2018-07-02: Song of the Giants
- Log: Song of the Giants
- Cast: Riesenlied, Siegfried
- Where: The Photosphere, circa Day of Collapse
- Date: 2nd July 2018
- Summary: Close to five hundred years ago, a wounded knight meets a tainted child who brought home a giant with her song...
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
(Close to) FIVE HUNDRED YEARS AGO...
The Day of Collapse -- as it would be known -- had left an overwhelming and insidious scar upon Filgaia. Not limited to just the realms and nations of humankind, the devastation had spread wide and consumed all not even in its direct path. Lain low at the end of the conflict, the Photosphere faced its own share of problems as the humans, as Lombardia would tell, betrayed them.
It is in this wake that a resource crisis unfurled -- the war had consumed the Photosphere of a great number of acceptable-grade Living Metal, and through circumstances the only remaining materials left to quicken new neonates...
... were less than acceptable. "Tainted," the engineers and materials scientists called them. Brittle, weak, incapable of sustaining much stress...
Yet the Photosphere needed more workers. There was no substitute for the quantity of hands on deck needed.
And thus, an underclass was born in that era -- an underclass borne out of necessity, and yet one that was not so easily disposable.
The tensions were readily apparent from the first few batches of 'Tainted' -- Metal Demons that were hardly fit to be even shock troopers or fodder; conflict breeds more conflict, and those that survived the war looked down cruelly upon those that did not meet their standards of martial excellence.
And those Tainted that had outlived their usefulness were eventually cast down to the deepest pits within the Photosphere, colloquially becoming known as a ghetto known as the 'Gutter'. A place where the unworthy go to be forgotten...
Yet it is curious that it is here, of all places, that a news report reaches Siegfried one day, some years later.
"A Dragon," a subordinate reports. "The fossil of a great Metal Dragon, my lord Siegfried. A girl brought it in all on her lonesome... but it could be the breakthrough in the resources we need to bring ourselves back to our feet."
One fossil alone cannot save the Photosphere, but the prospect of finding raw, quality materials to save the future of the Hyadeans... what tidings does this news bring?
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
In the wake of the Day of Collapse, Siegfried entered a depression.
Metal Demon society did not have the words or the knowledge, much less the understanding, to treat depression. He was said, alternately, to be in a torpor or to be exhausted by the great efforts expended -- for naught, as the Diabolos had fallen and humanity survived -- in that last great war. His exhaustion was seen as the mirror of his race's.
Some whispered, though, that he did not show the rage that his fellows did over the Tainted: a stain on their race, it was said. For Siegfried, in the wake of everything, he found it hard to... care.
It felt worse, somehow, than failed Metal Demons.
He looks up at the answer to the question that he asked almost lackadaisically. He lifts his head, tilted slightly. He feels a pang of interest, for the first time in years. "A Dragon... incredible. It may, yet, be what we need."
He rises. "Show me."
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
And that lack of knowledge has not necessarily been dispelled in the modern day as well. A wellspring of knowledge only founded upon martial, technological and scientific excellence... and not so much the needs of the mind and soul.
The last of the True Dragons had gone. Lombardia had gone. And those that they attempted to create within the research and development laboratories have been...
To call them Whelps would be an understatement.
The subordinate bows, and shows the Quarter Knight towards the depths of the Gutter.
More precisely, to a portion along the southern walls of the Photosphere that make one side of it -- it was originally armor plating that had caved in from the sheer shock of the impact visited upon the spaceship from their descent into Filgaia. In the coming centuries, it's been repurposed into an entrance and exit ramp in a fashion...
The frigid howl of the Arctican winds blows, where the metal has all been slicked over. A not too thin dusting of powdery snow coats all those who stay there -- not out of choice, but out of a lack of it; the Tainted who dwell there do so in ramshackle huts and other... creative means of housing, such as gigantic ammo casing and storage containers.
Upon this ramp, Siegfried can see what must be a nostalgic sight--
--the remnants of a large, true Metal Dragon, glistening with a purity of quicksilver unfounded within the basest floors of the Photosphere.
And next to it... there is a girl, as the subordinate said.
She is humanoid, and small even for a human -- her Tainted nature rather visibly shows from the creep of scales and other deformities that break her skin, cresting in Dragon-like horns that protrude to each side of her head. Her pale blonde hair is caked in frost, whipping about heavily from how drenched and frozen it has been. She wears little more than rags, under which a neonate's battered suit can be seen.
A small, live Dragon is in her arms, shifting and shuffling quietly.
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
Siegfried is left with his memories. Lombardia had been one of the last of his true friends; Berserk was ever bloodthirsty, with a philosophy at odds with Siegfried's. Alhazred was monstrous, but Mother required her monsters. The others were dead.
A new Dragon, though, even a lesser one... that brings memories to the fore.
