The Benedictine Circus: An island of man-beasts?

Standing on the top of the mast, swinging on one arm, Nero looked out over the ocean as the faint glitter of the coming dawn reflected across the surface. Sighting what appeared to be a largely forested island on the horizon he cried,"Island sighted." Listening for a moment at the crew wondering why the captain was working like a common crewmen, The Ringleader smiled to himself and took in a deep breath of salty air. Then like a man without remorse took a step off of the mast and heavily landed on the deck. The buzz of the crew around him wasn't anything particularly new and he started walking towards the kitchen where Gael would be cooking and Ziv and Lucio should be eating. Opening the door he poked his head in,"You guys up for exploring an island?"

Ziv had been feeding Abo who had been sitting on her shoulder, and jumped down to disappear inside her bag now. He might not be the most intelligent ferret there was, but he was a very careful one.
She looked at Nero and raised an eyebrow, as if saying: “Look what you've done now!“ or: “Exploring? What?“ It could mean both, no one could be entirely sure which one it really was though. And since Ziv could neither speak nor write, it'd most likely remain a mistery forever.

Smiling a small understanding smile Nero rubbed the back of his head in slight embarassment and reached into his pocket to produced a specially formulated rodent treat; which he then placed on a near by table as a peace offering. Addressing the look other reason for the look Ziv gave him while looking at the rest of the crew he explained the island in a generally quiter voice," It looks as if it is heavily forrested and I'm assuming from the lack of any smoke no major settlements. If everything goes well we might have discovered a new island, and maybe a few exotic animals. Get your gear and companions together and when your ready meet me on the next to the shuttle."

Abos pink little nose came out of the bag when he noticed a most delicious smell. It sniffed a bit, then Abo himself jumped out of the back and grabbed the treat. With a speed only rodents had, he ran back to Ziv and climbed back on her shoulder where he started eating the delicious thing.
Ziv reached out to him and patted his head.
Then she stood up and walked towards Nero. She stopped at his side and looked up to him. She didn't need to gather her companions, she knew they were somewhere around. They just didn't like the sun as much.
Abo, who had finished his meal, looked at Nero as well. He wanted some more.

Gael was cleaning up as Nero walked into the room. "Forested, you say?" Gael inquired, creating a small fruit tree on the floor. He picked its fruit: a peach. Between quiet and clean bites, Gael said, "I'd be interested. I'll just get my bag." With that Gael graciously excused himself from Nero's presence and got his messenger bag from his room. He placed Fenrir and two water bottles into his bag, and he went up onto the deck to prepare to go.

Lucio burps and stands up.

Bahh! Exploration!

But the sound comes from the parrot on his shoulder. Lucio wipes his mouth with his forearm and looks to Nero.

If this is indeed a new island, I bet there are good animals we can adopt to improve our show. I was thinking of acquiring a pair or a trio of show birds.

Suddenly Pipiu, a small parakeet lands on my other shoulder and whistles.

have ya been drinking lately?

Gael! Gael! Yo yo yo!

The parakeet wigles from side to side and suffenly burps a leather arrow, propelling him backwards off Lucio's head. The leather arrow is shoot against Nero.

The arrow that flew toward Nero found its way into his hand caught in mid-air in a startling display of reflex's. Breaking in his grip he motioned for Lucio and Ziv to follow him onto the side of the deck. Whistling loudly in the air Nero waited a moment for Kong to come running at full speed from his quaters with Kappa under his arm; thier combined weight constantly slaming on the deck of the ship was causing it to shake. When they slid to a stop next to Nero the runt Sea-king under the Gigantic silver-backs arm was hissing and snapping its mouth to be let down. Looking out on the water the ship was about a mile from the shore of the island,"Gael can your devil fruit reach that island and tell us if there is anything particularly hostile?" Then turning to the other two members of the crew Nero said," The shore-boat that this ship is equiped with is a small iron-wood steampowered boat and takes a very short amount of time to travel across the distance of water; in other words it is fast, very fast, and if you dont calm your animals right before we take off they might spazz out a bit. Does everyone understand?"

Gael dropped to his knees and placed his palms flat on the deck of the ship. A vine shot out of the ship's deck and shot towards the island. When it reached the shore, the vine intertwined with a branch of a tree, and Gael took over the tree's systems, and then began using its branches to create an intricate information network. It took a while before his eyes focused and got used to being flooded with information. "I'm starting to get something..." Gael said. He saw...

((Nero, please fill this in for me.))

Nero's eye's widen a considerable amount,"So your telling me there are man-beasts on the island and they have different pirates and marines captive? Raising one of his gauntleted hands to his scalp he started scratching his head. Thinking he had lice Kong started to pick through his hair. Turning around quickly Nero moved Kongs hand gently away,"Ok guys these things on the island are probably aggressive so when we get over there so be prepared for either combat or support. Ziv I dont want you to be in combat if you dont feel comfortable. Lets go." At that Nero started to climb down to the recently deployed boat with Kong right behind him. Once he got in the boat he got behind the steering wheel. Looking on he saw Kappa already heading to the shore to secure a landing zone.

