Powder Miner

As soon as Iowa blew CFW Trick to particularly ugly and particularly small smithereens, Perlita was off like a shot, running as fast as her legs could possibly take her to where the android girl consumed by Trick had been dumped onto the grass. She ran, nearly tripping over her own long dress, until she fell to her knees by 6D -- someone who had almost certainly directly saved her from the fate that 6D herself had befallen, a fate that 6D had only befallen because of a simple, stupid lapse of attention on Perlita's part. "No no no no no no, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Crawford, Crawford!" Perlita called out her Perlita, and channeled healing magic to the best of her ability into the unconscious android, and then again, and then again, and then again. Perlita paused to take a breath, and then another, raggedly coming out of her lungs, and it was then she noticed everyone Trick had disgorged seemed to be unconscious, "Oh, God, God, Dios en el cielo, Dios en el cielo, please wake up, please say you are not dead, please. . ."

"This really does not seem like a priority to me. Considering that we are dealing with a Trespasser incursion in all likelihood, we can't waste our time running around and performing secondary objectives. If all goes well, we can just go back and do it later, can't we? We wouldn't want to run out of time to save this place from Trespassers just for compassion's sake, would we? We have to keep efficiency in mind, here." The fairy in Isobel's pocket crossed her arms, looking out at the rest of the group perhaps somewhat challengingly, only for a sigh to sound out above her. "...right. My apologies.I think we're going to be perfectly fine helping her out, LOTUS. I know that you want to get the mission done, but wouldn't it be helpful to make friends who can help us along the way? Besides, if it really is these artifacts just getting spread around, and if we've already got two of them under control, I think this means that if it is Trespassers involved, they're doing things kind of indirectly and in kind of a limited way. So, well, I think we've got time to get this taken care of." Isobel now looked up at Sakuya. "How would we actually go about it, though? Are we going to go up and try to talk to your boss?"

"Ehhhh," Jack replied, "In this place if we're gonna get shot, we're gonna get shot in an urban environment, and I'm preeeetty sure we're gonna get shot at at some point considering the job. I'd rather just walk headfirst into it and rock 'em off kilter than give 'em the opportunity to set where and when to fight and get the first shot." Covered in weaponry as Jack was, he really didn't seem to give as much of a shit about attracting attention... but, well, he was in fact drawing attention. "If one of you guys wanna go climb a roof or some shit, you can go ahead. Probably a little more difficult for me to do it, all told. Bet Scarlet's the best bet, if someone does tag her it shouldn't slow her down much. 'spose I'd just wait and watch for now."

"-AAAAAAH!" Satomi tumbled through the portal, "eep"ed a little as she turned out to be on a skeleton, but after rolling off of it and standing up she rapidly began to calm down. "Well, now... that was a stupid decision, was it not?" she muttered to herself, and looked around. Some sort of prison cell, but that was okay, she could break out of that sort of thing just fine, especially with the bars being such a disaster of corrosion -- it would be trivially easy to break and unseat at least a few of the bars, and if that didn't work she could just disassemble the housing. The overall architecture of the prison was... interesting. It seemed like escape would be a precarious proposition were this place still operational (and by the looks of it it did not seem to be, such a shame to see buildings fall out of maintenance), but it had to have been a lot of effort to make somewhere very difficult to actually run -- especially because in the event of some sort of escape, Satomi would expect heavy casualties for all involved. With her architectural analysis out of the way, Satomi began to devote her thought processes to more immediate concerns and reactions to her situation. The sounds of combat from above drove Satomi to begin to inspect her weapons, making sure her crossbows were in good condition (or, well, at least as good a condition as the trash crossbow could get), make sure her armor and underarmor's coverage left no gaps, and she popped her katana ever so slightly out of its sheathe to prepare to quick-draw it. Whatever was fighting up there didn't scream... but that only made her more wary. She turned and waved, hoping that she could be seen as she'd seen glimpses of the interior of this place, and then she elected to wait to see if she was followed.

