Session 16 - Reporting for Duty

Previously, across the Horizon… The Slim Reaper’s arrival in Alterna was rather eventful, and the hour and change since the party arrived has been much the same. Bast buried himself in the engine room to break previous fixes, evicting an unexpected sparkling emerald rabbit just a few moments later. Linnet mostly tried to stay out of everyone’s way, busying herself about the deck and bridge near Galley. Orrey left the ship to explore and promptly fell in a hole. Yves left the ship to look for Orrey and promptly wandered into a very peculiar forest. Isa left the ship to look for Yves and to look for Orrey and promptly wandered into a hostile and talkative thunderstorm. Curious about how quiet it had become, Linnet and Bast also went exploring, and found the same thunderstorm Isa had taken refuge from, a storm that shifted into silhouettes of electrified birds, birds that formed into one massive stormbird that demanded its continued freedom. Inside the Adventure Hole, Orrey and his little sister traveled up through the crumbling floors, finding multiple floors dedicated to the gods of Ducorde, eventually joining up with Isa, Bast, and Linnet as they went. Inside the Spring Forest, or perhaps Springy Forest, Yves found another mask like the one Isa tossed at him at the Bernier Station just last week, this one seemingly bestowed upon him by the weird forest itself. Inside the tower, Orrey realized that the size of the tower dictated there would be one more floor than there were remaining gods, and the ancient mysteries of Alterna stretched out before him, just as the toppled tower stretched out over the roaring ocean over a hundred feet below. Faced with the risks inherent in further exploration, as well as the true reasons for their arrival in Alterna, Orrey tore himself away from deeper exploration and pressed the group to continue deeper into Alterna, and leave the religious mysteries undisturbed. We join our heroes as they climb out of the original window Orrey fell into, Cassiat’s rope coming in handy as all good adventuring inventory items do, with a familiar figure returning from the north, an emerald rabbit bounding around his feet…
Cassiat carefully shifts the rope to just her left hand, supporting most of someone’s weight underneath her, and waves at Yves. “Where’d you go?” she calls out.
“You really shouldn’t be wandering off that far! Lots of holes to fall into.” Orrey shakes his head, doing a terrible Isa impression.
Yves takes several steps along the way thinking about how to answer that question before he concludes, “To the park? I was walking the rabbit. Then the trees decided they wanted to text at me and gave me a mask so, uh, what have you guys been up to?”
“Theological spelunking, I think,” Bast says.
“The sort of thing you do on any big trip,” Cassiat grunts, going back to two hands on the rope. “Getting souvenirs. Orrey found a helmet down there.”
“And the weather is made up of angry birds that zap you. So, uh, maybe keep an eye on the rabbit,” Linnet says.
Isa pulls herself up the rope, and claps Cassiat on the shoulder. “Thanks,” she says, and looks at Yves. And then the rabbit.
“Isa, we’re leaving a motherlode of potential wonders un-excavated in there. Can we please come back once we’ve rescued Orrey’s father?” Linnet asks.
Yves glances down at the rabbit, in case there’s sudden zapping in store. Upward or downward. “Well, I guess we could put the mask and the helmet together and see if they start talking, but I’m not sure that’d be my go-to place to start experimenting. The trees asked for my help? That’s sort of new? Trees don’t usually talk—write—turn into textual shapes at me. Maybe everyone else is used to that. I didn’t major in botany.”
The rabbit looks at Isa, the little ruby on its forehead shining innocently.
“Oh yes, definitely, we’re coming back, Linnet.” Orrey is CERTAIN of this.
“Generally words only happen in trees after they’ve been cut down and processed. Can you show us?” Linnet beams at Orrey over her shoulder.
“Did you say the trees can talk?!” Orrey exclaims.
“First things first. Just…make a note of this place,” Isa relents.
“DONE!” Orrey pats his satchel full of notebooks.
“We could lower someone down on a rope from the ship, so long as we’re here. Shouldn’t take that long,” Bast says.
“I’m… not sure going back in there is a great idea right now? But… here.” Yves flips his notebook to where he drew what he saw on the trees, and offers it out for people to take a look. “Also they gave me a mask, but I’m not sure what I’m supposed to /do/ with it.”
