[ooc: Blanket CWs in this whole thread for medical horror, unethical human experimentation, cult propaganda, racism/xenophobia, concubines, forced breeding/noncon, torture, gore, and probably much more.]
Tox is excited and nervous in equal measure for his first trip to the surface. He's excited because it means he's starting on the path of a spy and assassin in earnest; at the tender age of twelve, this is a promising lifelong career. He's nervous because the picture of the surface and its people that has been painted for him is terrifying and grim. A violent, savage people with no respect for science or innovation, or perhaps too dumb for it; a brutish enemy.
The job is simple, boring and low stakes: perfect for a 12-year-old and one of his mentors, Damian, to take on. Busywork, just to give him an idea of what they do and what the surface is like, without putting him in too dangerous a situation. Of course, he is still cautioned excessively to stay with Damian and not to interact with the surface dwellers, not to even be seen or heard by them. He is cloaked in all-black, with a face covering to match: only his toxic green eyes are visible beneath. He hasn't mastered disguise magic yet, but when he does, he will disguise himself to look more like a surface-dweller. To that end, and to his own curiosity's end, he does want to see what they look like.
But they're out in the woods, mapping pathways and elevation, making note of any signs of civilization they find. There aren't many. Damian says that only loggers and lumberjacks come out this way, for the high-quality wood. He says this casually enough, but Tox himself has never seen a tree, or grass, or the sky. He's never felt the wind on his face like this, drying his eyes strangely, or heard the rustle of leaves and the strange animals singing and chittering in the branches (birds? He's only heard of them). It's a veritable sensory smorgasbord, and he finds it overwhelming. He can't stop looking around and listening in pure awe.
After Damian shows him how to log the details of the landscape on the map, he gives Tox instructions: they'll split up to cover more ground, then come back to one another using specialized navigation devices. Or rather, Tox will stay where he is and his mentor will come back to him, so he doesn't get lost.
He sets out, determined to make himself useful here despite how foreign and somewhat frightening the landscape is. He observes carefully and loses himself in thought as he marks things down. That there- is that type of tree uncommon? Or is it nothing of note? Is that a man-made path, or just a clearing? He barely knows what he's looking at, so he doesn't know what he's looking for. No wonder they wanted him up here so young; it'll take forever to get used to the place enough to be able to navigate it with any effectiveness.
After a while on his solo hike, he hears something strange. It's different from the rest of the forest noises, he thinks. Something melodic, maybe? At first it's hard to catch between the other sounds, but as he moves further, it becomes clearer.
Someone is singing. Not an animal; a person.
Singing is certainly not what he expected to hear from a surface-dweller, and his curiosity burns. It sounds like a girl. The melody is oddly... nice. What does she look like? Maybe he could get a glimpse without being noticed, if he's quiet.
Creeping up slowly, he tries not to step on twigs that might snap, but he is not skilled at forest stealth yet in the slightest. His footfalls can absolutely be heard, as can the small yelp he lets out as netting whips up around him, hoisting him into the air.
He flails and flounders, panicked. They've already captured him! Surely they'll find out he's from underground and kill him! This is not good- he tries to find his navigator to alert Damian, but he's tangled and wrapped tightly in the netting.
"May as well be speakin' to a brick wall with you, sprout." That is what Juno's father, Solanus, had said when he found her hot on his heels during his trek to his worksite for the day. It was a rare sight for his daughter not to be beside him, eager to explore the forest while he tore trees from the earth with his bare hands and chopped them down for processing in town. The massive man was built, in simple terms, like a brick shithouse — all muscle and broad shoulders, eight feet tall, with a hearty belly that spoke of a fondness for drink and skin tanned by the sun. His daughter, though young, already stood over six feet — small, he said, for a half-giant, but she still had time to grow.
Juno laughed. "And you keep doing it, Pa! I'm not going far anyway, so don't worry. I just gotta see if any of my traps sprung." She had set a few out in the woods — simple rope snares and leaf covered pitfalls meant to catch rabbits, or if she was lucky, a deer.
Solanus waved a gloved hand as he disappeared into the brush, fitting his leather gloves tighter as he went. "Be careful, Juno. If anything happens, your mother'll have my head on a pike outside the shop."
That made her laugh harder. He wasn't wrong — Diana, for all her small human frame, would absolutely find a way to make good on that threat if anything happened to their only child. Luckily, Juno knew what she was doing — and Solanus knew it too.
With her father set to work, Juno wandered deeper into the woods. At first she walked in silence, but the birdsong and chipmunk chatter started to bore her fast. So, she began to sing — a tale of a girl lost in the forest, hunted by a wolf. Of how it tricked her, how she outsmarted it, and how, despite her bravery, the beast still devoured her grandmother in the end. Odd choice of song in the middle of the woods, but Juno had never been afraid of wolves.
The snapping of twigs didn't alarm her — but the sudden yelp did. She spun, blonde hair whipping over her shoulder, and bolted toward the sound. It had been loud, maybe even big — a deer, perhaps? They always made strange noises when caught.
