#steel pile foundation

[shayyjustin]

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[vincivilworld]

Sheet pile -Sheet piling types, sheet piling advantages

A sheet pile is a type of driven pile that uses sections of sheet materials with interlocking edges. We generally install Sheet piles for lateral earth retention, excavation support, and shoreline protection operations. They are typically made of steel, but can also be made of vinyl, wood, or aluminium. Sheet piles are installed in sequence to the design depth along the excavation perimeter or…

[dieseldame]

𝗗𝗿𝗮𝘄𝗻 𝗯𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗖𝗮𝗿𝗱𝘀

Sevika x Fortune Teller! Reader

𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗻𝘁: 2,1K

𝗦𝘂𝗺𝗺𝗮𝗿𝘆: Intrigued by Sevika’s use of a tarot deck, Reader joins her for a game that takes an unexpected turn.

𝗡𝗼𝘁𝗲𝘀: Slow burn, fortune-telling, tarot, romantic tension, domestic fluff, Zaun setting.

𝗔𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗿'𝘀 𝗻𝗼𝘁𝗲𝘀: I’ve recently gotten my hands on my very first tarot deck, and it’s been such a fascinating journey learning the meanings behind the cards and their symbolism. That curiosity sparked the idea for this story—combining Sevika’s no-nonsense attitude with the mystical allure of tarot readings. I wanted to capture the tension, the mystery, and the inevitability of fate in this piece. Enjoy!

The Last Drop was alive with the raucous energy of a late Zaunite evening. The air thrummed with music, laughter, and the click of glasses colliding in toasts. Smoke curled lazily from various corners, and the smell of spilled liquor clung to the damp floorboards. It was a place for the desperate and the bold, where fortunes were gambled and lives sometimes exchanged for coin or glory.

And at the heart of it all sat Sevika.

She leaned back in her chair with the air of someone who owned not just her table but the entire room. A small smirk tugged at her lips as she toyed with a glass of amber liquid in one hand and shuffled her deck with the other. The cards moved between her fingers like extensions of herself, each flip and ripple precise, hypnotic. Around her, a circle of admirers and challengers alike watched with bated breath. Another winning streak. Another pile of coin gathered at her elbow.

For Sevika, it wasn’t about the money—it was about control. She reveled in the predictable chaos of it all: the sweat beading on her opponents' brows, the way their bravado faltered under her calculating stare. She was the gravitational force pulling them all in. And she liked it that way.

But tonight, she felt it before she saw it. A shift in the air.

You had been watching her from the edge of the room, drawn like a moth to a flame. Something about her presence—the easy confidence, the intensity in her gaze—snared you and wouldn’t let go. It wasn’t just her skill at the table or the low rasp of her voice as she called her plays. It was something deeper, something unspoken, like the hum of an engine beneath layers of steel.

Before you knew it, you were moving. Through the crowd, past the jeers and cheers of the patrons. Closer to her.

She noticed you immediately, of course. Her eyes flicked up, sharp and assessing.

— Another challenger? — she drawled, her voice cutting through the din like a blade.

— Not quite, — you replied, your voice steady, though your heart raced. You gestured to the seat across from her. — But I’d like a hand.

Sevika arched an eyebrow, clearly intrigued. She nodded toward the chair. — Your funeral.

The deck moved between her hands again, shuffling with practiced ease. As you sat, you noticed the intricate designs on the cards—less a standard playing deck and more… something else. Tarot cards.

— Interesting choice. — you said, gesturing to the deck.

Sevika’s smirk deepened. — Keeps things interesting. You’d be surprised how much the cards know.

She dealt three cards in a smooth, deliberate motion. One. Two. Three. Face down.

You hesitated before flipping them over. Something about this felt… significant.

The first card revealed itself: The Tower, reversed.

The air seemed to thicken. You swallowed hard, your fingers brushing the edge of the card. — Your past. — you murmured.

Sevika chuckled, low and rough. — Go on, fortune teller. Enlighten me.

You didn’t know what compelled you to continue—whether it was her challenge or the magnetic pull she had on you. But as you spoke, the words came unbidden.

— The Tower reversed represents… chaos avoided. A disaster that didn’t destroy you but left its mark. You’ve rebuilt yourself, piece by piece, but the foundation still trembles. — You glanced up, meeting her gaze. — You’ve survived, but survival came at a cost.

For a moment, something flickered in Sevika’s eyes. Recognition? Pain? It was gone as quickly as it appeared, replaced by her usual mask of indifference.

— Lucky guess. — she said, though her tone lacked conviction.

The second card. The Eight of Swords, upright.

— Your present, — you continued, your voice quieter now. — You’re trapped. Not physically, but… mentally. You feel confined by something. Your choices, your loyalty, your circumstances. You’re strong, but even the strongest can feel caged.

This time, Sevika didn’t speak. Her jaw tightened, and her hand curled into a fist on the table. You could feel the tension radiating from her, a storm barely contained.

Finally, the third card. The Lovers, upright.

You froze. The card seemed to hum with its own energy, the vibrant imagery drawing your eye.

— Your future, — you said softly. — A union. Love. A choice that will change everything.

Sevika scoffed, breaking the spell. — Love? Please. I don’t need anyone.

You couldn’t help but smile, leaning forward slightly. — The cards don’t lie.

Her gaze locked with yours, a challenge in her eyes. — We’ll see about that.

The moment stretched, taut and electric. You could feel the weight of her attention, the way it pinned you in place. Finally, you stood, letting the tension break.

As you turned to leave, you glanced over your shoulder, offering her a teasing smile. — I’ll be seeing you, Sevika.

She didn’t reply, but her eyes followed you, dark and unreadable.

Months Later

Sevika’s apartment was quiet, save for the soft clink of pots and pans from the kitchen. The first rays of dawn filtered through the grimy window, casting long shadows across the room.

She stepped inside, kicking the door shut behind her. The weight of the day’s winnings—gold and coin stuffed into various bags—pulled at her arms, but she barely noticed. Her gaze was fixed on the figure in the kitchen.

You stood at the stove, humming softly to yourself as you stirred a pot. The warm, familiar scent of spices filled the air. You looked over your shoulder as she entered, your lips curling into a smile.

— Late night? — you teased, your tone light but knowing.

Sevika grunted, dropping the bags near the door before making her way toward you. She leaned against the doorframe, watching you with a mix of amusement and something softer, something she wouldn’t dare name.

— You’re cooking again. — she said.

— Someone has to keep you alive, — you shot back, turning to face her fully. — And I’d rather it not be through Zaun’s questionable street food.

Her lips twitched, almost a smile. Almost.

You tilted your head, your eyes sparkling with mischief. — Come here, Sevika.

She didn’t need to be told twice. Crossing the small space in a few strides, she slipped her arms around your waist, pulling you close. Her body was warm, solid, grounding. You leaned into her, resting your head briefly against her chest.

— Miss me? — you asked, your voice teasing.

— Don’t push it, — she muttered, but the way her hands lingered on your hips betrayed her.

You tilted your head up, catching her gaze. — You know, — you said softly, — I told you the cards don’t lie.

Sevika rolled her eyes, but before she could retort, you leaned up and kissed her. It was soft, almost chaste, but it lingered just enough to make her breath hitch.

When you pulled back, she gave you a look that was equal parts exasperation and affection. —You’re insufferable.

— And yet, — you replied, your grin widening.

Without warning, she scooped you up, setting you down on the kitchen island with ease. Her hands framed your face as she kissed you again, this time with more heat, more intent. The world seemed to fall away, leaving only the two of you.

When you finally broke apart, your breathing uneven, your gaze drifted to the counter beside you. There, lying face up, was a single card: The Lovers.

You couldn’t help but laugh, the sound light and joyous. — See? I told you.

Sevika smirked, brushing her thumb over your cheek. — Maybe the cards know a thing or two.

And with that, the night gave way to something new, something bright, something undeniably yours.

ㅤㅤㅤ

[skylinesnsunshines]

pac: the person you are becoming in a year (TIMELESS) -`♡´-

hi everyone! im back again for a 2nd pac for you all <3 the response from my 1st pac was so amazing so thank you all for supporting me. i no longer feel motivated to do readings for celebrities but i won't be entirely opposed to doing them, i'll just be more selective on who i'm reading and what i'm reading about. any requests for pac topics will be much appreciated! thank you everyone :3

disclaimer: all for entertainment purposes only, free will exists and energies are subject to change. if it doesn't resonate then it might not be the pile or reading for you. remember that this is a general reading, so i'm channelling the energy of the majority, not a specific individual.

(italicised is the card on the bottom of the tarot deck which is meant to represent the subconscious/blind spot of the situation + rx means reversed)

photo cr: pinterest | dividers | personal readings | tips

PILE 1 -> PILE 2

PILE 3 -> PILE 4

pile 1 ~ 4 of cups, 3 of swords, 9 of wands rx, the moon

okay so i want to reiterate that you have free will and i am just the messenger, so you don't have to claim this if this doesn't resonate. i feel a sense of rigidity with your energy cause i keep seeing an image of someone trying to bend steel and clearly failing. you may be running away or avoiding a certain situation due to it not aligning with your life plan. some of you might have virgo placements as well, cause i keep hearing that you "have an image to upkeep" and deviating from your plan will cause you a lot of anxiety. you may struggle with being okay with the unknown, which leads you to constantly seek reassurance from others or tangible things (e.g achievements). The main message I'm getting from this is to surrender, which is easier said than done but once you let go of certain expectations you will be reborn and no longer feel the dread of past situations that haunt you. you might be unhappy with your progress over the year, but remember that consistency matters most and you can't keep moving forward on a foundation that is easily shaken. i keep hearing longevity, which makes sense why you might feel frustrated about not moving at the pace you hope for because whatever skill or resource you are building will follow you throughout your life. i also get reminded of chappell roan, as many people are referring to her journey with the phrase "sometimes it takes 10 years to become an overnight success". i do think that this next year, you will be focusing on your healing and learning to let go of anxieties regarding your self-perception. now, the moon on the bottom of the spread tells me that the person you are becoming in a year is still hidden, mainly due to the choice that you have when it comes to your growth. there will be a lot of truths regarding yourself and the people around you that will help you elevate into the best version of yourselves. spirit's encouraging you to embrace the unknown, and be aware of the power that you hold within yourself. you have autonomy and are the deciding factor on the outcome of your future, the universe is here to encourage and support you into the person you want to become.

i know the tarot was a bit gloomy, but the oracles actually show lots of success and strength that you will find within yourself. the valley card depicts a situation where whatever the universe throws at you, your resilience perseveres as you have more resilience than you give yourself credit for. i love the panther card, as it encourages you to explore the unknown and to not limit yourself on the preconceived outcomes that you may envision for yourself. this card is encouraging you to embrace fluidity and limit the need to control on how it will unfold. a situation that you may perceive to be a failure today could be what leads you to unfathomable success in the future. the unicorn card also encourages you to embrace the unknown, you are destined for great things and it's important to learn to trust the universe. believe that things are unravelling for you behind the scenes and that you don't always need tangible things to measure your growth/success. it's important to remember that your path should not be compared to anyone else's and placing certain beliefs limits the outcomes of the person you want to be.

oracle cards ~ valley: deep personal strength and peace that assure success. 22 panther: no expectations. unicorn.

channelled song ~ one step at a time by jordin sparks

pile 2 ~ 8 of swords, 9 of swords, page of pentacles rx, judgement rx

this spread tells me that this year will teach you how to stand on your own, and uproot beliefs that no longer serve you. you might be someone who experiences a lot of racing thoughts, and you might struggle to manage them. i feel that within a year, you will learn to manage those thoughts and learn to trust your intuition more than your anxieties. you will learn to separate those two patterns for you to have a guide on what/who to trust. i'm sensing you might be someone who often sees past the surface and your innate gift is the gift of knowing, but it often frustrates you when you don't see movement in your physical reality or when it doesn't align with your vision. spirit's reminding you that you are so powerful, but you need to learn to let go of those feelings of always needing to know, we as humans living in this reality aren't meant to know everything as life is meant to be experienced and lived rather than entirely orchestrated. i'm hearing that in a year you will learn to embrace the unknown and make decisions based on how you feel rather than what you think. i think you could be extremely sensitive to energies (twin!) and you're being taught to really practice trusting yourself and your gut even if you see it isn't logical. you have so much inner knowing or guidance but oftentimes need someone else or physical evidence to validate your intuition, and the universe is saying it doesn't always work like that. the universe is asking you to look within and build a stronger connection with your inner guidance system and believe that you truly know best. the universe is reminding you to operate from a place of gratitude and trusting even in things that you don't believe other people will understand. this is a never-ending journey and within a year it'll be only the beginning of you living your most authentic life.

