#he has one of the penny swords that he can fling around or fight with but hes more inclined to help with stuff like repairs around like. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

iliketowritemystories · 1 year

Text

Living metal

“Shit!” Penny skids on the hill, sweat dripping down her brow as it pinches in focus. “Don’t let him get away!” Her hair is short and dark, cut close to her scalp. A black mask covers the lower half of her face.

She yanks the mask down and swears. Penny stands at the precipice of a cliff face and the ocean thunders far below it. Her breath hitches at the height.

The guards clammer behind her, screaming and shouting about bounties and stolen property. Turning around, she glares at them. They stumble over themselves. Her lower face is riddled with scars, burns and scratches that mold together in an amalgamation of scar tissue.

She takes a step towards them and they fumble for their swords. She takes another, and another, before suddenly sprinting towards them at an unforgiving pace.

In a few minutes, the battle ends. Her breath comes short and she savors this moment to rest, having finished flinging the dozen or so combatants off the deadly cliff. She sits on the ground, taking her dark hood off and running a hand through her short hair.

You killed them.

Scowling, she yanks the sword off her holster and tosses it to the side. “No,” she spits, her accent foreign and thick. “There is water beneath them, and if they are smart then that should be enough to spare their lives.”

Some will die.

“Perhaps.” She grabs her water canteen with a rough grip and takes a harsh drink.

Why are you so angry?

She has to grit her teeth and pinch her toes for a long minute, finally turning her face towards the stupid sword that lies on the ground, humorously immobile. “Because of you.”

There’s a moment of pause before the sword replies: Why? I haven’t even done anything to warrant this treatment yet.

‘-yet,’ she repeats this in her mind a few times. With an angry sneer, she stands up and marches away from the hunk of metal, muttering curses.

Are you really going to leave me here?

Not deigning to answer it, she keeps walking away.

So be it. I’ll see you tonight, Penny.

That night, the sword is in the place that her real sword should be. She throws it out of the window.

The sword sighs to itself. How long will it take before she warms up to it?

Two weeks later, Penny has already attempted to break it, sell it, barter it, and even jammed the blade so fiercely into a stone block that no passerby could yank it out, and a dozen men could move it by a millimeter. By dawn, it had disappeared and reappeared in her house again. Finally, she snaps.

But, unlike what the sword expected, which was for the woman to finally talk with it- ending in a cliche deal that benefited both sides but would ultimately bring them closer together; instead, Penny goes back to where she stole it from. Surely, if they managed to keep the sword in one place before, it’ll work again, right?

“Why do you not use the sword by your waist?” The princess’s personal knight asks. They are both engaged in a tense battle, but the thief is losing. Her clothes have been damaged and she has a few more cuts and scratches to add to her list of scars. Her breath comes in shallow, quick steals as she narrowly avoids the expert blade.

Despite his calm voice, the royal knight is sweating. He’s searching for a distraction so he can finish this job and continue protecting the princess. She doesn’t give it to him, kicking up the dirt beneath them into the guard’s eyes. He swears, and in his stumble he knocks over a pot of flowers. He curses their fight for happening in the gardens, of all places.

She darts towards the shattered pottery, grabbing a sharp edge and knocking the knight over with a push of her foot. In three moves, she pins him to the ground, disarms him, and presses the ceramic blade to his throat.

“I do not want trouble,” she whispers harshly. “I have come to return a possession of the royal family. I need to meet with someone who will take it and keep it far away from me.”

The guard squints his eyes at her. She watches the emotions float over his face, before conceding to her request. His duty is not with the king or other affairs after all. His only job is to keep the princess safe, and Penny had only threatened her safety by having an unknown objective.

By the end of the night, she’s gotten in contact with the king, and the royal librarian. They discuss matters briefly, and she describes her trouble with the blade in few, sparse words.

“It will not leave me alone.”

The librarian looks at her strangely, but the king smiles and agrees to take it from her. She can smell trickery in the air, and her guard does not drop from these promising words.

She carefully puts her hand on the hilt of the blade, ready to hand it off and never hear that voice again, when—

Behind you.

She spins around in fury, and her sharp eyes pinpoint at least a dozen shadows lurking in the shadows. Without the voice’s warning, she might have given away her only weapon to defend herself against this trap. She unsheathes the blade and, without a second to waste, parries the attack from behind, turning her head to see the king who wields a large war hammer. She had barely felt the impact from such a mighty weapon, she realizes with wide eyes.

A normal sword would have broken, I’ll have you know. I just saved your life.

She growls and rushes at the librarian, dragging the sword along her arm and carving a deep scar into her soft, pretty skin. The king stops his attack promptly, aiding the poor girl who screams in pain, dropping to her knees.

Sword in hand, she boulders through the castle, taking down any and all obstacles with a brutal and bloody vengeance. At the end of the night, she gets home and her hand is gripping the soft leather so tight that the sword itself complains.

Hey, you’re going to ruin my hilt! It was very expensive, I’ll have you know.

She wordlessly throws the sword onto her bed, yanking off her mask and hood before dismantling her belt. Once she’s finally gotten to remove her shoes, she leaves the room. The sword waits in tense anticipation.

Except, when she comes back in fresh, softer clothes; the sword only gets placed to the side and ignored. She falls asleep.

Fine, I can play the long game. The sword gleams with excitement. Just wait, Penny. Your future can get brighter yet.

#short story #excalibur #my writing #November 22 2022

0 notes

psyga315 · 4 years

Text

Fixing RWBY Volume 7

Much like my Volume 6 Tweak, this Volume 7 Tweak doesn’t change a lot of things, but the things that do change will be to be centered around a theme: Who Can You Trust? With the amount of the word “trust” being thrown around, it helps to add more than just characters parroting “I trust you, do you trust me” and “can we reeeeaaaaally trust you” ad nauseum.

Now, normally, I’d begin with Episode 1, but for the most part, Episodes 1 & 2 do a great job setting up the conflict for the Volume. The only thing that would be changed is an earlier introduction to Robyn. Either through a character short style random fight or have the group bump into her during their trip to Mantle.

Also, probably change up how Weiss handles the drunkard because… Yeah, you don’t just fling a guy into the trash bin for being racist after you spend the past six volumes having a villain faction of murderous terrorists motivated by racists attacking their kind. The problem is that I don’t know how. The best I can say is that Weiss tries to do something about it, the dude’s like “wait, aren’t you a Schnee?” and then Weiss realizes “Oh shit, we should be incognito.”

Episode 3

Now here’s where things start to change up. Have a split in the group over whether Ruby was in the right to omit Salem’s immortality to Ironwood. A clear 50/50 split or as close to one as possible. If I was deciding who was on who’s side, Weiss, Blake and Nora would be on Ruby’s side and Jaune, Ren, and Yang would be on Ironwood’s side. Over the course of the Volume, they give their reasons, but I’ll explain their reasons now.

Weiss and Blake’s reasons are virtually the same, with Weiss’s added caveat being that she overheard Ironwood going “OZPIN SHOULD HAVE TRUSTED ME!” bit. Nora would be too pissed at Ironwood to care what he wants and anything to fuck him over is a win in her book, even egging on the other side to join by saying how he disqualified RWBY from the Vytal Tournament and how this would be good payback.

