An Unnatural Love of Shiny

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Now that Nehaalista could work a little bit more naturally (her leg still ached, but at least it wasn't hard to walk on), she'd set out to find a forge. And found one she did, recently used, if the embers in the forge were any indication. With a little, strange sort of almost-grunt, she dropped her box of ore on the ground beside and relit the flame, stoking it until heat boiled from the red mouth of the forge.

While on shore leave, Nehaalista had been able to purchase some ore. To not do anything with her hands while stuck aboard Stacy would have driven her crazy, and Nehaalista wasn't about to let that happen to her sanity. After all, what would happen if she did go crazy? Start gyrating wildly while standing on a mailbox?

She wasn't a night elf, for Light's sake. Sorry, Choline.

Nehaalista prospected half the box, pulling away a few dozen uncut gems and setting them aside. They were strange, and Nehaalista couldn't think of names, but had arranged them by color. The rest of the ore was melted down into bars, one of which Nehaalista hefted in one hand.

Now, what to make? She pushed away a limp, sweaty curl and swished her tail against the chair, thoughtfully.

Comments

[sonofether.livejournal.com]

It had been quite a while, hadn't it? And Stephen was not about to interrupt the good Vindicator just yet. The knowledge that she was at the forge was good enough. He'd been down in the City himself, trying to bang out more work on his lab. Literally.

Curiosity had bade him poke his head in the forge, and upon seeing the Draenei female lost in thought, the plan had been hatched. Luckily he was the quiet sort. This meant he left in silence.

Of course, when he came back he was noisy enough, pushing a makeshift sort of cart in front of him. Yes, he'd made it himself. It was full of crates, perhaps four or five in all, with varied types of ore in them. Stephen was rather proud of himself for that.

He was quite certain that this would be an absolutely lovely surprise.

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Nehaalista had moved on from idle thought to cutting and hammering out the metal into small rings, soldering them closed with something from her jeweler's kit. They were just small enough to fit over her barbels, and those particular small gold bands had just gotten a good cleaning, sitting in a little row in front of her.

She jumped slightly when Stephen's noisemaking interrupted her work and stabbed her finger with a sharpened chisel. Nehaalista sucked a breath in and put the wounded finger in her mouth. She waved at Stephan, and signed one-handedly, [Hello again.]

[sonofether.livejournal.com]

His smile stopped when he realized he'd surprised her into hurting herself. Stephen lifted a hand to rub at the back of his head, sheepishly, before dropping it to sign to her.

[I'm sorry, Nehaalista, I didn't mean to startle you.] He set his hands down on the cart handle to steady it, before putting his foot before one of the wheels so it wouldn't roll away.

[I haven't had a chance to catch up to you until now, but I went scrounging for a bit while on shore leave, and I found a couple things for you.] Yeah, that's how he'll describe it, just a couple of things. He patted the cart handle again, then.

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Nehaalista waved a dismissive hand and pulled her finger out of her mouth to sign, [It wasn't very deep, don't worry about it.] She eyed the cart curiously, and tilted her head. [That looks quite a bit more than a couple of things, Stephen.] She grinned toothily.

[sonofether.livejournal.com]

[I'm more of a recycler than someone who builds things from scratch. Well, unless I need to, I suppose. I figure you'd get more use from this than I would.] It was true, all of it!

[Besides, I figure you'd give me a hand if I ever needed your expertise. You know a lot more about crystal properties, I would think, than I do. I might need a lens of some sort for a weapon, if I decide to build one.] Stephen shrugged.

[quark-assassin.livejournal.com]

From the doorway, Dustin cleared his throat. Loudly.

He hadn’t exactly laid claim to this forge, though it was obvious that he’d been tinkering around with some of the metals inside, working with the tools, modifying a few of the ones that didn’t function to his liking. It had been relatively quiet there since he discovered it before shore leave, but once he got back and began frequenting it more often, it was only a matter of time before the rest of the crew decided to take a look around. That was usually how it happened, right? As he told Kira…

Luckily for Nehaalista, Dustin wasn’t much of a threat in his current condition, even if the flat, murderous glare he was giving her suggested otherwise. That crutch wasn’t going to let him move very fast, let alone free his arms for shooting the very large gun tucked inside his backpack.

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

It would take a lot more than a glaring little human to scare Nehaalista. She raised her eyebrows and stopped shaping the little barbel cuffs she'd be working on. [Can I help you with something?] she signed, looking nonplussed. Her hands continued to work on her barbel cuffs, her eyes focused on Dustin.

[quark-assassin.livejournal.com]

“I should be asking you the same thing,” came the reply, gruff and more than a little aggravated. For his credit Dustin didn’t look away—nor did he seem surprised by the signing. One would assume that a genius of his caliber would understand such a language, yeah? He did, however, recognize that this creature was more intent on finishing her little project than attacking him, and thus he took a moment to adjust his posture into something slightly more comfortable.

Otherwise he stayed where he was and continued to glare.

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

He'd be staying there a while then, because Nehaalista only shrugged, [It was empty, I am using it.] There were no clearer black and white principles than that. She returned to her work. Her long, nimble fingers carving out a setting for one of the small stones.

