COLLAB POST: Skyrte & Rithy
She became animated once more at the mention of finding the relic, and immediately set off to finding it. She lead the him to an old wooden staircase, when she walked upon it, it creaked and groaned. Zhevon followed, keeping an eye on the stairs, wondering if they were strong enough to hold their weight. Soon enough, they arrived at the top. It was an attic like room, dusty and filled with cobwebs. Old paintings and sculptures lay about, gathering dust. The Gallery's original inhabitants, Zhevon guessed. He found himself wandering towards an old bookcase, full of ancient books. He grabbed one and flipped through it, reading the words fine, but making no sense of it. The contents were dense and written in an older form of high gothic. He felt dumb in its presense, so he put it under his arm, wanting to read the book of philosophy later. He looked over the book case again, finding a old leather book, bordered with heavy iron. He narrowed his eyes, recognizing the text from its spine cover.
He heard a loud rustle, and looked over to where Adrianne was. She had pulled out a shield from the corner. Zhevon looked back to the iron and leather book, which wasn't there anymore. He let out a quiet humph, it was an old book that he was very familiar with. A book of war. He took it as an omen of coming combat. Bringing his attention back to Adrianne and the shield, he walked over to her.
"I have seen a shield like this before, in the possession of an Astartes! But this feels different. It is blessed with a powerful aura of purity, capable of chasing away the corruptive influence of this building. This is no petty relic, but an object of power!" She explained, looking up at Zhevon, with a smile on her face. "I believe we have found the object we were looking for!"
Zhevon knew what the shield was, not just any combat shield, the next evolution of one. A Stormshield. "Yep. This is our thing, and not just any thing, an Astartes Stormshield..." He said, crouching down next to it.
"Mind you, it's a little heavy."
He tried to lift it, giving it a little test. "Oh yeah." He agreed, "Come on big guy, we'll get you out of here and get you back home." He gave it another heave, to no avail. He took the book from under his arm and quickly stuffed it into his ruck. He gave it once more, another heave and successfully pulled it out of the pile of dusty boxes. He stood up, letting the large shield lean on his body. He muttered something about its weight, then said strained, "Let's go, we should get to the safehouse." Wondering if she took what he asked to heart.
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Adrianne would gaze at Zhevon as the Inquisitor moved to lift the shield. The look on her face would be that of both amusement, and a little surprise when the Inquisitor finally managed to lift the shield up. Yet despite the impressive feat and show of what could only be considerable core strength, Adrianne noticed how the Inquisitor leaned threateningly to each side, as if he risked falling over at any moment!
Moving her gaze over to the staircase, she wondered how many stairs Zhevon would actually be able to make before tumbling over and falling down the entire staircase along with the shield. A morbid curiosity in her made her almost tempted to let him try, but the nobler side of her made her decide to intervene.
"You know, Inquisitor. I am not going to question your manliness or your strength... " She would start somewhat slowly, looking at the Inquisitor with a soft smirk.
"But I think you're going to feel that shield all the way through to next week if you try taking it with you down those stairs. I'm not questioning your ability, but, you are standing next to a Master of Telekinesis... "
Adrianne spoke with a slightly suggestive tone, making a small but not so subtle emote with her hand to motion at herself.
The shield was definitely no little toy by any means or interpretation. Adrianne doubted she would be able able to lift it with mere physical strength alone, but for her powers, holding that shield locked in the air in front of them would be a breeze.
It only remained to see how far Zhevon's pride would allow her to help him.
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Zhevon looked at her, down at the shield, then back at her. "No, nah, I can do this." He said, "Don't want to freak people out in the street or anything." He quickly made up the excuse. "Now... Uh..." He mumbled, slowly shuffling to the stairway. There was a little smile on his face, lugging around this huge shield reminded him of when he was a child, fetching the shield for his father when there were times of war. Except this time the shield was actually big, and heavy for the average person.
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"Understood." Adrianne said, following behind Zhevon as the Inquisitor began walking towards the staircase. Emperor forbid, she did not want to stand in front of him and potentially risk getting the shield in her head. It was better to walk behind him, so that she could clearly see if the Inquisitor was about to 'drop the ball', for lack of better words.
"This can never end well... "
She thought to herself as they approached the staircase, instinctively taking a step back to give Zhevon room.
