Return of the Emblem Chapter Nine: Consolidating Forces

[ReformBlade]

A quick friendly jab to Zach's shoulder and a smirk later, "Good. I don't ask much, and truth be told I want to believe your story a lot, but it sounds too convenient... I hope you understand, Zach? It's nothing personal, I'm just a bit cautious..." Cocking her head to the side, Aneda gave a puzzled look, "Oh come on, why are you so afraid of me now, kid? After everything I just explained, sigh...."

[Phoenix]

Main Deck

More people returning was a good sign, but she was still unsure of how to proceed now. Learning that the Governor was more likely to side with them than against them threatened to trivialize their cover up and bribery plans. Faatina's question needed addressing, so Raquel began with that. "A wealthy man in this port's trying to capture or kill us as a favor to our real enemies. We're trying to plan a preemptive attack, but it's not easy. There's also a girl I'm hoping to rescue from him." Short and concise.

Docks

Ringo continued to follow the trio by gliding from higher rooftops to lower ones, and flying up to higher ones. Whichever gave him the best view. Flying constantly would force him to stay too high to be in rescue range. He really didn't like this place. The buildings were old and poorly maintained. Half of the buildings he perched on would lose at least a dozen tiles before he moved on to the next.

Gabbie ended up putting her hood up for most of the trip back in minor embarrassment. Once they reached the docks, Ringo began flying again, and was happy to be able to do so.

"Hey, you three! Hey!" Someone was calling over to them. Gabbie glanced over hoping to the gods whatever they said had nothing to do with the wyvern circling overhead like a vulture. "There's a wild wyvern ... right ... above you!" he warned. He pointed up toward Ringo with his finger. Gabbie glanced up at Ringo and then over to the man.

After sighing heavily she replied "Yeah ... we know."

Warrior's Guild

Once they made it back to the guild building, Mandy approached some of the loafers standing around the main entrance. "Hey, have any of you seen Tali around? There's no way we beat her back here."

"Maybe on the roof? I saw someone flying nearby, but she never landed. Saw her fly over the roof and then she was outta my sight." the man explained with a shrug.

"That's not fair, Tali" Mandy muttered to herself. "... okay, thanks for the information."

"So she's on the roof?" asked Shadrak, wondering if there was even a way up there.

"... maybe. She likes to go where people won't find her as quickly. Honestly if she didn't want to be found, she wouldn't head straight back to the guild, but she certainly doesn't make it easy on me. Tell you what; you can talk to her like you planned, but I personally need to find her, first."

Shadrak shrugged. "That's fine. I just had some questions, anyway. Where do we start?"

"Well you stay here and hold onto this," Mandy instructed, handing Shadrak the reins of the horse. She quickly mounted up on her pegasus. "I'm going to see if she's actually up there, and if she is, I'll talk her down. If she's not up there ... well then we'll just have to check around some more."

"Alright." This is going to take longer than I thought ...

[Eail]

"Oh no real reason I suppose, you were just a tad bit scary for a moment is all. Anyways, we should be getting back to Raquel and the rest. Almost everyone should be here by now yeah?"

He decided he might as well tell her the rest as well "I have proof you can trust me just so you know though, I brought along a dossier folder that I left with Raquel that has files on her and a plan of attack that was set by the cult. Beyond that you'll just have to wait till tonight to see just how truthful I am."

Edited June 7, 2012 by Eail

[Script]

A Man Called Gar

"You can call me Gar," Gar said wen the Reign guy asked about him. It wasn't much, but until they left or Zachary arrived there wasn't much else to do either other than observe. The Reign guy's next words were quite logical. Which meant he'd be a one to keep an eye on, since once Gar's suspicious nature was revealed he'd probably follow him around like a lovesick puppy. That was gonna be a fun little game. After that some Rexian woman came up and was another drop in the river of people who were going to be asking what's going on. Raquel answered quick and to the point, but answering everyone individually would take far too long. "As kind as it is to answer everyone individually, it'll probably save more time to just wait for everyone or pass explaining off to someone else," Gar pointed out. "More time spent scouting out terrain means better review off the land and so on and such." Of course they also needed Zachary to be back for... and there he was riding on a pegasus. That certainly was a form of luck. "Well looks like the floor planner is here."

