Water, Pits, and Vikings, Oh My!

Everything had happened so fast from what started out as just an innocent game of War in the field of Mars had turned into something much bigger. Now the camp was short a praetor and some of their campers that had been taken as hostages. One of those hostages had been her younger brother Roy. She was worried beyond belief and she still felt like she was going to have a full blown panic attack, her throat felt like it was closing in on itself and her hand grasped for the plastic bottle that was inside of her pocket, before she opened the lid and grabbed one popping it into her mouth.

It would probably take some time before it worked, but it was the best that she could do. It had only been a couple of minutes since everything had passed when she started to try and assemble any sort of rescue team. Of course Lennie had been with her from the start, but they agreed that Lennie would be out waiting at the tunnel's and Cassia would gather some people up.

It had just so happened that she found Rowan of the second cohort centurion and Jackson the optio of the third cohort.

It wasn't long until they had driven to the west coast where they had a boat they could take that would probably be navigated down towards Panama and through the canal.

Lennie was determined. She felt like everything was happening all over again, but this time she had a chance to make things different. She could see the worry that laid on Cassia's face, it was like she was thinking about losing everything, not just one person in her life.

Lennie put her hand on Cassia's shoulder before they left the car. "Hey." She told her. "We'll get him back. This isn't going to go the other way." Lennie promised. She didn't know how she found it in her to make that kind of promise; as surely Lennie wasn't the person that you wanted promising no one would die. At least, not given recent events she wasn't. Her last party had died entirely.

Lennie grabbed what she had with her, which wasn't exactly a ton, nor was it what she would have packed if she was given notice. But she had her weapons and gear, due to War Games, and that was something to rejoice for. She made it a point to not waste a moment boarding the ship. It was small, but it would do the job, and it's what they had ready.


"Okay, we need the sails down, anchor up, wheel manned." Lennie wasn't really much of a sailor, but the sooner they were sea-bound, the better it was for everyone. "Scouts said they're heading east, so that means our only way is through the Panama Canal." Lennie continued to usher people further, while she climbed up the mast. "Someone might want to check the hatches, though I doubt they'd have any reason to be open."

Rowan Davenport found herself on a boat. She hadn't planned on being on one, nor had she packed accordingly, but at least she was armed. Her father always said that the number one thing you need in a survival situation is a weapon. Thankfully everything had happened during the War Games, so she was fully armed. She had her compound bow, her fully stocked quiver of arrows, and her knife strapped to her leg.

All they had was one small rickety sailboat. She was thankful there were only four of them because one more person would make moving around that much harder. To be honest she didn't know much about sailing. Sure, her father had taught her and her brother the basics of surviving on water, but he always seemed more keen to send them on survival missions in the wilderness. Maybe he believed the Roman superstition about sea travel. She didn't know.

When Lennie started shouting orders, Rowan didn't hesitate to make herself useful. She started at the anchor, hoisting it up until they were no longer held in place. That was a good place to start. She was somewhat excited, this would be her first excursion outside of camp since she was reinstated. After the whole Waterford situation, she was ready for a return to normalcy. If normalcy included going after a traitor after he killed the praetor and took hostages.

She made quick work of the sails, remembering the knots her father had shown her. Sure, they had a rough relationship to say the least, but he was nothing if not helpful.

Rowan turned to Lennie, "Sails are down, the anchor's up. You want to man the wheel or shall I?"

Jacks had eagerly accepted the offer to come, it would be good to have one last mission before he offically retired in a couple weeks, even if it was very last minute and he didn’t have a lot of time to grab much other than his weapons. He had skipped out on the war games, usually he didn’t but he had some other things he had to take care of today. Part of him was glad he missed it.

The boat was small, kind of old, and Jacks wasn’t certain it would make it out of the canal, but he wasnt going to be the one to complain. He jumped up to help take in the anchor and set the sails. He’d been sailing plenty of times to know what he was doing. After the sails were up, he had wanted to offer to steer, but Rowan had beat him too it, so he settled to sitting back and letting her do it, she seemed extra eager to be doing something anyway.

Cassia wasn't super thrilled about the boat that they had, but it would do for now. It was this or nothing and honestly she was going to take her chances with this rather than swimming the whole length there, she was sure they would be fine and everything would go smoothly, right? She had been starting to feel much calmer than she previously had been before she had taken her pill. It was then that she remembered parts of the letter that she had gotten from Christian. It was weird knowing he was gone, they didn't have a super close relationship like others had, but they were bonded together in a strange way.

