worstcrystalbearer

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 30 - "Two Heads Are Better Than One"

It was a normal day at the Ishgard branch of Katakura Adventuring Financial Services. The weather was cold but clear, and inside the office, the pair of Uzuki and Khena were working with paperwork at their respective desks, when a small bell signaled the entrance of someone through the apartment building's front door. She didn't think she had any clients scheduled for today, nor was Jana supposed to come over, so Uzuki stood to greet a prospective new client.

Through the door came a wiry Hyur man, midlander by the look of him, though Uzuki knew well enough to tell he was actually from Othard. "Welcome to Katakura Adventuring Financial Services. Can I help you?" Even if it was a bit of a mouthful, Uzuki always made sure to give the name of her business in full.

"'Katakura,' is it? I believe, you can, yes..." The man moved as if to take off his coat before suddenly drawing a dagger and slamming it into the wall, pinning a piece of parchment to it. Uzuki reached for the hilt of the curved sword on her desk as Khena gave an audible yelp, but the man was already halfway out the door before she could draw. She ran outside to give chase, but was already too late to see him, simply shocking a few passerby as she ran out with her blade.

She could only sigh and head back inside, though Uzuki was a little surprised to see Khena recovered enough to be reading the paper which had been so violently forced upon them. "It's a list, though of what, I don't know."

Taking the page, Uzuki began to scan it, and her eyes widened in recognition. Unclaimed cargo that she'd sold with Jana's help when she first came to Eorzea, a few cycles ago already. And at the very bottom of the list, a single line revealing the identity of the "sender."

"'Hanasaki-kai'... A crime syndicate."

"My sister absolutely cannot know about this."

"Oh, she'd butcher them. Absolutely not."

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 28 - "Deleterious"

Panting and wheezing, Uzuki stopped for a rest, leaning against a rock that doubled as shade from the hot Thanalan sun. She'd made sure to bring water with her when she went out for "a run," but she'd long since run out of it. And while she'd already made the choice to turn back and return to the city, she made the decision too late, too far from the gates.

She could only get a bit of relief by wiping the sweat from her brow with a forearm, trying to catch her breath and finish her run. Part of her deal with her guardian was to join the Adventurers' Guild and learn their way of life, if her chosen business was to work alongside them. That meant training, even if Uzuki didn't really know for what.

She didn't have the strength or endurance to fight like her guardian did, punching people to death. Nor did she have the aptitude for magic, or the keen eyesight to use guns and bows to their best effect (though Jana didn't either, now that Uzuki thought about it). But her pride as the only remaining member of the Katakura samurai clan demanded that she try something.

Today, that meant simply running in the hot sun with too little water to match her intended distance. Tomorrow, it would mean doing push-ups or squats until she collapsed, or lifting weights that were way too heavy for her to endure a full set of repetitions. Though it'd wear her down, maybe she could get strong enough to learn something from someone, eventually...

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 27 - "Memory"

The alcohol was wearing off, but Jana was still intoxicated enough to be seeing and hearing ghosts. Stumbling through an Ul'dahan alleyway, the visions she'd drunk so much to forget came flooding back to her at once, and the voices echoed in the back of her head, adding to the dull pain as a hangover began to settle in.

Some of them were faces and voices she couldn't remember actually encountering - People she'd only seen or heard briefly before she'd snuffed out their lives. Some of them were of people she actually considered "friends," though their appearances in her mind now were anything but friendly. And one of them, sneaking in and out of the periphery of her visions, was the kill that had started Jana down her path.

The woman she'd loved, but allowed to die in her arms.

It was no different than if she'd wrapped her arms around her neck and snuffed it out herself. Maybe others would disagree - She'd been told before that it wasn't her fault. But Jana knew better than anyone that she'd made a terrible mistake that day. She'd prioritized healing a pair of captives - Captives! Prisoners! - over her ally, her lover. But why had she hidden the wound from Jana in the first place-

The vital question was snuffed out before she could make sense of it. In her stumbling, Jana finally tripped, faceplanted into a wall, and fell into a mercifully dreamless sleep.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 26 - "Zip"

As bullets whizzed by overhead, Jana was reminded of the trenches on the two fronts of the war against Garlemald. But now, she was in no trench, but out in the open, in the snowfields of Ilsabard as part of the Eorzean Alliance's Ilsabard Contingent. There was no safety wall she could hide behind until they slowed or stopped, no hard line at which her advance could stop. So she didn't.

Raising a small shield in front of her head, she charged blindly until she felt the impact of a body in front of her and used her inertia to push it over. Rolling in the snow in front of her was now a single tempered Garlean, who she quickly dispatched with a single empty-handed punch to the temple. A bullet pinged off her shield, causing her to stagger a bit, and Jana could only grumble under her breath... Having to knock out these soldiers instead of killing them off with any of the wide range of techniques at her disposal made her job a lot harder...

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 29 - "Dip"

Jana plunged into the salty waters below. Battered, burned, and bruised, but still alive.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 24 - "Bar"

The Dragonsong War was over, ending a way of life for the people of Ishgard that had lasted a thousand years, but to many adventurers, there was still plenty to do. Whether it was aiding in reconstruction work, serving as pathfinders for the establishment of new trade routes through Dravania, or simple mercenary work in beastman suppression, their way of life was secure for at least a few more years.

It wasn't too long after Ishgard had opened its gates to outside adventurers that Jana joined the Machinists' Guild and learned how to load and fire Big Bertha cannons. Sure, there wasn't a pressing need to fire them against airborne dragons... But what if these cannons could be mounted to a ship? It was an idea she'd had after witnessing a clash between an Lominsan galley and several smaller Garlean airships; despite the obvious size and power differences, the powerful shipborne cannons on the galley had been unable to get the angle needed to hit the smaller airships when they were too close or directly overhead. Bertha cannons, made to defend walls from flying dragons, would not have the same issue.

These high-angle guns had another trick that Jana was working on. Firing shells at a high angle so they would plunge down onto the deck of a ship, instead of impacting it in the side, had the potential to do massive damage if it got around the armored hulls of many ships of the line. Plus, the technique could be combined with the air-bursting shells she'd developed to clear decks of their crew without dealing heavy damage to a prize vessel... Now Jana just needed the time to train a ship's crew to fire as she'd planned.

-

A certain Miqo'te who Jana both loved and loathed had managed to secure her a job as a cannon commander aboard an experimental magitek-powered and armored privateer. Now aboard the Iron Bitch (it was that other miqo'te's naming sense, and not at all Jana's), their task was to stop a massive Garlean airship from reaching an island of ceruleum drillers (the actual situation was much more politically complicated, but Jana hadn't bothered to learn all the details for this job). On their side were other privateers, affiliated with the Maelstrom or simple adventurers contracted for the job, and even Garlean defectors, including an experimental submersible (at least a couple cycles before they would be commonplace in the grubby hands of Eorzean Free Companies). Notably absent were the Maelstrom's main forces themselves - Those background politics had somehow led to their expected reinforcements being a no-show.

Whether it had been a mistake of their helmsman, skillful maneuvering by the Garleans, the lack of pressure on the airship from their absent reinforcements, or a bit of all of the above, she didn't know, but the Iron Bitch had found itself directly under the airship, staring right at the opening doors of their bomb bays. Some of the crew were already panicked, but Jana could only look at her longed-for death with glee in her eyes.

"Angle ninety-degrees! Keep firing!"

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 25 - "Perpetuity"

Uzuki had only a few minutes to go in her work when she looked up and noticed that night had already fallen. Adventurers aiding the city in reconstruction were plentiful, and her second branch office in Ishgard had already become successful. Even with extra help, it seemed like she was going to continue taking care of numbers and figures into the late hours for some time to come.

