A Pound of Redemption

    The sun rises upon another day. Eas remains an occupied fort, held against any threats that might make their way here from Mac Anu. It's a case of having friends far closer than they should be. Among the Dukedom, that tends to deliver them into temptation.

    Regardless of all of that, the Baroness Wake sits in the one place that the soldiers on duty are not allowed to enter. The only other landers still here gather in this place. A few children race around in the chill air as their mothers watch. There is little for them to do but enjoy the hospitality and relax. There are no crops to tend in the mountain winters.

    Wake is idly connected to someone via chimlink, relaying what sound like orders. Her contacts are maintaining what pressure they can on the invaders, as well as keeping her keenly aware of all movements. Ships being made ready, enemy supply caravans raided or destroyed. The excitement has long since worn off. None of these things resolve the problems. But the Wave.. that just might.

Eirik walks in looking around a bit his hand resting upon the cutlass at his hip, seeing the Baroness he removes his hat and takes a deep bow in greeting though he doesn't speak unless or until spoken to. His eyes do take in his surroundings as this is his first time being in this place, he smiles as he see the children racing around he gives a happy chuckle as he adjusts his leather armor and once acknowledged in some way he straightens up.

Goldenblade has taken advantage of the Arcade's lack of troops and reduced foot traffic to commandeer a small area for what looks like a slightly portable table and chair. She sits at the table going over plans and grumbling, and holding conversations with half a dozen Landers. Seemingly all at once. Every so often one peels off on some task, but generally another replaces them quickly. This is her version of relaying orders, which in her case are generally with respect to various building projects. The plan for electricity in Eas is taking longer than expected, her plans not quite turning out. She's never been a double-E, so she's going by vague recollections of community college courses taken fifty years ago. She looks up as Eirik enters, then again, as if he was not who she was expecting, though she will nod his way by way of greeting.

    The Baroness looks up as she is approached. Per protocol, she simply clicks the chimlink to silence. She looks at Eirik closely. Her first glance is, admittedly, rather severe as she studies his scalp. Once she's certain that there is no crown there, she rises.

    If there is one thing one should expect when meeting this woman, it is a curtsey. She glides into it, her head bowed. For a moment she makes it appear like she's floating, then she straightens and meets the strangers eyes. "I am Baroness Wake. Welcome to Eas." She looks the man over and adds, "You are rather far from the ocean, sailor."

Eirik rising from his bow he smiles at Wake. "Im Eirik Torsen, Pirate Lord and whiskey conneseur" He says with a smile. "Aye that I am, and that's because Im rather..well in the market for a ship as it were. Though I've been told it shouldn't be to hard to get one." The Undine man says with a chuckle. "I was also told it would be a good idea to come and meet you Baroness, and I must say so far I think I was told right."

Goldenblade's ears perk at the mention of being in the market for a ship. She hrmphs audibly, and interrupts, "Whoever told you it wouldn't be hard to get one was lying so hard their ears should fall off." She does an inspect on him, though, and considers. She's not subtle enough to disguise the motions, though if you knew her, you'd know she generally wouldn't bother. "Though if you know your way around a /modern/ ship, there might be something we can do with you." She considers her words, and amends, "Sort of modern."

    Wake studies Eirik for a time. She doesn't comment on the ease of getting what amounts to one of the most in-demand possessions in the world right now. The entire Alliance has a grand total of one, as she recalls. She has more at her command, granted, but they are not her possessions by any stretch of the imagination.

    "It is a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Torsen," she replies calmly. "Someone directed you to me? Are you gathering resources to build yourself a vessel, then? I can support many dreams, though at the moment even my resources are strained. So many are working. I imagine it is all a respose to the growing vulnerability of our enemies. We are starting to hope again."

    She turns her attention to a young girl who nearly runs into the baroness. For a moment, the child looks nervous and uncertain, thinking perhaps she's about to get in trouble. Wake reaches out to ruffle her hair and laugh. "And to play and dream, too."

    She looks past the immediate scene to Goldenblade's work group. "How are you coming along, my friend? Are you twice as worn out as I am?"

Eirik nods his head chuckling and he smiles softly when Wake ruffles the young girl's hair. "Aye I was instructed to meet you, more for a meet and greet and to offer my services in anyway I can than for any other reason." But Goldenblade's voice gets his attention and he turns back to offer her a familiar smile. "Ok well maybe easy was the wrong word for it. But it was you who said you might have a ship for me and to introduce myself to the Baroness." Eirik says offering a smile. "But yes I can sail any ship you put me on lass, you put me on the ship, I'll build and train a crew and that ship will be Golden!"

