diatu | tell me a story of things in the night

tell me a story of things in the night

Who: Kuja and ?
Where: On the campus grounds
When: The middle of the day and later, after sunset
What: Fluffy Califleur! Adventure! Rewards! Doom! (Also a starter for the The Eye Have It adventure)

Random Encounters!

The day is pleasant enough that Kuja has taken time to bring a book or two out onto a grassy patch under a tree for a bit of studying. As much as he despises that he was forced into this whole academy and all of the unnecessary schooling that goes with it, it gives him something to fill his time and he'll concede to playing along for now. So he'll be found, reading quietly while Califleur dozes peacefully, pressed in against his side whether or not he asked her to be there.

He hadn't asked, but there she was nonetheless, and he may have found a suitable arm rest in her. If his fingers idly brush through her fur as he reads, well, she just happens to be soft and pleasing to touch. That's all. And if she has begun purring softly in her drowsing, he'll say he just hadn't noticed. It's just something that she does now and then, after all. But those who know him better might have a different version of that story.

The Eye Have It

Following the events here, Kuja has taken it upon himself, after careful consideration, to follow the lights with a measure of caution. He is not one to easily fall under the influence of anything, though at the time, the wisps' call had seemed like a cool balm on burned skin. It is for that reason that he trails after, now wary of their game and what threat they pose, but he wants to know.

Maybe, for better or worse, a part of him needs to know. How are they able to hold such power over him, and what is it they're luring him toward?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

For a short time, Kuja stood, watching after the lights as they trailed away. Wisps, they'd been called, before the student wandered off to wherever she was needed. The Eye, they had called themselves, before they disappeared. Whatever they were, he had it in his head to find out.

"This is a world of magic. It would only make sense." Part of him felt a fool for stepping off after the creatures, but he was unafraid. Wary, but unafraid. "Stay if you wish or not. I'd like to see this for myself."

"It is likely dangerous," Orisa said, lifting her fusion driver slightly and opening the vents on it. Green trails of energy streamed in as the core powered up her capacitors and expelled heat. "I will accompany you and keep you safe."

His step slowed to a stop and Kuja turned back, as if he thought he might have misunderstood, though he heard every word clearly. This machine was nothing like the ones he'd known before, but it seemed odd to him that one of them could make decisions for itself, let alone speak.

The words it spoke baffled him more than anything. "You wish to protect me?" He shook his head and tossed a hand in the air in gesture as he turned back to his original purpose. "That won't be necessary, but do come along if it is your desire as much as mine to see this through."

"That is my primary function." Orisa's tone brooked no argument as she accelerated to move in front of him. The potential danger was from in front, after all, and her size and bulk would provide adequate shielding even in absence of her shield projector.

The machine moved past him, and Kuja watched it in some small mind of exasperation. He needed no protection, not from these wisps and not from what lay ahead.

But whatever. He wasn't in a mood to argue. They were moving in the same direction, and if the machine wanted to plow ahead, he would let it. Kuja sighed, shook his head, hands on his hips, and followed along. "Your primary function seems misguided here and now, but alas. What do I know of your world?"

"Such a function is never misguided. The protection of others is a vital and necessary purpose. Even if you are strong and capable on your own, you do not possess a fusion driver or armor. Therefore, if danger threatens, my presence can only be an asset to you."

Orisa seemed incapable of taking offense, apparently. Or backing down, as she continued to move forwards towards the lights.

To that, Kuja sighs and continues on the trail, waiting for something, anything, to happen, if it even will. What was a fusion drive anyway?

"I have no need of armor at present. What I am wearing now will suffice." But maybe the machine would be of some use. He shook his head. Here he was, talking to a machine and receiving somewhat intelligent answers. What a strange and wondrous world this place was.

Then, just to see what it would say... "Dare I ask what a fusion drive is?"

"Driver," Orisa corrected, extending her right arm to make the weapon more obvious to him as he walked behind her. "It is my primary weapon."

