DracoLunaris

War Notes

@TheWindel @Hammerman @KoL @Mercurial @Crimmy

Althea was startled by the appearance the red line, though fortunately she was in the middle of switching tools at the time. It took her a moment to find the source of the magic, Gerhardt, and once she realized it was friendly she quickly continued her operation. The Regeneration ability was helping seal his insides true, but it was also sealing her incisions which might have become inconvenient in a more lengthy procedure.

She tried to avoid being distracted by the two who arrived to help her, a difficult task with Gradon even in normal situations. She definitely appreciated him coming to protect her on his own volition, though she wasn't in any position to answer his queries while she focused.

“Book. After.”

Is all she gives him during the operation. Esther arrives a considerable amount of time after she was asked for. Althea’s focus on the patient meant she had no idea that the noble girl had been playing a vital role in keeping the other cadets from being shot. She was just rather peeved that she was basically done with the procedure when protection finally arrived.

She finished sewing shut Wagnil’s skin, applied bandages over the sutures and then frantically checked his pulse and breathing when the scout slipped into unconsciousness. Fortunately he was just resting, though it was going to be touch and go whether he ever woke up again. She put his comments aside for now, about the book, but she agreed, they needed to move him and soon. The fact that the enemy might come for them again if they stayed here did not cross her mind, but she knew they needed to get him to a proper hospital or at least somewhere warmer and more sterile than the middle of a forest.

“You showed up before we were reduced to paste so that's good enough I suppose. It looks like he will make it if he is allowed to rest”

she told Esther then turned to the captain

“We can move him if it is done gently, I recommend heading for the nearest town so he can get better care”

Then raising her voice to get their attention of everyone

“We need two strong volunteers and some poles of some kind to make a stretcher out off. TZI, Leon your trident and glaive might work for this”

She wasn’t sure whether any of the others might carry something like a 10 ft pole but she could probably make a stretcher out of the sheet and the two cadets pole mounted armaments. She would help whoever came to help set up the stretcher.

Having done as much as she could she finally got around to answering Gradon’s question as to why they were after her. She reached into her coat, retrieved the bloodied book the scout had been carrying and showed it to him. It reminded her She would have to make sure to retrieve her own journal from where it lay on the ground before they left.

“He was very insistent in giving this to me, in trying to make sure it didn’t fall into their hands. Maybe he stole it from them?”

She really wasn't shure. Holding it so that he (and anyone else close enough) could see it she opened the book and tried to work out what was so important about it. Her initial assumption is proved incorrect as it appears to be Wagnil’s journal for field reports. She rather frustratedly flicks through it, wondering why it was so important.

Then she reaches the end and spots a rather good sketch of soldiers that look just like the ones that attacked them. They seem to be guarding a coach and moving to Orello, though she is not sure how so few troops with the gear they have been drawn with would be able to take a fort like Orello. Not that she is a military expert but she was under the assumption you needed siegeworks and at least an equal number of troops to the place you're attacking.

There's some barely legible rambling from Wagnil about how suspicious that movement pattern is, along with the transcription of a conversation he appears to have somehow gotten close enough to have heard. The conversation was between two foot soldiers talking about the "special cargo" they were guarding and how they couldn't believe how easy it was to get it.

Then there's some hastily looking written scrawls, most of which are illegible apart from the words "... How could... she be...." the very last words being a scrawl saying "not let Bergm..."

“Captain! You might want to see this.”

Project Crossover [Video Game Crossover RP]

@Lmpkio
If your looking for something to do Samus could perform a flanking maneuver and come in via the kitchen. It's something I was thinking of having Naija do as well so that we aren't all crowding the door. Then we can maybe find out what mama's idea was before it shows up.

Apotheosis

Golden eyes suggestions of using the pelts and wood harvesting method where probably the best choice and she agreed, it was probably easier than finding a human jobs without being able to speak their language and perhaps was safer than adventuring.

"While we are in the human town could find out what we specifically we want and then how much it, the pelts and the wood are worth so we make sure we bring enough stuff to sell on our next trip. Maybe I can also find out if there’s any types of plants they might wanna buy?"

Though those getting those two resources required tools of their own, but presumably the village did have access to appropriate tools. Licking tress wasn’t exactly telling her ways to make bows, arrows, axes or traps out of them, so hopefully the could borrow or be show how to make those tools.

