2023-01-26: Call You to Account

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  • Log: Call You to Account
  • Cast: Eleanor Klein, Josephine Lovelace
  • Where: Forsaken Fortress - Battlements
  • Date: January 26, 2023
  • Summary: One must be certain they are prepared before heading into battle. Josie and Eleanor chance upon a moment to speak with one another before confronting Ganondorf, and here Josie lets Eleanor know something very important... and dire. Takes place after Here at the Ends of the World and before Eternal Loneliness.

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

The long, gold-touched corridor sees Eleanor pause, and stop for a moment, as she moves out into another chamber. It'll be easy for someone to bring her over to the side for a private conversation, though they might end up watched a little.

For her part, Eleanor looks tired. Very tired. She has been working hard, and doing her best, but she's not willing to give up yet, because the mission is unfinished. Her family is at stake... and many, many more families besides.

So she takes a moment to take a seat. "I'll be right along," she tells her friends. "Just give me a moment?"

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Here they are.

    In a place, probably, where they absolutely shouldn't be. Fair's fair, though, as far as Josie figures. He'd left the door open, though whether he'd done it on accident or purposefully...

    Well, she'd put money on one rather than the other, sure enough. It's one reason why she's lingered a moment, heading down that golden corridor. Why she's paused, even -- taken out a cigarette and with a snap of her fingers, lit it and gazed at the walls for a good few moments, lost in thought.

    She notices after a moment more that she's not alone.

    "Takin' a breather, kiddo?" she asks of Eleanor. "Or... got something on your mind?" She pauses, approaching the younger woman. "He won't wait forever or none. But I wager you knew that already," Josie drawls.

    Once, not all that long ago, she and Ganondorf had been 'on the same side'. But the rules of the game have changed since. Or at least, this particular game piece has most decidedly gone AWOL.

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

Oh, nobody should be here but the Gerudo, that much is sure. Eleanor can't be sure either if it's some kind of trap.l.. but that doesn't matter.

She glances at the cigarette's smoke, and then at Josie. "Yes," Eleanor answers. ...To both, really. But especially, "I only need a few moments. But you're right. I can't tarry too long..."

She hesitates. "I won't ask you what changed your mind. ...But that you expressed care about my mother... I appreciate it."

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    A breather, and something on her mind. Well, well, well. Not that it ain't expected, given the circumstances.

    "Right you are. And me, neither," Josie answers, shaking her head. "He'll greet them that comes, I figure, whether or not you're with the welcoming party." Her mouth splits in a broad grin. "Sure as you are," she tells Eleanor. "And it's my secret to keep, right? But don't you worry about it or none -- I ain't here for an ambush from behind." She pauses. "This time 'round. Besides, doubt you'd believe me even if I told you!"

    But she's happy that Josie expressed concern about her mother...?

    "I know how it is with family," Josie says, her expression uncharacteristically grim. "And... that's a delicate time for a lady, however many times she's done it. My own mother..." Josie grimaces, shaking her head. "Forget it. Water under the bridge, right?" she tells Eleanor, despite that not being how the phrase is typically applied. "...Point is, I can't stand that sort of thing. Ripping families apart."

    She leans against one of those gold walls, watching smoke drift up towards the ceiling. Smoke... huh.

    "Hey. That magic you were usin'. What's that? Ain't nothing I've seen before."

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

"Probably. He's treacherous, and arrogant... but powerful." She can't deny that he's powerful. But she nods--she is part of the 'welcoming party'. "I believe you," Eleanor says. "...I'm not sure why," she admits. "But you've always seemed at least honest about what you were doing."

Family... "Yes," Eleanor says. "It's certainly not her first. But that's what worries me." That is not how the phrase is used, but, "Then, we're alike in at least one way. I don't like that, either."

The smoke drifts up.. And--Ah?

Eleanor says, "...It's an ancient form of magic. It's not Crest Sorcery, though I still do use that. It comes from ancient Sages--sworn to oppose Ganondorf over the ages. ...But," she says, "We're all gone. I'm the only one left. And me, only because the last Sage was able to make that happen."

"It's..." She considers how to phrase it. "It's 'will'. and 'Light.'"

