Nevix

What Are You Listening To?

Okay, so a bit of context here. Pat the Bunny is a retired musician who mostly did folk-punk stuff about how much he hates himself, rich people, the government, and cops. That's a gross oversimplification, he's an incredible songwriter, but that's sort of a crash course. Anyway, I just found about a side-project of his called Playtime Posse where he raps about Breakfast.

The World of Aerion

Drostan Welm / "Osmund Griff" - Dalenham, Ethora

---

Drostan didn't particularly like being back in Ethora. He supposed he didn't have much reason to be afraid. They were well away from the lands of House Welm, well away from anyone who might have seriously recognized him. And it wasn't as though his name was being spoken much, anymore. Doubtless, it had been months, even years since anyone had thought of Drostan Welm. But it wasn't just fear that had kept him out of Ethora for so long. The place was his homeland, and for all its flaws and depravity, it was a part of him. When he was away, he could pretend as though he'd always been Osmund Griff, as though he'd never before visited Dalenham with his uncle and his sister when he was a boy. But staying here, amongst the people who were once his own, brought back all kinds of memories.

"I'm getting to be too damn old for this, Varian." He said, mostly in jest as he took a seat next to his fellow mercenary. He said something to that effect after almost every job. It was funny, because he was only thirty-one and because Varian was barely younger than him. But, then again, he was sore and tired more often than not and sometimes his back popped when he sat down. He raised a hand and looked at the bartender. "Barkeep! I'll have some of that Raelus Ale you were whining about." Truth be told, he normally ordered Ethoran drinks in Ethora, just because they were a bit cheaper. They weren't as good, but he didn't mind. Alcohol was a means to an end so far as he was concerned. But he'd heard the barkeep groan about it and couldn't resist. Besides, after this job, he could afford to splurge a bit on some finer brew. It wasn't like he was saving for anything.

He'd changed out of his battle wear, trading his light armor for simple travel clothes and stashing away his shield and spear. His sword was still buckled on his hip, as it always was. The blade had a name once, not that it mattered much anymore. He'd worn down the identifying inscriptions on the blade and replaced its ornate scabbard and belt with simpler fare a long time ago.

"I'm never quite prepared for how... monstrous Orcs can be." He shook his head, taking a long draught from the tankard that the barkeep had brought him. "It's as though every time I see one, I forget about the last however-many times I've seen them." When he was a boy, he'd read 'Treatise on the Orc Dilemma,' by some Falkian philosopher he'd forgotten the name of. It was a long-winded essay that basically said that orcs were just of a different culture and that it was the responsibility of the other intelligent races to educate them, or something to that effect. Having never seen an orc before, he'd brought the paper to his father, interested to see what he thought. Robert Welm had torn it in half, and had the eleven-year-old Drostan fitted with armor and attached to a group of soldiers that were hunting an orc raiding party. What he'd seen had made him seriously question whether that philosopher had ever met an orc. Drostan wanted to believe there was good in the Orcs, as there was in all the other races, but he didn't want to be the poor bastard whose job it was to educate them.

The World of Aerion

Sorry for being so slow. Will have a post up within the next twelve hours.

Via Stellarum

Alekhine IV had been a beautiful planet, once, he was told. A wide variety of ecosystems, thriving plant and animal life, the whole nine yards. But, it had tons of mineral wealth below its surface and it became little more than a mining node to the various galactic empires and corporate conglomerates. Edwyn wasn't sure if the planet looked torched on account of the many battles over the years that had been waged for rights to the planet's resources, or if the extraction of those resources was what had done it. Either way, what was once healthy and normal had been made bare, stark, and ugly.

Where they were, anyway. Supposedly there were areas, in Alekhine's southern hemisphere where you could trick yourself into thinking that the rock was hospitable. Not here. Here, on some nameless continent where the 121st had been ordered to assault a well-defended drilling station, the soil had been made tough, sandy, and infertile. A number of trees still stood and even more lied flatly on the ground, toppled from their stumps, but they were dry and bare. The earth was jagged and broken in many places, as though the ground itself was out to get you. No signs of life beyond the 121st, the well-lit metallic drilling station in the distance, and the pockets of soldiers and anti-aircraft guns that were scattered on the ground between the two.

The typical per-mission casualty rate of the 121st hovered just around 20%, normally. Of course, that was an average. He could remember times where they had lost only a handful of people out of the whole division. He could also remember missions like this one. Eight dropships had carted them to the surface. Two had been blasted out of the sky, leaving no survivors, and two or three more had been damaged and crash landed. This was bad, but probably was a part of the plan. The mercenary company that owned the 121st, and all the soldiers in it, knew that they were cheap and expendable. Quite probably, they'd been sent ahead just to soften the defenses so that legions of better-trained, better-equipped, actual volunteers could finish the job. This was unfair, of course, the sort of robotic utilitarianism and profit-oriented policy that he'd fought a war against, once. Taking a stand against the injustice had just exposed him to more of it, and so he'd learned to keep his head down.

"O'Byrne!" A harsh, sharp shout snapped Edwyn out of his thoughts. He turned to look, and saw Sergeant Reyes waving viciously at him. Maria Reyes was in her later thirties and tough as nails, one of only a handful of people he really recognized from when he'd been forced to enlist, a little more than a year back. He'd heard she was a cop once, and that she'd beat a suspect to death with her bare hands. It might have been total horseshit, but he believed it. "Get your ass over here!" Edwyn raced over from where he'd been, just outside of the dropship's interior, past some makeshift tables where people were busy setting up comms equipment and the like.

"What do you need, Reyes?"

"I need you to take five people and go check for survivors at the south-west crash site, corporal." She said, turning around and not waiting for a response. Edwyn cocked an eyebrow.

"Er, Sarge, I'm not a-"

"You are now. Felix caught some shrapnel to the jaw when we took that AA round in the air. If you're that terrified of a little fuckin' responsibility we can make it temporary, but you're a big kid now, O'Byrne. Get a move on." She walked away before he could protest. He swore under his breath and ran to grab five people. New one's, people he didn't know. He wasn't expecting trouble, but he wasn't going to be responsible for getting a buddy killed.

As they hustled to the crash site, he caught a glimpse of himself in the small part of his rifle's metal reciever that was still clean enough to be reflective. Tired green eyes, and dark hair and stubble that were both long enough to get him reprimanded if there was an inspection soon, but there was never an inspection. He stood at least a couple of inches taller than even the tallest of his five companions, his fatigues just a little too short in the sleeves on account of the length of his arms. His attention was pulled away from himself, however, as they approached the smoking wreckage. He grimaced, the outlook for anyone who was inside wasn't terribly promising.

He ran over as he saw someone crawling from the wreckage. A soldier, a woman, one of their own. He helped her up and gave her a quick glance over to make sure that she wasn't bleeding profusely or that a bone wasn't sticking out somewhere, not that he was qualified to help if that had been the case. He didn't recognize her, but whether she was new or whether they had just never ran into each other, he couldn't be sure.

"I'm pri- er, Corporal O'Byrne, from Dropship 3. Are you okay?" He said, slowly, maybe a little too loud for how close they were standing. "Do you know if there are any other survivors in there?" He pointed toward the wreckage. He wasn't super confident that there would be, but if she'd made it out, maybe others had, too.

The World of Aerion

Drostan Welm, Kinslayer

Name: Drostan Welm (Under an assumed name, "Osmund Griff")

Age: 31

Gender: Male

Race: Human

Country of Origin: Ethora (Claims Falke)

Appearance:

image

Personality: A sort of burnt-out idealist, his former devotion to egalitarianism has been tempered by time into aimless hate of hierarchy,
class, and authority. However, this hate is kept in check by a sense of cynicism and resignation (as well as a touch of alcholism), that way things are is the way they will probably always be. This manifests in a feeling of weariness that almost radiates off of him.

But, there are moments when his former self peaks through. Get him talking about his beliefs, and you may not get him to stop. He can manage some dry wit, when he bothers to try. He has a sort of default respect for most people, regardless of race, sex, or class, but it doesn't seem to extend to the wealthy or the noble.

Once very confident in himself and his abilities, staggering defeat has humbled him greatly. He's cautious, doubly so when he's responsible for other people. He has deep-seated self-doubt, though he usually tries to swallow it. No one wants to hire an insecure mercenary.

History: The second son of Lord Robert Welm, Drostan led an incredibly privileged childhood. Free from the burden of inheriting his father's title, since his older brother would be heir, he was free to more or less do as a pleased. He learned a few things about himself early-on. He liked to fight (with both blades and words), he liked to read, and he really liked to travel. Beginning at age twelve Drostan accompanied his uncle on economic and diplomatic journeys to the surrounding nations. Falke was his favorite, and there he got his hands on the writings of Elven and early Falkian thinkers. This, combined with the things he saw in his travels, left him with the vague sense that something was wrong. He couldn't quite put his finger on why, or how he would go about fixing it, but the way things were didn't sit quite right. When he was eighteen, his uncle died, and his travels were suspended for the time being. He stayed once more in his family's home, developing his martial skills with his brothers and reading everything he could get his hands on.

When he was twenty-one he began writing things of his own. A sort of synthesis of all he'd read, combined with his own observations, Drostan's brand of social and economic egalitarianism was entirely too radical for much of the nation, though it did find some purchase among the very lowest rungs of society. Realizing his work was sort of seditious, he sent it around anonymously. He let only one person know that he was the one writing it, his childhood friend, Sir Garren Curtis, a knight sworn to his house.

He tried to live a more typical Ethoran noble life, participating in a number of tournaments over the next few years. Though he often did quite well, he was never able to win one. He courted Alys Curtis, a cousin of Garren's, and was engaged to be married. At twenty-six, however, just a few weeks prior to his wedding date, Drostan had a crisis of conscience. Surrounded by wealth and privilege, he couldn't escape a lingering sense of guilt, that people suffered while he lived so comfortably.

So, Drostan and Garren slipped out one night with a handful of soldiers who bought into his ideas. They carried with them copies of Drostan's earlier writing, and rode to rally townsfolk and farmers to his cause, with limited success. After a week, he had gathered about two dozen people. Against Garren's advice, the small group of radicals decided to mount a poorly planned coup. After some successful raids on merchant caravans and the such, Drostan decided that he was going to try and kill the king. This failed spectacularly. Their attempt to ambush a carriage that was supposed to be carrying the king went awry as the carriage's guards put up a much better fight than expected. Drostan's forces were more or less dismantled. Garren was captured, and Drostan was forced to flee. The king wasn't even in the carriage.

In hiding, all but a handful of his followers deserted him. Eventually, he was found. Sir Garren Curtis had been tortured into revealing the location of Drostan's hideout, and then was promptly executed. A manhunt, led by Drostan's own father, came upon them in the night. Drostan's few remaining allies were slain and he was cornered. Fully expecting to die, Drostan put up the best fight he could, and in the process killed his father. But Drostan wasn't killed, he was taken away in chains.

His older brother made a show of stripping Drostan of his lands, titles, and nobility, erasing his name from House Welm's lineage. He was guilty of treason, and to be hanged like a commoner. However, hours before his execution, his younger sister, Amelia, visited him in his cell. She hated him for killing their father, but she had been in love with Sir Garren, and couldn't forgive the kingdom for torturing him. She bribed a guard to free him, and secured him passage to Falke, but left him with a warning. If he ever came back to Ethora, she'd kill him herself. Drostan believed her.

In Falke, he created a new identity. He became Osmund "Oz" Griff, a Falkian mercenary. He lived in Falke for a couple years, studying the spear and trying unsuccessfully to learn archery. Work was scarce, however, and so at twenty-nine he left for Miraheim in search of opportunity. There, he worked independently for some time before falling in with Varian's group.

Weapon Preference: Drostan wields an unremarkable, circular wooden shield in his offhand, and a Falkian short-spear in the dominant hand. He keeps a more traditionally Ethoran one-handed sword on his hip, but he hasn't used it in quite some time.

