Beachside Story, Chapter I: You savvy, mate?

[Inbred Chocobo]

For those that dare gazed upon the sky upon the beach, with the glaring day star burning the retinas of those who would even consider such an act, they would find their vision greeted by an unexpected sight. It appears a falling star hung in the sky. A bit odd considering its the middle of the day (or whatever time people decide it is). Somewhere in Russia a man driving his car has to put down is visor so he can see.

Soon however as it grew bigger, people realized that while it may not be a star, it certainly was a falling object, and heading straight for the beach. Some people looked up in awe, a few people may or may not have panicked. Some people said prayers, others took pictures. As the object approached, the light emitting from entry into the atmosphere gave off enough light to overtake the sun for just a brief moment, so those that even tried to ignore it were forced to give it some mind.

And then just a breath of a moment later, the foreign object crashed into the sand. The object in question was this massive... junk pile? Seriously, it looked like someone took a tree, duct taped roughly eight thousand pieces of shitty metal to it, and made it into a pear shape. There is no way this thing should've survived falling twenty feet, let alone burning through the atmosphere.

These inquries didn't last long, as soon a foot kicked off half the... thing... from the inside, revealing itself. A massive brute of a beast, the green skinned visitor inside looked like he made professional athlete steroid use a joke. A full nine feet tall, with clothing of the obvious cheap and a bit too small for him, it probably threw a few people off when he shouted.

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAG HHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

The brute charged forward, pulling out a crude weapon of dubious quality, firing the thing. It was loud too, each shot sounding like someone hitting a hollow anvil with a heavy hammer. Luckily the shots were so horribly off hitting the anything that the only thing threatened was the sand on the beach, someone's drink, and a crab in a tree. As he was firing, he stopped at an umbrella and proceeded to pull out a crappy axe and then chop the thing into pieces.

[Girasol of Chaos]

A nearby crab waved his claw at Riley, whom returned what she read as a friendly gesture. It’s too bad she didn’t have a cookie to offer it, like the faerantula. Perhaps another time.

Bright flames caught the blonde's eye and she followed what looked to be a meteor's path right into the sand on the beach below her. The crash echoed and after a moment, the vehicle ejected what could only be described as a green, probably smelly something. It seemed to decide the best way to announce its presence was with a strange battlecry. Nope, not going down on the beach anytime soon. Safe up here.

Just as the crab had dismissed her, shots rang out, one narrowly missing her own form. The green-skinned was now flailing and attacks an umbrella. Okay, perhaps she WASN'T safe up here.

From her perch, Riley aims Zebrek’s shotgun and fires, meaning to stop the angry beast. She couldn’t allow it to endanger anyone.

Riley is compelled by Risk Management!
(14:22:42) Gary the Chatbot: Girasol_of_Chaos rolls 4d3 and gets 2,3,2,3.
Guns score of 5 + 2 = 7. Epic level attack. Meet or beat score to defend.
Shotgun Weapons rating of 2.

The thunder of the weapon made the corner of Riley’s mouth turn upward, and maybe made her ears ring quite a bit. Note to self: bring the yellow earmuffs next time you fall through portals.

[Overcast]

Alastor rolls Notice: 84+200=284 Impossible level.

Al had caught the flying object out of the corner of his eye the moment it appeared, a cursory scan with his energy sight gave him a pretty good personal image of it due to the heat of rentry. In a certain way to Al it looked like the old relics of Solomon, but without any of the rudimentary effectiveness. Only the fact it seemed more advanced than what he was used to, but honestly it seemed crudely cobbled together even by his uninitiated eyes. Stranger still the craft seemed to be resisting the heat intensities gathering around it despite that seeming well beyond the means of it.

When it crashed it honestly should have exploded. And in a way it did, only without the fire and shards of metal, but in a strange green oni wielding a crudely machined, but unusually efficient aquebus that was noisy as a thunderstorm, firing wildly into the nothing as it screamed out something similar to the word War. But not quite.