the boat card details the possibility of receiving a gift or monetary help through your environment. you could be enrolling in a competition in which you succeeded at or experiencing your luck through help from another individual. the eagle describes someone who is meant to be the light-bringer in the darkness of life. while it's important to say that this is not your sole identity, it aims to help you acknowledge your unique vision and honour your inner knowing to help embrace its unique energy. you might have been struggling to "fit in", but the spirit's saying that that's not your path and you are meant to stand out to inspire others. while everyone brings a unique trait to the table, your trait is to understand your light and not dim it for anyone's sake. honour your gift by embracing beliefs that resonate with your authentic self and bringing them to the world to show that not everything needs to be full of doom and gloom. crow energy is incredibly potent, and it is often a symbol of the occult as crows often embody a meaning when it shows up in people's lives. while this meaning is often deemed as negative, people misunderstand the crow as crow energy can only be understood with a clear mind. this reiterates the point of trusting your inner guidance, and also listening to your body when it comes to different experiences (eating a new food, making a new friend, etc.). crows are often misunderstood, but the universe is reminding you to have faith in your vision and that you are your greatest ally.

oracle cards ~ boat: money or property through an inheritance, winning or windfall. 30 eagle: you are more. crow.

channelled song ~ talk to me nicely by blxst

pile 3 ~ the fool, the hierophant, strength rx, 8 of cups

a new version of yourself will emerge in a year, representing stability and authority. you will have a new beginning, whether in your career, love life, or personal life. spirit wants to remind you to embrace your wisdom and share your gift of communication, as i feel that in a year people will feel called to ask for your guidance more. i also noticed that your spread has the colours orange, red and yellow so they might be important colours. since this will be a new experience, you might feel uncomfortable/unsure of your capabilities, but spirit's encouraging you to find a silver lining as this will test your resilience and self-assurance. by next year you will release a lot of the restrictions that you have placed on yourself, and feel that you will find a newfound level of strength when it comes to your resilience/willpower. i do think that initially, it will feel difficult for you to accept that you've grown cause i see resistance, but you'll eventually shed those feelings of tension and wholeheartedly accept the new change coming in. this spread could also indicate that if you are in a relationship, in a year the relationship may be elevated commitment-wise. within a year you will be someone who will be looked at with a lot of wisdom, and how people will look at you with amazement as you feel like you are trudging your own path. i feel that there will be a new sense of yourself that will emerge that puts you in a position of influence, wether that'd be in your personal or professional life. i see you as a really humble individual, and that you are sometimes even unaware of the strength that you possess. while humility is one of your greatest traits, it's also encouraging you to be more comfortable with being acknowledged and given your flowers. learning how to be confident authentically in yourself and your abilities is something that you could be experiencing. spirit's also hoping to bring your attention to a "lack" mindset that you might operate on. i don't see this as a bad thing though, as this lack seems to stem from the hunger and desire to always do better and be the best. your determination is what makes you special, but it's also encouraging you to sometimes stop and smell the flowers as you can sometimes feel that once you achieve something it's time to set your sights on achieving the next. spirit's encouraging you to pat yourself on the back and practice gratitude, as oftentimes your feelings of lack can sometimes disrupt your ability to be present in reality. overall, the experiences you will have within a year will shape you greatly with 3 major arcanas coming out, and spirit's saying that you are so deserving but to also remember to celebrate yourself and your achievements.

again the tulip card touches on the romantic aspect as it signifies great passion. so within a year, you might feel a new sense of passion reignited with another person, if that doesn't resonate, it could be a new passion for your creations or hobbies or even work. the antelope is encouraging you to be more mindful of your intention through movement to release any pent-up emotions you might have. on days when you feel it's difficult, it's encouraging you to move by not letting your circumstances fully dictate your worth. you are smarter than you give credit for, and you inherently know how to bounce back from difficulties. it's reminding you to move and trust yourself/your body to help you get through difficult periods. the first thing i notice from the eagle card is how eagles fly alone and at high altitudes, and that in a year you will embody the bravery of the eagle by learning and accepting your true self and trusting the path that you're on. you might lose some people along the way, but you've learned to be good on your own. i see for those of you who are manifesting a relationship as well, this frequency will help you attract a stable/secure relationship.

oracle cards ~ tulip: great passion. 27 antelope: shake, release, heal, move on. eagle.

channelled song ~ priorities by tyla

pile 4 ~ 10 of wands, temperance rx, 6 of pentacles, queen of swords rx

my pile 4's, you seem to be the provider group. you might have many burdens due to your self-perception/upbringing/environment. people look to you to provide whether that'd be financially, emotionally, with your time, etc. (this could also be cause you're financing yourself). i see that you might be the type of person to keep to yourself when going through hardship, that could be because your environment is difficult and it's encouraged you to develop a mentality of "trudging it out". i'm seeing someone who has a wound on their back/the back of their head and is unaware of how big the wound is because you need to keep the show going. everyone around you is asking you "are you ok?" and your response is always "i'm fine, keep going" and while your resilience is admirable, it's worrying to them given that they're able to see how clear the wound is. spirit's encouraging you to not keep to yourself and share the burden, as i can see that there is a lack of vulnerability you share with others. one of my favourite sayings i learned recently is that "shared sorrow is half a sorrow, and shared joy is a double joy", and i feel that this saying could be relevant to what you're currently going through. i'm hearing that in a year, you will learn to shed those beliefs of thinking that you're a burden and that you will learn to incorporate more balance in your life. these experiences will help you cultivate the skill of expressing your feelings and emotions coherently, also improving your mind/body connection. i feel that you have a lot to give to others, whether that'd be time, wisdom, or even loyalty but you might feel that since it's not tangible or physical you don't have much to contribute. for that i say, those around you who get to experience the most vulnerable parts of you see you as an even stronger person, because you also inspire them to undergo the same transformation.

you could meet a person within a year that helps you undergo this transformation, or be the catalyst of that change. it could come out of the blue and take you by surprise, but their energy seems so delightful that i feel like over time your friendship or relationship with them will flourish. the phoenix card tells the story of a transformation and reminds you that your current reality does not define what you will experience ahead. i see you shedding beliefs that ultimately don't serve you, and truly help you become the person you see as your best. i'm feeling a need for control with this group, so the buffalo also reminds that setbacks are an opportunity for upliftment. although it is natural to want to grieve and feel your emotions, it's reminding you to not sit in that energy for too long because of your resilience. you have gone through your hardest days and will continue to do so as you will experience days filled with happiness and fulfilment that reflect on the work you put in yourself.

oracle cards ~ handshake: a meeting with a stranger could be important. 42 phoenix: transformation. buffalo.

channelled song ~ the fighter - gym class heroes ft ryan tedder

so that’s it for the reading! let me know if it resonated and if you have any feedback, questions or requests! my ask box is always open for a chat as well <3 sending you love and light always :) hope you enjoyed it!

[searchingforserendipity25]

garak fades into obscurity. a shed and a garden that feeds half the neighborhood.

door open, always, less in welcome than to stop the walls from closing in - but people come inside, too.

-

the hungry, generally. other gardeners, come to pick up shovels and seeds. some of them can't stand to look him in the eye, some of them stagger blind to the world, caught in memory and half-blind to the world.

orphans, widows. old victims with old grievances, sometimes. we are the new cardassia, growing from the dust, glimmer the propaganda-screens in the squares. united we build. some people even believe it.

there is nothing else to believe in. they eat together, the neighbors of tain's old district, and share old stories: poetry and theater, cruel orders, disappearances.

people come to the slantwise shadow of the small room, with its rich smells, the piles of good soil and samples of tubers bred to grow on the radioactive soil. they come to find good work, they come to find answers.

my brother, they say. my daughter, my lover, what did you do to them? the last parmak, asking for their cousin kelas. the last - oh, cardassia is full of them, made up of them, their last-names, long generations turned to a remnant. he is only to blame for some of it; but to be a culprit in any part of cardassia's diminished is worse than any other sin.

he gives them red bush tea, coordinates for secret labor camps and torture chambers, answers. true answers all, especially the lies. no one murders him, not even in the dark of a dust storm. united we build, join together for the future. they take the food from his garden and go.

when, three years after the end of the war, the notice comes for a public trial, he packs a bag with old tailor's scissors and makes ready.

because this is the new cardassia, there is no execution. because this is cardassia, punishment is precise, measured, and symmetrical. beautiful, for a mind inclined to find such things beautiful.

we are the new cardassia, growing from the dust, and we seek to build from the ground up on good foundations, castellan ghemor says.

'but of course,' elim garak says. he does not look like a torturer, in his gardener's apron and working braid, dust and soil beneath the nails of his expressive hands; but then, torturers rarely do. 'there is no place for old rot, i tell my apprentices so every time. i am gratified to be exiled, if the court allows it to be a benefit to cardassia.'

this is the new cardassia: most trials are not recorded and projected on town squares, but some are. why not give a last decent show?

people need examples to follow, the guilty most of all; even professor lang had agreed, when he first proposed the idea, though she hadn't much liked it at first. tain's son regretful in shackles is a fine fiction, the better still for being true

he leaves the shed door open, instructions on how to continue cultivating the hardiest crops, and a small pot on her desk. small tight buds nearly ready for flowering, the first edosian orchids of new cardassia.

and then? and then to the stars again, a handful of sickly soil sewn into a secret pocket, scissors in another.

there is a small hole in a floating husk of steel waiting, a shop no one ever leased again, the front windows drawn closed by curtains like a theater house waiting for the new season's farces to start.

if that is peculiar bad luck for the bustling promenade, it might just be that the head of the infirmary across the hall didn't much like the notion of new neighbors changing his usual sights.

sentiment, rank sentiment. on new cardassia, amidst the wreckage, some have started to sing poems to it, to sing it without fear.

half-blind with memory, it is difficult to return, a blinding strangeness that dilates time for the first weeks. there is food on the table and company with it, there is someone in the landing bay, there are patterns to cut and lines to wind and unwind, match together.

kira's voice is distinctive and so is the ringing of her steps, bashir leans his cheek against his fist when he's tired and at ease, quark pours drinks with the same habitual flair.

in uncertain times, it is good that some things remain, cleave together, persist. one day he looks across the lunch table, and is even fairly certain of when to place himself. his secret pocket weighting him down, bad soil but enough to feed on.

-

bolts of fabric gathering dust, a bother to wash and terribly out of fashion - but fashion does tend to come around, cyclical as the desert winds.

he will find a use for those old scraps, garak of garak's clothiers. men like him always do.

[macla539ac]

I once heard from a mouth with no face that all the world entire is a collapsing building.

It said no more and so I thought about the words. I thought about the words and the letters comprising the words both now and in the past and what the future might bring for them. I thought about the two words together and to what larger notion or idea or psychosis the two of them might belong. I thought for many years until I had almost forgotten the mouth that had said these words. and then the mouth reappeared.

I heard from its lips, now green with moss and slavering something brown and stinking of rot, that all the human race entire lives in a collapsing building. It said no more and so I again thought about the words. more words this time. more letters. more pasts and futures. more spheres which these words might inhabit. surely, I thought, this mouth must be here to tell me something, something important. I thought. even longer about these words and what their assemblage. might mean and what the mouth's very saying of them might entail or imply. I thought for many more years until again, the memory of the mouth and its words began to fade into the gently aching mists of forgetting. and then the mouth came again, for the last time.

I heard from its lips, now black and broken, cracked and oozing something shining strangely, blacker than black, that the building had collapsed and no one had noticed because no one notices anything except what they will notice in the first place. and no one noticed the building or its decay and failing walls and beams and foundation. they don't know anything of the building or its collapse, that it fell straight down as in a controlled demolition and that all of them now lay strewn about the remnants of a building which was the world and now is a pile of broken cement and twisted steel and pieces of people. and that no one has noticed because there is no noticing for them to have or to be had. there is no noticing, it said, and was gone forever.

[heartfullofleeches]

*slowly opens your closet door and hands you the rest of the chips I was eating in there*

What if. Reader kissed King's scars or traced over them n asked if shed tell them how she got em? I think scars are neat and I dunno about you but personally I'd love to know how she got em. Hope your day is well!

Not a scratch on her.

You distinctly remember the claws of your attacker digging into the exposed meat of the knight's bicep her armor failed to shield yet here there is no mark to prove it. The two of you sat in King's dressing room following the incident, and all the time it took you begging to pull her off them. You thought you'd be fine on your own for a little while without her - clearly word hasn't gotten around the casino that you belong to her just yet. After she checked you over and made sure you weren't hurt it was only fair of you to do the same, but once you scrubbed all that blood off her there really wasn't much else for you to take care of.

"Hm......"

King lifts her head from the pile of pillows you both lay on, dismayed by absence of your hands on her. "Everything okay over there? Seems like you got something on your mind."

"Just thinking.... You've got so many scars, but that other demon didn't even put a scratch on you ... Kinda curious why.."

"Oh, that? That was nothing.-" King sits up, pounding a fist against her chest as she rises. "Takes a lot more than a coward like that to put a dent on this body. Hell, my skin's thicker than the steel I throw on. The stories behind every single one of 'em could the tale of centuries."

