[Nexus] Remnant HQ

[UncleWolf]

Carl's Place

After a few more morning snuggles, as Sunny takes a shower to freshen up, Carl stretches and goes to fixing the first meal he's had in over a year. He grabs the waffle batter, getting ready to remake the first meal they had together.

Command Tent

Edijar is about to say something, but notices Bugs entering the medical center. He gives a thoughtful frown. "There's a different way to earn our trust." He tells Feia. "We have a mage who is comatose from having her magic sucked out of her by force. Can you fix it?"

Gate

"So you agree then?" Dizzy asks Zefir.

[happyturtle]

Carl's Place

Sunny doesn't take long in the shower, and is soon at the table in her bathrobe and towel turban on her head, tapping away at her laptop. First, a message to Charity to say that everything is alright. And then, work. So much to do, because she knows how important it is. Even if she'd rather spend the day doing nothing with Carl.

But the importance of the work can't keep the foolish smile off her face, or stop her from stealing looks at her boyfriend as he cooks.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Command Tent]

Feia's head tilts to the side a little bit and looks in the direction that Edijar had been.

"I can certainly investigate. There is likely something I can do, though it depends strongly on how the individual acquires their magic."

[horngeek]

[Courtyard]

Idari is currently finishing up familiarising herself with the layout of the HQ.

If anyone wants, they could interact with her.

[UncleWolf]

Carl's Place

It's obvious that Carl is rusty at cooking, having to actually concentrate on it, and even then, he burns a few waffles. When he's done though, he serves it all with maple syrup, and gives Sunny a kiss. "I love you Sunny, always."

Command Tent

Edijar begins to walk away, gesturing for her to follow him. "Born with it naturally." He tells her as they head to the infirmary.

Courtyard

Idari may come across a massive Giantkin, Sue, training new recruits in hand to hand combat. He's unarmed and unarmored, stripped to just a set of pants, but is easily holding his own against a half dozen power armored troopers, literally throwing them about. Arla is nearby, watching them with a shake of his her head, in case anyone gets hurt too badly.

[horngeek]

Idari heads over next to Arla. "Well, that's one way to train..."

[happyturtle]

Carl's Place

Sunny pushes her laptop off to the side without closing it, and leans over to kiss Carl. "I love you too. Did you know we're flying now?"

Courtyard

Delisle is crossing the courtyard at a quick pace, but when she sees Sue up and about she stops next to Arla. "I thought he was still in the infirmary. Your work?"

[Chaotic Bob]

[Command Tent->Infirmary]

Feia falls into step slightly to his right, tracing her cheek while she thinks.
"I shall assume it was that device you used to repel the AMENites. I believe there's something I can do for this."
Natural mages, in a way, are easier. Their bodies have a predisposition to the magic, from birth, so simply planting a seed of sorts, should work, if properly performed...

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

Feia will be led to a well guarded room, which even Edijar has to turn over his gun to enter, and inside, is a simple hospital room, with a small pale woman on the bed. She's hooked up to machines, and Feia will tell that she has the same sort of Deadness that Edijar has, but it's fading as the normal background magic eats it away. Even so, at this rate, it'd take weeks for her to climb back to normal.

Carl's Place

Carl hops up onto the seat next to her and begins chowing down. "I saw that. Checked a window while you were showering. I take it you helped?" He asks with a smile.

Courtyard

Arla nods to both of them. "It works, and it is." She says, answering them both in turn. "The best way to train is by doing."

The fighting stops for a moment, and Sue tells them something out of hearing range for a moment. The look on the faces of the troopers is impossible to read due to the visors, but it's obvious that they're suddenly feeling awkward. Sue repeats his words again, and then the soldiers in training draw blades which start to glow red-hot...

[happyturtle]

Carl's Place

Sunny grins. "Yup! Me and Geoff and Aliz," she says, talking with her mouth full of waffle in her excitement.

Courtyard

Delisle winces as she watches. She knows that Sue knows what he's doing, but that doesn't mean he won't get hurt.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Infirmary]

This will be the moment where it's convenient that Feia is not ever properly armed. No weapon-forking-over for her.

