(text, un: dante)

[durante]

Good afternoon, Ximilia Station.

By now I've had some time to get accustomed to the situation here and what we're expected to be doing, but there's still a lot left unanswered. However, I don't want to wear someone out with too many questions, so I've decided to try something different. Anyone who responds to this post, I'll ask one question I have about life here, our missions, or our purpose.

Thank you in advance for helping out.

Comments

[coordination]

Then you're more than adequately prepared to be here. Our mission briefings are always a great help, but like any situation, you're never truly prepared for what awaits us when we're actually down there.

But you said you were the manager of some retrieval team prior to your arrival? What sort of team? What sort of retrievals?

[durante]

< It'd be easiest to sum it up as going after powerful and volatile artifacts. >

[easier than trudging through the muck of explaining that they don't actually know what the Boughs are for, that their own lack of memory makes it simple to point them at a target and say go, that no one is explaining anything but in drops and cryptic sentences. what a headache.

still, they remember. remember the landscape Kromer made, the way they had to fight for every step forward. only a fool would disagree that keeping them out of the hands of people like that would be the wrong path.]

< There's the Before team, who scouts for information and the general lay of the land, to let us know what we're likely to face, and the After team, who handles cleanup and what needs addressing once the mission is over, but mine was the team that specifically went into the fray. We took on the most risk - the infiltration, combat, and handling anything unexpected, to be able to secure the artifact. >

[coordination]

An After team, huh. The nature of the missions we go on don't require one of those. And it's Degar and Viveca who essentially take the role that Before does. Only without the physical excursion onto the planet.

[ He moves to the weapons rack to properly place the sword he was handling back. The pistol returns to its holster that's hidden beneath the long jacket of his uniform. ]

Are the artifacts you sought out magical in nature? Weapons? Sentient in any way? What did they do?

[durante]

< It's hard to say if they're magic or really advanced technology. Both are capable of extraordinary things. But in the wrong hands, they could be weapons. >

[and it's hard to explain something they don't know enough about.]

< They sort of...reflect the depths of your own mind, is the simplest way to put it. I know that doesn't make a ton of sense, but it's the best explanation I have right now. >

[the joys of not having the security clearance to force answers out.]

[coordination]

I'm not sure I've met a teammate that has something so eerily close to these orbs in their own reality.

[ A beat. ]

You were the one who had the questions, and yet now somehow I'm the one asking them all.

[durante]

< I don't mind, though. It's not as though we're running out of time to talk about it. >

[and it's a relief, to get to say these things openly. not having words pushed aside for the next mission, not getting vague and cryptic replies to what should be straightforward questions. it helps in ways that Dante might not admit but are true all the same.]

< Honestly, if these orbs are any closer to the artifacts I was searching for, understanding one is understanding the other. >