[-Cynthia-]

Veronika

"I suppose focusing on the battle for now would be in our best interest," she answered Reign curtly, simply watching everyone else arrive for the moment. She began to do a headcount- she figured they needed all their strength to plan properly.

Connor

"People sure are weird about wyverns here...wonder why that is? You think something that flies would be useful traveling across islands," he mentioned to Gabbie.

[Acacia Sgt]

Gil grunted, waking up. Seems the place has gotten more noisy than usual. He began to rise, but then stopped, then turned his head. Looks like she had long left. And so he resumed and stretched his wings. On further inspection he noticed John was finally back outside, and seems the humans had gathered. Well, still not of his concern. So he decided to lie down again and just wait it out, awake.

-----

''So it's back to the Wardroom then once everybody is back?'' John asked. <I suppose it can be fine doing it out here, but back inside may be preferable.>

[ReformBlade]

"Yeah we should be getting back I suppose." She agreed completely, but then Zach decided to bring up that silly trust issue again. "Look, I told you, it sounds really super convenient, and you telling me more convenient things isn't helping me trust you any more or less. I'll believe it when I see it... despite how horrific that sounds in context here..."

Davod couldn't help but chuckle to himself. "Thank you for the information!" he said with probably a bit too much sarcasm but he didn't care all that much as he was holding his head down to try and hide his face and his laughter.

[Phoenix]

Main Deck

"That would make this easier, yeah." Reign replied with a small nod. "Like I said, that's a relative of the governor who's willing to help out. Maybe we'll hear back from the governor in a little while, who knows." Not that he'd even know where to find us unless someone's following Grant. "So has there been any progress ... at all?"

"Errrrrr, I was on my way to get some dye for this cloak. But we might still need more extra robes than I can carry ..." To John she answered "It would be a little crowded, so I don't know."

Docks

"Y-you're welcome ...?" the man replied, not sure what to think, and missing the sarcasm by a mile. None of these people seemed to mind being followed by that wyvern. Of course upon closer inspection, he saw it was tacked. Oddly tacked, but tacked nonetheless. He felt embarrassed after realizing that it may have just been following its master.

"Sometoimes a little fear's healthy for people. Keeps them from assuming they can waltz roight up to some wild animal and not get their friggin' heads bitten off." she replied to Connor. She quickly looked back to the worried man and said "He's ours."

"He just ... flies around like that ...?"

"Pretty much. Completely broken~ Well, we need to get goin', now. See ya around." With that, Gabbie urged the group along. The Leverager was in plain sight now, and she was wondering what was with all the people on deck. Ringo knowing full well Gabbie was headed for it, swooped down onto the ship. He landed on top of the Dauntless, rocking the entire vehicle and freaking out one of the sailors who was passing by.

"Hey! What the he- ... wait, I recognize you. You're with Raquel's group." the sailor realized. Ringo didn't say anything in response. Frankly, he had nothing to say. Furthermore, there was nothing he could say.

Gabbie was less interested in all the trouble Ringo was causing and more interested in the obvious situation developing. Not everyone was present, but there were two new faces, and both of them seemed to have misplaced their hair colors somewhere. "We're back." she said with a small wave. "So who are you?" she asked Grant from behind.

Warrior's Guild

Mandy flew up to investigate the roof. Its slight dome shape forced her to fly full circle around the building. She didn't find Talitha up there, so began to worry. If she was inside, someone would have already found her and noticed how upset she was. If not, then she had no idea where to look. They didn't live in Tremere, so she wasn't sure where the woman would hide out during an episode. "Urgh, it's always like this. Where would I hide out if I were really ticked off at humans? Hmm."

Shadrak waited patiently on the ground.

Edited June 8, 2012 by Phoenix

[Eail]

Walking back to Raquel and CO. Zach noticed they still seemed to be in conversation exactly as it was when he left.

"So did I miss anything important here? Shadrak is still at the guild but I brought back Aneda, and two others as well. Everyone has calmed down by now right?"

[Acacia Sgt]

''No, you didn't miss much actually. Only Gar here volunteering to scout the vicinity of the cult's manse.'' John answered. <Though now that he is back, wouldn't he be able to supply that information instead? Maybe now that he's here he may have the chance to.>

[Eail]

"Couldn't we save a good bit of time by just having me give you that information?" He questioned "What exactly are you wanting to know about the place?"

