2017-10-07: Scattered Pieces

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  • Log: Scattered Pieces
  • Cast: Fei Fong Wong, Ida Everstead-Rey, Kalve
  • Where: Jolly Roger, and also Marze.
  • Date: October 7, 2017
  • Summary: Kalve and Fei wake up in what's left of a warehouse in Jolly Roger, then head back to Marze to find Ida. The three of them discuss the events at the warehouse, and the mysterious presence of the Trial Knight.


<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Well that just happened.

Some time after the water came down and eradicated what remained of the warehouse, a martial arrist/artist picks himself up out of the rubble, wood and granite sloughing off him as he pulls himself out into the day. Fei cricks his neck and checks his hands, which are still bloodied from all the digging, and then with a roll of his body manages to fwump back down onto the debris, breathing out a long sigh.

"Didn't take." He says to himself before his eyes widen, "K.K!" He looks around and doesn't see them before adding, "And the other one... ughh--what was his name again?" He rubs at his forehead. He's a protaganist, talking to himself when he thinks he's alone is what he does. "...Guess I should go look for them."

He just sits there though instead of budging a muscle, staring out into the distance.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

"Kalve."

The source of the voice is already sitting nearby -- within easy earshot, obviously -- perched on a slab of unidentifiable charred debris. It's sticking up out of relatively shallow water at an angle. It looks like it's stuck into the ground, or pinned by a larger weight. Kalve is resting on top of it with his poncho draped over the side, still clearly soaked. He's got some kind of little yellow table stuck to it, too, and is messing with something small and square on it. His pants are burned around his lower legs. It doesn't look comfortable. "My name is Kalve."

"You're alive," he observes. "He must have lost his grip when he dragged you underwater."

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei jerks his head towards the sound of the voice. He takes in a deep ragged breath and lets out a relieved sigh. "Of the Method," He remembers. "You're okay too." He pauses, squinting at what Kalve is working on. Is he...patching his poncho? He starts making his way down the debris pile when K.K says something strange.

"Who?" Fei asks. "Oh, you mean... 'K.K'...? I don't--remember--him grabbing me. The last thing I remember is Ida going inside." He pauses and looks back over his shoulder, frowning as coherent thought starts working back into his memory. "...I guess I got lucky." He looks back to Kalve. "Is Ida okay?" Pause. Frown. "...It was a setup. They didn't care if we were caught in the blast."

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Patching, yes. Poncho, no. Kalve is fiddling with a little box and the contents thereof. He pinches something from it, and leans forward, tugging on his ragged pant leg and exposing burnt flesh. It looks more like the humanlike coloration got worn away to something dull grey, with obvious cracks where the burns are the worst. With his other hand, he spreads a material that looks like silver dust across the wound. Medicine, maybe?

"I'm alive," he confirms. 'Okay' is another matter. He looks towards Fei, frowning. "You attacked him, and he tried to, I assume, drown you. Hold you in the path of the wave. He seemed focused on the matter..."

Kalve looks up and away. "I did not see her leave the building... but I have not found her body, either. I suspect someone removed her from the scene before the collapse." He frowns, lapsing into momentary silence. He reaches back towards his little parcel. "...more important they remove their enemies than keep their own defenders alive to fight for them. Calculated. Unexpected."

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei Fong Wong grimaces upon getting a better look and seeing that Kalve is working on Kalve. What's with him, Fei wonders, and ended up in these situations with Metal Demons who are ostensibly warring against humankind. If Noeline's words are any indication, 'peace' is going to be a lot harder than it sounds. People love their dragon fossils, even if they're only out to stop weapons like Sado be made. Still, Fei has to admit to himself that sounds like the sort of goal he'd be up for even if he doesn't have much faith in its chance for success. "...Leon probably saved her. I saw him going in--that's right, he went in too." Unless of course Leon also exploded but Fei doesn't want to entertain that thought.

If he did, though, if he died. Or Josephine for that matter--then...

"Or maybe..." He murmurs to himself. "...Maybe you weren't the target." He looks over to Kalve. "Something like this might do some harm to you guys, but it's no sure thing, and everyone knows how slippery drifters can be." He frowns. "Maybe the target was Ida herself. It was her family--her merchant family I mean--that hired us." He lowers his hand and adds, "At least, that's the cruelest possible thing I could think of, so that means it's probably true."

