Stories Now Will Unfold

[Moonhunter]

[Wayward City, Open RP]

One particular dive bar in the slums had attracted a crowd—and a diverse one at that. Orcs, humans, lizardfolk, dwarves, and even a troll had wandered in, attracted by the strange, loud music. "Music with Rocks In," some people called it when asked. Anyone who walked in, if they weren't immediately put off by the grime on the walls, the axe buried into a dart board, the melange of various species' body odors and stale alcohol, would see a human on a keyboard, a kobold rattling a drumset, and what looked like a white werewolf with a hood over his head playing a strange sort of guitar-- a guitar that wailed under his fingers, instead of strummed with an organic resonance.

The wolf said a few words to his apparent bandmates, who nodded before the kobold hit his drums and the wolf-man started playing... and singing. It was, apparently, a song they had played before, as the dwarves in particular stared raising their mugs and cheering loudly.

Mysteries of ages told
Stories now will unfold
Tales of mystic days of old are hidden in these walls
Hear the witches play their tunes
Sing their songs to the moon
As they play the night will move, in the hall of the mountain king
Wild child so innocent
You took that away

Thoughts of wonder and surprise hide themselves in your eyes
As the smoke begins to rise inside the mountain halls
Ancient tales of witches' lore
Answers lie through that door
All you'd ever want and more, is calling for you now

Through darkened corridors
Try but you cannot break free
You took her innocence

Now you will answer to me

He started to play his guitar, a rapid, repetitive sequence of notes... but then, suddenly, he stopped. The kobold, who had been struggling to keep up, found himself playing a few beats before he realized the wolf-man's guitar had stilled. He pulled the hood away from his head to scan the bewildered crowd, ears raising like a pair of devil's horns. One pass over the crowd before he honed in on a table in a center of the room, where a human male was holding on to one of the lizardfolk serving wenches by the arm.

"Hey, buddy," the wolf called out. His speaking voice growled just like his singing voice. "Hands off the wait staff."

"Shut up and play, bard!" the man said, his voice slurring. "Me and this lusty lizard maid got some business."

"I'm no bard," the wolf said. "And you're drunk, so you get one more warning. Let. Her. Go."

The man flipped the wolf off—only for the wolf's hand to become a blur of motion, pulling a machine from his hip that unfolded into a gun. It made a high-pitched sound, and suddenly the man's finger was gone. He screamed and collapsed, as bouncers moved in to drag him out. The serving wench scampered off, casting the wolf a grateful glance.

He holstered his weapon. "Happens every time," he muttered, before nodding to his fellow performers, and started playing again.

In a midnight fantasy
More than any eye can see
Hear them laughing crazily, It's out of your control
Mysteries of ages told, stories now will unfold
Tales of mystic days of old are hidden in these walls

Through darkened passages
Run but you cannot escape
You took her innocence
And for this crime you must pay, ha-ha!

I am the mountain king
Are you not afraid?

Again the music got faster, faster, more frantic, more loud, the crowd loving it. When the song finally ended, a patron sidled up to the bar for another drink. "Who's that werewolf?" he asked the bartender.

The bartender shrugged as he poured the man a new drink. "No idea. He just shows up every few months, even before I bought the place. Plays a few songs, then hands by regular players sheet music for a new song to practice for the next time he comes around. All I know is, I don't wanna tell him to stop. For multiple reasons."

[sasco]

The Dragonborn pushed the rotted door open with his shoulder, cursing under his breath as soot and grime smeared onto his overcoat. He took a last long drag from his pipe before extinguishing it. These days even the most slummy dives seem to frown upon smoking indoors. He walked in just in time to see a man get his finger shot off though he failed to see who the shooter was. Upon seeing the wench scurry off, he could only shake his head.

"Damn scalechasers."

As the band began playing once more he took a seat upon the bar and placed a slightly higher than normal amount of credits towards the bartender. "Two bottles of the darkest beer you have."

As he waited for the bartender's response he glanced around to get his bearings of the bar. In a past time the music would be unbearable to him but has now gotten used to the noise. He raised a brow towards the wolf-man on the stage but continued scanning. Typically these dives would have some sort of "fortune teller" in the seedier corners of the bar. Most of them were charlatans but there was that odd one once in a while that had some sense of the power they were using. If he found the right one then he could find his next clue.

