Fate/Ethereal Order
- Thread starter Squirtodyle
- Start date
[X] The cafeteria. Considering that you've been under hypnosis, drugged, or otherwise kept out of your right state of mind for as long as it took to get to Chaldea, you quite literally can't remember the last time you've eaten, and your stomach is making it known that it's not happy with this state of affairs.
Briefing's in two hours, so let's focus on the things that make Edward in better condition and mood right now. Control room and poking around the lab to check how many warcrimes are on can wait until after the briefing and the schedule is looser, if necessary. Medical checkup can wait if we can't fit it in.
@Squirtodyle you said multiples were possible, so I put my votes in order of preference - is that the format you want, or do you want a single vote? (Answered: Single vote)
OOCly, medical wing and then cafeteria are the most important for Edward. Since there are no divergences from the plot of Grand Order whatsoever, Edward is going to be having some difficulties maintaining consciousness right now, and will probably conk out during the briefing, which will most definitely not help with Olga-Marie after the initial reaction. A medical check might be able to keep that from cropping up, or at least give us a doctor's note to excuse ourselves when we fall asleep in front of her face.
But he doesn't feel the tiredness right now and from his perspective, the medical checkup is mostly for long-term impacts, nothing too severe is going to happen in the next two hours. So the above vote instead.
Now, on the plus side, Edward gets to rub this in Olga-Marie's face if/when he ends up needing to save her - she will be much happier to have someone who saves those who aren't mission-critical when she's the one who isn't mission-critical, I imagine. She doesn't really deserve the bullying but she very much hits the 'high-handed aristocrat' notes that Edward can't stand among magi, so they're gonna be at odds at this point, at least until he realizes the aristocrat nonsense came along with some actual noblesse oblige.
Briefing's in two hours, so let's focus on the things that make Edward in better condition and mood right now. Control room and poking around the lab to check how many warcrimes are on can wait until after the briefing and the schedule is looser, if necessary. Medical checkup can wait if we can't fit it in.
@Squirtodyle you said multiples were possible, so I put my votes in order of preference - is that the format you want, or do you want a single vote? (Answered: Single vote)
OOCly, medical wing and then cafeteria are the most important for Edward. Since there are no divergences from the plot of Grand Order whatsoever, Edward is going to be having some difficulties maintaining consciousness right now, and will probably conk out during the briefing, which will most definitely not help with Olga-Marie after the initial reaction. A medical check might be able to keep that from cropping up, or at least give us a doctor's note to excuse ourselves when we fall asleep in front of her face.
But he doesn't feel the tiredness right now and from his perspective, the medical checkup is mostly for long-term impacts, nothing too severe is going to happen in the next two hours. So the above vote instead.
Now, on the plus side, Edward gets to rub this in Olga-Marie's face if/when he ends up needing to save her - she will be much happier to have someone who saves those who aren't mission-critical when she's the one who isn't mission-critical, I imagine. She doesn't really deserve the bullying but she very much hits the 'high-handed aristocrat' notes that Edward can't stand among magi, so they're gonna be at odds at this point, at least until he realizes the aristocrat nonsense came along with some actual noblesse oblige.
Last edited:
Saturday
Say I Tried
- Location
- Kingdom Come
[X] The cafeteria. Considering that you've been under hypnosis, drugged, or otherwise kept out of your right state of mind for as long as it took to get to Chaldea, you quite literally can't remember the last time you've eaten, and your stomach is making it known that it's not happy with this state of affairs.
- Location
- Ireland
- Pronouns
- He/Him
One vote at a time, basically. Once the next scene is written out, you'll be given the same choice of options, with the one you've already visited removed.
Roger roger, correcting vote.
Commonwealth1991
Thanks, I hate it.
- Location
- United States
[X] The room marked "Laboratory". You're not quite sure what they'd be researching here, but you suppose that an isolated facility somewhere in a snowy mountain range would be a pretty good place to do whatever they want without oversight.
- Location
- London
[X] The cafeteria. Considering that you've been under hypnosis, drugged, or otherwise kept out of your right state of mind for as long as it took to get to Chaldea, you quite literally can't remember the last time you've eaten, and your stomach is making it known that it's not happy with this state of affairs.
- Location
- Ireland
- Pronouns
- They/Them/She/Her
[X] The cafeteria. Considering that you've been under hypnosis, drugged, or otherwise kept out of your right state of mind for as long as it took to get to Chaldea, you quite literally can't remember the last time you've eaten, and your stomach is making it known that it's not happy with this state of affairs.
Cafeteria means food and more importantly people.
Cafeteria means food and more importantly people.
[X] The cafeteria. Considering that you've been under hypnosis, drugged, or otherwise kept out of your right state of mind for as long as it took to get to Chaldea, you quite literally can't remember the last time you've eaten, and your stomach is making it known that it's not happy with this state of affairs.
- Location
- Ireland
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Voting will close today at midnight GMT as usual.