Driver, then. Whatever it was called, it might prove as intriguing as the rest of the machine itself. How the world went from Mist engines to steam engines to factories to... this creation, he just didn't know. He would wonder later what such a world was like, but for now, they had a path and a destination somewhere beyond the darkness.

"Capable of astounding devastation, I'm sure. Or did this world strip you of that power as it did me mine and everyone else theirs?"

Was the magic here so particular that it left machines untouched? He had to know.

"My fusion driver still functions effectively. Some other systems do not perform at expected levels, however. It is possible that the fusion driver, being fully integrated into my system and requiring no external projection of force or increased power generation, is considered as part of my body and thus no more subject to error than a leg." That was speculation on her part, but she felt it logical.

Following this, Kuja stops abruptly, on alert when he feels the ground start to give way. He gives a startled cry as he falls, landing harshly on his hip and side once the mayhem is over.

For the moment.

In his mind, the danger isn't over, and he looks up as the dust clears - and can see nothing. There's a soft, strained sound as Kuja sits up, favoring his hip as he does.

"Of all the rotten luck."

Orisa let out a startled yelp as they plummeted down. Her impact with the ground thundered heavily -- she was, after all, not light.

After a moment, during which she performed a system diagnostic and found no errors, Orisa activated her voice processor once again. "This instability was unexpected. Are you harmed?"

A few moments and choice, unappreciative sounds later and Kuja is on his feet, favoring one side. That will definitely be a bruise in the coming hours. He takes his wand in hand to conjure a bit of flame to its end for light, harmless to the rest of the wand itself. "Yes, for what worth it is. And you?"

Truly, could the machine be harmed? Would it simply be damaged? He doesn't know how to properly address that and isn't of a mind to care right then. Holding the flame out and moving it around reveals they are in no more than a pit, and quite deep into it, with not much to help them climb out.

"One would think they could keep these grounds better maintained for what this place is."

"The grounds are very large. I suspect magic is to blame."

Orisa looked up at the sides of the pit, then over at Kuja. "It would be easiest to help you out if you were to climb on my back."

One more look around the pit walls and, as much as he doesn't want to admit it, this machine has a point. He doesn't want to be any closer, in any sense of the word, to anyone than he has to be under most circumstances, but he'll concede it doesn't look good for them any other way.

Or him, at least. He doesn't know what this machine can do. At last, he looks back to it and sighs. "Little in this world is accomplished without some magic. Whatever we were following, that Eye, it must have done this."

He turns to step closer, looks his companion over, hesitating. "How do you propose to proceed once I am on your back?"

"Shortly after arriving on this world, I acquired parts that originally belonged to an airship! I was able to integrate them with my existing circuitry, so I have some capacity to fly now. And I think I have got the problem with accelerating managed."

Oria leaned her head back, calculating as her eyeshields whirred in slow rotations. Then they snapped into her happy-carat shapes. "The inertial forces should not cause excessive harm to normal human anatomy!"

He might not be familiar with all of the inner workings of an airship, and the last that he had seen were flying based on a newly developed steam technology that made them independent of Mist for function, but Kuja knows enough of what he has just been told to know he doesn't like it.

"That does not sound appealing." He looks up again at the walls, hoping he had missed something on his first search over them, but nothing. He shakes his head, cursing his luck, and looks back at his companion. "But I suppose I have little choice in the matter."

Good thing he isn't a normal human. Or human at all.

"Situational analysis suggests that it is preferable to remaining in this pit." Sometimes, appeal was what you made of it -- or the best of a bad situation, anyway.

Orisa turned around carefully in a way not unlike an animal preparing a spot to sit, then lowered herself down with all four legs folding up. That ought to make it easier for him to climb aboard.

None of this looked promising. In fact, everything about it seemed a terrible idea, but in the end, what choice did he really have?

