From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
10-10-2020, 06:44 PM (This post was last modified: 10-10-2020, 07:24 PM by Edwyn.)
what makes a desert beautiful...is that it hides a well, somewhere
No, Edwyn isn't from Torchline, but that hardly matters now does it? For purely selfish reasons it's always good to have a working shrine, but for even more pragmatic ones, it was a bit...disrespectful in a way to just leave their goddess's place of worship all banged up. So despite his relative lack of initiative when it came to most ascended-related things, that he wasn't currently sick seemed to be a good of a reason as any to take this onto his shoulders.
So he's gathered himself a small crew, not wanting too many cooks, and arrives at sundown so that he can work without issue from the sun. It's still incredibly warm, not that he feels it of course.
"Right!" Edwyn chimes, upbeat and cheerful as ever despite the massive amount of work ahead. "There's debris to be cleared away, some structural damage to be repaired, and of course, cleaning up the shrine itself. Have any of you a preference?"
This is a PQ to rebuild the TL Ascended shrine. It'll have 5 rounds. No, you don't need to be an ascended to join!
When a man drags your ass off the shore after you nearly drown, you tend to help that man. So Jack shows up to help rebuild this shrine, though it’s not one he’s ever heard of. And it’s in the asshole of some rocks, and it looks like hell. But then he supposes that’s why it needs rebuilding. The captain peers around at the once-was-shrine, itching at the stubble on his cheek and letting out a slow whistle.
”I can shift some of this.” He waves a hand at the debris, kicking over a couple of rocks and hunkering down to peek at a few shinies in the sand. ”What kind of offerings do you leave here?” he wonders, not knowing what Ascended might leave to a creator who already has everything.
Just one cook would show up to help with the repairs, it turned out. After hearing that Jack was going out of his way to help someone, Saiden had decided to tag along, because he really had to see this. So the Hali ambled in behind the captain.
Peeking his head into the cave, Saiden whistled when he saw the damage. Looking at the stranger, the cook grinned. "Saiden Hali. Nice to meet ye." He saluted, then looked back at the shrine.
Scratching under his chin, he shrugged. "I'll take the structural damage. Seems disrespectful for me to be working on the shrine, what with bein' an Abandoned an' all." Chuckling, he took up some tools and supplies and moved towards the nearest unstable looking area.
what makes a desert beautiful...is that it hides a well, somewhere
"Whatever we all feel like, really." Edwyn replies sunnily. "The Voice has no need of offerings of course...and it isn't like with your gods, where the quality of what's on offer has anything to do with their mood. But...it's a sign of respect, I think? For most anyhow. I imagine for some who are more new to being ascended, it's more of a habit." He replies with a soft shrug, nodding appreciatively as Jack begins to shift things about. The captain is fairly efficient for a man as wiry as he is. It all goes rather well for him, the debris moving more or less with ease as he chucks it out from the shrine and into the seawater that surrounds the cave. As he moves things, he'll notice some rather valuable looking trinkets...will he risk trying to scoop them up for himself?
"Nice to meet you too!" Offering the cook a dazzlingly white smile, the ascended nods a welcome hello of appreciation. "Edwyn Digby." The name has a charming bounce to it that way it's said, as if the ascended might be a performer in his other life. He isn't of course, but writers can have interesting names too. Saiden will find that he's having a considerably harder go of things. The storms of the past season have really done a number on the shrine, and many of the larger boulders look ready to give way at any moment, sealing them in the cave. Will he ask for help? Or does he have a clever trick up his sleeve (not that he's probably wearing any), to try and reinforce things?
”Ah, I see,” Jack mutters, hauling driftwood and seaweed and other crap that’s been washed in from outside into the seawater. Honestly it’s pretty easy to work in here, given that it’s in the shade of the LongHeat sun, and there’s enough of a breeze coming off the waves outside to keep them from drowning in humidity. As he finishes the last of his clean-up, he does indeed spot some clever trinkets.
And does he think of grabbing them? You’re fucking right he does. ”What’s she like then, this Voice?” he wonders, collecting up said trinkets and considering for a moment what they would look like on his walls, or as a trade with the merfolk. But angering a goddess is a bit far even for the rough captain. ”Where’d you want these?” he calls to Edwyn instead, nodding at the treasure he’s found.
The stranger was chatty. Grunting at the man's words, Saiden glanced at Jack. The cook arched an eyebrow, wondering why the captain was interested in the Voice. However, the Hali was soon engrossed in his work shoring up the cave.
Which was going poorly. Whistling as he worked, Saiden didn't get far before he stepped away from the walls. "Hey, could I get a hand? I don't like the look of these rocks." He pointed at the boulders in question.
"I could maybe roll them down in a way that doesn't trap us? If I took some water from the ocean." Scratching the top of his head, he frowned as he considered the problem. If anyone had any smart suggestions, he'd follow them.
Saiden asks for help and will follow whatever plan the others might come up with.
what makes a desert beautiful...is that it hides a well, somewhere
"Well..." With a reverent tone and a smile, the ascended beams at Jack's interest, wrongly assuming of course that it has to do with a curiosity about the Voice rather than the types of things she'd miss were they snatched. "..since she has no need of physical objects, I suppose she likes things that are thoughtful. You know, not just gifts for gifts-sake." Glancing at the treasure trove that Jack indicates, Edwyn exhales in a way which puffs out his cheeks, offering up an almost caricature look of boy, what a great question. "Well, I don't really think they're needed, but it seems almost disrespectful to just...get rid of them. Does Torchline have some sort of place that takes donations for the less fortunate?"
Ugh. Aren't the ascended meant to be made of fluid, and not sugar?
