Chapter 6 - Session 11

Smoke, Steel, and a Serpent's Wake

Events and Actions

The session opened with a recap of the boarding party's progress through The Fortnum's orlop deck: Knick Nab, Mani, Leela, Boarder, and Riu had fought their way from the bow to the stern, clearing a damage-control party of carpenters and cutting down two musket-armed guards outside the sail room, where they found Randolph the Chronicler held prisoner. Randolph refused rescue, explaining that he had given his word not to attempt escape so long as the captain held his writings — kept, as far as he knew, in a case in the captain's cabin.

With that understood, the party turned toward the stern, where a lone guard stood watch by the aft mast and two routes led up to the gun deck above, alongside a narrow powder-monkey run the ship's boys used to ferry powder charges between decks. Mani closed on the guard playing a wounded marine fresh from the bow — staggering and calling out that a ball had come through — while Knick Nab circled in behind; between the ruse and a sweeping blow that slammed the guard against the wall, the two of them beat him unconscious without raising an alarm. Mani took the man's jacket, hat, and loaded musket to round out his disguise. When a powder monkey came scrambling up the run moments later, Leela's attempt to grab him went wide, but Knick Nab hauled the boy off the ladder by the ankles. A pistol at close range persuaded him to stay quiet; he was then searched for hidden knives, bound, gagged, and hidden behind stores in the cable room alongside the unconscious guard.

While the party regrouped, Noddy — having stayed behind invisible and airborne after opening the boarding portal in the previous session — set fire to the sailyard above the main mast, and the ship's crew began scrambling to fight the blaze. Riu climbed the powder-monkey run, stuck his head above the gun deck, and flung a lit grenade into a distant gun crew, spotting a stunned officer staring aft in the chaos before ducking back down; a second grenade followed shortly after to help clear the way. As two firefighting crews scrambled to answer the blaze, Noddy — still unseen overhead — struck the lead hose-bearer with a spell that sent him stumbling off the rigging; he crashed to the deck twenty feet below, losing both his weapon and his grip on the hose, and setting the firefighting effort back further still.

Under cover of the explosions and the drifting black fog that still clung to the deck, the party split to climb both stairways onto the gun deck at once, emerging onto a deck cleared for battle: bulkheads struck down into a single open space, with gun crews lining both sides for the length of the ship. Mani and Knick Nab emerged near the stern, close by the captain's cabin, while Boarder and Leela came up on the far side, where Leela's charge into an unsuspecting gun crew — screaming and swinging her axe — left no doubt to anyone watching that she was not one of the crew. Riu, still down by the powder-monkey ladder, grabbed a lit grenade, cackled at a nearby gun crew, and threatened them so convincingly that they abandoned their loaded cannon and fled toward the next crew down the line; he then teleported the grenade after them, and the blast tore through both crews at once. Spotting a powder charge the fleeing crew had left behind, Riu set it down further along the deck and dropped a second grenade on it as he withdrew; the blast tore through the ship's midsection just as an unnamed officer near the bow — presumably the gun deck's other lieutenant — was beginning to rally a counter-response, scattering the effort before it could take shape.

A figure carrying two sabers stepped out of the captain's cabin doorway to challenge Mani, demanding to know who dared board his ship; Knick Nab, glimpsing him from a distance, briefly took him for First Lieutenant Montoya, the ship's reputed finest swordsman, but when Mani gave his own name and guessed his opponent's rank, the man confirmed it: Second Lieutenant Bush. He fought with a skill well beyond any sailor or marine the party had faced before. The two duelled at length: Bush opened recklessly with a two-handed slash that landed one serious blow to Mani's shoulder while his second strike went wide, and Mani answered by driving his own blade through Bush's stomach, his cheek, and finally his knee, before finishing with a contemptuous, token slash to the shoulder with the flat of his blade and declaring him defeated. Bush collapsed, alive but bleeding heavily and incapacitated. Knick Nab, meanwhile, caught sight of a commanding figure further down the deck and, looking out past him toward the open sea, spotted something enormous and serpentine slithering slowly toward the ship from a great distance.

With the cabin's defender down, the party pressed inside. They found a locked sea chest, blew its lock open with a pinch of loose powder, and inside found Randolph's writing case — a large, book-crammed cabinet of his chronicles, seemingly matched to the books themselves — along with a second, empty case shaped for a pair of pistols, presumably the ones Captain Mason wore on his person, sitting alongside a shelf of the captain's scrolls and charts. Mani ran the writings down to Randolph in the sail room, telling him bluntly that the captain no longer held them and that he should come now if he wanted to live. Randolph, ever precise, made Mani swear to it formally — that the writings were no longer within Mason's control or command — and only once Mani had done so did he consider the oath discharged. He armed himself with his own blade and pistols, set a lantern to the sail room on his way out, and followed Mani back up through the ship. Along the way, Mani freed the bound powder monkey.

Above, Knick Nab climbed to the weather deck and found Captain Mason himself — pacing the deck with his hands clasped behind his back, coolly directing firefighting and gun crews through the chaos and reassuring wounded sailors without missing a beat — and warned him plainly that a sea serpent was inbound and both crews had bigger problems than each other. When Knick Nab announced himself as the enemy captain, it barely broke Mason's stride; he simply pressed for Knick Nab's actual intent, and on hearing the party meant to leave with the chronicler, flatly refused to allow it. Knick Nab withdrew below regardless. Aboard The Medallion, Werner — acting captain in Knick Nab's absence — ordered the crew, including the lookout Jacopa, to fix their attention solely on The Fortnum and watch for any signal. The party loaded Randolph's writing case and a chest of looted scrolls and charts into the captain's own jolly boat, still hanging from the stern — a boat rated to carry a captain and four rowers safely, but with the case and chest already aboard, there was safe room for barely two more — and gathered by the aft balcony to plan their escape, while out across the water the Medallion held position, watching for the signal to close in and pick them up.

