Caerul alighted directly on the doorstep, food balanced carefully in her arms. She wasn’t that late—only about ten minutes, which was really good all things considered! Still, she was a little nervous as she went to knock. The party was sure to be full of senior delvers. To have been invited was an honor, but she knew she’d be out of place the moment she stepped through the door. Stop it. Since when do people make me nervous? Since always, when it came to the White Whistles... but Caerul had met most of them individually at least once before. Surely she could keep it together now. Taking a deep breath, she rapped the door gently with her toe.
@s-r-a-j-o
If one were listening closely, they might imagine the sound of cartoon-like wheels spinning and scrambling and shoes sliding against hardwood floors as a frantic new homemaker careens around her house and slams into the front door with a dull thud, before swining open to reveal Lyza panting, dressed in her bright red and white Abyssmas best with her apron still dangling from her shoulders.
“SRa--aaaaveen..!! My friend!” She corrects midcourse as she remembers the request for anonymity. “I’m glad you could make it, please come in, and enjoy yourself! There’s lots to eat, and even a few oddities you might enjoy!”
[SPOILERS if you’d rather these be revealed in threads!]
Srajo - a large, double layered flask with a hardened steel shell and a ceramic interior. The two layers are separated by a vacuum, keeping the ceramic both impact- and thermally-isolated from the steel. It’s designed to keep beverages warm for about 24 hours, but it can also be used for long term storage that is considerably more rugged than glass. Caerul’s mentor designed and specially commissioned a whole bunch of them for coffee, but Caerul hopes that Srajo can use it for mulled wine.
Ozen - a 6-month subscription to a monthly spice sampler, which sends a different variety of exotic spices every month. Caerul went through her old shipping lists to try to check that they weren’t spices Ozen already regularly ordered, but she isn’t 100% sure. Most subscription services won’t ship to the Abyss, but Caerul was able to cut a deal since she would personally complete the delivery.
Lyza - The latest model of a fancy imported folding multitool, with all kinds of different blades and other attachments. Ironically, Caerul’s hero was the hardest for her to shop for, but she’d started thinking about giving her an Abyssmas gift long before being invited to the party. She got the handle engraved with “Annihilator” in fancy script framed by eternal fortunes.
how tf Caerul got all those abyssmas cards and invitations delivered in time
because I like continuity and hate handwaving stuff. I was gonna write a drabble or two to cover this (and went ahead and threw my shitty half-written draft under the cut) and have an in-progress thread that’ll probably deal with the fifth layer part, but I hit a block and was behind on my abyssmas replies, so here’s the notes on what happened instead.
Delivered all of the cards in the first two layers. This only took about two days. In between deliveries, Caerul stocked up for her expedition to the fourth layer.
Starting from Seeker Camp, plummeted down to the fourth layer to deliver to Idofront and search for Srajo. This happened in a matter of minutes; Caerul might or might not have broken the sound barrier on the way down through the Great Fault.
When no one was around to receive the letter and deliver a disguise for Srajo to the drop point, trekked to Idofront accompanied partway by Srajo (ongoing thread). In Fifth Layer time, this actually shouldn’t have taken that long, but ~*time dilation*~ is a thing. Gave Srajo the disguise, and began the journey back alone.
Hoisted herself back up to the Fourth Layer via the “riding-the-rope-up-as-the-chandelier-comes-crashing-down” technique, only with a precariously balanced boulder instead of a chandelier. Caerul set this up on the way down, so all she had to do was tie herself up with the loose end of the rope and chuck pebbles at the boulder until it fell. She sustained some minor sprains from the curse of the Fifth Layer and some nastier scrapes from being dragged up the cliff face, but all things considered, it went fairly well. The hardest part was untying herself once she came to her senses in the Fourth Layer.
Hurled herself up through the Fourth Layer by flying as fast as possible and pushing herself to the absolute limit of her pain tolerance. The logic was that if she went fast enough, she’d only have time to lose a limited amount of blood. Whether that was true or not... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ In any case, she survived this and made it to the base of the Third Layer. She did pass out for several days in a neritantan den upon arrival.
Shakily made her way up the Third Layer the normal way. Caerul has been working on a workaround for flying through the Great Fault, but she hasn’t perfected it yet. This was less physically traumatic than the Fourth and Fifth Layer ascents, but it did take a lot longer.
Made it back to the Second Layer, took a short rest, and then blasted through the last two layers to the top. Fasted in preparation for this and managed to only throw up once!
Arrived home three nights before Abyssmas and immediately collapsed. Slept through all of the next day, cleaned and patched herself up that evening. Ran errands the following morning and took Viddy out on Abyssmas Eve.
aaaaaaaand then here’s that half-written drabble. It does cut off halfway through a sentence ;;>~>
Once she’d delivered all the letters with higher destinations—a task of just a couple of days—Caerul perched on the observation deck of the Seeker Camp, thinking. Terminal velocity wasn’t going to cut it to get her through the Great Fault without incident. She’d had plenty of splitjaw run-ins before, and knew freefall wouldn’t stop a determined maw from trying to catch her and gulp her down. Once spiky wings caught on one’s throat it’d probably spit her out, but not before those teeth had left their mark. She didn’t have time for that.
But she also didn’t have time to do it the slow way. Crawling through nerintantan tunnels was tedious enough before the wings, but now it was downright maddening.
At a high enough speed, the splitjaws couldn’t break her momentum... but she could still hit one. That might get messy... But what choice did she have? The ascent from the Fourth (or Abyss forbid, the Fifth) Layer would take her weeks. And with just under a month to Abyssmas, she’d need every second to return in time. Caerul adjusted her goggles and smiled ruefully. Besides, when had she let the risks stop her? She’d succeed, or she’d go out in a blaze of glory. It was as simple as that.
This time, she didn’t carelessly flop back into the Abyss, letting gravity do the work. She backed up from the precipice, and with a running leap, dove headfirst toward the central shaft, thrusters blazing. C’mon... faster... faster... faster... The wind rushed by her, ripping at her clothing, hair, and skin with the force of