[ReformBlade]

Gar...? Who the fuck? "Gar is who now? Sorry, newcomer or something?" Aneda questioned as she followed Zach. "And yeah, can't we just like pick his brain or something? Not that I trust him, but uh, yeah, you should probably ask someone who was there a lot more than a random guy. Funny! Both just happen to be newcomers!"

[Mercakete]

Once Rizen and he were back in their gear, Norbert mounted the pegasus once again and took off in the direction of the ship the group had arrived on. Of course, that meant gaining some altitude early on in the flight so they could pass over whatever buildings were between them and the Leverager. Considering there was some distance between the field and the ship, there was plenty of time to think about the incident...which turned out to not be such a good thing seeing as the more he thought about it, the more disposed to his anger he was.

Nadya was the one who was outright insulting the Fallen and only Aneda even mentioned her. I was dismissing what I'd assumed by the evidences Talitha was showing me of her nature and then I got yelled at by that hen for no good reason. Then, after that, Faatina hit me and started scolding me as though she had any right to chastise me for what I said which wasn't even unprovoked! And then Aneda joins in and even apologizes for me! There's just something about me that draws all the blame no matter what the circumstances are. There isn't anything I can do about it but defend myself to the best of my abilities. I try to be nice to someone and I'm suddenly the most insulting creature alive... Bah, why am I even thinking about this? It's how it's always been. Nothing to do but bear it and keep fighting. Why am I even in a social situation again? I'm just going to be blamed for everything. There's a lot of benefit to being here, sure. That kid, Connor, can make equipment better with magic. So long as you travel with a merchant, it won't be often you'll be short on supply. There are even regular meals. The pay's good, too, and I get to do what I like doing without having to follow a regimen like the military does. I don't think I help out much. I probably get everyone into more trouble than I help. I'm just a bad luck token, I guess.

Norbert's anger grew as he thought about how helpless he felt. "There's nothing I can do about it either," he growled to himself, gritting his teeth, "I couldn't stop Cecelia and I can't stop anyone else. No matter how hard I try, I keep winding up on the ground, both figuratively and literally. Even when I'm right I'm wrong!" For a short while, the pegasus rider was silent. The wind was the only thing he could hear. Then, "I'll never stop trying, though. I'll just get up just as many times as I'm knocked down." Determination and anger burning within, Norbert looked down to finally see the Leverager below. "Time to get up."

Most of the group was already gathered when Rizen and Norbert landed. He couldn't tell because he wasn't specifically looking for individuals, but there were still a few missing. As he dismounted he decided that his one objective for the time being was to isolate himself as much as he could from the others without being absent from whatever meeting Raquel had wanted everyone to attend.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Gytha finally pulled her mind out of her wonderings and back into the present. As she caught the scent of something cooking, the mariner looked up to the sky. Was it time to eat already? How long had she been lost in thought? Well, no use wondering about it. So, Gytha wandered back over to the main deck...where various members of the group had gathered, apparently.

[Script]

A Man Called Gar

Aye aye aye, things just kept going forward. Well, with so many people coming it wasn't a surprise. Veronika was trying to focus things, Armor Guy said they would go back to the wardroom once things were ready, which was true. Reign guy reassured Raquel a bit, and Raquel reminded armor guy of the whole dye and cloak and robe thing. Zachary boy came walking up, throwing the name Shadrak out. If that was stalker guy then that was really just too hilarious to not be premeditated. There was also the name Aneda, which was probably the pegasus girl. Armor guy mentioned Gar's role, and Zachary volunteered his experience. Excellent. Pegasus girl came up asking who Gar was, probably guessing it was him but eh, better to get confirmation.

Also some wyvern saw fit to land up on that wagon. Since no on seemed to care that meant they were used to it. Weirdos.

Well, first things first, "You can call me Gar," he said to the pegasus girl before looking at Zachary. "I wanted to go scout out places outside the manse for useful ambush or defensive formations along with checking out the outside of the manse to see if their own defenses vary in accordance with anything you'd relate. It is possible they're setting you up you know. On top of that, I'm hoping that if you're asked you'll draw up a floor plan of the manse since there's no way any of the rest of us can find that out." Gar crossed his arms and chuckled. "My my, look and me being the bid bad order jerk. And I'm even newer and more suspicious than you. Isn't that annoying?"

