calling_logs | What girl doesn't need a good axe?

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What girl doesn't need a good axe?

WHO: Garnet and anyone who wants to drop by!
WHAT: Weapon shopping.
WHEN: Around midday.
WHERE: The Mid-Summer Festival in the Lost City of Amazonia
NOTES/WARNINGS: Dem thighs always need a warning. /ahem. Nothing as yet.

She had taken her arrival with her usual aplomb. The City of Tomorrow had been interesting, but she saw more things that she might need to take a closer look at when she thought about attending the Festival that everyone was talking about.

So that was where Garnet had gone. It was rather nice to be amongst fellow warrior women - not that she wasn't always, or almost always, but the attitude here was different. Pearl fought because Rose fought. Amethyst fought because, in her words, she was 'scrappy.' Garnet's reasoning was different. She fought because the battle needed to be fought, and she was able to fight it.

The reason she was looking intently at a weapons booth, though, was because...

Well...

Her giant axe looked a little lonely, and this place was, currently, a little closer (and definitely less laden with memory) than the strawberry fields.

Her lips tugged to one side, a hand at her chin, Garnet eyed a particularly well-made polearm. Reach, and a blade. Both of those were positives in her book.

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A cave-in, a hidden door, a broken mechanism-- They're all possible, all tied together, as if the path of the future leans on the faintest hair.

"...Oops."

"Don't.

"Move."

There was a pause between the words as Garnet quickly searched forward into the future, seeing the three main branches form from nothing, watched the waters heading toward them twirl and tumble, choosing seemingly at a whim which to go toward. Everything was very uncertain--

But as everything stayed quiet, the future where they found themselves surrounded by falling rocks seemed to fade. She wouldn't be certain, of course, but she could only see what seemed to be happening.

"The future is more uncertain than usual. I can't guarantee a positive outcome until I look deeper--"

Or.

She looked toward Loki. And then, making a decision, she stepped over, grasped Loki's jaw, and placed a kiss on Loki's forehead. Future vision: granted. It would last only a few seconds, but in those few seconds, Loki could see what Garnet saw.

Choices. How each choice would make the future unfold. What those futures would hold. And much as Steven had said, many of those possibilities were bad. But a few were good.

Those were the ones Garnet always tried to steal toward. But Loki was a chaotic variable. In this, it seemed to be Loki's choice that mattered.

The possibilities snake out before her, plunging into pits, and crashing over cliffs, and Loki's eyes widen, pupils constricting as the possibilities chase each other through her mind. This way or that, or perhaps that...

She finds the path through sheer dumb luck, in the end, her eyes snapping into focus, and she presses more firmly on the rune, dragging her finger over, and up, and there's another, closer click, and then a low rumbling, before a section of the wall sinks into the ground before them.

"Ah, secret doors. My favourite kind."

She had seen that possibility. But it had been narrow - difficult to focus on, especially with how Loki's being seemed to skitter through all of the timelines like an errant leaf. The easiest thing to do was just accept what had happened, and extend a hand to shine her red-tinted light on what was inside. "Good work."

Vital to say that. Encouragement, she had learned from Steven, did wonders.

Loki finds her smile softening slightly, warming.

"Thank you," she says, peering down the hall revealed by the now-vanished door. It's a nice thing to hear; she so seldom hears it. Almost never.

The light from Garnet's palm reflects off of the tiny olivine crystals so thick in this dungeon. The walls here are rougher, and has thicker veins of the greenish crystal.

"Hm."

With one finger, Garnet traced one of those veins. It wasn't something she was completely used to, how, on Earth, these stones formed and had no mind, no thought - how they were just decorative. Naturally occurring. And Gems had to plant themselves in order to reproduce.

Earth. It was an odd place for a gem. And this place... Well, this wasn't even really Earth, was it? Or at least it certainly wasn't a part that Gems had explored.

"This is an odd place. Even for me."

"Is it?" Loki asks, arching an eyebrow. "I don't find it terribly strange. Unusual, but not strange."

"You aren't a gem."

Simple answer, but still true.

"All places like this on the world I've come from were made by gems. Stone is our most common building material, but we wouldn't use stone with a gemstone mineral embedded this way. It's...

"Odd."

And now, perhaps it was clear that that was a polite way of wondering if she'd known the gems that were currently in the walls.

"Ah. In my experience, places such as this may indeed be formed by natural causes, but are more often deliberately shaped by magic - however rough and unfinished they may appear. For you... Hm. This would seem more akin to building with bones, or some such, no?" She brushes her fingers over the glimmering green crystal, and sends a questing pulse of magic through it, looking for signs of... Well.

Life.

And to think, she is actually almost surprised when... something... comes echoing back to her.

"Huh."

"What is it?"

She wasn't omniscient - just prescient. That 'huh' of Loki's made her wonder. For obvious reasons.

"There is something alive in there," Loki replies, tapping gently on the vein of olivine. "Quiescent, and very deep, but alive."

"Like it's in stasis."

She was assuming, but it felt like a safe assumption.

"In a bubble."

"Ye-e-es," Loki agrees, drawing out the word thoughtfully. She sends another small pulse of seeking magic, sketching a few runes as she does, and nodding to herself when the more intricate spell returns the same information.

"Shall we?" she asks, gesturing down the rough stone hall, where the thickest vein of olivine leads.

"Yes."

