((OOC: I'll look this over for errors tomorrow; I have to sleep now.))
Galvez Prison
Asher Ikakois
Artus sighed and managed to smile and nod at Asher, which made the construct gain a bit of confidence. “Thanks Asher. At least now we kind of know what to look for…” Artus trailed off, and walked over to examine the carvings for himself. He touched the carvings, but did not seem to find anything; even the slightest hint would be helpful. “Biff, you have any ideas as to what the password might be? A possible character or something like Asher said?” Artus was beginning to worry. The group stood and stared each other for a few moments before Biff finally spoke up.
“…Uhhh…no, actually I don’t,” Biff admitted, and his tone had changed. “Hey, can I ask you guys something?” he asked, and triggered a sigh from Natalia. Everyone was at their wit’s end, and more questions certainly were going to aggravate an already exasperated trigger-happy noblewoman. Asher wanted to avoid that—he had had enough of people killing and being killing. “What do we do once we get out, assuming if we get out?” Biff asked. Asher was not entirely sure of the answer, only that it had something to do with rescuing Luna and defeating Ghan; his haziness about the whole plan he attributed to his lassitude.
“We go after the Commander obviously. What does this have to with anything? We’re not even out yet and you’re already talking about what to do once you’re free?” Artus said, in a rough tone of voice that was quite uncharacteristic of him. The cave’s atmosphere and their imprisonment was taking its toll on him, but he seemed to have realized that rudeness was un-called-for and said, “Biff, just shut up.” Asher thought that that surely would be an improvement over their current situation. “You can do whatever you want once you get out. Happy?”
Whining, Biff said, “So…you’re gonna go after Ghan and then what? Everything’s all good? I know what you’re trying to do now, it’s obvious. You just want to teach him a lesson ‘cus you think it’ll make yourself feel good that you killed the guy who was in charge of destroying our village. Well, you’re wrong! Ghan wasn’t in charge, it’s ultimately Diaz’s choice!” Asher immediately noticed that Biff thought that Diaz had been in charge, and felt rather sorry for Ghan—should he follow Diaz’s orders, then he was a murderer; disobey, a traitor. “Besides, he has three more Commanders…killing this one won’t do anything.” Asher thought that reducing a three-legged stool to a two-legged stool would impact the functionality, but that wasn’t to be so with people.
” Then we get all of them. And then we go after Diaz. Biff, shut up now, so I can think,” Artus said. He was concentrating on removing the seal on the door rather than the viability of his suggestions. “Biff, that drawing of the bird you saw…was its wings opened, or folded?” Asher could not discern the position of the bird carving, so he could have no input, but perhaps Biff had seen the bird drawing when it was newer.
“Hmmm…not sure, the drawing was old and parts of it were degraded. All I know is that bird drawing is not the only one I have seen since my stay here. I have seen many bird doodles, some different, and some same,” Biff responded.
’Ah, I had not considered that possibility,’ Asher thought as he put away his lump of metal, ’it is entirely possible that I am entirely incorrect and the answer is a bird. If so, then…I shall make every effort to remain unnoticed, on the chance that I am wrong. Being silent will cause no more injuries than being wrong.’ He resolved to not speak up unless it was absolutely vital. ’Perhaps…it is better if I even refrain from having opinions.’
“…But I think I have a guess as to what the password may be,” Biff said. Asher felt truly useless—even Biff was more useful than he was and he wasn’t even sane.
“Well, what’re you waiting for? Go and draw it!” Artus said as he threw Biff at the door. Asher nimbly dodged out of the way and looked on at the door. “Anything is better than nothing. Besides, if it is ‘booby-trapped’ like you said it is, then at least we’ll have nothing to worry about.” Biff had procured a rock with which to draw the symbol, but paused when Artus mentioned “booby-traps”. Artus had, perhaps unfairly, decided that Biff was going to take the brunt of any booby-trap that there was and it looked as if Natalia agreed with him on that point.
“…what do you mean ‘nothing’ to worry about? What if it's wrong?” Biff asked, scared to try anything.
“I mean, it’s better YOU than us. You get it Biff? It’s gonna be either you or us. Like you said before, we’re dead anyways, so why do you care?” Artus nearly snarled, quite angry. He had turned Biff’s words against him—the latter got teary-eyed and began to slowly draw something on the door. For a few moments everyone watched Biff, and Artus shoved him out of the way when he examined the new carving on the door. Between the other carvings was a simple drawing of an owl.
’One of the more symbolic birds. I had not even thought of drawing between the other carvings,’ Asher thought, ’Ah, does this have something to do with my being a construct?’
“This is it? This is the password? It’s just an owl or something. You wanna tell me how you came up with this?” Artus was skeptical, perhaps rightfully.
