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Post by Fraze on Feb 1, 2013 5:07:54 GMT -5
Miss Jensen reached for her sword at the surprise attack, but it proved to be unnecessary. All the better. It was easy to pick off your opponents when they flung themselves at you one at a time. As various people tended to Krisseh's breakdown, she decided to answer the questions that they had asked.
"You're right. This kingdom barely deserves the title; it's really more of a city-state. I could have chosen any given land in any given story plane. I chose to start a war here because of the--" she paused, searching for a word. "--Inconsistencies permeating this land. "Consider these Guilds of yours. With the exception of the Knights and the Mages, they are completely separate non-governmental entities that should have no connection with one another, and yet they have played a pivotal role in most of the large upheavals in this world. It was the Guilds that fought for control of that gem, and later brought the Underdeep under control. This should have been the work of governments and official armies, but it was not. "Furthermore, the people in this world seem to have a way of coming out on top, when all logic, far beyond narrative reason, dictates otherwise. Such eccentricities in this story plane frustrated me immensely, but also drew me to this place. As I said, I want a challenge. The heroes who can defeat any opponent, against an opponent who cannot be defeated." Miss Jensen grinned an anticipatory, toothy grin. "This sounds like an excellent story, does it not?"
She gazed down at Krisseh. "She will need proper medical assistance, and from the looks of it, magical intervention. If you wish to take her to the Manor through that portal, I will not stop you."
--------
Hellas and Alabaster were moving through a long stretch of grassy fields. The army trailed behind them on the dirt road, careful not to step on any of the farmland. A figure approached them.
"Out for a moonlit walk?" Alabaster muttered to his companion. "Too much of a coincidence. And no highwayman could be that foolish." Alabaster nodded. "Best to determine his intentions, then." He looked toward Draco and raised a hand in greeting. "Hail, fellow. Do you have business with us?"
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Post by Draco on Feb 1, 2013 13:50:49 GMT -5
Draco slows down his run as he approaches Hellas and Alabaster. He walks closer, but keeps his distance just in case.
"No, coincidence did not bring me here."
He looked at the zombies, then back to the 'heroes' taking note of anything he could do to stop them. He didn't really find any.
"I see you are literally raising a army... Why? Depending on your answer, I won't need to draw my blades tonight."
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Post by Huntress on Feb 1, 2013 17:24:38 GMT -5
Hunty's weary face lit up at Zylaa's shinies.
"All this respectable business is starting to get on our reputation," she said, weighing the bag. "We could just as well start selling our services as a mail ship, I've been looking at the market a bit."
"This probably means that there's trouble brewing somewhere, though."
"Usually does," the captain agreed, shooting a yearning glance at her cabin and its extremely comfy bed. People had their ideas about conditions out at sea, getting all sorts of thoughts about hammocks and wet feet and dry bisquits with weevils, never wondering just how many comfy mattresses one can get from a single well-stocked apprehended merchant boat. Which had, of course, been a while back now.
"Well, you were out there and I wasn't," she told Zylaa. "What does your gut say? If we go to sleep right now, how likely are we to get shaken out of it before morning by, say, meteorites or undead penguins or the apocalypse or some such crap?"
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Post by Tiger on Feb 1, 2013 22:03:58 GMT -5
Tiger bent down beside Krisseh, glancing at the broken - melted - torn? leg. Something was clearly wrong with the Usul, even beyond the physical injury. The last remnants of mist from the snake curled around Tiger's clawed fingers. While she watched Ellen mend and treat the leg - as best she could - Tiger reformed her songbird. Its memories, her memories, whichever, weren't as sharp, but they would have to do.
Shifting the bird to her shoulder to hide away in her long hair, Tiger glanced up at Celestial and offered, "I can carry Krisseh."
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Post by Amneiger on Feb 1, 2013 22:28:57 GMT -5
The shuttle had arrived promptly, and Amneiger had hopped on board and taken an uneventful trip back to Spacefleet HQ. Once he'd deposited the shinies in his account, he'd gone back to his quarters for a good night's sleep.
