#i can see how some of this might suit rhiki...

[pangolinheart]

What tragic horror character trope are you?

Thank you for the tag @eris-vito! I can never resist a good horror themed activity!

I suppose I'll tag: @avalon821, @jasleh, @the-littlest-kojin, @irisopranta (if any of you feel like doing it.)

But, if you follow me and want to do it, I'd love to be tagged to see everyone's lovely characters! <3

[windup-warrior]

Prompt 12: Accolade (Makeup)

For Want of Accomplishment

“I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.”

― Edward Everett Hale

“Private Armstrong, you’re late.”

“Corporal Armstrong, you’re late.”

“Sergeant Armstrong, you’re late.”

“Chief Sergeant Armstrong, you’re late.”

See a trend? Punctuality has never been my strong suit but the fact of the matter is, despite my penchant for being perpetually tardy, I consistently showed up anyways. I know it drove Commander Rhiki absolutely insane the way I would wander in sometime around midday with a hangover and half the energy I likely needed for the day’s assignments and exercises. But I showed up! Which is more than some could say. Sure, it took me a couple months to get into the swing of regularly reporting to someone other than myself, but I did it. A for Effort or something like that.

“I have good reason for it today.” I told R’ashaht as I trudged into Maelstrom Command. I’m sure that I looked like a pile of hot garbage but to my credit, it had been a very, very long day. My gear was marred with pockmarks from splattered goldbile and even after munching on morbol fruit and attention from a healer, my lungs still burned with the residual fumes that rolled off of the gold pools deep within Aurum Vale.

“Oh? Do tell.” Commander Rhiki offered with a gesture of her hand. The bemused twist of her lips said she was gearing up to listen to a tall tale just before scolding me and sending me off to run my people through their paces. She was in for a surprise.

“So, that Ishgard job, right? The one you sent me to Coerthas for?” I began, looking down to pick at a hole in my pants and the burn underneath that had caused the hole to begin with.

“Mhm, I’m aware of it.” R’ashaht confirmed with a diminutive nod of her head. Though the Miqo’te woman was short in stature and hardly built like a soldier, she was well accomplished within the Maelstrom. Of course, she was one of the earliest recruits and joined up at a fairly young age. Hell, she is still pretty young now. Not even thirty name days have passed for her, if I recall correctly. At something like twenty-two, they even put her in charge of the Foreign Levy. She was there for the Battle of Carteneau too. I was bit too young for that, not even an adventurer yet. Anyways, if I were the sort to admire military sorts, I would definitely have a girl crush on R’ashaht Rhiki.

“Well, I marched my ass all the way to Aurum Vale and when I got there, they were like… oh, can you go in and check this out? They called us all the way up there to dive into that hellhole when they could have just as easily done it themselves. They are a bunch of pansy asses, that’s what they are.” I said, putting my hands on my hips as if I had been affronted with some massive indignity. Sure, it got old cleaning up other people’s messes, but I suppose there were worse things in life. The pay was decent, the adventure was fun. It was a nice adrenaline boost. The near death experiences weren’t as fun but they were nothing if not exhilarating.

“Uh huh… and they needed our help. Please don’t tell me you left them to their own devices.” Commander Rhiki said, already cringing at the thought. I rolled my eyes at her but my smile gave me away before my words could.

“Of course I did. Did you really expect me to go in there?” I asked, my mouth quivering with mischief and mirth.

“Armstrong, please don’t tell me…” She groaned but I quickly cut her off in a rare show of interrupting a commanding officer.

“I’m not telling you that. I went in. I took some support with me. It was a hot mess but I handled it.” My hands came away from my hips, splaying wide with a wiggle of my fingers. It was a hell of a ta-da motion. At first, Rhiki didn’t look particularly amused but after a moment, she relaxed and let out a tense little chuckle.

“Well, well, well. I suppose that is an acceptable reason for your tardiness. Tell me more, what did you face while you were there?” She asked. The woman’s savagery was legendary. I was always surprised that they had relegated her to a position like this where she spent all day at Command instead of allowing her out where her skills could be better used on the front lines. I may as well indulge a bit of her latent bloodthirst. Thus launched the legendary tale of Karma Armstrong versus Aurum Vale.