Imagine her surprise when she stumbled into a clearing to find not a deer, but a man in black tangled in her trap. Juno stopped a few feet away, a small handaxe hanging loosely at her side.
"Uh..." she snorted. "Never caught a man before. You good?" Clearly, he was not. And she was definitely laughing.
Tox flopped around like a fish, twisting until he could see the girl below him. Blonde, tall, standing near, holding an axe. And-- laughing?
"D-Don't kill me, please," he begs breathlessly. His accent is quite different from hers, and his hood has now been tousled off of his head some to reveal green hair and stark black tattoos on his face. It's... Probably pretty clear he's not from around here.
Her brows lifted. "Kill you?" She repeated, absolutely baffled by the suggestion. Juno had never heard anyone speak in that particular tone before — maybe he was from the mainland and had somehow gotten lost? It would not surprise her, if that were the case.
She stepped closer, reaching up with her free hand to grasp the bottom of the net. "Stay still. I can cut you down, but if you squirm too much, I'll end up cutting a leg off." It would take a minute for her to saw through the rope with her axe, but if he listened to her, he would be fine. "You're lucky I don't use metal traps, friend."
He panics more as she approaches and reaches for him, talking about cutting a leg off- he's still certain this is how he'll die. He grabs at the netting above him, trying to pull himself up and away from her axe.
"Please don't--"
She oddly seems more confused than angry or violent, and she's calling him friend for some baffling reason, but that doesn't mean she's not about to take him back to her tribe or clan or whatever and kill him.
"Don't what? Release you from the trap? If you want, I can just leave you here, but you'll be awfully cold come dusk." She grasped the netting harder to try and keep it as still as possible with all his squirming, axeblade sawing into one of the thickly wound fiber. "But dad'll have my head for that. Now stay still so we can get you out and you can head back to... wherever you came from. You've got a weird accent."
Oh, so... She doesn't know where he came from? Good, that's good, he should just keep his mouth shut so he doesn't blow his cover. It seems like she's trying to help him, maybe? Unclear. For now, he just grips the ropes and waits, trembling slightly with adrenaline, as though he's waiting for her axe to cut into his thigh.
Juno knew how to handle weaponry, and even as a 13-year-old girl, she had the strength most men could only hope to achieve with a lot of effort. She cut through the bottom of the net to make an opening big enough for him to stick his leg through, then dropped her axe so it stuck into the dirt.
"I'm gonna open this up and you're gonna want to jump. I can catch you so you don't go breaking your legs." and if her strength was not terrifying enough, she grasped the frayed edges of the netting and pulled until the hole was big enough for him to slide through; her muscles twitching with the effort.
In turn, Tox clings harder to the netting as his leg is freed, with an unnatural grip strength for a 12-year-old. He's able to hold himself up as she- oh god- she tears through the final rope with her bare hands. And now he's supposed to jump down into her arms? Forgive him a little hesitation, here, giant surface girl...
He hangs there, looking down at her warily for a few long moments. He almost tells her to just stand aside-- he knows how to tuck and roll, and is agile enough not to break his legs from a fall like this. Then again, this is the forest, and he doesn't know what the terrain beneath him is like. To fall on his ankle wrong on the uneven forest floor could put him out of training for weeks, and he can't afford that.
He lets go, allowing her to catch him. He's not overly big for his age, but he is oddly muscular. Still, he should be no problem for her to catch.
It's been a couple of weeks since Sebastian was blinded by the Magnus Pater, the commune's leader, in front of everyone, for his crime of loving a girl on the surface. He was then taken Under Arsil's Eye, not that he knows it, to be healed and corrected. He's been languishing in this cold cell since then, in a hospital bed. He's in immense pain, going over the incident in his mind again and again, reliving it in nightmares, and waking to worry about Juno and Eve. Surely, they're going to capture Juno and torture or kill her, if they haven't already. Surely, they will turn Eve against him even more than they already have, by labelling him a traitor, a disgusting man who would lie down in filth with vermin.
And there's nothing he can do about it.
He's stuck here, miserable and in pain. He's lost everything; his family, his community, his career, probably the love of his life, and maybe his daughter.
He has no idea how much time passes before they throw another person into the room with him. He was hardly aware there was even a second bed in here.
Tox does not know it yet, but there's a new criminal in town, someone who showed up unannounced and unexplained, which of course was met with confusion and hostile interrogation from... Pretty much everyone. No one in this commune likes outsiders; at best, they will interfere with their way of life and be a bad influence that could guide them astray from Arsil, and at worst, they are spies from the surface, here to infiltrate and destroy their community from the inside. As such, any attempt at reason or trustworthiness the outsider uses is only seen as further proof of trickery.
At first, Rastaban was thrown in jail in the general populace, but once mages detected the strange magic in him, he was taken in for experimentation. And of course, there is little experimentation done in this commune that doesn't require a hospital bed afterwards. That is what lands Rastaban here, next to a green-haired man with bandaged eyes, in a dank cell that smells strongly of rot.