Only the one. That was what he had. With a sigh, Kuja approached the machine and found the best holds on his way up. He could have jumped upon it, but didn't want to risk letting himself slip. Once there, he held firmly to whatever he could, tail tip twitching in irritation, and was prepared to leap off once they were high enough in the air that he could find footing on the ground again.

"Let us be done with it, if you would."

Orisa checked to make sure he had established himself firmly, then activated her internal mechanisms. The magic in her integrated parts came to life, jerking them both violently upwards before she brought it under control.

Much more controlled, she lifted them up to the height of the ground around the pit.

That had been a far harsher lift off than he had expected, but he held tight, well acquainted with what it felt like to have the ground give way under him so suddenly. This ground hadn't given way, but Kuja still held on and waited for his opportunity to be rid of the escape platform and make his leap to solid ground again.

He didn't have to wait long. Once the machine had them at ground level, Kuja could have taken his chance, but out of curiosity, he stayed on the machine's back, to see what it would do. He didn't trust its stability in the air, though they steadily rose, though he eyed the academy grounds in some small concern. As if he might not see them again.

And the travel was terribly slow. Slower than he would have liked. But still, he waited. "Will you make this climb?"

Orisa brought her ascent to a halt, then began to shift sideways, bringing her legs over solid terrain once more. "I have not yet mastered this skill so that I can smoothly turn in midair. I find coming to a halt and then beginning on a new path is best. But I will keep trying!"

Again she came to a halt, and then a little downward motion brought all four of her feet onto the earth once again.

That hadn't been nearly as terrible as it sounded like it might, so just to see what would happen, Kuja stayed where he was until they were on the ground again before climbing back off. He stepped back to a modest distance, looking the machine over a time or two in fascination. Not that he hadn't considered it a modern marvel before, he hadn't seen it actually do anything but talk and wander about.

"You are a fascinating piece of machinery. There is no Mist about and I see no steam, but you are not from my world. You must power yourself with something else."

With a faint hiss, the lifting effects cut out. The ground depressed under Orisa's feet as her full and not-insubstantial weight came fully onto them.

"I rely on internal generators." The nature of which were black-box and not to be disclosed. "On Earth, omnics are not rare at all. I am not particularly more interesting than any other except by virtue of my unique creation."

Everything it said to him baffled him more and more. The technology was well beyond what he knew, and he wondered if it was just a thing of the machine's world.

He wondered it, tail swaying lightly behind him, just enough to ask. "I am not familiar with any of that. Have people in your world heard of steam technology?" A long shot, he thought, but it couldn't hurt.

"Steam power was brought into common use about four hundred years ago on Earth," Orisa said with her usual bright cheer. "Most power generation methods relied on some form of steam-powered turbine almost up to the present."

Oh. Well, then. That explained a lot that he could already tell just by looking at it, but now he had a time reference for the machine's world. They had been conversing for some time, but still he had a hard time thinking of it as more than a creation of man, though it somehow had intelligence enough to respond to him as a person.

"You call your world Earth. I've heard that word before, and it never does cease to amaze me that as far across the worlds as we've come from, there are still similarities."

"I do not believe it is that surprising," Orisa said, looking around for the lights so they could resume their path. "It is likely that the many-worlds hypothesis is in play here."

"What they call parallel universes?" If such a term existed where the machine was from. He had spotted a length of pathway that they might follow, but no lights to lure them off and away from safety. Curious.

"Elusive little jesters."

"Yes." Which was agreement to both sentiments. Orisa brought her fusion driver up again, suspicious now. Surely further traps awaited...

There was that again, and he couldn't help but wonder why this machine had been able to keep something like that if his own magic had been a part of him since his creation. But he gave voice to none of it and made his way to the path in the near distance, all the more cautious of what was around him, above and below.

(ooc: Should we keep going with this or let it drop and say they found nothing else and went home for the night? I'm not sure how much further the mods are gonna make rolls on it anyway.)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

tell me a story of things in the night

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that feel when you flub and your character pays for it XDD

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