Basha Back

Late at night, Larkin was suddenly accosted -- attacked by Bretta Khash and some of the Basha's thugs. She was roughed up and informed that she shouldn't have betrayed her father, and should have taken care of Hansel Granger while she had the opportunity.

She was told she was no longer family, and she needed to get out of Skyport before the end of the night, or it would end badly for her.

Infuriated and confused, Larkin left for Glimmerton to get help from the Runners, and found out that Hansel wasn't there -- he had, in fact, gone into Skyport for the day. Goro tracked down Mishka and inspected the Lover's Locket, which was shiny, but also discovered that Hansel had forgotten to wear his scrying earring. Mishka joined the Runners in tracking down his ex-crewmate and husband.

The gang Sent to Amari at the Sanctuary of Eldath, and she regretfully informed them that she couldn't find Kheman, and that earlier in the day a pirate ship had docked in the port, which scared quite a few people. They confirmed that this was the Siren -- Dread Jones's ship. Apparently, it had sailed in the direction of Skyport.

So the Runners first went to the Basha warehouse, where no amount of trickery and lockpicking could get them past the doorman, Shrewd; then Goro used a locating spell on both Hansel's locket and the Salt Penny Larkin had given her father, and found them both in the port.

In the belly of the Siren.

Using an Eyering, Larkin scouted the ship out. Jones wasn't aboard; the tiefling crew was mostly in the city, it seemed, but she saw Kheman unconscious in the hold, and on the way there, creeping through the ship, she saw Hansel, Jonn, and Luci heading for the brig, seemingly intending to rescue him. The gang dithered for a while over what to do, but finally Goro got impatient and just charged ahead.

They fought their way down through the decks, reaching the hold just after Hansel and the Sterlings -- taking some painful hits from the crew and burning most of their magic. Luci healed them, Hansel was horrified by their sudden appearance on his secret mission, and Jonn thought this was all Just Great and gave Roddy a cheery wave.

One more tough battle -- in which Mishka was very annoyed by his inability to set things on fire, because black powder for the ship's cannons was stored down in the hold -- and the Runners freed Larkin's father. Luci examined him and assured Larkin that he was all right, and had merely been drugged. He would wake up and be all right in a couple hours.

Rescue mission successful, the gang headed back up through the ship, where they walked directly into Dread Jones.

She had half a dozen of her crew with her, and Jones herself was a fearsome opponent, and the Runners were exhausted already. They decided that their best course of action was to simply escape with their lives. Mishka and Roddy teleported down to the hold to recover Larkin and Kheman, while the others bolted on foot -- but Jones headed them off. She polymorphed one of her crew into a giant octopus that blocked the gangplank and attacked Raef, and the others converged on Goro, Hansel, and the Sterlings. Goro took a few hits but managed to get off the ship, leaping to the docks for safety, and Luci followed him.

Meanwhile, Jones's crew directed cannon fire off the port side of the ship, where Mishka and Larkin waited for their friends. Raef escaped the octopus and joined them, and all three managed to avoid to worst of the cannon barrage.

Mishka decided he'd had enough of this shit. He used up the last of his magic to teleport back to the hold, light up the black powder, and crack back out just as Hansel and Jonn got off the ship, and Luci was struck by cannon shrapnel and knocked unconscious. Goro saved her and the group joined back up -- sans Roddy, who had cracked Kheman as far away as possible -- and ran for it, as behind them, the Siren boomed and went up in flames, sinking into the harbor.

Dread Jones, however, survived.

The rest of the gang met Roddy at the Basha warehouse, where his knocking had been ignored and he'd resorted to picking the lock. When he got them in, Larkin led the way into a warehouse that was ... strangely empty. Then they began to come across signs of a struggle -- scorch marks, blood spatter. Then, bodies. Larkin and Goro rushed to Renar's office, where they found an injured, traumatized Bretta Khash burning the evidence of the Basha's criminal enterprises. She stared at Larkin vacantly.

She told them that Amren had been helped to escape the cellar by a strange pale woman with blond hair, and the two of them had systematically decimated the Basha's guard. She and Renar were fighting off Amren -- losing -- when a man with a scarred face and lightning magic came in and distracted Amren, allowing them time to get away. Renar had suffered devastating losses; he was leaving the city, either to attempt to regroup with his allies in Moorland, or just go home to Calisham.

Goro and Roddy went to Stoic Hall, where they met with Red Wyn. She was mildly concerned about the state they were in, and Goro told her that they'd had to fight Dread Jones, but that wasn't the point. She frowned and mulled it over as he told her about what had become of the warehouse, and said she didn't know anything about it -- that this must have been Blue's work, and she'd been left out of the loop.

She didn't even seem pleased when Goro pointed out that she'd successfully put the Basha out of business, as she'd promised, and merely told him she'd back back to him once she'd talked to Blue, and they were ready to take down Lively Fred.

Larkin sat outside the smoking, bloody Basha warehouse. She had saved her father. She had lost everything else.