Ren’s reason was implied, but it’d be more pronounced that he wants Salem dealt with now. Not out of apathy or tiredness, but because he knows the Grimm now have a mistress and that the only person who has an actual plan to deal with her is being lied to. Yang and Jaune share their reason, but in different ways. Yang isn’t too keen on Ruby omitting information to Ironwood after they had just spent an entire two Volumes distrusting Ozpin for the same thing and Jaune especially doesn’t like that Ironwood is going to go into an unwinnable battle without knowing all the details, much like how Pyrrha never found out about Salem.

Oscar, Qrow, and Maria would be the middle of the fence. Maria doesn’t care too much about the situation and is just there to help out Pietro, Qrow has known Ironwood more than anyone but recent events had him uneasy, and Oscar just doesn’t want to be hurt because that tends to happen whenever people find out about Ozpin’s many, many skeletons. However, they all have faith that Ruby is doing something right…

The only other thing I’d change with this is giving the outright confirmation that these are the mines that Ilia’s parents died in. Maybe even have Marrow allude to how it was a major turning point in making the White Fang what they are now.

Episode 4

Not much changes, except for Ironwood showing genuine remorse for what’s going on with Mantle and trying to make amends by making the group Huntsmen and having them broker peace to Mantle by helping them out.

The other major change is Qrow not telling Ruby that she’s done nothing wrong. Instead, he warns that Ironwood, while he’s a very valuable ally, is also one whose trust is hard to earn and easy to break. He reveals to Ruby about how Ozpin was put on thin ice in Volume 2 and how Ironwood became the head of security for Vytal. Because the Tweaking Volume 6 showed Summer in the flashback to Ruby, I don’t think we’ll get that here.

A minor bit would be Penny and Jaune talking about Pyrrha, because what’s Jaune’s character arc without bringing Pyrrha into it?

Episode 5

Nothing really changes that much except for a training montage between the Ace Ops and RWBY so that we get that out of the way. Maybe even have Nora note the hole in the wall and get more furious at Ironwood for just leaving that out in the open when a simple patch would fix it. Ironwood would then give a rebuttal that it wouldn’t fix the Manticore problem.

There’s a small change in Robyn’s demeanour in which she doesn’t like Penny. “Just because you’re the protector of Mantle doesn’t mean you’re not another one of Ironwood’s machines. Once I get in power, you’re the first bot to enter the scrapyard!” Like, the world knows Penny is a robot, right? Speaking of, we have Ruby talk to Penny about how depressed she was when she died. Because remember when she broke down into tears over that and had Penny’s death be a major impact to her psyche?

The biggest change would be that whole scene with Winter and Fria. Weiss is appalled that Fria is locked up in a room before Winter tells her that it’s to secure her, explaining how Maidens end up having their powers taken from them through murder instead of the natural way and using the Fall Maiden’s death as an example. Weiss then asks “isn’t that what you’re going to do to her? Why don’t you just do Ironwood a favor and stab her right now?” Winter is silent.

Oh, and there’s no scene of Jacques inciting a riot. You’ll understand why later, but this will eliminate the stupid “riot happens off screen” bit. Instead, we get a scene where a plane flies towards the blockade. They demand to know who’s on the plane, only for Cinder to come out, smirk, and her Maiden eye flares as a snowstorm kicks off.

Episode 6

Not a lot changes here save for the obvious minor detail of a snowstorm hitting Atlas and Mantle (as well as Ironwood receiving reports about his blockade being taken out, thus he tells the group to take the night off while he looks into getting replacement planes) and one major detail: Tyrian’s attack during the rally would be him busting in during a power outage (engineered by either Watts’s hacking or Cinder’s snowstorm) and slaughtering people as they try to whip out their phones to try and illuminate the area. We’d even have an earlier scene where we could see Tyrian sneak in the background as Nora kisses Ren, giving the notion that, had Nora not macked on Ren, they would have seen Tyrian.

Penny tries to fight Tyrian because of her night vision, but Tyrian gets the better of her, even dancing through her slashes and have other people get hurt and possibly killed by her blades, blood being on her swords once the lights go back on. Robyn instantly attacks Penny, leading to Ruby to try and defend her and prove her innocence. Marrow gets the angry mob to “STAY!”, but it’s pretty clear that Robyn was out of the radius when that happened. As Ruby and Penny run off, Robyn gives chase, the Grimm invade, a plane lands without any problem on Mantle, and we get perhaps the largest change in the entire volume: An entire episode gets shafted in favor of one we were promised.

Episode 7

We see Blake and Yang with FNKI when they hear the Grimm siren go off and they go to investigate. Meanwhile, Weiss, Jaune, and Oscar exit the theater only to get attacked by Grimm. The majority of this episode would be them fighting the Grimm until Ruby, Penny and Robyn come in to Blake and Yang’s perspective.

Not sure what’s going on, Blake and Yang fight Robyn while Penny runs away. It isn’t until Robyn rants about Ironwood does Blake stops fighting her, tells her about Ironwood’s plan, and the whole truth Semblance thing happens. Yang confronts Blake on this, to which she gives her rant about how she distanced herself from the White Fang and that what RWBY is doing is exactly like the White Fang. It doesn’t help that, when Yang reassures Blake that they did what they had to do, she sounds exactly like Adam, right down to her saying “It's good to know I've still got you...”

Weiss, Jaune, and Oscar find Ruby and Penny and have a brief moment to reconvene before a mob comes after Penny, demanding her head. In the middle of this, Cinder and Neo look on. Neo nonverbally asks if they should get Ruby while they have the chance, but Cinder smirks upon seeing her scroll and says she has a plan. During a stand off where Ruby tries to proclaim Penny’s innocence, Cinder sneaks into the mob and, with the help of Neo disguising her as an old lady (because what’s RWBY without making characters into two different fairy tale references at once?), tell the group how Penny had been going out and murdering people for Ironwood, showing the group the doctored footage of Penny murdering Forrest and Cinder lying about how Forrest is her (grand)son.

Now in an even bigger frenzy, the crowd swarm Ruby as Cinder slinks into the background. Despite all their best efforts, the people of Mantle get their hands-on Penny and dismember her from limb to limb. The despair of Penny dying again followed by several more Grimm coming in causes Ruby’s Silver Eyes to go off, turning the Manticores to stone (and, if you want some instant karma, one of them could be in midflight and fall on top of some of the more ruder Mantleans, crushing them in the process) before she gets weak and Weiss carries her away, with Jaune and Oscar carrying Penny’s remains from the blinded crowd.

In the middle of all this, Ren and Nora fight Grimm on their own, getting into an argument about how Mantle is being treated. This is where Nora’s rant comes in, not to Ironwood, but to Ren. Ren tells her his reason why Ironwood is their best bet and because of his words, it upsets Nora enough to go her separate way. We end the episode with Nora coming across Robyn.

Episode 8

It’s been a week since the battle and we reconvene on Penny being rebuilt. Ruby and Jaune converse about how coincidental it is, with Ruby being clearly upset that she had to watch Penny die twice now. Jaune, however, elates that at least she’s alive, awkwardly bringing up his dead girlfriend again. Pietro comes in and tells them that it is not as coincidental as they believe and demonstrates by using his Semblance, the ability to be a make shift deliberator.

Basically, this is where I reinvent how Pietro’s relation to Penny works. I’m keeping the disturbing aspect that he slowly dies a little each time he uses this power while taking out the unintentionally disturbing aspect of Penny really being just Pietro in the robotic shell of a young girl. As for who Penny is… You saw this coming and if RT wanted to really make those fairy tale references, it just makes sense for them to pay homage to the very first anime that just so happens to also reference Pinocchio, or at least is compared to Pinocchio.

We have a flashback to Pietro and Watts working on the Paladin project together before Pietro gets a call. We don’t hear what it is, but we can definitely tell from how he reacts and how it’s framed exactly what happened. We cut to Pietro in the morgue grieving over a dead girl who looks similar to Penny and get that hard confirmation that Penny was Pietro’s daughter… or rather was the basis of Pietro’s daughter.

He uses his Semblance, which he says allows him to jumpstart people’s aura and save them from the brink of death. While normally an Aura technique in of itself to awaken another’s aura, it’s another thing to awaken another’s aura and save their life in the process. However, he tried that on a long dead Human Penny and all it did was put her in a comatose state, needing to be put on constant life support or else she’d die. Not wanting to let go of Penny, Pietro invented a means to transfer her aura over to something else: The Aura Transfer Machine. He places Penny into the shell of V1!Penny and jumpstarts her. She opens her eyes and says “Salutations!”

As the flashback ends, he explains how what he did was unnatural and, as a consequence, whenever he jumpstarts Penny with his Semblance, his Aura completely depletes and it damages him. It’s how he became crippled. Normally, the Aura would return slowly and he’d be recovered, but because he had to do it so many times in a short amount of time, it damages him. Jaune says he’ll use his Semblance to save Penny next time, but Pietro brings up the contrast between their Semblances: Jaune just dumps aura into other people, but Pietro is bringing the dead back to life. Even if Jaune were to use his Semblance, all it would do is put Aura into a robotic shell and not Penny. A sad reminder that, no matter what he did, Penny will never be a real girl again. Especially since, as one last flashback shows, Ironwood was more than pleased with Penny and convinced Pietro to turn Penny into a living weapon, something he was very hesitant about.

I’d add that Pietro would die right there to show that Penny has no ‘extra lives’ left, but I feel like RT would do that already… So I’ll say he’s written out of the volume by going into a coma.

Interspersed with this is the dinner scene. Because there’s fewer people going with Ironwood, RT might splurge a bit and give characters different outfits for the scene, like Weiss having an all-white version of her Mistral dress or having Qrow’s new outfit be the outfit he wears to the dinner. Obviously, not everyone gets new dresses, as the Ace Ops still have their uniforms. Only Weiss, Blake, Yang, Ren, and Oscar attend for obvious reasons.

Weiss investigates Jacques like usual, but she gets quite a few encounters, such as running into Harry Marigold (who gets in a heated argument with May and establishes who she is right there and then instead of doing Twitter) and even the Trophy Wife who she tried to kill. They’re brief, but show the consequences of Weiss’s actions. Maybe have the Trophy Wife flee in terror. She then comes across Willow, who, for the first time in Weiss’s life, is not drunk. In fact, she is elated to see Weiss return, but understands why she doesn’t share the same notion. She reveals to have sobered up since Weiss ran away and had done a lot of contemplation. She doesn’t say too much, but she does leave Weiss with the video and guilt trips her about Whitley.

While Watts turning off the heating grid is still in, it’s not the final scene. Instead, it’s during the dinner with Ironwood and the others, in which Robyn, as part of the “get Ironwood impeached” party, brings in someone who had been “tormented by Atlas’s boot on Mantle’s face for far too long…”: Nora.

Nora’s Backstory

Okay, granted, this is something that is operating on information we don’t know yet, so there’s a lot of speculation to go on here. I’ll probably make an update to this once we get a proper backstory for Nora, but for now, this is what I think would be Nora’s backstory:

Mantle had been scapegoated as the cause of the Great War and while they had a hand in it, the real cause of it, the nobles, decided to take their ball and go home by using the Relic to lift their Kingdom high into the clouds, leaving the rest of Mantle to take the fall. The Oz at the time allowed this to happen knowing exactly why they did it, but instead tried to cite it as creating a beacon of hope instead of what it truly was.

As a result, Mantle hit an unstable depression and unable to even be on the same level as the other Kingdoms, essentially being Menagerie before they made Menagerie. This resulted in people starving and dying. Of the few people who remained hopeful was Fria Valkyrie, who proposed life living out in the lands of thriving kingdoms rather than be ruled over by Atlas. She went to Mistral and got a few people into pooling their resources to make a new Kingdom, one that would exist outside the four and be by the people, for the people.

Unfortunately, not everyone shared her vision and some even took her resources to create Menagerie for the purpose of dumping the Faunus there. After she gained the Maiden powers by chance, she was forced to give up her dream by Oz. Her child grew up and inherited that vision, getting a child of their own, moving to Mistral, wooing someone to birth Nora, tell her about how Mantle became a shithole thanks to Atlas, and then head to make Oniyuri with the others. The Nuck came, killed Nora’s parents and left her an orphan, only for her to bring the Nuck with her to Kuroyuri and the rest is history.

Of course, this wouldn’t all be shown and is a rough idea, but the core idea is: Mantle suffered long ago because the people who caused the Great War refused to take blame and went into their floating castle while Oz just looked at it and said “hey, look at this shiny beacon!”

With that in mind, let’s return to the story:

Episode 9

Nora lays down Mantle’s grievances to Ironwood in front of everyone before she includes the two members of the council and Jacques into the shit pile, saying how they’re not blameless. When called out on going all “sins of the father” on the group, she says how they should have thought of that before doing that to Mantle. Robyn attempts to expose Ironwood before Weiss drops in and tries to expose Jacques…

And here’s where major change #2 comes into play. As the video plays of Jacques and Watts having their conversation, it takes a turn for the weird as Jacques just throws Watts out of his house and refusing to hear any further of his offer. This is one of the major scenes that convey the theme of trust. Throughout the Volume, we’re built up to not trust Jacques and trust Ironwood before the tables turn around this exact moment. Now, with the revelation that Jacques refused to work with Watts and Ironwood turning Penny into a weapon against her and Pietro’s will, Jacques is the trustworthy one and Ironwood is the deceitful.

Though, before any consequences play out, it’s all put on hold as news of the heating grid had been turned off. And yes, before you ask, in this tweak, the heating grid is in Mantle and thus is just as easy to hack. The reason why Watts decided to do this now is to make it look like Ironwood is doing it in retaliation for what happened to Penny. As a result, riots and Grimm naturally come. Robyn asks Ironwood why he’s working so hard to hide Amity Arena and this gives Oscar the (unintended) signal that now’s the time to tell him the truth. He covers for Ironwood, then gets him to a secure room to tell him all he knows about Salem.

Especially how she boned Ozpin.

Okay, joking aside… The rest of the episode (as well as Episode 10) play out like normal, but with Ruby and Jaune arriving to help from the ground instead of from the plane for obvious reasons.

Episode 10

The only big change is the reveal that Tyrian is a serial killer here because we retconned the original Episode 7. The only sight twist I can add to this is that he was part of the White Fang, had a hand in some of Weiss’s family members being killed, and that’s why Salem knew of them.

Episode 11

Okay, this is the best episode of Volume 7 so there’s not a lot to change. The only major changes are as follows.

Ironwood confronts the group over Robyn knowing about Amity. When confronted on why he had to keep that a secret, he explains that it was to prevent the enemy from learning about it, like what happened with Watts. When Yang calls him out for lying, he snaps and calls her out for lying.

