rekindleme | 005 - The best laid plans...

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005 - The best laid plans...

Who: Lloyd Irving and anyone
Where: Arrival Point in District Two
When: Morning of the 16th
Summary: Lloyd and buckets of sand, and what he thinks is a well-thought-out plan.

It was almost that time of the month. Every month since Lloyd had arrived, right around this time (or a day or two from now), people showed up in this plaza. Every time it had happened, Lloyd had somehow missed the key point when the new arrivals started appearing. This time he was determined not to miss out. This time he had a plan. Even if he wasn't here to see it himself, he'd make sure there were still clues for him to find to help him find the Otherworldly Gate. To that end, he'd brought bucket after bucket of sand up from the beach.

Sand. Yes, sand.

And all morning long he'd been carefully spreading the stuff out, covering the plaza in a thin layer of grit. Better watch your step if you're passing through.

Not really thinking about the hazard, or the oddity of what he was doing, Lloyd went to pick up another bucket that he'd already filled with sand.

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Coming form a world with such fear of exploration Jean hasn't found himself all that comfortable with venturing to far, the plaza wan't out of his range so for what little venturing he was comfortable with he chose it today.

Nice winter jacket providing a shield from the cold, nippy outside but never could it compare to training in this sort of weather.

His boots scrap over the sand, looking down to see the strange new surface. Jean knows, mud, grass, or stone but not sand. Having never been to a beach before in his life from humanities fear of what lurks outside the some-what safe walls of his human cities. A tilt of the head and the raise of the brow..

Lloyd comes from the opposite end of the spectrum, having traveled all over his world as well as a good deal of the world connected directly to it. He's seen forests and deserts, mountains and plains, and even sailed across parts of the sea. A little sand on the pavement might be a little out of place, mostly because they're not in a desert, but the idea that sand might be completely foreign to someone never even crosses his mind.

With that oblivious lack of thought in his head, Lloyd pours another bucket out onto the ground. Using one booted foot, he scuffs it around, trying to get it spread out evenly. "Man, I should have thought about getting a rake..."

Another scuff, one that didn't come from him, alerts him that there's someone behind him. Lloyd glances back, but it's not someone he recognizes, so he just lifts his hand with a friendly smile, a passing greeting in case the guy just wants to walk on.

"...." Jeans curious but not rude, he waves back, his smile frozen by the cold weather. Eyes looking down to the sand once again, scraping his boot across it..

A pause, he doesn't bother the other teen at first but Lloyd continues to spread the sand and it causes Jean to keep wondering what it's purpose is and what it is in the first place. "HEY! What are you doing..?" walking closer, everyone here has seemed to be friendly so far. There shouldn't be any worry of hostility.

Lloyd's not about to be the exception to the lack of hostility that Jean's generally found in this place. Definitely not for something as simple as walking up and asking a question. On the contrary, the red-clad teen has been hauling buckets of sand all morning and is more than happy for an excuse to take a break.

"This?" he said, pointing at the sand. "New people are probably going to show up soon. I'm trying to find the Gate where they come through. The sand will help me follow their tracks." As plans go, it's a pretty simple one. It's just a lot of work to haul up that much sand, especially by himself.

"...."

Well, if someone were to use mud Jean can imagine it'd do the same thing. It wasn't a bad plan as he thought about it, if you're planning on following whoever made them that is. However, there was the initial question still on his mind.. "Sooooo, what's sand?"

Armin used to tell the boys of the 104th all about his nerdy little books he'd read about the world outside the walls. "That's what you can find at a... beach?? ....Right? Never seen the stuff before, okay."

Lloyd blinked at the question. Then blinked again. "You're... kidding, right?" Who didn't know what sand was?

Only it looked like the guy was serious. He was even admitting to having never seen sand. Lloyd stared, boggling at the concept, and still not entirely certain Jean wasn't pulling his leg. Still, it was in his nature to take people at face value, so hesitantly he answered, "It's... kind of like lots of really tiny rocks. Like dirt, but it's just rock, no dead plants or anything else." He scratched the back of his neck. That wasn't quite right either. He reached down and scooped up a handful, which he held out. "Here, see for yourself."

Jean grumbles to himself when Lloyd first speaks, he knows by now a lot of these people are going to wave him off as ignorant.. Its hard for a young man, even one as matured for his age as Jean, to stay so low in peoples respects without feeling frustrated.

Despite all that Jean was generally curious, holding out his hand and feeling the new strange substance, "So is it from a beach or not?" not trying to sound brutish but that's just how Jean is -- meaning no harm even if harm is done.

"Aren't beaches supposed to be warm? How did you get this if it's cold outside?"

