[07] north country winters keep a-gettin' me down

[thethundersaid]

Who: Crew of Murderess/Howling Sabers
Where: West of Empieza
When: Month of March. Top post starts beginning of month; mark dates in new threads to maintain some semblance of continuity. :Db
What: Catch-all for March posts -- will include Captain fight at least.
Warnings: Violence as ever
Style: Anything that'll move!
Status: Open to anyone actually on board or nearby

They'd spent a month docked at Empieza, and finally they were on the move. Sasuke wouldn't deny that they had perhaps needed the time -- to get the ship back into shape, for one, and to pick up a medic-nin, even if that hadn't been in the plans. But an entire month of one small island and an even smaller ship had left Sasuke about as stir-crazy as he could get, and the presence of said medic-nin and her entourage only exacerbated it.

He'd told Naruto and Sakura that he hadn't been doing nothing since arrival, but in all honesty, in terms of real progress, he'd accomplished nothing. Nothing of use, nothing of real import, for all that they had a shard on board and no one had been possessed to kill everyone else recently.

So it was that Sasuke was in the rigging in a better mood than he'd been in all month as they sailed away from the island, heading for rendezvous with the crew of the sailboat that had gone to find fairies.

Comments

An efficient man's nightmare (First week in March)

[breakfastmetaphors]

[Things had been dire enough when he'd first signed on, but this past month has been like herding cats. L-Elf has countless plans of action and training regimens designed, but gaining any sort of traction with them has been difficult at best, impossible at worse. He had better luck with a school full of Japanese high school students. At least they respected his abilities.

If Sasuke's place of choice has become the rigging, then you could say that L-Elf's has become the base of the mast, where he's taken to posting what he's written up and then catnapping beneath it.]

[forhylia]

[It's sometime around midday when Link takes a stroll out on the deck. Upon noticing... something posted on the mass. He approaches, raising his eyebrow as he reads through the regimens that have been posted.

By whom? Perhaps this white-haired fellow knew. Or was the poster, even. Is he... sleeping on the deck?]

Did you write these?

[breakfastmetaphors]

[The elder Link. One of the few others on the crew who don't rely on any sort of supernatural or superhuman ability. L-Elf opens his eyes and looks up at him dispassionately.]

I did. If this crew is to be successful, plans like these are necessary. If they continue to be ignored, I'll find another ship to offer my services to.

[forhylia]

[Offer his services to? Link has to bite back a chuckle at that.]

Your services? Are you a professional trainer, then?

[breakfastmetaphors]

I have no title at the moment. On my own world, I'm the military liaison to the prime minister of New JIOR. Prior to that I was an operative of the Dorssian Military Pact Federation. I have acted as a trainer in New JIOR, but I wasn't compensated for it.

[He leaves out the fact that New JIOR consists of Sakimori Academy and its students. That information is irrelevant to the current discussion.]

[yatteyanyo]

-Tojiko, at least, was always willing to listen to a good strategy. She was an adept strategist, herself. The issue with L-Elf was, well... he had too many of them. She looked over the notes during her watch, a section each time she came by him, but after awhile, she had to say something.-

You know, there's a saying that a man with may desires will fulfill none of them... Have you thought about selecting one or two of these strategies and just focusing on those? Right now it seems like your mind is in a thousand different places and pursuing nothing.

[breakfastmetaphors]

[It would definitely look like that and in many ways it is, which is what is truly frustrating. Usually these endless variations would never be seen by anyone else and remain merely as calculations in his head, but with no clear end goal and no cooperation, there's nothing to unify them. He has his own greater goal, but there's no one clear path to it at the moment.]

So it seems. It's become a thought exercise and nothing more.

[yatteyanyo]

Well it wouldn't have to be. Are you sure there's nothing here you particularly favor and would want to work with the rest of us on?

[breakfastmetaphors]

[Tojiko's cooperation is a variable accounted for in several of the scenarios he's currently written out, so he stands and wordlessly takes down several sheets. More remain than he'd like, but the largest potential branch in outcomes lies with the endorsement or lack thereof of lethal tactics, something he's already debated with Sasuke at length to no avail.]

It's not a matter of what I favor, it's a matter of what is necessary.

[He points at a few of the remaining papers on the mast and describes them in turn.]

If the captain authorizes lethal force in engagements with the Navy. [This has several branches.] If Naruto refuses to follow orders and attend to training. [Only one sheet.] If there is continued insistence on using magic instead of conventional naval tactics. [This is the area he's had the most difficulty covering, as his understanding of the concept is rudimentary at best.]

There are too many vectors. A path needs to be chosen.

CAPTAIN BATTLE -- ON BOARD MURDERESS

[thethundersaid]

get healed

[slugly]

The reason why Sasuke invited her onto the ship can finally be put to use in the battle with the captain. She's a healer and a damned good one at that; she's been trained by the best in the business back home. There aren't many injuries she couldn't fix with her "magical powers." As such, she's going to be staying on board the Murderess and making sure everyone remains living and breathing and fighting.

As much as she'd like to destroy the attacking ship with her bare fist.

She's low on materials though, only carrying what she has in her back pouch from the war, which is a couple small rolls of bandages. A lot of her medic duties she fixes with her jutsu, whittling down her chakra. As she works, she tries to get updates from her crew since she's unable to fight herself or even really see it since she's holed up in the safety of the ship.

"What's the enemy's status?"

[voicing in]

[thethundersaid]

[Sasuke is already perched on one of the masts of the Captain's ship when he checks his journal and hears Sakura's voice.]

Easily overwhelmed. We're ... looting now. [That's the correct term, he supposes; there's not really any other way to describe it.]

Are there any medical supplies you want us to look for?

