Waldemar smiled at the confusion. This band of gents was in fact pretty damn interesting. Walking up behind the rest of the crew, Waldemar just managed to see Song volunteer Johnathan as the person to stay on guard. Waldemar decided to cut off his protest.

"Johnathan, I never foresaw you as reliable. I was certain as God that thou would visit upon the gentleladies of the port, but thou Grace sets an example of character that any decent men should follow."

Waldemar smiled at Johnathan, giving a slight bow. Then he turned to the captain and did the same. Waldemar hoped he had spoken properly - he was still unsure of his ability with this language. He relaxed a bit, hoping the captain would force his assholeness to remain in port for this leg of the journey.

"Me and her Dame Nobel both need to visit the Chemikalie and Werkzeug Geschäfte I assume. For I need medicine and she needs Sprengstoff." Now that he was relaxed, the nobleman forgot to stick with one tounge.

Melody quickly looked over to the side, and saw Jonathan's hand raised in the air. Quickly followed was a poetic intercourse from Waldemar. Melody smiled, she knew that Jonathan would fall asleep, so in order to make sure that didn't happen she turned fully to look at Jonathan. "Well Jonathan. I sincerely thank you for sacrificing your time in order for the rest of the crew to enjoy their time on this island. However, due to recent cases and issues, and the nature of this island, I am going to leave you and Milly in charge of the protection of this ship." Melody than looked at Milly, "Milly. I know you might not like this job, so I have an extra task for you. I need you to set up defensive traps when we land at port to send off any curious or unwanted strangers. Also, if you catch Jonathan sleeping, please make sure that he regrets that decision. I trust you'll know what to do?" Melody began to give out more orders, having all the crew prepare for landing.
As the ship eased in to the port, and the locking mechanisms engaged, Melody looked at her crew strewn about the ship. "Alright crew! We aren't going to be staying on this island long. So I am warning you, we will be leaving in 6 hours. I want you all to make sure that it is well spent, meaning: We need food and supplies, we can skip the gunpowder, we have enough; an extra crew member that is crazy enough to follow me, if you can find one. Aside from that, we have evenly split the loot, use your money as you please." With that last word, Melody jumped off the ship onto the port and made her way into the city.

As Melody finished assigning the orders, Char let go Jon's arm, "Ah... How noble of you, Jon-sama, to sacrifice your time for the others..." she said, swooning. Either she wasn't so perceptive or was feigning ignorance, there was no way for them to be sure.

Then, Char went bellow the deck and picked a hooded cloak. It wasn't the most conspicuous cloth ever, given the elaborate brocade that lined the cloak's edge, but it would still be able to hide her face in case the bounty hunters that her father sure must have sent to find her were on port. Also, who would suspect of someone wearing fancy clothes on a pirate port? "The best place to hide a tree is in a forest..." Her father said, when teaching her how to evade taxation, the fact that he was so good a teacher that his lessons could be used against him was quite the irony in Char's opinion.

Nevertheless, when Char got back at the deck she said, "Minnie-san, please take care of Jon-sama for me, you're the only person that I trust to do that on this ship." Hidden within Char's words was the message, "Since you two wouldn't be doing anything with this sorrowful body, anyway. Hehehe."
Then Char strode happily towards the port, while saying (a little louder than needed), "Now then, Pico what should we do today? I know it, I was really needing a new bra, anyway..." Before striding into the city.

"Wh-what?"

She... she was going to stay behind on the ship?! But that sucked! She wanted to go into the port, too... Milly frowned deeply, and couldn't even open her mouth before her captain lept off the side of the boat and headed into town. That just... just... Hmph. All that the tiny white-haired girl could think is that Melody better make it up to her, whether it be through explosives, sweets, the potential new crew member being a pretty girl(they were nicer to look at then the male crew members, that was for sure), or the new potential new crew member being a pretty girl carrying explosives and sweets.

... Actually, that last possibility was really something, especially the explosives. Milly wasn't entirely sure why the thought of pretty girls carrying explosives made her so happy. Then again, she did like pretty girls(and feel a bit jealous of some of them even if she totally was just a late bloomer) and explosives independently, though she didn't express the former as much as the latter(it got a little embarrassing sometimes, what would people think? After all, no-one ever thought she was strange or weird now, right? Right?). Maybe both together was some kind of multiplier.

Of course, Milly was swiftly snapped out of her rather odd thought process when Charlotte yet again called her "Minnie" her long twintails seeming to move on their own from the sheer force of her irritation, her slight hands balled into fists and thrust down at her sides as she leaned towards the other girl, who proceeded to add insult to injury and mention that she was planning on buying a new bra. "Grrr... you... you..."

So irritated was the explosives-loving girl, that the only retort she could think of was sticking her tongue out, before folding her arms and swiftly turning away with a pout.

