Orion

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Surgeon Cry Wolf (from early inksome days) (link)

Orion - The Warrior - Yellow - A most peculiar column they have formed from the southernmost country... While as their yellow banner shows, the officers are all men, the overwhelming majority of the troops are women. No dolls of lace and flowers are these! Women of steel, strength and fire, more ferocious than many a man marching along side them under other colors. A mate of mine had once called them a 'lion's pack.' Now, I think I understand it.

Weaver Memories (link)

[It was only a random intervention that kept you from it. You WERE that close. It had taken most of the night to wind your way through the masquerade.

So many twisted visages, formed of paper, feathers and wood... you knew that the faces beneath them were no better. Twisted, unnatural mixtures of man and beast, the worst of a mad god's dabbling. Animalistic by their very nature, these creatures had the intellect of a proper high man, but the cruelty and caprice of the low beasts they were twisted with.

It was hard not to shake with rage, but such an emotion would carry on the air. Some of them would smell it... you knew you had to get a little bit closer.

In the next turn of the dance, you glide, the bow perfect, you reach out, smile warmly at the duke's tusked face - marks of its dirty lineage. You have the blade ready in a moment, poised, snakelike to strike. You revel in that moment, the dawning look of comprehension and fear on the noble's face. You knew you'd get this strike, and then be set upon. But... maybe it would be enough to show everyone that these things were just as mortal, that they COULD rise up... they could fight back rather than just be massacred like your husband, like your children.

It was just.. in that instant, the music changed. A plumbed jester pranced by at just that moment, taking the blade meant for the thing that had taken so much from you.

The outcry is instant... you feel your arms wrenched back, twisted until you scream in rage and pain and drop the knife.

The duke strides over and sniffs at you, tilts your head up with one thick finger. He sees something in your eyes and gives a half smile...

"Don't kill her yet."

A wretched pain lances through you, starting at your shoulder and rattling your skull until mercifully, everything goes dark.]

Nishi: You remember a strange race emerging, stronger, better, faster, more adapted to almost everything, they effortlessly took your country by force. You remember royal graces, how to use a knife, and will find you can throw them well. Also a -10 AGAIN towards Surgeon for some reason you can't exactly explain.

((ICLY: “I think... something about the memory reminded me a little. Of Surgeon.”))

[You remember sitting on the edge of the field, gazing over the broken and flatten stalks. Carefully you stride out out into the rows, pacing around the dry irrigation ditches by habit. Carefully, you place an armful of the very best of the crop on one side of the field, then pace over to the opposite side, directly across from it, and place the very worst, wilted and mottled of the harvest.

With a quick prayer of fortune to the [Twins] you set the field ablaze, old stalks and offerings alike as your family had for generation. Destruction begets growth, after all.]

Nishi: You remember that the grains you normally get in Sabra are annual crops and require a lot of water, you know how basic irrigation systems work, and you now know how to do offerings for good fortune with food

[5:03pm] Chaz[photoshop]: interesting!

[5:03pm] Chaz[photoshop]: one minor question: looked more like quinoa plants, or looked more like wheat?

[5:04pm] Nishi: I picture more like wheat, but that's not word of god. What YOU remember looks more like wheat

[5:04pm] Chaz[photoshop]: gotcha. thanks!

New Uniform Description

Concept: Trendy hikers

Top piece: 3/4 sleeved shirt

Bottom piece: Cargo pants (m), knee-length skirt (f)

Outer piece: Hooded vest

Accessory: Belt

Footwear: Hiking boots, socks

[There is the gentle sound of a shuttle moving through taut thread, and as the memory settles deep, your eyes open to the familiar garments of your kin on both yourself and those around you, dyed vividly bright.

These clothes are comfortably rugged, with just the slightest touch of earth at the edges to suggest clothes that are (and will be) well-used. A tight 3/4s length shirt in dark yellow is first. Made from panna cloth, it's light enough to be comfortable but durable enough to handle plenty of active movement. The men have a set of sturdy, pocketed pants made from a mix of badgercroc wool and panna, while women have a long, equally sturdy skirt that falls to their knees. Both genders get a comfortable hooded vest jacket in brilliant gold. It too is pocketed, with small toggle buttons in the flaps to keep them from spilling their contents accidentally. More mushwood toggle buttons go up the middle of the vest to keep it comfortably closed. A studded belt and a set of comfortable hiking boots finish off the outfit. All the stitching is tight and smooth, though not personally fitted.

The hunter needs movement and flexibility. It could mean life or death.]