Well, a good night's sleep right up until the doorbell for his room had started ringing in the middle of the night.
Amneiger sat up and fumbled for the light. The clock read 2:00 am station time. He got up, rubbed his eyes, and walked over to the intercom in the door. "Who is it?"
"Sir, this is Cadet Dale. We're reading strange activity on the surface, near Castle Kestrel. There's what looks like three separate zombie armies that have suddenly appeared and began moving in the area. So far they've made no offensive action. Commander Fraze has ordered that we observe the situation."
"I was just down there." The sleepy fog was dispelling from Amneiger's brain, and he drew a conclusion. "You wanted to know if I saw anything that might have something to do with that."
"Yes, sir."
"A magician was holding a competition that I took part in." Amneiger tried to remember why the magician had wanted to do the competition in the first place. "There wasn't any mention of the undead, though."
"Ah, about that, sir. We got some good pictures of the people who were around the zombies, and it looks like one of them was one of the competition workers."
"What?" Amneiger was immediately awake the rest of the way. He reached over and powered on his computer. "Send it to my terminal."
"Sending, sir...and done."
Amneiger pulled up the files. It was definitely the magician's assistant, at the head of one of the zombie platoons. "Where is she now?"
"She was last seen entering Castle Kestrel, sir. We haven't seen her leave."
"Take me there."
* * *
Ten minutes later, a shuttle was setting down at the gates of Castle Kestrel. The gates were unguarded, and the moonlight showed that they had been broken down.
Amneiger got off, followed by two minitanks. He'd replaced the standard ballistic hoppers with more ammo for the grenade launchers; bullets were unlikely to be effective against magical undead, but if the zombies suddenly converged at the castle the grenades could blast a path through them. Amneiger fitted a commlink to his ear. "Stay close," he said to the pilot. "Keep the weapons charged. If I don't report back within three hours, alert Commander Fraze."
"Understood. Moving out." The shuttle doors shut, and the craft lifted off.
Amneiger turned and walked into the throne room, the two minitanks trailing him. He arrived at the throne room just as Miss Jensen began talking about inconsistencies and Guilds.
Amneiger waited just until the end of Miss Jensen's declaration of her goals before turning around and walking back into the relative privacy of the empty grounds outside. He switched on the commlink. "Cadet?"
"Yes sir?"
"Here's what's going on." Amneiger quickly recounted what Miss Jensens had said. "Since we're a Guild, we're a target. Make sure Commander Fraze gets this information. I'm going back in to see if anything else happens."
"Roger that, sir."
"Good. Out." Amneiger turned and went back into the throne room.
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Post by Zylaa on Feb 2, 2013 0:13:45 GMT -5
"Well, you were out there and I wasn't. What does your gut say? If we go to sleep right now, how likely are we to get shaken out of it before morning by, say, meteorites or undead penguins or the apocalypse or some such crap?" Hunty asked.
Zylaa made a face. "My gut is telling me that I wish I'd stopped for food on the way back. But there is something fishy about this. Let me get the weasels, we can do a proper reading of the situation." Zylaa reached in her pocket and tossed up a few of her newfound shinies. A pile of weasels appeared with little popping sounds, snatching the shinies out of the air. They'd been taking the loss of ship funds very hard. After brief cajoling, they returned to the deck, complete with miniature instruments.
On the one hand, these instruments had been a gift from a ninja-- on the other hand, it was dead useful to get to listen in on the background music of your life. Zylaa was properly set up for an exposition now.
"The way I see it, the contest they set up didn't make much sense," Zylaa said, and heard the miniature cello start to play. "If the people running the game were in this for profit, they would have tried to squeeze us out of money-- as it stands, they gave us half their money, despite providing the entire setup and illusions." A few more instruments had joined in, and yes, this had a definite eerie feeling to it. "Which also doesn't add up, come to think of it. Why anyone with that much magic would want to resort to a traveling carnival is a mystery. But most importantly," she said, hearing the music crescendo with her, "they were interesting strangers who wandered into town and seemingly wandered out without any incidents, twists, or fuss. And that's enough reason to be suspicious."
