anon has whispered: For the one-word prompts, if you're still accepting? fight : my muse stops your muse from getting into a physical fight with someone else. With Maebh/@semper-miles
some one word prompts. // accepting.
Things took a turn in ways even the bringer of storms did not anticipate. It starts with questions ── who are you? ── who is she? ──
It ends with the realisation that should’ve dawned upon Karigan a long time ago. And it seems that her prime target, Izola, was too struck with an epiphany. She is almost ready, too ready for physical confrontation. The first instinct was to fight as she had been so thoroughly taught all her life. It was the grit of one’s jaw and the harshness of one’s determination that was essential to surviving.
“ Oh? You’d sell out your own partner? ” The sky pirate hums in mere amusement. Mere moments before she attempted to get the first hit. “ How unfortunate that things had to end up this way. ”
It was a clear indication that she should not trust any of them, as even the information broker had turned against someone who was living comfortably under the same roof. There is a grunt of frustration when her fist does not connect with her intended target.
“ Move, ” Karigan hisses and withdraws her arm, backing away from Maebh entirely, “ I’m only here to find out what else the Corpse Brigade has in store for poor, poor Ala Mhigo. ”
@lynxden / @semper-miles has whispered: 🖐️ // put a hand around my muse’s throat + 🔙 // push my muse against a wall + 🔵 // grab my muse hard enough to leave a bruise . "insult my partners again and there won't be a next time." (platonic with Maebh? :3)
come fight me cowards // accepting.
Greed was the blight that weakened all steel, but wrath was the sin she'd drink deep in the goblet. With her back pressed against the wall with a loud thud, Karigan only cracks a crooked grin at the broker, almost as if it was on purpose to annoy the shorter of the two.
The sky pirate was no stranger to these types of situations, no. It was the thrill that kept her going, and her hatred to fuel every motor that grinded for war. “ Is that a threat ── ” Green hues were wild and ablaze as she gazed down at the broker, “ ── or a promise ? ”
Karigan didn't need an answer. She already knew the implications but there was an unbearable itch to taunt. To see how far this would go. There is a pause the pirate attempts to catch her breath, bringing a free hand up to grip at Maebh's wrist. “ Empty promises wouldn't do your reputation well, hm? ” She purrs, albeit hoarsely from being choked. The grip on the brooker's wrist only got tighter and tighter, like a serpent coiled around it's prey.
“ As much as I'd love to see this through, ” Her appetite for blood was like the never-ending abyss, always hungry for more. “ Let's drop it for now, shall we? You get what you want, and I get my Corpse Brigade. ”
Contains the First shard version of Solveig, played by @semper-miles !))
===
Rattle rattle rattle--
Solveig woke up with a start at the sounds.
Thump, rattle, THUNK--
She blearily looked over at the chronometer--too early in the bloody morning, it was.
THUMPTHUMPTHUMP bump rattle--
Well, there was no going back to sleep now, so she just got up with a groan of protest from both her mouth and her metal legs.
THUNKTHUNKTHUNK--
BAM!
“Zarr!”
The Ronso in question had, it seemed, bowled over a table by the time she stumped her way out to the living room; the tablecloth had come off of it and now Zarr was just wriggling in it, huffing and snorting and really the only thing Solveig could see outside it was that long lion-like tail lashing.
At least, until Zarr heard that voice, and froze.
“...Hi Solv.” They almost sounded embarrassed, but not quite.
“It is,” Solveig started, rubbing her face, “three in the Light-damned morning.”
They wiggled out of the tablecloth, their heavy-maned head popping right out of it. Solveig didn’t fail to note how dilated their pupils were. “Yes it is.”
“And you’re up why?”
At that, Zarr’s gaze just shifted to the ceiling, their red eyes no longer meeting hers.
“Zarr.”
“I kinda...felt like running.” They almost didn’t want to say it, clearly, but they had anyway under that questioning stare. “S’ all. Sorry.”
“Just don’t do that in the house? Again?” But really, as annoyed as Solveig could get with this kind of strange cat-like nonsense...she had to admit, at least unlike some people she could name, their foibles were at least relatively benign. Amusing, even.
That was good enough for her. It was probably all she could ask for in a friend.
((Runya gets a visitor from Vira ( @semper-miles ). Mentions of Sorin ( @aetherstitch )! ))
===
The last thing he had been aiming for was to get knocked flat by some Light-ridden monster that wasn’t even remotely related to his current grudges.
Great.
Just excellent.
He of course brushed off any healer help that wasn’t strictly related to getting back on his feet; he saw how they had looked at some of the more obvious signs of his augmentations and had zero desire whatsoever to get them involved, directing them instead to Sorin. (He did not need nor want their pity. He did not need nor want them butchering him further to take it out. He did not need nor want anyone sticking their noses into his business when they would likely disapprove of it anyway.)
His ear flicked, though, as he heard a voice outside the tent. A familiar voice...
Speaking of people who did not need to be in his business--
The tent flap flopped open with a loud noise and Vira darted in, a harried-looking Hyur at their heels. They brightened up immensely seeing him sitting up, but he just narrowed one eye in response.
