The scale-skinned man looks at Valai in amazement, and some amusement, and says ”Yew har an ‘elf,’ yew say? Yew can herdly say tha wurd – eluf. And tha elufs harn’t extinct, thay left. I sippose yew’r from Kyonin, eh? Whull, I’fe bean threw Kyonin, fought thear. Thear har no elufs thear.”
He pauses, then continues ”Az to me, my naym iz Zellyser. I ham a scowt and guide foor tha Fifth Harmy uf Exploracion, uf tha Hempire uf Taldor. I…it iz comming back…I was ahn patrol, in a swamp, hunder attack, and wounded,” he puts a massive hand to his right side, brushing his fingers against it and inspecting them as if he expects them to come away bloody, amazed that he is unharmed. ”Badly wounded, and running foor mine life. That iz awl I remimbur, until awaking up hear.”
Valai's eyes widen.
"Interesting," she says. "Well, I have some bad news for you, and some worse news. The bad news is that yes, I am from Kyonin. The Kingdom is once again inhabited by my people. The worse news is that from my perspective, the time of the Fifth Army of Exploration is currently over two thousand years ago."
The Elf casts a clinical look on the containment vats.
"Those things must be very good at preserving their contents," she says.
Turning back to Zellyser. "Your long removal from the world explains the linguistic oddities. You may be just as, hah, 'fresh' as you were during Taldor's heydays, before the empire fell in on itself and was eclipsed by Cheliax, but the world has moved on."
From Zellyser, she turns to LK-X85.
"How about you? What is your last memory prior to waking up here?"
"Oi! On it, on it, Willy-boy!" Celia bleets, spurred into to running at full speed by the goat's horny approach.
"N' I'll beat you there, too! As I just finished tellin' Boodka, I think, I AM ALL THAT IS GNOME!" Celia laughs, holding an imaginary hat to her head.
"Don' worry though, goat. I'll make up the eating, later. You don't taste very good, bu' I'll bet you like bein' pet, yeah?" Celia then switches from goat.
"Valai, I'm comin'! Your goat wasn't very specific though, ya' in some kind of trouble?"
"Brushing and feeding are better," William replies, running to keep up with Celia -- but conspicuously not passing her at any point. In fact, the goat deliberately lets the small priestess get ahead of him when they approach the hold.
Celia enters the previously sealed-off area with wide eyes, skidding to a halt after her sprinting. Both the sight of the android and the tiefling put her at a loss.
"... Valai...? I see a large sword, but not the owlbear you 'ere predictin. N' you're talking, so I assume ya aren't gettin' eaten. That's good."
"Celia Deschmertz, our ship's chaplain and local high priestess of Cayden Cailean," Valai says, her voice suspiciously dry. She gracefully indicates Zellyser. "I introduce to you a two thousand year old tiefling from the fallen Empire of Taldor, who has not seen fit to mention his name." Another graceful gesture, this at LK-X85. "And this is LK-X85, who has been told he is not alive, and was created to be a high-quality assistant or servant to people of worth. And I am known as Valai Blackheart to some. Our mutual host is the scientific genius known as the Mechanic. The floating orb is Keth, and the goat is William. There. Now we are all acquainted."
Celia flares her nostrils like a rabbit for a moment, one gnomish ear twitching a bit as she appears to process Valai's mountain of words. She seems to understand enough of it, however, to punctuate the ending of introductions with a smile and a wave.
"Welcome to the party, then!" Celia beams. "Though it would be right an' proper to know everyone at the table. And sorry if I interrupted something, li'."
Zellyser stands in stunned silence after the elf tells him he has been somehow been in…storage…for thousands of years. And that, somehow, Taldor has fallen from greatness, eclipsed by something called Cheliax? Isn’t that what the land beyond Taldor’s western border is sometimes called? he thinks. It’s a wilderness, how can it be greater than the empire? How can I begin to make sense of this?