What colour would the bubble be? If there was a bubble. She knew-- Well. No, she didn't know. It wasn't likely it was a red Garnet bubble. Her type of fusion was...

Singular.

But a violet Amethyst bubble, or pale Pearl, or pink--

Garnet found herself wishing for Steven. He had the gift of faith in all things, and if there was a bubbled gem...

She wished for Steven, but led the way with a palm upturned, lighting the hall before them.

Loki follows, close, but not too close, as the path leads deeper, narrowing, and then widening slow, growing into a hall big enough for something twice, and then three times the size of either of them.

Ahead, there is a low, grinding sound.

And that has the light from Garnet's palm fading as, with a clenched fist and a bass, metallic sound, her gauntlets manifested around each hand. That sort of sound never meant anything good and, with all of the new variables, her future vision was unreliable.

So maybe this place had one mark against it. She could live with one.

"Get ready."

Loki nods, and starts fading from sight. She is naught but a translucent outline when she says:

"Can you see what it is?"

The grinding is regular, and slow, like something... turning.

Garnet crouched, gauntleted fingers stretching out against the floor, measuring the vibrations and considering options - and one good thing came of that time spent weighing and measuring what she sensed.

Streams were eliminated with every fraction of a second, drying up and their beds being lost to possibility. This was no bubbled gem. Whether or not it was a gem construct was yet to be seen, but one thing was certain: It was mineral, and it was alive. There was only one word for it, and as she stood, she spoke. "A golem. It may be animated by this olivine."

Garnet wasn't yet sure if it was simply enchanted olivine or Olivine, proper. She'd find out soon enough, she was sure.

"If it is, I will take care of the gem afterward, but for now, we have to assume it's corrupted."

"All right," Loki agrees easily. The air around her hands flickers for a moment, the shape of a sword briefly visible before fading with the rest of her.

"I'll sneak around to take the back."

And Garnet's future vision might show her the possibilities there, of magic (rolling off the golem, like so much emerald water), of physical strikes (effective, slowly), and trying to go it alone-- A bad plan, for either of them.

"Your magic won't effect it." The moment she saw that possibility, she subverted it. "Use your weapons."

And then, after a moment, she added, "And be patient."

Doing this alone... Yes, not a good idea. For a moment, she toyed with the idea of unfusing. Heat and cold in rapid succession could fracture something like a golem, but--

But no. She knew that she was more effective as she was. All of her knew that.

Garnet rolled one shoulder. Tilted her head just so to give her neck a crack, and then, in her usual way, she strode into the room - a big, bright distraction so Loki could get into place. Olivine, if you're in there, you'll be safe at home soon, she thought, but outwardly? Outwardly, she stood proudly before the golem and gave it a taunting gesture before leaping up to its head height and striking with a magically reinforced fist.

The blow rocks the golem - glittering, crystalline green all through, the veins of olivine thick around it, allowing it to move like some fluid, the grinding sound coming from that movement, as it shifts and moves to strike back at Garnet--

Only to whirl as Loki comes at its back, blade as sharp as thought as she strikes, and dodges, and strikes again, blade flickering in and out of sight as she does.

This.

This was more certain.

She tapped into her future vision, everything having coalesced into currents she could easily follow toward the correct outcome. She watched them, saw how they flowed, and she moved with them - anticipating each of the golem's moves and, perhaps more importantly, each of Loki's. In this sort of battle, it was utterly necessary to know where one's partner would strike, to both stay out of their way and position the opponent so both of you would score the necessary hits.

And that was how it was that Garnet dropped to the ground and, with a strong kick, started the golem wavering, almost like a pendulum. If she could get it to the floor, then it would be an easy win.

Unfortunately, it wasn't a future she could absolutely guarantee.

Fortunately, Loki is very heavy, and likewise very used to using whatever tactics are necessary to win the day - in this case, vanishing her sword back where it came from, and conjuring a great mass, in the form of ice, to herself as she latches onto the golem's head, and tips it to the ground.

Maybe magic would roll right off the golem, but Loki herself is another story.

"Good tactic!"

This wasn't someone she's fought with for millenia. This wasn't someone who knows how she moves, how she fights. This wasn't someone who can read the future, like she could. So encouragement, affirmation, and, she reminded herself, shouting her own intents would only be good things.

It was thanks to Loki that the construct was fully down. And with the construct down, it became clear to Garnet that, though this olivine was somehow making it function, this was not a corrupted gem to poof and bubble.

Which put it firmly in the category of the young centipeetles: things to put down without remorse.

Garnet could do that.

Leaping onto its chest, she began to punch at its core. Not just singular heavy strikes but a multitude all focused on the same place, as fast as a jackhammer. When one large, grinding arm moved to try to sweep her away, she leapt and, from on high, she shouted, "Rocket fists!"

Confusing? Maybe. But her gauntlets shot from her arms with plumes of flame following them, propelled at exactly the same location she'd been punching while Garnet--

While Garnet seemed to hang in midair. Handless.

Loki has seen stranger. Done stranger. It still gets a blink, though she doesn't hesitate to get out of the way, by which we mean she teleports, a flicker of green in one place, and then another, out of range of Garnet's attack.

With the golem down, and structurally weakened by the cold generated by Loki, the impact of the rocket fists cracks the it in half, and--

Some faint light in it sinks into one of the veins of olivine, and flickers as it moves away from the now-inert mass of yellow-green rock-crystal.

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...so I'm thinking a golem.

Works for me.

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