Marie's danger-side storyEdit
Marie was in a good mood. She was visiting her uncle in the Temple Distict, and was staying in the Bloated Float to save money. She had just gotten her 2nd free dinner on the house, and was ready to head to bed when she heard a faint crash. She had specially trained ears and nobody else picked up the subtle sound. She threw her cloak one and yelled, "I'll be out." to Ormil, a nice guy who ended up bartending on a cruddy boat.
She ran towards the temple district, instinctively knowing that the sound she heard meant something. She heard another crash, a bit louder, and ran faster through the gates to the temple. Not much was happening there, but the skies had somehow turned blood red. Weird, she thought. I've never seen anything like this before. Amazingly, Antoinetta Marie was not afraid. She rushed onto the Green Emperor Way, where the noises were becoming recognisable. Screams? Crashes?
She found her way into the Market District, because she started to fear going into the Elven Gardens District, where the sounds were coming from. There were no guards here, the streets practically deserted. She remembered that she had to tell Phintias what she found about the Dark Brotherhood. (She was the Cyrodiil Dark Brotherhood informant) She jogged to First Edition, wondering if his store was open, or if he had gotten back from his thieves guild mission. She also wondered if Tei' Emm would ever figure out that she was the informant, and how he would react. That Argonian was quite the hunk, and even his girl didn't know all of his skills, or his history for that matter, just a bit about being a slave. People thought it weird that she was dating a lizard, especially since Agonians were slaves, but she didn't care. Tei' Emm was perfect for her.
Then there was that Hinder guy. A new comer to the family. She caught him staring at her several times, even once at 4 a.m.! What a creep. I hope he knew that Tei' Emm could kill him easy. If she was him, he'd better back off. She took her mind off of figuring out 99 lethal points to put an arrow into him, and getting past the fact that he had the skills to catch arrows, whe she opened the door to the shop. The sight inside was what had given her the good mood.
Phintias was stitching up a book, 'Followers of the Gray Fox' A bestseller, Marie thought to herself. At the site of a customer, Phintias said briskly, "Welcome to First Edition, loyal customer or first time browser, feel free to check out our selection. I recommend a new one, 'Mysteries of Mysticism,' an informative book written by the famous mage Alperion on all you need to know about this magic art. Magicians have been fooling us with magic for decades!"
Marie realized that her cloak was hiding her face, and undid it. "Oh, Marie, it's you! Any news for me?" Marie nodded, "Yes, but how did your thieves guild mission go?" His face lit up, "Flying colors, flying colors. We managed to 'eliminate' 2 VIPs within the guild." Marie answered his question, "That's great, anyways, the Cheydinhal sanctuary, which I believe is the only one now, Has a new member. His name is Hinder, and he used to be a Holy Assassin." Phintias nodded, "I read about him in the paper."
"I almost forgot! Tei' Emm brought another recruit, namely Daruke. Another vampire. Get this:Daruke left one night and came back with a dozen vampires and attacked us." Phintias was writing this down. "We lost Mraaj-Dar and Teinaava, and Daruke" Phintias looked concerned, and asked "I need to know; Is this relationship between you and Tei' Emm real or not? I need to know this." Marie lied, "It's fake, just something to keep my cover." They went through the usual parting talk, and Marie hurried off.
Secretly, she was deeply in love with Tei' Emm, and she was sad that Teinaava and Mraaj-Dar had been lost. She was torn between the Empire and the Brotherhood, and she might just choose the latter. She wasn't raised this way, but then, she had run away... When her Aunt objected, she had suffered quite the fate, being poisoned by her own niece! Marie was a bad girl, but she wanted to be some times. Once she had stepped outside, she learned that action was a mistake. Beasts were roaming the streets, and the guards were in a desperate struggle with them. These small Nord colored things let out shrill screams and attacked with fire balls. She quickly stepped back inside.
She started hearing more crashes, like some sort of giant siege machine was crawling through the city. One of those little Nord colored things found its way into the shop, and an arrow was quickly put into its heart. "That was close!" Phintias sighed. "I'm going to hold this door, you do whatever you want." Marie wondered what would happen if the siege machine reached the market district. A plan started forming in her head.
