Four steps over the edge

[PirateWench]

Oedipus's reality had exploded.

Just three or four hours ago he had been explaining the concept of flight to his best friend Micheal (who was infact an Elephant) and now, now he was in the middle of a flaming village accompanied by a smellacle with his tongue stuck to the pavement, a handful of walrus attackers and a small terrified man, shking uncontrollably in a puddle of his own urine.

It had been a bad day.

Well, he was here now and that bearded fellow with the shiny basketball had said that this "Frall" person was a hero. Oedipus waited.

Nothing happened.

Frall let out a piteous moan and said; " Can thomeone help me?"

Oedipus looked at Carl, who whined and excreted more liquid, Oedipus rolled his eyes and in one swift motion stepped forward and ripped Frall off the pavement. Frall shrieked in a totally manly and angry fashion.

Oedipus grabbed the smaller man by his collar and lifted him so high that their beak like noses were almost level. Then he spoke in his nasally, new york accent;

"I don't care if you're a hero or not-you better find my circus or by the hairs in my nose I'll train an elephant to sit on you!"

[Battlewalrus]

Chaos was an understatement.

People were on fire, houses were on fire, and national Fire day wasn't the cause of it.

Carl was scared of fire.

But he was even more scared by the fact that the populace of the town were being possessed by Walrus Skins, that flopped menacingly across the ground before launching themselves yodeling on to their next victim. Oedipus led them through the town with a purposeful stride, cracking it at any walrus that happened to launch themselves towards him with his whip. After a short while he paused, turned to Frall and said, as one does in the situation they were in..

"and how in heck are we supposed to find 'somewhere over the western mountains?"
"I geusstth we headth westtht?" said Frall, still not quite recovered from his painful tongue injury
"and how do we find the somewhere?!" screeched Oedipus. Frall shrugged and turned his attention to Carl
"any ideaths?" he spat
"err..." Carl stammered "Perhaps.. fate will lead us there... or maybe.. you could smell the dark lord?"
"smeicthulss donth work thatt wayth"
"Oh for the love a Mike! Your just fakin' that now!" roared Oedipus
"reathlly? Youth wanna tryth havingth your tounghth manglethed?"
"..err..."
"Oh Sure! I did you a favour yah putz!"
"Reallyth? Could oth fooled me!"
"err.. fellas..."
"Oh? You wanna dance!"
"Yeah I wanna danth!"
"Bring it!"
"guys...."
"okaythh leths go!"
"GUYS!"

Both Oedipus and Frall turned to Carl, shocked by his un-carl like out burst and realised what he was talking about. Around them the chaos had died down.. the streets seemed silent, numerous tracks headed west, which turned out to be the direction to their right. A single man lay, slouched against a wall, bleeding profusely from where his nose once was, holding a dead Walrus skin in his hands.

"...t-there was....too many..." he said slowly, looking up at them
" They... came from the bank... spread all around... the eggs... they spread their eggs by shooting them down your... mouth"
The man coughed "they... not got much time once their born, not much.. t-time to find a host, before.. before they die...." the man looked at the dead skin, his nose in its jaws, Carl wet himself, but the man continued his story as if nothing had happened
".. they headed.. West.... to where the Dark Lord-"
"Hang on just one second!" said Oedipus
" How do you know all this? What makes you such a expert on inter-dimensional walrus skins, and how the heck does everyone apart from us know about this Dark lord fellar?"
the man shook his head knowingly
"No.. time... head... w-west... avenge... us................." his eyes went blank, Frall crossed over, and closed his eyes, it felt like the right sort of thing for a hero to do.
"He wasth a good manth, he'th be remebered.."
"Okay, that time was definitely fake!"
Carl drowned their argument out, and looked fearfully in the direction of the tracks... suicide was beginning to become more and more appealing once again.

[Fort]

Carl: So....
Frall: So...
Oedipus: This is very silly.
Frall: A man just died!
Oedipus: Yes, yes. Boo-hoo. I'm off to claim insurance off my circus.
Car: ...eh, don't say that word.
Frall: But, you can't leave! What about your beloved circus friends! We're on a epic quest!
Oedipus: Look, all I have to go on is the crazy ramblings of a man with a beard too silky to be healthy, and a delirious, dying man holding a Walrus skin.
Frall: The grand oracle is...the grand oracle! You can't go against his word! Or dying people, it's unethical!
Carl: Guys....
Oedipus: Well I -
Carl: GUYS.
Frall: If this is another dying man I'm going to be very displeased, Carl.
Carl: Walllrusssess..... *Tinkle*

The group looked around them, as a thousand beady eyes looked down upon them from the rooftops, all atop matted, blood-stained heads.

