Oso

🗡 Roses and Daggers 🎕

---

Time: Evening
Location: Banquet Hall
Mentions / Interactions: @Tae Kali, @princess Lottie, @Apex Sunburn Sjan-dehk

---

Kalliope’s words hit him with the kind of imagery that tugged instinct out of muscle memory. He leaned in without thinking, letting that wicked little smirk settle fully across his face as his hand drifted lazily to the wall behind her, drawing them just a little closer.

“Hard candy,” he echoed, voice low and warm like the press of skin to velvet. “Hard liquor...”

His gaze dipped briefly, grazing her lips. He leaned in, his voice dropped into something that could barely be called speaking.

“As hard as things were the other night.” His eyes traveled down her body and then down his own…just about to his belt.

Then, something in his expression flickered.

Just the tiniest twitch of his brow, the subtlest shift in his gaze. Like a sound only he had heard.

His eyes moved, almost against his will, scanning the room... and stopped.

Charlotte.

She was seated again, her posture a little too stiff, her hand clutched around her wineglass like it was the only solid thing left in the world. He caught the tension in her jaw, the paleness in her cheeks. And beside her, Sjan-dehk.

Cassius froze, just for a second. Something inside him turned. Not jealousy. Not anger. Just... that feeling. The one that felt like waking up underwater. Heavy and cold. All he could think about now was how something was clearly bothering Lottie, and how he couldn’t fight the urge to make sure that she was okay.

His gaze lingered for a breath too long, then he turned back to Kalliope, the grin on his face dimming enough for perhaps just her to notice.

He cleared his throat softly.

“We should probably go find our seats,” he said, voice still warm, but quieter now, and far less playful.

He moved without waiting, offering her a hand like a gentleman even as something behind his eyes gave him away. Cassius Vael, wrapped in silk, sharp as ever, perfectly composed... and already gone.
Pulled across the room like the north pole of a magnet being drawn to its south.

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

The sudden, violent shake of the ship caught the man off guard. The corpse beneath his fingers, still cold and lifeless, trembled as the explosion rocked the vessel, sending ripples through the air. His gaze flickered for a moment, irritation flashing across his features, the kind one might have when a delicate ritual is disrupted. He set the severed head back into the bag with a care that was almost painful, like a father tucking a child into bed.

"How inconvenient," he muttered under his breath, his voice low and controlled, tinged with a quiet fury. "I was just getting comfortable." He stood, straightening his coat with an elegance that belied the chaos around him. The tension in the air was palpable, but it wasn’t enough to ruffle him.

He stepped swiftly toward the door, his every movement measured and deliberate. The sound of screams and hurried footsteps echoed down the hallway as he made his way to the stairs, his mind already calculating how best to deal with the unruly rabble. But as he exited his room and turned toward the deck, he paused.

The screams of the passengers echoed off the walls, muffled by the violence that erupted in every corner. The man stood in the doorway of his quarters, his pale eyes cold as he watched the carnage unfold.

One assailant stabbed a woman in the back, the blade sinking deep into her spine as she collapsed with a cry. He didn’t even flinch. Another attacker, taller and broader, moved methodically, his strikes clean and precise as he cut down a man trying to shield his family. The blood pooled on the floor like a macabre painting, staining the polished wood beneath them.

His sharp eyes narrowed, gaze flickering over the attackers. Black and red, the colors of Karrnath—the very colors of his nation. But something was wrong. The red was too… bold. Too brash. They wore it like a parody, a mockery of what it meant to be Karrnathi. It was obvious to him that these attackers were not of his nation, but the similarity in color could lead to misunderstanding…to assumptions…An insult, either way in his mind.

The man’s gaze narrowed as another assassin swung a blade down on a child who had been running for help, the innocent cry silenced with a swift blow. His fingers twitched at his sides, his body still, but the storm inside him was building.

The assassins, so caught up in their bloodlust, hadn’t noticed him standing there in the shadows. They were sloppy, wasteful, like children playing a dangerous game. His lip curled with disdain. It wasn’t until the last scream of a fallen passenger echoed down the hall that he moved. The man stepped forward, his movements fluid, like a predator finally closing in on its prey. His hand twitched, summoning the dark tendrils of necromantic energy that would carve a path through the fools in his way. The time for observation was over.