... At least there was whatever Johnathan had wanted to show her... maybe whatever explosive it surely was would make up for all this? ... And time to lay traps... Oh, she could have some fun with that...

She could even see how many she could pack into Charlotte's room. Not anything lethal, of course, but flashbangs were unpleasant and left a clear 'Don't call me Minnie' message.

~Song~

With a flick of her hair, she smoothly brushed past Jonathan, not even acknowledging his pleas for help.

Heading off into the city, she made a checklist of things she needed to get done. She needed her sword sharpened, wanted to pick up some apothecary supplies, and if she could find any, could definitely use some more paper for folding…

~Jonathan~

He huffed. He sighed. He harrumphed. He cleared his throat, folded his arms over his chest, and watched the rest of the crew depart off into Falis Island. How dreadful. Especially if Waldemar would return with a triumphant smile, victorious in his romancing.

Adjusting the lapels of his coat in resignation, he turned to Milly, who seemed flustered at first, but suddenly brightened up on her own. “Well, I suppose you and I will just have to find some way to entertain ourselves for six hours,” he said, with a defeated smirk. “It wouldn’t do to just sit around and stare at the port all day.”

He then remembered what he had said to Milly earlier that morning. “Oh. Actually, follow me. I’ll show you what I was talking about earlier.”

Jonathan made to descend below deck with Milly in tow, heading to his room. As he walked, his cocky demeanor began to fall away a bit, replaced with a calm, clear minded expression. He had no intention of wooing the young white haired girl, so he dropped the show. If one were to meet Jonathan in this state, they would mistakenly assume that he was a respectable, humble gentleman.

“Ah here we are,” Jonathan said as they reached his room. “I apologize in advance for the mess, but I was up late last night working, and nodded off without realizing.”

He opened the door, revealing that his cabin was far from a mess. In fact, it nearly sparkled from cleanliness. His years of growing up in a pristine mansion had caused him to become unnerved when things were out of place, so he impulsively took it upon himself to ensure that his bed was tightly made, and nothing littered the floor. Though it was small, Jonathan’s adept eye for spacing made his room appear a bit larger than it actually was. An elegant lamp gently lit the room, highlighting the subtly ornate rug that Jonathan had spread across the floor. In the corner was a neatly arranged desk with resistors, power supplies, gears, and all sorts of mechanical-electrical components laid out for easy reach. A strange disk like contraption sat in the center of the workspace.

“Now this, Ms. Nobel, is what I call the roto-bomber, for lack of an official name,” Jonathan said proudly, as he picked the gadget up and spun it around in his hands. “An effective combination of an impact spring mechanism with timed charge pump ignition, if I do say so myself. I spent quite a bit of time perfecting the timing delay across the resistor network to match the ignition to the release time, and I also put a tremendous amount of thought into making sure the centripetal force detection didn’t accidentally--”

“Ah,” Jonathan stopped himself, realizing that he was about to fall into tinkering mode and bore Milly to death. He got a bit too excited about his own inventions.

“Well, really, the point of all this is to say that when you throw the roto bomber like a discus, the mechanism inside will cause it to greatly accelerate rotation and go farther than you could normally throw it,” said Jonathan, demonstrating how to toss it. “Inside, the roto-bomber carries 12 small spheres for each orientation on the clock face, which you can time the release of. Upon release, the 12 spheres will self-ignite and be launched a calibrated distance between 10 to 30 feet away from the disk. I’m sure you can understand the value proposition in this invention- essentially, it’s a small timed bomb with a potential 100 foot effective blast radius.”

Jonathan pulled out one of the spheres. “Now this is where I’d gladly appreciate your assistance,” he said, handing the sphere to her. “I must admit that I’m not quite the expert in incendiaries that you are, and I was hoping that you’d be able to choose the right sort of explosive substances to fill these with, so that optimum blast radius can be achieved without destroying the roto-bomber itself. Assuming that the roto-bomber doesn’t self implode, it should be indefinitely reusable.”

Through all of this though, Jonathan had left the top of the ship unguarded...

@VitaVitaAR

Simone smirked at Jon's anguish in his situation. He might have felt bad for him if Jon wasn't so easy to laugh at. He wasn't a bad guy by any means, in fact Simone found him rather interesting, but he was just too easy a target sometimes. Oh well, nothing he could do. He adjusted his coat to make sure it wouldn't be uncomfortable as he thought of what they needed. Once he finished with his adjustments he nodded at Jon and Milly as he began to get off deck.

"I'll bring back something tasty for you two, something spicy maybe? Au revoir." He called out to the now guards as he got off of the ship and onto the port, also making his way to the city. He inhaled deeply and sighed contently. New city, new possibilities. He planned on tracking down some type of food market and getting some supplies, but he might need help getting all if it back to the ship. After that, the world was his oyster. Maybe he'd grab something to drink to cool himself down, if this weird crew could manage to keep itself out of trouble long enough for him to do that. Maybe a fight wouldn't break out today, but maybe that was just wishful thinking. As he thought more, he suddenly remembered something.