She drifts over towards the bed, if allowed, eying the woman.
She's got that Dead, to her, yes, but it doesn't seem to be quite the same as Edijar's, fading...slowly, but clearly.

"On the bright side, I believe she happens to be recovering naturally. On the unfortunate side, it looks like it would take quite some time.
Your device has done something I have never seen before...but I think I see the solution."
If ambient magical energy can peck away at the Deadness, perhaps directly applied magic of a non-dangerous variety, can work a little faster...

"Please don't misinterpret this."
Which is around when she'll quickly snap a simple, curved glyph through the air, and attempt to set the woman on fire.


On the bright side, it's largely illusiary fire, of a completely painless variety.
Just a little warm.

[horngeek]

Idari nods. "Quicker than going through forms. Of course, it also gives out more injuries..."

She then raises her eyebrows as the trainees draw their swords. "...okay, this'll be interesting."

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

When the time the spell is finished and she's caught on fire, Edijar will try to grab Feia's hair, pull her head back, and hold an electrified three and a half foot blade near her throat. He does it all very quickly and efficiently, wasting no time. It appears that the blade slide out from his wrist guard in his armor. If successful, he'll speak. "Don't misunderstand this, but while I'm inclined to believe you, if her vitals drop, you're dead."

So far, her vitals hold strong, and the Dead spot seems to be fading away, a bit quicker now. Even so, it'll take the better part of an hour.

Still, Edijar has time.

Carl's Place

Carl gives her a warm smile, and asks a question he probably shouldn't. "Mind explaining how? In detail." He knows he won't understand her technobabble, but he wants to hear her voice, to hear her happiness.

Courtyard

Arla gives a grin at the scene. "I love this part, even though it means I'll be mending a few broken bones soon. Pain is just as much of a part of training as weapon skills, if not more so."

They're actually long fighting knives, and the troopers spread out, encircling Sue, still unarmed. After a moment, one gets too impatient and darts forward, knife leading, only to have his entire hand, knife included, grabbed, twisted, and yanked, causing the man to scream as his wrist snaps and he's thrown into another. Sue doesn't mind the burn on his hand, but then the others all surge forward, trying to hack and stab him. He told them not to hold back, and they won't.

[happyturtle]

Carl's Place

Sunny uses TECHNOBABBLE!

There's quite a lot of it, and she gets rather carried away talking about the giant antigrav engines and the psychic link she made with her robots so that they could all work together on them and the work that Geoff did, and on and on and...

If Carl's eyes drift, he might notice that the screensaver on Sunny's laptop is scrolling a message:

Spoiler

Show

♡ Carl, will you marry me? ♡

[horngeek]

"...reminds me of the Gunzosha Commandoes... he's completely fearless."

[billtodamax]

A small, grapefruit sized robot with a propellor on its head approaches the HQ. It has a rather high-definition screen displaying a 16-bit smiley face on its front.

Helloooo? Hello? I have something for you! It says happily, turning up its volume so it can be heard.

Is anyone there?

[Chaotic Bob]

[Infirmary]

How...soldiery of Edijar.
Looks like the ruthlessness is back, too.

Feia winces a bit as he grabs her, though it doesn't seem to be over the fact that he's grabbing her, or of potential pain from him yanking her hair.
She expected something else to happen, and when she cracks open one eye and notes that it failed to happen, she tries to reclaim a faint little smile.

It's sort of there.
It also keeps her from breathing out a sigh of relief. Which could be bad, since it may annoy the fellow with a sword-type weapon to her throat.
"So essentially, watching it from my end, she has about an hour to acquire an extremely inconveniently timed aneurysm. I shall be quietly thankful that those odds are extremely low.

...not to make light of the situation of course. But I am reasonably sure she will be perfectly fine."

She also resists the urge to request that they move this to some chairs. This could be uncomfortable on her neck, after awhile.

[UncleWolf]

Wall

The drone is stopped when a woman in black power armor fades into existence in front of it on the wall. "Yes?" Carol asks.

