toss a gravity probe soon."
The ship was moving very slowly under propeller power, with the sails furled and the wings in steering position. When it was a few hundred feet away from the island, they saw Gladys toss a disk toward the island. It spun slowly through space in a straight line, flinging off a cloud of glittery flakes that expanded in a cone.
When the probe was about 150 feet from the island, its trajectory suddenly changed into the familiar parabola of a stone thrown in gravity. It hurtled down for about a second, but then, when it went under the ground level of the island, its motion changed again. It slowed down, and then started rising back up to the ground level just as fast as it had fallen. When it passed the line, it started falling again. It repeated this cycle, bobbing up and down three times before hitting the rocky side of the island.
"Why does it do that? I thought it would just keep falling down?"
"A gravity plane actually attracts things from both directions. It extends a lot further out in the Air direction, but right at the plane, when a thing passes through, gravity reverses for it and it falls back."
"Weird."
"Yes. You can use it to your advantage, sometimes, if you can get accustomed to what the gravity changes do to your stomach. We may get a chance to practice later."
The flakes it had been spinning off followed its motion, falling and bobbing with it. Soon they had settled down, slowed by the air, and were drifting on the gravity plane and making it look like a rippling water surface. The flakes further from the island, however, simply stayed in space without moving, making it obvious where the island's gravity started taking effect.
"Now they need to line up the ship's center of mass as close to the gravity plane as possible, so that the ship does not bob up and down too much when it enters the bubble."
Mary and Sofonisba watched as the crew carefully inched the ship forward and lined it up with the island's gravity plane, using the wings to make small corrections up and down. Mary held her breath as the bow of the ship came within a few feet of the gravity bubble, even though the painted center-of-mass line on the ship's hull was almost exactly lined up with the glittering flakes. Closer, closer...
And then a sudden gust of wind pushed the ship forward and down.
At any other time, this would have been insignificant, a deviation of a few feet easily fixed by shifting a wing. But the elemental keel was turned off for the approach, and before anyone could react, the bow of the ship was inside the island's gravity bubble and under the plane.
The bow lurched up, while the stern kept moving down on its previous trajectory. Soon, all of Fortuna's Kiss was inside the gravity bubble, bobbing around like a ship on a stormy ocean, and moving towards a collision with the side of the island.
Mary screamed, "What do we do?"
"Catch anyone who falls overboard. Go between ship and rocks. You take starboard."
Mary nodded at Sofonisba's calm command as the elf rapidly moved to the ship's port side. She moved her broomstick forward a bit, and closer to the ship, looking at her friends to see who might be in danger of getting thrown off.
Gladys, Ra fal, and Tsinta were fighting with the wings and sail and accomplishing little, but Mabellyne quickly shifted the engine into reverse and activated the overdrive. The propeller spun rapidly, quickly stopping the ship's forward momentum and saving it from any collision.
However, the sudden change in the ship's velocity happened at the same time that the ship was under the gravity plane, meaning that it and everyone on it were falling up. Ra fal, able sailor that she was, had a firm experienced grip on the railings and rigging that would be dislodged by almost nothing. Mabellyne was prepared for the velocity change and holding on, but both Gladys and Tsinta flew forward over the ship's railing as it reversed.
Gladys was flying starboard toward Sofonisba, and Tsinta was going directly forward. Mary flew her broom forward as fast as it could go to catch Tsinta, but misjudged the velocity and overshot. She then wheeled around, putting herself between Tsinta and the island, and then used her foot to stop the velocity of the slowly spinning elf, just like she did when bouncing off asteroids. Then Tsinta was able to grab her waist and get on the broomstick behind her.
"Where should I take you?"
"Back to the ship."
Mary moved the broomstick forward, but was surprised at how much harder it was. It was like she was carrying the elf while running. She could feel fatigue build up by the second. But it only took a few seconds to get back over the still-bobbing ship. Tsinta leaped gracefully off the broomstick, but ended up landing badly and sprawling on the deck as the ship heaved unexpectedly.
Mary looked over to check on Gladys, and saw that Sofonisba had already landed her on the island.
The ship's bobbing was less violent now. Mary saw the wings catch the air and slow the ship down a little with each motion. As soon as Gladys found a firm footing, Ra fal threw a line to her. The line missed, but Sofonisba quickly flew out to grab it where it had fallen into the gravity plane and handed it to the goblin. Gladys carefully hauled on the lines to control the bobbing, heaving and tugging with her great strength. As she was doing this, Ra fal and Tsinta used the wings to get the ship back under control, and soon the three of them were able to bring the ship in close to the island.
Tsinta tossed another line to Mary and gestured to her to tie it to a rock. Ra fal threw another to Sofonisba, and soon the ship was securely berthed.