"You picked the wrong colors for your cute little costumes." he sneered, disgust rippling through his chest. "A careless mistake that shall cost your lives, and more." His voice turned bitter. "It's offensive."

His hand clenched around the dark, arcane energy swirling at his fingertips. With a twist of his wrist, he drew forth the shadowy tendrils of necromantic magic. The hallway darkened as he moved with grace, his footfalls silent. The assassins caught in his path barely had time to react before he swept them aside like cobwebs in a storm.

A flick of his hand. The air shimmered with dark energy as the bones of the fallen assassins were ripped from their bodies, twisted and pulled into a swirling vortex around him. He watched with a detached interest as the bones hovered, spinning and slicing through the air, like jagged daggers eager to taste blood. His eyes gleamed with a twisted satisfaction.

"How fitting," he muttered, the bones hovering just inches from his fingertips. With another gesture, he sent them flying down the corridor, their sharp edges finding their marks with deadly precision. The screams were brief, cut off as they were pierced through the throat, the chest, and the limbs.

He stepped over the fallen bodies with the same poise and calculated elegance as he had when dining, his coat flowing behind him like the cloak of a king surveying his kingdom. As he made his way to the deck, he saw the battle unfolding below, his eyes locking on a lone figure. The Warforged, his glacial blue sword flashing as it cleaved through the air and through one of the would-be assassins. The man couldn't help but smirk.

"A fine weapon," he murmured to himself with begrudging approval. "But how… pedestrian."

The wind whipped around him as he stepped onto the deck, his feet barely making a sound as he floated above the railing. With a flick of his wrist, the bones around him flew towards another assailant, sharp as the teeth of a beast. They tore through the air like missiles, embedding themselves deep into the assassin’s body in a grotesque, fatal dance. The figure collapsed, crumpling to the deck in a heap of shattered bone and lifeless flesh.

The man floated down, his feet gently touching the ground near the bar. He straightened his coat, adjusting his tie with a calmness that seemed to mock the chaos around him. He took a moment to survey the carnage, his gaze lingering on his most recent victim, now reduced to little more than a human pin cushion.

"How dare they," he said softly to Wendel, Arya, Menzai, and Gears…his voice laced with satisfaction. "To interrupt one’s vacation is a crime fit for a brutal death."

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

Liana Vestra

Mentions/Interactions: Phia @princess, Meiyu @Tae, Talis @Oso

---

The moment Phia lunged, there was a flicker behind Liana’s eyes like a master watching a wild animal bare its fangs for the first time.

The girl was fast. Sloppy, yes, unrefined and screaming with raw instinct, but there was something undeniably alive in the way she moved. Her staff came crashing forward like the branch of a storm-tossed tree, unpredictable and deeply personal. What Liana hadn't expected in all of that erratic movement was the level of skill underneath...and when Phia's staff caught the side of Liana’s head just enough to pull her slightly off her centerline, she couldn't help but smirk.

Not enough to wound. But enough to impress.

“Oh,” Liana murmured, barely above the hiss of their motion, “seems you fight as well as you bleed, little bitch.”

She parried the next blow with a sharp tilt of her forearm, bracing one dagger against the length of her own wrist as it met the staff mid-swing. The resulting crack of impact rang through the tiled chamber like a note struck too hard on a piano, and it reverberated through both Liana and Phia’s bones painfully. The force of it sent her sliding half a step to the side, heels dragging briefly across the tile as Phia bore down on her with more attacks in mind.

Then came the second danger.

The illusions arrived like smoke trails twisting out of the corners of her vision. Half-formed silhouettes, mimicries of Phia’s fury, began closing from multiple directions, and for just the smallest fragment of a heartbeat, Liana hesitated as she was taken by surprise. She moved to strike one of the attackers, just to have her blade move through it as though it were a ghost. Then came analysis, recognition, and then…she adjusted.

Shadows. Projection. Clever.

Unfortunately for her, that was just enough of an error to give the caster her chance to strike.

Meiyu’s blade was already in motion by the time Liana turned. She caught it in her periphery, just a glint of steel at first, but there was a whisper of something slick on its edge that gave it away. Not just sharp as a razor’s edge, but poisoned as well.

