Chapter 2: Into the sea

After receiving his orders, Conrad blows in a whistle and shouts: "All hands on deck! All eyes on the sea!" He walks around the ship pulling and pushing those who stand in his way and not do what they are supposed to do, shouting curses and threats.
On the lower decks, he pulls a few men out of their hammocks as they haven't gotten out of them yet, "You lousy bastards, get to work, we are on a high alert! There will be punishments for insubordination! Act like a Royal Navy you are supposed to be!"

Josephine walks out of her cabin, escorted by Meyer as per Conrad's orders. She immediately feels the tension that has been building up on deck. Meyer’s presence is comforting, giving her a sense of security, she may not have otherwise, tough possibly burdensome if she wants to walk around the ship freely. They wander to the stern castle, where they find the scribes and helmsmen discussing their route. Despite being ignored by the two masters, Josephine offers an apprentice helmsman to help and, together, they re-interpret the charts, the directions and speeds, finding a number of mistakes. They present this to the master scribe, who, unhappily takes her notes into consideration, asking Jacome Tavares to grab the celestial records from the lower deck.

Understanding she wouldn’t be able to help much more, as she is unwelcome at the moment, Josephine decides to leave, crossing Harold in the stairs. The doctor confused by the situation, asks if the men lost the compass and, while the two masters wait Tavares to bring the recordsm he as a look at the charts himself. Educated in the natural sciences and mathematics, Harold starts to scribble some notes, doing some calculations, taking the navigation notes, angles and speed, Josephine’s corrections and overlapping them with the old maps. He points to a precise region of the sea, between two land masses.

In the meantime, Josephine reaches the deck to find Ceebee furious for the lack of help from the other sailors. The sailor storms across the deck to forcefully grab "Belly" attention away from the Lady. As the fat sailor wander off to find some work, humiliated, Josephine approaches Ceebee, thanking him for his support. The sailor rudely (by her standards) makes nothing of it, assuring Josephine that he understands she is not a witch. However, it may not be through sorcery, but he know she will bring trouble to the ship, sooner or later.

Conrad, on the other hand, takes the orders directly from Captain DuVaile and goes down to the lower deck, making sure all hands are on board by warning the laziest of the sailors.

As the fog thickens, all sails go down quickly, bringing the ship to a very slow motion, rocking with the waves. The master helmsman shouts to the captain "We have diverged from course!". The first mate orders all sailors to light the lanterns and fill the lookout posts as he climbs the ladder to meet Lopez Sanchez. After awhile, Francisco Veryard shouts to the apprentice helmsmen "Find land, we must find this landmark right now!" If the situation was not confusing enough, with the poor visibility and the fleet location not matching the expected, a new danger emerges from the mist. "Incoming ship!" shouts the soldier Conrad sent to the crow's nest...

CeeBee runs for the rudder wheel of the ship in an attempt to avoid a collision, but as he makes his way across the ship's deck, his boots get tangled in a jumble of rope and he lands flat on his face. These ropes... he thinks. Belly was responsible for getting this slack rolled up and off the deck.

CeeBee returns to his feet, but he knows it's likely too late. The ships are going to collide.

After her admittedly less than satisfying conversation with CeeBee, Josephine decides to head back to her quarters. On the way there, she runs into the captain, accompanied by her dear husband Martin. They seem to be in a hurry and under stress. When Josephine approaches them, the captain wants to send her away but Martin asks him to reconsider. He knows she is smart and suggests that she could help them. The captain begrudgingly agrees and Martin leads Josephine into the records room while the captain stays outside and coordinates the sailors' efforts. Apparently, Martin is looking for certain inventory documents so he can hand out needed supplies to the sailors. Josephine joins him in his search and quickly gets an overview of how the room is laid out. After only two minutes of searching, she hands him the documents he asked for.
Then, she returns to her quarters, trying not to draw more attention. Mayers accompanies her to the door but stays outside.
As she closes the doors to her quarters behind her, Josephine smiles to herself. Being asked for help with the records was a stroke of luck. Not only has she been able to get a good look inside the records room to familiarize herself with the way it is organized, she also has been seen entering it on official business. That might make people less likely to question her if they see her enter again in the future.