Orrey leans over the notebook, checking to se if he recognizes the script. “This is nothing like any of the writing I’ve seen before!” He immediately starts copying it as quickly as he can for future study.
“Who gave you a mask?” Cassiat asks, having some trouble keeping up.
The emerald rabbit looks up at the mask in Yves’s hand, and then its ears droop down.
“The trees,” Yves explains, patiently. “It was…” He waves the mask around. “It’s like it was growing /from/ them. And I’m wondering if I should break the mask? Does that help? Can they not break it themselves? I mean, I think we broke the previous mask and got a rabbit out of it, but I’m a little unclear on the details, it’s all pretty… metaphysical.”
“See if the rabbit can let something out of the mask? Also, should we give this little fella a name if he’s gonna keep hanging around? Hiya.” Linnet scritches behind the emerald rabbit’s ears.
The rabbit’s leg thumps in appreciation.
Isa attempts to change the subject, asking Orrey and Cassiat “Any ideas about your father? We know where the airship is supposed to be.”
Cassiat’s face falls, and a few lines crease her forehead. “From what the guy’s note said, we want to find the trains. If Papa’s work is being used in relation to those trains, the tracks probably lead to where they’re holding him,” she says with more confidence than she feels.
Bast seems to finally catch up with Yves’ description of his walk, and turns to him. “…so – the trees asked you for help. What did they want, exactly?”
Yves crouches down to hold the mask up in front of the rabbit. “I don’t know,” he tells Bast. “I tried to establish a ‘twitch once for yes, twice for no’ system so that I could start asking questions and narrow things down, but it didn’t take. It’s surprisingly hard to communicate with plants, even when they can spell.”
The rabbit’s little face somehow gets even sadder, and it lightly bonks its little gem against the wooden mask. Nothing happens as a result.
“Aw, it’s okay, buddy. We’ll see if we can’t find you a friend somewhere. And in the meantime, you’ve got us! We’ll be your friends. If you want.” Linnet crouches down. “How about…Garnet. Wanna come save the world, Garnet? Carnelian? Jasper? Cinnabar? Tell me when I hit on one you like.”
“Wonderful.” Bast rubs his forehead, frowning. “So we have trees that want help but won’t tell you how, lightning birds that try to zap us because they think we might want to cage them, and it hasn’t even been a day yet. Did the rest of you find anything like that in the rest of the building?”
“I’ll tell Galley to stay with the ship in case we need an escape, if you all are coming in with me,” Cassiat says. “But again, if you have your own stuff, you can do that. This is family business, it doesn’t have to involve all of you.”
“Or, and I realize this is controversial, we do what we came here to do,” Isa says.
“The building had some wonders related to the gods, nothing more, Bast,” Orrey says.
Linnet gives her best chipper smile. “Cass, honey, you’re not getting rid of us that easily. Point us at trouble and let’s make some salad!”
“There might be some salad in Yinha’s room, Linnet,” Orrey says.
Yves scritches the bunny, and stands up, tucking the mask away again. “So, ‘destroy it’ is still on the table, but no one is going ‘Oh yes that’s obviously how to help’, so I’m willing to think about that more while we… uh… keep flying? Do you think I should lend a hand with the engineering, or is that all handled?”
“I don’t think we need any more help right now!” Bast stares wide-eyed at Yves.
“Well, if you’re already done… I do feel a little bad about not sticking around to lend a hand.”
“You found the trees and this mask! That’s far more important.” (Linnet could hear Bast swearing the entire time he was breaking what Yves fixed. It’s a very good thing Yves didn’t stick around to lend a hand.)
“Don’t worry about it. I don’t suppose you found some regular wood along with the talking trees?”
“If you repair the ship with talking tree wood, will it keep talking?” Linnet asks.
From the fallen building serving as the dock for your airship, you have three basic paths. Straight north cuts through the overgrown park where Yves found the mask and the inquisitive trees. Northwest will eventually make it to the building’s base and then more toward the city center, and likely where the airship you came here to find would be found. West will carry you inland, with domed buildings and cracked rooftops along the path, and geographically, that is more the direction anyone traveling overland from Saron would have taken to get to Alterna.