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    She waves the cigarette she's holding in a sort of vague gesture when Eleanor says that at least she's always seemed honest about the way she goes at things. "Arguable, arguable," Josie allows, shrugging her shoulders. Apparently this is a bit of a hard sell for her, as far as things in her general direction go. "Still," she says, with a lopsided grin, "I'll take it. Not to get maudlin on it or none, but..." She doesn't complete the sentence but instead merely smiles in Eleanor's direction.

    As smiles go, it's the smile of someone who has taken a few lumps and rolled with it.

    "Even if it ain't your first, there's room to worry," Josie replies, her gaze everywhere but at Eleanor. "And takin' a lady that far along... ain't right," she opines, narrowing her eyes as she gazes at her own cigarette's lit end. "Just as bad as takin' someone's older sister."

    Not Josie's own. One... assumes?

    It's not Crest Sorcery. "Yeah? ...Yeah, didn't think it looked the type. I ain't a master of that kinda thing -- or even Symbology, really -- but it didn't look right for other things, neither. Sages... huh. So it's Sage magic."

    So that's why it was familiar.

    She casts the cigarette down to the floor and pulls away from the wall to stand up straight. "The last Sage, huh. And that one was... fire? Or somethin' like that." Golden halls or no, she grinds the smoldering end underfoot, leaving behind a smear of ash and paper. "Strength, like."

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

"Hmmm." Eleanor doesn't argue it for the moment; Josie would know better than her. And she does say she'll take it. That kind of smile... Eleanor can recognize it, all right, even if it's altogether less formal than she'd give herself.

"Yes," Eleanor agrees. An older sister... Yes, that's true. "A younger brother, too," Eleanor says quietly. "Though not this time..."

"You seem to be conversant enough in it, at least. One of my sisters is a new Symbologist. I've studied it a bit, as well, though I chose Crest Sorcery at school."

She tilts her head, thoughtfully. "Close," she says. "Light, like me. I'm his successor. He's been long dead, but he persisted for some time in order to await... Well, me."

"So far as I know the Sage of Fire..." She considers, and closes her eyes. "The last one Rauru knew... That would've been Darumaka. A strong Goron." What is a Goron? She's not entirely sure. "...I have his memories," she explains. "I can't always sort them, but..."

Why is she telling Josie all this? She already is, though.

"But so far as I know I'm the only one left alive. Ganondorf has killed or trapped and killed the rest. My responsibility is to find their successors, and awaken them as I was awakened."

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Josie takes what will turn out to be the last drag on her cigarette. "Expecting a boy, is she? Or...?"

    What can she do but nod? "My... father," she says, hesitating a moment before naming the connection for what it is, "is--was a Symbologist. A real 'wizard', suppose you could say. Him and my little sister. Me, I just play at bein' one, right..." She trails off, then quirks her lips in a tight half-smile. "But that don't mean I don't know what's what. Besides... I learned a thing or three on Lunar about their arts, like. Picked up a trick or two, even. And that ain't matching any of 'em. So, I figured..."

    To ask her about it, ultimately.

    Not fire, but light. Like her. Josie purses her lips. "Darumaka, huh. Heh. Figures. Well... Nora," she says to the Sage, gesturing towards herself with her good hand. "I figure, you've a right to know. If you're the last Sage standing, and all, right? He'll be gunning for you, and I'm sure you know that. But I know it too -- because I helped him kill Darumaka."

    She doesn't so much as glance away. "I won't say it was right. I ain't making apologies for it, neither. You... do what you think's right, whatever that is. And me, well... I'll do the same, like."

    She watches Eleanor, studying her carefully.

    "And who knows? Maybe you'll find 'em successors soon enough. Maybe you'll even win."

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

"Oh, there's arguments about which they'll be," Eleanor says of her new sibling. "But my younger brother was abducted recently, too. He's a soldier. But there are things beyond even talented soldiers."

Her... father. Hm. "Interesting," she says. "Well, to learn more about other approaches is certainly a worthwhile endeavor, I think. I admire the pursuit of knowledge." Pause. "Though..." She considers Josephine's last name; and then, the mage she knows of by that name. She ends her nice speech about knowledge with a grim look. "I see."

Eleanor's eyes widen, at the confession. She opens her mouth, and closes it again. "You..."

So one was alive, even now. And Josephine...

Eleanor looks sad, for a moment--but with Josie unwilling to look away, she will continue to look into her eyes. She approaches it in her way...