"I know you didn’t quit. I think you know that I didn’t quit too." It was weird to think that someone from a completely different walk of life could share something in common with you. It was a surreal feeling to know that he had died because of the pills and she could potentially face that same fate. It was hard to go day to day without taking them, especially now. She didn't know how to quit at this point her life depended on them. It still didn't stop the pit of nerves she was in thinking about the whole thing.

As everyone had worked with the anchor and the sails, Cassia had moved over towards the wheel where she stood in place. She looked at everyone trying to jump at the chance to use it an she grinned. "Well, I would say just pick already, but I'll handle the wheel."

Lennie watched Rowan crank into gear to get things moving. She hadn't really known a whole lot about the Davenport, only that she was a Davenport. Her and Jackson both had status, which was a turn off for Lennie, but she felt she owed it to Rowan, considering prior events. Lennie was grateful she was taking things so seriously. Then Cassia took the wheel after Rowan asking if she should. It left Lennie with a head shake and a shrug.

"Her brother, her call." Lennie had looked back to Rowan to address the situation. "I'm just here to make sure she still has a brother tonight." Lennie paced away from the mast, holding on to the side railing. She saw the hatch leading to the bottom of the ship; she wondered how that must have smelled at this point. Could be good for a homeless person to live in. Not much else.

She paced back to the rear of the ship. It wasn't like they were a warship. They had no canons. All they could do was try to make sail. "Radio isn't an option." She reminded them. "Even if our scouts wanted to risk their lives by using them, the sea monsters are a lot more dangerous." Lennie put a hand on the rail at the rear, glancing back at the coast they were departing from.

Jacks shrugged. He wasn’t going to stop Cassia, if she wanted to steer. If it was his sister who got kid napped, he’d probably be the same way. Maybe worse. Jacks agreed with not using the radios, not that having to use them should ever been an option. It being dangerous to use them didn’t even technically need to be brought up, it was common everyday knowledge. Normally he’d point that out in some sort of nonchalant way, but putting two and two together, he had gathered that Cassia and Lennie were friends so he wasn’t about to fight with her. Instead he kept his mouth shut.

It had been quite some time that they spent on the sea. Cassia wouldn't say that it was complete smooth sailing, but given the fact they were navigating the sea it was fairly expected that they'd hit waves on their sail. Cassia hadn't spoken a lot during the ride that they were on, she heard a little bit of chatter among the group but the centurion was focused on what she was doing to navigate and focused on a game plan for getting her brother back, she had to get him back, not only because he was her little brother, but because he was also her legionnaire.

The group had finally made it to the other side of the Panama and they were on the east coast now. It was early morning of the next day, and she thought she had seen something moving, but rubbed her eyes and it was gone. She shrugged it off as nothing, but that was when the boat got hit and began to top over to the one side a little.

Lennie had never been in any nautical situation before. She was beginning to realize that she genuinely hated it, especially when they hit the ocean for real. Looking out she saw nothing but water in front of them. If something went wrong, sure, she could swim, but not through an entire ocean. The wood underneath her feet suddenly felt rickety, knowing that in a few minutes they'd be in range of no land. But they were on the trail, and Lennie couldn't very well back out of it now.

Cassia had a look in her eye that Lennie didn't want to screw with, not that she wanted to in particular spark anything with allies, especially at sea. Even still, she'd been on the wheel far too long, and needed a break. Lennie must have spent a few too many moments sizing her up, because suddenly the vessel shook, and began to turn in on the port side. Lennie had been caught offsides, and lost her footing.

Lennie fell, and slid down the now tilted ship. He sight had quickly changed to the sky, passed the sail and jibsheet of the ship. She was stopped by the old railing, and was grateful the wood was still sturdy enough to hold her. Her head could just make out the large shadow coming from the water, until she suddenly realized it was coming from the water.  Lennie got her bearings and rolled from what came over the ship. It was far too big to be a tentacle, Lennie was certain it was a serpent of some kind. A giant serpent.

Rowan had awoken early, as per usual. Once it was light out, it was hard to go back to sleep, so she just stared at the sky, deeply regretting her choice to not bring reading material. She found a piece of spare rope and elected to practice her knots, but surprisingly, even knots got boring after a while. She forgot how boring the in-between of missions could be.

Then, the boat jolted, and Rowan grabbed onto the railing. Before she knew it, the boat was starting to tip. She pulled herself onto the railing, using the outside of the cabin as a footing. She leaned over, trying to see if any of the others had fallen in the water. She saw Lennie at the port railing, just on the other side of the Jib. Then she saw the problem, the dark green serpent head slowly pulling itself out of the water. Its face reminded her of those angler fish, with the underbite of razor-sharp teeth. Its milky white eyes were surrounded by scars, and there were spiky fins running from the top of its head, down its spine. Its scales scraped across the wood, loud enough for her to hear. She could see the white scratches that it left behind. It managed to pull its way up towards her, although it looked right past her, and continued over the side of the boat. The wooden railing cracked and splintered under its weight.