The abrasiveness earns a slight frown from Lloyd, but really, it barely holds a candle to some of the things Lloyd's put up with even from his friends. Besides, Jean is right that he hadn't answered that question. Lloyd lets out a breath, then shrugs, letting it slide.

"It's from the beach by the river," he says. "Though you can find sand in other places. The most sand I ever saw was in a desert. There's almost no water there." Another frown crosses his face, though this time it has nothing to do with Jean's terseness. "What would the weather have to do with whether or not I can find sand? I mean, even if it snowed, the sand would still be there. It's just be more work to get it, and it'd be cold and wet."

"R-really..?" Armin said in his book sand was only found on hot beaches. "So beaches can be on the side of rivers..? I guess I sound like an idiot." Being honest with himself, Jean knows he doesn't sound very educated.

Sadly, he can't just tell everyone all at once about his terrible upbringing from the life that ensued behind the Walls. Not from his mother -- mind you -- but from the life that comes form such a sheltered world. "Where I come from the winters are long and the summers are sort, it's mostly rainy and cold but not frigid I guess. Frigid is when snow covers the land contently, all the time, right?"

The comment about sounding like an idiot finally cracks a smile from Lloyd, and not the mocking kind. "Hey, don't worry about it. Nobody can know everything." Though some people like Genis and Professor Sage sure make it seem like they could. Still, if they knew everything, they wouldn't still keep studying, right? "There's a lot of stuff I don't know either, but I wouldn't say I'm an idiot." Never mind what other people sometimes say.

Rainy and cold, though. Thinking about it makes Lloyd want to shiver. "That definitely sounds like frigid to me. So it's even colder than here?" This place isn't so bad, in his opinion. It's been close enough to Iselia's general weather that he hasn't really paid much attention. "I don't think I'd like living in a place that's always cold. I like being in a place where things can grow. I grew up in a forest."

"...Thanks, yeah, you're right." Hey, Jean's smug but honest with almost everything he says and does, he saw himself rather stupid back there but having someone reassure him that he isn't boosts that confidence right back up.

"Well, in the winter it gets just about like it this." Looking around at the falling snow, jestering to it, "Maybe a little more at times, the summers are mild, but the air is still cold when you whip through it. I've never been anywhere but behind The Walls, so I don't know how else to describe it." Rubbing the back of his hair, "A forest, huh? We have those too, the trees are gigantic in 'em, about half the size of our apartment building."

"No problem." It was an easy, honest reassurance to give, and Lloyd has no problems just leaving it at that. No one should have to worry about comparing themselves to people like his genius of a friend and classmate.

"It gets about this cold in the winter where I'm from, but it gets pretty warm in the summer, too. We're close enough to the desert that that probably doesn't help." Though thankfully they never get that got. Ugh, just passing through Triet for a few days had made him feel like he was going to fry. "Man, trees half the size of the apartments? I wish I could see that." It sounds incredible.

Something about what the guy just said, though... Lloyd tilts his head, giving Jean of mixed confusion and curiosity. "What are the Walls? Why couldn't you go past them?"

"...What's the desert like? I've never seen one before.. Hell, I've never even heard of one. What are they? They got a lot of sand?" he runs the grains though his hand as they fall, the ones Lloyd had given him to feel.

"Course the place is ridden with titans, so I don't recommend going there." He guesses this guy knows what titans are, who wouldn't? They're everywhere, right? Jean has been so engulfed in a world of fear it's hard for him to imagine the carefree life of being able to do whatever you like and however you like it without being eaten or ripped to pieces.

"..." Wait, did he just say they don't have walls were Llyod lives? "...Ah- it's what humanity built to keep the titans out." even if there is some fishy business with those wall right now.

"Hot." Lloyd couldn't put enough emphasis on that word. "Hot and dry. It's almost nothing but sand for as far as you can see. I thought my brain was going to cook inside my head before we got to the oasis." He paused. If Jean didn't even know what a desert was... "An oasis is a spring that's in the desert. It's the only place you'll find anything green."

Unfortunately, what Jean took for granted, Lloyd had never encountered in his life. Now it was Lloyd's turn to stare, nonplussed, uncertain what he was talking about. "What are titans?" he asked. Jean made it sound like it was something everyone knew, and it wouldn't be the first time Lloyd knew less about something than people thought he should, but all he could draw was a blank.

Jean's eyes goes wide, "You make it sound like there isn't any water sides from the oasis...?!" How in Maria's name are you supposed to live in a place without water?? However, the sound of a beautiful warm place with plant life and spring water sounds amazing.. Jean would love to see it with his own eyes some day but not if that meant dying.

"...You don't know?" WHAT?!

"Titans are the monsters that live outside The Walls, they are those huge creatures that love devouring people for now reason." hence the whole 'living behind walls' thing. Those other dudes didn't know about The Walls either.. could it be that there are people that don't have to live in a world of constant fear?