Meiyu closed the distance like a dancer, her strike coming in an arc aimed precisely where Phia’s chaos had just created an opening.

Liana had to admit, It was…well-timed. Too well-timed.

The dagger sliced across the outer edge of Liana’s ribs, drawing a thin but precise line of blood that bloomed dark against the black of her tunic. She hissed...not in pain, but in disappointment. The moment was not a loss, but there was an adjustment.

Her counter was nearly imperceptible.

One of her daggers vanished from her hand in a cloud of black smoke as if it had simply grown bored of being held. Her now free palm snapped forward, fingers curling, and in the same motion she turned her body into Meiyu’s space, close enough to smell the the venom on her blade. Her free hand caught the wrist that had struck her and twisted, just slightly, just enough to send a message through the nerves.

And with that, she pushed hard enough to send Meiyu back into the blur of illusions she had conjured, causing her own magic to flicker as movement and reflection collapsed into one another.

The move gave her a window of opportunity to turn her focus back to Phia.

She twisted low beneath another wild swing, letting her body pivot with a grace that seemed impossible in such close quarters, then surged upward in a clean vertical arc, one obsidian dagger reversing in her grip as she brought the hilt toward Phia’s injured arm with brutal intent. It was not meant to slice. It was meant to punish. To shatter the rhythm.

If it landed, it would hit like a flash of lightning at the nerve center.

She followed it with a high kick toward Phia’s midsection, a movement both graceful and cruel, meant to drive her back and break her stance without delivering a killing blow. Liana’s every motion was precise, every breath measured, every strike meant to teach.

They were both more dangerous than she had first assumed, and so now she moved as if they deserved better.

Her next dagger danced between her fingers before snapping forward in a spinning arc, aimed toward the ceiling...no target, no kill. But as it struck the vent above, the light fixture shattered, casting the room into a flickering, strobe-lit chaos of broken arcane illumination and shadow-play, where perception was now a lie and motion became harder to track.

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

Ezekiel @Helo, Scratch / Vallena @Apex Sunburn, Callandra @princess

---

They move like wraiths, cutting through the smoke with a silence that screams louder than any noise could.

One flickers into view with a hiss of displaced air, appearing atop a crate for the briefest moment before vanishing again. With each flicker, she draws closer to Scaerthrynne, teleporting from one stack of wreckage to the next. Her twin blades gleam in the haze, each step a whisper of intent. No footsteps. No sound. Just the sharp scent of ozone and the low hum of magic clinging to her like a second skin. She doesn’t speak. She doesn’t rush. Her gaze is fixed on him ...a predator watching, observing, threatening with her presence, and waiting to strike until the perfect moment.

Another walks through the debris-strewn aisle like a priest at a funeral. Their hand dances with smoke and magic, eyes unseen beneath a blood-red hood, mouth muttering words you can’t quite hear until they are in your bones. But then ...they stop. A sudden stillness overtakes them, and they drop to one knee, fingers etching sigils into the floor with liquid fire. Magic begins to pool in the air around them, warping the space with heat and pressure, building toward something unknown.

The third steps forward with slow inevitability, dragging a brutal sickle along the metal floor. Sparks bloom with every step, and with each spark, you swear you see glimpses of your worst mistakes reflected in the gleam. They come for Ezekiel, eyes locked, movements steady. This one does not linger, instead they approach like the ending of a sentence ...already written, already brought to an end.

You all have time to take action. What do you do?

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

Bastion

Race: Warforged
Class: Warrior
Location: Airship; Top Deck - Bar
Interactions/Mentions: Arya @Potter, Wendel @FunnyGuy, Menzai @samreaper
Equipment:

equipment

☼ Tower Shield
☼ Greatsword made of Glacium (A material as hard as steel, yet formed from eternally frozen ice.)
☼ Titan Chain – A reinforced tow chain housed in his left palm, functioning as a powerful grappling hook.
☼ Aged Leather Satchel
☼ Worn but cherished scarf
☼ Maintenance Kit .
☼ Heavy-duty rations (for companions, not himself).
☼ A delicate glass figurine of a bird—an old keepsake.
☼ A locked, timeworn journal—contents unknown.