The music, as always, finished at the perfect time with an appropriate chord, this time an ominous one. Zylaa sighed. Just once, could a mysterious stranger come to town for happy reasons? And it was so late at night... Hunty looked about as tired as she felt.
"We could let someone else deal with the apocalypse this time," she offered.
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Post by Fraze on Feb 2, 2013 4:54:17 GMT -5
"I see you are literally raising a army... Why? Depending on your answer, I won't need to draw my blades tonight." Odd, the prohibition against speaking of their mission had been rescinded. Mostly, anyway. "We are going to conquer this kingdom," Hellas answered. "Our takeover will be swift, and we have been instructed not to shed blood needlessly." He looked a bit disappointed at this last part. Alabaster observed Draco with a curious expression. "You're a ninja, aren't you?" Alabaster asked. "A what?" Hellas appeared puzzled. "A warrior of stealth and shadow." He turned to Draco. "We have told you our business; now I ask that you tell us yours. Ninjas were not part of Dunburrow when I was alive; has this changed, or are you a foreigner to this kingdom?"
--------
Amid the chaos, Miss Jensen caught sight of Amneiger, trailing in the back of the throne room. "You," she said, looking directly at him. "You are going to report to Spacefleet, are you not?" She took a few steps closer to the professor. "I believe you heard my intentions. This does not concern your organization. As long as Spacefleet does not interfere with my plans, I will not interfere with them. But should you choose to take action, I am prepared to respond in kind."
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Post by Huntress on Feb 2, 2013 12:17:27 GMT -5
((So hey, people, can we do this location tag thing here again? Because it's always made following the action and where anyone is at any time much easier. ...not that I have issues keeping track of where my Sparrow-Gibbs duo currently lies, but all the same >> The White Weewoo))
Hunty looked glumly at Zylaa's weasels. When it came to plot forecasts, you couldn't beat weasels.
"You know how it goes with disasters," she said. "If we try to run away from them like reasonable pirates, they just catch up with us when we're at our least prepared. If we go out there now and try to catch it before it catches us, we at least have an upper hand.
And possibly profits," she added after a moment's thought, brightening considerably. "Apocalypses often involve profits for those who know how to grab them. Bloody Mary!"
Something small, plump and dark blue fell out of the darkness and landed on her shoulder with precision backed by years of practice.
"One day," said the meepit, "you'll decide to do the reasonable thing."
"Yeah, that'll be the day when I start spending all my time in a pub, getting youngsters to buy me drinks in ecxhange for tales of past adventures. Get a team together and fetch my mattress. Okay, make it two mattresses."
The captain clattered to the railing, suddenly full of that fake energy you get when you snatch it back from the jaws of exhaustion for one final task. She looked down at the large shadow that could just be seen drifting lazily under the surface.
"Here, boy! Up and over!"
A barrel-sized furry head poked out of the water, floppy ears perking. It would've looked ridiculous, had you forgotten for a moment that it was the head of a massive ship-sized beast, loaded full of spikes, claws, tentacles and an indiscriminately omnivorous appetite. Admittedly, he also had the cheery personality of a young cockerspaniel, but that wasn't much of a consolation for the people he gobbled down whole.
"Blarp!" he said and hooked his front paws into the sheer cliff, followed by the middle paws and then the hind paws. The blarf wiggled his way up the cliff and went over the top with unnerving ease. Hunty had thrown a few unperishable foodthings and some warm clothes in a satchel in the meantime and was watching as two mattresses wound their way out of the cabins, carried by slightly indignant meepits.
"Watch over yourself, girl," she said quietly, climbing up the rope bridge that connected the deck to the cliff's edge up above. The white brigantine glistened silently in the moonlight, immobile as ever, but unlike the last time she'd left her ship behind in that docking spot, the ship had its own defenses now, ready to spring into action as needed.
