Welcome to Gaia! ::

Mayor Henrik's eyes were slowly turning darker and darker as reports about the last day's efforts drifted in. Finally he rounded on his people.

"And where were you?"

The room fell silent. No one had ever heard the mayor speak in that tone of voice before. None save Hans, the Doctor, and Carn, who had known him during his adventuring days.

"Where were you, while these brave folks risked life and limb defending land that wasn't theirs? Where were you when they were being shot up, blown up, and washed away by the powerful currents? Where. Were. You?"

No one answered. Maybe no one dared too.

"Rydia!" Henrik barked. Carn was already standing right next to him. The woman jumped to attention.

"Sir?"

"You and Carn, take our forces with you, as many as can be spared from the defense of the village, and go with the adventurers today. Make sure nothing like this happens again. I will not have them facing armies without us at their backs again!"

Rydia and Carn nodded, and headed off to select their forces.

"Hans, get one of the air mages...spirits, get all of the air mages. We need some sort of device that they can use to signal they're in trouble, something that can be seen in the sky from here. Work on it."

"Will do, Mayor." And Hans ambled off as well.

Henrik sighed, and sank down in his chair. This was not going well. It was true that they had not been attacked, and the dam was broken...the fuel depot, he heard, was destroyed. But the dam had been destroyed by the monsters, and the fuel depot by...some other terrorists? It didn't make any sense...

While his adventurers, the ones he had sent into the conflict, had been pinned down, driven to extremes by Skinner's hired mercenaries. And been unable to accomplish much on their own. Well, he intended to do something about that.

The Mayor shook his head, gentling his voice. One hand reached out to clasp the young man's shoulder. "It isn't your fault, Kalis. If we had been less concerned with preserving our own necks, you wouldn't have needed to face all that you did."

Kalis would suddenly feel a woolen blanket wrapped around his shoulders from behind. It was the doctor's assistant, Celia, a young girl just beginning to be a woman. Kalis may have noticed in his time there than she was nervous, around everyone, and didn't speak much.

The Mayor's eyes followed all this, then he answered Kalis's question. "None of our lands have been attacked. The fuel depot lies in ruins, or so I'm told, and, well...you saw to it that the dam was no more." The Mayor grinned, face wrinkling it into a smile. "Beyond that I have not heard much. We have had few casualties...a handful of my summons were destroyed, but I don't believe any lives have been lost, yet."

Celia mumbled a "Your welcome" to her feet, her face flushing a bright red. She moved on to tend to the others, then help the cooks prepare breakfast.

The Mayor returned Kalis' firm nod with one of his own, matching his determined expression. "That, young man, is what I very much hope, and intend to see to."

It was a while later into the day that Kalis decided it was time to clean up the things laying about.

The sun up higher in the sky, warmer time of day. He carefully draped the blanket over a chair, and took care of resheathing all his blades, checking to be certain they were dry, and wandered outside with his gauntlets and greaves in hand.

Outside, he could be seen picking his things off the line, considering them, and at one time or another wringing things out. He wandered off toward wherever it was he kept his other things.

In a few minutes, he'd come back into the building in a mostly dry coat and jeans, sword and knives strapped on again. One could note, however, that he'd kept the scarf, if it really mattered. Gauntlets and greaves apparantly had been seen as dry enough too, covering his limbs before the conflict was even seeming to pick up again.

Aiolos grabbed a blanket and stuffed inside one of his large cloak pockets. He would need something if he wanted to do that flying trick again, one sheet held up barely for two people, he wanted one in case he had to carry someone again...

He lost a blade or two in the battling, but it seemed that his conductor's whistle was more use then he thought. Aiolos gripped the small whistle underneath his shirt as he walked outside, where he saw Kalis preparing his things.

"Ready?" Aiolos asked him, glancing at the blades.

Shade awoke, sleeping a bit off from everyone else, he turned on his cloak over night to make sure that no one would see him if there was indeed an attack. Standing up, he unseeingly stretched and yawned, before walking to the exit of the house.

"Help!" the little boy crowed, bursting into the building. "There's a man, in the southern forest. He's not one of us, I think he's coming after us! He could be dangerous, I- they told me to get help!" the little boy was frentic, almost hopping up and down.