Attire:
☼ Etched and weathered plating with bronze accents.
☼ Fitted harness for carrying supplies.
☼ Worn scarf
Gold Balance: 44 gold
Injuries:
☼ None, but signs of past battle damage remain.

---

Bastion’s gaze shifted gently toward Arya. She’d said her bird was like a piece of the sky… and that he might like one too. That he wasn’t alone.

“Thank you,” he said quietly, his voice smaller than usual. “You are very kind.”

His fingers lingered over the painted sun on his chest, warm with thought, when Wendel’s voice rolled in.

“You have me for the time being. For all of today at best.”

Bastion turned, optics flickering faintly at the corners. There was something real in those words. Something impermanent. Something fleeting. And maybe… that was what made them matter more.

“Then I’m glad it’s today,” he replied simply, but with profound appreciation.

Wendel warned him about birds and shiny things in a hushed, conspiratorial tone...something about poop. Bastion tilted his head. He didn’t quite understand the logic, but it was offered with kindness, and that was enough. He nodded solemnly, committing the odd wisdom to memory.

Then Menzai spoke.

“To have the sky as your domain? What better gift could one ask for?”

Bastion looked up. The sky stretched wide and gold above them, bright with sun and promise. He didn’t need wings to understand the beauty in that. He thought of his gifted scarf. Of the sun painted on his chest. Of the people here beside him. These, too, were gifts.

But then the world changed.

It started as a tremble underfoot...barely a whisper, at first. Barstools rattled. Glasses shook in their places. Conversations faltered into silence.

The sound grew, swelling from below like something ancient and wrong awakening.

Then it struck.

BOOM.

Light and sound tore through the deck in a single breathless instant. The Stormrider groaned beneath them, bucking as lanterns swung wildly overhead. Bastion moved without thinking...placing himself in front of Arya, arm outstretched, shielding her from the blast.

Smoke followed, thick and black and curling upward from the stairwell like a living thing.

That’s when they came.

Eight of them, stepping out of the smoke like they belonged to it. Crimson hoods. Blank masks. Blades gleaming at their sides. The air around them bent, pulled tight, like gravity itself answered to them. They didn’t speak, they didn’t need to.

Bastion didn’t move. Not yet. His eyes scanned...calculating, tracking, assessing.

Then a man bolted for the stairs.

He didn’t make it. A flicker of steel. A body hitting the floor. No words. No hesitation.

And then it all fell apart.

Screams broke loose. Tables overturned. Glass shattered. Panic surged like a wave through the tavern. Bastion focused in on one of them...a tall figure closing in on a couple by the railing. The man, small but brave, stepped in front of his wife.

The blade slashed downward with sickening violence. The man collapsed, his blood painting the deck and the very flesh and face of his poor wife.

The woman screamed, and that was all it took. Bastion rose from his seat with singular purpose.

No roar, no battle cry, just motion...slow and purposeful. The kind of movement that didn’t need announcing. Like something inside him had turned back on. Like something long-buried had been told to wake.

“Everyone,” he said, his voice calm, unwavering, “find safety. Now.”

He walked forward. Steady. Certain. The way only someone who’s done this before walks. The way someone who was created for moments like this walks.

One of the assassins looked up.

Too late.

With a low mechanical hum, Bastion’s left palm split open...plates retracting to reveal the gleaming core of his Titan Chain.

And then it fired.

The chain screamed through the air like a whip, a blur of metal and intent, slamming into the assassin’s chest with a brutal thud.

Bastion pulled.

The chain reeled in with a grinding snarl, heavy links clinking against themselves as they devoured the distance. The assassin was yanked forward, limbs flailing, dragged across the deck like a marionette with its strings violently snapped.

Bastion’s eyes flared brighter now, glowing with cold clarity.

“You will cease your destruction or you will cease to exist.”

He wasn’t shouting. It wasn’t rage. It was a statement. A fact. A warning for all of them.

The assassin struggled against the pull, heels scraping the deck, cloak whipping behind him. It didn’t matter.

Bastion advanced.

Each step thudded like a war drum. Deliberate. Inevitable. His focus sharp enough to cut through stone. There was no emotion in his eyes. No fury. Just the memory of what he was made to be.

His right arm reached back...gripping the hilt of a blade sheathed along his spine.

