Editing 04/07/2024 -- Titan Talks

* Date: 26 Chy-sa 715AR. Starring Abella, Andreas, Angel/Bloom, Bee, Koilos, Storm, and Thomas.
* We pick up with a day like any other. It’s raining out, the storm coming down in thick, rolling sheets, and we’re all beginning to make our way about the camp. We find Bloom first, in his tent, beginning his familiar spell. He makes a mental check, and gets 1 success. He concentrates and speaks the incantation, and golden light begins to shimmer from the pages. A clawed hand begins to come out of the book, and grind on the ground of the tent. Bloom reaches down to help it out, and there’s a pig-like squeal, before a wombat emerges.
* Reading portions of the spell, he discovers he’s summoned the Immortal Wombat – its physical form can be destroyed, but it’ll always come back. Bloom wonders what wombats eat, but with 0 successes on a mental check, he doesn’t have a clue. He rummages through his rations and gives it some raisins, which it eats, but it bites him when he tries to pet it. It doesn’t react when he introduces himself as Angel.
* Thomas is passing by, and hears squealing from the tent – he asks if Bloom is alright, and Bloom says yes, he just may have pissed ‘it’ off; he doesn’t know much about animals. He invites Thomas in, and Thomas sees the wombat, but doesn’t know what it is, either, since wombats aren’t native to the Primordial Ring. He asks how it got here, and Bloom says he tried a spell he found at the library, but that it doesn’t seem to like him very much.
* When it finishes the raisins, it looks up at them, its fur rippling, and gives a hiss. Thomas makes eye contact with it and holds a hand out to it, and beats it in a contested spirit check – it waddles forward, and presses its forehead against his. He gets to pet it, and it climbs into his arms. Bloom looks disappointed at this, and Thomas asks if it’ll let Bloom pet it. It makes eye contact with him, and he gets the impression of the wisdom of ages.
* Bloom reaches for the wombat, and it allows him to pet it, but it’s not really reacting – just watching him. Thomas heads out now, and sees Koilos Sky dragging an unconscious Claudia and Zey, and looking absolutely terrible. He asks what happened, and she says Zolona, and he asks what she did. She says they need to head to the Maiden, and gather who they can. Thomas says they need to get Claudia and Zey to the medical tent first, and picks them up. Ki follows behind him, and they get to the medical tents, where physicians put them on stretchers and start triage.
* Abella, Bee, and Andreas are close enough to the medical tent to hear – Bee runs over, and Andreas comes, starting to say he was relaxing in bed, but cuts himself off when he sees the situation. Ki is hugging herself, and explains that they went on the mission to get the Ki-rin’s hair, but Zolona was waiting for them, and she got Charon, Storm, and Fleur. She wants the Maiden to come to her within 48 hours, but that’s an obvious trap; Gold Hook was there with Blossomed zombies, setting up blue ores. With 1 success on a mental check, Andreas has heard vaguely of blue jade, and knows it’s a dangerous substance found on the Primordial Ring, but he doesn’t know specifics.
* Looking at Claudia, the best thing they can do for her is give her some blood. Bee is distressed by not being able to feed her her own blood, but is able to procure a blood bag to give her. Ki writes Claudia a note, and leaves it for her. She seems stable, so the group leaves to see the Maiden.
* On the way to the Maiden, the wombat is reluctantly plodding along behind Bloom. Abella arrives and talks to the wombat, who immediately complains about Bloom and the raisins, saying it wants grass. It’s from a pocket dimension with some grass, trees, and a pond. It’s basically hell here, and it doesn’t know it did to deserve this. It wants to see the Pillow Man (Thomas) again. It calls Abella a dumb broad for not taking her blindfold off.
** “I am wet, I am small, and I am new in town. And I am confused! I need grass!”
* They tell the wombat they’ll be somewhere dry soon with the Pillow Man, but grass might be harder to come by. Bloom offers to pick it up, but it doesn’t like that he smells like sulfur (as they walk, he sniffs himself, and he does indeed smell a bit like sulfur). It also declines Abella, because she smells like wet goat.  
* We pick up in a different place – Storm opens his eyes and sees a smoky lounge. He’s in a plush chair with a cigar in hand, dressed in a 3-piece brown suit that smells of a cologne he barely remembers. There’s a band on the small stage, and people mingle. It’s very calm. He decides to act like he belongs until he figures out more, and sees a woman making her way to him. She has long brown hair, sleek eyebrows beneath a golden wreath, and a beautiful ocean-colored dress. She sits next to him and smiles.
