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!
"This isn't as interesting as Angel's End," Mateo is complaining as they duck down into the cave system of the Burrows. Angel's End, he'd heard, was full of rare and fascinating vegetation, the types of which he'd never be able to find elsewhere. Even in the Celestine, waiting for something injured to show up and then creeping into a Climb enclosure was too much hassle.
He's been complaining uncharacteristically, in fact, since before they'd gotten to the sweltering region, his shoulders a bit hunched, his dark curls falling into his face. Maybe it's just a bad mood. Maybe it's hormones. Or maybe it's because his home had been attacked and an important landmark levelled to the ground, and then his best friend had been whisked away to some stupid frozen wasteland, and they hadn't even stopped in Halo to say hi.
"No," Remi agrees with a shake of his head. "It is not." Said carefully, the alchemist watches his son's shoulders hunch, listening to his dramatic sighs. It wasn't so much that Mateo had changed as it was that he'd been infected. Possessed, maybe, by some broody and always disappointed demon. "But it is the best place to find the silver ore that Stormbreak needs." The alchemist points out, unconvinced that logic will have any bearing at all on Mateo's state of mind, but being at a loss at what else he might say.
He'd never had a child make it to puberty, after all.
"Did...you make it to see Ghilio? You were right that it was a powerful being trying to grow plants." Would stroking Mateo's ego make him easier to be around? Gods, it was worth a try.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"I guess," Mateo grunts, crouching a ways back to look at some interesting mushroom or other that has sprouted in the cracks between the walls. He still doesn't understand Stormbreak needing silver as being anything to do with him, but here his eyes. Woo, and all that. Straightening back up, the boy strolls along, his fingers drumming against the smooth expanse of stone, like he can just tap out the silver. "Where are we meant to find silver in all this anyways?"
Mention of Ghilio earns a surly roll of his shoulders, Mateo gazing up at the curved ceiling now. "I didn't have anyone to go with," he says, like it might be Remi's fault completely that Ever had gone to live in Halo. "He's probably gotten enough water though, with everyone plodding out there."
"It comes in veins. We will have to use pickaxes to get it out." Or Mateo could channel, but the last thing Remi wanted to suggest right now was his son calling down a divine favour, if only because that favour would likely be "take me home, I'm bored". "Oh..I would have gone with you." Remi says, frowning as he subconsciously takes on board that this was his fault. "We still can, if you want?" The offer is accompanied by a tentative smile, not that Mateo will likely see it, with the way he's glaring looking up at the ceiling.
Shifting the bag on his back that had the supplies, Remi pulls in a breath, wondering how he drew the short straw what, if anything, he could say to earn his son's interest.
"Anywhere around here strike your fancy?" The alchemist asks, grinning at his pun as he gestures with his head towards the pickaxes in his bag.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
When you see something out of the corner of your eye, turn to look, and see nothing at all, what should you conclude? That you were having a hallucination? Or that your peripheral vision is perhaps not to be trusted. Ask yourself, are you tired? Drunk? Under the influence of something? Is the lighting good? Are there lots of moving shadows about? Are there reasons you have to think that your mind is playing tricks on you?
Because...well, because it would be absurd to think that out of the corner of your eye you had just seen a house. A house with a figure slamming its hands against one of the upper windows with enough force to shatter it, and then...
"You and dad have been busy," Mateo says, as if his growing mind has finally realised that his parents are pretty much always busy, and he's finally got the hormonal charge to resent it. He wrinkles his nose at the idea of using a pickaxe to do anything (have you seen Mateo?), but before he can express that in sass and withering glances for the pun in Remi's words, he spots something out of the corner of his eye.
A house. A figure slamming their hands against a window.
"Whoa--" Stumbling forward as if to get away from the illusion, Mateo collides with his father's back, clutching at his shirt. "Did you see that?"
04-14-2022, 08:07 PM (This post was last modified: 04-14-2022, 08:10 PM by Remi.)
REMI
'I know, but...' He means to say we always have time for you, but that would be unfair. It wasn't up to Mateo to orchestrate quality time with his parents. "..I am sorry. I do not mean to seem unavailable. " Remi admits guiltily. Hadn't he dreamt Mateo into life to give himself reason to live? And now here he was, taking him for granted.
"Mmmmmmmmm?" Remi, who had been too busy silently praying for an obvious indication of where they should start so that he wouldn't bore Mateo any longer than normal, hadn't seen more than a flash. Rubbing at one eye with his shoulder and using his other arm to reach around Mateo's shoulders, the alchemist gives his head a shake. "See what?" He wonders, glancing around.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Remi has been unavailable for much of Mateo's young life, but the boy doesn't have a chance to really sink that one in because his father is very much available right now, and he tucks himself beneath Remi's arm while glaring back at the pathway, like it might decide to spook them further. "I saw a house," he mutters. "It looked... wrong. Do spirits come here to play games?" If anyone ought to know, it's his father, aka Ludo's chosen, right?