They found Mabellyne curled up in a ball near the engine, nauseated and barely able to move. She had been violently ill, but had managed to catch everything in a waxed paper bag.
Gladys gave Mabellyne water and a pill, which seemed to help, and then Ra fal held her hand.
"You did good. You saved the ship from crashing by reversing the engine."
Mabellyne nodded weakly.
"Do you want me to get you to land?"
Mabellyne nodded again. Ra fal easily and tenderly picked her up and carried her over the gangplank to the island.
"Most people get spacesick the first time they bounce around on a gravity plane. The lurching up and down and gravity changing direction even started to affect me, and I have been sailing rough waters for years. You kept yourself together really well. Did you have that bag on you the while time?"
"Yes."
"Smart woman."
Ra fal deposited Mabellyne on the green grass and soft loam, but only after making sure that Gladys, Tsinta, and Sofonisba had formed a perimeter to keep watch for any danger. She raised her voice to address everyone.
"Well, that could have gone a lot better. But we are all in one piece, the ship is fine, and we got some good experience. You all did good, really good. Now we can prepare for the hunt."
Next (Tsinta)
Next Mary
3f: Sofonisba First Flight
Packed with many weeks' provisions:
Packed with pemmican and split-peas,
Packed with tack and nuts and meal-worms;
Packed with tools for garden-working,
Packed with weapons for protection,
Sailed the spaceship, Kiss of Fortune.
From the wondrous town of Boomport
From its spaceport on the mountain,
From the carven granite spacedock
Raised above the forces pulling
All things downward, ever downward,
Sailed the spaceship, Kiss of Fortune.
Up the thermals of the Gray Ridge
Far above the rhododendrons,
Far above the beaver meadows,
Far above the bright pine barrens,
Far above the deep green hollows,
Sailed the spaceship, Kiss of Fortune.
Onward, upward, ever upward,
Sailed the crew of Kiss of Fortune
Till at last the ground below them,
Kilometers down below them,
Faded into mist and distance,
Faded out of sight below them.
All their homelands, all their stories,
All their comforts, all their neighbors,
All the places they had lived in,
All the people who had loved them,
Everything they ever knew of,
Faded out of sight behind them.
Out before them, all around them
Floated objects strange and mystic:
They saw drifting fields of space rocks.
They saw floating chains of islands.
They saw rushing deep-space rivers.
They saw fiery motes of starstuff.
Out before them, all around them
There were dangers, there were hazards:
Sudden windstorms, fiercely howling;
Hungry creatures, ever stalking;
Greedy pirates, ever sailing;
Ancient magic, ever waiting.
Somewhere out there, somewhere distant,
Somewhere off among the dangers,
Lay the object of their questing,
Lay the reason for their journey:
Fields of turnips, special turnips
That could serve all kinds of people.
Finding these would surely challenge
Many crews of hardened spacers.
But they only had each other:
Fellow rookies new to wildspace.
So they learned and so they practiced
Building skills or teaching others.
From Ra fal they learned of sailing,
All the workings of a sailboat,
She could share her hard-earned knowledge
Of the ways of winds and rigging.
Though she did not know of spacing
She could lead them through the practice.
Mabellyne, with her mechanics,
Taught them spaceship engineering:
Navigating spatial vectors,
Steering by the elementals,
Basic care and needed cleaning
Of the complex spelljam engine.
Sofonisba knew of cooking
With the slow-cook spaceship galley,
Thus she served them hearty dinners.
Since she also knew of brooming
She could tutor bright bold Mary
While the others practiced sailing.
Mary brought them joy and friendship,
And she often helped the others
When they needed warmth and comfort.
She was also fast at learning,
With her spirit, with her focus
Soon she was an able deckhand.
Gladys showed them rapid learning,
Asking questions, deep and thorough
With her focus just on knowledge.
Very soon she was a sailor.
Oft she talked of arcane secrets
That might matter in the future.
Tsinta showed them quiet service,
Calming presence, mystic union.
For she'd formed a deep connection
With the ship and with her crewmates
After being split from commune
With the forests of the Gray Ridge.
After three days, they were practiced
and could function as a ship crew.
They were ready for a challenge
All together, as a unit.
Very soon they would be tested
Far beyond what they had trained for.
Next (Mary)
Next Sofonisba
Packed with pemmican and split-peas,
Packed with tack and nuts and meal-worms;
Packed with tools for garden-working,
Packed with weapons for protection,
Sailed the spaceship, Kiss of Fortune.
From the wondrous town of Boomport
From its spaceport on the mountain,
From the carven granite spacedock
Raised above the forces pulling
All things downward, ever downward,
Sailed the spaceship, Kiss of Fortune.