“Oh, ‘ey, yer up!”
“How very astute of you,” he drawled, but the tone visibly just went right over Vira’s head, judging by how their grin didn’t so much as falter a moment.
“I ‘eard wha’ happened,” they continued, sitting hard on the edge of his bed--causing him to inch away, but they weren’t deterred. “Mourning gotcha...?”
“Well, both Sorin and I both. But yes.”
They tilted their head, though, as they looked at him. (He wasn’t sure if he appreciated how blatantly they showed their emotions on their face, or if it was exceedingly obnoxious. Perhaps both.) “An’ it didn’...’urt Blue, did it?” Their brow furrowed. “Didn’ think anythin’ could ‘urt somethin’ tha’ big other’n another Weapon. Dae wasn’ ‘appy.”
Of course Daeyona wasn’t happy. He would argue that Daeyona was rarely happy just in general, even. But even his petty arse knew when to not debate a point too thoroughly, and so he just folded his arms. “I’m surprised she cares much about him beyond what we can do for her.”
“...We?”
He just blinked slowly, not deigning to respond to the question. And after some awkward fidgeting, Vira just stumbled on in the conversation.
“Well, ‘e’s nice.” And they sounded a bit defensive about it... “An’ even Dae thinks so too.” So there, was what they were clearly itching to cap that with, but they behaved enough to not say it. “An’ tha’ Mourning thing’s...well, y’know.”
He did indeed know.
“So is ‘e okay?”
“Very. He’s been doing little but hover outside since he brought dear Sorin and I here.” He glanced over at the other Miqo’te in question, but Sorin was indeed still out to the world, again. His bouts of consciousness were few and far between, to say the least. “If you look outside the gate, you’ll see him well enough.”
“Ah, a’right...” They relaxed a little at that, and then paused. “...You a’right?”
For a moment, he just tilted his head and wondered why, exactly, they cared. “I’m unsure why you’re asking.”
But Vira snorted as if it was incredibly obvious. “’Cause I wanna ask. An’ Miss Macbalor cares too.”
Ah, Maebh. That had been a segue that he hadn’t entirely expected, and he just smiled more at them...and in turn, they just looked more and more uncomfortable at him, before he finally spoke. “Does she, now.” A question, or a statement? He left it ambiguous.
“...Aye.” They were actually leaning away slightly from him, now. “Wish ye’d stop bein’ weird ‘bout it. Please.”
Why wouldn’t he be ‘weird’ about it, though? Wouldn’t anyone be weird about someone running around in their first ever (and for a long long time, only) friend’s body, using her face and her voice and even her mind? Someone who wasn’t put off by that would be a weirder one, indeed. “Mmmm, no.”
“Hmph.” They folded their arms tightly at that. “Y’r a jerk.”
And he laughed lightly. “I try.”
“But y’r a’right if y’r bein’ a jerk,” they grudgingly admitted, finally getting back up to their feet. “An’ if y’ think Sorin’s a’right...”
“I do.” He was quite sure about that, though the thoughts of that strange dark creature still crossed his own mind from time to time. He knew what that had been, but...he wasn’t quite sure where they were going to go from here with it, either. (Would Sorin be as fierce as Daeyona and keep it bent to his will?) “I am tired, Skor.”
They seemed to all but jump at the opportunity to get out of the conversation, much to his relief--and probably much to theirs, too, judging by the look on their face. “Ah, okay, I’ll leave y’ to it, then. An’ go talk to Blue.”
He could have groaned at that. Between the two of them--or specifically, the mental chatter Blue put off when he was meeting someone new--he wasn’t like to get any sleep at all. But he just let out a long-suffering sigh instead, flopping his head back on the pillow. “Oh, as you please...”
And barely had he finished the sentence before they were gone, leaving a faintly-moving tent flap in their wake. So he just closed his eyes and tried to doze off, as best he could with Blue’s excitement occasionally pinging through the haze of sleepiness.
But one thing that he hadn’t said, and one thing that still permeated his entire being let alone all of his thoughts, was that he just regretted not being there to kill that Garlean. He knew by now through a Swarstral messenger that Ariadne was dead, and so he hadn’t had to ask Vira--and there was little they could say that would reduce the disappointment he felt that she hadn’t died by his hand. (Wasn’t he the one who deserved most to do it?)
But, he supposed, there were still two left out of the three. At least, if they didn’t just throw themselves to their deaths in battle before he could recover enough to have a hand in their destruction.
If he had to drag them back out of hell just to kill them again, he would.
((Meanwhile: Izola and a couple Roegadyn run across another foe.
Features characters belonging to @semper-miles, namely Izola (kinda lol) and Celia, as well as a brief bit of Blue from @gold-eyes-vengeful-heart (which is mine).
General content warning for violent combat content and Celia being a bloodthirsty asshat. And the very last section (the all-italics one) has a whOANELLY content warning for parental abuse of the physical and emotional sort, because Merceus is a dick to his (adult) kids--please heed that if you’re sensitive to that sort of thing!))