Edited June 8, 2012 by Script

[Eail]

"Yes, yes it is. Incredibly at that" Zach replied "But I have better things to do than deal with you."

"If you want it I can draw up a floor plan for you Raquel. Though to be honest? It's just big, big but very simple." He said to the pink haired girl.

[Phoenix]

Leverager

There seemed to be some mistrust between the two former newcomers. That just made Raquel feel awkward. Here she was, taking all the help she could get, and the suspicious pair were suspicious of each other? Or something close to it? Well now there were several things to deal with. "Reign, can you have him come up here?" she asked, pointing to Grant. Oh wait, I should ask Captain Bogdan's permission first! she realized all too late.

"Hey, come on up, Grant." Reign called over, right when Raquel predicted he would. All too late, indeed.

Little choice but to get back to the topic at hand for the moment. "I don't want to lose anyone. We've been really REALLY lucky to have only a couple of casualties so far, and I want to keep it that way. I want you to draw up a floor plan. If we can't lure them out, then we'll have to fight inside, and we need to know the place at least half as well as they do or they could beat us."

Warrior's Guild

When Mandy flew back down, she landed about ten meters from Shadrak and waved him over. "Did you find her?" he asked, though he figured if she had, she wouldn't have come back so quickly. Despite what she said, if she found her up on the roof, she probably would have tried to talk her down before letting him speak with her.

"No, she's not up there, but I think I know where we can find her. Come on." She hopped down from Summer and led the pegasus off by the reins. Shadrak followed. They entered the stables and Mandy quickly put Summer back in her stall. The pegasus protested a bit, having her fun come to an end so soon, but Mandy pacified her with some horse feed. Shadrak had to wait out the next few minutes while she did that and took that time to look around the stables. He was pretty sure this wasn't where they were going to be looking, but figured it was worth a look.

As Mandy left Summer to come find Shadrak, he found Talitha, by herself in one of the stalls obscured by shadows. She was curled up in the corner with her tail forming a small circle around her legs. "Hey ... Tali was your name, right?" Shadrak greeted.

"What do you want?" came a quiet reply.

"I just wanted to ask you some questions."

"Questions about what?"

"Halfbreeds, mostly. I didn't even know they existed until today." he explained.

Talitha buried her head which made her already quiet replies even harder to understand. "I'm the only one as far as I'm concerned. I've never heard about any others. What do you want to know?"

Shadrak leaned a little closer, but didn't quite step into the stall since it was closed. This girl really wanted to be alone, he knew that ... but ... but he probably wouldn't get another chance. "So they're rare. Hmm ... I'm sorry, Tali, I don't mean to bother you with this while you're feeling down, but this is probably the only chance I'll ever get to learn about your kind. Even you have to admit that a half fallen half avian is intriguing."

"There's nothing intriguing about me." she shot back from her hiding place."

"Don't sell yourself short. I've never even seen someone with yellow feathers before. They look almost golden. That's really beautiful." he countered, hoping to encourage her a bit.

Talitha lifted up her head and gave Shadrak a blank stare. "Please tell me you're not one of those interracial sex fiends I've heard so much about. They're supposed to be subtle and 'genuinely' interested."

Shadrak froze at that, feeling almost accused. "Hell no! It's not like that. That's not what I was getting at. I want to know and understand other cultures and other peoples ... the ones worth understanding at least. How am I supposed to learn anything about halfbreeds if I don't talk to one?"

"'My kind' are so rare, we might as well not exist. People can't even make the distinction between halfbreed and full blooded fallen."

"Is that why you want to cut off your tail?"

"Yeah. They wouldn't have said anything about me, wouldn't have been remotely suspicious if not for my tail."

"Do you really want to, though? You'd think Mandy wouldn't have talked you out of it so many times if you really wanted to hurt yourself like that."

"Of course I don't want to do it! My tail's useful. But I don't think it's worth this ..."