* The woman tells him this place has incredible seafood, and says she ordered them grilled dolphinfish and lobster rolls. She thinks she’d love shrimp, but she doesn’t know. Storm encourages her to go for the shrimp, and she calls over a server, a 20-some year-old looking orc, and orders shrimp. She asks what he thinks of the place, and when he says it’s comfortable, she agrees, and says he looks good in a suit. He says thought he’d dress up for this, and she says he didn’t actually dress himself… or she supposes he did, but this is what he would’ve dressed in.
* Storm scratches his face, trying to feel his scar, and isn’t able to. She tells him he never joined the Ard Magos, and that they don’t exist in this reality. Neither do birds. He asks what she wants, and she says company for dinner. He says he appreciates the offer, but he’s not interested in joining her, and she asks if he doesn’t want to take a load off, and have a nice time. He agrees to humor her, and try to find the similarities between them. She asks if he’s been to a place like this in his normal life (he hasn’t), and then asks what he talks about when he’s with his friends. When he’s not with other soldiers, planning wars. He struggles to answer, and she asks if no one has ever taken interest in that Storm before.
* She says we’re all more than one thing – she’s a queen, but she loves to dance. She’s a ruler, but loves the smell of rain, and walks in it. Storm says he’s a soldier, and doesn’t like the rain. She says that’s fair, but the sky holds so much else – possibility, promise, opportunity… she asks what else he likes, and he’s not sure. She says she’s struggling with these mortal idiosyncrasies, and even eating is something she hasn’t experienced in so long. He encourages her to have the shrimp, and she cheers to that. He joins her in raising his glass.
* We cut back to the Maiden’s tent, all of us walking inside. She’s stitching up a hurt Brigade soldier, and her face drops. She excuses herself from the soldier, and asks if something’s wrong, before saying something’s probably wrong. She asks how bad it is, and Andreas prompts Ki – she’s looking pale, and Bee grabs her hand. Ki takes a deep breath, and says that it’s bad, but before she tells her, the Maiden has to swear not to run off on her own. The Maiden agrees, and Ki gives her the run-down.
* The Maiden’s eye begins to twitch, and everyone gets spirit checks – a few people get 1 success, and see she’s processing a lot of emotions, but with 2 successes, Abella sees the Maiden isn’t scared or worried, just angry. She asks where her mother is, and we tell her it’s a trap and she can’t do it alone, but she insists she can confront her mother alone. We have 36 hours left, and ask her to please make a plan with us.
* The Maiden is concerned that the longer the captives are with Zolona, the worse the situation will get. Ki says we should talk to Helmuth, Zetian, and Lavatera, but the Maiden says that the party should do that, but she needs to get going now. She doesn’t think they’ll help, anyway – Helmuth and Lavatera don’t want to engage Zolona at least until Widowstone, but maybe not even then. She doesn’t know about Zetian, but maybe they have something up their sleeve, or maybe they can use their scroll…
* She still insists on going immediately, and starts packing her things, saying she’s not in danger like the rest of us – she pops right back up when she dies. Ki worries, with Zolona calling the Maiden Ataxia, that the Maiden might not come back the same. When she continues trying to pack, Bee dives for the Maiden’s legs, wrapping herself around them. 
* Andreas asks about the blue jade, and she says she and Helmuth encountered it a few years ago in a place called Lourdes. She didn’t really get to figure out completely what it did, but Helmuth dealt with it a lot. Ki relays that they had thousands of pounds worth of blue jade, and Bee asks if we could blow it up – the Maiden says maybe, but that now she definitely doesn’t want us going near it. She wants to limit exposure, because there’s no coming back from the things they can do, especially with the Dark Star. Zolona is a warper, and controls everything. If we bring Helmuth and the others, she won’t let us get away.
* Andreas convinces her to tell us what she knows about Titans, and Bee lets go of her so that she can sit down. She brushes herself off, and takes a breath, saying she’ll start back at what she knows. She says there was something everything – high gods, Titans, everything – was fighting, and the Rings of Meropis were created for people to run to, but when they were running, the Titans got left behind, and there wasn’t time to go back for them. Eventually, though, the high gods felt the Titans coming back. The Maiden doesn’t know the details, but Ishin talked once or twice about a battle called the Solviad where the high gods saved the Titans, though much of the cosmic stack was destroyed in the process. The Titans were brought in, and there were celebrations, but…
* The Maiden asks if we know that angels don’t lay eggs, and Ki says she assumed they didn’t. She says as a result of everything, they were events – like how everyone knows the average angel doesn’t lay eggs, but what if a random angel comes along and lays an egg? What then? They built so many things on the assumption angels didn’t lay eggs, but this thing they thought was completely true wasn’t, and the rules were broken. Before this event, there were no angel egg events, but after this, there were times when the rules broke down, the echoes of the battle rippling not only through the dimensions, but time itself was altered, the same way if you crumple up a paper and straighten it, there’s still wrinkles. But it was okay, because the gods had a fourth ring.