Gael pulled his hands off the deck and followed Nero into the boat. He made sure Fenrir was ready to go as well, and in shield mode.

Lucio grabs Polly paws (Yes, polly turned to leopard hybrid, but since he still looks very much like a big parro, Lucio didn't seem to notice) and they both lift off and follow the boat. Pipiu get's back together and follows Lucio. to the shore.

(If I'm not here, you're free to rp with my character until I get back, remember, solemn, very very short, confident in his abilities, but afraid of leopards. When Polly turns to full leopard, which he does alot of the times, Lucio runs and hides. Pipiu is small and is able to shoot arrows from the material he his standing on)

Ziv quietly nodded and got into the boat. She was sure she wasn't going to fight.... Unless, for some chance, she'd find Regina on the island. But that was extremely unlikely to happen. She took Abo into her arms and covered his eyes with one hand. With the other, she started streaking through his fur. If he'd panic and try to jump overboard, she could always just grib him thight this way. It had happened before.

As Ziv got into the boat, there was a slight uproar in the kitchen of the ship.One could barely see them, but rats started gathering at the possible exits. They were completely silent, hundreds of eyes watching the ship, waiting for it to take off so they could follow it in some distance.

Looking at all of the crew members, Nero double checked that they had everything ready and settled. Glancing back at Kong he saw that he was already heavily gripping the sides of the boat knowing what was coming. Strapping one of his hands to the steering column Nero reached for the lever that started the forward movement, finally calming his nerves his face hardened and he droped it. The moment he did however his hair started to fly backwards and he face dragged a bit. Pulling himself forward toward the wheel Nero steered to the right and turned off the ignition. Letting the boat drift the rest of the way it eventually stopped and softly hit the shore. Looking at Kong the gorilla was already running towards Kappa very ready to get off of the boat. Looking between all of his nakama Nero said," how was your first trip on this little speed demon?" He couldn't not smile a little, he could have warned them more.

Ziv straightened up her hair and cast him a reproachful look. Abo had let out a shrill screech when the boat had started moving and had disappeared inside her clothes. She now pulled him out. The poor thing was so shocked.
She cast Nero another reproachful look, this time, she even raised an eyebrow to make her disappointement clear, and shook her head slightly.

Gael's bag had almost been pulled off of him. "Holy crap, captain..." Gael yelped in disbelief. "A warning would have been nice!" He needed to calm himself down more.

I don't get it.

Lucio didn't get the joke.

Ziv stared at Lucio for a while. There was no real way to tell what she was thinking. Then she gave him a smile. It could possibly mean that he looked funny, or that he should laugh anyway, or that it was okay if he didn't get it.
She stood up, which Abo commented by protesting loudly and digging his little claws into her shirt.
Ziv ignored it and took a look at the island.
Then she turned back to the others and pointed at the thick forest ahead of them.
There was a slightly demanding expression on her face.

Nero's eyebrow raised slightly with a completely dead-pan face,"Joke? I dont remeber a joke." Looking away from his crew he stepped out of the boat and made his way over to his companions cautiously watching the forest the whole way to the pair. Once he was over he noticed that Kappa had found a large bone pile of some sort,"Hey guys I think my turtle here found something." Nero smirked at Kappa's obvious distain for being called a turtle and ignored his attempts at stomping on his foot by waiting for his crew on the back of the turtle.

((Lol))

Lucio stucked his eyes, trying to get the joke. There wasn't even a joke. Suddenly Pipiu burped again, and as he was proppelled away from the sand, leaving a compacted sand arrow stuck in his place. That made Lucio wake up from his line of thinking. He pointed Polly to Nero.

Do you want my birds to scout the area?

Pipiu returned again, gently

Gael got out of the ship and followed Nero. "Or I could control the trees... your call, captain."

What? Lucio was outraged.

I'm sorry, but my birds are specially skilled. Much better then low life trees.

He say,s in a very cocky way, as usual, when talking about his and his pets abilities

Gael shrugged. "Well, without trees, your pets wouldn't exist. But what have you. Go ahead, if the captain is fine with it."

Men!
Ziv punched both of them on the shoulder. Not a real punch, of course, just a 'Really, can you just stop it?' kind of of punch.
Then she shook her head again and rolled her eyes to make her point clear.
Without another action, she caught up with Nero and started staring at him . He was the guy to say what to do.

Nero looked at the sole female on his team and smiled at her,"Thank you Ziv," Then his face hardened slightly, they hadn't done anything to terrible yet but this kind of arguement can lead to injuries and possibly worse if it continues. Looking both of them in the eye's Nero reared his body upwards in a dominant manner and strongly said,"Both of you stop your bickering, you both have good talents and you both need to use them. Lucio you can tell us what is happening from above and Gael you can scout the ground. This will go alot smoother if you two work together so we can save these people without complications."

Gael hung his head in shame. "Sorry Captain, I wasn't trying to bicker... Honest!" His voice had taken the tone of a child being scolded by his teacher. He walked over to the nearest tree, placed his palms on its bark, and then began doing what he did best.