“We dove first into the Golden Pools. Supposedly when miners first explored the Vale, they thought these were legitimate pools of Aurum, which is where the place got its name. But whew, were they wrong. Straight up acid, that stuff. It will eat right through your clothes, flesh, whatever. My plate armor held up pretty well against it, but still, it isn’t exactly the sort of stuff you wanna go splashing through on your way through. So not only are we fighting off these ugly ass mobs, but we are also having to avoid the pools too.” I let out a chuckle and took a breath, giving Rhiki time to interject.

“That sounds… delightful.” Sadly, she sounded like she meant it genuinely rather than sarcastically. I laughed again and continued on.

“Yeah, not exactly my idea of a good time, but hey, to each their own. Anyways. We made it into the Lock and there was this ugly motherfucker they call the Locksmith. Whatever he was, he was really good at nailing us repeatedly with poison, which… yeah, that sucked. Don’t breathe in the goldbile, it’s nasty stuff. We figured out though that if we ate this morbol fruit on the ground in there, it would hold some of the effects off.”

“Wait, you just went and ate fruit off of the ground in a place where the pools are acid and the fauna were all trying to kill you?” Rhiki asked. It was her turn to laugh. I joined her for a few moments.

“I suppose we figured that if the fauna and the locale were all going to try and kill us, we may as well try some of the flora to see if it was on our side. We lucked out, thank the Twelve. From there we moved through the Banded Lid, cut our way through more trash into the Empty Pocket. From the Empty Pocket, through more mobs and into something they called the Coincounter’s Chest. Which sounds like a really promising name, until you see what the Coincounter is. This thing hit like a gods damned truck. I think I’m still bruised from where he nailed me with one of his swipes. Lucky though, he had some swings that I think could have been fatal if they connected.” I shuddered at the mere thought, took a breath, and recollected my thoughts.

“Make sure you drop by the infirmary to get checked out. If it was as bad as you say, then we want to make sure you’re as healthy as possible after surviving that.” It was as good as an order so I didn’t argue it. I was a little ragged and it hurt to breathe, but all in all, I really wasn’t too bad off. The upside of dragging a competent healer with me on our expeditionary mission. By then, we had several officers lingering nearby listening to my story so I took a deep, painful breath, and continued.

“Once we took him down, it was onward from there to… I can’t remember, but there were more trash mobs. Easy stuff to cut and blast through. That said, we were all pretty cashed by the time we made it to Bile Lake. There we had to handle a couple morbol looking things. I guess they are called Goldvines. There was nothing gold about them though. You know, all in all, Aurum Vale is a pretty misleading name for the place.”

“Ironic more than misleading, I think.” Said one of the nearby officers. For the life of me, I couldn’t remember his name, but he was a friendly face leaning nearby to listen, so I shot him a smile and finished out the story.

“We headed into the Chantry from there and dear gods��� You thought most morbols were ugly, you haven’t seen anything yet. They called this thing the Miser’s Mistress. Who the Miser was, I don’t know, but he really needs to get his eyes check if this was his mistress. It took a bit of doing, considering how many of us ended up repeatedly poisoned, but with a little help from that handy dandy ground fruit, we took that bitch down too. Still, even with all of the trash cleaned up, that place is still creepy as hell, so even though we cleared it, I wouldn’t really recommend anyone go picnicking down there or anything any time soon.”

Laughter ensued, echoing all around as I looked back to Commander Rhiki to see what she thought. There was a hint of pride in the curl of her lips, I mirrored it in my own smile.

“Well done, Armstrong. Considering everything you have accomplished and just how much of a name you have made for yourself, I think it might be time to consider another rank promotion. How was that hunting log of yours looking?” She asked. I paused, dug through my pockets, and freed a rolled up and battered piece of parchment.

“Done and done.” I said as I handed it back to her. She took it, opened it, and looked it over. Her smile grew further and though they looked like they weren’t paying attention, I noticed everyone around us had gone quiet while they listened to the exchange.

“Looks like you have got the requisite Grand Company seals too. Let’s head over and get you that promotion, Second Lieutenant Armstrong.”