Quest Birthing a New Sun

[Twister]

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Sunberth--Spring 22, 513 AV

Night had fallen upon Sunberth. The recent fires set parts of the city ablaze and it seemed to glow unnaturally in the dark at a distance, never truly settling to sleep for more than a few minutes at a time as the arsonists in the city vigilantly kept the flares alive, eating away at the corruption and chaos in the lives of the city's citizens.

It wasn't about to stop here, either. The Sun's Birth's Dragoons were out and about the Gated Community, keeping close watch on their own part of the city in the light of the arsonist movement. Truthfully, the arsonists had been carefully avoiding the turf of the Sun's Birth up until now. Their little community was much more crowded than usual as people fled the fires and sought refuge behind the Dragoons' walls, but their charitable approach to the refugees would come to be their downfall. They just didn't know it just yet. Everything went according to plan.

The Dragoons patrolled, making sure no one was out and about. Little did they know, a few choice individuals hid in the shadows between the walls and the cracks in their defenses, eyes turned to the skies as if waiting for something. Beads of sweat trickled down their foreheads as the fear and excitement had their hearts racing. It was all going to happen tonight and they had been waiting for this for days, preparing and rehearsing their movements for the night's operations so everything would go flawlessly. The Dragoons suspected nothing, and they were in for a nasty surprise.

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Malkar and Thelma were both in place. These two had been leading the efforts in the city since the beginning and it seemed they were both well at work with preparing a small pyre out by the Tent City. The inhabitants circled around them on occasion to check what they were up to, some suspicious but all sensible enough to keep their distance from the working pair and their henchmen standing around, anxiously gazing to the skies and in the direction of the Gated Community. Anticipation was thick in the air and the crowd steadily grew. They needed all the manpower they could get, so they'd approached local taverns and neutral establishments for many days now to have the proprietors send potentials their way. Anyone with an interest or strength of arm was asked to present themselves to Thelma in the Tent City before the siege, but the details of the mission were never really detailed. Word was simply that this woman had something to do with the fires in the city of late.

Maybe even was the mind behind them.

That alone was enough to draw enough interest to gather a crowd, and it seemed more people were arriving with every passing chime. Sun set a long time ago already, yet the city was more awake than ever. Thugs, fortune seekers and displeasured citizens gathered around Thelma and Malkar, turning their backs on the pyre-in-progress to watch the crowd and address them with welcoming waves and salutes. Malkar remained silent, however. He knew better than to speak up with Thelma next to him. ... She preferred to do the talking.

"We're hitting a big one tonight. In a moment we'll light the pyre and send a signal up for our associates who are parked already at our target, ready to start a bit of chaos when we tell them to. " Thelma spoke, nodding slowly once she finished before pausing, carefully watching for reactions in the crowd. Better gauge the trustworthiness of their to-be accomplices before they were deep in the frey. "We ask that people take some serious time to consider if they want in on this. It's going to be hot and dramatic and potentially dangerous. We'll be hitting the wolf's den head-on and we'll have to count on the wolves snapping their jaws after us. It ain't going to be easy, this."
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[Braxus]

Rumors moved like rats through the streets of Sunberth. Especially when upheaval and street justice were involved. It was if the whole stinking city was its own life, rejecting any which tried to infringe on its right to be. Braxus was part of this organism, so perhaps it was in his very blood to join the hungry mobs and angry shades of night. After all, he was usually both hungry and angry, so it generally worked out.

He was also tired of bathing the walls of his small house in the Sunset Quarter, throwing what water he could on the roof as well. Fires had been another living thing lately, jumping through the nights. Finding out the source as well as earning a bit of income was a two headed spear. He now found himself among others he had seen from time to time in the shadows and places where few witnesses escaped. He didn't keep eye contact with the others much, his interest on the words of the pair before them all.

Her words warned of danger and of attacking the wolf's den. While an actual wolf might only have bones to pick from and chew on, these wolves had things that they probably wanted to protect. A business venture. Beyond that, it sounded like an excellent opportunity to practice killing under the watchful eye of professionals. School would be in session. His feet stepped forward as others wavered on their heels.