"Any special requests for food before I buy it and you guys get pissed because I didn't get anything you like? Nothing over the top, but I can splurge a bit here." He called out to the crew before they separated too much from each other so they could hear him. "If not I'll work something out." He shrugged nonchalantly.

Waldemar was a honorable man and went off first to secure medicinal herbs. The nobleman had not lied when he said that they were low; a serious wound without them could lead to a crew member's death via infection. Death by infection was only suitable for devils and Johnathan, and not a single other person.

He didn't reply to the question about food; in all honesty Waldemar trusted both Char's and the normal cook's prowess in the kitchen. If one thing was good about the ship, it was the luxury cuisine with every meal.

Milly was rather eager to follow Johnathan down to his work desk, the thoughts of rigging Charlotte's room with flashbang traps pushed to the back of her mind. She was even more eager when Johnathan revealed his device. Something of an inventor herself(albeit with a much more narrow field and none of her inventions being intended to survive their usage), she was fascinated, and naturally the applications got her excited. So much brilliant fiery destruction in a massive circle all around the disk! Aaah, it was enough to make desire swell in her heart, desire to cause things to erupt into brilliant fireballs and leave destruction in their wake... But naturally, she had to give her advice.

Of course, Milly had plenty of experience with creating explosives that were purpose-built. Most could blow out in any direction, but in other cases there needed to be some more finesse. Taking down a door, for example, required the explosive force to be directed to the door and no-where else. Well, unless Milly didn't care about damaging whatever was around the door. There'd been a few times where she stuck a sticky bomb to the handle and lit it without a second thought.

Eyes shining with excitement, the tiny girl began.

"That's amazing!" she cried, "A circular explosive delivery system... a complete three-hundred-sixty degree range... Haaah~ I can feel my heart beating faster and faster just thinking about using this thing!"

Her cheeks flushed and her hands at her sides, Milly was practically shaking with just how eager she was to be able to test the device out. "... Of course, you couldn't use it at close range unless there was some way to only trigger the explosives facing away from you, which is defeating the main purpose of the disc shape in the first place... if you used shaped charges you could direct the blast outwards and the disc wouldn't be harmed, but that could be tricky... the payload you'd need is hard to judge without seeing how far it can shoot the explosives out... but this is still amazing!"

"Hmm... I think you've made a little mistake here, isn't it, sir?" Char had a devious grin on her lips as she pressured an old, slightly fat and half bald man, who happened to be a jewel trader, "The exchange rate of these gems is a little off, don't you think? The three small ones should be worthy 200 gold each, while this one should be 500. Together they should make up to eleven hundred gold pieces, minus the 10% exchange fee... the final amount should be of eleven ninety gold. So, why is it that there's only 965 pieces on this bag?" She said while jiggling the bag of coins in front of the man.

"You're crazy, little girl! I counted them in front of you, there's precisely eleven ninety gold there. If you keep on trying to scam me I'll have to call the port security." The plump man snorted and cold sweat dripped from his brow. He couldn't believe someone had seen through his trick so easily, much less a girl barely out of her diapers.

"Oh yes, please do that," Char said with a provocative voice, taunting the man, "while we're on it, why don't I show them those 25 gold plated steel coins that you've thrown together with the others? I'm sure they would love to know about it." She twirled her right index over the man's street stall counter and looked at him with upturned coy eyes, for all that would be looking, she would be just a gentle, innocent girl. However, only the man could see the devilish smirk that was below the her hood.

It was common sense that it was the loser's woe to be caught cheating in business, Char knew it all too well and she was sure that the man knew it too, the look on his eyes said that he was prepared to have his own blood sucked in order to preserve his business' reputation.

"Now then, how about we discuss the way you'll compensate me..." Chaser said while flashing her best merchant's smile, however the man saw nothing but the fangs of a money vampire.

