epidemiology | EVENT ▸ DIPLOMACY

EVENT ▸ DIPLOMACY

DIPLOMACY

As the skirmishes between wandering Mountain and Sea Clan groups continue in the Flowerlands, by this point enough attackers have been interrogated by Guild Ophelia to paint a compelling picture of unorganized chaos. Each time a skirmish is interrupted, both sides blame the other for starting the impromptu fight, claiming no knowledge of or participation in an organized cabal; the conflicts are entirely coincidental, they say, just a situation where enemies clash in neutral territory.

The Flowerlands are suffering, crops trampled and livestock traumatized, and more and more Mountain and Sea Clan people are terrified to leave their cities, lest they be set upon by warriors from the opposing clan. Under this type of political strain, Hanabira threatens to erupt into full-out civil war at any moment, with or without the sanction of the empresses.

Two weeks after Ophelia's arrival in the Empire of the Crashing Wave, Doro sends word: Empress Nama and Empress Youmi have agreed to meet and discuss the term of an alliance. Doro's castle will serve as a meeting place, but the difficult part is bringing the empresses there safely. You foreigners have already proven yourselves to be capable and invested in seeing the conflict to a peaceful conclusion, so Doro contracts Ophelia to act as escorts and guards.

This might just be the perfect opportunity to whisper proposed solutions to advisors or, if you're lucky, to the empresses themselves.

▸ THE RETINUE

Ophelia has a few different options if they choose to take Doro's contract: escort Nama or escort Youmi and/or guard the Flowerlands castle.

ESCORT ▸ EMPRESS NAMA.
It's a week's worth of travel to return to the Land of Celestial Mountains from the Empire of the Crashing Wave, so the sooner Ophelia starts out, the better. Skirmishes between clans still dot the forests and farms of the Flowerlands, and each time the retinue encounters one, they must decide if they have the time to interfere or if they must push on. After all, the longer there is no peace in Hanabira, the more dire the situation becomes.

When the group finally reaches the Land of Celestial Mountains, they'll find that the entire city is locked down. Guards bar the gates, but upon seeing Doro's seal, they'll let the guild members inside and explain the situation:

Mountain Clan rebels have stormed Heavenly Summit, cutting a large swath through the castle. Much of Nama's court and guards lay dead inside, with the rebels holding the remainder hostage -- including Empress Nama herself -- unless war is declared against the Sea Clan. The city guards are afraid to approach, worried that this will only anger the rebels further and cause Nama's death, and have directed all townsfolk to stay in their homes until the situation has been resolved.

The guards caution Ophelia not to try any rescue efforts themselves, and instead ask them to either find a building to barricade themselves in or leave the city. Of course, it's not like they're keeping a close watch on everyone.

Those who choose to slip into Heavenly Summit Castle will find guards surrounding it, trying to stop anyone from coming in as well as keeping arrows trained on all windows in case a rebel shows her face. Stealth is the name of the game, or at least enough brute strength to knock a guard out in one blow before she sounds the alarm.

Inside the castle, rebels stalk the halls of every floor, masked in the green color of the Mountain Clan. Some are heavily armored and some only wear peasants' clothes, carrying farmers' sickles; it seems as though the attack on the castle was planned very quickly, too quickly to evenly distribute armor and weapons. There are corpses left where they were killed, with splashes of bright red blood beside them; there are hostages huddled in the corners of rooms, wide-eyed but silent at the sight of foreigners ostensibly here to save them; and, in the heavily-guarded throne room, Empress Nama herself.

Fight through the rebel guards with Nama's help, or find a back door and snatch her up before the rebels notice. Either way, once Ophelia lays eyes on her, the magitek will project words in front of them that only they can see:

» EMPRESS NAMA
Leader of the LAND OF CELESTIAL MOUNTAINS. 23 years old. SPECIES: Human. MEDICAL CONCERNS: Lactose intolerant, recent blow to the head.

