knightsoflegend | andres ♔ but life is for living

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andres ♔ but life is for living

WHO || Everyone
WHAT || With Andres Isle reclaimed, the Knights deal with the aftermath of their battle to save its people
WHERE || Andres Isle, and various
WHEN || September 20th, 2014 - October 20th, 2014 [backdated]
HOW || Actionspam

When the sun rises on Andres Isle the next morning, and the smoke and rubble clears, it is impossible to call the battle anything less than a victory, in terms of freeing the people from Sarandis' hateful regime.

But all victories come with their costs.

Sir Zatara's team easily accomplished their goal, shutting down the power station that allowed Sir Trinall's team to wrest control of Isle communications, although Emma Swan was grievously injured in the process and Faye Chamberlain found herself facing an unexpected temptation when she got her hands on Jordan Reeves' genie bottle. Sir Wellington and Carpenter led an assault on the prison base, that succeeded in freeing all of the captured Shadowkind and putting a halt to the hideous experimentation going on there - at the cost of Sir Maxwell Briggard's life. (And Nathan Young's... but he got better. Twice.) Even Myrilandel's familiar, Amaranth, was found, but when Lan turned violent on a bank of computers in a fit of hatred for the machines and all they represented, a targeting system was activated that released all the mind-controlled Shadowkind hybrids from the facility, on a dread path of destruction for the castle, ready to kill anything in their path.

Meanwhile, Sir O'Rourke's team had managed to locate the love potion that Dimitris Sarandis was using to control Kat Samcelot's behavior, and made it impossible for the next dose to be administered on time. Sir Hathaway's team likewise made it into the castle, after following a set of clues that indicated Sir Elena Gilbert and the doppelganger Kyp had killed a guard and stolen their identity, heading into the palace proper. Eavesdropping within its walls, they learned that the Prime Minister had been shot, and that the woman responsible was being held in a tower. This, however, proved to be a cruel trick of Dimitris' ally, the powerful psion known as the Mind Master. Forcing Elena to shapeshift into Dimitris, she mentally dominated Elena, and made her sit outside the empty tower cell, where Rose, Will, and Dean found her. Having been approached by Kyp, who had been separated from Elena and feared for her life, a grudging alliance was formed, and the doppelganger approached "Dimitris" alone. Despite her attempt to drop hints to her real identity, the situation escalated - until the Mind Master made Elena wrest Kyp's gun from him, and shoot him right between the eyes.

In the meantime, Sir Yassin's team had blown an entrance for Prince Marcus Andres to lead his group into the castle through the tunnels below it. Dimitris had, however, expected something like this, and filled the tunnels with all manner of monster and creation designed to stop them. With exceptional teamwork, they bypassed all threats and made it within, where they were shocked to discover the real Chad Becksworth was in fact a prisoner here, and that Draken Crombe, leader of the Church of the Lord's Humanity had been impersonating him with the aid of the Mind Master, for access to NOVA Records' resources, for years. They also discovered the bones of former Dragon's Claw Sir Ellison, Tia's father, and helped lay his spirit to final rest.

Knights around the Island struggled to halt the hybrid creatures from charging into the palace and ruining the internal team's chance to save Kat and Thomas and stop Dimitris. Wynn led his own team to hold the line between the forest and the castle, but the brutal creatures they faced were overwhelming, and even with back-up arriving, creatures broke through. Wynn sent Sir La Krail and Francesca, whose team had secured the guardhouse, to stop several driders who had passed, while he chased down a chemical golem that crashed right through the palace doors.

Dimitris had already sprung his trap, however, sealing Marcus and friends in a room below the palace pumped with poisonous gas, while he asked Kat Samcelot for her hand in marriage on a screen for them to watch. At that moment, however, the love potion wore off, and she stabbed him in the dick, and helped free the others below. Myri teleported several of the Knights up to the main floor to save Kat, who faced the guards alone and weaponless, but the arrival of the chemical golem provided enough of a distraction for Dimitris to make a break for the throne room.