"Hay Boss, who would be good to talk to if we wanna learn how to hunt? Would that be our parents when they get back?"

She considered the chief's answers her two questions. Dragon's blood and the world's second greatest magician: quite the prestigious bloodlines this tribe had, despite them spawning some of the lowliest monsters. Shame they had none of that, though they did have their gifts so maybe that was the universe/some god making up for their mundane lineage.

Sabu meanwhile was going on and on about humans. Not that the information wasn’t useful but the admiration he showed for them was somewhat uncomfortable, it was obviously because he was really excited but he kind of made her feel like trash for not having been born human. It was an unpleasant experience, even if he didn’t mean it to be. His last comment about getting human food and the state of goblin food did get her to pay particular attention and maybe justified his enthusiasm a bit in her eyes.

"Wait. We don’t cook food?" She said mainly to herself in a small bout of confusion. A whole heap of the plants she had analysed had given her the understanding that the could be cooked to make them either edible or more nutritious. Admittedly she had no idea how or what parts you could cook but it had given her the impression that cooking was what just what you did with food.

"My gift told me some of the plants I got in the forest where edible or better after you cooked em though. so why don't we?"

She had thought of just going straight about the tool situation and getting back to the forest as soon as possible, but now she wanted to know how cooking worked. She was also kinda hungry. If food was being offered who was she to say no, even if there was the whole not liking going back to goblin food problem to worry about.

"I wanna see how to do that, so I’ll come too. Plus the whole tools thing"

She hurried on over to be with Subu, Kluuto and the rest who were going to town.

We Aren't the Crystal Gems: A Steven Universe AU roleplay

edit: here come a possible pilot that can crash us

Howlite

Gem: Howlite

Name if your gem goes by a different name: Owl, Core

Appearance: She wears black helmet with an opaque visor which she uses to protect here 2 large light sensitive vision. It effectively has 5 cameras in it, that all dulled to a light level suitable for her 2 owlish eyes. The visor has 5 marks indicating the location of the cameras and they are synced up with her own eyes state, resulting in 5 expressive elliptical shapes on the visor. The visor can also display images instead of the eye marks to allow others to see data she has or emote in more absurd ways ([ ! ],[ ? ],[0_0]).

A collection of straps over her chest and back secure a metallic backpack which can extend 4 claw tipped limbs. At the front the straps link to a ringlike device around her gem which is located at the center of her chest. She wears a pair of white gloves, turquoise shorts and blue wee booties. Her skin is gray-white in color, her upper arms and lower legs are covered in random dark markings/patterns. Her pale blue hair features a braid that comes out of the back of her helmet. She is about the same a height as a ruby or limb enhancer-less peridot.

mspaint art

Powers:
Techno-Empathy II: She can link her mind with a device and ether operate it, read/write data at incredible speed or get an innate understanding of the device and what might be wrong with it. This only works through making contact with the device itself with her skin. The gloves stop her from interfacing with anything she touches and she can selectively activate link herself to devices using her additional limbs. This is done by making a wired connection from their extremities to her back.
Engineering II: capable of building and repairing gem tech level equipment so long as materials are available. This can be adapted to using earth tech if that is all which is available.

Items:

Weapon: Monkey wrench

BackPack: a small metal device on her back that features 4 extendable manipulator arms which end in 3 fingered claws. These are used either for climbing, transport or helping with work. The ending claws can mold themselves into variety of purposes that can be added to as needed. Currently these include welding torches, drills, circular saws, torches and light laser weapons. The arms can be combined to create larger versions of the end components or extend the limbs range(or sometimes both). Her Techno-Empathy works through these limbs if she wants it to.

Helmet: the visor on her helmet features 5 cameras that can provide ontop of normal darkened vision: thermal and night vision, flash suppression and a binocular function. The visor can also be used to display images or act like a flashlight. The helmet also contains a small computer and a bunch of memory for storing recordings and managing the camera/display systems.

These additional devices are practically a part of her due to being in constant contact with her skin.