Maybe it was just a trick of her perception, but the distant lantern lights out her window somewhat reminded her of lanterns in Doman festivals... Even if the time of year and weather were all wrong. She couldn't help but stand from her desk and wander over to look out over the city, stretching her arms over her head and thinking back to more nostalgic days. She'd been through a lot, including many obvious tragedies, but overall, Uzuki felt pretty okay.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 23 - "On Cloud Nine"

The smell of blood on the wind. A splash of viscera on her cheek. The occasional cry of anguish as another Garlean soldier met their end. Shots ringing out. Dropped blades hitting the ground. Artillery fire in the distance. The feeling of a man's head breaking under her boot. The sound of flesh melting from bone in a single magic cast, and the smell that came a moment later. The recoil from two barrels of scattershot being fired in quick succession. The sound of a shot passing dangerously close to her ear. The resistance of a man's rib cage finally failing under the force of a punch.

Jana let out a deep sigh of contentment as she took in the sight of Specula Imperatoris, inspecting the results of her handiwork. The rest of her Alliance unit would probably be along soon, but it was good for her to have a chance to let loose without worrying about them for a little bit.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 22 - "Sack"

Doma was burning.

Lord Kaien's rebellion had failed, though the young Katakura no Uzuki had no way of knowing the hows or whys. All she knew was that the two servants who normally staffed her family's relatively small manor were nowhere to be seen, nor were her parents. Looking out onto the red horizon, even though it was only midday, the young auri girl could hear some shouting from the streets, and a sudden banging on the manor's door.

"Katakura! You have to let us into-"

She threw open the door to a surprised "oh" from the Doman Hyur family outside; it seemed that they had expected her father. No matter; she already knew what his clients would want at a time like this. "I don't know where he is, but we can go together."

-

A massive brass keyring sat heavy on her belt as Uzuki ran down the street. It was short distance from the manor to a large warehouse behind it, situated right on the docks of The One River. This was where her family's business was, keeping them afloat but irrelevant to the rest of the samurai families in Hingashi. Fiddling with the keys as she rounded a final corner, Uzuki held onto the largest of them and unlocked the warehouse door. The hyurian father was right behind her, a slip clutched in his hand.

It only took a few minutes for more families to appear, either in whole or in part, themselves holding onto slips that would identify the part of the building in which their belongings were being stored. Uzuki did her best to keep people moving; some of those she'd already given their belongings to stayed behind to help. For the most part, the people were only retrieving a few small items, usually jewelry or official documents, occasionally an heirloom katana or something larger like antique furniture. Whether they would be allowed to bring such items onto the refugee ships, already loading nearby, wasn't any of Uzuki's business.

For better or worse, their Garlean keepers weren't coming to do anything about them, busy as they were with their suppression battle outside of the city and fighting in the palace across the river. This gave Uzuki and the other civilians enough time to get through all their slips, but she could already tell that there was a great deal that had yet to be claimed. Some of the stronger Doman men who'd stuck around to help milled about a little longer, but many were already being called by their families to board the boats.

"Uzuki!"

The sudden call of her given name startled her, and the preteen girl whipped around to see one of her family's two servants coming her way. "Shozo!"

Coming closer, Uzuki slowed as she realized that he was wounded, blood trailing down the side of his chiseled Roegadyn face... And that he was carrying her father's sword. "Shozo? What happened?"

"I- I'm sorry, it's our fault-"

While some of the details went over her head, it seemed that both of the family's servants had thrown their lot in with the resistance, using the warehouse to store medical supplies. With copies of the keys, they had kept it secret from her parents, up until the day that violence had exploded. Her parents had been at a bank on the other side of the city when it had happened, and those supplies never ended up reaching the front lines before their intended recipients had been cut down. Worse still, the resistance and the Garleans both had never trusted the words of her parents enough to fully protect them, and caught in the crossfire, both of them had... "Fallen," as Shozo put it, before he could arrive to protect them.