===
Thorn huffed as she padded in Long Shot’s wake, slipping on downpour-slicked rock. “Where are we goin’?”
No answer. Again. Not even a hand-sign, which--not that Thorn was bragging to herself or anything--she could more than read, even in the deluge-dimmed lighting.
“No, really, s’ stormin’ an’ I don’t know what y’r haulin’ me out for!” Not that she didn’t respect the older Roegadyn enough to just go with it, but still, it didn’t mean she wouldn’t complain mightily about it in the meantime. The hood of her cloak threatened to get blown back, and she reached up with one hand to keep it in place. Her axe bounced heavily on her back where she had it strapped, and it was taking every onze of effort she could give as a Warrior-in-training to keep up with Shot’s longer strides. That was, until they suddenly stopped altogether as Shot crested a large rocky hill--one of many that dotted Gyr Abania. Thorn wasn’t far behind. “Wha--?”
But Shot suddenly grabbed her by the shoulder and yanked her down behind an outcrop, and before Thorn could see anything, she heard it instead.
Metal against metal. Weapons clashing, but with a distinct ringing to them that sounded more Garlean than Eorzean.
“Is that all you got?”
That was most definitely not any of theirs. In fact, it sounded as if the brash, harsh voice was coming from behind a helmet than anything else. Thorn couldn’t help but hiss a question. “Is that--?”
--
The little Warrior was going to get them spotted, and so Shot reached over with a heavily-gloved hand to shush her. Another quick peek over the rock verified what she had been afraid of; the Izola dragon-woman had taken too long on patrol not just because of some minor distraction, but because she had found one of them. Or maybe the other way around, but the distinction didn’t matter--what mattered was that the most-likely-a-Silentius was brawling with Izola and it seemed like Izola was losing.
“Come on, savage! What’s the matter?”
Shot was already stringing up her longbow, bending it in a great arc with little more than a quiet hiss of air from between clenched teeth, accentuated with a raspy sound. (The problem with having had her throat cut in an effort to kill her; she never could make sound properly again.)
(She had been a singer, once. She had been peaceful, once. She had used a bow only for hunting, once.)
(Once. And this brat Izola was fighting was behind it.)
“Uh, Shot?” Thorn hissed practically in her ear. “Y’ can’t be serious.”
“Can you only fight Garleans who don’t fight back, savage?”
“Y’ can’t be thinkin’ about shooting an arrow at Garlean armor.”
“Your friend took my sister from me and killed the other--it’s the least I can do to kill you!”
“No matter how much y’ shoot y’r just gonna piss ‘er off, an’ my teach doesn’ think a single Warrior’s gonna do much against it either!”
A loud yelp of pain from Izola, and any thoughts of listening flew right out of Shot’s head. Not that she didn’t agree with Thorn--in fact, she agreed a lot, that she wasn’t really in a position to do anything, magicked arrows or no magicked arrows. She had heard first-hand from the first Swarstral hunters that the pair of sisters had ambushed, that most magic just bounced off of them like it was nothing. But...
Was she just going to sit here and watch someone die again?
(old memories of smoke and fire and the taste of blood and the scent of the charring meat of her village-mates nagged at the back of her mind)
She stood, at that, and took in the situation in a single cold glance over her lower face half-mask. Izola, bleeding furiously from her side; the too-familiar Garlean, standing over her with one fin-bladed arm raised for the kill.
(White, she reflected idly, was a terrible choice for armor color in a place like this.)
It made her snappy shot at her arm all too easy, even at this great a distance. The arrow shattered on the metal, yes, but it succeeded in throwing Celia off-balance, and she had to move one foot awfully fast to keep from getting bowled over.
“Shot!” The little Warrior was standing next to her, now, and rain hissed into steam on what little of her skin was exposed as she drew her axe. “Shot, come on, y’r just gonna get ki--”
But Shot cut her off with a quick signing, right before she reached for an arrow. [Go. I’ll hold her off.]
And yet, the stubborn Roegadyn’s voice rose practically an octave in disbelief as she responded. “Like hells am I doing that!”
Shot glared sideways at her for the insubordination, but she definitely had Celia’s attention now and she cracked off another shot at her helmet. Another arrow shattered, the armor barely dented, but the concussive force couldn’t be pleasant, and that was all Shot could count on at the moment.
“Oh Eorzean~” Celia raised her voice enough to be heard over the whipping wind and rain. “That was really stupid.”
Another shot from Shot, but one that was deflected by Celia’s arm this time.
“And you brought a little friend, too. I’ll be sure to carve her up into fish-bait before finally letting you die.”
Shot signed again, rather agitatedly. [Thorn, you’ll get killed. Leave.]
“Not while you’re here!” Now the rain was turning to steam entirely around Thorn, as the flames of a Warrior rose around her. “Y’r a Swarstral an’ so’m I! We don’t run away an’ leave another hunter to some monster like that!”
Celia was advancing slowly, almost sauntering. A coeurl, savoring the stalking hunt of what seemed to be easy, defenseless prey.