“Oscar told me the truth. About Salem.”

“What!? He wasn’t supposed to!”

“Then who would have? And when? When everyone threw their lives away for nothing? You’re just like Ozpin.”

And then Salem shows up, gloats a bit, goes yo mama, and Ironwood decides to use the Relic of Creation to send Atlas somewhere else. He’s not doing the stupid thing of yeeting it into space, though. Instead, he’s going to use it to move them away from the continent and towards another Kingdom. When Blake says that they’re leaving Mantle to die, he just coldly remarks that “they did this to themselves”.

Naturally, RWBY protests about this. The funny thing is, The Ace Ops are almost able to convince the girls to leave Mantle… But then Ironwood says this to Ruby:

“After what they’ve done to poor Penny… Surely, you’d agree that they don’t deserve our protection.”

This causes Ruby to quietly turn that comment around:

“Yeah… But after I heard about what you’ve done to Penny… The only thing I agree about is that you don’t deserve my trust.” Before she calls the others and says how Ironwood had gone mad. This leads to the confrontation with the Ace Ops and the end of our episode.

Episode 12

Well… How do we make the worst episode of V7 better? Well, we begin with showing what happened to Oscar. Robots come to take the Relic from him, Ruby comes in and Oscar saves her. They have some romantic tension, but uh oh! It’s Neo! And she took the Relic!

We then cut to the airplane. I should bring up that the arrest warrant has been changed a bit, excluding Qrow, Oscar, Jaune and Ren from the list. Qrow and Oscar because they gave Ironwood their trust and vice versa, Jaune because Ironwood overlooking Jaune would be hilarious, and Ren because of the kids, he was the most trustful of Ironwood. Nora, however, is still on the list due to her standing against Ironwood. As well as Robyn.

This leads to a more natural reason for Robyn to pick a fight: She’s resisting arrest. They crash and Clover calls for a medical team. Qrow and Clover have a conversation about what’s going on. Qrow insists they talk to Ironwood about this, only for Clover to insist he arrests Ruby. This leads to a natural conclusion as to why Qrow fights Clover: He wants to protect Ruby.

Tyrian joins in and the fight isn’t a 2v1 like the original, but instead Qrow vs. Clover but with Tyrian running interference against both sides. This leads to Qrow and Clover teaming up against Tyrian, but Qrow, at the last minute, knocks Clover aura out so as to disable him. Tyrian is kinda shocked at the betrayal but stays around to let it play out, especially since he knows something Qrow doesn’t.

Clover asks Qrow why he did that and Qrow told Clover that sometimes, you have to do the right thing instead of doing what you’re told to. Clover remarks that the right thing is often the hardest and stands firm with his belief that Ironwood will do the right thing, even if the cost is people’s lives. Qrow then says “then he will take the fall.” Clover chuckles, says good luck, then dies because it’s freezing out on Solitas.

Tyrian laughs at this, Qrow gets pissed, he runs off, and the aircraft comes.

RWBY vs. Ace Ops goes about as well as the best of the best of the best going up against a bunch of college drop outs who only had a week or so of training with said best. Very poorly. In fact, the group takes advantage of the team’s insistence of fighting in the White Rose and Bumblebee pairs, curbstomping them by exploiting their weaknesses. However, just as they’re about to be arrested, Marrow takes a look at Ruby.

“You know, I never wanted to actually arrest you guys…” He breathes in. “And I don’t want to.” Turns around and shouts “STAY!” to the rest of the Ace Ops and tells Ruby and her friends to run. As soon as they do, he gets out his weapon and glares at his ‘friends’. Harriet asks why he did this, only for him to reply:

“Well, maybe we were just tired of being pushed around.” He says before he tosses a volatile Dust crystal on the ground and hurts the group, making a getaway.

And the JNPR bit stays the same.

Episode 13

Because this will be setting up Volume 8, this is mostly speculative at this point. But then again, I did the same with Volume 6’s Tweaking before Volume 7 premiered… That said, Volume 6 was more conclusive than Volume 7 so…

Bottom line, this will most likely get disconfirmed by the time Volume 8 rolls around.

JNPR vs Neo stays the same, but Nora and Ren bicker about whether to stay on Mantle and help the others, causing Neo to give them the slip with the Relic and further sever the ties between Nora and Ren.

Cinder vs Winter, Penny and Fria is also a little changed. Namely, Penny takes a blow for Winter that destroys most of her body. Despite this, she struggles to go through the whirlwind that Fria makes and saves her from Cinder. Penny is dying as a result of putting herself through the extreme and with no Pietro to save her, this will basically be her final death.

Fria knows this. She also knows that Ironwood had sent only one person to see her to make it easier for her Alzheimer’s and that Penny is not that person. Despite this, she is moved by Penny’s dedication, asks for her name, and passes on her powers to Penny, saving her life. Ruby flashes Cinder and secures Penny. On the ship during Ozpin’s speech on fear, Pietro wakes up, checks up on Penny to see if she’s alright. Upon seeing that there’s blood on a cut from Penny, he’s at first afraid, but then cries in joy as she had become a real girl. However, if RT decides to do a plot point like this in a future volume where they make Penny a real girl, then disregard this bit.

The final bit (don’t worry, I’m going to the Ironwood vs Oscar bit later) is that Maria explicitly says that they’re leaving Atlas. As soon as she says that, Nora and Blake object. Nora because they’re leaving Mantle as well and Blake because they just had an entire fight where they wanted to stay and fight. Yang tries to reason with Blake, but she just comments about how she’s not going to run. Likewise, Nora is tired of sacrifices after losing Pyrrha. They both leave and go to Mantle just as the plane leaves.

Ironwood and Oscar’s Conversation

Okay, no amount of summary is going to do this justice, so I’m going to include this as a subsection like with Nora’s backstory. This would take place roughly in the same spot(s) as the original. It starts out roughly the same until Oscar pleads to work this out.

Ironwood: There is no working anything out. People have been demanding me to do things their way, to make things easier for them, and every time I try to bend to their whims, Salem and her forces go two steps ahead. The easiest solution is for me to do everything myself.

Oscar: Including leaving people to die?

Ironwood: That’s what Ozpin had been doing for most of his life. You don’t hear people complain about that. Because he kept it all to himself and never told others the bigger picture. Just like Ruby.

Oscar: Ruby only hid the truth because she was afraid of what you’d become if you found out.

Ironwood: That’d I’d become another Lionheart? I’m not that weak-willed a coward.

Oscar: Then why abandon Mantle?

Ironwood: Because Salem’s forces are on our doorstep. If we don’t do anything, then we will fall!

Oscar: No… If you divide us, then we will fall… It’s what she wants, James.

Ironwood: … James is what my friends call me. To you… it’s General.

And the rest of the scene plays out like normal, including the ending of Salem’s forces arriving.

Stinger

This is less fix and more wish.

Marrow stumbles onto a rooftop, the top portion of his face heavily burned from the explosion, and sees Salem’s forces arriving. A recovering Fiona approaches Marrow and tells him how protecting Mantle had just become more complex. Marrow shakes his head and takes out something from his pocket before he fixes it to his face.

“It was never about protecting Mantle, Fiona… It’s about making Atlas pay for what they’ve done.” He turns around, wearing a White Fang mask.

And that was Tweaking V7, perhaps the most intense tweaking I’ve done with five thousand words.