Up the thermals of the Gray Ridge
Far above the rhododendrons,
Far above the beaver meadows,
Far above the bright pine barrens,
Far above the deep green hollows,
Sailed the spaceship, Kiss of Fortune.
Onward, upward, ever upward,
Sailed the crew of Kiss of Fortune
Till at last the ground below them,
Kilometers down below them,
Faded into mist and distance,
Faded out of sight below them.
All their homelands, all their stories,
All their comforts, all their neighbors,
All the places they had lived in,
All the people who had loved them,
Everything they ever knew of,
Faded out of sight behind them.
Out before them, all around them
Floated objects strange and mystic:
They saw drifting fields of space rocks.
They saw floating chains of islands.
They saw rushing deep-space rivers.
They saw fiery motes of starstuff.
Out before them, all around them
There were dangers, there were hazards:
Sudden windstorms, fiercely howling;
Hungry creatures, ever stalking;
Greedy pirates, ever sailing;
Ancient magic, ever waiting.
Somewhere out there, somewhere distant,
Somewhere off among the dangers,
Lay the object of their questing,
Lay the reason for their journey:
Fields of turnips, special turnips
That could serve all kinds of people.
Finding these would surely challenge
Many crews of hardened spacers.
But they only had each other:
Fellow rookies new to wildspace.
So they learned and so they practiced
Building skills or teaching others.
From Ra fal they learned of sailing,
All the workings of a sailboat,
She could share her hard-earned knowledge
Of the ways of winds and rigging.
Though she did not know of spacing
She could lead them through the practice.
Mabellyne, with her mechanics,
Taught them spaceship engineering:
Navigating spatial vectors,
Steering by the elementals,
Basic care and needed cleaning
Of the complex spelljam engine.
Sofonisba knew of cooking
With the slow-cook spaceship galley,
Thus she served them hearty dinners.
Since she also knew of brooming
She could tutor bright bold Mary
While the others practiced sailing.
Mary brought them joy and friendship,
And she often helped the others
When they needed warmth and comfort.
She was also fast at learning,
With her spirit, with her focus
Soon she was an able deckhand.
Gladys showed them rapid learning,
Asking questions, deep and thorough
With her focus just on knowledge.
Very soon she was a sailor.
Oft she talked of arcane secrets
That might matter in the future.
Tsinta showed them quiet service,
Calming presence, mystic union.
For she'd formed a deep connection
With the ship and with her crewmates
After being split from commune
With the forests of the Gray Ridge.
and could function as a ship crew.
They were ready for a challenge
All together, as a unit.
Very soon they would be tested
Far beyond what they had trained for.
Next (Mary)
Next Sofonisba
3e: Ra fal First Flight
Things are always a bit rough with a new crew and a new ship, but after a few days we were sorting it out pretty well.
Mary and Sofonisba had the good sense to go off brooming when we first practiced the harder maneuvers, which let us all focus on our work. By the time they got back, we had all gotten the basics of spaceship sailing figured out, and I had a better feel for how to deal with my crew.
At first, Tsinta's performance was lubberly and she seemed distant and isolated, like she hated being here and was just barely tolerating us. But then she changed quickly, like a slack sail filling with wind and snapping taut. She started working with the crew like a seasoned hand, and also seemed happier. Everyone adjusts in their own way and at their own speed, of course, but this was something deeper than just getting comfortable with her job. Of course it would be pointless to ask her about it, but since it was not causing trouble I would leave it alone for now.
Gladys was the kind of person who would scream curses at you one minute and be perfectly fine with you the next. Basically, your typical sailor or adventurer. During much of the training, the two of us communicated mainly by flinging profanity back and forth, and were both fine with the arrangement. She was smart about some things but was a bit lacking in sense, and had to have many basic lessons of ship life beaten into her head. Sometimes literally. But everything would eventually sink in if I yelled at her enough and in the right way. I just had to remember to be really direct and literal, and not to assume that she would already know things or be able to read people.
Mabellyne was trickier. She did not do well in chaotic situations. She would get really stressed and flustered whenever anyone made a mistake, which happened all the time. I was afraid she would have some kind of breakdown the first evening, but Mary was able to talk to her and make things better. The human was already proving her worth. I soon realized that Mabellyne was the kind of person who needed to practice everything in a slow controlled way, and take time building up basic skills, but once she had those she could use them in clever and inventive ways. After the first day, I had her do simple drills of one thing at a time, and after a few days of this she was able to handle things a lot better.