Randolph then strode out onto the weather deck with Knick Nab in tow and, before the assembled crew, formally renounced his oath. Mason reminded him that the bargain had been safe passage in exchange for delivering his writings to the Academy unmolested and unviewed — but Randolph countered that the writings were no longer his to control, so the promise no longer bound either of them, and declared that he and Mason were enemies now rather than men in agreement. Mason simply said, "Understood," and ordered his marines to open fire. The session ended there, with the party caught between a newly hostile crew and an approaching sea serpent, still working out how to reach the boat and get everyone off the ship.

NPCs & Creatures

Randolph the Chronicler — insisted Mani swear formally that his writings were beyond Captain Mason's control before considering his oath discharged; once satisfied, armed himself and formally renounced his captivity before the crew of The Fortnum.
Captain Mason — commander of The Fortnum; unshaken by fire, chaos, the news of an approaching sea serpent, or even a stranger announcing himself as the enemy captain, coolly directing firefighting and gun crews throughout, and ultimately ordered his marines to fire on the party once Randolph renounced him.
Second Lieutenant Bush — met Mani in a duel outside the captain's cabin, briefly mistaken by Knick Nab at a distance for the more famous First Lieutenant Montoya; fought recklessly with a skill well beyond any ordinary sailor or marine the party had met, and was defeated, badly wounded but left alive.
Leela — fought alongside the boarding party, charging a gun crew on the Fortnum's gun deck.
Boarder — fought alongside the boarding party on the gun deck.
Jacopa — lookout aboard The Medallion, set to watch for the party's signal.
An unnamed powder monkey — captured, intimidated into silence at pistol-point, bound, and later freed by Mani.
A sea serpent — sighted approaching from a great distance across the water.

Locations

The Fortnum — the Northern Navy frigate under Captain Mason, the site of the entire boarding action: her orlop deck, gun deck, and captain's cabin.
The Fortnum's orlop deck — the utility deck below the guns: cramped, closet-sized officers' cabins near the bow, a sail room where Randolph was held prisoner, and a cable room used to store anchor rope and spare cordage. The party used the cable room to stash a beaten guard and a captured powder monkey, and Randolph put the sail room to the torch with a lantern on his way out.
The Fortnum's powder-monkey run — a narrow, steep passage between the hold, the orlop deck, and the gun deck, built ladder-scale for the ship's boys who ferry powder charges between decks; Riu used it to reach the gun deck unseen.
The Fortnum's gun deck — cleared to one open firing floor the length of the ship for battle, bulkheads struck down and gun crews packed to both sides; thick with drifting black fog throughout the boarding, which cost the defenders more visibility than it cost the party.
The Fortnum's captain's cabin — an unusually spacious, full-height cabin at the stern, its floor space shared with the mast projecting through the middle of the room; furnished with a bookcase and even a chair and table, a rare luxury aboard ship. It opens onto an outside balcony that doubles as a firing position for the stern chasers, and held a locked sea chest containing both Randolph's writing case and the captain's own scrolls and charts.
The Medallion — the party's ship, standing off in the fog and awaiting a signal to close in for extraction.

Conflicts

The party beat the orlop deck's remaining guard unconscious without raising an alarm or taking injury themselves. A captured powder monkey was subdued and bound unharmed. Noddy's fire spread across the Fortnum's main sailyard, drawing firefighting crews; one hose-bearer, struck by a spell that made him stumble, fell roughly twenty feet from the rigging, suffering a knee injury and dropping his weapon, which slowed efforts to fight the blaze. Riu's grenades were the most destructive weapon of the boarding: his first blind throw disrupted a distant gun crew, and later, after intimidating a second crew into abandoning their loaded cannon, he teleported a lit grenade onto them as they retreated, tearing through both that crew and the one they'd fled to; a third blast, made by planting an abandoned powder charge and dropping a grenade on it, scattered a lieutenant further up the deck just as he began rallying a counter-response. Mani's duel with Second Lieutenant Bush was the session's most serious fight: Mani took a solid early hit to the shoulder that left him stunned for a round, but recovered to inflict repeated wounds — through the stomach, the cheek, and finally the knee — before a final, contemptuous slash to the shoulder left Bush alive but incapacitated and bleeding heavily. Leela's charge into a second gun crew left several of its sailors down or scattered, though not all were killed.

Learnings and Discussions

Randolph confirmed that his oath to Captain Mason was specifically tied to the safekeeping of his writings — once those writings passed out of the captain's control, he considered himself released to act freely, and made a point of saying so publicly and formally before the ship's crew. The captain's cabin was confirmed to hold both Randolph's writing case and a separate stock of the captain's own maps and charts. The party also confirmed what they had been told of The Fortnum's command structure: the gun deck answers to two lieutenants, one stationed fore and one aft, though only the aft lieutenant, Bush, was ever engaged directly — the forward lieutenant was only glimpsed rallying his crew before Riu's explosion scattered the effort. A jolly boat, sized for a captain and four rowers, was confirmed still hanging off The Fortnum's stern as a possible means of escape, though its capacity would be tight once the party's own gear was loaded aboard. Knick Nab's warning to Captain Mason about the approaching sea serpent was heard and acknowledged, but did not stop Mason from ordering his marines to fire once Randolph renounced his captivity — leaving the party's escape plan unresolved as the session ended.

Items Gained

Randolph's writing case, containing his chronicles and journals.
A chest of maps and scrolls taken from Captain Mason's cabin.
An unconscious marine's jacket, hat, and loaded musket, taken by Mani to improve his disguise.
Knives confiscated from the captured powder monkey and the unconscious marine.

Items Lost

None.