"Grab as manny books as you can and take them down to the basement! Take more than one trip. Come on, lift with your legs!" She barked as Phintias loaded books it his arms. Good thing she had brought her extra quiver. She might need it. Another monster ran in; this one like a man, but skin like ash from a volcano. It had a mean looking bow with mean looking arrows. Marie had once won a reward when she was 13 for quickly drawing a bow. She still had that skill. Before Phintias could draw his sword or the monster could draw its bow, it had an arrow in its neck, and a second later another one in its head.
15 minutes and 3 monster later, Phintias had loaded enough books. The arrows that the ash-skins had were very lethal. Just one could kill her easily. They were specially made to conjur up blood. She had retreated to the basement, were dozens of books awaited them. "Start making some barricades, and I'll go grab provisions from your quarters!" She didn't wait for Phintias to respond and ran upstairs. She was greeted by three monsters. She shot an arrow at an ugly looking lizard thing, and ducked under the front counter. From the squeal she heard, she believed she scored a killshot.
There were two left, a giant blue thing, and another Nord colored one. She loaded an arrow, then jumped up. She was up in the air for about 1.2 seconds, long enough for her to analyze the blue beast's anatomy, and figure out where to put the arrow. When she jumped up again, she released the bowstring, and the arrow that she had taken from the ash-skins soared into the blue beast's head. When in doubt, aim for the head. Marie's uncle had said. He was a famed sharpshooter. She scored her fifth kill shot. She slowly went up, not bothering to load another arrow. The Nord colored one would be easy. She was met by sharp claws tearing into her torso. Another thing her uncle said, Don't underestimate size. A scorpion could easily kill a horse.
She had made a mistake, but quickly jumped back and shot another arrow, it slamming into the creature's eye. She ran upstairs and grabbed some food, putting it into a sack on the floor. She tore the blankets and sheets from the bed, and wrapped a dagger into the sheets for Phintias. Even though he probably arlready had a shortsword concealed in his jacket. She went downstairs, where Phintias was finishing up his barricades. She jumped over them, but not high enough, and knocked over a barricade. "That's all right," Phintias said. "I got food in this sack, and blankets and sheets to keep us warm. We can take turns sleeping, have a weapon?" Phintias shook his head, "I dropped it when I was grabbing books." Marie tossed him the dagger.
Tei' Emm, help me! She thought, desperately praying. She knew it was juvenile, but somewhere deep down she knew he had gotten the message. She had stayed up for 2 hours, and then Phintias took over watching duty. All night it went like this. Finally, at daybreak, the noises stopped. Phintias said, "Let's go to the Waterfront district." to an awakening Marie. She nodded and they headed out. The Market district did not look good. Marie was certain the monsters had gone through each building and slaughtered everyone inside. She was certain they had done that to the whole city. The whole city smell horrible. There were still some guards left fighting those..things.
As the walked through Green Emperor Way, they heard cries coming from the palace. They trekked on until they reached the Bloated Float, where Marie gathered all of her remaining stuff. It was a mess in there, and the Orc bodygaurd's body was on the front counter. Once they exited, they headed to the shacks. There they met the Thieve's guild.
They walked down the steps that led to the waterfront, and behind a burned shack they saw 4 people dressed in leather. As they were approaching on of them, a Bosmer girl cried, "Without Armand, we're doomed! We have nowhere to go!" Phintias stepped up. An Argonian who looked like he was homeless looked over with surprise. "Curtis, you're back! We thought you had been captured by Skingrad's guard!" Phintias said, "I'm not really Curtis, I'm Phintias, and it's my fault Armand died." He explained to them his thieve's guild mission.
They wanted to kill him. Marie intervened, saying, "We can go to Cheydinhal, I know some people there." "How do you know they survived?" The Bosmer girl asked. Marie answered. "Because they are a highly trained agent and ninja, named Tei' Emm and Hinder." Her face lit up, "Hinder Jockius!?" "I'm not sure, but how many other Imperials are named Hinder? They agreed to follow them. It was Amusei, the Argonian, Methredhel, the Bosmer, Puny, an Imperial, and Jair, a pickpocket. Jair and Phintias exchanged glances. "I won't go for yer coins again, Phint." Phintias nodded, "I'm keeping you under my watch." They swam across the Rummarre, which was thankfully warm. They hiked to Cheydinhal.