Rastaban had tried not to draw too much attention to himself and he didn't resist when he was captured and thrown in jail. He didn't know where he was and his magic was likely to make things worse. Unfortunately the people here were more attuned to magic than he expected. He didn't go quietly when they took him in for experimentation. He siphoned the life energy from anyone who touched him and he shaped his magic into vines of golden light that entangled everyone in the room. He was injured from his capture though and he couldn't sustain his magic and heal at the same time. After a fierce struggle Rastaban was overpowered and restrained.
He didn't remember much after that. When his captors started slicing into him he shifted his consciousness to his magic side to avoid the pain. Under the embrace of his magic the world around him blurred under a weightless cloud of magical energy that resonated with his anger and terror. He was only vaguely aware he was being moved somewhere else.
In his weakened state he noticed the addicting warmth of Tox's life energy before anything. Life energy gives off a special warmth. The warmth is tied to the person's soul so everyone's warmth feels slightly different. In general sickness or injury will make the life energy give off less warmth and magic generates more but nothing is set in stone. Rastaban was curious what Tox's energy would feel like and he struggled to sit up. They weren't moving, were they another prisoner? He hesitated. He had already broken his vow to not drain someone's life earlier today. Although he could argue that it was self defense. This wouldn't be and he slumped back down with a groan. His golden glowing eyes flickered with a spark of irritation as he turned to Tox with a frown.
Tox's life energy probably feels... Unique, to say the least. He has a grave injury, necrotic magic rotting through his eyes and into his skull as his body tries to fight it off with fever. But he also has magic, inherent and biological. Poison infused in every cell of his body, summoned at will.
He hears the stranger settle into the other bed, and his shivering muscles tense even more with hypervigilance. It's difficult being so attuned to danger around you but missing one of your key senses for assuring it's not there. He feels primed for more pain at any moment.
The other man groans, and Tox can smell the blood on him with his unnaturally heightened senses. Like a bloodhound, his father used to say proudly.
"No, not really," he mumbles quietly, slightly delirious and expecting no one to care or take pity on him.
Unique was an understatement and his glowing eyes narrowed with an agitated flicker as he followed the flow of of the necrotic magic and poison coursing through Tox's body. The severity of the other's injuries made him reluctantly sit up.
"I'll manage." He brushed Tox's concern aside as he tried to force his body to move. "More importantly how are you still alive?" The poison inside his body didn't feel like it was attacking him at the moment at least unlike the necrotic magic around his eyes. "Can you even see right now?"
Rastaban was blunt but there was genuine concern in his voice, underneath his irritation.
"No," he says simply. With or without the bandages on his eyes, everything is dark, and he's starting to accept that he may never get his vision back. "I might be blind for good."
It feels horrible to say out loud, and he curls in on himself more.
"And I might die yet, so... Stay tuned, I guess." Dark, dry humour, sure. He shivers violently, his teeth chattering slightly. Since the rot is magical, he doubts that his body will actually be able to get rid of it with fever. Who knows how long it'll be until it rots into his brain. But, the poison magic doesn't seem to be hurting him at all, strangely enough. If anything, it's fighting against the rot too.
"You won't. Not while I'm here." Rastaban's confident voice rang with a silent promise. He didn't know if he could restore his sight, but he would keep him alive. Unfortunately in order to heal him he needed to see, which meant leaving the safety of his magic where he could ignore pain. With a sharp sigh he closed his eyes and focused on calming his emotions. His golden eyes flashed with a pained flash as he nearly doubled over when the pain returned.
"Gah! By the damn Goddess!" He cursed as he slowly opened his eyes. At least the cell was dark so it was easier for his eyes to adjust. Stifling another cry of pain, he stumbled over to Tox's bed. His arms shook as he tightly gripped the bed to keep from falling over as he caught his breath.
"Hah, I'm going to try to take away the necrotic energy in your eyes. I don't have the strength to fight you so try not to thrash around too much if it hurts."
Despite his blunt bedside manner, Rastaban's touch was gentle as he reached for Tox's blindfold. He didn't know how the necrotic magic would react so he poured some of his life energy into Tox first to accelerate the healing process. The warmth from Rastaban's energy was weak, but there was a stubbornness to it that was stronger than its frail warmth would suggest. It was this hidden strength that filled Tox with energy, but there was a price. Rastaban's head swam as transfered his energy to Tox but he stubbornly pushed through it with an irriated sigh. "Are you alright so far?"
Tox is confused by the stranger's determination, and further bewildered as he exclaims in pain.
"What happened? Don't— don't hurt yourself on my behalf," he urges. Why is he swearing to a goddess? That's blasphemous in and of itself, and Tox doesn't even know of any goddess that could be worshipped down here.
His body tenses up even more as the man touches his bed and the bandages on his face, his jaw clenching. It seems that the stranger wants to help him, but he can't help his instinct to brace for pain. He wants to ask who he is and what his intentions are, but he's in no position to demand answers. And soon, those questions seem to matter less, as warm energy flows into him, slowly soothing his tight aching muscles.