Wow Fei.

"Either that, or maybe Lily's father schemed this..." He punches his fist into his palm in anger.

But it dissipitates quickly as Fei remembers when he last encountered Kislev. He rubs at his hands hesitantly before adding, "I think we should try to find her. If I'm right, her life might still be in danger. If Leon got her out, he probably took her to Marze."

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve is not the person to ask about Metal Demons and peacible human relations. He has the one (1) peacible human relationship, given his propensity for beating the tar out of humans who get within arm's (and ARMs) reach on a bad day, and that one is kind of up in the air right now. And slightly on fire. Kalve hopes Ida was not even slightly on fire.

What a strange thing to think, he reflects.

"She has a great many allies. Given her emotional state," he observes, working on the other leg now, "I expected it would take one of those physically removing her to cause her to evacuate the area." He extends his right leg, the one he's already patched up, and apparently tenses the muscles in it. His skin moves a little weirdly. It looks... wet, but like the illusion of skin was just a layer put on the surface of water. Liquid is perhaps a better word than 'wet,' given all the water around. The dust in the cracks starts to blend with the damaged metallic flesh, and slowly it begins to visibly knit back together.

"If she was indeed the target..." His tone begins to get a touch heated. A touch dangerous. He controls himself. "If she was indeed the target, then I will simply need to find the one who designated her such and remove them." Kalve is more matter-of-fact about it, which isn't much better. Then again, they're supposed to be some kind of warlike race of ancient evils, so that... fits...?

Kalve looks back down from his perch towards Fei. "Marze. Can you find your way there from here? I do not know the route." Which means that Kalve may have just joined Fei's party, whether he particularly wanted him to or not. (Too bad you can't unequip those ARMs of his.)

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

"Mm." Fei says, aware that 'lots of allies' isn't always what it's cracked p to be. Some of those allies might even be enemies in disguise! "That stuff you're putting on you." Fei says thoughtfully. "What do you call that? Haven't seen anything like it."

He gets readily that Kalve cares about his student but, well, Fei cares about Ida too. She's never done wrong by him. He has little idea of what's going on with her but if some Grahfian type is harassing her, she needs all the help she can get even if...he's not really sure what K.K's deal ACTUALLY is.

But he doesn't miss even the mild tone shift in Kalve's word.

Guess you've got a lot in common with this guy too. Just don't forget about Siegfried, eh?

Fei says, "Well, it's just a guess right now... If... Once we find Ida, we might find out more." He raises his eyebrows as Kalve asks him to essentially be tour guide. He laughs, cringes in pain, and ssteadies himself. Despite being on fire not so long ago, he largely seems to be suffering minor wounds, cuts, bruises, mild burns. Id's life of keeping Fei alive when he does stupid shit is a hard one. "Yeah, of course, follow me. I'll try to take the side roads so y'don't get in trouble."

KALVE FORCIBLY JOINS FEI'S PARTY

FEI'S GEAR

WEAPON: FISTS

ARMOR: SHEPHARD'S OUTFIT

ACCESSORY: HIDDEN CRUCIFIX

There's promptly a minigame where Kalve and Fei Fong Wong have to sneak around the harbor to avoid getting caught by guards and the like. AT one point they have to use the STEAL command to obtain uniforms and make it out the rest of the way to MARZE.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

"Its proper name is ferrochromatic exodermic precipitate," Kalve replies. "It accelerates regeneration by providing compatible material for my body to utilize in sealing external wounds. I can further expedite the process through bodily control provided by my chosen martial art, Method Mercury." He finishes with the other leg, and then closes the kit up, tucking it into his poncho. He picks that up, too, and the little yellow table vanishes into thin air. "Someone once called it 'metaclot'. I suppose it's easier to remember."

He hops down into the shallow water, wading over to meet Fei. He pulls the poncho on in the process. The extremely loud garment seems to be inside-out. It's grey and shapeless, now, and weirdly difficult to pick out detail about when Fei is looking at it. It's also still wet, but better damp than soaked. They both look a little drowned. Appropriate.