Backstory: Howlites are a gem type created to work specifically with the ever increasing amount of homeworld automation. Their ability to interface with any piece of technology allows them to more easily diagnose problems with that device and then their engineering skills let them fix those problems. They can often be found on ships, either as pilots neurally plugged in pilots or as maintenance crews. This particular one is about 350 years old and currently acts as both for the vessel that has been sent to earth. She has experience in a lot of other postings over those 350 years as Howlites generally move around quite a lot, being sent wherever damage has or might occur. She is rather excited to have been trusted with her first job where she is the senior (and in this case only) Howlite working on a task.

Writing example: probably non canon

We see a forearm against a black background, crawling upon this arm are several small 8 legged things that a human might mistake for ticks or spiders. They might be rather disturbed that the owner of the arm had not tried to swat the intruders off of itself. The spiders appear to be clustered around a festering wound of some kind on the forearm of the limb, as if tearing into the flesh of a hapless victim.

As the scene pans in closure the odd coloring of the arm becomes more apparent and the spiders are shown to be 3 small humanoids with 4 extra metallic limbs extending from their backs with which they cling to the side of the ship. Accompanying them are a number of actual spidery looking machines all carrying boxes filled with various suplise. The 3 Howlites are diligently working on an area where some form of space debris has punched through the side of the ship while it was traveling through interstellar space near the former colony of earth. The team had just finished cooling of the site with foam, one shouts to the other two.

“We cooled it down enough on my side. I’m gonna investigate the obstruction”

A Howlite (that Steven might have) called busty, chesty, doc, papa smurf Core put her foam sprayer back on the cargo spider and then descended into the hole using her mechanical limbs, her visor lighting up the inside of the hole as she approached the foreign object. It appeared to have once consisted of a large dish of white material with a smaller metal part behind it that sported a bunch of stickin out antenna. Using a combination of sawing, melting and non regulation wrench smacking she began to remove the obstruction till she reached what appeared to be a storage compartment which gave her pause. It contained a bunch of gold plated disk that have instructions on how to read data of of them. While she really should dispose of them like the rest (they weren’t gem tech and where thus unimportant) she couldn’t help but wonder what was on them.

The instructions were easy to follow but needed air to transmit their sonic data, so she spent some time reading them all onto her helmet's internal memory. The results were fascinating, 90 minutes of pleasingly ordered sounds, images and sounds of an uncolonised world, what appeared to be 55 versions of the word hello and a description of the purpose of the disks. She had just begun analysing that last segment when the others grew confused by the lack of debris extraction and called down what was the trouble.

“What is taking so long”

Core excitedly ascended to the surface again now with the disks and handed them to them to (someone steven might call) Brains who was the eldest and incharge of the other two.

“So I was digging around and I found...”

She stopped as she saw Brains chucking the disks off into space after the rest of the obstructions material. The third Howlite, Cheek, was similarly uninterested in the odd devices and was rolling her eyes at core. Quite an impressive performance, as the marks indicating the location of her optics did a 360 spin while being rolled to indicate just how idiotic Cheek though Core was for doing this.

“Why did you” “I know you're new but you can't stop working just because you see something shiny, get back to it newborn” “But” “now!” “Yes. Of course. On it.”

The rest of the repairs went as standard, the obstruction was removed, wiring was resoldered/replaced and the hull sealed shut with new materials retrieved from the cargo spiders. It was as routine as ever but made slightly more interesting for Core by the soft rhythmic sounds she had read from the disks.

War Notes

She took hold of the wounded scout as the captain went to rally the troops. She lay out a sheet across the grown and then lowered him and herself onto it. She pulled/cut away the garments covering the wounded areas and inspected his injuries. They were bad, very bad. Some part of her consider the patient lost, that it would be best to put the poor soul out of his misery and focus on keeping everyone else alive. But she was a doctor damn it, or at least on in training, and she refused to give up even as she nearly wet herself from the explosion that almost reduced them both to paste.

She channeled her magic, the gauntlet glowing red, as she took the odd journal and placed it in the pocket that had once held her own. She placed the softly glowing flask she had just created on the ground for later and de-summoned the gauntlet, removed the bangle and placed it inside her medical bag. Having loose jewelry on your person while operation was an awful idea as it might catch on something and do additional damage.

“I’ll keep it safe for you but you have to stay with me Wagnil. you have to hold on. you have some explaining to do after this, but no more words now. just try to stay still as I work”

She retrieved her scalpel, tweezers, needle and suture from the bag while she called out for help, apparently they really wanted her dead but there was no way in hell she was leaving the patient to die like this. She tried to put on a calm confidence to hide her terror as bullets whizzed past them. Her call for help was a mostly steady one.

@Hammerman “Esther! I would really appreciate if you came over and helped shield the patient from fire with your winds!”

She then began the procedure and while she wished she had a more sterile environment, the sheet that she had placed between him and the forest floor would have to do. It was a somewhat ironic fact about treating internal injuries that you had to cut the external wounds open more to get inside, she used her scalpel to widen the upper wound so that she could get a look inside. First she used the tweezers to extract any residue of the round that still remained in his body, then she used the needle and suture to sew shut the puncture in his lung. She then performed a similar procedure on his intestinal wound. Finally she sewed shut the external wounds and tried to get him to drink the previously created concoction. The healing potion would accelerate the natural healing process and hopefully seal the wounds with tissue where the suture had pulled the two separated areas of flesh together. It would also help increase blood production, hopefully countering the blood loss he had suffered. He would need plenty of rest after this but if everything had gone as planed he would live.

This entire process was a lengthy and delicate operation, the patient was perilously close to death and any interruption to the procedure could spell his doom. In the end though it was down to whether Wagnil had the will and blood to cling to life as she worked. Once the operation was complete Althea’s gloves were covered in blood and her nerves shot from having to do such a delicate procedure under fire. She had done all she could.

The Gladiators of House Valens

Brina Kerr

In her dreams she saw it again. A thing with too many mouths, a hulking bulk of squirming tendrils and horror that burst through a fake wall. The gluttonous black monstrosity bearing down upon them emitting a shrike that shattered eardrums and broke the nerves of even their most hardened warriors. It plowed through their group, tentacles and many hands all tipped with razor sharp blades cut, slashed and butchered while others dragged hapless victims closer to be consumed by its ravenous maws. So many, why did it have so many mouths!

---

A scream and a bust of sunlight erupt from a small glade in the forest. After that all that can be heard is a panicked hyperventilation. This is then slowed, conquered, controlled and replaced by the deep slow breaths of meditation. She reminds herself that those nightmarish creatures can be felled, they can be beaten, and that she and her kin have done so and will continue too time and time again till the world is cleansed. Eventually sleeps comes again, not easily, but it comes. The morning sun comes later and washes away the last of her stress, and she smiles once more.

---

It had been about a month since Brina completed her journey to dispose of that wretched slab, a month during which her remaining supplies had dwindled to naught and yet she still had yet to find a place in these foreign lands. So for the time being she had set up some way outside of Apulum, in the woods beyond the farmland that surrounded the city. While for the time being she had managed to get food by hunting, in these lands game was less plentiful than it was in the north. Blasting sparrows out of the air with beams of light might be rather easy if she could get close enough, but the pulp that remained after the poor bird received a projected mace strike was barely worth the effort. By comparison the one time she had managed to sneak up on and then blast the brains out of a deer had been a glorious feast, but that meat was long gone and so she was left to make sparrow (or rabbit or crow) gib stew most days, and going hungry the rest. She needed to find a way to earn coin so she could buy food or at this rate she might well starve.

Every few days she would make the trek from the little clearing she had set up camp, packing up all her belongings so that some woodsman or bandit did not steal them while she was away and then she would make for the city too seek work. She had high hopes now that the arena season had come around, fighting was one of the things she did best, right giving dramatic retellings of the stories of her tribe’s gods and legendary heroes, though that was sadly not in high demand. It turns out there were few occupations where those in the city would be willing to trust an outsider, let alone a heavily scarred Torguren woman. IT didn't help that many of the town’s jobs appealed to her in the slightest, she was a seasoned warrior and she was not going to be some maid, midwife or harlot. She had sent the man who suggested that last careening through the ceiling. She needed a job fit for a warrior but she had yet to find any one willing to trust her to guard their backs or trade caravan, but the arena seemed promising, there her appearance and origins might giver her more clout rather than be a disadvantage as it seemed to do everywhere else. For the Torguren were thought of as strong, vicious and dangerous by the mewling Venatrians and those where all qualities you wanted in a gladiator.

