MOD PLOT ↠ STILL RISING, STILL DEVOURING

[faderifting]

WHO: Everyone
WHAT: Sea beasts!
WHEN: Justinian 9:49 (now)
WHERE: Ostwick, Kirkwall, and the Amaranthine Ocean
NOTES: OOC post here! CW for some cruelty/violence toward mythological monsters/animals and also one ferryman. Use other CWs in your subject lines as appropriate.

I. INTERVENTION AT OSTWICK

The earliest reports from Riftwatch's contacts among the coastal Free Marches arrive in a confusing tangle in hours before dawn. The Venatori have taken Hercinia—no, a dragon has only destroyed a little piece of it—no, wait, yes, a dragon, but a dragon from the sea—wait, no, maybe pirates? Scratch that. Sea dragon, Venatori involvement, and ships and something massive moving west into the Waking Sea.

That is all the information Riftwatch has when it begins loading hastily woken people and griffons onto ships at sunrise to set out to intercept whatever it is, doing whatever it is trying to do, before it does more of it wherever it is trying to go.

Fortunately/unfortunately, those questions quickly answer themselves.

Scouts on griffons flying ahead of Riftwatch's ships spot the disturbance in Ostwick's harbor before they reach the city. Churning water, crunching wood, shouts of terror, and most of all an enormous shell, encrusted with stripes of spiky red crystals, housing something with an over-abundance of mandibles that it's using to funnel whatever it can reach toward its even more overabundant spiky teeth and a long spike of a tail lashing dangerously behind it. The huge tentacles of a giant octopus, encrusted with red barnacles, flatten boats with a slap, and sweep the length of the quay to fling soldiers and fleeing citizens into the water. The sinuous length of a sea serpent darts in and out of sight, its writhing revealing patches of scales replaced by crystalline growth. Occasionally it rises out of the water to snatch someone off a deck with a snap of triangular jaws, or twines around the center of a small merchant vessel and squeezes, dragging it down beneath the water with a tremendous creak of wood strained to breaking and the screams of its crew, all quickly silenced.

These enormous beasts are the largest and most obvious problem, but not the only one. Outside the harbor are a half-dozen small Tevinter vessels, Venatori colors unfurled, keeping their distance from the scorpion-crab's spiky tail, and something else red and silver and massive lurking beneath the surface of the deeper water nearby. On the decks of several are pillared structures that look like lantern posts but are topped by large crystals of red lyrium. Between each set of these beacons are stood two figures: a mage with a lyrium-crusted staff and a strange helm of red lyrium, chains of the crystal strung like armor down chest and arms, and a Templar in an identical helm, armor studded with lyrium and cut to accommodate the crystals that grow out of arms and shoulders. If someone chances a close inspection, their eyes glow red and lips seem to move in unison.

Ostwick is putting up the best defense it could muster with little warning, but its first order of business was evacuating the naval ships in the harbor before any more could be destroyed and only after first scattering to safety are a few of those undermanned vessels circling back around behind the harbor-devouring monsters and engaging the Venatori ships. The city guard on ground evacuate civilians and those on the walls of the inner city send forth volleys of arrows that bounce uselessly off of scales and shells.

As soon as Riftwatch's ships arrive they will find themselves bombarded by small missiles too—a veritable school of flying fish, flinging themselves out of the water and over the deck of the Walrus and the Fancy. With razor-sharp wingfins and needle teeth, they are unpleasant to have at face-height in any circumstance, and like their larger comrades these too are encrusted with red lyrium, the crystals adding weight and cutting edge and the threat of madness and blight to any blow they manage to strike—so it would be very wise to avoid that.

The teeming waters become even more cramped and chaotic when the beast hiding beneath the water near the Tevinter ships, its nose terminating in a sword-like spike meters long, appears from the depths to skewer a small naval vessel attempting to make an escape. The spear punches clean through the ship's hull but becomes stuck, and the ship is tossed from side to side, slapped against the water, flinging debris and passengers and shockwaves as the beast thrashes wildly in an attempt to remove it, its plight blocking the harbor mouth.

Riftwatch's captains keep their ships back at a relatively safe distance just outside the harbor, launching all the griffon-riders they've been able to muster on short notice, and bringing to bear what ranged attacks they have: large deck-mounted crossbows require aiming and winding, and though their heavy bolts can punch through armor and even decking, the time it takes to prepare each shot makes catching the fast-moving sea monsters difficult. Flinging rocks and alchemical grenades in the stone-throwers is faster, but less accurate. Most of the work will fall to those on griffon-back or brave enough to take a launch through the chaos to the quayside or what remains of the piers, to attack the beasts from above or in even closer quarters.

For a time the battle is largely contained to the harbor, the sea monsters seemingly driven to do as much damage in the harbor as they can, dragging people into the water, the scorpion crab's barbed missiles punching holes in waterside buildings, and thrashing tentacles fling wreckage onto shore. Some of the trapped ships fight on, and welcome aid from Riftwatch reinforcements ferried by griffon to help them escape or evacuate their crews to shore.

When the swordnose and its wooden nose ring stop blocking the harbor a small pack of ships make a run for it, and at the same time Ostwick's navy attempts to re-engage, the battle spilling out into the sea before the harbor. The sea snake appears suddenly alongside the Walrus, water pouring from it as its angular head rises over the ship's middle and darts across, flinging its scaly bulk amidships. It lands with a thunderous crash and slides through the trough it has made in the rail, scales gliding and crystals scraping the hull as it coils around the vessel, preparing to crush and it drag it down into the deep unless Riftwatch hacks and magically blasts it free in time.

As Riftwatch finds ways to put down the great beasts, Ostwick succeeds in sinking two of the Venatori ships and the others flee east back into the Amaranthine. The sword-nosed monster flees after them, once again stuck to a boat, this time via a harpoon lodged in its side dragging along the small craft on the other end of the line like a flag signaling its position. Riftwatch at least briefly gives chase, and after a few miles it becomes clear that this is not blind escape—the beast is traveling constantly in a straight line, as if drawn by a magnet. Scouting ahead along that trajectory, Riftwatch will discover that there is indeed somewhere in particular it is heading.

II. CHAOS IN KIRKWALL

Meanwhile, in Kirkwall–

It is Gallows ferry rush hour, the time of day when people who live in the city or who just want to get out of the fortress for dinner pack onto the ferry between their little island and the Kirkwall docks. The ferry only has so many seats, and the day's ferryman–Murph–is the energetic and impatient variety of salty old man who waits for no one, so some may have just missed it and be left standing on the Gallows' docks, watching twenty minutes of their lives row away.

But it turns out they're the lucky ones, because when the dinghy and its passengers are midway to shore, there's a swell of water, and for a moment the odd absence of waves, before a massive reptilian head breaks the surface and smoothly snatches Murph off his perch at the back of the ferry and into its maw.

The enormous shell attached to the head follows close behind it, dragging the ferry along on its crest as the creature–an enormous snapping turtle, more or less, with a long neck and spots of red lyrium on its already-jagged shell–proceeds on its way, slowly emerging from the water as the rocky shallows require it to trade swimming for lumbering. For minute it's too busy eating (sorry Murph) to notice or care about the boat and passengers it is dragging along with it toward the city, but once it does it stops where it is and begins turning its serpentine head back in their direction, snapping the sharp ridges of its mouth at anything it can reach.

So that's the situation. Some number of Riftwatchers are trapped on the shell of a giant red lyrium snapping turtle that is only momentarily distracted from its march toward the docks, left with the choices of climbing onto its shell (while carefully avoiding the lyrium) or leaping into the water behind it and hoping it doesn't turn back in their direction. Others, watching back at the Gallows, may have the presence of mind to run for the eyrie, whether they're very good with the griffons or not, or go for one of the emergency boats kept behind the fortress. Those ashore have other options: the Kirkwall guard is quick to organize a defense, and the turtle is coming their way sooner or later, with or without ferry's worth of Riftwatch members stuck on its back.

In the midst of the chaos, it will take a keen eye or two to notice a two figures on the deck of an unmarked ship in the harbor whose ceaseless murmurs and quick, closely-held gestures give away their involvement. It is, specifically, spellcasting that picks up in speed and intensity whenever the turtle seems to be reconsidering the wisdom of its march toward the shore. Someone will have to do something about them, too.

III. COMMOTION IN THE OCEAN

Following the heading of the escaping sword-nosed monster leads Riftwatch to a strange sight. A mile or two off the end of a small chain of uninhabited islands is anchored a flotilla of loosely-connected ships arranged in a semi-circle. They fly no flags but it won't be difficult to guess at their allegiance—red lyrium beacons float on buoys, and on the deck of one ship is a pair wearing red lyrium helms and wielding red lyrium staves, seemingly calling the fleeing sea monster home.