"Really?.... Then do you think you could tell me how you got your scars? I actually think they're pretty neat, but I didn't know the right time to ask you about them."

The mountain of pillows crumbles under the heavy swish of King's tail. "Yea....course... we'd be here all week if I told you how I got them all, but I can start off with some of my favorites for now."

King removes her chestplate - gesturing for you to climb in her lap as she regroups the pillows beneath her. She leans back down as she takes your smaller hands in hers, placing them on her abdomen. It was almost impossible to tell where her skin began and the old wounds ended. She guides your fingers to a crescent shaped hole just below her left pec - right over her ribs.

"Feel that? Got that one during the first tournament I feared I might lose. Underestimated the little bastard due to their size - barely came up to my knee in this form, the fucker. Unfortunately for them, they got a little too confident and all it took for me to wipe the floor with that small fry was catching them once.

"Amazing...." Your trace your fingers over the scar, dipping your head until in range to place a soft kiss on her hardened skin. King flinches - tail threatening to foundation of the pillows again as it shoots up with her.

"Wha- Huh?!- The fuck was that?"

"Sorry... Was that not okay? I guess I should've asked before I did that."

King's used to people asking about her scars. She may have been asked to be been kissed once or twice, but that was often by drunken fans - not the little treasure she picked out for herself. You are aware she could snap you in half at any second? You most definitely did, and that she'd never put you in serious danger. Still, you being so careless around a beast like her has got feeling a rush that's incomparable to the surge she feels in battle.

"Nah...." King shifts her tail benath her legs to hide the excitement it gave away. "A warning might've been nice - but your boldness makes it kinda hot. I knew I picked the perfect person to call mine.... Let's move on."

King nudges your fingers further north over her heart to anotger oddly shaped scar over her heart. With three points it almost look like a crudely embroidered crown. "This one. Welcoming gift from the boss themselves. Should'a known not to underestimate that other demon after dealing with them, but they're such an airhead it's easy to forget they can take care of themselves just fine."

Again - you kiss the blemish, the dragon's heart hammering loudly in her chest you can feel its rumble from your lips. There's other's she'd like to show you, but it you're so willing to kiss all her marks....

"Hey, got another one I think you might like."

King lifts her helmet over her jaw - shadows pealing away to unveil the wide, branching scar starting from her lower lip to benath her chin. She grins to show off the extent of the injury, the skin of her lips splitting to reveal more of her gums the further her smile creeps up the side of her face.

"This one? First and only time an angel tried to mess with our staff. Something about some demon winning the soul of someone they were watching over in a gang of cards. Made a huge fuss, but it was nothing I couldn't handle. Scar I'm most proudest of."

You ghost your fingers along her jaw, smiling as she slides her large hand down your back. "Uh-huh.... Something tells me there's another reason you wanted to show me this one in particular..."

"Don't get too full of yourself... Heh, who am I kidding." Tossing her mask aside, King pulls you for a kiss - a loud, yet oddly polite banging on the door interrupting the happy moment.

"Ms.King? We are all very glad you have found someone you are willing to protect at any cause, but some guests have raised concerns about your displays of victory. Please stop stringing your prey up over the pool. This is the third time we've had to close it this month."

[sephirthoughts]

Vincent's New Kid Just Dropped CH 11: Present Day With Short Deepground Flashback

NOTE: It's not a time skip in the Deepground section, it's just to frame Nero's physical trauma more. All that story is still going to be told!

Rating: Mature

WARNINGS: torture, captivity, phantom pain, PTSD

NOW WITH @siringadev's beautiful father-son art!

⚰️🕷️

father and son trying to out-edgelord each other but who is winning

it's vincent

After the Restrictor came, and they implanted those chips in everyone, they sedated Nero and carried him to a dark, cavernous place, in the lowest sub-level of Deepground. Industrial power tools whirred and shrieked. He awoke feeling the vibrations in his skull. 

Men were locking heavy shackles onto his wings, at six points. The shackles, they attached to the type of chains that are used for boat anchors; made of iron and as thick as a man’s arm. The chains were hung through huge, steel rings, bolted to a massive support pillar, and hooked up to a construction winch, on the other side. 

The Restrictor turned the winch and drew the chains tighter and tighter, laughing while the teenaged boy screamed in agony, pulling Nero’s wings higher and spreading them wider apart, till his shoulder blades felt like they were about to be dislocated, and his feet couldn’t properly rest on the ground. 

That was the position he was locked in. Splayed against the gigantic support pillar, like a butterfly pinned to a display board. Muzzled and bound in a straitjacket. Chained by his wings, to the literal foundation of Deepground. 

The only way to relieve the pain of bearing his weight on his wings, was to push himself up on tip-toe. He could only do that for so long, before his legs began to tremble with fatigue. Try as he might, his strength would eventually fail, and his legs give out. Then his wings would catch his full weight, and he would scream in agony again. 

The Restrictor often lingered nearby, watching him go through this process, drinking in the boy’s tormented groans and cries of distress, with lascivious glee. But he also observed the boy growing stronger and stronger…and more dangerous.

Nero curled up, as the lightning bolts of pain racked his body again, mouth hanging open, a clear stream drool running out onto the floor. Where was his muzzle? Where was his straitjacket? He’d had some kind of cotton jersey shirt on his top half, but he had clawed and torn it to shreds, and it now lay in a purple pile on the floor.

He heard a noise behind him, but he didn’t have time to work out what it was, before he felt the darkness react to something, like a dog jumping in excitement, when its master walks in the door. Weiss! It must be Weiss! he thought, deliriously. Tears of joy leaked from the sides of his eyes, even as they were squeezed shut against the pain. 

“W—Weiss…” he rasped, as the darkness reached out toward his beloved. His only one.

He was hauled up to a sitting position, and strong arms wrapped around him from behind, like bands of iron, compressing his crossed arms on his chest, in that familiar position. He was pressed tight against a stone-hard body and lifted to his feet, but…something was wrong. The darkness was curling happily around the person, but making no connection. Not Weiss! his mind screamed.

Enraged, Nero gave his lithe torso a sudden twist, like a snake, trying to wrench himself free, but the arms held him fast. “What the fuck!”

“Calm down,” a smooth, deep voice said, right in his ear. “You’ll hurt yourself.”

“Fuck you! Let me go!” he snarled, thrashing harder, still to no observable effect.

Vincent sighed. “Nero, I know you’re in pain. Let me help—”

“I don’t need your help you bastard!” he roared, kicking his legs, trying to throw this human monolith off balance. He may as well have struggled against the planet itself, for all the man moved. Panting and shaking with fatigue, from even that brief effort, he gave up and hung limply in Vincent’s arms. “I h—I hate you. Fucking die.”

“I can’t.”  

As Vincent said this, the room exploded into a whirling, crimson blur, and suddenly, they were atop the roof of the house. Nero’s bare feet stood on the sandy grit of the roof tiles, and blowing wind brought the scent of rain, from the rolling, grey storm clouds, that were obscuring the moon. 

“What the hell are you doing?” he asked, in real bewilderment. 

“I think I can help, with your pain,” a rasping, resonant, entirely demonic voice answered. “But I can’t try it inside the house. My wings are too big.”

Chaos. The demon’s familiar aura sent shivers of elation up Nero’s spine and made him sick to his stomach, at the same time. He felt bloodthirsty, resentful, filled with rage and grief and underneath it all, a deep, hollow ache. A longing as fathomless as the abyss.

“How do you know I’m in pain?” 

“Sephiroth explained, after you went upstairs.”

“Can he ever mind his own business?” Nero grumbled, under his breath.

Acting entirely without his input, Nero’s darkness tendrils suddenly burst out of the black markings all over his body and plunged directly into Chaos, connecting them, like it was plugging him into a power source. 

Horrified, Nero tried to make them come back, but his knees buckled and his vision went blank, just then, his brain shorted out by the sudden exposure to unfiltered Chaos energy. 

When his vision returned, the demon was still holding him, the same way—Nero’s arms restrained in straitjacket position, and his bare back pressed to its midsection—steadying him on his feet, so he didn’t fall off the roof. 

He was trying work out what the hell Chaos was playing at, when he felt it. A dizzying rush of relief, pouring in through the wing brackets on his shoulder blades and coursing through his body. Lack of pain so potent, it was ten times more intoxicating than the headiest pleasure. 

Involuntarily, Nero’s head dropped back onto Chaos’ chest and he gave a shuddering moan, as he began to unfurl the demon’s huge, membranous wings, slowly and stiffly, spreading them as wide as they could go. 

Tears poured unchecked down his ashen face, weeping openly, as he stretched and folded the wings on the demon’s back, savoring every movement, feeling the contorted phantom segments straightening out, the excruciating knots loosening, the throbbing tautness unwinding. 

Nero’s body now felt relaxed and comfortable, being held tightly in Chaos’ arms. Actually, he hadn’t felt this good since…well, in a long time. Now that they believed everything was back as it was supposed to be, the formerly tormented nerves were humming with vitality. Suddenly, the urge to use the wings he’d missed so sorely, was so strong he could taste it.

Nero’s own wings had nothing to do with his ability to defy gravity, so it was something of a shock to him, when he gave Chaos’ wings an exploratory flap, and the two rocketed into the air. 

He jolted and cried out in alarm, as the ground fell away and the rooftop shrank below them at a dizzying speed. Chaos, however, appeared patently unconcerned, only taking control to give his wings a few beats (to stop them plummeting directly back out of the sky, and to gain some height for safety reasons), then returning control to Nero. 

Nero wasn’t afraid of heights in the least, but he didn’t particularly want to smack into the earth like a meteor, so he scrambled to flap the massive wings. With an effort, he got them under good enough control to keep aloft, then gingerly began to try changing direction. 

He was uncoordinated, and kept going awkwardly off kilter. They tumbled and veered multiple times, before he actually began to get the hang of it. But by the time half an hour had passed, Nero was able to fly in relatively steady circles, above the Valentine-Highwind property.  

All this time, not a single word passed between himself and the ancient demon, whose body he was essentially sharing, at the moment, but at times he could feel its wordless intent, guiding him. Spread. Glide. Tuck. Bank left. More thrust on the right. 

It occurred to him, with a series of complicated emotions, that his father was teaching him to fly. Just like a real father teaching his real son to ride a bicycle. Patiently and calmly, ready to catch him, if he fell. He felt something deep inside him, begin to crack. 

Nero, being Nero, bridled and balked. Furious with himself, for being so soft and stupid, and letting himself be taken in so easily, he sullenly withdrew his control from the wings and let them fall, till Chaos lazily caught them and swooped back upward, with effortless elegance, as if it were no more difficult than breathing. 

That drew Nero right back out of his morose ruminations. He had thought he’d been doing well, but he clearly had no idea what flying even was. Chaos used far fewer wing beats to achieve the same height and speed, and seemed to be exerting ten times less effort. What the hell? How was it that much different to what he’d been doing?

Spinning like a corkscrew, the demon rapidly ascended, higher and higher, till they emerged from the storm cover in the clear, black sky, where the air became thin and icy-cold, and the the moon shone pure and bright over the sea of clouds. 

Nero was staring in undisguised awe at the tens of thousands of glittering stars, when Chaos tucked his wings tightly against his body and dropped abruptly into a freefall. Nero’s stomach flipped and he had to choke down a cry. They fell faster and faster, the wind beating furiously at his face, making his eyes tear up, as they plunged back into the grey clouds, plummeting earthward at terminal velocity.

Just above the treeline, Chaos extended his wings partway and used the downward momentum to shoot forward like a bullet, speeding over the blurred tops of the trees. 

As if on cue, thunder rolled and lighting crackled, as the heavy clouds burst, at last. The cold water droplets lashed Nero’s face and his bare torso, as they flew at that logic-defying speed, but he was actually rather thrilled by it. He wasn’t bothered by cold, and he’d never felt rain before. 

Apparently sensing that the weather didn’t trouble his passenger, Chaos kept going, soaring nonchalantly through blinding sheets of rain, doing spectacular loops and dizzying barrel rolls, throwing off spirals of water as they went. 

Nero had to force down the swell of mirth, that bubbled up in his chest, at the idea of this apocalyptic demon playing around in the rain, to amuse itself. Chaos was having fun, and it showed. If he could have admitted it, without gagging to death, so was Nero.

More than two hours evaporated, and soon they were circling back around toward home—er…toward the Valentine-Highwind house. When they got in close, rather than landing, Chaos did that teleportation thing with the whirling crimson, and they were simply standing in Nero’s room. 

Nero hadn’t got his sea legs yet, and turned around unsteadily to blink up at Chaos, who was Vincent again, in his slashed up black jeans and crimson henley, with that stupid headband, as usual. He was also perfectly dry, as opposed to Nero, who was soaking wet, from head to toe, black hair pasted to his white forehead, and quickly creating a puddle, on the wood floor. 

Conveniently, Sephiroth (because the world had gone thoroughly insane, and the hero of Wutai was now some kind of super-housewife) had left folded bath towels on the dresser, and put the fresh linens on the bed, while they were out.