Goldenblade's player is seventy five in RL and only -just- retired. ETO was picked up on a whim, at the suggestion of her RL family to save on long distance charges. Now she finds herself spry and 1/3 her age, and worn out? "What? Why?" She's a melee DPS, technically, and an off-tank by inclination, and she peers sidelong at Wake. "Tired? From what?" Wake will recall that Goldenblade's player is from the pre-TV generation, when to keep yourself busy, you /did/ things. She probably doesn't have as many projects as Wake has, granted. Wake is a martyr to people asking for aid. But she does a lot, and a lot more physical labor.

She peers at Eirik, ohs. "Ah, it's you. Good, you're here," she says. She says to Wake, "Yeah, I met this one a bit ago now, looking for a ship and a crew. I thought that the alliance steamship needed a good captain, and hear comes one. The name is some silly children's reference I didn't get, Boaty somethingorother." She shrugs. "But it's steam-powered, the first of its kind in Yamato, and we're adding Scale's deflector shields and NWA's spell catapult things. I don't get them, but they swear it's useful."

    Wake laughs softly at Goldenblade's comments. "Clearly you are handling things well, dear friend."

    She pauses to consider her words with extra care. When she's prepared, she says to Eirik, "Other than ships, what are your skills? I don't suppose you have a talent for woodworking, do you? We've a desperate need for those talents, and without them we won't be putting much of anything in the water. We are quite a ways from steel vessels."

    She gestures to the bench she was sitting on. "But it is more comfortable to sit." She suits her words and again turns to watch the Lander children. As she does, her calm smile is slowly drawn into something warmer. She allows Goldenblade to talk specifics about the ship itself. Her attention lies adjacent to the object itself. "What is it you like so much about sailing?"

Eirik smiles and nods to Goldenblade. "Aye it is indeed me, I do apologize I had to take some time to get somethings in order." He than looks to wake. "I'm skilled with a cutlass, and if someone could make a magical firearm of some sort...if thats even possible I'm skilled with those too. I'm skilled in the Druidic arts, and animal handling, Ive got some skills in negotiation and the like and Air, and Water, wood working though, well Im not sure I've never tried my hand at it, it's possible though."

Miho once again had been commisioned to make some parts and tools for the ship project. Given the nature of it? Miho had come to deliver it in person rather than send someone else. After all given it is imporant so she'd rather to it herself. So she would show up tail swishing as ewh goes.

"Oi got a delivery here!"

Goldenblade chuckles as Wake decides she's handling things all right. Though at the mention of steel hulls, she comments, "Steel plates on wooden-hull ships are -entirely- possible, and will almost certainly render their shipboard weapons obsolete. It was first done in the mid 1800's in real life when they figured out that wood wasn't a requirement and floating was a matter of displacing water, not just using floating materials." Bricklayer she may have been, but she also read a fair amount of history.

She shakes her head about woodworking. "There's a handful of skills the Alliance would love to fill, but you're under no obligation to fill it yourself. I might, in the fullness of time, since I'm our main builder. But it's not on my short-term planner."

Looking up as Miho arrives with a delivery, she asks, "What have you got?" With the number of projects going on, it could as easily be for her or Wake.

The Baroness allows her attention to stray for a time, called back only when Miho calls out. She rises to greet the salamander with a smile. She will, of course, curtsey. It might seem automatic, but she puts her attention into the motion every time.

    "How are you doing, dear? I hope your journey here was safe." She looks from Miho to Goldenblade. She isn't sure what delivery she might have coming. It could be almost anything at this point, really.

    "I'm thinking more like a solid steel vessel, not the Monitor or Merrimack. Though I imagine those would be quite a shock. We are trying to get weapons caught up. Magical grenades next, and then, in time, mortars."

    She wrinkles her nose in distaste. The priestess doesn't like speaking of weapons. "A pity none of that stops war. It just makes it worse in the end."

Miho smirks "Turtle ships would work much as I hate to admit it those things miffed the Imperial Army of the time pretty damn hard. It would be wonderful to turn it on the Palace Lands." She grins pretty widely at that as she looks the trio over for a moment. "It was fine other than some of the expected monsters on the way. Didn't the guy who made the Gattling Gun hoped it would be so nightmarish it would get people talk it out rather than fight?"