Surgeon Game (Orpheus)

Crossroad

[You are at a crossroad.. to your right you see the rise of a steel and stone city and to your left you see a dense jungle.

Which way do you go?]

The Mechanical City

[You work your way through clean streets of stone and metal, everything nearly uniform, study and ingeniously built to optimize space in the city. The guttering of candles and lanterns on posts have been slowly replaced by wires and a few oddly white orbs seem to glow here and there upon their perch. The night air is filled with light, dulling the views of the sky and the stars in the moonless sky are fewer than there should be for some reason. However, your footsteps are sure, even without your own illumination.

Around you see the signs of progress, printed signboards, advertising the latest in clockworks and the marvels of steam. The aqueducts move clear water above your paths, alongside of the muddier channels still used for travel. You smell, every now and then, rich food cooking from residences, even at this late hour, apparently just as work shifts seem to have ended.

Your destination is up ahead, the great reinforced steel doors inset into a gargantuan building at the center of the city, perfectly circular and without windows... To the left though, you hear a soft, quiet weeping and your eyes catch the form of what appears to be a woman, crouched by the canal...]

[The woman is not just crouched, she’s practically on all fours... one of her hands is white knuckled on the lip of the canal and the other is desperately seeking in the waters.]

"My baby... I’m sorry! My baby!" She wails... you see on the grating, a small toy duck caught on the bars... She seems to sense your presence and looks up frantic. "She fell in! I ... I can’t! Help! Please!"

"She! ... My baby, she was playing! I looked away just a moment!"

[She's frantic now]

Kelvin helps the woman

[Her shoulders are shaking and skin is bitterly cold.]

"Please... please..."

[She seems to warm... but you start to feel cold in her place.]

Faith investigates the Canal

[The water rushes by, it's cloudy from sediment and moving fast.]

Jumping in to save the child

[As Syaoran dives into the waters... He does not make out any forms in the swirling, murky water... Just a tatter of cloth on the grating below the surface.. the current is heavy and hard to swim against even with the ice forming against the current...

Do you continue looking or resurface...?]

"Just a few moments! Her hand ... I missed her hand!"

[The waters tears at Claude and Syaoran... It gets murkier and murkier...

You feel a small hand closing on both of your ankles, both of you, and starts to pull you down.]

[You feel cold and weak, you legs are stone as a freezing touch radiates through them cramping through every muscle you have.]

[Her sobs turn to wails and she simply slips out of Kelvin's grip like she was never there, and reaches into the water, on hands and knees.

Reaching for the hand

[Your hand closes around it, it's thin and very, very cold.]

[The water DOES boost both of them up a moment...... and suddenly water gushes up... completely empty of anything but sediment...

The woman wails... "My son! MY SON! He fell in!"]

"No! My boy! He dove in after his sister! He was just there! Please help him!"

Pushing the woman in the water

[Her eyes fly wide... and you see only empty sockets where they should be! She shrieks, her voice echoing in your ears, deafening everything else as she hits the water]

[In the canal beside you, the woman sinks into the water soundlessly after the outburst...

...

After, you hear laughter, loud, delighted, honest.] "My children!"

[And then nothing.]

Return to the City

[You return to the clean streets of stone and metal, everything nearly uniform, study and ingeniously built to optimize space in the city. The guttering of candles and lanterns on posts have been slowly replaced by wires and a few oddly white orbs seem to glow here and there upon their perch. The night air is filled with light, dulling the views of the sky and the stars in the moonless sky are fewer than there should be for some reason. However, your footsteps are sure, even without your own illumination.

Your destination is up ahead, the great reinforced steel doors inset into a gargantuan building at the center of the city, perfectly circular and without windows... ]

[You approach the main doors, and the neighborhood you travel through is markedly more industrial.]

[At the main doors to the facility, a single crown is graces the center, in lieu of any noticable handle or knocker.]

[As you touch the crown, you feel a gentle voice in your head:]

Seekers of our halls answer me this:

I’m a potion as old as fire and grain

Said to best heal if left to spoil

I both give and wash away pain

To beggar and king, I am their foil.]

(Answer: Alcohol)

[The gates open, and you catch a glimpse of a spanning building of clockwork and gears before the scene itself vanishes, and you are returned to the Arena...

Syaoran and Claude are already there, moments before, damp and muddy, but alive.]

Game End

Surgeon Game Orion Side Full Write-up (gdoc here)

Jungle

[The air you breath now is so muggy and humid you may cast an idle thought, wondering why your torches don’t reflect off of the sheer water in the air itself. Instead, everything around you seems to have a sheen... Slick branches and vines glimmer like gold in the light, and the huge leaves - some larger than you, yourself, have lost their green and violet hues to display what seems to be molten gold running down their veins.

