Solo Why do Strange Things Happen to Me?

[Aladon]

Time Stamp: 19th of Winter, 517 Event: Fire in the Sky Seasonal Event Who: Aladon Seasonal Plot Points: Receive a Wound like the scorch marks on the trees - 50 pts Search for evidence as to whats happening - 20 pts? Mention/See/Hear The Main Seasonal Theme in a thread - 10 pts? It was noon and Syna was high in the sky baking the small jungle settlement with her warmth. Aladon needed to stretch his muscles from a long day at work, so he decided to head out onto the beach and work on his swordsmanship. The Isur was making this a priority because with the strange lights in the sky followed with weird noises in the jungle. He would need to be able to defend his home if the need arise. Not to mention, he wanted to be able to protect himself from the predators that roam the Maw and the Jungle Wilds. Deciding to train on his own stretch of beach, the Isur walked along the treeline from his forge along the beach to his parcel. The beach was alive with all sorts of wild life from colorful birds, seagulls, and a occasional monkeys who decided to take a a break from terrorizing the settlement and enjoy the warmth of Syna on a rock. As Aladon got closer to the monkey, it turned to face him, got on a defensive pose, and started to squawk at him. The Isur just looked at this two foot monkey, crossed his arms, unimpressed, so he said in common, “No need to squawk at me! I don't care about your rock!” Suddenly, the monkey bared his teeth at him and jumped up with his arms raised. The Isur studied the monkey and noticed that he must be taking a defensive posture on the rock. He didn't want any trouble with the primate, so he just raised his hands and backed up. Suddenly, the monkey, turned around showing his surprisingly red butt to him, took a poop on the rock, picked it up, and threw it at him. Aladon was shocked at the sudden feces attack that he ducked out of the way, but out of the jungle came another monkey who grabbed his wide brim hat. The monkey with the hat ran to join his partner in crime on the rock and started to study his stolen item. Immediately, Aladon jumped to his feet and his hand went to the hilt of his sword; however, he rationalized to himself if he attacked the monkeys with the sword. The other residences of the town might think that he was unstable, so he took a deep breath and ordered the monkeys, “Give me my hat back you, little shytes.” The monkey who threw the feces at him earlier must have rearmed himself because another warm stinker came flying in his direction once again. The Isur jumped out of the way of the flying turd and yelled at the monkeys who were clearly amused at him, “Listen here you little monsters. I am higher on the food chain, and unless you don't want to get eaten. Give me my hat!” The monkey holding his hat, put it on his head, and started to chew the leather brim. Aladon was red with fury. He loved that hat, and now a monkey was using as a chew toy. The Isur wondered if the monkey was hungry if he was chewing the hat, so took a iron ration out of his pocket. He started to wave it at the monkey who was gently beating his rock mate with the hat now. The monkey with the hat looked over him and made a inquisitive sound. Aladon unwrapped the wrapper and bit into it. The monkey was intrigued and jumped off the rock dragging his hat in the sand. He seemed to be sticking out his hand for the ration when it got in the range. The blacksmith knew that he could rip the hat from his hand, and he had no intention on giving the little thief his ration either. When the monkey got into range of his hand, Aladon sort of felt bad as it was making sounds as it got closer, but the blacksmith knew that he needed to be tough with these little shytes, so when monkey got into range. He pounced for his hat, and the monkey let out a loud squawk. The Isur surprisingly shocked of the agility of the monkey because it jump out of the way as the blacksmith fell face first in the sand. Aladon turned to see both monkeys running down the beach. Getting to his feet, the Isur started to run after the pair of primates.

[Aladon]

