Decided to stop feeling sorry for myself so I worked further on my John Play Storyhour. Here is the preview / first segment.
JOHN PLAY
“Play To Win”
SEGMENT 001
“A Whisper of Things to Come”
Rhaan 10th, 995
Sharn, Breland
A gentle rain falls on the dark towers and connecting bridges of the largest city on Khorvaire. It is quiet except for an occasional call of a Spiretop Drake to the three moons in the night sky. A door suddenly opens and a man dressed in chainmail wearing a green tabard with a clawed hand on it bursts out. He runs calling out to an unknown person. He stops at the edge of the landing. As he catches his breath he leans over the edge and looks down the hundreds of feet of manmade canyons of stone, mortar and wood. Then he sees what he was looking for- a small airborne ship operated by a lone man also wearing green.
“We need to leave now. I have to see Lord ir’Valderbourne immediately.”
As he leaps over the edge onto the ship a fiery explosion erupts from the section of tower he had just left in a hurry. His unusual eyes turn to face the now falling cinders from the explosion. One eye is blue and the other green. His smile expresses a vile and corrupt pleasure in the destruction he has just left behind him.
The ship drops then swoops around the building in a hurried rate of speed as it ascends into the sky. People rush out from their homes, places of work and nighttime wanderings to investigate the fire and sounds of the explosion. The ship begins to close in on a bridge leading away from the backside of the tower they just left.
“Private Dannet…. What is….. Damn his luck!” The Emerald Claw operative curses as he looks to the bridge they are about to fly under. Standing on the bridge is a man smoldering as if he had just put out flames. He is watching them intently. “DIVE!” he screams as he sees the smoldering man step back from the edge. Too late.
The man jumps at a full run out from the bridge and lands hard onto the front of the taxiing ship. It dips sharply from the sudden weight and the mental command of amazed pilot. The man slips and falls onto the deck and begins to slide. The Emerald Claw passenger smiles in anticipation of the falling death of the burnt man. The burnt man pulls out a knife seemly from mid air and stabs it into the ship to stop his fall.
“Almost…. Missed you Brassinger…. Heh… almost.” The burnt man says with a faint laugh and a maddened gleam in his eyes. “Your… damned blade however… did not.” That is when Brassinger recognizes the dagger. It is his own. The knife meant to kill and absorb the soul of any victim. He knew he had struck this interloper with it but had assumed to have killed him even as the man fell into the lab shelves causing the flammable fluids to spill towards the fire they had caused when fighting.
“I do not know who you are but I neither care nor wish to know. I just want you dead.” The Emerald Claw man slowly pulls out a short sword that glows faintly of a purplish color. “You ruined two years worth of planning and setting up that project. My employer truly will be disappointed that the Prince will continue to live as well as the king.”
“I play like that.”, the burnt man says having nearly caught his breath now, and “I have the worst way of ruining the plans of evil and other wise unlikable people like you.” He takes two steps forward then stops. He instantly takes note of the sword, the wielder, the pilot, the ship and the fast coming cable connecting another airship to a platform. He flips the magical evil blade into the air making the armed man tense and stop his movement. The dagger is caught in midair and thrown into the pilot’s chest. The ship lurches suddenly. The burnt man leaps into the air and grabs the cable. The other remaining man turns and his mismatched eyes can not believe what he sees….
The explosion silhouettes the burnt man as the ship strikes a building at full speed. The broken and killed man and pilot both fall to the dark depths of the city to the streets below.
The ship operators of the moored craft reach down to the burnt and injured man. “You are lucky to be alive!” one calls.
“What is your name?”
“Play, John Play.”
Feels a bit rushed but it gets the feel out there. Lots of action and "Play" on words. Homage to James Bond as well.
Stories I have in mind involve House Cannith's continued experimentation on Warforged, House Kundarak lost stock holdings and various government / Last War tie-in stories.