"Yeah, cool. Give it to me, I'll go get some stuff. Instant Soykaf, Instant Miso Soup, various gut rotting soy and vatgrown chow. You know, stuff we all like."

Ziptide rolls his eyes, his lip twisting up sardonically. "Oh joy. Never get tired of that stuff. I think I'm going to go get at least one decent meal before we're on the seas again. This place is a dump, though. I was hoping we could sell that pleasure boat here, but who would buy it?"

"Maybe someone here's better off than it looks, doesn't look likely though. I'm gonna go for a walk before the town gets up." Unless interupted by dialogue, Horatio will head into town looking for any signs of affluence or talismongers.

"Now wait just a second, that bigass thing is the only place we have to sleep!. Its relitifly fast, and if we can get some money can turn into a rather nice high seas raider. Seeing as the Facepuncher nor the Wild Turkey are truly sea worthey. With my reseves we can get some half decent food, some extra guns, and get this show back on the road. If we need more money Im sure we can strip the Ice Queen (which is what Iron will be refering the Yacht as) for valueables. Im gonna get some shut eye, its been a long night."

"Eh. Maybe If we keep the Ice Queen I can assemble my drum set and get to playing again. You guys all like my drumming, right?", Johnny says.

"Anyway, I'll buy us some food. You guys write up a list of stuff you want, and I'll go shopping. Maybe I'll stop by the church and scare the priest with weird stories in the confessional booth. Thats always fun."

"you just keep away from me with those drums..." Iron shoots Johnny a icy glare. "But we really need to keep the Queen as our base of ops, its big fast, and pretty comfertable. Oh, right, Im gonna go see what i can learn about that sub..."

Ziptide scowls and kicks at a piece of debris as he walks along the docks. It's been far too long since he's had that sweet rush of adrenaline that he so craves, and it's making him petulant. He wanders into a small, out-of-the-way seafood place and orders some chowder, beer, and fish and chips. The fare is surprisingly good, temporarily disrupting his little pity party, until, with a mental strain, he turns his thoughts towards the play boat that they're stuck with. Nice amenities, but no cool guns or anything. Bah. His force of will overcoming the pleasant mood of the restaurant, he happily settles back to do some more brooding. Hmm, maybe if he looks angsty and introspective enough, that cute waitress will come over...

Johnny watches as Zip walks off.

"Damn. Bastards gonna go eat and leave us in the lurch. Ah, nevermind. I'm gonna go...do something. I don't know, girlwatch, or smoke, or something.", he says. He walks off and just wanders around the town for a bit.

Iron, Zip, and Johnny all wander the street for a bit, but end up at the bar when it opens. There really is only one street with anything interesting on it, and really only one interesting thing on that street.

It doesn't take long after they sit down and order some food and drink before a local wanders up to the table. He's about fifty, and his bare arms show where tattooes once were, although now they are just stretched and collapsed messes of ink. He doesn't even start with introductions. "You lads own those three ships out there?"

Iron looks over the excuse for syntha Gin hes nursing "Depends whos asking, friend."

Johnny leans back in his chair.

"Yeah...they're ours. Who're you?"

Well, the old man sits down without being invited and signals for a beer. "I'm the harbormaster hereabouts. I noticed that none of those ships match what kind people you lads seem to be, so it's fairly obvious what you're all about. But no need to get your panties in a bunch about it. You see, lads, you could probably help me with something."

He is brought his beer, cracks it, and takes two large gulps, wiping his whiskered, chinless mouth on his threadbare sleeve. You notice the smell of soap.

"I have to get some packages to some people in Kingston, and they should have some return packages for me. They need to be there in 4 days. I don't want anyone snoopin' through them, and I think you might be just the sort of lads for the job. Interested?"

"That depends on the price. If you don't insult us with that, then I don't think we'd have any problems with making a run into Kingston. We're pros - we keep our word, and you can trust both our competence and our discretion." Ziptide winces inwardly at his last sentence. Not for how it came off - mercenary but reliable, just what the guy's looking for - but because he's hoping it won't make one of the others suddenly burst out laughing.

Johnny suddenly snorts and coughs up some of his Tsing Tao beer back into the bottle.