Kaiu Satomi had stepped outside of the Weatherlight for a moment, eyeing the rounder of the two men of this world and wondering just what precisely was going on in this place and exactly how they fit into it, ignoring the aura of unease (for now -- she could only hope that there was not some sort of Taint she would have to contend with). When the glyph originally showed up on the ground, Satomi didn't register it at all -- after all, it was pretty much just a vaguely lighter blur to her at any distance. It was, perhaps, not possible to refer to Satomi as someone "of keen eye", after all. But, of course, when it burst into a full portal, she sure noticed THAT. "What the... I guess this might be like those windows to other realms in the void...?" Curiosity rapidly began to get the better of her, and with a pensive "hmmmm", she approached the portal, pulled a rod from one of the assemblages of weaponry tied to her back, and poked at the portal with the wooden rod. Then it yanked her through it with a shriek that cut off as she was sucked through, though she could be seen looking around, checking her weapons, and waving on the other side.

Ceridwen was leaning against a wall, wrist against its surface, as she just tried to get some air so she didn't burst into tears. Michi's presence drew a shaky sigh from the other redhead, who spoke quietly and haltingly. "...argument. It... Rhian attacked me for being... for grieving about everything that has happened. Ceridwen breathed for a few moments, and then began speaking again. "Then she started attacking everyone else... the Dragon Knights... I started defending them because I just... I just wanted them to be left alone to mourn. I figured out..." "...some things about her, which... which make it understandable, but still not good. And then Argos started yelling at me too... and I... I just wanted them to leave everyone alone." Ceridwen put her hands to her face, and spoke almost inaudibly next. "...all I did was make things more painful for everyone in here, though."

Argos' sudden forceful interjection into the conversation caught Ceridwen completely by surprise -- in fact, it looked like she had physically been punched in the gut, and she had difficulty actually formulating her next words. ""Wh-- why you?-- What do you think I'm--" Ceridwen let out a sharp breath, struggling. "I'm not-- did you even listen to me-- I'm not trying to... to have a social debate--" "I even said... I even said I didn't think all of this is right! But--" Ceridwen gestured at the wounded and grieving Dragon Knights with desperation this time, her arm shaking. And then as Rhian broke down into tears, Ceridwen found herself further overwhelmed, and what little composure she had began to falter. She put a hand to her eyes, taking in a shuddering breath as she tried not to enter a similar state as the other former apprentice of Gareth. "I'm trying to be rational, I'm-- I'm really trying my best-- but--" "I knew all of these people. I know all of these people. I-- I don't even know how many of my loved ones are-- are among the dead--" "Why does it have to be-- it has to be some-- some grandiose speech about-- why right now-- I just--" Ceridwen closed her eyes and took in another shaky breath, turning away lest she really lose the fight not to cry too. "Why can't you even just let us grieve? I can't... I can't do this anymore." As Ceridwen turned around and left, carefully holding her eyes and trying to hold her breath steady, her dragon stalked up to Argos, growled at him deliberately, and then moved back to his rider and wrapped a wing around her.

