Guards and Order

[GamesMaster]

In the city of Nyra, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups: the Lights, who create the laws that keep people safe, and the Guard, who enforce them. Criminals from Coalside, the roughest area of town, are considered especially heinous, and it is common to assign recruits a beat in Coalside to encourage them to wash out early if they don't have what it takes. This is one such recruit's story.

Once she completed basic training, Solras, Daughter of Umdor, was assigned to a unit and given a patrol through Coalside. A daytime patrol wasn't as dangerous as the famous Coalside Overnight, the deadliest beat in the city; instead of pairs, it was typical to assign three or four guards to a single patrol at night, to keep them safer. During the day, Coalside was dangerous, but not overly so -- there was a lot of rousting the homeless from places they're not allowed to sleep, for example, or running down common pickpockets. During the day, the threats tended to be more mundane: drug addicts, the desperate and homeless, those with little control over their magic, and of course, cats.

Elder Private Solras is capable and bright; the dwarf was a promising combatant even as a recruit, and better, one who remembered that the purpose of the guard was to enforce the law, not just beat people up for fun. Her trainer, Sergeant Vallen, likes to say that was the difference between Guards and Adventurers: adventurers may do good, but they do it lawlessly, answering to no-one and often on the wrong side of the law. Guards are meant to be better than that. Solras' partner, Private Lowell, tends to mock her for that, insisting that she was mixing up her work for the Vangal church with her work for the Guard. "We're not paladins like Vallen and her husband," the young woman bemoans frequently. "We're not divinely blessed supermortals. We're just folks. Sometimes we fuck up."

The two are anything but a matched pair. Solras is short, broad, and wears her red hair in a long braid, while Lowell -- Wylde to her friends -- is tall and lanky, with white-blond hair cut quite short. But they work well enough together. There is something about the girl that speaks to Solas of the wild: broad, snowy plains, the freedom to run for miles, the certainty that you could handle any threat that came your way. Maybe it's just her name. But maybe it's the way she seems twitchy when there were too many people around, the way she seemed like she wanted to watch all directions at once. And maybe it's something more. Who knows, in Nyra?

One thing Lowell definitely isn't, however, is a morning person. Today is far from the first time Solras has geared up alone at the station and headed out, hoping her partner catches up. It's a beat through Cattown, which is some of the worst parts of Coalside: several blocks in which catfolk crowd the streets, living and working in an insular community, hostile to non-cats who dare to walk through, let alone keep order. Catfolk are a lawless bunch at heart, always getting caught for stealing, whoring without a license, or swindling tourists out of their hard-earned gold. And worst of all, they hate the Guard. What upstanding citizen doesn't approve of the police force?

[Wylde]

By the time Private Lowell catches up to her partner, she's nearly a whole bell late for her shift. Thankfully, she'd stolen a spare uniform several weeks back, so she was at least dressed for work without having to stop off at the guard station. Knowing the route, she sprints along the cobblestone streets, only slowing to a jog once the dwarf is in sight. 

"Hey," she pants, pausing to catch her breath, resting her hands on her knees as she does. "How'sit?"

'It', thankfully, has been pretty quiet. There's cats everywhere in Cattown, and many of them are staring -- from balcony roofs, upper windows, perched on planks they've illegally balanced between adjoining buildings, on fire escapes, everywhere. Just like their four-legged counterparts, catfolk seem to like heights and hate strangers in 'their' territory; many of them sit idle all day, too lazy or self-righteous to work, watching the people go by and sometimes calling out in that strange, growling-meowing excuse for a language.

[Solras, The Protector]

Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch salutes her partner crisply and delivers a distinct summary of the events that have eventuated.

"Upon entering Coalside I proceeded to the make our rounds, through the 'flophouse district', primarily patrolling along Ja'shane street, taking a left along the extremely inaccurately named Short Alley, Then proceeding along Merchant's way, stopping three pickpockets in the act. Alas I had to let the pickpockets off with but a warning, not having a partner to perform a proper arrest. I next proceeded back along Merchants way until it crossed Morning Sunbeam, upon which i turned onto the aforementioned street. And here on the corner of Morning Sunbeam and High Perch is where you found me."

Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch does not sound upset about Private Lowell's tardiness, nor at having to patrol parts of Coalside alone (though she did stick to the most populated and public areas). The entire report is rather clinical and crisp, but at least she's dropped the poetic forms that had adorned her reports when she first joined as a recruit. no more of this "Bright was the day and high were our hearts when we.." fluff.

Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch stops her walk, and turns to Private Lowel, apparently remembering something.

"Good Morning."