Oedipus: Now, this may not be the time to prove a dead guy wrong but: told ya' so!
Frall: Shut up!
Carl: Mummy.

Suddney, from behind them, the large cracking sound of a door bursting open is heard. The group turn round to see the captain, standing proudly in the demolished ruins of his boat, set-upon by thousands of Walrus-people.

Captain Henry: ARRR! SURVIVORS! MAKE HASTE YE' LANDLUBBERS, UNLESS YOU WANT TO MAKE LIKE DAVY JONES'S PANTALOONS!
Frall: INTO THE BOAT!

The group threw themselves onto the boat, before hoardes of Walrus-people closed up the gap behind them.

Carl: Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. *WHEEZE* *WHEEZE* *WHEEZE*
Henry: TAKE THESE' ERE' CUTLASSES AND SHOW THE SWASHBUCKLER'S ONE-TWO.
Polly: *SQUUAAAKKK* ONE-TWO! ONE-TWO!
First-mate: Captain! It's the engine, she's fired, the men are trying their best to breathe into the bellows, but the hellium is making them dellerious!
Captain: ARR! BLOW HARDER! WE NEED TO LIFT THIS OLE'TUB M'HEARTIES.
Oedipus (while stabbing at the wall of posessed-villagers): Quite frankly I think it is perfectly reasonable of me to not trust the word of a dead guy.
Frall (hacking a villagers head off): SHUT UP!
Oedipus (Slashing frantically): Really, just because a guy is dying doesn't mean that you should automatically believe what he's saying.
Carl (poking his sword into the fray at intermediate points): Gyaaahhh!!! *Tinkle*
Frall: I'M TRYING TO KILL WALRUSES!
Captain Henry: ARRR!!!
First Mate: Down bellow sir! It's terrible! All the crew, they think there little tea-pots, short and stout!
Captain Henry: YARR! LANKY-JOE BE NOTHING LIKE SHORT AND STOUT! WALL UP DECKS! C’MON LADS, WE’LL BLOW UP THE BALLOON OURSELVES!

[Zerrer]

"Hey!" Neal said, running towards the boat. "Hey, can I have a ride?!" The eccentric hitchhiker called again. He wore a heavy leather coat and had a towel used as a sling. The sling carried a book, titled 'Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'. It wasn't really a guide, but it was a science fiction book that he was obsessed about. He ran up to the boat, did some nameless moves that would best be described as 'Ninja-like' and ended up on the boat.

"Hello there," Neal said, grinning like a psycho and running his fingers through his leonine blond hair. "I'm fine. I had my towel."

[Battlewalrus]

Captain Henry fixed his insane eyes on Neal, focusing on him with the full might of his piratical rage, he grabbed the towel from Neal, then hoisted him above his head and hurled him up into the air. Arms flailing poor Neal landed in amongst the furious horde of Walruses where he was promptly swarmed over.

The Captain spun round, roughly pushing the towel into Oedipus's stomach
"Here lad, fan the helium arrrr" he roared
" What do you mean fan the helium? That makes no sense! And who the heck was that guy? Why did you kill him?"
"HUSH LAD, THAR BE NO TIME!!!" he threw Oedipus with all his strength into the helium balloon.

The balloon was hot, sweltering so, Helium-high pirates gibbered and giggled in the darkness...
Oedipus gingerly crept forward into the middle of the balloon (which was difficult as walking in a giant balloon is hardly easy) to where the helium filter was (northern armada engineering is extremely complex) and began to shake the towel up and down madly

On deck the situation was grim.

The Walruses where climbing the hull by sinking their teeth deep into the wood and pulling themselves up. Carl gibbered with fear as they climbed ever harder, the first few were on deck now, but were quickly knocked off again by the frenzied assault of Captain Henry and the inexperienced slashes of Frall.
"YARHAR!!! TO DAVY JONES LOCKER WITH YE!"
"SMELL YOU LATER!"
"errr...."
Suddenly there was a jolt, a whoosh, the sound of a cat yowling, some hammer noises and a loud clunk and the ship slowly rose into the air, Walruses dropping off as they rose and tumbling to their hilarious blubbery doom.
"Ha Har! Victory lads!" cried Henry, slapping Frall on the back. Oedipus rolled out from inside the balloon, looking uncharacteristicly happy, but other-wise the same as he went in. Carl allowed himself a small time to smile, for the first time since he'd gotten into the massive mess.
His smile fell however, when he saw what was flying up behind them....