“I can’t believe that we got such easy payback for Ari. One of that monster’s friends and some of her hunters, too.”
But Shot coldly stared her down as she nocked and drew an arrow back as calmly as if she was simply target shooting--not like she was trying to fire in a storm on an enemy that just didn’t seem to be feeling much from her attacks. Do you even remember me, she wanted to ask, and would have if she could have. Do you remember what you did, or was it just another working day for you?
A faint glint in Celia’s side caught her attention, though. Bits of a spear-tip had clearly broken off in the armor, but it had broken it, too. Just barely.
A quick tweak of her aim, and Shot fired. This time, the arrow didn’t shatter but stuck, even if Celia whipped one arm down to snap it off.
“Yes, yes, keep shooting. I always liked watching them struggle in vain to hurt me. Even your dragoon couldn’t do anything to me, with a dragon!” Celia spread her arms, still advancing with all the implacability of a landslide. “What do you think you’re gonna manage?”
Another arrow slithered from her quiver as she drew it, and this time Shot poured what little magic she had into it, wind and levin swirling around its broad-bladed tip as she nocked it to her bow and drew again, further and further back.
“I’ll keep plucking off all of you savages that keep feeding Angerona’s delusions and bring her back to Father, where she belongs!”
With one more heave that strained every muscle in her torso, Shot drew her bow back to its full intense draw, and it took just a moment to readjust her aim and fire, the arrow thundering across the distance and cleaving the air with ease with the wind magic surrounding it, despite the storm’s best work to throw it off-course. And when it struck the armor, it not only stuck and drove itself a good few ilms into whatever was beneath it, but the levin lurking around the head burst across flesh and armor alike, zapping frenetically and driving the Garlean to her knees with a terrible shriek of pain, her helmet retracting and falling as she did, shorted from the assault.
Good, was the only word Shot could think when she saw and heard it. Suffer.
And yet, even then, Celia managed to struggle to her feet, and though she didn’t bother to remove the arrow, she still staggered towards them--something out of a nightmare, from her spasming muscles to the face contorted in a rictus grin of hate. “Oh, I’m g-gonna be drinking f-from your skull f-for that, savage.”
The levin-strike was wearing off already, and Shot didn’t think she had enough aether left for another. Her next two shots were quickly deflected with Celia’s arms, too, and the Garlean’s pace was slowly increasing as the lightning receded. Yet the terrible grin on her foe’s face remained, and Celia drew her arm back as she approached as if to slash--
Something was behind Shot. She heard it crunching.
Shot was quick to dive sideways out of the way and so was Thorn, though whether she heard it or was just following the older hunter wasn’t immediately obvious. Celia just cackled as if she hadn’t heard and darted over to follow them, but then entire yalms of space lit up in the shape of a machine--
Not just a machine.
The color drained from Celia’s face as Blue stared down at her, his armor glowing and his jaws slightly opening in a deep, rumbling growl that was more felt than heard.
“No...no, you get away from me--”
Anything further she had to say was drowned out by Blue’s roar, though, and as his jaws dripped glowing energy, Celia barely had any warning to get out of the way before a beam obliterated where she had been standing, carving a hole multiple fulms deep.
“No!” She moved with all the speed of a fleeing hawk, and Blue cracked off one, two, three shots after her before she disappeared past a ridge--and even that ridge swiftly had a hole ripped into it by another laser-like blast.
But Shot was already moving, now that her foe had been thoroughly driven back into a retreat. She dived down the slope, the fastest way down there, and rubble and scree battered her as she alternately rolled and ran. Izola was very much unconscious now, and without thinking twice, Shot picked her up and started to walk. She would get her help...and then try and track down where that monster Garlean went.
They weren’t going to let her escape for long.
--
A sharp crack of the back of a hand on flesh rang out harshly in the small metal room, and Celia was sent staggering back a good half her height, holding her hand to the side of her face, which was already turning a bruised red from Merceus’ slap. And yet, his voice hadn’t raised a fraction and his breathing remained steady and easy.
“You disobeyed my orders, Celia.” She twitched as he raised his hand again, but this time he just massaged it lightly with the other. “Thick-skulled as always.”
“Sorry, sir!” She quickly snapped to attention just like she had been trained to almost all her life. “I disobeyed you, sir. It won’t happen again, sir.”
“It had best not.” He didn’t need to make any threats with his children, now. “You were just supposed to find them and report back so we could attack them together. Not hare off on your own to get ambushed.” A stern voice, condescendingly slow-paced as if explaining to a child or a fool. “But don’t get too comfortable yet; I have another mission for you. And you won’t be doing it alone this time.”
Another armored figure loomed up from the shadows behind him, its movements jerky and erratic. And the second that Celia recognized her dead sister’s armor, her eyes widened and she froze.
“Ariadne wasn’t done with her mission, either. And even death can’t get you out of carrying out my orders. Now listen closely; I will not tolerate any further mistakes from either of you.”