Before Nero could say anything, Vincent picked up an oversized bath towel and spread it open, holding it up between them, like a privacy screen. Not quite understanding the prudishness of the gesture, Nero peeled off his soaking wet jeans and underwear, then let Vincent wrap the plushy towel around him. 

He still had no idea how to process what happened, tonight. No idea what it meant, or how to react. So he just stood there, dazed, while his father carefully rubbed his long hair, with the other towel. 

Fatigue settled on him, with the warmth and the weight of the gentle touch. Now that the pain was alleviated, he was exhausted, down to his bones. Without realizing it, his eyes drooped shut, and his head began to tip forward, by degrees, till it was resting against Vincent’s chest. 

Darkness tendrils slithered out of the black markings, all over his naked body, and coiled themselves around Vincent’s arms and waist and neck, like affectionate boa constrictors. If they could purr, they would have, fucking embarrassing things.

“Nero.”

“Mm?”

“The next time you’re in pain, don’t wait for it to become unbearable. Come to me, and I’ll help you.”

…

“Mn.”

THE AUTHOR HAS SOMETHING TO SAY:

nero the wet cat: *HISSSS GRRR HISSSSS* cat dad vincent: *pats dry with towel* nero the dry cat: …. *purr*

LINK TO NEXT CHAPTER:

[tc-doherty]

Book One | Chapter One

Index | Next Chapter

Tag List: @bloodlessheirbyjacques @magefaery @did-i-do-this-write @marrowwife @rainbow-snow-writes @muddshadow @outpost51 @full-on-sam @bluberimufim @unclear-contributions @talesfromtheunknowable @guessillcallitart @flowerprose

(Ask to be added or removed)

Knights all looked the same.

It had been years beyond counting since the last knight had dared Dragon's Keep, but from her place in the castle's tallest remaining tower she could tell that this one was no different from the others who had tried and failed over the years.

Her eyesight was better than a human's. Even from this height she could see that the steel armor encasing his arms and legs, well shined by some probably overworked squire, was scratched and dented. His surcoat was plain, with no heraldry in sight. The sword at his hip was gaudy, but the hilt was only gold leaf and glass gems, the latter cracked and the former beginning to flake. His destrier was red roan under its bulky iron barding, rather than the preferred white or black of older days.

He was a knight, but not a wealthy one. That was certainly why he was here.

Scattered bits of gold and silver lay around her feet. The hoard itself was behind her, the coins and gems, jewelry and weapons, crowns and idols and assorted other treasures that her mother had collected formed an untidy pile against the far wall. Coins clinked and chimed under her feet as she moved closer to the window. Slender brown fingers curled around the edge of the granite windowsill as she leaned forward and peered down at the knight below.

He had come to a stop. The horse shuddered and stamped one large hoof onto the dirt. The knight patted it idly on the neck to quiet it and lifted his visor – just enough to show pale skin, blue eyes, and a shock of golden hair.

From his point of view, the place must look abandoned. He had already passed the outer wall with its ivy-covered stones and the broken wrought iron gate hanging at an angle from busted hinges. The scene inside the walls was not any more welcoming.

She could picture what he was seeing, having played on these grounds her whole life. No carts had been by in so long that it took a dragon's eye to see the rutted dirt roads under encroaching grass and wildflowers. The bushes here and there stood large and untrimmed. Huge weathered chunks of stone lay scattered around the base of the tower where bits of wall had crumbled and gone unrepaired. The rest of the castle beyond the tower was in worse shape still. Most of the walls had toppled centuries ago and only the foundations remained.

All that only accounted for natural decay. There were also unmistakable signs of dragons. The air smelled slightly of smoke, copper, and the dry, cool scent of scales. Claw marks as deep as a man's hand adorned the trees and remaining walls. The ground at the tower's base was scorched black and had been artistically decorated with the bones of other foolish knights.

She smiled. That had been her touch, and she had sent many knights running with those bones alone.

Her work did not go unnoticed. The destrier saw the bones, smelled the air, and fidgeted. The knight, intentionally or otherwise, ignored the signs. He urged his mount forward. The horse moved with visible reluctance. It shook its head, nostrils flaring, ears flicking back and forth at the smallest noise. She couldn't see its eyes, but she knew they would be ringed with white. Its hooves pawed at the blackened ground.

Her mother descended right on time.

The dragon plummeted towards the earth with a roar that shook the tower and caused even more items to slide off the hoard and roll around the room. The girl in the tower ignored this interruption, keen as ever to watch her mother fight.

Her mother's obsidian scales glinted in a riot of ghostly colors as she fell through the sunlight. It might look careless, but her dive was as carefully controlled as any falcon's. Just as it seemed she would surely crash into the ground and save the knight the trouble of fighting her, black wings opened with a snap and she landed lightly on all fours. The girl thought, not for the first time, that dragons truly were the most graceful of creatures.

The warhorse screamed and reared but did not run. The dragon was three times its size, but it bellowed its defiance and stood firm. Perhaps it was not such a cheap horse as she had assumed, it had clearly had some actual training. But she knew it would make no difference in the end. She had seen this exact farce a hundred times.

The black dragon reared too, swinging back like a snake about to bite – except she produced fire rather than venom.

With a tug at the reins and a tap of his heels, the knight directed his horse aside just in time to avoid the jet of golden flame. He was not so lucky with the whiplike tail that followed after. It slammed into the horse's armor-covered side with a noise like a bell ringing. The force of the blow toppled the horse and sent it and its rider down in a tangled heap of armor and thrashing legs.

Before he had even regained his feet, the knight managed to unhook a painted steel shield from his saddle just in time to block her mother's second burst of fire. The horse screamed as sparks made contact, but the shield held back most of the flames and both were able to stand to challenge her mother once again.

High above the fight, she frowned. In the past her mother had been able to melt through shields in an instant. In the past, the knight would never have been able to stand again. But dragon's fire cooled over the years until it flickered out altogether, and her mother was no longer young. But age did not affect her cunning, nor her will to fight.

The dragon reared again. This time rather than fire she lashed out with her front feet. One foot hit the knight and sent him flying into a cluster of bushes. The other smacked down on the destrier's rump. Her claws slipped off the polished iron barding.

The horse's ears were flat back and his limbs trembled with fear but he did as he had been trained. He kicked out with both strong back legs and was rewarded by the sharp sound of bones cracking.

The girl frowned again. That was foolish. Like any other flying creature, dragons' bones were hollow, and broke easily. In the past her mother would have been fast enough to avoid that, but here too her age was showing.

Down below her mother hissed in pain and pulled back her injured foot. She directed a short spurt of fire at the offending horse, who still refused to bolt. It turned and cantered over to where the knight was chopping his way out of the bush into which he had fallen.

The dragon followed, ready to continue.

She reared up again as she neared the bush, certainly preparing for the final blow.

The knight stood up in a shower of cut branches, tossed aside his shield, and lunged.

The black dragon screamed, a cross between the call of a hunting hawk and a wolf's howl.

She wrenched herself free from the knight and his blade, which had already begun to melt. The dragon sprang for the sky. Her tail caught the knight across the chest and knocked him back into the smoldering remains of the foliage.

The effort of flying only widened the ugly gash in her belly. No longer predator, but wounded prey, she half crawled and half flew up the side of the tower. She let herself fall through a dragon sized hole in the roof and collapsed in a heap at her daughter's feet.

"Mother!" The girl cried. In the language of dragons, even that distressed cry was full of fang and fire. She waded through the trickles of blood and melting gold to put her hands against the gash and try to push the sundered flesh together again.

The dragon shuddered, and with a peculiar shrugging motion, began to shrink.

"Mother, you can't shapeshift right now!" said the girl. "You'll heal faster in your true form."

Even in this condition, her mother managed to laugh. She stopped transforming and pressed her snout to her daughter's forehead, speaking with gentle practicality. "It's time for my fire to go out, dear one. And truly, I could not wish for a better exit. Would you have me stay here and perish of boredom and old age?"

"Mother!"

"All things change around us, that is the knowledge of dragons as you are well aware. But I would gift you my cloak of scales so that it might protect you, even though I no longer can."

When the dragon began transforming again, the girl did not try to stop her, even as the shifting skin and muscle ripped the gash wider and spilled her mother's lifeblood onto the stone floor. Tears rolled down her face, far hotter than any dragon's blood or breath could be. She wished they were hot enough to burn her, so that she would not have to leave. All things might change, but that did not mean that she wanted them to. Unfortunately dragons were never harmed by fire, least of all their own.

She held onto her mother's body, so much smaller and sadder than she remembered. The brown skin was wrinkled, the once brilliant amber eyes no longer sparkled, the hair that had once fallen like a spill of shining night was matted with blood and sweat. Only a small smile which consistently hovered around her mother's lips was the same. She wrapped her mother’s scaled cloak around her own shoulders, wept over the frail, lifeless body, and waited for the knight to arrive.

He strutted into the room proud and shining, like he thought of himself as a ray of sun touching a land long shrouded by clouds. His step faltered slightly as he took in the incongruities of the scene. Despite what the stories said, this was no lady's chamber, and she was no delicate, doe-eyed princess in need of rescuing. She clung to her mother's body like a lifeline, wearing nothing but dragon's blood and a cloak of shimmering black scales. It was a testament to his personality that these facts did not stop him for long. He spoke, and she understood his strange, soft words, for all dragons have the gift of tongues.

"You're safe now, my lady," he told her as he picked his way around the worst of the still hot pools of blood and melted gold. "I've come to take you to court where you belong." He grabbed her wrist and tried to pull her to her feet.

Anger replaced grief in her heart, turning her blood to fire. She screamed at him, no word in any language, just a cry of frustration and loss and rage. She thrashed in his grip and pried at the steel gauntlets, trying to get free. Where skin touched armor the metal bubbled and melted. The knight winced as drops of hot steel began to burn their way through his gambeson into vulnerable flesh, but he held on.

She hissed and spat at him, and cursed him in the language of dragons, and wished it could be smoke and fire pouring from her lips instead of words.

The heat was enough to melt his armor, but not enough to shake his heart, for he was a knight, as foolhardy as he was brave. The strength he had gained through training well matched the strength she had been born with, and he held on.

He picked her up and held her until her fire fizzled out under the weight of grief and she collapsed into a dead weight, cool to the touch again. Only then did he set her gently on the ground.

She did not move.

She sat mute as he retrieved the saddlebags he had dropped outside the door and began filling them with treasure – the gold and gems that had not been damaged in her mother's death. He was robbing the dead, robbing her, and she couldn't make herself care. He spoke more words in his strange, soft tongue, and she refused to hear them.

Her mother, constant, proud, undefeatable; was dead. That was all that mattered. As for her future, she could not guess. She knew much of knights but little of human customs. She had never wanted to know. She didn't want to know now. So she sat and tried not to think, tried not to feel, as her life fell apart around her.

The knight took no notice. He filled his bags with stolen goods, and slipped the sword of another, less lucky, knight into the empty scabbard at his left hip. He slung the saddlebags over one shoulder, picked her up as if she weighed nothing at all, and left the tower.

For three weeks she did not eat, drink, or speak.

Except on her mother's back, she had never been far from the estate of Dragon's Keep. She had never traveled at length through the wild, creature infested lands outside, nor had she ever seen the dilapidated wall that separated their land from the lands of humans.

She did not see it now.

She noticed nothing of the journey back to the court this knight called home. She slept often, and tried to dream even while awake. To the knight she was a statue, neither resisting him nor responding to him.

She did not fight him when he dressed her in...well, some sort of human fashion, she assumed.

She closed her ears to the words he spoke, first bragging, then angry, then pleading, until he ceased to speak to her altogether and the rest of their journey passed in silence.

But there was no ignoring the court, not really. It was loud, full of people who talked about anything and everything. They talked about her too, making plans for her life without even asking her – not that she cared what they thought, not that she had any intention of responding.

She had never had any interest in humans, and she still didn't.

That did not stop them from being interested in her.

If she had listened to those conversations, she might have understood their actions. But she did not want to listen and she did not want to understand.

For reasons which made sense to them, they gave her back the gold and silver the knight had stolen. They called her lady, and gave her a room in the palace, a trunk full of donated clothing, and sent along three young women who flocked around her, twittering ceaselessly like little birds. Their presence irritated her as they pulled her this way and that way, trying to dress her up like one of them. They succeeded in removing the clothing the knight had given her and replacing it with a single garment before she ran them off with claw and fang and cast the rest of the clothing aside.

She slammed the door behind them.

She just wanted to be left alone, but here she was never alone. The sturdy stone walls pressed in on her, nothing like the decrepit castle she was used to. The sounds of wind, birdsong, and animal life had been replaced with a seemingly never-ending wave of sounds. She drowned in them, the talk and laughter, the thud of boots and the soft switch of fabric as humans moved, the rustle of brooms against rough stone, all of them. She had never been in a place so loud. She had never been exposed to her gift of tongues, which told her the basic meaning of everything said, whether or not she wanted to know.