It had obviously not invested much in using the aquebus though, it hit damn near anything but what he aimed at, which was honestly a problem in and of itself, but when he began to assault the umbrella with his just as crudely made axe Al was forced to intervene, lest he see his benefactor's property damaged more.

Al activates ENERGY DISCHARGE
Roll for psychic power: 94! OPEN roll again 13+94+135base=242 Almost Impossible level+1level= Impossible level. 140 damage
Roll for psychic projection: 96! OPEN roll again 64+96+205base=365 Inhuman level. Roll defense against projection to avoid or block.



Al's power surged from him as his whole body began to spark and arc with purple electricity, the energy striking the ground nearby in the form of strange electric cackling that simultaneously exploded from his mouth, they coalesced up to his forhead and covered the whole of his face before he unleshed a torrid scream, "WITNESS MY POWER!" And a lightning strike, gleaming purple, with Al's own ugly face screaming at the end of it erupted from his form with nearly perfect aim at the poor monster.

[Dracorion]

> Zebrek: Retrieve arms from space.

You can't! Miss Riley just escaped with your shotgun. How rude.

Gah, where'd she go? You need your shotgun!

> Ignore the guy telling you not to kill stuff.

Done! You're too busy looking around for miss Riley.

Besides, what kind of a crazy world doesn't let you kill critters?

> Counter: Appear.

You promptly appear in the upper left corner of the screen, despite the fact that there's no screen in this game.

00:51

> Zebrek: Wish upon a star.

Of course! When you make a wish on a falling star it always comes true, no matter who you are!

It's the middle of the day though where are you going to find a falling star?

00:34

> Look up.

Oh there's one!

Show wishlog

Zebrek: oh please please please please please please pleaaaseeee mister star help me find my
shotgun and ill uh give you cotton candy and stuff ill need to make a rocket first but ill 
do it promise double promise

00:09

> Zebrek: Enter.

What? Now that's crazy why would you need to enter anything what does that even mea-

> Zebrek: Randomly explode.

The falling star promptly crashes down next to you, throwing your tiny troll body into the air amidst a wave of sand and making you crash down several feet away.

> ========>

Sore and somewhat cut but otherwise not too badly hurt, you look up and see that something has emerged from the falling star, and some guy and miss Riley are now killing it.

Hey, it's your shotgun! Hooray! You thank the fallen star and remember to give it tons of cotton candy later.

[Inbred Chocobo]

Bullets came raining down from everywhere, knocking out a tree, some poor whale in the ocean, and a few even struck the fourth wall. RAAAUUGGH! didn't care, that umbrella was dangerous and he was surprised it was unguarded.

Then he felt someone sneeze on him, and turned to look to see who had shot him. Instead of seeing who held what, a face full of purple lightning decided it was a good time to see how his oral hygiene was going and he got a mouthful, along with an eyeful and a facefull. RAAAUUGGH! was completely taken by surprise by the attack, and was briefly stunned by this attack. And by briefly stunned, I meant he fell over on his back, dazed and staring at the sun.

A calm laid over on the beach, as wind picked up and the beat just laid there, doing absolutely nothing.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Gleek was succeeding at being a helpful lackey, heading up to the bar in search of Citrus Fruit Punch. There were one or two people queued up and a handy stepladder at the front for the vertically challenged. The man taking orders looked at the kobold with suspicion

Gleek took his turn in the queue patiently enough. No need to ruin a good alibi by being hasty. Besides, he doubted he was missing much. When he got to the counter, he hopped up the ladder and addressed the figure tending bar. He hadn't yet bothered to take much notice of their appearance beyond a generally suspicious look on their face, though that could just been on account of them working in retail.

"Hello fellow vacation-type person. Nice scurvy lady on beach needs juice. Big guy said so." He obligingly presented his cover identification form; this was a crumpled, inkjet printed slip of paper with a photograph that, due to the camera angle, cut off all but the top of his head and straw hat as well as biographical information typed in Comic Sans. It still smelled faintly of garbage bag water.