After the four of us worked things out the hard way, it was a lot easier to teach Sofonisba and Mary. It helped that they were both good learners. Sofonisba was quiet and dutiful, with the calm of an experienced adventurer. Mary mostly succeeded in making up for her inexperience with energy and eagerness. Pretty soon, each two-person shift could easily handle the basics of sailing through a steady trade wind and avoiding the occasional space rock. If anything more came up, they would get help from the two people on call, and in an emergency, they would wake up the two who were sleeping.
Once I was confident that we would not break a wing strut or crash into something, it was time to deal with the littler problems. Like Mary and the mealworms. On the afternoon of the fourth day of travel, after Mary had gone to sleep, I found Sofonisba in the galley.
A spaceship galley is a small efficient thing right next to the engine. There are no burners or open flames, just a washbasin and a series of metal tubs that hold three-gallon glazed earthenware pots. The metal tubs transfer heat from the engine into the pots. The cook adds dry ingredients, water, and spices to the pots, and basically leaves them alone for an entire day, just checking in every few hours to stir things or adjust the water and spices.
Sofonisba was scrubbing out a pot, or trying to. Her weak scrawny arms were not making much progress.
"Hey, do you want me to help with that?"
"Yes, thank you."
She handed me the wet pot, which I effortlessly held up in one hand while the other attacked it with a wooden scraper. Chunks of old crusted three-bean stew sloughed off into the washbasin. Sofonisba started stirring and tasting the things that were cooking in the other pots.
"Those smell delicious."
"Thank you."
I kept scrubbing, then stopped and turned to the elf. "I just realized something. Why do you not clean these with your Prestidigation magic?"
"I do not want to risk casting too many spells close to the engine."
I nodded gratefully. "Thank you for that."
She smiled. "Also, if you cast spells on a pot too many times without submerging it in running water, everything cooked in that pot starts to taste like zinc."
I grinned back. "Thank you for that too."
"Speaking of which, the water barrels are about half empty. We should refill them at the next river or iceberg we come across."
I nodded. "Have Mabellyne check the charts and aim for a river. I would rather land in liquid than dock with a solid object on our first time. We should do it during the day, and I want to be awake for it, so be sure to get me up when we are about five minutes away."
"I agree that you should supervise, but you have been awake more than any of us. How much longer can you keep this up before getting exhausted?"
"I can handle it. I am used to this. I will catch up on sleep when we land on one of the turnip islands and you all gather them up."
Sofonisba nodded. "The first one is about two days away, right?"
"Yes, pretty soon we will leave the trade wind and start heading to the Garcia-17 archipelago."
We chatted about our course and the weather while I kept cleaning and she kept adjusting spices, adding water, and stirring. I wanted to build comfort before I brought up something that might be interpreted as criticism, although the longer things went on, the harder it would be to change to that topic.
Thankfully, Gladys wandered in and asked, "What is ready to eat?"
Sofonisba pointed to the two furthest from the engine. "These two, but it would be best if you finished off the cricket loaf."
Gladys nodded, removed the lid from the pot, and began spooning the leftover but still-warm loaf into a bowl.
The slow-cooking galley was perfect for a small crew with shifts, because food would always be available whenever needed. After something finished cooking, you could move it to a different tub that would keep it warm for hours. Eventually it might get dried out or scorched, but it was usually finished off before then.
Gladys took a bite and grunted approvingly. "By the time this trip is over, I will not miss eating red meat. I will find a library to double-check what you said and make sure it is legit, of course, but if it checks out I will make this my new standard diet."
For Gladys, this was politeness, and Sofonisba handled it with a gracious "I am glad I could help." The goblin wandered off without saying anything, happily chewing on cricket loaf.
This was the perfect conversational opening for me. "I still do not understand why you refused to pack salt pork or other cured meat."
"I thought I convinced you that the toxic chemicals would eventually make you sick and shorten your life."
"You convinced Gladys, and after that I just went along with it. I never heard of anything like that, and I know dozens of hale and hearty sailors who live mainly on salt pork and ketchup. But I figured the extra cost was worth it to keep you and Tsinta happy, and I trusted that you would know how to use your nuts and legumes and cricket flour and mealworms to give us the protein we needed."
"And I have done as promised."
"Yes, you have. Your food can keep anyone going strong, if they eat enough of it. But we forgot the thing about humans and insects."
She looked confused. "What thing?"
Gladys had left the lid off the cricket-loaf pot, with the spoon in it. I looked in the pot and saw that it was mostly emptied, but that there were still crumbs and food stuck to the sides. I hate wasting food, so I started scraping the pot with a wooden spatula and eating the leftovers as we talked.
"Humans are weird about eating insects. They really do not like to do it."
"But Martin eats insects without any problem. He shares meals with everyone, and I have never heard of him refusing to eat any of the hors d'oeuvres at diplomatic functions, or even being picky about them."
