The exercise:
Write about: counting down the days.
Training my replacement begins Tuesday. Looking forward to meeting the new team member.
Very, very much looking forward to not having to listen to the Board meetings for much longer. Well, really just the one Director.
Today's meeting should have been much, much shorter.
3 comments:
Ah, I can with certainty say that even when you chair the meeting there's always one person who drones on forever, clearly loving the sound of their own voice, who no-one else actually wants to listen to. And very often there's nothing you can do about it without appearing to censor them. And I have tried :)
I hope Tuesday arrives swiftly and without delay for you!
Counting down the days
Fabian sighed softly. "This place is turning out to be a trap," he said. "I mean, I always wondered if we'd get in here and the Auditors would pounce on us, and it seems they have but... not in the way I was expecting."
"We don't know it's the Auditors," said Dread. "We only know that these two rooms are connected with them somehow. How many rooms do you think there are in this exhibit?"
"Depends," said Fabian feeling his confidence restore a little. "It would make sense for each half of the floor to have different but connected themes, so it's probably only this side. From the size of the Halls from the outside, and the size of the rooms we've seen so far... say fourteen rooms? Sixteen at most."
Rystin looked at them both. "We leave," he said. "We leave, and we come back with a wisp-elf. Someone who can turn that altar off. Safely."
Dread met Rystin's gaze and Fabian wondered briefly if mages had ways of talking that didn't involve their voices. Then he nodded his head, slowly and thoughtfully. "Yes," he said. "This isn't safe at all, and even if we can't turn the spell off we need to know what it is. And... well, there's no way the Emperor can come in here until this mess is sorted out."
"What do think the punishment is for letting the Emperor fall under the effects of an unknown spell that's been running for years?" asked Fabian trying to sound like he was joking. It fell as flat as could be expected.
"I expect they'll have to get the Imperial lawyers to make some new ones up," said Dread.
Rystin tapped a finger against his lips. "How long?" he said.
"They'll probably require us to be reanimated after we die so we can continue serving our sentences," said Dread.
"No, what Fabian said. How long has this spell been running?"
"Why? It's not like we're counting down the days to it running out. It'll keep going until the spell runs out of power, and we don't know--"
"The Day of No Sun!" said Fabian suddenly.
"Maybe," said Rystin. "That would be fourteen years, give or take."
"What? Why?" asked Dread. He stared at Fabian. "Why does that keep coming up?"
Fabian waved his hands in front of him like he was trying to explain abstract art. "That's just it," he said. "It does keep coming up. The Maestro pointed it out to me recently as well. Everything we've discovered lately -- the Day of No Sun keeps turning up. What if this spell caused the Day of No Sun?"
"That's rid--" started Dread and then he stopped. He opened and closed his mouth a few times, like an agitated goldfish. "That's a thought," he finally concluded. "But I don't see how a wisp-elf spell could make the sun vanish."
"It didn't," said Fabian. "It just made everything think the sun had vanished."
Rystin looked stunned. "That's possible," he said. "I mean... but how far would such an effect extend? Certainly not far outside the city. People in the next country wouldn't even know about it."
"Do they?" asked Fabian. "I've never spoken to anyone about it who wasn't here, or wasn't living here and heard about it. Did it actually happen everywhere?"
"Ye--" started Dread and then he stopped again. After a moment he looked briefly angry. "I don't know," he said. "Everything I can think of talks about it as though it was global but doesn't actually say that. We need a wisp-elf. An expert."
"One we can trust," said Rystin. "They might be elves, but they're tricky. And they have a lot of reasons to not like humans."
Greg - yeah, that sounds about exactly right.
Wooooooo... that is some discovery. I am both excited for them and afraid for them.
I think you handled Dread's reactions especially well in this bit, by the way.
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