"Sure it is, Tali." Mandy cut in. She apparently heard enough of the conversation as she approached to interject. "Tali, if you really didn't think it was worth it, nothing I could have said would have kept you from lopping it off, so keep it. It's a part of you, and you don't want a big scar on your butt, right? You'll miss being able to groom it and you won't be able to outfly dark avians anymore, either."

"Tch, there she goes, again, talking me out of it." Talitha muttered.

Mandy hopped into the stall and came over to sit by her. "I'm going to talk you out of it every time; count on it."

[Snowy_One]

Robin took a deep breath as she took one final glance around. She could hear several of the group members out on the main deck, but she wasn't sure if that meant the meeting was over or if it had merely moved outside. She looked down at the pot that was now on a VERY low simmer. Already she could see signs that the stew would start to fall apart before long due to the constant heating. This wasn't like pasta sauce, a ground up paste, this was something made from a careful mixture of various items in balance with each other. She gave a small grimace before finding a nearby cup and quickly emptying the liquid inside to try and re-balance the stew.

"I need to go up-top to see if the party is ready to eat. I need you to watch the stew so it does not burn. If they are not ready soon, I will serve what I can to the crew." she said to one of the chefs before she started to head topside herself. As she walked out onto the deck she looked about and saw that several of the people were there.

"The stew is done. I do not know how much longer it can last before it starts to fall apart though."

[Mercakete]

Things seemed to be progressing, whatever was going on. Then Robin came up onto the deck and said her stew was ready. Norbert was a bit surprised that she'd made the group something to eat but it was swiftly replaced by other thoughts, the primary of which was thinking back on what he'd eaten that day. He could only recall thinking about eating some biscuit but couldn't remember if he'd actually eaten any or not. And now that he was thinking about food, his stomach was able to complain to his brain about its emptiness. Idly he recalled how little he ate before joining up with Raquel's group. I guess I'm getting used to eating regularly again. I'm sure I could survive like I was before, but when food's offered, best to take it.

"Why don't we move th' meetin' t' th' galley?" Gytha suggested with a shrug, "Then we can eat n' plan at th' same time. Might as well from th' sound o' it." She actually wasn't sure if this was a meeting or not but it certainly looked kind of like one.

If we're still waiting for people we can eat while we wait, too. Norbert thought as he waited to see if anyone else would speak up on the idea or if Raquel would agree to it or not.

[Snike]

The conversation between Raquel and Reign continued as the group at the top of the loading ramp slowly grew, swelled by the returning mercenaries. Blake had no immediate interest in wading into the growing crowd. There was already enough chaos with the number of people there to begin with, why further the confusion by interjecting when he could just acquire the information later? Unfortunately, Fate did not seem to agree with the swordsman, as moments later, a wyvern flew from the port and landed on the Dauntless, rocking it a little too violently for the Ursian's tastes. Immediately the sellsword moved away from the wagon and towards his assembled allies. Safety did appear to be found in numbers.

***

More and more people went up the ramp, some on foot, and some on mounts. Grant pretended to not notice them while he mentally tallied up the numbers. Before long, though, someone took notice of him and was soon asking who he was. The ice magician turned around, extended a hand to the rather rough-looking woman, and said, smiling, "Grant Brayden, duelist. And you are...?"

Before he could say much more, Reign called for the governor's nephew to join him.

"Sorry, I guess I can more properly introduce myself later," Grant said with an apologetic smile. He pulled back his hand, turned, and made his way up the ramp, meeting Reign and the pink haired girl at the top.

"So, I guess this is your friend?" he asked the Rexian man, before extending his hand out to the other participant. "Grant Brayden, duelist, at your service. I understand you have a witness to Cervantes's crimes?"

[Eail]

"That would be me" Said Zach as he raised his hand to indicate the speaker. "Name is Zachary Fairweather, long story short I saw some things there that didn't set well with me and earlier today I learned that Cervantes plans on attacking this group. So I decided to kill to birds with one stone and help them with their problem which will also fix mine."

Noticing that Robin had decided to come up to announce that food was ready Zach continued. "I don't suppose we could sit down to a nice meal though? I can make a map afterwards, and fill in the new guy as well if need be."

[Phoenix]

Galley

"Unless she considers five spoon fulls a serving, this isn't even going to cover Raquel's group." one of the chefs noted. The other shrugged. Not his problem, though he too was beginning to wonder if they shouldn't try to do something about this. The ill timed cooking had some of the crewmen riled up, and teasing them was just wasn't right. "So what do you think? Should I get to work on dinner early?"

