Vessel

How big are vessels?

• Every size? (Tiny islands to entire continents, which are rarer)
• General island size?

What brings all these people together who hate eachother?

• Pirates yes but what’s stopping them from shanghaiing the first ship they come across and fucking off in their own separate directions

World

• Every landmass on the planet has an engine and a ship’s bridge attached

  • People on these islands often fight eachother for control of the island bridges, marauding pirates can get small islands and hijack other ones
  • Some are natural land with engines attached, some are a mix of manmade and nature, and some are a patchwork of metal and diesel and steel
  • These landmasses are called “vessels”
  • Each vessel has its own unique feel, it doesn’t have to be totally distinct but there has to be an awareness that something’s different

• Magma bombs, nasty piece of work

  • Only efficient way to kill a vessel
  • Pretty brutal quite frankly

Characters

• Every character constantly clashes and pretty much hate each other

  • Every main character and most side characters have cynical edges due to the harsh conditions of this world

• NO know-it-all types who invariably become lightning rods for all inter-personal conflict

• Azni

  • An optimistic nihilist trying masquerading as a pessimistic nihilist

  • Likes to act the leader but really sucks under pressure

    • Despite this she is pretty much the only thing that’s keeping people together and mediating disputes

  • After what the pirate captain did, she promises to have him dead within a year

  • Is a bit of a planner and schemer, likes to plan shit in advance for a payoff of mixed success

  • Has the Azni horn, her namesake, as a chekhov’s gun for the end when she frees her people, who in turn free everyone else.

• Leo

  • First scooby member is the artist/old man who was on the deck when they attacked, and might have the painting that depicts who they are

  • Basically this is who I imagine Leonardo Da Vinci to be like, an anti-social loser who is really good at what they do

  • Also old, can’t forget old

    • Old but kicks ass like the priest from firefly?

  • NOT a father figure for Azni, don’t be lazy

• Ferd(inand)

  • Second scooby member is a SUAVE SPANIARD MAN (In feel not in reality)
  • First thing he does is hit on the Azni so he really doesn’t have any shame
  • Physically the strongest of the group but doesn’t have any fighting ability
  • Compensating for something, obviously
  • “Ferdinand? Three syllables, that’s just stupid.”

• Gil

  • Bitter apathy type

  • Doesn’t want to die, but is also too miserable to be happy

    • Marvin the martian

  • Most of the shit he says are cynical remarks

    • NOT a nitpicker, doesn’t have a filter but has a sharp tongue
    • Think House but a bit more overtly miserable

  • Speaks without thinking much too frequently

  • Was trapped with Ferd on a tiny vessel for a time until Azni showed up

• Wolf

  • Ex-merchant who was pree dang successful
  • Then pirates haha whoops
  • Has knowledge of sailing and how the world works, is the only member of the vessel that has been outside of their home vessel regularly
  • Gets murdered by ???

• “The Wraith”

  • After Azni kicks up a small fuss in her first adventure with Leo, they begin getting followed by a cloaked figure

• Azni’s ship

  • On the smaller side
  • Mostly flat grasslands with odd trees scattered around
  • Gives vague signs its alive, like grumbling when something negative happens to it

Plot Outline

• Azni’s diary entries between chapters, wants to murder the captain within a year

  • This “in one year” motif comes up a lot, Ferd and Gil have been basically shipwrecked for a year, it took a year for the pirates to build up the resources necessary for invasion

• Pirates attack Azni’s home vessel.

• Azni’s own vessel

  • Finds it shipwrecked, leaning on another vessel that has been almost completely submerged
  • Lotsa loot and dead bodies on the sunk one, the non-sunk one is suspiciously empty
  • Gotta make it a piece of shit somehow at the beginning to mirror the crew’s own growth in abilities

• Leo suggests going to an area he knows about where four large vessels were pushed together by the population to work together. From the outside it looks like one big landmass with valleys where the vessels were once separate

• Second act sad moment pirates beat the shit out of Azni for disrupting the pirates so much

• (Day 366, just one day off) Ends with the Azni’s and the pirate’s vessel sinking

  • “You are all that’s keeping this empire together. I’ve seen what you pirates do when their leader is killed and an empire of this size would rip itself apart in the span of a year without you.”
  • Rigs the pirates’ magma bombs to be launched to the bridge of the flagship
  • Azni had to sacrifice their vessel and almost their life so that people on the pirate ship could escape\

Rough Draft

“Three! Two! One! HEAVE!” Was followed by the creaking and crashing of a tree hitting the grass. As the group unlashed their rope from the fallen tree and moved to the next one a second group swooped in and lashed their own rope to drag it away. The man supervising made no outward change in his mood from under his bushy beard as he alternated between barking orders and jollily bantering with the tree fellers. It was a conga line of broad-shouldered hulking giants of men, with one small exception in the form of a small girl.

“Good job everyone, especially Azni,” he shouted as the crew felled another tree.

• Tree harvesting season
• Bridge needs assistance
• Bang, pirates attack