RP:Test Subjects

Part of the Surface Tension Arc

Synopsis: Leone contacts Skylei to inform her that the trap she had commissioned has been completed. Meeting in a deserted part of the Nameless Desert, the two begin to conduct tests on the prototype, with Skylei using herself as test subject. Fortunately, all of the tests seem successful, until they are interrupted by Krice. Whilst Leone is unconcerned by his arrival, Skylei grows defensive and aggressive regarding the secrecy of the trap until he leaves.

Nameless Desert

Leone stands in what seems like the middle of nowhere, the jet black hair of the farrier like a hole rent between sky and sand amongst the bright terrain. Rising before the blacksmith's form, barely discernable in the glare of the sand, is a pod-shaped apparatus. The bulbous unit stands atop a single, spindly leg which disappears into the sands, countersunk below the surface of shifting grains. The plover seems to be making some last-minute adjustments, though to a casual observer, her position would seem strange. Rather than attending to the central spire of the device, the shoer fiddles and twiddles with what appears to be nothing at all, several feet removed from the visible invention.

Skylei had received the letter addressed to her by Leone and had travelled immediately to the location indicated by the smith. There is a clinking noise that indicates Skylei’s approach across the sands though her own raven’s head is as distinctive as the blacksmith’s in the myriad of sand. It’s the sound of vials, each stored within the pockets of her bag and coat knocking against one another. Each vial is filled with a quantity of blood; some vials contain little more than a couple of drops – some blood is much harder to source than others – whereas others are filled near to the brim. In addition to the blood of the humanoid races Skylei wishes to avoid poisoning, she also carries blood of a number of animals – rabbits, mice and a variety of birds. In her studies, Skylei had realised that such a complex trap would be wasted on small creatures and thus had decided to include animal blood in the enchantments. Most of the vials are correctly labelled but some, whether few error or design do not correctly proclaim what they are. There are two final vials, containing a sample potion that has many of the same properties of the desired final potion however, instead of asphyxiation, this potion simply produces ugly but painless boils on the skin. On sight of the blacksmith who had brought her brainchild to fruition, Skylei grins widely, opening her coat to reveal the multitude of samples. “Leone, I was so delighted to receive your letter. I do hope that you’re keeping well?” This mindless small talk is kept brief as Skylei wishes to focus on the real task at hand here, “I believe I should have all that you need.” Her attention is captured, of course, by the invention half-buried in the sand some distance from Leone, “It’s so beautiful…”

Leone gives Skylei a bemused smile, the smith's copper colored lips curving upward while her head nods in response to the greetings. "Quite well, thank you," the blacksmith states, one hand sweeping grandly toward the trap. "The diameter is eight feet in total. The outter hoop is made from the thinnest possible ghroundium, and it has a network of hairlike fibers that criss-cross the interior of the hoop so that if any one of them is touched, the trap goes off," the farrier begins to explain. A small dot on the horizon soon edges nearer to the couple, the messenger boy now ferrying a goat upon a leash toward the pair. A nod of acknowledgement is given to her assistant as he approaches, and the shoer reaches out for the goat's lead. "It is runed with holy sigils, because that's what I know, five times over. There is still room for arcane, though the two magics may conflict," the smith rattles off. "There are standard blessings against damage and the elements in general, and then specific wards for each sentient form of life that we discussed." Stepping toward the central fineal, the metallurgist twists the top of the podlike protrusion to reveal concentric rows of nested circles. Each port is aligned with others of the same size, creating a well of evenly spaced, identical cavities like a honeycomb within the pod. "Poison goes on the outside row, and the samples of blood go on the inside row. Once the races have been identified, you'll never need to fill those again."

Skylei follows as Leone introduces all of the parts of the trap to her. From the ghroundium hoop to the holy sigils to the protrusion that will be the resting place of all of the vials that clink as she moves, Skylei wears a beaming and almost hungry smile. Once Leone has finished, Skylei tears her eyes from the finished product and looks to its creator, “Forget blacksmith, they should call you an artist. That’s what this is, it’s pure artistry.” Once more, she would walk around the invention taking in everything again. “So, what now? We load it up with the blood samples and ensure that the blood types and the runes align?”