"Yes..." He's still on edge, because the stranger is still a stranger, and he said it might hurt, so he waits for the painful part, balling his hands into fists and willing himself to make no sound.
As far as missions go, this one could be a lot worse. Devero's been deep into ludd territory on protection details; he's camped out in wild forest to keep a team of Reclamation Corps civilians safe from the kind of outsiders who liked to make their own ignorance and poor choices into Gov's problem. He's had to run interference with megafauna wildlife in extreme conditions to ensure research teams can finish collecting their data. He's had to make choices that result in ended lives. Unlike most World Guards, he's a Scorpion, and that means he's had to fight.
This mission has not involved any fighting.
This time, his squad is accompanying a diplomatic envoy, escorting political specialists to a treaty renegotiation in... whichever outsider town this is. Is this the one with the copper mine? He thinks this is the one with the copper mine. If this place wasn't deep in the NorAm territory, Gov probably wouldn't have sent a Scorpion squad at all, but there are too many uppity ludd factions on this continent. It's not worth risking citizen's lives.
Ah, but right now, he's off-duty. He doesn't have to worry about anyone's life but his own. He and Alé and Keighjo had all set off together to explore this weirdly low-tech little town, but he'd lost the other two in a gaming hall. Watching them watch non-citizens play weird analog games was boring as fuck, so he'd left them to it and continued on until he found this place: a proper bar.
He ducks his head a little as he pushes inside, glad to get out of the dry heat of the town. Sun's been down for almost an hour and it's still hot; he is ready for a drink after enduring it.
He's aware of the locals watching him as he weaves between tables and up to the counter on the far side of the room. He's aware of the eyes on his Interface, its gleam and glow standing out in a place where the people don't even seem to have handheld Interfaces, much less wearable ones. (He knows he's not supposed to judge these people for their baffling indifference to joining Gov, but he can't help but be at least... bewildered by it.)
He finds an empty stool, eases his big frame down onto it, reaches without thinking for a feed that barely connects here like he'll be able to pull this place's menu up for a look. The bartender who approaches him gives him a weird look, but dutifully asks, "Get ya something?"
There's a hitch between the question and Devero's answer, his eyes going a little distant as he checks his Interface for the transcription of their words. Then he nods, head and fist both, and says, "Whatever local beer you recommend, please."
He says it... with his hands, flowing quick and comfortable through the motions of Global Sign. The bartender's brow furrows immediately, but only a moment later, Devero's Interface translates his words. His artificial voice is neutral and pleasant, masculine in timbre, and emits from his Interface eye where it sits on his face. The bartender blinks at him, smiles uncertainly, says, "Uh... sure, yeah," and heads off to the taps at the end of the counter.
Tox has also been on missions that involved ending lives, being the most effective soldier for taking people out in a silent, covert way. Trained since birth, it's easy for him to simply summon poison in the air a person is breathing, then catch them as they fall. No weapon, no blood, and not even an autopsy can truly pin it to him, because most people on the surface aren't aware his type of magic exists. Or they don't believe any type of magic exists.
This isn't one of those missions. This mission is kind of... Nothing. Someone got wind of a treaty renegotiation and thought it would be best to keep a finger on that pulse. What pulse? Tox had muttered grimly, certain that nothing interesting would happen and he'd just have to endure the heat for no reason.
Thus far, he's correct. The heat is awful, the sun is too bright for him even with sunglasses, and he has to wear a jacket to hide his augmented arm, so he doesn't stick out like a sore thumb in this low-tech wasteland, which borders him on heat stroke by the end of the day.
Tox, or Sebastian, as he goes by on the surface, sits at the bar pressing a cold mug to his flushed face. His hair is slightly shiny with sweat. He looks over with unnaturally bright, toxic green eyes as Devero sits down. The first thing he notices is how huge he is, even by surface standards, followed closely by the interface over his eye. He must not be from around here, and the uniform tells Tox he's probably here on official business for the treaty thing.
He watches Devero with interest as he orders, first with his hands, then an artificial voice that comes from his interface. That piques his curiosity far more than anything job-related. Sebastian has perhaps seen sign language before, but never translated in real time like that. His community doesn't do much in the way of disability accommodation, despite having the tech for it.
Well then, if he's going to get any intel from this trip, it's probably going to be from this guy. He's just unsure how to get his attention if he can't hear. Fortunately, they're only a couple seats apart and sort of facing each other at a right angle, so as the bartender sets the man's recommended local beer down, Sebastian lifts his drink toward him in a sort of cheers motion. Sipping, he acts like he's considering the taste.
Even if he hadn't caught the motion of the glass in his peripheral vision, his Interface taps against his temple to let him know he's being addressed. He thanks the bartender with a gesture, then wraps his big hand around the body of the glass rather than the handle, assessing the temperature for himself. He grins and nods an acknowledgement to the fellow sitting around the bar's corner, then takes the handle properly and lifts the beer for a taste.
He actually looks a little surprised at it, and takes a second, longer draught before setting it conscientiously down on a provided coaster. "Tastes pretty good to me," he says genially, with his Interface's attendant translation.