“Bast,” Isa wonders, “do you have anything in the vein of smoke signals?”
“Pretty much just warm, soft, occasionally pulsing and/or turning into letters tree wood, so,” Yves says.
“Gross, Yves. Wow. Sorry you had to experience that.” Orrey looks a bit uncomfortable with that description. “Maybe the buildings will have some lumber we could salvage? West would most likely get us to the tracks, anyway.”
“Doesn’t sound like something that would work for hull repairs. I suppose we could get back on the ship and limp along inland to see if we come across something useful,” Bast says.
“Let’s leave the ship where it is so we don’t break it further on the trees or the stormbudgies or something. Cinnabar, are the trees something we should go back and look at or something we should stay far away from?”
Cinnabar quirks their head to the side, and then hops over to Yves and sits next to him.
“…I’m going to take that as ’Let’s not go back to the warm, cryptic trees until we know more,’” Yves translates.
“That’s fair. Academic curiosity occasionally needs to wait in favor of real people issues.” Linnet stops. “…wait, what am I saying? Guys, I think I’ve been out of the library for too long.”
After a brief conversation and debate, the group agrees to move northwest along the rest of the building, heading further up into Alterna’s core. Cassiat has fallen quiet during the trip, hands shoved in the pockets of her jacket, and only giving short answers to any questions posed to her. Her eyes flick from side to side as she walks, always searching for something out of reach.
Orrey walks beside Cass, not fully satisfied by the direction, but willing to go along with the others so long as they return to track hunting as soon as possible.
Isa’s chosen path winds the group through what was once a chokepoint; there are still signs of battles here, discarded weapons and dented shields. A breastplate and spear of a Cardian warrior sit empty in front of two golden full-plate armor sets, swords and shields fallen to the side — completely undamaged, and the breastplate is still connected in the back, as if the wearers were just… erased.
“That looks really impractical. Why do people insist on making golden armor? …and why is it spooky?” Linnet finishes.
“It’s gilt steel,” Isa explains. “And old.”
Orrey’s sketchbook gets a workout, constant doodles in the margins, notes alongside them marking on the direction the ivy grows, the way that some of the glass panes are broken and others are brilliantly clean, and how some of the armor sets seem to be of much higher quality than the others, and those are usually the ones that look to have been protecting the city, not fighting into it.
The buildings through here took the brunt of the damage of Alterna’s fall, Bast’s practiced eye takes in. The shattered stone fountain’s base is far too thin to have supported its weight, not without some sort of magical assistance, whereas the lampposts on the path leading north from it are still intact. One even flickers, three hundred years later.
Linnet’s nature draws her closer to Cassiat as they walk, and the change in Cassiat’s demeanor is marked. Orrey’s little sister was his vibrant, inquisitive mirror in the little bit of time they spent in the toppled building, but every step she takes further away from the ship, from Galley, from Saron, breaks more and more of her resolve. Orrey’s attempted morale-boosting speech is still weighing heavily on her mind, it seems.
Yves has been watching the rabbit as it bounds along ahead of him, falling into that easy rhythm while the rabbit’s steps are more erratic. The sparkles from its coat shine in the occasional unbroken windows, green reflecting back at them, save the one blue reflection that returns instead, in one building missing a corner and a stable roof.
“Looks like they were defending the city-” Bast prods one of the empty suits of armor with his foot “-when whatever this is happened. Anyone know more about this? I’m not exactly a scholar of local history.”
Yves slows to look toward that blue reflection, a hand resting unconsciously over the mask he has tucked inside his jacket again.
“The great War. Three hundred years ago, give or take,” Isa says.
Yves has stopped entirely, to frown at a particular pane of glass, and then turn about to look in another direction entirely.
“They say that only the weakest, least known warriors survived the final explosion of the crystal during the last battle.. The strongest, the legends of the day, were wiped out.” Orrey looks around at just how many legends there must have been in that battle, considering the number of suits of armor. “Except one, a Saronite warrior, who, some say, was not killed, but rather, Forgotten.”
Bast sniffs. “Seems oddly selective.”
Linnet drifts along. “There’s a crapton of legends of the forbidden magic of Alterna, so if you see anything that looks particularly forbidden, let me know so I can poke at it.”