Here optimism was well placed, for she found out that the Valens noble family was seeking any and all volunteers for a fighting team and so once she had gotten directions she set off immediately for their manor outside of town. It was a grand building and Brina could not help but relish being able to see why the Venatrian rich seemed to feel the need to build the massive elaborate buildings for themselves.

The crimson robed warrior walked up to the gates wearing her armor as she usually did when she traveled. Said armor notably featured two metal skirts protecting the sides of her legs that hung down from her waist. From the right skirt hung a long thick mace emblazoned with runework, a simple brutish weapon but an effective one, particularly against that which did not bleed. To the left was a large tome, oddly chained to her side so that it could be pulled upwards to be read, but if the reader where to release it the book would slide back into place at her side. On her back was a traveling pack with a tent and various odds and ends that were useful for someone traveling the wilds.

She arrived at the gates, greeted the guards and was lead inside. She took a moment to examine the others. There were mixed feelings at seeing three Torguren looking men among the group, for on the one hand it would be good to fight with those of her kind, yet with the inter clan conflicts an almost constant state of being in the north it was hard to know who was friend or foe. Might her clan have fought against theirs and if so would they resent her, or in being here in exile had they cast such loyalties and grudges aside? She certainly kew that she had done no such thing and she detested the clans squabbling with a passion.

There was also warrior who appeared to have taken the exact opposite approach to her in armor, his arms, legs and head protected but his center bear. If they were to combine armor sets you would probably get a warrior as well armored as the guards in the school and have basically nothing left over but a single glove and have one arm left bare.

There was the lady who presumably was to be their sponsor sitting in a simple throne at the end of the training yard whom Brina would get a better look at once her turn came.

Finally there were the young boy and the strange individual covered head to toe in black. While her own appearance might make judging someone for wearing covering garment somewhat hypocritical, Brina still couldn't shake the feeling that there was something off about them. Perhaps it was his stillness. Perhaps the faceless man in black reminded her too much of the descriptions of the Dark One. Had she continued to simmer with suspicion and unease it might have boiled over into drastic action, however the barbarian cleric was, fortunately, rather distracted by the fact that there was alcohol on offer. She hadn't had a drink in what seemed like forever and so quickly found her way to the table with the wine and began partaking of it with relish. Not enough to disrupt her performance (she hoped), but enough that it ended up taking her mind off the cloaked man's unsettling appearance.

The Gladiators of House Valens

traveling and stuff done so I am starting writing now

We Aren't the Crystal Gems: A Steven Universe AU roleplay

@Spinna
Thanks. I'll probably be using a version of Howlite again I imagine, though with some more powers and a different backstory obviously

Apotheosis

Iris listened intently to the large amount of information they had just received, trying to keep it all in her head was proving a little tricky. It turned out her second suggestions to what the words had been sort of correct, that they were not magic but a technique exclusive to humans and a gift that was being used to mimic that technique. All in all that and the rest of the information provided a whole host of lines of inquiry from the more sensible of going and asking Aya about magic later to the probably less useful of how a dragon’s lineage ends up in a goblin. She did however wondered if any of them were like Sabu and the Chief. She was also curious about the other magic learned individual he mentioned.

"Hey boss, do any of us have interesting ancestry? Also who is Madam Archmage?"

She waved to Sabu as he mentioned them but left the others to go over and speak to him, knife ears… Kluuto apparently, had the gift of human language which was convenient for her when it came to all this. She wondered how hard that would be to pick up with regular learning and if anyone had the time to teach her and what she might be able to offer in return.

There were so many other things she wanted to as well though, she wondered where he would find the time. Their journey here had been just a glimpse into all the nature the forest contained, she wanted to explore it without having to keep up with the group. Yet she also wanted to get those digging tools to get at some of the roots of plants that her gift had told her might be useful. She also kind of wanted to go talk to Aya about magic. She supposed it depended if they could get money for the tools. She turned to Golden Eyes @Holy Grail

"Didja have any ideas of how you were going to get money for your digging tools? I can help you if you did, coz I kind of want some too."

The Gladiators of House Valens

I am basically about to go to bed and will be doing a spot of traveling tomorrow, so I'll probably be posting some time in the afternoon/evening