I shrugged. "He is an experienced diplomat. Most untrained humans find insects repulsive."
"Why?"
"Nobody knows. It is just one of those odd cultural things, or maybe something about how their brains are tuned."
"Mary never said anything about this."
"She is trying her best to fit in, and is afraid of insulting you."
She looked thoughtful. "So Mary has not been eating enough."
"Right. And I am worried that will weaken her and lead to mistakes."
"When did you first notice or remember this?"
She shrugged. "There is a trick to it. You pick it up after a few decades."
Mary and Sofonisba had the good sense to go off brooming when we first practiced the harder maneuvers, which let us all focus on our work. By the time they got back, we had all gotten the basics of spaceship sailing figured out, and I had a better feel for how to deal with my crew.
At first, Tsinta's performance was lubberly and she seemed distant and isolated, like she hated being here and was just barely tolerating us. But then she changed quickly, like a slack sail filling with wind and snapping taut. She started working with the crew like a seasoned hand, and also seemed happier. Everyone adjusts in their own way and at their own speed, of course, but this was something deeper than just getting comfortable with her job. Of course it would be pointless to ask her about it, but since it was not causing trouble I would leave it alone for now.
Gladys was the kind of person who would scream curses at you one minute and be perfectly fine with you the next. Basically, your typical sailor or adventurer. During much of the training, the two of us communicated mainly by flinging profanity back and forth, and were both fine with the arrangement. She was smart about some things but was a bit lacking in sense, and had to have many basic lessons of ship life beaten into her head. Sometimes literally. But everything would eventually sink in if I yelled at her enough and in the right way. I just had to remember to be really direct and literal, and not to assume that she would already know things or be able to read people.
Mabellyne was trickier. She did not do well in chaotic situations. She would get really stressed and flustered whenever anyone made a mistake, which happened all the time. I was afraid she would have some kind of breakdown the first evening, but Mary was able to talk to her and make things better. The human was already proving her worth. I soon realized that Mabellyne was the kind of person who needed to practice everything in a slow controlled way, and take time building up basic skills, but once she had those she could use them in clever and inventive ways. After the first day, I had her do simple drills of one thing at a time, and after a few days of this she was able to handle things a lot better.
After the four of us worked things out the hard way, it was a lot easier to teach Sofonisba and Mary. It helped that they were both good learners. Sofonisba was quiet and dutiful, with the calm of an experienced adventurer. Mary mostly succeeded in making up for her inexperience with energy and eagerness. Pretty soon, each two-person shift could easily handle the basics of sailing through a steady trade wind and avoiding the occasional space rock. If anything more came up, they would get help from the two people on call, and in an emergency, they would wake up the two who were sleeping.
Once I was confident that we would not break a wing strut or crash into something, it was time to deal with the littler problems. Like Mary and the mealworms. On the afternoon of the fourth day of travel, after Mary had gone to sleep, I found Sofonisba in the galley.
A spaceship galley is a small efficient thing right next to the engine. There are no burners or open flames, just a washbasin and a series of metal tubs that hold three-gallon glazed earthenware pots. The metal tubs transfer heat from the engine into the pots. The cook adds dry ingredients, water, and spices to the pots, and basically leaves them alone for an entire day, just checking in every few hours to stir things or adjust the water and spices.
Sofonisba was scrubbing out a pot, or trying to. Her weak scrawny arms were not making much progress.
"Hey, do you want me to help with that?"
"Yes, thank you."
She handed me the wet pot, which I effortlessly held up in one hand while the other attacked it with a wooden scraper. Chunks of old crusted three-bean stew sloughed off into the washbasin. Sofonisba started stirring and tasting the things that were cooking in the other pots.
"Those smell delicious."
"Thank you."
I kept scrubbing, then stopped and turned to the elf. "I just realized something. Why do you not clean these with your Prestidigation magic?"
"I do not want to risk casting too many spells close to the engine."
I nodded gratefully. "Thank you for that."
She smiled. "Also, if you cast spells on a pot too many times without submerging it in running water, everything cooked in that pot starts to taste like zinc."
I grinned back. "Thank you for that too."
"Speaking of which, the water barrels are about half empty. We should refill them at the next river or iceberg we come across."
I nodded. "Have Mabellyne check the charts and aim for a river. I would rather land in liquid than dock with a solid object on our first time. We should do it during the day, and I want to be awake for it, so be sure to get me up when we are about five minutes away."
"I agree that you should supervise, but you have been awake more than any of us. How much longer can you keep this up before getting exhausted?"
"I can handle it. I am used to this. I will catch up on sleep when we land on one of the turnip islands and you all gather them up."
Sofonisba nodded. "The first one is about two days away, right?"
"Yes, pretty soon we will leave the trade wind and start heading to the Garcia-17 archipelago."
We chatted about our course and the weather while I kept cleaning and she kept adjusting spices, adding water, and stirring. I wanted to build comfort before I brought up something that might be interpreted as criticism, although the longer things went on, the harder it would be to change to that topic.
Thankfully, Gladys wandered in and asked, "What is ready to eat?"
Sofonisba pointed to the two furthest from the engine. "These two, but it would be best if you finished off the cricket loaf."
Gladys nodded, removed the lid from the pot, and began spooning the leftover but still-warm loaf into a bowl.
The slow-cooking galley was perfect for a small crew with shifts, because food would always be available whenever needed. After something finished cooking, you could move it to a different tub that would keep it warm for hours. Eventually it might get dried out or scorched, but it was usually finished off before then.
Gladys took a bite and grunted approvingly. "By the time this trip is over, I will not miss eating red meat. I will find a library to double-check what you said and make sure it is legit, of course, but if it checks out I will make this my new standard diet."
For Gladys, this was politeness, and Sofonisba handled it with a gracious "I am glad I could help." The goblin wandered off without saying anything, happily chewing on cricket loaf.
This was the perfect conversational opening for me. "I still do not understand why you refused to pack salt pork or other cured meat."
"I thought I convinced you that the toxic chemicals would eventually make you sick and shorten your life."
"You convinced Gladys, and after that I just went along with it. I never heard of anything like that, and I know dozens of hale and hearty sailors who live mainly on salt pork and ketchup. But I figured the extra cost was worth it to keep you and Tsinta happy, and I trusted that you would know how to use your nuts and legumes and cricket flour and mealworms to give us the protein we needed."
"And I have done as promised."
"Yes, you have. Your food can keep anyone going strong, if they eat enough of it. But we forgot the thing about humans and insects."
She looked confused. "What thing?"
Gladys had left the lid off the cricket-loaf pot, with the spoon in it. I looked in the pot and saw that it was mostly emptied, but that there were still crumbs and food stuck to the sides. I hate wasting food, so I started scraping the pot with a wooden spatula and eating the leftovers as we talked.
"Humans are weird about eating insects. They really do not like to do it."
"But Martin eats insects without any problem. He shares meals with everyone, and I have never heard of him refusing to eat any of the hors d'oeuvres at diplomatic functions, or even being picky about them."
I shrugged. "He is an experienced diplomat. Most untrained humans find insects repulsive."
"Why?"
"Nobody knows. It is just one of those odd cultural things, or maybe something about how their brains are tuned."
"Mary never said anything about this."
"She is trying her best to fit in, and is afraid of insulting you."
She looked thoughtful. "So Mary has not been eating enough."
"Right. And I am worried that will weaken her and lead to mistakes."
"When did you first notice or remember this?"
"Our first dinner, when you served that delicious spiced split-pea stew with mealworms and garlic. As soon as I tasted it, I knew that this would be a good trip. I was sharing good food with a good crew."
"I wondered why you insisted that we all eat a meal together every day, but now I see the wisdom of it. It does help form a strong primal bond."
"Yes. But from Mary's point of view, she was surrounded by a bunch of rough beastly women chowing down on green glop with creepy crunchy bugs in it."
"Oh." Sofonisba looked thoughtful, then glanced out the galley door. "I did think it was odd that she ate so little, but I assumed that Gladys's table manners were putting her off her appetite."
"I wondered why you insisted that we all eat a meal together every day, but now I see the wisdom of it. It does help form a strong primal bond."
"Yes. But from Mary's point of view, she was surrounded by a bunch of rough beastly women chowing down on green glop with creepy crunchy bugs in it."
"Oh." Sofonisba looked thoughtful, then glanced out the galley door. "I did think it was odd that she ate so little, but I assumed that Gladys's table manners were putting her off her appetite."
I nodded. Gladys did have the table manners of a dwarf barbarian, and that meal was even worse than usual because she had been working up a big appetite by sailing all day. But I did not want to get in the habit of doing anything that might look like gossiping about or conspiring against another crew member, so I had to come to her defense. "She is about normal for sailors and adventurers. Among most crews, it is perfectly natural to pick your teeth with a dagger when things start building up in them. It took me an extra ten minutes to clean the mealworm legs and chitin out of my mouth that night. I have no idea how you and Tsinta avoid getting that stuff stuck between your teeth."
She shrugged. "There is a trick to it. You pick it up after a few decades."
Elves can be really annoying sometimes, but I could not let myself get distracted. I was done scraping the pot, so I splashed it with a bit of water, added soap, and started scrubbing it out in the washbasin. "I think that Mary will get used to the idea of eating bugs, but it will take time. We need her at her best before then, and if hunger forces her into it, she might associate us with a bad experience."