[Vythmiirik]

A female dragonborn with shimmering silver scales poked her head through the bar door, she clearly looked nervous as her sharp, sapphire, eyes scanned the area; before taking a deep breath and moving in through the door. Vythmiirik looked around taking note of the other patrons.  Clutching a soft parcel to her chest, she sidled up the area, her wings folded tightly and almost rigidly to her back; her tail curled almost defensively as she tried to find a clear spot she could wait in.  Thankfully the demonstration previously meant she went largely unharassed; a few snickers and thoughtful humms, but no one dared move for now.  She eyed up the copper dragonborn at the bar for a moment before dismissing him, not someone she knew, and hopefully, not someone she needed to worry about.

Vythmiirik looked up at the stage and then back around her, to be honest this probably wasn't her brightest idea but mother's stories had made it clear, this was something she had to do. In the old days when her family wandered, lost and afraid when things had not been so safe, her parents had fallen afoul of bandits and brigands out in the fields and hills.  They'd been sure it would have been the end of them; there had been talk of terrible things from slavery, to being skinned for their hides.  Mother had often not gone into too much detail on that part of her story or the next part, so Vythmiirik wasn't exactly sure what had happened only that it had been violent and at the end of it there hadn't been many people left standing. Only a white werewolf, who had strode with purpose through smoke and flame as though he were made of it himself, who had saved them and set them on their way.  Mother had commented that she felt that the moon maiden herself had sent him, that the goddess of outcasts and the trampled had intervened, by sending her most favoured servant.  Father had however; laughed and said no god or goddess had, or ever would, look at the dragonborn and to stop telling tall tales. Though he never refuted that the incident had happened.

So Vythmiirik had listened, and as she'd grown, starting her work as a weaver; she heard rumours.  Now she headed into where she'd heard the werewolf in question currently was, and there he was; looking just like the person out of her mother's tales.  So she clutched her gift to her chest wrapped in simple brown paper, and waited, she wasn't really all that good at this; but custom amongst her people demanded that she try.  She would not be alive had the hunter of the moon not helped her parents, and so she owed him a debt.

Vythmiirk just hoped that he would like it, it was her finest work, specially made and hopefully to size.  If he didn't like it...well she didn't know what to do, should she try again or possibly make something else?  Well no use borrowing trouble she supposed, she would wait until he finished his performance, it would be impolite to interrupt after all!

[Moonhunter]

Once the cacophony of clapping and cheering patrons had died down, the white wolf started playing something more moody.

You thought the leaden winter
Would bring you down forever
But you rode upon a steamer
To the violence of the sun

And the colors of the sea
Bind your eyes with trembling mermaids
And you touch the distant beaches
With tales of brave Ulysses
How his naked ears were tortured
By the sirens sweetly singing
For the sparkling waves are calling you
To kiss their white laced lips...

The song was much shorter, referencing historical figures that only the more educated members of the audience would recognize. But Greek mythology managed to keep its place in the knowledge of the public... especially in this world, where much of it had been proven true. There was an air of finality to the final note the wolf played. He set his strange guitar in its case, closed it, and slung it over his back. He leapt off the stage and drew his hood back over his head, which he hoped would signal to people that he wanted to be left alone. The stool at the far end of the bar was unoccupied, the barkeeper having reserved it for him. Moonhunter sat down and ordered something colorful and fruity-looking--not exactly the kind of drink one would expect him to order. But alcohol had no effect on him, so it was his sweet tooth he planned to indulge.

[Tarsys]

Tarsys, a hulking mass of orkish muscle, huge even by Ork standards, had just ended his shift. It had been one of those days. The kind that was vexing, irksome, tedious and draining. He was ready to let the firehouse. He didn't even bother changing out of his work clothes.

He hopped into heavily modded Quadro Javalina. A bushwacker like muscle car similar in style to a GTO. But plated with light armor, large nubbed off road tires and made his way to the local dive to ease some of the work day away.

He arrived, and as he entered he made a hole as a bouncer roughly shoved a ex-patron holding a bleeding stub of a finger. Tarsys snorted. Not exactly an uncommon event at this joint.

He saw a werewolf finishing up a rift on his instrument. He pulled a face. The sound eminating from the device was... not helping calm him down. It sounded like a dispondant cacophony of noise to him and he was grateful when the song was soon over.

"Oi, Keeper, far an' near. Make it beh'er, full 'ead. He said in his thick accent, even tossing in some rhyming slang to top it off.

