Balmas

Breathless Dead

"And what if we are?"

She stares at the departing god, spear drooping low. Is it anger that fuels her words now, or pity? Hades seems... Angry, yes. But despondent, too.

"What if we are doomed? Cursed to fail? Are we to give up? Accept it?

"You seem so certain we are not to succeed. Very well. Shall we cut our losses and settle here, with the Azura? Shall we return the Plousios? Perhaps there is a future in giving advice to the next crew?"

Two hundred and fifty years of disappointment. Of seeing crews fail to achieve your goal.

"You are wrong, I think. I certainly hope you are, because if you are not... then we will still go on, risk or no.

"But I am at least a little hopeful because... Well, you are wrong about my wish. It is not for myself."

She sighs.

"I gave up, you know. Wanted peace, and convinced myself that a niche with no fighting was what I wanted. And I could have it again, I think--Redana would probably even give me the seal, if she knew how and I asked. I could join any ship, travel somewhere, and start anew. Instant peace.

"But a niche is not good enough anymore."

It's wonderful, isn't it? Miraculous, even.

"I do not want to fight. But if I want to get my wish, my friends must also get their wishes. Their happy endings. And if that means defending them..."

She rubs the worn spot pensively.

"... I think I can be okay with that."

Breathless Dead

"I!"

The philosopher probably doesn't mean her words to bite like knives, like angry wasps. Doesn't mean them as attacks that arrow past all her defenses and sink deeper than any spear, lance into her like tongues of flame.

Why does she want to defend her friends? What else could she want?

What else is she useful for? To be the impenetrable barrier, the invincible wall is the very reason for her creation! It's what she was trained for, beaten for, broken to mold her into!

A defender--no, a defense--is what she is! It's all she knows, all she's good at, all she's good for!

"I!"

But... The brass tongue feels hot in her mouth. And that's new. That wasn't part of the design. The Pallas doesn't need taste to root out traitors, to smash the enemy, to lead the charge and be the perfect soldier.

And what of the others, hmm? Dolce looks so dashing in his new captain's hat, doesn't he? But he was raised a chef, hmm? Ramses wasn't born with his tentacles, but look how hard he's worked to make them a part of himself? None of the Coherent are satisfied with the forms they were assigned at birth, are they? They move and grow and change themselves to better match that vision.

What's her vision?

"I."

The hut in the forest by the river. Domesticity. Family. Good food, good friends. A place to cherish. Safety. A place to nourish and be nourished.

"I don't know," she admits. "And if I had a choice in it, then I would not wish to fight. Do not want conflict. Want to find a place that will never face those threats, where I can be at peace.

"But... If not me, then who? We journey to Aphrodite's Rift and beyond. We face thugs and soldiers and brigands. If I do not protect them, who can? Who could I trust to step into that role? Who should I assign that burden?"

Breathless Dead

For a second, Alexa ponders taking her shoes off to see where her stomach must have landed.

They're not hesitating at all. Drawing weapons, here, in the middle of a crowded square, full of witnesses. Granted, most of the crowd has turned to watch the argument--you know, whichever portion of the crowd was not already made of disciples--but still. To draw weapons on newcomers…

They're not going to stop coming until she does something. Run away. Talk. Stop them by force.

The spear does not leap to her hand. Does not dance in the air, warm her hands like a living being, practically aim itself at the foe's every vulnerable spot. It does nothing but sit in her hands, a length of wood with a point at one end.

Fretfully, she runs one thumb along its worn groove. That's still the same, at least. Can she swing this well while carrying an initiate? Aim, with two arms propping up someone else, and only one arm per side for fighting? Probably not the best idea to figure it out in the middle of fighting off slavers, but the smile on her face

Alexa takes a first practice swing. Awful. Terrible. Formless. Slow. Easily blocked.

"Your"--shit, titles, um--"Blessed Master!" Nailed it. Hopefully. "I crave your wisdom!

Second swing. Artless.

Can't turn to check on faces, expressions. Is the argument slowing down, she hopes?

Stab. Hmm. Potential. Amateurish, but look for pairings. Stab high, and then… where to bring the shield?

"In the course of our travels, I have lost the blessing of Athena Areia! How may I have the strength to protect my friends if I do not wish it again?"

Breathless Dead

Alexa carries the initiate like a princess. One arm wraps around and stabilizes the legs, mindful of imaginary ball dresses, while another comes up to steady her upper half in case of sudden movement.

It's purely practical, she tells herself. This way, if the pursuing thugs want to try the same trick, they'll at least have to go for her first, and give Skotos few seconds to make her getaway. Yep. Certainly nothing nice about the look in her eyes or the little whoop when she leaves the ground or having someone appreciate you. Nope.