Ceridwen took in a long breath, and then let out. Now she understood everything, and while she was still shaky, that made it a lot easier to deal with this. Now that she had all the facts, she could piece a case together -- though at least this time it hopefully wouldn't result in anyone's death. "...I think I know who you are. Not the details, because he never spoke about it any more than vaguely, but... it wasn't difficult to tell that Gareth was often consumed with pain over something, even when I was little. I thought for years about it, and asked about it in little ways, and eventually, I figured out what it was -- why he had always been extremely protective during my apprenticeship, and why he had always gone so far out of his way to make sure I was cautious with Ynddi." "Gareth had had an apprentice before me -- his daughter, I think. That must be you. And I knew that that apprentice had lost her dragon in a terrible accident, which..." Ceridwen sighed. "I never thought that that was right -- that tradition. I've thought about it a lot. And I guess that means I don't think it's right that it happened to you, either." "But knowing this also means I know where you're wrong. It wasn't about you, and it wasn't about tossing you aside because of a perceived level of effort, or something like that. It was about adhering to the rules, even though Gareth himself hadn't wanted it. It was a wound that never healed for him, I could tell -- if things were the way that they should have been, if that rule wasn't there, then he'd have been happier." Ceridwen sighed, then, and her expression once again took on some heat. "But this also means I know when you're lying. You're claiming you know this," and here Ceridwen gestured at the room full of the wounded and miserable, "but you don't. You can't. I never knew you, which means you have to have come before me, and you look like you're in your twenties to me -- which means that you have to have been... twelve to fifteen or so? Nothing like... this..." Ceridwen trailed off. "And nothing like this happened for a long time, I think. You can't ever actually have fought here. You can't have experienced what happened here. I thought it was a grudge against me... and I guess you wouldn't like me... but it's not really about me, is it? You've got a grudge against the Dragon Knights as a whole for what happened, and you're taking the first thing you can find to take that out on. But him?" Ceridwen gestured at Futch now, staring Rhian in the eyes. "He didn't exile you, Rhian. The people you're accusing of just... not caring... most of them didn't. But I don't think you really care about that, do you?"

As Jack walked throughout the streets of Smederevo, met with curious stares and wary glares, a grin slowly spread across his face, filled with more than just mirth or cynical amusement... this was a pure grin, almost childlike, of awe and wonder. People, so many people, massed together, living in their buildings and sprawling across their city. Having a hard time of it, oh, sure, probably, but being there, being there in enough of a teeming crowd to bring back muddled glimpses of very old memories. "Oh, man. This is pretty fucking rad, isn't it?" Behind his sunglasses, his eyes darted from person to person, taking in their faces as much as they took in his appearances. "I barely even..." Jack trailed off. And then he just shrugged and kept walking, pointing finger guns at some random person staring at him and regaling them with a casual but loud "Whaddup." He turned back to the others, one of his more normal, unsettling grins on his face this time. "So, what're you guys thinking? I figure we might as well get the fuck on wherever we're getting going. We don't have all that much time, I bet, and if something tries to fucking shoot us or something we can pop 'em pretty well in turn, yeah? Better than some sneaky-deaky infil shit, I think. Miss me with that. Assholes. But anyway, what I mean is that some cloak and dagger bullshit would be just doomed to get fucking dumb for everyone involved so we might as well just bulldoze through instead."

"Of course I am, you've picked the most hurtful and vulnerable moment to do this that you could have, and I don't think it's a coinci--" Ceridwen shut up for a moment as Argos pushed her a bit harder and tried to calm them down. But then she squinted, something occurring to her. "...what do you mean the way "we" do things around here?" Ceridwen paused, and her mouth worked for several moments without actually letting out any words as she mulled something over, her outrage cooled for the moment in favor of realization. "...oh. Oh, that would explain so much, wouldn't it?"

With Cecily striking down the enemy mage, Lizaveta took a moment to move up and apply some medicine to herself, wiping away some blood with a grunt before she looked back at Shin with a worried expression. "Shin...? Are you going to be okay...?" P16, vuln self.

Ceridwen took in a breath. "What the hell are you talking about?" "Are you claiming to know exactly what happened here?" "Are you claiming to know exactly how the war went?" "How can you claim to say that this could have been prevented? Do you believe that you know exactly what decisions were made here and why?" Ceridwen stepped closer to Rhian (leaning around Argos), but this time it was only to speak more quietly, so Futch couldn't hear. "Do you believe that you can personally trace the death of these apprentices to them just... being... thrown out for the sake of tradition just so that they could die? That it wasn't the result of fighting for survival against Caliss' armies -- of the kind of war that would leave this place like this??" Ceridwen let out a furious breath. "Either you must believe you are some sort of genius, or you're just bringing what happened here into your personal grudge, no matter who you need to trample over."