* She goes on to tell us that there used to be four rings, not just three, and she’s from the fourth – the Ring of Quelling, called so because it helped to quell a lot of the aftershocks, stabilizing magic on the rings. The Titans were given the fourth ring, because while the high gods are meant to be universal constants and don’t interact, the Titans were meant to step in and keep order, be the balance on the scale. At first, things were going well, but then the Twelfth discovered that when the Titans were left behind, they found something that helped them to survive, and it drove them insane – they seemed so normal, but when you pried beneath the surface, their minds didn’t work the same way. Everything about them was taken to the extreme.
* The Twelfth knew they had to be contained, but when they moved in, the Titans were already planning revolt, and hadn’t forgiven the gods for their great betrayal. All-out war broke out, and it looked like the gods would be able to contain the Titans, but the Titans had grown in power, and were acting in ways the gods didn’t anticipate. That was what led to things like herself – monsters. The Ring of Quelling was destroyed, and trillions died across the cosmic stack, dimensions burned, all to satiate the bloodlust of the Titans. The Maiden tells us they’ll never stop, but that it’s more than that.
* She asks if any of us have seen what happens when multiple kinds of magic mix (we haven’t), and she says there are problems when that happens, because when they mix the Rings aren’t doing their jobs, not keeping things in balance. The mixing of magic is sometimes called a Red Spiral Event, and happens when magic mixes and things go wrong, when random bits of our universe begin to break down. Usually the Titans make sure this doesn’t happen, because if a Red Spiral Event gets too large, the Rings of Meropis would be filled with storms of rogue magic, followed by a meltdown.
* There would be nothing left, but theoretically, there’s a failsafe – the Rings would destroy themselves, cut off from Primordial, High, and Low magic, and become a magicless world. This is thought to be impossible now, because this was partially the job of the fourth Ring; to quell the Red Spiral Event. The Ring is gone now, though, and there’s so much magic. Recently, the Titans and Aether Eaters have attempted to bring about these Red Spiral Events, and that’s what’s coming. With all of us being so close, if one happens while we’re there, it could destroy everything. She says this is what they’re doing, if they have Charon – Charon has parts of Niorax in them. She guesses her mother wants her to be involved in one of these events, but her friends saved her from being Ataxia, so Zolona can’t make that happen. If the Maiden gets in danger, she’ll just kill herself and pop back up. She has nothing to lose.
* We still insist on coming with her to save Storm, Charon, and Fleur. The Maiden says she’s going to try to get Zolona in her Aether Realm, get a hold of everyone, throw up a bubble of aether thick enough her mother won’t be able to get through, and teleport them 10 miles belowground. When the Maiden is turned to paste, she’ll regenerate and go back to get them, and ideally the others will be safe in her aether bubble. She’ll be fine. What’s the worst that could happen?
* We cut back to Storm and Zolona in the jazz club. Zolona complains that her teeth are preventing her from shoving more shrimp in her mouth, and doesn’t understand why they’re not retractable. She asks Storm what his favorite battle was, and he says he doesn’t know. She presses further, and he says it wasn’t really a battle, but the aftermath of Vangen was interesting. She says she’s vaguely aware of it, and she felt a meteor pass through her domain. She felt it be consumed by her child, Calamity. She says Savris fucked it up a bit, and they almost manifested.
* She says the aftermath of a battle is strange – “While you’re celebrating victory, you so often put aside everything you lost. I don’t know how so many of your kind can do that. Not remember what you lost.” Storm says that you do remember it, but in the immediate moment, you’ve won. You take time to at least acknowledge the achievement before returning to what you lost to gain it.
** “Well, that would have been nice. Did you know that the gods lost us? Me and my people. It’s true. We used to be staunch allies, fighting side by side. Then they left. They left us. We were completely destroyed. Most of us. My husband, he is the strongest, so he was able to survive. The rest of my family, though, my mother, my father, my children… I watched them get slaughtered. I don’t think they ever intended to come back for us. I don’t think they ever intended, Storm, to remember what they lost. How could they allow themselves to do that?”
* Storm says he’s not a god, and can’t say. She says he’s something better than a god – he’s a man with a conscience, but one who can also set it aside. There’s so much he could be. She says when she looks at him, she sees no futures but one, and then she blinks, and it switches, the path he was set on changes. It’s like fireworks, a sparkle of light, and then an image, color, something new. He asks if she’s trying to butter him up and get him to switch to her side. 