[Intern Nin]

The Bar

For those who care to know.Moments earlier

A round, Hawaiian shirt clad figure sits at the bar. (Well, it’s more of a slumped position than actual sitting.) The figure has dark green skin, a beaked face, and sounds like it’s choking to death on a squealing piglet. The man manning the bar at the moment readjusts his earplugs and continues wiping his lucky fighting glass. He knows better by now than to try and wake up this particular customer. The noise was bothering the other two patrons, true, but the last time he tried to make this shelled jerk-wad skedaddle, he ended up… talking to him.

Never again.

He can stay asleep as long as he needs, the barman thought; some things just aren’t worth it. The green man suddenly jerked himself upright and started screaming.

“AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!! DON’T HIT ME, SENSEI!!!!!!!! I’LL KILL THE CANARY JUST PLEASE STOP HURTING ME!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaahhh.”

The green barfly stopped screaming and looked around bewilderedly before letting out a sigh of relief. “Heh, it was just a nightmare. I’m still stuck here on this lousy vacation. This awful, unwanted vacation. Hm. And would you look at the time! I’d better get some breakfast. Taberneiro!”

The barman plucked his earplugs out and gave the green man a look he kept reserved for unwanted reptilians. The green tourist ignored the look and slapped some dollar bills down on the counter.

“A sampler platter of whatever is in those pickle jars over there and a bottle of your strongest Irish and/or Scotch whiskey, please! And do be quick about it, my good sir. I have places to go today.”

Barman swiftly pulled picked a bottle off of the rack and set it in front of the weirdo. Greenie took a closer look at the bottle as the barman plucked strange objects out of the jars with lightning speed.

“Well, well, ‘Feckin’ Pan-Scotia Whiskey’. You gotta love alternate timelines. Ooh, nibblies.” As the green man plucked odd morsel set in front of him, his bottle of booze grew a set of legs out from under it and started tip-toeing away at flash step speed. Keen martial art senses alerted the green man and he flash-yoinked the bottle away, revealing a small blue-skinned, red-haired man in an orange and green tartan, hunched over in a carrying position.

“Heh, that’s funny. I usually don’t see smurfs until the bottle’s empty. And after taking some other shit.”

And the small man did a little overly dramatic surprised jump. “Criv- Ah mean… Hello there. How are ye on this fine afternoon’? Oh my, would you look at happened! Here Ah am oot fer a walk ‘round th’ bar counter n’ suddenly I finds a whole bottle o’ whiskey is placed on me back. Strange, inanit? Is that there bottle yers, Mista Turtar?”

The green man leaned down so that his face was almost touching the little man’s. “Yes. Yes it is.”

“Oh, well then… ours now!” A tiny foot connected dead center on the green man’s beak and he flew about twelve feet backwards into a bunch of stacked chairs. The bottle, which the green man lost his grip on the instant his face became an innie, spun around mid-air before falling right back into the hands of the little man.

“Have fun breathin through a banjaxed snoot, ya ugly son of a frog n’ a powdery-puff case! Bald Collin, Normal-Sized-Pawd, nab th’ plate! We’s amscray!”

A two pairs of tiny legs lifted the plate of assorted food-like items off of the counter and then scampered off with the whiskey bottle right behind it. The turtle man picked himself up, wiped the blood leaking from his nostrils off his mouth, and stumbled off after the breakfast thieves.

“Come bag here! I ain’t finished wid chu!”

“Nac Mac Cathail!”

“Holler at th’ lads!”

“There can only be two hun’red tousand!”

The little men continued to shout out nonsensical phrases as they zipped out the door and slammed it shut behind them. The turtle man wobbled over to the handle and paused a moment to seethe.

“Damn lil Dingerbell-sized $#!%s! I’m gonna use dem as Q-dips once I get my hands-“

Paying no heed to the turtle man about to open the door to chase after some rowdy pixies, Kug kicked the door open with force of speeding Buick. The turtle hung onto the door and smashed straight through the wall, so technically he did make it out the front like he intended.

“Ow.”