Nama doesn't ask questions, recognizing the foreigners of Ophelia as those who were meddling after the festival attack and trusting they're here to help her escape. Longbow in hand, she leads the group through secret passageways in the castle, insisting they rescue the nobility on the way out. From there, Nama suggests stealthily escaping the castle and quickly riding out of the city to the safety of Doro's castle, unsure who she can still trust in her own empire.

With Empress Nama and her surviving courtiers added to the retinue, it's time to ride back to the Flowerlands -- and hope you aren't chased by rebels along the way.

ESCORT ▸ EMPRESS YOUMI.
It takes half a week to travel from the Empire of the Crashing Wave to Doro's castle in the Flowerlands. Youmi and two advisors ride in a carriage, with an entourage of royal guards on horseback in front and behind; those in Ophelia who choose to escort this group will either be on foot or must find a mount themselves.

The journey is peaceful, allowing for time to make camp by forested hot springs and in farmhouses (in which case Ophelia might need to sleep outside, depending on the size) along the way. The Sea Clan guards are open to idle chatter with the foreigners, curiously discussing cultural differences and indulging in quick lessons in archery.

Everything seems to be going smoothly until the entourage enters Flowerlands territory and is confronted by a winged spirit of the forest, angered by all the recent bloodshed in his home. There is no time to talk; the spirit does not wish to negotiate, only to stop the crew from moving any further into his territory by any means possible.

The spirit calls the creatures of the forest to his aid, controlling them as if they are under some sort of spell. Ogres, imps, bears, and wolves are the most worrisome among his helpers. His own attacks come from the sky, diving down to slash at his victims with exceptional speed. Those archery lessons will come in handy here, because ranged weapons are most effective against him as long as he remains in flight. He can take an astounding amount of hits, and once he is weakened, will land on the ground to fight in close quarters.

Once he is finally defeated, his spell on the forest animals is broken, and even the most aggressive of them scatter. His feathers are black, but up close, seem iridescent in the light, differentiating them from a common bird's. Youmi's guards suggest everyone take a feather to prove they felled a legendary beast.

GUARD ▸ FLOWERLANDS CASTLE.
Until the empresses and their escorts arrive, it's very uneventful at Doro's castle. It's a smart idea to keep an eye out in case someone hears about the summit and tries to interfere, but so far, things seem to be peaceful. Take the time to bolster defenses, relieve a guildmate of guard duty, or explore the castle.

▸ THE SUMMIT

Youmi and her entourage reach Doro's castle first, her royal guards immediately making a sweep of the castle and the grounds to ensure there is no danger lying in wait. Once the castle is cleared, Doro and Youmi disappear into a guarded room to begin discussions. Youmi's advisors are left out of this initial meeting, making now the perfect time to start some discussions of your own.

Days later, Nama's retinue arrives, and Doro and Youmi (and the rest of her entourage) meet her at the castle gates. The two empresses step cautiously forward to meet each other, bowing politely. Moments later, Doro steps forward to gather Nama into a hug, which she gladly returns, giggling like the young girl she is. She's had a rough time, which she quickly explains to Doro, and asks if she can first have a bath and a moment to breathe. Doro and Youmi are more than willing to give it to her after hearing her experience.

Doro tells Ophelia they have their run of the castle until dinner tonight, when Doro, Youmi, and Nama will all be together in the same room with the team. Sounds like the perfect time to propose a plan, so you'd better finish up discussions about what to do! There's a bit of a time limit.

▸ OOC NOTES

If you have questions about this log or the overall mission, please ask them on the dossier. Questions about Futurology in general should be directed to the FAQ.

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Uniform Design Contest, submissions due 28 February 23:59 UTC. Gamewide voting will be in March.

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

That it's in everything. Unlike a similar thing in my world called quintessence, you can't harness it or bottle it. It just ... is. And for some reason, it's both light and dark.

[Though that last bit comes out with a bit of a "that's weird" lilt. Keith feels like that's a really narrow way to look at the world (but he might be projecting given his inhuman circumstances).]

[He exhales. He probably should have expected that sort of reply.]

You have most of the basics. The Force is energy in the universe, yes — constantly striving to exist in balance. Life and death. Light and dark. It can be manipulated, but it is also its own entity, which is why it cannot be bottled.