Contains 5.2 spoilers! Also some vaguely gross imagery and also parental mental abuse of an adult child in the second half courtesy of @semper-miles Merceus being an asshole, mind that warning))
===
When Runya approached on the back of his Shinryu-egi, he would admit he didn’t expect to find Blue carving big furrows into the shores of the crater-lake with his body.
He dismounted and dismissed the aetherial construct without looking, his eyes registering his amusement at the Weapon. He kept skidding along, tilted to one side, in a vain effort to—Runya imagined—scrape off the crystalline substance coating the former injury he had from the Ruby Weapon. Even spotting Runya wasn’t enough to get Blue to totally stop, either; sure, he got to his feet and came thumping over, but when he paused in front of Runya, it barely took a moment before he hiked up one leg and started scratching at the crystal with his knee joint. It left him balancing on one foot, but he seemed steady enough, even as he craned his neck to look down at the much smaller Miqo’te.
{Runya-friend Runya-friend}
The little eager calls bounced onto his mind like raindrops. He couldn’t help but smile lazily up at the thing, even. “Ah, so you haven’t forgotten my face after all this time?”
The sarcasm earned him a flurry of mild huffiness, but as Blue kept scratching, Runya kept eyeing that leg and the shavings of crystals he was scraping off in the process. “...I can presume you itch.”
And he probably, in turn, should have expected Blue to project that feeling into his head so strongly that his body immediately echoed it, with a penetrating tickle that he almost doubled over onto before he started to rub furiously at the spot. “Excuse you, that was uncalled for!”
{Yes it was.}
“No it wasn’t.”
{Yes.} The thought sat there glacially, refusing to be moved even by him.
“...You just did that to amuse yourself, didn’t you?”
The glacier-facade cracked and trickled merriment, and the Weapon physically chuffed like a laugh. And in response, Runya just raised a hand to his forehead with feigned drama, sighing heavily. “Oh, heavens save me, he actually has a sense of humor.” A strange thing, that. He had to say, after seeing what he had done to an entire lab full of Garleans, he hadn’t expected Blue to be...well, quite this human.
And yet all the same he knew full well from that panic that he had had a couple times over that the Weapon was indeed still a weapon. And there was something...off in the depths of Blue’s mind, too, he came to realize the more he hung around the creature. It lurked not quite at the heart of Blue but frighteningly close, a tattered void-like slash in his mindscape like a gouge across a throat. Every time it occupied his thoughts, it drew him silently closer, beckoning him towards a tempting and all too familiar madness that both begged for help and bit furiously at any being that dared listen—it both threatened to consume him and yet also didn’t quite dare consume Blue himself, held in check by rocky scarred tissue mountainous around its edges but not quite enough to keep him away it would be too simple to peek in and see what memory lurked under the surface but all the same he could catch a familiar glimpse of dead eyes and mountains of bodies twisted and gored and cracked open like eggs but they weren’t human and some were tall and robed under the layers of char and gore—
He jerked back from the contact as the black yet vividly blaring, projecting scar threatened to consume his vision entirely. Even then, it dotted across his vision, bug-like, making him blink rapidly as he looked up at Blue.
For his part, the Weapon had paused with his hind leg half up in the air, and his head was very slowly cocking to one side until he nearly turned it sideways in confusion. Strangely, he didn’t seem to have even felt Runya’s intrusion into that mindscape incarnation of ancient mental trauma, and even Runya’s secondhand echo of it just concerned him more than alarmed him.
{??????} A cold fish-slimy slap of worry flew right into his face.
“It’s quite fine, thank you.” He waved off the now-crouching Weapon, despite how his body twitched and burned with secondhand panic not his own. His hand shook as he ran it through his hair. “I...aah, I shouldn’t have gone poking into your mind so offhand. That was rude of me.”
{...Very rude.} The concern soured into a sulk and heated into an accusation. {I don’t look into YOU like that. Even if your whole mind is like that.}
The two words didn’t need to be explained, at least; Blue knew immediately what he had been looking at, and perhaps he wasn’t entirely wrong that Runya’s entire mindscape was little else but a vast wound in and of itself, with only the faintest hints of something more around the edges—and even then he couldn’t stop picking at it long enough for those little hints to take hold.
“Perhaps.” He still waved off the notion with one hand. “But I do swear that I won’t be nosy without good reason. Does that sound alright?” And the second he got a grudging agreement, he continued, leaning on his elbows on the tip of Blue’s jaw. “And I actually came here to ask you a question. You do know that Macbalor isn’t an enemy, don’t you?”
The Weapon’s discordant jangle of negativity clashed against his thoughts so ferociously it put him in mind of jars of marbles being thrown down the stairs. Loud. Disorienting.
“Ah, come now...” Runya waggled a finger in his ear as if it would stop it ringing after that...that. “It’s an honest question, Blue, if you don’t mind.”
But no matter how genuinely honest the question, Blue didn’t want to cooperate; he could feel that much. The Weapon snorted and the gust of ocean-smell wind ruffled his robes.
