Grumbling under his breath about Ezgara's unsolicited advice, Odioki steps back, reloads, and fires at the dragon.
"That had nothing to do with you," he says, glancing at the elf.
Odioki fires haphazardly at clouds, then reloads and fires at dirt clods.
"No one ever said I was cut out for this kind of thing."
Odioki jumps for the creature, but even with Ezgara's guidance, he aims short. He scrambles to grab on, and for a moment he thinks the boney elf upon the creature's flank is the last thing he'll every see. But then his fingers find a hold, and he is flooded with relief. "The thief survives." He gives Ezgara a wry smile.
Odioki covers his ears in anticipation, not even waiting until Ezgara has stopped speaking.
Odioki thinks of his brother, Tonaro, falling through the ice on that fateful day, the panic, and the struggle to rescue his twin from the frozen water. He shakes the thought away. Even so, painful as it is, he would never give that memory away. Odioki is relieved when he hears Onye volunteer. "Are you sure?" Odioki asks, hoping however that Onye doesn't change his mind.
Odioki isn't thrilled about sensing someone probing his mind.
"I have memories of Ezgara I wouldn't mind losing, if that's what you mean." Odioki looks at the dishevled elf. "I'm sure we'll make new ones anyway."
Odioki Breathes out and fires!
Breathes in and reloads, then breathes out and fires again!
"These aren't easy targets, are they?"
Hey folks I'm currently on vacation in Seoul so my posts might be out of sync, but I'm still able to post. Of course please bot me if I'm holding things up.
Odioki tries to climb too and falls onto Ezgara. "Did you grease it or something?"
Maybe it's due to his vampiric nature, maybe it's the late nights spent "researching", but Soomdevi burns most of the daylight hours by sleeping, preferring to wake when the shadows are long, and the crickets begin to sing. He wears his veiled mask to keep nosy students at bay, and to hide the bags under his eyes. He finds some comfort in watching the mummies work, in their finding a purpose in undeath, but he is uncomfortable with that realization. Any feelings he has about it he explores through cryptic poetry and discusions with Noxolo and Mariama. After sunset he takes his students out to collect insects and fauna, looking for the impact of the red silt in the local ecosystem and in the blood. His study group only consists of students who can see in the dark, as he refuses to by burdened with light sources. Plus the light brings unwated attention. While the students are busy, he looks for any signs of interference from the shadow plane and tries to keep his paranoia in check.
"Can someone please swap ganglions with this old man so he'll shut up," Odioki says, gesturing dismissively toward Ezgara.
"Ghosts love getting drunk," says Broomzad the ghost, thereby confirming the theory.
Odioki reloads and readies to shoot a the outsider when it regenerates. Handcannon:
Broomzad tries to entertain Tombzaad with a juggling act, something he used to enjoy when he was alive, but doesn't seem as capable of now that he's a ghost...
"I see your eye still glitters, my queen," Broomzad says, proud of the gift, yet also wanting it back, yet also also too ghostly to play with marbles anymore. So, mostly just sad.
Odioki chuckles at the light on the end of his gun, and at Ezgara's comments. "The only thing I'm thinking right now is how do we find Kaneepo and get out of here safely? And also, can you stop rambling for even five seconds?"
"Boo!"
Odioki is not used to turning away strangers in the frosen north. He calls out to the thin man, his hands in the air to show he means no harm. "Who are you? What do you want?"
Hey folks, I'm back and have survived. Thanks for your patience. Are there any pinkskins left alive? Anything else I need to know to get back into things?
Hey folks, I'm back and have survived. Thanks for your patience. It looks like we're leveling. Anything else I need to know to get back into things?
Broomzad is horrified to see his animated corpse delivering fish! Surely it could be put to better use as a deadly killing machine out in the pinkskin's villages. Still, it isn't hard to put two and two together. "Friends," he says, looking at the ectoplasmic arrow in his chest. "I think I'm dead!" He begins to wail inconsolably.
GHOST?! Broomzad nearly panics when Kadosh screams. But then he remembers there's no such thing as ghosts. "I think it's this arrow. Something happened when it pierced my heart." He looks at the mutilated body on the ground and, while disgusting, he thinks little of it. That could be any kolbold. Could be Pepin for all he knows. "Anyway, let's go kill some pinkskins!"
Odioki puts away his gun, concern on his face, having seen the encroaching tear between the planes. "This can't be a good sign." Odioki concentrates, rubbing a coin between the thumb and forefinger of each hand, and tries to slow the effect with his mind.
Broomzad finds everyone standing around the spinning cauldron. Oh, what a silly group. He's so glad he didn't die back there when that whole arrow-through-the-heart thing happend. "What's everybody looking at?" He's a little more incorporeal than before, perhaps ectoplasmic even. The arrow still sticks out of his chest, and his feet don't quite touch the ground, which is a little odd. But, other than all that, he feels great! Hungry for VENGEANCE, but what else is new? "Did I miss anything?"
If there's a key to the seventh arch, are there keys to the others? "We'll get this key and disrupt the ritual, don't worry."
Odioki, who's never actually seen a circus and only heard stories about them, attempts to hype up the "show". "Lion tamers! Dancing bears! Poodles... walking on balls!"
