This is How the World Ends (Florian/Brenner)

[Brenner Dornkirk]

Brenner gasped, but that intake of breath was the only reaction he was afforded before the cave's ceiling began to topple over him. He didn't even have the chance to let out a cry of alarm or warning before all he could hear was the thunderous sound of the earth moving above and around him. He held his hands up to shield his head reflexively, but in that split second he knew that he would die.

But he didn't. Slowly his eyes blinked open and he looked up at his hands, quivering with fear-induced adrenaline and clean of debris. Instead, the rocks and dirt were held aloft by an unseen force. Slowly Brenner's gaze shifted toward the source of the energy and thus, to his chagrin, his saviour.

"Albrecht..." He slowly rose to a standing position and moved out from under the precarious patch, so the Lysanrin needn't maintain what appeared to be a strenuous hold over the forcefield he'd conjured.

"You saved me." He sounded genuinely surprised. If Florian was on the fence about their mission, he might have easily taken that moment for an act of the gods and let the Warrens consume Brenner and put an end to his lofty ambitions once and for all. It would have been an easy thing to let him die. He only had a split second to act, and if he'd hesitated for even a moment, the expedition would be down a leader and Zaichaer would be down a zealot. But he hadn't hesitated.

When Florian released his hold on the energy shield Brenner, without thinking, stepped forward and embraced him- firmly and heartily.

"You saved me..." He repeated in disbelief, and then began to laugh uncontrollably- Overcome with emotion and energy at his close brush with death. "Thank you, Florian" He managed to articulate between peels of relieved laughter. "Thank you..."

[Florian]

Florian inspected the remnants of the already-fallen stalacites above them even as Brenner hugged him. It was the very rare moment that he accepted a hug, or being touched at all by someone who was not Eitan, or treating him for an injury. He was also relieved that Brenner survived. He was safely out of the way of the collapse, but he rushed into it with half a notion of being able to help. He knew little of Lysanrin magic, and this was the first shield he conjured, like a mockery of Eitan. Perhaps it was fate that he saved Brenner.

"Don't let it get to your head, Brenner. I'm just doing my job." He replied, though he, too, was smiling. Not quite the disbelieving laughter. But it was true; part of his job was to use his magic to help them, and saving the life of the expedition leader was a part of that, even if he were to face the repercussions of this venture in the future. Even if. But he also didn't want anyone to die, and especially not when he could help it. Not now, anyway. Brenner's attempt to get to know him had at least one effect, and it was that it made him more of a person and less of a human charicature.

Florian eyed the area for Ghostblooms. "Do we need to go further, or have we gone far enough?" He asked, trying to move his thoughts away from the morbidity of what-could-have-been. He was growing tired from the expended aether, and what was left was maybe enough to sustain himself for another hour.

"I should rest when we get back. I don't know how much longer I can sustain myself on aether for. I'd rather sit or sleep."

[Brenner Dornkirk]

"Oh!" Brenner's hearty laughter had now dwindled to lighter chortles, "As quiet as you've been this whole trip, I didn't realise you were such a Spaßvogel." He shook his head, and picked the lantern up off the ground to shift the light back ahead.

"It looks like they're dwindling, so..." He nodded.

"Yeah, I think we can head on back now. Hopefully the other scouting party found more ghostblooms and fewer cave-ins." He noted, as he squinted to stare a bit longer in the direction they'd been heading up to now. He was looking more for potential threats than anything else. He didn't want something leaping out from behind them or, worse, leading anything back to the rest of the party.

"The din of the collapsing ceiling might have drawn the interest of some wretched Warrendwellers." He noted, "We should make haste and be gone before they show up to investigate." Satisfied that nothing was already present in the cavern ahead, he pivoted and started back the way from which they'd come.

He walked apace, occasionally checking over his shoulder or turning around to shed light on what lay behind them.

"I'm sure Piers will have reconnoitered that area by now, so we'll see whether he thinks it's safe enough to make camp." Brenner withdrew the timepiece Stefan had gifted him at the outset of the trip and snapped it open.

