trans_9 | That melt into spring [Open]

Zouchi stood by the blue-green waters of Faron Spring, eyes tracing the old, intricate patterns that covered the surfaces of the rocks nearby. The weather in this part of the City was a little cooler than usual, but he felt no discomfort; it was still well within his operational tolerances.

As he waited there, almost entirely still, a light rain began to fall from the sky. Artificial rain, of course, for an artificial city, but it was cool against his face and good for the plants. Zouichi closed his eyes for a moment; when he reopened them, the rain was still there... but it was accompanied by something else. Silvery numeric annotations swam through his vision, attached to each drop of water, too fast and too numerous for an untrained observer to make sense of. Speed calculations, trajectory and force projections. Each droplet of rain was a variable, a world of controlled chaos.

Some disappeared into the soft grass; others dropped onto the surface of the spring, sending up a cascade of secondary equations as it cast ripples across the surface of the water.

When it was time for battle, these same quicksilver calculations would help guide him in action: they'd show him the best way to destroy, the swiftest way to kill. But for now, there was no need to bend them to that purpose. Instead, he watched as they fell like phantoms through the sky.

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With his helm mag-locked to his hip, the templar approaches the place of quasi-natural beauty with a look of consternation. Feeling the rain on a battle scarred, bald pate. He looks down for a moment, unsure if he likes the fact that his tabard has now been slicked against the battle-plate and looks rather like a soppy rag, then dismisses the notion, moving on until he finds something, or someone.

Erhart's eyes, like a natural set of targeters, lock on and acquire Zouichi, and he crosses to him, nodding his head slightly, letting the smaller man acknowledge him or not. The low hum of his armor's servomotors aren't lost even here, in the rain, an unnatural intrusion.

Okay, Erhart, you have to learn not to do that. Even if you actually do acquire targets. Zouichi glanced at his unexpected visitor, first at the armor (which was still making a low-grade noise; maybe it never stopped), then up to Erhart's face.

"Nice haircut." Actually, Erhart looked kind of like Cargn. Zouichi wondered if immortality on Erhart's world came hand-in-hand with being bald. Maybe some side effect of whatever super-soldier process had created him.

"What are you doing out here?"

Edited 2011-10-05 16:18 (UTC)

"Is it? We cut our hair close because long hair tends to become annoying when wearing our helms for several weeks at a time."

He shrugs. "I wish I knew. I walk the ship for long hours, because it disquiets me. Only a few people from home and... the Eldar. They have claimed this was not their doing, but they always claim such things."

His face twists in bitterness, then subsides.

"This ship is not like a battle barge or strike cruiser. There are no long, unused passageways, no reliquaries of weaponry or other artifacts. That and the ship itself seems... alive. I find it hard to trust such a thing."

Hmm. That would explain a lot. Like the smell.

"Do you ever take your armor off?" Zouichi assumed that Erhart would still be around eight feet even without full armor, but maybe it was fused to him or something. Or maybe it wasn't, and Erhart could take a bath.

Erhart's complaints sounded... well, a lot like how he'd felt when he'd first gotten here. "Well, there are still quite a few undiscovered areas of the ship... but I'd say you were right not to trust it. Someone found a contingent of Reavers aboard not too long ago, and apparently it's storing a few nasty surprises that like to escape every once in a while. I don't think Ildraniath or Alendian are behind what's happened to us, though. For one thing, I don't think two people are quite enough for this kind of scale. And for another, they often seem just as frustrated as anyone else."

"In any case, I've found that helping out in various organizations throughout the ship helps a little with the downtime. That and training simulations in the Sensoriums... but I must admit that the pace of life here is much slower than what I'm used to."

"We can, but we rarely do so, except in private contemplation or in an area of absolute sanctity."

His eyes widen a bit as Zouichi describes the nature of the ship, and hisses. "It is like an Ork Rok, or a Space Hulk then. One of our duties as Templars is to explore such things, and cleanse them of dangerous Xenos while retrieving any valuable archeotech we find. Hmm. I am surprised everyone does not wear armor around all the time, if the ship is so mysterious. I would not send men to explore such a place without Terminator plate, such as Master Cargn wears."

The difference in Cargn's armor and Erhart's is significant. Erhart is massive, and powerful in his armor, standing some 8 feet. Cargn is closer to 11, and his armor is far, far thicker, though also much slower to manuever. Erhart moves with inhuman grace, whereas the Terminators have a lumbering inevitability to them.

"There are only two paces to the life of a Templar. Times of training and prayer, and times of War. Though I have found that every battle has a tempo which is peculiar to it."

"It's definitely not a fortress of safety and quiet, that's for sure. But on-ship, Security and any nearby volunteers take care of any threats that show up, so they're dealt with pretty quickly. And some areas are safer than others."

He clasped one wrist behind his back, thinking. "There's also the fact that not everyone on the ship is a warrior. There are a number of people around here who've barely even picked up a firearm before."

"In any case, you might find that the majority of the time consists of training and prayer. It's... an odd war."

P.S. Cargn must have a tough time shopping for cars.

Edited 2011-10-05 22:32 (UTC)

His eyes narrow. The idea that the ship is insecure annoys him.

"How is the war odd? Every war is different."

"It's a conflict in which we know even less about our allies than about our enemies, in which the ship carrying us cannot be controlled, and in which civilians, rather than soldiers, bear the majority of the fighting. Among other things." Zouichi gestures vaguely in the air. "We don't even know when we'll be able to next stop for supplies."

"We're fighting blind. How stupid."

His fists clench, obviously angered by the revelation.

"Can the captain not control his ship, then?"

"Apparently. Anyway, when we started out, the ship had been taken over by pirates; we've had to wrest control of the ship's AI from the 'warden' personality left in place by those pirates ever since. But the ship itself is like a living thing; it follows its own course. We probably have the Daligig to thank for that."

That melt into spring [Open]

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