It slid free with a hiss of frost.

The weapon shimmered with an unnatural chill, as if carved from frozen dusk. Forged from cerulean ice that refused to melt, the blade left streaks of cold across the deck as it passed, steam curling where it touched warm wood.

The assassin was nearly upon him now.

Bastion raised the sword with calm precision. There would be no more warnings. Just the clean, quiet promise of the end.

And then he struck.

Hard.

And final.

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

Location: Hiding in the Stall For Dear Life
Interaction: @Tae Meiyu @princess Phia

---

Talis clung to her satchel like if she held it tightly enough none of this would be real. Her knees were still drawn up against her chest but even tighter now, breath coming in shallow, shaking waves, the cold of the metal stall seat biting into her legs as the sounds outside twisted into something dark and sharp.

When Liana spoke, Talis froze. She didn’t recognize the voice, but the intention was clear.

Then came the response. It was the sweet, strange, wonderful girl, who had smiled at her and called her lovely and promised to walk beside her, as one. And now she was out there, standing between someone dangerous and a girl she barely knew.

Talis shut her eyes tightly.

She was going to die.

Of course she was.

She had known that since the beginning, since the moment she made her choice, since the night she walked out of that lab and sealed every door behind her. She had accepted it. She had made peace with it.

So why did it hurt so much now?

Because you’re a coward, she thought, lips pressed tight against her knees. Because you got scared and you started hoping maybe it wouldn’t come to this. Maybe you’d be lucky. Maybe you’d just disappear and no one would follow.

The sounds outside shifted again. Someone laughed. Someone raised a voice. Someone stepped forward.

Talis gritted her teeth and clutched the satchel tighter, her heart pounding loud enough to drown it all out.

You knew the risks. You did the right thing. You did what no one else would.

Her breathing hitched, and she had to bite her sleeve to stay quiet.

Even if they kill you, even if they burn you for it, you were right. You were right. You were…

But even that truth could not stop the tears.

And more than anything, more than fear or regret or the thousand ways she had imagined this moment, she found herself thinking of Phia. That strange little pink-haired hurricane of a girl who had offered her kindness without hesitation.

Please don’t let her get hurt. She doesn’t deserve this. She was only trying to help.

---

Mentions/Interactions: Phia @princess, Meiyu @Tae, Talis @Oso

---

From the center of the room, Liana tilted her head as Phia stepped forward and leveled that staff between them. A flash of pulsing blossoms curled into the wood and the girl’s voice was steady. Bold. Firm.

“You won’t be meeting anyone until you explain yourself. And until you do, you're not taking another step.”

Then came the warning about the beans. The line landed like a strange little stone tossed into deep water.

Liana blinked once…And then she smiled.

Not the cold smirk from before. This one was slower. Amused even, but still dangerous.

Her voice when it came was soft as velvet and smooth as blood over glass.

“You know… I truly admire conviction,” she said gently, letting her gaze fall on Phia. “So few people in this world still know what it means to stand for something. Even fewer are willing to bleed for it.”

She stepped to the side, only slightly, just enough to change the shape of the tension in the air. Her movements were precise and graceful, the kind of grace that comes from knowing exactly what one is capable of. Her blades remained in her hands but her posture never turned aggressive. Not yet.

Her gaze slid to Meiyu next, assessing and intrigued, a flicker of something like appreciation hiding in the corner of her eye.

“You came for her. That makes her interesting. That makes her mine—at least for now...And as much as I love a good bloodbath, I prefer to know why before the painting begins.”

“And you. Clever girl. You know how this ends and still choose to dance in the fire.” She exhaled with nonchalance. “Very few things impress me. You may count yourselves among them, if only for a moment longer.”

She looked between them now, the two young women standing in her way, one radiant with conviction and the other cloaked in sharp curiosity, and there was something almost reverent in her expression. Almost.

“It really is a shame,” she added, her voice softening further, almost wistful, “that I might have to kill such very pretty girls.”

Then, in that moment, as though she had planned it down to the very second, the explosive blast from the cargo hold erupts. The ship rocks violently from the detonation just as Liana's knives blur into motion.