With the prone form of Senna the demon ninja lady still clutched to his chest, Kug and along the rest of Telm’s party walked inside. Kug looked around the bar and gave an approving nod.

“Yes, fairly clean with no Rivots nor centipede-men in sight. Yappy dog-alligator-man has done well in leading Kug here.” Kug said to Gleek as he set Senna down on a bench.

While Jimmy, Telm, and Al talked about arrangements for some sort of festival, Kug stepped around the counter and started inspecting bottles for juice content. The tore himself away from his conversation with Gleek to try to stop Kug but the Pizza Barbarian gave him a pretty effective look. Best to just let the man that’s a full head taller than you help himself to whatever he wants, the barman thought.

As the others rushed outside to deal with the screaming orc threat, Kug stared in pure befuddlement at the small chrome box under the counter, trying as hard as he could to remember what it was called. He knew what it was called. He really did. It was on the tip of his tongue. He used to get Sunny D and Purple Stuff from it all the time.

“Eh, Kug will remember the name later.”

He opened the door and found a carton of Orange Pineapple Banana juice. Just what the doc-er, barbarian ordered. However, the afflicted koo-no-itchy had yet to make a successful revival role. There was only one way to get an unconscious and sickly person to drink. Kug walked over to the bench Senna was on and took a big swig of the juice. He opened her mouth slightly, leaned down to bring his lips close to hers, and-

*SPFFFFFFT*

-released a big vitamin C spray all over face. Most of it got in her mouth.

+++++++++++++++++

Somewhere in the higher plains of existence, in a place where the fates of all beings of great importance are left to chance, two people stand amongst the clouds. One of them looks very much like Kug, only slightly transparent and shimmery. The other is a harsh-looking old man with one eye.

“Well,” says the old man, “time to see if that worked. Keep in mind then, that that type of action has a severe penalty against it.”

“…” The Kug apparition didn’t seem in a talkative mood.

“So high in fact, I don’t think it would work even if you were to roll a natural 20.”

“…”

“Let’s not keep ourselves in suspense. Please, roll the die.”

The mysterious specter of Kug held up a steely twenty-sided die and tossed it into the air. He then unsheathed his ghost peel and swiped with impossible speed. The die came down and landed with the 1 side up. And with the 20 side up as well.

“That has to be cheating.”

“Kug rolled a twenty-one. Kug successfully revives Muffler-lady. Man-from-mountain doesn’t like it? Man-from-mountain can kiss avatar Kug’s ass.”

“Whatever.”

+++++++++++++++++

“Oh, it’s called a fridge!”

[PyrosNine]

SENNA HAS RECOVERED FROM: "scurvy" !! Con has returned to positive integers!

The dried cracked skin and bloody gums benefited greatly from the juice shower, though as Senna opened her bloodshot eyes, the citric acid felt about as well as you'd think it would.

???MY EYES?????????????????????????????????????! MY EYES! Kappa ga watashi no me o t?shite watashi no k?mon o sutte ita ka no y? ni akai menoitamidesu! she yelled in Tian, also known as Fantasy Japanese.

She blindly flailed around, reaching for something, and having found a bar and not some tangible salve to eye pain, proceeded to punch her hand through it as if punishing it for not making the eye pain go away, which she followed by doing a few backflaps about the area, swinging her hands and fists in deadly arcs. For the next few moments, the room was deathtrap, but a deathtrap with liquor.

However, con damage or not, the passing of scurvy allowed her demonic heritage to take root, and soon her crippled demonic healing began to reactivate, clearing the haze of red from her eyes and mending the deep skin cracks around her eyes and face like a Paragon Shepard in ME2.

The first thing Senna Ryu noticed, was that she had half a surfboard stuck on her arm after her flailing, and that she was no longer on a beach. The surfboard made sense, as it was proper to be on a beach, but the area she was in was not a beach. It was some sort of sake house, tavern, or "pub" as the Magnimarians called it, but open air.

There was the scent of the sea breeze in the air still, wafting through newly made holes in the walls. Perhaps she was not so far from the beach after all. Perhaps she had been brought here from the beach and resuscitated via some strange bleeding eye drug.

