2019-06-02: Staff Meeting

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  • Cutscene: Staff Meeting
  • Cast: Margaret
  • Where: A tent near Kilika
  • Date: 2019-06-02
  • Summary: The Hounds of Hell have a frank discussion about heresy, ditching, the progress of a militant effort, and cannibalism.

It was, in practice, a small council, though like many other aspects of the Hounds of Hell, they would not dare say that name. Not yet.

The five followers* of the Goddess Althena sat in their tent, some distance from others in the realm of Kilika. In the center table, there were maps, but atop the maps were the more pressing things. Two printed missives, one local, one less so.

Margaret's eyes turned over the missive from the Grand Maester, then over the missive from the White Knight. She knew full well the others were doing the same.

Margaret broke the silence. "Well," she said: "That's happened."


Her eyes turned first to Silf, who was freshly scrubbed. Silf straightened and chirped, "Outrider report. So, then, the White Knight's seized that temple in Kilika, and the locals aren't happy about it. The clerics and so on have been sent on the short horsebird to Luca."

"Yeow," said Griz.

"Rex," Margaret said, rubbing a bandage on her left wrist idly: "What do you take of the mood of the commons here?"

Rex put down his mug of water with a citrus accent. It had seemed meet of them all to stow what little liquors they had secured - at least where they could be seen. "The Kilika folk may - perhaps - be prepared to hear the Goddess's word. They might, maybe, be willing to shelter us. But we are newcomers and as you see dear Leo's statement, we also admit that our own hero isn't up to snuff."

Margaret grimaced.

"Ah," said the new figure.

The four old hands looked at the new addition. The woman with the doll's head brooch. 'Dolly' had put on the face-paint she wore in battle, perhaps from shyness, perhaps from an inner essence. It was like she matched the jewelry, Margaret thought idly.

"Should I er... I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-"

Margaret, Griz, and Rex all looked at one another, and to the hand each of them had raised in the anticipation of a conciliatory gesture. ("That means you're fine," Silf said, who had been using her hands to firmly grasp a large piece of bread.)

Margaret and Rex both began to speak. Another pause. (Now Dolly giggled, but without mirth.) Rex gestured, and Margaret continued, taking pains to smooth her tone. "It's difficult for you, I am sure. Since we have folded the forward forces into a single squad after everything... and, of course, since you have had to assume this role, in place of Jack. Why don't I take the lead?"

"Please do, miss," Dolly said.

"How are the group?"

"Well," said Dolly, "you know, I mean, we had twenty-two of the foot folks with the Thunder Road expertise. That's what we had, and now we have fifteen."

"How's morale?" Margaret asked.

Dolly faltered.

"You can say," Margaret continued, and this time the smoothness was more weary.

Dolly was quiet for long moments.

"I don't think they're happy to be here any more, ma'am," Dolly said, and then: "I'm sorry, I--"

Margaret shook her head. "I don't blame them in the slightest. I'm not either. Do you think they would be able, willing, to take the field again as a group?"

"You mean the way we did at Mushroom Rock?"

Margaret nodded her head.

Dolly said nothing.

"Ah," Margaret said, eyes turning to the table: "Well then."

"There is... something I have wondered," Dolly ventured, "if I may ask, which is... er... well, we have a little bit of everything here in the Hounds, and I've wondered why that is."

"Because now you've got a lot less of one thing," Rex says, "right?"

Griz elbowed him.

Dolly laughed, still brittle. "I mean, sir, I won't say you're wrong."

The numbers floated in the air, Margaret thought, though she couldn't see them. They'd come with a hundred, for luck. Eighteen cared for the ship and the food. Twenty-four were seconded to the support corps. Ten were in the beast wrangling business, and they were largely learning how to care for the damnable horsebirds. Seven sappers. Five scouts. Nine message-runners. Themselves.

The swift squad, the future of battle. Now one in three of them were dead.

"I don't want to get any of them in... trouble," Dolly said.

"You can name them by name," Margaret said, "and give time, and date, and I will swear to you, Dolly, darling - in front of these three, who can vouch - that they will suffer nothing, absolutely nothing, from my hand, or any of our hand. The worst that I will do is speak to them myself."

Dolly sucked in a breath through her teeth. "Alright..."

"I think, ma'am, that they're afraid. Not so much of... the Fiends here, or perhaps of Yevon, since I don't think they have our spell and everything, but they're afraid of Sin, because Sin's done what most of Filgaia couldn't," Dolly said, and her eyes were on the table as she spoke. "That creature ruined Azado, it slew the Dragonmaster, you know? A lot of them are thinking, or perhaps sort of hoping, that perhaps we'll write this off as a bad mission - bad idea, you know? Cut our losses and go home. Back to Neo-Vane, and all, even, not just back to our side of the water."

Dolly tensed up as she stopped, as much as finished.

"Hey, little sister," Griz said then, reaching over to clasp Dolly's shoulder. "It's alright. That was really candid of you. Jack would be proud."

"Don't-"

"So what happened with Jack anyway?" Silf said.

Dolly swallowed. "Er."

"Go on," Margaret said.

"That Filgaian woman, the small one. Marivel. She said she... took him, like, into herself, like she had a Filgaian power or something like that."

Margaret was silent for several seconds.

"Is he, then...?"

"I think - he's dead, ma'am," Dolly husked, "but I think she's kept him from going to that farplane thing, or from suffering. I don't know how true she told, but she was apolo... I don't know if it was apologetic. But she sounded like to her, it was a mercy."