“Yeah. My theory is that those who contributed the most experience to their crystals were most affected by the Shattering,” Orrey says.
“Do…you know what forbidden means?” Isa points out.
“Far too interesting for public consumption,” is Linnet’s casual reply.
Speaking of what is and isn’t forbidden, Yves seems to be not so much stopped as ambling off toward the east, staring about at various windows.
Bast grins in response but doesn’t comment.
Orrey stops. “Yves is wandering off again.”
Linnet shrugs. “I haven’t heard anything go boom, so he’s probably fine. Cinnabun is with him, right?”
Cinnabun quirks up and hops over, having heard their new name.
Which would be no, Cinnabun is with all of you.
“Oh for,” Isa sighs, and tromps off after Yves.
“Oh. Hi, buddy! Were you part of the forbidden magics?” Linnet yells over her shoulder, “Yves! Don’t poke anything that looks breakable!”
“Don’t worry,” Yves calls back, “I just saw something shiny.”
“Oh, well, that’s perfectly all right. Carry on.” Linnet scoops up Cinnabun and drapes him over Cassiat’s shoulder.
“Is it gold? Gems? A mirror?” Orrey calls.
Yves disappears into a building, but only for a moment, returning with a bottle. He holds it up for Isa’s inspection as she’s the one nearest when he starts returning to the rest of the group. “See? Shiny,” he says. “I’m pretty sure this is the same color as that crystal from Perilune.”
“Huh. Do you…put a message in the bottle?” Orrey asks.
Linnet pulls out Perilune’s crystal to compare.
The colors are strikingly similar. The bottle is, perhaps, a bit sparklier right now, but the hue is the same.
“It’s so pretty!” Linnet chirps. “It wasn’t holding up anything structurally important, was it?”
(The bottle itself is glass, and the liquid within is the sparkly stuff, the GM will make absolutely clear here)
“No, it was just with a lot of more boring bottles.” Yves adds, as a sort of afterthought, “Sorry for the delay.”
Your general pathway has been carrying you up into the city — elevation is increasing. You are winding up into the higher parts of Alterna, and you are passing the wreckage from the higher parts that came crashing down.
“Mm. Tomb’s going to be central, I’d bet,” Isa says.
Up ahead — perhaps two hundred yards away — is a decent-sized portion of the most impressive building you’ve seen yet, a grand castle spire. The stained glass window facing west looks to still be intact, not that you can make out any details on it from this angle.
“Note for next time: focus slightly less on the forbidden magics and slightly more on the practical ones. Like structural integrity.” Linnet makes a beeline for the window.
Linnet’s eagerness zips her head of the rest of the group, her wings giving her speed that the others can’t match without any warning. So hearing a voice behind her isn’t anything unusual. But hearing a voice she doesn’t recognize, that’s not exactly the best thing this deep into Alterna. “In a hurry?” A male voice, forced casual.
“Just sightseeing. Am I trespassing?” Also forced casual.
He walks out onto the stairs behind Linnet, putting himself between the sylph and the rest of the group. He’s slim and scrappy, wearing a skintight gray and black shirt with only one sleeve covering his right arm; his left has two ribbons tied just under his shoulder, one pink, one green, contrasted against his dark skin. His black pants and black boots have no extra decorations. He constantly rocking back and forth and hopping from one foot to the other, causing the braids cascading down his shoulders to bob and weave in rhythm. A pair of tonfas dangle from his belt, clacking together until he reaches down to hold them still, something that lasts about three seconds with his constant motion. “Trespassing? I don’t think there’s anyone around here to enforce 300-year-old rules.” He rolls a shoulder and limbers up his calves, hopping in place. “But I’d like to know what you’re up to just the same.”
“Right now, checking out what looked like a really cool window.” Linnet cranes her neck for a better view of it.
Isa puts out a hand to stop everyone else from closing in on Linnet and the man, and then gestures to spread out their line a bit.
“Also, you might do better to get some of that excess energy out on the ground. Or is that how you get your workouts in, running up and down stairs? I’ve heard good things,” Linnet says.
“Ah. Witty.” He sighs, and tosses a glance off to the side. “We’ve got a quotable one.”
