In the sheltered cove below, signs of a past inferno were visible. Several ships, including a two-masted caravel, a sizeable frigate, a long barge, and what might have once been a schooner were all burnt to the waterline. Further out, a three-masted caravel seems to have escaped the fire - for now. A shiny slick on the surface of the water itself reflected the sunlight, evidence of an oil fire. The crashing sounds of the waves masked any other sounds that may be issuing up from below. Through periodic gaps in the smoke, however, movement on the beach was visible - something still lived in the inferno below.
Descent to the beach below was accomplished by climbing down ropes. The cliffs that surrounded the cove were sheer but featured numerous handholds. They were forty feet high, and the Tropic Thunder scaled them down.
Another route was a rickety wooden walkway that descended from the eastern cliff down to the beach below. Although the fire had not reached it, the rickety wooden walkway had not been used by the pirates in some time and had rotted in the salt air.
To make the walkway less tempting, the tide carried one of the burnt ships careening into the west wall of the cove, where it had destroyed the central 50 feet of walkway.
The water in the eastern section of the cove was 20 feet deep - deep enough that a person could dive into the water from the cliffs forty feet above, taking no damage.
The one surviving ship in the harbor was the Sea Wyvern. The Sea Wyvern was a fearsome vessel. Her sails were decorated with stylized figures of a wyvern; its tail raised over its back as though ready to strike at enemies. Even its figure carried the figurehead as motif; a powerful wyvern, its wings unfurled, crouched at the prow. This ship had seen plenty of action; her hull was scarred in many places by scratches and dents, and a single huge claw mark raked across the starboard, deliberately left as a scar of battle. The ship's wheel was designed to represent a dozen-headed wyvern.
A fifty-foot wide beach separated the waters of Kraken's Cove from the cliffs to the north. A ten-foot-wide cave opened at the base of the cliff to the northwest, while to the northeast several planks provided a crude bridge across a tide pool to a second, smaller cave entrance. The swaths of blood and ragged body parts strewn across the beach testified to a terrible and recent battle upon the sands here. Broken crates and bamboo cages littered the area, blood and bits of bone sprayed across bolts of silk and cracked barrels of ambergris seeping into the coarse, rocky sand. A number of mangled corpses, each stripped nearly clean of flesh and bones cracked open, lay strewn about the beach. The casualties were staggering, with a quick count putting the dead at nearly forty.
The two savage pirates hid in the ruined wreckage along the shore, waiting for untainted flesh to draw them out. When they noted the Tropic Thunder approaching the cave entrances, the gibbering menaces leapt from hiding and charged.
Examination of the bodies in this area showed them to be devoured with a ferocity that bellies reason - bones gnashed in a single crashing bite, entire lengths of flesh and muscle ripped free. It was also obvious that the battle broke out suddenly between friends and allies. Crossbow bolts riddled the few savage pirates slain, and the mingling of deformed corpses and those nearly completely devoured was demonstrative of the infighting that took place. Near the tide pool, two sea cats lay dead on the rocks, still chained fast to a heavy iron stake embedded in the ground.
A deep pool of rushing water separated the smaller cave entrance from the beachhead. Two wide wooden planks served as a crude bridge to cross the surging waters of the pool.
The water was 20 feet deep below the boards. Crossing the slippery planks required a good balance.
The cave walls were of smooth, wet stone and stalactites hanged from the ceiling in places. Passageways averaged ten feet in height, and caverns were about twenty feet high. The pirates had long since removed the stalagmites that once clustered in many of the caves, and had spread sand through the entire area to even the floor and make movement through the caves less treacherous. The caves were lit by cheap hooded lanterns that hanged from the walls every 30 feet; these lanterns were burnt out by the time the Tropic Thunder entered the caves.
There were body parts, swaths of blood stained sand, deep scratches in the walls, and other macabre hints of mayhem throughout the caves. Further, exploration of the caves was accompanied by a symphony of howls, shrieks, maniacal laughter, clanging of metal on metal, and other discordant sounds one might expect from a madhouse whose locks have failed. As a result, hearing accuracy suffered in the caves.
Dozens of bolts of once-fine brocaded silk hanged from lines of rope stretched lengthwise across the ceiling of the first cavern, making it difficult to accurately judge the size of the sandy-floored cavern.
There the Tropic Thunder faced a creature resembling a deinonychus. The deinonychus' back writhed with wriggling tentacles, several of which wept puss and left a disgusting trail of yellowish smears on nearby silk sheets.
The hanging silks provided cover for any creature standing behind them, as they served to obscure vision and cast long shadows on the walls. As soon as the deinonychus detected the Tropic Thunder, it began stalking them, slipping quietly through the hanging sheets of silk until it picked Vicros to attack. The dinosaur then pounced on Vicros, killing him within seconds before the rest of the heroes could defeat it.
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