Rowan's first instinct was to stab it and pull the knife down its hide. But once the blade made it in, it wouldn't budge, almost pulling her overboard before she could pull the knife out. Slashing wasn't going to be an option. The thing was almost three feet across, so unless they had a guillotine, they weren't going to be able to chop it either. They could maybe stab it through the eyes into the brain. Finding its heart would be tough since the thing was about 200 feet long.

"Its coming back around to you!" Rowan yelled down to Lennie, "Its got some thick skin!"

She turned her attention to the closest person to her, Cassia, who was holding onto the wheel. "Grab onto my hand," She said, offering it down to her.

Jacks had been back near the stern. He had taken a nice long nap for the first half, and ended up falling off the spot he had chosen to sleep. When he stood up, the boat was bumped into again, and he finally figured out what was going on. He felt himself slipping, he grabbed the railing as the boat kept tipping, and climbed over it. It probably wasn’t the safest choice, the boat could slam down whatever way it wanted, the water was rough enough.

It didn’t take long for Jacks to spot the reason their boat was on its side. He glanced over to the others, he was a bit farther away from them then he would have liked. He could hear Rowan yell where it was at, and about the thick skin. Now he just had to wait for it to get close enough to him.

Cassia had been growing tired being at the wheel for as long as she had been. It was hard to want to go to sleep when she knew her brother was out there, but now even if she wanted someone else to take control of the wheel there wasn't time for it. It was only a matter of seconds before the boat started to rock a little, before it tilted onto the port side.

There wasn't a whole lot of time to react, but she made sure to put her feet on the starboard side of the wheel in case the boat started to tilt to the point of being capsized. It was only a matter of seconds before her body was leaning on the wheel and she tried her hardest to hold on and to prevent herself from slipping onto the port side of the boat where Lennie was.

She could hear Rowan yelling and she saw the serpent, before she had taken the hand of the demigod and got a pull up onto the railing of the starboad side. "Thanks." Cassia said before watching a little to determine the maneuvers and mannerisms of the serpent, Cassia had liked to read about the different types of sea monsters in her spare time.

"Rowan and Lennie, try cutting it on its underneath or try aiming just below the jaw line if you can." Cassia had yelled out to the two. "I'm going to go towards the bow." Cassia told Rowan as she began to walk along the rail slowly, keeping low. She figured if she could get to the head of where the serpent was she could ultimately try to end its life sooner rather than later. Hopefully before the boat got crushed and hopefully before it capsized.

She concentrated as much energy as she could before she got there, she wanted to be able to use some of her powers readily without needing a warm up. once she got to the tip of the railing on the bow she stood there and waited to get a good look at the head from the distance as she started to make some ice daggers. Maybe she could potentially get rid of its eye sight forcing it to be a little hindered. As the opportunity came up she started to fling some of the ice daggers at the head of the serpent.

Lennie felt frustrated at the situation. Fighting monsters was one thing, but being dangled from a rickety old railing while a boa-serpent hybrid wanted to eat your flesh was an entirely different scenario. A scorpio mounted on the ship would be a blessing, but the ship wasn't meant for combat missions. It was just something they had handy that they could get to quick. Lennie had nothing that was going to pierce the hide of this thing easily. In a perfect world they'd be able to skin these things and ditch Imperial Gold armor.

Lennie heard Cassia's shout, but she wasn't sure how they were going to get under this thing. Lennie had grabbed the railing and clung back to the boat. The ship wasn't tilted enough that she couldn't get to the other side, but she figured that rushing the way it was turning was a moot point for her anyway. If the ship capsized then the mission was over anyway, which wasn't an option.

The only plan Lennie could think of was to impale the thing by cutting the mast, but then they had no proper sails, which means the trail would be cold for them by the time they could get a working ship anyway. The Centurion vaulted over the serpent's body that was latched on. Lennie figured if Rowan and Cassia had the cabin side, Lennie would be most useful on the other end. She was thoroughly pissed off at the lack of options. Even if Cassia had more destructive fire powers, their boat would catch fire and sink. Even if they brought gunpowder, the explosion would also harm the boat. Even if something as crazy as canons were available, the serpent was already on the boat.