As Aladon chased the monkeys down the beach, he noticed the pair was doing much better than himself running on the loose sand. He couldn't run at full speed because the lack of traction or sinking in the sand hampered his ability to pick up speed. Not to mentioned the heat and humidity affected his want to run at top speed down the beach. The last thing that he wanted to suffer heat exhaustion in the jungle. The Isur was about fifteen feet behind the monkeys, and they were starting to lose him since he was starting to fatigue. It was only three chimes of running, and he was already starting to get winded. Suddenly the tailed bandits veered towards the jungle with his hat, so he did his best to cut them off, but they were quick and already in the understory of the Maw. Immediately, he stopped for a moment, and he gently bit his lip not wanting to go into the jungle alone. However, he saw his hat about fifty feet into the jungle. The Isur said to himself, “Stop being a ninny. The hats only fifty feet away. What can possible go wrong?” Aladon could feel the sweat pour down his face from the run, so he took out his water-skin and took a drink of water. He didn't drink what he normally took because he wanted to ration it. Just in case. When he finished, he hooked the water-skin back onto his belt and unsheathed his bastard sword. If anything attacked him in the jungle, he would at least die with his sword in his hands. Walking slowly, the Isur played it safe and stayed on the dirt between the plants. If the vegetation was over a foot, and he couldn't see under it. He stayed away from it. He didn't know what lived in it. What if he stepped on a poisonous snake or insect? He wasn't going to take the chance. Walking up the his hat, he reached down to pick it up, but a foot long centipede walked over it. Aladon quickly pulled his hand back to allow the insect to pass. The last thing he wanted to do was get bitten by it. When he picked the hat up, he inspected the folds of the hat for any other insect that could have decided to make a home in it. Luckily, he didn't find anything, so he put it back on his head. Looking around him, Aladon noticed a strange scorch marks burnt into the tree in front of him. He walked over to the trees, touched the blacken part of the tree, and felt the ash on his finger tip. The Isur took a step back and wondered what could have burned the tree? If it was a forest fire, he would have seen evidence of burnt undergrowth all around him. However, none of the undergrowth was burnt at all. He started to look around and noticed the some of the other trees in the area were burnt the same way as the one tree in front of him. The blacksmith was intrigued, but he tightened his grip on his sword. Feeling the cool metal in his hand, the Isur felt a personal sense of safety with it. The blacksmith said to himself, “This is definitely not normal, are these marks made by someone or something?” Suddenly, Aladon had the brilliantly idea if these marks were made by someone than they had to leave evidence like footprints on the ground unless they were spirits. The Isur started to look at the ground and started to search around for unusual tracks in the dirt. However, he decided to step down hard in the dirt to see what his footprints would look like, so he compare if he found a new track. When he looked at his own track, he noticed that it didn't look like a human foot. It had the shape of a boot. It was long and round front of the track, and the back of the track was rounded too, but it dug deep into the dirt. The Isur looked for the closest burnt tree and started to walk towards it, but he kept his nose to the ground as he looked for other footprints.

[Aladon]

Aladon spent about a bell looking over the area for any signs of anything that could make the scorch marks on the trees, and the Isur came up fruitless in his search because he wasn't quite sure what a track would look like if it wasn't his own track. The only tracks different from his own were the monkey tracks that went deeper into the Maw. Bending down to look at the tracks, he noticed two sets of tracks with a small indent and five elongated fingers. The tracks weren't very deep in the soil. He couldn't really tell much from them other than they were quite a bit smaller than his boot track. Which way the monkeys were headed, or how fast they were moving was a mystery to the blacksmith. Frustrated for wasting a bell in the jungle, the Isur decided to call it quits. Syna was getting higher in the sky with each passing bell the temperature, humidity, and the biting flies would just get worse, and he really didn't want to be stuck in the humid jungle during the heat of the day or evening. Standing up, the Isur turned his back on the jungle, unhooked the water-skin from his belt, and took a drink of water. Suddenly, he felt a growing warm sensation on his butt cheek. He figured one of Syna's rays penetrated the canopy. However, the growing warmth became searing pain that caused him to howl out in pain. The burning pain brought the blacksmith to his knees, and he reached back to feel his arse.

[Gossamer]

As Aladon reached behind him to feel for the burning sensation in his buttock, the Isur completely lost his ability to move and pitched forward into the soft earth of the jungle duff. He landed on his stomach with his head turned sideways towards where the fire had come from. The burn on his butt was not deep, but it scored along the length of his left cheek and had the effect the shooters were going for. This pants were ruined. The burning sensation froze him, his whole body stiff except for his breathing and his eyes. He could move them. Turning his head, moving his hands, even twitching his toes proved impossible.

The Isur could hear footsteps approach. The strangers that converged on him were not graceful in the jungle, not like some of the Syka residents. Instead they muscled through, tearing at vines and hacking at what would not yield easily. They were humanoid, though their features were vaguely wrong or different. A nose was different. Ears were long and tufted with extra membrane. There were patterns on their skin - they weren't dressed from the waist up - though the patterns almost looked like scales. They came into view and leaned over Aladon, not rolling him over completely like one would assume. Quickly they bent, opened a pack, and got to work. Hair and saliva were taken. A needle was inserted and a strange flask attached to it was filled with his red blood from an arm that was stretched out. Then they cut into the back of his neck briefly and somehow sealed the wound.