* Zolona says the truth is the world was awful even before they began to act. Left to our own devices, we still almost destroyed ourselves, and if the high gods remain, the Rings will destroy themselves within 500 years. There’s a 4% chance of survival past the year 1200 without the Titans involved. She says the sickest forests are the ones where the old trees do not allow new life, the old trees casting shade and killing the undergrowth. A forest dies underneath its own weight without wildfire, but a bolt of lightning can come from the sky and create a blaze, destroying the forest and creating the chance for life. 
* She tells him to see from her eyes, from the eye of the storm. Help her hurl the lightning bolt. He says they call him Storm because he’s scared of them. As much as he empathizes, he has brothers and family, and he’s not gonna leave them. His entire life has been to be a soldier, and he doesn’t have anything before or after that. She tells him he’s not a weapon, but a person. She asks what he’d do if he was the only one who knew the world was wrong.
** “I would do what I could to change it, but what I’m looking at when I see a bunch of shambling rotten people, is not that- maybe I’ve been groomed by the gods or whatever to think that’s not right, but you look at some of these creatures we’ve been running from, I don’t know… maybe the unnatural order I’m apart of, but it’s gonna be more than just like, oh, let me pretend I understand your viewpoint completely and can shift everything, you know?”
* Zolona says she understands, and thinks he deserves an opportunity to make his case.  To see more. She tells him to go, and really look for her. Inspect everything. When they meet again, she’d like him to tell her what he’s found, and she’ll be looking too, comparing the unnatural and natural order. They’ll decide which one knows the real truth. She says she’d hoped that he’d seen enough and would know to join, but everything in its own time. As a Titan, she guides those underneath her care, and aids where the gods do not. Storm repeats that as much as he understands her, he can’t turn his back on everyone he’s sworn to help, or he’d be doing exactly what she accuses the gods of. It’s easier to just be a weapon. He can be that. He doesn’t know how to be a person. 
* She asks if the weapon cares who wields it, and he says a weapon that can think does. She says he hasn’t been thinking, he’s been going through his life with no consideration, no reflection. He asks if she’s been through his life, or if she’s taking potshots. She says they’re educated guesses. She asks him to try to be a person, and he says he can try. She says it’s been literal thousands of years since she’s danced, and extends a hand to him. He says it’s better than him having never danced before, and takes her hand. She tells him to let her lead.
* We cut back to the Maiden’s tent, where we’re still in a tense standoff. She tells us if we go, she’ll almost certainly destroy all of us, and Andreas says that we’re the Brigade, we do this together. None of us are an island, and like it or not, that’s what she signed up for. She says she didn’t sign up for anything like that, she signed up to help, but she’s still failed all of us. She thanks us, but says now is the time for action. We ask her to give us 12 hours to come up with a plan, and she says that’s 12 hours too long. She says she’s going to go, and if any of us wish to come with her, to raise a hand. She draws her hands together and begins to recite an incantation, seeming to try to teleport, and Andreas tries to grab her hands and separate them. Bloom tries to help, and Andreas gets Benefit I for that. Andreas gets 5 successes on a physical check, and we’re able to pin her down. We have her completely restrained, and send Ki to go get Helmuth.
* Ki arrives at Helmuth’s training grounds, and he asks if she’s ready to train. She says no, and that Zolona captured Fleur, Charon, and Storm. She says we have the Maiden restrained from teleporting alone, and we need his help to plan a rescue mission. She says the Maiden seems like she’s gonna go alone, and Zolona seems to have something planned for her. She also mentions that the Maiden says he knew things about the blue jade, and he says he’s never heard of blue jade, and asks her to bring him to the Maiden.
* Helmuth tells the Maiden she’s not going to Zolona, and she looks completely furious, and says they’re not leaving them. Helmuth says it’s stupid to try and fight, and tells us the Maiden can’t beat her, and not to listen to the crazy woman. Andreas says he won’t call the Maiden crazy, but that he doesn’t think any of us are in a position to beat the Titan Queen. Helmuth says that’s good enough, and asks about the blue jade. She starts to talk about Lourdes, and he cocks his head to the side, telling her not to speak of this anymore. He hasn’t done this yet, but perhaps information can be gathered.
* He tells Ki, Andreas, and Abella to make sure the Maiden is kept under lock and key, and to put a sock in her mouth, preventing her from teleporting. He must go back to the past and complete actions he has taken. He doesn’t know when he’ll return, but ideally quickly. The Maiden says we don’t need to actually gag her, but we gather with a spirit check that she’s lying, so we gag her anyway (though not with a sock).
