Return of the Emblem Chapter Twelve: Divergent Paths

[Ether]

"Well I suppose I would have to test a sample of the new balance before knowing for sure..." Angelica replied, as the Kigenese alchemist made another of her 'blunders', shirking from her words mid-sentence. This was too easy, it really was... but this trip to Weyland Enterprises hadn't been quite as she had expected, and livening it up with something like this might not be so bad... besides, she was curious as to this woman's mannerisms. Taking a hold of the alchemist's hand, she brought it to the ring of knives strapped against her thigh, placing it gingerly against the handle of one of them... towards the inner of the circle of course, no point in going halfway.

"Sure, just take off the strap and it should slip right into your hand."

[scorri]

"Hmm, ok." Hoshi was trying to find the strap when she realized exactly where the other woman had placed her hand. Pulling her hand back like the knives had suddenly gone red hot, her face turned as bright red as was possible, the red turning up clearly against her darker skin. "Uhm, I, what, uhm, I'll just, never mind, I don't need one of your knives, I should be able to just figure it out without one, uhm, how many do you want me to convert? All of them? Do you want me to convert one of them to the style I have in mind now to see if you like that style better? Also, the designs I was talking about wouldn't need to mess with the throwing. It could be a design etched into the handle to help the grip be better or it could be a design in the blade even, uhm also do you have any other weapons I could maybe improve? A tome or something?" She knew she was babbling, but the only other alternative was to look at the woman who had just put Hoshi's hand on her upper inner thigh and she would much rather appear to be a complete fool than do that right now.

[ReformBlade]

"Ha, me drunk isn't really a grand sight, I just get less inhibited." Aneda quipped before anyone got any misconceptions. "And really, I'd be up for either option, or a third one or a fourth one. I'm joining you two, so you figure it out since you've already got my vote."

[Ether]

"Well, I guess we would start with one, and do the others if the redesign works out?" Angelica replied, as the woman took a moment to shy away from her, face turning a bright red. And now she mumbled about with her head down, face still red.

"Well, I have a tome you can take a look at, but from my understanding, it's well past the point where most aside from a master craftsman could improve it." Angelica replied to a part of the ramblings, before taking Hoshi's chin in her hand and pressing her forehead against the other woman's, looking her straight in the eye with a feigned look of concern, intentionally brushing her lips against the older woman's, if only for an instant, as Angelica positioned herself.

"You're getting all red, Hoshi? Do you have a fever... ah, your face is hot."

[scorri]

Hoshi froze. Had... Yes. She backed up a few steps muttering curses in Kigen before slowly blinking and saying, "Uhm, I... please don't do that. I'm fine. I'm just not comfortable getting very close physically with people. I... Uhm.. I." She stuttered into silence and paused for a few seconds, staring blankly ahead, desperately trying to gather her scattered thoughts. "Uhm, I... yes. Please don't do that again. I'm fine." She slowly trailed off before muttering in Kigen, <"This is what I get for approaching someone like this. I should have just stayed in my workroom. It's safe there.">

[Ether]

Well, that happened. Not quite the reaction that Angelica had been expecting, to be certain. Taking a few larger strides so as to catch up to Hoshi, she walked a few feet away from the woman.

"Ah... did I do something bad? I'm not very good at recognizing and keeping boundaries... sorry." Angelica noted to the woman, bowing as she continued to walk, dexterously avoiding obstacles as she did so.

"Also, I can understand Kigenese, so it's not going to do anything for you to switch languages." She decided to add at the end... as good for gathering extra information as it was, revealing that fact might be best in this situation.

[scorri]

<"Great. Just what I needed."> Pausing for a few seconds, Hoshi sighed, shrugged, and continued walking. Arriving at her room, she pushed open the door, walked in and sat down at her desk. Staring that the various alchemy instruments sitting there, she opened her mouth as if to speak, paused, shut it, paused and then said slowly, "I... am not used to physical contact being something I am allowed to do, especially not... intimate contact. Since I left home 6 years ago... there's been no need for it and I've had no desire for it. And I was raised expecting an arranged marriage. So like I said, not allowed. To have someone dressed as yourself do what you did... It would never happen and I am more than embarrassed enough for both of us. It was not something you could have know, so you are at no fault. I would prefer as if we just continued on as if nothing had happened though. Therefore, one of your knives?"

[Ether]

"An arranged marriage, huh? Isn't that kind of stifling to have looming over your head?" Angelica replied, wondering why the woman was deciding to tell her this.

"Either way, you shouldn't have anything to worry about with just a girl checking your temperature... and there's nothing wrong with my clothes! They're nice and light and comfy and easy to move in~" The agent continued with a chipper smile, as she detached one of her knives in a fluid motion, stopping herself just before the part where the blade would have flown into some poor sap's throat, instead holding the blade gingerly in-between two fingers, the handle facing Hoshi.

