The Welcoming Committee
Parika woke in the dark. Her head was pounding, but she was otherwise unhurt. She took stock of her situation. She was bound hand and foot on a wooden floor. Her sword and bow were gone, but her hidden daggers and lockpicks seemed to still be in place. She tested her bonds and found them tight but poorly tied. Stretching her fingers, she was able to get enough of a grip to undo the knot on her wrists. After that it was trivial to untie her feet.
Freed, Parika turned to the mystery of her location. She could hear the sounds of people breathing, so she wasn't alone in her predicament. The smell of many bodies mingled with the tang of salt air and another odor that was unpleasant and strong but not easily identifiable. From that information Parika deduced that she really wished she could see anything. She thought she could hear someone speaking from below her, but it was too faint for her to make out any words.
Moving slowly and quietly, she rose from the ground and began to feel her way around the room. Picking her way around bodies -- some of which moved out of her way -- she was able to find a wall. Moving around the room, she found what felt like a boarded up window. She tried to pry one of the boards loose, but was rewarded only with a loud creak that made her freeze in her tracks. The voices below stopped and she heard heavy footfalls from below her. A deep and raspy voice shouted from somewhere below, "Quit movin' around up there or I'll hafta come up an' bust some heads!" A few whimpers could be heard from the other prisoners.
The footsteps returned to where they had been. Parika slowly let out her breath and continued to move around the room. Threat or no threat, she wasn't about to sit around and wait for whatever fate her captors had planned for her. When her circuit of the room was nearly complete, her foot found empty air. Gently probing downward, it seemed to be an open hole in the floor. Further experimentation found it to be about two paces wide by four paces. The room itself was perhaps twenty by thirty feet and littered with debris in addition to people. In her exploration, Parika had found one apparently unconscious prisoner shackled to the wall, as well as an empty pair of iron manacles. The only exit from the room seemed to be the hole in the floor.
Desperate as she may have been, Parika wasn't about to jump down a hole in pitch darkness without knowing at least how much it was going to hurt. She took a small piece of plaster that had crumbled from the wall and dropped it down the hole. From the sound, it sounded like the fall was no more than ten feet, probably less. Unfortunately, someone else heard the sound as well.
"Right, that's it! Someone's gonna bleed!" The feet came stomping across the room below again, and the sound of something large and wooden being moved could be heard. Parika rushed across the room and lay down behind another prisoner, pretending to be bound and unconscious. Parika tried to breathe evenly as she heard someone ascending a creaky ladder. The sound stopped and Parika counted her heartbeats.
"Somebody was movin' around up here. Who was it?" growled the voice.
The man Parika was hiding behind cried out, "He's over here! Please don't hurt us!" The half-elf kicked him and rose to a crouch, drawing a dagger. Her captor could obviously see in the dark, which put her at an almost suicidal disadvantage, but she had no choice.
Without warning, the room blazed with light. It was no brighter than a torch, but after the pitch dark it was almost painful. In the sudden light Parika could see a large half-orc shielding his eyes from the light. He was standing at the top of a ladder that had been leaned against the top of the hole where stairs had once been. On the other side of the room she saw a dark-skinned man with a tattooed face wearing the stained clothes of a sailor. He was unarmed but moving his hands in a way that suggested that the light was his doing.
Not about to waste her luck, Parika flung her dagger at the half-orc, but her aim was off. He came up the ladder in her direction, but the blast of red light that streaked from Gambumbo's fingers to slam into the side of his head made him change direction. As the murderous halfbreed made his way through the sea of bound prisoners, another face appeared at the top of the ladder. It was almost familiar to Parika, though now her charming breakfast companion had short green hair and blue, scaly skin. The woman tossed a dagger of her own, drawing a line of blood across Gambumbo's thigh. The half-orc finally reached the islander and knocked him to the floor with one blow from his iron-studded club.
Parika knew that club was coming her way next, so she took the initiative and charged into the fray. Showing more courage than she would have given them credit for before, some of the prisoners rolled up against the half-orc's legs, putting him off balance enough to let Parika sink her dagger into his hip. Roaring with rage and streaming blood down his leg, the half-orc smashed the skull of one of the prisoners and disentangled himself, moving away toward the ladder. As he passed Parika, though, she slashed her dagger across the underside of his arm. The weakened half-orc crashed to the floor, bleeding.
Seeing that her partner had been taken out, the blue-skinned woman scurried down the ladder and disappeared. The sound of the ladder clattering to the floor dashed any hopes Parika had for a quick pursuit. She made sure the half-orc would not get up again, then went to see if the islander was still alive. He was unconscious, but in no mortal danger. A cheer went up from the remaining prisoners, and Parika went about the task of freeing them.
Eventually, Parika went down the hole and wrestled the ladder into place, allowing everyone else to descend. All of their possessions were safe downstairs, abandoned by the fleeing kidnapper. Gambumbo was eventually revived, as was the man shackled to the wall. Parika picked the lock on his manacles and he thanked her profusely. His name was Burton Lund, a longshoreman by trade. He had tried to escape earlier but had received nothing but a headache for his troubles. Before he left he told Parika and Gambumbo that he could be found through the Union if they ever needed anything.
Emerging from the run-down house, none of the prisoners were sure where they were, though most guessed by the disrepair and smell that it was somewhere in Scurvytown. They dispersed in small groups, leaving Parika and Gambumbo to find their own way out. The two introduced themselves and decided to stick together for the time being. They picked a direction and started walking. Fortunately for them of all the unsavory characters they could have run into during their tour of the Freebooters' Quarter they found the most harmless: Captain Frick.
Captain Frick was an ancient mariner and ex-pirate whose wealth of stories was exceeded only by his lack of limbs. And perhaps by his desire for drink. For the promise of a pint at the Broken Mug he not only guided them out of Scurvytown but also gave them a general overview of the various districts of the city. Once they reached Frick's watering hole Gambumbo accompanied him inside to help him get marinated. He and Parika agreed to meet back up later at the Black Gull.
DM Notes:
* Yes, this was a big railroad. It was essentially a variation on the "you all get press ganged" trick.
* I originally had the PCs make rolls (to spot the half-orc and resist the poison), but then I realized that they had to fail to move the plot forward. Choo choo!
* The fight with the kidnappers went about how I wanted it, but the rolls started going against the PCs toward the end. I had the prisoners assist near the end as sort of a fudge. It's not cool to have a TPK during your party gathering scenario.
* One of the reasons that things didn't balance out right toward the end was that I had expected four PCs instead of just two. I had also expected at least one fighter type, which I didn't have.