Member
RPM
The Otter
Expendable
AwesomeZero5
Zapdos
Kronshi
ERodeGalahad Caradoc
Miina Malina
The streets of Brightlam were busy in the aftermath of the attack. People worked tirelessly to repair their city, as others attempted to find normalcy in life. The fighting itself was only half of the proverbial battle, it seemed as though the lion’s share of the effort would be spent fixing everything- and everyone that broke.
The Kirins, despite being the veritable heroes of the fighting, were no exception; Galahad found himself carrying boxes, rubble, even people, in the mornings, working enough physical labor to make him feel like he was training again. He set a crate of bandages and clear alcohol down as a tired looking white mage opened the flaps of one of many medical tents. As it had in these past few days, Galahad’s halberd found more use today as a crowbar as he used the spike to pry open the top of the box.
The sound of the mage’s thanks was quickly drowned out by a gaggle of children playfighting with sticks running past them. Galahad snorted softly as he watched them go- only to notice a familiar head of red hair ducking into what looked like a shop or bar built into the thick trunk of a tree.
Curious enough, and recalling Izayoi’s advice from earlier, Galahad poked his head inside as well. Sure enough, it was who he thought it was.
”Miina?” Galahad remarked as he sighted the redhead again, ”Thought that was you.”
“?” That was an unusually feline noise, even for a mystral, which all but confirmed that the short redhead could only be the erstwhile red mage of their group, only just starting to turn around with…
Honestly it probably wasn’t worth putting a name to whatever was in the bottle, it wouldn’t last.
Although, Galahad could be forgiven for not immediately recognising her; neither wearing her full mage getup, nor her more rural outfit, Miina seemed to have stopped dressing halfway and wandered outside as soon as it wouldn’t get too many questions.
“Y-Yeah. Do you need s-something? I thought you were all healed n-n-now.”
Galahad certainly cocked an eyebrow at the getup- not necessarily disapproving, but more… confused than anything. ”Ah, no I’m fine for now, thank you. I’d been meaning to come find you in the aftermath of all of the fighting, I was just surprised to find you here.”
Galahad glanced around at the bottles of alcohol lining the shop- then at the bottle in Miina’s hand. ”Didn’t much take you for a drinker- though I suppose now is as good a time as any.” He remarked as he picked out a bottle on a relatively high shelf as well.
”To be fair, I also didn’t take you as the type to fling yourself off magic ledges,” he snorted, more amused now that more than a few days had passed.
“Had to c-catch Izayoi,” she answered with a shrug, opening the bottle and taking a sniff. Hmm, fruit, but she wasn’t really sure which fruit. Not that it mattered, it still tasted good enough to drink without issue.
And she had low standards there anyway.
“I c-c-could reduce the falling speed, so… it w-would have been fine. N-Not as good, but…” her gaze moved away from Galahad’s upper torso and down to his legs, “How do you n-not break your legs?”
At least. There was also the question of ‘how do you jump that high’, but Miina was more concerned about getting down from high places than getting into them. She could climb fine.
A simple question- yet something no one had asked him before. For the most part, it was just assumed that Galahad could basically land from most heights and be fine. But breaking down the specifics was not quite as simple. ”Would you believe me if I told you I don’t actually have bones in my legs and they’re held together purely by sinew and skin?” Galahad offered as he took a swig of his bottle.
“No. I’ve h-healed you.”
”You are, of course, correct. That was a lie. The actual how is hard to explain in a precise science. Edreni Dragoons learn to jump over the course of years of training. I could leap a house when I was 16, but I couldn’t jump like I do now until my early twenties.” Galahad explained, pulling a pair of chairs out from a nearby table and offering a seat to Miina. No sense standing around when they could sit instead. ”Best I can explain is that it’s a combination of martial training and magic infused physical therapy. ”
”All in all, much more mundane and boring than many of the feats you’re capable of whipping up with just a bit of concentration.” Galahad chuckled. ”I’ve spent over a decade learning to fall without snapping my bones- and you can just cast a spell to achieve the same effect.”
“N-N-Not the same,” Miina shook her head, taking the seat and pulling her legs up, “It’s no good as a r-reaction, or if I’m doing something… I just…”
Well, ‘I jump off reasonably high things oddly often’ was an odd thing to think, but it was true. “I c-c-can manage warehouse rafters or… mmm, p-probably a rooftop, but I was thinking about b-b-bigger drops. It could be useful…”
Or just as a quicker way down from climbing. Going up was easy, it was the getting down that was the hard part. She looked down at her drink, once again trying to discern some specific fruit information. Maybe… plums? She thought there was a hint of plum in this one.
”Well…” Galahad’s brows furrowed for a moment as he considered the possibilities. Teaching something- well anyway, was oft harder than actually doing that something. ”As strange as it sounds, falling great distances is becoming a shockingly common experience among our group.” he remarked. The fight in Kugane involved Eve falling out of the sky. The fight with Izayoi’s former master involved them falling- not out of the sky, but still a far distance. Then there was this most recent fight amongst Valheim’s airships- and Galahad doubted this would be the last time they faced Valheim’s fleet.
”I doubt I’d be able to make a dragoon out of you in such short notice, but if you had the time, I could see if I couldn’t teach you how to fall greater distances without hurting yourself.” Galahad offered, ”At the risk of sounding rude, it would be easier for someone of your size rather than say- Arton, if he were still with us- to learn.”
“G-G-Got nothing better to d-do,” Miina replied, looking outwards, “And th-there’s trees here. That helps.”
Which was an understatement, but if there was one thing she was exceptionally good at, it was climbing, and it gave them a lot of different options for heights. Although, jumping straight from the top again might not make for the best experience.
”It's mostly in the knees,” Galahad explained idly as he took a sip from his drink, before capping the bottle and settling it in a pouch. ”Oh, and maybe while we’re at it, you can help me with familiarizing myself with this here-” he chuckled as he fished out a round green orb from his pocket, tossing it up into the air and catching it.
”According to the shopkeep I bought it from- its supposed to be Cure materia.” Galahad remarked, ”I figured it might be helpful for more than one of us to be able to cast healing spells. As it stands, you do the bulk of our magical heavy lifting, so with this I might be able to help take at least some of the burden off your shoulders.”
“… You want me to s-s-stab you so you can heal?”
”I…” Galahad stared blankly at the smaller mystrel for a long moment of stunned silence. ”Uh… If it were all the same to you, I’d rather not be stabbed.”
“Th-Then what is there to practice?” Miina blinked slowly, “Doing it f-for you is the entire p-p-point of Materia. The aether it gathers can be m-manipulated, but… isn’t an easy healing s-spell enough? There’s nothing cl-cl-clever to do with it.”
Well, that was a lie, but ‘healing Rudolf’s bizarre anatomy’ was something that needed far more finesse than just controlling magic, and it wasn’t like the battlefield or a small group called for extra finicky adjustments… Miina’s vanity might, but that was all.
”No I meant- … You know what? Let’s just go practice falling without hurting ourselves.” Galahad sighed.
“W-W-Well, if I fall wrong, you c-can practice then.”
Why did she sound so upbeat about that?