A particularly abrasive laugh – the laugh of that knight – grated on her ears. During the journey back to court he had been subdued, but here, surrounded by people, he had regained his courage. He was coming to see her, she was certain of it, coming to see what his princess looked like now that she was civilized. But she didn't want to see him. Not him, not the young women, not any of the people here. With a cry like that of a wounded animal she pushed herself out of her seated position, grabbed her mother's cloak, fled through the nearest door, and found herself outside.

She stood for a moment, surprised. The noise of a door opening brought her back to herself. She gathered her wits and ran.

It was not wilderness, this place she found herself in, but it was not stone walls either. She followed stone paths laid neatly on the ground, the clothing she had been pushed into tangling around her legs. There was nowhere to stop, nothing but stone paths and stone fountains with the occasional bush or row of flowers. Even here there were people, people who scattered out of her way and stared after her as she passed. She paid them scant attention.

Dragons were predators by nature, and she had never wondered what a deer might feel while being pursued by her mother. Now though, she did not have to wonder. She thought she had a pretty good idea.

In some ways this fake wilderness was even worse than being inside.

She ran and ran and did not stop until she felt grass under her feet and then she stopped all at once, collapsing onto the ground in a heap. She fought back the sobs that wanted to come out although a few tears escaped to scorch the ground beneath her. She didn't want to be here, but she wasn't about to let these humans see her grieve.

She knew that her mother would not be pleased with this. Dragons were not so emotional. The world changed around them and they adapted to it. They were calm and practical, rational. She never had been good at that. Still, she tried.

Only when she got herself back under control did she look around to see where she had landed.

It was a small grove surrounded by cypress trees. From here, the castle was not even visible. Nor were any people. She breathed, letting the familiar openness chase out the lingering claustrophobia of too much stone and too much metal and too much noise. The muttered conversation from the grounds behind her faded, masked by the sound of branches moving in the wind. Eventually, a few of the braver birds even began to chirp and the area around her sprang to life again, her wild interruption forgotten.

It could almost be one of the courtyards she was used to, save for the fact that someone clearly maintained the area. The grass was too short, too free of wildflowers and fallen branches and leaves. The trees too were too neat. It was still better than where she had been.

She curled in on herself, and began to dream.

She did not return to the room which had been forced upon her. The cypress grove, quiet and solemn, became her retreat. She did not leave it for several days, except to hide deeper in the fake woods when others came looking for her.

The rest of the time she dreamed of the past. Any moment, she thought, her mother could fly overhead – strong as ever, with her black scales glittering like gems in the sun. She would dance in the sky as she always had done. She would shower her beloved daughter with gold she had stolen, scoop her up to go flying, or drop a kill at her feet for them to share.

Nothing would've changed, they would still be together as they should be. Her mother would never have left her on her own to travel to someplace she could not follow. She would, as she had always done, tell her daughter wildly exaggerated stories of the hunt while they ate.

These visions were so strong to her that she did not realize at first that the smell of blood was real. She came back to herself with a start.

A platter of freshly killed venison hovered half a foot from her face. She frowned.

Dragons did not have much of a sense of smell, but the smell of blood was sharp and distinctive. She should have noticed it, or the sound of someone approaching. She would have, if she had not been so determined not to.

Because the meat, naturally, had not made its way there on its own. It was held lightly in the hands of a woman who held herself with the confidence of a knight. Until that moment, she had not known that women could be knights. It certainly had seemed from her mother’s stories that humans were only divided into knights and ladies. But she had seen enough knights in her life to recognize one, even without the armor and sword.

"Don't turn away," the knight said before she even had a chance to do so. "Even dragons have a need to eat eventually." She set the ceramic platter down on the grass and backed off a few paces before dropping into an easy sit.

Three weeks was a long time, even for a dragon. With the smell of fresh meat in front of her, she could no longer pretend not to be hungry. She grabbed a piece from the top and ripped into it, heedless of the mess she caused.

The knight continued to talk, undeterred. "Here I am, on a short visit to my family, and I miss it all," she said. "The whole court is abuzz about Leroy and his Lady Dragon. Tell me, why not just transform and fly away?"

The knight gave her ample time to respond, which she did not do.

"Nothing, hm?" The knight shrugged. "Well, you are a dragon. You of all people ought to know that mourning has to end eventually. I'm surprised you were distraught enough to let it go on this long."

She paused again, and still received no response. "Such a show can only mean you are named after an emotion. Which one is it?"

The bit of meat she was holding slipped her numb fingers to the grass below.

"How-" the dragon hardly even realized she had spoken until after the word was out. This human language was unfamiliar in her mouth and she snapped her fangs shut around the rest of the sentence. It did not matter. One word was enough.

The knight smiled. "Dragons are not unfamiliar to my home country. It pays to know about them. So, your name?"

"It does not translate easily," the dragon said, and felt anger at herself for giving in. She had not wanted to speak to these humans at all, and had even entertained the thought of living in silence until her own flame ran out. But the will to live and thrive runs as strongly in dragons as in humans, and she could no more keep herself from speaking than from eating the meal in front of her.

"I don't mind."

For the first time, the dragon heard the flavor of foreign speech in the words the knight spoke, and recognized them as being different from the things she had half heard over the last few days. This knight, then, was a stranger here too. Still the dragon hesitated, groping for words in a language she understood but had not yet spoken.

"It is the sense of belonging between two or more people who consider themselves family," she finally said, hating how she stumbled over the words. Dragon names came in two flavors: concepts or feelings. Concept names were strong and feeling names were graceful. In the language of dragons her name was beautiful. As sharp as new grown scales and as delicate as a butterfly's wings. In this human language it was long and clumsy, without sense or rhyme.

The knight nodded. "It is a bit long. A sense of belonging between people, hm? In my language we call this 'patrisjie'. As a name here, it would probably be Patrice. And in my home, we would call you Patya."

The dragon growled. "I do not want these human words or this human name," she said.

The knight nodded again. Her hair, brilliant red and cut to be even with her jaw, bobbed in time with the motion. "Soon they will become tired of calling you 'dragon girl' and someone is going to name you. Better it be something close to what you’re used to."

“And it is so easy to lose your true name!" The dragon said. She heard the snap of fangs and crackle of flame in her words, but the knight did not lose her relaxed posture as a wiser person would have done. Then again, that seemed to be the way with knights. She merely plucked a violet out of the grass and turned the flower round and round in her fingers.

"You aren't alone. My name is Felisjyta, but no one here can say it. They just all call me Felicity."

"And why should I care what they call you?" asked the dragon. Suddenly the rest of her meal was no longer appealing. She pushed the tray away, across the grass. "I do not want that name either. I am no friend to knights." She stood and began to walk away.

The knight made no move to follow her, but did speak again. "You know, Felisjyta is just like a dragon name. You would probably say 'the happiness of someone who has experienced recent good fortune'."

It was a very dragon like name, and she knew exactly how they would say such a thing. In the language of dragons, that name was warm and comforting, like curling up next to her mother on a chilly evening. It didn't suit her current mood at all. She shook her head. "Why should I need this feeling of yours? I have not experienced good fortune in a long time."

She left the garden and the meddling knight behind.

Index | Next Chapter

[shannaraisles]

Let It Snow - for @tangerineloves

For the charming @tangerineloves, who requested some Alistair/Warden OC lovin' for the season. Thank you so much for commissioning me, darling - hope your festive is good to you!

Let It Snow

Snow fell.

It fell soft and silent over the ruins of Denerim City, at first just to melt away on contact with charred wood and scorched stone, then to begin to lay and pile up, covering the worst signs of the damage inflicted upon the city by the last battle of the Blight. Overnight, the city went from a blackened memory of foundations and walls, to a romantic ruin blanketed in white.

The timing could not have been more perfect. Satinalia had arrived, and despite the wreckage that still littered the city from a battle won barely two months before, this was a night in which everyone had been told to forget their cares. They had a lot to celebrate, from the mere fact of their survival after a year of terror to the Grey Wardens’ announcement that the Fifth Blight was officially over, to the raising of their new young king to his throne - not only a king, but a hero in his own right, the man who had struck the final blow that killed the archdemon right here in Denerim itself. 

That young king had already made it very clear that his plan for Ferelden would be different from the plans enacted by his brother and father, and tonight was where that would begin - elves and dwarves were not only invited to the royal celebration held in the ruined market square, but were given places of honour; commoners were expected to mingle with nobles, just as they did on this night in cities like Treviso. Everyone would be masked and incognito. Tonight was a night to celebrate just being yourself. 

A night in which the young man dancing with you, drinking with you, sharing stories with you, might just be that young king you so admired and wished well. A young king who needed to know that he was not despised by his people just for being the forgotten son of a popular ruler long lost to mystery. 

Alistair couldn’t help smiling a little behind his mask, reveling in the novelty of being just another face among the crowd for the first time in what felt like a lifetime. So much had happened since his last Satinalia ... so many lost, so much found and gained, so much pain and joy experienced. He felt much older than his twenty years, and yet, right now, he thought he could glimpse the carefree boy he had been when Duncan had first inducted him into the Wardens. 

“... strange, to be celebrating in a ruin, don’t you think?”

The words caught his ear, his head tilting just a little as he focused in on the conversation taking place not too far away between what he could only assume was a pair of dwarves. 

“Can’t think of a better place to do it,” was the robust reply from behind an intricate mask crafted of delicate steel. “We survived another year and look at what we survived! Seems pretty good to me.”

“It’s cold,” his companion complained from the depths of a similarly beautiful black iron mask.

“Go get a drink and stop complaining, then.”

Biting down on a laugh, Alistair moved away from the dwarves, brushing snow from the shoulders of his black velvet coat absently as he pivoted to avoid a gaggle of giggling girls, at least two of which were definitely not as noble as their companions thought them to be. 

“- we going?”

“The king is here somewhere! We should find him and kiss him!”

Thank the Maker for the mask. Suddenly his face felt hot enough to cook dinner for six, a strangled cough escaping his throat as his pivot almost spun him entirely around in the hope of escaping to the keep. No such luck for him, though - a hand caught his, pulling him back from his hopeful lurch and into the thick of the dancers, giving him no choice but to fall into step or disrupt the dance entirely.

“I’m terribly sorry, I -”

His apology was stopped by the sudden press of lips to his own. He froze, shock and disgust at the fact that he was allowing a stranger to steal a kiss from him coursing through his limbs ... and then he realised this was no stranger. He knew these lips, the soft, lithe form pressed to his own, the scent of her hair, the tingle of magic that lingered on her skin at all times. Forgetting his shock, the risk of being caught and recognised, his hands reached to pull her closer, lips parting to steal yet more kisses, sharing his grin with her even as he felt her lips curve in an answering grin of her own. 

It was only when he noticed the small throng around them raising a jeering, cheering cackle of encouragement that he broke that kiss and opened his eyes once more, gazing down at a gorgeous mask of blue and silver ... into the lovely eyes of his lover and fellow hero, Mira Surana, the elven mage who had truly saved Ferelden not so very long ago. She offered him a cheeky little smirk in response. 

“Leliana owes me two gold,” was her friendly greeting, her laugh punctuating the drop of his jaw as he stared at her. “Oh, don’t look so shocked. You know what she’s like.”

“But ... what if someone ... what if Eamon saw ...?”

He didn’t need to see her entire face to know the expression aimed squarely at him beneath the mask now speckled with the melted droplets of snow falling from above them. 

“It’s Satinalia,” she reminded him, still pressed close amid the dancing throng about them. “When else can we be openly as we truly are to each other, than tonight?”

He felt the pang of guilt and pain all over again at her words. He would dearly have loved to have married her, to have her sat on the throne at his side, but in this, Eamon was absolutely right - the people of Ferelden would not accept an elven mage on the throne. Yet Alistair had not been ready to let go of her, his Mira, his first and only love, and despite the pain of knowing that one day a noble woman would rightfully share his bed in the eyes of the Maker and the world, she had agreed to stay with him in the only way they knew how - as a secret known only to a privileged few. 

“But -”

She stopped his protest with another kiss, and again, he melted into her, only too ready to forget his crown and responsibilities in her arms. And she was right. Tonight, of all nights, who cared who saw what and thought what? So what if someone recognised the king in the arms of a beautiful woman? For most of them, it would be nothing more than titillating gossip; for some, the concern it might raise would be dealt with.

It was Satinalia. His people were safe and fed and sheltered, celebrating their survival and the coming year at his side in the midst of the ruins of the year that had passed. And the woman he loved was in his arms, warm and loving and determined to keep him from thinking any sad or troubling thoughts for the rest of the night. They had earned this.

He had his Mira in his arms, and their lives ahead of them. 

Let it snow.

[lonestarbattleship]

February 19, 2023 Update from the Battleship Texas Foundation.

(my apologies, I forgot to post this earlier. It's been a busy week for me.)