Linnet floats about. “Oh, I wouldn’t give myself that much credit. Hi, everyone! Let’s stop skulking and introduce ourselves properly. You first.”
Orrey pulls out the now nearly inevitable sketchbook…
A throat is cleared from a doorway near Orrey’s left side.
Yves spreads, slightly baffled.
Linnet is keeping this so casual that she’s not even sparking yet, but the set of her wings might tell the party that all is not necessarily tea and biscuits.
Bast not so much steps as slides to the side, hands in pockets, giving him a few paces of clear space all around.
In the doorway back by Orrey, perhaps thirty feet away, stands a trapezoid given flesh, with his hair buzzed tight to his scalp and an incredibly expressive face. He wears a long sleeveless coat in the curious color of teal, one that barely restrains his broad shoulders, and the largest arms you’ve ever seen are bare and ready for anything. The shorts he wears under the coat are tiny, the better to show off his tree-trunk thighs, with a pair of purple boots completing his eye-catching ensemble. Orrey’s practiced artist’s eye immediately grabs a family resemblance between the two, though the man here has likely a hundred and twenty pounds on Linnet’s conversation partner.
Orrey flips a page and starts a second sketch of the trapezoid.
“You’ve come traipsing around in Alterna,” the first man says, forcing a smile on his face, “shouting around for your friends, barging into buildings, scaring up Twelve only knows what, and honestly, making a tremendous amount of trouble for us. Now, I’m not offended offended, but I’m kind of offended? What are you doing here?”
The second man gives Orrey a you-have-to-be-kidding-me face, and then looks over at Isa, as if for commiseration.
“Did we miss peak tourism season?”
Isa’s face is pure “whattayagonnado”
Linnet focuses on the first man. “And seriously, who are you? The only thing we’ve scared up around here is you two, and if it took this long than clearly we’re not all that important to your daily routine of stair-jogging and clothes-dyeing. Sometimes, a window is just a window.”
“Oh yes, the highlight of the season is definitely when Quetzacoatl is rampaging through the entire nation trying to short out the few things that still run here that aren’t actively trying to kill—!”
“Oh, that sounds wonderful,” Linnet adds to the silence.
He spreads his hands out wide, fingers splayed, and takes a deep breath. “Not your fault. You don’t know. A bunch of rank and file amateurs, but it’s not your fault. Of course.”
Orrey writes down ketzacoatal.
“Gil for your thoughts, Wedge,” he calls out.
“Welllllllllllll,” the wider man starts, his voice a rich drink of a fine red wine, “I think our boys and girls here are on a nice field trip exploring a living museum! We just need to talk to their chaperone about making sure they get home before someone catches cold or catches these hands.”
Orrey labels his Wedge sketch.
Yves takes a look at those hands, and takes a thoughtful few steps further away. Range is good. He likes range.
“So run along back to the screaming silver ship you tore here in on,” the first man says, walking his fingers at Linnet, “and leave Alterna to the professionals, please?”
“Which organization are you working for?” Orrey looks up and latches onto the word professional.
“All professionals have to start somewhere,” Linnet says. “…and the screaming silver ship wasn’t our fault. If you know them, could you tell them they need a better lookout, please? And maybe some side mirrors.”
Wedge draws himself up. “The Arbiters of Truth,” he says proudly, as if a flag is billowing behind his broad shoulders.
The first man opens his mouth, and then groans. “That sounds a lot dorkier out loud than I thought it would.”
“Like… accountants?” Yves pauses. “No, wait, that’s auditors.”
“Fancy. Any particular truth?” Bast adds.
“The truth of how it’s very dangerous to be anywhere near big silver ships that don’t watch where they’re going? The truth of how stained glass windows are really really cool? Possibly the truth of why Quetzacoatl wants to be free and what it thinks it needs to be free from?” Linnet presses.
“Look, lady, I —” the first man stops. “She spoke to you?”
“I’d like some warm tree truth, if you’ve got details on those. We tried to have a conversation, but they only really gave me one word in a language I could read, and it’s hard to work with that,” Yves says to no one in particular.
“Who wants to know what a bunch of trees have to say?” Wedge says. “No one, that’s who! Trees don’t live interesting lives!”