Tox doesn't like beer. He's never understood why anyone does. It doesn't taste good, and he's never been drunk in his life due to his immunity to poison, so he doesn't get why surface people go nuts for it, even get addicted to it. He's only drinking it now because it helps him blend in. He supposes the carbonation and the temperature are somewhat refreshing.
But this guy seems to be a Beer Enjoyer, and apparently this beer is not bad. Wrong move number one, but he can probably recover. The man is friendlier than he expected him to be.
"It's not bad," he concedes, and there's at least a small nugget of truth in there. "I definitely need the refreshment, today was a scorcher." No one who lives here permanently is sweating and flushed the way Tox is, another reason he needs to do everything he can to fit in, to seem like he belongs when he truly doesn't.
He's not the only one who's flushed from the heat, and running around in a body as big as this one doesn't make it easy to keep cool, no matter how high-tech the fabric of his World Guard fatigues is. His easy grin remains and he makes a point of fanning at his face with his free hand. "This heat is rough," he agrees. "Could be worse, though. Could be humid. You ever been--"
Devero. You are in an Outsider town. No one here has ever been anywhere but here (as far as he knows).
He grimaces self-consciously, signing a 'sorry' with one hand and using another to take a fresh gulp of the beer.
Ah, yeah, most people here don't exactly travel... But of course, Tox isn't from here, and neither is Sebastian.
"I've been around a bit, actually. I travel for work." Which is not a lie. He does travel for work. "Where could possibly be worse than here?" He asks jokingly. He can't imagine a place hotter.
Devero looks directly over at him, eyebrows lofted in evident surprise. He'd assumed that everyone in this stupid town lived here, had always lived here, and would always live here. And that's the kind of assumption that makes a Guard underestimate an opponent, he reminds himself, seeing the admonition scroll in his mind's eye like he's receiving the lecture directly.
He's seen ground vehicles on the streets here. Is it so impossible that some of these towns are linked up, that people might shuffle between them?
"The CenAm archipelago," he says. "You go far enough south from here, past the steppes and the grasslands to where the land breaks up into that island chain between this continent and SouAm. All of those islands are tropical rainforest. Hotter than this, and so wet it feels like drinking the air."
Tox knows all about assumptions. He'd had hundreds of falsehoods about the surface baked into him from birth, which lead to a lot of embarrassing moments up here as a spy. He's still not the most knowledgeable, but he's curious enough to actually learn the truth of things up here, so he gets by.
"Oh, wow." He's heard of this place, and heard of rainforests, and he's felt hot humid air before, but... It still sounds so exotic to him.
"So you really travel. That kind of heat sounds miserable... But a jungle, that must be cool. I'm a biologist, and I hear the biodiversity there is immense."
He laughs, big and loud enough that a few heads turn his way. "The first time I was on one of those islands I thought I was going to sweat out of my clothes," he says, leaning across the counter a little like he's confiding some big secret. "Talk about miserable.
"I'm not a nature guy," he continues, "but yeah, there's a lot of wild stuff in jungles like that. One time, I stuck my foot in my boot without checking it and got bit by some spider that had moved in overnight. Hurt so bad I could barely walk; my mates had to carry my ass to medical so I could get the antivenom."
He tells the story with a grin, able to look back on it as just a misadventure, but it had actually been pretty scary at the time. If he hadn't been a citizen of the most medically advanced society on the planet (...as far as he knows!), and able to get treated immediately, this story might have been more of a cautionary tale.
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For Juno
Tox is excited and nervous in equal measure for his first trip to the surface. He's excited because it means he's starting on the path of a spy and assassin in earnest; at the tender age of twelve, this is a promising lifelong career. He's nervous because the picture of the surface and its people that has been painted for him is terrifying and grim. A violent, savage people with no respect for science or innovation, or perhaps too dumb for it; a brutish enemy.
The job is simple, boring and low stakes: perfect for a 12-year-old and one of his mentors, Damian, to take on. Busywork, just to give him an idea of what they do and what the surface is like, without putting him in too dangerous a situation. Of course, he is still cautioned excessively to stay with Damian and not to interact with the surface dwellers, not to even be seen or heard by them. He is cloaked in all-black, with a face covering to match: only his toxic green eyes are visible beneath. He hasn't mastered disguise magic yet, but when he does, he will disguise himself to look more like a surface-dweller. To that end, and to his own curiosity's end, he does want to see what they look like.
But they're out in the woods, mapping pathways and elevation, making note of any signs of civilization they find. There aren't many. Damian says that only loggers and lumberjacks come out this way, for the high-quality wood. He says this casually enough, but Tox himself has never seen a tree, or grass, or the sky. He's never felt the wind on his face like this, drying his eyes strangely, or heard the rustle of leaves and the strange animals singing and chittering in the branches (birds? He's only heard of them). It's a veritable sensory smorgasbord, and he finds it overwhelming. He can't stop looking around and listening in pure awe.
