Note: Follow-up to A Talk
Armil
It was the next night. Things had been a blur as the Conexus came, took her statement, took the body. Keydis had cleaned the more visceral elements of the encounter and Nyct had helped with the more practical side of fixing the damage to the equipment and tools.
The sun had set, Nyct had gone home, and Keydis stood in the secret vault underneath her workspace. The plaque continued to fascinate her, leaving her wondering what relation, if any, her mother had with the future terrorist organization. She was dead almost fifteen years before the assassination attempt that carried these same words. Was she related to them? Did she somehow inspire them? Was it just a common phrase back then which the terrorists decided to bring back?
For now, there was no way to know, and there were more immediate concerns to deal with.
Keydis closed her eyes, concentrating, focusing on what she could feel of Caeancora inside her. It was difficult, but gradually she could feel warmth inside and it began seeping leftward, toward her shoulder. Once it reached the scarred stump, Keydis couldn't feel it anymore, but she opened her eyes and looked at the violet outline of an arm, the threads of glowing veins reaching into open air.
The plaque sat under an armillary sphere showing Araevis and the surrounding celestial bodies made, seemingly, out of pure caelitium lateris. It looked like an award, though Keydis had no idea what for. As far as she knew, Fiamma was a dealer in rare animals, not someone who studied the stars. "A person can do more than one thing," she reminded herself out loud, and her lapse in concentration caused the arm to fade a little.
Embarrassed, she grit her teeth and focused harder, bringing the arm into full form. Then she reached out with her mind, pleased to see the arm follow her command, open fingertips spreading toward the armillary sphere.
When those fingers touched the rare metal, it was like a flame racing up an oil-soaked rag. "Bell-damn!" Keydis spat out, jumping back as a sharp pain chased the disintegrating arm. She clutched at her stump as it throbbed in agony. Instead of frustration or anger, though, Keydis grinned.
It was real. Where the award came from, what it meant, all things she could hopefully figure out later. The important thing: the material was legitimate.
Keydis laid out some tools and went to work. Touching the armillary sphere with her own flesh-and-blood hands had no impact whatsoever. She could feel a tingle of latent power, similar to any terra regia, but no pain. That was a response to Caeancora.
Piece by piece, she tore down the sphere and laid the pieces out on the table. The globe at the center was hollow, and she separated the halves. There was a ring for Caesar, the sun; another for Aestus, the larger moon; Lacunar, the smaller moon; Tus, the Comet; even one for Spera, although it was represented by an empty wire circle. No one knew exactly what Spera was, or at least, it wasn't commonly known. Keydis had never looked very hard into it.
Other rings had markings she didn't understand and no celestial bodies attached. She had no idea if they meant anything or if this was just decoration for whatever this trophy was for.
The plaque itself was made of silvery bigatium, still a beautiful metal but not important for her goal. The base was made of some kind of dark, smooth-grained wood. She set that aside and hoped to take it to the Sapientia Coetus if she survived what she had planned. If anyone in Terminus would know what the thing was for, that'd probably be where to ask. Belatedly, she wondered if she should have drawn what the sphere looked like before taking it apart.
Keydis wished she had or knew how to use Nyct's tools. As it was, she just had to make her best estimates using what she had: the weight of the caelitium material was about three times her blacksmithing hammer, or about double the heavy sledge. That would be around four kilograms. Keydis stroked her fingers over the marvelously rare material, doing some quick math in her head, some of the only math she knew how to do.
"Time to see if that whacked out chemist is full of it..." Keydis picked up one piece of the disassembled sphere, the orb representing Aestus, and focused on the ring she was wearing. A band of golden auritium covered in innumerable flakes of volcanic obsidian. On contact with the ring, as Keydis focused, the heat in the hidden room began to rise. She frowned a little bit, half-expecting that her efforts would fizzle out and she'd have one more reason to deck Naevius Squalidus.
Her frustrations were unfounded, though. As she concentrated, the metal in her hand began to glow from within. It didn't turn red or orange, though, and instead the metal started to glow blue-white, flashing a few times as the heat poured into the metal. She kept focusing a little longer until she was satisfied.
When Naevius gave her the ring, he said it would probably work 'for green and blue.' Probably. Despite the fact that the ring had never let her down thus far, she was doubting the chemist's honesty and his prowess both, but to her chagrin, he was as good as his word. Again.
Keydis found a roll of parchment and a grease pencil and set about making notes, sketching designs. The brunette paused for a moment and looked over at the spiral-guard of a broken sword hilt, almost longingly. She stared and considered, before ultimately shaking her head. Onto the design she crossed out the spiral hilt and instead added something with a cross-guard instead of a basket hilt.
It was time to move forward, even if that meant retiring Promoveo.