"That is a terrible crime," Eleanor says. "You may have helped to doom the world." But despite the obvious accusation--her voice is calm, rather than vicious or full of invective. "...What's right..."

"I cannot undo what you have done. ...But neither can I refuse your aid."

"...I intend to," she says, of the successors. Of winning. "I need time to decide... What's right. There may be a day when I must call you to account for this."

"...But it's not today," she says with a shake of her head. "Preserving the world... isn't your duty," she says. "Like it is mine. It seems, at least, we agree on what must be done now. But I will promise you this."

"If that day comes, I won't shoot you in the back."

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    "Heh, even nobles don't quite know, eh," Josie remarks with a sidelong glance. "Well... fair enough. Shame to hear 'bout your brother. Sounds like he's back on safe-enough soil?"

    Something about the tone in Eleanor's voice there, perhaps.

    Josie answers that look of Eleanor's with a grim smile of her own and does not say a thing. The name 'Lovelace' has been tarnished by more than one person of late.
    Who of them -- if any -- will be remembered when the world of today is reduced to so much dust?

    Neither does she say a thing more except to look at Eleanor, to give her the chance to react and respond to what she'd willingly confessed.

    "Might have," Josie admits freely. "Wouldn't even be the first time, neither." She doesn't smile, not at this. "But... I made up my mind about it now, right. Just like everything else... I ain't running from what I did. But I ain't gonna lay myself down and beg for mercy, neither. You do what you think's right. And me, I'll do the same."

    Finally, here, her lips twitch in a smile that only makes it halfway across her lips. "Ain't askin' you to undo it, Nora. But you take your time. Think about what you wanna do. Won't say I'll still be here waitin' for you to do your thing, but I ain't gonna vanish on purpose, neither." It's a grim smile again that finds its way across her face. "...You just ain't the only one, right?"

    She's got a whole host of people who might just jostle to be ahead in line, should that day of judgement come.

    "...Sure ain't. I'm just here to make sure a little girl ain't missing her sister no more," Josie says, glancing away from Eleanor as if the subject were even embarrassing. "You're here to make sure they'll both have a world for 'em waiting. The rest... well..."

    She smiles, as bright as a cold winter's day.

    "As long as it ain't in the back. Can't be having my back turned, when it comes."

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

"It's true," Eleanor says. Even nobles! "Thank you," she says. "He is."

Perhaps that day, when the world of today gives way to another, is sooner than either of them imagines.

Wouldn't be the first time... Hm. She isn't smiling, at least. "You didn't have to tell me," she says. "But indeed, you aren't... running."

It's something she isn't sure how she feels. So she will take her time, for the moment. "All right."

"...I can imagine I'm not."

That little girl... "It's as good a reason as any;" Eleanor says, of that little girl. It could be embarrassing--but for Eleanor, it's proof that whatever Josephine has done, there's something in her that's otherwise.

"Then I'll keep that promise," she says. Probably, she should get moving again, but...

"...I'm not exactly the diehard vengeance type," she admits. "That you told me does count for something." A pause. "Well. Let's be on. That little girl won't wait forever."

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Perhaps so. Everyone, always, feels as if they are living in the end of days... but perhaps it is more the truth for Filgaia's increasingly fragile state.
    Or calamity after calamity that comes crawling out of the dark.

    "Won't say I didn't think about it or none," Josie says, fidgeting briefly with her left hand, as if hunting for a cigarette anew and aborting the process. "But..."

    But she'd thought about that, too. Thought about a half-dozen things and what she's owed -- what she owes. And she'd come to an answer of a sort. Not running, no. Not escaping what's due. But at the same time.
    At the same time, she won't make a mockery of what she was or what she did. Of who she is now.

    And while she might not be able to wait forever for Eleanor to come to her conclusion, well.

    Well.

    "...Heh. Better than some, maybe. But I still ain't here to save the world," Josie says as if it were a reminder -- or a salve for what she seemingly would rather bury, even if it might only elevate her in the eyes of others. Still... little girls shouldn't be missing their big sisters.

    "Well, see what you come up with. I think you might even surprise me," Josie tells her, only to glance down that golden hall and gesture ahead. "Well, after you, Sage of Light. You've got a mother and a little something-or-other to save, right?"

    And she'd said she wouldn't shoot Eleanor in the back, after all.