"DRY DOCK TOURS

Another beautiful day at Gulf Copper!

Yes, we’re still running dry dock tours! We have dates posted until April 2023. For more information please visit: battleshiptexas.org/drydock

SHIP REPAIRS

TORPEDO BLISTERS (Yes, new torpedo blisters ARE going back on) - The addition of new framing for the torpedo blisters has stopped on the ship’s starboard side. Any new frames will be done with modules that will consist of about 9 frames each. They are produced off of the dock and will be brought on and attached to the ship’s hull. We now have the first two modules installed on the ship.

The plated up portions of the blisters are comprised of two blister modules, more to follow.

The forward starboard blister is nearly complete, the rest of the starboard blister will be built as modules rather than assembled on the ship as individual frames and plates.

Modules are being made in the shipyard’s fabrication shop.

More of the blister plate is going on the forward section on the starboard side. The forward sections are almost entirely plated up.

The blisters will be of a slightly different design and square off at the bottom below the waterline. This design change will make the new blisters easier to maintain. Workers have removed most of the aft and midship portions of the port torpedo blister.

The exposed end of a blister module. Note the flat bottom, this is the main modification that we are making to their design. The original blisters curved under the ship and created maintenance problems because of it.

FOAM REMOVAL - Foam removal on the port side blisters is complete.

HULL - As work continues moving aft, any holes in the ship’s original hull (including areas under the blisters) are being repaired. New plates are added to thinner areas and smaller pin holes are welded up. The ship’s hull on the starboard side is now being primed temporarily. Sandblasting is almost complete on the starboard side.

The midship section of the port side blister is largely removed, as well as the lower portions of about 3/4ths of the port side blister.

Progress on the port side blister will soon reach the forward most section.

STERN - New plating continues being paced onto the ship’s stern. As the new plates go on, they are welded to the repaired framing done while the ship was still at San Jacinto Battleground State Historic Site in 2013-2014.

More steel on the stern, there is a large open section behind the scaffolding awaiting new steel.

SCRAP STEEL - Any steel that comes off the ship (and is deemed worthy) will be used in future fundraising. We have already started making prototypes of the new products we will be offering on our store.

The scrap pile grows, rest assured that this material will be made into items available soon on battleshiptexas.org/donate

Thank you all for the support and,

Come on Texas!"

Posted on the Battleship Texas Foundation Group Facebook page: link

[dragons-bones]

FFXIV Write Entry #6: The Form of Magic

Prompt: ring || Master Post || On AO3

--

Synnove sets stick to ground, and begins to walk.

The stick would be better called a rod: two-thirds her height, just thin enough to close her hand so that thumb touches middle finger, made of ironwood. A simple, unassuming tool, save for the simple fact it is over two hundred years old and has only ever been used to map out arrays.

Synnove herself is a mathematical genius with a memory like a steel trap: show her an arcanima array, and she will know it for life, how to tweak it, how to scale it, how to draw it, how to hold it in her mind in two dimensions and in three. She is able to draw a perfect circle freehand, a fact which drove more than one of her teachers in her early days at the Guild into fits of hysteria (and Mhaslona into fits of chortling, smug glee at poaching her from the mathematics department). She is, thus, the perfect arcanist to create the draft for a new permanent array for the Guild’s use on the Range.

The circle is the most basic shape of magic, the foundation for nearly all of the most important spells within an arcanist’s grimoire. Even thaumaturgy and black magic must needs bow to its use, stabilizing their spells else the power they attempt to channel consume them whole. Conjury, too, though less obviously, for the cycle of life and death and the elements was just another kind of circle writ large across creation.

Synnove walks smooth and sure, adjusting her grip on the array rod minutely as needed to ensure the circle growing behind her is as perfect as her steps. Tyr shadows her, ensuring the furrow left by the rod are smooth and flawless, using his equally precise aether control to flick away pebbles and rocks. Across her shoulders, Galette sprawls, though they are working today so rather than napping, she keeps the winds on the work site that blow off the Indigo Deep calm and friendly, and her nose twitches as she takes in the ambient aether, ensuring no sudden changes occur that will affect the efficacy of the array.

Dawn is only just breaking on the eastern horizon.

Ten minutes later, Synnove finishes the circle and a satisfying snap crackles through the air as she closes it, the protective magicks this array will emit already thrumming to life with the intent that Synnove used in the shaping. Tyr packs down the small pile of dirt with a paw, and Synnove side steps carefully inward until she is precisely six feet from the edge. The end of the rod hits the dirt with a soft thud, and once more, she begins to walk.

This time, behind her, other arcanists move in to begin carving out the shapes and equations that will fill the outermost circle. Topaz carbuncles join Tyr in removing the detritus, either pitching it beyond the edge of the array or packing it down into the earth.

Once a permanent array has begun its crafting, they cannot stop. If it takes all day to finish, so be it. If they work into the night and the next dawn, to ensure its perfection, so be it.

When the second circle is complete, Synnove moves further inward, ever and on, creating each and every circle this array requires with surety. Once the last closes, she moves to assist with the secondary lines and equations and shapes, one arcanist among many working as a smoothly oiled magitek engine.

They break at noon for food and water, and as Synnove drinks from her canteen and eats a roll stuffed with cheese and thinly sliced beef and roasted peppers, she walks the array, Tyr at her side. With a critical eye, she tracks every curve, every straight line, every number and letter scored into the earth, ensuring total perfection. Anything less, and the array won’t work.

Or it’ll explode.

Fifty-fifty chance, depending.

After lunch, work resumes, slow and methodical. Someone starts a shanty that helps the afternoon roll by a little faster, though quiet still dominates: concentration is key. But as the shadows lengthen, the carving finishes, and Synnove and the other senior arcanists walk the array once more, stepping carefully into any free spot, examining and double-checking and studying. Her fellows use copies of the array written in plain ink on plain parchment as reference; Synnove needs only her memory.

Then, finally, once they deem the array perfect, it’s the turn of the metallurgists to work.

Ivar and the few other ruby carbuncles the Guild has have been minding the crucibles, ensuring the metal within remains fiery hot, especially now as the metallurgists carefully carry the crucibles out in pairs to the array from the makeshift smithy. And, even more carefully, they begin to pour, melting flowing down the circle’s edge and diverting into the channels made by the other array elements as the metallurgists now walk the same path that Synnove did.

The ruby carbuncles now work to ensure the metal—a mithril alloy the Guild favors for shielding arrays, a proprietary mix they jealously guard—stays just as molten in the earthen furrows as it does in the crucibles. When the metallurgists are finished, every part of the array that touches itself will be a single piece of metal. For now, the molten material glows white with its heat, setting the growing night alight.

By necessity, this step is slow: the metallurgists must tip the crucibles carefully and pour even more so, to ensure no metal splashes and mars the array. And the crucibles must be refilled. It is nearing midnight when every single element glows under the night sky.

Most of the arcanists returned home bells before, but Synnove and a few others remain. They walk the array one last time with the topaz and ruby carbuncles—Tyr is on her right, Ivar her left, sniffing suspiciously at anything that looks remotely like a bubble that could lead to a void in the metal. The radiating heat is pleasant against the chill of the night, and Galette draped around her neck—now asleep, no longer on duty—makes for an excellent scarf.

Finally, they are satisfied.

Force cooling metal so quickly could lead to brittleness and breaks if not performed with care, but with carbuncles aspected to earth and to fire working together, such work is complete in nearly an eyeblink. The final product glitters in the light from the torches surrounding the worksite, perfectly flush with the ground.

The ambient aether thrums with the change. Reality has been warped, if subtly.

Synnove strides out to the very middle of the array and points up. A roiling ball of Ruin rushes forth into the sky, up and up and up and—

—reality twists more obviously, and the spell smacks into a domed shield that glimmers into life, forcibly dissipating the spell into harmless aether. The shield itself is wide: the dome isn’t limited to the array itself, but arches out into the waters beyond the Range. It seals the entire island.

Synnove grins as she walks out to meet her colleagues. “Interior shell seems to hold well on initial application,” she says, softly scritching Tyr’s head where it leans into her hip. “We’ll do a more thorough test with the exterior defenses tomorrow.”

Houxine from mathematics rubs at her eyes as they trudge out the edge of the permanent array. “So glad to have this project nearly finished,” the elezen grumbles.

Murmurs of assent and yawns answer her. Synnove takes one last look out over the array, now lost to shadow, and leans down to rub her fingers over the perfectly smooth outer edge of the circle. The metal is still warm, and the magic in it hums contently to match the song of the aether in the air and soil around her.

A job well done, and Synnove nods her satisfaction, and follows after her colleagues.

PREVIOUS || NEXT

[script-a-world]

Submitted via Google Form:

I'm having trouble trying to calculate the costs of how much a city could save purely on lighting alone by building taller buildings above ground rather than deep into the ground. There are so many factors to lighting costs that seem impossible to compare something above ground to something very similar underground and then I get all the costs that don't even matter i.e. street lights. In my world costs to build underground would be cheaper than building up due to extreme (almost magical) advances in tunnelling technology. So really, the only big issue is lighting. Above ground saves on lighting because you can turn them off during the day which you basically can't at all underground. How should I go about this?

Addy: You can have dimmable lights, where you turn lights down real low at night. And you can still turn off lights inside of buildings that aren't being used. That doesn't change at all. Sure, you might have really dim hallway lights (like nightlights), but you don't need lights on full blast 24/7.

If you wanna look at lighting cost savings, I'd say to look at the cost differences in lighting in modern standard buildings vs buildings with adaptive lighting (lights near windows dimmer when it's bright outside).

Or just look at the cost of lighting inside large office buildings - modern office buildings don't make much use of windows, as the buildings are much larger and deeper. Older office buildings made more use of natural light, which has also made them easier to turn into apartments and the like.

Tunneling tech can make it easier and cheaper to build underground, but the main thing about building underground is the sideways pressure from the ground itself. Soil wants to make piles, and building underground means that you have straight walls (aboveground equivalent is a retaining wall), which soil doesn't really like. Still totally doable, though! But you might want to add some kind of soil anchoring mechanism to your tunneling tech.

I'd say that you might want to add in some very high wind speeds at high elevations (say >300' aboveground), which would make building up more than 30 stories difficult to manage. You'd get a lot of lateral shear acting on the building (which is annoying to deal with), plus you'd get a lot of swaying. There are code requirements about the maximum amount a building can sway in the wind – too much movement, and people get vertigo. Or nauseous. You can make a building stiffer to reduce the amount of sway, but it's a hassle and it costs more to do. Steel is especially flexible (concrete is very stiff), so if you've got poor concrete formulations (either weaker concrete or more expensive concrete), or if steel is especially cheap, then building up can become more expensive and just more of a hassle.

Also, if you have soft soil near the surface and good rock further down, that'll also limit your aboveground building height. Heavy buildings put a lot of pressure on the ground. If the ground is rock, that's easy to manage. If it's something soft, then you need to build a larger foundation to spread out the weight into a lower pressure. If you have an area where the top is soft but you've got good bedrock a bit of a ways down, you're going to want to build piles down that far anyways, might as well make a basement. If you've got a basement, well, you've got a building.

On the other hand, it's also a pain to dig through bedrock (especially hard rock), so that's going to add cost once you get further down. Also, in places like Denmark or Florida (places with lots and lots of sand and no bedrock for miles), that brings issues of its own - nothing solid to build anything heavy on. Clay soils are also a pain to deal with, since they swell and shrink based on water content. Imagine if you were trying to build a tower on top of a waterbed…. Except your walls moved just as much. Walls don't like being squished or pulled, and that's what clay soils do.

So if you want extensive underground development, you're probably going to want a place with high winds, soil that'll cooperate (sand, silt, and dry clay (in an area without many trees, say a savanna) could all be suitable), and a rock layer that isn't too close to the surface. That'll help reduce construction costs.

Also, as long as it's plausible, you don't need to know the costs down to the dollar (or similar). Something rough is more than enough.

Feral: Okay so lighting design happens to be the niche within built environment design where my career resides. So… you’re about to get a lot of information you probably don’t need. Sorry. 

To calculate costs, you need to need to know the number of lamps (light sources), the initial cost of each lamp, the wattage of each lamp, the number of hours per day* the lamp is on at what percentage of full output,** the cost of energy per kilowatt hour, and the estimated useful life in hours of each lamp. 

*When I’m doing these calculations for real, we typically assume 8 hours a day for a kitchen, which is a) used a lot and b) requires artificial lighting for task lighting even when ambient lighting can be provided naturally, but we assume 3 hours a day for a bathroom because even though it may not have natural light, depending on local codes at the time it was built, it’s not used that much.

**If you’re using an electroluminescent source, like an LED, the percentage of total watts used will be the same(-ish) as the percentage of full light output. An electric incandescent source, like a tungsten filament bulb, will not have this one to one relationship; they are more inefficient as they are dimmed. 

We’ve talked before about underground living, but it’s really important to recognize that the sun is a lot more important than just “it’s a free light source.”