Diary of the Outcast Ninja 5 part 2Edit
We had decided to go back to the sanctuary, to hold a meeting. We were arranged around the dinner table. I dropped some cheese under said table so Schemer would attend this meeting. Tei' Emm was arranged at the head of the table, the highest rank present, with Ocheeva across from him. Gogron and I, the Murderers, were sitting on the far bench next to eachother. Tei' Emm started the meeting. "I don't think the Brotherhood should murder much anymore." Ocheeva nodded, "I concur, if this has happened all over Cyrodiil, or Tamriel for that matter, there won't be many more people to kill." So I had joined the Dark Brotherhood, but I would never murder a soul.
"So what do we do now?" I asked. Gogron said angrily, "If it's not killing, I'm out of here!" He rushed out, and we never saw him again. They say he was... taken by Daedra. Tei' Emm answered, "I say we go around and see what happened wide-scale, and see if we can bring order to Cyrodiil." Ocheeca looked surprised, "You mean liberate Cyrodiil? That will go down well with the legion." Tei' Emm countered, "What Legion? You saw the smoke coming from the Imperial City. And that crazy Khajiit in the paper was right, nobody would come after us." I thought aloud, "Three old Brotherhood members taking over Tamriel? I'm sure the Fighter's guild and Mage's guild would object." Tei' Emm nodded, "Let's hope their judjement is good."
I realized that Tei' Emm only killed the corrupt, and that Ocheeva was serving her government. Of course, that left me. "Are you going to abandon me? I've attacked and killed an innocent." Tei' Emm thought for a moment, and concluded, "Jair was a pickpocket, and you didn't actually kill him." Little did I know he was halfway here already. So I wasn't a murderer. That took a load off my conscience.
We ate a lunch in silence. I decided to go topside and explore. Seeing all of the despair and destruction made my attempted murder seemed like a lifetime ago. I saw what was left of the castle, it now a complete ruin. The main street got it pretty bad, too. The Fighter's and Mage's Guilds were just piles now. I think I saw a fur gauntlet beneath a man-made rock, but I wanted to get out of there, because I had just had a chilling realization. Cheydinhal was a graveyard. I could barely imagine this times eight. I wondered just how evil Mehrune's Dagon really was. If this Daedra had wanted to wipe out Tamriel, he could have just opened a gate outside every farm, and any farm that was starting. With no food, Cyrodiil would die pretty quick. Food here grew super quickly, and we had a surplus of food, mostly sending it to Elseweyr and Morrowind. Maybe Dagon just prefered to kill everyone.
I decided to head in, but I heard the familiar creak of the main gate to the city opening. In walked Marie, Phintias, Methredhel, A lizard and an Argonian and... Jair! I fainted. I woke up minutes later in the sanctuary, where Marie told me her story. I stole a glance at Jair, he smiled and waved, "Sorry bout' dat. Juss' needed to feed meself." I used a telekinesis spell, right on his cheek. The effect was like a punch to the face. "Wasn't me!" Phintias yelled, knowing the trick I had just pulled. Tei' Emm did the same to me, but substantially harder. A fight was about to break out, a play fight, but a fight none the less. Marie jumped into our now forming magical beams. "Stop!" She shouted, "The last thing Cyrodiil needs is you two messing around like this!" So they had been informed of our plans. Tei' Emm nodded, "I'm sorry." Marie walked over and kissed him on the cheek. "It's alright." "This doesn't mean we're not talking about the informant thing!" Tei' Emm yelled to an exiting Marie, and ran after her.
I remembered now. Antoinetta had spoken of being an informant to the Blades. That was why Phintias was here. The only one here alligned with the empire, I realized. I didn't care, since we would be the founders of the new empire. As long as this Redguard had the skills to hold up in intense battle. I counted off the list in my head. Tei' Emm:Skilled in more ways than I knew. Ocheeva:A shadowscale, she would hold tight. Phintias:He was a blade, special operations. He could most likely dish out some pain. Hinder:I am a Ninja! Jair:He probably had no fighting skills whatsoever, but he was the only one here trained in pickpocketing. The Argonian, Amusei, and Puny Ancus, the Imperial:Deadweight. Unless we needed them to pose as beggars. Methredhel:She is a Ninja! Speaking of Methredhel.. "Hinder! What a twist of fate! We must get reaquainted!" I nodded,
"I need to feed Schemer first."