[voicing in]

[slugly]

[With Sasuke and Naruto on the attack, she's not surprised.

She would help loot herself but there's a couple stragglers she needs to tend to.]

Anything you can find. Particularly bandages, I'm low.

But what about you? Are you injured?

[voicing in]

[thethundersaid]

I'll look.

I'm fine -- [Or he starts, but suddenly there's the sound of the scuffle, the journal falling to the floor and distant shouting.]

[yatteyanyo]

Chessmaster's main vessel being besieged by the boarding party didn't stop their remaining ships from trying to pepper at the Murderess, intending to take it down and isolate the enemy onboard their own. And that was where Tojiko came in.

As she'd learned in her excursion to the Fairy Island, cannonballs were unfond of lightning, the sudden and intense superheating of their surfaces causing them to pop like cherries in the sky. Which of course sometimes meant shrapnel, but that was better than a direct it.

KRAKOOOOOM went another volley of shots, Tojiko casting up her bolts in arcing waves. It was difficult work, but so far, so good. Not a single shell had passed.

CAPTAIN BATTLE -- BOARDING PARTY

[thethundersaid]

[forhylia]

[I'll match to brackets if you prefer.]

Link was at the front of the charge onto the so-called Chessmaster's ship. He carried his sword and wore his armor as always, with the small addition of a pistol on his hip. He hated the barbaric thing, but he also had to keep in mind his opponent's advanced weaponry.

The Hylian was light on his feet, but gave no true attempt at stealth. One, two, soldiers fell to his blade in moments. No mercy. This was a raid; kill or be killed.

[forthevillage]

Itachi was not a fan of this attack. While he realized it was their best chance at the time, he'd done enough killing before he'd been brought here. He didn't like the idea of raising those numbers. There wasn't much he could do for their reputation as pirates, so that didn't even really factor into the equation. Whether or not they killed anyone, they would still be seen as the villains.

All the same, his attacks were aimed to incapacitate, not finish anyone off. He remained a pacifist at heart. Perhaps he could afford it with his skills, or perhaps he would just be causing then more trouble later... but he was fairly sure that those he knocked out would remain out for a good while. With all that was going on, he was probably still endangering their lives, but this was the best he could do.

[missvicegirl]

Luka flew into action alongside everyone else - literally this time, as she'd just taken the form of Abare Yellow, whose Dino Guts afforded her wings upon which to glide.

She landed near Link and Sasuke, slashing at several of the Navy soldiers with the blades now on her arms.

"You guys need a hand?" she said, not really waiting for a response as she tore into the enemies.

[forhylia]

"Always!" Link shouted over his head at Luka as she landed by their side.

"We aim to incapacitate, but do not hesitate to strike fatally!" He swept beneath another soldier and knocked him off his balance, tossing him overboard.

"Itachi, we must reach the captain before he can commence a proper counteroffensive."

[breakfastmetaphors]

It felt like it had been far too long since L-Elf had seen proper combat. He couldn't even count the zombies at the fortress, mindless as they were, so it was almost enjoyable to fight actual thinking human enemies again. Sailors on ships such as these were trained for close-quarters combat, though he doubted they saw much of it, relying as they did on superior firepower. It made for opponents that knew what they were doing.

But ones that would panic when they saw someone who knew how to do it better.

He followed after the initial charge, armed only with one of the knives he stole at the fortress and sidearms stolen off fallen foes. Guns of this time period took too much time to reload and he wanted to conserve his own ammunition, so he used whatever shot there was in the pistols he stole and threw the guns aside when they were of no more use. Unlike some of his crewmates, he did not hesitate to kill his opponents, nor did he take any chances that might allow an incapacitated foe to survive an attack.

[thethundersaid]

For all that their opponents were far from the level of even genin ninja, they were at least something other than mindless zombies and flying horses with magical powers. Alicorns. Whatever -- it meant fighting with focus and thought instead of just cleaving a path to the final destination, and Sasuke hadn't expected he'd miss even this level of intelligent combat as much as he had. Or maybe it was just the weight of his own sword in his hands again, for all that it had nearly bankrupted him to finally buy it back.

He hadn't thought their plan would have worked as effectively as expected, either, but the genjutsu covering their approach had held without an issue, and the surprise of stripping it away to reveal their boarding party abruptly on the deck had given them a strong initial advantage over the sailors. At this rate, Sakura would just be bored back on the Murderess.

It didn't take much deduction to tell one trail of bodies apart from another's, and he caught up to L-Elf by administering a stab and a slash at a pair of soldiers attacking on either side, tossing their bodies out of the way.

"Leave the captain alive if you find him," he said, voice pitched to be heard over the ruckus around them. Sasuke's own body count, even when he'd been rampaging toward Danzo, was deliberate rather than thorough: he killed whom he meant to kill. "I want him for information."

[breakfastmetaphors]

"I know." If there was one thing he knew, it was that Sasuke wanted people left alive for information. There was value in interrogation, but the fact that Sasuke wanted them to remain alive after they were no longer of use was endlessly frustrating for someone like L-Elf, who had been raised under the strict philosophy of "Kill, don't be killed." Judging by the general level of fighting ability, Sasuke and his comrades from his world had to have started their combat training at a young age, but it seemed that their instructors were far kinder than those at the Karlstein Institute.

"He'll live." It was both an acknowledgement of the request and a prediction of the future. It went against how he would have liked to see the scenario play out, but Sasuke was extraordinarily stubborn.

CAPTAIN BATTLE -- LOOTING PARTY

[thethundersaid]

[missvicegirl]

Luka was gleefully picking through the ship now that they'd successfully taken it, pocketing as much coin as she could. Some she meant for the crew, some she left for herself.

"I'll give the navy of this place some credit," she said. "They carry some nice swag."