He walks along until he spots the remains of the Metal Dragon: one of the creatures so different than their furtive attempts to recapture that glory. A majestic thing, as large as the humans' Gears, and more powerful than those. He looks over it for a moment, before his eyes settle down onto that girl. He can see that she is Tainted; it doesn't fill him with the anger that it filled most people. He looks, sideways, to the attendant that brought him here. Then, he steps down -- entering the depression and sliding down. His armor is on, as it has been ever since the Collapse. His helmet is not, and he looks down at her -- and then down at the small Metal Dragon in his arms. His breath catches. "To think..." He shakes his head, once. Then, he looks down at the little girl caked in frost. "...Where did you find this one?"
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
Siegfried is left with his memories. Lombardia had been one of the last of his true friends; Berserk was ever bloodthirsty, with a philosophy at odds with Siegfried's. Alhazred was monstrous, but Mother required her monsters. The others were dead.
A new Dragon, though, even a lesser one... that brings memories to the fore.
He walks along until he spots the remains of the Metal Dragon: one of the creatures so different than their furtive attempts to recapture that glory. A majestic thing, as large as the humans' Gears, and more powerful than those. He looks over it for a moment, before his eyes settle down onto that girl. He can see that she is Tainted; it doesn't fill him with the anger that it filled most people. He looks, sideways, to the attendant that brought him here.
Then, he steps down -- entering the depression and sliding down with surprising control. His armor is on, as it has been ever since the Collapse. His helmet is not, and he looks down at her -- and then down at the small Metal Dragon in his arms. His breath catches. "To think..." He shakes his head, once. Then, he looks down at the little girl caked in frost. "...Where did you find this one?"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
It takes a little while for the girl to gain her bearings -- the journey back had taken a lot out of the both of them, both the little Dragon and herself.
But she looks up, gently, with wide eyes filled with a kind of resolve that isn't often seen in the hopeless halls of the Gutter. Her face is stained with all kinds of soot and dirt from the outside, but the gleam of her expressive demeanor shines through.
"A deep mineshaft in the far eastern mountains, m-milord..." she speaks. Though her voice is soft and trembling, she doesn't sound afraid. She more sounds... awed, to see the blue knight in person. She tucks her arms a little closer around the small Dragon.
"It was the site of a great battle, perhaps from our distant past... there are many more who have been laid to rest there."
She tucks her head down and expresses, "... there was a small amount of life left in this one," as she lays her hand on the side of the great Dragon Fossil's skull. "He spirited us back here on his last legs... please, milord, honour his memory."
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
Siegfried rarely interacts with the Tainted. His attendants make excuses: that, in his exhaustion and during his recovery, he need not trouble himself with garbage. The few times he has, though, he has grown used to downward glances and hopeless expressions. He looks down at the little girl, his expression considering -- wondering at how a mere Tainted had wandered down there... and lived.
No mere Tainted, he suspects, is the answer.
"And you dared to venture there alone?" he asks. "It is only with Mother's blessing that you live. And this one..." He looks at the huge Metal Dragon -- or what remains of it. He nods, before he walks over, and rests a palm on him. "He did well," he says, softly. "We will not forget him, or his sacrifice."
He shakes his head. "...How did you brave the mineshaft? And find him? Most would flee before ever going so deep as he -- and the others -- must have been."
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
The girl quietly nods, clinging a little closer to the small Dragon who... also gazes up towards Siegfried with that similar look of awe -- yet also one of curiosity, as the Dragon takes a glance all around as if absorbing every little detail like it were new. Truly an infant, in every sense of the term.
"... it is only because of Mother's blessing, yes," she whispers, truly reverent. "There were others with me, but... they perished to the snow storm..."
She huddles for a moment, before nodding as she bows her head to the Dragon. "I heard a voice calling... that-- that is all I can say. Something strong beckoned to me beneath the very earth, and I followed it... the humans and others have long since abandoned that mineshaft. There was no life there in that cavern, save..."
The little Dragon burbles just a little, pawing at her cheek for a moment. She probably doesn't even have the ability to speak right now.
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
Siegfried looks down at the Dragon. It dawns on him, slowly and surely, what the Metal Dragon might be: the very last of the true, original Dragons. Lombardia was dead; her brood was fallen. He knew the weight had been terrible -- that the rest of them had been extinguished to a one, during the Day of Collapse, was another reason that she could not forgive him. And yet, it seems, one might have lived.
It was too much to hope for.
"You did well," he says, quietly. "That even this one should live..." His eyes close. How many of them were dead, now? If they failed, then the deaths of countless members of his race were for nothing. Mother would have a long elegy to sing, when they found her and woke her. And...
"We will not forget the sacrifice of your friends, either," he promises. His eyes open, then, and look down; for the moment, the steel in them is grey, the light unable to catch them right to give them that angry, metallic red sheen. "What were their names?" He pauses, a moment, and then adds: "...And what is your name?"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
It is a heavy destiny, to be certain. One that an infant of her kind can't possibly begin to fathom... and perhaps unfortunately for the more pragmatic and militaristic side of the Photosphere, one that cannot lend their efforts into any kind of battle immediately, given their infancy.
To think of the sacrifices of her friends... no, it was nothing that noble. They lent their efforts to her desire to strike out and do good, and...