The bar keeper poured the Ork a beer and slid it down to him. He caught it, turned and leaned a heavy muscular arm upon the scrubbed polished table gazing about.

[Vythmiirik]

Vythmiirik listened and watched as the hunter of the moon sang his song. He had a nice voice, she decided, though she did not care much for the song itself, too melancholy for her tastes.  Taking a fortifying breath, she made her way over, her parcel clutched to her chest like a shield; radiating nervousness as she did so.  She stopped a short, but respectful distance away.

"Excuse me sir, may I have a moment of your time?" she asked softly ;not so loud as to be heard by everyone but loud enough for his sensitive ears. Watching and waiting for any sign she should leave.

"I wont bother you too much sir, it's just, I believe that you are the person who once saved my parents many moons ago, on the travellers road in the hills?  A dragonborn pair, chained by bandits? I look quite like my mother, if that would help?" she watched him hoping for some sign "If I've got the wrong person; I apologise most sincerely for talking to you like this.  It's just..." here she paused the tip of her tail curled in on her posture, she looked almost ready to bolt; but she rallied herself. "If I do have the right person, and I think I do, then, I want to just say thank you.  If not for you...I wouldn't exist.  So..." she trailed off looking at her parcel and held it out in offering "A gift of gratitude; as is the way in my clan, please accept it."

She didn't realise (in her nervousness and unfamiliarity with the area) that she hadn't even introduced herself.

[sasco]

It wouldn't be long before the Ork grabbed Sasco's attention.


"This man may know his way around some oddballs. Probably the best shot I'll have in this place."


Grabbing his extra bottle of beer, he moseyed over next to the Ork and offered the fresh bottle.


"Just missed some fireworks. Listen, I'll get to the point. I'm new in town and looking for a fortune teller. The more suspicious, the better. You got any directions?"


He looks down at this waist and makes sure his money pouch is still present. He then patted his coat packet and sighed in relief that his credit sticks were still there. Credit sticks were a new thing for him but he couldn't deny their convenience, despite their size making them easier to lose.

[Moonhunter]

Moonhunter sensed someone approaching, sensed their anxiety--they were nervous, possibly an attacker. Dragonborn, female, young. Footsteps were hesitant, not those of a would-be assassin, but that could be an act to throw him off-guard if someone had studied him long enough to know about his heightened senses but not know about his immortality. Every now and then Moonhunter liked to plant false rumors about himself. It made it harder for his enemies to separate fact from fiction.

But then she started talking, politely, though she didn't stop. Describing an incident that certainly sounded like something he would do, though there had been many travelers and many raiders. When she said she looked like her mother, his face shifted under his hood and a ice-blue eye peered out at her, though even then it didn't bring any recollection.

He considered what to say. It would probably be easiest to brush her off and claim she had the wrong guy. But for some reason that didn't sit right with him. Moonhunter wasn't looking for gratitude or gifts--in fact, he hated receiving gifts. But it seemed important to her to meet the man who had saved her parents.

Slowly, he turned in his chair so he could face her. "I dunno if I'm your guy or not," he told her. "I've... encountered plenty of dragonborn over the years, lass."

[Vythmiirik]

A small squeak escaped her mouth as he turned around, but she rallied herself. "I see...well.  Sir, you are just as my mother described you to be, though I will admit she did not speak your language all that well at the time, so she might have butchered your name a bit in her stories." Vythmiirik tries to lighten the atmosphere a little as she remains coiled in on herself; but she looks a little disappointed that he has not accepted her gift.  She occasionally glances around clearly uncomfortable with the area in which she's in, but seemingly determined to see this through; she was quite aware she'd attracted some attention herself and wasn't pleased by it.

"She called you the hunter of the moon, if that helps at all?" she seems a little shy at that drawing further into herself and shuffling her feet a little, as though remembering childish stories and being a little embarrassed by it. Regardless this is important so she kept herself resolute. "My mother named me to remember the event, my name is Vythmiirik, it means Steel song in our native tongue...so sir you see, even if you don't remember us. You left quite the impression on my family, we still talk about it to this day."

