faderift | get me out of this place before I cause more damage

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get me out of this place before I cause more damage

WHO: Church, Malcolm, Rachette, yyyyyou
WHAT: Catch-all!
WHEN: March/Draconis not-darkest-timeline-time
WHERE: Around Skyhold
NOTES: Hit me up on plurk if you want to start something else specific

[Rachette is still dropping by unsuspecting classes after how enlightening some of them have been. It could be any of them! Typically she doesn't actually sit in them, more like lingers and loiters just outside the edges, but still, call her out on it. Or call her out on inquiring about ingredients to make grenades with one of the merchants hanging around the courtyard. Another thing she's doing just around the hold is practicing her rogue-ish abilities. This means she's up on the battlements, running around on the edges. She's doing backflips off walls and sneak-stabbing dummies. She's finding new and inventive ways to get around the hold, sometimes with the unspoken stipulation that she can't touch the ground/floor. Also, lurking and hiding in shadows, trying to be unseen. If you get that feeling of someone watching you...might be her.]

[Church is still spending a lot of time at the tavern doing actual work. If you've seen him last month doing some stocking, bartending, and other Work, he's only gotten better. You might see him sometimes with a couple of cups of boozy liquid, studying them before taking a sip and making a face. Sometimes it's a good face, sometimes it's a bad face. And then jotting down notes. What a nerd. Continuing the nerd streak, he's gone back to hovering around in the library, taking even more notes. Some of these seem to be on food-based sciences, for what you could call science. And he's also busted out the maps again, though he's focused on the Free Marches now instead of the gigantic world map.]

[Malcolm has been spending more and more time in meetings and doing work for Cassandra, primarily regarding the pending move the Advisors are planning. When not with her, he goes about his normal routine as best he can, from prayer to training, but he's also spending plenty of downtime in the main hall, eating whatever there is to be found and reading and writing plenty of documents. You might find him with the feathery end of a quill resting against his lips in deep thought. If you fancy a more action-oriented Seeker, then the courtyard finds him instructing several troops in swords and shields. It's not his forte, but he's skilled enough in it to not find any trouble. Despite fake weapons and practice shields, he uses his own shield with the Seeker eye emblazoned on it for the demonstrations. Later on, you might catch him working out alone, or taking a rest with a splash of water to the face.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Ellana remembers Rachette from working with her in the Western Approach, as well as just seeing her around Skyhold. She thinks it might be a good idea to add to her skills by getting some lockpicking lessons, but that requires finding the elusive dwarf first. Over the last two months, Ellana has been developing some rogue-like skills, but mostly spells that will help her as one of Leliana's scouts. She's already worked with a fellow scout to learn stealth, but she's taken it beyond to learn spells that will completely hide her. However, being sneaky and spying on people will get her no one if she can't actually get in to where they are, and lockpicking spells don't exist.

One day she keeps an eye out for Rachette, and finally takes note of the sounds of a dummy being stabbed. She follows the noise to just catch a flash of silver hair. That has to be her.

"Hey, wait!" she calls, hoping to catch her before she backflips into the ether.

Thankfully there's not much ether to backflip into, or she'd go right off the battlements to her death. What fun would that be? There is some jumping around before Rachette hacks her sword into the side of the dummy and leaves it there (eh, it's a convenient enough place), right before she realizes the call is for her.

"Just as well," she says, panting and moving over to a bucket of water, splashing her face and drinking some. "Could use a break. What am I waiting for?"

"For me," Ellana replies, coming over with a smile. "Do you remember me? We worked together in the Western Approach." Back when they went on an adventure down a well and found a magical barrier and some shiny metal. "I hear you're the one to come to if I want to learn how to pick locks."

"Yeah." She's having a hard time placing the name, but by the Ancestors, there are just so many people here. "Took forever to finally get all the sand out of places that should never have sand in them. You need something broken into specifically, or you just want me to show you the ropes?"

"Just in general," she replies, smothering her laughter about the sand comment. She completely agrees there.

"I figured I might come across some locked doors in the near future, and I need to be able to handle them."

"I generally find you come across locked doors nearly every day, but that's just because some things in Skyhold need to be locked up. Footlockers. Doors with supplies. Offices that could be filled with sensitive information." The last one would be more of a security issue for the Advisors if she could actually read any of it, buuuuut.

Rachette straightens up (not that it makes much difference as a dwarf) and puts her hands on her hips, pouting in consideration. "So, hold on, I figure the answer must be no if you're coming to me, but I'm curious--" what else is new "--whether you can just...magic locks open."

"I was thinking more like getting into places the enemy is using, but sure, that too." And really, where better to practice than right here at Skyhold? It's convenient. "At least there are examples here to use."

She understands the question, because it's one she had too. "Ah, I did some research and it looks like the answer's no. It's just too... delicate. There are all these little oddly shaped metal bits inside of locks that no magic can be fine tuned enough to move. That's not to say mages don't have their own ways of locking things with wards or whatever, like that barrier we saw under the well? But when it comes to real locks, we're stumped." Here she knows stealth and shapeshifting and everything else in order to be of use to Sister Leliana, but she can't actually get into places yet. Not if they're locked.

"Magic's kind of more of a blunt instrument when it comes to that sort of thing, huh? All right. First we have to find ourselves a lock." And she's not the type to just carry one around with her for funsies, so, once she's reholstered her sword from being lodged in the side of a dummy, she motions for the elf to follow.