Side: Mercenaries

The World of Aerion

@TheLazarus

Drostan Welm, Kinslayer

Name: Drostan Welm (Under an assumed name, "Osmund Griff")

Age: 31

Gender: Male

Race: Human

Country of Origin: Ethora (Claims Falke)

Appearance:

image

Personality: A sort of burnt-out idealist, his former devotion to egalitarianism has been tempered by time into aimless hate of hierarchy,
class, and authority. However, this hate is kept in check by a sense of cynicism and resignation (as well as a touch of alcholism), that way things are is the way they will probably always be. This manifests in a feeling of weariness that almost radiates off of him.

But, there are moments when his former self peaks through. Get him talking about his beliefs, and you may not get him to stop. He can manage some dry wit, when he bothers to try. He has a sort of default respect for most people, regardless of race, sex, or class, but it doesn't seem to extend to the wealthy or the noble.

Once very confident in himself and his abilities, staggering defeat has humbled him greatly. He's cautious, doubly so when he's responsible for other people. He has deep-seated self-doubt, though he usually tries to swallow it. No one wants to hire an insecure mercenary.

History: The second son of Lord Robert Welm, Drostan led an incredibly privileged childhood. Free from the burden of inheriting his father's title, since his older brother would be heir, he was free to more or less do as a pleased. He learned a few things about himself early-on. He liked to fight (with both blades and words), he liked to read, and he really liked to travel. Beginning at age twelve Drostan accompanied his uncle on economic and diplomatic journeys to the surrounding nations. Falke was his favorite, and there he got his hands on the writings of Elven and early Falkian thinkers. This, combined with the things he saw in his travels, left him with the vague sense that something was wrong. He couldn't quite put his finger on why, or how he would go about fixing it, but the way things were didn't sit quite right. When he was eighteen, his uncle died, and his travels were suspended for the time being. He stayed once more in his family's home, developing his martial skills with his brothers and reading everything he could get his hands on.

When he was twenty-one he began writing things of his own. A sort of synthesis of all he'd read, combined with his own observations, Drostan's brand of social and economic egalitarianism was entirely too radical for much of the nation, though it did find some purchase among the very lowest rungs of society. Realizing his work was sort of seditious, he sent it around anonymously. He let only one person know that he was the one writing it, his childhood friend, Sir Garren Curtis, a knight sworn to his house.

He tried to live a more typical Ethoran noble life, participating in a number of tournaments over the next few years. Though he often did quite well, he was never able to win one. He courted Alys Curtis, a cousin of Garren's, and was engaged to be married. At twenty-six, however, just a few weeks prior to his wedding date, Drostan had a crisis of conscience. Surrounded by wealth and privilege, he couldn't escape a lingering sense of guilt, that people suffered while he lived so comfortably.

So, Drostan and Garren slipped out one night with a handful of soldiers who bought into his ideas. They carried with them copies of Drostan's earlier writing, and rode to rally townsfolk and farmers to his cause, with limited success. After a week, he had gathered about two dozen people. Against Garren's advice, the small group of radicals decided to mount a poorly planned coup. After some successful raids on merchant caravans and the such, Drostan decided that he was going to try and kill the king. This failed spectacularly. Their attempt to ambush a carriage that was supposed to be carrying the king went awry as the carriage's guards put up a much better fight than expected. Drostan's forces were more or less dismantled. Garren was captured, and Drostan was forced to flee. The king wasn't even in the carriage.

In hiding, all but a handful of his followers deserted him. Eventually, he was found. Sir Garren Curtis had been tortured into revealing the location of Drostan's hideout, and then was promptly executed. A manhunt, led by Drostan's own father, came upon them in the night. Drostan's few remaining allies were slain and he was cornered. Fully expecting to die, Drostan put up the best fight he could, and in the process killed his father. But Drostan wasn't killed, he was taken away in chains.

His older brother made a show of stripping Drostan of his lands, titles, and nobility, erasing his name from House Welm's lineage. He was guilty of treason, and to be hanged like a commoner. However, hours before his execution, his younger sister, Amelia, visited him in his cell. She hated him for killing their father, but she had been in love with Sir Garren, and couldn't forgive the kingdom for torturing him. She bribed a guard to free him, and secured him passage to Falke, but left him with a warning. If he ever came back to Ethora, she'd kill him herself. Drostan believed her.