She saw Cassia doing what she could, flinging ice daggers at the serpent's face. Many made contact, which was assurance, except for lack of a screech. Lennie chalked it up as a lack of vocal cords due to being nautical. The serpent reacted, it's path strayed slightly, but ultimately grappled another coil around the ship. Lennie was grasping at straws for ideas at this point. "How hot can your flames get, Cassia?" Lennie called out.

Rowan had already resigned that stabbing the giant serpent wasn't going to go anywhere. If anything, it would probably lead to her losing her dagger, which wouldn't help her in the long run. After the giant serpent head made it over the side of the boat again, she realized what she was going to have to do.

Once she saw the face come back up the side, she was poised and ready with her bow and arrow. She had only 24 arrows, and stood a poor chance of being able to retrieve them from this monster. She had to play her cards right, and make sure she didn't run out of arrows before they reached the people they were trying to get to.

Rowan breathed, begging the archery gods for this one shot to hit, and loosed an arrow. It flied past Cassia, Jacks, and Lennie, hitting squarely in one eye. The monster screeched, and before it could close its mouth, Rowan loosed another arrow, and it sailed straight to the back of the throat.

Then the monster kept going. What should've been two killing blows only slowed the serpent down to a turtle speed.

"God fucking dammit." Rowan said, mainly to herself. She was now down to 22 arrows.

Jacks cursed, he had been hoping that the arrows Rowan shot would have worked, but they hadn’t, and now they knew pretty much nothing was going to kill this thing. Jacks tried to think of everything he knew about sea monsters, but he had never heard of this one before and had no clue. But at least it the arrows slowed it down, that was something at least. Maybe they could just keep stabbing it in the eye and mouth and it would eventually give up?

Jacks wondered this, as the monster came up next to him. He was close enough to use his sword, hitting the actual body wouldn’t do any good, but he was in the perfect position to stand it other eye that didn’t have an arrow sticking out of it. He stabbed his sword forward, into the eye socket, and as it screeched in pain Jacks pulled his sword back out before the monster could disappear underwater again.

There was a thumping that could be heard and it took her awhile to realize that it had been her heart pounding in her chest. Her blood was rushing more than it ever had before, this was one of the most intense and fearful situations she could have been in, luckily before everyone woke up she had popped a pill into her mouth to combat any anxiety that would come up. Even still some of it was coming up, but no where near as bad as it would have been if she hadn't taken them.

Cassia watched as Rowan's arrows had slowed the serpent down and as Jackson had stabbed it in the eye. She heard Lennie call out to her and she turned to face her, "They can get really hot!" She shouted back and she was trying to rack her head thinking about why Lennie would want to know that but she saw the hatchet and was now having it calculate in her head.

The daughter of Vulcan focused on the flames that'd grow in her hand before she brought her blade to sit in the fire. She had some time before the serpent would be coming up for another wrap around, this had to be now or they'd probably all die and the thought of that resting on her shoulders made them feel heavy. The head came back around and she pulled her blade out at the last second out of the flames before pulling a risky move such as jumping up to stab it just below the jaw. At first her blade was stuck in the skin as she was hanging from the handle of her blade.

She swung her body forward and immediately her blade began to slice through the serpent, as it did she was sprayed with blood before her and her blade fell onto the deck. She had to quickly stab it into the wood to keep herself from sliding but the stop half of the serpent came down onto the ship. The centurion was trapped under it so she pulled her gladius out from where she stuck it. The whole deck had been covered in blood and even part of the water had blood pouring in it.

With the ridiculous amount of blood loss from the serpent, it hadn't been long before it was clear how it would go. Between the copious amounts of wounds and damage to the head and the massive abundance of blood loss, the serpent was dead. Even if it wasn't dead yet, there was no fight left in it, and it would die before it ever found the strength to fight back. Lennie ended up getting sprayed with a lot of blood, from her face to her boots, she was thoroughly coated. With some elbow grease and work, the ship was on course again, with some lost time.

Lennie had a lot of blood on her, which for the third time in such a short period brought her back to the amazons. Back to Xena. She'd felt anger at the woman, and in one split second decided to do something that she could never take back. The masts would be at full sail for the rest of the trip, so Lennie wasn't worried, not to mention she was sure the others would want a turn on the wheel. Lennie ended up at the rear of the ship, above the cabin, looking out at the open ocean for what was a long while. She didn't bother cleaning herself up. To her, the blood was good. It was the only way that the people who took Katrina would know who they were screwing with.

The girl had chalked it up as being on watch; she didn't want another surprise serpent. The crew had been careful of the blood. The deck of the ship was practically a slip and slide now, and that would need to be remedied when they had time. Lennie breathed in the salty air of the sea. She could feel her prior phobia of the sea that had crept up on her, like a shadow in the night, crumble, as again, she didn't die.