Melody didn't bother to look behind herself as she left the ship. They were all adults, except for known few members of her crew. Melody didn't exactly like the fact that Char was running around in this lawless cesspool by herself. She really didn't care too much, she knew that Char had her ways, but then again, pirates did too. Melody smirked as she made her way across the island, she knew there were people staring at her, and why wouldn't they? She had a bounty on her head, and although it wasn't very high (5000 gold) but it was enough to make pirates and low level bounty hunters consider making a quick pay day. She hoped they would try, none of these idiots could come close to capturing her.
Melody stopped in front of a small store hidden behind a bunch of crates located in a corner in the middle of the island. She walked in and a familiar voice greeted her. "Ahhh... Is that Melody? An old guy walked up from behind the counter his small stature making him seem even smaller in the dimly lit space. Melody knew that it would be a bad idea to try stealing from here. THe old man was small, but he had many ways and traps in order to get even. She politely said hello to the man and continued, "Mark, do you have any more music disks?" The old already knew who his customer was, and although she frequented the store, he always managed to have at least 1 disc for sale to his friendly customer. She bought the only one Mark had, for 2000 gold. These discs were rare, and Melody was out to create a massive collection. Once she had bought the disc, she continued on going around town, hitting up a few bars, singing at some others for a quick pay, and then came back tot the ship with 10 minutes left before the 6 hour deadline. She didn't even try to enter the ship, instead she called out Milly. Melody didn't want to have to mess with the various traps on the ship She was after all carrying precious cargo.

~Jonathan~

When Milly responded enthusiastically, Jonathan beamed, albeit mildly surprised. This was the first time in a very long while that anyone had taken one of his inventions seriously! Song only shot down the logical fallacies behind his inventions, so he appreciated being able to share his creations with an aficionado. Perhaps he didn't have to worry about boring Milly with technical jargon after all!

"Yes, good points for sure. Depending on how you load it, it'll take some thought to make sure that you're not anywhere near it when it goes off," Jonathan agreed. "For closer range though, I think it would be best to just throw a normal bomb, and use the roto-bomber only as a long distance specialty weapon that just blows everything to oblivion- all in good fun. I put it together in the discus shape and designed the internal acceleration so that you could hopefully launch it much further than you could throw- perhaps even further than the average marksman's accurate gun range, say 200-300 feet, if you give it enough of a heave. It's always nice to take out your enemies from afar, though you can't quite feel the explosions as intimately, I'm afraid."

"But now that you mention it, the ability to remotely control the launch of individual spheres would be incredibly useful," Jonathan put his hand to his chin. "You could throw the roto bomber into the middle of a battle, and wait until the opportune time to launch them if you had some sort of controller... It could almost be a game of sorts! I'll give this some more thought. I’ve recently been experimenting with using radio waves as control signals. Maybe this would be a good use for it."

"The directional charges might be a good idea as well. There’s also the case where the disk launches a sphere, but the sphere hits something and detonates near the roto bomber... though again, a controller would solve that problem."

"Ah payload wise, as I mentioned earlier, you can adjust how far the disk will shoot the spheres out between 10-30 feet, and adjust accordingly, though it's probably best to keep the roto bomber as light as possible by keeping the spheres themselves light. One of the nice things is that you can be quite versatile with this contraption. Load it up with flashbangs, fireworks, cupcakes even."

“But what’s a good invention without a bit of collaboration? Why don’t you hold on to the roto bomber and tinker with it how you like. Ultimately, I think you’ll be the one with the most use for it,” Jonathan said with a knowing grin. “I’ll keep looking into radio waves, though perhaps you may find an opportunity to use it before I figure anything out.”

With that, Jonathan let Milly off to her own devices, and begun fiddling away with antennae at his desk.

@VitaVitaAR

~Song~

On her way to the apothecary, Song caught sight of the young german noble. While he wasn’t the easiest to read, she appreciated his presence aboard the ship. The little rivalry that Waldemar and Jonathan had begun to form kept her traveling mate just a little bit more on his toes.

She gave him a nod of recognition and a light smile, but didn’t quite know what else to say to start a friendly conversation.

@RabidAnubis

"Guess I'll work something out." He said as he shrugged yet again and made his way into the town. He didn't have any real fear of being recognized as a pirate, after all, he was simply buying food. That wasn't exactly suspicious activity, unless no one actually ate around here. He felt the coin purse attached to his hip, the coins jingling and bouncing against his leg. Simone walked down various streets looking for some place to buy some food supplies, and wondering how he was going to get it all back to the ship once he got it. He watched the people stroll past him, almost a little wary, keeping a hand on his coins. Eventually, after a few minutes of searching he found a nice food store.

Simone strolled about the interior, taking it all in, thinking about what they needed. He didn't look forwards to dragging it all back to the ship and what not, but he supposed it was necessary. He bought a couple of small bags to carry his food in and set off to work at finding what he wanted. He quickly started grabbing what he thought he needed from one stall, muttering to himself as he did.

"Need that, that, and that, definitely that. Got any chili powder?" He asked quickly, before realizing there was a jar off to the corner. "Thank you very much." Simone mumbled as he slid it over to the rest of his pile. There was more than enough meat to choose some, and he grabbed some that originated from quit a few animals for variety. "How much do I owe you for all of this?"