It was the oddest sensation, being worked on by what in essence was a team of healers, but they were quietly taking things and not saying much. Aladon could tell though that they seemed to communicate non-verbally though he had heard them speaking before in a strange language. They acted much like a group of men - there were three of them - would that were working on a project together and speaking - all the gestures were there - but there were no vocalizations. It was almost as if he could hear the words flying around him but could make no sense of them.

Their coloring was off too. Their skin metallic. No one of them resembled the other.... one being copper, one being an almost antique gold, and one being silver. Their stomachs and chests were a different contrasting color to their scaled skin. They weren't snake-like, but they did indeed resemble lizards or other reptiles... if reptiles looked like men.

And the hands they touched him with.... long fingers ended with claws. And yet it did not make them awkward. They were incredibly graceful, almost beautiful with vivid eyes.

They left him after a time, after they took what they wanted. He wasn't able to move then either. It was a long while after that feeling began to creep back into his limbs and he was able to finally get his legs under him and stand. The encounter should have left him wondering if it were real... except in the dirt at his feet were bootprints - incredibly smooth bootprints. It was all the evidence one would probably need to realize what had just happened was real. There was prick mark in his arm from the needle and the back of his neck was also still sore.

[Aladon]

It was painful to the touch, and he brought back his hand and saw blood and ash on his finger tips. The Isur slowly got to his feet, and he clearly annoyed because he spent a bell looking for what caused the burnt marks on the trees, and now he had a burnt mark on his arse. Life wasn't fair, and he actually believed someone was petching with him at the moment. Aladon eyes narrowed in anger and thought to himself, 'By Izurdin's left arm, what the holy petch just happened...!' Looking out into the jungle, the Isur decided to be a dignified as possible as he said loudly with a nod, “Alright. Alright fine! I get the point! I will go back to my beach and leave your burnt trees in peace!” The blacksmith must look like a complete idiot talking to nothing and said continued, “By the way, petch all of you and have a nice day!” Whirling on his heels, the Isur needed to see a doctor if he didn't, he was sure a untreated wound would fester in the heat and humidity. If their was anyone in the jungle, they would be seeing him holding his arse as he was applying pressure to the would to stop the bleeding. This was clearly a walk of shame out of the jungle for Aladon, and he wasn't quite sure who he pissed off to deserve it. Regardless, his butt cheek was burnt and bleeding, and he wasn't every sure who or where the healers were in Syka. This clearly wasn't his day, and the Isur prideful nature just wanted to keep it quiet, but with a wound like this one, he needed it treated quickly.

[Aladon]