EDIT: Life being life means I likely won't have time to write tomorrow, so midnight GMT on the 3rd instead will be the deadline.
EDIT: Life being life means I likely won't have time to write tomorrow, so midnight GMT on the 3rd instead will be the deadline.
Last edited:
[X] The room marked "Laboratory". You're not quite sure what they'd be researching here, but you suppose that an isolated facility somewhere in a snowy mountain range would be a pretty good place to do whatever they want without oversight.
Zerbans Argument hold weight for me, and Edward being someone that is overworking himself, and might possibly want to gotcha Olga via a comment about the warcrime lab seems genuine plausible.
Zerbans Argument hold weight for me, and Edward being someone that is overworking himself, and might possibly want to gotcha Olga via a comment about the warcrime lab seems genuine plausible.
[X] The room marked "Laboratory". You're not quite sure what they'd be researching here, but you suppose that an isolated facility somewhere in a snowy mountain range would be a pretty good place to do whatever they want without oversight.
Show us the warcrimes!
(Odds are good that there are no warcrimes in Chaldea proper. In Chaldea-related holdings, warcrimes are much more likely.)
Show us the warcrimes!
(Odds are good that there are no warcrimes in Chaldea proper. In Chaldea-related holdings, warcrimes are much more likely.)
[X] The cafeteria. Considering that you've been under hypnosis, drugged, or otherwise kept out of your right state of mind for as long as it took to get to Chaldea, you quite literally can't remember the last time you've eaten, and your stomach is making it known that it's not happy with this state of affairs.
- Location
- unknown
[X] The cafeteria. Considering that you've been under hypnosis, drugged, or otherwise kept out of your right state of mind for as long as it took to get to Chaldea, you quite literally can't remember the last time you've eaten, and your stomach is making it known that it's not happy with this state of affairs.
Chapter Five: Servant
- Location
- Ireland
- Pronouns
- He/Him
You're about to make your decision when your stomach does one of those growls that you thought only happened in fiction, the kind that squirms and roars and groans until it's embarrassing for you and everyone around you and you go off to find something to chow down on half to avoid having anything quite like that happen again. It's never really happened to you before, and you don't have an audience, but in the constrained, uncomfortably same-y halls of Chaldea, you can imagine the sound bouncing around halfway through the facility. And, well, if there's one thing that you've never wanted when you're in a tight space filled to bursting with magi, it's to be noticed.
The cafeteria doesn't seem to be far, but now that you're finally moving around freely, you wish it was closer. Everything about Chaldea is...uncomfortable. To an extent, you know that it's difficult to blend magecraft and technology, so seeing the stronghold of one of the twelve Lords of the Clock Tower being so obviously cutting-edge is bizarre, but it's more than that. You know exactly what it is, and you hate yourself a little for it, but twenty years of history doesn't just vanish, no matter how much you might wish it. Years of being taught the ways of the druids back in an idyllic glade, a manor that wasn't so much built as it was grown from the forest itself. Even now that you're gone nearly ten years, some part of you can't help but feel disgust, can't help but crave the earthy smells of the deepwoods, the scent of decay and growth, of morning dew on shimmering emerald leaves, of flowers dancing in the wind.
Some part of you craves life, and Chaldea isn't it. The only scents in the air are sterility and efficiency, chemicals and recycled air flavoring every breath you take through corridors and hallways of grey metal broken up only by the little signs at crossroads and junctions and the window that runs the length of the outer ring of the floor you're on. It's almost a blessing when your route takes you down from the third floor to the second, because if you had to spend much more time wandering around it, you might have ended up going stir-crazy already. The idea that Chaldea's going to be your home for at least a year from this day on is seeming less and less attractive by the minute, but you'll get used to it. You got used to the hustle and bustle of London when you ended up there, and you'll figure out how to get used to this too. Besides, you saw plenty of leisure areas too. Whatever about Animusphere being a pain in the ass to deal with personally, apparently even she understands that if she kept people cooped up in whatever godforsaken ass-crack of the world she's found to put Chaldea in without any way to blow off steam, she'd end up with a mutiny at best or a society of crazed cannibals at worst.
You shiver a little at that last thought. Maybe not the best thing to drag up some unpleasant memories of one particular family you took in right before you're getting a meal.
The room that opens up once you approach the silvery sliding doors right out of a sci-fi movie is not at all what you expected. Oh, you're certain that wherever Animusphere stays there's probably a kitchen and hired staff right next door, but this is...it's a cafeteria. An enormous one, to be sure, six rows of benches that run the length of the room, three on each side with one long path up to the actual food in the middle. It's all buffet style, food shoveled into metal containers to keep warm, and people coming and going as they please, a constant flow of warm food into warm bodies as they mill in and out, laughing and chatting and arguing until it combines into the hazy, impossible to parse thrum of conversation anywhere you get far too many people inside a tight space. It's downright uncomfortable, makes your skin crawl a little, but from the way that one small little group goes quiet and starts sneering - nobility, probably, judging from how pissed off they all look that they're forced to dine with the rest of the rabble - you're not the only one who'd rather not be here now. That makes everything a lot easier, even if you were hoping you wouldn't be recognised for at least a couple days.
