009 - The Walking Dead
Solana is back in town, trying to keep calm. So there’s a new pillar that’s creating undead, or something. Of course, she’s only really keeping calm because she doesn’t understand just how bad the situation is. Still, this is what she does, sort of: wander around and get into trouble, and she IS very curious about what’s going on. Oh, right, and saving the town. She swears to stop the undead incursion.
Still, she’s just one girl. She’s going to need help, and fast. The guardsfolk, from when she dueled, they seemed impressed. Maybe they’ll listen to her and offer a thing or two.
The guards are mostly dismissive: in fact, patrols haven’t seen any sort of skeletons like Solana has mentioned. Besides, even if there was a real problem, things are tight enough from taxation and supply seizes that they’re stretched too thin. “You want us to play along”, the captain says, “do something about Master Kjeld taking everything we got”. He holds out his shield. “You pull that off and we’d do anything you’d like anyway.”
Olgar’s Stand does have two problems on its hands… Solana places her hand on the shield, and swears to do something about the overly-greedy leaders.
Time to think. Clearly, the local force isn’t the one doing the seizing, or they’d just stop doing it. Who’s in charge of checking these carts and traders and relieving them of their goods, anyway? Solana decides to… loiter around a little, see what she can learn about the finer points of the economy of Olgar’s Stand.
In an alleyway by the market square, Solana bides her time. A stakeout is new to her, and not really her approach to things, but these are powerful people and she’s in their territory. Just people giving things, taking things, the guards inspecting… wait a second, those aren’t the guards she knows at all! Their equipment looks the same, but much more… new, and their voice and behavior are all wrong. These taxmen are completely different folks! Are there two separate armed forces at work here, the one she knows, and this one doing the seizing? Well, if she follows them along, she’ll surely see where the goods go.
Solana attempts to keep a fine distance, hide in the shadows, all those sneaky things. Around and around she goes, trying to keep tabs on her target. Suddenly, two hands grab her shoulders: two large, armored men are behind her. Clearly, she wasn’t as stealthy as she liked to believe. “I think you need to come with us.”
Solana tries to come up with something quickly. Uh, hi! I’m not from around here, I was looking for, the famous, uh… shoe..maker…?
Being pushed much more forcefully than she’d like, Solana was quickly and wordlessly escorted to a sturdy, stone building. Not the more clean, careful structure of a small fortress or keep. The dingy kind, the kind you’d throw prisoners into.
“Asking too many questions” was, apparently, the charge before shoving her into a rather dismal and empty room. “We’ll be back.”
Solana’s strong, but not so strong as to bust apart the wood between her and freedom. The windows are nothing she could fit in, much less climb to. Whatever these bad guys are up too, she made too much noise, asking too much stuff. Who knows what’s happening when they come back for her.
Oh, man…
Mid-Story Commentary
The Walking Dead. Not to be confused with other, better media. Also, this section titled The Walking Dead does not actually feature any walking dead in it. When I was playing, titles are just as often about the things that JUST happened as things that I expected TO happen. This is because when I sat down to play, I'd make a new entry and title it first, then get to playing. I think I played this bit immediately after 008, so the Bonewalker thing was fresh on my memory and I assumed it'd be a lot more involved with this bit than it ended up being.
One thing about Ironsworn is how the consequences of actions aren't always strictly mechanical, and you can adjust the overall hazard of things by how you pay your consequences. So, if I was to Gather Information by snooping around a little and get caught, I don't necessarily have a horrible thing happen immediately, depending on how I want to set the stakes.
For instance, after being caught, I could give myself a chance to get out of it, which also fails, and sends poor Solana into a cell. In other games this could possibly be a game over state, but this is Ironsworn, so there's always a way to get yourself out of something if you strain credibility hard enough.