{Pilotnotpilotpilotnotpilot—} The confusion, Runya could nearly taste; Blue had wanted to run but he couldn’t with her exerting that pressure on his mind, no matter how subconsciously she did it—he remembered the small Garleannotgarlean being brought to him as a last resort and he refused until she broke through his will like butter but even then he fought the whole way down the corridor as she made him move—
Runya actually snapped his fingers at Blue as the right half of his vision and the left half of his vision disagreed so wildly so that his stomach churned with nausea—one eye stuck in Blue’s past and the other stuck in Runya’s present. “Ah ah ah, you’re going to make me ruin your lovely paint job if you keep doing that.” And his head felt liable to explode, but that was obvious, he hoped. “Focus, Blue. I would prefer not to get shoved out of my own head again.”
Luckily for the both of them, he listened and did exactly as asked. The Weapon took in a deep breath and audibly blinked, and the wild torrent of uncontrolled memory receded to just a trickle of faint impressions. {...Sorry.}
“Even if I didn’t have a literal safety mechanism for my brain, I still do not enjoy migraines and feeling as if I’m going to lose lunches I ate years ago.”
{Said sorry.}
“Just a reminder that it’s unpleasant, is all.” He gave Blue’s nose a pat, the claws on his gloves clicking lightly against the metal. “You have a very loud voice. Mine pales in comparison.”
{Like it though.}
Runya cocked his head and flicked his ears forward. “Well, there’s a good thing.” He wasn’t going to question why, particularly not when even the most tentative of pushes on that front met an unyielding wall. “I should be honored, I suppose.”
{Work with. Not over.} But whatever that enigmatic remark meant, Blue wasn’t keen on explaining. Instead, the top hatch hissed open, and he wordlessly peppered Runya’s mind with the urge to go run, fly, run. To move. Boredom, perhaps, but the reasons were irrelevant to Runya.
(It was so easy to get addicted to that feeling of power—and that was even without the Resonance active. He could, for a while, be not in a carved-apart-sewn-together nightmare of a body, but in something fluid and powerful and vibrant in a way that even a normal, healthy body would never be able to give him.)
“Oh, as you wish, dear.”
— — —
Shifting patterns of light roiled over Legatus Silentius’ face, as he replayed the footage over and over. Footage not just of the VIIth Legion’s vaunted Ruby Weapon, but also of his Weapon, dueling fighting clawing flying biting, until it flew into a rage at the sight of the monstrous Van Darnus and tore her apart.
He scrolled the recording back automatically, without conscious thought, his attention so focused on what was before his eyes that he almost missed the soft thuds of footsteps behind him. Almost.
“Sir?”
Ariadne’s voice. But it held hesitation, weakness, and when he craned his neck around to look sidelong at her, she stiffened.
“Have you come to bring me your sister?”
“No sir.”
“Hmm. The Weapon, then; have you captured it and dragged it back here?”
Ariadne swallowed. “Sir, I came to tell you that Angerona is on the move. She disappeared again—“
“I did tell you,” Merceus interrupted lightly, “only to interrupt your father with news of your successes...not your failures.”
The reprimand set Ariadne’s shoulders even stiffer than before, but really, he had told her that her only purpose now was to drag her wayward sister back here. He had not, for a moment, insinuated that he would tolerate one of his blood failing him. “Were you expecting help, Ariadne?” He smiled. “This isn’t the first time she has very suddenly eluded even your sight. And Celia’s. I don’t care why; I just want her found again. That is the task I set both of you to: finding her, and also finding the Weapon that is key to irreversibly ensuring our dominance over the weak. I did not send both of my loyal daughters on such a simple task only for them to come crawling back demanding assistance with something they should have no issue with.”
His chiding done and met with silence, he languidly returned his stare to the screen, the projected light flickering across his eyes. To no one in particular, he spoke aloud. “The Seventh was always short-sighted. They just wanted to repeat their same old mistakes, expecting that they just had to work this time.” He chuckled. “We were on to something, with this Weapon. Even in the hands of the unworthy, it carved through one of Baelsar’s glorious projects. One of the others even steals our Sapphire Weapon’s name...”
The smile disappeared. “And yet, none of us could get it to fight even half as well. It disobeyed us, routinely made us override its mind just to make it move...It refused to show us this potential, and yet here it does just that in the hands of some useless savage.” Or at least, he was quite certain that had been an Eorzean; no one else would dare stand up to the Empire. “If you do drag that pilot back here alive, Ariadne, I will be very sure to squeeze whatever foul spell he’s cast on that thing out of him before I finally let Celia have a little fun with him. But if you have to kill him, very well. I will not have both one of my daughters defying me and our Weapon being used so casually by a savage.”
Ariadne frowned, as she came to stand by him, but not too closely. (Experience, perhaps, informed her how terrible an idea that could be. “He loses control of it...there, though. When that Darnus monster appears. That’s more like when it went berserk at Celia—“
“It would still be a grand help, Ariadne,” he interrupted testily, “if you were able to drag him back here so we can dissect him properly instead of guessing.” He would not be reminded of failures—
“It has to be fond of him, somehow, to let him do this...” But Ariadne visibly winced as Merceus walked over and painfully clapped her shoulder with an even wider smile.
