Barling has been a rather downtrodden city in recent times, what with it's mines and foundries empty for a few years now. Those who arrive to this city do so for rather unsavory reasons. Getting away from authority, escaping captivity, revenge, a whole manner of things. Sometimes people just mess up and end up as accidental stowaways turned unpaid-onboard shipwright.

That's what happened to Kooky, when the airship Captain found her in the middle of repairing the heavily dented internal structure of the ships fuselage. The Captain, (He never told Kooky his name) had met Kooky before departing, as she was finishing up the repair that was being done on the ships main engines. He did indeed tell Kooky that the ship was due to leave, but she was far too focused on her job to listen.

Since that happened 4 days ago, Kooky had been treated quite nicely by the Captain, and was promised with a written contract (as all Gnomes are known to do) that she would not be turned in to the authorities of Barling for the various crimes Kooky had apparently committed by continuing to repair the airship whilst it was in flight. (Since Gnomes seriously dislike when other people do anything to their work while it's still working) Kooky was fine with not receiving any money for this though, but what she wasn't fine with was the fact she wasn't allowed to talk until the airship reached the docks in Barling, when the contract would be considered complete on her side of its responsibilities.

Why? Because Kooky spent far too much time talking about the various mistakes made by previous repair efforts on the Captains ship, that he messed up while writing the contract 3 different times in his attempts to make it so complicated (As Gnomes are known to do in the bureaucratic state that Barling belongs to) that Kooky would be forced legally work like she was for decades into the future. The Captain gave up after wasting 3 sheets of contract paper and just wrote a simply one that asked Kooky to shut up until they reached Barling, and that she would be given food and treated as a passenger in exchange for repairing the ship mid-flight.

Kooky had decided to simply focus solely on repairing the ships internals to her satisfactory standards, which despite her being a kobold, were insanely high. She wouldn't do anything less than what she believed was necessary, and because of this she was quite a popular shipwright and artificer back home. Granted, not many ships came to her refugee camp, but some still did, to bring things to those who needed it, and bring those who had saved up enough to buy passage onto the ship, into cities for better lives.

Kooky hadn't really been saving up to take an airship and live in an actual city, she was saving up to buy materials to make magic items and prosthetic limbs. (Kooky won't tell you, but she planned to use other refugees as test subjects for the prosthetic limbs) Mostly because she wanted to turn herself into a dragon, as her only interactions with other kobolds were of them being dragon worshipping weirdos, Kooky decided to join in.

Since she ended up heading to a city anyway, Kooky decided to find some help with her work in the form of fellow artificers, but after asking some of the crew on the airship, Kooky learned that artificers were rare as fuck. Most who could become artificers chose instead to be wizards, as the pay was almost entirely higher, and required less material work, since wizards only needed to memorize their spells and keep a book of them to help create or memorize more of them. Kooky's adoptive father was a wizard after all, and he taught her the basics. 

After signing the contract with Captain, Kooky went to the deck to see the surrounding landscape, since she had heard from various merchants and other airship Captains that the trip from the refugee camp to Barling was rather serene compared to other routes. As she was heading up from the lower decks, she almost bumped into a very tall, lithe man in improperly sized full-plate armor. He mumbled what Kooky could only assume was an apology before heading into one of the rooms near the stairs. A quick glance after the man showed that it was likely his bedroom.

Kooky continued up the stairs and skipped out onto the deck before jumping on top of one of the railing, scaring one of the other passengers right next to her. (They likely thought Kooky was going to jump off) Looking out over the vast forest beneath them, Kooky was giddy from the new horizon she had never been able to see before. Instead of a slight mountain range surrounding her from all sides, Kooky saw a sea of trees from left to right, front to back, and she could even see portions of a paved road, meaning they were getting close to Barling.

With an indescribable giddiness at the first city Kooky will ever see, she almost thought it her fault when the entire airship lurched to the side along with the sound of splintering wood. Quickly balancing herself back onto the deck of the ship, Kooky saw another, much more roughly repaired airship had launched harpoons tied with ropes into the further broadside that she had just finished repairing last night.

Mr. Clanky-Armor had apparently arrived on the deck, along with a human... half-elf? Half-elf. Mr. Clanky-Armor and the half-elf both arrived and readied weapons towards the pirates, along with members of the crew, while all of the other passengers went into the lower decks for safety. Kooky, having only ever seen light scuffles for food, clothes, and the occasional murder, decided to actually join the fight instead of being protected like before. Her dad isn't alive anymore to protect her, so she might as well learn how herself.