Sofonisba nodded. "So you want me to make her something without any insects."
"Do not single her out. Just try to make sure that the menu always happens to have something meatless in it, so she can eat her fill along with us."
She frowned thoughtfully. "That will be difficult. I will have to adjust the whole meal plan, and most of the recipes need the insects to work right."
"Do not worry about how things taste. All that matters is that she gets enough food, and by tomorrow she will be hungry enough to eat almost anything. Actually, having the meatless things be more bland might be good for her. It might guide her to the normal food, make her like and appreciate it. She has eaten enough of it for some part of her to remember that it tastes good. And having the meatless food be bland will make the rest are less likely to eat them, so there is always enough for Mary."
"You are right. I think I can work something out."
"Thank you." I finished washing the pot, then dried it off, put it on the rack, and wiped my hands. Then I turned to her, stood at attention, pressed my fist to my heart, and opened it to her in a classic elven gesture of respect. "You are the best cook I have ever worked with."
She smiled. "I know how much of a compliment that is coming from you. You are welcome."
I smiled, and headed back to my pod to sleep.
3d: Gladys First Flight
Mabellyne teaching spelljamming engine. Fun.
Mary: "I am surprised that an elf can handle machinery so well."
Sofonisba: (ಠ_ಠ)
Socialite: "Foot in mouth. Not mine this time. Potential conflict. Defuse."
Engineer: "Give technical details. Always helps, calms things down."
Speak. "Back in the Third Age of the world, engineering and magic were separate knowledge skills. But when Fourth Age dawned, the foundations of reality were altered, and knowledge became more unified. Now anyone trained in Arcana knows magic and machinery. They are all based on math and equations.
Sofonisba: (>_<)
Mary: Ages of the world?
Ra fal ovearhears, joins in: "The character of the gods determines the character of the world. Each new chapter of their story is a new age of the world. The Fourth Age happened when the modrons, unfathomable alien creatures of gears and clockwork, overpowered the gods and swarmed all over creation. They devoured almost all of the planes, vanquished most of the gods, gained control of the foundations of the universe, and started to rewrite the rules of reality. They tried to change the world into one that ran on their ideal of clockwork mechanical perfection, and as they did so, they drained all life and character from it. But when all hope seemed lost, the old gods returned from the void, shattered the power of the modrons, restored the planes, and returned life and joy to the world, forming the Fifth Age in which we now live."
Metaphysician: "Wrong. Correct error."
Socialite: "Be polite."
Ego: "Sustained."
Nod. Speak. "Yes, the Modrons nearly ate our world before all of the gods, both good and evil, combined forces to defeat them. But to the best of our knowledge, events in our world do not determine when Ages change. Ages change in many worlds at once, driven by vast unknown forces even larger than the gods.
Ra fal shrugs, wanders off.
Mary: "Other worlds? Do you mean like the feywild?"
Speak. "The feywild is just another plane in our world. I mean other worlds entirely."
Mary: :-/
Sofonisba: "Imagine a large picture book. Everything we see, all the world we live in, is one page in that book. The feywild is on the next page, and after that there are pages for the realms of the gods. Each page is called a plane. With effort, we can move to other planes, other pages in our book. But there are also other books, ones that we can never travel to."
Engineer: "Just said that."
Anthropologist: "Good analogy for explaining. remember it."
Mary: So how do we know anything about those worlds?
Speak. "In the second age, people could use spelljamming ships to travel to them. That stopped in the third age, but information still leaks through in dreams and visions. And some special people seem to have information from beyond this world. Usually they are normal, but at other times, special times of drama and crisis, they act differently, almost as if they are being inhabited by spirits from beyond. They say strange things, things that make no sense to us, but that give glimpses of other worlds. We can learn about the nature of our world and others by watching them. I think that Martin and his companions are people like that."
Sofonisba: "That is just superstition."
Speak: "Knowledge is that which can make accurate predictions about reality. I predict that if you listen to Martin talk with his party when they think nobody else is around, you will hear them speak of things not of this world."
Sofonisba: "Every group has in-jokes and stories that make no sense to outsiders. The group has several people not native to the Gray Ridge, and they have famously explored many places, talked to many peoples, read many ancient tomes. Do you know all of the myths of the Zhonghua Empire and the Svirfneblin? Things from other cultures often appear otherworldly."
Logic: "From an outside perspective, her probabilistic logic is sound. Hearing a group talk of strange things is not strong evidence for the outworld-control hypothesis."
Metaphysician: "Have accumulated evidence that encourages much higher prior on outworld-control."
Socialite: "Now is not the time to discuss such evidence, others not receptive."
