Session 2: An Unexpected Guest

General Summary

Before dawn, the Foundation was roused in the dorms by Karkhan. Down in the offices of the Phaeros Foundation, the party met with Major Hackett who led them to the docks in the Cliffside district. Once there, a House Sivis messenger brought a message to Hackett from the Foundation’s contact in House Sivis, Nedal. The message contained four pieces of coded information and Hackett challenged the group to figure out three of the four for an extra 10 crown. The message told Hackett that the ship was a Faust and Sons (a Lyrandar sponsored shipping company) shipping galley called the Dragonfly and that the crates would be marked with the insignia of House Phiarlan. 
Argo met the party and explained that his ship, the Leveebreaker, was the impressive Lyrandar Runner at the end of the dock (a ship powered by a water elemental). Hackett got angry, accusing Argo of stealing a blatantly obvious ship and causing them trouble. Argo explained that he won the ship in Darguun during the war and they would have no trouble. Hackett relented and the party boarded the Leveebreaker where Argo showed off that he had freed the water elemental, named Tidal, and that they now work together. With Biggin at the helm, the Leveebreaker set out into open waters.
The party then made their plan to retrieve the House Vol seal: they would board the Dragonfly at night when the security was lowest and most of the rowers and officers were sleeping. Once aboard, they would search for the marked crates and take them off the boat back to the Leveebreaker. Hackett ensured the party knew that there were to be no casualties. During the rest of the trip, the party prepared and Marcella asked Argo about how he freed Tidal. He explained that being a blue-skinned tiefling meant he had some natural connection to elementals, especially water elementals and that he could communicate with Tidal. He also explained that Lyrandar doesn’t mess with him as long as he keeps Tidal a secret.
Once the Leveebreaker caught up to and identified the Dragonfly, Bal discovered that two security officers were keeping an eye on the cargo. The party planned to swim to the Dragonfly and that Marcella and Yelena would board the ship and take out the security officers, then signal to the rest to board and search for the cargo. Marcella and Yelena managed to take out the two officers with the help of Marcella’s innate ability to go undetected. The rest of the party boarded and successfully found the marked crates. Inside, they found what looked to be the contents of a desk, including the wax seal stamp marked with a skeletal stag insignia. Then, everyone made their way back to the Leveebreaker without rousing anyone on the Dragonfly.
They turned the ship around and headed back to Sharn. During that time, Argo tested Yelena’s shooting abilities, Vax impersonated Bal, Rasp tried to get over their fear of the speeding vessel, and Marcella started a game of dice. Vax got people interested and Rasp let everyone use their legitimate bone dice. Argo then joined and suggested the game of 6’s and 7’s, an old dice game based around betting on the outcome of two rolled dice. During the game, Marcella asked Yelena why she had used the phrase, “common people” and asked her how she would identify herself, to which Yelena responded, “common people”. Hackett broke up the game when he called for everyone to join him at the rear of the ship. When the party initially said they’d be back when the game was done, they heard a voice they did not recognize say, “now”.
As the party slowly made their way to the back of the ship, they found Hackett being held by an unknown figure: an assailant wearing an black uniform with bronze buttons and a bronze mask. The uniform had no identifying markings of any kind and the only marking on the attacker’s entire body was a roman numeral V engraved on the forehead of the mask. The attacker held a shortsword to Hackett’s neck and trained a pistol on the rest of the party. At first, Vax tried to offer the assailant a silver quill he had taken from the crates on the Dragonfly, but the assailant pressed the blade harder against Hackett’s throat. Then, Vax tried a gambit: he threw the seal in a long arc over the back of the speeding Leveebreaker. The assailant quickly pushed away from Hackett and stabbed him through before shooting Vax and jumping from the back of the ship.
The party mobilized quickly with several attempts to hit the attacker as he dove. This included Yelena casting a chill touch spell, which caused her whole body to exude smoke for a moment afterwards. Rasp healed Hackett who was nearly unconscious from the stabbing. Vax, for the first time displaying magical ability, cast Mage Hand and grabbed the seal out of the air, pulling it back to him. The assailant turned in midair, like a cat, calling out “‘mancer” before he hit the water. Argo and Biggin called on Tidal to punch it, and they took the Leveebreaker up to top speed.
The party broke, with Vax running to a cabin and hiding the seal in a drawer under the bed. He was then healed by Rasp. Bal took up position at the aft of the ship trying to keep an eye on everything. Marcella grabbed her cane and readied for combat as did the rest and Argo joined at the aft.
Unfortunately, the assailant wasn’t gone. In the darkness behind them, the party saw a Lyrandar Skimmer, powered by an air elemental, gaining ground on them. They prepared, with Argo handing Yelena an explosive which she threw at the skimmer and managed to blow up. However, the assailant had never boarded his skimmer. As soon as he hit the water, he cast Thunder step to teleport to the underside of the Leveebreaker and used his skimmer as a distraction. Just before the skimmer blew up, V had made his way to the foredeck and snuck up on Bal, stabbing him in the back. The entire party, including Biggin with a leaping, brass-knuckle clad haymaker, gathered around Bal, cornering V. Bal managed to get a number of attacks in against the assailant after several successful spells from Vax and Rasp. Argo also called on Tidal’s help, summoning the elemental onto the deck.
Outnumbered, V fled the ship, diving from the deck and seemingly teleporting somewhere before hitting the water.
After the battle, Yelena held up Hackett with her revolver and asked him to explain. Hackett told her and the rest of the party that he had no idea what this guy was or why he wanted the seal, but that Terk might. Hackett told them that Terk had some outlandish ideas that some might call conspiracies, but that it might be time to listen to him. Vax, visibly shaken, made the party promise to protect him mentioning that “they” might now “be after him”. The party agreed.

Character(s) interacted with

Major Lee Hackett
Argo Zun
Biggin'
Tidal
Operative V

Report Date

06 Jun 2020