fighting_mad | (no subject)

(no subject)

It would be startling, if anyone were watching. One moment, the empress is leaving the banquet hall in a poorly-hidden bad temper, and the next, a dark-haired aide is suddenly by her side as they step through the archway and continue down the corridor.

Plourr glances over her shoulder, but no one at the table appears to have been looking.

The corridor--walls steely blue, and floors a dark gray shining marble--is simple and empty, but for a guard who turns the corner and bows his head respectfully as he passes. Plourr tips her head in return, and she looks back again as they round the corner. No one appears to be staring or coming after.

Her evil plan is working?

"Welcome to Eiattu."

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"Well," Ajedrez-Beatriz-Ibella says in an overly-patient voice, "your darling wife decided to show me your blasters. And then we ran into your mother."

"My mother - oh, dear." Rial glances around, then drops a quick half-bow.

"In that case, I'm off. Enjoy your stay at the palace." And with no more then a raised eyebrow at Plourr that says "you'll explain later," he's gone.

She blinks at that, rather more taken back then she would care to admit.

"I don't," says Plourr, after a moment, "know if he's running away from her, or toward her."

Beat.

"Either way, I'm going to kill him."

"Men," is Ajedrez's comment.

"Idiot," Plourr mutters to herself, and then she says, "Well, come on, then. He may be running, but we've got an armory to get to."

She waves her on into the dark passageways, and while she's talking, she leads them on a twisting, impossible-to-follow route through turns and quick corners, never hesitating.

"I'm not sure what kind of stuff you're looking for."

"Well, neither am I," Ajedrez points out as she follows.

"Explosives, blasters, old-fashioned projectile weapons, bladed weapons, mines?" She runs her hand along a nondescript section of wall, and a panel slides open. She steps through.

They're in yet another palace corridor, which looks very much like the ones that they've already been through.

Except for the two armed guards in royal purple livery standing at attention on either side of a door at the end of the hall.

Plourr heads straight for them.

She opens her mouth to answer, but the guards she shuts her mouth.

Plourr can talk, oh yes she can.

"Your Majesty," says the guard on the left, bowing deeply, and the other one bows as well.

Plourr inclines her head, gracefully. "Erian, Wer. The situation here has been uneventful, I trust?"

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"Good," says Plourr, and she taps a code into the keypad in the wall just over Wer's head. "Carry on, gentlemen." She sweeps past them and through the door that hisses open.

The room inside is dark, but the way that their footsteps immediately echo suggests a large space.

Ajedrez just pads at her heels, demure and surprisingly good at it.

At the loudness of the echoes, she pauses.

The door hisses closed.

Plourr's strong voice rings out. "Empress Isplourrdacartha Estillo. My father was Emperor Uthorferrellcartha Estillo the Third. Security parameters, off." A low beep. "Lights." The lights come up.

The 'room' is really more of a warehouse, the ceiling rising high and the walls extending far, and they are covered in shelves, racks, and all sorts of ways of holding weaponry. As for the weaponry itself -- there is too much to take in all at once.

Racks of blaster rifles, one entire row of tiny holdout blasters; a shelf full of round thermal detonators, each carefully kept in its place. One far wall holds mines, stacked atop each other. There are blocks of knives, of vibroblades, of forcepikes and truncheons and even more exotic-looking weaponry -- even some swords.

It is everything needed to outfit the entirety of the capital city's defense forces, in overwhelming quantities.

She doesn't go 'oh, my'.

But it's a struggle, and she can't stop her hands from moving, just once.

"Welcome to the armory," Plourr says, dryly, but grinning at the other woman's face. "We're not actually in the palace anymore; we went under and over a block or so."

She gestures broadly. "Over here you've got weapons, explosives, things like that, and," another sweep of her hand, "over here is your armor, defensive measures, force pikes, miscellaneous items."

"How...how to blasters and such actually work?"

Plourr walks across the cold expanse of floor to the nearest shelf of blaster rifles, and she pulls a vicious-looking rifle out from a row of its fellows.

"It's simple," she says, checking the rifle over and checking the safety, movements quick and expert. She jiggles it in Ajedrez's direction. "Blaster."

She picks out a power pack from the shelf below, and holds it out for Beatriz's inspection. "Power pack."

She slams it home into the rifle, and brings the big weapon up with the stock pressed to her shoulder, pointed at the far wall. "Point and shoot."

She sights along the barrel for a moment, then lowers it. "I can't fire in here. This is an A280 blaster rifle; probably bigger than anything you'd want." She grins. "Packs a hell of a punch, though. It can cut a stormtrooper in half at medium range, straight through his armor."

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