Perhaps...but perhaps they had meant to kill her and take her-no, even confused, deep in Senna's soul she knew she wasn't worth much right now. No gold, no infamy, no mystery. Just a washed up ninja on foreign shores. She could only just be happy to be alive, and perhaps show some grattitude to her savio- was that a Kobold?

Her instinctive adventurer instincts immediately honed in on the RPG underling, just as a wolf immediately senses the sheep, as the lion senses the antelope. There were just certain interactions between creatures, good or bad, that were innate. Adventurers were no different from any predator, and Kobolds, Goblins, and WereRats were the common prey. A master at unarmed combat like herself, down in pocket money and exp, was naturally and inevitably drawn to hunt Kobolds.

Senna couldn't guess things like CR rating, or break the fourth wall like certain other folk, but even she wagered that it was at least worth 48 EXP and maybe 5 silver pieces. That would be enough for a spare throwing dagger, or a toothbrush to get the taste of pain out of her mouth, or 12 pounds of coffee for some reason.

Wiping some juice from her chin, and cracking her knuckles, she walked, almost purely in instinct from some lingering Wis damage, towards Gleeok, bumping into Kug as she did so, and walking into him like an npc with poor pathfinding as she found it hard to change direction or maneuver in any manner that didn't involve backflips or ninja kung-fu.

????????????????????????????????????????????"Kansh? shinai, watashi wa, yori takai reberu ni t?tatsu suru dakede wa kono sent? hy?ka ni ch?sen suru hitsuy? ga arimasu." She muttered into Kug's chest.

It was for the best she was unaware of the Ork, as as far as she knew it, Orcs tended to have a higher CR and at least 15 gold on them, which was worth a good meal, a warm bed, and enough coffee to last for two years, give or take heavy coffee consumption.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

Wiping some juice from her chin, and cracking her knuckles, she walked, almost purely in instinct from some lingering Wis damage, towards Gleeok, bumping into Kug as she did so, and walking into him like an npc with poor pathfinding as she found it hard to change direction or maneuver in any manner that didn't involve backflips or ninja kung-fu.

Gleek yelped and retreated behind Kug. Prey animals have instincts as well, and his were telling him Scurvy Lady was more dangerous than she looked. Guess he'd found his first target, but disposing of her would take guile. Based on her incoherent ramblings, negotiating with her was out of the question, but the meatshield between them was fair game.

"What is she, crazy? I not monster, just humble non-suspicious gardener type. You tell her, yes?"

[Steel Shadow]

Originally Posted by Inbred Chocobo

Bullets came raining down from everywhere, knocking out a tree, some poor whale in the ocean, and a few even struck the fourth wall. RAAAUUGGH! didn't care, that umbrella was dangerous and he was surprised it was unguarded.

Then he felt someone sneeze on him, and turned to look to see who had shot him. Instead of seeing who held what, a face full of purple lightning decided it was a good time to see how his oral hygiene was going and he got a mouthful, along with an eyeful and a facefull. RAAAUUGGH! was completely taken by surprise by the attack, and was briefly stunned by this attack. And by briefly stunned, I meant he fell over on his back, dazed and staring at the sun.

A calm laid over on the beach, as wind picked up and the beat just laid there, doing absolutely nothing.

For a moment all was still - an eerie silence descending over the beach. Specifically the part where poor RAAAUUGGH! lay, who cares about the rest.

Then, a shadow began to pass over the sun. It was quick, and yet to the ork's dazed eyes, it seemed to take forever. The shadow moved purposefully, a silhouette of a hooded, cloaked man appearing, standing over RAAAUUGGH! And looking down into his eyes. Behind the man's head, the sunlight shone in a hollow ring, preventing the Ork from making out his features (if he cared, which, let's be honest, he didn't, but forgive a writer for lapsing into prose).

Another moment passed, and then the apparition spoke.

"Dude, you spilled my drink. You're paying for a new one."