"That would be..." The merchant counted it all up. "320 gold coins"

Simone whistled in slight shock. "All right, I suppose that's fair enough." He counted out and gave him the right amount of gold for the mass amount of food he got. Now... how the hell to haul it all back? He sighed loudly as he sorted it meticulously into bags and looked at them all around. "All right, I saw a cart outside. I assume that's yours right?" The shop keep nodded warily. "I'm going to borrow it, gotta get all of this food back somehow. You'll find it at the port, see you." He tossed an extra few coins to the shop keep and dragged his food haul to the cart outside. After loading it all up he started on his way, hauling the cart behind him. He made it all the way to the ship with the cart and hauled it on board, before loading the kitchen up. He had managed to get all kinds of fruit, vegetable, meat, spices and even some booze. he pushed the cart off of the ship and back onto the port nonchalantly and made his way back to the kitchen. There went his trip, he supposed. He decided he had a little time left here, and with that he would try his hand at cards in town.

He made his way back in and quickly found a gambling place; far faster than he found a food place. He got in and sat down at a card table, ready to try his luck and he placed his bet and got his hand.

The applications of the roto-bomber were so vast and explosive that Milly couldn't help but be more and more excited. Toss it into a large room and shut the door, no-one would be walking out of there depending on how you use it and you'd probably knock the walls out depending on the explosive payload packed into the device. Same situation but to avoid lethality, flashbangs would render everyone in the room deaf and blind! For a little while, at least. And of course, a radio wave system would make it even simpler, not just for the roto-bomber but also for any explosives. Right now, Milly had to rig her traps with complicated long-range ignition methods, but if all she had to do was send a radio wave to them, that would make for even more rapid fiery annihilation!

"Aaaah~ Thank you Johnathan!" she exclaimed cheerfully as she took the device, "I'll take good care of it!"

With that, she headed back to her room to put the roto-bomber down for later tinkering. Perhaps there was an even better way to ensure the explosives had more range without harming the disc itself... For now, she had a job to do. Starting with Charlotte's room.

It was a little while later when Melody returned. She peered over the side of the ship at the captain, and gave her a cheerful wave before setting out to disarm her traps.

Moments later, with a collection of sticky bombs and grenades reclaimed, the white-haired girl couldn't help but ask.

"What did you get?!"

"Isn't the life of piracy amazing, Pico?" Char said while scratching that underside of Pico's neck while walking through the crowded streets of the marketplace with practiced easy. Despite her father never knowing about that, Char was used to slipping away during business trips and walking through markets, warehouses and other such places on her own. It was during these excursions that she acquired her roguish knack and a good deal of her talking skills, with thieves and merchants that she met here and there.

"kuru!" Pico chirped pleased by his owner's petting and rubbed his face against Char's cheek, making her giggle happily in return. The reason for Char's happy mood was easily, she managed to make that pig-like man buy her gems for fifteen hundred and forty gold, minus the transaction fee (since Char is a good girl she paid it, of course), this brought her to thirteen eighty six gold, a net of forty percent wasn't something to scoff at so easily, after all.

Anyway, Char walked down the streets until she found the places that she were looking for, first a couturier where she could get a made to order bra as well as a dress fitting a girl of about her size. When she walked into the store, Char was immediately greeted by a corset wearing, scrawny looking man of all things, "Bonjour, mademoiselle! What Pierre can do for such a lovely flower, this early inn the morning?"

"Bonjour, master. I'd like to order a special dress as well as some lingerie, if it would not be a trouble."

"Absolutely not, mon chéri. In fact, Pierre would be honoured to sew une robe to une jolie fille such as you." Char quickly came to notice that trying to piece this Pierre's words together was about as hard as trying to understand Waldemar's casual talk. Sure the two gentlemen would make for quite an entertainment if placed on the same table along with a bottle of wine and some other refreshments, Char thought. She made a mental note of arranging this meeting on the next available opportunity, but now she had more pressing matters at hand.

"Actually, the clothes that I want aren't for me, master. But you can still make them with my measurements, as the body type of their future owner is almost like mine... well, except for the bust..." Char them gave the queer man the needed measurements and paid half of the extra high fee, for the speedy job, before going out of the store, "I'll come back to pick the clothes in no time, master. By the way, do you know where I can find a fireworks merchant here?"

Moments later...

Char found herself in a back alley, in front of a store that reeked of gunpowder and glue, where a signboard written in characters whose Char couldn't even begin to fathom the meaning hanged precariously against the wooden eave.

"Yup, I bet that she would be squealing right now if she saw that place." Char thought as she pushed the door open, the jiggling of the small bell attached to it denouncing her intrusion, "Hi there, is the master of this shop here?"

"What's your desire, young one?" A long bearded old man wearing an eastern robe came in through the back door, to greet Char.

"I'd like some fireworks. Scratch that, I'd like lots of fireworks, in fact. And I'd like them big and pretty. Do you have any around, master?"

