Session 61: We're Looney, We're Tuney

We are at the inn. There's a smell of chowder in the air. Cali takes a bath and then a nap, and Wulf goes to hose himself off before heading to the communal bath. Jade studies the quill tip, and finds out that it creates its own ink. Quell looks into the snowflake, and finds out that it's pretty old, and seems to be part of a set, the other half of which being the chains. It has the ability to freeze water after a certain amount of time, but more as a side effect than the intended purpose.
 
Quell goes to talk to Branna but it seems like she's not there, so she decides to go downstairs for dinner. Setluk comes down to join her, and she asks him questions about what he knows about Branna and how she was captured, until Branna comes down herself and Quell motions for her to join them. Wulf pipes up to mention he likes meat, and Quell and Branna talk some more. Branna notes Quell's odd accent. She tells Quell about where she came from, and the criminals out there. That "they always used to take people, but it was never our people". She then has a brief crisis over that making her sound horrible, but talks about how it used to be that the priests of the Mother were trustworthy and "you could go to a temple to pray and expect to make it back out". Quell mentions T'kari and Branna says that's just a legend to scare children. Quell tells her we met someone who knew her and Branna is baffled. They talk about going to Nag and how unsafe it is, but that Quell is sure we have to.
 
[Meanwhile, upstairs, Cali is having a nightmare. It starts out nonsensical; traveling, fighting, images, etc. It morphs to the crab that grappled them earlier in the day, except instead of Jade coming to the rescue, the crab successfully clips their head off with its claw, and they continue being conscious as the crab swallows their head like a pill. As they go down, their life flashes before them and they see good and bad, little memories from childhood that Cali had forgotten about. When they get to the belly, which resembles the market from that docking town, they see Ivy. They scream her name and start trying to run to her. She's crying and in a dirty nightgown, stained in mud and greenery and blood. It's suddenly raining somehow and tendrils from the wall reach out and grab them, pulling them to the wall like bubblegum. They can't move, every time they cut through the tendrils they reattach stronger, and eventually swallow their weapons too. Ivy has tendrils coming up from the floor, wrapping around her feet and sliding upward. She is just standing there, not fighting at all, staring straight at Cali and crying. As the tendrils continue wrapping around Cali and Ivy, the last thing Cali sees is Koili strolling through from some corridor somehow. No tendrils touch him and in fact he seems to control them. With a large devilish grin, he gets behind Ivy, who is still just staring at Cali and crying, and he grabs two tendrils from the ground and wraps them directly around Ivy's throat. Cali's eyes are covered by the tendrils as they are fully absorbed into the wall. They can hear the horrible gurgling of Ivy dying, and then when it stops, they wake up.]
 
Quell pulls out the necklace her Lady said was "from Quell's blood". She shows it to Branna, and tells her it was on a pouch carried by one of the people on Brianna's ship. Branna says "I'm so sorry, holy woman". Branna says she'll draw us a map for her old ship so we can try and find it and get around on it. She asks that we don't harm her crew, and Quell asks which were her crew and which were with Vren. She says the woman who came back hurt, and a man. The woman has green hair, and the man has a long braid down his back. They both have black cloaks. Quell asks if there's anything she wants us to bring back of hers? She asks for a bracelet her brother made for her out of seaglass. Quell says of course and reassures her it's not silly. Branna makes a comment about how fancy this hotel is and then excuses herself to make the map. Quell apologizes to Setluk for speaking so much Naghi beside him and he and Wulf both come back to consciousness, having not understood any of it.
 
Quell asks Wulf if he wants to go back on the ship with her, and he says he doesn't think they'll let him... But Quell says she means sneaking. "I am very sneaky" he says. Quell wonders if Cali and Jade will come too.
 
After awhile Cali stumbles down the stairs, hair a mess and half dry and not put up at all. They go and get some chowder and silently sit down with Quell and Wulf and dig into the food. Jade has been testing out her new never-ending ink pen and writing constant notes. Quell mentions the ship to Cali who agrees to go, and after a bit, Quell goes upstairs to collect the map from Branna then goes to see Jade. Jade is also going to go, and didn't realize it was so late. She asks what we're going to go to the ship for, and Quell explains that the people working for Vren might have given them something in exchange for Branna and Quell wants to know what that is. Jade agrees and then goes downstairs to eat something since she's forgotten to do so.
 
Fast forwarding to midnight:
 
We head out of the inn and toward the harbor. Cali casts pass without trace and Jade casts detect magic, just to have it. Cali asks Wulf how he got in last time and he says "very carefully". There's a man pacing the harbor with a lantern, clearly a guard. Jade finds a way around him thankfully and we get down to the harbor and start making our way to The Silent Sky.
 
We stealthily make our way through the water and to the ship. Cali hears what might be a footstep, so Quell sends up rabbit and sees someone pacing who matches the description of one of Branna's crew. Quell relays this to us and we press against the ship to hide as he comes to look near where we are. We swim to the other side and Jade gets stuck fighting against the undercurrent, so Cali swims over to help her along with us. On the other side is an open porthole, through which we can hear voices. Jade recognizes it as Naghi but she can't speak it, so she tells Cali to listen. They can't make out much though, they got water in their ears while helping Jade. Eventually we climb up the side of the ship and peek over the deck to see the guy still pacing. As he's about to turn around and see us, Quell uses thaumaturgy to make it sound like there are rats getting into something. He grumbles NOT AGAIN and calls for a crewmate.
 
Cali uses their ring of X-ray vision and is able to see where everyone is below deck, and then direct everyone to the hold. We quietly rush in and hide amongst the crates while trying to figure out the next course of action. Cali had also seen a little crate they couldn't see through (meaning it's lined with lead) inside of another bigger crate beforehand, so they go to where they saw it and then ask Quell about it. Quell asks Jade if she's picking up any magic on it and she's not. We debate getting it out but decide it's too risky for now considering how many crew members are just in the other room.
 
We also realize that we're right beside the room with the bunks, which is where we need to go to retrieve Branna's bracelet, but that also happens to be where everyone is. We brainstorm many ways to get everyone out, including but not limited to:
-Jade using magic to make a foul odor while Cali casts fog cloud on the room so it looks like poisonous gas and Jade will also color it green to make it look toxic,
-Quell using a pollen bomb to make everyone sneeze and come running out,
-Jade casting something on one crewmate who is playing poker or something and losing, to make him forget everyone around him is not an enemy so he loses his shit and starts a brawl,
-Quell going invisible with her potion of invisibility and trying to go in there and get it,
 
We have yet to land on a solid plan but are having a great time with our Looney Tunes shenanigans.
 
EOS