"Yes. I'm sure she'll be able to help." There's a momentary pause, and he pulls something out of his poncho. It's... a healing berry? He extends a black gauntleted hand, offering it to the injured Fei. "Here. And... thank you."

KALVE FORCIBLY JOINS FEI'S PARTY

KALVE'S GEAR

WEAPON: SILHOUETTE ENGINE

ARMOR: CAMO PONCHO

ACCESSORY: MANIPULE ARRAY

The stealth minigame is easy right up until Kalve is pretty sure they've been spotted and wants to go out and beat some guys up instead of sneaking around. Cultural differences in action, one supposes.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Marze, despite its fearsome reputation, is not very big compared to metropoli like November City or Bledavik. On one hand, that might not count for much when--allegedly--every inhabitant is proficient in Symbology, but it does give it a quaint small-town feel. The ferry docks a few miles away from the town proper, but once the hike is done, there are stone streets and ivy-encrusted brick buildings and a handful of townsfolk up and about.
The other good thing about it being a small town with few visitors is that it's pretty easy to find the one hotel in town and check it out for any sign of Ida. As luck would have it, she's right nearby.
Ida told herself she is staying here to get her horse, and then to find out if anyone can tell her anything about that symbol that was in the crate. She's washed, at least, and she's wearing a fresh outfit, but the malaise around her is unmistakable. She sits on a small bench in a little park, next to a brook fed by a bubbling spring. The spring itself is generated by a Symbol of some sort, but Ida hasn't examined it.
She is trying not to think about last night.
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei nodded along with the explanation. "So it's Method Mercury..." He pauses. "Oh I think I get it. Heh. Nice." He takes the heal berry. "Uh--no problem. Thanks for ... being around."

Fei Fong Wong isn't particularly interested in Symbology. The last thing on his mind is more power. He's not sure why there's such an interest in it quite frankly. Probably because if you turn your back on a power, the power bites back, he figures.

"I'm going to guess the hotel." Luckily there's no complex stealth minigame here as the entrance to the hotel is not that far away, and Ida's right out in front of it. Three people is enough protection if anyone's sore and looking for someone to blame for last night.

"Ida!" He shouts, jogging his way over, throwing a wave at her to try and get her attention.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve is interested in Symbology. He has a project involving it that he'd very much like to continue. The problem is that his attention has been consumed with what he calls the 'Wayside experiment,' and thus, he hasn't been able to pursue that particular avenue of research. If the circumstances were different, he might spend some time investigating it. As it stands...

Well, as it stands, they get to skip further minigames in the interest of soul-crushing despair-- er, getting right to the point. "A good place to start," he agrees. They start thataway, and... there she is.

Kalve spots Ida, and some of his personally-unnoticed tension finally unravels. He hastens his pace, following barely a step behind Fei.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida raises her head. She blinks, once, and rubs at her eyes to make sure this isn't a hallucination brought on by too little sleep and too much stress. She rises as Fei comes running up to her, revealing... one arm, the right one, that's not in its sleeve. Instead, it is draped across her chest in an improvised sling made of some sort of metallic fabric--more of the fabric peeks out from the back of her jacket, like a scarf. She stands there for a moment, trembling--
And then rushes right up to Kalve, giving him as tight a hug as she can manage with a single functional arm. Tension spills out of her. She starts to tremble. Before long, she's openly sobbing into his poncho, overcome with a strange mixture of pain and relief. Fei is all right. Kalve is all right, and he's still worried about her.
"I--I'm sorry," she whispers, between sobs. The bench is still right over there.
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei's mood is uplifted immediately. "Ida I'm so glad you're okay." He says. He's the sort of person who feels the need to spout it rather than just let it be evident through other means, as if he's worried it'll be distrusted. He is briefly confused, of course, by Ida HUGGING Kalve since earlier they were kung fu fighting one another and also, well, Kalve IS a Metal Demon and to hear Siegfried speak of her ancestors? They didn't care for the Metal Demon.

But then he thinks, isn't it better that way? Whatever happened back then clearly didn't work out. He allows himself a small smile as he observes this, looking away for decorum sake...and also to see if Leon's still aruond.