“…It’s…hard to explain. I saw a bunch of these drawings down here a couple of days ago. I’ve noticed that it changes every so often, so I’m pretty sure the drawings correspond with Ghan’s-“ Biff attempted to explain, and was promptly ignored by Artus, who, Asher was sure, felt inferior to Biff at this point. “Hey! I’m trying to tell you how I got it! It could help you later on you know? I think you should listen to what I have to say!” Biff yelled at Artus as he realized that he was being ignored. He turned around to plead with Natalia and Asher, saying, “Hey, you guys aren’t going to leave me right? I mean, I’m pretty important to the team, right?” He grabbed a hand each from both Asher and Natalia. Asher pulled his hand back, retracting any offers of assistance to Biff. Natalia did the same, but coupled with a threat. Asher backed away and lowered his gaze; he had not meant to harm anyone, but he had an intense dislike of physical contact.
“Biff, knock it off! We can talk about this after we get out,” Artus snapped, and Biff rose back to his feet. “Assuming you were able to carve this into the stone, and nothing happened, that means there was no trap like you said, right? Unless you got it correct, and the trap was dispelled.” Biff was still hesitant, and looked from side-to-side in search of something that only he knew about.
“…I guess so…” Biff admitted, and seemed to calm down. Artus touched the door with his hand, and it began to glow. The luminescent blue of the light filled the carvings as if they were rivulets and the light was water. The drawing of the owl was similarly outlined. “I think I spoke too soon,” Biff commented, as a low growl resonated in the tunnel as the beast appeared. The torch’s light was blown out by its roar and the quickly-diminishing eerie glow of the carvings. Asher quickly backed away from the massive monster and its horrid stench.
’We talked too loudly and for too long!’ Asher thought as he took quick steps backwards. Fortunately, there appeared an opening beneath the carvings. Asher was the first to hurry through the new door, as was the closest one to the door who did not have problems. He longed to stay behind, but he rationalized his departure by readying himself for any traps in the other room. He emerged into such a bright space that he had to stand off to the side and shield his eyes from the light.
Artus ran for the door, and was stopped by Biff, who was grabbing onto his arm. “Hey! Let go!” he yelled in a panic. “Biff, you a*shole! What are you doing?!” Asher was sorry for the both of them, but if he doubled back to help, then he would be blocked by Natalia, who was bound to have entered the opening already.
“Owww! No, please! Take me with you!” Biff was panicking in the chaos, and even his shouts could be heard through the beast’s noise. “It’s got me! Don’t let go!” he began to yell, but the beast silenced him, and only the snapping of bones could be heard.
After Natalia appeared from the gap, it closed to prevent the beast from chasing after the remainder of the group. Asher was neither glad nor particularly upset that Biff had died; the others were similarly conflicted. Biff had been rather irritating and touchy-feely, but Asher disliked people dying; his only exception was when living on was far more painful than dying—if that was the case, then what was the point in living? The other’s ambivalence over Biff’s death reassured Asher that thinking that maybe it was perfectly fine that Biff had died. The way he had died, though, disturbed Asher.
As soon as Asher’s eyes had accustomed themselves to the light, he cast a look around the room. It appeared to be a storage room, but only of material things; no food was to be seen. “We should be more careful from now on. No more arguing,” Artus said after a few moments’ thought. Asher had forewarned the group, but they had continued on the path of internal conflict and a person was dead. He glared at Natalia as if she were the sole reason for the strife, but Asher felt that it was more along the lines of it was his fault.
’I…could have prevented them from arguing. I am supposed to be the mature one, the one who watches over the group.’
“Sure, from now on we’ll be best friends forever!” Natalia said, scathingly, in a pitch that resembled a small child’s. “Now, can we continue our escape?” She was impatient, but Asher could hardly blame her—she had been pursued by a monster, harassed by a madman, and now Artus was admonishing her for something that she did not do. She walked next to Artus and said, “Step aside.” She examined the door and lock, and brought out a few pieces of thin wire; Asher had not known that she knew the art of lock-picking. Asher did not know how to lock-pick a door, as he could absorb any metal locks, break down any wooden locks, and any wooden locks that he could not destroy were probably unable to be picked. She cautiously opened the door and surveyed outside; apparently it was safe, as she said, “The coast is clear, we can get out of here.” Artus nodded and smiled and in agreement, but just as he was about the leave the room, Natalia said, “But, perhaps it would be best if we come up with a plan before we start blindly wandering around.”
Artus froze in his tracks and Asher braced himself for another argument; although, he wondered how they would plan well for exploring an unknown place without supplies. “Well, seeing as we barely know anything about this place, I think it’s safe to say the only thing we can do is play safe for now,” Artus said after some thought. He walked up to the door and touched Natalia just enough to get her out of the way. Asher could not see what ways the path now led, but he could guess that it went in two directions as Artus seemed to pause when he looked left and right.