Being an Enforcer is a fun little paradox. You're the real backbone of the Clock Tower, because gods know that magecraft would be public knowledge by now if you weren't around to keep it from spilling over into the public consciousness whenever anyone went too hardcore on their fantasies of becoming an immortal mage-god. But you'll still get treated like dirt for so publicly abandoning the search for the Root, right up until they need you. Feared when you walk past, but the moment your eyes are off of them, they'll turn to whisper venomous words and barbed insults, trading them between each other as they look for the best way to push themselves forwards in their social circle, using the idea of you as a stepping stone.
It's a song and dance you're well aware of. You don't care. It stopped getting to you after the third or fourth time you nearly died on the job. You've just had to learn to take the satisfaction when you can, like how nearly every magus you've ever had to report to breaks into a cold sweat they think you can't see when you sit down in their office.
Your stomach growls again as you stand in line and you have to suppress the urge to just stab it right there and then. The last thing you need is to stand out more than you already do, but given that nearly everyone is wearing a Chaldea uniform, either yellow or green or white, and you're the only one in a long black coat...well, that was probably a pipe dream from the start, and that's before you got into how odd your hair and eyes are when you're pushed into a crowd of mostly normal looking people. There's the odd smattering of pale white hair, some dyed pinks and blues and purples, but among them all you're the only one with that kind of naturally unnatural colour, and it bothers you. You prefer to not be noticed, and that suits you just fine.
At least the spread is varied enough to take your preferences into account. If you're already going to end up being talked about because of how odd you look, you'll happily gorge yourself on all those fresh pastries you can see at the end of the buffet spread. Luxury, thy name is warm, freshly baked croissant.
A few minutes later after you wordlessly scooped exactly enough food to be socially unacceptable onto your plate, you're sitting down. You don't know if the space around you cleared out because people were getting ready for the briefing and finished eating, or if it was because no one wanted to sit around the big bad Enforcer, but frankly you don't care. The hum of conversation is still around you, but you have your own little bubble of quiet to enjoy, and frankly from the way your stomach seems to be doing its best to rip its way out of your torso so it can shove the food into itself directly, you feel like you're going to enjoy this plenty. Fried eggs, bacon, blood pudding, some sausages, some mushrooms, almost everything you need for a proper fry-up, along with a rough bucketful of black tea that you've added just a smidge too much milk and sugar to, and a half-dozen warm croissants that you tear into like you imagine a hungry wolf might do to an unsuspecting rabbit. A deliciously flaky, sweet, buttery rabbit filled with a little dark chocolate and...
You're about halfway through ruining the analogy in your head when you realise someone's staring at you.
With a forceful swallow that you chase down with a gulp of hot tea, you manage to clear your throat of any obstructions as you look up, which turns out to be a good thing. If you'd taken the sharp breath you do when you see the woman in front of you while you still had pastry in your throat, you'd probably have started choking.
She's not wearing the uniform, that's the first thing you notice. The table blocks off everything down from her knee, but even from that you can see the blue thigh-highs she has on, leaving a few inches of pale, soft thigh exposed before your eyes reach the red skirt she's wearing. Above that there's some kind of odd mix between a corset and a coat, a soft brown thing trimmed with red and gold, coattails hanging below her knees even though it only really starts at her impressive chest in front, tied around her waist with a red sash and a matching golden buckle. Underneath that there's some sort of blue blouse that you can see through the slits in the puffy shoulders of that weird coat thing, and neatly tucked into the short sleeves are two elbow length blue gloves. All in all, it's an ensemble that's weird enough that you'd pin her as a magus, but not so strange as to make you worry that she's something more.
No, it's her face that does that.
There's nothing wrong with it is the problem. It's soft, gentle, the smile she has bordering on the mysterious side of amused and her light blue eyes sparkling in the artificial light of the cafeteria. Her hair is like silk, reaching down to her lower back and curling around her shoulders in such a perfectly imperfect way that you can only imagine that it's magic that does it, and from the way she's staring at you without a hint of anything besides interest puts you on edge all by itself. In all honesty, she might be one of the most beautiful woman you've ever seen, let alone met.
She's also the spitting image of the Mona Lisa, and you've been involved in enough Grail Wars to know that "unbelievably gorgeous" is as much of a warning sign as any skull mask or suit of armor.
This woman is a Servant, and that fact alone makes you feel like there are ants running up and down beneath your skin, pricking and biting at every bit of flesh they can find.
"Is this seat-" she begins, before you cut her off. Balance it. Rude enough to make her go away, not enough to make her mad.
"No, it's fine. Sit if you want, I'll be done in a minute." Half that, really. You'd take being surrounded by Lords if it meant getting away from whoever the hell this was. Even if your vague guess is correct, and it's someone relatively harmless, you'd really rather be literally anywhere else.
"Perfect! I was hoping I'd get the chance to talk to you when I saw you'd walked in!"
Fuck.
"After all, it's not every day we get an Enforcer in Chaldea, and your simulation was so interesting!"
Fuck.
"Director Animusphere didn't seem to think so. I'll work on doing better next time-" You're about to begin the whole apologetic speech again before the woman waves her hand dismissively, her smile growing wider as she spears a few slices of bacon with a fork and carefully layers them onto a slice of buttered toast, beginning the foundations of what your stupid, traitorous, slow-to-the-punch stomach tells you is going to be a wonderful sandwich.
"Oh, don't mind her, she's under a lot of stress. I really did want to make sure the simulation was up to scratch after her last-minute adjustments, but she kept wanting to push you a little more and more and...well, you did figure it out in the end, but that just goes to show that it's not perfect, right? Though, if you didn't already know one was coming, I don't think you would have...well, that doesn't matter. I did want to congratulate you on seeing through it, but next time you won't be so lucky!" There's a competitive glint in her eye, and despite how fast and excited she is, there's still an almost musical quality to her voice. Every part of her seems like it was practically designed for perfection, and it's about as uncomfortable as you expected it to be. You already feel grubby and flawed, and the fact that she had plenty to do with that simulation is making that pit of tar in your chest bubble up again. But you can't lose your temper, not with a Servant.
"I'd rather not be put in one without my knowledge again, honestly. Watching a man be shot and thinking it was my fault wasn't very...enjoyable." You keep your voice level, that's good, but it's like pulling teeth. One minute around a Servant and you're already on edge, does no one else here realise that she could turn the entire room into a bloodbath in seconds if she felt like it? Your words make her blink, and she holds a hand in front of her mouth like she's been shocked by something.
"...Oh! Oh, right. Yes, that part was a bit much, but Olga kept on insisting that Enforcers were used to death and that it shouldn't really bother you, and she is the Director, so..." Despite her words, she looks vaguely guilty, and with a theatrical sigh she sets down the pudding she carefully carved into sandwich-appropriate slices before looking you in the eye, and gods you wish she'd just kept making the damn thing. "I'm sorry, Edward. Honestly, I hadn't thought of that. I was just very impressed you'd seen through it, and especially impressed that you tried to save the pilot. For what it's worth, I think you did the right thing."
Damn right you did, but you take that little ball of warmth you can feel in your chest and snuff it out immediately. It's manipulation, plain and simple. Animusphere probably just wants someone to get on your good side after remembering who she pissed off, now that you're armed again. You're too smart for that kind of simple manipulation, too smart to let a little praise go to your head.
"Thank you..." You scramble around in your head for a name, before frowning. Might as well go with your guess, the worst that can happen is that she's compared to someone fantastic. Your experience with the fickleness of the Grail means that "historically recorded as a man" is no real barrier to being summoned looking like...well, looking like a masterpiece come to life. "...Miss Da Vinci?"
She claps her hands together and beams at you, before it turns into the kind of smug smile that can only mean she's about twice as pleased with herself as she is with you for figuring it out. "Mm! I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you're not surprised, given what's in your file. Yes, I'm Leonardo da Vinci, finally as perfect on the outside as I always sought to be! Olga does work me to the bone, but the upside of being summoned as a Servant is that I was able to control how I appeared a little bit. Working out all the kinks and issues with everything that we need to keep Chaldea running is its own reward for a genius like myself, but getting to finally fit in a body that really feels right is wonderful too. Ah, what a lucky organization, to have summoned a beautiful genius such as me!"
Well, that's certainly something. Leonardo da Vinci being summoned makes a certain kind of sense, given that historically he - she, you correct yourself - was one of the greatest minds in history, especially with regards to engineering and thinking up new inventions. With her at the helm, creating a place like this that so perfectly marries magecraft and machinery could be turned from "nigh-impossible" to just "extremely difficult", but the results are more than evident. You are, after all, digging in to a fry-up cooked about six thousand feet above sea level, inside a facility built into a mountain, somewhere so out of the way that you half expect to be told that they brought you to another planet while you were out.
And despite it all, how friendly she is, how she's apologised, how she's probably responsible for the fact that your stomach isn't trying to devour itself in rebellion against the cruel host that refused to feed it, you'd still rather be anywhere else but here. She's a Servant. Powerful, intelligent, dangerous. Everyone else around you might see a pretty face and a sweet voice and delude themselves, but you can't. Not yet, at least, and from the look she gives you, she can see it on your face. When she speaks up again, it's gentle, soothing, a hair shy of motherly if you're being kind, patronizing if you're not.
"I know it's probably difficult for someone with your experience to relax around me, but really, we're on the same side. I'll leave you to your meal if you'd like, and if you ever want to chat I'm sure you'll be able to find me-"
"No, it's fine. I was just finishing up." You weren't, but all of a sudden you're really not hungry. One last puff of buttery, flaky goodness vanishes into your mouth before you start to move your tray, but the damn woman still just keeps smiling as she offers you a little wave.