[Though to be frank, even though he knows more than Rey, he is hardly a scholar himself. He cannot explain to him the finer details.]

The same is true for those of us who are sensitive to it. The Force manifests within us in different ways — the Dark Side comes more easily to me.

And the Light for Rey. [To Keith, he figures that goes without saying. It was her hope and willingness to give people chances that had initially drawn him to her, whether he realized that at the time or not. He certainly realizes it now. It's why her shift in mannerisms stood out to him so much.]

But nothing is ever really ... Light or Dark. That isn't how anything works. When it comes to your war, though—what I know of the First Order is that they aren't the good guys. That what they're fighting for isn't good. I've seen some of what they can do.

[Keith doesn't have any plans on specifying what he means. Talking about Rey's dark future is out of the realm of possibility.]

I know that you're with them. You just don't seem like you're completely unreasonable. [Which could be a compliment coming from someone else's mouth. From Keith's, it's more of a statement, like he's taking his measure of Kylo Ren a little late.]

[Kylo almost looks impressed when Keith comes out with “nothing is ever really Light or Dark”, enough that he lets him finish talking without interruption.]

I very much doubt you know anything about the First Order, especially if your information is coming from her. Rey spent her life isolated on a desert planet in the Western Reaches of the Inner Rim. All she has seen of any sort of government and power has been recent.

[He doesn’t sound offended by Keith’s assessment. None of it is wrong, really. But talk of Light and Dark in the same breath chafes a little.]

Then tell me about it. I want to know why you and her knowing each other is a problem, and I'm not going to get that if I don't hear it from you. [Keith would explain the whole "Galra" thing, but he chooses not to for the moment. He is a little annoyed at Rey's knowledge being disregarded, but he keeps that bit to himself.]

[He has to consider how to answer this, eyes narrowed just slightly. He isn’t entirely sure what Keith is getting at, or how much Rey had told him.]

It is not a problem.

[Because knowing each other doesnt equate to being friends or allies.]

We are presently on opposite sides of the war, which was instigated by thirty years of stagnation and inaction from the Republic. The First Order rose with the intent of establishing a proper governing power.

[After the Galra Empire—]

Stagnation isn't a crime. [Which is probably something that stands out because of the Galra Empire. They weren't stagnant, they just took over everything.]

And what you're saying doesn't justify why you would lie to me about teaching her. Or knowing her period.

No? You should consider asking Rey how she feels about Jakku’s economy, some day. I am sure she would have plenty of things to say on the subject. Jakku and many other Inner Rim worlds lost their economic structure when the Empire was torn down. The Republic spent all of their time basking in their own morals and inability to agree while entire planets collapsed around them.

[But Keith isn’t here for a history lesson. Its easy enough to understand what he really wants. His frown deepens.]

You are not entitled to anything I have to say. I do not have to “justify” anything to you.

[He offers that curt reminder while debating how he wants to answer. So, Rey had told him that she helped him with the guards — annoying, to have gone through the trouble of taking credit for nothing.]

Don't get defensive. [Never mind that Keith has his moments of being the most defensive guy on the team. He's touchy and sensitive at times, and this has the potential of being one of those times.]

Rey believes in you. [Is that something that Ben knows? Keith doesn't know what is or isn't a secret anymore. Having to navigate this conversation paranoid about that is tiring. It's like political intrigue but not even the intrigue of his own world. And, to be frank, Keith struggles with that brand of intrigue, too.]

She doesn't do something like that lightly. Not when it can put all her friendships at risk. But there's a lot of it I don't understand. And I want to understand. That includes knowing about your war. About the sides. About the Empire, the First Order, and the Republic. Because I may not get it, but it seems important—to her and to you.

Don't attempt to make demands of me, and I will not be forced to remind you of basic facts.

[He doesn't have a problem throwing that out into the open air. While Rey might have given her trust freely, Kylo Ren certainly did not. There is no attempt to refute the fact that he is defensive either. He's definitely being defensive.]

I am not a historian, Keith. I am a First Order enforcer, the force the Resistance happens to be fighting against.

