[Plot] The Basal Lake - Introduction

[Gwendolyn of nowhere]

"My sister?" The girl asked, her lips stilled for a brief moment by the assassin's question while her eyes lit up with unabashed excitement.

Micali had unwittingly stumbled upon the spurii's favorite topic.

"Heck yeah I have a sister! Aelflead's fucking awesome, -that's her name, Aelflead- but she lets me call her Aelf, or Alfie, or Elfie because she told me it was all I could really say when we first met which is kind of weird when you really think about it because I wasn't like a baby or anything, but we're not gonna think about it so that's okay. You probably shouldn't call her Aelf, or Alfie, or Elfie though because she really doesn't like it when people make up nicknames, in fact, I think I only know a few other people who she lets call her anything else but her full name. There's Borin, and Nicky, Bvyrnick, and Hayled, and Yam, and pretty much all of the other guys from-" The young woman paused to strike a dynamic pose with her fists akimbo and flip her feathery bangs away from her face. "Where I used to stay." Then slipped back into her bouncing gait beside Micali as she continued to ramble.

"There's a couple of other adults like... Moonona and Marilynn, but I'm the only one that really matters because I'm the only one she let's drop the 'd' sknnigk -drop the 'D'. Sorry- out of her name. She does make up nicknames for a lot of people though so that doesn't really make much sense; but she's like really really cool though, and I think you'd like her a bunch. Like I said, she doesn't use any bows or guns, she really is a terrible shot, but she's super fast, and tough, and strong- Vis she's so freaking strong. I knocked over this guy's produce cart by accident in the Emerald Jewel one day when I convinced her to take me out shopping for textiles, and she picked the whole cart up with one freakin' hand when he started yelling at us! I helped put the produce that wasn't all bruised up back in while she held the cart up and the guy didn't even charge us for ruining the stuff that fell out and got really smashed. He did seem kinda sweaty though, but I bet it was because he was so impre-"

 

[Micali Alsara]

Micali felt her last shreds of decency fight for control of her actions as Gwendolyn spoke, and spoke, and spoke.

And spoke.

...And spoke.

It wasn’t as endearing as it had been for an instant as Micali’s head began to cramp. The girl continued, and continued, didn’t she need to stop for a breath? Was it some spurii trait that allowed her to literally talk forever? The details were almost entirely lost, as well, due to the fact that there was no pause, no break to actually digest any information that was being supplied.

“Gwendolyn,” Micali interrupted, sharp and loud enough to stop the girl mid-sentence. “Please...stop talking. Take a breath. I’m getting a headache.” The laicar clutched her temple both to illustrate her point and to genuinely attempt to curb any sharpness that etched in. In a last ditch attempt to get her point across, she spoke again in the now-rare silence, “sometimes it’s okay for nobody to be talking.”

Was it a tad harsh? Perhaps, but Micali feared for her sanity on a four-day trip across the ocean with this girl’s incessant rambling continuing on at all times. Regardless, she didn’t wish to see the girl deflate. “Sorry. Just- I like quiet.” This girl bore passing resemblance to Rosa, should someone get Rosa on a topic she enjoyed. Incessantly excited, hyper-actively enthusiastic. The similarities ended there, for the sake of Micali’s already bruised conscience on the matter.

[1573]

 

[Gwendolyn of nowhere]

Surprised, Gwendolyn blinked and regarded the woman with wide eyes while she spoke, and then shrugged in response.

"Oke doke!" She chirped, and just like that the torrent of sound ended.

The dialogue vacuum left behind was quickly filled again by the nearby cacophony of the rest of the boarding company's chatter, while the immediate noise around them receded into it's source with naught but a flip of the girl's hair as a note to its existence.

Succinctly and with a now strangely subdued aura, Gwendolyn fell into step with the older woman and laced her fingers behind her back. "You don't have to apologize, Aelf likes the quiet too sometimes. I get it." She said, and then followed this with a wide smile that flashed her teeth.

After a beat of silence, she spoke up again though drastically devoid of the mania that'd controlled her speech up until then. "Do you have any sisters?"

 

[Micali Alsara]

Micali couldn’t help but feel some measure of guilt as the girl seemed to deflate from her previous elation, though her ears may have thanked her for it. As the two made their way forward, the Arsenic now coming into distant view, Micali let out a sigh as the din of the busy port city sounded through, now a tolerable white noise as the two walked for a short period in silence.

This Aelflead character seemed more and more like a description of Micali herself as time went on, and some small part of the laicar thought perhaps this was a contact she’d want to reach at a later time. She was set on her path now, but should Talrigori fail to make good on her promises, having allies in or around Terminus would be a very good thing for tracking down the rest of the Seven Devils.

Gwendolyn spoke up again, though this time much more palatable, and Micali was unsure of how to answer. The sniper figured she’d most likely never see this girl again after the trip, and there was nobody else listening, so what was the harm in honesty?

“I don’t know, but probably not. I was really young when my parents died, and I was...taken in by some other people. I never met a sibling so I guess it’s possible, but they’d be a stranger to me.” The words left an unsure hollow in her chest, a strange pull that perhaps, just maybe, it was possible. If she had that kind of support system in place from a young age, she wondered if where she was today would be much different. Despite herself and the hypothetical, she turned to Gwendolyn anew.

“Where’s your sister now? Does she know you’re here?” For what had started as a convenient cover, this interaction had quickly changed into Micali being attached to a stranger for sheer worry that the spurii was entering a war zone that she likely stood no chance of returning from.

[1909]

 

[Gwendolyn of nowhere]

"Right now?"

Gwendolyn stopped walking a moment and thought. "The last time I saw her was at that weird temple umm... Shambler? Shambler, place in Excelsus. Remember I said I fought some dead things? Yeah there. I knew she was close cuz I messed with the porro vox I snuck into a care package Marilynn sent her a few months ago her so it lights up if she's close, so I called her to tell her about it because I felt bad that I got in the way of some other really cool people who were helping fight the shamblers there too. Anyway, umm..."

The spurii paused and placed her finger to her lips, gears almost visibly turning in her head while she re-ordered her thoughts, and then spoke again. "She showed up in like a half hour or something, told me not to move and went in the temple. Then there was a boom a couple hours later, the temple collapsed and she came back. Then chewed me out," Gwen abruptly slammed her foot into the ground, her sudden anger making her cheeks turn a bright shade of pink through her dark scales.

"Without even listening to me! Like, of fucking course I'm all the way out here for a good reason! I'm not just a kid doing dumb shit anymore! There's pirat- Rrgh, sorry." The girl stopped short, sucking in a sharp breath that did little to quell the angry roses at her cheeks. "That's not important, we're talking about Aelf, not to her..." She paused to take another small breath, then began speaking in clipped tones. "I don't actually know where she is right now any more specific than," She reached into her tunic and produced a clear orb filled with bronze liquid and a shimmering disc, scrutinizing it for a moment before dropping it back in place. "Further than 20 kilometers of here, it's probably best that way right now. I'm pretty sure Aelflead kill me if she found me all the way out here instead of home right now."