"Come talk soon! I'd love to find out how you made those chains of yours, they were fascinating from the little look I had!"
You don't respond, but you feel your Code tighten around your torso a little, the unconscious command giving you a little comfort. It's pressure and weight but it's the good kind, the kind that reminds you that you have a weapon and protection. Useless against one of the Throne's many heroes, but a nice little placebo that keeps you going until you march out the door and finally let out the breath you were holding.
"...That sucked." You're not hungry, but now you've apparently caught the interest of a Servant, even if it's only due to your craftsmanship. She'll get bored once she realises the trick, but actually handing it over for her to examine feels like a violation all on its own.
Later, you can think of it later. All in all, you spend about an hour looking for the cafeteria and then eating, but you should have time to meander around a little more before the briefing. You can still remember the icons that caught your eye on that holographic map, so all that's left is choosing where to next.
[ ] The medical wing.
[ ] Your room.
[ ] The room marked "Laboratory".
[ ] The control room.
The cafeteria doesn't seem to be far, but now that you're finally moving around freely, you wish it was closer. Everything about Chaldea is...uncomfortable. To an extent, you know that it's difficult to blend magecraft and technology, so seeing the stronghold of one of the twelve Lords of the Clock Tower being so obviously cutting-edge is bizarre, but it's more than that. You know exactly what it is, and you hate yourself a little for it, but twenty years of history doesn't just vanish, no matter how much you might wish it. Years of being taught the ways of the druids back in an idyllic glade, a manor that wasn't so much built as it was grown from the forest itself. Even now that you're gone nearly ten years, some part of you can't help but feel disgust, can't help but crave the earthy smells of the deepwoods, the scent of decay and growth, of morning dew on shimmering emerald leaves, of flowers dancing in the wind.
Some part of you craves life, and Chaldea isn't it. The only scents in the air are sterility and efficiency, chemicals and recycled air flavoring every breath you take through corridors and hallways of grey metal broken up only by the little signs at crossroads and junctions and the window that runs the length of the outer ring of the floor you're on. It's almost a blessing when your route takes you down from the third floor to the second, because if you had to spend much more time wandering around it, you might have ended up going stir-crazy already. The idea that Chaldea's going to be your home for at least a year from this day on is seeming less and less attractive by the minute, but you'll get used to it. You got used to the hustle and bustle of London when you ended up there, and you'll figure out how to get used to this too. Besides, you saw plenty of leisure areas too. Whatever about Animusphere being a pain in the ass to deal with personally, apparently even she understands that if she kept people cooped up in whatever godforsaken ass-crack of the world she's found to put Chaldea in without any way to blow off steam, she'd end up with a mutiny at best or a society of crazed cannibals at worst.
You shiver a little at that last thought. Maybe not the best thing to drag up some unpleasant memories of one particular family you took in right before you're getting a meal.
The room that opens up once you approach the silvery sliding doors right out of a sci-fi movie is not at all what you expected. Oh, you're certain that wherever Animusphere stays there's probably a kitchen and hired staff right next door, but this is...it's a cafeteria. An enormous one, to be sure, six rows of benches that run the length of the room, three on each side with one long path up to the actual food in the middle. It's all buffet style, food shoveled into metal containers to keep warm, and people coming and going as they please, a constant flow of warm food into warm bodies as they mill in and out, laughing and chatting and arguing until it combines into the hazy, impossible to parse thrum of conversation anywhere you get far too many people inside a tight space. It's downright uncomfortable, makes your skin crawl a little, but from the way that one small little group goes quiet and starts sneering - nobility, probably, judging from how pissed off they all look that they're forced to dine with the rest of the rabble - you're not the only one who'd rather not be here now. That makes everything a lot easier, even if you were hoping you wouldn't be recognised for at least a couple days.
Being an Enforcer is a fun little paradox. You're the real backbone of the Clock Tower, because gods know that magecraft would be public knowledge by now if you weren't around to keep it from spilling over into the public consciousness whenever anyone went too hardcore on their fantasies of becoming an immortal mage-god. But you'll still get treated like dirt for so publicly abandoning the search for the Root, right up until they need you. Feared when you walk past, but the moment your eyes are off of them, they'll turn to whisper venomous words and barbed insults, trading them between each other as they look for the best way to push themselves forwards in their social circle, using the idea of you as a stepping stone.
It's a song and dance you're well aware of. You don't care. It stopped getting to you after the third or fourth time you nearly died on the job. You've just had to learn to take the satisfaction when you can, like how nearly every magus you've ever had to report to breaks into a cold sweat they think you can't see when you sit down in their office.