[angel-ofthe.livejournal.com]

Castiel had been investigating different locations on the ship when he stumbled across Daja's forge. He stopped, cocking his head to observe the ... interesting woman who appeared to be working within.

A normal human would have said something, announced their presence; Cas did not feel the need. Instead he stood and silently watched.

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Nehaalista worked, sitting back to examine an uncut gem. It had very few flaws, she noticed, and with the proper application of heat and cuts, would probably sparkle brighter than an Azerothian diamond. It was a bit over large, though. Maybe she should cut it down?

A hand reached up to rub one of her horns. It had cracked slightly in her fall during the fight with the Ohm, and like her leg, still ached a little bit. Nehaalista happened to glance up while working on the gem and raised her eyebrows. She put her tools and gem down and signed rapidly at him.

[angel-ofthe.livejournal.com]

She was clearly not human, but Cas wasn't sure what she was. Some kind of monster he wasn't familiar with? He frowned as he stared, trying to figure her out.

And then she started making hand gestures at him. He frowned even more, tilting his head as he tried to pull any meaning at all from the motions. "... I'm sorry," he said after a moment, "I ... don't follow."

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Oh, whoops. Complacency stuck again, it seemed. Nehaalista sighed heavily, the sound oddly neutral-sounding, and picked up her omnicomm from the table, where it'd been sitting on a bar of ore. [Can I help you with something?] It felt like she was a youngling all over again in her father's jewelry shop, sitting at the counter and trying to decipher what others wanted.

Neheram would've been proud of his daughter... well, prouder if she didn't look so bothered by the intrusion. Certainly this man could see that she'd been working.

[restoresbalance.livejournal.com]

Even though he'd been on Stacy for a long time, Luke still hadn't explored every part of the city--it was a huge place, humid and dark, and he generally found himself only heading to the Temple. So it was that he was on his way there when he caught the smell of fire, and itching for a bit of difference in his routine, went to go check it out.

While he didn't immediately recognize the structure he found, the term forge came to him eventually. These were generally only seen on a much greater scale where he was from; one made for personal use wasn't common at all. But here, anything was possible.

The next thing he noticed was the being off to one side, clearly lost in thought with a block of ore in its hand. Suddenly feeling shy, like he'd walked unbidden into a private moment, Luke bowed politely. "Sorry to intrude," he said. "I was just curious, I smelled fire and wasn't sure if it was something bad or not."

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Nehaalista sat up, her tail curled around her hip. She shook her head and smiled, the silvery-blue glow of her eyes fairly welcoming. Nehaalista signed rapidly at Luke.

[restoresbalance.livejournal.com]

While Luke could speak several languages--being multilingual was a necessity just to get along back home--sign languages weren't ones generally used. He could read intent in the Force, and everything about this being said that they had nothing but goodwill in them.

"I'm sorry," he said again. "I don't understand."

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Nehaalista frowned slightly, and tilted her head. She removed her omnicom and wrote, [Is there anything I can help you with today?] Sigh, it looked like the girl could leave the sales counter, but the sales counter could never leave the girl.

[short-changed.livejournal.com]

Ed was in a VERY good mood right now as he wandered through the city, whistling an off-tune note when he noticed the bloom of heat the closer he got to the forge. Curious, he turned towards it and soon found himself standing there, watching the woman work.

"Hi," said Ed, hands in his pockets, the shiny new arm glinting in the fire. "Working on something?"

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

She looked up, a loupe on one eye to better examine the cut of the stone she was working on. It would probably be a bust; there were many spider-web like flaws in it, and it would make the stone difficult to cut. Through the loupe, one eye seemed to glow extra bright, giving Nehaalista the appearance of a... well, of a giant, horned flashlight.

She waved.

[short-changed.livejournal.com]

"Jeweler I take it?" said Ed, recognizing the loupe that was attached to her eye. The glowing eyes was new but so was all of her. He figured she was one of the newest arrivals like he was.

"I'm Ed. Need a hand or are you good?"

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Nehaalista signed at Ed, [I'm fine.] She put down her bar and peered at the little human, standing up to her full, lofty height. Humans would never cease to amaze her with their little size. A shame the lot of them were crazy.

[metalbent.livejournal.com]

Toph first noticed the strange woman weeks ago, but had never really run into her since then.

And now there she was, at the forge, doing things with metal and gems...

"Are you an earthbender?"

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Boy, it was certainly busy in here, wasn't it? Nehaalista finished another tapping cut on a ring with a silver-blue sheen to the metal and shook her head. What was an earthbender anyway? That sounded like something those Shamans did, when they weren't busy extolling the virtues of nature.

If you slapped a shapeshift on them and gave them some granola, they'd be right up there with the druids.

[metalbent.livejournal.com]

Toph could sense each tap and cut; it resonated through the gem and down into the floor.

"'Cause you're pretty good at working with stones."

[dearest-nehaa.livejournal.com]

Nehaalista smiled at the girl and went back to work. Shape, and tap, shape and tap, until the ring had grooves to hold the stone she had polished up earlier. She wasn't sure what to "say" exactly, and so motioned the girl closer.