Originally published January 2016

Due to my recent experience with the rogue-lite, story-focused, H.P. Lovecraft sailing simulator, Sunless Sea, I decided to make my playthrough more personally interesting by sharing the adventures of my second ship captain from his journal. Sadly, my first was lost in the great computer upgrade.

Unterzee Log 1

Fallen London - Sept 1, 1880

At last! I've saved my echoes and have finally put forth a down payment for my own vessel! After years of calling on houses to entertain the gold-laced parties and the bored artisans waiting for their lovers to return home, weaving them some cheap verses or silly songs, I've finally saved enough to chart my own adventure beyond the streets. The benevolent Mrs. Flattery has allowed me room and board for the next year in the apartment above her shop down by the docks for a very small fee. I'm not sure if she's willing to have me pay so little for the space because she's a fan of the literary arts, or if she has no faith in my ability to stay alive at sea. Hah!

I think the good people around here underestimate the commanding and navigating skills of a Fallen London poet. Out on the Unterzee, it takes passion. It takes artistic vision like you're painting the sea and the ceiling itself with your own thoughts. That is how you map the darkness! The light that cascades and bounces off the water shines upon the stalactites of the dark night's ceiling are my constellations, and I shall use them to chart a course to my song of the sea.

I love Fallen London as it has been the only home I've ever known. And while I've always enjoyed her bitterbeer and warming fires, she's grown stale for a poet seeking song and adventure. More than anything I want to achieve the dream of all poets and write a masterpiece to last a legacy. It will be a song so grand in scope and power that even my children would stop at nothing to write it themselves. My song shall be sung in shanties and pubs from coast to coast, island to island, mountain top to deepest abyss, and in tongues, the human mouth cannot hope to utter. Thus, with such an ambition as this, I must seek inspiration out where the crabs scuttle, the bats screech, and the pirates raid. The material I need I cannot hope to gain in the dark alleys of London.

London, I shall return to your welcoming open arms as I always have, again and again, but for now, the zee calls, pail mistress that she is, and I must answer her.

1 Day East of London - Sept 2, 1880

A full day at sea and the dark salty air never tasted so fresh. We've already struck our first milestone. Not literally, thankfully. The lads call the looming rocks the Corsair Forest. It takes some skill and precision to navigate between the stones so well, and we're a few zailors short, but the crew has managed thus far.

I think the Brisk Campaigner, as she likes to be called, gives everyone the confidence they need to get the job done. I met her just outside the shipping yard where a freighter had just landed with its delivery of spider silk. I could tell immediately that there was a longing for purpose on her face. With the scars of sand and salt on her skin, she looked as though she had already traveled a great deal. While I think she did reach her original destination, I bet it never quite suited her. Offering her a seat as my surgeon seemed to spark some fire in her grey and glossy eyes. Good to see that she's already paying her weight in respect and skill.

And knowledge. She's told me that pirates like to patrol these waters, waiting in the fog to get the first strike on unsuspecting novice captains. But I shant be out-gunned or maneuvered. I shall make this foggy forest of stones my garden, and the pirates will be little more than an annoying mole, which I must snuff out with some water and a spade.

2 Days East of London - Sept 3, 1880

We've arrived in Gaiders Mourn. What a treacherous hive of wretches! The people here are so delightfully full of violent vigor! Most of the men and women I've encountered here so far are surely pirates that would just as soon shoot down and scuttle me as any of the other zailor on the open sea, but in Gaider's Mourn the rules of the zee do not apply. Here there is some unwritten diplomacy that everyone seems to understand and abide by. It's quite fascinating!

It seems that when it comes down to the people's traditions around here, it usually ends in a fistfight in one of the local pubs. Despite being pirates, I've yet to see anyone draw a gun on another. Perhaps there's just an understanding of violence here. I'll bet the Admiralty of London will want to see if there is any intelligence to be gained here between the knife fights and fisticuffs, though there is likely to be little. All I've seen thus far that would net me some coin back home is news of the various sport they're selling in the market. I've seen jars of red honey and boxes bursting with light. Both of those I know little of, other than their illegality back home.

Perhaps upon returning with this information, the Admiralty will accept my assistance as an honorary zee captain. I could tell that most of them were skeptics of the "paltry poet" turned zee captain. I'm pretty sure they had bets on how soon I would either die or come home with my tail between my legs. We shall set their opinions straight. They'll know how paltry they are when they can't escape my song every time they go out for a drink.

Fallen London - Sept 4, 1880

Back home and by the skin of our teeth! I knew the ship I had purchased was not much for combat, but a warrior she most certainly was not. We had to turn tail in the face of three pirate convoys as we made our way past Mutton Island, with a large crab in tow. They call the crabs Auroral Megalops, I'm assuming because of how their mustard shells seem to glow in the low light of the Unterzee.

While we may have run from the pirates, the hunger of the crew and myself drove us to turn the ship around and blast the beastly crustacean with our deck gun. With the blast and the echoing crack of the cannon, the crab's shell was shattered, its tender meat weeping from the wound, waiting to be scooped up. We could see more megalops closing in to either cannibalize their comrade or chase us down for some animalistic revenge. As fuel was beginning to run low, we grabbed all we could and headed for home.

Nonetheless, we've made it home and we can all breathe a sigh of relief for our first week of voyage! I've since visited the Admiralty and have offered my information for commission. Seems that despite their low expectations of me, they're more than willing to pay me for my port reports in cash and in fuel. Good to know that my adventures will be self-sufficient. I can't wait to refuel and head out for more!