Jean has to say.. he's envious.

"There isn't," Lloyd says, completely serious. "You have to make sure to take water with you, or you can die." And you had to be careful to drink enough without drinking too much, and you had to try to travel when it wasn't too hot, and so many other things he'd never had to worry about before. He'd been lucky to have Genis with him, someone who knew all this stuff (even if only academically), otherwise he might not have made it to Triet.

"How big are you talking about?" he asks cautiously. After all, big is a relative term. "And what do they look like? I've run into some pretty big monsters before. Maybe I just call them something else."

( this took a while! I changed accounts for this game so it's still

sweetjeans and the mods finally added me wow I'm so sorry for the delay you don't have to reply!! ;; thanks for tagging me aaa! )

"What?! How does a place like that exist? Don't living things need water?!" You're blowing his ignorant little mind, Lloyd. Sure, he knows what summer feels like but never has it gotten so hot the kids wouldn't need their jackets on during 3DMG training. "And I've seen titans fifteen meters tall, okay, their big. What other word can you use? Massive, huge, big-ass??" Yeah, his voice is laced with brutish sarcasm.

"Titans are not joke, these things live only to kill human-beings. I've never seen one of them even lend a finger on some forest animal. Where I come from.. we got problems, big problems." he looks away, feeling a little sick thinking about the condition of his squad and friends.. wondering if they are okay. Could Eren pull off his thing? Did.. Do you think they need Jean? Most likely not..

[Nah, it's cool! I'm still tagging other threads in this post anyway. o/ ]

"There's not a lot of stuff that does live there." Hey, it's weird for Lloyd, too, knowing more than someone else for a change. Kind of nice in its own way, though. Is this what Genis feels like all the time? "Mostly it's just cactus and scorpions and snakes. I guess they don't need that much water to survive." He'd never really thought about how creatures and plants like that did get their water - they had to get it somehow, right? - but he figures its not all that important in the long run, so he just shrugs it off.

"Fifteen..." Lloyd's eyes widen as comprehension sinks in. "Holy cow, that's huge! That's as big as a dragon!" Maybe a few other monsters he'd run into, but that's the first to come to mind. "How do you fight one of them?"

Edited 2014-02-13 01:59 (UTC)

Jean thinks highly of himself but clearly this is a subject he's not going to dominate, "Don't know what a cactus is or a scorpion but they both don't sound all that friendly." He cracks a smile, its strange but being ignorant currently doesn't bother Jean that much. Sorta fun learning about places and things he's never seen and it's not like it's his fault he's never seen them.

"That's right, guess you never really seen a titan before.. have ya?" That's such a hollow feeling.. "We fight 'em with 3D maneuver gear, special made military issued gear that helps you fling into the air." He motions to the nape of his neck, "You have to slice through their necks to really kill them, they will regenerate just about any body part if you don't. Know how to use a sword? I have a set back at my place.." --and finally Jean has something he knows more about, the exchange is rewarding.

"Oh and don't know what a dragon is." Another smirk.

"A cactus is a plant covered with thorns. Some of them get this long." He holds his thumb and forefinger roughly two or three inches apart. "Scorpions are a bug that'll sting you. They really, really hurt, and they're a little bit poisonous, too." He doesn't know if Jean'll ever get the chance to see a desert, but it's only fair to warn him about that.

While he has no idea what 3D maneuver gear is, Jean's description by itself seems clear enough that Lloyd tries to picture battling a giant monster like that. Maybe some kind of giant slingshot, shooting him higher than he can go with one of his Tempest techniques? "It sounds like you'd have to take them out pretty quick. It takes time to get back to that gear stuff, right? So you'd only have one chance each time you used it." Man, that'd be a pain.

How to describe a dragon, though... Lloyd rubs his chin for a moment. "Think of a lizard, only as big as that titan, with teeth and claws and wings, and it can breathe fire. That's what a dragon looks like."

"You know, both of those sound pretty painful. Why would you go to one of these deserts in the first place?" Jean cringes at the size of this thorn, just the idea of that thing going in unwanted places... He wonders how tall those things grow, if they are plants they can't be very big? Course, he's see some big ass tress before..

"If you're lucky, you might get a second chance. I've only ever killed a few titans personally. We mostly work in groups.. so teamwork is a huge factor." he scratches the back of his head, "But not everything about my gear is a pain, in fact, once I got the hang of it, it was kinda fun to teach your body that sort of control. Does this place have any laws against free flying by the way? Do you know? I wouldn't mind keeping form getting rusty."

"..." That sounds.. worse than a titan -- way worse. "Ahh.. Well, shit, that does kinda sound similar.."

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005 - The best laid plans...

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forgive the icons my paids out

no worries o/

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