In a flash of black and silver, she threw her daggers. One towards Phia, the other in Meiyu’s direction. The air cracked as she moved, blades catching the bathroom light as her cloak snapped behind her like a shadow come alive. The space erupted into motion.

The Devil had made her choice.

---

The time for talk is over. Combat has been initiated. I will reach out to those in this scene so we can discuss and make any necessary rolls before continuing.

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

Ezekiel @Helo
Scratch / Val @Apex Sunburn
Callandra @princess

---

The beeping reaches its final breathless moment. One last pulse. One last blink. Then—

White light. Heat. Sound like a god’s scream.

The bomb detonates. Not with fire, but with force. A wave of arcane energy explodes outward, tearing through the cargo hold like a tidal surge of lightning and sound.

Time fractures. Metal screams. Crates are hurled into the air like toys caught in a storm.

Ezekiel, you see it coming but move too slow. The blast hits you squarely, hurling you backwards through a wall of shattered barrels. Your body crashes against the cargo hold’s frame, the impact knocking the breath from your lungs and leaving you sprawled in a heap. But you’re alive, and you’re mostly intact.

Val, you dive behind a stack of crates just in time to dull the worst of it, but you are not fully unscathed. The shockwave tears across your side. You feel something sharp cut into you, but thankfully it doesn’t feel too deep. You hit the ground hard, pain flaring as you clutch your ribs and try to breathe through the sting.

Scratch, your instinct is to protect Vallena, no matter the cost. By the time you turn to act she dives to relative safety and here is no more time to react. But thankfully, you don’t have to.

Because Callandra does.

You feel her grab you just before the explosion hits. She throws herself over you, wrapping her body around yours in a single desperate motion.

Callandra, the blast strikes your back like nothing you’ve ever experienced before. It tears into you with unrelenting power. You feel bones crack. You feel something softer, more internal, give way. Your world turns white. You hit the ground like a ragdoll, and then there is nothing but ringing silence and the taste of blood.

Scratch, when the smoke clears, you are not untouched, but you are okay. Callandra, however, does not rise.

And around you, the chaos deepens.

The explosion has shattered more than wood and steel.

At the far end of the hold, the griffon’s cage is mangled, split wide open. You all hear it before you see it ...a shriek, wild and furious, echoing through the haze.

The griffon erupts from the wreckage, wings spread wide. It crashes into a stack of crates, sends barrels flying, talons slashing wildly at anything near. Its eyes are crazed. Its body is all muscle and panic and fury.

And behind it, another danger builds. The hull near the engineering deck is fractured. A jagged breach has formed near the sealed engineering room that houses the bound elemental itself. Sparks crackle from exposed conduit. The floor beneath you trembles.

You can feel it ...the elemental within is stirring. The wards are damaged. The bond is weakening.

Smoke swirls in thick columns now. Fires flicker in the debris. Somewhere behind it all, an alarm begins to wail.

The cargo hold has become a war zone.

And Callandra lies motionless in the rubble.

But that’s not all. You hear something else, something peculiar…

The sound of the very weave of space and time ripping open, and the smell of smoke and brimstone that follows. And in an instant, the silhouettes of 3 humanoid shapes appear in different corners of the room. The thick smoke in the air makes them difficult to make out, but you notice that they each are wearing some kind of red hood.

What do you do?

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

Mentions/Interactions: Phia @princess, Meiyu @Tae, Talis @Oso

---

The lights flickered.

Just once.

It was subtle, easy to miss, until the sudden rush of cold air swept through the bathroom like the breath of something ancient. The next heartbeat brought the smell of smoke and brimstone pouring into the room.

Black mist spilled into the space between Phia and Meiyu in a smooth coil, and from within it, in an instant, appeared a woman as though she had always belonged there. Cloaked in shadow and crimson trim, her figure emerged like a painting finishing itself stroke by stroke, deliberate and in no hurry. Her hair was dark as the smoke around her, falling in elegant waves beneath her red hood, and her eyes burned with a cold clarity that had no business looking so calm in such a strange situation.

Her boots clicked gently against the tile. Her lips parted in a smile that was not warm. Not even close.

She stood between them, not looking at either one immediately. Then, slowly, she turned her head, first to Phia, then to Meiyu, giving each a glance that weighed and measured and dismissed them all in the span of a blink.