Leone tilts her head to one side, peridot eyes peering upward to the sky. "Just one blood sample per slot should do us, and the internal workings, the runes inside that identify and sort each type based on a few magical standards and distinctions (I borrowed a book from the castle library; it's really amazing the things Tristram has collected), should do their job. I've still not figured out what to do about people of half-blooded status, but I've made sure that the sensitivity of the identification wards is so much that at least half a matching life form signature should disallow the trap from going off," the smith assures the scholar, the citrus sights swinging downward to the ranger's face, "So I think mixed-races should be fine, as well. You shouldn't need a whole vial, just a couple of drops from each type and that step will be finished," the farrier instructs, allowing the giddy half-elf the privilege of doing it. For the moment, the metallurgist just stands back, waiting until that portion of the procedure is complete.

Skylei is like a child in a candyshop when she is allowed to fill the segments with the blood herself. The process would take some time. Skylei has been cautious and thorough in her preparations and the sheer number of bloods she has on her is extensive. She starts with the most likely creatures to travel through the forests in which she has told Leone she plans to use the trap; humans, lycans and elves. Then she adds more races, filling each segment with the droplets, not even straying from her task to converse with the blacksmith. However, there is one thing she does address: Leone’s comment on those of half-blooded status. Skylei raises a wry eyebrow at these as she continues to transfer a couple of drops of blood from each vial until a pile of vials rests to her right and none are left within her coat. “I can only hope that you are correct, or else I will be meeting my death in a cruelly ironic way.” Finishing up, Skylei would pass the prototype poison to the blacksmith. If you want to install this, I am happy to allow the first test to be done on myself, once the creation has caught up with the blood samples.”

Leone nods in singular regard to Skylei's response, both concerns and offers accepted hesitantly, and then mulled over for several seconds as the blacksmith studied the trap once more. Stepping forward, the farrier pulls out a flask from her pocket. "The poison wells, they can actually be filled with anything liquid. Once the trap is tripped, they just simply release a portion of their reserve. Right now, it stands at one-tenth the volume of the reservoir, just to be conservative. I have water here. If you'd like to try it on yourself, then I am more than satisfied with using water first, rather than risk you suffering any ill effects," the metallurist says with a smile. The flask is offered to the scholar with the extension of the plover's arm. "Also, I thought perhaps portability would be a concern, once I realized precisely how large the trap was. As such, I've fashioned it so that a release along the post below the repository will fold the trap up like a parasol. I've make completely sure that this will in no way sacrifice the durability nor stability of the device," the shoer expounds.

Skylei beams as Leone explains the practicalities of the trap. She is especially delighted to hear of its portability, near clapping her hands in delight, “I have said once and I will say again; you are a genius with metal. I don’t think that many people could do the things that you can do with such precision or poise.” Skylei has always been one for living dangerously and so, in spite of the offer of water chooses to insert the pseudo-poison into the receptacle. “Whilst water would work, I’d like to ensure that a liquid with similar properties to that of the poison I intend to use just to ensure that the delivery works. The poison itself, well, it’s a simple enough concoction, but requires ingredients from the far reaches of Rynvale and Venturil I’m told, or something similar. Such a hassle and I’m yet to see any.” Skylei rolls her eyes and moves away from the pod. “So what now? I just move around in the near vicinity and the hoop and fibres should be activated?”

Leone gestures toward the flipped-open pod with one hand. "First, you just need to twist that closed, the hinge is pinned, so it will move either way. I didn't know if you were left or right handed, so I just made it universal," the smith adds as an aside, "But once you've closed that, the trap is prepared, all you need to do is activate it. The runes are already imbued, so you just need to step out of the circle, and tap the hoop anywhere three times to arm it, and then three times to disarm it within a five-second period. It sounds brief, I know, but it truly is not. Also, the hoop will assess sapient versus accidental tappings. If there is no sapient form in the area, the taps are taken as false positives, so a tree branch during a storm, for example, cannot simply deactivate the trap," the farrier asserts, confident in the infallibility of the device in this case.

Skylei would wait so that, should Leone want to move beyond the impressive range of the trap she could do so. Really, it all depended on the blacksmith’s confidence in her own science. Skylei herself, sees little risk in the operation and certainly none that she is unwilling to put herself in, but Leone might disagree. That done, Skylei closes the pod (with her right hand) and moves so that she is aside the hoop. Twisting her head to grin at Leone, Skylei remarks, “Here goes nothing,” before following the instructions given to her by the blacksmith. Three taps on the hoop is supposedly all it takes to activate the trap and so that is what she does, counting aloud, “One, two-” Stock still, she’d utter a further question, “What happens after three?” She leaves Leone no chance to reply before tapping the hoop for a third time.