[Fort]

If Frall’s life had a soundtrack, it would have gone along the lines of: Dun-dun-dun-duuun-dun. Dun-dun-dun-duuun-dun. Dun, dun, dun, DUUUN! However Frall’s life does not have a soundtrack, and instead of 32-bit high quality stereo song, his ears had to contend with the weird yodel-worbblings of a thousand Walrus’s attached together into one massive blimp.
To Carl it looked like a great big, blubbery pig’s bladder; he was too scared to urinate.
“Yahrr,” Captain Henry whispered, sucking in air, he stared madly at the oncoming monstrosity, “it looks like the behemoth that took No-armed Jim’s third leg! …Ehh…It was a birth defect!” he added hurriedly.
“It’s gaining Captain!” screamed First-Mate Percy, “actually…umm, it’s falling. It’s really, really, slow.”
“It’s a Blimp,” said Oedipus.
The group stared at it for some time.
“Squak,” the parrot added to break the awkward silence.
“Avast.”

“It looks like it’s falling apart,” Carl added helpfully, his fear-induced-rigamortis subsiding.
“But…the pieces aren’t falling to the ground,” the first-mate muttered darkly, as he was the one who liked to point-out-the-obvious and was rather slow on the upkeep.
Frall’s nose tingled, it smelled of…Helium, and blubber, and fire, and…old man?

Oh no.

“THEY’RE FLYING TOWARDS US!” they all screamed at once, hell, it wasn’t just the first-mate who was slow on the upkeep.

“There’s the first one now, m’hearties!” screamed Henry, “shoot it down! SHOOT IT NOW!”

It was almost poetic how the walrus’ flippers moved with their flight; almost artistic as they sung their slow, rhythmic song; and almost touching how they went straight for the jugular.

“GYAH!” screamed No-Armed Jim, writhing on the ground in panic.

“NO!” screamed Henry, hacking at the scount-walrus with a pirate filled rage.

“It’s too late,” whispered the first mate, clutching the designated plate-cleaner’s head, “he’s dead.”

“YAHR! NO! NOT JIM! HE WAS SO YOUNG!”
“He was Sixty, Captain,” the first-mate corrected.

“He had so much to live for!”

“Jim licked plates for ‘is livelihood, Captain.”

“GYAHHHARRR!” the captain screamed again, arms thrown back, beard protruded to the wind.

The sky took on a deathly blood-red haze, the captain’s eyes filled up like fiery opals and from his beard flew death on two wings. Millions, upon millions of parrots.

***

“Thiiss, maaastter, is your treasure guard,” the one-eyed elite minion hissed at Phil, the lord and master of legion.

Phil looked at the troll nervously, he looked large and ungainly, and his teeth were yellowed and crooked.

“Hi,” said Phil said nervously.

The troll stared down at him, in two grubby paws he held two menacing long pikes, with skulls for decoration.

“Ehrm, err…I don’t even own any treasure,” the lord and master of legion began, but stopped from the beady stare his elite guard gave him, “well I uh – Maureen has these Jewels from ‘er mu-om. Umm, not sure they’re worth fightin’ for tho’.”

“I knit,” the troll rumbled.

Phil furrowed his brow, but decided that it was not worth fighting about, this new getup was…weird, and the spikey shoulder pads kept stabbing him in the neck. Truth be told he’d be happy to go back to model-train making, but everyone seemed so convinced he was “the lord of darkness, fist of legion”, he couldn’t really argue. Maureen called it a promotion, and it certainly meant he was now officially the most successful man in the class of 1304, and if he played his cards right he may also be the most successful woman!

[Battlewalrus]

The Walruses swooped down screeching and yodeling in a terrifying manner, the pirates, now recovered from their helium-high state out of necessity prepared to meet them.
Captain Henry fluttered from Walrus to Walrus roaring the whole time as he slashed and hacked at his blubbery foes. Walruses retreated whimpering as he came close, no one had even seen someone so Red raged, not even Captain Red Rage, named for obvious reasons.
"YAAARRHAYYY YO-HO HO AND A BOTTLE OF PAIN!"
"... I don't think Red Rage improves one liners at least" whispered Oedipus
but he barely had time as Walruses swooped down striking pirates left and right the full battle of Safeton (the ironically named town) had begun.