Odioki can't help but smile. "You all know Ezgara is not all there, right?"
Odioki tries to keep his reactions to himself as he passes through the gates of Lepidstadt. The dark eyed Erutaki man isn't quiet or shy, but he doesn't want anyone to mistake his unworldliness for stupidity. His unfashionable clothes, and thick accent are bad enough. He's read about cities. He's seen drawings and heard the tales. He knows they're full of buildings and towers all crammed together. Everyone living on top of everyone else, like sea parrots nesting in the rocky cliffs. He's been to Ul-Angorn, not that anyone here would call that town a city, and he'd never seen so many huts and sheds. These cities in the south, though, they were something else. When the caravan passes a tavern, Odioki is relieved, he was hoping for a place to rest and get a drink. When they pass a second, even larger tavern, he is even more relieved. A bookstore, a curio shop, he doesn't know where to go first. Then they pass a bakery, and he's beyond hungry. He's only heard about bakeries in fairytales, but of course Lepidsadt would have one, with a pink awning and cakes in the window. And then a second one across the street? What kind of place needed two bakeries across from each other? How does that work? Were they friends? And then a third tavern?! Overwhelmed, Odioki turns his attention from the street to his hands. He rubs together the coins from Lung Wa his late grandfather gave him, and the sensation calms his nerves. He isn't sure about all this Gatewalker business. He isn't sure it's possible to understand what happened. But he is curious. He knows about magic. Know it's unreliable and unpredictable at best. Why should the gates be any different? But, if it wasn’t the spirit of his dead twin, Tonaro, who called him into the gate that fateful night, then who or what was it?
When the shadow of the obelisk falls upon the stage, Soomdevi steps forward. He wears his veil down, and for a few moments he silently surveys the audience and takes it all in, the families, the teachers, the students. Then he removes his mask and tucks it under his arm. He smiles. "I wasn't supposed to be here. I was supposed to go to some other Magaambya. But I didn't want that. I wanted something greater. I knew that I could be something greater than just the vampire boy that everyone shunned. How, or who, I had no idea. But that's the thing. You don't have to know. You've just got to get out there and figure it out. And if they think you're weird? They'll learn the truth eventually."
Sad that he won’t be running missions for Koride, Soomdevi nonetheless continues to study the connections between the shadow plane and the material plane, mostly by consuming the strange plants and bugs he brought back from his trips. The good thing is that he can partake of his supplies, and work on his thesis, while also hanging out in the tunnels, listening to music and dancing with Noxolo and Mariama, smoking cloves, and philosophizing. Shadowdevi dances too, giggling and rolling their eyes, while Blinks sleeps. Soomdevi is not entirely sure if it was the iridescent beetle he mashed into a paste and licked off the plate, or the purple, trumpet shaped flowers he dried and brewed into a tea, but as Noxolo dances, the shadows take on larger and more fanciful shapes, until Soomdevi is convinced that what he’s seeing is a doorway, a gate. “What are you doing?” Noxolo asks, although she doesn’t stop dancing, as Soomdevi rises and moves the shadows aside. “Looking,” Soomdevi says. What did she think he was doing? He isn’t annoyed, but he needs to focus, needs to push the shadows out of the way. They keep growing, sliding around, but whispering encouragement to him as they do. And his heart soars. He can find a way! He’s so close! Keep going! Even when his fingers touch solid wall, he knows there is a way through, a crack somewhere, if he can only find it, hidden, behind all the shadows. Noxolo is gone when Soomdevi comes down, sweaty and thirsty. Shadowdevi is still dancing and giggling even without lights or music. Blinks still snores away. Soomdevi gets the fear then, that despite his research and discoveries, even if he finishes his thesis, he may not have enough beetles, or flowers, or mushrooms, or whatever to break through to the shadow plane, if there’s a way at all. He may just be stuck in this ordinary world forever.
"I told them to come here and tell you, but whatever. They don't listen to me. Somehow it's still a 'conspiracy' and a 'theory', even when people start ripping their own faces off. I don't know how many times people have to get the lizardfolk surprise before they start listening to me." "Also, the egg's probably a god or whatever."
Broomzad startles at being spoken to directly. ”Yes, your highness, what sharp eyes you have, despite having just… one.” He looks at her eyepatch and gulps before he continues. ”Tis only a trinket I found, a tiny marble, like a cat’s, you know, eye. I thought it might perhaps please you on account of your lost…” He gestures toward his own eye rather than say the word another time. ”May it forever rest in our hearts.” He gulps again and wishes so badly that he were sorting junk with Kezzind right now.
Broomzad was discussing with Kezzind the many uses for human picnic baskets, having recently recovered one from a family of lunching humans, when the official summons arrived.
"Funny seeing all of you here," he says by way of a greeting. "You all got a summons too? Lucky day!"
That night, in the tunnels, Soomdevi hosts a wake (and bake) in honor of Ignaci. "Now I wish I'd gotten to know him better, but whatever. He'll be back, I'm sure." He turns to Mariama and Noxolo through the thick smoke. "How much you want to bet this crooked magistrate is involved with the demon cultists?" |