[scorri]

"Well, I left it behind. And I'm not talking about the temperature. I... you know what I'm talking." Taking the knife, Hoshi closed her eyes and concentrated. Placing her hand on a nearby tome, she slowly chanted a spell, weaving a dark tendril as she did. Once the tendril was formed, she slowly probed at the knife with it. After a few minutes, she nodded to herself. Pulling over a blank sheet of paper, she waved in the direction of a spare chair. "Feel free to take a seat, this might take a few moments." Slowly, she started sketching out a design that she hoped would be suitable for Angelica.

[Ether]

May as well feign ignorance for now. Tilting her head slightly as Hoshi spoke about her knowing what she had been talking about, in apparent confusion. Taking a seat nearby as the woman worked, she noticed the dark tendrils being used.

"Analysing the structure and construction of the weapon in a way that no human eye could using tendril magic... interesting."

[scorri]

"It's the basics of alchemy," Hoshi said offhandedly as she continued to sketch. "To perform an alchemical transformation, you need to almost know the material you're transforming and the material you're attempting to achieve better than you know the back of your own hand. The easiest and quickest way to do this is through tendril magic. I already knew about this material and the type of material I want to transform it into, but a quick refresher is never a bad idea." Adding a few annotations to her sheet, she paused, nodded, and then pushed her chair over to where Angel was, though she kept a slight distance. "So, this is my idea. They would be slightly longer like you see here, and the blade a bit narrower. This would allow for an easier ability to slip through things like ribs and other bone structures. The metal would be slightly heavier, however, with the change in size, the weight difference will not be extreme. The center of balance would theoretically be here," she pointed to a star on the blade right in the middle of the knife, "as opposed to here," she pointed to a spot slightly closer to the hilt, "which is where is approximately is now. This would allow for a better path through the air. As I said, I can make a design on the blade, if you wanted something to make it unique and marked as yours, but they can also be plain, with just a simple tang for any blood." She paused and took a breath. "Thoughts?"

[Ether]

"Well, it all checks out in theory... I won't know for certain until I have one in my hands. As for the design, no need... I'd rather they not be traced back to me, in case I ever can't retrieve one... never know what might happen, right?" Angelica replied, looking over the drawings she had presented... it all appeared to be as she said, but theory and practice weren't always the same.

"How long do you think it would take to get a prototype ready?"

[scorri]

"Uhm, for something this simple... Most of my stuff is set up anyways, so... a few seconds or so?"

She turned around and scooted back towards her desk. There, she cleared her papers off one of her smaller control surfaces and placed the blade in the center. Picking up her trigger, she checked over it quickly before placing it with the nozzle just touching the circle's edge. With a deep breath, she slowly began forming the blade exactly as she wanted it in her mind. The long, narrow blade, the balance perfect, the edge hard and sharp, the hilt formed perfectly to the grooves left in the current hilt from Angel's hand. Suddenly, dark magic sprung up from the control surface and began to eat away at the blade, a deep red in color. She smiled slightly. The color was correct. Keeping the new blade fixed in her mind, she watched as the dark magic turned violet and then a deep blue in color. As the glow began to slowly fade away, the start of a grin showed on Hoshi's face. She didn't have the starts of a headache. Reaching down, she picked up the knife and the grin came in full force. It was perfect. She'd gotten her alchemy working again. Handing it over to Angel, she asked, "So, what do you think? If you want to try it out, the walls are ok to use as targets."

[Ether]

Taking hold of the blade that Hoshi has reshaped, Angelica took a minute to get a feel for the new balance, turning the knife about in her hands for a short while, before flipping it into the air and catching it just above the blade between two fingers.

"Hmm... not bad..." She noted, taking a look towards the wall that Hoshi had pointed out... it was rather plain, a few pock marks here and there. Letting the blade fly, she made a quick note aloud.

"Square inch quadrants, where 1,1 is located in the upper left... coffee stain at coordinates 54,27." The Adept concluded, and moments later, the blade sunk into the wall, sticking in the centre of a notable little coffee stain in the wall.

"Not bad at all..."

[scorri]

Hoshi grinned. It was nice to see her work being used. "So, uhm, did you want the rest of them like that then?"

[Ether]

"Yeah, I think that'd be great." Angelica replied, as she made her way over to the wall and removed the knife. Moving back over to the table, she unstrapped the knives from her thighs, and placed them in a little pile...

Of course, it didn't quite stop there. After several minutes of shuffling clothes about, reaching through and around various things, and probably flashing someone unintentionally for once... or twice... or however many times it may have happened, a sizeable pile of pointy instruments were now making their home on Hoshi's worktable.

"I think that's all of them... oh, wait..." Angelica began, before recalling another blade, which she produced after what would have appeared to be running her hand through her hair to anyone who saw her.

"There, now it's all of them."