Frall swung his cutlass left and right, he'd been cut off from Oedipus and Carl and was following the trail of urine in hope of being reunited with them. Suddenly meaty hairy hands clasped round his shoulder and hoisted him over its shoulder. Frall protested but his anger was drowned out by the shrieks and warbles of the Walrus horde. The man dropped him down at the far left side of the boat, relatively untouched by the battle.
" ARRR laddie, it be me first mate Percy" said Percy. Frall suddenly noticed that Oedipus and Carl were both standing there, except for the fact that that Carl was in more of a fetal position than standing.
" The Walruses arrrrrr here fer ye lads, they know ye plan to stop the dimension gate openin! You have to go lads, ye have to go and stop the darrrrrrk lord" growled Percy
" Wait, how do you know about the dark lord? How come these walruses don't have host bodies? how-"
"Thar be no time" said Henry as he pushed them in a small flying row boat and flung them over the side.

[addman]

((Alright, I'm going to try and join in. Forgive me if I'm out of place as this RP has been pretty tough to follow so far. My understanding is that there are a bunch of pirates invading the town of Safeton, and that the protagonists are caught in the middle of it. If I'm wrong, I'll edit my post to suit))

"Water....Waaaater...Bagginsssssss..."

Addman wasn't sure what exactly a Baggins was, but he was almost certain that it'd contain water or some sort of thirst-quenching fluid.

It had been days since he'd last seen Fort. Ever since that overgrown reindeer had collaborated with an evil doctor in order to start a rather successful chain of Pianist Enlargement stores, Addman had been discarded like an early 90's copy of Amateur Photographer, and forced to roam the plains of an unfamiliar land. Oddly enough, for the insane amount of interesting adventures he'd experienced before Fort left, since his departure, he'd barely even seen a living soul. No pinata-wearing monks, no teleporting Gnomes, and no Mickey Rourke. What he wouldn't give to see Yotaman holding a canteen full of delicious water, virgin's tears, or even something as disgusting as Irn Bru. Semen would do. Anything!

Stooping down to place his palms on the dry, dusty scrubland beneath him, Addman began to crawl across the landscape towards...well...whatever happened to be directly ahead of him, just over the towering mountains that jutted their way into the sky, violating his view of an imagined civilisation of four breasted valkyrie warrior maidens that he convinced himself must be just over the horizon. It was the only thing that kept him going. That, and the hope that he'd be able to seduce Fort's secretary once he got back to the cave.

Suddenly, Addman found himself floating through the air. The ground was slowly vanishing from below him, and he felt weightless, yet strangely serene at his mysterious altitude gain.

"That's it. I've died" The muppet said to himself. Then another thought struck him. He hadn't bribed enough members of the clergy to ascend into heaven. What was going on?

"Yarrrrr, we've landed the big one Cap'n!"
"Excellent. Hoist him on board!"

As he snapped back into reality, Addman realised he was caught in what appeared to be a giant fishing net. Why was it always nets? Probably the least effective catching device in this day and age since the invention of white vans with "Free Candy" written on them, tazer guns, and Pokeballs. Yet Addman always seemed to get caught in them. Seconds later, he found himself flumped down hard onto the wooden deck of a ship.

"He'll feed the crew for days! Quick, gut him like a kipper!"

One skinny pirate stepped forward with a cutlass, and sliced at Addman, who was too weak to even protest. He scored a hit across the front of the muppet, then stood back in confusion as nothing but stuffing came pouring out of the wound.

"You gimp..." Meekly retorted Addman, as he sat up and started trying to gather up his stuffing and shove it back into the wound.

"We can't eat this one Captain, what are we going to do for food?"
"Never mind" Replied the Captain "We're headed towards certain doom in the battle of Safeton anyway. The ones that survive can eat the ones who die."

Realising his crew looked a little startled and upset by this, the Captain tried a different approach.

"And I hear they have a simply marvellous Frankie and Benny's"
"YARRRR!" Cheered the crew, uplifted by this revelation. And so, the ship continued to float towards the town of Safeton, with Addman in tow.

