The Day After [Journal]

[Unnamed Mercenary]

((Grouping multiple scenes into this thread for convenience. Scenes will be listed in newest -> oldest order)) 

 

((Note: I'm still getting used to the RP scene here. If I make a post that seems off, or appears to be godmoding/metagaming, please let me know. It was most likely unintentional, and we can work towards a resolution of continuity if it occurs))

 

#### CURRENT SCENES ####

The Day After [Journal Entries]

 

--------PAST SCENES--------

Rebuilding a Life Lost [Journal Entries] : Starting from Post 59, ends post 64

[Echo of the Past Scene [Closed] : Starting from Post 24 in this thread]

[A Mercenary Unhired Scene [Closed] : Following Balmung Bulletin Board Post 74]

 

-------Ancient Intro from Way Back---------

 

The Unnamed Mercenary sat down at one of the free tables. Looking around the Quicksand, there was not a single person he recognized. But that was pretty normal. He wouldn't know them anyway. He knew had amnesia, but this was ridiculous. Flagging a staff down, he made his wants clear. "Hey, I want an ale". There probably wouldn't be anyone looking to hire a mercenary for anything today either.

[111]

Natalie tromped though the crowded bars, everyone giving her a wide berth in her rusty red armor. She knew what the news of their actions against Aya had spread like wildfire, and she also knew she could care less at the moment. She simply wanted to get drunk and escape her burgeoning sense of dread.

 

Several tables were half full, but as she approached the looks of disdain and disgust caused her to pause. Finally she spy's someone who looked as disgruntled and surly as she felt. "Hey there big guy" she says pulling out a chair, "I'm sitting here."

[Unnamed Mercenary]

The Unnamed Mercenary slouches in his chair a bit, "I thought you people have patrols to do", taking a heavy swig of his ale. He was glad the halfmask he wore didn't cover his mouth. He wondered to himself if this person person would be as interesting to play around with as Kage. It'd at least give him something to do. He glanced the Miqo'te women, he figured she was probably half his size and half his age. Could she even fight?

[111]

She drops her helmet onto the table and flags down a server. They approach nervously, and bring her an ale with trembling hands. "Gods..." Natalie thanks the woman and she scurries off.

 

She chuckles at his comment, "I thought someone your size would have pies to eat." she kicks her feet up onto the table. "Did your mask come like that?" She smirks at him,

"Or did you eat the bottom?"

[Unnamed Mercenary]

"She'll do just fine", he thought. Clearly, the Miqo'te was trying to get him riled up. 

"Do /I/ look like someone who's got the gil for that?", this time, making eye contact with her, at least from his point of view. He pointed to the mask with an index finger, "This thing was made this way." 

 

He knew the mask was important for some reason. The message that came with it when he first woke up after being dumped in the desert had said so. While it wasn't exactly a "gift", of the couple memories he did have, he knew that even if a certain woman wasn't after his life, the people below her might be. "People don't tend to remember me, so what's the point of them seeing my face?". 

 

He'd see how far this "conversation" would last. Maybe if he was lucky, his favorite target would walk in as well. Luck had been on his side lately. Or least least everything but financially. No aether mishaps, the one person he was uncomfortable around hadn't asked of anything, what could go wrong?

 

Taking another heavy gulp of the ale again, he put the mug down on the table and leaned over a bit.

[111]

She grins and sips her ale, "You must have had the money..." she waves her hand at his hulking frame, "All of you came from somewhere. Somewhere like a patisserie."

 

She gulps more ale, leaning back and enjoying the sensation. Life had been so complicated lately, but this felt so simple. Gazing curiously upon his mask, "People don't remember you...?" she laughs, "Well then I'll break that trend."

 

"I'm Natalie. What should I call you?"

[Unnamed Mercenary]

He couldn't believe the words flying out of her mouth. Not only was she making fun of him, but she was calling him...overweight? If this went any further, he was sure to snap. There was a limit to how much he could take.

 

 

He felt a surge and realized he was probably draining a lot of the residual aether in the area. Hopefully there weren't any aether-sensitive people around. He did t really feel like having to deal with that. It had been nice being in control while it lasted.

 

 

"Excuse me?" He was still hung up on the pastry comment.

[111]

"I'm suprised you're so hard of hearing, did some of the pastries make it into your ears as well as your mouth?"

 

She pauses and regards him for a moment.

 

"Porkchop."

 

"Porkchop..." she says it again, as if testing the feel of the name, then looks at him and nods, "I'll call you Porkchop."

[Unnamed Mercenary]

Porkchop? PORKCHOP? If his face had been visible, Natalie would have seen one of his eyes twitching. Was this really what he'd been reduced to? He was a proud Garlean soldier, even if the army was still out to kill him. 

 

He couldn't take it any longer. 

 

In a quick motion, he'd overturned the table with one hand, and sent the other with a first straight at the Miqo'te. 

 

"WHO THE BLOODY HELLS ARE YOU CALLING A 'PORKCHOP'?!" Simply put, he'd finally snapped. And as almost expected, the artificial aether unit was back to leaking heavy amounts of aether that had been passively gathered for some time. A few small shards of bright orange over-aspected aether could be seen falling around him. 