"What can we make in the next ten minutes, stir fry?" the other chef quickly asked, feeling like they were running out of time already. "That won't feed everyone, either."

"Meh. You keep an eye on the stew. I'll have a look around. We don't have to feed the whole crew. Most of them will be out taking this port for all its worth. We just need to worry about who's left."

"I still don't see less than twenty something mouths to feed ..."

"Just watch the damn stew."

Leverager

It was a short introduction, with Gabbie only getting to say "Gabbie." before Grant got his cue to come aboard. She shrugged, figuring she'd warn him about her odd nicknaming policy later if he turned out to be more than a temporary ally. She walked up the ramp after him assuming Connor and Davod were following. She caught the bit about food being ready and chuckled. Part of her wanted to hide the sausage roll she had partially wrapped, and another part of her wanted to get back to eating it, but she'd wait to see what the situation was. She didn't want to talk with her mouth full or miss a chance to cut in.

"I don't mind moving to the galley for this. If there isn't enough stew for everyone, then maybe the chefs will make something extra for the rest of us in the meantime." was Raquel's response, to which Gabbie suppressed a chuckle. Grant again introduced himself, and Raquel shook his hand. Her wariness grew over the passing seconds, culminating at "I'm ... Raquel ..." no need to say her last name or give any more information than necessary. Maybe. Something suddenly clicked. He's a duelist? So does that mean he'll fight with us?

When Zachery suggested making the map after they ate, Gabbie finally cut in. "Afraid you'll spill stew all over the map?~"

Raquel was wondering why he couldn't draw it for them during the meal as well, but she wasn't going to force the issue. No way.

[Acacia Sgt]

Robin soon came announcing the stew was finally ready.

<I suppose it's not a bad idea to plan while we eat..> John thought.

We are going to eat the stew now? So it is not going to be for dinner after all. Sophia thought.

And Reign's companion soon climbed on deck.

<So that's him.> John thought. <I wonder if he'd want stew as well. As if we weren't many enough, heh.>

[Script]

A Man Called Gar

Heh, Zachary guy was certainly quite way over-bothered by the relatively light condescending tone Gar had took. Raquel called to Reign who called to newest new guy Grant who eventually came aboard the ship as well. But not before Raquel confirmed she wanted a floor plan from Zachary. At this point it was almost disturbing how swimmingly this was going. Maybe Gar was the one being led into a trap. Nah.

There were a couple other minor distractions like that stew girl coming up and Gytha suggesting things move to the galley or something. But those were really side issues to get to when things worked out here. That was also when Grant showed face on deck, immediately going into asking who was the witness, which Zachary answered. Though waiting until the rest were done eating before making the map? Well, that was quite the window.

While Gar certainly could have prodded the guy on, Raquel relented to the suggestion of heading to eat first, leaving Gar with no more openings in a retort. Oh well. Also some other unrevealed woman stepped aboard as well. This was a real fun house wasn't it. Well she certainly got right on to bothering Zachary FAIRWEATHER about his inability to make a map and eat stew at the same time. "Well, since eating seems to have moved up as the better thing to do than deal with me for everyone," Gar shot a dig at both himself and Zach. "Suppose I'll put my priority of checking the rum stores up just as high."

Gar's head twisted towards the other two who hadn't heard his name. "Oh yeah, you can call me Gar," he said. They hadn't asked, but it was better to give it in this situation.

[Eail]

"If it was something easier to eat I'd draw while eating, but like she said" Zach replied while pointing to Gabbie "I'd rather not spill it on the paper, but trust me. I'll be done with the map before the rest of you are even close to done eating. Good food tends to not last long around me."

[Snowy_One]

A small blush came across Robin's face as the mere notion of her stew being eaten was so readily accepted, even by Gytha whom she had fulled expected to reject the stew on principle.

"I was not aware that the meeting was still going on. I am happy to hear you are so eager to try it though. I put a lot of work into it. I may not be the best chef on this galley, but I have experience and I know that it is good stew. If the meeting is a problem though, should it not take importance? The stew can only last so long, but I can make more eventually."