Shaking his head, he understands that the elf is speaking to the strangely armored man as if he too has newly arrived. Before the man responds, a small person and a goat come rushing into the room, and Zellyser thinks to himself Ah, a gnome and a goat. At least these are not creatures out of legend and fantasy, like this ‘elf’.
On hearing the introductions, Zellyser says, ”Az I haf said, my naym iz Zellyser, eluf. But yoor introwductions confooze me. This being naym’d Elkay Exaytifive - he iz not halive? And forgiff me, high priestess, but thear iz no god by that naym.”
"Ze-lie-zur?"Celia attempts, wrinkling her nose with effort. "Please tell me I got that one right, ya? And sorry, I don't... I don't know of Elkay Exaytifive... but I'm not very well, connected."
The gnome lets her words hang there apologetically, though she suspects that Elkay didn't survive for 2000 years. She puts a hand on William and tries to scratch him behind his goaty ears.
"Valai called me a high priestess, but I'm really jus' an itinerant servant, and my god is new, ya! He was a man, once, and 'e got really hammered and woke up a god! True story!"
"I've been told Mr Zellyser, that if you have not been born, you cannot be alive. I find many philosophers disagree on this point, and look towards more higher order functions of the mind, but this has the analogous of making some that were born not truly alive... Sentience is a difficult thing to measure. And while..." he proceeds to delve into more references and thoughts, almost oblivious to anyone truly paying attention to him...
"Well, ya seem alive enough to me." Celia announces, patting the android on what she hopes is his back.
"Mr. Mechanic, can ya talk some sense inta him before he kills us all by confusion? Not so sure if he's gonna come outta this spiel anytime soon-we used ta haul a wizard like this..."
Zellyser looks down on the tiny acolyte of The Accidental God and a smile crosses his face, though it is a somewhat frightening smile, as his snake-like eyes convey no warmth and the rise of the left side of his mouth causes a patch of red scales on his cheek to ripple slightly. "Zell-ih-sir, little whun, iz how my name iz said. I ham glad to zee a being I recognize, even iff yoor god iz unknown to me," he tells her, in a deep, but surprisingly gentle, voice.
Turning to look at the others in the room, he says, "It hwill tayk zum time to make sense uf hall this. Elkay iz not an armirred man, but a metal man, made to talk. Valai iz an eluf, returned to Golayrion zince I knew that land, long yearz ago it seems somehow. Hand why haff yoo named the orb hand the goat? Does either answer hwen called?"
Valai snaps her fingers at William, who immediately trots to her side -- and bleats challengingly at Zellyser.
Realization dawns on the gnome.
"Oh. LK. You're talking abou' Mr. Philosophocalypse over here. Not 'Elkay'... Er, gonta be a bit honest, Mr. Zell-ih-sir... you lost me there for a sec or two."
"Well, I think introductions aside, we should make sure you are well," suggest the Mechanic. "I think making sure you have some food is in order. Come along, we can meet the others."
They head up to the next deck and meet with the remaining group. After a large meal that was constructed from seemingly nowhere, they all take the time to explain their current situation.
A few hours pass without any other events. However, William is soon bleating at one of the 'windows' with an almost panicked sound to to his calls. A brief shadow is seen outside, floating past the ship.
cocks his head to one side "My memory banks do not include primal languages such as the goats native tongue... but it seems concerned" The android gets up in a forced motion and walks to the window and looks at the goat in common "What is it my four legged compatriot?" looks over the goat and through the window
LK would see through the window a horrific beast. Somewhat like a sea serpent, yet it had three mouths. It was half a mile long and it's skin appeared to be adamantine. It swam out of sight so quickly, LK almost doubted he saw it at all.
William clip-clops over to Lym and tries to hide his head under her robes.
"Big! Ugly! Mouths! Teeth!" he whimpers in Goat.