After Damian shows him how to log the details of the landscape on the map, he gives Tox instructions: they'll split up to cover more ground, then come back to one another using specialized navigation devices. Or rather, Tox will stay where he is and his mentor will come back to him, so he doesn't get lost.
He sets out, determined to make himself useful here despite how foreign and somewhat frightening the landscape is. He observes carefully and loses himself in thought as he marks things down. That there- is that type of tree uncommon? Or is it nothing of note? Is that a man-made path, or just a clearing? He barely knows what he's looking at, so he doesn't know what he's looking for. No wonder they wanted him up here so young; it'll take forever to get used to the place enough to be able to navigate it with any effectiveness.
After a while on his solo hike, he hears something strange. It's different from the rest of the forest noises, he thinks. Something melodic, maybe? At first it's hard to catch between the other sounds, but as he moves further, it becomes clearer.
Someone is singing. Not an animal; a person.
Singing is certainly not what he expected to hear from a surface-dweller, and his curiosity burns. It sounds like a girl. The melody is oddly... nice. What does she look like? Maybe he could get a glimpse without being noticed, if he's quiet.
Creeping up slowly, he tries not to step on twigs that might snap, but he is not skilled at forest stealth yet in the slightest. His footfalls can absolutely be heard, as can the small yelp he lets out as netting whips up around him, hoisting him into the air.
He flails and flounders, panicked. They've already captured him! Surely they'll find out he's from underground and kill him! This is not good- he tries to find his navigator to alert Damian, but he's tangled and wrapped tightly in the netting.
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Juno laughed. "And you keep doing it, Pa! I'm not going far anyway, so don't worry. I just gotta see if any of my traps sprung." She had set a few out in the woods — simple rope snares and leaf covered pitfalls meant to catch rabbits, or if she was lucky, a deer.
Solanus waved a gloved hand as he disappeared into the brush, fitting his leather gloves tighter as he went. "Be careful, Juno. If anything happens, your mother'll have my head on a pike outside the shop."
That made her laugh harder. He wasn't wrong — Diana, for all her small human frame, would absolutely find a way to make good on that threat if anything happened to their only child. Luckily, Juno knew what she was doing — and Solanus knew it too.
With her father set to work, Juno wandered deeper into the woods. At first she walked in silence, but the birdsong and chipmunk chatter started to bore her fast. So, she began to sing — a tale of a girl lost in the forest, hunted by a wolf. Of how it tricked her, how she outsmarted it, and how, despite her bravery, the beast still devoured her grandmother in the end. Odd choice of song in the middle of the woods, but Juno had never been afraid of wolves.
The snapping of twigs didn't alarm her — but the sudden yelp did. She spun, blonde hair whipping over her shoulder, and bolted toward the sound. It had been loud, maybe even big — a deer, perhaps? They always made strange noises when caught.
Imagine her surprise when she stumbled into a clearing to find not a deer, but a man in black tangled in her trap. Juno stopped a few feet away, a small handaxe hanging loosely at her side.
"Uh..." she snorted. "Never caught a man before. You good?" Clearly, he was not. And she was definitely laughing.
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"D-Don't kill me, please," he begs breathlessly. His accent is quite different from hers, and his hood has now been tousled off of his head some to reveal green hair and stark black tattoos on his face. It's... Probably pretty clear he's not from around here.
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She stepped closer, reaching up with her free hand to grasp the bottom of the net. "Stay still. I can cut you down, but if you squirm too much, I'll end up cutting a leg off." It would take a minute for her to saw through the rope with her axe, but if he listened to her, he would be fine. "You're lucky I don't use metal traps, friend."
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"Please don't--"
She oddly seems more confused than angry or violent, and she's calling him friend for some baffling reason, but that doesn't mean she's not about to take him back to her tribe or clan or whatever and kill him.
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"I'm gonna open this up and you're gonna want to jump. I can catch you so you don't go breaking your legs." and if her strength was not terrifying enough, she grasped the frayed edges of the netting and pulled until the hole was big enough for him to slide through; her muscles twitching with the effort.
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He hangs there, looking down at her warily for a few long moments. He almost tells her to just stand aside-- he knows how to tuck and roll, and is agile enough not to break his legs from a fall like this. Then again, this is the forest, and he doesn't know what the terrain beneath him is like. To fall on his ankle wrong on the uneven forest floor could put him out of training for weeks, and he can't afford that.
He lets go, allowing her to catch him. He's not overly big for his age, but he is oddly muscular. Still, he should be no problem for her to catch.
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for nicholaj
And there's nothing he can do about it.
He's stuck here, miserable and in pain. He's lost everything; his family, his community, his career, probably the love of his life, and maybe his daughter.
He has no idea how much time passes before they throw another person into the room with him. He was hardly aware there was even a second bed in here.
Tox does not know it yet, but there's a new criminal in town, someone who showed up unannounced and unexplained, which of course was met with confusion and hostile interrogation from... Pretty much everyone. No one in this commune likes outsiders; at best, they will interfere with their way of life and be a bad influence that could guide them astray from Arsil, and at worst, they are spies from the surface, here to infiltrate and destroy their community from the inside. As such, any attempt at reason or trustworthiness the outsider uses is only seen as further proof of trickery.