He doesn't see Leon so he must've bounced. Or he didn't make it out. "...Mm..." He murmurs.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve recognizes the cloth. It gladdens him to see that she's kept it, and that it's helping her, even if it's not, perhaps, in the method he'd originally intended. He doesn't quite know what to say at first, but he makes an attempt. "Ida, I --"

Then, she's hugging him. He blinks, and then hugs her back. He doesn't say anything, letting her vent her own mess of emotions in as comforting an embrace as he can manage. Fei might get the impression this is not the first time he's encountered the 'hug,' even if the 'fistbump' was a bit of a gap in his human social knowledge. And maybe that his protectiveness of her comes from a bit more than just the position of a teacher.

"You're shaking." Kalve guides her back towards the bench to sit down with him. "You do not need to apologize. I am just glad you are alright. We thought..." He casts a glance to Fei. He doesn't quite know how or when to broach the idea that the bomb might've been meant for her. Or if he even should.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
It doesn't take much to guide Ida over to the bench. She sits beside Kalve, still clinging to him, but gradually she starts to stabilize. She rubs the back of her functional hand across her eyes, and manages her first words in a while. "I was so afraid. The moment I saw both of you--" Ida swallows. "--go after K.K., I was certain I'd see one or both of you killed." She tucks herself closer to Kalve's side, and looks at Fei. "I don't know why they were there. They mentioned--a promise, or an oath, but I don't know what. They... they're the one that... corrupted Lahan, and made those Hellions in Port Timney, I'm certain of it." She did, in fact, tell Fei about what happened at Lahan, and what she did to stop it.
"There was a... a sacrificial pyre inside the cave at Timney, and I fed it a calling card because I didn't know what else to give it, and K.K. thinks I fed it myself." She's breathing a little raggedly.
Selfish girl. Aren't you going to tell them about the others?
Ida trails off. She blinks. "Leon--Leon is all right. He took me to safety. I think Riesenlied and Noeline are all right as well." Despite your best efforts.
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei looks away for a moment, clenching his fist lightly at the mention of Lahan. Kalve can tell Lahan is a sore subject pretty readily. "...It's never gonna leave me. Lahan." He murmurs. "....I hope they drowned." Yikes! But he does look back after a moment. He's heard about Lahan a lot. Somehow. For some reason "They that dangerous?" Fei says. "...Well, they feel dangerous."

He shakes his head. "I don't die easily." Unfortunately. He glances towards Kalve for a moment as he touches on the subject before looking back to Ida. "It's only a possibility but--I think we got played. And I don't think the trap was just meant for us or for the Metal Demons, even." He frowns. "Your family is the one that hired me. You think they might be ruthless enough to want to remove you?"

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve is, if nothing else, a rock to cling to in a figuratively stormy sea. "We hurt it. We were injured, but not badly." He's pretty sure he saw Fei set himself on fire, or possibly catch fire after getting flung into the building. Humans don't usually react so well to that. He must be a tougher example of one. They change in response to stimuli over time, don't they? Maybe he gets set on fire a lot.

"If it comes after you again," Kalve says, "we will defeat it together."

He exhales. "Good. I did not think that would be enough to kill either of them, but it would be problematic if it had." Kalve isn't exactly friends with the more sociable pair of Hyadeans, but he's at least got a mostly positive rapport with them these days. Still... pragmatism isn't exactly frowned upon by most of his people. He glances back up at Fei, and then at Ida. "I am concerned for your safety, if this is a real possibility."

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida hopes K.K. drowned. She knows, though, that there is no way the Trial Knight would allow themself to succumb to such a fate if it didn't have any meaning to it. Fei brings up her family, and Ida struggles to hold back tears again. "I--no! No, they wouldn't! Aunt Anna... she wouldn't do this." She would be much subtler about it, for one thing, and she'd do it with much less collateral damage. On top of that, it goes against everything Ida's known about her. Ida takes a steadying breath. "She sent one of our top people to watch the deal. Someone she trusts. He was in that warehouse, too." Jimmy was on the list of people Ida was scared to death about, but then a Memory Cube message showed up. If it's possible to fake those, Ida doesn't know how. "He said--he said this might have been sabotage. He said he was looking into it. He told me to keep my head down."
Ida looks down at herself, and then at Fei. "My arm isn't working. It's not broken, but..." But every meridian in it is just not working, like lights with broken filaments. It's a jarring difference.
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Technically K.K set Fei on fire by throwing him into a burning warehouse. The Fire Medium may have helped him handle that better than he normally should. He doesn't look a gift avoidance of third degree burns in the mouth.