Zellyser continues to be amazed by all the strange things that occur and appear around him. Distracted by all this, it takes him a moment to realize it, but once the meal is served, it occurs to him he has not eaten in over two thousand years, and he is insatiably hungry. He eats far more than his share, but cannot help himself. Once sated, he sits back contentedly and lazily, looking not unlike a bizarre serpent that has just eaten a number of small beasts. He and the other members of this odd crew talk further about their backgrounds and how this place works, and he begins to accept his new surroundings. He also pays careful attention to how the others pronounce their words in Taldan, and works to adjust his own pronunciation to better match theirs, so they can understand each other more easily.
Hearing LK-X85’s description of what he has seen out the windows, Zellyser asks in an alarmed tone, ”The size of a city?” He rushes over to the window and looks out, but seeing nothing continues with his questions, ” Hwhat zort of mammal? What waz it doing? Where did it go? The size of a city? Really?”
Valai freezes halfway to her chair, her suit already on, and turns to the Mechanic, her eyes wide and her face pale. "A what is in the vicinity?!"
If not for William urgently tugging on her sleeve, the Elf might have just stood there, trembling either with rage or fear.
Valai sits down, checks both her and William's suits, buckles up -- and all the while, she demonstrates the fact that the Elven language actually includes a surprising number of colourful expressions. When Elven runs out of ways for her to vent her feelings at the situation, Valai seemlessly switches to ranting and cursing the vagaries of Fate in Draconic, Gnomish and Thassalonian...
"-so, we thought we could use a pulley, the now-dead squid was just too darn 'heavy, and so cap'n Neems in out flatboat, 'e decides to go an'-," Celia somehow manages to talk adeptly, even with food in her mouth during the meal, somehow veering very, very far off topic before the beast in question shows up. However, one could get the idea that the purple-haired gnome really doesn't like squid.
After the sighting of the ship-eater and the mechanic's dire warnings, the gnome follows in Valai's footsteps (albeit with much less swearing. Again, she uses her racial abilities to talk to Valai's goat during the fact, bleating awkwardly as her face moves with a rabbitish quality.
"Gonna be okay, William. It's gonna be, I mean. Tell Valai that, too. If I tell her, it's going to sound like preaching, because I think my friend in heaven will make it so, or we'll be too dead ta notice."
Zellyser tries not to struggle as he is put into the suit and belted into the strange chair, but having only just been released from two millenia of inactivity, he finds his body wants to move. He resists Kethans' efforts to get him contained at first, though Zellyser knows he means well - he just can't help it. Finally, accepting the inevitable and distracted by the gnome who appears to be fluent in Goatese, Zellyser takes his seat and consents to being buckled in. Even so, he can't help wiggling and looking about for the Ship Eater, and his fingers twitch and reach for his sword every few minutes.
works his way into his suit without any complaint
They all prepared for the worst. Minutes flew by without a single event outside of the ship. Eventually, they could see the ship eater slowly swimming over to the remains of the Terran ship. It bean to bit and tear at it, chewing through metal as if it were paper. Debris flew in all directions. A large piece flew violently at their ship.
"I don't have enough time to avoid it," warned the Mechanic. "Brace for impact."
The ship was struck and rocked like a galleon in a terrible summer storm. However, they were all intact. Their ship continued forward, soon out of sight of the feasting beast.
"We're away from the Ship Eater. However, according to the ship, it's fuel lines have been severed and we're quickly set to run out of fuel. I'm going to have to make an emergency landing for repairs. Castrovel is nearby, so we'll stop there."
An hour after the incident, they were entering the atmosphere of the Green. Lush jungles filled the ground as far as the eye could see. The Mechanic made for a clearing to land in. The ship groaned and creaked as its landing gear forced its way out of a smashed hull. They landed safely, but the ship sounded as if she was needing a good rest.
"Well, we've made it, but it might be a day or two before we can leave again. In the meanwhile, welcome to Castrovel."
At the news that the ship is headed to Castrovel, Valai buries her head in her hands and moans as if she had just been informed that she was headed to one of the Lower Planes. She refrains from more vocal comments, however, other than to say: "Removing those stasis tubes was the right thing to do."
Once on the planet, the Elf very firmly pulls up her hood.
"How likely is that monstrous beast to still be up there when we leave?" she asks the Mechanic. "And is there any way to expedite repairs?"
