It started with us getting up this morning and wasting a bunch of time arguing about what we ought to do; some of us wanted to go explore along the trails that the natives left behind, while others wanted to move the camp and still others had vague plans of tanning on the beach and stuff. Eventually, it was decided to leave the sailors in charge of relocating camp closer to fresh water while we brave adventurers sought out the natives and explored this (fairly large) island. In retrospect, it might have been wiser to stick together, but oh well.

Off we went, bickering all the way (as usual), with Leighla and I in the lead (after all, we're the only two who were brave enough to leave camp yesterday!), when suddenly, there was a great crash from the brush off to our right and an enormous bear-type thing came out! Leighla immediately went up to try to calm it down, but before any progress could be made (or, more likely, before Leighla could be torn limb from limb), a rather ursine human stepped out and told the animal to calm down, and wonder of wonders, it did. Strange, though: what kind of a name is MINXY for a bear?

This rather bizarre being, about six feet in height and the same in circumference, introduced himself as "Dr Fran." Fran is apparently a rather addled natural scientist; he came to this island to study nature and appears to have been here for quite a long time. What was a little disturbing is that he somehow realized we were on the island long before we had caught any sight of most of the natives; he'd brought a basket of berries with him as a beachwarming gift, as it were. While Leighla was for some unaccountable reason very suspicious of him, I did my best to make up for my companion's lack of social graces, and soon, we found ourselves following Fran back to his manor.

We eventually got there; he seems to have found a nice part of the island, since he had this large meadow right out in front and there weren't any trees surrounding the home so close that it would be easy to sneak up on it. This latter fact appears to be important, judging by the wooden wall which surrounds the place; it's rather primitive, but still enough to lend some measure of security to the place. There was one gate, normally kept closed and warded by a porter named Orson, who's even bigger than Fran is! Somehow, I'm glad he's not mad at me.

Well, Fran led us into the house; there were really two buildings on the grounds, but one was a small guest house, which he kindly offered for our use, and most of the space was taken up by a fairly sizable building. It must have taken him a long time to build his house, even though he had, he says, the help of some of the friendlier natives.

Fran has a largish library, though many of the books are water damaged (apparently, he collects a lot of salvage from shipwrecks, though he promised to leave the Sunset Empires alone). A largish and comfortable looking dining room and the other rooms associated with it complete one part of the manor. He also has a menagerie (complete with the black leopard that Leighla so thoughtfully shot the other day; Fran found this most irritating, despite the fact that he views nature as mostly violent), along with a lab of which he is obviously quite proud.

One of the interesting things about the man is that he is obviously a painter of some considerable skill, though only where scenes of nature are involved. His human figures are rather poorly done, but his animals are tremendous! Admittedly, I don't particularly care for scenes of cute little rabbits being ripped to shreds by slavering wolves and whatnot, but this seems to be Fran's image of nature, and since he was our host, I saw no reason to argue with him about it. Leighla, ever one for the civilized graces, disagreed with me and spent quite a bit of time arguing with him; possibly this is because she is rather paranoid and feels that the man is up to no good here on this island (the fact that the last lab she saw was of course the one in which Rooden created that little golem out of his misguided love for his niece may factor into this).

The other remarkable thing is the size of his household. In addition to Orson and himself, there are Felix, a rather stuck up priestly looking type, and Delphi, a young woman who is apparently Fran's ward. I think all of us took a rather immediate dislike to Felix (or, at least in my case, a positive loathing; he reminds me more than a little of a rat), but I, for one, rather like Delphi, although she seems to have a bit too much of Mitsy in her; I suppose she must be very lonely on this island, but still... She's all but throwing herself at Prihelm, and the poor man isn't really sure what to do; I think they'd make a cute couple, but Haley and Leighla, for some odd reason (jealousy, perhaps?) are against my matchmaking. Some people!

At any rate, after our quick tour of the house, we decided to get back to camp, and the good doctor left long enough to get a couple of baskets full of food for us. While we were waiting in the library, I spotted a map, but since it seems to have been the doctor's only copy, and I, for one, am not an ungrateful guest, I decided against asking to borrow it, especially since we can always come back and look at it later.

Fran, as mentioned, brought us some food, and away we went. Leighla was starting to sound a little paranoid with her rants against this nice man, and she'd infected the entire group with her unease to some extent. For myself, I don't entirely trust him yet, but I don't think he's the kind of monster Leighla seems to believe he is. I mean, wait until I tell you what we saw when we got back to camp!

We arrived, and the camp had been burned and ruined; most of the sailors were dead, except for a few that were missing, and a few that were dying; Al was able to save Singe, but we were too late for the other. Now, given that the natives knew where our camp was, given that Fran warned us that not all the natives are friendly, and given that the tracks were, it seemed, from the natives, I don't think it's much of a stretch to assume that the natives were responsible for this tragedy. Leighla, though, blames the doctor, even though he was with us all day long. I think maybe the human blood in her is making her overly suspicious.

Well, I wanted to track the missing sailors down and rescue them right away, but the others decided that our obligation to protect them wasn't strong enough to take that risk, and I let myself be overruled; I hope I won't regret that later! We decided instead to camp for the night, and pursue them in the morning. So here we are, eating the wonderful dinner provided by that nice man (Leighla didn't eat it; I think she was convinced that the food was poisoned or something), and after a night spent sleeping in comfort and safety, we're off to rescue the missing people, even though Dirk and Agar are among the missing and I, for one, would be happy is they stayed that way...