Fei listens to Ida's explanation of her family. He can be more suspicious but in the end, it's up to Ida to know who or who not to trust. It's not like Fei can run over to Guild Galad and check. "So it wasn't supposed to be sabotaged, then." Fei considers this. If Ida didn't know about it then it has to be someone else in the family. Or someone in Kislev. Or someone in a rival family that heard about the deal somehow, but that seems less likely.

"Another possibility is that it was someone in Kislev who did it. Is it possible they stole the goods, then left the bombs to hide the theft? Or did they pay in advance?" The war has been going on for some time, maybe they can't afford dragon fossils so readily now.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

"In the absence of familial sabotage," Kalve says, "I think it is most likely that Riesenlied's standard operating procedure is predictable, and they sought to deal as much damage as possible to prevent further attacks. You would have a better idea of who would perpetrate such sabotage than I would." He's looking at Fei for that last bit. "I am certain that they would be interested in knowing who attempted to incinerate them as well," Kalve adds. He knows he would.

Kalve pulls slightly away from Ida to look at her arm better. He reaches out and takes hold of her arm by the wrist, prodding it with his other hand. "Can you feel it? Did you overexert yourself?" He couldn't see what she did from where he was fighting K.K. Stopping to watch would have ended very, very badly.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida closes her eyes. After a moment, she reaches around to touch the knot she made in the back of the improvised sling. It comes loose, and Ida's arm comes loose with it, dropping into Kalve's hands. The sleeve is rolled up and held into place with a garter, revealing dark bruising everwhere. The flow of life force in it is extremely faint--it's not dying, and will probably recover in time, but it's the sort of thing that happens when someone gets clumsy with chi.
Another similarity between humans and Hyadeans.
"I struck Riesenlied," Ida says. Her voice is tiny. She's not looking over at Fei, or up at Kalve. "She blocked. I tried to overpower her. This happened." She looks ashamed. Claude warned her about this, twice. She finally looks up at Fei, eyes dark with tears. "We... we have to look into it. No one threatens my family like that. No one steals from us. No one tries to frame us."
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

"Mm... I know of someone in Kislev's military who seems fond of traps like that, sent his own daughter into one I'm pretty sure, but I don't really know of their true nature just yet. I'm hoping that I turn out to be wrong about him, but maybe it's about time we start being more pro-active about looking into what Kislev's up to."

He pauses for a moment before saying, "Geeze, what am i saying?" He smacks his forehead. "Going up against Kislev AND Aveh, am I insane?" He starts pacing around for a few moments, gradually becoming more agitated, pausing only when Ida says he struck at Riesenlied. His fingers twitch, but he seems to reconsider his initial instinct. "Well, we were trying to fend them off, I'm sure she gets it."

He was totally not there for Ida's outburst. But then he adds, "But--ngghh... we're already chasing after Gryndille but it's not like we can sneak into Kislev HQ and find out."

He looks back to Kalve. "Even the Tainted couldn't just storm that city. It's not like Adelhyde." He looks back to Ida. "Moving that many explosives in--maybe there was an eyewitness. We could try with that and see where it leads. It's possible I'm just jumping to conclusions. I guess I'm kinda paranoid. Heh."

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve is gentle as he can be while performing such an inspection. Considering she's already so banged up, that's for the best. "You have slag in your flows everywhere," Kalve says. "It's damaged them. You need to be more careful with your channeling." He puts it back in a resting position across her lap. "But you will recover. There are steps we can take to encourage proper healing, but you will primarily require rest."