"Are you sure the staircase can even take it?" She'd ask cautiously as they stood at the edge of the stairs. In her mind, she was convinced that it would be best for only one of them to use the stairs at a time. Judging by the noise they had made coming up, she was sure that both of them with the shield would be the last straw and the entire thing would just collapse!
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"Probably not..." He replied, taking a first step anyways. The stair groaned under the weight and Zhevon took his foot off of it. He took a second to think, then he set the shield down, and slid it down the stairs, making a series of loud thuds as the shield hit each stair. "Not the most glamorous way to get down, but it's better than falling into a dusty pit full of spiders." He said to both the shield and Adrianne. He went down the stairs after it and took his time picking it back up, again leaning it against his body.
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Adrianne would flinch at the thundering sound generated by the stormshield as it bumped down the stairs to crash down at the bottom, tearing off pieces of wood straight off both the steps and surrounding walls before violently crashing onto the floor with a loud bang!
"So much for being a venerable, priceless relic."
She would grimace at the stormshield's treatment at the hands of the Inquisitor. But it hardly did any real damage to the legendary shield, at best ripping off one of the purity seals.
Yet Adrianne would eventually just shrug her shoulders, before stepping after the Inquisitor. Her first step down the stair was cautious, as if she feared the stair would collapse after the beating it had received from the venerable Stormshield. The stormshield had probably done more damage to the building than what the building could ever hope to do to it!
But she made it down to the bottom of the stairs just fine, the steps never collapsing under her and sending her down into some forgotten daemon pit they hadn't discovered somewhere in the lower levels of the building!
"Just don't tell me I didn't warn you." Adrianne would comment when she heard another grunt from Zhevon as he carried the shield.
As they walked through the hallway, she would look out to her side and through the giant, gaping hole in the wall that she had made. The sky on the outside was a mix yellow and red, as dusk was upon the city. It looked quite bautiful from the gallery, if one could look past the devastation wrought in the hall that they were in.
But when she looked down at the plaza, she could also see a number of vehicles and heavily armed and armored arbiters rushing about. The large spotlights on the vehicles had been directed towards the building, and she could see small and curious crowds gathering at the various walkways and balconies around the gallery grounds.
"I guess the welcoming committee has finally arrived." She would comment to Zhevon, as the Inquisitor was probably too busy to even notice as he struggled to carry his shield which blocked half his view.
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"Eh?" Zhevon asked, peering forwards, "Oh."
"Identify yourselves!" A loudspeaker boomed out.
"Inquisitor Zhevon Amoxa! And company!" He yelled out to them, although not as loud as the loudspeaker.
"Identification!" The loudspeaker boomed again, wanting proof.
"I uh... Can't really!" He yelled back, shrugging with the shield, in a few seconds a rather decorated, middle aged Arbite commander walked out from the group of vehicles towards them. As the arbite got closer, he yelled, confused.
"Zhevon?! How long has it been!"
Zhevon was equally as confused, he glanced at Adrianne, "Uh, yeah! Too long buddy!"
"Five years I think, when you were flung out of that chapel and into my truck! Those were the days, adventure, action, those two months had it all!" The Arbite laughed, he waved down his troops
"Oh yeah, pity you couldn't join us."
After a few moments of 'catching up', a younger Arbite came up and whispered something into the Commanders' ear. He and Zhevon said their farewells and he left.
"I have no idea who that guy was." Zhevon admitted.
The young Arbite looked at his watch, "I'll give you guys a ride to the safehouse." He said, jogging back to a truck, he switched it on and drove closer.
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As they met with the young arbiter at the bottom of the stairs to the gallery, Adrianne would be sure to gain eye contact with the boy and motion silently towards Zhevon carrying the shield next to her.
She would not pretend to belittle the Inquisitor's manliness in front of mere local arbiters by asking out loudly, but the arbiter nonetheless seemed to understand the secret gesture as he rushed over to offer his aid to the Inquisitor.
"That's too much shield for you to handle, big boy."
While Zhevon and the young arbiter worked on pushing the huge stormshield into the back of the truck, hopefully without breaking any backs, Adrianne would enter the armored truck and take a seat at the front next to the driver seat. Maybe the Inquisitor might have objections about taking the backseat, but Adrianne was used to sitting next to the driver. Her skills as a diviner worked best when she could more easily interact with the pilot of the vehicle or grab the steering wheel should she sense danger.
When Bravo finally came around to jumping into the driver seat, Adrianne would lean her head slightly towards him.
