(TFT) Solo 1.1

["David Michael Grouchy II" <david_michael_grouchy_ii@hotmail.com>]

Day one
    A trip on a river barge.  You both take passage on a large flat barge 
that is less than a meter above the water.  The river Mississippi is muddy, 
silent, and very strong.  About two kilometers across, entire trees can be 
seen floating down it.

?I know a poem.? Eva says.  ?It?s about love lost and the bayou.?

?It was the month of may.  Far down the Beautiful River.
Past the Ohio shore and past the mouth of Wabash,
into the golden stream of the broad and swift Mississippi,
Floated in cumbrous boat, that was rowed by Acadian boatmen.
With them Evangeline went, and her guide, the Father Felecian.
The Boatmen swerved from their course;
     and entering the Bayou Plaquemine,
Soon were lost in a maze of sluggish and devious waters,
Which, like a network of steel, extended in every direction.
Over their heads the towering and tenebrous boughs and the Cypress
Met in dusky arch, and trailing mosses in mid-air
Waved like banners than hang on the walls of ancient cathedrals.
Deathlike the silence seemed, and unbroken, save by the herons.
Dreamlike and indistinct, and strange were all things around them;
they emerged from the shades; and before them
Lay in the golden sun, the lakes of the Atchafalaya.
Water lilies in myriads rocked on the light undulations
Made by the passing oars, and resplendent in beauty, the lotus
Lifted her golden crown above the head of the boatmen.?

    ?Evageline by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.?  She smiles sadly.
    [hearing the reading of this poem is worth five experience.
     If you wish you may make a 4D vs. IQ to try and memorize the
     poem.  If successfull you get an additional ten experience]

	Latter that day she goes to the captain of the barge.  ?This is it.  There 
is the spot.  Put us ashore there.?  They drop you off on the banks of the 
river.  Your gear and pirogue [pee-row] are off loaded.  ?We have to carry 
the pirogue over the natural levee to the bayou on the other side.?  You put 
your equipment and spear into the pirogue and the two of you carry it up an 
odd little hill into the woodland.
     The side of the river is lined with little hills.  They look quite 
Hobbit like but are natrual.  They are formed by the river floods and 
currents.  Even though it is spring the ground is covered with brown dried 
leaves from oaks, elms, and pines.  You cut between two of the hills 
carrying the pirogue between you.  The forest floor is tangled with ferns, 
vines, and holly but the going is easy.  After about two kilometers, and 
many breaks, you come to the natural levee and the end of the flood plain.  
Both of you move to the front and drag the pirogue up hill.  The ground here 
is fully dry.  The fallen leaves crackle even more.  You are being followed 
by a pack of wolves.
    They are trailing at a distance and you only notice them because Lady 
Eva points them out to you.  They are gray and gangly looking.  Even though 
you can only see two, lady Eva says there are eight of them.  ?When I was 
walking out of the swamp these wolves followed me for the last three days.  
I think they were waiting for me to collapse from hunger.  I can?t believe 
they are still here.?
    This is your chance to use an explosive gem.  If you can get them all 
together.  They are animals and not monsters, so your gift of making 
followers out of monsters will be of no use here.  Lady Eva is a naturalist 
who knows the area and animals well.  She insits that while they may not be 
monsters they are not natural either.  Natural wolves would only have a 
passing curiosity in adults as healthy as you two.  There is far too much 
game to be had for them to bother.  That and why do they look so hungry and 
lean.  She suspects that they have aquired a taste for human flesh and will 
continue to be a problem.
    When you ask her how you can get them all together for one shot, she 
suggests that you climb a tree.  "Wolves and dogs can become very brave when 
they think they have something trapped in a tree."  You leave the pirogue 
and move to a magnolia tree with many low branches.  Climbing the tree is 
very easy (3D vs. DX if you bring your spear).  After about an hour of being 
still the entire pack comes sniffing around the base of the magnolia and the 
pirogue.  One of them rears up, puts his front paws on the tree and looks 
up.  It starts a terrible snarling that sets the rest to a mad barking and 
yipping.  They are now clustered around the base and trying to jump up.
    Lady Eva takes out an arrow and pricks her finger.  She squeezes out a 
single drop and it hits one of the wolves in the nose.  They go into a mad 
frenzy.  Clustering tightly, climbing over each other, and generaly trying 
to climb the tree.  "I thought so." she says.
    You take out a single 5D explosive gem and drop it.  The GM rules that 
droping an explosive gem on a pack of wolves is an automatic hit, but 
because of the intervening branches roll anyway.  On an automatic miss or 
worse, sixteen or greater, you blow up a branch and waste one of the three 
explosive gems.  On a hit roll 5D damage for each wolf.

Pack of eight wolves
ST 15    13    13    12    12    12   11   10    Bite 1+1
DX 14    Fur(1)
IQ  6
MA 12
  [get one experience point for every point of damage done
   if you kill one get its DX in experience also.  The total
   potential experience for killing them all is 232.  Either
   way get 5 experience for learning so much about wolves
   from a naturalist.]

    Evening is close so you grab the pirogue and make some distance from 
the exploded bodies.  About a hundred meters away the ground slopes away and 
you get your first view of the bayou.  She makes a small fire and warms some 
soup.  You clear some spots on the ground for sleeping on.  Siting there 
sipping a bowl of soup you watch the sun sink down behind the trees.  The 
air is lazy and you are tired.  You are going to sleep well this evening.
   [get five experience for time in play and five more for your
    first sunset on the bayou.]



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