#RWDE #RWBY #Rewrite #RWBY Rewrite

8 notes · View notes

carryonsimoncarryonbaz · 5 years

Text

Whumptober Day 9

I’m all over the place with this. I’m a day late but that’s better than nothing, right?

Day 9: Shackled

Simon

I’ve got a free afternoon today. Baz is at football practice, so I’ve got the room to myself for a change. I’m lying on my bed, window open, relishing the peace and quiet when a little bird flies in with a summons from the Mage.

He doesn’t do this that often—mainly when he’s got a mission for me. But I just got back from one a few days ago so I’d be surprised if he sends me out again so soon. I’ve already missed half a week of classes.

Penny says it’s irresponsible of the Mage and shows an unforgivable lack of respect for my education.

“But I’m getting an education in real magic when I go, Penny.”

“You can’t do the practicals without having a solid foundation in the theory, Simon!”

Penny has very definite views on magickal education. She regularly sends strongly worded missives to the faculty board regarding the educational practices at Watford. She was livid when the linguistics program was shut down fourth year and nearly went off when the music program ceased being part of the curriculum last year.

“Sung spells are so important, Simon! The technique is completely different than spoken spells—you have to perfect the elocution and the melody, not to mention the tempo.” We’d been in Magic Words class at the time and I’d been trying to levitate my notebook. It kept flinging itself off the edge of my desk instead.

Penny’s eyes had gone distant. “Sung spells are the only ones you can cast with other mages to increase their power. It’s criminal to eliminate the music program.”

“That’s one thing you and I can agree on, Bunce.” Baz had leant across the aisle, his book hovering a foot above his desk, not even wavering when he turned to nod at Penny. Wanker.

“If nothing else, I can count on you to support the value of a well-rounded education, Basil.” Penny had given him a meaningful look.

Baz’s face had lost its harsh angles momentarily, the sneer he typically sports when I’m in the vicinity fading away as his expression softened into something unfamiliar. Thoughtful and fleetingly vulnerable.

It was unexpected and it made my chest tighten. “It was important to my mother.” He’d paused, looking down for an instant before continuing. “She was a master of sung spells. My father . . . My father says he’s never heard anyone who could match her.”

I’d been agitated the rest of the class period. And most of the afternoon. It’s unnerving when Baz acts out of character. It throws me off.

Probably why he does it, the tosser.

Always plotting.

I make my way to the Mage’s office, passing through the wards set at the entrance. They’re set to let me pass freely. He’s at his desk, a large book open in front of him. He closes it and tucks it into a drawer when he catches sight of me.

“You called for me, sir?”

The Mage stands then, coming around his desk, arms clasped behind his back.

He’s taller than me.

I grew three inches this summer but I’m still a bit shorter than he is. I still have to tilt my head up to meet his eyes.

He’s grown a goatee this year and I’m dead jealous, even if Baz keeps making snide Robin Hood references about it.

Not that Baz has anything to brag about. He’s no better than me—not a hint more than peach fuzz on my face and Baz’s skin is even smoother, pale and unblemished, not a whisker in evidence.

“Simon. I called you here for some extra practice.” He sits on the front edge of his desk, one hand against the desk and the other lightly gripping his sword hilt. “I feel I’ve been remiss with some of your training.” His eyebrows come together in a furrow over his forehead. “We’ve not spent adequate time practicing spells you might need to utilise if you are bound or captured. Now that the Goblins are intent on your demise we need to add those to your arsenal.”

“I don’t intend to get captured, sir.”

“Simon.” There’s an edge to his voice when he says my name this time. “We must prepare for every eventuality. It is not an unlikely scenario, and not just as far as Goblins. Who knows what dark creatures might try to ingratiate themselves with the Goblins by apprehending you.”

I hate doing spell practice with the Mage. His mouth always narrows to a thin line and I can see the disappointment in his eyes, hear the frustration in his voice when he barks at me to enunciate clearly and use my words.

So much for my free afternoon. “Yes, sir.”

He walks behind his desk again and opens another drawer. “Come here, Simon. Hold out your hands.”

I put my hands out, fully expecting him to place something in them.

The Mage steps forward and snaps a set of metal shackles around my wrists before I can react. He nods at me as I stare at him in surprise. “Let’s have you try to get out of those.” He holds a hand up as I start spluttering. “Unlocking or releasing spells only, Simon. You have to count on stealth and speed in a situation like this, not brute force. The risk of being discovered or injuring yourself is real.”

Fucking hell. I’m terrible at this sort of thing, thinking up spells on the fly. I’m not even good when I try to do the ones I’ve memorised.

My mind is an utter blank. I can’t think of a single spell to open the shackles on my wrists.

“Come on, now, Simon. I haven’t got all night.”

“I can’t reach my wand.”

“Exactly the circumstance you would find yourself in, if this happened in the field. You can cast without your wand. We’ve worked on that.”

We have. I can do it, sometimes. Mostly when I don’t intend to. It’s unpredictable, like all my magic is.

“Uh . . . the only opening spell I know is ‘open sesame’, sir.”

He gives me a pained look. “Absolutely not in this circumstance.”

I wrack my brain as I give the shackles an experimental tug. The chain stretches to its full length—about an eight inch span—but I can’t budge it beyond that. The links are sturdy.

“Simon.” It’s not just a hint of irritation this time.

Ok. Ok. I can do this.

I cast “lucky break” but there isn’t enough magic in it. I try again but nothing happens.

I go through “free as a bird” and “get out of jail free” to no avail. The shackles glow for an instant with “go scot-free” but nothing happens.

I can see the Mage is getting irritated with me. I tug at the shackles again.

I try to think of spells to enlarge the cuffs but nothing comes to mind.

The Mage has his arms crossed over his chest, brow furrowed, a frown on his face. He looks at his watch.

“Simon, why don’t you keep at it for a while longer. I need to check in with my men. I’ll be back shortly.”

And with that he leaves. Just leaves, with me still trapped in the cuffs.

I can feel my magic coursing under my skin as my agitation increases. I’m angry, I’ll not deny it.

When Miss Possibelf sets us tasks like this she prods us, gives us gentle nudges, hints, feedback on what we could do better. The Mage does that with swordplay, but with the magic he just seems to expect me to figure it out on my own. It doesn’t come as easily as the fighting does though. It’s a struggle. And that just aggravates him. I can tell.

I can’t believe he just left me.

Probably thinks it builds character or some such rot. “Let experience sharpen your blade, Simon.” He says that one far too often.

I sink into the armchair set in front of his desk and run through spells in my head. I’m not like Penny—i don’t have reams of them stored up.

Or like Baz, who’s never at a loss for words, the utter prat.

I mutter a few more spells. Nothing happens. I’m desperate enough to consider Bible verses. I know it’s taboo, but it’s not like I’ve got a lot of options, now do I?

I don’t want to still be struggling when the Mage gets back here.

I can think of a few verses that might work. Some of the care homes had a more religious bent than others. I just went along with it.

I cast a “loose the bonds of wickedness.” Nothing happens and I don’t get struck down for my audacity so I try another. “Break every yoke” makes the shackles glow again, for longer this time, but they don’t open.

I’m sweating now. I can feel my magic thrumming under my skin, heat coursing down my arms. I close my eyes as the red haze starts and I take a few deep breaths, muttering “stay cool” and “cool it now.”

It helps. The haze recedes when I open my eyes. I stare at my wrists, trying to think of something useful.