Engineer: "Concur. Want to learn spelljamming engine."
Adventurer: "Concur."
Socialite: "Exit conversation gracefully. Concede point and move on."
Metaphysician. "Do not tell any lies about belief probabilities! Have good evidence for them!"
Logic: "Crafting suitable response."
Socialite: "Hurry. Taking too long, others staring."
Speak. "I understand why you would think that. I have more evidence that supports my beliefs, but I understand that this is not the time for that talk. Mabellyne, I am sorry for interrupting, please continue."
Mabellyne teaching spelljamming engine. Fun.
Next (Ra fal)
Next Gladys
Mary: "I am surprised that an elf can handle machinery so well."
Sofonisba: (ಠ_ಠ)
Socialite: "Foot in mouth. Not mine this time. Potential conflict. Defuse."
Engineer: "Give technical details. Always helps, calms things down."
Speak. "Back in the Third Age of the world, engineering and magic were separate knowledge skills. But when Fourth Age dawned, the foundations of reality were altered, and knowledge became more unified. Now anyone trained in Arcana knows magic and machinery. They are all based on math and equations.
Sofonisba: (>_<)
Mary: Ages of the world?
Ra fal ovearhears, joins in: "The character of the gods determines the character of the world. Each new chapter of their story is a new age of the world. The Fourth Age happened when the modrons, unfathomable alien creatures of gears and clockwork, overpowered the gods and swarmed all over creation. They devoured almost all of the planes, vanquished most of the gods, gained control of the foundations of the universe, and started to rewrite the rules of reality. They tried to change the world into one that ran on their ideal of clockwork mechanical perfection, and as they did so, they drained all life and character from it. But when all hope seemed lost, the old gods returned from the void, shattered the power of the modrons, restored the planes, and returned life and joy to the world, forming the Fifth Age in which we now live."
Metaphysician: "Wrong. Correct error."
Socialite: "Be polite."
Ego: "Sustained."
Nod. Speak. "Yes, the Modrons nearly ate our world before all of the gods, both good and evil, combined forces to defeat them. But to the best of our knowledge, events in our world do not determine when Ages change. Ages change in many worlds at once, driven by vast unknown forces even larger than the gods.
Ra fal shrugs, wanders off.
Mary: "Other worlds? Do you mean like the feywild?"
Speak. "The feywild is just another plane in our world. I mean other worlds entirely."
Mary: :-/
Sofonisba: "Imagine a large picture book. Everything we see, all the world we live in, is one page in that book. The feywild is on the next page, and after that there are pages for the realms of the gods. Each page is called a plane. With effort, we can move to other planes, other pages in our book. But there are also other books, ones that we can never travel to."
Engineer: "Just said that."
Anthropologist: "Good analogy for explaining. remember it."
Mary: So how do we know anything about those worlds?
Speak. "In the second age, people could use spelljamming ships to travel to them. That stopped in the third age, but information still leaks through in dreams and visions. And some special people seem to have information from beyond this world. Usually they are normal, but at other times, special times of drama and crisis, they act differently, almost as if they are being inhabited by spirits from beyond. They say strange things, things that make no sense to us, but that give glimpses of other worlds. We can learn about the nature of our world and others by watching them. I think that Martin and his companions are people like that."
Sofonisba: "That is just superstition."
Speak: "Knowledge is that which can make accurate predictions about reality. I predict that if you listen to Martin talk with his party when they think nobody else is around, you will hear them speak of things not of this world."
Sofonisba: "Every group has in-jokes and stories that make no sense to outsiders. The group has several people not native to the Gray Ridge, and they have famously explored many places, talked to many peoples, read many ancient tomes. Do you know all of the myths of the Zhonghua Empire and the Svirfneblin? Things from other cultures often appear otherworldly."
Logic: "From an outside perspective, her probabilistic logic is sound. Hearing a group talk of strange things is not strong evidence for the outworld-control hypothesis."
Metaphysician: "Have accumulated evidence that encourages much higher prior on outworld-control."
Socialite: "Now is not the time to discuss such evidence, others not receptive."
Engineer: "Concur. Want to learn spelljamming engine."
Adventurer: "Concur."
Socialite: "Exit conversation gracefully. Concede point and move on."
Metaphysician. "Do not tell any lies about belief probabilities! Have good evidence for them!"
Logic: "Crafting suitable response."
Socialite: "Hurry. Taking too long, others staring."
Speak. "I understand why you would think that. I have more evidence that supports my beliefs, but I understand that this is not the time for that talk. Mabellyne, I am sorry for interrupting, please continue."
Mabellyne teaching spelljamming engine. Fun.
Next (Ra fal)
Next Gladys
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