asgardmeridiem | [OPEN] Your Friendly Neighbourhood Utgard

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[OPEN] Your Friendly Neighbourhood Utgard

Who: ANYONE going on the trip to Utgard!
What: A supplies run with one bonus a la carte spy.
When: Days 269 - 271 ( May 23 - 28 )
Where: Utgard
Rating: PG-13. Anything that might go higher than that should be taken to a private log, please!

[ Early in the morning on Day 269, several wagons will be geared up and at the ready by the Gate of Fog. The first two are more obviously intended for supplies, while the drivers of the last few will welcome Travellers to find anywhere comfortable to sit. A handful of coloured Natives from various districts will be coming along to assist in the shopping, though they're mostly content to stick to themselves in their own wagon for the duration of the trip. They won't have much to say to anyone that tries for conversation beyond simple pleasantries and a general air of gratitude.

It's a half day's drive to get to the city of Utgard, leaving the Sun just barely on its way back down by the time the caravan comes to a halt. This gives plenty of time to gather the things on the shopping list the drivers have on them. Natives will direct the Travellers to the things that are needed, such as bandages, food rations and the typical things expected for war efforts - though every now and again, very quietly, the Natives will check up on people to casually suggest that they might like to pick up a nice coat or two. Perhaps some sturdy gloves here or there, and a few portable heaters and the likes. Not overtly, not a great number. Just enough to give the general idea that there might be use of some warmer gear before long. If asked about them, the Natives won't say anything, only that it's always good to be prepared.

Day 270 will be left entirely to the Travellers' discretion. As promised, the Natives will hand everyone that helped out the day before a small pouch of seven silver runes and seven copper runes ( approximately $70 USD ) to spend on whatever they like. Remember that Utgard is a metropolitan city with higher technology levels than that of Asgard. You could buy a computer or radio here that would transmit and receive signals, but only within the boundaries of Utgard. Once it is brought back into Asgard, they will no longer function beyond having shiny dials and buttons. Travellers are welcome to keep anything left over from their allowances after they're done with their shopping.

On the morning of Day 271, the Natives will give the Travellers just a little while longer to look around while they make sure everything is packed securely and accounted for in the wagons before the caravan sets off around 10AM. There's another half day's travel ahead, and they want to be out of the woods before dark, so do try to be on time or wait for the next wagon!

Things seem to go off without a hitch, though, and the caravan will be moving right on time. The only thing that might seem a bit strange is that there is one Native that seems more interactive than the others. He might smile directly at you or ask some seemingly harmless questions, like how long you've been in Asgard for and what kinds of things you like to do during your day. He might comment how it's great that you're doing so much for them, and isn't it wonderful that we're in a time of peace? How long do you think it will last?

You can feel free to be suspicious about this "Native"'s behaviour, but as per the RNG, it will be Percival (sleeveless) that catches the spy! When it happens, the caravan will come to a halt and one of Heimdall's Natives will welcome Percival and a few others to come sit and guard the spy in one of the emptier wagons where none of the actual Natives will be at all inclined to give anything away, even by mistake. The mods will try to handle a couple threads for him. He won't have much to say after being caught, though, half because there will likely be several threads for him that we will have to devote time to and have because spies are such sour things when they get caught. :( No harm is to come to the spy or anyone else until Percival has had a chance to put up an open post on the network to discuss what to do with the spy. ]

[ OOC NOTES: This is the mingle log for the Your Friendly Neighbourhood Utgard plot! Please put the day/location in the title of your comment, along with [OPEN/CLOSED]. Also, if you haven't already, please check out the poll regarding how to handle Thiazi's spy over here.

edit: The IC network post regarding the spy is up over here! Let us know if you have any questions! ]

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That he had, and he would keep coping. Somehow.

"The right attitude to have, I believe."

"Something I've been thinking about, even while we're doing this, have you contacted any of the people in Freyr?" she said, scratching her chin. "It might be possible for them to start building up stockpiles of arrows for the war, or something like that."

"I have talked to one named Leonardi da Vinci about it. I saw him make a sword worthy on the battlefield, as far as I could see on the bracelet. I know he would be willing to help."