Vythmirrik again held out her parcel "I made it myself, it's very practical, a new cloak to keep you warm...or a blanket if you'd rather use it like that.  I wove it with the finest weave I could manage, with the best thread I could source and treated it to keep water out and the warmth in..." she trailed off and shuffled from side to side for a moment, mindful of the area around her and how much money her gift could be worth. "Please accept it, by all my clans customs I owe you a lot more than just this, indeed you have the friendship of my family if ever you should need it. But...I don't think there's anything I could really do for you.  Still I'd be content with knowing I've helped you a little; even if it's just a little thing like this" Vythmiirik waves the parcel slightly, she looks quietly hopeful.

[Conor]

Conor stopped his car in front of the bar. Despite the fact that, since coming to the city, he had installed mufflers into the sidepipes, it was still a loud vehicle, the otherworldy yell of an engine type that had long passed into legend ringing off the walls of the building. He scowled. In the desert, the roar of an engine intimidated people, made it hard to hear where you are coming from, bounced along the nothingness and misled people, but here, it was just an unnecesary way of announcing yourself. He'd need to re-do the mufflers. Get it to quieten down. Quiet was good. Blend in with the city.

He killed the engine and then slowly, methodically, fingers moving over the various switches and connectors, set the arming sequence. He got out a big chain, wrapped it around the steering wheel and fastened it to a D-ring welded to the floor. No computerised locks here, no ways to hack this, this was hardware, hand-forged by the best lockmakers out beyond the wadis. You'd need a lot of patience, time and force to get through them.

That, or be a magic user. But he had prepared for those too.

Swinging himself out of his vehicle, he closed the door gently, leaving the gold-black car standing, nose pointing towards the exit, in the darkness of the night.

He was wearing pretty much the same as he always did. a cropped leather jacket, leather trousers and heavy boots. The city made him clean himself and his clothing more often, but he would still not go for fabric. It was not his way.

He reached into his jacket, for his wallet, and then, making sure he was not carrying his shotgun, he navigated towards the bar.

He got past the bouncer by attching himself to the wake of a tall, muscular orc, quietly following him into the bar. After he was finally in, he turned sideways, followed the wall until he found a space that seemed suitable to him, giving him enough overview of the crowd and the stage, his back to a window, to potentially make a quick escape.

A gaggle of diverse creatures was playing and he watched them, fishing a cigar out of his jacket and starting to chew on it, not lighting it.

He liked the music. It was different from what he was used to, but he liked it. And he would listen to it, and then leave.

[Moonhunter]

Moonhunter sat and listened as the young woman described his impact on her family. Sounded like something he'd do, no denying that. He wasn't interested in her gratitude, however. But if she felt she was culturally obligated to do something, he couldn't fly in the face of that. He unconsciously rubbed the sleeve of his leather jacket. He preferred jackets, less likely to flap around and get caught in things if he engaged in battle. His longcoat even had a built-in hood. On the other hand, cloaks were easier to shed before jumping into a foray. Pros and cons, he supposed. Or it could be handy if he had to rescue someone else and sneak them out of somewhere...

"The name is Moonhunter, actually," he finally said. "And if it makes you happy, I'll take the cloak and you can consider us even."

[Vythmiirik]

Vythmiirik's smile could light up a room as she handed over her parcel, "Thank you so much sir!" she responded happily and with relief, loosing a little of her rigid posture. "Moonhunter" she tasted the word in her mouth, "I'll inform my mother of that, I think she'd be delighted."  Vythmiirik pauses for a moment, and then continues quietly, with a bit of shyness in her voice. "You won't need to worry about the rest of the clan turning up, I had the highest claim, so we all agreed I'd be the one to come and speak to you."  They didn't want to overwhelm the werewolf, after all they all felt they owed him so much...not, it appeared, that he remembered that.

"If ...ever you need repairs to any of your fabrics; I will always be happy to help you" her voice is a little softer now; as though knowing that her family's saviour wouldn't want too much of a fuss made about it, but still felt the need to offer. Normally she'd offer a formal bow at this, but this time she felt, it probably wouldn't fit the current setting, and she didn't want to give anyone the wrong idea after all. She waited a moment to see if he was going to look at the cloak, before giving him a respectful nod and turning to leave.

The cloak itself had a hood and two woven cords attached at the neck area to tie it closed. Its colour was deep grey, intended to blend in with shadows and crowds; as to not make the wearer stand out too much.  It was a delicate but strong weave, so it would not catch on anything; but possessing a soft inner lining, finely stitched in order to not cause abrasions.  The accents were a slightly lighter grey around the hem, and a tiny crescent moon was sewn into the collar area on the inside, a secret thank-you.