[As far as he is concerned, he's given all the context necessary to make clear the political situation.]

The Empire was instituted after the Clone Wars to re-stabilize the galaxy, was then overthrown by rebellion and replaced by the Republic. The Republic failed for thirty years after in its task to do what the Empire could not and has since been removed and replaced by the First Order.

[He exhales after he says most of that in two or three breaths, calming himself down as much as he is able.]

The Dark you hear Rey speak of is the Dark Side of the Force. Passion. Hatred. Anger. Fear. [These are emotions he clearly understands. What he says next, he says with some disgust.] The Light is its opposite. Compassion. Peace. Harmony. Serenity.

Rey definitely doesn't want you to stay on the Dark Side of the Force. I can see why. It's easy to be afraid, to feel things strongly, but it can backfire. [Keith feels as if he's living proof of that. All of his patience feels like it's been taught to him by outside forces: first Shiro and later Zenyatta while he was with Audentes. Being blinded by how he feels doesn't help. He can see why that can be Dark.

It doesn't mean he'll change anything.]

I think it's weird for something to be so ... [What's the word for it?] Narrow, I guess. You can feel something strongly without it being bad.

[Still: not the point.]

Do you know why she wants to help you? You don't sound like you have a problem with where you're standing. [To ... put it lightly.]

[There is something about this conversation that isn't sitting well with him. Maybe its the permeating idea that Keith continues to drive home, that Rey wants to change him -- but no, he already knew that. He did not like it, but they had already fought about it once.

Maybe its the fact that this feels like a lecture, from someone at least ten years his junior. He did not like it when Rey did it, and she was a familiar party.

Either way, the more Keith talks, the darker Kylo Ren's expression gets. He decides not to verbally address the first thing he says, though its obvious enough that he doesn't want to hear any more on that subject given how he chews on the inside of his cheek to steady the rush of anger.]

Because she does not understand the nature of the Force, and believes the Dark side can and should be shut out entirely.

[That's as much as he seems to be willing to give. His tone carries warning to it.]

[The warning tone is enough to jar Keith out of choosing not to relent with some truth of his own. If Rey were here, she'd definitely understand why Keith went about this line of questioning. But she isn't, and she's not meant to be.]

Back home, I'm fighting against an Empire. They took over everything. The people in charge are called the Galra. As it turns out, I'm part Galra myself. As a group, they don't relent. They don't stop. They're known for that, and even Galra who stand against that are the same way. [Knowledge or death. That's what it had come down to, only that "knowledge" wasn't as simple as Keith believed it was at first.]

It's nothing like the Force. But I'd be stupid to tell you to drop a side of yourself when I refuse to do the same. [It's just a matter of trying to understand why Rey's doing precisely that. Or what's leading to that.]

You are searching for an answer I cannot give you.

[Rey believes the Dark Side to be evil. In a way, she isn't wrong. Its called the "dark side" for a reason. Its unsavory to anyone who didn't have the stomach for it. For anyone who was naturally attuned to the light. He wasn't that person. He would never be that person.

Even still, Rey is -- unlike anyone else he's ever met. She believed like no one else ever could, even often knowing the futility of it. Even when she's had her hope dashed into pieces on the ground, she still found something to believe in.

And he has no idea what that is like.]

I don't know about that. You've made it clear that you think you know more than Rey. Maybe you weren't trying to do that. But you did. [This is the first time that Keith has felt like he's hitting a point where he's lecturing. There isn't a challenge to his voice, however; it feels like there's a weird dichotomy going on, between what Rey feels she doesn't know and what belief she's acting on all the same. Does one feed into the other? He doesn't know.]

She might agree. I dunno. She does believe in you. I just ... [Keith doesn't know what the right answer is here. He was inclined to follow Rey's belief, but it's hard to do something when the person believed in doesn't believe in that themselves. It's something he knows first hand. It's something he's not going to share.

There is no "I just" to continue. He doesn't know where to go, so he falls on the following, deeply unsatisfying words.]

Just—understand what it is she's doing to help you. And you and I—we're teammates.