* Bee asks the Maiden if the Maiden meant absolutely zero people went back for the Titans, and the Maiden doesn’t seem sure, but nods. Bee looks to Ki and says that Sin said he went back for them, and the Maiden’s eyes flash, and she looks around – she didn’t know that. Bee wonders if the Titans know he went back, and we hear a voice say, “Oh, they know.” Another figure enters the room.
** “It appears we are talking about matters that involve myself. Good day, everybody. Some may call me Sin. And that is what you may call me. Now, I did attempt to go back, after the Titanic War, and unfortunately, I failed. I was branded a heretic. But that’s what you get, no good deed goes unpunished, but many bad ones do. You have me to thank for that.”
* Sin says it looks like the Maiden is in a bit of a spot, and Bee says she can’t leave right now. Sin says he sees that, and that he’d like to set some records straight. Don’t lump him in with the other high gods – he’s done more for these Rings than they ever shall. He adds that Zolona isn’t to be trifled with, but she can absolutely be overwhelmed. If we’re willing to sacrifice, there are options. We’ll just need to see how that goes. Angel asks what kind of sacrifices, and he says, “Not for me to say, Angel. Not for me to say.” Angel’s surprised Sin knows him.
** “I’m always with you. I know everything about you. You have so many sins. Many that you don’t even understand. But you do have that pesky seal in your head. Would you like to know everything you've done? Would you like to embrace your past?”
* Angel says that if it will help get Charon back, then yes. Sin is pleased, but the Maiden flips the fuck out, fighting against her restraints. Andreas and Thomas try to talk him out of it, and Sin says he only wants what’s best for Angel, and that he embraces him, fully and completely. He offers just a bit, a taste – no harm, no foul. Angel agrees, and Sin holds out a hand. Angel moves to take it, but Ki grabs his hand. She tries to convince him not to, saying she doesn’t want him to make the same mistake she did with Zolona, but he says they’re different people.
* Angel says he’s tired of being in the dark, of not being able to do any good, but the party says he ''has'' done good, and eventually convince him not to push it. Angel tells Ki she can let go of him, and she does. Sin is still giving him a level look, holding his hand out, and Angel gets the feeling Sin really doesn’t think we’ll be able to do this on our own. Angel shakes his head, and Sin calls it a pity, before leaving. Andreas says he, Bee, and Abella will stay with the Maiden. Bee suggests Ki goes to visit Zetian, and Andreas suggests Thomas visit Lavatera. He tells Angel to go on a little walk.
* Thomas knocks on Lavatera’s door, and she asks why he’s disturbing her. He apologizes, and says they have a situation – he gives her the run-down, and she says that’s a shame. Thomas says he thought that’d be her answer, and she asks if she’s detecting something other than admiration in his voice, and he says no, it’s admiration. As she turns around to go back inside, she turns his right leg into a second left leg.
* Ki goes to Zetian, and they ask what the purpose of the visit is. She says they need help planning, and tells them what happened. They blink, and say we’ll have to hold a vigil. They refuse to help; they won’t tango with Titans (they will dance with dragons, though). They do tell Ki that blue jade is an accelerant of magic, and drives the minds of those who use it insane, powering the magic off of the madness itself. They don’t wish us luck.
** “Be sharp as a tack, quick as a whip, and perhaps you might maybe…”
** “Not die?”
** “Well, have a good day, Ki.”
* We cut back to the jazz lounge. Zolona gives Storm a bow as they walk off of the floor, and says he improves quickly. She tells him to never underestimate himself as a dancer, and he says, “Yes, ma’am,” but she tells him not to call her ma’am; your highness or Zolona, or Z. She’s missed Koilos calling her that. When he asks about Ki, she says helped that girl for a number of years, and thought she could be one of the next to ascend, like Hester. Like so many others. She says she doesn’t wish to keep him any longer, and asks if she should deposit him at the Brigade, or someone else. He asks about Fleur and Charon, and she says Fleur is working with her. As for Charon… they’ll see how her daughter fares with the task she’s been given, but no harm will come to them. She swears on her honor, her husband’s name, and her family who have long since departed.
* Storm says back to the Brigade is fine, and she says to remind her daughter of her task, and to be well. She hopes that they cross again. All at once, he feels the world shift, and he’s not standing in a nice jazz club, but in the rain, just outside Fort Galax. The thunder crackles in the distance, and he hears the sounds of people within. He throws on the helmet, and walks into the fort. We end the session here, and Storm gets a level-up. From here on out, it’s up to us to plan a mission if we want to attempt to rescue Charon and Fleur.