At first, Rastaban was thrown in jail in the general populace, but once mages detected the strange magic in him, he was taken in for experimentation. And of course, there is little experimentation done in this commune that doesn't require a hospital bed afterwards. That is what lands Rastaban here, next to a green-haired man with bandaged eyes, in a dank cell that smells strongly of rot.
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He didn't remember much after that. When his captors started slicing into him he shifted his consciousness to his magic side to avoid the pain. Under the embrace of his magic the world around him blurred under a weightless cloud of magical energy that resonated with his anger and terror. He was only vaguely aware he was being moved somewhere else.
In his weakened state he noticed the addicting warmth of Tox's life energy before anything. Life energy gives off a special warmth. The warmth is tied to the person's soul so everyone's warmth feels slightly different. In general sickness or injury will make the life energy give off less warmth and magic generates more but nothing is set in stone. Rastaban was curious what Tox's energy would feel like and he struggled to sit up. They weren't moving, were they another prisoner? He hesitated. He had already broken his vow to not drain someone's life earlier today. Although he could argue that it was self defense. This wouldn't be and he slumped back down with a groan. His golden glowing eyes flickered with a spark of irritation as he turned to Tox with a frown.
"Are you alright?"
cw eye gore
He hears the stranger settle into the other bed, and his shivering muscles tense even more with hypervigilance. It's difficult being so attuned to danger around you but missing one of your key senses for assuring it's not there. He feels primed for more pain at any moment.
The other man groans, and Tox can smell the blood on him with his unnaturally heightened senses. Like a bloodhound, his father used to say proudly.
"No, not really," he mumbles quietly, slightly delirious and expecting no one to care or take pity on him.
"You?"
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"I'll manage." He brushed Tox's concern aside as he tried to force his body to move. "More importantly how are you still alive?" The poison inside his body didn't feel like it was attacking him at the moment at least unlike the necrotic magic around his eyes. "Can you even see right now?"
Rastaban was blunt but there was genuine concern in his voice, underneath his irritation.
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It feels horrible to say out loud, and he curls in on himself more.
"And I might die yet, so... Stay tuned, I guess." Dark, dry humour, sure. He shivers violently, his teeth chattering slightly. Since the rot is magical, he doubts that his body will actually be able to get rid of it with fever. Who knows how long it'll be until it rots into his brain. But, the poison magic doesn't seem to be hurting him at all, strangely enough. If anything, it's fighting against the rot too.
the snail returns!
"Gah! By the damn Goddess!" He cursed as he slowly opened his eyes. At least the cell was dark so it was easier for his eyes to adjust. Stifling another cry of pain, he stumbled over to Tox's bed. His arms shook as he tightly gripped the bed to keep from falling over as he caught his breath.
"Hah, I'm going to try to take away the necrotic energy in your eyes. I don't have the strength to fight you so try not to thrash around too much if it hurts."
Despite his blunt bedside manner, Rastaban's touch was gentle as he reached for Tox's blindfold. He didn't know how the necrotic magic would react so he poured some of his life energy into Tox first to accelerate the healing process. The warmth from Rastaban's energy was weak, but there was a stubbornness to it that was stronger than its frail warmth would suggest. It was this hidden strength that filled Tox with energy, but there was a price. Rastaban's head swam as transfered his energy to Tox but he stubbornly pushed through it with an irriated sigh. "Are you alright so far?"
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"What happened? Don't— don't hurt yourself on my behalf," he urges. Why is he swearing to a goddess? That's blasphemous in and of itself, and Tox doesn't even know of any goddess that could be worshipped down here.
His body tenses up even more as the man touches his bed and the bandages on his face, his jaw clenching. It seems that the stranger wants to help him, but he can't help his instinct to brace for pain. He wants to ask who he is and what his intentions are, but he's in no position to demand answers. And soon, those questions seem to matter less, as warm energy flows into him, slowly soothing his tight aching muscles.
"Yes..." He's still on edge, because the stranger is still a stranger, and he said it might hurt, so he waits for the painful part, balling his hands into fists and willing himself to make no sound.
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This mission has not involved any fighting.
This time, his squad is accompanying a diplomatic envoy, escorting political specialists to a treaty renegotiation in... whichever outsider town this is. Is this the one with the copper mine? He thinks this is the one with the copper mine. If this place wasn't deep in the NorAm territory, Gov probably wouldn't have sent a Scorpion squad at all, but there are too many uppity ludd factions on this continent. It's not worth risking citizen's lives.
Ah, but right now, he's off-duty. He doesn't have to worry about anyone's life but his own. He and Alé and Keighjo had all set off together to explore this weirdly low-tech little town, but he'd lost the other two in a gaming hall. Watching them watch non-citizens play weird analog games was boring as fuck, so he'd left them to it and continued on until he found this place: a proper bar.
He ducks his head a little as he pushes inside, glad to get out of the dry heat of the town. Sun's been down for almost an hour and it's still hot; he is ready for a drink after enduring it.