"Returning your family's sword... Your badge of office, it was the least I could do after failing to save them..."

She couldn't suppress her tears, but Uzuki tried to stay calm. "The warehouse is open now! You can find your medicine, right? You- Wait now, you have to come with us, you're hurt!"

He slowly shook his head. "Umeme is still out there."

His wife, and the family's other servant. "I... I see. Then-" The middle-aged man stopped her by putting his massive hand on her head, the Roegadyn pressing down with a gentle and affectionate weight. "Then this is probably goodbye." The taller man released her as he made for the warehouse. "I'll get what I came for, and you can go on your way." Turning to the men still milling about, Shozo's voice boomed out, "Load the rest up onto your ship! Katakura's coin can pay you for that much, can't it?"

Fighting back her urge to wail, Uzuki stepped up alongside Shozo, dwarfed by his height. "It can, I promise! Please, help us!" Though there was some reluctance, the chance for some last-minute coin before resigning themselves to a life as refugees was enough to entice the men to work. Shozo and Uzuki faced each other one last time, Shozo to claim the resistance's medicine, and Uzuki to return to her father's safe in the manor.

"Stay safe, you have to-"

"I can't promise you that, young mistress."

"Then... Then, I dismiss you."

The look on the servant's face was briefly one of shock, but then softened when he saw the tears streaming down his now-former charge's face. "Yes... That is your right, as inheritor of your father's office. It was an honor to serve, mistress Katakura no Uzuki."

Her willpower failing, Uzuki's last words to Shozo came while choking back tears. "You are free to go."

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 21 - "Shade"

"Hey."

The simple greeting made Khena jump in her seat a bit; she'd been engrossed in sorting the files left for her by Uzuki and hadn't noticed Jana come into the room. Though it was also odd that her sister had bothered greeting her at all. "Yes?"

If she was bemused by her sister's reaction, Jana didn't show it. "The kid... Uzuki, I mean. She said this is the last one." A heavy file folder full of paper hit Khena's desk with a loud thunk. "Should be mostly sorted already, so it's not as much work as it looks."

"It's strange of her to be so considerate."

"Oh, then thank you! Tell her I'll be finished soon." Even with it being Jana in front of her, Khena couldn't help but smile, framing her bright blue eyes behind her reading glasses. Jana gave her a little attempt at a smile back, though it quite failed to really reach gloomy and tired purple eyes behind her own spectacles. "Sure, I'll let her know."

"Only easy shit for this fucking baby."

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 18 - "Hackneyed"

Coughing as she half-blindly stumbled through the small, smokey room, Jana activated a switch on a contraption in ta nearby corner. With a loud "whirr," the magitek air purifier started up, and the noxious gas began to thin out. When she could see again, the first thing apparent in Jana's makeshift "lab" was the mess caused by shattered glass and spilled chemicals. Aetherochemistry was not an exact science at the best of times, and trying to replicate Allagan experiments with incomplete texts made it that much harder.

However, in this specific instance, the gas explosion had been the intended result. Inspecting Allagan doo-dads scattered across the floor, Jana could measure the time it had taken for the reaction to happen, as well as its explosive force. Looing down and up made her feel a little light-headed ("Must have breathed some in, even with the mask"), but even this was a good sign. Getting gas through masks meant her concoction might even compete on the same level of lethality as the Empire's vaunted Black Rose. She'd already developed an artillery shell that exploded in the air to shower targets in shrapnel; if she could adjust this delivery system to instead release gas...

She didn't laugh out loud the way one might expect if they read the right kind of newspaper serial, but this did put a smile on Jana's face, inscrutable behind the gas mask.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 20 - "Duel"

"A job? In Ishgard?"

Khena looked at the letter in misbelief. MogMail from her sister had almost entirely ceased in the decade-ish since their mother had died, and here was a letter saying she'd both taken in a child and was offering a job working under her... Under the child! Even if she didn't want for work in Gridania and didn't feel like she owed Jana anything, her curiosity won out in the end. She would need to pack something warm...