[Gad]

"Charity" was word Gad had trouble believing was in a Sun's Birth vocabulary. They were the definition of mercenary. People in the city looked to the gated community long as the beacon of safety and civilization in the riotous cesspool that was Sunberth. But Gad always recognized a scam when he saw one. The creation of an island of stability all was dependent on a band of extortionist in plate mail fulfilling their end of a the bargain in what was, clearly, a protection racket. Gad couldn't help but grin at it. In a city where tomorrow was roll of the dice, the Sun's Birth had managed to sell peace of mind, served on the edge of a sword. The genius of the whole scheme is what Gad question their motivation. They had a product that sold itself, and they were giving it away? It would seem weird for a shopkeeper in his city to do that, and the Sun's Birth didn't tend anymore towards generosity than that miserly lot. Gad's suspicions were confirmed when he'd arrived in the community that early that morning in the still dark, seeking the refuge he'd heard was assured. Of course, they let him in. And as soon as he'd arrived he'd been handed a shovel, and told to dig. The Sun's Birth were no fools, and they were never charitable. Gad was one of many itinerant street folk to be yoked into constructing a sizable ditch between the eponymous gate of the community, and the equally renowned community, that the aforementioned gate encircled. Construction, it looked, had been undertaken with a fervent urgency, and the progress made was notable. The troubles outside was not out of range of their sight, nor obscured from their minds. The Sun Birth were preparing for a siege, it seemed clear to Gad, as he made his way to the bottom of the trench, to help the digging. He'd spent most of his morning down there, digging up the city's clay foundation in order to help the Sun's Birth continue to sell the illusion of safety to the people of the Gated Community. After a few toilsome bells of the manual labor, Gad had integrated enough into the rest of the digging crew to ask a few questions. "Why do they got us down here doing this in the first place?" Gad bemoaned while they were taking a break from the digging. "I heard that they heard it's about to go down." Said one of the workers. "...What's about to go down?" "I dunno, d'ythink maybe the fires and riots and murders might have something to do with it?" The man snapped at Gad, clearly fatigued and not up for a round of question and answer. Gad could guess by the frantic and readying climate with in the gate, the smell of anticipation, a stench like fear. The worried looks on the resident's faces. The grim stares from the Dragoons patrolling the grounds. Gad worked his way over to the ladder and climbed up. He waited at the top few rungs, just his head poking out of the deep dirt trap that had been worked from the Earth. Gad's eyes poked out over the ledge of the trench. From ground level near the Gate, he could see the tense movements of the guards, the occasional fretted steps of a wealthy patron to the gang, hurrying back into his safety, purloined from those whom his thugs endangered. This was ground level of it all that Gad was at. He could seen now the full extent of the building project. All the displaced dirt was being packed into barriers. Beggars were made slaves to get this done on time and efficiently, and the swollen mass of refugees that had slithered through the Gate of the Gated Community had had it's juices drained to fuel a greater, greedier beast, each man woman and child, indentured for the good of a few. No doubt, these totalitarian tactics were just modified procedures from the Sun's Birth former masters, the Syliran Nights. This particular offshoot had adapted to an environment where honor was a liability, and that had given it so many more choices in the realm of keeping their power. Gad had no doubts about as he looked around. The Sun's Birth and the Gated Community couldn't have cared less about the ditch diggers, and were probably planning on sacrificing them in the confusion that was sure to arise. Gad pulled himself from the hole in the ground as smoothly and stealthily as he could, and tried to duck off into an alley way. He figured if he was caught he'd say he was looking for shade. After sitting in the shade of a building for a few minutes unmolested, he made his way down the alley, cautiously, searching left and right for an abandoned home. He was gambling, but he figured whit all the turmoil, even real estate in the Gated community must be plummeting, so he was looking for one such abandoned home, and any valuables it's evacuating tenants might've left behind. [/ color]

[Twister]

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Back in the Tent City, people were slowly starting to move out. The crowd surrounding the bonfire thinned, leaving only a few people that listened attentively to Thelma's last few pieces of advice and instructions. All the thugs had been told to do was look to the skies and they would know for sure what they were supposed to do. Chimes passed, however, with nothing happening. Over in the Gated Community, things were still quiet. The digging had ended a while ago when the last of the workers collapsed in a pile of dirt he'd just dug up, dragged out by the Dragoons and tossed into a nearby alleyway to a relative "safety". Most of the homes inside the Gated Community were locked this night, most having the sense to protect their belongings despite the worry in the air. It would take Gad a while to find a door that was still open, and the house itself seemed posh enough. The carpet he stepped on when entering was sign enough. It was soft, and his feet sank several inches into it when he weighed down, or so it felt.