"Do you think you've got another hour or two in you? It's a bit earlier than we usually camp, but..." He shifted his gaze sidelong to regard his recent saviour, "If you really need to rest straight away, we'll work something out for you." He smirked,

"Even if that means tying you to someone's back so they can tote you about for a few kilometers."

[Florian]

"Ah." Florian replied, having no idea if what Brenner just called him was an insult or a compliment or something in between. He did not speak Kathalan in the least, but at least he had eventually figured out what it was that the dynamic trio spoke when they wanted to keep secrets. The silvered veins were already receding from him after the aether expenditure for a shield of that size, and he absorbed the rest of it into himself.

"I can last another hour or two. I don't need to be carried," Florian didn't want to seem weak or exhausted by the endeavor than he had already shown, and he wasn't that tired anymore considering his supernatural ability to practically eat the aether he absorbed. He followed Brenner again with a wary eye to the ceiling of the caverns, but they had seemed much more stable than the stalacties so fragile that even the echoing of their steps had caused them to collapse.

He had been hoping to be able to hold onto the aether for a bit longer, but when they were reunited with Eitan, it would be less of an issue. The two of them were well-practiced enough in making sure the both of them were well used to using magic, though expanding Eitan's shields had grown painful and difficult for him the more he did it, which seemed counter-intuitive to the point of practice itself. Even a tiny ward could leave him with a bloody nose. But he had yet to mention this to anyone, let alone Eitan or anyone else on the expedition.

[Brenner Dornkirk]

A silence hung between them as Florian and Brenner pondered what had just transpired and what was to come. After a few full minutes that were silent but for their echoing footfalls, the Air Commander broke the verbal armistice.

“How would you describe…” He paused, needing a moment to even frame the matter he wished to broach, “…what you did back there?” He tilted his head to the right.

“I’m keeping a mission log, and I’m not sure what to call what you did…” The log was intended, after all, for eyes in the highest echelons of the Zaichaeri State- perhaps even their hallowed Grand Marshal himself. As far as he could tell, there was still a bit of plausible deniability surrounding the Lysanrin abilities. That diverted or repurposed magic was somehow different and less appalling than that which was conjured directly from the Aetherium. Brenner did not wish to cause trouble for Florian or himself by phrasing something poorly in his report that cast aspersions on the campaign or any of its members.

“An… energy shield?” He floated, “And you diverted that energy from what?” He glanced to the side, where he’d seen Florian practicing his Kraft on a crystal jutting out of the wall earlier. “A dragonshard, was it?”

He would consider Florian’s response and decide into how much detail it was safe to reflect in his report. While he wasn’t one to deny credit where it was due, he might consider omitting the arcane aspect of the rescue. If details were requested that could be a problem for another time and he would have plenty of time between now and then to concoct a suitable pretext.

[Florian]

Florian took a few moments consideration of the question and ran a hand through his hair.

"I didn't know it would work." He admitted sheepishly. "I sort of knew...but I wasn't sure." Though this wasn't quite the answer that Brenner was asking for, he felt the need to start off with it. "I absorbed the aether through the dragonshard cluster — it was just an aetherite, which is neutral — and used it to make a shield. I think it's a bit like Angevin's wards. That's what went through my mind when I created it, at least.

"So an aetheric ward, or a shield. Maybe there's a better name for it, but that's what it was." He shrugged and looked back at Brenner from where his eyes had wandered as he tried to come up with words to explain what he did intuitively. "I didn't know if I'd be able to make it myself so I suppose we both could've died there," he laughed.

"The first time I used magic with Commander Angevin I essentially took a fireball to the face and transferred it to his ward." He added, his mind wandering. "And he asked me if I knew that I could siphon the fireball without getting hurt. I didn't know." He had saved lives with that risk, and still they were wary of him. The Zaichaeri hatred and distrust of magic was too complicated for him to map out, and the racism that was aligned on top of it only served to make him disliked no matter what he did. He had no hope that a mission log of any sort would help him escape those shackles, no matter how laudatory.

[Brenner Dornkirk]

"Ah..." Brenner's initial reply was no more than that. A phonated sigh with no apparent meaning beyond acknowledgement. It wasn't ideal, but he could work with it. After turning it over in his mind a few more times, he responded with more comprehensive thoughts.