Eventually, after a long time, they came to land. It was a long shot. They'd lost the other ship a long time ago. But, there was land, and on that land were mountains covering the majority of the landscape that could be seen. On the side, going up that mountain, there were wooden supports with dozens of huts and homes. There was a big longhouse that could be made out from their distance. 

At the bottom of the mountain-side settlement, rested a big stony circular building.

They continued along their course, trying to follow a possible trail the other ship could've taken. Days went by, and they continued along on a hunch. Rowan had almost suggested that they give up, there was a whole ocean, and they had no clue where to go. They would eventually run out of what little rations they had left, and then they would have to find their way back. But Cassia was determined, so Rowan kept her mouth shut, at least for the next day or so.

So they kept sailing, avoiding sea storms and other signs of danger until they saw shoreline. It had been so long since land had been seen, Rowan had thought it was a mirage when it appeared on the horizon. But as they approached it became clearer, a rocky peninsula jutting out and rising into a sharp peak, a long-dormant volcano maybe. The lowlands were covered with bright green grass. When they delved even closer, it became apparent there was a settlement on the mountain, what looked like long walkways between outcroppings supported by stilted poles, zig-zagging its way up the face of the mountain. As they slowly approached, there was a cove at the water's edge, with long docks filled with long wooden boats with one mast and dozens of oars. Then, they saw it, a modern yacht, pristine and unmistakable. It stood out amongst the rest of the dark wooden boats.  

"We should find somewhere else to dock." Rowan said. Whoever was in that settlement should've seen their approach, but she'd be damned if she was going to try to dock in their harbor. They could be boarded right away, at least docking somewhere else would mean they could make more ground before they were met.

They found a small outcropping about a half mile away from the docks, where the rocks blocked them from view of the settlement. They made it to land, on a small beach of pebbles that quickly turned into grass. Yet they didn't make it far before they heard the sound of people running. A young woman led a large group of warriors. She was short, with long blonde hair, she looked to be in her early 20s. She wore a tunic of some sort, covered in a fur shawl, and carrying a battle axe. The rest of the warriors were more suited for battle, holding circular wooden shields and a variety of very sharp looking weapons such as spears, axes, and swords.

"Welcome to Toft Kift," The woman said, "I suggest you drop your weapons."

Rowan did a quick study of the scene before her, and quickly decided that the four of them versus the group of Vikings wouldn't end in their favor. She dropped her bow and quiver, along with her knife. A couple of the warriors came forward to collect them.

"Don't worry, we'll return them to you shortly." The girl told them, "It all depends on what you choose, surrender, or glory?"

Jacks had started getting sick of being on the boat for so long. This quest was definitely going to be his last boat ride for a very long time once they finally got home. It had taken almost an entire month to get to their supposed destination, they actually had no idea where they were at most of the time. Then one day Jacks woke up to someone yelling that they saw land. He had quickly stood up too see if it were true, which it was. They could all see the fast approaching shoreline that was lined with docks and boats.

When they finally made it to land, Jacks and the rest of the group made their way back to where they had seen the docks. They had only made it about half way when they were stopped and surrounded by a group of warriors. At the command to drop their weapons to the ground Jacks glanced around to the others, and waited for them to start putting their weapons down first. A couple of the warriors came forward and gathered up their weapons. Jacks felt his heart jump a bit, not having his weapon could mean a lot of bad things. He could just manage to hear what the woman said, since she was off on his deaf side. He looked over at the rest of his group before looking back to the woman, making sure they all wanted to choose the same thing.

"We choose glory." Jacks finally said.

A lot of Cassia's worries had subsided by the time that the fight with the serpent had ended. She didn't bother to clean herself up from all the blood it was just going to be wasted time at this point. Cassia didn't sleep a whole lot, she was determined to find her brother and she was determined to get him back. There was also determination in trying to get their praetor back and hopefully alive. Cassia wasn't sure what was going to happen or even sure if they would ever find the ship again.

Eventually they had found a mountain that seemed to have civilization on it, it had been from there that they decided to sneak in, it would buy them more time than just being stormed onto. Cassia was hoping that she would be able to find her brother in this place, she had a bunch of worries on what would happen once they got off the boat and she worried maybe her brother would be dead, but there wasn't much she could do for it now.

They ran into a blonde girl and a bunch of others behind her. She told them to put down their weapons and asked about surrender or glory. Was this even real? Cassia didn't let go of her weapons right away and she watched as Jackson did.

"He chooses that." The daughter of Vulcan said and side eyed Jackson. She wasn't about to just give up her weapons, not like this and not right now. "Which option allows me to keep my weapons?"