Shoving his curls out of his face and still seeming unsettled, Mateo absently nods at one of the cave walls. "We can pickaxe there?" he suggests, still moody, but mostly preoccupied with not getting snatched up by what he'd seen. "How do we know what a vein looks like?"
The press of Mateo against his side makes Remi's heart flutter, a sensation that the budding botanist will no doubt feel as a prismatic swirl of emotion. Squeezing his fingers gently against his son's shoulder, the alchemist narrows his eyes thoughtfully as he frowns. "Well, if they do, we shall have to convince them to help us dig, mmm?" He replies, making no mention of the house as the lightness in his stomach quickly cools to something worrisome.
"Oh, you will know." Remi replies with a grin. Letting the bag slump from his shoulder into the crook of his arm that he might gently set it down, the alchemist picks up one of the axes but leaves the other. "How about I be the muscle, and you can tell me where to hit?" He suggests.
"Look for places surrounded by molten stone. Silver ore forms in areas of extremely high heat." Hence the reason they were at the Climb in the first place.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Much like an overconfident pup pressed against a parent for safety, Mateo feels a lot less startled about the whole ordeal when he realises that Remi doesn't sound particularly worried. "They had better," he mutters, glancing around as the bag slouches to the ground and peeling himself away from his father so he can see what's going on a little better.
"Alright, that sounds okay," he agrees of not having to be the muscle in this task, and his keen eyes do manage to pick out a promising spot against the cave walls. "How is the Greatwood?" he asks as he points it out, crouching to carefully move some strange and budding plant material that's sprouting from a crack in the wall. No sense in killing something that's trying so hard to grow.
Wishing he could have stretched out the moment without it becoming terribly awkward or obvious, it's with a bit of a sigh that Remi parts from his son and gets on with their task.
"Oh, same as always. Juniper left." This is said with a bit of relief that the alchemist doesn't bother to hide. It isn't a well-kept secret that Remi doesn't play well with others, and having to co-lead with someone as annoyingly diplomatic as Juniper had been taking its toll for months and months. "I think we might ask Frey to give us healing waters, or plants or something." He shrugs, having liked the idea of glowing trees instead.
Waiting for Mateo to remove the plant life which would otherwise have been demolished, Remi heaves his axe over his head before striking at the wall with impossible strength. Black rock splits apart, skittering out from where there is now a large crack in the stone, but no ore.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"Left? Seems like a stupid thing to do just before everyone dies." The war, he means, but he saw the aftermath of the Stormbreak attack. Everyone dies is just as accurate in his book. Mateo tucks the plantlife away in a container in his bag (of course he does), before standing back and wincing at the clang of the pickaxe on the stone. And when it yields nothing, it's with a very teenager like hmph that he steps forward again to try elsewhere.
"Healing plants would be cool," he offers, but where he'd normally have supplemented this with gibberish about the sorts of things he's been growing, this time he remains quiet on the matter. Remi and Ronin swan through his greenhouse enough to get to the apartment upstairs, when they decide to stay. They should know what's there.
"She decided that if she couldn't have things her way, she did not want to be a part of it. Which..." Remi shrugs. "..I suppose I understand." Too powerful now to have to be the take your ball and go home type, really, what else was there for Juniper to do?
"I am not sure why water is the default healing medium." Remi agrees, glancing at Mateo expectantly. Normally his son would offer up the sorts of plant life best suited for such a thing, or might even suggest some new type of plant with healing spores or some such, but instead, there was only stoney, teenage silence.
'Sure.' So saying, Remi raises the axe again, only to once again split the stone revealing only darkness. "Mmm." He grumbles, frowning.
"How..is Everest? I have not seen much of him lately." Remi asks, sounding like every parent out there who is desperately trying to get their child to engage with them.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"I suppose that's on her," Mateo mutters with a furrowed brow, though he still thinks it's an absurd idea if you ask him (and nobody is, surprise surprise). Sighing out a breath through his nose as the second ring of the pickaxe reveals nothing of interest, the boy doesn't realise it, but the expression of frustration on his face is identical to the Lullaby's. "Do we just keep trying until the cave comes down on top of us?" he wonders snippily, though it's entirely directed at the wall this time, at least.
Pointing out a third area for them to try, Mateo shifts his bag on his shoulder and scowls at the ground. "Neither have I," he says. "He and his family moved to Halo after the Ascended attacked Stormbreak. We write letters. It's not the same."