"I rather think less will be more when it comes to this entry. If, as you say, you aren't even sure about the mechanics of what happened yourself, it would be unscientific of me to pollute my log with groundless conjecture."

He paused before adding:

"Worry not. I'll still make note of your heroism, I'll just keep the specifics on how you went about things a bit nebulous. It'll be safer that way." Mostly for Florian, but for the whole expedition, really. His initial meeting with the First Minister hadn't been all sugar and spice. She'd come at him with as many critiques as compliments when she ran down the list of ways he'd made a name for himself. Even Brenner Dornkirk, who some called the Poster Boy of Zaichaer, was not above suspicion in the eyes of the State. He'd made choices he knew to be questionable from a legal standpoint, but ever with his eyes on the goal of this mission. As his father had taught him early on, a man did not change the world without sacrificing part of himself. There was no such thing as an innocent iconoclast, and Brenner's aims were nothing if not iconoclastic.

"It must be a strange thing..." He observed, somewhat idly as they walked. "To wield powers beyond your reckoning. You might wish to consult with Stefan about chronicling your revelations as they come. Perchance it would be good for your people to have a more academic understanding of their abilities, rather than stumbling into them as they become pertinent to a given situation."

[Florian]

"No, that's a terrible idea." He remarked at the idea of logging Lysanrin powers. "I think the Order's already got them categorized, and there is a long history of hunting down the few of us who wield them. No, absolutely not. My own mother had been a nervous wreck as soon as she found out what I was doing for the ZADC."

The more that was written about himself, too, the more worried he became that it would be used against him. Even Eitan's notes made him nervous, especially when he had to write his own side of things. What he felt, what he saw, what he knew and learned each time he opened himself up to the aetheric flows of the world around him were secrets he wanted to keep for himself, if for nothing more than his own safety. Florian frowned. "I don't care for heroism. I was just doing my job."

He realized he wasn't sure if he wanted Brenner to even mention it. It seemed the very second he had drawn attention to himself things started to fall apart at the seams and it was not something he wanted. Hadn't the original reason for his joining the Air Defense Corps to be normal? To fit in? Yet now he was in the Warrens on a secret expedition, using his growing magic to protect people who would no sooner hate him if it wasn't so personal. It was only because of his surprising connections that he was where he was. He wondered if Brenner was the kind of person to consider saving one's life as a debt to be repaid, but he didn't plan to ask it.

[Brenner Dornkirk]

Brenner's hackles rose at the summary dismissal of his suggestion, but that only presented as a setting of the jaw and a tensing of the neck. When Florian elaborated upon his rationale for the response, he understood it better. He wasn't saying it was a bad idea for Zaichaer. He was saying it was a bad idea for his race.

"I see." He would consider the matter and perhaps put in some research when they were back in Zaichaer, but he saw no need to commit to a course of action at the moment. If the Order had truly put in the work of chronicling the Lysanrin abilities, it would have been a superfluous endeavour to set Stefan to such a task. Especially when his concerns should be devoted to the project at hand. If he was to put more effort into researching Lysanrin physiology in the coming months, it should be a matter of comparing and contrasting the way they drained magic with the way their quarry supposedly did.

"And that humility rears its sheepish head once more." Brenner noted with a snigger, as Florian downplayed his heroism. There was a time and a place for modesty, in the Air Commander's opinion, but such intimate environs as two comrades in the Warrens did not fall into that category. Nor did an official report that might lead to advancement- perhaps even promotion. Still, he hadn't the sort of relationship with Florian as to advise him on such matters. Perhaps he would have a word with Eitan on the matter, next time they were on sentry or scouting duty alone.

"Well." They were drawing close enough to where they'd left the rest of the group that he could see their firelight in the distance. "It looks like our little side quest is drawing to a close... Of course I won't address the matter you broached with me to the others, but I reiterate my condolences on your loss and... Well, I hope you won't find the rest of the mission too weighty on your conscience. I am always happy to discuss my rationale, if there's aught you'd like clarified."

[Rune]

R E V I E W

Lore:
Brenner: 15
Florian: 14

Points: 10 each

Injuries/Ailments: None

Loot: None

Notes: