The Cloudhope Interrogation

The Party: Kona, Dacien

It’s been a few weeks since our last adventure. By common agreement of the Roving Council, the captive Stranger is being held by Cloudhope on their primary flying sanctuary engine. Despite Lanturnwurm’s requests to participate in the prisoner interrogation, there has been no response these past few weeks.

Meanwhile, Dacien attends to his gear, asking blacksmith Estley to fit a new handle covering to his pistol made from the skin of the mutant manta ray creature the team had dispatched in their last adventure and drawing up plans for an automatic loading mechanism. Kona spends some time with Nakoa, who had decided to travel with Lanturnwurm for a time. The pair patrolled the car roofs, discussing their backgrounds and the prejudices among the aquatic races. Their shared experiences had done much to challenge the ideas about sea elves that the sahuagin had imposed on Kona.

Finally, a message came from Cloudhope inviting a party from Lanturnwurm to inspect the prisoner. Meeting at a predetermined place, Dacien, Kona, and Nakoa were greeted by one of Cloudhope’s small transportation skiffs, a circular flying platform attended by a dragonborn Cloudhope clan member.

The transport brought them aboard Cloudhope, where Manu and Kamilah greeted them at the docking bay. Ever conscious of political formalities, Dacien presented an onyx amulet as a gift upon arriving. After initial greetings, Manu sent the group along with Kamilah a set of guards to see the prisoner being held in the brig, while he had to attend to business in the command room.

Kamilah led the group through the ship, eventually arriving in an area housing an on-board armory, security central, and the ship’s prison cells. Along the way, Dacien took note of the high level of discipline that the Cloudhope security forces seemed to show, in contrast to the “scrappier” atmosphere of Lanternwurm.

Arriving at the cell of the Stranger, Kamilah left the group to their business. As they opened the door, they found the Stranger, chained to the wall of the cell, in poor condition. Wounded and dazed, it was obvious that the prisoner had been through brutal interrogation techniques by Cloudhope.

Despite some protests from the guards, Dacien drew upon his paladin powers to heal the prisoner slightly in order to speak with him. Once the Stranger became more aware, the party quickly found him to be uncooperative. With Kona and Nakoa translating the strange dialect of Aquan that the Stranger spoke, Dacien attempted to cajole the prisoner into revealing more about their plans and where the Stranger’s came from.

The Stranger confirmed what the party already knew: they were trying to tunnel a pathway back to their home plane. They blamed the adventurers for meddling and causing the collapse of their portal. Finally, they revealed that the sanctuary engines were technology from their plane, and implied that they had a hand in their creation.

Broken and defeated, the Stranger would give no more and simply asked for death. None of Dacien’s further offers would sway them, so the adventurers left the prisoner to his fate.

Just then, they were approached by an official-looking dragonborn with wire glasses and a clipboard who asked them if they had licenses for their weapons. Unused to the bureaucracy, they explained that they were guests from Lanternwurm. After shuffling through some of his papers, the dragonborn let them go with a warning and a form for registering their weapons with security, before moving on to hassle a nearby merchant about their produce. Kona folded up his form and put it away, while Nakoa promptly crumpled his form and tossed it aside.

Meanwhile, Dacien wanted to see the engineering section of the ship before attending a scheduled meeting with Manu. He arrived on a chaotic scene as a pipe had burst near the engine room and members of the crew were frantically attempting repairs before the liquid could damage any sensitive equipment. A dwarf wearing goggles and overalls was working on the damaged pipe. Dacien offered his help which the dwarf gladly accepted.

With Dacien’s help, they were able to stem the leak. Once the danger had passed, the dwarf thanked Dacien and introduced himself as Jorma, the head engineer. Dacien asked if he could get a tour of the engineering section and Jorma, though busy, was happy to oblige. The dwarf explained how the engine used planar crystals to drive the flying mechanism of the ship, a power source held in common with Lanturnwurm and most other sanctuary engines. Dacien left the dwarf with a friendly parting gesture, using his magic to instantly clean the dwarf’s clothes.

Afterward, Dacien met up with Manu. He invited the Overseer to discuss matters as they toured the ship’s armory. What ensued was a battle of political posturing. In veiled language, Dacien suggested that less brutal interrogation techniques would have produced more useful information. Manu stated that Cloudhope would take whatever measures they had deemed necessary.

Just then, Kona and Nakoa witnessed a commotion in the market, as a human and two elves dressed in dark jumpsuits and scarves around the bottom half of their faces were being chased by a guard calling for them to stop. Kona recognized the outfits as the style of dress of clan Truespear. Despite being unsure whether or not he should get involved, he attempted to cast a spell to hold one of them in place, but the runner was able to acrobatically flip over the magical manacles. Nakoa also failed to take hold of one of them, as they twisted out of his grip and pushed him back.

Dacien and Manu, hearing the nearby commotion, rushed onto the scene. Dacien cast a spell of magical darkness ahead of the runners, slowing them down slightly. All three adventurers, along with Manu and a set of guards, now took chase, as the runners seemed to be headed to the docking bay. Kona attempted to head one of the runners off and engaged in a back and forth of martial arts maneuvering, before losing hold of him.

Then, Dacien issued a magical command spell, forcing two of the runners to turn back and approach him against their will. This allowed the guards to engage them in battle. The two masked elves fended off the guards, fighting hand-to-hand. Dacien finally fired magical blasts of energy to knock them down, allowing the guards to capture and disable them.

Meanwhile, Kona pursued the final runner just as they reached the docking bay. Magically teleporting ahead of them, Kona was able to surprise the runner and forced them into an armlock. However, the runner used his free hand to make a series of gestures in the air, using a technique of gaseous form. The runner dispersed into smoke in Kona’s hands before drifting out of the docking bay and into the open air, escaping from the ship.

During cleanup, with the infiltrators identified as Truespear members, Manu took the intrusion as an act of war. Dacien suggested that he could help question the prisoners, but Manu only curtly thanked them for their help and said Cloudhope could take care of their own business. The only consolation Dacien could wring from the Overseer was a promise to wait at least a week before any rash action and one of the intruders’ sashes as proof of the event.

The adventurers departed from Cloudhope uneasy, as the clouds of clan war seemed to be gathering on the horizon.

Loot:

• A sash of clan Truespear

• -1 piece of onyx jewelry worth 50gp