-

It was a strange situation to be sure. Jana's ward had teamed up with an Ishgardian politician to rent an apartment building and establish a new branch office for her financial business on the ground floor. Meeting Uzuki for the first time, Khena couldn't help but be taken in by her bright, blue eyes... Eyes that reminded her of herself. Before she could tease Jana about them, the young lady slid a sheet of paper to her.

"A contract, as well as what the work entails. Your sister... My guardian, has been doing it in Ul'dah for some time and assured me you would be alright at it?"

"'Alright'?" Khena seemed a little taken aback.

"Yeah, 'alright'." If Jana hadn't meant it as a stealth-diss before, she meant it as one now.

Even someone as conflict-averse as Khena couldn't help but puff out her chest at the blatant provocation by her only enemy in the world. Without even reading the contract, she moved for the quill Uzuki had offered her.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 19 - "Taken"

"Ah but, you simply must try the wine." "Oh, and the crumpets." "Don't forget the salt lick-"

Elections for the House of Commons had just concluded, and Uzuki had invited her two "employees" to a celebratory gala... Though it seemed member of the House of Lords had also been invited. Somehow, Khena Ridah, who'd made the trip over from Gridania, had attracted the attention of several men, vying for her attention. Had they somehow heard about her being a little wealthy, or was a cute miqo'te girl just that rare of a sight in Ishgard...?

Looking around in vain for Uzuki (she was somewhere else, talking to a neighbor that had just won his election), Khena's gaze instead met someone's she'd hoped to avoid: Her sister's. Bright blue eyes met gloomy purple eyes for just an instant, but it was enough; socially inept as Jana was, it seemed she understood Khena's plight from that look alone.

"Move along, the lady's spoken for." Jana half-shoved her way through the Ishgardian men, forcing them to disperse. "Thank-" "Sure, whatever."

-

But wait, didn't they look a little too similar for this trick to work? Khena couldn't help but notice that some of the gazes that came their way seemed amused, rather than lustful.......

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 17 - "Sally"

"You lot! Over the top! Go go go!" The trench system dug into the Bozjan southern front was maybe more extensive than the one Jana knew from Ghimlyt, but what really felt different was the degree of troop movement day by day. In Gyr Abania each side had been stubbornly dug into their respective Aldenard and Ilsabard sides, with the Garleans making few big moves and the Alliance playing it safe. But in Bozja, surrounded by the Empire on all sides, it felt like engagements were happening all around her at all times...

This was but one such engagement. In her capacity as an adventurer, Jana was aiding the local Resistance in their skirmishes around the ruins of the former capital, but calling them a "resistance" and their fights "skirmishes" felt a disservice. She'd been tempted to dismiss the Hrothgar as a tribe of beastmen when she'd first encountered them, but their unified resistance put up one hell of a fight against the Garleans, who were losing blood and steel to them as the days went by.

With her oversized Immortal Flames-issued handgonne, Jana fired off an arcing grenade round. When it landed some distance in front of the trenches, there was a quiet "thump" instead of the usual explosion, and smoke began to cover the battlefield. "Cover is set! Over the top!" Slinging the heavy firearm over her back, she drew her summoning tome from her hip and began to climb.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 16 - "Third-rate"

"That's enough, string-bean. Hop on down- Oh."

Jana let go of the bar she was using to do chin-ups and stepped over to where Uzuki was stuck... Hanging by her chin. Grabbing her legs, lifting her up a bit, then letting her down, Jana could only sigh as the teenage girl rubbed her neck. "I guess this was still too much? Then we can try something easier-"

It would be a lie to say Jana was pained upon seeing Uzuki's expression, but she did pity the girl. Whatever her strengths would be, physical power was clearly not one of them. And the more they tried these kinds of exercises, the more it seemed that Uzuki would accept it as fact. But for now, there was still a hint of defiance in her eyes... A bit of fire that actually did pain Jana to have to put out. She'd heard a little about katana masters that cut with speed instead of power, but how could she teach such a thing? The best she could do was keep Uzuki in good condition.