Riftwatch's assault will take them by surprise. The place is guarded and manned by mages and Templars, several of them lyrium-augmented and capable of inhuman strength and stamina, the crystals growing from their bodies serving as both armor and weapon. Most of its denizens are at least somewhat combat trained, and nearly all will put up some sort of fight. But the majority don't seem to be soldiers and it isn't a big facility. It won't take nearly as long to kill or subdue its workforce as it did the monsters that it now appears may be their creations, or at least under their control.

At first, the semi-circle configuration of the vessels appears random, arranged around nothing but an unremarkable patch of ocean. But every so often something causes the surface at that point to roil, and at one point during the battle a wave races out from that point to rock the ships on their anchor chains sharply enough to send the unwary toppling to the deck before settling again.

When the assault ends, investigation of the site will find a curious combination of equipment, some appropriate to a fishing village, some familiar from Venatori research operations, and some strange apparatus of metal and glass and tubing. Cleansing runes inscribed into the exteriors of most of the ships, save one that appears to've been a barracks, bunks reinforced to accommodate the weight of bones studded by crystal growths, storage chest including a stock of red lyrium potions. Other chests contain armor and equipment corrupted with the same.

Eventually, someone will spot a strange vertical length of pipe near the rail on the central ship, at the point nearest the center of the semi-circle. One end travels through the deck, the other up to head height for a man, an angle just before the open top end inviting passers to step up and try looking in. Doing so will find it is a primitive periscope, its other end reflecting a scene beneath the water: a hill of dark rock broken open and glowing with magma along its fissures, flows of lava bubbling up from the spout and spreading slowly outward, occasionally heaved upwards with greater force. At first it may seem a trick of the light, dim and shifting with the waves above, but soon they will realize it is not just the orange-red of molten rock heated to boiling, but a brighter, deeper shade they've seen everywhere today: the red of tainted lyrium.

The good news is that this discovery means Riftwatch has minimal worries about tainting an untainted environment by burning, sinking, and otherwise dismantling the floating base and its red lyrium adornments. It's still a slow, careful undertaking, to avoid destroying any useful information or exposing anyone to the red lyrium in the process. Examining notes and underwater evidence will confirm that the Venatori were luring sea monsters to the volcano by drawing them in with food or distress calls, then casting spells to paralyze them. Wounding the animals while keeping them in close proximity to the underwater magma resulted in the wounds healing over with red lyrium crystals.

In the meantime those with any skill in cartography do their best to chart the location of the facility so they'll be able to find the volcano again without any sign of it above the water. And Riftwatch also takes time to check out each of the nearby islands—unpopulated and unaffected by the lyrium so far, on investigation, with some abandoned campsites that indicate the Venatori were using them to replenish food and fresh water for the operation but no lingering dangers. Once that's confirmed, Riftwatch is able to set up a camp on the beach of one of the islands and give anyone who needs it a break from sleeping on the ships for the remaining days of their demolition project.

Comments

[favoriteanalyst]

"So long as Riftwatch is able to keep some set aside for those of us that still take, there shouldn't be any problems. If we ever run into a shortage..." Mobius gives a shrug. "Shove an emergency lyrium potion in our hands every couple days? It's not exactly the same, but might be same enough."

That sounds like that should be that. And it should be. There's not even a lecture on how he needs to quit the habit, even if it's recommended, and for good reason. He almost even lets it go at that. Withdrawal symptoms are far more likely what he'll run into, after all.

If the rest tends to go unsaid, then this in particular is something that is kept close to the chest. His fingers curl along his legs, straighten out again. Fascinating how he still retains muscle memory for muscles he can no longer feel. (It's tendons being pulled by muscles he can feel, to be technical, but not the point.) That's probably what will keep him going, if he lives that long. Muscle memory.

"Stephen." He looks up, steels himself when he catches the eyes of a friend.

"There are long-term effects. Besides the addiction. Things you see in the older Templars, things you see in the ones lucky enough to retire with a nice controlled stipend of lyrium to your name and a little place in Val Royeaux. And you're probably going to try harder to get me to quit, but what I do--what I can do is too important. I've been doing this for decades. Flint will keep stealing me away for missions for Forces, I'm sure, because of what I can do, and I intend to keep being able to do it. With any luck, I'll be dead long before it becomes an issue. Do you understand?"

[portalling]

Small blessings, that Stephen isn’t quite enough of an asshole to lecture someone else about their substance use which he only just learned about, like, five minutes ago. Particularly when there were only seemed to be downsides in quitting: you would be eliminating the risk of going into accidental withdrawal, but it was balanced against the pain of withdrawal itself, and losing your powers.

But this changes the equation, abruptly tips the scales. It seems there was something Mobius hadn’t mentioned, has skirted around, and almost omitted entirely.

After a pause, Stephen asks: “What long-term effects, precisely? And how old?”

He’s shooting the other man a sharp, doubtful look: at the laughter-lines around Mobius’ eyes, the pure shock of grey in his hair. He’s, what, fifty?

Not aged yet, but also not young.

[favoriteanalyst]

"More length of use than how old you are, which is why you see it in the older ones. Don't ask me numbers; I don't know. Like every other damn thing, it's gonna be different factors, and it's also one of those things that tends to be gradual enough that you don't know it's happening until you're ass-deep in it."

And Stephen hasn't agreed to much of anything, here, but if he stops now or pesters until he hears a 'yes I understand' and a 'no I won't talk you out of it' and a 'cross my heart and hope to die I won't tell a single other soul this fact ever', their stubborn natures are going to spin wheels against each other.

Mobius slumps back and spreads his hands. Tries to say it, doesn't, then tries again.

"I said one of the withdrawal symptoms was getting forgetful. And...the funny flip of the coin is, long-term use does the same thing. You start to forget. Everything. A little and a little at a time until you're not a whole lot better than a doorstop. And for some Templars, who don't have anyone to care for them, who want to be on the job until they drop, some just get sent to some chantry Maker knows where and plays guard duty. Guess some things just get so ingrained you couldn't forget even with your brain fried. You get--clumsy, you get agitated, you get disoriented. I've heard it called dementia before. If you don't stop and you don't die, that's how you end up. Losing more and more of yourself."

And it's utterly terrifying, scares him near as much as Red Templars do (for a lot of the same reasons, if he's honest). He's spent his whole life reading and learning and knowing things. All that effort, to eventually be erased. Little by little.

He looks at Stephen, just this side of helpless, and then to the middle distance. "I've been--I try to write things down. So I don't forget. Ever since my hands went, writing's such a pain in the ass, so now it's even harder to keep track. Anytime I forget something, I have to wonder: is that just me being human who can't keep everything in my head all the time? Or is it the lyrium finally starting to eat away at me? If it's started, it's not bad enough yet to notice, and Maker willing, by the time it gets that bad, I'll be a wizened old fool ready to go anyway."

[portalling]

If he were a little less distracted at the moment, he’d feel oddly gratified that Mobius knows him so well by now. That he didn’t try to force Stephen into an additional promise beforehand, and that muttered you’re probably going to try harder to get me to quit. Because it’s true: Stephen’s first kneejerk thought is what the fuck, you should quit immediately.

For a neurosurgeon, this is his own personal nightmare. That sounds hellish, he’d said, but he was wrong. This part is so much worse.

“God, Mobius, that’s…” He falters out. Tries to imagine it. Can’t. Stephen Strange’s own mind has always been the sharpest thing about him, even when his body failed him and fell short.

“Dementia is a fucking nightmare, even back in my world; we don’t have a cure for it either. And you really haven’t reconsidered? You still want to keep taking it, knowing that awaits you? You could still be useful in Forces, swinging a sword without your templar abilities. Plenty of people swing a sword without bringing magical abilities to the field. Flint himself, for one.”

This is why he couldn’t promise in advance to understand. To not try, as an initial reaction, to talk his friend out of it. He can’t not.

[favoriteanalyst]

Even with the fear, even with that deeply rooted fear of the thing inside of him waiting to tear him apart, he's going to be one of those assholes who thinks his faith sustains him. And stubborn determination. He sighs, a deep and vaguely annoyed sound, shaking his head.

"How many Templars, active ones, who still take the damn stuff do you think are in Riftwatch right now? And how often do we go up against mages? The Venatori are pretty much all mages, and we can't rely on the Divine's help since she called all the faithful of the Order back to her new Exalted March, which is going just swimmingly." Oh yeah, and this Divine also isn't the friendliest to a lot of their people. "We need to be able to shut that shit down at the source." The long and the short of it, as far as he's concerned. If they can't disconnect mages from their powers out in the field, then they can't win. Maybe that's closed-minded of him, but in a numbers game? Riftwatch is vastly outnumbered.

"I'm here to make a difference. This is how I make a difference! If all you needed was a guy to swing a sword, lots of people can swing a sword. If all you needed was a librarian or another guy who likes to read a little too much when not swinging a sword, you can find that, too. This is what I do. Let me do this."

[portalling]

Stephen’s mouth thins, presses tight around that displeasure. Because as aggravated as he is with this, and what an absolute fucking waste it is for Mobius to have to watch his own slow deterioration and feel himself slip away —

Stephen can, also, understand the motivation. He, too, could have chosen to heal himself at any time — could have held his hands together with magic and gone back to surgery, at the cost of funnelling all his magical attention into keeping them functional, not having anything else left over for actual magic, giving up on being a sorcerer. Giving up his role in saving the world. Instead, he chose living day-in and day-out with that chronic pain and disability. So who the hell is he to say Mobius can’t do something similar?

(Hypocrite.)

He could argue, he could shout back, but instead his fingers just dig into the meat of his crossed arms until his joints ache again.

“You,” he says, “are infuriatingly noble. How the hell am I supposed to argue against that point?”

[favoriteanalyst]

"By telling me I'm being an idiot."

It's almost like weathering Ellie after she found out what he used to do for a living. Because it is a weathering, to face it and to let it wash over and to be somewhat diminished in the wake but to be still standing even still. Stephen's a doctor. Was a doctor. Is. His job is to help patients live their best lives. And Mobius knows people have made it through withdrawal to the other side.

But that's not the point. The point is that he can't do what he does without it, so he has to keep taking it.

"You could say I'm not so noble. I've felt withdrawal before; I don't really want that in my life ever again if I can help it. That's one of those things that makes an addiction an addiction. I don't want to kick the habit; I like the habit. You could tell me we have other ways of fighting the Venatori that don't involve neutralizing magic. You could tell me I'm crazy."

That last point never used to hurt. And he would still ignore anyone who suggested it. But deep in those ruins, when he didn't know who he was, who anyone else was (a taste of things to come), he can still hear those damn birds. Crazy and unrighteous and deluded and ignoble and forgotten. And forgetting. Stephen didn't think him crazy after divulging that the reason he does what he does, why he's with Riftwatch, is just because of signs and portents he thinks he sees in his life. Ellie had shared some experiences. Astarion had humored him, at least, in that cat-like way he had.

Rifters seem to understand it better. The strange and the weird and the miraculous.

It doesn't mean he isn't crazy.

"The red stuff? Does what the blue stuff does but tenfold. Bigger, stronger, bolder. More addicted. They lose themselves in a way that's much faster and much more horrifying. That, that thing I've lost brothers and sisters to, that scares me more than a slow descent. And I gotta tell you, the slow descent scares the piss out of me, but it's a fear that I'm willing to live with so I can keep doing my job. When I die, I want it to be doing my job; I want it to be protecting people from the very real evil that's in this world. So you can argue, if you want. I won't stop you; I'll even try to listen. I almost wish you would," he admits. "But you're not going to change my mind. This is what I was chosen to do."

[portalling]

It’s a sharp twinge in his chest, recognising too much of himself in this man. No wonder they get along. No wonder Stephen likes him.

It’s wild, the whiplash he’s gone through in this conversation. Mobius has pulled the rug out from under him, because first Stephen found himself thinking the addiction was acceptable enough, then utterly untenable, and now: a necessary evil. Because who else is Mobius harming, except himself? Only himself, by throwing himself on that sword.

This is what I was chosen to do.

“I don’t think I ever told you about my teacher,” he says, suddenly, the topic banking sideways. “The Ancient One, I only knew her by that name. She was the one who— she didn’t try to talk me out of sorcery, in fact, the very opposite. She encouraged me, said that the world would have use of my talents and I would be able to do so much more good where I was, if I didn’t do the selfish thing. Taught me to see the bigger picture, the forest over the trees. So the selfish thing, the safer thing, would be to tell you to go through the withdrawal and spare your sanity.

“But unlike people who caught a shard, you had a choice in coming to Riftwatch. And you didn’t come to Riftwatch to be safe. This is a sacrifice. And unfortunately you’re right: this is a war and you can do more good here, with those powers, against these mages. So. I want to tell you to do the thing that’s better for you, but instead I’m going to echo my teacher’s words and say that you have the choice to serve something greater than yourself. And, ultimately, who am I to take that choice from you.”