If there was a king arthur, why not? She shrugged and nodded. "If he's anything like the guy who had that name in my history books back home, that's exactly the sort of man you need on your team," she said. "I think there's another couple running around, but from what I've seen of at least one, I wouldn't say he's stable."

There were a few reasons she hadn't ever tried talking to Equius.

"We shall have to ask around." A pause. "He's in the history books?"

New piece of information, that.

"Da Vinci? He's kind of a big deal," she said with a nod. "I'm not sure what he actually did for history, but he was one of the most famous inventors ever."

"Ah. Then, yes, I expect he shall be helpful."

Sounds like they might have a main supplier, of a kind. That's always a good thing.

"I don't doubt it. He certainly seems invested in the whole war effort from what I can tell."

Yep, they're thinking the same thing there.

"Which is very good news. We need all of that we can get."

If you weren't truly invested, a war was even more difficult to fight. You needed to put everything you could into it to win. Which was... difficult when they were practically forced to do it.

The gods were idiots.

Something else she agreed on. Admittedly, she'd gotten fully invested in the last several months, but she also didn't like how they handled things because she saw herself as more of an exception, not the main rule. That fact really complicated things and made turncoats more likely.

"We do. You know anyone else I should get in touch with these days?"

"Unfortunately, I haven't seen or talked to anyone else worth of note. I shall have to keep an eye out."

"I have a feeling after everything cools a little from some of the more recent plans, we'll be able to sit and meet up. Honestly, we might want to just call a war council one of these days."

He nodded, solemn. "I do believe that is long overdue."

For once, he had been caught up in family matters rather then war or... anything else. State matters. And he still hadn't gotten anywhere. So perhaps it was about time he did something actually useful.

"The more plotting and planning we can do off of the network, the more defenses we can get put up. I honestly don't think we had much more than a militia organized before the last big fight," she said, shaking her head. She had a rough idea about the whole Merlin fiasco, but not much in terms of details. She'd kept her nose mostly out of it for now.

"There is, sadly, only so much that can be done with the people we are given. I do wish they would provide us with more soldiers."

Not just fighters, soldiers. People who knew about war and could follow and give orders and...

But alas, the gods weren't that generous. Or maybe they didn't have that much control over it but that... simply didn't make sense.

"The numbers in Thor and Baldr are a little low, yeah," she said, shaking her head. "And so many of them are just hot heads. Of course the soldiers could always take up leadership roles. That seems to be the best way to use them."

Sense or not, that was pretty much her assumption these days. They seemed to only have half the control they needed.

"I think that would be best. It is not that difficult a role to settle into."

Not all people are born leaders, but they can certainly be taught how to be it.

People have been against organisation, he's heard, but if they don't do it, they're all going to fall, and suffer. It's been far too close too many times. The battles haven't been many but even one is too much.

Sam's banking on people being willing to do military organization, at least loosely. At the very least, little projects like the one over in Svartalfaheim would unify a few teams for various specific missions. It was a start, if nothing else.

"Experience is a rarer quality than skill."

And everything has to start somewhere.

"Unfortunately. We'll have to make do with mostly skill."

"And power. But, if this fight lasts long enough, we may end up with a reasonable amount of experience to say the least," she muttered, shaking her head.

"Then it looks like we ought to hope for less of it."

And for the time to matter, they would have to have the same people around, which wasn't always a guarantee. Nothing could be counted on here, and it tended to make it difficult to start anything. Even the people who had been here longest were beginning to disappear.

"I've learned never to hope for less fighting, just the strength to endure what comes," she said, shaking her head. "The world isn't kind that way in my experience."

"Indeed..."

But hoping wasn't initially bad, and Uther would keep doing so. As long as you still prepared for what you were hoping wouldn't happen, then hoping was just fine. Hope was... what he had liked to think was driving him back home, but at this point he figured it was more fear and hatred.

In truth, though she didn't often speak of such things, hope was the hardest of the old virtues for Samantha to hold onto. For all her stubbornness and refusal to give up, she wasn't a woman given to hope very much. But there were reasons she'd been sent to Hel, and they had less to do with the presence of death in her life.

"Alright then," she said, patting everything. "I think we're mostly set here."

"Yes, it looks like we are." He took a breath. "Well, then, all aboard."

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