Now, if you want to get into photometry, it’s a lot. Godspeed. But basically, the thing about lighting a space that a lot of people don’t get is that humans don’t perceive light output. We perceive relative brightness, or contrast. In other words, we are sensitive to the context of the light and the difference between lighting levels rather than the luminance itself. 

So what does all this have to do with your world-building question. Frankly, I don’t know. I’m not actually sure what your question has to do with your worldbuilding. 

However, visual comfort is a very important aspect of how we perceive an environment. So, if you are trying to build a setting that you can then describe in these terms, you might want to know more about it. So, further reading:

How to Measure Visual Comfort in Buildings (by window manufacturer SageGlass)

How to Design for Visual Comfort Using Natural Light (by ArchDaily)

Guidelines for Optimum Visual Comfort, derived by key performance factors (by The Energy and Resource Institute)

How to Design Buildings for Visual and Acoustical Comfort (by DesignHub1610)  

Optimization of Visual Comfort: Building Openings (originally published in the Journal of Building Engineering)

Daylight in Buildings and Visual Comfort Evaluation: the Advantages and Limitations (published in the Journal of Daylighting)

Conditions Required for Visual Comfort (by the Encyclopedia of Occupational Health and Safety)

Provide Comfortable Environments (by the Whole Building Design Guide)

You’ll notice that daylight is an assumption in pretty much all of the above. So, for your world-building, consider what is lost when daylight is removed. Note: it’s more than just energy savings.

[casteliacityramen]

Munday Side Stories - Subject 150 Mewtwo

Disclaimer: Gatekeeper idea made by Weapons Grade Waifus, formatting heavily inspired by SCP Foundation. ~3k Words

Subject 150 Mewtwo is an artificial pokemon created by criminal syndicate Team Rocket. Subject is a replication and/or amalgamation of genetic studies based on Mew (PKMN DEX # 151). Subject Mewtwo has been noted to be of extremely high intelligence and terrifying power, surpassing any known psychic entity in current and past history. Its His psychic abilities break the current known laws of telepathy and telekinesis. It’s He’s able to bypass solid material, such as steel and concrete, unless such material is treated with specific “dark” type coatings.

History: 

Subject 150 Mewtwo was created born on ██/██/██████ by criminal syndicate Team Rocket. When released to the rest of the world, Subject 150 Mewtwo fled to Cerulean Cave and stayed until the Subject he was pacified by Pokemon League Champion “Red”. Subject 150 Mewtwo has chosen to live in Cerulean Cave as of 2/18/1999 of his free will and continues to do so as of 5/22/2023 as its main inhabitant and protector.

Security Procedures:

Subject 150 Mewtwo is not to leave the area unless specific permission is granted by the current Secretary of Defense, or Ex-League Champion "Red." A team of high-performance military personnel will surround the inner and outer perimeter in constant combat readiness. Security personnel designation: Gatekeepers.

Gatekeepers will pass psychological evaluation and be re-evaluated every three months. Any abnormalities or severe changes in mental faculties will result in a release of duty from the Gatekeeper profession with full pay until the next fiscal year.

Interceptor Operator Teams with approved psy resistant gear will be on stand-by at all times. Inner ring perimeters will consist of four land-based phalanx weapon systems pointed at each cardinal direction. All stations are to be equipped with seismic recording devices for any underground movement. Pile-driven high-yield explosive charges are to be installed at ████████████, ██████, and ██████████ at minimum depths of 100 meters. All equipment will be inspected daily for wear.

Gatekeepers are to neutralize the Subject in the event of an inner perimeter breach.  Immediately inform the Secretary of Defense in the event of an inner or outer perimeter breach.

Gatekeepers are to provide any reasonable accommodations requested by Mewtwo by any means necessary.

[SEE BELOW FOR ADDENDUMS 150.1 - 150.6 - MESSAGES BETWEEN SUBJECT 150 MEWTWO AND GATEKEEPER STAFF]

Addendum 150.1: Gatekeeper Briefing

[Date: 3/15/1999]

To whomever it may concern, 

You have been assigned as a Gatekeeper. Your mission is dual purpose.  One: You are the first and last defense against anything and everything that comes from this cave.  Two: You are to defend the inhabitant of this cave with your life.  This job may seem like the menial day-to-day service required of many others in various military branches, but know that the subject of your occupation is the single most dangerous living being currently occupying the world.  You shall be rewarded handsomely for your efforts. Make your country proud. Commander-in-Chief and Prime Minister of Kanto: Haruka Nagumo

Addendum 150.2: Email Logs between General Takashi Shino and Commander-in-Chief Haruka Nagumo

[Date: 4/12/2001]

Commander,  It has been brought to my attention that Subject 150 has not breached containment for the past three years. It’s always been aware of the surveillance equipment, but this might be the first time it’s acknowledged it. The subject seems to be interested in communication between the surveillance team. It's making motions towards its mouth and towards the cameras. What should be our next course of action? Respectfully, General Takashi Shino

[Date: 4/13/2001]

General, After deliberating with Cinnabar’s Gym Leader Blaine, Professor Samuel Oak, and members of the ICSR ethics committee, Subject 150 is to be treated as a sapient with rights. We will be sending specialized communication equipment and appropriate protection equipment for leaving it outside the cave. When Subject 150 makes contact, I want rifle barrels pointed at the heads of the surveillance team. We have no gauge on the capabilities of Subject 150. That includes whether or not the surveillance team can be put under telepathic suggestion via digital communication. You are to report to me every single detail of communication regarding Subject 150. Commander In Chief Haruka Nagumo

[Date: 4/14/2001]

Commander,  We have successfully made contact with Subject 150. No casualties or suggestion of psy tampered personnel or equipment. Its first words with the surveillance team, and I quote, are the following: “I’m bored.” This doesn’t seem said out of defiance or malice, the Subject looks… well... bored out of its mind. I request that we send forms of entertainment via books, magazines, etc. if the science and ethics teams allow it. As always, the surveillance tapes are to follow in a separate file.  Respectfully, General Takashi Shino

[Date: 4/14/2001]

General,  You are to give Subject 150 whatever it wants from the list provided, below. - Television with approved pre-programmed channels  - Kantonese Encyclopedia Set and Dictionary  - MP3 Player with non radio functions and pre-installed music  - Children’s coloring book with 64-Crayon set.  - A set of tennis balls - A chess board with all pieces - Silph Co. Technological Magazine Given the history of Subject 150’s mistreatment from humanity, let’s pray to Mother Mew that it decides to spare us if it takes the MP3 player. If it has to listen to the Dugtrio Duds’ latest song, we might all be dead the next day.  Keep me posted, Commander In Chief Haruka Nagumo

[Date: 4/14/2001]

Commander, The Subject has requested “all of the above.” General Takashi Shino

Afterword: Subject 150 has requested more items between the dates noted in Addendum 150.2 and 150.3. Such items include: the highest selling mystery novel written by up-and-coming Unovan author Shauntal; miscellaneous household items: blanket, mattress, pillows; and a grand piano. All items were delivered with no issues.

Addendum 150.3 - Instant Messenger Chat Log between Subject 150 and Captain Asuka Shinohara

[Date: 5/23/2001]

S-150: Hello. 

AS: Hello. Has the portable computer given you any problems?

S-150: None.

AS: How are your accommodations?

S-150: Lacking. The cave is not what I would consider ‘comfortable'. 

AS: I can put a request for more accommodations if you would like. 

S-150: That would be appreciated. Thank you.

[END OF LOG]

[Date: 5/24/2001]

S-150: Hello.

AS: Hello. How are the items we provided you yesterday?

S-150: I broke the lamp. 

AS: Broke the what?

S-150: I was not aware of the fragility of this “lava lamp” that was provided. May I request another one? 

AS: Of course. 

S-150: I am also curious about the slots in this portable computer. It seems that there is room for something to enter this device. 

*pause due to deliberation between surveillance team members*

AS: The slot is for something called a “computer disk” that contains data on various subjects such as movies, music, and games.

S-150: Games can be played digitally?

AS: Correct. However, the portable computer you possess does not have the capability to “run” anything with limited electricity and processing power. It is a device strictly for communication. 

S-150: I see. May I request electricity and a computer that can run these games?

AS: Stand by.

*pause due to deliberation between surveillance team members*

AS: The request will need to be sent to a higher staff member. 

S-150: I have nothing but time.

[END OF LOG]

Afterword: A nearby team of electricians were hired to provide electricity to the entrance to Cerulean Cave. Electricians refused to enter further than the entrance to the cave, reporting feelings of "pressure."

[Date: 5/27/2001]

S-150: Hello. 

AS: Hello. I apologize for the location of the electrical grid, we hired a civilian contractor that has no formal combat and psychic training. 

S-150: It is acceptable. The instructions and instrumentation provided are very impressive. 

AS: Have you experienced anything of the sort before?

S-150: In a lab.

AS: I apologize. 

S-150: Haha

AS: Haha?

S-150: A laugh.

AS: I didn't realize you had a dark sense of humor.

S-150: I feel insulted. Am I not a sapient being like the rest of you?

AS: You are, but you would be surprised at the amount of sapients that lack a sense of ANY kind of humor.

S-150: They must lead dull and uninteresting lives.

AS: Haha  

[END OF LOG]

Addendum 150.4 - Instant Message Chat Log between General Takashi Shino and Commander-In-Chief Haruka Nagumo

[Date: 7/21/2001]

Commander,  All seems to be well over here. The surveillance team is in unusually high spirits. It seems that the monitored conversations have done well to improve the morale of both the team and the subject.  The subject, however, has requested an improvement in the technology provided within Cerulean Cave: heating, cooling, ventilation, electricity, lighting, and most worryingly, internet access. I highly advise against the last option.  Respectfully,  Captain Takashi Shino

[Date 7/22/2001]

Takashi,  For whatever fucking reason, the committee has decided to approve all items including the goddamn internet. Arceus help us all. Nagumo

Addendum 150.5 - IM Chat Logs between Subject 150 and Captain Asuka Shinohara

[Date: 7/29/2001]

AS: Did you seriously order a pizza party to Cerulean Cave?

S-150: Hello. 

S-150: Yes, I did. 

AS: You realize that this area is under constant military surveillance? With top-of-the-line weaponry and security? And that the facilities near Cerulean Cave are designed to be defended with the upmost discretion?

S-150: Yes. May I have them?

AS: Stand by.

*Extended pause for HEAVY deliberation by surveillance team*

AS: We are sending a team of operators to the cave entrance to deliver the pizzas.

S-150:  :) 

[END OF LOG]

Afterword: Subject 150 ordered the entirety of ‘Cerulean Pizzeria’s’ menu items meant for catering for large events. Such events as birthday parties and company-wide events. The delivery driver was sent back to his employer after signing a non-disclosure agreement drafted in short notice by Kanto Homeland Security.

[Date: 8/2/2001]

S-150: Hello. 

S-150: Are you somehow cheating at chess?

AS: The surveillance team doesn’t appreciate that you’re reading their minds, so we’re equipping our psy helmets. Commander Nagumo told us that this isn’t a misappropriation of personal protection equipment. 

S-150:  Booooo >:/

[END OF LOG]

Addendum 150.6.1 - Video Transcript 1 of Virtual Meeting Between Subject 150 - (New Designation: Mewtwo) and Commander-In-Chief Haruka Nagumo

[Date: 8/5/2001]

HN: Hello. I was told by my staff that you requested an audience with me? 

MT: Yes, I did. 

HN: May I ask what for?

MT: Perspective. 

HN: I’m sorry?

MT: What are your goals in… all of this? The guards, the provisions, everything?

HN (pauses): Well, you pose an interesting situation for the nation. You are simultaneously the most dangerous entity in the world, and yet the international committee has agreed that you should be treated like any regular Kantonese citizen. 

MT: The accommodations have been appreciated by all of us.

HN: Hold on a second, us?

MT: I have other pokemon who suffered at the hands of Team Rocket Scientists. They are experiments, like me. They live deeper in the cave. 

HN: Was there a reason you kept this hidden from us until now?

MT: I was scared for them.

HN: Scared?

MT: There are claims that I am the strongest on the planet, yet I was humbled by one of your youngest to hold the title of "champion." I am not as strong as I had hoped. I was not sure if I could provide for the ones I call siblings.

HN: They’re not as strong as you?

MT: On the contrary. They’ve been hurt, abused, and tortured at the hands of people like you.

HN: … People like me?

MT: Your records are public, Commander-In-Chief Nagumo. I understand that you took part of the Kanto-Johto war as a commanding officer. 

HN: I did. 

MT: Then you know what humanity is capable of. What you are capable of. You were a part of it, after all.

HN: I like to think that I’ve passed that. 

MT: Oh? And actions like these are supposed to redeem the actions of your subordinates at Blackthorn City?

HN: ...The ones responsible were put on trial and summarily executed. 

MT: Who says you shouldn’t belong there in the grave with them?