[Wylde]

"Ugh," grunts Wylde in sympathy. "I am ssoooo sorry, you see, what happened was, my new rommate -- you remember the one, merikos troll, really into lip rouge? anyway, she promised she'd wake me up on time this time but then I guess she has this boyfriend and she was out all night and she only just got back ten minutes before my shift and--"

Wylde cuts herself off, taking a few deep breaths. "Right. Patrolling. Guarding. Stuff." She squares her shoulders, lifting her head and checking for her baton. "Okay. So. Cattown. Any trouble since you-- no, you'd have said, sorry. Uh."

[Solras, The Protector]

Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch nods, well that explains that.

"We Watch. We Guard." she says as she starts walking again, satisfied with the explanation and happy to have a partner by her side for this patrol.

Except when making reports Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch is pretty short of words when on duty, and while she becomes more verbose off duty she never seems to have too many words to string together at a time, something that has caused more than one partner to ask for a different partner. Wylde on the other hand doesn't seem to mind the brevity, at least not that Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch has actually noticed.

[Wylde]

Indeed; today she seems, as she does most days on patrol, perfectly content to fall into line, matching her steps with Solras' despite her longer legs. She's not tall, for a human, but dwarves are the size of children to humans, broad but noticeably shorter. Despite that, Wylde never complains about slowing her pace to Solras'. She seems perfectly content to trot alongside her partner, bright-eyed and eager, enjoying the sunshine so much as she's guarding.

[GamesMaster]

The pair make their way through Cattown, back out toward the Bazaar. For all that there's a lot of crime in Coalside, much of it committed by cats, Cattown itself was a fairly safe beat; there's just not a lot of petty thieving inside Cat territory, for the simple fact that cats don't have a lot to steal.

Once they get just outside it, however, anything's fair game. Including, apparently, a smash-and-grab they have the pleasure of witnessing: a cat with black-and-white fur breaks a window, grabbing some vials from the display and taking off running. Cats tend to be fast runners, so he's likely to get away -- unless they give chase immediately.

[Solras, The Protector]

Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch barely hesitates before launching into a sprint..... well to a Dwarf it's a sprint....


"<dw>The Law Requires You To Halt!</dw>" is the shout raised as the dwarf pounds down the pavement "Thou Shalt Halt in the name of the Watch, Protector of the Peace!"

[Wylde]

Something small and canine inside Wylde perks up, and an instant later, she's off like a shot. She doesn't hold back to stay with Solras this time; instead, she lets out her full speed, her feet finding an easy rhythm (cities are great, there's no underbrush or anything!) as she gives chase. 

She handily gains on the cat, even as he runs full-out into Cattown. Unfortunately, she starts at a disadvantage; the cat, not being an idiot, immediately leaps into the air, grabbing a fire escape and scampering up into the higher levels at an unnatural clip. Private Lowell slows, scowling at him as she reaches for the ladder, knowing she can't catch up at this rate.

[Solras, The Protector]

The slowed pace gives Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch time to catch up and with barely a dwarvish swear she determinedly runs for the ladder after the Cat. She's not about to let a little matter of Height get between her and her <strike>prey</strike>... <strike>quarry</strike>... She's not going to stop the chase because of no damned ladder.

[GamesMaster]

They both scramble up after the cat, but it's hard to beat a creature that can naturally climb; the tuxedo-patterned catfolk leaps to a higher balcony, climbs up the side of a building, gets up onto a roof, and pauses to look back at them.

"Ha!" he laughs, pointing back down at Wylde. He calls out something taunting in catfolk, clearly jeering. 

[Solras, The Protector]

"<dw>Show respect for that which protects those who cannot protect themselves</dw>" Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch mutters as she searches for handholds to continue the chase. The cat might have a natural advantage but nothing gets between a dwarf and their shinies target, at least not for long...

[Wylde]

Solras, Daughter of Umdor, is therefore partway up a brick wall, clinging to the jutting-out stone, when the first rock hits. 

As more follow, Wylde jumps from the ladder she's on, giving up the chase to shout at the surrounding catfolk. "Oi! That's assaulting an officer!" she snaps, looking around -- but of the perhaps two dozen cats in sight, none obviously hold rocks. And yet, a few more rocks are thrown even as Wylde is looking around for the culprits -- from widely different directions. 

[Solras, The Protector]

Solras, Daughter of Umdor, and Elder Private of the Watch is not dissuaded by some mere stones and continues the climb, until a particularly large stone catches her full in the face, knocking her off the wall and into thin air... Oops.

[Wylde]

As she plummets, she obtains the benefit of her partner's quick reflexes -- Wylde reaches out and snatches her, grabbing Solras' collar in an impressive mid-air rescue.

Unfortunately, she forgot to account for Solras' momentum, nor the dwarf's sheer bulk.

And so, instants later, she ends up sprawled atop the other guardswoman, the wind knocked out of them both, in an alley in cattown, surrounded by giggling, jeering cats.

Swell.