Well, none of them were particularly experienced. Not in foraging, not in navigation, not in survival techniques... Hyadean or not, they were horribly ill-prepared for Arctica's hostile weather.
But still.
"Asmund. Dagny. Ingemar..."
Siegfried asks who she is, however. Her name. She hesitates for a moment, then shakes her head and speaks gently:
"I... have no name, milord." A pause. "My designation at creation was... it was Dragon Unit No. 1, Type R."
The Type 'R' designation stands for a project started after the Day of Collapse, in a vain and desperate attempt to create new Dragons, after the True have been decimated...
... and none of them had been successful, even now.
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
Once, Siegfried thinks, they would have made the world tremble at their passing. Now, their fledglings huddle and die in the cold. The Metal Demon race had fallen far since the days of the war -- and further still, after the Collapse.
He looks down, for a moment, and nods. He commits the names to memory. For all of his flaws, and they are many, Siegfried remembers them. His eyes close.
Then open, again.
"Then... you received no name," he says. He looks down at the small, blonde-haired child in front of him. "Once, every Hyadean earned their name. When we first came to this world, we were given our names -- for prowess in battle, for skill in leadership, for the weapons we won and the traits that we displayed. The practice stopped, as our race grew... as we found Filgaia to be our new home."
His lips curl back, into a frown, and he kneels down in front of her. "But old traditions carry weight." He reaches his hands around his back, and unclasps the white and black cloak that he had worn ever since his days as 'Sigmund,' a knight errant that pretended to travel as a human. Around the girl's shoulders, it is massive, and she is practically lost in it.
But, it is warm.
"Riesenlied," he declares, after a moment's thought. "Giant's Song. For the song that led our giants back to us. May it continue to do so."
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
The child watches as the blue knight closes his eyes. Remembers them. She much does the same, bowing her head. In memory... in guilt, but also, so that they have not lived in vain.
Siegfried says she's received no name -- and that's true. He regales her with how Hyadeans earned their name, for the many ways in which they excelled -- whether in leadership, or martial skill, or for the glories in which they procured upon the battlefield...
He unclasps his cloak, which she does not know to be one that he donned when he pretended to be human. It swims around her, swaddling her in a warmth that feels... genuine.
Parental.
"Riesen...lied..." the girl -- newly christened, such, as Riesenlied.
She quietly nods, a trembling light in her eyes as she tears up softly. She pulls the mantle of Sigmund a little closer to her, to also coddle the little Dragon she embraces. Her voice is heartfelt and touched, the sound of someone who has clearly not seen such care and grace in her entire life.
"Thank you... thank you, Lord Siegfried."
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
Siegfried does not quite smile, but there is a tug at the corner of his lips. More than that, he feels something else: a warmth in his heart, a feeling that he almost forgot, that feels strangely and woefully at odds with what a Metal Demon should be. It is a ghost of those old feelings, but it is a little light that shines through the mire that has descended over his whole life for years.
He leaves the cloak about her, then rises slowly to his feet. He looks down, then, and gives her a reaffirming nod -- and tries, his very best, to hide that he isn't fully sure what he should do or say in the moment.
"We should return to the Photosphere," he says. "I will find you quarters--and learn more of your training. And the training and circumstances of your brethren." Even if, in truth, he could only do so much.
"Can you walk with me, Riesenlied?"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Down from the depths of the Gutter where the artificial lights of the Photosphere nearly does not shine, it is hard to fathom just how frightening and awe-inspiring the legendary figure of a Quarter Knight can strike.
For a lot of them, Berserk was their one and only interaction -- and it likely ended with them being crushed and thrown over the precipice into the Gutter.
So to experience a meeting in full with the Blue Knight himself, to see so many sides to him... even now, as a child, something is already kindling within her. Something that lets her hear the voices of the world, something that lets her feel a little of what it is he feels inside.
She scoops herself up to her feet, as does the little Dragon, as she huddles around the mantle. It'll drag around her for a bit, but... there's room to grow yet.
To be granted quarters, and to learn from him...
There's a powerful, surging feeling of relief and something else within her, almost hitting her all at once. She quietly nods and says, "Yes, Lord Siegfried," with the mirth of someone who... does sound for all the world like she just found a father.
She steps by his side and--
--biting her lip for a moment, knowing that she oversteps her bounds, that it could be seen as uncouth--
--but she does so anyway:
She holds her hand out with wide eyes as if to reach for him, so they can walk side-by-side with hand held.
<Pose Tracker> Siegfried has posed.
Siegfried looks down at her, watching as she steps up. He looks down curiously; his eyes widen, a moment, when her hand reaches up. He remembers, once, when he would have knocked that hand aside -- or scolded her. He remembers, in the days after Enkidu's passing, when he would have raged at her for it. But, he met Lacan and Sophia. Perhaps he lost them; perhaps his heart is hardened, now, and such things will never be for him again.
But it isn't hardened completely, he finds.
Ignoring the stares and confused looks from the handful of subordinates, the Quarter Knight takes her much smaller hand in his gauntleted one, and begins to lead her back to the only home that their race has known.