("Griz, wipe that look off your face," Rex told the anxious man.)

Margaret blinked her eyes, slowly... and then asked, "What is your desire, then?"

"About what?" Dolly asked.

"About Jack."

Dolly answered, two heartbeats later, "I don't know."

"Do you want us to retrieve his body?"

"... I don't know," Dolly said.

"This is awful, isn't it?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Shall we change the topic?"

"If it please ye, ma'am."

Silf, who had finished eating her bread, banged her small fist on the table, rattling the pitcher. Dolly jumped: Silf insisted, "Stop saying ma'am! Geesh! I understand you're upset and you've got a bunch of rights to be but this is a meeting, we're talking in candor!"

"Of course ma'am," Dolly answered without thinking. Then she tightened her jaw, her eyes unfocusing slightly; the white paint on her face veiled any further reaction.

"Just work on it," Silf said, reaching over to put her hand on top of Dolly's. "Us old desperadoes have to stick together. Sir and ma'am is what we call the marks."

"The marks?" Dolly asked.

"The marks," Rex confirmed.

Dolly fell silent.

"Shall I make the traitor's pitch?" Rex said then. (To Dolly, he explained: "I like to propose the opposite of what we should do, or will do, so we understand why we're not doing that.")

Receiving assent, Rex said: "Very well. We should pack everyone onto the Raven's Mist, throw open the gates to the Yevonites, and cut out. I imagine we could even barter with the Yevonites, especially if we are clear that our intention is to no longer darken their doorstep. They might even lade us with treasures and those Sphere things, or our weight in blitzballs, to thank us."

"They'd probably kill Borgan, too," Griz nodded. "That's a plus."

Margaret reached over with a fingertip to prod Dolly's chin. "Your mouth's open," she told her: "You'll get pyreflies in it."

"I, just," Dolly said. "Did - did you do this with Jack?"

"Absolutely," Silf said.

"Yeah," Rex nodded.

"He had some great lines," Griz said, eyes going wide. "I'll hit you up llllater, but now let's go round the table and point out the big problems here! Alrightttttt. I'll go first! Here we are: There are like, five thousand of us here and it would literally take one guy going to one of the Statues and being all, yo, Hounds betrayed us, and then," Griz papped his hands together, "BALAM! Double excommunicated. You want to try to learn that funky goggle-dude talk?"

"We could always go back to Filgaia," Silf pointed out. "On Filgaia, the law is the gun and the lash!"

"Go back to Filgaia? Tell me how," Margaret interjected. ("Mmmmmm," Silf replied.)

"I'm next," Silf said. "We'd have to get liiiiiitterally everyone on board on our team. Like I betcha, Dolly, that a lot of people are feeling a lot more faithful, in the White Knight if not in like, Althena, lately. One guy decides he's not fam any more and pow, it all falls apart."

"You've adequately touched on the human resources," Rex said. "So: I will say that the return voyage would not be easy. Whether we sailed east or west, there is likely a reason why there has not been traffic. Our journey here was long but not so long as to be impossible. It would not astonish me if Sin hunts down ships that go too far from shore. Our spells of swiftness don't work on ships, at least, not yet."

"I'll go last," Margaret said. "Dolly, what is your take?"

"Well I mean I'm certainly a little shocked you even talk like this," Dolly gawped, "but I mean the big one here is that the Goddess would not approve of all of this now would she? I mean she's probably hearing you talk right now, or could be; I mean, you're my family, and I understand this is.. this is just like... like a debate, so I'm not UPSET,"

("You're totally upset," Silf interjected.)

"Alright, well I'm not ANGRY, I'm just SURPRISED, but I mean once we got back into the Boundary wouldn't we get smote proper? Even if we avoided a smiting we'd all be on the run. And you know we've the invalids and the scholars back in Neo-Vane, to think of, too; even if we got back there and took over, when the Black Wizard returned he'd just invest the place or cut us off from the ground to starve us out."

"You've got a good mind for this, Dolly," Margaret murmured. "That was bold of you. You're a lady of vision."

"What?"

Margaret smiled. "Your first thought was to conquer Neo-Vane. I like that."

"As for your point," Margaret said, "I think that the Goddess very clearly is inclined to help those who help themselves, especially given recent events." Straightening, she folded her arms. "Here is the real reason, then, why I think this is a poor idea."

"What's that?" Dolly said, and Margaret raised a fingertip.

"Because," Margaret said, "even if we succeeded, more of you would be lost. I was a fool to send you to strike in that way, Dolly. We will not win glory here by running fifteen pikes up and down a battlefield. We may yet do that -- but that won't be why people remember."

"... then what..."

"Hm?"

"What will we do, ma'am?"

Griz slapped his thighs with a sound of meat. "I'm for a meal, myself. Good meeting. Dolly, great ta meet you more, like, officially! You're gonna come to most of these but sometimes we're gonna like, rotate, get me? I'm kind of the head of support, Rex bosses the sappers and the wranglers, Silf gets the scouts..."

"But we didn't make a decision!" Dolly wailed.

Rex rose, even as Margaret looked faintly amused. It was his turn now to reach over and clasp the younger Hound's shoulder. Dolly saw the bandage on his wrist, that matched Margaret's, but she heard his words more firmly. "Sometimes," he said then, "There isn't a decision to make in a tent. We'll watch events. When the moment comes, we'll move."

"But what will the moment look like?"

"We'll find out together," Margaret said, and now she smiled for real.