“You should leave.” Her voice was velvet, low and unhurried, shaped with the poise of someone entirely unconcerned with their presence. “There is a bomb on this ship. Multiple, in fact. The first is going to detonate in…” she glanced upward, as though consulting the ceiling. “Well…any moment now.”

She smiled again, a flash of white framed by shadow. “So if you have anything you care about still aboard this ship, now would be a lovely time to consider your exit.”

Two glints of black metal shimmered into existence in her hands. The obsidian daggers caught the dim light with a ripple like oil on water, curved and elegant and utterly lethal.

She turned her head just enough to glance toward the closed stall door.

“As for me,” she said, twirling one blade slowly between her fingers, “I have a very important meeting with the redhead behind door number one.”

Her eyes never left the door now.

“So unless you would like to be in the way when this gets… interesting, I suggest you run along.”

She took one slow step forward. Just one. Enough to make the air shift again, thick with promise.

“I am not feeling generous today.”

And just like that the snake and the mongoose had met The Devil.

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

As you start coming up with some semblance of a plan, you reach for control, for purpose, for anything that makes sense of this moment. Then you hear it. A sound that cuts deeper than steel. Beeping. Precise. Unstoppable. A countdown has begun.

The device is awake now. Not waiting. Not hesitating. It was never meant to be stopped.

The bomb… it was never meant to be defused. There is no miracle. No redemption in wires or cleverness, nor the grace of gods. This was always meant to end one way.

You see it now. You feel it in your chest. The people in this hold were never meant to leave. This was never a rescue. It is a message. A warning. A piece of something far larger, far worse.

And your part in it has already been written.

You have only one choice, and even that has been taken from you.

All you can do is seek cover and hope that Ezekiel's unfinished prayer is enough to save you.

Ezekiel @Helo
Scratch / Vallena @Apex Sunburn
Callandra @princess

I need each of you to please roll me a D20

Neo Genesis: Chronicles of Eberron

Location: The Place of Biological Release
Interaction: @Tae Meiyu @princess Phia

---

Talis paused mid-splash, blinking water from her lashes as Phia stepped closer.

“You’re washing away the sweat of your terror. I hope you are not afraid of me.”

She froze, water still dripping from her fingertips, then let out a laugh that sounded more like a cough and a hiccup colliding.

“No no, not at all, I’m just… you know, terrified of everything else. Entirely unrelated. You’re lovely. It’s fine.”

She grabbed a towel and started dabbing at her face with frantic little pats, as if she could press the fear right out of her pores. Her reflection in the mirror was wild-eyed and red-faced, hair still frizzing from stress and sink humidity. She gave it a tight little smile that said, we’re trying our best.

As she looked over to Phia…for a brief, shining moment, it felt like she could actually breathe again. Phia was odd, yes, but kind. Gentle in a strange, floaty way. Maybe she wasn’t alone in this strange nightmare of an airship. Maybe she could even relax a little.

The click of the door behind them echoed like a thunderclap.

Talis turned, shoulders lifting like they were trying to cover her ears. Her eyes went wide. Her stomach dropped.

The snake woman.

Standing in the doorway like a shadow given purpose. Smiling like the kind of person who complimented your necklace while imagining how to use it as a garrote.

“...Oh, good. I was beginning to feel left out.”

Talis made a sound. Not a word. Just a faint squeak that may or may not have originated in her soul.

“So. What did I miss?”

Talis opened her mouth and something came out, something not entirely chosen by her brain.

“THE BEANS!!!” she blurted, eyes wild. “From this morning. They are… staging a full-scale revolt. It’s a siege situation. Intestinally. I must go. I’m so sorry.”

She turned on her heel and practically dove into the nearest stall, slamming the door behind her with enough force to rattle the coat hook. The lock clicked into place a moment later, followed by the rustle of cloth and a quiet, whispered gasp of pure panic.

She sat on the closed lid, knees tucked up, arms wrapped tight around her satchel as if it might float her away from all of this.

Please go away please go away please go away. Her thoughts spun like a wheel on ice. I cannot die in a bathroom. Not today. Not like this.

She shut her eyes and tightened her grip on the bag.

Maybe if I’m quiet enough they’ll just forget I was ever here.