TEST DRIVE MEME!

[faderifting]

TEST DRIVE MEME

Maybe you’ve been around for a while, or maybe you’re new to the Inquisition. Maybe you’re new to Thedas, having recently fallen from a tear in reality and been collected by uniformed rescuers. Whoever you are, you’ve been sent to Kirkwall, to an outpost where many of the Inquisition’s members and allies work on some of the biggest mysteries and problems the organization must solve if it’d like to keep the world from ending, where “ending” means “falling under the power of an ancient powerful corrupted being who wants everyone to bow to him as a god.”

And just to be clear, it would like that. It would like that a lot.

I. THE GALLOWS: The Gallows is an island fortress in Kirkwall’s harbor. It’s been home to, in order: Tevinter slaves, a Circle of Magi, a lot of creepy red lyrium, and now the Inquisition, which has occupied the fortress with the provisional Viscount’s blessing. There are walls that still need rebuilding and corners that still need dusting, but for the most part the Inquisition has gotten down to business. There’s space in the stone-floored courtyards to train or spar; or, if your skills don’t lie in the realm of hitting things, there’s a large library and several offices supporting the Inquisition’s areas of research and diplomatic efforts. If you don’t know what to do with yourself, then by all means, ask; someone will definitely be able to put you to work.

II. KIRKWALL: A quick row across the harbor will take you to Kirkwall proper. The city is built into the cliffs, from exclusive and wealthy Hightown at the top to impoverished Darktown in the abandoned mining tunnels below. In the middle is Lowtown, home to taverns, merchants, and plenty of trouble to keep anyone looking for it happy. You’re welcome to spend your free time and your money here—but try not to annoy the locals too much, please, in case their welcome runs out. It’d be a shame to have to pack again so soon after arriving.

III. QUESTING: Barely had time to make yourself at home, did you, before you were sent away from Kirkwall again—but this time on a mission. There’s a rift outside of Markham, pouring demons into the fields, and the Inquisition has been asked to lend a hand. Maybe literally. If you have an anchor embedded in your palm, you’re needed to close the damn thing. If not, maybe you’re here to fight demons or guard against bandits on the road, or to gather samples and take notes on the rift’s location once its closed, or to speak to Markham’s nobility afterwards to make sure that they fully appreciate the Inquisition’s efforts. Regardless, it’s a long trip, so we hope you like campfire cooking and sharing a tent.

IV. SENDING CRYSTAL: Joining the Inquisition gets you access to the very latest in barely-understood magical communication devices—namely, a crystal, small enough to wear around your neck, that will allow you to communicate verbally with anyone else who has one. Or everyone else who has one. Say hello.

V. WILDCARD: The whole of Thedas is yours to explore, from coast to uncharted wilderness. Choose your own adventure!

Comments

OOF

[paladingus]

[The pause makes him wonder for a cringing moment if he's gotten it wrong and made a bit of a fool of himself, but...no, that's the voice he remembers, or more specifically the tone he remembers, and he laughs with surprise and delight. He's always been one to wear his heart on one mailed sleeve, rendering the armor all but useless.]

I'd never. That's Rick's job, the bastard. What are you doing here? And for the Maker's love, why'd you come through Orlais?

[serjeant]

Orlais pays better than your wanker brother--

( Seoraj, be nice.

Or don't. He does sound awfully cheerful, though; as surprise massive humans go, he'll take Simon Ashlock any day of the week. )

Thought I'd come down here, take up needlepoint.

( Yeah, in the fucking forge. What do you think he's doing, Simon, other than having to change his joke midstream because he doesn't know what florists call their business. Flower...bollocks? )

[paladingus]

...That's fair. ['Nice' is not a requirement when talking about Simon's brother in front of him; he'd probably be less well-disposed if you tried. It's a blow to his high-flying morale regardless, remembering that the forge belongs to Rick now, and Simon doesn't really know what he's made of the place. Ma wouldn't let him make a complete hash of it, and at last writing Da wasn't too ill yet to offer input, but they're still not the ones paying the wages anymore.]

Well, so long as you haven't been drowned in frills and perfume. It must've been a narrow enough escape. And I hear we're in need of good seamstresses.

You've got time for a drink, haven't you?

[serjeant]

If you've got the coin for it.

( fingerguns )

Tell you a few stories about frills and perfume.

( Simon is not the only person in the world who noticed Seoraj's abs, hair or tats. )

[paladingus]

Yeah, yeah. [He should've expected that, and takes it in stride anyway. It's a small price to pay for the promised few stories.