[favoriteanalyst]

Mobius tips his head in the way he tends to when he's taking in new information and considering it, when he's considering Rifters, when he's considering the person in front of him. Because on the surface of it all, Stephen Strange is a pompous, arrogant man. And Mobius knows for a fact that that isn't true at all.

Well. It's a little true; these are still facets of Stephen's personality. But it is not the whole of him. Sacrifices were made for the power he gained, and the weight of the world on his shoulders is not something that's ever taken on lightly.

"I know I always have a choice. But in a way it didn't feel like I did. I saw the sign and realized where I needed to be. I don't always feel useful, and I don't always feel like I did the right thing sometimes, but where else would I go? Find some other city in the Free Marches to try and rebuild a life only for it to get burned down, too?" He hesitates, just briefly, because that comes very close to Starkhaven. Other places have been wiped off the map, but that's been the biggest so far. He'd let Gela know, but that--

"No, I belong here where I can do the most good. Even if there are people here who would rather see me dead if they thought they could get away with it. And if I die in service to this greater cause, better here than being on the front lines of the Exalted March getting chewed up and spat out. Thank you," he says ultimately, with a sag in his shoulders, "for understanding."

[portalling]

“Sometimes I honestly wish I didn’t,” Stephen admits. “It’s an ugly sort of calculus, burning up your own life. Plus sacrificing others, sometimes.”

He doesn’t elaborate. Instead, fidgety and restless, he picks up a quill from the table and spins it between his gnarled fingers. And there’s something to what Mobius said which is nagging at him, and maybe he’s reading too much into it, but:

“There are people within Riftwatch who literally want to see you dead? — or do you mean, the whole mage-templar war. Thing.”

[favoriteanalyst]

Mobius rolls a hand. "The whole war thing. It's not so much that they hate me; they hate the thing that I am. The thing that I was, that I still have the ability to do." A shrug. "The thing that they see me as whether I say I left the Order or not. There are mages who will trust no Templar, no matter the circumstances. There are those who won't trust me and would feel safer if I was dead just because of that without getting to know me as I am. It's a whole thing."

So, yes, there are people within Riftwatch who literally want to see him dead, because the whole mage-templar war Thing. It's a thing. He is so not interested in getting into that.

[portalling]

“I thought perhaps everyone had settled into their Riftwatch getalong shirts long ago,” there’s that particular phrasing from Arlathan again, automatic and unthinking, “but that makes sense. The memory of a war doesn’t go away quite so quickly.”

Stephen might not get it on the same visceral, blood-spilled-in-the-dirt, thirty-years-in-a-Circle way that the local mages do, but he gets it enough. He’s talked to Julius about Tranquility. Heard enough ugly details to see the shape of it, and to know he doesn’t want to step into this quagmire of a fight which was never technically his. No, we don’t have to get into it.

“Thank you,” he adds after a moment, “for trusting me. I’ll loop back later if anything else which occurs to me or if there’s anything else it seems I might need to know, in a medical capacity.”

Actually. Considering how evasive Mobius had been at first — “… Is there anything else?”

[favoriteanalyst]

"Still can't believe amnesic you remembered that." Old elf ruins are weird and they all need to just maybe stay away from them maybe at this point thanks.

Mobius raises his hands. "No, no, I promise that's it, that's what you need to know." Are there further details that Stephen could know? Sure. But the necessary stuff, that is, he feels, covered. "Just so long as you keep it to yourself. I mean it. If everyone starts whispering about lyrium addiction and addled minds from it, I'll know exactly who to blame."

And the conversation has wrung him out, emotionally. And he would like to be as far from the red lyrium now as possible, so maybe he just needs to call it a night. He stands, and he feels like he's creaky about it. "Let me know if you find anything particularly interesting in all this," with a little wave to the notes and pages. "And get some sleep."

& scene

[portalling]

“Aye aye, sir,” Stephen says, dryly, and turns back to rummaging through the files, trying to understand the bizarre notes, their arcane implications. He bundles up what he finds and obligingly passes it over when other Riftwatch members join him; as they finish pillaging this base and picking it apart and then, ultimately, sinking the installation so it hopefully doesn’t infect any more sea creatures.

He doesn’t try to touch the red lyrium again.