Krice was at first a rippling silhouette on the horizon. The winds of the far-off desert swept against him, freckling his tan-coloured cloak and hood with lighter grains. With his left hand up, the man held his hood low over his face, protecting his face from the irritation of those sands. The further inland he got, the less strength the winds harboured to bother him, and as such, that 'securing' hand was no longer required against the hood atop his head. That curved fabric remained in place, however, as he turned his head to view the pair of women some several metres ahead - and to the right - of him. What was that contraption situated between them?

Leone moves out of the circle of the buried loop, mostly because she knew something else that Skylei did not: the trap would not active with someone standing inside. The question answers itself, the blacksmith not needing to reply. Upon the third tap, there is an audible click, followed shortly by a high-pitched whine. The divine runes spiraling around the perimeter of the trap flash livid orange thrice before the sigils along the central unit and stem answer in kind. Then, the entire device falls silent. A nod is given to the half-elf, and the farrier drags the hapless goat further away, so that the animal will not be startled and attempt to run, possibly endagering the ranger in the process. Inhaling and then settling into a tense posture, the metallurgist waits for the other woman to breech the trap's area. Intent on the test that was taking place, the plover doesn't notice Krice immediately. Perhaps it was his quite nature that always took the shoer by surprise.

Skylei, too, fails to notice Krice. Then again, she’s currently the subject of an experiment that could leave her looking worse than the backend of a horse for a good part of a week, so maybe she has an excuse for being unobservant. Once Leone is at a safe distance and the trap whirs and then falls to silence, Skylei pulls a face at her partner in crime, “You know, now I think about it, water might have been a better idea for the first test…” It’s a little too late for that and instead all that Skylei can do is move and allow the trap and Leone’s handiwork to work their magic. Her first step is tentative. Her second slightly less so and by the third and fourth, she seems almost relaxed, letting out a huge sigh of relief. It seems that the trap works just as had been designed. Seemingly, the combination of the bloods within the mechanism, either elven or human or both, means that the pod remains uninterested in spraying Skylei with the boil-inducing potion. She is not an unknown lifeforce and thus remains boil free. Thank Sven for that. As if in disbelief Skylei continues to pace around, just in case the hoop and its fibres had not been activated due to her distance.

Krice wasn't so curious about that contraption that he got any closer. Standing roughly four metres back from the women, he pocketed his hands, currently concealed beneath that billowing cloak, and watched them in silence; glancing from Leone, to Skylei, to the contraption, and then back to Leone for a lingering moment. As Skylei approached and stepped into some kind of designated area, the silver-haired man adopted a look of quizzical concern but he still did not interfere; after all, Skylei looked as though she -intended- to move that way. Whilst the half-elf presumably continued testing that contraption, Krice decided to break his silence with a casual, " Looks like fun."

Leone feels successful, triumphant, even as the trap fails to spray Skylei with the loaded poison. Each step from the half-elf brings the trap to reassess, and then reset, without fail. A single rune atop the central reservoir flares with amber light each time the device resets. Of course, this turn of events elicits a frown from the farrier. "Oh, perhaps I need to come up with something so that it is not constantly resetting, though I don't imagine many people will be doing circuts around it like an arena," the blacksmith chides, winking toward the ranger. The swordsman's words are met with a start of surprise, and the intense peridot sights abruptly turned onto him. "Hello," the metallurgist says with reservation, "It's work, but also rather fun." A subdued smile is given to the male.

Skylei’s elation at their success is cut short by the presence of another. Even though she knows him, like him, even, Krice is met with a cold stare before her eyes turn back to the smith. Skylei doesn’t want to continue discussing mechanisms in front of the man, but she has questions burning in the back of her mind. In spite of her reservations she asks them anyway, though her words are shorter, sharper, and much more business than fun. “How does it react to multiple persons? Say if it picks up on the presence of something it does recognise and something it doesn’t - how would it react then? And are you able to show me how it folds? Now that we know it ‘works’, I’m keen to use it as soon as possible. It’s the right season for hunting.” Then, Skylei scowls at Krice. “What are you doing? Why are you even here? Normal people don’t venture into the desert without reason.” It’s nothing personal, of course. Skylei is just ever so protective of her brain baby, a.k.a. the trap, and she isn’t ready to share it with just anyone just yet (maybe ever). She almost wants to cover it up so that Krice can’t see the contraption at all. Another scowl settles on her lips as her arms fold across her chest awaiting answers whilst her body stands between Krice and the pod of the trap.