I’d be right well fucked if this was a real situation.

I’m right well fucked with it as a training exercise.

I yank my hands apart, as if I could break the links. There’s nothing weak about any of them.

Fucking hell! I cast a “weakest link” and pull my hands apart as hard as I can. The middle link snaps clean through.

The shackles are still firm on my wrists but I can at least move my hands independently now.

If I were really held captive this would be enough. I could call the Sword of Mages and use it, cuff notwithstanding.

But I have a feeling that won’t be good enough for the Mage.

I stew on it a bit, shifting around in the seat. I can’t sit still so I get up and start pacing back and forth across the Mage’s office.

Six steps to the bookshelf and six steps back.

Back and forth.

I just want to be free of these stupid shackles. I want to leave. I want to go back to my room.

I look out the window. The sun is slanted lower. Baz will be heading back from football practice soon.

I’d rather deal with him than be here for one more minute.

I just want to be free.

I just want to break free.

Merlin, that’s it!

I can hear the lyrics in my head. Baz may be a complete wanker but he’s a wanker with good taste in music. I’ve heard him play this song often enough on his contraband iPod.

I cast “I want to break free.”

The shackles glow even brighter this time and stay that way, shimmering. I can feel a tingle in my wrists and heat radiating from the cuffs. It doesn’t burn.

But they don’t snap open.

What am I doing wrong?

It comes to me then. It’s a song.

Maybe I have to sing this for it to work.

Fuck. I don’t sing.

I mean, I sing when I’m in the shower but only if Baz isn’t around. He’d take the piss if he heard me, I’m sure of it.

I have to try. I’m out of options and I’m sure the Mage will be back soon. I can’t face disappointing him again.

I hum the tune a few times to prepare myself.

“I want to break free.” It comes out wavery. What did Penny say? Melody, elocution, tempo. Ok. Ok.

And intention. That’s true with every spell though.

I intend for these fucking shackles to come off.

I take a breath and sing the lyric again.

And again, my voice getting stronger with each repetition. The shackles glow with a blue light and spring open, falling to the floor.

I rub my wrists and shake my hands out.

The Mage walks in just as I’m picking the cuffs up off the floor.

His eyebrows go up as he takes in the sight of my cuff-free wrists. “Well done, Simon. Tell me, what spell did you use?”

“‘Weakest link’ to break the chain, sir, and ‘I want to break free’ for the cuffs.”

His expression relaxes and relief floods through me.

“I wanted you to focus on releasing spells to remove or loosen the shackles but ‘weakest link’ is a good one in a pinch. It lets you use your sword, if nothing else.” He puts a hand on my shoulder. “The other one worked as a spoken spell?”

“No, sir, I had to sing it to make it work.”

He looks pleased now and I can’t help but bask in it. “Did you?” His claps my shoulder and gives me a hint of a smile. “Well done indeed.”

I smile back.

I’m so relieved.

#so many darn spells #whumptober 2019 #whumptober day 9 #carry on #baz pitch #simon snow #the mage #shackled

70 notes · View notes

trickstersantana · 7 years

Text

Para: We See Things as We Are

Who: Santana and Blaine Location: Undique Stadium Time: 30th January, after Blaine’s AMATs and before Ryder’s party Summary: The Liar Squad The Illusionist Posse fight each other. Triggers/Notes: Violence , fake illusory blood

Blaine had finished his AMAT and didn't know what to think about it. "It's not good to dwell in the past," he told himself and shook it off. His duel with Santana was the next thing; he had heard along the grapevine about Santana's recent string of wins, and it had been affecting her perception of witches. Namely to say, she thought of them weak. Blaine wanted to counteract that. And so here they were at Undique Stadium, staring at each other from opposite ends of a stage. "So who did you beat again?" Blaine asked, trying to keep the move light despite his nervousness.

Blaine sighed as he put his hand into the pocket, touching the lucky penny that had been on him since his fight with Spencer.

Santana was waiting for Blaine. After just beating Spencer, the strongest witch their age she knew, she had lost some of the expectations for something interesting happening on a fight against her. Though she has 0 hopes on Blaine of defeating her, and more expectations of him being ridiculous, she wanted to see if it was true what Spencer said of him getting better. She knew she shouldn't understimate Blaine. He was a terrible witch, but he was also smart and resourseful. She waved at him. "Let's see... Marley, Elliott, Adam, Rachel, Madison, Puck, Sam and Spencer" She said on a row. "Are you ready to be the next on the list?"

Blaine blinked after she listed all the names. Those were almost all of their friends. "Elliott too?" Blaine asked, mainly to himself. What did he get himself in now... But he put on a brave and collected face and said, "I'm ready to be the person to stop it!" Blaine carefully bowed, eyeing Santana as he finished. It was a customary show of respect to her in order to begin the duel. After that, Blaine got into position, bending down a little lower in case he had to dodge an attack.

Santana nodded, apathic "Elliott too" Also she later argued with him for real. Better not to think about it. Ever. "Let's go, Blaine. Show me what you're made of" She said, with a neutral expression. She hoped this wad going to be interesting.

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 1

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 5

Santana she snapped her fingers, desinterested, while making appear a single spear from the ground next to Blaine, just to scare him a little.

Blaine took a breath and then nodded at Santana's challenge. He wanted to show what he was made of. He was an Anderson, right? Blaine had promised Cooper he would be. At the moment Santana snapped her fingers, Blaine gestured, jumping high into the air at a fast pace. His cape billowed like the cap of a mushroom, ripping as he spun himself out of it and drew a fencing epee that shined in the light. << Reflect light! >> Blaine cast, his magic circle growing around his wrist and then bouncing right off of the sword's edge right into Santana's eyes in a harsh beam of pink light.

Blaine peeked quickly down and commended himself for dodging Santana's spear.

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 4

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 4

Santana was blinded for the light and her eyes hurt a little. When she could open them she saw everything with a pink filter. She smiled "That's a good start, Arsène, let's make things interesting" She said while making fire blues appearing around him. She remembered Tina and Ryder for a moment. If they got afraid of fire for Blaine's mind, was he also afraid of it? "Were you afraid of fire or I'm confusing you with someone else? I can make ice if you prefer" She said, and it sounded like a taunting, though she just really had a limit of making people she liked angry per month and she got it covered already.

Blaine smirked despite his blood turning into a frost and then searing inside of him. Blue fire was Cooper's specialty within his household. Blaine landed, more than necessary away from Santana. He drew his epee out in front of him, ready to wield it as needed. "Fire or ice, I'll fight it through." Blaine said in response, his eyebrows furrowed as he awaited Santana's strike.

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 3

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 2

Santana smiled at that. "That's the attitude" She said a little proud. Fight... of course, the knight in shinning armour. Let's give him something he fancies more. She made appear a big walking armour in front of him, with a huge sword in its left hand. The metal sounded clashing to each other, though it was just a mere illusion, of course. She made her fake warrior attack him. "Fight this, them" She said with a shrug

Blaine knew it was an illusion. It had to be an illusion, he kept on telling himself, but the actual push against his own sword was so weighty and felt so real that Blaine felt himself being pushed back some. His mental energy struggled as he pushed off the creature and he retreated further back, looking for an opening to get at Santana.