The blarf, who'd been waiting for them, shook himself dry and waited patiently as the mattresses got wedged between his spikes. The captain settled down cross-legged on one of them and dug out a map.
"We'll head for the castle," she decided. "If we don't hear anything on the way, we should hear anything there is to hear at Kestrel, and we'll use the chance to stock up on food and whatnot, now that we actually have shinies. It's about five miles from here, should take us a couple hours... you hear me, boy, on those couple hours?"
"Blarf," said the blarf, and settled off through the woods on a slow meandering pace as Hunty curled up on the mattress and was asleep almost instantly.
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Post by Lord Hayati on Feb 2, 2013 14:40:50 GMT -5
the Castle:
Krisseh opened her eyes, gazing right into Tiger's Eyes. She never knew this person, yet, she felt trust coming from her.
"I-I-Its okay... I can walk myself out... But... the underdeep..."
She started to become translucent again, while picking herself up. But, It wasn't easy, due to the fact that her leg was torn off, and reapplied rather hastily.
"I was possessed by the underdeep. I still am, but..."
she started to hobble herself out of the castle, not wanting to show weakness. Even if Tiger would carry her, her ears would have to be made of steel, because Krisseh was not going to stand it.
That is, if she didn't fall down the first set of stairs. Luckily, no harm was done, but Falling down stairs right in front of the main villian was probably a bad idea.
@_@ "um... Is that carrying offer still available?"
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Post by Celestial on Feb 2, 2013 15:25:38 GMT -5
((The Castle))
Celestial rushed forward to Krisseh, standing over her as Ellen and Tiger tended to the jelly usul.
"Where have you been all this time? You disappeared without warning since that incident and now you're just here!" she yells, feeling relief at seeing her old friend but cursing that she could not have come at a worse time.
The mage looked up at Kristy and Azzie as they came in.
"We've been used. Jensen used us and is now, along with a bunch of legendary heroes, raising up an army of, yes, zombies. We should be safe, those zombies don't eat brains without orders," she explained hurriedly, glaring at Miss Jensen through the flames. She listened as the woman explained her reasoning, which sounded ridiculous to her but she was not going to argue with a megalomaniac assistant to a circus master.
She nodded at Tiger's offer to carry Krisseh, especially after seeing the usul fall down the stairs.
"Okay. We'll get her to the Manor, through the...the portal," she hissed, wondering how Miss Jensen knew about that. "We need figure out what in the Underdeep and the Grey Lands we can do about this."
Celestial saw Miss Jensen looking at something. Following her line of sight, the mage's gaze settled on Amneiger.
"Take the portal ahead of me, get back to the Manor, all of you. It is probably the safest place on the surface right now," she ordered, pointing them down the corridor where the portal was. "You all know how to use it. As for me, I'm staying here. I need to have a word with somebody."
She took a few quick steps until she was right in front of Amneiger, coming between him and the gaze of Miss Jensen. Celestial scowled at him and took him by the arm, forcefully dragging him out of the throne room and away from her.
"Spacefleet...I should have known you would come down here. I bet you're going to enjoy watching from your high and mighty position as she tears us apart, aren't you? You make me sick!" she said angrily as she dragged him. However, as soon as she was out of the way of any eyes and ears, her tone turned much softer and her expression became neutral.
"I am sorry about that. I don't have any ill will against Spacefleet, well, not any more than you probably have against us," she said casually, trying to smile without looking threatening. "But it doesn't matter. We need your help. I know what she said but...you can't stand by and just not interfere. We need you. And I'm willing to be in Spacefleet's debt if it means getting her out of our Kingdom. Go back to your commander and say that."
((Mage Manor))
The librarian listened carefully to what Zephyr had to say, although he continued reading his book at the same time. It was polite to listen but he did not really care about what sounded like politics and Guild things. He was a creature of simple tastes. As long as they did not harm the books, he was content to leave well enough alone.