 

Who cares if it made a scene? She was /asking/ for it!

[111]

Natalie grins and leans to the side, dodging the cascade of dishes sliding off the table, and makes a strange gurgling noise as his fist impacts her face. Her chair rocks back for a moment, balancing on two legs, before it lazily falls downward.

 

She lies still for a moment, the only movement the trickle of blood from a single nostril, before her eyes snap open. "Oh..." she purrs, "So Porkchop has some fight in him."

 

Hopping to her feet, her mouth locked in a feral and bloodstained grin, she leaps over the overturned table, aiming a flying knee at his stomach.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

As he'd thought, she was enjoying this. If it weren't for getting the air knocked out for a moment, he might not have felt the blow to his torso. It'd been a little while since he'd gotten to engage in a fights without weapons. There was a crazed grin on his face. "Perhaps today won't be boring after all", he thought.

 

"I told ya to stop calling me that!". If she thought we so big, he might as well let her experience it first-hand. The Unnamed Mercenary tackled the Miqo'te, in an attempt to pin her on the ground so he could get a decent hit in.

 

Around the Quicksand, people just stood at the rails, watching the brawl.

[111]

Natalie laughed as the blood pounded in her ears. Enough skulking around, enough threats and knives in the dark. This is what she was meant for, and all it took was a fist in...

 

She loses her train of thought as her view point abruptly shifts, and the breath is forced from her lungs as several hundred pounds of angry highlander knock her to the floor, only the padding of her armor saving her from shattered ribs. She shakes the stars from her vision, and joins her fists together aiming a hammer blow to the side of his head.

 

"Ge'off me porkchop" she growls.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

Another wave of rage washed over. If she called him that one. More. TIME. He was sure to lose control. 

"I swear! What is /wrong/ with all of you?!" 

 

He sent another punch flying, a desperate attempt to knock some sense into the woman.

 

"Stop callin' me POCKCHOP! IT'S NOT MY NAME! IF I KNEW THE BLOODY THING, MAYBE YOU'D HAVE GOTTEN IT". He was losing control. If this kept up, he might actually cause an explosion. Aether was leaking out at a much larger rate than he'd seen before. Some of the nearby floor had started to crystallize.

[111]

She grins and catches the punch with her hands, his rage making his swings wild. She sits there for a moment, her arms shaking as she tries to hold his fist back.

 

"Alright... Por-" she chuckles through a split lip, "I mean, well what *should* I call you then? What kind of person doesn't know their own name?"

[Unnamed Mercenary]

At this point he was just throwing punches with each word.

 

"It's. Called. Memory. Problems."

 

He kept Natalie pinned for good measure. Her armor was surprisingly better than expected.

[Coatleque]

The man suddenly felt the tip of a sword resting on his shoulder.

 

The Knight had just been passing through on her routine patrol and happened upon the commotion. It was quite easy to just walk right up to them, both distracted as they were. She now stood at the ready, blade drawn, and tapped his shoulder with the tip.

 

"I would suggest you take this outside, Ser, before you break something important."

[111]

Natalie wiggles back and forth and protects herself with her hands as the punches rain down. "You can't remember...? That's-" She grunts as one of them slams into her shoulder, "That's too bad."

 

She grins up at him, "How do you know your name *isn't* porkchop then?"

 

"You certainly seem to respond to it well."

 

Natalie notices the woman, and a strange look flickers across her face as she sees the armor. "Ah... hello there. Just brass blades business, nothing to be worried about."

[Unnamed Mercenary]

He paid no attention to the Paladin stepping in. The worst a cut would do was rip his clothes. Like the previous encounter with Kage once, his physical injuries weren't an issue if they just faded away.

 

And of course she had to say it again. He had to at least give her credit for not getting knocked out yet. Maybe these Eorzeans were stronger than they looked.

 

He spied the sword next to him, and tried to grab it by the edge. "Borrowing this." The couple cuts would be gone once he stopped grabbing it from the edge. Maybe he could use it to shut her up.

[Coatleque]

Removing her sword before he could reach it, she held it back out of reach. Deciding she needed to do something to disrupt his onslaught, the first thing to come to mind was heavy force. She moved to plow her left shoulder into his right as hard as she could, hoping her full weight would be enough to topple him off of his target.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

Maybe's he'd had more to drink than he thought, or perhaps she'd had a perfect execution of physical ability. Either way, after his failed attempt at grabbing her sword, he'd been left in an unbalanced state. He never saw the move coming and it knocked him off of Natalie.

Picking himself up, he turned his attention to the Paladin. "I believe this doesn't concern you", he said rather coldly. Sure, the table had been flipped over, and a mug or two was broken. He'd seen rougher days at the Quicksand himself, and what business did some uninvolved person have anyways?

 

He then focused on the Miqo'te, wondering what her next move would be.

[Coatleque]

The Knight quickly regained her footing, and stepping back, she offered her left hand to Natalie while keeping her sword trained on the man.