[scorri]

Hoshi blinked, shrugged, and started quickly counting up the knives. After doing some quick math in her head, she nodded slightly. "I'm not going to be able to do all of these in a row. Too much strain and mental stress. However, I'll be able to have them done... say by this evening? Before the ball probably if you're going to that. Not that you'd be taking these with you. Because no weapons. But, uhm, yeah. Is that ok with you?" Without waiting for an answer, the alchemist had already started on the first blade of the pile.

[Ether]

"That seems fine. So I'll just pop in later and see how it's going, I suppose?" Angelica responded.

[scorri]

Hoshi nodded absentmindedly as she carefully removed the first newly converted knife from the control surface, inspected it quickly, set it aside, and placed a new one on, ready to start the whole process over again.

[Ether]

'She certainly takes her work seriously, huh?' Angelica though to herself, as she left Hoshi`s workshop and made her way back to the dining room.

[Mercakete]

"Well, fer one, Shadrak's not here anamore," Gytha replied to Malik's question about why they should wait, "N' I thought ye were supposed t' be restin'. Didn't sound like ye cared much about lookin' inta that anaway."

[-Cynthia-]

Veronika

"I think it would be pretty difficult to kill a vasilus all things considered," Veronika said, still looking at the egg quizzically. Apparently this isn't normal egg behavior for even Fallen hatching- I'm not sure there's anyone who knows what to do here.

Nadya

"Not to pry into her business and all, but why exactly does Aisha want a piece of this emblem anyway? It seems to have caused Raquel a lot more harm than good the way I see it," she chimed in.

Connor

"We're going to need a good cover story to be in Neviskotia at any rate- I don't think Raquel's weapon selling license applies in countries outside of Ursium. They're naturally going to be suspicious of our intentions if they see what we're carrying," he pointed out.

[Script]

A Man Called Gar

"Is that an indiscriminate gender 'them' or there's actually more than one, 'them'?" Gar asked for clarification on that point first. If it was carrying more than one somehow, well that'd just be terrible wouldn't it? "But that aside, the mother isn't likely to spontaneously appear out of nowhere. So focus on what you can do, not what you want to happen." Not like there ever was a mother? Stupid vasili. Gar mentally mumbled between song.

[Phoenix]

Dining Room

"Hey, don't say it like that," the guard quickly replied. "I was being general ... sure I wouldn't complain if it was Gabbie fawning over me ... but I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen." Slowly moving his gaze toward Steinn, he added, "So ... what's your secret?"

"Hm?"

Meanwhile ... "It's not like I have to go, though I'd certainly like to have gone with them if this turned out to lead us to some new information or straight to an emblem piece for that matter. Our mission's more important than ... recreational ... activities," Malik explained.

"I guess it's just us then," Fizza quietly noted to Amon.

To Nadya, Malik immediately said, "That's prying into her business."

"We don't know all the details, either, but we're at least expecting some improvements over the current situation," Amon said. He wasn't sure he wanted to bring up the apparent curse issue here.

"Have any of you people seen 'Aisha' with your own eyes? It almost sounds like you have," Chie chimed in again. To that, Malik simply gawked. He couldn't believe she was doubting them at all. He wasn't surprised that there were doubters, she was never seen outside of Sanctuary itself and so most considered the true government was hiding behind a single avatar called 'Queen Aisha'. "A simple yes or no will do, 'Sancturan'."

Patio

"More than one child in a single egg? That's impossible, isn't it?" Shadrak asked.

Siv flinched a bit at the question Gar asked. "I don't know if there are more than one, but I also don't know if they're male or female. I could only sense one, though."

"I guess 'it' moight be a bit insulting," Gabbie mused and shrugged.

"Siv, Lilith wanted us to look after the egg. It may look like a fallen egg, but the child inside of it probably never had parents to begin with. It's a vasilus, so it even like this, it's probably immortal ... I guess. I guess what I'm trying to say is that you can trust us to look after it, since I doubt there's anything we can do to endanger it's safety. We just wanted some tips to try and make sure we were at least making it comfortable."

Workshop

Anna donned a mischievous grin at the mention of a cover story. "Let's turn you two into skotians~" Immediately going back to her normal, thoughtful demeanor, she explained, "It's not just Raquel we're worried about. You need a good alias too or you're as good as kidnapped."

Crossing his arms, Weyland said, "I have serious reservations about sending him off to Neviskotia with them. This is not only a potential attack on the enemy's stronghold, but also an expedition into a country we have an extremely light presence in. Even with an 'alias' he'll be spending most of his time in a moving target."

Anna frowned. She figured that would come up sooner or later.

[Ether]

"There isn't much merit to that question... there is no secret of Lord Devlinos' design... he is an attractive, overall highly desirable male specimen, as well as a future Sovereign... it would be more surprising for a woman to not show interest." Annelise replied with a blank expression.