"Take a stop at the local market. There is one at the street eight blocks north of here. I have some things that I need to pick up."
She would speak with a motionless expression while continuing to stare straight ahead out of the reinforced windshield, yet as she sat, a deep and loud growl emanated from her belly.
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Bravo looked at her stomach when he heard the growl. "Uh, yeah sure. Zhev, we'll grab some food then yeah?" Zhevon just nodded, and after a short ride they stopped at the market. It was a fairly remarkable grocery, well lit, and having very expensive food. Likely for the very wealthy nobles that like to shop for themselves. Zhevon and Bravo got out of the truck and went into the store, looking for some ingredients to cook up.
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Adrianne would soon follow the two others, whilst leaving her staff and helmet behind in the truck.
Walking into the store behind them, she'd gaze around. The store was absolutely massive, consisting of a great hall supported by four central and gigantic stone pillars. Lane upon lane of storage shelves were lined across the massive area, and the white marble floor was white and pristine to the point one could easily use it as a mirror! Even the shelves were lined and trimmed with gold paint upon onyx painted wood and steel frames.
Yet the sight did not seem to impress Adrianne. Instead, she set off to march forward, like a woman on a mission, before disappearing into the massive jungle of shelves!
Arriving some minutes later, she would once again reappear from the maze that was a market, to walk over to the counter and carrying large sacks of frozen food and junk foods, bags of chips, chocolate and various energizing drinks. She would drop it all onto the counter, to the great horror of the store assistant who stood behind it, a small and somewhat thin girl wearing a white store uniform and with her golden hair tied into a ponytail.
"Do you have a membershi,-" The girl was about to ask, but when she suddenly received an angry stare from Adrianne's purple eyes, she'd immediately go quiet and simply start processing the wares.
Once she was done with the purchase, Adrianne would walk out of the market with two giant bags, before unloading them like a small avalanche in the back of the armored arbiter truck. Procuring a bag of chocolate covered chips from one of them, she'd jump back into the passenger seat next to the driver seat and begin eating as she waited for Zhevon and his arbiter friend, crunching away at the bag's contents at an impressive rate!
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Zhevon and Bravo hopped into the truck right after Adrianne got in, having a small bag of apples and various other things, in the backseat next to the Inquisitor. It was only a short ride to the apartment complex containing the Safehouse. During the ride there, Zhevon and Bravo discussed who would carry the shield up, and ultimately it ended up being Bravo. For some reason, he had a wide grin on his face, even when hefting the shield.
The trio went up the elevator. Zhevon was moving with a purpose, and Bravo was moving with a very heavy shield. As such, they went right into the Safehouse. The Inquisitor, with his bag of apples and ingredients, walking right into the kitchen and closed the door without saying much of anything to his retinue.
Bravo however, in his arbite garb, walked over to the table and almost dropped it on the table, letting it hit with a loud thud. He wiped some sweat off his chin. He and Alpha exchanged friendly greetings.
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Having finished her bag of chocolate covered chips and stuffed the bag down into the interior door pocket of the truck, Adrianne would hop out of the vehicle and onto the street, staff and helmet in hand.
"Sure you don't need any help?" She joked to Zhevon and Bravo as they moved to unload the heavy stormshield.
Behind her, M4R1-A, her servo-skull, would float out from the armored arbiter truck to swing around as it scanned its new surroundings.
As both of her hands were already busy holding her helmet and staff, she would instead resort to using a small power of levitation on her two large grocery bags to make them float up into the air and hover next to her. The street looked empty enough to the point Adrianne felt confident enough that there was no hidden spectator that would enact a witch hunt just because he or her saw a pair of floating bags.
Following Zhevon and Bravo into the apartment building and up to the 15th floor, Adrianne would be quick to locate the living room.
"I hope starvation hasn't claimed any of you mortals yet. I come bearing relief." Adrianne would speak out to the rest of the denizens of the safehouse with a smirk as she motioned towards her two bags of junk and frozen food, before flicking her finger and causing them both to drop to the floor.
Leaning her staff against the couch and placing her skeletam helmet on the armrest, Adrianne would be quick to locate a wrapped sandwich, a bag of chips and a bottle of sparkly energy drink before she'd slump down into the couch! Lying across it, holding the baguette with both hands, she'd begin tearing through it as though she had never tasted food her entire life!