Now information, he was keen on providing information. The librarian put down the book, clasped his gloved hands over his mouth and paused for a moment, trying to recall if what Zephyr wanted was at all provided by the library.
He finally unclasped his hands and turned to the Mage. The librarian opened is mouth for a second as he tried to remember how to make words and get a normal-sounding voice at the same time.
"Castle library," he said in a monotone and returned to reading without missing a beat, exuding an air of 'leave me alone now'.
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Post by Zylaa on Feb 2, 2013 15:45:05 GMT -5
The White Weewoo
"Apocalypses often involve profits for those who know how to grab them."
"True enough," Zylaa said, grinning. As Hunty readied the meepits and blarf, Zylaa dashed to her on cabin, pouring out a large portion of the shinies, on which the weasels happily pounced. Though leaving plenty of shinies out in the open was not a wise move in the strictest sense, Zylaa figured that if anyone was desperate enough to try and take the shinies from the weasels, they deserved them.
"It's time for another adventure. Who wants to come?" she announced. Sure, she could summon the weasels, but it was always handy to have a few immediately available as scouts and soundtrack. A few squeaks of volunteers. Zylaa racked her memories as she looked at the volunteer weasels-- yep, they covered a decent range of instruments. They'd be able to get a good atmospheric tune going at any point. "Excellent. Grab your instruments and a personal shiny each. We're riding on the blarf."
A few minutes later, with her own satchel of dried food and extra clothes, Zylaa clambered onto her own mattress, followed by the volunteer weasels. We could set up a whole portable home on the blarf, she thought.
Castle Kestrel sounded like a good plan-- as did sleep. She snuggled under her coat and fell asleep to the melodic sounds of crashing underbrush.
---
Castle Kestrel
Zylaa awoke to one of the meepits tapping her on the head. "Castle Kestrel," it said.
Zylaa sat up, rubbing her eyes blearily, wondering if she would be able to spot anything wrong. Surely, the castle was asleep at this hour...
Oh. The door had been broken down. Violently.
"Looks like they've taken the party inside," Zylaa sighed. "Do we know any back ways in? I'd rather not charge in with swords drawn until we know what eldritch abomination we're facing this time."
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Post by Draco on Feb 2, 2013 15:50:01 GMT -5
((Castle))
Dragus followed the mages, keep a eye out for anyone following them or any ambushes.
"Be careful on the way out. There are some stairs."
---
((Uhh... Somewhere? >.> A field between Castle Kestrel and Mage Manor?))
Draco stands staring at the man who just asked him a question.
"You answered my question, so I will answer yours. We have hidden ourselves from this land for a long time. It has only been the past few generations that we have made ourselves known to the people of this land."
He reaches behind himself. One hand near his shoulder, the other closer to his hip. He draws two swords.
"We protect this land the best we can from the shadows. Only coming out when it is necessary."
A voice leaks into his mind, "It always seems necessary around this crazy place! It's always under attack, and you're always butting your way into it! Look what happened last time! You now have me to listen to!" He shakes his head, silently cursing.
"I don't want to do this, but I'm afraid I can't let you move any further."
"You're going to get yourself killed! Us killed!"
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Post by Tiger on Feb 2, 2013 17:34:41 GMT -5
((Castle Kestrel))
Tiger nodded once at Krisseh's question and picked the Usul up without waiting for further permission. Her ears twitched as she edged back toward the group, listening to Celestial's orders. Tiger didn't like the idea of leaving Celestial on her own - then again, the mage could turn into a dragon, so she'd probably be all right.
Probably. "Be careful," she growled, before heading for the stairs. The portal was beneath the staircase; it seemed like an odd place to put an immensly powerful artifact, but Tiger was quickly learning that the Guilds had their own...logic.
She paused around the bend of the stairs, turning her head to meet the songbird that obligingly hopped onto the crest of her shoulder. "Meet us at the manor," she instructed. "If we aren't there when you arrive, find...I don't know, find someone." The bird's beak fluttered in a silent twitter, and it swept off, passing low over the stone floor and out the broken door.