“This family does not make friends with things, Silentius. Nothing ever could, with that beast, even if they tried. And if it wouldn’t willingly cooperate with the very people that gave it such power, there is no chance that it is willingly cooperating with an Eorzean, either.”
“Of course, sir.” She only relaxed once he let go of her, and she turned to salute to him. (A sharp, precise motion, born of practice unyielding until he had been satisfied with it.) “I’ll take a magitek ship and continue the search, Legatus. By your leave.”
He had half a mind to deny her, after she came crawling back empty-handed and begging like some pathetic worm. But...for the moment, his mercurial mood took a turn for the marginally more lenient, and he just dismissed her with a wave of his hand. “Do not fail me again. Bring her back, bring the Weapon back, even bring the savages’ pilot back...or don’t come back at all.” And even then, he wouldn’t suffer such failure of his bloodline to live...but he didn’t need to say it out loud. Ariadne swallowing audibly was proof enough she didn’t need to hear it, either.
“Yes sir.”
He would find those three, even if he had to go out and find them himself. Even if he had to sacrifice all of what remained of his family and his men to do it. Even if he had to kill them with his bare hands. He would not tolerate such an insult to his pride as a Legatus to continue existing unhindered.
The Weapon was his. Angerona was his. And the savages all belonged to him, even if they refused to believe it. They would see, when he had the full extent of his power aligned...they would all see.
✪ (we haven't interacted, but curious as to what you think? @semper-miles)
❖ POSITIVE.I think you’re awesome ║ I like you ║ I want to go on a date with you║ I love you║ You’re cute/handsome ║ I want to marry you║ You’re attractive║ I wish we could spend more time together!║ I’d like to get to know you better║ I admire you║ You’re someone that I look up to║ You’re very kind║ I consider us friends║ I secretly have a crush on you║ I have high respect for you║ We have common interests║ I’m happy that I met you
❖ NEGATIVE.
I feel uncomfortable around you ║ You’re bothersome ║ I never want to speak to you again ║ I dislike you ║ I loathe you ║ I’m envious of you ║ I’m worried about you ║ We don’t get along well ║ You’re the worst kind of person ║ You get on my nerves ║ You’re annoying to me║ We have nothing in common║ I wish I had never met you║ I wouldn’t date you if you were the last person alive║ Not you again
(for Maebh, since that’s the name i’m familiar with~ thank you so much @semper-miles! ♥ this is based on the tiny bit i know from stalking your tumbls, but i think Ember and Maebh would get along well once they get through the part where both of them are all stiff and tough and acting like they want nothing to do with each other. c:)
Defend/possessive for that dominance meme :D (Maebh @ Dae, possibly sticking up for her against the Grand Companies?)
((lol well this kinda ballooned a wee bit, BUT
@semper-miles here you go :D
also mention of @roemom ‘cause that be how the setup be this time around))
Come find me, she had always told not just her friends, but her hunters as well. If you ever find more trouble than you can handle, come find me, and I will make it stop. She had gotten mixed reactions from said friends–Nevermore had cheekily noted that he didn’t need her permission to hide behind her–but still, she had emphasized it often enough that she thought her point made clear.
Of course, sometimes the trouble found them for the right reasons; sometimes she had to just step back and make them face their own problems, or the consequences of what they had done. Sometimes it was less clear, sometimes both were in the wrong, and she just resorted to irritably dismissing them both, with warnings to either side to cease testing her patience with their nonsense.
…And then, sometimes, it was all too clear that someone was being an arse at those around her simply because they thought they could.
And then, sometimes, individuals did it just often enough that she completely lost her patience with them. And then, sometimes, her patience had already been sorely tested, over and over in far too rapid succession, for one reason or another.
Backhanding a Maelstrom sergeant hard enough to break his nose over a crude comment made in Ember’s direction had, in retrospect, been inevitable at that point…but simultaneously, not the best of ideas. Particularly when a good half-dozen of the people in her camp were Maelstrom themselves–Warriors, yes, and ones in training with those definitely her own. But still, Maelstrom nonetheless.
(Not that we wanted to report you to them, Rambling Brook had noted with an unhappy shrug. Llymlaen knows that Cap’n Skullcrusher would have…)
(The silence between them had lasted far too long before the other Roegadyn dared to continue.)
(Still, ‘twas either that or sit on our arses and let that man make up whatever details he pleases to the superiors. His superior’s hard enough to deal with as it is.)
And as she sat facing the Captain in question, recognizing them as the very bloody Arcanist that had been a thorn in her side for a good few moons now…she could very well believe it. And it was taking a great deal of effort to keep from getting too heated about this whole thing, as she got nothing but disbelief on disbelief.
“Is this,” Daeyona finally hissed, the short points of her magitek fingers digging into the wood of the table between them, “just you being difficult for the sake of being difficult?”
They bristled, but slightly. “I’m merely quite aware of your boorish insistence on picking fights to satisfy your overblown ego rather than actually following rule of law like someone civilized.“
Ye gods she was just moments away from just demanding a trial by combat and having done with it anyway! “That’s somehow more believable than one of your own actually doing something shite–?!”