"Yes, Zip is right. We could get the package there...", he says, looking at the harbormaster from over the top of the brown neck of the bottle.

He lets the silence hang for a bit, then adds.

"...but...it would depend on all the elements in the equation, if you catch my meaning."

Horatio returns to the docks, his mild search resulting in nothing. Three empty boats greet him.

"I really thought one of them would stay behind and make sure these stay untouched."

Finding a seat with a good view, Horatio calls a watcher to find everyone.

[ooc: force 2: 1,3,4,5,7,7; drain resist: 1,1,3,4,5,8; only want it for an hour]

The shadowy form of a crow enters the world, and is faced with a simple command, "Find Johnny and tell me where he is."

Iron stumbles over his words, "Basicly, whats it worth to ya?" Wow, that sucked... I gotta learn to shut my mouth more Rodger thinks.

"Well, hows 20,000 when you get back with my return package?"

Iron thinks to him self thats what.... 4000 each with the ships getting a cut? I could live with that for now, we might find a hapless ship on the way...
Iron looks confused and goes back to the rum and coconut he is nursing.

"20,000, huh? And can we expect any third party trouble from this package?", Johnny asks, swirling the last drink of beer around in his bottle.

"Just the usual. Border patrols, pirates, awakened sharks. Nothing out of the ordinary."

"Sounds good.", Johnny says, downing the rest of his beer. "You got a deal."

"Very good," intones the old man. "I'll have the boys drop you a crate tonight and the info on your contact in Kingston. You boys have a fun time."

With that, he pads off, out of the bar.

The waitress comes back to ask if your food is okay.

Rodger swigs down the last of his drink "Well thats that. Im gonna go see about getting us some fuel, and see what I can find out about that Sub" Iron drops a handfull of coins on the table and leaves.

"Awakened sharks? Cool." Ziptide smiles. "Well, if you guys are gonna be chasing down beers, and rumors about that tacky submarine, the one with the graffitti on it... then I'll just head back to the boats and oversee them loading up that crate."

"The food's fine. Thanks.", Johnny says, swirling his fork around in his seafood pasta. He takes a few more bites and leaves some money on the table, then leaves and heads back to the boat.

I need to remember to give watchers a smaller area to search...if it went the wrong way, it'll be searching Spain when the hour is up.

Rodger heads down to the docks, looking for anything resembeling a boat sized gas station.

The gas station is at least thirty years old, and seems to have never been cleaned or serviced in all that time. Judging by the fack that someone slopped some gas down the side of it, it still works. There is also a skinny guy sitting on top of a crate immediatly between the Facepuncher and the Turkey.

Johnny walks up to the guy, and by extension, the crate.

"This the cargo?", he asks him.

The skinny guy, about thirty, in desperate need of a shave and some new clothes, nods. He has a scar on his throat that makes you think that he may not be able to speak.

"Hey, anyone home? We need some fuel pronto. Anyone? Auh f*ck it," Iron grabs a pump and lugs the line over to the facepuncher, and starts pumping the gas on his own.

The watchers return about the same time as Iron and Johnny, with excited news that they've found Johnny.

Also, there *still* seems to be nobody associated with the pumps at all.

"My quick search found nothin', what's this about cargo?"
and when did that other guy show up with the crate? Well, I wasn't paying that much attention...

Iron looks around again, now intent on helping himself to the fuel, reguardless if anyone cares or not. "Horatio, we are gonna be playing delivery boy, we is going to Jamacia! And RUM!"

Rodger helps load the crate of unknown cargo onto the Facepuncher, before finishing borrowing the fuel that is going into the boats. "Suppose we should get a move on eh? Shove off before whom ever that gas is owned by notices we just stole 300 gallons of high test?"

Iron happy debarks in sunny Jamica. "Now whersh shat guy wish de boxesh?"

The trip too Kingston is fairly uneventful. The weather is blistering hot, bleaching everything in the relentless rays of the sun. Every bit of skin on every crew member turns the same shade of heavily tanned brown, with all the appropriet peeling and discomfort. Days are spent taking the three boats across open water, the nights are spent drinking, swimming, and fishing.

