Fantasy RPG Forum - Standing Trials

5 Ashan 718


If it weren't for her obvious injuries, Max might've doubted any of it had been real. The kidnappings, the battle, and the collapse of the docks. All of it felt like a distant, albeit powerful nightmare she'd woken up from. Memories of the incident played vividly in her head as though they were happening in the here and now. Usually she could shut everything off, tuck her emotions away somewhere deep, deep down until they were all but forgotten. She could drink. She could smoke. She'd go on. This time, however, this experience just wouldn't let her go. Rather than run from it another trial, she elected to let this reality slap her in the face like it wanted to.

Each step that brought her closer to the docks came with a dark foreboding she could feel. Anxiety's grip on her gradually became tighter. Her heart raced just a bit faster in her chest. She could see the devastation and grief on the faces of people she passed long before she reached her destination. Maxine thought she clearly remembered the destruction. When her journey came to a halt she realized just how wrong she'd been about that. The scene that opened up before her made her jaw unhinge.

Five trials later, and the place was still full of chaos. Rubble and debris expanded across the region that once held humble homes and small businesses. Dirt and dust swirled with each gust of wind, and with it the putrid scent of the death from bodies likely still crushed somewhere deep within the folded structures. There was no need to imagine the weight of this horror. Any seeing eye could gather just how much whole lives had been either taken or uttered ruined. It wasn't all doom and gloom though. Within this mess there were the helpers. Apparently some benevolent force had organized an effort to bring relief to Scalvoris Town, hoisting tents and scattering themselves about to both clean up and give aid to those that desperately required it.

Maxine pressed her lips together and slowly shook her head. Before she really knew what she was doing, her feet were moving again. Using her single crutch, something she still toted along for the moments she inevitably strained her healing foot, the Rusalka navigated down into the wreckage. She approached a diligently working crew in the center of the ruins. One man had managed to clear away a hole in one wounded building, and while he haphazardly maneuvered his body through the tight squeeze, another prepared to hand a lit lantern through. Max's brow furrowed with curiosity before her attention found a familiar face.

"Hey, healer," she called out benevolently toward Faith before making her approach. She might've been out of it when Mercedes dragged her out of the collapsing warehouse, but she very much remembered this woman to be instrumental to her current ability to walk at all. If she had anything to do with the relief effort on the ground, lending a hand would be the first step in paying off that debt. "How can I help?"

The Rusalka navigated her way down toward where Faith was standing like a strong rock in a stream, evidently in charge by the way other relief workers rushed about her like busy bees. Always the healer, the other woman immediately opened up with questions about her well-being. Maxine's brow furrowed for but a trill. She was still very much coming to grips with what had happened in Scalvoris Town. Her injury slowing her down did little to ease the transition either. She'd been left feeling slow and vulnerable. Weak. Those conditions were not ones that could be allowed to remain.


"I manage," the Rusalka brushed off the benevolent line of questions with a shrug. Her attention quickly turned to the destruction around her. While the relief effort had made noticeable headway, it was clear that there was still much left to do. "I'm tired of sitting." Her eyes darted toward Charles, the man making his way into the precariously standing building. Her head tilted slightly at the whistling that followed soon after. She turned to Faith, who had accurately read her confusion and briefly explained the meaning behind the sound.

Survivors?

While Faith returned to start barking necessary orders, Max found herself eyeing the rubble with bewilderment. It had been trials since the collapse. If anyone had indeed survived up until now down beneath that mess, they were a blessed lot indeed. "Alright then," she said with a nod. She wished not to see another soul suffocated and left to die beneath the surface. "Let's do this." Max moved toward the spot she watched Charles disappear. She couldn't trust her bad foot to hold much weight should she need it to. That wouldn't stop her commitment to this task.

Dropping the crutch beside her, Max eased down so that she sat parallel to the opening in the building. Her bad foot extended outward to rest on the ground. The other was braced up on what looked to be a stable part of the wall, her knee bent and ready to use her leg strength as additional leverage. After a few breaths to steady herself, she turned to look over her shoulder. A hand beckoned the approaching relief worker following Faith's instructions over. The woman was a little more petite than Charles. The look in her eyes as she approached, however, was anything but. There was a sense of purpose. Her focus unwavering like a soldier living and dying by Faith's orders. Max faintly wondered what her motivation was, though she thought it safe to assume it was both personal and strong.

The Rusalka extended her stronger, dominate right hand outward toward the woman. She seized Max's grip and wasted no time shimmying herself to the edge of the hole. Max's grip tightened the moment the worker committed to the task. She drove the heel of her foot against the wall, the muscles in her arm straining as they worked to help slow the worker's descent into the dark. In a couple trills the woman's feet had apparently hit the ground. Her grip on Max's hand relinquished willingly, and the Rusalka leaned over to peer curiously into the depths of the hole.

"Is this rare?" Max dared to ask the healer carefully. "To find survivors?" So much needless death had come from the events of what started as a fun party. When she'd escaped the warehouse behind Sephira, Kura, Lavana, and Vega she had thought that would've been the end of the killings. What she hadn't expected was for the disturbance of the docks' support by a portal to send the city into turmoil. The aftermath had been overwhelming, she'd remembered. Max could only imagine the things Faith had seen and pulled from beneath this chaos. Surely this had been no easy undertaking.

Max frowned at Faith's answer. It hadn't been very surprising to hear that more corpses than survivors had been pulled out of the rubble. She'd been shocked enough that Vega's man, Arlo, had managed to rescue a baby from the collapse and return it to its mothers arms. The state of the docks wasn't one that read for much optimism. It was a shame though, that those lucky enough to outlast the initial collapse would perish where they'd been trapped. It seemed that these deaths were those that bothered the healer most. By the way the relief workers eagerly moved at Faith's every command, it was safe to assume this effort was likely organized by the woman. Her job had been to make sure any that could be saved were. Every starved and dehydrated body they plucked from the earth only served to suggest the workers could never quite do enough. This burden Faith bore was not one Maxine envied.

"You are not responsible for their deaths," she assured the healer, her tone growing tight. "The ones that are will get what they deserve. Sooner or later." Her eyes had turned from a light caramel to a deeper brown. Sephira might've been partially to blame for the destruction here, but it had been the cultists within the Element ranks who had truly made this place a graveyard. Her mind began to slip toward dark places. "Moseke has chosen well at least. You put your abilities to good use. People will be grateful and most won't forget." A shout ended their brief exchange, minds shifting toward the next task.

Maxine peered down to spy Charles toting a beat-up looking survivor in his arms. Rough as she looked, she was alive. The Rusalka tore her eyes from the miraculous scene down below to focus on Faith's instructions. A hammer began driving a peg into the ground nearby just as a pair of workers hustled into view with a strange device. Her brow furrowed at the mess of straps, but made no protest when a pair of hands set to attaching her to the contraption.

"As long as your husband's invention doesn't strangle me with all this leather," she teased dryly while the patients were attached to the other end of the contraption. Her brow furrowed as she watched the process, ignorant thoughts filling her head. She didn't know how this system worked any more than she really knew what a physicist did. All she understood in that moment was that Faith was sure it would work. If she believed in the device, it would have to be enough for Max.

Her hands reached down to get a hold of the contraption in preparation to pull. She adjusted her grip a few times and re-positioned her foot upon the rubble. Breaths came slower, steadier as she visualized this task she was about to undertake. "Ready?" she looked to Faith before nodding. "One. Two. Three!" So began the hard part. The muscles of her arms flexed, hands clenched tight while she began the process of tugging her end. Slowly, slowly the contraption brought the patients to rise from the depths of the hole. Maxine's teeth clenched, sweat beaded her forehead, and her body protested against the continued effort. The burn was starting to take hold in her lightly shaking limbs. Nonetheless, she persisted to keep pulling as in time with Faith as she could muster. It took one final growl of self-defiance before the bodies rose into view.

"Now...what?" Max inquired of the relief effort leader through clenched teeth. Her muscles demanded she let the patients fall loose to spare herself injury. She leaned back, the small gesture going far in her effort to help keep the patients above ground in their slings. All she could focus her entire being on was not letting the cultists claim another pair of lives.