Eorl Deals With The New Weirdos In C-Town
Bright and early, Sir Reginald Q. Zappata gets a knock on his door. It's his freshly laundered Crimson Cutlass outfit. He quickly pays the launderer a gold piece and swears him to secrecy, then heads over to Eorl's room. He explains that he travels with a Crimson Cutlass so that he can dress as "that menace" at assorted high society costume balls. Eorl sighs and decides to let the baby have his bottle. "My mistake," says Eorl graciously. Reginald then heads down to the bar for some breakfast. While dining he meets a young man offering him an "investment opportunity" in the lighthouse off shore. Reginald agrees to bring some gold that evening to Crimea Alley that night after dark and they can discuss it.
That night, The Crimson Cutlass stalks from rooftop to rooftop over to Crimea alley; Eorl following close behind. He spies his prey consorting with another thug, both of them giggling like goons over the million gold pieces that Sir Reginald promised to bring. The Crimson Cutlass is ready to leap down on them when there comes some yelling from around the corner.
A sailor is yelling at a shabbily dressed teen, accusing him of stealing his coin purse. Eorl continues to watch from the shadows as the sailor draws a large hook at hits him smack in the shoulder. The Crimson Cutlass looses a sling bullet and hits him smacks him right in the face. The salty dog insists that the boy robbed him and the Cutlass insists that this is a matter for the authorities. The crowd seems unsure. The teen, noting their hesitation, takes the opportunity to book it out of there. The Cutlass follows him and confronts him in a nearby alley. The boy proclaims his innocence, and the Cutlass believes him, for now. Then, nearby, they hear a loud crash, followed by some growling noises. Some one has been improperly shipping a pair of bears. They also haven't been feeding them.
The Cutlass scampers back up to a rooftop while Eorl starts firing arrows at the bears. Cyril starts looking through barrels for something for them to eat other than people. He distracts the first one with some figs, but the other is on a rampage. The bear claws the crap out of our poor wastrel for his trouble, but he stays conscious enough to crawl away. Soon the Cutlass and Eorl take out the rampaging bear. The Cutlass dashes off, only to find his con-men missing.
Eorl looks around grumpily and calls on Leo to come downtown and assess the damages. It turns out there was some asshole who figured that the old patriarch liked cats, maybe the new guy will like bears. Eorl groans and says that this guy is gonna have to pay for the goods destroyed in the bear attack, and in the future he'll need to have the proper permits to ship live, dangerous animals through Chrysopolis.
Eorl follows the blood trail to find the wounded teen hiding under a stoop. He introduces himself as Cyril and Eorl invites him back to the Governor's Mansion to get patched up. Oeonoe joins them in the drawing room and finds out his deal. Sir Reginald stumbles in bleeding and explains he cut himself shaving his chest. Eorl rolls his eyes and asks Oeonoe to patch him up too. Eorl starts grilling Cyril the same way he grills anyone with an ounce of bravery that wanders into Chrysopolis, and Cyril claims to be able to swing a sack of door knobs. Eorl offers him a letter of introduction to Xenon, saying that the town guard can always use someone with some guts.
