#tabard 001

[armoredfuturist-blog]

@tabardalon--

    This was them: short, stammering, hot under the collar.

    This was you: cross, taller than that, and ready to empty the contents of your lungs for a sigh.

    “You have electricity.”

    “Yes.”

    “And industry.”

    “Some.”

    “Presumably, a whole wild of animals that could kill you if they so much as looked at you past the barrier.”

    “Well...”

    “And not a single one of you operates a blacksmith.”

    “...” They were tugging at their sleeves, but silent. You looked on, though you might be gobsmacked.

    “My suggestion,” you said to them, “Is for you to tell your mayor that Stark Resilient is moving in. And I’m gonna need a plot of land. Run off, now.” You waved them away and they hurried on, the rest of the moment held by you pinching the bridge of your nose.

    Some town. If it weren’t for the barrier and crystal castle, you figure all these townspeople would be little more than fresh meat for the wolves. Ever the go-getter, eh, Tony Stark?

    (Or people-pleaser, but that’s beside the point.)

     You turn your head, seeing someone else about that must’ve heard your little, shall we say, tirade. You would’ve ignored the fact were they not almost pauldron-for-pauldron a knight in shining armor. Literally. Was that silver?

    “Doing my part,” you said. “If I’m going to be stuck here, I need somewhere to do work. Someone’s gotta stoke a smithy’s fire.” As long as your suit’s out of commission, you don’t have much of a choice.

    Now... you just needed to remember how to handle an anvil.

    Back to the knight. “Who’re you? Prince Charming?”

[mischiefburned-blog]

@tabardalon --

    The village of Eidolon is smaller than the castle of glass it’s ran around would lead to believe. There’s pieces missing, as though by design, not unlike a puzzle whose corners are filled and the rest left to go. Interesting, sure, but not complete. It leaves the lingering taste of an experiment. Maybe it’ll be finished. Maybe it won’t. Which of them comes true appears to be left in the hands of those who’ve never known this place in their lives until a few days ago. It’s also small enough that certain figures do not go unnoticed for very long. In short—

    —should a man of stone go a-walking, well, you wouldn’t stop yourself from watching.

    You were scribbling down something entirely unrelated to the proposition when it happened, some such details banal on this and that in the name of a Mayor of whom you haven’t so much as met in person, a train of thought which was interrupted rather immediately when you glanced up, gears grinding down to a screeching halt. Yes, a man of stone. It had to have been the oddest—least to the eyes—in a town made by the odd.

    And, of course, first instinct was to take the odd by its teeth. (Or tongue, as is your preference.)

    “I haven’t seen a knight in full suit before,” you said, which was a lie by omission. “Are you guarding the barrier?”

    You asked the question because for how threatening the wastes were, the rest of town (by which you meant the natives) seemed not concerned in the slightest as long as the barrier held. It was apparently keeping Eidolon safe and yet so far you’ve not met a single soul occupied with guarding the damn thing. If they looked like this, then, those natives might’ve had a point after all.

    “Isn’t that armor hard to move around in with the cold? Must be manageable here, but out there…” You allude to it with a noncommittal gesture. Frankly, you’re just interested in whatever he has to say.

    And what isn’t.