[Battlewalrus]

(( Close enough, basically the township of Safeton has been overrun by a horde of evil inter-dimensional walruses, who have killed and infected the entire towns population. Phil the unknowing dark lord may accidentally open a dimensional gate allowing Walruses to kill everything that exists. In order to combat this threat the high Oracle of the order of oracles has summoned a party of heroes. Carl the Accountant, Oedipus the Circus Ring master and Frall the smellicle. The pirates are good guys on their side fighting for the king of the North the Larvae King. Its a fairly complicated thread and sorry if all this wasn't apparent by reading it through. Also, I'm not sure this takes place in the same universe as the rest of Darkstar, we shall have to ask Fort ))


"Whats going on..?" whispered Addman, feeling rather embarrassed by the fact all his stuffing was dangling out.
"Why lad, ol' Henry's gone out with the call, a Red Rage so powerful all pirates within 100 leagues could sense it" said the captain if it was common knowledge
"Do you have water..?" The Captain continued his story as if nothing had been said
" We're going to join 'im lad! Fight whoever he's fighting! that be the pirate way ohh-arr!" all the pirates roared and Addman groaned, it seemed strange that stuff like this always happened to him, he was only a Muppet after all.

* * * * * * *

"AAAAAAAGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" screamed the motley band of Frall, Carl and Oedipus as the 'flying' rowboat failed to do what it said on the tin.
Above them Captain Henry's Ship was locked in mortal combat with the Walrus blimp. Other Walrus blimps seemed to be rising now from the ruins of Safeton, but on the horizon other pirate ships floated serenely towards the conflict, and Carl would have got the feeling that the battle had only just begun...

Had he not been plummeting towards the ground for the second time in two very hectic days.

*FlUMPFF*

Had they been in the South, or towards leftyways of or in teh general area of peppermint they would certainly be dead, but luckily for the heroes they were in the North, where soft cushiony snow conveniantly worked as a plot device for the poster to break falls without killing off main characters.
Oedipus struggled to his feet and cast around for his top hat, finding it, crumpled somewhat, a few feet from where he fell. Frall himself got to his feet and gazed up at the battle that was being fought overhead.
"Well..." he said after a short while " I guess we should head to the great Western mountains"
"How?!" exclaimed Oedipus " We have no food, no water, no compass no map! All we have are a few rusty cutlasses a broken flying rowboat and the clothes on our backs!"
"..err... that's not completely true" Carl said in a small voice " I have this pen..."

[Zerrer]

((Yes, I know normal walruses don't have claws.))

Unseen, Neal was hanging onto the edge of the flying ship. He climbed up and grabbed his towel, which was sitting on the ground forgotten. He tied it tightly around his waist, and then noticed that he had a Walrus claw in his arm. He pulled it out just to get tackled by a full walrus.

"Could someone help, please?" He mumbled, the blubber muffling his voice.

[Bim's Not Dead]

It smelled fear.
It smelled panic.
It smelled a large amount of urine.
It smelled the blubber of It's fallen comrades.
It smelled.....HENRY.
The beast roared, and flew off after its companions.

[Fort]

It...FLEW.

****

Captain Henry lowered himself down onto the boat with his parrots after an awesome air-fighting scene you just missed.
"Yahr, ye' survived ye' land-lubber?" he gawked, dead walrus carcasses littering the deck, and one dead plate-licker.
"Well you see -" Neal began, preparing for some lengthy exposistion.

From out of nowhere...IT came. Thrusting itself through Neal' abdomen in a spectacular mess of red gore, the White Walrus hissed at Captain Henry.

"AIYEE!" the hitchhiker screamed, ripped into two pieces as the flabby, bloated monstrosity dived for Henry.

"BACK YE' SCURVY SEA-CAT!" the captain roared, but it was too late, the monster had a firm bite of the captain's hand, and the pirate had to reach for his sword with his bad arm.

"Captain!" screamed the first mate, "it be the Walrus's, they're re-grouping!"

"Armada ships on the horizon, captain! And it looks like their captains...have beards, the red rage must 'ave called 'im, sir!" shouted one eyed, badly navigatable Jim, who despite his namesake did have good eyesight and an acute sense of where, North, South, Leftways, and peppermint lay on a compass,"we're gonna win sir, we have backup!"

But it was too late, the captain's hand was cut clean off, it was only due to the rage the bleedin' stopped - and made a hook grow in its place.

"ME' CUTLASS HAND YOU SEA PUFFERFISH!" the captain swore, each obscenity getting worse than the last, slashing at the White Walrus in fits of rage.

One of the hits hit home, hacking off part of the Walrus's flippers.

"SKQUEEEEECHH!" the Walrus hissed, throwing itself overboard, backing away from the losing battle.