When Aladon waddled out of the jungle, he started to walk back to the main part of the settlement. He was sure that he would run into someone who can direct him to the healer. As he was walking down the beach, he saw a man with a long sword on his hip walking towards him. When they were close enough to each other, the older human must have saw how Aladon was walking, walked towards him, and asked with a concerned look on his face. “Are you OK, friend? You were walking like you were hurt, and I wanted to see if you were alright. My name is Buraga Shamzen.” Aladon looked at the man, and he noticed that he had the look of man who knew how to use the long sword on his hip. However, the Isur seemed relaxed around him because he seemed concerned about his condition. Aladon said with nod, “I would shake your hand, but my hand is kind of occupied at the moment.” Buranga smiled and said quickly, “No need. I understand.” The Isur said, “Let me ask you something? Have you heard anything about other people being scorched like the trees in the jungle?” The human looked at him for a few ticks before saying anything, “No, but I will definitely keep a ear out for it.” Aladon figured that he was the only one and said with a nod, “Thank you. Does Syka have a healer or doctor?” Buranga said with a nod, “Yes, talk to Jansen and Kalum in the Panacea. They should be able to help you.” The older human asked before he continued down the shoreline, “Stay safe, friend.” Aladon slowly hobbled to the Panacea. If he saw someone on his way, he politely asked them to direct him to healer. When he got to the healers hut, he was surprised that he only saw one akalak in the clinic. He was expecting two when Buranga said Jansen and Kalum. Regardless, he will call by the name that he presents to him. It is safer that way. The akalak seemed like he was busy organizing bandages, so Aladon politely asked in tukant, “Hello Aladon. Busy? Burnt.” The blacksmith was awful at tukant, but he respected the blue skinned giants when he lived in there city of Riverfall, so he did his best to learn their language even if it sounded like garbage. Seeing the akalak, it brought back memories of the second home that he left behind. Aladon recalled about the city on the waterfall how beautiful the akalak city was in comparison to Sultros. He always believed that Izurdin must have blessed the great akalak builders when they made their city. The akalak turned to him and said in simple tukant, “Welcome to the Panacea. My name is healer Jansen.” Aladon caught maybe three words in that exchange in tukant healer, name, and Jansen. The towering akalak walked over to him and asked in common with gentle smile, “You seemed to be hurt. I doubt you broke anything sense your a Isur. What happened to you?” Aladon said with a embarrassed look on his face, “Honestly, I don't know. I was kneeling in the jungle and looking at something on the ground. I stood up to leave than all of sudden I felt a burning sensation on my right butt cheek and the burning sensation immediately became a searing pain in rear end. When I reached back to touch it, it was bleeding and burnt.” Jansen asked, “May I see the wound?” Aladon lowered his pants enough for him to see it, and the doctor looked at closely and said, “Smart thing coming to me quickly. Untreated wounds in the jungle tend to fester quickly than you would have a serious problem.” Isur just nodded and let the doctor do his thing; however, he said, “I have gotten burnt enough times working as a blacksmith and metal-smith to know that if your burn starts to bleed it is serious.” Jansen asked, “Did you sit on anything like a plant or get bitten by anything?” The blacksmith shook his head and said, “No, can plants cause this type of burning?” Jansen said, “Why don't you take off your pant than I will treat it.” Aladon nodded to the healer, and he started to disrobe accept for his small clothes. The healer answered his questions, “Some plants produce chemicals strong enough to cause burns, but I doubt this wound is caused by it because I don't see any thorns or plant residue. Anyways, lets get this wound treated, so you can be on your way.”

[Aladon]

The Isur layed face down on the cot as the doctor started his treatment. He wasn't quite sure what the akalak was doing, but he seemed to be cleaning it because he felt something warm and wet than he felt the wound suddenly sting. This caused him to grunt in pain, but the healer started to murmur something, and he started to feel a refreshing feeling wash over him as the pain started to subside. Aladon said as he looked out the window, “Healer, do you offer first aid classes? I figure if I start heading out into the jungle. Maybe I should attend one of your classes.” Jansen was placing something over the wound and said, “Come by anytime, Aladon. I would love to teach you first aid. It smart to know if your hurt in the jungle and can't get to a healer. Alright all done.” The blacksmith got off the cot, put on his pants, and asked, “How much for the treatment, Jansen?” The doctor washed his hands and said with a nod, “If you don't have money, I do accept trade or services? Aladon didn't have anything to trade or money on him, so he said, “I don't have anything to trade, but if you want me to do a service for you. I will?” Jansen thought about it a moment and said with a nod, “Why don't you chop some fire wood for me than we will call it even. I need to organize some stuff around the clinic before night fall, and you doing that will save sometime.” Aladon didn't fight the payment because chopping firewood in the heat of the day was a lot better than a festering wound on his arse. Jansen lead him to the wood pile, handed him the axe, and said with nod, “Thank you. I have a lot to do before night fall.” Picking up a log, the Isur stood it up on one of the saw ends on a larger log. Spreading his legs slightly, he raised the wood slitting ax over his head, and swung it down towards the smaller log. The swing of the ax missed the log, and the Isur just shook his head knowing how today was already going. The blacksmith took another swing at it and split the log down the middle. Aladon continued wood for about two more bells as he tried to rationalize in his head the reason for the burnt marks on the trees. He came up with the theory that it wasn't a random act of nature because only the trees were affected by the burnt marks and eventually it was him. The blacksmith was starting to feel uneasy with the strange lights and noises to burnt marks in the trees. Something strange was starting to happen in Syka.

[Gossamer]

Aladon

Experience: Observation +3, Acrobatics +2, Intimidation +1, Negotiation +2, Running +1, Tracking +1, Planning +2, Interrogation +1, Investigation +3


Lores: Acrobatics: Dodging Thrown Monkey Feces, Negotiation: Trying to bribe a Monkey, Location: The Panacea, The Panacea: Jansen/Kalum The Doctors At The Panacea


Notes: Wound: Burn Mark On Ass, Slight Soreness To Base Of Neck, Needle Prick Mark on Arm