He waves off the other bit, though. "Riesenlied has been attacked by those who sometimes call her 'ally' before. I would be disappointed if she took it terribly personally. You should put it from your mind." Kalve can tell Ida is not in a great state emotionally, but he doesn't want to address that in front of Fei (it's probably a thing that'll make them uncomfortable) and isn't really sure how to solve it anyway. Maybe he should seek outside help. Hmm.

"The Tainted do not represent a significant fraction of our military might," Kalve says evenly and perhaps a bit too frankly. "They are a small population of undesirables among a civilization of proper warriors." He twitches a second after, and looks away. It definitely seems like he recognizes a kneejerk response about that now. "...however, they are... making strides towards bridging the unfortunate gap," he slowly adds. Kalve grunts quietly. "But there is no reason for a significant action against Kislev for a slight against a flighty commander and her eccentric subordinate. We would need to find another approach. Identifying a target and approaching when they leave their stronghold, perhaps."

He shakes his head. "We require more information first and foremost. Now is not the appropriate time to settle on a plan of attack."

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
"Full of slag," Ida says. She... almost thinks she gets it, is it a metaphor? "I'm so sorry," she says. "I've been a terrible student. I challenged Claude because I knew he would challenge me, but I was just looking for that... peace, in combat. I couldn't find it. I tried to explain the Second Method to Zed and Tethelle, but they didn't understand... or I didn't. I don't know which."
Ida bundles her arm up in its sling again. For someone right-handed, she's pretty good at using the left one for fine manipulation--it started, of course, when the Wels happened the first time, a year or so back. She turns to Fei. "It was a Symbol," she says. "One does not just come by those. It, too, is a lead." She pauses a moment, and then: "Gryndille?"
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

"Mm." Fei says. "True, but I'm sort of not suggesting a demon invasion to investigate a hunch. Just saying...it's kind of crazy to think about personally going up against 'em." Aveh is one thing, Bart's the rightful ruler, but Kislev is not run by a corrupt prime minister who seriously at one point attacks the party with a plugged in robot that keeps him from moving more than a couple yards away from where it's plugged in. Granted, that hasn't happened yet, but it's only a matter of time guys.

He considers Ida's arm again. "You said the chi flow is disrupted? That's what you meant right?" He is far less concious of how martial arts work than his alter ego. This guy just MAKES it happen. It's second nature, but that's far different than knowing terminology, terms, or anything of the sort. Normally such a thing is impossible, but even with amnesia--the techniques remain.

"This is the city of symbologists..." He murmurs. It's frustrating, but every little new clue just seems to open up possibilities, not close them.

"--But maybe if you can describe it to a symbologist, they can recognize its point of origin." He offers before being asked about Gryndille. "Oh uh--it's this ... thing that Leon and Lily are after. I don't actually know much about it except that it's very dangerous. Anything else, uh, not my place to explain."

Pause. He looks over to Kalve. "Huh. I thought you--liked them. Or maybe you do, and you just don't respect them?"

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

"Interpreting the meaning of the Methods and comprehending that meaning as it applies to you is not a thing that will be achieved in any short amount of time," Kalve says. "I do not expect you to be the ideal student immediately; I expect you to be willing to accept when mistakes have been made, and to be just as willing to correct them to better yourself." He gives Ida a one-armed squeeze. A little more softly, "We will discuss what happened, and what you have learned, while you recover."

He nods to Fei. "Yes. The terminology is different, but yes. Its presence and utilization is a trait we have in common with humans." He's thoughtful. He nods again. "Yes. Perhaps if we could identify the symbol, we could identify the one who created it. Craftsmen leave their marks in subtle ways in their workings, do they not? Is it the same among magic-users?" Kalve really doesn't know.

That pause. Kalve frowns. "I agreed to assist the Tainted in their relocation and the Wayside experiment. I respect Riesenlied's dedication to her charges. I respect her skill at arms, despite her disability. But the Tainted represent a step backwards, away from the innate strengths of my people. They are weaker. More vulnerable to harm. If it comes to war again, and if more and more Tainted come about when we must replace our losses..."

"...I am concerned for the future of my species, and the threat they represent to that if a solution cannot be found." Kalve's voice is low. "But I can still hope that they are able to find a place for themselves here, away from the many who shun them for what they are."