As soon as Conrad hears the warning about the incoming ship, he shouts: "Beat the drums!" and proceeds to blow in the whistle, signaling the emergency. Series of same whistle sounds are now heard throught the ship and the drummers start beating the drums producing powerfull and loud beat.

With the their position re-estimated and the ship left to rock gently from the waves, the crew focused on setting up the lookout, scouting and warning lights to help the fleet navigate the thick fog. However, another ship is spotted coming their way and the crew doubles their efforts to avoid the possible crash. The guard is quick to react, raising the alarm with drums and whistles, lighting all the lanterns to illuminate the ship's limits and helping the hectic sailors as they tried to stay away from the path of the incoming ship. In the chaos of running on the wet deck, it was to be expected that some sailor would get hurt and the medical staff stood ready to attend to the wounded.

All in all, their efforts were successful, the other ship coming to a halt before the crash became an irreversible reality.

The sense of tranquility and accomplishment slowly set into the minds of the tired men, but the fog still hanged over the fleet, slowly being blown by the soft sea breeze. The fleet starts to slowly move through the thinning mist, the sounds of the waves slowly crushing into the side of the ships, releasing the salty aroma that mixed with the crew's sweat. They had to follow the others now, trying not to get lost.

Josephine reaches her quarters and, instead of entering right away, turns to Mayers. "Thank you so much for your assistance", she says with a smile. "But I will retreat to my quarters for now. Maybe you can help the others. This seems to be a tense situation."
Mayers considers her suggestion for a moment, then nods. "As long as you stay in your cabin, you should not be in any danger," he agrees. He waits for her to enter her cabin and close the door and then turns to leave to report in to guard captain Verne and ask if he can help with anything.
The moment he is gone, Josephine exits her quarters once again. She doesn't necessarily want him to see everything she is up to.

The first thing she does, is to find the group of sailors from before, with CeeBee Uriah. The way he acted doesn't sit right with her and she might want to look into him some more.
Before she finds him, however, another man catches her attention, old and with a crook in his neck. He is watching her but his expression does not match how most sailors look at her, no lust, no hate, no disgust, just... knowing.
She walks up to him and greets him with her warmest smile. "I'm sorry to bother you, good man, you must be very busy. But maybe you can help me. It seems all the sailors are working especially hard currently and everyone appears very tense. Are we in any trouble at the moment?"

The old sailor looks up to Josephine, as if hadn't noticed her yet "Just a break from the job me lady, the old man replies with an old tired face, bowing excessively. "The trouble is be past us. She just needs to keep pace with the fleet, but that ain't no easy feat in this bloody fog if yer ask me" he explains, pointing down to the ship.

CeeBee commences his sailoring duties. Things start running more smoothly and he finds himself so focused on the task at hand he forgets about his fellow sailors.

As the crisis is passed, Conrad starts checking on his men and if they are at their posts, making sure that the security is set up properly. Considering that he had to personally get people to work, he wants to make sure that sailors are being watched in case they decide to slack off.

As the fog clean up and the sailors have some time to take a breath, Josephine decides to sneak around and check one of the sailors that was looked at her, not out of lust or fear, but... understanding... The quick conversation left her with the uncomfortable feeling even though she apparently made an important friend within the crew.

Ceebee is quick to stand up and get back to work. He knew perfectly well that they could not loose sight of the other and the fleet had to re-organise after this unwelcomed mist. Harold walked around the deck, bonding and teaching his apprentice boy Javier as he noticed Ceebee's leg. Meanwhile, Conrad is busy setting up the security onboard, hoping something like this does not happen again

The helmsman is with the captain discussing their route and talking about the fleet's objective. Adding to the strangeness of the situation, Conrad Verne and his men seem to be preparing for something.