Artus was startled by something and quickly closed the door. His gestures indicated to Asher that they were to remain quiet; for him that would be easy, but Natalia might have some difficulties. Asher could barely hear the people outside, or wardens, he supposed, but he did manage to pick up, “…Yeah, did you hear? A bunch of Immigrants from the north tried to cross over to Salos. Apparently they got some sort of population crisis on their hands or something.” That nearly confirmed his idea that the people of Diaz’s army were probably forced into service and did not voluntarily join forces as intelligent people, he thought, were less likely to share Diaz’s method of achieving his goals.
’…It would be like me to be wrong; it is better to refrain for assuming,’ Asher thought, adsorbed to his thoughts.
“Alright, let’s get out of here before anyone else shows up,” Artus said as he opened the door again. Asher thought that he was not being cautious enough and they could end up fighting again; nevertheless, Asher was both impressed and envious of Artus’s confidence. Artus peered out the door and took a look both ways, and said, “Seeing as how those guys went to the right, we should go left.” Asher cocked his head to the right—was that rather obvious?
The corridor itself was brightly lit, if only compared to the tunnels. Asher supposed that the reason for the increased illumination was that the wardens had the same light requirements as normal humans to see properly. Still, that the torches on the sides of the walls did not emanate as much heat as he would have supposed was surprising to him. After a while, they emerged into a circular room that overlooked the water of the river in the center. Rope railings had been erected around the gaping hole in order to prevent people from falling in, but Asher was still uncomfortable with the idea of a river so near. Why on earth is there even a room above the water? Is not the river intended to keep people away from Galvez Prison? Do they fish here? I suspect that whoever designed this whole area needs to start taking their meds again…’
“Damn it,” Artus swore again, “how are we supposed to find anyone in a place like this? Hopefully the others are having better than luck than us.” Asher also hoped that, but he suspected that it was not so—after all, including Keres in a group was bound to cause more problems than it would solve, but at least they would be better off against the beast than Biff was. The room held three paths out, to the right, left, and directly ahead; to check each out individually would consume a large amount of time that they did not have, but Asher was not going to suggest a path to take and going around the pit multiple times might trigger an unwanted battle. Artus turned around to face Natalia and Asher and asked, “Which way should we take?”
As if the sentence was a spell for summoning them, two wardens and a wolf appeared from the left entrance. Artus drew his sword and prepared to fight just as the two noticed him. Both of the wardens were clothed in what Asher accepted as their uniform, the only difference between the two that Asher immediately noticed was that one of them held in his hand a leash that was attached to a rusty-red and black wolf. The one without the wolf looked at the other nervously and shouted, “W-Who are they?” The one with the wolf looked away and Asher could hear his mental sigh as the nervous one kept on asking him questions. “Wait, what are we supposed to do? Fight? Run? Ghan said we capture all loose prisoners, and put them back in cells, or kill them if they don’t behave. What do we do?” Asher prepared himself for running away; the party was exhausted and fighting would only be squandering what energy remained.
“Them we get them,” the warden with the wolf responded, “sic ‘em, boy!” He released his hold on the wolf’s leash, and the animal rushed the group with tongue lolling and leapt at the group, likely aiming for their necks. Artus intercepted the wolf, but was thrown to the ground; he hit the wolf a few times and it let him go to back away. The two wardens ran towards the group, one armed with a spear; the other, a sword.
’Eh, the wolf backed off? Aren’t they trained to hold onto the human until the handler can do something? Maybe this one is a tracking or guard…wolf,’ Asher thought, and then felt a sudden burst of pity for the animal. ’It’s here through no fault of its own; it’s probably unable to be rehabilitated, is it best if I “put it out of its misery”? The humans…I feel not attachment to, not even one to feel as if they should continue living.’
He shook off the mists of his reverie and kneeled down to touch the ground, but attempted to make it appear so that he tripped and injured something. Luckily, the ground was stone, so he formed a small dagger out of it, put it into his right hand, and readied himself for the inevitable attack. The guard with the sword ran at Asher. ’Have to judge this accurately…’ At what he thought was the prime moment for a surprise attack, Asher rose to his feet in a forward motion and leaned in to stab the warden with his dagger.
“Damn!” the warden cursed and swung his sword at Asher. The construct was unsure of what to do now that the guard had dodged, but he was in very close combat at this point, so he grabbed the sword by the hilt with his free left hand. It dug into the flesh until it reached the bone and blood started to spurt out of the resulting injury. It stung, like sticking his hand into fire, but Asher was able to grasp both edges of the sword and fuse the sides with his bones. “You crazy b*stard!” the warden yelled as he desperately tried to shake his sword free of Asher’s grasp.
