2017-10-23: Introductions in November City
- Log: Introductions in November City
- Cast: Rose, Jacqueline Barber, Iskandra Grendorre
- Where: November City - Market Street
- Date: 10-23-2017
- Summary: Jacqueline introduces a fellow alchemist to Rose. Plans are hatched, and revelations are made.
=====================<* November City - Market Street *>====================== November City is the greatest and the largest of the Seed Cities. When it appeared after the Night of Falling Stars, it was already a large settlement, built by the survivors of that day quickly. It has since grown enormously, appealing to people in the Badlands in search of some security and the refugees from failed and lost Seed Cities. Market Street, its main thoroughfare, demonstrates this. On the outskirts of the city, shantytowns and shacks pop up along the street, gradually becoming the larger buildings in the heart of November. The street is named for the huge market that has sprung up across it, occupying the three and four story brick buildings along each side. It's a wide, paved road (a rare thing in the Badlands) and connected to Central Station, where all of the railways come. Here, one can find anything they want. The laissez-faire nature of November City's government makes the black market an open one, and this is one of the few places where ARMs and stolen goods from Aveh and Kislev can be bought with ease. There are also saloons, taverns, restaurants, and hotels to be found. November City is a true melting pot, where Drifters from across Filgaia mix with foreign merchants and locals of every class. Men wearing suits brush by peasants in homespun, while Drifters and knights bump into each other. The police force usually prevents outright gunfights in the streets, but November City's officials are infamously easy to bribe.
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
Another day in November City, another day in the sun and heat. More importantly, another day to peddle wares. The Market Street is as busy as ever, booths and tents and caravans set up in front of countless shops and storehouses. The Sparrowfeathers are no exception, having rented some storage space from which they operate a few tables of choice goods, not to mention from which they offer their services. Beating the competition on price is hard here: everyone wants to sell for the lowest price, everyone has something the others don't. The Sparrowfeathers have found more success carrying goods from point A to B than selling them, since nobody wants to cross the war-torn desert these days but merchants with the paperwork to avoid trouble.
Today is no exception, with one of the two wagons gone, Eguille and Rosh off to fetch some scrap from Dazil for a client. That left Rose and the twins to man the tables, although Rose is currently lounging on a beach chair sipping from a thermos of hot soup. She's still not entirely back on her feet after that Armatization episode.
Seems today the Sparrowfeathers are trying to get rid of the last of those "haunted" tools they'd been selling the last couple weeks. Authentic farm equipment from decades back, rusted, bloodied, darkened, and more importantly, cursed or haunted in some fashion. It's completely harmless now, but all of it tried to kill the Shepherd's party once, so it's real! And spooky. Collectors love this stuff.
There's also the usual adventuring wares, from potions to rope, food, torches, low-key ARMs like grenades. Fancy herbs, good-looking weapons of all sorts, some lighter armor. And of course the spot typically reserved to show some of the CaraKin's wares, since they have that back and forth deal.
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
Today, the Caravan Kinship was operating without Jacqueline's guidance. She trusted her friends to run things well in her absence, as she had business to take care of in the City. This business, as it happened, involved the Sparrowfeathers.
She's walking through their set-up now, glancing over all the good they had on offer. There was some interesting stuff here, definitely...but she wasn't here to make a purchase. No, right now, her interest was with their leader.
"Good morning, Rose!" Jacqueline greets with a cheerful wave, approaching the beach chair her fellow merchant is lounging in. "How's business been treating you?"
She takes a moment to notice her condition. She didn't look to be at one-hundred percent, but...
"I hope this isn't a bad time...but there was someone I was hoping to introduce to you..."
<Pose Tracker> Iskandra Grendorre has posed.
Following Jacqueline is a Hellion who is doing her best to suppress her Malevolence and allow people to assume she's a beastman or other kind of non-hellion winged person. She smiles politely at Rose, and extends a hand, "I'm Iskandra Grendorre, an alchemist looking for business contacts. Miss Jay recommended I look into making a deal with the Sparrowfeathers."