"Ho ho ho, who do you think you're talking to, youngling?" The man asked as he motioned Char to come with him to the storage room. Inside of it there were more bombs and all manner of explosive contraptions that Char had ever seem packed in one single place, including Milly's "bedroom". In fact, Char coul bet that if someone lit a flame here, a good half of the flying city would be blown out of the skies.

"Yup, definitely her kind of place." Char said absent minded as she went about choosing some good looking fireworks.

After that, Char finished her round through the city by going to a pastry store and buying a freshly baked birthday cake, though since carrying this much stuff to the ship would prove tough to someone of her size, Char paid a few coins to dumb looking brute that was carrying heavy boxes around to carry her things for her until she got back to the Stormsong.

"Aren't you excited, Pico?" Char said as she reviewed her plan.

It all began yesterday when Char found out Milly's birthday date (which just happens to be today) while was prowling through the ship's logs and diaries trying to correct Melody's horrendous financial accounts. After the captain said that they would be stopping at Fallis Island to restock today, Char came up with a plan to surprise Milly (and everyone else, since they all forgot about it) on her own. First: she would harass Milly and cause as much trouble as possible inside the ship, so that no one had a chance to remember, second: she would bring the party supplies to the ship, third: they would rock out all night, fourth: ???, fifth: profit.

"This is going to be a blast even Milly-san won't forget, hehehe!" Char chortled deviously as she boarded the Stormsong again.

After she got back into the ship, Char looked around to see if there was anyone around, she had to wait until they had departed the port if she wanted to really surprise everyone. She had the random brute carry her box of things to the ship's treasury and hide it there, since only she and Melody had the key to the door and knew how to disarm the traps that Milly set up there.

Once Char saw the brute off the ship, she spun on her heels and went to her room to get a fresh set of clothes before going to the bathroom to wash off the sticky sensation of sweat clinging to her skin. However, just as she pushed the door of her wardrobe open...

BANG!

Char stood there for several moments completely disoriented, her ears ringing that it seemed like her brain out burst and her vision was nothing but a white pan. She could feel that Pico was flaying around in the floor near her too, sure the effect of whatever hit them was much greater in he than it was on her. Then she tripped over the edge of her bed and fell face-first into the floor, knocked unconscious by the force of the impact.

"Huh!? Mama? No... an angel?" Char said a little delirious as she started to regain her senses, and the blurred image of beautiful girl was in front of her eyes, when she finally could make who was it in front of her, Char said, "No... it's... Milly-san!?" Char's face was slightly flushed as she remembered the flashbang and she looked in Milly's eyes before saying, "It was you who did...that?"

As she waited for the other girl to answer her, Char stood still with slightly flushed cheeks, she may never have admitted it to anyone yet, but the truth is that Char was quite like into these kinds of things (S&M things, she meant), and to have Milly do something like this to her right before her surprise birthday party...

"Ahhh~~~ Jon-sama! Where are you when I need you the most?"

Cards was something Simone was good at, and he likes to play it. His opponents? Not so much. He had one a few too many time and they were starting to get curious as to how this kid was pulling this off against these veteran players. Truth be told, Simone was just kind of lucky, and used to play cards in his free time as a kid for something to do. It was when Simone nonchalantly laid down another winning hand that they got upset. He swept the pot over to himself again and shrugged.

"I guess I'm done. You guys have fun." Simone said as she dumped all the gold coins into his coin bag with the rest. He hadn't made too much extra, but it was money none the less. It was then he saw the knife slam down into the table.

"You cheated, you think we're gonna let you leave after that?"

"Don't blame your lack of skill on me, I have a ship to catch and I really can't stick around." Simone shot back.

"Don't you dare." Another said as he stood up, drawing a knife as well.

"Bye." Simone said as he took a step back, and the others started after him angrily. Sighing, he turned and ran out the door. These guys weren't worth hurting, so he'd out run them and be done with it. Just out run five angry poker players who feel cheated, he'd done worse in his sleep. He took off down the street, faster than they could follow but not bothering to go near top speed. He veered right and jumped onto the counter of a market stall, then again to it's canopy, and with a final leap to the building beside it.

Now he was faster and high above the cranky cards players. Turning his head, Simone saw then falling behind and scratching their heads on what happened and it caused it him to burst out laughing for some reason. There he was, sprinting across rooftops while laughing like an idiot, way too keep low profile. He hopped off the last roof and rolled to his feet before sprinting the last stretch of the port onto the ship. At the least he had made up for the price of food. He heard a bang somewhere in the ship and just assumed it was Milly's doing, oh well.

Waldemar looked at Song, a bit confused about her. She gave off the common sign of greeting then said absolutely nothing. Does she not know the common language well? Does she think I'm too incompetent to understand? However, her slight smile made her doubt the second one - she really seemed to be a friendly soul. "Hi, need help with what you are looking for?"