"There's this one merchant whose business isn't very good, mostly because he likes to spend his time in the tavern, and also because his wares are shit. But everyone has to start from somewhere. Fortunately he keeps his stuff locked up. Unfortunately, lockpick."

What if they're caught trying to break into a merchant's wares? Well, she isn't forthcoming on that point. She'll just lead Ellana to the tiny little stall in question, and behind it, to a trunk supposedly full of goods. "Now, there are a lot of ways you can improvise if you don't have the tools. But there are tools." She reaches a hand down her top, only to bring out a small cloth roll of metal rods of certain shapes. "All you really need is this bent rod here to apply pressure, and some kind of pick to do the actual picking. I don't know if this stuff has scientific words to it, so you'll just have to deal with whatever I call it all. But you can improvise this stuff together if you have to. I got this baby off one of my Carta buddies before he died, which has been super handy, but before that I mostly used whatever I shaped out that lasted he pressure."

Ellana's eyes widen, but she keeps following Rachette and listens to what she's saying. It seems sort of wrong to do this to someone just trying to do business. Maybe she'll feel better about it if she assumes he's a real asshole.

And then the dwarf pulls out her gear and Ellana immediately knows she'll have to find somewhere else to store hers. The only way she'll have the sort of cleavage that can hold up a bundle of lockpicking tools is if she wears the corset Araceli encouraged her to buy, and she doubts she can fight in it without practice.

Kneeling out of sight of the front of the stall, she nods along. "I have a blacksmith friend. Pretty sure he won't ask questions." And if he does, it's not like Sam can deny that picking locks for the Inquisition is a good cause.

"So what's next?"

Ample cleavage is a blessing and a curse. Usually a curse, because men and because aerodynamics and center of gravity, which are fancy terms she doesn't know related to 'moving while trying to parkour rogue-style'. But as storage? Golden.

And shh, don't worry about this merchant. He's not here, and they're not stealing anything. Shit wares, after all. Not worth her time.

"So you slide in the bent rod and you pull it this way. Just a little bit! A little pressure. Too much, and nothing's going to move. Too little, and everything's going to slide back into place. The idea is to give it just enough pressure that what you pick stays in the right place to actually unlock the lock."

Nobody but some of the wannabe Kestrels had ever asked her specifically after her skills on lockpicking, to teach them. She's not a teacher herself, so this is kind of exciting. Mostly she'd shown people how to disarm basic traps and reset them. "Then you put the pick in. Now, you're going to feel these...kind of like switches, on top. You push them in with the pick until it clicks into the right place, which is why you need the rod to give you pressure to keep it there. The reason keys work the way they do is that every lock has a different place where the switch falls when a key gets put in. If it's the right key, the switches are in the right places, and the key turns. If it's not the right key, the switches aren't where they're supposed to be, and it doesn't budge. So you have to test every switch down the line and hope you don't screw up."

She has a look of concentration on her face now that she's done the best she can at wordy explaining. It doesn't take her long...which means she's probably done this lock before. There are a few small clicks as everything falls into place, and the rod turns, and the lock opens. (For what it's worth, she doesn't actually open the chest. Yeah definitely has picked this before if she's not curious what's in it; she already knows.)

"Harder than it looks, I promise."

So there really is quite a bit of concentration involved here, huh? At least at first. Ellana imagines it must get easier with time, and feel more natural. But right now, the idea of clicking switches into position is pretty daunting. Just because Rachette can do it with practiced ease doesn't mean Ellana thinks it's easy.

"I don't doubt it. So I'll feel when the switch has pushed back into the right spot? And the rod keeps them there until they're all done?" Or has she missed a step here? It's not a lot of steps, but it's something she can't see. She'll have to feel for herself.

"Yeah! It's like...it's like you're starting to turn a key. So when the switch starts falling back down, the lip of the turning mechanism catches it so it doesn't go all the way back. So if you're pulling too hard, you can't even move the other switches, but if you don't have any pressure, then they'll fall right back down. You'll feel it when it's right, because it'll stop falling. And when it's all right, click, you're in!"

Listen, you could find a worse teacher. This is pretty exciting in a way. She clicks the lock back into place. "Want to try? Be gentle."

Ellana wonders if she could find a half-built lock somewhere so she can see all the little moving pieces inside. Then maybe she'd have a better idea of what she's up against. Right now, it's all still very vague, though that's hardly Rachette's fault.

"Sure!" She takes the rod and pick and takes a good look at the tip of each before sliding in the rod. "Why gentle? Could I end up ruining the tools if I don't do it right?"

Maybe someone has practice locks around! She sure doesn't. "Yeah, actually. Might bend the rod or snap the pick, but I'm not worried about it. Besides, like I said, you could kind of make them out of anything in a pinch. Would rather have my tools intact, though."

"I'll do my best," she says, starting to feel around inside and finding that it's just as hard as she thought it would be. The little mechanisms are so tiny that it requires a lot of concentration and a very sure touch to determine if she's actually moving things. Practice locks would be a great thing. Maybe with the inside made of metal and the outer part made of glass?

"Hmm, I think I feel one." Ellana pushes it back into place and checks to see if the lock will open. Nope. Time to check the next.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

get me out of this place before I cause more damage

backflipping dwerf

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