[ARCANA PLOT - ota] we all fall down

[stacks_the_deck]

The Embassy, even though it has only been on the Deck for months, has managed by sheer dint of its height, to be an indelible part of the skyline. Or so it has seemed.

Until today.

Today when the Tower and Magician fought......and the Embassy fell, leaving only a pile of gray rubble and bits of colored glass where once stood a tall edifice of

Comments

[headfollowheart]

Zoe isn't by any stretch of the imagination first on the scene. She arrives with a crowd, and for a moment, she just stares at the rubble of the building she'd been in and out of for months. "What happened?" she murmurs, and then looks around, moving when she sees a familiar figure laying on the ground.

She sinks down next to him, unnoticed for now, and lightly touches his face to look at the forming bruise. "Well, someone certainly managed to leave a mark," she says. It's not clear if she means on the Magician or on the Deck.

But then, it is rather both things, isn't it?

[morallydefunct]

"Would it be too much to hope it feel on top of them all?" He only ask because he honestly felt that it would be better for them all if the Arcana died in a bed of their own making.

He didn't trust them, after all.

[headfollowheart]

The look Zoe slants Victor says he's not helping. Of course, neither is the Magician going to wake up just now, so she releases his chin and rocks back on her heels before standing again and brushing back her hair.

"The others are wandering around with the rest of us," she says dryly. She can see the Tower, still standing, and she's fairly sure he's the one who sent the Embassy down. The Fool, and Strength, a new face she doesn't know. "So I think it's safe to say they've gotten out unscathed."

[morallydefunct]

"Pity." Was all he said with a shrug, ignoring her glance as only Victor could ignore things.

"Who is the new one?" Because clearly she was new, and rather unhappy looking.

[foolishlywitty]

What... had they done.

What had they done!

He'd always thought they'd needed to reach their boiling point, to knock through so they could hear each other talk, but...

He wanted to be horrified, and instead Christophe was guilty of still thinking their battle beautiful, even with his beloved stained glass crunching under his feet as he approached.

[aedificavi]

It is beautiful, in its own way. This is the most honest Burke and Gustave have been with each other in eons.

Getting up to his full height again is just a touch shaky. Grabbing his war hammer from the rubble helps ground him again. Which means he's ready to brush past Christophe with the lowest rumble.

"It's done."

[foolishlywitty]

Christophe didn't step out of the way, like he usually would. Like he should, if he used the brain he so often tricked people into thinking he didn't have.

No, instead he forced the Tower to bump shoulders with him as he passed.

"I was done a long time ago." Christophe didn't fight. He didn't fight with anyone. Not really. Not with anything but laughter and evasion. So that uncharacteristic bitterness must have been pure imagination.

It must have.

[aedificavi]

Maybe it was unfair, to people like the Fool. People who weren't deeply invested, embroiled, tangled up in the break.

That's likely why it's only a light bump, not a harsh shove. "Then I suppose the rest of us have caught up. Go home, Christophe."

[lenire_feris]

There's a low stream of cursing as she picks her way over the rubble. Wonderful, absolutely wonderful. Instead of building a good accord with these people they'd now get to see how childish such powerful beings could be.

If anyone can catch what she's muttering, they'd be immediately aware of two things: that it isn't any modern language, and that there's a rumbling undertone that's not entirely human.

The door is blocked by rubble on the side facing the embassy, but she moves to the other side, testing it a few times, open and close. Seems to work well enough, though what may be seen through the doorway isn't rubble and ruin but a beautiful path.

[weorold]

Vesna understood what Silke was saying all too well. And she only barely spared a glance at the others before turning to the woman as she picked her way through the rubble.

"Was everyone out?" She asked, for a moment letting true concern shine through the annoyance on her face.

[lenire_feris]

"Ic belí-" she stopped and shook her head and answered in kind. "I believe I have them all evacuated, but... the building came down too fast for me to be certain. We shall have to search."

[weorold]

"Will you help me?" She asked, holding out a hand as she tried to pick a path over the rubble to where Silke was. "We'll look together as best we can."