Your stomach growls again as you stand in line and you have to suppress the urge to just stab it right there and then. The last thing you need is to stand out more than you already do, but given that nearly everyone is wearing a Chaldea uniform, either yellow or green or white, and you're the only one in a long black coat...well, that was probably a pipe dream from the start, and that's before you got into how odd your hair and eyes are when you're pushed into a crowd of mostly normal looking people. There's the odd smattering of pale white hair, some dyed pinks and blues and purples, but among them all you're the only one with that kind of naturally unnatural colour, and it bothers you. You prefer to not be noticed, and that suits you just fine.
At least the spread is varied enough to take your preferences into account. If you're already going to end up being talked about because of how odd you look, you'll happily gorge yourself on all those fresh pastries you can see at the end of the buffet spread. Luxury, thy name is warm, freshly baked croissant.
A few minutes later after you wordlessly scooped exactly enough food to be socially unacceptable onto your plate, you're sitting down. You don't know if the space around you cleared out because people were getting ready for the briefing and finished eating, or if it was because no one wanted to sit around the big bad Enforcer, but frankly you don't care. The hum of conversation is still around you, but you have your own little bubble of quiet to enjoy, and frankly from the way your stomach seems to be doing its best to rip its way out of your torso so it can shove the food into itself directly, you feel like you're going to enjoy this plenty. Fried eggs, bacon, blood pudding, some sausages, some mushrooms, almost everything you need for a proper fry-up, along with a rough bucketful of black tea that you've added just a smidge too much milk and sugar to, and a half-dozen warm croissants that you tear into like you imagine a hungry wolf might do to an unsuspecting rabbit. A deliciously flaky, sweet, buttery rabbit filled with a little dark chocolate and...
You're about halfway through ruining the analogy in your head when you realise someone's staring at you.
With a forceful swallow that you chase down with a gulp of hot tea, you manage to clear your throat of any obstructions as you look up, which turns out to be a good thing. If you'd taken the sharp breath you do when you see the woman in front of you while you still had pastry in your throat, you'd probably have started choking.
She's not wearing the uniform, that's the first thing you notice. The table blocks off everything down from her knee, but even from that you can see the blue thigh-highs she has on, leaving a few inches of pale, soft thigh exposed before your eyes reach the red skirt she's wearing. Above that there's some kind of odd mix between a corset and a coat, a soft brown thing trimmed with red and gold, coattails hanging below her knees even though it only really starts at her impressive chest in front, tied around her waist with a red sash and a matching golden buckle. Underneath that there's some sort of blue blouse that you can see through the slits in the puffy shoulders of that weird coat thing, and neatly tucked into the short sleeves are two elbow length blue gloves. All in all, it's an ensemble that's weird enough that you'd pin her as a magus, but not so strange as to make you worry that she's something more.
No, it's her face that does that.
There's nothing wrong with it is the problem. It's soft, gentle, the smile she has bordering on the mysterious side of amused and her light blue eyes sparkling in the artificial light of the cafeteria. Her hair is like silk, reaching down to her lower back and curling around her shoulders in such a perfectly imperfect way that you can only imagine that it's magic that does it, and from the way she's staring at you without a hint of anything besides interest puts you on edge all by itself. In all honesty, she might be one of the most beautiful woman you've ever seen, let alone met.
She's also the spitting image of the Mona Lisa, and you've been involved in enough Grail Wars to know that "unbelievably gorgeous" is as much of a warning sign as any skull mask or suit of armor.
This woman is a Servant, and that fact alone makes you feel like there are ants running up and down beneath your skin, pricking and biting at every bit of flesh they can find.
"Is this seat-" she begins, before you cut her off. Balance it. Rude enough to make her go away, not enough to make her mad.
"No, it's fine. Sit if you want, I'll be done in a minute." Half that, really. You'd take being surrounded by Lords if it meant getting away from whoever the hell this was. Even if your vague guess is correct, and it's someone relatively harmless, you'd really rather be literally anywhere else.
"Perfect! I was hoping I'd get the chance to talk to you when I saw you'd walked in!"
Fuck.
"After all, it's not every day we get an Enforcer in Chaldea, and your simulation was so interesting!"
Fuck.
"Director Animusphere didn't seem to think so. I'll work on doing better next time-" You're about to begin the whole apologetic speech again before the woman waves her hand dismissively, her smile growing wider as she spears a few slices of bacon with a fork and carefully layers them onto a slice of buttered toast, beginning the foundations of what your stupid, traitorous, slow-to-the-punch stomach tells you is going to be a wonderful sandwich.
"Oh, don't mind her, she's under a lot of stress. I really did want to make sure the simulation was up to scratch after her last-minute adjustments, but she kept wanting to push you a little more and more and...well, you did figure it out in the end, but that just goes to show that it's not perfect, right? Though, if you didn't already know one was coming, I don't think you would have...well, that doesn't matter. I did want to congratulate you on seeing through it, but next time you won't be so lucky!" There's a competitive glint in her eye, and despite how fast and excited she is, there's still an almost musical quality to her voice. Every part of her seems like it was practically designed for perfection, and it's about as uncomfortable as you expected it to be. You already feel grubby and flawed, and the fact that she had plenty to do with that simulation is making that pit of tar in your chest bubble up again. But you can't lose your temper, not with a Servant.