’Aggghhhh! Hurts!’ Asher clung on to the sword despite it cutting even more of his flesh. He brought up the dagger in his right hand to slash the warden just below the chin; he was surprised by the sheer amount of blood that came out from the newly-formed wound—so much that it wet his hand until the handle of the dagger became slippery, it splattered his face, dripped off and drench the front of his shirt. The warden stumbled backwards, let go of the sword, and clutched at his neck while gasping for breath, but he could take in no more air and was drowning in his own blood. ’No! Why did I?! It should be physically impossible for me to kill someone…perhaps death-by-blood-loss bypasses that? Why am I not caring about that death?’ Asher dropped the dagger in disgust and disregard for his own safety.
“You-!” the warden yelled as he, too ran towards Asher. This time, though, Asher’s trick would not work a second time and he was now hobbled by the sword attached to his left hand. The construct struggled in vain to absorb as much of the sword as he could before the spear could reach him, but it seemed that all he could do was get through half of the sword’s width. The second warden took advantage of his fallen comrade’s attacks and tried to stab Asher with his spear, on his left side where he was struggling with the sword. Asher was then targeted by the other side of spear; and the middle section was quickly grabbed by Asher’s bloodied right hand. It hurt his hand to hold onto the shaft of the spear, but his sheer strength was enough to rip the weapon from the warden’s hand without losing his grip on the spear.
“What the hell? Are you not human?!” the warden nearly screamed in fright. Asher had nearly absorbed all of the other warden’s sword’s sections to heal his hand, but he continued to absorb it until it broke in two. The pieces fell down to the floor with a clatter as the second warden stared at Asher in horror.
Asher detested that look—it was the look that people had given him when they discovered what he was. ’Just because I am abnormal…you look at me in that way! Why?! I need a reason…please. Just give me one. It cannot be that I have killed your companion—charging into battle, aiming for the person who could be hiding a trap.’ He could be rather cold in the heat of battle, but he would never have killed a person—it was programmed into him that he could never kill, yet what was this? Asher lifted his head and looked down his nose at the warden;—it was the only way that he could fully see him, as the blood had even obscured his vision by drying on his eyelashes. Ugh. This blood…is disgusting. I think that I swallowed some, even. Why do I feel nothing by...harming, killing these people?’
“You…monster!” the warden yelled and tried to run away, towards where he had come from, past Natalia and Artus. Asher ran after him on instinct and the grasped the collar of his uniform before jerking it back. He slammed him to the ground and used Weapon Formation to create ropes of stone that bound the man by the waist. He rose to his feet to neutralize the wolf, but the warden grabbed Asher’s long hair to tug him backwards. Unfortunately for the warden, there was enough slack for Asher to whirl around and stomp, hard, on the man’s hand with his heel. He screamed in pain and recoiled, but he did not make another attempt to stop Asher.
’Why? Why am I doing this? Why do I feel hatred towards people I have neither meet nor know?’ Asher knew of nothing that would rationalize his actions. Even a contrived answer could not be arrived at. ’Did…my creator have something to do with this? Does a single human’s hatred influence their actions so much that they’ll change something that they have cared for all their life?’ As he stopped in the exact middle between the incapacitated warden and the wolf, he stood there, facing the wolf. It did not move. ’I shall stop while I can; Natalia and Artus can handle themselves. I…do not want their disapproval because of my actions. Even so, I cannot run away now. Wolf…I am sorry that this life of yours will end in this manner…farewell.’
The wolf, sensing his intentions, decided to turn towards him and growl to try and keep him away. ’Why…do I have more sympathy for a wolf than for humans? Because I am close in origin to neither and animals rarely treat me with the same scorn that humans have.’ The wolf fluffed out its fur in an effort to appear larger, but Asher was unmoved and advanced. The wolf lunged for his throat, but Asher brought up his bag as something else for the wolf to latch onto. Its growling drowned out anything else that Asher might have heard, but he could concentrate enough to use Weapon Formation to create a spear of the stone. The spear rose out of the stone to pierce the wolf through the neck, killing it. He lowered his bag down and detached the wolf’s jaw from it.
Asher turned to face Natalia and Artus directly. He glanced away, ashamed. Who had asked him to dispose of the wardens, and so bloodily as well? ’Ah, now they know of my strength and perhaps my abilities of recovery as well. Why have I not kept my resolution to remain unnoticed?’ He tried to back away, but to nearly every side of him there were bodies. He kept not meeting the eyes of either of the other two and instead tried to back against the wall. ’Why, why, why? Why did I kill? It might have been possible to win without killing, but…. Even now, am I worth something to the group?—I know that they would have easily defeated the wardens, perhaps without taking a single injury, even. I splattered blood everywhere on my body; if we happen to meet someone, then I will be suspicious immediately. I don’t(…didn’t?) want to kill…so why have I? What is wrong with me? How is everyone else so nonchalant about it?’
((OOC: You said that we could kill them in one round, yes?))