Elsewhere on the Isle, Sir Koraith's team had been gathering allies among the Shadow Village, to face an attack that they had been warned about, by soldiers seeking the location of Rocket, who had escaped the Shadow prison after attempting to assassinate the Prime Minister. Koraith led those who could not fight towards the boats, while the others remained to hold the line and take out not only the soldiers, but also the clockwork creations called nimblewrights, robots whose construction Failboat had learned was based on some kind of demonic creature held in Dimitris' basement. The battle was brutal, and Sir Riddick fell to the clockwork soldiers' assault. The fate of Sir Jaina Solo and a Shadowkind villager named Indra Crestrage remains unknown, as they were also grievously injured in the assault.

Sir Edain's team had secured various boats to transport villagers off the Isle, but also discovered a sinister shack where body parts were created up for export to Japan. In the battle that followed to hold the docks, Hook lost his entire arm, but managed to hold onto his life.

Back in the palace, several Knights joined Wynn in taking down the chemical golem, as Marcus and company moved to confront Dimitris and the Mind Master in the throne room. The Prime Minister was unrepentant for his crimes, and revealed that after capturing Kat, he had had the Dragon's Claw Thomas Bancroft killed, dumping his body off a balcony for them to see. Enraged, Kat ran to attack Dimitris, and was nearly killed by his bodyguard, Asha, but Fred Jr. intervened, sacrificing himself to save her. Des murdered Asha instantly, while the Mind Master teleported herself and Dimitris away, leaving the guards willing to surrender, and the Knights frustrated by the hollow victory.

A search of the Isle revealed no trace of where the two had gone, but it also meant that Andres was free of Sarandis' influence. Sir Banks' team had managed to gather all the wealthy human elite of the Island together inside a country club under the guise of a gas leak, and when Emma Frost appealed to the humanity of Sergeant Alastair Stone, a local police officer, he assisted them in routing out potential supporters of Dimitris, and separating them from the others, so that they might be shown the truth about what had been happening on the Island, right underneath their noses, in the form of a video of the prison laboratory provided by Logan and Nathan.

Most of the natives were shocked by what they saw, but had already been distrustful of Sarandis' true motives. Hearing that the true heir to the throne had returned has given the people of Andres a real sense of hope that things can change, but the road will not be an easy one.

Rather than pull out and head home the next day, Wynn has asked as many Knights as possible to remain and help with reconstruction. There are families to reunite, injured to tend to, homes to rebuild, a palace to remodel, and much more. This post is for things following directly in the aftermath of the Battle for Andres, especially for things happening on the Island itself. More posts will go up in the near future to backdate less immediate events. Characters are free to go back and forth to the castle as they please, but also have accommodations provided in the city or palace on Andres Isle.

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[Des has been staying in the palace, combing through every crevice for any sign of where Dimitris might have gone or any secret clues about his agenda, but mostly it's all for nothing. Eventually, he ends up outside, though he doesn't really feel he's suited for the rebuilding process. Someone needs to see if there are breadcrumbs and he's sort of here for his Nancy Drew bullshit.

But sometimes that gets to be headache-inducing. It's those moments he spends with the people who are more on the passive side of the rebuilding process, which is why he falls into step beside Myri while she's walking between things.] Did you find your... familiar?

[With everything going on, Myri hasn't had much time to stop and think about her lost familiar. Or maybe she's purposefully avoiding the thoughts, trying not to wonder about whether or not he's alive.]

...No. I haven't.

[And that's all she really wants to say about it for now.]

[Right. Terrible topic. He was hoping maybe something good had come out of all this- something a little closer to home than simply saving Andres, but this may be just another disappointment. So he leaves it there.]

I'd ask you if you were all right, but I don't think anyone is. [He throws an arm over her shoulder.] I'm sorry, Little Bit.

[She leans into him, taking comfort in the moment, trying to push the rest away for now.]

I didn't realize seeing him would be so... [There's a tremble that courses through her. Now that it's over- or over for now, she can actually spend time feeling that fear that had to be put on hold.]

Hey. [He tightens his grip on her.] You have every right to be afraid of him- of what he could do. He might be a little shit with a Napoleon cock, but for months he was your personal boogeyman. But if you want my opinion, I think you handled it well. Some people get into situations like that and shut down.