"I'd rather not be put in one without my knowledge again, honestly. Watching a man be shot and thinking it was my fault wasn't very...enjoyable." You keep your voice level, that's good, but it's like pulling teeth. One minute around a Servant and you're already on edge, does no one else here realise that she could turn the entire room into a bloodbath in seconds if she felt like it? Your words make her blink, and she holds a hand in front of her mouth like she's been shocked by something.
"...Oh! Oh, right. Yes, that part was a bit much, but Olga kept on insisting that Enforcers were used to death and that it shouldn't really bother you, and she is the Director, so..." Despite her words, she looks vaguely guilty, and with a theatrical sigh she sets down the pudding she carefully carved into sandwich-appropriate slices before looking you in the eye, and gods you wish she'd just kept making the damn thing. "I'm sorry, Edward. Honestly, I hadn't thought of that. I was just very impressed you'd seen through it, and especially impressed that you tried to save the pilot. For what it's worth, I think you did the right thing."
Damn right you did, but you take that little ball of warmth you can feel in your chest and snuff it out immediately. It's manipulation, plain and simple. Animusphere probably just wants someone to get on your good side after remembering who she pissed off, now that you're armed again. You're too smart for that kind of simple manipulation, too smart to let a little praise go to your head.
"Thank you..." You scramble around in your head for a name, before frowning. Might as well go with your guess, the worst that can happen is that she's compared to someone fantastic. Your experience with the fickleness of the Grail means that "historically recorded as a man" is no real barrier to being summoned looking like...well, looking like a masterpiece come to life. "...Miss Da Vinci?"
She claps her hands together and beams at you, before it turns into the kind of smug smile that can only mean she's about twice as pleased with herself as she is with you for figuring it out. "Mm! I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you're not surprised, given what's in your file. Yes, I'm Leonardo da Vinci, finally as perfect on the outside as I always sought to be! Olga does work me to the bone, but the upside of being summoned as a Servant is that I was able to control how I appeared a little bit. Working out all the kinks and issues with everything that we need to keep Chaldea running is its own reward for a genius like myself, but getting to finally fit in a body that really feels right is wonderful too. Ah, what a lucky organization, to have summoned a beautiful genius such as me!"
Well, that's certainly something. Leonardo da Vinci being summoned makes a certain kind of sense, given that historically he - she, you correct yourself - was one of the greatest minds in history, especially with regards to engineering and thinking up new inventions. With her at the helm, creating a place like this that so perfectly marries magecraft and machinery could be turned from "nigh-impossible" to just "extremely difficult", but the results are more than evident. You are, after all, digging in to a fry-up cooked about six thousand feet above sea level, inside a facility built into a mountain, somewhere so out of the way that you half expect to be told that they brought you to another planet while you were out.
And despite it all, how friendly she is, how she's apologised, how she's probably responsible for the fact that your stomach isn't trying to devour itself in rebellion against the cruel host that refused to feed it, you'd still rather be anywhere else but here. She's a Servant. Powerful, intelligent, dangerous. Everyone else around you might see a pretty face and a sweet voice and delude themselves, but you can't. Not yet, at least, and from the look she gives you, she can see it on your face. When she speaks up again, it's gentle, soothing, a hair shy of motherly if you're being kind, patronizing if you're not.
"I know it's probably difficult for someone with your experience to relax around me, but really, we're on the same side. I'll leave you to your meal if you'd like, and if you ever want to chat I'm sure you'll be able to find me-"
"No, it's fine. I was just finishing up." You weren't, but all of a sudden you're really not hungry. One last puff of buttery, flaky goodness vanishes into your mouth before you start to move your tray, but the damn woman still just keeps smiling as she offers you a little wave.
"Come talk soon! I'd love to find out how you made those chains of yours, they were fascinating from the little look I had!"
You don't respond, but you feel your Code tighten around your torso a little, the unconscious command giving you a little comfort. It's pressure and weight but it's the good kind, the kind that reminds you that you have a weapon and protection. Useless against one of the Throne's many heroes, but a nice little placebo that keeps you going until you march out the door and finally let out the breath you were holding.
"...That sucked." You're not hungry, but now you've apparently caught the interest of a Servant, even if it's only due to your craftsmanship. She'll get bored once she realises the trick, but actually handing it over for her to examine feels like a violation all on its own.
Later, you can think of it later. All in all, you spend about an hour looking for the cafeteria and then eating, but you should have time to meander around a little more before the briefing. You can still remember the icons that caught your eye on that holographic map, so all that's left is choosing where to next.
[ ] The medical wing.
[ ] Your room.
[ ] The room marked "Laboratory".
[ ] The control room.
