melodiesoflife | Feeling down? Putting your life in danger helps.

Who: Ales Mansay and OPEN
Where: The tall buildings around Aqures Ixen
When: March 2nd, all day
Summary: After two months of work, Ales finally completes his minicopter and flies everywhere.
Warnings: Possible Teensie falling on you.

It had been a difficult month. There were few Heroes Ales could say he trusted after the vision of the future, and he holed himself up in his lab for a month for that very reason, working on redesigning the personal portable minicopter when he wasn't flying. His Moogle was getting worried that he never spoke to anyone that didn't come see him at the lab, but he assured her that it was for a good cause.

Meeting Ganondorf was a welcome reprieve. That man knew that improving the world meant making difficult choices, and he had a lot of grand plans that brought life back into Ales' eyes. Then he was gone, and so was one of the few Heroes Ales could call an ally. But who cared about being upset? All the more reason to complete his project and test it out!

The lightweight machine didn't have much to it: handlebars with a rubber coating for an easy grip, a crystal-powered motor and its housing, and retractable propeller blades. It felt different than the Lum-powered one he based it off of, but worked just the same in a lab setting. To check if he could reasonable use it while traveling, he ran outside, stood in front of a single story store, and turned it on.

The motor whirred to life, and the Teensie was lifted into the air. Above the heads of confused onlookers, then high enough to peer over the rooftop. There was a limited time that he could turn it on, and the copter was reaching its limit. He was high enough to grab the ledge with a hand, but he had to wait. Then high enough to roll onto it. The engine slowed down just as his feet when over the ledge and he jumped onto the rooftop.

"Success!" He cheered from up top. The shopkeeper yelled something, but Ales didn't care enough to pay attention. "Now to hop over to the next one!"

Throughout the whole day, he gently jumped off of rooftops, slowly climbed his way higher, resting while waiting for the engine to cool down.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Leonardo who?" An unfamiliar name in his world. Granted, the nature of Ales' machinations would make him a bit of a renaissance man (minus the artistic skill) in his time.

He made sure not to let his pride show when confirming Mary's implication. "Well, airships aren't unheard of in my world, but I've only seen them used by lands populated by robots. But...yes, most of my creations are unique. This is only the simplest and smallest of what I've made."

He would delve farther, but the lack of enthusiasm stemmed from his continued uncertainty of Mary's allegiance. The other Heroes may have denied their actions, but Ales was only acting as he would normally. Those who fought with and against him saw for what he truly was.

"I don't know if the airships in that vision count, but they were also designed by yours truly."

Mary was briefly surprised at the question, but only because it was a name that was so well known in her home world, not to mention the Brotherhood. She had to remind herself that of course he might not know the name in his own world.

"Simple it may be, but something like that would be a wonder where I'm from. I imagine many people would do a lot for one." The Templars and Assassins would likely kill for supremacy over such a device.

She wasn't going to bring up the Vision, but since he did she did have a question on her mind. "I'm curious. What was it you were after in that future. Do you know? I don't mean to accuse you of anything, but I'd like to know what your goal was." Why he took a fleet to attack a city that contained some of the few innocents left caught in the middle of the conflict.

War was war, but there had to be a line.

Ales adjusted his grip on his contraption, subconsciously drawn a bit more attention to his pride. "Your people sound like they have a good head on their shoulders." There were so many worlds that regarded technology with respect. Maybe his world was just exceptionally dumb.

When Mary asked her question, he turned away and walked to the edge of the roof. He knew why he attacked Mysidia: it was the base of operations for the opposing side, and controlling a city of civilians would only make it better. It would be nice to have control over something, anything. Ales needed to feel triumphant over his own achievements.

"It was for greater control. We decided that attacking their base of operations would be the best course of action." Mary didn't need to know that the plan was mostly for his benefit.

Technology was respected by some and hated by others back on Earth. The major split came on how much the technology shook up the status quo and who would benefit from it as a result. Humans were a greedy race more often than not.

"That's all then? Because that's the path that the schism between all of us took you to?" Her words are cold and needling, but without any hot sort of anger. She's not accusing him of anything, simply digging to the core of the matter. "What of all of the people in the city? Those caught between all of us while the Calamity was creeping in at them from all sides?"

Ales snapped back at her almost immediately. "What about them? Keeping you guys distracted from our other plans was more important!" Realizing that it might have sounded defensive, he waved both his hands in front of himself.

"At-tat-tat," he stuttered. "Just. Look." He took a deep breath.

"Don't expect me to know exactly what I was thinking there. All I knew was that I didn't have to worry about anyone standing in the way of my plan. You know what those others said, right? Something happened during those two years that changed us."

Thanks be to Levy and the rest for their apologies. There was something to make this argument more convincing.

Kidd was silent for a time, watching him with a serious gaze. But then she relented, taking a half step back and relaxing her shoulders. "Aye. For all we know it could have been fabricated entirely by the Sage. Showing us a vision like that and then telling us we're not worthy of knowing why all of that happened isn't a good way to make trusted allies of us all.

She began to walk along the rooftop, not to go anywhere in particular but simply meandering as she spoke. "I just mean to see if there's anything to the warnings. To make sure that we're not going to try to recreate what happened. Not all of us are classic "Hero" material, but there's still a line we should mind I think. I doubt we were brought here to become a bigger threat than the Calamity itself."

Ales gripped the handlebars of his minicopter when Kidd walked away. He knew it. She had misgivings about him, despite having worked together. This was what he was worried about. It could be the similar to Ellie's situation, where the two years had changed her drastically, and the same might be true for Kidd. It was better to let her assume the same thing for Ales. Let them believe the Sage fabricated some of these stories.

Not that he was going to dwell on those events.

He took in a deep breath and followed Kidd on her rooftop walk. "Whatever it is, we learned that a lot of us has the potential to be destructive." The conversation he and Lydia had over mail came to mind. "It might have been a warning not to be too curious about the meaning of the Calamity."

Regardless of his paranoia, as far as she was concerned her misgivings were natural. After all she was a pirate. The company she kept was far from the most well mannered and moral. Still, lines had to be drawn somewhere. Things that you would never do, not for all the glory and gold in the world. That was why she was so concerned about Kenway after all. The treasure he was seeking and how he had started going about it put more than just his crew at risk.

So in the end she was right. She was choosing to trust that the him in that vision wasn't quite the same person as here and now.

"Aye, that's true. Whatever we were capable of in our home worlds a good many of us have become even more powerful here. And then there's the matter of how we're connected to the Calamity as well." She glanced over her shoulder at him as she kept walking.

"Still, I don't mean to let all of this go. The Calamity will keep spreading regardless of us I'm sure. And I don't mean to let it go unchecked if there's something we can do about it. And that means knowing more about it than we do right now if we don't want history to repeat."

"Of course, of course." Calamity first, then the ethics of his methods later. "We can't let that vision scare us into inaction."

He balled his fist in his pocket. "But the question is figuring out just where to learn more about this. All we have to go with at the moment is the Mysidian Tower."

"At least it's a place to begin. The only thing we can hope is we figure out what the inhabitants were trying to tell us before time runs out."

Feeling down? Putting your life in danger helps.

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