It's another mystery! [OPEN]

[tidesnpc]

Characters: The crew of the Winding Way
Content: The prized Golden Fleece has gone missing, and it's up to the Winding Way to investigate!
Setting: All over Jinkston
Time: Various times over the next three days
Warnings: None
Notes: What good investigation doesn't involve questioning NPCs? If you'd like your characters to ask any of the Jinkston

Comments

[drinkitlovelife]

Kurumi had been immediately attracted by the investigation; finally, something interesting was going on. She stepped out of the ship, shielding her eyes from the desert sun, and surveyed the tiny collection of buildings.

"Let's see. What's the most suspicious place?"

look who finally got off her butt and decided to tag :|

[bestpirateevar]

"The bar, like we were talking about before," Haruhi said as she stepped onto the scene, observing a very interesting crack in the wall with her magnifying glass. Yes. A very, very interesting crack! "Or a run down place in town. An old building or warehouse. That would make a good hiding place I should think."

But there had to be something more. She lowered the magnifying glass from her eye and stood up fully, brushing some invisible dirt off her coat. Reaching into one of the coat's pockets, she pulled out a pipe, brought it to her lips, and blew. Now, what was supposed to happen was a stream of bubbles to come shooting out. Instead, all she got was a burst of spuds.

"Ew!" Haruhi pulled the dripping pipe away from her in disgust. "These things never work as advertised. Hana, hold this," she said, holding out the pipe to him. She was an ace detective; she couldn't be bothered with these things!

[ooc: Permission to godmod Hana into the scene is get.]

Following behind~

[d_luffymonkey]

It was only moments after did a certain powder monkey appear behind the trio, flying in from the crow's nest and out to where they were; it wasn't that terribly hard to see them since the town was, well... not a particularly big one. There was something to say about a town that was actually small when you were just at the deck alone instead of the highest part of the ship.

He came just in time as Haruhi passed the pipe to Hanatarou. Luffy looked with a fair amount of interest at the buildings and the outfit that the female brunette was in - this was certainly the first time he and seen her in something like this. "What 'cha doin' now, Haruhi?"

[drinkitlovelife]

Kurumi crossed her arms. "We're trying to find that thing the town lost. Did you see anything that looked like no one had checked there yet?" Why was she asking for help from the idiot? Well, at least it would keep him occupied.

[tiny_tinker_toy]

Okay, time to investigate.

Unlike Haruhi and all of them, Rikku was going about the questioning her own way, namely just going around, asking for information. First step was to figure out just how big this fleece was, where it'd be held, and if the locks had been picked. Then she could go from there.

There was someone! Smiling, Rikku walked over to the townsperson. "Excuse me, I'm trying to figure out what happened to the Fleece. Can you maybe give me some information and stuff, please?"

[tidesnpc]

The person Rikku had approached was a woman in her thirties, wearing a drab cotton dress, her hair up in a loose bun. On her arm was a wicker basket, which held a few various items she had just purchased at one of the stores.

"Oh, that old thing?" The woman asked, with some surprise. "Did Dunward goad you circus folks into helping him? If you ask me, it's not worth looking for. That fleece has gotta be half moth-eaten by now."

[tiny_tinker_toy]

"No, but my captain doesn't want us to get blamed for it," Rikku explained. "How old is it?" If it really was that old, why was the mayor so anxious to find it?

[tidesnpc]

"Like you folks would even want that thing in the first place," she said, shaking her head. There was some sympathy in her tone now, undoubtedly over the idea that a ship like the Winding Way - which was richer than this town, no doubt about it - would want anything to do with a mangy bit of fleece.

"It was Dunward's great-grandpa that first got the fleece, so that's gotta make it about... two hundred years old? Something like that. And that was back when this town was founded."

[fire_water_wood]

Harlequin slipped off the ship wrapped in a piece of burlap to help blend into the drab colors of the barren land and lessen the chance of being spotted. He was small, true, but at the moment, dressed once more in his parti-colored tunic and breeches, even he would have stood out against the landscape like an airship on the white clouds of the sky. There'd been a reason for that, of course.