The AI-turned-fairy let out a "hmm", a little disappointed. "It sounds like we've exhausted the opportunities we currently can find here -- in that case, yes, we should certainly get moving. I suppose that our most immediate lead would be," and here there was a sigh, "the aquatic people that Masako knows. I... suppose... that we should follow her lead for now, at least until we find a concrete lead to pursue that will allow us to find some wider-ranging understanding and a solution to these artifacts. Operating with little information and little basis for strategy is not what I would prefer to be doing, and I certainly don't want to try and completely run blindly into this situation." Isobel crossed her arms, also in thought. "Masako, I'd like to ask that you approach who you would think would be the most willing to work with us, first. I want to avoid getting into an unnecessary fight if I have to. It seems... honestly worryingly viable to just fight people and then work with them, here, but if we can avoid causing pain to everyone involved, it would be a lot better."

The passive hostility of this place was largely a mere curiosity to Jack -- it was something unfamiliar to the New Conglomerate mercenary, but it wasn't something of real concern. It wasn't like he really expected to be sitting around in some serene peaceful landscape or something, after all. He'd have to keep on his guard, but just because getting the first shot off inevitably meant an advantage in combat, and he wanted to pad his KDR, not take a hit. Plus, he guessed he'd be back at Auraxis if he got popped here, and that would be lame; this whole thing was the most interesting thing he'd seen in quite some time. As for the deserted status, well... Jack was used to seeing empty land. Civilian population on Auraxis had largely fucked off back up to the stations when the war'd become as big as it did, after all. His train of thought was derailed with the appearance of a new figure, though. "Right, so she mentioned Handsome Jack, my name is Jack, but not Handsome Jack, a different Jack, and also a different Jack from the pirate Jack that also isn't Handsome Jack. Got it? You'll need to, or else you might get... jacked up." The blue-and-yellow armored man grinned and shot finger guns at Harold. "But, nah, we're basically mercenaries, though our employer is some doofus who seems to think he's really scary. I don't really know why he thinks he's having some grand effect, but going out and fighting new shit is nice, and getting shit to spend that isn't the same-old is pretty nice too -- and if you want fuckin' gold and weapon tech you've come to the right place. We're on a mission where those are our rewards, to escort some dude with information other people don't want him to have, and we'll have to blow some guys away in the process more than likely. If you want in on that, come with us." Jack paused. "I guess you're kinda on your own out here if you don't, though, considering there's not exactly a ton out here. Sucks for you, I guess."

Lizaveta pulled herself off of the ground, Tabitha's words and Shin's support proving motivating as she got back to her feet, scowling at the foes remaining alive near her -- only to gasp as a SECOND meteor hit Shin, sending him painfully to the ground. She kneeled over him. "SHIN! Oh, no, I'm sorry, if you hadn't come for me...! I'll... I'll help you, or get revenge for you, or, or something! Someone please heal him!" (also crimson move to J16)

Hearing Neve's footsteps, Candide finished his singing to himself and turned to the sound of the voice -- Neve. He cracked a little bit of a cheeky grin. "Ahah, well, if you cannot understand what I am saying, how can you know if the poem is impressive?" "Mais non, I kid. The language you hear me speak is Arnaise -- the tongue of my homeland, Arne. It is across the waters from Tameloc, you see, but does not share in many of its... more unique properties." "In fact, the only reason I can speak Tamelocian as well as I can is the study of poetry I performed back when I was in my homeland."

Kietasenshi, overconfident, went from almost lazily making a swipe of his sword to flat on his back in but a moment, and after a couple of seconds of confused blinking, he suddenly grinned and burst into raucous laughter, even through both Ivoh'to and Megumi's comments. "Ahahahahaha, ahahahahaha! Well now. I didn't see that coming. And no, I'm not really some great war spirit, I'm just a samurai who didn't die, is all. Besides! It wouldn't exactly be a lot of fun if I only ever won, would it?"

Perlita drops a Patra on herself, removing all ailments and also healing herself for [SYN*2] thanks to her perks!

