( closed ) player plot: the stars go waltzing

[eviscerates]

WHO: Adelaide, Araceli, Avery, Bellamy, Bruce, Ciri, Cosima, Daenerys, Jamie, Korrin, Lexa, Martel, Merrill, Ruby, Sabine, Teren.
WHAT: catch all log; the capture of shardbearers, their rescue, and related shenanigans.
WHEN: Gently timey wimey for flexibility, Team Rescue arrives at the outpost on the 10th.
WHERE: Orlais/Nevarra borders (roughly halfway between the Fields of Ghislain and Trevis), and then a Creepy Place.
NOTES: Log for the missing shardbearers player plot; ooc here & here. Only the travel threads for teams one and two are going up for now, the rest will go up on Friday :]b And to clarify - when I say party style, what I mean is subthread to your hearts content!
WARNINGS: HORROR THEMES. Abduction, experimentation/torture, forced ingestion of lyrium, implied past deaths/murder, violence.

SPEEDY LINKS

• TEAM ONE: travel to Craintellier
• TEAM ONE: rift two attempt & Venatori attack
• TEAM ONE: dungeons
• TEAM ONE: escape attempt — Cosima, Jamie & Lexa only
• TEAM TWO: travel to Craintellier
• TEAM TWO: post rift investigation — Adelaide, Bellamy & Sabine, Bruce, Korrin & Teren, Ciri & Merrill
• TEAM TWO: take the outpost — Attack & Distract & Stealthy & Stealy
• TEAM TWO: regroup & into the dungeons — plus a Lexa-shaped guest star
• ALL: finding your shardbearers
• ALL: boss fight
• ALL: epilogue & return to Skyhold — tba

click for bigger version. full map of Thedas here.

East of Perendale and south of Trevis, next to a river's winding course, there lies the bones of a fortress. It is an old and almost forgotten place, a dramatic, clawed seeming thing reaching up into the sky, harsh against the the rolling hills.

It is an ancient place, dating back to 660TE, a testament to an Empire suffering after civil war and grasping to restore its wealth and influence after it had been so shaken. It stands as a memory of grandeur, rather than an icon of it, and bears the marks of devastation and scarring that so much of the land suffered during the First Blight. It was all but abandoned thereafter, host only to the desperate and the greedy, and never for long. Once ornate mosaics now only hold flecks of gold, flakes that stubbornly resisted the hands of looters trying to pry them away. Other colours, reds, whites, greys and blacks, they all remain.

The site was chosen for its riches, sitting atop a mine that once held immense wealth, seams of gold that would bring wealth back into the Empire and help restore stability. Opulence, the central Tevinter staple (aside from slavery and blood magic, some might say).

But they dug too deep, and when the First Blight came so too did the darkspawn.

It has a new master, now, and he serves the Elder One. Parts of this stronghold may be in ruins now, but remember: it is not what lies on the surface that counts, but what lurks beneath it.


AD VICTORIAM, AD GLORIA.

Comments

that icon wouldve caused a very dramatic turn in this conversation

[thecookery]

"Ah..."

A little embarrassed, Avery awkwardly shrugs and answers, "I don't know. It's been a while since I was, um, involved? With anyone. I'm not very good at... people."

[youwonscience]

"Okay, well, fair enough. If it makes you feel better, my last two relationships were actually people trying to spy on me and I fell for it twice, so it's not like I'm an expert."

She says it lightly, but doesn't seem to be joking.

[thecookery]

...okay, that seriously raises a lot of questions, and Avery honestly just gives Cosima the most baffled look.

"Who are you that you need spying on?"

[youwonscience]

The face she makes is at herself more than Avery. Keeping secrets is not her long suit, and especially in a world without Dyad, she's gotten careless about it, but not everyone's going to take it as well as Ruby had.

"Um. Really, really long story." She sighs, rubbing the back of her neck. "I'll tell you if you're interested, but the short version is that someone did something to me when I was really small and they wanted to see how it affected me as I grew up. And they didn't want me to know they were checking on me."

[thecookery]

"Sounds pretty fucked up," Avery says simply, unsure if she should be asking more or not. She's curious, sure, but again... it sounds pretty fucked up. And even going so far as to have people pose as her lovers to spy on her?

Why are people so shitty all the time forever?

[youwonscience]

Cosima laughs, a little shaky despite herself. "Yeah, it really was. Turns out someone thought I was their property, which is a shitty thing to find out. But... now I'm here."

[thecookery]

"And you're no one's slave here." Because they have a word for being someone's property around these parts.

[youwonscience]

It's... close enough, really, considering. "I guess it's weird to want to go home, when you put it that way. But they think they own my sisters, too." Cosima knows she may not be able to help them, now, but she can't help worrying about them anyway.

[thecookery]

Avery's never had siblings, but she knows a little about wanting to protect family. The lengths some people will go to do that.

"You'll figure something out."

[youwonscience]

"Yeah, of course." Cosima manages a smile. "Sorry, this got kind of weirdly heavy. Didn't mean to just, like, dump my emotional baggage on you."

[thecookery]

That comment just earns her a shrug. Avery might not be good at talking most of the time, but even she can manage shutting up and listening for a bit. "You probably could've picked someone better at this, yeah."

[youwonscience]

"Oh Jesus," she says with a startled laugh, "I don't... It's not really the kind of thing I'd expect anyone to be good at hearing. It's more that, like, you brought up an observation about what I'm eating and somehow I'm making it all about... Everyone's got their own shit, you know?"

Okay, maybe not shit where someone secretly patented their biology. Or where they fell through a Rift into another world. But the point holds.

[thecookery]

"I guess." At this point, Avery is starting to look mildly confused. And not just because she has no idea what a good number of the words Cosima is using at any given time actually mean. "Seems like it helps for some people to talk about things."

Though it sometimes feels like pulling teeth when it comes to Avery's own issues.

[youwonscience]

"I've been accused of being an over-sharer," Cosima says, tacit agreement. "I'll tell you the whole thing, sometime, if you want. But it seems like a conversation one or both of us will need a drink for."

[thecookery]

"You buying?" she asks simply.

[youwonscience]

"Of course. The finest shitty drinks my Rifter allowance can buy."