The buildings here were old and worn, with cracks and crevices breaching the walls. Precious few rodents lived out in this wasteland, but Harlequin didn't need a mouse to show him the way. He drew up to the nearest building, circled it till he found a way in, and dropped the burlap as he crawled inside, peeking around in the comparative indoor gloom before he stood up. Little wooden hands went up to a piece of string wrapped around his neck, checking to make sure his new tag was still tied securely, the piece of cardstock itself brushing the back of his tunic. It was...his disguise, essentially. "Property of the Winding Way - if found,

[tidesnpc]

It was in one of the many barns in Jinkston that Harlequin's search ran into a snag. All was relatively quiet - except for the sheep bleating outside - until the doors suddenly swung open, and in came a boy of about fifteen years or so, clad in old work clothes and sporting sandy blonde hair.

"Now c'mon, Chops!" He laboriously pulled a sheep into the barn after him, not a very large sheep, but it seemed unwilling all the same. "You know you gotta take your vitamins!" Kicking the barn door shut behind him, the boy wiped his brow and looked around in dismay. It was pretty crowded in the small barn, various farming tools fighting for space with bales of hay and wooden boxes.

"... If I could find the stuff."

[fire_water_wood]

Harlequin swallowed a squeak of startled fear and ducked behind a hay bale. It was just one person, though, s-so even if he were caught . . .

One hand reached back over a shoulder to find his tag, making sure it was still there. Yep, still there. Thank goodness. I-if he were caught- He couldn't shake the old terror from if he'd been doing something like this back home. Master Fire-eater-!

Stop it!, he admonished himself. Master Fire-eater wasn't here. That wasn't home, not anymore. The Winding Way was home now, and the captain knew he was out here. Or, well, knew he'd intended to get out here. So, if he was caught, he'd not be punished. Or . . . h-he didn't think so. Still, it'd be best if he just weren't caught at all. The boy would likely be headed for some of the boxes. By comparison, where he was offered little cover if the boy came over this way. As quietly as his little wooden body would allow, the puppet began sneaking for better cover.

[gypsymothdance]

As much as she hated to admit it, Jean really wasn't that great at gathering information or detective work. Not that she didn't like talking to people, but she preferred to be nice and straightforward about it. And at times she had been labeled as a bit naive, and rightfully so. Long story short, she really wasn't cut out for leading a personal investigation.

So, until someone else needed her assistance, she decided she would take the opportunity to at least look around the town. Even if it was a one horse town, after all, there were still plenty of sheep to see. And who didn't like cute, sleepy-eyed sheep and their soft, fluffy wool? They were cute and lulling, the sort of animal you'd want to use as a living pillow.

[sugarforteatime]

He was poking around the town, looking for anything that might get the Way off of the hook. He'd worked very hard over the last months, almost a year, to see to it that the Winding Way would get over their past. They'd gotten away with so much, it seemed ridiculous that it would crumble over something they hadn't even done.

He caught a flash of green hair and headed over to who he had at first glance assumed was his boatswain but was actually Jean. Oh well, no reason the cook couldn't help.

"Have you found anything of note yet? It seems like the towns people are more strange than I had originally anticipated."

[gypsymothdance]

Jean had been thoroughly occupied with feeding a long reed of grass to an adorable little lamb, and so it did not occur to her immediately that she was being addressed, and by the captain of her ship at that. When she realized, she hastily stood up from where she was crouching on the ground and quickly dusted her skirt in case it had picked up any dirt off the ground.

"Not yet, I'm afraid. But I've been mostly talking to the sheep, so..." Though she said it with a jesting tone, as if she were making a joke, she was actually half-serious about that.

[sugarforteatime]

He craned his neck to look at the lamb she had been feeding. "Did they provide any further criminal details or information?"

He was joking as well, he'd learned to do that a little better over the last year, but his tone was a complete and total deadpan. He crouched down to look at the lamb and the rest of the pasture. It was unlikely the fleece could be found here out in the fields, but it was always possible. The gold color would be a dead give away. Perhaps if it had been colored black to temporarily disguise it...?

He went wandering into the pasture to look around, but stayed well within conversational distance.