She hesitated at the edge of the portal, frozen by the double fear of having never used the thing before and worrying that Jensen might have damaged it. Why let us leave if the thing's perfectly intact?
As always, it seemed, there wasn't much choice. Tiger's ears flattened, but she stepped into the portal ((Or however the thing works, is this the first time the portal's been used in RP?)). The thing was connected to a sentient and for-the-most-part benevolent magical manor...it would turn off or something if the portal became damaged. ...Right?
Tiger wouldn't find out in this post, what the manor's response to a damaged portal would be. Instead, she would learn that something - the portal, the Manor, or maybe the magic itself - did not take well to the Underdeep.*
((Mage Manor))
Or maybe the Manor always threw people crossing through the portal smack into dungeons. Tiger hadn't even known the Manor had cells.
She nearly smacked herself and Krisseh into the iron bars of the cage. Recoiling from the impact, she expected to stagger into the protal again. No luck; just concrete wall. A shove from her shoulder didn't budge the cell door.
"Come on!" Tiger shouted. "You stupid mansion, we're mages, not intruders!"
Growling, she set Krisseh down and tried to reach through the bars for the lock. The Manor responded by shrinking the gap between the rods. Tiger snatched her hand back. "Hello?" she shouted. "Anyone out there? We came from the castle, this stupid shack locked us up!"
((...I hope I didn't go overboard with the whole 'take initiative' thing?))
((My theory is that since the portal can read minds to find the password, it would also detect the Underdeep. If I've violated any canon, lemme know and I'll edit/delete appropriately ^^))
-----------------------------------
*Not that she would know this was what she'd learned, having been in Backstory Land for the Underdeep plot, but you try rearranging that sentence to imply that she learned something she didn't learn without deviating from the point of the entire paragraph.
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Post by Lord Hayati on Feb 2, 2013 19:40:45 GMT -5
Mage manor:
Krisseh raised her head as they went through the portal, Expecting to land in the common area. The actual location they landed was much more shocking.
"J-jail."
She had only gone down to the area once, and that was to find a lost book for the librarian. If there was one thing she learned that day, it was to never lose a book from the Librarian's collection.
But that was a different subject. She and Tiger were in jail, probably due to being infected by the underdeep.
"T-tiger, I know why. I have the underdeep in me... If you can get a hold of the librarian... Maybe he could help. Maybe say a book is lost down here."
Hopefully, the Manor would let tiger go. but she knew for a fact she was stuck.
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Post by ♥ Azzie on Feb 2, 2013 21:00:33 GMT -5
((Castle Kestrel) Azzie listened to Celestial explain. She frowned when Celestial reached the end.
"Well, using people isn't very nice. But if we're safe, why are there zombies in the first place? If they're not attacking... what's the point?" It confused her. In both of the other wars she'd seen, the attacker's forces had spared no time in attacking people. Here they just seemed to be... waiting. Are they all some sort of threat she's using? Azzie wondered.
She stopped wondering when Miss Jensen began speaking. The woman's words were making a surprising amount of sense, at least to Azzie. She found herself looking at Miss Jensen with curiosity, rather than the contempt she'd expected.
At her final words, Azzie looked over at Krisseh. She hadn't realized the Usul was so badly injured from her friends' attempts to save her. She hurried over to help her, but by the time she reached her, she was already with Tiger.
When Celestial told everyone to go through the portal, she hurried on after the others. She had not, strictly speaking, used it before. She knew the password, of course; all the mages did, but she hadn't had any reason to go to the castle before, so she'd never used the portal.
With a last glance back at Miss Jensen, she followed Tiger and Krisseh down the stairs and into the portal.
((Mage Manor)) Azzie looked around and saw, with relief, that she was back on Manor property. She stepped out of the gazebo, expecting it to fill soon with more returning forumers. It really was a lovely night, awash in a dim sort of moonlight, but Azzie hadn't noticed it before. She sighed, for the moment content, and waited for the rest of her friends to make their way back.
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