Krice responded to Leone's greeting with a softer look sent her way, before Skylei's defensive acknowledgment of his presence ultimately drew his focus away. He reacted defensively as well, albeit in that muted way so characteristic of him. He fixed Skylei with a level stare and muttered, " Really? You're -really- reacting like that?" He even lifted a finger to point at her, clearly unimpressed.

Leone holds a single finger up toward Skylei, "Well, the failsafe I've built into it is that if it senses any sapient life at all, it shouldn't go off. So if a person and an animal end up in the web together, the poison won't release. Er...it shouldn't. But that's under the theory that we've included all of the sapient races in the presets, of course," the blacksmith mummbles the last sentence, somewhat sheepishly. Stepping forward, the farrier taps the rim of the trap three times, and the sigils flash in reverse: first the pod, then the hoop to display that the device is deactivated. Checking first to make sure that Skylei is no longer standing within the diameter of the ghroundium circle, the plover then begins to up-end the trap, turning the edge of the loop to the sky and causing the pod to come to rest upon the sand. Approaching the junction of spire and webbing, the smith pokes her hand through one of the many gaps in the hairlike mesh, and points to a small nub along the haft of the stem. Once she's sure that the half-elf has seen the indicated button, the metallurgist depresses it with the tip of her finger. Almost instantly, the entire circumference of the trap collapses downward, falling to the sand in its new, slim-line profile, not unlike a furled beach umbrella.

Skylei shakes her head at Krice, “This is one of the most innovative creations of our time. Do you…- do you even have any idea what we’re doing here? Or how dangerous it could be to have this around people who don’t know what they’re doing?” Skylei takes a deep breath in and out before uttering one more thought, “This thing could kill you. Or be used to kill people! That’s why we’re out here, where’s there’s no one and nothing, except, apparently, for -you-.” That scowl hasn’t even lightened in all the time she’s been talking. Her arms are folded dangerously tightly across her chest and there is a single blue vein popping on the left of her forehead. Whilst she’s not yet shouting, the signs of her irritation are clear. That irritation seems to fade at Leone’s explanation and as Skylei immerses herself once again in the comfortable world of academia, rather than the unfortunate world of social interaction, “There’s one or two missing. Those that were too difficult to obtain by the usual methods” Skylei confesses, equally sheepishly, to Leone. “But what’s the chance of a Naga walking through Larket’s forests, eh?” She’s joking, but the gnawing of her bottom lip suggests that Leone’s enquiry has her worried.

Krice may have liked to watch Leone work on that contraption, interested in her prowess with such things, but Skylei's attitude was getting on his nerves. Indeed, on any other day he was at the very least tolerant of her, even pleased with her presence, but right now... Well, neither one of them was happy with the other. In response to her rambling, even before she finished, he turned away with a muttered 'whatever you say' and stepped forward, proceeding toward town.

Leone twitches a smile at Skylei's lecture, her head turned away from Krice with the intent to hide the amusement at someone else laying into the swordsman aside from herself. The farrier clears her throat, a bid made to interrupt the scholar, an attempted ploy by way of words. "To be fair, he's always cautious, even when he doesn't need to be. And seeing as I'm the only one here who actually knows how it works, you've put yourself in much the same position," the smith says sympathetically, the same smile still tweaking her upper lip into a grin. "Just go easy on him." Realization then settles into the blacksmith's countenance, her brows knitting together into a deep furrow. The petite woman seems confused, contemplative, even perplexed. Finally, the smith reveals the source of her consternation, asking, "What's a naga?"

Skylei pulls a face at Leone that is designed to convey feelings of ‘But this whole trap was my idea in the first place and therefore I’m much better equipped than Krice to be here!’ Instead she just looks like a gormless fool, until Leone questions her on exactly what Naga are, “Snake-like people. They’re weird… and arrogant bastards too. I highly doubt you’d find any of them lurking in Larket, so we should be okay.” By this time, Krice has already begun to make his retreat (and Skylei has pulled a particularly ugly face at his retreating back) and, with their experimenting just about done for the day, Skylei is willing to suggest that they follow him back to civilisation.

Leone acquiesces to Skylei's suggestion, the blacksmith moving back toward the folded trap. Picking it up, she mutely hands it to the ranger. "I hope I don't have any cause to meet one, then. I don't do well with arrogance," the farrier says, probably loudly enough for the ever-retreating Krice to hear. Following suit of the rest of the group, the petite plover starts the long trek back through the sands and toward Gualon.