Nader looked over the contents of the room, and with every single item he came across -- the "Nose Nuzzlers Champions", the diary, for God's sake, the Santa Claus outfit -- his frown deepened. This wasn't what the masked man had expected, not at all, not with these illusions talking about how they were going to take all humans' souls in order to destroy the barrier evidently keeping them all trapped here. Nader had expected, perhaps, to see a cowardly tyrant revealed, such as the one he had dealt with so long ago, or failing that the bold and driven planning of a man who believed himself to be doing what needed to be done at all costs... but this, it... to tell the truth, it didn't make much sense to Nader. It seemed like this King was, more than anything else, a broken man. He had already known that they were killing humans because of the death of the Prince of this place, but Nader supposed that he hadn't thought it could destroy someone so completely... and how could somebody like this manage to kill several people? "None of this makes any sense... this isn't the way that kings are supposed to act. The way that... tyrants are supposed to act. How can this all be? I just..." He just didn't get it. And what did this make the illusions, then? Nader had assumed it was some form of propaganda, but humans probably weren't expected to be in ASGORE's house anyhow, and... well, somebody reduced to this probably wasn't capable of some grand propaganda campaign. Was it for him? Did he feel the need to repeat all of this to himself every day just to justify and motivate him to do the things that he did? Nader was, however, jarred out of his thoughts by Lucine running into his back. Not by the impact, he barely felt the girl impact against his armor, but by how suddenly being touched on the back had him jump and whirl around before seeing who he was actually looking at. "What the f-- oh. Oh. Ah, Lucine... it's alright. Here, let's go, okay? I've seen what I've needed to see in this place." Gesturing the small girl to follow him as he left the house and met up with the others, Nader found himself lost in thought. He'd seen what he needed to see, but... he would need to process it, as well.

LOTUS fell silent for a moment, contemplating: this actually contradicted her earlier assumptions and therefore her understanding of the situation would need correcting immediately in order to be able to make well-informed decisions. ”Hmm. By the sounds of it — and the lack of remark about any sort of corruption of the artifact, which I’m sure would be noticed — perhaps these artifacts aren’t actually corrupted and the similarity to what we were previously dealing with is merely a coincidence. Now, with that said, I find myself wondering in turn: does this artifact seem to you to originate from this place, or from elsewhere? I doubt we’ve been brought in to deal with a wholly internal matter.”

Ceridwen stumbled back a little at Rhian's push, but her reply and further action were cut off by Argos' quick thinking. "But you still tried to use Futc-- At Argos' response to her, Ceridwen let out a breath -- one that was rather wet, as she both tried to deal with the emotions running through her from this sudden conversation, and from what she was already dealing with. "I-- the Commander... the Mid-Wing Commander Milich got was Gareth, my mentor... and... and we couldn't find him at the castle. They'd planned to make an example of him, I think, but ended up "taking him away" somewhere, and I don't know where... and I don't know if he's okay or not..." Ceridwen gulped, finding it hard to speak for a moment, but that moment passed and Ceridwen found herself spilling her guts. "But I wasn't angry with Rhian for that. I know I don't know for sure what happened, and that maybe he's okay, and that I don't really deserve to act like everyone else here, because I wasn't even here for the invasion and all they went through, but that's not the point, because the people here did go through it. Rhian can see that they did, and they, we, lost people! I just want them to be left to grieve, that's all."

Ceridwen just continued to shrink in on herself at the start of Rhian's little tirade at her, up until the point when Rhian started to wheel on the Dragon Knights. It was at that moment when her posture changed, suddenly tensing up, a disgusted snarl on her face. Ceridwen slowly bent down, gingerly put the blacksmith's journal down somewhere out of the way where it wouldn't be stepped on, and then whirled around on Rhian, with an expression on her face that was angrier than had been seen outside of battle up until now. And she began to speak. "I don't know what grudge you have with me. Don't think I haven't seen the way you've been looking at me, and snapping at me without any provocation. I'm perceptive enough to see that much. But... I don't care what you say about me. I know that maybe what you say about me is right. But the fact that you decided to look at people in-- in their greatest moment of pain, after all that happened, after all the people lost, and then pretend to care about them just long enough to turn around and insult them, to get at me, to try to turn Argos against me and against them... that is wrong. That's awful. I thought you were mean from the start, but that I just came to expect." It's at this point that Ceridwen demonstrated why she'd put the blacksmith's journal down, grabbing at the rims of Rhian's armor near her neck, "But I cannot abide you finding the ugliness within you to-- to-- to see the pain and loss and decide that it was your opportunity to get at me! You didn't care about any of this when you walked in, I sure didn't hear you talking to Argos about it, but it was when he brought you near to me that you... you pounced on the chance! You aren't a good person at all, to do something as callous as that!"