The area is alive around you, even at night. You hear skitterings and chitterings, the flap of huge wings and the buzz of smaller ones, things chirp, crow, call, hiss and whistle seemingly without any regard for your presence whatsoever. There is a constant drip and drizzle of water, but you really can’t be sure if it is raining above the great canopy above you, or if the night’s cooler air has simply pulled the remaining moisture from it to collect.

The ground that you slog through does not seem to have any immunity to the constant moisture either, as you slog through thick mud. Your path has been cut through the underbrush, leading to the southeast... Though you see the mercy of a cobblestone, almost out of place, beginning to the southwest, so almost covered in muck to be invisible.]

Decision point one

Southeast

[The jungle thickens here, which certainly does not seem to aid your path. The cut path in the underbrush seems to have already started to grow back, requiring either bullish footsteps or another hand to cut the path for those behind.

Refreshingly, you start to see carvings on some of the trees here and there, the winding, glyph like language of the city ahead. Though the words are a mystery, the arrows carved in them, bear no question, the path to the city of intrigue and learning was only just ahead.

As if in response to your lifted spirit, the sun seems to rise in the north suddenly bursting to life and casting a radiant glow across the foliage. The light encircles you, bouncing off of every wet surface around... and illuminating what seems to be the entrance to a ruin..]

Southwest

[The way breaks into a stone path, easy to travel and unobscured by the mud. And ends... in a small, limestone abode... The wooden door creaks open as you approach and a figure appears in the doorway brandishing a wooden club... Eyes narrow on you suspiciously, and a female voice calls out...]

“Scoundrels? I will have no lot with them.”

Decision point two

City

[As you approach the great city, it’s slick marble walls and stone structures rise above in a testament of both achievement and a will to rise above their elements. You stride towards the first building along the golden cobbled road, when you are suddenly stopped by either magic or divine favor. You hear a gentle voice in your ear...]

[Riddle]

Light

[You must pick your way carefully into the ruins as the very stone you walk on is overgrown with thick roots, and the further you go in, the move foliage you must step carefully upon or over. In the center of the room is a stone altar... and you can’t see what rests upon it exactly, but a shining golden light radiates from it.

What do you want to do?]

House

[The house is ... cozy. A warm fire lights the center of the room from a stone pit carved there. The furniture, rough hewn, perhaps is draped in velvets and silks, making them seem both a comfort and a luxury. A table sits just to the side of the fire and a single chair pushed against it. The woman beacons you to sit, and begins preparing a tea.]

“Make yourself comfortable, I shall let you on your way as the rains stop.”

“I’ve taken with an illness in my childhood... it is long gone, but it left my face a travesty... for visitors... I cover it.” She replies, her head low. She seems to shrink even further, the stoop of her back becoming more pronounced. “Come, eat. Tell me of your wares and your business, travellers.”

“... I wish to see my son again... but my mind is feeble though my body stout from work.. The way is held by a riddle and I’ve not guessed it... I tried so many times, the guards now fire upon me should I ask. May the King curse their bones to rot!” She cries, reaching a gloved hand up to wipe at her face. “If you could take me there... I would be in your debt... and I’m sure my dear son will reward you well.”

Boss

Lureman

[As you get close to the altar, it seems like the floor itself rips away and the roots around you come alive. Moving with incredible speed and agility, vines and roots seek to entangle you... your footing becomes slippery beneath you as the stones are pulled away, and the giant plant’s body is all there is left to stand upon... In the center of the ‘room’ a wide mouth opens in the plant matter... You don’t know what’s in it, but by the sulfuric stench and bubbling yellow fluid within, you can guess easily that it isn’t good.]

Beast man

[As you unravel the riddle, the woman at your side... seems to straighten. Her stooped appearance gives away to a proud, muscular seven feet of figure. She removes the veil, and you can at last see her face. Her skin in pale, almost bluish in hue, her hair is wirely and almost metal... her thick lips spread back, a grin revealing tusks and thick, sharp teeth.]

“At last... WE BEGIN!” She throws her head back and unleashes a guttural howl... all around her in the jungle, other voices join hers... and the land almost beings to shake as beings... all of them twisted with animalistic features, charge past the barrier, each calling the answer to the riddle like a war cry.

A far more human scream answers within the city, sirens and bells begin to toll... and the guards begin to rally...

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