Someone with too much money on his hands lived here. That much was obvious. Unfortunately for Gad, most of his valuables had already either been ransacked or taken with the owner when he fled. The furniture still stood, for the most part, but the desks and tables stood naked and the bookshelves were empty. Most of what was left looked like it could probably fetch a nice bit of coin if sold at the right side of the market, but the problem with that would be to actually carry any of it. Furniture had little value in Sunberth, too. They never lasted very long where they went, unless they parked in a well-protected building like this one.

A shuffling nearby caught Gad's attention. Should he turn to face the noise, he would meet a surprised and alarmed pair of eyes, a younger man standing only a few feet away from him. By the looks of him, he was just one of the many street boys of this city, and he looked sorely misplaced in this kind of environment. Before Gad could speak, the boy tried to launch forward at the wizard, aiming to slap a hand over the man's mouth with a panicked hush. He was wiry and small, however, so if Gad would make the quick decision to retaliate before the boy reached him...
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[Gad]

"Tsk" Place was clean, so to speak. Enough wealth to live inside the Gates meant enough wealth to move it. Gad should've known, but he didn't have much time to lament his poor choice of marks. Creeping through the dark a scraggly youth stalked the wizard, his angular framed lurched towards Gad. A twitch of the ear was all the warning Gad needed. Hyper-vigilance was a necessary survival trait on the streets of Sunberth, and the patter of feet behind you in the dark was a sound you'd pay attention to. If you didn't, you wouldn't live to regret it. The wizard spun on his heels sending a left hay-maker around to clock the younger guy in the temple. It sent him reeling off balance, and he let out a restrained moan, a leashed cry of pain. Gad didn't spare time and continued the combo, throwing a right uppercut to the boy's gut to knock his wind out, his left grazed the retreating man's chin, and quickly Gad wrapped his fingers around the boys neck, both of them falling downward from the momentum as Gad lunged. They hit the ground with a thud, and Gad could see the kid's eyes go wide in the shaft of light that fell on his face, shining through- as it was- the nearby window. Gad debated for a moment. Underneath his tight grip the urchin wriggled and writhed, struggled and wheezed with his hands clawing inefficiently at Gad, who had long arms and reach. Hrm...don't wanna murder this fool, looks like he's got something to say. "Listen you ugly bastard, I'm gonna loosen my grip. You say your piece, if I like it, you live. But if I think you're calling for the guards, I'm gonna bash your head against this floor. You'll be dead before the 'goons get here, and I'll be gone." The younger man's bulging eyes showed enough of what passed for recognition that Gad eased his fingers off of the groves they'd worked into the kid's frail neck. A funnel of air poured down the assailant's throat and his chest expanded and he gasped. "Uaah..." he panted " huhuh...thanks, I think this is all just a misunderstanding, what's your name friend?" His voice was soft and raspy. Gad's brow raised high above his emerald windows. Skeptical as he was, he figured he had his prey pinned, and could afford to find out what the guy wanted. "Gad, I-" A meaty thwack landed across Gad's cheek, sending pink spittle across the room. He felt a foot slam into, and then push into, his balls. The pressure vanished, and then reappeared in his gut as another kick landed in his abdominal. He reeled, briefly, and stumbled into standing position. Quickly, the spry youngster bolted to an odd abandoned chair and raised it towards Gad, brandishing it menacingly, and with surprising ease, as even compared to the lanky Gad he sported a wiry build. Through his own subdued grunts of pain Gad spoke. "You weaselly sonuvabitch, cheap mother-" "-Hey! Shuddup, you almost choked me to death man! Think I'm gonna sit here and let you do... I-don't-know-what to me? Look, I don't really wanna fight." Kid had a point. "Fine fine! Just keep it down. Now, what in the name of sweet Syna's bloody stool were you doing sneaking up on me?" Gad's hand clutched his lower stomach and the other rested on his knee and he stood there half doubled over (quartered over?) in pain that only now was starting to seep through his stomach.