----------
Q/N: No, Chaldea's cafeteria isn't that big in canon, but frankly for what it is, Chaldea in canon seems kind of small. In my head I'm thinking it's about three times as big, so bear in mind there's a bunch more to it than what we see in canon. Ideally I've captured Da Vinci's voice, and I blended in the fact that she's explicitly trans fairly organically, but given my relative lack of experience, I'm of course open to criticism and suggestions on how to do better. Hope you enjoy!
- Location
- Texas, USA
[X] The medical wing.
NeonLights
Formerly Reliable_2IC
- Location
- In shambles
[X] The control room.
- Location
- Russia
[X] The medical wing.
That's where Mash would be. Probably. I guess.
Also, it's kinda grating that MC has such a Servant aversion, considering his future job and the little fact that 98% of waifus in fgo are Servants. And what will he do when Chaldea summons someone really scary?
Besides, Servants are just superpowered famous people. He himself is a superpowered combatant. Is he afraid of all of them because of the difference in strength and expieriencing it himself in a battle?
I don't mind troubled character pasts and growing, it's just seems like a problem that will grow to be very annoying very fast.
Just my two cents.
That's where Mash would be. Probably. I guess.
Also, it's kinda grating that MC has such a Servant aversion, considering his future job and the little fact that 98% of waifus in fgo are Servants. And what will he do when Chaldea summons someone really scary?
Besides, Servants are just superpowered famous people. He himself is a superpowered combatant. Is he afraid of all of them because of the difference in strength and expieriencing it himself in a battle?
I don't mind troubled character pasts and growing, it's just seems like a problem that will grow to be very annoying very fast.
Just my two cents.
WildCardFool
A Reaction Pic for nearly every occasion
- Location
- Earth
[X] The medical wing.
- Location
- Ireland
- Pronouns
- They/Them/She/Her
[X] Your room.
After that experience, I think going to our room to relax a bit before the canon-requisite everything going to shit wouldn't be unwise.
Anyway speaking of the experience, I think it might highlight one of the first hurdles that Ed's gonna have to clear. It might be easy enough, or it could be a problem that rears its head later down the line to cause problems more than once.
Setting aside the fact that just about any Servant could kick his ass with ease, Ed has very little reason to like, or even to trust Servants, given his involvement in Grail Wars, especially in the position he has been in for them. Yeah, sure, Servants can be some of humanity's best and brightest, like Leonardo da Vinci, or they can be assholes like Jack the Ripper, but the common thing between 99% of Servants summoned in a Grail War, which is where all of Ed's experience with them comes from, is that they have a wish. There's something they want that's so important to them, that they're willing to rock up to a party, hundreds if not thousands of years after they died, and do whatever they can to get what they want, consequences be damned (the occasional personal code of honour notwithstanding).
Holy Grail Wars are destructive, high stakes affairs, that have a near constant tendency to tank property values and jeopardize innocent people just as much as the people that signed on for it. And they're like that, in no small part because seven superpowered assholes showed up with the intent of wrecking shit to get what they want. And part of Ed's job is dealing with fallout from these assholes.
Ed's take on the matter of HGWs and Servants could be more charitable (I'll cop to basically thinking, "what's the least charitable view of a Grail War possible?") than this but yeah, I don't think his distrust and dislike of Servants is coming solely from the place of "They're better than me and could easily kill me and that's just cheating,"
After that experience, I think going to our room to relax a bit before the canon-requisite everything going to shit wouldn't be unwise.
Anyway speaking of the experience, I think it might highlight one of the first hurdles that Ed's gonna have to clear. It might be easy enough, or it could be a problem that rears its head later down the line to cause problems more than once.
Setting aside the fact that just about any Servant could kick his ass with ease, Ed has very little reason to like, or even to trust Servants, given his involvement in Grail Wars, especially in the position he has been in for them. Yeah, sure, Servants can be some of humanity's best and brightest, like Leonardo da Vinci, or they can be assholes like Jack the Ripper, but the common thing between 99% of Servants summoned in a Grail War, which is where all of Ed's experience with them comes from, is that they have a wish. There's something they want that's so important to them, that they're willing to rock up to a party, hundreds if not thousands of years after they died, and do whatever they can to get what they want, consequences be damned (the occasional personal code of honour notwithstanding).
Holy Grail Wars are destructive, high stakes affairs, that have a near constant tendency to tank property values and jeopardize innocent people just as much as the people that signed on for it. And they're like that, in no small part because seven superpowered assholes showed up with the intent of wrecking shit to get what they want. And part of Ed's job is dealing with fallout from these assholes.
Ed's take on the matter of HGWs and Servants could be more charitable (I'll cop to basically thinking, "what's the least charitable view of a Grail War possible?") than this but yeah, I don't think his distrust and dislike of Servants is coming solely from the place of "They're better than me and could easily kill me and that's just cheating,"
Last edited:
EternalObserver
eYe Gaze baCk
- Location
- The Void
[X] Your room.
God forbid we don't immediately love all the waifus...
I'm sorry dude this quest will actually just involve Ed being dicked down by Roman, waifus will never factor into it so I don't think this is an actual problem