Armil
Wordcount: 1,001
It was the next night. Things had been a blur as the Conexus came, took her statement, took the body. Keydis had cleaned the more visceral elements of the encounter and Nyct had helped with the more practical side of fixing the damage to the equipment and tools.
The sun had set, Nyct had gone home, and Keydis stood in the secret vault underneath her workspace. The plaque continued to fascinate her, leaving her wondering what relation, if any, her mother had with the future terrorist organization. She was dead almost fifteen years before the assassination attempt that carried these same words. Was she related to them? Did she somehow inspire them? Was it just a common phrase back then which the terrorists decided to bring back?
For now, there was no way to know, and there were more immediate concerns to deal with.
Keydis closed her eyes, concentrating, focusing on what she could feel of Caeancora inside her. It was difficult, but gradually she could feel warmth inside and it began seeping leftward, toward her shoulder. Once it reached the scarred stump, Keydis couldn't feel it anymore, but she opened her eyes and looked at the violet outline of an arm, the threads of glowing veins reaching into open air.
The plaque sat under an armillary sphere showing Araevis and the surrounding celestial bodies made, seemingly, out of pure caelitium lateris. It looked like an award, though Keydis had no idea what for. As far as she knew, Fiamma was a dealer in rare animals, not someone who studied the stars. "A person can do more than one thing," she reminded herself out loud, and her lapse in concentration caused the arm to fade a little.
Embarrassed, she grit her teeth and focused harder, bringing the arm into full form. Then she reached out with her mind, pleased to see the arm follow her command, open fingertips spreading toward the armillary sphere.
When those fingers touched the rare metal, it was like a flame racing up an oil-soaked rag. "Bell-damn!" Keydis spat out, jumping back as a sharp pain chased the disintegrating arm. She clutched at her stump as it throbbed in agony. Instead of frustration or anger, though, Keydis grinned.
It was real. Where the award came from, what it meant, all things she could hopefully figure out later. The important thing: the material was legitimate.
Keydis laid out some tools and went to work. Touching the armillary sphere with her own flesh-and-blood hands had no impact whatsoever. She could feel a tingle of latent power, similar to any terra regia, but no pain. That was a response to Caeancora.
Piece by piece, she tore down the sphere and laid the pieces out on the table. The globe at the center was hollow, and she separated the halves. There was a ring for Caesar, the sun; another for Aestus, the larger moon; Lacunar, the smaller moon; Tus, the Comet; even one for Spera, although it was represented by an empty wire circle. No one knew exactly what Spera was, or at least, it wasn't commonly known. Keydis had never looked very hard into it.
Other rings had markings she didn't understand and no celestial bodies attached. She had no idea if they meant anything or if this was just decoration for whatever this trophy was for.
The plaque itself was made of silvery bigatium, still a beautiful metal but not important for her goal. The base was made of some kind of dark, smooth-grained wood. She set that aside and hoped to take it to the Sapientia Coetus if she survived what she had planned. If anyone in Terminus would know what the thing was for, that'd probably be where to ask. Belatedly, she wondered if she should have drawn what the sphere looked like before taking it apart.
Keydis wished she had or knew how to use Nyct's tools. As it was, she just had to make her best estimates using what she had: the weight of the caelitium material was about three times her blacksmithing hammer, or about double the heavy sledge. That would be around four kilograms. Keydis stroked her fingers over the marvelously rare material, doing some quick math in her head, some of the only math she knew how to do.
"Time to see if that whacked out chemist is full of it..." Keydis picked up one piece of the disassembled sphere, the orb representing Aestus, and focused on the ring she was wearing. A band of golden auritium covered in innumerable flakes of volcanic obsidian. On contact with the ring, as Keydis focused, the heat in the hidden room began to rise. She frowned a little bit, half-expecting that her efforts would fizzle out and she'd have one more reason to deck Naevius Squalidus.
Her frustrations were unfounded, though. As she concentrated, the metal in her hand began to glow from within. It didn't turn red or orange, though, and instead the metal started to glow blue-white, flashing a few times as the heat poured into the metal. She kept focusing a little longer until she was satisfied.
When Naevius gave her the ring, he said it would probably work 'for green and blue.' Probably. Despite the fact that the ring had never let her down thus far, she was doubting the chemist's honesty and his prowess both, but to her chagrin, he was as good as his word. Again.
Keydis found a roll of parchment and a grease pencil and set about making notes, sketching designs. The brunette paused for a moment and looked over at the spiral-guard of a broken sword hilt, almost longingly. She stared and considered, before ultimately shaking her head. Onto the design she crossed out the spiral hilt and instead added something with a cross-guard instead of a basket hilt.
It was time to move forward, even if that meant retiring Promoveo.
Last edited: