A nocturnal date…
… for a fire works show?!
Our Friends young Pirates should have no problem understanding that Poerava dated them, either directly, or with the intermission of Elorria, but her aim remains to be clarified.
Hence, Poerava waits alone for them, as soon as the night is dark enough or the latest from the beginning of the fireworks and until one hour after at least. Elorria cannot attend the date herself for her father won't let her go. That said, even Poerava is usually not allowed to go out at such hours! She took however the risk tonight to escape and upon that made sure to come without Elorria, which we'll be able to understand soon.
If the Players' Characters do not come or not all of them, Poerava will search for other ways to contact them later in order to obtain the date she expects from them. And well, for those who believe it could have been a love tryst, they'll see soon enough that there were already more amorous adventures before.
She waits behind the Chapel of the Rock and when she is sure that only the ones she expects attend, she comes out of the shadow and signify silently to follow her somewhat higher up in the forest which starts right above the chapel. If the fireworks didn't start yet, she then proposes to go further and look at them from the top of the Rock, a half an hour walk from there.
It's a provocation!
After the fireworks, making a mysterious face, she takes everyone to a roughly cleared area in the woods where two sabers are stucked in the ground… actualy two wooden sabers! At that point she turns to the Characters of the Players and speak out the following words:
« – The reason why I took you there is that, following your heroic acts of this morning, I judge you courageous enough and dignes to fight in a Duel against me! » (It would be better for those who would be about to smile or laugh at her that they refrain from it for she could take it quite seriously… Up to you to decide, Friend Game Master, whether it should be subjected to a Roll versus Got a Nerve! or you take it easy and let your Players play their role without breaking the flow…)
« – Moreover, according to the Pirate Code, I invite each of you already to select his or her witness or witnesses for the Duel… You! », she adds while pointing one of the wooden sabers to the first of the Players' Characters and calling him or her by his or her name, « Aye, you! Choose your witness and fight! No joke! My witness shall be Ernesto! », she tells then, pointing now to a magnificient yellow-headed green parrot perched not far from here… « Ernesto-Ribeiro! », screams the parrot before adding with an Anglese (Hum, inhabitant of a half-legendary island where the speaking has a very strange accent… well never mind!) gentleman's tone: « Miss Poerava! Never point your saber to the Witnesses like that, if you please! »
(Ernesto will soon prove enough he is an excellent Witness and even a good instructor regarding Insaulting in a Duel, being a « finely educated and spiritual » parrot, according to the words of Poerava herself…)
To be defied like that, by a little girl barely thirteen, when one is probably quite older than that, is extremely upsetting. Let us hope that our friends the Players' Characters have the soul of a Pirate deep in them for, then, they'll accept the challenge!
Of managing a first Duel
You'll have understood, Game Master, it goes about a Pirate Duel (almost) following the rules. So prepare the cards on the table in three packs, one for verbs, one for nouns and one for adjectives… And let there be words of colourful and witty nimbleness at insaulting!
It is not written that Poerava should win. On the contrary! She would consider a great candidate to Piracy someone who could defeat her and have so much esteem as to tell him or her right after the Duel: « Oh, oh! Take it easy, Captain! ». As for Ernesto, he would add: « Ya, Swashbuckler, ye'll soon may call me by me nombre! ».
It isn't said either that Poerava will have the necessary energy to hold the level in all the Duels. It is up to you to judge from the development of the sequence and from the rolled dices. It is the first occasion for the Players - as well as for their Character – to discover the rules of Pirate Duels: who did not play the Pirates while still a kid?! In that respect, of course whatsoever, do not forget for each Duel to let the Witnesses be chosen, including by the Players Characters.
Those who would have been lucky – or not – to not fight a Duel versus Poerava will have their turn sometime in the future for sure, if they become Pirates…
By the way… Why so much a do?!
One can wonder, indeed!
Or else start finding a clue: Poerava actually (and acutely) does not feel at ease on the Yellow Lizard's Island, even if she could not precisely tell why. It results in much sorrow as well, since she very much like the Governor and even more Elorria… But there is something like calling her, which she feels as soon as she is alone and that is the call of the sea, that same sea that everyone on that island seems to want to avoid, and that what she « hears » is indeed nothing else but her own cry for Liberty!
Therefore the scheme she devises (somewhat complicated, that cannot be denied) to « dis-cover » some courageous youngs, not afraid of water, then the evening Duel to confirm « those who have some » and will be ready to go along with her to the end of the world (well, that begins on a more reasonable scale, as we'll soon see)…
Some prying eyes?
Several other persons could happen to be there that night, hidden in shadow, spying the deeds of the Characters and Poerava, possibly up to interfering with her plans, either by breaking in on the scene right in the middle of a Duel, or by organising a later punishment for her by informing the Governor about the events…
This is up to you to decide, Friend Game Master, how far you want to complexify the scene but the following parameters should be considered:
- - Avoid to much complexity if your Players are already on the reserve, more observing the events than really taken by the trials of Poerava;
- - Limit the number of potential participants to Elorria (she finally also escaped to try to understand that which Poerava plots) and / or Gomez Garcia (either sent by the Governor, now on alert, or having come himself after seeing Poerava go out in the night);
- - In both cases, if the spies should interrupt the scene, let at least one or two Duels happen before (so as to not « kill » the Scenario right from its beginning and it is more logical also);
- - To keep the consistency of the Scenario, you may prefer an intervention of Elorria in order to develop her Character if you intend to stage her kidnapping in the following of the Scenario; an intervention of Gomez Garcia, if you want to develop a sort of relentless « ennemy » running after the team of the Characters.
To summarise the scene: according to your choices and / or the dice - the way you let the dice tell the story is in your hands anyway! - friend Game Master, the outcomes are different. It is however rather likely that the Characters come out of it with the promise of a thrashing to be distributed on the day after. In the early morning, again and before the said thrashing, they'll surely receive a « parrot » giving them a new date for the next evening.
If you let the scene be interrupted on the first evening, you'll take the same ones and have the same thing again the night after! And all the story is shifted by one day (which has no consequence at all). For sure, the place for the date will be in the same corner of the island but Poerava will propose a better hidden place and will be all eyes to avoid the same annoying adventures…
Moreover and last but not least, as a good Pirate in becoming as she is, if the one or several Duels she gave the day before were lost by her, she'll request to fight them again. She'll otherwise propose to restart from the last finished one…