And as soon as she was close enough, Vesna wrapped her arms around the other woman. If nothing else, she thought, she was grateful that Silke was unhurt.

[onlytolerable]

There's something to be said for being trained your entire life to take charge. The training has Sophie arriving among the first wave of Deck inhabitants. What's more, it has her grabbing gawking cards and organizing search teams. There could be people hurt here. It never occurs to her that some of those she's bossing about outrank her.

She'd be lying if she said she never wanted the embassy gone, but never like this. She's never been one for seeing others hurt. Right. She shoves her hair back and takes a moment to think. She's an envoy still. She needs to find an Arcana and offer what help she can.

She really hopes no one is buried beneath the rubble.

[maskofhearts]

Well, what do you know? Hadyn had never been around to see the towers up close. From a distance he'd gotten enough of a look at them to just not care anymore. And aside meeting the Tower, he'd never actually spoken to a single Arcana.

But at the moment he couldn't help the slow clap. That slow, punctuating slap of his hands together as he smirked and tilted his head a little.

"Now that's a party," he comments, moving a little closer. "Why- I'd say that was the best damn party I've seen in a while. Question, though. Does this mean we get party favors now? I have dibs on the good favors, if we do."

[onlytolerable]

"Perhaps they'll package up rubble and sell it like they did with the Berlin Wall." Sorry, Haydn. She left her sense of humor in her other coat.

She doesn't care about them--they've given ample proof they aren't like other people--but she does care about their servants who, as far as she could tell, were normal.

"Amazing how only two of them seem worried that some of their staff may be buried beneath this. Tower did this I bet. He's like a three year old having a tantrum. By all means enjoy yourself, but if you get bored you might see if you can help the wounded." She bites her lower lip. "There's...there should be more of them. They had a surprising number of servants."

[maskofhearts]

"It'll make a killing, I'm sure." Hadyn said dryly, looking over the rubble with a bit of frown. He wasn't sure what he could honestly do for anyone trapped too far down. There was a lot of stone in a Castle. People could be buried very deep, after all.

"If they are buried in there, you'll need more than hands to dig them out. You've got to be looking at several hundred tons of stone and glass alone."

[weorold]

She had come to the Deck with one purpose, with one thought. And that alone was enough to leave a slight frown on her face. She'd vaguely hoped Gustave and Christophe would become bored and come home after a few days- or the Deck would throw them out.

Instead they had moved an entire castle. And brought servants- and the Tower. The Tower who attacked the Deck...

And yet still, no one set the wayward Arcana home. And now, now after months (hedging to nearly a year, for that matter), Vesna had convinced enough of the Arcana to her side that she stepped onto the Deck lands with a comforting superiority.

Or at least, something to that effect. Until she watched the Spires tumble down, shaking the ground and sending up a giant plum of dust and dirt.

"Should I congratulate you both? My what job well done." She spoke, hands on her hips as she tapped one foot against the ground. She didn't care if the members of the Deck turned and looked at her almost startled. The World was not above mocking those practiced idiocy on a regular bases.

[aedificavi]

Her appearance is... unexpected. Not good, actually, given the sentiment back home it likely indicates. It can likely only temporarily quell what's burning inside him now.

"It's a start." Which is the important thing. It's started. She's not really going to attempt to stop him now, is she?

[weorold]

She would. She would bend the very earth if she had to- by whatever means she had to do it. She would reach out to stop them both.

"You're a child, Burke. Look around you. Do you not see what you have done? The only people you might well have hurt today are your own. And you can't even care about that, perhaps we'd be better off with someone else to build towers."

And perhaps that was an empty threat, but Burke didn't need to know that. It might take more than her to push someone out of the Arcana, but it could be done. In a way.

With enough convincing that a certain someone was a danger to himself and the others.

[aedificavi]

"The Magician is not my own, Vesna." And everyone in the sham of an Embassy had been Gustave's. Even Christophe and Silke, in their own way. Even if Asmodai were injured, he doubted she'd particularly minded. "And this institution was not fit to remain standing. This needed to be done, and you know others will stand behind me in this belief."

This was his purpose, after all. To build good, strong towers, yes; but also to tear down the ones that didn't belong.