He's aware of the locals watching him as he weaves between tables and up to the counter on the far side of the room. He's aware of the eyes on his Interface, its gleam and glow standing out in a place where the people don't even seem to have handheld Interfaces, much less wearable ones. (He knows he's not supposed to judge these people for their baffling indifference to joining Gov, but he can't help but be at least... bewildered by it.)
He finds an empty stool, eases his big frame down onto it, reaches without thinking for a feed that barely connects here like he'll be able to pull this place's menu up for a look. The bartender who approaches him gives him a weird look, but dutifully asks, "Get ya something?"
There's a hitch between the question and Devero's answer, his eyes going a little distant as he checks his Interface for the transcription of their words. Then he nods, head and fist both, and says, "Whatever local beer you recommend, please."
He says it... with his hands, flowing quick and comfortable through the motions of Global Sign. The bartender's brow furrows immediately, but only a moment later, Devero's Interface translates his words. His artificial voice is neutral and pleasant, masculine in timbre, and emits from his Interface eye where it sits on his face. The bartender blinks at him, smiles uncertainly, says, "Uh... sure, yeah," and heads off to the taps at the end of the counter.
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This isn't one of those missions. This mission is kind of... Nothing. Someone got wind of a treaty renegotiation and thought it would be best to keep a finger on that pulse. What pulse? Tox had muttered grimly, certain that nothing interesting would happen and he'd just have to endure the heat for no reason.
Thus far, he's correct. The heat is awful, the sun is too bright for him even with sunglasses, and he has to wear a jacket to hide his augmented arm, so he doesn't stick out like a sore thumb in this low-tech wasteland, which borders him on heat stroke by the end of the day.
Tox, or Sebastian, as he goes by on the surface, sits at the bar pressing a cold mug to his flushed face. His hair is slightly shiny with sweat. He looks over with unnaturally bright, toxic green eyes as Devero sits down. The first thing he notices is how huge he is, even by surface standards, followed closely by the interface over his eye. He must not be from around here, and the uniform tells Tox he's probably here on official business for the treaty thing.
He watches Devero with interest as he orders, first with his hands, then an artificial voice that comes from his interface. That piques his curiosity far more than anything job-related. Sebastian has perhaps seen sign language before, but never translated in real time like that. His community doesn't do much in the way of disability accommodation, despite having the tech for it.
Well then, if he's going to get any intel from this trip, it's probably going to be from this guy. He's just unsure how to get his attention if he can't hear. Fortunately, they're only a couple seats apart and sort of facing each other at a right angle, so as the bartender sets the man's recommended local beer down, Sebastian lifts his drink toward him in a sort of cheers motion. Sipping, he acts like he's considering the taste.
"It's cold, at least, I'll give it that."
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He actually looks a little surprised at it, and takes a second, longer draught before setting it conscientiously down on a provided coaster. "Tastes pretty good to me," he says genially, with his Interface's attendant translation.
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But this guy seems to be a Beer Enjoyer, and apparently this beer is not bad. Wrong move number one, but he can probably recover. The man is friendlier than he expected him to be.
"It's not bad," he concedes, and there's at least a small nugget of truth in there. "I definitely need the refreshment, today was a scorcher." No one who lives here permanently is sweating and flushed the way Tox is, another reason he needs to do everything he can to fit in, to seem like he belongs when he truly doesn't.
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Devero. You are in an Outsider town. No one here has ever been anywhere but here (as far as he knows).
He grimaces self-consciously, signing a 'sorry' with one hand and using another to take a fresh gulp of the beer.
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"I've been around a bit, actually. I travel for work." Which is not a lie. He does travel for work. "Where could possibly be worse than here?" He asks jokingly. He can't imagine a place hotter.
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He's seen ground vehicles on the streets here. Is it so impossible that some of these towns are linked up, that people might shuffle between them?
"The CenAm archipelago," he says. "You go far enough south from here, past the steppes and the grasslands to where the land breaks up into that island chain between this continent and SouAm. All of those islands are tropical rainforest. Hotter than this, and so wet it feels like drinking the air."
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"Oh, wow." He's heard of this place, and heard of rainforests, and he's felt hot humid air before, but... It still sounds so exotic to him.
"So you really travel. That kind of heat sounds miserable... But a jungle, that must be cool. I'm a biologist, and I hear the biodiversity there is immense."
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"I'm not a nature guy," he continues, "but yeah, there's a lot of wild stuff in jungles like that. One time, I stuck my foot in my boot without checking it and got bit by some spider that had moved in overnight. Hurt so bad I could barely walk; my mates had to carry my ass to medical so I could get the antivenom."
He tells the story with a grin, able to look back on it as just a misadventure, but it had actually been pretty scary at the time. If he hadn't been a citizen of the most medically advanced society on the planet (...as far as he knows!), and able to get treated immediately, this story might have been more of a cautionary tale.
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this autistic coded sadboy
buddyyyyyy
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cw amputation
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cw extreme homophobia
babyyyyyyy
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