There was a knock at the door. And both of them turned to look at it, puzzlement written all over both their faces before they turned back to one another, staring silently for a few moments.
The knock came again. Daeyona grumbled first.
“Is that yours?”
“Is it yours?”
“How in the hells am I supposed to know that? I wasn’t expecting anyone, this is your bloody roo--”
The door opened, finally, cutting off any further argument between the two as another Maelstrom soldier and Maebh sidled in, the latter far more relaxed-looking than the former as she craned her neck to look up at him. “Oh, I’m interrupting?” Not that Maebh seemed to care much. “I thought I’d find a way to end this argument before it can take off into Daeyona doing something stupid.”
(Daeyona’s jaw tensed at the remark, but she also knew better than to cross Maebh and just left her displeasure at that.)
“Well?” Maebh continued with a nod to the soldier. “Go oh, tell them what you saw. Or what you heard, was it?”
The soldier hedged for just a moment too long, and the Captain that had been sniping at Daeyona mere moments before turned on him just as swiftly. “Go on, speak.”
At the very least, that was enough to get the Captain interrogating him; once she realized that this was no trick and that he really was just telling them what had happened, the tension in Daeyona’s shoulders slowly drained, though not quite so completely as to imply that she was entirely happy with all of this.
The words faded into background noise as she stared at Maebh. And Maebh stared right back, unfazed, unbowed, and almost unblinking, waiting politely until the other two were done--which took long enough--before speaking up again.
“So...are we done here? I would like to take mine, if you don’t mind.”
“Yes.” Not that the Captain seemed terribly happy to be letting Daeyona out from under her claws again, but Daeyona couldn’t really be arsed to feel sorry about that. “Go on, before I change my mind.”
“Excellent.” And Maebh walked up, took Daeyona by the arm, and all but pulled her out before any of them could say another word, waiting until they were well out of earshot before speaking.
“...So, it would be nice if you could stop pissing them off, Dae.”
Daeyona, yet again, was less than pleased to be chided, especially so hot on the heels of that little remark that made it sound like she owned her...no matter how true that sometimes was... “Like you wouldn’t have done the same thing if someone had done that to Iz.”
Maebh coughed awkwardly. “Well, can’t say I wouldn’t, but that doesn’t mean that you should,” she finally settled on, giving Daeyona’s arm a tug of warning. “Unlike you, I actually have a decent history with them that gets me some breathing room--that you definitely don’t have, given...”
She trailed off, and Daeyona stared sideways at her as if daring her to keep going.
“...Well, you know they think you’re obnoxious, a thorn in their side, and also suspicious in general with what you are,” Maebh huffed. “That last one might not be right,” she continued when she caught Daeyona’s expression hardening for an argument, “but honestly, if you could just keep in mind that if you get too obnoxious or suspicious, they do have the manpower to hurt you, and definitely have the manpower to do things to everyone around you, too.”
“And,” she kept going, in full form now, unstoppable even with Daeyona doing her damnedest to work a word in edgewise, “do consider that yes, Vira looks up to Iz, but they look up to you, too, and they can’t be picking fights like you do all the time, Dae.”
“...That was low, Maebh.” She growled it, but all the same, she didn’t exactly have an argument against it, either--something that the woman picked up on instantly, judging by how she sent Daeyona a look that Daeyona was all too familiar with.
“The truth hurts, hm?” But thankfully, Maebh left it at that...and at a playful punch to Daeyona’s upper arm. “Stop it with that face, you know I’m right.”
“Why do you think I’m not arguing with you?” Admittedly, there were a variety of reasons for that, when it came to Maebh. It said something that even Izola, for all her stubbornness, avoided it like the plague sometimes. But yet...
Even with Khann whispering constantly in the back of her mind, telling her that giving in to her angrier nastier impulses was a good thing always, Daeyona had to admit when Maebh had a point, too. Even if it didn’t necessarily feel good, and went against every onze of pride that she had...
“Oh, I just assumed you knew better.” The smile Maebh had on her face was significantly less like a frozen rictus and more comfortably settled onto her face instead. “Really, though, Vira has enough problems with picking fights, and watching one of their teachers going at it constantly can’t be helping...even if I get where you were coming from this time,” she added with a mutter that was still loud enough for Daeyona to hear.
“I’m not constantly going at everyone, thanks--”
“Izola,” Maebh dryly interrupted.
“...She’s an exception and you know it.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“Vira doesn’t pick fights with her so it’s fine.”
“You’re bloody impossible, Dae.”
Daeyona clicked her tongue lightly. “You know I’d do the same thing for any one of my friends who was getting crude comments--including you. If they’re going to talk like that they can accept that they might just get a piece of magitek to the face in the process.”
A pause. Maebh stared, so intensely that Daeyona had to look away.
“...I’ll try and think twice about it before doing it the next time, though.”
“Okay, close enough.” Maebh smiled slightly, reflecting out loud as they walked back off towards camp. “I can’t be defending you all the time, can I?”