Turning to Saiden, Edwyn immediately comes to his aid. He is stronger in the dark that's true, but this certainly isn't his skillset. If the three of them work together though, they just might be able to fortify things better than any one of them could on their own. "Far be it for me to point out the obvious, but you two look like you've done this sort of thing more than once. So just tell me where you want me."
Up to Jack and Saiden to make a plan on how best to reinforce the mouth of the cave so that the loose boulders don't collapse!
Jack’s hmm suggests that he’s taking all the information in - and he is, just not in the way Edwyn might think - and the captain eventually leans in to scoop up the treasures to keep them safe (inside his pockets). ”Reckon I know about a place they can go,” he says, ”I’ll make sure they make it there safely.” The place is in the Ark’s coffers, of course, but well, the Ascended has practically given them away and out of the Voice’s jurisdiction. That means they’re fair game again.
But now there’s a new problem, and Jack approaches the boulders at the entrance to the shrine. ”Fishing net might keep the boulders where they ought to be,” he says. ”An’ if we can get some wood, you can brace the entrance with it. It’ll have to be sturdy stuff, though. You don’t want this shit collapsin’, that’s for sure. How are we lookin’ for materials? Reckon we should be able to get some net easy enough, eh Hali?”
Saiden grinned at Edwyn as the other man suggested they donate the treasures Jack had found. The trinkets would go to the needy alright; after all, the Ark needed contraband, which made its crew needy. And the cook was under no illusions about what the captain was actually going to do with the goods.
Nodding at Jack's suggestion, the Hali glanced at the captain. "Aye I can get us some nets. An' if we don't have any suitable wood here we could probably get some from one o' the shipyards." They had masts and planks and things. Regardless, the cook would set off to retrieve a sturdy net, the kind used for deep sea fishing.
what makes a desert beautiful...is that it hides a well, somewhere
'Ah! That's excellent. Thank you so much." Says the mouse to the lion, truly believing that Jack will selflessly give the treasures to those who need them.
With his hands clasped politely at his waist, Edwyn listens to the more clever minds as they devise a plan. He wonders if the wood will rot away with the pounding of the waves but...well! He did say that Jack and Saiden knew best, so who was he to argue? Was this one of his stories he might have written-in some sort of monster coming along to be killed or some such, it's bones and sinew used to reinforce the caves.
But wood and netting worked too.
"Perfect. I'll finish up in here then." He says with a nod toward the shrine at his back, as if implying it was the sort of thing only an ascended could do.
”And I’ll get to the shipyard,” Jack echoes, tossing a lazy salute over his shoulder to Edwyn before setting off back into the blazing heat and along the beach. If this shit is the kind of thing only an Ascended can do, he wonders why there aren’t more available to do this heavy lifting. But whatever - the captain makes his way to the docks and the shipyard, greases a few wheels and makes a few whispers in the right ears, and voila!
When he returns it’s with two brawny dock hands in tow, carting along some decent scrap wood from a recent shipwreck. The wood has been treated for sailing, so the waves shouldn’t give it much hassle. (He hopes). There are tools available as well, so Jack starts to direct the men to measure out the entrance to the shrine, so they can cut the planks accordingly.
Jack plays foreman, gets some help from the shipyard and starts to bolster the shrine entrance!
Saiden was already heading off, but he nodded at Edwyn and Jack's words. It didn't take long for the cook to stumble upon some fisherman. And it took even less time for the Hali to rope them into helping out with the efforts (pun semi-intended). He showed up with two helpers in tow, all of them carrying a pile of netting. All it took was a promise to use some of their catch in his shack and give them free meals for a bit.
Heading towards the cliff above the cave, he ordered the fishermen to start anchoring the boulders as best they could. Saiden joined them, taking his own length of netting. Taking some wood as well, he used it to try and anchor the netting in place so the netting was secured to something.
Saiden gets help and netting from some fishermen. They do their best to secure the boulders with netting and wood.
what makes a desert beautiful...is that it hides a well, somewhere
Whether or not it takes an ascended for this part is entirely beside the point. Edwyn is the best man for the job regardless of the fluid that runs through his veins, if only because he knows what this shrine ought to be like. So it is that he doesn't worry so much about the kelp that's been throw-in by the previous storms, but the alignment of the shrine itself. The statue on the top of it and how it might conduct his goddess's electricity and radiance. It isn't race-specific work, but it does take a specific sort of eye to get the details right.
Though there is almost no one in Torchline who'd disobey an order from Jack, crew or not, and Saiden is easily able to persuade workers into following his commands as well, things do not go as quickly as easily as they otherwise might. Too many hands, something Edwyn had wanted to avoid, do muddy up the process. What Jack's crew and what Saiden's do are at odds with one another for a moment, some of whom are moving boulders while others want to leave them where they are to be shored up by the netting and the wood.
A fight breaks out and soon a punch is thrown hard enough that it breaks the jaw of one of the sailors.
Jack is doing Jack-work, which basically equates to keeping a sharp eye on things and listening out for any trouble. Unfortunately, whatever Edwyn is doing inside the shrine has him distracted enough for the moment that he doesn’t realise the sailors are at each other’s throats until one of them throws a punch at the other. ”Oi!” he calls sharply, rounding on the two men.
”Congrats, you both just cut yourself out of the deal. Off you fuck,” he snaps, gesturing for the two men to get the fuck off this stretch of the beach. As for the others? He nods at the remaining worker for the wooden supports, moving to help with the grunt work (he’s always doing that lately, for fuck’s sake).
”You good, Hali?” he calls up to Saiden and his remaining fisherman.
Jack sends the two guys who fought packing, and gets his hands dirty to help with the wooden supports.