"Ah, no I was just going to pick up a few herbs for some supplements," Song replied with noticeable relief. She was glad that Waldemar approached her. She hadn't yet spoken to him, though she was intrigued by his background. "What are you here for?"

Waldemar shrugged. "Oh? I'm the ships medic. Have to get some stuff for that." She seemed to be acting a little off... was she usually this tense?

Song noticed that she was making Waldemar uncomfortable, but didn't quite know what to say. "Oh, right. That's very important, in case someone gets hurt." Obviously. What a dumb thing to say, she thought. She was totally winning at this conversing with new people thing. Why was talking to her incompetent traveling mate so easy compared to this?

She let the silence trail off for several awkward seconds before changing the subject. "Ah wait, I've been meaning to ask about your accent. Where is it from? I've heard it before, but I never had the chance to find out what country it originates in."

This was the definition of awkward. A few second of silence passed.

Waldemar shrugged. A more interesting question now. It wasn't really a secret. "I come from an area known as the Reichland. Not many of my people end up out here. Not surprised that you can't place my voice. Yourself? You seem a little culturally different from the others."

She brightened up a bit. "Oh, yes, I've heard of the Reichland before," She replied with interest, feeling herself loosen up. "Ah, and I don't mean to say that your voice is strange. In fact, I think it sounds quite nice, compared to a certain someone's voice I know." She smirked a bit, hoping that they could find common ground in their mutual annoyance with Jonathan.

At his next question though, Song's demeanor again grew icy. She avoided the gaze of Waldemar's single blue eye as she hesitantly offered, "I'm descended from people that live in the far east, a land called Zhong Guo." She didn't know if this was true or not, but it seemed like a reasonable story to offer in place of admitting that she didn't have a past. However, it was apparent that she was lying.

Waldemar nodded, catching it. However, he figured she had a reason for her secrets just as he had his own. "So what exactly is your relation with him? If I understand correctly you two are fairly close, yes?" Was she just giving off small sisterly complaints about Johnathan? That didn't seem like Song, but he did see them pick on each other quite a bit.

Thankfully, Waldemar didn't pry any further. "Oh, we come in a package deal," Song said unironically. "I'm the brains, and he's-- well, I'm also the brawn, but he just owes me for-- well, There was this transaction that he didn't come through on, and I'm just following him to make sure that I get what he promised."

She sighed, realizing that whenever Jonathan came up, she really had no shortage of words. Without thinking though, she continued, absentmindedly leafing through the medicine pouches in the shop. "To be honest though, I realized a long time ago that he'd never be able to keep his promise," Song said wistfully. "So sometimes I wonder why I still follow him around. Though he has a laundry list of irksome behavioral issues, it's not like he really needs me. He got along just fine in the three years before he found me."

She picked out two pouches of herbs, and fiddled around with them as she spoke. A bit of melancholy set in over her cat like eyes, and she tucked a loose strand of black hair behind her ear. "I also wonder what I am to him, and what he is to me. Business Partners? Acquaintances? Friends? Siblings? Lo..."

She trailed off before she finished, as she realized that Waldemar had been listening to the whole thing. Her eyes widened, and she dropped the medicine pouches on the floor. A subtle blush crept in over her cheeks.

Waldemar listened attentively while she spoke, surprised that she was so open to the subject. From what he knew of her, she was quiet and secluded. On this topic though, she gave an extremely detailed explanation. And then she blushed. By the almighty, she may actually have real emotions. She definitely has deeper feelings than friendship towards Johnathan. The nobleman picked up her package, and then threw it in his small satchel. "I needn't bother you further. Our allies may be awaiting us however, so perhaps we should retreat to our fortress?"

"Ah Y-Yes, that's a good idea," Song replied. She noticed that Waldemar had picked up the medicine she was holding, but didn't think it would be right to refuse his kindness. "And thank you. Ah... but make sure you don't tell anyone about this, alright?" She let Waldemar pay for the medicine, then hurried back to the ship, forgetting that she also intended to buy folding paper on her trip to the port.

Waldemar headed back to the ship after a quick trip for some liquor. That girl indeed was confusing.

As Melody walked onto the Stromsong, Milly bustled back and forth disarming all of her traps. "A little excessive in your traps don't you think Milly?" Milly just giggled a little as she disarmed her last trap. Milly, curious as ever, then inspected Melody's package, "What did you get?" Melody was about to answer the question when a loud BANG! followed by a light erupting from below deck. Melody turned her head to Milly and cocked an eyebrow, "Who got the BANG this time huh?" Melody shook her head and just and continued on towards her cabin door. After entering her sanctum, he opened a part of her closet and deposited the precious music disc along with the many others. She didn't know what songs where recorded on the disk, but she would find out tonight.
Melody left her cabin and got back on deck. Looking at the large clock posted at port, she could tell that the designated 6 hours had passed. Waldemar and Song boarded the ship just barely before Melody started the ships engines. "Cutting it a bit close eh? She let out a laugh and had the ship leave port. Shortly after they had taken to the air, destination unknown, Melody's stomach growled. She then began to wonder what was for dinner?

