RESONANCE
Act I Scene III
Act I Scene III
Camp Drybone, on an unexpectedly rainy day
It was the sort of day that left the residents of Drybone feeling both fulfilled and sullen, for it was anything but dry. A torrent of warm rain pounded on the little village, and the Aetheryte square was soaked in an inch of mud, with more ochre and clay-laden water cascading in little waterfalls from the bluffsides above.
The rainfall was a blessing, in that it meant that the meager crops around the settlement would be healthy and hearty, and the boon to the local wildlife meant work would be easier on the guards for a day or two, as the local fauna, bolstered and sated by the sudden plenty, were more apt to prey upon one another rather than harass the locals out of the normal sort of animal desperation. However, on these unusual, very uncommon days, tourists and traders and travelers were apt to mutter and complain about the name of the town, wondering about where the dry went, how the bones must surely have been washed away, and how Mudbowl would surely be a more accurate name. This was the source of the sullenness that would hang over the locals, who were too dependent on the trade to truly vent their feelings on the matter.
Very little stirred in the square besides the rainwater: the guards and Brass Blades were huddled under the eaves and canopies of the shop entrances, doing their best not to become sodden. The mix of emotions and the rain had quickly led a swarm of patrons into the settlement's little tavern, which quickly filled beyond capacity, turning the place into a standing-room-only sea of bodies and chatter, filling the air with the smells of sweat, mud and ale. It was too full even to allow the two more entrants to push inside, and so like the guards at other posts, they huddled under the eaves, pulled back to the wall to escape the encroaching puddles.
Nearest to the door of the pub was a Lalafellin woman, lanky for her race, with wide Plainsfolk eyes enhanced by dark cosmetics, and hair of violet hue. She was a contender for the most impeccably dressed person in Drybone that day, clad in black satin coat and pants and matching shoes, though the shoes and the lower pantlegs were thorougly mudsplattered, causing their wearer to frown and look down at herself.
"Mmf, this will take forever to clean. If we can't trust Drybone to be dry, it's a lesson in trust overall." The voice was crisp and prim. She folded her arms, and peered out into the hazy square, in which the Aetheryte was heavily obscured by the weather.
Her companion towered over her, but was still petite for her kind - a Roegadyn woman of golden-brown skin and red-orange locks. Two bells ago, despite her size, or perhaps even because of it, she had presented a ravishing figure of her kind: Hair combed and styled up in waves, face enhanced with a flattering blush and heavy mascara, and her voluptuous figure left to little imagination in a tight, low-cut black coattee and skirt. However, her own shoes, black and usually vibrant with white lace frills, were similarly mudlogged, and the humidity had already begun the process of thinning her makeup, which threatened to run at any moment; her clothing was already slightly damp, and were it any wetter, might have threatened to show her off more than necessary, save for the dark coloration of it. She was studiously avoiding touching any part of herself, though, save for one. She held a thin, especially sharp and jagged knife, not the sort one would expect to see held by a woman so dressed, and was cleaning her manicured nails, frowning at them in much the same way as the Lalafell frowned at her own shoes.
"Wetsludge, that's what I'm calling this place!" The Roegadyn's voice carried hints of a breathiness that might have gone well with her attire, but was pierced by notes that could only be properly called whining.
The other looked up at her, not bother to unfold her arms. "Oh, stop it. You're going to get dirty looks from the guards..." The Lalafell peered across the way at the Brass Blade guards, who, actually, were watching the pair, but with expressions that, even from there, were recognizable as lewd. "Oh, never mind, just stop. He'll be here when the weather permits."
The Roe's reply began with a high-pitched hmph, and she lowered her knife. "He shoulda been here before that, the lazy bum. I coulda filched a chocobo and a cart and done it myself in the time he's taking!"
"No, because you wouldn't, and you don't know anything about successfully harvesting those..." The Lalafell cut her voice to a whisper, suddenly. "Items." The last word was a hiss.
"I could do it if I wanna! I just shouldn't have to!" The Roe's face turned into a pout.
"Just... don't make me say it." The smaller woman stared out into the rain.
"Say what? You've been throwin' that at me for a fortnight now, and I'm gettin' tired of this Midget of Mystery thing you think you have going on! YOU stop it!" She tucked the dagger within her cleavage and folded her arms under her bosom.
The Lalafell cringed at that, and her hands flexed, and began to glow in an orange aura; motes and sparks of flame flew from them. It lasted but for two seconds. She took a pair of breaths, straightened her posture, and directed a powerful stare at her companion, struggling to keep her words to a loud whisper rather than a traveling shout.
"I will tell you once more, and only once more, Melange. The only reasons you are here at all, AT ALL, are for distraction, motivation and eye candy. We will meet our seller, and I am going to give him a ten percent bonus and convince him that the weather will be the perfect cover, to get him to make the haul in the rain and the mud. You are going to do what you do, and wiggle like a cheap courtesan if you have to, to get him to agree, and this time, do not pick his pocket! Just because the Lord favored your bouncy arse in his chambers once, ONCE, Melange, does not mean you are immune to..."
"He was blackmailing me, you know that!" The whiny voice was whinier still.
"Because..." The shout was pulled back into a loud whisper again, and the Lalafell wagged her finger at her tall companion. "Because you can't keep your hands out of pockets, and you are JUST useful enough for that reason, otherwise, he'd have given you to the Yellowjackets instead of bedding you once, ONCE, and hiring your grabby-handed..."
The door to the tavern flung open near them, interrupting, and a pair of dusky Hyuran women bolted past them into the torrents. The Lalafell took another breath, and ran her hand through her hair, continuing before the open-mouthed Roe could interject.
"Just play your role, and we'll be done with this, and you can go back to prancing your way around again, and I can get back to working with him in the lab, and we'll both be happy."
The Roegadyn's mouth opened wide, then clamped shut, and then opened again, and she giggled. "I knew it! Threnn is jealous, Threnn is jealous, nyah!"
The Lalafell glared up at her, and then back at the obscured Aetheryte. "All that meat hanging off you, and you just can't grow up into it, can you? Wise up. He's no longer interested in you, so you'd be wise to just be useful."
"Bah! I've got plenty of use! You ain't so smart." The Roe's hands fell to her hips.
"You might have Obelisk under your finger, but if you don't give him a little something soon, even he's going to get tired of it, and then he won't be there to keep Glimmer from doing to you what you know she'd love to do to you, if she wasn't as dedicated to this project as I am. Now, just be patient, unless you really want to go running out in a storm dressed like we are."
Melange clamped her mouth shut - for a moment. "Fine, fine! But Thal's nuts, where could he be... and why here?"
Threnn waved towards the east, and replied quiety and slowly, in a schoolteacher's tone for a wayward child. "The Mor Dhonan crystals are too stable, too hard to resonate, for this stage. We need something more volatile, and from somewhere that they would just as likely not be missed. Burning Wall meets both those criteria, but it's a dangerous climb, and the Mirrorknights are a constant hazard, and the goods have to get past Highbridge, and... I know we told you this, this morning..."
The Roegadyn woman had already recovered her knife, and was trimming away at her nails again.
"...and you were as attentive, then. Just, pull your top up. You're sagging."
Melange eeped, and tugged upward on her coatee, and the rain continued.
"But in the laugh there was another voice. A clearer laugh, an ironic laugh. A laugh which laughs because it chooses not to weep."