[url=https://www.roleplayerguild.com/posts/4294927]Previously...[/url]

Maxine Holloway crooked an eyebrow at the proceedings, but made no move to stop them. "Come, come, Constance," she said, rising and ringing a minute bell she pulled from her person. "I shall show you the lavatory. I daresay you've no need to freshen up at all, but I shan't fault you for an attempt."

They had almost made it out of the room when Edward burst in, Raymond in tow. "Sorry to intrude, honest," Edward began, cheeks flushed. "Constance, Luna--Conway's just landed down at the coast. We've be asked to regroup at the Endurance and wait for him there. The people here: they have automobiles which should get him here within the end of the day. No working airplanes, if you can believe that! But that's not all."

Raymond rushed to Juliette, taking especial care not to look Maxine in the eye. "Juliette!" he mumbled, and a stream of Ghalari followed. Edward assumed he was asking if she was okay. Probably was.

Maxine made an equally careful show of ignoring him entirely, her eyes fixed on the other two men. "I beg your pardon?"

Edward shuffled from foot to foot, excitement dancing in his eyes. "Plummet! They have an obelisk here! Honest to God obelisk, like the one at home. But it's dead somehow, like a broken power line. I don't know how to explain it, because they just explained it to me. Come on, then!" He didn't know about the others, but this had been his whole reason for coming out of the U.I. "Collin and Raymond have agreed to take us to it, even!"

"Nonsense, Mr. Samick," huffed Maxine, "Constance is to begin familiarizing herself with the Holloway brand, and those who work alongside it. She has no time for such a trip to ye-la'spiekr."

Now it was Edward's turn to turn an arched eyebrow to Constance. She was many things, and not all of them pleasant, but he hadn't known her to let anyone else tell her what she was allowed to do. "I...see?"

"Certainly not with Mr. Geralt traveling such to see her.  Arn!" Maxine smiled at the young man when he peeped his head in. "Ring Mr. Geralt, would you? He shouldn't be far. I believe he is in town currently on business of some sort."

"Wait, Geralt?" Edward stopped short on his quest to drag everyone out the door. The name sounded oddly familiar, but...

"Joseph Geralt? I'm sure someone on your little island must know of him, yes?"

"Joseph Geralt died," Edward said flatly. "Some thirty years ago, he flew some high-tech aircraft out into the storms surrounding out home. He never returned, and we heard no more communications from him.

Maxine tossed her head, nostrils flaring. "Then I suppose the Joseph Geralt Ghalari fishermen found thirty years ago, clinging to a wooden scrap in the middle of the ocean, that was imagined, then?"

Edward shook himself slightly. "Oh, my apologies, Mrs. Holloway. I did not mean to imply disrespect. Geralt is a sort of mythic figure back home. People, myself included, would be surprised to find that he survived, that's all." Before she could inhale more breath, a thought occurred to him. "Geralt was in his mid-thirties when he left. Wouldn't that mean he's--"

"Geralt is somewhat aged, this is true." Maxine's eyes flickered almost imperceptibly to Constance's face, but Edward had become excellent at reading such minute details. "But he is fit, intelligent, and witty to a fault, I assure you. I can also assure that he would be most interested to meet you as well."

"Of course, but...we really must be going now. We have only the day to reach the obelisk and back, and we can't fly in our aircraft." He glanced at Constance, and a pang of something flashed through him. Like her or not, they'd gone through multiple hells together, and it felt wrong to abandon her here, even if it was where she was most comfortable. He shrugged. "We'll be outside for a few minutes while Collin tracks down an jitney." He turned and went to the door. "Come on, Ray! Juliette can come too, of course."

Then he stepped outside. It looked like the sun was still rising. So they had a good amount of time left before Conway would expect them to be back at the Endurance. Still, he didn't really trust time to give them the benefit of the doubt. It didn't matter how long you had, time always found a way to slip out of your fingertips.