Ep. 147 New Dawn's Return Chapter Four (C2)

## Listen

C2 Ep 147 New Dawn's Return Chapter Four

—Reynard

The Loaded Dice make preparations to take on the Warlord. Reynard glimpses someone tied up in Kath's living room when they go to recruit her, and Sana breaks down to him and Hob at the Four Sails when they ask her about it. She admits that Kath has been on a vengeance quest, and doesn't believe she'll stop until she gets whoever is responsible for Faru's death.

Erys has several projects going. Reynard is gifted a set of goggles, and Iggrik is modified to fit Tasha. Finally, Olive is ready to try out her harness, and they successfully capture a fire elemental from Fernia.

## Synopsis

The Loaded Dice prepare for Hob's last job for House Deneith. Milo follows Erys back to the Cauldron, where she plans to work on the Shadow Stalker, and Kath and Sana will be recruited for the job. Khyber's Gate is where the warlord was last seen.

Hob and Reynard go to Kath and Sana's apartment. Kath opens the door with a black eye, and says she just beat some toughs up. Hob fills her in on what's been happening, and asks if she'd help them. They can tell she's lying about how she got the black eye. Reynard attempts comfort, and then tells her to put frozen meat on her gross eye. Over her shoulder Reynard sees in her living room, a completely black outfit built for Kath's body, with the gloves Erys gifted her attached to the armor. There's a form-fitting helmet with a very passive, featureless visage. Hanging off the shoulders is a purple cape. He gets the briefest glimpse of what appears to be someone sitting in the chair, with something over their head. It looks like it's made to strike fear into her enemies hearts. Reynard tells her to bring it.

Hob becomes suspicious when Kath responds with, *"Oh, you just saw the suit?"* She doesn't share anything else, and says she'll be down in ten minutes.

At the Cauldron, Olive is working on the harness, where the arms attach to the back. She asks how the job is going, and Erys calls Iggrik over to handle the device. She explains that it's got some sort of life-draining capacity, it's stealthy, and he uses it to hunt people. Olive suggests checking the harness out, since it might be helpful for the fight.

*"You just make it seem dangerous, and I want—"
"It is. That's why I…I didn't…want **you** to be in danger."*—Olive and Erys
Not only is she planning on deconstructing the Shadow Stalker, but she wants to see if she can make a weapon that will target constructs, and seeing if she could find a way to let Tasha pilot Iggrik. She first sets about making Reynard some goggles. They have a steampunk vibe, with owl motifs. It's gold and brown and bronze, and has some leather. She pops the lenses out of an old set of goggles that broke during an explosion and starts tinkering with them. The lenses she makes are a greenish-blue. She gives Olive 52 silver to get her some dragonshards. Erys makes Milo wear a welder's hat to assist her.

*"Let me assist you, please, while you concentrate and focus. I will hand you the tools and you can devote all your attention to the work."
"Put a hat on."*—Milo and Erys
While she's messing with the goggles, some of the magic gets into her head, and she loses the knowledge of Olive's elemental-summoning box being unpredictable and dangerous. Milo notices on the base of the Shadow Stalker is a small mobile construct, and he sees how it could easily be utilized for an arcane sentry. Rather than setting up a rune to be an alarm, it seems to reason that the Warlord would have mobile alarms throughout his hideout.

At the Four Sails, Sana is running around, frantically taking care of customers. Hob helps clear tables. Reynard's version of helping is trying to shame customers into clearing their tables. After about eight minutes, Kath arrives and sits at a table. When the rush dies down, Hob goes to talk to Sana in the kitchen. Reynard grabs Arthur and joins him. Ace directs them to the elementally-cooled walk-in, where Sana is hiding out.

They have a conversation about what Kath has been up to, with Reynard bringing up the mannequin. Sana admits that she's been seeking vengeance on whoever killed Faru, and she feels like she's really close to finding the person responsible, and then she'll stop. She's horribly worried, but they support each other. Kath isn't sleeping. Sana tells Hob to not talk to her about it—if they push her too hard, Sana thinks Kath will just hide it. She's trying to support her enough that Sana could help take care of her when she's hurt. She woke up that morning and Kath had someone tied up and was torturing him. She's learned it was Tartis Viteithers, and it looking for him.

The next thing Erys works on is making Tasha able to pilot Iggrik. She creates a casing to slot the dragonshard into. Iggrik's eyes glow differently and begin to give an arcane, blue smoke. The chassis stands taller and looks around as Tasha gets used to it. Her next plan is an anti-construct ammunition for Reynard's bow. She takes his fancy quiver and loads the new arrow into it.

When they finish with all that, Olive suggests trying her harness out. They're all there, so plenty of backup in case anything happens. Iggrik helps her get into the harness. She asks Milo to check the box, which is programmed to catch something from Fernia. He checks the runes and gives the okay. At Olive's request, Erys uses the tools to rotate the runes at the front of the box into place to finalize it. The magic in the box glows more intensely and fills with swirling fire. The face of a fire elemental roars and infuses into the shard, which falls down, and the orange light goes through the tubing that Olive has connected to the harness as it falls into place.

End of episode.

## Locations

* The Cauldron
* Khyber's Gate
* Lower Menthis
	+ Kath and Sana's apartment

## Quotes

"Regardless of how much Erys…what Erys thinks about a person—"
"We've been getting along!"
*—Philip and Trevor*

"I woke up this morning, and there was a guy tied up in our living room."
"Yeah, been there."
*—Sana and Trevor*