Carl's Place

Carl's eyes drift a bit, but then he stares at the screensaver for a moment, unable to believe what he's seeing, but then he lunges for her and wraps his arms around her neck, shutting her up with a kiss.

That's probably a yes.

Infirmary

Edijar lets her go, and the ornate shock blade slides back into his wrist, point made. "Then we wait an hour." He tells her, gesturing at a chair.

Courtyard

By now, Bugs has come over to the audience's side, a visor over his eye telling him if anyone needs immediate attention.

Sue takes a stab to his arm, deep and to the hilt, but he doesn't flinch at all, and simply takes the man's hand and twists, snapping the blade off, deactivating it, and using the man as a club against the others before tossing him aside. A few are laying, groaning in pain, but another leaps onto his back, stabbing a pair into his shoulders. He gives a roar of fury and reaches back, grabbing the man before literally punting him to land near the watchers, knocked out.

"Broken ribs." Bugs informs, but fine.

Sue gives a stomp towards the still standing opponents, knives still in his back, cauterizing the wounds. "WHO ELSE?!?!"

He seems to be getting carried away...

[Chaotic Bob]

[Infirmary]

Feia's mouth has found what it wants to do with itself, which seems to be acquiring a somewhat dry smile to go with her equally dry tone of voice.
She can talk while she claims her chair.
"From my view, here, this woman is identical to you. Magic physically unable to exist within her. However, unlike you, her's appears to be of a temporary measure, somewhat like wood.
Yes, wood is a nice example.

Magic can be odd to explain to normalish individuals, so analogies are useful.
"Fire cannot exist inside wood as it is, it will starve, deprived of the oxygen it needs to properly exist. However, fire can be set to the outside, to slowly burn out the rest of the wood on the inside."

It takes a moment for her to see a slight issue with this analogy, the way she just explained it, at which point she looks more amused than anything else.
"The wood of this situation being the force physically blocking out the magic within her, not her body. The fire is technically not real, if you would like to go- no, you cannot. Disregard that.

Anyway, the point of this, is that the spell I placed upon your subordinate is meant to devour what is keeping magic from her.
When it completes, she will either reclaim her magic naturally, over time, or I shall have to place a small energy seed within her. The latter is harmless, but takes a few days to properly adapt to her...nature, we shall say, before resuming along as naturally as her own magic would."

[happyturtle]

Carl's Place

Sunny was so carried away in her technobabble that it takes her a moment to connect the surprise kiss to the screensaver proposal that she'd set up while Carl was cooking breakfast. Of course she enthusiastically responds to the surprise kiss anyway, but when she suddenly realizes what it's for, she laughs, squeezes him tight, and returns to kissing.

Courtyard

Delisle certainly isn't about to challenge Sue. She can pass her physical training requirements, but that's as far as it goes. She just watches, eyes wide.

[billtodamax]

Wall

The drone is stopped when a woman in black power armor fades into existence in front of it on the wall. "Yes?" Carol asks.

That was neat! I wish I had cool sensors so I could see invisible people. The drone says, it's screen still showing a happy smile.

Jetpack designs! Fully tested and everything. Look! It says, it's screen flickering to an image of the blueprints.

It's a very sleek, crisp design, with a single point at the top branching into twin engines.

"IT'S TESTED" is written across the bottom in big letters.

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

He nods, but stops listening halfway through, his mind already worked through what she was saying. Just because he couldn't use magic, didn't mean he didn't know how it worked. He knows how it works really well in fact, making it one of his main areas of focus.

He's Remnant's main weapon against it after all.

Courtyard

The three remaining troopers share a glance before nodding at each other. They spread out before sprinting forward at the same time, using their boots to amplify their speed. Sue roars when one slices his calf open, and another stabs his thigh, making him fall to one knee in time for the third to stab his shoulder. However, that one isn't quick enough to avoid having his head grabbed and slammed into the ground, making him go still.

Bugs winces at that, but doesn't move, knowing that the suit protected him from the worst of it.

It's Arla who stops the fight though, drawing a long barreled pistol and firing off a pair of shots, shooting the blades out of the soldiers' hands. "Enough!" She shouts before looking at Irdari and Alice. "Any more, and Sue would have killed them."