Kingston eventually comes into view, a sprawl on the inside point of one of the islands bays. The sticky heat makes the garbage normally inhabiting the sea-water even more pungent than normal. All around the Turkey, Puncher, and Ice Queen, boats, large and small, float aimlessly. People chatter between houseboats in english, french, spanish, and some bastard combination of the three. The three undercrewed boats draw a bit of attention, compared to the crowded, ancient water-craft that crowd the bay.

At the docks, the three boats are immediatly approached by an older black man with waist-length dreds interspersed with grey. He's skinny, carrying a water-proof datapad and wearing only a ragged pair of three-quarter length cargo pants. He approaches the assembled group of the three ships and adresses them all without looking up from his board.

"I and I require yas' ship information and some ID to 'tatch to 'em. Tyin' up here cost 20 bucks a night for less than a week stretch, and 5 a night after dat."

Johnny picks some dead skin off his newly bronzed skin.

"The sun sucks. I'm an elf! I'm supposed to be pale!", he grumbles, then runs his hand through his blonde hair bleached even lighter by the sun.

"We should've bought sunblock...", he says as the old man approaches. From the deck of the Facepuncher, Johnny listens to the requirements.

"Hmmm...how about...100 bucks each, and we forget the ID?"

The old man smiles, showing more than a few missing teeth. "Ya, baldie, we can do tha'. Enjoy Jamaica."

He takes the proper amount of money, marks something down on his clipboard, and pads off to greet someone he evidentally knows.

The docks are quite crowded, filled with colorful people in colorful clothes. Green, yellow, red, black, it's all here. The crowd is predominantly black, but about ten percent is hispanic, white, or another various ethneticity. Somewhere, someone is playing the steel drum.

Johnny smiles back at the man, and then turns to Ziptide as he walks off.

"Thanks for footing the three hundred nuyen. We'll make it up to you, we will.", he says, scanning the crowd.

"All we gotta do now is find the guy who we gotta give this box to. Oo, drums."

Iron stumbles to the rail again, and flops over it, hanging half out of the boat "And RUM we need RUM! And shomething other then fish!"

Horatio takes a minute to cast create food, and hand the nearly tasteless lump to Iron as he heads out to the island.
"This isn't fish."

Johnny starts laughing.

"Haha...faced."

Ziptide gives Johnny a "Who are you kidding?" look as he gazes around. He calls back to Iron "We'll bring you back some calimari."

He's half-tempted to stay with the boats himself, but he wants to stretch his legs out. Plus, he want to be sure he's there when they meet the guy, in case it's a setup. He walks along with the others, not caring how his elegant greatcoat and green hair make him stand out in this crowd.

The information that came with the crate says that once you arrive in Kingston, you should go to the Sunnyside Hotel, about twenty blocks from the docks, and tell whoever's behind the counter that you've a package, go back to the boats, and wait.

(Sorry, meant to include that earlier. Appendix and all.)

There's a commotion at the end of the docks, a several of the old fishermen who'd been having a game of cards, have their table upended. The angry calls preceed the statuesque ebon warrior figure that rounds the bend onto the pier where the group is gathered. Jimmi's at a full sprint, naked from the waist up, a series of tattoos growing more distinct upon his form as he draws closer. Jimmi's dreadlocked hair, red, black, yellow and green beads within it, trails behind him as he adjusts the satchel around his shoulder, his bare feet clapping evenly with his long, graceful stride. Jimmi passes by the group and leads clear off the pier onto a waiting water scooter. He tries to start the small craft, but the first few times it doesn't come to life.

`Come on girl, I and I be needin' to be on our way now.`

He doesn't even seem to notice the group gathered on the pier, nor the dockmaster, whom he hadn't paid for use of the slip.

The dockmaster chuckles softly, but then quickly places himself in the way of anyone that would be following Jimmi.

Horatio asks the dockmaster, "Does that happen often?"

"Not really, but I and I knows the kid. Good kid."

Just then, three more jamaican, and a large anglo troll come bursting through the crowd, guns drawn. "Where'd he go?" The troll stares down the harbormaster "Where's he?" "I and I has no clue who you be talking about."