"Five minute break. Then we'll figure something else out to try."

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 14 - "Telling"

It had taken a lot of time and effort, working odd jobs and saving money in Ul'dah, but the young Jana Ridah had finally made it to Limsa Lominsa to join their Arcanists' Guild. It hadn't been too long since they had changed their policy to allow adventurers to join their ranks and had even changed the magical discipline they trained newcomers in.

Mealvaan's Gate did indeed train newcomers in arcanima, but whether an adventurer could actually take in those teachings depended on both their innate ability to use aether and their ability to read and write in the special ink used in their tomes... So Jana had to start waaay back there, if she was ever going to turn her vague idea of making magitek that ran on magic into a reality.

Learning to read and write was easier said than done, but Limsa Lominsa at least didn't seem to discriminate against outsiders in the way Gridania did, or try to exploit them as readily as Ul'dah. Finding work as an adventurer was easy enough and the skills she'd picked up in the Pugilists' Guild would be enough to fund her burgeoning education.

It wasn't actually very long before Jana could return to the guild. Unexpectedly, the former poacher had a talent for academics, and it became a talent in arcanima as well. Continuing to study while working as an assessor, learning numbers and geometry to control the magic and carbuncle she needed in her new day-to-day, Jana felt for the first time that her vague ideas could be real goals, dreams to make the world a better place.

For better or worse, arcanima would continue to be a reliable weapon for Jana in her day to day life, but the dream she initially left home with would wither and die. Perhaps because the real reason for that dream, the driving force that led her to seek out magitek in the first place, had always been vengeance against the Garleans that had built a castrum over her home. That drive would never go away, but as Jana suffered traumas over the years, the burning desire would consume her and turn her into someone altogether different... Save for the drive to bleed others dry for an irreparably warped sense of justice.

[worstcrystalbearer]

Day 13 - "Butte"

"Corporal Ridah! Your attention, here!"

As part of the Immortal Flames Free Brigade, Jana Ridah was used to having orders shouted at her, but the Captain's tone seemed a little different this time, even to her inexpert ear for such things. As she separated from the rest of the squadron's training exercise and came closer, the Captain pointed to a distant rock formation, distinct in the areas around Little Ala Mhigo - and Zan'rak. "Corporal, show me that magic of yours again. Blast that butte."

Without questioning her superior, Jana did as she was told, pulling her tome from her hip and firing a blast of corrosive, acidic magic. The midpoint of the distant butte dissolved in an instant, and the top clattered to the ground with a distant "thump."

"Good shooting, but not what I meant. Hit it again, with that other magic."

"Ah, so that's what this is about."

With a short incantation, voicelessly and rapidly intoned under her breath, Jana used the art of Allagan summoning to hit the remainder of the butte again. With a sweep of her hand, a burst of flame appeared just in front her, coalescing into the form she knew as Ifrit-Egi. A few of the nearby Flames squadron members stopped what they were doing to watch as the primal incarnation launched itself forwards, briefly heating up the already-hot desert air, before hitting the rock and exploding into flame.

There was some ooh-ing and ahh-ing from the other Flames, but from their number stepped out a unformed Private wearing what Jana could tell was a pair of aether-reading goggles. "No trace of void energy, Captain, sir!" While she'd already reported to her superiors on the nature of summoning magic, and had largely avoided using it where villagers could fly into a panic over demons, it didn't seem unreasonable for her direct Captain to want to verify it himself.

As the remains of the butte bubbled and melted into slag, Jana put her tome back onto her hip and crossed her arms. "No demon magic. Satisfied? Captain?" she added as an afterthought to avoid being a little too insubordinate. And while he didn't vocalize it, the eventual formation of a Summoners' Squad seemed to imply he was indeed.