As we approach the coming pirating season, on of the most famous of all Wormwood Pirating mysteries is the secret underground location of the Peg Leg's Pirate ship, the SS Pointy Pontoon.
The SS Pointy Pontoon supposedly sits anchored deep underground, reached only through a complex and confusing set of catacombs, mazes and tunnels connected directly into the Wormwood Valley sewer system. The sewers beneath Wormwood are quite ancient and astoundingly complex. they overlap, twist and turn every few feet only to end in long dark holes, shallow drains and mysterious closed doors deep beneath the Wormwood Mountains.
The only entrance and exit known is that of the Wormwood River flow-through gate, south of town and nestled somewhere deep in the jagged rocks of the Wormwood River Cliffs. It is somewhere beneath these dark and foreboding waters that the Peg Leg's, one of the most ferocious and dedicated of Wormwood's Pirating teams struggles for their chance at this years Golden Hook Tournament. But it is their surroundings and their peculiar choice of practice locales that gives the SS Pointy Pontoon and even darker reputation, for legend says that the SS Pointy Pontoon sits anchored directly beneath Billy Blood Falls.
Billy Blood Falls was named after Billy Bilgerat, a local resident who attempted to float down the falls of the Wormwood River in a barrel he had made in his 17th century cooper arts class specifically for the feat. Billy advertised his stunt all over Wormwood, tacking signs to every light post in town and even taking out a full page ad in our very own Wormwood paper, the Wormwood Valley Daily Information Operations Publication. It was a warm September morning when the entire town turned out to witness Billy’s amazing stunt, complete with the Wormwood School String Ensemble and Celebratory Funeral Band. Banners flapped in the morning breeze, the sun glistened off of the foaming spray of the Wormwood River casting shimmering rainbows across the many residents gathered at the waters edge. Everyone watched as Billy entered his barrel just at the edge of the rapidly falling river, his pudgy frame squeezing into the barrel like a tiny black silhouette against a clear morning sky of deep blue. He sealed the lid shut with the help of the towns local Master Cooper, Mr. Abacus, and put in above the waterfall, some 375 feet above. The barrel bobbed and bounced as it neared the edge of the waterfall, and momentarily stopped as if stuck on a branch or rock. the crowd gasped, the band fell silent, and the anticipation hung in the air like the droplets of water sticking to the dense branches of the surrounding Wormwood trees. Curiously, the barrel continued to hover, right at the edge of the falls as if there was some unseen hand keeping Billy from completing his foolish attempt. Suddenly the barrel pitched to its side, rolled and slowly fell from the river above in an almost slow-motion like descent.
Silence fell over the gathered masses, the only sound the echoing thunder of the crashing water. The crowd watched as the barrel seemed to float gently down, disappearing into the white misty abyss below, the roar of the falls deafening the barrels splash to silence. Everyone shuffled quickly to the edge of the river, scanning the water frantically for any sign of the barrel’s surfacing from the thick frothy depths. They watched, and watched…and watched, but Billy, and his barrel, never surfaced. The only sign of Billy’s ludicrous stunt was a faint shadow of red watery blood, swirling in the waters and churning with the falling river.
wormwood called out the local town rescue militia, complete with a cadre' of the towns best swimmers and searched all day for poor Billy or any signs of his barrel. by nightfall, the search had to be called off. the woods were far to dangerous to search at night, and the Wormwood River especially. All sorts of nasty things were known to come out to drink at night along the edges of the Wormwood River, and that would only make the search more complicated. It's quite difficult to swim in a raging river in the dark when one is being hunted by a Giant Black Fin Water Worm, or the notorious Wormwood River Gulp Gulley's, massive silvery fish that glow by the light of their own beating organs, ever pursuant up stream for their next meal.
for three more days the crews searched, all the while bringing no sign of Billy Bilgerat or his barrel. The Mayor of Wormwood Valley, Prime Grinnister Marvin ‘The Hack’ Burnstyle, declared it a day of morning, banned barrel stunts from Wormwood Valley and re-named the waterfall Billy Blood Falls in his honour.
To this day, some say that the waterfall splashes forth a faint red cloud of mist each morning in the month of September as it splashes into the river below and continues its flow through the Wormwood Pirating Arena and out to sea, as if Billy’s ghost is calling from beneath the depths, longing to be remembered once more for his foolhardy and ludicrous stunt.
He was awarded, posthumously of course for his record-setting barrel float and his prize winning barrel. Mr. Abacus, the Master Cooper and teacher of 16th and 17th century Coopering Arts at the Wormwood Valley School never quite got over the loss. Billy's barrel was said to be one of the best barrels he had ever seen made by one of his students, and he felt Billy had quite the future in pirate barrel making ahead of him.
To this day, many an eye watches the banks of the Wormwood River as it flows and ebb's its way through town in the month of September, each looking for a spot of blood, or a sliver of wood that might bring them good luck, passed down the falls by little Billy Bilgerat.
Reporting from deep below Wormwood Square,
Inkly Tolew the Third Esq.
Manager, Operator, Owner
Wormwood Valley Daily Information Operations Publication
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