Event: Day 343 [open]

[bastionpc]

Who: everyone, and some NPCs
Open: Open
When: Day 343
Where: The bastion, the lagoon, and the ura camp
What: the pieces are starting to fall together
Format: action
Warnings: none

See individual threads within the post for scene starters.

Comments

[bastionpc]

[Normally he would say no, because drinking and working are not a good combination, but today he makes an exception and takes the bottle.]

Thanks. It's good to know at least SOMEONE around here isn't an ass.

[He's not mad at you Anya, he's mad at other people. Like Zahi.]

[dontyoujustwish]

No, I just possess an exceptionally fine one.

[You can look, she won't stop you.]

So what happened? No one broke the monument, did they?

[bastionpc]

No, that's fine, it's just...

[He sighs and deflates a bit.]

I work my ass off to keep everything going here. Would it kill someone to maybe say 'thank you' instead of 'what you made is crap, fix it'?

[dontyoujustwish]

The people who do the most for a community are often unappreciated. People feel entitled to things like living, and not falling out of the sky, and if you even bring up material compensation, it's considered immoral.

It must be very frustrating for you.

[bastionpc]

Just a little bit, yeah.

[He's going to down a huge drink of that booze.]

...I didn't mean to hit him.

[Anya didn't say anything about it, but with the bottles from the distillery, he can guess how she even knew to come over here in the first place.]

[dontyoujustwish]

Who, Zahi?

He probably deserved it. [Let's face it, he's a man. You all deserve to be punched for something.] What did he say anyway?

[bastionpc]

He DID deserve it. But I shouldn't be punching people just because they're jerks.

He was giving me grief about the amulets again! Telling me to fix this, fix that, why aren't things translating right, that sort of thing. And he got really annoying about it, and I've been so busy with altering the land function, I just lost it and punched him.

[dontyoujustwish]

That seems reasonable. So what if the amulets aren't translating perfectly? People could just put in a little effort to learn the local language and then we wouldn't even need them, would we?

[bastionpc]

It wouldn't even have to be the local language, if we could all just agree on one to focus on. But he kept focusing on that 'first son' business. I told him, you just have to look at the context clues. But he wouldn't believe me when I said that I thought it was 'Pyth' that was being mistranslated.

[dontyoujustwish]

I'd say going by a god's name was conceited, but we are talking about a man.

Have you ever spoken to him yourself?

[bastionpc]

Who, Zahi? Yeah, we talk pretty frequently. Usually about stuff to keep the Bastion running. What needs to be done, how many resources we need, stuff like that. As annoying as he can get, he's actually pretty good at micromanaging people.

[dontyoujustwish]

[...Nate, we were just talking about your conversation with Zahi.]

No, no, I mean the boy who calls here sometimes talking about "First Son."

[bastionpc]

[The stress and booze is affecting his brain ok.]

Oh. ...no, I don't think I ever did.

[dontyoujustwish]

No time to spend in phone booths?

[The way she puts it makes it sound like there are much more interesting things you could do in a phone booth besides making phone calls.]

[bastionpc]

[That gets a raised eyebrow from Nathaniel. Just what are you getting at, Anya?]

Not really, no. There's way too much work to do around here.

[dontyoujustwish]

[Hmm. Well, if that's true, he couldn't be the one talking to Zero. It's sounding like he's innocent of this.]

Say, do you think it might be the phone booth that's messed up the translation? Since you've never taken a look at it, you couldn't know for sure, right?

[bastionpc]

...you know, I hadn't considered that.

[Now his tech-mind is wondering about it.]

If you could show me where it is-

[And he stands up, only to stumble. Nathaniel doesn't hold his liquor well.]

[dontyoujustwish]

Hey, careful!

[Anya comes in to offer a steadying hand. How about a pretty lady right up in your personal space?]

Of course I'll show you the way.

[bastionpc]

[That...is actually pretty nice. Nathaniel hasn't had much time for being interested in women, but right now he is acutely aware of the fact that he is standing very close to Anya.]

Right, yeah, sorry. I guess I just, er, lost my balance.

[dontyoujustwish]

It's all right.

[She takes his arm to lead him on eastward and up the hill to the random phone booth.]

Kind of an inconvenient place for it, huh?

[bastionpc]

Just a little bit, yeah. Probably got grabbed up in a land grab.

[There are more technical words for it, but it's hard to explain at the moment.]

[dontyoujustwish]

I did hear it used to be floating around outside somewhere, but I don't leave the Bastion very often.

[bastionpc]

Yeah, I heard that too, must've floated in.

[Then he frowns suddenly.]

It- the guy who's messing with us, he used this before it was in here.

[dontyoujustwish]

I think he's used it after it got here, too.

We must see him all the time, and he goes right on lying to us.

[Which is about what Anya expects from men anyway, but she still has plenty of capacity to be upset about it.]

[bastionpc]

It- It can't be a lot of people here, they never went out on the skyway.

[But who? Who could it be?]

...Pyth. That's what 'first son' means: Pyth.

Zulf told about the Gods a while ago. It has to be someone who was listening to that. Nobody else would know the legends.