Chapter 1 - Leaving Dunova

"I'll head out to gather some firewood, then keep watch when I return. How long do you think until it gets dark?" He ask, trying to fins the sun through the trees.

"I'll come with you," Ail tells Pierre. "I am Strong Ail and have the strength to carry a lot of firewood. Besides, no one should go alone until we have discovered what happened."

The instructions that Huxley and Jezlyn were given for going back into the ship were to find the chart room and recover the maps. Preferably, the more detailed map of the forest routes if it’s intact or otherwise anything the pair could get their hands on.

The theory behind the action came as the easy part, and getting into the airship appeared to be the hard part. The ship had fallen with a tilt to the side, meaning the pair would either need to climb up to the door or climb the bottom and slide down. Either way, it’d be harder than they’d thought.

Inside, things were still touch and go. The walls and floor didn’t seem to be entirely stable, and from the heat inside a fire still burned somewhere even if most had been smothered by the impact.

"It might help if we make this quick. We don’t want to get trapped here, right?" Huxley chuckles nervously.

---

Pinion and Ail head into the woods after agreeing with Leon on the job. They notice pretty quickly that, despite the size of the ship, they lose sight of it quickly enough due to the thickness and height of the trees. They can still hear the crew though, luckily.

The chief engineer had sent one of his team, a man by the name of Baffles, with them in case they found anything to repair the ship. Between Pinion and him, they’d be able to identify anything. Not that anyone expected to find anything around.

Nothing about Baffles suggested they were anything but normal, although they weren’t the loudest person around. They were pleasant, and a little shy, and utterly unremarkable. Even still, after a short distance, he turned back to the pair with a question.

"How far out do we want to search?"

"Not too far. I don't want to lose our way. I'd also like to be back to the ship in case we have hostile visitors. Not that I know what I'd do if we did. Barter? plead for mercy? . . . ."

"Well, I have my hammer," Ail shrugs. "So anyone would do better to stay away from us."

Before long Pinion, Ail and Baffles find suitable tree branches. It is surprising how hard they find finding suitable wood in the forest regards to firewood, but they find some close enough to the airship. After gathering a suitable amount to make a large fire, or several smaller ones if needed, they're ready to head back to camp. Something distracts them, however.

They run across some footprints. Though none of them are trackers, they can clearly see the boot prints in the mud and fallen leaves. They look like human footprints, but any further information would need more evaluation. Whoever made them, they're fresh and heading toward the crater.

"That's not... uh... who made these?" Baffles asks, hands on hips.

---

Inside the airship, Jezlyn advises speed. The two pick their way through the corridors which now more resemble tunnels, and they do so with impressive speed. They've barely navigated their way down a flight of stairs when Huxley calls out to Jezlyn and points at a door. "The chart room is just through there."

They clamber up the slanted tunnel, avoiding a small amount of a cave in, and Huxley pushes the door open. They climb in and settle. Or settle as best the can among the upturned tables and scattered papers. Thankfully, most stuff was secured in locked filing cabinets and secured locations and have stayed put. Smiling at the luck, Huxley makes her way to one of the cabinets and begins picking through.

Not long after she's opened the door though, the pair hears the groan of metal. They share a wary glance, but nothing further happens.

Ail scouts towards the crater. "Someone who don't have our best interest in heart I's wager," Ail says with a sigh. "We should hurry back to camp."

Jezlyn looks around at the sound of groaning. "Well let's hope our luck lasts long enough to get back out! Here, let me carry some of those. Then we can get out on the double." Jezlyn grabs some of the charts and makes her way out before she gets trapped.

"Just a moment." Pinion says as looks over the footprints before catching up with Ail and Baffles, hoping to get some sense of who they'd be dealing with, or how many.

Away from the ship, Pinion delays the group long enough to get a gook look at the tracks. He can tell there are at least three people who must've made them, and though he's not an experienced tracker he can tell they were pretty heavy by how deep the prints are. They're probably wearing armour, or something similar. He's about to say as much, when the sounds of an explosion splits the tranquillity.

The explosion also grabs the attention of Huxley and Jezlyn who have just emerged from the ship. The shockwave is close enough to them that it upsets the precarious balance, and they're both forced to jump from the ship as part of the tunnel collapses behind them. They land in a heap in the dust. Neither stay on their arses for long though.

Everyone converges on the source, and one lone woman is already there.

Velisse stands in the fading dust of the explosion, facing off against two autonomous knights. They don't look like they'll give her too much trouble, but if the blast is anything to go by it means there are definitely more on the way. She'll need backup before too long.

Strong Ail drops all the firewood he has gathered, and draws his hammer before they even hit the ground. "Stay back!" he tells Baffles before running towards danger.

"Oh, this can't be good." Pinion says, readying himself for what's to come.

Velisse whirled around when she heard the entrance of the others, on guard to see if she was being flanked by even more enemies than the two armoured soldiers she discovered ahead of her. The explosion and the billowing dust had obscured her sight, making it hard for her to make out who exactly had entered the room.

For if anyone had had a chance to lay eyes on her, they would've noted a tall warrior woman with a knightly bearing, clad in an antique armour not recently seen. It was tempered black with purple embellishments, worn in all the usual spots. She wore no tabard to indicate her allegiance nor where she hailed from. Grasped in both hands was an equally old sword, nearly as long as she was tall, as broad as the hair that fanned out behind her that was fluttered in the blast for she wore no protective helmet.

Velisse had been in pursuit of some clue as to the fall of the Kirin empire, and it was said that the ancient ruins of Megido might bear some solution that could revive the fallen glory of the Kirin.

Jezlyn massages her rear. "Twice in one day!" she grumbles. Then she hears the explosion. "Huxley, go to the crew and let them know to find somewhere to hide. I think something bad is about to go down." Then she races, well limps quickly, in the direction of the explosion.

As Velisse had expected, there weren't only two of the automated soldiers. A total of four had followed her into the room, and were encroaching on her position. They had their halberds at the ready, but luckily for her and the new arrivals they were moving slowly suggesting something interfered with their systems.

The two earlier ones engage Ail and Velisse, while the other two take their time arriving.

"I doubt they are part of the welcome parade," Jez quips. She squints her eyes and analyzes the mechanical foes.