“Your lack of appreciation for their interests doesn’t mean those interests aren’t meaningful!” Yves mutters under his breath about bigots who only give fauna any credit for having feelings.
“Wedge. Honestly? Adults are talking. Bounce your pecs at them, okay?” the first man sighs after another sigh.
“You’ve never heard the tale of the Old Rowan?” Orrey says. “Trees can lead fascinating lives.”
“See?” Yves points to Orrey. “He knows.”
“You mean the whole WE WILL NEVER BE CAGED AGAIN thing is not the regular greeting for visitors around here?” Bast gives the first man a level look.
Isa rubs at her face, and only the nearby or perceptive can see that she’s actually….trying very hard not to laugh.
“I’m just saying I wouldn’t read a book a tree wrote!” Wedge exclaims.
Yves sniffs. “Some meaningful things aren’t /meant/ for outsiders, you know.”
“I don’t imagine him reading a book ever…” Orrey mutters under his breath.
“Oh so you live with the trees now?!” Wedge shouts, his voice nearly breaking.
“The budgie-cloud is a she? Then, yes, she spoke to us, and also roasted us a bit.” The end of Linnet’s braid is still singed. “Now why is there a giant cloud of lightning birds roaming around Alterna and what does it want?”
“…besides, a tree writing a book would be creepy under current printing mechanisms. Maybe if they carved it in stone—hey! We all live with trees! That’s where we get /air/ from and they’re a very important part of the ecosystem!” Yves’ ears shiver with sudden outrage. “I bet you practice slash and burn agriculture.” Yves does look about thirty seconds away from breaking out some lightning himself, to defend the honor of trees.
Isa lifts up a hand. “Hey. I’m going to have a seat while you all do…whatever it is you’re doing. If you decide it’s going to come to blows, let me know?”
The first man lifts up on his toes to look over at Isa. “Take me with you?”
“Room enough for anyone,” Isa says.
The first man makes an over-elaborate show of stepping to the side and gesturing for Linnet to continue on her way, and then walks over toward Isa, rubbing his fingertips against his temples.
“Thanks!” Linnet gives him a cheery smile and races up the stairs to get a better view of the window.
“Yves, I don’t think he’s an arsonist. He just doesn’t know any better. Uh, Wedge, and…what was your name? Have you seen anyone else besides the silver ship people hanging around near here? We’re here looking for my father.”
“…can’t just go around disrespecting entire ecological systems, does he have /no/ idea that their root systems hook up for communication?” Yves grumbles.
“Listen, bud, I don’t practice anything, I excel at it,” Wedge says, glaring daggers at Yves, taking his sleeveless coat off to be better ready to throw down. “And while I have not expanded my already CONSIDERABLE list of skills into modern-day industrialization, let me assure you that I am certainly looking into the options now, just because of your FACE!”
“Yves, put the lightning away, it might attract the storm birds,” Linnet says.
Isa has found a piece of masonry to sit on, watching various posturing and posing without too much apparent concern.
The stained glass window, far above the ground atop the spire, shows a brilliant blue crystal in the center, with beams of light shining out all around it.
Yves’ fingers flex. “You probably don’t know the /first/ thing about crop rotation, do you.” He folds his arms grouchily at Linnet’s comment. “Try two centuries of poorly planned logging some time, and then don’t come crying to /me/ if it all turns into mudslides.”
A sudden, sharp shout of a woman’s voice: “SHUT UP!”
A human woman appears — early twenties, much like the other two. She is dressed smartly, in a gold vest over a black shirt, a black layered skirt stopping above the knee, and a pair of tall white boots. A black-and-gold checkerboard beret covers most of her head, though the forest of curly red hair cannot be fully tamed. A band of freckles cross her cheeks across the bridge of her nose, and a gold ring curves around her lower lip. “Five minutes!” she exclaims, glaring at the first man, who ducks his head and darts out of her way. “Gone for five minutes, but what do A hear but a bunch of screamin’ idiots, goin’ on about crops and bleedin’ out trees and whatnot! I don’t know who they are, Biggs, Wedge, but A do know who ye are, and A know yer better than a bunch of fuckin’ children playin’ whistley-dipsy in the fuckin’ streets, ye are! I dinnae come all this way to have someone else bring the whole fuckin’ ruin down on me head, and yet here we are?!”