I do know more than she does. She discovered her Force sensitivity two years ago. I have lived with it since my birth. I am trained. She is a novice -- a novice who rejects all teachings and wisdom offered to her when it isn't what she wants to hear.

[He says this very firmly, as if he wishes to make that Absolutely Clear above everything else they might be talking about. Its a fight to avoid gritting his teeth, but he somehow manages it.

As Keith goes on, talking about Rey helping him, he feels his spine getting stiffer and stiffer. He never should have let her open her mouth.]

I will tell you exactly what I told her: the Dark Side is not something you are rescued from. Where there is light, there will also be dark. How much of one or the other is as the Force wills it.

[Darkness rises, and Light to meet it.]

Rey has a reason for rejecting what someone's saying to her. [It's easy to rise to her defense. Keith doesn't understand why Kylo Ren/Ben/whoever or whatever he wants to be called is trying to discredit her when he's also working with her. It just doesn't make sense.]

Look, tell me this. If you think she's wasting her time, then why are you letting her? [There's another argument he can make about Light and Dark and all that nonsense, but it would be coming from the biased position of a part-Galra person. It would be tilted in that direction, and ... wrong. He knows that much.]

[Keith has absolutely no place to ask him that question, and he doesn't need to answer him. There's a stretch of silence, like Kylo Ren thinks that it will communicate these exact things to him.]

"Letting her".

[He tilts his head to one direction and scoffs, thinking of Takodana, and of Starkiller Base. Of Zeta-12, and Perdition's Rest.]

If you believe I have some unseen sway over what Rey does or does not do, I am afraid you do not know her as well as you think you do.

You know what I meant. You wouldn't work with her. You wouldn't help our mission. You wouldn't do a lot of things that you're doing. And you wouldn't be her friend, but it sounds like you are. It isn't just about what she's doing. You're on the other side. So, again, why are you letting it happen if there isn't some truth to what she believes?

[Keith would ask if there was another angle, and if he entered this conversation more prepared, he would. That's what Loki would advise him to do. But then, Keith isn't great at looking for advisement.]

[His expression continues to grow more puzzled by the minute.]

You are making quite a lot of assumptions as to what I am doing or why I am doing it.

[And then Keith uses the “F” word and he raises his hand to cut off further inquiry, because the moment that someone assumes that he and Rey are “friends” is the moment that their relationship to one another has been grossly misunderstood. He waits until he is sure Keith isn’t going to interrupt him before continuing.]

We both want something from Hathaway. We both wanted something out of ALASTAIR too. That necessitates cooperation, regardless of the war we’ve both momentarily exited.

[Also, like hell is he going to put voice to the Thoughts he has been having about the Supreme Leader lately, especially to an uninformed party.]

Anything else I have to say on the matter is not your business.

If you think that's how Rey is, then you don't really know her all that well, either.

[They had made a promise to only leave each other as friends when they were ready. Keith doesn't think people make promises like that unless they're sincere, unless they mean something with it. Rey had made that promise before she had gone home, before she had ... changed. Before Kylo Ren.]

I'm not gonna abandon her just because she's working with you. Just in case you were wondering.

[Since Keith is judging Poe more for that decision than, well, anyone else involved.]

I was not wondering.

[Yeah, he knows well enough that Rey isn't doing this for the incentive, but that is why he's doing it -- and really, that's all that matters to him. If there was any question as to how devoid of emotion he was toward this whole thing -- well, that probably says it all right there.]

That does not make it any more of your business.

I don't want it to be my business. But Rey and I plan on being here for a long time.

[So, no matter how it shakes out, Keith's pretty certain he doesn't have a choice but to deal with this matter. He just doesn't get it.]

We'll see if Hathaway feels the same way.

[He doesn't know about Keith's history with ALASTAIR, but he does know that Rey was transferred at one point or another, as he was. They could blink, and suddenly be leaving for another guild.]

There's a difference between going home and going to another guild.

[He says that, but there's some inner turmoil connected to the words, like he's acting as if the other paladins leaving without talking to him had been an accident, like they all thought they'd see him again back home. And normally, Keith knows that would be the case.]

EVENT ▸ DIPLOMACY

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