Walls

Unseeable by the drone, Carol blinks. "But...um...sorry to break this to you, but we already have flight." She gestures down at her boots, and after a moment, she begins to hover a few inches off the ground.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Infirmary]

Feia generally dislikes presuming that anyone of not-magic bent knows anything of significance about the art.
It's easier to just explain everything with the assumption that they don't, rather than assume they do, then be forced to back track and explain it anyway.

At least if they do know, they can just tune her out, as Edijar did.


So a few moments pass, while they wait for the magic fire to do it's work.
And then Feia gets bored.

She kicks her legs a little bit, before raising a finger to doodle a tree in the air, "growing" out of her thigh. Probably an apple tree.
All assuming her present superior isn't exceptionally twitchy and decides to cut her finger off or something.

[happyturtle]

Carl's Place

Sometime much later, breakfast is probably reheated and finished.

"Let's go tell Cherry and Djar and Vasquez and everyone."

Courtyard

"Is there anything I can do, or should I stay out of the way?" Delisle asks.

[billtodamax]

Walls

Unseeable by the drone, Carol blinks. "But...um...sorry to break this to you, but we already have flight." She gestures down at her boots, and after a moment, she begins to hover a few inches off the ground.

Oh. The screen flickers, and changes to a sad face. Well, I guess there was a design for a robot, but he didn't really want me to show you that yet. I thought you'd be abit more excited about it is all. I was pretty excited when I found out I could fly... The little drone says.

Is that TED? It asks, peering over Carol's shoulder. Then it remembers to change its facial expression, and it's mouth forms an O.

[UncleWolf]

Infirmary

Edijar ignores the show, and just watches the monitors as the hour goes by. When it does, Feia will no longer feel the Deadness inside her. Instead, they'll be able to see as the magic illusion gets sucked into her body as it absorbs magic, filling what it lost.

Edijar doesn't look too impressed with it though, as if he's been expecting it the entire time.

Courtyard

Arla and Bugs head over to the fallen soldiers, but the prior shouts back. "Keep Sue calm!" If she looks, Alice will see that Sue is gritting his teeth, still on the verge of berserk from the pain as he pulls the knives out of his flesh.

Carl's Place

Carl reaches up and sets a finger on Sunny's lips to stop her talk. "Not yet." He says with a sad smile. "Lets let things calm down first. Just you and me for a bit."

Walls

Carol looks behind her before giving a nod. "You're Iggy's then?" She asks. By now TED should be completely repaired by Geoff.

[billtodamax]

Of course I- OH! I forgot to tell you! I'm from Iggy! Except that should have been at the start of the conversation. the drone says, trying to nod, but tilting to far forwards and probably running into Carol's helmet.

Sorry! This is hard.

[Chaotic Bob]

[Infirmary]

Edijar's impressiveness is irrelevant, for the most part here.
Feia's doing what she was asked to do.

"Fascinating, it creates a straight vacuum..."
She's already drifting up out of her chair, possibly forgetting her watchful guard is here at all.

Unless otherwise interrupted, she may begin feeding additional illusions to the previously-Dead mage.
A little bit to see if it keeps working. A little bit to see how many disturbingly-dangerous-looking ones she can get away with. And a bit more to see how long the mage will keep taking in the magic.

[happyturtle]

Courtyard

Delisle steps closer to Sue, knowing he could snap her like a twig without any effort, and tries to meet his eyes. "The training exercise is over, Sue." she says, putting some emphasis on those words. Not a battle. Just training. It's safe to come down.

Carl's Place

Sunny starts to ask why, but the sad look makes her pause, and reassure him instead. "Okay. Just us." she says, and hugs him. "I don't want to go..." she doesn't finish the sentence, but she doesn't have to. They both know the stakes. She finishes getting dressed, puts on her toolbelt, with her beautiful hammer in pride of place, and heads out to the machine shop. She has dozens of sets of armour to customize.

[horngeek]

Idari stands back for now. She's not suited to this.