[003]

[fallen_stage]

Characters: Kuja, Zidane, and YOU
Setting: Floor 2 (infirmary), Floor 14 (media room), Floor 18 (study room), Floor 22 (art gallery), Floor 26 (morgue)
Format: Starting with prose, will match
Summary: Kuja meets with his brother for a chat; Kuja gets stuck; Kuja around the Tower in general.
Warnings: Claustrophobia in the morgue.


After speaking with Zidane over the network, Kuja immediately made his way to the media room. Although he browsed through the selection, he did so without real interest. He was here to have a little chat, not settle down with a story. Maybe later.


The morgue was an unusual and out of place location. What point was there to a morgue where the dead never remained so? Kuja looked through some of the cabinets, and while he did find a few remains, they were utterly unfamiliar, without any identifying markers. Most of them were empty, as if built for a higher death count... In one he thought he saw a glimmer, but to go headfirst into a dark, narrow place was foolish. Instead, he tried to fish it out with magic, and when that didn't work, he braced himself on the shelf to reach the object with his foot.

Immediately the drawer slammed closed with a heavy click. Kuja pressed against the door, but nothing happened, not even when he rammed against it. His heart started pounding in the stifling space, but he couldn't panic.

"Hello? Help! I'm in here!"

Kuja resisted the impulse to also shout 'I'm not dead'. The scent of cold metal and preservative filled his head but that didn't mean he had to lose it entirely. Someone would come by. Eventually. In the meantime, Kuja summoned some fire, for light since the metal didn't melt in the slightest.


After all that nonsense, Kuja just wanted to relax. What better way than with a book? Some might not think a medical text wasn't very engaging, especially one focusing on chemistry, but Kuja liked it. The text reminded him of the countless hours studying in his youth, learning how magic could affect and shape the body.

Now, if only the ghostly whispers would stop. At first Kuja tried to decipher the words, but every time he listened, the noise was just this side of unintelligible. So, like with many minor annoyances, Kuja ignored it. The warm, wet air stirring at his neck was harder to ignore, but he could manage it well enough.


With all of the changes in the recent pod situation, Kuja decided to take the next step in his education on more mundane methods of medicine. He had the book from the library with him, and he was checking the information against the stock available in the infirmary.

Comments

[fallen_stage]

Well, with the obviously-not-empty person at roughly eye level, Kuja could get a better look. Whatever they were, they obviously had a soul and a will at that. Kuja wasn't about to ask what they were, but he wondered if this was yet another example of different worlds. Not all Black Mages could be so meek, surely.

"Forgive me for staring, but you look similar to someone I know. Might I know your name?"

[isthatashortjoke]

Of course he'd look familiar, he wouldn't know why anyone wouldn't want to look like him.

"I'm Veigar, master of raw power, space and time magic and all powerful mage!" That was also his shortest title. A plethora more came from having such a huge ego.

Veigar looked over at Kuja and raised a brow. "And you?"

[fallen_stage]

A mage with quite the ego. After his frustration with the meekness of his previous creations, Kuja finds himself oddly fond of this little spitfire.

"Lord Kuja, patron of mages such as you."

Of a sort. That's all Veigar really needed to know, and Kuja didn't trust him with much more: he seemed like something of a loudmouth.

[isthatashortjoke]

"Patron of us mages you say?" This is certainly the first time he's ever heard of such a title and decided that maybe this was one of the moments where you gain more from learning than blowing things up.

"I've never heard of such, so I'll assume you're from another world much like many of the blasted minions that dwell in this accursed tower."

[fallen_stage]

Minion? Feh, Kuja never liked slipping on that role, needed as it was. But a noble, bloated with excess cash and influence... Even without resources, people could trust such an individual to set up something similar. But was Veigar using 'us mages' excluding or including Kuja himself?

"As are you, I'm sure." Really, everyone but the administrators were. "Magic is so fascinating, and mages can come up with such marvelous spells and creation, with just a little support."

[isthatashortjoke]

"So, your name, it doesn't sound familiar, though I must say that's kind of the point of living in this place... Where are you from? What was your world like?" Veigar asked curiously. After all, mages from other worlds should be interesting to say the least.

[fallen_stage]

Now here was a subject both of them were interested in. With such a mix of worlds, what other methods of magic could be shared?

"I lived in a city called Treno, in the country of Alexandria, upon a planet called Gaia. I couldn't easily reduce a whole planet to a few bare facts, you understand, but... Let's see. We have magic, and were on the verge of switching to a steam engine to power all sorts of things, from household heating to powering whole airships. There are four continents, although the Mist Continent is the most populous, with a number of large cities and kingdoms."

[isthatashortjoke]

Not that different from his own it seems...

"Hmm, I believe we came from similar era's... Runeterra is full of magic, some would say to an unwelcomed amount since it almost ripped the world apart. We have a few continents, Valoran being the most populated and active and some of the City-States focus more on technology, building airships and machines vastly different from anything else in Valoran."

[fallen_stage]

Difficult to sum up an entire planet in only a few sentences, but on the surface they seem similar enough. Kuja burns with curiosity about the magic that could do so much, but he can't ask about that. Not just yet.

"Sounds similar to Lindblum, an immense city knows for its airship yards and innovation. What sort of mechanical advances are we talking about?"

[isthatashortjoke]

"I wasn't much into them, but Piltover was known for the most advanced mechanical innovations. Mobile vehicles, automatons, augmented armors, airships, war vessels... There's a great deal in that particular city."

And that was just skimming it considering they had built sentient automatons like Blitzcrank and Orianna.