 

"If it happens in this city, it concerns me."

[Unnamed Mercenary]

Not wanting to deal with someone wielding a weapon, he slowly bent down, put the table upright, and left some gil on the table. Enough to pay for the drinks and some replacement mugs.

 

Looking over to the paladin, "Then if it concerns you, you can help clean up the mess she made as well." The hit from earlier had knocked at least a little sense into him. Now and here we're not the time and place to make things worse. People would begin to notice, and not just the patrons of the Quicksand that expected things like this.

 

Taking a deep breath to recollect himself, he brushed some of the diet from the ground off his tabbed and began to walk out of the Quicksand. He took one last glance at the Miqo'te. "If you need something to call me by, just use 'Merc', I'm sure you figure out my profession. And never call me porkchop again."

[111]

Natalie takes the Paladin's hand and rises, rubbing her jaw, "Thanks."

 

"You've got a bit of a short temper merc-chop. I'll see you around!"

 

She pats herself off and gives the larger woman a wry grin. "Thank goodness one of Ul'dah's finest was here to rescue me."

[Unnamed Mercenary]

((The Unnamed Mercenary's story continues where it left off from Here (Posts 6-21)))

 

The last thing he remembered from the previous day was blacking out during a fight with Kage, and having the perhaps the strangest dream he'd ever had. Well, he couldn't be sure. The Unnamed Mercenary knew there was a part of him missing, namely almost all of his life.

 

The dream had been surreal, as if he'd actually been there. There was a women and a girl. They were looking at him, speaking even, but he couldn't make out the words. Everything he saw around them felt both familiar, but unknown. Who were they? Why were they looking at him this way? He knew they were Garlean. The third eye made that quite apparent. The place they were in, it was peaceful, nice. Completely different from the harsh desert city he had been living in lately. In the dream, he tried to walk closer to them. Almost close enough to touch them, he reached out his hand, only to watch them fade away as he woke up.

 

Opening his eyes after the whole experience, the light hurt his eyes. How long had he been out? More-so, how did he get here? It certainly wasn't the pavement of Pearl Lane, nor was it a jail cell. It was an inn room, and something much nicer than he could have afforded. It even had a mirror! Where he expected to find bruises and cuts from the previous day, there was nothing. "Heh, at least this thing can be useful sometimes", as he referenced the artificial aether device somewhere inside him. He was in his smallclothes, his tabbard and trousers having been washed apparently and neatly folded on a table. "This place's gonna cost me a fortune!" He didn't want trouble. At least, not now. Something was different. Felt different. As he dressed, he noticed his mask was missing. It dawned on him that it must have happened the day before, and Kage had to have seen his face. He would have to stay out of trouble. That didn't seem like a problem for now.

 

He dressed, and left the room, looking for whoever was in charge to pay.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

*Switching POV over to Frhanz'ir Kirche*

As the airship boarded Ul'Dah, a certain over-trusting Elezen exited. It had been a few weeks since his last visit, and he hadn't heard anything from the people he knew in the large city. A bag filled with various concoctions and sweets, he set out for the inn he stayed at last. He would unpack, and then depart to where he assumed his friends and their acquaintances would be.

 

What he found there was a large hyuran man arguing with the innkeep. "ALL I'M ASKING IS TO KNOW WHO PAID!" Frhanz could only assume that someone had paid the man's stay, and the staff was not obligated to say who. Walking up to him, Frhanz tried to interject. "Umm...ser? They don't keep logs of such things here. As many people people travel to Ul'Dah for business, most of the inns allow one to pay up front and anonymously". "There's a good chance she wasn't even working that shift", as Frhanz motioned to the innkeep, who was nearly in tears by now. She gave him a look of desperation, and Frhanz figured the man had been quite persistent. 

 

The man turned to Frhanz, "You can't honestly expect me to believe a stranger paid this?". Frhanz looked at the bill, noticing it was a fairly nice room. "Why is that? Ul'Dah has many people who could afford to do such a thing." "Now, if you'll excuse the interruption, I do not believe there is anything more she can do for you, and I'd be more than happy to try helping you find the person you're looking for." Frhanz leaned over to the girl, "you wouldn't happen to know who paid his room would you?". The most she could say was that a Brass Blade had carried the man in, who had been passed out at the time, paid for a room, and promptly left. The previous attendant hadn't told her anything else. Upon hearing that, the man had a very confused expression. Frhanz didn't expect his next response, "Kage...".

 

There was only one person that the man was referring to. More importantly, how in the world did a lalafell carry what looked like a highlander?! Frhanz had to ask directly. "You know Kage?!" The man looked over to Frhanz, "You could say that", as he started to leave. This hyur would certainly be interesting after all. Frhanz handed a hefty amount of gil to the inn attendant. "I'm really sorry to ask for this. I have a couple bags at the airship docks still and want a room for a week. Any leftover gil is a tip". He ran off to catch up to the hyur, hoping the "deposit" he'd left would ensure his bags would be safe. It was about a month's stay in advance. "Ser! I wasn't done talking!" Frhanz ran after the man, headed towards the Quicksand.