Goldenblade ahhs at a solid steel vessel, and agrees, "They didn't come into play until the late 1800's, when shipbuilders had finally come to realize that steel plates wouldn't sink a ship, but they would absolutely bounce cannonballs. One of the last armored barques was in San Diego as a museum. I took my family there in the 90's when the oldest had /his/ first kid." She absolutely has no grasp of roleplay, it's clear. "Like the Monitor, it was steel plate-on-wood. I figure that's easiest to work with here, because we can just plate up an existing ship. I'm not sure what it's take to teach shipbuilders the sort of welding they'd need to make all-steel ships. It might take /our/ generators," she laughs, "If I can ever work out how to build them."

She nods to Miho about the Imperial Army and says, "Most people who invent much better weapons hope it will end warfare. It never does, of course. The Nobel Peace Prize was funded by the fellow who invented dynamite," she notes ironically. "And I'd give a prize to anyone who could give /me/ some TNT."

    "Hiram Maxim," says Wake softly. She sighs deeply. "He didn't make the gatling gun. He made the true machine gun, which laid millions to rest in The Great War and millions more since."

    She frowns, turning her gaze away, staring out over the water. "We march the same path. We all will. Is this all to prove that we always find a way to choose death?" She looks down at the crude bracelets on her wrists and shakes her head.

    "Goldenblade, we have to make sure we don't take this too far. It's a deadly path we walk, bringing the worst of our world to disturb this one."

Miho Says "Toi be fair he didn't make it to be a weapon." She noted. "It was for mining but give man a way to kill someone and it will protabley be used at least once in history."

She frowns a bit at this. She then looks to the Baroness.

"The Palace Land noblity wants us dead or worse. We are playing nice all things considered."

Goldenblade arches her brow as Wake addresses her. "We didn't start this war, their Landers did, and we didn't code the game. Whatever you do, keep in mind, it -is- just a game." She nods at what Miho says. "That's right, at this point it's them or us. So no kid gloves on this one, it's mailed fist time. We won't be receiving any quarter from those scum, so consider them the same as monsters."

She looks puzzled at Miho but ohs, "You mean about Nobel, not Maxim?"

    "This is no game," Wake replies softly. "Death walks here. What we used to think a mere nuisance can destroy our minds. It just takes time. We can be enslaved. We can be turned into undead. We are just waking up to the reality around us. The world that was? Maybe there's a way back. That's just a guess and a hope now. An alliance is already dedicated to that, and I wish them all the best. As for me, I rather doubt it will be so convenient. My very existance is reason to doubt it."

    She rises and shakes herself. "But enough gloom. I do not wish to dwell on these problems in the light of day. Come night, I will attend to our future concerns. When my mind is sufficiently healed."

    She laughs suddenly and heads towards the small group of Lander children. It's clearly not her first time joining them, as a little girl races at her and shouts, "Wake! Wake! Can we play hide and seek in the theater again?"

    "You know, dear, that sounds like a wonderful idea. If your parents are okay with it."

    Wake looks back to Miho and Goldenblade, "I hope you can both stay for a time! There are rooms at the inn or if you want to join me in the castle, there's even more space there. Plus the finest meals in the Fourlands!"

Miho says "Look I'm not the best at western history." She looks embrassed "Though what I do know is facinating and I'll be honest a lot of what I know related to smithing." She looks to Wake for a moment "Aye, we can be enslaved or worse even die for good. I haven't died so far yet and Don't intend to if I can help it. You know what you go have fun you need it with all the Polticing you have to do and .. I won't say no. Wait you have Hifumi on staff now?!"

Goldenblade shrugs as Wake claims this is no game. But she logged on to a game, and has seen nothing to tell her that this is something else. She's of course no expert on games, so destroying minds and enslaving people are just made up things in a made up computer gane world as far as she's aware. You can't do that in RL, at least not how it's done here, so we -must- be in a game, to her overly-literal way of thinking. "I didn't say it was a /good/ game," she points out. As to staying at Eas, she nods. "Thank you, I will." She knows she has a standing invite and stays here often when working on projects, so had planned on it. She stays for the food as much as the bed, to be truthful.

She shrugs to Miho about Western History, and says, "You certainly know more than I do about smithing." About the Lore, anyhow. No one remembers that Goldenblade is quite an exceptional weapon and armor smith, herself. Then again, Miho may very well have surpassed her, she's not really competing.

Miho pauses for a moment at Goldenblade. "True, but you are learning very fast from what I hear if you ever want to work on something when you have an idea with me! I'd love to, you likely may have caught something I have not about the craft. Only a fool thinks they are done learning!"

Goldenblade shrugs about learning very fast. "I did most of my learning when the game first started. I've just maintained, since then. I need to improve if I'm going to work on these," she says, pulling her golden katana about a foot from its sheath. It's not actual gold, which would be terrible for a sword, but the way it's mixed with Fire lends it a golden hue.