Isn't that what I did? [Maybe if she had acted faster, Fred would still be alive.

No, he wouldn't but Myri isn't thinking rationally.]

Okay. Let's look at the situation. We were having a group sing-along, Kat decided she was having none of that and hit the ground running, which put her against that bitch with the claws, and then there's Fred. Simple, heroic Fred.

[he screws up his face.] So you could have tried to hold Kat, which wouldn't work, because that girl is a tiger. You could have stopped Fred, and he wouldn't have listened or Kat would have gotten hurt. You see where I'm going? There was no good ending here. That isn't on you.

I just keep hearing her. Every moment that's quiet enough, I can hear her begging me to do something...

[He goes quiet. Hard to logic that one when it was right there, plain as day.] People get crazy when they're grieving. She doesn't blame you, Little Bit. She was just reaching.

[She doesn't say anything for a long time, very quiet, looking down at the floor. Her breathing is uneven as she seems to be at war with herself on what to say.]

...sometimes I still hear you, too.

[It feels like it was another lifetime before this moment, like it wasn't really her and it wasn't really him, but it was.

Get her out of here. She can't do anything for Jade now. It's just gonna make it worse for everyone else. Go!

More than a year ago and she can hear it, just as plain as if he'd said it this morning.]

[Des sets his jaw.] That's why I know what I'm talking about.

[That's why it hurt to hear it from Kat and know that was him once upon a time, back before Myri meant more to him than she did, back before things started changing.]

You meant it then. [She knows that it's more complicated than that. They weren't close. She was just the weird, quiet healer with a strange pet cat. She wasn't important to Des and Jade was everything.

But she still can remember the tension in that room, the way they all felt that day. And she knows that Des mean what he said in that moment.

Just like Kat did.

And the moments that come after may change and shift the way a person feels, but the anger and the fear and the disappointment linger, like an echo down a long hallway. It burns into her, written deep into the bone.]

People mean a lot of things in the moment, Myri. [He releases her shoulders and steps into her path, so she has to look at her.] Do you remember after the trial, when everyone found out about me and Jaka? All those things Buffy and Rafael did to me because they were angry?

They meant every word. Believe me, I was picking glass out of my hair for a week- I think they got their point across. Point is... It happened and then they stopped being angry and I stopped caring that they tried to murder me. That is a really extreme example, but... you get what I'm saying, right? People are always going to do stupid things when they're angry or scared or... Whatever. And it's gonna hurt, but most of the time? It's gonna fade away. You have to focus on that, Myri. Focus on the good you've done, not what you couldn't do, because the mistakes go away. The good is what lingers. And you're one of the best people I've ever met.

[She takes another shaking breath and nods, trying to listen to what he's saying, trying to believe it.]

I don't know if I can talk to her. Should I? She's barely left him since everything... I just don't know what to do.

I think you you have other skills besides magic, Little Bit. [Kat might be abrasive, but she, like everyone else in this world who isn't EVIL, would never intentionally hurt Myri and not regret it later. It's like stepping on a kitten's tail.] She needs people right now, to talk to her, to take her out of her own head. That's all you have to do. Bring her food, keep her company... Anything.

And if she doesn't want me there?

[She's scared of this conversation, afraid of what happens when she tries to bridge the gap.]

What if I only make it worse?

What if you make things better?

[Thank you, Des. You are terribly mysterious.]

[The non answer seems to at least make her think.]

Maybe.

Maybe I could try.

You'll just be fretting over it if you don't. [He ruffles her hair.] This is much more productive. And I promise Kat will appreciate it in her own way.

[Again, she quiets, then nods.]

Thank you.

You're welcome. And if it goes bad, just come find me. I'll take full responsibility and help take your mind off it. Okay?

[he winks at her. such a good big brother.] Now go on, Little Bit. Put on that brave face I've seen a hundred times.

[She ducks her head, smiling sheepishly.]

I'll see you soon, I'm sure. [Whether it goes good or bad, Myri will find him. He deserves that much of an update.]

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andres ♔ but life is for living

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