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
"Oh, hey Jay! Not bad, not bad! Bad time? Nah, I'm as solid as a brick wall, it's going to take more than some fusion thing going slightly wrong to throw me off my groove!" She gets up, as a matter of fact, the merchant grinning to hide the fact she isn't walking perfectly straight. She glances to her fellow merchant's side to spot Iskandra, and immediatly shakes her hand.
Rose doesn't discriminate against beastmen, so there's no reason for her to suspect anything. She mostly discriminates against ghosts and the undead.
"Well, hello there Iskandra! Name's Rose, I lead the Sparrowfeathers Merchant Guild and travel with the Shepherd on my spare time. You want anything, we have it, if we don't, we'll go get it. And we're always happy to put more wares on our tables too! It can be hard getting your name out there, so having other people sell your wares for you's never a bad plan!"
Rose is nothing if not extremely upfront.
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
"Oh, well, good to hear, then!" Jacqueline says with a smile. Rose looks alright enough, at least...Jacqueline supposes that as long as she's not falling over or anything, that's a good sign.
Jacqueline steps aside to let Iskandra and Rose have a more direct line to each other.
"Miss Iskandra's potions are good quality. I can vouch for their usefulness." She says with a smile. "They've certainly helped us out of a jam or two while adventuring!"
<Pose Tracker> Iskandra Grendorre has posed.
"I don't just make potions, though. I also make other useful adventuring tools, including climbing glues, acids, bombs, sedatives, poisons, grease and so forth." Iskandra explains, pulling out some samples of various things, "And nice to meet you, miss Rose." Then she considers something carefully, "The Shepherd? Like the guy from those fairy tales?"
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
"Oh, that so?" Rose says as Jay vouches for Iskandra.
"Well, if Jay's vouching for you, that counts for a lot. Can't picture her vouching for just anyone, she's got a name to protect too! Let's have a look at your most exotic stuff, I'm curious!"
The climbing glue and poisons seem to have Rose's attention in particular, from the ones laid out so far. "Climbing glue? How's that work? Sounds like it'd be pretty popular if it's what it sounds like it is!"
Oh, the winged lady has a question too! "Yep, the same! Name's Sorey, he hasn't been Shepherd for that long now, about half a year or so. You must be from Lunar too if you've heard the stories! I didn't believe them at first either, but it's hard not to now."
What with all the ghosts in her life.
Ugh.
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
Jacqueline nods in agreement. She could recognize quality when she saw it! She listens as Iskandra lists off the variety of her wares, and then asks a question about the Shepherd.
Jacqueline actually didn't know that much about the role of Shepherd, being from Filgaia...she only knew what she'd heard when he held that meeting in Port Timney, so long ago.
"I don't know too much about Shepherds myself, admittedly...but Sorey seems like a nice guy. I've met him a few times, myself." She comments. He'd even helped get her family out of Adlehyde when it had been attack, that was something she'd never forget.
<Pose Tracker> Iskandra Grendorre has posed.
"You basically smear it over your gloves and it makes your gloves sticky enough to give you a lot more grip on surfaces that'd be tough to climb, especially smooth and slippery ones, and then when you're done you just rub it off with some alcohol, cleans right off that way. It's not perfect of course, but it helps." Iskandra explains the way her climbing gloves work. "And yeah, I'm from Pendrago." She frowns a little bit when hearing about the Shepherd, but eventually shrugs, "Well, I wish you and him the best of luck."
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
"There's not much to know, really," Rose answers Jacqueline, waving a hand about dismissively. "Shepherds are those heroes destined to fight Lords of Calamity and save the world from Malevolence. At least that's the story. I've got... doubts, about being that focused on the task. I guess I'm wondering if it can really be so black and white." Lucia's always been on Rose's mind. She didn't act like a "Lord of Calamity" should. Her friends all say it's a set up. It's a mess.