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 4

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 4

Santana keep going with her illusion warrior. "En Garde, Arsène" she said "C'mon you got a good start... I'm even boring of winning so much... you witches are such a crushing dissapointment"

Blaine tried as he might but that armor creature was tougher to do away than he thought. "En garde, Santana! Don't lose your focus, who knows what might happen." Blaine argued as he parried another blow.

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 3

Santana make another armour warrior appear next to Blaine, this time way shorter, like a dwarf. "Do you prefer someone your size?" that one made really cartoony sounds.

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 6

Blaine frowned and glared at Santana with actual animosity. "You're shorter than me!" Blaine argued over the cartoony sounds of the knight. << Slash! >> Blaine cast, his magic circle whirring as winds whipped around his illusioned sword, changing it from an epee to a knight's long sword. He struck at the knight, slicing the illusion into two pieces and dispersing it altogether. Blaine leapt right through and let the winds fling off his blade to knock Santana off her feet.

Santana shrugh with a smile "I'm taller than you when I wear heels, so it counts" she then saw how Blaine just destroyed her poor innocent knight and went for her. She tried to dodge it but failed and fell to the ground.

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 4

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 6

Blaine flushed in embarrassment at Santana's easy retort. But then got curious. "I heard tricksters can change their human form however they want -- why not make yourself taller, then?"

Santana just glared at him from the floor "Seriously?" She answered while she was getting up "First, I'm fucking perfect already. Second, heels make my ass look even perfecter, if there is something more perfect than perfect, and third, we aren't fucking shapeshife- are you trying to distract me?" She noticed quick, a little angry because it worked

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 4

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 2

Blaine shook his head. "No, I'm not trying to distract you," he replied. In fact, the conversation was distracting both of them from their illusions.

Blaine struggled to keep the shape of his illusion. Talking to Santana while casting an illusion was harder than he thought. His mental focus was weaning away.

Santana "Yes you are and it's not going to work, I bet you even pretended to not know that just to trick me, you pretending-to-be-naive mastermind" She said making an illusion of a foil sword in her left hand to make an attack.

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 6

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 2

Blaine "I'm not trying to trick you, Santana! Why would I? We're friends!" He raised his sword up to defend her attack but she managed to get through and hit him. Blaine winced at the pain, trying to say it was an illusion, but her power was quite strong. He grasped at the wound.

Santana keep attacking with her fake sword, making the metal clashing noises when clashing with Blaine's sword to try to make it dissapear. "Oh, c'mon!" She complained "You are on the Liar Squad for a reason, Arsène" she said while poining at his neck with her sword "I might had believe your fake clumsy inept persona before, but I know you are no fool. And you don't fool me anymore, no need to pretend"

Blaine rolled a die. The die showed: 2

Santana rolled a die. The die showed: 6

Blaine kept on parrying her attacks, the swords made loud and unnatural clangs of aggression. "I'm not fake or clumsy or inept! I'm not pretending -- I'm an Anderson!" Blaine shouted, anger and shame under pressure inside him. Cooper would never be in a situation like this. His brother was never fake, or clumsy, or inept. Blaine was a fool for thinking otherwise. His illusions began to shift, warp their form, and then Blaine lost his focus. His sword disappeared right when Santana moved.

Santana wondered what the hell was that Anderson crap. "You are not, but you do pretend, as we all do" She said, stabbing Blaine in the chest with her precious illusory sword. [TW: Blood] She made it look like blood was appearing from the fake wound she inflicted. Very teathrical and dramatic, just slowly appearing.

Blaine looked down at the wound on his chest, the red blossoming into his clothes. "It's an illusion," he wanted to tell himself but he watched, zoned out, and fell to his knees in a very theatrical and dramatic fashion. He looked up at Santana, fighting his tears, and said, "You stabbed me."

Santana looked down at Blaine "Friends stab you from the front" she said, while giving him a hand. "...with illusory fake swords, c'mon dude, don't be so dramatic" She said while snapping her fingers to make all the blood vanish. "What was that 'I'm an Anderson crap?"

Blaine got up and touched at his head. He was feeling very dizzy and didn't know what to do. He reached down to find his penny and it was gone. Blaine gasped and pulled out his pockets on both of his pants. "My penny," he said, not listening to Santana.

Santana crossed her hands. "What penny? Weren't you rich... I though rich people didn't even had coins" She wasn't going to let the question go to waste though.

Blaine put his head into his hands. "No, there was a lucky..." He sighed and moved his hands off his face. "It doesn't matter. Ryder's birthday party is coming up in an hour. I'm... you're going right? We should clean up and not look like we're beaten up."

Santana roll her eyes "You don't need luck when you have skills" and then she saw he planned to run away. She took advange of Blaine being right now in worse conditions than her and just grab his arm so he wouldn't go anywhere. "Blaine. What. Was. That. Anderson crap" she asked again. "Long ago, wit Fiji and the trial, you told me you liked to solve things as Blaine, not as your family name"

Blaine bit at the inside of his cheek. He hated that Santana was right about luck. He almost pulled her grip off of him but then her words stopped him from yanking his arm away. "And in the end, what happened? I solved it with my family name, like everyone wanted. You didn't even care at that time, Santana. You told me to do everything to save Elliott." Blaine looked at her, eyes flashing wild with vexation.

Santana was actually surprised at the answer. She spend a time looking down before answering "...Maybe I care now?" She said, unsure of her words. "Ugh, dude" she said letting her arm go. "It worked, and I apreciate it, and you are still an Anderson. But also you are still Blaine. You don't have to stop doing things on your way" she said, not really knowing what to say though she was the one pushing the issue.

Blaine turned around, tired. His head was killing him, the mental strain of the illusions had been too much. "Santana, can we talk about this later? I have to go get ready for the party." He felt terrible for almost blowing up at Santana. His family wasn't known to be explosive. They were always calm under pressure. Courage was supposed to be grace under pressure, and Blaine was ruining it all. "I'll... see you later. Good fight." Blaine faced Santana again, bowed, and left the stadium feeling more unsure of his magic than ever.

Santana was hearing inside her mind the lyrics of the song 'you ruin everything you stupid bitch' on repeat while everything happened on slow motion. "Oh, yeah" she said, snapping to reality. "The party" she said knowing she kind of fucked up AGAIN. As usual. "It was a really good fight you did great!" She shout while he was leaving. "Ugh" she wondered when winning stopped being funny.