HN: Because my nephew died in Blackthorn by the hands of those... excuses for human beings. He was eight years old. Eight. I personally made sure that those responsible were lined up against a wall, shot, and buried so deep that the earth will roll ten times over before their remains ever see the sun again.

Silence fills the room. Mewtwo leans forward, focusing extremely hard at the screen. Review suggests that Mewtwo was able to telepathically deduce that Commander Nagumo was telling the truth.

MT: You're not lying.

HN: The internet doesn’t have all of the answers, unfortunately. Journalists take advantage of topics like this all of the time, especially if their motives are to smear your reputation while you run for office. If you want public access to the documents, beyond the spoon-feeding speculation of a half-wit college undergraduate, I’m afraid that you have to spend more time than that before you have access to the truth.

MT: (silence)

Commander Nagumo stands to leave, knocking her chair back in the process.

HN: If all you wanted to do is anger me, I’m afraid that this conversation is over.

MT: Wait. 

Commander Nagumo stops.

MT: I apologize. I was not aware that I did not have all of the information. 

HN: ... Apology accepted.

Commander Nagumo sits back down.

MT: Clearly not.

HN: It’s a... touchy subject. I know that you are new to this, but incidents like that don’t get discussed in such an accusatory manner, unless one is on trial or under duress.

Silence. Mewtwo looks uncharacteristically uncomfortable.

MT: You say that the documents detailing this event are accessible. May I see them?

Commander Nagumo turns to the rest of the surveillance and science team. All of them are vehemently shaking their heads or making gestures of disapproval.

HN: Sure.

Surveillance Staff Member: Prime Minister-

HN: I don’t want to hear it. He has the right to know.

HN (turning to mewtwo): Against my advice, my cabinet seem to think that talking about our shame makes us weak. Although, their argument has some merit. The full details don’t paint a good picture of our actions during the Kanto-Johto war. You might not like what you see. 

MT: I have been subject to cruelty that you would not imagine. I feel that you will have to put forth tremendous effort to phase me.

HN: You’d be surprised at what I’ve watched soldiers do for the sake of themselves and their country. Human and pokemon alike.

MT: I see. May we continue this conversation after I’ve read the documents?

HN: If you learn how to be polite in conversation, perhaps. 

MT: You will have to be patient with me. I am only six years old, after all.

[END OF VIDEO CALL]

Addendum 150.6.2 - Video Transcript 2 of Virtual Meeting Between Mewtwo and Commander-In-Chief Haruka Nagumo

[Date: 8/6/2001]

HN: Good morning. 

MT: Hello. Good morning. I would like to apologize for my words the other day. 

Commander Nagumo takes a brief moment to take a sip of her coffee.

HN: I forgive you. I understand why you might be wary of people like me. Talking about Blackthorn is like reopening an old wound, but I should have kept my temper in check. I am also sorry.

MT: I understand and I forgive you. I still harbor resentment towards those who have wronged me. However, you are not one of them. It would be unfair to treat you as such. I let my emotions surface more than I wanted. I would like to continue our conversation, if you would allow it. 

HN: By all means. Before we do...

Commander Nagumo raises a binder to the screen.

HN: Since you had some files on me, I decided to take a deeper look into your time with Team Rocket. It’s all kinds of fucked. 

MT: Fucked?

A science team audibly groans in the background. Commander Nagumo sheepishly lowers the binder and clears her throat. 

HN: It’s an expletive. The science team decided to keep your education material elementary, but given all that’s happened between us, and between you and Team Rocket, I figure we can drop the kindergarten language. 

MT: That... is appreciated. I have to admit, I was beginning to feel that I was being talked down to. I feel that you and I, at the very least, can converse as equals. 

HN: Equals?

MT: The world has not been kind to us, Prime Minister. Given my current circumstance and your position of power, I believe that you and I have a lot in common. We both are responsible for people we care about. We both fought to be where we are and have made grave mistakes in doing so. We are both leaving behind the battlefield, where we thrive, to talk to each other for the sake of cooperation and peace.

HN (visibly surprised): Well, it’s good to see that the strongest pokemon in the world has the capacity of sympathy and empathy. 

MT: I am glad to see that someone in a high position, like yourself, don't see a conversation with a pokemon as beneath you. 

HN: On the contrary. I’m very pleased to let you know that Team Rocket’s views towards pokemon is very, very much out of the ordinary. I’ve see pokemon exhibit more “humanity” than what the best of humanity have to offer.

Commander Nagumo puts the binder away.

HN: Picking up from yesterday, I understand that you have companions in Cerulean Cave?

MT: Yes. In addition to the pokemon who previously inhabited this cave, I have fellow Rocket victims that are seeking refuge. The intent of our initial meeting was to request additional accommodations for them.

Commander Nagumo takes a pen and piece of paper from a nearby surveillance member.

HN: If there is anything that we can do to make your lives comfortable, list them. 

[CONVERSATION HAS BEEN EDITED TO RETAIN SECURITY AND PRIVACY OF THE INHABITANTS OF CERULEAN CAVE] 

MT: … May I ask what you are drinking?

HN: It’s coffee. 

MT: May I request that, as well?

HN: I don’t know, it might not be palatable for someone with a six-year-old tongue. 

MT: Try me.

[END OF VIDEO CALL]

[ADDENDUM 150.7 THRU 150.30 REMOVED FOR THE PROTECTION OF THE INHABITANTS OF CERULEAN CAVE AND IN-SERVICE GATEKEEPER STAFF]

END OF DOCUMENT

[nirikeehan]

For Thalia and Lace from Bad Things Happen Bingo: Roaring Rampage of Rescue. Very excited :3

THANK YOU BLUE I have finally come to fill this one. I love Lace Harding and it was a delight to give her some screen time. :3

For @dadrunkwriting and @badthingshappenbingo

Series: Dragon Age: Inquisition

WC: 1098

Notes: Here is Roaring Rampage of Rescue's definition on TVTropes, for a bit more context.

---

The Tower of Bone, it’s called. Harding has heard the stories from the townsfolk. Some say it was built in the days of old Tevinter with blood magic. Others said it was Elven. Others still told her tales of a man with too much pride, the demon that resulted, and his sons. That’s where the chains came in, apparently. The sons erected them, to keep the demon from escaping. 

And something about piles and piles of human bones in the foundation. Harding thinks she has a strong constitution, but that bit made her shiver. She blamed it on the cold. 

It’s cold here too, in the bowels of the tower. Is this dungeon where the bones were found? She shudders to think. 

She also shudders when her jailers come around. The Red Templars up close are no picnic. She feels bad for them, a bit; it’s clear most of them are in the throes of some madness. She tried to appeal to a few at first — I’m just an employee, you’re just an employee, that sort of thing. It didn’t take. Many of them can barely seem to form words. The more crystals are visible, the worse off they are. Harding is taking notes. Mental ones — she can’t write with the shackles, and otherwise they don’t let her have parchment. 

The Inquisitor is going to want to know all about this. 

Because the Inquisitor is coming, Scout Harding is certain. That was the first thing she thought when their camp outside Sahrnia was attacked: The Inquisitor is gonna be pissed when she finds out I’ve been taken captive. This has cheered Harding, kept her in good spirits, even though she’s not sure how long she’s been down here. With no windows, it’s difficult to tell the passage of days. It could have been two days, or twenty — it’s really hard to say. 

But that’s okay. Lady Thalia is her friend. Friends don’t leave friends at the mercy of mad red lyrium men. If that isn’t a statute in that massive tome the Inquisition uses, it should be. At least maybe a sub-clause. 

Harding hums to herself, a half-forgotten tune her mother sang sometimes when she stitched up a kirtle or a bodice or a doublet for her clients. What would her mother say if she saw her now? I told you that Inquisition nonsense was too dangerous, Lace. Now I’m going to outlive my daughter! 

Yikes. No, no, that line of thinking won’t do. 

A red templar guard lumbers past her cell door. Harding can sense them coming now, sort of. You can hear the red lyrium before you see it. Varric Tethras — yeah, that Varric Tethras! — said it had a song to it, and Harding gets it now. It gets louder over time. Prettier, too. Maybe that’s the song she’s humming. Maybe it’s not her mom’s at all. 

Uh oh. 

Harding knows, on some level, that the longer she spends here, in the Tower of Bone, with the giant red lyrium crystals arcing out of the walls and parapets, the worse off it is for her. That the proximity to the stuff is dangerous. But how’s she to know if it’s starting to affect her, when she hasn’t seen sunlight in days? When the food they feed her is just thin cruel, and yesterday — or the day before — she found a cockroach in the bowl? When she says thank you, how do you do to her guards, and all they do is mutter about the glory of their master and their unslakable thirst? 

Harding feels sorry for them, a bit.  

There’s a commotion outside. Harding stands, straining to look through the bars — but a lifetime of being shorter than most people keeps her from being disappointed when she can’t see much. She cocks her head, listens harder than before. It’s the sounds of battle, surely — she can make out the smashing of a mace or warhammer, the clang of steel on shields, the zip-zipping of spells. And it’s not coming from the outside of her cell, its coming from the outside of her wall. 

Dizzying minutes pass, and there’s stomping and raging and war cries and at one moment she thinks she can hear Warden Blackwall’s thick Marcher accent: One less to worry about! 

It’s them. They’ve come. Harding runs to the stone wall, starts banging against it. “Help!” she calls. “In here, I’m in here!” 

The din dies, and she hears Lady Thalia’s voice. “Scout Harding? Is that you?” 

“Yes! It’s me, Inquisitor, I’m right here! It’s about time you showed up.” 

“All right, Harding, I need you to stand well away from this wall,” Lady Thalia calls. “Can you do that for me?”

“Of course, Your Worship.” 

Harding scrambles backward, and just in time, too. The next second brings a terrible booming racket, and with surprising ease, the stones collapse inward in a pile of dust and debris. Standing to either side of the gap are Blackwall and the Iron Bull. Bull slings his hammer over massive shoulder. “You all right in there, little miss?”

Before Harding can answer, in barrels Sera the blond-haired elf, bow cocked and ready. “Any red templar shits in here? I’ll skewer ‘em, bam! Rat on a stick.”

The Inquisitor hops over the fallen stones by Sera’s side, the staff on her back still glowing with residual electric magic. She coughs as she storms through the dust cloud. “Harding! Thank the Maker, there you are.” 

Then, well, it’s a little embarrassing, because Harding runs to her and throws her arms around Thalia, or tries to — it’s tough with shackles. “You came for me,” she says, surprised by the awe in her voice. She feels weirdly emotional, near tears.

“Of course I did,” Thalia says, stooping down to hug her properly. “Where would I be without you? Utterly lost. I’ve got a terrible sense of direction, you know.” 

Harding laughs, and then she’s crying for real, which is super embarrassing. Except that Sera offers her a cookie and the two warriors help her through the pile of rubble and the Warden is promising her they’ll get those shackles off by hook or by crook. They’re going to build a camp here now that the red templars have been vanquished, and she just needs to get warm by a fire and she’ll be fine, just fine. 

“I’m already fine,” Harding insists, but she can still hear the song from the red lyrium crystals that protrude from rock and snow and earth. But that’s normal, isn’t it? Everyone can hear that. Can’t they? 

[rawcalamity]

Metal screeches and groans from a writhing mess of sinew and wire, woven around a body that reeks of decay. The howls of machinery threatens the nights silence as it whirrs to life, echoing a disgusting yet pitiful cry. Torn and mutilated, a disheveled corpse held together only by steel shambles along broken corridors; a horror reanimated by machine. May it find salivation at the end of its miserable existence, for such a creature has been cursed to dwell within the decrepit walls of a facility long abandoned. Stories sail from ear to ear, recounting the prime of mans greatest achievements—an era defined by discovery, passion, innovation, and most importantly: progression. Brilliant minds from all over the worlds continents joined together to build upon this very foundation, thus marking the birth of a facility like no other. This foundation invited those of many scientific fields who had honed their skills and intimate knowledge over decades to unite. Together as one, man would ascend to greater heights never before reached by their predecessors. This tale however is not one of golden glory, for an unseen darkness plagued its legacy. Rumors flocked to the towns, as whispers of horrifying weapons and experiments tainted the air. The origins of these rumors were a mystery left unsolved, though government bodies were not unfamiliar with such conspiracies surrounding them.

For a time, these rumors remain only as that; rumors... That is, until tragedy reared it’s ugly head. Whether it was an unpredictable event, or the consequence of toying with elements man should not have disturbed. Unbeknownst to the many, something truly awful festered beneath the surface of their accomplishments. Mans foolish desires culminated in a tragedy far beyond their control, as in a single night all they had made was ravaged and torn asunder. Now those poor fools lay sunken and buried beneath a tomb of their own making; piles upon piles of blood-soaked debris forever stain the history of what they had built. To this day, it is believed that what remains of the facility harbor unspeakable horrors. Some say these horrors have snaked their way out of the wreckage—slowly but surely seeping into our world.