“You don’t have to be like that about a perfectly polite exchange of ideas between peers,” Yves says. “It’s not like anyone is getting into a fight, here.”
“Nobody’s bringing anything down on anyone’s head! We’re fine! We’re all friends here!” Linnet backpedals.
Isa isn’t even trying to hide her smile now. It’s a little unnerving.
“Lie to me? I heard the whole thing!” She glares around the group in turn, and then turns back to Linnet. “Look, I’ll keep you anonymous, but I’m gonna need some information. Age, hometown, profession’d be nice. What’d the zappy bird say to you, again?” A notebook is open and in her hand, a pencil between her fingers.
Orrey looks approvingly at her notebook. He also remembers to label his Biggs sketch, and then sketches the newcomer as well.
Linnet blinks at the notebook. “…that’s a little out of thin air. Are there actually enough people here to support independent journalism?”
“I mean, there’s always mimeographs for niche newsletters,” Yves says.
“I find your work enjoyably diverting,” Isa asides to Biggs.
Biggs gives Isa a surprised nod. “Oh! Thanks. I do the photography.”
“Oh? Good eye.”
“Twenty-two, librarian in training, and “WE WILL NEVER GO BACK INSIDE, WE WILL NEVER BE CAGED AGAIN,” or something of that nature," Linnet says.
“Not here, you daft little thing.” The human makes a get-on-with-it gesture. “But out there, aye. Capital letters, capital letters,” she mutters as she jots it down. “Witnesses? Eh? Anyone else there? Moogle on the street, human in the sheets? Which of you?”
“Um…it was me and the moogle,” Linnet finishes. “Seriously, why is there a giant cloud of lightning birds, who caged it, why does it zark people walking through the woods? Does anyone know?”
“Dazzling. Occupation, hometown, age if you like, sordid history if you don’t. Anything to add, or just a pretty face?” She’s over with Bast now, scribbling down notes and waiting for him to fill in the gaps.
Bast is well past what the hell is going on and is mostly waiting around to see where this goes.
Linnet can’t help but smile. “He’s definitely the pretty face of this party.”
Jessie taps her pen to her lips. “Aye, a texture to make you weak in the knees. Can’t imagine you’re here legally, though, so we’ll forego the headshot. Shame, that’d move the papers.”
“Does one of the issues cover those trees past the old park?” Yves asks. “Have they said anything besides ‘help’ to anyone? Do they generally hand things out to people? Have you printed translations of their conversation in that other alphabet that I didn’t recognize? Actually, do you know if their default set of signs is an alphabet, or more like idiograms, or a syllabary, or what?”
She stops and looks at Yves. She taps her pencil against her lips, thoughtfully, then walks over and extends her hand. “Sorry, I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced. Jessie Coates, reporter for the Arbiters of Truth.”
“I honestly wasn’t aware there was enough civilization left in Alterna to have border control,” Linnet says. “Or broadsheets, really.”
“I do the layout,” Wedge says, sticking his head between Isa and Biggs. “For the paper. Visual design. Affordable rates!”
Yves shakes Coates’ hand amiably enough. “And here I thought there were just looters visiting a place like this,” he says. “Look, you’re right, I did get a little heated about people not understanding crop rotation. But if no one is doing agriculture here, it’s a moot point, isn’t it? Yves Mjrwin. I’m… uh… between jobs.”
“I see you don’t have a notebook,” Jessie continues, “so I’ll ask your artist friend to jot this down, as well as his commission fee. I’m a reporter. I’m not a fuckin’ forest wizard with songbirds trilling arpeggios on my wrists and doing little ribbon knots in my hair. So no, I don’t know what the fucking trees are saying.”
“The songbirds generally aren’t paying attention to what the trees are saying, either. They’re pretty self-absorbed when they do stop to chat.”
“Around here, if they do ribbon knots in your hair, that’s probably a coded message too,” Yves helpfully adds.
With a roll of her eyes and shake of her head, she’s removed Yves from the relevant journalistic world and moved over to Orrey. “Twenty gil to see the first page of your sketchbook,” she says, already digging into a pocket.