"I'll zay it waz, Valai. Two thouzand years and more I slept on that ship, and the day I get off it, it gets eaten by a dragon that zwims between the ztars. I don't believe I haf zaid it yet - thank you all for awakening me."
After the rough landing, Zellyser asks Valai, "why were you so upzet to learn that we were landing on Castrovel? Hisn't any world better than being up there in space with that monzter around? What iz so bad about thiz place?"
"What fortune, luck, and all that. I mean, what were tha' chances?" the gnome asks no one in particular during the landing sequence, assuming in advance that the landing was going to be just fine. The accidental god had already pulled through.
"I mean, less than Trew gettin' his with Aleysia, and that's sayin' something, but I'm gettin' esoteric over here and I notice I'm no longer bleetin' in goat."
---
Celia paws at the exit like a caged animal as soon as she is removed from her safety tethers. Valai's misgivings aren't unimportant, but they won't change the fact they'd reached Castrovel and Celia wanted to roll around on the ground, goshdarnit! How many gnomes had the opportunity to stain their spacesuits in such a verdant place? Not to mention she missed dirt, land masses, and the ability to run without going in a circle.
"Pray you don't find out," is all Valai says to Zellyser.
Turning to the mechanic, she asks: "Which part of Castrovel are we on? Do you know if there are any major settlements nearby? And what kind of materials do you need to fix the ship?"
"According to an initial scan of topography before our landing, we have arrived approximately one mile outside of the city of Qabarat, a major city of primarily lashunta population.
"A review of the ship reveals that we are mostly in need of metal to rework the hull and rebuild fuel lines. Nanites are able to fabricate such materials, but providing the materials or their equivalent ourselves would bypass the lengthy process."
"That would require us to go into town and barter," Valai says. "Sir Mechanic, do we have anything in the way of legal tender, or valuable objects? I could a few illusion-performances, but I doubt those would earn us much money unless the populace is starved for entertainment."
"That's fine by me!" Celia announces, pawing at the exit with more gusto. "But canna we get out of here, please?! I wanna see outside!"
If you want to see the outside there's a perfectly fine Viewport here, there's also I'm sure some holographic or at least primitive displays. LK says apparently very pleased with himself for his good advice
"You are taking her too literally," Valai says, sighing. "What she means is, that she wishes to go outside so she may see and experience everything. Gnomes, you know. It's new experiences or insanity and death."
"Oh, but there's always tha' chance we get all three at tha' same time, but we don't live when we aren't movin' or doin' or something, a' least."
As if to punctuate her point, she flicks the exit hatch.
"I can promise tha' gettin' out will mellow me..."
Well if you insist, although we can quickly see more of the world from a screen here. The android gets up and holds open the door for the little lady
Celia stepped outside and was greeted by a lush jungles and skies as clear as gin. She squealed with delight at the sight and proceeded to remove her helmet. The air was warm on her skin as she took in a deep breath. The air smelled like the Mwangi and she felt right at home. LK stepped out not long after to find an overjoyed gnome in awe of her surroundings.
"Well, I would welcome zomething to look at other than the inzide of thiz ship, and it zounds like the little one likes what she zees out there."
Zellyser removes his suit and leaves it inside the ship. He steps through the door, eyes scanning all around him and hands ready to draw a weapon.
Valai strips off her spacesuit before - cautiously - stepping outside, William Goat trotting along at her side.
"Humid," she says, dispassionately, while glancing around.
While her general attitude may be relaxed, the way she holds onto her quarterstaff is anything but.
William Goat trots over to the nearest plantlife and sniffs it, almost daintily.
Having done all that he can to ascertain the nature of this new and strange greenery... William proceeds to eat it, his jaws chomping stoicically away.
"Cayden be praised! This is gonna be awesome!" the gnome declared, proceeding to roll around in the dirt and muck of the jungle. She also ends up grabbing a sprig of something on one pass and rolls back in the direction of the goat to proffer a frond of something or other.