Even if he's old enough now to have a few of his own, some that he wouldn't even mind telling, that painful-sweet ache of childhood nostalgia is more than worth a round of drinks on him. Maker knows he'd sat around the forge often enough, getting underfoot and gulping down any tale Seoraj would tell him for free about life in the midst of the city or on the road.

There had come a point where it hadn't done to look so eager about it, where suddenly those abs and those tats and that glistening hair wet from the rain barrel had become very noticeable indeed, and looking suave in front of him had rocketed up the priority list, but Simon would like to pretend he doesn't remember any of that.]

Meet you at the Hanged Man, then, and you can give 'em here.

[serjeant]

Aye.

( Like it's that easy - it is that easy, just slotting back into the something long left behind, something from a childhood that at the time he hadn't thought was still his. He felt big, back then. Felt grown. He thinks back and, ah, lad. What a cocky fucker he'd been.

They're both lucky to have got this far. You can't take that sort of thing for granted - he's fiercely glad to hear from the boy, even if the boy is thirty, and he's only five years his senior, Seoraj.

So along he goes to the Hanged Man, and nineteen or thirty-five but hasn't time been kind to him. The little beard of which he was so proud, the sideburns remain the same; the hair might be a bit longer. He dresses much as he ever did, plain and fitted for ease of movement - a few more tattoos. A few lines, around the mouth and eyes. Something more settled about him: a man who knows who he is.

And who grins, when he sees a friend-- )

Fuck me, you aren't half big.

( Bring it in you obnoxiously tall motherfucker. )

[paladingus]

[Simon's always been too tall and broad for his own good, always getting reprimanded in the training yard for bruising the other pages with clumsy strength he hadn't even meant to exercise, but there's near to nothing left now of that soft baby-faced boy who didn't understand his own bulk or know what to do with his limbs. He'd had a pinchable-cheeked look about him at eighteen, something a little laughable about the determined set of his jaw, even if the laughter it prompted was kindly meant enough. It's no wonder Seoraj wouldn't have expected to hear from him again.

But there is no visible softness about him at thirty, and only a little of the old ungainliness about his walk once he's made to navigate a small crowded room. The armor he hasn't had the time to change out of hangs on him as if anything else would look vaguely out of place. Seoraj, though--

One always expects a subject of childhood admiration to seem less impressive when revisited as an adult. Not so, now. Not at all. The hair has only become even more majestic, the tattoos as enthralling as ever they were, and the aura of confidence that had made a teenage Simon hang on his words--that's indelible.

He grins back, and pulls Seoraj into a rough embrace.]

And you've still got nicer braids than all the village girls put together.

[serjeant]

We don't tell 'em so, ( -- piously. ) Or they yank 'em.

( Not that Seoraj is averse to having his hair pulled by a pretty girl, now and again.

But Maker, it is good to see a familiar face here - all the better that it's a friendly one, too. The world is flying to pieces, half the players shoving their hands in to tear off strips for themselves, and somehow at the arse of everything, here they are. He raises two fingers, lazily, to a serving girl- )

We'll have two, love, on the big lad.

( Keep your smiles to yourself, elf. There's a table; they can sit. )

You volunteer or you get volunteered?

( For the Inquisition, he means. It's not that he won't get to frilly knickers - he will - but he would like a bit of catch up. It's been more than long enough. )

[paladingus]

I'm not seeing the problem. [The slightest bit racy, there, for a man who's been firmly under the chaste and reserved thumb of the Chantry for as long as Seoraj has known him, but then, any observer with good night vision could have caught him sneaking out from the root cellar of Lindsay Pottinger's house at all hours the summer before she'd taken up with Rick and had the baby.

It's all in the distant past, where Simon is concerned. He's seen none of them in well over a decade, and isn't sure whether he'd expected to again. Were Seoraj a closer relation, he might feel somehow conflicted about the encounter, but here's all the pleasure of old fond acquaintance with none of the guilt that comes from neglecting blood, and he won't dwell on that a moment longer, even if the question raises some remorse of a different sort.

Oh, I joined up of my own accord. [Eventually.] Not exactly a wealth of other options for a templar without a Circle, were there. I stuck it out in Ansburg until the Knight-Commander threw in the towel, but for all the good it did I might as well have left early for a head start on my way back here. [Because when he'd left home, it had been for Kirkwall. But changes happen, and assignments shift, and usually the input of the templar in question isn't involved. He'll pretend that's what happened.]

Why, how'd they catch you?