Her eyes refocus on the bottle of blue. "Oooh, really now. This is some next-level product! And Pendrago, huh? I'm from around there too. Small village, not the main city, but I've been there a few times. Were the knights still uptight and stuffy last you saw?" When aren't they, though, with that war on the horizon.
Rose picks up one of the vials of poison, and one of sedative, examining them. "And these, what're they made of? What kinds of effects?"
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
Jacqueline listens in, nodding in understanding. That made a lot of sense, actually... She then glances toward Rose with a slight frown.
"...I don't think so, either. The world's a lot more complicated than that." She comments with a shrug, then turns her attention to the bottle Rose was focusing on.
Pendrago...that must be the capital Iskandra had been referring to when they first met. It was interesting, to hear about Lunarian cities...she didn't know much about them.
<Pose Tracker> Iskandra Grendorre has posed.
"Sounds like a rough job if it's that black and white, and if it's not, then he's got quite a few choices to make on top of that." Iskandra comments on that, seeming to agree with Rose and Jay on the matters of grey, too. She didn't read the celestial record as a child. "Most of them, sure. My brother wasn't that bad, though." There's a tinge of sadness in her eyes when she mentions her brother.
"What they are made of is a professional secret I'm afraid, I'm not divulging those for free." She glances towards the vials Rose picked up. "This one is a fairly basic poison, though. Get it in someone's blood and it'll make the wound much worse, and if you apply enough it'll spread and cause damage all over."
"That one is a potent sedative, if inhaled people and even weaker monsters will get drowsy, and if it's enough they'll fall asleep." She continues on the next, "My favourite use is to use them to make what or who I'm fighting pack a bit less of a punch, since I can throw a flask towards them and if it hits they'll probably get enough of a whiff to affect them."
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
"Fair enough! Just had to ask to make sure! Seems pretty good though." The merchant puts the vials back down, crossing her arms as she inspects the rest of Iskandra's business. "How comfortable are you with custom orders? Can I give your name out to folks looking for very specific brews and mixes, or if I ever need something that's not normally available?" That's pretty useful to know. She also carefully picks up a vial of acid to inspect it. "Oh, I haven't had any of this in stock for a long time! A favorite for people who hate locks." Or people's faces, but she can't legally imply that. Also that's kind of awful and if someone uses her wares for that they better have a good reason.
She backtracks, idly, to the other conversation. "Things're pretty complicated yeah. I admit we've yet to cross a Hellion whose first reaction to seeing us isn't to try to eat our faces, but it just seems too convenient if Malevolence is evil and the Shepherd is good. Reminds me I keep meaning to chat with Lucia and her friends!" She really needs more spare time.
Then to Iskandra: "Oh? Your brother's a knight?"
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
Jacqueline's...a tad bit uncomfortable about the idea of using one's wares on people, and looks away when it's mentioned. She doesn't say anything, though, she does look away when Iskandra mentions her brother.
She'd heard the story before.
"I don't know about 'Malevolence' itself, admittedly. It causes so many problems for the people affected by it. I had a friend who had a terrible case of it for a while. But Hellions...they're still people. I mean...when they are people, of course, and not animals or things like that..." She comments.
<Pose Tracker> Iskandra Grendorre has posed.
Iskandra mostly uses the acid to soften down thick hides and armour, "I can't promise anything custom without at least knowing what it is, but in general I'm open to that kind of job. Depends on the specifics, of course. Feel free to send them my way as long as that's made clear." Iskandra answers with a somewhat measured tone, knowing that it's kind of a niche thing and not expecting to find it any time soon.
Then, she takes a breath, "He's dead." She doesn't go into detail, and then takes a moment to consider the other thing, and eventually settles on the less than subtle but still not quite outright, "Well, I didn't try to eat your face."
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
"Sorey impressed that on me pretty hard, yeah. That time when Timney got run over by a horde of them, and I couldn't see Malevolence yet, they just looked like violent farmers and animals to me. It's still weird to think there's this force that can make that happen to people."
Not as weird as when Iskandra just puts all the cards on the table. Rose stares for a moment, but to her credit, doesn't back actually. Actually she crawls up into Iskandra's personal space like it's the first time she's ever seen a human being.