She puts up one placating hand, wary of the gravharnesses. "Please. We are mere travelers--we would only listen."

Breathless Dead

Alexa bears down on Skotos like a landslide.

It's no use trying to overpower an Azura sphere with muscles alone--you may as well try to overpower a planet's gravity. They must at least limit themselves to what won't damage Skotos's--admittedly surprisingly muscled, for a hermetic initiate?--wrists and ankles, thank goodness.

But she can crush the marbles, grind the stone and glass to dust, scratch the runes to meaninglessness with her nails. There is no artistry, to it. No grace, no beauty, no subtlety. Actually, there's a refreshing element of simplicity to it--just smashing as many marbles as she can, as quickly as she can.

Alexa pulverizes another marble and wonders whether she should enjoy this.

[Overcome: 11.]

"Skotos, how do you feel about philosophers? We should talk to philosophers. Right now would be good."

Breathless Dead

Blessed of Athena. That's a laugh, isn't it?

Surely there's a market here. Some public square. A forum. A bathhouse, even. Just let there be witnesses. Enough people, law-abiding or not, that the bribes and "no, actually you didn't see anything"s get more costly than the profit of kidnapping or slavery.

Scan faces. See who meets her eyes, whose gazes scan across her, who look at her and then quickly make sure they don't see her. Check on Skotos, make sure her orders are being followed. Subtly scan for the thugs. Look for businesses whose doors aren't shuttering before her eyes. Which way is the ship? Can they circle back? Check for Skotos. Check for thugs. Keep eyes on everyone and everything and hope that nothing goes astray or hides or is missed in the increasingly frantic search for something, anything that will keep them from the obvious.

[4 on Look Closely. Tell me about the people of the square. How could they hurt/help me? I find out the answer the hard way.]

Breathless Dead

Alexa is the very picture of the awestruck tourist. See her point, eyes wide, at everything? How she gawks at the ordinary, wonders over the mundane, admires shopkeep's wares as if they were produced by kings and princes?

Damn. Damn! There's no possible way she could have predicted it, but she still should have known! Should have been prepared for this! Should have realized that of course there'd be thugs eager to take advantage of new arrivals!

On the one hand, they have the advantage of unpredictability. They're newcomers, with no set pattern or destination. If they start sprinting right now, there'd be no way the thugs trailing them could know which way they're going.

But that goes both ways. They don't know the lay of the land, which roads go where. There could be an ambush or a funnel or something around the corner, and there'd be know way to know the corner was even there.

"Skotos."

And now she's here, with no support, and a starry-eyed Hermetic looking at her like she's about to pull a miracle out of her ass. Does everyone know who she was? Did-- No, Ramses wouldn't have talked about it to someone else, not after being so helpful and accommodating and instantly accepting.

Damn!

"Skotos, I need you to listen very closely. Good job not looking at them, but we are in trouble. We need witnesses in a hurry--people who will give them pause, keep them from jumping us.

"But if we cannot find that, you need to run. I will hold them off as best I can, but I cannot do that for long, and it will be for nothing if they capture you too. Get to the ship. Find M--er, Redana. Tell her to call me to her side. She will know what to do. Nod if you understand."

Breathless Dead

It is practically impossible to ruin a salad.

And yet, the kitchen is strewn with the corpses of salads past, like the aftermath of a particularly leafy battlefield. This one was too sweet. That one had too much salt. Too much oil. Not enough oil. Wrong kind of leaves. Grabbed the salt instead of the sugar. Croutons didn't complement the texture of the kale. Wrong dressing. Tomatoes chopped too large. Tomatoes chopped too small? She's never had to think what "bite-size" is for a god, and this has to be perfect.

Once more, she inspects it, scrutinizing it from every angle. If you make everything small, you sidestep the size issue, so in theory this salad should be perfect. Apples and grapes from the gardens, some nuts she's ground to fragments in her palm, and most curious of all, chunks of celery.

She pokes the celery suspiciously. Sweet, sweet, savory... water. And bitter water, at that. The acrid plant seems almost traitorous mixed in with its brethren, but the cookbook insisted it was part of the recipe.

The salad seems so lonely sitting in front of Apollo's altar. Should she have tried to make juice? Something to clear the palette after all that sweet?

"Apollo, god of servitors," she starts, "please accept this humble offering."

She's prepared for this. Thought what she wanted to say, how she wanted to phrase it. Written it all down on a card, memorized it, practiced the words in front of a mirror.

But now that she's here, at the temple, the words stick in her throat.

"I hope you like it," she blurts out. "I do not know whether you enjoy sweets as much as I do. Because…"

She sighs. "I do not know what I am. What I should be. What I want to be."

Can she even make that decision? Even asking the question imagines that it's possible to be more than what she was made as. But… So is everyone else in this ship, right? The Coherents were not created to be guards. Dolce's creators never imagined a chef as a captain.