"I'LL GET YE' WHITE WALRUS! I'LL GET YE' FOR WHAT YOU DID TO ME' HAND-!" Henry looked down at the deck littered with parts of the hitchiker tastefully littered in a form of Feng Shui, feeding the captain with a sudden sense of calm and serenity - " - and err...whats his face too," he added lamely.

[Battlewalrus]

Carl groaned, in a way that was pathetic even by his standards.

His feet ached, his legs ached, his stomach ached and his bowel ached and still despite his complaints the motley adventurers marched on. And if he felt this bad after half an hour he couldn't bare the thought of walking to 'somewhere over the western mountains'
Of course Oedipus had been right, they had no food, no water no map or encompass, they were pretty doomed before their adventure had even properly begun.

The fact that they had even started moving at all was a miracle. They had quickly left Safeton at least, but as soon as the ships where our of sight the arguing began. Frall said on way Oedipus said the other, after many curses and 'putzes' they finally agreed to head forward in hope that they would either die or find somewhere to get the necessary supplies (though without money this could prove difficult). Frankly to Carl the former option was seeming more and more appealing

Frall was angry. Very much so.

He was supposed to be the hero! Not Oedipus! He was supposed to make the decisions, not Oedipus! For a comic relief Oedipus seemed to be providing precious little laughs for the run down group and that just made Frall even moodier.
He was also cross at the High oracle, for being so useless, for providing so few answers, for not even giving them money to buy supplies with.
He was angry with those stupid pirates for being stupid and piratical, he was angry with the Walruses for trying to kill him, he was angry at Carl for being a waste of space and-

*thunk*

An arrow thudded into the ground next to Frall, if he wasn't so surprised, he'd be angry with it too.

[addman]

Addman found himself left to his own devices as the crew of the flying ship S.S. GIRLPOWER (the boat was formerly owned by a misguided feminist) went about their usual duties of yanking ropes and pulleys that weren't attached to anything, tying meaningless knots in lengths of rope, and whilsting indecript tunes whilst inserting the word "rum" at random. If there had been any lawyers around, these pirates would find themselves up against a tribunal for unethical stereotyping of pirates.

As the muppet scoured the deck for anything that wasn't poop, he happened across a murky bucket of water that had been used as a mop bucket. He glugged it down without a second thought, letting the glorious water trickle down his throat, and coughing on a few unexpected lumps. Seconds later, he let the empty bucket drop onto the deck with a clunk, only for it to be hastily scooped up by a cabin boy who looked disgruntled that this week's supply of cleaning water had vanished.

Peering over the side of the ship, Addman noticed that the mountains he had been heading towards were now right below them. In fact, they were rather close to them. Malevolent rocky spears jutted upwards, almost skewering the underneath of the ship at times.

"Hey! Shouldn't we ascend a little higher here?" Queried the muppet in a shaky voice.

"Nonsense! If we go too high, we might fly off into space!" Was the captain's unreassuring response. Addman couldn't question his logic though as he didn't have a degree in pirate ship flying as the captain did, prominently displayed just above the door to his private cabin.

Suddenly, something sharp hit Addman in the shoulder. An arrow came out of nowhere and pierced his fluffy exterior, leading to even more stuffing being lost. Yanking the offending item out, Addman leaned over and saw a barbaric tribe of scantily clad warriors beneath them on the mountain, waving bows and shouting.

"They look like cannibals. Fine young cannibals" Said the captain. "Our boat isn't cannibal proof. This is going to be tough."

"We could load up the cannons"

"But what if the cannibals are cannon-proof? Eh? Did you think of that? I bet they have, and that's why they are winning this battle!"

As if on cue, a flaming arrow landed squarely in the middle of the deck. 20 pirates and a fat blue puppet immediately leaped overboard in panic.

****

In front of Frall, a group of semi-naked, bronze skinned tribesmen appeared, pointing an array of pointy weapons and bows with points on them, and pointy points scoring pointed points at him and the rest of the party. One of the group who wore feathers in his hair stepped forward.

"As the Ambassedor For Public Relations of this group of rather peckish cannibals, I hereby encourage you to step into this net and lay down quietly. You may relinquish your weapons into this wooden hamper as you do so. Anything you wish to say may be taken down and written on the napkins that we will serve with you. Do you understand?"

"Can't we negotiate?" Asked Frall.

"Negative"

"So much for being an ambassedor then."

"Be quiet and get in the net!" Snapped the previously calm ambassedor, and motioned towards a giant net the group were carrying with them.

[addman]

((Oops. Double post.))