"Wh... really? You're not joking? That can't be right! You're acting completely normal, you're not even radiating any of that... evil mist aura. I can't even sense any Malevolence!" That isn't saying much, Rose still sucks at it. "If... if that's true, well, first off, thank you for not eating my face! I like it attached to my skull, sometimes you have to be happy about being able to go to sleep with it still on, ahah~."
But second off... "And two, well... if that's true, I won't tell anyone. Last thing you probably need is the Shepherd hot on your tail trying to purify you like you're carrying around some horrible disease. But if you act up and eat someone's face, all bets are off!" Please do not eat faces.
"So how come you don't look like one? All the ones I've encountered so far have been... really scary, actually. Like monsters but worse."
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
Iskandra makes her nature clear for Rose. It was something Jacqueline already knew about. She wouldn't have said anything, but since Iskandra herself had said it...
"...I knew about it, too." Jacqueline admits with a glance toward Rose. She can't answer any of the more specific questions, though, so for the moment she just keeps quiet.
Iskandra wasn't the first human Hellion she had met who retained their intelligence. But then again, the first one she had met, well...
...Wasn't exactly the best reference point.
<Pose Tracker> Iskandra Grendorre has posed.
And when Rose asks why she doesn't look like one, Iskandra just... lets go. To many people, the difference would be unnoticeable. To past Rose it would've been, but there's that 'evil mist aura' and black streaks that run across her face, eyes that glow red, and teeth sharper than needles. "It's bad for trade." She comments on why she doesn't look like that.
Then she gets back to hiding her malevolence, and smiles politely. "I think the Hellions you're used to aren't in control of themselves anymore. I am, that's the difference." She then moves on, "Thank you, though. I appreciate you understanding that this shouldn't be an impediment to trade." She shrugs a bit, "So, anything else to discuss?"
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
Oh, there it is alright. That aura, the tight feeling in her chest like someone's squeezing her heart, the monstrous features. It obviously makes Rose uncomfortable, but you don't need to be good at telling people aren't lying to tell Rose is being honest when she says: "Being able to shift on-demand like that is kind of cool."
And spooky, if not spoopy. That one goes unsaid.
"Heh, yeah, probably best not to look like that when you're trying to get people to buy your stuff! Well, it doesn't bother -me-. It actually makes me kind of hopeful to know Hellions can regain control like that." If she knew the whole story, about how Hellions are fundamentally changed in some way, maybe she wouldn't say that! But she doesn't, so she's rolling with the assumption this means Iskandra is in full, complete control.
Oh, back to business! "Hmmm. Pricing, but we can hash that out over something to drink in a little bit." As in, in ten minutes, conveniently offscreen because numbers are the devil. "Oh, oh! How about a field demonstration sometime? You, me, Jay, a couple other Drifters, and whatever ruin we can find by throwing darts on a map. Show off to Drifters -and- to me, there's no better way to sell a product!"
<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.
Definitely bad for trade. It was important for a merchant to be approachable!
"A field demonstration? ...Hm, yes, I think it'd be a great idea, though in the end it's your decision, Iskandra." Jacqueline comments with a smile, glancing over to the winged alchemist. She had to agree - showing people what your wares could do was the best way to spread the word about them!
<Pose Tracker> Iskandra Grendorre has posed.
"Pricing we'll hash out later." Iskandra agrees, moving on from the somewhat uncomfortable topic of exactly how in control she is with ease, if Rose wants to assume things that are convenient for her, Iskandra is glad to have that happen. She considers the idea of using a field demonstration to hawk her wares and smiles, "I wish I'd thought of that. A field demonstration is a great idea."
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
"Right then! Sound settled to me. Let's go have a drink to celebrate and then find a dartboard we can put a map on," Rose says, grinning wide. She could use a drink anyway, and not just because she's out of soup. Which she is. Hydration is important! So's occasionally taking a break to relax. Of several days if needed!