"As we travel among the Azure skies, we will be among nothing but servitors. An entire civilization, divorced from humanity. They… They must have different ideas. Different ways of thinking.

"Please... help me to find a new way to think of myself."

Breathless Dead

Alexa doesn't quite know where to stand.

Which is maddening, by the by. Decades of training, centuries of practice in standing still, and in one fell swoop, she's back to being awkward. The spear in her hand feels like a toy--no, worse, like a child using her mother's weapon in a game of pretend. Standing behind Redana now, in her condition, would be as insulting as it would be silly. But it's also what those decades of training insist is correct--that she should be in the background, behind and slightly to the left, in case of any attacks.

As if any of the other groups would accept an interloper claiming that position of unearned prestige. As if she could do anything if it happened. It's not nearly so restful or peaceful as it was in the party with the Coherents.

Still, once she sees Mynx on that dais in that form, she has to move forward. Quietly, meekly, so as not to disrupt the others or tread on toes. Without demanding. She's here, Mynx. You can see that face, see that concern there. But you obviously have a speech to respond to, right? She's here. She'll wait.

Breathless Dead

Alexa sits up in bed like the room is about to pitch over at any time--one arm on the bed, one on the bedrail, propping herself up, giving herself support. It can't be that simple, can it? Surely there should be... Something? Side effects? Operations are one of those things that should knock you out for a week, right? Not like you took a long nap?

She buries her face in one hand and groans. It was supposeed to take long enough that everybody could forget, especially her.

What was she thinking? She has a girlfriend already! If you wanna get real technical about it, she's got two! She doesn't want anybody to misunderstand, get the wrong idea about... About things! Things and stuff! Especially since she doesn't even know what the right idea is yet!

I mean, Ramses is. Well. Nice. Incredibly nice. Kind. Danced with her. Sought her out after she tried to bully her way into an appointment. Fed her. Held her. Arranged this whole thing for her. For someone Ramses only met once at a party. I mean, who does that kind of thing? Goes to that sort of effort for a stranger?

Is this flirting? Is that what Ramses wants in return? Is this courting? Is Ramses just a naturally good, kind, outgoing person? Does she want more?

And what does Alexa want them to want?

She groans, and hauls herself to the mirror. Feels around her face for sharp edges or indentations, for any telltale gaps, razor-sharp lines of fresh brass, and finds none. Is it weird to almost be disappointed at that? She... Well, it would be quite rude to say she expected worse. And in retrospect, none of the Coherents show terrible signs or scarring as a result of their modifications, so she doesn't quite know why she thought she'd come out with scarring.

Still, she finds herself grinning at the mirror version of herself. Mugging at the mirror, making faces, sticking out her tongue.

Huh.

Brass?

Is it funny that she hadn't thought what it would look like? Pink, neon blue? It's a good color obviously but... Was that an intentional material choice? Did the magos have a point to make in choosing that?

"Peter Piper picks pickles. Quick brown fox. Toy boat toy boat toy boat. Rrrrrroll. Things thought thoroughly."

Whew. Everything still works as it should. She wasn't that concerned, but... Whew.

She grins again, and makes a few more faces, just for good measure.

And now, the part she's been... Well, dreading isn't the right word. Anticipating, in the same way you anticipate test results, maybe? Everything so far has been so excellent, she's almost afraid that the most important part won't work.

Salty seems like a good place to start. She at least knows what salt is for--you put it on the rim of a martini--but has never understood why. She picks up the rod--thick, brittle, brown, with white speckles across its surface. Snaps it between two fingers, studies the crisp inner structure. Lays it on her tongue and--

Briefly, she's convinced that Ramses must have miscommunicated what she wanted to the priest and that she's ended up with the tongue of a gourmand.

What is this? The way it sits on her tongue, slowly dissolves? Draws out all the saliva, craves more? Almost before she knows it, the other half of the pretzel is in her mouth and gone and come on, you can't just give her one of those, that's blatantly a trap. With some reluctance, she sips the water.

Sugar is similar, but almost in the opposite direction? The fragile wafers sandwich a filling between them that tickle her tongue, beg for more. She could scrape the crackers clean for hours, if they weren't gone in seconds.

Dangit, she should have savored them more. Most of the salty drink recipes also call for sweet fruit, or something similar. Should have tried them together.

Sour is like lightning on her tongue, sucks her lips in. She laughs as she tastes it--not a favorite, she doesn't think.

Bitter just leaves her grabbing for the glass of water. Is that really a flavor? People choose to eat that?

That just leaves spicy, which... Well, at first, she's pretty sure she doesn't taste anything at all.

And then, well, after she can taste it, drinking water just makes it worse.