Every time that one of Argos' outbursts rang through the hall, Ceridwen winced a little, though with her current state and expression, they were less cringes, and more simply her face setting tiredly. All of these people trying to grieve... her trying to... trying to grieve, she supposed, though she still could hope that maybe, just maybe she didn't have to, though she didn't know if Gareth was dead or worse... the saddened Dragon Knight didn't think that the rest of the Allied Guard really understood what was going on. Kerr, maybe, at least understood the seriousness of it all, as the heavily armored girl's eyes turned to track him for a moment, but... she supposed she was the only one it would hurt this much for. Argos came over to her then, hood up, and Ceridwen swallowed -- this wasn't going to be good. His whole act drew first a nervous glance at Rhian; Ceridwen wasn't sure why, but after... after searching for Gareth in Scarleticia, it seemed that Rhian hated her, and Ceridwen couldn't help but shrink back a little. Ceridwen took in a breath, and sighed. "..." Then, when Argos had finished, Ceridwen hesitated a moment and finally began to speak. The way Rhian was looking at her was worrying, but it wasn't the most important thing, now... the way Argos was acting, it was important to more people than just her, after all. "Argos, we've... the people here... and..." That hadn't come out so well. Ceridwen let out a long breath and tried again. "A lot of us have just lost people... who... who we really cared about." Ceridwen looked at Futch, and then down at the book she was clutching. "So... it's not just... it's... it's not just some thing that can be... done away with, Argos. The people here... just need some quiet and understanding so they can grieve." The next words out of Ceridwen's mouth came out quietly, and piteously. "And... and me too, maybe. I don't know, but... but..." Ceridwen trailed off into silence.

For the process of getting to the Stronghold, Ceridwen had looked remarkably vulnerable --thanks to the mix of emotions roiling within her, far less angry than Rhian's but more distraught in turn-- and that state of being absolutely did not change when the group entered the Tower. It was hard to see the Stronghold in this state: wartorn, with many of those she knew probably wounded, dead, or dying. Sharon... even the apprentices, even Sharon... Ceridwen put a hand to her mouth for a moment, feeling nauseous, and took a while for that ugly swelling of queasy, mournful horror. Ceridwen had spoken to her in such a light, happy way before she'd left... and now she was gone. The red-haired Dragon Knight feared to think of who else might have died. She ended up hugging a particular manual to her chest, the weathered book Gareth had used for his smith-work, which she hadn't let be more than a couple of feet away from her ever since she'd grabbed it. It was in her saddlebag while she flew, obsessively checked over to make sure the stress of flying hadn't finally shaken it apart when she landed, and clutched tightly whenever she was the ground. Now was no exception, and right now her grasp around it was tight, her gaze down, as she tried to withstand the monumental tide of loss currently deluged both the Stronghold and her own life. Ceridwen remained in silence. "..."

Kietasenshi grinned as he strode towards the remaining wolf, unsheathing his katana with a flick, the lick of soul-fire emanating from the ever-present cut above his eye dancing with his excitement. "Well, I see you all were kind enough to leave some for me, huh? Thanks for that." Kietasenshi lunged at the wolf, his smile wide across his face -- and once he'd done that, his other arm swung out to heartily clap Nil on the back... practically hard enough to knock the poor mute shikigami out of this plane of existence, though no malice was meant. Kietasenshi then positioned himself in front of Nil, his sword held out and at the ready. "Let me take care of things for you now, yeah, little buddy?" L11, kill Wolf 1, Guard Nil.