In Falke, he created a new identity. He became Osmund "Oz" Griff, a Falkian mercenary. He lived in Falke for a couple years, studying the spear and trying unsuccessfully to learn archery. Work was scarce, however, and so at twenty-nine he left for Miraheim in search of opportunity. There, he worked independently for some time before falling in with Varian's group.

Weapon Preference: Drostan wields an unremarkable, circular wooden shield in his offhand, and a Falkian short-spear in the dominant hand. He keeps a more traditionally Ethoran one-handed sword on his hip, but he hasn't used it in quite some time.

Side: Mercenaries

I didn't notice until after I finished the sheet that a Lord Robert Welm is responsible for the quote in the OP. I can change Drostan's house, if anything there contradicts. I also don't know if the whole coup backstory is too much, I tried to make it small and relatively easily snuffed out, so that it doesn't throw too much of a wrench in the established history.

Post a random fact about yourself.

I didn't know that Mark Wahlberg was Marky Mark from Marky Mark and The Funky Bunch until, like, a couple of months ago.

BLEAK — action, adventure, drama.

This sounds pretty badass. I'm down.

Give Me Your Favorite Quote(s).

We know that there is no help for us but from one another, that no hand will save us if we do not reach out our hand. And the hand that you reach out is empty, as mine is. You have nothing. You possess nothing. You own nothing. You are free. All you have is what you are, and what you give.

Shevek

From Ursula K. Le Guin's The Dispossessed

Chronicles of Sarastrea

Edric

---

Wimps.

Azamor's thought echoed in Edric's head, bitter, as the demons heading toward them evaporated. Edric knew that Azamor bore a special sort of anger toward his own kind, and he had seen it on display the handful of times they'd been attacked in their journeys. He assumed it had something to do with the reason he'd been sealed in the pendant, all those years ago. Edric didn't know the details, and he'd never asked. He figured Azamor would tell him, someday.

Edric was more relieved than disappointed by the sudden disappearance of the demons, but the feeling didn't last. Dread and curiosity took its place. The dread, he imagined, was natural. This attack had unnerving implications. Whoever had orchestrated it had, apparently, gotten away clean. He didn't want to think about the casualties, but he doubted it was a tiny number.

His curiosity was a little less abstract, more mundane. It was a result not of the monsters that had ravaged the city, but of the well-armed woman who'd he almost fought them with.

"How did you know I'm an Athalian?" He followed her to the bench she'd sat down on and stood beside her. "I'm not, ah, exactly wearing a name tag."

Face it, Eddy. You- no- we- have fans.

"I'm Edric, by the way." He offered a hand to shake and quirked an eyebrow. "But I'm getting the weird sense that you already know that."

_{@Driving Park}

---

Dexter

---

"Oh."

Dexter looked around as the demons that had managed to surround him dissolved. He stood, alone now, in the middle of the street holding a fireman's ax. He took another look around, confirmed that he was no longer in danger, and opened his hands, letting the ax fall from his hands. It vanished before it hit the ground. He looked at buildings around him, saw one that looked suitably bar-like, and allowed himself. He'd need to be going soon. Doubtless, there was money to be made off of this. Rich people tended to get nervous, whenever something like this happened, especially if it was difficult to explain or understand. They'd be clamoring for guards, hired muscle. At first glance his resume, what with the police and military experience, was impressive, as was his magic.

But first, there was an unlocked bar, untended expensive liquor, and an empty flask he had to attend to.

---

Aileen

---

BANG!

Aileen poked her head above her stall and watched as the smoke created by the explosive she'd thrown cleared to reveal that the crowd of demons that had found their way into the medical exhibit area was entirely gone. The irritated intern from earlier stood up, brushing off his shirt. He'd been cowering behind a bench.

"Well, Ms. Deckard, that was some bomb."

"I don't think-" The explosive she'd created sounded and looked a lot more powerful than it actually was. She'd learned the recipe from a hunter while she and Edric had traveled. It was a lot more effective at scaring an attacker than it was at hurting one. She'd made a couple of the little bombs up before coming, just in case. She hadn't really expected it to do anything to the demons when she'd thrown it. She walked out from behind her stall and looked around. She couldn't see, hear, or smell any demons. "I think it's over."