The moment she heard the "bang" of her trap going off, Milly excitedly rushed off to Charlotte's bedroom. If she'd planned things out right, the trap would have gone off the moment that the other girl opened her wardrobe. Obviously, it was invariable that Charlotte would do such a thing at some point, and Milly knew it would happen at some point. But this quickly? It was perfect, absolutely perfect! Hands out at her sides as she ran, grinning widely, the white-haired girl found the door and happily pushed it open, striding inside. There was Charlotte, knocked senseless by the flashbang trap. She felt a little guilty, both for how hard it had hit(she hadn't expected Charlotte to trip and bump her head) and for the fact that the other girl's pet dragon had been caught up in the blast, but at least Charlotte deserved it!

Arms folded, she stood over the recovering girl confidently. It had all gone according to plan! For the most part, at least.

"Of course it was me," she said, "Who else could rig a flashbang trap like that on this ship? Hopefully it'll let you know not to call me 'Minnie'!"

... Charlotte sure was blushing a lot... what was up with that? Maybe she was embarrassed to end up like this... Well, if she laid off the 'Minnie' stuff, it wouldn't happen again!

"Remember, I'm just a late bloomer!"

Simone was still giggling to a degree as he made it to his hammock area. He popped open his foot locker and put away his well earned cash, locking it up incase anyone got any wise ideas. He settled down a bit as he crawled into his hammock and laid back for a moment. He pondered what the next destination was now, since the last had been (besides a brief chase) largely uneventful. He closed his eyes and pulled his hood down low over his eyes as he brought his mind to his actual job on the ship, cooking. Right, he had to cook something before the crew got too hungry and irritable, which happened for some sooner than others. He swung his legs over to the side and dropped to the floor, starting for the kitchen.

Simone crossed the deck in the sun and to the kitchen. He thought over some ideas for a meal tonight, and decided he had his mind set on something spicy, which he luckily had gotten the supplies for. He made it to the kitchen and went for the door to the food storage room. As he reached for the handle, he heard some movement behind the door. With that he cautiously swung the door open to find a young looking dark-haired boy among the food.

"What the hell?" Simone exclaimed at the sight of him. A stowaway?

Aedos dropped the orange he was munching on when the door opened. There in the doorway, was a fairly tall, somewhat built teenager staring at him. "What the hell?" He could hear the guy say. Aedos didn't know what to do, he had no idea where he was, all he knew was that he was hungry and that he woke up in a storage closet. Afraid that the other guy might do something, Aedos quickly held out both of his hands in front of him and chanted a few words. The next thing Simone knew, he was blinded by a bright flash of light, while Aedos, on the other hand, skillfully shielded his. Now that the man was blinded, Aedos rushed past him and up the the stairs. He needed to find some place to hide for a bit, so he could figure out what was going on. He left the guy in the kitchen and ambled his way up the stairs, looking behind him to see if the guy was following Aedos rammed head first into something on the stairs.

---

Melody put the ship in a hover state, as she had no idea where to go at the moment and she was hungry. She didn't trust her crew to fly her ship, and stubbornly enough, she hadn't taught anyone yet either. "I should really train a new helmsman someday."Melody muttered to herself as she leapt of the healm and made her way towards the kitchen below deck. She had just entered the stairs when a strange person ran headfirst into her legs. Although the person was moving pretty fast, Melody didn't even budge an inch, nor did she really feel the collision. What caught her attention was the sound of something falling down the stairs. Sighing, she made her way down the stairs to the kitchen. "How many times do I have to tell Milly not to leave her bo..." She stopped talking to herself when she saw a boy, huddled at the bottom of the stairs, obviously in pain. "Simone! Where are you! What's for dinner?" Melody walked over Aedos' body like it wasn't even there. Melody was hungry, and when she was hungry, there wa hell to be loosed on those that tried to stop her from eating. Melody found Simone just recovering from the blinding flash. Walking over she helped Simone up and asked what happened. Simone then explained the stowaway situation and Melody went back to the entrance of the kitchen and looked at Aedos who was still huddled on the ground. "Wha? Your saying that this pipsqueak beat you?" Despite her size and frame, Melody had no problem lifting Aedos of the ground into the air with 1 arm. She then walked him up the stairs and threw him on the upper deck. She left him there and walked back down to the kitchen. She ordered Simone to stop dawdling and to start cooking. Once she confirmed that Simone was indeed cooking, she went back up the stairs and called everyone, except for Simone to the deck.

They had a stowaway on board.