“Fifty.”
“Thirty, and I don’t give you any honest feedback.”
“Oh, I’d prefer to have the feedback. Only way to improve. But 30 will do.” Orrey opens up his sketchbook to the picture of…Isa on the train.
Bast snorts quietly at the haggling, but stays back. Might as well let Jessie occupy herself with everyone else.
“It’s shit, but I’m lying. 300 gil for a sketch of the castle, 500 for a detail of the crystal window, and 200 for a silhouette of the girl with the twigs in her hair for the interview on page three. Deadline is five days from now, Triad or Turon, just let me know.” She clicks the lip piercing against her teeth twice, and then looks around. “And if that’s all, I’ll ask you to keep your fuckin’ voices down so we don’t get any other idiots charging in on us, this place is already dangerous enough as it is, follow?”
“Admittedly, no, not really following. What are you doing here?” Linnet asks.
“Deal. Have you seen any others around? We’re looking for my father,” Orrey asks.
“Didn’t seem that dangerous,” Yves says, not quite under his breath.
“Followin’ a story,” Jessie says, as if it could ever have been anything else. “And it’s dangerous enough right now because it’s not that dangerous, which… of course you don’t. You! Braid & Blade.”
“Hm?” Isa raises her eyebrows.
“Alterna. Right fuckin’ nuts, right?”
“Yes.”
“Last time it tried to kill you? Few ticks now, right?”
Isa shrugs, noncommittal.
“It’s all linked arms and chocobo races right now. Day at the beach, bring the kids and blow a balloon. This place dangerous? Hah. So why isn’t it dangerous?”
“Well, depends if you consider a cloud of lightning budgies with a grudge ‘dangerous,’” (Linnet is hovering up very close to the window right now, tracing the fine details.)
“It’s still dangerous, they’re just idiots,” Isa allows.
She waves her arm around to encompass everything, more or less. “Should be explosions in the sky, right? Only it’s not. It’s peaceful. Simple. Serene. Like a lovely picnic. Someone brought the peace with them. And since you said Quetzacoatl was screamin’ her head off at you earlier, it’s clearly not you that did it.”
“How do you know it’s not? I could be the avatar of serenity.”
She throws her head back and laughs.
Isa smiles.
Then, she digs into her pocket and tosses a 5-gil piece at Isa. “Bars around here are shit. Consider that a drink from me for the laugh when you get the chance.”
“Wait, there are still bars? I thought Alterna was, well, a magical wasteland, more or less,” Linnet asks.
Isa plucks the coin out of the air. “Sure. If we run into each other somewhere civilized, I’ll get the next round.”
“So the peace came here. And the peace has been comin’ here. Who’s bringing it? Why? What are they after? What’s it doing while it’s here? And has your flighty friend ever heard — eh, skip.”
“Probably not. Catch me up later?” Linnet says.
“No idea, and not a lot of care. We’re here for our own business and if it’s quiet while we take care of it, so much the better,” Isa says.
“Biggs! Wedge!” She snaps her fingers, and they both pop up. “It’s a peace too quiet to last, but until the storm comes, we make the most of it, and then we write about it. Someone brings the peace, we bring the word. Then we figure out what to do with it.” She goes to leave, but then stops and walks back to Orrey, peering uncomfortably closely at him. “Alyon, aye?”
“Yeah. What do you know?”
“Dinnae see him on the train. A few, not him.”
“When were you on the train?”
“Took the train here, jumped on it and hid in the back! Didn’t take a ship here, I’m not fuckin’ daft,” Jessie snorts.
“So, the last time it ran my father wasn’t on it, then?”
“Cassiat, pretend you didn’t hear that. The ship was fun!” Linnet chirps helpfully.
“The ship was just fine,” Yves says. “Especially once I touched up a few things.”
“The right of it.” Jessie manages a smile, honest and sincere. “Chin up.”
“Thanks. I’ll get those sketches to you soon,” Orrey says.
“And if we run across anything else potentially newsworthy, we’ll make sure we write it down,” Linnet says.
Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie then head back the way you came, conversations of column width and hidden mysteries passing between them, leaving you all a bit wiser and certainly more confused.
And with that… End session.