Kidnappers?

There were 4 people in total, all of them men. They didn't look very young and looked like they were well built. It looked like they knew how to fight since all of them were carrying some kind of weapon. Two of them had swords and the other two had spears. The most important detail though was that two of them were carrying something on their shoulders. I couldn't tell what it was since they were in sacks.

I continued to observe them as the got closer to me when all of a sudden the sack started to move and make noise. I heard a voice of a person! These people are bandits! It looks like they are carrying some people to their base. Maybe they want to hold these 2 people in the sacks for ransom? I heard the voice of a man from the sack, so it didn't seem like that it was for their enjoyment. Suddenly the other sack also started moving. This time it was a woman's voice. Damn… I was wrong. If not the man, the woman will surely be used for their enjoyment.

The bandit carrying the man said "Don't worry! We'll take good care of you. You don't have to worry about anything!"

The bandit carrying the woman also said "Yeah, we are not going to hurt you. We might do that if you don't shut up!"

The woman stopped struggling and so did the man after a little while. The two bandits chuckled and continued on their way. The other 2 bandits didn't seem to care at all and continued to walk behind them.

Once they went past my location, I had to quickly think about what I was going to do. If I wanted to save these people, I need to follow the bandits to find their hideout. Any kind of rescue will involve careful planning and we couldn't do that if we didn't know where the bandit base was. We couldn't just stumble onto their hideout! We could get hurt or killed if we did that.

On the other hand, I could just leave these people to their fate. I didn't know them and I didn't have to risk my life or my party members' life for them. I had to decide quickly but soon realized that it was really difficult for me to decide two people's fate just like that. The only thing I could think of was to find out the base and then discuss with the rest of the party on what to do.

So I decided to follow the bandits from a safe distance. I couldn't be completely quiet in the woods but that didn't mean I couldn't still follow them from a distance. I could tell how much noise I was making and how far I need to stay.

After following the bandits for almost 10 minutes, they stopped in a small flat area in front of a rise. I saw a small opening behind them in the rise. There were 2 more guards at the opening, so I assumed this was the entrance to their cave. The four bandits talked with the 2 guards for a few minutes. I heard them laugh and joke around. Finally the 4 bandits started entering through the entrance. The entrance wasn't too big and they had to hunch a bit while entering. It was dark inside the cave entrance and I couldn't really see what was inside.

To my surprise, the gate guards didn't stay at the entrance anymore and also entered. They left the opening completely unguarded! Why would they do such a thing? I wait for a minute to see if they or someone else came out. I looked around but didn't see anyone either. Is this a trap? Should I go and check it out now that I had come all this way? I didn't think that the bandits had noticed me, so I didn't think this was a trap.

It would help us to have more information if we did decide to attempt a rescue. So far I had seen 6 bandits but I didn't know how many more were there inside. Without knowing this, it was almost impossible to plan anything. What if there were 100 more inside? In this case, we could abandon any possibility of rescue. On the other hand what if there were only 10? In that case we might be able to even take them all out.

Of course, not of this was my call. As our leader, I would want Cleo to make this decision. But I as a scout wanted to get her the best information possible to attempt this rescue or at least make the decision. As I thought this, I knew I had decided what to do.