#happilyeveranders #chara: blaine #para: blaine

4 notes · View notes

sirarthurtennerly · 7 years

Text

Dossier: Sir Arthur Tennerly

Full name: Arthur Tennerly Nickname: Arth Titles: Cadet, Knight of the Silver Hand Race: Human (Stromic and Lordaeronian) Gender: Male Age: Twenty-six (26) 'At first glimpse...' Tall and lean, but with broad shoulders and thick wrists. Shoulder-length red hair, gray eyes, short red beard. Disfiguring facial scars. -- Background -- History: Arthur Tennerly was born in 11 AD to Sir Lucais Tennerly, Knight of the Silver Hand, and Lady Myrtle Kelsey, their firstborn child. House Tennerly of Bencaster and the unlanded House Kelsey of Lordaeron were both minor in the extreme; after the Third War destroyed their fortunes, the family was never able to recover. Sir Lucais himself died on Mount Hyjal. Arthur himself, age 10, was sent to Northshire Abbey to finish his time as a page and begin his squireship. In 25 AD at the tender age 14, having become a squire a year or so earlier than average, he set off as a "squire-errant" rather than sticking around to apprentice under a knight. He learned the finer points of his art in the school of hard knocks, only now and then staying for a week or three at a church or somesuch for brief tutoring from an experienced Paladin. He is know to have been active during the Defias rebellion, and in most conflicts since, in various capacities - as a squire- and later knight-errant, these tended toward auxiliary military service at most, but most often acting as an adventurer. He has somehow managed to survive more than a decade of such misadventures. In addition to field service, he has spent a good deal of time in Stormwind itself, particularly its poorer neighborhoods. He has been known to, in his words, "help [criminals] find a better way." This tendency is what ultimately led him into the thick of the string of murders related to the Georgiano case, and from there to joining the Guard to ensure that these people can no longer prey on the innocent, and to avenge a friend who had become a victim. Legacy: While his father's death technically makes him the head of House Tennerly, that house is scattered and no longer has any land or liquid assets to speak of, making the title is more or less meaningless. Thus far, he seems content with merely bearing the name and the sigil and the ancestral sword, Firebrand. He is also more than happy to continue the family's long, proud martial tradition - since the founding of the house, it has never not had a knight bearing its name. -- Appearance -- Aesthetics: He wears his thick, wavy coppery-red hair loose to his shoulders, and maintains a closely-cropped beard of the same color. The twelve years he's spent as a knight-errant have not been easy on him, all the less for having started early - he has numerous facial scars, albeit mostly faded to thin wide shadows, and his nose appears to have been broken too often to fully heal, and is somewhat crooked. High, sharp cheekbones and iron-gray eyes are set on an angular face that might once have been handsome, before his warrior's trade put paid to that. His accent drifts between bog-standard aristocratic Lordaeronian and Highland Stromic. When he's not in uniform as a Stormwind Guardsman, he dresses as a cavalier would – a long, hooded green cloak bordered with thread-of-gold of sturdy wool, oiled against rain; a belt and baldric of good leather, tooled in aesthetically pleasing but mostly meaningless patterns and with a buckled shaped like the House seal. A suit of mail armor in forest green and brown protected him in his knight-errancy, being better suited to constant travel than full plate. These days, he prefers it as a compromise between flexibility and protection when not on duty. Build: Sir Arthur is not a large man - slim the way a knife is slim, all sinew and whipcord muscle and not a spare scrap of flesh beyond what fitness demands. He is fairly tall, however, with a few inches on most, and long-limbed with the broad shoulders and thick wrists of a swordsman. Strength not being his advantage, he relies on the long reach of his arms and the skill earned from endless practice both on and off the field of battle to make up the difference. Trinkets and jewelry: The heavy gold signet ring of House Tennerly – with the rampant bear of the House magically protected from wear – hangs from a leather thong around his neck, tucked safely under shirt and mail. His cloak is fastened by a lair of forged-brass pins bearing the Bear Rampant of his house, reversed on the left so that they snarl at each other across his chest. In his bag: He carries several gold coins in a pouch on the side of his satchel, to ensure he has the necessary coin to finance his often long-term adventures. A smaller pouch at his belt holds a few more, along with loose silver pennies and other pocket change. Other details: It is rare indeed to catch him without his sword hanging from his left hip, or his misericordia dagger from his right. The sword itself has a blade that is clearly very old, inscribed with Old Arathi runes, and has been re-hilted many times. The present hilt is nothing fancy; plain steel and leather-cord wrapping, with a polished cut agate decorating the pommel. -- Talents and Psychology -- Personality: Close comrades speak with varying degrees of irritation, weary resignation, or wry amusement of Sir Arthur's impetuous nature and burning need for action, often flinging himself head-first into battle with little more than a brief tactical assessment. Generous to a fault, that "man of action" mindset often also leads him to use up much of his meager income – typically in the form of giving to beggars, though he is usually able to tell which are genuine and which are trying to scam him. He is also highly protective – close friends and comrades quickly find themselves regarded as surrogate family, and thus liable to see Sir Arthur take a very close interest in their trials. He is very friendly and good-natured, quick to laugh and thick-skinned. Whether by nature or from experience, he empathizes easily with the poor and down-trodden, and is slow to judge those who do what they must to survive, and quick to anger against those who take advantage of the unfortunate. He loves a good fight, but always prefers to settle disputes with words before swords unless dealing with someone he considers to be an irreconcilable enemy. Oddly, despite an independent streak, he thrives under the discipline of an established hierarchy, and believes whole-heartedly in the vital importance of the rule of law. He considers his honor and integrity to be dearer than his own life, and is absolutely dedicated to his duty. Strengths and weaknesses: Nearly all of Arthamir’s talents and strengths are martial in nature - he is a very skilled swordsman and rider, and has a good head for strategy, tactics, and organization. His courage borders on the suicidal, and his loyalty is unshakable once earned - both of which have led him into hot water on more than one occasion, especially in situations where someone he is loyal to is in trouble, as he is prone to mount a head-on rescue attempt. Aside his friendly demeanor, easy confidence, and casual charisma are boons in personal interaction. He has been noted to be too trusting - he wants to believe in people's better nature, and while he isn't easily deceived, necessarily, this can and has combined with his better nature to lead to his being manipulated. His recklessness has been mentioned before - he rarely thinks of his own safety and, in absence of orders and if there is no one else to take care of, is prone to taking a given problem head-on. This lack of concern for his own well-being also leads into his tendency to place honor and duty so far above his own needs that he is willing to grin and bear great hardship to uphold his values on points so small that many would call it irrational. His protective nature sometimes goes so far as for him to become wrapped up in a bitter disagreement, purely due to his instinct to act on behalf of those he feels responsible for. Relatedly, he is extraordinarily stubborn – once he digs his heels in, he often sits there come hell or high water. This is particularly troublesome when he is intent on holding a field of battle, nearly always volunteering to serve in the rear guard. On the bright side, he has enough self-discipline to be on his best behavior when on-duty. Factions and loyalties: With a Stromic father, a Lordaeronian mother, and having spent very little of his life in either country, it is perhaps unsurprising that he considers Stormwind, where he spent his adolescence, to be his home. He is proud that he swore a knightly oath to the House of Wrynn when he earned his spurs, even if he has yet to become a Knight of Stormwind in truth. He IS, however, a Knight of the Silver Hand, and enthusiastically so. He often disagrees with the clergy on orthopraxy, however, and is seen as something of a maverick by many. Nevertheless, his devotion to the ideals of the Order cannot be called into question, and wherever he fights he raises the cry: "Tyr and the Silver Hand!" That being said, while he believes in the value of peace, he will always be ready to defend the Grand Alliance against the depredations of the Orcish Horde and its Banshee Queen. He also considers close friends and allies to be a surrogate family, and will defend them with his life. Prejudice and judgment: In addition to the ancient enmity against the Amani inherited from his father, he nurses a burning hatred for the undead that destroyed the homelands of both his parents and drove his family into exile, and the Legion that killed his father on Mount Hyjal - the former of which causes him rather more difficulty than the latter, in times of peace. On a far lesser level, he isn't fond of goblins, Dark Irons, Alteraci, feral worgen, Highborne, the Horde in general (excepting Tauren), or a handful of miscellaneous nuisances (such as Hozen), for various reasons and to varying degrees. Motivations: Sir Arthur is a man driven by his obligations. Ultimately, everything comes down to duty - to his people, to the Order, to the Alliance, and, now, to the 42nd.

0 notes